Hydrogen sensors based on single Pd nanowires show promising results in speed, sensitivity, and ultralow power consumption. The utilization of single Pd nanowires, however, face challenges in ...nanofabrication, manipulation, and achieving ultrasmall transverse dimensions. We report on hydrogen sensors that take advantage of single palladium nanowires in high speed and sensitivity and that can be fabricated conveniently. The sensors are based on networks of ultrasmall (<10 nm) palladium nanowires deposited onto commercially available filtration membranes. We investigated the sensitivities and response times of these sensors as a function of the thickness of the nanowires and also compared them with a continuous reference film. The superior performance of the ultrasmall Pd nanowire network based sensors demonstrates the novelty of our fabrication approach, which can be directly applied to palladium alloy and other hydrogen sensing materials.
The issue, composition dependence of glass-forming ability (GFA) in metallic glasses (MG), has been investigated by systematic experimental measurements coupled with theoretical calculations in Cu-Zr ...and Ni-Nb alloy systems. It is found that the atomic-level packing efficiency strongly relates to their GFA. The best GFA is located at the largest difference in the packing efficiency of the solute-centered clusters between the glassy and crystal alloys in both MG systems. This work provides an understanding of GFA from atomic level and will shed light on the development of new MGs with larger critical sizes.
Liver kinase B1 (LKB1) is mutationally inactivated in Peutz-Jeghers syndrome and in a variety of cancers including human papillomavirus (HPV)-caused cervical cancer. However, the significance of LKB1 ...mutations in cervical cancer initiation and progress has not been examined. Herein, we demonstrated that, in mouse embryonic fibroblasts, loss of LKB1 and transduction of HPV16 E6/E7 had an additive effect on constraining cell senescence while promoting cell proliferation and increasing glucose consumption, lactate production and ATP generation. Knockdown of LKB1 increased and ectopic expression of LKB1 decreased glycolysis, anchorage-independent cell growth, and cell migration and invasion in HPV-transformed cells. In the tumorigenesis and lung metastasis model in syngeneic mice, depletion of LKB1 markedly increased tumor metastatic colonies in lungs without affecting subcutaneous tumor growth. We showed that HPV16 E6/E7 enhanced the expression of hexokinase-ll (HK-II) in the glycolytic pathway through elevated c-MYC. Ectopic LKB1 reduced HK-II along with glycolysis. The inverse relationship between HK-II and LKB1 was also observed in normal and HPV-associated cervical lesions. We propose that LKB1 acts as a safeguard against HPV-stimulated aerobic glycolysis and tumor progression. These findings may eventually aid in the development of therapeutic strategy for HPV-associated malignancies by targeting cell metabolism.
Abstract
This study examined the prebiotic effects of xylooligosaccharides (XOS) on intestinal characteristics, gut microbiota, cecal short-chain fatty acids, plasma calcium metabolism, and immune ...parameters of laying hens. A total of 1,080 White Lohmann laying hens (28 wk of age) was assigned to 6 dietary treatments that included XOS at concentrations of 0, 0.01, 0.02, 0.03, 0.04, or 0.05% for 8 weeks. Each treatment had 6 replicates with 10 cages (3 birds/cage). Blood, intestinal tissues, and cecal digesta samples were collected from chickens at the end of the experiment. Villus height, crypt depth, the villus to crypt (VH: CD) ratio, and the relative length of different intestinal sections were evaluated. Additionally, the number of microorganisms and the content of short-chain fatty acids in cecal digesta samples were determined. Plasma concentrations of immunoglobulin A (IgA), immunoglobulin G, immunoglobulin M (IgM), interleukin 2 (IL-2), tumor necrosis factor-α(TNF-α), 1, 25-dihydroxyvitamin D3 (1,25(OH)2D3), calcitonin (CT), and parathyroid hormone (PTH) were also determined. The results showed that villus height and the VH: CD ratio of the jejunum were increased (linear, P < 0.01) with the increase in dietary XOS concentration, and the relative length of the jejunum (P = 0.03) was increased significantly in XOS diets. Dietary supplementation of XOS significantly increased (linear, P < 0.01) the number of Bifidobacteria in the cecum; however, total bacteria count, Lactobacillus, and Escherichia coli in the cecum were not affected by XOS supplementation. In addition, inclusion of XOS increased (linear, P < 0.01) the content of butyrate in the cecum; and the content of acetic acid showed a linear increasing trend (P = 0.053) with increasing concentration of XOS in the diets. Supplementation with XOS increased (quadratic, P < 0.05) the content of 1,25(OH)2D3 in plasma. There were no significant differences (P > 0.05) in the content of CT and PTH among dietary treatments. Furthermore, dietary XOS increased contents of IgA (linear, P < 0.05), TNF-α (linear, P < 0.05), IgM (linear, P < 0.05; quadratic, P < 0.05), and IL-2 (quadratic, P < 0.05). Taken together, it was suggested that supplemental XOS can enhance the intestinal health and immune function of laying hens by positively influencing the intestinal characteristics, gut microbiota, cecal short-chain fatty acids, and immune parameters.
Abstract Delta opioid receptor (DOR) is essential for neuronal survival against hypoxic/ischemic damages. However, current understanding on how DOR activation affects astrocytic functions under ...ischemia remains incomplete. The present study investigated the astroglial responses to d -Ala2, d -Leu5 enkephalin (DADLE) (a selective DOR agonist)-induced DOR activation after global cerebral ischemia. Adult male rats were preimplanted with intracerebral cannula and subjected to global ischemia for 10 min. The rats were divided into four groups: normal group (without any procedure), sham group (sham procedure with intracerebroventricular injection of ACSF), I/R group (ischemia procedure with intracerebroventricular injection of ACSF) and DAD-treated group (ischemia procedure with intracerebroventricular injection of DADLE). Hippocampal CA1 neuronal survival and activation of astrocytes were measured in the animals at 72 h post-ischemia. The distribution and phenotypes of p-Akt and active caspase-3 were also determined. The ischemic injury resulted in a significant neuronal loss and an increase in the dying astrocytes in the hippocampal CA1 region as compared with those in the sham animals (200.7±22.7/mm2 vs. 6.6±3.1/mm2 , P <0.001). Improved neuronal survival in the DAD-treated animals was evident, which was accompanied by less dying astrocytes and enhanced astrocytes reaction with more active astrocytes than that in the I/R group (267.6±13.2/mm2 vs. 157.0±18.1/mm2 , P <0.01) and a significantly increased immunoreactivity of p-Akt. However, the active caspase-3 positive cells were also evident in DAD-treated group (313.0±23.1/mm2 ) and significantly increased as compared with those of the sham group (159.0±15.8/mm2 , P <0.001) or I/R group (193.6±26.2/mm2 , P <0.01). Most of the active caspase-3-expressing cells were colabeled with glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), an astrocytes marker. We conclude that the post-ischemic treatment with DADLE promotes beneficial astrocytes activation and induces astroglial apoptosis 72 h after reperfusion which may be involved in reducing their harmful effect to neurons survival.
In our previous experiment, we found that fats with pre-emulsification (PreE), a new supplemented mode of emulsifier, had an improved bioavailability for Pekin ducks than fats without PreE based on ...dietary EE utilization. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the effects of the supplemented mode of emulsifier (PreE vs. emulsifier direct supplementation) on the growth performance, serum biochemical index, quality of meat and skin fat, and nutrient utilization in Pekin ducks. A total of 640 healthy 10-day-old Pekin male ducks (408.65 ± 12.00 g) were randomly allocated into 4 treatments with 16 replicates of 10 birds each. The 4 dietary treatments were as follows: the positive control group (PC; the oil supplemented amount of 6%), the negative control group (NC; the oil supplemented amount of 5.4%), the emulsifier group (E; NC diet with an emulsifier added directly), and the oil pre-emulsification group (PreE; NC diet with oil PreE). The results showed reducing the amount of fat in the diet (NC vs. PC) significantly decreased growth performance and quality of skin fat, and affected serum lipid metabolism (P < 0.05). Interestingly, the body weight (BW), body weight gain (BWG), and the shear force of skin fat were increased, but the feed to gain ratio (F/G) was markedly decreased in the PreE group (P < 0.05) compared to those in the NC group, and these levels were similar to those in the PC group (P > 0.05). Additionally, the utilization of dietary dry matter (DM), ether extract (EE), and total phosphorous (TP) were increased, but the activity of aspartate aminotransferase (AST) in serum was decreased in the PreE group compared to those in the NC group (P < 0.05). Furthermore, compared to the E group, the F/G was decreased (P < 0.05), and the utilization of dietary EE, the shear force of skin fat and content of collagen in skin fat were markedly increased (P < 0.05) in the PreE group. However, no differences were observed (P > 0.05) in growth performance between the group administered a direct supplementation of emulsifier and the control groups (PC and NC). These results indicate that the negative effect of reducing the oil supplementation amount (−0.6%) in the diet can be restored by supplementation with emulsifier, especially by oil with PreE.
Purpose
Studies have found that erectile dysfunction (ED) may be a short-term or long-term complication in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients, but no relevant studies have completed a ...pooled analysis of this claim. The purpose of the review was to comprehensively search the relevant literature, summarize the prevalence of ED in COVID-19 patients, assess risk factors for its development, and explore the effect of the COVID-19 infection on erectile function.
Methods
Medline, Embase, and the Cochrane Library was performed from database inception until April 14, 2022. Heterogeneity was analyzed by
χ
2
tests and
I
2
was used as a quantitative test of heterogeneity. Subgroup analyses, meta-regression, and sensitivity analyses were used to analyze sources of heterogeneity.
Results
Our review included 8 studies, 4 of which functioned as a control group. There were 250,606 COVID-19 patients (mean age: 31–47.1 years, sample size: 23–246,990). The control group consisted of 10,844,200 individuals (mean age: 32.76–42.4 years, sample size 75–10,836,663). The prevalence of ED was 33% (95% CI 18–47%,
I
2
= 99.48%) in COVID-19 patients. The prevalence of ED based on the international coding of diseases (ICD-10) was 9% (95% CI 2–19%), which was significantly lower than the prevalence of ED diagnosed based on the International Index of Erectile Function (IIEF-5) (46%, 95% CI 22–71%,
I
2
= 96.72%). The pooling prevalence of ED was 50% (95% CI 34–67%,
I
2
= 81.54%) for articles published in 2021, significantly higher than that for articles published in 2022 (17%, 95% CI 7–30%,
I
2
= 99.55%). The relative risk of developing ED was 2.64 times in COVID-19 patients higher than in non-COVID-19 patients (RR: 2.64, 95% CI 1.01–6.88). The GRADE-pro score showed that the mean incidence of ED events in COVID-19 patients was 1,333/50,606 (2.6%) compared with 52,937/844,200 (0.4%) in controls; the absolute impact of COVID-19 on ED was 656/100,000 (ranging from 4/100,000 to 2352/100,000). Anxiety (OR: 1.13, 95% CI 1.03–1.26,
I
2
= 0.0%) in COVID-19 patients was a risk factor for ED.
Conclusion
COVID-19 patients have a high risk and prevalence of ED, mainly driven by anxiety. Attention should be paid to patient’s erectile functioning when treating COVID-19.
In this study, to systematically identify the most stably expressed genes for internal reference in zebrafish Danio rerio investigations, 37 D. rerio transcriptomic datasets (both RNA sequencing and ...microarray data) were collected from gene expression omnibus (GEO) database and unpublished data, and gene expression variations were analysed under three experimental conditions: tissue types, developmental stages and chemical treatments. Forty‐four putative candidate genes were identified with the c.v. <0·2 from all datasets. Following clustering into different functional groups, 21 genes, in addition to four conventional housekeeping genes (eef1a1l1, b2m, hrpt1l and actb1), were selected from different functional groups for further quantitative real‐time (qrt‐)PCR validation using 25 RNA samples from different adult tissues, developmental stages and chemical treatments. The qrt‐PCR data were then analysed using the statistical algorithm refFinder for gene expression stability. Several new candidate genes showed better expression stability than the conventional housekeeping genes in all three categories. It was found that sep15 and metap1 were the top two stable genes for tissue types, ube2a and tmem50a the top two for different developmental stages, and rpl13a and rp1p0 the top two for chemical treatments. Thus, based on the extensive transcriptomic analyses and qrt‐PCR validation, these new reference genes are recommended for normalization of D. rerio qrt‐PCR data respectively for the three different experimental conditions.
Previous studies showed conflicting results concerning the value of CBF maps obtained from arterial spin-labeling MR imaging in grading gliomas. This study was performed to investigate the ...effectiveness of CBF maps derived from 3D pseudocontinuous arterial spin-labeling in preoperatively assessing the grade, cellular proliferation, and prognosis of gliomas.
Fifty-eight patients with pathologically confirmed gliomas underwent preoperative 3D pseudocontinuous arterial spin-labeling. The receiver operating characteristic curves for parameters to distinguish high-grade gliomas from low-grade gliomas were generated. Pearson correlation analysis was used to assess the correlation among parameters. Survival analysis was conducted with Cox regression.
Both maximum CBF and maximum relative CBF were significantly higher in high-grade gliomas than in low-grade gliomas (
< .001). The areas under the curve for maximum CBF and maximum relative CBF in distinguishing high-grade gliomas from low-grade gliomas were 0.828 and 0.863, respectively. Both maximum CBF and maximum relative CBF had no correlation with the Ki-67 index in all subjects and had a moderate negative correlation with the Ki-67 index in glioblastomas (
= -0.475, -0.534, respectively). After adjustment for age, a higher maximum CBF (
= .008) and higher maximum relative CBF (
= .005) were associated with worse progression-free survival in gliomas, while a higher maximum relative CBF (
= .033) was associated with better overall survival in glioblastomas.
3D pseudocontinuous arterial spin-labeling-derived CBF maps are effective in preoperative evaluation of gliomas. Although gliomas with a higher blood flow are more malignant, glioblastomas with a lower blood flow are likely to be more aggressive.
PDF
