Recent progress in understanding the role of genes in the pathogenesis of cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma

Cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma(cSCC)is the second most common skin tumor in humans.Ultraviolet(UV)radiation is an important environmental risk factor for cSCC;other risk factors include human papilloma virus(HPV)infection,chronic inflammation,and chronic wounds.A large proportion of patients present with an aggressive form of cSCC at the time of diagnosis,which is often accompanied by regional lymph node involvement and distant metastases.The long-term prognosis for these highly metastatic diseases is extremely poor,with a 10-year survival rate of less than 10%.Therefore,clarifying the pathogenesis of this tumor is of great significance and may contribute to the identification of novel biomarkers and development of new therapeutic strategies.In this review,we focus on the recent progress in genes related to the development of this tumor,intending to aid future investigations into the genetic alterations related to cSCC.

Determination of multiple drugs of abuse in human urine using dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction and capillary electrophoresis with PDA detection

A new method was developed for pre-concentration and determination of multiple drugs of abuse in human urine using dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction(DLLME)and capillary electrophoresis(CE)with photodiode array detection.The method was based on the formation of tiny droplets of an organic extractant in the prepared sample solution using water-immiscible organic solvent(chloroform)dissolved in water-miscible organic dispersive solvent(isopropyl alcohol).The organic phase,which extracted eight drugs of abuse from the prepared urine solution,was separated by centrifugation.The sedimented phase was transferred into a small volume CE auto-sampler vial with 10μL of 1%HCl methanol solution and evaporated to dryness.The residue was reconstituted in lidocaine hydrochloride(internal standard)aqueous solution and introduced by electrokinetic injection into CE.Under the optimum conditions,acceptable linear relationship was observed in the range of 3.0–500 ng/mL with the correlation coefficient(r)of 0.9982–0.9994 for spiked urine samples.The limit of detection(LOD)(S/N=3)was estimated to be 1.0 ng/mL.A recovery of 75.7%–90.6%was obtained for spiked samples.The mean relative error(MRE)was within±7.0%and the relative standard deviation(RSD)was less than 6.9%.The proposed DLLME-CE procedure offers an alternative analytical approach for the sensitive detection of drugs of abuse in real urine samples.

Collective motion of bacteria in two dimensions

Collective motion can be observed in biological systems over a wide range of length scales, from large animals to bacteria. Collective motion is thought to confer an advantage for defense and adaptation. A central question in the study of biological collective motion is how the traits of individuals give rise to the emergent behavior at population level This question is relevant to the dynamics of general self-propelled particle systems, biological self-organization, and active fluids. Bacteria provide a tractable system to address this question, because bacteria are simple and their behavior is relatively easy to control. In this mini review we will focus on a special form of bacterial collective motion, i.e., bacterial swarming in two dimensions. We will introduce some organization principles known in bacterial swarming and discuss potential means of controlling its dynamics. The simplicity and controllability of 2D bacterial behavior during swarming would allow experimental examination of theory predictions on general collective motion.