Abstract
Salmonella serotype (ser.) Enteritidis
infection in broilers is a main foodborne illness that substantially threatens food security. This study aimed to examine the effects of a novel ...polysaccharide isolated from alfalfa (APS) on the intestinal microbiome and systemic health of
S. ser. Enteritidis-
infected broilers. The results indicated that broilers receiving the APS-supplemented diet had the improved (
P
< 0.05) growth performance and gut health than those fed no APS-supplemented diet. Supplementation with APS enhanced (
P
< 0.05) the richness of gut beneficial microbes such as
Bacteroidetes
,
Barnesiella
,
Parabacteroides
,
Butyricimonas
, and
Prevotellaceae
, while decreased (
P
< 0.05) the abundance of facultative anaerobic bacteria including
Proteobacteri
a,
Actinobacteria
,
Ruminococcaceae
,
Lachnospiraceae
, and
Burkholderiaceae
in the
S. ser. Enteritidis
-infected broilers. The
Bacteroides
and
Odoribacter
were identified as the two core microbes across all treatments and combined with their syntrophic microbes formed the hub in co-occurrence networks linking microbiome structure to performance of broilers. Taken together, dietary APS supplementation improved the systemic health of broilers by reshaping the intestinal microbiome regardless of whether
S. ser. Enteritidis
infection was present. Therefore, APS can be employed as a potential functional additives to inhibit the
S. ser. Enteritidis
and enhance the food safety in poultry farming.
The pelleted total mixed ration (PTMR) has a positive effect on the productivity of fattening lambs. However, whether the beneficial effects are underpinned by altering the rumen microbiota and ...metabolome that remain unclear. This study aimed to investigate correlations among growth performance, ruminal microbiota, and ruminal metabolome of lambs fed PTMR diet. A total of 100 crossbred (Dorper sheep × Fine-wool sheep) ram lambs at 55 days of age with similar body weight (BW) (13.2 ± 0.5 kg) were randomly allocated to 10 pens that were fed either PTMR (PTMR group) or unpelleted total mixed ration (UPTMR group) with the same dietary ingredients and nutritional contents. The average daily gain (ADG) and average daily feed intake (ADFI) were determined during the 62-day experimental period and ruminal pH, volatile fatty acid (VFA) concentrations, microbiota, and metabolome in the rumen of the lambs were examined at the end of the experiment. Compared to those of the UPTMR group, the PTMR group had greater ADFI (
= 0.002), ADG (
= 0.003), and feed efficiency (G/F) (
< 0.05). Similarly, feeding PTMR increased the concentration of total VFA (TVFA) and the molar proportion of propionate, but decreased the proportion of butyrate and acetate to propionate ratio in the rumen of lambs compared to that in lambs from the UPTMR group (
< 0.05). In addition, the PTMR group demonstrated lowered alpha-diversity of the ruminal microbiota and enhanced the relative abundance of
(
< 0.05),
(
< 0.05), and the abundance of
(
= 0.064) in the rumen compared with those in the UPTMR group. Feeding lambs with PTMR significantly upregulated the metabolic pathways involving tryptophan, histidine, cysteine and methionine, β-alanine, tyrosine metabolisms, and steroid biosynthesis. Moreover, the abundance of the microbiota strongly correlated with the altered performance, ruminal VFA, metabolites, and metabolic pathways of lambs. Taken together, feeding PTMR shaped the ruminal microbiota of lambs with decreased diversity, while improving relative abundance of some specific microbes and upregulating certain growth-related metabolic pathways, which contributed to the augmented growth performance and G/F of fattening lambs. Thus, feeding PTMR to fattening lambs for superior production performance and G/F is recommended.
Ferroptosis, driven by iron-dependent phospholipid peroxidation, is emerging as an intrinsic cancer defense mechanism. However, the regulatory networks involved in ferroptosis remain largely unknown. ...Here, we found that serine beta-lactamase-like protein (LACTB) inhibits liver cancer progression by regulating ferroptosis. LACTB is downregulated in liver cancer, and the ectopic expression of LACTB markedly inhibits cell viability, colony formation, and tumour growth. LACTB knockout exerts the opposite effects. Further investigation revealed that LACTB blocks HSPA8 transcription in a p53-dependent manner, resulting in the elevation of NCOA4-mediated ferritinophagy and inhibition of SLC7A11/GSH/GPX4 signalling, thereby triggering ferroptosis and suppressing liver cancer progression. Liver cancer cells with an endogenous mutation of p53 binding site in the HSPA8 promoter exhibited increased resistance to ferroptosis inducers, and the ferroptosis-promoting effect of LACTB was significantly weakened in these mutant cells. Importantly, LACTB is identified as a downstream target of lenvatinib, and adeno-associated virus-mediated overexpression and knockdown of LACTB notably enhance and attenuate the anti-tumour efficacy of lenvatinib in vivo, respectively. Taken together, our study reveals a novel action of LACTB and provides potential therapeutic strategies for enhancing the efficacy of lenvatinib in liver cancer.
The effects of adding fermented feed to a pelleted total mixed ration (PTMR) on the growth performance of lambs remain unclear. The present study aimed to investigate the feed efficiency and ...productivity of lambs that were fed PTMR containing fermented soybean meal (FSM) or wheat bran (FWB).
Sixty 90-d-old hybrid lambs were randomly allocated into 12 pens (5 lambs/pen) that were randomly assigned to 4 dietary treatments (3 pens/treatment) with PTMR (basal diet), 2% FSM, or Lactobacillus- or yeast-FWB (L-FWB or Y-FWB) addition in the basal diet.
The findings showed that lambs fed 2% FSM supplemented diet had enhanced (p<0.05) average daily gain (ADG) and carcass yield (p = 0.015), while they had a decreased (p = 0.006) feed conversion ratio compared to that of other three groups. Inclusion of FSM or FWB in PTMR improved (p<0.05) the nutrient digestibility, while it reduced the urea nitrogen content in serum compared to the PTMR group. Additionally, the decreased ratio of N excretion to ADG (p<0.01) was observed with FSM and L-FWB supplementation compared with the PTMR and Y-FWB groups.
In conclusion, feeding the fermented feed-supplemented diet improved nutrient digestibility and growth performance, and 2% FSM-supplemented diet exhibited superior production-promoting efficiency to lambs.
Wind energy has become one of the most important measures for China to achieve its carbon neutrality goal. The spatial and temporal evolvement of economic competitiveness for wind energy becomes an ...important concern in shaping the decarbonization pathway in China. There has been an urgent need in power system planning to model the future dynamics of cost decline and supply potential for wind power in the context of carbon neutrality until 2060. Existing studies often fail to capture the rapid decline in the cost of wind power generation in recent years, and the prediction of wind power cost decline is more conservative than the reality. This study constructs an integrated model to evaluate the cost-competitiveness and grid parity potential of China's onshore wind electricity at fine spatial resolution with updated parameters. Results indicate that the total onshore wind potential amounts to 54.0 PWh. The average levelized cost of wind power is expected to decline from CNY 0.39 kWh−1 in 2020 to 0.30 and CNY 0.21 kWh−1 in 2030 and 2060.28.3%, 67.6%, and 97.6% of the technical potentials hold power costs lower than coal power in 2020, 2030, and 2060.
Display omitted
•Technical and economic potential of onshore wind power in China are estimated.•Grid parity trajectory of onshore wind power towards carbon neutrality is assessed.•The cost of wind power is projected to decrease by 23% in 2030 compared to 2020.•Cost-competitive wind power potential is expected to increase to 52.6 PWh in 2060.
Indoor positioning and navigation is an essential field of location-based service. Non-line of sight (NLOS) error restricts the accuracy of indoor positioning. Many researchers have studied the ...localization problem in indoor NLOS environments, but there is still a problem that NLOS error cannot be mitigated in unknown areas. To solve the above problems, this paper proposes a method of constructing virtual base stations in unknown areas (UA-VBS), and presents the corresponding positioning algorithm to calculate the location of the user equipment. Firstly, the base stations are selected and the initial positioning is carried out. Then, multiple virtual base stations are constructed according to the user equipment positions in the first three steps. The LOS base stations and virtual base stations participate in the TDOA calculation together, and calculate the base stations' combination with the minimum residual and the corresponding positioning result. Finally, the pedestrian dead reckoning fusion weight is updated by the residual value, and the accurate positioning result in NLOS environment is obtained. Simulation and experimental results show that the proposed algorithm has high positioning accuracy and stability in NLOS environment.
In recent years, position information has become a key feature to drive location and context aware services in mobile communication. Researchers from all over the world have proposed many solutions ...for indoor positioning over the past several years. However, due to weak signals, multipath or non-line-of-sight signal propagation, accurately and efficiently localizing targets in harsh indoor environments remains a challenging problem. To improve the performance in harsh environment with insufficient anchors, cooperative localization has emerged. In this paper, a novel cooperative localization algorithm, named area optimization and node selection based sum-product algorithm over a wireless network (AN-SPAWN), is described and analyzed. To alleviate the high computational complexity and build optimized cooperative cluster, a node selection method is designed for the cooperative localization algorithm. Numerical experiment results indicate that our proposed algorithm has a higher accuracy and is less impacted by NLOS errors than other conventional cooperative localization algorithms in the harsh indoor environments.
Aging is one of the key factors that regulate the function of human bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (hBM-MSCs) and related changes in microRNA (miRNA) expression. However, data reported on ...aging-related miRNA changes in hBM-MSCs are limited.
We demonstrated previously that miR-10a is significantly decreased in aged hBM-MSCs and restoration of the miR-10a level attenuated cell senescence and increased the differentiation capacity of aged hBM-MSCs by repressing Krüpple-like factor 4 (KLF4). In the present study, miR-10a was overexpressed or KLF4 was downregulated in old hBM-MSCs by lentiviral transduction. The hypoxia-induced apoptosis, cell survival, and cell paracrine function of aged hBM-MSCs were investigated in vitro. In vivo, miR-10a-overexpressed or KLF4-downregulated old hBM-MSCs were implanted into infarcted mouse hearts after myocardial infarction (MI). The mouse cardiac function of cardiac angiogenesis was measured and cell survival of aged hBM-MSCs was investigated.
Through lentivirus-mediated upregulation of miR-10a and downregulation of KLF4 in aged hBM-MSCs in vitro, we revealed that miR-10a decreased hypoxia-induced cell apoptosis and increased cell survival of aged hBM-MSCs by repressing the KLF4-BAX/BCL2 pathway. In vivo, transplantation of miR-10a-overexpressed aged hBM-MSCs promoted implanted stem cell survival and improved cardiac function after MI. Mechanistic studies revealed that overexpression of miR-10a in aged hBM-MSCs activated Akt and stimulated the expression of angiogenic factors, thus increasing angiogenesis in ischemic mouse hearts.
miR-10a rejuvenated aged hBM-MSCs which improved angiogenesis and cardiac function in injured mouse hearts.
Considerable evidence suggests that dietary energy levels and gut microbiota are pivotal for animal health and productivity. However, little information exists about the correlations among dietary ...energy level, performance, and the gut microbiota and metabolome of donkeys. The objective of this study was to investigate the mechanisms by which dietary energy content dictates the growth performance by modulating the intestinal microbiome and metabolome of donkeys. Thirty-six nine-month-old male Dezhou donkeys with similar body weights were randomly assigned to two groups fed low- or high-energy diets (LE or HE). The results showed that donkeys fed HE had increased (
p
< 0.05) the average daily gain (ADG) and feed efficiency (G/F) compared with those that received LE diet. The gut microbiota in both groups was dominated by the phyla Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes regardless of the dietary energy level. However, feeding HE to donkeys significantly decreased (
p
< 0.05) the ratio of Firmicutes to Bacteroidetes (F/B). Compared to the LE group, feeding HE specifically increased the abundances of
unidentified_Prevotellaceae
(
p
= 0.02) while decreasing the richness of
unidentified_Ruminococcaceae
(
p
= 0.05). Compared to the LE group, feeding the HE diet significantly (
p
< 0.05) upregulated certain metabolic pathways involving the aspartate metabolism and the urea cycle. In addition, the increased bacteria and metabolites in the HE-fed group exhibited a positive correlation with improved growth performance of donkeys. Taken together, feeding the HE diet increased the richness of Prevotellaceae and upregulated growth-related metabolic pathways, which may have contributed to the ameliorated growth performance of donkeys. Thus, it is a recommendable dietary strategy to feed HE diets to fattening donkeys for superior product performance and feed efficiency.
Polysaccharides derived from
(LJPS) have shown a variety of beneficial effects on improving human health; however, the structural features and bioactivities of long-chain LJPS remain unclear. This ...study aimed to investigate the structural characteristics and bioactivities of a novel long-chain LJPS. Results showed that the LJPS was composed of Fuc, Rha, Ara, Gal, Glc, Xyl, Man, Fru, Rib, GalA, GluA, GlcA, and ManA, with a molar ratio of 35.71:1.48:0.28:13.16:0.55:2.97:6.92:0.58:0.41:0.14:3.16:15.84:18.79. Of these, Fuc, Gal, Man, GlcA, and ManA were the predominant components with an accumulated proportion of 93.6%. The LJPS was found to consist of seven types of the monomer residues, and the main interchain glycosidic linkages were
-D-(1 → 2),
-D-(1 → 3), (1 → 4), and (1 → 6), and the molecular mass was 5.79 × 10
g/mol. Regarding the molecular conformation, LJPS was a multi-branched, long-chain macromolecule, and appeared in a denser crosslinking network with highly branched and helix domains in the terms of morphology. Additionally, the LJPS had no toxicity to mouse macrophage cells and exhibited biphasic immuno-modulating capacity. The present findings suggested that the long-chain LJPS might be an attractive candidate as an immunopotentiating and anti-inflammatory functional food, and this study also provides a feasible approach to decipher the structural characteristics and spatial conformations of plant-derived polysaccharides.
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