Microbial mediators of plant community response to long-term N and P fertilization: Evidence of a role of plant responsiveness to mycorrhizal fungi.

Climate changes and anthropogenic nutrient enrichment widely threaten plant diversity and ecosystem functions. Understanding the mechanisms governing plant species turnover across nutrient gradients is crucial to developing successful management and restoration strategies. We tested whether and how soil microbes, particularly arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF), could mediate plant community response to a 15 years long-term N (0, 4, 8, and 16 g N m-2  year-1 ) and P (0 and 8 g N m-2  year-1 ) enrichment in a grassland system. We found N and P enrichment resulted in plant community diversity decrease and composition change, in which perennial C4  graminoids were dramatically reduced while annuals and perennial forbs increased. Metabarcoding analysis of soil fungal community showed that N and P changed fungal diversity and composition, of which only a cluster of AMF identified by the co-occurrence networks analysis was highly sensitive to P treatments and was negatively correlated with shifts in percentage cover of perennial C4  graminoids. Moreover, by estimating the mycorrhizal responsiveness (MR) of 41 plant species in the field experiment from 264 independent tests, we found that the community weighted mean MR of the plant community was substantially reduced with nutrient enrichment and was positively correlated with C4  graminoids percentage cover. Both analyses of covariance and structural equation modeling indicated that the shift in MR rather than AMF composition change was the primary predictor of the decline in perennial C4  graminoids, suggesting that the energy cost invested by C4 plants on those sensitive AMF might drive the inferior competitive abilities compared with other groups. Our results suggest that shifts in the competitive ability of mycorrhizal responsive plants can drive plant community change to anthropogenic eutrophication, suggesting a functional benefit of mycorrhizal mutualism in ecological restoration following climatic or anthropogenic degradation of soil communities.

Removal of estrogen pollutants using biochar-pellet-supported nanoscale zero-valent iron.

Nanoscale zero-valent iron-supported biochar pellets (nZVI)-(BP) were synthesized via liquid-phase reduction and applied to estrogen removal, including estrone (E1), 17ß-estradiol (E2), and estriol (E3). The performance of nZVI-BP, with respect to its characterization, removal kinetics, and isotherms, was investigated. The results showed that the adsorption equilibrium was reached within 10 min of exposure. The adsorption capacity of estrogen decreased with increasing solute pH and nZVI-BP dosage. The adsorptivity increased with increasing initial estrogen concentration. The estrogen behavior followed a pseudo-second-order kinetic model. The adsorption data of different initial estrogen concentrations fitted to Freundlich adsorption isotherms. In addition, a preliminary discussion of the adsorption mechanism of nZVI-BP for estrogens was provided.

Soil microbiome mediates positive plant diversity-productivity relationships in late successional grassland species.

Which processes drive the productivity benefits of biodiversity remain a critical, but unanswered question in ecology. We tested whether the soil microbiome mediates the diversity-productivity relationships among late successional plant species. We found that productivity increased with plant richness in diverse soil communities, but not with low-diversity mixtures of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi or in pasteurised soils. Diversity-interaction modelling revealed that pairwise interactions among species best explained the positive diversity-productivity relationships, and that transgressive overyielding resulting from positive complementarity was only observed with the late successional soil microbiome, which was both the most diverse and exhibited the strongest community differentiation among plant species. We found evidence that both dilution/suppression from host-specific pathogens and microbiome-mediated resource partitioning contributed to positive diversity-productivity relationships and overyielding. Our results suggest that re-establishment of a diverse, late successional soil microbiome may be critical to the restoration of the functional benefits of plant diversity following anthropogenic disturbance.

Serum-plasma matched metabolomics for comprehensive characterization of benign thyroid nodule and papillary thyroid carcinoma.

Metabolomics offers a noninvasive methodology to identify metabolic markers for pathogenesis and diagnosis of diseases. This work aimed to characterize circulating metabolic signatures of benign thyroid nodule (BTN) and papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) via serum-plasma matched metabolomics. A cohort of 1,540 serum-plasma matched samples and 114 tissues were obtained from healthy volunteers, BTN and PTC patients enrolled from 6 independent centers. Untargeted metabolomics was determined by liquid chromatography-quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometric and multivariate statistical analyses. The use of serum-plasma matched samples afforded a broad-scope detection of 1,570 metabolic features. Metabolic phenotypes revealed significant pattern differences for healthy versus BTN and healthy versus PTC. Perturbed metabolic pathways related mainly to amino acid and lipid metabolism. It is worth noting that, BTN and PTC showed no significant differences but rather overlap in circulating metabolic signatures, and this observation was replicated in all study centers. For differential diagnosis of healthy versus thyroid nodules (BTN + PTC), a panel of 6 metabolic markers, namely myo-inositol, α-N-phenylacetyl-L-glutamine, proline betaine, L-glutamic acid, LysoPC(18:0) and LysoPC(18:1) provided area under the curve of 97.68% in the discovery phase and predictive accuracies of 84.78-98.18% in the 4 validation centers. Taken together, serum-plasma matched metabolomics showed significant differences in circulating metabolites for healthy versus nodules but not for BTN versus PTC. Our results highlight the true metabolic nature of thyroid nodules, and potentially decrease overtreatment that exposes patients to unnecessary risks.

The study on clinical value of the detection about serum and Unconjugated Bilirubin in diagnosis of neonatal jaundice.

In this paper, the clinical value of the detection about serum and unconjugated bilirubin (UCB) in neonatal jaundice was studied to found an effective and rapid method for diagnose of neonatal jaundice. ALB (Serum Albumin), total serum bilirubin (TSB) and UCB were detected by ELISA method among the 100 cases with neonatal jaundice selected for the study. The values of ALB, UCB and TSB in moderate jaundice patients were (42.83±3.87) g/L, (287.35±44.38) µm/L, (304.16±43.40) µm/L, respectively; as for the severe jaundice patients, the values were (38.41±4.82) g/L, (354.38±48.75) µm/L, (375.20±47.51) µm/L. The results showed significant differences with the p< 0.05 between moderate and severe jaundice patients. The level of ALB, UCB, TSB in hemolytic jaundice, obstructive jaundice and jaundice caused by other infections also had significant differences, and the difference was statistically significant (p<0.05). The detection of ALB and UCB provides a useful method for the diagnosis and assessment of neonatal jaundice.

Drug resistance profile and serotype of streptococcus of pneumoniae infected pediatric patients.

To investigate the surveillance of drug resistance and serotype monitoring of steptococcus pneumoniae in hospitalized children. the pathogenic bacteria isolation and identification methods were employed to do the bacteria isolation identification and drug sensitive test on the specimens from Women & Infants Hospital of Zhengzhou. From the specimens, there were 134 detected strains of Streptococcus pneumoniae, and the drug resistance to erythromycin and clindamycin were respectively 97.7% and 89.9%, and the drug resistance to tetracycline, azithromycin and paediatric compound sulfamethoxazole were respectively 86. 3%, 58. 3%, 51. 2%. The vancomycin resistant Streptococcus pneumoniae were often not found. the Streptococcus pneumoniae in children were generally with drug resistant in Zhengzhou area. It shall strengthen drug resistance surveillance, and reasonably choose antibacterial agents.

Diagnosis and clinical observation of lactose-free milk powder on treatment of neonatal diarrhea.

Neonatal lactose intolerance syndrome is a series of digestive system symptoms caused by the lack of lactase, and could not fully digest the lactose in breast milk or cow milk. Lactose is one of the disaccharides mainly existed in mammalian milk. Lactose content in breast milk is 7.2g/100ml, cow milk is 4.7g/100ml. Dairy products are the main energy sources for the newborn, and lactose provides 20% energy for infants. During the growth of the newborn, lactose not only play a significant role in energy supply, but also involve in the development of the brain growing. This study mainly studied the lactose development features, the reasons for lactose intolerance, and the measures to treat lactose deficiency.

Clinical practice of procalcitonin and hypersensitive c-reactive protein test in neonatal infection.

To study the clinical practice of procalcitonin and hypersensitive c-reactive protein test in neonatal infection. Two hundred cases of our hospital treatment confirmed infection early newborn children were selected from February 2014 to March 2015. According to the condition, the children were divided into four groups as follows: severe infection group, local infection group, non-infection group and healthy newborns group. At the same time, the new healthy newborns were chosen as control group. The levels of serum procalcitonin and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein were detected in all children and the levels in severe infection group children before and after treatment were also quantitatively detected and the test results were analyzed. There was significant difference in procalcitonin among the four groups (pS<0.05). The positive rate of the high-sensitivity C-reactive protein in local infection group has no significant difference compared with the non-infection group (p>0.05). But there was significant difference between the local infection group and healthy newborn group. As for the severe infection group, both the levels of procalcitonin and positive rate of high-sensitivity C-reactive protein had significant difference compared with the other groups. The detection of procalcitonin and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein could contribute to the diagnose of the early infection neonatal children and has important values in diagnosis and treatment of infectious diseases in the newborns.

The incidence of infants with rotavirus enteritis combined with lactose intolerance.

UNLABELLED: This study was to research the incidence of infants with rotavirus enteritis combined with lactose intolerance and the clinical effect of low lactose milk powder for infantile rotavirus enteritis with lactose intolerance. The control groups were 126 cases of infants with diarrhea randomly collected from our hospital at the same period, which their rotavirus detection was negative. The observation group was 185 cases of infants with rotavirus, which was tested to be positive. Through the urine galactose determination, 62 cases of the control group were positive and 124 cases of the observation group were positive. Then 124 cases of infants with rotavirus combined with lactose intolerance were randomly divided into two groups. 60 cases in the control group were given rehydration, correction of acidosis, oral smecta, Intestinal probiotics and other conventional treatment, then continued to the original feeding method. While, 64 cases in the treatment group, on the basis of routine treatment, applied the low lactose milk feeding. To observe the total effective rate for the two groups. The incidence of lactose intolerance in children with rotavirus enteritis (67.03%) was significantly higher than that of children with diarrhea (49.2%), which was tested to be negative. And the difference was statistically significant (p<0.5). In the aspect of reducing the frequency of diarrhea, and diarrhea stool forming time, the treatment group has the obvious superiority. The total effective rate was 95.4% for treatment group, which was higher than that in the control group (76.7%), the difference was statistically significant (P<0.05). CONCLUSION: Infants with rotavirus enteritis was easier to merge with lactose intolerance. The low lactose milk powder could improve the therapeutic effectively and could reduce the duration of disease, and restored to normal diet for 2 weeks feeding time.

Comprehensive analysis and experimental verification of the mechanism of action of T cell-mediated tumor-killing related genes in Colon adenocarcinoma.

BACKGROUND: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a prevalent malignancy of the digestive tract. A new prognostic scoring model for colon adenocarcinoma (COAD) is developed in this study based on the genes involved in tumor cell-mediated killing of T cells (GSTTKs), accurately stratifying COAD patients, thus improving the current status of personalized treatment. METHOD: The GEO and TCGA databases served as the sources of the data for the COAD cohort. This study identified GSTTKs-related genes in COAD through single-factor Cox analysis. These genes were used to categorize COAD patients into several subtypes via unsupervised clustering analysis. The biological pathways and tumor microenvironments of different subgroups were compared. We performed intersection analysis between different subtypes to obtain intersection genes. Single-factor Cox regression analysis and Lasso-Cox analysis were conducted to establish clinical prognostic models. Two methods are used to assess the accuracy of model predictions: ROC and Kaplan-Meier analysis. Next, the prediction model was further validated in the validation cohort. Differential immune cell infiltration between various risk categories was identified via single sample gene set enrichment analysis (ssGSEA). The COAD model's gene expression was validated via single-cell data analysis and experiments. RESULT: We established two distinct GSTTKs-related subtypes. Biological processes and immune cell tumor invasion differed significantly between various subtypes. Clinical prognostic models were created using five GSTTKs-related genes. The model's risk score independently served as a prognostic factor. COAD patients were classified as low- or high-risk depending on their risk scores. Patients in the low-risk category recorded a greater chance of surviving. The outcomes from the validation cohort match those from the training set. Risk scores and several tumor-infiltrating immune cells were strongly correlated, according to ssGSEA. Single-cell data illustrated that the model's genes were linked to several immune cells. The experimental results demonstrated a significant increase in the expression of HOXC6 in colon cancer tissue. CONCLUSION: Our research findings established a new gene signature for COAD. This gene signature helps to accurately stratify the risk of COAD patients and improve the current status of individualized care.

Improving crop health by synthetic microbial communities: Progress and prospects.

Crop health directly affects yields and food security. At present, agrochemicals such as fertilizers and pesticides are mainly used in agricultural production to promote crop health. However, long-term excessive utilization of agrochemicals will damage the ecological environment of farmlands and increase the safety risk of agricultural products. It is urgent to explore efficient and environment-friendly agricultural products. Rhizosphere microbiome are considered as the second genome of plants, which are closely related to crop health. Understanding the key functional microbes, microbe-microbe interactions, and plant-microbe interactions are fundamental for exploring the potential of beneficial microbes in promoting crop health. However, due to the heterogeneity and complexity of the natural environment, stimulating the function of indigenous microorganisms remains uncertain. Synthetic microbial community (SynCom) is an artificial combination of two or more different strain isolates of microorganisms, with different taxonomic, genetic, or functional characteristic. Because of the advantages of maintaining species diversity and community stability, SynCom has been widely applied in the fields of human health, environmental governance and industrial production, and may also have great potential in promoting crop health. We summarized the concept and research status of SynCom, expounded the principles and methods of constructing SynCom, and analyzed the research on the promotion of crop health by exploring the mechanism of plant-microbe interactions, promoting plant growth and development, and improving stress resistance. Finally, we envisaged the future prospects to guide the using SynCom to improve crop health.

Rapid differentiation of soil and root microbiomes in response to plant composition and biodiversity in the field.

Research suggests that microbiomes play a major role in structuring plant communities and influencing ecosystem processes, however, the relative roles and strength of change of microbial components have not been identified. We measured the response of fungal, arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal (AMF), bacteria, and oomycete composition 4 months after planting of field plots that varied in plant composition and diversity. Plots were planted using 18 prairie plant species from three plant families (Poaceae, Fabaceae, and Asteraceae) in monoculture, 2, 3, or 6 species richness mixtures and either species within multiple families or one family. Soil cores were collected and homogenized per plot and DNA were extracted from soil and roots of each plot. We found that all microbial groups responded to the planting design, indicating rapid microbiome response to plant composition. Fungal pathogen communities were strongly affected by plant diversity. We identified OTUs from genera of putatively pathogenic fungi that increased with plant family, indicating likely pathogen specificity. Bacteria were strongly differentiated by plant family in roots but not soil. Fungal pathogen diversity increased with planted species richness, while oomycete diversity, as well as bacterial diversity in roots, decreased. AMF differentiation in roots was detected with individual plant species, but not plant family or richness. Fungal saprotroph composition differentiated between plant family composition in plots, providing evidence for decomposer home-field advantage. The observed patterns are consistent with rapid microbiome differentiation with plant composition, which could generate rapid feedbacks on plant growth in the field, thereby potentially influencing plant community structure, and influence ecosystem processes. These findings highlight the importance of native microbial inoculation in restoration.

Enhancement of Alkali Resistance of Glass Fibers via In Situ Modification of Manganese-Based Nanomaterials.

Glass fibers are widely used in cement-based precast products, given the reinforcing requirements for toughness and strength. However, inferior alkali resistance hinders the effectiveness of glass fibers in reinforcing cement-based materials. In this paper, nanoparticle coatings were applied on the surface of alkali-resistant glass fiber (ARGF) as a protective layer via the in situ chemical reaction of oleic acid (OA) and potassium permanganate (PP). The morphology and constituents of the as-prepared ARGFs were examined using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and obtaining X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) measurements. Mass loss and strength retention were investigated to characterize alkali resistance of modified ARGFs. Results showed that ARGFs could be optimally coated by a layer of MnO2-based nanoparticles consisting of approximately 70% MnO2, 18% MnO, and 12% MnSiO3, when modified with an optimum OA to PP ratio of 10 for 24 h. The dissolution of ARGFs matrix in 4% and 10% NaOH solutions were distinctly delayed to 28 d, as a consequence of the introduction of the MnO2-based nanoparticle layer, compared with nontreated ARGF occurring at 3 d in 4% NaOH solution. For the optimally modified ARGFs, the mass loss was controlled to 1.76% and 2.91% after 90 d of corrosion in 4% and 10% NaOH solutions, and the retention of tensile strength was increased by approximately 25%. With respect to the increment in alkali-resistant performance, the modified ARGFs can be promising candidates for wide applications in alkaline cement-based products.

Aging Population, Balanced Diet and China's Grain Demand.

The need to make more accurate grain demand (GD) forecasting has become a major topic in the current international grain security discussion. Our research aims to improve short-term GD prediction by establishing a multi-factor model that integrates the key factors: shifts in dietary structures, population size and age structure, urbanization, food waste, and the impact of COVID-19. These factors were not considered simultaneously in previous research. To illustrate the model, we projected China's annual GDP from 2022 to 2025. We calibrated key parameters such as conversion coefficients from animal foods to feed grain, standard person consumption ratios, and population size using the latest surveys and statistical data that were either out of date or missing in previous research. Results indicate that if the change in diets continued at the rate as observed during 2013-2019 (scenario 1), China's GD is projected to be 629.35 million tons in 2022 and 658.16 million tons in 2025. However, if diets shift to align with the recommendations in the Dietary Guideline for Chinese Residents 2022 (scenario 2), GD would be lower by 5.9-11.1% annually compared to scenario 1. A reduction in feed grain accounts for 68% of this change. Furthermore, for every 1 percentage point increase in the population adopting a balanced diet, GD would fall by 0.44-0.73 million tons annually during that period. Overlooking changes in the population age structure could lead to an overprediction of annual GDP by 3.8% from 2022 to 2025. With an aging population, China's GD would fall slightly, and adopting a balanced diet would not lead to an increase in GD but would have positive impacts on human health and the environment. Our sensitivity analysis indicated that reducing food waste, particularly cereal, livestock, and poultry waste, would have significant effects on reducing GD, offsetting the higher demand due to rising urbanization and higher incomes. These results underscore the significance of simultaneous consideration of multiple factors, particularly the dietary structure and demographic composition, resulting in a more accurate prediction of GD. Our findings should be useful for policymakers concerning grain security, health, and environmental protection.

Dilution of specialist pathogens drives productivity benefits from diversity in plant mixtures.

Productivity benefits from diversity can arise when compatible pathogen hosts are buffered by unrelated neighbors, diluting pathogen impacts. However, the generality of pathogen dilution has been controversial and rarely tested within biodiversity manipulations. Here, we test whether soil pathogen dilution generates diversity- productivity relationships using a field biodiversity-manipulation experiment, greenhouse assays, and feedback modeling. We find that the accumulation of specialist pathogens in monocultures decreases host plant yields and that pathogen dilution predicts plant productivity gains derived from diversity. Pathogen specialization predicts the strength of the negative feedback between plant species in greenhouse assays. These feedbacks significantly predict the overyielding measured in the field the following year. This relationship strengthens when accounting for the expected dilution of pathogens in mixtures. Using a feedback model, we corroborate that pathogen dilution drives overyielding. Combined empirical and theoretical evidence indicate that specialist pathogen dilution generates overyielding and suggests that the risk of losing productivity benefits from diversity may be highest where environmental change decouples plant-microbe interactions.

Mycorrhiza-mediated recruitment of complete denitrifying Pseudomonas reduces N2O emissions from soil.

BACKGROUND: Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) are key soil organisms and their extensive hyphae create a unique hyphosphere associated with microbes actively involved in N cycling. However, the underlying mechanisms how AMF and hyphae-associated microbes may cooperate to influence N2O emissions from "hot spot" residue patches remain unclear. Here we explored the key microbes in the hyphosphere involved in N2O production and consumption using amplicon and shotgun metagenomic sequencing. Chemotaxis, growth and N2O emissions of isolated N2O-reducing bacteria in response to hyphal exudates were tested using in vitro cultures and inoculation experiments. RESULTS: AMF hyphae reduced denitrification-derived N2O emission (max. 63%) in C- and N-rich residue patches. AMF consistently enhanced the abundance and expression of clade I nosZ gene, and inconsistently increased that of nirS and nirK genes. The reduction of N2O emissions in the hyphosphere was linked to N2O-reducing Pseudomonas specifically enriched by AMF, concurring with the increase in the relative abundance of the key genes involved in bacterial citrate cycle. Phenotypic characterization of the isolated complete denitrifying P. fluorescens strain JL1 (possessing clade I nosZ) indicated that the decline of net N2O emission was a result of upregulated nosZ expression in P. fluorescens following hyphal exudation (e.g. carboxylates). These findings were further validated by re-inoculating sterilized residue patches with P. fluorescens and by an 11-year-long field experiment showing significant positive correlation between hyphal length density with the abundance of clade I nosZ gene. CONCLUSIONS: The cooperation between AMF and the N2O-reducing Pseudomonas residing on hyphae significantly reduce N2O emissions in the microsites. Carboxylates exuded by hyphae act as attractants in recruiting P. fluorescens and also as stimulants triggering nosZ gene expression. Our discovery indicates that reinforcing synergies between AMF and hyphosphere microbiome may provide unexplored opportunities to stimulate N2O consumption in nutrient-enriched microsites, and consequently reduce N2O emissions from soils. This knowledge opens novel avenues to exploit cross-kingdom microbial interactions for sustainable agriculture and for climate change mitigation. Video Abstract.

Societal projection: Beliefs concerning the relationship between development and inequality in China.

We examine how the relationship between development and inequality at the societal level is perceived and evaluated by ordinary Chinese people. We hypothesize that because the Chinese have recently experienced rapid increases in both economic growth and social inequality, they tend to view economic development as a driving force of social inequality. To address this question, we conducted a social survey in 2006 in six Chinese provinces (n=4898). The survey data reveal that a large proportion of Chinese people have internalized a causal model in which they project high levels of inequality onto countries they view as more developed and low levels of inequality onto countries they see as less developed. However, results also show that a smaller proportion of Chinese believe in a negative relationship between development and inequality. Hence, the study reveals heterogeneity among ordinary Chinese in their perceptions of the causal relationship between development and inequality. Surprisingly, socioeconomic and demographic characteristics provide no explanatory power in explaining this heterogeneity.

High bacterial diversity and siderophore-producing bacteria collectively suppress Fusarium oxysporum in maize/faba bean intercropping.

Beyond interacting with neighboring plants, crop performance is affected by the microbiome that includes pathogens and mutualists. While the importance of plant-plant interactions in explaining overyielding in intercropping is well known, the role of the microbiome, in particular how the presence of microbes from heterospecific crop species inhibit pathogens of the focal plants in affecting yield remains hardly explored. Here we performed both field samplings and pot experiments to investigate the microbial interactions in the maize/faba bean intercropping system, with the focus on the inhibition of Fusarium oxysporum in faba bean plants. Long-term field measurements show that maize/faba bean intercropping increased crop yield, reduced the gene copies of F. oxysporum by 30-84% and increased bacterial richness and Shannon index compared to monocropping. Bacterial networks in intercropping were more stable with more hub nodes than the respective monocultures. Furthermore, the observed changes of whole microbial communities were aligned with differences in the number of siderophore-producing rhizobacteria in maize and pathogen abundances in faba bean. Maize possessed 71% more siderophore-producing rhizobacteria and 33% more synthetases genes abundance of nonribosomal peptides, especially pyochelin, relative to faba bean. This was further evidenced by the increased numbers of siderophore-producing bacteria and decreased gene copies of F. oxysporum in the rhizosphere of intercropped faba bean. Four bacteria (Pseudomonas spp. B004 and B021, Bacillus spp. B005 and B208) from 95 isolates antagonized F. oxysporum f. sp. fabae. In particular, B005, which represented a hub node in the networks, showed particularly high siderophore-producing capabilities. Intercropping increased overall bacterial diversity and network complexity and the abundance of siderophore-producing bacteria, leading to facilitated pathogen suppression and increased resistance of faba bean to F. oxysporum. This study has great agronomic implications as microorganisms might be specifically targeted to optimize intercropping practices in the future.

[Clinical Study of miRNAs Derived from Serum Exosomes in Multiple Myeloma].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the expression level and prognostic value of miR-21, miR-18a, miR-146a, and Let-7b derived from serum exosomes in patients with multiple myeloma (MM). METHODS: Serum exosomes were extracted from 57 MM patients and 20 healthy persons using ExoQuick exosome precipitation solution kit, and the relative expression level of miR-21, miR-18a, miR-146a, and Let-7b derived from serum exosomes was measured by RT-qPCR. Correlations of the expression levels of all miRNAs mentioned above with routine laboratory parameters were analyzed by Spearman correlation analysis. The relationship between the expression level of miR-21, miR-18a, miR-146a, and Let-7b derived from serum exosomes and overall survival of patients with MM was analyzed using the Kaplan-Meier survival curve. RESULTS: The expression levels of miR-21, miR-18a, and Let-7b derived from serum exosomes in patients with MM were significantly lower than those in the normal control group (P<0.001), while the expression level of miR-146a between the two groups was not significantly different (P>0.05). The expression level of miR-21 was strongly negatively correlated with serum ß2-microglobulin concentration (r=-0.830), and weakly negatively correlated with serum creatinine, corrected serum calcium, and cystatin C (r=-0.488, -0.282, -0.627). The expression levels of Let-7b and miR-18a were also weakly negatively correlated with the corrected serum calcium, ß2-microglobulin, and cystatin C concentration (r=-0.305, -0.362, -0.461; -0.317, -0.542, -0.434). However, there was no significant correlation between the expression level of miR-146a and routine laboratory parameters in MM patients. The overall survival rate of MM patients with low expression level of miR-21, miR-18a, and Let-7b significantly decreased compared with high expression level group (P<0.05), however, the expression level of miR-146a was not related to the overall survival rate. CONCLUSION: Aberrant low expression levels of miR-21, miR-18a, and Let-7b derived from serum exosomes exist in patients with MM, which are associated with a worse overall survival rate.

2-Bromo-2-(5-bromo-1H-1,2,4-triazol-1-yl)-1-(2,4-difluoro-phen-yl)ethanone.

In the title compound, C(10)H(5)Br(2)F(2)N(3)O, the mean planes of the benzene and triazole rings form a dihedral angle of 84.86 (2)°. In the crystal structure, weak inter-molecular C-H⋯O hydrogen bonds link mol-ecules into extended chains propagating along the c axis.