Gut microbiota impacts bone via Bacteroides vulgatus-valeric acid-related pathways.

Although the gut microbiota has been reported to influence osteoporosis risk, the individual species involved, and underlying mechanisms, remain largely unknown. We performed integrative analyses in a Chinese cohort of peri-/post-menopausal women with metagenomics/targeted metabolomics/whole-genome sequencing to identify novel microbiome-related biomarkers for bone health. Bacteroides vulgatus was found to be negatively associated with bone mineral density (BMD), which was validated in US white people.

Autologous Cytokine-Induced Killer Cell Immunotherapy Enhances Chemotherapy Efficacy against Multidrug-Resistant Tuberculosis.

Objective: Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) causes persistent infection and challenges tuberculosis control worldwide. T cell-mediated immunity plays a critical role in controlling (Mtb) infection, and therefore, enhancing Mtb-specific T cell immune responses represents a promising therapeutic strategy against TB. Cytokine-induced killer (CIK) immunotherapy is based on autologous infusion of in vitro expanded bulk T cells, which include both pathogen-specific and nonspecific T cells from patient peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) into TB patients.

Household Clusters of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Infection in Suzhou, China.

Objectives: The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is an emerging virus causing substantial morbidity and mortality worldwide. We performed a cross-sectional investigation of SARS-CoV-2 clusters in Suzhou to determine the transmissibility of the virus among close contacts and to assess the demographic and clinical characteristics between index and secondary cases.

Methods: We review the clustered patients with SARS-CoV-2 infections in Suzhou between 22 January and 29 February 2020.

Clinical evaluation of potential usefulness of serum lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) in 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pneumonia.

Background: There was much evidence suggesting that the serum lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) levels reflect the extent of various pathophysiological processes. However, the current information about dynamic change of LDH in COVID-19 pneumonia has not been well investigated.

Methods: Study was performed in 87 cases confirmed by COVID-19 infection.

Additional benefits of GeneXpert MTB/RIF assay for the detection of pulmonary tuberculosis patients with prior exposure to fluoroquinolones.

Background: We performed a prospective study to investigate the association between pre-diagnosis exposure to fluoroquinolone (FQ) and laboratory testing results among tuberculosis (TB) patients.

Patients And Methods: Each TB-suspected patient provided sputum specimen for mycobacteria growth indicator tube (MGIT) culture and GeneXpert among pulmonary TB patients. Confirmed TB patients and clinically diagnosed TB patients were further enrolled in the final analysis.

Identification of potential functional genes in papillary thyroid cancer by co-expression network analysis.

Interactions between multiple genes are involved in the development of complex diseases. However, there are few analyses of gene interactions associated with papillary thyroid cancer (PTC). Weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) is a novel and powerful method that detects gene interactions according to their co-expression similarities.

System network analysis of genomics and transcriptomics data identified type 1 diabetes-associated pathway and genes.

Genome-wide association studies (GWASs) have discovered >50 risk loci for type 1 diabetes (T1D). However, those variations only have modest effects on the genetic risk of T1D. In recent years, accumulated studies have suggested that gene-gene interactions might explain part of the missing heritability.

Multivariate analysis of genomics data to identify potential pleiotropic genes for type 2 diabetes, obesity and dyslipidemia using Meta-CCA and gene-based approach.

Previous studies have demonstrated the genetic correlations between type 2 diabetes, obesity and dyslipidemia, and indicated that many genes have pleiotropic effects on them. However, these pleiotropic genes have not been well-defined. It is essential to identify pleiotropic genes using systematic approaches because systematically analyzing correlated traits is an effective way to enhance their statistical power.

Linking Alzheimer's disease and type 2 diabetes: Novel shared susceptibility genes detected by cFDR approach.

Background: Both type 2 diabetes (T2D) and Alzheimer's disease (AD) occur commonly in the aging populations and T2D has been considered as an important risk factor for AD. The heritability of both diseases is estimated to be over 50%. However, common pleiotropic single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs)/loci have not been well-defined.

Identification of novel genetic loci for osteoporosis and/or rheumatoid arthritis using cFDR approach.

There are co-morbidity between osteoporosis (OP) and rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Some genetic risk factors have been identified for these two phenotypes respectively in previous research; however, they accounted for only a small portion of the underlying total genetic variances. Here, we sought to identify additional common genetic loci associated with OP and/or RA.

Use of DNA microarray chips for the rapid detection of resistance to rifampicin and isoniazid.

The objective of the present study was to evaluate the potential development of DNA microarray chips to detect rifampicin (RFP) and isoniazid (INH) resistance in (MTB), using samples from clinical tuberculosis (TB) patients in Soochow City, China. The sputum samples of 42 patients with TB in the Affiliated Hospital of Infectious Diseases of Soochow University (Soochow, China) were collected. The conventional Lowenstein-Jensen culture medium (Gold Standard) was used to assess drug sensitivity using the absolute concentration method.

Increased identification of novel variants in type 2 diabetes, birth weight and their pleiotropic loci.

Background: Clinical and epidemiological findings point to an association between type 2 diabetes (T2D) and low birth weight. However, the nature of the relationship is largely unknown. The aim of this study was to identify novel single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in T2D and birth weight, and their pleiotropic loci.

Integrative Analysis of Genomics and Transcriptome Data to Identify Potential Functional Genes of BMDs in Females.

Osteoporosis is known to be highly heritable. However, to date, the findings from more than 20 genome-wide association studies (GWASs) have explained less than 6% of genetic risks. Studies suggest that the missing heritability data may be because of joint effects among genes.

Clofazimine for the treatment of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis: prospective, multicenter, randomized controlled study in China.

Background: Clofazimine (Cfz) has shown activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis, including multidrug-resistant (MDR) strains in vitro and in animal studies. Here we evaluate the clinical efficacy and tolerability of using Cfz to treat MDR tuberculosis in China.

Methods: We enrolled 105 patients who had sputum culture-positive MDR tuberculosis in 6 major tuberculosis specialty hospitals in China.

Efficacy, safety and tolerability of linezolid for the treatment of XDR-TB: a study in China.

Linezolid may be effective in treating multidrug-resistant tuberculosis and extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis. We conducted a prospective, multicentre, randomised study to further evaluate the efficacy, safety and tolerability of linezolid in patients with extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis in China. 65 patients who had culture-positive sputum for extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis were randomly assigned to a linezolid therapy group or a control group.