An improved multi-scale feature extraction network for medical image segmentation.

Background: The use of U-Net and its variations has led to significant advancements in medical image segmentation. However, the encoder-decoder structures of these models often lose spatial information during downsampling. Skip connections can help address this issue; however, they may also introduce excessive irrelevant background information.

Gut Microbiota and Tryptophan Metabolism in Pathogenesis of Ischemic Stroke: A Potential Role for Food Homologous Plants.

Scope: The intestinal flora is involved in the maintenance of human health and the development of diseases, and is closely related to the brain. As an essential amino acid, tryptophan (TRP) participates in a variety of physiological functions in the body and affects the growth and health of the human body. TRP catabolites produced by the gut microbiota are important signaling molecules for microbial communities and host-microbe interactions, and play an important role in maintaining health and disease pathogenesis.

Ultrasound image denoising autoencoder model based on lightweight attention mechanism.

Background: The presence of noise in medical ultrasound images significantly degrades image quality and affects the accuracy of disease diagnosis. The convolutional neural network-denoising autoencoder (CNN-DAE) model extracts feature information by stacking regularly sized kernels. This results in the loss of texture detail, the over-smoothing of the image, and a lack of generalizability for speckle noise.

Boosting Electrocatalytic N Reduction to NH by Enhancing N Activation via Interaction between Au Nanoparticles and MIL-101(Fe) in Neutral Electrolytes.

Electrocatalytic nitrogen reduction reaction (NRR) has attracted much attention as a sustainable ammonia production technology, but it needs further exploration due to its slow kinetics and the existence of competitive side reactions. In this research, xAu/MIL-101(Fe) catalysts were obtained by loading gold nanoparticles (Au NPs) onto MIL-101(Fe) using a one-step reduction strategy. Herein, MIL-101(Fe), with high specific surface area and strong N adsorption capacity, is used as a support to disperse Au NPs to increase the electrochemical active surface area.

Dl-3-n-butylphthalide attenuates cerebral ischemia/reperfusion injury in mice through AMPK-mediated mitochondrial fusion.

NBP is a compound isolated from celery seeds, which was approved by the National Medical Products Administration in 2002 for clinical treatment of ischemic stroke. However, in brain ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury, the related research on mitochondrial dynamics and its mechanism of action of NBP still need to be further studied. The aim of this study was to assess NBP on cerebral pathology in ischemic stroke , with a specific focus on the molecular mechanisms of how NBP promotes mitochondrial fusion.

Mechanism of Efferocytosis in Determining Ischaemic Stroke Resolution-Diving into Microglia/Macrophage Functions and Therapeutic Modality.

After ischaemic cerebral vascular injury, efferocytosis-a process known as the efficient clearance of apoptotic cells (ACs) by various phagocytes in both physiological and pathological states-is crucial for maintaining central nervous system (CNS) homeostasis and regaining prognosis. The mechanisms of efferocytosis in ischaemic stroke and its influence on preventing inflammation progression from secondary injury were still not fully understood, despite the fact that the fundamental process of efferocytosis has been described in a series of phases, including AC recognition, phagocyte engulfment, and subsequent degradation. The genetic reprogramming of macrophages and brain-resident microglia after an ischaemic stroke has been equated by some researchers to that of the peripheral blood and brain.

Vagus nerve stimulation-induced stromal cell-derived factor-l alpha participates in angiogenesis and repair of infarcted hearts.

Aims: We aim to explore the role and mechanism of vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) in coronary endothelial cells and angiogenesis in infarcted hearts.

Methods And Results: Seven days after rat myocardial infarction (MI) was prepared by ligation of the left anterior descending coronary artery, the left cervical vagus nerve was treated with electrical stimulation 1 h after intraperitoneal administration of the α7-nicotinic acetylcholine inhibitor mecamylamine or the mAChR inhibitor atropine or 3 days after local injection of Ad-shSDF-1α into the infarcted heart. Cardiac tissue acetylcholine (ACh) and serum ACh, tumour necrosis factor α (TNF-α), interleukin 1β (IL-1β) and interleukin 6 (IL-6) levels were detected by ELISA to determine whether VNS was successful.

The spatiotemporal matching pattern of Ezrin/Periaxin involved in myoblast differentiation and fusion and Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease-associated muscle atrophy.

Background: Clinically, Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT)-associated muscle atrophy still lacks effective treatment. Deletion and mutation of L-periaxin can be involved in CMT type 4F (CMT4F) by destroying the myelin sheath form, which may be related to the inhibitory role of Ezrin in the self-association of L-periaxin. However, it is still unknown whether L-periaxin and Ezrin are independently or interactively involved in the process of muscle atrophy by affecting the function of muscle satellite cells.

Continuous exposure to isoprenaline reduced myotube size by delaying myoblast differentiation and fusion through the NFAT-MEF2C signaling pathway.

We aimed to explore whether superfluous sympathetic activity affects myoblast differentiation, fusion, and myofiber types using a continuous single-dose isoprenaline exposure model in vitro and to further confirm the role of distinct NFATs in ISO-mediated effects. Compared with delivery of single and interval single, continuous single-dose ISO most obviously diminished myotube size while postponing myoblast differentiation/fusion in a time- and dose-dependent pattern, accompanied by an apparent decrease in nuclear NFATc1/c2 levels and a slight increase in nuclear NFATc3/c4 levels. Overexpression of NFATc1 or NFATc2, particularly NFATc1, markedly abolished the inhibitory effects of ISO on myoblast differentiation/fusion, myotube size and Myh7 expression, which was attributed to a remarkable increase in the nuclear NFATc1/c2 levels and a reduction in the nuclear NFATc4 levels and the associated increase in the numbers of MyoG and MEF2C positive nuclei within more than 3 nuclei myotubes, especially in MEF2C.

Determination of the Salmonella intracellular lifestyle by the diversified interaction of Type III secretion system effectors and host GTPases.

Intracellular bacteria have developed sophisticated strategies to subvert the host endomembrane system to establish a stable replication niche. Small GTPases are critical players in regulating each step of membrane trafficking events, such as vesicle biogenesis, cargo transport, tethering, and fusion events. Salmonella is a widely studied facultative intracellular bacteria.

Aloe-Emodin Induces Mitochondrial Dysfunction and Pyroptosis by Activation of the Caspase-9/3/Gasdermin E Axis in HeLa Cells.

Aloe-emodin (1,8-dihydroxy-3-hydroxymethyl-anthraquinone), derived from some Chinese edible medicinal herbs exerts a potential anticancer activity on various cancer cells, making it a drug candidate for cancer therapy. Yet, the role of aloe-emodin in pyroptosis, a new type of cell death, is uncharacterized. In this study, we explored the molecular mechanisms of aloe-emodin-triggered pyroptosis.

Spatio-temporal model of Meox1 expression control involvement of Sca-1-positive stem cells in neointima formation through the synergistic effect of Rho/CDC42 and SDF-1α/CXCR4.

Aims: Neointimal hyperplasia remains a major obstacle in vascular regeneration. Sca-1-positive progenitor cells residing within the vascular adventitia play a crucial role in the assemblage of vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) and the formation of the intimal lesion. However, the underlying mechanisms during vascular injury are still unknown.

A CACTA-like transposable element in the upstream region of BnaA9.CYP78A9 acts as an enhancer to increase silique length and seed weight in rapeseed.

Rapeseed (Brassica napus L.) is a model plant for polyploid crop research and the second-leading source of vegetable oil worldwide. Silique length (SL) and seed weight are two important yield-influencing traits in rapeseed.