Novel Prognostic Nomograms Based on Inflammation-Related Markers for Patients with Hepatocellular Carcinoma Underwent Hepatectomy

Yifei Wang,Kaiyu Sun,Jingxian Shen,Bin Li,Ming Kuang,Qinghua Cao,Sui Peng 대한암학회 2019 Cancer Research and Treatment Vol.51 No.4

Purpose Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is an aggressive disease with high recurrence rate. However, current staging systems were lack of predictive capacity for HCC recurrence. We aimed to develop prognostic nomograms based on inflammation-related markers for HCC patients underwent hepatectomy. Materials and Methods We recruited 889 surgically treated patients from two medical centers. Independent prognostic factors were identified by cox regression analyses. Nomograms for recurrence-free survival (RFS) and overall survival (OS) were established and validated internally and externally. The performance, discrimination, and calibration of nomograms were assessed and compared with existed staging systems. Results Neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR) and gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase to platelet ratio (GPR) were the two inflammation-related factor that independently correlated with survival. NLR, GPR, international normalized ratio (INR), microvascular invasion, satellite lesions, tumor number, tumor diameter, and macrovascular invasion were used to construct nomogram for RFS while GPR, total bilirubin, INR, -fetoprotein, microvascular invasion, satellite lesions, tumor diameter, and macrovascular invasion were for OS. In the training cohort, the C-index of nomogram was 0.701 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.669 to 0.732) for RFS and 0.761 (95% CI, 0.728 to 0.795) for OS. These results received both internal and external validation with C-index of 0.701 (95% CI, 0.647 to 0.755) and 0.707 (95% CI, 0.657 to 0.756) for RFS, and 0.706 (95% CI, 0.640 to 0.772) and 0.708 (95%CI, 0.646 to 0.771) for OS, respectively. The nomograms showed superior accuracy to conventional staging systems (p < 0.001). Conclusion The nomograms based on inflammation-related markers are of high efficacy in predicting survival of HCC patients after hepatectomy, which will be valuable in guiding postoperative interventions and follow-ups.

Semisupervised Tripled Dictionary Learning for Standard-Dose PET Image Prediction Using Low-Dose PET and Multimodal MRI

Wang, Yan,Shen, Dinggang,Ma, Guangkai,An, Le,Shi, Feng,Zhang, Pei,Lalush, David S.,Wu, Xi,Pu, Yifei,Zhou, Jiliu IEEE 2017 IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering Vol.64 No.3

<P>Objective: To obtain high-quality positron emission tomography (PET) image with low-dose tracer injection, this study attempts to predict the standard-dose PET (S-PET) image from both its low-dose PET (L-PET) counterpart and corresponding magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Methods: It was achieved by patch-based sparse representation (SR), using the training samples with a complete set of MRI, L-PET and S-PET modalities for dictionary construction. However, the number of training samples with complete modalities is often limited. In practice, many samples generally have incomplete modalities (i.e., with one or two missing modalities) that thus cannot be used in the prediction process. In light of this, we develop a semisupervised tripled dictionary learning (SSTDL) method for S-PET image prediction, which can utilize not only the samples with complete modalities (called complete samples) but also the samples with incomplete modalities (called incomplete samples), to take advantage of the large number of available training samples and thus further improve the prediction performance. Results: Validation was done on a real human brain dataset consisting of 18 subjects, and the results show that our method is superior to the SR and other baseline methods. Conclusion: This paper proposed a new S-PET prediction method, which can significantly improve the PET image quality with low-dose injection. Significance: The proposed method is favorable in clinical application since it can decrease the potential radiation risk for patients.</P>

Circular RNA expression profiles in the porcine liver of two distinct phenotype pig breeds

Huang, Minjie,Shen, Yifei,Mao, Haiguang,Chen, Lixing,Chen, Jiucheng,Guo, Xiaoling,Xu, Ningying Asian Australasian Association of Animal Productio 2018 Animal Bioscience Vol.31 No.6

Objective: An experiment was conducted to identify and characterize the circular RNA expression and metabolic characteristics in the liver of Jinhua pigs and Landrace pigs. Methods: Three Jinhua pigs and three Landrace pigs respectively at 70-day were slaughtered to collect the liver tissue samples. Immediately after slaughter, blood samples were taken to detect serum biochemical indicators. Total RNA extracted from liver tissue samples were used to prepare the library and then sequence on HiSeq 2500. Bioinformatic methods were employed to analyze sequence data to identify the circRNAs and predict the potential roles of differentially expressed circRNAs between the two breeds. Results: Significant differences in physiological and biochemical traits were observed between growing Jinhua and Landrace pigs. We identified 84,864 circRNA candidates in two breeds and 366 circRNAs were detected as significantly differentially expressed. Their host genes are involved in lipid biosynthetic and metabolic processes according to the gene ontology analysis and associated with metabolic pathways. Conclusion: Our research represents the first description of circRNA profiles in the porcine liver from two divergent phenotype pigs. The predicted miRNA-circRNA interaction provides important basis for miRNA-circRNA relationships in the porcine liver. These data expand the repertories of porcine circRNA and are conducive to understanding the possible molecular mechanisms involved in miRNA and circRNA. Our study provides basic data for further research of the biological functions of circRNAs in the porcine liver.

Effects of chronic alcohol exposure on ischemia–reperfusion-induced acute kidney injury in mice: the role of β-arrestin 2 and glycogen synthase kinase 3

Lihua Wang,Yifei Zhu,Lili Wang,Jingjing Hou,Yongning Gao,Lei Shen,Jingyu Zhang 생화학분자생물학회 2017 Experimental and molecular medicine Vol.49 No.-

Little is known about the effects of chronic alcohol intake on the outcome of acute kidney injury (AKI). Hence, we examined the effects of chronic alcohol intake on the development of renal fibrosis following AKI in an animal model of bilateral renal ischemia–reperfusion (IR) injury. We first found that chronic alcohol exposure exacerbated bilateral IR-induced renal fibrosis and renal function impairment. This phenomenon was associated with increased bilateral IR-induced extracellular matrix deposition and an increased myofibroblast population as well as increased bilateral IR-induced expression of fibrosis-related genes in the kidneys. To explore the mechanisms underlying this phenomenon, we showed that chronic alcohol exposure enhanced β-arrestin 2 (Arrb2) expression and Akt and glycogen synthase kinase-3 (GSK3)β activation in the kidneys. Importantly, pharmacological GSK3 inhibition alleviated bilateral IR-induced renal fibrosis and renal function impairment. Furthermore, we demonstrated that Arrb2− / − mice exhibited resistance to IR-induced renal fibrosis and renal function impairment following chronic alcohol exposure, and these effects were associated with attenuated GSK3β activation in the kidneys. Taken together, our results suggest that chronic alcohol exposure may potentiate AKI via β-arrestin 2/Akt/GSK3β-mediated signaling in the kidney.

Integrated mRNA and miRNA profile expression in livers of Jinhua and Landrace pigs

Minjie Huang,Lixing Cheng,Yifei Shen,Jiucheng Chen,Xiaoling Guo,Ningying Xu 아세아·태평양축산학회 2019 Animal Bioscience Vol.32 No.10

Objective: To explore the molecular mechanisms of fat metabolism and deposition in pigs, an experiment was conducted to identify hepatic mRNAs and miRNAs expression and determine the potential interaction of them in two phenotypically extreme pig breeds. Methods: mRNA and miRNA profiling of liver from 70-day Jinhua (JH) and Landrace (LD) pigs were performed using RNA sequencing. Blood samples were taken to detect results of serum biochemistry. Bioinformatics analysis were applied to construct differentially expressed miRNA-mRNA network. Results: Serum total triiodothyronine and total thyroxine were significantly lower in Jinhua pigs, but the content of serum total cholesterol (TCH) and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol were strikingly higher. A total of 467 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and 35 differentially expressed miRNAs (DE miRNAs) were identified between JH and LD groups. Gene ontology analysis suggested that DEGs were involved in oxidation-reduction, lipid biosynthetic and lipid metabolism process. Interaction network of DEGs and DE miRNAs were constructed, according to target prediction results. Conclusion: We generated transcriptome and miRNAome profiles of liver from JH and LD pig breeds which represent distinguishing phenotypes of growth and metabolism. The potential miRNA-mRNA interaction networks may provide a comprehensive understanding in the mechanism of lipid metabolism. These results serve as a basis for further investigation on biological functions of miRNAs in the porcine liver.