Causes of death and conditional survival estimates of long-term lung cancer survivors.

INTRODUCTION: Lung cancer ranks the leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide. This retrospective cohort study was designed to determine time-dependent death hazards of diverse causes and conditional survival of lung cancer. METHODS: We collected 816,436 lung cancer cases during 2000-2015 in the SEER database, after exclusion, 612,100 cases were enrolled for data analyses. Cancer-specific survival, overall survival and dynamic death hazard were assessed in this study. Additionally, based on the FDA approval time of Nivolumab in 2015, we evaluated the effect of immunotherapy on metastatic patients\u27 survival by comparing cases in 2016-2018 (immunotherapy era, n=7135) and those in 2013-2016 (non-immunotherapy era, n=42061). RESULTS: Of the 612,100 patients, 285,705 were women, the mean (SD) age was 68.3 (11.0) years old. 252,558 patients were characterized as lung adenocarcinoma, 133,302 cases were lung squamous cell carcinoma, and only 78,700 cases were small cell lung carcinomas. TNM stage was I in 140,518 cases, II in 38,225 cases, III in 159,095 cases, and IV in 274,262 patients. 164,394 cases underwent surgical intervention. The 5-y overall survival and cancer-specific survival were 54.2% and 73.8%, respectively. The 5-y conditional survival rate of cancer-specific survival is improved in a time-dependent pattern, while conditional overall survival tends to be steady after 5-y follow-up. Except from age, hazard disparities of other risk factors (such as stage and surgery) diminished over time according to the conditional survival curves. After 8 years since diagnosis, mortality hazard from other causes became higher than that from lung cancer. This critical time point was earlier in elder patients while was postponed in patients with advanced stages. Moreover, both cancer-specific survival and overall survival of metastatic patients in immunotherapy era were significantly better than those in non-immunotherapy era (P CONCLUSIONS: Our findings expand on previous studies by demonstrating that non-lung-cancer related death risk becomes more and more predominant over the course of follow-up, and we establish a personalized web-based calculator to determine this critical time point for long-term survivors. We also confirmed the survival benefit of advanced lung cancer patients in immunotherapy era

AI-assisted system improves the work efficiency of cytologists via excluding cytology-negative slides and accelerating the slide interpretation

Given the shortage of cytologists, women in low-resource regions had inequitable access to cervical cytology which plays an pivotal role in cervical cancer screening. Emerging studies indicated the potential of AI-assisted system in promoting the implementation of cytology in resource-limited settings. However, there is a deficiency in evaluating the aid of AI in the improvement of cytologists’ work efficiency. This study aimed to evaluate the feasibility of AI in excluding cytology-negative slides and improve the efficiency of slide interpretation. Well-annotated slides were included to develop the classification model that was applied to classify slides in the validation group. Nearly 70% of validation slides were reported as negative by the AI system, and none of these slides were diagnosed as high-grade lesions by expert cytologists. With the aid of AI system, the average of interpretation time for each slide decreased from 3 minutes to 30 seconds. These findings suggested the potential of AI-assisted system in accelerating slide interpretation in the large-scale cervical cancer screening

Dysfunctional gut microbiota and relative co-abundance network in infantile eczema

Additional file 1. The representative sequences of OTUs in 33 infants

Alterations of Gut Microbiota in Cholestatic Infants and Their Correlation With Hepatic Function

Cholestasis is a major hepatic disease in infants, with increasing morbidity in recent years. Accumulating evidence has revealed that the gut microbiota (GM) is associated with liver diseases, such as non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma. However, GM alterations in cholestatic infants and the correlation between the GM and hepatic functions remain uninvestigated. In this study, 43 cholestatic infants (IC group) and 37 healthy infants (H group) were enrolled to detect GM discrepancies using 16S rDNA analysis. The diversity in the bacterial community was significantly lower in the IC group than that in the H group (P = 0.013). After determining the top 10 abundant genera of microbes in the IC and H groups, we found that 13 of them were differentially enriched, including Bifidobacterium, Bacteroides, Streptococcus, Enterococcus, and Staphylococcus. As compared with the H group, the IC group had a more complex GM co-occurrence network featured by three core nodes: Phyllobacterium, Ruminococcus, and Anaerostipes. In addition, the positive correlation between Faecalibacterium and Erysipelatoclostridium (r = 0.689, P = 0.000, FDR = 0.009) was not observed in the IC patients. Using the GM composition, the cholestatic patients can be distinguished from healthy infants with high accuracy [areas under receiver operating curve (AUC) > 0.97], wherein Rothia, Eggerthella, Phyllobacterium, and Blautia are identified as valuable biomarkers. Using KEGG annotation, we identified 32 functional categories with significant difference in enrichment of the GM of IC patients, including IC-enriched functional categories that were related to lipid metabolism, biodegradation and metabolism of xenobiotics, and various diseases. In contrast, the number of functions associated with amino acid metabolism, nucleotide metabolism, and vitamins metabolism was reduced in the IC patients. We also identified significant correlation between GM composition and indicators of hepatic function. Megasphaera positively correlated with total bilirubin (r = 0.455, P = 0.002) and direct bilirubin (r = 0.441, P = 0.003), whereas γ-glutamyl transpeptidase was positively associated with Parasutterella (r = 0.466, P = 0.002) and negatively related to Streptococcus (r = -0.450, P = 0.003). This study describes the GM characteristics in the cholestatic infants, illustrates the association between the GM components and the hepatic function, and provides a solid theoretical basis for GM intervention for the treatment of infantile cholestasis

Bacterial Signatures of Paediatric Respiratory Disease : An Individual Participant Data Meta-Analysis

Introduction: The airway microbiota has been linked to specific paediatric respiratory diseases, but studies are often small. It remains unclear whether particular bacteria are associated with a given disease, or if a more general, non-specific microbiota association with disease exists, as suggested for the gut. We investigated overarching patterns of bacterial association with acute and chronic paediatric respiratory disease in an individual participant data (IPD) meta-analysis of 16S rRNA gene sequences from published respiratory microbiota studies.Methods: We obtained raw microbiota data from public repositories or via communication with corresponding authors. Cross-sectional analyses of the paediatric (10 case subjects were included. Sequence data were processed using a uniform bioinformatics pipeline, removing a potentially substantial source of variation. Microbiota differences across diagnoses were assessed using alpha- and beta-diversity approaches, machine learning, and biomarker analyses.Results: We ultimately included 20 studies containing individual data from 2624 children. Disease was associated with lower bacterial diversity in nasal and lower airway samples and higher relative abundances of specific nasal taxa including Streptococcus and Haemophilus. Machine learning success in assigning samples to diagnostic groupings varied with anatomical site, with positive predictive value and sensitivity ranging from 43 to 100 and 8 to 99%, respectively.Conclusion: IPD meta-analysis of the respiratory microbiota across multiple diseases allowed identification of a non-specific disease association which cannot be recognised by studying a single disease. Whilst imperfect, machine learning offers promise as a potential additional tool to aid clinical diagnosis.Peer reviewe

The Genome of Ganderma lucidum Provide Insights into Triterpense Biosynthesis and Wood Degradation

BACKGROUND: Ganoderma lucidum (Reishi or Ling Zhi) is one of the most famous Traditional Chinese Medicines and has been widely used in the treatment of various human diseases in Asia countries. It is also a fungus with strong wood degradation ability with potential in bioenergy production. However, genes, pathways and mechanisms of these functions are still unknown. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: The genome of G. lucidum was sequenced and assembled into a 39.9 megabases (Mb) draft genome, which encoded 12,080 protein-coding genes and ∼83% of them were similar to public sequences. We performed comprehensive annotation for G. lucidum genes and made comparisons with genes in other fungi genomes. Genes in the biosynthesis of the main G. lucidum active ingredients, ganoderic acids (GAs), were characterized. Among the GAs synthases, we identified a fusion gene, the N and C terminal of which are homologous to two different enzymes. Moreover, the fusion gene was only found in basidiomycetes. As a white rot fungus with wood degradation ability, abundant carbohydrate-active enzymes and ligninolytic enzymes were identified in the G. lucidum genome and were compared with other fungi. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: The genome sequence and well annotation of G. lucidum will provide new insights in function analyses including its medicinal mechanism. The characterization of genes in the triterpene biosynthesis and wood degradation will facilitate bio-engineering research in the production of its active ingredients and bioenergy

PHYSICAL MAPPING OF rDNA IN DENDRANTHEMA NANKINGENSE AND ITS CLOSE RELATED SPECIES BY FLUORESCENT IN SITU HYBRIDIZATION

Abstract: Distribution of 18S-26S rDNA on the chromosomes of Dendranthema nankingense and its two close-related species D. nankingense and D. lavendulifolium was studied by fluorescent in situ hybridization with a JHD 2-15A DNA clone. Six rDNA loci were found in D. nankingense, eight in D. lavendulifolium, and twelve in D. indicum. The rDNA loci number and pattern were applied to analyze the phylogenetic relationship of the three closely related species

Spatio-Temporal Variations in Pollen Limitation and Floral Traits of an Alpine Lousewort (<i>Pedicularis rhinanthoides</i>) in Relation to Pollinator Availability

Populations of the same plant species living in different locations but flowering at different times may vary in pollinator availability and floral traits. However, the spatial and temporal links between floral traits and pollination are rarely included in single studies. In this study, three populations of an alpine lousewort, Pedicularis rhinanthoides Schrenk subsp. tibetica (Bonati) Tsoong, were surveyed to detect the variations in floral traits and pollinator activity. We hypothesized that floral divergence was spatio-temporally correlated with pollen limitation (PL) in relation to pollinators. Sampled plants from each population were divided into three groups, according to flowering stage: early, peak, and late. Pollen-supplementation experiments and investigations into pollinators, reproductive success, and floral traits were conducted on the plants from the different flowering stages and across the populations. Our results showed that the extent of PL varies across populations and among flowering stages. Populations in which more pollinators were recorded displayed a lower extent of PL. Furthermore, the temporal differences in PL showed a similar pattern for the three populations; the plants from the peak flowering stage suffered slighter PL than those from the other two stages. Nevertheless, some of the floral traits displayed similar spatial and temporal patterns to the PL, while the others only varied among the populations spatially. The results indicated that the performance of floral traits in a particular spatial–temporal situation shows they are well adapted to the corresponding pollination environment, which might help plants to optimize their reproductive fitness under different abiotic factors