Challenges for the application of EGFR-targeting peptide GE11 in tumor diagnosis and treatment.

Abnormal regulation of cell signaling pathways on cell survival, proliferation and migration contributes to the development of malignant tumors. Among them, epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is one of the most important biomarkers in many types of malignant solid tumors. Its over-expression and mutation status can be served as a biomarker to identify patients who can be benifit from EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors and anti-EGFR monocloncal antibody (mAb) therapy. For decades, researches on EGFR targeted ligands were actively carried out to identify potent candidates for cancer therapy. An ideal EGFR ligand can competitively inhibit the binding of endogenous growth factor, such as epidermal growth factor (EGF) and transforming growth factor-α(TGF-α) to EGFR, thus block EGFR signaling pathway and downregulate EGFR expression. Alternatively, conjugation of EGFR ligands on drug delivery systems (DDS) can facilitate targeting delivery of therapeutics or diagnostic agents to EGFR over-expression tumors via EGFR-mediated endocytosis. GE11 peptide is one of the potent EGFR ligand screened from a phage display peptide library. It is a dodecapeptide that can specifically binds to EGFR with high affinity and selectivity. GE11 has been widely used in the diagnosis and targeted delivery of drugs for radiotherapy, genetherapy and chemotherpy against EGFR positive tumors. In this review, the critical factors affecting the in vivo and in vitro targeting performance of GE11 peptide, including ligand-receptor intermolecular force, linker bond properties and physiochemical properties of carrier materials, are detailedly interpreted. This review provides a valuable vision for the rational design and optimization of GE11-based active targeting strategies for cancer treatment, and it will promote the translation studies of GE11 from lab research to clinical application.

Effectiveness and safety of tenofovir alafenamide for chronic hepatitis B patients with decompensated cirrhosis / 实用医学杂志

Objective To investigate the efficacy and safety of tenofovir alafenamide fumarate(TAF)in the treatment of patients with decompensated hepatitis B cirrhosis.Methods We retrospective analyzed 41 patients with decompensated hepatitis B cirrhosis receiving TAF antiviral therapy for 24 weeks at Wuwei Tumor Hospital in Gansu province from June 2022 to June 2023.Primary endpoint was proportion of patients achieving virologic response(HBV DNA<20 IU/mL).Other endpoints included changes in ALT,AST,TBIL,Child-Pugh score(CTP),and MELD score from baseline to week 24.In terms of safety,changes in Scr,eGFR and adverse events from baseline to week 24 were observed.Results Of 41 patients,73.2%were male(n = 30),with mean age of 53.49 years.24 weeks after treatment with TAF,HBV DNA was undetectable in 90.2%of the patients.The median levels of ALT,AST and total bilirubin(TBIL)were 50.70 U/L,48.70 U/L and 26.40 μmol/L respectively at base-line,and reduced significantly to 31.50 U/L,37.8 U/L and 23.8 μmol/L(P<0.05)respectively after 24-week therapy with TAF.CTP score was improved in 58.6%of the patients(n = 24),and so was MELD score in 63.4%of the patients(n = 26)at week 24.The median serum creatinine and eGFR were 58.5 μmol/L and 106.15 mL/(min·1.73 m2)respectively at baseline,and creatinine and eGFR were stable during treatment.No drug-related adverse events or severe adverse events occurred during treatment,neither did creatinine and eGFR liver transplan-tation,HCC or death.Conclusions Our clinical studies demonstrated better effectiveness and safety of TAF for decompensated CHB patients.

Expressions of Smad3 and Smad7 in colonic mucosa of patients with ulcerative colitis / 中华消化杂志

Objective To investigate the expressions of Smad3 and Smad7 in patients with ulcerative colitis(UC)and their relation with clinicopathology.Methods The expressions of Smad3 and Smad7 were measured by immunohistochemistry with SABC method in 60 UC specimens and 16 normal colonic tissues.The association of expressions of Smad3 and Smad7 proteins with clinical staging,lesion extent and pathologic grading were retrospectively analyzed.Results The expression of Smad3 was significantly lower in UC patients than in normal controls(P＜0.05),however,there was no relation between Smad3 expression and lesion extent(P＞0.05).There was a negative correlation between the expression of Smad3 and histological grade(r=-0.283,P＜0.05).The expression of Smad7 was significantly higher in UC patients than in normal controls,and its expression in active disease was higher than that in clinical remission(Z=2.097,P=0.036).There was a positive correlation between the expression of Smad7 and histological grade(r_s=0.453,P=0.000),and no relation between Smad7 expression and lesion extent(r_s=0.066,P=0.614).The statistical analysis showed a negative correlation between Smad3 expression and Smad7 expression(r=-0.420,P＜0.05).Conclusion The abnormal expressions of Smad3 and Smad7 are correlated with pathogenesis of UC.Furthermore.Smad7 may serve as marker for disease activity of UC.

Research on Noninvasive Diagnosis for Coronary Heart Disease Based on Neural Network / 航天医学与医学工程

Objective To extract characteristic parameters of ECG signals a new method of non-invasive diagnosis for coronary heart disease with artificial neural network. Methods ECG signals were digitized with A/D converter and filtered to eliminating the noise. Span of QRS interval, R-R interval,and voltage of S-T segment of filtered ECG were detected. These 3 characteristics were as the input parameters of the input layer. Samples were trained with an improved 3-layers back propagation(BP) artificial neural network, as trained samples. The non-trained samples were recognized with these BP neural networks. Results After 12 samples had been trained about 1500 times, the BP neural network could accurately distinguish samples of coronary heart disease from the trained samples and also recognize 20 non-trained samples, 19 to be correct except one. Conclusion It is showed that based on BP network and characteristic parameters of ECG, a new and promising method of non-invasive diagnosis for coronary heart disease has been found.

Capability of SMBG instrument and its progress / 医疗卫生装备

Diabetes is a vulgar malady of metabolism and incretion. It is important to monitor and control the blood glucose for the diagnosis and treatment of diabetes. In particular, it is one of the most effective means for physicians or patients to do so through self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG) instruments. In this paper, SMBG instruments are discussed in detail and classified as the minimally invasive one, the non-invasive one and the continuous glucose monitoring system (CGMS). The needle or laser applied to blood sampling, the technology of the minimally invasive one is relatively mature, and the result of measurement is exact, but this way is achy for the patients. Reverse iontophoresis and spectral analysis adopted, the non-invasive has an increasing accuracy. The CGMS can perform the periodical measurement and record of the value of blood glucose automatically for several days.