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In this work, an Fe3O triangle based helical chain complex [Fe3(μ3-O)(μ-O2CH)6H2O] was assembled in a solvothermal reaction. The complex was a rare polymeric complex bearing charge separation of Fe3+ and Fe2.5+, in which the charge distribution was like that of magnetite. The valence distribution and polymeric nature result in various magnetism behaviours e.g., ferrimagnetism along the chain, canted antiferromagnetic order, spin-flop and field induced SCM like behavior at low temperature.

Microplitis bicoloratus bracovirus (MbBV) induces apoptosis in hemocytes of the host (Spodoptera litura) via the cyclophilin A (CypA)-mediated signaling pathway. However, the mechanisms underlying CypA-mediated signaling during apoptosis remain largely unknown. Therefore, in this study, we investigated how CypA and apoptosis-inducing factor (AIF) interact during MbBV-mediated apoptosis. Our findings showed that MbBV induces apoptosis through the CypA-AIF axis of insect immune suppression. In MbBV-infected Spli221 cells, both the expression of the cypa gene and the release of AIF from the mitochondria increased the number of apoptotic cells. CypA and AIF underwent concurrent cytoplasm-nuclear translocation. Conversely, blocking of AIF release from mitochondria not only inhibited the CypA-AIF interaction but also inhibited the cytoplasmic-nuclear translocation of AIF and CypA. Importantly, the survival of the apoptotic phenotype was significantly rescued in MbBV-infected Spli221 cells. In addition, we found that the cyclosporine A-mediated inhibition of CypA did not prevent the formation of the CypA and AIF complex; rather, this only suppressed genomic DNA fragmentation. In vitro experiments revealed direct molecular interactions between recombinant CypA and AIF. Taken together, our results demonstrate that the CypA-AIF interaction plays an important role in MbBV-induced innate immune suppression. This study will help to clarify aspects of insect immunological mechanisms and will be relevant to biological pest control.

Tumor angiogenesis is an important biological process involved in the proliferation and migration of endothelial cells, regulated by Ang/Tie-2 signaling pathways, which is essential for tumor growth and metastasis. Therefore, blocking Ang/Tie-2 signaling pathways is a promising anti-angiogenic strategy for tumor treatment. 2,5-Diketopiperazines (DKPs) are a kind of bioactive compounds derived from marine fungi and they present a wide spectrum of pharmacological properties, particularly in the field of cancer treatment. Herein, a DKP marine natural product, Cryptoechinuline D (Cry D) was applied to structural modification and twelve derivatives were synthesized. Among which, compound 5 showed significant inhibitory activity against HUVECs with an IC

We study one-dimensional general non-Hermitian models with asymmetric long-range hopping and explore to analytically solve the systems under some specific boundary conditions. Although the introduction of long-range hopping terms prevents us from finding analytical solutions for arbitrary boundary parameters, we identify the existence of exact solutions when the boundary parameters fulfill some constraint relations, which give the specific boundary conditions. Our analytical results show that the wave functions take simple forms and are independent of hopping range, while the eigenvalue spectra display rich model-dependent structures. Particularly, we find the existence of a special point coined as pseudo-periodic boundary condition, for which the eigenvalues are the same as the periodical system when the hopping parameters fulfill certain conditions, whereas eigenstates display non-Hermitian skin effect., Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures

Additional file 2: Table S1. Antibodies for flow cytometry. Table S2. Antibodies for immunohistochemistry. Table S3. Characteristics of enrolled HIV-1 infected patients in single-cell RNA sequencing.

Additional file 1: Fig. S1. Gating strategy of mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) cells. Fig. S2. Correlation analysis of mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) cell frequencies with CD4+ T-cell counts (a), plasma human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) viral load (b) and the frequencies of CD38highHLA-DR+-expressing MAIT cells (c). Fig. S3. Workflow and quality-control of scRNA-seq. Fig. S4. Increased mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) cells in colorectal mucosa tissues from human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) infected patients.

Background Mucosal-associated invariant T (MAIT) cells are systemically depleted in human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) infected patients and are not replenished even after successful combined antiretroviral therapy (cART). This study aimed to identify the mechanism underlying MAIT cell depletion. Methods In the present study, we applied flow cytometry, single-cell RNA sequencing and immunohistochemical staining to evaluate the characteristics of pyroptotic MAIT cells in a total of 127 HIV-1 infected individuals, including 69 treatment-naive patients, 28 complete responders, 15 immunological non-responders, and 15 elite controllers, at the Fifth Medical Center of Chinese PLA General Hospital, Beijing, China. Results Single-cell transcriptomic profiles revealed that circulating MAIT cells from HIV-1 infected subjects were highly activated, with upregulation of pyroptosis-related genes. Further analysis revealed that increased frequencies of pyroptotic MAIT cells correlated with markers of systemic T-cell activation, microbial translocation, and intestinal damage in cART-naive patients and poor CD4+ T-cell recovery in long-term cART patients. Immunohistochemical staining revealed that MAIT cells in the gut mucosa of HIV-1 infected patients exhibited a strong active gasdermin-D (GSDMD, marker of pyroptosis) signal near the cavity side, suggesting that these MAIT cells underwent active pyroptosis in the colorectal mucosa. Increased levels of the proinflammatory cytokines interleukin-12 (IL-12) and IL-18 were observed in HIV-1 infected patients. In addition, activated MAIT cells exhibited an increased pyroptotic phenotype after being triggered by HIV-1 virions, T-cell receptor signals, IL-12 plus IL-18, and combinations of these factors, in vitro. Conclusions Activation-induced MAIT cell pyroptosis contributes to the loss of MAIT cells in HIV-1 infected patients, which could potentiate disease progression and poor immune reconstitution.

Background: The goal is to evaluate the effects of a flipped class strategy on knowledge, self-directed learning ability, learning satisfaction and pregnancy outcomes in primiparas undergoing antenatal education. Methods: A convenience sampling method was adopted. A total of 621 primiparas who were diagnosed with early pregnancy in a first-class hospital in southeast China and received continuous prenatal health education from May to July 2020 were selected as the research subjects. The primiparas were divided into two groups in the antenatal education centre. One was the experimental group, who used the prenatal health education model based on blended learning (a flipped classroom with team-based learning); the other was the control group, who used the traditional mode of prenatal health education. The two groups were compared on the following outcomes: knowledge, self-directed learning ability, learning satisfaction and pregnancy outcomes. Results: The blended learning approach enhanced the primiparas’ knowledge, self-directed learning ability, and learning satisfaction, effectively controlled the gestational weight gain (GWG), alleviated the degree of anxiety and depression in the pregnant women during pregnancy, improved the self-efficacy and the natural delivery rate of the primipara, shortened the delivery process and reduced the risk of gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM), all PConclusions: Blended learning may be an effective strategy because of its validity and practicality in antenatal education.

Infections of clinical methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a very tough public health problem and a challenge of new drug development. Nearly 90 Diels-Alder adducts (DAAs) have so far been isolated from Morus plants, but only a few of them have been evaluated for their anti-MRSA activities. To study the antibacterial compounds of DAAs from the root barks’ section of Morus alba L. and their synergism with antibacterial agents against clinical MRSA strains, bioassay-guided phytochemical methods were used to screen the active components. Minimal inhibitory concentrations (MICs) and minimal bactericidal concentrations (MBCs) were assayed through broth serial microdilution. The synergism were evaluated by checker board microdilution and dynamic time-kill experiments. Three DAAs (multicaulisin (1), sanggenon G (2) and albanin G (3)) were isolated and identified from M. alba root barks. They were determined with potent effect against MRSA isolates with MICs/MBCs at 2–8/16–128 mg/L. They also showed synergy with conventional antibacterial agents, especially the aminoglycosides, with fractional inhibitory concentration indices (FICIs) ranged from 0.19 to 0.50 and the dose reduction indices (DRIs) ranged from 16 to 2. The MRSA resistance to the antibiotics could be reversed by compounds 1–3. The dose-dependent bactericidal synergism against MRSA was observed as well. The study released for the first time the anti-MRSA synergism of DAAs from M. alba root barks with antibacterial agents and the reversal of MRSA resistance to aminoglycosides. The results may be valuable for further development of new antibacterial drugs and synergists against MRSA infections.

The series of metal 8-hydroxyquinolates {[Ni7 (μ2-L1)6(μ3-L1)2(OAc)2(μ7-L2)(OCH3)]·CH3OH·CH3CN} (1), {[Ni7(μ2-L1)6(μ3-L1)3(SCN)2(μ7-L2)(CH3CN)]·(CH3OH)2·CH3CN} (2), [Ni5Dy2(μ2-L1)6(OAc)4(μ7-L2)2] (...

Systems with non-Hermitian skin effects are very sensitive to the imposed boundary conditions and lattice size, and thus an important question is whether non-Hermitian skin effects can survive when deviating from the open boundary condition. To unveil the origin of boundary sensitivity, we present exact solutions for one-dimensional non-Hermitian models with generalized boundary conditions and study rigorously the interplay effect of lattice size and boundary terms. Besides the open boundary condition, we identify the existence of non-Hermitian skin effect when one of the boundary hopping terms vanishes. Apart from this critical line on the boundary parameter space, we find that the skin effect is fragile under any tiny boundary perturbation in the thermodynamic limit, although it can survive in a finite size system. Moreover, we demonstrate that the non-Hermitian Su-Schreieffer-Heeger model exhibits a new phase diagram in the boundary critical line, which is different from either open or periodical boundary case., 21 pages, 12 figures