Objective To explore the value of axillary MRI in differential diagnosis of metastatic axillary lymph nodes in patients with breast cancer.Methods Axillary MRI was performed in 44 breast cancer patients proved by pathology.Long axis,short axis,cortex thickness,ADC value,hilus,margin,perifocal fat gap,signal intensity on DWI,enhancement pattern and time-signal intensity curve were analyzed.The diagnostic ability of long axis,short axis,cortex thickness and ADC value were analyzed with ROC curves.Results Twenty-four patients (24/44,54.55 ％) were proved with metastases axillary lymph nodes,the other 20 patients (20/44,45.45％) were negative.Long axis,short axis,cortex thickness,ADC value,hilus absence,irregular margin,fuzzy perifocal fat gap,high signal intensity on DWI and heterogeneous enhancement showed statistically significant between patients with metastatic and without metastatic axillary lymph nodes (all P＜0.05).The area under ROC curve of long axis,short axis,cortex thickness and ADC value were 0.797,0.765,0.848,0.749 respectively.Conclusion MRI plays an important role in differential diagnosis of axillary lymph nodes me tastasis.The cortex thickness larger than 0.54 cm can help to predict metastatic axillary lymph nodes.

Objectives To compare clinical manifestations and electrophysiological features in patients with chron?ic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP) and Type-I Charcot Marie Tooth Disease (CMT-I) for guiding dif?ferential diagnosis. Methods Data including clinical manifestations and electrophysiological indexes was collected from thirty-one CIDP cases and 28 CMT-I cases. Correlation analysis was used to assess the association of the severity of electrophysiology with the severity of clinical symptoms. Results There were statistically significant differences in onset site, sensory dysfunction, foot deformity and cerebrospinal fluid protein between these two groups (P<0.05). There were significant differences in indexes of nerve conduction and needle electromyography between these two groups (P<0.05). The severity of clinical symptoms was not related with the severity of electrophysiology in CMT-I group (r=0.27,P>0.05). Conclusions Differential diagnoses of CIDP and CMT-I can be made based on clinical manifestations and electro?physiological features.

Objective To evaluate the effects of rigorous surveillance and retroperitoneal lymph node dissection (RPLND) in the treatment of low-risk patients with clinical stage Ⅰ nonseminomatous germ cell testicular tumors (NSGCT) after radical orchiectomy.Methods The data of 71 patients with clinical stage Ⅰ NSGCT were analyzed retrospectively in Hunan Provincial Tumor Hospital,Xiangya Third Hospital of Central South University and Hunan Provincial People's Hospital between Feb,2001 and Apr,2012.Excluding lymphatic and vascular invasion,percentage of embryonal carcinoma＞50％ and increasing tumour markers (AFP/β-HCG) following orchiectomy,46 low-risk patients out of 71 patients with clinical stage Ⅰ NSGCT were selected and divided into rigorous surveillance group (30 cases) and RPLND group (16 cases) according to different therapeutic methods after radical orchiectomy.Univariate analysis was used to confirm variables associated with disease progression,and the disease free survival rates (DFSR) were compared by using Kaplan-Meier analysis.Results Five cases were lost,and 41 cases were followed up for an average of 61 months (range,15-147 months),with 58 months in rigorous surveillance group (range,19-147months) and 65 months in RPLND group (range,15-144 months).The survival rate was 100％ in 2 groups.The DFSR was 89％ (24/27) and 86％ (12/14),respectively,and there was no significant difference between the 2 groups (x2 =0.08,P=0.78).The DFSR was 83％ in patients with small amout of embryonal (percentage of embryonal carcinoma ＜ 50％),and 92％ in patients without embryonal carcinoma,and there was no significant difference between the 2 groups (x2=1.07,P=0.30).Also there was no significant difference between the patients less than 15 years and patients more than 15 years (x2=1.59,P =0.21).Conclusions There is no significant difference in recurrence rate and DFSR between rigorous surveillance group and RPLND group.Low-risk patients with clinical stage Ⅰ NSGCT may achieve satisfactory prognosis with surveillance after radical orchiectomy.

Objective To investigate the expression of survivin/Human leukocyte antigen class I ( HLA-Ⅰ) proteins and its physiological significance in clear cell renal cell carcinoma ( CCRCC ) . Methods Immunohistochemistry was used to analyze survivin/HLA-Ⅰ protein expression in 90 cases of CCRCC and 10 normal tissues to study relationships with clinical symptoms and disease prognosis . Resutl s The level of survivin protein expression was found to be significantly higher in CCRCC tissues 82.2%( 74/90) than in normal tissues( 0/10).However, the relative amount of HLA-Ⅰprotein in colorectal cancer tis-sue was also found to be significantly lower 67.8%(61/90) than in normal tissues 90%(9/10).Survivin expression was associated with tumor grade , stage,and lymph node metastasis ( P=0.000, P=0.016, and P=0.001, respectively ) .Conversely , lost HLA-Ⅰexpression did not have any associations with clinicopath-ological data (P>0.05).Survivin negative patients (25.0%, 4/16) had a higher tumor-free survival rate than patients (52.7%, 39/74)with survivin expression (P=0.037).Patients (27.6%, 8/29) with normal HLA-Ⅰlevels had a higher tumor-free survival rate than those ( 60.7%, 37/61) with reduced HLA-Ⅰlev-els (P=0.020).The univariate and multivariate analyses indicated that expression of survivin and HLA indi -vidually and in combination were independent predictors for CCRCC patient survival . Conclusions Over-expression of survivin but reduced HLA-Ⅰ expression is associated with CCRCC development and progres-sion.

Objective To investigate the expression of Notch1,Delta-like ligand 4 (DLL4),hairy and enhancer of split-1 (HES-1),microvessel density (MVD),lymphatic vessel density (MLD) in gastric carcinoma,so as to discuss their roles in the development of gastric carcinoma.Methods Gastric carcinoma,paracancer tissues which was apart from the edge of cancer tissue ＞ 60 mm obtained during operation and normal gastric mucosa obtained during gastroscopy were used as controls.All specimens were made tissue microarray.The expressions of Notchl,DLL4,HES-1 were detected by immunohistochemistry.Immunohistochenical double taining was used to detect MVD and MLD.The relationships between Notch1,DLL4,HES-1 expression and angiogenesis,lymphangiogenesis and their significances were analyzed.Results The positive rate of Notch1 in gastric carcinoma was 48.30％,significantly higher than that of paracancerous (25.00％,x2 =6.38,P ＜ 0.05) and control group (16.67％,x2 =10.18,P ＜0.05).The differences of the positive rate of DLL4 in gastric carcinoma (55.94％),paracancerous (45.70％) and control group (56.67％) were not significant (x2 =1.18,P ＞0.05 ; x2 =0.005,P ＞ 0.05).The differences of the positive rate of HES-1 in gastric carcinoma (36.64％),paracancerous (34.40％) and control group (33.33％) were not significant (x2 =0.05,P ＞ 0.05 ;,x2 =0.11,P ＞ 0.05).The mean of MVD in gastric carcinoma group was 28.84 ± 14.17,which was significantly higher than that in paracancerous group (17.02 ±8.54,t =4.03,P＜0.05) and control group (16.69 ±7.21,t =5.01,P＜0.05).The mean of MLD in gastric carcinoma group was 8.55 ±4.98,which was significantly higher than that in paracancerous group (4.05 ± 2.48,t =9.30,P ＜ 0.05) and control group (3.99 ± 1.56,t =10.32,P ＜ 0.05).The expression of DLL4 was correlated with MVD (t =2.77,P ＜ 0.05),but wasn't correlated with MLD (t =1.89,P ＞0.05).There were no correlations between the expression of Notch1,HES-1 and tissues MVD,MLD (P ＞0.05).Conclusion Notch1 plays important roles in the development of gastric carcinoma.There are many angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis in gastric carcinoma.The expression of DLL4 in gastric carcinoma has certain effect in the formation of microvessel.

Objective To explore the feasibility of the virtual non-contrast images derived from dual-layer spectral detector CT (SDCT) substitute for true non-contrast images.Methods From July 2017 to September 2017,40 patients under-went pre-and arterial-venous dual-phase post-contrast abdominal imagining on a SDCT in Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine Affiliated Ruijin Hospital.The images were retrospectively analyzed.The arterial VNC images (VNC-a) and venous VNC images (VNC-v)were derived from spectral based image (SBI) datasets of arterial and portal venous phase using a dedicated software respectively.Then mean CT attenuation,mean image noise,signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) were compared with one-way ANOVA analysis among TNC,VNC-a,VNC-v images in liver,spleen,pancreas,abdominal aorta,inferior vena cava,psoas muscle,L4 vertebra and perirenal fat.And Bland-Altman plots was used to analyze the CT attenuation equivalence between TNC and VNC.Subjective image quality was assessed with a 5-point scale and compared with Friedman H test.The dose length product (DLP) of pre-and post-contrast scans were recorded.Results The CT attenuation of abdominal aorta,perirenal fat,L4.vertebra among three kinds of images had significant differences (P＜0.05)which overestimated the CT attenuation of perirenal fat and underestimated CT attenuation of abdominal aorta and vertebra compared to TNC,VNC.Except for pancreas,the image noise of all other tissues among three kinds of images had significant differences,images noise of VNC images were lower than TNC images (P＜0.05).The SNR of liver,spleen,psoas muscle and inferior vena cava and CNR of pancreas,abdominal aorta,inferior vena cava,L4 vertebra and perirenal fat were statistically significant among the three images (P＜0.05).Except for vertebra and perirenal fat,good equivalence between VNC and TNC images were observed in all relevant tissues with Bland-Altman analysis.Image quality subjective scoring of TNC,VNC-a,and VNC-v were 5.00(1.00),5.00(0.75),5.00(1.00) respectively which had no significant differences (P=0.20).The DLP of TNC,arterial and venous phase scan were (255.2±62.0),(258.9±62.9),(252.0±61.2)mGy·cm,and the total DLP of dual-phase contrast enhanced scan was (766.2± 185.3) mGy· cm.The DLP of TNC accounted for 33.3％(255.2/766.2) of the total DLP,and effective dose of TNC was (3.83±0.90)mSv.Conclusions CT attenuation in VNC image which exhibited lower image noise was identical to TNC images in the majority of abdomen tissues except for vertebra and perirenal fat.and the VNC image.The VNC image which reduces radiation dosage derives from SDCT enhanced image might be used as a substitute for the TNC image.

Objective:To investigate the clinical value of iodine density map and low keV virtual monoenergetic images (VMI) derived from dual-layer spectral detector CT (DLCT) for the pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (pNETs) detection.Methods:From January to June 2019, data of 23 pathologically confirmed patients of pNETs were retrospectively analyzed. All of the patients underwent pancreas enhanced DLCT scanning within 1 week before surgery. The conventional polyenergetic images (PI), iodine density map and 40, 50, 60, 70 keV VMI were generated. One resident radiologist with 3 years’ experience and one senior radiologist with over 10 years’ experience interpreted the images for the lesion detection independently using the following image series: PI, VMI (40-70 keV), PI combined with iodine density map. Lesion detection rates were recorded and compared among different image series. The CT value and noise of lesion, normal pancreatic parenchyma, and abdominal subcutaneous fat were measured in PI and VMI in both arterial and portal vein phases. The contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) of lesion was calculated. The CT value of lesion and normal pancreatic parenchyma, CNR of lesion, and image noise were compared using repeated one-way ANOVA test. Subjective image quality was assessed with a 5-point scale and compared with Friedman test.Results:A total of 26 lesions were confirmed from 23 patients. For resident radiologist and senior radiologist, the detection rates of pNETs lesion using PI were 76.9% (20/26) and 84.6% (22/26) respectively, and both improved to 92.3% (24/26) using image series of 40 and 50 keV VMI. For senior radiologist, the pNETs lesion detection rate was further improved to 96.2% (25/26) using image series of PI with iodine map. The CT value of lesion and normal pancreatic parenchyma, CNR, and image noise had statistical differences among PI and VMI (40-70 keV) in both arterial and portal vein phase ( P<0.001). The mean CT attenuation and CNR of lesion in VMI increased significantly as the energy level decreased.The CNR of lesion in all VMI (40-70 keV) was significantly higher than that in PI. The median of subjective scores of image quality in PI and VMI (40-70 keV) were 3, 3, 4, 4, and 5 respectively, and the difference was statistically significant (χ2=66.393, P<0.001). Conclusions:The low keV VMI derived from DLCT can increase the CT value and CNR of pNETs, and the lesion detection rate can be improved combined with iodine density map. The CNR of pNETs is the highest in 40 keV VMI, and image noise is still lower than that of PI, so 40 keV VMI is recommended for clinical application.

Objective:To explore the optimal monochromatic level for the observation of coronary in-stent lumen by dual-layer spectral CT (DLCT).Methods:Forty-nine patients with 74 stents after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) who underwent coronary CTA (CCTA) examinations by a DLCT between January 2016 and September 2017 were retrospectively enrolled. A total of 12 groups of images including 60-120 keV (kilo electron voltage) images with 10 keV interval, 140-200 keV images with 20 keV interval and conventional images. In-stent lumen diameter of proximal, mid and distal portion was measured. Difference of CT values between in-stent lumen and ascending aorta was used to describe as blooming artifact, and noise of in-stent lumen as image noise. Then Likert 5-point scale was performed to evaluate images noise, enhancement of in-stent lumen, blooming artifact and diagnostic confidence. Differences of objective and subjective parameters among conventional and various monochromatic images were compared by Friedman test.Results:In the diameter measurement of the proximal, middle and distal segments of the stent, the difference between the images of each group was statistically significant (χ 2 = 427.270, 426.375, 400.981, P< 0.001). The diameter of the lumen measured by 120-200 keV single-level image was larger than that measured by 60-100 keV single-level image, and the difference was statistically significant ( P< 0.05). In the comparison of CT difference between the stent lumen and ascending aorta, the difference between the images of each group was statistically significant (χ 2 = 242.193, P< 0.001), and 100-200 keV single-level images were lower than the conventional images, the difference was statistically significant ( P< 0.05). In the comparison of noise values, the difference between the images of each group was statistically significant (χ 2 = 420.161, P< 0.001), and the difference was statistically significant ( P< 0.05). In the subjective scores of noise, enhancement, halo artifact and diagnostic confidence, there were statistically significant differences among the groups (χ2= 333.827, 455.989, 276.824, 399.497, P< 0.001). The noise score of 100-200 keV single-level image was higher than that of conventional image, the difference was statistically significant ( P< 0.05). The enhancement score of 60 keV was significantly higher than that of other images ( P< 0.05). The halo artifact score of 100-200 keV single level image was higher than that of 60-90 keV image, the difference was statistically significant ( P<0.05). The scores of 90-120 keV single-level images were higher than those of other single-level images, and the difference was statistically significant ( P< 0.05). Conclusions:CCTA examinations can be effectively performed by DLCT in patients after PCI in clinical settings, and 120 keV is recommended as the optimal monochromatic image for the observation of in-stent lumen.

Objective:To explore the image quality of 40 keV virtual monoenergetic images (VMI) derived from dual-layer spectral detector CT （DLCT） pancreas dynamic enhanced scanning and its optimal window setting.Methods:From January to July 2019, 28 patients who underwent pancreas enhanced DLCT scan within one week before surgery and pathologically confirmed of pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (pNETs) were retrospectively enrolled. Conventional polyenergetic images (PI) and 40 keV virtual monoenergetic images （VMI 40 keV） were generated after scanning.CT value of normal pancreatic parenchyma, lesion, abdominal subcutaneous fat, abdominal aorta and portal vein were measured in PI and VMI 40 keV. The contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) of the pNETs lesion was calculated. All these objective results were compared between VMI 40 keV and PI using paired ttest. Individual window settings （W-Ind, including window width and window level） of VMI 40 keVwere recorded. Calculated window settings （W-Calc） were mathematically calculated via regression analysis and optimized window settings （W-Opt） were obtained.Subjective image quality was assessed with a 5-point scale and compared among VMI 40 keV with different window settings (W-Std, W-Ind, W-Calc and W-Opt) using Friedman test, and compared PI with standard abdominal window setting (W-Std) and VMI 40keV with W-Opt settings using Wilcoxon test.The maximum diameter of lesion was measured and compared with one-way ANOVA analysis among PI and VMI 40 keV with different windows settings. Results:For VMI 40 keV in both arterial phase and portal vein phase, the CT attenuation [(464.0±136.7), (375.4±79.2) HU] of pNETs lesion were statistically significantly higher than those in PI [（168.8±38.0), (140.5±23.5) HU] （ t=-16.107,-22.225, P<0.001）, CNR （16.5±11.1, 10.9±6.1） were also statistically significantly higher than those in PI （4.5±2.9, 3.0±1.9） （ t=-7.838, -9.781， P<0.001）,while with lower image noise in VMI 40 keV[（11.8±1.5),(11.8±1.4) HU] than PI （13.1±1.5,12.9±1.3 HU）（ t=6.356,3.891， P<0.001）. The subjective score for PI with W-Std and VMI 40 keV with W-Std, W-Ind, W-Calc, W-Opt in arterial phase were 4（1）, 1（0）, 5（0）, 5（0.75）, 5（1）, and which in portal vein phase were 3.5（1）, 1（0）, 5（0）, 5（0）, 5（1）.The subjective score of VMI 40 keV with different window settings had statistical differences （χ 2=76.143,76.000， P<0.001）. Compared to the image quality of PI with W-Std settings, VMI 40 keV with W-Opt settings have higher objective score （ Z=4.685, 4.235， P<0.001）. The maximum diameter of lesion has no statistical difference among PI and VMI 40 keV with different window settings （ F=0.008, 0.004， P>0.999） in both arterial phase and portal vein phase. Conclusions:The VMI 40 keV in pancreas dynamic enhancement scanning derived from dual-layer spectral detector CT have higher image quality than PI. Due to changes of CT value of tissue in VMI 40 keV, it is recommended to optimize window settings （window width/window level， 880/230 HU for arterial phase and 840/260 HU for portal vein phase） to obtain the best image quality.

Efforts to control inflammation and achieve better tissue repair in the treatment of periodontitis have been ongoing for years. Human β-defensin 3, a broad-spectrum antimicrobial peptide has been proven to have a variety of biological functions in periodontitis; however, relatively few reports have addressed the effects of human periodontal ligament cells (hPDLCs) on osteogenic differentiation. In this study, we evaluated the osteogenic effects of hPDLCs with an adenoviral vector encoding human β-defensin 3 in an inflammatory microenvironment. Then human β-defensin 3 gene-modified rat periodontal ligament cells were transplanted into rats with experimental periodontitis to observe their effects on periodontal bone repair. We found that the human β-defensin 3 gene-modified hPDLCs presented with high levels of osteogenesis-related gene expression and calcium deposition. Furthermore, the p38 MAPK pathway was activated in this process. In vivo, human β-defensin 3 gene-transfected rat PDLCs promoted bone repair in SD rats with periodontitis, and the p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway might also have been involved. These findings demonstrate that human β-defensin 3 accelerates osteogenesis and that human β-defensin 3 gene modification may offer a potential approach to promote bone repair in patients with periodontitis.
Animals ; Anti-Infective Agents ; metabolism ; pharmacology ; Cell Differentiation ; drug effects ; Cells, Cultured ; Humans ; Osteogenesis ; drug effects ; Periodontal Ligament ; drug effects ; metabolism ; Periodontitis ; drug therapy ; Rats ; Rats, Sprague-Dawley ; beta-Defensins ; metabolism ; pharmacology