The Association between Tooth Loss and Insulin Resistance Mediated by Diet Quality and Systemic Immunoinflammatory Index.

(1) Background: Both tooth loss and diabetes have high global prevalence, and both have a significant influence on patients' general health and quality of life. Previous research has indicated a possible connection between tooth loss and diabetes, but it has been unclear whether tooth loss has an effect on the development of diabetes and how it affects it. We aim to investigate the relationship between insulin resistance (IR) and tooth loss and examine how the systemic immune-inflammation index (SII) level and diet quality mediate it. (2) Methods: The cross-sectional study data were obtained from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). After describing and comparing baseline data, we used regression models to evaluate the relationship between IR and tooth loss, diet quality and tooth loss and IR, SII and tooth loss and IR. Furthermore, we applied bootstrapping to test the mediation effect of diet quality and SII between tooth loss and IR. Diet quality is reflected by the HEI (Healthy Eating Index)-2015 score. (3) Results: The total number of subjects included was 8197, with 3861 individuals belonging to the IR group (HOMA-IR ≥ 2.5) and 4336 in the non-IR group (HOMA-IR < 2.5). In the model with all covariates adjusted, tooth loss in the fourth quartile was found to be positively correlated with an increase in HOMA-IR (OR = 1.301; 95% confidence interval (CI) = [1.102, 1.537]; p < 0.001) compared to the first quartile; tooth loss in the fourth quartile correlated with the HEI-2015 score compared to the first quantile (ß = -0.121, 95% CI = [-4.839, -2.974], p < 0.001); and the highest number of tooth loss was found to have a significant effect on SII (ß = 0.032; 95%CI = [1.777, 47.448]; p < 0.05). Compared to average diet quality, best diet quality acts as a safeguard against elevated HOMA-IR (OR = 0.776; 95% CI = [0.641, 0.939]; p < 0.01); inadequate diet quality is a risk factor (OR = 1.267; 95%CI = [1.138, 1.411]; p < 0.001) conversely. Meanwhile, it can be seen that compared with the first quantile of SII, the highest score is significantly correlated with the higher incidence of IR (OR = 1.363; 95%CI = [1.179, 1.575]; p < 0.001). Diet quality and SII played a partial mediating role in the relationship between HOMA-IR and tooth loss, and the mediating effect ratio for the total effect value was 4.731% and 4.576%, respectively. The mediating effect of SII and diet quality in the association of the relationship between HOMA-IR and tooth loss both was 0.003 (95%CI = [0.001, 0.004]). (4) Conclusions: Our study revealed the relationship between IR and tooth loss, and further explored the mediating role of SII and diet quality between the number of missing teeth and IR, emphasizing that improving diet quality and reducing SII can effectively prevent and treat IR and related diseases. It provides new theoretical support for the study of IR mechanisms and new ideas and approaches to deal with related diseases.

Genome-wide identification and expression analysis of WRKY gene family members in red clover (Trifolium pratense L.).

Trifolium pratense is an important legume forage grass and a key component of sustainable livestock development. Serving as an essential component, the WRKY gene family, a crucial group of regulatory transcription factors in plants, holds significant importance in their response to abiotic stresses. However, there has been no systematic analysis conducted on the WRKY gene family in Trifolium pratense. This study conducted a comprehensive genomic characterization of the WRKY gene family in Trifolium pratense, utilizing the latest genomic data, resulting in the identification of 59 TpWRKY genes. Based on their structural features, phylogenetic characteristics, and conserved motif composition, the WRKY proteins were classified into three groups, with group II further subdivided into five subgroups (II-a, II-b, II-c, II-d, and II-e). The majority of the TpWRKYs in a group share a similar structure and motif composition. Intra-group syntenic analysis revealed eight pairs of duplicate segments. The expression patterns of 59 TpWRKY genes in roots, stems, leaves, and flowers were examined by analyzing RNA-seq data. The expression of 12 TpWRKY genes under drought, low-temperature (4°C), methyl jasmonate (MeJA) and abscisic acid (ABA) stresses was analyzed by RT-qPCR. The findings indicated that TpWRKY46 was highly induced by drought stress, and TpWRKY26 and TpWRKY41 were significantly induced by low temperature stress. In addition, TpWRKY29 and TpWRKY36 were greatly induced by MeJA stress treatment, and TpWRKY17 was significantly upregulated by ABA stress treatment. In this research, we identified and comprehensively analyzed the structural features of the WRKY gene family in T.pratense, along with determined the possible roles of WRKY candidate genes in abiotic stress. These discoveries deepen our understandings of how WRKY transcription factors contribute to species evolution and functional divergence, laying a solid molecular foundation for future exploration and study of stress resistance mechanisms in T.pratense.

Researching progress on bio-reactive electrogenic materials with electrophysiological activity for enhanced bone regeneration.

Bone tissues are dynamically reconstructed during the entire life cycle phase, which is an exquisitely regulated process controlled by intracellular and intercellular signals transmitted through physicochemical and biochemical stimulation. Recently, the role of electrical activity in promoting bone regeneration has attracted great attention, making the design, fabrication, and selection of bioelectric bio-reactive materials a focus. Under specific conditions, piezoelectric, photoelectric, magnetoelectric, acoustoelectric, and thermoelectric materials can generate bioelectric signals similar to those of natural tissues and stimulate osteogenesis-related signaling pathways to enhance the regeneration of bone defects, which can be used for designing novel smart biological materials for engineering tissue regeneration. However, literature summarizing studies relevant to bioelectric materials for bone regeneration is rare to our knowledge. Consequently, this review is mainly focused on the biological mechanism of electrical stimulation in the regeneration of bone defects, the current state and future prospects of piezoelectric materials, and other bioelectric active materials suitable for bone tissue engineering in recent studies, aiming to provide a theoretical basis for novel clinical treatment strategies for bone defects.

Neural Matrix Factorization Recommendation for User Preference Prediction Based on Explicit and Implicit Feedback.

Explicit feedback and implicit feedback are two important types of heterogeneous data for constructing a recommendation system. The combination of the two can effectively improve the performance of the recommendation system. However, most of the current deep learning recommendation models fail to fully exploit the complementary advantages of two types of data combined and usually only use binary implicit feedback data. Thus, this paper proposes a neural matrix factorization recommendation algorithm (EINMF) based on explicit-implicit feedback. First, neural network is used to learn nonlinear feature of explicit-implicit feedback of user-item interaction. Second, combined with the traditional matrix factorization, explicit feedback is used to accurately reflect the explicit preference and the potential preferences of users to build a recommendation model; a new loss function is designed based on explicit-implicit feedback to obtain the best parameters through the neural network training to predict the preference of users for items; finally, according to prediction results, personalized recommendation list is pushed to the user. The feasibility, validity, and robustness are fully demonstrated in comparison with multiple baseline models on two real datasets.

Identification of interacting proteins of Arabidopsis cyclophilin38 (AtCYP38) via multiple screening approaches reveals its possible broad functions in chloroplasts.

AtCYP38, a thylakoid lumen localized immunophilin, is found to be essential for photosystem II assembly and maintenance, but how AtCYP38 functions in chloroplast remains unknown. Based on previous functional studies and its crystal structure, we hypothesize that AtCYP38 should function via binding its targets or cofactors in the thylakoid lumen. To identify potential interacting proteins of AtCYP38, we first adopted ATTED-II and STRING web-tools, and found 12 proteins functionally related to AtCYP38. We then screened a yeast two-hybrid library including an Arabidopsis genome wide cDNA with different domain of AtCYP38, and five thylakoid lumen-localized targets were identified. In order to specifically search interacting proteins of AtCYP38 in the thylakoid lumen, we generated a yeast two-hybrid mini library including the thylakoid lumenal proteins and lumenal fractions of thylakoid membrane proteins, and we obtained six thylakoid membrane proteins and nine thylakoid lumenal proteins as interacting proteins of AtCYP38. The interactions between AtCYP38 and several potential targets were further confirmed via pull-down and co-immunoprecipitation assays. Together, a couple of new potential candidate interacting proteins of AtCYP38 were identified, and the results will lay a foundation for unveiling the regulatory mechanisms in photosynthesis by AtCYP38.

Functional Relationship of Arabidopsis AOXs and PTOX Revealed via Transgenic Analysis.

Alternative oxidase (AOX) and plastid terminal oxidase (PTOX) are terminal oxidases of electron transfer in mitochondria and chloroplasts, respectively. Here, taking advantage of the variegation phenotype of the Arabidopsis PTOX deficient mutant (im), we examined the functional relationship between PTOX and its five distantly related homologs (AOX1a, 1b, 1c, 1d, and AOX2). When engineered into chloroplasts, AOX1b, 1c, 1d, and AOX2 rescued the im defect, while AOX1a partially suppressed the mutant phenotype, indicating that AOXs could function as PQH2 oxidases. When the full length AOXs were overexpressed in im, only AOX1b and AOX2 rescued its variegation phenotype. In vivo fluorescence analysis of GFP-tagged AOXs and subcellular fractionation assays showed that AOX1b and AOX2 could partially enter chloroplasts while AOX1c and AOX1d were exclusively present in mitochondria. Surprisingly, the subcellular fractionation, but not the fluorescence analysis of GFP-tagged AOX1a, revealed that a small portion of AOX1a could sort into chloroplasts. We further fused and expressed the targeting peptides of AOXs with the mature form of PTOX in im individually; and found that targeting peptides of AOX1a, AOX1b, and AOX2, but not that of AOX1c or AOX1d, could direct PTOX into chloroplasts. It demonstrated that chloroplast-localized AOXs, but not mitochondria-localized AOXs, can functionally compensate for the PTOX deficiency in chloroplasts, providing a direct evidence for the functional relevance of AOX and PTOX, shedding light on the interaction between mitochondria and chloroplasts and the complex mechanisms of protein dual targeting in plant cells.

Basic Helix-Loop-Helix (bHLH) Transcription Factors Regulate a Wide Range of Functions in Arabidopsis.

The basic helix-loop-helix (bHLH) transcription factor family is one of the largest transcription factor gene families in Arabidopsis thaliana, and contains a bHLH motif that is highly conserved throughout eukaryotic organisms. Members of this family have two conserved motifs, a basic DNA binding region and a helix-loop-helix (HLH) region. These proteins containing bHLH domain usually act as homo- or heterodimers to regulate the expression of their target genes, which are involved in many physiological processes and have a broad range of functions in biosynthesis, metabolism and transduction of plant hormones. Although there are a number of articles on different aspects to provide detailed information on this family in plants, an overall summary is not available. In this review, we summarize various aspects of related studies that provide an overview of insights into the pleiotropic regulatory roles of these transcription factors in plant growth and development, stress response, biochemical functions and the web of signaling networks. We then provide an overview of the functional profile of the bHLH family and the regulatory mechanisms of other proteins.

Impacts of Cropping Systems on Aggregates Associated Organic Carbon and Nitrogen in a Semiarid Highland Agroecosystem.

The effect of cropping system on the distribution of organic carbon (OC) and nitrogen (N) in soil aggregates has not been well addressed, which is important for understanding the sequestration of OC and N in agricultural soils. We analyzed the distribution of OC and N associated with soil aggregates in three unfertilized cropping systems in a 27-year field experiment: continuously cropped alfalfa, continuously cropped wheat and a legume-grain rotation. The objectives were to understand the effect of cropping system on the distribution of OC and N in aggregates and to examine the relationships between the changes in OC and N stocks in total soils and in aggregates. The cropping systems increased the stocks of OC and N in total soils (0-40 cm) at mean rates of 15.6 g OC m-2 yr-1 and 1.2 g N m-2 yr-1 relative to a fallow control. The continuous cropping of alfalfa produced the largest increases at the 0-20 cm depth. The OC and N stocks in total soils were significantly correlated with the changes in the >0.053 mm aggregates. 27-year of cropping increased OC stocks in the >0.053 mm size class of aggregates and N stocks in the >0.25 mm size class but decreased OC stocks in the <0.053 mm size class and N stocks in the <0.25 mm size class. The increases in OC and N stocks in these aggregates accounted for 99.5 and 98.7% of the total increases, respectively, in the continuous alfalfa system. The increases in the OC and N stocks associated with the >0.25 mm aggregate size class accounted for more than 97% of the total increases in the continuous wheat and the legume-grain rotation systems. These results suggested that long-term cropping has the potential to sequester OC and N in soils and that the increases in soil OC and N stocks were mainly due to increases associated with aggregates >0.053 mm.

Interactions between HLH and bHLH factors modulate light-regulated plant development.

Phytochromes (Phy) and phytochrome-interacting factor (PIF) transcription factors constitute a major signaling module that controls plant development in response to red and far-red light. A low red:far-red ratio is interpreted as shading by neighbor plants and induces cell elongation-a phenomenon called shade-avoidance syndrome (SAS). PAR1 and its closest homolog PAR2 are negative regulators of SAS; they belong to the HLH transcription factor family that lacks a typical basic domain required for DNA binding, and they are believed to regulate gene expressions through DNA binding transcription factors that are yet to be identified. Here, we show that light signal stabilizes PAR1 protein and PAR1 interacts with PIF4 and inhibits PIF4-mediated gene activation. DNA pull-down and chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) assays showed that PAR1 inhibits PIF4 DNA binding in vitro and in vivo. Transgenic plants overexpressing PAR1 (PAR1OX) are insensitive to gibberellin (GA) or high temperature in hypocotyl elongation, similarly to the pifq mutant. In addition to PIF4, PAR1 also interacts with PRE1, a HLH transcription factor activated by brassinosteroid (BR) and GA. Overexpression of PRE1 largely suppressed the dwarf phenotype of PAR1OX. These results indicate that PAR1-PRE1 and PAR1-PIF4 heterodimers form a complex HLH/bHLH network regulating cell elongation and plant development in response to light and hormones.

Integration of light- and brassinosteroid-signaling pathways by a GATA transcription factor in Arabidopsis.

Light and brassinosteroid (BR) antagonistically regulate the developmental switch from etiolation in the dark to photomorphogenesis in the light in plants. Here, we identify GATA2 as a key transcriptional regulator that mediates the crosstalk between BR- and light-signaling pathways. Overexpression of GATA2 causes constitutive photomorphogenesis in the dark, whereas suppression of GATA2 reduces photomorphogenesis caused by light, BR deficiency, or the constitutive photomorphogenesis mutant cop1. Genome profiling and chromatin immunoprecipitation experiments show that GATA2 directly regulates genes that respond to both light and BR. BR represses GATA2 transcription through the BR-activated transcription factor BZR1, whereas light causes accumulation of GATA2 protein and feedback inhibition of GATA2 transcription. Dark-induced proteasomal degradation of GATA2 is dependent on the COP1 E3 ubiquitin ligase, and COP1 can ubiquitinate GATA2 in vitro. This study illustrates a molecular framework for antagonistic regulation of gene expression and seedling photomorphogenesis by BR and light.