English Learning Stress, Self-Efficacy, and Burnout among Undergraduate Students: The Moderating Effect of Mindfulness and Gender.

Research has indicated that English learning stress contributes significantly to English learning burnout among undergraduate students. However, knowledge of the mediating and moderating mechanisms underlying this relationship is limited. To bridge this gap, a moderated mediation model was constructed to examine whether English learning self-efficacy mediated the relationship between English learning stress and English learning burnout. Furthermore, this study analyzed whether the mediated relationship was moderated by mindfulness and gender. A total of 1130 Chinese undergraduate students (mean age = 20.84 years, SD = 1.57 years) reported their experiences regarding English learning stress, English learning self-efficacy, English learning burnout, and mindfulness. After controlling for covariates, the results revealed that English learning self-efficacy mediated the positive link between English learning stress and English learning burnout among both men and women. Moreover, the findings demonstrated that the indirect link was moderated by mindfulness among male undergraduate students. However, the moderating effect of mindfulness was not significant among the women in this study. The implications of these findings for future research, and the development of intervention and prevention of English learning burnout are discussed.

Injectable in situ intelligent thermo-responsive hydrogel with glycyrrhetinic acid-conjugated nano graphene oxide for chemo-photothermal therapy of malignant hepatocellular tumor.

Malignant tumor is one of the major diseases with high morbidity and mortality. The purpose of this study is to prepare berberine hydrochloride (BH) in situ thermo-sensitive hydrogel based on glycyrrhetinic acid (GA) modified nano graphene oxide (NGO) (GA-BH-NGO-gel). NGO was taken as the photosensitizer, GA was taken as the target molecule, and BH was taken as the model drug. The physicochemical properties and anti-tumor activity in vivo and in vitro were also studied. This subject could provide a certain theoretical basis for the chemo-photothermal therapy combined treatment of malignant tumor. The release behavior of GA-BH-NGO-gel in vitro presented sustained and temperature-dependent drug release effect. The anti-tumor activity studies in vivo and in vitro had shown that GA-BH-NGO-gel had stronger anti-tumor activity, which could be targeting distributed to the tumor tissues. Moreover, the inhibitory effect of GA-BH-NGO-gel was enhanced when combined with 808 nm of laser irradiation. In this research, the chemo-photothermal combination therapy was applied into the tumor treatment, which may provide certain research ideas for the clinical treatment of malignant tumor.

The photodynamic activity and toxicity evaluation of 5,10,15-tris(ethoxylcarbonyl)corrole phosphorus(V) in vivo and in vitro.

The development of novel, efficient and nontoxic photosensitizers (PSs) is a challenging task for photodynamic therapy (PDT). In our previous study, corrole had been demonstrated to be a promising PS in PDT for cancer cells. In this paper, a novel electron-deficient flat phosphorus tris(ethoxycarbonyl) corrole (1-P) was synthesized and characterized. In vitro photodynamic activities and toxicity of 1-P in HepG2 xenograft tumours was evaluated by standard assay. The results shown 1-P displayed a potential efficient and low-toxic PS, which suggesting this kind of corrole is a powerful and promising antitumor PS for PDT. In addition, the potential anti-tumour mechanism study of 1-P was also investigated by the apoptosis antibody array, immunohistochemical and western blotting assay (WB) experiments, we found that the PDT activity of 1-P can degrade SIRT1 (an important deacetylase), and activate the Fas signal pathway to inhibit the growth of liver cancer cells.

[Warm-needling moxibustion for knee osteoarthritis:a randomized controlled trial].

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the clinical efficacy of warm-needling moxibustion for knee osteoarthritis (KOA), and to explore its effects on isokinetic strength of lower limb muscle. METHODS: Fifty cases of KOA were randomly divided into an observation group (25 cases) and a control group (21 cases), but 4 cases lost contact. The observation group was treated with warm-needling moxibustion at Dubi (ST 35), Neixiyan (EX-LE 4), Xuehai (SP 10), Liangqiu (ST 34), Yinlingquan (SP 9), Yanglingquan (GB 34), Weizhong (BL 40), Heyang (BL 55) and Fengshi (GB 31) for 40 min per treatment. The first 6 treatments were given once a day, and the last 6 treatments were given once every other day. 12 treatments were taken as one course, and totally 3-week treatment was given. No treatment was given in the control group for 3 weeks. The isokinetic strength of extensor muscle and flexor muscle, including the total work, absolute peak torque (aPT) and relative peak torque (rPT), and Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Arthritis Index (WOMAC), and comprehensive efficacy were observed and compared in the two groups. RESULTS: Compared before treatment, the total work, aPT and rPT of the extensor and flexor muscle increased significantly after treatment in the observation group (P<0.01, P<0.05), but the flextion/extention ratio was lowered (P<0.05). In the control group, aPT and rPT of flexor muscle were reduced after treatment (P<0.05, P<0.01). The total work, aPT and rPT of the extensor muscle in the observation group were higher than those in the control group after treatment (P<0.05, P<0.01), but the flextion/extention ratio was lowered (P<0.05). The item score and total score of WOMAC were reduced in the observation group after treatment (all P<0.01), but no significant change was observed in the control group (all P>0.05). The pain score, stiffness scores and total score of WOMAC in the observation group were lower than those in the control group (P<0.01, P<0.05); the score of daily function activities was declined in the observation group, but not significantly different from that in the control group (P>0.05). The total effective rate was 88.0% (22/25) in the observation group. CONCLUSIONS: Warm-needling moxibustion could relieve pain, improve function and muscle balance, strengthen extensor and flexor muscle power, especially extensor, which has superior clinical efficacy.

Nitric oxide enhances aluminum tolerance by affecting cell wall polysaccharides in rice roots.

Nitric oxide (NO) is a key signal molecule involved in many physiological processes in plants. To study the mechanisms of exogenous NO contribution to alleviate the aluminum (Al) toxicity, roots of rice (Oryza sativa) seedlings pre-treated with sodium nitroprusside (SNP, a NO donor) were used to investigate the effect of Al in this study. Results indicated that NO alleviated the lipid peroxidation induced by Al and promoted the root elongation, whereas butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA), an efficient lipophilic antioxidant, alleviated the lipid peroxidation only. Rice seedling roots pre-treated with SNP followed by Al treatment had lower contents of pectin and hemicellulose, lower Al accumulation in root tips and cell walls, higher degree of methylation of pectin and lower wall Al-binding capacity than the roots with Al treatment only. Therefore, the decreased Al accumulation in the cell walls of rice roots is likely to be the reason for the NO-induced increase of Al tolerance in rice, and it seems that exogenous NO enhanced Al tolerance in rice roots by decreasing the contents of pectin and hemicellulose, increasing the degree of methylation of pectin, and decreasing Al accumulation in root cell walls.

Developmental changes in DNA methylation of pollen mother cells of David lily during meiotic prophase I.

Epigenetic marks in the form of DNA methylation are involved in the development of germ cells and are important in the maintenance of fertility. However, the controlling system of the on-off switch for DNA methylation largely remains unclear. In this study, the extent of cytosine methylation during the meiotic prophase I in David lily is assessed using high pressure liquid chromatography to evaluate the DNA methylation rates. Comparing the degree of DNA methylation before, during, and after synizesis, both de novo methylation and demethylation occurred. Mainly the methylation level decreased by 21.3% (from 54.8 to 33.5%) during synizesis in the pollen mother cells. The developmental timing of genome-wide DNA methylation acquisition during pollen mother cell development is clarified in this paper. The relative amounts of 5-methyl-deoxycytidine of global methylation in leaf DNA in David lily were also higher than in other species reported.