Risk and mechanisms of phosphorus release at the sediment-water interface of lakes in cold and arid regions during non-frozen seasons.

In recent years, the eutrophication of lakes has accelerated in cold arid regions; the release of nutrients from sediments is an important contributor. The sequential extraction method, high-resolution peeper (HR-Peeper), and diffusive gradients in thin films (DGT) techniques were used to study the occurrence characteristics, release risk, and release mechanism of phosphorus (P) at the sediment-water interface (SWI) of Ulanor Wetland in the Hulun Lake Basin, Inner Mongolia, China. The mean total P concentration in overlying water was lower in August than that in May. Dissolved organic P (DOP) or particulate P (PP) was the main form of P in the overlying water. PP dominates in May and DOP in August. Refractory P was the main form of P in sediments. The concentrations of soluble reactive P and DGT-active P in the pore water of the sediment column were higher than those in the overlying water, and the concentrations were higher in August than those in May. Release of P in the wetland sediments occurred during the non-frozen seasons, with a higher risk in August than in May. The good linear correlation between dissolved P, Fe, and Mn in the DGT profiles verified their co-release due to the anaerobic reduction of Fe/Mn oxides. Moreover, alkaline sediments are also conducive to the release of sediment P. This study can provide data and theoretical support for eutrophication control in Ulanor Wetland and other similar water bodies in cold and arid regions.

Traditional Chinese Medicine Treatment, Gua Sha, can Induce Subtle Molecular Changes in Gene Expression / 生物医学与环境科学（英文）

OBJECTIVE@#Here, we explored molecular changes that could potentially mediate healing effects of Gua Sha - a method employed by the Chinese traditional medicine with proven track records of safe and efficient applications dating back to ancient times as well as support from randomized controlled trials performed by modern medical studies - yet remaining almost entirely unexplored by the modern-day high-throughput methods of the -omics sciences.@*METHODS@#We investigated transcriptome changes occurring shortly after Gua Sha treatment in the whole blood of healthy volunteers using bulk RNA-seq analysis. We applied various analytical tools to identify genes with consistent expression changes in multiple individuals in response to Gua Sha and their networks.@*RESULTS@#We found that while the changes were very subtle and individual-specific, we could identify consistent upregulation of three histone genes. Further analysis of the potential regulatory networks of these histone genes revealed the enrichment of functions involved in the immune response and inflammation.@*CONCLUSION@#The significance of these results in the context of potential effects of Gua Sha and the next steps in exploring the molecular mechanisms of action of this technique are discussed.