The potential for synthesized invasive plant biochar with hydroxyapatite to mitigate allelopathy of Solidago canadensis.

Few studies tried to explore the mitigation effect and underlying mechanisms of biochar and their complex for negative allelopathy from invasive plants, which may provide a new way in the invasive plant management. Herein, an invasive plant (Solidago canadensis)-derived biochar (IBC) and its composite with hydroxyapatite (HAP/IBC) were synthesized by high temperature pyrolysis, and characterized by scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersion spectrometer, X-ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Then, both the batch adsorption and pot experiments were conducted to compare the removal effects of kaempferol-3-O-ß-D-glucoside (C21 H20 O11 , kaempf), an allelochemical from S. canadensis, on IBC and HAP/IBC, respectively. HAP/IBC showed a stronger affinity for kaempf than IBC due to its higher specific surface area, more functional groups (P-O, P-O-P, PO4 3- ), stronger crystallization [Ca3 (PO4 )2 ]. The maximum kaempf adsorption capacity on HAP/IBC was six times higher than on IBC (10.482 mg/g > 1.709 mg/g) via π-π interactions, functional groups, and metal complexation. The kaempf adsorption process could be fitted best by both pseudo-second-order kinetic and Langmuir isotherm models. Furthermore, HAP/IBC addition into soils could enhance and even recover the germination rate and/or seedling growth of tomato inhibited by negative allelopathy from the invasive S. canadensis. These results indicate that the composite of HAP/IBC could more effectively mitigate the allelopathy from S. canadensis than IBC, which may be a potential efficient approach to control the invasive plant and improve invaded soils.

An Adaptive Multi-Scale Network Based on Depth Information for Crowd Counting.

Crowd counting, as a basic computer vision task, plays an important role in many fields such as video surveillance, accident prediction, public security, and intelligent transportation. At present, crowd counting tasks face various challenges. Firstly, due to the diversity of crowd distribution and increasing population density, there is a phenomenon of large-scale crowd aggregation in public places, sports stadiums, and stations, resulting in very serious occlusion. Secondly, when annotating large-scale datasets, positioning errors can also easily affect training results. In addition, the size of human head targets in dense images is not consistent, making it difficult to identify both near and far targets using only one network simultaneously. The existing crowd counting methods mainly use density plot regression methods. However, this framework does not distinguish the features between distant and near targets and cannot adaptively respond to scale changes. Therefore, the detection performance in areas with sparse population distribution is not good. To solve such problems, we propose an adaptive multi-scale far and near distance network based on the convolutional neural network (CNN) framework for counting dense populations and achieving a good balance between accuracy, inference speed, and performance. However, on the feature level, in order to enable the model to distinguish the differences between near and far features, we use stacked convolution layers to deepen the depth of the network, allocate different receptive fields according to the distance between the target and the camera, and fuse the features between nearby targets to enhance the feature extraction ability of pedestrians under nearby targets. Secondly, depth information is used to distinguish distant and near targets of different scales and the original image is cut into four different patches to perform pixel-level adaptive modeling on the population. In addition, we add density normalized average precision (nAP) indicators to analyze the accuracy of our method in spatial positioning. This paper validates the effectiveness of NF-Net on three challenging benchmarks in Shanghai Tech Part A and B, UCF_ CC_50, and UCF-QNRF datasets. Compared with SOTA, it has more significant performance in various scenarios. In the UCF-QNRF dataset, it is further validated that our method effectively solves the interference of complex backgrounds.

Label-reconstruction-based pseudo-subscore learning for action quality assessment in sporting events.

Most existing action quality assessment (AQA) methods provide only an overall quality score for the input video and lack an evaluation of each substage of the movement process; thus, these methods cannot provide detailed feedback for users. Moreover, the existing datasets do not provide labels for substage quality assessment. To address these problems, in this work, a new label-reconstruction-based pseudo-subscore learning (PSL) method is proposed for AQA in sporting events. In the proposed method, the overall score of an action is not only regarded as a quality label but also used as a feature of the training set. A label-reconstruction-based learning algorithm is built to generate pseudo-subscore labels for the training set. Moreover, based on the pseudo-subscore labels and overall score labels, a multi-substage AQA model is fine-tuned from the PSL model to predict the action quality score of each substage and the overall score for an athlete. Several ablation experiments are performed to verify the effectiveness of each module. The experimental results show that our approach achieves state-of-the-art performance.

Effects of Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi Glomus mosseae on the Growth and Medicinal Components of Dysosma versipellis Under Copper Stress.

In order to investigate the effects of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) (Glomus mosseae) inoculations and additions of copper (Cu) ion at gradual concentrations (0, 200, and 400 mg kg-1) on different parameters of Dysosma versipellis such as growth, lipid peroxidation (MDA and MRP), antioxidation enzymatic (SOD, POD and CAT) activities, and active medicinal components. Pot experiments have been conducted. The results showed that additions of Cu could inhibit growth and the activity of antioxidant enzymes, increase the degree of membrane lipid peroxidation, and decrease the podophyllotoxin content of D. versipellis compared with the control. Meanwhile, inoculations with AMF enhanced its antioxidant capacity and reduced the degree of membrane lipid peroxidation in leaves of D. versipellis under Cu stress. Besides, AMF inoculations significantly increased the biomass and content of podophyllotoxin in roots of D. versipellis, while it decreased Cu absorption content in roots. Thus, inoculations with AMF could effectively alleviate the Cu stress and improve the active components content of D. versipellis, which might be important for Cu stress adaptation and the improved productivity and quality of D. versipellis.

Retraction Note to: The role of seed appendage in improving the adaptation of a species in definite seasons: a case study of Atriplex centralasiatica.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via the original article.

Identification of genomic alterations in oesophageal squamous cell cancer.

Oesophageal cancer is one of the most aggressive cancers and is the sixth leading cause of cancer death worldwide. Approximately 70% of global oesophageal cancer cases occur in China, with oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) being the histopathological form in the vast majority of cases (>90%). Currently, there are limited clinical approaches for the early diagnosis and treatment of ESCC, resulting in a 10% five-year survival rate for patients. However, the full repertoire of genomic events leading to the pathogenesis of ESCC remains unclear. Here we describe a comprehensive genomic analysis of 158 ESCC cases, as part of the International Cancer Genome Consortium research project. We conducted whole-genome sequencing in 17 ESCC cases and whole-exome sequencing in 71 cases, of which 53 cases, plus an additional 70 ESCC cases not used in the whole-genome and whole-exome sequencing, were subjected to array comparative genomic hybridization analysis. We identified eight significantly mutated genes, of which six are well known tumour-associated genes (TP53, RB1, CDKN2A, PIK3CA, NOTCH1, NFE2L2), and two have not previously been described in ESCC (ADAM29 and FAM135B). Notably, FAM135B is identified as a novel cancer-implicated gene as assayed for its ability to promote malignancy of ESCC cells. Additionally, MIR548K, a microRNA encoded in the amplified 11q13.3-13.4 region, is characterized as a novel oncogene, and functional assays demonstrate that MIR548K enhances malignant phenotypes of ESCC cells. Moreover, we have found that several important histone regulator genes (MLL2 (also called KMT2D), ASH1L, MLL3 (KMT2C), SETD1B, CREBBP and EP300) are frequently altered in ESCC. Pathway assessment reveals that somatic aberrations are mainly involved in the Wnt, cell cycle and Notch pathways. Genomic analyses suggest that ESCC and head and neck squamous cell carcinoma share some common pathogenic mechanisms, and ESCC development is associated with alcohol drinking. This study has explored novel biological markers and tumorigenic pathways that would greatly improve therapeutic strategies for ESCC.

Adsorption and mechanistic study of the invasive plant-derived biochar functionalized with CaAl-LDH for Eu(III) in water.

Herein, we developed the invasive plant-derived biochar (IPB) functionalized with CaAl-LDH at five mass ratios using a physical mixture method, assessed their adsorption perform for Eu(III), and explored the relative mechanisms. Results show that the IPB successfully loaded CaAl-LDH in five composites and their Eu(III) sorption affinities were strongly affected by solution pH, contact time, temperature, and the mass ratio of LDH and IPB. All the sorpiton process for Eu(III) occurred on the heterogeneous surface of five composites and the boundary layer diffusion limited the chemical sorption rate. Interestingly, the CaAl-LDH/IPB composite with high ratio of IPB had higher sorption capacity than the one with high ratio of LDH due to larger porosity of the former. Three mechanisms containing ion exchange between Al and Eu ions, surface complexation with carboxyl- and oxygen-containing functional groups, and precipitation were involved in the Eu(III) sorption, but the dominant sorption mechanism for each CaAl-LDH/IPB composite differed with different mass ratio of CaAl-LDH and IPB. In composite with more IPB (e.g., CaAl-LDH/IPB-13), both ion exchange and surface complexes dominated the sorption process and the intensity of Eu3+ was identified with the one of Eu2O3. Whereas in composites with high LDH, ion exchange dominated the sorption and the intensity of Eu3+ was obviously higher than the one of Eu2O3. This research will provide a new perspective for the application of the LDH/biochar materials.

The role of seed appendage in improving the adaptation of a species in definite seasons: a case study of Atriplex centralasiatica.

BACKGROUND: As a common accompanying dispersal structure, specialized seed appendages play a critical role in the successful germination and dispersal of many plants, and are regarded as an adaptation character for plants survival in diverse environments. However, little is known about how the appendages modulate the linkage between germination and environmental factors. Here, we tested the responses of germination to seasonal environmental signals (temperature and humidity) via seed appendages using Atriplex centralasiatica, which is widely distributed in salt marshlands with dry-cold winter in northern China. Three types of heteromorphic diaspores that differ in morphology of persistent bracteole and dormancy levels are produced in an individual plant of A. centralasiatica. RESULTS: Except for the nondormant diaspore (type A, with a brown seed enclosed in a persistent bracteole), bracteoles regulated inner seed dormancy of the other two dormant diaspore types, i.e., type B (flat diaspore with a black inner seed) and type C (globular diaspore with a black inner seed). For types B and C, germination of bracteole-free seeds was higher than that of intact diaspores, and was limited severely when incubated in the bracteole-soaking solution. Dormancy was released at a low temperature (< 10 °C) and suitable humidity (5-15%) condition. Oppositely, high temperature and unfit humidity induced secondary dormancy via inhibitors released by bracteoles. Type C with deeper dormancy needed more stringent conditions for dormancy release and was easier for dormancy inducement than type B. The germination windows were broadened and the time needed for dormancy release decreased after the bracteole flushing for the two dormant types in the field condition. CONCLUSIONS: Bracteoles determine the germination adaptation by bridging seeds and environmental signals and promising seedlings establishment only in proper seasons, which may also restrict species geographical distribution and shift species distributing ranges under the global climate change scenarios.

The relative contributions of climate, soil, diversity and interactions to leaf trait variation and spectrum of invasive Solidago canadensis.

BACKGROUND: Invasive plants commonly occupy diverse habitats and thus must adapt to changing environmental pressures through altering their traits and economics spectra, and addressing these patterns and their drivers has an importantly ecological and/or evolutionary significance. However, few studies have considered the role of multiple biotic and abiotic factors in shaping trait variation and spectra. In this study, we determined seven leaf traits of 66 Solidago canadensis populations, and quantified the relative contributions of climate, soil properties, native plant diversity, and S. canadensis-community interactions (in total 16 factors) to leaf trait variation and spectrum with multimodel inference. RESULTS: Overall, the seven leaf traits had high phenotypic variation, and this variation was highest for leaf dry matter content and lowest for leaf carbon concentration. The per capita contribution of climate to the mean leaf trait variation was highest (7.5%), followed by soil properties (6.2%), S. canadensis-community interactions (6.1%), and native plant diversity (5.4%); the dominant factors underlying trait variation varied with leaf traits. Leaf production potential was negatively associated with leaf stress-tolerance potential, and the relative contributions to this trade-off followed in order: native plant diversity (7.7%), climate (6.9%), S. canadensis-community interactions (6.2%), and soil properties (5.6%). Climate, diversity, soil, and interactions had positive, neutral or negative effects. CONCLUSIONS: Climate, soil, diversity, and interactions contribute differentially to the leaf trait variation and economics spectrum of S. canadensis, and their relative importance and directions depend on plant functional traits.

Performance of biochar derived from rice straw for removal of Ni(II) in batch experiments.

Biochar, as a cost-efficient adsorbent, is of major interest in the removal of heavy metals from wastewater. Herein, batch experiments were conducted to investigate the performance of biochar derived from rice straw for the removal of Ni(II) as a function of various environmental conditions. The results showed that Ni(II) sorption was strongly dependent on pH but independent of ionic strength and the effects of electrolyte ions could be negligible over the whole pH range. Ionic exchange and inner-sphere surface complexation dominated the sorption of Ni(II). Humic/fulvic acids clearly enhanced the Ni(II) sorption at pH <7.2 but inhibited the sorption at pH >7.2. The sorption reached equilibrium within 10 hours, and the kinetics followed a pseudo-second-order rate model. Any of the Langmuir, Freundlich, or Dubinin-Radushkevich isotherm models could describe the sorption well, but the Langmuir model described it best. The maximum sorption capacity calculated from the Langmuir model was 0.257 m·mol/g. The thermodynamic parameters suggested that Ni(II) sorption was a spontaneous and endothermic process and was enhanced at high temperature. The results of this work indicate that biochar derived from rice straw may be a valuable bio-sorbent for Ni(II) in aqueous solutions, but it still requires further modification.

Dasatinib enhances cisplatin sensitivity in human esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) cells via suppression of PI3K/AKT and Stat3 pathways.

The clinical efficacy of cisplatin in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) treatment remains undesirable. Src, a non-receptor tyrosine kinase involved in multiple fields of tumorigenesis, recently has been indicated as a promising therapeutic target in the treatment of solid tumors including ESCC. However, whether inhibition of Src activity can increase cisplatin efficacy in ESCC cells remains unknown. The present study found that inhibition of Src by its inhibitor-dasatinib sensitized ESCC cells to cisplatin in vitro. Our data also suggest a likely mechanism for this synergy that dasatinib reduces expression of critical oncogenic members of the signaling pathways, such as AKT or Stat3, and cisplatin-resistant molecules, such as ERCC1 and BRCA1, under the control of Src. Furthermore, dasatinib could sensitize ESCC cells to another platin-based agent, carboplatin. Therefore, this study provides a potential target for improving cisplatin efficacy in ESCC therapy.

Global and targeted metabolomics of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma discovers potential diagnostic and therapeutic biomarkers.

Diagnostic and therapeutic biomarkers useful for esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) have the ability to increase the long term survival of cancer patients. A metabolomics study, using plasma from four groups including ESCC patients before, during, and after chemoradiotherapy (CRT) and healthy controls, was originally carried out by LC-MS to determine global alterations in the metabolic profiles and find biomarkers potentially applicable to diagnosis and monitoring treatment effects. It is worth pointing out that a clear clustering and separation of metabolic data from the four groups was observed, which indicated that disease status and treatment intervention resulted in specific metabolic perturbations in the patients. A series of metabolites were found to be significantly altered in ESCC patients versus healthy controls and in pre- versus post-treatment patients based on multivariate statistical data analysis (MVDA). To further validate the reliability of these potential biomarkers, an independent validation was performed by using the selected reaction monitoring (SRM) based targeted approach. Finally, 18 most significantly altered plasma metabolites in ESCC patients, relative to healthy controls, were tentatively identified as lysophosphatidylcholines (lysoPCs), fatty acids, l-carnitine, acylcarnitines, organic acids, and a sterol metabolite. The classification performance of these metabolites were analyzed by receiver operating characteristic (ROC)(1) analysis and a biomarker panel was generated. Together, biological significance of these metabolites was discussed. Comparison between pre- and post-treatment patients generated 11 metabolites as potential therapeutic biomarkers that were tentatively identified as amino acids, acylcarnitines, and lysoPCs. Levels of three of these (octanoylcarnitine, lysoPC(16:1), and decanoylcarnitine) were closely correlated with treatment effect. Moreover, variation of these three potential biomarkers was investigated over the treatment course. The results suggest that these biomarkers may be useful in diagnosis, as well as in monitoring therapeutic responses and predicting outcomes of the ESCC.

Synergistic effects of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi and biochar are highly beneficial to Ligustrum lucidum seedlings in Cd-contaminated soil.

Cadmium (Cd) contamination is a widespread environmental issue. There is a lack of knowledge about the impacts of applying arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) and biochar, either alone or in their combination, on alleviating Cd phytotoxicity in Ligustrum lucidum. Therefore, a pot experiment was conducted in a greenhouse, where L. lucidum seedlings were randomly subjected to four regimes of AMF treatments (inoculation with sterilized AMF, with Rhizophagus irregularis, Diversispora versiformis, alone or a mixture of these two fungi), and two regimes of biochar treatments (with or without rice-husk biochar), as well as three regimes of Cd treatments (0, 15, and 150 mg kg-1), to examine the responses of growth, photosynthetic capabilities, soil enzymatic activities, nutritional concentrations, and Cd absorption of L. lucidum plants to the interactive effects of AMF, biochar, and Cd. The results demonstrated that under Cd contaminations, AMF alone significantly increased plant total dry weight, soil pH, and plant nitrogen (N) concentration by 84%, 3.2%, and 13.2%, respectively, and inhibited soil Cd transferring to plant shoot by 42.2%; biochar alone significantly enhanced net photosynthetic rate, soil pH, and soil catalase of non-mycorrhizal plants by 16.4%, 9%, and 11.9%, respectively, and reduced the soil Cd transferring to plant shoot by 44.7%; the additive effect between AMF and biochar greatly enhanced plant total dry weight by 101.9%, and reduced the soil Cd transferring to plant shoot by 51.6%. Furthermore, dual inoculation with D. versiformis and R. irregularis conferred more benefits on plants than the single fungal species did. Accordingly, amending Cd-contaminated soil with the combination of mixed-fungi inoculation and biochar application performed the best than either AMF or biochar alone. These responses may have been attributed to higher mycorrhizal colonization, soil pH, biomass accumulation, and biomass allocation to the roots, as well as photosynthetic capabilities. In conclusion, the combined use of mixed-fungi involving D. versiformis and R. irregularis and biochar addition had significant synergistic effects on enhancing plant performance and reducing Cd uptake of L. lucidum plants in Cd-contaminated soil.

Migfilin protein promotes migration and invasion in human glioma through epidermal growth factor receptor-mediated phospholipase C-γ and STAT3 protein signaling pathways.

Migfilin is critical for cell shape and motile regulation. However, its pathological role in glioma is unknown. Using an immunohistochemical staining assay, we demonstrate that there is a significant correlation between expression of Migfilin and pathological tumor grade in 217 clinical glioma samples. High Migfilin expression is associated with poor prognosis for patients with glioma. Investigation of the molecular mechanism shows that Migfilin promotes migration and invasion in glioma cells. Moreover, Migfilin positively modulates the expression and activity of epidermal growth factor receptor, and Migfilin-mediated migration and invasion depend on epidermal growth factor receptor-induced PLC-γ and STAT3-signaling pathways. Our results may provide significant clinical application, including use of Migfilin as a molecular marker in glioma for early diagnosis and as an indicator of prognosis.

Resistance of Mycorrhizal Cinnamomum camphora Seedlings to Salt Spray Depends on K+ and P Uptake.

Salt spray is a major environmental issue in coastal areas. Cinnamomum camphora is an economically important tree species that grows in the coastal areas of southern China. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) can alleviate the detrimental effects of abiotic stress on host plants. However, the mechanism by which AMF mitigates the adverse effects of salt spray on C. camphora remains unclear. A pot experiment was conducted in a greenhouse, where C. camphora seedlings were exposed to four AMF regimes (inoculation with sterilized fungi, with Glomus tortuosum, Funneliformis mosseae, either alone or in combination) and three salt spray regimes (applied with distilled water, 7, and 14 mg NaCl cm-2) in order to investigate the influence on root functional traits and plant growth. The results showed that higher salt spray significantly decreased the K+ uptake, K+/Na+ ratio, N/P ratio, total dry weight, and salinity tolerance of non-mycorrhizal plants by 37.9%, 71%, 27.4%, 12.7%, and 221.3%, respectively, when compared with control plants grown under non-salinity conditions. Mycorrhizal inoculation, particularly with a combination of G. tortuosum and F. mosseae, greatly improved the P uptake, total dry weight, and salinity tolerance of plants grown under higher salt spray conditions by 51.0%, 36.7%, and 130.9%, respectively, when compared with their counterparts. The results show that AMF can alleviate the detrimental effects of salt spray on C. camphora seedlings. Moreover, an enhanced uptake of K+ and P accounted for the resistance of the plants to salt spray. Therefore, pre-inoculation with a combination of G. tortuosum and F. mosseae to improve nutrient acquisition is a potential method of protecting C. camphora plants against salt spray stress in coastal areas.

[Expression and clinical significance of BRCA1 in human esophageal squamous cell carcinoma].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the expression of BRCA1 in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) tissues and evaluate its correlation with clinicopathological features as well as the prognosis of ESCC patients. METHODS: The expression of BRCA1 was detected by immunohistochemistry (IHC) in 201 specimens of T3 stage ESCC tissues and corresponding adjacent normal tissues using tissue microarray. The correlation between BRCA1 expression and clinicopathological features of ESCC was determined by chi-square analysis. The cumulative survival rate was analyzed by Kaplan-Meier method. RESULTS: The positive rate of BRCA1 expression in ESCC tissues was significantly higher than that in adjacent normal tissues [88.6% (178/201) vs. 36.8% (74/201), P < 0.001]. There was a significant correlation between the expression of BRCA1 and lymph node metastasis. In the tumors with positive lymph nodes, strong positive expression of BRCA1 was found in 45.0% (49/109), while only 19.6% (18/92) in tumors without lymph node metastasis, showing a significant difference (P < 0.001). A close relationship was also found between the expression of BRCA1 and gross typing of tumors (P < 0.05). The expression of BRCA1 was not significantly correlated with gender, age, tumor location, differentiation, and tumor thrombus (P > 0.05). The results of Kaplan-Meier analysis indicated that ESCC patients with a higher positive rate of BRCA1 expression have a poorer prognosis (P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The expression of BRCA1 is related to the occurrence and development of esophageal carcinoma. BRCA1 protein may serve as a new potential biomarker in estimating the biological behavior of ESCC.

'People listen more to what actors say': A qualitative study of tuberculosis-related knowledge, behaviours, stigma, and potential interventions in Puducherry, India.

India has made substantial advancements in reducing the burden of tuberculosis (TB), but persons living with active TB (PLWATB) still face myriad challenges in seeking and receiving care, including TB-related stigma. To meet the END TB targets, it is critical that PLWATB engage in care and are able to adhere to treatment. This qualitative study aimed to understand TB-related stigma (perceived, enacted, and internalised) and possible interventions to reduce stigma in Puducherry and Tamil Nadu, India. We conducted 47 in-depth interviews with PLWATB and household members and eight focus group discussions: two each with PLWATB, their household members, healthcare workers, and key informants. We found varying TB-related knowledge: the vast majority of interview participants reported incorrect modes of transmission, although most were also aware that TB is curable. Participants reported high levels of perceived stigma, with nearly two-thirds of PLWATB choosing to hide their disease to avoid being stigmatised in their community. Participants supported interventions including celebrity advocacy and school-based programming to increase community knowledge and reduce enacted stigma as well as support groups and counselling to reduce internalised stigma in PLWATB. This study has the potential to inform future interventions to reduce TB-related stigma in India.

Effect of the joint fermentation of pyracantha powder and glutinous rice on the physicochemical characterization and functional evaluation of rice wine.

Pyracantha fortuneana, as a kind of wild plant resource for both medicine and food, has high nutrition and health-care value. This study was to explore the effect of the joint fermentation of pyracantha powder and glutinous rice on the physicochemical and functional characterization of rice wine, aiming to improve the rice wine functional quality. As a result, a light dry rice wine fermented with P. fortuneana (PRW) was obtained using the fermentation technology of the Chinese rice wine. Although the contents of alcohol and protein in PRW were lower compared with the rice wine (RW) without adding pyracantha powder, the contents of sugar, ascorbic acid, total phenols, total flavonoids, and anthocyanins were higher in PRW. The analysis of volatile compounds by GC-IMS showed that the contents of most aldehydes, alcohols, and esters increased in PRW. The quantification of organic acids and phenolic monomers indicated that most of the monomers determined were more abundant in PRW. Besides, the antioxidant capacity of PRW, including the scavenging rate of DPPH• and ABTS+•, was significantly stronger than that of RW. The bacteriostatic effect of the phenolic extracts from PRW was also observed obviously. It was expected to provide an effective way for the comprehensive utilization of P. fortuneana resource by producing a kind of nutritious and healthy pyracantha rice wine.

Integrated ionization approach for RRLC-MS/MS-based metabonomics: finding potential biomarkers for lung cancer.

An integrated ionization approach of electrospray ionization (ESI), atmospheric pressure chemical ionization (APCI), and atmospheric pressure photoionization (APPI) combining with rapid resolution liquid chromatography mass spectrometry (RRLC-MS) has been developed for performing global metabonomic analysis on complex biological samples. This approach was designed to overcome the low ionization efficiencies of endogenous metabolites due to diverse physicochemical properties as well as ion suppression, and obtain comprehensive metabolite profiles in LC-MS analysis. Ionization capability and applicability were manifested by improved ionization efficiency and enlarged metabolite coverage in analysis on typical urinary metabolite standards and urine samples from healthy volunteers. The method was validated by the limit of detection and precision. When applied to the global metabonomic studies of lung cancer, more comprehensive biomarker candidates were obtained to reflect metabolic traits between healthy volunteers and lung cancer patients, including 74 potential biomarkers in positive ion mode and 59 in negative ion mode. Taking identical potential biomarkers of any two or three ionization methods into account, analysis using ESI-MS in positive (+) and negative (-) ion mode contributed to 70 and 64% of the total potential biomarkers, respectively. The biomarker discovery capability of (+/-) APCI-MS accounted for 45 and 42% of the overall; meanwhile (+/-) APPI-MS amounted for 39 and 54%. These results indicated that potential biomarkers with vital biological information could be missed if only a single ionization method was used. Furthermore, 11 potential biomarkers were identified including amino acids, nucleosides, and a metabolite of indole. They revealed elevated amino acid and nucleoside metabolism as well as protein degradation in lung cancer patients. This proposed approach provided a more comprehensive picture of the metabolic changes and further verified identical biomarkers that were obtained simultaneously using different ionization methods.

[Clinical significance of abnormal expression of Aurora-A in human esophageal squamous cell carcinoma with or without lymph node metastasis].

OBJECTIVE: China has the highest incidence and mortality of esophageal carcinoma in the world, and the esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is the major type. In this study, the authors investigated the expression of Aurora-A in stage T3 esophageal squamous cell carcinomas (ESCC) with positive and negative lymph node metastasis, and analyzed its relationship with prognosis of ESCC patients. METHODS: ESCC tissue arrays including 212 specimens had been constructed. The expression of Aurora-A in both ESCC tissues and adjacent normal tissues was determined by immunohistochemical staining. The correlation between Aurora-A protein levels and lymph node status in ESCC and survival rate were statistically analyzed. RESULTS: The positive expression of Aurora-A was 74.07% (140/189) in tumor tissues and 18.52% (35/189) in adjacent normal tissues, showing a significant difference between them (χ(2) = 105.162, P < 0.05). In tumors with positive lymph nodes, strong positive expression of Aurora-A was found in 42.99% (46/107), while only 7.37% (7/95) in tumors with negative lymph nodes, with a statistically significant difference (χ(2) = 36.132, P < 0.05). The cumulative survival rate of the patients with strong Aurora-A-positive tumors was significantly lower than that in patients with Aurora-A-negative tumors (P = 0.0042, P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: The positive expression of Aurora-A in ESCC tissues is much higher than that in adjacent normal tissues. The expression of Aurora-A is higher in lymph node-positive tumors than in the lymph node-negative ones. There is a significantly longer cumulative survival rate in patients with negative Aurora-A expression than that in patients with strong positive Aurora-A expression.