Electroacupuncture improves peripheral neuropathy by up-regulating Sirt1/PGC-1α/TFAM pathway in type 2 diabetes rats with peripheral neuropathy.

Objectives: To observe the effect of electroacupuncture (EA) on activation of silent information regulator 1 (Sirt1)/peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ coactivator 1α (PGC-1α)/mitochondrial transcription factor A (TFAM) pathway in type 2 diabetes (T2DM) rats with peripheral neuropathy (DPN) , so as to explore its possible mechanisms underlying improvement of DPN.

Methods: Thirty male SD rats were randomly divided into blank control group (=8) and DPN model group (=22) which were further divided into model group (=8) and EA group (=8) after successful modeling. The model of T2DM was established by high-fat diet and low-dose intraperitoneal injection of streptozocin (35 mg/kg).

Diabetic foot ulcers: Classification, risk factors and management.

Diabetic foot ulceration is a devastating complication of diabetes that is associated with infection, amputation, and death, and is affecting increasing numbers of patients with diabetes mellitus. The pathogenesis of foot ulcers is complex, and different factors play major roles in different stages. The refractory nature of foot ulcer is reflected in that even after healing there is still a high recurrence rate and amputation rate, which means that management and nursing plans need to be considered carefully.

Earliest evolution of multituberculate mammals revealed by a new Jurassic fossil.

Multituberculates were successful herbivorous mammals and were more diverse and numerically abundant than any other mammal groups in Mesozoic ecosystems. The clade also developed diverse locomotor adaptations in the Cretaceous and Paleogene. We report a new fossil skeleton from the Late Jurassic of China that belongs to the basalmost multituberculate family.

A Jurassic eutherian mammal and divergence of marsupials and placentals.

Placentals are the most abundant mammals that have diversified into every niche for vertebrates and dominated the world's terrestrial biotas in the Cenozoic. A critical event in mammalian history is the divergence of eutherians, the clade inclusive of all living placentals, from the metatherian-marsupial clade. Here we report the discovery of a new eutherian of 160 Myr from the Jurassic of China, which extends the first appearance of the eutherian-placental clade by about 35 Myr from the previous record, reducing and resolving a discrepancy between the previous fossil record and the molecular estimate for the placental-marsupial divergence.

Evolutionary development of the middle ear in Mesozoic therian mammals.

The definitive mammalian middle ear (DMME) is defined by the loss of embryonic Meckel's cartilage and disconnection of the middle ear from the mandible in adults. It is a major feature distinguishing living mammals from nonmammalian vertebrates. We report a Cretaceous trechnotherian mammal with an ossified Meckel's cartilage in the adult, showing that homoplastic evolution of the DMME occurred in derived therian mammals, besides the known cases of eutriconodonts.

Convergent dental adaptations in pseudo-tribosphenic and tribosphenic mammals.

Tribosphenic molars of basal marsupials and placentals are a major adaptation, with the protocone (pestle) of the upper molar crushing and grinding in the talonid basin (mortar) on the lower molar. The extinct pseudo-tribosphenic mammals have a reversed tribosphenic molar in which a pseudo-talonid is anterior to the trigonid, to receive the pseudo-protocone of the upper molar. The pseudo-protocone is analogous to the protocone, but the anteriorly placed pseudo-talonid is opposite to the posterior talonid basin of true tribosphenic mammals.

A nearly modern amphibious bird from the Early Cretaceous of northwestern China.

Three-dimensional specimens of the volant fossil bird Gansus yumenensis from the Early Cretaceous Xiagou Formation of northwestern China demonstrate that this taxon possesses advanced anatomical features previously known only in Late Cretaceous and Cenozoic ornithuran birds. Phylogenetic analysis recovers Gansus within the Ornithurae, making it the oldest known member of the clade. The Xiagou Formation preserves the oldest known ornithuromorph-dominated avian assemblage.

A swimming mammaliaform from the Middle Jurassic and ecomorphological diversification of early mammals.

A docodontan mammaliaform from the Middle Jurassic of China possesses swimming and burrowing skeletal adaptations and some dental features for aquatic feeding. It is the most primitive taxon in the mammalian lineage known to have fur and has a broad, flattened, partly scaly tail analogous to that of modern beavers. We infer that docodontans were semiaquatic, convergent to the modern platypus and many Cenozoic placentals.

Palaeontology: pterosaur egg with a leathery shell.

The recent discovery of a pterosaur egg with embryonic skeleton and soft tissues from the Yixian Formation confirmed that the flying pterosaurs were oviparous. Here we describe another pterosaur egg whose exquisite preservation indicates that the shell structure was soft and leathery.

An Early Cretaceous tribosphenic mammal and metatherian evolution.

Derived features of a new boreosphenidan mammal from the Lower Cretaceous Yixian Formation of China suggest that it has a closer relationship to metatherians (including extant marsupials) than to eutherians (including extant placentals). This fossil dates to 125 million years ago and extends the record of marsupial relatives with skeletal remains by 50 million years. It also has many foot structures known only from climbing and tree-living extant mammals, suggesting that early crown therians exploited diverse niches.

The earliest known eutherian mammal.

The skeleton of a eutherian (placental) mammal has been discovered from the Lower Cretaceous Yixian Formation of northeastern China. We estimate its age to be about 125 million years (Myr), extending the date of the oldest eutherian records with skull and skeleton by about 40 50 Myr. Our analyses place the new fossil at the root of the eutherian tree and among the four other known Early Cretaceous eutherians, and suggest an earlier and greater diversification of stem eutherians that occurred well before the molecular estimate for the diversification of extant placental superorders (104 64 Myr).