A simple two‐step spray method is used to prepare superhydrophobic and bacteriostatic surfaces, involving dual‐coating with polydimethylsiloxane‐normal‐fluorine (PDMS‐NF) or branched‐fluorine ...(PDMS‐BF) in combination with fluorinated silica nanoparticles (FSiO2‐NPs) using a spray technique. This approach has the potential to create surfaces with both water‐repellent and antimicrobial properties, which could be useful in a variety of applications. It is noteworthy that the dual‐coating on cotton fabric exhibited an impressive dual‐scale roughness and achieved superhydrophobicity with a water contact angle of 158° and a hysteresis of less than 3°. Additionally, the coating was subjected to an ultra‐high concentration of bacteria (109 CFU/mL) and was still able to inhibit more than 80 % of attachment, demonstrating its effectiveness as a bacteriostatic surface.
A two‐step spray method creates superhydrophobic, bacteriostatic surfaces by dual‐coating with polydimethylsiloxane‐fluorine and fluorinated silica nanoparticles. Notably, dual‐coating on cotton fabric achieves superhydrophobicity with a water contact angle of 158°. Tested against an ultra‐high bacterial concentration (109 CFU/mL), the coating inhibits over 80 % of attachment, highlighting its efficacy as a bacteriostatic surface.
Chemotherapy is typically used to treat malignant brain tumors, especially for the tumors in surgically inaccessible areas. However, owing to the existence of blood-brain barrier (BBB), the tumor ...accumulation and therapeutic efficacy of clinical therapeutics is still of great concerns. To this end, we present herein a prominent therapeutic strategy adopting adipose-derived stem cells (ADSCs) capable of carrying nanotherapeutic payloads selectively toward brain tumors for thermo/chemotherapy. The nanoparticle (NP) payload was obtained from co-assembly of poly(γ-glutamic acid-co-distearyl γ-glutamate) with poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid), paclitaxel (PTX), and oleic acid-coated superparamagnetic iron oxide NPs in aqueous solution. The particle size and drug loading content were ca 110nm and 8.4wt%, respectively. After being engulfed by ADSCs, the nanotherapeutics was found rather harmless to cellular hosts at a PTX concentration of 30μM over 48h in the absence of pertinent stimulus. Nevertheless, the ADSC-based approach combined with high frequency magnetic field exhibits a sound therapeutic performance with a 4-fold increase in therapeutic index on brain astrocytoma (ALTS1C1)-bearing mice (C57BL/6J) as compared to the typical chemotherapy using a current first-line chemodrug, temozolomide. Immunohistochemical examination of brain tumor sections confirms the successful cellular transport and pronounced cytotoxic action of therapeutics against tumor cells in vivo. This work demonstrates the promise of ADSC-mediated chemo/thermal therapy against brain tumors.
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Independent studies by numerous investigators have shown that it is possible to harvest multipotent progenitor cells from diverse dissociated and cultured fetal, perinatal, and principally adult ...developed tissues. Despite the increasingly recognized medical value of these progenitor cells, the archetype of which remains the mesenchymal stem cell, this indirect extraction method has precluded the understanding of their native identity, tissue distribution, and frequency. Consistent with other researchers, we have hypothesized that blood vessels in virtually all organs harbor ubiquitous stem cells. We have identified, marked, and sorted to homogeneity by flow cytometry endothelial and perivascular cells in a large selection of human fetal, perinatal, and adult organs. Perivascular cells, including pericytes in the smallest blood vessels and adventitial cells around larger ones, natively express mesenchymal stem cell markers and produce in culture a long-lasting progeny of multilineage mesodermal progenitor cells. Herein, we review results from our and other laboratories that suggest a perivascular origin for mesenchymal stem cells and other adult progenitor cells. Recent experiments illustrate the therapeutic potential of human pericytes to regenerate skeletal muscle and promote functional recovery in the diseased heart and kidney.
The patient population with stage III non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is heterogeneous, with varying staging characteristics and diverse treatment options. Despite the potential practice-changing ...implications of randomized controlled trials evaluating the efficacy of perioperative epidermal growth factor receptor-tyrosine kinase inhibitors (EGFR-TKIs), concerns have been raised due to conflicting overall survival (OS) results. Few real-world studies have examined the survival outcomes of patients with resected EGFR-mutant stage III adenocarcinoma receiving perioperative chemotherapy and EGFR-TKIs.
In this retrospective observational study, we enrolled patients with resected stage III adenocarcinoma with EGFR mutations between January 2011 and December 2021. Patients were classified into two groups: perioperative chemotherapy and perioperative EGFR-TKIs. Outcomes and prognostic factors were analyzed using Cox proportional hazards regression analysis.
Eighty-four patients were enrolled in the analysis. Perioperative EGFR-TKIs led to longer progression-free survival (PFS) than chemotherapy (38.6 versus 14.2 months; p = 0.019). However, only pathological risk factors predicted poor PFS in multivariate analysis. Patients receiving perioperative chemotherapy had longer OS than those receiving EGFR-TKIs (111.3 versus 50.2 months; p = 0.052). Multivariate analysis identified perioperative treatment with EGFR-TKIs as an independent predictor of poor OS (HR: 3.76; 95% CI: 1.22-11.54).
Our study demonstrates that chemotherapy should be considered in the perioperative setting for high-risk patients, when taking pathological risk factors into consideration, and that optimized sequencing of EGFR-TKIs might be the most critical determinant of OS.
Oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is an aggressive malignancy and the major histological subtype of oesophageal cancer. Although recent large-scale genomic analysis has improved the ...description of the genetic abnormalities of OSCC, few targetable genomic lesions have been identified, and no molecular therapy is available. This study aims to identify druggable candidates in this tumour.
High-throughput small-molecule inhibitor screening was performed to identify potent anti-OSCC compounds. Whole-transcriptome sequencing (RNA-Seq) and chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing (ChIP-Seq) were conducted to decipher the mechanisms of action of CDK7 inhibition in OSCC. A variety of in vitro and in vivo cellular assays were performed to determine the effects of candidate genes on OSCC malignant phenotypes.
The unbiased high-throughput small-molecule inhibitor screening led us to discover a highly potent anti-OSCC compound, THZ1, a specific CDK7 inhibitor. RNA-Seq revealed that low-dose THZ1 treatment caused selective inhibition of a number of oncogenic transcripts. Notably, further characterisation of the genomic features of these THZ1-sensitive transcripts demonstrated that they were frequently associated with super-enhancer (SE). Moreover, SE analysis alone uncovered many OSCC lineage-specific master regulators. Finally, integrative analysis of both THZ1-sensitive and SE-associated transcripts identified a number of novel OSCC oncogenes, including PAK4, RUNX1, DNAJB1, SREBF2 and YAP1, with PAK4 being a potential druggable kinase.
Our integrative approaches led to a catalogue of SE-associated master regulators and oncogenic transcripts, which may significantly promote both the understanding of OSCC biology and the development of more innovative therapies.
The present study investigated the in vivo bone-forming efficacy of an innovative titanium (Ti) dental implant combined with a collagen sponge containing recombinant human bone morphogenetic ...protein-2 (BMP-2) in a pig model. Two different concentrations of BMP-2 (20 and 40 µg/mL) were incorporated into collagen sponges and placed at the bottom of Ti dental implants. The investigated implants were inserted into the edentulous ridge at the canine-premolar regions of Lanyu small-ear pigs, which were then euthanized at weeks 1, 2, 4, 8, and 12 post-implantation. Specimens containing the implants and surrounding bone tissue were collected for histological evaluation of their bone-to-implant contact (BIC) ratios and calculation of maximum torques using removal torque measurement. Analytical results showed that the control and BMP-2-loaded implants presented good implant stability and bone healing for all testing durations. After 1 week of healing, the BMP-2-loaded implants with a concentration of 20 µg/mL exhibited the highest BIC ratios, ranging from 58% to 76%, among all groups (
= 0.034). Additionally, they also possessed the highest removal torque values (50.1 ± 1.3 N-cm) throughout the 8-week healing period. The BMP-2-loaded implants not only displayed excellent in vivo biocompatibility but also presented superior osteoinductive performance. Therefore, these findings demonstrate that BMP-2 delivered through a collagen sponge can potentially enhance the early-stage osseointegration of Ti dental implants.
In the ribosome complex, tRNA is a critical element of mRNA translation. A rich repertoire of cell regulation is hypothesized to occur during the recruitment of specific tRNAs in polypeptide ...formation. However, this basic question in nascent chain biology remains unaddressed due to the lack of technologies to report the complete tRNA complement inside ribosomes during active translation. Here, we characterize a technique for profiling ribosome-embedded tRNA and their modifications. With this method, we generated a comprehensive survey of the quantity and quality of intra-ribosomal tRNAs. In cells under environmental stress, we show that methionine tRNA inside ribosomes is a robust biomarker for the impairment of translation initiation or elongation steps. Concurrent tRNA/mRNA ribosome profiling revealed a stress-dependent incorporation of damaged and uncharged tRNAs into ribosomes causing translation arrest. Thus, tRNA ribosome profiling can provide insights on translation control mechanisms in diverse biological contexts.
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•Ribo-tRNA-seq quantifies ribosome-bound tRNAs with modifications•Simultaneous Ribo-mRNA/tRNA-seq reveals the correlation between codons and anti-codons•Ribo-tRNA-seq can serve as a sensor for environmental-stress-induced translation changes•CCA-tail-degraded tRNAs are incorporated into ribosomes and inhibit translation
Intra-ribosomal tRNAs impact mRNA translation in cells under normal and disease conditions, but their details remain unclear. Chen and Tanaka developed a technology to decipher the quantity and quality of intra-ribosomal tRNAs with their modifications. This technique unlocks applications requiring a comprehensive mapping of the ribosome-bound tRNA repertoire in translation.
Background
This study aimed to examine the clinical characteristics of bone metastasis (BoM) in patients with non‐small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who have an epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) ...mutation and to identify the most effective treatment strategy using EGFR–tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs).
Methods
The study included patients with stage IV EGFR‐mutated NSCLC who were receiving first‐line treatment with EGFR–TKIs between January 2014 and December 2020. These patients were divided into two groups based on the presence or absence of BoM at the time of initial diagnosis. The BoM group was further subdivided based on whether they received denosumab or not.
Results
The final analysis included 247 patients. Those with BoM at initial diagnosis had shorter progression‐free survival (12.6 vs. 10.5 months, p = 0.002) and overall survival (OS) (49.7 vs. 30.9 months, p = 0.002) compared to those without BoM. There was a difference in the location of metastatic sites between the two groups, with a higher incidence of extrathoracic metastasis in the BoM group (p < 0.001). The incidence of T790M was higher in patients with BoM than in those without (47.4% vs. 33.9%, p = 0.042). Multivariate Cox regression analysis revealed that sequential osimertinib treatment and the addition of antiangiogenic therapy (AAT) and denosumab therapy improved OS in patients with BoM.
Conclusions
The presence of BoM is a negative prognostic factor for NSCLC patients with an EGFR mutation, possibly due to the presence of extrathoracic metastases. However, adding AAT and denosumab, along with sequential osimertinib, to the treatment regimen for patients with BoM can improve survival outcomes.
DNMT3A mutations are associated with poor prognosis in acute myeloid leukemia (AML), but the stability of this mutation during the clinical course remains unclear. In the present study of 500 ...patients with de novo AML, DNMT3A mutations were identified in 14% of total patients and in 22.9% of AML patients with normal karyotype. DNMT3A mutations were positively associated with older age, higher WBC and platelet counts, intermediate-risk and normal cytogenetics, FLT3 internal tandem duplication, and NPM1, PTPN11, and IDH2 mutations, but were negatively associated with CEBPA mutations. Multivariate analysis demonstrated that the DNMT3A mutation was an independent poor prognostic factor for overall survival and relapse-free survival in total patients and also in normokaryotype group. A scoring system incorporating the DNMT3A mutation and 8 other prognostic factors, including age, WBC count, cytogenetics, and gene mutations, into survival analysis was very useful in stratifying AML patients into different prognostic groups (P < .001). Sequential study of 138 patients during the clinical course showed that DNMT3A mutations were stable during AML evolution. In conclusion, DNMT3A mutations are associated with distinct clinical and biologic features and poor prognosis in de novo AML patients. Furthermore, the DNMT3A mutation may be a potential biomarker for monitoring of minimal residual disease.
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