Gastric carcinogenesis is a multistep process involving genetic and epigenetic alteration of protein-coding proto-oncogenes and tumor-suppressor genes. Recent discoveries have shed new light on the ...involvement of a class of noncoding RNA known as microRNA (miRNA) in gastric cancer. A substantial number of miRNAs show differential expression in gastric cancer tissues. Genes coding for these miRNAs have been characterized as novel proto-oncogenes and tumor-suppressor genes based on findings that these miRNAs control malignant phenotypes of gastric cancer cells. In this connection, miRNA dysregulation promotes cell-cycle progression, confers resistance to apoptosis, and enhances invasiveness and metastasis. Moreover, certain polymorphisms in miRNA genes are associated with increased risks for atrophic gastritis and gastric cancer, whereas circulating levels of miRNAs may serve as biomarkers for early diagnosis. Several miRNAs have also been shown to correlate with gastric cancer progression, and thus may be used as prognostic markers. Elucidating the biological aspects of miRNA dysregulation may help us better understand the pathogenesis of gastric cancer and promote the development of miRNA-directed therapeutics against this deadly disease.
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DOBA, EMUNI, FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, IZUM, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
The fall armyworm (FAW), Spodoptera frugiperda, is a newly invasive, widespread agricultural pest in China. Understanding the suitability of the main field crops in Chinese agricultural system as ...host for this polyphagous herbivore is especially important for making control strategy. Here, after FAWs were fed three important oil-bearing crops (oilseed rape, soybean and sunflower) planted in China and resultant population parameters were compared using the age-stage, two-sex life table method, survival of larvae on soybean was significantly lower than that on oilseed rape and sunflower. Developmental duration of larvae on soybean was also the longest (23.3 days). The highest pupation rate was recorded on sunflower. The highest pupal mass (0.19 g) was attained on oilseed rape, significantly higher than on the other host plants; the lowest mass was on soybean (0.15 g). On soybean, oilseed rape and sunflower, respectively, the average generation period was 42.21, 39.10 and 40.44 d; the intrinsic rate of increase (r) was 0.0844, 0.1041 and 0.1134; the finite rate of increase (λ) was 1.0881, 1.1098 and 1.1202. While the most suitable host plant overall was sunflower, S. frugiperda completed development and increased its population on all three host plants. Thus, soybean, oilseed rape and sunflower were all suitable for FAW, and population monitoring and management of FAW in these crops should be increased.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
Summary
Background
The sensitivity of current upper limit of normal (ULN) of serum alanine aminotransferase (ALT) levels for detecting chronic liver disease has been challenged recently.
Aim
To ...identify modulating factors for serum ALT levels and to refine its ULN threshold.
Methods
We enrolled 34 346 consecutive subjects who completed the health check‐up at Taipei Veterans General Hospital from 2002 to 2009. ULN was set for healthy ALT level to the 95th percentile of the reference healthy population.
Results
A group of 21 282 subjects were used as a training set to define an ULN with the highest sensitivity; afterwards, this ULN was validated in another set of 13 064 subjects. A reference healthy population was selected from the training set after excluding subjects with any abnormalities in independent risk factors associated with elevated serum ALT level (>40 IU/L) by multivariate analysis like body mass index, waist circumference, glucose, cholesterol, high‐density lipoprotein‐cholesterol, triglyceride, hepatitis B virus surface antigen, anti‐hepatitis C virus antibody and fatty liver. The new ULN of serum ALT level defined as the 95% percentile in the healthy population were 21 IU/L and 17 IU/L for men and women respectively. These cut‐off values had the highest Youden's index and areas under the corresponding receiver operating curves among four widely applied thresholds in both the training and validation sets.
Conclusions
The suggested threshold of upper limit of normal provides better discrimination between healthy and unhealthy status. Viral hepatitis, metabolic syndrome and fatty liver are the major risk factors of elevated serum alanine aminotransferase levels.
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BFBNIB, DOBA, FZAB, GIS, IJS, IZUM, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNs), one of the important porous materials, have garnered interest owing to their highly attractive physicochemical features and advantageous morphological ...attributes. They are of particular importance for use in diverse fields including, but not limited to, adsorption, catalysis, and medicine. Despite their intrinsic stable siliceous frameworks, excellent mechanical strength, and optimal morphological attributes, pristine MSNs suffer from poor drug loading efficiency, as well as compatibility and degradability issues for therapeutic, diagnostic, and tissue engineering purposes. Collectively, the desirable and beneficial properties of MSNs have been harnessed by modifying the surface of the siliceous frameworks through incorporating supramolecular assemblies and various metal species, and through incorporating supramolecular assemblies and various metal species and their conjugates. Substantial advancements of these innovative colloidal inorganic nanocontainers drive researchers in promoting them toward innovative applications like stimuli (light/ultrasound/magnetic)‐responsive delivery‐associated therapies with exceptional performance in vivo. Here, a brief overview of the fabrication of siliceous frameworks, along with discussions on the significant advances in engineering of MSNs, is provided. The scope of the advancement in terms of structural and physicochemical attributes and their effects on biomedical applications with a particular focus on recent studies is emphasized. Finally, interesting perspectives are recapitulated, along with the scope toward clinical translation.
Mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNs) have garnered enormous interest owing to their highly advantageous physicochemical and morphological attributes. Collectively, progression has been made by modifying the surface of the siliceous frameworks through incorporating diverse supramolecular assemblies. An overview of the fabrication of MSNs and discussions on significant advances in engineering of MSNs, along with their scope toward clinical translation, is provided.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Type Ia supernovae, calibrated by classical distance ladder methods, can be used, in conjunction with galaxy survey two-point correlation functions, to empirically determine the size of the sound ...horizon rs. Assumption of the ΛCDM model, together with data to constrain its parameters, can also be used to determine the size of the sound horizon. Using a variety of cosmic microwave background (CMB) data sets to constrain ΛCDM parameters, we find the model-based sound horizon to be larger than the empirically determined one with a statistical significance of between 2 and 3 , depending on the data set. If reconciliation requires a change to the cosmological model, we argue that change is likely to be important in the two decades of scale factor evolution prior to recombination. Future CMB observations will therefore likely be able to test any such adjustments; e.g., a third-generation CMB survey like SPT-3G can achieve a threefold improvement in the constraints on rs in the ΛCDM model extended to allow additional light degrees of freedom.
Excessive rainfall provides a favorable condition for field mold infection of plants, which triggers field mold (FM) stress. If FM stress occurs during the late maturation stage of soybean seed, it ...negatively affects seed yield and quality. To investigate the responses of soybean seed against FM stress and identify the underlying biochemical pathways involved, a greenhouse was equipped with an artificial rain producing system to allow the induction of mold growth on soybean seed. The induced quality changes and stress responses were revealed on the levels of both transcriptome and metabolome. The results showed that soybean seeds produced under FM stress conditions had an abnormal and inferior appearance, and also contained less storage reserves, such as protein and polysaccharide. Transcriptional analysis demonstrated that genes involved in amino acid metabolism, glycolysis, tricarboxylic acid, β-oxidation of fatty acids, and isoflavone biosynthesis were induced by FM stress. These results were supported by a multiple metabolic analysis which exhibited increases in the concentrations of a variety of amino acids, sugars, organic acids, and isoflavones, as well as reductions of several fatty acids. Reprogramming of these metabolic pathways mobilized and consumed stored protein, sugar and fatty acid reserves in the soybean seed in order to meet the energy and substrate demand on the defense system, but led to deterioration of seed quality. In general, FM stress induced catabolism of storage reserves and diminished the quality of soybean seed in the field. This study provides a more profound insight into seed deterioration caused by FM stress.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
The field of mesoporous metal nanoarchitectonics offers several advantages which cannot be found elsewhere. These materials have been showcasing impressive enhancements of their electrochemical ...properties for further implementation, compared to their micro‐ and macroporous counterparts. Since the last few decades, various methods have been developed to achieve narrow pore size distribution with a tunable porosity and particle morphology. While hard templates offer a reliable and intuitive approach to synthesize mesoporous metals, the complexity of the technique and the use of harmful chemicals pushed several research groups to focus in other directions. For example, soft templates (e.g., lyotropic crystals, micelles assemblies) and solution phase methods (requiring to control reduction reactions) offer more and more possibilities in terms of available compositions and morphologies. Indeed, various metal (Pt, Pd, Au, Ru, etc.) can now be synthesized as dendritic, core@shell, hollow or polyhedral nanoparticles, with single‐ or multicomponents, alloyed or not, with unprecedented electrochemical activity.
Mesoporous metals are normally synthesized by templating methods (hard or soft), while dendritic nanostructures are instead fabricated by wet chemical methods. To date, a broad spectrum of nanoporous metals (including both microporous and mesoporous metals) with different sizes and shapes has been successfully prepared under various conditions. Recent progress relating to this emerging field is reviewed.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Although graphene nanomesh is an attractive 2D carbon material, general synthetic routes to produce functional graphene nanomesh in large‐scale are complex and tedious. Herein, we elaborately design ...a simple two‐step dimensional reduction strategy for exploring nitrogen‐doped graphene nanomesh by thermal exfoliation of crystal‐ and shape‐modified metal‐organic frameworks (MOFs). MOF nanoleaves with 2D rather than 3D crystal structure are used as the precursor, which are further thermally unraveled into nitrogen‐doped graphene nanomesh by using metal chlorides as the exfoliators and etching agent. The nitrogen‐doped graphene nanomesh has a unique ultrathin two‐dimensional morphology, high porosity, rich and accessible nitrogen‐doped active sites, and defective graphene edges, contributing to an unprecedented catalytic activity for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) in acid electrolytes. This approach is suitable for scalable production.
Mesh‐merized: A nitrogen‐doped graphene nanomesh was simply prepared by thermal exfoliation of crystal‐ and shape‐modified metal–organic frameworks. The ultrathin, nitrogen‐doped graphene nanomesh obtained with high porosity and defect‐rich graphene edges, shows an unprecedented catalytic activity for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) in acid electrolytes.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Conspectus Well-constructed porous materials take an essential role in a wide range of applications, including energy conversion and storage systems, electrocatalysis, photocatalysis, and sensing. ...Although the tailored design of various nanoarchitectures has made substantial progress, simpler preparation methods are compelled to meet large-scale production requirements. Recently, advanced electrochemical deposition techniques have had a significant impact in terms of precise control upon the nanoporous architecture (i.e., pore size, surface area, pore structure, etc.), enabling access to a wide range of compositions. In this Account, we showcase the uniqueness of electrochemical deposition techniques, detail their implementation toward the synthesis of novel nanoporous metals, and finally outline the future research directions. Nanoporous metallic structures are attractive in that they can provide high surface area and large pore volume, easing mass transport of reactants and providing high accessibility to catalytically active metal surface. The great merit of the electrochemical deposition approach does not only lie in its versatility, being applicable to a wide range of compositions, but also in the nanoscale precision it affords when it comes to crystal growth control, which cannot be easily achieved by other bottom-up or top-down approaches. In this Account, we describe the significant progress made in the field of nanoporous metal designed through electrochemical deposition approaches using hard templates (i.e., porous silica, 3D templates of polymer and silica colloids) and soft templates (i.e., lyotropic liquid crystals, polymeric micelles). In addition, we will point out how it accounts for precise control over the crystal growth and describe the unique physical and chemical properties emerging from these novel materials. Up to date, our group has reported the synthesis of several nanoporous metals and alloys (e.g., Cu, Ru, Rh, Pd, Pt, Au, and their corresponding alloys) under various conditions through electrochemical deposition, while investigating their various potential applications. The orientation of the channel structure, the composition, and the nanoporosity can be easily controlled by selecting the appropriate surfactants or block copolymers. The inherent properties of the final product, such as framework crystallinity, catalytic activity, and resistance to oxidation, are depending on both the composition and pore structure, which in turn require suitable electrochemical conditions. This Account is divided into three main sections: (i) a history of electrochemical deposition using hard and soft templates, (ii) a description of the important mechanisms involved in the preparation of nanoporous materials, and (iii) a conclusion and future perspectives. We believe that this Account will promote a deeper understanding of the synthesis of nanoporous metals using electrochemical deposition methods, thus enabling new pathways to control nanoporous architectures and optimize their performance toward promising applications such as catalysis, energy storage, sensors, and so forth.
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IJS, KILJ, NUK, PNG, UL, UM
Past studies on the issue of learning‐theory foundations in game‐based learning stressed the importance of establishing learning‐theory foundation and provided an exploratory examination of ...established learning theories. However, we found research seldom addressed the development of the use or failure to use learning‐theory foundations and categorized these learning theories into relative types and synthesized their development. We investigate this issue from the perspective of learning theories invoked to underpin educational computer game design and use based on the four types of learning theories: behaviourism, cognitivism, humanism and constructivism. Because the investigation needs to examine and analyse the results from a large number of independent previous studies, this study applied the meta‐analysis method to present a more comprehensive description and discussion of the influence and implications of the findings. This study shows the distribution of development trends for the use of learning theory as a theoretical foundation, as opposed to those that fail to use learning theory in game‐based learning, along with the distribution of types and principles of learning theories that used a learning‐theory foundation. These new findings can supplement the results of previous studies with regard to the issue of learning‐theory foundations in game‐based learning. The contributions of this study for the issue of learning‐theory foundations in game‐based learning are discussed.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
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