Anti-beta2 glycoprotein I (beta2GPI) antibodies facilitates phagocytosis of apoptotic neutrophils in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE)

BACKGROUND : Increased apoptosis provides a continuous source autoantigens and has been suggested to have a pathogenic role in SLE. We have previously shown patients with SLE have impaired clearance of apoptotic bodies. In this study, we evaluated whether anti-beta2GPI antibodies, a subset of antiphospholipid antibodies, may have an effect on the phagocytosis of apoptotic bodies by macrophages in these patients …published_or_final_versio

Contribution of discourse and morphosyntax skills to reading comprehension in Chinese dyslexic and typically developing children

This study aimed at identifying important skills for reading comprehension in Chinese dyslexic children and their typically developing counterparts matched on age (CA controls) or reading level (RL controls). The children were assessed on Chinese reading comprehension, cognitive, and reading-related skills. Results showed that the dyslexic children performed significantly less well than the CA controls but similarly to RL controls in most measures. Results of multiple regression analyses showed that word-level reading-related skills like oral vocabulary and word semantics were found to be strong predictors of reading comprehension among typically developing junior graders and dyslexic readers of senior grades, whereas morphosyntax, a text-level skill, was most predictive for typically developing senior graders. It was concluded that discourse and morphosyntax skills are particularly important for reading comprehension in the non-inflectional and topic-prominent Chinese system. © 2010 The Author(s).published_or_final_versionSpringer Open Choice, 21 Feb 201

Sex hormones and apoptosis and immunoglobulin production in systemic lupus erythematosus

BACKGROUND: SLE is an autoimmune disease that affects predominantly female of reproductive age. Previous studies have suggested an immunomodulatory role of sex hormones in the pathogenesis of SLE. Objectives: To examine the effects of various sex hormones on apoptosis and immunoglobulin production by peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) in SLE patients …published_or_final_versio

PubMed-supported clinical term weighting approach for improving inter-patient similarity measure in diagnosis prediction

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Photogrammetric frontal facial proportions of 12-year-old southern Chinese

Poster SessionThis journal suppl. entitled: Special Issue: Abstracts of the 2012 FDI Annual World Dental CongressThis study aimed to establish norm values for facial proportion indices of 12-year-old southern Chinese and to describe any gender differences. Of the 258 individuals (140 females and 118 males) was obtained from a Hong Kong Chinese Birth Cohort Study. Facial landmarks were plotted with ImageJ 1.45 on the frontal photographs. Twenty-two facial proportion indices were obta...postprin

Lycium barbarum Extracts Protect the Brain from Blood-Brain Barrier Disruption and Cerebral Edema in Experimental Stroke

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Ischemic stroke is a destructive cerebrovascular disease and a leading cause of death. Yet, no ideal neuroprotective agents are available, leaving prevention an attractive alternative. The extracts from the fruits of Lycium barbarum (LBP), a Chinese anti-aging medicine and food supplement, showed neuroprotective function in the retina when given prophylactically. We aim to evaluate the protective effects of LBP pre-treatment in an experimental stroke model. METHODS: C57BL/6N male mice were first fed with either vehicle (PBS) or LBP (1 or 10 mg/kg) daily for 7 days. Mice were then subjected to 2-hour transient middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) by the intraluminal method followed by 22-hour reperfusion upon filament removal. Mice were evaluated for neurological deficits just before sacrifice. Brains were harvested for infarct size estimation, water content measurement, immunohistochemical analysis, and Western blot experiments. Evans blue (EB) extravasation was determined to assess blood-brain barrier (BBB) disruption after MCAO. RESULTS: LBP pre-treatment significantly improved neurological deficits as well as decreased infarct size, hemispheric swelling, and water content. Fewer apoptotic cells were identified in LBP-treated brains by TUNEL assay. Reduced EB extravasation, fewer IgG-leaky vessels, and up-regulation of occludin expression were also observed in LBP-treated brains. Moreover, immunoreactivity for aquaporin-4 and glial fibrillary acidic protein were significantly decreased in LBP-treated brains. CONCLUSIONS: Seven-day oral LBP pre-treatment effectively improved neurological deficits, decreased infarct size and cerebral edema as well as protected the brain from BBB disruption, aquaporin-4 up-regulation, and glial activation. The present study suggests that LBP may be used as a prophylactic neuroprotectant in patients at high risk for ischemic stroke.published_or_final_versio

Pro-inflammatory adipokines as predictors of incident cancers in a chinese cohort of low obesity prevalence in Hong Kong

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The clinical significance and potential therapeutic role of GPx3 in tumor recurrence after liver transplantation

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Fractal Profit Landscape of the Stock Market

We investigate the structure of the profit landscape obtained from the most basic, fluctuation based, trading strategy applied for the daily stock price data. The strategy is parameterized by only two variables, p and q. Stocks are sold and bought if the log return is bigger than p and less than -q, respectively. Repetition of this simple strategy for a long time gives the profit defined in the underlying two-dimensional parameter space of p and q. It is revealed that the local maxima in the profit landscape are spread in the form of a fractal structure. The fractal structure implies that successful strategies are not localized to any region of the profit landscape and are neither spaced evenly throughout the profit landscape, which makes the optimization notoriously hard and hypersensitive for partial or limited information. The concrete implication of this property is demonstrated by showing that optimization of one stock for future values or other stocks renders worse profit than a strategy that ignores fluctuations, i.e., a long-term buy-and-hold strategy.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figure