Bioactive secondary metabolites isolated from the branches and leaves of Pittosporum pulchrum Gagnep.

Five new compounds, including two sesquiterpenoid glycosides (1 and 2), two monoterpenoid glycosides (3 and 4), and a quinovose ester (5), together with four known compounds (6-9) were isolated from branches and leaves of Pittosporum pulchrum Gagnep. Their structures were established by 1D and 2D NMR, HR-ESI-MS, IR and UV spectral analyses. This is the first time to investigate the chemical constituents of P.

Numerical study of the future PM concentration under climate change and best-health-effect (BHE) scenario.

The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) is one of the key areas with PM air pollution in China. Driven by the PM target accessibility of the Interim Target-1 (IT-1) by World Health Organization (WHO) and China's carbon neutrality, this study explored and quantified the contribution of climate change and anthropogenic emission to future PM in the region. The experiments considered future climate change scenarios RCP8.

Preparation and Adsorption Performance of Boron Adsorbents Derived from Modified Waste Feathers.

This research focuses on modifying discarded feathers by grafting glycidyl methacrylate (GMA) onto their surface through thiolation, followed by an epoxy ring-opening reaction with N-methyl-D-glucamine (NMDG) to synthesize feather-based boron adsorbents. Optimization of the adsorbent preparation conditions was achieved through single-factor experiments, varying temperature, time, GMA concentration, and initiator dosage. The synthesized adsorbent (F-g-GMA-NMDG) underwent characterization using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and X-ray diffraction (XRD).

Utilizing Synchrotron-Based X-ray Micro-Computed Tomography to Visualize the Microscopic Structure of Starch Hydrogels .

This study aimed to visualize the microstructures of starch hydrogels using synchrotron-based X-ray micro-computed tomography (μCT). Waxy maize starch (WMS, 3.3% amylose, db), pea starch (PS, 40.

Important roles of coarse particles in pasting and gelling performance of different pulse flours under high-temperature heating.

Dehulled pea, lentil, and faba bean grains were milled into flours with 0.5- to 2.5-mm sieves.

Clustering and Beamwidth Optimization for UAV-Assisted Wireless Communication.

With the development of wireless communication technology, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) are now widely used in many complex communication scenarios. When a UAV serves as an aerial base station for urban and rural ground users or marine users, it is necessary to consider the clustering of ground users and the energy efficiency of the UAV since the users are usually randomly distributed. For the scenario with randomly distributed ground users and different densities of ground users in urban and rural areas, a clustering and beamwidth optimization method for UAV-assisted wireless communication is proposed.

Effect of Impact Velocity and Angle on Impact Wear Behavior of Zr-4 Alloy Cladding Tube.

In the pressurized water reactor nuclear power plant, 316L SS chips were captured by the support grid and continued to affect the Zr-4 cladding tube, causing the fuel rods to wear and perforate. In this work, a 60° acute angle cone of 316L SS was used to simulate the cyclic impact of debris on a Zr-4 alloy tube with different initial impact velocities and impact angles. Results showed that increasing the initial impact velocity will generate a wear debris accumulation layer with a wear-reducing effect, but also promote the extension and expansion of fatigue cracks, resulting in the delamination of Zr-4 alloy tubes.

An Improved Transformer-Based Neural Machine Translation Strategy: Interacting-Head Attention.

Transformer-based models have gained significant advances in neural machine translation (NMT). The main component of the transformer is the multihead attention layer. In theory, more heads enhance the expressive power of the NMT model.

DAN-SuperPoint: Self-Supervised Feature Point Detection Algorithm with Dual Attention Network.

In view of the poor performance of traditional feature point detection methods in low-texture situations, we design a new self-supervised feature extraction network that can be applied to the visual odometer (VO) front-end feature extraction module based on the deep learning method. First, the network uses the feature pyramid structure to perform multi-scale feature fusion to obtain a feature map containing multi-scale information. Then, the feature map is passed through the position attention module and the channel attention module to obtain the feature dependency relationship of the spatial dimension and the channel dimension, respectively, and the weighted spatial feature map and the channel feature map are added element by element to enhance the feature representation.

Comparative Transcriptome Analysis Revealed Candidate Genes Potentially Related to Desiccation Sensitivity of Recalcitrant Seeds.

Chinese cork oak () is a widely distributed and highly valuable deciduous broadleaf tree from both ecological and economic perspectives. Seeds of this species are recalcitrant, i.e.

Complete mitochondrial genome of (Fagales, Fagaceae).

(Chinese cork oak) is an economically valuable oak as the source of industrial cork, which was widely distributed in eastern Asia. In this study, the complete mitochondrial genome of was sequenced using the Illumina Hiseq and PacBio Sequel technique. The mitogenome is 412,886 bp in length and the GC content is 45.

[Analysis of Heavy Metal Pollution and Ecological Risk Assessment on Vegetation Leaves in Baoji City].

Using seven types of vegetation and seven heavy metals (Cr, Cu, Ni, Mn, Pb, Cd, and As), the present study explored the ability of accumulation and degree of contamination in the leaves of vegetation in Binhe Road. The results demonstrated a negative trend between vegetation height and heavy metal content of vegetation leaves, i.e.

Partitioning beta diversity in a tropical karst seasonal rainforest in Southern China.

Both deterministic and stochastic processes have been linked to forest community assembly; however, their contribution to beta diversity has not been properly explored, and no studies to date have investigated their impacts on sparse depleted soils in forests that contain widespread exposed limestone karst. We found that the pairwise differences in species composition between quadrates was determined by a balanced variation in abundance, whereby the individuals of some species at one site were substituted by an equivalent number of individuals of different species at another site. Both the total beta diversity and its balanced variation in abundance declined with increasing sampling grain size.

Starch structure in developing kiwifruit.

Starch is the major component of kiwifruit at the time of commercial harvesting. The structural changes of starches from 2 kiwifruit varieties (Hayward and Gold3) at different growing stages up to commercial harvesting time were studied. During the fruit growth, the starch content (dry weight basis) increased from ~2% to 46% (Hayward) and 58% (Gold3) and the starch granules enlarged from 4 to 10 μm.

Characterization of polymer chain fractions of kiwifruit starch.

In this report, the amylose composition and molecular structure of starches from the core and outer pericarp of 3 golden kiwifruit varieties were characterised, using enzymatic and chromatographic techniques. Starches from the core tissues of kiwifruit tend to have higher amylose contents (by ∼3-5%) and longer unit chains of both amylopectins and their φ, β-limit dextrins (LDs) than those of the outer pericarp starches. The contents of short B-chains of the φ, β-LDs of amylopectins from the outer pericarp were higher (by ∼3%) than those of φ, β-LDs of the core amylopectins.

Physicochemical properties of kiwifruit starch.

Three varieties of golden kiwifruit (Actinidia chinensis) (Gold3, Gold9 and Hort16A) were collected at the commercial harvesting time, and physicochemical properties of starches from core and outer pericarp were studied. Starch contents (dry weight basis) in outer pericarp and core tissues ranged from 38.6 to 51.

The Suppressive Effects of Cinnamomi Cortex and Its Phytocompound Coumarin on Oxaliplatin-Induced Neuropathic Cold Allodynia in Rats.

Oxaliplatin, a chemotherapy drug, induces acute peripheral neuropathy characterized by cold allodynia, spinal glial activation and increased levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines. Herein, we determined whether Cinnamomi Cortex (C. Cortex), a widely used medicinal herb in East Asia for cold-related diseases, could attenuate oxaliplatin-induced cold allodynia in rats and the mechanisms involved.

Preventive Effects of Bee Venom Derived Phospholipase A₂ on Oxaliplatin-Induced Neuropathic Pain in Mice.

Oxaliplatin, a chemotherapy drug used to treat colorectal cancer, induces specific sensory neurotoxicity signs that are aggravated by cold and mechanical stimuli. Here we examined the preventive effects of Bee Venom (BV) derived phospholipase A₂ (bvPLA₂) on oxaliplatin-induced neuropathic pain in mice and its immunological mechanism. The cold and mechanical allodynia signs were evaluated by acetone and von Frey hair test on the hind paw, respectively.

Analgesic Effects of Bee Venom Derived Phospholipase A(2) in a Mouse Model of Oxaliplatin-Induced Neuropathic Pain.

A single infusion of oxaliplatin, which is widely used to treat metastatic colorectal cancer, induces specific sensory neurotoxicity signs that are triggered or aggravated when exposed to cold or mechanical stimuli. Bee Venom (BV) has been traditionally used in Korea to treat various pain symptoms. Our recent study demonstrated that BV alleviates oxaliplatin-induced cold allodynia in rats, via noradrenergic and serotonergic analgesic pathways.

Oxygen consumption by bovine granulosa cells with prediction of oxygen transport in preantral follicles.

The rate of oxygen consumption by granulosa cells is a key parameter in mathematical models that describe oxygen transport across ovarian follicles. This work measured the oxygen consumption rate of bovine granulosa cells in vitro to be in the range 2.1-3.

A novel method for modifying AFM probe to investigate the interaction between biomaterial polymers (chitosan-coated PLGA) and mucin film.

A new method for modifying atomic force microscope (AFM) probe with polymer was proposed to estimate the interaction between Chitosan (CS)-coated poly (lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) polymer and mucin film. In this method, the mixture of polymers and its suitable volatile dissolvent were deposited on the AFM probe tip through a micropipette controlled by micromanipulator. After being dried, the polymer film forms on the probe tip.