The number of seeds per spike of qingke barley is one of the primary factors contributing to its associated economic output, and the development process of young spikes affects the resulting number ...of grains. Therefore, the differentiation and development processes of qingke spikes represent vitally important milestones in the formation of qingke yields. Nevertheless, the developmental course of qingke spikes has not yet been well characterized. In this study, we first systematically divided the development process of young spikes into 10 landmark stages. These periods spanned from the one-leaf stage to the ten-leaf stage, and we analysed the phenological characteristics of the spikes at each stage. Each spike was composed of axis and spikelet. Each spikelet contained one floret, which had a pair of rudimentary glumes (sterile lemmas), two interlocking large glumes (lemma and palea), an awn, a similar rudimentary axis, a pistil, three stamens, and two lodicules. In this research, we ascertained the patterns for the differentiation and development of young spikes, which provides a reference and theoretical basis for further research on qingke production and reproductive biology.
Questions
Trait–environment relationships hold great promise for elucidating the mechanisms that drive community assembly. We asked to what extent does functional trait coordination underlie the ...differentiation of acquisitive–conservative strategies along environmental gradients? Also, to what extent does soil water availability determine trait combinations and subsequently shape microhabitat preferences for species with distinct ecological strategies?
Location
Yunnan Province, southwest China.
Methods
Pearson correlation and trait network analyses were used to quantify trait associations. A combined RLQ–fourth‐corner analysis and a spatial autoregressive error model were employed to examine trait–environment relationships and explain species distribution along environmental gradients.
Results
Leaf and stem traits were tightly coordinated along the first RLQ axis. Herein, traits representing construction cost exhibited trade‐offs against traits representing resource acquisition rate, underlying an acquisitive–conservative strategy differentiation along the environmental gradients. Significant overall and bivariate trait–environment relationships were found. In addition, the topographic wetness index contributed substantially to the environmental variation, and significantly influenced most traits alone. These results supported the hypothesis that soil water availability was the key environmental factor in selecting trait combinations and driving the differentiation of acquisitive and conservative strategies for coexisting species compared with other environmental factors. Finally, deciduous and a proportion of the evergreen species were acquisitive, whereas the remaining evergreen species were conservative, preferring wetter and drier microhabitats, respectively.
Conclusions
Our findings indicate that soil water availability plays a central role in shaping both the trait combinations and microhabitat preferences of species with different ecological strategies rather than different leaf habits. These findings also highlight the fundamental significance of functional traits in facilitating the differentiation between acquisitive and conservative strategies along environmental gradients.
We observed tight trait coordination underlying the differentiation of acquisitive and conservative strategies along environmental gradients in the Ailaoshan subtropical mid‐mountain moist evergreen broad‐leaved forest. In addition, our findings suggest that soil water availability is the primary factor shaping the microhabitat preference of coexisting woody species, mainly through driving the differentiation of diverse ecological strategies.
Oxidative stress plays an important role in cerebral ischemia–reperfusion injury. Dimethyl fumarate (DMF) and its primary metabolite monomethyl fumarate (MMF) are antioxidant agents that can activate ...the nuclear factor erythroid-2-related factor 2 (Nrf2)/heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) pathway and induce the expression of antioxidant proteins. Here, we evaluated the impact of DMF and MMF on ischemia-induced brain injury and whether the Nrf2 pathway mediates the effects provided by DMF and MMF in cerebral ischemia–reperfusion injury. Using a mouse model of transient focal brain ischemia, we show that DMF and MMF significantly reduce neurological deficits, infarct volume, brain edema, and cell death. Further, DMF and MMF suppress glial activation following brain ischemia. Importantly, the protection of DMF and MMF was mostly evident during the subacute stage and was abolished in Nrf2
−/−
mice, indicating that the Nrf2 pathway is required for the beneficial effects of DMF and MMF. Together, our data indicate that DMF and MMF have therapeutic potential in cerebral ischemia–reperfusion injury and their protective role is likely mediated by the Nrf2 pathway.
OBJECTIVES:Famine exposure in early life has been reported to be associated with higher risk of hypertension prevalence in adults. The aim of the present study was to investigate the association of ...exposure to the Chinese famine during early life with the risk of hypertension prevalence in adults.
METHODS:There were 8742 participants born between 1952 and 1964 derived from the Dongfeng–Tongji cohort included in the present study. Participants were classified as nonexposed group, fetal exposed group, early-childhood exposed group, mid-childhood exposed group, and late-childhood exposed group, respectively. Logistic regression model was used to explore the association between famine exposure in early life and risk of hypertension prevalence in adults.
RESULTS:The prevalence of hypertension among individuals in nonexposed group, fetal exposed group, early-childhood exposed group, mid-childhood exposed group, and late-childhood exposed group were 34.0, 38.0, 43.9, 47.4, and 54.4%, respectively. Compared with nonexposed group, participants exposed to the famine in the fetal 1.24, 95% confidence interval (CI)1.01–1.51, early childhood (1.44, 95% CI1.20–1.73), mid-childhood (1.67, 95% CI1.38–2.02), and late childhood (2.11, 95% CI1.75–2.55) had higher risk of hypertension prevalence in adults after adjustment for potential confounders (P for trend <0.0001). Adjustment for age did not materially change the results.
CONCLUSION:Results in the present study indicated that exposure to the famine in early life increases the risk of hypertension prevalence in adulthood.
Visibility determination is a key requirement in a wide range of national and urban applications, such as national security, landscape management, and urban design. Mobile LiDAR point clouds can ...depict the urban built environment with a high level of details and accuracy. However, few three-dimensional visibility approaches have been developed for the street-level point-cloud data. Accordingly, an approach based on mobile LiDAR point clouds has been developed to map the three-dimensional visibility at the street level. The method consists of five steps: voxelization of point-cloud data, construction of lines-of-sight, construction of sectors of sight, construction of three-dimensional visible space, and calculation of volume index. The proposed approach is able to automatically measure the volume of visible space and openness at any viewpoint along a street. This approach has been applied to three study areas. The results indicated that the proposed approach enables accurate simulation of visible space as well as high-resolution (1 m × 1 m) mapping of the visible volume index. The proposed approach can make a contribution to the improvement of urban planning and design processes that aim at developing more sustainable built environments.
Beta-diversity, or the spatio-temporal variation in community composition, can be partitioned into turnover and nestedness components in a multidimensional framework. Forest structure, including ...comprehensive characteristics of vertical and horizontal complexity, strongly affects species composition and its spatial variation. However, the effects of forest structure on beta-diversity patterns in multidimensional and multiple-scale contexts are poorly understood. Here, we assessed beta-diversity at local (a 20-ha forest dynamics plot) and regional (a plot network composed of 19 1-ha plots) scales in a Chinese subtropical evergreen broad-leaved forest. We then evaluated the relative importance of forest structure, topography, and spatial structure on beta-diversity and its turnover and nestedness components in taxonomic, functional, and phylogenetic dimensions at local and regional scales. We derived forest structural parameters from both unmanned aerial vehicle light detection and ranging (UAV LiDAR) data and plot inventory data. Turnover component dominated total beta-diversity for all dimensions at the two scales. With the exception of some components (taxonomic and functional turnover at the local scale; functional nestedness at the regional scale), environmental factors (i.e., topography and forest structure) contributed more than pure spatial variation. Explanations of forest structure for beta-diversity and its component patterns at the local scale were higher than those at the regional scale. The joint effects of spatial structure and forest structure influenced component patterns in all dimensions (except for functional turnover) to some extent at the local scale, while pure forest structure influenced taxonomic and phylogenetic nestedness patterns to some extent at the regional scale. Our results highlight the importance and scale dependence of forest structure in shaping multidimensional beta-diversity and its component patterns. Clearly, further studies need to link forest structure directly to ecological processes (e.g., asymmetric light competition and disturbance dynamics) and explore its roles in biodiversity maintenance.
The land controlled-source electromagnetic (CSEM) method dynamically monitors reservoir fluid by contrasting electrical conductivity between hydraulic fracturing fluids and surrounding rock ...formations. In hydraulic fracturing monitoring, the underground steel casings represent significant high-conductivity objects that require accurate and rapid numerical modeling for understanding the CSEM responses and optimizing the survey configurations. To efficiently simulate the steel well casings, we made use of the modified finite volume method (FVM) with the concept of edge conductivity equivalence that avoids the computational cost of grid refinement down to millimeters or centimeters for the casing. The new algorithm is satisfactorily validated by a numerical comparison against a trusted program Dipole1D and a commercial program COMSOL. Then the algorithm is used to investigate the characteristic CSEM responses of injected fracturing fluid due to a galvanic electromagnetic (EM) source grounded near the head of steel-cased well, an unconventional configuration that can maximize the data anomaly by channeling more excitation current to the deep reservoir. In particularly, we simulated two fracturing scenarios with different fluid migration directions: one with a high-resistivity cap layer as the background and the other with a realistic heavy oil fracturing site from Karamay in Xinjiang, China. Our simulation shows that the configuration of near-casing excitation significantly enhances the electric-field anomalies of the fluid injection, which is the most prominent as the galvanic effect at low frequencies. These phenomena highlight the crucial role of steel casing in the CSEM method for hydraulic fracturing monitoring.
Emerging studies have investigated the association between different anthropometric indices with diabetes risk but the results were inconsistent. The aims of the study were to examine the ...associations of different anthropometric indices with incident diabetes risk and whether novel anthropometric indices improve diabetes prediction beyond traditional indices among elderly Chinese.
Nine thousand nine hundred sixty-two elderly individuals (age ≥ 60 years old) derived from the prospective Dongfeng-Tongji cohort were included. Hazard ratio (HR) and corresponding 95% confidence interval (CI) were evaluated by Cox proportional hazard model to examine the associations between traditional anthropometric indices (body mass index BMI, waist circumference WC, waist-to-height ratio WHtR), novel anthropometric indices (visceral adiposity index VAI, a body shape index ABSI, body roundness index BRI) and diabetes risk. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve and area under curve (AUC) were applied to compare the novel anthropometric indices with the traditional indices in diabetes prediction.
During mean 4.6 years of follow-up, 614 incident cases of type 2 diabetes (T2D) were identified. Significant positive associations were detected between BMI, WC, WHtR, VAI and BRI and incident T2D risk. For ABSI, no significant association was observed in either men or women. BMI was the strongest predictor in diabetes in men (AUC = 0.655) comparable with the other anthropometric indices (P < 0.05). Similar as men, BMI was the strongest predictor (AUC = 0.635) in women. Except for WC, the AUC of BMI was larger than WHtR, VAI, and BRI. In contrast, ABSI was not a good predictor in either men (AUC = 0.507) or women (AUC = 0.503).
In elderly Chinese, BMI, WC, WHtR, VAI and BRI were positively associated with incident T2D risk. Among them, BMI was the strongest predictor in both men and women.
Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is the world’s third most common cause of vascular mortality and a serious complication from multiple departments. Risk assessment of VTE guides clinical intervention in ...time and is of great importance to in-hospital patients. Traditional VTE risk assessment methods based on scaling tools, which always require rules carefully designed by human experts, are difficult to apply to large-population scenarios since the manually designed rules are not guaranteed to be accurate to all populations. In contrast, with the development of the electronic health record (EHR) datasets, data-driven machine-learning-based risk assessment methods have proven superior predictability in many studies in recent years. This paper uses the gradient boosting tree model to study the VTE risk assessment problem with multi-department data. There exist two distinct characteristics of VTE data collected at the level of the entire hospital: its wide distribution and heterogeneity across multiple departments. To this end, we consider the prediction task over multiple departments as a multi-task learning process, and introduce the algorithm of a task-aware tree-based method TSGB to tackle the multi-task prediction problem. Although the introduction of multi-task learning improves overall across-department performance, we reveal the problem of task-wise performance decline while dealing with imbalanced VTE data volume. According to the analysis, we finally propose two variants of TSGB to alleviate the problems and further boost the prediction performance. Compared with state-of-the-art rule-based and multi-task tree-based methods, the experimental results show the proposed methods not only improve the overall across-department AUC performance effectively, but also ensure the improvement of performance over every single department prediction.
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•This study proposes a new perspective of VTE risk assessment for multiple departments as an MTL problem.•Two novel variants are proposed based on the state-of-the-art tree-based MTL model to handle data imbalance.•The proposed algorithms can boost the predictive performance effectively for both the overall and single-department tasks.
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