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Renal ischemia-reperfusion (IR) induces tissue hypoxia, resulting in disrupted energy metabolism and heightened oxidative stress. These factors contribute to tubular cell damage, which is a leading cause of acute kidney injury (AKI) and can progress to chronic kidney disease (CKD). The excessive generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) plays a crucial role in the pathogenesis of AKI. This study presents the synthesis of curcumin ultra-small coordination polymer (Ru/Cur) nanodots and their application in scavenging ROS in renal tissues. By adding ruthenium ions to a methanol solution containing the natural product curcumin, ultra-small Ru/Cur nanodots were successfully synthesized. To enhance the dispersibility of these nanoparticles in water, polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) was used as a growth aid, resulting in highly stable nanodots with sizes smaller than 10 nm. The results indicated that Ru/Cur nanodots effectively eliminated various ROS and demonstrated significant therapeutic effects and biocompatibility in IR-AKI mice, reducing markers of kidney function damage, alleviating renal oxidative stress, and decreasing inflammatory cell infiltration. Ru/Cur nanodots inhibited renal fibrosis by suppressing epithelial-mesenchymal transition and the secretion of transforming growth factor-β1 in the model of IR-AKI to chronic kidney disease (CKD). In summary, our findings confirm that Ru/Cur nanodots mitigate the pathological conditions associated with both AKI and its progression to CKD by reducing IR-induced tubular cell injury.

Androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) has long been the only treatment for metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC). In recent years, with the use of docetaxel chemotherapy and the emergence of various novel hormone therapy drugs, such as Abiraterone, Enzalutamide, Apalutamide, Darolutamide, and Rezvilutamide, the treatment strategies for mHSPC have been greatly changed. Furthermore, local treatment has been added to the treatment of low tumor burden mHSPC and triple therapy has been regarded as an important treatment choice for high tumor burden mHSPC. The survival rate of mHSPC patients has increased significantly and the quality of life also improved with these new treatment strategies. This article reviews the latest advances and controversies in the current treatment of mHSPC. Ongoing clinical trials are introduced and further directions are also discussed in this mini-review.

Objective To study the complications of ultrasound-guided radiofrequency ablation (RFA) in chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients undergoing renal replacement therapy with secondary hyperparathyroidism (SHPT).Methods This retrospective study reviewed the clinical data, including general information, examination results, treatment times, time interval, and postoperative complications, of 103 SHPT patients who received ultrasound-guided RFA treatment from July 2017 to January 2021.Results Of 103 patients, 52 required two sessions of RFA within a month. The incidence of recurrent laryngeal nerve injury at the second treatment was significantly higher than that at the first treatment (first session vs. second session, 5.77% vs. 21.15%; p = .021). Of all the enrolled 103 patients, 27 suffered complications after the first session of RFA. When we separated patients into complications group and non-complication group, we detected more ablated nodules in the complications group (Z = −2.222; p = .0026). Subgroup analysis further showed that the patients in the severe hypocalcemia group were younger (p = .005), had more ablated nodules (p = .003) and higher blood phosphorus (p = .012) and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) levels (p = .002). Univariate analysis showed that age, serum phosphorus, ALP, and number of ablated nodules were associated with a higher risk of severe hypocalcemia after the first session of RFA.Conclusions An interval of more than 1 month between two treatments may help to avoid recurrent laryngeal nerve injury. Age, serum phosphorus, ALP, and number of ablated nodules were associated with a higher risk of severe hypocalcemia after the first session of RFA.

The research investigated the potential of heterologous expression of the heat-shock protein PpHSP70 in enhancing high temperature and drought tolerance in rice. After screening the whole genome sequence of Physcomitrium patens in the Phytzome database, 30 members of the HSP70 gene family were obtained. Their expression and the tissue expression patterns under abiotic stressors of high temperature, drought, and salt were analyzed. During the four-leaf stage of rice, overexpressed materials were subjected to a temperature of 45 °C for 20 h and to drought conditions for one week. After processing, 5 overexpression PpHSP70 materials survived against high temperature, and 7 materials survived against drought, while all wild-type materials KY131 died after the treatment. The results demonstrated that overexpression of PpHSP70 significantly improved both high-temperature tolerance and drought. This study provides valuable insights into the utilization of heterologous expression for enhancing crop tolerance to abiotic stressors.

Agropyron cristatum (2n=4x=28, PPPP) is a wild relative of common wheat which contains a large number of desirable genes that can be exploited for wheat improvement. Wheat–A. cristatum 2P alien translocation lines exhibit many desirable traits, such as small flag leaves, a high spikelet number and density, and a compact plant type. An agronomic trait evaluation and a genetic analysis were carried out on translocation lines and backcross populations of these lines carrying different translocation fragments. The results showed that a translocation fragment from 2PT-3 (2PL) reduced the length of the flag leaves, while translocation fragments from 2PT-3 (2PL) and 2PT-5 (2PL (0.60–1.00)) reduced the width of the flag leaves. A translocation fragment from 2PT-13 (2PS (0.18–0.36)) increased the length and area of the flag leaves. Translocation fragments from 2PT-3 (2PL) and 2PT-8 (2PL (0.86–1.00)) increased the density of spikelets. Translocation fragments from 2PT-7 (2PL (0.00–0.09)), 2PT-8 (2PL (0.86–1.00)), 2PT-10 (2PS), and 2PT-13 (2PS (0.18–0.36)) reduced plant height. This study provides a scientific basis for the effective utilization of wheat–A. cristatum translocation lines.

Protein solubility plays an important role in the research of drug design.Traditional biological experiments of detecting protein solubility are time-consuming and laborious.Identifying protein solubility based on computational methods has become an important research hot spot in bioinformatics.Aiming at the problem of insufficient representation of protein features by traditio-nal solubility prediction models,this paper designs a neural network model PSPNet based on protein sequence information and applies it to protein solubility prediction.PSPNet uses amino acid residue sequence embedding information and amino acid sequence evolution information to represent protein sequences.Then convolutional neural network is used to extract the local key information of amino acid sequence embedding features.Secondly,bidirectional LSTM network is used to extract the features of remote dependencies of protein sequences.Finally,the attention mechanism is used to fuse this feature and amino acid evolution information,and the fusion feature containing multiple sequence information is used in protein solubility prediction.The experimental results show that PASNet obtains the remarkable performance of protein solubility prediction compared with the benchmark me-thods and also has a good scalability.

Introduction: Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a clinical emergency caused by the rapid decline of renal function caused by various etiologies. Growth differentiation factor 11 (GDF11) can promote renal tubular regeneration and improve kidney function in AKI, but the specific mechanism remains unclear. Herein, we investigated the effect and mechanisms of GDF11 in ameliorating acute kidney injury (AKI) induced by ischemia-reperfusion (I/R). Methods: An animal model of acute kidney injury was established by I/R method, and the changes of serum urea nitrogen and creatinine were measured to evaluate the acute kidney injury. Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) was used to measure cytokines, malondialdehyde (MDA), superoxide dismutase (SOD), nitric oxide synthase (iNOS), and arginase 1 (Arg-1) levels. Flow cytometry was used to count the M1/M2 macrophages. IHC, WB, and q-PCR experiments were used to evaluate the expression of GDF11. Results: The changes in serum levels of urea nitrogen and creatinine after I/R suggest that an animal model of acute kidney injury (AKI) induced by I/R was successfully established. AKI caused by I/R significantly changed the M1/M2 macrophage polarization balance, with an increase in M2 being significantly higher than M1 an well as increased oxidative stress. Treatment with GDF11 after I/R significantly increased the differentiation of M2 cells and inhibited the differentiation of M1 macrophages, as well as decreased oxidative stress. Conclusion: GDF11 can promote the repair of acute kidney injury caused by ischemia-reperfusion by regulating the balance of M1/M2 polarization in macrophages and oxidative stress.

With modified water glass as binder and the introduction of micro silicon powders into the coremaking process, an improvement was made to the tensile strength and collapsibility of the sand core. The potassium hydroxide, sodium hexametaphosphate and white sugar were applied as the modifiers of water glass. The optimum proportion of the modifiers was determined through the combination of single factor test and orthogonal test. The optimum proportion of water glass, potassium hydroxide, sodium hexametaphosphate and white sugar is 1000: 40: 5: 5 (wt.). In terms of weight, modified binder and micro silicon powders accounted for 2% and 0.6% of sand, respectively. The sand core was hardened by going through a warm core box process, in which the temperature of core box was 150 °C, and the compressed hot air was blown at 120 °C for 40 s under a pressure of 0.2 MPa. As for the sand core bonded with modified water glass, the tensile strength is 2.46 MPa at room temperature (σ0) and 2.49 MPa at 25 °C and 40% RH for 24 h (σ24), which are 2 times more than that with unmodified binder. The bonded strengths of sand core are increased as a result of the reaction between -OH groups from addition of potassium hydroxide and SiO2 particles widely distributed in the sand core. Comparing with the sand core bonded with unmodified water glass, the high temperature residual tensile strength (σr) of sand core bonded with modified water glass under 600 °C for 5 min, is sharply reduced from 0.20 MPa to 0.01 MPa. By the comparison with unmodified water glass, the dynamic viscosity of the modified water glass and the flowability of molding sand using modified water glass are increased from 74 mPa·s and 2.15 g to 80 mPa·s and 2.21 g, respectively. As revealed by FT-IR analysis, new groups including PO3-, PO4 3-, and Si-O-C appear in the molecular structure of modified water glass, which are beneficial to the collapsibility of sand core.

Epididymitis can be caused by infectious and noninfectious etiological factors. While microbial infections are responsible for infectious epididymitis, the etiological factors contributing to noninfectious epididymitis remain to be defined. The present study demonstrated that damaged male germ cells (DMGCs) induce epididymitis in mice. Intraperitoneal injection of the alkylating agent busulfan damaged murine male germ cells. Epididymitis was observed in mice 4 weeks after the injection of busulfan and was characterized by massive macrophage infiltration. Epididymitis was coincident with an accumulation of DMGCs in the epididymis. In contrast, busulfan injection into mice lacking male germ cells did not induce epididymitis. DMGCs induced innate immune responses in epididymal epithelial cells (EECs), thereby upregulating the pro-inflammatory cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and interleukin-1β (IL-1β), as well as the chemokines such as monocyte chemotactic protein-1 (MCP-1), monocyte chemotactic protein-5 (MCP-5), and chemokine ligand-10 (CXCL10). These results suggest that male germ cell damage may induce noninfectious epididymitis through the induction of innate immune responses in EECs. These findings provide novel insights into the mechanisms underlying noninfectious epididymitis, which might aid in the diagnosis and treatment of the disease.

The performance of sand core was improved by using the modified water glass as a binder and adding powder additives in the sand hardening process. The optimal proportion of the compound additives was determined by an orthogonal test, with a ratio of microsilica: polyvinyl alcohol solution: borax: B agent = 25: 20: 2: 1. The binder accounted for 2% of the sand by weight, and the compound additives accounted for 0.96%. The core box was heated to 175 °C, and the compressed hot air of 120 °C kept blowing for 40 s. Tensile strength was used as the main indicator to evaluate the humidity-resistance of the sand core. For the sand core, the instant tensile strength reached 0.73 MPa, the tensile strength at room temperature was 1.81 MPa, and that of sand core holding at the condition of 35 °C and 90% RH for 2 h and for 4 h reached 1.61 MPa and 1.19 MPa, respectively. The gas evolution was 7.5 mL·g-1 at 850 °C for 3 min. The residual tensile strength was 0 MPa at 750 °C for 5 min. Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy analysis showed that the humidity-resistance of the core was greatly improved by the powder additives.

Agropyron cristatum, a wild relative of common wheat (Triticum aestivum L.), provides many desirable genetic resources for wheat improvement, such as tolerance to cold, drought, and disease. To transfer and utilize these desirable genes, in this study, two wheat-A. cristatum derivatives II-13 and II-23 were identified and analyzed. We found that the number of root tip cell chromosomes was 44 in both II-13 and II-23, but there were four and six P genome chromosomes in II-13 and II-23, respectively, based on genomic in situ hybridization (GISH). The chromosome configurations of II-13 and II-23 were both 2n=22II by the meiotic analysis of pollen mother cells (PMCs) at metaphase I, indicating that there were two and three pairs of P chromosomes in II-13 and II-23, respectively. Notably, wheat chromosome 7D was absent in derivative line II-13 while II-23 lacked chromosomes 4B and 7A based on SSR analysis combining fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) analysis with pAs1 and pSc119.2 as probes. Chromosomes 2P and 7P were detected in both II-13 and II-23. Another pair of P genome chromosomes in II-23 was determined to be 4P based on expressed-sequences tags-sequence tagged sites (EST-STS) markers specific to A. cristatum and FISH with probes pAcTRT1 and pAcpCR2. Overall, these results suggest that II-13 was a 7P (7D) substitution line with one pair of additional 2P chromosomes and II-23 was a multiple 4P (4B), 7P (7A) substitution line with one pair of additional 2P chromosomes. Moreover, we obtained six alien disomic addition lines and five alien disomic substitution lines by backcrossing. These new materials will allow desirable genes from A. cristatum to be used in common wheat.

Founder parents have contributed significantly to the improvement of wheat breeding and production. In order to investigate the genetic characteristics of founder parents and widely planted cultivars, Mazhamai (M), Biyumai (B) and six sibling lines (BM1–6) derived from the cross M×B were phenotyped for eight yield-related traits over multiple years and locations and genotyped using the the wheat 90K single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) assay. BM4 has been used as a founder parent, and BM1 has been widely planted, whereas BM2, 3, 5, and 6 have not been used extensively for breeding or planting in China. Phenotypic comparisons revealed that BM4 and BM1 displayed a better overall performance than the other sibling lines. BM1 showed higher thousand-grain weight than BM4, whereas BM4 exhibited lower coefficient of variation for most of the yield-related traits across different years and locations, indicating that BM4 was widely adaptable and more stable in different environments. SNP analysis revealed that BM4 and BM1 inherited similar proportions of the M genome but are dissimilar to BM2, 3, 5, and 6. Both BM1 and BM4 have specific alleles that differ from the other BM lines, and most of these alleles are concentrated in specific chromosomal regions that are found to associate with favorable QTLs, these SNPs and their surrounding regions may carry the genetic determinants important for the superior performance of the two lines. But BM4 has more genetic diversity than BM1 with more specific alleles and pleiotropic regions, indicating that the genome of BM4 may be more complex than the other sibling lines and has more favorable gene resources. Our results provide valuable information that can be used to select elite parents for wheat and self-pollinating crop breeding.

Background: Recent research has shown that statins improve pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH), but their mechanisms of action are not fully understood. This study aimed to investigate the role of RhoA/ROCK1 regulation in the therapeutic effects of simvastatin on PAH. Methods: For in vivo experiments, rats (N = 40) were randomly assigned to four groups: control, simvastatin, monocrotaline (MCT), and MCT + simvastatin. The MCT group and MCT + simvastatin groups received proline dithiocarbamate (50 mg/kg, i.p.) on the first day of the study. The MCT + simvastatin group received simvastatin (2 mg/kg) daily for 4 weeks, after which pulmonary arterial pressure was measured by right heart catheterization. The protein and mRNA levels of Rho and ROCK1 were measured by immunohistochemistry, Western blot, and PCR. For in vitro experiments, human pulmonary endothelial cells were divided into seven groups: control, simvastatin, monocrotaline pyrrole (MCTP), MCTP + simvastatin, MCTP + simvastatin + mevalonate, MCTP + simvastatin + farnesyl pyrophosphate (FPP), and MCTP + simvastatin + FPP + geranylgeranyl pyrophosphate (GGPP). After 72 h exposed to the drugs, the protein and mRNA levels of RhoA and ROCK1 were measured by Western blot and PCR. Results: The MCT group showed increased mean pulmonary arterial pressure, marked vascular remodeling, and increased protein and mRNA levels of RhoA and ROCK1 compared to the other groups (P < 0.05). In vitro, the MCTP group showed a marked proliferation of vascular endothelial cells, as well as increased protein and mRNA levels of RhoA and ROCK1 compared to the MCTP + simvastatin group. The MCTP + simvastatin + mevalonate group, MCTP + simvastatin+ FPP group, and MCTP + simvastatin + FPP + GGPP group showed increased mRNA levels of RhoA and ROCK1, as well as increased protein levels of RhoA, compared to the MCTP + simvastatin group. Conclusions: Simvastatin improved vascular remodeling and inhibited the development of PAH. The effects of simvastatin were mediated by inhibition of RhoA/ROCK1. Simvastatin decreased RhoA/ROCK1 overexpression by inhibition of mevalonate, FPP, and GGPP synthesis.

Grain number per spike (GNPS) is a major factor in wheat yield breeding. A new wheat germplasm Pubing 3504 shows superior features in spike traits. To elucidate the genetic basis of spike and yield related traits in Pubing 3504, 282 F2:3 families were generated from the cross Pubing 3504×Jing 4839, and seven spike and yield related traits, including GNPS, spike length (SL), kernel number per spikelet (KPS), spikelet number per spike (SNS), thousand-grain weight (TGW), spike number per plant (SNP), and plant height (HT) were investigated. Correlation analysis indicated significant positive correlations between GNPS and spike-related traits, including KPS, SNS, and SL, especially KPS. A genetic map was constructed using 190 polymorphic simple sequence repeat (SSR), expressed sequence tag (EST)-SSR, and sequence-tagged-site (STS) markers. For the seven traits measured, a total of 37 quantitative trait loci (QTLs) in a single-environment analysis and 25 QTLs in a joint-environment analysis were detected. Additive effects of 70.3% (in a single environment) and 57.6% (in a joint environment) of the QTLs were positively contributed by Pubing 3504 alleles. Five important genomic regions on chromosomes 1A, 4A, 4B, 2D, and 4D could be stably detected in different environments. Among these regions, the marker interval Xmag834–Xbarc83 on the short arm of chromosome 1A was a novel important genomic region that included QTLs controlling GNPS, KPS, SNS, TGW, and SNP with stable environmental repeatability. This genomic region can improve the spike trait and may play a key role in improving wheat yield in the future. We deduced that this genomic region was vital to the high GNPS of Pubing 3504.

A new casting binder was prepared based on an animal bone glue. In order to overcome the disadvantages of the animal glue agglomeration at room temperature, an alkaline decomposition process was used, with acrylic acid, ammonium persulfate, and glucose as modifiers of the animal glue to obtain a high strength of binding. In the process of alkaline decomposition, NaOH was used as the catalyst with the addition of 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8wt.%, respectively, into 100 g of animal glue and the alkaline decomposition temperature was set for 30, 40, 50, 60, and 70 ºC, with an identical decomposition time of 30 min, in order to reduce viscosity of the animal glue and maintain a liquid state at room temperature. The added acrylic acid, ammonium persulfate and glucose were determined through an orthogonal experiment. The experimental results are as follows: the optimal amount of NaOH addition is 5wt.%; alkaline decomposition temperature is 50 ºC; the optimal weight ratio of three kinds of modifiers to animal glue is acrylic acid : ammonium persulfate : glucose : animal glue = 30:3:15:100; the modification reaction should be performed at 75 ºC with a reaction time of 90 min. With the addition of 3% binder to sand, a final tensile strength of about 3.36 MPa and surface tension value of about 25.387 mN●m-1 are achieved; the gas evolution at 850 ºC is 19 ml•g-1 and the residual strength after high temperature (700 ºC × 10 min) is 0 MPa. Finally, the new binder was characterized and analyzed by means of element analysis and an IR infrared spectrum.

The wheat grain number per spike (GNPS) is a major yield-limiting factor in wheat-breeding programs. Germplasms with a high GNPS are therefore valuable for increasing wheat yield potential. To investigate the molecular characteristics of young spike development in large-spike wheat germplasms with high GNPS, we performed gene and protein expression profiling analysis with three high-GNPS wheat lines (Pubing 3228, Pubing 3504 and 4844-12) and one low-GNPS control variety (Fukuho). The phenotypic data for the spikes in two growth seasons showed that the GNPS of the three large-spike wheat lines were significantly higher than that of the Fukuho control line. The Affymetrix wheat chip and isobaric tags for relative and absolute quantitation-tandam mass spectrometry (iTRAQ-MS/MS) technology were employed for gene and protein expression profiling analyses of young spike development, respectively, at the floret primordia differentiation stage. A total of 598 differentially expressed transcripts (270 up-regulated and 328 down-regulated) and 280 proteins (122 up-regulated and 158 down-regulated) were identified in the three high-GNPS lines compared with the control line. We found that the expression of some floral development-related genes, including Wknox1b, the AP2 domain protein kinase and the transcription factor HUA2, were up-regulated in the high-GNPS lines. The expression of the SHEPHERD (SHD) gene was up-regulated at both the transcript and protein levels. Overall, these results suggest that multiple regulatory pathways, including the CLAVATA pathway and the meristem-maintaining KNOX protein pathway, take part in the development of the high-GNPS phenotype in our wheat germplasms.

PurposeThe aim of this study was to investigate the effect of phosphotyrosine interaction domain containing 1 (PID1) on the insulin-induced activation of the AKT (protein kinase B)/protein kinase A (PKA)/hormone-sensitive lipase (HSL) pathway and lipolysis.MethodsSprague-Dawley rats were fed either chow or a high-fat diet (HFD). The levels of insulin, glycerol, free fatty acids (FFAs) and PID1 mRNA expression were measured in the 2 groups. Furthermore, we examined the role of PID1 in the regulation of the AKT/PKA/HSL cascade and lipolysis in the 3T3-L1 cell line.ResultsAdipose tissue from HFD rats exhibited elevated PID1 expression, which showed a positive correlation with insulin levels and lipolysis. In 3T3-L1 adipocytes, we found that the antilipolytic effect of insulin is mediated by AKT and that phosphorylated AKT results in the promotion of PDE3B expression, the dephosphorylation of PKA and HSL and the suppression of glycerol release. However, overexpression of PID1 and treatment with 1 μM isoproterenol and 100 nM insulin for 24 h resulted in an increased release of glycerol and a noticeable inhibition of AKT phosphorylation, PDE3B expression and the phosphorylation of PKA/HSL in 3T3-L1 cells. In contrast, knockdown of PID1 and treatment with the above reagents inhibited lipolysis and activated the phosphorylation of AKT, which resulted in the dephosphorylation of PKA and HSL.ConclusionsOur findings indicate that PID1 in adipose tissue increases lipolysis by altering the antilipolytic action of insulin. This suggests that PID1 may represent a new therapeutic target to ameliorate adipocyte lipolysis and hence improve insulin sensitivity.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0214606.].

In this paper, three phosphates were used as modifiers to modify animal glue binder. The structural characteristics and thermal properties of animal glue binder treated with phosphates were studied by Fourier transform-infrared spectroscopy, gel permeation chromatography and derivative thermogravimetric analysis. The results showed that the modified animal glue binder had better sand tensile strength and lower viscosity than untreated animal glue binder. The best modification process was as follows: the optimal amount of sodium carbonate was 4 wt% to animal glue; the optimal weight ratio of the modifiers was sodium pyrophosphate : sodium tripolyphosphate : sodium hexametaphosphate : animal glue = 3 : 3 : 4 : 100, and the optimal reaction should be performed at 80°C for a reaction time of 120 min. A final tensile strength of approximately 3.20 MPa was achieved and the viscosity value was approximately 880 mPa s.

Spike number is one of three yield-related factors and is closely related to wheat yield. In the present study, we found that the inhibited and normal tillers of the 3558 line presented phenotypic differences at the elongation stage by morphological and anatomical analysis. We then initiated a proteomic study using two-dimensional electrophoresis (2-DE) and nanoscale liquid chromatography-high-definition tandem mass spectroscopy, to isolate and identify the key proteins and metabolic pathways related to spike-development inhibition. A total of 31 differentially expressed proteins (DEPs), which were mainly involved in cell cycle regulation, photosynthesis, glycolysis, stress response, and oxidation-reduction reactions, were isolated and identified. 14-3-3-like proteins and proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA), involved in cell-cycle regulation, were dramatically down-regulated in inhibited tillers compared to normal tillers. Six spots corresponding to degraded Rubisco large subunits, involved in photosynthesis, were detected in different locations of the 2-DE gels and were up-regulated in inhibited tillers. In addition, the relative levels of DEPs involved in glycolysis and oxidation-reduction reactions changed dramatically. Development was blocked or delayed at the elongation stage in the inhibited tillers of 3558. Weakened energy metabolism might be one reason that the inhibited tillers could not joint and develop into spikes. These DEPs and related metabolic pathways are significant for understanding the mechanism of spike-development inhibition and studying the spike-development process in wheat.

Grain number per spike (GNPS) is a major factor in wheat yield breeding. The development of high GNPS germplasm is widely emphasized in wheat-yield breeding. This paper reported two high GNPS wheat germplasm lines, Pubing 3228 and Pubing 3504, which had a stable and wide adaptability to different ecological regions. By exploring a nested cross design with reciprocals using Pubing 3228 or Pubing 3504 as a common parent and investigating the GNPS phenotypes of F1 hybrids in 2007-2008 and F2 populations in 2008-2009 of different cross combinations, the narrow-sense GNPS heritability was up to 49.58 and 52.23%, respectively. Genetic model analysis predictions suggested that GNPS in Pubing 3228 and Pubing 3504 was mainly controlled by additive genetic effects. Correlation analysis results between GNPS and 1 000-kernel weight (TKW) of F2 populations showed that TKW was not influenced with the increase of GNPS. The good coordination among three yield components of spike number per plant (SNPP), GNPS, and TKW in the F2 segregating population implied that selection of good candidate individuals in breeding programs would be relatively straightforward. Overall, our results indicated that Pubing 3228 and Pubing 3504 are two potential germplasm lines for yield improvement of GNPS in pedigree selection of wheat breeding.

In the title compound, C14H10BrN3O4·CH4O, the benzohydrazide molecule is nearly planar [maximum deviation = 0.110 (2) Å]. The mean planes of the two benzene rings make a dihedral angle of 8.4 (3)°. In the benzohydrazide molecule, there is an intramolecular O—H...N hydrogen bond and the NH group is hydrogen bonded to the methanol solvent molecule. In the crystal, intermolecular O—H...O hydrogen bonds involving the methanol solvent molecule link the benzohydrazide molecules to form chains which propagate along the a axis.