Publications by authors named "XiuQing Zhang"

This study investigated the effects of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii polysaccharides (CRPs) on retarding the retrogradation of japonica rice starch (JS) and glutinous rice starch (GS). Structure characterization revealed that CRPs, with an average molecular weight of 505 kDa, mainly consisted of glucose, mannose, and galactose and featured a triple-helix structure. CRPs could reduce the storage modulus increment of JS during the cooling process by interacting with amylose, thereby inhibiting gel network formation.

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cGAS-like receptor (cGLR)-stimulator of interferon genes (STING) recently emerged as an important pathway controlling viral infections in invertebrates. However, its exact contribution at the organismal level remains uncharacterized. Here, we use STING::GFP knockin reporter Drosophila flies to document activation of the pathway in vivo.

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Pathway analysis is a crucial analytical phase in disease research on single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) data, offering biological interpretations based on prior knowledge. However, currently available tools for generating cell-level pathway activity scores (PAS) exhibit computational inefficacy in large-scale scRNA-seq datasets. Additionally, disease-related pathways are often identified through cross-condition comparisons within specific cell types, overlooking potential patterns that involve multiple cell types.

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The human gut microbiota is a vast and complex microbial community. According to statistics, the number of bacteria residing in the human intestinal tract is approximately ten times that of total human cells, with over 1000 different species. The interaction between the gut microbiota and various organ tissues plays a crucial role in the pathogenesis of local and systemic diseases, exerting a significant influence on disease progression.

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Article Synopsis
  • * It used data from 964 patients and applied nine different machine learning algorithms, ultimately finding that the random forest model performed the best and accurately predicted outcomes with an AUC of 0.903.
  • * The model is user-friendly and addresses interpretability concerns in machine learning by clearly ranking the importance of features that affect discharge outcomes.
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The HPV vaccine, which has been demonstrated to be an effective method of reducing the risk of developing cervical cancer, is still being underutilized among college students in China. To assess the current status of HPV vaccine hesitancy among college students in Guangdong Province after the COVID-19 outbreak, and to systematically analyze the influencing factors of HPV vaccine hesitancy and construct a prediction model based on the WHO 3Cs model. A cross-sectional web-based survey was conducted in June 2023 among female college students in four cities in Guangdong Province.

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Teratoma, due to its remarkable ability to differentiate into multiple cell lineages, is a valuable model for studying human embryonic development. The similarity of the gene expression and chromatin accessibility patterns in these cells to those observed in vivo further underscores its potential as a research tool. Notably, teratomas derived from human naïve (pre-implantation epiblast-like) pluripotent stem cells (PSCs) have larger embryonic cell diversity and contain extraembryonic lineages, making them more suitable to study developmental processes.

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This research investigates the impact of polysaccharides (DOP) with different molecular weights on antioxidant effects, lifespan enhancement, and obesity reduction, utilizing both in vitro analyses and the () model. Through a series of experiments-ranging from the extraction and modification of polysaccharides, Gel Permeation Chromatography (GPC), and analysis of composition to the evaluation of antioxidant capabilities, this study thoroughly examines DOP and its derivatives (DOP5, DOP15, DOP25) produced via HO-Fe degradation. The results reveal a direct relationship between the molecular weight of polysaccharides and their bioactivity.

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oil (SZSO) is a natural vegetable oil extracted from , a traditional Chinese medicine renowned for its sleep-promoting properties, while the mechanisms are still unclear. Our findings revealed that the terpenoids present in SZSO (T-SZSO) were identified as the active components responsible for promoting sleep. Network pharmacological analysis suggested that T-SZSO targeted different sleep-aid pathways to varying degrees and exhibited potential for preventing central nervous system diseases.

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The prevalence of childhood asthma and obesity is increasing, while obesity increases the risk and severity of asthma. Lipid metabolism has been considered as an important factor in the pathogenesis of obesity-associated asthma. Stearoyl-CoA desaturase 1 (SCD1) is a rate-limiting enzyme that catalyzes the production of monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFA).

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Article Synopsis
  • The study focuses on improving the quality control of neoantigen-based products by developing a sensitive mass spectrometry (MS) method to analyze antigen presentation by antigen-presenting cells (APCs).
  • The researchers optimized a targeted LC-MS/MS technique using ultra-high performance liquid chromatography (UHPLC) and established reliable quality control peptides for consistency across different APCs.
  • Validation results showed that the method met criteria for selectivity, sensitivity, and repeatability, making it a promising tool for assessing the quality of cellular products in conjunction with T-cell assays.
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Background: Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) are potential targets for cancer therapy. Due to the heterogeneity of CAFs, the influence of CAF subpopulations on the progression of lung cancer is still unclear, which impedes the translational advances in targeting CAFs.

Methods: We performed single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) on tumour, paired tumour-adjacent, and normal samples from 16 non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients.

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MXene-supported noble metal alloy catalysts exhibit remarkable electrocatalytic activity in various applications. However, there is no facile one-step method for synthesizing these catalysts, because the synthesis of MXenes requires a strongly oxidizing environment and the preparation of platinum nanoalloys requires a strongly reducing environment and high temperatures. Hence, achieving coupling in one step is extremely challenging.

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Axolotl (Ambystoma mexicanum) is an excellent model for investigating regeneration, the interaction between regenerative and developmental processes, comparative genomics, and evolution. The brain, which serves as the material basis of consciousness, learning, memory, and behavior, is the most complex and advanced organ in axolotl. The modulation of transcription factors is a crucial aspect in determining the function of diverse regions within the brain.

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Vertebrate embryogenesis is a remarkable process, during which numerous cell types of different lineages arise within a short time frame. An overwhelming challenge to understand this process is the lack of dynamic chromatin accessibility information to correlate cis-regulatory elements (CREs) and gene expression within the hierarchy of cell fate decisions. Here, we employed single-nucleus ATAC-seq to generate a chromatin accessibility dataset on the first day of zebrafish embryogenesis, including 3.

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Article Synopsis
  • Chemotherapy related cognitive impairment (CRCI) significantly affects the quality of life for breast cancer patients, prompting interest in understanding its neurobiological mechanisms.
  • Various neuroimaging techniques, like fMRI, ERP, and NIRS, have been utilized to investigate how chemotherapy impacts brain structure and function.
  • This review highlights advancements in neuroimaging research on CRCI, offering insights for future studies on its mechanisms, diagnosis, and potential interventions.
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It has been demonstrated that lignin was efficiently degraded by (). However, the process of lignin degradation and utilization by has not been discussed in detail. Therefore, the effects of lignin on mycelium growth, chemical compositions, and phenolic profiles were investigated herein.

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Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is an aggressive, malignant cancer with a complex pathogenesis. However, effective therapeutic targets and prognostic biomarkers are limited. Sorafenib provides delaying cancer progression and survival improvement in advanced HCC.

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In this work, three kinds of tungsten powders with different particle sizes were spheroidized by radio-frequency (RF) inductively coupled plasma spheroidization. The spheroidization behavior of these tungsten powders was investigated and compared. The spheroidization effects of irregular tungsten powder improves with the decrease in degree of agglomeration and increases with primary particle size.

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Understanding the phenotypic and functional diversity of cerebral cortical GABAergic neurons requires a comprehensive analysis of key transcriptional signatures and neuronal subtype identity. However, the diversity and conservation of GABAergic neurons across multiple mammals remain unclear. Here, we collected the single-nucleus RNA sequencing (snRNA-seq) datasets of cerebral cortex from human, macaque, mouse, and pig to identify the conserved neuronal cell types across species.

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Numerous studies have investigated the risk factors of Alzheimer's disease (AD); however, AD-risk factors related miRNAs were rarely reported. In this study, AD-risk factor related miRNAs of 105 Chinese individuals (45 AD patients and 60 cognitively normal controls) were investigated. The results showed that Hsa-miR-185-5p, Hsa-miR-20a-5p, and Hsa-miR-497-5p were related to AD and education, Hsa-miR-185-5p, Hsa-miR-181c-5p, Hsa-miR-664a-3p, Hsa-miR-27a-3p, Hsa-miR-451a, and Hsa-miR-320a were related to AD and depression.

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Plasma cell-free RNAs (cfRNAs) can serve as noninvasive biomarkers for the diagnosis and monitoring of diseases. However, the delay in blood processing may lead to unreliable results. Therefore, an unbiased evaluation based on the whole transcriptome under different storage conditions is needed.

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Peptide-based cancer vaccines have been shown to boost immune systems to kill tumor cells in cancer patients. However, designing an effective T cell epitope peptide-based cancer vaccine still remains a challenge and is a major hurdle for the application of cancer vaccines. In this study, we constructed for the first time a library of peptide-based cancer vaccines and their clinical attributes, named CancerVaccine (https://peptidecancervaccine.

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