Detrital and authigenic clay minerals in shales: A review on their identification and applications.

Clay minerals are widely distributed and are important components in sedimentary rocks. The identification and quantification of detrital and authigenic clay minerals have been hot topics recently due to the needs of petroleum geology, paleoclimate, and sedimentary history research. Detrital clay minerals exhibit the phenomenon of discrete grain boundaries, while authigenic clay minerals have various specific particle shapes.

Dietary β-hydroxybutyric acid improves the growth performance of young ruminants based on rumen microbiota and volatile fatty acid biosynthesis.

Introduction: The ketone body β-hydroxybutyric acid (BHB) plays critical roles in cellular proliferation and metabolic fuel utilization; however, its effects on the rumen microbiota remain unknown.

Methods: Here, three doses of BHB (low, medium, and high) were supplemented to early-weaned goat kids.

Results: Compared with controls, the beneficial effects of BHB on growth and rumen development were observed in goats at 90 days of age (d).

Bupleurum chinense exerts a mild antipyretic effect on LPS-induced pyrexia rats involving inhibition of peripheral TNF-α production.

Ethnopharmacological Relevance: Bupleuri Radix, the dried roots of Bupleurum chinense DC. (BC) or Bupleurum scorzonerifolium Willd., is one of the most frequently used traditional Chinese medicines.

Scalable high yield exfoliation for monolayer nanosheets.

Although two-dimensional (2D) materials have grown into an extended family that accommodates hundreds of members and have demonstrated promising advantages in many fields, their practical applications are still hindered by the lack of scalable high-yield production of monolayer products. Here, we show that scalable production of monolayer nanosheets can be achieved by a facile ball-milling exfoliation method with the assistance of viscous polyethyleneimine (PEI) liquid. As a demonstration, graphite is effectively exfoliated into graphene nanosheets, achieving a high monolayer percentage of 97.

Comparison and selection of probiotic from human intestinal tract and traditional fermented food in vitro via PCA, unsupervised clustering algorithm, and heat-map analysis.

Traditional fermented products and human intestines are rich sources of strains which may have remarkable probiotic properties. In the present study, the probiotic properties of 40 strains isolated from intestinal tracts of longevity population and traditional fermented food in China were determined, including the survival rates in simulated gastric acid and bile salt, aggregation, hydrophobicity, adhesion rate, antioxidant ability (ferric reducing antioxidant power), and antimicrobial ability. The differences between human strains and nonhuman strains were compared via -test and principal component analysis (PCA).

Resibufogenin, one of bufadienolides in toad venom, suppresses LPS-induced inflammation via inhibiting NF-κB and AP-1 pathways.

Toad venom is a traditional Chinese medicine that has a long history in treating infectious and inflammatory diseases, such as carbuncle, pharyngitis. As one of the major active components in toad venom, resibufogenin (RBG) possesses a variety of pharmacological activities, including lowering blood pressure, reducing proteinuria and preventing oxidative stress. But only its antitumor activity attracts widespread attention in these years.

Anti-oxidative and anti-inflammatory activities of the ethanol extract of edible flower from .

Chimonanthi Praecocis Flos, namely wintersweet flower, is the edible flower or flower bud of (L.) Link which is a deciduous shrub plant originated from China and is widely cultivated as a garden or ornamental plant all over the world. However, few studies focused on its anti-inflammatory property.

A comparative study of spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 and its variant Omicron (B.1.1.529) on some immune characteristics.

The emergence of Omicron variant raises great concerns because of its rapid transmissibility and its numerous mutations in spike protein (S-protein). S-protein can act as a pathogen-associated molecular pattern and complement activator as well as antigen. We compared some immune characteristics of trimer S-proteins for wild type (WT-S) and B.

MAPKs/AP-1, not NF-κB, is responsible for MCP-1 production in TNF-α-activated adipocytes.

Obesity is associated with the infiltration of monocytes/macrophages into adipose tissue in which MCP-1 plays a crucial role. But the regulatory mechanism of MCP-1 expression in adipocytes is not well defined. Our results demonstrated that TNF-α induced abundant MCP-1 production in adipocytes, including 3T3-L1 pre- (≈ 9 to 18-fold), mature adipocytes (≈ 4 to 6-fold), and primary adipocytes(< 2-fold), among which 3T3-L1 pre-adipocytes showed the best reactiveness.

Study on sustainable developments in Guangdong Province from 2013 to 2018 based on an improved ecological footprint model.

Aiming at the ecological footprint model, the traditional trade adjustment method only considered the international trade process at the urban scale, ignoring the trade footprint generated by domestic trade and indirect trade in various products. This paper adopts the urban-scale ecological footprint model based on the macro-trade adjustment method to calculate the trade adjustment coefficient of biological products and the energy trade adjustment coefficient respectively to correct the trade footprint. The results showed that the per capita ecological deficit showed a straight upward trend, from 0.

Compound Kushen Injection Induces Immediate Hypersensitivity Reaction Through Promoting the Production of Platelet-Activating Factor via Pathway.

Compound Kushen Injection (CKI) is a herbal formulation extracted from Kushen (Radix Sophorae Flavescentis) and Baituling (Rhizoma Heterosmilacis Yunnanensis). Clinically, it is used as the adjuvant treatment of cancer. However, with the increased application, the cases of immediate hypersensitivity reactions (IHRs) also gradually rise.

Elevated visceral fat area is associated with adverse postoperative outcome of radical colectomy for colon adenocarcinoma patients.

Objective: To assess the impact of visceral obesity quantified by preoperative computed tomography on short-term postoperative outcomes compared with body mass index (BMI) in stage I-III colon adenocarcinoma patients.

Methods: In this retrospective study, 107 patients treated with radical colectomy for stage I-III colon adenocarcinoma were classified as obese or non-obese by computed tomography-based measures or BMI (obese: BMI ≥28 kg/m , visceral fat area (VFA) to subcutaneous fat area ratio (V/S) ≥0.4, and VFA ≥100 cm ).

Comparison of sorption kinetics of PAHs by sorptive sinks and caco-2 cell and the correlation between bioaccessibility and bioavailability of PAHs in indoor dust.

Sorptive sinks are extensively used in the bioaccessibility of organic contaminants, but their suitability for simulating the intestinal cell is seldom reported. In the present study, the sorption efficiency of PAHs by sorptive sinks including silica, poly(ethylene-co-vinyl acetate) (polyE), tenax, and C18 were compared with that by caco-2 cells. The elimination rate constants of phenanthrene, fluoranthene, pyrene, benzo(a)pyrene by caco-2 cell were 0.

Quantitative proteomic analysis of serum from pregnant women carrying a fetus with conotruncal heart defect using isobaric tags for relative and absolute quantitation (iTRAQ) labeling.

Objective: To identify differentially expressed proteins from serum of pregnant women carrying a conotruncal heart defects (CTD) fetus, using proteomic analysis.

Methods: The study was conducted using a nested case-control design. The 5473 maternal serum samples were collected at 14-18 weeks of gestation.

Open-field arena boundary is a primary object of exploration for Drosophila.

Drosophila adults, when placed into a novel open-field arena, initially exhibit an elevated level of activity followed by a reduced stable level of spontaneous activity and spend a majority of time near the arena edge, executing motions along the walls. In order to determine the environmental features that are responsible for the initial high activity and wall-following behavior exhibited during exploration, we examined wild-type and visually impaired mutants in arenas with different vertical surfaces. These experiments support the conclusion that the wall-following behavior of Drosophila is best characterized by a preference for the arena boundary, and not thigmotaxis or centrophobicity.

Identification of novel candidate maternal serum protein markers for Down syndrome by integrated proteomic and bioinformatic analysis.

Objective: This study aimed to identify candidate protein biomarkers from maternal serum for Down syndrome (DS) by integrated proteomic and bioinformatics analysis.

Methods: A pregnancy DS group of 18 women and a control group with the same number were prepared, and the maternal serum proteins were analyzed by isobaric tags for relative and absolute quantitation and mass spectrometry, to identify DS differentially expressed maternal serum proteins (DS-DEMSPs). Comprehensive bioinformatics analysis was then employed to analyze DS-DEMSPs both in this paper and seven related publications.