Enhancing insights into diseases through horizontal gene transfer event detection from gut microbiome.

Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) phenomena pervade the gut microbiome and significantly impact human health. Yet, no current method can accurately identify complete HGT events, including the transferred sequence and the associated deletion and insertion breakpoints from shotgun metagenomic data. Here, we develop LocalHGT, which facilitates the reliable and swift detection of complete HGT events from shotgun metagenomic data, delivering an accuracy of 99.

Coding genomes with gapped pattern graph convolutional network.

Motivation: Genome sequencing technologies reveal a huge amount of genomic sequences. Neural network-based methods can be prime candidates for retrieving insights from these sequences because of their applicability to large and diverse datasets. However, the highly variable lengths of genome sequences severely impair the presentation of sequences as input to the neural network.

Recent updates on pyroptosis in tumors of the digestive tract.

Pyroptosis is an inflammasome-dependent form of programmed cell death that is mediated by caspases-1, -4, -5, and -11, and the gasdermin protein family. It is characterized by the rupture of cell membrane and the subsequent release of cell contents and interleukins, leading to inflammatory reaction and activation of the immune system. Recent studies have suggested that pyroptosis plays a role in the development of gastrointestinal tumors, impeding tumor generation and progression as well as providing a favorable microenvironment for tumor growth.

PhageScope: a well-annotated bacteriophage database with automatic analyses and visualizations.

Bacteriophages are viruses that infect bacteria or archaea. Understanding the diverse and intricate genomic architectures of phages is essential to study microbial ecosystems and develop phage therapy strategies. However, the existing phage databases are short of meticulous annotations.

Probabilistic tensor decomposition extracts better latent embeddings from single-cell multiomic data.

Single-cell sequencing technology enables the simultaneous capture of multiomic data from multiple cells. The captured data can be represented by tensors, i.e.

Sex and age differences in chronic postoperative pain among patients undergoing thoracic surgery: a retrospective cohort study.

Background: The effect of sex and age on chronic post-thoracic surgical pain (CPTP) at rest and with activity remains unclear. The main purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the incidence of chronic postoperative pain (at rest and with activity) and sex/age differences.

Methods: This was a single-center retrospective study that included adult patients who had undergone elective thoracic surgery.

Plasma Amino Acid Profile in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder in Southern China: Analysis of 110 Cases.

To retrospectively explore the characteristics of plasma amino acids (PAAs) in children with autism spectrum disorder and their clinical association via case-control study. A total of 110 autistic and 55 healthy children were recruited from 2014 to 2018. The clinical phenotypes included severity of autism, cognition, adaptability, and regression.

The Roles of Stress-Induced Immune Response in Female Reproduction.

Stress response plays pivotal roles in physiological process, including reproduction and embryonic development. It's long been acknowledged that stress stimulates the activation of both hormone and immune system resulting in disorders of maternal immune function and infertility. However, the stress types, biological alterations, clinical outcomes, and the potential underlying mechanisms remain largely unclear.

Maresin1 Alleviates Metabolic Dysfunction in Septic Mice: A H NMR-Based Metabolomics Analysis.

Maresin1 (MaR1), a new anti-inflammatory and proresolving lipid mediator, has been proven to exert organ-protective effects in septic animal models. However, the potential mechanisms are still not fully elucidated. In this study, we sought to explore the impact of MaR1 on metabolic dysfunction in cecal ligation and puncture- (CLP-) induced septic mice.

Dual Channel Activatable Cyanine Dye for Mitochondrial Imaging and Mitochondria-Targeted Cancer Theranostics.

Because mitochondria are the key regulators for many cellular behaviors and are susceptible to hyperthermia and reactive oxygen species, mitochondria-specific reagents for simultaneous targeting, imaging, and treatment are highly desirable in cancer theranostics. Herein, we developed a mitochondria-targeted cyanine dye IR825-Cl, which possesses two separated excitation wavelength channels for both red fluorescence imaging and near-infrared (NIR) photothermal therapy (PTT). For imaging, IR825-Cl rapidly entered cells and selectively targeted mitochondria.

[Quercetin permeability across blood-brain barrier and its effect on the viability of U251 cells].

Objective: To investigate the permeability of quercetin across blood-brain barrier (BBB) and its impact on the proliferation and apoptosis of U251 cells.

Methods: The BBB model was established through culture of primary brain microvessel endothelial cells (BMVEC) and primary astroglia cells (AC), which was confirmed by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and trans epithelial electric resistance (TEER). High pressure liquid chromatography (HPLC) was performed to determine quercetin permeability across BBB.

[The effects of human 21.5 kDa MBP gene on HepG-2 proliferation and apoptosis].

Objective: To test the effects of the 21.5 kDa human brain myelin basic protein (MBP) on the proliferation and apoptosis of HepG-2.

Methods: pSVCEP-MBP-CAT plasmid containing the full-length 21.

Inhibition of human gastric carcinoma cell growth by atofluding derivative N3-o-toluyl-fluorouracil.

Aim: To evaluate the growth inhibition efficacy of atofluding derivative N3-o-toluyl-fluorouracil (TFU) on human gastric carcinoma cell lines SGC-7901 and MKN-45.

Methods: Cell growth inhibition by TFU was measured by MTT and clonogenic assays without or with liver microsomal enzymes. Xenografts of cancer cells in nude mice were employed to study the anti-proliferative effects of TFU in vivo.

[Inhibitory effect of human brain myelin basic protein on H2O2-induced apoptosis of human lung cancer cell line YTLMC-90].

Background & Objective: Human brain myelin basic protein (MBP) distributes in nervous system and other tissues extensively, and can be detected in many kinds of tumor cells, such as lung cancer, breast cancer, and neuroglioma. However, it has not been reported whether MBP is relevant to the activity of neural invasion of tumors and whether MBP plays a role in biological behaviors of human lung cancer cells. This study was to investigate the inhibitory effect of MBP on hydrogen peroxide (H2O2)-induced apoptosis of human lung cancer cell line YTLMC-90.

[Suppressive effect of brain derived neurotrophic factor on H2O2-induced apoptosis in human lung cancer cell YTMLC-90].

Background & Objective: It has been shown that neurotrophic factors such as nerve growth factor (NGF), brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), and neurotrophin (NT-3/4) are synthesized in a variety of cells inside and outside the nervous system. These factors are not only able to promote neural survival, proliferation and apoptosis of neural cells but also relevant to the activity of neural invasion of tumors. It has not been reported to date whether BDNF may play roles in the biological behavior of human lung cancer cells.