Lung cancers are highly heterogeneous and resistant to available therapeutic agents, with a five-year survival rate of less than 15%. Despite significant advances in our knowledge of the genetic alterations and aberrations in lung cancer, it has been difficult to determine the basis of lung cancer's heterogeneity and drug resistance. Cancer stem cell model has attracted a significant amount of attention in recent years as a viable explanation for the heterogeneity, drug resistance, dormancy, recurrence and metastasis of various tumors. At the same time, cancer stem cells have been relatively less characterized in lung cancers. This review summarizes the current understanding of lung cancer stem cells, including their molecular features and signaling pathways that drive their stemness. This review also discusses the prognosis of lung cancer and its relationship with lung cancer stem cell, in an effort to eradicate these cells to combat lung cancer.
ObjectiveTo compare the biological features of early and late endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) by isolating and culturing early and late EPCs from the human peripheral blood so as to find some unique properties of EPCs and to propose a suitable strategy for EPCs identification. MethodsMononuclear cells were isolated from the human peripheral blood using density gradient centrifugation. Then, the cells were inoculated in human fibronectin-coated culture flasks and cultured in endothelial cell basal medium 2. After 4-7 days and 2-3 weeks culture, early and late EPCs were obtained respectively. The morphology, proliferation potential, surface markers, cytokine secretion, angiogenic ability, and nitric oxide (NO) release were compared between 2 types of EPCs. Meanwhile, the human aortic endothelial cells (HAECs) were used as positive control. ResultsThe morphology of early and late EPCs was different:early EPCs formed a cell cluster with a spindle shape after 4-7 days of culture, and late EPCs showed a cobblestone appearance. Late EPCs were characterized by high proliferation potential and were able to form capillary tubes on Matrigel, but early EPCs did not have this feature. Both types EPCs could ingest acetylated low density lipoprotein and combine with ulex europaeus Ⅰ. Flow cytometry analysis showed that early EPCs did not express CD34 and CD133, but expressed the CD14 and CD45 of the hematopoietic stem cell markers;however, late EPCs expressed CD31 and CD34 of the endothelial cell markers, but did not express CD14, CD45, and CD133. By RT-PCR analysis, the expressions of vascular endothelial growth receptor 2 and vascular endothelial cadherin in early EPCs were significantly lower than those in the late EPCs and HAECs (P<0.05), but no significant difference was found in the expression of von Willebrand factor and endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS) between 2 type EPCs (P>0.05). The concentrations of vascular endothelial growth factor, granulocyte colony-stimulating factor, and interleukin 8 were significantly higher in the supernatant of early EPCs than late EPCs (P<0.05). Western blot assay indicated eNOS expressed in both types EPCs, while the expression of eNOS in late EPCs was significantly higher than early EPCs at 5 weeks (P<0.05). Both cell types could produce similar amount of NO (P>0.05). ConclusionThe expression of eNOS and the production of NO could be used as common biological features to identify EPCs, and the strategy of a combination of multiple methods for EPCs identification is more feasible.
ObjectiveTo introduce a new method for identifying intersegmental planes during thoracoscopic segmentectomy using pulmonary circulation single-blocking in the target segment. MethodsTo retrospectively analyze the clinical data of 83 patients who underwent thoracoscopic pulmonary segmentectomy from January 2019 to March 2020 using the pulmonary circulation single-blocking method. There were 33 males and 50 females, with a median age of 54 (46-65) years, and they were divided into a single vein group (SVG, n=31) and a single artery group (SAG, n=52), and the clinical data of two groups were compared. ResultsThe intersegmental planes were identified successfully in both groups and there were no statistically significant differences between the two groups in terms of intersegmental plane management (P=0.823), operating time (P=0.786), intraoperative blood loss (P=0.775), chest drainage time (P=0.659), postoperative hospital stay (P=0.824) or the incidence of postoperative complications (P=1.000). ConclusionThe use of pulmonary circulation single-blocking for intersegmental plane identification during thoracoscopic segmentectomy is safe and feasible, and the intersegmental plane can be satisfactorily identified by the single-blocking of arteries or veins.
ObjectiveTo investigate the status of knowledge, attitude, and practice of patient identification in nurses, and provide a basis for clinical managers to carry out targeted training.MethodsA total of 3 696 nurses of tertiary, secondary, and primary hospitals in Guizhou Province were recruited and investigated for the status of knowledge, attitude, and practice of patient identification with a questionnaire by using convenient sampling in May 2019.ResultsThe scores of identification knowledge, attitude, and practice of the 3 696 nurses were 47.87±6.10, 27.39±3.15, and 57.19±4.86, respectively. Logistic regression analysis showed that the higher the educational level was, the higher the score of nurses’ knowledge of patient identification was [odds ratio (OR)=1.592, 95% confidence interval (CI) (1.084, 2.338), P=0.018]; the higher the personal monthly income was, the more positive the nurses’ attitude towards patient identification was [OR=1.570, 95%CI (1.005, 2.453), P=0.048].ConclusionsThe general situation of patient identification in nurses is good, but there are still differences among nurses with different characteristics. It is suggested that managers should pay special attention to the training of nurses with low educational level and low income, make them master the knowledge of patient identification, at the same time, improve their enthusiasm and standardize their behavior, so as to ensure the safety of patients.
ObjectiveTo summarize the latest progress of parathyroid gland identification in thyroid surgery, and to provide some reference for improving the clinical efficacy.MethodThe literatures about the identification of parathyroid gland in thyroid surgery in recent years were collected to make an review.ResultsThere were many methods for identifying parathyroid gland in thyroid surgery, such as naked eye identification method, intraoperative frozen section, intraoperative staining identification method, intraoperative optical identification method, intraoperative parathyroid hormone assay, γ-detector, and histological identification, each method had its own advantages and disadvantages.ConclusionThe identification of parathyroid gland does not only depend on a certain method, but also require surgeons to enhance their ability to distinguish parathyroid gland.
Carbapenemase producing Enterobacteriaceae (CPE) has emerged as a significant global public health challenge and placing infected patients at risk of potentially untreatable infections. When resistance to carbapenems occurs, there are often few alternative treatments available. Numerous international guidelines have performed systematic and evidence review to identify new strategies to prevent the entry and spread of CPE in healthcare settings. Several key strategies have been shown to be highly effective. Firstly a new strategy that is proven to be effective is the early identification of the CPE carrier patients through active surveillance cultures. While waiting for the screening results, suspected CPE carriers will be put on preemptive isolation in single room and healthcare worker will at the same time practice contact precautions. The active surveillance culture and prompt preemptive isolation will limit the entry and spread of CPE from getting into hospital. Secondly, it is of utmost importance to incorporate enforcement of the basic infection prevention and control best practices in the hospital including, full compliance to hand hygiene, appropriate use of personal protective equipment, execute antibiotic stewardship program to control abuse of antibiotics, effective environmental cleaning and decontamination, staff education and feedback, as well as surveillance of healthcare-associated infections. Such a holistic approach has been shown to be effective in inhibiting CPE from gaining foothold in the hospital.
Objective To establish a simple and efficient method to isolate and culture the umbilical vein vascular endothelial cells in canine. Methods Twelve umbilical cords [(13.0 ± 1.5) cm in length] were taken from 12 newborn pups of Beagles. And then the vascular endothelial cells were isolated from these umbilical cords digested by 1% collagenase type I for 5, 7, and 10 minutes respectively (4 umbilical cords in each group). After cultured, the vascular endothelial cells were identified by morphology, immunofluorescence, and flow cytometry. And the growth curvature of umbilical vein vascular endothelial cells was detected by MTT assay. Results Few vascular endothelial cells were collected at 5 and 10 minutes after digestion; many vascular endothelial cells were seen at 7 minutes, and became cobblestone with culture time, with a large nucleus; after passage, cell morphology had no obvious change. Fluorescence microscope results showed that positive von Willebrand factor (vWF) and CD31 cells were observed in most of cells. The flow cytometry test displayed that the positive cell rates of vWF and CD31 were 99.0% ± 0.7% and 98.0% ± 1.2%, respectively. The above results indicated that cultured cells were vascular endothelial cells. MTT assay showed that vascular endothelial cells proliferation increased significantly with culture time. Conclusion Enzyme digestion is a convenient method to isolate vascular endothelial cells from canine umbilical vein, and a large number of cells and high purity of cells can be obtained by the method.
In this research a strain of isolated Pseudomonas alcaligenes which causes degradation of dexamethasone was acclimated further and its proteins of every position in the bacterium were separated by the osmotic shock method. The separated intracellular proteins which had the highest enzyme activity were extracted by the salting out with ammonium sulfate and were purified with the cation exchange chromatography and gel chromatography. The purified proteins which was active to cause degradation of dexamethasone had been detected were cut with enzyme and were analyzed with mass spectrometry. The results showed that the degradation rate to dexamethasone by acclimated Pseudomonas alcaligenes were increased from 23.63% to 52.84%. The degrading enzymes were located mainly in the intracellular of the bacteria and its molecular weight was about 41 kD. The specific activity of the purified degrading enzymes were achieved to 1.02 U·mg-1. Its 5-peptide amino acid sequences were consistent with some sequences of the isovaleryl-CoA dehydrogenase. The protein enzyme may be a new kind degrading enzyme of steroidal compounds. Our experimental results provided new strategies for cleanup of dexamethasone in water environment with microbial bioremediation technique.
Intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) is widely used in coronary artery examination. Ultrasonic elastography combined with IVUS is very conspicuous in identifying plaque component and in detecting plaque vulnerability degree. In this study, a simulation model of the blood vessel based on finite element analysis (FEA) was established. The vessel walls generally have radial changes caused by different intravascular pressure. The signals at lower pressures were used as the pre-deformation data and the signals at higher pressure were used as the post-deformation data. Displacement distribution was constructed using the time-domain cross-correlation method, and then strain images. By comparison of elastograms under different pressures, we obtained the optimal pressure step. Furthermore, on the basis of the obtained optimize pressure step, the simulation results showed that this method could effectively distinguish characteristics between different component plaques, and could guide the later experiments and clinical applications.
Using modular identification methods in gene-drug multiplex networks to infer new gene-drug associations can identify new therapeutic target genes for known drugs. In this paper, based on the gene expression data and drug response data of lung cancer in the genomics of drug sensitivity in cancer (GDSC) database, a multiple network algorithm is proposed. First, a heterogeneous network of genes of lung cancer and drugs in different cell lines is constructed, and then a network module identification method based on graph entropy is used. In this heterogeneous network, network modules are identified, and five lung cancer gene-drug association modules are identified through iterative convergence. Compared with other methods, the algorithm has better results in terms of running time, accuracy and robustness, and the identified modules have obvious biological significance. The research results in this article have guiding significance for the medication and treatment of lung cancer, and can provide references for the treatment of other diseases with the same targeted genes.