Basic Medical Sciences Team Reveals a New Mechanism Linking U12 Intron Splicing to Hepatic Lipogenesis and Fibrosis
Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD) has seen a steadily rising global incidence over the past decades, significantly increasing the public health burden worldwide. Recently, Dr. Zhao Xuyun’s team from College of Basic Medical Sciences at Shanghai Jiao Tong University published their latest research in theJournal of Clinical Investigation, uncovering how splicing factors Zrsr1 and Zrsr2, which regulate U12 intron splicing, are downregulated by inflammatory stimuli during MASLD progression. This suppression results in aberrant U12 intron splicing, ultimately contributing to hepatic fibrosis and disease progression.
The study demonstrates that improper U12 intron splicing leads to intron retention in Insig1 and Insig2, thereby promoting SREBP1c activation. This in turn upregulates Idh1, enhancing glutamine-derived reductive carboxylation for de novo lipogenesis. The process generates excess ammonia, which drives liver fibrosis and exacerbates MASLD. Thus, the SREBP1c-IDH1 axis and associated ammonia production may serve as critical checkpoints and therapeutic targets for MASLD.
School of Public Health Links Chronic Liver Disease to Increased Cardiovascular Risk in Hypertensive Patients
Professor Wang Hui’s team from the School of Public Health recently published a study titled"Impact of NAFLD and Fibrosis on Adverse Cardiovascular Events in Patients with Hypertension" in the prestigious journalHypertension. Using large-scale cohort data, the study found that elevated indices of fatty liver and hepatic fibrosis are significantly associated with increased cardiovascular risk and mortality in hypertensive individuals.
Based on data from the UK Biobank (UKB) and the U.S. NHANES database, the study revealed strong correlations between NAFLD and the incidence/mortality of cardiovascular disease (CVD) among hypertensive patients. Over a median 8.5 years of follow-up in NHANES, 3,376 deaths were recorded; in UKB, over 13.5 years, there were 15,864 deaths, 4,062 ischemic strokes (IS), and 5,314 myocardial infarctions (MI). In UKB, NAFLD increased the risk of IS by 16% and MI by 64%. In NHANES, NAFLD raised all-cause mortality by 29%. More notably, patients with high-risk liver fibrosis experienced even greater risks: a 91% increase in all-cause mortality and 42% increase in IS risk in UKB, and a 95% increase in all-cause mortality in NHANES. Mediation analysis showed that NAFLD accounted for 6.45% of all-cause death risk, 5.17% of CVD death risk, and 8.20% of MI risk.
The findings underscore NAFLD as not only a risk factor for CVD and mortality but also a crucial mediator of adverse outcomes in hypertensive populations. Early screening and interventions targeting NAFLD are urgently needed.
Nursing School's Latest Research Offers New Ideas for Personalized Fall Prevention in Parkinson's Disease
The nursing team at Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine has published a new study inCNS Neuroscience & Therapeutics titled"Nonmotor Symptom Changes and Their Association With Falls Among Parkinson’s Disease Patients Undergoing Deep Brain Stimulation: A 1-Year Cohort Study." The study investigates the relationship between nonmotor symptoms and fall incidents in Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients after one year of deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgery.
PD is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder, with both motor and nonmotor symptoms worsening over time. Notably, 60.5% of patients experience falls, 65% of whom sustain injuries, and 33% suffer fractures, severely impacting their quality of life. Although DBS is effective in controlling motor symptoms, its effects on nonmotor symptoms and fall risks remain unclear.
In this study, 136 PD patients were followed for one year by specialized Parkinson’s nurses, with assessments conducted before surgery, and at 6 and 12 months post-operation. While DBS did not significantly reduce the overall fall incidence, it altered the contexts in which falls occurred—such as location and whether freezing of gait was involved. Moreover, emotional/cognitive symptoms, gastrointestinal and urinary symptoms, and their interactions with motor symptoms were significantly associated with fall risk.
This research contributes theoretical insights into PD nursing care and opens new avenues for developing individualized fall prevention strategies tailored to each patient's specific symptom profile.
Health Science and Technology Team Advances Intelligent Diagnosis and Precision Medicine with MRI Image Synthesis Framework
Dr. Zhang Xiaoyong’s team from the College of Health Science and Technology at Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine has published a paper inMedical Image Analysis titled"HiFi-Syn: Hierarchical Granularity Discrimination for High-Fidelity Synthesis of MR Images with Structure Preservation."
The core innovation is a multi-level structural constraint strategy (illustrated in the figure), which incorporates anatomical priors into pixel-, structure-, and global-level constraints in the generative model. This ensures anatomical consistency and modality fidelity across all levels. Experimental results on both normal brain datasets (UK Biobank and IXI) and tumor datasets (BraTS) showed significant improvements in accuracy and structural reliability for both normal and pathological MRI image synthesis. This work provides a powerful technical foundation for multimodal image generation and diagnostic support. It offers a generalizable solution for medical image generation problems, with future applications in fast reconstruction of missing MRI data, historical dataset completion, and medical image enhancement—paving the way for advancements in intelligent diagnosis and precision decision-making in clinical practice.
School of Global Health Uncovers Patterns and Risks of Drug-Resistant E. coli in Companion Animals
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) poses a major global public health challenge, responsible for approximately 5 million deaths annually, according to the World Health Organization. Under the One Health framework—linking human, animal, and environmental health—pets are considered a key component of health ecosystems, especially in urban centers like Shanghai where over 2 million dogs and cats reside.
To investigate the role of pets in AMR transmission, the School of Global Health at Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine and the Shanghai Animal Disease Control Center conducted the first large-scale surveillance of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria in companion animals in Shanghai. A total of 730 rectal swabs were collected from 11 veterinary hospitals, isolating 244 strains of Escherichia coli resistant to critically important antimicrobials (CIA-EC). Many strains showed multidrug resistance. Key findings and innovations include:
Prevalence of CIA-EC in Companion Animals: For the first time, the widespread presence of CIA-EC in Shanghai’s pet population was systematically documented, revealing concerning levels of multidrug resistance and providing vital epidemiological data.
Reservoirs of High-Risk Resistance Genes: Genomic sequencing showed that pets act as reservoirs for high-risk antimicrobial resistance genes (ARGs), especially extended-spectrum β-lactamases and carbapenemase genes, which confer resistance to frontline clinical antibiotics.
Plasmid Stability and Transmission: The blaNDM-5-positive IncX3 plasmid exhibited high interspecies transmissibility and environmental stability, even in the absence of antibiotic pressure. Previously detected in humans and animals worldwide, its presence in pets raises serious concerns about cross-species and cross-regional transmission.
This study highlights the crucial role of companion animals in AMR ecology and emphasizes the need to include pets in AMR surveillance systems. Such efforts will help track AMR dynamics more comprehensively and inform targeted interventions—advancing the integration of “pet-friendly” policies with healthy city planning at a policy level.
