Acquired resistance to standard chemotherapy causes treatment failure in patients with local advanced and advanced non-small lung cancer (NSCLC). Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are a small subpopulation within cancer that is thought to be resistant to conventional chemotherapy. The Notch pathway is one of the most intensively studied for putative therapeutic targets of CSCs in solid tumors. In our study, suppression of Notch3 decreased colony and sphere formation of stem-like property in lung cancer cells. In addition, Notch3 expression was demonstrated to be upregulated in the patients with chemoresistance and related to poor prognosis of NSCLC patients. Our results also showed that CSC markers ALDH1A1 and CD44 were highly expressed in NSCLC patients with chemoresistance and these two markers were positively correlated with Notch3 expression in lung cancer specimens from TCGA database. Furthermore, the lung cancer cells with drug resistance were shown to be associated with activation of autophagy. All the data support a crucial role of Notch3 in the increase of stem-like property in NSCLC cells that might be associated with upregulation of ALDH1A1 and CD44 and activation of autophagy.

ZnO/Mg0.16Zn0.84O (ZnO/MgZnO) films are fabricated on x-cut and z-cut LiNbO3 (LN) substrates by radio-frequency magnetron sputtering. High transparencies are confirmed by a spectrophotometer. X-ray diffraction (XRD) spectra show that all the films are c-axis oriented. The waveguiding properties, as well as the refractive indices and thickness of the films are demonstrated and determined by prism coupling. Both transverse electric (TE) and transverse magnetic (TM) modes are measured at lambda=0.633 mum and 1.539 mum, respectively. The waveguide loss is measured at lambda=0.633 mum with a fiber probe technique. The experimental results show that high optical quality ZnO films can be obtained with MgZnO buffer layers.

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This paper reports the experimental investigation of the dielectric barrier discharge in which the gap area is filled with a two-phase mixture (TPM), air and solid particles. We found that there are two kinds of discharges in the TPM. One is the surface discharge generated on the surface of the solid particles and the other is the filament discharge generated in the air void. For the case of low volume fraction of solid particles, the surface discharge starts to occur when the applied voltage is higher than the onset voltage. At a further voltage increase, the filament discharge takes place at the same time. For the case of high volume fraction, such as the packed-bed reactor, only the surface discharge exists. Under the condition of the same volume fraction, the larger the diameter of the solid particles, the lower the surface discharge onset voltage. As a conclusion, we think that the plasma reactor using the form of low volume fraction of solid particles may be a better choice for waste-gas treatment enhanced by catalysts.

BackgroundTo evaluate differences in the clinical characteristics and molecular pathology of lung adenocarcinoma subtypes as defined by the new International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer/American Thoracic Society/European Respiratory Society international histological classification.MethodsWe retrospectively reviewed 269 patients with initial primary lung adenocarcinoma who had undergone complete resection at our department from August 2013 to December 2014, focusing on the new histologic subtype classification, clinical characteristics, and molecular pathology.ResultsAll specimens were invasive adenocarcinoma, and were lepidic (13.0%), papillary (19.7%), acinar (51.7%), solid (8.6%), micropapillary (1.1%) or mucinous predominant (5.9%). Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutations were detected in 132 cases (60.3%). Female patients and non‐smokers had higher EGFR mutation rates (P = 0.022 and 0.026, respectively). The lepidic, papillary, acinar, solid, micropapillary, and mucinous predominant patterns had EGFR mutation rates of 70.6%, 64.8%, 72.5%, 33.3%, 100%, and 5.9%, respectively. The exon mutation distribution differed according to serum carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) levels (P = 0.018). v‐Ki‐ras2 Kirsten rat sarcoma viral oncogene homolog (KRAS) mutations were detected in 20 cases (9.2%), and were frequently found in the mucinous and solid predominant subtypes. The serum CEA levels differed among the subtypes.ConclusionsIn China, there are significant differences between lung adenocarcinoma histologic subtypes. The presence of well‐differentiated components in lung adenocarcinoma indicates higher EGFR mutation rates; the presence of solid or mucinous components indicates higher KRAS mutation rates. Serum CEA levels are associated with histologic subtype and EGFR exon mutations.