Prediction of preterm birth with and without preeclampsia using mid-pregnancy immune and growth-related molecular factors and maternal characteristics.

OBJECTIVE:To evaluate if mid-pregnancy immune and growth-related molecular factors predict preterm birth (PTB) with and without (±) preeclampsia. STUDY DESIGN:Included were 400 women with singleton deliveries in California in 2009-2010 (200 PTB and 200 term) divided into training and testing samples at a 2:1 ratio. Sixty-three markers were tested in 15-20 serum samples using multiplex technology. Linear discriminate analysis was used to create a discriminate function. Model performance was assessed using area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC). RESULTS:Twenty-five serum biomarkers along with maternal age <34 years and poverty status identified >80% of women with PTB ± preeclampsia with best performance in women with preterm preeclampsia (AUC = 0.889, 95% confidence interval (0.822-0.959) training; 0.883 (0.804-0.963) testing). CONCLUSION:Together with maternal age and poverty status, mid-pregnancy immune and growth factors reliably identified most women who went on to have a PTB ± preeclampsia

An In Vitro System for Studying Murid Herpesvirus-4 Latency and Reactivation

The narrow species tropisms of Epstein-Barr Virus (EBV) and the Kaposi's Sarcoma -associated Herpesvirus (KSHV) have made Murid Herpesvirus-4 (MuHV-4) an important tool for understanding how gammaherpesviruses colonize their hosts. However, while MuHV-4 pathogenesis studies can assign a quantitative importance to individual genes, the complexity of in vivo infection can make the underlying mechanisms hard to discern. Furthermore, the lack of good in vitro MuHV-4 latency/reactivation systems with which to dissect mechanisms at the cellular level has made some parallels with EBV and KSHV hard to draw. Here we achieved control of the MuHV-4 lytic/latent switch in vitro by modifying the 5′ untranslated region of its major lytic transactivator gene, ORF50. We terminated normal ORF50 transcripts by inserting a polyadenylation signal and transcribed ORF50 instead from a down-stream, doxycycline-inducible promoter. In this way we could establish fibroblast clones that maintained latent MuHV-4 episomes without detectable lytic replication. Productive virus reactivation was then induced with doxycycline. We used this system to show that the MuHV-4 K3 gene plays a significant role in protecting reactivating cells against CD8+ T cell recognition

Fixed-time artificial insemination in beef cattle

which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Background: The study was designed to test the effect of fixed-time artificial insemination (fixed-AI) after the slightly modified Ovsynch protocol on the pregnancy rate in beef cattle in Finnish field conditions. The modification was aimed to optimize the number of offsprings per AI dose. Methods: Ninety Charolais cows and heifers were entered into the program an average of 1.8 times. Thus, 164 animal cases were included. Animals were administered 10-12 μg of buserelin. Seven days later animals without a corpus luteum (CL) were rejected (20.7%) while the remaining 130 cases with a CL were administered prostaglandin F2α, followed 48 h later with a second injection of buserelin (8-10 μg). Fixed-AI was performed 16-20 hours after the last injection. Results: The pregnancy rate was 51.5 % (67/130). The pregnancy rate after a short interval (50-70 d) from calving to entering the program was significantly higher than that after a long interval (>70 d). Conclusion: This protocol seems to give acceptable pregnancy results in beef herds and its effect on saving labour is notable

The Reform of Employee Compensation in China’s Industrial Enterprises

Although employee compensation reform in Chinese industrial sector has been discussed in the literature, the real changes in compensation system and pay practices have received insufficient attention and warrant further examination. This paper briefly reviews the pre- and post-reform compensation system, and reports the results of a survey of pay practices in the four major types of industrial enterprises in China. The research findings indicate that the type of enterprise ownership has little influence on general compensation practices, adoption of profit-sharing plans, and subsidy and allowance packages. In general, pay is linked more to individual performance and has become an important incentive to Chinese employees. However, differences are found across the enterprise types with regard to performance-related pay. Current pay practices are positively correlated to overall effectiveness of the enterprise

Genetic analysis of lung function in inbred mice suggests vitamin D receptor as a candidate gene

Vitamin D receptor (VDR) polymorphisms are associated with an increased asthma incidence in human populations; however, observations in Vdr knockout mice are unclear. The aim of our study was to determine the influence of the genetic variation in Vdr among inbred strains on lung resistance (i.e., dynamic and airway resistance). In an intercross between the strains C57BL/6J (B6) and KK/HlJ (KK), we identified that a significant QTL for dynamic resistance on Chr X was interacting with a QTL on Chr 15. The Chr 15 QTL peak was located in close proximity to the Vdr locus. We further examined if phenotypes of several inbred strains with varying Vdr genotypes differed. Strains with a B6-like genotype on the Vdr locus had significantly lower airway resistance than strains with a KK-like genotype. Vdr knockout mice were examined for dynamic resistance and showed significantly higher resistance than mice with one (i.e., heterozygous) or both copies (i.e., wild-type) of the Vdr. In comparison to B6, the strain A/J is more resistant but carries the same genotype at the Vdr locus. Dietary vitamin D manipulation in the strain A/J did not rescue the high airway resistance phenotype. Finally, we observed that serum vitamin D does not correlate significantly with lung resistance parameters in a survey of 18 strains. Conclusively, Vdr contributes to the phenotypic variation of lung resistance in inbred mice but other molecules in the Vdr pathway and extended network [i.e., Chr X gene(s)] may contribute as well

Core components for effective infection prevention and control programmes: new WHO evidence-based recommendations

Abstract Health care-associated infections (HAI) are a major public health problem with a significant impact on morbidity, mortality and quality of life. They represent also an important economic burden to health systems worldwide. However, a large proportion of HAI are preventable through effective infection prevention and control (IPC) measures. Improvements in IPC at the national and facility level are critical for the successful containment of antimicrobial resistance and the prevention of HAI, including outbreaks of highly transmissible diseases through high quality care within the context of universal health coverage. Given the limited availability of IPC evidence-based guidance and standards, the World Health Organization (WHO) decided to prioritize the development of global recommendations on the core components of effective IPC programmes both at the national and acute health care facility level, based on systematic literature reviews and expert consensus. The aim of the guideline development process was to identify the evidence and evaluate its quality, consider patient values and preferences, resource implications, and the feasibility and acceptability of the recommendations. As a result, 11 recommendations and three good practice statements are presented here, including a summary of the supporting evidence, and form the substance of a new WHO IPC guideline

In vitro anti-angiogenic properties of LGD1069, a selective retinoid X-receptor agonist through down-regulating Runx2 expression on Human endothelial cells

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>LGD1069 (Targretin^®) is a selective retinoid X receptor (RXR) ligand, which is used in patients for cutaneous T-cell lymphoma. Our published study reported that LGD1069 inhibited tumor-induced angiogenesis in non-small cell lung cancer. In present study, we found that LGD1069 suppressed the proliferation, adhesion, invasion and migration of endothelial cells directly, and affected the expression of vegf and some matrix genes.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) were used for <it>in vitro </it>study. MTT assay and Sulforhodamine B assay were used for cell viability assay; the tube formation assay was used to investigate the effect of LGD1069 on angiogenesis <it>in vitro</it>. <it>In vitro </it>adhesion, migration and invasion of HUVEC cells were analyzed by Matrigel adhesion, migration and invasion assay. Gene expressions were measured by RT-PCR and Western blot analysis.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Our data showed here that LGD1069 inhibited the activation of TGF-β/Smad pathway significantly. Furthermore, it was demonstrated that expression of Runx2 was suppressed pronouncedly during incubation with LGD1069. Runx2 is a DNA-binding transcription factor which plays a master role in tumor-induced angiogenesis and cancer cells metastasis by interaction with the TGF-β/Smad pathway of transcriptional modulators.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our results suggested that LGD1069 may impair angiogenic and metastatic potential induced by tumor cells through suppressing expression of Runx2 directly on human endothelial cells, which may point out new pathway through which LGD1069 display anti-angiogenic properties, and provide new molecular evidence to support LGD1069 as a potent anti-metastatic agent in cancer therapy.</p

Study of Bc+B_c^+ decays to the K+K−π+K^+K^-\pi^+ final state and evidence for the decay Bc+→χc0π+B_c^+\to\chi_{c0}\pi^+

A study of $B_c^+\to K^+K^-\pi^+$ decays is performed for the first time using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3.0 $\mathrm{fb}^{-1}$ collected by the LHCb experiment in $pp$ collisions at centre-of-mass energies of $7$ and $8$ TeV. Evidence for the decay $B_c^+\to\chi_{c0}(\to K^+K^-)\pi^+$ is reported with a significance of 4.0 standard deviations, resulting in the measurement of $\frac{\sigma(B_c^+)}{\sigma(B^+)}\times\mathcal{B}(B_c^+\to\chi_{c0}\pi^+)$ to be $(9.8^{+3.4}_{-3.0}(\mathrm{stat})\pm 0.8(\mathrm{syst}))\times 10^{-6}$. Here $\mathcal{B}$ denotes a branching fraction while $\sigma(B_c^+)$ and $\sigma(B^+)$ are the production cross-sections for $B_c^+$ and $B^+$ mesons. An indication of $\bar b c$ weak annihilation is found for the region $m(K^-\pi^+)<1.834\mathrm{\,Ge\kern -0.1em V\!/}c^2$, with a significance of 2.4 standard deviations.Comment: All figures and tables, along with any supplementary material and additional information, are available at https://lhcbproject.web.cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/LHCbProjectPublic/LHCb-PAPER-2016-022.html, link to supplemental material inserted in the reference