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In this paper, we consider S-chains of extremal self-dual and self-orthogonal codes and their applications in the construction of quantum codes. Then, by virtue of covering radius, we determine necessary conditions for linear codes to have subcodes with large dual distances and design a new S-chain search method. As computational results, 18 S-chains with large distances are obtained, and many good quantum codes can be derived from those S-chains by Steane construction, some of which improve the previous results.

Hypo-salinity events frequently occur in marine ecosystem due to persistent rainfall and freshwater inflow, reducing the cytosol osmolarity and triggering cellular stress responses in aquatic organisms. Euryhaline bivalves have developed sophisticated regulatory mechanisms to adapt to salinity fluctuations over a long period of evolution. In this study, we performed multiple biochemical assays, widely targeted metabolomics, and gene expression analysis to investigate the comprehensive metabolic responses to hypo-salinity stress and osmoregulation mechanisms in hard clam Mercenaria mercenaria, which is a euryhaline bivalve species widely cultured in China. During hypo-salinity stress, increased vacuoles appeared in gill filaments. The Na+ and Cl- concentrations in gills significantly decreased because of the up-regulation of Na+/K+-ATPase (NKA) activity. The cAMP content dramatically decreased at 5 d post hypo-salinity stress. Meanwhile, the gene expression levels of adenylate cyclase, proteinkinase A, and sodium and calcium channel proteins were evidently down-regulated, suggesting that cAMP-PKA pathway was inhibited to prevent ambient inorganic ions from entering the gill cells. Antioxidant metabolites, such as serine and Tyr-containing dipeptides, were significantly up-regulated to resist oxidative stress. Glycerolipid metabolism was strengthened to stabilize membrane structure when hypo-salinity stress was prolonged to 5 days. At 1 d post hypo-salinity stress, an increase in alanine and lactate contents marked the initiation of anaerobic metabolism. Acylcarnitines accumulation indicated that fatty acids β-oxidation was promoted to provide energy for osmoregulation. The potential biomarkers of hypo-salinity stress were identified in hard clams. This study provides novel insights into the metabolic regulatory mechanisms to hypo-salinity stress in euryhaline bivalves.

As a vital developmental event, metamorphosis controls the population dynamics of most marine invertebrates and affects the breeding of economic shellfish. Rapana venosa is an economically important species in China, but artificial aquaculture has hampered its metamorphosis process. Previous studies have found that juvenile oysters can effectively induce the metamorphosis of R. venosa, but the specific induction mechanism is not clear. Here, we investigated the mechanism underlying the response of R. venosa to juvenile oysters through the RNA-seq analysis. In this study, the gene set responses to metamorphosis cues (juvenile oysters) in R. venosa were identified, and GO and KEGG enrichment analyses were further performed on these gene sets. The results showed that the expression of the prototype of the class of immediate early genes, the transcription factor AP-1, was rapidly and significantly increased, and the molecular chaperone of NOS, HSP90, exhibited lower expression in the M12 group than in the control group. In contrast, the expression of inhibitors of apoptosis (IAPs) was significantly increased upon exposure to juvenile oysters. Additionally, the Wnt signaling pathway and MAPK signaling pathway were enriched in the trend analysis. These pathways may also play critical regulatory roles in the response to juvenile oysters. Taken together, the results show that competent larvae rapidly respond to the inducing effects of oysters via some immediate early genes, such as the transcription factor AP-1, which may further regulate downstream pathways such as the MAPK signaling pathway to cause subsequent changes, including a decrease in HSP90 and an increase in IAPs. These changes together may regulate the metamorphosis of R. venosa. This study provides further evidence that juvenile oysters are the metamorphosis cues of R. venosa, which may enhance our understanding of the metamorphosis mechanism in this marine invertebrate.

Electroactive biofilm plays a crucial rule in the electron transfer efficiency of microbial electrochemical systems (MES). However, the low ability to form biofilm and the low conductivity of the formed biofilm substantially limit the extracellular electron transfer rate of microbial cells to the electrode surfaces in MES. To promote biofilm formation and enhance biofilm conductivity, we develop synthetic biology approach to systematically engineer Shewanella oneidensis, a model exoelectrogen, via modular manipulation of the full-cycle different stages of biofilm formation, namely, from initial contact, cell adhesion, and biofilm growth stable maturity to cell dispersion. Consequently, the maximum output power density of the engineered biofilm reaches 3.62 ± 0.06 W m−2, 39.3-fold higher than that of the wild-type strain of S. oneidensis, which, to the best our knowledge, is the highest output power density that has ever been reported for the biofilms of the genetically engineered Shewanella strains.

This paper proposes a dual-output port on-board charging system based on a CLLC resonant converter, which can realize the function of simultaneously charging high-voltage power batteries and low-voltage batteries. The system topology is composed of a front-stage PFC and a latter-stage CLLC resonant converter. The system uses a three-port transformer to couple the resonant converter, the high-voltage charging circuit, and the low-voltage charging circuit. The system also realizes soft switching through resonant components. According to the design requirements of the charging system, the control strategy of the dual-output ports is determined by analyzing the working mode and gain characteristics of the system and the dual closed-loop control structure is designed to realize the functions of power factor correction and wide-range voltage regulation. Simulation and experimental results verify the correctness of theoretical analysis and structural design.

Chemoreception is one of the most important senses and it plays a key role in the survival and adaptation of animals to their environments. Many gastropods, such as Rapana venosa and Neptunea cumingii, have emerged as economically important shellfish. Meanwhile, invasive gastropods have destroyed commercial shellfisheries in many countries. Given the importance of chemoreception in the behavior of aquatic gastropods, the mechanism of their chemical perception has recently garnered attention. To provide a foundation for understanding the chemoreception of aquatic gastropods, we reviewed recent studies and summarized the chemoreception behaviors and mechanisms that gastropods use to perceive and locate targets in aquatic environments, along with relevant molecular and genetic insights. We highlight several of the implications of these studies for chemoreception-related research and shellfish fishery development. This review should aid in the rational development and utilization of gastropod resources as well as in controlling the populations of invasive species.

Abstract The colony stimulating factor 2 receptor subunit beta (CSF2RB) is the common signaling subunit of the cytokine receptors for IL‐3, IL‐5, and GM‐CSF. Several studies have shown that spontaneous and random mutants of CSF2RB can lead to ligand independence in vitro. To date, no report(s) have been shown for the presence of potentially transforming and oncogenic CSF2RB mutation(s) clinically in cancer patients until the first reported case of a leukemia patient in 2016 harboring a germline‐activating mutation (R461C). We combined exome sequencing, pathway analyses, and functional assays to identify novel somatic mutations in KAIMRC1 cells and breast tumor specimen. The patient’s peripheral blood mononuclear cell (PBMC) exome served as a germline control in the identification of somatic mutations. Here, we report the discovery of a novel potentially transforming and oncogenic somatic mutation (S230I) in the CSF2RB gene of a breast cancer patient and the cell line, KAIMRC1 established from her breast tumor tissue. KAIMRC1 cells are immortalized and shown to survive and proliferate in ligand starvation condition. Immunoblot analysis showed that mutant CSF2RB signals through JAK2/STAT and PI3K/mTOR pathways in ligand starvation conditions. Screening a small molecule kinase inhibitor library revealed potent JAK2 inhibitors against KAIMRC1 cells. We, for the first time, identified a somatic, potentially transforming, and oncogenic CSF2RB mutation (S230I) in breast cancer patients that seem to be an actionable mutation leading to the development of new therapeutics for breast cancer.

In order to make the superheated steam flowing at high speed complete the desuperheating process in the pipeline with limited distance, so as to save the production cost, this paper makes structural innovation on the existing equipment, a solution to install static mixing elements in the pipeline downstream of the nozzle of the desuperheater is proposed to improve the performance of the desuperheater without increasing the cost of nozzle atomization. Based on Fluent software, the working process of the new desuperheater is numerically simulated, and its working mechanism and desuperheating effect are visually analyzed. Compared with the traditional desuperheater, the desuperheating range of the new desuperheater in the pipeline with the same distance is increased by about 70.8%, and the temperature non-uniformity coefficient is reduced by about 75.5%. Furthermore, the validity of the above simulation results is verified by experiments.

Post transcriptional modifications to RNA may be important in the function of NK cells but this is not fully known. Here the authors show that m6A-methyltransferase METTL3 deletion in NK cells leads to reduced function and protection against tumour challenge through suppressing response to IL-15.

Background and objective: Vascular cognitive impairment (VCI) can be caused by multiple types of cerebrovascular pathology and is considered a network disconnection disorder. The heterogeneity hinders research progress in VCI. Glymphatic failure has been considered as a key common pathway to dementia recently. The emergence of a new method, Diffusion Tensor Image Analysis Along the Perivascular Space (DTI-ALPS), makes it possible to investigate the changes of the glymphatic function in humans non-invasively. We aimed to investigate alterations of glymphatic function in VCI and its potential impact on network connectivity.Methods: We recruited 79 patients with mild VCI, including 40 with cerebral small vessel disease cognitive impairment (SVCI) and 39 with post-stroke cognitive impairment (PSCI); and, 77 normal cognitive (NC) subjects were recruited. All subjects received neuropsychological assessments and multimodal magnetic resonance imaging scans. ALPS-index was calculated and structural networks were constructed by deterministic tractography, and then, the topological metrics of these structural connectivity were evaluated.Results: The ALPS-index of VCI patients was significantly lower than that of NC subjects (P < 0.001). Multiple linear regression analysis showed that ALPS-index affects cognitive function independently (β = 0.411, P < 0.001). The results of correlation analysis showed that the ALPS-index was correlated with overall vascular risk factor burden (r = −0.263, P = 0.001) and multiple cerebrovascular pathologies (P < 0.05). In addition, global efficiency (Eg) of network was correlated with ALPS-index in both SVCI (r = 0.348, P = 0.028) and PSCI (r = 0.732, P < 0.001) patients. Finally, the results of mediation analysis showed that Eg partially mediated in the impact of glymphatic dysfunction on cognitive impairment (indirect effect = 7.46, 95% CI 4.08–11.48).Conclusion: In both major subtypes of VCI, the ALPS-index was decreased, indicating impaired glymphatic function in VCI. Glymphatic dysfunction may affect cognitive function in VCI by disrupting network connectivity, and, may be a potential common pathological mechanism of VCI. ALPS-index is expected to become an emerging imaging marker for VCI.

Space-based measurements, such as the Greenhouse gases Observing SATellite (GOSAT) and the TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) aboard the Sentinel-5 Precursor satellite, provide global observations of the column-averaged CH4 concentration (XCH4). Due to the irregular observations and data gaps in the retrievals, studies on the spatial and temporal variations of regional atmospheric CH4 concentrations are limited. In this paper, we mapped XCH4 data over monsoon Asia using GOSAT and TROPOMI observations from April 2009 to December 2021 and analyzed the spatial and temporal pattern of atmospheric CH4 variations and emissions. The results show that atmospheric CH4 concentrations over monsoon Asia have long-term increases with an annual growth rate of roughly 8.4 ppb. The spatial and temporal trends of XCH4 data are significantly correlated with anthropogenic CH4 emissions from the bottom-up emission inventory of EDGAR. The spatial pattern of gridded XCH4 temporal variations in China presents a basically consistent distribution with the Heihe–Tengchong Line, which is mainly related to the difference in anthropogenic emissions in the eastern and western areas. Using the mapping of XCH4 data from 2019 to 2021, this study further revealed the response of atmospheric CH4 concentrations to anthropogenic emissions in different urban agglomerations. For the urban agglomerations, the triangle of Central China (TCC), the Chengdu–Chongqing City Group (CCG), and the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) show higher CH4 concentrations and emissions than the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei region and nearby areas (BTH). The results reveal the spatial and temporal distribution of CH4 concentrations and quantify the differences between urban agglomerations, which will support further studies on the drivers of methane emissions.

The exploration of high-efficiency photocatalysts to drive the conversion of highly toxic heavy metal hexavalent chromium (Cr(VI)) in wastewater to low-toxic trivalent chromium (Cr(III)) is of great significance for purifying water that contains emerging contaminants. Herein, four hourglass-type phosphomolybdate-based hybrid networks—(H2bpe)2[M(H2O)3]2{M[P4Mo6O31H7]2}·8H2O (M = Mn for 1, Co for 2) and (Hbpe)(H2bpe)Na[M(H2O)3]2{M[P4Mo6O31H7]2}·9H2O (M = Mn for 3, Co for 4; {M[P4Mo6O31H7]2}8− (abbr. M{P4Mo6}2); bpe = 1,2-di(4-pyridyl)ethylene)—were hydrothermally synthesized as heterogeneous photocatalysts for Cr(VI) reduction. A structural analysis showed that the four hybrids 1–4 exhibited two-dimensional inorganic sheet-like structures with a 3,6-connected kgd topology built of hourglass phosphomolybdate clusters having different central metal ions, which further interacted with organic bpe cations via abundant hydrogen-bonding interactions to extend the structure to a three-dimensional (3D) supramolecular network. The four hybrids displayed excellent redox properties and wide visible-light absorption. When used as heterogeneous photocatalysts, hybrids 1–4 exhibited excellent photocatalytic activity for Cr(VI) reduction under 10 W white light irradiation, with reduction rates of 91% for 1, 74% for 2, 90% for 3, and 71% for 4, respectively, within 80 min. The Cr(VI) reduction reaction over hybrids 1–4 followed the pseudo first-order kinetics model with reaction rate constants k of 0.0237 min−1 for 1, 0.0143 min−1 for 2, 0.0221 min−1 for 3 and 0.0134 min−1 for 4, respectively. The Mn{P4Mo6}2-based hybrids 1 and 3 showed better photocatalytic performance than the Co{P4Mo6}2-based hybrids 2 and 4, along with excellent recycle stability. This mechanism study shows that the different central metals M in the M{P4Mo6}2 cluster have a considerable impact on photocatalytic performance due to their regulation effect on the electronic structure. This work provides evidence for the important role of the central metal in hourglass-type phosphomolybdate in the regulation of photocatalytic performance, and it brings inspiration for the design of highly efficient photocatalysts based on polyoxometalates.

Abstract Background Pancreatic cancer (PC) is one of the most lethal cancer types with high degree of malignancy and poor prognosis. Recent studies have shown that long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) were associated with the initiation and progression of pancreatic cancer. In the current study, we have investigated the expression, biological function and mechanism of a lncRNA CTD-3252C9.4 in pancreatic cancer. Methods The expression of CTD-3252C9.4 in pancreatic cancer cells and tissues was measured by qRT-PCR. In vitro and in vivo functional experiments assays were implemented for identifying CTD-3252C9.4 function in pancreatic cancer. Molecular relationships among CTD-3252C9.4, IRF1 and IFI6 were investigated via luciferase reporter assay, pulldown assay and ChIP assays. Results CTD-3252C9.4 was found remarkably decreased in pancreatic cancer cells and tissues. Overexpression of CTD-3252C9.4 suppressed migration, invasion and proliferation, yet facilitated apoptosis of pancreatic cancer cells both in vitro and in vivo. Then, IFI6 was identified as a downstream target that could be down-regulated by CTD-3252C9.4 and IFI6 overexpression could counteract the effects of CTD-3252C9.4 upregulation on the survival and apoptosis of pancreatic cancer cells. Furthermore, mechanism experiments revealed that IRF1 was a transcriptional factor of IFI6 that can be blocked by CTD-3252C9.4 to inhibit IFI6 transcription. Conclusion Our data indicated that CTD-3252C9.4 could promote pancreatic cancer cell apoptosis and restrain cell growth via binding IRF1 and preventing the transcription of IFI6, which may become a potential therapeutic target for pancreatic cancer.

Identification of gene targets is one of the major challenges to construct superior microbial cell factory for chemical synthesis. Here, the authors employ CRISPRi and omics analyses for genome-scale target genes identification for high-titer production of free fatty acids in E. coli.

Abstract Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) and their crosstalks with other RNAs have been revealed to be closely related to tumorigenesis and development, but their role in invasive pituitary adenoma (IPA) remains largely unclear. In our study, LINC00473 was identified as the most upregulated lncRNA in IPA by whole transcriptome RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq). Further, its related signaling pathway LINC00473/miR-502-3p/KMT5A was obtained by constructing a competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) regulatory network. Their expression in IPA and non-invasive pituitary adenoma (NIPA) tissues was verified by qRT-PCR. Then the effects and mechanisms of LINC00473 and its ceRNA network on the proliferation of pituitary adenoma (PA) cells were confirmed by gene overexpression or silencing techniques combined with CCK-8 assay, EdU staining, flow cytometry assay, and double luciferase reporter gene assay in PA cell lines AtT-20 and GT1-1 in vitro and in a xenograft model in vivo. LINC00473 is overexpressed in IPA and can promote PA cells proliferation. Mechanistically, overexpression of LINC00473 restricts miR-502-3p through the ceRNA mechanism, upregulates KMT5A expression, and promotes the expression of cyclin D1 and CDK2, which is conducive to the cell cycle process, thereby promoting the proliferation of PA cells, involving IPA progression.

Microbiologically influenced corrosion is a major source of degradation of metals. Here, extracellular electron transfer is studied during pitting corrosion of stainless steel in the presence of an electroactive bacterium and a riboflavin electron shuttle, revealing bidirectional electron transfer.

Background: Numerous benefits of green tea have been reported. However, the effects of green tea on cognitive function remain disputable and the mechanism is still unclear.Objective: To investigate the relationship of green tea consumption with cognitive function and related blood biomarkers among Chinese middle-aged and elderly people.Methods: A total of 264 participants aged 50–70 years old were enrolled from Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University. They were interviewed about green tea consumption patterns and underwent neuropsychological tests covering five main cognitive domains to assess cognition including Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) and the other 10 scales. Then we detected serum oxidative stress biomarkers including Superoxide Dismutase (SOD), Malondialdehyde (MDA), Glutathione Peroxidase (GPx), Glutathione Reductase (GR), and Alzheimer’s disease (AD) markers including β-amyloid (Aβ)40, Aβ42, and phosphorylated tau-181 (pTau181).Results: In the tea-consuming group, the MoCA scores (P = 0.000), Hopkins Verbal Learning Test (HVLT) immediate recall (P = 0.012) and delayed recall (P = 0.013) were significantly higher while Trail Making Test-B (P = 0.005) and Victoria Stroop test interference (P = 0.000) were lower. In terms of oxidative stress markers, the tea-consuming group had lower serum MDA levels (P = 0.002) and higher serum SOD (P = 0.005) and GPx (P = 0.007) levels. In terms of AD markers, serum pTau181 (P < 0.000), Aβ42 (P = 0.019) and total Aβ levels (P = 0.034) but not serum Aβ40 levels, were lower in the tea-consuming group. In the logistic regression analysis, there was a significant negative correlation between green tea consumption and cognitive impairment (OR = 0.26, 95 % CI 0.13 0.52 for high group).Conclusion: Regular green tea consumption is associated with better cognitive function among Chinese middle-aged and elderly people, mainly reflected in memory and executive function. It may achieve protective effects by reducing AD-related pathology and improving anti-oxidative stress capacity and higher levels of tea consumption have a stronger protective effect.

Infrared neural stimulation (INS), as a novel form of neuromodulation, allows modulating the activity of nerve cells through thermally induced capacitive currents and thermal sensitivity ion channels. However, fundamental questions remain about the exact mechanism of INS and how the photothermal effect influences the neural response. Computational neural modeling can provide a powerful methodology for understanding the law of action of INS. We developed a temperature-dependent model of ion channels and membrane capacitance based on the photothermal effect to quantify the effect of INS on the direct response of individual neurons and neuronal networks. The neurons were connected through excitatory and inhibitory synapses and constituted a complex neuronal network model. Our results showed that a slight increase in temperature promoted the neuronal spikes and enhanced network activity, whereas the ultra-temperature inhibited neuronal activity. This biophysically based simulation illustrated the optical dose-dependent biphasic cell response with capacitive current as the core change condition. The computational model provided a new sight to elucidate mechanisms and inform parameter selection of INS.

Deep-trap luminescent materials have attracted great attention for optical information storage applications. However, the flexible luminescence films based on red luminescence materials with temperature and infrared response are scarce. In this study, we have successfully developed various novel flexible red emitting films based on Eu2+/Dy3+ co-doped Sr2Si5N8 phosphors through screen-printing and spin-coating technologies, respectively. Interestingly, the fabricated flexible luminescence films exhibit unique temperature and infrared responsive properties for optical information storage by releasing photons in response to thermal or infrared stimulation. Notably, deep-trap red emitting Eu2+/Dy3+ co-doped Sr2Si5N8 phosphors are crucial for the optical information storage properties of the films. Two emission peaks of Sr2Si5N8:Dy3+ phosphors at 476 nm and 577 nm are observed under excitation at 345 nm, corresponding to the radiative transition occurs from the 4F9/2 level to the 6H13/2 and 6H15/2 levels of Dy3+. When Dy3+ and Eu2+ ions are co-doped in Sr2Si5N8, the energy transfer from Dy3+ to Eu2+ in Sr2Si5N8 matrix is found and the decay time confirms that Dy3+ ions can be acted as deep trap centers to storage photons. For Sr2Si5N8:Eu2+,Dy3+ phosphors and the corresponding flexible luminescence films, the specific patterns (for example apple and note patterns) are firstly recorded under NUV or blue light excitation and then reappear through thermal stimulation or near-infrared photo-stimulation (980 nm laser). This work not only validates the feasibility of Sr2Si5N8:Eu2+,Dy3+ phosphors as deep-trap red emitting luminescence materials, but also suggests the applications of flexible luminescence films for optical information storage.

Background: The personalized, heart rate-dependent computed tomography angiography (CTA) protocol can reduce the use of contrast medium (CM) and the radiation dose. This is especially beneficial for patients with CTA of coronary combined with pulmonary arteries. Purpose: To evaluate the feasibility of low CM in one-stop coronary and pulmonary arterial CTA tailored by patients’ heart rate. Material and Methods: 94 patients set to undergo CTA of coronary combined with pulmonary arteries with one-stop scans. Patients were prospectively randomized into two groups: For group A (n = 47), the timing of the scans was determined according to the patient’s HR using 30 mL CM; For group B (n = 47), in which the routine bolus tracking was applied by setting the ascending aortic threshold of 80 HU with 70 mL CM, scans were performed simultaneously. Results: Compared with group B, group A had slightly higher computed tomography (CT) value and image quality of pulmonary artery (CT value: group A 484.7HU; group B 457.9HU; t = 2.446, P = .016; image quality: χ2 = 8.292, P = .016), but in coronary artery wasn’t statistically different between two groups(image quality: χ2 = 2.516, P = .642). Conclusion: The heart rate-dependent CM injection protocol can greatly reduce the use of CM, simplify the work-flow, and may obtain comparable or even better image quality compared with the routine bolus tracking.

Flavins serve as the electron mediators in Shewanella oneidensis, determining the extracellular electron transfer (EET) rate. Currently, metabolic engineering of flavins biosynthetic pathway has been studied for improving EET. However, the cellular response triggered by flavins that contribute to EET remains to be elucidated. In this study, the riboflavin-overproducing strain C5 (expressing the flavins synthetic genes in plasmid PYYDT) and the PYYDT strain (harboring the empty plasmid PYYDT) in the microbial fuel cells are applied for comparative transcriptomic analyses to investigate beneficial gene targets that could improve EET. From the differentially expressed genes, we select the significantly upregulated and downregulated genes for inverse engineering in S. oneidensis. The results show that overexpression of ahpC and ccpA, and inactivation of pubA, putB, and tonB are able to improve the EET capability. Combinatorial modulation of these five genes results in the recombinant strain CM4, achieving the maximum power density of 651.78 ± 124.60 mW/m2, 1.97 folds of the parental strain. These genes modulation is speculated to reduce the ROS damage and to promote cytochrome synthesis and heme accumulation, which coherently enhance EET. Our findings facilitate in-depth understanding of the mechanism of flavins-mediated EET and provide new insights in promoting EET of S. oneidensis for electricity generation.

Biomass gasification for hydrogen (H2) production provides outstanding advantages in terms of renewable energy resources, carbon neutral, high efficiency, and environmental benefits. However, the factors influencing H2 production from biomass gasification are complex, which makes determining the optimal operating conditions challenging. Biomass gasification also poses challenges owing to the high associated tar content and low gas yield, which need to be overcome. This review summarizes the influence of the gasification parameters on H2 production. Catalytic gasification technology and some of the latest catalysts, such as composites and special structure catalysts, are also summarized herein based on the requirements of high-purity H2 production. Moreover, novel technologies, such as staged gasification, chemical looping gasification, and adsorption-enhanced reforming for producing H2 rich gas are introduced. Finally, the challenges and prospects associated with biomass gasification for H2 production are presented.

Background The mutations associated with metastasis in advanced-stage cholangiocarcinoma (CCA) have not been investigated. Objective To explore mutations in patients with advanced CCA and independent factors related to metastasis. Methods This retrospective study performed next-generation sequencing of tumor specimens from patients with advanced CCA treated between January 2017 and December 2019. Tumor mutational burden (TMB), microsatellite instability, and programmed cell death ligand (PD-L)1 positivity were determined. Factors independently associated with metastasis were explored via logistic regression. Results Ninety-one patients were included in this study. TP53 mutation frequencies were significantly higher in extrahepatic than intrahepatic CCA, while ARID1A mutations were significantly more frequent in intrahepatic CCA. Mutation frequencies in six selected genes did not differ according to patient age or sex. SMAD4 mutations were significantly less frequent in stage IV cancer; ARID1A and PBRM1 mutation frequencies were significantly higher in TMB >10 tumors. PBRM1 mutation frequencies were significantly higher in PD-L1-positive tumors, but lower in patients with metastasis. Multivariable analysis showed that a history of biliary surgery, SMAD4 mutations, and PBRM1 mutations were independently associated with CCA metastasis. Conclusions A history of biliary surgery and mutations in SMAD4 and PBRM1 are independent protective factors for metastasis in patients with advanced CCA.

Induction chemotherapy in oral squamous cell carcinoma is a controversial issue in clinical practice. To investigate the evolution of cancer cells and tumor microenvironment (TME) response to chemotherapy in oral squamous cell carcinoma, single-cell transcriptome analysis was performed in a post-chemotherapy squamous cell carcinoma located in oral cavity. The main cell types were identified based on gene expression patterns determined using dimensionality reduction and unsupervised cell clustering. Non-negative matrix factorization clustering of the gene expression of Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) and macrophages was performed. Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway analyses and gene set enrichment analysis were performed to explore significant functional pathways. CellPhoneDB and NicheNet were used to detect the intercellular communication between cell types. CAFs were divided into “inflammatory CAFs,” “antigen-presenting CAFs” and “myofibroblastic CAFs.” Three classic subgroups of tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs) were detected, namely C1Q (+), FCN1 (+) and SPP1(+) TAMs. The inflammatory cytokine expression is elevated, and several molecular pathways, such as PI3K/Akt/mTORC1, TNF-α via NFκB, TGF-β, IL-6/JAK2/STAT3 and CXCL12/CXCR4 axis associated with epithelial-mesenchymal transition were enriched in TME. Also, CD74-MIF/COPA/APP interactions were expressed in TME of oral squamous cell carcinoma after chemotherapy. The results revealed the characteristics of TME in post-chemotherapy oral squamous cell carcinoma at single-cell transcriptome level, providing new insights and clues for further investigation.

Background Previous studies have been reported the immune dysfunction of various live tissues. However, the potential molecular mechanism of post-transcriptional regulation of immune related genes in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is still not clear. We tried to identify crucial immune related biomarkers associated with HCC patients’ outcomes and to reveal the transcriptional regulation. Method The fractions of 22 immune cells in tumor and adjacent tissues were estimated by CIBERSORT. Kruskal-Wallis test and differentially expressed analyzes were used for comparative studies. Cox proportional hazard regression model, Kaplan-Meier estimates and Log-rank test were used for survival analyses. Results From The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), the gene, lncRNA and miRNA expression profiles of 379 HCC samples with clinical information were used for comparative studies. Eleven adaptive and innate immune cell types were significantly altered in HCC samples, including B cell memory, regulatory T cells and follicular helper T cells. Differentially expressed competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) network associated with patients’ overall survival was identified. Then, the novel pathway, including LINC00261, MiR105-5p and selectin L(SELL) was found and may be potential novel biomarkers for patients’ outcomes and immunotherapy. Furthermore, SELL was significantly positively correlated (correlation coefficients: 0.47–0.69) with 12 known gene signatures of immunotherapy except for programmed cell death 1 (PDCD1). Conclusions Our findings could provide insights into the selection of novel LINC00261/MiR105-5p/SELL pathway which is associated with overall survival and may impact on efficacy of immunotherapy in HCC.

Summary: Bio-electrochemical systems are based on extracellular electron transfer (EET), whose efficiency relates to the expression level of numerous genes. However, the lack of multi-functional tools for gene activation and repression hampers the enhancement of EET in electroactive microorganisms (EAMs). We thus develop a type I-F CRISPR/PaeCascade-RpoD-mediated activation and inhibition regulation (CRISPR-PAIR) platform in the model EAM, Shewanella oneidensis MR-1. Gene activation is achieved (3.8-fold) through fusing activator RpoD (σ70) to Cas7 when targeting the prioritized loci upstream of the transcription start site. Gene inhibition almost has no position preference when targeting the open reading frame, which makes the design of crRNAs easy and flexible. Then CRISPR-PAIR platform is applied to up-/down-regulate the expression of six endogenous genes, resulting in the improved EET efficiency. Moreover, simultaneous gene activation and inhibition are achieved in S. oneidensis MR-1. CRISPR-PAIR platform offers a programmable methodology for dual regulation, facilitating in-depth EET studies in Shewanella spp.

Precisely controlling the chemical composition and structure of nanoclusters is an ongoing challenge. Here, the authors report a clickable assembly strategy to construct widely varied lanthanide nanoclusters with synergized optical functionalities.

Progress in predictive machine learning is typically measured on the basis of performance comparisons on benchmark datasets. Traditionally these kinds of empirical evaluation are carried out on large numbers of datasets, but this is becoming increasingly hard due to computational requirements and the often large number of alternative methods to compare against. In this paper we investigate adaptive approaches to achieve better efficiency on model benchmarking. For a large collection of datasets, rather than training and testing a given approach on every individual dataset, we seek methods that allow us to pick only a few representative datasets to quantify the model’s goodness, from which to extrapolate to performance on other datasets. To this end, we adapt existing approaches from psychometrics: specifically, Item Response Theory and Adaptive Testing. Both are well-founded frameworks designed for educational tests. We propose certain modifications following the requirements of machine learning experiments, and present experimental results to validate the approach.

As the largest freshwater lake in China, Poyang Lake is an internationally important wetland and the largest migratory bird habitat in Asia. Many sub-lakes distributed in the lake basin are seasonal lakes, which have a significant impact on hydro-ecological processes and are susceptible to various changes. In this study, using multi-source remote sensing data, a continuous time-series construction method of water coverage suitable in Poyang Lake was developed. That method combined the downscaling of the MNDWI (modified normalized difference water index) with the ISODATA (iterative self-organizing data analysis technique algorithm), and its accuracy can be up to 97% in the months when Landsat 8 is available or 87% when it is unavailable. Based on that method, the increasing variation in water coverage was observed in the sub-lakes of Poyang Lake during 2013–2020 to be within a range of 200–690 km2 normally. The center of the sub-lakes always remained inundated (>80% inundation frequency), while the surrounding areas were probably kept dry for seven months (except for June to September). The dominant influencing factors of water coverage variations were different in different hydrological periods (wet season and dry–wet season: discharge; dry season: temperature and wind speed; wet–dry season: temperature and precipitation). In addition, “returning farmland to lakes” affected the increase in the water area in the sub-lakes. This study is helpful for the management of water resources and the protection of migratory birds in the Poyang Lake region.

Abstract Background Inhibitors of apoptosis (IAPs) are critical regulators of programmed cell death that are essential for development, oncogenesis, and immune and stress responses. However, available knowledge regarding IAP is largely biased toward humans and model species, while the distribution, function, and evolutionary novelties of this gene family remain poorly understood in many taxa, including Mollusca, the second most speciose phylum of Metazoa. Results Here, we present a chromosome-level genome assembly of an economically significant bivalve, the hard clam Mercenaria mercenaria, which reveals an unexpected and dramatic expansion of the IAP gene family to 159 members, the largest IAP gene repertoire observed in any metazoan. Comparative genome analysis reveals that this massive expansion is characteristic of bivalves more generally. Reconstruction of the evolutionary history of molluscan IAP genes indicates that most originated in early metazoans and greatly expanded in Bivalvia through both lineage-specific tandem duplication and retroposition, with 37.1% of hard clam IAPs located on a single chromosome. The expanded IAPs have been subjected to frequent domain shuffling, which has in turn shaped their architectural diversity. Further, we observed that extant IAPs exhibit dynamic and orchestrated expression patterns among tissues and in response to different environmental stressors. Conclusions Our results suggest that sophisticated regulation of apoptosis enabled by the massive expansion and diversification of IAPs has been crucial for the evolutionary success of hard clam and other molluscan lineages, allowing them to cope with local environmental stresses. This study broadens our understanding of IAP proteins and expression diversity and provides novel resources for studying molluscan biology and IAP function and evolution.

Metallization of pure hydrogen via overlapping of electronic bands requires high pressure above 3 Mbar. Here the authors study the Ba-H system and discover a unique superhydride BaH12 that contains molecular hydrogen, which demonstrates metallic properties and superconductivity below 1.5 Mbar.

Abstract Orbital-angular-momentum (OAM) multiplexing has been utilized to increase the channel capacity in both millimeter-wave and optical domains. Terahertz (THz) wireless communication is attracting increasing attention due to its broadband spectral resources. Thus, it might be valuable to explore the system performance of THz OAM links to further increase the channel capacity. In this paper, we study through simulations the fundamental system-degrading effects when using multiple OAM beams in THz communications links under atmospheric turbulence. We simulate and analyze the effects of divergence, turbulence, limited-size aperture, and misalignment on the signal power and crosstalk of THz OAM links. We find through simulations that the system-degrading effects are different in two scenarios with atmosphere turbulence: (a) when we consider the same strength of phasefront distortion, faster divergence (i.e., lower frequency; smaller beam waist) leads to higher power leakage from the transmitted mode to neighbouring modes; and (b) however, when we consider the same atmospheric turbulence, the divergence effect tends to affect the power leakage much less, and the power leakage increases as the frequency, beam waist, or OAM order increases. Simulation results show that: (i) the crosstalk to the neighbouring mode remains

Background Hyperthermia has been reported to cause cancer stage regression, thus providing surgical opportunities in patients with unresectable tumors and improving the quality of life of patients by preserving certain organs. Methods A prospective open-label phase II trial was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of hyperthermia combined with induction chemotherapy in patients with locally advanced resectable oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). Patients received hyperthermia combined with two cycles of 5-fluorouracil, cisplatin, and docetaxel (TPF) induction chemotherapy regimens or TPF induction chemotherapy alone, followed by radical surgery with postoperative radiotherapy. The primary endpoint was the clinical response rate of the induction chemotherapy. The secondary endpoints were overall survival (OS), disease-free survival (DFS), and toxicity. Results A total of 120 patients were enrolled, and 115 patients were included in the clinical response analysis. The clinical response rate was significantly higher in the experimental arm than in the control arm (65.45% vs. 40.00%, p = 0.0088). There were no unexpected toxicities, and hyperthermia and induction chemotherapy did not increase the perioperative morbidity rate. Moreover, there was a significant improvement in DFS, but no significant difference in OS between the two arms. In the subgroup analysis, increased OS and DFS rates were associated with patients with favorable clinical response after induction chemotherapy in the total population, experimental arm, and control arm. Conclusions Our study demonstrates that hyperthermia combined with induction chemotherapy is associated with a high response rate and provides a new treatment option for patients with resectable stage III or IVA OSCC.

Aspect-based sentiment analysis (ABSA) aims to analyze the sentiment polarity of an input sentence in a certain aspect. Many existing methods of ABSA employ long short-term memory (LSTM) networks and attention mechanism. However, the attention mechanism only models the local certain dependencies of the input information, which fails to capture the global dependence of the inputs. Simply improving the attention mechanism fails to solve the issue of target-sensitive sentiment expression, which has been proven to degrade the prediction effectiveness. In this work, we propose the multi-head self-attention transformation (MSAT) networks for ABSA tasks, which conducts more effective sentiment analysis with target specific self-attention and dynamic target representation. Given a set of review sentences, MSAT applies multi-head target specific self-attention to better capture the global dependence and introduces target-sensitive transformation to effectively tackle the problem of target-sensitive sentiment at first. Second, the part-of-speech (POS) features are integrated into MSAT to capture the grammatical features of sentences. A series of experiments carried on the SemEval 2014 and Twitter datasets show that the proposed model achieves better effectiveness compared with several state-of-the-art methods.

Electroactive bacteria could perform bi-directional extracellular electron transfer (EET) to exchange electrons and energy with extracellular environments, thus playing a central role in microbial electro-fermentation (EF) process. Unbalanced fermentation and microbial electrosynthesis are the main pathways to produce value-added chemicals and biofuels. However, the low efficiency of the bi-directional EET is a dominating bottleneck in these processes. In this review, we firstly demonstrate the main bi-directional EET mechanisms during EF, including the direct EET and the shuttle-mediated EET. Then, we review representative milestones and progresses in unbalanced fermentation via anode outward EET and microbial electrosynthesis via inward EET based on these two EET mechanisms in detail. Furthermore, we summarize the main synthetic biology strategies in improving the bi-directional EET and target products synthesis, thus to enhance the efficiencies in unbalanced fermentation and microbial electrosynthesis. Lastly, a perspective on the applications of microbial electro-fermentation is provided.

Heat shock protein 70 (HSP70) members participate in a wide range of housekeeping and stress-related activities in eukaryotic cells. In marine ecosystems, bivalves encounter abiotic stresses, including high temperatures and low dissolved oxygen. Here, 133 MmHSP70 genes were identified through combined methods including Blastp, HMM and manual filtration, based on the whole Mercenaria mercenaria genome. The MmHSP70 genes were unevenly distributed, and 41 genes (33.08%) were located on Chr 7. Phylogenetic analyses indicated that the MmHSP70 gene family mainly consisted of two clusters and the Hspa12 subfamily underwent lineage-specific expansion. A high-density collinear gene block was observed between M. mercenaria Chr 7 and Cyclina sinensis Chr 14. Tandem duplication MmHSP70 gene pairs experienced different levels of purifying selection, which could be an important source of sequence and functional constraints. MmHSP70 genes showed tissue-specific and stress-specific expression. Most tandem duplication HSP70 gene pairs had high expression under hypoxia stress. HSP70 B2 tandem duplication gene pairs showed significantly increased expression under heat plus severe hypoxia stress. This study provided a comprehensive understanding of the MmHSP70 gene family in the M. mercenaria and laid a significant foundation for further studies on the functional characteristics of MmHSP70 genes during exposure to heat and hypoxia stress.

Non-homologous end joining (NHEJ)-mediated integration is effective in generating random mutagenesis to identify beneficial gene targets in the whole genome, which can significantly promote the performance of the strains. Here, a novel target leading to higher protein synthesis was identified by NHEJ-mediated integration that seriously improved fatty alcohols biosynthesis in Yarrowia lipolytica. One batch of strains transformed with fatty acyl-CoA reductase gene (FAR) showed significant differences (up to 70.53-fold) in fatty alcohol production. Whole-genome sequencing of the high-yield strain demonstrated that a new target YALI0_A00913g (“A1 gene”) was disrupted by NHEJ-mediated integration of partial carrier DNA, and reverse engineering of the A1 gene disruption (YlΔA1-FAR) recovered the fatty alcohol overproduction phenotype. Transcriptome analysis of YlΔA1-FAR strain revealed A1 disruption led to strengthened protein synthesis process that was confirmed by sfGFP gene expression, which may account for enhanced cell viability and improved biosynthesis of fatty alcohols. This study identified a novel target that facilitated synthesis capacity and provided new insights into unlocking biosynthetic potential for future genetic engineering in Y. lipolytica.

Although phospholipase A2 group VI (PLA2G6) is involved in oncogenesis in several human tumors, its expression and role in cutaneous malignant melanoma (CMM) pathogenesis remains unclear. Here, by using the Oncomine and CCLE online database, immunohistochemistry, RT-qPCR, and western blotting analysis, we revealed that PLA2G6 was markedly up-regulated in CMM tissues compared to nevus tissues, as well as remarkably increased in vitro in SK-MEL-28 and M14 melanoma cell lines compared to human melanocytes. In vivo, PLA2G6 was also elevated in nine melanoma tissues compared to adjacent tissues. To investigate the malignant behaviors of PLA2G6 in CMM, SK-MEL-28 and M14 cell lines with PLA2G6 stable knockdown by RNAi strategy were constructed. Through CCK8 and colony formation assays in vitro and xenograft tumor experiment in vivo, we found that knockdown of PLA2G6 dramatically inhibited cell proliferation. The results of scratch-wound and transwell assays suggested that the migration and invasion of melanoma cells were prominently suppressed after silencing PLA2G6. In addition, flow cytometry showed that the knockdown of PLA2G6 promoted the apoptosis rate of melanoma cells. To further explore the potential molecular mechanism, we used liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) proteomic and bioinformatics analysis. The GO and KEGG analysis suggested that the underlying mechanism of PLA2G6 in CMM might be associated with the ferroptosis pathway, and ferroptosis-related proteins were validated to be differentially expressed in PLA2G6 knockdown SK-MEL-28 and M14 cells. Together, these results suggested that PLA2G6 knockdown significantly inhibited cell proliferation, metastasis, and promoted apoptosis in melanoma. Our findings on the biological function of PLA2G6 and the underlying association between PLA2G6 and ferroptosis in melanoma may contribute to developing a potential therapeutic strategy for melanoma.

Active components reloading is critical process for the catalyst regeneration, which is limited by the low adsorption capacity and unwilling distribution of desired components to the catalyst surface. Herein we demonstrated that with dimethyl formamide(DMF) modification and sequentially reloading of vanadium, the traditional V-Ti SCR catalyst, which uses vanadium as the active components and titanium as the carrier, showed the significantly improved DeNOx performance, owing to the increased adsorption capacity and desired distribution of vanadium. When the DMF concentration was 6%, the adsorption capacity of the promoted catalyst was 3.58 and 6.57 mg/g under vanadyl ion concentrations of 1.5 and 3 g/L, respectively, 135 and 147% higher than that of the original catalyst. Adsorption kinetics demonstrated that the pseudo-second-order kinetic model better describes the process by which vanadyl ions adsorb onto the catalyst. In addition, the adsorption equilibrium indicated that Langmuir model was a closer fit for the vanadyl ion adsorption to the promoted catalyst. After DMF modification, the vanadyl ions were first adsorbed onto the functional groups on the catalyst surface, substantially increasing the vanadium loading on the catalyst surface while limiting the increase in vanadium content within the interior of catalyst, which was conducive to enhancing the DeNOx activity and reducing the increase in the SO2/SO3 conversion. When the vanadium adsorption capacity was 3.5 mg/g, the increase in the DeNOx activity of the promoted catalyst was 68.1% higher than that of the original catalyst, whereas the increase in SO2/SO3 conversion was 28.9% lower than that of the original catalyst. Thus, in the regeneration of SCR catalysts vanadium initial concentration and loading could be reduced.

EphA2 is the specific entry receptor for both human γ-herpesviruses Kaposi sarcoma associated herpesvirus (KSHV) and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV). Here, the authors present the crystal structures of the EphA2 ligand binding domain (LBD) bound to the viral glycoprotein gHgL from EBV and KSHV and further analyse EphA2 gHgL interactions with mutagenesis experiments in cell-based fusion assays and suggest that other animal γ-herpesviruses could also use EphA2 as an entry receptor.

Cloud manufacturing (CM) establishes a collaborative manufacturing services chain among dispersed producers, which enables the efficient satisfaction of personalized manufacturing requirements. To further strengthen this effect, the manufacturing service composition and optimal selection (SCOS) in CM, as a NP-hard combinatorial problem, is a crucial issue. Quality of service (QoS) attributes of manufacturing services, as the basic criterion of functions and capabilities, are decisive criterions of SCOS. However, most traditional QoS attributes of CM ignore the dynamic equilibrium of manufacturing services and only rely on initial static characterizations such as reliability and availability. In a high uncertainty and dynamicity environment, a major concern is the equilibrium of manufacturing services for recovering their functions after dysfunctional damage. Therefore, this paper proposes a hybrid resilience-aware global optimization (HRGO) approach to address the SCOS problem in CM. This approach helps manufacturing demanders to acquire efficient, resilient, and satisfying manufacturing services. First, the problem description and resilience measurement method on resilience-aware SCOS is modeled. Then, a services filter strategy, based on the fuzzy similarity degree, is introduced to filter redundant and unqualified candidate services. Finally, a modified non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (MNSGA-III) is proposed, based on diversity judgment and dualtrack parallelism, to address combination optimization processing in SCOS. A series of experiments were conducted, the results show the proposed method is more preferable in optimal services searching and more efficient in scalability.

Coronavirus main protease is essential for viral polyprotein processing and maturation. Here Fu et al. report efficient inhibition of SARS-CoV-2 replication using two inhibitors - Boceprevir and GC376 - targeting the active site of the main viral protease.

Orbital angular momentum takes several forms in structured light beams. Here, the authors demonstrate control of dynamic spatiotemporal beams combining two forms of orbital angular momenta, by coherently adding frequency comb lines.

Abstract Background Microbial fuel cell (MFC) convokes microorganism to convert biomass into electricity. However, most well-known electrogenic strains cannot directly use glucose to produce valuable products. Zymomonas mobilis, a promising bacterium for ethanol production, owns special Entner–Doudoroff pathway with less ATP and biomass produced and the low-energy coupling respiration, making Z. mobilis a potential exoelectrogen. Results A glucose-consuming MFC is constructed by inoculating Z. mobilis. The electricity with power density 2.0 mW/m2 is derived from the difference of oxidation–reduction potential (ORP) between anode and cathode chambers. Besides, two-type electricity generation is observed as glucose-independent process and glucose-dependent process. For the sake of enhancing MFC efficiency, extracellular and intracellular strategies are implemented. Biofilm removal and addition of c-type cytochrome benefit electricity performance and Tween 80 accelerates the electricity generation. Perturbation of cellular redox balance compromises the electricity output, indicating that redox homeostasis is the principal requirement to reach ideal voltage. Conclusion This study identifies potential feature of electricity activity for Z. mobilis and provides multiple strategies to enhance the electricity output. Therefore, additional electricity generation will benefit the techno-economic viability of the commercial bulk production for biochemicals or biofuels in an efficient and environmentally sustainable manner.

Here, the authors focus on incrementally acquiring heterogeneous knowledge from both internet and publicly available datasets to reduce the tedious and expensive labelling efforts required in video annotation. An incremental transfer learning framework is presented to integrate heterogeneous source knowledge and update the annotation model incrementally during the transfer learning process. Under this framework, web images and existing action videos form the source domain to provide labelled static and motion information of the target domain videos, respectively. Moreover, according to the semantic of the source domain data, all the source domain data are partitioned into several groups. Different from traditional methods, which compare the entire target domain videos with each source group from the source domain, the authors treat the group weights as sample‐specific variables and optimise them along with new adding data. Two regularisers are used to prevent the incremental learning process from negative transfer. Experimental results on the two large‐scale consumer video datasets (i.e. multimedia event detection (MED) and Columbia consumer video (CCV)) show the effectiveness of the proposed method.