Publications by authors named "X-M Lei"

Article Synopsis
  • Erythropoietic protoporphyria (EPP) is a genetic disorder that causes painful skin reactions when exposed to light, with few treatment options available.
  • Researchers developed oral inhibitors of the ABCG2 transporter, which helps remove protoporphyrin IX from cells, as a new therapeutic approach.
  • In a mouse model of EPP, these inhibitors were successful in reducing protoporphyrin IX levels and preventing phototoxic reactions, offering a promising new treatment strategy.
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Upconversion fluoride phosphors NaMYF:Er+, Tm, Yb (M = Li/K) have been synthesized by low-temperature combustion method. The optimal doping ratios of ions in the matrix lattice were determined by orthogonal experiments with the control variable method. It was found that when a certain amount of Tm ions were doped into the lattice of Er ions, the upconversion fluorescence intensity and red-to-green ratio of the samples were significantly enhanced.

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Background: Doxorubicin is an effective chemotherapeutic agent, but its use is limited by acute and chronic cardiotoxicity. Exercise training has been shown to protect against doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity, but the involvement of immune cells remains unclear. This study aimed to investigate the role of exercise-derived B cells in protecting against doxorubicin-induced cardiotoxicity and to further determine whether B cell activation and antibody secretion play a role in this protection.

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Study Question: Do prepregnancy peripheral leukocytes (PPLs) and their subsets influence the risk of spontaneous abortion (SAB)?

Summary Answer: PPLs and their subsets are associated with the risk of SAB.

What Is Known Already: Compelling studies have revealed the crucial role of maternal peripheral leukocytes in embryo implantation and pregnancy maintenance. Adaptive changes are made by PPLs and their subsets after conception.

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Introduction: Liver fibrosis results from chronic liver injury and inflammation, often leading to cirrhosis, liver failure, portal hypertension, and hepatocellular carcinoma. Progress has been made in understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying hepatic fibrosis; however, translating this knowledge into effective therapies for disease regression remains a challenge, with considerably few interventions having entered clinical validation. The roles of exosomes during fibrogenesis and their potential as a therapeutic approach for reversing fibrosis have gained significant interest.

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By using a simple co-precipitation method, new Fe O -based nanocatalysts (samples) were synthesized. The samples were composites of two or three transition metal oxides, MO (M=Fe, Mn, Co, Ni, and Cu). The average size of CuO crystallites in the composites composed of two oxide components (CuO-Fe O ) was about 14.

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ATP-binding cassette subfamily G member 2 (ABCG2), an efflux transporter, is involved in multiple pathological processes. Ko143 is a potent ABCG2 inhibitor; however, it is quickly metabolized through carboxylesterase 1-mediated hydrolysis of its t-butyl ester moiety. The current work aimed to develop more metabolically stable ABCG2 inhibitors.

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Article Synopsis
  • - Checkpoint inhibitors like tislelizumab have shown effectiveness in treating recurrent/metastatic nasopharyngeal cancer (R/M NPC), significantly improving progression-free survival (PFS) compared to placebo when combined with chemotherapy.
  • - In a clinical trial (RATIONALE-309), patients receiving tislelizumab with chemotherapy had better outcomes regardless of their programmed death-ligand 1 expression, and the overall safety of the treatment was similar to the placebo group.
  • - Gene expression profiling identified specific tumor characteristics that were associated with better PFS in patients treated with tislelizumab-chemotherapy, suggesting this combination should be considered for first-line treatment in R/M NPC and could help select the best candidates for therapy
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(Gou Teng) and (cat's claw) are frequently used herbal supplements in Asia and America, respectively. Despite their common usage, information is limited regarding potential herb-drug interactions associated with Gou Teng and cat's claw. The pregnane X receptor (PXR) is a ligand-dependent transcription factor that regulates cytochrome P450 3A4 (CYP3A4) expression and contributes to some known herb-drug interactions.

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  • A randomized, double-blind, phase 2 trial assessed the safety and effectiveness of a new vaccine, NVSI-06-09, as a booster for UAE adults previously vaccinated with BBIBP-CorV.
  • * The trial involved 516 participants who received either NVSI-06-09 or continued with BBIBP-CorV, showing a similar low incidence of mild adverse reactions in both groups.
  • * Results indicated that NVSI-06-09 produced significantly higher neutralizing antibody levels against various SARS-CoV-2 variants, including significantly better responses against Omicron strains compared to BBIBP-CorV.
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NVSI-06-08 is a potential broad-spectrum recombinant COVID-19 vaccine that integrates the antigens from multiple SARS-CoV-2 strains into a single immunogen. Here, we evaluate the safety and immunogenicity of NVSI-06-08 as a heterologous booster dose in BBIBP-CorV recipients in a randomized, double-blind, controlled, phase 2 trial conducted in the United Arab Emirates (NCT05069129). Three groups of healthy adults over 18 years of age (600 participants per group) who have administered two doses of BBIBP-CorV 4-6-month, 7-9-month and >9-month earlier, respectively, are randomized 1:1 to receive either a homologous booster of BBIBP-CorV or a heterologous booster of NVSI-06-08.

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The increased coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) breakthrough cases pose the need of booster vaccination. We conducted a randomised, double-blinded, controlled, phase 2 trial to assess the immunogenicity and safety of the heterologous prime-boost vaccination with an inactivated COVID-19 vaccine (BBIBP-CorV) followed by a recombinant protein-based vaccine (NVSI-06-07), using homologous boost with BBIBP-CorV as control. Three groups of healthy adults (600 individuals per group) who had completed two-dose BBIBP-CorV vaccinations 1-3 months, 4-6 months and ≥6 months earlier, respectively, were randomly assigned in a 1:1 ratio to receive either NVSI-06-07 or BBIBP-CorV boost.

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Similar trends of management and in-hospital mortality of acute pulmonary embolism (PE) have been reported in European and American populations. However, these tendencies are not clear in Asian countries. We retrospectively analysed the trends of risk stratification, management and in-hospital mortality for patients with acute PE through a multicentre registry in China (CURES).

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The prognostic power of circulating cardiac biomarkers, their utility, and pattern of release in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients have not been clearly defined. In this multicentered retrospective study, we enrolled 3219 patients with diagnosed COVID-19 admitted to 9 hospitals from December 31, 2019 to March 4, 2020, to estimate the associations and prognostic power of circulating cardiac injury markers with the poor outcomes of COVID-19. In the mixed-effects Cox model, after adjusting for age, sex, and comorbidities, the adjusted hazard ratio of 28-day mortality for hs-cTnI (high-sensitivity cardiac troponin I) was 7.

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Background: Ischemic tolerance of donor hearts has a major impact on the efficiency in utilization and clinical outcomes. Molecular events during storage may influence the severity of ischemic injury.

Methods: RNA sequencing was used to study the transcriptional profile of the human left ventricle (LV, n=4) and right ventricle (RV, n=4) after 0, 4, and 8 hours of cold storage in histidine-tryptophan-ketoglutarate preservation solution.

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A novel strain (BPBA052) capable of degrading 3-phenoxybenzoic acid (3-PBA) was isolated from soybean rhizosphere soil. The strain was obtained by screening after enrichment, isolation, and purification using 3-PBA as the sole carbon and energy source. It could degrade 96.

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In recent years, much attention has been paid to layer-structured BiBiFeMTiO (BFMTO, M = Co, Mn) compounds due to their potential as high temperature single phase multiferroic materials. However, BFMTO single crystals have been rarely reported in the past, though they are better candidates for studying the corresponding intrinsic multiferroics as well as the platform for making future devices, due to their structural complexity and difficulties in fabrication. In this article, BiFeCoTiO single-crystalline nanoplates were synthesized by the hydrothermal method.

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Mainly due to their economic importance, genomes of 10 legumes, including soybean (), wild peanut ( and ), and barrel medic (), have been sequenced. However, a family-level comparative genomics analysis has been unavailable. With grape () and selected legume genomes as outgroups, we managed to perform a hierarchical and event-related alignment of these genomes and deconvoluted layers of homologous regions produced by ancestral polyploidizations or speciations.

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Article Synopsis
  • Total gaseous mercury (TGM) was monitored at Wuzhi mountain from May 2011 to May 2012, showing an average concentration of (1.58 ± 0.71) ng x m(-3), indicating little pollution in the area.
  • TGM levels were generally low during summer months but peaked from September 2011 to January 2012, influenced by tropical monsoons.
  • The study found a daily pattern in TGM concentrations, with lows in the morning and highs in the evening, affected by mercury transport from mainland China and local weather conditions.
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By simulating vertical stratification data of PM2.5 with the third-generation air quality model CMAQ and high resolution relative humidity data with mesoscale meteorological model WRF, MODIS AOD data were revised by vertical and humidity correcting method, respectively. A linear regression model between revised AOD and PM2.

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We report a general synthetic route to well-crystallized metal nitrides through a high-pressure solid-state metathesis reaction (HPSSM) between boron nitride (BN) and ternary metal oxide A(x)M(y)O(z) (A = alkaline or alkaline-earth metal and M = main group or transition metal). On the basis of the synthetic metal nitrides (Fe3N, Re3N, VN, GaN, CrN, and W(x)N) and elemental products (graphite, rhenium, indium, and cobalt metals), the HPSSM reaction has been systematically investigated with regard to its general chemical equation, reaction scheme, and characteristics, and its thermodynamic considerations have been explored by density functional theory (DFT) calculations. Our results indicate that pressure plays an important role in the synthesis, which involves an ion-exchange process between boron and the metal ion, opening a new pathway for material synthesis.

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The ring finger protein 4 gene (RNF4), which might play a role in fetal germ cell development as well as in oocyte and granulosa cell maturation, was one of the potential candidate genes for reproductive traits. In the present work, we isolated the complete coding sequence of porcine RNF4 gene, identified a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP: T/C) in intron5, and developed a PCR-SacII-RFLP genotyping assay. Association of this SNP with reproductive traits was assessed in three populations with diverse genetic backgrounds.

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Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) were quantified in 67 high volume air samples taken concurrently in a forest and a clearing in southern Ontario, Canada from October 2001 to November 2002. Air concentrations were comparable between the two sites. Gaseous PCBs ranged from 6.

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