Effect of fenugreek (Trigonella foenum-graecum L.) intake on glycemia: A meta-analysis of clinical trials

10.1186/1475-2891-13-7Nutrition Journal131

Prophenoloxidase from Pieris rapae: gene cloning, activity, and transcription in response to venom/calyx fluid from the endoparasitoid wasp Cotesia glomerata *

Prophenoloxidase (PPO) plays an important role in melanization, necessary for defense against intruding parasitoids. Parasitoids have evolved to inject maternal virulence factors into the host hemocoel to suppress hemolymph melanization for the successful development of their progeny. In this study, the full-length complementary DNA (cDNA) of a Pieris rapae PPO was cloned. Its cDNA contained a 2 076-base pair (bp) open reading frame (ORF) encoding 691 amino acids (aa). Two putative copper-binding sites, a proteolytic activation site, three conserved hemocyanin domains, and a thiol ester motif were found in the deduced amino acid sequence. According to both multiple alignment and phylogenetic analysis, P. rapae PPO gene cloned here is a member of the lepidopteran PPO-2 family. Injection of Cotesia glomerata venom or calyx fluid resulted in reduction of P. rapae hemolymph phenoloxidase activity, demonstrating the ability to inhibit the host′s melanization. Real-time reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) showed that transcripts of P. rapae PPO-2 in the haemocytes from larvae had not significantly changed following venom injection, suggesting that the regulation of PPO messenger RNA (mRNA) expression by venom was not employed by C. glomerata to cause failure of melanization in parasitized host. While decreased P. rapae PPO-2 gene expression was observed in the haemocytes after calyx fluid injection, no detectable transcriptional change was induced by parasitization, indicating that transcriptional down-regulation of PPO by calyx fluid might play a minor role involved in inhibiting the host′s melanization

A Machine Learning Algorithm to Identify Patients at Risk of Unplanned Subsequent Surgery After Intramedullary Nailing for Tibial Shaft Fractures

Objectives: In the SPRINT trial, 18% of patients with a tibial shaft fracture (TSF) treated with intramedullary nailing (IMN) had one or more unplanned subsequent surgical procedures. It is clinically relevant for surgeon and patient to anticipate unplanned secondary procedures, other than operations that can be readily expected such as reconstructive procedures for soft tissue defects. Therefore, the objective of this study was to develop a machine learning (ML) prediction model using the SPRINT data that can give individual patients and their care team an estimate of their particular probability of an unplanned second surgery. Methods: Patients from the SPRINT trial with unilateral TSFs were randomly divided into a training set (80%) and test set (20%). Five ML algorithms were trained in recognizing patterns associated with subsequent surgery in the training set based on a subset of variables identified by random forest algorithms. Performance of each ML algorithm was evaluated and compared based on (1) area under the ROC curve, (2) calibration slope and intercept, and (3) the Brier score. Results: Total data set comprised 1198 patients, of whom 214 patients (18%) underwent subsequent surgery. Seven variables were used to train ML algorithms: (1) Gustilo-Anderson classification, (2) Tscherne classification, (3) fracture location, (4) fracture gap, (5) polytrauma, (6) injury mechanism, and (7) OTA/AO classification. The best-performing ML algorithm had an area under the ROC curve, calibration slope, calibration intercept, and the Brier score of 0.766, 0.954, -0.002, and 0.120 in the training set and 0.773, 0.922, 0, and 0.119 in the test set, respectively. Conclusions: An ML algorithm was developed to predict the probability of subsequent surgery after IMN for TSFs. This ML algorithm may assist surgeons to inform patients about the probability of subsequent surgery and might help to identify patients who need a different perioperative plan or a more intensive approach.Orthopaedics, Trauma Surgery and Rehabilitatio