Clinical characteristics and risk factors of Talaromyces marneffei infection in human immunodeficiency virus-negative patients: A retrospective observational study.

BACKGROUND: To investigate the clinical characteristics and risk factors of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-negative patients with Talaromyces marneffei (T. marneffei) infection. METHODS: We retrospectively collected the clinical information of HIV-negative patients with T. marneffei infection from January 1, 2010 to June 30, 2019, and analyzed the related risk factors of poor prognosis. RESULTS: Twenty-five cases aging 22 to 79 years were included. Manifestations of T. marneffei infection included fever, cough, dyspnea, chest pain or distress, lymphadenopathy, ear, nose, and throat (ENT) and/or skin lesions, bone or joint pain, edema and pain in the lower extremities, digestive symptoms, icterus, malaise, and hoarseness. Two cases had no comorbidity, while 23 cases suffered from autoimmune disease, pulmonary disease, cancer, and other chronic diseases. Sixteen cases had a medication history of glucocorticoids, chemotherapy or immunosuppressors. Pulmonary lesions included interstitial infiltration, nodules, atelectasis, cavitary lesions, pleural effusion or hydropneumothorax, bronchiectasis, pulmonary fibrosis, pulmonary edema, and consolidation. The incidence of osteolytic lesions was 20%. Eight patients received antifungal monotherapy, and 11 patients received combined antifungal agents. Fifteen patients survived and ten patients were dead. The Cox regression analysis showed that reduced eosinophil counts, higher levels of blood urea nitrogen (BUN), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), lactic dehydrogenase (LDH), myoglobin (Mb), procalcitonin (PCT), and galactomannan were related to poor prognosis (hazard ratio [HR]>1, P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Bone destruction is common in HIV-negative patients with T. marneffei infection. Defective cell-mediated immunity, active infection, multiple system, and organ damage can be the risk factors of poor prognosis.

Protective effects of recombinant 53-kDa protein of Trichinella spiralis on acute lung injury in mice via alleviating lung pyroptosis by promoting M2 macrophage polarization.

Trichinella spiralis represents an effective treatment for autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. The effects of recombinant T. spiralis (TS) 53-kDa protein (rTsP53) on acute lung injury (ALI) remain unclear. Here, mice were divided randomly into a control group, LPS group, and rTsP53 + LPS group. ALI was induced in BALB/c mice by LPS (10 mg/kg) injected via the tail vein. rTsP53 (200 µl; 0.4 µg/µl) was injected subcutaneously three times at an interval of 5 d before inducing ALI in the rTsP53+LPS group. Lung pathological score, the ratio and markers of classic activated macrophages (M1) and alternatively activated macrophages (M2), cytokine profiles in alveolar lavage fluid, and pyroptosis protein expression in lung tissue were investigated. RTsP53 decreased lung pathological score. Furthermore, rTsP53 suppressed inflammation by increasing IL-4, IL-10, and IL-13. There was an increase in alveolar M2 macrophage numbers, with an increase in CD206 and arginase-1-positive cells and a decrease in alveolar M1 markers such as CD197 and iNOS. In addition, the polarization of M2 macrophages induced by rTsP53 treatment could alleviate ALI by suppressing lung pyroptosis. RTsP53 was identified as a potential agent for treating LPS-induced ALI via alleviating lung pyroptosis by promoting M2 macrophage polarization.

The value of transvaginal ultrasound in clinical surgical treatment of cesarean scar pregnancy.

The clinical value of transvaginal ultrasound in clinical surgical treatment of cesarean scar pregnancy (CSP) was evaluated. The clinical data of 104 patients with CSP admitted at Tongji Hospital from 2013 to 2016 were collected and analyzed retrospectively, including the patients' age, gestational age, the size of gestational sac or uneven mass, the uterine scar thickness, ß human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) levels and so on. Of these 104 cases, 30 cases were subjected to laparotomy, 29 cases to laparoscopy, 27 cases to hysteroscopy, 16 cases to ultrasound-guided uterine curettage, and 2 cases to conservative treatment. The transvaginal ultrasound showed that uterine scar thickness and gestational sac or uneven mass size had significant difference (P<0.05) among different surgical methods by comparatively analyzing the patients' data. It was suggested that transvaginal ultrasound may provide the valuable reference for choosing clinical surgical procedures for CSP.

Support Substructures: Support-Induced Part-Level Structural Representation.

In this work we explore a support-induced structural organization of object parts. We introduce the concept of support substructures, which are special subsets of object parts with support and stability. A bottom-up approach is proposed to identify such substructures in a support relation graph. We apply the derived high-level substructures to part-based shape reshuffling between models, resulting in nontrivial functionally plausible model variations that are difficult to achieve with symmetry-induced substructures by the state-of-the-art methods. We also show how to automatically or interactively turn a single input model to new functionally plausible shapes by structure rearrangement and synthesis, enabled by support substructures. To the best of our knowledge no single existing method has been designed for all these applications.

[Effect of comparability of Coptis chinensis and Scutellaria baicalensis on five sub-enzymatic activities of liver microsomes in rats].

To study the mechanism of metabolic interaction between Coptis chinensis and Scutellaria baicalensis. Rats were given C. chinensis and S. baicalensis for 7 days to produce hepatic microsomal enzyme. Cocktail probe substrate and liver microsome in vitro temperature incubation method were adopted. Meanwhile, the metabolic elimination percentages of the five probe substrates were detected with HPLC, in order to evaluate the effect of each administration group on the enzymatic activity of rat liver microsome CYP450. Compared with the blank group, C. chinensis obviously inhibited CYP2D6 and CYP1A2, and S. baicalensis remarkably inhibited CYP1A2, CYP2E1 and CYP2C9. The compatibility of C. chinensis and S. baicalensis with the ratio of 1:1 not only inhibited CYP1A2, but also remarkably activated CYP2D6 and CYP3A4. However, their activation effect disappeared under the ratio of 2: 1, and turned into the inhibitory effect on CYP1A2 and CYP2C9. The results showed that C. chinensis and S. baicalensis had an inhibitory effect on CYP450, but their compatibility with certain ratio resulted in double effects of activation and inhibition, which was related to their compatibility ratio. It is speculated that the inhibitory and inducing effects of C. chinensis and S. baicalensis on metabolic enzymes are among causes for their attenuation and synergistic effects.