First-line induction or consolidation chemotherapy combined with concurrent chemoradiotherapy for esophageal squamous cell carcinoma.

Background: The RTOG 85-01 trial established that definitive concurrent chemoradiotherapy (CCRT) is the standard treatment for inoperable, locally advanced esophageal carcinoma, as well as for patients who decline surgery. The present study aims to compare the impact of three treatment modalities, CCRT, induction chemotherapy (ICT) followed by CCRT (ICT + CCRT), and CCRT followed by consolidation chemotherapy (CCT) (CCRT + CCT), on the survival of patients with inoperable esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC).

Methods: This retrospective analysis was conducted with 391 patients with ESCC who underwent radical CCRT with induction or CCT or CCRT only from January 2016 to October 2020 at the Fourth Hospital of Hebei Medical University in Shijiazhuang, Hebei province, China.

Heterogeneous entity representation for medicinal synergy prediction.

Motivation: Forecasting the synergistic effects of drug combinations facilitates drug discovery and development, especially regarding cancer therapeutics. While numerous computational methods have emerged, most of them fall short in fully modeling the relationships among clinical entities including drugs, cell lines, and diseases, which hampers their ability to generalize to drug combinations involving unseen drugs. These relationships are complex and multidimensional, requiring sophisticated modeling to capture nuanced interplay that can significantly influence therapeutic efficacy.

Genomic variation responding to artificial selection on different lines of Pekin duck.

Understanding the genomic variation in Pekin duck under artificial selection is important for improving the utilization of duck genetic resources. Here, the genomic changes in Pekin duck were analyzed by using the genome resequencing data from 96 individual samples, including 2 conservation populations and 4 breeding populations with different breeding backgrounds. The population structure, runs of homozygosity (ROH), effective population number (Ne), and other genetic parameters were analyzed.

Multiplex one-step RT‒qPCR assays for simultaneous detection of AMDV, MEV and CDV.

Background: Aleutian mink disease, mink viral enteritis and canine distemper are known as the three most serious diseases that cause great economic loss in the mink industry. In clinical practice, aleutian mink disease virus (AMDV), mink enteritis virus (MEV) and canine distemper virus (CDV) are common mixed infections, and they have similar clinical clinical signs, such as diarrhoea. Therefore, a rapid and accurate differential diagnosis method for use on mink ranches is essential for the control of these three pathogens.

Intra-arterial tenecteplase after successful endovascular recanalisation in patients with acute posterior circulation arterial occlusion (ATTENTION-IA): multicentre randomised controlled trial.

Objective: To assess whether intra-arterial tenecteplase administered after successful endovascular recanalisation improves outcomes in patients with acute arterial occlusion of the posterior circulation.

Design: Multicentre randomised controlled trial.

Setting: 31 hospitals in China, 24 January 2023 to 24 August 2023.