[Baseline survey of psychosocial factors levels and their health effects in a cohort study of natural gas field workers].

Objective: To investigate the level of psychosocial factors in workplace and their health effects among workers in a natural gas field. Methods: A prospective and open cohort of natural gas field workers was established to study the level of workplace psychosocial factors and their health effects, with a follow-up every 5 years. In October 2018, a cluster sampling method was used to conduct a baseline survey of 1737 workers in a natural gas field, including a questionnaire survey on demographic characteristics, workplace psychosocial factors and mental health outcomes, physiological indicators such as height and weight, and biochemical indicators such as blood routine, urine routine, liver function and kidney function. The baseline data of the workers were statistically described and analyzed. The psychosocial factors and mental health outcomes were divided into high and low groups according to the mean score, and the physiological and biochemical indicators were divided into normal and abnormal groups according to the reference range of normal values. Results: The age of 1737 natural gas field workers was (41.8±8.0) years old, and the length of service was (21.0±9.7) years. There were 1470 male workers (84.6%). There were 773 (44.5%) high school (technical secondary school) and 827 (47.6%) college (junior college) graduates, 1490 (85.8%) married (including remarriage after divorce), 641 (36.9%) smokers and 835 (48.1%) drinkers. Among the psychosocial factors, the detection rates of high levels of resilience, self-efficacy, colleague support and positive emotion were all higher than 50%. Among the mental health outcomes evaluation indexes, the detection rates of high levels of sleep disorder, job satisfaction and daily stress were 41.82% (716/1712), 57.25% (960/1677) and 45.87% (794/1731), respectively. The detection rate of depressive symptoms was 22.77% (383/1682). The abnormal rates of body mass index (BMI), triglyceride and low density lipoprotein were 46.74% (810/1733), 36.50% (634/1737) and 27.98% (486/1737), respectively. The abnormal rates of systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, uric acid, total cholesterol and blood glucose were 21.64% (375/1733), 21.41% (371/1733), 20.67% (359/1737), 20.55% (357/1737) and 19.17% (333/1737), respectively. The prevalence rates of hypertension and diabetes were 11.23% (195/1737) and 3.45% (60/1737), respectively. Conclusion: The detection rates of high level psychosocial factors in natural gas field workers are high, and their effects on physical and mental health remain to be verified. The establishment of a cohort study of the levels and health effects of psychosocial factors provides an important resource for confirming the causal relationship between workplace psychosocial factors and health.

[Effect of occupational stress on depression in gas field workers].

Objective: To explore the occurrence level of depressive symptoms and it's influencing factors among gas field workers. Methods: In October 2018, a cross-sectional study was conducted in 1726 gas field workers from a gas field by using cluster sampling method. Questionaire was used to evaluate the individual factors, depressive symptoms, occupational stress factors and stress regulatory factors. The correlation between depressive symptoms and occupational stress was analyzed. Multivariate logistic regression was used to analyze the influencing factors of depressive symptoms. Results: The depressive symptoms score of gas field workers was 12.00 (7.00, 19.00) point. Correlation analysis revealed that depressive symptoms score was positively related to sleep disorders (r=0.598) , effort (r=0.186) , daily tension (r=0.478) , negative affectivity (r=0.565) , social support (r=0.446) and monotony of work (r=0.484) (P<0.01) . And it was negatively related to reward (r=-0.386) , work stability (r=-0.294) , promotion opportunities (r=-0.258) , positive affectivity (r= -0.310) , self-efficacy (r=-0.312) , contral strategy (r=-0.268) , support strategy (r=-0.209) and job satisfaction (r=-0.398) (P<0.01) . Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that sleep disorder, high negative affectivity, low support from colleagues, low support from family, high monotony of work and high daily tension were the risk factors for depressive symptoms of gas field worker (OR=3.423, 95%CI: 2.644-4.397; OR=2.847, 95%CI: 2.200-3.683; OR=1.646, 95%CI: 1.215-2.116; OR=1.496, 95%CI: 1.164-1.923; OR=1.578, 95%CI: 1.227-2.303; OR=1.903, 95%CI: 1.480-2.440; P<0.01) . High work stability, high self-efficacy and high job satisfaction were protective factors for depressive symptoms of gas field workers (OR=0.752, 95%CI: 0.591-0.958; OR=0.590, 95%CI: 0.465-0.749; OR=0.718, 95%CI: 0.516-0.999; P<0.05) . Conclusion: Occupational stress factors have a great influence on the depressive symptoms of gas field workers. Increased work stability, self-efficacy and job satisfaction could reduce the risk of depressive symptoms.

[Correlation between social support and occupational stress among gas production workers in the field].

Objective: To investigate the level of social support and its correlation with occupational stress among gas production workers in the field. Methods: In October 2018, the cluster sampling method was used to perform a cross-sectional survey for 1726 gas production workers in the field, and related data of these workers were collected, including age, education level, marital status, level of social support, and related factors for occupational stress. A Spearman's rank correlation analysis was used to investigate the correlation between social support and occupational stress, and the levels of occupational stress-related factors were compared between the groups with different social support scores. Results: The gas production workers in the field had a median (25th percentile, 75th percentile) social support score of 24.00 (19.00, 28.00) , and there was a significant difference in social support score between the workers with different posts or work shifts (P<0.01) . Social support score was positively correlated with effort, daily stress, negative emotion, and job routinization (P<0.05) and was negatively correlated with job satisfaction, reward, working stability, and promotion opportunity (P<0.05) . The group with a high social support score had significantly higher scores of effort, job routinization, sleep disorders, and daily stress than the other two groups (P<0.01) , and the group with a low social support score had significantly higher scores of reward, self-efficacy, positive affection, and job satisfaction than the other two groups (P<0.01) . Conclusion: High-level social support plays an important role in alleviating occupational stress and protecting mental health among gas production workers in the field.

[Correlation of job monotony and social support on daily hassle: a cross-sectional study based on natural gas field workers].

Objective: To explore the correlation of job monotony and social support on daily hassle. Methods: A convenient sampling survey of demographics characteristics, job monotony, social support and daily hassle was conducted on 1 466 natural gas field workers by questionnaire in October; 2018. Multivariate logistic regression model was used to analyze the correlation of job monotony and social support on daily hassle. Results: The age of 1 466 subjects was (44.47±8.0) years and the length of service was (20.46±5.77) years. There were 258(17.6%), 173(11.8%), 799(54.5%), 120(8.2%) and 116(7.9%) subjects from production and marketing department, processing plant, branch, maintenance department and emergency center respectively. There were 374(25.5%) and 1 092(74.5%) subjects with high and low level of job monotony, and 398(27.1%), 648(44.2%) and 420(28.6%) subjects with high, middle and low level of social support. There were 464(31.7%) and 1 002(68.3%) subjects with high and low daily tension respectively. Compared with the low level of job monotony, the high level of job monotony had a higher risk of daily hassle(OR=4.83,P<0.001), and compared with the high level of social support, the middle and low level of social support had a higher risk of daily hassle(OR=1.25, 2.24,P<0.05). Conclusion: Job monotony and social support were associated with daily hassle.

[Interaction of shift work and psychological capital on abnormal glucose and lipid metabolism among natural gas field workers].

Objective: To explore the interaction between shift work and psychological capital on abnormal glucose and lipid metabolism. Methods: A convenient sampling survey of demographics characteristics, shift work and psychological capital was conducted on 1 415 natural gas field workers by questionnaire in October 2018,and their physiological and biochemical indexes were measured according to standard norms. Multivariate logistic regression model was used to analyze the interaction between shift work and psychological capital on abnormal glucose and lipid metabolism. Results: For 1 415 subjectsthe prevalence of abnormal blood glucose was 21.2%, the prevalence of diabetes was 8.3%.The prevalence of abnormal total cholesterol was 40.4%, the prevalence of hypercholesterolemia was 11.3%.The prevalence of abnormal triglyceride was 41.6%, the prevalence of hypertriglyceridemia was 24.7%.The detection rate of Low-density Lipoprotein was 17.3%, the detection rate of Low-density Lipoprotein was 4.0%, and the detection rate of high-density Lipoprotein was 1.3%. Multiple logistic regression model analysis showed that shift work, the low level of self-efficacy and the low level of optimism was positively associated with abnormal blood glucose, respectively (P<0.05). Shift work was positively associated with abnormal triglyceride (P<0.05). However, there was no interaction between shift work, low self-efficacy, low hope, low resilience, and low optimism on abnormal glucose and lipid metabolism. Conclusion: Shift work was a risk factor of abnormal blood glucose and triglyceride, self-efficacy and optimism were protective factors of abnormal blood glucose. There was no multiplicative interaction between shift work and psychological capital on abnormal glucose and lipid metabolism in the study population.

[Sleep quality and occupational stress relationship analysis of field gas recovery workers].

Objective: To explore the relationship between sleep quality and occupational stress in field gas recovery workers. Methods: In October 2018, cluster sampling method was adopted to conduct cross-sectional survey on 1726 field workers in a gas production oilfield. The individual characteristics, occupational stress factors, stress regulation factors, stress response and sleep quality, social support and coping strategies were evaluated by occupational stress measurement tools and job content questionnaire. Mann Whitney U test and Kruskal Wallis H test were used to compare sleep quality scores between the groups. Spearman rank correlation analysis was used to analyze the correlation between sleep quality and occupational stress, and logistic regression analysis was used to analyze multiple factors. Results: There were significant differences in sleep quality scores among different positions, gender, marital status, age, length of service, smoking and drinking (P<0.05) . There were no significant differences in sleep quality scores between different education levels and work shift groups (P>0.05) . Spearman rank correlation analysis showed that sleep quality score was negatively correlated with job satisfaction, reward, job stability, promotion opportunity, positive emotion, respect, self-esteem, control strategy, support strategy and self-efficacy score (r(s)=-0.361, -0.311, -0.238, -0.261, -0.248, -0.212, -0.139, -0.188, -0.152, -0.226, P<0.01) , and was positively correlated with social support, giving, daily tension, negative emotion, work monotony and depression symptom (r(s)=0.312, 0.279, 0.547, 0.493, 0.429, 0.599, P<0.01) . Compared with the high sleep quality score group, the middle and low sleep quality score groups had lower giving, work monotony, daily tension, depressive symptoms, negative emotions and social support (P<0.01) , while the scores of respect, reward, job satisfaction, positive emotion, self-efficacy, job stability, promotion opportunity, control strategy and support strategy were higher (P<0.01) . Multiple depressive symptoms, high daily tension, high negative emotion and high work monotony were the risk factors for sleep disorders (OR=3.417, 2.659, 2.913, 1.543) . Conclusion: Depressive symptoms, daily tension and negative emotion have great influence on sleep quality of field gas recovery workers.

A comparative study on genetic characteristics of two new varieties of Pelodiscus sinensis and their hybrid.

Chinese soft-shelled turtle Pelodiscus sinensis has been an important aquaculture species in Southeast Asian countries. To breed a new variety of soft-shelled turtle with excellent properties and to evaluate the effect of hybridization of two turtle strains with a highly different trait phenotype, inheritance, microsatellite loci, and transcriptome analysis were studied in the hybrid turtles and their parents of P. sinensis Japanese strain and Qingxi black turtle. The genotypic characteristics and economic trait of the hybrid turtles were analyzed and compared to the two parents, showing significant growth vigor. The chromosome number of the hybrid turtle was diploid (2N = 66). The karyotype formulae were 8m+10sm+26t+22mc, with little differences between the two parents. Genotypic segregations of 241 microsatellite loci were screened in 3 populations including 90 species and showed that the specific allele numbers and polymorphic fragments increased in hybrid turtles indicating genetic diversity increased by hybridization. The liver transcriptome analysis of the hybrids and two parents showed similar distribution abundance in the parental and hybrid groups, but the transcripts with high abundance appeared in the hybrid group. There were 274 significant differentially expressed transcripts in the hybrid group compared to the two parental groups, among them 7 differentially expressed genes indicating super-parent expression, and only 2 genes showing low-parent expression. In the differentially expressed genes, expression changes were mainly contributed to regulatory region changes rather than coding region sequences. These results would be important for facilitating successful breeding strategies by hybridization in P. sinensis.

Effects of genetic correction on the differentiation of hair cell-like cells from iPSCs with MYO15A mutation.

Deafness or hearing loss is a major issue in human health. Inner ear hair cells are the main sensory receptors responsible for hearing. Defects in hair cells are one of the major causes of deafness. A combination of induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) technology with genome-editing technology may provide an attractive cell-based strategy to regenerate hair cells and treat hereditary deafness in humans. Here, we report the generation of iPSCs from members of a Chinese family carrying MYO15A c.4642G>A and c.8374G>A mutations and the induction of hair cell-like cells from those iPSCs. The compound heterozygous MYO15A mutations resulted in abnormal morphology and dysfunction of the derived hair cell-like cells. We used a CRISPR/Cas9 approach to genetically correct the MYO15A mutation in the iPSCs and rescued the morphology and function of the derived hair cell-like cells. Our data demonstrate the feasibility of generating inner ear hair cells from human iPSCs and the functional rescue of gene mutation-based deafness by using genetic correction.

Differentiation of four strains of Chinese soft-shelled turtle (Pelodiscus sinensis) based on high-resolution melting analysis of single nucleotide polymorphism sites in mitochondrial DNA.

The Chinese soft-shelled turtle (Pelodiscus sinensis) has been one of the most economically important aquatic animals in China for thousands of years, and several breeding strains have been formed. Since the morphological characteristics of some strains are similar, a rapid and accurate molecular method to differentiate between strains is required. In this study, partial sequences of mitochondrial DNA from four turtle strains, Taihu Lake Strain, Taiwan Strain, Japanese Strain, and Yellow River Strain, were amplified and sequenced based on selected strain-specific single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) sites. The corresponding primers were designed and a high-resolution melting (HRM) technique was employed for genotyping these SNPs. The results indicated that a total of seven SNPs can be detected by HRM. Among these SNPs, one can be used for identifying the Taihu Lake Strain, one for the Japanese Strain, two for the Taiwan Strain, and three for the Yellow River Strain. This method is rapid and convenient, which offers technical support for strain identification and selective breeding in Chinese soft-shelled turtles.

Fetal liver-conditioned medium induces hepatic specification from mouse bone marrow mesenchymal stromal cells: a novel strategy for hepatic transdifferentiation.

BACKGROUND: Although different strategies have been established for hepatic differentiation of mesenchymal stromal cells (MSC), further studies are required to define an efficient strategy to produce hepatocytes from stem cells and uncover the mechanisms of hepatic differentiation. METHODS: Bone marrow mesenchymal stromal cells (BMMSC), isolated from ICR mice, were induced by fetal liver-conditioned medium from different developmental stages, embryonic days (ED) 9.5, 11.5 and 13.5 and newborn (1 day). Differentiated cells were characterized by morphologic changes, liver-specific gene expression at mRNA and/or protein levels and in vitro functional features. RESULTS: BMMSC morphologically became epithelioid and binucleated after 7 days' exposure to fetal liver-conditioned medium from ED13.5, expressed liver-specific genes (AFP, HNF-3beta, TTR, CK18, ALB and CK19) at mRNA and/or protein levels and acquired in vitro functions characteristic of liver cells, including glycogen storage, urea production and albumin secretion. Conditioned medium derived from fetal liver at ED13.5 was most efficient on hepatic differentiation of BMMSC compared from the other three developmental stages. DISCUSSION: The present study not only provides a high-performance strategy for hepatic differentiation from BMMSC, but also implies liver at different developmental stages might secrete different types of cytokines that have diverse effects on hepatic differentiation, which could support further investigation to provide insight into fundamental processes that govern development and regeneration of the liver.

Characterization, expression and evolution analysis of Toll-like receptor 1 gene in pufferfish (Tetraodon nigroviridis).

The Toll-like receptor (TLR) family is a pathogen-associated molecular pattern recognition receptor family that plays key roles in the activation of innate immune system. As an important member of TLRs, TLR1 is involved in the recognition of triacylated lipoproteins and mycobacterial products by binding to TLR2 to form a heterodimer. Although partial sequences of TLR1 has been predicted in Fugu and Danio by bioinformatics, the molecular cloning and characterization of this gene in fish still remains largely unclear. Here we report the full-length sequence of TLR1 gene in the pufferfish (Tetraodon nigroviridis), providing experimental evidence to its existence in fish. The cloned Tetraodon TLR1 (TnTLR1) cDNA exhibited 2587 bp in length and contains a 122-bp 5' untranslated region (UTR), a 2391-bp open reading frame and a 74-bp 3' UTR. Expression of TLR1 transcripts in most selected tissues were detected at lower levels; however, the transcripts in spleen was markedly increased (threefold) after stimulation with lipopolysaccharide, indicating that TLR1 in fish may be involved in the inflammatory responses to bacterial endotoxin or Gram-negative bacteria infection. Gene organization of TnTLR1 is similar to mammalian and avian, and a high degree of conservation of chromosome synteny exists between them. The protein sequence shares 33.7-77.3% identity with known TLR1 members. Phylogenetic analysis grouped TnTLR1 with other fish TLRs on a separated branch, excluded from mammalian and avian TLR1s. TnTLR1 with 796 amino acids has a calculated molecular mass of 90.69 kDa and a theoretical pI of 8.43. Structurally, TnTLR1 has a Toll/interleukin-1 receptor (TIR) domain, a transmembrane domain and leucine-rich repeat domain which are the hallmarks of TLR family. Phylogenetic analysis provided evidence that the TnTLR1 was very close to mammalian TLR1, TLR6 and TLR10 and seemed to be their common ancestor. This report of the full-length TLR1 gene in Tetraodon will provide us further insights into the study of both function and evolution of fish TLRs as a whole.

Transdifferentiation of mouse BM cells into hepatocyte-like cells.

BACKGROUND: During the past few years multiple studies have revealed that adult stem cells, including BM origin stem cells, can be transdifferentiated into various cell types, including hepatocyte-like cells, under proper treatments or in a suitable microenvironment. However, little is known about the mechanism of the transdifferentiation, and the treatments employed seem to be very complicated and require simplification. It is important to determine the suitable conditions in which BM cells would be efficiently differentiated into hepatocytes. METHODS: Mouse BM cells were isolated from femurs and tibias and cultured in IMDM supplemented with 10% FBS. Hepatic differentiation was induced in a differentiation medium containing 20 ng/mL HGF, 10 ng/mL FGF-4, 10 ng/mL Oncostatin M (OSM) and different concentrations of liver-injured mouse sera. The differentiated hepatic cells were characterized by the expression of liver-associated mRNA and proteins and morphologic and functional features. RESULTS: BM cell-derived polygonal cell colonies appeared after several days of culture, and these hepatocyte-like cells expressed AFP, HNF-3beta, CK19, CK18, ALB, TAT and G-6-Pase at mRNA and protein levels, and the cells also had some hepatic cellular functions, such as glycogen storage and urea production. Interestingly, suitable concentrations of sera from liver-injured mice added to this system showed strong stimulation on the in vitro transdifferentiation of mouse BM cells into hepatocytes. DISCUSSION: In the present study we have established an effective hepatic differentiation system by a combination of HGF, FGF-4, OSM and liver-injured mouse sera in vitro. Accordingly, it will be a useful resource not only for understanding the mechanisms of transdifferentiation but also for efficient amplification of hepatocyte progenitor cells of BM origin.

Evidence for K+-dependent HCO3- utilization in the marine diatom Phaeodactylum tricornutum.

Photosynthetic utilization of inorganic carbon in the marine diatom Phaeodactylum tricornutum was investigated by the pH drift experiment, measurement of K(1/2) values of dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) with pH change, and comparison of the rate of photosynthesis with the rate of the theoretical CO(2) formation from uncatalyzed HCO(3)(-) conversion in the medium. The higher pH compensation point (10.3) and insensitivity of the photosynthetic rate to acetazolamide indicate that the alga has good capacity for direct HCO(3)(-) utilization. The photosynthetic rate reached 150 times the theoretical CO(2) supply rate at 100 micromol L(-1) DIC (pH 9.0) in the presence of 10 mmol L(-1) K(+) and 46 times that in the absence of K(+), indicating that for pH 9.4-grown P. tricornutum, HCO(3)(-) in the medium is taken up through K(+)-dependent and -independent HCO(3)(-) transporters. The K(1/2) (CO(2)) values at pH 8.2 were about 4 times higher than those at pH 9.0, whereas the K(1/2) (HCO(3)(-)) values at pH 8.2 were slightly lower than those at pH 9.0 whether without or with K(+), providing further evidence for the presence of the two HCO(3)(-) transport patterns in this alga. Photosynthetic rate and affinity for HCO(3)(-) in the presence of K(+), respectively, were about 2- and 7-fold higher than those in the absence of K(+), indicating that K(+)-dependent HCO(3)(-) transport is a predominant pattern of HCO(3)(-) cellular uptake in low DIC concentration. However, as P. tricornutum was cultured at pH 7.2 or 8.0, photosynthetic affinities to HCO(3)(-) were not affected by K(+), implying that K(+)-dependent HCO(3)(-) transport is induced when P. tricornutum is cultured at high alkaline pH.

Sporotrichosis presenting as pyoderma gangrenosum.

A 56-year-old female with an eight-year history of corticosteroid therapy for rheumatoid arthritis presented with large, deep, painful ulcers on the left buttock and thigh. The lesions appeared typical of pyoderma gangrenosum. Nine separate cultures of the exudate grew Sporothrix schenckii. During the course of iodide therapy, the patient expired due to Escherichia coli pneumonia. This is the third case report of sporotrichosis presenting as pyoderma gangrenosum and the first report from China. Sporotrichosis presenting as pyoderma gangrenosum is a special form of this disease. It develops quickly and must be treated promptly. Only two cases have been reported in the world literature. This is the first case reported from China.