[Analysis on prevalence and epidemic risk of animal plague in different ecological plague foci in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region].

The risk of plague epidemics and relapse of various types of plague foci persists in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. For Marmota sibirica plague foci, the animal plague has not been found but antibody has been detected positive. Nowadays, Marmota sibirica has been increasing in population and distribution in China. In bordering countries Mongolia and Russia, the animal plague has been continuously prevalent. For Spermophilus dauricus plague foci, the animal plague has been taken place now and then. Compared to the above foci, the animal plague is most prevalent in Meriones unguiculatus plague foci and frequently spread to humans. Due to higher strain virulence and historical disaster in Marmota sibirica plague foci and Spermophilus dauricus plague foci, plague prevention and control should be strengthened on these foci. In addition to routine surveillance, epidemic dynamics need to be further monitored in these two foci, in order to prevent their relapse and spread to humans.

The fractal correlation between relaxation dynamics and atomic-level structures observed in metallic glasses by computer simulation.

In the present study, atomistic simulation reveals that the microscopic mechanism of the relaxation dynamics in amorphous materials is governed by the activating atoms that jump more than half of the average nearest neighbor distance within a given time. Based on the unsupervised machine-learning algorithm, hierarchical clustering analysis shows that the activating atoms are excited in a cooperative and avalanche-like model to form activating units. Correlation analysis suggests that large free volumes facilitate the formation of activating atoms. Interestingly, a fractal correlation is found between the number and size of the activating units, indicating that when the maturation temperature, i.e. percolation threshold, is reached the activating units form a complicated and connected body in space.

Atomistic modeling to investigate the favored composition for metallic glass formation in the Ca-Mg-Ni ternary system.

A realistic interatomic potential was first constructed for the Ca-Mg-Ni system and then applied to Monte Carlo simulations to predict the favored composition for metallic glass formation in the ternary system. The simulations not only predict a hexagonal composition region, within which the Ca-Mg-Ni metallic glass formation is energetically favored, but also pinpoint an optimized sub-region within which the amorphization driving force, i.e. the energy difference between the solid solution and disordered phase, is larger than that outside. The simulations further reveal that the physical origin of glass formation is the solid solution collapsing when the solute atom exceeds the critical solid solubility. Further structural analysis indicates that the pentagonal bi-pyramids dominate in the optimized sub-region. The large atomic size difference between Ca, Mg and Ni extends the short-range landscape and facilitates the development of a hybridized packing model in the medium-range, and eventually enhancing the glass formation in the system. The predictions are well supported by the experimental observations reported so far, and could be of help for designing the ternary glass formation.

Retraction: Atomic-scale simulation to study the dynamical properties and local structure of Cu-Zr and Ni-Zr metallic glass-forming alloys.

Retraction of 'Atomic-scale simulation to study the dynamical properties and local structure of Cu-Zr and Ni-Zr metallic glass-forming alloys' by M. H. Yang et al., Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2016, 18, 7169-7183.

Atomic-scale simulation to study the dynamical properties and local structure of Cu-Zr and Ni-Zr metallic glass-forming alloys.

Molecular dynamics simulation with well-developed EAM potentials was carried out to investigate the transport properties and local atomic structure of Cu-Zr and Ni-Zr metallic glasses and supercooled liquids. It is found that Cu or Ni atoms have much faster dynamics than Zr atoms in relaxation timescales, while Zr atoms display faster dynamics in the Cu-Zr system than in the Ni-Zr system. A dynamical crossover phenomenon from Arrhenius to super-Arrhenius behavior in the transport properties was observed for the Cu65Zr35 system at Tx ≈ 1250 K and the Ni65Zr35 system at Tx ≈ 1500 K, respectively. Further structural analysis suggests that the dominant interconnected clusters in Cu65Zr35 and Ni65Zr35 systems are 〈0, 0, 12, 0〉, 〈0, 1, 10, 2〉, 〈0, 2, 8, 2〉 and 〈0, 3, 6, 4〉. To directly characterize and visualize the correlated dynamics, we regard the full icosahedra as the microscopic origin responsible for the formation of metallic glasses in the Cu65Zr35 system, while the metallic glass formation in the Ni65Zr35 system can be attributed to the slow dynamics of 〈0, 3, 6, 4〉, 〈0, 2, 8, 2〉 and 〈0, 1, 10, 2〉 Ni-centered Voronoi polyhedra. The local atomic order and dynamics for Cu65Zr35 and Ni65Zr35 systems are remarkably different, and these differences are presumed to hinder crystal nucleation and growth, hence promoting the largely different bulk glass-forming ability.

Expression and significance of miR-21 in multiple myeloma patients.

The aim of the present study is to examine the expression level of peripheral mir-21 in multiple myeloma (MM) patients and to determine its clinical significance. MM patients (30), monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) patients (14), and normal controls (20) were recruited to determine the serum level of ß2-MG, IgA and IgM, IgG, λ, κ, TP, ALB, Hb, LDH, and Ca(2+). Gene expression of mir-21 was quantified by SYBR green real-time fluorescent quantitative PCR. We found that the expression level of serum mir-21 in the MM group was significantly higher than the MGUS group and the NC group (P < 0.01). According to the ISS installment, the level of mir-21, lgG, κ, and ALB in the MM group in stage I differed from that in stages II and III. The level of IgA, ß2-MG in stage III was higher as compared with stage I and II (P < 0.05 and P < 0.01).The levels of mir-21, κ, (κ+λ), IgG, (IgG + IgA + IgM), and ß2-MG in MM patients were positively correlated with ALB (P < 0.01). Based on the results, miR-21 plays an important role as an oncogene. Mir-21 may be important in the occurrence, development, and disease prognosis of MM.

Computation assisted design of favored composition for ternary Mg-Cu-Y metallic glass formation.

With the aid of ab initio calculations, a realistic interatomic potential was constructed for the Mg-Cu-Y ternary system under the proposed formalism of smoothed and long-range second-moment approximation of tight-binding. Taking the potential as the starting base, an atomistic computation/simulation route was developed for designing favored and optimized compositions for Mg-Cu-Y metallic glass formation. Simulations revealed that the physical origin of metallic glass formation is the collapse of crystalline lattice when solute concentration exceeds a critical value, thus leading to predict a hexagonal region in the Mg-Cu-Y composition triangle, within which metallic glass formation is energetically favored. It is proposed that the hexagonal region can be defined as the intrinsic glass formation region, or quantitative glass formation ability of the system. Inside the hexagonal region, the driving force for formation of each specific glassy alloy was further calculated and correlated with its forming ability in practice. Calculations pinpointed the optimized stoichiometry in the Mg-Cu-Y system to be Mg64Cu16Y20, at which the formation driving force reaches its maximum, suggesting that metallic glasses designed to have compositions around Mg64Cu16Y20 are most stable or easiest to obtain. The predictions derived directly from the atomistic simulations are supported by experimental observations reported so far in the literature. Furthermore, Honeycutt-Anderson analysis indicated that pentagonal bipyramids (although not aggregating to form icosahedra) dominate in the local structure of the Mg-Cu-Y metallic glasses. A microscopic picture of the medium-range packing can then be described as an extended network of the pentagonal bipyramids, entangled with the fourfold and sixfold disclination lines, jointly fulfilling the space of the metallic glasses.

Atomistic modeling to optimize composition and characterize structure of Ni-Zr-Mo metallic glasses.

An interatomic potential was constructed for the Ni-Zr-Mo ternary metal system with the newly proposed long-range empirical formulism, which has been verified to be applicable for fcc, hcp and bcc transition metals and their alloys. Applying the constructed potential, molecular dynamics simulations predict a hexagonal composition region within which metallic glass formation is energetically favored. Based on the simulation results, the driving force for amorphous phase formation is derived, and thus an optimized composition is pinpointed to Ni45Zr40Mo15, of which the metallic glass could be most stable or easiest to obtain. Further structural analysis indicates that the dominant interconnected clusters for Ni64Zr36-xMox MGs are 〈0, 0, 12, 0〉, 〈0, 1, 10, 2〉, 〈0, 2, 8, 2〉 and 〈0, 3, 6, 4〉. In addition, it is found that the appropriate addition of Mo content could not only make a more ordered structure with a higher atomic packing density and a lower energy state, but also improve the glass formation ability of Ni-Zr-Mo alloys. Moreover, inherent hierarchical atomic configurations for ternary Ni-Zr-Mo metallic glasses are clarified via the short-range, medium-range and further in the extended scale of the icosahedral network.

Prediction of protein-protein interactions using chaos game representation and wavelet transform via the random forest algorithm.

Studying the network of protein-protein interactions (PPIs) will provide valuable insights into the inner workings of cells. It is vitally important to develop an automated, high-throughput tool that efficiently predicts protein-protein interactions. This study proposes a new model for PPI prediction based on the concept of chaos game representation and the wavelet transform, which means that a considerable amount of sequence-order effects can be incorporated into a set of discrete numbers. The advantage of using chaos game representation and the wavelet transform to formulate the protein sequence is that it can more effectively reflect its overall sequence-order characteristics than the conventional correlation factors. Using such a formulation frame to represent the protein sequences means that the random forest algorithm can be used to conduct the prediction. The results for a large-scale independent test dataset show that the proposed model can achieve an excellent performance with an accuracy value of about 0.86 and a geometry mean value of about 0.85. The model is therefore a useful supplementary tool for PPI predictions. The predictor used in this article is freely available at http://www.jci-bioinfo.cn/PPI.

Structural skeleton of preferentially interpenetrated clusters and correlation with shear localization in Mg-Cu-Ni ternary metallic glasses.

Inherent hierarchical structure and its effect on shear localization were clarified for ternary Mg-Cu-Ni metallic glasses via molecular dynamics studies based on a newly constructed n-body potential for the system. Assisted by a proposed index to detect the medium-range correlation heterogeneity, it was found that the Cu/Ni-centered icosahedra and specific Mg-centered clusters exhibit a strong preference to interconnect, leading to the formation, over an extended scale, of a percolated network that serves as structural skeleton in the glassy matrix. In constituting the skeleton network, the clusters mainly integrate in an interpenetrating mode, while the noninterpenetrating linkages provide additional reinforcements, jointly consolidating the structural and energetic stability of the skeleton. Furthermore, by monitoring the structural evolution upon compressive deformation, it was revealed that the gradual collapse of the skeleton network is intimately correlated to the mechanical response of metallic glasses and acts as a structural signature of the initiation and propagation of shear bands.

[Research progress on the role of resveratrol in wound healing].

The difficulty of wound healing in patients is a difficult problem that doctors in all clinical departments may encounter, and there is still no good solution. Resveratrol is a kind of natural active substance, which has anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, antibacterial, and angiogenesis promoting effects, and is a potential drug to promote wound healing. However, the clinical application of resveratrol is limited due to its low bioavailability. In this review, the molecular mechanism of resveratrol in promoting wound healing and its administration methods in wound treatment were reviewed to provide ideas for the redevelopment of resveratrol.

Microchemical inhomogeneity to characterize atomic configurations in the heating and quenching of a CuHf2 alloy.

Based on the constructed Cu-Hf interatomic potential, Monte Carlo simulations were conducted to reveal the atomic configurations in heating and quenching of a CuHf(2) alloy through scrutinizing the evolution of microchemical inhomogeneity. Simulations show that the CuHf(2) crystalline structure becomes more homogeneous during heating but an obvious drop in microchemical inhomogeneity appears when reaching its melting point. During the quenching process, the CuHf(2) melt becomes increasingly inhomogeneous and shows a change in the slope in the microchemical inhomogeneity around glass transition temperature. Simulation results were evidenced by the atomic packing analysis through the Voronoi tessellation method. The implications of our study suggest that the glass transition could be visualized as a process involving increase of microchemical inhomogeneity from the liquid to glassy state.

Thermodynamic calculation and interatomic potential to predict the favored composition region for the Cu-Zr-Al metallic glass formation.

For the Cu-Zr-Al system, the glass forming compositions were firstly calculated based on the extended Miedema's model, suggesting that the amorphous phase could be thermodynamically favored over a large composition region. An n-body potential was then constructed under the smoothed and long-range second-moment-approximation of tight-binding formulism. Applying the constructed Cu-Zr-Al potential, molecular dynamics simulations were conducted using solid solution models to compare relative stability of crystalline solid solution versus its disordered counterpart. Simulations reveal that the physical origin of metallic glass formation is crystalline lattice collapsing while solute concentration exceeding the critical value, thus predicting a hexagonal composition region, within which the Cu-Zr-Al ternary metallic glass formation is energetically favored. The molecular dynamics simulations predicted composition region is defined as the quantitative glass-forming-ability or glass-forming-region of the Cu-Zr-Al system.

[Effectiveness of a new health education pathway for echinococcosis control among primary school students in hyper-endemic regions].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effectiveness of a new health education pathway for echinococcosis control among primary school students in regions highly prevalent for echinococcosis in China. METHODS: Six primary schools were randomly selected from echinococcosis hyper-endemic regions, with 13 classes assigned to the intervention group and 9 to the control group, and all students in these 21 classes were recruited as the study subjects. Echinococcosis health education was performed through the pathway of assessing the current status-strengthening the building of teaching resources-focusing on practices in the intervention group, while routine health education was given in the control group. A questionnaire survey was performed to assess the score of echinococcosis control knowledge (including theoretical knowledge score and mean daily practical capability score) before and after the health education interventions to evaluate the effectiveness of this new health education pathway for echinococcosis control. RESULTS: The mean score of echinococcosis control knowledge was 68.86 ± 18.70 points at baseline, with the mean theoretical knowledge score of 40.97 ± 10.75 points, and the mean daily practical capability score of 27.89 ± 12.50 points. Clustering analysis showed three types of populations, including "unsatisfactory", "learn and apply creatively", and "rote learning", which accounted for 24.62% (240/975), 45.74% (446/975) and 29.64% (289/975), respectively. The mean score of echinococcosis control knowledge was 81.08 ± 18.15 points in the intervention group during the final assessment, with the mean theoretical knowledge score of 43.65 ± 9.40 points, and the mean daily practical capability score of 37.43 ± 12.22 points, and both were significantly higher relative to baseline (t = -4.201 and -15.202, both P values < 0.01). The mean score of echinococcosis control knowledge was comparable between at baseline (70.55 ± 19.46 points) and final assessment (71.74 ± 19.37 points) in the control group (t = -0.87, P > 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The awareness of echinococcosis control knowledge is fair among primary school students in echinococcosis hyper-endemic regions; however, the capability of combining theoretical learning and practices requires to be improved. The health education mode based on the pathway of assessing the current status-strengthening the building of teaching resources-focusing on practices seems to remarkably improve the understanding of echinococcosis control knowledge among primary school students in echinococcosis hyper-endemic regions.

Melting of (MgO)(n) (n=18, 21, and 24) clusters simulated by molecular dynamics.

Molecular dynamics simulations are employed to investigate the melting behavior and thermal stability of magnesium oxide clusters (MgO)(n) (n=18, 21, and 24). The rocksalt and hexagonal tube structures are two dominant low-energy structural motifs for small (MgO)(n) clusters and it results in the magic sizes n=3k (k is an integer). For n=6, 9, 12, and 15, the rocksalt and hexagonal tube structures have the same topological geometry, but for n>or=18, the two isomers are separated by high energy barriers. The simulations show a one-step melting process for the rocksalt structures of (MgO)(18,24) (no perfect rocksalt structure exists for n=21). The melting transition occurs sharply between 1800 and 1950 K for n=24 but gradually from 1400 to 2450 K for n=18. The relative root-mean-square bond length fluctuation reveals a premelting stage from about 700 K to the melting transition for the hexagonal tube structures of all the three clusters. The short-time averages of kinetic energy and a visual molecular dynamics package are used to monitor the structures along the trajectories. The low-energy isomers are identified by the quenching technique and the isomerization processes are traced. The results show that there exists a family of isomers which are only 0.1-0.4 eV higher in energy than the corresponding hexagonal tube structures and separated by low energy barriers. The premelting stage is caused by the isomerizations among these structures. The melting characteristics demonstrated in the simulations are clarified in terms of the energies of the isomers and the energy barriers separating them.

Proposed long-range empirical potential to study the metallic glasses in the Ni-Nb-Ta system.

An n-body potential is constructed for the Ni-Nb-Ta ternary metal system in the newly proposed form of long-range empirical potential. The constructed Ni-Nb-Ta potential can well reproduce the lattice constants, cohesive energies, and elastic modulus of the metals and some compounds as well as the equations of state of the system. Applying the constructed Ni-Nb-Ta potential, molecular dynamics simulations and Voronoi tessellations are carried out to study the issues related to the Ni-Nb-Ta metallic glasses. It is found that increasing the Ni content can obviously improve the glass-forming ability of the binary Nb-Ta system, which features a isomorphous phase diagram unfavoring for forming glass, indicating that the Ni solute plays a decisive role in forming the Nb-based or Ta-based Ni-Nb-Ta metallic glasses. Concerning the atomic structure, the Voronoi cell volume and coordination number (CN) of Ta are generally larger than those of Ni in the binary Ni-Ta metallic glasses. With increasing the Ni concentration, the fraction of icosidihedron (CN=13) increases, while the fractions of icosihexahedron (CN=15) and icosioctahedron (CN=16) decrease. Meanwhile, with increasing the Ni concentration, the dominating coordination numbers of Ta atoms increase. Interestingly, similar feature in the atomic structure with variation of Ni concentration is also observed in the Ni-Nb metallic glasses. For the ternary Ni-Nb-Ta alloys, it is observed from the CN distributions that the structure of the metallic glasses is mostly affected by the Ni concentration.

Tetraethylammonium inhibits glioma cells via increasing production of intracellular reactive oxygen species.

BACKGROUND: Potassium channel blockers have been shown to possess antitumor properties, but the role of apoptosis remains to be clarified. In this study, we investigated the antiproliferative effect of tetraethylammonium (TEA), a nonspecific potassium channel blocker, in rat C6 and 9L glioma cells. METHODS: Cytotoxicity was evaluated by MTT assay. Apoptosis was detected by TUNEL and annexin V-FITC/propidium iodide assays. Protein levels were determined by Western blot analysis. Intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) levels were assessed flow cytometrically. RESULTS: TEA (2-60 mM) significantly inhibited the proliferation of C6 and 9L glioma cells. In addition, increased cell apoptosis was confirmed after treatment with 40 mM TEA. Apoptosis was associated with a dramatic increase in ROS levels and altered Bcl-2/Bax protein balance. CONCLUSION: TEA can inhibit proliferation and induce apoptosis in both cell lines; therefore, it might be associated with the increase in intracellular ROS production.

Formation and structural anomaly of the metastable phases in an immiscible Ag-Mo system studied by ion beam mixing and molecular dynamics simulation.

For the equilibrium immiscible Ag-Mo system characterized by a large positive heat of formation, the nanosized Ag-Mo multilayered samples are designed and prepared to include sufficient interfacial free energy to elevate their initial energetic states to be higher than that of either the amorphous phase or solid solution and then subject to 200 keV xenon ion irradiation. The results show that a uniform amorphous alloy can be obtained within a composition range, at least, from 25 to 88 atom % of Mo. Interestingly, in the intermediate stage of ion irradiation, a bcc phase, an amorphous phase, and an order (bcc)-disorder coexisting state appear simultaneously in the Ag12Mo88 multilayered sample and extend over the entire bright field image with unanimously homogeneous composition. In thermodynamic modeling, a Gibbs free energy diagram of the Ag-Mo system is constructed, based on Miedema's model, and suggests that within a narrow composition regime of 85-90 atom % of Mo, the energy difference between the bcc and the amorphous phases is extremely small, which is probably the very reason for the order-disorder coexisting state to appear. In atomistic modeling, an ab initio derived Ag-Mo potential is applied to perform molecular dynamics simulations. The simulations not only determine an intrinsic glass-forming ability/range (GFA/GFR) of the Ag-Mo system to be from 10 to 88 atom % of Mo but also reveal the possibility of the formation/appearance of a crystalline and amorphous mixture in a narrow composition regime of 88-92 atom % of Mo. Apparently, the theoretical results are in excellent agreement and/or compatible with the experimental observations in ion beam mixing.

Interleukin-10 -1082 promoter polymorphism is associated with schizophrenia in a Han Chinese sib-pair study.

The interleukin-10 (IL-10) gene has been identified as a susceptibility gene for schizophrenia in Caucasians. A previous case-control study conducted by our group revealed a weak association between polymorphism, -592C/A, of the IL-10 gene promoter and schizophrenia. Our present study was aimed at confirming the association of the IL-10 promoter with schizophrenia using 197 Han Chinese sib-pair families. A family-based association test (FBAT) and haplotype analysis was undertaken using the FBAT v1.5.5. The global TDT was significant for a different polymorphism, -1082G/A (chi2=13.16, P=0.000285) and that the allele -1082G was preferentially transmitted to schizophrenia-affected children. Furthermore, haplotype TDT analysis showed that haplotype "GCC" was significantly associated with the disease (chi2=8.1, P=0.00443). Our results also indicate that the IL-10 gene may play a significant role in the etiology of schizophrenia among Han Chinese.