Effects of antipsychotics on bone mineral density and prolactin levels in patients with schizophrenia: a 12-month prospective study

Objective: Effects of conventional and atypical antipsychotics on bone mineral density (BMD) and serum prolactin levels (PRL) were examined in patients with schizophrenia.Methods: One hundred and sixty-three first-episode inpatients with schizophrenia were recruited, to whom one of three conventional antipsychotics (perphenazine, sulpiride, and chlorpromazine) or one of three atypical antipsychotics (clozapine, quetiapine, and aripiprazole)was prescribed for 12 months as appropriate. BMD and PRL were tested before and after treatment. Same measures were conducted in 90 matched healthy controls.Results Baseline BMD of postero-anterior L1–L4 range from 1.04 ± 0.17 to 1.42 ± 1.23, and there was no significant difference between the patients group and healthy control group. However, post-treatment BMD values in patients (ranging from 1.02 ± 0.15 to 1.23 ± 0.10) were significantly lower than that in healthy controls (ranging from 1.15 ± 0.12 to 1.42 ± 1.36). The BMD values after conventional antipsychotics were significantly lower than that after atypical antipsychotics. The PRL level after conventional antipsychotics (53.05 ± 30.25 ng/ml) was significantly higher than that after atypical antipsychotics (32.81 ± 17.42 ng/ml). Conditioned relevance analysis revealed significant negative correlations between the PRL level and the BMD values after conventional antipsychotics.Conclusion The increase of PRL might be an important risk factor leading to a high prevalence of osteoporosis in patients with schizophrenia on long-term conventional antipsychotic medication.<br/

Anti-Kekulé number of the {(3, 4), 4}-fullerene*

A {(3,4),4}-fullerene graphG is a 4-regular plane graph with exactly eight triangular faces and other quadrangular faces. An edge subset S of G is called an anti-Kekulé set, if G − S is a connected subgraph without perfect matchings. The anti-Kekulé number of G is the smallest cardinality of anti-Kekulé sets and is denoted by akG. In this paper, we show that 4≤akG≤5; at the same time, we determine that the {(3, 4), 4}-fullerene graph with anti-Kekulé number 4 consists of two kinds of graphs: one of which is the graph H1 consisting of the tubular graph Qnn≥0, where Qn is composed of nn≥0 concentric layers of quadrangles, capped on each end by a cap formed by four triangles which share a common vertex (see Figure 2 for the graph Qn); and the other is the graph H2, which contains four diamonds D1, D2, D3, and D4, where each diamond Di1≤i≤4 consists of two adjacent triangles with a common edge ei1≤i≤4 such that four edges e1, e2, e3, and e4 form a matching (see Figure 7D for the four diamonds D1 − D4). As a consequence, we prove that if G∈H1, then akG=4; moreover, if G∈H2, we give the condition to judge that the anti-Kekulé number of graph G is 4 or 5

Two NHX-type transporters from Helianthus tuberosus improve the tolerance of rice to salinity and nutrient deficiency stress.

The NHX-type cation/H+ transporters in plants have been shown to mediate Na+ (K+ )/H+ exchange for salinity tolerance and K+ homoeostasis. In this study, we identified and characterized two NHX homologues, HtNHX1 and HtNHX2 from an infertile and salinity tolerant species Helianthus tuberosus (cv. Nanyu No. 1). HtNHX1 and HtNHX2 share identical 5'- and 3'-UTR and coding regions, except for a 342-bp segment encoding 114 amino acids (L272 to Q385 ) which is absent in HtNHX2. Both hydroponics and soil culture experiments showed that the expression of HtNHX1 or HtNHX2 improved the rice tolerance to salinity. Expression of HtNHX2, but not HtNHX1, increased rice grain yield, harvest index, total nutrient uptake under K+ -limited salt-stress or general nutrient deficiency conditions. The results provide a novel insight into NHX function in plant mineral nutrition

Preparation and characterization of simvastatin/DMβCD complex and its pharmacokinetics in rats

Simvastatin is poorly bioavailable because it is practically insoluble in water and shows dissolution rate-limited absorption. Solubilizing effects of several β-cyclodextrin （βCD） derivatives such as HPβCD, SBEβCD and DMβCD on simvastatin in aqueous solution were investigated using the phase solubility technique. The solubility diagram of simvastatin with each βCD derivative could be classified as AL-type, indicating soluble complex formation of 1:1 stoichiometry. Among the above βCD derivatives DMβCD was found to be the ideal complexing agent for improving drug solubility. The simvastatin complex with DMβCD was prepared using the co-evaporation method and was then characterized by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) and in vitro dissolution. Dissolution and pharmacokinetic studies indicated that the simvastatin/DMβCD complex exhibited an increased dissolution rate, rapid absorption, and improved bioavailability in rats compared to free drug. Maximum plasma concentration (cmax) and the time to reach it (tmax) were 21.86 µg mL–1 and 1.4 h for the drug complex, 8.25 µg mL–1 and 3.0 h for free drug, respectively. Main pharmacokinetic parameters such as tmax, cmax were significantly different (p < 0.01) between the simvastatin complex and free drug. Bioavailability of the simvastatin complex relative to free drug was up to 167.0 %

Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices Associated With Diabetic Foot Prevention Among Rural Adults With Diabetes in North China

The diabetic foot is a global threat to public health because it can result in infection and amputation, as well as cause the patient to experience considerable pain and incur financial costs. The condition of patients with diabetic foot in North China is distinguished by more severe local ulcers, a worse prognosis, and a longer duration of disease than that of patients with diabetic foot in the south. Through appropriate preventive measures, the diabetic foot can be effectively avoided. This study assesses the existing knowledge, attitudes and practices associated with diabetic foot prevention among adults with diabetes living in rural areas of North China

SpaSSA: superpixelwise adaptive SSA for unsupervised spatial-spectral feature extraction in hyperspectral image.

Singular spectral analysis (SSA) has recently been successfully applied to feature extraction in hyperspectral image (HSI), including conventional (1-D) SSA in spectral domain and 2-D SSA in spatial domain. However, there are some drawbacks, such as sensitivity to the window size, high computational complexity under a large window, and failing to extract joint spectral-spatial features. To tackle these issues, in this article, we propose superpixelwise adaptive SSA (SpaSSA), that is superpixelwise adaptive SSA for exploiting local spatial information of HSI. The extraction of local (instead of global) features, particularly in HSI, can be more effective for characterizing the objects within an image. In SpaSSA, conventional SSA and 2-D SSA are combined and adaptively applied to each superpixel derived from an oversegmented HSI. According to the size of the derived superpixels, either SSA or 2-D singular spectrum analysis (2D-SSA) is adaptively applied for feature extraction, where the embedding window in 2D-SSA is also adaptive to the size of the superpixel. Experimental results on the three datasets have shown that the proposed SpaSSA outperforms both SSA and 2D-SSA in terms of classification accuracy and computational complexity. By combining SpaSSA with the principal component analysis (SpaSSA-PCA), the accuracy of land-cover analysis can be further improved, outperforming several state-of-the-art approaches

In situ earthworm breeding in orchards significantly improves the growth, quality and yield of papaya (Carica papaya L.)

ABSTRACT The aim of this study was to compare the effects of four fertilizer applications-control (C), chemical fertilizer (F), compost (O), and in situ earthworm breeding (E)-on the growth, quality and yield of papaya (Carica papaya L.). In this study, 5 g plant −1 urea (CH 4 N 2 O, %N = 46.3%) and 100 g plant −1 microelement fertilizer was applied to each treatment. The fertilizer applications of these four treatments are different from each other. The results showed that the E treatment had the highest growth parameters over the whole growth period. At 127 days after transplantation, the order of plant heights from greatest to smallest was E &gt; F &gt; O &gt; C, and the stem diameters were E &gt; F &gt; O &gt; C, with significant differences between all treatments. Soluble-solid, sugar, vitamin C, and protein content significantly increased in the E treatment. In addition, the total acid and the electrical conductivity of the fruit significantly decreased in the E treatment. Fruit firmness clearly increased in the O treatment, and decreased in the F treatment. The fresh individual fruit weights, fruit numbers, and total yields were greatly improved in the F and E treatments, and the total yield of the E treatment was higher than that in the F treatment. In conclusion, the in situ earthworm breeding treatment performed better than conventional compost and chemical fertilizer treatments. Furthermore, in situ earthworm breeding may be a potential organic fertilizer application in orchards because it not only improves the fruit quality and yield but also reduces the amount of organic wastes from agriculture as a result of the activities of earthworms

ТРАДИЦИОННАЯ КУЛЬТУРА В ПОВСЕДНЕВНОЙ ЖИЗНИ СОВРЕМЕННЫХ КИТАЙЦЕВ

The research aims at highlighting the specific traditions and culture in daily life of the Chinese society. The research was carried out by means of sociocultural and comparative approaches. The authors admit that for conducting global research on specific traditions and culture in daily life of the Chinese society it is necessary to have approval of the Chinese Government. Due to this fact, the authors used questionnaire and observation methods for collecting empirical data. Questionnaire method was used as structural interview in January 2016 before the Chinese New Year. The interview aimed at revealing the attitude of Chinese people to their traditions and culture and highlighting most typical elements of traditional culture in their daily life. Confucianism and lunar calendar are revealed as cultural dominants in modern culture of China. Confucianism as a spiritual tradition is supported by the Chinese Government. Confucianism contributes to ideology and spiritual values of modern China. Lunar calendar enhances the rhythm of the Chinese daily life. The respondents outlined lunar calendar and its derivatives (agricultural calendar and 12 zodiac signs) as the first one in ranging the elements of Chinese traditions and culture. Chinese culture is full of western assimilations, which are adapted to Chinese culture in order to fix there. In some cases, this process does not change the cultural sense of assimilating cultural element and rendered as an element of foreign culture. In other cases, adaptation is long and it changes the cultural sense of substitution. This results in the fact that this element becomes the element of Chinese culture. Traditions and culture remain the value core of national culture. Modern Chinese culture includes traditional culture, its transformation and western assimilations adopted in China. The authors speak about stratification of Chinese society on subcultures appeared on the basis of attitude to the values of traditions and culture. Modern Chinese culture is a new form of national culture that differs from traditional culture and assimilated one. The authors make a case that further investigation of modern Chinese culture is impossible without these peculiarities.Основной целью исследования, осуществляемого в русле социально-культурного и компаративистского научных подходов, является выявление специфики традиционной культуры в повседневной жизни современного китайского общества. В рамках исследования для сбора эмпирической информации использовались метод анкетирования и метод наблюдения, поскольку для полномасштабного изучения специфики традиционной культуры в повседневной жизни современных китайцев необходимо разрешение китайского руководства на его проведение. Метод анкетирования был использован нами в январе 2016 г. накануне китайского Нового года в форме структурированного интервью, направленного на определение отношения современных китайцев к своей традиционной культуре и выявление наиболее типичных элементов традиционной культуры, бытующих в их повседневной жизни. Культурными доминантами в современной культуре Китая являются конфуцианство и лунный календарь. Конфуцианство как духовная традиция активно поддерживается китайским руководством на государственном уровне. Под воздействием конфуцианства формируются идеология и духовные ценности современного Китая. Лунный календарь задает ритм повседневной жизни современных китайцев. Называя элементы китайской традиционной культуры, все респонденты на первое место поставили лунный календарь, его праздники и производные –сельскохозяйственный календарь «Цзеци» и 12 знаков китайского зодиака. Национальная культура Китая насыщена западными заимствованиями, однако прежде чем укорениться в китайской национальной/ традиционной культуре, заимствуемые элементы проходят обязательный процесс адаптации к китайской культуре. В одних случаях этот процесс практически не изменяет культурный смысл заимствуемого культурного элемента, и тогда новация отчетливо воспринимается как элемент некитайской культуры. В других случаях процесс адаптации длительный и принципиально изменяет культурный смысл новации, в результате чего заимствуемый культурный элемент становится элементом китайской национальной/традиционной культуры. Традиционная культура, подвергаясь трансформации в современных условиях, остается хранителем ценностного ядра национальной культуры. Таким образом, 1) поле современной национальной китайской культуры включает традиционную китайскую культуру, ее трансформации и западные заимствования, прошедшие курс адаптации; 2) можно говорить о стратификации китайского общества на субкультуры, возникающие на основе своего отношения к ценностям традиционной культуры и соблюдения ее норм и правил; 3) современная китайская культура является новой формой национальной культуры, отличающейся от заимствованной и традиционной/национальной культуры. Авторы считают, что дальнейшее изучение и анализ современной национальной культуры Китая невозможны без учета этих особенностей

Long-Term Adaptation of Acidophilic Archaeal Ammonia Oxidisers Following Different Soil Fertilisation Histories

Acknowledgements We thank Prof Yuanqiu He (now deceased) at the State Key Laboratory of Soil and Sustainable Agriculture, Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences for his contribution to this study. In addition, we thank the staff of the Analysis Center at the Institute of Soil Science for technical support, including Ms Rong Huang and Mr Zuohao Ma for 454-pyrosequencing, Mr Ruhai Wang for the ammonia and nitrate and nitrite content assays, Mr Guoxing Lu for the SOM assay. We also thank Dr Jian Cui and Dr Xiaoli Liu for assistance in soil sampling in the fields. Funding This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41530857, 91751204 and 41977056). JZ was funded by a Natural Environment Research Council grant (NE/K016342/1) and CGR was supported by a Royal Society University Research Fellowship (URF150571).Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Serum Helicobacter pylori NapA antibody as a potential biomarker for gastric cancer

Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection is strongly associated with gastric cancer. However, only a minority of infected individuals ever develop gastric cancer. This risk stratification may be in part due to differences among strains. The relationship between neutrophil-activating protein (NapA) and gastric cancer is unclear. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the significance of NapA as a biomarker in gastric cancer. We used enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) to determine the status of H. pylori infection. Indirect ELISA method was used for detection of NapA antibody titer in the serum of H. pyloriinfected individuals. Unconditional logistic regressions were adopted to analyze the variables and determine the association of NapA and gastric cancer. The results of study indicated serum H. pylori NapA antibody level were associated with a reduced risk for development of gastric cancer. It may be used in conjugation with other indicators for gastric cancer detection