Objective:To investigate the expression of CXCR4/CXCL12 and effect on the expression of CXCR4 by hypoxia in trophoblasts of human first trimester gestation.Methods:To detect the expression of CXCR4 and CXCL12 in placental tissue and primary cytotrophoblasts by immunohistochemistry and to assess the level of CXCR4mRNA under the condition of hypoxia in the trophoblasts of first trimester gestation by reas-time PCR.Results:The expression of CXCR4/CXCL12 were detected in the villous column,blood vessels and trophoblasts in the early pregnancy;CXCR4 mRNA was significantly higher through 12,24,48 and 72 h incubation periods in the hypoxic condition than that under normal oxygen condition respectively.Conclusion:Human first trimester trophoblasts produced CXCR4/CXCL12,which may play important biological role on the normal human pregnancy;Hypoxia could regulate the expression of CXCR4,which may contribute to the physiological pregnancy process.

Molecular biology,one of the major branches of biochemistry,is quite abstract and abstruse for students.Fortunately with the help of multimedia,an effective teaching assistant method which enjoys great advantages,teachers can fully convey teaching ideas in a vivid picture.As a result,it will be much easier for students to follow teachers in class.

Aim To explore protective effect of Sanweitanxiang powder on isoproterenol-induced myocardial ischemia in rats, and its possible mechanism. Methods A myocardial ischemia model in rats was established by intraperitoneal injection of isoproterenol (Iso 5 mg?kg-1 once a day ,for 3 days). After ip 24 h, The levels of LDH、CK in serum and NOS、iNOS and NO in the myocardium tissue were measured. The myocardial area suffered from ischemia injury were determined. The changes of myocardial ultrastructure were observed with electron microscope. Results Compared with model group, the levels of LDH、CK and infarction size of myocardium were decreased. The concentrations of NOS, iNOS and NO in myocardium were less than those in the model group. The results of myocardial ultrastructure indicated that the partial mitochondria crista and myofibrils sprase, z band unaltered in Sanweitanxiang powder groups. Conclusion Sanweitanxiang powder has a significant protective effect on isoproterenol-induced myocardial injury in rats. By improving the energy metabolism of myocardium,the structure and function of mitochondria and reducing the NO release.

With the development of minimally invasive surgical technology, laparoscopic cholecysteeto-my, endoscopic retrograde cholangiopanereatography, endoscopic sphincterotomy and choledochoscopy were applied increasingly in the clinical practice. Based on the domestic and foreign literatures, this article re-viewes these minimally invasive surgical technologies.

Depression and insomnia are intimately related. Depressed patients usually manifest sleep discontinuity and early awakening, reduced or no slow wave sleep (SWS) and shortened latency of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. These sleep abnormalities are very similar to those caused by over activated hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis with stress. Therefore, the animal models developed by post-traumatic stress disorder or chronic unpredictable mild stress could be used to evaluate drugs which have effects of both anti-depression and improvement of sleep quality, and to provide a more reliable platform for further studis on the mechanisms of depression and accompanied insomnia. This review mainly focuses on the typical features of sleep disturbance of depression, possible pathophysiological mechanisms, establishment of animal stress models and analysis of their abnormal sleep characteristics.

Objective To evaluate the right ventricular (RV) systolic function in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) by speckle tracking imaging (STI).Methods A total of 40 cases with SLE were divided into two groups,SLE (24 cases) and SLE complicated with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) (16 cases).Meanwhile,35 healthy subjects were used as control group.Longitudinal peak systolic strain (PSS) of the basal,mid,apical segments of the free wall of right ventricular and interventricular septum and suben-docardial myocardium of the whole right ventricular were measured by STI respectively.Every parameter was compared.And the main factors affecting the strain of the whole right ventricule were analyzed.T test,one-way ANVOA,SNK-q,Spearman's correlation and Pearson's correlation analysis were used for statistical analysis.Results ① In SLE group,strains of the whole RV(GLS RV) [(-22±4)％] and all segments of RV wall[the basal segments of free wall (bas FW) (-27±8)％ were lower than that of the control group (-26±4)％,(-33±6)％,respectively (t=-4.815,P=0.000; t=-3.619,P=0.001)].Tricuspid valve orifice peak velocity E/A and right ventricular ejection fraction were significantly different between SLE group and control group (P＜0.05).② In terms of conventional parameters and the strain of all segments of RV wall,bas FW and GLS RV were different between the SLE group [(-30±7)％,(-23.7±3.5)％,respectively] and SLE with PAH group [(-22±6)％,(-18.4±2.3)％,respectively] (t=-3.581,P=0.001; t=-5.769,P=0.000).③ The RV anterior wall thickness of the moderate-severe subgroup was significantly higher than that of the mild group [(5.0±0.8) mm,(4.3±0.8) mm; t=-2.49,P=0.017].GLS RV[(-19±4)％,(-24±7)％;t=-3.016,P=0.015],bas FW [(-22±9)％,(-35±6)％; t=-3.125,P=0.03] and bas IVS [(-19±6)％,(-24±6)％; t=-2.272,P=0.029] were significantly lower than that of the mild group.Conclusion Right ventricular function is decreased in patients with SLE.STI can be used objectively to assess the right ventricular longitudinal systolic function.

Objective To observe changes of the right ventricular (RV) myocardial strain and the time to peak strain (ST) before and after anticoagulant and thrombolytic therapy in patients with acute pulmonary embolism (APE) by two dimension speckle tracking imaging (2D-STI).Methods A total of 25 patients with APE along with 30 age-matched and gender-matched normal subjects (as control group) were examined by echocardiography.And basal,mid,apical segments of right ventrieular wall and septum (6-segments) longitudinal peak systolic strain (PSS) and the time to peak strain (ST) were analyzed by 2D-STI.The mean and standard deviation (STsD) of 6-segmental ST were calculated.Results ①Compared with control group cases,PSS of 6-segments were significantly impaired in patients with APE (P ＜0.05).②The PSS of 6-segments in APE patients after treatment were significantly higher than that of before treatment (P ＜0.05).The PSS of apical segment of the right ventricular wall and interventricular septum in APE patients after treatment showed no significant difference with the control group (P ＞0.05).The PSS of other segments in APE patients were significantly lower than that of control group (all P ＜0.05).③The STsD of APE patients before and after treatment were significantly higher than that of the control group (P ＜0.05).Conclusions The PSS of 6-segments of RV were decreased in patients with APE and STsD were increased.After treatment,the PSS of APE patients were returned.However,the PSS in APE patients were not returned to normal.Two-dimension STI can objectively assess the curative effect of APE patients after treatment.

This study was aimed to observe the clinical efficacy of Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy (HAART) combined withPing-Ai(PA) Mixture in the treatment of Human Immunodeficiency Virus / Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS) patients with non-infectious skin lesions, in order to study the advantages of integrative medicine in AIDS prevention and treatment. A total of 9 cases, who met the inclusion criteria of AIDS-associated non-infectious skin lesion with the pattern ofqi-yin deficiency and internal obstruction of phlegm-stasis, were selected. The combination of HAART and number 1 and 4 prescription of PA Mixture were used in the treatment for 3 months. The observations were made on changes of clinical symptoms, body signs, Karovsky integral and CD4+ T cells of patients before and after treatment. Stata 12.0 was used in the statistical analysis. The results showed that after integrative therapy, the single integral of clinical symptoms and body signs, such as skin spot papula, subcutaneous nodules, skin itching, fatigue was obviously reduced compared to that of the pretreatment. The total score decreased than that of the pretreatment. The patients’ quality of life (QOL) significantly increased. The Karovsky integral increased compared with that of pretreatment. The CD4+ T cells values were higher than that of the pretreatment. It was concluded that the integrative therapy had a certain effect in the treatment of AIDS-associated non-infectious skin lesions, which can improve the clinical symptoms, body signs, obviously increase the patients’ QOL and immune function.

Objective: To predict the prognosis of cervical cancer, we constructed a novel model with 5 specific cell types and identified a potential biomarker. Methods: We employed CIBERSORT and xCell method to evaluate the abundances of 23 cells types in tumor microenvironment. Five specific cell types were filtrated to determine different immunotypes by applying least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) Cox regression method. The expression of immune checkpoints (ICPs) and effectors were validated by immunohistochemistry. Correlation analysis was performed to examine the relevance between PIK3CA mutational status and ICPs. Results: Unsupervised clustering of patients on the basis of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes and fibroblasts identified patients with shorter overall survival (OS) (hazard ratio [HR]=3.0729; 95% confidence interval [CI]=1.5103–6.2522; p=0.0118). An immunoscore (IS) signature consisting of 5 immune cell types infiltrating in tumor core (CD8T, activated NK cells, neutrophils, activated mast cells, macrophages) was constructed using LASSO Cox regression analysis. Receiver operating characteristic curves confirmed that the area under the curve of IS was significantly higher to that of International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics staging alone (0.637 vs. 0.55). Survival analysis revealed patients in high IS group exhibited a poorer OS (HR=3.0113; 95% CI=1.8746–4.8373; p<0.0001). The multivariate analysis indicated the IS was an independent prognostic factor. In addition, the lower IS related to higher expression of ICPs and neoantigen load. Conclusions The identification of IS in cervical cancer tissues could facilitate patient risk stratification and selection of immunotherapeutic responses, but more prospective studies are needed to assess its reliability.

UNLABELLEDWe designed a pair of specific primers and a TaqMan fluorescent probe targeting the toxR gene of Vibrio parahaemolyticus (VP). After optimizing the conditions, the specialty, sensitivity and reproducibility of the detection method were evaluated.

RESULTS(1) the developed real-time PCR assay protocol detected only VP and was not affected by other normal food pathogens such as Staphylococcus aureus, Salmonela, Listeria monocytogenes. (2) the limit of detection was 25 copies of toxR gene in the detected samples, and the sensitivity of pure cultures and simulated food samples was 21 cfu/mL and 210 cfu/g. (3) the developed protocol of real-time PCR assay had a high reproducibility, and the sample's variation was 0.9% and 1.3% within the same sample and between tests. (4) the standard curve had a good linearity when the gene quantity was between 2.5x10(1) and 2.5x10(6) copies. The developed detection assay targeting the toxR gene can quantitatively detect VP in only 3 hours, and thus is an efficacious method for the detection of Vibrio parahaemolyticus.

Bacterial Proteins ; genetics ; DNA-Binding Proteins ; genetics ; Fluorescent Dyes ; metabolism ; Gene Targeting ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; methods ; Sensitivity and Specificity ; Taq Polymerase ; metabolism ; Transcription Factors ; genetics ; Vibrio parahaemolyticus ; genetics ; isolation & purification