Search

Objective To study the antidiabetic and anti-oxidative effects of honokiol (Hon) in Magnolia officinalis and its underlying molecular mechanism in diabetic rats induced by high-fat diet (HFD) and streptozotocin (STZ). Methods After ig administration with Hon [25, 50, and 100 mg/(kg·d)] to diabetic rats for consecutive 10 weeks, the levels of blood glucose (BG), oral glucose tolerance (OGT), blood lipids including total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), high density lipoprotein-cholesterol (HDL-C), and low density lipoprotein-cholesterol (LDL-C), hepatic oxidative stress including the activities of superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT), glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px), methane dicarboxylic aldehyde (MDA), and cytochrome P4502E1 (CYP2E1) in diabetic rats were measured. Results Compared to the diabetic control rats, ig administration of Hon resulted in significant decrease in BG, TC, TG, and LDL-C levels in serum, as well as hepatic CYP2E1 activity and MDA content in diabetic rats, whereas the level of OGT and activities of hepatic CAT, SOD, and GSH-Px in diabetic rats were significantly increased. Conclusion Hon could alleviate hyperglycemia, hyperlipemia, hepatic oxidative damage, and insulin resistance in diabetic rats by inhibiting hepatic CYP2E1 activity.

This article mainly introduced novel carrier-modified methods for active targeting antitumor preparation as well as their evaluation methodology in recent years. By reviewing related domestic and overseas literatures, the up-to-date scientific researches concerning active targeting antitumor preparation were elaborated and the problems existing in present studies were discussed. Numerous valid vector-embellished methods had been discovered with excellent targeting effects, and the significant progress was acquired for the evaluation tools in vitro and in vivo. The active targeting agent would be a major direction in prospective tumor or cancer therapeutic regimen.

Lead-free piezoelectric ceramics of Ba 0.70 Ca 0.30 Ti 1− x Fe x O 3 ( x =0–0.03) have been synthesized by a conventional solid state reaction method. The influence of Fe content on the microstructure, phase transition, dielectric, ferroelectric, and piezoelectric properties is investigated systematically. The ceramics with x ≤0.02 are diphasic composites of tetragonal Ba 0.80 Ca 0.20 TiO 3 :Fe and orthorhombic Ba 0.07 Ca 0.93 TiO 3 :Fe solid solutions. The tetragonal phase is gradually suppressed as x increases, the ceramic with x =0.03 is found to have diphasic pseudocubic and orthorhombic phases. And the grain size is dependent on Fe content significantly. Introduction of Fe at B-sites improves the densification and decreases the sintering temperature. As x increases from 0 to 0.03, the room temperature relative dielectric permittivity enhances, dielectric loss decreases, and the Curie temperature decreases monotonically from 128 °C to 58 °C. However, the ferroelectricity enhances slightly and reaches the maximum near x =0.005, and then weakens with increasing x . On the other hand, the piezoelectric coefficient ( d 33 ) and the electromechanical coupling coefficient ( k p ) decrease simultaneously with increasing x , whereas the mechanical quality factor ( Q m ) increases significantly. The structure–electrical properties relationship is discussed intensively to give more information on (Ba,Ca)TiO 3 -based lead-free piezoelectric ceramics.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the image quality of hand tendons using dual-energy computed tomographic gemstone spectral imaging (DECT GSI) compared with conventional CT images.Forty patients scanned with GSI mode on DECT were enrolled. The 65-keV optimal contrast-to-noise ratio for viewing hand tendons was selected. The image quality of monochromatic GSI images (65 keV) and conventional CT images was compared with two different methods including a subjective method and an objective method by two radiologists, respectively.In the subjective method, the image quality in GSI images was superior to conventional CT images (P.05). And in the objective method, the beam-hardening artifacts in the phalanges of finger space were reduced markedly, with hand tendons displaying more clearly in GSI images (P.05). There was no significant difference between the two radiologists in both methods, with good correlation (kappa=0.75, kappa=0.85).DECT GSI with the optimal 65-keV monochromatic images could reduce the artifacts and increase image quality significantly in hand tendons imaging. It might be very useful in detecting tendon diseases in routine work.

Taking 29 Chinese lakes and 29 Italian lakes as two separate case studies, the paper presented the variations of exergies and structural exergies along eutrophication gradients in Chinese and Italian lakes. The exergies (Ex) and structural exergies (Exst) were calculated based on phytoplankton biomass (BA) and zooplankton biomass (BZ). A trophic state index (TSI) scaling from 0 to 100 was developed to classify trophic status for Chinese and Italian lakes based on three indicators, chlorophyll-a concentration (Chl-a, in mg/m3), total phosphorus (TP in mg/m3) and transparency in Secchi disk depth (SD in m). The relationships between TSI and Ex, Exst, total biomass, BZ/BA ratios were analyzed. The following results were obtained: (1) with the increase of TSI in Chinese and Italian lakes, there is an increasing trend for Ex, and a decreasing trend for Exst, generally. The obvious negative correlations exist between TSI and Exst, at the significant level of 0.01 for Italian lakes, and 0.05 for Chinese lakes. The obvious positive correlations exist between TSI and Ex, at the significant level of 0.01 for Chinese lakes, and for Italian lakes in Spring, Autumn and the all-year. (2) The structural exergy is more dependent on the ratio of phytoplankton biomass to zooplankton biomass (BZ/BA) than the exergy, and the exergy is more dependent on total biomass than the structural exergy. (3) The phytoplankton biomass (BA) and zooplankton biomass (BZ) are increased with the increasing TSI in Chinese and Italian lakes, and phytoplankton biomass (BA) increases more rapidly then zooplankton biomass (BZ) does. This results in the definite decrease of BZ/BA ratio with the increasing trophic status index. Such changes of BA, BZ and BZ/BA ratio could explain successfully the variations of exergies and structural exergies along eutrophication gradients in Chinese and Italian lakes. From the two separate case studies of Chinese lakes and Italian lakes, it could be concluded that exergy and structural exergy are feasible to serve as the system-level ecological indicators to give appropriate information on the trophic status of different lakes.

The residual levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in the liver, brain, gill and muscle tissues of four common edible freshwater fish species including crucian carp, snakehead fish, grass carp and silver carp collected from Lake Small Bai-Yang-Dian in northern China were measured by GC–MS. The distribution and composition pattern of PAHs in the fish tissues, and the effects of lipid contents in fish tissues and the octanol–water partition coefficient (Kow) of PAHs congeners on them were analyzed. The human health risk of PAHs though fish consumptions was estimated. The following results were obtained: (1) The average residual levels of total PAHs (PAH16) on wet weight base in the different tissues of each fish species ranged from 4.764 to 144.254 ng/g ww. The differences in the average residual levels on wet weight base for PAH16 within four fish species were not statistically significant (P > 0.05); however, these within four fish tissues were statistically significant (P

The electronic structures and optical properties of heavily boron (B)-doped zinc blende silicon carbide (β-SiC) have been investigated using the plane-wave pseudo-potential method with the generalized gradient approximation (GGA) based on density functional theory. The doped models Si n BC n −1 ( n =4, 32) have been constructed by β-SiC unit cell. The calculated results show that the band gap of β-SiC transforms from indirect band gap to direct band gap with band gap shrink after carbon atom is replaced by boron atom. The dielectric constant of heavily B-doped β-SiC in low frequency is found to be remarkably larger, so it may act as a new dielectric material. Furthermore, after B doping, absorption peaks appear in the ultra-violet band (5–20 eV) and infrared band (0–2 eV). The ultra-violet absorption is similar to the undoped β-SiC. The infrared absorption would intensify with the increase of doping concentration, and absorption edge emerges redshift.

Using the first-principles density functional method, we investigate the band structures and conductivity spectra for N-doped 3C-SiC. It is found that conductivity peaks of heavily N-doped 3C-SiC are observed in the ultraviolet (UV), visible and infrared (IR) regions while the peaks can be only seen in the UV region for 3C-SiC. In the UV region, the conductivity peaks of 3C-SiC are obviously higher than those of N-doped 3C-SiC. According to the data of band structures, we calculate the ionized impurity scattering, inter-carrier scattering and neutral impurity scattering. The calculation results show that the scattering by incomplete ionization N to electrons and inter-carrier scattering have large effect on the conductive behavior of heavily N-doped 3C-SiC at room temperature. In the UV region, the conductivity of 3C-SiC depends on long-wavelength optical wave scattering, which has a longer relaxation time than that inter-carrier scattering and neutral scattering. This is the reason of anomalous conductivity of N-doped 3C-SiC in the UV region.

[corrected] To determine the correlation of lipocalin-type prostaglandin D synthase (L-PGDS) and alpha-glucosidase in semen.We analyzed 68 seminal plasmas for lipocalin-type prostaglandin D synthase (L-PGDS) and alpha-glucosidase, L-PGDS was analyzed by ELISA. The semen donors were categorized in 3 groups: normal, obstructive and non-obstructive azoospermia. We then evaluated their correlation.The difference of L-PGDS concentration (P0.001) and alpha-glucosidase activity (P0.001) among the 3 clinical groups was statistically significant. Correlation between L-PGDS concentration and alpha-glucosidase was also statistically significant. L-PGDS concentration correlated positively with alpha-glucosidase activity (r=0.882).L-PGDS in seminal plasma, like alpha-glucosidase, suggests an obstruction of the seminal ducts and may be a potential marker that may aid in the differential diagnosis of obstructive and non-obstructive azoospermia.