• The Korean Journal of Physiology and Pharmacology
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.457-470
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• 2023

The aim of this study was to investigate the role of kinesin superfamily member 15 (KIF15) in nasopharyngeal carcinogenesis (NPC) and explore its underlying mechanisms. We employed various assays, including the CCK-8 assay, flow cytometry, the Transwell and scratch assay, Western blotting, and nude mice transplantation tumor, to investigate the impact of KIF15 on NPC. Our findings demonstrate that KIF15 plays a critical role in the proliferation, apoptosis, migration, and invasion of NPC cells. Furthermore, we discovered that silencing KIF15 inhibits cell proliferation, migration, and invasion while promoting apoptosis, and that KIF15's effect on NPC cell growth is mediated through the PI3K/AKT and P53 signaling pathways. Additionally, we showed that KIF15 promotes nasopharyngeal cancer cell growth in vivo. Our study sheds light on the significance of KIF15 in NPC by revealing that KIF15 knockdown inhibits NPC cell growth through the regulation of AKT-related signaling pathways. These findings suggest that KIF15 represents a promising therapeutic target for the prevention and treatment of NPC.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.22
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• pp.9635-9641
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• 2014

Background: This retrospective study was aimed to investigate the efficacy of prophylactic agents in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients receiving TACE and compare the difference between lamivudine and entecavir. Materials and Methods: A consecutive series of 203 HBV-related HCC patients receiving TACE were analyzed including 91 patients given prophylactic agents. Virologic events, defined as an increase in serum HBV DNA level to more than 1 log10 IU/ml higher than the nadir level, hepatitis flares due to HBV reactivation and progression free survival (PFS) were the main endpoints. Results: Some 48 (69.6%) reached virologic response. Prophylaxis significantly reduced virologic events (8.8% vs 58.0%, p=0.000) and hepatitis flares (1.1% vs 13.4%, p=0.001). Patients presenting undetectable HBV DNA levels displayed a significantly improved PFS as compared to those who never achieved undetectable HBV DNA. Prophylaxis and e-antigen positivity were the only significant variables associated with virologic events. In addition, prophylaxis was the only independent protective factor for hepatitis flares. Liver cirrhosis, more cycles of TACE, HBV DNA negativity, a lower Cancer of the Liver Italian Program score, non-metastasis and no hepatitis flares were protective factors for PFS. Prophylactic lamivudine demonstrated similar efficacy as entecavir. Conclusions: Prophylactic agents are efficacious for prevention of HBV reactivation in HCC patients receiving TACE. Achievement of undetectable HBV DNA levels displayed a significant capability in improving PFS. Moreover, persistent tumor residual lesions, positive HBV DNA and hepatitis B flares might be causes of tumor progression in these patients.

• Molecules and Cells
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• v.37 no.5
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• pp.383-388
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• 2014

Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is associated with a high frequency of metastasis and only few therapies substantially prolong survival. Honokiol, isolated from Magnolia spp. bark, has been shown to exhibit pleiotropic anticancer effects in many cancer types. However, whether honokiol could suppress RCC metastasis has not been fully elucidated. In the present study, we found that honokiol suppressed renal cancer cells' metastasis via dual-blocking epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and cancer stem cell (CSC) properties. In addition, honokiol inhibited tumor growth in vivo. It was found that honokiol could upregulate miR-141, which targeted ZEB2 and modulated ZEB2 expression. Honokiol reversed EMT and suppressed CSC properties partly through the miR-141/ZEB2 axis. Our study suggested that honokiol may be a suitable therapeutic strategy for RCC treatment.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.227-237
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• 2017

This paper presents optimization of a long-span portal steel frame under dynamic wind loads using a surrogate-assisted evolutionary algorithm. Long-span portal steel frames are often used in low-rise industrial and commercial buildings. The structure needs be able to resist the wind loads, and at the same time it should be as light as possible in order to be cost-effective. In this work, numerical model of a portal steel frame is constructed using structural analysis program (SAP2000), with the web-heights at five locations of I-sections of the columns and rafters as the decision variables. In order to evaluate the performance of a given design under dynamic wind loading, the equivalent static wind load (ESWL) is obtained from a database of wind pressures measured in wind tunnel tests. A modified formulation of the problem compared to the one available in the literature is also presented, considering additional design constraints for practicality. Evolutionary algorithms (EA) are often used to solve such non-linear, black-box problems, but when each design evaluation is computationally expensive (e.g., in this case a SAP2000 simulation), the time taken for optimization using EAs becomes untenable. To overcome this challenge, we employ a surrogate-assisted evolutionary algorithm (SAEA) to expedite the convergence towards the optimum design. The presented SAEA uses multiple spatially distributed surrogate models to approximate the simulations more accurately in lieu of commonly used single global surrogate models. Through rigorous numerical experiments, improvements in results and time savings obtained using SAEA over EA are demonstrated.

• Proceedings of the KSEEG Conference
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• 2002.04a
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• pp.8-10
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• 2002

POPs in sediments and soil in the PRD are comparable to or much higher than those reported in other regions. Some sites may be classified as POPs- polluted with high ecological risks. Large-scale land transform in the process of regional urbanization may facilitate the transfer of POPs in the soil to the sedimentary system by enhancing the soil run-off. Urban atmospheric PCBs in PRD are found to be less than some of the North American or European urbans, but PAHs are significantly higher. The center of the PRD has been the major source area of PAHs and organochlorine pesticides in the PRD. The northern part of the PRD serves as a regional sink for the air particulates and affiliated POPs.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• v.14 no.8
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• pp.3501-3518
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• 2020

The method of DNS data collection is one of the most important parts of DNS simulation. DNS data contains a lot of information. When it comes to analyzing the DNS security issues by simulation on the cyber range with customized features, we only need some of them, such as IP address, domain name information, etc. Therefore, the data we need are supposed to be light-weighted and easy to manipulate. Many researchers have designed different schemes to obtain their datasets, such as LDplayer and Thales system. However, existing solutions consume excessive computational resources, which are not necessary for DNS security simulation. In this paper, we propose a light-weighted active data collection method to prepare the datasets for DNS simulation on cyber range. We evaluate the performance of the method and prove that it can collect DNS data in a short time and store the collected data at a lower storage cost. In addition, we give two examples to illustrate how our method can be used in a variety of applications.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.7
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• pp.3029-3033
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• 2014

Background: Dynamic changes of cancer-related fatigue (CRF) among hospitalized patients with colorectal cancer were determined. Materials and Methods: This longitudinal, descriptive study involved 96 hospitalized patients with colorectal cancer, all recruited from a tertiary general hospital in Guangzhou, China. Patients completed questionnaires three times to assess the degree of fatigue, and measurement points were within one week of admission, at 2 to 3 days after surgery and 3 weeks after surgery. Results: Significant differences among the three measurement points (p<0.01) were observed. The scores of fatigue in the second survey were the highest, followed by the third and first surveys. Colon cancer patient scores were higher than those of rectal cancer patients with a significant difference (p<0.05). Colorectal patients experienced different degrees of fatigue at different periods during hospitalization. Conclusions: This study highlights the importance of interventions that are carefully tailored to patients based on the characteristics at different periods to alleviate fatigue.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.29 no.9
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• pp.1488-1493
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• 2019

The rising cases of multidrug-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii (Ab) and the lack of effective drugs call for quick attention. Here, based on a Tn7 transposon and Xer/dif system, we constructed a stable, selectable marker-free autoluminescent Ab capable of producing visible light without extra substrates. Utilization of this autoluminescent reporter strain has the potential to reduce the time, effort and costs required for the evaluation of activities of anti-Ab drug candidates in vitro.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.25 no.9
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• pp.1559-1567
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• 2015

The combination of trimethoprim (TMP) and sulfamethoxazole (SMX) has been shown to be active against Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) in clinical tuberculosis (TB) treatment. However, the mechanism of action of TMP-SMX against Mtb is still unknown. To unravel this, we have studied the effect of TMP and SMX by deleting the folP2 gene in Mycobacterium smegmatis (Msm), and overexpressing the Mtb and Msm folP1/2 genes in Msm. Knocking out of the folP2 gene in Msm reduced the minimum inhibitory concentration of SMX 8-fold compared with wild type. Overexpression of the folP1 genes from Mtb and Msm increased the MICs by 4- and 2-fold in Msm for SMX and TMP, respectively. We show a strong correlation between the expression of folP1 and folP2 genes and TMP-SMX resistance in mycobacteria. This suggests that a combination of FolP2 inhibitor and SMX could be used for TB treatment with a better outcome.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.22
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• pp.9899-9903
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• 2014

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is an uncommon disease in most countries but occurs with much greater frequency in southern China. This study aimed to examine the secular trends of NPC in urban Guangzhou over the time period of 2000-2011 using data from the Guangzhou Cancer Registry. Age-adjusted annual incidence rates of NPC were calculated by the direct method using the WHO World Standard Population (1960) as the reference. The average annual percentage change (AAPC) was used as an estimate of the trend. A total of 7,532 new cases of NPC and 3,449 related deaths were registered. In both genders, the peak incidence occurred in the 50- to 59-year age group, and this age distribution pattern remained similar throughout. The AAPC in NPC incidence rates was -3.26% (95% CI: -5.4%--1.1) for males and -5.74% (95% CI: -8.9%--2.5) for females, resulting in a total decrease of 39.3% (from 22.14 to 13.44 per 100,000 population) for males and 48.6% (from 10.1 to 5.18 per 100,000 population) for females over this 12-year period. The AAPCs in NPC mortality rates were -4.62% (95%CI: -3.5%--5.7) for males and -6.75% (95% CI: -5.2%--8.3) for females, resulting in a total decrease of -46.1% (from 12.1 to 6.54 per 100,000 population) for males and 51.7% (from 4.14 to 2.00 per 100,000 population) for females. The age-adjusted incidence and mortality rates of NPC declined during 2000-2011 in urban Guangzhou but remained high. Future efforts to improve prevention, early detection and treatment strategies are needed.