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Obesity is a global public health issue. Obesity-related chronic low-grade inflammation (meta-inflammation) can lead to aberrant adipokine release and promote cardiometabolic diseases and obesity-related tumors. However, the mechanisms involved in the initiation of inflammatory responses in obesity and obesity-related tumors as well as metastasis are not fully understood. In this study, we found that the increased tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) in adipocytes promoted the lung metastasis of MC38 colon cancer cells via Fas signaling. The release of TNF-α and interleukin (IL)-6 by Fas signaling in adipocytes was caused by the activation of the nuclear factor-kappa B (NF-κB) and mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathways mediated by the interaction of Fas with Bmx, a non-receptor tyrosine kinase. Moreover, the Fas/Bmx complex is involved in the inflammation of adipocytes via Fas at the Tyr189 site and SH2 domain of Bmx. This is the first study to report the interaction between Fas and Bmx in adipocyte inflammation, which may provide clues for the development of potential new treatment strategies for obesity-related diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Determining dietary patterns in China is challenging due to lack of external validation and objective measurements. We aimed to characterize dietary patterns in a community-based population and to validate these patterns using external validation cohort and metabolomic profiles. We studied 5145 participants, aged 18–80 years, from two districts of Hangzhou, China. We used one district as the discovery cohort (N = 2521) and the other as the external validation cohort (N = 2624). We identified dietary patterns using a k-means clustering. Associations between dietary patterns and metabolic conditions were analyzed using adjusted logistic models. We assessed relationships between metabolomic profile and dietary patterns in 214 participants with metabolomics data. We identified three dietary patterns: the traditional (rice-based), the mixed (rich in dairy products, eggs, nuts, etc.), and the high-alcohol diets. Relative to the traditional diet, the mixed (OR adj = 1.7, CI 1.3–2.4) and the high-alcohol diets (OR adj = 1.9, CI 1.3–2.7) were associated with type 2 diabetes and hypertension, respectively. Similar results were confirmed in the external validation cohort. In addition, we also identified 18 and 22 metabolites that could distinguish the mixed (error rate = 12%; AUC = 96%) and traditional diets (error rate = 19%; AUC = 88%) from the high-alcohol diet. Despite the complexity of Chinese diet, identifying dietary patterns helps distinguish groups of individuals with high risk of metabolic diseases, which can also be validated by external population and metabolomic profiles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our previous study found that platelet counts were positively associated with body fat percentage in human. In the present study, we conducted a reverse translational study to explore the role of platelets in modulating pre-adipocyte proliferation in mice. Mouse pre-adipocyte cell line (3T3-L1) and human pre-adipocytes harvested from female subcutaneous fat were used. Pre-adipocytes were co-cultured with platelets or platelet releasate, which were isolated from mice or humans. The cell viability and proliferative ability of the pre-adipocytes were examined by MTT and flow cytometry assays. Western blotting analysis was used to determine the phosphorylation levels of proteins in the mTOR pathway. The number of platelets in the adipose tissues from obese mice was significantly higher than that from lean mice. Platelets and collagen-activated platelet releasate stimulated the proliferation of human pre-adipocytes and 3T3-L1 cells in vitro. Besides, platelets from obese mice were more potent in stimulating pre-adipocyte proliferation than those from lean control mice. Mechanistically, platelets enhanced pre-adipocyte proliferation through the acceleration of cell cycle progression from G0/G1 to S phase cell cycle progression. At the molecular level, platelets promoted pre-adipocyte proliferation through mTOR pathway-mediated upregulation of cyclin D1 expression. In conclusion, platelets and platelet releasate play an important role in the proliferation of pre-adipocytes. Our study may provide new clues and the molecular mechanism of the causal pathways between platelets and body fat to explain the finding we observed in population study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Injection of urethral bulking agents is a low-risk, minimally invasive surgical procedure to treat stress urinary incontinence (SUI). In this study, we developed a promising injectable bulking agent comprising extracellular matrix fragments of adipose-derived stem cell sheets (ADSC ECM) and investigated its effectiveness in urethral bulking therapy. The structural integrity and proteins of ADSC sheet ECM were well retained in decellularized ADSC ECM fragments. To locate transplanted ADSC ECM fragments, they were labeled with ultrasmall super-paramagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles, which enabled in vivo monitoring after implantation in a SUI rat model for up to 4 weeks. When ADSC ECM fragments were injected into the rat urethra, they became fully integrated with the surrounding tissue within 1 week. Four weeks after transplantation, host cells had regenerated within the ADSC ECM fragment injection area. Moreover, new smooth muscle tissue had formed around the ADSC ECM fragments, as confirmed by positive staining of myosin. These results indicate that injection of ECM fragments may be a promising minimally invasive approach for treating SUI. Image, graphical abstract [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to accurately analyze the safety management efficiency of China's coal enterprises, based on the panel data of 14 coal listed enterprises in 2012–2018, this paper analyzes the overall technical efficiency (TE), pure technical efficiency (PTE) and scale efficiency (SE) of safety management of sample enterprises by the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model, and builds Tobit model of random panel effect to evaluate the impact of business management and safety investment on safety management efficiency. The results show that: in 2012–2018, the average values of TE, PTE and SE of sample enterprises are respectively 0.674, 0.777 and 0.864; all have great room for improvement. The development of PTE and SE in most sample enterprises is unbalanced; TE of sample enterprises does not significantly improve, and shows a trend of rising-decreasing-rising; safety investment, enterprise scale and labor productivity are significantly positively related to safety management technical efficiency, while safety training person time and employees quality are negatively correlated. This paper identified the positive and negative effects of various influencing factors on the safety management efficiency of coal enterprises, and analyzed the main reasons that hinder the improvement of safety efficiency, and puts forward corresponding countermeasures and suggestions, which are helpful for coal enterprises to effectively improve their safety management efficiency and economic efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • The Early Carboniferous clastic sediments in the North Lhasa Terrane was mainly from the Indian continent and partly from the Australian continent. • The North Lhasa Terrane may be located at the northern margin of the Indian- and Australian continent during the Early Carboniferous. • The reduction of Grenvillian detrital zircons in the Yongzhu Formation might be associated with the Early Carboniferous rifting process in the eastern Lhasa Block. The Lhasa Block was located at the northern margin of East Gondwana before it drifted away, but its exact paleogeographic location in the Late Paleozoic remains controversial. The Late Paleozoic strata in the Lhasa Block, especially the Lower Carboniferous, for which the rock assemblage and sedimentary age have been described but the in-depth research on provenance and tectonic environment are still lacking, may provide vital information about its paleogeographic location. This study presents a systematic field geological survey of the Lower Carboniferous Yongzhu Formation, along with U-Pb dating and Hf isotope analysis of detrital zircons. The detrital zircons U-Pb data revealed major age peaks at 530 and 980 Ma as well as several subordinate age peaks at 784, 890, 1160, 1514, 1690, 2480, and 2600 Ma. The Hf isotopes of the detrital zircons showed similarity with zircons from the Indian continent on the age peaks at 980 and 890 Ma and with those from the Australian continent on the age peaks at 1160 and 2600 Ma, which indicates mixed provenance for the Yongzhu Formation. From this study, we infer that the Lhasa Block might have been located at the northern margin of the Indian and Australian continents during the Early Carboniferous. The weaker age peak at 1160 Ma of the Lower Carboniferous compared to the Pre-Carboniferous and Upper Carboniferous-Lower Permian might be related to the opening of the Sumdo Paleo-Tethys Ocean. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A fully physical TCAD framework to model the NBTI is validated with differently processes MOSFET measured data. • RD model with ABDWT model for interface trap generation, RDD model for bulk trap generation, ABDWT model for hole trapping is used. • Framework Validation in TCAD in 3D FinFETs and GAA-FETs is in progress. A physics-based framework is incorporated in TCAD to model the primary mechanisms responsible for Negative Bias Temperature Instability (NBTI) in P channel High-K Metal Gate (HKMG) MOSFETs. Three underlying mechanisms are treated including interface trap generation-passivation via a Reaction-Diffusion (RD) model and its charge occupancy via an Activated Barrier Double Well Thermionic (ABDWT) model, hole trapping and de-trapping in pre-existing defects in the gate stack are modeled via an ABDWT model, and bulk trap generation-passivation is modeled via a Reaction-Diffusion-Drift (RDD) model. The framework is used to model measured NBTI time-kinetics for DC stress-recovery and various mixed DC-AC gate pulse segments for planar devices. Furthermore, the same framework is also used to test NBTI behavior in 3D FinFETs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Afforestation is affecting widespread sampling deficiency in plant collections. • The big data map the potential artificial and naturals tree coverage of the historical and revisited records of Engelhardia. • The afforestation on historical distribution of recorded plants is blinded by the bright. Against the background of climate change, the booming afforestation is the most effective strategy for climate change mitigation. Also, the rise of the economic forests can bring benefits to eliminate poverty from economic growth. However, it's worth noting that afforestation is affecting widespread sampling deficiency in plant collections. Here, we used the big data to map the potential artificial and naturals tree coverage of the historical and revisited records of Engelhardia. The results show that new collections localities have been discovered in areas with natural forest coverage; on average, the disappearance of recorded localities are likely to be related the increasing artificial forests. Our results highlight the disappearance of recorded species and/or shifts of the biodiversity patterns are blinded by the bright that photosynthetic carbon captured by the afforestation for climate change and the economic values to reduce regional poverty by the economic forests. Therefore, the natural forests are necessary to be valued in biodiversity, ecology and evolution. Also, our study provides insight into the impact of afforestation on historical distribution of recorded plants, which are essential to sustain ecological restoration programs, and will improve ecological managements and policies with the rise of artificial forests across the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zinc (Zn) isotope data for mid-ocean ridge basalts (MORB) are scarce. The possible effects of MORB differentiation and mantle compositional heterogeneity on MORB Zn isotope compositions are poorly understood. In this paper, we report Zn isotope data of MORB lavas from the East Pacific Rise (EPR) at 10°30′N, which are understood to have been derived by a similar extent of melting from a compositionally uniform mantle source but manifest significantly varying extents of magma differentiation (MgO = 7.38–1.76 wt%) to demonstrate unequivocal Zn isotope fractionation during MORB differentiation. These lavas have a small δ66Zn (relative to the JMC-Lyon standard) range of 0.21–0.32‰, with an average of 0.26 ± 0.07‰ (2SD, N = 24), overlapping with literature data. However, δ66Zn values show significant correlations with indices of magma differentiation (e.g., MgO and CaO), with the more differentiated samples having isotopically heavier Zn. We can thus conclude that MORB differentiation can lead to ∼0.1‰ δ66Zn elevation, which is similar to that observed in Hawaiian Kilauea Iki lava lake samples. Fractional crystallization of olivine and clinopyroxene at MgO > ∼3.5 wt% and clinopyroxene and Fe–Ti oxides dominated by ilmenite at MgO < ∼3.5 wt% results in the observed Zn isotope fractionation. The δ66Zn values for primitive N-MORB and MORB source mantle are estimated to be ∼0.22‰ and ∼0.17‰, respectively. Furthermore, we observe a positive correlation between δ66Zn and [La/Sm] N in primitive (MgO = 7.58–9.01 wt%) literature MORB, indicating the existence of possible Zn isotope heterogeneity in the oceanic upper mantle. We thus predict heavy Zn isotope enrichment in mantle sources for E-MORB samples with high [La/Sm] N , which requires future testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Five cadinane sesquiterpenoids, named stereumin A (1), B (2), C (3), D (4) and E (5) were isolated from the CHCl3 extract of the culture broth of the fungal strain CCTCC AF 207024. Based on the sequences at the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region and partial 28S rDNA, this fungus was identified as a Stereum sp. The structures of the five compounds were elucidated using spectroscopic data from 1D, 2D NMR and HRESIMS experiments, and the structures of 1 and 2 were further confirmed by single-crystal X-ray diffraction analysis. Compounds 1–5 showed nematicidal activities against the nematode Panagrellus redivivus at 400 mg l−1. Among these five compounds, compounds 3 and 4 killed 84.4% and 94.9% of P. redivivus, respectively in 48h. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• The sliding mode is fast continuous and nonsingular. • The controller reduces the chattering and renders high-precision performance. • The corresponding parameters are easy to adjust. • The conservativeness of the proposed controller is reduced. • The stability and robustness have been verified by the simulation and experiments. In this paper, a fast terminal sliding mode controller is designed for an active suspension gravity compensation system with unknown bounds of uncertainties and disturbances. A robust finite-time convergence estimator is used to estimate the velocity and the disturbances. The estimator can guarantee that the speed of the estimation errors converge faster than the displacement tracking errors by regulating its gains. The corresponding stability and robustness of the closed-loop system are proved. In particular, the proposed control scheme can reduce the chattering effectively and render the high-precision tracking performance that have been verified by the simulation and experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water vapor is the most variable constituent in the atmosphere and plays an important role in climate studies, mesoscale meteorology modeling and numerical weather forecasting. Being able to penetrate clouds, interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) shows great potential in atmospheric water vapor mapping. But InSAR can only measure differential water vapor between two acquisitions. In this paper, we formulate a general framework by constructing the Gauss-Markov model and developing the estimation method to retrieve the non-differential water vapor from Small BAseline Subset InSAR (SBAS-InSAR). To address the rank-deficiency in the Gauss-Markov model, we propose a new constraint, i.e., the temporal mean of water vapor being invariant. Simulated and real data experiments are conducted to validate the effectiveness of the framework and the advantages of the proposed constraint. The results show that the new constraint can offer an estimation more robust than the two traditional ones, i.e., the temporal mean of water vapor being zero and single or multiple epoch water vapor referencing. In addition, we found that there exists a constant bias, which equals to the temporal mean of water vapors, between the solutions under the new constraint and that under the constraint of the temporal mean of water vapor being zero. Finally, the possible methods to evaluate the temporal mean of water vapor are discussed. • Formulating a general framework and developing the estimation method to retrieve the non-differential PWV from TS-InSAR. • Proposing a new constraint to address the rank-deficiency in Gauss-Markov model. • Funding a constant bias between the solutions under the new constraint and that under one of the existing constraints. • Proving the equivalency between the new method and the rule of minimum-norm least-squares. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Idiopathic pulmonary hemosiderosis (IPH) is an extremely rare cause of massive pulmonary hemorrhage in children. During the acute phase, death due to massive alveolar hemorrhage and subsequent severe respiratory failure. We report two cases of IPH children who developed hypoxemic respiratory failure and massive pulmonary hemorrhage. One case of a 10-year-old boy was treated with methylprednisolone pulse therapy (10mg/kg/d) for the first three days and followed by systemic steroid therapy, he successfully decannulated 10days later and discharged with a favorable quality of life. Another case of a 4year-old female child with Down's syndrome diagnosed as IPH for over one year and treated with oral corticosteroids for maintenance therapy. She sudden suffered severe hypoxemia with rapid falls in the hemoglobin level. We applied methylprednisolone pulse therapy (10mg/kg/d) for three days and other supportive therapies, the girl survived through complicated with oxygen dependence. We suggest that methylprednisolone pulse therapy provides a chance of recovery and survival for patients with IPH at the acute phase, even if accompanied by severe pulmonary hemorrhage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Redox-driven copper (Cu) isotope fractionation has been widely observed in low-temperature weathering and hydrothermal processes. However, how Cu isotopes may fractionate during magmatic processes remain unknown. To address this issue, we studied MORB samples from the East Pacific Rise (EPR) at 10°30′N to explore the Cu isotope behavior during magma differentiation. These samples are globally ideal because they are generated from a uniformly depleted sub-ridge mantle source but have experienced varying extents of fractional crystallization and sulfide segregation with large variations of MgO (1.76–7.38 wt%) and Cu (16.0–75.2 μg/g). Lavas with MgO ≥ 4.9 wt% involving olivine, clinopyroxene and plagioclase as the major liquidus minerals show homogeneous δ65Cu of 0.05 ± 0.03‰, suggesting little Cu isotope fractionation at this stage of magma differentiation. However, after Fe-Ti oxides appear on the liquidus, melt δ65Cu values first decrease rapidly to –0.41‰ at MgO of 3.9 wt% and then increase with the most evolved sample having δ65Cu of 0.08‰. Such a significant Cu isotope fractionation during magma differentiation has never been reported before. We suggest the large Cu isotope variation at MgO < 4.9 wt% reflect a redox change of MORB melt resulting from fractional crystallization of Fe-Ti oxides. The crystallization of ilmenite (Fe2+TiO 3), which is the first Fe-Ti oxide phase during MORB differentiation, causes a sudden increase of Fe3+/∑Fe in the residual melt and drives the redox reaction Fe3+ + Cu1+ → Fe2+ + Cu2+. As a result, sulfides segregated from the MORB melts have high Cu2+ content and heavy Cu isotope compositions with Δ65Cu Sulfide-Silicate melt > 0 because of the preferential bonding of heavy Cu isotopes (65Cu vs. 63Cu) with Cu2+, whose fractionation rapidly decreases δ65Cu of the residual melts. The increase of Fe3+/∑Fe will quickly drive the melt to be saturated in titanomagnetite (magnetite-Ulvöspinel solid solutions), whose crystallization decreases melt Fe3+/∑Fe and drives the redox reaction Fe2+ + Cu2+ → Fe3+ + Cu1+. As a result, the segregated sulfides after titanomagnetite saturation have decreasing Cu2+ content. These sulfides are also predicted to have low Ni content and exhibit Δ65Cu Sulfide-Silicate melt < 0, whose segregation raises δ65Cu in the residual melts. Therefore, we suggest a significant influence of redox states of Cu and abundance of Ni in the segregated sulfides on the Cu isotope fractionation during MORB differentiation. During mantle melting for MORB at ΔFMQ < 0, Cu isotope fractionation between melt and mantle sulfide is inferred to be limited, and the upper mantle has primitive MORB-like δ65Cu of 0.06 ± 0.05‰. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background & Aims No targeted therapies have been found to be effective against hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), possibly due to the large degree of intratumor heterogeneity. We performed genetic analyses of different regions of HCCs to evaluate levels of intratumor heterogeneity and associate alterations with responses to different pharmacologic agents. Methods We obtained samples of HCCs (associated with hepatitis B virus infection) from 10 patients undergoing curative resection, before adjuvant therapy, at hospitals in China. We collected 4–9 spatially distinct samples from each tumor (55 regions total), performed histologic analyses, isolated cancer cells, and carried them low-passage culture. We performed whole-exome sequencing, copy-number analysis, and high-throughput screening of the cultured primary cancer cells. We tested responses of an additional 105 liver cancer cell lines to a fibroblast growth factor receptor (FGFR) 4 inhibitor. Results We identified a total of 3670 non-silent mutations (3192 missense, 94 splice-site variants, and 222 insertions or deletions) in the tumor samples. We observed considerable intratumor heterogeneity and branched evolution in all 10 tumors; the mean percentage of heterogeneous mutations in each tumor was 39.7% (range, 12.9%–68.5%). We found significant mutation shifts toward C>T and C>G substitutions in branches of phylogenetic trees among samples from each tumor ( P < .0001). Of note, 14 of the 26 oncogenic alterations (53.8%) varied among subclones that mapped to different branches. Genetic alterations that can be targeted by existing pharmacologic agents (such as those in FGF19, DDR2, PDGFRA , and TOP1 ) were identified in intratumor subregions from 4 HCCs and were associated with sensitivity to these agents. However, cells from the remaining subregions, which did not have these alterations, were not sensitive to these drugs. High-throughput screening identified pharmacologic agents to which these cells were sensitive, however. Overexpression of FGF19 correlated with sensitivity of cells to an inhibitor of FGFR 4; this observation was validated in 105 liver cancer cell lines ( P = .0024). Conclusions By analyzing genetic alterations in different tumor regions of 10 HCCs, we observed extensive intratumor heterogeneity. Our patient-derived cell line-based model, integrating genetic and pharmacologic data from multiregional cancer samples, provides a platform to elucidate how intratumor heterogeneity affects sensitivity to different therapeutic agents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes an incremental scheme to identify the neurons in electronic microscope image. It first computes the probability of each pixel being cell membrane and then determines the image areas of the neurons. Our contributions also include novel combined multi-scale image features that are computationally efficient and provide strong discrimination ability for differentiating membrane pixels from other pixels. Experiment results show that the proposed system offers much higher speed than the compared state-of-the-art methods while produces comparably high accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• New Sr-Nd-Hf isotopic data on MORB lavas from OH-1 and OH-3 segments at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge 33–35°N. • Three mantle components are identified in the mantle source of these MAR lavas. • A Sr-Nd-Hf isotopic view on the origin of geological differences in OH-1 and OH-3 segments. We present new Sr-Nd-Hf isotopic data on mid-ocean ridge basalts from two ridge segments (OH-1, OH-3) between the Oceanographer and Hayes fracture zones at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge 33–35°N to constrain the nature and origin of upper mantle heterogeneity beneath the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Together with the major and trace elements data (Niu et al., 2001), the new Sr-Nd-Hf isotopic data illustrate that the mantle sources of these lavas comprise three components, i.e., a depleted mantle with high radiogenic Hf isotopic compositions (ADM), an incompatible elemental enriched component with radiogenic Sr and un-radiogenic Nd-Hf isotopic compositions (E-type I), and an incompatible element depleted component with variably enriched Sr-Nd-Hf isotope compositions (i.e., E-type II). The ADM and E-type I components may be understood as representing ancient mantle melting residues and metasomatic veins developed at the base of the thickening oceanic lithosphere, respectively. The unique E-type II component is best explained as recent mantle melting residues of a geochemically enriched mantle, probably associated with the Azores mantle plume to the north. Taking together, we interpret the E-MORB dominated OH-1 lavas as resulting from a relatively higher degree melting of a mantle source composed of ADM matrix and E-type I material, whereas the N-MORB dominated OH-3 lavas resulting from lower degree melting of the mantle source primarily comprising ADM and E-type II components. Such a petrological and geochemical understanding explains the contrast in crustal thickness, ridge morphology and tomography, and mantle Bouguer anomalies between the two ridge segments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies of mid-ocean ridge basalts (MORB) have revealed a heterogeneous asthenospheric mantle in chemical elements and radiogenic isotopes. Here we report that MORB mantle is also heterogeneous in Fe isotopes through studying the glass samples from seamounts flanking the northern East Pacific Rise between 5° and 15°N. These samples show large Fe isotope variation with δ56Fe values (+0.03‰ to +0.36‰) exceeding the known range of MORB (+0.05‰ to +0.17‰). Such highly varied δ56Fe values cannot be well explained by seafloor alteration, fractional crystallization or partial melting processes, but instead require a source mantle significantly heterogeneous in Fe isotope compositions. Importantly, the δ56Fe values of these basalts correlate significantly with major and trace elements and Sr-Nd-Pb-Hf radiogenic isotopes, reflecting melting-induced mixing of a two-component mantle with the enriched component having heavy Fe isotope compositions dispersed as physically distinct domains in the depleted mantle matrix. The major and trace element characteristics of the enriched mantle component, as inferred from these basalts, are consistent with a low-degree melting origin. Such low-degree melts with heavy Fe isotope compositions most likely formed at sites such as the lithosphere-asthenosphere boundary beneath ocean basins, which can metasomatize the overlying oceanic lithosphere by crystallizing dikes/veins of garnet pyroxenite lithologies. Recycling of these dikes/veins with isotopically heavier Fe can readily contribute to the Fe isotope heterogeneity in the MORB mantle. However, the extremely high primitive δ56Fe values of the two alkali basalts (up to 0.34‰) require an enriched source component with unusually high δ56Fe values. We suggest that partial melts from the recycled dikes/veins of garnet pyroxenite lithologies can react with the ambient peridotitic mantle and generate a secondary garnet pyroxenite with heavier Fe isotope compositions than, but similar radiogenic isotope compositions as its precursor. Melting-induced mixing between these garnet pyroxenites (recycled and newly formed) and depleted mantle matrix can readily explain the compositional variations in elements, radiogenic isotopes and Fe isotopes observed in these seamount lavas. These new data and correlated variations offer a new dimension for understanding the origin of mantle chemical and isotopic heterogeneity in the context of chemical differentiation of the Earth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whether the Earth's mantle has a chondritic δ56Fe (deviation in 56Fe/54Fe from the IRMM-014 standard in parts per thousand) value or not remains under debate. The current view is that the observed average δ56Fe of mid-ocean ridge basalts (MORB) cannot be explained by partial melting of mantle source with chondritic value alone. Here, we report Fe isotope compositions on 29 MORB glasses sampled along a flowline traverse across the East Pacific Rise (EPR) axis at 10°30′N. These glasses show large MgO variation (1.8–7.4 wt.%) that forms a compositional continuum resulting from varying extent of fractional crystallization, which is accompanied by systematic Fe isotopic variation. Fractional crystallization modeling suggests that early crystallization of olivine, pyroxene and plagioclase gives rise to an iron enrichment trend and an increase in δ56Fe. Once Fe-Ti oxides appear on the liquidus and begin to crystallize, the FeOt and TiO 2 contents of the residual melt decrease rapidly, which lead to a slight decrease in δ56Fe. These observations indicate that significant Fe isotope fractionation can indeed take place during MORB melt evolution. Hence, δ56Fe values of variably evolved MORB melts do not represent those of primary MORB melts and thus cannot be used to infer mantle source Fe isotope compositions. Importantly, δ56Fe values of primary MORB melts after correction for the effect of fractional crystallization can be well reproduced by mantle melting. Therefore, our study supports the idea that the Fe isotope composition of the accessible Earth is close to be chondritic. We note that conclusion would assume that the core, which takes up ∼90% of the Earth's Fe, must have a chondritic Fe isotope composition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract The sucrose nonfermenting 1 (SNF1)-related protein kinase 2 (SnRK2) genes play central roles in plant stress signal transduction. In this study, 8 SnRK2 genes were identified from the tea plant genome database and named CsSnRK2.1-8. Phylogenetic analysis showed that the CsSnRK2 genes were classifiable into three groups, similar to those of Arabidopsis thaliana , Oryza sativa and maize. The coding sequences (CDSs) of all CsSnRK2s were separated by eight introns, and their exon-intron organizations exhibited high similarity to those of other plants. The fluorescence of GFP fused with CsSnRK2.3 was detected in only the cytoplasm, while the rest of the proteins showed GFP signal in both the nucleus and the cytoplasm. The results of the expression patterns of the CsSnRK2 genes showed that CsSnRK2s were differentially induced by salt, polyethylene glycol (PEG) and abscisic acid (ABA) stress. Interestingly, The expression of CsSnRK2.3 was inhibited by ABA, suggesting the complicated roles of CsSnRK2s in the ABA signal transduction pathway. Some CsSnRK2 gene pairs showed significant expression change correlations under stresses, indicating that CsSnRK2s might exhibit synergistic effects of signal regulation in response to various stresses. In summary, this comprehensive analysis will facilitate further studies of the SnRK2 family of Camellia sinensis and provide useful information for the functional validation of CsSnRK2s. Highlights • We identified and characterized 8 CsSnRK2 genes and explored the expression under abiotic stresses. • We explored the subcellular localizations of CsSnRK2s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of KBa 2−x−y (PO 3 ) 5 :xTb 3+ , yCe 3+ phosphors have been synthesized by the conventional high temperature solid-state reaction method. The crystal structure, the morphology, and the luminescent properties were investigated by X-ray power diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and photoluminescence spectra (PL). In the Ce 3+ and Tb 3+ co-doped system, the efficient energy transfer mechanism has been demonstrated to be an electric dipole-dipole interaction. The experimental results show that the optimum Tb 3+ and Ce 3+ doping concentrations are 0.4 and 0.01, respectively. The new phosphor of KBa 1.59 (PO 3 ) 5 :0.4Tb 3+ , 0.01Ce 3+ shows remarkable CIE chromaticity coordinates, indicating that it has potential application as a green-emitting phosphor in white light-emitting diodes (W-LEDs). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]