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Background: Pulleys have been reported as the functional origins of the rectus extraocular muscles (EOMs). However, biomechanical significance of pulleys on binocular vision has not been reported.Methods: Three eye movement models, i.e., non-pulley model, passive-pulley model, and active-pulley model, are used to simulate the horizontal movement of the eyes from the primary position to the left direction in the range of 1°-30°. The resultant forces of six EOMs along both orthogonal directions (i.e., the x-axis and y-axis defined in this paper) in the horizontal plane are calculated using the three models.Results: The resultant force along the y-axis of the left eye for non-pulley model are significantly larger than that of the other two pulley models. The difference of the force, between the left eye and the right eye in non-pulley model, is larger than those in the other two pulley models along x-axis and y-axis.Conclusion: The pulley models present more biomechanical advantage on the horizontally binocular vision than the non-pulley model. Combining with the previous imaging evidences of pulleys, the results show that pulley model coincides well with the real physiological conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The supply chain always appears inefficient because of the different targets of members and information asymmetry, especially when upstream enterprises not only hide information about their effort levels, but also hide information about their technology level. The paper uses principal-agent theory and the theory of regulation to design the contract to realize the maximization of principal's profit on the condition that the contract satisfies the participant and incentive conditions of agent. As a result, it is obvious that the contract achieves the goal of control. In addition, it also can be concluded that the amount of rent that the manufacturer can obtain is up to the value of his information and the condition of his resource. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Solvent 2a Yield 3a Yield [%] [b] [%] [b] 1H 2 SO 4 CH 3 CN no no 2 HNO 3 CH 3 CN no no 3CH 3 COOH CH 3 CN 5 0 4 PhCOOH CH 3 CN 6 0 5 p-CH 3 C 6 H 4 SO 3 HCH 3 CN 5 0 6 HCl CH 3 CN 5 0 7HI CH 3 CN 15 0 8 HBr CH 3 CN 76 0 9 HBr AcOEt 82 0 10 HBr DCE 7 0 11 HBr toluene 29 0 12 HBr EtOH 55 0 13 HBr THF 92 0 14 [c] HBr THF 81 0 15 [d] HBr THF 80 0 16 [e] HBr THF 82 0 17 [f] HBr THF 70 0 18 [g] HBr THF 085 19 [h] HBr THF 15 66 20 - THF 0 0 [a] The reactions of 1a (0.10 mmol) and H + (0.10 mmol) were carried out in 1 mL of solvent at 80 °C for 10 h. [b] Isolated yield. It is noteworthy that the Br 2 produced in the reaction system would react well with water to generate HBr, which would be capable of catalyzing another round of reaction. Communication doi.org/10.1002/ejoc.202001118 EurJOC European Journal of Organic Chemistry Debromination Selective Debromination of , , -Tribromomethylketones with HBr-H 2 O Reductive Catalytic System Hui Wang, [a][‡] Meng-Xia Zheng, [a][‡] Hongmei Guo, [b] Guozheng Huang, [b] Zhao Cheng,* [c] and Abulikemu Abudu Rexit* [a] Abstract: A debromination of , , -tribromomethylketones is developed for chemoselective synthesis of -mono- and , dibromomethylketones with high selectivity under H 2 O-HBr reductive conditions. Interestingly, hypobromic acid would also decompose at high temperatures and generate another of HBr, which ensured that a sufficient amount of HBr to support multiple rounds of HBr-H 2 O reduction. [Extracted from the article]

Alepterolic acid is a natural diterpenoid isolated from Aleuritopteris argentea (S. G. Gmél.) Fée, a fern with potential medicinal activity, used in China as a folk medicine to regulate menstruation and prevent cancer. Nevertheless, there are few reports about the structural modification of this natural product. With the wide application of 1,2,3-triazole derivatives in medicines, pesticides, functional materials, the synthesis of 1,2,3-triazoles derivatives has attracted the attention of synthetic chemists. In this article, 23 new derivatives of alepterolic acid combined with 1,2,3-triazole were designed and synthesized by esterification and click chemistry reaction in a fast, conventional and efficient way. All the products were obtained in good yields (72 to 97 %). The structure of these compounds was confirmed by ¹H-, 13C-NMR and mass spectral data. The use of the easily available reactants and the common reaction conditions furnish an efficient method for the synthesis of alepterolic acid derivatives. The preparation of these compounds would enable further biological evaluation in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ulcerative colitis (UC) is a prevalent relapsing-remitting inflammatory bowel disease whose pathogenetic mechanisms remain elusive. In the present study, colonic biopsies samples from three UC patients treated in the Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital and three healthy controls were obtained. The genome-wide mRNA and lncRNA expression of the samples were profiled through Agilent gene expression microarray. Moreover, the genome-wide DNA methylation dataset of normal and UC colon tissues was also downloaded from GEO for a collaborative analysis. Differential expression of lncRNA (DELs) and mRNAs (DEMs) in UC samples compared with healthy samples were identified by using limma Bioconductor package. Differentially methylated promoters (DMPs) in UC samples compared with controls were obtained through comparing the average methylation level of CpGs located at promoters by using t-test. Functional enrichment analysis was performed by the DAVID. STRING database was applied to the construction of gene functional interaction network. As a result, 2090 DEMs and 1242 DELs were screened out in UC samples that were closely associated with processes related to complement and coagulation cascades, osteoclast differentiation vaccinia, and hemorrhagic diseases. A total of 90 DEMs and 72 DELs were retained for the construction of functional network for the promoters of their corresponding genes were identified as DMPs. S100A9, HECW2, SOD3 and HIX0114733 showed high interaction degrees in the functional network, and expression of S100A9 was confirmed to be significantly elevated in colon tissues of UC patients compared with that of controls by qRT-PCR that was consistent with gene microarray analysis. These indicate that S100A9 could potentially be used as predictive biomarkers in UC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stroke is a leading cause of mortality and disability globally. Cerebral ischaemia-reperfusion (I/R) injury is characterized by significant inflammation and extensive cell death. Multiple signaling pathways play essential roles in the process, and identifying the unclear crucial regulators of these pathways may provide promising targets for treatment. CASP8 and FADD-like apoptosis regulator (CFLAR) is expressed in multiple organs to regulate inflammation. Here, we reported that CFLAR expression was markedly reduced in brain samples of mice with middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) stroke. Furthermore, CFLAR knockdown markedly elevated the neurological deficit, brain water content and the infarct volume. In addition, significantly promoted inflammation and endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress was detected in brain tissues of mice after MCAO, as evidenced by the promoted expression of p-IκBα, p-nuclear factor (NF)-κB (p65), glucose-regulated protein 78 (GRP78), PKR-like ER kinase (PERK), activating transcription factor-6 (ATF-6) and cleaved Caspase-12. Notably, MCAO-induced cerebral I/R injury was markedly alleviated in mice over-expressing CFLAR through suppressing inflammation and ER stress. Furthermore, our in vitro results indicated that oxygen-glucose deprivation (OGD)-induced cell death was evidently ameliorated by CFLAR over-expression. In contrast, the cell death triggered by OGD was accelerated by CFLAR knockdown in vitro through enhancing Caspase-3 cleavage, and this effect was obviously ameliorated by the blockage of ER stress using 4-phenyl butyric acid (4-PBA). Collectively, these results demonstrated that CFLAR could be considered as a novel candidate to develop effective therapeutic treatment against cerebral I/R injury. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Objectives: Cow milk allergy is the most common food allergic disease in young infants and vitamin D has a critical role in regulating intestinal inflammation.Methods and Study Design: To determine roles of vitamin D in cow milk allergy, fifty-six young infants with cow milk allergy were enrolled. The serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25OHD), total and specific IgE, circulating regulatory T lymphocytes, and blood eosino-phil counts were determined.Results: The serum 25OHD in cow milk allergy and age-matched infants were sim-ilar (68.3±38.9 nmol/L versus 72.9±33.1 nmol/L, p>0.05), 71% Cow milk allergy infants (40/56) had serum 25OHD lower than 75 nmol/L compared to 66% (37/56) in the controls. The cow milk allergy infants with 25OHD lower than 75 nmol/L had persistent blood eosinophilia and delayed resolution of symptoms after cow milk elimination compared to those with 25OHD above 75 nmol/L (odd ratio 3.7, 95% CI 1.1-12.6, p<0.05). The serum 25OHD inversely correlated with blood eosinophil counts after cow milk elimination (r=-0.37, p<0.01). Cow milk allergy infants with 25OHD lower than 50 nmol/L (vitamin D deficiency, n = 22) were in general at younger age (1.6±0.6 months) compared to infants with insufficient (50-75 nmol/L) or normal (>=75 nmol/L) group (4.3±1.2 and 4.6±0.9 months, respectively, p<0.001).Conclusions: Low serum vitamin D associates with persistent blood eosinophilia and symptoms in young cow milk allergy infants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context: The audiological features and cochlear morphology of individuals with noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) are well characterized. However, the molecular processes in the cochlea are not well understood.Aims: To explore the role of the endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS) response in the guinea pig model of cochlear damage induced by exposure to intense noise.Settings and Design: A pilot case-control study.Subjects and Methods: Forty-eight guinea pigs were divided into four equal groups. At 1, 4, or 14 days (d) post-exposure, the auditory brainstem responses (ABRs) were tested before sacrificing the subjects. The expression levels of the binding immunoglobulin protein/glucose-regulated protein 78 (BiP/GRP78) and C/EBP-homologous protein/growth arrest and DNA damage-inducible gene 153 (CHOP/Gadd153) proteins were evaluated using immunohistochemistry and Western blotting. The number of cochlear hair cells with altered nuclei was counted using confocal fluorescence microscopy.Statistical Analysis Used: One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and the least squares difference (LSD) test.Results: The outer hair cells (OHCs) showed changes of apoptosis, necrosis, and loss after noise exposure. In the 1- and 4-d groups, more apoptotic cells were found than necrotic cells (P < 0.01). The level of BiP/GRP78 was significantly higher in all three experimental groups compared to the control group (P < 0.01). The level of CHOP/Gadd153 was increased at 1 d post-exposure, achieving a peak that was maintained until 4 d, after which it returned to baseline levels by 14 d post-exposure.Conclusions: ERS response was activated by inducing the expression of BiP/GRP78 to lessen the extent of the resulting cellular damage and activating the CHOP/Gadd153 pathway to eliminate the most severely damaged cells. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]