Objective To observe the effect of the soft tissues injury around atlantoaxial joint on memory abilities of mice.Methods 44 mice were divided into the model group and control group with 22 animals in each group.The soft tissues around atlantoaxial joint were injured in the model group by surgery between the first and the second cervical vertebrae.The changes of learning and memory of mice were observed with step-down avoidance test,water-maze test and hole-board test;the expression of caspase-3 in hippocampus was observed by immunohistochemical staining.Results Compared with the control group,escape latency was longer and wrong times were more in water-maze test of the model group(P<0.01). In step-down avoidance test of the model group,the reaction period prolonged and wrong times increased obviously(P<0.01).In hole-board test,the latency period prolonged and the times of extending the holes decreased significantly(P<0.01).Degenerated or dead neuron in hippocampus of surgery-treated mice was found scatteredly or continuously with HE staining,the expression of caspase-3 protein was showed positive with immunohistochemical staining.Conclusion The soft tissues injury arround atlantoaxial joint can induce abnormality of the stability of cervical vertebra,which aggravated the aging process of the mice and decreased abilities of learning and memory.

ObjectiveTo observe the 2-8 years' follow-up results of percutaneous laser disc decompression(PLDD) on cervical spondylotic radiculopathy,and to identify factors affecting the outcome of PLDD.MethodsEighty-seven patients with cervical spondylotic radiculopathy were treated consecutively by PLDD in our hospital from December 2002 to June 2009,who were followed up for 2-8 years.There were 32males and 26 females,with the mean age of 51.8 years (range,26-74).The results were evaluated according to the Japanese Orthopedic Association's score of cervical spondylotic radiculopathy(JOA 20 score) and numeric rating scales (NRS) after surgery.Two years after the operation,the excellent and good rate of JOA score of patients with different genders,ages and duration of each subgroup will be compared.ResultsThe excellent and good rate were 37.9％,51.7％,65.5％,81.0％,82.8％,80.9％,72.4％ and 72.7％ at 1,3,6months and 1,2,4,6,8 years after operation respectively.Significant difference was found between the time points of 6 months to eight years after operation and that of one month after operation.The NRS score of the pain symptoms at the final follow-up was significantly reduced(P＜0.05).The excellent and good rate of patients whose course of disease (93.3％) was less than 18 months was significantly higher than that of those whose course of disease was over than 18 months(71.4％) two years after operation (P＜0.05).Conclusion The intermediate-term curative effect of PLDD for the treatment of cervical spondylotic radiculopathy is reliable and stable,and the postoperative curative effect may be influenced by patients' duration of disease.

Objective To establish a mouse model of acute liver failure induced by lipopolysaccharide /D-galac-tosamine ( LPS/D-GalN) .Methods The optimum dose of LPS/D-GalN was determined by i .p.injection of eight differ-ent doses of LPS and D-GalN into 40 female C57BL/6 mice and observation of their survival time .Then, 32 female C57BL/6 mice were i.p.injected with the optimal dose of LPS/D-GalN and sacrificed at 0, 1, 4, 8 hours after the injec-tion, 8 mice in each group.The control mice received saline injection .Hepatic changes were observed by pathology and se-rum ALT, IL-6, MCP-1 and TNF-αwere measured by biochemistry or flow cytometry .Results LPS (2.5 mg/kg) and D-GalN (0.3 g/kg) were determined as the optimal dose for the establishment of mouse model of acute liver injury .Com-pared with the control group , the hepatocellular damages were progressing in a positive correlation with the time course after LPS/D-GalN administration .The level of serum ALT was significantly increased after LPS/D-GalN administration ( P <0.001).The levels of inflammatory cytokines IL-6, MCP-1 and TNF-αwere increased and reached a peak at one hour after LPS/D-GalN administration and then decreased almost to that of the control group 8 hours later(P<0.001).Conclusions The mouse model of acute liver injury is successfully established by LPS /D-GalN administration , and provide an effective animal model for the study of pathogenic mechanisms of acute liver failure and evaluation of therapeutic drugs .

Objective To explore the neuroprotective effects ofβ-aescinate on brain edema in rats of traumatic brain injury (TBI). Methods A total of 78 male SD (Sprague Dawley) rats were randomly divided into three groups: sham-operation group (Sham), traumatic brain injury group (TBI) andβ-aescinate group, with 26 rats in each group. Rats of Sham group were anesthetized and surgically prepared only, but were not induced by cortical contusion. Electronic brain cortical damage impactor (eCCI) was used for establishing TBI model in TBI group and β-aescinate group after opening the bone window. TBI group was only established TBI model, but no intervention. After establishment of TBI model in β-aescinate group, β-aescinate (5 mg/kg body weight) was intraperitoneally injected, once every 24 hours. The modified neurological severity scores (mNSS) was used for evaluating changes of neurological function. After 48 hours, SD rats were sacrificed for hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) staining (n=6). Additionally, water content of the brain tissue was evaluated using the wet-to-dry weight ratio (n=10). Evans blue assay was performed to investigate the blood-brain barrier (BBB) permeability (n=4). The expression of aquaporin 4 (AQP4) was measured by Western blot assay (n=6). Results Compared with the Sham group, neurologic deficit, increased brain water content and the expression of AQP4 were found in TBI group (all P<0.05). Moreover, BBB permeability was destroyed. However, β-aescinate can improve the neurological function, reduce the brain water content and significantly decrease the expression of AQP4 in TBI rats. The BBB permeability was significantly improved in treatment group (all P<0.05). Conclusion These findings suggest that β-aescinate can reduce cerebral edema and improve neurological outcome in SD rats after TBI. This neuroprotection may be related with the down-regulation of AQP4 protein.

Bone is a load-bearing organ in human body. Fatigue damage occurs readily at the modest loads to which bone is subjected during its habitual physiological usage. Even bone fracture may occur during vigorous activity. The nature of fatigue damage is that in bone there are very fine microcracks which are smaller than typical microcracks, and may occur at the level of hydroxyapatite crystals. But bone can repair microdamage by bone remodeling. Osteocytes play an important role of signaling during bone remodeling. Some researchers attempted to describe the process of bone fatigue damage and repair by mathematic, mechanical models in order to understand it well and to apply it well in clinical practice.
Animals ; Bone Remodeling ; physiology ; Bone Resorption ; pathology ; physiopathology ; Bone and Bones ; cytology ; injuries ; physiology ; Fractures, Stress ; pathology ; physiopathology ; Humans ; Models, Biological ; Stress, Mechanical

Objective To analyze and compare the pathological changes of lung tissue in mice infected with the novel H7N9 influenza virus and 2009 pandemic H1N1 influenza virus, respectively, and to preliminarily study the mecha-nisms of acute lung injury induced by those virus infection .Methods SPF 6-week old BALB/c mice ( body weight 18-20 g, male∶female=1∶1) (n=3 in each subgroup) were intranasally infected with H7N9 virus and H1N1 virus, respec-tively.The behavior and survival time of mice after virus infection were observed and the survival rates were analyzed .The heart, liver, spleen, lung, kidney, intestines, and brain were collected at indicated time points for histopathological exami-nation using H&E staining .The distribution of virus antigen was detected by immunohistochemistry .The neutrophil infiltra-tion was also observed .The correlation of lung injury with virus replication and host immune responses was analyzed .Re-sults The lung and spleen injury of mice infected with H 7N9 virus was slighter and their survival rate (100%) was high-er than those of mice infected with H1N1 virus.The damages of the lung and spleen in H1N1virus-infected mice were more severe than that in H7N9 virus-infected mice, and all the 10 mice in this group died within 9 days after virus inoculation . The distributions of both the virus antigens were mainly in the bronchial epithelial cells , a few stromal cells and alveolar ep-ithelial cells .The levels of virus replication in the two groups were not significantly different .There were more intense neu-trophil infiltration in the lung and inflammatory response in the H 1N1 virus-infected mice than those in the H7N9 virus-in-fected mice .Conclusions There are some differences of the pathological characteristics and extent of lung injury in the mice infected with H7N9 virus and H1N1 virus, respectively.The virus replication is a precipitating factor but not the deci-sive factor of the lung injury , and there is a close relationship between the host immune responses and acute lung injury .

BACKGROUNDIt is well known that more than 40% patients were initially diagnosed with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with intrapulmonary or/and distant metastasis. However, up to now, the reports about effects of different metastatic sites on survival were limited. The aim of this study is to investigate the clinicopathologic and survival difference by retrospective analysis among sole intrapulmonary metastasis, sole extrathoracic distant metastasis and simultaneous metastasis of lung and other extrathoracic organs for the patients with advanced NSCLC, and to analyze the prognosis-related factors of NSCLC with intrapulmonary metastasis.

METHODSOf the 425 patients with stage IV NSCLC diagnosed by pathology and through staging evaluation and treated at Beijing Cancer Hospital with long follow-up during Oct. 1995 to Dec. 2003, 81 cases had sole intrapulmonary metastasis, 98 cases had sole extrathoracic distant metastasis and 68 cases presented simultaneous lung metastasis and extrathoracic spread. Kaplan-Meier survival curve was performed to estimate the survival of patients with different metastasis, Log-Rank test was used to compare their survival difference, and univariate analysis was used to find prognostic related factors.

RESULTSMedian survival time (MST) and 1-, 2-, 3-year survival rate (SR) for patients with sole intrapulmonary metastasis were 13 months (95% CI: 11-15), 57%, 21%, 7%, respectively; MST was 22 months (95% CI: 18-26) for patients with N1 and/or N2 and 10 months (95%CI: 7-13) for patients with N3 (P=0.001). Among the patients with ipsilateral, contralateral and bilateral intrapulmonary metastasis, difference of MST and 1-, 2-, 3-year SR had no statistical significance (P > 0.05); Survival of patients with sole intrapulmonary metastasis was not significantly different from that of patients with sole brain or bone metastasis (P > 0.05), but was longer than that of patients with simultaneous lung and extrathoracic spread (P=0.021). One way analysis of variance showed that no significant association were found among age, pathologic subtype, differentiation degree or response of first-line chemotherapy and survival of the patients with sole intrapulmonary metastasis (P > 0.05), but sex and invasive status of lymph node (N1/N2 vs N3) were found to influence the survival of the patients (P= 0.018, P=0.001). Further stratified analysis by age showed that invasion of lymph node was independent prognostic factor (P=0.002); whereas for the patients with simultaneous metastasis of lung and distant organs, metastatic numbers (2 vs ≥3) of organ were independent prognostic factor (P=0.013).

CONCLUSIONSNo statistical difference is found among survival of NSCLC patients with sole intrapulmonary metastasis and with sole brain, bone metastasis. Invasive status of lymph node and metastatic number of organ are important prognostic factors for patients with sole intrapulmonary metastasis and simultaneous metastasis of lung and extrathoracic organs, respectively.

OBJECTIVETo investigate the metabolites in rat urine after orally administrating gossypetin-8-O-beta-D-glucuronide.

METHODGossypetin-8-O-beta-D-glucuronide was administrated orally at the dose of 250 mg x kg(-1) to healthy rats, then the urine was collected, pre-treated appropriately and detected by HPLC-DAD-MS(n).

RESULTIn the rat urine, gossypetin-8-O-beta-D-glucuronide, along with 6 metabolites, were detected, and their structures were elucidated on the basis of reference standards, UV and MS(n) spectra. The metabolic pathways of gossypetin-8-O-beta-D-glucuronide included mainly deglycosylation, glucuronidation and methylation.

CONCLUSIONA rapid and sensitive method for the analysis of metabolites in rat urine after orally administrating gossypetin-8-O-beta-D-glucuronide was established and this will be useful for the further metabolism study of gossypetin-8-O-beta-D-glucuronide.

Administration, Oral ; Animals ; Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid ; Flavonoids ; administration & dosage ; metabolism ; Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy ; Male ; Rats ; Rats, Sprague-Dawley

Objective The aim of this study is to explore the changes of expression of integrin αvβ3 in bovine u-terine epithelial cells in vitro induced by estrogen or/and progesterone alone or in combination,and to provide a new refer-ence marker for determining bovine uterine receptivity state. Methods RT-PCR was used to analyze the transcriptional changes of αvβ3 expression in bovine endometrium treated by different concentrations of estrogen,progesterone alone or in combination. Results The expression of integrin αvβ3 reached the highest level when the culture medium was added with progesterone at the concentration of 10 -7mg/mL,and the expression of αv and β3 in the 10 -7mg/mL concentration group was significantly higher than that of the control one(P<0.05). Moreover,the expression of αv was highest in the 10 -10 mg/mL E2group,but the expression of β3 was the lowest in that one. In addition,adding with both estrogen and progester-one,the transcriptional level of integrin αvβ3 was significantly higher than that in the control one. The transcriptional level of αv in the treatment group was significantly higher than that in the control group(P<0.05),but the transcriptional level of β3 in this group was not(P>0.05). Conclusions It can be concluded that integrin αvβ3 can be used as a new poten-tial reference marker gene for detecting the bovine uterine receptive status.

Objective To compare the difference of diagnostic ability between ultrasound radiomics ( USR) and different conventional imaging models of central neck ( Ⅵ ) lymph node metastasis in papillary thyroid carcinoma ( PTC) . Methods A training set of 609 cases was set up . USR features were extracted and screened by USR method . A weighted formula was established to calculate the USR score of each patient by ultrasound image . T he USR score of the best diagnostic ability was obtained by statistical method and set as the diagnostic criterion . A test set of 326 cases was established to compare the diagnostic ability of USR score with ultrasound ( US ) ,computed tomography ( CT ) and US combined CT . Results T he accuracy ,sensitivity ,specificity ,area under ROC curve and Youden index of USR score in test set were 0 .804 ,0 .867 ,0 .770 ,0 .766 ,0 .533 ,respectively ,which were significantly higher than the corresponding values of US ,CT and US combined CT ( all P ＝ 0 .000 ) . Conclusions USR score obtained with USR method can effectively predict lymph node metastasis in Ⅵ region of PTC . T he diagnostic efficiency and clinical value of USR score were significantly higher than those of conventional medical imaging models .