Effect of total flavonoids of Cuscuta chinensis Lam. (Convolvulaceae) on oxidative stress injury in mouse testis and epididymis, and on serum levels of reproductive hormones in oligoasthenospermia mice model

Purpose: To investigate the effect of total flavonoids of Cuscuta chinensis (TFCC) on oxidative stress injury in testis and epididymis, and serum levels of reproductive hormones in an oligoasthenospermia (OAS) mice model. Methods: Thirty male Wistar mice were randomly assigned to three groups of 10 mice each: control group, OAS group and TFCC group. With the exception of control group, OAS was orally induced in the mice with ornidazole. The TFCC group received TFCC. Reactive oxygen species (ROS), malondialdehyde (MDA) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) were determined. Serum levels of follicle stimulating hormone (FSH), luteinizing hormone (LH) and testosterone were also measured. Results: The levels of ROS and MDA in the testis and epididymis significantly increased in OAS group, when compared to control mice (p < 0.05). However, TFCC administration significantly reduced their levels in these tissues (p < 0.05). In contrast, SOD activity significantly decreased in the testis and epididymis of mice in OAS group, relative to control group, but increased significantly after TFCC exposure (p < 0.05). Serum FSH and LH were markedly elevated in OAS group, but treatment with TFCC significantly reduced the levels of these hormones (p < 0.05). Conclusion: These results suggest that TFCC effectively improves sperm quality and reduces oxidative damage in testis and epididymis of mice with oligoasthenospermia via a mechanism involving the regulation of serum levels of reproductive hormones. Thus, TFCC may be useful in the treatment of oligoasthenospermia

Performance of bone tracer for diagnosis and differentiation of transthyretin cardiac amyloidosis: a systematic review and meta-analysis

PURPOSE :Bone tracers have been validated for many years in detecting transthyretin cardiac amyloidosis (TTR-CA). However, several new studies suggest conflicting results. Our study aimed to systematically evaluate the accuracy of bone radiotracers for diagnosis and differentiation of TTR-CA via a systematic review and meta-analysis.METHODS:We retrieved articles assessing the performance of bone tracer in diagnosing and differentiating TTR-CA from PubMed, the Cochrane Library, ScienceDirect, and DOAJ databases, dating up to 10 July 2020. The meta-analysis was conducted through Stata 16 software, and the risk of bias for the included studies was assessed by the QUADAS-2 tool. Moreover, we made a comprehensive review.RESULTS:Fourteen articles were included in the systematic review, and 9 in the meta-analysis. The pooled sensitivity was 0.97 (95% confidence interval [95% CI] 0.85–0.99) with heterogeneity (I2=73.5, 95% CI 55.6–91.2), and the specificity was 0.92 (95% CI 0.82–0.96) with heterogeneity (I2=42.0, 95% CI 0.0–86.9). The pooled positive and negative likelihood ratios were 11.49 (95% CI 5.07–26.0) and 0.03 (95% CI 0.01–0.18), respectively. The diagnostic odds ratio was 341 (95% CI 53–2194), and the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was 0.96 (95% CI 0.94–0.97).CONCLUSION:The findings evidence that the bone radiotracer is a valuable noninvasive approach that provides high accuracy for diagnosing TTR-CA and plays a modest role in differentiating TTR-CA from immunoglobulin amyloid light-chain cardiac amyloidosis. 99mTc-HMDP may be more accurate than 99mTc-PYP, 99mTc-DPD, and 18F-NaF in the TTR-CA detecting process, and 18F-NaF is a promising bone tracer to diagnose and differentiate TTR-CA

Mitigation of Multiple Environmental Footprints for China’s Pig Production Using Different Land Use Strategies

Pig production contributes considerably to land use and greenhouse gas (GHG) and reactive nitrogen (Nr) emissions. Land use strategies were widely proposed, but the spillover effects on biological flow are rarely explored. Here, we simultaneously assessed the carbon (C), nitrogen (N), and cropland footprints of China's pig production at the provincial scale in 2017. The environmental impacts of land use strategies were further evaluated. Results show that one kg live-weight pig production generated an average of 1.9 kg CO2-equiv and 59 g Nr emissions, occupying 3.5 m2 cropland, with large regional variations. A large reduction in GHG (58-64%) and Nr (12-14%) losses and occupied cropland (10-11%) could be achieved simultaneously if combined strategies of intensive crop production, improved feed-protein utilization efficiency, and feeding co-products were implemented. However, adopting a single strategy may have environmental side-effects. Reallocating cropland that pigs used for feed to plant food alternatives would enhance human-edible energy (3-20 times) and protein delivery (1-5 times) and reduce C and N footprints, except for rice and vegetables. Reallocating cropland to beef and milk production would decrease energy and protein supply. Therefore, a proper combination of land use strategies is essential to alleviate land use changes and nutrient emissions without sacrificing food supply

A Kind of New Surface Modeling Method Based on DEM Data

Surface elevation changes greatly in the river erosion area. Due to the limitation of the acquisition equipment and cost, the traditional seismic acquisition data has sparse physical points both horizontally and longitudinally, the density of surface measurement data is not enough to survey the surface structure in detail. With the development of science and technology, and the application of satellite technology, the DEM elevation data obtained from the geographic information system (GIS) are becoming more and more accurate. In this paper, a precise modeling is performed on the surface based on the geographic information from the river erosion area and combined with the results of the surface survey control points, a good effect is achieved.Key words: River erosion area; Geographic information; Similarity coefficient; Kriging interpolation; Surface modeling; High and low frequency static

Quantitative Analysis of Intestinal Flora of Uygur and Han Ethnic Chinese Patients with Ulcerative Colitis

Aim. To study the correlation between intestinal flora and ulcerative colitis by analyzing the abundance of Bacteroides, Fusobacterium, Clostridium, Bifidobacterium spp., and Faecalibacterium prausnitzii in the intestinal of ulcerative colitis (UC) patients and healthy controls with Uygur and Han ethnic. Methods. Bacterial genomic DNA was extracted from fecal samples and analyzed with real-time fluorescence quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to identify the abundance of Bacteroides, Fusobacterium, Clostridium, Bifidobacterium spp., and Faecalibacterium prausnitzii. Results. The samples from UC patients, Uygur and Han ethnic combined, had higher abundance of Bacteroides (P=0.026) but lower Clostridium (P=0.004), Bifidobacterium spp. (P=0.009), and Faecalibacterium prausnitzii (P=0.008) than those from healthy controls. Among UC patients, Bacteroides population was raised in acute UC patients (P≤0.05), while the abundance of Clostridium, Bifidobacterium spp., Fusobacterium, and Faecalibacterium prausnitzii decreased (P≤0.05) compared with the remission. In both UC patients group and control group, no difference was observed in the abundance of these 5 bacteria between the Han and the Uygur group. Conclusions. Variations in the abundance of these five bacterial strains in intestines may be associated with the occurrence of UC in Uygur and Han populations; however, these variations were not associated with ethnic difference