Objective:To study the expression of angiotensin-converting enzyme(ACE),extracellular signal-regulated kinase(ERK),and the changes of atrial fibrosis in patients with rheumatic heart disease(RHD) and atrial fibrillation(AF) treated with angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor(ACEI).Methods:Atrial tissues were obtained from the right appendage during open surgery in 35 patients with RHD.The mRNA of ACE and ERK2 were semi-qualified by reverse transcription-ploymerase chain reaction(RT-PCR) and normalized to the glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase(GAPDH).Western blotting analysis was employed to examine the expressions of ACE and phosphorylated ERK(pERK).Atrial collagen volume fraction(CVF) was detected by Masson's stain.Results:The mRNA of ACE and ERK2 or the protein of ACE and pERK were significantly increased,and CVF was significantly increased in patients with chronic atrial fibrillation(CAF) compared with sinus rhythm group(SR)( P 0.05).Conclusion:The expressions of ACE,ERK2 and pERK increase,and fibrosis is more severe in RHD patients with CAF as compared with those with SR.Compared with CAF patients treated without ACEI,the expressions of ERK2 and pERK significantly decrease( P 0.05)in CAF patients treated with ACEI.This suggests that the increasing expression of ERK2 and pERK resulting from local renal angiotensin-converting enzyme system activation mediates the development of atrial fibrosis,and ACEI may contribute to lesser atrial fibrosis in RHD patients with AF.

According to the sera aquaporin-4 antibody (AQP4), neuromyelitis optica (NMO) can be classified into two types as AQP4 antibody positive (AQP4+) and negative (AQP4-). However, the NMO patients with AQP4- are prone to delayed treatment, and may have a different pathogenesis compared to that in patients with AQP4+. Scientific researches and the clinical trials on NMO with AQP4- will deepen the understanding of NMO pathogenesis and help to make an early accurate diagnosis and rational therapy for NMO with AQP4-. This review aims to summarize the progress in clinic diagnosis for NMO patients with AQP4-.

Pulmonary hypertension (PH) is a progressive disorder characterized by abnormally elevated blood pressure of the pulmonary circulation. PH progresses rapidly to right ventricular (RV) failure and even death without treatment. Cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) is an accurate and reproducible tool for the assessment of RV morphology and function, which plays an important role in the prognosis of patients with PH. The aim of this study is to review the clinical application and research progress of CMR in evaluation of PH.

The acupuncture medical literature during the Republic of China is divided into four categories, including theoretical literature, acupuncture channels and acupoints drawing literature, translations, and teaching materials and medical cases. It is found that the theoretical literature focuses on inheriting the traditional theories as well as combining traditional Chinese and Western medicine. The drawings are becoming more and more precise, and in these drawing works anatomy begins to appear at that time. Translations are the achievements of communication between TCM and Western medicine, which promote the scientization of acupuncture greatly. Teaching materials are also influenced by Western medicine, presenting a rough frame of modern acupuncture disciplinary system. As important clinic data, medical cases have great clinical value. Overall, acupuncture medical literature during the Republic of China is widely published, which is influenced greatly by the Western medicine and presents a significant tendency of scientization.
Acupuncture Points ; Acupuncture Therapy ; history ; Books ; history ; China ; History, 20th Century ; Humans ; Translations

Acupuncture scientization was a consensus of most of acupuncture scholars who had long-term perspectives in the 20th century, among them Ms. ZHULian was the important one. Ms. ZHU Lian built a systemic new acupuncture" academic structure in practice and theory aspects. At the same time, as the main architect of Institute of Acupuncture-moxibustion of China Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Ms. ZHU Lian was the first one who began to carry out the acupuncture clinical trail and laboratory experiment in modern way, which meant "acupuncture therapy" was transformed into "acupuncture science" by Ms. ZHULian's endeavor.
Acupuncture ; education ; history ; standards ; Acupuncture Therapy ; history ; methods ; standards ; China ; History, 20th Century ; History, 21st Century ; Humans ; Science ; history

Five flavors are basic nature of Chinese medicine. But the labeling of Chinese medicine flavors was in a chaos. Song Jin and Yuan dynasty is a transconformation stage of labeling Chinese medicine flavors. In this article the author put forward that the determination of Chinese medicine flavor shifted from tasting of early and middle age of Northern Song dynasty to categorical analogizing and functional analogizing in the late age of Northern Song dynasty. The latter method had a flourished development in Southern Song, Jin and Yuan dynasty. This regularity conclusion has provided a reference for the standardizing Chinese medicine flavors.
History, Medieval ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; history ; Taste

Periodontal ligament may have independent response to orthodontic stimulation and thus initiate alveolar bone osteogenesis and osteoclasts. Orthodontic-induced alveolar bone remodeling has no bone loss,while inflammation can lead to alveolar bone loss,suggesting that force signal and inflammatory factors may induce the differentiation of undifferentiated cells in the periodontal ligament via different pathways. The strength of the force and the nature of the force (basal tension and fluid shear force) may affect the differentiation of periodontal ligament cells,and may produce antagonistic or synergistic effect with the inflammatory factors through complex autocrine and paracrine regulation,resulting in local bone reconstruction,which is manifested as bone deposition and bone absorption. Studies have shown that Wnt signaling is an important regulatory pathway for osteoblast differentiation. Inflammatory factors can block the differentiation of stem cells into osteoblasts. The Wnt pathway is closely related to the effects of force and inflammatory factors on the differentiation of periodontal ligament cells.

Poly(U)-binding-splicing factor 60 KDa (PUF60), a U2-related splicing factor that facilitates 3′splice-site recognition at the early stage of spliceosome assembly.High expression of PUF60 is related to the occurrence of multiple tumors, such as colorectal cancer, ovarian cancer, gastric cancer, liver cancer, et al.PUF60 can regulate the expression of c-myc through the core-human transcription factor Ⅱ basal transcription factor.Anti-PUF60 antibodies are detected in the sera of patients with early-stage and recurrent tumor, and the levels are significantly decreased after the operation.PUF60 can be used as a combined or independent test index for the diagnosis of cancer, which can be a potential new target for gene therapy.

Measles is an acute respiratory infectious disease caused by measles virus.Measles is highly contagious,and it can spread rapidly mainly in infants and young children.With the application of measles vac-cine,the morbidity and mortality of the disease are significantly reduced,but in recent years,measles is still prev-alent in some regions of our country,and presenting some new characteristics on the epidemiology and clinical manifestations.To understand the present epidemic characteristics and the clinical manifestations of measles in a timely manner,and to monitor the level of the crowd measles antibody plays an important role in achieving the goal of eliminating measles.This article reviews the recent epidemiology and clinical characteristics of measles.

Apoptosis ; drug effects ; Asbestos ; toxicity ; Humans ; Mineral Fibers ; toxicity