Hyperlipidemia is a common feature of chronic diseases. The aim of this work was designed to assess the role of probiotics (Lactobacillus casei Zhang, Bifidobactetium animalis subsp. lactis V9, and ...Lactobacillus plantarum P-8) in the treatment of hyperlipidemia.
Thirty three patients with hyperlipidemia were randomly divided into a probiotic group (n = 18) and a control group (n = 15). The probiotic group was administered probiotics (2 g once daily) and atorvastatin 20 mg (once daily), and the control group was administered a placebo (2 g once daily) and atorvastatin 20 mg (once daily). Serum and fecal samples were gathered for subsequent analyses.
Time had a significant effect on the total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG), and low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol (LDL-C) levels in the probiotic and control groups (P < .05). The gut microbial abundance in the probiotic group was markedly higher than that in the control group following 3-month probiotic treatment (P < .05). At the phylum level, probiotics exerted no notable effects on the relative abundance of Firmicutes, Bacteroidetes, and Actinobacteria but elevated that of Tenericutes and reduced Proteobacteria. At the genus level, probiotics increased the relative abundance of Bifidobacterium, Lactobacillus, and Akkermansia, and decreased that of Escherichia, Eggerthella, and Sutterella relative to the control group in months 1, 2, and 3 (P < .05).
Probiotics optimize the gut microbiota structure and decrease the amount of harmful bacteria in patients with hyperlipidemia. Probiotics can influence the composition of gut microorganisms and increase their diversity and abundance in vivo. It is recommended to use probiotics combined with atorvastatin to treat patients with hyperlipidemia.
Efficient fire extinguishing is a safety prerequisite for protecting the environment from fire damage. Understanding the effect of fire extinguishing agent on flame in complex environment is basic ...work for efficient fire extinguishing. We investigate the impact of HFC-125 on the extinguishment of propane-air highly stretched diffusion flames. Flame thickness is measured using the proportional method. Parameters such as dimensionless flame stand-off distance and flame stretch rate are calculated. Low concentrations of HFC-125 initially increase the flame thickness, but as the concentration increases further, the flame thickness decreases and the flame suppression effect of HFC-125 intensifies. HFC-125 reduces the amount of carbon soot generated and accelerates the transition from yellow to blue flame. Within a specific concentration range, N2 has a minimal effect on flame structural parameters compared to HFC-125. High concentration of N2 forms a high bright blue flame, while HFC-125 reacts with the flame to form a blue-violet flame. Compared to HFC-125, HFC-227ea can significantly reduce flame thickness and increase dimensionless flame stand-off distance, exhibiting a notable suppression effect. Furthermore, high concentrations of HFC-125 substantially reduce the critical flame stretch rate and provide a lower extinguishing concentration in counterflow diffusion flames than in the cup burner.
Bifidobacterium animalis ssp. lactis Probio-M8 is a potential probiotic strain that was isolated from human milk. Previously, we obtained an oxygen-resistant variant (Probio-M8o) of Probio-M8 by an ...adaptive evolution strategy. In the present study, a comparative transcriptomic analysis of Probio-M8o and Probio-M8 was carried out to reveal the cellular mechanism of the oxygen-resistant phenotype. Using RNA-seq, 210 and 217 differentially expressed genes were identified in Probio-M8o compared with Probio-M8 after oxygen exposure for 30 and 60 min, respectively. The oxygen treatment upregulated a set of genes that encoded proteins responsible for fatty acid biosynthesis. This observation was in good agreement with the composition change in fatty acids at the biochemical level. Our study showed that the oxygen-resistant phenotype could be related to adaptation of fatty acid metabolism.
Display omitted
•High viable counts of PC-01 and B8589 over storage of fermented milk beverages.•Co-fermentation improves post-storage stability of fermented milk beverages.•Co-fermentation increases ...γ-aminobutyric acid and malate in stored products.
Few studies investigated the effects of co-fermentation with bifidobacteria on post-storage changes of probiotic fermented beverages (PFBs). Thus, this study compared the post-storage changes in physicochemical index and metabolomes of PFBs produced singly by Lacticaseibacillus paracasei PC-01 (PC-01) or in combination with Bifidobacterium adolescentis B8589 (B8589). No significant differences were observed in the pH, titratable acidity, and viable cell counts between the two PFBs over 30-day storage. However, adding B8589 not only increased the stability of PFB (based on evaluating differences in PFBs metabolomics), but also the contents of beneficial amino acid metabolites, including 4-hydroxystyrene, gamma-aminobutyric acid, N-acetyl-l-aspartic acid, d-alanyl-d-alanine, and l-malic acid, after storage. Our study showed that B8589 is preferred to single-strain fermentation by PC-01. This study supports the concept of using bifidobacteria as starter culture in PFB production.
Copy number variation (CNV) is a type of structural variation, usually defined as genomic segments that are 1 kb or larger, which present variable copy numbers when compared with a reference genome. ...The screening and ranking algorithm (SaRa) was recently proposed as an efficient approach for multiple change-points detection, which can be applied to CNV detection. However, some practical issues arise from application of SaRa to single nucleotide polymorphism data.
In this study, we propose a modified SaRa on CNV detection to address these issues. First, we use the quantile normalization on the original intensities to guarantee that the normal mean model-based SaRa is a robust method. Second, a novel normal mixture model coupled with a modified Bayesian information criterion is proposed for candidate change-point selection and further clustering the potential CNV segments to copy number states. Simulations revealed that the modified SaRa became a robust method for identifying change-points and achieved better performance than the circular binary segmentation (CBS) method. By applying the modified SaRa to real data from the HapMap project, we illustrated its performance on detecting CNV segments. In conclusion, our modified SaRa method improves SaRa theoretically and numerically, for identifying CNVs with high-throughput genotyping data.
The modSaRa package is implemented in R program and freely available at http://c2s2.yale.edu/software/modSaRa.
Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
There has been a growing interest in cofermentation of starter cultures with probiotics in milk. In this study, we analyzed the effects of adding the single probiotics Lactobacillus casei Zhang ...(Zhang) or Bifidobacterium animalis ssp. lactis Probio-M8 (M8) or a combination of Zhang and M8 to starter cultures on volatile and nonvolatile metabolomic profiles after 14 d of storage at 4°C and compared using a liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS) and GC-MS-based metabolomics approach. Principal component analysis, heatmap plots, and Spearman correlation results showed that Zhang alone had a greater effect on volatile and nonvolatile metabolomic profiles than M8 alone. The combination of Zhang and M8 had additive effects on the production of metabolites. For volatile metabolites, the levels of acetaldehyde, diacetyl, acetoin, and acetic acid were higher for the combination of Zhang and M8 compared with either single probiotic culture. Significantly increased nonvolatile components induced by adding Zhang were identified were enriched in the galactose, amino- and nucleotide sugar, fructose and mannose, purine, phenylalanine metabolism, and arginine biosynthesis pathways. The metabolism and biosynthesis of starch, sucrose, tyrosine, galactose metabolism, and aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis were significantly upregulated by adding the combination of Zhang and M8. This work provides a detailed insight into different effects of Zhang and M8 used alone or in combination on the volatile and nonvolatile metabolomic profiles of yogurts.
Food allergy is a global food safety problem with a growing prevalence. People in industrial regions are more susceptible to allergy, but the mechanisms behind this are not fully understood. In this ...study, the probiotic Lactobacillus casei Zhang (LcZ) was administered to allergic individuals and the impact on allergy-related factors were determined. LcZ alleviated allergenic responses, and there was a significant correlation between the intestinal isoleucine content and IgE concentration. Metagenomics results suggest that the metabolism of the gut microbiota is a source of isoleucine. In a mouse model of food allergy, a high isoleucine diet exacerbated allergic responses and increased the activity of allergenic dendritic cell. In a dendritic cell model, a protein array revealed that the mTOR/AKT pathway mediated the function of isoleucine, and molecular docking suggested that Sestrin2 could be the potential receptor. Overall, this study revealed the role of isoleucine in promoting food allergy, elucidated the underlying mechanisms, and suggested that a high intake of isoleucine could be a potential risk factor for food allergy.
Hypothesis testing in mixture regression models Zhu, Hong-Tu; Zhang, Heping
Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Series B, Statistical methodology,
February 2004, Volume:
66, Issue:
1
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
We establish asymptotic theory for both the maximum likelihood and the maximum modified likelihood estimators in mixture regression models. Moreover, under specific and reasonable conditions, we show ...that the optimal convergence rate of n-1/4for estimating the mixing distribution is achievable for both the maximum likelihood and the maximum modified likelihood estimators. We also derive the asymptotic distributions of two log-likelihood ratio test statistics for testing homogeneity and we propose a resampling procedure for approximating the p-value. Simulation studies are conducted to investigate the empirical performance of the two test statistics. Finally, two real data sets are analysed to illustrate the application of our theoretical results.
Infants born prematurely risk significant life-long cognitive disability, representing a major pediatric health crisis. The neuropathology of this cohort is accurately modeled in mice subjected to ...sublethal postnatal hypoxia. Massively parallel transcriptome analysis using cDNA microchips (9,262 genes), combined with immunohistochemical and protein assays, reveals that sublethal hypoxia accentuates genes subserving presynaptic function, and it suppresses genes involved with synaptic maturation, postsynaptic function, and neurotransmission. Other significantly affected pathways include those involved with glial maturation, vasculogenesis, and components of the cortical and microtubular cytoskeleton. These patterns reveal a global dysynchrony in the maturation programs of the hypoxic developing brain, and offer insights into the vulnerabilities of processes that guide early postnatal cerebral maturation.
PDF
