Acupuncture for persistent atrial fibrillation after catheter ablation: study protocol for a pilot randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a common arrhythmia, which is closely related to cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. Although acupuncture is used in the treatment of AF, the evidence is insufficient. The objective of this pilot trial is to evaluate the feasibility, preliminary efficacy, and safety of acupuncture in reducing AF burden for persistent AF after catheter ablation (CA). METHODS AND DESIGN: This will be a multi-center, 3-arm, pilot randomized controlled trial in China. Sixty patients in total will be randomly assigned to the specific acupoints group, the non-specific acupoints group, or the non-acupoints group in a 1:1:1 ratio. The whole study period is 6 months, including a 3-month treatment period and a 3-month follow-up period. All patients will receive 18 sessions of acupuncture over 12 weeks after CA and appropriate post-ablation routine treatment. The primary outcome is AF burden at 6 months after CA measured by electrocardiography patch that can carry out a 7-day continuous ambulatory electrocardiographic monitoring. The secondary outcomes include AF burden at 3 months after CA, recurrence of AF, quality of life, etc. The adverse events will also be recorded. DISCUSSION: This pilot study will contribute to evaluating the feasibility, preliminary efficacy, and safety of acupuncture in reducing AF burden for persistent AF after CA. The results will be used for the sample size calculation of a subsequent large-scale trial. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Chinese Clinical Trial Registry ChiCTR2000030576 . Registered on 7 March 2020.

Age-related decrease in constructive activation of Akt/PKB in SAMP10 hippocampus.

Aging is the greatest risk factor for neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease (AD). Age-dependent alterations of cell signaling play an important role in the onset of AD. The serine/threonine kinase Akt is a critical cell signaling to neuronal survival. Using the senescence-accelerated mouse SAMP10, we investigated the effect of aging on AKT signaling in hippocampus tissue. During aging, the expression of Akt mRNA and protein remained stable. However, the constructive phosphorylation of Akt(Ser473) displayed a continuous decrease after 6 months in SAMP10. When compared with the control SAMR1, aged SAMP10 mice showed significant reduced phosphorylation of Akt(Ser473). SAMP10 at the age of 6 months showed obvious deterioration in performance of learning and memory tasks. Thus, the data reported here suggested a potential link between the age-related alteration of Akt(Ser473) and the deterioration in performance of learning and memory tasks in SAMP10 mouse.

[Intraspecific DNA sequence polymorphism and genetic markers in the mitochondrial CO I gene from three populations of Macrobrachium rosenbergii].

The mitochondrial COI gene was PCR amplified and sequenced from 17 samples obtained from three populations of Macrobrachium rosenbergii (F1 of the Burma wildtype population, Jiangsu cultured population and F2 of the Guangxi breeding population). A 498-bp long partial gene segment was acquired and used to study the genetic diversity among the three populations. Results indicated that the COI gene locus was relatively more polymorphic in the F1 of Burma wildtype population, while the polymorphism in Jiangsu cultured population and Guangxi breeding population were very poor. A total of 10 polymorphic sites and 5 haplotypes were found in the sequences of the 17 samples. The average nucleotide divergence in the three populations was 0.88%0.07% and 0 respectively. The UPGMA phylogenetic tree suggested that F2 of the Guangxi breeding population and Jiangsu cultured population were closest genetically, and their haplotypes could be gathered together to a genetic branch while F1 of the Burma wildtype population diverged and could form another relatively independent branch. For these distinct nucleotide differences, COI gene could be suitable as a genetic marker for distinguishing these two branches of the Macrobrachium rosenbergii population.