Abscisic acid (ABA) is a vital phytohormone that regulates mainly stomatal aperture and seed development, but ABA receptors involved in these processes have yet to be determined. We previously ...identified from broad bean an ABA-binding protein (ABAR) potentially involved in stomatal signalling, the gene for which encodes the H subunit of Mg-chelatase (CHLH), which is a key component in both chlorophyll biosynthesis and plastid-to-nucleus signalling. Here we show that Arabidopsis ABAR/CHLH specifically binds ABA, and mediates ABA signalling as a positive regulator in seed germination, post-germination growth and stomatal movement, showing that ABAR/CHLH is an ABA receptor. We show also that ABAR/CHLH is a ubiquitous protein expressed in both green and non-green tissues, indicating that it might be able to perceive the ABA signal at the whole-plant level.
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DOBA, IJS, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
In this study, the soil microbial fuel cells (MFCs) were constructed in the topsoil contaminated with toxic refractory organic pesticide, hexachlorobenzene (HCB). The performance of electricity ...generation and HCB degradation in the soil-MFCs were investigated. The HCB degradation pathway was analyzed based on the determination of degradation products and intermediates. Experimental results showed that the HCB removal efficiencies in the three groups (soil MFCs group, open circuit control group and no adding anaerobic sludge blank group) were 71.15%, 52.49% and 38.92%, respectively. The highest detected power density was 77.5 mW/m(2) at the external resistance of 1000 Ω. HCB was degraded via the reductive dechlorination pathway in the soil MFC under anaerobic condition. The existence of the anode promoted electrogenic bacteria to provide more electrons to increase the metabolic reactions rates of anaerobic bacteria was the main way which could promote the removal efficiencies of HCB in soil MFC.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPUK
Sugar plays an essential role in plant cold acclimation (CA), but the interaction between CA and sugar remains unclear in tea plants. In this study, during the whole winter season, we investigated ...the variations of sugar contents and the expression of a large number of sugar-related genes in tea leaves. Results indicated that cold tolerance of tea plant was improved with the development of CA during early winter season. At this stage, starch was dramatically degraded, whereas the content of total sugars and several specific sugars including sucrose, glucose and fructose were constantly elevated. Beyond the CA stage, the content of starch was maintained at a low level during winter hardiness (WH) period and then was elevated during de-acclimation (DC) period. Conversely, the content of sugar reached a peak at WH stage followed by a decrease during DC stage. Moreover, gene expression results showed that, during CA period, sugar metabolism-related genes exhibited different expression pattern, in which beta-amylase gene (CsBAM), invertase gene (CsINV5) and raffinose synthase gene (CsRS2) engaged in starch, sucrose and raffinose metabolism respectively were solidly up-regulated; the expressions of sugar transporters were stimulated in general except the down-regulations of CsSWEET2, 3, 16, CsERD6.7 and CsINT2; interestingly, the sugar-signaling related CsHXK3 and CsHXK2 had opposite expression patterns at the early stage of CA. These provided comprehensive insight into the effects of CA on carbohydrates indicating that sugar accumulation contributes to tea plant cold tolerance during winter season, and a simply model of sugar regulation in response to cold stimuli is proposed.
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EMUNI, FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
The aim of this study is to evaluate an AAV vector that can selectively target breast cancer cells and to investigate its specificity and anti-tumor effects on breast cancer cells both in vitro and ...in vivo, offering a new therapeutic approach for the treatment of EpCAM-positive breast cancer.
In this study, a modified AAV2 viral vector was used, in which EpCAM-specific DARPin EC1 was fused to the VP2 protein of AAV2, creating a viral vector that can target breast cancer cells. The targeting ability and anti-tumor effects of this viral vector were evaluated through in vitro and in vivo experiments.
The experimental results showed that the AAV2M
virus could specifically infect EpCAM-positive breast cancer cells and accurately deliver the suicide gene HSV-TK to tumor tissue in mice, significantly inhibiting tumor growth. Compared to the traditional AAV2 viral vector, the AAV2M
virus exhibited reduced accumulation in liver tissue and had no impact on tumor growth.
This study demonstrates that AAV2M
is a gene delivery vector capable of targeting breast cancer cells and achieving selective targeting in mice. The findings offer a potential gene delivery system and strategies for gene therapy targeting EpCAM-positive breast cancer and other tumor types.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Wearable sensors for non-invasive, real-time detection of sweat lactate have far-reaching implications in the fields of health care and exercise physiological responses. Here, we propose a wearable ...electrochemical sensor with gold nanoelectrode arrays fabricated on the nanoporous polycarbonate (PC) membrane by encapsulating lactate oxidase (LO x ) in chitosan (CS) hydrogel for detecting body temperature and sweat lactate concurrently. Flexible gold nanoporous electrodes not only enhance electrode area but also offer a nanoconfined space to accelerate the catalytic reaction of LO x and control substrate concentration on the surface of LO x to decrease substrate inhibition. The proposed sensor has a long durability of 13 days and better selectivity for the detection of sweat lactate over a wide linear range (0.01–35 mM) with a low detection limit (0.144 μM). Furthermore, temperature-dependent transmembrane currents passing through the sensor are used to estimate body temperature. We then use multiple linear regression to adjust the effect of temperature on lactate detection and succeed in monitoring lactate molecules in sweat and body temperature during exercise.
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IJS, KILJ, NUK, PNG, UL, UM
Copper-based catalysts have been considered as the most promising candidates in the solar-driven catalytic reduction of CO2 to value-added chemicals, but their catalytic performance encounters ...intrinsic limitations in the precise construction of copper catalytic active sites. This work employed the well-defined Cu2Cl2-bpy (bpy = 4,4′-bipyridine) as the precursor and fabricated a dual atom site Cu photocatalyst on polymeric carbon nitride (DAS-Cu@PCN) with a distance between dual Cu atoms of ∼2.8 Å. The PCN substrate enhances the stability of double Cu catalytic sites, and the appropriate Cu–Cu spacing effectively promotes the C–C coupling, which greatly improves the performance of photocatalytic CO2 reduction. Our findings provide valuable guidelines for the atom precise photocatalyst design toward highly efficient photocatalytic CO2 conversion to high value-added carbon products.
Aims
This systematic review and meta‐analysis aimed to evaluate the effects of home‐based telehealth compared with usual care on six‐minute walking distance (6MWD), health‐related quality of life, ...anxiety and depression in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
Methods
We identified randomized controlled trials through a systematic multidatabase search. Titles and s were assessed for relevance. Two authors independently extracted data and assessed the risk of bias and quality of evidence. Meta‐analyses were conducted using Review Manager and Stata.
Results
We included 32 randomized controlled trials (n = 5232). Devices used for home‐based telehealth interventions included telephones, videos, and combined devices. The quality of the evidence was downgraded due to high risk of bias, imprecision, and inconsistency. Home‐based telehealth significantly increased 6MWD by 35 m (SD = 30.42) and reduced symptom burden by 3 points (SD = −2.30) on the COPD assessment test compared with usual care. However, no significant differences in anxiety and depression were noted between the home‐based telehealth group and the standard care group. In subgroup analysis, home‐based telehealth significantly improved 6MWD and health status after 6–12 months and >12 months.
Conclusion
Low quality evidence showed that home‐based telehealth interventions reduce symptom burden and increase walking distance to a clinically meaningful extent in patients with COPD. However, no effects on depression and anxiety were observed.
Summary statement
What is already known about the topic?
In the context of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease progression, exacerbation of symptoms results in negative impacts on physical condition and psychological status.
The overall effect of telehealth for patients living with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is unclear based on different results reported in existing studies.
What this paper adds?
Home‐based telehealth improved the six‐minute walking distance and health status in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, but it did not improve anxiety and depression.
Home‐based telehealth based on combined devices but not telephone or video improved the six‐minute walking distance and health status.
Home‐based telehealth significantly improved six‐minute walking distance and health status in the 6–12 months subgroup and the more than 12 months subgroup but not at <6 months.
The implications of this paper:
Telehealth offers a feasible method to provide long‐term and regular health care to patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease living at home.
Telehealth can help expand the recognition, accessibility and application of medical care services for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK, VSZLJ
Abstract
Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) has become the most prevalent chronic liver disease in the world, however, no drug treatment has been approved for this disease. Thus, it is urgent ...to find effective therapeutic targets for clinical intervention. In this study, we find that liver-specific knockout of PPDPF (PPDPF-LKO) leads to spontaneous fatty liver formation in a mouse model at 32 weeks of age on chow diets, which is enhanced by HFD. Mechanistic study reveals that PPDPF negatively regulates mTORC1-S6K-SREBP1 signaling. PPDPF interferes with the interaction between Raptor and CUL4B-DDB1, an E3 ligase complex, which prevents ubiquitination and activation of Raptor. Accordingly, liver-specific PPDPF overexpression effectively inhibits HFD-induced mTOR signaling activation and hepatic steatosis in mice. These results suggest that PPDPF is a regulator of mTORC1 signaling in lipid metabolism, and may be a potential therapeutic candidate for NAFLD.
The battery modeling and iterative state calculation in the battery management system is very important for the high-power lithium-ion battery packs, the accuracy of which affects its working ...performance and safety. An adaptive improved unscented Kalman filtering algorithm is developed to realize the iterative calculation process, aiming to overcome the rounding error in the numerical calculation treatment when it is used to estimate the nonlinear state value of the battery pack. As the sigma point is sampled in the unscented transform round from the unscented Kalman filter algorithm, an imaginary number appears that results in the working state estimation failure. In order to solve this problem, the decomposition is combined with the calculation process. Meanwhile, an adaptive noise covariance matching method is implied. Experiments show that the proposed method can guarantee the semi-positive and numerical stability of the state covariance, and the estimation accuracy can reach the third-order precision. The estimation error remains 1.60% under the drastic voltage and current change conditions, which can reduce the estimation error by 1.00% compared with the traditional method. It can provide a theoretical safety protection basis of the energy management for the lithium-ion battery pack.
•An adaptive power battery modeling and iterative state calculation method is proposed.•The improved Kalman filtering algorithm is investigated in the SOC estimation.•The relaxation effect is considered to realize the accurate power availability correction.•The residual power prediction problem is solved by considering complex current influence.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
The current surveillance system only focuses on notifiable infectious diseases in China. The arrival of the big-data era provides us a chance to elaborate on the full spectrum of infectious diseases.
...In this population-based observational study, we used multiple health-related data extracted from the Shandong Multi-Center Healthcare Big Data Platform from January 2013 to June 2017 to estimate the incidence density and describe the epidemiological characteristics and dynamics of various infectious diseases in a population of 3,987,573 individuals in Shandong province, China.
In total, 106,289 cases of 130 infectious diseases were diagnosed among the population, with an incidence density (ID) of 694.86 per 100,000 person-years. Besides 73,801 cases of 35 notifiable infectious diseases, 32,488 cases of 95 non-notifiable infectious diseases were identified. The overall ID continuously increased from 364.81 per 100,000 person-years in 2013 to 1071.80 per 100,000 person-years in 2017 (χ
test for trend, P < 0.0001). Urban areas had a significantly higher ID than rural areas, with a relative risk of 1.25 (95% CI 1.23-1.27). Adolescents aged 10-19 years had the highest ID of varicella, women aged 20-39 years had significantly higher IDs of syphilis and trichomoniasis, and people aged ≥ 60 years had significantly higher IDs of zoster and viral conjunctivitis (all P < 0.05).
Infectious diseases remain a substantial public health problem, and non-notifiable diseases should not be neglected. Multi-source-based big data are beneficial to better understand the profile and dynamics of infectious diseases.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
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