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Tai chi improves depressive symptoms among community-dwelling older persons by mediating BDNF methylation: A preliminary study

Liao S, Tan M, Li M, Ren J, Wang Y, Zheng R, et al.

Geriatr Nurs, 2022 Feb 10;44:137-142.
PMID: 35152066 DOI: 10.1016/j.gerinurse.2022.01.015

Tai Chi could alleviate depression, while the biological mechanisms underlying this effect remains unelucidated. This study recruited 18 community-dwelling older persons with a pre-post testing design, aiming to unveil the potential epigenetic effect by which Tai Chi in the alleviation of depression, using methylation of BDNF promoter as the biomarker. The methylation levels (determined by pyrosequencing using saliva samples) of the targeted BDNF sequence were positively associated with the existence and severity of depressive symptoms (measured with the 9-item Patient Health Questionnaire). Both methylation levels and depression decreased significantly after the Tai Chi intervention. Demethylation of BDNF promoter might be one of the potential mechanisms underlying the holistic depression alleviating effect of Tai Chi. BDNF methylation may potentially serve as a screening, diagnostic as well as disease activity biomarker to determine treatment effects for depression. Further adequately powered studies are needed to verify and strengthen our findings.
Longitudinal associations between sleep quality and menopausal symptoms among community-dwelling climacteric women: A multi-centered study

Xiong A, Luo B, Li M, Chong M, Wang J, Liao S

Sleep Med, 2022 Dec;100:198-205.
PMID: 36113232 DOI: 10.1016/j.sleep.2022.08.025

STUDY OBJECTIVES: Menopausal symptoms exist in most climacteric women, which can harm the quality and satisfaction of life for them. Moreover, a series of ineluctable negative life changes experienced in middle-age usually make the situation more complicated and stressful. We aimed to determine the trajectories and influential factors of sleep quality and menopausal symptoms and their longitudinal interrelationships among climacteric women.
METHODS: A total of 1875 community-dwelling climacteric women were included in this study. The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) and the Menopause Rating Scale (MRS) were adopted to assess sleep quality and menopausal symptoms, respectively. Data were collected 4 times from March 2019 to December 2019, at a 3-month interval.
RESULTS: The Cross-lagged analysis showed that worse sleep quality and more severe menopausal symptoms over time after controlling for specified covariates, and more severe menopausal symptoms were predicted by declined sleep quality. The Generalized estimation equation model showed that education level, marital status, chronic diseases, life events, income, and age were the influential factors of sleep quality, while menopausal symptoms were impacted by marital status and income.
CONCLUSIONS: Increasing negative sleep quality and more severe menopausal symptoms over time contribute to the health burden of climacteric women. Menopausal symptoms could be alleviated by sleep quality improvement, which is influenced by education level, marital status, chronic diseases, life events, age, and economic factors.
Facile preparation of high-performance plywood adhesive from gelatinized corn starch crosslinked with ammonium dihydrogen phosphate

Jia Y, Luo B, Lee SH, Huang H, Wu Z, Zhou B, et al.

Int J Biol Macromol, 2024 Jan;256(Pt 2):128548.
PMID: 38043656 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijbiomac.2023.128548

A flame retardant high-performance gelatinized starch (GS)-ammonium dihydrogen phosphate (ADP) wood adhesive, named GS-ADP adhesive was prepared by condensation of GS and ADP under acidic condition. The preparation process of GS-ADP adhesive is very simple by mixing and stirring GS and ADP evenly at room temperature. The results revealed that the GS-ADP adhesive has good storage stability and water resistance, and its wet shear strength is much higher than that of phenolic resin (PF) adhesive. Markedly, the cone calorimeter test results show that G-ADP adhesive has good flame retardancy, and the plywood based on GS-ADP adhesive has good flame retardancy. Meanwhile, it can be seen from dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) that GS-ADP has excellent modulus of elasticity (MOE), high glass transition temperature (Tg) and good thermal stability. The findings suggest that GS-ADP could be a viable substitute for PF resin in structural wood fabrication.

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