Higher circular RNA_0015278 correlates with absence of extrathyroidal invasion, lower pathological tumor stages, and prolonged disease-free survival in papillary thyroid carcinoma patients.

BACKGROUND: Circular RNA_0015278 (circ_0015278) inhibits the progression of several cancers and is greatly reduced in papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) tissues compared with benign thyroid lesions by microarray profiling. This study aimed to further investigate the correlation of circ_0015278 with tumor characteristics and prognosis in PTC patients. METHODS: Totally, 206 PTC patients who underwent tumor resection were retrospectively enrolled; subsequently, circ_0015278 expression in their tumor and adjacent tissues was detected by reverse transcriptional-quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Besides, disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) were calculated. RESULTS: Circ_0015278 was reduced in tumor tissues compared with adjacent tissues (p < 0.001), and receiver operating characteristic analysis showed that it well discriminated tumor tissues from adjacent tissues (area under curve: 0.903, 95% confidence interval: 0.874-0.932). Besides, higher tumor circ_0015278 expression was correlated with absence of extrathyroidal invasion (p = 0.036), lower pathological tumor (pT) stage (p = 0.05), pathological node (pN) stage (p = 0.002), and pathological tumor-node-metastasis (pTNM) stage (p = 0.001). Moreover, higher tumor circ_0015278 expression was associated with a reduced relapse rate (p = 0.011), but not mortality rate (p = 0.110); meanwhile, it was also correlated with prolonged DFS (p = 0.017), but not OS (p = 0.136). Additionally, multivariate Cox's regression analyses showed that higher tumor circ_0015278 expression independently associated with favorable DFS (p = 0.026, hazard ratio = 0.529). CONCLUSION: Circ_0015278 is reduced in tumor tissues, while its' higher expression in tumor correlates with absence of extrathyroidal invasion, lower pT, pN, and pTNM stage, as well as prolonged DFS in PTC patients.

Lnc-MEG3 acts as a potential biomarker for predicting increased disease risk, systemic inflammation, disease severity, and poor prognosis of sepsis via interacting with miR-21.

BACKGROUND: This study aimed to investigate the correlations of long non-coding RNA maternally expressed gene 3 (lnc-MEG3), microRNA (miR)-21, and lnc-MEG3/miR-21 axis with disease risk, inflammation, disease severity, and 28-day mortality of sepsis. METHODS: Totally, 219 sepsis patients and 219 health controls (HCs) were enrolled. Plasma samples were obtained from sepsis patients within 24 hours after admission and from HCs on enrollment to detect lnc-MEG3 and miR-21 expressions by real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction. RESULTS: The lnc-MEG3 expression and lnc-MEG3/miR-21 axis were increased, while miR-21 expression was decreased in sepsis patients compared with HCs. Lnc-MEG3 (area under the curve (AUC): 0.887, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.856-0.917) and lnc-MEG3/miR-21 axis (AUC: 0.934, 95% CI: 0.909-0.958) had good values for predicting elevated sepsis risk, while miR-21 (AUC: 0.801, 95% CI: 0.758-0.844) presented a good predictive value for reduced sepsis risk. Furthermore, lnc-MEG3 expression and lnc-MEG3/miR-21 axis positively correlated with, whereas miR-21 expression negatively correlated with acute pathologic and chronic health evaluation II, sequential organ failure assessment score, serum creatinine, C-reactive protein, tumor necrosis factor-α, interleukin (IL)-1ß, IL-6, and IL-17 in sepsis patients. Additionally, lnc-MEG3 (AUC: 0.704, 95% CI: 0.626-0.783) and lnc-MEG3/miR-21 axis (AUC: 0.669, 95% CI: 0.589-0.750) exhibited acceptable values in predicting higher 28-day mortality risk, while miR-21 (AUC: 0.588, 95% CI: 0.505-0.672) presented a poor predictive value for lower 28-day mortality risk in sepsis patients. CONCLUSION: Lnc-MEG3 might serve as a potential biomarker for the development, progression, and prognosis prediction of sepsis via interacting with miR-21.

The predictive value of microRNA-21 for sepsis risk and its correlation with disease severity, systemic inflammation, and 28-day mortality in sepsis patients.

BACKGROUND: This study aimed to investigate the value of microRNA (miR)-21 for predicting sepsis risk and its correlation with inflammation, disease severity as well as 28-day mortality in sepsis patients. METHODS: Totally, 219 sepsis patients and 219 healthy controls (HCs) were recruited. Plasma samples were obtained from sepsis patients within 24 hours after admission and from HCs at the enrollment to detect miR-21 expressions by real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Besides, the clinical characteristics of sepsis patients were recorded and the 28-day mortality of sepsis patients was evaluated. RESULTS: MiR-21 expression was decreased in sepsis patients compared with HCs, and further receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis revealed that miR-21 was of a good value in predicting sepsis risk (area under the curve [AUC]: 0.801, 95% CI: 0.758-0.844). Besides, miR-21 expression was negatively associated with acute pathologic and chronic health evaluation II (APACHE II) and sequential organ failure assessment (SOFA) score in sepsis patients. Furthermore, miR-21 expression was negatively correlated with serum creatinine, C-reactive protein, tumor necrosis factor-α, interleukin (IL)-1ß, IL-6, and IL-17, while positively correlated with albumin in sepsis patients. However, there was no correlation of miR-21 expression with white blood cell, smoke, or comorbidities in sepsis patients. Additionally, ROC curve analysis displayed that miR-21 exhibited a poor predictive value for 28-day mortality risk in sepsis patients (AUC: 0.588, 95% CI: 0.505-0.672). CONCLUSION: MiR-21 might serve as a potential biomarker for the development and progression of sepsis, while not for prognosis prediction in sepsis patients.

Bioinformatic analysis on related genes of lung adenocarcinoma / 中国肿瘤生物治疗杂志

@# To indentify the candidate genes and signaling pathways in lung adenocarcinoma by analyzing gene profiles with bioinformatics. Methods: The expression profiles of GSE40791, GSE68571, GSE43458, and GSE18842 were down-loaded from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database. The four microarray datasets were integrated to obtain the differentially expressed genes related to lung adenocarcinoma. STRING database was used to construct the protein-protein interaction (PPI) network of differentially expressed genes, and to further explore the gene modules and the key genes. DAVID was used to perform the gene enrichment analysis of each gene module, and to explore the regulatory function of each gene module in adenocarcinoma cells, as well as the relationship between the key genes in the module and the prognosis of the patients. Results: Thirty-seven up-regulated genes and 120 down-regulated genes were obtained from the primary screen, and the protein-protein interaction(PPI) network was successfully constructed. According to MCODE algorithm, we constructed gene modules and calculated the core genes (KIF14, SEPP1, SPP1, RBP4) in the PPI network. Finally, four modules were proved to be involved in regulation of cell cycle, blood coagulation, cell adhesion and cell metabolism, and four key genes were proved to be differentially expressed between lung adenocarcinoma tissues and normal tissues (all P<0.05). Survival analysis showed that expressions of KIF14, SEPP1 and SPP1 had significant effect on the prognosis of lung adenocarcinoma (P<0.01 or P<0.05), while RBP4 exerted insignificant difference in the survival rate of lung adenocarcinoma patients (P>0.05). Conclusion: With bioinformatics, three differentially expressed genes between lung adenocarcinoma tissues and normal adjacent tissues were finally screened out and proved to be closely related to the prognosis of patients, which provided new thoughts in the diagnosis and prognosis prediction of lung adenocarcinoma and improved the study efficiency on the mechanism of lung adenocarcinoma.

Biosorption of uranium by chemically modified Rhodotorula glutinis.

The present paper reports the biosorption of uranium onto chemically modified yeast cells, Rhodotorula glutinis, in order to study the role played by various functional groups in the cell wall. Esterification of the carboxyl groups and methylation of the amino groups present in the cells were carried out by methanol and formaldehyde treatment, respectively. The uranium sorption capacity increased 31% for the methanol-treated biomass and 11% for the formaldehyde-treated biomass at an initial uranium concentration of 140 mg/L. The enhancement of uranium sorption capacity was investigated by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy analysis, with amino and carboxyl groups were determined to be the important functional groups involved in uranium binding. The biosorption isotherms of uranium onto the raw and chemically modified biomass were also investigated with varying uranium concentrations. Langmuir and Freundlich models were well able to explain the sorption equilibrium data with satisfactory correlation coefficients higher than 0.9.

[Study on biosorption of uranium by Rhodotorula glutinis].

Characteristic of uranium biosorption in water solution by Rhodotorula glutinis was investigated in the present study and the optimal pH for uranium adsorption was found to be 6-7. At the same time, maximum adsorption capacity of 149.4 mgU/(g dry cell) was identified, and Langmuir adsorption models can be used to simulate the isothermal biosorption process with high correlation coefficient of 0.99. According to Fourier transform infrared spectra, a new peak at wave number of 904 cm(-1), which can be assigned to the stretch vibration of UO2, was detected in the cell which was contacted by the uranium, indicated that uranium was really absorbed by Rhodotorula glutinis. Changes in the uranium-exposed yeast biomass were in the stretching vibrations of amino or hydroxyl groups, which shift from 3309 to 3287 cm(-1), and in the stretching vibrations of C--O band, which shift from 1068 to 1080 cm(-1), and these are all attributed to the important role that they may played in the binding of uranium. Hardly any changes can be found in the characteristic IR adsorbing peaks of protein at wave numbers of 1653, 1540 and 1237 cm(-1) before and after uranium adsorption, making it clear that the major component and the structure of the biomass remained intact. 96% of the absorbed uranium can be easily desorbed by 0.1 mol x L(-1) NaHCO3. Obviously, the application potential of this yeast in the uranium wastewater treatment was very wide and expansive, and more more work should be done to realize its industrial use.