Association of DNA methylation and transcriptome reveals epigenetic etiology of heart failure

Functional & Integrative Genomics - Epigenetic modifications viz. DNA methylation, histone modifications, and RNA-based alterations play a crucial role in the development of cardiovascular...     

Mechanical and hydrodynamic effects of stent expansion in tapered coronary vessels

Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) has become the primary treatment for patients with coronary heart disease because of its minimally invasive nature and high efficiency. Anatomical studies have shown that most coronary vessels gradually shrink, and the vessels gradually become thinner from the proximal to the distal end. In this paper, the effects of different stent expansion methods on the mechanical and hemodynamic behaviors of coronary vessels and stents were studied. To perform a structural-mechanical analysis of stent implantation, the coronary vessels with branching vessels and the coronary vessels with large bending curvature are selected. The two characteristic structures are implanted in equal diameter expansion mode and conical expansion mode, and the stress and mechanical behaviors of the coronary vessels and stents are analyzed. The results of the structural-mechanical analysis showed that the mechanical behaviors and fatigue performance of the cobalt-chromium alloy stent were good, and the different expansion modes of the stent had little effect on the fatigue performance of the stent. However, the equal diameter expansion mode increased distal coronary artery stress and the risk of vascular injury. The computational fluid dynamics analysis results showed that different stent expansion methods had varied effects on coronary vessel hemodynamics and that the wall shear stress distribution of conical stent expansion is more uniform compared with equal diameter expansion. Additionally, the vortex phenomenon is not apparent, the blood flow velocity is slightly increased, the hydrodynamic environment is more reasonable, and the risk of coronary artery injury is reduced.

     

完全弗氏佐剂诱导大鼠慢性骨盆疼痛综合征炎性痛模型的制备*

目的: 建立大鼠慢性骨盆疼痛综合征(CPPS)炎性痛模型并进行评价,为CPPS炎症引起的慢性骨盆疼痛的外周及中枢机制研究提供可靠的动物模型。方法: 将60只SD雄性大鼠随机分成空白组,假手术组和模型组,每组20只。采用向大鼠前列腺腹侧叶注射完全弗氏佐剂(CFA)的方法制备CPPS炎性痛模型。术后观察大鼠一般情况变化;分别于造模后7 d,14 d,21 d,28 d,35 d测定大鼠足底和阴囊热刺激疼痛阈值;取材后前列腺组织称重计算前列腺指数;显微镜下观察大鼠前列腺组织病理变化并用半定量法评价前列腺组织损伤程度,以评价模型是否成功。结果: 模型成功17只,成模率为85%。与空白组和假手术组比较,造模后大鼠的活动度、毛发光泽度降低,排尿量增加。足底和阴囊热刺激疼痛阈值显著降低并可稳定维持1个月以上(P＜0.01)。前列腺湿重和前列腺指数均显著性提高(P＜0.01)。前列腺组织肉眼可见明显水肿,与周围组织粘连严重;镜下可见腺腔萎缩,间质内大量炎性细胞浸润。结论: 利用向大鼠前列腺腹侧叶注射CFA的方法,可成功复制CPPS炎性痛模型,这将为后续CPPS发病机制的研究,特别是疼痛行为与潜在炎症和神经损伤之间的机制联系提供有价值的工具。     

Sodium butyrate suppresses NOD1-mediated inflammatory molecules expressed in bovine hepatocytes during iE-DAP and LPS treatment

Nucleotide oligomerization domain protein-1 (NOD1), a cytosolic pattern recognition receptor for the γ-D-glutamyl-meso-diaminopimelic acid (iE-DAP) is associated with the inflammatory diseases. Very little is known how bovine hepatocytes respond to specific ligands of NOD1 and sodium butyrate (SB). Therefore, the aim of our study was to investigate the role of bovine hepatocytes in NOD1-mediated inflammation during iE-DAP or LPS treatment or SB pretreatment. To achieve this aim, hepatocytes separated from cows at ∼160 days in milk (DIM) were divided into six groups: The nontreated control group (CON), the iE-DAP-treated group (DAP), the lipopolysaccharide-treated group (LPS), iE-DAP with SB group (DSB), LPS with SB group (LSB), and the SB group. Both iE-DAP and LPS highly increased the expression of both NOD1 and RIPK2, the two key factors for the immune response in hepatocytes. IκBα, NF-κB/p65, and MAP kinases (ERK, JNK, and p38) were activated through phosphorylation. The activation of NF-κB and MAPK pathway consequently increased the proinflammatory cytokines, IL-6, TNF-α, IL-8, and IFN-γ and the chemokines CCL5, CCL20, and CXCL-10. Both treatments improved iNOS/NOS2 expression. However, iE-DAP was failed to express acute phase protein SAA3, but HP and LPS HP but SAA3. These ligands also increased LRRK2, TAK1, TAB1, and β-defensins expression. The SB pretreatment at lower dose restored the function of hepatocytes by suppressing these increased molecules, as HDAC3 was inhibited. The activated NOD1 negatively regulated the expression of FOXA2. Altogether these data suggest an important role of bovine hepatocytes to promote immune responses via NOD1 expression during infection in the liver and a key role of SB to attenuate inflammation.     

Identification and validation of key genes associated with non-small-cell lung cancer

Non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is one of the main causes of death induced by cancer globally. However, the molecular aberrations in NSCLC patients remain unclearly. In the present study, four messenger RNA microarray datasets (GSE18842, GSE40275, GSE43458, and GSE102287) were downloaded from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database. Differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between NSCLC tissues and adjacent lung tissues were obtained from GEO2R and the overlapping DEGs were identified. Moreover, functional and pathway enrichment were performed by Funrich, while the protein–protein interaction (PPI) network construction were obtained from STRING and hub genes were visualized and identified by Cytoscape software. Furthermore, validation, overall survival (OS) and tumor staging analysis of selected hub genes were performed by GEPIA. A total of 367 DEGs (95 upregulated and 272 downregulated) were obtained through gene integration analysis. The PPI network consisted of 94 nodes and 1036 edges in the upregulated DEGs and 272 nodes and 464 edges in the downregulated DEGs, respectively. The PPI network identified 46 upregulated and 27 downregulated hub genes among the DEGs, and six (such as CENPE, NCAPH, MYH11, LRRK2, HSD17B6, and A2M) of that have not been identified to be associated with NSCLC so far. Moreover, the expression differences of the mentioned hub genes were consistent with that in lung adenocarcinoma and lung squamous cell carcinoma in the TCGA database. Further analysis showed that all the six hub genes were associated with tumor staging except MYH11, while only the upregulated DEG CENPE was associated with the worse OS of patients with NSCLC. In conclusion, the current study showed that CENPE, NCAPH, MYH11, LRRK2, HSD17B6, and A2M might be the key genes contributed to tumorigenesis or tumor progression in NSCLC, further functional study is needed to explore the involved mechanisms.