BTEB2-Activated lncRNA TSPEAR-AS2 Drives GC Progression through Suppressing GJA1 Expression and Upregulating CLDN4 Expression.

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are characterized as key layers of the genome in various cancers. TSPEAR-AS2 was highlighted to be a candidate lncRNA potentially involved in gastric cancer (GC) progression. However, the clinical significance and mechanism of TSPEAR-AS2 in GC required clarification.

Famitinib versus placebo in the treatment of refractory metastatic colorectal cancer: a multicenter, randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled, phase II clinical trial.

Background: Metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) patients with progressive disease after all available standard therapies need new medication for further treatment. Famitinib is a small-molecule multikinase inhibitor, with promising anticancer activities. This multicenter, randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled, phase II clinical trial was designed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of famitinib in mCRC.

Atlantoaxial Misalignment Causes High Blood Pressure in Rats: A Novel Hypertension Model.

Atlantoaxial disorders are often correlated with hypertension in practice. In order to study the relationship between atlantoaxial disorder and hypertension, we attempted to construct an animal model. In this work, we presented an animal model where their atlantoaxial joints were misaligned.

[Epidemiological survey of asthma among children aged 0-14 years in 2010 in urban Zhongshan, China].

Objective: To investigate the prevalence, current treatment, and clinical characteristics of asthma, as well as the risk factors for this disease, among children aged 0-14 years in 2010 in urban Zhongshan, China.

Methods: A total of 10 336 children aged 0-14 years were selected from urban Zhongshan by cluster random sampling. The Third National Childhood Asthma Epidemiological Questionnaire 2010 was used to analyze the prevalence, current treatment, and clinical characteristics of childhood asthma, as well as the risk factors for this disease.

Curdione inhibits proliferation of MCF-7 cells by inducing apoptosis.

Background: Curdione, one of the major components of Curcuma zedoaria, has been reported to possess various biological activities. It thus might be a candidate anti-flammatory and cancer chemopreventive agent. However, the precise molecular mechanisms of action of curdione on cancer cells are still unclear.

[Incidence of wheezing and chronic cough in children aged 3-14 years in rural and urban areas of Zhongshan, China: a questionnaire survey].

Objective: To investigate the incidence of wheezing and chronic cough in children aged 3-14 years in different living areas of Zhongshan, China.

Methods: According to the unified program of the 2010 national epidemiological survey of asthmatic children aged 0-14 years, a questionnaire survey of the children aged 3-14 years in rural and urban areas of Zhongshan was conducted.

Results: A total of 15 763 children were included in the survey.

Mesothelin promotes cell proliferation in the remodeling of neonatal rat pancreas.

Aim: To investigate the effect of mesothelin in the remodeling of the endocrine pancreas in neonatal rats.

Methods: Overexpression or downregulation of mesothelin expression in INS-1 cells was carried out to investigate the effect of mesothelin during cell proliferation and cell apoptosis in vitro. Adenovirus-mediated RNA interference was performed to block mesothelin in vivo to directly assess the role of mesothelin in the remodeling of the endocrine pancreas in neonatal rats.

Lnc RNA HOTAIR functions as a competing endogenous RNA to regulate HER2 expression by sponging miR-331-3p in gastric cancer.

Background: Accumulating evidence indicates that the long non-coding RNA HOTAIR plays a critical role in cancer progression and metastasis. However, the overall biological role and clinical significance of HOTAIR in gastric carcinogenesis remains largely unknown.

Methods: HOTAIR expression was measured in 78 paired cancerous and noncancerous tissue samples by real-time PCR.

Downregulation of BRAF activated non-coding RNA is associated with poor prognosis for non-small cell lung cancer and promotes metastasis by affecting epithelial-mesenchymal transition.

Background: Recent evidence indicates that long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) play a critical role in the regulation of cellular processes, such as differentiation, proliferation and metastasis. These lncRNAs are found to be dysregulated in a variety of cancers. BRAF activated non-coding RNA (BANCR) is a 693-bp transcript on chromosome 9 with a potential functional role in melanoma cell migration.

[Effects of electroacupuncture stimulation of "Neiguan" (PC 6) and "Shenmen" (HT7) on contents of 5-hydroxytryptamine in hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus region and serum in hyperlipidemia rats with acute myocardial infarction].

Objective: To observe the effects of electroacupuncture (EA) stimulation of "Neiguan"(PC 6) and "Shenmen" (HT 7) on 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) levels in the paraventricular nucleus (PVN) region of hypothalamus and serum in hyperlipidemia rats with acute myocardial infarction (AMI).

Methods: A total of 80 SD rats with hyperlipidemia were used in the present study. Among them, 20 rats were randomly selected to be the sham-operation group, and the rest 60 cases were used to make the AMI model by occlusion of the anterior descending branch of the left coronary artery.

Gambogenic acid induction of apoptosis in a breast cancer cell line.

Background: Gambogenic acid is a major active compound of gamboge which exudes from the Garcinia hanburyi tree. Gambogenic acid anti-cancer activity in vitro has been reported in several studies, including an A549 nude mouse model. However, the mechanisms of action remain unclear.

[Effects of electroacupuncture on the expression of oxidized low-density lipoprotein and its receptors in rats with coronary atherosclerotic heart disease].

Objective: To explore action mechanism of electroacupuncture for coronary atherosclerotic heart disease (CHD) in order to provide experimental support for clinical acupoint selection.

Methods: Among sixty clean-grade healthy male Wistar rats, twenty-four cases were randomly selected as a normal control group and an electroacupuncture (EA) preconditioning group, 12 cases in each one. Then rats in the EA preconditioning group and the rest 36 rats were fed with high fat diet for 12 weeks to duplicate the CHD model.

[Comparative study on effects of electroacupuncture stimulation of Shenmen (HT 7) and Taiyuan (LU 9) on P 300 of event-related potentials and brain electrical activity mapping in healthy young adults].

Objective: To observe the effect difference of electroacupuncture (EA) stimulation of Shenmen (HT 7) and Taiyuan (LU 9) on P 300 of event-related potentials (ERPs) in volunteer subjects, so as to explore functional specificity of acupoints in processing cerebral information.

Methods: Sixty healthy volunteer college students were randomly and equally divided into Shenmen (HT 7) group and Taiyuan (LU 9) group (30 persons/group). EA (2 Hz, 1 mA) was applied to bilateral Shenmen (HT 7) and Taiyuan (LU 9) for 15 min.

[Effects of electroacupuncture intervention on blood lipid levels and expression of CD 40 L and MMP-9 in the coronary artery tissue in coronary heart disease rats].

Objective: To observe the effect of electroacupuncture (EA) of "Neiguan" (PC 6) and "Xinshu" (BL 15) on levels of serum total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), high density lipoprotein (HDL) and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) and expression of T cell CD 40 L and matrix metalloproteinases-9 (MMP-9) in the coronary artery in coronary heart disease (CHD) rats, so as to reveal its mechanism underlying improvement of coronary atherosclerotic heart disease.

Methods: A total of 60 Wistar rats were randomly divided into normal control, model, EA-pretreatment, routine EA and medication groups (n = 12). Coronary atherosclerotic heart disease model was established by feeding the animals with high fat forage for 3 months and intraperitoneal injection of VD3 (2 mL/kg, 60 000 IU/100 g, once daily for 3 days).

Low-loss optical waveguides and Y-branch splitters in lithium niobate fabricated by MeV oxygen ions with low dose.

Single-mode optical waveguides in LiNbO(3) substrate with loss as low as 0.17dB/cm were fabricated by a multi-energy low-dose ion implantation technology and cumulative annealing treatment. A waveguide Y-Branch splitter was demonstrated.

[Progress of researches on involvement of serotonin in the central nervous system in acupuncture analgesia and other effects].

As for an important central regulatory neurotransmitter involving acupuncture effect, serotonin (5-HT) is worthy of being paid with more attention. In the present paper, the authors review development of researches on the involvement of 5-HT and its receptor subunits in pain perception, acupuncture analgesia, and other effects of acupuncture (anti-depression, weight-reduction, etc.).

[Effects of electroacupuncture at PC6 and BL15 on nerve electrical activity in spinal dorsal root and norepinephrine and dopamine contents in paraventricular nucleus of hypothalamus in rats with acute myocardial ischemia].

Objective: To investigate the effects of electroacupuncture (EA) at Neiguan (PC6) and Xinshu (BL15) on the nerve electrical activity in spinal dorsal root and norepinephrine (NE) and dopamine (DA) concentrations in the paraventricular nucleus of the hypothalamus in rats with acute myocardial ischemia (AMI).

Methods: A total of 100 male Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly divided into sham-operation, model, EA at PC6, EA at BL15 and EA at both PC6 and BL15 groups with 20 rats in each group. The nerve electrical activity in spinal dorsal roots was recorded by bipolar electrodes.

MicroRNA-196a promotes non-small cell lung cancer cell proliferation and invasion through targeting HOXA5.

Background: MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are short, non-coding RNAs (~22 nt) that play important roles in the pathogenesis of human diseases by negatively regulating gene expression. Although miR-196a has been implicated in several other cancers, its role in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is unknown. The aim of the present study was to examine the expression pattern of miR-196a in NSCLC and its clinical significance, as well as its biological role in tumor progression.

High-efficiency second-harmonic generation in doubly-resonant χ(²) microring resonators.

By directly simulating Maxwell's equations via the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method, we numerically demonstrate the possibility of achieving high-efficiency second harmonic generation (SHG) in a structure consisting of a microscale doubly-resonant ring resonator side-coupled to two adjacent waveguides. We find that ≳ 94% conversion efficiency can be attained at telecom wavelengths, for incident powers in the milliwatts, and for reasonably large bandwidths (Q ∼ 1000s). We demonstrate that in this high efficiency regime, the system also exhibits limit-cycle or bistable behavior for light incident above a threshold power.

Optical waveguides in TiO₂ formed by He ion implantation.

We report on the formation and the optical properties of the planar and ridge optical waveguides in rutile TiO₂ crystal by He+ ion implantation combined with micro-fabrication technologies. Planar optical waveguides in TiO₂ are fabricated by high-energy (2.8 MeV) He+-ion implantation with a dose of 3 × 10¹⁶ ions/cm² and triple low energies (450, 500, 550) keV He+-ion implantation with all fluences of 2 × 10¹⁶ ions/cm² at room temperature.

[Effects of acupuncture at Shenmen (HT7) or Taiyuan (LU9) on P3a and P3b of event-related potentials in healthy young adults].

Objective: To investigate the effects of manual acupuncture at Shenmen (HT7) or Taiyuan (LU9) on the attention function of the brain, and to lay an experimental foundation for researching brain function and integration mechanisms of the human brain in relation to acupuncture stimulation.

Methods: Ten healthy young college students were selected as experimental subjects. P3a and P3b potentials were induced by novel stimulation and target stimulation with vision and were observed using Neuroscan event-related potentials system at time windows of ms 330-430 or 400-600 ms for observing the change of intensity distribution of P300 after manual acupuncture at HT7 or LU9.

[Effects of acupuncture on expression of norepinephrine transporter mRNA in the cervical sympathetic ganglion and beta1-AR mRNA in the heart in cerebral-cardiac syndrome rats].

Objective: To observe the effect of electroacupuncture (EA) intervention on the expression of norepinephrine transporter (NET) mRNA in the middle cervical-stellate ganglion complex (MC-SGC) and beta1-adrenergic receptor (beta1-AR) mRNA in the left ventricular myocardium in cerebral-cardiac syndrome (CCS) rats, so as to study its underlying mechanism in the prevention and treatment of CCS.

Methods: Eighteen Wistar rats were randomized into sham operation, model and EA groups (n=6). CCS model was duplicated by intravenous injection of 1 microL of saline containing collagenase (1 U/microL) + heparin (7 U/microL) into the caudate nucleus.

[Relatively specific effect of electroacupuncture of different acupoints on hypothalamic monoamine neurotransmitters in myocardial ischemia rats].

Objective: To observe the effect of electroacupuncture (EA) of "Shenmen" (HT 7), "Neiguan" (PC 6), etc. on monoamine neurotransmitter contents of hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus (PVN) region in myocardial ischemia (MI) rats, so as to analyze the substantial basis of efficacy specificity of acupoints in improving MI.

Methods: SD rats were randomized into normal control, model, EA-Shenmen (HT7), EA-Neiguan (PC 6) and EA-Taiyuan (LU 9) groups (n = 10/group).