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Objective To compare the effects of the combination of (Yishu) psychodrama versus general mental health education with antidepressants on clinical symptoms, coping style and neuroimaging features in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) who experienced childhood trauma. Methods This prospective case-control study was conducted in MDD patients with childhood trauma recruited from our department of psychiatry. The patients were randomly assigned into observation group (n=16) for treatment with antidepressants combined with (Yishu) psychodrama and control group (n=16) treated with antidepressants and general mental health education, and selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) was used as the main antidepressants for 6 months in both groups. After the interventions, the patients were assessed using Beck Depression Inventory-13 item (BDI-13), Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI), and Trait Coping Style Questionnaire (TCSQ), and the amplitude of low frequency fluctuations (ALFF) in resting functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was determined and compared between the two groups. Results After 6 months of intervention, no significant differences were found in the changes of BDI score (P>0.05) or BAI score (P>0.05) between the two groups, but the changes in TCSQ positive score (P < 0.05) and TCSQ negative score (P < 0.01) differed significantly between them. Resting fMRI results showed 19 interactive brain regions (corrected by FDR, P < 0.05) in these patients. Post hoc analysis revealed that after the intervention, the patients in the observation group, as compared with the control patients, tended to have enhanced activation of the left medial superior frontal gyrus (P>0.05) and showed significant enhancement of activation in the right parahippocampal gyrus (P < 0.01) with attenuated activation in the left precuneus lobe (P < 0.05). Conclusion Antidepressants combined with psychodrama can more effectively modify the coping style of depressed patients with childhood trauma than the combination of medications and general mental health education, possibly due to the effect of psychodrama to enhance the activation of the right parahippocampal gyrus and attenuate the activation of the left anterior cuneiform lobe, which leads to reduction of the adverse effects of negative experiences on emotion and cognition-coping. Psychodrama combined with medications can be used in the treatment of depressed patients with childhood trauma.

Principal component analysis is a versatile tool to reduce dimensionality which has wide applications in statistics and machine learning. It is particularly useful for modeling data in high-dimensional scenarios where the number of variables p is comparable to, or much larger than the sample size n. Despite an extensive literature on this topic, researchers have focused on modeling static principal eigenvectors, which are not suitable for stochastic processes that are dynamic in nature. To characterize the change in the entire course of high-dimensional data collection, we propose a unified framework to directly estimate dynamic eigenvectors of covariance matrices. Specifically, we formulate an optimization problem by combining the local linear smoothing and regularization penalty together with the orthogonality constraint, which can be effectively solved by manifold optimization algorithms. We show that our method is suitable for high-dimensional data observed under both common and irregular designs, and theoretical properties of the estimators are investigated under l q (0 ≤ q ≤ 1) sparsity. Extensive experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in both simulated and real data examples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Solid‐state lithium‐sulfur batteries (SSLSBs) using polymer electrolytes are considered as one of the most promising energy storage systems due to their high specific energy, facile processability, and low cost. However, the sluggish solid‐state sulfur conversion kinetics limits their specific density and challenges the practical application. Here, to address this concern, a hollow carbon/Li1.4Al0.4Ti1.6(PO4)3 nanosphere (H‐C/LATP) structure is prepared, with high mixed electronic/ionic conductivity, as sulfur hosts for fabricating high‐performance polymer‐based solid‐state Li‐S battery. With the incorporation of the H‐C/LATP rigid shell, the localized sulfur conversion with accelerated kinetics is realized by introduced stable sulfur‐H‐C/LATP double‐phase interface and enhanced charge‐transfer behavior. In addition, H‐C/LATP shows excellent absorption ability toward lithium polysulfides, thus suppressing the shuttle effect in solid electrolytes. As a result, superior cycling stability and rate performance are achieved. The assembled SSLSB delivers a capacity of 1213.2 mAh g−1 in the first cycle and 948.3 mAh g−1 after 200 cycles at 0.1 C. Besides, high active material loading is also demonstrated in this configuration with stable capacity retention. This work provides a practical pathway for the sulfur cathode design in polymer‐based SSLSBs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Primary cilia are conserved organelles in most mammalian cells, acting as "antennae" to sense external signals. Maintaining a physiological cilium length is required for cilium function. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are potent gene expression regulators, and aberrant miRNA expression is closely associated with ciliopathies. However, how miRNAs modulate cilium length remains elusive. Here, using the calcium‐shock method and small RNA sequencing, a miRNA is identified, namely, miR‐669a‐5p, that is highly expressed in the cilia‐enriched noncellular fraction. It is shown that miR‐669a‐5p promotes cilium elongation but not cilium formation in cultured cells. Mechanistically, it is demonstrated that miR‐669a‐5p represses ras‐GTPase‐activating protein SH3‐domain‐binding protein (G3BP) expression to inhibit histone deacetylase 6 (HDAC6) expression, which further upregulates A‐kinase anchor protein 12 (AKAP12) expression. This effect ultimately blocks cilia disassembly and leads to greater cilium length, which can be restored to wild‐type lengths by either upregulating HDAC6 or downregulating AKAP12. Collectively, these results elucidate a previously unidentified miR‐669a‐5p/G3BP/HDAC6/AKAP12 signaling pathway that regulates cilium length, providing potential pharmaceutical targets for treating ciliopathies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Structural variations (SVs) are a major source of domestication and improvement traits. We present the first duck pan‐genome constructed using five genome assemblies capturing ∼40.98 Mb new sequences. This pan‐genome together with high‐depth sequencing data (∼46.5×) identified 101,041 SVs, of which substantial proportions were derived from transposable element (TE) activity. Many TE‐derived SVs anchoring in a gene body or regulatory region are linked to duck's domestication and improvement. By combining quantitative genetics with molecular experiments, we, for the first time, unraveled a 6945 bp Gypsy insertion as a functional mutation of the major gene IGF2BP1 associated with duck bodyweight. This Gypsy insertion, to our knowledge, explains the largest effect on bodyweight among avian species (27.61% of phenotypic variation). In addition, we also examined another 6634 bp Gypsy insertion in MITF intron, which triggers a novel transcript of MITF, thereby contributing to the development of white plumage. Our findings highlight the importance of using a pan‐genome as a reference in genomics studies and illuminate the impact of transposons in trait formation and livestock breeding. Highlights: We present the first duck pan‐genome constructed using five genome assemblies capturing ∼40.98 Mb new sequences absent from the reference genome.We find a significant portion of the detected structural variants were derived from transposable element (TE) activity. Many of these are located within gene bodies or regulatory regions, potentially linked to duck domestication and enhancement.We used two representative examples to show how TE insertions can lead phenotypic diversity, highlighting IGF2BP1's role in bodyweight and MITF's influence on white plumage in ducks.Notably, the Gypsy insertion in the IGF2BP1 promoter, to our knowledge, explains the largest effect on bodyweight among avian species (27.61% of phenotypic variation). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]