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High intramuscular fat content of pigs improves pork quality and increasing intramuscular fat deposition is a long-term goal in the husbandry of pigs reared for meat production. There are significant phenotypic differences between the Ningxiang (NX) pigs (an indigenous Chinese breed) and Large White (LW) pigs (a western, lean-type breed). The present work aimed to gain insight into the longissimus dorsi muscle transcriptome between the two pig breeds. We investigated the molecular basis of these differences by comparing their transcriptome profiles. RNA-seq technology was used to identify the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in the longissimus dorsi muscle of the NX and LW pigs. We obtained 692 million clean reads using transcriptome sequencing of muscle samples from the two pig breeds. A total of 885 DEGs were identified, including 469 upregulated and 416 downregulated genes in the NX pigs compared with the LW pigs. Using KEGG pathway analysis, it was found that the significant DEGs were mainly enriched in metabolism-related pathways, such as lipid metabolism and biosynthesis, and glucose metabolism or biosynthesis. Quantitative real-time PCR confirmed the differential expression of eight selected DEGs in both pig breeds. qPCR results showed that the RNA-seq results were reliable. Several DEGs were candidate functional genes related to the lipid metabolism, including CD36, LIPE, MCAT, LPIN1, ANGPTL4, PPARD, SCD, INSR, MOGAT, IGF1, AKT2 and JAK2. Our results provide a comprehensive basis for the investigation of the differences in transcriptional regulation of the muscles between divergent phenotypes.

Abstract Designing an efficient and durable electrocatalyst for the sluggish anodic oxygen evolution reaction (OER) has been the primary goal of using proton exchange membrane electrolyzer owing to the highly acidic and oxidative environment at the anode. In this work, it is reported that high‐valence manganese drives the strong anchoring of the Ir species on the manganese dioxide (MnO2) matrix via the formation of an Mn–O–Ir coordination structure through a hydrothermal‐redox reaction. The iridium (Ir)‐atom‐array array is firmly anchored on the Mn–O–Ir coordination structure, endowing the catalyst with excellent OER activity and stability in an acidic environment. Ir‐MnO2(160)‐CC shows an ultralow overpotential of 181 mV at j = 10 mA cm−2 and maintains long‐term stability of 180 h in acidic media with negligible decay, superior to most reported electrocatalysts. In contrast, when reacting with low‐valence MnO2, Ir species tend to aggregate into IrOx nanoparticles, leading to poor OER stability. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations further reveal that the formation of the Mn–O–Ir coordination structure can optimize the adsorption strength of *OOH intermediates, thus boosting the acidic OER activity and stability.

Catalytic membrane reactors have the advantages of allowing the selective removal of products, avoiding the separation procedure of powder catalysts from the reaction mixture, intensifying the diffusion of reactants in the catalytic region, and integrating different reactions in one unit. Catalytic membrane reactors have been widely applied in the fields related to carbon peaking and carbon neutrality, including the capture and utilization of carbon dioxide, hydrogen production, and hydrogenation reaction. This review summarizes the design and fabrication of catalytic membrane reactors, with the focus on the capture and efficient utilization of carbon dioxide, hydrogen production and efficient liquid-phase hydrogenation. The design of membrane materials, catalyst materials and catalytic membranes, and the operation of catalytic membrane reactors are discussed respectively. Finally, the perspectives and future challenges of catalytic membrane reactors for carbon peaking and carbon neutrality are forecasted.

Abstract Seawater electrolysis is an attractive technique for mass production of high‐purity hydrogen considering the abundance of seawater. Nevertheless, due to the complexity of seawater environment, efficient anode catalyst, that should be, cost effective, highly active for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) but negligible for Cl2/ClO– formation, and robust toward chlorine corrosion, is urgently demanded for large‐scale application. Although catalysis typically appears at surface, while the bulk properties and morphology structure also have a significant impact on the performance, thus requiring a systematic optimization. Herein, a multiscale engineering approach toward the development of cost‐effective and robust OER electrocatalyst for operation in seawater is reported. Specifically, the engineering of hollow‐sphere structure can facilitate the removal of gas product, while atom‐level synergy between Co and Fe can promote Co sites transforming to active phase, and in situ transformation of sulfate ions layer protects catalysts from corrosion. As a result, the as‐developed hollow‐sphere structured CoFeSx electrocatalyst can stably operate at a high current density of 100 mA cm–2 in the alkaline simulated seawater (pH = 13) for 700 h and in a neutral seawater for 20 h without attenuation. It provides a new strategy for the development of electrocatalysts with a broader application potential.

Energy-efficient hydrogen purification technologies are needed for the hydrogen economy. Here the authors report facile and scalable fabrication of asymmetric carbon molecular sieve membranes for the separation of hydrogen and carbon dioxide.

Sixteen 35-day-old piglets, including eight Large White (LW) piglets (a lean-type pig breed) and eight Ningxiang (NX) piglets (a fatty-type Chinese Indigenous pig breed), were fed the same diet for 105 days. NX pigs had higher intramuscular fat content than LW pigs (p < 0.05). According to 16S rRNA gene sequencing, the relative abundances of the genera Ruminococcaceae_NK4A214_group, Parabacteroides, Christensenellaaceae_R-7_group and Ruminiclostridium were higher, whereas the abundances of Prevotellaceae_NK3B31_group, Prevotella, Subdoligranulum and Faecalibacterium were lower, in the colon of NX pigs compared to that of LW pigs. Nonmetric multidimensional scaling analysis revealed that the microbiota of the two pig breeds clustered separately along the principal coordinate axis. Furthermore, functional prediction of the bacterial communities suggested higher fatty acid biosynthesis in NX pigs. NX pigs also exhibited lower concentrations of total short-chain fatty acids, propionate and butyrate in the colon (p < 0.05). These findings suggest that NX pigs exhibited higher intramuscular fat content and backfat thickness than LW pigs. The bacterial communities in the colon of NX pigs were also more diverse than those in the colon of LW pigs, which might be used as a potential metabolomics mechanism to research different breeds of pigs.