Who can benefit more from its twelve-week treatment: A prospective cohort study of blonanserin for patients with schizophrenia.

Background: Blonanserin (BNS) is a well-tolerated and effective drug for treating schizophrenia.

Aim: To investigate which types of patients would obtain the most benefit from BNS treatment.

Methods: A total of 3306 participants were evaluated in a 12-week, prospective, multicenter, open-label post-marketing surveillance study of BNS.

The catalytic triad of rice NARROW LEAF1 involves H234.

NARROW LEAF1 (NAL1) exerts a multifaceted influence on leaf morphology and crop yield. Recent crystal study proposed that histidine 233 (H233) is part of the catalytic triad. Here we report that unlike suggested previously, H234 instead of H233 is a component of the catalytic triad alongside residues D291 and S385 in NAL1.

Structural insights into the N-terminal APHB domain of HrpA: mediating canonical and i-motif recognition.

RNA helicases function as versatile enzymes primarily responsible for remodeling RNA secondary structures and organizing ribonucleoprotein complexes. In our study, we conducted a systematic analysis of the helicase-related activities of Escherichia coli HrpA and presented the structures of both its apo form and its complex bound with both conventional and non-canonical DNAs. Our findings reveal that HrpA exhibits NTP hydrolysis activity and binds to ssDNA and ssRNA in distinct sequence-dependent manners.

Anemia in inflammatory bowel disease course is associated with patients' worse outcome.

Background: Purpose: Anemia affects the life quality of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients, but no report from Asian about anemia screening and its impact previously. We aimed to explore the prevalence and impact of anemia among the IBD patients in Taiwan.

Methods: A retrospective study was conducted from January 2006 to February 2018 at National Taiwan University Hospital.

Clinical Outcomes of Metastatic Breast Cancer in Patients Having Imaging Liver Pseudocirrhosis with or without Evident Varices.

Background: Pseudocirrhosis is an imaging finding of malignancies with liver metastasis with or without clinical liver cirrhosis-related portal hypertension (pHTN). This study defined evident pHTN by the presence of esophageal or gastric varices and compared patients' outcomes of metastatic breast cancer with imaging-diagnosed pseudocirrhosis with or without varices.

Methods: The medical records from patients with metastatic breast cancer and pseudocirrhosis between 2005 and 2017 were retrospectively analyzed.

Characteristics and Resource Utilization Associated with Frequent Users of Emergency Departments.

Background: Frequent emergency department (ED) users place a huge influence and burden on healthcare systems and medical costs. In Taiwan, citizens have very easy access to medical services and the national health insurance (NHI) puts very few restrictions on the frequency and facilities which the patients go to. However, there is still a certain percentage of frequent ED users in Taiwan, and yet, there are few research studies investigating the features of such users and their impact on the healthcare system.

A Case Report of MODY Combined with Intestinal Neuroendocrine Tumor.

Maturity-onset diabetes of the young 3 (MODY) is an autosomal dominant monogenic diabetes mellitus characterized by defective β-cell function and non-insulin-dependent early-onset diabetes mellitus. The facts that patients with MODY are often misdiagnosed as type 1 and type 2 diabetes mellitus and genetic diagnosis is expensive, make its diagnosis very challenging. In this study, we reported a case of MODY, which was verified to be caused by a mutation in hepatocyte nuclear factor 1α gene (c.

Effect of smoking on the development and outcomes of inflammatory bowel disease in Taiwan: a hospital-based cohort study.

Smoking influences the risks of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). A hospital-based cohort was conducted to evaluate the effect of smoking on the development and outcomes of IBD, with age, sex and comorbidities matched non-IBD controls from the National Health Interview Survey database of Taiwan. 700 IBD patients (360 ulcerative colitis (UC), 340 Crohn's disease (CD)) were analyzed for outcomes; and 575 patients (297 UC, 278 CD) were analyzed for prevalence.

A Toolbox for Site-Specific Labeling of RecQ Helicase With a Single Fluorophore Used in the Single-Molecule Assay.

Fluorescently labeled proteins can improve the detection sensitivity and have been widely used in a variety of biological measurements. In single-molecule assays, site-specific labeling of proteins enables the visualization of molecular interactions, conformational changes in proteins, and enzymatic activity. In this study, based on a flexible linker in the RecQ helicase, we established a scheme involving a combination of fluorophore labeling and sortase A ligation to allow site-specific labeling of the HRDC domain of RecQ with a single Cy5 fluorophore, without inletting extra fluorescent domain or peptide fragment.

miR-503/Apelin-12 mediates high glucose-induced microvascular endothelial cells injury via JNK and p38MAPK signaling pathway.

Introduction: Diabetic patients are often accompanied by complications of diabetic vascular disease, which could lead to heart failure or stroke. In this work, we explored the role of miR-503/Apelin-12 in diabetic angiopathy (DA) .

Methods: ELISA and qPCR were applied to assess the expression of miR-503 and Apelin-12 in high glucose (HG)-treated microvascular endothelial cells (HMEC-1).

Structural analysis reveals a "molecular calipers" mechanism for a LATERAL ORGAN BOUNDARIES DOMAIN transcription factor protein from wheat.

LATERAL ORGAN BOUNDARIES DOMAIN (LBD) proteins, a family of plant-specific transcription factors harboring a conserved Lateral Organ Boundaries (LOB) domain, are regulators of plant organ development. Recent studies have unraveled additional pivotal roles of the LBD protein family beyond defining lateral organ boundaries, such as pollen development and nitrogen metabolism. The structural basis for the molecular network of LBD-dependent processes remains to be deciphered.

[Identification and clinical evaluation of lung cancer serum biomarker L-lactate dehydrogenase B].

Objective: To identify potential biomarkers related with lung cancer metastasis.

Methods: Conditional media proteins collected from a primary non-small cell lung cancer cell line (NSCLC) NCI-H226 and its brain metastatic subline H226Br were analyzed by SDS-PAGE and MALDI-TOF-MS. Twelve biomarkers were identified, of which LDHB was significantly up-regulated in H226Br cell and was further validated using ELISA in sera including 105 lung cancer samples, 41 pneumonia and pulmonary tuberculosis samples and 65 healthy samples.

Discovery and identification of Serum Amyloid A protein elevated in lung cancer serum.

Two hundred and eighteen serum samples from 175 lung cancer patients and 43 healthy individuals were analyzed by using Surface Enhaced Laser Desorption/Ionization Time of Flight Mass Spectrome-try (SELDI-TOF-MS). The data analyzed by both Biomarker Wizardtrade mark and Biomarker Patternstrade mark software showed that a protein peak with the molecular weight of 11.6 kDa significantly increased in lung cancer.

Protein profile of human lung squamous carcinoma cell line NCI-H226.

Objective: To construct a database of human lung squamous carcinoma cell line NCI-H226 and to facilitate discovery of novel subtypes markers of lung cancer.

Method: Proteomic technique was used to analyze human lung squamous carcinoma cell line NCI-H226. The proteins of the NCI-H226 cells were separated by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and identified by mass spectrometry.

[A new automatic quasars recognition technique based on PCA and Hough transform].

The main purpose of quasar recognition is to determine the observed quasar spectrum's redshift value. Previously the template of quasar rest frame in the literature was basically constructed based on astronomers' hypotheses. Due to the inaccuracy of such a template, it is hard to determine the redshift value by matching the observed quasar spectrum with the template directly.