油隔离泥浆泵乙形管中间罐的改造

分析油隔离泥浆泵乙型管故障原因并实施了中间罐的改造,进一步完善了油隔离泵设计与制造的理论基础,具有较大的社会和经济价值。

Clinicopathologic characteristics of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma in patients with positive serum a-fetoprotein

AIM:To explore clinicopathologic characteristics of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC) in patients with positive serum a-fetoprotein (AFP). METHODS:One hundred and thirty one patients who underwent surgical dissection for pathologically confirmed ICC were divided into a positive AFP (> 20 ng/mL) group (n = 32) and a negative AFP group (n = 99), whose clinicopathologic features were analyzed and compared. RESULTS:The positive rate of HBsAg and liver cirrhosis of the positive AFP group was higher than that of the negative AFP group, while the positive rate of CA19-9 (> 37 U/mL) and the lymph node metastasis rate was lower. CONCLUSION:ICC patients with positive AFP share many clinicopathologic similarities with hepatocellular carcinoma.

Chronic hepatitis B serum promotes apoptotic damage in human renal tubular cells

AIM： To investigate the effect of the serum of patients with chronic hepatitis B （CHB） on apoptosis of renal tubular epithelial cells in vitro and to study the role of hepatitis B virus （HBV） and transforming growth factor-β1 （TGF-β1） in the pathogenesis of hepatitis B virus associated glomerulonephritis （HBV-GN）. METHODS： The levels of serum TGF-β1 were measured by specific enzyme linked immunosorbent assay （ELISA） and HBV DNA was tested by polymerase chain reaction （PCR） in 44 patients with CHB ,and 20 healthy persons as the control. The normal human kidney proximal tubular cell （HK-2） was cultured together with the sera of healthy persons, CHB patients with HBV-DNA negative（20 cases） and HBV-DNA positive （24 cases） for up to 72 h. Apoptosis and Fas expression of the HK-2 were detected by flow cytometer. RESULTS： The apoptosis rate and Fas expression of HK-2 cells were significantly higher in HBV DNA positive serum group 19.01±5.85% and 17.58±8.35%, HBV DNA negative serum group 8.12±2.80% and 6.96 ± 2.76% than those in control group 4.25±0.65% and 2.33 ± 1.09%, respectively （P 〈 0.01）. The apoptosis rate and Fas expression of HK-2 in HBV DNA positive serum group was significantly higher than those in HBV DNA negative serum （P 〈 0.01）. Apoptosis rate of HK-2 cells in HBV DNA positive serum group was positively correlated with the level of HBV-DNA （r = 0.657）. The level of serum TGF-β1 in CHB group was 163.05 ± 91.35 μg/L, signifi- cantly higher as compared with 81.40 ± 40.75 μg/L in the control group （P 〈 0.01）.CONCLUSION： The serum of patients with chronic hepatitis B promotes apoptotic damage in human renal tubular cells by triggering a pathway of Fas up-regulation. HBV and TGF-β1 may play important roles in the mechanism of hepatitis B virus associated glomerulonephritis.

Is transient elastography a useful tool for screening liver disease?

Transient elastography(TE)is a new non invasive tool for measuring liver stiffness,which is correlated to the histologic stage of liver fibrosis.Several studies in chronic liver disease(CLD)have determined a good accuracy of TE in predicting significant fibrosis and an optimal accuracy in predicting cirrhosis.Normal liver stiffness ranges between 3.3-7.8 KPa and using a cut off of 7.1 KPa,significant fibrosis and cirrhosis can be excluded with a very high negative predictive value(NPV).Positive predictive value(PPV)for the diagnosis of cirrhosis is lower using just a single scan but increases to 90% if high stiffness values are confirmed by a second independent scan.However the presence of fatty liver and metabolic syndrome slightly increases the readings and may reduce the accuracy of the test.It is uncertain if this increase is related to the presence of steatofibrosis or ifit is caused by steatosis itself.TE can be used in screening patients attending the liver clinics to identify those with signifi cant fi brosis or cirrhosis and may be particularly useful in discriminating HBV inactive carriers from chronic hepatitis B patients.TE,however,is not reliable in predicting the presence of esophageal varices in cirrhotics.Another potential indication for TE is the systematic screening of populations at high risk for CLD,such as intravenous drug users and alcoholics,but further studies are needed to determine its diagnostic accuracy in these settings.

Identification of deregulated miRNAs and their targets in hepatitis B virus-associated hepatocellular carcinoma

AIM： TO identify the differentially expressed miRNAs and their targets in hepatitis B virus （HBV）-associated hepatocellular carcinoma （HCC）. METHODS： Six hundred and sixty seven human miRNAs were quantitatively analyzed by Taqman lowdensity miRNA array （TLDA） in HBV-HCC tissues. Gene ontology （GO） and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes （KEGG） pathway analyses were used to analyze the significant function and pathway of the differentially expressed miRNAs in HBV-HCC. TargetScan software was used to predict the targets of deregulated miRNAs. Western blotting and luciferase assay were performed to verify the targets of these miRNAs.RESULTS： Ten up-regulated miRNAs （miR-217, miR- 518b, miR-517c, miR-520g, miR-519a, miR-522, miR- 518e, miR-525-3p, miR-512-3p, and miR-518a-3p） and 11 down-regulated miRNAs （miR-138, miR-214, miR-214#, miR-199a-5p, miR-433, miR-511, miR-592, miR-483-3p, miR-483-5p, miR-708 and miR-1275） were identified by Taqman miRNAs array and confirmed quantitatively by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction in HCC and adjacent non-tumor tissues. GO and KEGG pathway analysis revealed that ＂regulation of actin cytoskeleton＂ and ＂pathway in cancer＂ are most likely to play critical roles in HCC tumorigenesis. MiR- 519a and ribosomal protein S6 kinase polypeptide 3 （RPS6KA3） were predicted as the most significant can-didates by miRNA-mRNA network. In addition, cyclin D3 （CCND3） and clathrin heavy chain （CHC）, usually up-regulated in HCC tissues, were validated as the di- rect target of miR-138 and miR-199a-5p, respectively.

Current trends in management of hepatitis B virus reactivation in the biologic therapy era

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) reactivation represents an emerging cause of liver disease in patients undergoing treatment with biologic agents. In particular, the risk ofHBV reactivation is heightened by the use monoclonalantibodies, such as rituximab (anti-CD20) and alemtuzumab (anti-CD52) that cause profound and longlasting immunosuppression. Emerging data indicatethat HBV reactivation could also develop following theuse of other biologic agents, such as tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α inhibitors. When HBV reactivation is di-agnosed, it is mandatory to suspend biologic treatmentand start antiviral agents immediately. However, preemptive antiviral therapy prior to monoclonal antibodyadministration is crucial in preventing HBV reactivationand its clinical consequences. Several lines of evidencehave shown that risk of HBV reactivation is greatlyreduced by the identifi cation of high-risk patients andthe use of prophylactic antiviral therapy. In this article, we discuss current trends in the management of HBV reactivation in immunosuppressed patients receiving biologic therapy, such as rituximab, alemtuzumab and TNF-α antagonists.

Thermogravimetric characteristics and different kinetic models for medical waste composition containing polyvinyl chloride-transfusion tube

Thermogravimetric study of medical transfusion tube （MTT） waste containing polyvinyl chloride （PVC） was carried out using the thermogravimetric analyser （TGA） with N2, at different heating rates of 5, 10, 20, 30, 50 ℃/min. The purpose is to obtain pyrolysis characteristics and kinetic parameters of medical waste. The experimental results indicate that the pyrolysis behavior of the MTT sample is in agreement with its main ingredient of PVC, appearing two stair stepping stages. The influence of the additives in MTT on pyrolysis behavior was also revealed, which could improve MTT pyrolysis at lower temperature in the first stage, and cause obvious unsmoothness and asymmetry of the second DTG peak. Four n-order kinetic models of Coats-Redfern, Ozawa, Kissinger and Freeman-carroll were used to get the kinetic parameters. Furthermore, a novel ＂two-step four-reaction model＂ was established to simulate the whole continuous process. The different methods and the kinetic parameters thus obtained were discussed and compared with each other in literatures. The reasons of deviation among kinetic values were tried to be elucidated. The new established model could more satisfactorily describe the pyrolysis process of MTT, being more mechanistic and conveniently serving for the engineering.