Distribution and changes in microplastics in Taihu Lake and cyanobacterial blooms formed by the aggregation of Microcystis colonies.

As a new type of pollutant, microplastics have attracted much attention. As the third largest freshwater lake in China, Taihu Lake is characterized by severe eutrophication caused by external pollution and frequent occurrence of cyanobacterial blooms. Although there have been previous investigations into the spatial distribution of microplastics in Taihu Lake, research on the relationships among microplastics, pollutants, and cyanobacterial blooms, as well as the spatiotemporal distribution and changing characteristics of microplastics, is deficient. This study investigated the characteristics of microplastics, pollutants, and cyanobacterial blooms in the surface water and sediments of Taihu Lake. The abundances of microplastics were 0-3.7 items/L in the surface water and 44.42-417.56 items/kg (dry weight) in the sediments. Microplastics are most abundant in the western, southern, and northern lake areas. The northern and western lake areas are severely polluted, and cyanobacterial blooms are prone to occur in these areas. This study found that microplastics exist in the surface water of the southeastern lake area, which is a source of drinking water, and the microplastics may thus have adverse effects on drinking water quality. As the main organisms in the cyanobacterial blooms, Microcystis and microplastics have similar spatial distributions in Taihu Lake and are both affected by wind. Based on a combination of the investigations of this paper with the existing research on the microplastics in Taihu Lake, the spatiotemporal distribution of microplastics was obtained: the abundance of microplastics in surface water has continuously decreased, there are no obvious spatial distribution differences, and the spatial distribution of microplastics in the sediments is the same as that in the surface water.

Application of ARE-reporter systems in drug discovery and safety assessment.

The human body is continuously exposed to xenobiotics and internal or external oxidants. The health risk assessment of exogenous chemicals remains a complex and challenging issue. Alternative toxicological test methods have become an essential strategy for health risk assessment. As a core regulator of constitutive and inducible expression of antioxidant response element (ARE)-dependent genes, nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (Nrf2) plays a critical role in maintaining cellular redox homeostasis. Consistent with the properties of Nrf2-mediated antioxidant response, Nrf2-ARE activity is a direct indicator of oxidative stress and thus has been used to identify and characterize oxidative stressors and redox modulators. To screen and distinguish chemicals or environmental insults that affect the cellular antioxidant activity and/or induce oxidative stress, various in vitro cell models expressing distinct ARE reporters with high-throughput and high-content properties have been developed. These ARE-reporter systems are currently widely applied in drug discovery and safety assessment. In the present review, we provide an overview of the basic structures and applications of various ARE-reporter systems employed for discovering Nrf2-ARE modulators and characterizing oxidative stressors.

WeChatting for Health: What Motivates Older Adult Engagement with Health Information.

Although WeChat has become increasingly popular among Chinese elderly people as a tool to engage with health information, little research has examined their motivations for health purposes and their engagement with health information on the site. By applying the two-stage Use and gratification (U&G) approach, we first conducted in-depth interviews (n = 20) to explore older adults' distinctive motives. Based on the 22 motives found in the qualitative research, we developed a questionnaire for an online survey (n = 690) to further investigate how these motives affect older adults' engagement with health information on WeChat. As the result, six motive typologies were identified: information needs, social support, surveillance, social interaction, self-agency building, and technological convenience. Together, these six types of motivations jointly account for 59.9% of the variance in older adults' engagement with health information (M = 2.71, SD = 0.79, adjusted R2 = 0.59, p < 0.001). Social support and information needs were significant predictors, suggesting that the older WeChat users' active engagement is driven by personal instrumental gratification. This study examines the explanation power of U&G theory in a health context, as well as provides the practical implication for leveraging mobile social media to improve older people's healthcare management.

Continuous use of fitness apps and shaping factors among college students: A mixed-method investigation.

OBJECTIVE: This current study pursued an exploration of the psychological mechanism that determines college students' continuance intention to use fitness apps. METHODS: This current study adopted a mixed methods research that composed two distinct phases. Study 1 was quantitative research that helped to identify determinants of Chinese college students' continuance intention to use. A self-reported questionnaire was completed by 379 college students to ascertain their user experience. Study 2 was qualitative research. A semi-structured interview was conducted with a sample of 10 college students. Study 2 can be seen as a follow-up study and it pursued an in-depth understanding on how college students use fitness apps in the everyday life and their views towards study 1's major findings. RESULTS: The results revealed that five factors (confirmed usefulness, confirmed ease of use, satisfaction, fitness achievement and social connection) were found to significantly and positively affect college students' continuous intention to use fitness apps. Entertainment did not show obvious impact. In the interview, college students reported that even if they don't obtain entertainment from fitness apps, they will still push themselves to use them, because they have a very specific goal when using fitness apps, which is to achieve health and fitness. CONCLUSION: These findings indicated that successful fitness apps should make users feel convenient to use and indeed improves the fitness user's efficiency. Besides, people are more eager to get the information with strong credibility with the negligible effort. This implies more efforts should be made to design apps that can provide high-quality services. Moreover, if apps designers can pay more attention to protecting the personal information and data, it will inspire more people to use social connection functions.

Initial research on the relationship between let-7 family members in the serum and massive cerebral infarction.

Eighty-eight ischemic stroke patients with massive cerebral infarction (MCI) who met our selection criteria were included in this study. MCI was assessed using the Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) at hospital admission and at 2 weeks. The sera of all patients and controls were sampled at 48 h after the patients' attacks, and the sera of patients with MCI who had no severe cardiopulmonary complications, including those with hemorrhagic transformation (HT), were sampled again at 2 weeks. The relative expression of let-7 miRNA in the serum was determined by real-time qRT-PCR, and the blood levels of lipids, glucose, high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP), homocysteine and blood pressure were measured at admission. Interleukin-6 (IL-6) levels were detected by ELISA, and a luciferase assay was performed to confirm that IL-6 was a gene target of let-7. The relative expression of let-7f was significantly down-regulated in MCI without HT patients compared with controls (P<0.001), and it was positively correlated with GCS (P<0.01) and negatively correlated with hs-CRP (P<0.01). The relative expression of let-7f was significantly up-regulated in MCI patients with HT (P<0.01). IL-6 is a direct target gene for let-7f, and IL-6 expression was increased in MCI without HT patients compared to controls (P<0.01). The expression of let-7f in serum is associated with MCI without HT, which specifically inhibits IL-6. This suggests that let-7f may control inflammation in patients with MCI without HT.

Elevated Serum MicroRNA Let-7c in Moyamoya Disease.

BACKGROUND: Few studies have examined the relationship between mircroRNAs and moyamoya disease (MMD). We performed a study of the significance of let-7c expression in the serum of MMD patients. METHODS: The experimental group includes 49 MMD patients, and the control group consists of 30 normal people, 20 cerebral hemorrhage patients, 20 massive cerebral infarction patients, 20 nonmassive cerebral infarction patients, and 20 neurological autoimmune disease patients. Let-7 family levels were determined by polymerase chain reaction. A dual luciferase assay was used to test whether let-7c recognized the 3'UTR of RNF213. RESULTS: The expression level of let-7c in MMD patients is higher than that observed in the control groups (P < .001). The luciferase assay results indicated that hsa-let-7c could diminish luciferase activity from a reporter vector containing the 3'-UTR of RNF213 (P < .05). The suppression of luciferase activity is not found in mutRNF213 (P > .05). CONCLUSIONS: Increased expression of let-7c in MMD patients may contribute to MMD pathogenesis by targeting RNF213. Thus, let-7c may be a potential biomarker for the diagnosis of MMD.

The Expression and Significance of the Plasma Let-7 Family in Anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate Receptor Encephalitis.

The study aimed to investigate the expression and significance of the plasma let-7 family in anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) encephalitis. Blood samples from 5 anti-NMDAR encephalitis patients and 5 negative controls were collected for microarray analysis. Blood samples from10 anti-NMDAR encephalitis patients, 10 anti-NMDAR encephalitis patients whose physical conditions have improved after 3 months of immunotherapy, 20 virus (meningitis) encephalitis patients, 20 tuberculosis (meningitis) encephalitis patients, 10 purulent (meningitis) encephalitis patients, 20 cerebral cysticercosis patients, 20 ischemic stroke patients, 20 intracerebral hemorrhage patients, 15 neuromyelitis optica patients, 15 multiple sclerosis patients, 15 moyamoya disease patients, and 20 negative controls were collected for real-time quantitative PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis. The expression levels of let-7a, let-7b, let-7d, and let-7f were significantly down-regulated in anti-NMDAR encephalitis compared with the negative controls (NC). The expression levels of let-7a, let-7d, and let-7f were significantly down-regulated in other nervous system diseases compared with the NC group while the expression level of let-7b was statistically insignificant in other nervous system diseases compared with the NC group. In addition, there was no significant dysregulation of let-7b in the anti-NMDAR encephalitis treatment group compared with the NC. Let-7b may be a potential diagnostic marker and an indicator that reflected the molecular mechanism of anti-NMDAR encephalitis.