Xu Zhang

University of Science and Technology of China | USTC · Department of Electronics Science and Technology

BACKGROUND Abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) is a potentially life-threatening vascular condition, but approved medical therapies to prevent AAA progression and rupture are currently lacking. Sphingolipid metabolism disorders are associated with the occurrence and development of AAA. It has been discovered that ganglioside GM3, a sialic acid–containi...

b> Background and Objective: Distal ureter management is an essential part of radical nephroureterectomy (RNU). However, there is no agreement on the optimal surgical treatment for ureter and bladder cuff excision. The classical “pluck” technique following transurethral resection of the intramural ureter increases the risk of extravesical and intra...

Transurethral resection of bladder tumor (TURBT) serves both diagnostic and therapeutic purposes in the management of bladder cancer. Attaining a high-quality TURBT is not always guaranteed due to various factors. En-bloc resection of bladder tumors (ERBT) holds promise to be a primary technique for removing bladder tumors in most non-muscle invasi...

Background Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a principal cause of mortality and adverse oncologic outcomes in patients with renal tumor and inferior vena cava tumor thrombus (RT-IVCTT). However, the preoperative thrombotic risk factors in these patients remain not fully characterized. Objectives To identify preoperative thrombotic risk factors in pa...

One-step adsorption separation of C2H4 from ternary C2 hydrocarbon mixtures remains an important and challenging goal for petrochemical industry. Current physisorbents either suffer from unsatisfied separation performance, poor stability, or are difficult to scale up. Herein, we report a strategy of constructing multiple supramolecular binding site...

Background Cisplatin (CDDP)-based chemotherapy is a standard first-line treatment for metastatic bladder cancer (BCa) patients, and chemoresistance remains a major challenge in clinical practice. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) have emerged as essential regulators in carcinogenesis and cancer progression. However, the role of circRNAs in mediating CDDP ch...

Background To discuss the risk factors affecting the recurrence of pheochromocytoma after surgery. Methods We retrospectively reviewed patients who were hospitalized and underwent surgery for PCC between January 2012 and December 2020 at Chinese PLA General Hospital. Inclusion criteria were pathological diagnosis of PCC and availability of follow...

Purpose The purpose of this study was to elucidate the feasibility and safety of the technique of robot-assisted laparoscopic adrenal metastasectomy (RAL-AME) for adrenal metastasis (AM) originating from renal cell carcinoma (RCC) with surgical history. Materials and Methods From October 2015 to September 2020, RAL-AME was performed on 13 patients...

The cross-user gesture recognition is a puzzle in the myoelectric control system, owing to great variability in muscle activities across different users. To address this problem, a novel optimal transport (OT) assisted student-teacher (ST) framework (termed OT-ST) was proposed in this paper to facilitate transfer across user domains in an unsupervi...

Objectives: To evaluate whether venous tumor thrombus (VTT) consistency is a risk factor for the patient's prognosis with renal cell carcinoma (RCC). Materials and methods: A total of 190 RCC patients with VTT, who were treated at Department of Urology, Chinese PLA General Hospital, were retrospectively analyzed in this study. The baseline clini...

Background: This study presents the procedure of single-port extraperitoneal transvesical approach to robot-assisted radical prostatectomy (SETvRARP) on the da Vinci Xi platform coupling with a 4-channel single port and evaluated the short-term outcomes in the first 72 prostate cancer (PCa) patients. Methods: Seventy-two patients with localized...

Background: Venous tumor thrombus (VTT) consistency of renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is an important consideration in nephrectomy plus thrombectomy. However, evaluation of VTT consistency through preoperative MR imaging is lacking. Purpose: To evaluate VTT consistency of RCC through intravoxel incoherent motion-diffusion weighted imaging (IVIM-DWI)...

Objectives The vesicoprostatic muscle (VPM) is a longitudinal smooth muscle that originates from the trigone of the bladder or the opening of the ureter and is involved in urination as part of the detrusor apron. We explored the effect of VPM reconstruction on immediate and early recovery of urinary continence in patients undergoing robot-assisted...

Background Splenogonadal fusion (SGF) is a rare congenital malformation in which the spleen is abnormally connected to the gonads or to the mesonephric derivatives. There is no obvious causality between SGF and testicular neoplasm. However, cryptorchidism, which is a well-known risk factor of testicular germ cell tumors, are the most frequent malfo...

Background: Myocardial ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) injury causes cardiac dysfunction to myocardial cell loss and fibrosis. Prevention of cell death is important to protect cardiac function after I/R injury. The process of reperfusion can lead to multiple types of cardiomyocyte death, including necrosis, apoptosis, autophagy, and ferroptosis. Howeve...

Background: Germline pathogenic variants are estimated to affect 3-5% of patients with renal cell carcinoma (RCC). The identification of patients with hereditary RCC is important for cancer screening and treatment guidance. Methods: Whole-exome sequencing (WES) (n=69) or gene panel sequencing containing 139 genes (n=54) related to germline cance...

Myoelectric pattern recognition (MPR) has shown satisfactory performance under ideal laboratory conditions. Nevertheless, the individual variances lead to dramatic performance degradation in cross-user MPR applications. It is crucial to enable the myoelectric interface to adapt to multiple users' surface electromyography (sEMG) distributions in pra...

Developing porous materials for C3H6/C3H8 separation faces the challenge of merging excellent separation performance with high stability and easy scalability of synthesis. Herein, we report a robust Hofmann clathrate material (ZJU‐75a), featuring high‐density strong binding sites to achieve all the above requirements. ZJU‐75a adsorbs large amount o...

Developing porous materials for C3H6/C3H8 separation faces the challenge of merging excellent separation performance with high stability and easy scalability of synthesis. Herein, we report a robust Hofmann clathrate material (ZJU-75a), featuring high-density strong binding sites to achieve all the above requirements. ZJU-75a adsorbs large amount o...

(1) Background: For completely lower pole renal tumors, we compared the perioperative outcomes of robotic partial nephrectomy via transperitoneal and retroperitoneal approaches. (2) Methods: Complete lower pole renal tumors were defined as tumors that received 1 point for the “L” element of the R.E.N.A.L. and located at the lower pole of kidney. Af...

Due to physiological and anatomical variations across users, myoelectric interfaces trained by multiple users cannot be adapted to the unique hand movement patterns of the new user. Most current work requires the new user to provide one or more trials per gesture (dozens to hundreds of samples), applying domain adaptation methods to calibrate the m...

Background: Of the currently available prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) positron emission tomography (PET) tracers, although 68Ga-PSMA-11 and 18F-DCFPyL have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), both tracers are excreted rapidly through the urinary tract, resulting in strong accumulation in the bladder and blurring...

Objective This study aims to investigate early oncologic outcomes in patients with adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) with venous invasion (VI) treated using both open and mini-invasive approaches. Patients and materials We conducted a retrospective analysis of 4 international referral center databases, including all the patients undergoing adrenalect...

Recent studies have revealed that chemokine-like factor-like MARVEL transmembrane domain-containing family member 6 (CMTM6) promotes tumor progression and modulates tumor immunity by regulating programmed death-ligand 1 stability; however, its intrinsic functions and regulatory mechanisms in clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) remain poorly und...

Background: The knowledge about the effect of different prostate biopsy approaches on the prostate cancer detection rate (CDR) for patients with gray-zone PSA is limited. We aimed to compare CDR in different biopsy approaches for patients with rising prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels in the gray zone. Methods: In this retrospective study, we i...

Background This study aimed to explore the appropriate location of renal tumors for retroperitoneal approach. Materials and Methods We retrospectively analyzed 1040 patients with renal tumor who were treated at our institution from Janurary 2015 to June 2020 and had underwent retroperitoneal robotic assisted-laparoscopic partial nephrectomy (rRAPN...

Background Spi-1 proto-oncogene ( SPI1 ), which encodes an ETS-domain transcription factor, can activate gene expression in myeloid and lymphoid lineages. The role of SPI1 in the tumor immune microenvironment in clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) remains unknown. In this study, we investigated the possible role of SPI1 in ccRCC using an indepe...

Background: The use of slow release fertilizers (SRFs) is an effective approach to reduce the agriculture cost, environmental and ecological issues simultaneously. This work provided a series of poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA)/sodium alginate (SA) polymer membranes as the eco-friendly and biodegradable coatings for SRFs. Moreover, polymer-coated urea (P...

Purpose: To introduce an intrapericardial control technique using robotic approach in the surgical treatment of renal tumor with level IV Inferior vena cava (IVC) thrombus to decrease the severe complications associated with cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) and deep hypothermic circulatory arrest (DHCA). Materials and methods: Eight patients with le...

Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is increasingly becoming a main complication of diabetes, and is difficult to cure. In our research, network pharmacology analysis suggested that both compound Danshen dripping pills (CDDP) and bezafibrate (BZF) have potential protective effects against DR and the two drugs may act synergistically. The pharmacological effe...

Background: Prostate biopsy is still unavoidable in patients with a rising prostate-specific antigen even though multiparametric magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is widely used. 18 F-DCFPyL positron emission tomography (PET)/MRI was proved to be promising both in sensitivity and specificity. But its guiding fusion biopsy and the advantages in the...

Ferredoxin 1 (FDX1), an iron-sulphur protein, is responsible for electron transfer in a range of metabolic redox reactions. Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) is an aggressive cancer characterised by metabolic reprogramming, and FDX1 is a critical regulator of cuproptosis. However, the expression profile and prognostic value of FDX1 associated...

Objective: To evaluate the effects of CO2 pneumoperitoneum on venous hemodynamics and cardiopulmonary function during transperitoneal or retroperitoneal laparoscopic surgery. Methods: A single institution prospective study. 43 patients with renal cell carcinoma undergoing retroperitoneal (22) or transperitoneal (21) laparoscopic partial nephrect...

Objective This study aimed to explore the prognostic value of preoperative red blood cell distribution width (RDW) in patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC). Methods Clinicopathological data of 230 patients with mRCC treated at the First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University and the Chinese PLA General Hospital from Jan...

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fgene.2022.874189.].

Urothelial carcinomas (UCs) are malignant tumors that arise from the lower and upper urinary tract and are characterized by multiple recurrences. Aristolochic acid (AA) is a potent nephrotoxin and human carcinogen associated with UC. East Asian populations with a high UC prevalence have an unusual genome-wide AA-induced mutational pattern. To addre...

Background: To develop an efficient and stable canine model of IVC progressive obstruction at the renal hilus level. Methods: The model was established in two beagles by encircling an ameroid constrictor on the IVC at renal hilus level. Abdominal wall varicosity and animal weight variations were observed weekly after operation. Ultrasound examin...

Cell division cycle‑associated 5 (CDCA5) protein, which is involved in cohesion, contributes to cell cycle regulation and chromosome segregation by maintaining genomic stability. Accumulating evidence indicates that CDCA5 expression is upregulated in a number of types of cancer associated with a poor prognosis. However, the biological function of C...

Background: This study aimed to explore the appropriate location of renal tumors for retroperitoneal approach. Material/Methods: We retrospectively analyzed 1040 patients with renal tumor who were treated at our institution and had underwent retroperitoneal robotic assisted-laparoscopic partial nephrectomy. Clinical features and postoperative outco...

Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) is one of the most common malignant tumors and is characterized by a poor prognosis. Although G2- and S -phase expressed-1 (GTSE1) is known to be involved in the progression and metastasis of various cancers, its significance and mechanism in ccRCC remain unknown. In the present study, we found that GTSE1 was...

Gestural interfaces based on surface electromyographic (sEMG) signal have been widely explored. Nevertheless, due to the individual differences in the sEMG signals, it is very challenging for a myoelectric pattern recognition control system to adapt cross-user variability. Unsupervised domain adaptation (UDA) has achieved unprecedented success in i...

Recent development of surface electromyogram (sEMG) decomposition technique provides a good basis of decoding movements from individual motor unit (MU) activities that directly representing microscopic neural drives. How to interpret the function and contribution of each decomposed MU to macroscopic movements remains unclear. The objective of this...

In recent years, energy conversion and storage technologies have been a research hotspot. Bipolar membrane reverse electrodialysis (BMRED) is a safe and sustainable way to convert and store energy. This work focused on the BMRED performance in an open-loop configuration and its application in electrodialysis (ED) desalination. Firstly, effects of o...

The objective of this study is to develop a method for alleviating a novel pattern interference toward achieving a robust myoelectric pattern-recognition control system. To this end, a framework was presented for surface electromyogram (sEMG) pattern classification and novelty detection using hybrid neural networks, i.e., a convolutional neural net...

A deep learning method involving hybrid neural networks incorporated with a physiological twitch force model is presented for decoding muscle force from individual motor unit (MU) activities. A series of MU action potential (MUAP) trains were obtained using a progressive FastICA peel-off algorithm through high-density surface electromyogram (HD-sEM...

Objectives We compared the outcomes of transperitoneal robotic partial nephrectomy (TRPN) and retroperitoneal robotic partial nephrectomy (RRPN) for complete upper pole renal masses (1 point for the “L” component of the RENAL scoring system). Material and Methods We retrospectively reviewed patients who underwent either TRPN or RRPN from 2013 to 2...

Objectives To evaluate the prognostic value of systemic Inflammation Response Index (SIRI) in patients with renal cell carcinoma and inferior vena cava tumor thrombus (RCC-IVCTT) treated with radical nephrectomy and IVCTT thrombectomy. Methods We retrospectively reviewed the clinical data of 144 consecutive patients with RCC-IVCTT who received rad...

Automatic emotion recognition based on electroencephalogram (EEG) has attracted rapidly increasing interests. Due to large inter-subject variabilities, subject-independent emotion recognition faces great challenges. Recently, domain adaptation methods have been successfully applied in this field due to their ability to align features from different...

Under the ideal condition, traditional myoelectric pattern recognition systems can achieve superior performance on recognizing motion intents. However, in practical applications, electrode shift is inevitable during re-wearing the electrodes. The data variation caused by the shift can lead to dramatic performance degradation. In the literature, dee...

Aqueous organic redox flow batteries (AORFBs) represent a promising energy storage technology that may enable the grid-scale integration of intermittent renewable energy. The water-soluble, redox-active organic species that are utilized to reversibly store electricity are the most critical performance-determining components in AORFBs. To ensure aff...

Purpose：Distal ureter management in radical nephroureterectomy (RNU) is challenging. Methods: This study describes a simple endoscopic clip technique with polymer clip ligation for the management of the distal ureter during retroperitoneal laparoscopic RNU. This endoscopic technique was used in 14 patients with upper tract urothelial carcinoma (UTU...

Endothelial cells play a critical role in maintaining homeostasis of vascular function, and endothelial activation is involved in the initial step of atherogenesis. Previously, we reported that Abl kinase mediates shear stress–induced endothelial activation. Bosutinib, a dual inhibitor of Src and Abl kinases, exerts an atheroprotective effect; howe...

Purpose: To compare the treatment outcomes of robotic retroperitoneal lymph node dissection (R-RPLND) versus laparoscopic RPLND (L-RPLND) for clinical stage I non-seminomatous germ cell testicular tumors (NSGCTs). Materials and methods: We retrospectively reviewed the data of patients with stage I NSGCTs who underwent robotic or laparoscopic RPL...

Background: Cell division cycle-associated 5 (CDCA5) protein, which is involved in cohesion, contributes to cell cycle regulation and chromosome segregation by maintaining genomic stability. Accumulating evidence indicates that CDCA5 is upregulated in many types of cancers with poor prognoses. However, it remains largely unknown about the biologica...

Rationale: Timely inhibition of inflammation and initiation of resolution are important to repair injured tissues. Mammalian STE20-like protein kinase 1/2 (MST1/2) acts as a regulator of macrophage-associated immune responses to bacterial infections. However, the role of MST1/2 in regulating macrophage phenotype and function in myocardial infarctio...

Previous studies have suggested the role of CD4+Foxp3+ regulatory T cells (Tregs) in protection against kidney ischemia reperfusion injury via their immunosuppressive properties. Unfortunately, the associated mechanisms of Tregs in kidney ischemia reperfusion injury have not been fully elucidated. Semaphorin 4A (Sema4A) is essential for maintaining...

The article aims to study the effect and mechanism of shear stress on eicosanoids produced by the metabolism of polyunsaturated fatty acids in endothelial cells. First, human umbilical vein endothelial cells were treated by control (Static), laminar shear stress (LSS) and oscillatory shear stress (OSS) for 6 h. Then the endothelial cells were incub...

Myocardial ischemia/reperfusion injury (MIRI) is closely related to oxidative stress. However, the redox environment of the heart has not been evaluated thoroughly after MIRI, which limits precise redox intervention. In this study, we developed the redox environment metabolomic evaluation (REME) method to analyze the redox metabolites of the heart...

Steady-state visual evoked potential (SSVEP) serves as one of extensively utilized paradigms for brain-computer interface (BCI). SSVEP-based BCI has advantages of good classification accuracy, high information transfer rate (ITR) and little user training. However, there exist few studies investigating SSVEP-based BCI in the mobile situation, where...

In this work, the synthesis, characterization, and phosphorescent properties of the coordination polymer, {Ag3(dppy)2[μ-SCN]3}n (1), are described. X-ray crystallography showed that the complex forms a one-dimensional infinite zipper-like chained structure linked by thiocyanate as the bridging ligand. The silver(I) complex exhibits a strong sky-blu...

Background Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) with venous tumor thrombus (VTT) is associated with a poor clinical outcome. Although several studies have examined the genomic features of ccRCC, the genetic profile of VTT along with its matched primary tumor has not been fully elucidated.Materials and methodsSamples of VTT tissues and matched pr...

e16500 Background: Renal pelvis cancer is accounting for about two-thirds of upper tract urinary carcinoma. Lesions in renal pelvis often lead to a differential diagnosis that requires ureteroscopic biopsy. Besides causing discomfort and pain, ureteroscopy prior to surgery increases risk of tumor implantation and recurrence. Although urine cytology...

Background: Disorders of autophagic processes have been reported to affect the survival outcome of clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) patients. The purpose of our study was to identify and validate the candidate prognostic long noncoding RNA signature of autophagy. Methods: Transcriptome profiles were obtained from The Cancer Genome Atlas....

Enhanced synthesis or uptake of lipids contributes to rapid cancer cell proliferation and tumor progression. In recent years, cell cycle regulators have been shown to be involved in the control of lipid synthesis, in addition to their classical function of controlling the cell cycle. Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) is the most common subtyp...