The β-sheet peptides can be self-assembled to form different supramolecular solids. The supramolecular solid can be linked to a wide range of functional domains, for example, with cell adhesion sequences, signal domains, and vaccine epitopes to form complex nanostructures, which can be widely used in biomedical fields. In this paper, we mainly reviewed the self-assembly of peptides using β-folding secondary structure to form nanostructures, and discussed the application of nanostructures in drug delivery and tissue engineering.

Objective To review the CT appearance of various anomalous mediastinal veins left to aortic arch and provide guideline for differentiating between them. Methods All 41 patients (26 men, 15 women; mean age 50.6) underwent CT scan and no one associated with congenital heart disease. 36 of which had the injection of IV contrast material. Others had chest MRI or ultrasound examination. Three-dimension (3D) and MIP reconstruction of the major mediastinal vascular structures were performed in 6 patients. All the CT scans were reviewed in order to observe the CT findings in each anomaly. Results Of the all cases, 24 cases had persistent left superior vena cava, of them, 23 cases with duplication of SVC, and 1 case with absent right SVC. Eleven cases had anomalous left brachiocephalic vein, and 6 of 11 cases were associated with various anomalous aortic arches. Four patients had partial anomalous pulmonary venous drainage of the left upper lobe. Two cases had left brachiocephalic vein continuation of the azygos vein. There were different CT findings among various types of venous anomalies, especially their courses below the aortic arch. Conclusion Contrast enhancement CT scan was valuable in the diagnoses of these anomalous veins. Careful analysis of the CT scans allowed the radiologist to avoid making wrong diagnosis.

Objective to probe the potential application and advantages of heuristic method in the film-reading session of Imaging Radiology.Methods 66 eight-year program clinical medical juniors in the grade of 2008 to 2010 in Beijing University were selected as the subject and were evenly divided into two groups.Experimental group(n=33) was taught with heuristic method,in which the teacher ask questions and lead the students to find the way to solve problems in the way of clinical thinking mode.Control group(n=33) was taught with didactic method.The analysis of final examination of radiology course and an anonymous questionnaire survey were carried out at the end of semester,and the questionnaire survey to the students in grade 2008 and 2009 was conducted again after 1 years of their clinical practice.Results The score of students in experimental group were higher than those of control group (P=0.015,0.001,0.026 for the students in the grade of 2008,2009 and 2010 seperately).The two survey shows that the experimental group is better than the control group in the aspects of learning interest,clinical thinking ability,clinical application ability,solving difficult problem ability and language expression ability.Conclusion In the medical imaging practice teaching for clinical medical specialty undergraduate,the reasonable application of heuristic teaching,helps to improve students' learning enthusiasm and initiative,helps to cultivate medical students' ability of clinical application,and at the same time,can also improve teachers' teaching level.

Objective To review the serial CT findings of cryptogenic organizing pneumonia(COP)and semiquantitatively analyze the changes after corticosteroid therapy.Methods The clinical and radiological features of 13 patients with COP confirmed by pathology were retrospectively collected and analyzed.The lung lesions extent on CT scans was estimated using semi-quantitative method.Changes of overall disease extent were evaluated by comparing the initial CT images and the follow-up CT scans after corticosteroid therapy.Results CT images of all cases revealed diffuse and bilateral lesions,mainly located in lower zone,distributed as predominantly subpleural and(or)along the bronchovascular bundle.The two most common manifestations of lung abnormality on initial scans were ground-glass opacity(GGO)(13 cases)and consolidation(12 cases),the average areas of which were 13％ and 10％ respectively.The treatment with antibiotics was ineffective.After treatment with corticosteroid,the lesions resolved completely in 2 patients ; the disease was decreased in extent in 8 patients ; and the lesion showed no change in extent in one patient,while the disease progressed in extent in 2 patients on follow-up CT.The most common CT findings were GGO(10 cases)and reticulation(5 cases),followed by consolidation(4 cases),the average areas of which were 19％,2％ and 1％ respectively.Conclusion The CT features of the patients with COP are characteristic.The most lesions resolved or improved after corticosteroid therapy on follow-up CT scans.The estimation of disease extent with semi-quantitative method is helpful for the clinicians to evaluate the therapeutic effect.

Objective To establish classification and regression tree (CART) for differentiating benign from malignant solitary pulmonary nudules (SPN).Methods One hundred and sixteen consecutive cases with 116 solitary pulmonary nodules,which finally were pathologically proven 54 malignant nodules and 62 benign nodules,were prospectively registered in this research.Twelve clinical presentations and 22 CT findings were collected as predictors.A classification tree was established to distinguish benign SPNs from malignant ones.In the observer test,two groups (one made of junior radiologists and one of senior radiologists) were independently presented with clinical information and CT images without knowing the pathologic and machine-learning results.Performance of observers and CART were compared by receiver operating characteristic analysis.Results Receiver operating characteristic analysis showed areas under the curve of CART,senior radiologists and junior radiologists respectively were 0.910±0.029,0.827±0.038,0.612±0.052. Difference between areas (DBF) between CART and junior radiologists was 0.297 (P＜0.01).DBF between CART and senior radiologists was 0.083(P＜0.05).DBF between senior and junior radiologists was 0.214(P＜0.01).CART showed a best diagnostic efficiency,followed by junior radiologists,and then senior radiologists.Conclusion Our data mining techniques using CART prove a high accuracy in differentiating benign from malignant pulmonary nodules based on clinical variables and CT findings.It will be a potentially useful tool in further application of artificial intelligence in the imaging diagnosis.

Objective To study the diagnosis and treatment of Mycobacterium avium complex lung disease with severe renal insufficiency,and to provide a basis for improving the clinical diagnosis and treatment of MAC lung disease with severe renal insufficiency.Methods Clinical data of an elderly patient with MAC lung disease confirmed by induced sputum culture and complicated with chronic kidney disease (CKD 4) was reported.The related literatures at home and abroad were reviewed.Results A male patient aged 80 years with poor nutrition was suffering from progressive weight loss,exhaustion and night sweats.His weight was only 43-44 Kg.Chest CT showed that multiple small nodules,small spot pieces of shadow and ground glass shadows in bilateral lung tissues.PET/CT indicated that spot pieces and nodules with metabolic activity in high performance.Bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) inspection was negative.MAC was identified by induced sputum culture through high permeability brine induced sputum.It was difficult to choose drugs for the treatment of MAC lung disease due to his poor kidney function [GFR of left kidney:9.0 ml /min,GFR of right kidney:18.8 ml/min].Conventional anti-mycobacterium drugs showed a low to high resistance to MAC.Moxifloxacin was discontinued for renal insufficiency.His condition was stable after choosing trimodality therapy including azithromycin 0.25 g/d tiw,rifapentine 0.3 g/d biw,ethambutol 0.375 g /d tiw and the joining immunotherapy.Conclusions PET/ CT is not useful in identifying tuberculosis and MAC lung disease.The treatment of MAC lung disease is difficult in elderly patients with severe renal insufficiency and low weight.Individual therapy combined with immunotherapy and improving the nutrition state is a good choice for the treatment of MAC lung disease in elderly patients with severe renal insufficiency.The anti-MAC drugs should be carefully selected and the adverse reactions should be closely observed in order to obtain the satisfactory clinical results.

Objective To evaluate the role of CT or Chest radiograph in diagnosis of chest wall tuberculosis.Methods The study population included 21 patients with chest wall tuberculosis confirmed by operation or biopsy. Chest radiograph and plain CT were performed in all cases, while enhanced CT in 9 cases , and all images were reviewed by 2 radiologists.Results Single soft tissue mass of the chest wall was detected in all cases on CT, but not on chest radiograph(?2=42.000,P

Diabetic nephropathy is a microvascular complication in the advanced stage of diabetes. About 20%-40% of patients with diabetes will progress to diabetic nephropathy. And worldwide, diabetic nephropathy has become the leading cause of end-stage renal disease. Animal model is a useful tool to study the pathogenesis and treatment of diabetic nephropathy. Currently, the commonly used diabetic nephropathy models all simulate partial characteristics of human diabetic nephropathy in different degrees of pathophysiology. However, the research on diabetic nephropathy has not achieved considerable progress. The main obstacle is that there is no effective animal model that can fully simulate all the characteristics of human diabetic nephropathy. In this paper, the animal models of diabetic nephropathy were reviewed from the aspects of modeling mechanism, pathophysiology, their advantages and disadvantages.

OBJECTIVE: To compare the clinical utility of the different imaging techniques used for the evaluation of tracheobronchial diseases. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Forty-one patients with tracheobronchial diseases [tuberculosis (n = 18), bronchogenic carcinoma (n = 10), congenital abnormality (n = 3), post-operative stenosis (n = 2), and others (n = 8)] underwent chest radi-ography and spiral CT. Two sets of scan data were obtained: one from routine thick-section axial images and the other from thin-section axial images. Multiplanar reconstruction (MPR) and shaded surface display (SSD) images were obtained from thin-section data. Applying a 5-point scale, two observers compared chest radiography, routine CT, thin-section spiral CT, MPR and SSD imaging with regard to the detection, localization, extent, and characterization of a lesion, information on its relationship with adjacent structures, and overall information. RESULTS: SSD images were the most informative with regard to the detection (3.95 +/-0.31), localization (3.95 +/-0.22) and extent of a lesion (3.85 +/-0.42), and overall information (3.83 +/-0.44), while thin-section spiral CT scans provided most information regarding its relationship with adjacent structures (3.56 +/-0.50) and characterization of the lesion (3.51 +/-0.61). CONCLUSION: SSD images and thin-section spiral CT scans can provide valuable information for the evaluation of tracheobronchial disease.
Bronchial Diseases/*radiography ; Comparative Study ; Female ; Human ; *Imaging, Three-Dimensional ; Male ; Middle Age ; *Tomography, X-Ray Computed/methods ; Tracheal Diseases/*radiography

BACKGROUND:Gut microbiota is closely related to host energy balance and metabolism.The metabolites of intestinal flora can regulate the occurrence and development of obesity and can be a new target for the prevention and treatment of obesity. OBJECTIVE:To summarize the interaction between the intestinal flora and obesity,as well as the specific mechanism underlying regulation of obesity by metabolites of intestinal flora,thereby providing a new reference and basis for the prevention and treatment of obesity. METHODS:"Intestinal microbiota,intestinal bacteria,intestinal microbiota metabolites,short-chain fatty acids,bile acids,ipopolysaccharide,trimethylamine N-oxide,medium-chain fatty acids,tryptophan derivatives,obesity"were used as search terms in Chinese and English.Literature related to obesity from 1990 to 2022 was retrieved in PubMed and CNKI databases.According to inclusion and exclusion criteria,88 articles were finally selected. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION:Intestinal flora is closely related to the occurrence and development of obesity.For example,changes in the Firmicutes to Bacteroidetes ratio can be used as a biomarker for the diagnosis of obesity,and the occurrence of obesity can be delayed by the colonization of probiotics such as Bifidobacterium breve,Lactobacillus and Akkermansia.Intestinal flora is mainly mediated by the metabolites of intestinal flora to participate in the regulation of obesity.For example,short-chain fatty acid can regulate adipogenesis by regulating signaling pathways such as G protein-coupled receptors 41,43 and peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ,thus delaying the occurrence and development of obesity.Bile acids can increase insulin sensitivity and body energy expenditure by promoting the activation of G protein-coupled receptor 5 and farnesol X receptor.In addition,lipopolysaccharide,trimethylamine oxide,medium-chain fatty acids and tryptophan derivatives are also widely involved in the occurrence and development of obesity through various signaling pathways.Further studies have found that metabolites of the same bacterial community exert heterogeneous effects in the specific process of regulating obesity via different signaling pathways.For example,under the influence of high-fat diet,acetic acids can activate the parasympathetic nervous system,leading to hyperphagia and liver insulin resistance and thus accelerating the physiological course of obesity.