[en] Objective: To explore the clinical significance of changes of serum gastrin and leptin levels in patients with gastric cancer. Methods: Serum levels of gastrin and leptin were (with RIA) in 32 patients with gastric cancer and 35 controls. Results: Serum levels of gastrin and leptin in patients with gastric cancer were significantly higher than those in the controls (P<0.01). Serum levels of gastrin and leptin where mutually positively correlated. Conclusion: Both serum gastrin and leptin levels were increased significantly in patients with gastric cancer. (authors)

[en] Objective: To explore the value of carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), cytokeratin 19 fragment (CYFRA21-1), neuron-specific-enolase (NSE), progastrin releasing peptide (Pro-GRP), squamous cell carcinoma antigen (SCC), and carbohydrate antigen 125 (CA125) in the diagnosis and differential diagnosis of lung cancer and pulmonary tuberculosis. Methods: The levels of CEA, CYFRA21-1, NSE, Pro-GRP, SCC and CA125 in serum of 138 patients with lung cancer, 138 patients with pulmonary tuberculosis and 138 health examiners (controls) were measured by electrochemical method, and the results were used to evaluate its diagnostic value in lung cancer and pulmonary tuberculosis. Results: The serum levels of CEA, CYFRA21-1, NSE, Pro-GRP and SCC in patients with lung cancer were significantly higher than those of pulmonary tuberculosis patients and the healthy control group. The serum level of CA125 in patients with pulmonary tuberculosis was significantly higher than those of patients with lung cancer and healthy control group. The level of Pro-GRP, NSE in patients with small cell lung cancer (SCLC) were significantly higher than patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The level of CYFRA21-1, SCC, and CA125 in NSCLC were significantly higher than SCLC. The level of CEA and CA125 in the adenocarcinoma group were significantly higher than the squamous cell carcinoma group, while the levels of CYFRA21-1 and SCC in the squamous cell carcinoma group were significantly higher than the adenocarcinoma group (P < 0.05). The ROC curve analysis showed that the area under the curve (AUC) of combined detection of 6 tumor markers were 0.993 and the sensitivity was increased to 96.4%, which was superior to that of single-index detection, and combined detection was statistically significant compared with the pulmonary tuberculosis group (P < 0.05). When tested separately, the AUC of CA125 in the diagnosis of tuberculosis was 0.928 and the sensitivity was 81.9%, which was significantly superior to other indexes. The AUC of NSE and Pro-GRP in the SCLC group were 0.961 and 0.938, and the sensitivity were 85% and 92.5%, respectively. The AUC of CYFRA21-1 and SCC in the squamous cell carcinoma group were 0.977 and 0.933, and the sensitivity were 90.9% and 87.9%, respectively, which was significantly superior to other indexes. The AUC of CEA in the adenocarcinoma group were 0.957, which was significantly superior to other indexes, with the sensitivity of 89.2%. Conclusion: The level of tumor markers in patients is related to benign, malignant and pathological types, and combining multiple tumor markers for detection is more conducive to clinical diagnosis. (authors)

[en] A high-damping magnetorheological elastomer (MRE) with bi-directional magnetic-control modulus is developed. This MRE was synthesized by filling NdFeB particles into polyurethane (PU)/ epoxy (EP) interpenetrating network (IPN) structure. The anisotropic samples were prepared in a permanent magnetic field and magnetized in an electromagnetic field of 1 T. Dynamic mechanical responses of the MRE to applied magnetic fields are investigated through magneto-rheometer, and morphology of MREs is observed via scanning electron microscope (SEM). Test result indicates that when the test field orientation is parallel to that of the sample's magnetization, the shear modulus of sample increases. On the other hand, when the orientation is opposite to that of the sample's magnetization, shear modulus decreases. In addition, this PU/EP IPN matrix based MRE has a high-damping property, with high loss factor and can be controlled by applying magnetic field. It is expected that the high damping property and the ability of bi-directional magnetic-control modulus of this MRE offer promising advantages in seismologic application

[en] The water saturated Arabidopsis seeds were irradiated with protons in air. The ion energy is from 1.1 MeV to 6.5 MeV. According to TRIM simulation, the damaged region of the seed induced by the incident ions is near the surface region of the embryo, half of the embryo and the whole embryo, respectively. The protons with high energy can damage the shoot apical meristem (SAM) in the embryo while the protons with low energy cannot. The ion fluence used in this experiment was in the range of 4 x 10⁹ to 1 x 10¹⁴ ions/cm². The experimental results showed that both the germination and survival rates decrease while increasing ion fluence, and the fluence-response curve for different damaged region of the embryo has different characters. Besides SAM, which is generally considered as the main radiobiological target, the existence of a secondary target besides SAM is proposed in this paper. (authors)

[en] A study of the fragments of DNA irradiated with MeV ions is important for the understanding of the DNA damage mechanism and the subsequent biological effects (induced by heavy ions). In this experiment, the products of calf thymus DNA (CT DNA) irradiated with MeV fluorine ions were analyzed using agarose gel electrophoresis, modified time-of-flight mass spectrometer (MALDI-TOF), and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The results showed that the molecular mass of the fragments were concentrated around 831 bp with agarose gel electrophoresis, there was no observable product in the range of 1,000-30,000 (m/q) using MALDI-TOF, and small biomolecules were separated from the products. The results of this study indicated that the strand breaks of calf thymus DNA induced by MeV fluorine ions were nonrandom. (authors)

[en] To identify which patient with prostate cancer (PCa) could safely avoid extended pelvic lymph node dissection (ePLND) by predicting lymph node invasion (LNI), via a radiomics-based machine learning approach. An integrative radiomics model (IRM) was proposed to predict LNI, confirmed by the histopathologic examination, integrating radiomics features, extracted from prostatic index lesion regions on MRI images, and clinical features via SVM. The study cohort comprised 244 PCa patients with MRI and followed by radical prostatectomy (RP) and ePLND within 6 months between 2010 and 2019. The proposed IRM was trained in training/validation set and evaluated in an internal independent testing set. The model's performance was measured by area under the curve (AUC), sensitivity, specificity, negative predictive value (NPV), and positive predictive value (PPV). AUCs were compared via Delong test with 95% confidence interval (CI), and the rest measurements were compared via chi-squared test or Fisher's exact test. Overall, 17 (10.6%) and 14 (16.7%) patients with LNI were included in training/validation set and testing set, respectively. Shape and first-order radiomics features showed usefulness in building the IRM. The proposed IRM achieved an AUC of 0.915 (95% CI: 0.846-0.984) in the testing set, superior to pre-existing nomograms whose AUCs were from 0.698 to 0.724 (p < 0.05). The proposed IRM could be potentially feasible to predict the risk of having LNI for patients with PCa. With the improved predictability, it could be utilized to assess which patients with PCa could safely avoid ePLND, thus reduce the number of unnecessary ePLND. The combination of MRI-based radiomics features with clinical information improved the prediction of lymph node invasion, compared with the model using only radiomics features or clinical features. With improved prediction performance on predicting lymph node invasion, the number of extended pelvic lymph node dissection (ePLND) could be reduced by the proposed integrative radiomics model (IRM), compared with the existing nomograms.

[en] Highlights: • The first LCA of cornstalk-based ethyl levulinate. • Life cycle energy consumption and environmental emissions were evaluated. • Detailed foreground data from a demonstration project in China was used. • Criteria emissions in the combustion stage were based on engine tests. • Sensitivity analysis was performed based on different cornstalk prices. - Abstract: This study analysed the sustainability of fuel-ethyl levulinate (EL) production along with furfural, as a by-product, from cornstalk in China. A life cycle assessment (LCA) was conducted using the SimaPro software to evaluate the energy consumption (EC), greenhouse gas (GHG) and criteria emissions, from cornstalk growth to EL utilisation. The total life cycle EC was found to be 4.54 MJ/MJ EL, of which 94.7% was biomass energy. EC in the EL production stage was the highest, accounting for 96.8% of total EC. Fossil EC in this stage was estimated to be 0.095 MJ/MJ, which also represents the highest fossil EC throughout the life cycle (39.5% of the total). The ratio of biomass to fossil EC over the life cycle was 17.9, indicating good utilisation of renewable energy in cornstalk-based EL production. The net life cycle GHG emissions were 96.6 g CO_2-eq/MJ. The EL production stage demonstrated the highest GHG emissions, representing 53.4% of the total positive amount. Criteria emissions of carbon monoxide (CO) and particulates ⩽10 μm (PM10) showed negative values, of −3.15 and −0.72 g/MJ, respectively. Nitrogen oxides (NO_x) and sulphur dioxide (SO_2) emissions showed positive values of 0.33 and 0.28 g/MJ, respectively, mainly arising from the EL production stage. According to the sensitivity analysis, increasing or removing the cornstalk revenue in the LCA leads to an increase or decrease in the EC and environmental emissions while burning cornstalk directly in the field results in large increases in emissions of NMVOC, CO, NO_x and PM10 but decreases in fossil EC, and SO_2 and GHG emissions.