The bottlenose wedgefish Rhynchobatus australiae has experienced substantial population declines throughout its range. However, there is a lack of life history information (age, growth, and maturity) ...available for this species to inform conservation and management efforts. A total of 48 R. australiae samples were purchased from 2 fishing ports in Singapore between July 2018-July 2019. Species identification was confirmed by mtDNA barcoding using the NADH2 region. Length of specimens ranged from 506-1645 mm total length (TL), and ages ranged from 0-11 yr. Multi-model analysis was used to estimate growth parameters using a Bayesian approach with informative priors. The von Bertalanffy model was the best fitting growth model for the combined sexes ( L ∞ = 2814 mm TL; L 0 = 517 mm TL; k = 0.07 yr -1 ), for females only ( L ∞ = 3053 mm TL; L 0 = 504 mm TL; k = 0.06 yr -1 ), and for males only ( L ∞ = 2741 mm TL; L 0 = 497 mm TL; k = 0.07 yr -1 ). Preliminary results indicate that females and males may mature at different ages and lengths, with females ( A 50 = 3.25 yr; L 50 = 1014 mm TL) matured younger and at smaller sizes, than males ( A 50 = 5.03 yr; L 50 = 1197 mm TL). R. australiae has an estimated theoretical longevity of 40 and 47 yr for males and females, respectively. This study provides the first preliminary species-specific life history information for R. australiae , suggesting that this species in Southeast Asian waters is slow-growing. This information will further the biological knowledge available for this species and can be used to help design effective management and conservation measures.
China has been experiencing fine particle (i.e., aerodynamic diameters ≤ 2.5 μm; PM2.5) pollution and acid rain in recent decades, which exert adverse impacts on human health and the ecosystem. ...Recently, ammonia (i.e., NH₃) emission reduction has been proposed as a strategic option to mitigate haze pollution. However, atmospheric NH₃ is also closely bound to nitrogen deposition and acid rain, and comprehensive impacts of NH₃ emission control are still poorly understood in China. In this study, by integrating a chemical transport model with a high-resolution NH₃ emission inventory, we find that NH₃ emission abatement can mitigate PM2.5 pollution and nitrogen deposition but would worsen acid rain in China. Quantitatively, a 50% reduction in NH₃ emissions achievable by improving agricultural management, along with a targeted emission reduction (15%) for sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, can alleviate PM2.5 pollution by 11−17% primarily by suppressing ammonium nitrate formation. Meanwhile, nitrogen deposition is estimated to decrease by 34%, with the area exceeding the critical load shrinking from 17% to 9% of China’s terrestrial land. Nevertheless, this NH₃ reduction would significantly aggravate precipitation acidification, with a decrease of as much as 1.0 unit in rainfall pH and a corresponding substantial increase in areas with heavy acid rain. An economic evaluation demonstrates that the worsened acid rain would partly offset the total economic benefit from improved air quality and less nitrogen deposition. After considering the costs of abatement options, we propose a region-specific strategy for multipollutant controls that will benefit human and ecosystem health.
Alginate/gelatin hydrogel (Alg-Gel) scaffold has been applied in tissue engineering, but the research on its application in dental tissues regeneration is still lacking. We investigated the effect of ...this scaffold on human dental pulp stem cells (hDPSCs).
hDPSCs were cultured in both Alg-Gel and 3D-printed Alg-Gel scaffolds. Cell growth and adhesion were compared using fluorescein isothiocyanate–phalloidin staining and scanning electron microscopic micrographs. Changes in the proliferation in hDPSCs cultured in the complete culture medium containing aqueous extracts of the Alg-Gel or 3D-printed Alg-Gel scaffolds were examined using Cell Counting Kit-8 assay and flow cytometry analysis. Cells were cultured in the mineralization medium containing aqueous extracts of the Alg-Gel or 3D-printed Alg-Gel scaffolds for 7 or 14 days, and the differentiation of cells was shown by alizarin red S staining and alkaline phosphatase staining. The messenger RNA and protein expression of mineralization-related genes were detected with real-time polymerase chain reaction and Western blotting. Elemental analysis was used to test the material extract composition.
More cells were grown and adhered to the 3D-printed Alg-Gel scaffolds than the Alg-Gel scaffolds. The aqueous extracts of 3D-printed scaffolds can promote cell proliferation, and compared with Alg-Gel scaffolds, the extracts of 3D-printed scaffolds were more effective. Compared with the negative control group, 3D-printed Alg-Gel scaffold and Alg-Gel scaffold aqueous extracts promoted osteogenic/odontoblastic differentiation of hDPSCs with the enhanced formation of bone-like nodules and the alkaline phosphatase staining. The expression of mineralization-related genes was also up-regulated. 3D-printed scaffold aqueous extract contained more calcium and phosphorus ions than the Alg-Gel scaffold.
These findings suggest that compared with the Alg-Gel scaffold, 3D-printed Alg-Gel is more suitable for the growth of hDPSCs, and the scaffold extracts can better promote cell proliferation and differentiation.
•A 3-dimensional (3D) scaffold is more suitable for cell growth and adhesion.•3D-printed scaffold extract boosts human dental pulp stem cells (hDPSCs) growth.•3D-printed scaffold extract promotes osteogenic differentiation of hDPSCs.•3D-printed scaffold extract promotes odontogenic differentiation of hDPSCs.
Rapid global climate change is posing a substantial threat to biodiversity. The assessment of population vulnerability and adaptive capacity under climate change is crucial for informing conservation ...and mitigation strategies. Here we generate a chromosome-scale genome assembly and re-sequence genomes of 230 individuals collected from 24 populations for Populus koreana, a pioneer and keystone tree species in temperate forests of East Asia. We integrate population genomics and environmental variables to reveal a set of climate-associated single-nucleotide polymorphisms, insertion/deletions and structural variations, especially numerous adaptive non-coding variants distributed across the genome. We incorporate these variants into an environmental modeling scheme to predict a highly spatiotemporal shift of this species in response to future climate change. We further identify the most vulnerable populations that need conservation priority and many candidate genes and variants that may be useful for forest tree breeding with special aims. Our findings highlight the importance of integrating genomic and environmental data to predict adaptive capacity of a key forest to rapid climate change in the future.
Previous studies implicated the neuronal guidance molecule netrin-1 in attenuating myocardial ischemia-reperfusion injury. However, the tissue-specific sources and receptor signaling events remain ...elusive. Neutrophils are among the first cells responding to an ischemic insult and can be associated with tissue injury or rescue. We found netrin-1 levels were elevated in the blood of patients with myocardial infarction, as well as in mice exposed to myocardial ischemia-reperfusion. Selectively increased infarct sizes and troponin levels were found in Ntn1loxP/loxP Lyz2 Cre+ mice, but not in mice with conditional netrin-1 deletion in other tissue compartments. In vivo studies using neutrophil depletion identified neutrophils as the main source for elevated blood netrin-1 during myocardial injury. Finally, pharmacologic studies using treatment with recombinant netrin-1 revealed a functional role for purinergic signaling events through the myeloid adenosine A2b receptor in mediating netrin-1-elicited cardioprotection. These findings suggest an autocrine signaling loop with a functional role for neutrophil-derived netrin-1 in attenuating myocardial ischemia-reperfusion injury through myeloid adenosine A2b signaling.
Most predictive models based on gene expression data do not leverage information related to gene splicing, despite the fact that splicing is a fundamental feature of eukaryotic gene expression. ...Cigarette smoking is an important environmental risk factor for many diseases, and it has profound effects on gene expression. Using smoking status as a prediction target, we developed deep neural network predictive models using gene, exon, and isoform level quantifications from RNA sequencing data in 2,557 subjects in the COPDGene Study. We observed that models using exon and isoform quantifications clearly outperformed gene-level models when using data from 5 genes from a previously published prediction model. Whereas the test set performance of the previously published model was 0.82 in the original publication, our exon-based models including an exon-to-isoform mapping layer achieved a test set AUC (area under the receiver operating characteristic) of 0.88, which improved to an AUC of 0.94 using exon quantifications from a larger set of genes. Isoform variability is an important source of latent information in RNA-seq data that can be used to improve clinical prediction models.
The zebrafish (Danio rerio) has been widely used in the study of human disease and development, and about 70% of the protein-coding genes are conserved between the two species
. However, studies in ...zebrafish remain constrained by the sparse annotation of functional control elements in the zebrafish genome. Here we performed RNA sequencing, assay for transposase-accessible chromatin using sequencing (ATAC-seq), chromatin immunoprecipitation with sequencing, whole-genome bisulfite sequencing, and chromosome conformation capture (Hi-C) experiments in up to eleven adult and two embryonic tissues to generate a comprehensive map of transcriptomes, cis-regulatory elements, heterochromatin, methylomes and 3D genome organization in the zebrafish Tübingen reference strain. A comparison of zebrafish, human and mouse regulatory elements enabled the identification of both evolutionarily conserved and species-specific regulatory sequences and networks. We observed enrichment of evolutionary breakpoints at topologically associating domain boundaries, which were correlated with strong histone H3 lysine 4 trimethylation (H3K4me3) and CCCTC-binding factor (CTCF) signals. We performed single-cell ATAC-seq in zebrafish brain, which delineated 25 different clusters of cell types. By combining long-read DNA sequencing and Hi-C, we assembled the sex-determining chromosome 4 de novo. Overall, our work provides an additional epigenomic anchor for the functional annotation of vertebrate genomes and the study of evolutionarily conserved elements of 3D genome organization.
Although allopatric speciation is viewed as the most common way in which species originate, allopatric divergence among a group of closely related species has rarely been examined at the population ...level through phylogeographic analysis. Here we report such a case study on eight putative cypress (Cupressus) species, which each have a mainly allopatric distribution in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau (QTP) and adjacent regions. The analysis involved sequencing three plastid DNA fragments (trnD-trnT, trnS-trnG and trnL-trnF) in 371 individuals sampled from populations at 66 localities.
Both phylogenetic and network analyses showed that most DNA haplotypes recovered or haplotype-clustered lineages resolved were largely species-specific. Across all species, significant phylogeographic structure (N(ST) > G(ST), P < 0.05) implied a high correlation between haplotypes/lineages and geographic distribution. Two species, C. duclouxiana and C. chengiana, which are distributed in the eastern QTP region, contained more haplotypes and higher diversity than five species with restricted distributions in the western highlands of the QTP. The remaining species, C. funebris, is widely cultivated and contained very little cpDNA diversity.
It is concluded that the formation of high mountain barriers separating deep valleys in the QTP and adjacent regions caused by various uplifts of the plateau since the early Miocene most likely promoted allopatric divergence in Cupressus by restricting gene flow and fixing local, species-specific haplotypes in geographically isolated populations. The low levels of intraspecific diversity present in most species might stem from population bottlenecks brought about by recurrent periods of unfavorable climate and more recently by the negative impacts of human activities on species' distributions. Our findings shed new light on the importance of geographical isolation caused by the uplift of the QTP on the development of high plant species diversity in the QTP biodiversity hotspot.
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•Three star D-A-D type donors based on BODIPY derivatives bearing extended π-electron systems on 3,5,8-positions were developed.•They exhibit strong and broad absorption in the range ...of 500 to NIR.•They display good complementary absorption spectra and suitably matched energy level with PC71BM.•The optimized solar cells based on BDP-2 show high power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 11.83%.
In recent years, structural modification for boron-dipyrromethene (BODIPY) derivatives has been proven to be an effective way to improve their performance of organic solar cells (OSCs). Here, three D-A-D type small molecule donors BDP-1, BDP-2 and BDP-3 were synthesized based on 3,5,8-trimethyl BODIPY dye as the core by the introduction of 4-(diethylamino)phenyl, 4-diethylamino-2-methoxyphenyl and 4-(diphenylamino)phenyl at the 3, 5 and 8 positions, respectively, and used for the construction of organic solar cells. BDP-1, BDP-2, and BDP-3 are synthesized. Due to the strong electron-donating ability of the substituted groups at 3, 5, and 8 positions of BODIPY core, three donors exhibit extended π-conjugation and effective intramolecular charge transfer, resulting in the strong absorption in the range of 500–––900 nm with narrow band gaps below 1.52 eV. BDP-1, BDP-2 and BDP-3 display complementary absorption spectra and suitable highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) and lowest unoccupied molecular orbital levels (LUMO) with fullerene derivative PC71BM. These molecules (BDP-1, BDP-2 or BDP-3) as electron donor were applied into BHJ solar cells by using PC71BM as electron acceptor. The performance of BHJ organic solar cells is systematically investigated and compared. The optimized solar cells based on BDP-1, BDP-2 and BDP-3 show high power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) of 9.52%, 11.83% and 5.27%, respectively. The OSCs based on BDP-2: PC71BM exhibited excellent short-circuit current density (Jsc), high electron mobility and open-circuit voltage (Voc). This work demonstrates that BODIPY derivatives with simple-structured show great potential for high performance OSCs.
Monolithic perovskite/organic tandem solar cells (POTSCs) have significant advantages in next‐generation flexible photovoltaics, owing to their capability to overcome the Shockley–Queisser limit and ...facile device integration. However, the compromised sub‐cells performance challenges the fabrication of high‐efficiency POTSCs. Especially for all‐inorganic wide‐bandgap perovskite front sub‐cells (AIWPSCs) based n‐i‐p structured POTSCs (AIPOTSCs), for which the power conversion efficiency (PCE) is much lower than organic–inorganic mixed‐halide wide‐bandgap perovskite based POTSCs. Herein, an ionic liquid, methylammonium formate (MAFm), based dual‐interface engineering approach is developed to modify the bottom and top interfaces of wide‐bandgap CsPbI2Br films. In particular, the Fm− group of MAFm can effectively passivate the interface defects, and the top interface modification can facilitate the formation of uniform perovskite films with enlarged grain size, thereby mitigating the defects and perovskite grain boundaries induced carrier recombination. As a result, CsPbI2Br‐based AIWPSCs with a high PCE of 17.0% and open‐circuit voltage (VOC) of 1.347 V are achieved. By integrating these dual‐interface engineered CsPbI2Br‐based front sub‐cells with the narrow‐bandgap PM6:CH1007‐based rear sub‐cells, a record PCE of 23.21% is obtained for AIPOTSCs, illustrating the potential of AIPOTSCs for achieving high‐efficiency tandem solar cells.
The ionic liquid, methylammonium formate (MAFm), based dual‐interface engineering is developed to modify the bottom and top interfaces of wide‐bandgap CsPbI2Br films, which enables a high PCE of 17.0% and VOC of 1.347 V for CsPbI2Br‐based wide‐bandgap sub‐cells. High‐efficiency monolithic perovskite/organic tandem solar cells based on these sub‐cells demonstrate a champion PCE of 23.21% and VOC of 2.10 V.
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