Retinal vein occlusion(RVO)is often accompanied by macular edema(ME), which is the main cause of visual impairment in patients. From the perspective of traditional Chinese medicine theory, the key pathogenesis lies in Qi stagnation and blood stasis, as well as internal retention of water and dampness, which is closely related to the dysfunction of internal organs such as liver depression and qi stagnation, spleen failure to function properly, and kidney deficiency with water retention. Although anti-vascular endothelial growth factor(VEGF)therapy has become the first-line treatment option for RVO-ME, some patients show a low response or no response to this therapy, resulting in recurrent ME. According to traditional Chinese medicine, such difficult-to-treat cases are often caused by long-term illness entering the meridians and the interplay of phlegm and blood stasis, or by deficiency of the body's vital energy and the lingering of pathogenic factors. Intervention should be carried out through therapeutic methods such as promoting blood circulation and diuresis, resolving phlegm and unblocking meridians, and strengthening the body's vital energy and eliminating pathogenic factors. At present, the pathogenesis of RVO-ME is not yet fully understood. Modern medicine believes that it may involve multiple factors such as retinal microstructure damage, abnormal blood flow and systemic diseases throughout the body, while traditional Chinese medicine emphasizes the overall connection between local lesions and the imbalance of Qi, blood, Yin and Yang throughout the body. This article systematically reviews the existing research achievements of traditional Chinese and Western medicine on RVO-ME, analyzes its possible high-risk factors, and provides a theoretical basis for formulating individualized treatment plans integrating the advantages of traditional Chinese and Western medicine for such patients.

OBJECTIVES: To assess the changes in body composition and nutritional risks faced by children with different stages of acute leukemia (AL). METHODS: Bioelectrical impedance analysis combined with anthropometric measurements was used to detect body composition. This prospective study was conducted from August 2023 to July 2024 at Shandong Provincial Hospital, examining the body composition and physical balance of children with various stages of AL and healthy children. RESULTS: The non-fat components of children with AL and healthy children both showed a linear increase with age. In the younger age group, there were no significant differences in body composition between children with AL and healthy children. However, in the older age group, the body composition of children undergoing chemotherapy for AL was significantly lower than that of healthy children (P<0.05), and muscle mass recovered first after the completion of AL chemotherapy. The proportion of children with increased trunk fat in AL children who completed chemotherapy was significantly lower than that in healthy children (P<0.05), while the incidence rate of severe left-right imbalance in body composition was significantly higher (P<0.05). Muscle distribution in children with AL primarily showed insufficient limb and overall muscle mass, whereas healthy children mainly exhibited insufficient upper limb muscle mass. CONCLUSIONS The body composition of children with AL varies at different treatment stages, indicating that nutritional status is affected by both the disease itself and the treatment. Early screening can provide a basis for reasonable nutritional intervention.
Humans ; Child ; Male ; Female ; Child, Preschool ; Body Composition ; Prospective Studies ; Adolescent ; Leukemia/metabolism* ; Infant ; Nutritional Status ; Acute Disease ; Electric Impedance

OBJECTIVE: To establish an in vitro cell model simulating acute graft-versus-host disease (aGVHD) bone marrow microenvironment injury with the advantage of mouse serum of aGVHD model and explore the effect of serum of aGVHD mouse on the adipogenic differentiation ability of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs). METHODS: The 6-8-week-old C57BL/6N female mice and BALB/c female mice were used as the donor and recipient mice of the aGVHD model, respectively. Bone marrow transplantation (BMT) mouse model (n=20) was established by being injected with bone marrow cells (1×10⁷ per mouse) from donor mice within 4-6 hours after receiving a lethal dose (8.0 Gy, 72.76 cGy/min) of γ ray general irradiation. A mouse model of aGVHD (n=20) was established by infusing a total of 0.4 ml of a mixture of donor mouse-derived bone marrow cells (1×10⁷ per mouse) and spleen lymphocytes (2×10⁶ per mouse). The blood was removed from the eyeballs and the mouse serum was aspirated on the 7^th day after modeling. Bone marrow-derived MSCs were isolated from 1-week-old C57BL/6N male mice and incubated with 2%, 5% and 10% BMT mouse serum and aGVHD mouse serum in the medium, respectively. The effect of serum in the two groups on the in vitro adipogenic differentiation ability of mouse MSCs was detected by Oil Red O staining. The expression levels of related proteins PPARγ and CEBPα were detected by Western blot. The expression differences of key adipogenic transcription factors including PPARγ, CEBPα, FABP4 and LPL were determined by real-time quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR). RESULTS: An in vitro cell model simulating the damage of bone marrow microenvironment in mice with aGVHD was successfully established. Oil Red O staining showed that the number of orange-red fatty droplets was significantly reduced and the adipogenic differentiation ability of MSC was impaired at aGVHD serum concentration of 10% compared with BMT serum. Western blot experiments showed that adipogenesis-related proteins PPARγ and CEBPα expressed in MSCs were down-regulated. Further RT-qPCR assay showed that the production of PPARγ, CEBPα, FABP4 and LPL, the key transcription factors for adipogenic differentiation of MSC, were significantly reduced. CONCLUSION The adipogenic differentiation capacity of MSCs is inhibited by aGVHD mouse serum.
Animals ; Mesenchymal Stem Cells/cytology* ; Mice ; Mice, Inbred BALB C ; Mice, Inbred C57BL ; Adipogenesis ; Female ; Cell Differentiation ; Graft vs Host Disease/blood* ; Bone Marrow Cells/cytology* ; PPAR gamma/metabolism* ; Disease Models, Animal ; CCAAT-Enhancer-Binding Protein-alpha/metabolism*

OBJECTIVE: To identify the CDYL-interacting proteins in murine testis and investigate the mechanism of CDYL involved in spermatogenesis. METHODS: CDYL-interacting partners in testis were identified using co-immunoprecipitation coupled with liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). Expression pattern of CDYL-interacting protein MYH9 was analyzed through immunohistochemistry (IHC), confocal immunofluorescence (IF) and Western blot (WB) in mouse testicular cells. The effect of the Cdyl conditional knockout (CdylcKO) in spermatogenic cell on Myh9 expression was quantified via RT-qPCR, WB and IF imaging in both spermatids and spermatozoa from cauda epididymides. RESULTS: Direct interaction between MYH9 and CDYL was confirmed in murine testis. During spermiogenesis, MYH9 exhibited co-localization with CDYL at the manchette structure, and binding to F-ACTIN, the component of manchette. In cauda epididymal spermatozoa, MYH9 signal concentrated on acrosomal region and continuously distributed along the tail length. Conditional deletion of Cdyl in spermatogenic cell resulted in the transcriptional downregulation of Myh9. In spermatids, CdylcKO led to reduced but retained MYH9 localization to the disorganized manchette structure. In spermatozoa from CdylcKO mice, abnormalities of MYH9 localization were observed, including attenuation of acrosomal signal and/or partial vanishment/enhancement of tail signal. CONCLUSION In murine spermatids, MYH9 protein is localized to the manchette structure, with its expression and subcellular distribution is affected by CDYL protein. CDYL-MYH9 interaction is essential for the spermiogenesis.
Animals ; Male ; Mice ; Testis/metabolism* ; Myosin Heavy Chains/metabolism* ; Spermatogenesis ; Mice, Knockout

BACKGROUND: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a common cardiac arrhythmia in the elderly. This study aimed to evaluate urban-rural disparities in its prevalence and management in elderly Chinese. METHODS: Consecutive participants aged ≥ 65 years attending outpatient clinics were enrolled for AF screening using handheld single-lead electrocardiogram (ECG) from April 2017 to December 2022. Each ECG rhythm strip was reviewed from the research team. AF or uninterpretable single-lead ECGs were referred for 12-lead ECG. Primary study outcome comparison was between rural and urban areas for the prevalence of AF. The Student's t-test was used to compare mean values of clinical characteristics between rural and urban participants, while the Pearson's chi-square test was used to compare between-group proportions. Multivariate stepwise logistic regression analysis was performed to estimate the association between AF and various patient characteristics. RESULTS: The 29,166 study participants included 13,253 men (45.4%) and had a mean age of 72.2 years. The 7073 rural participants differed significantly (P ≤ 0.02) from the 22,093 urban participants in several major characteristics, such as older age, greater body mass index, and so on. The overall prevalence of AF was 4.6% (n = 1347). AF was more prevalent in 7073 rural participants than 22,093 urban participants (5.6% vs. 4.3%, P < 0.01), before and after adjustment for age, body mass index, blood pressure, pulse rate, cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption and prior medical history. Multivariate logistic regression analysis identified overweight/obesity (OR = 1.35, 95% CI: 1.17-1.54) in urban areas and cigarette smoking (OR = 1.62, 95% CI: 1.20-2.17) and alcohol consumption (OR = 1.42, 95% CI: 1.04-1.93) in rural areas as specific risk factors for prevalent AF. In patients with known AF in urban areas (n = 781) and rural areas (n = 338), 60.6% and 45.9%, respectively, received AF treatment (P < 0.01), and only 22.4% and 17.2%, respectively, received anticoagulation therapy (P = 0.05). CONCLUSIONS In China, there are urban-rural disparities in AF in the elderly, with a higher prevalence and worse management in rural areas than urban areas. Our study findings provide insight for health policymakers to consider urban-rural disparity in the prevention and treatment of AF.

Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) represents an emerging medical functional imaging technology, which operates by applying safe-to-human excitation currents through surface-mounted electrodes, measuring boundary voltages between electrodes, and selecting appropriate image reconstruction algorithms to visualize resistivity in tomographic cross-sections. Compared to traditional medical imaging techniques, EIT offers non-invasive and radiation-free operation, high sensitivity to tissue resistivity changes, and superior temporal resolution, meeting the real-time requirements of clinical dynamic condition monitoring. This paper comprehensively reviews the research status of brain EIT technology, systematically summarizes its advantages and technical limitations in perioperative applications, and prospectively forecasts future development directions of perioperative brain EIT based on current research foundations and clinical application demands, with the aim of providing methodological references for further optimization and clinical promotion of this technology.
Electric Impedance ; Tomography/methods* ; Humans ; Brain/diagnostic imaging*

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to explore the association between body mass index (BMI) and mortality based on the 10-year population-based multicenter prospective study. METHODS: A general population-based multicenter prospective study was conducted at four sites in rural China between 2013 and 2023. Multivariate Cox proportional hazards models and restricted cubic spline analyses were used to assess the association between BMI and mortality. Stratified analyses were performed based on the individual characteristics of the participants. RESULTS: Overall, 19,107 participants with a sum of 163,095 person-years were included and 1,910 participants died. The underweight (< 18.5 kg/m ²) presented an increase in all-cause mortality (adjusted hazards ratio [ aHR] = 2.00, 95% confidence interval [ CI]: 1.66-2.41), while overweight (≥ 24.0 to < 28.0 kg/m ²) and obesity (≥ 28.0 kg/m ²) presented a decrease with an aHR of 0.61 (95% CI: 0.52-0.73) and 0.51 (95% CI: 0.37-0.70), respectively. Overweight ( aHR = 0.76, 95% CI: 0.67-0.86) and mild obesity ( aHR = 0.72, 95% CI: 0.59-0.87) had a positive impact on mortality in people older than 60 years. All-cause mortality decreased rapidly until reaching a BMI of 25.7 kg/m ² ( aHR = 0.95, 95% CI: 0.92-0.98) and increased slightly above that value, indicating a U-shaped association. The beneficial impact of being overweight on mortality was robust in most subgroups and sensitivity analyses. CONCLUSION This study provides additional evidence that overweight and mild obesity may be inversely related to the risk of death in individuals older than 60 years. Therefore, it is essential to consider age differences when formulating health and weight management strategies.
Humans ; Body Mass Index ; China/epidemiology* ; Male ; Female ; Middle Aged ; Prospective Studies ; Rural Population/statistics & numerical data* ; Aged ; Follow-Up Studies ; Adult ; Mortality ; Cause of Death ; Obesity/mortality* ; Overweight/mortality*

Inflammasome is a kind of intracellular polyprotein complex,which is an important component of the complex system of local inflammatory microenvironment after human tissue damage.When the inflammasome is activated,it induces the activation of cysteine aspartate proteinase 1(caspase-1),mediates the maturation and secretion of proinflammatory cytokines,such as interleukin(IL)-1 β and IL-18,and induces cell death,which plays an important role in regulating the host immune response to pathogen infection and tissue repair of cell damage.Nod-like receptor protein 3(NLRP3)inflammatory body,which is composed of NLRP3,pro-cysteine aspartic acid specific protease-1(pro-caspase-1)and apoptosis-related spot-like protein(ASC),is the most deeply and widely studied type of inflammatory body,which plays an important role in the regulation of inflammation.When NLRP3 inflammatory bodies are activated,inflammatory mediators are produced and released,which participate in the occurrence and development of a variety of inflammatory diseases.Some studies have shown that traditional Chinese medicine can improve the pathological state of a variety of diseases by inhibiting NLRP3 inflammatory bodies,and play a role in the prevention and treatment of a variety of inflammatory diseases,including cardiovascular diseases,joint inflammation,diabetes and so on.This paper systematically combs the mechanism of NLRP3 inflammatory bodies,and summarizes the latest research reports on the effects of traditional Chinese medicine compound prescription,traditional Chinese medicine monomers and traditional Chinese medicine extracts on NLRP3 inflammatory bodies in the treatment of inflammatory diseases,in order to provide new ideas for the further study of the pathogenesis and drug treatment of many inflammatory diseases.

Sucrose synthase plays a crucial role in the plant sugar metabolism pathway by catalyzing the production of uridine diphosphate (UDP)-glucose, which serves as a bioactive glycosyl donor for various metabolic processes. In this study, a sucrose synthase gene named CtSus was cloned from Cistanche tubulosa, a traditional Chinese medicine known for its rich content of diverse glycosides, based on transcriptome analysis results. The open reading frame of CtSus was 2 418 bp long encoding 805 amino acids. Sequence analysis revealed conserved domains associated with the plant sucrose synthase family at both the N-terminal and C-terminal regions of CtSus protein. Phylogenetic analysis demonstrated that CtSus shares a close evolutionary relationship with sucrose synthases from other plants within the same order. Functional identification of CtSus was performed through whole-cell catalysis coupling with UGT71BD1, a characterized glycosyltransferase enzyme. The results showed that the introduction of CtSus significantly enhanced the conversion rate of glycosylation catalyzed by UGT71BD1. The soluble expression of CtSus in Escherichia coli was further achieved using the pCold^TM TF expression vector. In vitro enzymatic assay indicated the activity of CtSus to catalyze the formation of UDP-glucose in the presence of sucrose and UDP. Real-time quantitative-polymerase chain reaction results showed that the expression patterns of CtSus gene in different parts of C. tubulosa and the suspension cell cultures of C. tubulosa under drought stress correlated with the accumulation patterns observed for phenylethanol glycosides, respectively. Furthermore, key amino acids and their interactions between enzyme and substrate were explored based on protein structure prediction and molecular docking results. Overall, our findings identify a sucrose synthase CtSus responsible for the supply of the active glycosyl donor UDP-glucose during the biosynthesis of glycoside products in C. tubulosa and have also provided a gene element that can be utilized in engineering strain construction for glycoside products production.