Analyzing the Combination of Polymorphisms Associating with Antidepressant Response by Exact Conditional Test

Genetic factors have been shown to be involved in etiology of a poor response to the antidepressant treatment with sufficient dosage and duration. Our goal was to identify the role of polymorphisms in the poor response to the treatment. To this end, 5 functional polymorphisms in 109 patients diagnosed with unipolar, major depressive disorder are analyzed. Due to the small sample size, exact conditional tests are utilized to analyze the contingency table. The data analysis involves: (1) Exact test for conditional independence in a high dimensional contingency table; (2) Marginal independence test; (3) Exact test for three-way interactions. The efficiency of program always limits the application of exact test. The appropriate methods for enumerating exact tables are the key to improve the efficiency of programs. The algorithm of enumerating the exact tables is also introduced

Temperature Adaptability of Asphalt Pavement to High Temperatures and Significant Temperature Differences

Temperature adaptability of asphalt pavements is very important, due to their potential influence on pavement structure design, particularly in areas that experience significant temperature differences. In this paper, a finite element (FE) model was developed, and Turpan-Xiaocao Lake Highway in southern Xinjiang was taken as a case study engineering, which tends to experience this adverse environmental condition (temperature difference: 25.5°C; July 14, 2008). In this model, the generalized Kelvin model and the Burgers model were used. The time-dependent tire pressure was considered. To guide pavement structure design and control pavement distresses in this area, seven alternative pavement structures were selected to simulate and analyze pavement temperature fields and the mechanical responses. It was observed that the influence of air temperature had the greatest impact on Str-1, possibly due to the thinnest asphalt course. Moreover, when rutting depth, maximum shear stress of the asphalt course, deflection on the pavement surface, and compressive strains at the subgrade top surface were taken as the evaluation indices, the adaptability of asphalt pavements using compound base courses had obvious advantage due to their strong absorption and reflection of load impact. The adaptability of seven structures analyzed in this paper decreased in the following order: Str-5 > Str-6 > Str-4 > Str-2 > Str-m > Str-1 > Str-3. In addition, it broke the traditional view that asphalt pavement with a flexible base had the poor ability on rutting resistance. Besides, it also suggests that when the thickness of asphalt courses was equivalent, increasing the thickness of chemical-treated base courses would help with the deformation resistance, and vice versa

Thoracoscopic Surgery for Glomus Tumor: An Uncommon Mediastinal Neoplasm and Iatrogenic Tracheal Rupture

Mediastinal glomus tumors are rarely recognized, and only seven cases have been reported in the literature. Here, we describe a rare mediastinal glomus tumor and review the characteristics of this rare clinical case. The patient was a 50-year-old female who presented with coughing for 3 months. Her chest computed tomography scan demonstrated a localized tumor in the posterior superior mediastinum. Intraoperatively, we found a longitudinal rupture of the membranous trachea above the carina. We completely resected the tumor and repaired the tracheal rupture under a thoracoscopy using a pedicled muscle flap. The tissue was diagnosed as a mediastinal glomus tumor according to its histological and immunophenotypic characteristics

Development of a New Marine Fish Continuous Cell Line Derived from Brain of Red Sea Bream (<i>Pagrosomus major</i>) and Its Application to Fish Virology and Heavy Metal Toxicology

Red sea bream (Pagrosomus major) is one of the most popular farmed marine teleost fish species. Fish cell lines are becoming important research tool in the aquaculture field, and they are suitable models to study fish virology, immunology and toxicology. To obtain a Pagrosomus major cell line for biological studies, a continuous cell line from brain of red sea bream (designated as RSBB cell line) was established and has been successfully subcultured over 100 passages. The RSBB cell line predominantly consisted of fibroblast-like cells and multiplied well in M199 medium supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum at 28 °C. Karyotyping analysis indicated that the modal chromosome numbers of RSBB cells was 48. After transfection with pEGFP-N1, RSBB cells showed bright green fluorescence with a transfection efficiency approaching 8%. For toxicology study, it was demonstrated that metal Cd could induce cytotoxic effects of RSBB cells, accompanied with a dose-dependent MTT conversion capacity. Morphologically, cells treated with metal Cd produced rounding, shrinking and detaching and induced both cell apoptosis and necrosis. For virology study, the RSBB cells were highly susceptible to Nervous necrosis virus (NNV) and Singapore grouper iridovirus (SGIV) with steady titers (i.e., 108.0~8.3 TCID50 mL−1 and 107.0~7.2 TCID50 mL−1 respectively). Furthermore, an obvious cytopathic effect (CPE) could be observed in RSBB cells infected with Infectious spleen and kidney necrosis virus (ISKNV) and Siniperca chuatsi rhabdoviruses (SCRV). Meanwhile, all the infections were confirmed by polymerase chain reaction. The new brain cell line developed and characterized from red sea bream in this study could be used as an in vitro model for fish studies in the fields of toxicology and virology