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The plant root absorbs water and nutrients, anchors the plant in the soil, and promotes plant development. Root is developed from root apical meristem (RAM), which is formed during embryo stage and is maintained by dividing stem cells. Plant hormones have a predominant role in RAM maintenance. This review evaluates the functional crosstalk among three major hormones (auxin, cytokinin, and brassinolide) in RAM development in Arabidopsis, integrating a variety of experimental data into a regulatory network and revealing multiple layers of complexity in the crosstalk among these three hormones. We also discuss possible directions for future research on the roles of hormones in regulating RAM development and maintenance.

Fermentation is an important concoction technique for botanical drugs. Fermentation transforms and enhances the active ingredients of botanical drugs through specific microbiological processes, ultimately affecting their pharmacological effects. This review explores the use of fermented botanical drugs in areas such as anti-tumor, hypolipidemic, antioxidant, antimicrobial, cosmetology, and intestinal flora regulation. It elucidates the potential pharmacological mechanisms and discusses the benefits of fermentation technology for botanical drugs, including reducing toxic side effects, enhancing drug efficacy, and creating new active ingredients. This article also discussesdelves into the common strains and factors influencing the fermentation process, which are crucial for the successful transformation and enhancement of these drugs. Taken together, this study aimed to provide a reference point for further research and wider applications of botanical drug fermentation technology.

Ensuring the safety of oil tank farms is essential to maintaining energy security and minimizing the impact of potential accidents. This paper develops a quantitative regional risk model designed to assess both individual and societal risks in oil tank farms, with particular attention to energy-related risks such as leaks, fires, and explosions. The model integrates factors like day–night operational variations, weather conditions, and risk superposition to provide a comprehensive and accurate evaluation of regional risks. By considering the cumulative effects of multiple hazards, including those tied to energy dynamics, and the stability and validity of the model are researched through Monte Carlo simulations and case application. The results show that the model enhances the reliability of traditional risk assessment methods, making it more applicable to oil tank farm safety concerns. Furthermore, this study introduces a practical tool that simplifies the risk assessment process, allowing operators and decision-makers to evaluate risks without requiring in-depth technical expertise. The methodology improves the ability to safeguard oil tank farms, ensuring the stability of energy supply chains and contributing to broader energy security efforts. This study provides a valuable method for researchers and engineers seeking to enhance regional risk calculation efficiency, with a specific focus on energy risks.

The surface material of an object is a key factor that affects non-line-of-sight (NLOS) imaging. In this paper, we introduce the bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) into NLOS imaging to study how the target surface material influences the quality of NLOS images. First, the BRDF of two surface materials (aluminized insulation material and white paint board) was modeled using deep neural networks and compared with a five-parameter empirical model to validate the method’s accuracy. The method was then applied to fit BRDF data for different common materials. Finally, NLOS target simulations with varying surface materials were reconstructed using the confocal diffusion tomography algorithm. The reconstructed NLOS images were classified via a convolutional neural network to assess how different surface materials impacted imaging quality. The results show that image clarity improves when decreasing the specular reflection and increasing the diffuse reflection, with the best results obtained for surfaces exhibiting a high diffuse reflection and no specular reflection.

Methane emissions from ruminants significantly contribute to greenhouse gases. This study explores the methane mitigation effect and mechanism of S. mcclurei through in vitro rumen fermentation, aiming to establish its potential as a feed additive. We investigated the effects of freeze-dried and dried S. mcclurei at supplementation levels of 2%, 5%, and 10% of dry matter on nutrient degradation, ruminal fermentation, methane inhibition, and microbial community structure in in vitro rumen fermentation. The freeze-dried S. mcclurei at 2% supplementation significantly reduced CH4 emissions by 18.85% and enhanced crude protein degradability. However, total VFA and acetate concentrations were lower in both treatments compared to the control. The microbial shifts included a decrease in Lachnospiraceae_NK3A20_group and Ruminococcus and an increase in Selenomonas, Succinivibrio, and Saccharofermentans, promoting propionate production. Additionally, a significant reduction in Methanomicrobium was observed, indicating direct methane mitigation. Freeze-dried S. mcclurei at a 2% supplementation level shows potential as an effective methane mitigation strategy with minimal impact on rumen fermentation, supported by detailed insights into microbial community changes.

The genus Asparagopsis has garnered escalating attention in the spheres of marine biology and biotechnology due to its diverse chemical composition and promising biological capabilities. This all-encompassing review is dedicated to conducting an exhaustive inquiry into the chemical identification and biological importance of Asparagopsis species. By meticulously dissecting the array of chemical compounds found in genus Asparagopsis, encompassing polysaccharides, lipids, proteins, sterols, and bromoform. We unveil their potential utility in realms such as biomedicine, biotechnology, and the conservation of the environment. Furthermore, we delve into the bioactive attributes inherent in these compounds, encompassing effects such as antioxidative, antimicrobial, and anti-inflammatory properties, as well as their conceivable role in cancer treatments. Furthermore, this review underscores the environmental pertinence of genus Asparagopsis, particularly its capacity to mitigate climate change through the generation of compounds that alleviate greenhouse gas effects. Additionally, we delve into the economic facets of this genus, spanning from its integration into food additives to its contributions in cosmetics and sustainable agriculture. This comprehensive review furnishes a multi-faceted comprehension of Asparagopsis, illuminating its chemical diversity and biological significance, thereby paving the way for further explorations into its potential contributions across a spectrum of sectors.

Abstract Cattle and the draught force provided by its skeletal muscle have been integral to agro‐ecosystems of agricultural civilization for millennia. However, relatively little is known about the cattle muscle functional genomics (including protein coding genes, non‐coding RNA, etc.). Circular RNAs (circRNAs), as a new class of non‐coding RNAs, can be effectively translated into detectable peptides, which enlightened us on the importance of circRNAs in cattle muscle physiology function. Here, RNA‐seq, Ribosome profiling (Ribo‐seq), and peptidome data are integrated from cattle skeletal muscle, and detected five encoded peptides from circRNAs. It is further identified and functionally characterize a 907‐amino acids muscle‐specific peptide that is named circNEB‐peptide because derived by the splicing of Nebulin (NEB) gene. This peptide localizes to the nucleus and cytoplasm and directly interacts with SKP1 and TPM1, key factors regulating physiological activities of myoblasts, via ubiquitination and myoblast fusion, respectively. The circNEB‐peptide is found to promote myoblasts proliferation and differentiation in vitro, and induce muscle regeneration in vivo. These findings suggest circNEB‐peptide is an important regulator of skeletal muscle regeneration and underscore the possibility that more encoding polypeptides derived by RNAs currently annotated as non‐coding exist.

The rapid spread of oil pollution owing to river flow has vast consequences for human activities and ecosystems within the affected river basin. In the context of the profound impact of oil spills on river basins, an integrated riverine oil spill impact assessment framework is proposed. The framework combines a risk-matrix approach with an oil trajectory model and the environmental sensitivity index (ESI) methodology to estimate the impact level of the affected river basin. The framework was applied in simulation to the middle reaches of the Nenjiang River, China, to evaluate the impact of a hypothetical oil spill accident during different seasons. Our findings revealed similar propagation trends of the oil and impact level maps during normal water and flood seasons, largely owing to the regulating function of a downstream dam. Specifically, the oil front edge spread over 2 km/h along the initial 30-km downstream segment in normal water and flood seasons, and the speed slowed to 1.2 km/h in the dry season. The length of the polluted river during normal water and flood seasons was approximately 1.4 times that in the dry season, with contaminated zone lengths averaging 0.45, 0.61, and 0.82 km in the dry, normal water, and flood seasons, respectively. The output impact-level maps, which highlight the severely affected areas over time after the spill, are especially useful for decision makers. This framework is shown to be a valuable tool for quantitatively evaluating the dynamic impacts that a river basin may face following an oil spill, and is particularly useful for facilitating the initial emergency response.

Remote sensing is a promising technology for global water eutrophication monitoring, and the quantity and representativeness of the observed samples influence its accuracy. Due to limitations in high costs in situ monitoring, current remote sensing of lakes often relies on models trained with water quality samples from a single season. However, the generalization ability of these single-season trained models to other seasons has not been extensively studied. In this study, focusing on 38 major lakes in the Yangtze River Basin, we utilized monthly chlorophyll-a (Chla) monitoring data and Sentinel-2 image datasets from 2016 to 2021 to assess the impact of different seasonal data-trained models on the performance of Chla concentration retrieval in lakes. The results indicate that: (a) The sampling time for lake Chla significantly affects the performance of the retrieval model. Based on the seasonal data, the trained models show an R2 range of 0.523 to 0.699, with a Bias ranging from −7.06 % to 7.74 %, while the models trained with full-season samples perform between the various seasonal models. (b) When models built with seasonal data are applied to full-season data retrieval, there is a noticeable decrease in performance. The R2 of the spring-winter data trained model drops by 18.2 %, with RMSL and MAPE increasing by 11.4 % and 4.2 %, respectively. Similarly, the model trained from summer-autumn data shows a 4.02 % decrease in R2, with RMSLE and MAPE rising by 2.76 % and 13.56 %, respectively. This suggests that using models established from seasonal samples to infer full-season Chla concentrations can amplify errors. (c) Compared to seasonal models, full-season models based on different seasonal sampling exhibit better performance (R2 = 0.585, RMSLE = 0.337, Bias = -3.12 %, MAPE = 34.71 %). R2, RMSLE, and MAPE are all superior to seasonal models. Therefore, when performing full-time and long-term retrieval of Chla concentrations in water bodies, it is necessary to use data sampled in different seasons to reduce the errors introduced by seasonal sampling. (d) Chla retrieval models were established for 38 typical lakes and reservoirs in the Yangtze River Basin using the full-time dataset, revealing that 25 % (7/28) of the lakes and 20 % (2/10) of the reservoirs showed significant alteration trends. The number of lakes with increasing Chla concentrations exceeded those with decreasing concentrations, indicating that there is still a substantial risk of eutrophication in the lakes and reservoirs of the Yangtze River Basin.

Objective: In order to offer possible therapeutic treatment evidence for diabetes-associated cognitive decline (DACD), we thoroughly evaluated the effectiveness and safety of combining Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and Western Medicine (WM) in the current study.Methods: The present study employed a comprehensive search strategy across multiple databases, namely, PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science, the Cochrane Library, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), Wanfang Data, Chinese Scientific Journals Database (VIP), and Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (CBM), to identify relevant articles published until July 2023. Subsequently, a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were conducted to assess the efficacy and safety of integrating TCM with WM for the treatment of DACD. The literature included in this study was assessed using the GRADE criteria and the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions. Statistical analysis was conducted using RevMan 5.4 software.Results: A total of 20 RCTs involving 1,570 patients were ultimately included in this meta-analysis. The pooled results demonstrated that the integration of TCM and WM therapy significantly enhanced the overall effectiveness rate compared to WM therapy alone [OR = 4.94, 95% CI (3.56, 6.85), p < 0.00001]. Additionally, the combination therapy resulted in reductions in fasting blood glucose [MD = −0.30, 95% CI (−0.49, −0.10), p = 0.003], HbA1c [MD = −0.71, 95%CI (−1.03, −0.40), p < 0.00001], TNF-α levels [MD = −8.28, 95%CI (−13.12, −3.44), p = 0.0008], and TCM Syndrome Score [MD = −5.97, 95%CI (−9.06, −2.88), p = 0.0002]. Meanwhile, the combination therapy had a positive effect on MoCA Score [MD = 2.52, 95% CI (1.75, 3.30), p < 0.00001], and MMSE Score [MD = 2.31, 95% CI (1.33, 3.29), p < 0.00001]. In addition, the safety of the combination therapy was comparable to that of the WM alone [OR = 0.40, 95% CI (0.12, 1.31), p = 0.13].Conclusion: The integration of TCM and WM therapy outperformed WM alone in DACD treatment. Simultaneously, the combination therapy could improve the therapeutic effect on blood glucose, cognitive function, and inflammation to a certain extent with few adverse effects. However, given the constraints imposed by the quality limitations of the incorporated studies, as well as the potential presence of reporting bias, it is imperative that our findings be substantiated through rigorous, large-scale, randomized controlled trials of superior quality in the future.

The worldwide application of organophosphorus pesticides (OPs) has promoted agricultural development, but their gradual accumulation in soil and water can seriously affect the central nervous system of humans and other mammals. Organophosphorus hydrolase (OPH) is an effective enzyme that can catalyze the degradation of the residual OPs. However, the degradation products such as p-nitrophenol (p-NP) is still toxic. Thus, it is of great significance to develop a multi-functional support that can be simultaneously used for the immobilization of OPH and the further degradation of p-NP. Herein, a visible light assisted enzyme-photocatalytic integrated catalyst was constructed by immobilizing OPH on hollow structured Au-TiO2 (named OPH@H-Au-TiO2) for the degradation of OPs. The obtained OPH@H-Au-TiO2 can degrade methyl parathion to p-NP by OPH and then degrade p-NP to hydroquinone with low toxicity by using H-Au-TiO2 under visible light. OPH molecules were immobilized on H-Au-TiO2 through adsorption method to prepare OPH@H-Au-TiO2. After 2.5 h of reaction, methyl parathion is completely degraded, and about 82.64% of the generated p-NP is further degraded into hydroquinone. After reused for 4 times, the OPH@H-Au-TiO2 retains more than 80% of the initial degradation activity. This research presents a new insight in designing and constructing multi-functional biocatalyst, which greatly expands the application scenarios and industrial value of enzyme catalysis.

To systematically study the influence of a propensity for a particular driving style on car-following risk, a safety potential field risk-quantification method that considers driving style is proposed. First, we classify driving behaviors and construct a field-based safety potential car-following model via analogy with intermolecular interactions; second, we establish a risk-quantification model by considering driving style, risk exposure, and risk severity and classify the consequent risk into four levels, high risk, medium risk, low risk, and safe, using the fuzzy C-means algorithm. Finally, we predict the car-following risk using the LightGBM algorithm in real time. The experimental results show that the LightGBM algorithm can recognize up to 86% of medium–high risk levels compared to the Decision Tree and Random Forest Algorithms. It can achieve effective prediction of car-following risk, which provides sufficient warning information to drivers and helps improve the overall safety of vehicle operation.

Sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas (L.) Lam.) is one of the most widely cultivated crops in the world, with outstanding stress tolerance, but drought stress can lead to a significant decrease in its yield. To reveal the response mechanism of sweet potato to drought stress, an integrated physiological, transcriptome and metabolome investigations were conducted in the leaves of two sweet potato varieties, drought-tolerant zhenghong23 (Z23) and a more sensitive variety, jinong432 (J432). The results for the physiological indexes of drought showed that the peroxidase (POD) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) activities of Z23 were 3.68 and 1.21 times higher than those of J432 under severe drought, while Z23 had a higher antioxidant capacity. Transcriptome and metabolome analysis showed the importance of the amino acid metabolism, respiratory metabolism, and antioxidant systems in drought tolerance. In Z23, amino acids such as asparagine participated in energy production during drought by providing substrates for the citrate cycle (TCA cycle) and glycolysis (EMP). A stronger respiratory metabolism ability could better maintain the energy supply level under drought stress. Drought stress also activated the expression of the genes encoding to antioxidant enzymes and the biosynthesis of flavonoids such as rutin, resulting in improved tolerance to drought. This study provides new insights into the molecular mechanisms of drought tolerance in sweet potato.

This study simulated the wind energy density distribution in the Jiaodong Peninsula region using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model. The impacts of different boundary-layer and near-surface parameterization schemes on the simulated wind speed and direction were investigated. The results indicate that the Yonsei University (YSU) scheme and the Quasi-Normal Scale Elimination (QNSE) scheme performed optimally for wind speed and wind direction. We also conducted a sensitivity test of the simulation results for atmospheric pressure, air temperature, and relative humidity. The statistical analysis showed that the YSU scheme performed optimally, while the MRF and BL schemes performed poorly. Following this, the wind energy distribution in the coastal hilly areas of the Jiaodong Peninsula was simulated using the YSU boundary-layer parameterization scheme. The modeled wind energy density in the mountainous and hilly areas of the Jiaodong Peninsula were higher than that in other regions. The wind energy density exhibits a seasonal variation, with the highest values in spring and early summer and the lowest in summer. In spring, the wind energy density over the Bohai Sea is higher than over the Yellow Sea, while the opposite trend is modeled in summer.

Abstract Background Cyclic nucleotide-gated ion channels (CNGCs) are calcium-permeable channels that participate in a variety of biological functions, such as signaling pathways, plant development, and environmental stress and stimulus responses. Nevertheless, there have been few studies on CNGC gene family in cotton. Results In this study, a total of 114 CNGC genes were identified from the genomes of 4 cotton species. These genes clustered into 5 main groups: I, II, III, IVa, and IVb. Gene structure and protein motif analysis showed that CNGCs on the same branch were highly conserved. In addition, collinearity analysis showed that the CNGC gene family had expanded mainly by whole-genome duplication (WGD). Promoter analysis of the GhCNGCs showed that there were a large number of cis-acting elements related to abscisic acid (ABA). Combination of transcriptome data and the results of quantitative RT–PCR (qRT–PCR) analysis revealed that some GhCNGC genes were induced in response to salt and drought stress and to exogenous ABA. Virus-induced gene silencing (VIGS) experiments showed that the silencing of the GhCNGC32 and GhCNGC35 genes decreased the salt tolerance of cotton plants (TRV:00). Specifically, physiological indexes showed that the malondialdehyde (MDA) content in gene-silenced plants (TRV:GhCNGC32 and TRV:GhCNGC35) increased significantly under salt stress but that the peroxidase (POD) activity decreased. After salt stress, the expression level of ABA-related genes increased significantly, indicating that salt stress can trigger the ABA signal regulatory mechanism. Conclusions we comprehensively analyzed CNGC genes in four cotton species, and found that GhCNGC32 and GhCNGC35 genes play an important role in cotton salt tolerance. These results laid a foundation for the subsequent study of the involvement of cotton CNGC genes in salt tolerance.

Multi energy integrated service stations have strong comprehensive energy and coupling properties, covering functional units such as substation, multi type energy conversion station, data center, distributed power generation, charging and replacement power station, wireless base station and so on. However, with the continuous improvement of the physical complexity of power grid information, there are still great theoretical and practical difficulties on how to build the operation optimization architecture of energy integrated service station and realize the organic integration of energy flow, data flow and business flow. The typical model forms of various equilibrium equality constraints and inequality constraints between stations and stations are established, and the multi-objective operation optimization model is established and solved. The results show that it improves the level of multi energy conversion, multi energy complementarity, comprehensive energy utilization efficiency, realizes the purpose of collaborative control optimization of multiple energy integrated service stations, and effectively promotes the maximum local consumption of renewable energy.

As one of the important equipment in the field of oil and gas storage and transportation, the oil storage tanks are in the increasingly urgent demand for scientific and effective maintenance strategies. Hence, a risk characteristics database was built by fusing the multi-source data relying on the basic information, operating conditions, process parameters, cathodic protection, inspection and monitoring, and maintenance data of oil storage tanks. Specifically, the key indicators and development trends of the health status of storage tanks were obtained by mining and analyzing the typical failure cases of storage tanks and the multi-source data based on the historical multi-source big data, in combination with the condition monitoring and inspection results. Meanwhile, a risk assessment method was developed based on the characteristics database, which could automatically generate the time points for predictive maintenance of the tank and recommend the appropriate maintenance methods. In addition, a integrated multi-source data management system (desktop and mobile) of tank was established through the customized design of data interface in B/S architecture. Thus, the collection and management of tank data and the multi-dimensional data analysis were realized, which could provide a new idea for maintenance management of storage tanks, as well as support for the digitalization and intellectualization of tank management.

The prevalence of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is increasing every year. Medications are currently the most common therapy for T2DM. However, these medications have certain adverse effects. In order to find safe and effective ways to improve this disease, researchers have discovered that some natural products can decrease blood sugar. Flavonoids are one of the most essential low molecular weight phenolic chemicals in the plant world, which widely exist in plant roots, stems, leaves, flowers, and fruits. They possess a variety of biological activities, including organ protection, hypoglycemic, lipid-lowering, anti-oxidative and anti-inflammatory effects. Some natural flavonoids ameliorate T2DM and its complications through anti-oxidation, anti-inflammatory action, glucose and lipid metabolism regulation, insulin resistance management, etc. Hence, this review aims at demonstrating the potential benefits of flavonoids in T2DM and its complications. This laid the foundation for the development of novel hypoglycemic medications from flavonoids.

Objective: This study aims to investigate the safety and efficacy of abrocitinib in treating moderate-to-severe AD in adolescents and adults.Methods: Pubmed, Cochrane, Embase, and Web of science data base were searched from inception to 9 August 2022. All randomized controlled trials (RCTs) evaluating the efficacy and safety of abrocitinib in moderate to severe AD were included in the meta-analysis.Results: This meta-analysis comprised 7 studies and found that 100 mg or 200 mg of abrocitinib significantly improved IGA {[RR = 2.44, 95% CI (1.93–3.08)] [RR = 3.16, 95% CI (2.52–3.96)]} and EASI-75{[RR = 2.18, 95%CI (1.78–2.67)] [RR = 3.04, 95%CI (2.22–4.16)]} responses compared to placebo. Following that, the population was divided into adolescent and adult groups. The abrocitinib improved IGA, EASI-75 responses, and it was still superior to placebo in both the adolescent and the adult groups. PP-NRS4 response index demonstrated that abrocitinib had a greater effect than placebo at 100 mg [RR = 2.22, 95% CI 1.80–2.72] and 200 mg [RR = 3.28, 95% CI 2.59–4.17]. Abrocitinib improved PSAAD, POEM, DLQI, CDLQI, and HADS more than a placebo.Conclusion: In conclusion, this meta-analysis preliminarily demonstrated that abrocitinib had higher efficacy and safety in the treatment of moderate-to-severe AD in adolescents and adults. In addition, abrocitinib could rapidly relieve itching, and effectively improve symptoms and signs, with a greater effect at the dosage of 200 mg than 100 mg.

The high resistance connection fault of the stator is a common fault in doubly fed induction generators, which causes a three-phase imbalance in the stator circuit. Since the stator winding is directly connected to the power grid, interference from the asymmetric power grid must be eliminated in order to achieve the accurate diagnosis of stator resistance imbalance faults. Therefore, a new diagnosis method based on filter shunt capacitor banks is proposed in this paper. By introducing shunt capacitor banks, an artificial neutral point is constructed to replace the neutral point of the power grid. Then, the neutral point voltage of the stator winding relative to the artificial neutral point is selected as a fault characteristic signal. In this paper, the change in three-phase stator currents after a high-resistance connection fault is analyzed in detail, and by comparing the fault characteristic signal with three-phase stator currents, the fault phase location and fault severity of high-resistance connection can be accurately obtained. Finally, simulations are carried out via the field-circuit coupling method to validate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Serine protease inhibitors (Serpins) are the most widely distributed protease inhibitors in nature and have been identified from all kingdoms of life. Eukaryotic serpins are most abundant with their activities often subject to modulation by cofactors; however, little is known about the regulation of prokaryotic serpins. To address this, here we prepared a recombinant bacteria serpin, termed chloropin, derived from green sulfur bacteria Chlorobium limicola and solved its crystal structure at 2.2 Å resolution. This showed a canonical inhibitory serpin conformation of native chloropin with a surface-exposed reactive loop and a large central beta-sheet. Enzyme activity analysis showed that chloropin could inhibit multiple proteases, such as thrombin and KLK7 with second order inhibition rate constants at 2.5×104 M−1s−1 and 4.5×104 M−1s−1 respectively, consistent with its P1 arginine residue. Heparin could accelerate the thrombin inhibition by ∼17-fold with a bell-shaped dose-dependent curve as seen with heparin-mediated thrombin inhibition by antithrombin. Interestingly, supercoiled DNA could accelerate the inhibition of thrombin by chloropin by 74-fold, while linear DNA accelerated the reaction by 142-fold through a heparin-like template mechanism. In contrast, DNA did not affect the inhibition of thrombin by antithrombin. These results indicate that DNA is likely a natural modulator of chloropin protecting the cell from endogenous or exogenous environmental proteases, and prokaryotic serpins have diverged during evolution to use different surface subsites for activity modulation.

Knowledge of in situ diet of widespread rotifers is crucial for accurately understanding the trophic position, ecological function, and adaptability to environmental changes in aquatic ecosystems. However, it is challenging to achieve the in situ diet information due to the lack of efficient and comprehensive methods. Here, we investigated the diet composition of Polyarthra in a subtropical lake using high-throughput sequencing (HTS) of a rRNA metabarcode for Polyarthra and ambient water samples. After eliminating Polyarthra sequences, a total of 159 operational taxonomic units (OTUs) from taxa in 15 phyla were detected from Polyarthra gut content samples. Most of the OTUs belong to Chlorophyta, followed by unclassified Fungi, Chrysophyta, Dinoflagellata, Ciliophora, Bacillariophyta, Cryptophyta, Arthropoda, Cercozoa, Mollusca, Apicomplexa, Haptophyta, Amoebozoa, Chordata and other eukaryotes. Our results showed that Polyarthra mainly grazed on Chlorophyta, which may result from the high relative abundance of Chlorophyta in ambient waters. In contrast, Chrysophyceae and Synurophyceae were enriched in Polyarthra’s gut, indicating that this rotifer prefers these taxa as food. Moreover, correlation analysis showed that total nitrogen, transparency, depth, Chlorophyll-a and total phosphorus were key factors for the variation of the eukaryotic community in the Polyarthra gut contents. When the concentration of nutrients in the water environment decreased, Polyarthra shifted from herbivorous feeding to more carnivorous feeding. Thus, Polyarthra is generally omnivorous but preference for Chrysophytes and Synurophytes, and it responds to the environmental changes by adopting a flexible feeding strategy. This could partly explain why the widespread rotifers have apparently wide tolerance toward spatial and environmental changes.

In the starlight atmospheric refraction navigation when the starlight transmits in the supersonic flow field, the aero-optical effect will reduce the accuracy of navigation. In this paper, the aircraft model is established by ICEM and Fluent is used to simulate the atmosphere density distribution at different altitudes and speeds. Then, the principle of geometric optics is used to track the starlight, the angular deviation of starlight transmission is deduced, and finally, the influence of different speeds and altitudes on starlight atmospheric refraction navigation is analyzed. The results show that the aero-optical effect produced by supersonic vehicles is related to the flight altitude and flight speed. Taking the flight altitude of 20 and 30 km as an example, when the flight speed is Mach 2, the angular deviation caused by the aero-optical effect is 1.045 and 0.699“ respectively, and when the flight speed is Mach 10, the angular deviation is 20.075 and 4.643”, respectively. Therefore, the aero-optical effect can be ignored at the altitude of 30 km and above. However, the influence of the aero-optical effect at 20 km needs to be judged according to the flight speed.

Abstract Aims This integrative review aims to explore the willingness of nursing students to work in geriatric care over the past 10 years and to explore the factors influencing nursing students to work in geriatric care. Design An integrative review. Methods Studies investigating nursing students’ willingness in gerontological nursing work and related influencing factors published in English in Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, Embase, PsycINFO and CINAHL between 2010–2020 were included. Data collected in April 2020. Results Twenty‐four studies were analysed. Most studies presented a contradictory or negative attitude about the willingness of nursing students to engage in gerontological nursing work. In most studies that rank the intention to work in nursing fields, gerontological care received the lowest or a relatively low ranking. The main factors affecting work related to gerontological nursing include prior experience caring for older adults, attitudes towards geriatrics, anxiety about ageing, clinical practice environment and living experience with older family members.

Biological pattern formation ensures that tissues and organs develop in the correct place and orientation within the body. A great deal has been learned about cell and tissue staining techniques, and today’s microscopes can capture digital images. A light microscope is an essential tool in biology and medicine. Analyzing the generated images will involve the creation of unique analytical techniques. Digital images of the material before and after deformation can be compared to assess how much strain and displacement the material responds. Furthermore, this article proposes Development Biology Patterns using Digital Image Technology (DBP-DIT) to cell image data in 2D, 3D, and time sequences. Engineered materials with high stiffness may now be characterized via digital image correlation. The proposed method of analyzing the mechanical characteristics of skin under various situations, such as one direction of stress and temperatures in the hundreds of degrees Celsius, is achievable using digital image correlation. A DBP-DIT approach to biological tissue modeling is based on digital image correlation (DIC) measurements to forecast the displacement field under unknown loading scenarios without presupposing a particular constitutive model form or owning knowledge of the material microstructure. A data-driven approach to modeling biological materials can be more successful than classical constitutive modeling if adequate data coverage and advice from partial physics constraints are available. The proposed procedures include a wide range of biological objectives, experimental designs, and laboratory preferences. The experimental results show that the proposed DBP-DIT achieves a high accuracy ratio of 99,3%, a sensitivity ratio of 98.7%, a specificity ratio of 98.6%, a probability index of 97.8%, a balanced classification ratio of 97.5%, and a low error rate of 38.6%.

In the past three decades, harmful algal blooms (HAB) have become more frequent and widespread in southeast Chinese sea areas. Resting stages are regarded as the “seed bank” of algal blooms, and play an important role in initiating HABs. The distribution of resting stages in sediments especially those of HAB species can make good predictions about the potential risk of future blooms, however with limited reports. In this study, surface sediment samples were collected in the four sea areas along the southeast Chinese coasts, including Dafeng Port (DF) in the southern Yellow Sea, Xiangshan Bay (XS), Funing Bay (FN), and Dongshan Bay (DS) in the East China Sea. Diversity and community structure of eukaryotic microalgae in surface sediments were assessed by metabarcoding V4 region of the 18S rDNA, focusing on the distribution of HAB species. Biogenic elements including total organic carbon (TOC), total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorus (TP), biogenic silicon (BSi), and moisture content (MC) were analyzed. A total of 454 eukaryotic algal OTUs were detected, which belonged to 31 classes of 9 phyla. Altogether 149 algal species were detected in this study, and 59 taxa have been reported to form resting stages. Eukaryotic algal community was similar in XS, FN and DS of the East China Sea, which were predominated by dinoflagellates. However, algal community was different in DF of the Yellow Sea, and characterized by the dominance of chrysophytes and low OTU richness. The distribution of most abundant HAB species showed positive correlations with TN, BSi, and TOC, suggesting that eutrophication and consequent increase in diatom productivity may have a significant influence on the distribution of HAB species and facilitate the occurrence of HABs. Furthermore, HAB species occurred more abundantly and widely in FN. Our results suggest high potential risks of HABs in the southeast Chinese coast especially in Funing Bay.

Abstract Beam‐induced heating effect on nanoscale samples is a crucial question, as it strongly influences the interpretation of observed unusual behaviours. This question is currently under debate without a convincing conclusion. Here, using silver nitride (Ag3N) nanoparticles as temperature labels, we perform an investigation on this heating effect inside a transmission electron microscope (TEM) under normal imaging conditions. Combined with experimental measurements and semi‐quantitative calculations, a temperature increase of more than 100 K is estimated and confirmed in the graphite carbon nitride (g‐C3N4) films. Strong temperature gradients are found to exist in the single‐end fixed g‐C3N4 films. The influencing factors of heat accumulation are also investigated and discussed. Findings in this study may shed some light on the understanding of the abnormal behaviours of nano‐objects observed inside TEM.

When the direct visible-light channel is affected by people walking or other obstacles, the shadow effect formed in the receiver space affects communication performance and can even lead to communication interruption. In this paper, two numerical methods for calculating the shadow area of the human body were proposed for an indoor multi-light communication system. The influence of shadows on system performance was analyzed using the mean square errors of illuminance and signal-to-noise ratio, as well as the interrupt probability, as parameters. The results showed that shadows had a great influence on the performance of the visible-light communication system. When the number of light sources was fixed, the shadow effect could be effectively reduced by optimizing the layout of the light sources. These research results can provide a theoretical basis for improving the stability of visible-light communication systems.

Stem nematode disease can seriously reduce the yield of sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas (L.) Lam). To explore resistance mechanism to stem nematode in sweet potato, transcriptomes and metabolomes were sequenced and compared between two sweet potato cultivars, the resistant Zhenghong 22 and susceptible Longshu 9, at different times after stem nematode infection. In the transcriptional regulatory pathway, mitogen-activated protein kinase signaling was initiated in Zhenghong 22 at the early stage of infection to activate genes related to ethylene production. Stem nematode infection in Zhenghong 22 also triggered fatty acid metabolism and the activity of respiratory burst oxidase in the metabolic pathway, which further stimulated the glycolytic and shikimic pathways to provide raw materials for secondary metabolite biosynthesis. An integrated analysis of the secondary metabolic regulation pathway in the resistant cultivar Zhenghong 22 revealed the accumulation of tryptophan, phenylalanine, and tyrosine, leading to increased biosynthesis of phenylpropanoids and salicylic acid and enhanced activity of the alkaloid pathway. Stem nematode infection also activated the biosynthesis of terpenoids, abscisic acid, zeatin, indole, and brassinosteroid, resulting in improved resistance to stem nematode. Finally, analyses of the resistance regulation pathway and a weighted gene co-expression network analysis highlighted the importance of the genes itf14g17940 and itf12g18840, encoding a leucine-rich receptor-like protein and 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate synthase, respectively. These are candidate target genes for increasing the strength of the defense response. These results provide new ideas and a theoretical basis for understanding the mechanism of resistance to stem nematode in sweet potato.

High long-term stress on the plantar fascia (PF) is the main cause of plantar fasciitis. Changes in the midsole hardness (MH) of running shoes are an important factor leading to the alteration of the PF. This study aims to establish a finite-element (FE) model of the foot–shoe, and investigates the effects of midsole hardness on PF stress and strain. The FE foot–shoe model was built in ANSYS using computed-tomography imaging data. Static structural analysis was used to simulate the moment of running push and stretch. Plantar stress and strain under different MH levels were quantitatively analyzed. A complete and valid 3D FE model was established. With an increase in MH from 10 to 50 Shore A, the overall stress and strain of the PF were decreased by approximately 1.62%, and the metatarsophalangeal (MTP) joint flexion angle was decreased by approximately 26.2%. The height of the arch descent decreased by approximately 24.7%, but the peak pressure of the outsole increased by approximately 26.6%. The established model in this study was effective. For running shoes, increasing the MH reduces the stress and strain of PF, but also imposes a higher load on the foot.

Abstract Genetic differentiations and phylogeographical patterns of small organisms may be shaped by spatial isolation, environmental gradients, and gene flow. However, knowledge about genetic differentiation of rotifers at the intercontinental scale is still limited. Polyarthra dolichoptera and P. vulgaris are cosmopolitan rotifers that are tolerant to environmental changes, offering an excellent model to address the research gap. Here, we investigated the populations in Southeastern China and eastern North America and evaluated the phylogeographical patterns from their geographical range sizes, geographic–genetic distance relationships and their responses to spatial‐environmental factors. Using the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I gene as the DNA marker, we analyzed a total of 170 individuals. Our results showed that some putative cryptic species, also known as entities were widely distributed, but most of them were limited to single areas. The divergence of P. dolichoptera and P. vulgaris indicated that gene flow between continents was limited while that within each continent was stronger. Oceanographic barriers do affect the phylogeographic pattern of rotifers in continental waters and serve to maintain genetic diversity in nature. The genetic distance of P. dolichoptera and P. vulgaris populations showed significant positive correlation with geographic distance. This might be due to the combined effects of habitat heterogeneity, long‐distance colonization, and oceanographic barriers. Furthermore, at the intercontinental scale, spatial distance had a stronger influence than environmental variables on the genetic differentiations of both populations. Wind‐ and animal‐mediated transport and even historical events of continental plate tectonics are potential factors for phylogeography of cosmopolitan rotifers.

Background: Many miRNAs have been demonstrated to be associated with the prognosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). However, how to combine necroptosis-related miRNAs to achieve the best predictive effect in estimating HCC patient survival has not been explored.Methods: The mRNA and miRNA expression profile were downloaded from a public database (TCGA-LIHC cohort). Necroptosis-related genes were obtained from previous references, and necroptosis-related miRNAs were identified using Pearson analysis. Subsequently, differential expression miRNAs (DEms) were identified in HCC and paracancer normal samples based on necroptosis-related miRNA expression. The whole set with HCC was randomized into a training set and testing set (1:1). LASSO-Cox regression analysis was used to construct an miRNA signature. Multiple statistical methods were used to validate the clinical benefit of signature in HCC patients, including receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curves, Kaplan–Meier survival analyses, and decision curve analysis (DCA). The downstream target genes of miRNAs were obtained from different online tools, and the potential pathways involved in miRNAs were explored. Finally, we conducted RT-qPCR in SK-HEP-1, THLE-3, and HUH-7 cell lines for miRNAs involved in the signature.Results: The results showed that a total of eight specific necroptosis-related miRNAs were screened between HCC and adjacent tissues in the training set. Subsequently, based on the aforementioned miRNAs, 5-miRNA signature (miR-139-5p, hsa-miR-326, miR-10b-5p, miR-500a-3p, and miR-592) was generated by LASSO-Cox regression analysis. Multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that the risk scores were independent prognostic indicators in each set. The area under curves (AUCs) of 1 year, 3 years, 5 years, and 7 years were high in each set (AUC >0.7). DCA analysis also revealed that the risk score had a potential benefit than other clinical characteristics. Meanwhile, survival analysis showed that the high-risk group showed low survival probabilities. Moreover, the results of enrichment analysis showed that specific miRNAs were mainly enriched in the cAMP signaling pathway and TNF signaling pathway. Finally, the results of RT-qPCR were consistent with the prediction results in public databases.Conclusion: Our study establishes a robust tool based on 5-necroptosis-related miRNAs for the prognostic management of HCC patients.

Abstract In view of the influence of model errors in conventional BeiDou prediction models for clock offsets, a semiparametric adjustment model for BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) clock offset prediction that considers model errors is proposed in this paper. First, the model errors of the conventional BeiDou clock offset prediction model are analyzed. Additionally, the relationship among the polynomial model, polynomial model with additional periodic term correction, and its periodic correction terms is explored in detail. Second, considering the model errors, combined with the physical relationship between phase, frequency, frequency drift, and its period in the clock sequence, the conventional clock offset prediction model is improved. Using kernel estimation and comprehensive least squares, the corresponding parameter solutions of the prediction model and the estimation of its model error are derived, and the dynamic error correction of the clock sequence model is realized. Finally, the BDS satellite precision clock data provided by the IGS Center of Wuhan University with a sampling interval of 5 min are used to compare the proposed prediction method with commonly used methods. Experimental results show that the proposed prediction method can better correct the model errors of BDS satellite clock offsets, and it can effectively overcome the inaccuracies of clock offset correction. The average forecast accuracies of the BeiDou satellites at 6, 12, and 24 h are 27.13%, 37.71%, and 45.08% higher than those of the conventional BeiDou clock offset forecast models; the average model improvement rates are 16.92%, 20.96%, and 28.48%, respectively. In addition, the proposed method enhances the existing BDS satellite prediction method for clock offsets to a certain extent.

Bdelloid rotifers are a group of microscopic invertebrates known for their obligate parthenogenesis and exceptional resistance to extreme environments. Their diversity and distributions are poorly studied in Asia, especially in China. In order to better understand the species distribution and diversity of bdelloid rotifers in China, a scientific surveys of habitats was conducted with 61 samples (both terrestrial and aquatic habitats) from 11 provinces and regions of China, ranging from tropics to subtropics with a specific focus on poorly sampled areas (Oriental) during September 2017 to October 2018. A total of 59 morphospecies (including subspecies) were found, of which, thirty-nine morphospecies (including one genus) are new records for China, almost doubling the number of previous records. Four rare morphospecies (Adineta cf. acuticornis Haigh, A. beysunae Örstan, Habrotrocha ligula loxoglotta De Koning and H. serpens Donner) are depicted and redescribed, and an updated checklist of Chinese bdelloids with their location and ecological information is presented. This study provides new data from a large region of China, enriching the knowledge of bdelloid biodiversity, and their global biogeography.

Leishmaniasis is a neglected tropical disease that seriously influences global public health. Among all the parasitic diseases, leishmaniasis is the third most common cause of morbidity after malaria and schistosomiasis. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are a new type of noncoding RNAs that are involved in the regulation of biological and developmental processes. However, there is no published research on the function of circRNAs in leishmaniasis. This is the first study to explore the expression profiles of circRNAs in leishmaniasis. GO and KEGG analyses were performed to determine the potential function of the host genes of differentially expressed circRNAs. CircRNA–miRNA–mRNA (ceRNA) regulatory network analysis and protein–protein interaction (PPI) networks were analyzed by R software and the STRING database, respectively. A total of 4664 significant differentially expressed circRNAs were identified and compared to those in control groups; a total of 1931 were up-regulated and 2733 were down-regulated. The host genes of differentially expressed circRNAs were enriched in ubiquitin-mediated proteolysis, endocytosis, the MAPK signaling pathway, renal cell carcinoma, autophagy and the ErbB signaling pathway. Then, five hub genes (BRCA1, CREBBP, EP300, PIK3R1, and CRK) were identified. This study provides new evidence of the change of differentially expressed circRNAs and its potential function in leishmaniasis. These results may provide novel insights and evidence for the diagnosis and treatment of leishmaniasis.

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) contribute to cellular redox environment and serve as signaling molecules. Excessive ROS can lead to oxidative stress that are involved in a broad spectrum of physiological and pathological conditions. Stem cells have unique ROS regulation while cancer cells frequently show a constitutive oxidative stress that is associated with the invasive phenotype. Antioxidants have been proposed to forestall tumor progression while targeted oxidants have been used to destroy tumor cells. However, the delicate beneficial range of ROS levels for stem cells and tumor cells under distinct contexts remains elusive. Here, we used Drosophila midgut intestinal stem cell (ISCs) as an in vivo model system to tackle this question. The ROS levels of ISCs remained low in comparison to that of differentiated cells and increased with ageing, which was accompanied by elevated proliferation of ISCs in aged Drosophila. Neither upregulation nor downregulation of ROS levels significantly affected ISCs, implicating an intrinsic homeostatic range of ROS in ISCs. Interestingly, we observed similar moderately elevated ROS levels in both tumor-like ISCs induced by Notch (N) depletion and extracellular matrix (ECM)-deprived ISCs induced by β-integrin (mys) depletion. Elevated ROS levels further promoted the proliferation of tumor-like ISCs while reduced ROS levels suppressed the hyperproliferation phenotype; on the other hand, further increased ROS facilitated the survival of ECM-deprived ISCs while reduced ROS exacerbated the loss of ECM-deprived ISCs. However, N- and mys-depleted ISCs, which resembled metastatic tumor cells, harbored even higher ROS levels and were subjected to more severe cell loss, which could be partially prevented by ectopic supply of antioxidant enzymes, implicating a delicate pro-surviving and proliferating range of ROS levels for ISCs. Taken together, our results revealed stem cells can differentially respond to distinct ROS levels under various conditions and suggested that the antioxidant-based intervention of stem cells and tumors should be formulated with caution according to the specific situations.

The high-affinity potassium transporters (HKT) mediate K+-Na+ homeostasis in plants. However, the function of enhancing low-potassium tolerance in sweet potato [Ipomoea batatas (L.) Lam.] remains unrevealed. In this study, a novel HKT transporter homolog IbHKT-like gene was cloned from sweet potato, which was significantly induced by potassium deficiency stress. IbHKT-like overexpressing transgenic roots were obtained from a sweet potato cultivar Xuzishu8 using an Agrobacterium rhizogenes-mediated root transgenic system in vivo. Compared with the CK, whose root cells did not overexpress the IbHKT-like gene, overexpression of the IbHKT-like gene protected cell ultrastructure from damage, and transgenic root meristem cells had intact mitochondria, endoplasmic reticulum, and Golgi dictyosomes. The steady-state K+ influx increased by 2.2 times in transgenic root meristem cells. Overexpression of the IbHKT-like gene also improved potassium content in the whole plant, which increased by 63.8% compared with the CK plants. These results could imply that the IbHKT-like gene, as a high-affinity potassium transporter gene, may play an important role in potassium deficiency stress responses.

Extensive studies have demonstrated the relationship between static street networks and dynamic pedestrian movement. Street vendors temporarily appear in a vibrant space, closely engaging with numerous pedestrians. Is street vending distribution related to street network configuration? And if so, in what ways? This study investigates the heterogeneous relationships between pedestrians, vendors and the urban and suburban places they inhabit in Yuncheng by contrasting two different types of pedestrian-driven maps. The vending distribution map was identified via semi-structured interviews with urban managers (n = 11) in 2017. The spatial network configuration was examined through space syntax segment angular analysis, containing Integration, Choice and Combined Centrality properties at macro-, meso- and micro-scales. By overlapping the distribution map to the syntactic maps in the Quantum Geographic Information System (QGIS) platform, our results show that street vending distribution is most related to the Choice property at the meso-scale. Using semi-structured interviews (n = 53) and observations at two specific sites, we further found relationships tend to be opposed in urban and suburban areas. The study provides an alternative approach to integrating quantitative and qualitative data, expanding the theoretical and empirical understanding of spatial configuration and urban street activities related to walking and vending. This understanding has the potential to contribute to the design of more liveable street spaces.

Leaked methane from natural gas distribution pipelines is a significant human and environmental health problem in urban areas. To assess this risk, urban mobile methane leak surveys were conducted, using innovative methodology, on the streets of Hartford, Danbury, and New London, Connecticut, in March 2019. The Hartford survey was done to determine if results from a 2016 survey (Keyes et al., 2019) were persistent, and surveys in additional towns were done to determine if similar findings could be made using an identical approach. Results show that Hartford continues to be problematic, with approximately 3.4 leaks per road mile observed in 2016 and 4.3 leaks per mile estimated in 2019, similar to that previously found in Boston, Massachusetts (Phillips et al., 2013). A preliminary estimate of methane leaks in Hartford is 0.86 metric tonnes per day (or 313 metric tonnes per year), equivalent to 42,840 cubic feet per day of natural gas, and a daily gas consumption of approximately 214 U.S. households. Moreover, the surveys and analyses done for Danbury and New London also reveal problematic leaks, particularly for Danbury with an estimated 3.6 leaks per mile. Although road miles covered in New London were more limited, the survey revealed leak-prone areas, albeit with a range of methane readings lower than those in Hartford and Danbury. Data collection methods for all studies is first reported here and are readily transferable to similar urban settings. This work demonstrates the actionable value that can be gained from data-driven evaluations of urban pipeline performance, and if supplemented with a map of leak-prone pipe geo-location, and information on pipeline operating pressures, will provide a spatial database facilitating proactive repair and replacement of leak-prone urban pipes, a considerable improvement compared to reactive mitigation of human-reported leaks. While this work pertains to the selected urban towns in the Northeast, it exemplifies issues and opportunities nationwide in the United States.

Anti-cancer peptides (ACPs) are a series of short peptides composed of 10–60 amino acids that can inhibit tumour cell proliferation or migration, or suppress the formation of tumour blood vessels, and are less likely to cause drug resistance. The aforementioned merits make ACPs the most promising anti-cancer candidate. However, ACPs may be degraded by proteases, or result in cytotoxicity in many cases. To overcome these drawbacks, a plethora of research has focused on reconstruction or modification of ACPs to improve their anti-cancer activity, while reducing their cytotoxicity. The modification of ACPs mainly includes main chain reconstruction and side chain modification. After summarizing the classification and mechanism of action of ACPs, this paper focuses on recent development and progress about their reconstruction and modification. The information collected here may provide some ideas for further research on ACPs, in particular their modification.

Precipitation is an important requirement for the stable and sustainable development of ecosystems and communities in arid areas, which are vulnerable to the influences of climate change. The changes in precipitation throughout the Holocene, as well as its long-term characteristics in arid northwest China, are not well understood, and records to reconstruct the precipitation trends are needed. Therefore, this study established a well-dated black carbon (BC) stable isotope-inferred (δ13C) precipitation record based on a sediment core from Sayram Lake, Tianshan Mountains (Xinjiang province, northwest China). The record spans the last 12880 cal. yr BP. Variations in BC δ13C showed that between ∼12280 and 9260 cal. yr BP, regional precipitation gradually decreased, but then increased continually until the present, with millennial to centennial scale fluctuations. During the Holocene, a distinct period of low precipitation was observed between 9800 and 8800 cal. yr BP, and two episodes of high precipitation were observed between 8000 and 7600, and 5800 and 2500 cal. yr BP. The maximum precipitation occurred at ∼3800 cal. yr BP. Generally, the persistently increasing precipitation trend is consistent with other records from arid northwest China and adjacent areas. The trend was possibly controlled by Northern Hemisphere solar insolation and associated substantial ice sheet remnants, due to the influence of the North Atlantic Ocean sea surface temperatures and intensities of the Westerlies, which regulate the transport of water vapor to Xinjiang. The results provide a better understanding of the mechanisms driving the evolution of precipitation through the Holocene.

Fish-associated microbial communities play important roles in host growth, health and disease in the symbiont ecosystem; however, their diversity patterns and underlying mechanisms in different body habitats remain poorly understood. Siganus fuscescens is one of the most important consumers of macroalgae and an excellent natural marine source of nutritional lipids for humans, and widely distributes in shallow coastal areas. Here we systematically studied the microbial communities of 108 wild S. fuscescens in four body habitats (i.e., skin, gill, stomach, and hindgut) and surrounding water. We found that the β-diversity but not α-diversity of fish-associated microbial communities from each habitat significantly (p < 0.05) increased as body weight increased. Also, opportunistic pathogens and probiotics (e.g., Pseudomongs, Methylobacterium) appeared to be widely distributed in different body habitats, and many digestive bacteria (e.g., Clostridium) in the hindgut; the abundances of some core OTUs associated with digestive bacteria, “Anaerovorax” (OTU_6 and OTU_46724) and “Holdemania” (OTU_33295) in the hindgut increased as body weight increased. Additionally, the quantification of ecological processes indicated that heterogeneous selection was the major process (46–70%) governing the community assembly of fish microbiomes, whereas the undominated process (64%) was found to be more important for the water microbiome. The diversity pattern showed that β-diversity (75%) of the metacommunity overweight the α-diversity (25%), confirming that the niche separation of microbial communities in different habitats and host selection were important to shape the fish-associated microbial community structure. This study enhances our mechanistic understanding of fish-associated microbial communities in different habitats, and has important implications for analyzing host-associated metacommunities.

Background: Several studies including some genome-wide association studies (GWAS) had shown that BAK1 gene rs210138 polymorphisms might be associated with testicular germ cell tumors (TGCT). Here we tried to sum up the association through a systematic review and meta-analysis.Methods: Studies associated with BAK1 rs210138 and TGCT was systematically searched in databases. The effect size was pooled according to ORs and 95% CIs.Results: Our systematic review and meta-analysis comprised 14 articles. Significantly increased risk of TGCT was found in eligible GWAS and follow-up studies, in overall group and its Caucasian subgroup.Conclusions: Compared with adenine (A), BAK1 rs210138 guanine (G) is associated with increased risk of TGCT. Well-planned studies with larger sample size and more subgroups are needed to verify the risk identified in our systematic review and meta-analysis.

The physiological and biochemical characters of muscles derived from pasture-fed or barn-fed black goats were detected, and RNA-seq was performed to reveal the underlying molecular mechanisms to identify how the pasture feeding affected the nutrition and flavor of the meat. We found that the branched chain amino acids, unsaturated fatty acids, and zinc in the muscle of pasture-fed goats were significantly higher than those in the barn-fed group, while the heavy metal elements, cholesterol, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol were significantly lower. RNA-seq results showed that 1761 genes and 147 lncRNA transcripts were significantly differentially expressed between the pasture-fed and barn-fed group. Further analysis found that the differentially expressed genes were mainly enriched in the myogenesis and Glycerophospholipid metabolism pathway. A functional analysis of the lncRNA transcripts further highlighted the difference in fatty acid metabolism between the two feeding models. Our study provides novel insights into the gene regulation and network organization of muscles and could be potentially used for improving the quality of mutton.

Abstract Ocean acidification (OA) and coastal eutrophication affect coastal marine organisms. We studied the physiological responses of Gracilariopsis lemaneiformis (Gracilariales, Rhodophyta) to increased concentrations of CO2 and NH4 +. Incubation treatments were applied at two different pH units (low, 7.5; high (control), 7.9) and three different NH4 + concentrations (low, 10; medium, 50; high, 100 μM). Growth, rates of photosynthetic oxygen evolution, and NH4 + uptake rates were affected by both elevated CO2 and NH4 + conditions. The changes in the pH of culture media were influenced by elevated CO2 or NH4 + treatments. However, chlorophyll fluorescence was affected only by the level of NH4 +. These results indicate that the physiological responses of G. lemaneiformis might be enhanced when the concentrations of CO2 and NH4 + rise. Therefore, cultures of this alga could provide a good mitigation solution against ongoing problems with OA and coastal eutrophication.

Salt (sodium chloride) is an essential dietary requirement, but excessive consumption has long-term adverse consequences. A high-salt diet (HSD) increases the risk of chronic diseases such as cardiovascular conditions and diabetes and is also associated with poor sleep quality. Little is known, however, about the neural circuit mechanisms that mediate HSD-induced sleep changes. In this study, we sought to identify the effects of HSD on the sleep and related neural circuit mechanisms of Drosophila. Strikingly, we found that HSD causes young Drosophila to exhibit a fragmented sleep phenotype similar to that of normal aging individuals. Importantly, we further showed that HSD slightly impairs circadian rhythms and that the HSD-induced sleep changes are dependent on the circadian rhythm system. In addition, we demonstrated that HSD-induced sleep changes are dopaminergic-system dependent. Together, these results provide insight into how elevated salt in the diet can affect sleep quality.

Abstract Microorganisms are important drivers of material and energy circulation in freshwater ecosystems. Altered aquatic sedimentary environments disturbed by human activities affect microbial community composition. Concentrations of heavy metals, and sediment physicochemical properties, are described for 25 sediment samples collected from five habitat types (residential, duck farm, lotus pond, fish farm, and a reference reserve shallow freshwater lake site) around Baiyangdian Lake, China. Bacterial and fungal communities in sediments were determined using 16S rRNA and 18S rRNA high‐throughput sequencing technology. Sediment physicochemical properties and heavy metal concentrations vary significantly among habitat types. Bacterial genera involved in S and N cycles are most abundant, followed by those that degrade organic pollutants, and are tolerant of heavy metals. Sediment bacterial Chao1 index is predominantly regulated by cobalt concentrations. The microbial communities within replicate samples within habitats are more similar to each other than they are between habitats. Redundancy analysis indicates Zn, pH, and TP are the main environment factors structuring bacterial communities, while fungal communities are most significantly influenced by Co and TP. The genus Cryptomonas is a food source for small zooplankton and fishes, and is mainly distributed in fish farm and lotus pond habitats. Species of Pseudallescheria that cause mycetoma, maduromycosis, and other infections in humans are highly abundant in duck farm and residential habitats. Species of Aleuria are saprobes; decompose organic matter, dead organisms, or biological excrement; and are highly accumulated in duck farm habitat.

The high productivity in the US Corn Belt is largely enabled by the consumption of millions of tons of manufactured fertilizer. Excessive application of nitrogen (N) fertilizer has been pervasive in this region, and the unrecovered N eventually escaped from croplands in forms of nitrous oxide (N _2 O) emission and N leaching. Mitigating these negative impacts is hindered by a lack of practical information on where to focus and how much mitigation potential to expect. At a large scale, process-based crop models are the primary tools for predicting variables required by decision making, but their applications are prohibited by expensive computational and data storage costs. To overcome these challenges, we built a series of metamodels to learn the key mechanisms regarding the carbon (C) and N cycle from a well-validated process-based biogeochemical model, ecosys . The trained metamodel captures over 98% of the variability of the ecosys simulated outputs for 99 randomly selected counties in Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana. To identify hotspots with high mitigation potential, we introduce net societal benefit (NSB) as an indicator for synthesizing the loss in yield and social benefits through emissions and pollutants avoided. Our results show that reducing N fertilizer by 10% leads to 9.8% less N _2 O emissions and 9.6% less N leaching at the cost of 4.9% more SOC depletion and 0.6% yield reduction over the study region. The estimated total annual NSB is $395 M (uncertainty ranges from $114 M to $1271 M), including $334 from social benefits (uncertainty ranges from $46 M to $1076 M), $100 M from saving fertilizer (uncertainty ranges from $13 M to $455 M), and −$40 M due to yield changes (uncertainty ranges from −$261 M to $69 M). For the median scenario, we noted that 20% of the study area accounts for nearly 50% of the NSB, and thus represent hotspot locations for targeted mitigation. Although the uncertainty range suggests that developing such a high-resolution framework is not yet settled and the scenario based estimations are not appropriate to inform the management practices for individual farmers, our efforts shed light on the new generation of analytical tools for life cycle assessment.

Point set is a major type of 3D structure representation format characterized by its data availability and compactness. Most former deep learning-based point set models pay equal attention to different point set regions and channels, thus having limited ability in focusing on small regions and specific channels that are important for characterizing the object of interest. In this paper, we introduce a novel model named Attention-based Point Network (AttPNet). It uses attention mechanism for both global feature masking and channel weighting to focus on characteristic regions and channels. There are two branches in our model. The first branch calculates an attention mask for every point. The second branch uses convolution layers to abstract global features from point sets, where channel attention block is adapted to focus on important channels. Evaluations on the ModelNet40 benchmark dataset show that our model outperforms the existing best model in classification tasks by 0.7% without voting. In addition, experiments on augmented data demonstrate that our model is robust to rotational perturbations and missing points. We also design a Electron Cryo-Tomography (ECT) point cloud dataset and further demonstrate our model’s ability in dealing with fine-grained structures on the ECT dataset.