Evaluation of the intervention effect of conventional and peer AIDS voluntary counseling and testing services among young students / 中国学校卫生

Objective@#To explore the influence of two voluntary counseling and testing(VCT) services on young students acquired immune deficiency syndrome(AIDS) related knowledge and behaviour, so as to provide a new idea for further improvement and promotion of VCT services.@*Methods@#From April 2017 to December 2018, the sample size,selected from 12 patrol and fixed monitoring sites in colleges in Guangzhou, was calculated by non inferiority trial, and the students who received services at the same period were 1∶1 matched. A total of 113 students received conventional VCT and 186 recerived peer VCT services. The Chi square test was used to analyse the difference of AIDS related knowledge and behavior before and after intervention, and a survey was conducted on satisfaction.@*Results@#After young students received conventional VCT services, the overall awareness rate of AIDS basic knowledge increased from 80.53% to 93.75%, and the frequency of condom use every time during heterosexual sexual activity in the past year increased by 29.17 percentage points ( χ 2=4.49,4.10, P <0.05). After young students received peer VCT services, the awareness rate of the Four Frees and One Care Policy increased from 34.95% to 58.26%, the rates of homosexual anal sex and more than or equal to 2 sexual partners in the past half a year decreased by 14.84 and 29.43 percentage points, respectively( χ 2=15.69, 4.82, 10.97, P <0.05).@*Conclusion@#After young students receive two modes of VCT services respectively, the AIDS related knowledge and behavior have been improved, and the influence of the two VCT services has different advantages. The combination of conventional VCT and peer education might be a more effective way of AIDS intervention.

Tumor-derived neomorphic mutations in ASXL1 impairs the BAP1-ASXL1-FOXK1/K2 transcription network

Additional sex combs-like 1 (ASXL1) interacts with BRCA1-associated protein 1 (BAP1) deubiquitinase to oppose the polycomb repressive complex 1 (PRC1)-mediated histone H2A ubiquitylation. Germline BAP1 mutations are found in a spectrum of human malignancies, while ASXL1 mutations recurrently occur in myeloid neoplasm and are associated with poor prognosis. Nearly all ASXL1 mutations are heterozygous frameshift or nonsense mutations in the middle or to a less extent the C-terminal region, resulting in the production of C-terminally truncated mutant ASXL1 proteins. How ASXL1 regulates specific target genes and how the C-terminal truncation of ASXL1 promotes leukemogenesis are unclear. Here, we report that ASXL1 interacts with forkhead transcription factors FOXK1 and FOXK2 to regulate a subset of FOXK1/K2 target genes. We show that the C-terminally truncated mutant ASXL1 proteins are expressed at much higher levels than the wild-type protein in ASXL1 heterozygous leukemia cells, and lose the ability to interact with FOXK1/K2. Specific deletion of the mutant allele eliminates the expression of C-terminally truncated ASXL1 and increases the association of wild-type ASXL1 with BAP1, thereby restoring the expression of BAP1-ASXL1-FOXK1/K2 target genes, particularly those involved in glucose metabolism, oxygen sensing, and JAK-STAT3 signaling pathways. In addition to FOXK1/K2, we also identify other DNA-binding transcription regulators including transcription factors (TFs) which interact with wild-type ASXL1, but not C-terminally truncated mutant. Our results suggest that ASXL1 mutations result in neomorphic alleles that contribute to leukemogenesis at least in part through dominantly inhibiting the wild-type ASXL1 from interacting with BAP1 and thereby impairing the function of ASXL1-BAP1-TF in regulating target genes and leukemia cell growth.

Case-control and family-based association studies of novel susceptibility locus 8q24 in nonsyndromic cleft lip with or without cleft palate in a Southern Han Chinese population located in Guangdong Province.

Nonsyndromic cleft lip with or without cleft palate (NSCL/P) is one of the most common congenital malformations and a susceptibility locus on chromosome 8q24 has been replicated as a genetic risk factor for NSCL/P in patients of European and Asian descent. However, given considerable variations in allele frequencies across geographical regions studied, the aim of this study was to investigate the association of rs987525 located at 8q24 with NSCL/P only among the southern Han Chinese population from Guangdong province. We recruited 216 NSCL/P cases, their parents, and 200 controls to conduct case-control analysis and family-based association studies. Genotyping of rs987525 was carried out by the matrix assisted laser desorption ionization-time of flight mass spectrometry method. Case-control analysis showed allele and genotype distributions for rs987525 were not significantly associated with the risk of NSCL/P in our study population. Similar results were found when all cases were stratified into cleft lip only and cleft lip with cleft palate. A transmission disequilibrium test showed no statistically significant transmission of A nor C alleles and family-based association test (FBAT) analysis provided no evidence of NSCL/P risk with single markers. These results do not provide evidence for an association between rs987525 at 8q24 and the risk of NSCL/P in the southern Han Chinese population from Guangdong province.