Application Prospects of Specific Rehabilitation Task Training in Upper Limb Function Rehabilitation of Stroke Sequelae Patients.

Objective: To analyze the application prospects of specific rehabilitation task training in upper limb function rehabilitation of stroke sequelae patients. Methods: A retrospective analysis was conducted on 80 patients with upper limb function rehabilitation who received treatment for stroke sequelae in The People's Hospital from January 2022 to December 2022. The patients were divided into two groups based on different training methods, with 40 cases in each group. The control group received conventional rehabilitation training, while the observation group received specific rehabilitation task training. The intervention in both groups spanned for one month on a daily basis. The motor function, self-care ability, self-efficacy, negative emotions, and nursing efficacy of the two groups of patients were compared. Results: There was no statistically significant difference in baseline data between the two groups of patients, indicating comparability (P > .05). After different nursing interventions, the Fugl-Meyer Assessment (FMA) scores and Functional Capacity Assessment (FCA) scores of the observation group were lower than those of the control group, and the differences were statistically significant (relative risk [RR] 1.67, 95%CI 1.50-1.85; RR 1.24, 95%CI 1.09-1.41). The Generalized Self-Efficacy Scale (GSES) scores of both groups at 7 days and 3 months after surgery were significantly higher than the preoperative scores in each group (RR 1.51, 95%CI 1.40-1.63; RR 1.54, 95%CI 1.31-1.79), and the GSES scores of the observation group were significantly higher than those of the control group at 7 days and 3 months after surgery (RR 1.56, 95%CI 1.37-1.77; RR 2.17, 95%CI 1.65-2.83). The Self-Rating Anxiety Scale (SAS) scores and Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS) scores of the observation group at 7 days and 3 months after surgery were significantly lower than those of the control group (RR 2.30, 95%CI 1.81-2.93; RR 1.18, 95%CI 1.10-1.25). The nursing efficacy of the observation group was higher than that of the control group (RR 1.65, 95%CI 1.28-2.14). Conclusion: For patients with upper limb function rehabilitation after stroke sequelae, specific rehabilitation task training intervention can effectively improve patients' negative emotions and self-efficacy and enhance their motor function and self-care ability. It is worth promoting and applying.

The underlying neuropsychological and neural correlates of the impaired Chinese reading skills in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Impaired basic academic skills (e.g., word recognition) are common in children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). The underlying neuropsychological and neural correlates of impaired Chinese reading skills in children with ADHD have not been substantially explored. Three hundred and two children with ADHD (all medication-naïve) and 105 healthy controls underwent the Chinese language skill assessment, and 175 also underwent fMRI scans (84 ADHD and 91 controls). Between-group and mediation analyses were applied to explore the interrelationships of the diagnosis of ADHD, cognitive dysfunction, and impaired reading skills. Five ADHD-related brain functional networks, including the default mode network (DMN) and the dorsal attention network (DAN), were built using predefined regions of interest. Voxel-based group-wise comparisons were performed. The ADHD group performed worse than the control group in word-level reading ability tests, with lower scores in Chinese character recognition (CR) and word chains (WS) (all P < 0.05). With full-scale IQ and sustained attention in the mediation model, the direct effect of ADHD status on the CR score became insignificant (P = 0.066). The underlying neural correlates for the orthographic knowledge (OT) and CR differed between the ADHD and the control group. The ADHD group tended to recruit more DMN regions to maintain their reading performance, while the control group seemed to utilize more DAN regions. Children with ADHD generally presented impaired word-level reading skills, which might be caused by impaired sustained attention and lower IQ. According to the brain functional results, we infer that ADHD children might utilize a different strategy to maintain their orthographic knowledge and character recognition performance.

Green Neutrophilic Inclusion Bodies: a Rare Phenomenon Indicating a More Critical Situation for Patients.

BACKGROUND: Green neutrophil inclusion bodies represents a rare and specific cytoplasmic change in neutrophils, which is often accompanied by acute liver failure and lactic acidosis, making them an indicator of poor prognosis and high mortality risk in patients. METHODS: Here, we report a case with green neutrophil cytoplasmic inclusion bodies from the aspects of clinical manifestation, morphological characteristics, identification of similar inclusion bodies, and scatter diagram distribution, along with a literature review. RESULTS: Green neutrophil cytoplasmic inclusion bodies have a green or blue-green color, variable sizes, and a blocky appearance with ill-defined borders. They are easy to identify and distinguish from similar inclusion bodies and have a characteristic scatter diagram distribution. In addition, their appearance is often accompanied by acute liver failure and lactic acidosis, indicating a very poor prognosis, which is consistent with previous reports. CONCLUSION: Green neutrophilic inclusion bodies are a rare phenomenon indicating a more critical situation for patients. A better understanding of this critical condition is needed to provide insights for clinical prevention and treatment.

Gene-environment interaction on neural mechanisms of orthographic processing in Chinese children.

The ability to process and identify visual words requires efficient orthographic processing of print, consisting of letters in alphabetic languages or characters in Chinese. The N170 is a robust neural marker for orthographic processes. Both genetic and environmental factors, such as home literacy, have been shown to influence orthographic processing at the behavioral level, but their relative contributions and interactions are not well understood. The present study aimed to reveal possible gene-by-environment interactions on orthographic processing at the behavioral and neural level in a normal children sample. Sixty 12 year old Chinese children from a 10-year longitudinal sample underwent an implicit visual-word color decision task on real words and stroke combinations. The ERP analysis focused on the increase of the occipito-temporal N170 to words compared to stroke combinations. The genetic analysis focused on two SNPs (rs1419228, rs1091047) in the gene DCDC2 based on previous findings linking these 2 SNPs to orthographic coding. Home literacy was measured previously as the number of children's books at home, when the children were at the age of 3. Relative to stroke combinations, real words evoked greater N170 in bilateral posterior brain regions. A significant interaction between rs1091047 and home literacy was observed on the changes of N170 comparing real words to stroke combinations in the left hemisphere. Particularly, children carrying the major allele "G" showed a similar N170 effect irrespective of their environment, while children carrying the minor allele "C" showed a smaller N170 effect in low home-literacy environment than those in good environment.

Visible light catalysis-assisted assembly of Ni(h)-QD hollow nanospheres in situ via hydrogen bubbles.

Hollow spheres are one of the most promising micro-/nanostructures because of their unique performance in diverse applications. Templates, surfactants, and structure-directing agents are often used to control the sizes and morphologies of hollow spheres. In this Article, we describe a simple method based on visible light catalysis for preparing hollow nanospheres from CdE (E = Te, Se, and S) quantum dots (QDs) and nickel (Ni(2+)) salts in aqueous media. In contrast to the well-developed traditional approaches, the hollow nanospheres of QDs are formed in situ by the photogeneration of hydrogen (H2) gas bubbles at room temperature. Each component, that is, the QDs, metal ions, ascorbic acid (H2A), and visible light, is essential for the formation of hollow nanospheres. The quality of the hollow nanospheres depends on the pH, metal ions, and wavelength and intensity of visible light used. Of the various metal ions investigated, including Cu(+), Cu(2+), Fe(2+), Fe(3+), Ni(2+), Mn(2+), RuCl5(2-), Ag(+), and PtCl4(2-), Ni(2+) ions showed the best ability to generate H2 and hollow-structured nanospheres under visible light irradiation. The average diameter and shell thickness of the nanospheres ranged from 10 to 20 nm and from 3 to 6 nm, respectively, which are values rarely reported in the literature. Studies using high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), inductively coupled plasma-mass spectroscopy (ICP-AES), and steady-state and time-resolved spectroscopy revealed the chemical nature of the hollow nanospheres. Additionally, the hollow-structured nanospheres exhibit excellent photocatalytic activity and stability for the generation of H2 with a rate constant of 21 µmol h(-1) mg(-1) and a turnover number (TON) of 137,500 or 30,250 for CdTe QDs or nickel, respectively, under visible light irradiation for 42 h.

What Factors Contribute to Reading in ADHD: Examining Reading-Related Skills in Children With ADHD Only/Comorbid Developmental Dyslexia.

BACKGROUND: ADHD and developmental dyslexia (DD) frequently co-occur. However, it is unclear why some children with ADHD acquire DD while others do not. METHODS: A total of 830 children (including typically developing controls, ADHD only, DD only, and ADHD + DD groups) of two ages (younger: first-third grade; older: fourth-sixth grade) were assessed on measures of reading ability and reading-related skills. RESULTS: The clinical groups had different degrees of impairment in each reading-related skill. Regression results found that the four groups had different skills in predicting reading ability in younger and older grades. Especially, rapid automatized naming (RAN) was the only predictor of reading ability in children with ADHD only. CONCLUSIONS: The study highlights that RAN plays an important role in the reading development of children with ADHD only, reflecting the possible protective role of RAN in reading development.

Foveal crowding in children with developmental dyslexia.

Excessive crowding in the visual periphery has been demonstrated in children with developmental dyslexia (DD). However, less is known about crowding in the fovea, even though foveal crowding is at least equally important, as reading is mostly accomplished through foveal vision. Here we used a special set of digit stimuli (Pelli fonts) to measure foveal crowding in DD and DD + ADHD children, and compared it to that in TD (typically developing) and ADHD children. We also used the Chinese reading acuity charts (C-READ) to assess the maximum reading speed and reading acuity, along with tests to evaluate cognitive attributes including phonological awareness, rapid automatized naming, morphological awareness, and orthographic knowledge. The results indicate significantly stronger foveal crowding in the DD and DD + ADHD groups, as well as in the ADHD group, than in the TD group. Furthermore, the DD and DD + ADHD groups exhibited poorer maximum reading speed and reading acuity compared to the ADHD and TD groups. Within the two DD groups, the slower maximum reading speed and higher reading acuity can be predicted by stronger foveal crowding. In addition, the DD and DD + ADHD groups performed the worst in four cognitive skills, with the DD group showing negative correlations between foveal crowding and performances across all these skills. Our findings thus move beyond previously well-documented peripheral crowding in dyslexia, and the easy administration of the Pelli-font-based crowding test may be useful for early diagnosis of developmental dyslexia in young children.

Aperiodic components and aperiodic-adjusted alpha-band oscillations in children with ADHD.

This study aimed to investigate the aperiodic properties and aperiodic-adjusted alpha-band oscillations in children with ADHD, focusing on the influence of different scalp regions and lateralization on these neural correlates. Sixty-two ADHD children and 52 typical developing children aged 6-12 years were enrolled. EEG recordings were made with eyes closed for a minimum of 6 min. The 'FOOOF' was used to compute aperiodic parameters (exponent and offset), and aperiodic-adjusted alpha-band features including center frequency (CF), adjusted power (AP), and bandwidth (BW). Mixed-design ANOVAs were conducted with two between-subjects levels (ADHD and control groups) and two within-subjects' factors (lateralization and scalp region). ANCOVAs were conducted after accounting for sex and age. The ADHD group showed a significantly lower exponent compared to the control group, and this difference was not influenced significantly by factors like lateralization, scalp region, or sex. There were no notable distinctions between the groups for other measures. We noticed alpha-band CF tends to increase with age, while only frontal AP shows a significant positive correlation with age. Significant main effects of sex and lateralization were observed for offset, along with an interaction effect between sex and lateralization for CF. Our findings indicate that children aged 6-12 with ADHD have a markedly lower exponent, suggesting that this measure could potentially serve as a biomarker for ADHD. Future studies should consider factors such as age, sex, lateralization, and scalp region when investigating aperiodic and aperiodic-adjusted features.

Abnormal trial-to-trial variability in P300 time-varying directed eeg network of schizophrenia.

Cognitive disturbance in identifying, processing, and responding to salient or novel stimuli are typical attributes of schizophrenia (SCH), and P300 has been proven to serve as a reliable psychosis endophenotype. The instability of neural processing across trials, i.e., trial-to-trial variability (TTV), is getting increasing attention in uncovering how the SCH "noisy" brain organizes during cognition processes. Nevertheless, the TTV in the brain network remains unrevealed, notably how it varies in different task stages. In this study, resorting to the time-varying directed electroencephalogram (EEG) network, we investigated the time-resolved TTV of the functional organizations subserving the evoking of P300. Results revealed anomalous TTV in time-varying networks across the delta, theta, alpha, beta1, and beta2 bands of SCH. The TTV of cross-band time-varying network properties can efficiently recognize SCH (accuracy: 83.39%, sensitivity: 89.22%, and specificity: 74.55%) and evaluate the psychiatric symptoms (i.e., Hamilton's depression scale-24, r = 0.430, p = 0.022, RMSE = 4.891; Hamilton's anxiety scale-14, r = 0.377, p = 0.048, RMSE = 4.575). Our study brings new insights into probing the time-resolved functional organization of the brain, and TTV in time-varying networks may provide a powerful tool for mining the substrates accounting for SCH and diagnostic evaluation of SCH.

Construction and evaluation of two nomograms for screening major depressive disorder and subthreshold depression individuals based on anxiety, depression, and sleep items.

BACKGROUND: Current evidence is insufficient to support specific tools for screening Major Depressive Disorder (MDD). Early detection of subthreshold depression (SD) is crucial in preventing its progression to MDD. This study aims to develop nomograms that visualize the weights of predictors to improve the performance of screening tools. METHODS: Participants were recruited from Peking University Sixth Hospital and Beijing Physical Examination Center between October 2022 and April 2024. The Mini-International Neuropsychiatric Interview (MINI) 5.0.0 was employed as the diagnostic gold standard, and Generalized Anxiety Disorder questionnaire-7 (GAD-7), Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9), and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) were employed to assess anxiety, depression, and sleep state. The nomograms were constructed by incorporating optimal predictors, selected through the Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO), into a multivariate logistic regression model to estimate the probability of MDD and SD. RESULTS: After matching age and education, 164 participants were included in each group for analysis. Both nomograms demonstrated superior discrimination, calibration, and clinical applicability compared to PHQ-9. Anxiety emerged as a most significant predictor for SD, while sleep problems exhibited high rankings for both SD and MDD. The two predictors subsequently affect concentration and daytime functioning. LIMITATIONS: With a lack of external validation data, the performance of nomograms may be overestimated. CONCLUSIONS: This study is the first attempt to develop a nomogram for predicting SD, while also providing a nomogram for MDD. The crucial predictors offer valuable insights into potential variables for clinical intervention.

Reversible sol-to-gel transformation of uracil gelators: specific colorimetric and fluorimetric sensor for fluoride ions.

A new type of anthracene organogelator based on uracil was obtained using organic aromatic solvents, cyclohexane, DMSO, ethanol, and ethyl acetate. It was further characterized by field-emission scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy. Specifically, the resulting organogels were demonstrated to be promising colorimetric and fluorescent sensors toward fluoride ions with high sensitivity and selectivity, accompanying the disruption of the gelators. Spectroscopic study and (1)H NMR titration experiment revealed that the deprotonation of the hydrogen atom on the N position of uracil moiety by fluoride ions is responsible for the recognition events, evidenced by immediate transformation from the sol phase to the gel state upon adding a small amount of a proton solvent, methanol. The process is reversible, with zero loss in sensing activity and sol-to-gel transformation ability even after five runs.

The roles of fundamental frequency contours and sentence context in Mandarin Chinese speech intelligibility.

Flattening the fundamental frequency (F0) contours of Mandarin Chinese sentences reduces their intelligibility in noise but not in quiet. It is unclear, however, how the absence of primary acoustic cue for lexical tones might be compensated with the top-down information of sentence context. In this study, speech intelligibility was evaluated when participants listened to sentences and word lists with or without F0 variations in quiet and noise. The results showed that sentence context partially explained the unchanged intelligibility of monotonous Chinese sentences in quiet and further indicate that F0 variations and sentence context act in concert during speech comprehension.

Pathogenesis of Comorbid ADHD and Chinese Developmental Dyslexia: Evidence From Eye-Movement Tracking and Rapid Automatized Naming.

BACKGROUND: ADHD and Chinese developmental dyslexia (DD) have a very high comorbidity rate; however, which cognitive deficits characterize the comorbidity and when they occur during cognitive processing are still under debate. METHODS: Rapid automatic naming (RAN) tasks with eye-movement tracking were conducted with 75 children who were typically developing, had comorbid ADHD and DD, had only ADHD, and had only DD. RESULTS: The clinical groups had longer first fixation durations than the control for RAN digits. Temporal eye-movement measures, such as gaze duration and total reading time, were found to vary between the comorbidity and ADHD groups. Spatial eye-movement measures, such as regression probability and incoming saccade amplitude, differed between the comorbidity and DD groups. CONCLUSIONS: These results indicate that investigation with eye-movement measures combined with RAN tasks can strengthen the understanding of the pathogenesis of comorbid ADHD and DD.

Discrimination of auditory verbal hallucination in schizophrenia based on EEG brain networks.

Auditory verbal hallucinations (AVH) are a core positive symptom of schizophrenia and are regarded as a consequence of the functional breakdown in the related sensory process. Yet, the potential mechanism of AVH is still lacking. In the present study, we explored the difference between AVHs (n = 23) and non-AVHs (n = 19) in schizophrenia and healthy controls (n = 29) by using multidimensional electroencephalograms data during an auditory oddball task. Compared to healthy controls, both AVH and non-AVH groups showed reduced P300 amplitudes. Additionally, the results from brain networks analysis revealed that AVH patients showed reduced left frontal to posterior parietal/temporal connectivity compared to non-AVH patients. Moreover, using the fused network properties of both delta and theta bands as features for in-depth learning made it possible to identify the AVH from non-AVH patients at an accuracy of 80.95%. The left frontal-parietal/temporal networks seen in the auditory oddball paradigm might be underlying biomarkers of AVH in schizophrenia. This study demonstrated for the first time the functional breakdown of the auditory processing pathway in the AVH patients, leading to a better understanding of the atypical brain network of the AVH patients.

Neural basis of phonological processing in second language reading: an fMRI study of Chinese regularity effect.

The present study examined the neural basis of phonological processing in Chinese later acquired as a second language (L2). The regularity effect of Chinese was selected to elucidate the addressed phonological processing. We recruited a group of alphabetic language speakers who had been learning Chinese as L2 for at least one year, and a control group of native Chinese speakers. Participants from both groups exhibited a regularity effect in a pilot behavioral test. Neuroimaging results revealed that L2 learners exhibited stronger activation than native Chinese speakers in the right occipitotemporal region (i.e. right lingual gyrus and right fusiform gyrus). Moreover, L2 learners exhibited greater activations in the ventral aspects of the left inferior parietal lobule (LIPL) and the left inferior frontal gyrus (LIFG) for irregular character reading minus regular character reading. In contrast, native Chinese speakers exhibited more dorsal activations in the LIPL and LIFG. According to the "accommodation/assimilation" hypothesis of second language reading, the current findings suggest that native speakers of alphabetic languages utilized an accommodation pattern for the specific requirements of the visual form of Chinese characters, and an assimilation pattern for orthography-to-phonology transformation in Chinese reading.

Altered temporal variability in brain functional connectivity identified by fuzzy entropy underlines schizophrenia deficits.

Investigation of the temporal variability of resting-state brain networks informs our understanding of how neural connectivity aggregates and disassociates over time, further shedding light on the aberrant neural interactions that underlie symptomatology and psychosis development. In the current work, an electroencephalogram-based sliding window analysis was utilized for the first time to measure the nonlinear complexity of dynamic resting-state brain networks of schizophrenia (SZ) patients by applying fuzzy entropy. The results of this study demonstrated the attenuated temporal variability among multiple electrodes that were distributed in the frontal and right parietal lobes for SZ patients when compared with healthy controls (HCs). Meanwhile, a concomitant strengthening of the posterior and peripheral flexible connections that may be attributed to the excessive alertness or sensitivity of SZ patients to the external environment was also revealed. These temporal fluctuation distortions combined reflect an abnormality in the coordination of functional network switching in SZ, which is further the source of worse task performance (i.e., P300 amplitude) and the negative relationship between individual complexity metrics and P300 amplitude. Notably, when using the network metrics as features, multiple linear regressions of P300 amplitudes were also exactly achieved for both the SZ and HC groups. These findings shed light on the pathophysiological mechanisms of SZ from a temporal variability perspective and provide potential biomarkers for quantifying SZ's progressive neurophysiological deterioration.

Similarities and Differences in Brain Activation Between Patients With Schizophrenia and Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: A Near-Infrared Spectroscopy Study.

Schizophrenia (SZ) and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) share several epidemiological and clinical features, but the neurobiological substrates shared by these two diseases remain unclear. This study aimed to explore the similarities and differences in brain function between them using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). Eventually, 130 SZ patients, 70 OCD and 75 normal controls (NCs) were enrolled. A 52-channel NIRS instrument was used to detect the concentration changes in oxygenated hemoglobin ([oxy-Hb]) during the verbal fluency task. Ten regions of interests (ROIs) were defined: the bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), frontopolar cortex (FPC), orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), inferior prefrontal gyrus (IFG) and temporal gyrus (TG). Through two different analysis strategies based on channels or ROIs, we compared the [oxy-Hb] changes in three groups by one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and post-hoc tests. Across 52 channels, compared to the NC group, both SZ and OCD groups exhibited reduced activity in 17 channels, including left FPC, left DLPFC, bilateral OFC, IFG, middle TG, supplementary motor cortex and Broca's area, while SZ showed lower activity in channel 35 (right OFC) than OCD patients. Across all ROIs, compared to the NC group, both SZ and OCD groups showed reduced activity in 7 ROIs, including left FPC, bilateral OFC, IFG and TG, while SZ showed lower activity in the right OFC than OCD group, which were almost consistent with the results based on channels. This study suggests SZ and OCD present with some similar neuropathological changes, while SZ shows more severe impairment in the right OFC than OCD.

Prevalence and correlates of depression and anxiety among Chinese international students in US colleges during the COVID-19 pandemic: A cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: Previous studies showed that the COVID-19 outbreak increased the levels of depression and anxiety in heterogeneous populations. However, none has explored the prevalence and correlates of depression and anxiety among Chinese international students studying in US colleges during the pandemic. OBJECTIVE: This study examines the prevalence of depression and anxiety among Chinese international students enrolled in US universities during the COVID-19 pandemic and identifies the associated factors, including habits, social and psychological support, sleep quality, and remote learning. METHODS: Between June and July 2020, we conducted a cross-sectional study through Wenjuanxing, a web-based survey platform. Participants were recruited with snowball sampling through 21 Chinese international student associations in US universities. The survey consisted of demographic questions, the Social Support Rating Scale (SSRS), the Insomnia Severity Index (ISI), the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9), the General Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7), and self-constructed questions on academic performance, financial concerns, use of social media, physical exercise, and psychological support. Cut-off scores of 10 were used for both PHQ-9 and GAD-7 to determine the binary outcomes of depression and anxiety, respectively. Bivariant analyses and multivariable logistic regression analyses were performed to identify the associated factors. RESULTS: Among 1881 participants, we found a prevalence of depression (PHQ-9 score⩾ 10) at 24.5% and that of anxiety (GAD-7 score⩾ 10) at 20.7%. A higher risk of depression was associated with recent exposure to traumatic events, agreement to pandemic's negative impacts on financial status, agreement and strong agreement to the negative impacts of remote learning on personal relationships, and a higher ISI score. A lower risk of depression was associated with disagreement to the negative impacts of remote learning on academic performance and future careers, strong willingness to seek professional help with emotional issues, and a higher SSRS score. In addition, a higher risk of anxiety was associated with recent exposure to traumatic events, a lot of workloads, often staying up for online classes, agreement and strong agreement to the negative impacts of remote learning on personal relationships, and a higher ISI score. A lower risk of anxiety was associated with the willingness and strong willingness to seek professional help with emotional issues, and a higher SSRS score. CONCLUSION: This study showed a high prevalence of depression and anxiety among Chinese international students studying in US colleges during the COVID-19 pandemic. Multiple correlates-including recent exposure to traumatic events, pandemic-related financial concerns, workload, social support, remote learning, willingness to seek professional help, and sleep quality-were identified. It is critical for future studies to further investigate this student population and for universities to provide more flexible learning options and more access to psychological services.

T-lymphoblastic lymphoma/leukemia without clonal TCR gene rearrangements: case report and literature review.

T-lymphoblastic lymphoma (T-LBL) is a highly aggressive malignancy originating from T-lymphocyte precursors. Incidence is highest in children and adolescents. T-cell receptor (TCR) gene rearrangement is usually present. TCR gene rearrangement-negative cases are considered rare. Here, we investigated the clinicopathological features, differential diagnosis, therapy, and prognosis of TCR gene rearrangement-negative T-lymphoblastic lymphoma/leukemia (T-LBL/ALL) by case report and literature review. An 18-year-old male with polyglandular lymphadenopathy underwent an excisional lymph node biopsy and bone marrow aspiration that disclosed diffuse distribution of round, small to medium sized cells with scant cytoplasm, delicate chromatin, and frequent mitotic figures. Immunophenotyping showed expression of TDT, CD3, CD7, and CD5, no CD34, CD20, CD56, bcl-6, CD4, CD8, or MPO in lymph node tissue. Immunohistochemical staining for pathological consultation was performed by Streptavidin peroxidase (SP) method, EB virus coded small RNA (EBER) tested by in situ hybridization (ISH), (EBER-ISH). And flow cytometry of bone marrow aspirate showed that tumor cells expressed CD3, CD5, CD7; partial expression of CD2, CD10, CD38, TDT; and no expression of CD1a, CD34, CD4, CD8, mCD3, CD33, CD56, CD19, CD79a, HLA-DR and MPO. These findings led to the diagnosis of T-LBL/-ALL. Molecular genetic testing showed no TCR gene rearrangement. The patient received chemotherapy consisting of vinorelbine, pirarubicin, cyclophosphamide, asparaginase, and prednisone. Prophylactic chemotherapy of the central nervous system and radiotherapy of the mediastinum were also given. And responded to combined chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Although T-LBL/ALL typically features TCR gene rearrangement, rare cases without rearrangement may occur. Diagnosis is based on clinical characteristics, histopathology, immunotyping, and molecular genetics.

The Value of Brain Imaging and Electrophysiological Testing for Early Screening of Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Systematic Review.

Given the significance of validating reliable tests for the early detection of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), this systematic review aims to summarize available evidence of neuroimaging and neurophysiological changes in high-risk infants to improve ASD early diagnosis. We included peer-reviewed, primary research in English published before May 21, 2021, involving the use of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), electroencephalogram (EEG), or functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) in children with high risk for ASD under 24 months of age. The main exclusion criteria includes diagnosis of a genetic disorder and gestation age of less the 36 weeks. Online research was performed on PubMed, Web of Science, PsycINFO, and CINAHL. Article selection was conducted by two reviewers to minimize bias. This research was funded by Massachusetts General Hospital Sundry funding. IRB approval was not submitted as it was deemed unnecessary. We included 75 primary research articles. Studies showed that high-risk infants had divergent developmental trajectories for fractional anisotropy and regional brain volumes, increased CSF volume, and global connectivity abnormalities on MRI, decreased sensitivity for familiar faces, atypical lateralization during facial and auditory processing, and different spectral powers across multiple band frequencies on EEG, and distinct developmental trajectories in functional connectivity and regional oxyhemoglobin concentrations in fNIRS. These findings in infants were found to be correlated with the core ASD symptoms and diagnosis at toddler age. Despite the lack of quantitative analysis of the research database, neuroimaging and electrophysiological biomarkers have promising value for the screening of ASD as early as infancy with high accuracy, which warrants further investigation.