CT Radiomics Features of Abdominal Adipose and Muscle Tissues Can Predict the Postoperative Early Recurrence of Hepatocellular Carcinoma.

Rationale And Objectives: To investigate the potential of computed tomography radiomics features extracted from abdominal adipose and muscle in predicting early recurrence (ER) of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) after surgery.

Materials And Methods: This retrospective study enrolled 252 patients with HCC who underwent curative resection from two independent institutions. In the training cohort of 178 patients from institution A, radiomics signatures extracted from abdominal visceral adipose, subcutaneous adipose, and muscle were applied to establish the radiomics score using the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator regression.

Neuroimmune interactions in the development and chronification of migraine headache.

Migraine is highly prevalent and debilitating. The persistent headaches in this condition are thought to arise from the activation and sensitization of the trigeminovascular pathway. Both clinical and animal model studies have suggested that neuroimmune interactions contribute to the pathophysiology of migraine headache.

Positive Associations of Perfluoroalkyl and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances With Hypertension May Be Attenuated by Endogenous Sex Hormones: A Nationally Representative Cross-Sectional Study.

Background: Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substance (PFAS) has endocrine-disrupting properties and may affect blood pressure. Endogenous hormones also play a crucial role in the progression of hypertension. However, their interaction with hypertension remains to be explored.

Nanopore analysis of cis-diols in fruits.

Natural fruits contain a large variety of cis-diols. However, due to the lack of a high-resolution sensor that can simultaneously identify all cis-diols without a need of complex sample pretreatment, direct and rapid analysis of fruits in a hand-held device has never been previously reported. Nanopore, a versatile single molecule sensor, can be specially engineered to perform this task.

Joint Exposure to Ambient Air Pollutants, Genetic Risk, and Ischemic Stroke: A Prospective Analysis in UK Biobank.

Background: Our primary objective was to assess the association between joint exposure to various air pollutants and the risk of ischemic stroke (IS) and the modification of the genetic susceptibility.

Methods: This observational cohort study included 307 304 British participants from the United Kingdom Biobank, who were stroke-free and possessed comprehensive baseline data on genetics, air pollutant exposure, alcohol consumption, and dietary habits. All participants were initially enrolled between 2006 and 2010 and were followed up until 2022.

Extracellular Matrix Disorganization Caused by ADAMTS16 Deficiency Leads to Bicuspid Aortic Valve With Raphe Formation.

Background: A better understanding of the molecular mechanism of aortic valve development and bicuspid aortic valve (BAV) formation would significantly improve and optimize the therapeutic strategy for BAV treatment. Over the past decade, the genes involved in aortic valve development and BAV formation have been increasingly recognized. On the other hand, (a disintegrin and metalloproteinase with thrombospondin motifs) gene family members have been reported to be able to modulate cardiovascular development and diseases.

Proxalutamide reduces SARS-CoV-2 infection and associated inflammatory response.

Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, data suggested that males had a higher risk of developing severe disease and that androgen deprivation therapy might be associated with protection. Combined with the fact that (), a host entry factor for the SARS-CoV-2 virus, was a well-known androgen-regulated gene, this led to an upsurge of research investigating androgen receptor (AR)-targeting drugs. Proxalutamide, an AR antagonist, was shown in initial clinical studies to benefit COVID-19 patients; however, further validation is needed as one study was retracted.

DNA repair mechanisms that promote insertion-deletion events during immunoglobulin gene diversification.

Insertions and deletions (indels) are low-frequency deleterious genomic DNA alterations. Despite their rarity, indels are common, and insertions leading to long complementarity-determining region 3 (CDR3) are vital for antigen-binding functions in broadly neutralizing and polyreactive antibodies targeting viruses. Because of challenges in detecting indels, the mechanism that generates indels during immunoglobulin diversification processes remains poorly understood.

TadA reprogramming to generate potent miniature base editors with high precision.

Although miniature CRISPR-Cas12f systems were recently developed, the editing efficacy and targeting range of derived miniature cytosine and adenine base editors (miniCBEs and miniABEs) have not been comprehensively addressed. Moreover, functional miniCBEs have not yet be established. Here we generate various Cas12f-derived miniCBEs and miniABEs with improved editing activities and diversified targeting scopes.

TadA orthologs enable both cytosine and adenine editing of base editors.

Cytidine and adenosine deaminases are required for cytosine and adenine editing of base editors respectively, and no single deaminase could enable concurrent and comparable cytosine and adenine editing. Additionally, distinct properties of cytidine and adenosine deaminases lead to various types of off-target effects, including Cas9-indendepent DNA off-target effects for cytosine base editors (CBEs) and RNA off-target effects particularly severe for adenine base editors (ABEs). Here we demonstrate that 25 TadA orthologs could be engineered to generate functional ABEs, CBEs or ACBEs via single or double mutations, which display minimized Cas9-independent DNA off-target effects and genotoxicity, with orthologs B5ZCW4, Q57LE3, E8WVH3, Q13XZ4 and B3PCY2 as promising candidates for further engineering.

Network pharmacology and experiment-based strategy to investigate mechanisms of JingFangFuZiLiZhong formula for ulcerative colitis.

Background: Ulcerative colitis (UC), a chronic inflammatory disease, often cause carcinogenesis, disability, and intestinal perforation. The JingFangFuZiLiZhong formula (JFFZLZ) shows a good effect against UC in the clinic. Hence, we aim to investigate the mechanisms between JFFZLZ and UC network pharmacology data mining and experiments.

Therapeutic efficacy of novel memantine nitrate MN-08 in animal models of Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a leading cause of dementia in elderly individuals and therapeutic options for AD are very limited. Over-activation of N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors, amyloid β (Aβ) aggregation, a decrease in cerebral blood flow (CBF), and downstream pathological events play important roles in the disease progression of AD. In the present study, MN-08, a novel memantine nitrate, was found to inhibit Aβ accumulation, prevent neuronal and dendritic spine loss, and consequently attenuate cognitive deficits in 2-month-old APP/PS1 transgenic mice (for a 6-month preventative course) and in the 8-month-old triple-transgenic (3×Tg-AD) mice (for a 4-month therapeutic course).

Faster State Preparation across Quantum Phase Transition Assisted by Reinforcement Learning.

An energy gap develops near quantum critical point of quantum phase transition in a finite many-body (MB) system, facilitating the ground state transformation by adiabatic parameter change. In real application scenarios, however, the efficacy for such a protocol is compromised by the need to balance finite system lifetime with adiabaticity, as exemplified in a recent experiment that prepares three-mode balanced Dicke state near deterministically [Y.-Q.

Long non-coding RNA SNHG7 promotes migration and invasion of melanoma via upregulating SOX4.

Since this article has been suspected of research misconduct and the corresponding authors did not respond to our request to prove originality of data and figures, "Long non-coding RNA SNHG7 promotes migration and invasion of melanoma via upregulating SOX4, by C. Zhang, B. Zhu, X.

Distinct Function of Estrogen Receptors in the Rodent Anterior Cingulate Cortex in Pain-related Aversion.

Background: Brain-derived estrogen is implicated in pain-related aversion; however, which estrogen receptors mediate this effect remains unclear. This study hypothesized that the different estrogen receptors in the rostral anterior cingulate cortex play distinct roles in pain-related aversion.

Methods: Formalin-induced conditioned place avoidance and place escape/avoidance paradigms were used to evaluate pain-related aversion in rodents.

Contribution of DNA methylation in chronic stress-induced cardiac remodeling and arrhythmias in mice.

It is recognized that stress can induce cardiac dysfunction, but the underlying mechanisms are not well understood. The present study aimed to test the hypothesis that chronic negative stress leads to alterations in DNA methylation of certain cardiac genes, which in turn contribute to pathologic remodeling of the heart. We found that mice that were exposed to chronic restraint stress (CRS) for 4 wk exhibited cardiac remodeling toward heart failure, as characterized by ventricular chamber dilatation, wall thinning, and decreased contractility.

Intermedin Enlarges the Vascular Lumen by Inducing the Quiescent Endothelial Cell Proliferation.

Objective: Intermedin plays an important role in vascular remodeling and significantly improves blood perfusion, but the precise mechanism remains unclear. Herein, we aimed to define whether vascular lumen enlargement is responsible for the intermedin-increased blood perfusion and explore the underlying cellular and molecular mechanisms.

Approach And Results: To study the role of intermedin, we generated the IMD-KO () mice using CRISPR/Cas9 (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats/clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeat-associated 9) system.

Astroglial MicroRNA-219-5p in the Ventral Tegmental Area Regulates Nociception in Rats.

Background: The authors previously reported that noncoding microRNA miR-219-5p is down-regulated in the spinal cord in a nociceptive state. The ventral tegmental area also plays critical roles in modulating nociception, although the underlying mechanism remains unknown. The authors hypothesized that miR-219-5p in the ventral tegmental area also may modulate nociception.

Fresh versus Frozen Embryos for Infertility in the Polycystic Ovary Syndrome.

Background: The transfer of fresh embryos is generally preferred over the transfer of frozen embryos for in vitro fertilization (IVF), but some evidence suggests that frozen-embryo transfer may improve the live-birth rate and lower the rates of the ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome and pregnancy complications in women with the polycystic ovary syndrome.

Methods: In this multicenter trial, we randomly assigned 1508 infertile women with the polycystic ovary syndrome who were undergoing their first IVF cycle to undergo either fresh-embryo transfer or embryo cryopreservation followed by frozen-embryo transfer. After 3 days of embryo development, women underwent the transfer of up to two fresh or frozen embryos.

Reduced Nicotinamide Adenine Dinucleotide Phosphate, a Pentose Phosphate Pathway Product, Might Be a Novel Drug Candidate for Ischemic Stroke.

Background And Purpose: Our previous study has defined a role of TP53-induced glycolysis and apoptosis regulator in neuroprotection against ischemic injury through increasing the flow of pentose phosphate pathway. We hypothesized that the pentose phosphate pathway product nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) could be a novel drug for treatment of ischemic stroke.

Methods: The NADPH was given before, at the onset, or after stroke onset with single or repeated intravenous (mice and rats) or intraperitoneal injections (monkey).

SOS2-LIKE PROTEIN KINASE5, an SNF1-RELATED PROTEIN KINASE3-Type Protein Kinase, Is Important for Abscisic Acid Responses in Arabidopsis through Phosphorylation of ABSCISIC ACID-INSENSITIVE5.

Abscisic acid (ABA) plays an essential role in seed germination. In this study, we demonstrate that one SNF1-related protein kinase3-type protein kinase, SOS2-like protein kinase5 (PKS5), is involved in ABA signal transduction via the phosphorylation of an interacting protein, abscisic acid-insensitive5 (ABI5). We found that pks5-3 and pks5-4, two previously identified PKS5 superactive kinase mutants with point mutations in the PKS5 FISL/NAF (a conserved peptide that is necessary for interaction with SOS3 or SOS3-like calcium binding proteins) motif and the kinase domain, respectively, are hypersensitive to ABA during seed germination.

PGC1α plays a critical role in TWEAK-induced cardiac dysfunction.

Background: Inflammatory cytokines play an important role in the pathogenesis of heart failure. We have recently found the cytokine TWEAK (tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-like weak inducer of apoptosis), a member of the TNF superfamily, to be increased in patients with cardiomyopathy and result in the development of heart failure when overexpressed in mice. The molecular mechanisms underlying TWEAK-induced cardiac pathology, however, remain unknown.