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BACKGROUND: We sought to identify students and their sexual partners in a molecular transmission network. METHODS: We obtained 5996 HIV protease and reverse transcriptase gene sequences in Guangxi (165 from students and 5831 from the general populations) and the relevant demographic data. We constructed a molecular transmission network and introduced a permutation test to assess the robust genetic linkages. We calculated the centrality measures to describe the transmission patterns in clusters. RESULTS: At the network level, 68 (41.2%) students fell within the network across 43 (8.1%) clusters. Of 141 genetic linkages between students and their partners, only 25 (17.7%) occurred within students. Students were more likely than random permutations to link to other students (odds ratio [OR], 7.2; P < .001), private company employees aged 16–24 years (OR, 3.3; P = .01), private company or government employees aged 25–49 years (OR, 1.7; P = .03), and freelancers or unemployed individuals aged 16–24 years (OR, 5.0; P < .001). At the cluster level, the median age of nonstudents directly linked to students (interquartile range) was 25 (22–30) years, and 80.3% of them had a high school or higher education background. Compared with students, they showed a significantly higher median degree (4.0 vs 2.0; P < .001) but an equivalent median Eigenvector Centrality (0.83 vs 0.81; P = .60). CONCLUSIONS: The tendency of genetic linkage between students and nonstudent young men and their important position in the HIV transmission network emphasizes the urgent need for 2-pronged public health interventions based on both school and society.

Yi Feng,1,2 Ying Dai,1,2 Zhihua Gong,1,2 Jia-Nan Cheng,1,2 Longhui Zhang,1,2 Chengdu Sun,1,2 Xianghua Zeng,1,2 Qingzhu Jia,1,2 Bo Zhu1,2 1Institute of Cancer, Xinqiao Hospital, Third Military Medical University, Chongqing, People's Republic of China; 2Chongqing Key Laboratory of Tumor Immunotherapy, Chongqing, People's Republic of China Background: A suppressive immune microenvironment and pathological angiogenesis are hallmarks of gastric cancer. Theoretically, immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) stimulate pre-primed neoantigen-specific T cells, and antiangiogenic agents then facilitate their infiltration into the tumor niche by promoting vascular normalization. Currently, the interconnections of these two phenotypes and their relevance to the tumor microenvironment (TME) have not been fully characterized in gastric cancer.Materials and methods: Transcriptome profiling data retrieved from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database were used to deconvolute the feature of TME for gastric cancer (N = 375). Machine learning, correlation, and prognosis analysis were applied to elucidate the correlations between angiogenesis, cytotoxic T lymphocyte infiltration, and patient survival.Results: Substantial heterogeneous infiltration of immune cell populations among cases was observed. Furthermore, among targetable pathways, angiogenesis was identified as the dominant factor in discriminating different infiltration statuses. Most importantly, the angiogenesis pathway was negatively correlated with the amount of activated CD8+ T cells only for patients with a higher infiltration, and the concomitance of low angiogenesis signaling and highly activated CD8+ T-cell infiltration was associated with a significant survival benefit.Conclusion: Our findings demonstrated a negative correlation between angiogenesis signaling and cytotoxic function in gastric cancer patients with a highly infiltrated immune niche. These data provided a rationale for potential combination strategy and further clinical investigations of ICIs plus antiangiogenesis agents for patients with gastric cancer with an inflamed TME. Keywords: gastric cancer, immune microenvironment, TCGA, angiogenesis, therapeutic implications

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