Application of static integrated skeletal reduction and tabulation of dynamic adaptive chemistry in the combustion simulation of ethylene-fueled scramjet combustor.

The high-fidelity reduced mechanism is one of the key elements in the combustion simulation of scramjet combustors to reveal their combustion and flow phenomena. In the present work, the hierarchically constructed NUIGMech1.2 (2857 species and 11 814 reactions) is applied to the combustion simulation of an ethylene-fueled scramjet combustor using the method of static integrated skeletal reduction and tabulation of dynamic adaptive chemistry (TDAC). The integrated skeletal reduction strategy successively consists of species elimination using the revised directed relation graph with error propagation method of fixed species scheme and improved sensitivity analysis method, and reactions elimination based on computational singular perturbation importance index. A preferred ethylene skeletal mechanism (26 species and 117 reactions) is obtained through the integrated skeletal reduction strategy under target working conditions of temperature range of 900-1800 K, pressure range of 1-4 atm, and equivalence ratio range of 0.25-5.0. The compact skeletal mechanism is comprehensively validated against the experimental results of ignition delay times, laminar flame speeds, and key species concentration profiles. Meanwhile, it shows consistent results with the detailed mechanism on the adiabatic flame temperature profiles and "S"-curves. When applying this skeletal mechanism to combustion simulations of ethylene-fueled scramjet combustor with double parallel cavities, the path flux analysis method and in situ adaptive tabulation algorithm of TDAC is further utilized to speed up the chemical reaction solution process at run-time. Under the scramjet and ramjet modes, the corresponding simulation results in terms of flame luminosity images, schlieren images, and static pressure distributions, coincide well with those of experimental measurements. The combustion and flow characteristics of the two modes are investigated and analyzed comparatively based on above results and combustion performance parameters. Present work contributes to the application of fuel kinetic mechanisms in scramjet combustor combustion simulation.

HM_ADET: a hybrid model for automatic detection of eyelid tumors based on photographic images.

BACKGROUND: The accurate detection of eyelid tumors is essential for effective treatment, but it can be challenging due to small and unevenly distributed lesions surrounded by irrelevant noise. Moreover, early symptoms of eyelid tumors are atypical, and some categories of eyelid tumors exhibit similar color and texture features, making it difficult to distinguish between benign and malignant eyelid tumors, particularly for ophthalmologists with limited clinical experience. METHODS: We propose a hybrid model, HM_ADET, for automatic detection of eyelid tumors, including YOLOv7_CNFG to locate eyelid tumors and vision transformer (ViT) to classify benign and malignant eyelid tumors. First, the ConvNeXt module with an inverted bottleneck layer in the backbone of YOLOv7_CNFG is employed to prevent information loss of small eyelid tumors. Then, the flexible rectified linear unit (FReLU) is applied to capture multi-scale features such as texture, edge, and shape, thereby improving the localization accuracy of eyelid tumors. In addition, considering the geometric center and area difference between the predicted box (PB) and the ground truth box (GT), the GIoU_loss was utilized to handle cases of eyelid tumors with varying shapes and irregular boundaries. Finally, the multi-head attention (MHA) module is applied in ViT to extract discriminative features of eyelid tumors for benign and malignant classification. RESULTS: Experimental results demonstrate that the HM_ADET model achieves excellent performance in the detection of eyelid tumors. In specific, YOLOv7_CNFG outperforms YOLOv7, with AP increasing from 0.763 to 0.893 on the internal test set and from 0.647 to 0.765 on the external test set. ViT achieves AUCs of 0.945 (95% CI 0.894-0.981) and 0.915 (95% CI 0.860-0.955) for the classification of benign and malignant tumors on the internal and external test sets, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Our study provides a promising strategy for the automatic diagnosis of eyelid tumors, which could potentially improve patient outcomes and reduce healthcare costs.

Immunity-and-matrix-regulatory cells enhance cartilage regeneration for meniscus injuries: a phase I dose-escalation trial.

Immunity-and-matrix-regulatory cells (IMRCs) derived from human embryonic stem cells have unique abilities in modulating immunity and regulating the extracellular matrix, which could be mass-produced with stable biological properties. Despite resemblance to mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) in terms of self-renew and tri-lineage differentiation, the ability of IMRCs to repair the meniscus and the underlying mechanism remains undetermined. Here, we showed that IMRCs demonstrated stronger immunomodulatory and pro-regenerative potential than umbilical cord MSCs when stimulated by synovial fluid from patients with meniscus injury. Following injection into the knees of rabbits with meniscal injury, IMRCs enhanced endogenous fibrocartilage regeneration. In the dose-escalating phase I clinical trial (NCT03839238) with eighteen patients recruited, we found that intra-articular IMRCs injection in patients was safe over 12 months post-grafting. Furthermore, the effective results of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of meniscus repair and knee functional scores suggested that 5 × 107 cells are optimal for meniscus injury treatment. In summary, we present the first report of a phase I clinical trial using IMRCs to treat meniscus injury. Our results demonstrated that intra-articular injection of IMRCs is a safe and effective therapy by providing a permissive niche for cartilage regeneration.

LncSUMO1P3 exacerbates malignant behaviors of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma cells via miR-486-5p/PHF8/CD151.

Background: Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is a malignancy usually associated with smoking or alcohol consumption. The involvement of long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) in the regulation of tumor development and metastasis through molecular mechanisms has been unveiled by accumulating evidence. However, the function of lncRNA SUMO1 Pseudogene 3 (lncSUMO1P3) essential to ESCC development remains obscure. Methods: Reverse transcription quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) and Western blot (WB) analysis were done to measure RNA and protein levels. Functional assays were carried out to examine the changes in ESCC cell phenotype. Supported by bioinformatics analysis, mechanism assays were done for assessment of putative interactions among different genes. Results: LlncSUMO1P3 was aberrantly up-regulated in ESCC cell lines, and lncSUMO1P3 deficiency could hamper cell proliferation, migration and invasion as well as epithelial-mesenchymaltransition (EMT) in ESCC while lncSUMO1P3 overexpression led to the opposite consequences. LncSUMO1P3 could competitively bind to microRNA-486-5p (miR-486-5p) or PHD finger protein 8 (PHF8) to modulate CD151 expression. CD151 was also verified to regulate ESCC cell biological behaviors. Conclusion: Our study revealed that lncSUMO1P3, up-regulated in ESCC cells, could sponge miR-486-5p and recruit PHF8 to up-regulate CD151, thus influencing the malignant behaviors of ESCC cells.

High-Strength Cell Sheets and Vigorous Hydrogels from Mesenchymal Stem Cells Derived from Human Embryonic Stem Cells.

Natural cell derivates, including cell sheets (CSs) and matrix gels, have opened new opportunities to probe questions in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. However, the potential of CSs and hydrogels generated by current protocols is still limited by the challenges of heterogeneity and weak mechanical properties. Here, we developed a 21 day long-term serum-free culture system for human embryonic stem cell (hESC)-derived immunity-and-matrix-regulatory cells (IMRCs). The CSs formed with IMRCs (IMRC-CSs) have a much greater secretion capacity for the extracellular matrix (ECM) and stronger mechanical properties than umbilical cord-derived MSCs, with a ten thousand-fold increase in elastin, a higher elastic modulus of 1500 kPa, a thicker structure of 20.59 µm, and a higher fiber count per square millimeter. The IMRC-CSs could promote corneal chemical injury repair and could be turned into injectable temperature-sensitive hydrogels for uterine adhesion repair via a decellularization process. In summary, we have established a high-strength CS platform using human pluripotent stem cells for the first time, providing a facile and scalable engineering approach for regenerative medicine.

Artificial intelligence in ophthalmology: The path to the real-world clinic.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has great potential to transform healthcare by enhancing the workflow and productivity of clinicians, enabling existing staff to serve more patients, improving patient outcomes, and reducing health disparities. In the field of ophthalmology, AI systems have shown performance comparable with or even better than experienced ophthalmologists in tasks such as diabetic retinopathy detection and grading. However, despite these quite good results, very few AI systems have been deployed in real-world clinical settings, challenging the true value of these systems. This review provides an overview of the current main AI applications in ophthalmology, describes the challenges that need to be overcome prior to clinical implementation of the AI systems, and discusses the strategies that may pave the way to the clinical translation of these systems.

Biliatresone induces cholangiopathy in C57BL/6J neonates.

Exposure to plant toxins or microbiota that are able to digest common food ingredients to toxic structures might be responsible for biliary atresia (BA). An isoflavonoid, biliatresone is known to effectively alter the extrahepatic bile duct (EHBD) development in BALB/c mice. Biliatresone causes a reduction of Glutathione (GSH) levels, SOX17 downregulation and is effectively countered with N-Acetyl-L-cysteine treatment in vitro. Therefore, reversing GSH-loss appears to be a promising treatment target for a translational approach. Since BALB/c mice have been described as sensitive in various models, we evaluated the toxic effect of biliatresone in robust C57BL/6J mice and confirmed its toxicity. Comparison between BALB/c and C57BL/6J mice revealed similarity in the toxic model. Affected neonates exhibited clinical symptoms of BA, such as jaundice, ascites, clay-colored stools, yellow urine and impaired weight gain. The gallbladders of jaundiced neonates were hydropic and EHBD were twisted and enlarged. Serum and histological analysis proved cholestasis. No anomalies were seen in the liver and EHBD of control animals. With our study we join a chain of evidence confirming that biliatresone is an effective agent for cross-lineage targeted alteration of the EHBD system.

Human embryonic stem cell-derived immunity-and-matrix regulatory cells promote intrahepatic cell renewal to rescue acute liver failure.

Acute liver failure (ALF) is a clinical syndrome characterized by the accelerated development of hepatocyte necrosis and significant mortality. Given that liver transplantation is now the only curative treatment available for ALF, there is an urgent need to explore innovative therapies. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have been applied in preclinical studies for ALF. It had been demonstrated that human embryonic stem cell-derived immunity-and-matrix regulatory cells (IMRCs) met the properties of MSCs and had been employed in a wide range of conditions. In this study, we conducted a preclinical evaluation of IMRCs in the treatment of ALF and investigated the mechanism involved. ALF was induced in C57BL/6 mice via intraperitoneal administration of 50% CCl4 (6 mL/kg) mixed with corn oil, followed by intravenous injection of IMRCs (3 × 106 cells/each). IMRCs improved histopathological changes in the liver and reduced alanine transaminase (ALT) or aspartate transaminase (AST) levels in serum. IMRCs also promoted cell renewal in the liver and protected it from CCl4 damage. Furthermore, our data indicated that IMRCs protected against CCl4-induced ALF by regulating the IGFBP2-mTOR-PTEN signaling pathway, which is associated with the repopulation of intrahepatic cells. Overall, IMRCs offered protection against CCl4-induced ALF and were capable of preventing apoptosis and necrosis in hepatocytes, which provided a new perspective for treating and improving the prognosis of ALF.

Prediction of OCT images of short-term response to anti-VEGF treatment for diabetic macular edema using different generative adversarial networks.

PURPOSE: This study sought to assess the predictive performance of optical coherence tomography (OCT) images for the response of diabetic macular edema (DME) patients to anti-vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) therapy generated from baseline images using generative adversarial networks (GANs). METHODS: Patient information, including clinical and imaging data, was obtained from inpatients at the Ophthalmology Department of Qilu Hospital. 715 and 103 pairs of pre-and post-treatment OCT images of DME patients were included in the training and validation sets, respectively. The post-treatment OCT images were used to assess the validity of the generated images. Six different GAN models (CycleGAN, PairGAN, Pix2pixHD, RegGAN, SPADE, UNIT) were applied to predict the efficacy of anti-VEGF treatment by generating OCT images. Independent screening and evaluation experiments were conducted to validate the quality and comparability of images generated by different GAN models. RESULTS: OCT images generated f GAN models exhibited high comparability to the real images, especially for edema absorption. RegGAN exhibited the highest prediction accuracy over the CycleGAN, PairGAN, Pix2pixHD, SPADE, and UNIT models. Further analyses were conducted based on the RegGAN. Most post-therapeutic OCT images (95/103) were difficult to differentiate from the real OCT images by retinal specialists. A mean absolute error of 26.74 ± 21.28 µm was observed for central macular thickness (CMT) between the synthetic and real OCT images. CONCLUSION: Different generative adversarial networks have different prognostic efficacy for DME, and RegGAN yielded the best performance in our study. Different GAN models yielded good accuracy in predicting the OCT-based response to anti-VEGF treatment at one month. Overall, the application of GAN models can assist clinicians in prognosis prediction of patients with DME to design better treatment strategies and follow-up schedules.

Successful thoracoscopic resection of a giant mediastinal cyst in a newborn boy.

There are fewer reports of thoracoscopic surgical resection of mediastinal cysts in neonates. The aim of this article is to report on the feasibility of thoracoscopic resection of a large mediastinal cyst and the management of chylothorax after surgery in neonates.

Ginsenoside Rb2: A review of pharmacokinetics and pharmacological effects.

Ginsenoside Rb2 is an active protopanaxadiol-type saponin, widely existing in the stem and leave of ginseng. Rb2 has recently been the focus of studies for pharmaceutical properties. This paper provides an overview of the preclinical and clinical pharmacokinetics for Rb2, which exhibit poor absorption, rapid tissue distribution and slow excretion through urine. Pharmacological studies indicate a beneficial role of Rb2 in the prevention and treatment of diabetes, obesity, tumor, photoaging, virus infection and cardiovascular problems. The underlying mechanism is involved in an inhibition of oxidative stress, ROS generation, inflammation and apoptosis via regulation of various cellular signaling pathways and molecules, including AKT/SHP, MAPK, EGFR/SOX2, TGF-ß1/Smad, SIRT1, GPR120/AMPK/HO-1 and NF-κB. This work would provide a new insight into the understanding and application of Rb2. However, its therapeutic effects have not been clinically evaluated. Further studies should be aimed at the clinical treatment of Rb2.

Artificial intelligence to detect malignant eyelid tumors from photographic images.

Malignant eyelid tumors can invade adjacent structures and pose a threat to vision and even life. Early identification of malignant eyelid tumors is crucial to avoiding substantial morbidity and mortality. However, differentiating malignant eyelid tumors from benign ones can be challenging for primary care physicians and even some ophthalmologists. Here, based on 1,417 photographic images from 851 patients across three hospitals, we developed an artificial intelligence system using a faster region-based convolutional neural network and deep learning classification networks to automatically locate eyelid tumors and then distinguish between malignant and benign eyelid tumors. The system performed well in both internal and external test sets (AUCs ranged from 0.899 to 0.955). The performance of the system is comparable to that of a senior ophthalmologist, indicating that this system has the potential to be used at the screening stage for promoting the early detection and treatment of malignant eyelid tumors.

Synthesis and anti-tumor activity evaluation of salinomycin C20-O-alkyl/benzyl oxime derivatives.

Seventeen C20-O-alkyl/benzyl oxime derivatives were synthesized by a concise and effective method. Most of these derivatives showed tens to several hundred nanomolar IC50 values against HT-29 colorectal, HGC-27 gastric and MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cells, whose antiproliferative activity is 15-240 fold better than that of salinomycin. The C20-oxime etherified derivatives can coordinate potassium ions, and further adjust the cytosolic Ca2+ concentrations in HT-29 cells. The significant improvement of the potency should be attributed to the better ion binding and transport ability of the modified derivatives. In addition, the C20-O-alkyl/benzyl oxime derivatives showed much better selectivity indexes (SI) than salinomycin, indicating that they present lower neurotoxic risk.

Laparoscopic vs open Ladd's procedure for malrotation in neonates and infants: a propensity score matching analysis.

BACKGROUND: Laparoscopic Ladd's procedure for malrotation in children is still a controversial approach. Although some retrospective studies have compared the outcomes of the two types of procedure with inconsistency outcomes. Currently, there are few large-scale studies on laparoscopic treatment in malrotation with neonates and infants. We did a study based on propensity score matching to compare the effects of the two kinds of approach in neonates and infants. To investigate the therapeutic effect of laparoscopy and open Ladd's procedure by the propensity score-matching (PSM) to enhance the validity of the comparison. METHODS: A total series of 143 cases of intestinal malrotation without intestinal necrosis was included in the study during the 8 years from January 2012 to January 2020, including 68 cases of open Ladd's procedure and 75 cases of laparoscopic Ladd's procedure including five cases of transfer laparotomy. By a propensity score 1:1 matching, 62 patients were stratified for each group. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: There was no significant difference in volvulus degree, weight and gender between the two groups (p > 0.05). Laparoscopic surgery took more time than open surgery (105.9 min vs 70.6 min, p < 0.05), but it had less hospital stay (12.4 days vs 14.6 days, p < 0.05) or less incision infection (0 vs 6, p < 0.05). There was no significant difference between the two groups at the time of first defecation, blood loss, time of full feeding and reoperation (p > 0.05). The cosmetic effect of laparoscopic surgery is better than that of open surgery. Laparoscopic Ladd's procedure is a safe approach. It can reduce the length of hospital stay and incision infection, but the operation time was extended, the other complications are similar compared with open procedure for intestinal malrotation in neonates and infants.

Application of Comprehensive Artificial intelligence Retinal Expert (CARE) system: a national real-world evidence study.

BACKGROUND: Medical artificial intelligence (AI) has entered the clinical implementation phase, although real-world performance of deep-learning systems (DLSs) for screening fundus disease remains unsatisfactory. Our study aimed to train a clinically applicable DLS for fundus diseases using data derived from the real world, and externally test the model using fundus photographs collected prospectively from the settings in which the model would most likely be adopted. METHODS: In this national real-world evidence study, we trained a DLS, the Comprehensive AI Retinal Expert (CARE) system, to identify the 14 most common retinal abnormalities using 207 228 colour fundus photographs derived from 16 clinical settings with different disease distributions. CARE was internally validated using 21 867 photographs and externally tested using 18 136 photographs prospectively collected from 35 real-world settings across China where CARE might be adopted, including eight tertiary hospitals, six community hospitals, and 21 physical examination centres. The performance of CARE was further compared with that of 16 ophthalmologists and tested using datasets with non-Chinese ethnicities and previously unused camera types. This study was registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT04213430, and is currently closed. FINDINGS: The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) in the internal validation set was 0·955 (SD 0·046). AUC values in the external test set were 0·965 (0·035) in tertiary hospitals, 0·983 (0·031) in community hospitals, and 0·953 (0·042) in physical examination centres. The performance of CARE was similar to that of ophthalmologists. Large variations in sensitivity were observed among the ophthalmologists in different regions and with varying experience. The system retained strong identification performance when tested using the non-Chinese dataset (AUC 0·960, 95% CI 0·957-0·964 in referable diabetic retinopathy). INTERPRETATION: Our DLS (CARE) showed satisfactory performance for screening multiple retinal abnormalities in real-world settings using prospectively collected fundus photographs, and so could allow the system to be implemented and adopted for clinical care. FUNDING: This study was funded by the National Key R&D Programme of China, the Science and Technology Planning Projects of Guangdong Province, the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province, and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities. TRANSLATION: For the Chinese translation of the abstract see Supplementary Materials section.

LncRNA ADAMTS9-AS1 knockdown restricts cell proliferation and EMT in non-small cell lung cancer.

A recent bioinformatics analysis identified long non-coding RNA antisense 1 ADAMTS9-AS1 as an independent prognostic marker in several tumors, including prostate cancer and bladder cancer. Nevertheless, the prognostic value and functional role of ADAMTS9-AS1 in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) remain elusive. Here, we first found that the expression of ADAMTS9-AS1 was significantly upregulated in NSCLC tissues compared with adjacent normal tissues using quantitative real time PCR analysis. Clinically, we observed that ADAMTS9-AS1 expression was associated with TNM stage, lymph node metastasis and poor prognosis in NSCLC patients. By performing loss-of-function assay in A549 and 95D cells, our in vitro experiments further showed that knockdown of ADAMTS9-AS1 remarkedly suppressed cell proliferation, caused cell cycle G0/G1 arrest and apoptosis, and inhibited cell migration and invasion in NSCLC cells using CCK-8, colony formation, flow cytometry and transwell assays. Moreover, we found that ADAMTS9-AS1 knockdown downregulated the expression of CDK4, N-cadherin, Vimentin, but upregulated the expression of Bad and E-cadherin. In summary, our results revealed that ADAMTS9-AS1 may serve as a potential therapeutic target for the treatment of patients with NSCLC.

A novel two-port single-site laparoscopic pyloromyotomy for infantile hypertrophic pyloric stenosis.

OBJECTIVE: The objective of the study is to explore a less invasive laparoscopic pyloromyotomy for treating infantile hypertrophic pyloric stenosis. PATIENTS AND METHODS: A series of 154 cases from January 2014 to January 2020 were retrospectively analysed. Seventy patients were treated with the method of transumbilical single-site laparoscopic pyloromyotomy (SSLP), and 84 patients were treated with two-site laparoscopic pyloromyotomy. There was no difference in the body weight, sex ratio or age between the two groups. The operation time, blood loss, post-operative feeding time and complications between the two groups were compared. RESULTS: The novel single-site method had better cosmetic effect than the two-site approach. There was no difference in the operation time, blood loss, post-operative feeding time or complications between the two groups. CONCLUSION: The novel SSLP method requires only two incisions through the umbilicus to complete the procedure, with barely visible scars and similar surgical complications to that of the two-site approach; thus, the novel method is worth promoting.

High Expression of MDM2 and the p53 Protein is Predictive Biomarkers for Poor Prognosis of Oesophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: In the present study, we detected the expression of MDM2 and p53 in oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) specimens, studied their relationship with the survival of OSCC patients, and explored the potential of MDM2 and p53 to serve as predictive OSCC tumour markers. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Through immunohistochemistry and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH), we detected the expression of MDM2 and the p53 protein in 157 OSCC specimens that met the inclusion and exclusion criteria. After scoring the results, Pearson's chi-square test and Cox regression were used for analysis. RESULTS: The results showed that the rates of high MDM2 and p53 expression in OSCC tissues were 60.5% and 51.0%, respectively. The expression levels of MDM2 and p53 in OSCC were significantly positively correlated (p<0.001, r=0.414). In addition, the pathological metastasis (M) status and MDM2 protein expression in OSCC were significantly correlated (p=0.027), and high expression of the p53 protein was positively correlated with OSCC transfer (p=0.005), pathological node status (p=0.008), and clinical stage (p=0.003). Kaplan-Meier survival analysis showed that the high expression of MDM2 and p53 was significantly related to the poor prognosis of OSCC. Moreover, subgroup analysis of the TNM staging of OSCC patients showed that the high expression of MDM2 and p53 was significantly correlated with poor OS and DFS of OSCC patients in either stage I-II or III-IV patients. Both univariate and Cox multivariate analyses showed that p53 and MDM2 can be used as independent factors for the prognosis of OSCC patients. Finally, our FISH detection results for MDM2 showed that the high expression of MDM2 was significantly correlated with the amplification of MDM2 (p=0.015). CONCLUSION: This study shows that MDM2 and p53 can be used as independent predictors of the prognosis of patients with oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma.

Hyaluronate supports hESC-cardiomyocyte cell therapy for cardiac regeneration after acute myocardial infarction.

INTRODUCTION: Enormous progress has been made in cardiac regeneration using human embryonic stem cell-derived cardiomyocyte (hESC-CM) grafts in pre-clinical trials. However, the rate of cell survival has remained very low due to anoikis after transplantation into the heart as single cells. Numerous solutions have been proposed to improve cell survival, and one of these strategies is to co-transplant biocompatible materials or hydrogels with the hESC-CMs. METHODS: In our study, we screened various combinations of biomaterials that could promote anoikis resistance and improve hESC-CM survival upon co-transplantation and promote cardiac functional recovery. We injected different combinations of Matrigel, alginate and hyaluronate with hESC-CM suspensions into the myocardium of rat models with myocardial infarction (MI). RESULTS: Our results showed that the group treated with a combination of hyaluronate and hESC-CMs had the lowest arrhythmia rates when stimulated with programmed electrical stimulation. While all three combinations of hydrogel-hESC-CM treatments improved rat cardiac function compared with the saline control group, the combination with hyaluronate most significantly reduced pathological changes from left ventricular remodelling and improved both left ventricular function and left ventricular ejection fraction by 28 days post-infarction. CONCLUSION: Hence, we concluded that hyaluronate-hESC-CM is a superior combination therapy for promoting cardiac regeneration after myocardial infarction.

Stem cell therapy for COVID-19, ARDS and pulmonary fibrosis.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an acute respiratory infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). COVID-19 mainly causes damage to the lung, as well as other organs and systems such as the hearts, the immune system and so on. Although the pathogenesis of COVID-19 has been fully elucidated, there is no specific therapy for the disease at present, and most treatments are limited to supportive care. Stem cell therapy may be a potential treatment for refractory and unmanageable pulmonary illnesses, which has shown some promising results in preclinical studies. In this review, we systematically summarize the pathogenic progression and potential mechanisms underlying stem cell therapy in COVID-19, and registered COVID-19 clinical trials. Of all the stem cell therapies touted for COVID-19 treatment, mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) or MSC-like derivatives have been the most promising in preclinical studies and clinical trials so far. MSCs have been suggested to ameliorate the cytokine release syndrome (CRS) and protect alveolar epithelial cells by secreting many kinds of factors, demonstrating safety and possible efficacy in COVID-19 patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). However, considering the consistency and uniformity of stem cell quality cannot be quantified nor guaranteed at this point, more work remains to be done in the future.