[Dynamics of soil respiration and its influencing factors in urban forests under nitrogen addition].

Urban forest is an important carbon pool, soil respiration of which is an important part of terrestrial carbon cycle. To understand the dynamics and influencing factors of soil respiration in urban forest under the background of increasing nitrogen deposition, we conducted dynamic observation on soil respiration rate, temperature, moisture and chemical properties by adding 0 (CK), 50 (LN), 100 (HN) kg N·m·a ammonium nitrate to a typical urban forest. The results showed that soil respiration had significant seasonal variation, which was not affected by nitrogen addition.

PECAplus: statistical analysis of time-dependent regulatory changes in dynamic single-omics and dual-omics experiments.

Simultaneous dynamic profiling of mRNA and protein expression is increasingly popular, and there is a critical need for algorithms to identify regulatory layers and time dependency of gene expression. A group of scientists from United States and Singapore present PECAplus, a comprehensive set of statistical analysis tools to address this challenge. Protein expression control analysis (PECA) computes the probability scores for change in mRNA and protein-level regulatory parameters at each time point, deconvoluting gene expression regulation in the presence of measurement noise.

Simultaneous quantitative analysis of main components in linderae reflexae radix with one single marker.

Establish a quantitative analysis of multi-components by the single marker (QAMS) method for quality evaluation and validate its feasibilities by the simultaneous quantitative assay of four main components in Linderae Reflexae Radix. Four main components of pinostrobin, pinosylvin, pinocembrin, and 3,5-dihydroxy-2-(1--mentheneyl)--stilbene were selected as analytes to evaluate the quality by RP-HPLC coupled with a UV-detector. The method was evaluated by a comparison of the quantitative results between the external standard method and QAMS with a different HPLC system.

Protein Arginine Methyltransferase 6 (Prmt6) Is Essential for Early Zebrafish Development through the Direct Suppression of gadd45αa Stress Sensor Gene.

Histone lysine methylation is important in early zebrafish development; however, the role of histone arginine methylation in this process remains unclear. H3R2me2a, generated by protein arginine methyltransferase 6 (Prmt6), is a repressive mark. To explore the role of Prmt6 and H3R2me2a during zebrafish embryogenesis, we identified the maternal characteristic of prmt6 and designed two prmt6-specific morpholino-oligos (MOs) to study its importance in early development, application of which led to early epiboly defects and significantly reduced the level of H3R2me2a marks.

Splice blocking of zygotic sox31 leads to developmental arrest shortly after Mid-Blastula Transition and induces apoptosis in zebrafish.

Here we report that splice blocking morpholinos (Sb MO) against zebrafish sox31 elicit developmental arrest, likely through creating a series of dominant negative splicing variants. Embryos injected with the Sb MO develop normally before the Mid-Blastula Transition (MBT); however, they do not initiate epiboly. Microarray analysis of mRNAs collected at the dome stage revealed that the Sb MO impairs activation of a large set of zygotic genes and reduces degradation of maternal mRNA during MBT.

The protective effects of alpha-ketoacids against oxidative stress on rat spermatozoa in vitro.

The aim of this study was to determine the effects of antioxidants, including alpha-ketoacids (alpha-ketoglutarate and pyruvate), lactate and glutamate/malate combination, against oxidative stress on rat spermatozoa. Our results showed that H(2)O(2) (250 micromol L(-1))-induced damages, such as impaired motility, adenosine triphosphate (ATP) depletion, inhibition of sperm protein phosphorylation, reduced acrosome reaction and decreased viability, could be significantly prevented by incubation of the spermatozoa with alpha-ketoglutarate (4 mmol L(-1)) or pyruvate (4 mmol L(-1)). Without exogenous H(2)O(2) in the medium, the addition of pyruvate (4 mmol L(-1)) significantly increased the superoxide anion (O(2)(-).