Search

Many studies have found that the orthographic neighborhood frequency (NF) effect plays a dominant role in word identification. Yet most research has been conducted on alphabetic languages rather than Chinese. We investigated the NF effect on Chinese character recognition in the context of lexical decision tasks. Experiment 1 tested the NF effect in simple characters, Experiment 2 tested the NF effect in compound characters. Results showed that targets with higher frequency neighbors had longer response latencies for both simple characters and compound characters, and that this inhibitory effect was more significant for low-frequency targets. The results overall imply there is an inhibitory NF effect existing in Chinese character recognition. The implications of the results are discussed with regard to character recognition.

Rose (Rosa chinensis), which is an economically valuable floral species worldwide, has three types, namely once-flowering (OF), occasional or re-blooming (OR), and recurrent or continuous flowering (CF). However, the mechanism underlying the effect of the age pathway on the duration of the CF or OF juvenile phase is largely unknown. In this study, we observed that the RcSPL1 transcript level was substantially upregulated during the floral development period in the CF and OF plants. Additionally, the accumulation of the RcSPL1 protein was controlled by rch-miR156. The ectopic expression of RcSPL1 in Arabidopsis thaliana accelerated the vegetative phase transition and flowering. Furthermore, the transient overexpression of RcSPL1 in rose plants accelerated flowering, whereas the silencing of RcSPL1 had the opposite phenotype. Accordingly, the transcription levels of floral meristem identity genes (APETALA1, FRUITFULL, and LEAFY) were significantly affected by the changes in RcSPL1 expression. The RcTAF15b protein, which is an autonomous pathway protein, was revealed to interact with RcSPL1. The silencing and overexpression of RcTAF15b in rose plants led to delayed and accelerated flowering, respectively. Collectively, the study findings imply RcSPL1–RcTAF15b modulates the flowering time of rose plants.

Schematic of the synthesis and functional mode of the H2O2responsive prodrug-nanosystem. HA–PBI–Tre can respond to H2O2, release model drug, and inhibit the foaming progress.

The application of a liver targeting nanometer prodrug system based on an oxalate ester bond for treating NAFLD.

Objective: Unethical behavior has a powerful effect on an individual's overall judgment and is easily influenced by their looks. However, it remains unclear whether the unethical behavior of ugly-looking individuals is more likely to be judged as immoral and what the mechanisms behind it are. The present study investigates whether facial ugliness influences the bad and ugly judgments of unethical behavior from the perspective of neural mechanisms. Method: The experimental material consisted of scenarios describing different levels of unethical behavior committed by ugly-looking or non-ugly-looking people. Subjects were asked to rate the bad and ugly levels of behaviors on a 4-point scale while being scanned for brain activity. We conducted a parametric general linear model (GLM) to estimate neural responses to facial ugliness in morally bad and ugly judgments, which varied with the level of immorality. Results: The results showed that ugly-looking faces activated the anterior cingulate cortex and bilateral inferior occipital gyrus in both judgments, indicating a task-general pattern. Ugly-looking faces in morally ugly judgment showed stronger activity than in morally bad judgment in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, left insula, left middle temporal gyrus, and cortical midline structures that characterize the emotional significance of events, suggesting a task-specific pattern. Conclusions: The results of the current study demonstrate that facial ugliness is task-specific as well as task-general in evaluating unethical behaviors. The findings provide more experimental and neurological evidence for the understanding of the essence between morality and aesthetics.

Drug-induced liver injury (DILI) by acetaminophen (APAP) was one of the most challenging liver diseases. Wolfberry (Lycium barbarum L.), a traditional Chinese medicinal material and food supplement, has a potential effect on increasing the abundance of Akkermansia muciniphila (A. muciniphila) in mice colons. However, the effect and mechanism of wolfberry remain unclear in APAP-induced DILI. In this study, wolfberry promoted the proliferation of activated-A. muciniphila in vitro and in vivo. For the first time, we detected that the activated-A. muciniphila but not the killed-A. muciniphila increased the expression level of Yes-associated protein 1 (YAP1) in the liver and alleviated liver injury in APAP-induced DILI mice. Mechanically, A. muciniphila improved the intestinal mucosal barrier and reduced lipopolysaccharide (LPS) content in the liver, leading to the increased expression level of YAP1. Furthermore, wolfberry increased the A. muciniphila abundance in the colon and YAP1 expression in the liver from APAP-induced DILI mice, which promoted the recovery of APAP-induced liver injury. Meanwhile, wolfberry combination with A. muciniphila synergistically increased AKK abundance and YAP1 expression in the liver. Our research provides an innovative strategy to improve DILI.

Background Moral judgments are influenced by facial attractiveness. Moral behavior of good-looking people is more judged as morally beautiful and specifically activates brain regions involved in the representation of emotional meaning. In moral judgments, immoral behavior is more diagnostic than moral behavior. However, it is not clear whether the implied relationship between face and moral traits affects people's judgments of immoral behavior. The present study is the first to investigate the neural responses to facial attractiveness in the judgments of moral badness and ugliness. Results Experimental materials consisted of scenarios depicting behaviors at different levels of immorality acted by good- or ugly-looking males in daily life. Subjects were asked to rate how bad and how ugly the male immoral behavior was on a 4-point scale. A parametric general linear model (GLM) was performed to estimate neural response to face attractiveness that varies with the levels of immorality in the judgments of moral badness and moral ugliness. Results showed that ugly faces both in the judgments of moral badness and moral ugliness activated the anterior cingulate/medial prefrontal cortex and bilateral inferior occipital gyrus, suggesting that ugly faces in evaluation of immoral behavior elicited activity in brain regions associated with underlying general emotions and automatically processed visual features of faces. In addition, compared with ugly faces in moral badness judgment, ugly faces in moral ugliness judgment showed stronger activity in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, left insula, left middle temporal gyrus and cortical midline structures, and specifically activated bilateral frontal poles. These brain regions are mainly involved in the representation of emotional meaning of faces, suggesting that emotional information carried by ugly faces only affects moral aesthetic judgment. And no differential activation was found for the opposite contrast. Conclusion The results of this study demonstrate that facial attractiveness is task-specific as well as task-general in evaluating the badness and ugliness of immoral behavior. The findings provide more experimental and neurological evidence for the impact of implied relationships between faces and moral traits on higher moral decision-making. Our findings are of great significance to the understanding of the essence between morality and aesthetics.

Oxidative stress can lead to a variety of diseases, and oxalate bonds can consume excess reactive oxygen species (ROS) in cells. In this study, a H

Laodelphax striatellus is a sap-feeding pest and the main insect vector of rice stripe virus (RSV). There is an urgent need to identify molecular targets to control this insect pest and plant arboviruses. In this study, we identified a L. striatellus gene (named LsGrpE) encoding a GroP-E-like protein. We found that the LsGrpE protein localized to mitochondria. Using gene-specific dsRNA to interfere with the expression of LsGrpE led to a significant increase in insect mortality, and most of the surviving insects could not develop into adults. Further analyses revealed that LsGrpE deficiency caused mitochondrial dysfunction and inhibited the insulin pathway, resulting in diabetes-like symptoms such as elevated blood sugar, inactive behaviour, developmental delay, and death. In addition, LsGrpE deficiency significantly reduced the RSV titre in surviving L. striatellus, and indirectly prevented viral vertical transmission by reducing the number of adults. We generated transgenic rice plants expressing LsGrpE-specific dsRNA, and the dsRNA was acquired by L. striatellus during feeding, resulting in increased insect mortality and the prevention of arboviral transmission. This study clarifies the function of LsGrpE and demonstrates that LsGrpE can be used as a molecular target of plant-generated dsRNA to resist this sap-feeding pest, a17nd therefore, its transmitted arboviruses.

Cocrystal is constructed to improve physicochemical properties of active pharmaceutical ingredient and prevent polymorphism via intermolecular interactions. However, recent examples on cocrystal polymorphs display significantly different properties. Even though some analytical techniques have been used to characterize the cocrystal polymorphic system, it remains unclear how intermolecular interactions drive and stabilize the structure. In this work, we study the cocrystal polymorphs of nifedipine (NFD) and isonicotinamide (INA) using terahertz (THz) spectroscopy. Form I and form II of NFD-INA cocrystals show spectral fingerprints in THz region. Temperature-dependent THz spectra display distinguished frequency shifts of each fingerprint. Combined with solid-state density functional theory (DFT) calculations, the experimental fingerprints and their distinct responses to temperature are elucidated by specific collective vibrational modes. The vibrations of hydrogen bonding between dihydropyridine ring of NFD and INA are generally distributed below 1.5 THz, which play important roles in stabilizing cocrystal and preventing the oxidation of NFD. The rotations of methyl group in NFD are widely distributed in the range of 1.5-4.0 THz, which helps the steric recognition. The results demonstrate that THz spectroscopy is a sensitive tool to discriminate cocrystal polymorphs. It has the potential to be used as a non-invasive technique for pharmaceutical screening.

supplemental document 463437

We reported the basic optical properties of a triple cation CsFAMA perovskite film and its application in the inverted p-i-n solar cells. The exciton binding energy of 42 meV and the refractive index of 2.4 is obtained from the temperature-dependent photoluminescence spectra and spectroscopic ellipsometry measurement, respectively. The results indicate that CsFAMA lead halide perovskite is an excellent light-absorbing material. The inverted p-i-n CsFAMA perovskite solar cells with PMMA passivation layer are studied, and the optimized PCE can be increased to 16.90% with a negligible hysteresis effect. The long-term and thermal stabilities of CsFAMA perovskite solar cells can be improved after PMMA passivation, which maintains 81% (40% relative humidity, 25 °C, 720 h) and 91% (50% relative humidity, 100 °C, 6 h) of initial efficiencies, respectively. This work provides a promising method for stable and low-cost inverted perovskite solar cells.

Background: Cancers of unknown primary (CUP) are a type of metastatic cancer. However, their primary anatomical site of origin cannot be clinically determined using routine history inquiries, laboratory tests, endoscopy, and imaging. CUP account for ~3-5% of cancers. Empirical chemotherapy (paclitaxel, carboplatin, etc.) is generally used, although the curative effect is poor. Finding the primary site of origin for CUP patients is of great significance for clinical treatment. Method: Our study employed 10,001 pathological images and 9,775 gene detection data points based on whole-exome sequencing (WES) or YUANSU®(OrigiMed, Shanghai, China) for primary cancer within a database containing 32 common cancers. We applied machine learning algorithms (autoML, Transformers, attention) and constructed two diagnostic models. The models diagnosed by identifying pathological images (Model 1) and genomic data (Model 2). Accuracy for the two models was verified. Result: Both models were evaluated using top-k differential diagnosis accuracy, in other words how often the ground truth label was found for k highest confidence predictions for the model. The pathological model (Model 1) achieved a top-3 accuracy of 83.38% and a top-5 accuracy of 90.36%. Using the same methodology, genomic model (Model 2) results were 87.5% and 92.2%, respectively. Conclusion: Using deep learning, we developed diagnostic models for CUP based on pathological images and genomic data. Accuracy for both the pathological image model (Model 1) and the genomic data model (Model 2) was not satisfactory. To improve diagnostic accuracy, further studies on developing a diagnostic model that combines pathological imaging and genomic data are ongoing.. Citation Format: Yanan Wang, Guanjun Zhang, Xi Liu, Yanfeng Xi, Pan Wang, Yuman Zhang, Xing Li. Genomics and pathology based deep learning to predict cancers of unknown primary [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2022; 2022 Apr 8-13. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2022;82(12_Suppl):Abstract nr 5045.

e13560 Background: Despite of routine medical history inquiry, laboratory analysis, histopathological analyses, endoscopy and imaging methods, 3-5% of metastatic cancers are diagnosed with unknown primary (CUP). It poses a considerable challenge as modern therapeutic options for patients with CUP are mainly limited to empirical chemotherapy (paclitaxel, carboplatin, etc.), leading to an overall poor prognosis. In current clinical trials (CUPISCO trial, PACET-CUP trial) targeting CUP for precision therapy, genomic data suggest that only 31% of CUP patients could be matched for at least one targeted or immune agent. The determination of primary tumor origin and genetic mutations could probably provide more therapeutic choices and help to significantly improve the outcome in CUP patients. Methods: To identify the primary lesion of CUP, we built a weighted ensemble model by Automated machine learning, including 13 models ( XGBoost, RandomForestGini, ExtraTreesGini, etc.), using genetic and clinical datasets containing 22,018 patients of 28 tumor types, enrolled between 2016-2021. Our genetic and clinical datasets contained 10 features including age, tumor site, gene alteration, TMB, etc. Among them, 813 sites related to tumor were covered by gene alteration. The 5-fold Cross-Validation method was used to estimate the accuracy of our diagnosis models. Results: The models were evaluated using top-k differential diagnosis accuracy, which measured how frequently the top-k predictions capture any of the primary diagnoses in the reference standard. Our diagnostic model was then performed on 8 CUP patients. All of them were successfully confirmed their diagnosis of primary origin tumor. Among these patients, 2/8 CUP patients have begun relevant systemic therapy based on the confirmed diagnosis: 1 patient with diagnosis of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma receiving the immune combination TP Regimen (Albumin paclitaxel plus cisplatin) and achieved a 9-month PFS; another patient diagnosed as colorectal cancer achieved a 2-month PFS after treatment with Oxaliplatin-based chemotherapy regimen. Preliminary results of our study demonstrated the efficiency of this Artificial Intelligence model for the diagnosis in CUP patients. Conclusions: We developed a diagnostic model on CUP using deep learning based on genomic and clinical data and preliminarily applied in clinic. Genetic characterization of CUP patients contributes to the selection of targeted therapies under unclear diagnosis, whereas our diagnosis model could equally adjust more proper precision treatment for CUP patients. In CUP patients, the combined strategy of deep learning-predicted diagnosis and genetic mutations-based therapy could help to maximize the clinical benefit in a clinical setting and optimize the clinical development of innovative therapies.

e15071 Background: Cancer of unknown primary (CUP) comprises 2-5% of all diagnosed cancers worldwide and is one of most common cause of death. Deep understanding of CUP plays an imported role in improving the disease diagnoses and finding the primary sites. In this study, our data revealed the genomic and clinical features of CUP in Chinese patients. Methods: FFPE samples and matched peripheral blood were collected for NGS based 450 cancer genes panel assay. Somatic variants were analyzed following CAP/CLIA-certificated workflows, including Single Nucleotide Variant (SNV), Copy Number Variation (CNV), large insertion and deletions (Lindel) and gene rearrangements. MSI status and TMB were also acquired by an NGS algorithm in house. PD-L1 status was analyzed by IHC. Results: Of the 264 CUP patients, 54.2% were male and median age was 61 years old (range, 2-88 years old). The median value of TMB was 4.6 muts/Mb (range, 0-61.2). Only 1 patient was found MSI-H status with the TMB value of 61.2 muts/Mb. In addition, 23.9% and 28.4% of the CUP patients presented PDL1 positive (> 1%) and PDL1 negative respectively, with others unavailable. In the patients of available stage status, they were all advanced stage (stage ≥ III). Top metastatic sites were lymphaden (17.8%), liver(15.9%) and bone (15.5%). TP53 was the most common mutated gene (62.1%), followed by KRAS (22.3%), CDKN2A (15.9%), TERT (10.2%), EGFR (9.8%) and PIK3CA (9.8%). In the alterations of KRAS, G12D, G12V and G12C were occupied 32.2%, 28.8% and 8.4% respectively. Among the alterations of EGFR, 38.5% were L858R and 19.2% were 19del. Besides, amplification of MYC (4.9%) and 11q13 (5.3%) obviously appeared in our data. Fusion/Rearrangements of ALK and ROS1 accounted for 0.8% and 1.1% respectively . The gene alterations of tyrosine kinase were found in 48.4% of CUP patients such as ALK, BRAF, EGFR, FGFR1/2/3/4, RET, ROS1 and so on. PI3K−Akt signaling pathway and MAPK signaling pathway were the most significantly pathways (fdr < 0.001) enriched in our data. A CUP patient with positive PDL1 and high TMB achieved a 9-month PFS after treatment of TP chemotherapy and immunotherapy. Conclusions: In this study, we revealed comprehensive genomic and clinical features of cancer of unknown primary site in Chinese patients. It shows promise to identify the origin anatomic site of tumor while targeted therapeutic approaches to improve outcomes.

Large-scale multi-label learning has been widely applied in daily life, such as product recommendation and search ranking. It is an important and challenging research problem for its extremely high dimensional feature space and label space. To solve the problem, this paper presents a classification algorithm based on label hierarchical compression that combined spectral clustering with principal label space transformation or conditional principal label space transformation. The algorithm compresses labels on the basis of decentralized thoughts, which has the advantage of extracting multiple characteristics of the data, making the classification of data more accurate. Experimental results show that the algorithm has a better performance than principal label space transformation or conditional principal label space transformation.

Background: Chronic liver disease is traditionally conceived as a risk factor for cardiovascular surgery. Transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) has recently burgeoned to precede surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) in patients with severe aortic stenosis at intermediate to high surgical risk. The evidence regarding TAVI in the patients with chronic liver disease is currently scarce. Methods: This article aims to assess the application of TAVI technique in the patients with chronic liver disease. Results: TAVI in the patients with chronic liver disease produced acceptable postoperative results. The post-TAVI outcomes were comparable between the patients with or without chronic liver disease, except for a lower rate of pacemaker implantation in the patients with chronic liver disease (OR, 0.49[0.27–0.87], P = .02). In the patients with chronic liver disease, compared to SAVR, TAVI led to a decrease in the in-hospital mortality (OR, 0.43[0.22–0.86], P = .02) and need for transfusion (OR, 0.39[0.25–0.62], P

Seed dormancy is a natural phenomenon in plants. It ensures that seeds complete the grain-filling stage before germination and prevents germination in unsuitable ecological conditions. In this study, we determined the previously unknown function of the rice (Oryza sativa) gene GERMIN-LIKE PROTEIN 2-1 (OsGLP2-1) in seed dormancy. Using artificial microRNA and CRISPR/CAS9 approaches, suppression of OsGLP2-1 expression in rice resulted in the release of dormancy in immature seeds. Conversely, overexpression of OsGLP2-1 driven by the OsGLP2-1 native promoter led to greater seed dormancy. Seed scutellum-specific expression of OsGLP2-1 was increased by exogenous abscisic acid, but decreased with gibberellic acid treatment. We provide evidence that OsGLP2-1 is antagonistically controlled at the transcriptional level by ABA INSENSITIVE5 and GAMYB transcription factors. We conclude that OsGLP2-1 acts as a buffer, maintaining appropriate equilibrium for the regulation of primary dormancy during seed development in rice.

INTRODUCTION Recently transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) has emerged as a feasible alternative for traditional surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) in patients with intermediate to high risk. There is currently no clear consensus regarding the optimal antiplatelet strategy after TAVR. The primary objective of this updated meta-analyses was to compare the outcomes of dual antiplatelet therapy (DAPT) versus single antiplatelet therapy (SAPT) following TAVR. EVIDENCE ACQUISITION A meta-analysis of eligible studies of patients undergoing TAVR which reported our outcomes of postoperative DAPT in comparison with SAPT, was carried out. The outcomes included the all-cause mortality, stroke, major/life-threatening bleeding, myocardial infarction and a composite endpoint of mortality, stroke, bleeding and myocardial infarction. EVIDENCE SYNTHESIS Three randomized controlled trials (RCTs, N.=421) and 5 observational studies (N.=6683) were included in this updated meta-analysis. All-cause mortality was comparable between the two groups (OR 1.13 [95% CI: 0.70-1.81], P=0.619). Besides, DAPT resulted in an augmented risk of major/life-threatening bleeding (OR 2.45 [95% CI: 1.08-5.59], P=0.032). No statistically significant difference was found between the two groups in the rates of stroke (OR 0.83 [95% CI: 0.62-1.10], P=0.212) and myocardial infarction (OR 1.17 [95% CI: 0.47-2.91], P=0.728). And DAPT led to an increased rate of the composite endpoint (OR 2.39 [95% CI: 1.63-3.50], P

Microblogs are electronic platforms that convey brief communications posted by users. Keyword searches in popular microblogs, like Twitter, reveal fragments of users' knowledge of and views on issues like climate change. Evaluations of climate change communications in the microblogosphere are rare even compared with the few studies on the impacts of Web sites and blogs on users' perceptions of climate change. However, extant research focuses more often on appraising logic and evidence in microblog discourse than in discovering pathways of influence and impact. The limiting ‘frames’ imposed by strategic users of microblogs and the persuasive power of ‘influencers’ are often depicted as interfering with the open, egalitarian potential of microblogs, and also, as perpetrating bias and misinformation. But oversimplifying or biased framings and pronouncements by celebrities are the stock and trade of microblogs. Good or bad, they are part of a communication medium whose users plunge in to exchange views, to persuade, and to be persuaded. Tweets and posts on any number of issues are fodder for attitudinal analytics and predictive modelling. Tools of the analytical trade should be applied to climate change microblogging, too, considering the sheer number of people who post commentary on this topic, and considering the continuing need to better understand how people view and engage with climate change. For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website. Conflict of interest: The authors have declared no conflicts of interest for this article.

The [Formula: see text] (SBT) nanometer film can be used as a physical memristive component. Three oscillatory circuits built on the physical SBT memristor are proposed in this paper, one is self-excited oscillatory circuit and two are forced oscillatory circuits. These three oscillatory circuits have simple structures with complex dynamics. The self-excited oscillatory circuit can generate steady periodic oscillations; the first forced oscillatory circuit can generate relatively complex quasi-periodic oscillations, while the second can generate more complex dynamics such as chaotic oscillations. The impacts of the circuit parameter and initial state values of the SBT memristor on the dynamical behaviors of the three oscillatory circuits are investigated via numerical simulations. It is found that the SBT memristor can be used to design various memristor-based circuits. Specifically, in a flux-controlled memristor-based circuit, if an inductor is in parallel with the memristor, the order of the circuit is one less than the number of energy storage elements in the circuit. The equilibrium point of the circuit is different from the typical line equilibrium for autonomous circuits. The initial state value of the memristor has no impact on the steady state of the circuit. The same phenomena are observed for a charge-controlled memristor-based circuit, when a capacitor is in series with the memristor.

Body weight and length are economical important traits in aquaculture species influenced by quantitative trait loci (QTL) and environmental factors. In this study, a backcross (BC1) common carp family, with 86 progeny, was utilized to construct genetic map for preliminary QTL mapping. The genetic map was constructed with 366 markers, including 191 SNP from gene, coverage 50 linkage groups with an average marker distance of 18.5 cM. A total of fourteen QTLs associated with body weight (BW), body length (BL) and condition factor (K) were detected on ten linkage groups (LGs). Among these QTLs detected, three (qBW8, qBL8 and qK8) were associated with BW, BL and K respectively, were mapped on LG8. qBW8 and qK8 were identified on similar interval neared locus HLJ2394 explained 14.9 and 20.9 % of the phenotype variance, while qBL8 was identified on separate nearby locus HLJ571 with 30.8 % of phenotype variance. Two QTLs, qBW13 and qK13, related with BW and K separately, were found on LG13 at different locus with phenotype variance of 25.3 and 20.9 %. Other two QTLs, qBW19 and qBL19, associated to BW and BL were mapped on same region near SNP0626 on LG19, and explained 10.3 and 15.6 % of phenotype variance. While other seven QTLs related with BW and BL were located on different LGs. Confidential interval was ranged from 1.1 to 10 cM in the present study. These markers, with lower QTL interval, have great influence on the body weight and length. Therefore, these QTLs will be helpful to find out the genes related with specific trait.

Small silencing RNAs (sRNAs) are non-coding RNA regulators that negatively regulate gene expression by guiding mRNA degradation, translation repression or chromatin modification. Plant sRNAs play crucial roles in various developmental processes, hormone signaling, immune responses and adaptation to a variety of abiotic stresses. miR441 and miR446 were previously annotated as microRNAs (miRNAs) because their precursors can form typical stem-loop structures, but are not considered as real miRNAs because of inconsistency with some ancillary criteria of the recent guidelines for annotation of plant miRNAs. We tentatively rename them small interfering (si)R441 and siR446, respectively, in this study. It has recently been shown that the precursors of siR441 and siR446 might originate from the miniature inverted-repeat transposable element (MITE) Stowaway1. In this report, we show that, in contrast with Dicer-like (DCL)3- and RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RDR)2-dependent MITE-derived ra-siRNAs, siR441 and siR446 are processed by OsDCL3a but independent of OsRDR2, indicating that siR441 and siR446 are generated from single-stranded stem-loop precursors. We also show that abscisic acid (ABA) and abiotic stresses downregulate the expression of siR441 and siR446 but, surprisingly, increase the accumulation of their precursors in rice plants, implying that processing of siRNA precursors is inhibited. We provide evidence to show that this defective processing is due to increased precursor accumulation per se, possibly by intermolecular self-pairing of the processing intermediate sequences, thus hindering their normal processing. Functional examinations indicate that siR441 and siR446 are positive regulators of rice ABA signaling and tolerance to abiotic stress, possibly by regulating MAIF1 expression.

As one of the largest gene families, F-box domain proteins have important roles in regulating various developmental processes and stress responses. In this study, we have investigated a rice F-box domain gene, MAIF1. The MAIF1 protein is mainly localized in the plasma membrane and nucleus. MAIF1 expression is induced rapidly and strongly by abscisic acid (ABA) and abiotic stresses. MAIF1 expression is also induced in root tips by sucrose, independent of its hydrolytic hexose products, glucose and fructose, and the plant hormones auxin and cytokinin. Overexpression of MAIF1 reduces rice ABA sensitivity and abiotic stress tolerance and promotes rice root growth. These results suggest that MAIF1 is involved in multiple signaling pathways in regulating root growth. Growth restraint in plants is an acclimatization strategy against abiotic stress. Our results also suggest that MAIF1 plays the negative role in response to abiotic stress possibly by regulating root growth.

SBT memristor is a physical memristor built on Sr 0.95 Ba 0.05 TiO 3 nanometer film, described by a deterministic flux-controlled mathematical model. A new physical SBT-memristor-based Chua’s circuit is presented in this paper, using the memristor to replace the Chua diode to connect with a negative conductance in parallel. The circuit can be well modeled by a fourth-order nonlinear system in the voltage-current domain and a third-order nonlinear system in the flux-charge domain, respectively. The dependences of the circuit stability on both the initial state value of the SBT memristor and the linear resistance in the circuit are analyzed theoretically, verified by numerical simulations, which shows that the circuit system has complex dynamics with multiple behaviors, including sink, periodic cycle, limit cycle, chaos, and some complicated transient dynamical behaviors. The new findings shed light on future research on the physical realization of the SBT-memristor-based Chua’s circuit and other similar devices.

In this paper, a physical SBT memristor-based chaotic circuit is presented. The circuit dynamic behavior of dependence on the initial state of the SBT memristor and a key circuit parameter are investigated by theoretical analyses and numerical simulations. The results indicate that different initial states of the SBT memristor and the key circuit parameter can significantly impact the dynamic behavior of the chaotic circuit, such as stable sink, periodic cycle, chaos, and even some complex transient dynamics. It can guide future research on the realization of chaotic circuit based on physical SBT memristor.