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Relative to the SMI and E-aMCI groups, the AD and L-aMCI groups had higher frequency of the APOE e3/e4 genotype, and the AD group had a higher frequency relative to the L-aMCI group. However, there was no significant difference between the E-aMCI and SMI groups. In our longitudinal data, APOE e4 carrier showed a steeper incline slope in a clinical dementia rating sum of boxes (CDR-SB) score than APOE e4 non-carrier in SMI (B = 0.0066, p = 0.0104), E-aMCI (B = 0.0313, p  less then  0.0001), and L-aMCI (B = 0.0178, p = 0.0007). APOE e4 carrier showed a steeper decline slope in the CDR-SB than APOE e4 non-carrier in AD (B = - 0.0309, p = 0.0003). These findings suggest that E-aMCI and SMI are associated with a similarly increased frequency of the APOE e4 allele compared to controls, suggesting a greater genetic risk for AD and the importance of monitoring the allele more closely.Primary aldosteronism (PA) is associated with a higher prevalence of abdominal aortic calcification (AAC). Unilateral and bilateral PA are the most common subtypes of PA. However, no studies have addressed the difference in the prevalence of AAC between the two subtypes. In addition to aldosterone, parathyroid hormone (PTH), an important regulator of calcium metabolism, was also reported to be elevated in individuals with unilateral PA. Therefore, we hypothesized that the prevalence of AAC may be higher in individuals with unilateral PA, which may be related to the plasma aldosterone concentration (PAC) and PTH levels. We included 156 PA patients who underwent adrenal venous sampling and 156 with essential hypertension (EH) matched by age and sex. Of the former, 76 were diagnosed with unilateral PA, and 80 were diagnosed with bilateral PA. The aortic calcification index (ACI) presented the severity of AAC and was measured by adrenal computed tomography scan. Our results showed that compared with the EH group, the prevalence and severity of AAC were higher in PA patients (32.7 vs. 19.6%; 4.32 ± 3.61% vs. 2.53 ± 2.42%, respectively). In the PA subgroup analysis, unilateral PA was associated with a higher and more severe AAC than bilateral PA (40.7 vs. 25.0%; 5.12 ± 4.07% vs. 3.08 ± 2.34%, respectively). Moreover, PAC and PTH levels were higher in individuals with unilateral PA than in those with bilateral PA (P  less then  0.05). After risk adjustment, multivariate regression analysis revealed that PAC and PTH were positively-associated with AAC in patients with PA (P  less then  0.05). find more In conclusion, unilateral PA patients exhibited a higher prevalence of AAC and more severe AAC due to elevated PAC and PTH levels.Cataract is the primary cause of visual impairment and can be corrected by cataract surgery. We investigated the impact of cataract on the risk of depression along with the benefits of cataract surgery. Patients newly diagnosed with cataract by ophthalmologists between 2001 and 2015 were identified from the National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD) in Taiwan. Non-cataract individuals were recruited by 11 matching for age, sex and index year. After propensity score matching, 233,258 patients in total were included in our study 116,629 in each of the cataract and non-cataract cohorts. The primary outcome was the new diagnosis of depression by psychiatrists. In a mean follow-up period of 7.8 years, cataract was significantly associated with increased risk of developing depression (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR] = 1.78, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.70-1.87, p  less then  0.001). We further divided the cataract cohort into surgery and non-surgery groups. Notably, cataract surgery group was associated with a decreased risk of depression compared with non-surgery patients (aHR = 0.75, 95% CI 0.71-0.79, p  less then  0.001). Our results emphasise the importance of regular screening for depression among cataract patients and the beneficial effect of cataract surgery in reducing the risk of depression.The identification of the earliest dogs is challenging because of the absence and/or mosaic pattern of morphological diagnostic features in the initial phases of the domestication process. Furthermore, the natural occurrence of some of these characters in Late Pleistocene wolf populations and the time it took from the onset of traits related to domestication to their prevalence remain indefinite. For these reasons, the spatiotemporal context of the early domestication of dogs is hotly debated. Our combined molecular and morphological analyses of fossil canid remains from the sites of Grotta Paglicci and Grotta Romanelli, in southern Italy, attest of the presence of dogs at least 14,000 calibrated years before present. This unambiguously documents one of the earliest occurrence of domesticates in the Upper Palaeolithic of Europe and in the Mediterranean. The genetic affinity between the Palaeolithic dogs from southern Italy and contemporaneous ones found in Germany also suggest that these animals were an important common adjunct during the Late Glacial, when strong cultural diversification occurred between the Mediterranean world and European areas north of the Alps. Additionally, aDNA analyses indicate that this Upper Palaeolithic dog lineage from Italy may have contributed to the genetic diversity of living dogs.The molecular features of mantle cell lymphoma (MCL), including its increased incidence, and complex therapies have not been investigated in detail, particularly in East Asian populations. In this study, we performed targeted panel sequencing (TPS) and whole-exome sequencing (WES) to investigate the genetic alterations in Korean MCL patients. We obtained a total of 53 samples from MCL patients from five Korean university hospitals between 2009 and 2016. We identified the recurrently mutated genes such as SYNE1, ATM, KMT2D, CARD11, ANK2, KMT2C, and TP53, which included some known drivers of MCL. The mutational profiles of our cohort indicated genetic heterogeneity. The significantly enriched pathways were mainly involved in gene expression, cell cycle, and programmed cell death. Multivariate analysis revealed that ANK2 mutations impacted the unfavourable overall survival (hazard ratio [HR] 3.126; P = 0.032). Furthermore, TP53 mutations were related to worse progression-free survival (HR 7.813; P = 0.043). Among the recurrently mutated genes with more than 15.