The complete chloroplast genome of Calyptothecium philippinense Broth. (Pterobryaceae, Hypnales).

The genus Calyptothecium, currently comprising ca. 30 species worldwide, is the largest genus within the family Pterobryaceae. However, a comprehensive taxonomic revision of this genus is lacking. Calyptothecium philippinense Broth. 1899, a moss species widely found in the tropical regions of Asia, is characterized by the unique rugose leaves and large auriculate leaf bases. In this study, we sequenced the complete chloroplast genome (CPG) of C. philippinense using the Illumina NovaSeq 6000 platform. The length of the CPG of C. philippinense was determined to be 124,513 bp, with an AT content of 74%. The CPG of C. philippinense exhibited a standard quadripartite structure, consisting of one small single-copy (SSC) region (18,541 bp), one large single-copy region (LSC) (87,222 bp), and two inverted repeat (IR) regions (9375 bp each). A total of 126 genes from the CPG of C. philippinense were annotated, including 82 protein-coding genes, eight ribosomal RNA genes, and 36 transfer RNA genes. Phylogenetic analysis based on the CPGs of 25 bryophyte taxa revealed that the three Pterobryaceae species C. philippinense, Calyptothecium hookeri (Mitt.) Broth. and Pterobryopsis orientalis (Müll. Hal.) M. Fleisch. formed a robust clade. The findings could facilitate more accurate classification and help elucidate evolutionary relationships within Calyptothecium.

Experimental study on negative skin friction characteristics of double-sleeve pile.

Pile foundation structures are widely used in the construction of high-piled wharves in coastal soft soil areas due to their excellent adaptability to such environments. However, the extensive, deep backfilling involved in constructing these wharves can easily induce negative skin friction (NSF) on the piles, resulting in safety issues such as excessive settlement during the service life of the structures. This paper presents an indoor model experiment to examine the distribution of the THE NSF under varying pile-top loads and surcharge effects on single pile and double-sleeve pile foundations. The potential of double-sleeve pile foundations to mitigate the NSF was also explored. The results show that the axial force within the double-sleeve pile's protected section remains essentially stable, though it is affected by the surface surcharge in the unprotected section. Time effect is exhibited both for the axial force and the NSF, gradually increasing over time. Compared to single piles, double-casing pile foundations can effectively isolate the down drag load caused by surrounding soil settlement, thereby reducing or eliminating the NSF on the pile sides.

A TCM formula assists temozolomide in anti-melanoma therapy by suppressing the STAT3 signaling pathway.

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL RELEVANCE: Temozolomide (TMZ) is a first-line therapeutic medication for melanoma. Nonetheless, it exhibits a relatively elevated toxicity profile, and falls short in terms of both effectiveness and median survival rate. Clinical research has demonstrated that the integration of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) with chemotherapy in the treatment of melanoma can enhance efficacy and reduce toxicity. A TCM formula (SLE) containing Lonicera japonica Thunb. and Robinia pseudoacacia L. has shown anti-melanoma properties through the inhibition of STAT3 phosphorylation. In the genesis and advancement of melanoma, the STAT3 signaling pathway is essential. AIM OF THE STUDY: The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of SLE combined with TMZ (SLE/TMZ) in inhibiting melanoma, and to explore the contribution of inhibiting the STAT3 signaling pathway in this effect. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Both A375 cells and B16F10 tumor-bearing mice were used for in vitro and in vivo experiments, respectively. In vitro assays included CCK8, crystal violet staining, flow cytometry, qRT-PCR, and Western blotting. Animal experiment indicators included tumor volume, tumor weight, mouse weight, and the proportion of mouse immune cells. RESULTS: SLE/TMZ inhibited the proliferation and growth of A375 cells, and also induced apoptosis. Additionally, SLE/TMZ synergistically inhibited tumor growth in the B16F10 melanoma mouse model and had immunomodulatory effects, increasing the proportion of Th, Tc, and NK cells and decreasing the proportion of MDSCs in the spleen of melanoma-bearing mice. qRT-PCR and Western blotting results confirmed that SLE/TMZ inhibited STAT3 phosphorylation and regulated its downstream factors, including Bcl2, Mcl1, CCND1, MYC, MMP2, MMP9, VEGFA, and FGF2. The inhibitory effect of SLE/TMZ on melanoma cell growth was considerably lessened when STAT3 was overexpressed at the cellular level. CONCLUSION: Synergistic anti-melanoma effects of SLE/TMZ have been observed in animal and cellular models. One of the mechanisms of SLE/TMZ that underlies its anti-melanoma actions is inhibition of the STAT3 pathway. This work offers pre-clinical pharmacological backing for the advancement of SLE as a therapeutic agent to be used in conjunction with TMZ for the treatment of melanoma.

Association Between the Inflammatory Potential of Diet and Constipation Among Adults in the United States: A Cross-sectional Study.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the potential association between Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII) scores and constipation among a sample of adults in the United States. METHODS: This cross-sectional study used data from adult participants in the 2005 to 2010 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (ie, "NHANES"). Self-reported information was used to identify cases of constipation. The DII was used to assess inflammatory potential of the diet. Odds ratios (ORs) and corresponding 95% CIs for the association between the DII and constipation were determined using multivariate logistic regression modeling. Stratified analyses explored whether there was effect modification to influence the relationship between DII and constipation. RESULTS: Of 8272 subjects, 759 reported constipation, and 7513 did not, corresponding to a prevalence of 9.2%. After adjusting for age, gender, race/ethnicity, marital status, education level, smoking status, alcohol consumption, physical activity, body mass index (BMI), cardiovascular diseases (CVD), hypertension, stroke, diabetes, energy intake, carbohydrate intake, and selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) use. Compared with lower DII scores group T1 (-5.28 to ≤0.72), the adjusted OR values for DII scores and constipation in T2 (>0.72 to ≤2.50) and T3 (>2.50 to 5.24) were 1.27 (95% CI: 1.02-1.58, P=0.029) and 1.43(95% CI: 1.14-1.8, P=0.002). Subgroup analyses showed that there were effect modification of gender and physical activity factors on DII scores and constipation. CONCLUSIONS: Results of this cross-sectional study suggest that a higher dietary inflammatory index score was associated with increased risk of constipation after adjustment for confounding in a multivariable analysis. gender and physical activity were found to be an effect modifier of this relationship.

Clinical relevance of critical plasma homocysteine levels in predicting rupture risk for small and medium-sized intracranial aneurysms.

Plasma homocysteine (Hcy) has been globally recognized as an independent risk factor for various neurovascular diseases. In this study, the authors investigated the relationship between critical Hcy concentration and the risk of rupture in intracranial aneurysms (IAs). This study collected data from 423 patients with both ruptured and unruptured IAs. We compared demographic data, vascular rupture risk factors, and laboratory test results between the two groups. Multivariable logistic regression analysis was employed to determine the correlation between critical plasma Hcy levels and the risk of rupture in small to medium-sized IAs. A total of 330 cases of ruptured intracranial aneurysms (RIA) and 93 cases of unruptured intracranial aneurysms (UIA) were included. Univariate analysis revealed statistically significant differences between the ruptured and unruptured groups in terms of hypertension, hyperlipidemia, plasma Hcy levels, and IA morphology (all P < 0.05). Multivariable logistic regression analysis indicated that hypertension (odds ratio [OR] 0.504; 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.279-0.911; P = 0.023), hyperlipidemia (OR 1.924; 95% CI 1.079-3.429; P = 0.027), and plasma Hcy levels (OR 1.420; 95% CI 1.277-1.578; P < 0.001) were independently associated with the rupture of small to medium-sized IAs, all with statistical significance (P < 0.05). Our study suggests that critical plasma Hcy levels are an independent risk factor for increased rupture risk in small to medium-sized intracranial aneurysms. Therefore, reducing plasma Hcy levels may be considered a valuable strategy to mitigate the risk of intracranial vascular abnormalities rupture and improve patient prognosis.

Enhancing Few-Shot CLIP With Semantic-Aware Fine-Tuning.

Learning generalized representations from limited training samples is crucial for applying deep neural networks in low-resource scenarios. Recently, methods based on contrastive language-image pretraining (CLIP) have exhibited promising performance in few-shot adaptation tasks. To avoid catastrophic forgetting and overfitting caused by few-shot fine-tuning, existing works usually freeze the parameters of CLIP pretrained on large-scale datasets, overlooking the possibility that some parameters might not be suitable for downstream tasks. To this end, we revisit CLIP's visual encoder with a specific focus on its distinctive attention pooling layer, which performs a spatial weighted-sum of the dense feature maps. Given that dense feature maps contain meaningful semantic information, and different semantics hold varying importance for diverse downstream tasks (such as prioritizing semantics like ears and eyes in pet classification tasks rather than side mirrors), using the same weighted-sum operation for dense features across different few-shot tasks might not be appropriate. Hence, we propose fine-tuning the parameters of the attention pooling layer during the training process to encourage the model to focus on task-specific semantics. In the inference process, we perform residual blending between the features pooled by the fine-tuned and the original attention pooling layers to incorporate both the few-shot knowledge and the pretrained CLIP's prior knowledge. We term this method as semantic-aware fine-tuning (). is effective in enhancing the conventional few-shot CLIP and is compatible with the existing adapter approach (termed ). Extensive experiments on 11 benchmarks demonstrate that both and significantly outperform the second-best method by + 1.51 % and + 2.38 % in the one-shot setting and by + 0.48 % and + 1.37 % in the four-shot setting, respectively.

Exploring the viability of peracetic acid-mediated antibiotic degradation in wastewater through activation with electrogenerated HClO.

Electrochemical advanced oxidation processes (EAOPs) face challenging conditions in chloride media, owing to the co-generation of undesirable Cl-disinfection byproducts (Cl-DBPs). Herein, the synergistic activation between in-situ electrogenerated HClO and peracetic acid (PAA)-based reactive species in actual wastewater is discussed. A metal-free graphene-modified graphite felt (graphene/GF) cathode is used for the first time to achieve the electrochemically-mediated activation of PAA. The PAA/Cl- system allowed a near-complete sulfamethoxazole (SMX) degradation (kobs =0.49 min-1) in only 5 min in a model solution, inducing 32.7- and 8.2-fold rise in kobs as compared to single PAA and Cl- systems, respectively. Such enhancement is attributed to the occurrence of 1O2 (25.5 µmol L-1 after 5 min of electrolysis) from the thermodynamically favored reaction between HClO and PAA-based reactive species. The antibiotic degradation in a complex water matrix was further considered. The SMX removal is slightly susceptible to the coexisting natural organic matter, with both the acute cytotoxicity (ACT) and the yield of 12 DBPs decreasing by 29.4 % and 37.3 %, respectively. According to calculations, HClO accumulation and organic Cl-addition reactions are thermodynamically unfavored. This study provides a scenario-oriented paradigm for PAA-based electrochemical treatment technology, being particularly appealing for treating wastewater rich in Cl- ion, which may derive in toxic Cl-DBPs.

An anti-CRISPR that pulls apart a CRISPR-Cas complex.

In biological systems, the activities of macromolecular complexes must sometimes be turned off. Thus, a wide variety of protein inhibitors has evolved for this purpose. These inhibitors function through diverse mechanisms, including steric blocking of crucial interactions, enzymatic modification of key residues or substrates, and perturbation of post-translational modifications1. Anti-CRISPRs-proteins that block the activity of CRISPR-Cas systems-are one of the largest groups of inhibitors described, with more than 90 families that function through diverse mechanisms2-4. Here, we characterize the anti-CRISPR AcrIF25, and we show that it inhibits the type I-F CRISPR-Cas system by pulling apart the fully assembled effector complex. AcrIF25 binds to the predominant CRISPR RNA-binding components of this complex, comprising six Cas7 subunits, and strips them from the RNA. Structural and biochemical studies indicate that AcrIF25 removes one Cas7 subunit at a time, starting at one end of the complex. Notably, this feat is achieved with no apparent enzymatic activity. To our knowledge, AcrIF25 is the first example of a protein that disassembles a large and stable macromolecular complex in the absence of an external energy source. As such, AcrIF25 establishes a paradigm for macromolecular complex inhibitors that may be used for biotechnological applications.

Efficient recovery of gold from solution with a thiocyanate-modified Zr-MOF: adsorption properties and DFT calculations.

The design and development of new large-capacity and selective materials for extracting rare precious metals via electronic waste is practically essential. In this paper, a new efficient UiO-66-NCS has been obtained as a consequence of the modification of the classical Zr-MOF (UiO-66-NH2), and its ability to recover gold has been investigated. These batch results adequately illustrated that UiO-66-NCS exhibited good adsorption capacity (675.5 mg g-1) and exceptional selectivity. In addition, UiO-66-NCS achieved faster adsorption equilibrium times of about 120 min. Adsorption kinetics and isotherms demonstrated that the pseudo-second-order adsorption scheme and a Langmuir-type procedure were shown by the adsorption of Au(III) on UiO-66-NCS. Characterized by pH effect experiments, TEM, XRD, and XPS, the adsorption of UiO-66-NCS with Au(III) relies on coordination, which further results in reduction, and the generated Au(0) is uniformly dispersed in the MOF. The adsorbent has considerable advantages for cyclic regeneration. Finally, DFT fitting results showed that the adsorption binding energy of UiO-66-NCS with [AuCl4]- was -8.63 kcal mol-1 for the adsorption process. UiO-66-NCS is likely to be an ideal substance for gold recovery.

MaHsf24, a novel negative modulator, regulates cold tolerance in banana fruits by repressing the expression of HSPs and antioxidant enzyme genes.

Transcriptional regulation mechanisms underlying chilling injury (CI) development have been widely investigated in model plants and cold-sensitive fruits, such as banana (Musa acuminata). However, unlike the well-known NAC and WRKY transcription factors (TFs), the function and deciphering mechanism of heat shock factors (HSFs) involving in cold response are still fragmented. Here, we showed that hot water treatment (HWT) alleviated CI in harvested banana fruits accomplishing with reduced reactive oxygen species (ROS) accumulation and increased antioxidant enzyme activities. A cold-inducible but HWT-inhibited HSF, MaHsf24, was identified. Using DNA affinity purification sequencing (DAP-seq) combined with RNA-seq analyses, we found three heat shock protein (HSP) genes (MaHSP23.6, MaHSP70-1.1 and MaHSP70-1.2) and three antioxidant enzyme genes (MaAPX1, MaMDAR4 and MaGSTZ1) were the potential targets of MaHsf24. Subsequent electrophoretic mobility shift assay (EMSA), chromatin immunoprecipitation coupled with quantitative PCR (ChIP-qPCR) and dual-luciferase reporter (DLR) analyses demonstrated that MaHsf24 repressed the transcription of these six targets via directly binding to their promoters. Moreover, stably overexpressing MaHsf24 in tomatoes increased cold sensitivity by suppressing the expressions of HSPs and antioxidant enzyme genes, while HWT could recover cold tolerance, maintaining higher levels of HSPs and antioxidant enzyme genes, and activities of antioxidant enzymes. In contrast, transiently silencing MaHsf24 by virus-induced gene silencing (VIGS) in banana peels conferred cold resistance with the upregulation of MaHSPs and antioxidant enzyme genes. Collectively, our findings support the negative role of MaHsf24 in cold tolerance, and unravel a novel regulatory network controlling bananas CI occurrence, concerning MaHsf24-exerted inhibition of MaHSPs and antioxidant enzyme genes.

The manipulation of photon blockade via Newtonian gravity.

We theoretically investigate the model of a quadratically coupled optomechanical system with a Newtonian gravitational potential in the weak-driving regime, where the optical cavity is driven by an external laser. The steady state of the whole system is treated in the framework of a few-photon subspace. We find that the conventional single-photon blockade, nonstandard types of single-photon blockade, two-photon blockade, and photon-induced tunneling can be induced by gravity when the quadratic optomechanical coupling strength remains constant. Moreover, we find that gravitational potential energy can compensate for the lack of quadratic optomechanical coupling for observation photon blockade. In particular, the photon stream with super-Poissonian distribution can be converted into a sub-Poissonian, antibunching photon stream by changing the driving detuning when the gravitational potential energy is included. These results show that the gravity has potential for realizing the manipulation of photon blockade in a quadratically coupled optomechanical system.

The PCV3 Cap Virus-like Particle Vaccine with the Chimeric PCV2-Neutralizing Epitope Gene Is Effective in Mice.

Porcine circovirus type 3 (PCV3) infection can cause symptoms similar to those of porcine circovirus type 2 (PCV2) infection, and coinfections with both PCV2 and PCV3 are observed in the swine industry. Consequently, developing chimeric vaccines is essential to prevent and control porcine circovirus infections. In this study, we used both E. coli and mammalian expression systems to express PCV3 Cap (Cap3) and a chimeric gene containing the PCV2-neutralizing epitope within the PCV3 Cap (Cap3-Cap2E), which were assembled into virus-like particle (VLP) vaccines. We found that Cap3 lacking nuclear localization signal (NLS) could not form VLPs, while Cap3 with a His-tag successfully assembled into VLPs. Additionally, the chimeric of PCV2-neutralizing epitopes did not interfere with the assembly process of VLPs. Various immunization approaches revealed that pCap3-Cap2E VLP vaccines were capable of activating high PCV3 Cap-specific antibody levels and effectively neutralizing both PCV3 and PCV2. Furthermore, pCap3-Cap2E VLPs demonstrated a potent ability to activate cellular immunity, protecting against PCV3 infection and preventing lung damage in mice. In conclusion, this study successfully developed a PCV3 Cap VLP vaccine incorporating chimeric PCV2-neutralizing epitope genes, providing new perspectives for PCV3 vaccine development.

Using a Machine Learning Approach to Predict the Need for Elective Revision and Unplanned Surgery after Implant-based Breast Reconstruction.

Two-stage implant-based reconstruction after mastectomy may require secondary revision procedures to treat complications, correct defects, and improve aesthetic outcomes. Patients should be counseled on the possibility of additional procedures during the initial visit, but the likelihood of requiring another procedure is dependent on many patient- and surgeon-specific factors. This study aims to identify patient-specific factors and surgical techniques associated with higher rates of secondary procedures and offer a machine learning model to compute individualized assessments for preoperative counseling. A training set of 209 patients (406 breasts) who underwent two-stage alloplastic reconstruction was created, with 45.57% of breasts (185 of 406) requiring revisional or unplanned surgery. On multivariate analysis, hypertension, no tobacco use, and textured expander use corresponded to lower odds of additional surgery. In contrast, higher initial tissue expander volume, vertical radial incision, and larger nipple-inframammary fold distance conferred higher odds of additional surgery. The neural network model trained on clinically significant variables achieved the highest collective performance metrics, with ROC AUC of 0.74, sensitivity of 84.2, specificity of 63.6, and accuracy of 62.1. The proposed machine learning model trained on a single surgeon's data offers a precise and reliable tool to assess an individual patient's risk of secondary procedures. Machine learning models enable physicians to tailor surgical planning and empower patients to make informed decisions aligned with their lifestyle and preferences. The utilization of this technology is especially applicable to plastic surgery, where outcomes are subject to a variety of patient-specific factors and surgeon practices, including threshold to perform secondary procedures.

Se-p Orbitals Induced "Strong d-d Orbitals Interaction" Enable High Reversibility of Se-Rich ZnSe/MnSe@C Electrode as Excellent Host for Sodium-Ion Storage.

The heterostructure of transition-metal chalcogenides is a promising approach to boost alkali ion storage due to fast charge kinetics and reduction of activation energy. However, cycling performance is a paramount challenge that is suffering from poor reversibility. Herein, it is reported that Se-rich particles can chemically interact with local hexagonal ZnSe/MnSe@C heterostructure environment, leading to effective ions insertion/extraction, enabling high reversibility. Enlightened by theoretical understanding, Se-rich particles endow high intrinsic conductivities in term of low energy barriers (1.32 eV) compared with those without Se-rich particles (1.50 eV) toward the sodiation process. Moreover, p orbitals of Se-rich particles may actively participate and further increase the electronegativity that pushes the Mn d orbitals (dxy and dx2-y2) and donate their electrons to dxz and dyz orbitals, manifesting strong d-d orbitals interaction between ZnSe and MnSe. Such fundamental interaction will adopt a well-stable conducive electronic bridge, eventually, charges are easily transferred from ZnSe to MnSe in the heterostructure during sodiation/desodiation. Therefore, the optimized Se-rich ZnSe/MnSe@C electrode delivered high capacity of 576 mAh g-1 at 0.1 A g-1 after 100 cycles and 384 mAh g-1 at 1 A g-1 after 2500 cycles, respectively. In situ and ex situ measurements further indicate the integrity and reversibility of the electrode materials upon charging/discharging.

A novel fullerene composite material for directional oil control and antioxidant.

BACKGROUND: There are very few cosmetic ingredients that can target oil control and extend the wear time. Fullerenes have been reported to have excellent antioxidant capacity and a variety of biological activities, such as quenching free radicals, inhibiting lipid peroxidation, and promoting lipid flocculation. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of applying foundation makeup on the face is to make the skin color even, but the secretion and oxidation of skin oil will make the makeup mottled and dull. In order to solve this problem, a fullerene composite material that can directionally absorb oil and resist oil oxidation has been developed. METHODS: Fullerenes and hydroxyapatite composite was prepared by high pressure homogenization under alkaline condition. The indicated morphology and structure were characterized by SEM, UV-Vis, Raman, and XRD. The oil absorption capacity was determined by adding the C60-hydroxyapatite composite to a mixed solution of hexane and oil, shaking for 1 h, filtering, analyzed by GC-MS, and calculating the oil absorption by external standard method. Artificial sebum was prepared by adding different mass of water and oleic acid to screen the optimum ratio. C60-hydroxyapatite mixture and C60-hydroxyapatite composite were added to the artificial sebum to test the oil-absorbing capacity of the materials. The hydroxyl radical scavenging ability of C60-hydroxyapatite composite containing different fullerene contents was measured by X-band ESR spectroscopy, and the long-term radical scavenging ability of the composites was tested in comparison with VC. Antioxidant experiment is adding C60-hydroxyapatite composite material, and hydroxyapatite to oleic acid, then the UV light irradiation is aimed to accelerate the oxidation of oleic acid. Oleic acid act as a control group, and make the detection of oleic acid peroxide value after 7 days. The safety of the materials was tested by using culture media to soak the C60-hydroxyapatite composite for 24 h and then used to culture cells. RESULTS: The characterization of SEM, UV-Vis, Raman, and XRD showed that fullerene clusters were dispersed on the surface of hydroxyapatite stably, and they formed a stable composite. The adsorption rates of C60-hydroxyapatite composites for oleic acid, phenyl trimethicone, caprylic capric glyceride, isooctyl palmitate, mineral oil, olive oil, and dimethicone were 60.5%, 9.3%, 9.15%, 5.24%, 2.94%, 1.01%, and 0%, respectively. The flocculation amount of artificial sebum was 5.9 g per gram of C60-hydroxyapatite mixture and 24.2 g per gram of C60-hydroxyapatite composite. C60-hydroxyapatite composites have excellent quenching ability for hydroxyl radicals. When the fullerene content is 1, 2, 3, and 4 mg/kg, the quenching rates are 25.02%, 39.57%, 49.75%, and 62.24%, respectively. The quenching effect was enhanced with the increase of fullerene content, and it had strong long-term antioxidant properties. It can also be proved that C60-hydroxyapatite composites have strong antioxidant capacity through antioxidant experiments. The peroxide value of oleic acid on Day 0 was 2.8, and after 7 days of UV irradiation, the peroxide values of blank control, hydroxyapatite group, C60-hydroxyapatite composite containing 0.5% and 1% fullerenes four groups of materials were 8.02 meq O2/kg, 7.98 meq O2/kg, 7.11 meq O2/kg, and 6.87 meq O2/kg, respectively. The cell activity was 20.94% and 99.2% after the cells were cultured for 24 h using C60-hydroxyapatite composite and hydroxyapatite extracts, respectively, and the addition of fullerene was able to significantly increase the cell activity. CONCLUSION: Fullerene hydroxyapatite complex has excellent directional oil absorption characteristics, which can effectively remove free radicals and reduce skin oil oxidation.

Characterization of Acellular Cartilage Matrix-Sodium Alginate Scaffolds in Various Proportions.

The development of three-dimensional (3D) bioprinting technology has provided a new solution to address the shortage of donors, multiple surgeries, and aesthetic concerns in microtia reconstruction surgery. The production of bioinks is the most critical aspect of 3D bioprinting. Acellular cartilage matrix (ACM) and sodium alginate (SA) are commonly used 3D bioprinting materials, and there have been reports of their combined use. However, there is a lack of comprehensive evaluations on ACM-SA scaffolds with different proportions. In this study, bioinks were prepared by mixing different proportions of decellularized rabbit ear cartilage powder and SA and then printed using 3D bioprinting technology and crosslinked with calcium ions to fabricate scaffolds. The physical properties, biocompatibility, and toxicity of ACM-SA scaffolds with different proportions were compared. The adhesion and proliferation of rabbit adipose-derived stem cells on ACM-SA scaffolds of different proportions, as well as the secretion of Collagen Type II, were evaluated under an adipose-derived stem cell chondrogenic induction medium. The following conclusions were drawn: when the proportion of SA in the ACM-SA scaffolds was <30%, the printed structure failed to form. The ACM-SA scaffolds in proportions from 1:9 to 6:4 showed no significant cytotoxicity, among which the 5:5 proportion of ACM-SA scaffold was superior in terms of adhesiveness and promoting cell proliferation and differentiation. Although a higher proportion of SA can provide greater mechanical strength, it also significantly increases the swelling ratio and reduces cell proliferation capabilities. Overall, the 5:5 proportion of ACM-SA scaffold demonstrated a more desirable biological and physical performance.

Synergistic effects of lactobacillus strains and Acetobacter pasteurianus on jujube puree's product functionality and quality.

Commercial lactic acid bacteria strains and indigenous Chinese acetic acid bacterium were co-cultivated bi- and tri-culturally in Junzao jujube puree for the first time to investigate their effects on physicochemical properties and quality attributes. Lactic-acetic acid bacteria co-fermentation was performed at 37 °C for 48 h during the anaerobic fermentation phase and at 30 °C for 144 h during aerobic fermentation. FTIR results showed that predominant wave numbers at 1716-1724 cm-1 and 2922-3307 cm-1 exhibited discernible alterations in the lactic-acetic acid co-fermented jujube purees compared to the control sample. Pearson correlation analysis showed that the flavonoid and flavonol contents were responsible for the enhanced 2,2'-azino-bis (3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) and 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl scavenging activities of the fermented jujube purees. Consequently, fermented jujube puree from tricultures of Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus plantarum, and Acetobacter pasteurianus gave the best results, with the highest phenolics, flavonoid, and flavonol contents and the most improved antioxidative properties and color. Overall, lactic-acetic acid bacteria co-culture holds significant promise in valorizing Junzao jujube purees for functional ingredient development, paving the way for further research into similar interactions with different food matrices or microbial strains.

The SlGRAS9-SlZHD17 transcriptional cascade regulates chlorophyll and carbohydrate metabolism contributing to fruit quality traits in tomato.

Some essential components of fleshy fruits are dependent on photosynthetic activity and carbohydrate metabolism. Nevertheless, the regulatory mechanisms linking chlorophyll and carbohydrate metabolism remain partially understood. Here, we uncovered the role of SlGRAS9 and SlZHD17 transcription factors in controlling chlorophyll and carbohydrate accumulation in tomato fruit. Knockout or knockdown of SlGRAS9 or SlZHD17 resulted in marked increase in chlorophyll content, reprogrammed chloroplast biogenesis and enhanced accumulation of starch and soluble sugars. Combined genome-wide transcriptomic profiling and promoter-binding experiments unveiled a complex mechanism in which the SlGRAS9/SlZHD17 regulatory module modulates the expression of chloroplast and sugar metabolism either via a sequential transcriptional cascade or through binding of both TFs to the same gene promoters, or, alternatively, via parallel pathways where each of the TFs act on different target genes. For instance, the regulation of SlAGPaseS1 and SlSUS1 is mediated by SlZHD17 whereas that of SlVI and SlGLK1 occurs only through SlGRAS9 without the intervention of SlZHD17. Both SlGRAS9 and SlZHD17 can also directly bind the promoter of SlPOR-B to regulate its expression. Taken together, our findings uncover two important regulators acting synergistically to manipulate chlorophyll and carbohydrate accumulation and provide new potential breeding targets for improving fruit quality in fleshy fruits.

Banana MaNAC1 activates secondary cell wall cellulose biosynthesis to enhance chilling resistance in fruit.

Chilling injury has a negative impact on the quantity and quality of crops, especially subtropical and tropical plants. The plant cell wall is not only the main source of biomass production, but also the first barrier to various stresses. Therefore, improving the understanding of the alterations in cell wall architecture is of great significance for both biomass production and stress adaptation. Herein, we demonstrated that the cell wall principal component cellulose accumulated during chilling stress, which was caused by the activation of MaCESA proteins. The sequence-multiple comparisons show that a cold-inducible NAC transcriptional factor MaNAC1, a homologue of Secondary Wall NAC transcription factors, has high sequence similarity with Arabidopsis SND3. An increase in cell wall thickness and cellulosic glucan content was observed in MaNAC1-overexpressing Arabidopsis lines, indicating that MaNAC1 participates in cellulose biosynthesis. Over-expression of MaNAC1 in Arabidopsis mutant snd3 restored the defective secondary growth of thinner cell walls and increased cellulosic glucan content. Furthermore, the activation of MaCESA7 and MaCESA6B cellulose biosynthesis genes can be directly induced by MaNAC1 through binding to SNBE motifs within their promoters, leading to enhanced cellulose content during low-temperature stress. Ultimately, tomato fruit showed greater cold resistance in MaNAC1 overexpression lines with thickened cell walls and increased cellulosic glucan content. Our findings revealed that MaNAC1 performs a vital role as a positive modulator in modulating cell wall cellulose metabolism within banana fruit under chilling stress.