Gastroesophageal reflux disease, mood swings, and frozen shoulder: A two-sample, two-step Mendelian randomization study.

A Mendelian randomization (MR) study was undertaken to establish a causal link between gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) and frozen shoulder (FS), examining whether the risk of GERD with FS is mediated through mood fluctuations. Genetic loci from populations of independent European ancestry were selected as instrumental variables for GERD, FS, and mood swings. The primary analysis employed the inverse-variance weighted method supplemented by 3 additional analytical methods.

A 44-cm3 physics package for the high-performance pulsed optically pumped atomic clock.

The pulsed optically pumped (POP) atomic clock has demonstrated unexpected performance in terms of frequency stability and drift. However, it remains a huge challenge to make this type of atomic clock more compact. Herein, we report the design of a miniaturized physics package, which is equipped with a magnetron microwave cavity holding a vapor cell of 1.

Miao medicine Gu Yan Xiao tincture inhibits mTOR to stimulate chondrocyte autophagy in a rabbit model of osteoarthritis.

Ethnopharmacological Relevance: The Gu Yan Xiao tincture, a blend of traditional Chinese herbs, is traditionally used for osteoarthritis and related pain. This study investigated its mechanism of action in order to rationalize and validate its therapeutic use.

Aim Of The Study: This study analyzed, in a rabbit model of knee osteoarthritis, whether and how Gu Yan Xiao tincture exerts therapeutic benefits by modulating chondrocyte autophagy.

ALG3-CDG: lethal phenotype and novel variants in Chinese siblings.

Congenital disorders of glycosylation (CDG) are a group of genetic, mostly multisystem disorders, which often involve the central nervous system. ALG3-CDG is one the some 130 known CDG. Here we report two siblings with a severe phenotype and intrauterine death.

Fatigue Performance of the CA Mortar Used in CRTS I Ballastless Slab Track under Simulated Servicing Condition.

The cement and asphalt mortar (CA mortar) used in the China Railway Track System (CRTS) I ballastless slab track may encounter a coupling fatigue effect under the high-frequency vibration, load and high-and-low temperature cycles, and the deterioration under fatigue may happen during service of the high-speed railway. In this study, the performance degradation and its mechanism of the CA mortar with and without polymer emulsion incorporated under the coupling fatigue effects of the high-frequency vibration, load and temperature were studied by using an anti-fatigue testing device specially developed for the CA mortar used in the ballastless slab track of the high-speed railway. The results showed that the deformation capacity of the CA mortar for CRTS I slab ballastless slab track decreased after fatigue test under simulated service environment, presenting a typical brittle characteristic and an obvious reduction of the ductility and toughness.

Henoch-Schönlein Purpura With Testicular Necrosis: Sonographic Findings at the Onset, During Treatment, and at Follow-up.

Henoch-Schönlein purpura (HSP) with involvement of the testes is extremely rare. Here, we present a pediatric case of HSP involving testicular ischemic necrosis in an 8-year-old child. Ultrasonography plays an important role not only in the differential diagnosis at onset, but also in the assessment of treatment response and prognosis during treatment and at follow-up.

CO2 bubbling-based 'Nanobomb' System for Targetedly Suppressing Panc-1 Pancreatic Tumor via Low Intensity Ultrasound-activated Inertial Cavitation.

Noninvasive and targeted physical treatment is still desirable especially for those cancerous patients. Herein, we develop a new physical treatment protocol by employing CO2 bubbling-based 'nanobomb' system consisting of low-intensity ultrasound (1.0 W/cm(2)) and a well-constructed pH/temperature dual-responsive CO2 release system.

Role of microRNAs in hepatocellular carcinoma.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the fifth most common cancer and the third leading cause of cancer related death worldwide. HCC develops through a multistep process that involves genetic and epigenetic changes. In addition to genetic and epigenetic mechanisms, recent studies have shown that microRNAs (miRNAs) play essential roles in hepatocellular carcinogenesis through the post-transcriptional regulation of tumor associated-genes.

Differential diagnosis of gallbladder wall thickening: the usefulness of contrast-enhanced ultrasound.

he purpose of this study was to evaluate the usefulness of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) in the differential diagnosis of gallbladder wall (GBW) thickening and determine the predictors of malignant GBW thickening. One hundred fifty-nine patients with GBW thickening, including 76 men and 83 women, from eight institutions were enrolled. CEUS was performed after injection of a sulfur hexafluoride microbubble-based ultrasound contrast agent.

Bipolar radiofrequency ablation for liver tumors: comparison of contrast-enhanced ultrasound with contrast-enhanced MRI/CT in the posttreatment imaging evaluation.

Objective: The aim of the study was to assess the role of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) in treatment response evaluation after percutaneous bipolar radiofrequency ablation (BRFA) for liver tumors.

Methods: From May 2012 to May 2014, 39 patients with 73 tumors were treated by BRFA. One month after the treatment, CEUS and CEMRI/CECT were conducted to evaluate the treatment response.

A combined "RAFT" and "Graft From" polymerization strategy for surface modification of mesoporous silica nanoparticles: towards enhanced tumor accumulation and cancer therapy efficacy.

A novel modification route integrating the copolymers of positive charged quaternary amines and polyethylene glycol (PEG) units using a combination of reversible addition-fragmentation chain-transfer polymerization (RAFT) and "Graft From" strategy, has been proposed and developed, for the first time, to decorate the surface of mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNs). These MSNs are shown to have a greatly reduced hydrodynamic particle size in physiological solution. It is demonstrated that such an efficient copolymer surface modification strategy, resulting in PEG coating with high positive zeta potential, can achieve a nearly 2-fold enhanced permeability and retention (EPR) effect, and longer blood half-life compared to coating with PEG only.

A drug-perfluorocarbon nanoemulsion with an ultrathin silica coating for the synergistic effect of chemotherapy and ablation by high-intensity focused ultrasound.

The synergistic effect of chemotherapy and ablation using high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) is realized with a newly developed drug-delivery system. The system comprises an ultrathin silica shell surrounding a poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) nanoemulsion core containing the drug (CPT) and a perfluorocarbon (PFOB). This nanosystem presents many advantages in drug delivery, such as excellent structural stability, high drug-loading capacity, and rapid HIFU-mediated drug release.

Acoustic radiation force impulse imaging: a new tool for the diagnosis of papillary thyroid microcarcinoma.

Purpose: To evaluate the diagnostic performance of ARFI imaging in differentiating between benign and malignant thyroid nodules <1 cm.

Materials And Methods: 173 pathologically proven thyroid nodules (77 benign, 96 malignant) in 157 patients were included in this study. Receiver-operating characteristic curve (ROC) analyses were performed to assess the diagnostic performance of conventional ultrasound (US) and ARFI imaging in papillary thyroid microcarcinoma (PTMC).

Solitary schwannoma of the gallbladder: a case report and literature review.

Schwannomas occurring in the gallbladder are extremely rare. Preoperative diagnosis of gallbladder schwannomas appears to be very difficult because they are normally asymptomatic and are often found incidentally. Until now, only five cases have been reported in the literature.

The safety and treatment response of combination therapy of radioimmunotherapy and radiofrequency ablation for solid tumor: a study in vivo.

Objection: To investigate the safety and treatment response of radioimmunotherapy (RIT) in combination with radiofrequency ablation (RFA) for the treatment of VX2 tumor on rabbit.

Materials And Methods: A total of 36 rabbits bearing VX2 tumor on the thigh were randomly assigned into 3 groups (group I: 1-2 cm; group II: 2-3 cm; group III: 3-4 cm) and 4 subgroups (A: as control, just puncture the tumor using the RFA electrode without power output; B: RFA alone; C: 131I-chTNT intratumoral injection alone; D: RFA+131I-chTNT intratumoral injection 3 days later). The variation of blood assay, weight and survival among different groups and subgroups were used to assess the treatment safety.

A continuous tri-phase transition effect for HIFU-mediated intravenous drug delivery.

Aiming at substantially enhanced efficacy and biosafety of clinical HIFU therapy, a natural solid medium, L-menthol (LM), characteristic of mild and controllable "solid-liquid-gas" (SLG) tri-phase transition, was adopted, instead of those conventional explosive liquid-gas (LG) bi-phase transitional media, in constructing a multifunctional theranostic system. Owing to the continuous and controllable characteristics of SLG tri-phase transition, such a novel tri-phase transition-based theranostic system has been demonstrated of the repeatedly enhanced HIFU efficacy ex vivo and in vivo under once intravenous injection and the significantly improved treatment precision, controllability and biosafety when comparing to the traditional bi-phase transition medium, perfluorohexane (PFH), thus promising great application potential in clinical HIFU treatment. Moreover, this theranostic system has been demonstrated a long blood-circulation lifetime and continuous accumulation in tumor in 24 h, which is very beneficial for the enhanced tumor ablation in vivo along with SLG tri-phase transition.

Conventional US, US elasticity imaging, and acoustic radiation force impulse imaging for prediction of malignancy in thyroid nodules.

Purpose: To evaluate conventional ultrasonography (US), US elasticity imaging (EI), and acoustic radiation force impulse (ARFI) imaging in thyroid nodule malignancy prediction.

Materials And Methods: This prospective study was institutional review board approved; informed consent was obtained. Study included 375 patients (mean age, 51 years; range, 18-75 years) with 441 pathologically proven thyroid nodules.

Sorafenib blocks the HIF-1α/VEGFA pathway, inhibits tumor invasion, and induces apoptosis in hepatoma cells.

Hypoxia and hypoxia-driven angiogenesis play an important role on the recurrence of hepatocellular carcinoma after insufficient radiofrequency ablation. The hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF)-1α/vascular endothelial growth factor-A (VEGFA) pathway plays an important part in this process. Sorafenib is a multikinase inhibitor with activity against several receptor tyrosine kinases.

Management of hepatocellular carcinoma: The role of contrast-enhanced ultrasound.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the sixth most common neoplasm and the third cause of cancer death worldwide. Contrast enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) has been applied for more than ten years and plays increasingly important roles in the management of HCC. On the basis of the Guideline and Good Clinical Practice Recommendations for CEUS in the liver-update 2012 and related literature about the management of HCC, we summarize the main roles and applications of CEUS in the management of HCC, including HCC surveillance, diagnosis, CEUS-guided treatment, treatment response evaluation and follow-up.

Nano/microparticles and ultrasound contrast agents.

Microbubbles have been used for many years now in clinical practice as contrast agents in ultrasound imaging. Recently, their therapeutic applications have also attracted more attention. However, the short circulation time (minutes) and relatively large size (two to ten micrometers) of currently used commercial microbubbles do not allow effective extravasation into tumor tissue, preventing efficient tumor targeting.

An intelligent nanotheranostic agent for targeting, redox-responsive ultrasound imaging, and imaging-guided high-intensity focused ultrasound synergistic therapy.

A novel multifunctional nanotheranostic agent with targeting, redox-responsive ultrasound imaging and ultrasound imaging-guided high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) therapy (MSNC-PEG-HA(SS)-PFH, abbreviated as MPH(SS)-PFH) capabilities is developed. The redox-responsive guest molecule release and ultrasound imaging functions can be both integrated in such a "smart" theranostic agent, which is accomplished by the redox-triggered transition from the crosslinking state to retrocrosslinking state of the grafted polyethylene glycol-disulfide hyaluronic acid molecules on the particle surface when reaching a reducing environment in vitro. More importantly, under the tailored ultrasound imaging guiding, in vivo Hela tumor-bearing nude mice can be thoroughly and spatial-accurately ablated during HIFU therapy, due to the targeted accumulation, responsive ultrasound imaging guidance and the synergistic ablation functions of nanotheranostic agent MPH(SS)-PFH in the tumors.

Liver specific phase of perflubutane microbubbles contrast-enhanced ultrasound for potential use in the diagnosis of focal liver lesions.

The purpose of this study was to distinguish passive retention of microbubbles in liver sinusoids from active intracellular retaining, and to provide further evidence of post vascular liver specific phase of perflubutane microbubble contrast-enhanced ultrasound for potential use in the detection of focal liver lesions. Fifty-four rats were divided into three groups: saline group (G1, as a control, n=6), sulphur hexafluoride microbubble group (G2, n=24) and perflubutane microbubble group (G3, n=24). The livers were perfused at 2, 5, 10 and 20 min after injection of perflubutane or sulphur hexafluoride gas-filled microbubbles or normal saline.

Radiofrequency ablation before intratumoral injection of (131)I-chTNT improves the tumor-to-normal tissue ratio in solid VX2 tumor.

Purpose: This study was aimed to investigate whether the tumor necrosis induced by radiofrequency ablation (RFA) can improve the ratio of tumor-to-normal tissue (T/NT) after intratumoral injection of (131)I-chTNT.

Materials And Method: Eighteen New Zealand rabbits bearing VX2 tumor on the thigh were randomly divided into two treatment groups (control group: intratumoral injection of (131)I-chTNT alone; RFA group: RFA + intratumoral injection of (131)I-chTNT 3 days after RFA) and each group was further divided into three subgroups I, II, and III (1-2 cm, 2-3 cm, and 3-4 cm in maximum diameter, respectively), by the tumor size. SPECT was performed to evaluate the T/NT on days 1, 8, and 15 after (131)I-chTNT injection.

Role of contrast-enhanced ultrasound in follow-up assessment after ablation for hepatocellular carcinoma.

Aim: To assess the usefulness of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) during follow-up after percutaneous ablation therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).

Methods: A total of 141 patients with HCCs who received percutaneous ablation therapy were assessed by paired follow-up CEUS and contrast-enhanced computed tomography (CECT). The follow-up scheme was designed prospectively and the intervals between CEUS and CECT examinations were less than 14 d.