Solobacterium moorei promotes the progression of adenomatous polyps by causing inflammation and disrupting the intestinal barrier.

BACKGROUND: Adenomatous polyps (APs) with inflammation are risk factors for colorectal cancer. However, the role of inflammation-related gut microbiota in promoting the progression of APs is unknown. METHODS: Sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene was conducted to identify characteristic bacteria in AP tissues and normal mucosa. Then, the roles of inflammation-related bacteria were clarified by Spearman correlation analysis. Furthermore, colorectal HT-29 cells, normal colon NCM460 cells, and azoxymethane-treated mice were used to investigate the effects of the characteristic bacteria on progression of APs. RESULTS: The expression levels of inflammation-related markers (diamine oxidase, D-lactate, C-reactive protein, tumor necrosis factor-α, interleukin-6 and interleukin-1ß) were increased, whereas the expression levels of anti-inflammatory factors (interleukin-4 and interleukin-10) were significantly decreased in AP patients as compared to healthy controls. Solobacterium moorei (S. moorei) was enriched in AP tissues and fecal samples, and significantly positively correlated with serum inflammation-related markers. In vitro, S. moorei preferentially attached to HT-29 cells and stimulated cell proliferation and production of pro-inflammatory factors. In vivo, the incidence of intestinal dysplasia was significantly increased in the S. moorei group. Gavage of mice with S. moorei upregulated production of pro-inflammatory factors, suppressed proliferation of CD4+ and CD8+cells, and disrupted the integrity of the intestinal barrier, thereby accelerating progression of APs. CONCLUSIONS: S. moorei accelerated the progression of AP in mice via activation of the NF-κB signaling pathway, chronic low-grade inflammation, and intestinal barrier disruption. Targeted reduction of S. moorei presents a potential strategy to prevent the progression of APs.

MiR-150-5p Alleviates Renal Tubule Epithelial Cell Fibrosis via the Inhibition of Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition by Targeting ZEB1.

INTRODUCTION: Although microRNA (miR)-150-5p participates in the progression of renal fibrosis, its mechanism of action remains elusive. METHODS: A mouse model of unilateral ureteral obstruction was used. The in vitro renal fibrosis model was established by stimulating human kidney 2 (HK-2) cells with transforming growth factor beta 1 (TGF-ß1). The expression profiles of miR-150-5p, zinc finger E-box binding homeobox 1 (ZEB1), and other fibrosis- and epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT)-linked proteins were determined using Western blot and quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. The relationship between miR-150-5p and ZEB1 in HK-2 cells was confirmed by a dual-luciferase reporter assay. RESULTS: Both in vivo and in vitro renal fibrosis models revealed reduced miR-150-5p expression and elevated ZEB1 level. A significant decrease in E-cadherin levels, as well as increases in alpha smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) and collagen type I (Col-I) levels, was seen in TGF-ß1-treated HK-2 cells. The overexpression of miR-150-5p ameliorated TGF-ß1-mediated fibrosis and EMT. Notably, miR-150-5p acts by directly targeting ZEB1. A significant reversal of the inhibitory impact of miR-150-5p on TGF-ß1-mediated fibrosis and EMT in HK-2 cells was observed upon ZEB1 overexpression. CONCLUSION: MiR-150-5p suppresses TGF-ß1-induced fibrosis and EMT by targeting ZEB1 in HK-2 cells, providing helpful insights into the therapeutic intervention of renal fibrosis.

Reducing the incidence of persistent headache attributed to retrosigmoid craniotomy: the role of 3D computed tomography venography image-guided technique and bone defects minimization.

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this paper was to assess the risk factors for persistent headache attributed to retrosigmoid craniotomy. Furthermore, we evaluated the role of the 3D computed tomography venography(CTV) image-guided technique in reducing the incidence of persistent headache. METHOD: The study encompassed patients with trigeminal neuralgia who underwent microvascular decompression. Patients were categorized into two groups based on the use of 3D CTV in surgical planning. Factors related to craniotomy and postoperative complications were analyzed between the two groups. Binary logistic regression analysis was conducted to identify risk factors for persistent headache attributed to craniotomy. RESULT: The inclusion criteria yielded 48 patients who underwent craniotomy with 3D CTV image guidance (the image-guided group) and 69 patients who did not use this technique (the control group). The image-guided group experienced significantly shorter craniotomy durations (27.9 ± 4.7 vs. 37.5 ± 8.0 min; p < 0.001), smaller craniotomy areas (472.7 ± 56.7 vs. 617.4 ± 89.7 mm2; p < 0.001), and reduced bone defects (141.8 ± 33.5 vs. 233.2 ± 71.1 mm2; p < 0.001). Bone defect (OR: 1.012; 95% CI: 1.005-1.018; p < 0.001) was found to be significantly associated with persistent headache in the multivariate analysis. CONCLUSIONS: Bone defects constitute an independent risk factor for persistent headache attributed to retrosigmoid craniotomy. The 3D CTV image-guided technique effectively reduces the size of bone defects, thereby leading to a reduced incidence of persistent headache postoperatively.

Deep learning for virtual orthodontic bracket removal: tool establishment and application.

OBJECTIVE: We aimed to develop a tool for virtual orthodontic bracket removal based on deep learning algorithms for feature extraction from bonded teeth and to demonstrate its application in a bracket position assessment scenario. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Our segmentation network for virtual bracket removal was trained using dataset A, containing 978 bonded teeth, 20 original teeth, and 20 brackets generated by scanners. The accuracy and segmentation time of the network were tested by dataset B, which included an additional 118 bonded teeth without knowing the original tooth morphology. This tool was then applied for bracket position assessment. The clinical crown center, bracket center, and orientations of separated teeth and brackets were extracted for analyzing the linear distribution and angular deviation of bonded brackets. RESULTS: This tool performed virtual bracket removal in 2.9 ms per tooth with accuracies of 98.93% and 97.42% (P < 0.01) in datasets A and B, respectively. The tooth surface and bracket characteristics were extracted and used to evaluate the results of manually bonded brackets by 49 orthodontists. Personal preferences for bracket angulation and bracket distribution were displayed graphically and tabularly. CONCLUSIONS: The tool's efficiency and precision are satisfactory, and it can be operated without original tooth data. It can be used to display the bonding deviation in the bracket position assessment scenario. CLINICAL SIGNIFICANCE: With the aid of this tool, unnecessary bracket removal can be avoided when evaluating bracket positions and modifying treatment plans. It has the potential to produce retainers and orthodontic devices prior to tooth debonding.

Age-Dependent Inflammatory Microenvironment Mediates Alveolar Regeneration.

Lung aging triggers the onset of various chronic lung diseases, with alveolar repair being a key focus for alleviating pulmonary conditions. The regeneration of epithelial structures, particularly the differentiation from type II alveolar epithelial (AT2) cells to type I alveolar epithelial (AT1) cells, serves as a prominent indicator of alveolar repair. Nonetheless, the precise role of aging in impeding alveolar regeneration and its underlying mechanism remain to be fully elucidated. Our study employed histological methods to examine lung aging effects on structural integrity and pathology. Lung aging led to alveolar collapse, disrupted epithelial structures, and inflammation. Additionally, a relative quantification analysis revealed age-related decline in AT1 and AT2 cells, along with reduced proliferation and differentiation capacities of AT2 cells. To elucidate the mechanisms underlying AT2 cell functional decline, we employed transcriptomic techniques and revealed a correlation between inflammatory factors and genes regulating proliferation and differentiation. Furthermore, a D-galactose-induced senescence model in A549 cells corroborated our omics experiments and confirmed inflammation-induced cell cycle arrest and a >30% reduction in proliferation/differentiation. Physiological aging-induced chronic inflammation impairs AT2 cell functions, hindering tissue repair and promoting lung disease progression. This study offers novel insights into chronic inflammation's impact on stem cell-mediated alveolar regeneration.

Impact of orthodontic-induced facial morphology changes on aesthetic evaluation: a retrospective study.

BACKGROUND: The profound influence of orthodontic treatments on facial aesthetics has been a topic of increasing interest. This study delves into the intricate interplay between orthodontic treatments, facial feature alterations, and aesthetic perceptions. METHODS: A total of 73 patients who had undergone orthodontic treatment were included in this study. Facial photographs were taken before and after treatment. Ten orthodontists provided facial aesthetic ratings (FAR) for each patient's frontal, profile, and overall views. 48 facial landmarks were manually placed by the orthodontists and normalized using Generalized Procrustes analysis (GPA). Two types of phenotypes were derived from facial landmarks. Global facial phenotypes were then extracted using principal component analysis (PCA). Additionally, 37 clinical features related to aesthetics and orthodontics were extracted. The association between facial features and changes in FAR after orthodontic treatment was determined using these two types of phenotypes. RESULTS: The FAR exhibited a high correlation among orthodontic experts, particularly in the profile view. The FAR increased after orthodontic treatment, especially in profile views. Extraction of premolars and orthognathic surgery were found to result in higher FAR change. For global facial phenotypes, the most noticeable changes in the frontal and profile views associated with FAR occurred in the lip area, characterized by inward retraction of the lips and slight chin protrusion in the profile view, as well as a decrease in lip height in the frontal view. The changes observed in the profile view were statistically more significant than those in the frontal view. These facial changes were consistent with the changes from orthodontic treatment. For clinical features, two profile features, namely pg.sm.hori and pg.n.ls, were found to be associated with FAR following orthodontic treatment. The highest FAR scores were achieved when pg.sm.hori was at 80° and pg.n.ls was at 8°. On the other hand, frontal clinical features had a subtle effect on FAR during orthodontic treatment. CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrated that orthodontic treatment improves facial aesthetics, particularly at lip aera in the profile view. Profile clinical features, such as pg.sm.hori and pg.n.ls, are essential in orthodontic treatment which could increase facial aesthetics.

[Clinical characteristics of children on prolonged mechanical ventilation due to different primary diseases]. / ä¸åŒåŽŸå‘ç— å¯¼è‡´é•¿æœŸæœºæ¢°é€šæ°”æ‚£å„¿çš„ä¸´åºŠç‰¹å¾åˆ†æž.

OBJECTIVES: To investigate the differences in clinical characteristics among children on prolonged mechanical ventilation (PMV) due to different primary diseases. METHODS: A retrospective analysis was performed on the clinical data of 59 pediatric patients requiring PMV from July 2017 to September 2022. According to the primary disease, they were divided into respiratory disease (RD) group, central nervous system (CNS) group, neuromuscular disease (NMD) group, and other disease group. The four groups were compared in terms of general information, treatment, and outcome. RESULTS: There were significant differences among the four groups in age, body weight, Pediatric Logistic Organ Dysfunction-2 (PELOD-2) score, Pediatric Risk of Mortality III (PRISM Ⅲ) score, analgesic and sedative treatment, nutrition supply, rehabilitation treatment, tracheotomy, successful ventilator weaning, and outcomes (P<0.05). Compared with the RD group, the CNS group and the other disease group had a significantly higher age and a significantly higher proportion of children receiving rehabilitation treatment, and the CNS group had a significantly higher proportion of children receiving tracheotomy (P<0.008). Compared with the other disease group, the CNS group and the NMD group had significantly lower PELOD-2 and PRISM III scores, and the CNS group had a significantly higher proportion of children with successful ventilator weaning and a significantly higher proportion of children who were improved and discharged (P<0.008). CONCLUSIONS: There are differences in clinical characteristics among children receiving PMV due to different etiologies. Most children in the RD group have a younger age, and children in the CNS group have a relatively good prognosis.

Breast metastatic tumors in lung can be substituted by lung-derived malignant cells transformed by alternative splicing H19 lncRNA.

Metastasis accounts for most cancer-associated deaths; yet, this complex process remains poorly understood, particularly the relationship between distant metastasis and primary site-derived cells. Here, we modified the classical MMTV-PyMT breast carcinoma model to trace the fate of mammary-derived carcinoma cells. We show that within the lung, when the metastatic breast carcinoma cells are conditionally depleted, transformed lung epithelial cells generate new metastases. Metastatic breast carcinoma cells transmit H19 long noncoding (lnc) RNA to lung epithelial cells through exosomes. SF3B1 bearing mutations at arginine-625 alternatively splices H19 lncRNA in lung epithelial cells, which selectively acts like a molecular sponge to sequester let-7a and induces Myc upregulation. Under the conditional elimination of primary site-derived breast carcinoma cells, lung malignant cells expressing the mutated SF3B1 splice variant dominate the newly created tumors. Our study suggests that these new carcinoma cells originating from within the colonized organ can replace the primary site-derived malignant cells whenever their expansion is abrogated using an inducible diphtheria toxin receptor in our designed system. These findings should call for a better understanding of metastatic tumors with the specific origin during cancer metastasis.

BrACOS5 mutations induced male sterility via impeding pollen exine formation in Chinese cabbage (Brassica rapa L. ssp. pekinensis).

KEY MESSAGE: BrACOS5 mutations led to male sterility of Chinese cabbage verified in three allelic male-sterile mutants. Chinese cabbage (Brassica rapa L. ssp. pekinensis) is one of the major vegetable crops in East Asia, and the utilization of male-sterile line is an important measure for its hybrid seed production. Herein, we isolated three allelic male-sterile mutants, msm1-1, msm1-2 and msm1-3, from an ethyl methane sulfonate (EMS) mutagenized population of Chinese cabbage double-haploid (DH) line 'FT', whose microspores were completely aborted with severely absent exine, and tapetums were abnormally developed. Genetic analyses indicated that the three male-sterile mutants belonged to allelic mutation and were triggered by the same recessive nuclear gene. MutMap-based gene mapping and kompetitive allele-specific PCR (KASP) analysis demonstrated that three different single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of BraA09g012710.3C were responsible for the male sterility of msm1-1/2/3, respectively. BraA09g012710.3C is orthologous of Arabidopsis thaliana ACOS5 (AT1G62940), encoding an acyl-CoA synthetase in sporopollenin biosynthesis, and specifically expressed in anther, so we named BraA09g012710.3C as BrACOS5. BrACOS5 localizes to the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). Mutations of BrACOS5 resulted in decreased enzyme activities and altered fatty acid contents in msm1 anthers. As well as the transcript accumulations of putative orthologs involved in sporopollenin biosynthesis were significantly down-regulated excluding BrPKSA. These results provide strong evidence for the integral role of BrACOS5 in conserved sporopollenin biosynthesis pathway and also contribute to uncovering exine development pattern and underlying male sterility mechanism in Chinese cabbage.

Applications and Challenges of Bacteriostatic Aptamers in the Treatment of Common Pathogenic Bacteria Infections.

The continuous evolution and spread of common pathogenic bacteria is a major challenge in diagnosis and treatment with current biotechnology and modern molecular medicine. To confront this challenge, scientists urgently need to find alternatives for traditional antimicrobial agents. Various bacteriostatic aptamers obtained through SELEX screening are one of the most promising strategies. These bacteriostatic aptamers can reduce bacterial infection by blocking bacterial toxin infiltration, inhibiting biofilm formation, preventing bacterial invasion of immune cells, interfering with essential biochemical processes, and other mechanisms. In addition, aptamers may also help enhance the function of other antibacterial materials/drugs when used in combination. This paper has reviewed the bacteriostatic aptamers in the treatment of common pathogenic bacteria infections. For this aspect, first, bacteriostatic aptamers and their screening strategies are summarized. Then, the effect of molecular tailoring and modification on the performance of the bacteriostatic aptamer is analyzed, and the antibacterial mechanism and antibacterial strategy based on aptamers are introduced. Finally, the key technical challenges and their development prospects in clinical treatment are also carefully discussed.

Zinc homeostasis and regulation: Zinc transmembrane transport through transporters.

The second abundant micronutrient, zinc, is attracting more and more attention for it performs essential functions in living organisms and bears close relationships with the occurrence of diseases. However, excess zinc is toxic to cells. Ensuring a balanced zinc state for organisms is essential. Zinc transporters, including ZIPs and ZnTs, are pivotal in regulating zinc homeostasis. Benefiting from zinc transporter structures determination and their transporting dynamic revelation, the clarification of detailed mechanisms of zinc trafficking and the maintenance of zinc homeostasis by transporters in the human body are getting more and more evident. The present review gives a detailed description of the structural basis of zinc transport through ZIP and ZnT, through which the molecular mechanism of zinc binding and transport was illustrated. Then the motive force that drives zinc transmembrane transport and finally a generalization for the regulation models of zinc transporters were summarized.

Plasmalogen Improves Memory Function by Regulating Neurogenesis in a Mouse Model of Alzheimer's Diseases.

Adult hippocampal neurogenesis (AHN) is associated with hippocampus-dependent cognitive function, and its initiation is attributed to neural stem cells (NSCs). Dysregulated AHN has been identified in Alzheimer's disease (AD) and may underlie impaired cognitive function in AD. Modulating the function of NSCs and stimulating AHN are potential ways to manipulate AD. Plasmalogen (PLA) are a class of cell membrane glycerophospholipids which exhibit neuroprotective properties. However, the effect of PLA on altered AHN in AD has not been investigated. In our study, PLA(10µg/mL) -attenuated Aß (1-42) (5µM) induced a decrease in NSC viability and neuronal differentiation of NSCs, partially through regulating the Wnt/ß-catenin pathway. Additionally, AD mice were supplemented with PLA (67mg/kg/day) for 6 weeks. PLA treatment improved the impaired AHN in AD mice, including increasing the number of neural stem cells (NSCs) and newly generated neurons. The memory function of AD mice was also enhanced after PLA administration. Therefore, it was summarized that PLA could regulate NSC differentiation by activating the Wnt/ß-catenin pathway and ameliorate AD-related memory impairment through up-regulating AHN.

Biological characteristics of microRNAs secreted by exosomes of periodontal ligament stem cells due to mechanical force.

BACKGROUND: Orthodontic tooth movement (OTM) has previously been considered an inflammatory process. However, recent studies suggest that exosomes may play an important role in the cellular microenvironment of OTM. microRNAs (miRNAs) are one of the major constituents of exosomes. This study aims to investigate the biological characteristics of miRNAs secreted by exosomes of periodontal ligament stem cells (PDLSCs) due to mechanical forces. MATERIALS AND METHODS: First, we established a mechanical stress model. The PDLSCs were loaded under different force values and exosomes were extracted after 48 h. High-throughput sequencing of exosomal miRNAs was performed to further evaluate their biological functions and underlying mechanisms. RESULTS: The morphology and functions of exosomes were not significantly different between the loading and non-loading PDLSC groups. The optimal loading time and force were 48 h and 1 g/cm2, respectively. After sequencing, gene ontology (GO) and Kyoto encyclopaedia of genes and genomes (KEGG) pathway and network analyses were performed and 10 differentially expressed miRNAs were identified according to a literature search. These are miR-99a-5p, miR-485-3P, miR-29a-3p,miR-21-5p, miR-146a-5p, miR140-3p, miR-1306-5p, miR-126-5p, miR-125a-5p, and miR-23a-3p. LIMITATIONS: Extracting exosomes needs a large amount of PDLSCs. More functional experiments need to be done to confirm the exact mechanism of exosomal miRNAs of PDLSCs due to mechanical force. CONCLUSIONS: The expression levels of miRNAs secreted by PDLSC-derived exosomes due to mechanical force were very different compared to PDLSC-derived exosomes under nonmechanical stress. The function of many of the identified exosomal miRNAs was found to be related to osteoblasts and osteoclasts. Further validation is required. A functional investigation of these miRNA could provide novel insights into their mechanism.

The psc-CVM assessment system: A three-stage type system for CVM assessment based on deep learning.

BACKGROUND: Many scholars have proven cervical vertebral maturation (CVM) method can predict the growth and development and assist in choosing the best time for treatment. However, assessing CVM is a complex process. The experience and seniority of the clinicians have an enormous impact on judgment. This study aims to establish a fully automated, high-accuracy CVM assessment system called the psc-CVM assessment system, based on deep learning, to provide valuable reference information for the growth period determination. METHODS: This study used 10,200 lateral cephalograms as the data set (7111 in train set, 1544 in validation set and 1545 in test set) to train the system. The psc-CVM assessment system is designed as three parts with different roles, each operating in a specific order. 1) Position Network for locating the position of cervical vertebrae; 2) Shape Recognition Network for recognizing and extracting the shapes of cervical vertebrae; and 3) CVM Assessment Network for assessing CVM according to the shapes of cervical vertebrae. Statistical analysis was conducted to detect the performance of the system and the agreement of CVM assessment between the system and the expert panel. Heat maps were analyzed to understand better what the system had learned. The area of the third (C3), fourth (C4) cervical vertebrae and the lower edge of second (C2) cervical vertebrae were activated when the system was assessing the images. RESULTS: The system has achieved good performance for CVM assessment with an average AUC (the area under the curve) of 0.94 and total accuracy of 70.42%, as evaluated on the test set. The Cohen's Kappa between the system and the expert panel is 0.645. The weighted Kappa between the system and the expert panel is 0.844. The overall ICC between the psc-CVM assessment system and the expert panel was 0.946. The F1 score rank for the psc-CVM assessment system was: CVS (cervical vertebral maturation stage) 6 > CVS1 > CVS4 > CVS5 > CVS3 > CVS2. CONCLUSIONS: The results showed that the psc-CVM assessment system achieved high accuracy in CVM assessment. The system in this study was significantly consistent with expert panels in CVM assessment, indicating that the system can be used as an efficient, accurate, and stable diagnostic aid to provide a clinical aid for determining growth and developmental stages by CVM.

Commemoration and Emotional Sustenance: A Text Analysis of Students' Motivations Behind Online Mourning of Dr Li Wenliang.

As one of the first doctors issued a protective warning to the public, Dr. Li Wenliang was known as "whistleblower" of COVID-19 pandemic. After his death of COVID-19, students entered to his Sina Weibo to display their condolences and sorrow. We conduct text analysis and sentiment classification to investigate the motivation behind online mourning for Dr. Li among students on Sina Weibo. Our results indicate that, a) there always more than one motivation behind online mourning exists in each time period. b) continuing connection and semi-interaction with the deceased is the main motivation when students mourn online. c) there exists positive correlation between the influence of the deceased and the motivation--sharing information with the community of fans and creating social support in a time of loss and social support. d) the motivation--honoring the dead and expressing sadness and resentment can gradually lose over time.

Carbon dots derived from folic acid attenuates osteoarthritis by protecting chondrocytes through NF-κB/MAPK pathway and reprogramming macrophages.

BACKGROUND: Osteoarthritis (OA) is a common joint disorder worldwide which causes great health and economic burden. However, there remains an unmet goal to develop an effective therapeutic method to prevent or delay OA. Chondrocytes, as the major cells involved in OA progression, may serve as a promising therapeutic target. RESULTS: A kind of carbon dots (CDs) with excellent biocompatibility was fabricated from folic acid via hydrothermal method and could effectively attenuate osteoarthritis. It was demonstrated that CDs treatment could rescue IL1ß-induced proinflammatory responses, oxidative stress, cartilage degeneration and extracellular matrix degradation. Moreover, CDs reprogrammed lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced macrophage inflammation and polarization. Conditioned medium (CM) from CDs-treated macrophages could attenuate IL1ß-induced chondrocyte injury. Also, CM from CDs-treated chondrocytes had immunoregulatory functions on macrophages. Mechanistically, CDs inhibited the activation of nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) and mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPK) signaling pathways in IL1ß-stimulated chondrocytes. In vivo, anterior cruciate ligament transection (ACLT) mice model was adopted and it was indicated that intra-articular injection of CDs effectively delays OA pathogenesis. CONCLUSIONS: Taken together, these findings indicated CDs could mediate OA via promoting cartilage repair and immunomodulating macrophages within local microenvironment, which may provide evidences for utilizing CDs as a novel nanomaterial for OA treatment.

Micro-dimensional oscillation-based optimization for a dielectric metalens in the mid-infrared.

In the past few decades, there has been significant progress made in metasurfaces and integrated and miniaturized optical devices. As one of the most prominent applications of metasurfaces, the metalens is the subject of significant research. In this paper, for achieving better focusing performance of the initial metalens designed by the Pancharatnam-Berry (PB) phase, a concept of micro-dimensional oscillation is proposed to optimize the geometric parameters of nanopillars. A strategy of grouping iteration is proposed to reduce the loss rate and computational effort in a holistic way. Its essence is to divide an extremely large-scale optimization space into many overlapping groups. Meanwhile, an improved genetic-simulated annealing (IGSA) algorithm is presented for the optimal solution of each group. By introducing the adaptive crossover and mutation probabilities in traditional genetic algorithms, the IGSA algorithm has both strong global searching capability and excellent local searching capability. After optimization, the maximum field intensity of the central hot spot can be increased by about 8% compared to the initial metalens. Moreover, the field intensity of the side lobes around the hot spot is almost constant, and the central hot spot increases, which provides a potential for the realization of high imaging contrast.

A variant of H19 transcript regulates EMT and oral cancer progression.

Oral cancer is one of the most common malignant tumors of the head and neck, and it continues to represent a serious public health problem. Recent reports show the involvement of H19 long noncoding RNA (LncRNA) in oncogenesis but its mechanism associated with oral cancer remains unclear. Here, we identify an H19 transcript variant that lacks exon 4 in oral cancer specimens and carcinoma-derived cells. Depletion of H19 by short hairpin RNAs (shRNAs) targeting exon 1 but not exon 4 significantly inhibited oral cancer iCell-h120 cells growth and invasion in vitro and tumorigenesis of these cells in vivo. Through binding the ZEB1 mRNA, the variant H19 transcript without exon 4 promotes the expression of ZEB1 protein during epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT). Thus, these data reveal the role of a splicing events of H19LncRNA in oral tumorigenesis, and indicate that the splicing event of H19 can be served as potential therapeutic targets for oral cancer.

Combined Surgical-Orthodontic Treatment of Patients With Severe Parry-Romberg Syndrome.

ABSTRACT: Parry-Romberg syndrome (PRS) refers to a relatively rare dysfunction disease that is characterized by chronic progressive maxillofacial atrophy, especially one side of facial skin, subcutaneous tissue, muscle, and bone. According to the atrophy degree of skin, subcutaneous tissue, and skeleton in the area innervated by the trigeminal nerve, PRS can be classified into mild, moderate, and severe. In general, cases with different severity have specific treatment regimens. For mild and moderate cases, soft tissue augmentation techniques are the optimal strategy for aesthetic reconstruction. In this study, the authors report a 19-year-old female with severe PRS. Considering the severity of the case, a combined surgical and orthodontic treatment was performed, which was involved in alveolar bone augmentation, preoperative and postoperative orthodontic treatment in combination with orthognathic surgery, medpor filling of zygomatic and maxillary complex, free fat grafting, as well as angulus oris and lip trimming. Comprehensive treatment is recommended for severe cases with extensive atrophy of soft tissue and craniofacial bone, obvious deviation of the chin and occlusal plane.

Accuracy of dental arch form in customized fixed labial orthodontic appliances.

INTRODUCTION: This study evaluated arch form accuracy with or without premolar extraction in customized fixed labial orthodontic appliance treatment. METHODS: Setup and posttreatment digital models of 27 samples (15 extractions and 12 nonextractions) were selected and superimposed by best-fit surface-based registration in both the maxilla and the mandible. The facial axis points were identified and converted into Cartesian coordinates. A sixth-order polynomial equation was used to fit dental arches. Arch discrepancies (the mean distance between 2 arch forms) and similarities were compared between extraction and nonextraction groups, maxilla and mandible, and anterior and posterior arches. RESULTS: The arch discrepancy between extraction and nonextraction groups showed no statistically significant difference, but a statistically significant difference in arch similarity was found in the mandible. There were statistically significant differences between anterior and posterior arch discrepancies in the extraction (mandible) and the nonextraction (maxilla and mandible) groups. However, no statistically significant correlation was shown between anterior and posterior arch discrepancies. The arch similarities were 96.18% and 97.38% in the maxilla and 96.01% and 97.49% in the mandible between extraction and nonextraction groups. Arch form discrepancies and similarities showed a moderate correlation but no statistically significant differences between the maxilla and the mandible. CONCLUSIONS: In customized fixed labial orthodontic appliance treatment, arch form setup can be accurately achieved with and without premolar extraction. Anterior arch form acquires fewer discrepancies than the posterior arch, and overcorrection should be added to the end of the customized archwire to reduce posterior arch discrepancies. The discrepancy of the maxillary and mandibular arches is interrelated, and adjustments should be made on both maxillary and mandibular archwires to correct single-jaw transverse malposition.