Background: Traditional radiotherapy and chemotherapy have been intensively studied for their role in the treatment of tumours. However, these therapies often cause side effects for patients, which calls for the development of novel treatment options for tumours. B-cell lymphoma-2 (Bcl-2)/adenovirus E1B 19 kDa-interacting protein 3 (BNIP3) reportedly apoptosis-inducing effects in tumour cells and is associated with the progression and treatment of multiple tumours. Nevertheless, little is known about its potential role in tumour diagnosis and targeted therapy. Findings: The results of the study demonstrated that the interaction of BNIP3 with HDAC1 may affect the progression of breast invasive cancer (BRCA), sarcoma (SARC), kidney renal clear cell carcinoma (KIRC), and low-grade glioma (LGG). BNIP3 seemed to exert its effects in BRCA and SARC primarily through gene silencing and integrator complex, and in KIRC and LGG, mainly by affecting olfactory function, suggesting that targeted therapy can be developed based on the above signalling pathway and downstream molecules. Interpretation: BNIP3 has emerged as a promising therapeutic and diagnostic target for BRCA, SARC, KIRC, and LGG, providing new insights into tumour molecular therapies in the clinic.

Relapse was the major cause of treatment failure in patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-HSCT). We aimed to identify the efficacy and safety of preemptive interferon-α (IFN-α) treatment in ALL patients who had minimal residual disease (MRD) after allo-HSCT. Multiparameter flow cytometry and polymerase chain reaction assays were applied for MRD monitoring. Recombinant human IFN-α-2b injections were administered subcutaneously twice weekly in every 4 weeks cycle. Twenty-four (35.3%), 5 (7.4%), 6 (8.8%), and 13 (19.1%) patients achieved MRD negativity at 1, 2, 3, and > 3 months, respectively, after treatment. Seven patients showed grade ≥ 3 toxicities after IFN-α treatment. The 4-year cumulative incidence of total acute graft-versus-host disease (aGVHD), severe aGVHD, total chronic GVHD (cGVHD), and severe cGVHD after treatment was 14.7%, 2.9%, 40.0%, and 7.5%, respectively. The 4-year cumulative incidences of relapse and non-relapse mortality after treatment was 31.9% and 6.0%, respectively. The 4-year probabilities of disease-free survival and overall survival after IFN-α treatment were 62.1% and 71.1%, respectively. Thus, preemptive IFN-α treatment could protect against relapse and improve long-term survival for ALL patients who had MRD after allo-HSCT. The study was registered athttps://clinicaltrials.govas #NCT02185261 (09/07/2014).

Background: Clostridium piliforme (causative agent of Tyzzer disease) infects various animals, including primates, and hence a threat to animal and human health worldwide. At present, it is detected using traditional methods, such as path morphology, polymerase chain reaction and enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay. Therefore, it is necessary to develop convenient, efficient visual molecular biological methods for detecting C. piliforme.Objectives: To establish a method with good specificity, high sensitivity and simple operation for the detection of C. piliforme.Methods: In this study, we designed internal and external primers based on the conserved 23S rRNA region of C. piliforme to develop a biotin‐labelled diarrhoea‐suffered loop‐mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) system for detecting of C. piliforme and assessed the specificity, sensitivity and repeatability of the LAMP system.Results: The LAMP system did not exhibit cross‐reactivity with 24 other common pathogenic species, indicating that it had good specificity. The minimum concentration of sensitivity was 1 × 10⁻⁷ ng/μL. Mouse models (Meriones unguiculatus) of Tyzzer disease were established and a LAMP−lateral flow dipstick (LAMP–LFD) was developed for detecting C. piliforme. The detection rate of C. piliforme was 5.08% in clean‐grade animals and 9.96% in specific‐pathogen‐free‐grade animals from Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai. In addition, the detection rates of C. piliforme were 10.1%, 8.6% and 20%, in animals from Hangzhou, Wenzhou and Shaoxing, respectively. The detection rate of C. piliforme was higher in experimental animals used in schools than in those used in companies and research institutes.Conclusions: The LAMP–LFD method established in this study can be used to detect C. piliforme in animals handled in laboratory facilities of universities, pharmaceutical enterprises and research and development institutions.

Background: Minimal/measurable residual disease (MRD) determined by multiparameter flow cytometry (MFC) is an important variable for relapse prediction and treatment approach selection in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). We aimed to investigate whether leukemia-stem cell (LSC)-based assay is superior to traditional MFC methods, including LAIP and D-F-N assays, for MRD evaluation in predicting clinical outcomes. Methods: In this cohort study, a total of 360 AML patients who received allogeneic stem cell transplantation (allo-SCT) between July 2018 and November 2019 were prospectively enrolled. The patients were randomized (1:1) and classified into a training set (n=180) and a validation set (n=180). Posttransplantation MRD were according to LSC based assay, mainly including a cocktail of CD7, CD11b, CD22, CD56, Tim-3, and CLL-1 on CD34 ⁺CD38 ^- cells, and traditional assay determined by MFC, respectively. Findings: In the training set, patients were classified as LSC positive group (group A) and LSC negative group (group B) according to a cutoff value of CD34 ⁺CD38 ^-cocktail ⁺ LSCs as 0.004%. Subjects in group A had a higher cumulative incidence of relapse (CIR, 42.7% vs. 2.6%, P<0.001) and comparable non-relapse mortality (NRM, 0% vs. 8.1%, P=0.154) compared with cases in group B, leading to inferior leukemia-free survival (LFS, 57.3% vs. 89.3%, P<0.001) and overall survival (OS, 70.8% vs. 90%, P=0.009) of cases in group A to group B. Multivariate analysis showed that positive LSCs after transplantation could independently predict CIR (P<0.001), LFS (P<0.001), and OS (P=0.021). The predictive value of positive LSCs following allo-HSCT for CIR (P<0.001), LFS (P<0.001), and OS (P=0.004) was further confirmed in the validation set. In the total case cohort, multivariate analysis also showed that positive LSCs after transplantation could independently predict CIR (HR=13.999, P<0.001), LFS (HR=5.429, P<0.001), and OS (HR=3.761, P=0.021). The total patients were classified into positive MRD and negative MRD groups according to the traditional MFC method. The results showed that the CIR of patients in the traditional MRD positive group was significantly higher than the CIR of patients in the traditional MRD negative group (44.9% vs. 7.3%, P<0.001), leading to lower LFS (55.1% vs. 85.6%, P<0.001) and OS (55.6% vs. 87.5%, P<0.001). Compared with MRD detected by the traditional MFC method, using LSCs for MRD evaluation has high sensitivity (66.7% vs. 43%), a high C-index (0.76 vs. 0.69) and a high Youden index (0.58 vs. 0.37). The median time from CD34 ⁺CD38cocktail ⁺ LSC positivity to relapse was longer than the median time from traditional MRD positivity to relapse by 141.5 days (range, 18-465 days) vs. 64.5 days (range, 13-144 days) (P=0.003). The median level between CD34 ⁺CD38 ^-cocktail ⁺ LSCs and traditional MRD detected by MFC was 0.0072% (range, 0.0007%-3.742%) and 0.16% (range, 0.01%-3.75%) (P<0.001). Interpretation: Our data suggest the superiority of LSC-based MRD assays such as higher sensitivity, low false negativity, and longer time for MRD positivity to relapse to traditional MFC MRD methods for outcome prediction in AML patients received allograft.