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Background Microangiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis are essential for tumor growth in the tumor microenvironment, contributing to tumor invasion and metastasis. Limited literature exists on these processes in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). Therefore, the purpose of this study is to explore the impacts of microangiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis on the occurrence, progression, and prognosis assessment of ESCC. Methods Surgical specimens and paraffin-embedded human tissues were procured from ESCC patients, encompassing 100 ESCC tissues and 100 cancer-adjacent normal (CAN) tissues. CD34 and D2-40 were utilized as markers for microvessel endothelial cells and lymphatic vessel endothelial cells, respectively. Microvascular density (MVD) and lymphatic vessel density (LVD) were evaluated through immunohistochemical quantification. Results We found that tumor tissues in ESCC patients had significantly higher MVD and LVD than cancer-adjacent normal (CAN) tissues. High MVD and LVD were associated with lymph node metastasis and advanced tumor clinical stages. Additionally, both high MVD and high LVD were strongly linked to poorer prognosis among cancer patients. Furthermore, a positive correlation was found between high MVD and high LVD (p < 0.05). The presence of these markers individually indicated a worse prognosis, with their combined assessment showcasing enhanced prognostic value. Conclusions Overall, the increased MVD and LVD indicates higher invasion and metastasis of ESCC, closely correlating with unfavorablefor poor prognosis of ESCC patients.

Introduction: Gene-edited pigs have become prominent models for studying human disease mechanisms, gene therapy, and xenotransplantation. CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats)/CRISPR-associated 9 (CRISPR/Cas9) technology is a widely employed tool for generating gene-edited pigs. Nevertheless, delivering CRISPR/Cas9 to pre-implantation embryos has traditionally posed challenges due to its reliance on intricate micromanipulation equipment and specialized techniques, resulting in high costs and time-consuming procedures. This study aims to introduce a novel one-step approach for generating genetically modified pigs by transducing CRISPR/Cas9 components into pre-implantation porcine embryos through oviductal injection of recombinant adeno-associated viruses (rAAV).Methods: We first used rAAV-1, rAAV-6, rAAV-8, rAAV-9 expressing EGFP to screen for rAAV serotypes that efficiently target porcine embryos, and then, to achieve efficient expression of CRISPR/Cas9 in vivo for a short period, we packaged sgRNAs targeting the GHR genes to self-complementary adeno-associated virus (scAAV), and Cas9 proteins to single-stranded adeno-associated virus (ssAAV). The efficiency of porcine embryos -based editing was then validated in vitro. The feasibility of this one-step method to produce gene-edited pigs using rAAV-CRISPR/Cas9 oviductal injection into sows within 24 h of conception was then validated.Results: Our research firstly establishes the efficient delivery of CRISPR/Cas9 to pig zygotes, both in vivo and in vitro, using rAAV6. Successful gene editing in pigs was achieved through oviductal injection of rAAV-CRISPR/Cas9.Conclusion: This method circumvents the intricate procedures involved in in vitro embryo manipulation and embryo transfers, providing a straightforward and cost-effective approach for the production of gene-edited pigs.

Biomineralization in plant roots refers to the process of cell-induced self-assembly to form nanostructures on the root surface. Silicon (Si) is the second most abundant element in soils, and beneficial to plant growth. Meanwhile, silicon is shown to participate in the process of biomineralization, which is useful for improving mechanical strength and alleviating biotic and abiotic stress, for example silicic acid polymerizes to form amorphous silica (SiO2–nH2O) in the process of growing to resist fungi and environmental stress. This process alters physical and chemical properties of cell wall. However, the mechanistic basis of this process remains unclear. Aluminum toxicity is a major constraint affecting plant performance in acid soil. This paper summarizes recent research advances in the field of plant biomineralization and describes the effects of silicon biomineralization on plant aluminum tolerance and its adaptive significance, using aluminum toxicity as a case study.

Abstract Ca2+ is an important signaling messenger. In microorganisms, fungi, and plants, H+/Ca2+ antiporters (CAX) are known to play key roles in the homeostasis of intracellular Ca2+ by catalyzing its efflux across the cell membrane. Here, we reveal that the bacterial CAX homolog YfkE transports Ca2+ in two distinct modes: a low-flux H+/Ca2+ exchange mode and a high-flux mode in which Ca2+ and phosphate ions are co-transported (1:1) in exchange for H+. Coupling with phosphate greatly accelerates the Ca2+ efflux activity of YfkE. Our studies reveal that Ca2+ and phosphate bind to adjacent sites in a central translocation pathway and lead to mechanistic insights that explain how this CAX alters its conserved alpha-repeat motifs to adopt phosphate as a specific “transport chaperon” for Ca2+ translocation. This finding uncovers a co-transport mechanism within the CAX family that indicates this class of proteins contributes to the cellular homeostasis of both Ca2+ and phosphate.

Abstract Homologous recombination deficiency (HRD) renders cancer cells vulnerable to unrepaired double-strand breaks and is an important therapeutic target as exemplified by the clinical efficacy of poly ADP-ribose polymerase (PARP) inhibitors as well as the platinum chemotherapy drugs applied to HRD patients. However, it remains a challenge to predict HRD status precisely and economically. Copy number alteration (CNA), as a pervasive trait of human cancers, can be extracted from a variety of data sources, including whole genome sequencing (WGS), SNP array, and panel sequencing, and thus can be easily applied clinically. Here we systematically evaluate the predictive performance of various CNA features and signatures in HRD prediction and build a gradient boosting machine model (HRDCNA) for pan-cancer HRD prediction based on these CNA features. CNA features BP10MB[1] (The number of breakpoints per 10MB of DNA is 1) and SS[ > 7 &

Background: Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma is the most common malignant tumor of the upper gastrointestinal tract, which is prone to metastasis and has a poor prognosis. Lysine oxidase-like protein 2 (LOXL2) is an important intracellular protein that is highly expressed in a variety of tumors, leading to reduced patient survival. Studies have shown that LOXL2 is closely associated with tumor metastasis. However, the effect of LOXL2 on the biological function of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) and its related mechanisms are not fully understood. This study aimed to evaluate the potential prognostic and treatment value of LOXL2 in patients with ESCC. Results: The expression of LOXL2 was higher in ESCC tissues than in adjacent tissues. Positive LOXL2 expression was associated with poor tumor differentiation, lymph node metastases, and poor prognosis in ESCC patients. LOXL2 is an independent prognostic risk factor for ESCC. In vitro experiments showed that LOXL2 significantly promoted ESCC cell proliferation, migration, and invasion ability. LOXL2 altered the expression of the EMT marker, upregulating the mesenchymal marker (Snail) and downregulating the epithelial marker (E-cadherin). Mechanistically, LOXL2 induces EMT in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma by increasing FAK and SRC phosphorylation levels. Conclusions: Taken together, LOXL2 regulates the FAK/Src signaling pathway to promote malignant biological behavior and EMT process in ESCC cells. LOXL2 is a marker of poor prognosis, and LOXL2 could be a promising therapeutic target for the treatment of esophageal squamous carcinoma.How to cite: Liu Y, Liu X, Chen F, et al. LOXL2 promotes tumor proliferation and metastasis by FAK/Src signaling in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma. Electron J Biotechnol 2023;63. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejbt.2023.01.002.

The development of global urbanization has brought about a significant amount of solid waste. These untreated wastes may be dumped in any corner, causing serious pollution to the environment. Thus, it is necessary to accurately obtain their distribution locations and detailed edge information. In this study, a practical deep learning network for recognizing solid waste piles over extensive areas using unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) imagery has been proposed and verified. Firstly, a high-resolution dataset serving to solid waste detection was created based on UAV aerial data. Then, a dual-branch solid waste semantic segmentation model was constructed to address the characteristics of the integration of solid waste distribution with the environment and the irregular edge morphology. The Context feature branch is responsible for extracting high-level semantic features, while the Spatial feature branch is designed to capture fine-grained spatial details. After information fusion, the model obtained more comprehensive feature representation and segmentation ability. The effectiveness of the improvement was verified through ablation experiments and compared with 13 commonly used semantic segmentation models, demonstrating the advantages of the method in solid waste segmentation tasks, with an overall accuracy of over 94%, and a recall rate of 88.6%—much better than the best performing baselines. Finally, a spatial distribution map of solid waste over Jiaxing district, China was generated by the model inference, which assisted the environmental protection department in completing environmental management. The proposed method provides a feasible approach for the accurately monitoring of solid waste, so as to provide policy support for environmental protection.

Ruminants such as cattle rely mainly on microbes in the rumen to digest cellulose and hemicellulose from forage, and the digestion products are mainly absorbed and utilized by the host in the form of short chain fatty acids (SCFAs). This study aimed to isolate acid-producing strains from the cattle rumen and investigate their functions. A total of 980 strains of acid-producing bacteria were isolated from cattle rumen contents using a medium supplemented with bromocresol green. Combined with the test of acid production ability and 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing technology, five strains were selected based on their ability to produce relatively high levels of acid, including Bacillus pumillus, Enterococcus hirae, Enterococcus faecium, and Bacillus subtilis. Sheep were treated by gavage with a mixed bacterial suspension. The results showed that mixed bacteria significantly increased the body weight gain and feed conversion rate of sheep. To investigate the function of acid-producing bacteria in sheep, we used 16S rDNA sequencing technology to analyze the rumen microbes of sheep. We found that mixed bacteria changed the composition and abundance of sheep rumen bacteria. Among them, the abundance of Bacteroidota, Actinobacteriota, Acidobacteriota, and Proteobacteria was significantly increased, and the abundance of Firmicutes was significantly decreased, indicating that the changes in gut microbiota changed the function of the sheep rumen. The acid-producing bacteria isolated in this study can effectively promote the growth of ruminants, such as cattle and sheep, and can be used as additives to improve breeding efficiency, which lays a foundation for subsequent research on probiotics.

Despite intensive effort was made to regenerate injured meniscus by cell-free strategies through recruiting endogenous stem/progenitor cells, meniscus regeneration remains a great challenge in clinic. In this study, we found decellularized meniscal extracellular matrix (MECM) preserved native meniscal collagen and glycosaminoglycans which could be a good endogenous regeneration guider for stem cells. Moreover, MECM significantly promoted meniscal fibrochondrocytes viability and proliferation, increased the expression of type II collagen and proteoglycans in vitro. Meanwhile, we designed 3D-printed polycaprolactone (PCL) scaffolds which mimic the circumferential and radial collagen orientation in native meniscus. Taken these two advantages together, a micro-structure and micro-environment dually biomimetic cell-free scaffold was manipulated. This cell-free PCL-MECM scaffold displayed superior biocompatibility and yielded favorable biomechanical capacities closely to native meniscus. Strikingly, neo-menisci were regenerated within PCL-MECM scaffolds which were transplanted into knee joints underwent medial meniscectomy in rabbits and sheep models. Histological staining confirmed neo-menisci showed meniscus-like heterogeneous staining. Mankin scores showed PCL-MECM scaffold could protect articular cartilage well, and knee X-ray examination revealed same results. Knee magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanning also showed some neo-menisci in PCL-MECM scaffold group. In conclusion, PCL-MECM scaffold appears to optimize meniscus regeneration. This could represent a promising approach worthy of further investigation in preclinical applications.

Chaolong Wang and colleagues report a large genome-wide association study for COVID-19 severity in Chinese individuals. By meta-analysis with European data, they identify 3 loci associated with severe disease that suggest key roles for the adaptive immune system and the ABO blood group system in development of severe COVID-19.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) ranks as the leading cause of dementia. MicroRNA (miR)-212-3p has been identified to exert neuroprotective effects on brain disorders. The current study analyzed the protective role of miR-212-3p in AD rats via regulating the nucleotide-binding oligomerization domain-like receptor family pyrin domain containing 3 (NLRP3)/Caspase-1 signaling pathway. The AD rat model was established via injection of amyloid-β 1-42 (Aβ1-42), followed by the Morris water maze test. The morphology and functions of neurons were observed. Furthermore, miR-212-3p, NLRP3, cleaved Caspase-1, gasdermin D N-terminus, interleukin (IL)-1β and IL-18 expressions were measured. H19-7 cells were treated with Aβ1-42 to establish the AD cell model, followed by an assessment of cell viability and pyroptosis. Downstream targets of miR-212-3p and specificity protein 1 (SP1), as well as beta-site amyloid precursor protein cleaving enzyme 1 (BACE1) were predicted by databases and testified using dual-luciferase and chromatin immunoprecipitation assays. miR-212-3p was weakly expressed in AD rats. miR-212-3p overexpression was linked to improved learning and memory capacities of AD rats and reduced neuronal pyroptosis linked to neuroinflammation attenuation. In vitro, miR-212-3p improved viability and suppressed pyroptosis of neurons via inhibiting NLRP3/Caspase-1. Overall, miR-212-3p inhibited SP1 expression to block BACE1-induced activation of NLRP3/Caspase-1, thereby attenuating neuroinflammation of AD rats.

Abstract Mucoepidermoid carcinoma (MEC) is the most common type of salivary gland cancers and patients with advanced, metastatic, and recurrent MECs have limited therapeutic options and poor treatment outcomes. MEC is commonly associated with a chromosomal translocation t(11;19) (q14-21;p12-13) that encodes the CRTC1-MAML2 oncogenic fusion. The CRTC1-MAML2 fusion is required for MEC growth in part through inducing autocrine AREG-EGFR signaling. Growing evidence suggests that MEC malignancy is maintained by cancer stem-like cells. In this study, we aimed to determine critical signaling for maintaining MEC stem-like cells and the effect of combined targeting of stem cell signaling and CRTC1-MAML2-induced EGFR signaling on blocking MEC growth. First, we evaluated the significance of Notch signaling in regulating MEC stem-like cells. Aberrantly activated Notch signaling was detected in human fusion-positive MEC cells. The inhibition of Notch signaling with genetic or pharmacological inhibitors reduced oncosphere formation and ALDH-bright population in vitro and blocked the growth of MEC xenografts in vivo. Next, we investigated the effect of co-targeting Notch signaling and EGFR signaling, and observed enhanced inhibition on MEC growth in vivo. Collectively, this study identified a critical role of Notch signaling in maintaining MEC stem-like cells and tumor growth, and revealed a novel approach of co-targeting Notch and EGFR signaling as a potential effective anti-MEC treatment.

The fluid inerter is a new mechanical element which has received great attention in the field of vibration reduction. However, due to the influence of secondary flow in the curved channel, the damping force is too large and the inertia force is relatively small, which limits the engineering applications of the single-cylinder fluid inerter. To eliminate the influence of secondary flow in the single-cylinder fluid inerter, this paper proposes a dual-cylinder fluid inerter that has a straight tube instead of the spiral pipe or spiral groove. We Analyze the working principle, derive conditions of free movement, establish the damping force and inertia force model, and prove the validity of the model through bench testing. Contrastingly, it is found that the maximum parasitic damping force is only 40.32% of the single-cylinder structure, but the inertia force increases to 180.96% of the single-cylinder structure. The proposed inerter greatly increases the proportion of inertia force, and provides a new scheme for engineering applications.

The cow’s milk production characteristics are a significant economic indicator in the livestock industry. Serum cytokines such as interleukin-17 (IL-17) may be potential indicators for bovine mastitis concerning the milk somatic cell count (SCC) and somatic cell score (SCS). The current study aims to find previously undiscovered single nucleotide polymorphisms in the bovine (IL-17A) gene and further investigates their associations with milk production traits in Chinese Holstein cows. Twenty Chinese Holstein cows were randomly chosen from six farms in Jiangsu Province, China. The DNA was extracted from selected samples of bloods for PCR amplification Sequence analyses were used to find SNPs in the bovine (IL-17A) gene. The discovered five SNPs are g-1578A>G, g-1835G>A, and g-398T>A in the 5′UTR; g3164T>C and g3409G>C in the exon region. The genotyping of Holstein cows (n = 992) was performed based on Sequenom Mass ARRAY and SNP data. The connection between SNPs, milk production variables, and the somatic cell score was investigated using the least-squares method. Based on the results, SNP g-398T>A had a significant linkage disequilibrium with g3164T>C. SNPs were found to have significant (p < 0.05) correlations with the test-day milk yield. In conclusion, IL-17A affects cow’s milk production traits significantly.

Lung cancer with loss-of-function of the LKB1 tumor suppressor is a common aggressive subgroup with no effective therapies. LKB1-deficiency induces constitutive activation of cAMP/CREB-mediated transcription by a family of three CREB-regulated transcription coactivators (CRTC1-3). However, the significance and mechanism of CRTC activation in promoting the aggressive phenotype of LKB1-null cancer remain poorly characterized. Here, we observed overlapping CRTC expression patterns and mild growth phenotypes of individual CRTC-knockouts in lung cancer, suggesting functional redundancy of CRTC1-3. We consequently designed a dominant-negative mutant (dnCRTC) to block all three CRTCs to bind and co-activate CREB. Expression of dnCRTC efficiently inhibited the aberrantly activated cAMP/CREB-mediated oncogenic transcriptional program induced by LKB1-deficiency, and specifically blocked the growth of human and murine LKB1-inactivated lung cancer. Collectively, this study provides direct proof for an essential role of the CRTC-CREB activation in promoting the malignant phenotypes of LKB1-null lung cancer and proposes the CRTC-CREB interaction interface as a novel therapeutic target.

Objective: Postoperative complications of surgical revascularization in moyamoya disease (MMD) are difficult to predict because of poor knowledge of the underlying pathophysiological process. Since the aim of surgery is to improve brain dynamics by increasing regional blood flow, we hypothesize that postoperative complications are closely related to aberrant electrophysiological changes. Thus, we evaluated the clinical significance of intraoperative electrocorticography (iECoG) in bypass surgery for adult MMD. Methods: Ninety-one adult patients operated on by the same neurosurgeon in our institute were involved (26 in the iECoG group, 65 in the traditional group). Two 1 × 6 subdural electrode grids were placed parallel to the middle frontal gyrus and superior temporal gyrus to record ECoG data continuously during the procedure in the iECoG group. Selected from several M4 candidate arteries, the recipient artery was determined to be closer to the cortex with lower power spectral density (PSD) in the beta band. The PSD parameter we used was the (delta+theta)/(alpha+beta) (DTAB) ratio (DTABR). Next, the pre- and post-bypass PSD values were evaluated, and correlations between post-/pre-bypass PSD parameter ratios and neurological/neuropsychological performance (in terms of changes in National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale [NIHSS] and Mini-Mental State Examination [MMSE] scores) were analyzed. Results: Postoperative complications (transient neurological events) in the iECoG group were significantly lower than those in the traditional group (p = 0.046). In the iECoG group, the post-/pre-bypass DTABR ratio in the bypass area was significantly correlated with postoperative NIHSS (p = 0.002, r2 = 0.338) and MMSE changes (p = 0.007, r2 = 0.266). In the nonbypass area, neither postoperative NIHSS nor MMSE changes showed a significant correlation with the post-/pre-bypass DTABR ratio (p > 0.05). Additionally, patients with postoperative complications exhibited significantly higher DTABR (1.67 ± 0.33 vs. 0.95 ± 0.08, p = 0.003) and PSD of the theta band (1.54 ± 0.21 vs. 1.13 ± 0.08, p = 0.036). Conclusions: This study is the first to explain and guide surgical revascularization from the perspective of electrophysiology. Intraoperative ECoG is not only sensitive in reflecting and predicting postoperative neurological and cognitive performance but also usable as a reference for recipient artery selection.

1,2-propanediol (1,2-PDO) is an industrial chemical with a broad range of applications, such as the production of alkyd and unsaturated polyester resins. It is currently produced as a racemic mixture from nonrenewable petroleum-based feedstocks. We have reported a novel artificial pathway for the biosynthesis of 1,2-PDO via lactic acid isomers as the intermediates. The pathway circumvents the cytotoxicity issue caused by methylglyoxal intermediate in the naturally existing pathway. Successful E. coli bioconversion of lactic acid to 1,2-PDO was shown in previous report. Here, we demonstrated the engineering of E. coli host strains for the de novo biosynthesis of 1,2-PDO through this pathway. Under fermenter-controlled conditions, the R-1,2-PDO was produced at 17.3 g/L with a molar yield of 42.2% from glucose, while the S-isomer was produced at 9.3 g/L with a molar yield of 23.2%. The optical purities of the two isomers were 97.5% ee (R) and 99.3% ee (S), respectively. To the best of our knowledge, these are the highest titers of 1,2-PDO biosynthesized by either natural producer or engineered microbial strains that are published in peer-reviewed journals. Keywords: 1,2-propanediol, Lactic acid, Reduction, Stereospecific, Escherichia coli

Background: MicroRNA-155 (miR-155) is upregulated during T cell activation, but the exact mechanisms by which it influences CD4+ T cell activation remain unclear. Objective: To examine whether the B and T lymphocyte attenuator (BTLA) is a target of miR-155 during naïve CD4+ T cell activation. Methods: Firefly luciferase reporter plasmids pEZX-MT01-wild-type-BTLA and pEZX-MT01-mutant-BTLA were constructed. Lymphocytes were nucleofected with miR-155 inhibitor or negative control (NC). Then, naïve CD4+ CD62L+ helper T cells purified from lymphocytes were stimulated with immobilized antibody to CD3 and soluble antibody to CD28. miR-155 and BTLA expression were examined by real-time RT-PCR. Cell surface CD69 expression and IL-2 secretion were measured by ELISA and flowcytometry, respectively. Results: Luciferase reporter assay showed that miR-155 targeted the BTLA 3’UTR region. Compared with non-stimulated condition, both miR-155 and BTLA mRNA expression were upregulated after T cell activation. Similar results were observed for BLTA protein expression. Compared with NC, the miR-155 inhibitor decreased miR-155 by about 45%, but did not influence BTLA mRNA expression. Compared with NC, the miR-155 inhibitor decreased the surface BTLA expression by about 60%. Upregulation of BTLA in miR-155 knockdown CD4+ T cells did not influence the cell surface expression of CD69, an early activation marker (p=0.523). Similarly, IL-2 production was not changed. Conclusion: miR-155 is involved in the inhibition of BTLA during CD4+ T cell activation. These results might serve as a basis for an eventual therapeutic manipulation of this pathway to treat inflammatory and autoimmune diseases.

Fatty acid-derived fuels and chemicals have attracted a great deal of attention in recent decades, due to their following properties of high compatibility to gasoline-based fuels and existing infrastructure for their direct utilization, storage and distribution. The yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is the ideal biofuel producing candidate, based on the wealth of available genetic information and versatile tools designed to manipulate its metabolic pathways. Engineering the fatty acid metabolic pathways in S. cerevisiae is an effective strategy to increase its fatty acid biosynthesis and provide more pathway precursors for production of targeted products. This review summarizes the recent progress in metabolic engineering of yeast cells for fatty acids and fatty acid derivatives production, including the regulation of acetyl-CoA biosynthesis, NADPH production, fatty acid elongation, and the accumulation of activated precursors of fatty acids for converting enzymes. By introducing specific enzymes in the engineered strains, a powerful platform with a scalable, controllable and economic route for advanced biofuel production has been established. Keywords: Metabolic engineering, Fatty acid biosynthesis, Fatty acid derivatives, Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Long-distance imaging in time-varying scattering media, such as atmosphere, is a significant challenge. Light is often heavily diffused while propagating through scattering media, because of which the clear imaging of objects concealed by media becomes difficult. In this study, instead of suppressing diffusion by multiple scattering, we used natural randomness of wave propagation through atmospheric scattering media as an optimal and instantaneous compressive imaging mechanism. A mathematical model of compressive imaging based on the modulation of atmospheric scattering media was established. By using the Monte Carlo method, the atmospheric modulation matrix was obtained, and the numerical simulation of modulation imaging of atmospheric scattering media was performed. Comparative experiments show that the atmospheric matrix can achieve the same modulation effect as the Hadamard and Gaussian random matrices. The effectiveness of the proposed optical imaging approach was demonstrated experimentally by loading the atmospheric measurement matrix onto a digital micromirror device to perform single pixel compressive sensing measurements. Our work provides a new direction to ongoing research in the field of imaging through scattering media.

Image acutance or edge contrast in an image plays a crucial role in hyperspectral hand biometrics, especially in the local feature representation phase. However, the study of acutance in this application has not received a lot of attention. Therefore, in this paper we propose that there is an optimal range of image acutance in hyperspectral hand biometrics. To locate this optimal range, a thresholded pixel-wise acutance value (TPAV) is firstly proposed to assess image acutance. Then, through convolving with Gaussian filters, a hyperspectral hand image was preprocessed to obtain different TPAVs. Afterwards, based on local feature representation, the nearest neighbor method was used for matching. The experiments were conducted on hyperspectral dorsal hand vein (HDHV) and hyperspectral palm vein (HPV) databases containing 53 bands. The results that achieved the best performance were those where image acutance was adjusted to the optimal range. On average, the samples with adjusted acutance compared to the original improved by a recognition rate (RR) of 29.5% and 45.7% for the HDHV and HPV datasets, respectively. Furthermore, our method was validated on the PolyU multispectral palm print database producing similar results to that of the hyperspectral. From this we can conclude that image acutance plays an important role in hyperspectral hand biometrics.

With the rapid development of cloud computing, it is playing an increasingly important role in data sharing. Meanwhile, attribute-based encryption (ABE) has been an effective way to share data securely in cloud computing. In real circumstances, there is often a mutual access sub-policy in different providers’ access policies, and the significance of each attribute is usual diverse. In this paper, a secure and efficient data-sharing scheme in cloud computing, which is called unified ciphertext-policy weighted attribute-based encryption (UCP-WABE), is proposed. The weighted attribute authority assigns weights to attributes depending on their importance. The mutual information extractor extracts the mutual access sub-policy and generates the mutual information. Thus, UCP-WABE lowers the total encryption time cost of multiple providers. We prove that UCP-WABE is selectively secure on the basis of the security of ciphertext-policy weighted attribute-based encryption (CP-WABE). Additionally, the results of the implementation shows that UCP-WABE is efficient in terms of time.

Foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) is an economically devastating viral disease leading to a substantial loss to the swine industry worldwide. A novel alternative strategy is to develop pigs that are genetically resistant to infection. Here, we produce transgenic (TG) pigs that constitutively expressed FMDV-specific short interfering RNA (siRNA) derived from small hairpin RNA (shRNA). In vitro challenge of TG fibroblasts showed the shRNA suppressed viral growth. TG and non-TG pigs were challenged by intramuscular injection with 100 LD50 of FMDV. High fever, severe clinical signs of foot-and-mouth disease and typical histopathological changes were observed in all of the non-TG pigs but in none of the high-siRNA pigs. Our results show that TG shRNA can provide a viable tool for producing animals with enhanced resistance to FMDV.

Arthrospira platensis was used to obtain functional extracts through supercritical carbon dioxide extraction (SFE-CO2). Pressure (P), temperature (T), co-solvent (CX), static extraction (SX), dispersant (Di) and dynamic extraction (DX) were evaluated as process parameters through a Plackett–Burman design. The maximum extract yield obtained was 7.48 ± 0.15% w/w. The maximum contents of bioactive metabolites in extracts were 0.69 ± 0.09 µg/g of riboflavin, 5.49 ± 0.10 µg/g of α-tocopherol, 524.46 ± 0.10 µg/g of β-carotene, 1.44 ± 0.10 µg/g of lutein and 32.11 ± 0.12 mg/g of fatty acids with 39.38% of palmitic acid, 20.63% of linoleic acid and 30.27% of γ-linolenic acid. A. platensis extracts had an antioxidant activity of 76.47 ± 0.71 µg GAE/g by Folin–Ciocalteu assay, 0.52 ± 0.02, 0.40 ± 0.01 and 1.47 ± 0.02 µmol TE/g by DPPH, FRAP and TEAC assays, respectively. These extracts showed antimicrobial activity against Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 25923, Pseudomonas aeruginosa ATCC 27853, Escherichia coli ATCC 25922 and Candida albicans ATCC 10231. Overall, co-solvent was the most significant factor for all measured effects (p < 0.05). Arthrospira platensis represents a sustainable source of bioactive compounds through SFE using the following extraction parameters P: 450 bar, CX: 11 g/min, SX: 15 min, DX: 25 min, T: 60 °C and Di: 35 g.

We present a network framework for analyzing multi-level regulation in higher eukaryotes based on systematic integration of various high-throughput datasets. The network, namely the integrated regulatory network, consists of three major types of regulation: TF→gene, TF→miRNA and miRNA→gene. We identified the target genes and target miRNAs for a set of TFs based on the ChIP-Seq binding profiles, the predicted targets of miRNAs using annotated 3'UTR sequences and conservation information. Making use of the system-wide RNA-Seq profiles, we classified transcription factors into positive and negative regulators and assigned a sign for each regulatory interaction. Other types of edges such as protein-protein interactions and potential intra-regulations between miRNAs based on the embedding of miRNAs in their host genes were further incorporated. We examined the topological structures of the network, including its hierarchical organization and motif enrichment. We found that transcription factors downstream of the hierarchy distinguish themselves by expressing more uniformly at various tissues, have more interacting partners, and are more likely to be essential. We found an over-representation of notable network motifs, including a FFL in which a miRNA cost-effectively shuts down a transcription factor and its target. We used data of C. elegans from the modENCODE project as a primary model to illustrate our framework, but further verified the results using other two data sets. As more and more genome-wide ChIP-Seq and RNA-Seq data becomes available in the near future, our methods of data integration have various potential applications.

Mobile group II introns consist of a catalytic intron RNA and an intron-encoded protein with reverse transcriptase activity, which act together in a ribonucleoprotein particle to promote DNA integration during intron mobility. Previously, we found that the Lactococcus lactis Ll.LtrB intron-encoded protein (LtrA) expressed alone or with the intron RNA to form ribonucleoprotein particles localizes to bacterial cellular poles, potentially accounting for the intron's preferential insertion in the oriC and ter regions of the Escherichia coli chromosome. Here, by using cell microarrays and automated fluorescence microscopy to screen a transposon-insertion library, we identified five E. coli genes (gppA, uhpT, wcaK, ynbC, and zntR) whose disruption results in both an increased proportion of cells with more diffuse LtrA localization and a more uniform genomic distribution of Ll.LtrB-insertion sites. Surprisingly, we find that a common factor affecting LtrA localization in these and other disruptants is the accumulation of intracellular polyphosphate, which appears to bind LtrA and other basic proteins and delocalize them away from the poles. Our findings show that the intracellular localization of a group II intron-encoded protein is a major determinant of insertion-site preference. More generally, our results suggest that polyphosphate accumulation may provide a means of localizing proteins to different sites of action during cellular stress or entry into stationary phase, with potentially wide physiological consequences.

Abstract Background Cell viability is one of the basic properties indicating the physiological state of the cell, thus, it has long been one of the major considerations in biotechnological applications. Conventional methods for extracting information about cell viability usually need reagents to be applied on the targeted cells. These reagent-based techniques are reliable and versatile, however, some of them might be invasive and even toxic to the target cells. In support of automated noninvasive assessment of cell viability, a machine vision system has been developed. Results This system is based on supervised learning technique. It learns from images of certain kinds of cell populations and trains some classifiers. These trained classifiers are then employed to evaluate the images of given cell populations obtained via dark field microscopy. Wavelet decomposition is performed on the cell images. Energy and entropy are computed for each wavelet subimage as features. A feature selection algorithm is implemented to achieve better performance. Correlation between the results from the machine vision system and commonly accepted gold standards becomes stronger if wavelet features are utilized. The best performance is achieved with a selected subset of wavelet features. Conclusion The machine vision system based on dark field microscopy in conjugation with supervised machine learning and wavelet feature selection automates the cell viability assessment, and yields comparable results to commonly accepted methods. Wavelet features are found to be suitable to describe the discriminative properties of the live and dead cells in viability classification. According to the analysis, live cells exhibit morphologically more details and are intracellularly more organized than dead ones, which display more homogeneous and diffuse gray values throughout the cells. Feature selection increases the system's performance. The reason lies in the fact that feature selection plays a role of excluding redundant or misleading information that may be contained in the raw data, and leads to better results.