Miro-mediated mitochondrial transport: A new dimension for disease-related abnormal cell metabolism?

Mitochondria are versatile and highly dynamic organelles found in eukaryotic cells that play important roles in a variety of cellular processes. The importance of mitochondrial transport in cell metabolism, including variations in mitochondrial distribution within cells and intercellular transfer, has grown in recent years. Several studies have demonstrated that abnormal mitochondrial transport represents an early pathogenic alteration in a variety of illnesses, emphasizing its significance in disease development and progression. Mitochondrial Rho GTPase (Miro) is a protein found on the outer mitochondrial membrane that is required for cytoskeleton-dependent mitochondrial transport, mitochondrial dynamics (fusion and fission), and mitochondrial Ca2+ homeostasis. Miro, as a critical regulator of mitochondrial transport, has yet to be thoroughly investigated in illness. This review focuses on recent developments in recognizing Miro as a crucial molecule in controlling mitochondrial transport and investigates its roles in diverse illnesses. It also intends to shed light on the possibilities of targeting Miro as a therapeutic method for a variety of diseases.

Impacts of adding thermotolerant nitrifying bacteria on nitrogenous gas emissions and bacterial community structure during sewage sludge composting.

This study aimed to evaluate the impacts of inoculation with bacterial inoculum containing three thermotolerant nitrifying bacteria strains on nitrogenous gas (mainly NH3 and N2O) emissions and bacterial structure during the sludge composting. The results of physicochemical parameters indicated that inoculation could prolong the thermophilic phase, accelerate degradation of organic substances and improve compost quality. Compared with the non-inoculated treatment, the addition of bacterial agents not only increased the total nitrogen content by 8.7% but also reduced the cumulative NH3 and N2O emissions by 32.2% and 34.6%, respectively. The bacterial inoculation changed the structure and diversity of the microbial community in composting. Additionally, the relative abundances (RA) of bacteria and correlation analyses revealed that inoculation increased the RA of bacteria involved in nitrogen fixation. These results suggested that inoculation of thermotolerant nitrifying bacteria was beneficial for reducing nitrogen loss, nitrogenous gas emissions and regulating the bacterial community during the composting.

Case report: 10-year survival of a patient with a primary hepatic gastrointestinal stromal tumor.

Background: Gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs) are mesenchymal tumors of the gastrointestinal tract. Extra-gastrointestinal stromal tumors (EGISTs) predominantly arise outside the gastrointestinal tract, although primary hepatic GISTs are extremely rare. GISTs are highly aggressive; they often grow to a large size. Here, we report the 10-year survival of a patient with a primary hepatic GIST following sequential response therapy. Case presentation: A 50-year-old Chinese man complained of fatigue and slight abdominal pain, and presented with a large lump in the liver, which was detected by computed tomography (CT). He was subsequently diagnosed with a primary hepatic GIST, based on CT-guided fine needle aspiration cytology and immunohistochemistry analyses. The presence of GIST or EGIST metastases was excluded using CT, esophagogastroduodenoscopy, colonoscopy, and ultrasound. Cytological examination showed that the tumor was composed of epithelioid and spindle cells. Immunohistochemistry analysis revealed positive staining for CD117 (KIT) and DOG1, and negative staining for CD34, S-100, and α-smooth muscle actin (SMA). Following tumor ablation with argon-helium cryosurgery, the patient received imatinib mesylate for 61 months. However, this treatment was discontinued because of disease progression, at which point interventional therapy was administered once. One month later, sunitinib malate was administered for 71 months. The patient achieved long-term survival for 135 months. Conclusions: EGISTs can be easily misdiagnosed as other types of tumors because they have no specific characteristics to distinguish them during imaging examinations. However, our case study demonstrates that the long-term survival of patients with EGISTs can be achieved with molecular targeted therapy.

Heterogeneity Analysis of Bladder Cancer Based on DNA Methylation Molecular Profiling.

Bladder cancer is a highly complex and heterogeneous malignancy. Tumor heterogeneity is a barrier to effective diagnosis and treatment of bladder cancer. Human carcinogenesis is closely related to abnormal gene expression, and DNA methylation is an important regulatory factor of gene expression. Therefore, it is of great significance for bladder cancer research to characterize tumor heterogeneity by integrating genetic and epigenetic characteristics. This study explored specific molecular subtypes based on DNA methylation status and identified subtype-specific characteristics using patient samples from the TCGA database with DNA methylation and gene expression were measured simultaneously. The results were validated using an independent cohort from GEO database. Four DNA methylation molecular subtypes of bladder cancer were obtained with different prognostic states. In addition, subtype-specific DNA methylation markers were identified using an information entropy-based algorithm to represent the unique molecular characteristics of the subtype and verified in the test set. The results of this study can provide an important reference for clinicians to make treatment decisions.

Comparison between spleen and liver stiffness measurements by sound touch elastography for diagnosing cirrhosis at different aminotransferase levels: a prospective multicenter study.

OBJECTIVES: To compare the performance of spleen stiffness measurement (SSM) and liver stiffness measurement (LSM) by sound touch elastography (STE) for the diagnosis of cirrhosis at different alanine aminotransferase (ALT) levels, and to compare the applicability and repeatability of SSM with LSM performed by STE, a new two-dimensional shear wave elastography technology. METHODS: This prospective multicenter study included 25 centers and recruited chronic hepatitis B (CHB) patients with liver biopsy between May 2018 and November 2019. All patients underwent LSM and SSM by STE. Success and reliability rates were calculated and compared. Intra-observer agreement was assessed using intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs). Differences between areas under the receiver operating characteristic curves (AUCs) of LSMs and SSMs at different ALT levels were compared using the Delong test. RESULTS: Among 603 CHB patients, the success and reliability rates of SSM were 94.53% (570/603) and 85.74% (517/603), respectively, which were similar to those of LSM (p > 0.05), respectively. The ICC for intra-observer agreements of SSM was 0.964 (p < 0.001). In the total cohort, ALT ≤ 2 × upper limit of normal (ULN) group, and A0-1 group, the AUCs of SSMs were significantly lower than those of LSMs for the diagnosis of cirrhosis (p < 0.001). In the ALT > 2 × ULN group and A2-3 group, the AUC of SSM improved and was not significantly different from that of LSM (p = 0.342, p = 0.510, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: SSM by STE achieved applicability and repeatability equivalent to those of LSM. SSM might be a good substitute to LSM in patients with high ALT levels. KEY POINTS: • Spleen stiffness measurement performed by sound touch elastography was proven to have similar applicability and repeatability to liver stiffness measurement in this prospective multicenter study. • Spleen stiffness measurement demonstrated a poorer diagnostic performance for cirrhosis compared with liver stiffness measurement in the total cohort and low ALT level group, yet it showed a similar diagnostic performance to liver stiffness measurement in patients with high ALT levels.

Synthesis of CaO from waste shells for microwave-assisted catalytic pyrolysis of waste cooking oil to produce aromatic-rich bio-oil.

Energy shortage and environmental pollution have attracted long-term attention. In this study, CaO were prepared from waste eggshell (EGC), preserved egg shell (PEC), clam shell (CLC) and crab shell (CRC), which were then compared with commercial CaO (CMC) to catalyze microwave-assisted pyrolysis of waste cooking oil (WCO) for enrichment of aromatics in bio-oil. The characterization results indicated that EGC and CLC contained 95.54% and 95.61% CaO respectively, which were higher than that of CMC (95.11%), and the pore properties of EGC were the best. In addition, the effects of CaO type and catalytic mode on pyrolysis were studied. In CaO catalytic pyrolysis, CMC and CLC in-situ catalysis produced more aromatics than ex-situ catalysis, and PEC and CRC were more conducive to aromatics formation in ex-situ condition. EGC was conducive to produce benzene, toluene and xylene (BTX) both in in-situ (19.04%) and ex-situ (20.76%) catalytic pyrolysis. In CaO/HZSM-5 catalysis, the optimal dual catalytic mode for generating monocyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (MAHs) was Mode A (CaO separated from HZSM-5 for ex-situ catalysis), and EGC/HZSM-5 performed well in benzene, toluene and xylene (BTX) production.

Low-temperature carbonization synthesis of carbon-based super-hydrophobic foam for efficient multi-state oil/water separation.

In view of the complexity and diversity of multi-state oils, the development of green and low-cost materials with high selectivity to oils has important ecological significance in the polluted water treatment. Herein, a simple method was proposed to develop large-scale production of superhydrophobic sponges (CPMF200 sponges) for high-efficiency oil/water separation under different complex environments. The as-prepared CPMF200 sponges possessed many superior properties, including high roughness, well-developed porosity, good thermal stability, excellent chemical stability, and superhydrophobic properties (water contact angle is 152°), which is conducive to high oil adsorption capacity (up to 70-179 times of its own weight) and oil-water separation. More importantly, the CPMF400 sponge has an excellent photothermal conversion capability to improve the fluidity of high viscosity oil for oil recovery. Based on a simple synthesis method, it exhibits high-efficiency absorption of multi-state oils and excellent oil-water separation performance and strongly proves their application prospects in treating oily wastewater.

Microwave catalytic co-pyrolysis of waste cooking oil and low-density polyethylene to produce monocyclic aromatic hydrocarbons: Effect of different catalysts and pyrolysis parameters.

It is promising to convert waste oil and plastics to renewable fuels and chemicals by microwave catalytic co-pyrolysis, enabling pollution reduction and resource recovery. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of catalysts on the product selectivity of microwave-assisted co-pyrolysis of waste cooking oil and low-density polyethylene and optimize the pyrolysis process, including pyrolysis temperature, catalytic temperature, waste cooking oil to low-density polyethylene ratio, and catalyst to feedstocks ratio. The results indicated that catalysts had a great influence on the product distribution, and the yield of BTX (benzene, toluene, and xylenes), which increased in the following order: SAPO-34 < Hß < HY < HZSM-5. HZSM-5 was more active for the formation of light aromatic hydrocarbons as compared to others, where the concentrations of toluene, benzene and xylenes reached 252.59 mg/mL, 114.7 mg/mL and 132.91 mg/mL, respectively. The optimum pyrolysis temperature, catalytic temperature, waste cooking oil to low-density polyethylene ratio and catalyst to feedstocks ratio could be 550 °C, 450 °C, 1:1 and 1:2, respectively, to maximize the formation of BTX and inhibit the formation of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.

Using Ultrasound-Based Multilayer Perceptron to Differentiate Early Breast Mucinous Cancer and its Subtypes From Fibroadenoma.

OBJECTIVES: Mucinous breast cancer (MBC), particularly pure MBC (pMBC), often tend to be confused with fibroadenoma (FA) due to their similar images and firm masses, so some MBC cases are misdiagnosed to be FA, which may cause poor prognosis. We analyzed the ultrasonic features and aimed to identify the ability of multilayer perceptron (MLP) to classify early MBC and its subtypes and FA. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study consisted of 193 patients diagnosed with pMBC, mMBC, or FA. The area under curve (AUC) was calculated to assess the effectiveness of age and 10 ultrasound features in differentiating MBC from FA. We used the pairwise comparison to examine the differences among MBC subtypes (pure and mixed types) and FA. We utilized the MLP to differentiate MBC and its subtypes from FA. RESULTS: The nine features with AUCs over 0.5 were as follows: age, echo pattern, shape, orientation, margin, echo rim, vascularity distribution, vascularity grade, and tumor size. In subtype analysis, the significant differences were obtained in 10 variables (p-value range, 0.000-0.037) among pMBC, mMBC, and FA, except posterior feature. Through MLP, the AUCs of predicting MBC and FA were both 0.919; the AUCs of predicting pMBC, mMBC, and FA were 0.875, 0.767, and 0.927, respectively. CONCLUSION: Our study found that the MLP models based on ultrasonic characteristics and age can well distinguish MBC and its subtypes from FA. It may provide a critical insight into MBC preoperative clinical management.

Exosomes derived from miR-1228 overexpressing bone marrow-mesenchymal stem cells promote growth of gastric cancer cells.

There has been increasing evidence that microRNAs (miRNAs) are related to glioma progression, and that genetically engineered mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) can inhibit the growth of gliomas. However, the underlying mechanism of bone marrow-MSCs (BM--MSCs) and miRs in gastric cancer still remains unclear. Patients with gastric cancer treated in Shijiazhuang First Hospital as well as healthy individuals undergoing physical examinations were recruited to measure the expression of exosomal miR-1228. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were plotted and the patients were followed up. BM--MSCs from healthy subjects were collected and exosomes were extracted. The MSC cells were transfected with lentiviral vectors carrying miR-1228 and MMP-14 over-expression sequences and scramble sequence, followed by exosome extraction. The exosomes were co-cultured with SGC-7901 and MGC-823 cells to detect cell proliferation, invasion, apoptosis and migration. The correlation between miR-1228 and MMP-14 was determined by dual-luciferase reporter assay. miR-1228 was highly expressed in serum exosomes of patients with gastric cancer with a area under ROC curve (AUC) of 0.865. The exosomes derived from BM-MSCs are expected to be efficient nanocarriers. Up-regulation of miR-1228 can down-regulate the expression of MMP-14 and effectively hinders the development and progression of gastric cancer.

Expression of cell divisioncycle-associated genes and their prognostic significance in hepatocellular carcinoma.

The cell division cycle-associated (CDCA) protein family plays an essential role in tumor progression by cell division. However, the function of each CDCA family member in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is not well known. This study is to find the roles of CDCAs in the prognosis of HCC patients by using ONCOMINE, UALCAN, Human Protein Atlas, Kaplan-Meier Plotter, and cBioPortal databases. Overexpression of CDCA mRNA and protein were found to be significantly associated with individual cancer stages and tumor grades in HCC patients. Higher mRNA expressions of 6 CDCA family members were found to be significantly associated with shorter overall survival (OS) in HCC patients. Multivariate analysis showed that overexpressions of CDCA mRNA were independent prognostic factors for shorter OS in HCC patients. Moreover, a high mutation rate of CDCAs (27%) was also detected in HCC patients, and genetic alteration in CDCAs was associated with shorter overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) in HCC patients. Finally, a functional analysis showed that CDCAs were mainly enriched in the cell cycle (hsa04110) and oocyte meiosis. Overall, these results indicated that CDCA2/3/4/5/8 could be prognostic biomarkers of survival in HCC patients.

Real-Time Elastography: A Web-Based Nomogram Improves the Preoperative Prediction of Central Lymph Node Metastasis in cN0 PTC.

BACKGROUND: Given the difficulty of accurately determining the central lymph node metastasis (CLNM) status of patients with clinically node-negative (cN0) papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) before surgery, this study aims to combine real-time elastography (RTE) and conventional ultrasound (US) features with clinical features. The information is combined to construct and verify the nomogram to foresee the risk of CLNM in patients with cN0 PTC and to develop a network-based nomogram. METHODS: From January 2018 to February 2020, 1,157 consecutive cases of cN0 PTC after thyroidectomy and central compartment neck dissection were retrospectively analyzed. The patients were indiscriminately allocated (2:1) to a training cohort (771 patients) and validation cohort (386 patients). Multivariate logistic regression analysis of US characteristics and clinical information in the training cohort was performed to screen for CLNM risk predictors. RTE data were included to construct prediction model 1 but were excluded when constructing model 2. DeLong's test was used to select a forecast model with better receiver operator characteristic curve performance to establish a web-based nomogram. The clinical applicability, discrimination, and calibration of the preferable prediction model were assessed. RESULTS: Multivariate regression analysis showed that age, sex, tumor size, bilateral tumors, the number of tumor contacting surfaces, chronic lymphocytic thyroiditis, and RTE were risk predictors of CLNM in cN0 PTC patients, which constituted prediction model 1. Model 2 included the first six risk predictors. Comparison of the areas under the curves of the two models showed that model 1 had better prediction performance (training set 0.798 vs. 0.733, validation set 0.792 vs. 0.715, p < 0.001) and good discrimination and calibration. RTE contributed significantly to the performance of the prediction model. Decision curve analysis showed that patients could obtain good net benefits with the application of model 1. CONCLUSION: A noninvasive web-based nomogram combining US characteristics and clinical risk factors was developed in the research. RTE could improve the prediction accuracy of the model. The dynamic nomogram has good performance in predicting the probability of CLNM in cN0 PTC patients.

Identification of Diagnostic Markers for Breast Cancer Based on Differential Gene Expression and Pathway Network.

Background: Breast cancer is the second largest cancer in the world, the incidence of breast cancer continues to rise worldwide, and women's health is seriously threatened. Therefore, it is very important to explore the characteristic changes of breast cancer from the gene level, including the screening of differentially expressed genes and the identification of diagnostic markers. Methods: The gene expression profiles of breast cancer were obtained from the TCGA database. The edgeR R software package was used to screen the differentially expressed genes between breast cancer patients and normal samples. The function and pathway enrichment analysis of these genes revealed significant enrichment of functions and pathways. Next, download these pathways from KEGG website, extract the gene interaction relations, construct the KEGG pathway gene interaction network. The potential diagnostic markers of breast cancer were obtained by combining the differentially expressed genes with the key genes in the network. Finally, these markers were used to construct the diagnostic prediction model of breast cancer, and the predictive ability of the model and the diagnostic ability of the markers were verified by internal and external data. Results: 1060 differentially expressed genes were identified between breast cancer patients and normal controls. Enrichment analysis revealed 28 significantly enriched pathways (p < 0.05). They were downloaded from KEGG website, and the gene interaction relations were extracted to construct the gene interaction network of KEGG pathway, which contained 1277 nodes and 7345 edges. The key nodes with a degree greater than 30 were extracted from the network, containing 154 genes. These 154 key genes shared 23 genes with differentially expressed genes, which serve as potential diagnostic markers for breast cancer. The 23 genes were used as features to construct the SVM classification model, and the model had good predictive ability in both the training dataset and the validation dataset (AUC = 0.960 and 0.907, respectively). Conclusion: This study showed that the difference of gene expression level is important for the diagnosis of breast cancer, and identified 23 breast cancer diagnostic markers, which provides valuable information for clinical diagnosis and basic treatment experiments.

Identification of Prognostic Biomarkers for Bladder Cancer Based on DNA Methylation Profile.

Background: DNA methylation is an important epigenetic modification, which plays an important role in regulating gene expression at the transcriptional level. In tumor research, it has been found that the change of DNA methylation leads to the abnormality of gene structure and function, which can provide early warning for tumorigenesis. Our study aims to explore the relationship between the occurrence and development of tumor and the level of DNA methylation. Moreover, this study will provide a set of prognostic biomarkers, which can more accurately predict the survival and health of patients after treatment. Methods: Datasets of bladder cancer patients and control samples were collected from TCGA database, differential analysis was employed to obtain genes with differential DNA methylation levels between tumor samples and normal samples. Then the protein-protein interaction network was constructed, and the potential tumor markers were further obtained by extracting Hub genes from subnet. Cox proportional hazard regression model and survival analysis were used to construct the prognostic model and screen out the prognostic markers of bladder cancer, so as to provide reference for tumor prognosis monitoring and improvement of treatment plan. Results: In this study, we found that DNA methylation was indeed related with the occurrence of bladder cancer. Genes with differential DNA methylation could serve as potential biomarkers for bladder cancer. Through univariate and multivariate Cox proportional hazard regression analysis, we concluded that FASLG and PRKCZ can be used as prognostic biomarkers for bladder cancer. Patients can be classified into high or low risk group by using this two-gene prognostic model. By detecting the methylation status of these genes, we can evaluate the survival of patients. Conclusion: The analysis in our study indicates that the methylation status of tumor-related genes can be used as prognostic biomarkers of bladder cancer.

The signature of pharmaceutical sensitivity based on ctDNA mutation in eleven cancers.

IMPACT STATEMENT: Gene mutations are closely related to cancers and drug sensitivity and noninvasive liquid biopsy was used to detect mutations of ctDNA in plasma. In this study, we performed exon sequencing of 416 cancer-related genes for cancer primary tissue and plasma samples of 20 patients in 11 cancers and obtained the comprehensive mutation landscape. We found that liquid biopsy is reliable in place of tissue biopsy. And 31 potential unique mutation prognostic markers were screened in 7 cancer types. Moreover, the drug-mutation network (DMN) was constructed and 9 gene mutations (B-Mut-9) were confirmed that can be served as drug biomarkers in blood. Our study showed that the variation in ctDNA can be used as the biomarkers for cancer prognosis and drug efficacy prediction. This can provide a reference for clinical noninvasive testing.

Population-based projections of blood supply and demand, China, 2017-2036.

OBJECTIVE: To estimate the long-term effect of the changing demography in China on blood supply and demand. METHODS: We developed a predictive model to estimate blood supply and demand during 2017-2036 in mainland China and in 31 province-level regions. Model parameters were obtained from World Population Prospects, China statistical yearbook 2016, China's report on blood safety and records from a large tertiary hospital. Our main assumptions were stable age-specific per capita blood supply and demand over time. FINDINGS: We estimated that the change in demographic structure between 2016 (baseline year) and 2036 would result in a 16.0% decrease in blood supply (from 43.2 million units of 200 mL to 36.3 million units) and a 33.1% increase in demand (from 43.2 million units to 57.5 million units). In 2036, there would be an estimated shortage of 21.2 million units. An annual increase in supply between 0.9% and 1.8% is required to maintain a balance in blood supply and demand. This increase is not enough for every region as regional differences will increase, e.g. a blood demand/supply ratio ≥ 1.45 by 2036 is predicted in regions with large populations older than 65 years. Sensitivity analyses showed that increasing donations by 4.0% annually by people aged 18-34 years or decreasing the overall blood discard rate from 5.0% to 2.0% would not offset but help reduce the blood shortage. CONCLUSION: Multidimensional strategies and tailored, coordinated actions are needed to deal with growing pressures on blood services because of China's ageing population.

The MS-lincRNA landscape reveals a novel lincRNA BCLIN25 that contributes to tumorigenesis by upregulating ERBB2 expression via epigenetic modification and RNA-RNA interactions in breast cancer.

The landscape of molecular subtype-specific long intergenic noncoding RNAs (MS-lincRNAs) in breast cancer has not been elucidated. No study has investigated the biological function of BCLIN25, serving as a novel HER2 subtype-specific lincRNA, in human disease, especially in malignancy. Moreover, the mechanism of BCLIN25 in the regulation of ERBB2 expression remains unknown. Our present study aimed to investigate the role and underlying mechanism of BCLIN25 in the regulation of ERBB2 expression. The transcriptional landscape across five subtypes of breast cancer was investigated using RNA sequencing. Integrative transcriptomic analysis was performed to identify the landscape of novel lincRNAs. Next, WEKA was used to identify lincRNA-based subtype classification and MS-lincRNAs for breast cancer. The MS-lincRNAs were validated in 250 breast cancer samples in our cohort and datasets from The Cancer Genome Atlas and Gene Expression Omnibus. Furthermore, BCLIN25 was selected, and its role in tumorigenesis was examined in vitro and in vivo. Finally, the mechanism by which BCLIN25 regulates ERBB2 expression was investigated in detail. A total of 715 novel lincRNAs were differentially expressed across five breast cancer subtypes. Next, lincRNA-based subtype classifications and MS-lincRNAs were identified and validated using our breast cancer samples and public datasets. BCLIN25 was found to contribute to tumorigenesis in vitro and in vivo. Mechanistically, BCLIN25 was shown to increase the expression of ERBB2 by enhancing promoter CpG methylation of miR-125b, leading to miR-125b downregulation. In turn, ERBB2 mRNA degradation was found to be abolished due to decreased binding of miR-125b to the 3'-untranslated region (UTR) of ERBB2. These findings reveal the role of novel lincRNAs in breast cancer and provide a comprehensive landscape of breast cancer MS-lincRNAs, which may complement the current molecular classification system in breast cancer.

Development of a method for identifying and functionally analyzing allele-specific DNA methylation based on BS-seq data.

Aim: To comprehensively identify allele-specific DNA methylation (ASM) at the genome-wide level. Methods: Here, we propose a new method, called GeneASM, to identify ASM using high-throughput bisulfite sequencing data in the absence of haplotype information. Results: A total of 2194 allele-specific DNA methylated genes were identified in the GM12878 lymphocyte lineage using GeneASM. These genes are mainly enriched in cell cytoplasm function, subcellular component movement or cellular linkages. GM12878 methylated DNA immunoprecipitation sequencing, and methylation sensitive restriction enzyme sequencing data were used to evaluate ASM. The relationship between ASM and disease was further analyzed using the The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) data of lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD), and whole genome bisulfite sequencing data. Conclusion: GeneASM, which recognizes ASM by high-throughput bisulfite sequencing and heterozygous single-nucleotide polymorphisms, provides new perspective for studying genomic imprinting.

Upregulation Of Protein Tyrosine Phosphatase Receptor Type C Associates To The Combination Of Hashimoto's Thyroiditis And Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma And Is Predictive Of A Poor Prognosis.

INTRODUCTION: PTC is not generally considered a lethal disease, but prone to recurrence as the prognosis. Hashimoto's thyroiditis (HT) is an important factor that affects the prognosis of papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC). It is crucial to find biomarkers to identify the combination of HT with PTC and to predict the prognosis. METHODS: RNASeq data from the Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database was used to screen differentially expressed genes (DEGs) of PTC with HT via the edgeR package of R software version 3.3.0. Also, the DEGs were applied to the DAVID web-based tool to determine the enrichment of gene functions via Gene Ontology (GO) analysis and to identify associated pathways in the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) database. By constructing protein interaction networks within Cytoscape software, we screened candidate genes and explored possible relationships with the clinical phenotype of PTC. Finally, additional thyroid tissue samples were collected to verify the results above. RESULTS: After analyzing the RNA-Seq data of PTC patients from the Cancer Genomic Atlas, 497 differentially expressed PTC genes were found to be associated with HT, of which protein tyrosine phosphatase receptor type C (PTPRC), KIT, and COL1A1 were associated with tumor size and lymph node metastasis (p < 0.05). Verification of these results with another 30 thyroid tissues of clinical PTC patients revealed that the expression level of PTPRC in the PTC with HT group was higher than that in the PTC without HT group (p < 0.05) and the ROC curve showed a good discrimination (area under the curve = 0.846). However, the correlation with the clinical phenotype was not statistically significant (p > 0.05). DISCUSSION: These data suggest that upregulation of PTPRC enhances the incidence of HT associated with PTC and is also predictive of a poor prognosis.

A facile approach to ultralight and recyclable 3D self-assembled copolymer/graphene aerogels for efficient oil/water separation.

In this paper, a facile approach was developed for highly effective oil/water separation by incorporating of the dimethyldiallylammonium chloride acrylamide polymer (P(AM-DMDAAC)) into graphene aerogels. The functionalized 3D graphene aerogel integrated a series of excellent physical properties, including low density (11.4 mg/cm3), large specific surface area (206.591 m2/g), and great hydrophobicity (contact angle of 142.7°). The modified aerogel showed excellent adsorption capacity for oils and organic solvents (up to 130 g/g). The saturation can be reached in a short time and the adsorption capacity remained nearly unchanged after repeated heating cycles. Meanwhile, we found a simple method to achieve controlled wettability transition of P(AM-DMDAAC)/graphene aerogels (PGAs) by changing the pH values. The hydrophobic PGA prepared at pH 2.03 showed outstanding oil/water separation performance (130 g/g). As the pH increased, the oil adsorption capabilities of PGAs decreased slightly, but the adsorption performance for the hydrophilic organic dye was significantly improved. Therefore, as a recyclable and efficient water purification material, the sustainable and environment-friendly polymer-modified graphene aerogel has great application potential.