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Background: The relationship between dysregulation of the immune system and reproductive health, particularly in the context of abortion, is an area of critical research. Identifying the immunological factors that contribute to abortion could provide valuable insights into its prevention and management. Methods: This study used bidirectional two-sample Mendelian Randomization (MR) approach to evaluate the causal link between 731 immune cell features and the risk of abortion. The study analyzed GWAS data from 257,561 Europeans, including 7,069 cases and 250,492 controls, by utilizing genetic variation as instrumental variables. The immune phenotypes included several cell types, including B cells, T cells, TBNK cells, Treg cells, and monocytes. These were analyzed using the 'TwoSampleMR' package in R software. Results: The study identified 34 immune phenotypes that have a significant causal relationship with abortion risk. Notably, Results from the B cell group showed a positive correlation between abortion and certain phenotypes, including Unsw mem %B cell, PB/PC %B cell, IgD+ CD24+ %B cell and Naive-mature B cell %lymphocyte. In the T cell group, certain maturation stages such as Naive CD8br %T cell and CD4 on CD45RA+ CD4+ exhibited negative causal links, whereas CCR7 on naive CD8br showed a positive association. The group of Treg cells showed both positive and negative causal relationships with abortion, highlighting the complexity of immune regulation in reproductive health. Conclusions: This study reflects the causal relationship between different subtypes of different immune cells and abortion. The results underscore the importance of the immune system in reproductive health and suggest potential therapeutic interventions targeting these immunological pathways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently, the flame retardancy of epoxy resin (EP) was achieved at the expenses of the transparency and/or toughness. In the present work, a phosphorus/nitrogen‐containing compound (FDNP) was synthesized by one‐pot method using 9,10‐dihydro‐9‐oxa‐10‐phospha‐phenanthrene‐10‐oxide, furfural and N‐phenyl‐p‐phenylenediamine as raw materials, and further adopted as a functional agent for epoxy resin. The results demonstrated that the FDNP remarkably improved the fire safety of EP. The incorporation of 4 wt% FDNP enabled EP to pass UL‐94 V‐0 rating test and achieve a limiting oxygen index value of 35.5%; meanwhile, the peak heat release rate, total heat release rate and total smoke release were significantly reduced by 41.3%, 41.6% and 72.5% as compared with the pure EP, respectively. What is more, the EP/4 wt% FDNP composite kept almost the same transparency of the pure EP, simultaneously its impact strength was more than doubled as that of the pure EP. Herein, the improved flame retardancy is contributed to a synergistic biphasic flame retardant effect including the formation of a compact protective carbon layer and the release of both non‐combustible gases and phosphorus‐containing radicals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pollen fertility is a critical factor in seed development and crop breeding. Extensive studies have explored the mechanisms of pollen fertility in model plants and economic crops. However, the mechanisms of pollen abortion in medicinal and edible plants, including Lycium barbarum, remain elusive. This study utilized transcriptome analysis to identify key genes and regulatory networks implicated in pollen fertility in L. barbarum. The results demonstrated differential expression of 12,185 genes (DEGs) between the sterile and fertile lines, encompassing 489 genes that exhibited variation across the five stages of pollen development. Additionally, GO and KEGG enrichment analyses indicated that the DEGs were predominantly associated with energy metabolism, carbohydrate metabolism, and notably, hydrolase activity. Co-expression network analysis unveiled two modules intimately associated with fertility, each comprising 908 and 756 hub genes, incorporating β-1,3-glucanase genes (Glu) and co-expressed transcription factors (TFs). Phylogenetic analysis implied that LbGlu1 was a potential candidate gene implicated in regulating pollen abortion in L. barbarum. This work advances a novel understanding of pollen abortion in L. barbarum and offers theoretical support for the utilization of sterility genes to enhance crop improvement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a new abstract computational model in evolutionary transfer optimization (ETO), single-objective to multi-objective optimization (SMO) is conducted at the macroscopic level rather than the intermediate level for specific algorithms or the microscopic level for specific operators; this method aims to develop systems with a profound grasp of evolutionary dynamic and learning mechanism similar to human intelligence via a "decomposition" style (in the abstract of the well-known "Transformer" article "Attention is All You Need", they use "attention" instead). To the best of our knowledge, it is the first work of SMO for discrete cases because we extend our conference paper and inherit its originality status. In this paper, by implementing the abstract SMO in specialized memetic algorithms, key knowledge from single-objective problems/tasks to the multi-objective core problem/task can be transferred or "gathered" for permutation flow shop scheduling problems, which will reduce the notorious complexity in combinatorial spaces for multi-objective settings in a straight method; this is because single-objective tasks are easier to complete than their multi-objective versions. Extensive experimental studies and theoretical results on benchmarks (1) emphasize our decomposition root in mathematical programming, such as Lagrangian relaxation and column generation; (2) provide two "where to go" strategies for both SMO and ETO; and (3) contribute to the mission of building safe and beneficial artificial general intelligence for manufacturing via evolutionary computation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]