1.Construction of the clinical diagnosis and treatment model during the “pre-disease to disease” window period in traditional Chinese medicine: integration of objective multimodal data from the perspective of traditional Chinese medicine stateology
Danyang Li ; Min Ai ; Pai Zhou ; Ying Deng ; Chaoyang Yang ; Qinghua Peng
Digital Chinese Medicine 2026;9(2):173-183
The philosophy of “treating disease before its onset” is a fundamental concept of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), permeating its diagnostic and therapeutic framework, and is central to clinical practice. However, current TCM diagnostic and treatment models for the “pre-disease to disease” window period face several limitations, including the lack of comprehensive clinical parameters, difficulties in characterizing and integrating heterogeneous multimodal data, and insufficient dynamic precision in interventions and efficacy evaluations. To address these issues, guided by Professor Candong Li’s theory of TCM stateology, this study focuses on integrating objective multimodal data. It proposes a new model for personalized TCM diagnosis and treatment targeting the “pre-disease to disease” window period. This approach first proposes the idea of restructuring the conceptual framework of “symptom” and integrating multi-source heterogeneous data at macroscopic, mesoscopic, and microscopic levels to form a three-dimensional assessment indicator system. By integrating graph neural networks, convolutional neural networks, attention mechanisms, and knowledge graph-guided weight allocation, this approach enables collaborative representation, alignment, and fusion of multi-source data. Subsequently, it plans to construct a multimodal fusion model at both feature and decision levels, in order to establish mappings between indicators and TCM state elements, and to screen key indicators characterizing pathological evolution during the window period. Furthermore, it proposes a technical path for enhancing model interpretability using methods such as SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) and Ablation-CAM++. Finally, with state assessment as the core, it proposes the concept of constructing a dynamic evaluation method for individualized diagnosis and treatment based on time-series data analysis using algorithms such as long short-term memory (LSTM) networks and gated recurrent units (GRUs). Moreover, a causal inference framework and semi-supervised learning strategies are introduced to enable quantitative evaluation of individual intervention effects and to provide interpretable therapeutic feedback, forming a complete technical path from data representation and fusion, weight adjustment, and interpretability analysis, to dynamic diagnosis feedback. This study aims to address deficiencies in the current TCM diagnosis and treatment model during the “pre-disease to disease” window period and to provide an operational framework for the clinical practice of TCM’s “treating disease before its onset”.
2.Attenuation of oxidative injury in retinal photoreceptor cells by Gouqizi (Lycii Fructus) and Danshen (Salviae Miltiorrhizae Radix et Rhizoma) through modulation of ANGPTL4
Jun Peng ; Junjiang Jiang ; Junnan Zhong ; Siyi Zhou ; Tingyan Hu ; Xuyu Chen ; Qinghua Peng ; Yasha Zhou
Digital Chinese Medicine 2026;9(2):290-301
Objective:
To investigate the protective effects of Gouqizi (Lycii Fructus, GQZ)-Danshen (Salviae Miltiorrhizae Radix et Rhizoma, DS) against hydrogen peroxide (H2O2)-induced oxidative injury in 661W retinal photoreceptor cells and to explore whether these effects involve angiopoietin-like 4 (ANGPTL4).
Methods:
Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) was used to identify the major components of GQZ-DS aqueous extract. An H2O2-induced oxidative injury model was established in 661W cells. Working concentrations of H2O2 and GQZ-DS were determined using the cell counting kit-8 (CCK-8) assay. Cells were subjected to GQZ-DS, ANGPTL4 knockdown, or ANGPTL4 overexpression as indicated. Flow cytometry was used to analyze cell cycle distribution, apoptotic rate, and intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS). Colorimetric determination of malondialdehyde (MDA) content and superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity using the thiobarbituric acid (TBA) method was performed. The protein expression level of ANGPTL4 was assessed by immunofluorescence. Reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) was performed to quantify the mRNA level of ANGPTL4. Western blot was used to detect the protein levels of ANGPTL4 and cleaved caspase-3.
Results:
LC-MS identified five major constituents in the GQZ-DS aqueous extract: 2-O-β-D-glucopyranosyl-L-ascorbic acid, rutin, D-galactose, salvianolic acid A, and tanshinone IIA. The CCK-8 method selected 300 μmol/L H2O2 as the oxidative stress condition for experiments, and 0.05 and 0.1 g/mL were selected as the low and high doses of GQZ-DS, respectively, for subsequent experiments. The intervention with H2O2 resulted in reduced cell viability, elevated ROS and MDA levels, decreased SOD activity, increased apoptotic rate, upregulated cleaved caspase-3 expression, and G0/G1 phase cell cycle arrest of 661W cells. Both low and high doses of GQZ-DS alleviated these alterations, with high dose exhibiting stronger protective effects (P < 0.05 or P < 0.01). GQZ-DS also downregulated ANGPTL4 expression at both the mRNA and protein levels. Following plasmid transfection of cells, the study further revealed that ANGPTL4 knockdown mitigated oxidative stress and apoptosis-related injury, whereas ANGPTL4 overexpression exacerbated these pathological changes. Moreover, GQZ-DS partially reversed the degree of cellular oxidative damage induced by ANGPTL4 overexpression.
Conclusion
GQZ-DS can alleviate the H2O2-induced oxidative injury of 661W retinal photoreceptor cells, and the effects are related to the down-regulation of ANGPTL4 expression.
3.Current Understanding of Retinitis Pigmentosa in Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine
Qing LI ; Ying DENG ; Li XIAO ; Jing LU ; Min AI ; Yasha ZHOU ; Yuhui QIN ; Qinghua PENG ; Yijing YANG
Journal of Traditional Chinese Medicine 2026;67(14):1567-1573
This paper has summarized current studies on retinitis pigmentosa (RP) from two perspectives, which were disease mechanism insights from western medicine, and etiology, pathogenesis and therapeutic principles in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). From the perspective of western medicine, the understanding of RP has evolved from an early single-factor explanation focusing on pathogenic gene mutations to a more comprehensive, multifactorial model involving genetic abnormalities, photoreceptor cell degeneration, retinal pigment epithelium dysfunction, oxidative stress, inflammatory responses, microenvironmental imbalance, and vascular insufficiency. In TCM, RP is considered to be a disorder manifested in the eyes but rooted in dysfunction of the zang-fu (脏腑) organs. Its pathogenesis is primarily associated with congenital insufficiency, liver-kidney depletion, impaired spleen function of transportation and transformation, and stasis obstructing the meridians. The core pathological mechanism can be summarized as "deficiency complicated by stasis", emphasizing holistic imbalance, dynamic disease progression, and syndrome differentiation and treatment. The differences and complementarities between the two medical systems in understanding disease progression are further discussed. RP is proposed to be more appropriately regarded as a complex disease characterized by long-term progression, stage-dependent evolution, and persistent decompensation. Western medicine contributes to elucidating the molecular mechanisms underlying RP and provides the foundation for targeted therapeutic interventions, whereas TCM offers a holistic perspective for understanding disease evolution through the assessment of overall functional status, disease-stage stratification, and long-term syndrome-based regulation.
4.Current Understanding of Retinitis Pigmentosa in Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine
Qing LI ; Ying DENG ; Li XIAO ; Jing LU ; Min AI ; Yasha ZHOU ; Yuhui QIN ; Qinghua PENG ; Yijing YANG
Journal of Traditional Chinese Medicine 2026;67(14):1567-1573
This paper has summarized current studies on retinitis pigmentosa (RP) from two perspectives, which were disease mechanism insights from western medicine, and etiology, pathogenesis and therapeutic principles in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). From the perspective of western medicine, the understanding of RP has evolved from an early single-factor explanation focusing on pathogenic gene mutations to a more comprehensive, multifactorial model involving genetic abnormalities, photoreceptor cell degeneration, retinal pigment epithelium dysfunction, oxidative stress, inflammatory responses, microenvironmental imbalance, and vascular insufficiency. In TCM, RP is considered to be a disorder manifested in the eyes but rooted in dysfunction of the zang-fu (脏腑) organs. Its pathogenesis is primarily associated with congenital insufficiency, liver-kidney depletion, impaired spleen function of transportation and transformation, and stasis obstructing the meridians. The core pathological mechanism can be summarized as "deficiency complicated by stasis", emphasizing holistic imbalance, dynamic disease progression, and syndrome differentiation and treatment. The differences and complementarities between the two medical systems in understanding disease progression are further discussed. RP is proposed to be more appropriately regarded as a complex disease characterized by long-term progression, stage-dependent evolution, and persistent decompensation. Western medicine contributes to elucidating the molecular mechanisms underlying RP and provides the foundation for targeted therapeutic interventions, whereas TCM offers a holistic perspective for understanding disease evolution through the assessment of overall functional status, disease-stage stratification, and long-term syndrome-based regulation.
5.Self-Supervised Multi-Organ Segmentation in Pediatric Abdominal CT Based on Vision Foundation Models
Qinghua ZHANG ; Ming LI ; Zhedian ZHOU ; Jian ZHENG ; Huadan XUE ; Qiuxia WANG ; Yu DU ; Zhen LI
Medical Journal of Peking Union Medical College Hospital 2026;17(4):954-962
To address the scarcity of annotated data for pediatric abdominal CT imaging and the insufficient generalization capability of existing models, we constructed a self-supervised pretraining architecture tailored for pediatric CT domain adaptation based on the visual foundation model DINOv3, and validated its performance in the task of pediatric abdominal multi-organ segmentation. We built a general-purpose radiological visual representation using the large-scale adult CT dataset CT-3M, and introduced a Gram-anchoring mechanism that employs a frozen adult pretrained model as a structural teacher to guide domain alignment of local topological structures on unlabeled pediatric CT data. Combined with a multi-scale feature aggregation strategy and a lightweight Primus decoder, downstream segmentation tasks were evaluated on a public pediatric CT dataset. Based on case-wise paired results, we compared the mean Dice similarity coefficient (DSC) and mean intersection over union (IoU) between our model and the baseline nnU-Net using the Wilcoxon signed-rank test, and computed the relative performance improvements. A total of 867 abdominal CT imaging cases were collected, constituting a pretraining dataset comprising 367 588 two-dimensional CT slices. On the public Pediatric-CT-SEG dataset (359 cases), our model achieved a mean DSC of (71.38±1.08)% and a mean IoU of (63.73±1.01)%, representing improvements of 3.22% and 3.59% over the baseline nnU-Net, respectively, with statistically significant differences ( The self-supervised pretraining framework proposed in this study effectively alleviates the domain shift between adult and pediatric abdominal CT images, significantly enhances segmentation accuracy for pediatric abdominal multi-organs-particularly small organs and structures with complex boundaries-and provides a reliable technical solution for intelligent pediatric imaging analysis in scenarios with limited annotated data.
6.Reproductive toxicity of clothianidin on two generations of Wistar rats
Yinghua LIU ; Qinghua ZHOU ; Shufei LI ; Miao ZHAO ; Dianming ZHOU ; Zhiyong QIAN
Journal of Public Health and Preventive Medicine 2025;36(5):18-22
Objective To investigate the reproductive and developmental effects of Clothianidin in rats. Methods Clothianidin was administrated by diet to both parental and first filial (F 1) generations of rats at the dosages of 0, 30.51, 110.84 and 304.26 mg/(kg·d) in females, and 0, 26.45, 92.69 and 279.42 mg/(kg·d) in males. Clothianidin was administered through diet to male and female rats for 8 weeks before mating. Clothianidin was administered to female rats in the parental and F1 generations during mating, gestation and lactation periods. During the test, toxicity performance was observed, reproduction index was calculated, and pathological examination was carried out. Results The body weights of rats in the parent and F1 generations in the high-dose group were lower than those in the control group during pre-mating exposure and at various time points during pregnancy and lactation (P<0.05). The pregnancy rates of parental and F1 generations in the high-dose group were lower than those of the control group (48.57% vs 71.43%, 45.71% vs 80.00%, P<0. 05). Sperm concentration and sperm motility of the parental generation were lower than those of the control group [(42.55±12.87) vs (53.84±7.65) ×106/ml, (58.94±10.59) vs (65.59±6.03), (P<0.05)]. Sperm concentration and sperm motility of the F1 generation were lower than those of the control group [(41.64±12.42) vs (53.09±9.48), (55.13±9.19) vs (64.53±6.31), (P<0.05). Conclusion Exposure to clothianidin has reproductive toxicity to Wistar rats, and the no-observed adverse effect level (NOAEL) in the two-generation reproductive toxicity test is 92.69 mg/kg·BW for males and 110.84 mg/kg·BW for females in Wistar rats.
7.Analysis of Animal Models of Primary Dysmenorrhea Based on Clinical Features in Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine
Qinghua WANG ; Yu HUAN ; Shuangling ZHOU ; Ting ZUO ; Mingsan MIAO
Chinese Journal of Experimental Traditional Medical Formulae 2025;31(17):220-226
ObjectiveTo systematically review the modeling methods and analyzes the model alignment with clinical features of primary dysmenorrhea (PD) in both traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and western medicine, providing theoretical and practical guidance for establishing the animal models of PD that better reflect the diagnostic and therapeutic characteristics of both TCM and western medicine. MethodsThe literature on PD animal models was searched against domestic and international databases such as PubMed, CNKI, and Wanfang Data. According to the diagnostic criteria of TCM and western medicine, the modeling methods in the literature were summarized, evaluated for strengths and weaknesses, and systematically assessed for clinical concordance rates to identify suitable reference models. ResultsThe available animal models of PD showed the average clinical concordance rates of 43.64% and 61.27% with the clinical features in TCM and western medicine, respectively. Commonly used modeling methods included estrogen administration, physical stimulation, and surgical intervention, with the estrogen combined with oxytocin model and the ice-water bath model being the most studied. The model of Qi stagnation and blood stasis syndrome that was established with the comprehensive stimulation method demonstrated the highest clinical concordance rate. ConclusionCurrent PD animal models primarily replicate dysmenorrhea and simulate menstruation, but they differ from human menstruation to some extent and cannot fully reflect the pathogenesis and physiological characteristics of PD. Moreover, except the cold coagulation and dampness stagnation syndrome and Qi stagnation and blood stasis syndrome, no animal models for other TCM syndromes have been reported, which limits comprehensive TCM research on this disease to a certain extent.
8.Analysis of Animal Models of Primary Dysmenorrhea Based on Clinical Features in Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine
Qinghua WANG ; Yu HUAN ; Shuangling ZHOU ; Ting ZUO ; Mingsan MIAO
Chinese Journal of Experimental Traditional Medical Formulae 2025;31(17):220-226
ObjectiveTo systematically review the modeling methods and analyzes the model alignment with clinical features of primary dysmenorrhea (PD) in both traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and western medicine, providing theoretical and practical guidance for establishing the animal models of PD that better reflect the diagnostic and therapeutic characteristics of both TCM and western medicine. MethodsThe literature on PD animal models was searched against domestic and international databases such as PubMed, CNKI, and Wanfang Data. According to the diagnostic criteria of TCM and western medicine, the modeling methods in the literature were summarized, evaluated for strengths and weaknesses, and systematically assessed for clinical concordance rates to identify suitable reference models. ResultsThe available animal models of PD showed the average clinical concordance rates of 43.64% and 61.27% with the clinical features in TCM and western medicine, respectively. Commonly used modeling methods included estrogen administration, physical stimulation, and surgical intervention, with the estrogen combined with oxytocin model and the ice-water bath model being the most studied. The model of Qi stagnation and blood stasis syndrome that was established with the comprehensive stimulation method demonstrated the highest clinical concordance rate. ConclusionCurrent PD animal models primarily replicate dysmenorrhea and simulate menstruation, but they differ from human menstruation to some extent and cannot fully reflect the pathogenesis and physiological characteristics of PD. Moreover, except the cold coagulation and dampness stagnation syndrome and Qi stagnation and blood stasis syndrome, no animal models for other TCM syndromes have been reported, which limits comprehensive TCM research on this disease to a certain extent.
9.Circulating tumor DNA- and cancer tissue-based next-generation sequencing reveals comparable consistency in targeted gene mutations for advanced or metastatic non-small cell lung cancer.
Weijia HUANG ; Kai XU ; Zhenkun LIU ; Yifeng WANG ; Zijia CHEN ; Yanyun GAO ; Renwang PENG ; Qinghua ZHOU
Chinese Medical Journal 2025;138(7):851-858
BACKGROUND:
Molecular subtyping is an essential complementarity after pathological analyses for targeted therapy. This study aimed to investigate the consistency of next-generation sequencing (NGS) results between circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA)-based and tissue-based in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and identify the patient characteristics that favor ctDNA testing.
METHODS:
Patients who diagnosed with NSCLC and received both ctDNA- and cancer tissue-based NGS before surgery or systemic treatment in Lung Cancer Center, Sichuan University West China Hospital between December 2017 and August 2022 were enrolled. A 425-cancer panel with a HiSeq 4000 NGS platform was used for NGS. The unweighted Cohen's kappa coefficient was employed to discriminate the high-concordance group from the low-concordance group with a cutoff value of 0.6. Six machine learning models were used to identify patient characteristics that relate to high concordance between ctDNA-based and tissue-based NGS.
RESULTS:
A total of 85 patients were enrolled, of which 22.4% (19/85) had stage III disease and 56.5% (48/85) had stage IV disease. Forty-four patients (51.8%) showed consistent gene mutation types between ctDNA-based and tissue-based NGS, while one patient (1.2%) tested negative in both approaches. Patients with advanced diseases and metastases to other organs would be suitable for the ctDNA-based NGS, and the generalized linear model showed that T stage, M stage, and tumor mutation burden were the critical discriminators to predict the consistency of results between ctDNA-based and tissue-based NGS.
CONCLUSION
ctDNA-based NGS showed comparable detection performance in the targeted gene mutations compared with tissue-based NGS, and it could be considered in advanced or metastatic NSCLC.
Humans
;
Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung/pathology*
;
Circulating Tumor DNA/blood*
;
High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing/methods*
;
Female
;
Male
;
Lung Neoplasms/pathology*
;
Middle Aged
;
Mutation/genetics*
;
Aged
;
Adult
;
Aged, 80 and over
10.Mechanisms of Chinese herbal medicine in modulating gut microbiota on primary open-angle glaucoma: a study based on data mining, network pharmacology, and Mendelian randomization
Yu TANG ; Bingyao ZHU ; Qianhong LIU ; Kai WU ; Pai ZHOU ; Xiaolei YAO ; Qinghua PENG
Digital Chinese Medicine 2025;8(4):491-503
Objective:
To elucidate the potential mechanisms by which Chinese herbal medicine (CHM) regulates gut microbiota (GM) to influence the development of primary open-angle glaucoma (POAG).
Methods:
Data mining, network pharmacology, and Mendelian randomization (MR) analyses (two-sample design) were conducted in integration to systematically explore the CHM-GM-POAG axis. Literature-based data mining method was applied to identify frequently used herbs and herb pairs for POAG, and the properties and meridian tropism of the herbs were analyzed as well. Target prediction and pathway enrichment analyses were performed to identify shared molecular pathways among CHM components, GM, and POAG. MR analysis was performed to assess the genetically predicted causal associations between specific microbial taxa and POAG risk.
Results:
Our data mining work indicated that commonly used CHMs were mainly bitter and sweet in flavors and cold in property, with meridian tropism toward the liver, lung, and kidney. The predominant therapeutic effects of the CHMs included soothing the liver and regulating Qi, promoting blood circulation, and reducing fluid retention. Representative herb pairs were Shudihuang (Rehmanniae Radix Praeparata)-Gouqi (Lycii Fructus) with Zexie (Alismatis Rhizoma), Gouqi (Lycii Fructus)-Fuling (Poria) with Shudihuang (Rehmanniae Radix), and Juhua (Chrysanthemi Flos)-Gouqi (Lycii Fructus) with Zexie (Alismatis Rhizoma). Network pharmacology revealed overlapping targets involving antioxidative, anti-inflammatory, and metabolic regulation pathways. MR analysis demonstrated that higher abundances of Ruminiclostridium 6 [odds ratio (OR) = 0.73, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.58 – 0.92, P = 0.007], Ruminococcaceae UCG-002 (OR = 0.77, 95% CI: 0.63 – 0.96, P = 0.018), Ruminococcus torques group (OR = 0.71, 95% CI: 0.57 – 0.90, P = 0.004), and Victivallis (OR = 0.82, 95% CI: 0.70 – 0.96, P = 0.016) were causally associated with reduced POAG risk, whereas Actinomyces (OR = 1.34, 95% CI: 1.06 – 1.68, P = 0.013) and Blautia (OR = 1.39, 95% CI: 1.01 – 1.90, P = 0.042) showed positive associations.
Conclusion
This study revealed potential causal links between GM and POAG and provided integrative evidence that CHM may modulate the microbiota to exert neuroprotective effects. These findings offer new integrative insights into the gut-eye axis and a theoretical basis for developing microbiota-targeted CHM strategies in glaucoma management.


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