Analgesia for total knee arthroplasty: a meta-analysis comparing local infiltration and femoral nerve block

Patients frequently experience postoperative pain after a total knee arthroplasty; such pain is always challenging to treat and may delay the patient’s recovery. It is unclear whether local infiltration or a femoral nerve block offers a better analgesic effect after total knee arthroplasty.We performed a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials to compare local infiltration with a femoral nerve block in patients who underwent a primary unilateral total knee arthroplasty. We searched Pubmed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library through December 2014. Two reviewers scanned abstracts and extracted data. The data collected included numeric rating scale values for pain at rest and pain upon movement and opioid consumption in the first 24 hours. Mean differences with 95% confidence intervals were calculated for each end point. A sensitivity analysis was conducted to evaluate potential sources of heterogeneity.While the numeric rating scale values for pain upon movement (MD-0.62; 95%CI: -1.13 to -0.12; p=0.02) in the first 24 hours differed significantly between the patients who received local infiltration and those who received a femoral nerve block, there were no differences in the numeric rating scale results for pain at rest (MD-0.42; 95%CI:-1.32 to 0.47; p=0.35) or opioid consumption (MD 2.92; 95%CI:-1.32 to 7.16; p=0.18) in the first 24 hours.Local infiltration and femoral nerve block showed no significant differences in pain intensity at rest or opioid consumption after total knee arthroplasty, but the femoral nerve block was associated with reduced pain upon movement

PYCR1 and PYCR2 Interact and Collaborate with RRM2B to Protect Cells from Overt Oxidative Stress

Ribonucleotide reductase small subunit B (RRM2B) is a stress response protein that protects normal human fibroblasts from oxidative stress. However, the underlying mechanism that governs this function is not entirely understood. To identify factors that interact with RRM2B and mediate anti-oxidation function, large-scale purification of human Flag-tagged RRM2B complexes was performed. Pyrroline-5-carboxylate reductase 1 and 2 (PYCR1, PYCR2) were identified by mass spectrometry analysis as components of RRM2B complexes. Silencing of both PYCR1 and PYCR2 by expressing short hairpin RNAs induced defects in cell proliferation, partial fragmentation of the mitochondrial network, and hypersensitivity to oxidative stress in hTERT-immortalized human foreskin fibroblasts (HFF-hTERT). Moderate overexpression of RRM2B, comparable to stress-induced level, protected cells from oxidative stress. Silencing of both PYCR1 and PYCR2 completely abolished anti-oxidation activity of RRM2B, demonstrating a functional collaboration of these metabolic enzymes in response to oxidative stress

Recovering Y and Eu from Waste Phosphors Using Chlorination Roasting—Water Leaching Process

Recovering Y and Eu from waste phosphors using chlorination roasting followed by a water leaching process was investigated in this study. Firstly, by chlorination roasting and water leaching, Y and Eu elements present in waste phosphors were efficiently extracted into a leach solution. Secondly, the majority of the impurities in the solution can be removed by adjusting the pH to 4.5 using a Na2S and NH3·H2O solution. Thirdly, the rare earths can be precipitated afterwards by adding a H2C2O4 solution and adjusting the pH to 2.0. Then rare earth oxides (REOs) can be obtained after calcining at 800 °C for 1 h. The characterization study of the waste phosphors and the rare earth oxide products was performed by XRD, XRF, and SEM-EDS analysis to determine the phase and morphological features. Influences of the factors, such as roasting temperatures and time, the addition of ammonium chloride on the roasting of waste phosphors, as well as the pH and the amount of oxalates on the precipitation of Y and Eu, were investigated. The maximum grade (99.84%) of mixed rare earth oxides and recovery rate (87.35%) of Y and Eu were obtained at the optimized conditions

Analgesia for total knee arthroplasty: a meta-analysis comparing local infiltration and femoral nerve block

Patients frequently experience postoperative pain after a total knee arthroplasty; such pain is always challenging to treat and may delay the patient’s recovery. It is unclear whether local infiltration or a femoral nerve block offers a better analgesic effect after total knee arthroplasty.We performed a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials to compare local infiltration with a femoral nerve block in patients who underwent a primary unilateral total knee arthroplasty. We searched Pubmed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library through December 2014. Two reviewers scanned abstracts and extracted data. The data collected included numeric rating scale values for pain at rest and pain upon movement and opioid consumption in the first 24 hours. Mean differences with 95% confidence intervals were calculated for each end point. A sensitivity analysis was conducted to evaluate potential sources of heterogeneity.While the numeric rating scale values for pain upon movement (MD-0.62; 95%CI: -1.13 to -0.12; p=0.02) in the first 24 hours differed significantly between the patients who received local infiltration and those who received a femoral nerve block, there were no differences in the numeric rating scale results for pain at rest (MD-0.42; 95%CI:-1.32 to 0.47; p=0.35) or opioid consumption (MD 2.92; 95%CI:-1.32 to 7.16; p=0.18) in the first 24 hours.Local infiltration and femoral nerve block showed no significant differences in pain intensity at rest or opioid consumption after total knee arthroplasty, but the femoral nerve block was associated with reduced pain upon movement

Step distribution of Yb filling fraction during microstructural evolution in skutterudites

Abstract To achieve a better material for thermoelectric power generation device, filled skutterudite Yb0.3Co4Sb12 samples were fabricated by melting–quenching–annealing–spark plasma sintering (SPS) method. Two sets of samples, before and after SPS, were investigated. In both the two sets of samples, the average grain size of the samples increases monotonously with the increase of annealing time, while Yb filling fraction firstly increases and then decreases. Yb not filling into the skutterudite remains at the grain boundaries in the form of Yb2O3 after SPS, which could be quantified by the spatially difference method of energy dispersive spectra. Step distribution of Yb filling fraction was observed in the samples annealed for 1 h, which was caused by the microstructural evolution from the peritectic phases to the skutterudite phase. The sample annealed for 3 days and SPS sintered possesses the maximum value of Yb filling fraction 0.249 and the maximum ZT value of 1.24 at 850 K. These results are helpful to better understand the microstructural evolution and Yb filling behavior in skutterudite materials

Emerging Trends and Hot Spots of Electrical Impedance Tomography Applications in Clinical Lung Monitoring

OBJECTIVE: This study explores the emerging trends and hot topics concerning applications on electrical impedance tomography (EIT) in clinical lung monitoring. METHODS: Publications on EIT applications in clinical lung monitoring in 2001–2021 were extracted from the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC). The search strategy was “electrical impedance tomography” and “lung.” CiteSpace, a VOS viewer was used to study the citation characteristics, cooperation, and keyword co-occurrence. Moreover, co-cited reference clustering, structural variation analysis (SVA), and future research trends were presented. RESULTS: Six hundred and thirty-six publications were included for the final analysis. The global annual publications on clinical lung monitoring gradually increased in the last two decades. Germany contributes 32.2% of total global publications. University Medical Center Schleswig-Holstein (84 publications, cited frequency 2,205), Physiological Measurement (105 publications, cited frequency 2,056), and Inéz Frerichs (116 articles, cited frequency 3,609) were the institution, journal, and author with the largest number of article citations in the research field. “Electrical impedance tomography” (occurrences, 304), “mechanical ventilation” (occurrences, 99), and “acute respiratory distress syndrome” (occurrences, 67) were the top most three frequent keywords, “noninvasive monitoring” (Avg, pub, year: 2008.17), and “extracorporeal membrane oxygenation” (Avg, pub, year: 2019.60) were the earliest and latest keywords. The keywords “electrical impedance tomography” (strength 7.88) and co-cited reference “Frerichs I, 2017, THORAX” (strength 47.45) had the highest burst value. “Driving pressure,” “respiratory failure,” and “titration” are the three keywords still maintaining a high brush value until now. The largest and smallest cluster of the co-cited references are “obstructive lung diseases” (#0, size: 97) and “lung perfusion” (#20, size: 5). Co-cited reference “Frerichs I, 2017, THORAX” (modularity change rate: 98.49) has the highest structural variability. Categories with most and least interdisciplinary crossing are “ENGINEERING” and “CRITICAL CARE MEDICINE.” CONCLUSIONS: EIT is a valuable technology for clinical lung monitoring, gradually converting from imaging techniques to the clinic. Research hot spots may continue monitoring techniques, the ventilation distribution of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), and respiratory therapy strategies. More diversified lung function monitoring studies, such as lung perfusion and interdisciplinary crossing, are potentially emerging research trends

Circ-SHPRH suppresses cadmium-induced transformation of human bronchial epithelial cells by regulating QKI expression via miR-224–5p

Circular RNAs (circRNAs) have been demonstrated to play critical roles in the pathogenesis of human cancers and carcinogenesis of several environmental pollutants. Nevertheless, the function of circRNAs in cadmium carcinogenesis is unclear. circ-SHPRH is down-regulated in many cancers including non-small cell lung cancer. In our present study, during cadmium-induced transformation of human bronchial epithelial BEAS-2B cells, epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) was induced. Meanwhile, at the middle and late stages of cell transformation, cadmium down-regulated the expression of circ-SHPRH, as well as QKI, a tumor suppressor protein known to prevent the proliferation and EMT during progression of human cancers, compared with passage-matched control BEAS-2B cells. Overexpression of circ-SHPRH in cadmium-transformed BEAS-2B cells promoted the expression of QKI and significantly inhibited proliferation, EMT, invasion, migration and anchorage-independent growth in soft agar of the cells. Mechanistic studies showed that circ-SHPRH functioned as a sponge of miR-224–5p to regulate QKI expression. Interestingly, QKI and circ-SHPRH could form a positive-feedback loop that perpetuated circ-SHPRH/miR-224–5p/QKI axis. Collectively, our results demonstrated that circ-SHPRH inhibited cadmium-induced transformation of BEAS-2B cells through sponging miR-224–5p to regulate QKI expression under cadmium treatment. Our study uncovered a novel molecular mechanism involved in circRNAs in the development of lung cancer due to cadmium exposure

Derivation of induced pluripotent stem cell SJTUi003-A from a 69-year-old Chinese Han Sporadic Alzheimer’s disease patient with APOEε3/ε4 genetic background

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is an age-related and progressive neurodegenerative disease. In this study, we generated an induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) line from the dermal fibroblasts of a 69-year-old female patient carrying APOEε3/ε4 allele and diagnosed with sporadic AD. The iPSC line will be a useful tool for investigating the pathogenesis mechanisms and for drug tests in AD