Description of new species of two genera Dayus Mahmood and Znana Dworakowska from Thailand (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae: Typhlocybinae)

Two genera, Dayus Mahmood, 1967 and Znana Dworakowska, 1994 of the leafhopper tribe Empoascini (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae: Typhlocybinae) are reviewed. One new species of each genus, Dayus furcatus sp. nov. and Znana furca sp. nov., are described from Thailand. A checklist and distribution summary of Dayus Mahmood species is given. Male habitus photos and illustrations of male genitalia of the two new species and notes on allied species are also provided.     

Protective potential of Chinese herbal extracts against microsporidian Nosema ceranae,an emergent pathogen of western honey bees,Apis mellifera L.

Nosema ceranae, a newly emergent parasite invading western honey bees (Apis mellifera L.), is indicated to threaten honey bee health at both individual and colony levels. However, the efficient and environmentally-friendly treatments are quite limited at present. To find alternative medicine to control Nosema diseases, the effect of 8 types of herbal extracts against N. ceranae infection were screened under laboratory condition. Of which, 1% Andrographis paniculata (A. paniculata) decoction was found to significantly decrease N. ceranae spore numbers on 7 days post infection (dpi) and 13 dpi. Then, our results further revealed that A. paniculata decoction at doses ranging from 1% to 7% displayed significant efficient inhibition of Nosema spore proliferation and improved the infected bees' survival rates in a dose-dependent manner. A. paniculata decoction was found to protect the gut tissues of infected workers from damage cause by N. ceranae, which might be due to the regulation of the expression of certain genes in Wnt and JNK pathways, including armadillo, basket, frizzled2 and groucho. Additionally, our study suggested that A. paniculata decoction performed this Nosema spore-reducing potential over its two monomers, andrographolide and dehydrographolide. Taken together, this work enables us to better understand A. paniculata decoction's potential to inhibit N. ceranae infection, thus providing a new guidance for developing applicable drugs to control Nosema diseases.     

Pyroptosis in stroke-new insights into disease mechanisms and therapeutic strategies

Journal of Physiology and Biochemistry - Stroke is a common disease with high mortality and disability worldwide. Different forms of cell deaths, including apoptosis and necrosis, occur in ischemic...     

Editorial Expression of Concern: Long non-coding RNA Mirt2 relieves lipopolysaccharide-induced injury in PC12 cells by suppressing miR-429

Journal of Physiology and Biochemistry - An Editorial Expression of Concern to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13105-019-00691-7     

Metabolic dynamics across prolonged diapause development in larvae of the sawfly,Cephalcia chuxiongica (Hymenoptera: Pamphiliidae)

Nutrient metabolism is crucial for the survival of insects through the diapause. However, little is known about the metabolic mechanism of prolonged diapause. The sawfly, Cephalcia chuxiongica (Hymenoptera: Pamphiliidae), is a notorious defoliator of pine trees in southwest China. One of the distinguishing biological characteristics of this pest is the prolonged diapause of about 1.5 years. In this study, the body lipid, carbohydrate (total body sugar, glycogen, trehalose, and glucose), protein, and glycerol contents were measured in diapausing larvae of C. chuxiongica. The results showed that the changes of biochemical composition in C. chuxiongica are associated with the diapause initiation, maintenance, and termination phases. During the initiation phase, trehalose, glucose, and glycerol increased significantly, but glycogen decreased sharply. In general, the lipid, carbohydrate, and glycerol levels decreased gradually across the maintenance phase. At termination phase, the contents of glycogen and lipid persistently decreased, while an increase of trehalose, glucose, and glycerol contents were detected. The protein level was significantly higher at maintenance phase than at initiation and termination phases. It was also found that elevation of trehalose, glucose, and glycerol contents occurred in winter. These implies that the metabolites with altered levels in diapausing larvae of C. chuxiongica are responsible for maintaining a prolonged development and overwintering.     

Conceptual Method of Temperature Sensation in Bionic Hand by Extraordinary Perceptual Phenomenon

Lack of temperature sensation of myoelectric prosthetic hand limits the daily activities of amputees.To this end,a non-invasive temperature sensation method is proposed to train amputees to sense temperature with psychophysical sensory substitution.In this study,22 healthy participants took part besides 5 amputee participants.The duration time of the study was 31 days with five test steps according to the Leitner technique.An adjustable temperature mug and a Peltier were used to change the temperature of the water/phantom digits to induce temperature to participants.Also,to isolate the surround-ings and show colors,a Virtual Reality(VR)glass was employed.The statistical results conducted are based on the response of participants with questionnaire method.Using Chi-square tests,it is concluded that participants answer the experiment significantly correctly using the Leitner technique(P value＜0.05).Also,by applying the"Repeated Measures ANOVA",it is noticed that the time of numbness felt by participants had significant(P value＜0.001)difference.Participants could remember lowest and highest temperatures significantly better than other temperatures(P value＜0.001);furthermore,the well-trained amputee participant practically using the prosthesis with 72.58％could identify object's temperature with only once time experimenting the color temperature.     

A novel dominant-negative PD-1 armored anti-CD19 CAR T cell is safe and effective against refractory/relapsed B cell lymphoma

Refractory/relapsed B cell lymphoma patients who received the available anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells may still experience a short duration of remission. Here in this study, we evaluated the safety and efficacy of a novel dominant-negative programmed cell death-1 (PD-1) armored anti-CD19 CAR T cells. A total of 9 patients (including 4 diffuse large B cell lymphomas, DLBCL, 2 transformed follicular lymphomas, TFL, and 3 follicular lymphomas, FL) received the novel CAR T cells infusion at a dose of more than 1 × 10⁶/kg. Grade ≥ 3 cytokine release syndrome (CRS) and neurotoxicity were observed in 11.1% (n = 1/9) and 11.1% (n = 1/9) of patients, respectively. The overall response rate (ORR) was 77.8% (n = 7/9) and complete response (CR) rate was 55.6% (n = 5/9). Two patients have ongoing CR (all at 20+ months). CAR T cells expanded after infusion and continued to be detectable at 12+ months in patients with ongoing CR. This novel CD19-CAR T cell was safe and effective with durable remissions in patients with refractory/relapsed B cell lymphoma.     

Epidemiological and clinical features in patients with coronavirus disease 2019 outside of Wuhan,China: Special focus in asymptomatic patients

ObjectivesIn December 2019, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) emerged in Wuhan City and rapidly spread across the world. The clinical characteristics of affected patients in different regions and populations may differ. Thus, this study aimed to identify the characteristics of the disease to provide an insight about the prevention and treatment of COVID-19.MethodsData on the demographic characteristics and clinical findings of the patients admitted at the First Hospital of Changsha from January 1, 2020 to February 10, 2020 were assessed.ResultsIn this study, there were 8 (3.8%) asymptomatic, 21 (10.0%) mild upper respiratory tract infection (URTI), and 180 (86.1%) pneumonia cases. In total, 47 (22.5%) patients resided in Wuhan, and 45 (21.5%) had recently traveled to Wuhan before disease onset. Moreover, 19 (9.1%) had contact with people from Wuhan, and 69 (33.0%) were family cluster cases. The median incubation period was approximately 6.3 (range: 1.0–20.0) days. Fever and cough were the most common initial symptoms: 99 (49.3%) patients presented with fever, without cough; 59 (29.4%) with cough, without fever; and 33 (16.4%) with both fever and cough.ConclusionThe symptoms of patients with COVID-19 were relatively mild outside Wuhan, and family cluster was a remarkable epidemic characteristic. Special attention should be paid to asymptomatic patients.     

An efficient pipeline for ancient DNA mapping and recovery of endogenous ancient DNA from whole‐genome sequencing data

Ancient DNA research has developed rapidly over the past few decades due to improvements in PCR and next‐generation sequencing (NGS) technologies, but challenges still exist. One major challenge in relation to ancient DNA research is to recover genuine endogenous ancient DNA sequences from raw sequencing data. This is often difficult due to degradation of ancient DNA and high levels of contamination, especially homologous contamination that has extremely similar genetic background with that of the real ancient DNA. In this study, we collected whole‐genome sequencing (WGS) data from 6 ancient samples to compare different mapping algorithms. To further explore more effective methods to separate endogenous DNA from homologous contaminations, we attempted to recover reads based on ancient DNA specific characteristics of deamination, depurination, and DNA fragmentation with different parameters. We propose a quick and improved pipeline for separating endogenous ancient DNA while simultaneously decreasing homologous contaminations to very low proportions. Our goal in this research was to develop useful recommendations for ancient DNA mapping and for separation of endogenous DNA to facilitate future studies of ancient DNA.