Scientific reports
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The type III secretion system of Pseudomonas aeruginosa is an important virulence factor contributing to the cytotoxicity and the invasion process of this microorganism. The current study aimed to determine the presence of the exoU+/exoS+ genotype in P. aeruginosa clinical isolates. The presence of exoS, exoT, exoU and exoY was determined in 189 P. aeruginosa by PCR, and the presence/absence of exoU was analysed according to source infection, clonal relationships, biofilm formation, motility and antimicrobial susceptibility. ⋯ MLST analysis of a subset of 25 isolates showed 8 different STs displaying the exoU+/exoS+ genotype. The MDR basis of the exoU+ isolates remain to be elucidated. Furthermore, the clinical implications and spread of exoU+/exoS+ P. aeruginosa isolates need to be established.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Effects of neuromuscular blockade reversal on bispectral index and frontal electromyogram during steady-state desflurane anesthesia: a randomized trial.
The degree of neuromuscular blockade reversal may affect bispectral index (BIS) value. One possible reason is that the reverse of neuromuscular blockade affects electromyographic (EMG) signals of fascial muscle. Another reason is, the afferentation theory, the reverse of neuromuscular blockade relieves block signals generated in muscle stretch receptors from accessing the brain through afferent nerve pathways and induces arousal. ⋯ The BIS and EMG values had a positive correlation (P < 0.001). Our results demonstrate that the EMG and BIS values have increased after neuromuscular blockade reversal under desflurane anesthesia regardless of the type of neuromuscular blockade reversal agent. BIS should be applied carefully to measure of depth of anesthesia after neuromuscular blockade reversal.
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This study aimed to develop prognosis signatures through a radiomics analysis for patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) by their pretreatment diagnosis magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). A total of 208 radiomics features were extracted for each patient from a database of 303 patients. The patients were split into the training and validation cohorts according to their pretreatment diagnosis date. ⋯ The nomograms improved the prediction accuracy with the C-index value of 0.029 for DFS and 0.107 for OS compared with clinical features only. The DFS and OS radiomics nomograms developed in our study demonstrated the excellent prognostic estimation for NPC patients with a noninvasive way of MRI. The combination of clinical and radiomics features can provide more information for precise treatment decision.
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It has been suggested that many forms of secondary lymphedema in humans are driven by a progressive loss of lymphatic pump function after an initial risk-inducing event. However, the link between pump failure and disease progression has remained elusive due to experimental challenges in the clinical setting and a lack of adequate animal models. Using a novel surgical model of lymphatic injury, we track the adaptation and functional decline of the lymphatic network in response to surgery. ⋯ Lymphatic function in the intact collecting vessel negatively correlated with swelling, while a loss of pumping pressure generation remained even after resolution of swelling. By using this model to study the role of obesity in lymphedema development, we show that obesity exacerbates acquired lymphatic pump failure following lymphatic injury, suggesting one mechanism through which obesity may worsen lymphedema. This lymphatic injury model will allow for future studies investigating the molecular mechanisms leading to lymphedema development.
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Whole genome bisulfite sequencing (WGBS), with its ability to interrogate methylation status at single CpG site resolution epigenome-wide, is a powerful technique for use in molecular experiments. Here, we aim to advance strategies for accurate and efficient WGBS for application in future large-scale epidemiological studies. We systematically compared the performance of three WGBS library preparation methods with low DNA input requirement (Swift Biosciences Accel-NGS, Illumina TruSeq and QIAGEN QIAseq) on two state-of-the-art sequencing platforms (Illumina NovaSeq and HiSeq X), and also assessed concordance between data generated by WGBS and methylation arrays. ⋯ There was little difference in performance between NovaSeq and HiSeq X, with the exception of higher read duplication rate on the NovaSeq (P < 0.05), likely attributable to the higher cluster densities on its flow cells. Systematic biases exist between WGBS and methylation arrays, with lower precision observed for WGBS across the range of depths investigated. To achieve a level of precision broadly comparable to the methylation array, a minimum coverage of 100x is recommended.