SFN promotes renal fibrosis via binding with MYH9 in chronic kidney disease.

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a clinical syndrome characterized by persistent renal function decline. Renal fibrosis is the main pathological process in CKD, but an effective treatment does not exist. Stratifin (SFN) is a highly-conserved, multi-function soluble acidic protein. Therefore, this study explored the effects of SFN on CKD. First, we found that SFN was highly expressed in patients with CKD, as well as in CKD animal and cell models. Next, we induced injury and fibrosis in human renal tubule epithelial cells, and SFN knockdown reversed these effects. Furthermore, SFN knockdown mitigated ureteral obstruction (UUO)-induced renal tubular dilatation and renal interstitial fibrosis in mice. Liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry/mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS), co-immunoprecipitation (Co-IP), and immunofluorescence co-localization assays demonstrated that SFN bound the non-muscle myosin-encoding gene, myosin heavy chain 9 (MYH9), in the cytoplasm of renal tubular epithelial cells. MYH9 knockdown also reduced Col-1 and α-SMA expression, which are fibrosis markers. Finally, silencing SFN decreased MYH9 expression, alleviating renal fibrosis. These results suggest that SFN promotes kidney fibrosis in CKD by interacting with MYH9. This study may provide potential strategies for the treatment of CKD.

A control theoretic analysis of oscillator Ising machines.

This work advances the understanding of oscillator Ising machines (OIMs) as a nonlinear dynamic system for solving computationally hard problems. Specifically, we classify the infinite number of all possible equilibrium points of an OIM, including non-0/π ones, into three types based on their structural stability properties. We then employ the stability analysis techniques from control theory to analyze the stability property of all possible equilibrium points and obtain the necessary and sufficient condition for their stability. As a result of these analytical results, we establish, for the first time, the threshold of the binarization in terms of the coupling strength and strength of the second harmonic signal. Furthermore, we provide an estimate of the domain of attraction of each asymptotically stable equilibrium point by employing the Lyapunov stability theory. Finally, we illustrate our theoretical conclusions by numerical simulation.

[Diagnostic Value of Ultrasound for Thyroid Nodules With a Spoke-Wheel Blood Flow Pattern].

Objective To explore the diagnostic value of ultrasound for thyroid nodules with a spoke-wheel blood flow pattern.Methods The clinical data of the patients with thyroid nodules presenting a spoke-wheel blood flow pattern examined by ultrasound were collected,and the gray-scale ultrasound features of the nodules were recorded.The diagnostic performance of the Thyroid Imaging Reporting and Data System by American College of Radiology (ACR TI-RADS),Chinese Thyroid Imaging Reporting and Data System (C-TIRADS),and combined specific indicators for the thyroid nodules with a spoke-wheel blood flow pattern was evaluated by comparison with the pathological results,which was regarded as the gold standard.Results A total of 64 patients with thyroid nodules were finally included,including 47 patients with malignant nodules and 17 patients with benign nodules.In addition to the general ultrasound features,central scar mostly appeared in malignant nodules (χ2=5.968,P=0.015),while central coarse calcification was more common in benign nodules (χ2=10.899,P=0.001).After the combination of central scar and central gross calcification,the diagnostic performance of ACR TI-RADS and C-TIRADS was improved (both P<0.001).Conclusions When the thyroid nodule shows a spoke-wheel blood flow pattern,one should be cautious of the possibility of malignancy.Combining central scar and central coarse calcification can improve the accuracy of ultrasonic diagnosis.

Janus droplet microreactors for preparing polyaniline/AgCl nanocomposites.

We report a novel method to conduct heterogeneous reactions using aqueous-ionic liquid Janus microdroplets as a series of isolated bi-phasic microreactors where AgCl@polyaniline core-shell nanoparticles are successfully synthesized accompanied by polyaniline nano-needles, and enhanced visualization of reaction progression through the color changes in Janus droplets is achieved.

Short-term inhalation of xenon during anesthesia for prevention of postoperative delirium in elderly patients undergoing laparoscopic radical colectomy: study protocol for a randomized controlled clinical trial.

BACKGROUND: Postoperative delirium (POD) is a common complication that is characterized by acute onset of impaired cognitive function and is associated with an increased mortality, a prolonged duration of hospital stay, and additional healthcare expenditures. The incidence of POD in elderly patients undergoing laparoscopic radical colectomy ranges from 8 to 54%. Xenon has been shown to provide neuroprotection in various neural injury models, but the clinical researches assessing the preventive effect of xenon inhalation on the occurrence of POD obtained controversial findings. This study aims to investigate the effects of a short xenon inhalation on the occurrence of POD in elderly patients undergoing laparoscopic radical colectomy. METHODS/DESIGN: This is a prospective, randomized, controlled trial and 132 patients aged 65-80 years and scheduled for laparoscopic radical colectomy will be enrolled. The participants will be randomly assigned to either the control group or the xenon group (n = 66 in each group). The primary outcome will be the incidence of POD in the first 5 days after surgery. Secondary outcomes will include the subtype, severity, and duration of POD, postoperative pain score, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PQSI), perioperative non-delirium complications, and economic parameters. Additionally, the study will investigate the activation of microglial cells, expression of inflammatory factors in colon tissues, plasma inflammatory factors, and neurochemical markers. DISCUSSION: Elderly patients undergoing laparoscopic radical colectomy are at a high risk of POD, with delayed postoperative recovery and increased healthcare costs. The primary objective of this study is to determine the preventive effect of a short xenon inhalation on the occurrence of POD in these patients. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Chinese Clinical Trial Registry ChiCTR2300076666. Registered on October 16, 2023, http://www.chictr.org.cn .

First report of leaf spot disease caused by Cladosporium pseudocladosporioides on Lonicera caerulea L. in Heilongjiang Province, China.

Blue honeysuckle (Lonicera caerulea L.) has contributed to maintaining the forest's ecological balance and remarkable frost-resistant abilities, helping it withstand extremely cold conditions (-46 °C) and a wide pH range (5 to 8) (Sharma and Lee 2021). Between September 2022 and September 2023, leaf spots were observed on approximately 30% of blue honeysuckle plants of the 'Lanjingling' cultivar grown in a 1.13 ha field in Da Hinggan Ling Prefecture (50.32° N, 124.13° E) in Heilongjiang Province, China. The leaves of the affected plants displayed black-colored spots. To identify the causal agents, 10 healthy and symptomatic leaves were randomly collected from ten healthy and infected individual plants, respectively. Small (3 to 4 mm) segments of the symptomatic tissues were immersed in 5% sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl) for 3 min, rinsed three times with sterile distilled water, dried in a paper towel, and plated on 9-cm Petri dishes containing potato dextrose agar (PDA). Ten fungal colonies developed on the PDA plates with an isolation frequency of 100% from 10 symptomatic leaves, and all colonies displayed a morphology consistent with Cladosporium spp. (Bensch et al. 2018). Cladosporium-like fungi were not isolated from healthy leaves. Dark olive-colored mycelia were observed, with straight unbranched conidiophores bearing terminal light brown-colored limoniform conidia (1.80 to 4.50 × 2.10 to 12.60 µm) and surrounded by a thin line of white mycelium (Delisle-Houde et al. 2024). To confirm this identification, PCR amplification of two representative strains LD-299 and LD-300 genomic DNA was performed with ITS1/ITS4 (White et al. 1990) and ACT512F/ACT783R (Carbone and Kohn 1999) primers. Basic local alignment search tool (BLAST) analyses of the National Center for Biotechnology Information database showed that sequences of the ITS (PP600316, PP600317) and ACT (PP624334, PP624335) all revealed 100% (493/493 nt, 493/493 nt; 181/181 nt, 181/181 nt) shared identity with Cladosporium pseudocladosporioides strain ex-type MF473195 and HM148674 (Bensch et al. 2010), respectively. Using a neighbor-joining phylogenetic analysis based on the ITS and ACT sequences, isolates LD-299 and LD-300 clustered in the same clade of C. pseudocladosporioides. Therefore, based on its morphological characteristics and molecular phylogeny, the two isolates were identified as C. pseudocladosporioides (Cosseboom and Hu 2023). A pathogenicity test was performed using nine healthy two-year-old blue honeysuckle Lanjingling plants. Three plants were inoculated with either the LD-299 or the LD-300 conidial suspension (1 × 106 spores/ml) or with clean water as an experimental control (Aydogdu et al. 2023). All plants were cultured in a greenhouse (28℃, 75% relative humidity, 12 h light and dark cycle), and each experiment was replicated three times. Typical leaf spot symptoms were first observed on the inoculated leaves after 10 days. Morphological and molecular characterization of re-isolated pathogens from the artificially infected leaves indicated that the two isolates were identical, thereby confirming Koch's postulates. Cladosporium pseudocladosporioides previously caused leaf spot disease on artichoke (Cynara scolymus) in Türkiye (Aydogdu et al. 2023). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of C. pseudocladosporioides causing leaf spots on blue honeysuckle in China. Blue honeysuckle production losses due to the leaf spots are critical for growers. Therefore, further focus should be given to investigate the host range and geographic distribution of C. pseudocladosporioides.

Deep Learning-Based Localization and Detection of Malpositioned Nasogastric Tubes on Portable Supine Chest X-Rays in Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine: A Multi-center Retrospective Study.

Malposition of a nasogastric tube (NGT) can lead to severe complications. We aimed to develop a computer-aided detection (CAD) system to localize NGTs and detect NGT malposition on portable chest X-rays (CXRs). A total of 7378 portable CXRs were retrospectively retrieved from two hospitals between 2015 and 2020. All CXRs were annotated with pixel-level labels for NGT localization and image-level labels for NGT presence and malposition. In the CAD system, DeepLabv3 + with backbone ResNeSt50 and DenseNet121 served as the model architecture for segmentation and classification models, respectively. The CAD system was tested on images from chronologically different datasets (National Taiwan University Hospital (National Taiwan University Hospital)-20), geographically different datasets (National Taiwan University Hospital-Yunlin Branch (YB)), and the public CLiP dataset. For the segmentation model, the Dice coefficients indicated accurate delineation of the NGT course (National Taiwan University Hospital-20: 0.665, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.630-0.696; National Taiwan University Hospital-Yunlin Branch: 0.646, 95% CI 0.614-0.678). The distance between the predicted and ground-truth NGT tips suggested accurate tip localization (National Taiwan University Hospital-20: 1.64 cm, 95% CI 0.99-2.41; National Taiwan University Hospital-Yunlin Branch: 2.83 cm, 95% CI 1.94-3.76). For the classification model, NGT presence was detected with high accuracy (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC): National Taiwan University Hospital-20: 0.998, 95% CI 0.995-1.000; National Taiwan University Hospital-Yunlin Branch: 0.998, 95% CI 0.995-1.000; CLiP dataset: 0.991, 95% CI 0.990-0.992). The CAD system also detected NGT malposition with high accuracy (AUC: National Taiwan University Hospital-20: 0.964, 95% CI 0.917-1.000; National Taiwan University Hospital-Yunlin Branch: 0.991, 95% CI 0.970-1.000) and detected abnormal nasoenteric tube positions with favorable performance (AUC: 0.839, 95% CI 0.807-0.869). The CAD system accurately localized NGTs and detected NGT malposition, demonstrating excellent potential for external generalizability.

Risk Factors and Nomogram Model for Hepatocellular Carcinoma Development in Chronic Hepatitis B Patients with Low-Level Viremia.

Background and aim: Patients with chronic hepatitis B patients (CHB) with low-level viremia (LLV) are not necessarily at low risk of developing hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The question of whether CHB patients with LLV require immediate antiviral agent (AVT) or long-term AVT remains controversial. The study aims to investigate the risk of HCC development and the risk factors in CHB patients with LLV and construct a nomogram model predicting the risk of HCC. Methods: We conducted a retrospective cohort study that enrolled 16,895 CHB patients from January 2008 to December 2020. The patients were divided into three groups for comparison: the LLV group, maintained virological response (MVR) group and HBV-DNA>2000 group. The cumulative incidence of progression to HCC was assessed. Cox regression analysis was performed to determine the final risk factors, and a nomogram model was constructed. The 10-fold Cross-Validation method was utilized for internal validation. Results: A total of 408 new cases of HCC occurred during the average follow-up period of 5.78 years. The 3, 5, and 10-year cumulative HCC risks in the LLV group were 3.56%, 4.96%, and 9.51%, respectively. There was a significant difference in the cumulative risk of HCC between the HBV-DNA level > 2000 IU/mL and LLV groups (p = 0.049). Independent risk factors for HCC development in LLV group included male gender, age, presence of cirrhosis, and platelets count. The Area Under the Curve (AUC) values for the 3-year and 5-year prediction from our HCC risk prediction model were 0.75 and 0.76, respectively. Conclusion: Patients with LLV and MVR are still at risk for developing HCC. The nomogram established for CHB patient with LLV, incorporating identified significant risk factors, serves as an effective tool for predicting HCC-free outcomes. This nomogram model provides valuable information for determining appropriate surveillance strategies and prescribing AVT.

Dtx2 deficiency induces ependymo-radial glial cell proliferation and improves spinal cord motor function recovery.

Traumatic injury to the spinal cord can lead to significant, permanent disability. Mammalian spinal cords are not capable of regeneration; in contrast, adult zebrafish are capable of such regeneration, fully recovering motor function. Understanding the mechanisms underlying zebrafish neuroregeneration may provide useful information regarding endogenous regenerative potential and aid in the development of therapeutic strategies in humans. DTXs regulate a variety of cellular processes. However, their role in neural regeneration has not been described. We found that zebrafish dtx2, encoding Deltex E3 ubiquitin ligase 2, is expressed in ependymo-radial glial cells in the adult spinal cord. After spinal cord injury, the heterozygous dtx2 mutant fish motor function recovered quicker than that of the wild-type controls. The mutant fish displayed increased ependymo-radial glial cell proliferation and augmented motor neuron formation. Moreover, her gene expression, downstream of Notch signaling, increased in Dtx2 mutants. Notch signaling inactivation by dominant-negative Rbpj abolished the increased ependymo-radial glia proliferation caused by Dtx2 deficiency. These results indicate that ependymo-radial glial proliferation is induced by Dtx2 deficiency, by activating Notch-Rbpj signaling to improve spinal cord regeneration and motor function recovery.

Two C-terminal isoforms of Aplysia tachykinin-related peptide receptors exhibit phosphorylation-dependent and independent desensitization mechanisms.

Diversity, a hallmark of G protein-coupled receptor (GPCR) signaling, partly stems from alternative splicing of a single gene generating more than one isoform for a receptor. Additionally, receptor responses to ligands can be attenuated by desensitization upon prolonged or repeated ligand exposure. Both phenomena have been demonstrated and exemplified by the deuterostome tachykinin (TK) signaling system, although the role of phosphorylation in desensitization remains a subject of debate. Here, we describe the signaling system for tachykinin-related peptides (TKRPs) in a protostome, mollusk Aplysia. We cloned the Aplysia TKRP precursor, which encodes three TKRPs (apTKRP-1, apTKRP-2a, and apTKRP-2b) containing the FXGXR-amide motif. In situ hybridization and immunohistochemistry showed predominant expression of TKRP mRNA and peptide in the cerebral ganglia. TKRPs and their post-translational modifications were observed in extracts of CNS ganglia using mass spectrometry. We identified two Aplysia TKRP receptors (TKRPRs), named apTKRPR-A and apTKRPR-B. These receptors are two isoforms generated through alternative splicing of the same gene and differ only in their intracellular C-termini. Structure-activity relationship analysis of apTKRP-2b revealed that both C-terminal amidation and conserved residues of the ligand are critical for receptor activation. C-terminal truncates and mutants of apTKRPRs suggested that there is a C-terminal phosphorylation-independent desensitization for both receptors. Moreover, apTKRPR-B also exhibits phosphorylation-dependent desensitization through the phosphorylation of C-terminal Ser/Thr residues. This comprehensive characterization of the Aplysia TKRP signaling system underscores the evolutionary conservation of the TKRP and TK signaling systems, while highlighting the intricacies of receptor regulation through alternative splicing and differential desensitization mechanisms.

Non-classical Deactivation Mechanism in a Supported Intermetallic Catalyst for Propane Dehydrogenation.

Platinum-based supported intermetallic alloys (IMAs) demonstrate exceptional performance in catalytic propane dehydrogenation (PDH) primarily because of their remarkable resistance to coke formation. However, these IMAs still encounter a significant hurdle in the form of catalyst deactivation. Understanding the complex deactivation mechanism of supported IMAs, which goes beyond conventional coke deposition, requires meticulous microscopic structural elucidation. In this study, we unravel a nonclassical deactivation mechanism over a PtZn/γ-Al2O3 PDH catalyst, dictated by the PtZn to Pt3Zn nanophase transformation accompanied with dezincification. The physical origin lies in the metal support interaction (MSI) that enables strong chemical bonding between hydroxyl groups on the support and Zn sites on the PtZn phase to selectively remove Zn species followed by the reconstruction towards Pt3Zn phase. Building on these insights, we have devised a solution to circumvent the deactivation by passivating the MSI through surface modification of γ-Al2O3 support. By exchanging protons of hydroxyl groups with potassium ions (K) on the γ-Al2O3 support, such a strategy significantly minimizes the dezincification of PtZn IMA via diminished metal-support bonding, which dramatically reduces the deactivation rate from 0.2044 to 0.0587 h-1.

[Examination of the Thermal Stability and Swallowing Safety of a Self-Developed Enteral Nutrition Thickening Agent]. / è‡ªåˆ¶è‚ å† è¥å »æ¶²å¢žç¨ å‰‚çš„çƒ­ç¨³å®šæ€§åŠåžå’½å®‰å ¨æ€§æŽ¢ç´¢.

Objective: To experimentally validate the effects of a self-developed heat-stable thickening agent on the textual characteristics of enteral nutrition solutions of standard concentration and its applicability in improving dysphagia. Methods: A gradient of different doses of the self-developed thickening agent (1.0 g, 1.5 g, 2.0 g, 2.5 g, and3.0 g) and three commonly used commercial thickeners were mixed with 23.391 g of a complete nutrition formula powder dissolved in 85 mL of purified water to prepare 100 mL standard concentration nutrition solutions. The textual parameters (cohesiveness, viscosity, thickness, and hardness) of these nutrition solutions were measured using a texture analyzer at various temperature gradients (20 ℃, 40 ℃, 60 ℃, and 80 ℃) to compare their thermal stability. A dysphagia rat model was created via epiglottectomy to explore the effects of the thickener on lung tissue damage scores and levels of inflammatory markers. The rats were divided into a test intervention group, a positive control group, a negative control group, and a blank control group (no surgery and normal feeding after fasting for one day), with 15 rats in each group. After fasting for one day post-surgery, the test intervention group was fed with the standard concentration nutrition solution thickened with the self-developed thickener, while the positive control group was given a standard concentration nutrition solution thickened with product 3, and the negative control group was fed a normal diet. All groups were fed for two weeks with food dyed with food-grade green dye. General conditions, body mass, and food intake were observed and recorded. After two weeks, abdominal aorta blood was collected, and heart, liver, spleen, lung, and kidney tissues were harvested and weighed to calculate the lung tissue organ coefficient. The organ conditions were evaluated using routine H&E staining, and lung damage was semi-quantitatively analyzed based on the Mikawa scoring criteria. Blood supernatants were collected to measure the total serum protein and albumin levels to determine the nutritional status of the rats. The expression of IL-6 and TNF-α genes in lung tissues was measured by RT-qPCR. IL-6 and TNF-α protein expression levels in lung tissues, lung tissue homogenate, and serum were measured by ELISA. The aspiration incidence rate was calculated. Results: Within the dosage range of 1.0 g to 3.0 g, the self-developed thickener in the test samples exhibited superior thermal stability in cohesiveness compared to the three commercially available thickeners, with a statistically significant difference (P<0.01). The differences in the thermal stability of viscosity and hardness between the self-developed thickener and the three commercially available thickeners were not statistically significant. The viscosity stability was optimal for the self-developed thickener, followed by the commercially available thickeners 1 and 3, with thickeners 2 being the least stable, though the differences were not statistically significant (P>0.05). Product 1 showed the best thermal stability in thickness, followed by the self-developed thickener and product 2, while the product 3 exhibited the worst performance, with the difference being statistically significant (P<0.01). The self-developed thickener had the best thermal stability in hardness at temperatures ranging from 20℃ to 80 ℃, followed by products 1 and 2, with product 3 being the least stable. However, the differences were not statistically significant (P>0.05). Animal experiment results indicated that the body weight gain in the positive control group and the test intervention group was lower than that in the blank and negative control groups (P<0.01). The spleen coefficient of the intervention group was lower than that of the positive control group and the blank control group (P<0.01), while the heart, liver, and kidney coefficients were lower than those of the blank control group (P<0.01). The differences in the lung coefficient of the intervention group and those of the other three groups were no statistically significant. Levels of TP and ALB in the test intervention group, the positive control group, and the negative control group were all lower than those in the blank control group, with statistically significant differences (P<0.01). ELISA results showed that serum IL-6 levels in the blank and test intervention groups were lower than those in the negative and positive control groups (P<0.05), while the difference in the other indicators across the four groups were not statistically significant (P>0.05). There were no statistically significant differences among the four groups in terms of lung tissue damage pathology scores, or in the levels of IL-6 and TNF-α gene expression in lung tissues. The aspiration incidence rate was 0% in all groups. Conclusion: The self-developed enteral nutrition thickening agent demonstrated excellent thermal stability and swallowing safety. Further research to explore its application in patients with dysphagia is warranted.

Flash Joule Heating: A Promising Method for Preparing Heterostructure Catalysts to Inhibit Polysulfide Shuttling in Li-S Batteries.

The "shuttle effect" issue severely hinders the practical application of lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries, which is primarily caused by the significant accumulation of lithium polysulfides in the electrolyte. Designing effective catalysts is highly desired for enhancing polysulfide conversion to address the above issue. Here, the one-step flash-Joule-heating route is employed to synthesize a W-W2C heterostructure on the graphene substrate (W-W2C/G) as a catalytic interlayer for this purpose. Theoretical calculations reveal that the work function difference between W (5.08 eV) and W2C (6.31 eV) induces an internal electric field at the heterostructure interface, accelerating the movement of electrons and ions, thus promoting the sulfur reduction reaction (SRR) process. The high catalytic activity is also confirmed by the reduced activation energy and suppressed polysulfide shuttling by in situ Raman analyses. With the W-W2C/G interlayer, the Li-S batteries exhibit an outstanding rate performance (665 mAh g-1 at 5.0 C) and cycle steadily with a low decay rate of 0.06% over 1000 cycles at a high rate of 3.0 C. Moreover, a high areal capacity of 10.9 mAh cm-2 (1381.4 mAh g-1) is obtained with a high area sulfur loading of 7.9 mg cm-2 but a low electrolyte/sulfur ratio of 9.0 µL mg-1.

N-Containing Porous Carbon-Based MnO Composites as Anode with High Capacity and Stability for Lithium-Ion Batteries.

MnO has attracted much attention as the anode for Li-ion batteries (LIBs) owing to its high specific capacity. However, the low conductivity limited its large application. An effective solution to solve this problem is carbon coating. Biomass carbon materials have aroused much interest for being low-cost and rich in functional groups and hetero atoms. This work designs porous N-containing MnO composites based on the chemical-activated tremella using a self-templated method. The tremella, after activation, could offer more active sites for carbon to coordinate with the Mn ions. And the as-prepared composites could also inherit the special porous nanostructures of the tremella, which is beneficial for Li+ transfer. Moreover, the pyrrolic/pyridinic N from the tremella can further improve the conductivity and the electrolyte wettability of the composites. Finally, the composites show a high reversible specific capacity of 1000 mAh g-1 with 98% capacity retention after 200 cycles at 100 mA g-1. They also displayed excellent long-cycle performance with 99% capacity retention (relative to the capacity second cycle) after long 1000 cycles under high current density, which is higher than in most reported transition metal oxide anodes. Above all, this study put forward an efficient and convenient strategy based on the low-cost biomass to construct N-containing porous composite anodes with a fast Li+ diffusion rate, high electronic conductivity, and outstanding structure stability.

Postnatal renal tubule development: roles of tubular flow and flux.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Postnatal renal tubule development is critical to adult kidney function. Several postnatal changes regulate the differentiation and proliferation of renal tubular cells. Here, we review the literature and our efforts on thick ascending limb (TAL) development in Bartter syndrome (BS). RECENT FINDINGS: Glomerular filtrate quickly increases after birth, imposing fluid shear stress and circumferential stretch on immature renal tubules. Recent studies showed that kidney organoids under flow (superfusion) have better development of tubular structures and the expression of cilia and solute transporters. These effects are likely mediated by mechanosensors, such as cilia and the piezo1 channel. Improved renal oxygenation and sodium pump-dependent active transport can stimulate mitochondrial respiration and biogenesis. The functional coupling between transport and mitochondria ensures ATP supply for energy-demanding reactions in tubular cells, including cell cycle progression and proliferation. We recently discovered that postnatal renal medulla maturation and TAL elongation are impaired in Clc-k2-deficient BS mice. Primary cultured Clc-k2-deficient TAL cells have G1-S transition and proliferation delay. These developmental defects could be part of the early pathogenesis of BS and worsen the phenotype. SUMMARY: Understanding how tubular flow and transepithelial ion fluxes regulate renal tubule development may improve the treatment of congenital renal tubulopathies.

[Effects of different exercise modes on neuromuscular junction and metabolism of skeletal muscle-related proteins in aging rats].

The present study aimed to explore the effects of different exercise modes on neuromuscular junction (NMJ) and metabolism of skeletal muscle-related proteins in aging rats. Ten from 38 male Sprague-Dawley (SD) rats (3-month-old) were randomly selected into young (Y) group, while the rest were raised to 21 months old and randomly divided into elderly control (O), endurance exercise (EN) and resistance exercise (R) groups. After 8 weeks of corresponding exercises training, the gastrocnemius muscles of rats were collected, and the expression of S100B in Schwann cells was detected by immunofluorescence staining. Western blot was used to detect the protein expression levels of agglutinate protein (Agrin), low-density lipoprotein receptor-related protein 4 (Lrp4), muscle- specific kinase protein (MuSK), downstream tyrosine kinase 7 (Dok7), phosphorylated protein kinase B (p-Akt), phosphorylated mammalian target rapamycin (p-mTOR), and phosphorylated forkhead box O1 (p-FoxO1) in rat gastrocnemius muscles. The results showed that, endurance and resistance exercises increased the wet weight ratio of gastrocnemius muscle in the aging rats. The protein expression of S100B in the R group was significantly higher than those in the O and EN groups. Proteins related to NMJ function, including Agrin, Lrp4, MuSK, and Dok7 were significantly decreased in the O group compared with those in the Y group. Resistance exercise up-regulated these four proteins in the aging rats, whereas endurance exercise could not reverse the protein expression levels of Lrp4, MuSK and Dok7. Regarding skeletal muscle-related proteins, the O group showed down-regulated p-Akt, and p-mTOR protein expression levels and up-regulated p-FoxO1 protein expression level, compared to the Y group. Resistance and endurance exercises reversed the changes in p-mTOR and p-FoxO1 protein expression in the aging rats. These findings demonstrate that both exercise modes can enhance NMJ function, increase protein synthesis and reduce the catabolism of skeletal muscle-related proteins in aging rats, with resistance exercise showing a more pronounced effect.

RETRACTED: Cheng et al. Using Comorbidity Pattern Analysis to Detect Reliable Methylated Genes in Colorectal Cancer Verified by Stool DNA Test. Genes 2021, 12, 1539.

The Genes journal retracts the article "Using Comorbidity Pattern Analysis to Detect Reliable Methylated Genes in Colorectal Cancer Verified by Stool DNA Test" [...].