Cacao agroforestry adoption by smallholder farmers and forest loss prevention in the Maya Golden Landscape, Belize.

Unsustainable land use practices have led to increased forest loss rates. Implementing cacao agroforestry can reduce forest loss by preventing the clear-cutting of forests for monoculture plantations. However, research is needed on its effectiveness in preventing forest loss and the factors influencing its adoption between full-time and part-time farmers.

Standard: Human gastric cancer organoids.

Gastric cancer is one of the most common malignancies with poor prognosis. The use of organoids to simulate gastric cancer has rapidly developed over the past several years. Patient-derived gastric cancer organoids serve as in vitro models that closely mimics donor characteristics, offering new opportunities for both basic and applied research.

Vibration discomfort of supine human body exposed to whole-body vibration: effect of vibration direction and magnitude.

Supine postures are increasingly adopted in medical transport, long-duration flights, and other healthcare environments. This study is aimed to identify the effect of vibration direction and magnitude on the objective and subjective responses of the human body in a supine posture. The transmissibilities to the head, chest, abdomen, and thighs of 12 male subjects were measured with single-axis random vibrations in longitudinal ( axis), lateral ( axis), and vertical ( axis) direction at 0.

Three New Dipeptide and Two New Polyketide Derivatives from the Mangrove-Derived Fungus sp.: Antioxidant Activity of Two Isolated Substances.

Five new metabolites, including three cyclic dipeptide derivatives (-) and two new polyketides (-), together with nine known ones (- and -), were isolated from the mangrove-sediments-derived fungus sp. SCSIO 41431. Their structures were determined using detailed NMR, MS spectroscopic analyses, and quantum chemical calculations.

Therapeutic Potential of Oligo-Fucoidan in Mitigating Peritoneal Dialysis-Associated Fibrosis.

Peritoneal dialysis (PD) serves as a home-based kidney replacement therapy with increasing utilization across the globe. However, long-term use of high-glucose-based PD solution incites repeated peritoneal injury and inevitable peritoneal fibrosis, thus compromising treatment efficacy and resulting in ultrafiltration failure eventually. In the present study, we utilized human mesothelial MeT-5A cells for the in vitro experiments and a PD mouse model for in vivo validation to study the pathophysiological mechanisms underneath PD-associated peritoneal fibrosis.