Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are of great interest for many potential applications because of their extraordinary electronic, mechanical and structural properties. However, issues of chaotic staking, high ...cost and high energy dissipation in the synthesis of CNTs remain to be resolved. Here we develop a facile, general and high-yield strategy for the oriented formation of CNTs from metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) through a low-temperature (as low as 430 °C) pyrolysis process. The selected MOF crystals act as a single precursor for both nanocatalysts and carbon sources. The key to the formation of CNTs is obtaining small nanocatalysts with high activity during the pyrolysis process. This method is successfully extended to obtain various oriented CNT-assembled architectures by modulating the corresponding MOFs, which further homogeneously incorporate heteroatoms into the CNTs. Specifically, nitrogen-doped CNT-assembled hollow structures exhibit excellent performances in both energy conversion and storage. On the basis of experimental analyses and density functional theory simulations, these superior performances are attributed to synergistic effects between ideal components and multilevel structures. Additionally, the appropriate graphitic N doping and the confined metal nanoparticles in CNTs both increase the densities of states near the Fermi level and reduce the work function, hence efficiently enhancing its oxygen reduction activity. The viable synthetic strategy and proposed mechanism will stimulate the rapid development of CNTs in frontier fields.
Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a chronic metabolic disease with high morbidity and mortality. Recently, stem cell-based therapy for DM has shown considerable promise. Here, we undertook a systematic ...review and meta-analysis of published clinical studies to evaluate the efficacy and safety of stem cell therapy for both type 1 DM (T1DM) and type 2 DM (T2DM). The PubMed, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, EMBASE, and ClinicalTrials.gov databases were searched up to November 2018. We employed a fixed-effect model using 95% confidence intervals (CIs) when no statistically significant heterogeneity existed. Otherwise, a random-effects statistical model was used. Twenty-one studies met our inclusion criteria: ten T1DM studies including 226 patients and eleven T2DM studies including 386 patients. Stem cell therapy improved C-peptide levels (mean difference (MD), 0.41; 95% CI, 0.06 to 0.76) and glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c; MD, -3.46; 95% CI, -6.01 to -0.91) for T1DM patients. For T2DM patients, stem cell therapy improved C-peptide levels (MD, 0.33; 95% CI, 0.07 to 0.59), HbA1c (MD, -0.87; 95% CI, -1.37 to -0.37) and insulin requirements (MD, -35.76; 95% CI, -40.47 to -31.04). However, there was no significant change in fasting plasma glucose levels (MD, -0.52; 95% CI, -1.38 to 0.34). Subgroup analyses showed significant HbA1c and C-peptide improvements in patients with T1DM treated with bone marrow hematopoietic stem cells (BM-HSCs), while there was no significant change in the mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) group. In T2DM, HbA1c and insulin requirements decreased significantly after MSC transplantation, and insulin requirements and C-peptide levels were significantly improved after bone marrow mononuclear cell (BM-MNC) treatment. Stem cell therapy is a relatively safe and effective method for selected individuals with DM. The data showed that BM-HSCs are superior to MSCs in the treatment of T1DM. In T2DM, MSC and BM-MNC transplantation showed favorable therapeutic effects.
Background We explored whether stem cell therapy was effective for animal models and patients with Crohn's disease (CD). Methods We searched five online databases. The relative outcomes were analyzed ...with the aid of GetData Graph Digitizer 2.26 and Stata 16.0 software. The SYRCLE risk of bias tool and the MINORS tool were used to assess study quality. Results We evaluated 46 studies including 28 animal works (n = 567) and 18 human trials (n = 360). In the animal studies, the disease activity index dramatically decreased in the mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) treatment groups compared to the control group. Rats and mice receiving MSCs exhibited longer colons mice: standardized mean difference (SMD) 2.84, P = 0.000; rats: SMD 1.44, P = 0.029, lower histopathological scores (mice: SMD - 4.58, p = 0.000; rats: SMD - 1.41, P = 0.000) and lower myeloperoxidase levels (SMD - 6.22, P = 0.000). In clinical trials, stem cell transplantation reduced the CD activity index (SMD - 2.10, P = 0.000), the CD endoscopic index of severity (SMD - 3.40, P = 0.000) and simplified endoscopy score for CD (SMD - 1.71, P = 0.000) and improved the inflammatory bowel disease questionnaire score (SMD 1.33, P = 0.305) compared to control values. CD patients maintained high remission rates for 3-24 months after transplantation. Conclusions Stem cell transplantation is a valuable supplementary therapy for CD. Keywords: Stem cells, Crohn's disease, Systematic review and meta-analysis, Crohn's disease activity index, Histopathological score, Colon length, Remission rate
Aim
The aims of this study were to examine the prevalence of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) among health science students in China; associations between the number of ACE exposures and severity ...of depressive and anxiety symptoms; and the extent to which resilience moderates the effect of ACEs on mental health outcomes.
Design
This descriptive, cross‐sectional study was conducted May–August 2020.
Methods
Five hundred and sixty‐six health science students (18–38 years) from China completed online surveys measuring ACEs using the Simplified Chinese version of the ACE‐International Questionnaire, depressive and anxiety symptoms and resilience. Descriptive statistical analysis, ANOVA with Tukey HSD post hoc tests and multiple regression analysis were performed using SPSS 27.
Results
88.5% of participants reported at least one ACE; 42.6% reported four or more ACEs. Higher number of ACEs was associated with more symptoms of depression and anxiety. Four or more ACEs were associated with significantly worse mental health outcomes than those with no ACEs and those with one to three ACEs. Greater resilience significantly attenuated the effects of ACEs on mental health symptoms.
Conclusions
ACEs are highly prevalent among Chinese health science students but their impact on mental health can be buffered by higher levels of resilience.
Impact
Screening for ACEs and strength‐based, trauma‐informed interventions on fostering resilience is needed to promote mental health among Chinese young adults.
Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have attracted interest for their potential to alleviate liver injury. Here, the protective effect of MSCs on carbon tetrachloride (CCl
)-induced acute liver injury ...(ALI) was investigated. In this study, we illustrated a novel mechanism that ferroptosis, a newly recognized form of regulated cell death, contributed to CCl
-induced ALI. Subsequently, based on the in vitro and in vivo evidence that MSCs and MSC-derived exosomes (MSC-Exo) treatment achieved pathological remission and inhibited the production of lipid peroxidation, we proposed an MSC-based therapy for CCl
-induced ALI. More intriguingly, treatment with MSCs and MSC-Exo downregulated the mRNA level of prostaglandin-endoperoxide synthase 2 (Ptgs2) and lipoxygenases (LOXs) while it restored the protein level of SLC7A11 in primary hepatocytes and mouse liver, indicating that the inhibition of ferroptosis partly accounted for the protective effect of MSCs and MSC-Exo on ALI. We further revealed that MSC-Exo-induced expression of SLC7A11 protein was accompanied by increasing of CD44 and OTUB1. The aberrant expression of ubiquitinated SLC7A11 triggered by CCl
could be rescued with OTUB1-mediated deubiquitination, thus strengthening SLC7A11 stability and thereby leading to the activation of system X
to prevent CCl
-induced hepatocyte ferroptosis. In conclusion, we showed that MSC-Exo had a protective role against ferroptosis by maintaining SLC7A11 function, thus proposing a novel therapeutic strategy for ferroptosis-induced ALI.
This study investigated the performance of ultrasonography in diagnosing deep soft-tissue tumors and tumor-like lesions in children with histological results. Demographic information and ultrasound ...characteristics of benign and malignant masses were statistically analyzed. Three radiologists (Radiologists 1, 2, and 3) independently reviewed the ultrasonography studies while being blinded to the medical history and other imaging findings. The 82 lesions included in the study were histopathologically classified as malignant (n = 25) or benign (n = 57). No statistically significant differences were observed between the benign and malignant subgroups regarding age (p = 0.059), sex (p = 1.0), disease course (p = 0.812), presence or absence of symptoms (p = 0.534), maximum diameter (p = 0.359), margin (p = 1.0), calcification (p = 0.057), or blood Adler type (p = 0.563). However, statistically significant differences were observed between the benign and malignant subgroups in terms of isolated or Multiple occurrences (p < 0.001), history of malignancy (p < 0.001), shape (p < 0.001), and echogenicity (p < 0.001). Parameters such as tumor shape (p = 0.042, OR = 6.222), single or multiple occurrences (p = 0.008, OR = 17.000), and history of malignancy (p = 0.038, OR = 13.962) were identified as independent predictors of benign and malignant tumors. The diagnostic sensitivities evaluated by the three radiologists were 68.0%, 72.0%, 96.0%, respectively, while the specificities were 77.2%, 82.5%, 77.2%, respectively. Ultrasound demonstrates good performance in the diagnosis of benign deep lesions such as hemangiomas/venous malformation and adipocytic tumors. Multiple irregular morphologies and a history of malignancy were identified as independent risk factors for malignant masses. The experience of radiologists in recognizing specific tumors is important. Careful attention should be paid to masses with ambiguous ultrasound features, as well as small lesions.
Let Formula: see text be a pseudo-differential operator defined by the symbol Formula: see text with Formula: see text Formula: see text. It is shown that if Formula: see text, then the operator ...satisfies the following pointwise estimate: Formula: see text for all Formula: see text and all Schwartz function Formula: see text Here, Formula: see text denotes the John-Nirenberg sharp function of Formula: see text and Formula: see text stands for the Hardy–Littlewood maximal operator.
Plastome sequence data is most often extracted from plant whole genome sequencing data and need to be assembled and annotated separately from the nuclear genome sequence. In projects comprising ...multiple genomes, it is labour intense to individually process the plastomes as it requires many steps and software. This study developed
Plastaumatic
- an automated pipeline for both assembly and annotation of plastomes, with the scope of the researcher being able to load whole genome sequence data with minimal manual input, and therefore a faster runtime. The main structure of the current automated pipeline includes trimming of adaptor and low-quality sequences using
fastp
,
de novo
plastome assembly using
NOVOPlasty
, standardization and quality checking of the assembled genomes through a custom script utilizing
BLAST+
and
SAMtools
, annotation of the assembled genomes using
AnnoPlast
, and finally generating the required files for NCBI GenBank submissions. The pipeline is demonstrated with 12 potato accessions and three soybean accessions.
Music therapy has been employed as an alternative treatment modality for the arousal therapy of patients with disorders of consciousness (DOC) in clinical settings. However, due to the absence of ...continuous quantitative measurements and the lack of a non-musical sound control group in most studies, the identification of the specific impact of music on DOC patients remains challenging. In this study, 20 patients diagnosed with minimally consciousness state (MCS) were selected, and a total of 15 patients completed the experiment.
All patients were randomly assigned to three groups: an intervention group (music therapy group,
= 5), a control group (familial auditory stimulation group,
= 5), and a standard care group (no sound stimulation group,
= 5). All three groups received 30 min of therapy five times a week for a total of 4 weeks (20 times per group, 60 times in total). Autonomic nervous system (ANS) measurements, Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS), and functional magnetic resonance-diffusion tensor imaging (fMRI-DTI) were used to measure the peripheral nervous system indicators and brain networks, and to evaluate patients' behavior levels.
The results reveal that PNN50 (
= 0.0004**), TP (
= 0.0003**), VLF (
= 0.0428**), and LF/HF (
= 0.0001**) in the music group were significantly improved compared with the other two groups. Such findings suggest that the ANS of patients with MCS exhibits higher activity levels during music exposure compared to those exposed to family conversation or no auditory stimulation. In fMRI-DTI detection, due to the relative activity of ANS in the music group, the ascending reticular activation system (ARAS) in the brain network also exhibited significant nerve fiber bundle reconstruction, superior temporal gyrus (STG), transverse temporal gyrus (TTG), inferior temporal gyrus (ITG), limbic system, corpus callosum, subcorticospinal trace, thalamus and brainstem regions. In the music group, the reconstructed network topology was directed rostrally to the diencephalon's dorsal nucleus, with the brainstem's medial region serving as the hub. This network was found to be linked with the caudal corticospinal tract and the ascending lateral branch of the sensory nerve within the medulla.
Music therapy, as an emerging treatment for DOC, appears to be integral to the awakening of the peripheral nervous system-central nervous system based on the hypothalamic-brainstem-autonomic nervous system (HBA) axis, and is worthy of clinical promotion. The research was supported by the Beijing Science and Technology Project Foundation of China, No. Z181100001718066, and the National Key R&D Program of China No. 2022YFC3600300, No. 2022YFC3600305.
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