Accelerated cardiac cine magnetic resonance imaging using deep low-rank plus sparse network: validation in patients.

Background: Accurate and reproducible assessment of left ventricular (LV) volumes is important in managing various cardiac conditions. However, patients are required to hold their breath multiple times during data acquisition, which may result in discomfort and restrict cardiac motion, potentially compromising the accuracy of the detected results. Accelerated imaging techniques can help reduce the number of breath holds needed, potentially improving patient comfort and the reliability of the LV assessment. This study aimed to prospectively evaluate the feasibility and accuracy of LV assessment with a model-based low-rank plus sparse network (L+S-Net) for accelerated magnetic resonance (MR) cine imaging. Methods: Fourty-one patients with different cardiac conditions were recruited in this study. Both accelerated MR cine imaging with L+S-Net and traditional electrocardiogram (ECG)-gated segmented cine were performed for each patient. Subjective image quality (IQ) score and quantitative LV volume function parameters were measured and compared between L+S-Net and traditional standards. The IQ score and LV volume measurements of cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) images reconstructed by L+S-Net and standard cine were compared by paired t-test. The acquisition time of the two methods was also calculated. Results: In a quantitative analysis, L+S-Net and standard cine yielded similar measurements for all parameters of LV function (ejection fraction: 35±22 for standard vs. 33±23 for L+S-Net), although L+S-Net had slightly lower IQ scores than standard cine CMR (4.2±0.5 for L+S-Net vs. 4.8±0.4 for standard cine; P<0.001). The mean acquisition time of L+S-Net and standard cine was 0.83±0.08 vs. 6.35±0.78 s per slice (P<0.001). Conclusions: Assessment of LV function with L+S-Net at 3.0 T yields comparable results to the reference standard, albeit with a reduced acquisition time. This feature enhances the clinical applicability of the L+S-Net approach, helping alleviate patient discomfort and motion artifacts that may arise due to prolonged acquisition time.

A national study exploring the association between triglyceride-glucose index and risk of hyperuricemia events in adults with hypertension.

Background: The triglyceride-glucose (TyG) index has been recommended as a practical surrogate of insulin resistance (IR). However, the association between the TyG index and hyperuricemia among adults with hypertension remains to be elucidated. Methods: We included and analyzed 3134 HTN patients and 4233 non-HTN participants from the cross-sectional 2013-2018 U.S. National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES). Multivariable logistic regression and restricted cubic splines (RCS) were used to explore the association between the TyG index and hyperuricemia. Stratifed analyses were performed to assess the association in populations with different subgroups of hypertension. Results: The prevalence of hyperuricemia was higher in HTN patients (28.00 %) than in non-HTN participants (12.47 %). The multivariable logistic regression showed that the TyG index was significantly associated with hyperuricemia. After multivariable adjustment, higher TyG index levels were found to be associated with a higher prevalence of hyperuricemia in HTN patients (OR: 2.39, 95 % CI: 1.37-4.17, Ptrend < 0.001) and non-HTN participants (OR: 2.61, 95 % CI: 1.45-4.69, Ptrend < 0.001). Restricted cubic spline regression showed linearity of the associations between the TyG index and hyperuricemia (p-nonlinear > 0.05). In the subgroup analysis suggested that the positive association seemed to be strong among male, alcohol use, and diabetes group (P for interaction < 0.05). Conclusions: TyG index, a practical surrogate of IR, was linearly and positively associated with hyperuricemia in HTN and non-HTN participants. Proactive measures are needed to prevent the comorbidity of IR-driven hyperuricemia in the future.

Fluorescence Enhancement Method for Aptamer-Templated Silver Nanoclusters and Its Application in the Construction of a ß-Amyloid Oligomer Sensor.

DNA-templated silver nanoclusters (DNA-AgNCs) have attracted significant attention due to their unique fluorescence properties. However, so far, the relatively low quantum yields of the DNA-AgNCs and the complex design of DNA-AgNC-based sensors have limited their application in biosensing or bioimaging. Herein, we report a novel fluorescence enhancement method. The ß-Amyloid Oligomer (AßO) aptamer (AptAßO) with A10/T10 at its 3' end can be directly used as the template to fabricate the AgNCs. When the AgNCs were hybridized with the complementary strand that has 12 bases suspended at its 3' terminal, being the same or complementary to the A/T at the 3' end of the AptAßO, and two-base mismatches in the complementary region of the aptamer excluded A10/T10, a dramatic fluorescence enhancement (maximum: ∼500-fold; maximum quantum yield: 31.5%) can be realized. The fluorescence enhancement should result from the aggregation-induced emission of the AgNCs, which can be attributed to forming the reticular structure of the hybridized product. To some extent, the method developed in this work is extendable. The fluorescence enhancement was also realized from the thrombin aptamer-templated AgNCs through designing the aptamer and the corresponding complementary strand according to the method. Based on the fluorescence enhancement of the AptAßO-templated AgNCs, an "on-off" fluorescence sensor was constructed for the sensitive and selective detection of AßO. This work provides a rational strategy to realize fluorescence enhancement for the aptamer-templated AgNCs and design an aptamer-based fluorescence sensor.