The development and application of assessment tools for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have been a hot spot both at home and abroad. More and more scales and questionnaires for COPD assessment have emerged. The comparison on characteristics of different scales / questionnaires, and the selection of appropriate as-sessment tool have become a key issue which requires to be solved. This article analyzed characteristics of commonly used assessment tools both at home and abroad. Related thoughts had been put forward for the providing of evidences in the improvement of COPD efficacy evaluation index system.

Comorbidity, which can affect the treatment and prognosis of its disease, has gradually caught attention from both at home and abroad. Although chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) mainly involved lung tissues, it may also cause the systemic (or extra-pulmonary) adverse effects. Many types of comorbidities existed in COPD. This article summarized the prevalence, risk factors and pathogenesis of comorbidities such as cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, anxiety and depression, lung cancer, infection, metabolic syndrome and diabetes mellitus. It also con-ducted related studies on the diagnosis and treatment status and current problems of COPD comorbidities, which may provide evidences for COPD outcome evaluation.

Objective To investigate chromosomal aneuploidy of chorionic villior tissue from embryo arrestor spontaneous miscarriage by the method of multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification(MLPA), and to provide genetic etiology data for recurrent spontaneous abortion(RSA) and embryo arrest.Methods The clinical retrospective analysis was used during November 2013 to October 2016 in Shenzhen Maternity and Child Healthcare Hospital.The genomic DNA of 7 036 chorionic villi or tissue samples from embryo arrestor pregnancy loss were extracted by resin and Proteinase K, following detected by multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification, and then analyzed by descriptive and frequency statistic using SPSS17.0 software.Results Totally 2 984 samples (42.41%) with chromosomal aneuploidy were detected, of which, the top five were trisomy 16(826)11.74%, monosomy X (Turner,401)5.70%, trisomy 22(247)3.51%, trisomy 13(149)2.12% and trisomy 21(144)2.05%.Aneuploidy 19 or 17 were rare,just 1 and 3 cases respectively.The aneuploidy of chromosome 1 was not discovered yet.There were 161 samples (2.28%) for segmental deletion and/or duplication cases.Besides of the monosomy X(Turner,401), monsomy 21 was also high frequency(17,0.24%).In addition, 56 samples(0.80%)were double trisomic,while 2 samples(0.03%)were tris-trisomy.Thirteen samples(0.18%)were heterosome trisomy,and five samples(0.07%)were Turner combined trisomy.Fifteen samples(0.21%) were unbalanced translocation of the arm,while 20 samples(0.28%) were nonhomologous chromosome translocation.Conclusions Trisome and monosome were the majority of chromosome abnormality (above 90%), as well as the main cause of spontaneous miscarriage.Meanwhile the chromosome aneuploidy (including segment deletion or duplication) could be screened by MLPA quickly, thoroughly and efficiently, further more discover the carrier of balanced translocation in couples and provide valuable genetic information for next pregnancy.

Horizontal gene transfer (HGT), also Lateral gene transfer (LGT), is any process in which an organism transfers genetic material to another species that is not its offspring. With the increase of available genomic data, it has become more convenient to study the way to detect the genes, which are products of horizontal transfers among a given genome. There are few data about known horizontal gene transfers in three bacterium genomes under consideration, so the experiments, which simulated gene transfer by artificially inserting phage genes, were carried out. Combining the feature analysis methods of gene sequences with support vector machine (SVM), a novel method was developed for identifying horizontal gene transfers (HGT) in 3 fully sequenced bacterium genomes (Escherichia coli K12, Borrelia burgdorferi, Bacillus cereus ZK). According to our previous work, codon use frequency (FCU) was selected as the sequence feature, in respect that it is inherently the fusion of both codon usage bias and amino acid composition signals. In addition, another computational method was proposed considering strand asymmetry and predicting horizontal gene transfers of leading strand and lagging strand of genomes under consideration, respectively. To avoid the occasionality of simulating gene transfer through artificially inserting phage genes, 100 times of the transfer-and-recover experiment were repeated and arithmetic average of measurement for each genome being considered were reported to evaluate algorithm's performance. Ten-fold cross-validation was used for both parameter and accuracy estimation. The best results were obtained for C-Support Vector Classification (C-SVC) type by using the radial basis function kernel with ?=100, while for one-class SVM type the best performance was obtained using the polynomial kernel of three degree. The performance of the approach was compared with that of Tsirigos' method ,which is one of the best predictive approachs to date in detecting of horizontal transfer genes. Firstly, for the original method that did not consider the strand asymmetry, the C-SVC type has a high relative improvement(RI) of 31.47% on hit ratio for Escherichia coli K12, while the one-class SVM type has RI of 11.61% for Borrelia burgdorferi. Moreover, as theoretically expected, the method considering the strand asymmetry resulted in higher RI than the original method. In order to examine the approach's performance in detecting factual gene transfer events, the approach was applied in genome of Enterococcus faecalis V583. It is not only succeed in recovering all the seven factual horizontally transferred genes, also found that the whole segment from 7 kb upstream of gene EF2293 to 38 kb downstream of gene EF2299 was probably transferred into E. faecalis V583 genome simultaneously with the above seven genes.

Objective To explore the value of non-invasive prenatal test (NIPT) in pregnant women with intermediate risk after traditional Down syndrome screening. Methods From March 1 2015 to March 31 2016, a total of 2 949 pregnant women with intermediate risk after traditional Down syndrome screening who received NIPT as the second-line screening method at Shenzhen Maternity and Child Healthcare Hospital after informed consent were recruited for this study. Retrospective data analysis including the results of traditional Down syndrome screening, ultrasound, NIPT and invasive amniocentesis to fetal karyotype analysis were conducted, and pregnant outcomes were followed up. Results NIPT results were all obtained in 2 949 pregnant women with intermediate risk after traditional Down syndrome screening. Of 25 NIPT-positive cases, 24 cases received invasive amniocentesis to fetal karyotype analysis. Thirteen cases were confirmed with fetal chromosomal abnormalities including 5 cases of trisomy 21, 2 cases of trisomy 13, 4 cases of sex chromosomal abnormalities and 2 cases of other chromosomal abnormalities. In addition, 1 NIPT-positive case refused prenatal diagnosis was confirmed normal result after birth. The postnatal follow-up in NIPT-negative women did not find any newborn with chromosomal abnormality. The incidence of fetal chromosomal abnormalities in women with intermediate risk was 0.44% (13/2 949). Conclusion NIPT can be used as second-line screening method in pregnant women with intermediate risk after Down syndrome screening, which could lead to the prenatal detection of a higher proportion of fetal chromosomal abnormalities and a lower invasive-testing rate.

Thyroid peroxidase(TPO) gene was detected in 20 patients with congenital hypothyroidism. An insertion c. 2268insT of TPO gene was found in one of them, and c. 2268insT combined with c. 1477G＞C mutation in another. TPO gene mutation may be related to pathogenesis of congenital hypothyroidism in Chinese.

Objective To histomorphometricly assess changes occurred in the alveolar ridge following different methods of socket preservation and to compare them against natural healing without interventions. Methods The second、 third and fourth mandibular premolars were extracted from six beagles. Six extraction sites in each dog were randomly assigned to three treatments as follows:natural healing (T1), Bio-Oss Collagen (T2) and immediate implant with Bio-Oss (T3). Six month after surgery, the dogs were euthanized and tissue samples were sectioned, fixed and mounted, then were stained with toluidine blue. The histologic studies and morphological measurements were performed by using an optical microscope and a digital image software. Results Reabsorption in the buccal aspect of the alveolar crest of ridge was showed in all groups. With respect to the mean vertical bone loss of the buccal bone plate, T3 is lower than T1 and T2(P<0.001 ), while no significant differences were observed between T1 and T2. With regard to horizontal dimension of the alveolar process , a statistical significance could be found at 3mm and 4mm below the crest of ridge in group T1 and T3(P=0.017, P=0.042), while no statistical differences were found between other groups. Conclusions Both techniques of alveolar ridge preservation were not able to completely preserve the original bone volume after tooth extraction. Immediate implant placement in combination with Bio-Oss seems to have the potential to limit the reabsorption of the alveolar process efficiently , but the bone preserving effect of Bio-Oss Collagen is undesirable.

This study was aimed to evaluate the efficacy of Tiao-Bu Fei-Shen therapies (i.e., Bu-Fei Jian-Pi, Bu-Fei Y i-Shen, Y i-Qi Zi-Shen) on cardiac remodeling of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) rats and its mechanisms according to the R-value comprehensive evaluation method. Based on the database of previous experiment of COPD rats, R-value comprehensive evaluation method was used to evaluate the indexes as fellows to discuss efficacy of Tiao-Bu Fei-Shen therapies on cardiac remodeling of COPD rats. ① Indicators of right ventricular morphologic indexes: right ventricular hypertrophy index (RVHI), cardiac muscle sarcomere lengths, bulk density of myocardial mitochondria (Vv), surface area (δ), membrane surface (δm), Vv, δ, δm of heart mitochondria;② Indicators of mechanisms: right ventricular endothelin-1 (ET-1), transforming growth factor-beta ( TGF-β) , vascular endothelial growth factor ( VEGF ) , basic fibroblast growth factor ( bFGF ) , matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9) and tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinase-1 (TIMP-1). The results showed that the sequence of improving effect of right ventricular remodeling at week 20 was Bu-Fei Jian-Pi, Bu-Fei Y i-Shen, aminophylline, and Y i-Qi Zi-Shen; at week 32 and the integrated week 20 and week 32, the sequence of effect was Bu-Fei Jian-Pi, Bu-Fei Y i-Shen, Y i-Qi Zi-Shen, and aminophylline. At integrated week 20 and week 32, Bu-Fei Jian-Pi had significant better intensity correcting effect than aminophylline (P< 0.01). There was no difference between week 20 and week 32. It showed that each treatment group had good long-term effect. For the mechanism of correcting effect on right ventricular remodeling, at week 20, the sequence of comprehensive effect was Bu-Fei Jian-Pi, Bu-Fei Y i-Shen, aminophylline, and Y i-Qi Zi-Shen. And Bu-Fei Jian-Pi had better effect compared with aminophylline and Y i-Qi Zi-Shen (P< 0.01); Bu-Fei Y i-Shen had better effect than Y i-Qi Zi-Shen (P< 0.05). At week 32, the sequence of effect was Y i-Qi Zi-Shen, aminophylline, Bu-Fei Jian-Pi, and Bu-Fei Y i-Shen. At the integrated week 20 and week 32, the sequence of effect was Bu-Fei Jian-Pi, and Bu-Fei Y i-Shen, Y i-Qi Zi-Shen, and aminophylline. Until week 32, the correcting effect of Tiao-Bu Fei-Shen therapies and aminophylline still maintained the same level as at week 20. It indicated that each treatment plan had good long-term effect. It was concluded that Tiao-Bu Fei-Shen therapies can improve the cardiac remodeling of COPD rats and expression of related factors in the cardiac remodeling through the R-value comprehensive evaluation method. And the effect of Bu-Fei Jian-Pi was obvious with good long-term effect.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a serious disease constituting a major threat to public health. Current popularity of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) in treating COPD implies its potential advantage in improving symptoms, reducing the frequency of acute exacerbation and improving the patients' quality of life. This study is to evaluate the efficacy and safety of a comprehensive intervention, Bufei Yishen Granule combined with acupoint-sticking therapy, in patients with stable COPD.