Dietary Probiotic Bacillus licheniformis TC22 Increases Growth, Immunity, and Disease Resistance, against Vibrio splendidus Infection in Juvenile Sea Cucumbers Apostichopus japonicus

In this study we examined the effects of probiotic Bacillus licheniformis TC22 on growth, immunity, and disease resistance against Vibrio splendidus in juvenile sea cucumbers Apostichopus japonicus. For 30 days, sea cucumbers were fed diets with TC22 at 0 (control), 105, 107, and 109 CFU/g respectively. Results showed that dietary TC22 at 109 CFU/g significantly improved (P0.05). Dietary TC22 at 109 CFU/g significantly improved phagocytosis, and total nitric oxide synthase activity in sea cucumbers (P0.05). Respiratory burst in sea cucumbers fed dietary TC22 at 109 CFU/g was significantly higher than those fed dietary TC22 at 107 CFU/g (P<0.05). Cumulative mortality after V. splendidus challenge decreased significantly in the sea cucumbers fed with TC22 at 109 CFU/g (P<0.05). The present study confirmed dietary B. licheniformis TC22 at 109 CFU/g could significantly improve immunity and disease resistance in juvenile A. japonicus

TNFα induces Ca2+ influx to accelerate extrinsic apoptosis in hepatocellular carcinoma cells

BACKGROUND: Tumor necrosis factor-α has been proven an effective anticancer agent in preclinical studies. However, the translation of TNFα from research to clinic has been blocked by significant systemic toxicity and limited efficacy at maximal tolerated dose, which need urgently to be solved. METHODS: The level of cytosolic Ca RESULTS: Here, we demonstrated that TNFα induced extracellular Ca CONCLUSIONS: Our study provides the evidence supporting a novel mechanism by which TNFα induces extracellular C

Particle transfer and fusion cross-section for Super-heavy nuclei in dinuclear system

Within the dinuclear system (DNS) conception, instead of solving Fokker-Planck Equation (FPE) analytically, the Master equation is solved numerically to calculate the fusion probability of super-heavy nuclei, so that the harmonic oscillator approximation to the potential energy of the DNS is avoided. The relative motion concerning the energy, the angular momentum, and the fragment deformation relaxations is explicitly treated to couple with the diffusion process, so that the nucleon transition probabilities, which are derived microscopically, are time-dependent. Comparing with the analytical solution of FPE, our results preserve more dynamical effects. The calculated evaporation residue cross sections for one-neutron emission channel of Pb-based reactions are basically in agreement with the known experimental data within one order of magnitude.Comment: 19 pages, plus 6 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Cell-free circulating mitochondrial DNA content and risk of hepatocellular carcinoma in patients with chronic HBV infection.

Recent studies have demonstrated a potential link between circulating cell-free mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) content and cancers. However, there is no study evaluating the association between circulating mtDNA as a non-invasive marker of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) risk. We conducted a nested case-control study to determine circulating mtDNA content in serum samples from 116 HBV-related HCC cases and 232 frequency-matched cancer-free HBV controls, and evaluate the retrospective association between mtDNA content and HCC risk using logistic regression and their temporal relationship using a mixed effects model. HCC cases had significantly lower circulating mtDNA content than controls (1.06 versus 2.47, P = 1.7 × 10(-5)). Compared to HBV patients with higher mtDNA content, those with lower mtDNA content had a significantly increased risk of HCC with an odds ratio (OR) of 2.19 (95% confidence interval [CI] 1.28-3.72, P = 0.004). Quartile analyses revealed a significant dose-dependent effect (Ptrend = 0.001) for this association. In a pilot longitudinal sub-cohort of 14 matched cases-control pairs, we observed a trend of dramatically decreased mtDNA content in cases and slightly decreased mtDNA content in controls, with a significant interaction of case-control status with time (Pinteraction = 0.049). Our findings suggest that circulating mtDNA is a potential novel non-invasive biomarker of HCC risk in HBV patients

Hybrid tilted fiber grating based refractive index and liquid level sensing system

We report a refractive index (RI) and liquid level sensing system based on a hybrid grating structure comprising of a 45° and an 81° tilted fiber gratings (TFGs) that have been inscribed into a single mode fiber in series. In this structure, the 45°-TFG is used as a polarizer to filter out the transverse electric (TE) component and enable the 81°-TFG operating at single polarization for RI and level sensing. The experiment results show a lower temperature cross-sensitivity, only about 7.33 pm/°C, and a higher RI sensitivity, being around 180 nm/RIU at RI=1.345 and 926 nm/RIU at RI=1.412 region, which are significantly improved in comparison with long period fiber gratings. The hybrid grating structure has also been applied as a liquid level sensor, showing 3.06 dB/mm linear peak ratio sensitivity

Numerical and experimental analysis of sensitivity-enhanced RI sensor based on Ex-TFG in thin cladding fiber

We report a highly sensitive refractive index (RI) sensor in the aqueous solution, which is based on an 81°-tilted fiber grating structure inscribed into a thin cladding fiber with 40 μm cladding radius. The numerical analysis has indicated that the RI sensitivity of cladding resonance mode of the grating can be significantly enhanced with reducing cladding size. This has been proved by the experimental results as the RI sensitivities of TM and TE resonance peaks in the index region of 1.345 have been increased to 1180 nm/RIU and 1150 nm/RIU, respectively, from only 200 and 170 nm/RIU for the same grating structure inscribed in standard telecom fiber with 62.5-μm cladding radius. Although the temperature sensitivity has also increased, the change in temperature sensitivity is still insignificant in comparison with RI sensitivity enhancement

Highly polarized multiwavelength er-doped fibre laser using all fibre lyot filter

A multiwavelength Er-doped fibre ring laser system using all fibre Lyot filter and highly nonlinear fibre was experimentally demonstrated, with degree of polarization up to 99.9% and 50 channels output

A multi-stage genome-wide association study of bladder cancer identifies multiple susceptibility loci.

We conducted a multi-stage, genome-wide association study of bladder cancer with a primary scan of 591,637 SNPs in 3,532 affected individuals (cases) and 5,120 controls of European descent from five studies followed by a replication strategy, which included 8,382 cases and 48,275 controls from 16 studies. In a combined analysis, we identified three new regions associated with bladder cancer on chromosomes 22q13.1, 19q12 and 2q37.1: rs1014971, (P = 8 × 10⁻¹²) maps to a non-genic region of chromosome 22q13.1, rs8102137 (P = 2 × 10⁻¹¹) on 19q12 maps to CCNE1 and rs11892031 (P = 1 × 10⁻⁷) maps to the UGT1A cluster on 2q37.1. We confirmed four previously identified genome-wide associations on chromosomes 3q28, 4p16.3, 8q24.21 and 8q24.3, validated previous candidate associations for the GSTM1 deletion (P = 4 × 10⁻¹¹) and a tag SNP for NAT2 acetylation status (P = 4 × 10⁻¹¹), and found interactions with smoking in both regions. Our findings on common variants associated with bladder cancer risk should provide new insights into the mechanisms of carcinogenesis

Excessively tilted fiber grating based Fe3O4 saturable absorber for passively mode-locked fiber laser

A novel approach to saturable absorber (SA) formation is presented by taking advantage of the mode coupling property of excessively tilted fiber grating (Ex-TFG). Stable mode-locked operation can be conveniently achieved based on the interaction between Ex- TFG coupled light and deposited ferroferric-oxide (Fe3O4) nanoparticles. The central wavelength, bandwidth and single pulse duration of the output are 1595 nm, 4.05 nm, and 912 fs, respectively. The fiber laser exhibits good long-term stability with signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of 67 dB. For the first time, to the best of our knowledge, Ex-TFG based Fe3O4 SA for mode-locked fiber laser is demonstrated

Blocking Mammalian Target of Rapamycin (mTOR) Alleviates Neuropathic Pain Induced by Chemotherapeutic Bortezomib

Background/Aims: Bortezomib (BTZ) is largely used as a chemotherapeutic agent for the treatment of cancer. However, one of the significant limiting complications of BTZ is painful peripheral neuropathy during BTZ therapy. Drugs preventing and/or treating the painful symptoms induced by BTZ are lacking since the underlying mechanisms leading to neuropathic pain remain largely unclear. The purposes of this study were to examine 1) the effects of blocking mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) on mechanical pain and cold hypersensitivity evoked by BTZ and 2) the underlying mechanisms responsible for the role of mTOR in regulating BTZ-induced neuropathic pain. Methods: Behavioral test was performed to determine mechanical pain and cold sensitivity in a rat model. Western blot analysis and ELISA were used to examine expression of mTOR and phosphatidylinositide 3-kinase (p-PI3K) signals, and the levels of substance P and calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP). Results: Systemic injection of BTZ significantly increased mechanical pain and cold sensitivity as compared with control animals (P&#x3c; 0.05 vs. control rats). The expression of p-mTOR, mTOR-mediated phosphorylation of p70 ribosomal S6 protein kinase 1 (p-S6K1), 4E–binding protein 4 (p-4E-BP1) as well as p-PI3K was amplified in the dorsal horn of spinal cord of BTZ rats as compared with control rats. Blocking mTOR by intrathecal infusion of rapamycin attenuated mechanical pain and cold hypersensitivity. Blocking PI3K signal also attenuated activities of mTOR, which was accompanied with decreasing neuropathic pain. Inhibition of either mTOR or PI3K blunted enhancement of the spinal substance P and CGRP in BTZ rats. Conclusions: The data for the first time revealed specific signaling pathways leading to BTZ-induced peripheral neuropathic pain, including the activation of mTOR and PI3K. Inhibition of these signal pathways alleviates pain. Targeting one or more of these signaling molecules may present new opportunities for treatment and management of peripheral painful neuropathy observed during chemotherapeutic application of BTZ