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Importance: Acupoint autohemotherapy (AA), a therapeutic technique involving the subcutaneous injection of autologous blood into acupoints, has been empirically validated as safe and effective for treating asthma by alleviating symptoms and decreasing acute attacks, though its mechanism is not well understood.Objective: The role of heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) in AA-induced suppression of asthmatic airway inflammation is examined. Methods: Twenty rats were assigned randomly to four groups, namely the Control, OVA, OVA + AA, and (OVA + Snpp) + AA. Rats in the OVA + AA and (OVA + Snpp) + AA received autologous blood injections into acupoints (BL13 and BL23) following OVA challenge. Rats in the (OVA + Snpp) + AA were concurrently subjected to intraperitoneal injections of Snpp, a inhibitor of HO-1. Airway inflammation was evaluated through HE staining, while the concentrations of cytokines in BALF were quantified using ELISA. The mRNA and protein levels of RORγt (Th17-specific transcription factor), Foxp3 (Treg-specific transcription factor), and HO-1 in lung tissue were assessed through qRT-PCR and WB. Results: HE staining indicated that airway inflammation was alleviated in the OVA + AA. The OVA + AA displayed significantly lower counts of total cells and eosinophils in the BALF compared to both the OVA and (OVA + Snpp) + AA. The ELISA demonstrated a significant decrease in levels of pro-inflamatory cytokines (IL-4, IL-17A), and an increase in levels of anti-inflamatory cytokines (IFN-γ, IL-10), in the OVA + AA when compared to both OVA and (OVA + Snpp) + AA. The qRT-PCR and WB analyses revealed an upregulation of HO-1 and Foxp3 expression, and a downregulation of RORγt expression, in the OVA + AA when compared to OVA and (OVA + Snpp) + AA. Conclusions and Relevance: The involvement of HO-1 in the underlying mechanism responsible for the anti-inflammatory effects of AA is evident.

A critical comprehension of the impact of snow cover on urban bidirectional reflectance is pivotal for precise assessments of energy budgets, radiative forcing, and urban climate change. This study develops a numerical model that employs the Monte Carlo ray-tracing technique and a snow anisotropic reflectance model (ART) to simulate spectral albedo and bidirectional reflectance, accounting for urban structure and snow anisotropy. Validation using three flat surfaces and MODIS data (snow-free, fresh snow, and melting snow scenarios) revealed minimal errors: the maximum domain-averaged BRDF bias was 0.01% for flat surfaces, and the overall model-MODIS deviation was less than 0.05. The model’s performance confirmed its accuracy in reproducing the reflectance spectrum. A thorough investigation of key factors affecting bidirectional reflectance in snow-covered urban canyons ensued, with snow coverage found to be the dominant influence. Urban coverage, building height, and soot pollutant concentration significantly impact visible and infrared reflectance, while snow grain size has the greatest effect on shortwave infrared. The bidirectional reflectance at backward scattering angles (0.5–0.6) at 645 nm is lower than forward scattering (around 0.8) in the principal plane as snow grain size increases. These findings contribute to a deeper understanding of snow-covered urban canyons’ reflectance characteristics and facilitate the quantification of radiation interactions, cloud-snow discrimination, and satellite-based retrieval of aerosol and snow parameters.

Background: Endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress plays a pro-apoptotic role in colorectal adenocarcinoma (COAD). This study aimed to develop a novel ER-stress-related prognostic risk model for COAD and provide support for COAD cohorts with different risk score responses to immune checkpoint inhibitor therapies. Methods: TCGA-COAD and GSE39582 were included in this prospective study. Univariate and multivariate Cox analyses were performed to identify prognostic ER stress-related genes (ERSGs). Accordingly, the immune infiltration landscape and immunotherapy response in different risk groups were assessed. Finally, the expression of prognostic genes in 10 normal and 10 COAD tissue samples was verified using reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Results: Eight prognostic genes were selected to establish an ERSG-based signature in the training set of the TCGA-COAD cohort. The accuracy of this was confirmed using a testing set of TCGA-COAD and GSE39582 cohorts. Gene set variation analysis indicated that differential functionality in high–low-risk groups was related to immune-related pathways. Corresponding to this, CD36 , TIMP1 , and PTGIS were significantly associated with 19 immune cells with distinct proportions between the different risk groups, such as central memory CD4T cells and central memory CD8T cells. Moreover, the risk score was considered effective for predicting the clinical response to immunotherapy, and the immunotherapy response was significantly and negatively correlated with the risk score of individuals with COAD. Furthermore, the immune checkpoint inhibitor treatment was less effective in the high-risk group, where the expression levels of PD-L1 and tumor immune dysfunction and exclusion scores in the high-risk group were significantly increased. Finally, the experimental results demonstrated that the expression trends of prognostic genes in clinical samples were consistent with the results from public databases. Conclusion: Our study established a novel risk signature to predict the COAD prognosis of patients and provide theoretical support for the clinical treatment of COAD.

The bark of Streblus indicus, a Dai medicine in China, has been listed in the Chinese Materia Medica as possessing hemostatic and analgesic properties. Ethnic medicine books record that its bark or leaves for the treatment of mumps and lymphoma. However, according to the literature survey, anti-inflammatory and analgesic studies available for leaves and branches of S. indicus have been seldom reported so far. The current study focuses on the metabolites of S. indicus bark and leaves responsible for anti-inflammatory and analgesic effects on the basis of bioactive-included acetic acid writhing, hot-plate, and xylene-induced ear swelling. The secretion of inflammatory mediators, TNF-α, IL-6, IL-1β, IL-4, and IL-10, were evaluated for their anti-inflammatory by xylene-induced in mouse ear cells. Histological examination was used to assess the anti-inflammatory and analgesic effects of the branches and leaves of S. indicus, and Western blot analysis determined the mechanism of the methanolic extract of branches and leaves. Different metabolites of S. indicus significantly alleviated analgesic and anti-inflammatory effects, with no discernable differences among them. All metabolites decreased the levels of TNF-α, IL-1β, and IL-6 and increased the levels of IL-4 and IL-10. The analgesic and anti-inflammatory mechanism of the methanolic extract was related to the NF-kB signaling pathway. These results not only would account for scientific knowledge for the traditional application of S. indicus, but also provide a credible theoretical foundation for the further development of anti-inflammatory and analgesic agents.

Determining background aerosol optical depth threshold value (BAOD) is critical to aerosol type identification and air pollution control. This study presents a statistical method to select the best BAOD threshold value using the VIIRS DB AOD products at 1 × 1 degree resolution from 2012 to 2019 as a major testbed. A series of multiple lognormal distributions with 1 to 5 peaks are firstly applied to fit the AOD histogram at each grid point, and the distribution with the highest correlation coefficient (R) gives preliminary estimations of BAOD, which is defined as either the intersection point of the first two normal distribution curves when having multiple peaks, or the midpoint between the peak AOD and the first AOD with non-zero probability when the mono peak is the best fit. Then, the lowest 1st to 100th percentile AOD distributions are compared with the preliminary BAOD distribution on a global scale. The final BAOD is obtained from the best cutoff percentile AOD distributions with the lowest bias compared with preliminary BAOD. Results show that the lowest 30th percentile AOD is the best estimation of BAOD for different AOD datasets and different seasons. Analysis of aerosol chemical information from MERRA-2 further supports this selection. Based on the BAOD, we updated the VIIRS aerosol type classification scheme, and the results show that the updated scheme is able to achieve reliable detection of aerosol type change in low aerosol loading conditions.

Methanol can be synthesized using green electricity and carbon dioxide, making it a green, carbon-neutral fuel with significant potential for widespread application in engines. However, due to its low ignition energy and high laminar flame speed, methanol is susceptible to hotspot-induced pre-ignition and even knocking under high-temperature, high-load engine conditions, posing challenges to engine performance and reliability. This paper systematically reviews the manifestations and mechanisms of pre-ignition and knocking in methanol engines. Pre-ignition can be sustained or sporadic. Sustained pre-ignition is caused by overheating of structural components, while sporadic pre-ignition is often linked to oil droplets entering the combustion chamber from the piston crevice. Residual exhaust gas trapped within the spark plug can also initiate pre-ignition. Knocking, characterized by pressure oscillations, arises from the auto-ignition of hotspots in the end-gas or, potentially, from deflagration-to-detonation transition, although the latter requires further experimental validation. Factors influencing pre-ignition and knocking, including engine oil, in-cylinder deposits, structural hotspots, and the reactivity of the air–fuel mixture, are also analyzed. Based on these factors, the paper concludes that the primary approach to suppressing pre-ignition and knocking in methanol engines is controlling the formation of pre-ignition sources and reducing the reactivity of the air–fuel mixture. Furthermore, it addresses existing issues and limitations in current research, such as combustion testing techniques, numerical simulation accuracy, and the mechanisms of methanol–oil interaction, and offers related recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) has a rich and complex tumor immune microenvironment (TIME). M2 macrophages are among the most extensively infiltrated immune cells in the TIME and are necessary for the growth and migration of cancers. However, the mechanisms and targets mediating M2 macrophage infiltration in pancreatic cancer remain elusive. Methods: The M2 macrophage infiltration score of patients was assessed using the xCell algorithm. Using weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA), module genes associated with M2 macrophages were identified, and a predictive model was designed. The variations in immunological cell patterns, cancer mutations, and enrichment pathways between the cohorts with the high- and low-risk were examined. Additionally, the expression of FCGR3A and RNASE2, as well as their association with M2 macrophages were evaluated using the HPA, TNMplot, and GEPIA2 databases and verified by tissue immunofluorescence staining. Moreover, in vitro cell experiments were conducted, where FCGR3A was knocked down in pancreatic cancer cells using siRNA to analyze its effects on M2 macrophage infiltration, tumor proliferation, and metastasis. Results: The prognosis of patients in high-risk and low-risk groups was successfully distinguished using a prognostic risk score model of M2 macrophage-related genes (p = 0.024). Between the high- and low-risk cohorts, there have been notable variations in immune cell infiltration patterns, tumor mutations, and biological functions. The risk score was linked to the manifestation of prevalent immunological checkpoints, immunological scores, and stroma values (all p < 0.05). In vitro experiments and tissue immunofluorescence staining revealed that FCGR3A can promote the infiltration or polarization of M2 macrophages and enhance tumor proliferation and migration. Conclusions: In this study, an M2 macrophage-related pancreatic cancer risk score model was established, and found that FCGR3A was correlated with tumor formation, metastasis, and M2 macrophage infiltration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biodiversity is the decisive factor of grassland ecological function and process. As the most important human use of grassland, grazing inevitably affects the grassland biodiversity. However, comprehensive studies of seasonal grazing on plant and soil bacterial, archaeal and fungal diversity of typical temperate grassland are still lacking. We examined the impact of seasonal grazing, including no-grazing (NG), continuous grazing (CG), grazing in May and July (G57), grazing in June and August (G68), and grazing in July and September (G79) on grassland plant and soil microbial diversity based on a long-term field grazing experiment. The results showed that the aboveground plant biomass (AGB) of the seasonal grazing plots was significantly higher than that of the CG plots. Compared with NG, CG increased significantly the Margalef richness index of plant community, while did not significantly change the Shannon, Simpson and Pielou evenness of plant community. Grazing changed the composition and biomass of dominant vegetation. Long-term grazing decreased the proportion of Leymus chinensis (Trin.) Tzvel. and increased the proportion of Cleistogenes squarrosa (Trin.) Keng. There was no significant change in the Shannoneven, Shannon and Coverage indices of soil bacteria, archaea and fungi between NG and the grazing plots. But the Chao index of soil fungi in G57, G68 and G79 and archaea in G57, G79 was significantly higher than that in CG. The results of correlation analysis showed that the plant diversity in the CG plots was significantly negatively correlated with the soil bacterial diversity. The plant richness in the G57 and G68 plots was significantly positively correlated with the soil archaea richness. Our study showed that seasonal grazing was a sustainable grazing management strategy for maintaining typical grassland plant and soil microbial diversity in northern of China.

ObjectivesAcupuncture therapy has been used for cognitive impairment-related diseases, however, there are still few studies on the overall trend of acupuncture therapy on cognitive impairment based on bibliometric analysis. The purpose of this study was to explore the research trend of the impact of acupuncture on cognitive impairment in the past 15 years, analyze the research trends and hotspots, and provide new ideas and theoretical basis for future research directions.MethodsFrom the Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC), the relevant literature on the treatment of cognitive impairment with acupuncture from 2007 to 2022 was retrieved. Then, based on the CiteSpace and VOSviewer software of the Java platform, the cooperation between countries and institutions in this field, the co-citation of journals and documents, and the cooperation between authors and authors, etc. were analyzed. In addition, the co-occurrence and burst analysis of keywords are also carried out, and a visual knowledge map is drawn.ResultsAs of August 08, 2022, a total of 394 records related to the treatment of cognitive impairment with acupuncture were identified. The analysis results show: The number and rate of annual publications have steadily increased, with some fluctuations from year to year. The countries that contribute the most to this field are China and the USA. Among them, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine and Capital Medical University are tied for first place in terms of the number of published papers. Tao Jing is the most prolific author and the number one cited author.ConclusionsThe number of publications on acupuncture for cognitive impairment is expected to increase rapidly in future research, suggesting a bright future for the field. Future research hotspots will focus on pain, injury, protocol, diagnosis, guidelines, etc. It is also necessary to strengthen cross-regional and cross-country cooperation among various academic groups.