Purpose: Cognitive impairment (CI) is a common but debilitating non-motor symptom in Parkinson's disease (PD). Although cerebrovascular functions are related to cognitive performance in healthy ...individuals, such a relation in PD remains elusive. This study aims to assess the association between cerebrovascular function and cognitive performance in PD individuals. Patients and Methods: Two-hundred-and-one PD individuals were retrospectively included. They were subsequently divided into two groups: PD with normal cognition (PD-NC) and PD with CI (PD-CI). Cerebral hemodynamic characteristics of the middle cerebral arteries were assessed by transcranial ultrasound. The association between scores in each cognitive domain and cerebral hemodynamic parameters was further analyzed using regression analyses. Additionally, a binary logistic regression model with backward stepwise procedure was applied to build the model for discriminating CI in PD individuals. An independent dataset of additional 46 PD individuals was used further. Results: The PD-CI group showed a relatively lower end-diastolic blood flow velocity (EDV, p < 0.05) and a higher resistive index (RI, p < 0.05) compared to the PD-NC group. RI showed significant associations with the memory item score of Montreal Cognitive Assessment (p < 0.05). A model combining clinical and hemodynamic variables was established with optimal efficiency (area under the curve, AUC = 0.651). Further replication of the model in an independent dataset yielded a great consistency (AUC = 0.704). Conclusion: In our study, cerebrovascular functions were significantly associated with the cognitive performance in PD individuals, especially with the memory task. The established model was effective in identifying CI in PD individuals, which might be a potentially useful tool to screen the cognitive decline in PD individuals at an early stage of the disease. Further studies with larger sample sizes in different populations are warranted. Keywords: Parkinson's disease, cognitive impairment, transcranial ultrasound, resistive index
China Spallation Neutron Source (CSNS) is the first high-performance pulsed neutron source in China, which will meet the increasing fundamental research and technique applications demands ...domestically and overseas. A new distributed data processing and analysis environment has been developed, which has generic functionalities for neutron scattering experiments. The environment consists of three parts, an object-oriented data processing framework adopting a data centered architecture, a communication and data caching system based on the C/S paradigm, and data analysis and visualization software providing the 2D/3D experimental data display. This environment will be widely applied in CSNS for live data processing.
Circulating microRNAs (miRNAs) are potential biomarkers for cancer. We examined plasma levels of 2 miRNAs, let-7a and miR-16, in 50 patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and 76 healthy persons ...using quantitative real-time PCR. Circulating levels of both miRNAs were similar among healthy controls but were significantly lower in MDS patients (P = .001 and P < .001, respectively). The distributions of these 2 miRNA levels were bimodal in MDS patients, and these levels were significantly associated with their progression-free survival and overall survival (both P < .001 for let-7a; P < .001 and P = .001 for miR-16). This association persisted even after patients were stratified according to the International Prognostic Scoring System. Multivariate analysis revealed that let-7a level was a strong independent predictor for overall survival in this patient cohort. These findings suggest that let-7a and miR-16 plasma levels can serve as noninvasive prognostic markers in MDS patients.
Membrane transporters play a central role in many cellular processes that rely on the movement of ions and organic molecules between the environment and the cell, and between cellular compartments. ...Transporters have been well characterized in plants and green algae, but little is known about transporters or their evolutionary histories in the red algae. Here we examined 482 expressed sequence tag contigs that encode putative membrane transporters in the economically important red seaweed Porphyra (Bangiophyceae, Rhodophyta). These contigs are part of a comprehensive transcriptome dataset from Porphyra utnbilicalis and Porphyra purpurea. Using phylogenomics, we identified 30 trees that support the expected monophyly of red and green algae/plants (i.e. the Plantae hypothesis) and 19 expressed sequence tag contigs that show evidence of endosymbiotic/horizontal gene transfer involving stramenopiles. The majority (77%) of analyzed contigs encode transporters with unresolved phylogenies, demonstrating the difficulty in resolving the evolutionary history of genes. We observed molecular features of many sodium-coupled transport systems in marine algae, and the potential for coregulation of Porphyra transporter genes that are associated with fatty acid biosynthesis and intracellular lipid trafficking. Although both the tissue-specific and subcellular locations of the encoded proteins require further investigation, our study provides red algal gene candidates associated with transport functions and novel insights into the biology and evolution of these transporters.
Integrated operation between submerged hollow fiber membrane filtration and a sequencing aerobic sludge blanket reactor (SASBR) led to a novel aerobic granular sludge membrane bioreactor (AGMBR). ...Throughout four months of operation granular sludge dominated in AGMBR and the mean diameter of biomass particle was as big as 0.70
mm. Reactor performance of AGMBR was compared with a traditional submerged membrane bioreactor (SMBR) that was dominated by bioflocs. AGMBR mixed liquor showed much better filtration characteristics. Constant pressure test indicated that when transmembrane pressure (TMP) increased by 8-fold, the membrane permeability loss was 34.5% with AGMBR mixed liquor, or 1.68-fold lower than that of SMBR. Constant flux test showed that when flux increased by 3-fold, the membrane permeability loss was 2.4% with AGMBR mixed liquor, or 21-fold lower than that of SMBR. During continuous reactor operation, membrane TMP increment in AGMBR was negligible whereas membrane module in SMBR required a regular physical maintenance. Dead end cell filtration based on typical mixed liquor samples from AGMBR and SMBR disclosed that the excellent membrane permeability in AGMBR was due to the low compressibility of granular sludge biomass.
To study the pharmacodynamics of vecuronium,atracurium, mivacurium and rocuronium in patients with end-stage renal failure.
Forty-six patients with end-stage renal failure scheduled for renal ...transplantation and 53 patients with normal renal function were given either vecuronium, atracurium, mivacurium or rocuronium. The neuromuscular effects were monitored by the evoked response of the adductor pollicis to train-of-four stimulation of the ulnar nerve.
Onset of vecuronium, atracurium and mivacurium occurred faster or tended to be faster in patients with end-stage renal failure, but there was no significant difference in onset by rocuronium between the control patients and renal failure patients. Furthermore, the no-response period, duration of action and recovery of atracurium did not differ between the two groups. There was no significant difference in duration of action or recovery of mivacurium between the two groups, whereas its no-response period was significantly prolonged in the patients with end-stage renal failure. There was no difference in no-response period or duration of action after the initial dose of vecuronium or rocuronium between the two groups. However, no-response period and duration of effect by vecuronium and rocuronium were prolonged with increasing incremental doses in patients with end-stage renal failure.
All four muscle relaxants could be safely used in patients with end-stage renal failure. Onset of the relaxants were, in some cases, accelerated and no-response period of mivacurium was prolonged in patients with end-stage renal failure undergoing dialysis therapy. End-stage renal failure prolonged the no-response period and duration of action of vecuronium and rocuronium after repeated incremental doses, but did not alter those attributed to atracurium.
To assess the performance of a wearable multi-sensor system (SensEcho) in comparison to polysomnography (PSG) in measuring sleep stages and searching for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA).
Participants ...underwent overnight simultaneous monitoring using SensEcho and PSG in a sleep laboratory. SensEcho analyzed the recordings spontaneously, and PSG was assessed as per standard guidelines. The degree of snoring was evaluated according to the guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of OSA hypopnea syndrome (2011 revision). The Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) was used to assess general daytime sleepiness.
This study included 103 Han Chinese, 91 of whom (age 39.02 ± 13.84 years, body mass index 27.28 ± 5.12 kg/m2, 61.54% male) completed the assessments. The measures of total sleep time (P = 0.198); total wake time (P = 0.182); shallow sleep (P = 0.297), deep sleep (P = 0.422), rapid eye movement sleep (P = 0.570), and awake (P = 0.336) proportions were similar between SensEcho and PSG. Using an apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) cutoff of ≥ 5 events/h, the SensEcho had 82.69% sensitivity and 89.74% specificity. Almost the same results were obtained at an AHI threshold of ≥ 15 events/h. Although the specificity increased to 94.67%, it decreased to 43.75% at an AHI cutoff of ≥ 30 events/h.
This study demonstrated that SensEcho can be used to evaluate sleep status and screen for OSA. Nevertheless, improving the accuracy of its assessment of severe OSA and further testing its effectiveness in community and home environments is necessary.
Searching for eco-friendly and earth-abundant materials to supersede traditional high-cost bismuth telluride for fabricating wearable devices is of great significance in thermoelectrics. In this ...work, promising flexible Cu2Se based thin films with high thermoelectric performance is successfully fabricated via a facile co-sputtering method. Experimental results indicate that excess Cu in Cu2Se films leads to the decrease of carrier concentration by suppressing the formation of Cu vacancies and donating electrons, benefiting to achieve high Seebeck coefficient. Moreover, Cu-excess Cu2Se films have highly (0l0) preferred orientation and extra high carrier mobility, maintaining the decent electrical conductivity in the whole measurement temperature range. Combined with the low thermal conductivity, a maximum ZT of 0.42 is obtained at 275 °C from the Cu-excess Cu2Se due to the simultaneous optimization both of electrical and heat transport. Subsequently, a flexible thermoelectric device assembled with high performance Cu2Se films exhibits a maximum power density of 4.28 Wm-2 at a temperature difference of 50 °C, which thermal stability is greatly improved after introducing a molybdenum buffer layer into electrode layer. Therefore, this work demonstrates that rational microstructure manipulations and connection technology improvement can achieve high performance in the flexible thermoelectric device, which possess potential in wearable applications.
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•Flexible Cu2Se based thin films with desired (0l0)-preferred orientation were successfully achieved by optimized growth temperature and composition.•Excess Cu in flexible Cu2Se films contribute to improve electrical and thermal transport properties simultaneously.•A Mo buffer layer introduced into electrode layer enhanced the thermal stability of Cu2Se based flexible thermoelectric device.
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