Reliability and validity of the novel self-reported spine functional scale (SSFS) in healthy participants.

OBJECTIVES: To develop the novel self-reported spine functional scale (SSFS) and conduct reliability and validity analysis, so that the public can better understand their own spine function in a more simple and scientific way, so as to effectively prevent spinal disorders and improve the quality of life through targeted rehabilitation therapeutic measures. METHODS: This study was approved by an institutional review board, and all subjects gave informed consent to participate. RESULTS: (1) Using Spearman correlation analysis to evaluate the content validity, each item was significantly correlated with the total score, and the project design was reasonable. The exploratory factor analysis method is used to evaluate the structural validity of the scale, and the standing position and the lying position of the posture evaluation can be attributed to the factor 2, which is called posture evaluation: the cervical flexor strength, the flat support, the prone back, and the supine knee. The back arch of the wall and the angel on the wall is attributed to factor 1, called the overall spine function test, and the cumulative contribution rate of the two factors was 46.057%. Confirmatory factor analysis showed that the two-factor model fits well (χ2/df = 2.440, RMSEA = 0.04 < 0.05, GFI = 0.945, AGFI = 0.920, CFI = 0.967, IFI = 0.967, TLI = 0.951, GFI, AGFI, CFI, IFI, and TLI are > 0.90) and the validity is ideal. (2) The test-retest reliability shows that the test-retest reliability of each entry, each dimension, and the total score is greater than 0.5, and the test-retest reliability is high. The Cronbach α coefficient was used to evaluate the overall internal consistency of the scale, α > 0.70, indicating that the scale has high reliability. After deleting each item one by one, the α coefficient is 0.692-0.717, and there is no significant increase. (3) Sex and occupation did not affect the level of spinal function (P > 0.05), and there was interaction. Different BMI levels significantly affected the score of spinal function (P < 0.05). The rate of spinal dysfunction in overweight and obese subjects was significantly higher than the normal group; the overall score of spinal function was worse than the normal group. DISCUSSION: The reliability and validity analyses of this study verified the reliability and scientificity of SSFS in the young healthy population. Body weight had a significant influence on SSFS score, and the performance levels were different for the two sexes. CONCLUSION: The novel Self-Reported Spine Functional Scale (SSFS) has high reliability and validity and is applicable to the self-assessment and maintenance of spinal health and the prevention of related spinal disorders in the young healthy population. Body weight has a significant influence on the SSFS score in healthy young people. Overweight and obese males were found to be more likely to have spinal dysfunction, while underweight males displayed poor cervical flexor muscle strength. Underweight females were found to have better overall spinal function and stronger cervical flexor muscle strength.

A stable and easily prepared copper oxide catalyst for degradation of organic pollutants by peroxymonosulfate activation.

A direct one-step calcination preparation of CuO catalyst (CuO-3) using polyethylene glycol (PEG) as nonionic polymeric structure directing agent was developed for activation of peroxymonosulfate (PMS). The morphological and physicochemical properties of the CuO-3 were characterized and the catalytic activity for degradation of organic pollutants was evaluated. The resultant CuO-3 with significantly enhanced surface area exhibited excellent catalytic performance of phenolic organic pollutants degradation. The reaction mechanism of the PMS/CuO system was systematically investigated with a series of radical quenching tests and the analysis of electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectroscopy. Quite different from traditional hydroxyl radicals (OH) and sulfate radical (SO4-) based advanced oxidation processes, singlet oxygen (1O2) was identified as the dominate reactive species responsible for the degradation of organic pollutants. Moreover, the main formation pathway of 1O2 was also investigated. The results indicated that the superoxide radical (O2-) was involved in the generation of 1O2 as a crucial precursor. Also, the PMS/CuO-3 system exhibited satisfactory stability and reusability under neutral conditions as well as high removal of organic pollutants in the presence of inorganic anions. This work not only provides a novel and stable preparation method for CuO catalyst, but also gives a deeper insight into the mechanisms of PMS activation by CuO.

New Organometallic Tetraphenylethylene⋠Iridium(III) Complexes with Antineoplastic Activity.

Iridium(III) complexes have attracted more and more attention in the past few years because of their potential antineoplastic activity. In this study, four IrIII complexes of the types [(η5 -Cpx )Ir(N^N)Cl]PF6 (complexes 1 and 2) and [Ir(Phpy)2 (N^N)]PF6 (complexes 3 and 4) have been synthesized and characterized. They exhibit potential antineoplastic activity towards A549 cells, especially in the case of complex 1 [IC50 =(3.56±0.5) µm], which was nearly six times as effective as cisplatin [(21.31±1.7) µm]. Additionally, these complexes show some selectivity towards cancer cells over normal cells. They could be transported by serum albumin (binding constants were changed from 0.37×105 to 81.71×105 m-1 ). IrIII complexes 1 and 2 could catalyze the transformation of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide reduced form (NADH) into NAD+ (turnover numbers 43.2, 11.9] and induce the accumulation of reactive oxygen species, thus confirming their antineoplastic mechanism of oxidation, whereas the cyclometalated complexes 3 and 4 were able to target the lysosome [Pearson co-localization coefficient (PCC)=0.73], cause lysosomal damage, and induce apoptosis. Understanding the mechanism of action would help further structure-activity optimization on these IrIII complexes as emerging cancer therapeutics.

Calcium-Carboxyl Intrabridging during Interfacial Polymerization: A Novel Strategy to Improve Antifouling Performance of Thin Film Composite Membranes.

This study reports a novel intrabridging strategy to improve the antifouling performance of a thin-film composite (TFC) membrane. We demonstrate that the addition of Ca2+ during the interfacial polymerization reaction led to the formation of stable Ca2+-carboxyl complexes within the polyamide rejection layer. This intrabridging of carboxyl groups by Ca2+ effectively sequestrated them, reducing their availability for binding divalent metal ions in the aqueous solution and for forming foulant-metal-membrane interbridges. Membrane fouling and cleaning experiments confirmed improved flux stability and fouling reversibility for the Ca2+ modified membranes. The greatly enhanced antifouling performance of these membranes, together with their better surface hydrophilicity and greater water permeability, makes the intrabridging approach highly attractive in overcoming the classical permeability-selectivity-antifouling trade-off. Our findings pave a new direction for synthesizing high-performance TFC membranes.

New insights into the organic fouling mechanism of an in situ Ca2+ modified thin film composite forward osmosis membrane.

In this study, the effect of organic substances on the fouling behavior of a thin film composite (TFC) membrane with in situ Ca2+ addition (TFC-Ca membrane) was evaluated. Bovine serum albumin (BSA), humic acid (HA) and sodium alginate (SA) were used as surrogate foulants for protein, natural organic substances and polysaccharides, respectively, thus enabling the analysis of foulant-membrane interaction in the membrane fouling process. Fouling experiments were carried out and the fouling mechanism was investigated by extended Derjaguin-Landau-Verwey-Overbeek (XDLVO) theory. SEM-EDX, ICP-OES and TOC analysis were applied to characterize the fouled TFC-Ca membrane. Results suggested that the interfacial free energies obtained from advanced contact angle measurements were correlated strongly with the rates of membrane fouling. In situ Ca2+ addition in the TFC membrane resulted in the decrease of the interfacial adhesion free energy (i.e., foulant-membrane interaction) and thus the mitigation of membrane fouling. The permeate flux of TFC-Ca FO membrane after organic fouling could be fully restored by simple physical cleaning. The antifouling mechanism of Ca2+ pre-binding carboxyl groups in the TFC-Ca FO membrane was demonstrated, which provides new insights into the development of antifouling TFC membranes in the future.

Novel immunoassays to detect methionine adenosyltransferase activity and quantify S-adenosylmethionine.

We present a novel real-time immunoassay to measure methionine adenosyltransferase (MAT) activity that integrates the MAT-catalyzed reaction of Met and adenosine triphosphate to produce S-adenosylmethionine (SAM) and a highly sensitive immunoassay to specifically quantify SAM simultaneously. The cellular localization of SAM and S-adenosylhomocysteine varies with cell proliferation status: in normal cells, they are found mostly in the cytoplasm, but localize to the nucleus in proliferating cells. MAT-I/III activity is stimulated by Met, but inhibited by S-nitrosoglutathione, and the methylation index (MI) increases after Met stimulation of L02 cells. Met and S-nitrosoglutathione inhibit MAT-II activity, and the MI decreases after Met stimulation of HepG2 cells. The method described provides a significant advancement in the field for the measurement of MAT activity under various conditions.

Immunoassay of S-adenosylmethionine and S-adenosylhomocysteine: the methylation index as a biomarker for disease and health status.

BACKGROUND: S-Adenosylmethionine (SAM) and S-adenosylhomocysteine (SAH) are relevant to a variety of diseases. Previous reports that quantified SAM and SAH were based on HPLC or LC-MS/MS. No antibody against SAM has been generated, and the antibody against SAH cannot be used with blood samples. Immunoassays have not been used to measure SAM and SAH. In this study, ELISA was used to measure blood SAM and SAH levels. RESULTS: Specific antibodies against SAM were produced for the first time using a stable analog as the antigen. The monoclonal antibodies against SAM and SAH were characterized. No cross-reactivity was detected for the analyzed analogs. For the anti-SAM antibodies, the ELISA sensitivity was ~2 nM, and the affinity was 7.29 × 1010 L/mol. For the anti-SAH antibodies, the sensitivity was ~15 nM, and the affinity was 2.79 × 108 L/mol. Using high-quality antibodies against SAM and SAH, immunoassays for the detection of SAM and SAH levels in blood and tissue samples were developed. Clinical investigations using immunoassays to measure SAM, SAH and the methylation index (MI) in normal and diseased samples indicated that (1) the SAM level is age and gender dependent; (2) the SAM level is associated with the severity of liver diseases, inflammatory reactions and other diseases; and (3) the methylation index (MI) is significantly reduced in many diseases and may serve as a screening biomarker to identify potentially unfavorable health conditions. CONCLUSION: It is possible to generate antibodies against active small biomolecules with weak immunogenicity, such as SAM and SAH, using traditional hybridoma technology. The antigens and antibodies described here will contribute to the development of immunoassays to measure SAM, SAH and related molecules. These assays enable the MI to be measured specifically, accurately, easily and quickly without costly equipment. This preliminary study indicates that the MI could be an effective indicator of general health, except under conditions that may alter the value of the MI, such as special diets and medications.

Portable and reusable optofluidics-based biosensing platform for ultrasensitive detection of sulfadimidine in dairy products.

Sulfadimidine (SM2) is a highly toxic and ubiquitous pollutant which requires rapid, sensitive and portable detection method for environmental and food monitoring. Herein, the use for the detection of SM2 of a portable optofluidics-based biosensing platform, which was used for the accurate detection of bisphenol A, atrazine and melamine, is reported for the first time. The proposed compact biosensing system combines the advantages of an evanescent wave immunosensor and microfluidic technology. Through the indirect competitive immunoassay, the detection limit of the proposed optofluidics-based biosensing platform for SM2 reaches 0.05 µg·L(-1) at the concentration of Cy5.5-labeled antibody of 0.1 µg·mL(-1). Linearity is obtained over a dynamic range from 0.17 µg·L(-1) to 10.73 µg·L(-1). The surface of the fiber probe can be regenerated more than 300 times by means of 0.5% sodium dodecyl sulfate solution (pH = 1.9) washes without losing sensitivity. This method, featuring high sensitivity, portability and acceptable reproducibility shows potential in the detection of SM2 in real milk and other dairy products.

Two-dimensional maximum local variation based on image euclidean distance for face recognition.

Manifold learning concerns the local manifold structure of high dimensional data, and many related algorithms are developed to improve image classification performance. None of them, however, consider both the relationships among pixels in images and the geometrical properties of various images during learning the reduced space. In this paper, we propose a linear approach, called two-dimensional maximum local variation (2DMLV), for face recognition. In 2DMLV, we encode the relationships among pixels in images using the image Euclidean distance instead of conventional Euclidean distance in estimating the variation of values of images, and then incorporate the local variation, which characterizes the diversity of images and discriminating information, into the objective function of dimensionality reduction. Extensive experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.