Phenolic compounds weaken the impact of drought on soil enzyme activity in global wetlands.

Soil enzymes play a central role in carbon and nutrient cycling, and their activities can be affected by drought-induced oxygen exposure. However, a systematic global estimate of enzyme sensitivity to drought in wetlands is still lacking. Through a meta-analysis of 55 studies comprising 761 paired observations, this study found that phosphorus-related enzyme activity increased by 38% as result of drought in wetlands, while the majority of other soil enzyme activities remained stable. The expansion of vascular plants under long-term drought significantly promoted the accumulation of phenolic compounds. Using a 2-week incubation experiment with phenol supplementation, we found that phosphorus-related enzyme could tolerate higher biotoxicity of phenolic compounds than other enzymes. Moreover, a long-term (35 years) drainage experiment in a northern peatland in China confirmed that the increased phenolic concentration in surface layer resulting from a shift in vegetation composition inhibited the increase in enzyme activities caused by rising oxygen availability, except for phosphorus-related enzyme. Overall, these results demonstrate the complex and resilient nature of wetland ecosystems, with soil enzymes showing a high degree of adaptation to drought conditions. These new insights could help evaluate the impact of drought on future wetland ecosystem services and provide a theoretical foundation for the remediation of degraded wetlands.

Biodegradable nanofibrillated microcellular PBS/PLA foams for selective oil absorption.

To address the challenges posed by spilled oil and oily wastewater, the development of clean oil-adsorption materials is crucial. However, traditional oil-adsorption materials suffer from the issue of secondary pollution. Herein, fully biodegradable nanofibrillated poly(butylene succinate)/poly(lactic acid) (PBS/PLA) foams with outstanding selective oil-adsorption performance were successfully fabricated via an eco-friendly supercritical CO2 foaming technology. The PBS/PLA composites, featuring nanofibrils with a diameter of approximately 100 nm, were prepared through a hot-stretching method subsequent to extrusion. Substantial improvements were observed in the crystallization rate and rheological properties of the fibrillated PBS/PLA composites. Furthermore, PLA nanofibrils enhanced foamability of the composite, achieving an impressive expansion ratio of up to 38.0, resulting in an outstanding oil-absorption performance (19.2-50.4 g/g) of the F-1 %-95 foam. Additionally, 20 adsorption-desorption cycles illustrated the prepared F-1 %-95 foam displayed recyclable oil-absorption characteristics. This work provides an eco-friendly strategy for preparing fully biodegradable foams intended for application as oil-adsorption materials.

Recent Progress of Preparation Strategies in Organic Nanoparticles for Cancer Phototherapeutics.

Phototherapy has the advantages of being a highly targeted, less toxic, less invasive, and repeatable treatment, compared with conventional treatment methods such as surgery, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy. The preparation strategies are significant in order to determine the physical and chemical properties of nanoparticles. However, choosing appropriate preparation strategies to meet applications is still challenging. This review summarizes the recent progress of preparation strategies in organic nanoparticles, mainly focusing on the principles, methods, and advantages of nanopreparation strategies. In addition, typical examples of cancer phototherapeutics are introduced in detail to inform the choice of appropriate preparation strategies. The relative future trend and outlook are preliminarily proposed.

A novel split-frequency feature fusion framework for processing the dual-optical images of offshore oil spills.

This paper presents a novel split-frequency feature fusion framework used for processing the dual-optical (infrared-visible) images of offshore oil spills. The self-coding network is used for high-frequency features of oil spill images based on local cross-stage residual dense blocks to achieve feature extraction and construct a regularized fusion strategy. The adaptive weights are designed to increase the proportion of high-frequency features in source images during the low-frequency feature fusion process. A global residual branch is established to reduce the loss of oil spill texture features. The network structure of the primary residual dense block auto-encoding network is optimized based on the local cross-stage method to further reduce the network parameters and improve the network operation speed. To verify the effectiveness of the proposed infrared-visible image fusion algorithm, the BiSeNetV2 algorithm is selected as the oil spill detection algorithm to realize the pixel accuracy of the oil spill image features at 91%.

Chemically Modified Bovine ß-Lactoglobulin as a Broad-Spectrum Influenza Virus Entry Inhibitor with the Potential to Combat Influenza Outbreaks.

Frequent outbreaks of the highly pathogenic influenza A virus (AIV) infection, together with the lack of broad-spectrum influenza vaccines, call for the development of broad-spectrum prophylactic agents. Previously, 3-hydroxyphthalic anhydride-modified bovine ß-lactoglobulin (3HP-ß-LG) was proven to be effective against human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and it has also been used in the clinical control of cervical human papillomavirus (HPV) infections. Here, we show its efficacy in potently inhibiting infection by divergent influenza A and B viruses. Mechanistic studies suggest that 3HP-ß-LG binds, possibly through its negatively charged residues, to the receptor-binding domain in the hemagglutinin 1 (HA1) subunit in the HA of the influenza virus, thus inhibiting the attachment of the HA to sialic acid on host cells. The intranasal administration of 3HP-ß-LG led to the protection of mice against challenges by influenza A(H1N1)/PR8, A(H3N2), and A(H7N9) viruses. Furthermore, 3HP-ß-LG is highly stable when stored at 50 °C for 30 days and it shows excellent safety in vitro and in vivo. Collectively, our findings suggest that 3HP-ß-LG could be successfully repurposed as an intranasal prophylactic agent to prevent influenza virus infections during influenza outbreaks.

The profiles of chiral pesticides in peri-urban areas near Yangtze River: Enantioselective distribution characteristics and correlations with surface sediments.

Chiral pesticides account for 30% of pesticides. Pesticides are inevitably leached into the groundwater by runoff. At the watershed level, the distribution characteristics of enantiomers in sediments collected from the river network of an agricultural area near the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River were tested, and their potential correlations with the physicochemical properties and microbial communities of the sediments were analyzed. The sediment pollution was serious at sites 8 and 9, with their pollution source possibly being agricultural or industrial sewage. Moreover, there were higher cumulative contents of pesticide residues at sites 4, 8, and 9. Specifically, Cycloxaprid was the most detected chiral pesticide in the study area, followed by Dinotefuran and Diclofop-methyl. Additionally, Ethiprole and Difenoconazole had strong enantioselectivity in the study area. Interestingly, the enantiomers of some chiral pesticides, such as Tebuconazole, had completely different distributions at different sites. Pearson correlation analysis showed that sediment catalase and microbial biomass carbon were important factors for enantioselectivity of chiral pesticides. The effect of sediment physicochemical properties on enantioselective distribution was achieved by influencing the microorganisms in the sediment. Furthermore, the enantioselective distribution of Tebuconazole was closely related to the genus Arenimonas. Overall, the enantioselective distribution of most of the chiral pesticides was positively correlated with the prokaryotic microbial community. This study provides empirical support for agricultural non-point source pollution caused by chiral pesticides, and also lays a research foundation for exploring the factors that affect the fate of chiral pesticides in the environment.

Insights on ball milling enhanced iron magnesium layered double oxides bagasse biochar composite for ciprofloxacin adsorptive removal from water.

Both ciprofloxacin (CIP) and sugarcane bagasse have brought enormous pressure on environmental safety. Here, an innovative technique combining Fe-Mg-layered double oxides and ball milling was presented for the first time to convert bagasse-waste into a new biochar adsorbent (BM-LDOs-BC) for aqueous CIP removal. The maximum theoretical adsorption capacity of BM-LDOs-BC reached up to 213.1 mg g-1 due to abundant adsorption sites provided by well-developed pores characteristics and enhanced functional groups. The results of characterization, data fitting and environmental parameter revealed that pore filling, electrostatic interactions, H-bonding, complexation and π-π conjugation were the key mechanisms for CIP adsorptive removal. BM-LDOs-BC exhibited satisfactory environmental safety and outstanding adsorption capacity under various environmental situations (pH, inorganic salts, humic acid). Moreover, BM-LDOs-BC possessed excellent reusability. These superiorities illustrated that BM-LDOs-BC was a promising adsorbent and created a new avenue for rational placement of biowaste and high-efficiency synthesis of biochar for antibiotic removal.

m6A Regulator-Mediated Tumour Infiltration and Methylation Modification in Cervical Cancer Microenvironment.

Background: N6-methyladenosine (m6A) is the most abundant internal mRNA modification in eukaryotic cells. There is accumulating evidence that m6A methylation can play a significant role in the early diagnosis and treatment of cancers. However, the mechanism underlying the involvement of m6A in cervical cancer remains unclear. Methods: Here, we examined the m6A modification patterns of immune cells in the tumour microenvironments (TMEs) of 306 patients with cervical cancer from The Cancer Genome Atlas dataset and analysed the relations between them according to 32 m6A regulators. Immune infiltration in the TME of cervical cancer was analysed using the CIBERSORT algorithm and single-sample gene set enrichment analysis. The m6Ascore was structured though principal component analysis. Results: Two different m6A modification patterns were detected in 306 patients with cervical cancer, designated as m6Acluster A and B. The immune cell infiltration characteristics and biological behaviour differed between the two patterns, with m6Acluster A showing a higher level of immune infiltration. The samples were also divided into two genomic subtypes according to 114 m6A regulatory genes shown to be closely correlated with prognosis on univariate Cox regression analysis. Survival analysis showed that gene cluster B was related to better survival than gene cluster A. Most of the m6A regulators showed higher expression in gene cluster B than in gene cluster A. Single-sample gene set enrichment analysis indicated a higher level of immune cell infiltration in gene cluster A. The m6Ascore signature was examined to determine the m6A modification patterns in cervical cancer. Patients with a high m6Ascore showed better survival, while the low m6Ascore group had a higher mutation frequency and better response to treatment. Conclusions: This study showed that m6A modification patterns play important roles in cervical cancer. Analysis of m6A modification patterns will yield an improved understanding of the TME in cervical cancer, and facilitate the development of better immunotherapy strategies.

Comparison of Efficacy and Safety of Lumbar Sympathetic Radiofrequency Thermocoagulation Versus Chemical Lumbar Sympathectomy in the Treatment of Cold Hypersensitivity in the Hands and Feet: A Retrospective Study.

BACKGROUND: Cold hypersensitivity in the hands and feet (CHHF) is a disease characterized by abnormal cold in the limbs with limited treatment options. Compared to traditional drug therapy, lumbar sympathectomy is a new minimally invasive surgical method for treating CHHF. OBJECTIVES: The present study aimed to compare the efficacy and safety of lumbar sympathetic radiofrequency thermocoagulation (RFT) and chemical lumbar sympathectomy (CLS) in treating CHHF. STUDY DESIGN: A single-center, retrospective, observational study. SETTING: Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine, Jiaxing, China. METHODS: A total of 102 patients with CHHF who underwent lumbar sympathectomy from January 2016 to April 2020 were included in this study. According to the mode of operation, the patients were divided into 2 groups: CLS (n = 56) and RFT (n = 46). All patients were treated under the guidance of computed tomography (CT). The foot temperature (T) and peripheral perfusion index (PI) were compared between the 2 groups before and after treatment. The 2 groups' visual analog scale (VAS) scores were evaluated before the operation and 1 day, 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, and 1 year after the treatment. The postoperative recurrence rate of the 2 groups was observed 1 year after treatment. The short and long-term complications during the postoperative follow-up were recorded. RESULTS: All patients completed the operation successfully. No significant difference was noted in the gender, age, course of the disease, preoperative T and PI, and postoperative T and PI between the 2 groups (P > 0.05). The postoperative T and PI were significantly increased compared to preoperative in both groups (P < 0.05). No significant difference was observed in T and PI between the 2 groups (P > 0.05), and no significant difference was recorded in VAS scores between the 2 groups 1 day and 1 month after the treatment (P > 0.05). The VAS scores at 3 months, 6 months, and 1 year after the treatment were significantly lower in the RFT group compared to the CLS group (P < 0.05). During the 1-year follow-up, patients who received CLS had a higher risk of recurrence than RFT treatment (P < 0.05). The RFT group treatment of CHHF showed better long-term outcomes than the CLS group. About 12.5% of patients in the CLS group and 6.5% in the RFT group had postoperative complications, including pain at the puncture site and genitofemoral neuralgia. However, no severe complications or deaths were observed in either of the 2 groups. LIMITATIONS: The was a single-center, retrospective, non-randomized study, which is a major limitation of this study. CONCLUSIONS: Lumbar sympathetic RFT had better long-term efficacy, lower recurrence, and fewer complications than the chemical lumbar sympathectomy when treating CHHF.

Exploring AdaBoost and Random Forests machine learning approaches for infrared pathology on unbalanced data sets.

The use of infrared spectroscopy to augment decision-making in histopathology is a promising direction for the diagnosis of many disease types. Hyperspectral images of healthy and diseased tissue, generated by infrared spectroscopy, are used to build chemometric models that can provide objective metrics of disease state. It is important to build robust and stable models to provide confidence to the end user. The data used to develop such models can have a variety of characteristics which can pose problems to many model-building approaches. Here we have compared the performance of two machine learning algorithms - AdaBoost and Random Forests - on a variety of non-uniform data sets. Using samples of breast cancer tissue, we devised a range of training data capable of describing the problem space. Models were constructed from these training sets and their characteristics compared. In terms of separating infrared spectra of cancerous epithelium tissue from normal-associated tissue on the tissue microarray, both AdaBoost and Random Forests algorithms were shown to give excellent classification performance (over 95% accuracy) in this study. AdaBoost models were more robust when datasets with large imbalance were provided. The outcomes of this work are a measure of classification accuracy as a function of training data available, and a clear recommendation for choice of machine learning approach.

Sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Appears to Be Sporadic Fatal Insomnia: A Case Report and Review of the Literature.

Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) subtypes are difficult to identify due to the heterogeneity of the clinical phenotype, and early accurate identification of sporadic CJD (sCJD) subtypes aids prognosis prediction. Currently, the diagnosis of sCJD subtypes is mainly based on brain tissue biopsy or autopsy. In this report, we present a case of confirmed sCJD initially presenting as insomnia. We described detailed information including clinical, electroencephalographic, polysomnographic, positron emission tomography-computed tomographic and other neuroimaging findings, cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers, skin tissue biopsy and whole blood PRNP gene sequencing in this patient. An extensive literature search was performed in order to better understand the diagnosis of various sCJD subtypes, particularly the thalamic form, sCJDMM2 (also known as sporadic fatal insomnia). Our study highlights sporadic fatal insomnia as a differential diagnosis of sCJD.

HPV 16 E6/E7 Promote the Glucose Uptake of GLUT1 in Lung Cancer Through Downregulation of TXNIP Due to Inhibition of PTEN Phosphorylation.

High-risk human papillomavirus (HPV) infection play an important role in the development of lung cancer. Our previously study showed that E6 and E7 in HPV16 upregulated the expression of GLUT1 in lung cancer cells. However, whether they can promote the glucose uptake by GLUT1 and the underlying molecular mechanism has not been identified. It has been reported that thioredoxin interacting protein (TXNIP) regulates both the expression of GLUT1 and its glucose uptake. We speculate that high risk HPV16 infection may be closely related to TXNIP expression. Therefore, we associate HPV16 with TXNIP to explore the potential molecular mechanism of their regulation of GLUT1 expression and glucose uptake. Using double directional genetic manipulation in lung cancer cells, we showed that HPV16 E6/E7 proteins downregulated the expression of p-PTEN in lung cancer cells, the knockdown of PTEN further inhibited the expression of TXNIP, the inhibition of TXNIP further promoted the accumulation of HIF-1α by inhibiting the translocation of nuclear HIF-1α to the cytoplasm, and subsequently upregulated the expression of GLUT1 at the protein and mRNA levels. More interestingly, we found that the knockdown of TXNIP played a decisive role to promote the glucose uptake by GLUT1. Together, these findings suggested that the PTEN-TXNIP-HIF-1α axis might be related to the E6/E7-mediated expression of GLUT1 and its glucose uptake.

Inkjet printing assisted fabrication of polyphenol-based coating membranes for oil/water separation.

While polyphenol-based coating has been regarded as a promising alternative to functionalize membrane surface, it usually suffers from problems of low-efficient procedure and low utilization rate of the polyphenolic compounds, hindering its large-scale implementations. To solve these problems, this study provided a first report on inkjet printing of polyphenols (catechol (CA) or tannic acid (TA)) and sodium periodate (SP) on a polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) membrane to improve membrane performance. A series of analyses showed the efficient formation of homogenous films on the PVDF membrane surface and the improvement of hydrophilicity by the inkjet printing technique. The PVDF membranes decorated with the optimized polyphenolic coating exhibited a promising oil/water separation efficiency (higher than 99%) with a high average water permeation flux of 5.2 times higher than that of the pristine membrane. Meanwhile, the modified membranes illustrated a good stability under acidic conditions (pH = 2-7). The novel method proposed in this study is facile, cost-saving and environment-friendly. The advantages of the proposed method and the modified membranes demonstrated the great significance of the proposed method in practical applications.

Inkjet printing assisted electroless Ni plating to fabricate nickel coated polypropylene membrane with improved performance.

While electroless nickel plating is considered as a promising candidate for fabrication of metallized polymer composite membranes with high performance, it suffers from problems of complex and high-cost pretreatment procedure, hindering its large-scale implementations. It is hypothesized that, inkjet printing integrated with electroless plating (ELP) can serve as a facile and economical membrane fabrication method to overcome above problems. The new method proposed in this study was processed by inkjet printing silver ions and pyrrole inks as catalytic layer followed by electroless Ni deposition on polypropylene (PP) membrane surface. Successful modification was verified by characterizing the surface morphology and elemental compositions of the membranes. In comparison to the pristine PP membrane, the PPy-Ag/Ni modified membrane demonstrated lower surface resistance (2.3 Ω), better hydrophilicity (44.9°) and higher pure water flux (1135.1 L m-2 h-1). When applying an external electric field (10.0 V cm-1), the average flux of the PPy-Ag/Ni membrane for yeast filtration increased from 107.8 to 137.7 L m-2 h-1, which was about 2.0 times higher than that of the pristine PP membrane. Meanwhile, the PPy-Ag/Ni membrane possessed a maximum flux recover rate when applied with an external electrical field. This work provided a facile and efficient approach for fabrication of composite conductive membranes.

[Repair of finger pulp defect with the homodigital spiral neurovascular island flap].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the method and clinical outcome of reconstructing large pulp defects of the fingertips with a homodigital neurovascular island flap. METHODS: Form June 2007 to October 2009, 16 patients with the defects of pulp were repaired by the spiral flap that was a homodigital neurovascular island flap with a unique spiral advancement and transposition design allowed pulp reconstruction using sensate glabrous skin while restricting donor morbidity to the injured digit. There were 12 males and 4 females with an average age of 37 years ranging from 18 to 49 years. The defect were caused by machine crush injury 11 cases, pressure injury by heavy objects in 2 cases, crush injury by door of car 1 case, injury by saw in 2 cases. The defect was located in the index finger in 5 cases, the middle finger in 9 cases,the ring finger in 2 cases. All injuries had large pulp defects averaging 1.6 cm (long) x 1.2 cm (wide) to 2.5 cm (long) x 1.7 cm (wide). Short-term results for all patients were reviewed. Outcome measures included static 2-point discrimination, total active motion, and hypersensitivity or cold intolerance. RESULTS: All flaps achieved primary healing with no complications. Sensory recovery was excellent with an average 2-point discrimination of 5.1 mm. All patients were followed-up for 8 to 20 months (averaged 12 months) with highly satisfactory with both aesthetic and functional outcome. There was no hypersensitivity or cold intolerance. According to the evaluation of total active motion (TAM) scales, the results were excellent in 7 cases, good in 8 cases (9 lesions) and fair in 1 case. CONCLUSION: The spiral advancement-transposition flap is suitable for resurfacing large pulp defects with excellent short-term functional and aesthetic results and high patient satisfaction.