Objective: To gather current evidence on the impact of antipsychotics on long-term mortality in patients with schizophrenia. Methods: We systematically searched for articles in Embase, PubMed, and PsycINFO reporting the long-term mortality (follow-up > 1 year) of patients with schizophrenia who were using any antipsychotics. We then conducted multiple meta-analyses to determine differences in long-term mortality between different types of antipsychotics. Results: We identified 45 articles that provided unadjusted long-term mortality rates, including 46,171 deaths during 2,394,911 person-years. The pooled mortality rate was 9.9 (95%CI = 7.4-12.7) per 1,000 person-years. The unadjusted crude mortality rate of antipsychotic drug users was lower than that of non-users (risk ratio [RR] = 0.546, 95%CI = 0.480-0.621), first-generation antipsychotics caused higher all-cause mortality than second-generation antipsychotics (RR = 1.485, 95%CI = 1.361-1.620), and polypharmacy had better effects than monotherapy on long-term mortality (RR = 0.796, 95%CI = 0.689-0.921). As for the causes of death, heart disease and cardiovascular disease ranked highest among cause-specific mortality (5.6 per 1,000 person-years). Conclusion: Since antipsychotics had a beneficial effect on long-term mortality in schizophrenia, greater precaution should be taken with patients who do not take them. However, since disease severity, comorbidities, and other confounding factors cannot be fully controlled, further research and verification are needed.

Abstract Quivers, gauge theories and singular geometries are of great interest in both mathematics and physics. In this note, we collect a few open questions which have arisen in various recent works at the intersection between gauge theories, representation theory, and algebraic geometry. The questions originate from the study of supersymmetric gauge theories in different dimensions with different supersymmetries. Although these constitute merely the tip of a vast iceberg, we hope this guide can give a hint of possible directions in future research.

Abstract The influence of magnesium on roasting vanadium slag was investigated by simulating the roasting process of vanadium by mixing V2O5 and MgO. The calcination products of V2O5 reacted with MgO at different temperatures which were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Thermogravimetry-differential scanning calorimetry (TG-DSC) and scanning electron microscope (SEM). There were two mass loss intervals, three endothermic peaks and one exothermic peak appearing during the reaction by the integrated thermal analysis as the temperature increased from room temperature to 1273.15 K. The samples of mixed V2O5 and MgO began to melt at 573.15 K and reacted at 773 K, and the shape of the particles changed from block to ovoid or irregular sphere at 773.15 K. With increasing the reaction temperature from 973.15 to 1073.15 K, the intermediate of VO2 was produced, and MgV2O6 was partially decomposed at 1073.15 K. During this process, the particle shape gradually returned to block shape. The conversion rate of vanadium is 99.4% with MgO of 1.65%.

Cerebrovascular diseases pose a serious threat to human survival and quality of life and represent a major cause of human death and disability. Recently, the incidence of cerebrovascular diseases has increased yearly. Rapid and accurate diagnosis and evaluation of cerebrovascular diseases are of great importance to reduce the incidence, morbidity and mortality of cerebrovascular diseases. With the rapid development of medical ultrasound, the clinical relationship between ultrasound imaging technology and the diagnosis and treatment of cerebrovascular diseases has become increasingly close. Ultrasound techniques such as transcranial acoustic angiography, doppler energy imaging, three-dimensional craniocerebral imaging and ultrasound thrombolysis are novel and valuable techniques in the study of cerebrovascular diseases. In this review, we introduce some of the new ultrasound techniques from both published studies and ongoing trials that have been confirmed to be convenient and effective methods. However, additional evidence from future studies will be required before some of these techniques can be widely applied or recommended as alternatives.

Background Berberine acts primarily as an important active ingredient in Coptis chinensis and has been traditionally applied in clinical treatment. Nevertheless, little information has been released about C. chinensis, as far as functional genes and biosynthetic pathway of berberine are concerned. Here, we isolated a novel (S)-canadine synthase gene (designated as CAS-1) from C. chinensis by using RT-PCR and RACE techniques. Results Bioinformatics analysis showed that the cDNA is 1942 bp in length with a complete open reading frame (ORF) of 1476 bp, and the ORF encodes a polypeptide of 491 amino acids with a calculated molecular mass of 55.29 kDa and a pI value of 8.92. Real-time quantitative PCR analysis showed that CcCAS-1 was constitutively expressed in leaf, petiole and rhizome tissues, especially in the leaves of C. chinensis. However, the results of berberine content in different tissues by high-performance liquid chromatography with photodiode array detection (HPLC-DAD) method showed that the leaves and the petiole tissues have similar content of berberine. Conclusions We found that the berberine content in the rhizome was seven times (more or less) than that in the leaves and the petioles. In addition, the full length coding sequence of CcCAS-1 was inserted into pET-32a and was successfully expressed in Escherichia coli, laying a solid foundation for protein purification, activity assay and multi-clonal antibody preparation. Together, our data suggest that CcCAS-1 is a novel heme-thiolate enzyme essential for berberine biosynthesis in C. chinensis.

We investigated the distribution of vibrios in Shenzhen coastal waters in order to obtain valuable information for the aquaculture industry and a health warning system. Quantities of vibrios from surface waters ranged from 0 to 4.40×10(4) CFUs mL-1 in April (spring), while from 0 to 2.57×10³ CFUs mL-1 in September (autumn); the abundance of V. alginolyticus-like species from surface water ranged from 0 to 6.72×10³ CFUs mL-1 in April (spring) and from 0 to 1.28×10³ CFUs mL-1 in September (autumn); higher counts were observed in spring. The V. alginolyticus-like species was dominant in Shenzhen coastal waters, with the highest abundance in the clean region (stations YMK001 and GDN064) in April, suggesting that Vibrio spp. were naturally occurring bacteria in marine environments. The correlation between the abundance of vibrios (including V. alginolyticus-like species) and environmental factors varied in different regions and different seasons. There were no vibrios detected when the salinity was less than 11.15‰ in the Zhujiang River estuary, which indicated that salinity played a key role in the distribution of vibrios and V. alginolyticus-like species.