Dissecting Causal Relationships Between Gut Microbiota, Blood Metabolites, and Stroke: A Mendelian Randomization Study

Wang Qi,Dai Huajie,Hou Tianzhichao,Hou Yanan,Wang Tiange,Lin Hong,Zhao Zhiyun,Li Mian,Zheng Ruizhi,Wang Shuangyuan,Lu Jieli,Xu Yu,Liu Ruixin,Ning Guang,Wang Weiqing,Bi Yufang,Zheng Jie,Xu Min 대한뇌졸중학회 2023 Journal of stroke Vol.25 No.3

Background and Purpose We investigated the causal relationships between the gut microbiota (GM), stroke, and potential metabolite mediators using Mendelian randomization (MR). Methods We leveraged the summary statistics of GM (n=18,340 in the MiBioGen consortium), blood metabolites (n=115,078 in the UK Biobank), and stroke (cases n=60,176 and controls n=1,310,725 in the Global Biobank Meta-Analysis Initiative) from the largest genome-wide association studies to date. We performed bidirectional MR analyses to explore the causal relationships between the GM and stroke, and two mediation analyses, two-step MR and multivariable MR, to discover potential mediating metabolites. Results Ten taxa were causally associated with stroke, and stroke led to changes in 27 taxa. In the two-step MR, <i>Bifidobacteriales</i> order, <i>Bifidobacteriaceae</i> family, <i>Desulfovibrio</i> genus, apolipoprotein A1 (ApoA1), phospholipids in high-density lipoprotein (HDL_PL), and the ratio of apolipoprotein B to ApoA1 (ApoB/ApoA1) were causally associated with stroke (all <i>P</i><0.044). The causal associations between <i>Bifidobacteriales</i> order, <i>Bifidobacteriaceae</i> family and stroke were validated using the weighted median method in an independent cohort. The three GM taxa were all positively associated with ApoA1 and HDL_PL, whereas <i>Desulfovibrio</i> genus was negatively associated with ApoB/ApoA1 (all <i>P</i><0.010). Additionally, the causal associations between the three GM taxa and ApoA1 remained significant after correcting for the false discovery rate (all q-values <0.027). Multivariable MR showed that the associations between <i>Bifidobacteriales</i> order, <i>Bifidobacteriaceae</i> family and stroke were mediated by ApoA1 and HDL_PL, each accounting for 6.5% (<i>P</i>=0.028) and 4.6% (<i>P</i>=0.033); the association between <i>Desulfovibrio</i> genus and stroke was mediated by ApoA1, HDL_PL, and ApoB/ApoA1, with mediated proportions of 7.6% (<i>P</i>=0.019), 4.2% (<i>P</i>=0.035), and 9.1% (<i>P</i>=0.013), respectively. Conclusion The current MR study provides evidence supporting the causal relationships between several specific GM taxa and stroke and potential mediating metabolites.

Inhibitory effects of piceatannol on human cytomegalovirus (hCMV) in vitro

Wang San-Ying,Zhang Jing,Xu Xiao-Gang,Su Hui-Li,Xing Wen-Min,Zhang Zhong-Shan,Jin Wei-Hua,Dai Ji-Huan,Wang Ya-Zhen,He Xin-Yue,Sun Chuan,Yan Jing,Mao Gen-Xiang 한국미생물학회 2020 The journal of microbiology Vol.58 No.8

Human cytomegalovirus (hCMV) is a ubiquitous herpesvirus, which results in the establishment of a latent infection that persists throughout the life of the host and can be reactivated when the immunity is low. Currently, there is no vaccine for hCMV infection, and the licensed antiviral drugs mainly target the viral enzymes and have obvious adverse reactions. Thus, it is important to search for compounds with antihCMV properties. The present study aimed to investigate the suppressive effects of piceatannol on hCMV Towne strain infection and the putative underlying mechanisms using human diploid fibroblast WI-38 cells. Piceatannol supplementation prevented the lytic changes induced by hCMV infection in WI-38 cells. Furthermore, piceatannol suppressed the expression of hCMV immediate-early (IE) and early (E) proteins as well as the replication of hCMV DNA in a dose-dependent manner. Moreover, hCMV-induced cellular senescence was suppressed by piceatannol, as shown by a decline in the senescence-associated β-galactosidase (SA-β-Gal) activity and decreased production of intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS). p16INK4a, a major senescence-associated molecule, was dramatically elevated by current hCMV infection that was attenuated by pre-incubation with piceatannol in a dose-dependent manner. These results demonstrated that piceatannol suppressed the hCMV infection via inhibition of the activation of p16INK4a and cellular senescence induced by hCMV. Together, these findings indicate piceatannol as a novel and potent anti-hCMV agent with the potential to be developed as an effective treatment for chronic hCMV infection.

Big Data Analysis of Weather Condition and Air Quality on Cosmetics Marketing

Wang, Zebin,Wu, Tong,Zhao, Xinshuang,Cheng, Shuchun,Dai, Genghui,Dai, Weihui Korea Data Strategy Society 2017 Journal of information technology applications & m Vol.24 No.3

Demands of cosmetics are affected not only by the well-known elements such as brand, price, and customer's consumption capacity, but also by some latent factors, for example, weather and air environment. Due to complexity and dynamic changes of the above factors, their influences can hardly be estimated in an accurate way by the traditional approaches such as survey and questionnaires. Through modeling and statistical analysis of big data, this article studied the impacts of weather condition and air quality on customer flow and sales of the cosmetics distributors in China, and found several hidden influencing factors. It provided a big-data based method for the analysis of unconventional factors on cosmetics marketing in the changing weather condition and air environment.

Protective Effects of Scutellaria barbata Against Rat Liver Tumorigenesis

Dai, Zhi-Jun,Wu, Wen-Ying,Kang, Hua-Feng,Ma, Xiao-Bin,Zhang, Shu-Qun,Min, Wei-Li,Lu, Wang-Feng,Lin, Shuai,Wang, Xi-Jing Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention 2013 Asian Pacific journal of cancer prevention Vol.14 No.1

Scutellaria barbata D. Don (S. barbata), a traditional Chinese medicine, is used to treat cancers, inflammation, and urinary diseases. This study aimed to determine any protective effects of S. barbata crude extract (CE-SB) against rat liver tumorigenesis induced by diethylnitrosamine (DENA). Liver malfunction indices in serum were measured by biochemical examination. Hematoxylin and eosin staining was performed to examine liver pathology. Contents of malondialdehyde (MDA) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) were measured in liver homogenates to evaluate oxidative stress. The levels of liver malfunction indices in the CE-SB groups, especially in the CE-SB high dose group, were lower than that of the model group (P<0.05). The results from histological examination indicated that the number of liver nodules in the CE-SB groups decreased compared with the model group (P<0.05). Content of MDA determined in liver was significantly decreased, and level of SOD elevated by CE-SB. CE-SB can inhibit experimental liver tumorigenesis and relieve hepatic injury in rats.

Effects of different diets on the growth and development of young silkworms

Wang Yuanfei,Shu Qilong,Gu Haoyi,Feng Piao,Dai Minli,Zhu Qingyu,Liu Wei,Dai Yan,Li Fanchi,Li Bing 한국응용곤충학회 2023 Journal of Asia-Pacific Entomology Vol.26 No.4

To investigate the impact of different diets on the growth and development of the silkworm Bombyx mori (L.; Lepidoptera: Bombycidae), we conducted an analysis of differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between larvae fed an artificial diet (referred to as the AD group) and those fed mulberry leaves (referred to as the ML group) during the first, second, and third instars using RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq) technology. Our results revealed that the DEGs primarily belonged to pathways associated with lipid metabolism, carbohydrate metabolism, amino acid metabolism, the endocrine system, the nervous system, the digestive system, the immune system, and oxida tion–reduction processes. Notably, in the AD group, there was a decrease in transcript levels of genes related to amino acid metabolism synthases, while the transcript levels of antimicrobial peptide genes were up-regulated. Furthermore, genes associated with cytochrome P450 (CYP) enzymes exhibited down-regulation in the AD group. These observed changes likely contributed to the delayed growth and compromised robustness observed in the AD group. Overall, these findings provided valuable insights into the mechanisms underlying the differ ences in growth, development, disease resistance, and adversity resistance between silkworms fed an artificial diet and those fed mulberry leaves.

The PP6 Phosphatase Regulates ABI5 Phosphorylation and Abscisic Acid Signaling in <i>Arabidopsis</i>

Dai, Mingqiu,Xue, Qin,Mccray, Tyra,Margavage, Kathryn,Chen, Fang,Lee, Jae-Hoon,Nezames, Cynthia D.,Guo, Liquan,Terzaghi, William,Wan, Jianmin,Deng, Xing Wang,Wang, Haiyang American Society of Plant Biologists 2013 The Plant cell Vol.25 No.2

<P>This study shows that two catalytic subunits of <I>Arabidopsis</I> protein phosphatase 6 (i.e., FyPP1 and FyPP3) negatively regulate abscisic acid responses through direct interaction with and dephosphorylation of ABI5, which subsequently regulates ABI5 stability and activity, seed germination, and postgermination seedling growth in <I>Arabidopsis</I>.</P>

Research on Natural Gas Leakage Diffusion of Urban Underground Pipeline and its Explosion Hazard

Dai Wang,Peng Liu,Chenguang Hua,Hai Zhang,Chenyang Shi,Jianmei Du 대한토목학회 2023 KSCE Journal of Civil Engineering Vol.27 No.2

For the risk of gas leakage and explosion that may occur during the serviceability of urban natural gas pipeline, based on the numerical simulation conducted by FLACS, the gas leakage, explosion and disaster risk under the different speed of wind are mainly studied with local climate characteristics for actual urban street. The results show that the wind speed has an obvious effect on the gas leakage and diffusion, the deviation of gas leakage direction is not obvious for the smaller speed of wind at the initial stage, the horizontal diffusion range gradually increases with the increase of wind speed, while the vertical diffusion range gradually decreases, and the volume of gas at the limit concentration of combustion and explosion gradually decreases. In urban buildings, the overpressure load of higher buildings is lower. After the explosion, the peak overpressure at the same monitoring point decreases with the increase of wind speed. With the increase of distance from the building to the explosion location, the overpressure load on the building decreases and the oscillation effect of overpressure load is relatively gentle. The thermal radiation after burning has great influence on the surrounding buildings and downwind position, especially the buildings around the leakage point.

Role of Nucleation-Promoting Factors in Mouse Early Embryo Development

Wang, Qiao-Chu,Liu, Jun,Wang, Fei,Duan, Xing,Dai, Xiao-Xin,Wang, Teng,Liu, Hong-Lin,Cui, Xiang-Shun,Sun, Shao-Chen,Kim, Nam-Hyung Cambridge University Press 2013 Microscopy and microanalysis Vol.19 No.3

<B>Abstract</B><P>During mitosis nucleation-promoting factors (NPFs) bind to the Arp2/3 complex and activate actin assembly. JMY and WAVE2 are two critical members of the NPFs. Previous studies have demonstrated that NPFs promote multiple processes such as cell migration and cytokinesis. However, the role of NPFs in development of mammalian embryos is still unknown. Results of the present study show that the NPFs JMY and WAVE2 are critical for cytokinesis during development of mouse embryos. Both JMY and WAVE2 are expressed in mouse embryos. After injection of JMY or WAVE2 siRNA, all embryos failed to develop to the morula or blastocyst stages. Moreover, using fluorescence intensity analysis, we found that the expression of actin decreased, and multiple nuclei were observed within a single cell indicating that NPFs-induced actin reduction caused the failure of cell division. In addition, injection of JMY and WAVE2 siRNA also caused ARP2 degradation, indicating that involvement of NPFs in development of mouse embryos is mainly through regulation of ARP2/3-induced actin assembly. Taken together, these data suggested that WAVE2 and JMY are involved in development of mouse embryos, and their regulation may be through a NPFs-Arp2/3-actin pathway.</P>

An Optimized Third Harmonic Injection Method for Three-Phase Cascaded H-Bridge Photovoltaic Inverter

Wang Mao,Xing Zhang,Tao Zhao,Yuhua Hu,Fusheng Wang,Zhiqiang Dai,Renxian Cao 전력전자학회 2019 ICPE(ISPE)논문집 Vol.2019 No.5

The uneven irradiation and temperature in photovoltaic (PV) modules of three-phase cascaded H-bridge (CHB) inverters will cause the unbalanced output power between solar panels, resulting in unbalanced grid current between three phases. In addition, since each phase can be regarded as a single-phase inverter, the second harmonic voltage pulsation of dc-side capacitors is a problem to be solved. To solve these two problems, a third harmonic injection optimization method on the basis of fundamental frequency zero sequence is proposed in this paper. The third harmonic with the same amplitude of fundamental modulated wave signal is injected into the modulated wave signal when the amplitude of synthesized wave signal is no greater than unity. Otherwise, the amplitude of third harmonic is decreased correspondingly to ensure the amplitude of synthesized wave signal being unity. With this method, the dc-side voltage pulsation is effectively restrained and the power balancing limit of CHB inverter is expanded. The feasibility and effectiveness of this method are verified by an experimental prototype of a three-phase seven-level CHB inverter.

Efficacy and Safety of Sorafenib for Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer: a Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials

Wang, Wei-Lan,Tang, Zhi-Hui,Xie, Ting-Ting,Xiao, Bing-Kun,Zhang, Xin-Yu,Guo, Dai-Hong,Wang, Dong-Xiao,Pei, Fei,Si, Hai-Yan,Zhu, Man Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention 2014 Asian Pacific journal of cancer prevention Vol.15 No.14

Background: Many clinical trials have been conducted to evaluate sorafenib for the treatment of advanced NSCLC, but the results for efficacy have been inconsistent. The aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of sorafenib in patients with advanced NSCLC in more detail by meta-analysis. Methods: This meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) was performed after searching PubMed, EMBASE, ASCO Abstracts, ESMO Abstracts, and the proceedings of major conferences for relevant clinical trials. Two reviewers independently assessed the quality of the trials. Outcomes analysis were disease control rate (DCR), progression- free survival (PFS), overall survival (OS) with 95% confidence intervals (CI) and major toxicity. Subgroup analysis was conducted according to sorafenib monotherapy, in combination with chemotherapy or EGFR-TKI to investigate the preferred therapy strategy. Results: Results reported from 6 RCTs involving 2, 748 patients were included in the analysis. Compared to sorafenib-free group, SBT was not associated with higher DCR (RR 1.31 (0.96- 1.79), p=0.09), PFS (HR 0.82 (0.66-1.02), p=0.07) and OS (HR 1.01 (0.92-1.12), p=0.77). In terms of subgroup results, sorafenib monotherapy was associated with significant superior DCR and longer PFS, but failed to show advantage with regard to OS. Grade 3 or greater sorafenib-related adverse events included fatigue, hypertension, diarrhea, oral mucositis, rash and HFSR. Conclusions: SBT was revealed to yield no improvement in DCR, PFS and OS. However, sorafenib as monotherapy showed some activity in NSCLC. Further evaluation may be considered in subsets of patients who may benefit from this treatment. Sorafenib combined inhibition therapy should be limited unless the choice of platinum-doublet regimen, administration sequence or identification of predictive biomarkers are considered to receive better anti-tumor activity and prevention of resistance mechanisms.