Rethinking Noise Sampling in Class-Imbalanced Diffusion Models.

In the practical application of image generation, dealing with long-tailed data distributions is a common challenge for diffusion-based generative models. To tackle this issue, we investigate the head-class accumulation effect in diffusion models' latent space, particularly focusing on its correlation to the noise sampling strategy. Our experimental analysis indicates that employing a consistent sampling distribution for the noise prior across all classes leads to a significant bias towards head classes in the noise sampling distribution, which results in poor quality and diversity of the generated images.

Causality-Invariant Interactive Mining for Cross-Modal Similarity Learning.

In the real world, how to effectively learn consistent similarity measurement across different modalities is essential. Most of the existing similarity learning methods cannot deal well with cross-modal data due to the modality gap and have obvious performance degeneration when applied to cross-modal data. To tackle this problem, we propose a novel cross-modal similarity learning method, called Causality-Invariant Interactive Mining (CIIM), that can effectively capture informative relationships among different samples and modalities to derive the modality-consistent feature embeddings in the unified metric space.

The mA reader IGF2BP2 regulates glycolytic metabolism and mediates histone lactylation to enhance hepatic stellate cell activation and liver fibrosis.

Evidence for the involvement of N-Methyladenosine (mA) modification in the etiology and progression of liver fibrosis has emerged and holds promise as a therapeutic target. Insulin-like growth factor 2 (IGF2) mRNA-binding protein 2 (IGF2BP2) is a newly identified mA-binding protein that functions to enhance mRNA stability and translation. However, its role as an mA-binding protein in liver fibrosis remains elusive.

Adaptive Hierarchical Similarity Metric Learning With Noisy Labels.

Deep Metric Learning (DML) plays a critical role in various machine learning tasks. However, most existing deep metric learning methods with binary similarity are sensitive to noisy labels, which are widely present in real-world data. Since these noisy labels often cause a severe performance degradation, it is crucial to enhance the robustness and generalization ability of DML.

The Antimicrobial Peptide Melectin Shows Both Antimicrobial and Antitumor Activity via Membrane Interference and DNA Binding.

Purpose: Increasingly complex diseases require novel drugs for their treatment. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are promising candidate treatments due to their broad existence and special characteristics. However, the current understanding of AMPs is not sufficient to allow them to be produced commercially for clinical use.

Female age affects the utility of sperm DNA fragmentation in predicting IVF and ICSI outcomes.

Research Question: The aim of this study was to investigate how female age affects the predictive effect of sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI) on clinical outcomes with assisted reproductive technology.

Design: A total of 2371 patients, comprising 2115 men with a normal DFI (≤30), 256 men with a high DFI (>30) and women of different ages, were recruited and investigated. All patients had normal chromosome karyotypes and were undergoing their first fresh IVF or intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) cycles.

Identifying Imaging Markers for Predicting Cognitive Assessments Using Wasserstein Distances Based Matrix Regression.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a severe type of neurodegeneration which worsens human memory, thinking and cognition along a temporal continuum. How to identify the informative phenotypic neuroimaging markers and accurately predict cognitive assessment are crucial for early detection and diagnosis Alzheimer's disease. Regression models are widely used to predict the relationship between imaging biomarkers and cognitive assessment, and identify discriminative neuroimaging markers.

Arminin 1a-C, a novel antimicrobial peptide from ancient metazoan , shows potent antileukemia activity against drug-sensitive and drug-resistant leukemia cells.

Purpose: Due to the emergence of multidrug resistance (MDR), traditional antileukemia drugs no longer meet the treatment needs. Therefore, new antileukemia drugs with different action mechanisms are urgently needed to cope with this situation.

Materials And Methods: Arminin 1a-C is an antimicrobial peptide (AMP) developed from the ancient metazoan marine .

NK-18, a promising antimicrobial peptide: anti-multidrug resistant leukemia cells and LPS neutralizing properties.

With the increase of multidrug resistance, novel anti-leukemia agents with diverse mechanisms of action are required to address this challenge. NK-18, the core region of mammalian derived protein NK-lysin, effectively inhibited the viability of both multidrug resistant and sensitive leukemia cell lines. Meanwhile, this proliferation inhibition effect was not distinct between sensitive and multidrug resistant leukemia cell line.

Influence of Proline Substitution on the Bioactivity of Mammalian-Derived Antimicrobial Peptide NK-2.

Multidrug-resistant bacteria are emerging as a global threat, making the search for alternative compounds urgent. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) became a promising hotspot due to their distinct action mechanism and possibility to be used as an alternative or complement to traditional antibiotics. However, gaining a better understanding about the relationship between antimicrobial peptides structure and its bioactivity is crucial for the development of next generation of antimicrobial agents.

Quercetin inhibits human sperm functions by reducing sperm [Ca2+]i and tyrosine phosphorylation.

Quercetin is widely known as potent natural antioxidant and scavenger of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and nitric oxide both in vitro and in vivo. Quercetin has a wide range of biological functions and health-promoting effects. There are more and more interests in the addition of this flavonol to various traditional food products.

Antifungal effect and action mechanism of antimicrobial peptide polybia-CP.

The incidence of life-threatening invasive fungal infections increased significantly in recent years. However, the antifungal therapeutic options are very limited. Antimicrobial peptides are a class of potential lead chemical for the development of novel antifungal agents.

Antimicrobial activities and membrane-active mechanism of CPF-C1 against multidrug-resistant bacteria, a novel antimicrobial peptide derived from skin secretions of the tetraploid frog Xenopus clivii.

Hospital-acquired infections caused by multidrug-resistant bacteria pose significant challenges for treatment, which necessitate the development of new antibiotics. Antimicrobial peptides are considered potential alternatives to conventional antibiotics. The skin of Anurans (frogs and toads) amphibians is an extraordinarily rich source of antimicrobial peptides.

Dual antifungal properties of cationic antimicrobial peptides polybia-MPI: membrane integrity disruption and inhibition of biofilm formation.

With the increasing emergence of resistant fungi, the discovery and development of novel antifungal therapeutics were urgently needed. Compared with conventional antibiotics, the limited propensity of AMPs to induce resistance in pathogens has attracted great interest. In the present study, the antifungal activity and its mechanism-of-action of polybia-MPI, a cationic peptide from the venom of Social wasp Polybia Paulista was investigated.

Membrane perturbation action mode and structure-activity relationships of Protonectin, a novel antimicrobial peptide from the venom of the neotropical social wasp Agelaia pallipes pallipes.

With the extensive use of antibiotics, multidrug-resistant bacteria emerge frequently. New antimicrobial agents with novel modes of action are urgently needed. It is now widely accepted that antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) could be promising alternatives to conventional antibiotics.

Membrane active antimicrobial activity and molecular dynamics study of a novel cationic antimicrobial peptide polybia-MPI, from the venom of Polybia paulista.

As the frequent emergence of the resistant bacteria, the development of new agents with a new action mode attracts a great deal of interest. It is now widely accepted that antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are promising alternatives to conventional antibiotics. In this study, antimicrobial peptide polybia-MPI and its analogs were synthesized and their antibacterial activity was studied.

Two hits are better than one: membrane-active and DNA binding-related double-action mechanism of NK-18, a novel antimicrobial peptide derived from mammalian NK-lysin.

The extensive use and misuse of antibiotics in medicine result in the emergence of multidrug-resistant bacteria, creating an urgent need for the development of new chemotherapeutic agents. Nowadays, antimicrobial peptides are widely recognized as a class of promising candidates with activity against multidrug-resistant bacteria. NK-18 is a truncated peptide derived from NK-Lysin, an effector of cytotoxic T cells and natural killer cells.

Membrane-active action mode of polybia-CP, a novel antimicrobial peptide isolated from the venom of Polybia paulista.

The extensive use of antibiotics in medicine, the food industry, and agriculture has resulted in the frequent emergence of multidrug-resistant bacteria, which creates an urgent need for new antibiotics. It is now widely recognized that antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) could play a promising role in fighting multidrug-resistant bacteria. Antimicrobial peptide polybia-CP was purified from the venom of the social wasp Polybia paulista.

One-pot enantioselective synthesis of functionalized pyranocoumarins and 2-amino-4H-chromenes: discovery of a type of potent antibacterial agent.

Function-oriented design and synthesis of chiral small molecules with novel activity is a key goal in modern organic chemistry. As multiple antibiotic-resistant pathogens are emerging and causing serious diseases, the need for practical routes for the development of new types of antibacterial agents is very urgent. Herein, we present a highly efficient process for the synthesis of optically active pyranocoumarins and 2-amino-4H-chromenes through an organocatalytic Knoevenagel/Michael/cyclization sequence, and the preliminary biological studies of these new heterocyclic compounds revealed potent antibacterial activity.

Membrane active antitumor activity of NK-18, a mammalian NK-lysin-derived cationic antimicrobial peptide.

As the increasing emergence of multi-drug resistant tumor cells, there is an urgent need for developing new chemotherapeutic agents. NK-lysin was a novel effector of cytotoxic T cells and natural killer (NK) cells and had broad antimicrobial activity. In this study, we developed a core region of NK-lysin termed NK-18, and studied its antitumor activity and possible action mode.

Novel cytotoxity exhibition mode of polybia-CP, a novel antimicrobial peptide from the venom of the social wasp Polybia paulista.

Antimicrobial peptide polybia-CP was purified from the venom of the social wasp Polybia paulista. It has an amphipathic sequence ILGTILGLLKSL-NH(2) and possesses potent antimicrobial activity against both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. In this study we synthesized polybia-CP, studied its cytotoxity on tumor cells and proposed its possible mechanism.

A novel analog of antimicrobial peptide Polybia-MPI, with thioamide bond substitution, exhibits increased therapeutic efficacy against cancer and diminished toxicity in mice.

Polybia-MPI (MPI), a short cationic α-helical antimicrobial peptide, exhibited excellent anticancer activity and selectivity in vitro in our previous studies. To improve its in vivo application, we synthesized an analog (MPI-1) of MPI by replacing the C terminal amide -[CO-NH(2)] with thioamide -ψ[CS-NH(2)]. Although there is just one atom difference, the MPI-1 exhibited some surprising properties.

In vitro and in vivo antitumor effects of novel actinomycin D analogs with amino acid substituted in the cyclic depsipeptides.

The actinomycin D (AMD) analogs in which the D-valine residues (the second amino acid residue in the cyclic depsipeptide of AMD) and the N-methyl-L-valine residues (the fifth amino acid residue in the cyclic depsipeptide of AMD) were replaced with D-Phe or l- and D-forms N-methylvalines, N-methylisoleucine, N-methylleucine, N-methylphenylalanine, N-methylalanine, and sarcosine were synthesized. The antimicrobial activity and cytotoxic activities of these compounds in vitro were investigated. The results showed that most D-valine substituted analogs had much lower antimicrobial activity and cytotoxic activities in vitro than AMD itself, but three N-methyl-L-valine substituted analogs had comparable or even more remarkable cytotoxic activities in vitro than AMD.

Novel mode of action of polybia-MPI, a novel antimicrobial peptide, in multi-drug resistant leukemic cells.

As the frequent emergency of resistant tumor cells during treatment, the development of new agents with new modes of action attracts a great deal of interest. Polybia-MPI was a short cationic alpha-helical amphiphilic peptide that has selective toxicity toward cancer cells but no hemolytic activity. Its target selectivity is based on the binding preference to membranes containing anionic phospholipids by electrostatic driving.