The Microsoft HoloLens is a head-worn mobile augmented reality device that is capable of mapping its direct environment in real-time as triangle meshes and localize itself within these three-dimensional meshes simultaneously. The device is equipped with a variety of sensors including four tracking cameras and a time-of-flight (ToF) range camera. Sensor images and their poses estimated by the built-in tracking system can be accessed by the user. This makes the HoloLens potentially interesting as an indoor mapping device. In this paper, we introduce the different sensors of the device and evaluate the complete system in respect of the task of mapping indoor environments. The overall quality of such a system depends mainly on the quality of the depth sensor together with its associated pose derived from the tracking system. For this purpose, we first evaluate the performance of the HoloLens depth sensor and its tracking system separately. Finally, we evaluate the overall system regarding its capability for mapping multi-room environments.

Chronic psychological stress is associated with an increased risk for relapse of inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) and impedes the treatment of this condition. However, the impact of stress on the risk of IBD onset remains unclear. The goal of the present study was to examine whether chronic unpredictable mild stress (CUMS) could initiate or aggravate the onset of colon inflammation in rats which, in turn, would be capable of triggering bowel disease. We found that CUMS exposure increased infiltration of CD-45 positive cells and MPO activity, as well as augmented the expression of the inflammatory cytokines, IFN-γ and IL-6 within the colon of these rats. In addition, CUMS treatment changed the composition and diversity of gut microbiota and enhanced intestinal epithelial permeability, indicating the presence of a defect in the intestinal barrier. This CUMS-induced disruption of mucosal barrier integrity was associated with a reduction in expression of the tight junction protein, occludin 1, and an inhibition in mucosal layer functioning via reductions in goblet cells. Results from bacterial cultures revealed an increased presence of bacterial invasion after CUMS treatment as compared with that observed in controls. Thus, our data indicate that CUMS treatment induces alterations of the fecal microbiome and intestinal barrier defects, which facilitates bacterial invasion into colonic mucosa and further exacerbates inflammatory reactions within the colon. Accordingly, chronic stress may predispose patients to gastrointestinal infection and increase the risk of inflammation-related gut diseases.

Leptin, an adipocyte-derived cytokine associated with obesity, has been reported to participate in carcinogenesis. Epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is also considered as a key event in tumor metastasis. The aim of this study is to investigate the mechanism of leptin in the promotion of EMT leading to metastasis in A549 lung cancer cells. We investigated the effect of leptin on migration of A549 cells using wound healing and transwell assays. The incidence of EMT in A549 cells was examined by real-time PCR and immunofluorescence staining. The expression of TGF-β in A549 cells was detected by real-time PCR, and blocking of TGF-β in A549 cells was achieved by siRNA techniques. Additional work was performed using 100 patient samples, which included samples from 50 patients diagnosed with lung cancer and an additional 50 patients diagnosed with lung cancer with metastatic bone lesions. Leptin expression was measured using immunohistochemistry techniques. We demonstrated that leptin can effectively enhance the metastasis of human lung cancer A549 cell line using both wound healing and transwell assays. We also found the incidence of EMT in A549 cells after leptin exposure. Furthermore, we detected the expression of TGF-β in A549 cells, which had been reported to play an important role in inducing EMT. We showed that leptin can significantly upregulate TGF-β at both the mRNA and protein levels in A549 cells. Using siRNA to block the expression of TGF-β in A549 cells, we confirmed the role of TGF-β in the promotion of metastasis and induction of EMT. Furthermore, we found that in patient samples leptin was present at higher levels in samples associated with diagnosis of lung cancer bone metastases tissue than lung cancer tissue. Our results indicated that leptin promoted the metastasis of A549 human lung cancer cell lines by inducing EMT in a TGF-β-dependent manner.

Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are promising biomarkers for clinical application. Cancer screening with Low-Dose Computed Tomography (LDCT) and CTC detections in pulmonary nodule patients has never been reported. The aim of this study was to explore the effectiveness of the combined methods to screen lung cancer. Out of 8313 volunteers screened by LDCT, 32 ground-glass nodules (GGNs) patients and 19 healthy volunteers were randomly selected. Meanwhile, 15 lung cancer patients also enrolled. CellCollector, a new CTC capturing device, was applied for CTCs detection. In GGNs group, five CTC positive patients with six CTCs were identified, 15.6% were positive (range, 1–2). In lung cancer group, 73.3% of the analyzed CellCollector cells were positive (range, 1–7) and no “CTC-like” events were detected in healthy group. All CTCs detected from GGNs group were isolated from the CellCollector functional domain and determined by whole genomic amplification for next-generation sequencing(NGS) analysis. NGS data showed that three cancer-related genes contained mutations in five CTC positive patients, including KIT, SMARCB1 and TP53 genes. In four patients, 16 mutation genes existed. Therefore, LDCT combined with CTC analysis by an in vivo device in high-risk pulmonary nodule patients was a promising way to screen early stage lung cancer.