Effects of cell-free DNA on kidney disease and intervention strategies

Kidney disease has become a global public health problem. Patients with end-stage kidney disease must rely on dialysis or undergo renal transplantation, placing heavy burdens on their families and society. Therefore, it is important to develop new therapeutic targets and intervention strategies during early stages of chronic kidney disease. The widespread application of liquid biopsy has led to an increasing number of studies concerning the roles of cell-free DNA (cfDNA) in kidney disease. In this review, we summarize relevant studies concerning the roles of cfDNA in kidney disease and describe various strategies for targeted removal of cfDNA, with the goal of establishing novel therapeutic approaches for kidney disease

Green's function and Pointwise Behavior of the One-Dimensional Vlasov-Maxwell-Boltzmann System

The pointwise space-time behavior of the Green's function of the one-dimensional Vlasov-Maxwell-Boltzmann (VMB) system is studied in this paper. It is shown that the Green's function consists of the macroscopic diffusive waves and Huygens waves with the speed $\pm \sqrt{5/3}$ at low-frequency, the hyperbolic waves with the speed $\pm 1$ at high-frequency, the singular kinetic and leading short waves, and the remaining term decaying exponentially in space and time. Note that these high-frequency hyperbolic waves are completely new and can not be observed for the Boltzmann equation and the Vlasov-Poisson-Boltzmann system. In addition, we establish the pointwise space-time estimate of the global solution to the nonlinear VMB system based on the Green's function. Compared to the Boltzmann equation and the Vlasov-Poisson-Boltzmann system, some new ideas are introduced to overcome the difficulties caused by the coupling effects of the transport of particles and the rotating of electro-magnetic fields, and investigate the new hyperbolic waves and singular leading short waves

Research on accurate stereo portrait generation algorithm of scientific research team

In order to smoothly promote the establishment of scientific research projects, accurately identify the excellent scientific research team, and intuitively and comprehensively describe the scientific research team, it is of great significance for the scientific research management department to comprehensively understand and objectively evaluate the scientific research team. At present, the research work on the construction of accurate three-dimensional portrait of scientific research team is relatively less. In view of the practical demand of scientific research management department, this paper proposes an accurate stereo portrait generation algorithm of scientific research team. The algorithm includes three modules: research team identification, research topic extraction and research team portrait generation. Firstly, the leader of the scientific research team is identified based on the iterative middle centrality ranking method, and the members of the scientific research team are identified through the 2-faction and snowball methods, so as to realize the identification of the scientific research team. Then, considering the statistical information of words and the co-occurrence features of words in the research team, the research topics of the research team are extracted to improve the accuracy of research topic extraction. Finally, the research team portrait generation module generates the accurate three-dimensional portrait of the research team through the generation of the research team profile, the construction of the research cooperation relationship, and the construction of the research team topic cloud. The research team is identified on the data set of scientific research achievements, and the accurate three-dimensional portraits of the research team are generated and visualized. Experiments verify the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm

A-Type Proanthocyanidins from the Stems of Ephedra sinica (Ephedraceae) and Their Antimicrobial Activities

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Morphology and phase control of fluorides nanocrystals activated by lanthanides with two-model luminescence properties

The morphology, size and phase control of luminescent fluoride nanocrystals through doping has become a new research hotspot due to their improved properties. In this work, Yb3+ ions, as one of the most efficient sensitizers for various lanthanide activators, were doped in NaGd(Y)F-4 nanocrystals. The results show that no obvious influence was observed for Yb3+-doped NaYF4 nanocrystals, while the influence of Yb3+ doping on NaGdF4 nanocrystals was remarkable. The NaGd1-xYbxF4 nanocrystals were synthesized by a hydrothermal route and had a morphology of rice-like nanorods. By controlling the synthesis parameters, the average size and slenderness of the nanocrystals increased gradually with addition of Yb3+ ions. In contrast, the NaGd1-xYbxF4 nanocrystals maintained a hexagonal phase, which is more beneficial for application as a luminescent host, until the content of Yb3+ ions reached x = 0.9. The growth and transformation mechanism of NaGd1-xYbxF4 nanocrystals was proposed to be a result of the competition between ion diffusion and an Oswald ripening process. Photoluminescence (PL) spectra confirm the efficient up-conversion and near-infrared (NIR) two-model luminescence properties of Er3+ (Tm3+) activated NaGd(Y)(1-x)YbxF4 nanocrystals. Simulated analysis results indicate that a colloidal solution of mixed luminescent nanocrystals is expected to find application as the activated medium of three dimensional displays and a broadband optical amplifier

The first two mitochondrial genomes from Apiotrichum reveal mitochondrial evolution and different taxonomic assignment of Trichosporonales

Abstract Apiotrichum is a diverse anamorphic basidiomycetous yeast genus, and its mitogenome characterization has not been revealed. In this study, we assembled two Apiotrichum mitogenomes and compared them with mitogenomes from Agaricomycotina, Pucciniomycotina and Ustilaginomycotina. The mitogenomes of Apiotrichum gracile and A. gamsii comprised circular DNA molecules, with sizes of 34,648 bp and 38,096 bp, respectively. Intronic regions were found contributed the most to the size expansion of A. gamsii mitogenome. Comparative mitogenomic analysis revealed that 6.85–38.89% of nucleotides varied between tRNAs shared by the two Apiotrichum mitogenomes. The GC content of all core PCGs in A. gamsii was lower than that of A. gracile, with an average low value of 4.97%. The rps3 gene differentiated the most among Agaricomycotina, Pucciniomycotina and Ustilaginomycotina species, while nad4L gene was the most conserved in evolution. The Ka/Ks values for cob and rps3 genes were > 1, indicating the two genes may be subjected to positive selection in Agaricomycotina, Pucciniomycotina and Ustilaginomycotina. Frequent intron loss/gain events and potential intron transfer events have been detected in evolution of Agaricomycotina, Pucciniomycotina and Ustilaginomycotina. We further detected large-scale gene rearrangements between the 19 mitogenomes from Agaricomycotina, Pucciniomycotina and Ustilaginomycotina, and fifteen of the 17 mitochondrial genes shared by Apiotrichum varied in gene arrangements. Phylogenetic analyses based on maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference methods using a combined mitochondrial gene dataset revealed different taxonomic assignment of two Apiotrichum species, wherein A. gamsii had a more closely relationship with Trichosporon asahii. This study served as the first report on mitogenomes from the genus Apiotrichum, which promotes the understanding of evolution, genomics, and phylogeny of Apiotrichum

Spatio-Temporal Evolution and Multi-Scenario Simulation of Non-Grain Production on Cultivated Land in Jiangsu Province, China

Cultivated land plays a crucial role as the basis of grain production, and it is essential to effectively manage the unregulated expansion of non-grain production (NGP) on cultivated land in order to safeguard food security. The study of NGP has garnered significant attention from scholars, but the prediction of NGP trends is relatively uncommon. Therefore, we focused on Jiangsu Province, a significant grain production region in China, as the study area. We extracted data on cultivated land for non-grain production (NGPCL) in 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2019, and calculated the ratio of non-grain production (NGPR) for each county unit in the province. On this basis, Kernel Density Estimation (KDE) and spatial autocorrelation analysis tools were utilized to uncover the spatio-temporal evolution of NGP in Jiangsu Province. Finally, the Patch-Generating Land Use Simulation (PLUS) model was utilized to predict the trend of NGP in Jiangsu Province in 2038 under the three development scenarios of natural development (NDS), cultivated land protection (CPS), and food security (FSS). After analyzing the results, we came to the following conclusions:(1) During the period of 2000–2019, the NGPCL area and NGPR in Jiangsu Province exhibited a general decreasing trend. (2) The level of NGP displayed a spatial distribution pattern of being “higher in the south and central and lower in the north”. (3) The results of multi-scenario simulation show that under the NDS, the area of NGPCL and cultivated land for grain production (GPCL) decreases significantly; under the CPS, the decrease in NGPCL and GPCL is smaller than that of the NDS. Under the FSS, NGPCL decreases, while GPCL increases. These results can provide reference for the implementation of land use planning, the delineation of the cultivated land protection bottom line, and the implementation of thee cultivated land use control system in the study area

The Efficacy of PD-1/PD-L1 Inhibitors in Patients with Liver Metastasis of Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer: A Real-World Study

Background: A controversy exists regarding the efficacy of programmed death-1 (PD-1)/ programmed death ligand-1 (PD-L1) inhibitors for patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and liver metastases. Our study retrospectively evaluated the efficacy of PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors in NSCLC patients with liver metastases. Methods: This retrospective study included 1627 lung cancer patients who received immunotherapy. Among 648 patients who had advanced NSCLC and received PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors, 61 had liver metastases and 587 did not have. We analyzed patient characteristics, progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS). An exploratory analysis of biomarkers including CD4, CD8 and CD68 for efficacy in patients with liver metastases was also performed. Results: In liver metastasis patients receiving PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors, the objective response rate (ORR) was 29.5%, the disease control rate (DCR) was 72.1%, PFS was 6.4 months and OS was 15.2 months, which were all worse than those of patients without liver metastases (ORR: 35.8%; DCR: 81.8%; PFS: 7.9 months, p = 0.001; OS: 20.6 months, p = 0.008). When compared to non-liver lesions, the ORR (26.2 vs. 39.3%) and DCR (75.4 vs. 88.5%) of liver lesions were lower. During the analysis of PD-L1 expression, 27 PD-L1-positive patients had a longer PFS than 21 patients in the negative group (p = 0.012). Being PD-L1 positive was the independent prognostic indicators for PFS (p = 0.006). Additionally, the PD-L1 and CD8 dual-positive group responded favorably to PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors. Conclusions: PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors are effective in liver metastasis–NSCLC patients. However, the efficacy is inferior when compared to those of patients without liver metastases. In NSCLC patients with liver metastases, PD-L1 expression and CD8+ T cell infiltration can predict the response of PD-1/PD-L1-directed immunotherapy