Melatonin improves the quality of rotenone-exposed mouse oocytes through association with histone modifications.

Rotenone, an insecticide that inhibits mitochondrial complex I and generates oxidative stress, is responsible for neurological disorders and affects the female reproductive system. However, the underlying mechanism is not fully understood. Melatonin, a potential free-radical scavenger, has been shown to protect the reproductive system from oxidative damage. In this study, we investigated the impact of rotenone on mouse oocyte quality and evaluated the protective effect of melatonin on oocytes exposed to rotenone. Our results showed that rotenone impaired mouse oocyte maturation and early embryo cleavage. However, melatonin prevented these negative effects by ameliorating rotenone-induced mitochondrial dysfunction and dynamic imbalance, intracellular Ca2+ homeostasis damage, ER stress, early apoptosis, meiotic spindle formation disruption, and aneuploidy in oocytes. Additionally, RNA sequencing analysis showed that rotenone exposure changed the expression of multiple genes involved in histone methylation and acetylation modifications that result in mouse meiotic defects. However, melatonin partially rescued these defects. These findings suggest that melatonin has protective effects against rotenone-induced mouse oocyte defects.

Three-Dimensional Interferometric ISAR Imaging Algorithm Based on Cross Coherence Processing.

Interferometric inverse synthetic aperture radar (InISAR) has received significant attention in three-dimensional (3D) imaging due to its applications in target classification and recognition. The traditional two-dimensional (2D) ISAR image can be interpreted as a filtered projection of a 3D target's reflectivity function onto an image plane. Such a plane usually depends on unknown radar-target geometry and dynamics, which results in difficulty interpreting an ISAR image. Using the L-shape InISAR imaging system, this paper proposes a novel 3D target reconstruction algorithm based on Dechirp processing and 2D interferometric ISAR imaging, which can jointly estimate the effective rotation vector and the height of scattering center. In order to consider only the areas of the target with meaningful interferometric phase and mitigate the effects of noise and sidelobes, a special cross-channel coherence-based detector (C3D) is introduced. Compared to the multichannel CLEAN technique, advantages of the C3D include the following: (1) the computational cost is lower without complex iteration and (2) the proposed method, which can avoid propagating errors, is more suitable for a target with multi-scattering points. Moreover, misregistration and its influence on target reconstruction are quantitatively discussed. Theoretical analysis and numerical simulations confirm the suitability of the algorithm for 3D imaging of multi-scattering point targets with high efficiency and demonstrate the reliability and effectiveness of the proposed method in the presence of noise.

Income gradient in health-related quality of life - the role of social networking time.

BACKGROUND: Widening social class discrepancies in health persist in the United States. Although the relationship between social class and health has been well illustrated, the pathways through which social class influences the distribution of health remain unidentified. This study is designed to analyze the income-health relationship by examining the role of social networking time. METHODS: A nationwide sample from the General Social Survey of the United States is adopted for the statistical analysis. The Healthy Days Measures developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are used to evaluate health-related quality of life in the general population. Social networking time is measured through the number of social evenings respondents spend with neighbors. Individuals' inflation-adjusted family income is used to indicate their income. The relationships between income, social networking time and health-related quality of life are calculated through multiple linear regressions, and the mediation effects of social networking time are further tested by the Sobel test with bootstrapping. RESULTS: People with a lower income tend to spend more time socializing with their neighbors than those with a higher income. Income is positively associated with health-related quality of life. Respondents who engage more frequently in neighborhood socializing report poorer health-related quality of life. The reproduction of the income gradient in health-related quality of life through social networking time mainly persists in mental health aspects. CONCLUSIONS: This study verifies the positive association between income and health-related quality of life. The results show that people's network ties are affected by their income and confirm the role of social networking time in the reproduction of the income gradient in health-related quality of life.