This study aimed to investigate the role of miR-558 in tumor angiogenesis by targeting heparinase (HPSE) in tongue squamous cell carcinoma (TSCC)-derived exosomes. In the present study, the role of ...exosome miR-558 in angiogenesis in vitro and in vivo was investigated by cell proliferation, migration, tube formation, subcutaneous tumor formation in mice, and in vivo Matrigel plug assay. The target genes of miR-558 were detected by means of dual luciferase assay. It was found that TSCC cells secrete miR-558 into the extracellular environment, with exosome as the carrier. Human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) ingested exosomes, which not only increased the expression level of miR-558, but also enhanced their proliferation, migration, and tube formation functions. In vivo Matrigel plug assay demonstrated that TSCC cell-derived exosome miR-558 promoted neovascularization in vivo. Compared with negative control cells, TSCC cells overexpressing miR-558 formed subcutaneous tumors in nude mice, with larger volume, heavier mass, and more vascularization. Dual luciferase assay confirmed that HPSE was the direct target gene regulated by miR-558. HPSE promoted the proliferation, migration, and tube formation of HUVECs, and the knockout of HPSE could downregulate the pro-angiogenic effect of miR-558. In summary, miR-558 in TSCC exosomes promotes the proliferation, migration, and tube formation of HUVECs by targeting HPSE, and enhancing tumor angiogenesis.
A novel microscopic Shape-From-Polarization (SFP) 3D shape reconstruction method is proposed, in which degree of polarization is calculated using Polarized Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution ...Function (PBRDF) to overcome azimuthal ambiguity for both specular and diffuse polarization microscopic scenes. Based on the calculated degree of polarization, a polarization modulation microscopy oriented variational model is established to estimate surface normal vector and rebuild 3D shape of the sample with "fuzzy guidance" based on atomic force microscopy (AFM). Experiments on different microscopic samples indicate the proposed method can restore the stereoscopic morphology distribution with precision in micrometer.
An exclusive breastfeeding rate in the first 6 months of life of at least 50% is one of the six World Health Organization global nutrition targets for 2025. However, the exclusive breastfeeding rate ...in China is quite low and decreasing which makes it urgent to explore effective ways to reverse the current downward trend. As mobile technologies have rapidly developed, mobile communication apps such as WeChat (one of the largest social networking platforms in China) are well accepted and have the potential to improve health behaviors in a convenient way. The current paper describes the study protocol of a WeChat intervention that aims to promote breastfeeding in rural areas in China.
The study is designed as a randomized controlled trial in rural Qinghai Province, China. Women who are 14-36 weeks pregnant will be randomized to routine antenatal and postnatal care, or routine care plus the WeChat breastfeeding education. pregnant women with a severe disease and complications of pregnancy or HIV-1 will be excluded. Breastfeeding knowledge and promotion information will be delivered to the intervention group through a WeChat official account from 3 months pregnancy to 6 months postpartum. The outcome assessments are conducted at baseline through face-to-face interviews, and at one week, 1 month, 3 months and 6 months postpartum by telephone interviews. The primary outcome is difference in the exclusive breastfeeding rate at 1 month, 3 months, and 6 months postpartum between the intervention group and the control group. Secondary outcomes include the overall duration of any and exclusive breastfeeding across the first 6 months postpartum; mothers' knowledge of breastfeeding; the proportion of early initiation of breastfeeding; and the timing of the introduction of solid food to infants. Intention-to-treat-analysis will be used. Survival analysis will be used to compare the overall duration of any and exclusive breastfeeding between groups.
This study is the first effort to promote exclusive breastfeeding through WeChat in China. Our results will provide scientific evidence for the effect of health education through WeChat on breastfeeding. Thereby this may offer a comprehensive intervention to promote exclusive breastfeeding in China and other settings.
Chinese Clinical Trial Registry -ChiCTR1800017364. Registered 26 July 2018. http://www.chictr.org.cn/showproj.aspx?proj=29325.
Taiping houkui tea won the title of "the King of Green Tea" at the International Tea Exposition in 2004, which had an orchid fragrance but the material basis of the orchid fragrance had not been ...revealed yet.
To investigate the material basis of the orchid fragrance and identify the quality grade of Taiping houkui tea.
A method was developed for evaluating orchid-like aroma between different grades Taiping houkui tea by solid-phase micro extraction (SPME) and comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography coupled with time-of-fight mass spectrometry (GC×GC-TOFMS). The crushed tea sample in a 25 mL headspace bottle was incubated at 90°C for 10 min. Then the gaseous sample was extracted by SPME divinylbenzene/polydimethylsiloxane fiber for 50 min and thermally desorpted at 250°C for 2 min.
In total, 735 volatile compounds were determined by SPME- GC×GC-TOFMS and 15 compounds were related to orchid-like aroma.
The high-quality Taiping houkui tea has the orchid fragrance and the low-grade one does not; thus orchid-like aroma can be used as a reference of grades of Taiping houkui tea.
Thirty different grades of Taiping houkui tea samples were compared and analyzed experimentally, and the results showed that the special aroma substances, which played a key role in grade discrimination of Taiping houkui tea, were found by the statistical method.
Elevated plasma free fatty acid (FFA) levels are associated with insulin resistance and can cause lipotoxicity in skeletal muscles. In response to FFAs, skeletal muscle can secrete a variety of ...cytokines. Irisin, one such muscle-secreted cytokine, can improve glucose tolerance, glucose uptake, and lipid metabolism. It is produced by the transmembrane protein fibronectin type Ⅲ domain containing 5 (FNDC5) by specific proteases. The purpose of this study was to investigate the regulatory mechanisms of the FNDC5 response to palmitate and their relationships with insulin resistance in C2C12 myotubes. RNA sequencing analysis results from C2C12 myotubes treated with palmitate showed that palmitate could activate the TGF-β signaling pathway. Palmitate directly affected the expression of Smad3, but not its phosphorylation level, in C2C12 myotubes. Furthermore, knockdown and knockout of Smad3 alleviated the inhibitory effect of palmitate on the expression of FNDC5. In contrast, overexpression of Smad3 aggravated the inhibition of FNDC5 expression. There is a Smad3 binding motif in the −660 bp to −649 bp region of the Fndc5 promoter. CRISPR/Cas9 knockout of this region also alleviated the inhibition of FNDC5 expression in response to palmitate. More importantly, inhibition of FNDC5 expression mediated by Smad3 led to a decrease in insulin sensitivity in C2C12 myotubes. Collectively, these findings suggest that palmitate could induce insulin resistance through Smad3-mediated down-regulation of the Fndc5 gene.
•Palmitate had an inhibitory effect on the expression of Fndc5.•Smad3 had a certain enrichment in the −756 to −634 bp region of the Fndc5 promoter.•Palmitate might attenuate the insulin signaling pathway via Smad3-mediated down-regulation of Fndc5.
In the existing cooperative cognitive radio, primary users are generally assumed to be more than capable of supporting their target throughput, thereby the rate enhancement or the cooperation from ...secondary users actually has less attraction to primary users. Instead, they might be more interested in the benefits in other format. This paper presents a new cooperative cognitive radio framework, where primary users are willing to cooperatively relay data for secondary users with their under-utilized resource to earn the revenue. An auction model with multiple auctioneers, multiple bidders and hybrid divisible/indivisible commodities is proposed to solve channel bands and cooperative transmit power competitions among secondary users. For maximizing the utility, secondary users can select receiving primary user's assistance (i.e., work in cooperative transmission mode) and purchase both spectrum and power from the primary user, or select direct transmission mode and just buy spectrum from the primary user. Then, the convergence of the proposed auction scheme to a Walrasian equilibrium is mathematically proved. Finally, the performance of the proposed scheme is verified by the simulation results.
The traditional fixing method for coverage gap in wireless sensor network (WSN) mainly targets the homogenous networks, in which all nodes have the same detection radius. By this method, the gaps in ...the network are covered randomly by mobile nodes, leading to low coverage and resource waste. Considering the different detection radii of actual WSN nodes, this paper explores the gap fixing in heterogenous WSNs, and proposes an improved gap fixing method based on fixing priority. Specifically, the gap fixing points were determined and prioritized with the aid of Voronoi polygons, and then fixed by mobile nodes. After that, the nodes with overlapping sensing ranges were removed to reduce the redundancy. Simulation results show that the improved method can effectively enhance the coverage of the entire network.
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Succinate-cytochrome c reductase (SCR) is composed of a mixture of mitochondrial complex II (succinate-ubiquinone oxidoreductase) and complex III (cytochrome bc1 complex). Meanwhile, ...complexes II and III are two promising targets of numerous antibiotics and fungicides. With an aim to identify new lead structures for SCR, complex II or III, a new series of 4-aryloxy-N-arylanilines were synthesized by introducing a 4-aryloxy phenyl group as one of the aryl groups in diaryl amines. With the economic Cu(OAc)2·H2O as the optimal copper promoter, a simple and facile protocol was utilized to afford 24 target products in 56–93% yields. Furthermore, extensive screening results suggested variable inhibitory activities of these compounds against SCR. Exceptionally, compounds 7k–7n showed excellent inhibition potency with their IC50 values in the nanomolar range, demonstrating higher potency than the commercial controls (penthiopyrad and azoxystrobin) by over one order of magnitude.
εNd and normalized Rare Earth Elements (REE) patterns of benthic and planktonic foraminifera and Fe‐Mn coatings precipitated on sediments have been investigated for the South China Sea (SCS) to (1) ...assess the reliability of the extraction of past seawater εNd in the SCS and to (2) reconstruct past hydrological changes during the last 25 kyr. Reductively cleaned mono‐specific planktonic foraminifera (Globigerinoides ruber) and mixed benthic foraminifera in core‐top sediments from 1500 to 2400 m display similar εNd values to those of the modern Pacific Deep Water (PDW) (εNd of −3.9 to −4.4). Furthermore, the εNd of the reductive cleaning solutions shows similar εNd values to ones obtained on cleaned foraminifera. Combined with PAAS‐normalized REE patterns, these results confirm that the oxidative and reductive cleaning procedure applied to foraminifera does not totally remove all of the Fe‐Mn coatings and that εNd values yielded by cleaned planktonic foraminifera retain the εNd imprint of the bottom and/or pore water. εNd values obtained from a leaching procedure carried out on the bulk non‐decarbonated sediments are comparable to the εNd values of the modern PDW, whereas a similar leaching procedure applied to decarbonated sediments reveals a bias due to contamination with Nd deriving from lithogenic particles. In core MD05‐2904, seawater εNd, reconstructed from planktonic foraminifera, indicates that the last glacial period is characterized by lower εNd (−5.2 ± 0.2 to −6.4 ± 0.3) than the late Holocene (−4.1 ± 0.2). Assuming that Nd input from river does not change strongly the εNd of the PDW of the northern SCS, these εNd variations suggest a higher relative proportions of southern‐sourced water in the deep water of the western subtropical Pacific Ocean during the last glacial period.
Key Points:
εNd of foraminifera investigated for the first time in the South China Sea
Improvement of the extraction of seawater Nd isotopes from marine sediments
Past hydrological changes in the subtropical Pacific for the last 25 kyr
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