Microplastics are plastic fragments widely distributed in the environment and accumulate in the organisms. However, the research on microplastics effects in mammals is limited. Polyethylene is the ...main kind of microplastics in the environment. We hypothesized that polyethylene exposure disrupts host intestine metabolism by modifying intestine microflora composition and then lipopolysaccharide (LPS) pathway. Female mice were orally exposed to 0, 0.002 and 0.2 μg/g/d polyethylene microplastics (PE MPs) for 30 days. Colon mucin density was quantized after AB-PAS staining. Mucin 2 (MUC2), inflammatory factors (IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8 and IL-10), short-chain fatty acid receptors (GPR41 and GPR43), LPS receptors (TLR4 and MyD88) and LPS pathway downstream genes (ERK1 and NF-κB) mRNA levels in colon were measured. Feces were collected on the 15th day of exposure for gut microflora analysis. Blood biochemical analysis was performed. Results showed that 0.2 μg/g/d PE MPs exposure significantly decreased colon mucin expression (p < 0.05), decreased IL-1β (p < 0.05) and increased IL-8 and IL-10 levels (p < 0.01 and p < 0.001 respectively). Microflora data showed that in 0.2 μg/g/d PE MPs group the number of Firmicutes decreased and the number of Bacteroides increased (both p < 0.01). Predicted KEGG metabolic pathways by piecrust method indicated that PE MPs enhanced amino acids metabolism in microflora. ERK1 and NF-κB mRNA were significantly lower in 0.2 μg/g/d PE MPs group (both p < 0.001). Blood total protein, albumin and globulin levels significantly increased after 0.2 μg/g/d PE MPs exposure (p < 0.01, p < 0.01 and p < 0.05 respectively). These results indicate that PE MPs exposure induced decreased mucin production, a slight immune response and increased the microflora amino acid metabolism in the mice colon by modifying colon microflora composition.
Polyethylene microplastics exposure decreased colon mucin release and increased amino acid metabolism by modifying colon microflora composition.
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•PE MPs exposure caused a decrease of colon mucin secretion in mice colon.•PE MPs exposure induced a mild inflammatory response in the colonic epithelium.•PE MPs exposure decreased the Firmicutes and increased the Bacteroides in gut microflora.•Alternation of microflora composition induced by PE MPs increased amino acid metabolism.•Both blood albumin and globulin levels increased after PE MPs exposure.
Since the seminal work of Zhang in 2016, donor–acceptor cyanoarene-based fluorophores, such as 1,2,3,5-tetrakis(carbazol-9-yl)-4,6-dicyanobenzene (4CzIPN), have been widely applied in photoredox ...catalysis and used as excellent metal-free alternatives to noble metal Ir- and Ru-based photocatalysts. However, all the reported photoredox reactions involving this chromophore family are based on harnessing the energy from a single visible light photon, with a limited range of redox potentials from −1.92 to +1.79 V vs SCE. Here, we document the unprecedented discovery that this family of fluorophores can undergo consecutive photoinduced electron transfer (ConPET) to achieve very high reduction potentials. One of the newly synthesized catalysts, 2,4,5-tri(9H-carbazol-9-yl)-6-(ethyl(phenyl)amino)isophthalonitrile (3CzEPAIPN), possesses a long-lived (12.95 ns) excited radical anion form, 3CzEPAIPN•–*, which can be used to activate reductively recalcitrant aryl chlorides (E red ≈ −1.9 to −2.9 V vs SCE) under mild conditions. The resultant aryl radicals can be engaged in synthetically valuable aromatic C–B, C–P, and C–C bond formation to furnish arylboronates, arylphosphonium salts, arylphosphonates, and spirocyclic cyclohexadienes.
Outbreaks of zoonotic diseases are accelerating at an unprecedented rate in the current era of globalization, with substantial impacts on the global economy, public health, and sustainability. Alien ...species invasions have been hypothesized to be important to zoonotic diseases by introducing both existing and novel pathogens to invaded ranges. However, few studies have evaluated the generality of alien species facilitating zoonoses across multiple host and parasite taxa worldwide. Here, we simultaneously quantify the role of 795 established alien hosts on the 10,473 zoonosis events across the globe since the 14
century. We observe an average of ~5.9 zoonoses per alien zoonotic host. After accounting for species-, disease-, and geographic-level sampling biases, spatial autocorrelation, and the lack of independence of zoonosis events, we find that the number of zoonosis events increase with the richness of alien zoonotic hosts, both across space and through time. We also detect positive associations between the number of zoonosis events per unit space and climate change, land-use change, biodiversity loss, human population density, and PubMed citations. These findings suggest that alien host introductions have likely contributed to zoonosis emergences throughout recent history and that minimizing future zoonotic host species introductions could have global health benefits.
Microplastics (MPs) pollution becomes an increasing concern and researchers keep exploring the health effects caused by MPs exposure. The ageing process in the environment significantly alters the ...physicochemical characteristics of MPs and subsequently affects their toxicities. The health effects of aged MPs exposure and the mechanism underlying are worthy of exploration. Polystyrene microplastics (PS-MPs) (with size less than 50 µm) were obtained by grinding and screening polystyrene materials. PS-MPs continued to be aged by ozone treatment (0.4 mg/min, 9 h). Both male and female C57BL/6 mice were orally exposed to 0 or 2 mg/kg/d aged PS-MPs for 28 days. Results showed that PS-MPs were found in liver, ovary and spleen of females and liver, testis and spleen of males in the aged PS-MPs group. Exposure to aged PS-MPs significantly decreased abdominal fat/body coefficient, the adipocyte size and the serum LDL-C level in females. Compared to the control, serum estradiol (E2) level, the mRNA expression levels of genes regulating E2 production (17β-hsd, 3β-hsd and Star) in ovary and the protein expression levels of E2 receptors (ERα, ERβ), AMPKα and p-AMPKα1 in liver increased significantly, and the mRNA expression levels of AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) downstream genes (Srebp-1c, Fas and Scd1) in liver decreased significantly in the female aged PS-MPs group. Liver metabolomic profiling showed that differential metabolites between female aged PS-MPs group and female control group were enriched in biotin metabolism and the level of biotin increased significantly in the female aged PS-MPs group. However, no significant changes were detected in males. These results indicated that aged PS-MPs exposure increased ovarian E2 production and activated the AMPK pathway in the liver which might inhibit liver lipid synthesis only in females. Our findings provide new insights into the potential sex-specific health effects of environmental MPs pollution.
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•Aged polystyrene microplastics could enter the ovary, testicle, spleen and liver.•Aged polystyrene microplastics promote the estradiol production in female ovary.•Aged polystyrene microplastics inhibit hepatic lipid synthesis only in females.
This paper investigates the problem of robust fault-tolerant containment control for a class of multiagent systems in which multiple active leaders and linear heterogeneous follower subsystems with ...mismatched affine uncertainties and actuator faults are distributed on a communication network. It first introduces a group of distributed adaptive intermediate estimators, based on which each following agent can estimate the desired containment trajectory objective. Then, by utilizing adaptive parameter estimation approach and S-procedure technique, a decentralized fault-tolerant tracking control algorithm is designed to guarantee all practical states of followers asymptotically track the desired containment trajectory even in the case of actuator faults and heterogeneous affine uncertainties. Interestingly, the main advantage of proposed fault-tolerant containment strategy is that, not only the faulty information from follower subsystems cannot affect neighbor agents, but also both actuator faults and heterogeneous affine uncertainties can be compensated in local subsystem. Finally, a numerical example is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the designed containment control protocol.
Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) are widely used for industrial and commercial purposes and have received increasing attention due to their adverse effects on health.
To examine ...the relationship of serum PFAS and glycometabolism among adolescents based on the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.
General linear regression models were applied to estimate the relationship between exposure to single PFAS and glycometabolism. Weighted quantile sum (WQS) regression models and Bayesian kernel machine regressions (BKMR) were used to assess the associations between multiple PFASs mixture exposure and glycometabolism.
A total of 757 adolescents were enrolled. Multivariable regression model showed that Me-PFOSA-AcOH exposure was negatively associated with fasting blood glucose. WQS index showed that there was marginal negative correlation between multiple PFASs joint exposure and the homeostasis model of assessment for insulin resistance index (HOMA-IR) (β = −0.26, p < .068), and PFHxS had the largest weight. BKMR models showed that PFASs mixture exposure were associated with decreased INS and HOMA-IR, and the exposure-response relationship had curvilinear shape.
The increase in serum PFASs were associated with a decrease in HOMA-IR among adolescents. Mixed exposure models could more accurately and effectively reveal true exposure.
Key Messages
The detection rates of different PFAS contents in adolescent serum remained diverse.
Adolescent serum PFASs had negative curvilinear correlation with INS and HOMA-IR levels.
PFHxS had the highest weight in the associations between multiple PFASs and adolescent glycometabolism.
This paper addresses the robust dissipative control problem for the singular linear parameter-varying (LPV) systems with multiple input time-delays. First, by constructing the parameter-dependent ...Lyapunov functional, a delay-dependent robust dissipativity criterion for singular LPV systems with multiple state time-delays is proposed. Second, on the basis of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) technique, a novel delay-dependent robust dissipativity-based controller for the singular LPV delay systems is designed. Furthermore, it is proved that the resultant closed-loop system via state feedback controller is admissible and strictly robustly (
Q,S,R
)-dissipative. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated by three numerical examples.
In this article, the grades of different kinds of energy sources are distinguished. Thus, we put forward an equivalent electric calculation method, which is compliant with the calculation of various ...energy resources that have different grades. Based on this aspect, we empirically analyzed the influence of industrial structure changing on energy consumption structure by analyzing panel data in 30 provinces of China from 2003 to 2013. Results showed that the calculated results of equivalent electric calculation method were more accurate because it considered the difference in grades between various energy sources. Industrial structure changing had a significant impact on energy consumption structure. The upgrading and rationalization of the industrial structure had a significant promotion on energy structure cleaning. In addition, technological progress was conducive to the clean development of energy structure, the decrease in energy price boosted energy structure cleaning, and the impact of economic level on energy consumption structure was not significant.
Pseudomonas fluorescens strain 3JW1, which has a broad-spectrum antimicrobial activity, was studied to investigate whether it affects the amounts of aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) produced by Aspergillus ...flavus. It was found that the bacterium reduced the amounts of AFB1 in potato dextrose broth (PDB) and peanut medium by 97.8% and 99.4%, respectively. It also reduced AFB1 by ~183 μg/kg (55.8%) when applied onto peanut kernels. This strain reduced AFB1 via three mechanisms. First, it significantly inhibited A. flavus growth; second, our data showed that strain 3JW1 inhibits aflatoxin biosynthesis by A. flavus; and third, P. fluorescens strain 3JW1 is capable of degrading AFB1 at a rate as high as 88.3% in 96 hours. This is the first report demonstrating that Pseudomonas fluorescens can reduce toxin contamination caused by A. flavus on peanut kernels. Our findings indicate that P. fluorescens strain 3JW1 had multiple effects including reducing A. flavus infection and aflatoxin contamination. And the results also highlight the potential applications of the strain 3JW1 for the biological control of aflatoxin contamination in peanuts and other susceptible crops.
Studies showed that vitamin D (25-hydroxyvitamin D) level in the human blood circulation could be affected by exogenous estrogen exposure. This study aims to explore the relationships between urinary ...phytoestrogens metabolites and serum total 25(OH)D in general population, urinary phytoestrogens metabolites (daidzein, enterodiol, enterolactone, equol, genistein and o-desmethylangolensin). Totally 2,609 adults ≥6 y old from the 2009–2010 National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) were recruited into the cross-sectional analyses and information including demographic, socioeconomic, examinations and laboratory test were collected. All analyses were performed using Stata13.0, one-way analysis of variance and multivariable regression were utilised according to data characteristics, respectively. It showed that age, race, education level, body mass index (BMI), and sampling season had significant effects on serum 25(OH)D level (all p<0.001). In the whole population, urinary enterodiol and equol were significantly positively associated with serum total 25(OH)D level (β=0.86, 95%CI=0.08–1.65, p<0.05; β=1.68, 95%CI=0.91–2.45, p<0.001). Equol was also found significantly positively correlated with total 25(OH)D in both female and male separately (β=1.69, 95%CI=0.51–2.87, p<0.05; β=1.66, 95%CI=0.63–2.69, p<0.05). Phytoestrogen concentrations in the urinary and 25(OH)D levels in the serum had proved a positive correlation in our study, which provide theoretical basis and reference for the dietary nutrient intake in the population.
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