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In this study, the changes in myofibrillar protein oxidation, taste substance and taste characteristics of dried Penaeus vannamei were investigated under accelerated storage conditions, and a correlation analysis was carried out between myofibrillar protein oxidation and taste characteristics. As a result, the color of dried Penaeus vannamei gradually changed to dark brown, the content of total sulfhydryl group decreased, and the carbonyl group content and surface hydrophobicity increased, which indicated increased degree of oxidation of myofibril protein. The content of inosine monphosphate and umami free amino acids in dried shrimp showed a trend of first increasing and then decreasing, while the contents of sweet free amino acids and total free amino acids decreased gradually. The electronic tongue was used to characterize the taste change of dried Penaeus vannamei, and it was found that the umami and sweetness intensity of dried Penaeus vannamei decreased, the bitterness intensity increased, but the saltiness intensity did not obvious change. The richness first increased and then decreased. The correlation analysis between protein oxidation and taste indexes showed that the degree of protein oxidation of dried Penaeus vannamei was positively correlated with the bitterness intensity, and negatively correlated with the umami, sweetness, saltiness intensity and richness. These results showed that there was no significant difference in the taste of dried white shrimp during short-term storage, but with the extension of storage time, the appearance and color deteriorated, the oxidation of myofibrillar protein increased, and the taste quality decreased. The findings from this study provide a theoretical and data basis for regulating the storage quality of white shrimp.

The lower reaches of the Minjiang River are located in an area of land-sea-air interaction. It is not only a sensitive area concerning environmental evolution, but also a hotspot for archaeological research on the southeast coast of China. Exploring the scope of ancient human activities and the evolution of land-use patterns is of great significance for understanding the development of human-land relations. By generating various cost surfaces of sites through GIS cost distance analysis and combining with the site catchment theory and method, we comprehensively analyzed the human activity range and land-use pattern in every cultural period from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age in the lower reaches of the Minjiang River and reconstructed the potential population in each period of the region. The results show that: (1) the area of site catchment, available and actually developed land increased from the Keqiutou to Huangtulun culture period in the lower reaches of the Minjiang River. Chronologically, the area of the site catchment continues to grow from 212 km2 to 4,858 km2, the accessible land area increased from 261 km2 to 7,599 km2, and the land area that was actually used by ancient humans continuously increased from 173 km2 to 3,914 km2. (2) With the development process of culture, the land-use intensity of prehistoric humans in the region first increased and then decreased by 81.58%, 92.95%, 87.99%, 79.33% and 80.57%, respectively, and the degree of land development was reduced, which may be related to the development and progress of productive forces. The frequency of ancient human exchanges can be represented by the ratio of the number of sites in the overlapping site catchment to the total number of sites in the same period (87.50%, 60.00%, 66.67%, 92.54%, and 97.81%, respectively). (3) The reconstruction results showed that the potential population in the area continued to expand, with substantial population growth in the lower Tanshishan-Tanshishan and Huangguashan-Huangtulun transitional periods. It was inferred that there was a relationship between population pressure and culture succession.

Mung bean seed was soaked and germinated in CaCl2 electrolyzed water (CEW) in order to investigate the effect and mechanism of CEW on preserving the quality of mung bean sprouts. The results showed that after 5 days of storage, the mass loss percentage of mung bean sprouts treated with electrolyzed CaCl2 solution at a concentration of 25 mmol/L decreased, and the hardness and brittleness increased by approximately 1.28 times higher than compared with the control group treated with tap water. The bactericidal effect of CEW was obvious, reducing the microbial load on the surface of mung bean sprouts by nearly one lg (CFU/g). Low-field nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy showed that the state of water in mung bean sprouts changed, and the bound water content increased. The relative conductivity, malondialdehyde (MDA) content and hydrogen peroxide content decreased by 16.5%, 27.5%, and 36.8%, respectively, the integrity of the cell membrane was maintained, and the accumulation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) was reduced, thus reducing the degree of membrane lipid peroxidation. In addition, the browning of mung bean sprouts during storage was inhibited by CEW treatment, and the mechanism could be related to the decrease in the content of total phenols as browning substrates and the decrease in the activities of polyphenol oxidase (PPO), peroxidase (POd) and phenylalanine ammonialyase (PAL). Therefore, CEW treatment can delay the quality deterioration of mung bean sprouts during storage to a certain extent.

Viral diseases are a leading cause of worldwide yield losses in crop production. Breeding of resistance genes (R gene) into elite crop cultivars has been the standard and most cost-effective practice. However, R gene-mediated resistance is limited by the available R genes within genetic resources and in many cases, by strain specificity. Therefore, it is important to generate new and broad-spectrum antiviral strategies. The CRISPR-Cas9 (clustered regularly interspaced palindromic repeat, CRISPR-associated) editing system has been employed to confer resistance to human viruses and several plant single-stranded DNA geminiviruses, pointing out the possible application of the CRISPR-Cas9 system for virus control. Here, we demonstrate that strong viral resistance to cauliflower mosaic virus (CaMV), a pararetrovirus with a double-stranded DNA genome, can be achieved through Cas9-mediated multiplex targeting of the viral coat protein sequence. We further show that small interfering RNAs (siRNA) are produced and mostly map to the 3 end of single-guide RNAs (sgRNA), although very low levels of siRNAs map to the spacer region as well. However, these siRNAs are not responsible for the inhibited CaMV infection because there is no resistance if Cas9 is not present. We have also observed edited viruses in systematically infected leaves in some transgenic plants, with short deletions or insertions consistent with Cas9-induced DNA breaks at the sgRNA target sites in coat protein coding sequence. These edited coat proteins, in most cases, led to earlier translation stop and thus, nonfunctional coat proteins. We also recovered wild-type CP sequence in these infected transgenic plants, suggesting these edited viral genomes were packaged by wild-type coat proteins. Our data demonstrate that the CRISPR-Cas9 system can be used for virus control against plant pararetroviruses with further modifications.

Broccoli sprouts have been considered as functional foods which have received increasing attention because they have been highly prized for glucosinolates, phenolics, and vitamins in particular glucosinolates. One of hydrolysates-sulforaphane from glucoraphanin is positively associated with the attenuation of inflammatory, which could reduce diabetes, cardiovascular and cancer risk. In recent decades, the great interest in natural bioactive components especially for sulforaphane promotes numerous researchers to investigate the methods to enhance glucoraphanin levels in broccoli sprouts and evaluate the immunomodulatory activities of sulforaphane. Therefore, glucosinolates profiles are different in broccoli sprouts varied with genotypes and inducers. Physicochemical, biological elicitors, and storage conditions were widely studied to promote the accumulation of glucosinolates and sulforaphane in broccoli sprouts. These inducers would stimulate the biosynthesis pathway gene expression and enzyme activities of glucosinolates and sulforaphane to increase the concentration in broccoli sprouts. The immunomodulatory activity of sulforaphane was summarized to be a new therapy for diseases with immune dysregulation. The perspective of this review served as a potential reference for customers and industries by application of broccoli sprouts as a functional food and clinical medicine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]