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Abstract Background The plant microbiome is one of the key determinants of healthy plant growth. However, the complexity of microbial diversity in plant microenvironments in different regions, especially the relationship between subsurface and aboveground microorganisms, is not fully understood. The present study investigated the diversity of soil microorganisms in different regions and the diversity of microorganisms within different ecological niches, and compared soil microorganisms and endophytic microorganisms. Methods 16 S and ITS sequencing was used to sequence the soil and endophytes microbiome of honeysuckle. Alpha diversity analysis and principal component analysis (PCoA) were used to study the soil and endophyte microbial communities, and the function of endophyte bacteria and fungi was predicted based on the PICRUST2 process and FUNGuild. Results In total, there were 382 common bacterial genera and 139 common fungal genera in the soil of different producing areas of honeysuckle. There were 398 common bacterial genera and 157 common fungal genera in rhizosphere soil. More beneficial bacteria were enriched in rhizosphere soil. Endophytic bacteria were classified into 34 phyla and 770 genera. Endophytic fungi were classified into 11 phyla and 581 genera, among which there were significant differences in the dominant genera of roots, stems, leaves, and flowers, as well as in community diversity and richness. Endophytic fungal functions were mainly dominated by genes related to saprophytes, functional genes that could fight microorganisms were also found in KEGG secondary functional genes. Conclusion More beneficial bacteria were enriched in rhizosphere soil of honeysuckle, and the microbial network of the rhizosphere is more complex than that of the soil. Among the tissues of honeysuckle, the flowers have the richest diversity of endophytes. The endogenous dominant core bacteria in each part of honeysuckle plant have a high degree of overlap with the dominant bacteria in soil. Functional prediction suggested that some dominant core bacteria have antibacterial effects, providing a reference for further exploring the strains with antibacterial function of honeysuckle. Understanding the interaction between honeysuckle and microorganisms lays a foundation for the study of growth promotion, quality improvement, and disease and pests control of honeysuckle from the perspective of microorganisms.

In the present study, the effects of different levels of allicin supplementation (0.00 % as control, 0.30 %, 0.45 %, 0.60 %, 0.75 %, and 0.90 %) on the growth performance, biochemical composition and immune capacity of ivory shells (Babylonia areolata) were investigated. Allicin supplementation in the daily diet significantly enhanced growth performance, with the highest specific growth rates observed at concentrations ranging from 0.75 % to 0.90 % (2.18–2.20 %/d), and the lowest feed conversion ratio (1.39) recorded at 0.60 %. Correspondingly, mRNA expression levels of two appetite-related genes, Orexin and Neuropeptide Y (NPY), in the hepatopancreas significantly increased, while the expression of the appetite-suppressing gene Leptin significantly decreased with increasing allicin supplementation. The amounts of almost all detected fatty acids significantly increased when ivory shells were fed diets supplemented with allicin, while their profiles varied, showing increases in C20:1n9 and C22:6n3 (DHA), and decreases in C16:0, C18:2n6, and C20:4n6 (ARA). Lipase activities in both the intestine and hepatopancreas significantly increased in the allicin-supplemented groups, with peak values observed at 0.90 % and 0.75 % allicin supplementation, respectively (3.64 U/g prot in the intestine and 9.52 U/g prot in the hepatopancreas). Allicin supplementation improved the antioxidant and antimicrobial abilities of ivory shells, leading to increased activities of total antioxidant capacity (T-AOC), superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT) and lysozyme in the hepatopancreas, and reduced malondialdehyde (MDA) contents. Similar trends were observed in mRNA levels of SOD, CAT and lysozyme genes. In conclusion, moderate allicin supplementation in artificial diets (approximately 0.75 %-0.90 %) can significantly enhance growth performance, increase muscle lipid content, and boost immune capabilities of ivory shells.

Abstract Named Entity Recognition (NER) in cybersecurity is crucial for mining information during cybersecurity incidents. Current methods rely on pre-trained models for rich semantic text embeddings, but the challenge of anisotropy may affect subsequent encoding quality. Additionally, existing models may struggle with noise detection. To address these issues, we propose JCLB, a novel model that Joins Contrastive Learning and Belief rule base for NER in cybersecurity. JCLB utilizes contrastive learning to enhance similarity in the vector space between token sequence representations of entities in the same category. A Belief Rule Base (BRB) is developed using regexes to ensure accurate entity identification, particularly for fixed-format phrases lacking semantics. Moreover, a Distributed Constraint Covariance Matrix Adaptation Evolution Strategy (D-CMA-ES) algorithm is introduced for BRB parameter optimization. Experimental results demonstrate that JCLB, with the D-CMA-ES algorithm, significantly improves NER accuracy in cybersecurity.

The identification of rock-breaking mode is a key basis to improve cutting ability, and the cutter cutting attitude has a significant influence on rock-breaking mode. In this study, the internal relationship between cutting attitude and rock-breaking mode was explored, and the optimal cutting attitude parameters of low energy consumption and high efficiency rock-breaking were inferred. Based on the massive collapse state of the wedge surface acting rock when disc cutter vibrates axially upward, the rock tensile-shear coupling failure condition was given according to the Mohr-Coulomb criterion on the basis of the nonlinear rock failure criterion, and the three-segment linear rock failure global criterion (tensile failure, tensile-shear coupling failure, shear failure, compression-shear coupling failure and compression failure) was obtained. The mathematical description of the cutter wedge surface compressive stress under different rock-breaking modes was got. Based on the principle of minimum energy of the wedge surface action, the identification method of rock-breaking mode was proposed, and the load model of cutting rock with disc cutter of oblique attitude was constructed. The correlation between load characteristics of the cutter, rock-crushing characteristics (rock fragmentation distribution and dust size distribution) and rock-breaking mode under different cutting attitude inclination angles was analyzed by numerical simulation and experiment. The results show that the characterization values of wedge surface energy consumption of disc cutter are proportional to the attitude inclination angle, and rock-breaking mode changes from tensile-shear coupling failure to compressive-shear coupling failure. The characterization values of wedge surface energy consumption of disc cutter in vibration cutting are obviously less than that in non-vibration cutting, and it is mainly caused by tensile-shear coupling failure, while the tension-shear and compression-shear coupling failure exists approximately in equal proportion in non-vibration cutting. When the wedge surface component of axial velocity is greater than that of feed velocity, the friction is transformed into rock-breaking assistance, and the energy consumption of the wedge surface is significantly reduced. The macroscopic morphology of disc cutter breaking rock is like the large crescent shape, and the microscopic morphology of the rock powder is like polyhedron and spheroid. The attitude inclination angle of the cutter is inversely proportional to the amount of the rock fragments, and is proportional to the amount of the rock powder (spherical-like dust decreases and polyhedron-like dust increases). It indicates that as the attitude inclination angle increases, the extrusion effect of the cutter teeth edge is weakened, and the energy consumption of dust generated by the wedge surface extrusion increases, which is consistent with the influence of the cutting attitude on the energy consumption of the wedge surface during the identification process of rock-breaking mode. The radial load and the attitude inclination angles of disc cutter are concave, the theory and simulation are consistent with the experimental radial load law, and the average errors are 8.46% and 9.55%, respectively. The rationality of the identification method of disc cutter rock-breaking mode, the load model of cutting rock with inclined attitude and the numerical simulation is verified.

Abstract Background Pancreatic cancer stem cells are crucial for tumorigenesis and cancer metastasis. Presently, long non-coding RNAs were found to be associated with Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma stemness characteristics but the underlying mechanism is largely known. Here, we aim to explore the function of LINC00909 in regulating pancreatic cancer stemness and cancer metastasis. Methods The expression level and clinical characteristics of LINC00909 were verified in 80-paired normal pancreas and Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma tissues from Guangdong Provincial People’s Hospital cohort by in situ hybridization. RNA sequencing of PANC-1 cells with empty vector or vector encoding LINC00909 was experimented for subsequent bioinformatics analysis. The effect of LINC00909 in cancer stemness and metastasis was examined by in vitro and in vivo experiments. The interaction between LINC00909 with SMAD4 and the pluripotency factors were studied. Results LINC00909 was generally upregulated in pancreatic cancer tissues and was associated with inferior clinicopathologic features and outcome. Over-expression of LINC00909 enhanced the expression of pluripotency factors and cancer stem cells phenotype, while knock-down of LINC00909 decreased the expression of pluripotency factors and cancer stem cells phenotype. Moreover, LINC00909 inversely regulated SMAD4 expression, knock-down of SMAD4 rescued the effect of LINC00909-deletion inhibition on pluripotency factors and cancer stem cells phenotype. These indicated the effect of LINC00909 on pluripotency factors and CSC phenotype was dependent on SMAD4 and MAPK/JNK signaling pathway, another downstream pathway of SMAD4 was also activated by LINC00909. Specifically, LINC00909 was localized in the cytoplasm in pancreatic cancer cells and decreased the stability the SMAD4 mRNA. Finally, we found over-expression of LINC00909 not only accelerated tumor growth in subcutaneous mice models, but also facilitated tumorigenicity and spleen metastasis in orthotopic mice models. Conclusion We demonstrate LINC00909 inhibits SMAD4 expression at the post-transcriptional level, which up-regulates the expression of pluripotency factors and activates the MAPK/JNK signaling pathway, leading to enrichment of cancer stem cells and cancer metastasis in pancreatic cancer.

The enzyme tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase 5 (TRAP5) performs an important biological function in immune defense. In the present study, the TRAP5 of Trachinotus ovatus (golden pompano, TroTRAP5) was cloned to assess its biological function. The open reading frame of TroTRAP5 was 990 bp in length and its mature peptide encoded a 34.775-kDa protein that contained a metallophosphatase superfamily domain. Homology sequence alignment revealed that the similarity among teleost fish was 57.66 %–75.99 %. Meanwhile, phylogenetic tree analysis showed that TroTRAP5 was clustered into one branch with teleost TRAP5. TroTRAP5 expression was the most abundant in immune organs (liver, spleen, head kidney, and gills) and up-regulated during bacterial infection. Of note, purified recombinant TroTRAP5 (rTroTRAP5) exhibited phosphatase activity, and the optimal pH and temperature for its activity were 6.0 and 50 ℃. In vivo experiments indicated that TroTRAP5 overexpression in T. ovatus significantly reduced bacterial infection in fish tissues, whereas TroTRAP5 knockdown increased bacterial dissemination and colonization in fish tissues. In summary, the present study results suggest that TroTRAP5 participates in the antibacterial immune response.

Coix seed is a good product for both medicinal and food use, which is highly susceptible to aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) contamination during field transport, storage, and processing. The aim of this study is to find microbial strains that can solve the problem of contamination of coix seed. In this study, the AFB1-degrading microorganism SX1-1 was isolated and identified as a Bacillus megaterium based on morphology, microscopy, and 16S rDNA sequencing. The optimum culture conditions for SX1-1 to degrade AFB1 were determined to be 12 h. The optimum degradation conditions were 72 h, 57°C, and an initial pH of 8.0. The highest degradation of AFB1 was observed in the fermentation supernatant of the SX1-1 strain, with a degradation rate of 97.45%. In addition, whole-genome sequencing analysis of this strain revealed the presence of a number of enzymes that could potentially degrade AFB1. Importantly, SX1-1 was able to degrade AFB1-contaminated coix seed in situ by 50.06% after co-culture. In conclusion, this strain had a high AFB1 degradation ability, and has great potential and great application as a biocontrol agent for AFB1 degradation of coix seed.

Background: Low temperature pose significant challenges to peach cultivation, causing severe damage to peach buds and restricting production and distribution. Ethylene, an important phytohormone, plays a critical role in enhancing plant cold resistance. Structural genes and transcription factors involved in ethylene biosynthesis and signal transduction pathways are associated with cold resistance. However, no research has specifically addressed their roles in peach cold resistance.Methods: In this study, we aimed for cold-resistance gene discovery in cold-sensitive peach cultivar “21Shiji” (21SJ) and cold-resistance cultivar “Shijizhixing” (SJZX) using RNA-seq and gas chromatography.Results: The findings revealed that under cold stress conditions, ethylene biosynthesis in “SJZX” was significantly induced. Subsequently, a structural gene, PpACO1-1, involved in ethylene biosynthesis in peach buds was significantly upregulated and showed a higher correlation with ethylene release rate. To identify potential transcription factors associated with PpACO1-1 expression and ethylene signal transduction, weighted gene co-expression network analysis was conducted using RNA-seq data. Four transcription factors: PpERF2, PpNAC078, PpWRKY65 and PpbHLH112, were identified.Conclusion: These findings provide valuable theoretical insights for investigating the regulatory mechanisms of peach cold resistance and guiding breeding strategies.

Spondylus aurantius, a member of the Mollusca phylum, Bivalvia class, Pterioida order, and Spondylidae family, is an important economic marine bivalve species that is widely distributed along the warm-water coastal region in Guangdong and Hainan Province in China, and the Philippines. As an important marine commercial bivalve, wild S. aurantius individuals are often captured by local fishermen for their large adductor muscle, which makes delicious seafood, and for their beautiful shells, which are used for displays.According to the China Fishery Statistical Yearbook for 2022, the annual production of cultured mollusks exceeded 15 million tons, with oysters, scallops, and clams accounting for 78.23% of the total aquaculture yield. In southeast coastal provinces, such as Guangdong, Guangxi, and Hainan, the most common cultured mollusks include Hong Kong oysters (Crassostrea hongkongensis), Suminoe oysters (Crassostrea ariakensis), pearl oysters (Pinctada fucata martensii), and noble scallops (Chlamys nobilis). Generally, Hong Kong and Suminoe oysters cannot tolerate high salinity conditions and are often cultured near estuaries; the P. f. martensii industry is rapidly declining because of high mortality rates and nucleus rejection after transplantation in the process of pearl production; and noble scallop rearing, which is primarily practiced in net cages, and a considerable amount of labor is required to clean attachments. Therefore, there is an urgent need to investigate the cultivation of new bivalve species that can adapt to coastal areas with high temperatures and high salinity.Though S. aurantius is traditionally regarded as an edible mollusk, few studies have reported the artificial breeding of this species. In this study, wild adult S. aurantius with shell length of (12.00±1.25) cm and wet body weight of (100.00±5.04) g were selected as the research subjects to artificially ripen mature individuals, observe and compare the development of the embryo and juveniles at different temperatures (28 ℃ and 32 ℃), and study the effects of different substrates and water depths on the adhesion efficiency of juveniles. Our results were as follows: (1) Under artificial conditions, adult S. aurantius gonads could continue to develop and mature, with testes and ovaries filled with milky spermatozoa and orange eggs, respectively; (2) The method of "dry in the shade + flowing water + high temperature" successfully induced spawning and fertilization of S. aurantius; (3) The diameters of fertilized eggs were (130.1±0.3) µm, and the first unequal cleavage was observed 95 min after fertilization. These eggs then developed into multicellular stages (cleavage occurred at approximately 30-min intervals), blastula (after 4–5 h of fertilization), trochophore (after 10–12 h of fertilization), D-shaped larvae (after 25–28 h of fertilization), umbo larvae (after 6–7 d of fertilization), pediveliger (after 14–15 d of fertilization), and juvenile (after 25–27 h of fertilization); (4) Fertilized eggs could develop into the juvenile stage at both 28 ℃ and 32 ℃; however, the survival rates of fertilized eggs under higher temperatures were lower than of those cultured at 28 ℃, although the speed of S. aurantius embryonic development at 32 ℃ was higher than that at lower temperatures; (5) The density of juvenile S. aurantius in deep water (1–1.5 m depth) was evidently higher than that in shallow water (0–0.5 m depth) in an indoor seedling pond (P < 0.05); (6) Furthermore, the densities of juvenile S. aurantius were highest on the surfaces of Pinctada margaritifera shells, followed by S. aurantius shells > oyster shells > concrete reels > black shading nets > green polyethylene mesh sheets under indoor conditions, while the densities and growth rate of juvenile S. aurantius attached itself and oyster shells were better after one month culture in the natural coastal area of Wuzhizhou Island, Sanya. In this study, embryonic development in S. aurantius was observed for the first time. Furthermore, the breeding technology of S. aurantius, including the induction of gonadal maturation and spawning, the incubation of fertilized eggs, and the selection of substrates, was established for the first time under artificial conditions, which could contribute to the future large-scale breeding and cultivation of this species.

The identification of rock fractures in strata is crucial to enhance the intelligence of rock detection. Traditional fracture feature extraction methods suffer from issues such as low accuracy and low processing speed, necessitating the development of more effective approaches. To address this problem, this study proposes a new fracture instance segmentation network called FracSeg. Based on the SOLOv2 framework, we incorporated the Swin Transformer to optimize the backbone network and enhance fracture feature extraction. The CARAFE operator is utilized to replace nearest neighbor interpolation, reducing the computational overhead when merging multi-scale fracture features. Finally, the Shuffle Attention module was employed to improve the network’s detection of fracture features. The experimental results demonstrate the superior performance of FracSeg, achieving a mask mAP of 78.2 on a custom dataset while maintaining an average inference speed of 28.2 fps. Even under complex conditions, it outperformed previous fracture segmentation networks in identifying crack structures in coal roadway roofs. Additionally, ablation studies verified the effectiveness of each optimized component in the FracSeg model.

Abstract Different from object detection in natural images, aerial‐view object detection faces special challenges with large changes in object orientation and wide multi‐scale distribution. Many methods based on Oriented Bounding Boxes (OBB) can reach accurate results, yet may face the problem of parameter mutation and axis prediction deviation. To address these problems, a two‐stage detection framework is proposed for arbitrary‐oriented traffic participant detection and axis prediction, named Axis Prediction Network. First, a Deformable Convolution Fusion Module (DCF‐Module) is proposed to enhance the ability of FPN to extract multi‐scale semantic features, for dealing with the multi‐scale change of objects. Then, the axis heat‐map prediction head network is proposed to fit the long axis of oriented objects labeled with Gaussian model, which uses pixel‐by‐pixel prediction heatmap to calculate the long axis of the object, avoiding the angle mutation of an OBB. Last, the long and short side prediction head network is proposed to predict the shape of an oriented object, avoiding the mutation of the width and height of an OBB. The experiments are conducted on the new built Crossroad dataset and the public DOTA dataset. Experiment results show that the proposed method achieve good performance in arbitrary‐oriented traffic participant detection and axis prediction in aerial view.

BackgroundAccurate detection of the histological grade of pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (PNETs) is important for patients’ prognoses and treatment. Here, we investigated the performance of radiological image-based artificial intelligence (AI) models in predicting histological grades using meta-analysis.MethodA systematic literature search was performed for studies published before September 2023. Study characteristics and diagnostic measures were extracted. Estimates were pooled using random-effects meta-analysis. Evaluation of risk of bias was performed by the QUADAS-2 tool.ResultsA total of 26 studies were included, 20 of which met the meta-analysis criteria. We found that the AI-based models had high area under the curve (AUC) values and showed moderate predictive value. The pooled distinguishing abilities between different grades of PNETs were 0.89 [0.84-0.90]. By performing subgroup analysis, we found that the radiomics feature-only models had a predictive value of 0.90 [0.87-0.92] with I2 = 89.91%, while the pooled AUC value of the combined group was 0.81 [0.77-0.84] with I2 = 41.54%. The validation group had a pooled AUC of 0.84 [0.81-0.87] without heterogenicity, whereas the validation-free group had high heterogenicity (I2 = 91.65%, P=0.000). The machine learning group had a pooled AUC of 0.83 [0.80-0.86] with I2 = 82.28%.ConclusionAI can be considered as a potential tool to detect histological PNETs grades. Sample diversity, lack of external validation, imaging modalities, inconsistent radiomics feature extraction across platforms, different modeling algorithms and software choices were sources of heterogeneity. Standardized imaging, transparent statistical methodologies for feature selection and model development are still needed in the future to achieve the transformation of radiomics results into clinical applications.Systematic Review Registrationhttps://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/, identifier CRD42022341852.

The heat generation mechanism, wear behavior and quantitative relationship between cutting load and coal rock characteristics of the interaction between the cutting tool of mining machinery and coal rock mass, are the keys in solving the wear failure short life of the cutter, and realizing the safe and efficient heading. By comprehensively analyzing the impact of temperature on tool life, wear, and cutting efficiency, the temperature and wear distribution law of disc cutter in cutting coal rock are explored, and the heat generation mechanism and wear characteristics of disc cutter in cutting coal rock are revealed. Under the cutting conditions of non-vibration and axial excited vibration, the heat flux calculation formulas of the cutter wedge surface and the blade are established by friction work. Based on the semi-infinite heat transfer model under the condition of instantaneous point heat source and heat compensation principle, the heat transfer models of wedge irregular surface heat source and blade line heat source of disc cutter are given, and the temperature mathematical model of any point is established. Also, the influence of relevant parameters on the temperature field of cutter was solved and analyzed. Using the finite element ABAQUS, and discrete element EDEM software, the study simulates the temperature field and wear characteristics of disc cutter in cutting coal rock at different feed speeds, and sets up an experimental system for vibration cutting coal rock with disc cutter. Furthermore, the study tests the temperature characteristics of coal rock broken by disc cutter, and comprehensively investigates the distribution law of temperature and wear behavior characteristics of disc cutter in theory, simulation, and experiment. The results show that the characteristics of temperature variation of disc cutter are mainly concentrated on the blade, which decreases gradually from the blade to the wedge surface. The temperature distribution along the circumference of disc cutter is like a parabola, and the temperature decreases gradually from the middle blade to both sides. Under different feed speeds, the steady-state average maximum temperatures obtained by theoretical calculation (cutting time tends to infinity) of non-vibration and axial excited vibration are 374.76 ℃ and 245.72 ℃ respectively. The average maximum temperatures obtained by simulation (cutting time is about 3 s) are 80.13 ℃ and 73.60 ℃ respectively, and the average maximum temperature without vibration is 8.87% higher than that with vibration. And the experimental results (cutting time is about 3 s) are 72.56 ℃ and 66.99 ℃, and the average maximum temperature without vibration is 8.45% higher than that with vibration, the average error between simulation and experiment is 11.69%. In the experimental process of disc cutter in cutting coal rock, the circumferential spin phenomenon of the cutter is conducive to its evenly wear, and vibration cutting is more obvious than non-vibration. The temperature dissipation of the disc cutter blade presents a nonlinear downward trend, which is rapidly transferred from the blade to the wedge surface, its structural form can avoid aggravating the local wear of the cutter due to the accumulation and concentration of temperature. The disc cutter wear is concentrated at the blade, the relative wear along the circumference is a parabola distribution, the relative wear of the middle blade is larger, and the relative wear of the two side blades is gradually reduced. And the ABAQUS simulation combined the cutter wear model estimates the characteristic law of relative blade wear, which are the same as that obtained by EDEM simulation. The relative wear amount of disc cutter circumference is consistent with the temperature characteristic law, the correlation coefficients are higher than 0.90, cutting temperature can characterize the cutter wear. The internal connection between the temperature distribution characteristics of disc cutter in cutting coal rock and its wear law is obtained by comprehensive theory, simulation, and experiment, the three temperature variation laws are consistent, which verifies the accuracy and effectiveness of the cutter heat transfer model.

ABSTRACTLicorice is a product with the same origin as medicine and food and is widely used in traditional Chinese medicine and the food, cosmetics and tobacco industries. With the increasing demand for licorice in the herbal market, there is also increasing concern about complex varieties and quality deterioration. Considering the importance of the quality and safety of commercial licorice products, we used DNA barcoding, HPLC and colorimetry to distinguish and evaluate commercial licorice products. Here, 52 samples could be accurately identified into three kinds of licorice, Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch. (Gu), Glycyrrhiza inflata Bat. (Gi) and Glycyrrhiza glabra L. (Gg), by internal transcribed spacer (ITS) and trnH-psbA sequences. Among them, the S27 sample was identified as Gi but had been incorrectly labeled as Gg. Based on HPLC combined with stoichiometric analysis, the contents of liquiritin, glycyrrhizic acid and isoliquiritin contents were significantly different between Gu and Gg, and Gi and Gg showed significant differences only in isoliquiritigenin content. The chemical components and color difference parameters showed that isoliquiritigenin had a significant correlation with the color parameter b*. The above results show that DNA barcoding can quickly and accurately distinguish species, but it cannot provide data on metabolites or other quality information beyond the plant raw materials. Techniques that combine of DNA barcoding, HPLC and colorimetry can more easily distinguish and evaluate the types and quality of commercial licorice products. This study provides good data support for the safety and quality of licorice in the Chinese market.

Groupers are valuable economic fish in the southern sea area of China, but the threat of disease is becoming more and more serious. Vibrio harveyi, V. parahaemolyticus, and Singapore grouper iridovirus (SGIV) are three important pathogens that cause disease in groupers, and infection with either a single one or a mix of these pathogens poses a serious threat to the healthy development of grouper culture. To enhance the rapid diagnosis and screening in the early stages, it is necessary to develop rapid detection methods of these pathogens. To simultaneously and rapidly detect the three pathogens, in this study, we utilized the TolC of V. harveyi, DNAJ of V. parahaemolyticus, and RAD2 of SGIV as the target genes and established a triple visual loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) method. This LAMP method showed a detection time as fast as 30 min and a high sensitivity of 100 fg/μL. Moreover, this method exhibited strong specificity and no cross-reaction with seven types of Vibrio and Staphylococcus aureus, as well as five common viruses in aquatic animals. Then, the LAMP products were enzymically cut, and three characteristic strips were used to identify the pathogen species. The results of the clinical trials demonstrated that the method could accurately and specifically detect V. harveyi, V. parahaemolyticus, and SGIV in grouper tissues. In summary, this study successfully established a triple visual LAMP rapid detection method for V. harveyi, V. parahaemolyticus, and SGIV. The method offers several advantages including simple equipment, easy operation, rapid reaction, high specificity, high sensitivity, and visual results. It is suitable for the early and rapid diagnosis of groupers infected with V. harveyi, V. parahaemolyticus, and SGIV, thereby providing useful technical support for further application in the large-scale disease surveillance of aquaculture animals.

Abstract Background Bisphosphonates (BPs) are widely used in clinical practice to prevent and treat bone metabolism-related diseases. Medication-related osteonecrosis of the jaw (MRONJ) is one of the major sequelae of BPs use. Early prediction and intervention of MRONJ are of great significance. Methods Ninety-seven patients currently on treatment with BPs or with a history of BPs usage and 45 healthy volunteers undergoing dentoalveolar surgery were included in this study. Participants' serum Semaphorin 4D (Sema4D) levels were measured and analyzed before participants underwent surgery (T0) and after a 12-month follow-up (T1). Kruskal–Wallis test and ROC analysis were used to examine the predictive effect of Sema4D on MRONJ. Results Sema4D levels in serum of patients corresponding to confirmed MRONJ were significantly lower at both T0 and T1 time points compared to non-MRONJ and healthy controls. Sema4D has a statistically predictive effect on the occurrence and diagnosis of MRONJ. Serum Sema4D levels were significantly reduced in MRONJ class 3 patients. MRONJ patients who received intravenous BPs had significantly lower Sema4D levels than those who received oral BPs. Conclusion Serum Sema4D level has predictive value for the onset of MRONJ in BPs users within 12 weeks after dentoalveolar surgery.

Different from the true oyster (family Ostreidae), the molecular diversity of the gryphaeid oyster (family Gryphaeidae) has never been sufficiently investigated. In the present study, the complete mitochondrial (mt) genome of Hyotissa sinensis was sequenced and compared with those of other ostreoids. The total length of H. sinensis mtDNA is 30,385 bp, encoding 12 protein-coding-genes (PCGs), 26 transfer RNA (tRNA) genes and two ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes. The nucleotide composition and codon usage preference of H. sinensis mtDNA is similar to that of H. hyotis within the same genus. On the other hand, the presence of three trnM and three trnL genes of H. sinensis was not detected neither in H. hyotis nor other ostroid species. Another unique character of H. sinensis mtDNA is that both rrnS and rrnL have a nearly identical duplication. The PCG order of H. sinensis is identical to H. hyotis and the two congener species also share an identical block of 12 tRNA genes. The tRNA rearrangements mostly happen in the region from Cox1 to Nad3, the same area where the duplicated genes are located. The rearrangements within Gryphaeidae could be explained by a "repeat-random loss model". Phylogenetic analyses revealed Gryphaeidae formed by H. sinensis + H. hyotis as sister to Ostreidae, whereas the phylogenetic relationship within the latter group remains unresolved. The present study indicated the mitogenomic diversity within Gryphaeidae and could also provide important data for future better understanding the gene order rearrangements within superfamily Ostreoidea.

Background: Co-diabetes pancreatic adenocarcinoma has a poorer prognosis than pancreatic adenocarcinoma without diabetes. This study aimed to develop a reliable prognostic model for patients with co-diabetes pancreatic adenocarcinoma. Method: Overall, 169 patients with co-diabetes pancreatic adenocarcinoma were included in our study. First, the independent risk factors affecting the prognosis of patients with co-diabetes pancreatic adenocarcinoma were determined by univariate and multivariate Cox regression analyses. Based on these identified risk factors, we developed a nomogram and evaluated its predictive ability using the concordance index, receiver operating characteristic curve, calibration plot, decision curve, and net reclassification index. Results: In this study, prealbumin, transferrin, carcinoembryonic antigen, distant metastasis, tumor differentiation neutrophil count, lymphocyte count and fasting blood glucose were confirmed as significant prognostic factors. Based on these predictors, a new nomogram was developed. Compared with the American Joint Committee on Cancer 8 staging system and other models, the nomogram achieved a higher concordance index in the training (0.795) and validation (0.729) queues. The area under the nomogram's curve for predicting patient survival at 0.5, 1, and 1.5 years in the training queue was >0.8. Patients were risk-stratified using the nomogram, and Kaplan–Meier survival curves of subgroups were plotted. The Kaplan–Meier curve also showed better separation than the American Joint Committee on Cancer 8 staging system, indicating that our model has a better risk hierarchical ability. Conclusions: Compared to the American Joint Committee on Cancer 8 staging system and other predictive models, our model showed better predictive ability for patients with co-diabetes pancreatic adenocarcinoma. Our model will help in patients’ risk stratification and improves their prognosis.

We admitted a 41-year-old man with a chief complaint of multiple nodules found in the scrotum, accompanied by itching discomfort, occasionally some nodules discharged white secretions. Physical examination revealed extensive nodules of scrotal skin, approximately 2.0 cm in diameter in the largest, grayish white, textured hard, no pain, no breakdown of skin. Due to the wide distribution of scrotal nodules in this patient, there was a large deletion in the scrotal skin after intraoperative removal of all nodules; the skin was submitted to V and Z-sutures, and the scrotum was finally successfully reconstructed.

In this study, the screening of lactic acid bacteria from traditional fermented food was carried out by enrichment culture, dilution separation, and agar plate diffusion experiments. Physiological and biochemical and 16S rDNA gene sequence homology analysis were used to identify the lactic acid bacteria. Then, the main antibacterial substances produced by the lactic acid bacteria were determined by acid excretion, hydrogen peroxide exclusion, and protease hydrolysis. Finally, the bacteriocin crude extract was obtained by alcohol precipitation and Sephadex LH-20 chromatography, and then was applied to the preserving the whole large yellow croaker. To evaluate the preservation effect of the bacteriocin crude extract on the large yellow croaker, sensory evaluation, pH determination, viable cell counts, TVB-N determination and texture profile analysis were systematically carried out every 3 days. The experimental results showed that the lactic acid bacteria isolated from shrimp paste was Lactobacillus plantarum and named MMB-11. Meanwhile, the bacteriocin produced by MMB-11 was sensitive to protease and had notable acid tolerance and thermal stability. With the application of the bacteriocin on the preservation of large yellow croaker, the viable cell counts in MMB-11 group, control group and Nisin-treated group after 12 d of storage were 3.50×104, 1.10×105 and 4.50×104 CFU/g, respectively. Furthermore, after 12 d of storage, the TVB-N treated with MMB-11 group, control group and Nisin group were 20.91±0.66、31.37±0.21 and 21.44±0.45 mg/100 g, respectively. Overall, the results showed that the crude bacteriocin extract of MMB-11 had a better preservation effect on large yellow croaker than the Nisin-treated group and control group. This study provides a fundamental knowledge for developing safe and harmless biological preservatives for large yellow croaker.

Abstract In order to train an end‐to‐end model for better performance in distinguishing superclasses and make the model more sensitive to inter‐class differences, the authors propose a Feature Context Network (FCNet), a novel ensemble framework for image retrieval based on clustering (EFC) and metric learning. In the authors' approach, the EFC framework consists of one common feature extractor and multiple learning branches. This tree‐like structure not only promotes the stability of the training process but also keeps the diversity by using multiple branches. Each branch is learnt by an independent random re‐labelling operation that distributes original classes into superclasses. In such a way, the framework thus can accelerate the training process. To make the EFC framework focus on the different attributes across the classes, the authors utilize k‐means clustering to divide the training set into subsets and train the model sequentially with those subsets. Meanwhile, to reduce the impact of over‐fitting problems, the authors design a branch weight structure during training. Further, FCNet fusions different scales of the neighbourhood information and consequently makes the feature map learn richer information with the different receptive fields. Simultaneously, it can reduce the layer of the network and the number of model parameters. Extensive experiments demonstrate that this approach outperforms the tested representative methods on CARS‐196, CUB‐200‐2011 datasets.

IntroductionScutellaria baicalensis is rich in bioactive flavonoid, which are widely used in clinical therapy. Many environmental factors, such as water and temperature, affect gene expression and secondary metabolites accumulation in plants.MethodsIn this study, to explore the effect of drought stress on the accumulation of flavonoids and gene expression in S. baicalensis seedlings, 4-week-old Scutellaria baicalensis seedlings were treated with different concentrations of PEG6000 to simulate drought stress. The contents of four root-specific flavones (baicalein, wogonin, baicalin, and wogonoside) in samples under different treatments were quantitatively analyzed by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The expression levels of flavonoid biosynthesis-related genes (PAL1, PAL2, CHS, and UBGAT) were determined by real-time quantitative PCR (qRT-PCR). Also, a correlation analysis between flavonoid contents and gene expression levels was made.ResultsThe HPLC results revealed that 5 and 10% PEG6000 treatments significantly increased the content of four flavonoids, with 5% PEG 6000 treatment being the most beneficial to the flavonoids accumulation. The qRT-PCR results showed that PAL2 and CHS gene expressions differed significantly in different organs, while PAL1 and UBGAT had poor organ-specific. For genes in roots, the expression of PAL1 and UBGAT was the highest in 5% PEG6000 treatment, and PAL2 and CHS were the highest in 10% PEG6000 treatment. Compared with other concentrations of PEG6000, 5 and 10% PEG6000 were more advantageous for gene expression. Collectively, PEG6000 at a low concentration promoted the accumulation of flavonoids and the expression of related genes. Additionally, the correlation results demonstrated that PAL1, PAL2, CHS, and UBGAT genes in roots stimulated the formation and accumulation of the four flavonoids to varying degrees, while the exception of PAL2 gene expression in roots was negatively correlated with wogonin content.DiscussionThis study for the first time investigated the effect of drought stress on the downstream gene UBGAT in S.baicalensis seedlings as well as the correlation between gene expression and flavonoid content in S. baicalensis seedlings under drought stress, providing a new sight for studying the effects of drought stress on flavonoid accumulation and related gene expression in S. baicalensis.

Abstract Background Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is one of the deadliest cancer due to its highly aggressive phenotype and lack of effective biomarkers or treatment strategies. ZMAT1 belongs to the C2H2 type zinc finger family, but its biological function is rarely investigated, as well as its role in cancer development. Methods Multiple bioinformatics analyses were used to evaluate ZMAT1 expression and potential role in PDAC. Intro and vivo studies were performed to assess the effects of ZMAT1 on PDAC cells growth. Furthermore, CHIP-seq and luciferase reporter assay was conducted to identify its specific regulatory mechanism in PDAC. Results The current study identified the down-regulation of ZMAT1 and its associations with unfavorable clinicopathological characteristics and poor survival of PDAC. Further, we found overexpression of ZMAT1 inhibited pancreatic cancer cell proliferation by inducing p21, leading to impaired S/G2 cell cycle progression. Besides, over-expression of ZMAT1 led to decreased pancreatic cancer cell apoptosis. Mechanistically, ZMAT1 up-regulated p53 expression and inhibition of p53 abrogated the effect of ZMAT1 over-expression on pancreatic cancer cell, indicating the role of ZMAT1 in PDAC was dependent on p53. By performing CHIP-seq assay, we found ZMAT1 did not bind to P53 but bound to the promoter region of SIRT3, an upstream regulator for p53. Luciferase reporter assay showed transfection of ZMAT1 induced SIRT3 transcription, suggesting ZMAT1 was a transcriptional activator for SIRT3. Conclusion Our findings indicated the role of ZMAT1-SIRT3-p53 signaling pathway during tumor growth, highlighting that ZMAT1 is a tumor suppressor and novel biomarker of PDAC.

The Tonnoidea Suter, 1913 (1825) is a moderately diverse group of large predatory gastropods, the systematics of which remain unclear. In the present study, the complete mitochondrial genomes of nine Tonnoidean species were sequenced. All newly sequenced mitogenomes contain 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), 22 transfer RNA genes and two ribosomal RNA genes, showing similar patterns in genome size, gene order and nucleotide composition. The ratio of nonsynonymous to synonymous of PCGs indicated that NADH complex genes of Tonnoideans were experiencing a more relaxed purifying selection compared with the COX genes. The reconstructed phylogeny based on the combined amino acid sequences of 13 protein-coding genes and the nucleotide sequences of two rRNA genes supported that Ficidae Meek, 1864 (1840) is a sister to Tonnoidea. The monophylies of all Tonnoidean families were recovered and the internal phylogenetic relationships were consistent with the current classification. The phylogeny also revealed that Tutufa rebuta (Linnaeus, 1758) is composed of at least two different species, indicating that the species diversity within Bursidae Thiele, 1925 might be underestimated. The present study contributes to the understanding of the Tonnoidean systematics, and it could provide important information for the revision of Tonnoidean systematics in the future.

The complete mitogenomes of Pinctada albina and Pinctada margaritifera were sequenced in this study, with sizes of 23,841 bp and 15,556 bp, respectively. The mitochondrial genome analysis of eight Pterioidea species indicated the existence of gene rearrangements within the superfamily. The ATP8 gene was not detected in the two new mitogenomes, and rrnS was found to be duplicated in P. albina’s mitogenome. The reconstructed phylogeny based on mitogenomes strongly supported the monophyly of Pterioidea and provided robust statistical evidence of the phylogenetic relationships within Pteriomorphia. The analysis of the mitochondrial gene order revealed that of P. margaritifera to be the same as the ancestral order of Pterioidea. The gene orders of the Pterioidea species were mapped to the phylogenetic tree, and the gene rearrangement events were inferred. These results provide important insights that will support future research, such as studies extending the evolutionary patterns of the gene order from P. margaritifera to other species and determining the evolutionary status of Pterioidea within the infraclass Pteriomorphia.

Exposure to heavy metals exerts toxic effects on female reproduction and embryo development. This study examined the exposure of patients with unexplained recurrent miscarriage (uRM) to multiple metals and the correlations among exposures to different metals. A total of 275 participants were enrolled, including 43 healthy women without previous miscarriage (the control group) and 232 uRM women (the case group); among these uRM women, 159 had two miscarriages (2M), 42 had three miscarriages (3M) and 31 had four or more miscarriages (≥4M). A total of 22 elements were measured in serum samples via inductively coupled plasma–mass spectrometry. The levels of calcium (104.37 mg/L vs. 92.65/93.02/92.61/92.47 mg/L) and selenium (131.85 µg/L vs. 117.80/118.04/115.88/124.35 µg/L) were higher in the controls than in the total uRM group and the 2M, 3M and ≥4M subgroups. The level of vanadium was significantly lower in the controls than in the total uRM group (0.15 µg/L vs. 0.23 µg/L), and the level of lead was lower in the controls than that in the total uRM group and the 2M, 3M and ≥4M subgroups (0.01 µg/L vs. 0.28/0.18/0.63/0.34 µg/L). After adjusting for age, body mass index and education level, calcium and selenium exposure were consistently negatively associated with miscarriage, while lead exposure was positively associated with miscarriage. In addition, the correlations among exposures to different metals slightly differed between the control and uRM groups. Therefore, changes in some metal elements in the blood might be related to the risk of uRM.

Different from the diverse family Pectinidae, the Spondylidae is a small group with a single genus that shares the sedentary life habit of cementing themselves to the substrate. However, little information related to the genetic diversity of Spondylidae has been reported. In the present study, the complete mitochondrial genomes of Spondylus versicolor and S. spinosus were sequenced and compared with those of pectinids. The mtDNA of S. versicolor and S. spinosus show similar patterns with respect to genome size, AT content, AT skew, GC skew, and codon usage, and their mitogenomic sizes are longer than most pectinid species. The mtDNA of S. spinosus is 27,566 bp in length, encoding 13 protein-coding genes, 22 transfer RNA genes, and 2 ribosomal RNA genes, while an additional tRNA-Met was found in the mtDNA of S. versicolor, which is 28,600 bp in length. The monophylies of Spondylidae and Pectinidae were well supported, but the internal relationships within Pectinidae remain unresolved due to the paraphyly of the genus Mimachlamy and the controversial position of the tribe Aequipectinini. The gene orders of S. versicolor and S. spinosus are almost identical but differ greatly from species of the Pectinidae, indicating extensive gene rearrangements compared with Pectinidae. Positive selection analysis revealed evidence of adaptive evolution in the branch of Spondylidae. The present study could provide important information with which to understand the evolutionary progress of the diverse and economically significant marine bivalve Pectinoidea.

Trajectory prediction aims to predict the movement intention of traffic participants in the future based on the historical observation trajectories. For traffic scenarios, pedestrians, vehicles and other traffic participants have social interaction of surrounding traffic participants in both time and spatial dimensions. Most previous studies only use pooling methods to simulate the interaction process between participants and cannot fully capture the spatio-temporal dependence, possibly accumulating errors with the increase in prediction time. To overcome these problems, we propose the Spatial–Temporal Interaction Attention-based Trajectory Prediction Network (STIA-TPNet), which can effectively model the spatial–temporal interaction information. Based on trajectory feature extraction, the novel Spatial–Temporal Interaction Attention Module (STIA Module) is proposed to extract the interaction relationships between traffic participants, including temporal interaction attention, spatial interaction attention, and spatio-temporal attention fusion. By adaptive allocation of attention weights, temporal interaction attention is a temporal attention mechanism used to capture the movement pattern of each traffic participant in the scene, which can learn the importance of historical trajectories at different moments to future behaviors. Since the participants number in recent traffic scenes dynamically changes, the spatial interaction attention is designed to abstract the traffic participants in the scene into graph nodes, and abstract the social interaction between participants into graph edges. Coupling the temporal and spatial interaction attentions can adaptively model the temporal–spatial information and achieve accurate trajectory prediction. By performing experiments on the INTERACTION dataset and the UTP (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle-based Trajectory Prediction) dataset, the experimental results show that the proposed method significantly improves the accuracy of trajectory prediction and outperforms the representative methods in comparison.

Cowries (Family Cypraeidae) are widely distributed in tropical and subtropical seas, with the highest diversity of cowries in the Indo-Pacific region. However, the classification of Cypraeidae, especially at the lower taxonomic levels, is still controversial. In the present study, we determined the complete mitochondrial genomes of 10 cowries. All the newly sequenced mtDNA encode 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), 22 transfer RNA (tRNA) genes, two ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes, and several non-coding regions. The reconstructed mitogenomic phylogeny of Cypraeidae recognized two monophyletic clades, with the first clade comprised of Erroneinae, Cypraeinae and Luriinae and the second clade formed by the single subfamily Erosarinae. The congeneric genetic distance values fall within 0.118–0.144, lower than those above genus level ranging from 0.163 to 0.271, consistent with the current division of genera within Cypraeidae. The divergence time estimated here indicated that the ancestor of Indo-Pacific cowries diversified during the Paleocene, and the closure of the Tethys Seaway might lead to the speciation events of several Indo-Pacific species. This study suggests that the complete mtDNA is a promising tool to improve the phylogenetic resolution of Cypraeidae, and mtDNA could also provide important information for future species delimitation especially within the cowries that possess different morphological phenotypes.

A zebrafish behavioral model is prevalent and has potential to be an important component of chemical screening and toxicity evaluations. However, applications of such zebrafish behavioral assays remain limited because of flaws in monitoring procedures and designs and inconsistent test methodology among published studies. In the present study, a behavioral assay method based on zebrafish larvae was established for rapid chemical toxicity evaluation, which included the optimization of test conditions and the development of behavioral parameters, such as accumulated distance, frequency of active state, acceleration and mobility. To validate the reliability and investigate the specificity of the method developed, the behavioral effects were evaluated for a set of 28 chemicals (flame retardants, pesticides, fungicides or heavy metals) typically reported in the environment and showing effects by various modes of action (MOAs). Our results showed that the most suitable container and volume for behavioral tests of zebrafish larvae was 24-well plate containing 8-mm depth of solution, and the most appropriate developmental period for monitoring was at 5 days post-fertilization (dpf). Chemical exposure led to various dose-dependent responses of the behavioral parameters via different MOAs, e.g. estrogenic chemicals caused hyperactivity through neurodevelopment disturbance and neurotoxic chemicals led to hypoactivity through disruption of nerve signal transmission. Our results suggested that the optimized behavior monitioring method have the potential for identification and classification of neurotoxic chemicals.

Background: Although some improvements in the management of pancreatic cancer (PC) have been made, no major breakthroughs in terms of biomarker discovery or effective treatment have emerged. Here, we applied artificial intelligence (AI)-based methods to develop a model to diagnose PC and predict survival outcome. Methods: Multiple bioinformatics methods, including Limma Package, were performed to identify differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in PC. A Back Propagation (BP) model was constructed, followed by Genetic Algorithm (GA) filtering and verification of its prognosis capacity in the TCGA cohort. Furthermore, we validated the protein expression of the selected DEGs in 92 clinical PC tissues using immunohistochemistry. Finally, intro studies were performed to assess the function of SLC6A14 and SPOCK1 on pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) cells proliferation and apoptosis. Results: Four candidate genes (LCN2, SLC6A14, SPOCK1, and VCAN) were selected to establish a four-gene signature for PC. The gene signature was validated in the TCGA PC cohort, and found to show satisfactory discrimination and prognostic power. Areas under the curve (AUC) values of overall survival were both greater than 0.60 in the TCGA training cohort, test cohort, and the entire cohort. Kaplan-Meier analyses showed that high-risk group had a significantly shorter overall survival and disease-free survival than the low-risk group. Further, the elevated expression of SLC6A14 and SPOCK1 in PC tissues was validated in the TCGA + GETx datasets and 92 clinical PC tissues, and was significantly associated with poor survival in PC. In PDAC cell line, SLC6A14 or SPOCK1 knockdown inhibited cells proliferation, migration and promoted cells apoptosis. Conclusions: Using Limma Package and GA-ANN, we developed and validated a diagnostic and prognostic gene signature that yielded excellent predictive capacity for PC patients' survival. In vitro studies were further conducted to verify the functions of SLC6A14 and SPOCK1 in PC progression.

In this study, the flavor compounds of ivory shell (Babylonia areolata) and their changes caused by ammonia and salinity stresses were studied. Ammonia stress improved the contents of free amino acids (FAAs), 5′-adenosine monophosphate (AMP), citric acid, and some mineral ions such as Na+, PO43−, and Cl−. The FAA contents decreased with increasing salinity, while the opposite results were observed in most inorganic ions (e.g., K+, Na+, Mg2+, Mn2+, PO43−, and Cl−). Hyposaline and hypersaline stresses increased the AMP and citric acid contents compared to the control group. The equivalent umami concentration (EUC) values were 3.53–5.14 g monosodium glutamate (MSG)/100 g of wet weight, and the differences in EUC values among treatments were mainly caused by AMP. Hexanal, butanoic acid, and 4-(dimethylamino)-3-hydroxy- and (E, E)-3,5-octadien-2-one were the top three volatile compounds, and their profiles were significantly affected when ivory shells were cultured under different ammonia and salinity conditions.

In this study, an eight-week feeding trial was performed to investigate the effects of different taurine supplementation levels (0.0% as control, 1.0%, 1.5%, 2.0%, 2.5%, and 3.0%) on the growth performance, lipid composition, and antioxidant ability in juvenile ivory shells Babylonia areolata. The results showed that taurine supplementation significantly improved the specific growth rates (SGRs) and survival rates of ivory shell (except the survival rate in the 3.0% taurine diet group) (p < 0.05). The SGRs showed an increasing and then decreasing tendency with increasing dietary taurine supplementation, and the highest value was observed in the 2.0% taurine diet (2.60%/d). The taurine content in the muscle of ivory shells fed taurine-supplemented diets significantly increased when compared to the control group (p < 0.05). The profiles of C22:2n6 in the muscle of ivory shells fed taurine-supplemented diets were significantly higher than in the control group (p < 0.05), and the highest values were observed in the 2.0% taurine supplementation group. The high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) content in the hepatopancreas showed an increasing and then decreasing tendency with increasing dietary taurine supplementation, while the low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) concentration showed a decreasing tendency. Furthermore, the activities of pepsin and lipase in both the intestine and hepatopancreas significantly increased at moderate taurine supplementation levels compared to the control group (p < 0.05). Accordingly, obvious increases in the histological parameters in the intestine of ivory shells fed taurine-supplemented diets were also found. As for the antioxidant ability, the activities of the total antioxidant capacity (T-AOC) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) showed an increasing and then decreasing tendency with increasing dietary taurine supplementation, and the highest values were observed in the 1.0% and 1.0–2.0% taurine supplementation groups, respectively; the malondialdehyde (MDA) contents significantly decreased with increasing dietary taurine supplementation (p < 0.05). The taurine intake affected the expression of four appetite-related genes in the hepatopancreas, in which orexin and NPY showed an increasing and then decreasing tendency, while leptin and cholecyatoklnin decreased with increasing dietary taurine supplementation. In conclusion, moderate taurine supplementation in an artificial diet (about 1.5–2.0%) could improve the growth performance and antioxidant ability and change the lipid composition of juvenile ivory shells.

As an important component of intelligent transportation-management systems, accurate traffic-parameter prediction can help traffic-management departments to conduct effective traffic management. Due to the nonlinearity, complexity, and dynamism of highway-traffic data, traffic-flow prediction is still a challenging issue. Currently, most spatial–temporal traffic-flow-prediction models adopt fixed-structure time convolutional and graph convolutional models, which lack the ability to capture the dynamic characteristics of traffic flow. To address this issue, this paper proposes a spatial–temporal prediction model that can capture the dynamic spatial–temporal characteristics of traffic flow, named the spatial–temporal self-attention graph convolutional network (STA-GCN). In terms of feature engineering, we used the time cosine decomposition and one-hot encoding methods to capture the periodicity and heterogeneity of traffic-flow changes. Additionally, in order to build the model, self-attention mechanisms were incorporated into the spatial–temporal convolution to capture the spatial–temporal dynamic characteristics of traffic flow. The experimental results indicate that the performance of the proposed model on two traffic-volume datasets is superior to those of several baseline models. In particular, in long-term prediction, the prediction error can be reduced by over 5%. Further, the interpretability and robustness of the prediction model are addressed by considering the spatial dynamic changes.

Abstract This paper proposes a distributed adaptive dynamic programming scheme to investigate the optimal tracking control problem for finite‐horizon non‐linear interconnected systems with constraint inputs under aperiodic sampling. A N‐player nonzero‐sum differential game system is constructed with the presented non‐linear interconnected system and the tracking error system by introducing the augment vectors. To address the problems of constrained‐input and finite‐horizon control, a non‐quadratic utility function and a finite‐horizon cost function are utilized which will arise in the time‐varying Hamilton–Jacobi (HJ) equation. Then, a periodic event‐triggered scheme is designed to realize aperiodic sampling, where the consumption of communication resources is reduced and the Zeno behavior is avoided. Under the designed periodic event‐triggered scheme, the time‐varying HJ equation is almost impossible to get an analytical solution due to its hybrid properties and non‐linearity. Therefore, the critic neural networks are used to estimate the optimal solution of the HJ equation, and the weight update law is constructed to guarantee the uniformly ultimate bounded of approximated errors. Further, the hybrid nonzero‐sum differential game is confirmed to be uniformly ultimate bounded by using the Lyapunov theory. Finally, the obtained distributed PET control strategy is successfully applied to dispose the missile‐target intercepter problem.

Tris (1,3-dichloro-2-propyl) phosphate (TDCIPP), widely applied as flame retardant into a variety of products, can be physically leached out to the aquatic environment. Measurable values of TDCIPP have been found in the environment and within biota. Many toxicological assessments have shown that TDCIPP could cause developmental toxicity and oxidative stress in fish. In this study, we focused on the effects of TDCIPP on the growth and oxidative stress of an important commercial fish species in China, silver carp (Hypophthalmichthys molitrix). Fish larvae was exposed to environmentally relevant concentrations (0.05, 0.5, 5 and 50 μg/L) of TDCIPP for 7, 14 and 28 days. Simultaneously, the transcription levels of genes associated with the growth hormone/insulin-like growth factor (GH/IGF) axis and the antioxidative enzymes were examined. The body length and body mass of silver carp larvae decreased significantly only under exposure to 5 and 50 μg/L of TDCIPP at 14 days compared with the control group, while differences on those paraments were observed at 0.05, 0.5, 5 and 50 μg/L when larvae were exposed for 28 days. The observation evidenced the time- and dose- dependent growth inhibitions caused by TDCIPP on silver carp larvae. Exposure to TDCIPP also decreased the contents of GH and IGF1 in fish attended by significant down-regulation of gh and igf1. Moreover, TDCIPP up-regulated the expression of cat, sod1 and gstt followed by an increase of the activities of catalase (CAT) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) and the levels of malondialdehyde (MDA) and glutathione (GSH), but the activities of glutathione peroxidase (GPX) were decreased. These results suggested that growth inhibition and oxidative stress co-occurred in silver carp larvae after exposure to environmentally relevant concentrations of TDCIPP accompanied by the abnormal expression of genes which associated with the GH/IGF axis and antioxidative enzymes.

Pinctada fucata martensii and P. maxima are two main traditional pearl oyster species that can produce seawater pearls. Our previous study showed a higher clearance rate (CR) and growth performance in P. f. martensii than in P. maxima fed with Isochrysis galbana. In this study, the P. f. martensii and P. maxima juveniles of two sizes (large and small) were fed with six different microalgae diets [I. galbana (I), Platymonas subcordiformis (P), Chaetoceros muelleri I, I+P, I+C, and P+C] to evaluate the differences in growth, feeding, and metabolism between two pearl oyster species. After 60 d of the rearing period, P. f. martensii and P. maxima fed with mixed microalgae showed a significantly higher relative growth rate (RGR) than those fed with single microalgae (P< 0.05). The RGRs were significantly higher in P. f. martensii than those in P. maxima fed with the same diets (P< 0.05). The RGRs showed a decreasing tendency with the growth in both pearl oyster species. The CRs of pearl oysters fed with mixed microalgae were significantly higher than those fed with single microalgae (P< 0.05), and the CRs of P. f. martensii were significantly higher than those of P. maxima fed with the same diets (P< 0.05). Significantly lower respiration rates (RRs) were observed in small-size P. f. martensii groups fed with I, P, and I+P diets and all large P. f. martensii groups compared to P. maxima fed with the same diets (P< 0.05). Higher activities of amylase, cellulase, lipase, and pepsin in P. f. martensiiwere observed compared to P. maxima fed with the same diets at two sizes. The pepsin activities in P. maxima decreased with the growth, while there were no consistent pepsin activities of P. f. martensii with the growth. The carbonic anhydrase activities in P. maxima were significantly higher than those in P. f. martensii fed with the same diets (P< 0.05). The carbonic anhydrase activities were highest in the I+C diet group, followed by C+P and I+P, I, C, and P groups. Significant differences were observed among different diet groups in the same pearl oyster species (P< 0.05). Our results suggest that the lower CR and activities of digestive enzymes and higher RRs and activities of carbonic anhydrase may cause a lower growth rate of P. maxima compared to P. f. martensii.

Asari Radix et Rhizoma is commonly used in classic prescriptions of herbal medicine in several Asian countries for resuscitation, pain relief, and sore treatment, and Asarum heterotropoides (A. heterotropoides) is an important source material of Asari Radix et Rhizoma. However, the plants of the Asari Radix et Rhizoma and some plants in Asarum spp. contain aristolochic acid I (AAI), which is considered as a carcinogen. The objective of the current study is to detoxify Asarum spp. through microbial degradation of AAI in order to ensure drug safety. Based on the observation of the close correlation between endophytic fungi of A. heterotropoides and AAI, we identified an AAI-degrading fungus and screened for candidate genes involved in AAI degradation. Full-length O-demethylase genes (ODMs) were cloned including A.h-ODM-5, Fs-ODM-4, and Fs-ODM-1, and their ability to degrade AAI was tested in vitro. The results showed that the AAI-degrading fungus was identified as Neocosmospora solani (A.h-Fs-1, endophytic fungi of A. heterotropoides), and verified the capability of specific O-demethylation to modify the structure of AAI. We further identified the functional ODMs in A.h-Fs-1 capable of degrading AAI and uncovered the AAI degradation mechanism of A.h-Fs-1. The microbial degradation of AAI demonstrated in the present study offers a new method to detoxify plant materials used for herbal medicine, and would enhance the regulation of toxic ingredients content in herbal medicine source materials.

N-isopropyl-N-phenyl-1,4-phenylenediamine (IPPD) is used as a ubiquitous antioxidant worldwide, it is an additive in tire rubber easily discharged into the surrounding environment. At present, there is no study concerning the subacute toxicity of IPPD on fish. We used zebrafish embryos (2 h post-fertilization) exposed to IPPD for 5 days at concentrations of 0, 0.0012, 0.0120 and 0.1200 mg/L to investigate its toxic effects of embryonic development, disruption of growth hormone/insulin-like growth factor (GH/IGF) and hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid (HPT) axis. The results showed that IPPD exposure decreased hatchability, weakened movement ability, reduced body length, and caused multiple types of deformities in zebrafish embryos. The expression of genes involved to GH/IGF and HPT axis were altered after exposure to IPPD in zebrafish larvae. Meanwhile, exposure to IPPD significantly decreased thyroxine (T4) and 3,5,3′-triiodothyronine (T3) contents in larvae, which indicated that HPT axis was in a disturbed state. Moreover, treatment of IPPD decreased the enzymatic activities of superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT) as well as levels of glutathione (GSH). While the contents of malondialdehyde (MDA) were elevated after exposure to IPPD. The present study thus demonstrated that IPPD induced oxidative stress, caused developmental toxicity and disrupted the GH/IGF and HPT axis of zebrafish, which could be responsible for developmental impairment and growth inhibition.

The marine gastropod Strombidae is widely distributed in tropical and subtropical regions all over the world and possesses high morphological diversity. In order to better understand how morphological characteristics evolved within Strombidae, a robust phylogenetic framework is needed. In the present study, the complete mitochondrial genomes of Lentigo lentiginosus, Euprotomus aratrum, and Canarium labiatum were sequenced. The three newly sequenced mt genomes contained 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), 22 transfer RNA (tRNA) genes, two ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes, and several non-coding regions, indicating a similar pattern with respect to genome size, gene order, and nucleotide composition compared with those of other strombids reported before. Two different datasets derived from mitochondrial genes were constructed to resolve the internal phylogenetic relationships of Stromboidea and Strombidae. Within Stromboidea, the sister group formed by Clade I [Rostellariidae + (Seraphsidae + Strombidae)] and Clade II [Xenophoridae + (Struthiolariidae + Aporrhaidae)] were fully recovered and supported by morphological synapomorphies as previously suggested. The phylogenetic positions of L. lentiginosus, E. aratrum, and C. labiatum were confirmed within Strombidae, and several morphological similarities were observed corresponding to the present phylogeny. A correlation between strombids speciation events and paleoclimate change was presumed. Our results indicate that complete mt genomes would be a promising tool to reconstruct a robust phylogeny of Strombidae with an increased taxon sampling in the future.

Hepcidin, a cysteine-rich antimicrobial peptide, has a highly conserved gene structure in teleosts, and it plays an essential role in host immune response against various pathogenic bacteria. Nonetheless, few studies on the antibacterial mechanism of hepcidin in golden pompano (Trachinotus ovatus) have been reported. In this study, we synthesized a derived peptide, TroHepc2-22, from the mature peptide of T. ovatus hepcidin2. Our results showed that TroHepc2-22 has superior antibacterial abilities against both Gram-negative (Vibrio harveyi and Edwardsiella piscicida) and Gram-positive (Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus agalactiae) bacteria. Based on the results of a bacterial membrane depolarization assay and propidium iodide (PI) staining assay in vitro, TroHepc2-22 displayed antimicrobial activity by inducing the bacterial membrane depolarization and changing the bacterial membrane permeability. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) visualization illustrated that TroHepc2-22 brought about membrane rupturing and the leakage of the cytoplasm for the bacteria. In addition, TroHepc2-22 was verified to have hydrolytic activity on bacterial genomic DNA in view of the results of the gel retardation assay. In terms of the in vivo assay, the bacterial loads of V. harveyi in the tested immune tissues (liver, spleen, and head kidney) were significantly reduced in T. ovatus, revealing that TroHepc2-22 significantly enhanced the resistance against V. harveyi infection. Furthermore, the expressions of immune-related genes, including tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), interferon-γ (IFN-γ), interleukin 1-β (IL-1β), IL-6, Toll-like receptor 1 (TLR1), and myeloid differentiation factor 88 (MyD88) were significantly increased, indicating that TroHepc2-22 might regulate inflammatory cytokines and activate immune-related signaling pathways. To summarize, TroHepc2-22 possesses appreciable antimicrobial activity and plays a vital role in resisting bacterial infection. The observation of our present study unveils the excellent application prospect of hepcidin as a substitute for antibiotics to resist pathogenic microorganisms in teleosts.

Searching for efficient electrode materials with excellent electrochemical performance is of great significance to the development of magnesium-ion batteries (MIBs). Two-dimensional Ti-based materials are appealing for use in MIBs due to their high cycling capability. On the basis of density functional theory (DFT) calculations, we comprehensively investigate a novel two-dimensional Ti-based material, namely, TiClO monolayer, as a promising anode for MIBs. Monolayer TiClO can be exfoliated from its experimentally known bulk crystal with a moderate cleavage energy of 1.13 J/m2. It exhibits intrinsically metallic properties with good energetical, dynamical, mechanical, and thermal stabilities. Remarkably, TiClO monolayer possesses an ultra-high storage capacity (1079 mA h g−1), a low energy barrier (0.41–0.68 eV), and a suitable average open-circuit voltage (0.96 V). The lattice expansion for the TiClO monolayer is slight (

Siphonosoma australe, Phascolosoma arcuatum, and Sipunculus nudus are three important sipunculan species in tropical intertidal zones. In this study, the particle size, organic matter content, and bacterial community composition in the gut contents of three different sipunculans and their surrounding sediments were analyzed. The grain size fractions of sipunculans’ guts were significantly different from those of their surrounding sediments; particle size fractions < 500 μm were favored by the sipunculans. As for the total organic matter (TOM), higher contents of organic matter were observed in the guts than in the surrounding sediments in all three sipunculan species. The bacterial community composition of all the samples was investigated by 16S rRNA gene sequencing, in which a total of 8974 OTUs were obtained from 24 samples based on a 97% threshold. The predominant phylum identified from the gut contents of three sipunculans was Planctomycetota, while the predominant phylum in their surrounding sediments was Proteobacteria. At the genus level, the most abundant genus was Sulfurovum (average 4.36%) in the surrounding sediments, while the most abundant genus was Gplla (average 12.76%) in the gut contents. The UPGMA tree showed that the samples from the guts of three different sipunculans and their surrounding sediments were clustered separately into two groups, which showed that these three sipunculans had a different bacterial community composition with their surrounding sediments. The grain size and total organic matter (TOM) had the greatest impacts on the bacterial community composition at both the phylum and genus levels. In conclusion, the differences in particle size fractions, organic matter content, and bacterial community composition between the gut contents and surrounding sediments in these three sipunculan species might be caused by their selective ingestion.

Although person re-identification has made great progress, unsupervised cross-domain adaptive person re-identification is still a challenging problem. With no labeled data in target domain, the performance may have a significant drop. In this paper, we propose an unsupervised cross-domain adaptive person re-identification framework based on horizontal pyramid similarity learning (UHPS). Firstly, horizontal pyramid features are extracted by dividing the deep feature maps into different number of partial feature bins. These feature bins with diverse scales can incorporate not only the global information but also local information in different spatial scales, making the framework more robust in complex environment. Then, horizontal pyramid similarity learning is proposed with the mechanism of fusing together the internal similarity of the target domain and the similarity between the source domain and target domain. Finally, the unsupervised clustering algorithm DBSCAN embeded with the horizontal pyramid similarity is employed to select training data in the target domain and estimate the pseudo labels in each training iteration, for the purpose of adapting the framework to the target domain. The results on Market1501 and DukeMTMC-reID confirm that the proposed framework can adapt to the target domain effectively and outperforms the state-of-the-art unsupervised cross domain person re-identification approaches.

Heosemys grandis, a species of Asian water turtle, that has a wide range of applications in the food and pharmaceutical industries. Since some processed products cannot be identified exclusively by morphological and microscopic identification, a reliable and quick approach to guarantee authenticity is critical. Thus, we fostered an effective and stable molecular identification system to identify Heosemys grandis based on DNA mini-barcoding and species-specific primers PCR technology. A total of 48 turtle samples from 16 different species were collected. To distinguish Heosemys grandis from its counterfeits, DNA mini-barcoding and a pair of species-specific primers were designed and verified by PCR after analyzing the COI sequences of samples. The results showed that only Heosemys grandis samples could generate a single clear band following amplification using species-specific primers. Employing DNA mini-barcoding to amplify samples can verify authenticity by sequence alignment. These findings indicated that species-specific primers PCR technology combined with DNA mini-barcoding could accurately detect the authenticity of Heosemys grandis. This technology broadens the application of molecular biology techniques in the food and pharmaceutical industries. It provides a reliable and convenient method for identifying raw materials to standardize the market and protect customers’ rights and interests.

N-(1,3-dimethylbutyl)-N′-phenyl-p-phenylenediamine (6PPD) is used as a ubiquitous rubber antioxidant worldwide and has been shown to be potentially toxic to aquatic organisms. In this study, zebrafish embryos were exposed to 6PPD for five days starting at two hours post-fertilization at concentrations of 0, 0.0022, 0.022, and 0.22 mg/L to investigate its effects on embryonic development, the growth hormone/insulin-like growth factor (GH/IGF) axis, and the hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid (HPT) axis. The results showed that the 96 h LC50 of 6PPD was 2.2 mg/L. 6PPD exposure decreased hatchability, lowered autonomous movement, reduced body length in zebrafish embryos and caused deformities. The hormones levels and the expression of genes related to GH/IGF and HPT axis were altered after exposure to 6PPD in zebrafish larvae. These results indicated that the GH/IGF and HPT axis was disturbed. Moreover, treatment of 6PPD produced oxidative stress in zebrafish embryos. Overall, the present study thus demonstrated that exposure to 0.22 mg/L 6PPD caused developmental toxicity and disrupted the GH/IGF and HPT axis of zebrafish, which could be responsible for developmental impairment and growth inhibition.

Complex inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) object recognition is a critical and challenging problem in computer vision tasks. An efficient complex object recognition method for ISAR images is proposed based on adaptive deep relation learning. (i) An adaptive multimodal mechanism is proposed to greatly improve the multimodal sampling and transformation capabilities of convolutional neural networks and increase the resolutions of the feature maps. In particular, an adaptive ranking and selection strategy for related regions are proposed. (ii) Deep graphical learning is proposed to jointly estimate large numbers of heterogeneous attributes and leverage the relations among features and attributes. Extensive experiments performed on real‐world datasets show that the proposed method outperforms other state‐of‐the‐art methods.

Liquiritigenin (LG), isoliquiritigenin (Iso-LG), together with their respective glycoside derivatives liquiritin (LN) and isoliquiritin (Iso-LN), are the main active flavonoids of Glycyrrhiza uralensis, which is arguably the most widely used medicinal plant with enormous demand on the market, including Chinese medicine prescriptions, preparations, health care products and even food. Pharmacological studies have shown that these ingredients have broad medicinal value, including anti-cancer and anti-inflammatory effects. Although the biosynthetic pathway of glycyrrhizin, a triterpenoid component from G. uralensis, has been fully analyzed, little attention has been paid to the biosynthesis of the flavonoids of this plant. To obtain the enzyme-coding genes responsible for the biosynthesis of LN, analysis and screening were carried out by combining genome and comparative transcriptome database searches of G. uralensis and homologous genes of known flavonoid biosynthesis pathways. The catalytic functions of candidate genes were determined by in vitro or in vivo characterization. This work characterized the complete biosynthetic pathway of LN and achieved the de novo biosynthesis of liquiritin in Saccharomyces cerevisiae using endogenous yeast metabolites as precursors and cofactors for the first time, which provides a possibility for the economical and sustainable production and application of G. uralensis flavonoids through synthetic biology. KEY WORDS: Glycyrrhiza uralensis, Liquiritin, Isoliquiritin, Liquiritigenin, Isoliquiritigenin, Heterologous synthesis, Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Fruit juices have been widely used as the substrates for probiotic delivery in non-dairy products. In this study, three lactic acid bacteria (LAB) strains, including Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus casei and Lactobacillus plantarum, were selected to ferment apple juice. During 72-h of fermentation, these LAB strains grew well in the apple juice with significant increases in viable cell counts (from 7.5 log CFU/mL to 8.3 log CFU/mL) and lactic acid content (from 0 to 4.2 g/L), and a reduction of pH value (from 5.5 to around 3.8). In addition, the antioxidant and antibacterial capacities of fermented apple juice in vitro were significantly improved through the phenolic and organic acid metabolisms. After storage at 4°C for 30 days, the total amino acid content of fermented apple juice was significantly increased, although the viable cell counts and total phenolic content were decreased (p < 0.05). Furthermore, the stored fermented apple juices still possessed antibacterial and in vitro antioxidant activities. Overall, all the selected LAB strains could be suitable for apple juice fermentation and can effectively improve their biological activities.