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•Examined the effect of financial development on the ecological footprint (EF).•Advanced econometric methods are employed for emerging countries.•Indirect effect of financial ...development on EF through human capital.•Institutional quality moderates financial development and footprint nexus.
Emerging countries are heading towards economic prosperity; however, the process of development has enhanced their ecological footprint. Therefore, to safeguard the environment, it is essential to identify the factors that affect the ecological footprint (EF). In this perspective, this study explores the effect of financial development, human capital, and institutional quality on the EF in emerging countries. Furthermore, we explore the effect of financial development on EF through the channel of human capital. In addition, we investigate the role of institutional quality in the financial development-EF nexus. Using the panel data from 1984 to 2017, we employed the cross-sectional autoregressive distributed lag (CS-ARDL) technique to conduct the short-run and long-run empirical analysis. The empirical outcomes unveiled that financial development degrades the ecological quality by raising the EF. The findings further unfolded that human capital and institutional quality reduce the EF. Moreover, financial development fosters environmental sustainability through the channel of human capital. Additionally, institution quality reduces the negative ecological impacts of financial development. The causality analysis suggested that any policy related to financial development, human capital, and institutional quality will affect EF but not the other way round. Based on these findings, emerging economies should promote environmental sustainability by promoting human capital and effectively using financial resources.
Arsenic, a common metal-like substance, has been demonstrated to pose potential health hazards and induce behavioral changes in humans and rodents. However, the chronic neurotoxic effects of arsenic ...on aquatic animals are still not fully understood. This study aimed to investigate the effects of arsenic exposure on adult zebrafish by subjecting 3-month-old zebrafish to three different sodium arsenite water concentrations: 0 μg/L (control group), 50 μg/L, and 500 μg/L, over a period of 30 days. To assess the risk associated with arsenic exposure in the aquatic environment, behavior analysis, transmission electron microscopy techniques, and quantitative real-time PCR were employed. The behavior of adult zebrafish was evaluated using six distinct tests: the mirror biting test, shoaling test, novel tank test, social preference test, social recognition test, and T maze. Following the behavioral tests, the brains of zebrafish were dissected and collected for ultrastructural examination and gene expression analysis. The results revealed that sodium arsenite exposure led to a significant reduction in aggression, cohesion, social ability, social cognition ability, learning, and memory capacity of zebrafish. Furthermore, ultrastructure and genes regulating behavior in the zebrafish brain were adversely affected by sodium arsenite exposure.
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•Arsenic has multiple neurobehavioral effects in zebrafish.•Arsenic exposure resulted in histopathological changes in the zebrafish telencephalon and midbrain.•Arsenic exposure altered the expression of npas4l, bdnf, pth2 and pcsk9 mRNA in zebrafish brain.
Given the unique features of the liver, it is necessary to combine immunotherapy with other therapies to improve its efficacy in patients of advanced cancer with liver metastases (LM). High-intensity ...focused ultrasound (HIFU) ablation is now widely used in clinical practice and can enhanced immune benefits. The study is intended to prospectively evaluate the safety and clinical feasibility of HIFU ablation in combination with systemic immunotherapy for patients with liver metastases. The study enrolled 14 patients with LM who received ultrasound-guided HIFU ablation combined with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) such as anti-programmed cell death protein 1 (anti-PD-1 agents manufactured in China) at Mianyang Central Hospital. Patients were followed up for adverse events (AEs) during the trial, using the CommonTerminology Criteria for Adverse Events v5.0(CTCAE v5.0) as the standard. Tumour response after treatment was assessed using computerized tomography. The 14 patients (age range, 35-84 years) underwent HIFU ablation at 19 metastatic sites and systemic immunotherapy. The mean lesion volume was 179.9 cm3 (maximum: 733.1 cm3). Median follow-up for this trial was 9 months (range: 3-21) months. The study is clinically feasible and acceptable to patients. This prospective study confirmed that HIFU combined with immunotherapy is clinically feasible and safe for treating liver metastases.
The inclusion criteria were (1) chest X-ray, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), or computerized tomography (CT) showing peripheral lung lesions, (2) the lesions were focally adherent to the pleura, ...(3) the patient underwent ultrasound-guided transthoracic needle biopsy, and (4) all data required for the analysis, including relevant images, reports, and pathologic diagnosis, were available from the medical records. According to the patient's symptoms and blood routine judgment after a needle biopsy, if the patient presented with chest pain, dyspnea, hemoptysis, hemoglobin decline, and other conditions, and suspected complications, such as pneumothorax and hemothorax, CT examination was performed to confirm the diagnosis. Variables with P < 0.05 in univariable analysis were entered into the multivariable logistic regression analysis using the forward (likelihood ratio) method, and odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CIs) were calculated. Inflammatory lesions can exhibit intralesional vascular remodeling and increased collateral circulation, while malignant tumors can contain a substantial number of newly generated vessels. ...these lesion types are particularly susceptible to puncture-induced vascular damage and pulmonary hemorrhage, resulting in hemoptysis, bloody sputum, and hemothorax.
Bladder cancer remains the 10th most common cancer worldwide. In recent years, metformin has been found to have potential anti-bladder cancer activity while high concentration of IC
at millimolar ...level is needed, which could not be reached by regular oral administration route. Thus, higher efficient agent is urgently demanded for clinically treating bladder cancer. Here, by conjugating artesunate to metformin, a novel artesunate-metformin dimer triazine derivative AM2 was designed and synthesized. The inhibitory effect of AM2 on bladder cancer cell line T24 and the mechanism underlying was determined. Anti-tumor activity of AM2 was assessed by MTT, cloning formation and wound healing assays. Decreasing effect of AM2 on lipogenesis was determined by oil red O staining. The protein expressions of Clusterin, SREBP1 and FASN in T24 cells were evaluated by Western blotting. The results show that AM2 significantly inhibited cell proliferation and migration at micromolar level, much higher than parental metformin. AM2 reduced lipogenesis and down-regulated the expressions of Clusterin, SREBP1 and FASN. These results suggest that AM2 inhibits the growth of bladder cancer cells T24 by inhibiting cellular lipogenesis associated with the Clusterin/SREBP1/FASN signaling pathway.
With the rapid development of China, urbanization has become an important research topic of China’s CO
2
emissions. To fill the gap in considering the spatial correlation of the comprehensive ...urbanization that includes multi-dimensional factors on CO
2
emissions from urban civil buildings (
UBEC
), this study constructs a comprehensive evaluation indicator of urbanization from four aspects including population, economy, society, and land urbanization by using the entropy method. The spatial spillover effect of
UBEC
and the impact of comprehensive urbanization on
UBEC
are also studied by using the spatial panel model in this paper. This study finds out that
UBEC
has obvious spatial spillover effects. During the early years of the study period, the eastern coastal areas had greater carbon emissions, while in recent years, they have gradually transitioned to the northwestern regions. Comprehensive urbanization has a significant promotion effect on it. And foreign direct investment and per capita energy consumption also have positive impact on
UBEC
. This study provides a reference for measuring the effects of urbanization on sector-specific CO
2
emissions and may be useful for energy efficiency and emission abatement efforts in China.
Fluoride exposure has been implicated as a potential risk factor for hypertension, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. This study investigated the role of the RhoA/ROCK signaling pathway in ...fluoride-induced hypertension. Male Wistar rats were divided into different groups and exposed to varying concentrations of sodium fluoride (NaF) or sodium chloride (NaCl) via drinking water. The rats’ blood pressure was measured, and their aortic tissue was utilized for high-throughput sequencing analysis. Additionally, rat and A7r5 cell models were established using NaF and/or Fasudil. The study evaluated the effects of fluoride exposure on blood pressure, pathological changes in the aorta, as well as the protein/mRNA expression levels of phenotypic transformation indicators (a-SMA, calp, OPN) in vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs), along with the RhoA/ROCK signaling pathway (RhoA, ROCK1, ROCK2, MLC/p-MLC). The results demonstrated that fluoride exposure in rats led to increased blood pressure. High-throughput sequencing analysis revealed differential gene expression associated with vascular smooth muscle contraction, with the RhoA/ROCK signaling pathway emerging as a key regulator. Pathological changes in the rat aorta, such as elastic membrane rupture and collagen fiber deposition, were observed following NaF exposure. However, fasudil, a ROCK inhibitor, mitigated these pathological changes. Both in vitro and in vivo models confirmed the activation of the RhoA/ROCK signaling pathway and the phenotypic transformation of VSMCs from a contractile to a synthetic state upon fluoride exposure. Fasudil effectively inhibited the activities of ROCK1 and ROCK2 and attenuated the phenotypic transformation of VSMCs. In conclusion, fluoride has the potential to induce hypertension through the activation of the RhoA/ROCK signaling pathway and phenotypic changes in vascular smooth muscle cells. These results provide new insights into the mechanism of fluoride-induced hypertension.
•Fluoride has the potential to induce hypertension.•Fluoride activates the RhoA/ROCK signaling pathway, leading to phenotypic changes in VSMCs.•Fasudil attenuates fluoride-induced VSMCs damage and alleviates hypertension by inhibiting RhoA/ROCK signaling.
Carboxyamidotriazole (CAI) was initially considered a non-cytotoxic anticancer agent. However, recently, pronounced anti-inflammatory properties of CAI have been reported. Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) ...is an autoimmune inflammatory disease characterized by aberrant activation of signaling pathways. Therefore, this study explored the therapeutic effects and potential mechanism of action of CAI on RA in the adjuvant arthritis (AA) model. The results showed that CAI reduced the severity of arthritis in AA rats as demonstrated by inhibited hind paw swelling, reduced body weight, and decreased infiltration of joint pathological inflammatory cells. Importantly, pathological scoring of new blood vessels and immunohistochemical assays revealed that CAI inhibited pannus formation. CAI decreased the expression of pro-angiogenic growth factors, such as vascular epidermal growth factor, basic fibroblast growth factor, and metalloproteinases (MMPs), namely, MMP-1 and MMP-3 in the synovium of AA rats. Furthermore, CAI significantly reduced the increased levels of phosphorylated p38, c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK)1/2, and extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK)1/2 proteins in AA rats. In addition, the proliferation of fibroblast-like synoviocytes (FLS) was downregulated by CAI both in vivo and in vitro. In conclusion, this investigation illustrates the therapeutic effect of CAI on synovitis and erosion of articular cartilage in RA. Furthermore, the mechanism might involve inhibition of aberrantly activated mitogen-activated protein kinase signaling, as well as a decrease in pro-angiogenic factors, MMP expression, and FLS proliferation.
This study aimed to investigate the ability of enhanced computed tomography (CT)-based radiomics and dosimetric parameters in predicting response to radiotherapy for esophageal cancer.
A ...retrospective analysis of 147 patients diagnosed with esophageal cancer was performed, and the patients were divided into a training group (104 patients) and a validation group (43 patients). In total, 851 radiomics features were extracted from the primary lesions for analysis. Maximum correlation minimum redundancy and minimum least absolute shrinkage and selection operator were utilized for feature screening of radiomics features, and logistic regression was applied to construct a radiotherapy radiomics model for esophageal cancer. Finally, univariate and multivariate parameters were used to identify significant clinical and dosimetric characteristics for constructing combination models. The area evaluated the predictive performance under the receiver operating characteristics (AUC) curve and the accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of the training and validation cohorts.
Univariate logistic regression analysis revealed statistically significant differences in clinical parameters of sex (p=0.031) and esophageal cancer thickness (p=0.028) on treatment response, whereas dosimetric parameters did not differ significantly in response to treatment. The combined model demonstrated improved discrimination between the training and validation groups, with AUCs of 0.78 (95% confidence interval CI, 0.69-0.87) and 0.79 (95% CI, 0.65-0.93) in the training and validation groups, respectively.
The combined model has potential application value in predicting the treatment response of patients with esophageal cancer after radiotherapy.
Previous work has demonstrated that metastases are not uniformly distributed across the brain. This study aims to determine there are low-risk brain metastasis (BM) areas that may be avoided during ...whole-brain radiotherapy (WBRT) to reduce neurocognitive toxicity.
Clinical and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data of 991 metastases in 192 patients with advanced cancer were analyzed retrospectively. Eleven anatomically defined regions of interest (ROIs) were contoured, and the locations of the BMs were recorded. Using the same definition, ROIs were contoured in 20 healthy volunteers.The proportions of patients with BMs in different ROIs, proportion of BMs, and proportion of different ROI volumes relative to the total volume were calculated.
The proportion of observed BMs was lower than expected in the brainstem, insula, diencephalon and internal structures, corpus callosum, and pituitary gland. The proportion of BMs was significantly higher than expected in the parietal lobe, occipital lobe, and cerebellum. For those patients with single BM, there was very low rate of low-risk ROIs involvement (0%), with 2-4 BMs, 6-13% of the patients had low-risk ROIs involvement, with ≥5 BMs, significant (> 30%) of the patients had low-risk ROIs involvement.
The brainstem, insula, diencephalon and internal structures, corpus callosum, and pituitary gland demonstrate low risk for metastatic involvement. Involvement of low risk areas occurs in patients with more than 1 BM.
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