Objective To measure serum levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25HVD) in patients with chronic urticaria (CU),and to explore its role in the occurrence of CU.Methods Peripheral blood samples were obtained from 50 patients with CU and 40 healthy controls.The urticaria activity score (UAS) was used to assess the severity of CU and to group the patients with CU.Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) was performed to measure the serum levels of 25HVD,interferon-γ (IFN-γ),interleukin-4 (IL-4) and immunoglobulin E (IgE).Statistical analysis was carried out by t test,rank sum test and linear correlation analysis.Results The serum level of 25HVD was significantly lower in the patients with CU than in the healthy controls (15.20 ± 7.72 vs.21.54 ± 8.31 μg/L,t =3.75,P ＜ 0.05).Moreover,there was a significant difference in the distribution of serum 25HVD levels between the patients and healthy controls (H =17.9,P ＜ 0.05).However,no significant difference was observed in the serum level of 25HVD between severe and mild CU groups (15.57 ± 7.38 vs.14.86 ± 6.28 μg/L,t =0.37,P ＞ 0.05).Compared with the control group,the patient group showed significantly decreased serum levels of IFN-γ (t =15.34,P ＜ 0.05),but increased serum levels of IL-4 and IgE (t =6.54,4.88,respectively,both P ＜ 0.05).Among the patients with CU,the serum level of 25HVD was positively correlated with that of IFN-γ(r =0.738,P ＜ 0.05),but negatively correlated with that of IL-4 (r =-0.689,P ＜ 0.05),and uncorrelated with that of IgE (r =-0.271,P ＞ 0.05).Conclusion The serum level of 25HVD evidently decreased in patients with CU,and it may participate in the occurrence of CU by mediating the Th 1/Th2 imbalance.

Gene co-expression network (GCN) mining identifies gene modules with highly correlated expression profiles across samples/conditions. It enables researchers to discover latent gene/molecule interactions, identify novel gene functions, and extract molecular features from certain disease/condition groups, thus helping to identify disease bio-markers. However, there lacks an easy-to-use tool package for users to mine GCN modules that are relatively small in size with tightly connected genes that can be convenient for downstream gene set enrichment analysis, as well as modules that may share common members. To address this need, we developed an online GCN mining tool package:TSUNAMI (Tools SUite for Network Analysis and MIning). TSUNAMI incorporates our state-of-the-art lmQCM algorithm to mine GCN modules for both public and user-input data (microarray, RNA-seq, or any other numerical omics data), and then performs downstream gene set enrichment analysis for the identified modules. It has several features and advantages:1) a user-friendly interface and real-time co-expression network mining through a web server;2) direct access and search of NCBI Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) and The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) databases, as well as user-input gene ex-pression matrices for GCN module mining; 3) multiple co-expression analysis tools to choose from, all of which are highly flexible in regards to parameter selection options;4) identified GCN modules are summarized to eigengenes, which are convenient for users to check their correlation with other clinical traits;5) integrated downstream Enrichr enrichment analysis and links to other gene set enrichment tools;and 6) visualization of gene loci by Circos plot in any step of the process. The web service is freely accessible through URL:https://biolearns.medicine.iu.edu/. Source code is available at https://github.com/huangzhii/TSUNAMI/.

Objective:To explore the competitive attitude of students of medical college and its influencing factors.Methods:A sample of 382 first to third year medical students was selected with the method of random sampling. The questionnaire consists of three parts: demographics, Competitive Attitude Scale of Chinese Version and Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy. SPSS 25.0 was applied to perform the statistical analysis. Concrete methods that used involved statistical interpretation, Kruskal-Wallis test, Mann-Whitney U test and Spearman rank sum correlation analysis. Results:The benign competitive attitude of students was 51.00(45.00，56.00) and the excessive competitive attitude was 35.00(31.00，38.00). There was a statistically significant difference in the score of benign competitive attitude among medical students of different grades( H=22.31, P<0.001). There were statistically significant differences in the scores of benign competitive attitudes among the medical students who enjoy teamwork ( Z=-4.53, P<0.001), who had role models to follow in the medical field ( Z=-3.99, P<0.001), and who had careful career planning ( Z=-2.19, P=0.029). There were statistically significant differences in the scores of excessive competitive attitudes among the medical students who enjoy teamwork ( Z=-2.47, P=0.014), who had role models to follow in the medical field ( Z=-2.89, P=0.004), and who had careful career planning ( Z=-2.32, P=0.021). There was a weak positive correlation between empathy and benign competitive attitude ( r=0.20, P<0.001), but a negative correlation between empathy and excessive attitude ( r=-0.36, P<0.001). Conclusions:Medical students had a good competitive attitude. Medical college should pay more attention to improving medical students' sense of teamwork, career planning ability and willingness to learn from role models, guide students to develop a benign competitive attitude and focus on improving their professional quality.

The bromodomain and extraterminal domain (Bet) family are the regulators of the epigenome and also the pivotal driving factors for the expression of tumor related genes that tumor cells depend on for survival and proliferation. Bromodomain-containing protein 4 (Brd4) is a member of the Bet protein family. Generally, Brd4 identifies acetylated histones and binds to the promoter or enhancer region of target genes to initiate and maintain expression of tumor related genes. Brd4 is closely related to the regulation of multiple transcription factors and chromatin modification and is involved in DNA damage repair and maintenance of telomere function, thus maintaining the survival of tumor cells. This review summarizes the structure and function of Brd4 protein and the application of its inhibitors in tumor research.
Humans ; Transcription Factors/metabolism* ; Nuclear Proteins/metabolism* ; Histones ; Cell Cycle Proteins/metabolism* ; Neoplasms/metabolism* ; Protein Domains

Humans ; Uric Acid ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Spondylarthritis/diagnostic imaging* ; C-Reactive Protein ; Spondylitis, Ankylosing