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The Zhangjiawu uranium deposit is the largest volcanic rock-type uranium deposit in the northern Zhejiang Province, China. The deposit has developed hydrothermal alteration, with obvious alternating zoning phenomena from the mineralized center to the fresh surrounding rocks. Based on detailed field and petrographic observations of typical ore bodies, the uranium mineralized section of the Zhangjiawu uranium deposit was divided into mineralized central, ore-side alteration, near-ore alteration and far-ore alteration zones, whose hydrothermal alteration intensity decreases sequentially. Using the standardized Isocon diagram method, the results show that CaO, MgO, Na2O, P2O5, LOI, Zn, Co, Cu, Pb and heavy rare earth elements (HREE) show gain during uranium mineralization, while K2O, Cs, Rb and Tl show loss, which is consistent with the development of hematite mineralization, sodic feldsparization and carbonation in the mine area. A negative correlation of MnO and MgO in the alteration zone indicates a possible elemental convective equilibrium migration mode in the ore zone. The migration mechanism of the elements indicates that the migration of P2O5 and HREE indicates the deep source nature of the mineralizing fluids, and that alteration can lead to a reduction in the activity of uranyl complexes, the formation of a reducing environment and a neutral to weak alkaline environment favorable for uranium precipitation, which can lead to uranium precipitation and enrichment of mineralization. The study of hydrothermal alteration and elemental migration patterns of the deposit provides supporting evidence for a better understanding of the process of uranium mineralization in Zhangjiawu, and also provides a basis for the next step of mineral search and exploration.

Radiation-induced lung injury (RILI), a potentially fatal and dose-limiting complication of radiotherapy for thoracic tumors, is divided into early reversible pneumonitis and irreversible advanced-stage fibrosis. Early detection and intervention contribute to improving clinical outcomes of patients. However, there is still a lack of reliable biomarkers for early prediction and clinical diagnosis of RILI. Given the central role of inflammation in the initiation and progression of RILI, we explored specific inflammation-related biomarkers during the development of RILI in this study. Two expression profiles from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database were downloaded, in which 75 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were screened out. Combining Gene Oncology (GO), Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis and protein–protein interaction (PPI) network analysis, we identified four inflammation-related hub genes in the progression of RILI—MMP9, IL-1β, CCR1 and S100A9. The expression levels of the hub genes were verified in RILI mouse models, with S100A9 showing the highest level of overexpression. The level of S100A9 in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) and the expression of S100A9 in lung tissues were positively correlated with the degree of inflammation in RILI. The results above indicate that S100A9 is a potential biomarker for the early prediction and diagnosis of the development of RILI.

Persistent organic pollutants (POPs) in soil have caused widespread concern, which is necessary to develop efficient and green technologies. Electrokinetic (EK) remediation technology, their enhancement techniques and composite techniques with other processes have shown broad application prospects in the field of soil POPs remediation. In this paper, the progress of EK remediation technology in the remediation of POPs in soil in recent years is reviewed. It can be seen that some technologies need to be further studied and evaluated, and it is inappropriate to simply compare them. The effect of field remediation is bound to be affected by field conditions, and the final data will be different from the laboratory data. Some emerging technologies, such as advanced oxidation technology and nanotechnology, demonstrated high POPs removal rates when coupled with EK remediation technology. This paper provides some insights into the future development of the technology and provides reference for the selection of technology in practical application.

Shan Jiang,1,* Yong-Qiang Wang,2,* Yifei Tang,1 Xi Lu,1 Dan Guo1 1Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, the China-Japan Friendship Hospital, Beijing, 100029, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Ophthalmology, the Sunshine Union Hospital, Weifang, Shandong, 261071, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Shan Jiang,Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, the China-Japan Friendship Hospital, No. 2 Ying Hua Yuan East Street, Beijing, 100029, People’s Republic of China, Tel +86 10 84205288, Fax +86 10 64217749, Email landjiang@126.comBackground: As a severe complication of sepsis, sepsis-associated encephalopathy (SAE) usually manifests as impaired learning and memory ability in survivors. Previous studies have reported that environmental enrichment (EE) can increase the learning and memory ability in different brain injury models. However, there has been no research on the possible positive effect of EE on SAE.Aim: The present study aimed to test the effect of EE on SAE-induced impairment of learning and memory and its related mechanisms.Methods: A Morris water maze test (MWM) was used to evaluate the learning and memory ability of SAE rats that received EE housing or not. The expression of vasopressin (VP) was assessed using immunofluorescence microscopy and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISAs). The synthesis of VP in the supraoptic nucleus (SON) was determined using quantitative real-time reverse transcription-PCR analysis. Moreover, inflammatory markers and brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) were detected using ELISA.Results: The results showed that SAE induced a decreased learning and memory ability, while EE reversed this impairment. EE also enhanced the synthesis and secretion of VP in the SON. Blocking the action of VP in the hippocampus interrupted the EE-induced amelioration of learning and memory impairment. Moreover, EE induced changes to the levels of BDNF and cytokines in the hippocampus and these effects were mediated by VP binding to the VP receptor 1a.Conclusion: Our findings demonstrated that the enhanced synthesis and secretion of VP in the SON are a key determinant responsible for EE-induced alleviation of learning and memory deficits caused by SAE.Keywords: sepsis associated encephalopathy, environmental enrichment, vasopressin, learning and memory, vasopressin receptor 1a

Porcine hemagglutinating encephalomyelitis virus (PHEV) is a typical neurotropic betacoronavirus causing digestive disease and/or neurological dysfunction in neonatal pigs. Actin filaments have been identified to implicate in PHEV invasion, but the effects of viral infection on microtubules (MTs) cytoskeleton are unknown. Here, we observed that PHEV infection induced MT depolymerization and was accompanied by the disappearance of microtubule organizing centers. Depolymerization of MTs induced by nocodazole significantly inhibited viral RNA replication, but over-polymerization of MTs induced by paclitaxel did not substantially affect PHEV infection. The expression of histone deacetylase 6 (HDAC6), an important regulator of MT acetylation, progressively increased during PHEV infection. Tramstatin A could alter HDAC6 deacetylase activity to enhance the acetylation of the substrate α-tubulin and MT polymerization, but does not increase PHEV proliferation. These findings suggest that PHEV could subvert host MT cytoskeleton to facilitate infection, and that MT depolymerization negatively affects viral replication independently of HDAC6 activity.

Microbial transformation of betulonic acid with Circinella muscae CGMCC 3.2695 yielded nine undescribed metabolites and eight known compounds. The structures of the metabolites were established based on extensive NMR and HR-ESI-MS data analyses. It is shown that C. muscae could catalyze the regioselective hydroxylation at C-2, C-7, C-15, C-16, C-21, and C-30 along with carbonylation at C-2 and C-21. Furthermore, potential anti-neuroinflammatory activities of the obtained compounds in NO production were tested in lipopolysaccharides-induced BV-2 cells. Some of the metabolites exhibited pronounced inhibitory activities with IC

In this work, we studied the synthesis, characterization, anticancer effect and pharmacokinetics of supramolecular hydrogels composed of 2-naphthalene acetic acid-Gly-Arg-Gly-Asp-Phe-Phe-Gly poly-peptide (Nap-peptide) and TanshinoneⅡA (TsⅡA) derivative (Ts-OH) which had excellent selectivity for inhibiting growth of cancer cells. The Nap-Ts hydrogels exhibited long, narrow and flexible nanofibers entangling each other to form three-dimensional networks, which further self-assembling into nanoparticles with diameters from 200 to 300 nm. The hydrogels drug delivery was suitable for the sustained release, which exhibited both diffusion and relaxation release mechanisms. Compared to TsⅡA, the Ts-OH, Nap-Ts hydrogels exhibited higher anticancer effect to SCG7901 cells, MCF-7 cells, HepG2 cells and MDA-MB-231 cells in vitro. The pharmacokinetic behaviours of Nap-Ts hydrogels were evaluated in rats. The Nap-Ts hydrogels possessed better biocompatibility, sustain drug release and anticancer effect than TsⅡA. The results demonstrated the potential drug delivery system of TsⅡA improving the anticancer activity.

BackgroundImmunotherapy for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) exhibits limited clinical efficacy due to immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (TME). Tumor-infiltrating macrophages (TIMs) account for the major component in the TME, and the dominance of M2 phenotype over M1 phenotype in the TIMs plays the pivotal role in sustaining the immunosuppressive character. We thus investigate the effect of bufalin on promoting TIMs polarization toward M1 phenotype to improve HCC immunotherapy.MethodsThe impact of bufalin on evoking antitumor immune response was evaluated in the immunocompetent mouse HCC model. The expression profiling of macrophage-associated genes, surface markers and cytokines on bufalin treatment in vitro and in vivo were detected using flow cytometry, immunofluorescence, western blot analysis, ELISA and RT-qPCR. Cell signaling involved in M1 macrophage polarization was identified via the analysis of gene sequencing, and bufalin-governed target was explored by immunoprecipitation, western blot analysis and gain-and-loss of antitumor immune response. The combination of bufalin and antiprogrammed cell death protein 1 (anti-PD-1) antibody was also assessed in orthotopic HCC mouse model.ResultsIn this study, we showed that bufalin can function as an antitumor immune modulator that governs the polarization of TIMs from tumor-promoting M2 toward tumor-inhibitory M1, which induces HCC suppression through the activation of effector T cell immune response. Mechanistically, bufalin inhibits overexpression of p50 nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) factor, leading to the predominance of p65-p50 heterodimers over p50 homodimers in the nuclei. The accumulation of p65-p50 heterodimers activates NF-κB signaling, which is responsible for the production of immunostimulatory cytokines, thus resulting in the activation of antitumor T cell immune response. Moreover, bufalin enhances the antitumor activity of anti-PD-1 antibody, and the combination exerts synergistic effect on HCC suppression.ConclusionsThese data expound a novel antitumor mechanism of bufalin, and facilitate exploitation of a new potential macrophage-based HCC immunotherapeutic modality.

Among the regenerated cellulosic fibers, viscose fiber is the most harmless material on human skin. Nonetheless, viscose fiber has some disadvantages such as low wet strength, high elongation, flammability, and poor color fastness. To improve adsorption and color fastness properties of viscose fiber, amphoteric viscose fibers were prepared. In the current study, viscose fiber was modified with 2,3-epoxy propyltrimethyl ammonium chloride and sodium chloroacetate using sodium hydroxide as catalyst. With adsorption performance of methyl orange and methylene blue as target dyes, the modification conditions were optimized in terms of temperature, time, and catalyst dosage with orthogonal test and single-factor experiment. The modified product was characterized using Fourier transform infrared spectrometry, scanning electron microscopy, ultraviolet spectrophotometry. Meanwhile, nitrogen content, degree of substitution, tensile strength, and adsorption property were measured. It was concluded that the best cationic reaction process conditions were reaction temperature of 70 °C, reaction time of 1 h, and sodium hydroxide dosage of 0.09 g, which was 1% of the amount of viscose fiber when the amount of etherifying agent was 30% of viscose fiber. The best anionic reaction conditions were reaction temperature of 70 °C, reaction time of 1 h, and 3.3 g of 10% sodium hydroxide solution. The adsorption properties of amphoteric modified viscose fiber towards methylene blue and methyl orange were excellent. The maximum adsorption of methylene blue and methyl orange was obtained at 1.483 and 0.234 mg g−1, respectively.

Sodium percarbonate (SPC) is considered a potential alternative to liquid hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) in organic compounds contaminated water/soil remediation due to its regularly, transportable, economical, and eco-friendly features. The solid state of SPC makes it more suitable to remediate actual soil and water with a milder H2O2 release rate. Apart from its good oxidative capacity, alkaline SPC can simultaneously remediate acidized solution and soil to the neutral condition. Conventionally, percarbonate-based advanced oxidation process (P-AOPs) system proceed through the catalysis under ultraviolet ray, transition metal ions (i.e., Fe2+, Fe3+, and V4+), and nanoscale zero-valent metals (iron, zinc, copper, and nickel). The hydroxyl radical (•OH), superoxide radical (•O2-), and carbonate radical anion (•CO3-) generated from sodium percarbonate could attack the organic pollutant structure. In this review, we present the advances of P-AOPs in heterogeneous and homogeneous catalytic processes through a wide range of activation methods. This review aims to give an overview of the catalysis and application of P-AOPs for emerging contaminants degradation and act as a guideline of the field advances. Various activation methods of percarbonate are summarized, and the influence factors in the solution matrix such as pH, anions, and cations are thoroughly discussed. Moreover, this review helps to clarify the advantages and shortcomings of P-AOPs in current scientific progress and guide the future practical direction of P-AOPs in sustainable carbon catalysis and green chemistry.

A fullerene derivative, α-bis-PCBM (bis-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester), is introduced as a dopant in the methylammonium lead iodide (MAPbI3) perovskite active layer to form a perovskite solar cell, demonstrating increased power conversion efficiency by 12% compared to neat MAPbI3-based devices, reduced photocurrent hysteresis and long-term stability in an unpacked environment. By measuring the ultrafast carrier dynamics of neat MAPbI3, MAPbI3: PCBM, MAPbI3: α-bis-PCBM active layers with transient absorption spectroscopy, we found that the α-bis-PCBM as the electron acceptor in perovskite active layer leads to reduced trap-assisted recombination and effective charge transfer into the electron acceptor. The carrier kinetics in the MAPbI3: α-bis-PCBM active layer is not seriously deteriorated during the exposure in atmospheric environment. High performance in perovskite solar cells well correlates improved microscopic ultrafast carrier dynamics, providing a deep insight to uncover the functioning of hybrid solar cells.

With the popularization and application of emerging Internet technologies such as big data and cloud computing, the traditional B2B and B2C warehousing logistics management modes have not achieved synergy between various distribution stations and suppliers, achieving “one-to-one” means a distribution station is supplied by a manufacturer, and a customer is also supplied by a distribution station. The traditional logistics industry model can no longer meet the individual needs of customers. At present, the logistics industry has a series of problems such as slow delivery, slow turnover, high cost and poor service. Based on the theoretical basis of pipeline network and smart logistics, this paper proposes a pipeline network model of intelligent logistics, and improves the ant colony algorithm to improve transportation efficiency, which provides a guarantee for the efficient operation of the intelligent logistics platform.

Anti-microbial properties of 21 endophytic fungal strains from Hypericum perforatum Linn. were evaluated against three human pathogens, Staphyloccocus aureus, Escherichia coli and Rhodotorula glutinis, and two phytopathogens, Rhizoctonia cerealis and Pyricularia grisea. The results indicated that the ethyl acetate extracts of endophytic fermentation broth had stronger anti-microbial activities than their fermentation broth. And the inhibitory effect of the endophytic extracts on human pathogens was better than those on phytopathogens. Among these endophytic fungi, strains GYLQ-10, GYLQ-24 and GYLQ-22 respectively showed the strongest activities against S. aureu, E. coli, R. glutinis. GYLQ-14 and GYLQ-22 exhibited the most pronounced effect on P. Grisea while both GYLQ-06 and GYLQ-08 had the strongest anti-microbial activities against R. cerealis. Till now, this study is the first report on the isolation of endophytic fungi from H. perforatum Linn. and their anti-microbial evaluation.

Next-generation sequencing (NGS) technology has rapidly advanced and generated the massive data volumes. To align and map the NGS data, biologists often randomly select a number of aligners without concerning their suitable feature, high performance, and high accuracy as well as sequence variations and polymorphisms existing on reference genome. This study aims to systematically evaluate and compare the capability of multiple aligners for NGS data analysis. To explore this capability, we firstly performed alignment algorithms comparison and classification. We further used long-read and short-read datasets from both real-life andin silicoNGS data for comparative analysis and evaluation of these aligners focusing on three criteria, namely, application-specific alignment feature, computational performance, and alignment accuracy. Our study demonstrated the overall evaluation and comparison of multiple aligners for NGS data analysis. This serves as an important guiding resource for biologists to gain further insight into suitable selection of aligners for specific and broad applications.

Background MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are potential regulators that contribute to the pathogenesis of cancer. Microarray technologies have been widely used to characterize aberrant miRNA expression patterns in cancer. Nevertheless, the miRNAs expression signatures identified for a same cancer differs among laboratories due to the cancer heterogeneity. In addition, how the deregulated miRNAs coordinately contribute to the tumourigenic process of prostate cancer remains elusive. Results We evaluated five outlier detection algorithms that take into account the heterogeneity of cancer samples. ORT was selected as the best method and applied to four prostate cancer associated microRNA expression datasets. After microRNA target prediction and pathway enrichment mapping, 38 Gene Ontology terms, 16 KEGG pathways and 99 GeneGO pathways are found putative prostate cancer associated. Comparison with our previous studies, we identified two putative novel pathways important in prostate cancer. The two novel pathways are 1) ligand-independent activation of ESR1 and ESR2 and 2) membrane-bound ESR1: interaction with growth factors signalling. Conclusions We proved that expression signatures of at the pathway level well address the cancer heterogeneity and are more consistent than at the miRNA/gene levels. Based on this observation, we identified putative novel microRNA regulatory pathways which will help us to elucidate the cooperative function of different microRNAs in prostate cancer.

Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) is the most common and invasive renal-originated malignancy. Altered microRNA expression has been observed in many human cancers including ccRCC. Microarray is routinely used in labs worldwide for detecting cancer specific microRNA expression profiles, but no consistent conclusion could be drawn so far. The function of microRNAs in carcinogenesis of this tumor type is thereof largely unknown. In this study, we describe an integrative framework to improve the comparability of differentially expressed microRNAs (DE-miRNAs) from different experiments, and apply it to 4 publicly available microRNA expression datasets in ccRCC. The approach uses a novel statistic method for cancer outlier detection. The identified DE-miRNAs are then screened by POMA, an in-house developed predictor, for microRNAs with real regulatory activity in the disease. The proposed framework not only achieves high reproducibility across different datasets but also identifies a consistent set of 12 DE-miRNAs which could be putative biomarkers and therapeutic targets. The targets of DE-miRNAs in each dataset were then mapped to functional databases for enrichment analysis. Both novel and previously characterized microRNA-regulated molecular pathways are identified that are likely to contribute to the pathogenesis of ccRCC. Overlapping comparison suggests that independent ccRCC expression profiles are more consistent at pathway level than that at gene/microRNA level.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are reported to play essential roles in cancer initiation and progression and microarray technologies are intensively applied to study the miRNA expression profile in cancer. It is very common that the set of differentially expressed miRNAs related to the same cancer identified from different laboratories varies widely. Meanwhile, how the altered miRNAs coordinately contribute to the cause of prostate cancer is still not clear. In this study, we collected and processed four human prostate cancer associated miRNA microarray expression datasets with newly developed cancer outlier detection methods to identify differentially expressed miRNAs (DE-miRNAs). The targets of these DE-miRNAs were then extracted from database or predicted by bioinformatics prediction and then mapped to functional databases for enrichment analysis and overlapping comparison. Newly developed outlier detection methods were found to be more appropriate than t-test in cancer research, and the consistency of independent prostate cancer expression profiles at pathway or gene-set level was shown higher than that at gene (i.e. miRNA here) level. Furthermore, we identified 41 Gene Ontology terms, 4 KEGG pathways and 77 GeneGO pathways which are associated with prostate cancer. Among the top 15 GeneGO pathways, 5 were reported previously and the rest could be putative ones. Our analyses showed that more appropriate outlier detection methods should be used to detect oncogenes or oncomiRNAs that are altered only in a subset of samples. We proved that expression signatures of independent microarray experiments are more consistent rather at pathway level than at miRNA / gene level. We also found that the utilization of similar meta-analysis methods between miRNA and mRNA profiling datasets result in the detection of the same pathways.

Background Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) represents the most invasive and common adult kidney neoplasm. Mounting evidence suggests that microRNAs (miRNAs) are important regulators of gene expression. But their function in tumourigenesis in this tumour type remains elusive. With the development of high throughput technologies such as microarrays and NGS, aberrant miRNA expression has been widely observed in ccRCC. Systematic and integrative analysis of multiple microRNA expression datasets may reveal potential mechanisms by which microRNAs contribute to ccRCC pathogenesis. Methods We collected 5 public microRNA expression datasets in ccRCC versus non-matching normal renal tissues from GEO database and published literatures. We analyzed these data sets with an integrated bioinformatics framework to identify expression signatures. The framework incorporates a novel statistic method for abnormal gene expression detection and an in-house developed predictor to assess the regulatory activity of microRNAs. We then mapped target genes of DE-miRNAs to different databases, such as GO, KEGG, GeneGo etc, for functional enrichment analysis. Results Using this framework we identified a consistent panel of eleven deregulated miRNAs shared by five independent datasets that can distinguish normal kidney tissues from ccRCC. After comparison with 3 RNA-seq based microRNA profiling studies, we found that our data correlated well with the results of next generation sequencing. We also discovered 14 novel molecular pathways that are likely to play a role in the tumourigenesis of ccRCC. Conclusions The integrative framework described in this paper greatly improves the inter-dataset consistency of microRNA expression signatures. Consensus expression profile should be identified at pathway or network level to address the heterogeneity of cancer. The DE-miRNA signature and novel pathways identified herein could provide potential biomarkers for ccRCC that await further validation.