1.Characteristic volatile organic compounds in exhaled breath of coal workers' pneumoconiosis patients by thermal desorption gas chromatography-mass spectrometry
Yazhen HE ; Chunguang DING ; Junyun WANG ; Yuzhen FENG ; Fangda PENG ; Gaisheng LIU ; Fan YANG ; Chunmin ZHANG ; Rui GAO ; Qingyu MENG ; Zhijun WU ; Jingguang FAN
Journal of Environmental and Occupational Medicine 2025;42(5):571-577
Background Coal workers' pneumoconiosis is a serious occupational disease in China. Exhaled volatile organic compounds (VOCs) can serve as the "breath fingerprint" of internal pathological processes, which provides a theoretical basis for exhaled VOCs to be used as potential non-invasive biomarkers for early diagnosis of coal workers' pneumoconiosis. Objective To screen out the characteristic VOCs and important characteristic VOCs of exhaled air in patients with coal workers' pneumoconiosis, and to explore the potential of these VOCs as biomarkers for early non-invasive diagnosis of the disease. Methods In this study, 27 VOCs in the exhaled breath of 22 patients with stage I coal workers' pneumoconiosis, 77 workers exposed to dust, and 92 healthy controls were quantitatively detected by thermal desorption gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (TD-GC-MS). Substances with P<0.05 in univariate analysis and variable importance projection (VIP) >1 in supervised orthogonal partial least squares discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA) model were selected as the characteristic VOCs for early diagnosis of coal workers' pneumoconiosis. Age was included in the LASSO regression model as a covariate to screen out important characteristic VOCs, and the diagnostic performance was evaluated by receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. Spearman correlation was further used to explore the correlation between important characteristic VOCs and clinical lung function indicators. Results Through univariate analysis and OPLS-DA modeling, 8 VOCs were selected, including 2-methylpentane, 3-methylpentane, n-hexane, methylcyclopentane, n-heptane, methylcyclohexane, 4-methyl-2-pentanone, and 2-hexanone, in exhaled breath of patients with coal workers' pneumoconiosis. The concentrations of 4 VOCs, including 3-methylpentane, n-hexane, 4-methyl-2-pentanone, and 2-hexanone, showed a decreasing trend with the increase of dust exposure years. By LASSO regression, the important characteristic VOCs of the coal workers' pneumoconiosis group and the dust exposure group were n-hexane, methylcyclohexane and 4-methyl-2-pentanone, and the important characteristic VOCs of the coal workers' pneumoconiosis group and the healthy group were 2-methyl-pentane and 4-methyl-2-pentanone. The ROC analysis showed that the area under the curve (AUC) of n-hexane, methylcyclohexane, and 4-methyl-2-pentanone were 0.969, 0.909, and 0.956, respectively, and the AUC of combined diagnosis was 0.988 and its Youden index was 0.961, suggesting that these results can serve as a valuable reference for further research on early diagnosis. The Correlation analysis found that there was a positive correlation between n-hexane and lung function indicators in the important characteristic VOCs, indicating that it could indirectly reflect the obstruction of lung function ventilation, further proving that important characteristic VOCs have the potential to monitor lung function decline. Conclusion Three important characteristic VOCs selected in this study have the potential to be used as non-invasive biomarkers for early diagnosis and disease monitoring of coal workers' pneumoconiosis, and are worthy of further study and verification.
2.The expression of YTHDF2 in cervical lesions and its relationship with prognosis based on bioinformatics
Yushu PENG ; Nan TIAN ; Xinlin FENG ; Rui ZHANG ; Zhaoxia RAN ; Jintao WANG ; Weihong ZHAO ; Zhiqiang TIAN ; Ling DING
Chinese Journal of Epidemiology 2025;46(2):280-287
Objective:To investigate the role of YTHDF2 in cervical lesions and its potential molecular mechanism.Methods:Gene expression data of cervical tissue were obtained from the GEO database to analyze the expression of YTHDF2 mRNA and perform pathway enrichment analysis. Patients with cervical lesions diagnosed by thinprep cytologic test in Gynecological Outpatient Department of Maternal and Child Health Hospital in Jiexiu, Shanxi Province, were selected as the research subjects. Data of cervical lesions and cervical exfoliated cells were collected. HPV infection status was detected by flow-through hybridization, and the expression of YTHDF2 mRNA was detected by reverse transcription real-time polymerase chain reaction. The expression of YTHDF2 in cervical lesions and the mediating role of HPV infection in the relationship between YTHDF2 and squamous intraepithelial lesion (SIL) were evaluated. YTHDF2-related genes were screened from multiple datasets in the GEO and ENCORI databases, and their expression, immune infiltration, and survival analysis were performed to assess the association between YTHDF2 and prognosis. Results:Compared with normal cervical tissue, YTHDF2 was highly expressed in cervical lesion tissue ( P<0.05). A total of 3 672 differentially expressed genes were screened from the dataset GSE49339. Gene Ontology analysis showed that YTHDF2 was mainly involved in transcription regulation. Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes analysis showed that YTHDF2 might be related to HPV infection and other signaling pathways. In the mediation analysis, χ2 test results showed that the expression level of YTHDF2 was significantly different among groups ( χ2=22.47, P<0.001). Trend χ2 test further showed that the expression level of YTHDF2 was upregulated with the degree of cervical precancerous lesions (trend χ2=10.26, P=0.001). Multivariate logistic regression analysis indicated that high YTHDF2 expression increased the risk of low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions ( OR=3.15, 95% CI: 1.93-5.15) and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions ( OR=1.85, 95% CI: 1.01-3.39). Mediation effect analysis revealed a partial mediating effect of HPV infection between YTHDF2 and SIL, accounting for 32.02% of the total effect. Twelve YTHDF2 related genes were screened by the intersection of multiple datasets. The immune infiltration analysis results showed that YTHDF2 and related genes KLF4, E2F3 and HOXC6 were associated with immune infiltration (all P<0.05). Multivariate Cox proportional hazard regression model analysis showed that low expression of KLF4 ( HR=0.53, 95% CI: 0.30-0.94) and high expression of RHOB ( HR=1.80, 95% CI: 1.04-3.13) were risk factors for the prognosis of cervical cancer. Conclusion:YTHDF2 is highly expressed in cervical lesions and may have been involved in the regulation of HPV infection-related pathways and its downstream related genes are related to immune infiltration and prognosis of cervical cancer, providing a theoretical basis for the study of mechanisms related to cervical lesions.
3.Research progress of blood-nerve barrier in diabetic peripheral neuropathy
Rui DING ; Xiaoyan ZHAO ; Haoyue FENG ; Xitao MA ; Maoyi YANG ; Rensong YUE
Chinese Journal of Diabetes 2025;33(5):378-382
[Summary]Diabetic peripheral neuropathy(DPN)is one of the most common complications of diabetes.The blood nerve barrier(BNB)is a barrier structure located in peripheral nerve tissue,protecting nerve tissue from toxic substances in the blood and maintaining material exchange and information transmission between nerves and blood.Studies have shown that changes in BNB may be the initial event leading to the occurrence of DPN.After BNB is destroyed,blood-borne pathogens can directly damage peripheral nerves and cause DPN.This article will review the physiological and pathological characteristics of BNB,the relationship between BNB and DPN,and the research progress in targeting BNB for the treatment of DPN.
4.Bibliometric analysis of Chinese-language medical publications in inner mongolia from 2018 to 2022
Yingjie TIAN ; Rui FENG ; Shangyan MA ; Haitao DING ; Zhanguo WANG
Modern Hospital 2025;25(8):1305-1308,1312
Objective To evaluate the productivity,quality,and thematic focus of Chinese-language medical research from various regions and institutions across the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region between 2018 and 2022,providing guidance for the future development of regional medical science and technology.Methods Data were extracted from the China National Knowledge Infrastructure(CNKI)database,The extracted Chinese-language medical literature affiliated with institutions in Inner Mongolia from 2018 to 2022 was analyzed using bibliometric indicators:publication volume,journal quality,research disciplinary distribution,and regional/institutional contributions.Results A total of 17,098 articles were published over five years,with an average annual output of 3 420 papers.Core journals accounted for 30.96%,including 2.82% in the Chinese Science Citation Database(CSCD),9.14% in Peking University Core Journals,and 31.30% in science and technology core journals.General journals accounted for 68.14% .The predominant research focus was"medicine and health"(90.90% ),with Chinese medicine(22.03% ),internal medicine(16.98%),and oncology(16.46%)being the most represented disciplines.Regionally,Ho-hhot(47.73%),Baotou(24.93%),and Chifeng(8.79%)had the highest output.Most publications originated from tertiary hospitals,general hospitals,and higher education institutions.Among the top 20 contributing institutions,Inner Mongolia Medi-cal University(2 220 articles),its affiliated hospital(1 840 articles),and the Inner Mongolia People's Hospital(1 627 arti-cles)ranked on the top in publication volume.Conclusion The quality of the output research in Inner Mongolia requires further improvement,with notable regional disparities.It is recommended to strengthen research management,optimize resource alloca-tion,and promote technological innovation to address these challenges.
5.Teaching evaluation of immersive stomatological humanistic courses empowered by on-site teaching mode in museums
Geng DOU ; Jiani LIU ; Jing YU ; Rui HOU ; Ning YANG ; Feng DING ; Li'an WU ; Yimin ZHAO
STOMATOLOGY 2025;45(10):765-770
This study innovatively incorporates on-site teaching with the International Museum of Stomatology into the curriculum to establish an immersive and intuitive teaching mode,promoting education from both theoretical and practical dimensions.The teaching effect is comprehensively evaluated to explore the pathway to optimization.Multi-dimensional questionnaires are designed to collect feedback data from students on teaching satisfaction,knowledge mastery,professional identity,and humanistic literacy perception,fol-lowed by in-depth quantitative and qualitative analyses.The results demonstrate that this teaching mode significantly enhances literacy,playing a critical role in helping stomatological students fully understand professional knowledge and humanistic connotations while sub-stantially improving their professional identity.This teaching mode gives a direction for innovative stomatological education,holds sig-nificant importance for cultivating stomatological professionals with both clinical skills and humanistic literacy,possessing substantial potential for promotion,application,and further refinement.
6.The expression of YTHDF2 in cervical lesions and its relationship with prognosis based on bioinformatics
Yushu PENG ; Nan TIAN ; Xinlin FENG ; Rui ZHANG ; Zhaoxia RAN ; Jintao WANG ; Weihong ZHAO ; Zhiqiang TIAN ; Ling DING
Chinese Journal of Epidemiology 2025;46(2):280-287
Objective:To investigate the role of YTHDF2 in cervical lesions and its potential molecular mechanism.Methods:Gene expression data of cervical tissue were obtained from the GEO database to analyze the expression of YTHDF2 mRNA and perform pathway enrichment analysis. Patients with cervical lesions diagnosed by thinprep cytologic test in Gynecological Outpatient Department of Maternal and Child Health Hospital in Jiexiu, Shanxi Province, were selected as the research subjects. Data of cervical lesions and cervical exfoliated cells were collected. HPV infection status was detected by flow-through hybridization, and the expression of YTHDF2 mRNA was detected by reverse transcription real-time polymerase chain reaction. The expression of YTHDF2 in cervical lesions and the mediating role of HPV infection in the relationship between YTHDF2 and squamous intraepithelial lesion (SIL) were evaluated. YTHDF2-related genes were screened from multiple datasets in the GEO and ENCORI databases, and their expression, immune infiltration, and survival analysis were performed to assess the association between YTHDF2 and prognosis. Results:Compared with normal cervical tissue, YTHDF2 was highly expressed in cervical lesion tissue ( P<0.05). A total of 3 672 differentially expressed genes were screened from the dataset GSE49339. Gene Ontology analysis showed that YTHDF2 was mainly involved in transcription regulation. Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes analysis showed that YTHDF2 might be related to HPV infection and other signaling pathways. In the mediation analysis, χ2 test results showed that the expression level of YTHDF2 was significantly different among groups ( χ2=22.47, P<0.001). Trend χ2 test further showed that the expression level of YTHDF2 was upregulated with the degree of cervical precancerous lesions (trend χ2=10.26, P=0.001). Multivariate logistic regression analysis indicated that high YTHDF2 expression increased the risk of low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions ( OR=3.15, 95% CI: 1.93-5.15) and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions ( OR=1.85, 95% CI: 1.01-3.39). Mediation effect analysis revealed a partial mediating effect of HPV infection between YTHDF2 and SIL, accounting for 32.02% of the total effect. Twelve YTHDF2 related genes were screened by the intersection of multiple datasets. The immune infiltration analysis results showed that YTHDF2 and related genes KLF4, E2F3 and HOXC6 were associated with immune infiltration (all P<0.05). Multivariate Cox proportional hazard regression model analysis showed that low expression of KLF4 ( HR=0.53, 95% CI: 0.30-0.94) and high expression of RHOB ( HR=1.80, 95% CI: 1.04-3.13) were risk factors for the prognosis of cervical cancer. Conclusion:YTHDF2 is highly expressed in cervical lesions and may have been involved in the regulation of HPV infection-related pathways and its downstream related genes are related to immune infiltration and prognosis of cervical cancer, providing a theoretical basis for the study of mechanisms related to cervical lesions.
7.Research progress of blood-nerve barrier in diabetic peripheral neuropathy
Rui DING ; Xiaoyan ZHAO ; Haoyue FENG ; Xitao MA ; Maoyi YANG ; Rensong YUE
Chinese Journal of Diabetes 2025;33(5):378-382
[Summary]Diabetic peripheral neuropathy(DPN)is one of the most common complications of diabetes.The blood nerve barrier(BNB)is a barrier structure located in peripheral nerve tissue,protecting nerve tissue from toxic substances in the blood and maintaining material exchange and information transmission between nerves and blood.Studies have shown that changes in BNB may be the initial event leading to the occurrence of DPN.After BNB is destroyed,blood-borne pathogens can directly damage peripheral nerves and cause DPN.This article will review the physiological and pathological characteristics of BNB,the relationship between BNB and DPN,and the research progress in targeting BNB for the treatment of DPN.
8.Teaching evaluation of immersive stomatological humanistic courses empowered by on-site teaching mode in museums
Geng DOU ; Jiani LIU ; Jing YU ; Rui HOU ; Ning YANG ; Feng DING ; Li'an WU ; Yimin ZHAO
STOMATOLOGY 2025;45(10):765-770
This study innovatively incorporates on-site teaching with the International Museum of Stomatology into the curriculum to establish an immersive and intuitive teaching mode,promoting education from both theoretical and practical dimensions.The teaching effect is comprehensively evaluated to explore the pathway to optimization.Multi-dimensional questionnaires are designed to collect feedback data from students on teaching satisfaction,knowledge mastery,professional identity,and humanistic literacy perception,fol-lowed by in-depth quantitative and qualitative analyses.The results demonstrate that this teaching mode significantly enhances literacy,playing a critical role in helping stomatological students fully understand professional knowledge and humanistic connotations while sub-stantially improving their professional identity.This teaching mode gives a direction for innovative stomatological education,holds sig-nificant importance for cultivating stomatological professionals with both clinical skills and humanistic literacy,possessing substantial potential for promotion,application,and further refinement.
9.Bibliometric analysis of Chinese-language medical publications in inner mongolia from 2018 to 2022
Yingjie TIAN ; Rui FENG ; Shangyan MA ; Haitao DING ; Zhanguo WANG
Modern Hospital 2025;25(8):1305-1308,1312
Objective To evaluate the productivity,quality,and thematic focus of Chinese-language medical research from various regions and institutions across the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region between 2018 and 2022,providing guidance for the future development of regional medical science and technology.Methods Data were extracted from the China National Knowledge Infrastructure(CNKI)database,The extracted Chinese-language medical literature affiliated with institutions in Inner Mongolia from 2018 to 2022 was analyzed using bibliometric indicators:publication volume,journal quality,research disciplinary distribution,and regional/institutional contributions.Results A total of 17,098 articles were published over five years,with an average annual output of 3 420 papers.Core journals accounted for 30.96%,including 2.82% in the Chinese Science Citation Database(CSCD),9.14% in Peking University Core Journals,and 31.30% in science and technology core journals.General journals accounted for 68.14% .The predominant research focus was"medicine and health"(90.90% ),with Chinese medicine(22.03% ),internal medicine(16.98%),and oncology(16.46%)being the most represented disciplines.Regionally,Ho-hhot(47.73%),Baotou(24.93%),and Chifeng(8.79%)had the highest output.Most publications originated from tertiary hospitals,general hospitals,and higher education institutions.Among the top 20 contributing institutions,Inner Mongolia Medi-cal University(2 220 articles),its affiliated hospital(1 840 articles),and the Inner Mongolia People's Hospital(1 627 arti-cles)ranked on the top in publication volume.Conclusion The quality of the output research in Inner Mongolia requires further improvement,with notable regional disparities.It is recommended to strengthen research management,optimize resource alloca-tion,and promote technological innovation to address these challenges.
10.Determination of 27 volatile organic compounds in exhaled breath by thermal desorption-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry
Rui GAO ; Fangda PENG ; Yazhen HE ; Jie FENG ; Wubin LIU ; Lijia YU ; Qingsong CHEN ; Chunguang DING
Journal of Environmental and Occupational Medicine 2024;41(1):96-102
Background Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in exhaled breath are closely associated with respiratory diseases and are linked to various metabolic reactions in the human body. A quantitative analytical method can provide technical support for studying VOCs related to various diseases. Objective To establish a thermal desorption-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (TD-GC-MS) method for the determination of 27 VOCs in exhaled breath. Methods VOCs in exhaled breath were collected using a Bio-VOC sampler and enriched with Tenax TA thermal desorption tubes before TD-GC-MS analysis. Standards were collected using thermal desorption tubes and optimized for thermal desorption conditions as well as chromatographic and mass spectrometric conditions: The separation of the 27 VOCs was achieved by an optimized temperature program, the improvement of sensitivity by optimizing quantitative ions, and the increase of VOCs desorption efficiency by optimizing thermal desorption time and temperature. Limit of detection, limit of quantification, accuracy, precision, and stability of the proposed method were investigated by spiking with a blank gas bag, and exhaled breath samples from 20 healthy individuals were collected for an application study of the proposed method. Results The thermal desorption temperature was 280 ℃, and desorption time was 6 min. A VF-624ms chromatographic column was selected for the separation of target substances. The initial temperature of heating program was 35 ℃, maintained for 1 min, and then increased to 100 ℃ at a heating rate of 3 ℃·min−1 for 1 min, followed by increasing to 210 ℃ at a heating rate of 28 ℃·min−1 for 5 min. A quantitative analysis was conducted with a single ion monitoring (SIM) mode. Under these conditions, the 27 VOCs showed good linear relationships in their respective concentration ranges and the correlation coefficients were higher than 0.9990. The limits of detection of the method were in the range of 0.01-0.13 nmol·mol−1, the limits of quantification were in the range of 0.02-0.44 nmol·mol−1, and the spiked recoveries were in the range of 80.1%-120.5%, with intra-batch and inter-batch precision ≤ 18.8% and 17.9% respectively. All substances can be stored at room temperature (23-28 °C) for 7 d and at 4 °C for 14 d. The proposed method was applied to exhaled breath samples from 20 subjects with detection rates≥ 80% (except for trans-2-pentene and decane) and a concentration range of 0.00-465.50 nmol·mol−1. Conclusion The established TD-GC-MS method for quantification of VOCs in exhaled breath is characterized by high sensitivity and good accuracy, and is suitable for quantitative determination of VOCs in exhaled breath, which can provide technical support for the study of exhaled breath VOCs.

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