Aurones are a subclass of active flavonoids characterized with a scaffold of 2-benzylidene-3(2H)-benzofuranone. This type of chemicals are widely distributed in fruit, vegetable and flower, and contribute to human health. In this review, we summarize the natural aurones isolated from dietary plants. Their positive effects on immunomodulation, antioxidation, cancer prevention as well as maintaining the health status of cardiovascular, nervous system and liver organs are highlighted. The biosynthesis strategies of plant-derived aurones are elaborated to provide solutions for their limited natural abundance. The potential application of natural aurones in food coloration are also discussed. This paper combines the up-to-date information and gives a full image of dietary aurones.
Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is one of the main causes of fibrosis. Liver biopsy remains the gold standard for the confirmation of fibrosis in NAFLD patients. Effective and non-invasive diagnosis of advanced fibrosis is essential to disease surveillance and treatment decisions. Herein we used routine medical test markers and logistic regression to differentiate early and advanced fibrosis in NAFLD patients from China, Malaysia, and India (n1 = 540, n2 = 147, and n3 = 97) who were confirmed by liver biopsy. Nine parameters, including age, body mass index, fasting blood glucose, presence of diabetes or impaired fasting glycemia, alanine aminotransferase, γ-glutamyl transferase, triglyceride, and aspartate transaminase/platelet count ratio, were selected by stepwise logistic regression, receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC), and hypothesis testing and were used for model construction. The area under the ROC curve (auROC) of the model was 0.82 for differentiating early and advanced fibrosis (sensitivity = 0.69, when specificity = 0.80) in the discovery set. Its diagnostic ability remained good in the two independent validation sets (auROC = 0.89 and 0.71) and was consistently superior to existing panels such as the FIB-4 and NAFLD fibrosis score. A web-based tool, LiveFbr, was developed for fast access to our model. The new model may serve as an attractive tool for fibrosis classification in NAFLD patients.
Clinical guidelines for the treatment of patients with non-ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (NSTEMI) recommend an invasive strategy with cardiac catheterization, revascularization when clinically appropriate, and initiation of dual antiplatelet therapy regardless of whether the patient receives revascularization. However, although patients with NSTEMI have a higher long-term mortality risk than patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), they are often treated less aggressively; with those who have the highest ischemic risk often receiving the least aggressive treatment (the "treatment-risk paradox"). Here, using evidence gathered from across the world, we examine some reasons behind the suboptimal treatment of patients with NSTEMI, and recommend approaches to address this issue in order to improve the standard of healthcare for this group of patients. The challenges for the treatment of patients with NSTEMI can be categorized into four "P" factors that contribute to poor clinical outcomes: patient characteristics being heterogeneous; physicians underestimating the high ischemic risk compared with bleeding risk; procedure availability; and policy within the healthcare system. To address these challenges, potential approaches include: developing guidelines and protocols that incorporate rigorous definitions of NSTEMI; risk assessment and integrated quality assessment measures; providing education to physicians on the management of long-term cardiovascular risk in patients with NSTEMI; and making stents and antiplatelet therapies more accessible to patients.
Dengue is a rapidly spreading mosquito-borne disease caused by the dengue virus (DENV) and has emerged as a severe public health problem around the world. Guangdong, one of the southern Chinese provinces, experienced a serious outbreak of dengue in 2014, which was believed to be the worst dengue epidemic in China over the last 20 years. To better understand the epidemic, we collected the epidemiological data of the outbreak and analyzed 14,594 clinically suspected dengue patients from 25 hospitals in Guangdong. Dengue cases were then laboratory-confirmed by the detection of DENV non-structural protein 1 (NS1) antigen and/or DENV RNA. Afterwards, clinical manifestations of dengue patients were analyzed and 93 laboratory-positive serum specimens were chosen for the DENV serotyping and molecular analysis. Our data showed that the 2014 dengue outbreak in Guangdong had spread to 20 cities and more than 45 thousand people suffered from dengue fever. Of 14,594 participants, 11,387 were definitively diagnosed. Most manifested with a typical non-severe clinical course, and 1.96 % developed to severe dengue. The strains isolated successfully from the serum samples were identified as DENV-1. Genetic analyses revealed that the strains were classified into genotypes I and V of DENV-1, and the dengue epidemic of Guangdong in 2014 was caused by indigenous cases and imported cases from the neighboring Southeast Asian countries of Malaysia and Singapore. Overall, our study is informative and significant to the 2014 dengue outbreak in Guangdong and will provide crucial implications for dengue prevention and control in China and elsewhere.
Ophthalmic trauma is a leading cause of preventable monocular blindness worldwide. The prevalence of ophthalmic trauma varies considerably based on geographic location, socio-economic status, age groups, occupation, and cultural practices such as firework celebrations. Clinical registries are known to be valuable in guiding the diagnosis, management, and prognostication of complex diseases. However, there is currently a lack of a centralized international data repository for ophthalmic trauma. We draw lessons from past and existing clinical registries related to ophthalmology and propose a new suitable international multicenter clinical registry for ophthalmic trauma: the International Globe and Adnexal Trauma Epidemiology Study (IGATES). IGATES is hosted on a secure web-based platform which exhibits user-friendly smart features, an integrated Ocular Trauma Score (OTS) prognosis calculator, efficient data collection points, and schematic graphical software. IGATES currently has 37 participating centers globally. The data collected through IGATES will be primarily used to develop a more robust and improved ophthalmic trauma prognostic classification system, the Ocular Trauma Score-2 (OTS-2), which builds on previous systems such as the Birmingham Eye Trauma Terminology System (BETTS) and Ocular Trauma Score (OTS). Furthermore, IGATES will act as a springboard for further research into the epidemiology, diagnosis, and management of ophthalmic trauma. Ultimately, IGATES serves to advance the field of ophthalmic trauma and improve the care that patients with ophthalmic trauma receive.
The nearby radio galaxy M87 offers a unique opportunity to explore the connections between the central supermassive black hole and relativistic jets. Previous studies of the inner region of M87 revealed a wide opening angle for the jet originating near the black hole1-4. The Event Horizon Telescope resolved the central radio source and found an asymmetric ring structure consistent with expectations from general relativity5. With a baseline of 17 years of observations, there was a shift in the jet's transverse position, possibly arising from an 8- to 10-year quasi-periodicity3. However, the origin of this sideways shift remains unclear. Here we report an analysis of radio observations over 22 years that suggests a period of about 11 years for the variation in the position angle of the jet. We infer that we are seeing a spinning black hole that induces the Lense-Thirring precession of a misaligned accretion disk. Similar jet precession may commonly occur in other active galactic nuclei but has been challenging to detect owing to the small magnitude and long period of the variation.