OsTH1 is a key player in thiamin biosynthesis in rice.

Thiamin is a vital nutrient that acts as a cofactor for several enzymes primarily localized in the mitochondria. These thiamin-dependent enzymes are involved in energy metabolism, nucleic acid biosynthesis, and antioxidant machinery. The enzyme HMP-P kinase/thiamin monophosphate synthase (TH1) holds a key position in thiamin biosynthesis, being responsible for the phosphorylation of HMP-P into HMP-PP and for the condensation of HMP-PP and HET-P to form TMP.

A UPLC-MS/MS method for quantification of metabolites in the ethylene biosynthesis pathway and its biological validation in Arabidopsis.

The plant hormone ethylene is of vital importance in the regulation of plant development and stress responses. Recent studies revealed that 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid (ACC) plays a role beyond its function as an ethylene precursor. However, the absence of reliable methods to quantify ACC and its conjugates malonyl-ACC (MACC), glutamyl-ACC (GACC), and jasmonyl-ACC (JA-ACC) hinders related research.

Mathematical kinetic modelling followed by in vitro and in vivo assays reveal the bifunctional rice GTPCHII/DHBPS enzymes and demonstrate the key roles of OsRibA proteins in the vitamin B2 pathway.

Background: Riboflavin is the precursor of several cofactors essential for normal physical and cognitive development, but only plants and some microorganisms can produce it. Humans thus rely on their dietary intake, which at a global level is mainly constituted by cereals (> 50%). Understanding the riboflavin biosynthesis players is key for advancing our knowledge on this essential pathway and can hold promise for biofortification strategies in major crop species.

Crystal Growth, Structural and Electronic Characterizations of Zero-Dimensional Metal Halide (TEP)InBr Single Crystals for X-Ray Detection.

Recently, metal halides have shown great potential for applications such as solar energy harvesting, light emission, and ionizing radiation detection. In this work, we report the preparation, structural, thermal, and electronic properties of a new zero-dimensional (0D) halide (TEP)InBr (where TEP is tetraethylphosphonium organic cation, CHP). (TEP)InBr single crystals are obtained within a few days of continuous crystal growth time via a solution growth methodology.

Graph Reasoning With Supervised Contrastive Learning for Legal Judgment Prediction.

Given the fact descriptions of legal cases, the legal judgment prediction (LJP) problem aims to determine three judgment tasks of law articles, charges, and the term of penalty. Most existing studies have considered task dependencies while neglecting the prior dependencies of labels among different tasks. Therefore, how to make better use of the information on the relation dependencies among tasks and labels becomes a crucial issue.

Multifunctional Covalent Organic Framework-Based Microneedle Patch for Melanoma Treatment.

Melanoma is resistant to conventional chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Therefore, it is essential to develop a targeted, low-toxic, and minimally invasive treatment. Here, DTIC/ICG-FeO@TpBD BSP/HA microneedles (MNs) were designed and fabricated, which can enhance targeting to melanoma and perform photothermal therapy (PTT) and chemotherapy simultaneously to synergistically exert anticancer effects.

Ultrafine FeF·0.33HO Nanocrystal-Doped Graphene Aerogel Cathode Materials for Advanced Lithium-Ion Batteries.

FeF has been extensively studied as an alternative positive material owing to its superior specific capacity and low cost, but the low conductivity, large volume variation, and slow kinetics seriously hinder its commercialization. Here, we propose the in situ growth of ultrafine FeF·0.33HO NPs on a three-dimensional reduced graphene oxide (3D RGO) aerogel with abundant pores by a facile freeze drying process followed by thermal annealing and fluorination.

Double total variation (DTV) regularization and Improved adaptive moment estimation (IADAM) optimization method for fast MR image reconstruction.

Background And Objective: Compressed sensing has been extensively studied as an advanced technique for fast MR image reconstruction. Current reconstruction algorithms often use total variation as the regularization term. Traditional total variation can easily lead to a staircase effect because it only pays attention to the variational information of the horizontal and vertical subbands.

Auxin-independent effects of apical dominance induce changes in phytohormones correlated with bud outgrowth.

The inhibition of shoot branching by the growing shoot tip of plants, termed apical dominance, was originally thought to be mediated by auxin. Recently, the importance of the shoot tip sink strength during apical dominance has re-emerged with recent studies highlighting roles for sugars in promoting branching. This raises many unanswered questions on the relative roles of auxin and sugars in apical dominance.

Sparse reconstruction of magnetic resonance image combined with two-step iteration and adaptive shrinkage factor.

As an advanced technique, compressed sensing has been used for rapid magnetic resonance imaging in recent years, Two-step Iterative Shrinkage Thresholding Algorithm (TwIST) is a popular algorithm based on Iterative Thresholding Shrinkage Algorithm (ISTA) for fast MR image reconstruction. However TwIST algorithms cannot dynamically adjust shrinkage factor according to the degree of convergence. So it is difficult to balance speed and efficiency.

Domestication and selection footprints in Persian walnuts (Juglans regia).

Walnut (Juglans) species are economically important hardwood trees cultivated worldwide for both edible nuts and high-quality wood. Broad-scale assessments of species diversity, evolutionary history, and domestication are needed to improve walnut breeding. In this study, we sequenced 309 walnut accessions from around the world, including 55 Juglans relatives, 98 wild Persian walnuts (J.

Super-Hydrophilic Microporous Ni(OH)x/Ni S Heterostructure Electrocatalyst for Large-Current-Density Hydrogen Evolution.

Exploiting active and stable non-precious metal electrocatalysts for alkaline hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) at large current density plays a key role in realizing large-scale industrial hydrogen generation. Herein, a self-supported microporous Ni(OH)x/Ni S heterostructure electrocatalyst on nickel foam (Ni(OH)x/Ni S /NF) that possesses super-hydrophilic property through an electrochemical process is rationally designed and fabricated. Benefiting from the super-hydrophilic property, microporous feature, and self-supported structure, the electrocatalyst exhibits an exceptional HER performance at large current density in 1.

Extraction and Quantification of Plant Hormones and RNA from Pea Axillary Buds.

The quantification of plant hormones and related gene expression is essential to improve the understanding of the molecular regulation of plant growth and development. However, plant hormone quantification is still challenging due to extremely low endogenous levels and high chemical diversity. In this study, we present a convenient extraction protocol that enables the simultaneous extraction of both phytohormones and RNA from the same sample in a small quantity (approximately 10 mg).

Mild Hypothermia Alleviates Complement C5a-Induced Neuronal Autophagy During Brain Ischemia-Reperfusion Injury After Cardiac Arrest.

After restoration of spontaneous circulation (ROSC) following cardiac arrest, complements can be activated and excessive autophagy can contribute to the brain ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) injury. Mild hypothermia (HT) protects against brain I/R injury after ROSC, but the mechanisms have not been fully elucidated. Here, we found that HT significantly inhibited the increases in serum NSE, S100β, and C5a, as well as neurologic deficit scores, TUNEL-positive cells, and autophagic vacuoles in the pig brain cortex after ROSC.

Engineering nickel vacancies in NiCo LDH nanoarrays accelerates hydrogen evolution and oxygen evolution reactions.

Exploring efficient bifunctional electrocatalysts is crucial for constructing water splitting systems. In this work, a bifunctional catalyst, NiCo layered double hydroxide (LDH) nanosheets with nickel vacancies, was fabricated by a hydrothermal and chemical etching method, which requires 195 and 227 mV overpotentials for HER and OER to achieve 10 mA cm and exhibited sustained activity for 100 h with almost no degradation. This study provides a new idea for the rational design of efficient non-precious metal catalysts with defects for water splitting.

Ancestral sequence reconstruction of the CYP711 family reveals functional divergence in strigolactone biosynthetic enzymes associated with gene duplication events in monocot grasses.

The strigolactone (SL) class of phytohormones shows broad chemical diversity, the functional importance of which remains to be fully elucidated, along with the enzymes responsible for the diversification of the SL structure. Here we explore the functional evolution of the highly conserved CYP711A P450 family, members of which catalyze several key monooxygenation reactions in the strigolactone pathway. Ancestral sequence reconstruction was utilized to infer ancestral CYP711A sequences based on a comprehensive set of extant CYP711 sequences.

Keyword-Based Diverse Image Retrieval With Variational Multiple Instance Graph.

The task of cross-modal image retrieval has recently attracted considerable research attention. In real-world scenarios, keyword-based queries issued by users are usually short and have broad semantics. Therefore, semantic diversity is as important as retrieval accuracy in such user-oriented services, which improves user experience.

Early high-dose continuous veno-venous hemofiltration alleviates the alterations of CD4+ T lymphocyte subsets in septic patients combined with acute kidney injury.

Background: This study aims to determine whether early high-dose continuous venous-venous hemofiltration (CVVH) alleviates the alterations in CD4 T lymphocyte subsets in septic patients combined with acute kidney injury.

Methods: Enrolled septic patients combined with acute kidney injury were randomized into CVVH (n = 50) and conventional treatment (non-CVVH, n = 53) groups. Healthy volunteers (n = 21) were enrolled.

Boron Coordination Effect in Ni-N Doped Graphene Catalysts on the ORR Performance Based on DFT Calculations.

The coordination atoms of metal active site in transition metal N-doped carbon single atom electrocatalysts play a vital role in dominating the catalytic performance of oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) at the cathode of fuel cells or metal-air cells. In view of weak adsorption ability of Ni active site in NiN -C catalysts to oxygen intermediate states, herein we introduce boron atoms with smaller electronegativity than N and C atoms to modulate the local coordination environment and electronic structures of Ni site. First-principles density functional calculations reveal that both B substitution for N atoms (NiN B -C) and B coordinating with N and C (NiN B -C) can effectively optimize the Gibbs free energy of oxygen intermediate states and hence improve the catalytic activity of the materials.

Compressively sampled magnetic resonance imaging reconstruction based on split Bregman iteration with general non-uniform threshold shrinkage.

Purpose: K-space under-sampling reconstruction technology is an effective means to improve the speed of magnetic resonance imaging. Among its many reconstruction algorithms, split Bregman iteration is an effective method to solve multi-constrained models. This model often contains TV variational regularization terms, the generalized threshold shrinkage operator often used to solve TV constraints subproblem.

Rational design of nano-FeOencapsulated in 3D honeycomb biochar for enhanced lithium storage performance.

Developing green materials applied in lithium-ion batteries is of significant importance for the present-day society. Herein, a feasible strategy to construct FeOnanoparticles (NPs) embedded in three-dimensional (3D) honeycomb biochar derived from pleurotus eryngii was proposed. The obtained material consists of FeONPs (35-85 nm) encapsulated in 3D honeycomb biochar possesses a high specific capacity of 723 mAh gat 1.

HEXOKINASE1 signalling promotes shoot branching and interacts with cytokinin and strigolactone pathways.

Plant architecture is controlled by several endogenous signals including hormones and sugars. However, only little information is known about the nature and roles of the sugar signalling pathways in this process. Here we test whether the sugar signalling pathway mediated by HEXOKINASE1 (HXK1) is involved in the control of shoot branching.

Risk factors associated with 28-day all-cause mortality in older severe COVID-19 patients in Wuhan, China: a retrospective observational study.

We aimed to analyse clinical characteristics and identify risk factors predicting all-cause mortality in older patients with severe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). A total of 281 older patients with severe COVID-19 were categorized into two age groups (60-79 years and ≥ 80 years). Epidemiological, clinical, and laboratory data, and outcome were obtained.