Intercropping fruit trees in tea plantation improves soil properties and the formation of tea quality components.

Intercropping has been recommended as a beneficial cropping practice for improving soil characteristic and tea quality. However, there is limited research on the effects of intercropping fruit trees on soil chemical properties, soil aggregate structure, and tea quality components. In this study, intercropping fruit trees, specifically loquats and citrus, had a significant impact on the total available nutrients, AMN, and AP in soil. During spring and autumn seasons, the soil large-macroaggregates (>2 mm) proportion increased by 5.93% and 19.03%, as well as 29.23% and 19.14%, respectively, when intercropping loquats and citrus. Similarly, intercropping waxberry resulted in a highest small-macroaggregates (0.25 mm-2 mm) proportion at 54.89% and 77.32%. Soil aggregate stability parameters of the R0.25, MWD, and GMD were generally considered better soil aggregate stability indicators, and significantly improved in intercropping systems. Intercropping waxberry with higher values for those aggregate stability parameters and lower D values, showed a better soil aggregate distribution, while intercropping loquats and citrus at higher levels of AMN and AP in different soil aggregate sizes. As the soil aggregate sizes increased, the AMN and AP contents gradually decreased. Furthermore, the enhanced levels of amino acids were observed under loquat, waxberry, and citrus intercropping in spring, which increased by 27.98%, 27.35%, and 26.21%, respectively. The contents of tea polyphenol and caffeine were lower under loquat and citrus intercropping in spring. These findings indicated that intercropping fruit trees, specifically loquat and citrus, have immense potential in promoting the green and sustainable development of tea plantations.

Family Socioeconomic Status and Parental Involvement in Chinese Parents of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Moderated Mediation Model.

Parental involvement benefits children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in multiple developmental areas. We conducted the present study to examine the role of parenting stress and ASD symptom severity in the relationship between family socioeconomic status (SES) and parental involvement. A total of 165 Chinese parents of children with ASD participated in this study. Mediation analyses indicated that family SES was positively related to parental involvement; parenting stress partially mediated the relationship between family SES and parental involvement. The analyses also found that ASD symptom severity moderated the influence of parenting stress on parental involvement. Specifically, the decreased parenting stress improved parental involvement when ASD symptom severity was low. The findings enhanced our understanding of the mechanism underlying the relationship between family SES and parental involvement among parents facing considerable child-rearing challenges. Implications for devising evidenced-based interventions to promote parental involvement for low SES children with ASD are discussed.

Randomized controlled trial for time-restricted eating in overweight and obese young adults.

Time-restricted eating (TRE) is known to improve metabolic health, whereas very few studies have compared the effects of early and late TRE (eTRE and lTRE) on metabolic health. Overweight and obese young adults were randomized to 6-h eTRE (eating from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.) (n = 21), 6-h lTRE (eating from 12 p.m. to 6 p.m.) (n = 20), or a control group (ad libitum intake in a day) (n = 19). After 8 weeks, 6-h eTRE and lTRE produced comparable body weight loss compared with controls. Compared with control, 6-h eTRE reduced systolic blood pressure, mean glucose, fasting insulin, insulin resistance, leptin, and thyroid axis activity, whereas lTRE only reduced leptin. These findings shed light on the promise of 6-h eTRE and lTRE for weight loss. Larger studies are needed to assess the promise of eTRE to yield better thyroid axis modulation and overall cardiometabolic health improvement.

COVID-19 pandemic-related anxiety, stress, and depression among teachers: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND: As millions of teachers have been forced to rely upon remote teaching due to the closure of schools during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is particularly important to understand the extent to which teacher's psychological wellbeing has been affected by this global health crisis. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis was twofold: 1) ascertain the prevalence of stress, anxiety, depression among teachers during the COVID-19 outbreak; 2) identify the associated factors of these psychological wellbeing domains of the teachers. METHODS: Academic Search Premier, Eric, PsycInfo, Scopus, and Web of Science were searched for articles published from December 2019 and July 2021, using search terms including "COVID-19" "anxiety" "depression" "stress", and "teachers". RESULTS: This study included 54 studies synthesising data from 256,896 teachers across 22 countries. The meta-analysis showed higher prevalence of stress (62.6%, 95% Confidence Interval [CI]: 46.1-76.6), compared to anxiety (36.3%, 95% CI: 28.5-44.9) and depression (59.9%, 95% CI: 43.4-74.4) among teachers. Teachers' experiences of these psychological issues were associated with various socio-demographic and institutional factors, including gender, nature of online teaching, job satisfaction, teaching experience, and the volume of workload. Additionally, several protective factors, such as regular exercises and provision of technical support for online teaching, reduced teachers' negative psychological experiences. CONCLUSION: There is a need for authorities to formulate educational policies to improve teachers' wellbeing at the time of global crisis. Special attention should be paid to assist female teachers in overcoming physical and mental stressors.

Associations between Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII) and bone health among postmenopausal women in the United States.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between the Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII® ) score and the bone health of menopausal women. METHODS: A total of 2461 participants were included in the analysis from the NHANES database 2009-2018 and 2005-2006. The association between the DII and Bone mineral density (BMD) and bone mineral content (BMC) was evaluated through a multiple linear regression model. RESULTS: The mean DII in this study was +0.89 (SD 0.18) and the scores ranged from -5.46 (most anti-inflammatory) to +4.58 (most pro-inflammatory). After adjusting for confounding factors, higher DII is associated with an increased risk of decreased total bone density (Model III, ß -0.012; 95% CI -0.023, -0.001). There is a similar correlation found in bone density content and other indicators of bone mineral density. At the same time, we used BMI as a stratified variable for subgroup analysis, we found that higher DII (continuous) was associated with a significantly higher risk of decreased total bone density in overweight/obese postmenopausal women (ß -0.018; 95% CI -0.025, -0.006). CONCLUSION: A higher DII score is significantly associated with lower bone density and bone density in postmenopausal women, especially women who are overweight/obese.

Association of Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII) and Depressive Disorders.

A lot of evidence shows that inflammation is related to the development of depression. However, the heterogeneity of depression hinders efforts to understand, prevent and treat this disease. The purpose of this comprehensive review is to summarize the links between inflammation and the established core features of depression, which show more homogeneity than the syndrome itself: overreaction to negative information, changes in reward processing, and cognitive control decline, and somatic syndrome. For each core feature, we first briefly outline its relevance to depression and neurobiological basis, and then review the evidence to investigate the potential role of inflammation. We mainly focus on the discovery of the experimental paradigm of exogenous inflammation. We concluded that inflammation may play a role in overreaction to negative information, altered reward responses, and physical symptoms. There is less evidence to support the effect of inflammation on cognitive control by standard neuropsychological measures. Finally, we discussed the implications for future research and recommendations on how to test the role of inflammation in the pathogenesis of heterogeneous mental illness.

Role of BMI in the Relationship Between Dietary Inflammatory Index and Depression: An Intermediary Analysis.

Introduction: This study investigated this association and the role of BMI in the inflammatory process in a large population-based observational study. Methods: A total of 1,865 elderly people (≥55 years) were followed from the Community Cohort Study of Nervous System Diseases (CCSNSD) cohort study from 2018 to 2019 (Mean [SD] age, 66.31 [0.32] years; 716 [38.4%] males). The semi-quantitative FFQ and geriatric depression scale (GDS) were used to evaluate the diet and depressive symptoms of the elderly, respectively. The multivariable logistic regression model estimated the OR and 95% CI between Empirical Dietary Inflammatory Index (E-DII) and depression. The interaction of E-DII and BMI on depressive events was tested, and the mediation analysis of BMI was performed. Results: As measured by E-DII, the mean (SE) value of the inflammatory potential of the diet in our study was 1.56 (0.12). E-DII ranged from 5.23 to 5.58. In comparison with the first quartile, the elderly from the second quartile (OR: 1.15 [95% CI: 1.09, 1.28]) to the fourth quartile (OR: 1.31 [95% CI: 1.16, 1.42]) have a higher risk of depression before adjustment for BMI. An interaction was observed between E-DII and BMI in terms of the risk of depression (PInteraction < 0.001). The whole related part is mediated by BMI (31.06%). Conclusion: Our findings indicate that the higher pro-inflammatory potential of diet is associated with a higher risk of depression, and this association may be mediated by BMI. Further research is needed to verify our findings and clarify the latent mechanism.

Procyanidins inhibit fine particulate matter-induced vascular smooth muscle cells apoptosis via the activation of the Nrf2 signaling pathway.

The functional role of procyanidins (PC) in PM2.5-induced cardiovascular diseases (CVD) is largely unexplored. This study aimed to explore the protective effect of PC against PM2.5-induced vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) apoptosis and underlying mechanisms. Sprague Dawley rats were pretreated with three doses of PC (50, 100, and 200 mg/kg) and exposed to 10 mg/kg PM2.5 by intratracheal instillation three times a week. VSMCs were exposed to 5, 10, and 20 µM PC before the addition of 100 µg/mL PM2.5. In vivo, the PM2.5 exposure induced apoptosis in the thoracic aorta of rats. The PM2.5 exposure significantly elevated the reactive oxygen species (ROS) and malondialdehyde (MDA) levels and decreased the superoxide dismutase activity. Also, PC supplementation increased the expression of nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (Nrf2), and its downstream antioxidant genes, i.e., NAD(P)H dehydrogenase (quinine) 1 and heme oxygenase 1, attenuated oxidative stress and vascular apoptosis. In vitro, PM2.5 induced cytotoxicity in VSMCs in a dose-dependent manner. Besides, PC abolished the PM2.5-induced cytotoxicity by activating the Nrf2 signal pathway, alleviating oxidative stress, and decreasing apoptosis. In conclusion, this work is the first study to demonstrate that PC can suppress the PM2.5-induced VSMCs apoptosis via the activation of the Nrf2 signal pathway.