Elemental Germanium Activation and Catalysis Enabled by Mechanical Force.

In the realm of materials science and chemical industry, germanium emerges as a strategic resource with distinctive properties that extend its applicability beyond traditional electronics and optics into the promising field of chemical catalysis. Despite its significant role in advanced technological applications, the potential of elemental germanium as a catalyst remains unexplored. Leveraging recent developments in mechanochemistry, this study introduces a groundbreaking approach to activate elemental germanium via mechanical force, facilitating the Reformatsky reaction without the reliance on external reducing agents.

Key Interaction Changes Determine the Activation Process of Human Parathyroid Hormone Type 1 Receptor.

The parathyroid hormone type 1 receptor (PTH1R) plays a crucial role in modulating various physiological functions and is considered an effective therapeutic target for osteoporosis. However, a lack of detailed molecular and energetic information about PTH1R limits our comprehensive understanding of its activation process. In this study, we performed computational simulations to explore key events in the activation process, such as conformational changes in PTH1R, Gs protein coupling, and the release of guanosine diphosphate (GDP).

Graphene oxide-based fluorescent biosensors for pathogenic bacteria detection: A review.

Background: Pathogenic bacteria are widespread in nature and can cause infections and various complications, thereby posing a severe risk to public health. Therefore, simple, rapid, sensitive, and cost-effective methods must be developed to detect pathogenic bacteria. Biosensors are prominent platforms for detecting pathogenic bacteria owing to their high sensitivity, specificity, repeatability, and stability.

A multiverse assessment of the reliability of the self-matching task as a measurement of the self-prioritization effect.

The self-matching task (SMT) is widely used to investigate the cognitive mechanisms underlying the self-prioritization effect (SPE), wherein performance is enhanced for self-associated stimuli compared to other-associated ones. Although the SMT robustly elicits the SPE, there is a lack of data quantifying the reliability of this paradigm. This is problematic, given the prevalence of the reliability paradox in cognitive tasks: many well-established cognitive tasks demonstrate relatively low reliability when used to evaluate individual differences, despite exhibiting replicable effects at the group level.

Identification of a Potent CDK8 Inhibitor Using Structure-Based Virtual Screening.

Pulmonary fibrosis is excessive scarring of the lung tissues. Transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β) has been implicated in pulmonary fibrosis due to its ability to induce the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and promote epithelial cell migration. Cyclin-dependent kinase 8 (CDK8) can mediate the TGF-β signaling pathways and could function as an alternative therapeutic target for treating pulmonary fibrosis.

Multivariate stochastic modeling for transcriptional dynamics with cell-specific latent time using SDEvelo.

Recently, RNA velocity has driven a paradigmatic change in single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) studies, allowing the reconstruction and prediction of directed trajectories in cell differentiation and state transitions. Most existing methods of dynamic modeling use ordinary differential equations (ODE) for individual genes without applying multivariate approaches. However, this modeling strategy inadequately captures the intrinsically stochastic nature of transcriptional dynamics governed by a cell-specific latent time across multiple genes, potentially leading to erroneous results.

Repair of Retrorsine-Induced DNA Damage in Rat Livers: Insights Gained from Transcriptomic and Proteomic Studies.

Pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs) are common phytotoxins that are found worldwide. Upon hepatic metabolic activation, the reactive PA metabolites covalently bind to DNAs and form DNA adducts, causing mutagenicity and tumorigenicity in the liver. However, the molecular basis of the formation and removal of PA-derived DNA adducts remains largely unexplored.

MiR-378 exaggerates angiogenesis and bone erosion in collagen-induced arthritis mice by regulating endoplasmic reticulum stress.

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic autoimmune disorder marked by pain, inflammation, and discomfort in the synovial joints. It is critical to understand the pathological mechanisms of RA progression. MicroRNA-378 (miR-378) is highly expressed in the synovium of RA patients and positively correlated with disease severity, but its function and underlying mechanisms remain poorly understood.

Facet-engineered NaNbO cubes with exposed (101) plane for enhanced lithium-ion storage.

Density functional theory (DFT) predicts superior lithium-ion diffusion the (101) plane of NaNbO. Experimental results confirm that despite a reduction in surface area, 6 μm NaNbO cubes with more (101) plane exposure exhibit enhanced Li storage, underscoring the significance of crystal facet engineering.

The concept of cone opponency may extend beyond accommodation, to myopiagenesis and emmetropization, for a better peripheral defocus lens.

Myopia has ever-rising prevalence in the past few decades globally. Its pathogenesis is still not adequately elucidated especially at the signal transduction level. For the environmental risk factors, there is a large body of fragmented knowledge about the visual inputs for accommodation, myopiagenesis and emmetropization, with the latter two being essentially local processes.

Cascade Reaction of Enyne-Amides with Sulfur-Ylides for the Synthesis of Indole-Tethered 5-Oxaspiro[2.4]hept-6-ene Derivatives.

An unexpected cascade reaction of enyne-amides with sulfur-ylides has been developed. This cascade reaction involves cycloisomerization, dearomatic cyclopropanation, ring-opening rearomatization, and subsequent cyclopropanation, differing from the common [2 + n] cyclization of enyne-amides. A variety of (spirocyclopropane)dihydrofuran derivatives have been efficiently and conveniently synthesized in a single vessel, exhibiting excellent diastereoselectivity and good functional group tolerance.

How mortality awareness regulates intertemporal Choice: A joint effect of endpoint reminder and retrospective episodic thinking.

Although life is lived forward, it can only be understood backward. From the perspective of life-history theory, we propose that mortality reminders may induce backward thinking from the endpoint of life and regulate intertemporal choice between smaller-and-sooner (SS) and large-and-later rewards (LL), thereby helping individuals with time management. Experiment 1 compared the effects of mortality (endpoint) imagination with the imagination of being at age 70 and found that only mortality imagination significantly reduced delay discounting, the extent to which a delayed reward is discounted.

DeepForest-HTP: A novel deep forest approach for predicting antihypertensive peptides.

Hypertension is a major preventable risk factor for cardiovascular disease, affecting over 1.5 billion adults worldwide. Antihypertensive peptides (AHTPs) have gained attention as a natural therapeutic option with minimal side effects.

Mapping the 9-year sleep trajectory and its implications for chronic disease risks among middle-aged and older adults.

Objective: To identify the 9-year trajectories of sleep duration and to assess the relationship between time-dependent sleep duration and sleep trajectories with 14 chronic diseases in adults.

Methods: This study used five waves of data of the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Survey. Participants with complete sleep duration data and at least one record of 14 chronic diseases were included.

Association between pyrrolizidine alkaloids exposure and risk of abnormal serum indices-Insights from a descriptive cross-sectional study in Yunnan Province.

The hazard of pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs) has been widely reported in animal studies but rarely in population-based research, especially reports about daily exposure. A single-centre descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on 552 Lahu Autonomous County residents recruited in 2021. Blood PAs exposure biomarker (pyrrole- protein adduct, PPA) and serum biochemical indices were measured.

PlmCas12e Utilizes Glu662 to Prevent Cleavage Site Occupation by Positively Charged Residues Before Target Strand Cleavage.

CRISPR-Cas12e is a recently identified gene-editing tool mainly known because its relatively small size benefits cell delivery. Drastically different from Cas9, it creates a blunt-end double-strand breakage of the DNA via two cleavage sites; Cas12e produces a sticky-end double-strand breakage of the DNA through only one cleavage site in its RuvC domain, meaning two consecutive cleavage events first on the non-target strand (ntsDNA) and then the target strand (tsDNA). Though crucial for Cas12e's cleavage efficiency, the mechanism by which Cas12e loads tsDNA for the second cleavage remains elusive.

Discovering a novel dual specificity tyrosine-phosphorylation-regulated kinase 1A (DYRK1A) inhibitor and its impact on tau phosphorylation and amyloid-β formation.

Dual-specificity tyrosine-regulated kinase 1 A (DYRK1A) is crucial in neurogenesis, synaptogenesis, and neuronal functions. Its dysregulation is linked to neurodegenerative disorders like Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease. Although the development of DYRK1A inhibitors has significantly advanced in recent years, the selectivity of these drugs remains a critical challenge, potentially impeding further progress.

Identification, biological evaluation, and crystallographic analysis of coumestrol as a novel dual-specificity tyrosine-phosphorylation-regulated kinase 1A inhibitor.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is an irreversible neurodegenerative disease, with tau pathology caused by abnormally activated dual-specificity tyrosine-phosphorylation-regulated kinase 1A (DYRK1A) being one of the culprits. Coumestrol, a phytoestrogen and natural antioxidant found in various plants, has been reported to alleviate AD, but the underlying mechanism remains unclear. We confirmed coumestrol as a novel DYRK1A inhibitor through enzyme-based assays, X-ray crystallography, and cell line experiments.

Intravitreal indocyanine green is toxic to the retinal cells.

Background: Indocyanine green (ICG) is widely used to stain the epiretinal membranes and internal limiting membranes during the pars plana vitrectomy (PPV). This study aims to evaluate the effect of ICG on rat retinas and various retinal cell lines, including ARPE-19 cells, rMC-1 cells, BV2 cells, HRMECs and R28 cells.

Methods: ICG solutions were prepared and diluted with glucose solution (GS) according to the standard clinical protocols.

Non-invasively predicting euploidy in human blastocysts via quantitative 3D morphology measurement: a retrospective cohort study.

Background: Blastocyst morphology has been demonstrated to be associated with ploidy status. Existing artificial intelligence models use manual grading or 2D images as the input for euploidy prediction, which suffer from subjectivity from observers and information loss due to incomplete features from 2D images. Here we aim to predict euploidy in human blastocysts using quantitative morphological parameters obtained by 3D morphology measurement.

Noise Exposure in the Workplace, Genetic Susceptibility, and Incidence of Atrial Fibrillation: A Prospective Cohort Study.

Background: No study explored the association of noise exposure in the workplace and genetic susceptibility with incidence of atrial fibrillation (AF). We aimed to assess the separate and joint relationship of noise exposure in the workplace and genetic susceptibility with the risk of AF.

Methods And Results: We included 167 577 participants without AF at baseline in UK Biobank.