•Galactooligosaccharides (GOS) or fucoidan extracted from Undaria pinnatifida ameliorate high-fat diet–induced dyslipidemia, hepatic tissue steatosis, and aortic arch injury in Sprague-Dawley ...rats.•GOS significantly increased Verrucomicrobia, Bacteroidetes, Blautia, and Akkermansia, but decreased Firmicutes, and fucoidan significantly decreased Aerococcus and Actinobacteria.•Fucoidan and GOS increased the expression of cholesterol 7-alpha hydroxylase in liver and bile salt hydrolase (BSH) activity of small intestine contents.•According to Spearman analysis, Adlercreutzia and Oscillospira were positively correlated with BSH enzyme activity. Aerococcus and Brevibacterium were negatively correlated with BSH enzyme activity.•GOS and fucoidan supplementation supported Lactobacillus casei DM8121 growth and enhanced its BSH activity.
Dyslipidemia is an important risk factor for cardiovascular diseases. Fucoidan (FUC) is a polysaccharide extracted from brown marine algae with various biological activities. Galactooligosaccharides (GOS) are important prebiotics that exert benefits on the intestinal microbiota. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of FUC and GOS on dyslipidemia in rats by modulating the gut microbiota and bile acid metabolism.
Twenty-four male inbred Sprague-Dawley (SD) rats aged 8 wk were fed a normal or high-fat diet (HFD) for 8 wk. During the feeding period, rats were gavaged with normal saline solution, FUC solution (100 mg/kg),or GOS solution (800 mg/kg), or a combination of both once daily. Serum biochemical parameters were determined, and the gut microbiota were analyzed via 16S rRNA gene sequencing. Bile salt hydrolase (BSH) activity in the small intestinal contents was also analyzed. The effects of FUC and GOS on Lactobacillus casei DM8121 were analyzed in vitro.
In rats, GOS and FUC supplementation significantly improved serum total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, lipopolysaccharide, serum total bile acid, hepatic tissue steatosis, aortic arch injury, gut microbiota, serum high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, cholesterol 7-alpha hydroxylase expression in the liver, and BSH activity in the small intestinal contents. In an in vitro experiment, GOS and FUC supplementation significantly increased L. casei DM8121’s BSH activity.
In rats, FUC and GOS supplementation improved serum dyslipidemia, gut microbiota, BSH activity, and bile acid metabolism–related pathways. In vitro, GOS and FUC supplementation increased L. casei DM8121’s BSH activity.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
Colorectal cancer (CRC) is regarded as one of the most common and deadly forms of cancer. Gut microbiota is vital to retain and promote several functions of intestinal. Although previous researches ...have shown that some gut microbiota have the abilities to inhibit tumorigenesis and prevent cancer from progressing, they have not yet clearly identified associative mechanisms. This review not only concentrates on the antitumor effects of metabolites produced by gut microbiota, for example, SCFA, ferrichrome, urolithins, equol and conjugated linoleic acids, but also the molecules which constituted the bacterial cell wall have the antitumor effect in the host, including lipopolysaccharide, lipoteichoic acid, β-glucans and peptidoglycan. The aim of our review is to develop a possible therapeutic method, which use the products of gut microbiota metabolism or gut microbiota constituents to help treat or prevent colorectal cancer.
The acquirement of the flow information in plate-fin heat exchanger (PFHE) is limited by its metal structure and complex flow condition. This work develops a new distributed optical measurement ...system to obtain flow information and boiling intensity. The system utilizes numerous optical fibers installed at the surface of the PFHE to detect optical signals. The attenuation and fluctuation of the signals reflect the variation of the gas-liquid interfaces and can be further used to estimate the boiling intensity. Practical experiments of flow boiling in PFHE with different heating fluxes have been carried out. The results verify that the measurement system can obtain the flow condition. Meanwhile, according to the results, the boiling development in PFHE can be divided into four stages with the increase in the heating flux, including the unboiling stage, initiation stage, boiling developing stage, and fully developed stage.
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IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
•High concentrations of Cd in soils of a rural area in the Three Gorges region, China, are reported.•Lognormal distribution plots and enrichment factors were applied to identify Cd ...sources.•Sedimentary rocks are main source of Cd in the Cd-enriched soils.•Results of sequential extractions show that a considerable fraction of the Cd in soils is in a labile form.
This study investigated the distribution and sources of Cd in soils from a Cd-rich area in the Three Gorges region, China. The results showed that in the study area arable soils contain 0.42–42mgkg−1 Cd with 0.12–8.5mgkg−1 in the natural soils, corresponding to high amounts of Cd (0.22–42mgkg−1) in outcropping sedimentary rocks in the area. Both lognormal distribution and enrichment factor (EF) plots were applied in an attempt to distinguish between geogenic and anthropogenic origins of Cd in the local soils. The lognormal distribution plots illustrated that geogenic sources dominated in soils with low and moderate Cd concentrations (<8.5mgkg−1), whereas anthropogenic sources (agricultural activities, coal mining) significantly elevated Cd contents in some arable soils (>8.5mgkg−1). The enrichment factor plots illustrated that the majority of the soil samples had EF values of <5, pointing to a geogenic origin of Cd in the soils, whereas some arable soils had EF values >5, pointing to an additional anthropogenic input of Cd to the soils. Sequential extraction results showed that Cd soluble in water and weak acid (water-soluble, exchangeable and carbonate fraction of the soil) accounts for an average of 31% of the total soil Cd, which indicates high potential for Cd mobility and bioavailability. The findings point to a potential health risk from Cd in areas with high geogenic background concentrations of this metal.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
Morphological evolution of river deltas depends to a large extent on river discharges, which are usually highly unsteady due to natural hydrological cycles and anthropogenic regulations. However, it ...is unclear that how and to what extent the discharge fluctuations influence the delta morphology. In this study, we focus on the morphological response of the Yellow River Delta to the Water‐Sediment Regulation Schemes, which generate impulsive floods and deliver high sediment load within a short time. Tracking the fate of fluvial sediment released by 10 historical events reveals that 51.3%, 19.7%, and 17.8% of fluvial sediment are deposited in the delta front, the subaerial delta and the prodelta, respectively. Hypopycnal and hyperpycnal flows occur alternately during different phases of the regulation schemes, and the latter contribute to 32% of the deposition volume with 10% of the duration. To explore the effects of river discharge schematizations on delta evolution, numerical experiments are conducted to compare models forced by unsteady and constant discharges, with the latter being a common practice in delta morphology modeling. We show that the constant‐discharge simplification fails to capture the highly‐depositional hyperpycnal flows, leading to dramatic underestimation of river mouth depositions. In addition, we demonstrate that including the 3D flow‐sediment interactions are critical in reproducing the correct plume structures, bed surface sediment compositions and deposition patterns. Our study highlights the importance of proper river discharge schematizations and full consideration of flow‐sediment interactions in modeling deltas affected by episodic river floods and high suspended sediment concentrations.
Key Points
Constant discharge simplification significantly under‐estimates river mouth deposition in the Yellow River Delta
Ephemeral hyperpycnal flows averagely contribute to ∼32% of the delta front deposition during the Water‐Sediment Regulation Schemes
Flow‐sediment interactions cannot be omitted in modeling deltas affected by episodic river floods and high sediment concentrations
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Abstract
The tumor ecosystem of papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) is poorly characterized. Using single-cell RNA sequencing, we profile transcriptomes of 158,577 cells from 11 patients’ paratumors, ...localized/advanced tumors, initially-treated/recurrent lymph nodes and radioactive iodine (RAI)-refractory distant metastases, covering comprehensive clinical courses of PTC. Our data identifies a “cancer-primed” premalignant thyrocyte population with normal morphology but altered transcriptomes. Along the developmental trajectory, we also discover three phenotypes of malignant thyrocytes (follicular-like, partial-epithelial-mesenchymal-transition-like, dedifferentiation-like), whose composition shapes bulk molecular subtypes, tumor characteristics and RAI responses. Furthermore, we uncover a distinct
BRAF
-like-B subtype with predominant dedifferentiation-like thyrocytes, enriched cancer-associated fibroblasts, worse prognosis and promising prospect of immunotherapy. Moreover, potential vascular-immune crosstalk in PTC provides theoretical basis for combined anti-angiogenic and immunotherapy. Together, our findings provide insight into the PTC ecosystem that suggests potential prognostic and therapeutic implications.
An improved modal strain energy method is proposed for damage localisation in jacket-type offshore wind turbines by defining a series of stiffness-correction factors that can be employed to calculate ...the modal strain energy (MSE) of the measured model without utilising the stiffness matrix of the finite element model (FEM) as an approximation. The theoretical contribution of this article is that the MSE of the measured model could be estimated with better accuracy, and the advantage of the proposed indicator is that it is more sensitive to damage locations than the traditional MSE method. Numerical studies on a tripod offshore jacket wind turbine reveal that the proposed method could locate the damage positions for jacket-type offshore wind turbines when limited number of lower-order modes is available, even when these modes are spatially incomplete. The performance of the proposed method is also investigated using real measurements from a steel jacket-type offshore wind turbine experiment conducted in a water tank of Ocean University of China. The experimental results demonstrated that the proposed method outperforms the traditional MSE method, and damages in jacket-type offshore wind turbines could be properly located utilising the first two measured modes excited by environmental loadings, such as waves, currents, or the vibration of the wind turbine.
•A new method is proposed for damage localization in jacket-type offshore wind turbines.•The proposed indicator is more sensitive to damage locations.•A series of stiffness-correction factors are defined.•A steel jacket-type offshore wind turbine with 1/15 is constructed.•The method can deal with spatial incompleteness of jacket-type offshore wind turbines.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
Sustainable development has increasingly become a primary concern of governments in the stage of high-quality economic development. Taking as an example Guangdong Province, China, where development ...and polarization coexist, this study uses a Vector Autoregressive(VAR) model to examine the relationship between higher education, technological innovation, and economic growth, and then uses the Coupling Coordination (CC) model to evaluate the developing coordination of subsystems where the above three elements are located; furthermore, it summarizes the mechanisms and corresponding paths of higher education on the quantity and quality of economic growth and illustrates the interactive relationships, the dynamic mechanisms, and the influencing factors. The results show that there is a dynamic interaction mechanism between higher education, technological innovation, and regional economy. The effect of this mechanism is enhanced in developed areas and with an obvious circle cumulative effect, while partly inhibited in undeveloped areas and with less or no circle cumulative effect. Therefore, on the path towards high-quality development, endogenous development models should be formulated and strengthened by developing higher education and constructing an innovation system, especially in the undeveloped areas. Higher education should be more in the regional development framework and targeted at the interaction and synergy in the regional socioeconomic system.
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DOBA, FZAB, GIS, IJS, IZUM, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
To deal with energy crisis and environmental issues, higher fuel economy standards and more stringent limitations on greenhouse gas emissions for ground vehicles have been made. Ecological ...cooperative adaptive cruise control (Eco-CACC) has been considered as an effective solution to decrease the fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions of a platoon of vehicles, and this paper proposes an Eco-CACC strategy for a heterogeneous platoon of heavy-duty vehicles with time delays. The proposed Eco-CACC strategy consists of distributed control protocols for the following vehicles and a new model predictive controller for the leading one. Firstly, after the distributed control protocols are designed based on the neighboring vehicle information, the sufficient conditions that guarantee the internal stability and string stability are derived, and the upper bound of the time delays under controller parameters is also obtained. Secondly, assuming the vehicle platoon as a rigid body with followers staying at desired positions, the new model predictive controller is designed in order to further improve the overall fuel economy of vehicle platoon. Simulations are conducted to validate the sufficient conditions of internal stability and string stability, and to explore the fuel saving performance of the proposed control strategy. The simulation results demonstrate that, compared with the benchmark, the proposed Eco-CACC strategy can significantly improve the fuel economy of heterogeneous platoon.
Colorectal cancer (CRC) is regarded as one of the most common and deadly forms of cancer. Gut microbiota is vital to retain and promote several functions of intestinal. Although previous researches ...have shown that some gut microbiota have the abilities to inhibit tumorigenesis and prevent cancer from progressing, they have not yet clearly identified associative mechanisms. This review not only concentrates on the antitumor effects of metabolites produced by gut microbiota, for example, SCFA, ferrichrome, urolithins, equol and conjugated linoleic acids, but also the molecules which constituted the bacterial cell wall have the antitumor effect in the host, including lipopolysaccharide, lipoteichoic acid, β-glucans and peptidoglycan. The aim of our review is to develop a possible therapeutic method, which use the products of gut microbiota metabolism or gut microbiota constituents to help treat or prevent colorectal cancer.
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