Publications by authors named "L-J Long"

Objective: To evaluate predictive validity of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics/American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition Indicators to diagnose pediatric malnutrition (AAIMp) and the Screening Tool for Risk on Nutritional Status and Growth (STRONGkids) in regard to pediatric patient outcomes in US hospitals.

Study Design: A prospective cohort study (Clinical Trial Registry: NCT03928548) was completed from August 2019 through January 2023 with 27 pediatric hospitals or units from 18 US states and Washington DC.

Results: Three hundred and forty-five children were enrolled in the cohort (n = 188 in the AAIMp validation subgroup).

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Respiratory health is negatively influenced by the dimensions and constituents of particulate matter (PM). Although mass concentration is widely acknowledged to be key to assessing dust retention by urban trees, the role of plant leaves in filtering PM from the urban atmosphere, particularly regarding the particle dimensions and chemical constituents of retained PM on the leaf, remains elusive. Here we combined single-particle aerosol mass spectrometry and a particle resuspension chamber to investigate how urban tree species capture PM constituents.

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Human health risks from particles with a diameter of less than 2.5 µm (PM) highlight the role of urban trees as bio-filters in air pollution control. However, whether the size and composition of particles captured by various tree species differ or not remain unclear.

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A wide variety of electrophilic derivatives of itaconate, the Kreb's cycle-derived metabolite, are immunomodulatory, yet these derivatives have overlapping and sometimes contradictory activities. Therefore, we generated a genetic system to interrogate the immunomodulatory functions of endogenously produced itaconate in human macrophages. Endogenous itaconate is driven by multiple innate signals restraining inflammatory cytokine production.

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Respiratory viruses are a major trigger of exacerbations in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Airway neutrophilia is a hallmark feature of stable and exacerbated COPD but roles played by neutrophil extracellular traps (NETS) in driving disease pathogenesis are unclear. Here, using human studies of experimentally-induced and naturally-occurring exacerbations we identify that rhinovirus infection induces airway NET formation which is amplified in COPD and correlates with magnitude of inflammation and clinical exacerbation severity.

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Article Synopsis
  • A novel deep learning (DL) system was developed to enhance the interpretation of transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) for assessing the severity of mitral regurgitation (MR) by integrating multiple video assessments.
  • The system was tested with a large dataset (over 61,000 TTEs) and showed high accuracy in classifying MR severity, achieving exact accuracy rates of 82% for internal and 79% for external test sets.
  • Most misclassifications occurred between none/trace and mild MR categories, and the use of multiple TTE views improved classification accuracy.
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Purpose: To evaluate whether the modified suture-button Latarjet procedure with coracoacromial ligament (CAL) and pectoralis minor (PM) preservation could achieve excellent outcomes at the 2-year follow-up.

Methods: During January 2019 to January 2021, the data of patients who underwent modified suture-button Latarjet with CAL and PM preservation in our department were collected. The glenoid bone loss of these patients was greater than 20% or greater than 10% with high demands for exercise.

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Expansions of glutamine-coding CAG trinucleotide repeats cause a number of neurodegenerative diseases, including Huntington's disease and several of spinocerebellar ataxias. In general, age-at-onset of the polyglutamine diseases is inversely correlated with the size of the respective inherited expanded CAG repeat. Expanded CAG repeats are also somatically unstable in certain tissues, and age-at-onset of Huntington's disease corrected for individual CAG repeat length (i.

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Background: Reducing cardiovascular disease burden among women remains challenging. Epidemiologic studies have indicated that polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), the most common endocrine disease in women of reproductive age, is associated with an increased prevalence and extent of coronary artery disease. However, the mechanism through which PCOS affects cardiac health in women remains unclear.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates the cellular structure of the human cortex to define different cortical areas using single-cell transcriptomics.
  • Researchers performed RNA-sequencing across eight cortical areas and found consistent cellular makeup, but notable variations in the proportion of excitatory neuron subclasses, indicating differences in connectivity.
  • Findings include unique features in the primary visual cortex, such as changes in the ratio of excitatory to inhibitory neurons and an expansion of excitatory neurons in layer 4, suggesting a need for refined understanding of human cortical organization.
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The cognitive abilities of humans are distinctive among primates, but their molecular and cellular substrates are poorly understood. We used comparative single-nucleus transcriptomics to analyze samples of the middle temporal gyrus (MTG) from adult humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, rhesus macaques, and common marmosets to understand human-specific features of the neocortex. Human, chimpanzee, and gorilla MTG showed highly similar cell-type composition and laminar organization as well as a large shift in proportions of deep-layer intratelencephalic-projecting neurons compared with macaque and marmoset MTG.

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Article Synopsis
  • - The transition to a new energy mix is increasing the demand for precise emissions reporting in the petroleum supply chain due to environmental regulations and the complexities of crude oil trading.
  • - Current assessments of carbon footprints lack detail and do not provide adequate traceability from oil wells to refineries, resulting in significant variability in carbon intensities.
  • - By using advanced data and algorithms, the study reveals a wide range of carbon emission intensities in crude trade pathways, highlighting that prioritizing low-carbon sources could save 1.5-6.1 Gigatons of CO-equivalent emissions by 2050 under climate-friendly scenarios.
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Here, we have developed an automated image processing algorithm for segmenting lungs and individual lung tumors in micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) scans of mouse models of non-small cell lung cancer and lung fibrosis. Over 3000 scans acquired across multiple studies were used to train/validate a 3D U-net lung segmentation model and a Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier to segment individual lung tumors. The U-net lung segmentation algorithm can be used to estimate changes in soft tissue volume within lungs (primarily tumors and blood vessels), whereas the trained SVM is able to discriminate between tumors and blood vessels and identify individual tumors.

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(1) Damage to the endothelial glycocalyx (eGC), a protective layer lining the endothelial luminal surface, is associated with chronic kidney disease (CKD), which leads to a worsening of cardiovascular outcomes in these patients. Currently, there are no targeted therapeutic approaches. Whether the dietary supplement Endocalyx (ECX) protects against endothelial damage caused by uremic toxins is unknown.

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Huntington's disease is caused by an expanded CAG tract in HTT. The length of the CAG tract accounts for over half the variance in age at onset of disease, and is influenced by other genetic factors, mostly implicating the DNA maintenance machinery. We examined a single nucleotide variant, rs79727797, on chromosome 5 in the TCERG1 gene, previously reported to be associated with Huntington's disease and a quasi-tandem repeat (QTR) hexamer in exon 4 of TCERG1 with a central pure repeat.

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The age at onset of motor symptoms in Huntington's disease (HD) is driven by HTT CAG repeat length but modified by other genes. In this study, we used exome sequencing of 683 patients with HD with extremes of onset or phenotype relative to CAG length to identify rare variants associated with clinical effect. We discovered damaging coding variants in candidate modifier genes identified in previous genome-wide association studies associated with altered HD onset or severity.

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Genome-wide association studies (GWASs) of Huntington disease (HD) have identified six DNA maintenance gene loci (among others) as modifiers and implicated a two step-mechanism of pathogenesis: somatic instability of the causative HTT CAG repeat with subsequent triggering of neuronal damage. The largest studies have been limited to HD individuals with a rater-estimated age at motor onset. To capitalize on the wealth of phenotypic data in several large HD natural history studies, we have performed algorithmic prediction by using common motor and cognitive measures to predict age at other disease landmarks as additional phenotypes for GWASs.

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Targeting interactions between α4β7 integrin and endothelial adhesion molecule MAdCAM-1 to inhibit lymphocyte migration to the gastrointestinal tract is an effective therapy in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Following lymphocyte entry into the mucosa, a subset of these cells expresses αEβ7 integrin, which is expressed on proinflammatory lymphocytes, to increase cell retention. The factors governing lymphocyte migration into the intestinal mucosa and αE integrin expression in healthy subjects and IBD patients remain incompletely understood.

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Article Synopsis
  • - Researchers found that even though SARS-CoV-2 (the virus causing COVID-19) engages with immune cells, these cells typically don’t have the primary receptor (ACE2) for the virus.
  • - They identified several other receptors on myeloid cells, like DC-SIGN and L-SIGN, that interact with parts of the virus's spike protein and trigger strong inflammatory responses, which are linked to more severe COVID-19 cases.
  • - The study also led to the development of a new nanobody that can block both the virus’s infection through ACE2 and the harmful inflammatory responses caused by myeloid cell receptors, highlighting potential new treatment strategies for COVID-19.
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Introduction: In patients with metastatic melanoma, progression of a single tumour lesion (solitary progression) after response to immune checkpoint inhibition (ICI) is increasingly treated with local therapy. We evaluated the role of local therapy for solitary progression in melanoma.

Patients And Methods: Patients with metastatic melanoma treated with ICI between 2010 and 2019 with solitary progression as first progressive event were included from 17 centres in 9 countries.

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Introduction: Little reliable evidence has been reported regarding usefulness of liver stiffness measurement (LSM) for monitoring the hepatic fibrosis changes during treatment. We aimed to assess the association between changes in LSM and histological outcomes in patients with chronic hepatitis B.

Methods: In this prospective multicenter study, 727 treatment-naive patients receiving entecavir-based therapy, who underwent paired biopsies at treatment baseline and week 72, were analyzed.

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Historically, Huntington's disease (HD; OMIM #143100) has played an important role in the enormous advances in human genetics seen over the past four decades. This familial neurodegenerative disorder involves variable onset followed by consistent worsening of characteristic abnormal movements along with cognitive decline and psychiatric disturbances. HD was the first autosomal disease for which the genetic defect was assigned to a position on the human chromosomes using only genetic linkage analysis with common DNA polymorphisms.

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Mitochondrial metabolism plays an essential role in various biological processes of cancer cells. Herein, we established an experimental procedure for the metabolic assessment of mitochondria in cancer cells. We examined procedures for mitochondrial isolation coupled with various mitochondrial extraction buffers in three major cancer cell lines (PANC1, A549, and MDA-MB-231) and identified a potentially optimal and generalized approach.

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Rationale: The efficient resolution of tissue hemorrhage is an important homeostatic function. In human macrophages in vitro, heme activates an AMPK (AMP-activated protein kinase)/ATF1 (activating transcription factor-1) pathway that directs Mhem macrophages through coregulation of HO-1 (heme oxygenase-1; ) and lipid homeostasis genes.

Objective: We asked whether this pathway had an in vivo role in mice.

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