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Based on the ANSYS CFX fluid-structure interaction numerical calculation method， the lubrication performance and structure design of water-lubricated composite stern bearing are studied， the effects laws of different grooves， clearance ratios， length diameter ratio， and diameters on load carrying capacity， water film pressure， bearing deformation， minimum water film thickness and bearing friction coefficient are expounded. In addition， by using a water-lubricated bearing test rig， the effects of different water grooves on the starting friction torque， transition speed， and friction coefficient of the bearing are studied. The results show that the friction coefficient， maximum water film pressure， and maximum bearing deformation increase with the number of water grooves. The load carrying capacity and minimum water film thickness decrease with the increase of clearance ratio while increase with the increase of length diameter ratio. Finally， the variation of load carrying capacity with a diameter of 100~500 mm， length diameter ratio of 2~3， and clearance ratio of 0.1%~0.2% is summarized. A certain theoretical basis for the design of water-lubricated stern bearings is provided.

Abstract GNA13, encoding one of the G protein alpha subunits of heterotrimeric G proteins that transduce signals of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCR), is frequently mutated in germinal center B-cell-like diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (GCB-DLBCL) with poor prognostic outcomes. Due to the “undruggable” nature of GNA13, targeted therapy for these patients is not available. In this study, we found that palmitoylation of GNA13 not only regulates its plasma membrane localization, but also regulates GNA13’s stability. It is essential for the tumor suppressor function of GNA13 in GCB-DLBCL cells. Interestingly, GNA13 negatively regulates BCL2 expression in GCB-DLBCL cells in a palmitoylation-dependent manner. Consistently, BCL2 inhibitors were found to be effective in killing GNA13-deficient GCB-DLBCL cells in a cell-based chemical screen. Furthermore, we demonstrate that inactivating GNA13 by targeting its palmitoylation enhanced the sensitivity of GCB-DLBCL to the BCL2 inhibitor. These studies indicate that the loss-of-function mutation of GNA13 is a biomarker for BCL2 inhibitor therapy of GCB-DLBCL and that GNA13 palmitoylation is a potential target for combination therapy with BCL2 inhibitors to treat GCB-DLBCL with wild-type GNA13.

Abstract Background Benzobicyclon (BBC) is a β-triketone herbicide (bTH) used in rice paddy fields. It has the advantages of high efficiency, low toxicity, high crop safety, and good environmental compatibility, and shows efficacy against paddy weeds resistant to other types of herbicides. However, as some important indica rice varieties are susceptible to BBC, BBC is currently only registered and applied in japonica rice cultivation areas. Results By analyzing haplotypes of the bTHs broad-spectrum resistance gene HIS1 and phenotypes for BBC in 493 major indica rice accessions in China, we identified a novel non-functional allelic variant of HIS1 in addition to the previously reported 28-bp deletion. Through detection with markers specific to the two non-functional mutations, it was clear that 25.4% of indica conventional varieties, 59.9% of fertility restorers, and 15.9% of sterile lines were susceptible to BBC. In addition, due to natural allelic variations of the HIS1 gene in the sterile and restorer lines, some two-line hybrid sterile lines were sensitive to bTHs, and the corresponding restorers were resistant. We showed the potential effectiveness of using bTHs to address the issue of two-line hybrid rice seed purity stemming from the self-crossing of sterile lines during hybrid rice seed production. Finally, allelic variations of the HIS1 gene may also play an important role in the mechanized seed production of hybrid rice. Conclusions Our findings offer guidance for the application of BBC in indica rice areas and provide a non-transgenic approach to address the seed purity issue of two-line hybrid rice.

Indoor scene understanding is an active research topic that has recently gained increasing attention in both computer graphics and computer vision community. This paper presents a novel automatic point cloud instance abstraction and segmentation of indoor scenes using learned pairwise planar patch relations. Planar patches have sufficient representative power to abstract the semantics in mostly man-made 3D indoor scenes. To exploit the planar patch relationships, a new indoor point clouds dataset is automatically derived from the public dataset ScanNet, which can be adopted for training a pairwise patch relation classifier. Given the pre-processed indoor scene point clouds, a set of planar patches are generated to provide robust and compact representation of indoor objects and parts. For each extracted planar patch, a feature descriptor in view of its geometric properties and appearance is calculated. Owing to the proposed feature descriptors, the relations of pairwise planar patch are measured and can be fed into the pre-trained patch relation classifier. To yield the instance segmentation of indoor scenes, a robust graph-based algorithm is adopted to group these planar patches which incorporate the learned patch relations. Experimental results demonstrate that our proposed approach can produce instance semantic segmentation of various cluttered indoor scenes robustly and efficiently.

The growth of dendrites on the electrodes during charge–discharge cycles can lead to short‐circuit and potential ignition, which limit the capacity and application of the rechargeable batteries. With the development of in situ electrochemical liquid cell transmission electron microscopy, the growth process of metallic dendrites can be observed in real‐time. However, there remains a great challenge to operate the electrochemical liquid cell experiments successfully and repetitively. Herein, the lithium‐ion battery electrolyte system and the other electrolyte system of silver nitrate with sodium nitrate aqueous solution are adopted in our experiments to demonstrate the problems in conducting electrochemical liquid cell experiments. Influence factors are summarized, including the tube residual, cleanliness of electrodes, bubbles in the liquid cell, and the stability of the electrochemical system. All these aspects affect the electrochemical liquid cell experiments, and understanding these influencing factors is beneficial to improve the success rate of experiments. This work may offer guidance for the wide application of in situ electrochemical liquid cell transmission electron microscopy in observing the growth of dendrites in batteries.

Like dandelion, dandelion seed also have anti-inflammatory activity. Therefore, in this article, we intend to explore the anti-cancer availability of aqueous dandelion seed extract (DSE) in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). Firstly, the effects of DSE on cell proliferation, apoptosis, migration, invasion and angiogenesis were investigated. Then to explore the mechanism of DSE against ESCC, the levels of proliferation-associated proteins (PI3K, Akt and pAkt), apoptosis-associated proteins (survivin, Bcl-2, Bax, caspase3 and caspase9), metastasis-associated proteins (MMP2, MMP9, VEGF) and EMT progression-associated proteins (Snail, E-cadherin and Vimentin) were analyzed. Next, we further explored the effect of DSE on the sensitivity of cisplatin (DDP) in ESCC cells and investigated the effect of DSE combined with DDP on DNA damage repair-associated proteins (MSH2, MLH1 and ERCC1) and drug resistant target protein STAT3. The results indicated that DSE selectively inhibited cell growth, proliferation, migration, invasion, angiogenesis and induced cell apoptosis in ESCC cells. It was observed the decreased PI3K, Akt and pAkt proteins levels in KYSE450 and Eca109 cells administrated with DSE. The data also showed that the application of DSE decreased the level of survivin and the ratio of Bcl-2/Bax, while increased the levels of caspase3 and caspase9. We also observed that DSE significantly decreased the levels of MMP2, MMP9 and VEGF proteins and inhibited the EMT progression in KYSE450 and Eca109 cells. In addition, survivin plays a critical role in DSE against ESCC followed with the application of survivin inhibitor YM155 impairing the inhibitory abilities of DSE in ESCC cells. Meanwhile, it was observed that DSE enhances the sensitivity of DDP to human ESCC cells via promoting DNA damage and inhibiting phosphorylation of STAT3. Therefore, DSE may affect ESCC progression and enhance the sensitivity of cisplatin, and consequently become an effective anti-cancer option for human ESCC treatment.

As the fastest land animal, cheetah has important reference significance for the research of high-speed quadruped robots in terms of its body structure, motion characteristics and control mechanism. In this paper, we used digital reconstruction to analyze the mechanism of the cheetah’s high-speed movement. Considering the body size and quality of a real cheetah, a simplified virtual model of cheetah was built. Using the D-H method, the kinematics and dynamics of the cheetah’s leg mechanism were established. By using the foot trajectory data of the cheetah’s running gait obtained from biological research, each joint angle, virtual leg length, leg-to-ground contact angle, leg energy, joint torque, and the manipulability of the leg mechanism were analyzed and compared in the time dimension. Finally, the high-speed motion law of engineering guiding significance was extracted.

Objective To understand the microbial contamination during the production and processing of prepackaged cooked meat products in Henan, find out the high-risk links and key control points of contamination, reduce theprobability of food contamination, and incidence of foodborne diseases. Methods Sample collection and detection were performed according to the National Manual for Risk Monitoring of Food Contamination and Hazardous Factors, serotyping and molecular typing of positive strains were all performed according to the National Manual for Foodborne Disease Surveillance. Results A total of 168 samples were monitored, including 104 environment samples (4 in the raw area and 100 in the cooked area), 8 strains of Listeria monocytogenes were detected. A total of 24 strains of Listeria monocytogenes and 2 strains of Salmonella were detected from 60 cooked meat-related samples. 2 strains of Salmonella were Salmonella Enteritidis and had 2 molecular patterns with similarity of 92.9% by digestion with Xba Ⅰ and pulsed field gel electrophoresis. The 32 strains of Listeria monocytogenes were classified into six serotypes (1/2a, 1/2b, 1/2c, 4ab, 3a and 4b), and the dominant serotype was 1/2a.32 strains were divided into 17 molecular patterns by digestion with Asc Ⅰ and pulsed field gel electrophoresis, and each pattern contains 1-10 strains with similarity ranged 55.8%-100.0%. There were 4 water samples, and the total number of colonies and the coliform was all less than 1 CFU/mL, which met the requirements according to the national standard for drinking water. Conclusion There were common sources or cross-contamination in the environment and foods, microbial contamination could be effectively controlled after cooking, however, there were still deficiencies in other aspects. Therefore, it is suggested to further strengthen the management of product division, strengthen the disinfection treatment of ground and operators, and stipulate reasonable production processing and storage period.

Abstract Background The Philadelphia chromosome (Ph), which leads to the creation and expression of the fusion gene product BCR-ABL, underlines the pathogenesis of chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) and a fraction of adult and pediatric acute B-lymphoblastic leukemia (B-ALL). The BCR-ABL tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) have shown a remarkable clinical activity in patients with CML, but their efficacy in treating Ph+ B-ALL is limited. Identifying additional therapeutic targets is important for the effective treatment of Ph+ B-ALL. Methods Activation of the JNK signaling pathway in human and mouse BCR-ABL+ B-ALL cells with or without dasatinib treatment was analyzed by Western blotting. JNK was inhibited either by RNA interference or chemical inhibitors, such as JNK-IN-8. The effect of JNK inhibition with or without BCR-ABL TKI dasatinib on BCR-ABL+ B-ALL cells was analyzed by the CellTiter-Glo® Luminescent Cell Viability Assay. The in vivo effects of JNK-IN-8 and dasatinib alone or in combination were tested using a BCR-ABL induced B-ALL mouse model. Results We found that the c-JUN N-terminal kinase (JNK) signaling pathway is abnormally activated in both human and mouse BCR-ABL+ B-ALL cells, but the BCR-ABL TKI does not inhibit JNK activation in these cells. Inhibition of JNK, either by RNAi-mediated downregulation or by JNK inhibitors, could significantly reduce viability of Ph+ B-ALL cells. JNK inhibition by RNAi-mediated downregulation or JNK inhibitors also showed a synergistic effect with the BCR-ABL TKI, dasatinib, in killing Ph+ B-ALL cells in vitro. Furthermore, a potent JNK inhibitor, JNK-IN-8, in combination with dasatinib markedly improved the survival of mice with BCR-ABL induced B-ALL, as compared to the treatment with dasatinib alone. Conclusions Our findings indicate that simultaneously targeting both BCR-ABL and JNK kinase might serve as a promising therapeutic strategy for Ph+ B-ALL.

Objective To understand the hygienic status of cereal-based complementary foods (CBCFs) for infants and young children (IYC) in Henan Province and therefore provide basic data for food safety risk assessment and standard formulation. Methods Sampling and testing were performed according to the method provided in the work manual of 2018 national food pollutants and hazardous factors risk monitoring.103 samples of CBCF for IYC were collected in Henan Province, and then the contamination of Enterobacteriaceae, Bacillus cereus, Listeria monocytogenes and Cronobacter were detected, respectively. Matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time-of-flight mass spectrometry was used to identify the suspicious colonies. Results The detection rates of Enterobacteriaceae and Cronobacter in 103 samples were 0.97% (1/103) and 5.83% (6/103), respectively. They were all detected in ready-to-eat CBCFs for IYC from convenience stores/retail stores, mainly produced in Jiangxi and Fujian Provinces. Five of the six Cronobacter positive samples were labeled before the initial stage of supplementary food addition. The quantitative result of Bacillus cereus in the range of 10-103 CFU/g were obtained in 9 samples, with a detection rate of 8.74% (9/103), which were produced from Guangdong, Jiangxi, Fujian, Heilongjiang and Sichuan Provinces. The sampling sites were supermarkets and convenience stores/retail stores, of which 8 were ready-to-eat CBCFs for IYC. Conclusion The CBCFs for IYC sold in Henan Province, especially the ready-to-eat CBCFs for IYC, were contaminated by Cronobacter and Bacillus cereus. Most of these positive products targeted the population at the beginning of the supplementary foods, which might result in greater food safety risks. It was suggested that the microbial requirements of Cronobacter and Bacillus cereus should be added to the ready-to-eat CBCFs for IYC, which could reduce the potential food safety problems.

Low-rank coal (LRC) can be converted to high value-added naphthalene and its alkylated derivatives through low-temperature catalytic pyrolysis. In this paper, the catalytic pyrolysis of Beisu LRC in a fixed-bed at low temperature was investigated. And the catalytic effects of HZSM-5, low-temperature carbocoal (LtC), and LtC-HZSM-5 on the content and yield of naphthalene oil were examined. The results showed that the generation of naphthalene oil in low-temperature LRC pyrolysis (LT-LP) process could be improved when LtC (prepared at 550 °C) or HZSM-5 was individually used as a catalyst. Compared with sole pyrolysis of raw LRC, the addition of the LtC-HZSM-5 catalyst increased the content of naphthalene oil from 11.19 wt.% to 31.49 wt%. And the yield of naphthalene oil was increased from 1.07 wt% to 5.31 wt%. The reactions of micromolecular hydrogen-containing radicals (·MHCR) were optimized by LtC. ·MHCR could be captured in relatively low-temperature region (200–400 °C) and released at high temperature by LtC. The generation of phenolics was inhibited by HZSM-5. As a result, the naphthalene oil-rich tar was obtained through low-temperature LtC-HZSM-5 catalytic pyrolysis of Beisu LRC.

Background: Qingda granules (QDG) exhibit antihypertension and multiple-target-organ protection. However, the therapeutic potential of QDG on hypertensive renal injury remains unknown. Therefore, the main objective of the current study is to explore the effects and underlying mechanisms of QDG treatment on renal injury in angiotensin (Ang) II-infused mice.Methods and results: Mice were infused with Ang II (500 ng/kg/min) or saline for 4 weeks with subcutaneously implanted osmotic pumps. After infusion, mice in the Ang II + QDG group were intragastrically administrated with QDG daily (1.145 g/kg/day), whereas the control group and Ang II group were intragastrically administrated with the same amount of double-distilled water. Blood pressure of the mice monitored using the CODA™ noninvasive blood pressure system revealed that QDG treatment significantly attenuated elevated blood pressure. Moreover, hematoxylin–eosin staining indicated that QDG treatment ameliorated Ang II-induced renal morphological changes, including glomerular sclerosis and atrophy, epithelial cell atrophy, and tubular dilatation. RNA-sequencing (RNA-seq) identified 662 differentially expressed transcripts (DETs) in renal tissues of Ang II-infused mice, which were reversed after QDG treatment. Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis based on DETs in both comparisons of Ang II vs. Control and Ang II + QDG vs. Ang II identified multiple enriched pathways, including apoptosis and p53 pathways. Consistently, terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT) dUTP nick-end labeling (TUNEL) staining and Annexin V staining revealed that QDG treatment significantly attenuated Ang II-induced cell apoptosis in renal tissues and cultured renal tubular epithelial cell lines (NRK-52E). Furthermore, western blot analysis indicated that Ang II infusion significantly upregulated the protein expression of p53, BCL2-associated X (BAX), cle-caspase-9, and cle-caspase-3, while downregulating the protein expression of BCL-2 in renal tissues, which were attenuated after QDG treatment.Conclusion: Collectively, QDG treatment significantly attenuated hypertensive renal injury, partially by attenuating renal apoptosis and suppressing p53 pathways, which might be the underlying mechanisms.

Objectives: To investigate the effects of swimming on cancer induced muscle wasting and explore its underlying mechanism in CT-26 bearing mice.Methods: BALB/c mice (n = 16) injected with CT-26 cells were divided into two groups, including Tumor group (n = 8) and Swimming group (n = 8). Another 8 un-injected mice were set as Control group. Mice in Swimming group were subjected to physical training for swimming twice per day for 30 min intervals and 6 days per week for a total of 4 weeks. The tumor volume was monitored every 3 days and tumor weight was measured at the end of experiment. The changes of muscle function, pathological and cell apoptosis of quadriceps muscles were further assessed, and its underlying mechanisms were further explored using multiple biological technologies.Results: Swimming obviously alleviated tumor volume and weight in CT-26 bearing mice. Moreover, swimming attenuated the decrease of muscle tension, autonomic activities, and increase of muscle atrophy, pathological ultrastructure, as well as cell apoptosis of quadriceps muscles in CT-26 bearing mice. Furthermore, swimming significantly down-regulated the protein expression of NF-κB, p-NF-κB, TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6 and Bax, while up-regulated the expression of Bcl-2. Further differential expressed metabolites (DEMs) analysis identified a total of 76 (in anion mode) and 330 (in cationic mode) DEMs in quadriceps muscles of CT-26 bearing mice after swimming, including taurochenodeoxycholic acid, taurocholic acid, ascorbic acid and eicosapentaenoic acid.Conclusion: Swimming attenuates tumor growth and muscle wasting, and by suppressing the activation of NF-κB signaling pathway mediated inflammation, reducing the level of Bax medicated cell apoptosis, as well as modulating multiple metabolites might be the importantly underlying mechanisms.

Legged animals can adapt to complex terrains because they can step or jump over obstacles. Their application of foot force is determined according to the estimation of the height of an obstacle; then, the trajectory of the legs is controlled to clear the obstacle. In this paper, we designed a three-DoF one-legged robot. A spring-loaded inverted pendulum model was employed to control the jumping. Herein, the jumping height was mapped to the foot force by mimicking the jumping control mechanisms of animals. The foot trajectory in the air was planned using the Bézier curve. Finally, the experiments of the one-legged robot jumping over multiple obstacles of different heights were implemented in the PyBullet simulation environment. The simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the method proposed in this paper.

At present, most quadruped robots can move quickly and steadily on both flat and undulating ground; however, natural environments are complex and changeable, so it is important for a quadruped robot to be able to jump over obstacles immediately. Inspired by the jumping movement of quadruped animals, we present aerial body posture adjustment laws and generate animal-like jumping trajectories for a quadruped robot. Then, the bionic reference trajectories are optimized to build a trajectory library of a variety of jumping motions based on the kinematic and dynamic constraints of the quadruped robot. The model predictive control (MPC) method is employed by the quadruped robot to track the optimized trajectory to achieve jumping behavior. The simulations show that the quadruped robot can jump over an obstacle of 40 cm in height. The effectiveness of the animal-like jump control method is verified.

Xanthoceras sorbifolia Bunge, an indigenous oilseed tree from China, is a major woody energy plant that has been used for biodiesel production for a long time. In the past decade, X. sorbifolia has become a hot research topic due to its diverse bioactivities, which include improving learning and memory deficits, killing sperm, stabilizing capillaries, lowering cholesterol, and rheumatism. This review aims to analyze a comprehensive appraisal of X. sorbifolia, including its history, traditional uses, biological activities, food value, economic value, and current applications, and provide instruction for promoting the multipurpose utilization of X. sorbifolia.

Oridonin (Orid) has been diffusely applied to remedy dissimilar cancers. Howbeit, the influence of Orid in ischemic heart disease (IHD) remains imprecise. The current study uncovered the functions of Orid in hypoxia-caused apoptosis and autophagy in H9c2 cells. H9c2 cells received hypoxia and Orid manipulation, cell viability, apoptosis, apoptosis-interrelated factors and autophagy-correlative factors were appraised. After the extraordinary vectors transfections, the impacts of miR-214 inhibition on hypoxia-triggered apoptosis and autophagy were investigated. Further, dual luciferase reporter assay was enforced for ascertaining the pertinence between miR-214 and PTEN. PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway was finally determined using western blot. We found that, Orid significantly alleviated hypoxia-induced apoptosis and autophagy through regulation their associated proteins in H9c2 cells. Up-regulation of miR-214 was found in hypoxia and Orid co-managed cells, meanwhile, repression of miR-214 obviously annulled the modulatory functions of Orid in hypoxia-evoked apoptosis and autophagy. Additionally, PTEN was forecasted to be a firsthand target of miR-214. Besides, we observed that Orid evoked PI3K/AKT/mTOR activation through elevation of miR-214 in hypoxia-managed H9c2 cells. In conclusion, the amusing results corroborated that Orid relieved hypoxia-caused apoptosis and autophagy via adjusting PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway through enhancement of miR-214 in H9c2 cells.

Abstract Background Arsenic sulfide was found to have potential anti-cancer activities, especially in gastric cancer. However, the underlying mechanism need to be further explored. This study was aimed to investigate the mechanism of arsenic compounds on gastric cancer. Methods Gastric cancer cell lines were infected with lentiviral vector carrying shNFATc3 and/or treated with arsenic sulfide. MTT assay were performed to assess cell growth. Flow cytometer assays were used to detect cell cycle and reactive oxygen species (ROS) level of gastric cancer cells. Western blot was carried out to detect nuclear factor of activated T-cells, cytoplasmic 3 (NFATc3), cell cycle markers, DNA damage pathway protein expression as well as other protein expression in gastric cancer cell lines. The expression of recombination activating gene 1 (RAG1) in gastric cancer cell lines was determined by RNA-sequencing analyses and Real-Time qPCR. The effect of NFATc3 on RAG1 were determined by CHIP-qPCR assay. The effect of arsenic sulfide on AGS cells was evaluated in vivo. Results We show that arsenic sulfide as well as knockdown of NFATc3 resulted in increased double-strand DNA damage in gastric cancer cells by increasing the expression of RAG1, an endonuclease essential for immunoglobulin V(D) J recombination. Overexpression of NFATc3 blocked the expression of RAG1 expression and DNA damage induced by arsenic sulfide. Arsenic sulfide induced cellular oxidative stress to redistribute NFATc3, thereby inhibiting its transcriptional function, which can be reversed by N-acetyl-L-cysteine (NAC). We show that NFATc3 targets the promoter of RAG1 for transcriptional inhibition. We further showed that NFATc3 upregulation and RAG1 downregulation significantly associated with poor prognosis in patients with gastric cancer. Our in vivo experiments further confirmed that arsenic sulfide exerted cytotoxic activity against gastric cancer cells through inhibiting NFATc3 to activate RAG1 pathway. Conclusion These results demonstrate that arsenic sulfide targets NFATc3 to induce double strand DNA break (DSB) for cell killing through activating RAG1 expression. Our results link arsenic compound to the regulation of DNA damage control and RAG1 expression as a mechanism for its cytotoxic effect.

Porous cotton stalk activated carbons (CSAC) were prepared by phosphoric acid activation of cotton stalks in a fluidized bed. The CSAC-supported Co–B and Co–Ce–B catalysts were prepared by the impregnation-chemical reduction method. The samples were characterized by the nitrogen adsorption, XRD, FTIR and TEM measurements. The effects of the sodium borohydride (NaBH4) and sodium hydroxide (NaOH) concentrations, reaction temperature and recyclability on the rate of NaBH4 hydrolysis over the CSAC-supported Co–Ce–B catalysts were systematically investigated. The results showed that the agglomeration of the Co–Ce–B nanoclusters on the CSAC support surface was significantly reduced with the introduction of cerium. The CSAC-supported Co–Ce–B catalyst exhibited superior catalytic activity and the average hydrogen generation rate was 16.42 L min−1 g−1Co at 25 °C, which is higher than the most reported cobalt-based catalysts. The catalytic hydrolysis of NaBH4 was zero order with respect to the NaBH4 concentration, and the hydrogen generation rate decreased with the increase in the NaOH concentration. The activation energy of the hydrogen generation reaction on the prepared catalyst was estimated to be 48.22 kJ mol−1. A kinetic rate equation was also proposed. Keywords: Sodium borohydride, Hydrogen, Activated carbon, Co–Ce–B catalyst, Catalytic activity, Kinetics

During 2013–2017, a total of 211 cases of listeriosis were reported by 64 sentinel hospitals in China to a national foodborne disease surveillance network. The average case-fatality rate was 31.2% for perinatal cases and 16.4% for nonperinatal cases. Sequence types 87 and 8 were the most prevalent types.

Background: There are no obvious clinical signs and symptoms in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease (AD), and most patients usually have mild cognitive impairment (MCI) before diagnosis. Therefore, early diagnosis of AD is very critical. This paper mainly discusses the blood biomarkers of AD patients and uses machine learning methods to study the changes of blood transcriptome during the development of AD and to search for potential blood biomarkers for AD.Methods: Individualized blood mRNA expression data of 711 patients were downloaded from the GEO database, including the control group (CON) (238 patients), MCI (189 patients), and AD (284 patients). Firstly, we analyzed the subcellular localization, protein types and enrichment pathways of the differentially expressed mRNAs in each group, and established an artificial intelligence individualized diagnostic model. Furthermore, the XCell tool was used to analyze the blood mRNA expression data and obtain blood cell composition and quantitative data. Ratio characteristics were established for mRNA and XCell data. Feature engineering operations such as collinearity and importance analysis were performed on all features to obtain the best feature solicitation. Finally, four machine learning algorithms, including linear support vector machine (SVM), Adaboost, random forest and artificial neural network, were used to model the optimal feature combinations and evaluate their classification performance in the test set.Results: Through feature engineering screening, the best feature collection was obtained. Moreover, the artificial intelligence individualized diagnosis model established based on this method achieved a classification accuracy of 91.59% in the test set. The area under curve (AUC) of CON, MCI, and AD were 0.9746, 0.9536, and 0.9807, respectively.Conclusion: The results of cell homeostasis analysis suggested that the homeostasis of Natural killer T cell (NKT) might be related to AD, and the homeostasis of Granulocyte macrophage progenitor (GMP) might be one of the reasons for AD.

In order to avoid the risk of tailing pond failures and to minimize the post-failure losses, it is necessary to analyze the current operation status of tailings ponds, to explore the evolution law of their failure process, to grasp their post-failure impact range, and to propose corresponding effective prevention and control measures. Based on a tailings pond in China, this paper establishes a 1:200 scale indoor model to explore the evolution law of post-failure tailings discharge in a tailings pond under flooded roof conditions; secondly, the finite element difference method and smooth particle fluid dynamics are combined to compare and analyze the post-failure impact area and to delineate the risk prevention and control area. The results of the study show that, during the dam break, the lower tailing sand in the breach is the first to slip, and after forming a steep can, the upper tailing sand in the steep can is pulled to slip, so that the erosion trench mainly develops vertically first, and then laterally. The velocity of the discharged tailing sand will quickly reach its peak value in a short period of time and then decrease to the creeping stage; the front edge of the sand flow is the first to stop moving, and the trailing edge of the tailing sand accumulation depth continues to increase until the end of the dam failure, at which point the initial bottom dam area of the discharge tailing sand flow velocity is the largest. The further the tailings are released from the initial dam, the smaller the accumulation depth and the larger the particle size, and the larger the elevation of the foundation in the same section, the smaller the accumulation depth and the larger the particle size; further, the presence of blocking materials will increase the local tailings accumulation depth. Based on the maximum flow velocity of the discharged tailings and the accumulation depth, the risk area downstream of the tailings pond is divided, so that relocation measures can be formulated. The test results can provide an important reference for the operation and management of similar tailings ponds.

Abstract IRF8 is a key regulator of innate immunity receptor signaling and plays diverse functions in the development of hematopoietic cells. The effects of IRF8 on hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) are still unknown. Here, it is demonstrated that IRF8 deficiency results in a decreased number of long‐term HSCs (LT‐HSCs) in mice. However, the repopulation capacity of individual HSCs is significantly increased. Transcriptomic analysis shows that IFN‐γ and IFN‐α signaling is downregulated in IRF8‐deficient HSCs, while their response to proinflammatory cytokines is unchanged ex vivo. Further tests show that Irf8−/− HSCs can not respond to CpG, an agonist of Toll‐like receptor 9 (TLR9) in mice, while long‐term CpG stimulation increases wild‐type HSC abundance and decreases their bone marrow colony‐forming capacity. Mechanistically, as the primary producer of proinflammatory cytokines in response to CpG stimulation, dendritic cells has a blocked TLR9 signaling due to developmental defect in Irf8−/− mice. Macrophages remain functionally intact but severely reduce in Irf8−/− mice. In NK cells, IRF8 directly regulates the expression of Tlr9 and its deficiency leads to no increased IFNγ production upon CpG stimulation. These results indicate that IRF8 regulates HSCs, at least in part, through controlling TLR9 signaling in diverse innate immune cells.

Background: Parkinson’s disease (PD), Alzheimer’s disease (AD) are common neurodegenerative disease, while mild cognitive impairment (MCI) may be happened in the early stage of AD or PD. Blood biomarkers are considered to be less invasive, less cost and more convenient, and there is tremendous potential for the diagnosis and prediction of neurodegenerative diseases. As a recently mentioned field, artificial intelligence (AI) is often applied in biology and shows excellent results. In this article, we use AI to model PD, AD, MCI data and analyze the possible connections between them.Method: Human blood protein microarray profiles including 156 CT, 50 MCI, 132 PD, 50 AD samples are collected from Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO). First, we used bioinformatics methods and feature engineering in machine learning to screen important features, constructed artificial neural network (ANN) classifier models based on these features to distinguish samples, and evaluated the model’s performance with classification accuracy and Area Under Curve (AUC). Second, we used Ingenuity Pathway Analysis (IPA) methods to analyse the pathways and functions in early stage and late stage samples of different diseases, and potential targets for drug intervention by predicting upstream regulators.Result: We used different classifier to construct the model and finally found that ANN model would outperform the traditional machine learning model. In summary, three different classifiers were constructed to be used in different application scenarios, First, we incorporated 6 indicators, including EPHA2, MRPL19, SGK2, to build a diagnostic model for AD with a test set accuracy of up to 98.07%. Secondly, incorporated 15 indicators such as ERO1LB, FAM73B, IL1RN to build a diagnostic model for PD, with a test set accuracy of 97.05%. Then, 15 indicators such as XG, FGFR3 and CDC37 were incorporated to establish a four-category diagnostic model for both AD and PD, with a test set accuracy of 98.71%. All classifier models have an auc value greater than 0.95. Then, we verified that the constructed feature engineering filtered out fewer important features but contained more information, which helped to build a better model. In addition, by classifying the disease types more carefully into early and late stages of AD, MCI, and PD, respectively, we found that early PD may occur earlier than early MCI. Finally, there are 24 proteins that are both differentially expressed proteins and upstream regulators in the disease group versus the normal group, and these proteins may serve as potential therapeutic targets and targets for subsequent studies.Conclusion: The feature engineering we build allows better extraction of information while reducing the number of features, which may help in subsequent applications. Building a classifier based on blood protein profiles using deep learning methods can achieve better classification performance, and it can help us to diagnose the disease early. Overall, it is important for us to study neurodegenerative diseases from both diagnostic and interventional aspects.

A vertical variable cavity organic fertilizer and compound fertilizer apparatus were designed according to tobacco farming requirements to overcome issues of unstable fertilizer discharge and blocking in the fertilizer disk of an existing fertilizer apparatus. The structure and working principle of the fertilizer apparatus were described. Combined with the principle of anti-arch and the requirements of fertilizer application, the structure size of the fertilizer apparatus was determined. Using the opening degree and rotational speed of the fertilizer disk as the test factors and the fertilizer rate and variation coefficient of fertilizer application rate as the indices, the EDEM was used to conduct the single factor test and obtain the appropriate rotational speed range. The results indicated that the variation coefficient of the fertilizer uniformity apparatus was 0.96–5.22% under different rotation speeds and fertilizer disk openings, which satisfied design requirements. The orthogonal experiment explored the interaction between rotational speed and the opening. The influence of the opening adjustment on the fertilizer application rate and the coefficient of variation of uniformity were greater than the change in fertilizer disk speed. The bench and field tests aligned with the simulation test. These findings provide a reference and theoretical basis to design a fertilizer apparatus.

The prevalence of obesity has reached alarming levels, which is considered a major risk factor for several metabolic diseases, including type 2 diabetes (T2D), non-alcoholic fatty liver, atherosclerosis, and ischemic cardiovascular disease. Obesity-induced chronic, low-grade inflammation may lead to insulin resistance, and it is well-recognized that macrophages play a major role in such inflammation. In the current review, the molecular mechanisms underlying macrophages, low-grade tissue inflammation, insulin resistance, and T2D are described. Also, the role of macrophages in obesity-induced insulin resistance is presented, and therapeutic drugs and recent advances targeting macrophages for the treatment of T2D are introduced.

NUFIP1 is an RNA-binding protein that interacts with fragile X mental retardation protein (FMRP) in the messenger ribonucleoprotein particle (mRNP). We previously showed that NUFIP1 was upregulated in colorectal cancer (CRC), but how the protein may contribute to the disease and patient prognosis is unknown. Here we combine database analysis, microarray, quantitative PCR, and immunohistochemistry of patients’ samples to confirm our previous findings on NUFIP1 overexpression in CRC, and to reveal that increased expression of NUFIP1 in CRC tissues correlated with worse overall, recurrence-free, event-free and disease-free survival in patients, as well as with more advanced CRC clinicopathological stage. Loss of function analysis demonstrated that NUFIP1 knockdown suppressed cell growth in vitro and in vivo, inhibited cell viability and survival, and induced cell cycle arrest and apoptosis in vitro, as well as up-regulated Bax and down-regulated Bcl-2 protein expression. In addition, as a natural anticancer triterpene from various fruits and vegetables, ursolic acid (UA) treatment suppressed cell proliferation, down-regulated NUFIP1 protein expression, and further enhanced the effects of NUFIP1 knockdown in CRC cells in vitro. NUFIP1 knockdown up-regulated the expression of 136 proteins, down-regulated the expression of 41 proteins, and enriched multiple signaling pathways including the senescence-associated heterochromatin foci (SAHF) pathway. Furthermore, NUFIP1 knockdown enhanced the expression of senescence-associated-β-galactosidase (SA-β-gal), the SAHF markers HP1γ and trimethylation (H3k9me3), and the senescence-related protein HMGA2, as well as both p53 and its downstream p21 protein expression. Our findings suggest that NUFIP1 is overexpressed in CRC and correlates with disease progression and poor patient survival. NUFIP1 may exert oncogenic effects partly by altering senescence. UA may show potential to treat CRC by down-regulating NUFIP1.

Abstract Background Seed germination, the foundation of plant propagation, involves a series of changes at the molecular level. Poplar is a model woody plant, but the molecular events occurring during seed germination in this species are unclear. Results In this study, we investigated changes in gene transcriptional levels during different germination periods in poplar by high-throughput sequencing technology. Analysis of genes expressed at specific germination stages indicated that these genes are distributed in many metabolic pathways. Enrichment analysis of significantly differentially expressed genes based on hypergeometric testing revealed that multiple pathways, such as pathways related to glycolysis, lipid, amino acid, protein and ATP synthesis metabolism, changed significantly at the transcriptional level during seed germination. A comparison of ΣZ values uncovered a series of transcriptional changes in biological processes related to primary metabolism during poplar seed germination. Among these changes, genes related to CHO metabolism were the first to be activated, with subsequent expression of genes involved in lipid metabolism and then those associated with protein metabolism. The pattern of metabolomic and physiological index changes further verified the sequence of some biological events. Conclusions Our study revealed molecular events occurring at the transcriptional level during seed germination and determined their order. These events were further verified by patterns of changes of metabolites and physiological indexes. Our findings lay a foundation for the elucidation of the molecular mechanisms responsible for poplar seed germination.

With polysaccharides of Chlorella pyrenoidosa as the raw material, the effects of CaO and HZSM-5 on the yield of bio-oil and the oxygen content in each phase in the pyrolysis of Chlorella vulgaris polysaccharides (CVP), which occurred in a tube furnace at 600 °C, were comprehensively investigated. The reaction path of deoxidation was also analyzed by TG, GC and GC–MS. The GC–MS analysis of liquids showed that liquids from the pyrolysis of chlorella polysaccharides included a range of light oxygenated compounds (e.g., furans, ketones and phenols), and the oxygen content of furan compounds decreased significantly with CaO and HZSM-5. Compared with the direct pyrolysis of polysaccharides (CVP), the catalytic pyrolysis contributed to the decrease in the oxygen content of organic components by 7.32% and 5.76%. The GC analysis showed that there was a remarkable downtrend in the release of oxygen-containing gas (CO and CO2), and the emission of CO2 decreased from 53.11% to 32.92%. The results of the thermogravimetric analysis indicated that the reaction paths of deoxidation in the pyrolysis process of polysaccharides (CVP) with CaO and HZSM-5 varied from those of the direct pyrolysis process: the catalytic pyrolysis with HZSM-5 promoted the conversion of carbohydrate from furans to aromatics over strong acid sites, which was consistent with previous studies; CaO not only acted as a catalyst but also participated in the reaction to change the reaction paths. All results and findings can help to further understand the thermochemical utilization of CPP for bio-oil. Keywords: Chlorella vulgaris polysaccharides, CaO, HZSM-5, Pyrolysis, Organic compounds, Deoxidation, Reaction paths

This study aims to explore the roles of miR-145/TGFBR2 axis in sepsis-induced acute lung injury. Here, RNA-sequencing assay showed that miR-145 was significantly decreased in exosomes from sepsis patient blood samples. And miR-145 was decreased but TGFBR2 was increased in LPS-treated mice lung tissues or BEAS-2B cells in a time-dependent manner. Mechanistically, TGFBR2 was identified as a direct target of miR-145 and the downstream effector Smad3 was also suppressed in BEAS-2B cells with miR-145 overexpression. Pre-injection or post-injection of miR-145 agomir following LPS treatment attenuated LPS-induced inflammation, characterized as the downregulation of IL-2 and TNF-α secretion and ameliorate sepsis, and prolonged the overall survival of septic mice with lung injury. Additionally, TGFBR2 overexpression partially abrogated miR-145-mediated inhibition on LPS-induced inflammation and sepsis-induced acute lung injury. Importantly, TGF-β (Transforming growth factor-β) and miR-145 level displayed a negative correlation in sepsis patients. Thus, these results suggest that miR-145 could ameliorate sepsis-induced lung injury via inhibiting TGFBR2 signaling.

Glass fiber-reinforced polymer (GFRP) composites are promising composites often utilized in coastal infrastructure or used as an alternative to steel reinforcement in seawater sea sand concrete due to their excellent corrosion resistance. Understanding the degradation mechanism of GFRP in corrosion environments is significant for improving the long-term performance of GFRP materials. This paper presented the influences of seawater content and temperature on the properties of GFRP composites using the molecular dynamics method. The simulation results were validated by existing experiments on mechanical properties, interlaminar strength, and microstructures of an accelerated aging test of GFRP. The calculation results indicated that when seawater content of the matrix increased from 0% to 9.09% at 298 K, Young’s modulus, shear modulus, and bulk modulus decreased 46.72%, 53.46%, and 41.75%, respectively. The binding energy of GFRP composites with seawater content of 2.15% at 353 K was 26.46% lower than that of unconditioned GFRP at 298 K. It revealed that the higher seawater content and temperature accelerated the degradation of the GFRP composites. The investigation provided a comprehensive understanding of the degradation mechanism of GFRP in seawater environments and provided a basis for the durability design of GFRP composites.

Evaluation of blasting-induced rock damage and fragmentation is very important for safety control of construction in the jointed rock mass. The discontinuous numerical models are commonly applied due to the advantages in modeling fragmentation and treating discontinuities. In this paper, the rock fracturing algorithm and rate dependent strength law are incorporated into the discontinuous deformation analysis (DDA) to study the wave propagation and rock fragmentation phenomena in dynamic problems. By reproducing Hopkinson pressure bar tests under different loading rates, the improved method is validated to be capable of solving dynamic failure problem. Finally, taking the Xiucun tunnel as an example, its failure process under the action of the explosive wave is simulated, and some failure features are captured. In addition, the explosion wave propagation and its induced particle vibration in surrounding rock are studied. The reasonable simulation results indicate that the modified DDA method can effectively model the stress wave propagation and joint growth process in the jointed rock under blasting load.

Maximum oxygen uptake (VO2max) is a "gold standard" in aerobic capacity assessment, playing a vital role in various fields. However, ratio scaling ([Formula: see text]), the present method used to express relative VO2max, should be suspected due to its theoretical deficiencies. Therefore, the aim of the study was to revise the quantitative relationship between VO2max and body weight (bw). Dimensional analysis was utilized to deduce their theoretical relationship, while linear or nonlinear regression analysis based on four mathematical models (ratio scaling, linear function, simple allometric model and full allometric model) were utilized in statistics analysis to verify the theoretical relationship. Besides, to investigate the effect of ratio scaling on removing body weight, Pearson correlation coefficient was used to analyze the correlation between [Formula: see text] and bw. All the relevant data were collected from published references. Dimensional analysis suggested VO2max be proportional to [Formula: see text]. Statistics analysis displayed that four mathematical expressions were VO2max = 0.047bw (p

Nowadays, under the encouragement of national and sports competition related policies, sports industry is gradually rising. In this case, how to provide ticketing services conveniently, quickly, and accurately for sports spectators all over the country and the world and how to keep up with the times and improve traditional ticketing services are two major problems that need to be solved urgently by those who are in charge of sports events. When investigating the current traditional ticketing platform for sports competitions, it is not difficult to find that most ticketing services rely heavily on manual services. From ticket purchase to ticket checking, consumers have poor experience, there is a lot of waste of manpower and material resources, and scalpers easily sell high-priced tickets. In addition, the traditional ticket sales mode still uses old-fashioned paper tickets or cards, which are difficult to preserve, making it difficult to prevent counterfeiting and use and control information statistics. Data confusion leads to financial risks. The “paralysis” of the ticketing system of many large-scale sports competitions, especially super-large sports competitions, just proves the importance and necessity of reforming ticketing platform of sports competitions in order to keep pace with development. This paper will study a large-scale (or super-large), flexible, efficient, and excellent performance, which can meet the burst peak access requirements of sports competition ticketing platform. We will first consider the overall demand of the sports competition ticketing market, then make a general analysis according to the demand, design a sports competition ticketing platform that can effectively serve large-scale or super-large sports competitions, and raise and solve the problems encountered when building the platform.

Around 9% of the adult population in the world (463 million) suffer from diabetes mellitus. Most of them (~90%) belong to type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM), which is a common chronic metabolic disorder, and the number of cases has been reported to increase each year. Zucker diabetic fatty (ZDF) rat provides a successful animal model to study the pathogenesis of T2DM. Although previous hepatic transcriptome studies revealed some novel genes associated with the occurrence and development of T2DM, there still lacks the comprehensive transcriptomic analysis for the liver tissues of ZDF rats. We performed comparative transcriptome analyses between the liver tissues of ZDF rats and healthy ZCL rats and also evaluated several clinical indices. We could identify 214 and 104 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and lncRNAs in ZDF rats, respectively. Pathway and biofunction analyses showed a synergistic effect between mRNAs and lncRNAs. By comprehensively analyzing transcriptomic data and clinical indices, we detected some typical features of T2DM in ZDF rats, such as upregulated metabolism (significant increased lipid absorption/transport/utilization, gluconeogenesis, and protein hydrolysis), increased inflammation, liver injury and increased endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress. In addition, of the 214 DEGs, 114 were known and 100 were putative T2DM-related genes, most of which have been associated with substance metabolism (particularly degradation), inflammation, liver injury and ER stress biofunctions. Our study provides an important reference and improves understanding of molecular pathogenesis of obesity-associated T2DM. Our data can also be used to identify potential diagnostic markers and therapeutic targets, which should strengthen the prevention and treatment of T2DM.

Cancer is the leading cause of death worldwide, and chemotherapy, as its main treatment, has side effects in clinical application due to lack of targeting selectivity to tumor tissues. Theranostic nanomaterials have shown wonderful functions for the diagnosis and therapy of disease benefitting from the controllability of nanomaterials. However, there is still little available for clinical transformation due to the uncertain biocompatibility. It is urgent to develop nanoprobes possessing bright transformation potentials. This study reports a facile biomineralization route to synthesize the theranostic nanoprobe using the clinic available nano-drug (trademark Abraxane). Further profiting from the binding ability of albumin to metal cations, we successfully prepared biocompatible nanoprobe, BSA-Gd2O3/PTX@Anti-HE4 mAb, for the targeted magnetic resonance imaging and chemotherapy of ovarian carcinoma. The obtained nanoprobe has the advantages of uniform particle size, good dispersibility and favorable stability. In vivo and in vitro experiment results showed that the nanoprobe can realize targeted magnetic resonance imaging and chemotherapy of ovarian carcinoma. Such a novel multifunctional nanoprobe based on clinic nano-drug might be promising for clinic transformation.

Intestinal floras influence a lot of biological functions of the organism. Although animal model are strong tools for researches on the relationship between host and microbe, a physiologically relevant in vitro human gut model was still required. Here, a novel human gut-vessel microfluidic system was established to study the host–microbial interaction. Peristaltic motion of the cells on the chip was driven by a pneumatic pump. When intestinal epithelial cells (Caco2) were co-cultured with vascular endothelial cells (HUVECs) on the peristaltic microfluidic chip, Caco2 showed normal barrier and absorption functions after 5 days cultivation, which generally took 21 days in static Transwell models. Intestinal microvilli and glycocalyx layer were seen after 4 days cultivation, and Lactobacillus casei was successfully co-cultured for a week in the intestinal cavity. A model for intestinal damage and inflammatory responses caused by E. coli was set up on this chip, which were successfully suppressed by Lactobacillus casei or antibiotic. In summary, this human gut-vessel microfluidic system showed a good potential for investigating the host–microbial interaction and the effect and mechanism of microbiome on intestinal diseases in vitro.

Diabetic kidney disease (DKD) is a complex disease, in which local inflammatory stress results from both metabolic and hemodynamic derangements. Intercellular adhesion molecule 1 (ICAM-1) is an acute-phase protein marker of inflammation. In the recent years, clinical observations have reported that increased serum/plasma ICAM-1 levels are positively correlated with albuminuria in the patients with type 1 (T1D) and type 2 diabetes (T2D). Genetic association studies have demonstrated that genetic polymorphisms, including SNP rs5498 (E469K, G/A), in the ICAM1 gene is associated with DKD. rs5498 is a nonsynonymous SNP and caused by substitution between E (Glu) and K (Lys) for ICAM-1 protein. In this review, we first summarized the genetic effects of ICAM1 E469K polymorphism in DKD and then demonstrated the possible changes of ICAM-1 protein crystal structures according to the genotypes of this polymorphism. Finally, we discussed the genetic effects of the ICAM1 E469K polymorphism and the biological role of increased circulating ICAM-1 protein and its formation changes in DKD.

This data article contains the truncated view of the transition states for methyl radical attacking camptothecin at the site of 9, 10, 11, 12 and 14 in acidic conditions obtained from quantum computation of Gaussian 09 with B3LYP/6–31+G(d,p) level, also the truncated view of transition states for H abstraction by singlet O2 from sites of 9, 10, 11 and 12 of the intermediates of methyl combination with camptothecin and that by triplet O2 from site 9 of the intermediate of methyl combination with camptothecin in acidic condition are included. The corresponding parameters of reaction rate constant calculation for the formation of methyl radical from acetaldehyde, the first and second step of radical substitution of camptothecin under acidic conditions are listed. The data of the basic parameters for the computation of the total energy of the spin-projection of singlet oxygen, and the S2 values for the reactants, transition states and intermediates in the free radical substitution reaction of camptothecin are also included.

Abstract Background Genetic variations in key DNA repair genes may influence DNA repair capacity, DNA damage and breast carcinogenesis. The current study aimed to estimate the association of APEX1 and OGG1 polymorphisms with the risk of breast cancer development. Methods A total of 518 patients with histopathologically confirmed breast cancer and 921 region- and age-matched cancer-free controls were genotyped for the APEX1 polymorphisms rs3136817 and rs1130409 and the OGG1 polymorphisms rs1052133 and rs2072668 using a QuantStudio™ 12 K Flex Real-Time PCR System. Results The rs3136817 heterozygous TC genotype along with the rs3136817 dominant model (TC + CC) was strongly associated with breast cancer susceptibility (odds ratio [OR] = 0.670, 95% confidence interval [95% CI]: 0.513 - 0.873, P = 0.003; OR = 0.682, 95% CI: 0.526 - 0.883, P = 0.004, respectively). No significant associations were observed among rs1130409, rs1052133, rs2072668 and breast cancer risk. Furthermore, an allele combination analysis revealed that APEX1 haplotypes containing C-T (alleles rs3136817 and rs1130409) conferred a significantly lower risk (corrected P

Background/Aims: Evidence from our and other groups has demonstrated that zinc transporter 7 in SLC30 family (ZnT7) inhibited epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and apoptosis in rat peritoneal mesothelial cells (RPMCs) under high glucose (HG) concentration. In the present study, we investigated the effect of ZnT7 on EMT of renal tubular epithelial cells (RTECs) in an in vitro model of diabetic nephropathy (DN). Methods: A dual-fluorescent staining protocol was used for detection of ZnT7 in a normal rat kidney tubular epithelial cell line (NRK-52E cells). EMT was induced with HG (30 mM). NRK-52E cells were transfected with plasmids codifying for hZnT7-EGFP and interfering RNA for determination of the effect of ZnT7 over-expression and silencing, respectively. Expression of ZnT7, activation of the MAPK/ERK and TGF-β/Smad pathways were analyzed with by means of Western blot. Results: ZnT7 was localized in the perinuclear region and Golgi apparatus. In HG-induced EMT of NRK-52E cells, ZnT7 was up-regulated. Over-expression of ZnT7 led to inhibition of HG-induced EMT, while knock-down of ZnT7 increased EMT. Furthermore, knock-down of ZnT7 and increased HG-induced EMT was accompanied by activation of the MAPK/ERK and TGF-β/Smad pathways. Conclusion: The present study provides evidence that ZnT7 has a protective effect over EMT of RTECs in DN and suggests that the inhibition of HG-induced EMT may be achieved through the MAPK/ERK and TGF-β/Smad pathways. Thereby, ZnT7 could be a potential target for translation medicine and prevention program in DN.

The data presented in this article are related to the research article entitled âThe mechanism for cleavage of three typical glucosidic bonds induced by hydroxyl free radicalâ (Dai et al., 2017) [1]. This article includes the structures of three kinds of disaccharides such as maltose, fructose and cellobiose, the diagrammatic sketch of the hydrogen abstraction reaction of the disaccharides by hydroxyl radical, the structure of the transition states for pyran ring opening of moiety A and cleavage of α(1â2) glycosidic bond starting from the hydrogen abstraction of C6âH in moiety A of sucrose, the transition state structure for cleavage of α(1â2) glycosidic bond starting from the hydrogen abstraction of C1â²-H in moiety B of sucrose, the transition state structure, sketch for the reaction process and relative energy change of the reaction pathway for direct cleavage of α(1â4) glycosidic bond starting from hydrogen abstraction of C6â²âH of moiety B of maltose.

The pathogenesis of respiratory diseases is complex, and its occurrence and development also involve a series of pathological processes. The present research methods are have difficulty simulating the natural developing state of the disease in the body, and the results cannot reflect the real growth state and function in vivo. The development of microfluidic chip technology provides a technical platform for better research on respiratory diseases. The size of its microchannel can be similar to the space for cell growth in vivo. In addition, organ-on-a-chip can achieve long-term co-cultivation of multiple cells and produce precisely controllable fluid shear force, periodically changing mechanical force, and perfusate with varying solute concentration gradient. To sum up, the chip can be used to analyze the specific pathophysiological changes of organs meticulously, and it is widely used in scientific research on respiratory diseases. The focus of this review is to describe and discuss current studies of artificial respiratory systems based on organ-on-a-chip technology and to summarize their applications in the real world.

Abstract Background Periodontitis is a widespread infectious disease ultimately resulting in tooth loss. The number of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) in patients with periodontitis is decreased, and MSC functions are impaired. Rescuing the impaired function of MSCs in periodontitis is the key for treatment, especially in a manner independent of exogenous MSCs. Our previous study found that overexpressed insulin-like growth factor binding protein 5 (IGFBP5) could promote exogenous MSC-mediated periodontal tissue regeneration. Here, we investigate the role of IGFBP5 protein in MSCs and periodontal tissue regeneration independent of exogenous MSCs in an inflammatory niche. Methods TNFα was used to mimic the inflammatory niche. Lentiviral IGFBP5 shRNA was used to silence IGFBP5 and recombinant human IGFBP5 protein (rhIGFBP5) was used to stimulate the periodontal ligament stem cells (PDLSCs) and bone marrow stem cells (BMSCs). The effects of IGFBP5 on PDLSCs were evaluated using the scratch-simulated wound migration, Transwell chemotaxis, alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity, Alizarin red staining, Cell Counting Kit-8, Western blot, Real-time PCR, Co-IP and ChIP assays. The swine model of periodontitis was used to investigate the functions of IGFBP5 for periodontal regeneration and its anti-inflammation effect. Results We discovered that 0.5 ng/ml rhIGFBP5 protein enhanced the migration, chemotaxis, osteo/dentinogenic differentiation and cell proliferation of MSCs under the inflammatory condition. Moreover, 0.5 ng/ml rhIGFBP5 application could rescue the impaired functions of IGFBP5-silenced-MSCs in the inflammatory niche. Furthermore, local injection of rhIGFBP5 could promote periodontal tissue regeneration and relieve the local inflammation in a minipig model of periodontitis. Mechanistically, we found that BCOR negatively regulated the expression of IGFBP5 in MSCs. BCOR formed a protein complex with histone demethylase KDM6B and raised histone K27 methylation in the IGFBP5 promoter. Conclusions This study revealed that rhIGFBP5 could activate the functions of MSCs in an inflammatory niche, provided insight into the mechanism underlying the activated capacities of MSCs, and identified IGFBP5 as a potential cytokine for improving tissue regeneration and periodontitis treatment independent of exogenous MSCs and its potential application in dental clinic.

Tuberculosis (TB) has been the leading lethal infectious disease worldwide since 2014, and about one third of the world’s population has a latent TB infection (LTBI). This is largely attributed to the difficulties in diagnosis and treatment of TB and LTBI patients. Exosomes offer a new perspective on investigation of the process of TB infection. In this study, we performed small RNA sequencing to explore small RNA profiles of serum exosomes derived from LTBI and TB patients and healthy controls (HC). Our results revealed distinct miRNA profile of the exosomes in the three groups. We screened 250 differentially expressed miRNAs including 130 specifically expressed miRNAs. Some miRNAs were further validated to be specifically expressed in LTBI (hsa-let-7e-5p, hsa-let-7d-5p, hsa-miR-450a-5p, and hsa-miR-140-5p) and TB samples (hsa-miR-1246, hsa-miR-2110, hsa-miR-370-3P, hsa-miR-28-3p, and hsa-miR-193b-5p). Additionally, we demonstrated four expression panels in LTBI and TB groups, and six expression patterns among the three groups. These specifically expressed miRNAs and differentially expressed miRNAs in different panels and patterns provide potential biomarkers for detection/diagnosis of latent and active TB using exosomal miRNAs. Additionally, we also discovered plenty of small RNAs derived from genomic repetitive sequences, which might play roles in host immune responses along with Mtb infection progresses. Overall, our findings provide important reference and an improved understanding about miRNAs and repetitive region-derived small RNAs in exosomes during the Mtb infectious process, and facilitate the development of potential molecular targets for detection/diagnosis of latent and active tuberculosis.

The effect of testing temperature and storage period on the polarization fatigue properties of poly (vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene) (P(VDF–TrFE)) ultrathin film devices were investigated. The experimental results show that, even after stored in air for 150 days, the relative remanent polarization (Pr/Pr(0)) of P(VDF–TrFE) of ultrathin films can keep at a relatively high level of 0.80 at 25 °C and 0.70 at 60 °C. To account for this result, a hydrogen fluoride (HF) formation inhibition mechanism was proposed, which correlated the testing temperature and the storage period with the microstructure of P(VDF–TrFE) molecular chain. Moreover, a theoretical model was constructed to describe the polarization fatigue evolution of P(VDF–TrFE) samples.

Background: Our study aimed to examine the effects of COVID-19 on the physical fitness and academic performance of Chinese college students. Participants: The sample included physical fitness test data from 9,712 undergraduate students and academic performance data from 12,000 undergraduate students at a top university in China. Methods: Physical fitness was measured and evaluated according to the Chinese National Student Physical Fitness Standard. Data were analyzed using two-sample t-tests and Pearson product-moment correlations. Results: Total physical fitness test scores of college students decreased after the outbreak, but their mean body mass index (BMI) remained at normal levels. The mean academic performance of college students unexpectedly improved during the online learning period. The positive correlation between physical test scores and academic performance was significantly higher during COVID-19 than that before the outbreak. Conclusions: Chinese college students with high physical fitness during COVID-19 were more likely to achieve good academic performance.

Organ-on-a-chip academic research is in its blossom. Drug toxicity evaluation is a promising area in which organ-on-a-chip technology can apply. A unique advantage of organ-on-a-chip is the ability to integrate drug metabolism and drug toxic processes in a single device, which facilitates evaluation of toxicity of drug metabolites. Human organ-on-a-chip has been fabricated and used to assess drug toxicity with data correlation with the clinical trial. In this review, we introduced the microfluidic chip models of liver, kidney, heart, nerve, and other organs and multiple organs, highlighting the application of these models in drug toxicity detection. Some biomarkers of toxic injury that have been used in organ chip platforms or have potential for use on organ chip platforms are summarized. Finally, we discussed the goals and future directions for drug toxicity evaluation based on organ-on-a-chip technology.