Purpose
Optical coherence tomography angiography (OCT-A) is a novel imaging modality for the diagnosis of chorioretinal diseases. A number of FDA-approved OCT-A devices are currently commercially ...available, each with unique algorithms and scanning protocols. Although several published studies have compared different combinations of OCT-A machines, there is a lack of agreement on the consistency of measurements across OCT-A devices. Therefore, we conducted a prospective quantitative comparison of four available OCT-A platforms.
Methods
Subjects were scanned on four devices: Optovue RTVue-XR, Heidelberg Spectralis OCT2 module, Zeiss Plex Elite 9000 Swept-Source OCT, and Topcon DRI-OCT Triton Swept-Source OCT. 3 mm × 3 mm images were utilized for analysis. Foveal avascular zone (FAZ) area was separately and independently measured by two investigators. Fractal dimension (FD), superficial capillary plexus (SCP), and deep capillary plexus (DCP) vessel densities (VD) were calculated from binarized images using the Fiji image processing software. SCP and DCP VD were further calculated after images were skeletonized. Repeated measures ANOVA, post hoc tests, and interclass correlation coefficient (ICC) were performed for statistical analysis.
Results
Sixteen healthy eyes from sixteen patients were scanned on the four devices. Images of five eyes from the Triton device were excluded due to poor image quality; thus, the authors performed two sets comparisons, one with and one without the Triton machine. FAZ area showed no significant difference across devices with an ICC of > 95%. However, there were statistically significant differences for SCP and DCP VD both before and after skeletonization (
p
< 0.05). Fractal analysis revealed no significant difference of FD at the SCP; however, a statistically significant difference was found for FD at the DCP layer (
p
< 0.05).
Conclusions
The results showed that FAZ measurements were consistent across all four devices, while significant differences in VD and FD measurements existed. Therefore, we suggest that for both clinical follow-up and research studies, FAZ area is a useful parameter for OCT-A image analysis when measurements are made on different machines, while VD and FD show significant variability when measured across devices.
Engaging in appropriate physical activity can significantly lower the risk of various diseases among middle-aged and older adults. Investigating optimal levels of physical activity (PA) is crucial ...for enhancing the health of this demographic. This study aims to explore the dose-response relationship between weekly PA levels and the frequency of colds among Chinese middle-aged and elderly individuals, identifying the necessary PA level to effectively diminish the risk of colds.
We conducted a cross-sectional study using a web-based survey targeting individuals aged 40 and older (
= 1, 683) in China. The survey collected information on PA and the frequency of colds. Data was analyzed using Kruskal-Wallis test and the
test. We explored the dose-response relationship between weekly PA and cold frequency over the past year through an ordered multivariate logistic regression model and a restricted cubic spline model.
(1) Brisk walking emerged as the preferred physical exercise for those over 40. The findings suggest that engaging in moderate (odds ratio (OR) = 0.64,
< 0.001, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.50-0.81) and high (OR = 0.64,
< 0.001, 95% CI 0.51-0.79) levels of PA weekly significantly reduces the risk of catching a cold. Individuals with one (OR = 1.47,
< 0.001, 95% CI 1.20-1.80) or multiple chronic diseases (OR = 1.56,
< 0.001, 95% CI 1.21-2.00) were at increased risk. Those residing in central (OR = 1.64,
< 0.001, 95% CI 1.33-02.01) and western China (OR = 1.49,
= 0.008, 95% CI 1.11-02.00) faced a higher risk compared to their counterparts in eastern China. (2) According to the restricted cubic spline model, adults who experienced one cold in the past year had a weekly PA level of 537.29 metabolic equivalent-minutes per week (MET-min/wk) with an OR value of 1. For those reporting two or more colds, the PA level was 537.76 MET-min/wk with an OR of 1.
(1) Brisk walking is the most favored exercise among the Chinese middle-aged and elderly, with the prevalence of colds being affected by the number of chronic diseases and the geographic location. (2) Regular, moderate exercise is linked to a lower risk of colds. To effectively reduce cold frequency, it is recommended that middle-aged and elderly Chinese individuals engage in a minimum of 538 MET-min/wk of exercise.
Bitumen is similar to oil and gas in logging, making it difficult to identify. It occupies the reservoir pores and affects the reservoir's physical properties. It is important to consider the ...influence of bitumen on reservoir physical properties and determine the logging identification method of bitumen for further oil and gas exploration. This article focuses on bitumen in the Mahu Depression. By carrying out bitumen dissolution experiments, comparative analyses of the physical property of bitumen-bearing samples before and after dissolution were made to quantitatively evaluate the influence of bitumen on the reservoir physcial properties. In addition, the NMR logging parameters of bitumen-bearing samples before and after dissolution of bitumen-bearing samples were compared and analyzed to quantify the correlation between bitumen content and NMR. The results showed that the porosity of the reservoir increased by 4.54% and the permeability increased by 15.17 mD after dissolution, and the pore size changed from a distribution mainly < 0.02 μm before dissolution to a distribution mainly between 2 μm and 20 μm after dissolution. The NMR T
2
relaxation times of bitumen and bound water are mainly in the range of 10 us to 6000 us, which supports the establishment of an identification model of bitumen by NMR logging. As the NMR porosity is considerably higher than that of gas measuring, an NMR-density porosity interpretation model of bitumen is established.
BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE—Acute interventions of stroke are often challenged by a narrow treatment window. In this study, we explore treatments in the postacute phase of stroke with wider windows of ...opportunity. We investigated the effects of stromal cell–derived factor (SDF-1α) in neurovascular recovery during the postacute phase and downstream signaling pathways, underlying SDF-1α–mediated neurovascular recovery.
METHODS—Adult male Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) mice underwent middle cerebral artery occlusion. One week after middle cerebral artery occlusion, the animals received stereotactic injection of adenoassociated virus (AAV) carrying SDF-1α gene as treatment or AAV-green fluorescent protein as control and were monitored for 5 weeks. Neurobehavioral outcomes were evaluated, and brain atrophy was measured. Neurogenesis and angiogenesis were examined. The proliferation and migration of neural progenitor cells were evaluated. Downstream pathways of SDF-1α were investigated. Inflammatory response was monitored.
RESULTS—Neurobehavioral outcomes were improved, and brain atrophy was greatly reduced for ≤5 weeks in AAV-SDF-1α groups when compared with the control. SDF-1 receptor CXCR4 was upregulated and colocalized with neural and endothelial progenitor cells. The number of nestin and doublecortin/bromodeoxyuridine cells in the subventricular zone, doublecortin and neuron/bromodeoxyuridine cells in the perifocal region, and cluster of differentiation (CD)31 and bromodeoxyuridine/CD31 microvessels are also significantly increased in AAV-SDF-1α groups. Administration of CXCR4 antagonist AMD3100 eliminated the beneficial effects of SDF-1α. SDF-1α/CXCR4 interaction activated AKT, extracellular signal-regulated kinases (ERK), and P38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling pathways but not the c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK) pathway.
CONCLUSIONS—SDF-1α promoted neurogenesis and angiogenesis during the postacute phase of ischemia without eliciting an inflammatory response. AAV-SDF-1α expression represents a promising avenue for ischemic stroke therapy with a wider treatment window.
A magnetic nano-solid acid catalyst Fe3O4-PDA-SO3H was synthetized through an efficient method, as an eco-friendly and more efficient catalyst. The obtained catalyst has uniform core-shell structure, ...appropriate particle size, and high acid density. Fe3O4-PDA-SO3H was applied to catalyze the esterification of levulinic acid (LA) with alcohols of different chain length to produce the levulinate esters. The catalytic effect was optimized from the aspects of catalyst dosage, reaction temperature, and acid-alcohol molar ratio. Furthermore, the response surface optimization method was used to obtain the optimal conditions. Verified under these conditions, the experimental results showed that the conversion rate of LA can reach 95.87%, which was much higher than common cationic exchange resin Amberlyst 36 and Amberlyst 46. Furthermore, the recovery and reuse of the Fe3O4-PDA-SO3H was demonstrated six times without obvious loss in the activity.
The mechanisms that underlie various inflammation paradoxes, metabolically healthy obesity, and increased inflammations after inflammatory cytokine blockades and deficiencies remain poorly ...determined. We performed an extensive -omics database mining, determined the expressions of 1367 innate immune regulators in 18 microarrays after deficiencies of 15 proinflammatory cytokines/regulators and eight microarray datasets of patients receiving Mab therapies, and made a set of significant findings: 1) proinflammatory cytokines/regulators suppress the expressions of innate immune regulators; 2) upregulations of innate immune regulators in the deficiencies of IFNγ/IFNγR1, IL-17A, STAT3 and miR155 are more than that after deficiencies of TNFα, IL-1β, IL-6, IL-18, STAT1, NF-kB, and miR221; 3) IFNγ, IFNγR and IL-17RA inhibit 10, 59 and 39 proinflammatory cytokine/regulator pathways, respectively; in contrast, TNFα, IL-6 and IL-18 each inhibits only four to five pathways; 4) The IFNγ-promoted and -suppressed innate immune regulators have four shared pathways; the IFNγR1-promoted and -suppressed innate immune regulators have 11 shared pathways; and the miR155-promoted and -suppressed innate immune regulators have 13 shared pathways, suggesting negative-feedback mechanisms in their conserved regulatory pathways for innate immune regulators; 5) Deficiencies of proinflammatory cytokine/regulator-suppressed, promoted programs share signaling pathways and increase the likelihood of developing 11 diseases including cardiovascular disease; 6) There are the shared innate immune regulators and pathways between deficiency of TNFα in mice and anti-TNF therapy in clinical patients; 7) Mechanistically, up-regulated reactive oxygen species regulators such as myeloperoxidase caused by suppression of proinflammatory cytokines/regulators can drive the upregulation of suppressed innate immune regulators. Our findings have provided novel insights on various inflammation paradoxes and proinflammatory cytokines regulation of innate immune regulators; and may re-shape new therapeutic strategies for cardiovascular disease and other inflammatory diseases.
As the process before the transporting of the capsule in a hydraulic capsule pipeline system, the capsule’s threshold of motion process is often tested in the horizontal straight pipe. However, the ...result of the physical test in this work shows that the wheeled capsule more easily start-moves in a horizontal bent pipe. Thus, the numerical simulation and the theory analysis were used to study the wheeled capsule’s threshold of motion process in the bent pipe. The simulation results demonstrate that the velocity magnitude of the water flow was asymmetric between the inner part and the outer part of the section closing on the wheeled capsule. This was unlike the water flow of the section in the straight pipe. From this result, a new mechanical model was proposed that divides the wheeled capsule into two parts. The two parts of the mechanical model correspond to the two parts of the section. Then, the deduction has shown that the bolsters of the inner part of the wheeled capsule in the bent pipe endured lower maximum static friction than those in the straight pipe. The whole wheeled capsule was more unstable in the bent pipe than in the straight pipe because of the additional drag force induced by the centrifugal effect of the bent pipe’s water flow.
Camellia oleifera Abel is rich in oil, which is beneficial to human health. Seasonal drought and uneven canopy microclimate distributions result in low yields and picking efficiencies. To reveal the ...features of fruit development in the canopy and evaluate the impact of pruning on the canopy microclimate and fruit parameters, a field experiment was carried out in Zhuzhou, Hunan. The C. oleifera tree canopy was divided into four positions: inside the upper canopy (UI); inside the lower canopy (LI); outside the upper canopy (UO); and outside the lower canopy (LO). A combination of high-light efficiency tree pruning and mulching with camellia shells and weedproof film (CPM) was tested and compared with mulching (M). Compared with temperature and humidity, canopy light intensity is a key climate factor that affects the development of Camellia oleifera fruits. CPM improved the canopy light distribution and increased the light intensity inside the canopy of C. oleifera. There was no significant difference in the fruit cracking rate among the four canopy positions in the CPM treatment, which indicated that the fruit maturation period tended to be consistent across the canopy positions. Treatment with CPM resulted in 24.14% and 4.11% greater yield and oil content ratios, respectively, than the treatment with M. The fresh weight of the fruits from LO was the lowest, and the fatty acid accumulation was the lowest due to the poor light availability. CMP increased fruit quality, particularly in LI, which was 41.92%, 36.36%, 13.21%, and 12.79% greater in terms of fresh weight, yield, fresh seed rate, and oil content, respectively, than M. Unfortunately, there was no discernible difference in fatty acid components between CPM and M. Our research suggested that pruning combined with the mulching of organic material is an effective way to alleviate seasonal drought and uneven fruit maturation in C. oleifera trees, further increasing yield and fruit quality.
To determine the roles of endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress and trained immunity, we performed transcriptome analyses on the thoracic aorta (TA) and abdominal aorta (AA) from the angiotensin II (Ang ...II)-HFD-ApoE-KO aneurysm model and made significant findings: 1) Ang II bypassed HFD-induced metabolic reprogramming and induced stronger inflammation in AA than in TA; 2) Ang II and HFD upregulated 890 genes in AA versus TA and induced cytokine signaling; 3) Ang II AA and TA upregulated 73 and 68 cytokines, scRNA-Seq identified markers of macrophages and immune cells, cell death regulators, respectively; transdifferentiation markers of neuron, glial, and squamous epithelial cells were upregulated by Ang II-AA and TA; and pyroptosis signaling with IL-1β and caspase-4 were more upregulated in Ang II-AA than in TA; 4) Six upregulated transcriptomes in patients with AAA, Ang II AA, Ang II TA, additional aneurysm models, PPE-AAA and BAPN-Ang II-AAA, were partially overlapped with 10 lists of new ER stress gene sets including 3 interaction protein lists of ER stress regulators ATF6, PERK, and IRE1, HPA ER localization genes, KEGG signal genes, XBP1 transcription targets, ATF4 (PERK) targets, ATF6 targets, thapsigargin ER stress genes, tunicamycin-ER stress genes, respectively; 5) Ang II-AA and TA upregulated ROS regulators, MitoCarta genes, trained immunity genes, and glycolysis genes; and 6) Gene KO transcriptomes indicated that ATF6 and PERK played more significant roles than IRE1 in promoting AAA and trained immunity whereas antioxidant NRF2 inhibited them. Our unprecedented ER-focused transcriptomic analyses have provided novel insights on the roles of ER as an immune organelle in sensing various DAMPs and initiating ER stress that triggers Ang II-accelerated trained immunity and differs susceptibilities of thoracic and abdominal aortas to diseases.
We used functional -omics angles and examined transcriptomic heterogeneity in CD4
Foxp3
regulatory T cells (Treg) from spleen (s-Treg), lymph nodes (LN-Treg), intestine (int-Treg), and visceral ...adipose tissue (VAT-Treg), and made significant findings:
Five new shared Treg genes including NIBAN, TNFRSF1b, DUSP4,VAV2, and KLRG1, and 68 new signatures are identified. Among 27 signaling pathways shared in four tissue Treg, 22 pathways are innate immune pathways (81.5%);
s-Treg, LN-Treg, int-Treg, and VAT-Treg have zero, 49, 45, and 116 upregulated pathways, respectively;
12, 7, and 15 out of 373 CD markers are identified as specific for LN-Treg, int-Treg, and VAT-Treg, respectively, which may initiate innate immune signaling;
7, 49, 44, and 79 increased cytokines out of 1176 cytokines are identified for four Treg, respectively, suggesting that Treg have much more secretory proteins/cytokines than IL-10, TGF-β, and IL-35;
LN-Treg, int-Treg, and VAT-Treg have 13 additional secretory functions more than s-Treg, found by analyzing 1,706 secretomic genes;
2, 20, 25, and 43 increased transcription factors (TFs) out of 1,496 TFs are identified four Treg, respectively;
LN-Treg and int-Treg have increased pyroptosis regulators but VAT-Treg have increased apoptosis regulators;
1, 15, 19, and 31 increased kinases out of 661 kinome are identified for s-Treg, LN-Treg, int-Treg, and VAT-Treg, respectively;
comparing with that of s-Treg, LN-Treg, int-Treg, and VAT-Treg increase activated cluster (clusters 1-3) markers; and decrease resting cluster (clusters 4-6) markers; and
Treg promote tissue repair by sharing secretomes and TFs AHR, ETV5, EGR1, and KLF4 with stem cells, which partially promote upregulation of all the groups of Treg genes. These results suggest that stem cell-shared master genes make tissue Treg as the first T cell type using a Treg niche to maintain their Treg-ness with 80% innate immune pathways, and triple functions of immunosuppression, tissue repair, and homeostasis maintenance. Our results have provided novel insights on the roles of innate immune pathways on Treg heterogeneity and new therapeutic targets for immunosuppression, tissue repair, cardiovascular diseases, chronic kidney disease, autoimmune diseases, transplantation, and cancers.
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