Silibinin attenuates TGF-β2-induced fibrogenic changes in human trabecular meshwork cells by targeting JAK2/STAT3 and PI3K/AKT signaling pathways.

Transforming growth factor-β2 (TGF-β2) induced fibrogenic changes in human trabecular meshwork (HTM) cells have been implicated in trabecular meshwork (TM) damage and intraocular pressure (IOP) elevation in primary open-angle glaucoma (POAG) patients. Silibinin (SIL) exhibited anti-fibrotic properties in various organs and tissues. This study aimed to assess the effects of SIL on the TGF-β2-treated HTM cells and to elucidate the underlying mechanisms.

Synthesis of MXene-based nanocomposite electrode supported by PEDOT:PSS-modified cotton fabric for high-performance wearable supercapacitor.

The rapid development of wearable and portable electronic devices prompts the ever-growing demand for wearable, flexible, and light-weight power sources. In this work, a MXene/GNS/PPy@PEDOT/Cotton nanocomposite electrode with excellent electrochemical performances was fabricated using cotton fabric as a substrate. Poly (3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene): poly (styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) was coated on the cotton fabric to obtain a conductive substrate through a controllable dip-drying coating process, while a nanocomposite consisting of MXene, Graphene nanoscroll (GNS), and polypyrrole (PPy) was directly synthesized and deposited on the PEDOT:PSS-modified cotton fabric via a one-step in situ polymerization method.

Overexpression of NtLHT1 affects the development of leaf morphology and abiotic tolerance in tobacco.

LYSINE HISTIDINE TRANSPORTER1 (LHT1) is a crucial broad-specificity and high-affinity amino acid transporter affecting the uptake of nitrogen and probably the tolerance to abiotic stress in plants. However, little is known about the phenotypic functions of LHT1 in plant growth and development and abiotic stress tolerance. In this study, we identified the NtLHT1 gene from the tobacco variety Honghuadajinyuan (HD) and determined its important roles in leaf morphological development and plant resistance to abiotic stress.

Differential effects of cow dung and its biochar on soil phosphorus effectiveness, bacterial community diversity and functional genes for phosphorus conversion.

Introduction: Continuous monoculture leading to soil nutrient depletion may cause a decline in plantation productivity. Cow dung is typically used as a cheap renewable resource to improve soil nutrient status. In this study, our purpose was to compare the effects of different cow dung return methods (direct return and carbonization return) on soil microbial communities and phosphorus availability in the root zone (rhizosphere soil and non-rhizosphere soil) of seedlings in forest gardens and to explore possible chemical and microbial mechanisms.

High-throughput creation of Nicotiana tabacum gene-targeted mutants based on CRISPR/Cas9.

4382 available sgRNAs targeting 1060 tobacco genes were obtained, and 10,682 targeted mutants were created using high-throughput methods. Four optimization experiments were established to solve problems encountered during genetic transformation.

An Overview of Cognitive Radio Technology and Its Applications in Civil Aviation.

This paper provides an overview of cognitive radio technology and its applications in the field of civil aviation. Cognitive radio technology is a relatively new and emerging field that allows for dynamic spectrum access and efficient use of spectrum resources. In the context of civil aviation, cognitive radio technology has the potential to enable more efficient use of the limited radio spectrum available for communication and navigation purposes.

Prediction of spatial distribution characteristics of ecosystem functions based on a minimum data set of functional traits of desert plants.

The relationship between plant functional traits and ecosystem function is a hot topic in current ecological research, and community-level traits based on individual plant functional traits play important roles in ecosystem function. In temperate desert ecosystems, which functional trait to use to predict ecosystem function is an important scientific question. In this study, the minimum data sets of functional traits of woody (wMDS) and herbaceous (hMDS) plants were constructed and used to predict the spatial distribution of C, N, and P cycling in ecosystems.

Co-exposure of polystyrene microplastics influence cadmium trophic transfer along the "lettuce-snail" food chain: Focus on leaf age and the chemical fractionations of Cd in lettuce.

Cadmium (Cd) and polystyrene microplastics (PS) co-contamination always occurs in environment; however, the trophic transfer of Cd and PS is still poorly understood. A hydroponic experiment was conducted to investigate the behavior of Cd in lettuce, together with the root or foliar exposure of different sized PS. Accumulation and chemical form distributions of Cd in leaves were distinguished into young and mature leaves.

Inference in High-Dimensional Online Changepoint Detection.

We introduce and study two new inferential challenges associated with the sequential detection of change in a high-dimensional mean vector. First, we seek a confidence interval for the changepoint, and second, we estimate the set of indices of coordinates in which the mean changes. We propose an online algorithm that produces an interval with guaranteed nominal coverage, and whose length is, with high probability, of the same order as the average detection delay, up to a logarithmic factor.

Microplastics and microorganisms in sediments from stormwater drain system.

Research has already confirmed the occurrence of microplastics (MPs) in sediments of stormwater drain system (SDS). However, the microplastic pollution remains to be elucidated well in sediments, especially the spatio-temporal distribution and the impacts of MPs on microorganisms. In this study, the averaged abundance of MPs in SDS sediments was 479 ± 688 items·kg for spring, 257 ± 93 items·kg for summer, 306 ± 227 items·kg for autumn and 652 ± 413 items·kg for winter.

Autotoxins in continuous tobacco cropping soils and their management.

Tobacco belongs to the family Solanaceae, which easily forms continuous cropping obstacles. Continuous cropping exacerbates the accumulation of autotoxins in tobacco rhizospheric soil, affects the normal metabolism and growth of plants, changes soil microecology, and severely reduces the yield and quality of tobacco. In this study, the types and composition of tobacco autotoxins under continuous cropping systems are summarized, and a model is proposed, suggesting that autotoxins can cause toxicity to tobacco plants at the cell level, plant-growth level, and physiological process level, negatively affecting soil microbial life activities, population number, and community structure and disrupting soil microecology.

Sugar transporter ZmSWEET1b is responsible for assimilate allocation and salt stress response in maize.

Sugar efflux transporter SWEET family is involved in multiple biological processes, from nectar secretion, pollen fertility to seed filling. Although roles of SWEETs in abiotic stress adaption have been revealed mainly in reference organism Arabidopsis, cereal crops SWEETs responses to abiotic stimulation remain largely elusive. Here, we report the characterization of maize SWEET family member ZmSWEET1b, with emphasis on its response to salinity stress.

Application of robotic surgery and traditional laparoscopic surgery in lymph node dissection for gynecological cancer: A meta‑analysis.

Since the advantages of robotic surgery and laparoscopic surgery in the number of lymph node resections are not well understood, this meta-analysis used evidence-based medicine to assess the difference in the number of lymph nodes retrieved in gynecological cancer between the two surgical methods to guide clinical treatment. In the present meta-analysis, the Pubmed, Embase, Cochrane, China National Knowledge Infrastructure and Wanfang libraries were searched for articles that were published from the time of the database's inception to January 2021, including cohort studies and randomized controlled trials, where the observation group underwent robotic surgery to treat gynecological cancers and the control group underwent laparoscopic surgery to treat gynecological cancers, including cervical and ovarian cancers and endometrial cancers. Duplicate publications, studies with no full text, incomplete information or where the authors were unable to perform data extraction, animal experiments, reviews and systematic reviews were excluded.

Reliable neck sonography of nodal thyroglobulin to diagnose recurrent/persistent disease from papillary thyroid carcinoma.

Objective: This study evaluates the correlation between the sonographic features and the nodal fine-needle aspiration thyroglobulin (FNA-Tg) in papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) patients with the recurrent/persistent lymph node for the purpose of the reasonable selection of lymph nodes.

Methods: This study prospectively contained PTC patients with the suspicious cervical lymph nodes in one medical center from April 2018 to January 2019. Each suspected lymph node was aspirated with a 22-gauge needle and the value of FNA-Tg was measured as well.

Asymmetric Transfer Hashing With Adaptive Bipartite Graph Learning.

Thanks to the efficient retrieval speed and low storage consumption, learning to hash has been widely used in visual retrieval tasks. However, the known hashing methods assume that the query and retrieval samples lie in homogeneous feature space within the same domain. As a result, they cannot be directly applied to heterogeneous cross-domain retrieval.

Thyroid Langerhans cell histiocytosis concurrent with papillary thyroid carcinoma: A case report and literature review.

Langerhans cell histiocytosis (LCH) is a clonal neoplasm of myeloid dendritic cells, rarely involving the thyroid gland. Papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) is the most common histological subtype of thyroid cancer. We report a rare case of a 34-year-old Chinese woman who has LCH with PTC and cervical lymph node metastasis of LCH, with a review of the literature.

Extension of the bright high-harmonic photon energy range via nonadiabatic critical phase matching.

The concept of critical ionization fraction has been essential for high-harmonic generation, because it dictates the maximum driving laser intensity while preserving the phase matching of harmonics. In this work, we reveal a second, nonadiabatic critical ionization fraction, which substantially extends the phase-matched harmonic energy, arising because of the strong reshaping of the intense laser field in a gas plasma. We validate this understanding through a systematic comparison between experiment and theory for a wide range of laser conditions.

Predicting spatial variability of species diversity with the minimum data set of soil properties in an arid desert riparian forest.

Species diversity has spatial heterogeneity in ecological systems. Although a large number of studies have demonstrated the influence of soil properties on species diversity, most of them have not considered their spatial variabilities. To remedy the knowledge gap, a 1 ha (100 m × 100 m) plots of arid desert riparian forest was set up in the Ebinur Wetland Nature Reserve (ELWNR) in the NW China.

Developing a competence framework for gerontological nursing in China: a two-phase research design including a needs analysis and verification study.

Background: China faces a serious shortage of competent nurses who can address the healthcare needs of older people in an ageing society. Chinese higher education institutes face serious challenges when it comes to developing new curricula that are capable of educating sufficient numbers of competent gerontological nurses. Therefore, the aim of this research study was to identify and verify competencies for gerontological nurses in China that are needed to provide nursing care for the growing number of older people in all care settings.

analysis and preclinical findings uncover potential targets of anti-cervical carcinoma and COVID-19 in laminarin, a promising nutraceutical.

Until today, the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has caused 6,043,094 deaths worldwide, and most of the mortality cases have been related to patients with long-term diseases, especially cancer. Autophagy is a cellular process for material degradation. Recently, studies demonstrated the association of autophagy with cancer development and immune disorder, suggesting autophagy as a possible target for cancer and immune therapy.

G-protein couples MAPK cascade through maize heterotrimeric Gβ subunit.

G protein couples MAPK cascade through maize heterotrimeric Gβ subunit MGB1. Heterotrimeric G protein Gβ interacts with Gγ subunit to generate Gβγ dimer in modulation of various biological processes. The modulatory events at transcriptome scale of plant Gβ subunit remain largely unknown.

Preclinical Evidence Indicates the Pharmacological Targets and Mechanisms of Mogroside V in Patients With Ovarian Cancer and Coronavirus Disease 2019.

The borderless transmission of coronavirus remains uncontrolled globally. The uncharted severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) variant reduces the therapeutic efficacy of vaccines against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Clinical observations suggest that tumour cases are highly infected with coronavirus, possibly due to immunologic injury, causing a higher COVID-19-related death toll.

Gypsy retrotransposon-derived maize lncRNA GARR2 modulates gibberellin response.

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) mediate diverse biological events mainly through the modulation of transcriptional hierarchy. The phytohormone gibberellin (GA) is essential for various aspects of plant growth and development. However, the roles of lncRNAs in the regulation of the GA response remain largely unknown.