Bacterial biofilms gave rise to persistent infections and multi-organ failure, thereby posing a serious threat to human health. Biofilms were formed by cross-linking of hydrophobic extracellular polymeric substances (EPS), such as proteins, polysaccharides, and eDNA, which were synthesized by bacteria themselves after adhesion and colonization on biological surfaces. They had the characteristics of dense structure, high adhesiveness and low drug permeability, and had been found in many human organs or tissues, such as the brain, heart, liver, spleen, lungs, kidneys, gastrointestinal tract, and skeleton. By releasing pro-inflammatory bacterial metabolites including endotoxins, exotoxins and interleukin, biofilms stimulated the body’s immune system to secrete inflammatory factors. These factors triggered local inflammation and chronic infections. Those were the key reason for the failure of traditional clinical drug therapy for infectious diseases.In order to cope with the increasingly severe drug-resistant infections, it was urgent to develop new therapeutic strategies for bacterial-biofilm eradication and anti-bacterial infections. Based on the nanoscale structure and biocompatible activity, nanobiomaterials had the advantages of specific targeting, intelligent delivery, high drug loading and low toxicity, which could realize efficient intervention and precise treatment of drug-resistant bacterial biofilms. This paper highlighted multiple strategies of biofilms eradication based on nanobiomaterials. For example, nanobiomaterials combined with EPS degrading enzymes could be used for targeted hydrolysis of bacterial biofilms, and effectively increased the drug enrichment within biofilms. By loading quorum sensing inhibitors, nanotechnology was also an effective strategy for eradicating bacterial biofilms and recovering the infectious symptoms. Nanobiomaterials could intervene the bacterial metabolism and break the bacterial survival homeostasis by blocking the uptake of nutrients. Moreover, energy-driven micro-nano robotics had shown excellent performance in active delivery and biofilm eradication. Micro-nano robots could penetrate physiological barriers by exogenous or endogenous driving modes such as by biological or chemical methods, ultrasound, and magnetic field, and deliver drugs to the infection sites accurately. Achieving this using conventional drugs was difficult. Overall, the paper described the biological properties and drug-resistant molecular mechanisms of bacterial biofilms, and highlighted therapeutic strategies from different perspectives by nanobiomaterials, such as dispersing bacterial mature biofilms, blocking quorum sensing, inhibiting bacterial metabolism, and energy driving penetration. In addition, we presented the key challenges still faced by nanobiomaterials in combating bacterial biofilm infections. Firstly, the dense structure of EPS caused biofilms spatial heterogeneity and metabolic heterogeneity, which created exacting requirements for the design, construction and preparation process of nanobiomaterials. Secondly, biofilm disruption carried the risk of spread and infection the pathogenic bacteria, which might lead to other infections. Finally, we emphasized the role of nanobiomaterials in the development trends and translational prospects in biofilm treatment.

Objective: To report gene mutations in nine patients with hereditary elliptocytosis (HE) and analyze the characteristics of pathogenic gene mutations in HE. Methods: The clinical and gene mutations of nine patients clinically diagnosed with HE at Institute of Hematology & Blood Diseases Hospital from June 2018 to February 2022 were reported and verified by next-generation sequencing to analyze the relationship between gene mutations and clinical phenotypes. Results: Erythrocyte membrane protein gene mutations were detected among nine patients with HE, including six with SPTA1 mutation, one with SPTB mutation, one with EPB41 mutation, and one with chromosome 20 copy deletion. A total of 11 gene mutation sites were involved, including 6 known mutations and 5 novel mutations. The five novel mutations included SPTA1: c.1247A>C (p. K416T) in exon 9, c.1891delG (p. A631fs*17) in exon 15, E6-E12 Del; SPTB: c.154C>T (p. R52W) ; and EPB41: c.1636A>G (p. I546V) . Three of the six patients with the SPTA1 mutation were SPTA1 exon 9 mutation. Conclusion: SPTA1 is the most common mutant gene in patients with HE.
Humans ; Mutation ; Elliptocytosis, Hereditary/metabolism* ; Erythrocyte Membrane/metabolism* ; Exons ; High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing ; Spherocytosis, Hereditary/metabolism*

Humans ; Anemia, Aplastic ; Leukemia, Large Granular Lymphocytic/diagnosis* ; Immunophenotyping

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the clinicopathological characteristics and factors influencing the prognosis of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) in oral and maxillofacial regions. METHODS: Clinicopathological data of 369 patients with oral and maxillofacial NHL initially diagnosed in Peking University Hospital of Stomatology from 2008 to 2020 were collected and analyzed retrospectively. RESULTS: There were 180 males and 189 females. The median age of the patients was 56 years (3 months to 92 years), and the median duration was three months. Clinically, 283 cases manifested as mass, 38 cases as ulcerative necrotizing lesions, and 48 cases as diffuse soft tissue swelling. The lesions of 90 cases located in face and neck (75 cases neck, 20.3%), 99 cases were of major salivary glands (79 cases parotid glands, 20.9%), 103 cases of oral cavity, 50 cases of maxillofacial bones, 20 cases of Waldeyer's ring, and 7 cases of infratemporal fossa. In the study, 247 of the 369 patients had cervical lymphadenopathy, only 40 cases had B symptoms, and 23 cases had the bulky disease. Of the 369 NHLs, 299 (81%) were B-cell NHL, and 70(19%) were T-cell NHL. Diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, extranodal marginal zone B-cell lymphoma of mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue, follicular lymphoma, and extranodal natural killer (NK)/T-cell lymphoma nasal type were the most common pathological subtypes. According to Ann Arbor staging, 87, 138, 106, and 38 cases were classified as staged Ⅰ, Ⅱ, Ⅲ, Ⅳ, respectively. The me-dian follow-up time was 48 months, 164 patients died during the follow-up period. The overall survival rates for one year, two years, and five years were 90.1%, 82.4%, and 59.9%, respectively, and the median survival was (86.00±7.98) months. Multivariate analysis showed that age (P < 0.001), Ann Arbor staging (P < 0.001), elevated lactate dehydrogenase (P=0.014), and pathological subtype (P=0.049) were the independent factors influencing the overall survival rate of NHL patients. CONCLUSION Oral and maxillofacial NHL has unique clinical characteristics and distribution patterns of pathological subtypes. Fewer patients had systemic symptoms. Neck and parotid glands were the most common sites invaded by NHL. Advanced age, Ann Arbor stage Ⅲ-Ⅳ, B symptoms, and T-cell NHL may predict a poor prognosis in oral and maxillofacial NHL patients.
Male ; Female ; Humans ; Middle Aged ; Retrospective Studies ; Prognosis ; Lymphoma, Large B-Cell, Diffuse/diagnosis* ; Lymphoma, B-Cell, Marginal Zone/pathology* ; Neck/pathology* ; Neoplasm Staging

Objective: To establish reference values for carotid intima-media thickness (CIMT) of adult dwellers in Shenzhen City. Methods: The study was conducted based on the Shenzhen heart failure epidemiological survey from 2021 to 2022. In this survey, residents aged 18 years and above in Shenzhen were selected by using a multi-stage stratified random sampling method. General information, cardiovascular disease (CVD) related behavior and carotid ultrasound examination and etc. were collected from the participants. People with CVD factors, a history of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, carotid plaque or having no carotid ultrasound examination results were excluded. The parameter regression model based on fractional polynomial was used to establish the reference values of CIMT by age and sex. Results: A total of 2 163 healthy individuals were enrolled in the final analysis, including 576 males (26.6%) and 1 587 females (73.4%). The fractional polynomial regression of the CIMT mean and standard deviation was obtained. For men, the regression was mean_CIMT=0.324 7+0.006 9×age and SD_CIMT=0.076 9+0.001 2×age. For women, the regression was mean_CIMT=0.354 9+0.005 4×age and SD_CIMT=0.041 6+0.002 0×age. Conclusion: The age and sex reference values for CIMT of adult people in Shenzhen established in this study could provide the latest reference standards for early screening of subclinical CVD.
Male ; Humans ; Adult ; Female ; Carotid Intima-Media Thickness ; Cardiovascular Diseases ; Reference Values ; Carotid Arteries/diagnostic imaging* ; Ultrasonography, Carotid Arteries ; Risk Factors ; Carotid Artery Diseases

PURPOSE: Child head injury under impact scenarios (e.g. falls, vehicle crashes, etc.) is an important topic in the field of injury biomechanics. The head of piglet was commonly used as the surrogate to investigate the biomechanical response and mechanisms of pediatric head injuries because of the similar cellular structures and material properties. However, up to date, piglet head models with accurate geometry and material properties, which have been validated by impact experiments, are seldom. We aim to develop such a model for future research. METHODS: In this study, first, the detailed anatomical structures of the piglet head, including the skull, suture, brain, pia mater, dura mater, cerebrospinal fluid, scalp and soft tissue, were constructed based on CT scans. Then, a structured butterfly method was adopted to mesh the complex geometries of the piglet head to generate high-quality elements and each component was assigned corresponding constitutive material models. Finally, the guided drop tower tests were conducted and the force-time histories were ectracted to validate the piglet head finite element model. RESULTS: Simulations were conducted on the developed finite element model under impact conditions and the simulation results were compared with the experimental data from the guided drop tower tests and the published literature. The average peak force and duration of the guide drop tower test were similar to that of the simulation, with an error below 10%. The inaccuracy was below 20%. The average peak force and duration reported in the literature were comparable to those of the simulation, with the exception of the duration for an impact energy of 11 J. The results showed that the model was capable to capture the response of the pig head. CONCLUSION This study can provide an effective tool for investigating child head injury mechanisms and protection strategies under impact loading conditions.
Animals ; Swine ; Finite Element Analysis ; Skull/injuries* ; Craniocerebral Trauma/diagnostic imaging* ; Brain ; Biomechanical Phenomena ; Scalp

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the factors related to renal impairment in patients with diabetic kidney disease (DKD) from the perspective of integrated Chinese and Western medicine. METHODS: Totally 492 patients with DKD in 8 Chinese hospitals from October 2017 to July 2019 were included. According to Kidney Disease Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) staging guidelines, patients were divided into a chronic kidney disease (CKD) 1-3 group and a CKD 4-5 group. Clinical data were collected, and logistic regression was used to analyze the factors related to different CKD stages in DKD patients. RESULTS: Demographically, male was a factor related to increased CKD staging in patients with DKD (OR=3.100, P=0.002). In clinical characteristics, course of diabetes >60 months (OR=3.562, P=0.010), anemia (OR=4.176, P<0.001), hyperuricemia (OR=3.352, P<0.001), massive albuminuria (OR=4.058, P=0.002), atherosclerosis (OR=2.153, P=0.007) and blood deficiency syndrome (OR=1.945, P=0.020) were factors related to increased CKD staging in patients with DKD. CONCLUSIONS Male, course of diabetes >60 months, anemia, hyperuricemia, massive proteinuria, atherosclerosis, and blood deficiency syndrome might indicate more severe degree of renal function damage in patients with DKD. (Registration No. NCT03865914).
Humans ; Male ; Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2 ; Diabetic Nephropathies ; Hyperuricemia ; Kidney ; Proteinuria ; Renal Insufficiency, Chronic/complications*

Objective: To reveal the compensatory features of bone marrow (BM) erythropoiesis in hereditary spherocytosis (HS) and to explore the effect of diferent hemoglobin levels on this compensation. Methods: Clinical and laboratory data of patients with HS were collected, and the peripheral blood absolute reticulocytes counts value was taken as the surrogate parameter to evaluate the ability of erythropoiesis compensation. BM erythropoiesis compensation in HS with diferent degrees of anemia were evaluated. Results: ①Three hundred and two patients were enrolled, including 115 with compensated hemolytic disease, 74 with mild anemia, 90 with moderate anemia, and 23 with severe anemia. ②Hemoglobin (HGB) was negatively correlated with serum erythropoietin in the decompensated hemolytic anemia group (EPO; rs=-0.585, P<0.001) . ③The median absolute reticulocyte count (ARC) of HS patients was 0.34 (0.27, 0.44) ×10(12)/L, up to 4.25 times that of normal people. The maximum ARC was 0.81×10(12)/L, about 10 times that of normal people. The median ARC of patients with compensated hemolytic disease was 0.29 (0.22, 0.38) ×10(12)/L, up to 3.63 times that of normal people. The median ARC of patients with hemolytic anemia was 0.38 (0.30, 0.46) ×10(12)/L, which was significantly higher than the patients with compensated hemolytic disease, up to 4.75 times that of normal people (z=4.999, P=0.003) . ④ ARC was negatively correlated with HGB in the compensated hemolytic disease group (rs=-0.177, P=0.002) and positively correlated with HGB in the decompensated hemolytic anemia group (rs=0.191, P=0.009) . There was no significant difference in the ARC among patients with mild, moderate, and severe anemia (χ(2)=4.588, P=0.101) . ⑤The median immature reticulocyte production index of the mild, moderate, and severe anemia groups was 13.1% (9.1%, 18.4%) , 17.0% (13.4%, 20.8%) , and 17.8% (14.6%, 21.8%) , respectively; the mild anemia group had lower index values than the moderate and severe anemia groups (P(adj) values were both<0.05) , but there was no significant difference between the latter groups (P(adj)=1.000) . The median immature reticulocyte count of patients in the mild, moderate, and severe groups was 5.09 (2.60, 7.74) ×10(10)/L, 6.24 (4.34, 8.83) ×10(10)/L, and 7.00 (3.07, 8.22) ×10(10)/L, respectively; there was no significant difference among the groups (χ(2)=3.081, P=0.214) . Conclusion: HGB can be maintained at a normal level through bone marrow erythropoiesis, while red blood cells are reduced in HS. However, once anemia develops, the bone marrow exerts its maximum erythropoiesis capacity and does not increase, regardless of anemia aggravation or serum EPO increase.
Bone Marrow ; Erythropoiesis ; Humans ; Reticulocyte Count ; Reticulocytes ; Spherocytosis, Hereditary

Objective: To reassess the predictors for response at 6 months in patients with severe or very severe aplastic anemia (SAA/VSAA) who failed to respond to immunosuppressive therapy (IST) at 3 months. Methods: We retrospectively analyzed the clinical data of 173 patients with SAA/VSAA from 2017 to 2018 who received IST and were classified as nonresponders at 3 months. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis were used to evaluate factors that could predict the response at 6 months. Results: Univariate analysis showed that the 3-month hemoglobin (HGB) level (P=0.017) , platelet (PLT) level (P=0.005) , absolute reticulocyte count (ARC) (P<0.001) , trough cyclosporine concentration (CsA-C0) (P=0.042) , soluble transferrin receptor (sTfR) level (P=0.003) , improved value of reticulocyte count (ARC(△)) (P<0.001) , and improved value of soluble transferrin receptor (sTfR(△)) level (P<0.001) were related to the 6-month response. The results of the multivariate analysis showed that the PLT level (P=0.020) and ARC(△) (P<0.001) were independent prognostic factors for response at 6 months. If the ARC(△) was less than 6.9×10(9)/L, the 6-month hematological response rate was low, regardless of the patient's PLT count. Survival analysis showed that both the 3-year overall survival (OS) [ (80.1±3.9) % vs (97.6±2.6) %, P=0.002] and 3-year event-free survival (EFS) [ (31.4±4.5) % vs (86.5±5.3) %, P<0.001] of the nonresponders at 6 months were significantly lower than those of the response group. Conclusion: Residual hematopoietic indicators at 3 months after IST are prognostic parameters. The improved value of the reticulocyte count could reflect whether the bone marrow hematopoiesis is recovering and the degree of recovery. A second treatment could be performed sooner for patients with a very low ARC(△).
Anemia, Aplastic/drug therapy* ; Antilymphocyte Serum/therapeutic use* ; Cyclosporine/therapeutic use* ; Humans ; Immunosuppression Therapy ; Immunosuppressive Agents/therapeutic use* ; Prognosis ; Receptors, Transferrin/therapeutic use* ; Retrospective Studies ; Treatment Outcome

Objective: To study the metabolic characteristics of anti-human T-cell porcine immunoglobulin (p-ATG) in patients with severe aplastic anemia (SAA) . Methods: For patients with SAA treated with p-ATG combined cyclosporine A (CsA) immunosuppressants between February 2017 and December 2017, the p-ATG dose was 20 mg·kg(-1)·d(-1) over 12 h of intravenous administration for 5 consecutive days. The blood concentration of p-ATG was detected by the three-antibody sandwich ELISA method, the pharmacokinetic analysis software was fitted, and the second-chamber model method was used to calculate the pharmacokinetic parameters and plot the pharmacokinetic curve. Adverse events were recorded and the hematologic reactions were determined at 6 months after treatment. Results: Sixteen patients with SAA treated with p-ATG were enrolled, including 8 females and 8 males, with a median age of 22 years (range, 12 to 49 years) and a median weight of 62.5 kg (range, 37.5 to 82.0 kg) . The pharmacokinetics of p-ATG could be evaluated in 14 cases. p-ATG is distributed in vivo as a two-chamber model, with an average drug concentration peak (T(max)) of (5.786±2.486) days, a peak concentration (C(max)) of (616±452) mg/L, and a half-life of (10.479±8.242) days. The area under the drug time curve (AUC) was (5.807±3.236) mg/L·d. Six months after treatment, 8 of 14 patients received a hematologic response; the AUC (0-t) of the effective group and ineffective groups was (7.50±3.26) mg/L·d vs (4.50±2.18) mg/L·d, and the C(max) was (627±476) mg/L vs (584±382) mg/L, respectively. Conclusion: The plasma concentration of p-ATG reached a peak after 5 days of continuous infusion, and then decreased slowly, with a half-life of 10.479 days, and the residual drug concentration was detected in the body 60 days after administration. A relationship between drug metabolism and efficacy and adverse reactions could not be determined.
Anemia, Aplastic/drug therapy* ; Animals ; Antilymphocyte Serum/therapeutic use* ; Cyclosporine/therapeutic use* ; Female ; Humans ; Immunoglobulins/therapeutic use* ; Immunosuppression Therapy ; Immunosuppressive Agents/therapeutic use* ; Male ; Swine ; T-Lymphocytes ; Treatment Outcome