An improved approach of salting-out solvent-free microwave mediated rotary distillation for essential oil preparation from fresh leaves of magnolia (Oyama sieboldii).

An improved method denoted as salting out-solvent-free microwave rotary distillation (SOSFMRD) was successfully developed for the extraction of essential oils from fresh magnolia (Oyama sieboldii) leaves, in which we achieved the rotation of the reaction material by means of a rotating motor to subject the material to uniform microwave irradiation. Magnesium chloride was selected as the salting-out agent through a comparative study on the salting-out effects of different anions and cations of metal salts. The variables of SOSFMRD were systematically optimized. Under the obtained optimization conditions, the essential oil yield was 21.68 ± 1.02 mL/kgDW. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry analysis showed that the main chemical constituent of O. sieboldii essential oil was dehydrocostuslactone, the content of which reached 30.23 ± 1.27 %. Compared with the other conventional methods, this method has a high yield and low energy consumption, which can effectively reduce impact on the environment.

Long-term effect of hospital volume on the postoperative prognosis of 158,618 patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma in China.

Background: The impact of hospital volume on the long-term survival of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) has not been well assessed in China, especially for stage I-III stage ESCC. We performed a large sample size study to assess the relationships between hospital volume and the effectiveness of ESCC treatment and the hospital volume value at the lowest risk of all-cause mortality after esophagectomy in China. Aim: To investigate the prognostic value of hospital volume for assessing postoperative long-term survival of ESCC patients in China. Methods: The date of 158,618 patients with ESCC were collected from a database (1973-2020) established by the State Key Laboratory for Esophageal Cancer Prevention and Treatment, the database includes 500,000 patients with detailed clinical information of pathological diagnosis and staging, treatment approaches and survival follow-up for esophageal and gastric cardia cancers. Intergroup comparisons of patient and treatment characteristics were conducted with the X2 test and analysis of variance. The Kaplan-Meier method with the log-rank test was used to draw the survival curves for the variables tested. A Multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression model was used to analyze the independent prognostic factors for overall survival. The relationship between hospital volume and all-cause mortality was assessed using restricted cubic splines from Cox proportional hazards models. The primary outcome was all-cause mortality. Results: In both 1973-1996 and 1997-2020, patients with stage I-III stage ESCC who underwent surgery in high volume hospitals had better survival than those who underwent surgery in low volume hospitals (both P<0.05). And high volume hospital was an independent factor for better prognosis in ESCC patients. The relationship between hospital volume and the risk of all-cause mortality was half-U-shaped, but overall, hospital volume was a protective factor for esophageal cancer patients after surgery (HR<1). The concentration of hospital volume associated with the lowest risk of all-cause mortality was 1027 cases/year in the overall enrolled patients. Conclusion: Hospital volume can be used as an indicator to predict the postoperative survival of ESCC patients. Our results suggest that the centralized management of esophageal cancer surgery is meaningful to improve the survival of ESCC patients in China, but the hospital volume should preferably not be higher than 1027 cases/year. Core tip: Hospital volume is considered to be a prognostic factor for many complex diseases. However, the impact of hospital volume on long-term survival after esophagectomy has not been well evaluated in China. Based on a large sample size of 158,618 ESCC patients in China spanning 47 years (1973-2020), We found that hospital volume can be used as a predictor of postoperative survival in patients with ESCC, and identified hospital volume thresholds with the lowest risk of death from all causes. This may provide an important basis for patients to choose hospitals and have a significant impact on the centralized management of hospital surgery.

Development and validation of a prognostic nomogram model for Chinese patients with primary small cell carcinoma of the esophagus.

BACKGROUND: Primary small cell carcinoma of the esophagus (PSCE) is a highly invasive malignant tumor with a poor prognosis compared with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma. Due to the limited samples size and the short follow-up time, there are few reports on elucidating the prognosis of PSCE, especially on the establishment and validation of a survival prediction nomogram model covering general information, pathological factors and specific biological proteins of PSCE patients. AIM: To establish an effective nomogram to predict the overall survival (OS) probability for PSCE patients in China. METHODS: The nomogram was based on a retrospective study of 256 PSCE patients. Univariate analysis and multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression analysis were used to examine the prognostic factors associated with PSCE, and establish the model for predicting 1-, 3-, and 5-year OS based on the Akaike information criterion. Discrimination and validation were assessed by the concordance index (C-index) and calibration curve and decision curve analysis (DCA). Histology type, age, tumor invasion depth, lymph node invasion, detectable metastasis, chromogranin A, and neuronal cell adhesion molecule 56 were integrated into the model. RESULTS: The C-index was prognostically superior to the 7th tumor node metastasis (TNM) staging in the primary cohort [0.659 (95%CI: 0.607-0.712) vs 0.591 (95%CI: 0.517-0.666), P = 0.033] and in the validation cohort [0.700 (95%CI: 0.622-0.778) vs 0.605 (95%CI: 0.490-0.721), P = 0.041]. Good calibration curves were observed for the prediction probabilities of 1-, 3-, and 5-year OS in both cohorts. DCA analysis showed that our nomogram model had a higher overall net benefit compared to the 7th TNM staging . CONCLUSION: Our nomogram can be used to predict the survival probability of PSCE patients, which can help clinicians to make individualized survival predictions.

Cu(II)-assisted orange/green dual-emissive carbon dots for the detection and imaging of anthrax biomarker.

The spores of Bacillus anthracis are highly deadly to human beings and animals, and are concurrently potential biological warfare agents. Hence, the rapid and sensitive monitoring Bacillus anthracis biomarker, dipicolinic acid (DPA), is very desirable. Herein, orange/green dual-emissive carbon dots (OG-CDs) were synthesized via the hydrothermal approach. The OG-CDs not only emitted dual fluorescence at 527 and 590 nm under the single 503 nm excitation, but also exhibited excellent water solubility, good photostability and great salt tolerance. The fluorescence of the OG-CDs at 527 nm can be completely quenched when chelated with Cu(II). However, because of the stronger chelation between DPA and Cu(II), the fluorescence restored rapidly on subsequent addition of DPA. As such, the CD-Cu(II) system can be used for determination of DPA based on the fluorescence "off-on" response. Under optimum conditions, the detection limit for DPA was 56 nM, with a linear range of 0.5-12.5 µM. The established CD-Cu(II) based spectrofluorometric method has been applied to the analysis of DPA in real water samples with recoveries of 93.6%-104.3%. More remarkably, the CD-Cu(II) probe also has been successfully applied for the imaging of DPA in Escherichia coli with excellent bio-compatibility.

Glutamatergic and gabaergic neuronal populations in the dorsal Periacqueductual Gray have different functional roles in aversive conditioning.

The dorsal periacqueductal gray (dPAG) is a midbrain structure having an essential role in coordinating defensive behaviors in response to aversive stimulation. However, the question of whether dPAG neurons can respond to aversive conditioning and retrieval, properties involved in emergence of negative emotional state, is still under debate. Here we used calcium imaging by fiber photometry to record the activity of dPAGVGluT2+ and dPAGGAD2+ neuronal populations during unconditioned and conditioned aversive stimulation. Then, following an unconditioned stimulation we performed a retrieval experiment to quantify memory-like responses of dPAG neurons. This shown that whilst both dPAGVGluT2+ and dPAGGAD2+ neuronal populations respond to direct US stimulation, and to CS stimulation during conditioning, only the dPAGVGluT2+ population persisted in responding to the CS stimulation during retrieval. Finally to better understand these divergences in dPAGVGluT2+ and dPAGGAD2+ responses, we investigated their respective connectivity patterns by performing a cell specific monosynaptic retrograde rabies virus tracing experiment. This revealed that different patterns of fibers projects to dPAGVGluT2+ and dPAGGAD2+, which could explain part of their response specificities. This may indicate that glutamatergic subpopulation is a main contributor of aversive memories in dPAG.

Ultrasound-Assisted Extraction of Taxifolin, Diosmin, and Quercetin from Abies nephrolepis (Trautv.) Maxim: Kinetic and Thermodynamic Characteristics.

Extraction behaviors of the 3 flavonoids taxifolin, diosmin, and quercetin have been investigated in Abies nephrolepis leaves and bark. The following operation parameters-ethanol volume fraction, liquid-solid ratio, temperature, ultrasound irradiation power and time, and ultrasound frequency-were varied to study their effect on the yield of the 3 flavonoids during extraction. The results showed that a low extraction efficiency occurred at 293.15 K due to slow kinetics, while the situation was significantly improved at 333.15 K. The kinetic data for the extraction yields of the 3 flavonoids achieved good fits by the first-order kinetic model. From the thermodynamic analysis results, we realized that the ultrasound-assisted extraction of taxifolin, diosmin, and quercetin from the leaves and bark of A. nephrolepis was a spontaneous and endothermic process in which the disorder increased (ΔG0 < 0, ΔH0 > 0, and ΔS0 > 0). According to the response surface methodology (RSM) analysis, under the optimal operation conditions (ethanol concentration of 50%, liquid-solid ratio of 20 mL/g, frequency of 45 kHz, extraction time of 39.25 min, ultrasound irradiation power of 160 W and temperature of 332.19 K), the total yield of the 3 flavonoids were 100.93 ± 4.01 mg/g from the leaves of A. nephrolepis (with 31.03 ± 1.51 mg/g, 0.31 ± 0.01 mg/g, 69.59 ± 2.57 mg/g for taxifolin, diosmin, and quercetin, respectively), and under the optimal operation conditions (ethanol concentration of 50%, liquid-solid ratio of 20 mL/g, frequency of 45 kHz, extraction time of 36.80 min, ultrasound irradiation power of 150 W and temperature of 328.78 K), 16.05 mg/g ± 0.38 mg/g were obtained from the bark of A. nephrolepis (with 1.44 ± 0.05 mg/g, 0.47 ± 0.01 mg/g, 14.14 ± 0.38 mg/g for taxifolin, diosmin, and quercetin, respectively), which were close to the prediction values.

Enrichment and Purification of Aucubin from Eucommia ulmoides Ionic Liquid Extract Using Macroporous Resins.

Aiming to address the shortcomings of high-concentration ethanol or methanol extraction solutions that need to be diluted and concentrated prior to use in conventional macroporous resin adsorption approaches, an efficient approach for enrichment and purification of aucubin from the ionic liquid extraction solution of samaras of Eucommia ulmoides was proposed. Among the nine kinds of macroporous resins investigated, the HPD850 resin was found to be the most suitable. Equilibrium adsorption tests were investigated and found to be better fitted by the Langmuir isotherm model. After the dynamic tests on a column packed with HPD850, the optimum operational conditions were as follows: for the absorption process, an initial aucubin concentration of 9.87 mg/L, a sample volume of 13 bed volumes (BV), and a flow rate of 2 BV/h; for the water washing process, 5 BV of deionized water and a flow rate of 3 BV/h; for the ethanol desorption process, a 10⁻80% ethanol volume fraction as the eluent, 2 BV for each ethanol volume fraction, and a flow rate of 3 BV/h. The 40⁻80% ethanol volume fraction eluent was collected and concentrated to produce the final products, resulting in an aucubin purity and recovery of 79.41% and 72.92%, respectively.

[Brief discussion on technique and application experience of penetrating moxibustion].

The penetrating moxibustion technique is proposed based on experience of the ancients and clinical practice for many years. From the aspects of definition, action characteristics and technique at different parts, the advantage and application experience of penetrating moxibustion have been discussed. The adequate dose of moxibustion is necessary in penetrating moxibustion; in addition, moxibustion sensation should be penetrating; therefore, with a temperature of 43℃ for more than 20 min, sweating, flushing, speckle appearing after penetrating moxibustion. Due to individual differences of age, gender and constitution factors, the effects of penetrating moxibustion are different, in clinical practice the body reaction and patient's feelings should be deliberately focused on other than does or sore and blister of moxibustion. The technique is common used in the abdomen, waist and knee joint, etc.

Determination of orientin in Trollius chinensis using ultrasound-assisted extraction and high performance liquid chromatography: Several often-overlooked sample preparation parameters in an ultrasonic bath.

The erratic pressure intensities and cavitation exhibited in an ultrasonic bath pose various during practical application. To achieve the most efficient experimental design, this manuscript aims to discover violently sites that are subject to the effect of slight changes in position on cavitation and ultrasound intensity distributed in the ultrasonic bath. In addition, optimization several often over-looked ultrasound parameters and experimental conditions, are intended to place the reaction vessel properly and operate under suitable experimental conditions to obtain the maximum yield of target analyte. In this study, an investigation of the various ultrasound intensities and cavitation in ultrasonic bath space were conducted with the help of the orientin yield using ultrasound-assisted extraction. Conventional parameters such as the volume fraction of ethanol, liquid-solid ratio, ultrasound irradiation power, time and frequency, and reaction temperature were investigated, all of which affect the extractive yield factors. Also several often over-looked parameters such as the extraction vessel position in the ultrasonic bath base, the distance between the bottom of the extraction vessel and the ultrasonic bath base, the diameter, the shape and the texture of the extraction vessel, height of the liquid medium and the ultrasound propagating medium salt concentration in the ultrasonic bath were tested exhaustively in this study. These results can therefore serve as a guide to optimize the usage of the ultrasonic bath for future applications.