SERS detection of volatile gas in spoiled pork with the Ag/MoS2 nano-flower cavity/PVDF micron-bowl cavity (FIB) substrate.

Putrescine and cadaverine are significant volatile indicators used to assess the degree of food spoilage. Herein, we propose a micro-nano multi cavity structure for surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) to analyze the volatile gas putrescine and cadaverine in decomposing food. The MoS2 nano-flowers are inserted into a PVDF micro-cavity through in-situ growth, followed by vacuum evaporation technology of Ag nanoparticles to form an Ag/MoS2 nano-flower cavity/PVDF micron-bowl cavity (FIB) substrate. The micro-nano multi cavity structure can improve the capture capacity of both light and gas, thereby exhibiting high sensitivity (EF = 7.71 × 107) and excellent capability for gas detection of 2-naphthalenethiol. The SERS detections of the putrescine and cadaverine are achieved in the spoiled pork samples with the FIB substrate. Therefore, this substrate can provide an efficient, accurate, and feasible method for the specific and quantitative detection in the food safety field.

The efficacy of 3D gait analysis to evaluate surgical (and rehabilitation) outcome after degenerative lumbar surgery.

BACKGROUND: Lumbar degenerative conditions are a major cause of back pain and disability in individuals aged 45 and above. Gait analysis utilizes sensor technology to collect movement data, aiding in the evaluation of various gait aspects like spatiotemporal parameters, joint angles, neuromuscular activity, and joint forces. It is widely used in conditions such as cerebral palsy and knee osteoarthritis. This research aims to assess the effectiveness of 3D gait analysis in evaluating surgical outcomes and postoperative rehabilitation for lumbar degenerative disorders. METHODS: A prospective self-controlled before-after study (n = 85) carried out at our Hospital (Sep 2018 - Dec 2021) utilized a 3D motion analysis system to analyze gait in patients with lumbar degenerative diseases. The study focused on the multifidus muscle, a crucial spinal muscle, during a minimally invasive lumbar interbody fusion surgery conducted by Shandong Weigao Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. Pre- and postoperative assessments included time-distance parameters (gait speed, stride frequency, stride length, stance phase), hip flexion angle, and stride angle. Changes in 3D gait parameters post-surgery and during rehabilitation were examined. Pearson correlation coefficient was employed to assess relationships with the visual analog pain scale (VAS), Oswestry Disability Index (ODI), and Japanese Orthopedic Association (JOA) scores. Patient sagittal alignment was evaluated using "Surgimap" software from two types of lateral radiographs to obtain parameters like pelvic incidence (PI), pelvic tilt (PT), sacral slope (SS), lumbar lordosis (LL), intervertebral space height (DH), posterior height of the intervertebral space (PDH) at the operative segment, and anterior height of the intervertebral space (ADH). RESULTS: By the 6th week post-operation, significant improvements were observed in the VAS score, JOA score, and ODI score of the patients compared to preoperative values (P < 0.05), along with notable enhancements in 3D gait quantification parameters (P < 0.05). Pearson correlation analysis revealed a significant positive correlation between improvements in 3D gait quantification parameters and VAS score, JOA score, and ODI value (all P < 0.001). CONCLUSION: 3D gait analysis is a valuable tool for evaluating the efficacy of surgery and rehabilitation training in patients.

Water pressure method combined with magnifying endoscopy for esophageal endoscopic submucosal dissection.

Poor visual field and limited submucosal space could obstruct endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) and increase the risk of complications. In this manuscript, we presented ESD assisted by water pressure method and magnifying endoscopy for a difficult case of early esophageal cancer.

Plantar and dorsal approaches for excision of morton's neuroma: a comparison study.

BACKGROUND: Morton's neuroma is a painful enlargement of the plantar digital nerve between the metatarsal heads that causes pain of the forefoot. Several approaches have been used to treat Morton's neuroma, each of them having distinct advantages and disadvantages. OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to investigate and compare the clinical outcomes of neurectomy in the treatment of Morton's neuroma through plantar and dorsal approaches. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 20 patients with a mean age of 48.5 ± 13.0 years (range: 19-66 years) who underwent excision of a Morton's neuroma that did not respond to conservative treatment were retrospectively analysed from June 2014 to June 2021. All the neurectomies were performed using a plantar or dorsal approach. Outcomes were evaluated using visual analogue scale (VAS) scores, American Orthopedic Foot and Ankle Society (AOFAS) scores, the Foot and Ankle Ability Measure (FAAM), and complications. The appearance index (AI) was also used to assess the influence of foot appearance on the quality of life after surgery. RESULTS: Eight patients underwent neurectomy by the dorsal approach, and 12 patients underwent neurectomy by the plantar approach. The average follow-up time was 28.9 ± 12.9 months (range: 15-72 months). No statistically significant difference was found between the dorsal and plantar approach groups with respect to postoperative pain measured by the VAS score. The postoperative AOFAS scores and FAAM outcomes were not significantly different between the groups. The complications reported in the dorsal approach group were significantly less than those of the plantar group, mainly discomfort in wearing shoes. The AI of the plantar group and the dorsal group were significantly different. CONCLUSION: The excision of the Morton's neuroma by both the dorsal and plantar approach resulted in satisfactory outcomes. However, the foot appearance after surgery by the plantar approach had less influence on the quality of life than that using the dorsal approach. Our recommendation is that surgeons should choose the approach they are most familiar with and with which they are most confident in performing. In addition, the plantar approach is recommended if the patient needs a better appearance.

miR-486-5p Inhibits Inflammatory Response, Matrix Degradation and Apoptosis of Nucleus Pulposus Cells through Directly Targeting FOXO1 in Intervertebral Disc Degeneration.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: microRNA-486-5p (miR-486-5p) and forkhead box protein O1 (FOXO1) play an important role in the development of intervertebral disc degeneration (IDD). However, their molecular mechanisms in IDD remain unknown. METHODS: qRT-PCR assay was used to identify miR-486-5p expression in nucleus pulposus (NP) cells. In-vitro transfection, CCK-8, flow cytometry and luciferase reporter assay were used to validate the role and relationship of miR-486-5p and FOXO1 in lipopolysaccharides (LPS)-stimulated NP cells. qRT-PCR and Western blot were used to measure the expression levels of inflammatory cytokines, matrix degrading enzymes, and extracellular matrix (ECM)-related genes. RESULTS: miR-486-5p expression was significantly down-regulated, while FOXO1 expression was up-regulated in LPS-treated NP cells (P<0.001). miR-486-5p over-expression repressed LPS-induced expressions of inflammatory cytokines (IL-1ß, IL-6 and TNF-α) and matrix degrading enzymes (MMP-3, MMP-13, ADAMTS-4 and ADAMTS-5), and promoted the expressions of LPS-inhibited ECM-related genes (Aggrecan and Collagen II) (all P<0.001). In addition, miR-486-5p over-expression protected NP cells against LPS-induced apoptosis. However, inhibition of miR-486-5p led to the opposite effects. Mechanically, FOXO1 was a direct target gene of miR-486-5p. Over-expressed FOXO1 aggravated LPS-induced injury, and antagonized protection effects of miR-486-5p. CONCLUSION: miR-486-5p can inhibit inflammatory response, ECM degradation and apoptosis in NP cells by directly targeting FOXO1, which may contribute to the biological therapy of IDD.

Output energy enhancement in a mode-locked Er-doped fiber laser using CVD-Bi2Se3 as a saturable absorber.

In this study, the output energy in topological insulators (TIs)-based Erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL) was improved using two strategies: bidirectional pumped laser cavity and saturable absorber (SA) with high damage threshold and large modulation depth. Using the chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method, Bismuth Selenide (Bi2Se3) film was synthesized and improved to a SA. Employing this CVD-Bi2Se3 SA in an EDFL, bright and bright-dark soliton operations were achieved. The average output power/pulse energy was 82.6 mW/48.3 nJ and 81.2 mW/47.5 nJ, respectively. The results demonstrate that CVD-Bi2Se3 can act as an excellent performance material to improve output power performance in TISA-based EDFL.

Graphene-Ag nanoparticles-cicada wings hybrid system for obvious SERS performance and DNA molecular detection.

In recent years, biomaterials have increasingly attracted attention on surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) due to their well Raman performance while metal particles are combined with biological substrates. Therefore, we propose an environmentally friendly substrate based on silver-plated cicada wings with seamless graphene layer (Gr-AgNPs-C.w.), which can be prepared with a simple and inexpensive method. Compared with AgNPs-C.w., Gr-AgNPs-C.w. hybrids show better SERS performance with high sensitivity, good uniformity and good stability with R6G detection. The minimum detected concentration can reach 10-15 M, and the value of R2 can reach 0.996, respectively. Theoretical simulation demonstrates the situation of electromagnetic field through COMSOL software. In addition, due to the affinity of graphene for biomolecules, we can successfully detect the DNA biomolecules through a simple process. Therefore, this cheap and efficient natural SERS substrate has great potential for a considerable number of biochemical SERS applications and can broaden the way in which multiple SERS platforms derived from other natural materials are prepared.

3D SERS substrate based on Au-Ag bi-metal nanoparticles/MoS2 hybrid with pyramid structure.

It is very vital to construct the dense hot spots for the strong surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) signals. We take full advantage of the MoS2 edge-active sites induced from annealing the Ag film on the surface of the MoS2. Furthermore, the composite structure of Au-Ag bi-metal nanoparticles (NPs)/MoS2 hybrid with pyramid structure is obtained by the in situ grown AuNPs around AgNPs, which serves the optimal SERS performance (enhancement factor is ~9.67 × 109) in experiment. Due to the introduction of AuNPs with the simple method, the denser hot spots contribute greatly to the stronger local electric field, which is also confirmed by the finite-different time-domain (FDTD) simulation. Therefore, the ultralow limit of detection (the LOD of 10-13 and 10-12 M respectively for the resonant R6G and non-resonant CV), quantitative detection and excellent reproducibility are achieved by the proposed SERS substrate. For practical application, the melamine molecule is detected with the LOD of 10-10 M using the proposed SERS substrate that has the potential to be a food security sensor.

Sensitive, reproducible, and stable 3D plasmonic hybrids with bilayer WS2 as nanospacer for SERS analysis.

The highly enhanced local electromagnetic field occurring through nanometer gap between the plamonic nanostructures provides the dominant contribution in surface enhancement Raman scattering (SERS) enhancement. Thence, we designed the remarkable SERS platform (AuNPs/WS2@AuNPs hybrids) by introducing bilayer WS2 film as the precise nanospacer. Bilayer WS2 film can realize the facile and tight combination with AuNPs via the thermal decomposition approach. Dense three-dimension (3D) hot spots provided by this hybrid plasmonic nanostructures are responsible for the extremely satisfying SERS performances. Using rhodamine 6G (R6G) as the probe molecules, the AuNPs/WS2@AuNPs hybrids perform the excellent sensitivity with the minimum detectable concentration as low as 10-11 M. Uniform and reproducible SERS signals illustrate that the synthesized SERS hybrids perform the splendid spot-to-spot reproducibility (RSD~5.4%) and substrate-to-substrate reproducibility (RSD~5.7%). The stability of AuNPs and the protection of WS2 film endow this hybrid plasmonic nanostructures with the brilliant anti-oxidation stability. Moreover, the enhanced electric field distribution simulated with the COMSOL software proves the remarkable SERS performance in theory. Therefore, AuNPs/WS2@AuNPs substrate not only widens the SERS research filed of WS2, but also shows vast potential as excellent SERS sensor for practical applicability.

The Effect of the Aqueous Extract of Bidens Pilosa L. on Androgen Deficiency Dry Eye in Rats.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Bidens pilosa L. (Bp) is widely distributed in China and has been widely used as a traditional Chinese medicine. The aim of this study was to examine the effect of the extract of Bp on androgen deficiency dry eye and determine its possible mechanisms. METHODS: Twenty-four rats were randomly divided into four groups: Group Con (control), Group Sal (physiological saline), Group Fin (oral finasteride), and Group Bp (oral finasteride and Bp). The dry eye model was established in group Fin and group Bp. Aqueous tear quantity was measured with phenol red-impregnated cotton threads with anesthesia. Tear film breakup time (BUT) and corneal epithelial damage were evaluated by fluorescein staining. Animals were sacrificed at 28 days, and ocular tissues (lacrimal gland and cornea) were evaluated with light microscopy; gene microarray analysis for inflammatory cytokines and Western blot were also performed. RESULTS: Finasteride administration effectively induced dry eye in rats by 14 days after administration. Group Fin rats had significantly higher fluorescein staining scores and lower aqueous tear quantity and BUT than the group Con rats, and notable inflammatory cell infiltrates were observed in the lacrimal gland of group Fin rats. The fluorescein staining score, aqueous tear quantity and BUT significantly improved with Bp treatment in the group Bp rats, and the structures of the lacrimal gland were well maintained without significant lymphocyte infiltration. Cytokine antibody array data identified the cytokines B7-2/Cd86, IL-1ß, IL-4, IL-6, IL-10, MMP-8, FasL, TNF-α and TIMP-1 as candidates for validation by Western blot. Expression levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines, including IL-1ß, IL-6, and TNF-α, in group Fin were upregulated compared with group Con. Levels of anti-inflammatory cytokines, such as IL-4 and IL-10, in group Fin were also upregulated compared with those in group Con. Compared with group Fin, IL-1ß, FasL, and TNF-α were significantly decreased in group Bp. CONCLUSION: The extract of Bp appears to be effective for the treatment of androgen deficiency dry eye in rats by improving aqueous tear quantity, maintaining tear film stability, and inhibiting the inflammation of the lacrimal gland.

[Paraspinal muscle approach with winglike working channel in the treatment of thoracic and lumbar spine fracture].

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the clinical and radiological efficacy of paraspinal muscle approach with winglike working channel in the treatment of thoracic and lumbar spine fracture. METHODS: From October 2010 to August 2012, a total of 51 patients with thoracic and lumbar spine fractures without neurological symptoms were enrolled in the study, including 32 males and 19 females. All patients were divided into two groups: 26 patients were treated through posterior paraspinal muscle approach with winglike working channel, and 25 patients were treated through traditional posterior approach. In all patients, the interval between injury and operation was less than two weeks; the vertebral canal blocked area was less than 1/3 in sagittal diameter; the compression of the fractured vertebra height was less than 2/3. And the patients with pathological fracture and severe osteoporosis were excluded. The perioperative index including operative blood loss, draining loss, operative time, postoperative bed time were recorded. The clinical results were evaluated by visual analogue scale (VAS) for back pain preoperatively, at 3 days, 3 months, the last follow-up postoperatively and modified Macnab criteria at the last follow-up. The radiological results were evaluated by sagittal Cobb angle and the anterior height of the fractured vertebra. The data of two groups were compared statistically with paired and independent t test, χ² test, Mann-Whitney U test and Wilcoxon test. RESULTS: All patients were followed up with average of 16.6 months. In the two groups, the operative blood loss was respectively (91.5 ± 36.6) ml and (209.2 ± 38.3) ml (t=-11.216, P=0.000), draining loss was (13.7±4.4) ml and (162.3 ± 56.6) ml (t=-13.352, P=0.000), postoperative bed time was (87.3 ± 11.5) hours and (118.4 ± 20.4) hours (t=-6.727, P=0.000), VAS for back pain at 3 days postoperatively was 5.5 ± 1.0 and 6.4 ± 0.8 (t=-3.304, P=0.002), also VAS at the last follow-up was 1.0 (1.0) and 2.0 (1.0) (U=191.0, P=0.008). Data above showed significant differences between the two groups.No significant differences were found in operative time, (109.0 ± 29.7) min vs. (119.2 ± 26.8) min (t=-1.283, P=0.206), and modified Macnab criteria (χ²=0.513, P=0.774) between the two groups. The anterior height of the fractured vertebra preoperatively, at 1 week and the last follow-up postoperatively of the two groups were respectively (57.2 ± 11.8)% and (55.2 ± 10.9)% (t=0.685, P=0.496), (95.2 ± 8.3)% and (95.3 ± 5.8%) (t=-0.068, P=0.946), (92.9 ± 6.7)% and (92.1 ± 5.6)% (t=0.505, P=0.615). The sagittal Cobb angles preoperatively, at 1 week and the last follow-up postoperatively of the two groups were respectively 21.0° (12.5°) and 23.0° (12.0°) (U=316.0, P=0.544), 3.0° (5.5°) and 4.0° (4.5°) (U=342.5, P=0.893), 4.0° (5.5°) and 6.0° (6.0°) (U=328.5, P=0.701). There were no significant differences of these radiological results between the two groups in the same time point. CONCLUSION: The paraspinal muscle approach with winglike working channel in the treatment of thoracic and lumbar spine fracture is an efficient surgical option which can acquire satisfactory clinical and radiological results.

MSEF-Net: Multi-scale edge fusion network for lumbosacral plexus segmentation with MR image.

Nerve damage of spine areas is a common cause of disability and paralysis. The lumbosacral plexus segmentation from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans plays an important role in many computer-aided diagnoses and surgery of spinal nerve lesions. Due to the complex structure and low contrast of the lumbosacral plexus, it is difficult to delineate the regions of edges accurately. To address this issue, we propose a Multi-Scale Edge Fusion Network (MSEF-Net) to fully enhance the edge feature in the encoder and adaptively fuse multi-scale features in the decoder. Specifically, to highlight the edge structure feature, we propose an edge feature fusion module (EFFM) by combining the Sobel operator edge detection and the edge-guided attention module (EAM), respectively. To adaptively fuse the multi-scale feature map in the decoder, we introduce an adaptive multi-scale fusion module (AMSF). Our proposed MSEF-Net method was evaluated on the collected spinal MRI dataset with 89 patients (a total of 2848 MR images). Experimental results demonstrate that our MSEF-Net is effective for lumbosacral plexus segmentation with MR images, when compared with several state-of-the-art segmentation methods.

Biomechanical assessment of different transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion constructs in normal and osteoporotic condition: a finite element analysis.

BACKGROUND CONTEXT: With the aging population, osteoporosis, which leads to poor fusion, has become a common challenge for lumbar surgery. In addition, most people with osteoporosis are elderly individuals with poor surgical tolerance, and poor bone quality can also weaken the stability of internal fixation. PURPOSE: This study compared the fixation strength of the bilateral traditional trajectory screw structure (TT-TT), the bilateral cortical bone trajectory screw structure (CBT-CBT), and the hybrid CBT-TT (CBT screws at the cranial level and TT screws at the caudal level) structure under different bone mineral density conditions. STUDY DESIGN: A finite element (FE) analysis study. METHODS: Above all, we established a healthy adult lumbar spine model. Second, under normal and osteoporotic conditions, three transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (TLIF) models were established: bilateral traditional trajectory (TT-TT) screw fixation, bilateral cortical bone trajectory (CBT-CBT) screw fixation, and hybrid cortical bone trajectory screw and traditional trajectory screw (CBT-TT) fixation. Finally, a 500-N compression load with a torque of 10 N/m was applied to simulate flexion, extension, lateral bending, and axial rotation. We compared the range of motion (ROM), adjacent disc stress, cage stress, and posterior fixation stress of the different fusion models. RESULTS: Under different bone mineral density conditions, the range of motion of the fusion segment was significantly reduced. Compared to normal bone conditions, the ROM of the L4-L5 segment, the stress of the adjacent intervertebral disc, the surface stress of the cage, and the maximum stress of the posterior fixation system were all increased in osteoporosis. Under most loads, the ROM and surface stress of the cage and the maximum stress of the posterior fixation system of the TT-TT structure are the lowest under normal bone mineral density conditions. However, under osteoporotic conditions, the fixation strength of the CBT-CBT and CBT-TT structures are higher than that of the TT-TT structures under certain load conditions. At the same time, the surface stress of the intervertebral fusion cage and the maximum stress of the posterior fixation system for the two structures are lower than those of the TT-TT structure. CONCLUSION: Under normal bone mineral density conditions, transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion combined with TT-TT fixation provides the best biomechanictability. However, under osteoporotic conditions, CBT-CBT and CBT-TT structures have higher fixed strength compared to TT-TT structures. The hybrid CBT-TT structure exhibits advantages in minimal trauma and fixation strength. Therefore, this seems to be an alternative fixation method for patients with osteoporosis and degenerative spinal diseases. CLINICAL SIGNIFICANCE: This study provides biomechanical support for the clinical application of hybrid CBT-TT structure for osteoporotic patients undergoing TLIF surgery.

Comparison of one-hole split endoscopic discectomy and microendoscopic discectomy in the treatment of lumbar disk herniation: a one-year retrospective cohort study.

BACKGROUND: We aim to compare and assess the surgical parameters and follow-up information of one-hole split endoscopic discectomy (OSE) and microendoscopic discectomy (MED) in the treatment of LDH. METHODS: This study included 154 patients with degenerative lumbar disk disease. Sixty-eight patients underwent OSE and 86 patients MED. The VAS score for lower back and lower limb radiation pain, ODI score, modified MacNab score, estimated blood loss (EBL), length of the incision, amount of C-reactive protein, and recurrence and complication rates were examined as indicators for clinical outcomes and adverse events. RESULTS: After surgery, the VAS and ODI scores in the two groups significantly decreased. On the third day after surgery, the VAS and ODI scores of the OSE group were significantly better than those of the MED group. The VAS and ODI scores preoperatively and at 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, and 12 months following the procedure did not substantially vary between the two groups. There was less EBL and a shorter incision with OSE than with MED. There was no significant difference in the rate of complications between the two groups. CONCLUSION: Compared with MED, OSE is a new alternative option for LDH that can achieve similar and satisfactory clinical outcomes. Furthermore, OSE has many advantages, including less EBL and a smaller incision. Further clinical studies are needed to confirm the effectiveness of OSE.

Comparative effectiveness of PEEK rods versus titanium alloy rods in lumbar fusion: a preliminary report.

BACKGROUND: Posterior lumbar instruments made of titanium and its alloys could change the physiological distribution of load at the instrumented and adjacent segments, which is a main cause of implant failure, non-fusion and adjacent segment degeneration. Posterior lumbar rods made of polyetheretherketone (PEEK) which is a semirigid alternative to titanium and its alloys have been introduced in lumbar fusion. This prospective study compared the radiological and clinical outcomes of patients undergoing lumbar fusion with PEEK rods versus titanium alloy rods. METHODS: Using transpedicular fixation and lumbar fusion, 21 patients were treated with titanium alloy rods (TI group), and 20 patients with PEEK rods (PEEK group). Radiological and clinical outcomes were evaluated, including the status of the implanted instruments, fusion rate, lumbar lordosis angle (LA), disc space height (DH), visual analog score (VAS) for lower back pain (VAS-BP) and leg pain (VAS-LP), Japanese Orthopedic Association scoring system (JOA score) and complications. RESULTS: Clinical VAS-BP, VAS-LP and JOA scores were significantly improved at 3 months, 6 months, and 1 year postoperatively as compared with preoperative scores in both groups (p < 0.05), with similar levels of improvement observed at the same time points postoperatively between the two groups. The overall fusion rate was 100 % at the 1-year follow-up for both groups. No significant differences in lumbar lordosis angle were found preoperatively, 1 week and 1 year postoperatively in both groups (p > 0.05). The postoperative increase of disc space height and loss of disc space height during the follow-up showed a similar extent of change between both groups (p > 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: PEEK rods offer a similar radiological and clinical efficacy as titanium alloy rods. PEEK rods, as a semirigid implant with unique characteristics, may be an effective alternative treatment for patients with degenerative lumbar disease in lumbar fusion.

Low-Dose CT Denoising via Sinogram Inner-Structure Transformer.

Low-Dose Computed Tomography (LDCT) technique, which reduces the radiation harm to human bodies, is now attracting increasing interest in the medical imaging field. As the image quality is degraded by low dose radiation, LDCT exams require specialized reconstruction methods or denoising algorithms. However, most of the recent effective methods overlook the inner-structure of the original projection data (sinogram) which limits their denoising ability. The inner-structure of the sinogram represents special characteristics of the data in the sinogram domain. By maintaining this structure while denoising, the noise can be obviously restrained. Therefore, we propose an LDCT denoising network namely Sinogram Inner-Structure Transformer (SIST) to reduce the noise by utilizing the inner-structure in the sinogram domain. Specifically, we study the CT imaging mechanism and statistical characteristics of sinogram to design the sinogram inner-structure loss including the global and local inner-structure for restoring high-quality CT images. Besides, we propose a sinogram transformer module to better extract sinogram features. The transformer architecture using a self-attention mechanism can exploit interrelations between projections of different view angles, which achieves an outstanding performance in sinogram denoising. Furthermore, in order to improve the performance in the image domain, we propose the image reconstruction module to complementarily denoise both in the sinogram and image domain.

LSP-SPP Coupling Structure Based on Three-Dimensional Patterned Sapphire Substrate for Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering Sensing.

Although the fabrication of controllable three-dimensional (3D) microstructures on substrates has been proposed as an effective solution for SERS, there remains a gap in the detection and manufacturability of 3D substrates with high performance. In this study, photolithography is adopted to obtain a pyramid-like array on a patterned sapphire substrate (PSS), with Al2O3 as the dielectric layer. In addition, silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) are used to decorate Au films to obtain mass-producible 3D SRES substrates. In the case of low fluorescence, the substrate realizes the coupling of localized surface plasmon polaritons (LSPs) and surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs), which is consistent with the simulation results obtained using the finite element method. The performance of the SERS substrate is evaluated using rhodamine 6G (R6G) and toluidine blue (TB) as probe molecules with detection limits of 10-11 M and 10-9 M, respectively. The substrate exhibits high hydrophobicity and excellent light-capturing capability. Moreover, it shows self-cleaning ability and long-term stability in practical applications. Allowing for the consistency of the composite substrate in the preparation process and the high reproducibility of the test results, it is considered to be promising for mass production.

Phosphorylated STAT3 as a potential diagnostic and predictive biomarker in ALK- ALCL vs. CD30high PTCL, NOS.

Aims: The differential diagnosis between ALK-negative anaplastic large cell lymphoma (ALK- ALCL) and peripheral T-cell lymphoma, not otherwise specified (PTCL, NOS) with high expression of CD30 (CD30high) are essential. However, no reliable biomarker is available in daily practice except CD30. STAT3 is characteristically activated in ALCL. We aimed to investigate whether the status of STAT3 phosphorylation could help the differential diagnosis. Methods: The status of phosphorylation of STAT3 was examined using two antibodies against pSTAT3-Y705 and pSTAT3-S727 by immunohistochemistry in ALK+ ALCL (n=33), ALK- ALCL (n=22) and PTCL, NOS (n=34). Ten PTCL, NOS with diffuse CD30 expression were defined as CD30high PTCL, NOS. Flowcytometric analysis were performed to evaluate the expression of pSTAT3-Y705/S727 in PTCL, NOS (n=3). Results: The median H-scores of pSTAT3-Y705 and S727 were 280 and 260 in ALK+ ALCL, 250 and 240 in ALK- ALCL, and 45 and 75 in CD30high subgroup, respectively. Using H score of 145 as the cutoff value, pSTAT3-S727 alone distinguished between ALK- ALCL and CD30high PTCL, NOS with a sensitivity of 100% and specificity of 83%. Additionally, pSTAT3-S727, but not pSTAT3-Y705, was also expressed by background tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (S727TILs) in PTCL, NOS. PTCL, NOS patients with high S727TILs H score had a favorable prognosis than those with no TILs (3-year OS rate: 43% vs. 0, p=0.013) or low S727TILs (3-year OS rate: 43% vs. 0, p=0.099). Flowcytometric analysis revealed that of the three patients investigated, two had enhanced pSTAT-S727 signals in neoplastic cell populations, and all three patients were negative for pSTAT3-Y705 expression in both tumor cells and background lymphocytes. Conclusions: pSTAT3-Y705/S727 can be used to help distinguish ALK- ALCL from CD30high PTCL, NOS and pSTAT3-S727 expression by TILs predicts the prognosis of a subset of PTCL, NOS.

Cyclic helix B peptide alleviates proinflammatory cell death and improves functional recovery after traumatic spinal cord injury.

BACKGROUND: Necroptosis and pyroptosis, two types of proinflammatory programmed cell death, were recently found to play important roles in spinal cord injury (SCI). Moreover, cyclic helix B peptide (CHBP) was designed to maintain erythropoietin (EPO) activity and protect tissue against the adverse effects of EPO. However, the protective mechanism of CHBP following SCI is still unknown. This research explored the necroptosis- and pyroptosis-related mechanism underlying the neuroprotective effect of CHBP after SCI. METHODS: Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) datasets and RNA sequencing were used to identify the molecular mechanisms of CHBP for SCI. A mouse model of contusion SCI was constructed, and HE staining, Nissl staining, Masson staining, footprint analysis and the Basso Mouse Scale (BMS) were applied for histological and behavioural analyses. qPCR, Western blot analysis, immunoprecipitation and immunofluorescence were utilized to analyse the levels of necroptosis, pyroptosis, autophagy and molecules associated with the AMPK signalling pathway. RESULTS: The results revealed that CHBP significantly improved functional restoration, elevated autophagy, suppressed pyroptosis, and mitigated necroptosis after SCI. 3-Methyladenine (3-MA), an autophagy inhibitor, attenuated these beneficial effects of CHBP. Furthermore, CHBP-triggered elevation of autophagy was mediated by the dephosphorylation and nuclear translocation of TFEB, and this effect was due to stimulation of the AMPK-FOXO3a-SPK2-CARM1 and AMPK-mTOR signalling pathways. CONCLUSION: CHBP acts as a powerful regulator of autophagy that improves functional recovery by alleviating proinflammatory cell death after SCI and thus might be a prospective therapeutic agent for clinical application.

Residual-atrous attention network for lumbosacral plexus segmentation with MR image.

Accurate segmentation of the lumbosacral plexus is a crucial step for diagnosis and analysis of nerve damage in clinical. Due to the extremely low contrast and complicated structure around the lumbosacral plexus, it has been remaining a challenging task to effectively segment the lumbosacral plexus from spinal MR images. Even though several deep learning methods for spine segmentation have been developed, most of them only pay attention to the segmentation of vertebral bodies and intervertebral discs rather than nerves. To solve these problems, in this paper, we propose a residual-atrous attention network (RA2-Net) for lumbosacral plexus segmentation with MR images. Specifically, the RA2-Net consists of three main parts, (1) the atrous encoder module is employed to learn multi-scale contextual features from MR images in the encoder, (2) the residual skip connection operation is used to integrate the features with high-resolution spatial details in the encoder and the high-level contextual features in the decoder, and (3) the scale attention block is proposed for fusing the multi-scale high-level features in the decoder. We perform our proposed RA2-Net for the lumbosacral plexus segmentation on the collected spinal MRI dataset with 10 patients (a total of 236 MRI scans). Extensive experiments demonstrate that our RA2-Net achieves better performance in lumbosacral plexus segmentation with MR images when compared with several state-of-the-art methods.