[Effect of Trichosanthis Pericarpium extract on bile acid metabolism in coronary heart disease model rats].

This study aims to explore the potential mechanism of action of Trichosanthis Pericarpium(TP) in improving coronary heart disease(CHD) based on a CHD rat model and metabolomics. The rat model of CHD was built by subcutaneous injection of high-fat diet combined with isoprenaline hydrochloride(ISO). To compare the expression level of lactate dehydrogenase, cardiac troponin Ⅰ(cTnⅠ), creatine kinase-MB(CK-MB), creatine kinase(CK), tumor necrosis factor-α(TNF-α), interleukin-1ß(IL-1ß),interleukin-6(IL-16), hypersensitive C-reactive protein(hs-CRP) in serum and cardiac pathological changes of model animals after administration of TP, LTQ-Orbitrap-MS analysis was combined with principal component analysis. The effect of TP on endogenous metabolites in the feces of CHD rats was studied. In addition, biomarkers were identified using the HMDB database and metabolic pathway enrichment analysis was performed using the MetaboAnalyst online pathway enrichment tool. The content of bile acid was further determined in the feces and serum of different groups of rats. Compared with blank group, the myocardial injury markers(CK,LDH, cTnⅠ, CK-MB) and inflammatory factors(TNF-α, IL-1ß, IL-6, hs-CRP) in serum of CHD rats were significantly increased.Myocardial injury and inflammatory infiltration in CHD rats were significantly improved by TP extract. The primary bile acid biosynthetic metabolism pathway was enriched by non-targeted metabolome analysis. The levels of total bile acid, primary bile acid,secondary bile acid, and unconjugated bile acids in the feces of CHD rats were significantly lower than those of control rats. Fecal excretion of total bile acid, primary bile acid, and unconjugated bile acid was significantly improved by TP extract. The levels of total bile acid, primary bile acid, secondary bile acid, and unconjugated bile acids in the serum of CHD rats were significantly higher than those of control rats. Circulating blood levels of total bile acids, primary bile acids, secondary bile acids, and unconjugated bile acids were significantly reduced by TP extract. Increasing fecal excretion of bile acid and decreasing the level of bile acid in blood circulation can improve CHD, and maintaining proper bile acid metabolism is one of the mechanisms of TP to improve CHD.

A Pre-Trained Fuzzy Reinforcement Learning Method for the Pursuing Satellite in a One-to-One Game in Space.

In order to help the pursuer find its advantaged control policy in a one-to-one game in space, this paper proposes an innovative pre-trained fuzzy reinforcement learning algorithm, which is conducted in the x, y, and z channels separately. Compared with the previous algorithms applied in ground games, this is the first time reinforcement learning has been introduced to help the pursuer in space optimize its control policy. The known part of the environment is utilized to help the pursuer pre-train its consequent set before learning. An actor-critic framework is built in each moving channel of the pursuer. The consequent set of the pursuer is updated through the gradient descent method in fuzzy inference systems. The numerical experimental results validate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm in improving the game ability of the pursuer.

Predictors of hookup behaviors among Asian and Asian American college students in the United States.

Objective: With the rapid growth in the population of Asian and Asian American college students in the United States, there is a need for research examining their participation in potentially risky sexual behaviors in order to expand understanding of this group's needs. This study focused on attachment orientation and hookup motives as predictors of hookup behaviors, which involve engaging in sexual behaviors without expectation of a long-term relationship.Methods: Participants included 169 Asian or Asian American college students ranging in age from 18 to 27 years who completed an online survey.Results: Results indicated that over half of participants reported engaging in hookup behaviors. The strongest predictors of hookup behaviors were increased age, liberal sexual attitudes, motivations to achieve excitement/sexual enhancement, and motivations to find a long-term partner. However, attachment orientations did not predict hookup behaviors. Results provide insight into a profile of Asian American college students increasingly exploring sexuality throughout young adulthood.

Transarterial chemoembolization combined with radiofrequency ablation for medium and large hepatocellular carcinoma: insufficient ablation is associated with intrahepatic distant metastasis and extrahepatic metastasis.

Purpose: To compare the prognosis of complete and insufficient ablation of transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) combined with radiofrequency ablation (RFA) in treating medium and large hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and to explore the differences in recurrence patterns between the two groups. Patients and methods: Patients´ medical records and imaging data of patients with confirmed HCC from January 2014 to January 2022 were collected. These patients were divided into 2 groups: complete ablation (n=172) and insufficient ablation (n=171). Overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) were estimated by the Kaplan-Meier curve and the log-rank test was used to compared. Fisher's exact test was used to compare recurrence patterns between the two groups. Results: The median OS time was 72.8 months (95%CI:69.5-76.1) and 62.0 months (95%CI: 55.3-68.7) in the complete and insufficient ablation groups, respectively. The median PFS time in the complete ablation group was 67.8 months (95% CI: 65.2-70.4) and 38.6 months (95%CI: 29.8-47.4) in the insufficient ablation group. The OS and PFS rates of the complete ablation group were significantly better than those of the insufficient ablation group (P<0.001). In the complete ablation group, 25(41%) patients experienced local tumor progression(LTP), 36(59%) experienced intrahepatic distant progression(IDP), and 0(0%) experienced extrahepatic progression (EP). In the insufficient ablation group, 51 (32.1%) patients experienced LTP, 96 (60.4%) experienced IDP, and 12 (7.5%) experienced EP. The progression patterns of the two groups were statistically significant (P=0.039). Conclusion: Insufficient ablation indicates a poor survival outcome of TACE combined with RFA for medium and large HCC and can promote intrahepatic distant and extrahepatic metastasis.

Transarterial chemoembolization combined with lenvatinib plus tislelizumab for unresectable hepatocellular carcinoma: a multicenter cohort study.

Objective: Comparing the efficacy of transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) combined with lenvatinib plus tislelizumab (TLT) with TACE combined with lenvatinib (TL) for unresectable hepatocellular carcinoma, particularly in determining which patients can benefit more from the TLT treatment. Methods: From March 2021 to September 2023, a total of 169 patients from three centers were included in this study, with 103 patients receiving TLT and 66 patients receiving TL. The Kaplan-Meier method was utilized to evaluate the cumulative overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) between the two groups and were assessed using the log-rank test. Subgroup analysis on tumor number, maximum tumor diameter, presence of portal vein thrombosis, AFP level, and Child-Pugh class were conducted. Results: The median OS was 26 months in the TLT group, and 20 months in the TL group. The median PFS was 14 months in the TLT group and 9 months in the TL group. The Kaplan-Meier curve demonstrated a significantly superior OS and PFS in the TLT group compared to the TL group. Subgroup analysis showed that for patients with a maximum tumor diameter greater than 7 cm, AFP > 400 ng/ml and accompanied by portal vein tumor thrombus, and Child-Pugh class A, there was a statistically significant difference in OS between TLT and TL groups. Conclusions: OS and PFS were significantly improved in patients who received TLT compared to those who received TL, patients with a largest tumor diameter greater than 7 cm, AFP > 400 ng/ml, Child-Pugh class A and PVTT appeared to derive more benefit.

Brain Tumor Segmentation Network with Multi-View Ensemble Discrimination and Kernel-Sharing Dilated Convolution.

Accurate segmentation of brain tumors from magnetic resonance 3D images (MRI) is critical for clinical decisions and surgical planning. Radiologists usually separate and analyze brain tumors by combining images of axial, coronal, and sagittal views. However, traditional convolutional neural network (CNN) models tend to use information from only a single view or one by one. Moreover, the existing models adopt a multi-branch structure with different-size convolution kernels in parallel to adapt to various tumor sizes. However, the difference in the convolution kernels' parameters cannot precisely characterize the feature similarity of tumor lesion regions with various sizes, connectivity, and convexity. To address the above problems, we propose a hierarchical multi-view convolution method that decouples the standard 3D convolution into axial, coronal, and sagittal views to provide complementary-view features. Then, every pixel is classified by ensembling the discriminant results from the three views. Moreover, we propose a multi-branch kernel-sharing mechanism with a dilated rate to obtain parameter-consistent convolution kernels with different receptive fields. We use the BraTS2018 and BraTS2020 datasets for comparison experiments. The average Dice coefficients of the proposed network on the BraTS2020 dataset can reach 78.16%, 89.52%, and 83.05% for the enhancing tumor (ET), whole tumor (WT), and tumor core (TC), respectively, while the number of parameters is only 0.5 M. Compared with the baseline network for brain tumor segmentation, the accuracy was improved by 1.74%, 0.5%, and 2.19%, respectively.

Preparation and Properties of Magnesium Phosphate Cement-Based Fire Retardant Coating for Steel.

Magnesium phosphate cement (MPC) is a potential inorganic binder for steel coating due to setting and hardening rapidly, and bonding tightly with steel. NH4H2PO4-based MPC as a fire-retardant coating for steel was investigated in this work. MPC coatings were prepared from MPC paste and MPC mortar with expanded vermiculite (EV). The physical-mechanical properties and fireproof performance of MPC coatings were investigated in detail. An infrared thermal imager was employed to collect the temperature distribution and temperature rise with time on the coating samples automatically. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) analyses were carried out on the MPC coating after the fireproof test. Re-fire test and corrosion resistance were performed preliminarily on the MPC coating. The results showed that the fireproof performance of MPC coating met the fire protection requirement for steel as long as the thickness of the MPC paste coating was up to 10 mm, while the thickness of MPC mortar coating decreased to 4 mm when adding 40% EV (by mass). Dehydration and decomposition of reacted products in the hardened MPC coating were, to some extent, contributed to the excellent fireproof performance during the fire test. The slight ceramic formation and integration of MPC coating during the fire test would compensate for the decreasing of strength due to the dehydration and decomposition, so that the MPC coating would keep certain fireproof performance when undergoing fire again. MPC is suitable for a fire-retardant coating, while higher tensile bonding strength with steel and potential corrosion resistance on steel, as well as rapid surface drying and hardening can be achieved.

Distinct tumor microenvironment landscapes of rectal cancer for prognosis and prediction of immunotherapy response.

PURPOSE: Tumor microenvironment (TME) affects the progression of rectal cancer (RC), and the clinical relevance of its immune elements was widely reported. Here we aim to delineate the complete TME landscape, including non-immune features, to improve our understanding of RC heterogeneity and provide a better strategy for precision medicine. METHODS: Single-cell analysis of GSE161277 using Seurat and Cellcall was performed to identify cell-cell interactions. The ssGSEA was employed to quantify the TME elements in TCGA patients, which were further clustered into subtypes by hclust. WGCNA and LASSO were combined to construct a degenerated signature for prognosis, and its performance was validated in two GEO datasets. RESULTS: We proposed a subtyping strategy based on the abundance of both immune and non-immune components, which divided all RC patients into 4 subtypes (Immune-, Canonical-, Dormant- and Stem-like). Different subtypes exhibited distinct mutation landscapes, biological features, immune characteristics, immunotherapy responses and prognoses. Next, WGCNA and LASSO regression were combined to construct a 10-gene signature based on differentially expressed genes among different subtypes. Subgroups divided by this signature also exhibited different clinical parameters and responses to immune checkpoint blockades. Diverse machine learning algorithms were applied to achieve higher accuracy for survival prediction and a nomogram was further established in combination with M stage and age to provide an accurate and visual prediction of prognosis. CONCLUSIONS: We identified four TME-based RC subtypes with distinct biological and clinical features. Based on those subtypes, we also proposed a degenerated 10-gene signature to predict the prognosis and immunotherapy response.

Comparing the infection biology and gene expression differences of Plasmodiophora brassicae primary and secondary zoospores.

Plasmodiophora brassicae (Wor.) is an obligate plant pathogen affecting Brassicae worldwide. To date, there is very little information available on the biology and molecular basis of P. brassicae primary and secondary zoospore infections. To examine their roles, we used microscope to systematically investigate the infection differences of P. brassicae between samples inoculated separately with resting spores and secondary zoospores. The obvious development of P. brassicae asynchrony that is characterized by secondary plasmodium, resting sporangial plasmodium, and resting spores was observed at 12 days in Brassica rapa inoculated with resting spores but not when inoculated with secondary zoospores at the same time. Inoculation with resting spores resulted in much more development of zoosporangia clusters than inoculation with secondary zoospores in non-host Spinacia oleracea. The results indicated that primary zoospore infection played an important role in the subsequent development. To improve our understanding of the infection mechanisms, RNA-seq analysis was performed. Among 18 effectors identified in P. brassicae, 13 effectors were induced in B. rapa seedlings inoculated with resting spores, which suggested that the pathogen and host first contacted, and more effectors were needed. Corresponding to those in B. rapa, the expression levels of most genes involved in the calcium-mediated signaling pathway and PTI pathway were higher in plants inoculated with resting spores than in those inoculated with secondary zoospores. The ETI pathway was suppressed after inoculation with secondary zoospores. The genes induced after inoculation with resting spores were suppressed in B. rapa seedlings inoculated with secondary zoospores, which might be important to allow a fully compatible interaction and contribute to a susceptible reaction in the host at the subsequent infection stage. The primary zoospores undertook an more important interaction with plants.

Cloning and expression of a cytosolic HSP90 gene in Chlorella vulgaris.

Heat shock protein 90 (HSP90), a highly conserved molecular chaperone, plays essential roles in folding, keeping structural integrity, and regulating the subset of cytosolic proteins. We cloned the cDNA of Chlorella vulgaris HSP90 (named CvHSP90) by combining homology cloning with rapid amplification of cDNA ends (RACE). Sequence analysis indicated that CvHSP90 is a cytosolic member of the HSP90 family. Quantitative RT-PCR was applied to determine the expression level of messenger RNA (mRNA) in CvHSP90 under different stress conditions. C. vulgaris was kept in different temperatures (5-45 °C) for 1 h. The mRNA expression level of CvHSP90 increased with temperature from 5 to 10 °C, went further from 35 to 40 °C, and reached the maximum at 40 °C. On the other hand, for C. vulgaris kept at 35 °C for different durations, the mRNA expression level of CvHSP90 increased gradually and reached the peak at 7 h and then declined progressively. In addition, the expression level of CvHSP90 at 40 or 45 in salinity (‰) was almost fourfold of that at 25 in salinity (‰) for 2 h. Therefore, CvHSP90 may be a potential biomarker to monitor environment changes.

CONSTRUCTION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF A TENTATIVE AMPLIFIED FRAGMENT LENGTH POLYMORPHISM-SIMPLE SEQUENCE REPEAT LINKAGE MAP OF LAMINARIA (LAMINARIALES, PHAEOPHYTA)(1).

A tentative amplified fragment length polymorphism-simple sequence repeat (AFLP-SSR) linkage map of Laminaria was constructed using a haploid population of 40 gametophyte clones isolated from an individual of Dongfang No. 2, the first commercially cultured hybrid of a female gametophyte clone of L. japonica Aresch. [=Saccharina japonica (Aresch.) C. E. Lane, C. Mayes et G. W. Saunders] and a male one of L. longissima Miyabe [=Saccharina longissima (Miyabe) C. E. Lane, C. Mayes et G. W. Saunders]. To the map, 263 markers (255 AFLP, seven SSR, and the gametophyte sex) were assigned. The map consisted of 25 linkage groups (LGs) with ≥ four markers, five triplets, and 15 doublets, which is 1,629.0 centiMorgans (cM) in length, covering 66% of Laminaria genome. The maximum space between loci is 24.63 cM. A putative sex-determining region was identified in LG2 , which was characterized by a dense marker distribution around the gametophyte sex locus. The linkage map itself and the methodology associated with its construction will facilitate the genetic study and further trials of the linkage map construction of Laminaria.