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The polygenic nature of complex diseases offers potential opportunities to utilize network-based approaches that leverage the comprehensive set of protein-protein interactions (the human interactome) to identify new genes of interest and relevant biological pathways. However, the incompleteness of the current human interactome prevents it from reaching its full potential to extract network-based knowledge from gene discovery efforts, such as genome-wide association studies, for complex diseases like chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Here, we provide a framework that integrates the existing human interactome information with new experimental protein-protein interaction data for FAM13A, one of the most highly associated genetic loci to COPD, to find a more comprehensive disease network module. We identified an initial disease network neighborhood by applying a random-walk method. Next, we developed a network-based closeness approach (CAB) that revealed 9 out of 96 FAM13A interacting partners identified by affinity purification assays were significantly close to the initial network neighborhood. Moreover, compared to a similar method (local radiality), the CAB approach predicts low-degree genes as potential candidates. The candidates identified by the network-based closeness approach were combined with the initial network neighborhood to build a comprehensive disease network module (163 genes) that was enriched with genes differentially expressed between controls and COPD subjects in alveolar macrophages, lung tissue, sputum, blood, and bronchial brushing datasets. Overall, we demonstrate an approach to find disease-related network components using new laboratory data to overcome incompleteness of the current interactome.

Cigarette smoke (CS) is one of the major risk factors for many pulmonary diseases, including chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and lung cancer. The first line of defense for CS exposure is the bronchial epithelial cells. Elucidation of the epigenetic changes during CS exposure is key to gaining a mechanistic understanding into how mature and differentiated bronchial epithelial cells respond to CS. Therefore, we performed epigenomic profiling in conjunction with transcriptional profiling in well-differentiated human bronchial epithelial (HBE) cells cultured in air-liquid interface (ALI) exposed to the vapor phase of CS. The genome-wide enrichment of histone 3 lysine 27 acetylation was detected by chromatin immunoprecipitation followed by next generation sequencing (ChIP-Seq) in HBE cells and suggested the plausible binding of specific transcription factors related to CS exposure. Additionally, interrogation of ChIP-Seq data with gene expression profiling of HBE cells after CS exposure for different durations (3 hours, 2 days, 4 days) suggested that earlier epigenetic changes (3 hours after CS exposure) may be associated with later gene expression changes induced by CS exposure (4 days). The integration of epigenetics and gene expression data revealed signaling pathways related to CS-induced epigenetic changes in HBE cells that may identify novel regulatory pathways related to CS-induced COPD.

Cell growth and release from the hydrogel scaffolds are critical steps in cell culture and cell therapies. Herein a double network hydrogel with one thermosensitive P(AEtMA-Cl-DEAEA) network and the other polyacrylamide network is reported. The diad hydrogel is elastic and maintains its structural integrity under large deformation. BSA is adsorbed onto the hydrogel at body temperature and subsequently released from the hydrogel at lower temperature. Hela cells proliferate on the hydrogel scaffolds at 37°C. When the scaffold is incubated at low temperature (20°C), 32.6% ± 6.4% of its population are detached from the scaffolds. The detached cells remain active in cell culture. This hydrogel with excellent mechanical properties and unique biological function has promising biomedical applications. © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part B: Appl Biomater 107B: 1786-1791, 2019.

In this paper, MCI diagnostic model based on neuropsychological scales was researched, and the performance of which was improved by combination of multiple neuropsychological scales. The data of 41 subjects includes 15 AD patients, 12 aMCI patients and 14 normal subjects as control group. Each subject was tested on the neuropsychology scales, which include MMSE, ADAS-cog and CCWS. The feature selection was based on Support Vector Machines-Recursive Feature Elimination (SVM-RFE), then use the PCA algorithm for feature compression. Support Vector Machines was utilized to build the classification model, and the classifier performance were evaluated based on accuracy, and using 10-fold cross validation. Finally, three neuropsychology scales were combined, and the result showed that classification accuracy for AD vs NC, AD vs aMCI and aMCI vs NC respectively was 1.0, 1.0 and 0.9, and classification of the three categories is up to 0.93. The results show that combination of multiple neuropsychological scales can improve the diagnostic performance and classifier performance of aMCI.

In order to improve the premature convergence problem of traditional shuffled frog leaping algorithm (SFLA), this paper proposed a normal cloud mutation shuffled frog leaping algorithm (NCM-SFLA) by mixing the cloud model algorithm (NCM) with SFLA algorithm, NCM is used to overcome the shortage of SFLA which is easy to fall into local optimal solution. The proposed NCM-SFLA has a good parallel characteristic, and the parallel computing can be implemented easily in multi core environment. In case study, this paper takes the Li Xianjiang cascade reservoirs in China as an instance to solve the cascade reservoirs operation optimization problem by the proposed NCM-SFLA. The results show that, compared with the Multi- dimensional Dynamic Programming (MDP), NCM-SFLA has the better global search ability and faster convergence speed, and the corresponding parallel computing can effectively shorten the run-time of NCM-SFLA. Therefore, the feasibility and rationality of the proposed NCM-SFLA and its parallel computing are effectively proved by the case study results.

A feeding trial was conducted to estimate the optimum level of dietary n-3 highly unsaturated fatty acids (HUFAs) for juvenile sea cucumber, Apostichopus japonicas, based on growth performance and fatty acid compositions. Diets with five n-3 HUFAs levels (0.15, 0.22, 0.33, 0.38, and 0.46%) were fed to sea cucumber juveniles (1.97 ± 0.01 g) once a day for 60 d. The sea cucumbers fed diets containing 0.22% n-3 HUFAs showed significantly (P 0.05) from those of sea cucumbers fed diets containing 0.33, 0.38, and 0.46% n-3 HUFAs. The sea cucumbers fed diets containing 0.46% n-3 HUFAs showed significantly (P 0.05) from those of sea cucumbers fed diets containing 0.22, 0.33, and 0.38% n-3 HUFAs. The results of growth performance and n-3 HUFA compositions of body wall indicated that the optimum level of dietary n-3 HUFAs for juvenile sea cucumber is between 0.22 and 0.46%.

Chemokine (C-X-C motif) receptor 3, a member of the G protein-coupled receptors superfamily, regulates the responses of many immune responses. In this experiment, we cloned and characterized the cDNA of CXCR3 in Scophthalmus maximus (turbot). A 5'-UTR of 216-bp, a 259-bp 3'-UTR with a poly (A) tail and a 1089-bp CDS encoding 362 amino acids form the cDNA of CXCR3, which is 1564-bp long. Phylogenetic analyses indicated that turbot CXCR3 shared a high similarity with other CXCR3s and shared more similarity with CXCR5 than the other subfamilies of chemokines. The CXCR3 protein in turbot showed the highest similarity with the CXCR3b from rainbow trout (44.5%), which indicated that this CXCR3 gene/protein may be a CXCR3b isoform. Quantitative real-time PCR analysis showed that CXCR3 transcripts were constitutively expressed in all the tissues of the non-injected turbot used in this study, with the highest expression occurring in blood. Several immune-related tissues of fish, such as the spleen, head kidney, liver and blood, tissues, which were abundant of lymphocyte, were investigated in this study. CXCR3 gene was expressed at the highest level in blood than the other tested tissues. The injection experiment suggested that the CXCR3 expression level after LPS injection was significantly up-regulated in all immune-related tissues in turbot. These results improve our understanding of the functions of CXCR3 in the turbot immune response.

Summary The dynamic control operation of reservoir flood limited water level (FLWL) can solve the contradictions between reservoir flood control and beneficial operation well, and it is an important measure to make sure the security of flood control and realize the flood utilization. The dynamic control bound of FLWL is a fundamental key element for implementing reservoir dynamic control operation. In order to optimize the dynamic control bound of FLWL by considering flood forecasting error, this paper took the forecasting error as a fuzzy variable, and described it with the emerging credibility theory in recent years. By combining the flood forecasting error quantitative model, a credibility-based fuzzy chance constrained model used to optimize the dynamic control bound was proposed in this paper, and fuzzy simulation technology was used to solve the model. The FENGTAN reservoir in China was selected as a case study, and the results show that, compared with the original operation water level, the initial operation water level (IOWL) of FENGTAN reservoir can be raised 4 m, 2 m and 5.5 m respectively in the three division stages of flood season, and without increasing flood control risk. In addition, the rationality and feasibility of the proposed forecasting error quantitative model and credibility-based dynamic control bound optimization model are verified by the calculation results of extreme risk theory.

Objective To present a novel miniature endoscopic system designed to improve the safety and efficacy of percutaneous nephrolithotomy, named the ‘super-mini percutaneous nephrolithotomy’ (SMP). Patients and Methods The endoscopic system consists of a 7-F nephroscope with enhanced irrigation and a modified 10–14 F access sheath with a suction-evacuation function. This system was tested in patients with renal stones of

A feeding trial aimed to determine the effects of dietary lipid level on growth performance, body composition and digestive enzymes activity of juvenile sea cucumber, Apostichopus japonicus. Diets with six crude lipid levels (1.9, 13.8, 29.1, 43.6, 59.6 and 71.6 g kg−1) were fed to sea cucumbers (initial weights 0.65 ± 0.01 g) at a density of 30 juveniles, once a day. After 60 days, body weight gain (BWG), specific growth rate (SGR), feed intake (FI) and protein efficiency ratio (PER) decreased with increasing dietary lipid levels. The sea cucumbers fed 1.9 g kg−1 crude lipid showed significantly higher (P

The current study aimed to determine the effects of dietary proportions of soybean meal (SM) with fish meal (FM) on growth performance, digestibility, and digestive enzyme activity of juvenile sea cucumber Apostichopus japonicus. Diets with six different proportions of SM with FM (0/100, 20/80, 40/60, 60/40, 80/20, and 100/0) were fed to sea cucumbers (1.00 ± 0.01 g) for 80 days. With dietary SM proportions under 60 %, body weight gain and protein efficiency ratios first increased and subsequently decreased. Feed conversion ratios for diets with 60 % SM decreased initially and then maintained a minimum value. Sea cucumbers fed a diet containing 40 % SM showed significantly (P

This study aimed to determine the effects of dietary supplementation with vitamin C (l-ascorbic acid, AsA) on lead (Pb) accumulation and toxicity in sea cucumber, Apostichopus japonicus. Three hundred sea cucumbers (10.02±0.02g) fed a basal diet containing 100mg Pb/kg were subjected to 5 levels of l-ascorbate-2-polyphosphate (LAPP) supplementation to achieve 5 AsA treatment levels of 0, 2727, 4630, 9171, 13,893mg AsA/kg. After 30 days, specific growth rate (SGR) and body weight gain (BWG) of supplementation groups were significantly (P

A budget describing the flow of organic carbon (OC), nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) through two polyculture ponds (jellyfish–shellfish–fish–prawn) was constructed. The total input of OC was 3107 kg ha−1 in pond 1 and 3358 kg ha−1 in pond 2, while total output was 1759 kg ha−1 in pond 1 and 1325 kg ha−1 in pond 2. In pond 1, the total input of N was 364 kg ha−1 and output was 359 kg ha−1, whereas, in pond 2, the total input of N was 439 kg ha−1 and total output was 331 kg ha−1. The total input of P was 75 kg ha−1 in pond 1 and 66 kg ha−1 in pond 2, while total outputs for pond 1 and pond 2 were 74 and 65 kg ha−1 respectively. Primary production from phytoplankton contributed the largest proportion of total OC (49–56%), while feed contributed the largest proportion of N (78–81%) and P (79–80%). Animals harvested from the aquaculture ponds accounted for the largest proportion of N (50–73%) and P (49–52%), and respiration accounted for the largest proportion of OC (43–61%) output from the system. The OC, N and P use efficiency of harvested animals was 30.30%, 70.19% and 50.14% in pond 1, respectively, and 21.03%, 46.95% and 46.47% in pond 2 respectively. In terms of nutrient use, the filter-feeding bivalve, Sinonovacula constricta, was the most efficient species within the polyculture system.

The components of an aero-engine gas path cannot be monitored in a timely way due to a lack of real-time monitoring technologies. As an attempt to address this problem, we have conducted research on a condition monitoring technology based on the charging characteristics of particles in an aero-engine gas path, and emphatically analyze the formation of particles in an aero-engine gas path, the charging mechanism of carbon particles and the factors that influence the charge quantity and polarity. The verification experiments are performed on the simulated experiment platform and a turbo-shaft engine test bench. The results show the carbon particles’ carry charge, and an obvious change in the total electrostatic charge level in the aero-engine gas path due to the increased carbon particles produced by burning or abnormal metal particles; the charge number is related to the size of particles, and the bigger carbon particles carry a negative charge and metal particles carry a positive charge; the change in engine power can lead to an obvious change in the level of electrostatic charge in the gas path, and the change in electrostatic charge results from the extra carbon particles formed in the rich-oil burning process. The research provides a reference for establishing the baseline of electrostatic charge while the engine runs on different power. The study also demonstrates the validity of the electrostatic monitoring technology and establishes a base for developing the application of electrostatic monitoring technology in aero-engines.

This paper describes the geology of organic-rich shales in China, their resource potentials, and properties of emerging and potential China shale gas and shale oil plays. Marine, lacustrine, and coastal swamp transitional shales were estimated to have the largest technically recoverable shale gas resource (25.08 trillion cubic meters or 886 trillion cubic feet) and 25 to 50 billion barrels of technically recoverable shale oil resource. The Precambrian Sinian Doushantuo Formation to Silurian Longmaxi black marine shales mainly accumulated in the intrashelf low to slope environments in the Yangtze Platform in South China and in the Tarim Platform in northwest China. The marine shales in the Yangtze Platform have high maturity (Ro of 1.3%–5%), high total organic carbon (mainly ![Formula][1] ), high brittle-mineral content, and have been identified as emerging shale gas plays. The Lower Paleozoic marine shales in the Upper Yangtze area have the largest shale gas potential and currently top the list as exploration targets. The Carboniferous to Permian shales associated with coal and sandstones were mainly formed in transitional depositional settings in north China, northwest China, and the Yangtze Platform in south China. These transitional shales are generally rich in clay with a medium level of shale gas potential. The Middle Permian to Cenozoic organic-rich lacustrine shales interbedded with thin sandstone and carbonate beds are sporadically distributed in rifted basins across China. Their main potentials are as hybrid plays (tight and shale oil). China shales are heterogeneous across time and space, and high-quality shale reservoirs are usually positioned within transgressive systems tract to early highstand systems tract intervals that were deposited in an anoxic depositional setting. For China’s shale plays, tectonic movements have affected and disrupted the early oil and gas accumulation, making tectonically stable areas more favorable prospects for the exploration and development of shale plays. [1]: /embed/mml-math-1.gif

A feeding trial was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of dietary heat-killed Lactobacillus plantarum L-137 (HK L-137) on growth performance, digestive, non-specific immune and phagocytosis of sea cucumber, Apostichopus japonicus. Sea cucumbers (initial body weight 1.35 ± 0.04 g) were fed diets supplemented with five levels of HK L-137 (0, 0.005, 0.025, 0.05 and 0.25 g HK L-137 kg−1 diets) for 60 days. Results indicated sea cucumbers fed with diets containing 0.05 and 0.25 g HK L-137 kg−1 diets showed significantly (P 0.05) were found in acid phosphatase activity. These results suggested that dietary supplementation of 0.05 g HK L-137 kg−1 diets would have benefit on growth, digestive enzymes and several non-specific immune parameters of sea cucumber.

A feeding trial was conducted to determine the adequate dietary ascorbic acid (AsA) levels and the effects on growth, meat quality and antioxidant status of sea cucumber (10.04 ± 0.06 g), Apostichopus japonicus. l-ascorbyl-2-polyphosphate (35% AsA equivalent) was supplemented separately to the basal diet to obtain five AsA levels, 0, 598, 1473, 4676 and 14340 mg kg−1 diet respectively. After 60-day feeding trial, the sea cucumbers fed diets containing 598 and 1473 mg AsA kg−1 showed significantly higher (P 0.05) were observed when the sea cucumbers fed diets with high dietary AsA levels. The content of malondialdehyde had the opposite trend of antioxidant enzymes. In conclusion, the adequate dietary AsA level focusing on growth performance of sea cucumber is between 598 and 1473 mg kg−1 diet. Furthermore, high level of dietary AsA (between 598 and 4676 mg kg−1 diet) improved meat quality and antioxidant status.

Introduction Hemorrhage is a major complication after percutaneous nephrolithotomy (PCNL). In the current study, we analyzed the risk factors for severe bleeding after PCNL. Material and methods Medical records of 982 consecutive patients undergoing PCNL at the Department of Urology, the Third Xiangya Hospital, were reviewed. The type of stone included: solitary (n = 471), multiple (n = 192) and staghorn (n = 319). 139 patients had renal stones of solitary kidney or functional solitary kidney. The puncture site was the inferior calyx in 246 cases, the middle calyx in 651 cases, and the upper calyx in the remaining 85 cases. Results The success rate (complete removal of the stone) was 92.8%, 73.4%, and 80.9% for solitary, multiple and staghorn stones, respectively. Severe bleeding occurred in 3.25% (8/246) of the cases with inferior calyx access, and 0.3% (2/651) in cases with middle calyx access. No severe bleeding occurred in patients with upper calyx access. The bleeding was controlled successfully with focal embolization under angiography in all 10 cases. Conclusions Severe postoperative bleeding after PCNL is associated with renal puncture via the inferior calyx, multiple renal stones and solitary kidney stones.

To meet growing demands of diverse complicated computer application projects, embedded operating system (EOS) is used as the core component and crucial link between software and hardware appears huge edge in practical use. Regarding all kinds of EOSs in the market characterize different features, this paper gives an introduction to several prevailing products and compares them with each other from different aspects. Also, principles about selection which has practical significance of different EOSs are discussed. Meantime, for high-reliability system’s construction, a set of effective validation ways is necessary. In face of particular difficulties, this paper summarizes the current ideas about verification to EOS including formal verification etc.

Although many optimization models and methods are applied to the optimization of reservoir operation at present, the optimal operation decision that is made through these models and methods is just a retrospective review. Due to the limitation of hydrological prediction accuracy, it is practical and feasible to obtain the suboptimal or satisfactory solution by the established operation rules in the actual reservoir operation, especially for the mid- and long-term operation. In order to obtain the optimized sample data with global optimality; and make the extracted operation rules more reasonable and reliable, this paper presents the multi-dimensional dynamic programming model of the optimal joint operation of cascade reservoirs and provides the corresponding recursive equation and the specific solving steps. Taking Li Xianjiang cascade reservoirs as a case study, seven uncertain problems in the whole operation period of the cascade reservoirs are summarized after a detailed analysis to the obtained optimal sample data, and two sub-models are put forward to solve these uncertain problems. Finally, by dividing the whole operation period into four characteristic sections, this paper extracts the operation rules of each reservoir for each section respectively. When compared the simulation results of the extracted operation rules with the conventional joint operation method; the result indicates that the power generation of the obtained rules has a certain degree of improvement both in inspection years and typical years (i.e., wet year; normal year and dry year). So, the rationality and effectiveness of the extracted operation rules are verified by the comparative analysis.

Triplicate groups of sea cucumbers (4.83 ± 0.15 g) were exposed to one of the four nominal concentrations of dietary mercury [0 (control), 67.6, 338, and 676 mg/kg dry weight, and actually total mercury were 17.55, 87.00, 275.50, 468.50 mg/kg, respectively; Table 3] for 21 days. Mercury accumulation in the intestine showed the greatest mercury burden (77.96 ± 1.20 mg Hg/kg tissue wet weight basis). However, survival rate (SR) was not affected. Body weight gain after the 676 mg Hg/kg treatment was significantly lower than the control group. The feed conversion rate of the 676 mg Hg/kg treatment group was significantly higher than the control group. Additionally, the superoxide dismutase (SOD) and total antioxidant capacity (T-AOC) of sea cucumbers decreased as the mercury dose increased. SOD, T-AOC and alkaline phosphatase of the 676 mg Hg/kg treatment group were significantly lower than the control group. However, there were no significant differences between the four groups in acid phosphatase and catalase (CAT) activity.

An efficient reservoir operation technique plays a very important role in improving the water resources and energy efficiency of reservoirs. In order to effectively avoid or alleviate the “curse of dimensionality” of Multi-dimensional Dynamic Programming (MDP) in the application of cascade reservoirs operation optimization (CROO) and keep a global convergence at the same time, two dimension reduction methods are proposed in this paper. One is a hybrid algorithm of MDP and a Progressive Optimality Algorithm (POA), named MDP-POA, which combines the global convergence of MDP and the strong local search ability of POA. MDP-POA first takes the global optimal trajectory of MDP in a low discrete degree as the initial trajectory of the POA, and then implements further optimization to the obtained initial trajectory by the POA with a high discrete degree, so as to avoid the “curse of dimensionality” of MDP in high discrete degree and the dependency of the POA for the initial trajectory. The other is an improved MDP (IMDP), which first constructs a corridor by the optimal trajectory of MDP in a lower discrete degree, and then implements further optimization in the corridor by MDP with a relatively high discrete degree, so as to avoid a large number of unnecessary calculations, and shorten the run-time effectively. In a case study, the results of MDP-POA, IMDP, and MDP are compared and analyzed from the aspects of power generation and run-time. The analysis indicates that the proposed MDP-POA and IMDP both have a good application effect and are worthy of further promotion.

Identifying effective methods to enhance the properties of catalysts is urgent to broaden the scanty technologies, so far. Herein, we synthesized four Co

Bioenergetics homeostasis is important for cells to sustain normal functions and defend against injury. The genetic controls of bioenergetics homeostasis, especially lipid metabolism, remain poorly understood in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), the third leading cause of death in the world. Additionally, the biological function of most of the susceptibility genes identified from genome-wide association studies (GWASs) in COPD remains unclear. Here, we aimed to address (1) how fatty acid oxidation (FAO), specifically β-oxidation, a key lipid metabolism pathway that provides energy to cells, contributes to cigarette smoke (CS)-induced COPD; and (2) whether-and if so, how-FAM13A (family with sequence similarity 13 member A), a well-replicated COPD GWAS gene, modulates the FAO pathway. We demonstrated that CS induced expression of carnitine palmitoyltransferase 1A (CPT1A), a key mitochondrial enzyme for the FAO pathway, thereby enhancing FAO. Pharmacological inhibition of FAO by etomoxir blunted CS-induced reactive oxygen species accumulation and cell death in lung epithelial cells. FAM13A promoted FAO, possibly by interacting with and activating sirutin 1, and increasing expression of CPT1A. Furthermore, CS-induced cell death was reduced in lungs from Fam13a-/- mice. Our results suggest that FAM13A, the COPD GWAS gene, shapes the cellular metabolic response to CS exposure by promoting the FAO pathway, which may contribute to COPD development.

Genetic variants annotated to the hedgehog interacting protein (HHIP) are robustly associated with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Hhip haploinsufficiency in mice leads to increased susceptibility towards the development of emphysema following exposure to chronic cigarette smoke (CS). To explore the molecular pathways which contribute to increased susceptibility, we performed metabolomic profiling using high performance liquid chromatography tandem mass spectroscopy (LC/MS-MS) on plasma, urine, and lung tissue of Hhip+/− heterozygotes and wild type (Hhip+/+) C57/BL6 mice exposed to either room-air or CS for six months. Univariate comparisons between groups were made with a combined fold change ≥2 and Student’s t-test p-value despite comparable plasma levels was observed in Hhip+/− heterozygotes; a strong gene-by-smoking association was also observed. Correlations between MACL and markers of oxidative stress such as urinary methionine sulfoxide were observed in Hhip+/− but not in Hhip+/+ mice. Metabolite set enrichment analyses suggest reduced antioxidant capacity and alterations in macronutrient metabolism contribute to increased susceptibility to chronic CS-induced oxidative stress in Hhip haploinsufficiency states.

Fast twitch muscle and slow twitch muscle are two important organs of Takifugu rubripes. Both tissues are of ectodermic origin, and the differences between the two muscle fibers reflect the differences in their myofibril protein composition and molecular structure. In order to identify and characterize the gene expression profile in the two muscle fibers of T. rubripes, we generated 54 million and 44 million clean reads from the fast twitch muscle and slow twitch muscle, respectively, using RNA-Seq and identified a total of 580 fast-muscle-specific genes, 1533 slow-muscle-specific genes and 11,806 genes expressed by both muscles. Comparative transcriptome analysis of fast and slow twitch muscles allowed the identification of 1508 differentially expressed genes, of which 34 myosin and 30 ubiquitin family genes were determined. These differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were also analyzed by Ontology (GO) analysis and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway. In addition, alternative splicing analysis was also performed. The generation of larger-scale transcriptomic data presented in this work would enrich the genetic resources of Takifugu rubripes, which could be valuable to comparative studies of muscles.

In comparison to genome-wide association studies (GWAS), there has been poor replication of gene expression studies in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). We performed microarray gene expression profiling on a large sample of resected lung tissues from subjects with severe COPD. Comparing 111 COPD cases and 40 control smokers, 204 genes were differentially expressed; none were at significant GWAS loci. The top differentially expressed gene was HMGB1, which interacts with AGER, a known COPD GWAS gene. Differentially expressed genes showed enrichment for putative interactors of the first three identified COPD GWAS genes IREB2, HHIP, and FAM13A, based on gene sets derived from protein and RNA binding studies, RNA-interference, a murine smoking model, and expression quantitative trait locus analyses. The gene module most highly associated for COPD in Weighted Gene Co-Expression Network Analysis (WGCNA) was enriched for B cell pathways, and shared seventeen genes with a mouse smoking model and twenty genes with previous emphysema studies. As in other common diseases, genes at COPD GWAS loci were not differentially expressed; however, using a combination of network methods, experimental studies and careful phenotype definition, we found differential expression of putative interactors of these genes, and we replicated previous human and mouse microarray results.

Anacardic acid, which is commonly seen in plants of Anacardiaceae, is an important composition of cashew, ginkgo leaf and fruit, and it has been suggested in previous research to show antitumor activity. The main aim of the present study was to evaluate the anticancer effects of anacardic acid on cell apoptosis of prostatic cancer and molecular mechanisms of this phenomenon. In this study we found that anacardic acid inhibited cell proliferation, induced apoptosis and caspase-3/9 activities and Bax protein expression of prostatic cancer. Anacardic acid induced the ER stress inducing factors (BiP, CHOP, p-eIF2α), autophagy, LC3, Beclin-1, Atg 7 and DAPK3 protein expression, and suppressed p-Akt and p-mTOR protein expression of prostatic cancer. Si-CHOP was used to inhibit ER stress in prostatic cancer by anacardic acid, which showed that the cell proliferation was increased, apoptosis, and caspase-3/9 activities and Bax protein expression was suppressed, autophagy, LC3, Beclin-1, Atg 7 and DAPK3 protein expression was reduced, and p-Akt and p-mTOR protein expression was promoted. DAPK3 inhibited p-Akt and p-mTOR protein expression, enhanced the anticancer effects of anacardic acid on prostatic cancer through autophagy. For the first time, the present study showed that anacardic acid induces cell apoptosis of prostatic cancer through autophagy by ER stress/DAPK3/Akt signaling pathway.

Six different methods of accurate measurement of the temperature of liquid steel in real time are analyzed. Using a comparison and analysis, a fast and accurate mathematical model is obtained. Проведен анализ шести различных методов точного измерения температуры жидкой стали в реальном времени. С помощью сравнения и анализа результатов получена быстрая и точная математическая модель. Проведено аналіз шести різних методів точного вимірювання температури рідкої сталі в реальному часі. . За допомогою порівняння і аналізу результатів отримана швидка і точна математична модель.

With the rapid development of cascade hydropower stations in recent decades, the cascade system composed of multiple reservoirs needs unified operation and management. However, the output distribution problem has not yet been solved reasonably when the total output of cascade system obtained, which makes the full utilization of hydropower resources in cascade reservoirs very difficult. Discriminant criterion method is a traditional and common method to solve the output distribution problem at present, but some shortcomings cannot be ignored in the practical application. In response to the above concern, this paper proposes a new total output operation chart optimization model and a new optimal output distribution model, the two models constitute to a double nested model with the goal of maximizing power generation. This paper takes the cascade reservoirs of Li Xianjiang River in China as an instance to obtain the optimal total output operation chart by the proposed double nested model and the 43 years historical runoff data, progressive searching method and progressive optimality algorithm are used in solving the model. In order to take the obtained total output operation chart into practical operation, mean value method and stepwise regression method are adopted to extract the output distribution ratios on the basis of the optimal simulation intermediate data. By comparing with discriminant criterion method and conventional method, the combined utilization of total output operation chart and output distribution ratios presents better performance in terms of power generation and assurance rate, which proves it is an effective alternative method to deal with the cascade reservoirs joint operation problem.

Air pollutants from poultry operations pose a potential threat not only for bird health, but also for the environment outside. Ventilation is believed to be an effective way of regulating house environment. To improve understanding of ventilation effects on house environment, distributions, concentrations and emissions of ammonia, carbon dioxide, total suspended particulates, and particulate matter 2.5 (fine particles with a diameter of 2.5 μm or less) were investigated in a manure-belt layer house using 9 ventilation stages (VS) with different ventilation rates (VT). Distributions of pollutants were assessed visually using contour plots and coefficient of variation. Emission rates of pollutants were estimated by multiplying VT by concentration. Spatial distributions of 4 pollutants were not homogeneous throughout the house, regardless of VS, and increased VT aggravated the spatial disparity. In the house, pollutant concentrations were controlled under harmful levels during the 9 VS. Ventilation, as expected, can decrease pollutant concentrations. However concentrations of ammonia and carbon dioxide did not decrease proportionately to increased VT. The highest emission rates of 4 pollutants were observed during VS1, a stage with maximum ventilation, which reflected VT as a key factor determining emission rate. The study indicated that it is difficult to balance house environment and control pollutant concentrations depending only on ventilation. Several additional factors, such as temperature, humidity, manure handling, bird management, and ventilation system design, should be comprehensively considered to control air pollutants from poultry operations.

Poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyvalerate) (PHBV)/chitin nanocrystals (CNC) composite scaffolds were synthesized by the salt leaching and thermally induced phase separation (TIPS) technique. The scaffolds have porous structures with macro-pores (100-300 mu m in diameters) and micro-pores (10 mu m). The surface characteristics of the scaffolds were characterized by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and static water contact angle measurement, and the mechanical properties were investigated by a compression test. Human adipose-derived stem cells (hADSCs) were seeded onto the PHBV/CNC scaffolds and in vitro cell culture results showed that the composite scaffolds enhanced the hADSCs adhesion, which implies that the material may have potential application in tissue engineering. (C) 2014 Qun Gu, Zhi-Qiang Jiang and Xue-Dong Wu. Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of Chinese Chemical Society. All rights reserved.

Both taurine and glutamine play important roles in growth performance, feed utilization and anti-oxidation status. Therefore, a 60-day feeding trial was conducted to determine the interactive effects of dietary taurine and glutamine on growth performance, feed utilization, blood parameters and oxidative status of juvenile Japanese flounder. No interactive effect is shown in the selected parameters except for glutamic-pyruvate transaminase (GPT) of Japanese flounder in this study. The growth parameters (final body weight, body weight gain and special growth rate) and feed intake were significantly affected by either taurine or glutamine, meanwhile, plasma glucose, glutamyl oxaloacetic transaminase (GOT), glutamic-pyruvate transaminase (GPT) and triglycerides of Japanese flounder were significantly dec,reased when fed with high level of dietary taurine (1.6 g free taurine of 100 g dry diet). The other blood parameters (hematocrit, hemoglobin, glucose, total protein, total cholesterol, total bilirubin and triglycerides) were not significantly altered by various diets. The muscle free taurine concentration of Japanese flounder directly reflected the dietary taurine level, which was not affected by dietary glutamine. Interestingly, fish fed with both high levels of taurine (1.6 g free taurine of 100 g dry diet) and glutamine (1.5 g free glutamine of 100 g dry diet) showed higher oxidation resistance, which indicated the important roles of taurine and glutamine in fish oxidative stress protection.

A feeding trial was conducted to determine the optimum dietary protein level of sea cucumber Apostichopus japonicus juvenile focusing on growth performance and non-specific immune response. Diets with seven crude protein levels (42.0, 108.9, 155.2, 216.7, 258.0, 313.3 and 357.5 g kg−1) were fed to sea cucumber juveniles (1.05 ±0.01 g) once a day for 100 days. More than 70% survival was observed, and there was no significant difference among all treatments. The sea cucumbers fed diets containing 108.9 g kg−1 crude protein showed significantly (P 0.05) were observed in moisture, crude protein, crude lipid, ash and carbohydrate content of the body wall among all treatments. The coelomic fluid catalase activity of the sea cucumbers generally increased with increasing dietary protein levels. Therefore, the acid phosphatase, superoxide dismutase and lysozyme activity increased with increasing dietary protein levels at first and decreased subsequently. The relationship between dietary protein levels and body weight gain was analysed by a second-order polynomial regression analysis model. The result indicates that the optimum dietary protein level for sea cucumber juveniles is 135.4 g kg−1.

In this study, combustion and emissions characteristics of a turbocharged compression ignition engine fueled with dimethyl ether (DME) and biodiesel blends are experimentally investigated. The effects of nozzle parameter on combustion and emissions are evaluated. The result shows that with the increase of DME proportion, ignition delay, the peak in-cylinder pressure, peak heat-release rate, peak in-cylinder temperature decrease, and their phases retard. Compared to the nozzle 6 × 0.40 mm, the peak cylinder pressure and peak heat-release rate are higher with nozzle 6 × 0.35 mm, and their phases are advanced. Increased DME proportion in fuel blends causes greater differences. Compared to biodiesel, NO x emissions of blends significantly decrease; HC emissions and CO emissions increase slightly. DME–biodiesel blends can be used as an alternative in a turbocharged CI engine. To obtain low NO x emissions and a soft engine operation, for high DME proportion blended fuels, nozzle of 6 × 0.40 mm adopted.

Poly(epsilon-caprolactone) (PCL)/reduced graphene oxide (RGO) nanocomposite bars were prepared by injection molding, and the effects of RGO on the PCL matrix were investigated. Differential scanning calorimeter and polarized optical microscopy results demonstrated that RGO was an effective nucleation agent for PCL. Two-dimensional wide angle X-ray diffraction results showed that the incorporation of RGO can enhance the orientation degree of PCL crystals in the flow direction and did not influence the crystal structure of PCL. Two-dimensional small angle X-ray scattering results confirmed that the orientation of PCL chains in the flow direction was enhanced with the increase of RGO content, which was attributed to that RGO obstructed the motion of polymer chains. These results indicated that the incorporation of RGO can enhance the crystallization and orientation of PCL matrix, which was the major factor for the improvement of mechanical properties. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Light provides a powerful approach for delivery of cargos and study of important biological events. This article reports a series of photosensitive and biocompatible delivery of nanoparticles which released proteins upon light irradiation. The nanoparticles were synthesized by emulsion copolymerization of 2-(dimethylamino) ethyl methacrylate with functional monomers and a photoliable o-nitrobenzyl diacrylate crosslinker. Upon mild UV irradiation (λ = 365 nm, 10 mJ/cm2), the photosensitive crosslinker underwent light-induced degradation and the sizes of the nanoparticles increased dramatically. The nanoparticles were uptaken by the cells which is confirmed by flow cytometry analysis. Bovine serum albumin and green fluorescent protein were loaded as model proteins into the nanoparticles and accelerated photo-triggered release were achieved. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part A: 103A: 65–70, 2015.

The lethal concentration of water-borne copper in Chinese mitten crab Eriocheir sinensis larvae was tested by exposing the animals to 0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.5 and 0.8 mg Cu L-1 at 20°C for 96 h. The 96-h median lethal concentration (LC50) and its corresponding 95% confident interval was estimated on zoea 1 larvae and megalopa larvae, respectively. Acute dissolved copper toxicity was higher for zoea 1 larvae (0.16 mg L-1) than for megalopa larvae (0.21 mg L-1). The antioxidant status, metallothionein-I mRNA expression and physiological response of the crab to copper toxicity was further investigated by exposing the megalopa larvae to 0, 0.08 and 0.16 mg Cu L-1 for 96 h. The superoxide dismutase activity, catalase activity, glutathione S-transferase (GST) activity and lipid peroxidation content of megalopa larvae increased concomitantly with the exposure time and copper concentration. MT-I mRNA expression levels were positively correlated with both the concentration and duration of copper exposure. The oxygen consumption and respiratory quotient of megalopa larvae in response to 0.16 mg L-1 copper were significantly higher than those in the control group after 96 h of exposure (P < 0.05). The results of this study highlight the potential effects of copper as a common stressor in E. sinensis larvae. MT-I and GST appear to be suitable biomarkers of environmental copper exposure stress in E. sinensis larvae La concentración letal de cobre disuelto se determina mediante la exposición de larvas del cangrejo de Shangai (Eriocheir sinensis) a dosis de 0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.5 y 0.8 mg Cu L–1, a 20°C durante 96 h. La concentración letal media (LC50) y su correspondiente intervalo de confianza del 95% fueron estimados en los estadios larvales zoea I y megalopa. La toxicidad aguda del cobre disuelto fue mayor sobre larvas de zoea I (0.16 mg L–1) que sobre las de megalopa (0.21 mg L–1). El estado antioxidante, la expresión del mRNA de la metalotionina–I y la respuesta fisiológica del cangrejo a la toxicidad del cobre fueron posteriormente investigados exponiendo las larvas de megalopa a dosis de 0, 0.08 y 0.16 mg Cu L–1 durante 96 h. La actividad de la superóxido dismutasa (SOD), de la catalasa (CAT), de la glutatión-S-transferasa (GST) y la peroxidación lipídica de las larvas de megalopa se incrementó en relación con el tiempo de exposición y la concentración de cobre. Los niveles de expresión de MT-1 mRNA se correlacionaron positivamente con la concentración de cobre y el tiempo de exposición. El consumo de oxígeno y la tasa respiratoria de las larvas de megalopa fueron significativamente más elevadas que las del grupo control (P < 0.05) en respuesta a dosis de 0.16 mg Cu L–1, durante 96 h de exposición. Los resultados presentados en este estudio ponen de manifiesto los efectos potenciales del cobre como factor de estrés sobre las larvas de E. sinensis. MT-I y GST parecen ser adecuados biomarcadores de estrés a la exposición de Cu ambiental en larvas de E. sinensis.

Ferromagnetism has been induced in nanostructured TiO2/Al powders prepared by ball milling at room temperature. This study presents the investigation of the origin of the magnetism in a TiO2/Al system with a combination of experiments and density functional theory (DFT) simulations. Our results demonstrate that adsorption of Al on surfaces of TiO2 nanostructures yields spontaneous magnetization. Our DFT simulations show that spin-polarized charge-transfer occurs from an adsorbed Al atom to O 2p state in surface and subsurface for some unique configurations. X-ray absorption near edge structure (XANES) spectra of the magnetic nanostructured TiO2/Al provide the necessary experimental evidence of the charge transfer and confirm the origin of ferromagnetic behavior. On the basis of the experiments and DFT simulations, we believe the room temperature ferromagnetism in nanostructured TiO2/Al originates from charge-transfer from Al to O atoms. Our results illustrate a complex interplay between the atomic level i...

With growing attentions paid to ecological protection in recent years, the ecological operation of cascade hydropower reservoirs is becoming an increasingly significant problem in water resource system. Mathematically, the ecological operation of cascade hydropower reservoirs is a high-dimensional, nonlinear and strong spatiotemporal coupling constrained optimization problem. To overcome the premature convergence and stagnation search of traditional methods in resolving this problem, this paper develops a novel algorithm known as simplex quantum-behaved particle swarm optimization, where the probabilistic mutation operator is performed on historical best position of some individuals, and then the simplex neighborhood search strategy based on the dynamic probability identification is used to enhance the local exploration ability of the swarm. The numerical experiments of 17 classical test functions indicate that the presented method can achieve satisfactory results in both convergence speed and global search ability. The application results from China’s Wu hydropower system indicate that our method has satisfying performance in reducing the ecological water shortage. Hence, this paper provides a novel effective tool for the complex ecological operation problem of cascade hydropower reservoirs.

This experiment was conducted to determine the toxicological effect of selenomethionine (Se-met) and bio-fermenting Selenium (Se-bio) supplementation with basal diet to investigate growth performance, bioaccumulation and non-specific immune function in sea cucumber, (Apostichopus japonicus). Three groups of sea cucumbers in triplicate were given basal diet or supplemented with selenium (Se) from Se-met or Se-bio for 30 days. No significant difference in survival was observed among three treatments, but both groups fed with Se exhibited significant inhibition in body weight gain, specific growth rate and protein efficiency ratio compared to control group, meanwhile, feed conversion rate was significantly (P

Solar irradiation prediction is of vital important to improve solar energy utilization. In recent years, many researches on solar irradiation prediction have been arisen. However, most forecasting model are based only on time series without considering the temporal and spatial variations of the solar energy, which hinders the progress of solar irradiation prediction. In this paper, we embed solar energy and meteorological data from multiple sites into a spatial grid and focus on the spatiotemporal solar irradiation prediction problem. An ensemble spatiotemporal deep learning model is proposed for solving the problem. The proposed model contains a convolutional operator in both the input-to-state and state-to-state transitions of the Gate Recurrent Unit, which makes it particularly suitable for spatiotemporal forecasting problems. Moreover, variational inference is employed in this deep learning model in order to quantify the uncertainty of the prediction. A real-world test case with a spatial region is used to illustrate the full potential of the proposed model. Four state-of-the-art deep learning models are considered for comparison. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed model significantly outperforms other models in term of three widely used evaluation criteria. Furthermore, the uncertainty estimation is given and it demonstrates that the proposed model is able to provide an effective uncertainty estimation for the prediction.

A reservoir operation chart is effective in guiding the actual operation of reservoirs. With the development and construction of large-scale mixed reservoirs, operating reservoirs using multiple objective operations has become a hot issue. This study, therefore, improved and expanded the traditional energy storage operation chart (ESOC) model for pure cascade reservoirs based to the special relationships between hydraulics and water volume of the upstream and downstream reservoirs in a mixed reservoir system. Considering the objectives of flood control, energy generation (including power generation, guaranteed output, and assurance rate), and ecological flow, a multi-objective ESOC optimization model for large-scale mixed reservoirs is established, and the corresponding solving method for this model is proposed. Taking the Pearl river basin of China as an example, the multi-objective Pareto fronts of different minimum discharges of upstream reservoirs are obtained. According to the actual operation demands and constraints, the optimal multi-objective schemes under different assurance rates and different ecological flow satisfaction rates are extracted based on the obtained Pareto fronts. For example, if the assurance rate of power generation is required to be equal to or greater than 90% and the ecological flow, the satisfaction rate of downstream control sections is required to be equal to or greater than 0.97, the scheme is the best when the minimum discharge of upstream reservoirs is 300 m3/s, and the corresponding power generation and guaranteed output are 58.989 × 108 kWh and 439 GW, respectively. On the whole, the proposed models and related results have significance for the actual operation of large-scale mixed reservoirs.

One of the most attractive routes for hydrogen production for fuel cell applications is partial oxidation of hydrocarbons. However, exothermic partial oxidation reaction tends to cause local overheating of the reaction bed therefore reducing catalytic activity. In this study, hydrogen production by partial oxidation of propane over Ni/Al2O3 based catalyst with the addition of SiC was experimentally investigated. Both packed bed mixing and bulk doping methods were introduced to study the effect of SiC for its high thermal conductivity and high temperature stability. The as-prepared samples were characterized by a variety of measurements. Due to the high temperature stability of SiC particles in the bulk regions, stacking dual porous-like structures were formed after calcination by doping SiC into Ni/Al2O3 with certain ratios. From the results, local overheating of the catalyst bed generated by the exothermic reactions was relieved by SiC addition for both cases. Ni/Al2O3-SiC (30 wt% SiC) catalyst performed a higher hydrogen production of 236 μmol/gcat.s and kept stable for 20 h at 600 °C compared to mechanical mixing method. Aggregation of Ni content and carbon deposition of the spent catalyst of SiC-containing catalysts were reduced compared to Ni/Al2O3. As can be seen from the morphological and non-isothermal kinetics, the carbon deposited on Ni/Al2O3-SiC catalyst that caused catalyst deactivation was more easily activated for removal due to SiC content with high thermal conductivity.

In this research, a novel enhanced gravitational search algorithm (EGSA) is proposed to resolve the multi-objective optimization model, considering the power generation of a hydropower enterprise and the peak operation requirement of a power system. In the proposed method, the standard gravity search algorithm (GSA) was chosen as the fundamental execution framework, the opposition learning strategy was adopted to increase the convergence speed of the swarm, the mutation search strategy was chosen to enhance the individual diversity, the elastic-ball modification strategy was used to promote the solution feasibility. Additionally, a practical constraint handling technique was introduced to improve the quality of the obtained agents, while the technique for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution method (TOPSIS) was used for the multi-objective decision. The numerical tests of twelve benchmark functions showed that the EGSA method could produce better results than several existing evolutionary algorithms. Then, the hydropower system located on the Wu River of China was chosen to test the engineering practicality of the proposed method. The results showed that the EGSA method could obtain satisfying scheduling schemes in different cases. Hence, an effective optimization method was provided for the multi-objective operation of hydropower system.

This paper considers empirical likelihood inference for a high-dimensional partially functional linear model. An empirical log-likelihood ratio statistic is constructed for the regression coefficients of non-functional predictors and proved to be asymptotically normally distributed under some regularity conditions. Moreover, maximum empirical likelihood estimators of the regression coefficients of non-functional predictors are proposed and their asymptotic properties are obtained. Simulation studies are conducted to demonstrate the performance of the proposed procedure and a real data set is analyzed for illustration.

A four-weeks feeding trial was conducted to evaluate the effects of dietary Bio-fermented selenium (Bio-Se) on zebrafish (Danio rerio). Effects of three Se diets containing basal diet (1.63 mg Se/kg), L-Se diet (3 mg Se/kg), and H-Se diet (10 mg Se/kg) on growth performance, nonspecific immune enzyme activities, proximate composition, and selenium accumulation of zebrafish were tested. The results indicate that body weight gain (BWG), specific growth rate (SGR), and nonspecific immune enzyme [glutathione peroxidase (GPx), superoxide dismutase (SOD), and alkaline phosphatase (ALP)] activities of fish fed with L-Se diet were significantly highest among all the groups. However, increased H2O2 content and decreased SOD activity indicates oxidative stress when fish was fed with H-Se diet. Dietary Se did not affect the proximate composition of zebrafish. The Se concentration in muscle increased in a dose-dependent manner, and the highest Se concentration was recorded in H-Se diet. In summary, the growth performance and nonspecific immunity of zebrafish fed with L-Se diet improved, but exposure to higher concentrations of Bio-Se severely affects the health status of fish. Keywords: Bio-fermented selenium, Zebrafish, Growth performance, Nonspecific immune enzyme, Bioaccumulation