The pivotal role of the long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) urothelial carcinoma associated 1 (UCA1) in anti-cancer drug resistance has been confirmed in many cancers. Overexpression of lncRNA UCA1 correlates with resistance to chemotherapeutics such as cisplatin, gemcitabine, 5-FU, tamoxifen, imatinib and EGFR-TKIs, whereas lncRNA UCA1 knockdown restores drug sensitivity. These studies highlight the potential of lncRNA UCA1 as a diagnostic and prognostic biomarker, and a therapeutic target in malignant tumors. In this review, we address the role of lncRNA UCA1 in anti-cancer drug resistance and discuss its potential in future clinical applications.

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Hydatidiform mole is an aberrant pregnancy with abnormal embryonic development and hydropic placental villi. Common moles are sporadic, not recurrent and affect one in every 1500 pregnancies in Western societies. Approximately, half of common moles are complete and mostly diploid androgenetic, whereas the remaining are partial and mostly triploid diandric. NLRP7 has been found to be responsible for a recurrent form of molar pregnancies. Recently, we showed that patients with NLRP7 mutations have an impaired inflammatory response to various stimuli. To date, molar tissues analyzed from patients with NLRP7 mutations have been found to be diploid and biparental. In this study, we report 10 new non-synonymous variants and one stop codon found in patients and not in controls. We demonstrate the presence of different types of moles, diploid biparental, diploid androgenetic, triploid and tetraploid conceptions, in patients with NLRP7 variants. We document in vitro and in vivo early embryo cleavage abnormalities in three patients. We propose a two-hit mechanism at the origin of androgenetic moles. This mechanism consists of variable degrees of early embryo cleavage abnormalities leading to chaotic mosaic aneuploidies, with haploid, diploid, triploid and tetraploid blastomeres. Surviving embryonic cells that reach implantation are then subject to the maternal immune response. Because of the patients' impaired inflammatory response, androgenetic cells, which are complete allograft, are able to grow and proliferate. In women with normal immune system, chaotic mosaic aneuploidies may also occur during early cleavage, however, androgenetic cells would die after implantation or stay undetected, confined to a small portion of the placenta.

For the first time, functional microporous conjugated polymers were synthesized for the efficient separation of uranium from simulated radioactive effluents.

It is of strategic and ecological importance to capture uranium(VI) from aqueous solutions. A novel strategy is reported herein to synthesize bifunctional polymeric microspheres for efficient uranium removal from aqueous solution. Specifically, positively charged microspheres with amidoxime groups were prepared by emulsion polymerization. The high selectivity and fast kinetics for uranium(VI) can be achieved by the microspheres via the synergistic interaction of positive charge and coordinating ligand. The negative uranium tricarbonate complex would be adsorbed to the positively charged microspheres by coulombic interaction without interference of other metal cations, and the coordination may occur with amidoxime groups via ligand exchange. It is calculated that nearly 36% of the adsorbed uranium(VI) is due to coulombic interactions of the positive charge while 64% is due to coordination of amidoxime groups. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on colloidal particles with positive charges and ligand groups for uranium(VI) uptake from aqueous solution. † Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental details for synthesis of block copolymers and functional microspheres; sorption kinetics and thermodynamics. NMR spectra; SEM images, particle size distributions, zeta potentials for characterizations. See Scheme 1 The schematic for the synthesis of poly(ionic liquid)functionalized microspheres. This journal isFig. 4 The characterization after sorption. (A) The sorption of uranium versus time for the PSt microspheres with (a) PEI 40 , and (b) PAOBI 40 (experimental conditions: 200 mL solution, 5 Â 10 À5 mol L À1 uranyl ion, 88 mg L À1 sorbent, pH 7.00, 298.15 K). (B) The desorption of uranium by EDTA versus time for uranium-PSt microspheres with PAOBI 40 . (C) FT-IR spectra (a) before and (b) after the sorption onto PSt microspheres. (D) Zeta potential of PSt microspheres-uranium complex.This journal is

Small cell neuroendocrine carcinoma arising in the ureter is extremely rare; only a few cases have been previously reported in the literature. The current study reports the case of a 65-year-old female who presented with right-sided back pain. A mass was identified in the right ureter, and a nephroureterectomy was performed. The microscopic examination revealed that the mass was composed of a monotonous population of small cells and that the cells of the carcinoma were positive for cluster of differentiation 56, chromogranin A and synaptophysin. The tumor was diagnosed as a ureteral neuroendocrine small cell carcinoma. The patient returned 4 months later with recurrences in the retroperitoneum. Chemotherapy was administered and following 80 mg/m2 intravenous irinotecan on days 1 and 8 and 25 mg/m2 cisplatin on days 1–3, every 21 days for 4 cycles, the tumor was considerably smaller. During the regular follow-up examinations, the tumor remained stable.

The limited bioavailability of plant-derived natural products with anticancer activity poses major challenges to the pharmaceutical industry. An example of this is camptothecin, a monoterpene indole alkaloid with potent anticancer activity that is extracted at very low concentrations from woody plants. Recently, camptothecin biosynthesis has been shown to become biotechnologically amenable in hairy-root systems of the natural producer Ophiorrhiza pumila. Here, time-course expression and metabolite analyses were performed to identify novel transcriptional regulators of camptothecin biosynthesis in O. pumila. It is shown here that camptothecin production increased over cultivation time and that the expression pattern of the WRKY transcription factor encoding gene OpWRKY2 is closely correlated with camptothecin accumulation. Overexpression of OpWRKY2 led to a more than three-fold increase in camptothecin levels. Accordingly, silencing of OpWRKY2 correlated with decreased camptothecin levels in the plant. Further detailed molecular characterization by electrophoretic mobility shift, yeast one-hybrid and dual-luciferase assays showed that OpWRKY2 directly binds and activates the central camptothecin pathway gene OpTDC. Taken together, the results of this study demonstrate that OpWRKY2 acts as a direct positive regulator of camptothecin biosynthesis. As such, a feasible strategy for the over-accumulation of camptothecin in a biotechnologically amenable system is presented.

It is strategically important to recycle uranium from radioactive liquid wastes for future uranium supply of nuclear energy. However, it is still a challenge to adsorb uranium selectively from highly acidic and radioactive waste. In this paper, we report a novel strategy for effective uranium removal from highly acidic and radioactive media by surface ion-imprinted mesoporous silica sorbent. The sorbent was successfully synthesized by a co-condensation method with uranyl as the template ion and diethylphosphatoethyltriethoxysilane as the functional ligands. The pseudo-second-order model and Langmuir model showed better correlation with the sorption kinetic and isotherm data, and the sorption equilibrium could be reached within 40 min, the maximum adsorption capacity from Langmuir model was 80 mg/g in 1 mol/L nitric acid (HNO) solution at 298.15 K. The sorbent showed faster kinetics and higher selectivity toward uranium over other ions compared with nonimprinted mesoporous and other previous sorbents. Furthermore, the ion-imprinted materials exhibited remarkable radioresistance stability and could be regenerated efficiently after five cycles. This work may provide a new approach for highly efficient sorption of uranium from strong HNO and radioactive media.