Adenylyl cyclase(AC)activity was determined by directly quantifying the product cAMP with ion-exchange HPLC. When AC reaction was terminated, the reaction mixture was kept at 0 degrees for 2 h to remove residual ATP utilizing the action of ATP-hydrolyzing enzymes existed in the crude AC preparation of membrane pellet. Papaverine was removed by the dichloromethane extraction, and cAMP was quantified by chromatography on a WAX-1 HPLC column with baseline-resolution. It was found that cAMP was linearly formed within 10 min of the reaction, and the amount of cAMP formed was proportional to the amount of enzyme. Mouse brain AC activity determined by this method was 42 nmol/min per gram of protein, similar to that obtained by the classical [(3)H] labeled ATP method. This ion-exchange HPLC was more rapid and convenient.
Objective
To retrospectively analyze the clinical characteristics of patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) accompanied with diarrhea.
Methods
From January 11 to February 6 in 2020, the clinical data of 663 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 admitted to Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University were collected. According to whether with diarrhea, the patients were divided into with diarrhea group and without diarrhea group. The differences in general condition, clinical manifestation, chest computed tomography (CT), laboratory findings, disease severity and death situation between two groups were compared. Chi-square test, Fisher exact test and Mann-Whitney U test were performed for statistical analysis.
Results
Among 663 COVID-19 patients, 70 (10.6%) patients accompanied with diarrhea. The ratio of fatigue and increased lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) of with diarrhea group were higher than those of without diarrhea group (58.6%, 41/70 vs. 28.2%, 167/593; and 64.2%, 43/67 vs. 50.4%, 277/550), and the differences were statistically significant (χ2=26.891 and 4.566, both P 0.05). There were no statistically significant differences in the ratio of mild and normal type, severe type and critical type between diarrhea group and without diarrhea group (35.7%, 25/70 vs. 38.6%, 229/593; 50.0%, 35/70 vs. 47.2%, 280/593; and 14.3%, 10/70 vs. 14.2%, 84/593, respectively) (χ2=0.240, P=0.887). There were no statistically significant differences in the ratio of death of each corresponding mild and normal type, severe type and critical type between diarrhea group and without diarrhea group (0 vs. 0.5%, 3/593; 0 vs 0 and 1.4%, 1/70 vs. 3.5%, 21/593) (Fisher exact test, all P>0.05).
Conclusions
Patients with COVID-19 accompanied with diarrhea are more likely to have fatigue and increased LDH. Diarrhea is not significantly correlated with the disease severity of patients with COVID-19.
Key words:
COVID-19; Diarrhea; Clinical characteristics; Disease severity
Objective We aimed to explore the geographic differences in psychological symptoms, sleep quality, and quality of life (QoL) among adult patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Methods A unified questionnaire was developed to collect data on psychological status and QoL of IBD patients from 42 hospitals across 22 provinces, municipalities, and autonomous regions in China's mainland from September 2021 to May 2022. Results A total of 2478 patients with IBD were surveyed. The proportions of patients with anxiety (28.5% vs 23.1%), depression (32.3% vs 27.8%), and poor QoL (44.8% vs 32.2%) were significantly higher in patients from the northern region compared to the southern region (all P < 0.05). In the western region, the proportions of patients with anxiety (31.9% vs 23.0%), depression (37.7% vs 26.7%), sleep disturbances (64.5% vs 58.5%), and poor QoL (44.9% vs 34.8%) were significantly higher than in the eastern and central regions (all P < 0.01). Patients from inland regions had significantly higher rates of anxiety (27.1% vs 23.3%), depression (32.5% vs 26.0%), sleep disturbance (62.0% vs 57.7%), and poor QoL (43.5% vs 29.9%) compared to those from coastal regions (all P < 0.05). In economically underdeveloped areas, the proportions of patients with depression (33.1% vs 28.5%) and poor QoL (52.0% vs 32.4%) were significantly higher than in economically (relatively) developed areas (both P < 0.05). Conclusion There are significant geographic differences in psychological symptoms, sleep quality, and QoL among Chinese patients with IBD, which might provide valuable insights for global IBD research and clinical practice.
Background Endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS) is a critical factor in the development of ulcerative colitis (UC); however, the underlying molecular mechanisms remain unclear. This study aims to identify pivotal molecular mechanisms related to ERS in UC pathogenesis and provide novel therapeutic targets for UC. Methods Colon tissue gene expression profiles and clinical information of UC patients and healthy controls were obtained from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database, and the ERS-related gene set was downloaded from GeneCards for analysis. Weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) and differential expression analysis were utilized to identify pivotal modules and genes associated with UC. A consensus clustering algorithm was used to classify UC patients. The CIBERSORT algorithm was employed to evaluate the immune cell infiltration. Gene Set Variation Analysis (GSVA), Gene Ontology (GO), and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) were used to explore potential biological mechanisms. The external sets were used to validate and identify the relationship of ERS-related genes with biologics. Small molecule compounds were predicted using the Connectivity Map (CMap) database. Molecular docking was performed to simulate the binding conformation of small molecule compounds and key targets. Results The study identified 915 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and 11 ERS-related genes (ERSRGs) from the colonic mucosa of UC patients and healthy controls, and these genes had good diagnostic value and were highly correlated. Five potential small-molecule drugs sharing tubulin inhibitors were identified, including albendazole, fenbendazole, flubendazole, griseofulvin, and noscapine, among which noscapine exhibited the highest correlation with a high binding affinity to the targets. Active UC and 10 ERSRGs were associated with a large number of immune cells, and ERS was also associated with colon mucosal invasion of active UC. Significant differences in gene expression patterns and immune cell infiltration abundance were observed among ERS-related subtypes. Conclusion The results suggest that ERS plays a vital role in UC pathogenesis, and noscapine may be a promising therapeutic agent for UC by affecting ERS.
In recent years, carbon dot (CD)-based fluorescent sensors for selective ions or small biomolecules have drawn great attention. In this work, highly fluorescent CDs (QY = 21%) were prepared from 2,3-diamino pyridine as the precursor through a facile solvothermal process. The CDs showed high stability and a green emission in aqueous, and the optimal emission wavelength of CDs is 508 nm under the excitation wavelength of 438 nm. Interestingly, a CDs-based nanoprobe was developed for a selective and sensitive fluorescence quenching response to NO2- in water, and the quenching mechanism was investigated in the work. Besides, the recovery rates of NO2- in the range of 98-103.5% were found to be acceptable, indicating that the proposed CDs could be act as potential candidates for determination of nitrite ions in real samples. Meanwhile, the nanoprobe was also successfully employed in a visualization biosensing platform for determination of NO2- in living cells due to its eminent biocompatibility.
To develop a fast, sensitive and cost-effective method based on resonance light scattering (RLS) for characterization of protein solubility to facilitate detection of changes in solubility of mutant proteins.We examined the response curve of RLS intensities to the protein concentrations in synchronous scanning mode. The curve intersection points were searched to predict the maximal concentrations of the protein in dispersion state, which defined the solubility of the protein in this given state. Bovine serum albumin (BSA, 0-50 g/L) was used as the model to investigate the influences of pH values (6.5, 7.0, and 7.4) and salt concentrations (0.05, 0.10, 0.15, and 0.20 mol/L) on the determined solubility. The solubility of glutathione S-transferase isoenzymes alpha (GSTA, 0-27.0 g/L) and Mμ (GSTM, 0-20.0 g/L) were estimated for comparison. The RLS-based method was used to determine the solubility of uricase (MGU, 0-0.4 g/L) to provide assistance in improving the solubility of its mutants.We identified two intersection points in the RLS response curves of the tested proteins, among which the lower one represented an approximation of the maximal concentration (or the solubility of the protein) in single molecular dispersion, and the higher one the saturated concentration of the protein in multiple molecular aggregation. In HEPES buffer, the two intersection points of BSA (isoelectric point 4.6) both increased with the increase of pH (6.5-7.4), and their values were ~1.2 g/L and ~33 g/L at pH 7.4, respectively; the latter concentration approached the solubility of commercial BSA in the same buffer at the same pH. The addition of NaCl reduced the values of the two intersection points, and increasing salt ion concentration decreased the values of the lower intersection points. Further characterizations of GSTA and GSTM showed that the low concentration intersection points of the two proteins were ~0.7 g/L and ~0.8 g/L, and their high concentration intersection points were ~10 g/L and ~11 g/L, respectively, both lower than those of BSA, indicating the feasibility of the direct characterization of protein solubility by RLS. The two concentration intersection points of MGU were 0.24 g/L and 0.30 g/L, respectively, and the low concentration intersection point of its selected mutant was increased by 2 times.RLS allows direct characterization of the solubility of macromolecular proteins. This method, which is simple and sensitive and needs only a small amount of proteins, has a unique advantage for rapid comparison of solubility of low-abundance protein mutants.
After modification with monomethoxyl-poly(ethylene glycol)-5000, a recombinant intracellular uricase from Bacillus fastidiosus ATCC 29604 showed residual activity of about 65%, a thermo-inactivation half-life >85 h, a circulating half-life about 20 h in rats in vivo, consistent effects of common cations, and consistent optima for reaction temperature and pH. Thus, this uricase can be formulated via modification with monomethoxyl-poly(ethylene glycol).
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