Child ; Humans ; Plasma Exchange ; Thrombotic Microangiopathies ; therapy

Lactic acid production and antagonistic property of five strains of LAB isolated from piglet intestine were investigated. The results showed that among all strains L5 exhibited the most rapid production and highest amount of lactic acid in the culture. Consequently, the pH in L5 culture showed the fast decline, with the final value significantly lower than those of other cultures. Strain L1 showed the least production of lactic acid and highest pH among all strains. Culture supernatants of the five strains showed different degrees of antagonistic effect against pathogenic E. coli K88, K99, 987P, O141, E1, and S. aureus. When taking out the effect of the acid, the culture supernatants still showed 22%～53% inhibitory effect, suggesting that the bacteria produced other inhibitory substances apart from lactic acid. The inhibitory effect of the culture supernatant was above 92% after heat treatment and above 85% when treated with proteases.

A novel method was developed for the rapid determination of multi-indicators in corni fructus by means of near infrared (NIR) spectroscopy. Particle swarm optimization (PSO) based least squares support vector machine was investigated to increase the levels of quality control. The calibration models of moisture, extractum, morroniside and loganin were established using the PSO-LS-SVM algorithm. The performance of PSO-LS-SVM models was compared with partial least squares regression (PLSR) and back propagation artificial neural network (BP-ANN). The calibration and validation results of PSO-LS-SVM were superior to both PLS and BP-ANN. For PSO-LS-SVM models, the correlation coefficients (r) of calibrations were all above 0.942. The optimal prediction results were also achieved by PSO-LS-SVM models with the RMSEP (root mean square error of prediction) and RSEP (relative standard errors of prediction) less than 1.176 and 15.5% respectively. The results suggest that PSO-LS-SVM algorithm has a good model performance and high prediction accuracy. NIR has a potential value for rapid determination of multi-indicators in Corni Fructus.
Algorithms ; Calibration ; Cornus ; chemistry ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; Fruit ; chemistry ; Least-Squares Analysis ; Models, Theoretical ; Neural Networks (Computer) ; Quality Control ; Spectroscopy, Near-Infrared ; Support Vector Machine

OBJECTIVETo observe therapeutic effects of different needle-retained durations at scalp acupoints on Tourette syndrome (TS).

METHODSSixty-two cases of TS were randomly divided into an observation group and a control group, 31 cases in each group. In the observation group, the needles were retained for 2 h and in the control group, they were retained for 30 min. The middle line of forehead, middle line of vertex and lateral line 1 of vertex were selected as main acupoints, and anterior oblique line of vertex-temporal and posterior temporal line were selected as adjuvant acupoints. They were treated for 2 months, once other day. Yale Global Tic Severity Scale (YGTSS) and Tourette Syndrome Global Scale (TSGS) were used for assessment of therapeutic effects and their therapeutic effects were compared.

RESULTSAfter treatment, YGTSS and TSGS scores had very significant changes in the two groups as compared with those before treatment (both P < 0.01), indicating an obvious improvement in kinetic Tic and vocalizing Tic. The total effective rate was 61.3% in the observation group and 67.7% in the control group with no significant difference between the two groups (P > 0.05).

CONCLUSIONScalp acupuncture therapy of both 2 h and 0.5 h retaining needle can significantly improve symptoms of TS patients, with a similar therapeutic effect.

Acupuncture Points ; Acupuncture Therapy ; Adolescent ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Scalp ; Tourette Syndrome ; therapy

Objective To investigate the changes and pathogenic significance of serum interleukin-12p70 (IL-12), intefferon-γ,(IFN-γ) and IL-4 in the course of hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome(HFRS). Methods Twenty five eases were divided into mild group (14 eases) and severe group (11 cases) according to the severity of illness. Blood samples were collected in various stages(fever, hypotensian and oliguria,diuresis stage). Serum IL-12 and IFN-γ levels were determined by enzyme-linked immunoserbent assay(ELISA), IL-4 by radioimmunoassay (RIA), blood urea nitrogen (BUN) and platelet by automatic biochemical analyzer and blood analyzer. Results Serum IL-12 levels in mild and severe groups were significantly different during various stages of HFRS (F=5.765, P<0.01). The IL-12 level of both patient groups significantly increased(P<0.01) in fever[ (0.87±0.38), (1.08± 0.77)μg/L], hypotension and oliguria [ (0.77±0.21), (2.11±2.13)μg/L] ,and diuresis stage [ (1.42±1.10), (1.20±0.88)μg/L], compared with control group [(0.56±0.10)μg/L]. In various stages, IFN-γ levels of both case groups were respectively (8.04±13.05), (5.94±8.24), (15.95±18.05), (4.41±4.10), (1.09±1.24), (1.38±1.74), (1.12±1.26), (0.19±1.29)μg/L, and the difference was statistically significant compared with control [ (0.27±0.15)rig/L]. K,-4 levels did not change significantly in the stages(F=0.682, P0.05), while the ratios of IFN-γ and IL-4 contents in mild and severe cases were significantly higher than control [(0.36±0.26) μg/L] in fever[ (2.46±3.52), (16.92±22.77)p.g/L], hypotension and oliguria[(2.52±2.72), (1.77±2.06) μg/L],diuresis stage [(1.45±2.28), (2.32±3.98)μg/L], the difference had statically significant (P<0.05 or 0.01).The curve of IL-12 was similar to that of BUN, but was contrary to blood platelet count. Conclusions The elevated levels of IL-12 and IFN-γ, with the imbalance of Th1/Th2 might be the main cause of systemic inflammatoryresponse and involved in the pathogenesis of HFRS.

The study was aimed to investigate the immunophenotypic and cytogenetic features of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) in order to provide an evidence for diagnosis and therapy. Immunophenotypic analysis was performed by using a panel of monoclonal antibodies and three-color immunofluorescence staining methods of flow cytometry in 51 patients with CLL, and the cytogenetic features were analyzed by R-banding technique. The results indicated that among 51 CLL cases, the positive rate of CD19 and CD23 was 96.1%, followed by CD15 (94.1%), CD20 (82.4%) and CD22 (78.4%). The positive rate of CD38 was 23.5%. Forty-six patients expressed both CD5 and CD19. Seven main clonal chromosomal abnormalities were detected by conventional cytogenetics (CC) in eighteen cases (35.3%), with three cases of +12, two cases of 13q(-), other chromosomal abnormalities included +14, 6q(-), t (11; 14), t (14; 18) and t (2; 7). Expression of the antigens had no relationship with chromosomal abnormalities. It is concluded that typical CLL express CD5, CD19 and CD23, and the positive rate detected by CC in CLL is low. Immunophenotyping in combination with cytogenetic technique plays an important role in the diagnosis and prognosis of CLL.
Adult ; Aged ; Aged, 80 and over ; Antibodies, Monoclonal ; Antigens, CD ; metabolism ; Antigens, CD19 ; metabolism ; Antigens, CD20 ; metabolism ; Chromosome Aberrations ; Chromosomes, Human, Pair 12 ; Chromosomes, Human, Pair 13 ; Female ; Flow Cytometry ; methods ; Humans ; Immunophenotyping ; Leukemia, Lymphocytic, Chronic, B-Cell ; genetics ; immunology ; Lewis X Antigen ; metabolism ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Translocation, Genetic ; genetics

Animals ; Cell Line ; Hepatic Stellate Cells ; drug effects ; metabolism ; pathology ; Plasminogen Activator Inhibitor 1 ; biosynthesis ; Rats ; Transforming Growth Factor beta1 ; pharmacology

OBJECTIVETo study the variation and evolution rules and analyze the genetic characterization of echovirus 30 during an outbreak of aseptic meningitis.

METHODSFor all the echovirus 30 isolates during the outbreaks in Zhangqiu city in 2003, complete VP1 genes were determined. Phylogenetic tree reconstruction and pairwise sequence were determined to compare the homological relationship and evolution rules between Zhangqiu strains and the other reported echovirus 30 in GenBank.

RESULTSPairwise sequence comparisoms in VP1 region indicated that there were 98.9%-99.5% identity of nucleotide acid among Zhangqiu strains, and having the highest homology with Taian strains (98.5%-99.0%) isolated in Shandong province. At the same time, when comparing with Zhejiang and Jiangsu strains, the nucleotide homology showed 98.2%-98.9%, relatively low identity with Taiwan strains (87.4%-87.6%) and French strains (89.1%-89.7%) but only 82.4%-82.8% identity when comparing with echovirus 30 prototype strain Bastianni. Data from phylogenetic tree analyses indicated that all the echovirus 30 correlated with aseptic meningitis in China recently came from the same evolution linkage and formed a monophyletic cluster.

CONCLUSIONIn 2003, there was an circulation of echovirus 30 in Shandong province which causing an endemic of aseptic meningitis in local areas. Data from phylogenetic tree analyses indicated that the antigenic characteristics of echovirus 30 in mainland China might be different from strains early isolated in other continents and formed a new genotype.

China ; epidemiology ; DNA, Viral ; analysis ; Disease Outbreaks ; Enterovirus B, Human ; classification ; genetics ; Enterovirus Infections ; epidemiology ; Genotype ; Humans ; Meningitis, Aseptic ; Phylogeny ; Sequence Analysis, DNA

Objective To determine kinetics of TNF-α and miR-146a (microRNA-146a)expressions in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced NR8383 alveolar macrophages (AM) at different intervals and their relationships in order to explore regulatory effect and mechanism of miR-146a on alveolar macrophages inflammatory responses.Methods NR8383 alveolar macrophages were seeded in a 6-well plate,and stimulated with 1 μg/ml of LPS for 0 h,3 h,6 h and 12 h separately after 90 min.Cells were harvested and supernatant were collected 0 h,3 h,6 h and 12 h after incubation.The expressions of miR146a and TNF-α mRNA in cells were detected by real-time qPCR and the levels of TNF-α protein in the supematant of cells were assayed by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay ( ELISA ).Pearson correlation analysis was used to analyze the correlation between miR-146a and TNF-α mRNA.Results ①The level of TNF-α protein in the supernatant of cell was significantly increased 3 h after LPS challenge ( 359.80 ±57.54) pg/ml (P ＜0.01 ),and peaked 12 h later (729.22 ±50.40) pg/ml (P＜0.01 ) ; ②the expression of TNF-α mRNA peaked 3 h after LPS challenge (67.48 ±24.52) fold,P ＜0.01 ),and then decreased gradually; ③the expression of miR-146a mRNA increased continuously until 6 h or 12 h after LPS challenge 6 h:(5.33 ±0.81) fold,12 h:(8.21 ±1.19) fold,(P＜0.01),and it showed an upward tendency;④ the expression of miR-146a mRNA was negatively correlated with TNF-α mRNA ( r =-0.895,P ＜0.01).Conclusions The miR-146a mRNA showed a negative correlation with TNF-α mRNA present in lipopolysaccharide-stimulated alveolar macrophages,suggesting miR-146a mRNA involved in regulating the inflammatory response of alveolar macrophages.

OBJECTIVESTo explore the effects of endotoxemia on gluconeogenesis in livers and kidneys during acute hepatic failure.

METHODTwenty-four healthy male SD rats were randomly divided into four groups (6 rats in each group) and all of them were injected intraperitoneally with solutions: group I with normal saline, group II with 400 mg/kg of D-galactosamine (D-GaLN), group III with 400 mg/kg of D-GaLN plus 50 microg/kg lipopolysaccharide(LPS), and group IV with 400 mg/kg of D-GaLN plus 500 microg/kg LPS. At 6 hours after the administration of different solutions intraperitoneally, blood samples were collected to examine blood urea nitrogen (BUN) and serum creatinine. Realtime PCR was used to study the expression of phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (PEPCK) in the livers and kidneys.

RESULTSNo endotoxemia developed in group I or group II but it was evident in group III and group IV. The level of endotoxemia in group IV was higher than in group III (8.05+/-0.43, 3.50+/-2.25, P<0.05). After 6 hours of administration of LPS in group IV, hypoglycemia appeared, and blood glucose was normal in the other three groups. BUN and serum creatinine were all normal in the four groups, except that blood urea nitrogen was elevated in group IV. The mRNA of PEPCK in livers decreased gradually in all the four groups (2.54+/-1.32 vs 1.87+/-0.15 vs 0.91+/-0.13 vs 0.44+/-0.42, P<0.05). In the kidneys there was no change in the expression of PEPCK in group I and group II (0.75+/-0.03 and 0.77+/-0.04, P>0.05), but it increased in group III (0.75+/-0.03 vs 1.63+/-0.86, P<0.05), and decreased in group IV (0.75+/-0.03 vs 0.13+/-0.07, P<0.05).

CONCLUSIONDuring acute hepatic failure severe endotoxemia would damage the function of gluconeogenesis in livers and kidneys by inhibiting transcription of PEPCK and this can induce hypoglycemia.

Animals ; Endotoxemia ; metabolism ; Gluconeogenesis ; Kidney ; metabolism ; Liver ; metabolism ; Liver Failure, Acute ; metabolism ; Male ; Phosphoenolpyruvate Carboxykinase (GTP) ; metabolism ; Rats ; Rats, Sprague-Dawley