The heterotrimeric G protein complex, consisting of Gα, Gβ, and Gγ subunits, are conserved signal transduction mechanism in eukaryotes. Recent molecular researches had demonstrated that G protein ...signaling participates in the regulation of yield related traits. However, the effects of G protein genes on yield components and stress tolerance are not well characterized.
In this study, we generated heterotrimeric G protein mutants in rice using CRISPR/Cas9 (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) gene-editing technology. The effects of heterotrimeric G proteins on the regulation of yield components and stress tolerance were investigated. The mutants of gs3 and dep1 generated preferable agronomic traits compared to the wild-type, whereas the mutants of rga1 showed an extreme dwarf phenotype, which led to a dramatic decrease in grain production. The mutants showed improved stress tolerance, especially under salinity treatment. We found four putative extra-large G proteins (PXLG)1-4 that also participate in the regulation of yield components and stress tolerance. A yeast two hybrid showed that the RGB1 might interact with PXLG2 but not with PXLG1, PXLG3 or PXLG4.
These findings will not only improve our understanding of the repertoire of heterotrimeric G proteins in rice but also contribute to the application of heterotrimeric G proteins in rice breeding.
Nowadays, deep learning has achieved remarkable results in many computer vision related tasks, among which the support of big data is essential. In this paper, we propose a full stage data ...augmentation framework to improve the accuracy of deep convolutional neural networks, which can also play the role of implicit model ensemble without introducing additional model training costs. Simultaneous data augmentation during training and testing stages can ensure network optimization and enhance its generalization ability. Augmentation in two stages needs to be consistent to ensure the accurate transfer of specific domain information. Furthermore, this framework is universal for any network architecture and data augmentation strategy and therefore can be applied to a variety of deep learning based tasks. Finally, experimental results about image classification on the coarse-grained dataset CIFAR-10 (93.41%) and fine-grained dataset CIFAR-100 (70.22%) demonstrate the effectiveness of the framework by comparing with state-of-the-art results.
NarrowBand Internet of Things (NB-IoT) is an emerging cellular-based technology that offers a range of flexible configurations for massive IoT radio access from groups of devices with heterogeneous ...requirements. A configuration specifies the amount of radio resource allocated to each group of devices for random access and for data transmission. Assuming no knowledge of the traffic statistics, there exists an important challenge in "how to determine the configuration that maximizes the long-term average number of served IoT devices at each transmission time interval (TTI) in an online fashion." Given the complexity of searching for optimal configuration, we first develop real-time configuration selection based on the tabular Q-learning (tabular-Q), the linear approximation-based Q-learning (LA-Q), and the deep neural network-based Q-learning (DQN) in the single-parameter single-group scenario. Our results show that the proposed reinforcement learning-based approaches considerably outperform the conventional heuristic approaches based on load estimation (LE-URC) in terms of the number of served IoT devices. This result also indicates that LA-Q and DQN can be good alternatives for tabular-Q to achieve almost the same performance with much less training time. We further advance LA-Q and DQN via actions aggregation (AA-LA-Q and AA-DQN) and via cooperative multi-agent learning (CMA-DQN) for the multi-parameter multi-group scenario, thereby solve the problem that Q-learning agents do not converge in high-dimensional configurations. In this scenario, the superiority of the proposed Q-learning approaches over the conventional LE-URC approach significantly improves with the increase of configuration dimensions, and the CMA-DQN approach outperforms the other approaches in both throughput and training efficiency.
Nickel cobalt phosphides electrocatalysts have shown great potential for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) but further improvements are necessary. Here, nickel cobalt phosphide nanosheets were ...synthesized via electrodeposition followed by phosphorization methodology. The relationships between phosphorization temperature and the structure or hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) activity were studied. The catalyst phosphated at 350 °C (NiCoP-350/CC) displayed excellent HER performance in alkaline media with a low overpotential of 59 mV at the current density of 10 mA cm−2 (η10 = 59 mV). This could be attributed to the formation and better dispersion of active NiCoP crystalline phase on the surface of carbon cloth.
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•NiCoP nanosheets was electrodeposited on the surface of carbon cloth.•The prepared catalyst phosphated at 350 °C showed the best HER performance.•A proper phosphating temperature could promote the formation and dispersion of active NiCoP crystalline phase on the surface of carbon cloth
Microbial fuel cells (MFCs) the most extensively described bioelectrochemical systems (BES), have been made remarkable progress in the past few decades. Although the energy and environment benefits ...of MFCs have been recognized in bioconversion process, there are still several challenges for practical applications on large-scale, particularly for relatively low power output by high ohmic resistance and long period of start-up time. Anodes serving as an attachment carrier of microorganisms plays a vital role on bioelectricity production and extracellular electron transfer (EET) between the electroactive bacteria (EAB) and solid electrode surface in MFCs. Therefore, there has been a surge of interest in developing advanced anodes to enhance electrode electrical properties of MFCs. In this review, different properties of advanced materials for decorating anode have been comprehensively elucidated regarding to the principle of well-designed electrode, power output and electrochemical properties. In particular, the mechanism of these materials to enhance bioelectricity generation and the synergistic action between the EAB and solid electrode were clarified in detail. Furthermore, development of next generation anode materials and the potential modification methods were also prospected.
Can the power generation and wastewater treatment like “Tai Chi” is complementary. Display omitted
•Elucidating difference nature advanced materials for anode decoration in MFCs.•Analyzing the reason of anode electrode to enhance bioelectricity generation.•Investigation the synergistic effects between microbes and solid electrode.•Summarizing fabrication technique for high performance anode electrodes.•Proposing possible modification methods for next-generation anode electrodes.
Carbon nanotube enhanced thin-film nanocomposite membranes were prepared by incorporating carbon nanotubes (CNTs) into the active layers of membranes used for water treatment. For inclusion into ...these active layers, a grafting procedure for carbon nanotubes was set up to increase their hydrophobicity. Multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) grafted by poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) were synthesized via a microemulsion polymerization of methyl methacrylate (MMA) in the presence of acid-modified multiwalled carbon nanotubes (c-MWNTs). Subsequently, polyamide thin-film nanocomposite (TFN) membranes containing PMMA–MWNTs were prepared via interfacial polymerization. Morphology studies demonstrate that MWNTs have been successfully embedded into the active polyamide layer. The rejection of Na2SO4 was high (99%), and the water flux was about 62% increased compared to the thin-film composite membrane when using 2g/L piperazine (PIP) in the aqueous phase, 4g/L trimesoyl chloride (TMC) and 0.67g/L PMMA–MWNTs in the organic phase, which demonstrates that PMMA–MWNTs significantly improve selectivity and permeability.
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•Incorporating hydrophobic enhanced PMMA–MWNTs into polyamide membrane.•Enhanced performance were exhibited compared to the membranes without PMMA–MWNTs.•A novel surface morphologies of TFN membranes were observed.
Compared with skyrmions in ferromagnetic (FM) materials, skyrmions in near-compensated ferrimagnetic (FIM) materials demonstrate higher motion velocity and negligible skyrmion Hall (Sky-Hall) angle. ...This provides a brighter prospect of skyrmions for computing applications. In this letter, we propose an FIM skyrmion-based ultra-low power electric-field-controlled reconfigurable (SUPER) logic gate. By leveraging electric-field-controlled magnetic anisotropy (EFCMA) effect and skyrmion-skyrmion (Sky-Sky) interaction, varied logic functions, such as AND, OR, XOR, NOT, etc., can be realized. Moreover, artificial fishtail-shaped hollows are introduced for implementing skyrmion divisions. Micromagnetic simulations have been performed to validate the logic operations and divisions. By combining these mechanisms, an ultra-low power parallel computing scheme based on FIM skyrmions is proposed, in which multiple logic operations of two inputs can be carried out in parallel. The influence of the number of logic operations on energy consumption improvement has been investigated.
The development of low-cost catalysts with oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) activity superior to that of Pt for fuel cells is highly desirable but remains challenging. Herein, we report a ...bimetal–organic framework (bi-MOF) self-adjusted synthesis of support-free porous Co–N–C nanopolyhedron electrocatalysts by pyrolysis of a Zn/Co bi-MOF without any post-treatments. The presence of initial Zn forms a spatial isolation of Co that suppresses its sintering during pyrolysis, and Zn evaporation also promotes the surface area of the resultant catalysts. The composition, morphology, and hence ORR activity of Co–N–C could be tuned by the Zn/Co ratio. The optimal Co–N–C exhibited remarkable ORR activity with a half-wave potential of 0.871 V versus the reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE) (30 mV more positive than that of commercial 20 wt % Pt/C) and a kinetic current density of 39.3 mA cm–2 at 0.80 V versus RHE (3.1 times that of Pt/C) in 0.1 M KOH, and excellent stability and methanol tolerance. It also demonstrated ORR activity comparable to and stability much higher than those of Pt/C in acidic and neutral electrolytes. Various characterization techniques, including X-ray absorption spectroscopy, revealed that the superior activity and strong stability of Co–N–C originated from the intense interaction between Co and N, the high content of ORR active pyridinic and pyrrolic N, and the large specific surface area.
•We summarized the technologies and applications of PIV in measuring indoor airflows.•We compared the pros and cons of PIV measurement in different indoor environment.•The accuracy and limitations of ...PIV measurement were discussed.•The PIV data is critical for analyzing turbulence and validating simulations.•PIV system parameters should be carefully considered according to the specific needs.
Quantifying the airflow field in building room or vehicle cabin is crucial for creating a thermal comfortable and healthy indoor environment. Airflow field measurement can provide quantitative information of indoor air distribution and local air velocity around occupants or passengers, which has strong relationship with the ventilation effectiveness, the pollutant transportation and the energy conservation in a building or a vehicle. Specifically, PIV has gradually became the most popular and promising technique for airflow field measurement in indoor environment during the last decade. This paper firstly gave an overview of the typical PIV technologies used in indoor environment and the state-of-the-art applications of PIV in measuring the indoor airflow fields. The overview shows that the quantitative and detailed turbulent flow information obtained by PIV is critical for analyzing turbulent properties and validating numerical simulations. Specifically, the authors focused on the pros and cons of PIV measurement and gave the typical parameters of PIV used in indoor airflow field measurements. Generally, the researchers should pay more attention to the selection of appropriate PIV system parameters according to their specific research needs. The accuracy of PIV measurement and the limitations of measurement systems using PIV were also discussed.
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