Prenatal diagnosis of type A fetal interrupted aortic arch by four-dimensional echocardiography with HD-flow STIC: A case report.

Interrupted aortic arch (IAA) is a rare complex congenital heart disease characterized by interrupted continuity between ascending aorta and descending aorta. Prenatal diagnosis of IAA by echocardiography is not uncommonly reported despite its rarity. However, employing four-dimensional ultrasound HD-flow imaging and spatiotemporal image correlation (STIC) in diagnosis of this condition has seldom been reported. We report a case of fetal IAA prenatally diagnosed by two-dimensional echocardiography and HD-flow STIC.

Vascular ring and sling in a fetus who developed esophageal and airway compression after birth.

Vascular ring and sling are congenital anomalies of the vascular structure in the thorax with a prevalence of 2.4/10,000 live births. Double aortic arch (DAA), right aortic arch with left ductus arteriosus and aberrant left subclavian artery (RAA-ALSA), and pulmonary artery sling (PAS) are the three common types of vascular ring and sling. These anomalies can be isolated or accompanied by intracardiac malformation. The presence of both vascular ring and PAS is extremely rare. Here, we report a fetus who was prenatally diagnosed with PAS and RAA-ALS, and developed symptoms due to esophageal and airway compression after birth.

Optimisation extraction of chondroitin sulfate from fish bone by high intensity pulsed electric fields.

High intensity pulsed electric fields (PEF) was used to extract chondroitin sulphate (CS) from fish bone. Results show that PEF extraction speed is much faster, and the content of CS is much higher compared with traditional methods. Variation of PEF parameters and the content of CS were determined by single factor experiments. The processing conditions were optimised by quadratic general rotary unitised design experiments. The maximum yield of 6.92 g/L was achieved under the following conditions: material-liquid ratio of 1:15 g/mL, electric field intensity of 16.88 kV/cm, pulse number of 9, and NaOH concentration of 3.24%. The purity of CS was analysed by agarose gel electrophoresis. CS purity was high, and the extract did not contain any other glycosaminoglycans. PEF can be widely used to extract CS with non-thermal performance, high speed, and low pollution.

Isolation and characterization of peptidoglycan recognition protein 1 from antler base of sika deer (Cervus nippon).

Peptidoglycan recognition proteins (PGRPs) are secreted innate immunity pattern recognition molecules. In this study, a new peptidoglycan recognition protein 1 named cnPGRP1 was isolated from an antler base of sika deer Cervus nippon. The antler base antimicrobial proteins (AAP) were subjected to consecutive chromatographic methods connected to Sephadex G-25 gel filtration column (CM) anion-exchange column, and RP-HPLC. The molecular weight of cnPGRP1 was 17.2 kDa under SDS-PAGE, and peptide mass fingerprint analysis by MALDI-TOF-MS as peptidoglycan recognition protein 1 matched to Dasypus novemcinctus. The matched amino acids sequences were RLYEIIQKWPHYRA. Both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria can be killed by cnPGRP1 in the 50-250 µg/mL range through in vitro. Furthermore, cnPGRP1 has been found to bind Gram-positive bacteria, Gram-negative bacteria, and even fungus.