Integration of light and temperature sensing by liquid-liquid phase separation of phytochrome B.

Light and temperature in plants are perceived by a common receptor, phytochrome B (phyB). How phyB distinguishes these signals remains elusive. Here, we report that phyB spontaneously undergoes phase separation to assemble liquid-like droplets. This capacity is driven by its C terminus through self-association, whereas the intrinsically disordered N-terminal extension (NTE) functions as a biophysical modulator of phase separation. Light exposure triggers a conformational change to subsequently alter phyB condensate assembly, while temperature sensation is directly mediated by the NTE to modulate the phase behavior of phyB droplets. Multiple signaling components are selectively incorporated into phyB droplets to form concentrated microreactors, allowing switch-like control of phyB signaling activity through phase transitions. Therefore, light and temperature cues are separately read out by phyB via allosteric changes and spontaneous phase separation, respectively. We provide a conceptual framework showing how the distinct but highly correlated physical signals are interpreted and sorted by one receptor.

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) modulate nitrogen signaling using temporal transcriptome analysis in foxtail millet.

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) is a chemically reactive chemical substance containing oxygen and a natural by-product of normal oxygen metabolism. Excessive ROS affect the growth process of crops, which will lead to the decrease of yield. Nitrogen, as a critical nutrient element in plants and plays a vital role in plant growth and crop production. Nitrate is the primary nitrogen source available to plants in agricultural soil and various natural environments. However, the molecular mechanism of ROS-nitrate crosstalk is still unclear. In this study, we used the foxtail millet (Setaria italica L.) as the material to figure it out. Here, we show that excessive NaCl inhibits nitrate-promoted plant growth and nitrogen use efficiency (NUE). NaCl induces ROS accumulation in roots, and ROS inhibits nitrate-induced gene expression in a short time. Surprisingly, low concentration ROS slight promotes and high concentration of ROS inhibits foxtail millet growth under long-term H2O2 treatment. These results may open a new perspective for further exploration of ROS-nitrate signaling pathway in plants.

WSe2/BN heterostructure as saturable absorber for a diode-pumped passively Q-switched 2†µm solid-state laser.

We have successfully achieved the synthesis of heterojunction consisting of WSe2 and BN, by using a liquid phase exfoliation method, and characterization of the prepared materials under the microstructure. The WSe2/BN heterojunction was used as a saturable absorber in the Tm:YAP laser for passively Q-switched operation, and a pulsed laser with an output wavelength around 2 µm range was successfully obtained. After comparing the effects of resonators composed of different cavity mirrors, it is concluded that when the curvature radius of the input mirror is 250 mm and the transmittance of the output coupler is 2.5%, the best output performance was obtained. The maximum average output power of 834 mW was achieved, with a pulsed repetition frequency of 43.51 kHz and a minimum pulse duration of 1.28 µs, corresponding to a peak power of 14.97 W and a maximum single pulse energy of 19.17 µJ.

High Overexpression of SiAAP9 Leads to Growth Inhibition and Protein Ectopic Localization in Transgenic Arabidopsis.

Amino acid permeases (AAPs) transporters are crucial for the long-distance transport of amino acids in plants, from source to sink. While Arabidopsis and rice have been extensively studied, research on foxtail millet is limited. This study identified two transcripts of SiAAP9, both of which were induced by NO3- and showed similar expression patterns. The overexpression of SiAAP9L and SiAAP9S in Arabidopsis inhibited plant growth and seed size, although SiAAP9 was found to transport more amino acids into seeds. Furthermore, SiAAP9-OX transgenic Arabidopsis showed increased tolerance to high concentrations of glutamate (Glu) and histidine (His). The high overexpression level of SiAAP9 suggested its protein was not only located on the plasma membrane but potentially on other organelles, as well. Interestingly, sequence deletion reduced SiAAP9's sensitivity to Brefeldin A (BFA), and SiAAP9 had ectopic localization on the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). Protoplast amino acid uptake experiments indicated that SiAAP9 enhanced Glu transport into foxtail millet cells. Overall, the two transcripts of SiAAP9 have similar functions, but SiAAP9L shows a higher colocalization with BFA compartments compared to SiAAP9S. Our research identifies a potential candidate gene for enhancing the nutritional quality of foxtail millet through breeding.

Cops5 safeguards genomic stability of embryonic stem cells through regulating cellular metabolism and DNA repair.

The highly conserved COP9 signalosome (CSN), composed of 8 subunits (Cops1 to Cops8), has been implicated in pluripotency maintenance of human embryonic stem cells (ESCs). Yet, the mechanism for the CSN to regulate pluripotency remains elusive. We previously showed that Cops2, independent of the CSN, is essential for the pluripotency maintenance of mouse ESCs. In this study, we set out to investigate how Cops5 and Cops8 regulate ESC differentiation and tried to establish Cops5 and Cops8 knockout (KO) ESC lines by CRISPR/Cas9. To our surprise, no Cops5 KO ESC clones were identified out of 127 clones, while three Cops8 KO ESC lines were established out of 70 clones. We then constructed an inducible Cops5 KO ESC line. Cops5 KO leads to decreased expression of the pluripotency marker Nanog, proliferation defect, G2/M cell-cycle arrest, and apoptosis of ESCs. Further analysis revealed dual roles of Cops5 in maintaining genomic stability of ESCs. On one hand, Cops5 suppresses the autophagic degradation of Mtch2 to direct cellular metabolism toward glycolysis and minimize reactive oxygen species (ROS) production, thereby reducing endogenous DNA damage. On the other hand, Cops5 is required for high DNA damage repair (DDR) activities in ESCs. Without Cops5, elevated ROS and reduced DDR activities lead to DNA damage accumulation in ESCs. Subsequently, p53 is activated to trigger G2/M arrest and apoptosis. Altogether, our studies reveal an essential role of Cops5 in maintaining genome integrity and self-renewal of ESCs by regulating cellular metabolism and DDR pathways.

Positional cloning and characterization reveal the role of a miRNA precursor gene ZmLRT in the regulation of lateral root number and drought tolerance in maize.

Lateral roots play essential roles in drought tolerance in maize (Zea mays L.). However, the genetic basis for the variation in the number of lateral roots in maize remains elusive. Here, we identified a major quantitative trait locus (QTL), qLRT5-1, controlling lateral root number using a recombinant inbred population from a cross between the maize lines Zong3 (with many lateral roots) and 87-1 (with few lateral roots). Fine-mapping and functional analysis determined that the candidate gene for qLRT5-1, ZmLRT, expresses the primary transcript for the microRNA miR166a. ZmLRT was highly expressed in root tips and lateral root primordia, and knockout and overexpression of ZmLRT increased and decreased lateral root number, respectively. Compared with 87-1, the ZmLRT gene model of Zong3 lacked the second and third exons and contained a 14 bp deletion at the junction between the first exon and intron, which altered the splicing site. In addition, ZmLRT expression was significantly lower in Zong3 than in 87-1, which might be attributed to the insertions of a transposon and over large DNA fragments in the Zong3 ZmLRT promoter region. These mutations decreased the abundance of mature miR166a in Zong3, resulting in increased lateral roots at the seedling stage. Furthermore, miR166a post-transcriptionally repressed five development-related class-III homeodomain-leucine zipper genes. Moreover, knockout of ZmLRT enhanced drought tolerance of maize seedlings. Our study furthers our understanding of the genetic basis of lateral root number variation in maize and highlights ZmLRT as a target for improving drought tolerance in maize.

Paternally imprinted LATE-FLOWERING2 transcription factor contributes to paternal-excess interploidy hybridization barriers in wheat.

Interploidy hybridization between hexaploid and tetraploid genotypes occurred repeatedly during genomic introgression events throughout wheat evolution, and is commonly employed in wheat breeding programs. Hexaploid wheat usually serves as maternal parent because the reciprocal cross generates progeny with severe defects and poor seed germination, but the underlying mechanism is poorly understood. Here, we performed detailed analysis of phenotypic variation in endosperm between two interploidy reciprocal crosses arising from tetraploid (Triticum durum, AABB) and hexaploid wheat (Triticum aestivum, AABBDD). In the paternal- versus the maternal-excess cross, the timing of endosperm cellularization was delayed and starch granule accumulation in the endosperm was repressed, causing reduced germination percentage. The expression profiles of genes involved in nutrient metabolism differed strongly between these endosperm types. Furthermore, expression patterns of parental alleles were dramatically disturbed in interploidy versus intraploidy crosses, leading to increased number of imprinted genes. The endosperm-specific TaLFL2 showed a paternally imprinted expression pattern in interploidy crosses partially due to allele-specific DNA methylation. Paternal TaLFL2 binds to and represses a nutrient accumulation regulator TaNAC019, leading to reduced storage protein and starch accumulation during endosperm development in paternal-excess cross, as confirmed by interploidy crosses between tetraploid wild-type and clustered regularly interspaced palindromic repeats (CRISPR) - CRISPR-associated protein 9 generated hexaploid mutants. These findings reveal a contribution of genomic imprinting to paternal-excess interploidy hybridization barriers during wheat evolution history and explains why experienced breeders preferentially exploit maternal-excess interploidy crosses in wheat breeding programs.

A kelch-repeat superfamily gene, ZmNL4, controls leaf width in maize (Zea mays L.).

Leaf width (LW) is an important component of plant architecture that extensively affects both light capture during photosynthesis and grain yield, particularly under dense planting conditions. However, the genetic and molecular mechanisms regulating LW remain largely elusive in maize (Zea mays L.). In this study, qLW4a, a major quantitative trait locus controlling LW, was identified in a population constructed with maize inbred lines PH6WC, with wide leaves, and Lin387, with narrow leaves. Map-based cloning revealed that ZmNL4, a kelch-repeat superfamily gene, emerged to be the candidate for qLW4a, and a single-base deletion in the conserved SMC_prok_B domain of ZmNL4 in Lin387 caused a frame shift, leading to premature termination. Consistently, the knockout of ZmNL4 by CRISPR/Cas9 editing significantly reduced the LW, which was attributed to a reduction in the cell number instead of cell size, indicating a role of ZmNL4 in regulating cell division. Transcriptomic comparison of ZmNL4 knockout lines with the wild type B73-329 revealed that ZmNL4 might participate in cell wall biogenesis, asymmetric cell division, metabolic processes, transmembrane transport and response to external stimulus, etc. These results provide insights into the genetic and molecular mechanisms of ZmNL4 in controlling LW and could potentially contribute to optimizing plant architecture for maize breeding.

Effect of Dexmedetomidine on Inflammatory Response in Aortic Dissection.

OBJECTIVE: To study the effect of dexmedetomidine (Dex) on perioperative inflammatory response in aortic dissection (AD) patients. METHODS: From June 2020 to June 2022, 50 patients with Stanford type B AD underwent endovascular stent-graft exclusion (EVAR) at our hospital. They randomly were assigned to two groups (N = 25): the control group (C group) and the Dex group. Patients in the Dex group received 0.5ug/kg Dex intravenously 10 minutes before induction of anesthesia and 0.5µg/kg/h Dex during the intervention until 15 minutes before the end of surgery. In contrast, the C group received the same volume of normal saline at the same time points. The two groups were induced and maintained with the same anesthetic agents. Venous blood samples were taken 3 days before operation (T1), 1 day before operation (T2), 1 day after operation (T3) and 3 days after operation (T4) to detect levels of C-reactive protein (CRP), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), and white blood cell count (WBC). RESULTS: At T3 and T4, CRP and ESR in the Dex group were significantly improved compared with those in the C group. CONCLUSION: Dexmedetomidine can reduce the inflammatory reaction of aortic dissection.

Comparative Efficacy of Local and General Anesthesia for Transcatheter Aortic Valve Implantation: A Meta-Analysis and Systematic Review.

BACKGROUND: This meta-analysis aimed to compare the potential effects of local anesthesia (LA) and general anesthesia (GA) for transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI). MEASUREMENTS: All relevant studies were searched from Pubmed, EMbase, Web of Science, and the Cochrane Library (January 1, 2016, to June 1, 2021). The main outcomes of this literature meta-analysis were 30-day mortality, procedural time, new pacemaker implantation, total stay in the hospital, use of the vasoactive drug, and intra-and postoperative complications and emergencies, including conversion to open, myocardial infarction, pulmonary complication, vascular complication, renal injury/failure, stroke, transesophageal echocardiography, life-threatening/major bleeding, cardiac tamponade, and emergency PCI. Pooled risk ratio (RR) and mean difference (MD) together with a 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated. RESULTS: A total of 17 studies, including 20938 patients, in the final analysis, fulfilled the inclusion criteria. Intra-and postoperative complications (myocardial infarction, vascular complication, renal injury/failure, stroke, and cardiac tamponade) undergoing TAVI in severe AS patients under GA do not offer a significant difference compared with LA. No differences were observed between LA and GA for new pacemaker implantation, total stay in the hospital, transesophageal echocardiography, and emergency PCI. LA has lower mortality compared with GA (RR 0.69, P = 0.600), pulmonary complications (RR 0.54, P = 0.278), life-threatening/major bleeding (RR 0.85, P = 0.855), and lower times of conversion to open (RR 0.22, P = 0.746). LA has many advantages, including a shorter procedure duration (MD=-0.38, P = 0.000) and reduction of the use of the vasoactive drug (RR 0.57, P = 0.000). CONCLUSIONS: For TAVI, both LA with or without sedation and GA are feasible and safe. LA appears a feasible alternative to GA for AS patients undergoing TAVI.

Indoor Spatiotemporal Contact Analytics Using Landmark-Aided Pedestrian Dead Reckoning on Smartphones.

Due to the prevalence of COVID-19, providing safe environments and reducing the risks of virus exposure play pivotal roles in our daily lives. Contact tracing is a well-established and widely-used approach to track and suppress the spread of viruses. Most digital contact tracing systems can detect direct face-to-face contact based on estimated proximity, without quantifying the exposed virus concentration. In particular, they rarely allow for quantitative analysis of indirect environmental exposure due to virus survival time in the air and constant airborne transmission. In this work, we propose an indoor spatiotemporal contact awareness framework (iSTCA), which explicitly considers the self-containing quantitative contact analytics approach with spatiotemporal information to provide accurate awareness of the virus quanta concentration in different origins at various times. Smartphone-based pedestrian dead reckoning (PDR) is employed to precisely detect the locations and trajectories for distance estimation and time assessment without the need to deploy extra infrastructure. The PDR technique we employ calibrates the accumulative error by identifying spatial landmarks automatically. We utilized a custom deep learning model composed of bidirectional long short-term memory (Bi-LSTM) and multi-head convolutional neural networks (CNNs) for extracting the local correlation and long-term dependency to recognize landmarks. By considering the spatial distance and time difference in an integrated manner, we can quantify the virus quanta concentration of the entire indoor environment at any time with all contributed virus particles. We conducted an extensive experiment based on practical scenarios to evaluate the performance of the proposed system, showing that the average positioning error is reduced to less than 0.7 m with high confidence and demonstrating the validity of our system for the virus quanta concentration quantification involving virus movement in a complex indoor environment.

The microRNAs let-7 and miR-278 regulate insect metamorphosis and oogenesis by targeting the juvenile hormone early-response gene Krüppel-homolog 1.

Krüppel-homolog 1 (Kr-h1), a zinc-finger transcription factor, inhibits larval metamorphosis and promotes adult reproduction by transducing juvenile hormone (JH). Although the transcriptional regulation of Kr-h1 has been extensively studied, little is known about its regulation at the post-transcriptional level. Using the migratory locust Locusta migratoria as a model system, we report here that the microRNAs let-7 and miR-278 bound to the Kr-h1 coding sequence and downregulated its expression. Application of let-7 and miR-278 mimics (agomiRs) significantly reduced the level of Kr-h1 transcripts, resulting in partially precocious metamorphosis in nymphs as well as markedly decreased yolk protein precursors, arrested ovarian development and blocked oocyte maturation in adults. Moreover, the expression of let-7 and miR-278 was repressed by JH, constituting a regulatory loop of JH signaling. This study thus reveals a previously unknown regulatory mechanism whereby JH suppresses the expression of let-7 and miR-278, which, together with JH induction of Kr-h1 transcription, prevents the precocious metamorphosis of nymphs and stimulates the reproduction of adult females. These results advance our understanding of the coordination of JH and miRNA regulation in insect development.

Genomic Imprinting Was Evolutionarily Conserved during Wheat Polyploidization.

Genomic imprinting is an epigenetic phenomenon that causes genes to be differentially expressed depending on their parent of origin. To evaluate the evolutionary conservation of genomic imprinting and the effects of ploidy on this process, we investigated parent-of-origin-specific gene expression patterns in the endosperm of diploid (Aegilops spp), tetraploid, and hexaploid wheat (Triticum spp) at various stages of development via high-throughput transcriptome sequencing. We identified 91, 135, and 146 maternally or paternally expressed genes (MEGs or PEGs, respectively) in diploid, tetraploid, and hexaploid wheat, respectively, 52.7% of which exhibited dynamic expression patterns at different developmental stages. Gene Ontology enrichment analysis suggested that MEGs and PEGs were involved in metabolic processes and DNA-dependent transcription, respectively. Nearly half of the imprinted genes exhibited conserved expression patterns during wheat hexaploidization. In addition, 40% of the homoeolog pairs originating from whole-genome duplication were consistently maternally or paternally biased in the different subgenomes of hexaploid wheat. Furthermore, imprinted expression was found for 41.2% and 50.0% of homolog pairs that evolved by tandem duplication after genome duplication in tetraploid and hexaploid wheat, respectively. These results suggest that genomic imprinting was evolutionarily conserved between closely related Triticum and Aegilops species and in the face of polyploid hybridization between species in these genera.

Candidate reference genes for quantitative gene expression analysis in Lagerstroemia indica.

Quantitative gene expression analysis by qPCR requires reference genes for normalization. Lagerstroemia indica (crape myrtle) is a popular ornamental plant in the world, but suitable endogenous reference genes are lacking. To find suitable reference genes, we evaluated the stabilities of nine candidate genes in six experimental data sets: six different tissues, three leaf colors, nine flower colors, and under three abiotic stresses (salt, drought, cold) using four statistical algorithms. A target gene LiMYB56 (homolog of Arabidopsis MYB56) was used to verify the authenticity and accuracy of the candidate reference genes. The results showed that the combination of two stably expressed reference genes, rather than a single reference gene, improved the accuracy of the qPCR. LiEF1α-2 + LiEF1α-3 was best for the tissue, salt treatment, and drought treatment sets; LiEF1α-2 + LiEF1α-1 was optimal for leaf color; LiEF1α-2 + LiACT7 was optimal for cold treatment; and LiUBC + LiEF1α-1 was best for the flower color set. Notably, LiEF1α-2 had high expression stability in all six experimental sets, implying it may be a good reference gene for expression studies in L. indica. Our results will facilitate future gene expression studies in L. indica.

Pulmonary High-Resolution Computed Tomography (HRCT) Findings of Patients with Early-Stage Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Hangzhou, China.

BACKGROUND The aim of this study was to investigate the imaging manifestations of early-stage coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and to provide imaging basis for early detection of suspected cases and stratified intervention. MATERIAL AND METHODS From 20 January 2020 to 2 February 2020, 6 patients diagnosed with COVID-19, including 1 male and 5 females, were retrospectively reviewed in Zhejiang Hospital. These cases were clinically assessed and classified as common COVID-19. All patients underwent thoracic high-resolution computed tomography (HRCT) within 2 days after the onset of symptoms, and their images were viewed by 2 radiologists who were blind to their clinical records. RESULTS CT images of 6 confirmed patients were collected. Two of the 6 patients (33.3%) had bilateral lung involvements and 4 (66.7%) had single-lung involvement. Two cases (33.3%) had a single lesion, 2 cases (33.3%) had 2 lesions, and 2 cases (33.3%) had multiple lesions. There were 2 cases (33.3%) with focal subpleural distribution and 1 case (16.7%) along the bronchial vascular bundle. Five cases (83.3%) had ground-glass opacities, 4 cases (66.7%) had ground-glass nodules, 1 case (16.7%) had thickened lobular septum, 2 cases (33.3%) had thickened bronchial wall, 2 cases (33.3%) had halo sign,1 case (16.7%) had crazy-paving sign, and 1 case (16.7%) had tree-in-bud sign. CONCLUSIONS The imaging manifestations of early-stage COVID-19 are relatively mild, and the imaging findings of some patients are not typical, which can easily lead to missed diagnoses. Thus, suspected cases need to be closely monitored, and epidemiological history and clinical laboratory examination should also be considered during diagnosis.

MiR-1254 suppresses HO-1 expression through seed region-dependent silencing and non-seed interaction with TFAP2A transcript to attenuate NSCLC growth.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of small non-coding RNAs, which direct post-transcriptional gene silencing (PTGS) and function in a vast range of biological events including cancer development. Most miRNAs pair to the target sites through seed region near the 5' end, leading to mRNA cleavage and/or translation repression. Here, we demonstrated a miRNA-induced dual regulation of heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) via seed region and non-seed region, consequently inhibited tumor growth of NSCLC. We identified miR-1254 as a negative regulator inhibiting HO-1 translation by directly targeting HO-1 3'UTR via its seed region, and suppressing HO-1 transcription via non-seed region-dependent inhibition of transcriptional factor AP-2 alpha (TFAP2A), a transcriptional activator of HO-1. MiR-1254 induced cell apoptosis and cell cycle arrest in human non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) cells by inhibiting the expression of HO-1, consequently suppressed NSCLC cell growth. Consistently with the in vitro studies, mouse xenograft studies validated that miR-1254 suppressed NSCLC tumor growth in vivo. Moreover, we found that HO-1 expression was inversely correlated with miR-1254 level in human NSCLC tumor samples and cell lines. Overall, these findings identify the dual inhibition of HO-1 by miR-1254 as a novel functional mechanism of miRNA, which results in a more effective inhibition of oncogenic mRNA, and leads to a tumor suppressive effect.

Pre-mixed nitrous oxide/oxygen mixture treatment of pain induced by postoperative dressing change for perianal abscess: Study protocol for a randomized, controlled trial.

AIM: This study aims to evaluate the safety and analgesic efficacy of pre-mixed nitrous oxide/oxygen mixture treatment of pain induced by dressing change for perianal abscess. DESIGN: This protocol is a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. METHODS: This study will be implemented in the Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Subjects enrolled in this study are hospitalized patients who suffered from moderate to severe pain due to dressing change after incision and drainage. Two hundred patients will be selected and randomly assigned to either an intervention or a control group. The intervention group will get routine pain treatment plus pre-mixed nitrous oxide/oxygen mixture treatment and the control group will be treated with routine pain management plus medical air treatment. All these patients, medical staff and investigators are blind to the nature of the gas in each cylinder, which is randomized. Data will be collected at baseline (T0), 5 min (T1) after the starting of intervention and 5 min post intervention (T2) for each group. The primary outcome is the level of pain relief at T1 and T2. The secondary outcomes cover physiological parameters, adverse events, satisfaction of patients and health professionals and the acceptance from patients. DISCUSSION: Results of this study will be discussed and the safety and effect of nitrous oxide/oxygen treatment of pain induced by dressing change will be proven. IMPACT: When the finding of this study has an active effect on the treatment of pain caused by dressing change, it may provide more options for nursing staff to choose nurse-led analgesia techniques and then improving the level and quality of pain care as well as patients' overall satisfaction with the Anorectal Department in China.

Fine mapping and candidate gene analysis of a QTL associated with leaf rolling index on chromosome 4 of maize (Zea mays L.).

KEY MESSAGE: One QTL qLRI4 controlling leaf rolling index on chromosome 4 was finely mapped, and ZmOCL5, a member of the HD-Zip class IV genes, is likely a candidate. Leaf rolling is an important agronomic trait related to plant architecture that can change the light condition and photosynthetic efficiency of the population. Here, we isolated one EMS-induced mutant in Chang7-2 background with extreme abaxial rolling leaf, named abrl1. Histological analysis showed that the increased number and area of bulliform cells may contribute to abaxial rolling leaf in abrl1. The F2 and F2:3 populations derived from Wu9086 with flat leaves and abrl1 were developed to map abrl1. Non-Mendelian segregation of phenotypic variation was observed in these populations and five genomic regions controlling the leaf rolling index (LRI) were identified, which could be due to the phenotypic difference between Chang7-2 and Wu9086. Moreover, one major QTL qLRI4 on chromosome 4 was further validated and finely mapped to a genetic interval between InDel13 and InDel10, with a physical distance of approximately 277 kb using NIL populations, among which one 602-bp insertion was identified in the promoter region of HD-Zip class IV gene Zm00001d049443 (named as ZmOCL5) of abrl1 compared with wild-type Chang7-2. Remarkably, the 602-bp InDel was associated with LRI in an F2 population developed by crossing abrl1 mutant and its wild-type. In addition, the 602-bp insertion increased ZmOCL5 promoter activity and expression. Haplotype analysis demonstrated that the 602-bp insertion was a rare mutation event. Taken together, we propose that the rolled leaf in the abrl1 mutant may be partially attributed to the 602-bp insertion, which may be an attractive target for the genetic improvement of LRI in maize.

Graphite paste electrodes modified with a sulfo-functionalized metal-organic framework (type MIL-101) for voltammetric sensing of dopamine.

The metal-organic frameworks MIL-101 and sulfo-MIL-101 were used to modify graphite paste electrodes (GPEs) to obtain sensors for determination of dopamine (DA). Taking advantage of the catalytic activity of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) and of the electrical conductivity of graphite, the modified GPEs show enhanced voltammetric responses, and the GPE modified with the sulfo-MOF displays superior sensitivity when operated at a working potential of -0.4 to 0.8 V (vs. Ag/AgCl). The sensor works in the 0.07 to100 µM DA concentration range and has a 43 nM detection limit. It is concluded that the sulfo group provides open sites for efficient electrostatic and hydrogen bonding interactions, which facilitates electron transfer. Graphical abstractSchematic representation of the structure of the sulfo-functionalized MOF (sulfo-MIL-101) and the different voltammetric signals of dopamine at the graphite paste electrodes (GPEs) modified with sulfo-MIL-101 and the parent MOF (MIL-101).

Analgesic Effect of Nitrous Oxide/Oxygen Mixture for Traumatic Pain in the Emergency Department: A Randomized, Double-Blind Study.

BACKGROUND: Acute pain is the most common complaint in Emergency Department (ED) admissions, and options for analgesia are limited. Nitrous oxide/oxygen possesses many properties showing it may be an ideal analgesic in the ED. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study is to evaluate the safety and analgesic effect of the fixed nitrous oxide/oxygen mixture for trauma patients in the ED. METHODS: We enrolled 60 patients in this double-blind, randomized study. The treatment group received conventional pain treatment plus a mixture of 65% nitrous oxide/oxygen. The control group received the conventional pain treatment plus oxygen. Primary outcome was the reduction in pain intensity at 5 and 15 min after the start of intervention. Secondary outcomes include adverse events, physiological parameters, and satisfaction from both patients and health care professionals. RESULTS: Initial pain scores for the nitrous oxide/oxygen group (6.0 [5.0-8.0]) and the oxygen group (6.75 [5.0-9.0]) were comparable (p = 0.57). The mean numerical rating scale scores at 5 min were 3.4 ± 1.8 and 7.0 ± 1.8 for nitrous oxide/oxygen and oxygen, respectively (p < 0.01). The mean pain intensity at 15 min in the treatment group was 3.0 ± 1.9, compared with 6.3 ± 2.2 in the control group (p < 0.01). Both patients' (8.0 [7.0-9.0] vs. 4.0 [2.0-6.0], p < 0.01) and physicians' (8.5 [8.0-9.0] vs. 4.0 [3.0-6.0], p < 0.01) satisfaction scores in the treatment group were significantly higher than the oxygen group. No serious adverse events were observed. CONCLUSIONS: This study gives supporting evidence for the safety and effectiveness of using self-administered nitrous oxide/oxygen mixture in the ED for moderate-to-severe traumatic pain.