Rediscovery of Mazus lanceifolius reveals a new genus and a new species in Mazaceae.

Mazus lanceifolius (Mazaceae) is a perennial herb with opposite leaves and endemic to central China that has not been collected for 130 years. Rediscovery of this enigmatic species in the wild allows for determination of its phylogenetic position within Mazaceae. Phylogenetic reconstruction of Mazaceae based on DNA sequences from four plastid markers (matK, rbcL, rps16 and trnL-trnF) and nuclear ribosome ITS consistently showed that Mazus was not monophyletic. Mazus lanceifolius is in the most basal clade within Mazaceae, as sister to the remaining species of three recognized genera Dodartia, Lancea and Mazus. These results support the separation of M. lanceifolius from Mazus as a new genus, which was established here as Puchiumazus Bo Li, D.G. Zhang & C.L. Xiang. Meanwhile, a collection from Shennongjia Forestry District of Hubei Province, China, misidentified as "M. lanceifolius" in previous molecular study, is here revealed to represent an undescribed species of Mazus, i.e., M. fruticosus Bo Li, D.G. Zhang & C.L. Xiang, sp. nov. Morphologically, Puchiumazus is clearly distinct from the other three genera by having quadrangular to somewhat ribbed stems, and obviously opposite leaves. In addition, we provide a taxonomic key to the four genera of Mazaceae.

Elevation alters carbon and nutrient concentrations and stoichiometry in Quercus aquifolioides in southwestern China.

Elevation is a complex environmental factor altering temperature, light, moisture and soil nutrient availability, and thus may affect plant growth and physiology. Such effects of elevation may also depend on seasons. Along an elevational gradient of the Balang Mountain, southwestern China, we sampled soil and 2-year old leaves, 2-year old shoots, stem sapwood and fine roots (diameter<5mm) of Quercus aquifolioides at 2843, 2978, 3159, 3327, 3441 and 3589m a.s.l. in both summer and winter. In summer, the concentrations of tissue non-structural carbohydrates (NSC) did not decrease with increasing elevation, suggesting that the carbon supply is sufficient for plant growth at high altitude in the growing season. The concentration of NSC in fine roots decreased with elevation in winter, and the mean concentration of NSC across tissues in a whole plant showed no significant difference between the two sampling seasons, suggesting that the direction of NSC reallocation among plant tissues changed with season. During the growing season, NSC transferred from leaves to other tissues, and in winter NSC stored in roots transferred from roots to aboveground tissues. Available soil N increased with elevation, but total N concentrations in plant tissues did not show any clear elevational pattern. Both available soil P and total P concentrations in all plant tissues decreased with increasing elevation. Thus, tissue N:P ratio increased with elevation, suggesting that P may become a limiting element for plant growth at high elevation. The present study suggests that the upper limit of Q. aquifolioides on Balang Mountain may be co-determined by winter root NSC storage and P availability. Our results contribute to better understanding of the mechanisms for plants' upper limit formation.

[Effects of simulated warming and functional group removal on survival and growth of Abies faxoniana seedlings]. / 模拟增温和功能群去除对岷江冷杉幼苗存活和生长的影响.

Warming and herbaceous functional group removal experiment was conducted in subalpine meadow to examine the effects of herbaceous species on Abies faxoniana seedlings by analyzing its physiological responses. The survival rate and non-structural carbohydrate content were significantly increased, but the growth and root/shoot of A. faxoniana were decreased. Seedling survival was significantly positively correlated with non-structural carbohydrate content, especially with soluble sugar. Under the treatment without warming, herbaceous species inhibited the survival of A. faxoniana, increased height growth and aboveground biomass. Grasses and forbs decreased the root length and belowground biomass of A. faxoniana. In the warming treatment, forbs increased the survival of A. faxoniana, sedges decreased root length and belowground biomass of A. faxoniana, and grasses and forbs decreased height growth and aboveground biomass of A. faxoniana. Simulated warming increased the survival of A. faxoniana seedlings, but also made it face stronger competition from herbaceous and thus inhibited its growth.

Mechanism of Jiawei Foshou San on invasion and metastasis in endometriosis based on network pharmacology / 药学学报

Jiawei Foshou San is a new Chinese medicine compound consisting of ligustrazine, ferulic acid and fumarate. Previously Jiawei Foshou San inhibited the growth of endometriosis with unclear mechanism, especially in metastasis and invasion. In this study, network pharmacology analysis was performed to explore potential mechanism of Jiawei Foshou San on endometriosis. Jiawei Foshou San compound targets were purchase from TCMID, TCMSP and SEA database. Endometriosis targets were collected from OMIM, DisGeNET and GEO database. Networks of Jiawei Foshou San compound-compound targets and compound target-endometriosis target were established with Cytoscape 3.5.0 software. Key targets were analyzed for pathway enrichment through DAVID database. It was found that Jiawei Foshou San regulated 66 core targets (MMP2, MMP9, TIMP1, ICAM1, VEGFA, et al.) and affected 115 pathways, such as estrogen, HIF-1, TNF and GnRH signaling pathways. MMP-TIMP were uncovered as one cluster of the core targets. Furthermore, Jiawei Foshou San significantly suppressed the growth of ectopic endometrium. Meanwhile, invasion and metastasis were restrained after treating with Jiawei Foshou San through decreasing MMP-2 and MMP-9, increasing TIMP-1. In brief, these results provide a pharmacodynamic basis for the study of Jiawei Foshou San.

Long non-coding RNA stabilizes the Y-box-binding protein 1 and regulates the epidermal growth factor receptor to promote lung carcinogenesis.

Indoor and outdoor air pollution has been classified as group I carcinogen in humans, but the underlying tumorigenesis remains unclear. Here, we screened for abnormal long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) in lung cancers from patients living in Xuanwei city which has the highest lung cancer incidence in China due to smoky coal combustion-generated air pollution. We reported that Xuanwei patients had much more dysregulated lncRNAs than patients from control regions where smoky coal was not used. The lncRNA CAR intergenic 10 (CAR10) was up-regulated in 39/62 (62.9%) of the Xuanwei patients, which was much higher than in patients from control regions (32/86, 37.2%; p=0.002). A multivariate regression analysis showed an association between CAR10 overexpression and air pollution, and a smoky coal combustion-generated carcinogen dibenz[a,h]anthracene up-regulated CAR10 by increasing transcription factor FoxF2 expression. CAR10 bound and stabilized transcription factor Y-box-binding protein 1 (YB-1), leading to up-regulation of the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and proliferation of lung cancer cells. Knockdown of CAR10 inhibited cell growth in vitro and tumor growth in vivo. These results demonstrate the role of lncRNAs in environmental lung carcinogenesis, and CAR10-YB-1 represents a potential therapeutic target.

[Understory effects on overstory trees: A review.] / æž—ä¸‹å±‚æ¤è¢«å¯¹ä¸Šå±‚ä¹”æœ¨çš„å½±å“ç ”ç©¶ç»¼è¿°.

Plant-plant interactions play a key role in regulating the composition and structure of communities and ecosystems. Studies of plant-plant interactions in forest ecosystems have traditionally concentrated on either tree-tree interactions or overstory species' impacts on understory plants. The possible effects of understory species on overstory trees have received less attention. We summarized the effects of understory species on soil physiological properties, soil fauna activities, leaf litter decomposition, and ecophysiology and growth of the overstory species. Then the effects of distur-bance on understory-overstory interactions were discussed. Finally, an ecophysiology-based concept model of understory effects on overstory trees was proposed. Understory removal experiments showed that the study area, overstory species age, soil fertility and understory species could significantly affect the understory-overstory interactions.

Down-regulation of microRNA-144 in air pollution-related lung cancer.

Air pollution has been classified as a group 1 carcinogen in humans, but the underlying tumourigenic mechanisms remain unclear. In Xuanwei city of Yunnan Province, the lung cancer incidence is among the highest in China, owing to severe air pollution generated by the combustion of smoky coal, providing a unique opportunity to dissect lung carcinogenesis. To identify abnormal miRNAs critical for air pollution-related tumourigenesis, we performed microRNA microarray analysis in 6 Xuanwei non-small cell lung cancers (NSCLCs) and 4 NSCLCs from control regions where smoky coal was not used. We found 13 down-regulated and 2 up-regulated miRNAs in Xuanwei NSCLCs. Among them, miR-144 was one of the most significantly down-regulated miRNAs. The expanded experiments showed that miR-144 was down-regulated in 45/51 (88.2%) Xuanwei NSCLCs and 34/54 (63%) control region NSCLCs (p = 0.016). MiR-144 interacted with the oncogene Zeb1 at 2 sites in its 3' untranslated region, and a decrease in miR-144 resulted in increased Zeb1 expression and an epithelial mesenchymal transition phenotype. Ectopic expression of miR-144 suppressed NSCLCs in vitro and in vivo by targeting Zeb1. These results indicate that down-regulation of miR-144 is critical for air pollution-related lung cancer, and the miR-144-Zeb1 signalling pathway could represent a potential therapeutic target.

[Altitudinal patterns of flower plant biomass on alpine and subalpine meadow in Balang Mountains].

A field survey was conducted to study the altitudinal patterns of flower plant biomass on alpine and subalpine meadow in Wolong Nature Reserve in Balang Mountains, and the soil factors were analyzed. With the increase of altitude, the aboveground biomass, including the biomass of flower-fruit, stem, and leaf, varied in unimodal and peaked at 3500 m a. s. l., the belowground biomass varied in U-shape, the soil acidity and the contents of soil hydrolyzable N and total K increased significantly, whereas the contents of soil organic matter, total N, and available P had a significant decrease. The aboveground biomass of the flower plants increased significantly with increasing soil pH and soil total N and available K contents, and the belowground biomass of the plants increased significantly with increasing soil organic matter and available P contents but decreased significantly with increasing soil total K and hydrolyzable N contents.