Research progress on the molecular mechanism of electroacupuncture at "Zusanli" (ST36) for regulating gastrointestinal dysfunction. / 电针"足三里"è°ƒèŠ‚èƒƒè‚ åŠŸèƒ½å¼‚å¸¸çš„åˆ†å­æœºåˆ¶ç ”ç©¶è¿›å±•.

Gastrointestinal dysfunction is manifested as digestive symptoms. Clinically, Zusanli (ST36) is crucial in the acupoint prescriptions of acupuncture no matter which type of the disease is differentiated in traditional Chinese medicine, but the underlying mechanism remains to be explored. Aiming to summarize the current status of the researches in terms of ameliorating gastrointestinal mucosal damage and regulating gastrointestinal motility disorders, we systematically reviewed the basic researches on the intervention with electroacupuncture (EA) at "ST36" in treatment of the diseases related to gastrointestinal dysfunction in the past 5 years, after searching the articles from Chinese and English databases. The results suggest that EA at ST36 may regulate the local gastrointestinal inflammation, oxidative stress and immune microenvironment to relieve gastrointestinal mucosal damage and adjust gastrointestinal motility disorders by means of modulating the central and peripheral nerve signaling as well as the function of mast cells and Cajal interstitial cells.

Spatial and temporal trends and drivers of fractional vegetation cover in Heilongjiang Province, China during 1990-2020.

Fractional vegetation cover (FVC) is a quantitative indicator for vegetation growth conditions and ecosystem change. Clarifying the spatial and temporal trends and driving factors of FVC is an important research content of global and regional ecological environment. Based on Google Earth Engine (GEE) cloud computing platform, we estimated FVC in Heilongjiang Province from 1990 to 2020 using the pixel dichotomous model. We analyzed the temporal and spatial trends and drivers of FVC using Mann-Kendall mutation test, Sen's slope analysis with Mann-Kendall significance test, correlation analysis, and structural equation model. The results showed that the estimated FVC based on the pixel dichotomous model had high accuracy (R2>0.7, root mean square error <0.1, relative root mean square error <14%). From 1990 to 2020, the annual average FVC in Heilongjiang was 0.79, with a fluctuating upward trend (0.72-0.85) and an average annual growth rate of 0.4%. The annual average FVC at the municipal administrative districts level also showed different levels of increase of FVC. The area with extremely high FVC dominated the Heilongjiang Province with a gradual increase proportion. The area with increasing trend of FVC accounted for 67.4% of the total area, whereas the area with decreasing trend only accounted for 26.2%, and the rest remained unchanged. The correlation of human activity factor on annual average FVC was higher than that of growing season monthly average meteorological factor. The human activity factor was the main driver for FVC change in Heilongjiang Province, followed by land use type. The total effect of monthly average meteorological factor during the growing season on FVC change was negative. The results would serve as technical support for long-term FVC monitoring and driving force analysis in Heilongjiang Province, and provide a reference for ecological environment restoration and protection, as well as the formulation of related land use policy.

Toxoplasma gondii causes changes in the host's expression of cancer-associated miRNAs.

Throughout the world, numerous individuals are infected with Toxoplasma gondii, which may improve immunity against cancer. Furthermore, microRNAs (miRs) may be differentially expressed in the host upon infection with T. gondii. In the present study, RNA-sequencing analysis and reverse transcription-quantitative PCR revealed that miR-429-3p, miR-145a-5p, miR-211-5p, miR-31-3p and miR-135a-5p were determined to be downregulated, while miR-21a-3p, miR-135b-5p, miR-210-5p and miR-146-3p were upregulated in mice post-infection with T. gondii. Antitumor genes [TNF receptor superfamily member 11b, large tumor suppressor kinase (Lats)2 and Lats1] were identified as targets of miR-429-3p, miR-145a-5p, miR-211-5p, miR-31-3p and miR-135a-5p with a luciferase reporter assay. In addition, the protein levels of Lats2 and Lats1 were detected to be higher in T. gondii-infected mice than in the control group. Therefore, these results provide favorable evidence for the suppression of cancer upon T. gondii infection and may give novel ideas for the treatment of tumors.

Transcriptome Sequencing Investigated the Tumor-Related Factors Changes After T. gondii Infection.

Toxoplasma gondii is an intracellular parasite and causes a global epidemic parasitic disease. T. gondii-infection could inhibit the growth of tumor. In this study, the transcriptomes of samples were detected by deep sequencing analysis. The transcriptome data was compared with reference genome to perform sequence alignment and the further analysis. The analyses of differential expression and the differentially expressed genes were performed in the present study. Genes involved in P53 signaling pathway, COLORECTAL cancer pathway, NON-SMALL CELL LUNG cancer signaling pathway, and BREAST cancer signaling pathway were up-regulated or down-regulated among the samples. The KEGG analysis indicated that the cancer pathways changed after infection of T. gondii. Furthermore, tumor-related mRNAs from different samples had a large difference, which suggested that the difference might provide important information in resisting cancer. The protein results indicated that tumor-related protein changes occurred after infection of T. gondii. In conclusion, the infection changed the cancer pathways, which could possibly inhibit the growth of tumor.

DNA vaccine ROP29 from Toxoplasma gondii containing R848 enhances protective immunity in mice.

AIMS: Toxoplasma gondii is an intracellular parasite that causes a global epidemic parasitic disease. Studies using DNA vaccines for the control of toxoplasmosis have made considerable progress. ROP proteins were proven to be excellent candidates for T. gondii DNA vaccine development. METHODS AND RESULTS: Here, a ROP29 DNA vaccine was successfully produced and injected into mice in combination with R848 to evaluate its ability to provide protection against T. gondii challenge. Compared with other mice, the mice injected with R848/pROP29 produced higher levels of IgG, IgG2a, interleukin (IL)-12, and interferon gamma (IFN-γ). Moreover, after a challenge of 20 T. gondii cysts, the number of brain cysts was lower in the R848/pROP29-immunized mice than in the other experimental mice. CONCLUSIONS: R848 could improve the productions of IL-12 and IFN-γ, thus enhancing the immune responses stimulated by the pROP29 DNA vaccine.

[Spatial distribution of soil total nitrogen in Liangshui National Nature Reserve based on local model].

Based on LiDAR data of Liangshui National Nature Reserve, digital elevation model (DEM) was constructed and both primary terrain attributes (slope, aspect, profile curvature, etc.) and secondary terrain attributes (wetness index, sediment transport index, relative stream power index, etc.) were extracted. According to the theory of soil formation, geographically weighted regression (GWR) was applied to predict soil total nitrogen (TN) of the area, and the predicted results were compared with those of three traditional interpolation methods including inverse distance weighting (IDW), ordinary Kriging (OK) and universal Kriging (UK). Results showed that the prediction accuracy of GWR (77.4%) was higher than that of other three interpolation methods and the accuracy of IDW (69.4%) was higher than that of OK (63.5%) and UK (60.6%). The average of TN predicted by GWR reached 4.82 g . kg-1 in the study area and TN tended to be higher in the region with higher elevation, bigger wetness index and stronger relative stream power index than in other areas. Further, TN also varied partly with various aspects and slopes. Thus, local model using terrain attributes as independent variables was effective in predicting soil attribute distribution.

[Estimation and spatial-temporal pattern of forest aboveground biomass and NPP in Heihe Region, Heilongjiang Province, China]. / 黑龙江省黑河地区森林地上生物量和NPPä¼°æµ‹åŠæ—¶ç©ºæ ¼å±€.

Based on 1390 fixed plots data collected in 2005 and 2010 in Heihe Region of Heilongjiang Province, biomass allometric models of tree species in northeastern China were applied to calculate aboveground biomass (AGB) and net primary productivity (NPP). Based on ETM+ ima-geries in 2005 and 2010, Kriging and co-Kriging methods in geostatistics were applied to interpolate AGB and NPP and different variogram models were compared. The distribution maps of AGB and NPP were produced using the best interpolation method. The change of AGB and NPP over time and space and the impacts of stand types and terrain factors (aspect, slope and altitude) on the distributions of AGB and NPP were analyzed by comparing the distribution maps in different years. The results indicated that AGB had an increasing trend and areas with AGB higher than 40 t·hm-2 also increased. However, NPP decreased from 2005 to 2010. Some high NPP regions were changed into low NPP regions. AGB and NPP were correlated with forest terrain factors, especially altitude, which indicated that the distribution of biomass and NPP were highly influenced by altitude. During the study period, AGB increased at all slope aspects while NPP decreased, AGB and NPP had an increasing trend with raised slope degree andaltitude, the AGB and NPP of evergreen coniferous forest increased most, and the AGB of mixed deciduous-coniferous forest and NPP of broad-leaved deciduous forest had the least increase.

[Comparison of three daily global solar radiation models].

Three daily global solar radiation estimation models ( Å-P model, Thornton-Running model and model provided by Liu Ke-qun et al.) were analyzed and compared using data of 13 weather stations from 1982 to 2012 from three northeastern provinces and eastern Inner Mongolia. After cross-validation analysis, the result showed that mean absolute error (MAE) for each model was 1.71, 2.83 and 1.68 MJ x m(-2) x d(-1) respectively, showing that Å-P model and model provided by Liu Ke-qun et al. which used percentage of sunshine had an advantage over Thornton-Running model which didn't use percentage of sunshine. Model provided by Liu Ke-qun et al. played a good effect on the situation of non-sunshine, and its MAE and bias percentage were 18.5% and 33.8% smaller than those of Å-P model, respectively. High precision results could be obtained by using the simple linear model of Å-P. Å-P model, Thornton-Running model and model provided by Liu Ke-qun et al. overvalued daily global solar radiation by 12.2%, 19.2% and 9.9% respectively. MAE for each station varied little with the spatial change of location, and annual MAE decreased with the advance of years. The reason for this might be that the change of observation accuracy caused by the replacement of radiation instrument in 1993. MAEs for rainy days, non-sunshine days and warm seasons of the three models were greater than those for days without rain, sunshine days and cold seasons respectively, showing that different methods should be used for different weather conditions on estimating solar radiation with meteorological elements.

Immunogenicity of oral vaccination with Lactococcus lactis derived vaccine candidate antigen (UreB) of Helicobacter pylori fused with the human interleukin 2 as adjuvant.

Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection remains a significant global public health problem. Vaccine, especially edible vaccine, is considered to be effective in the management of H. pylori infections. By using recombinant technology, Lactococcus lactis (L. lactis) could serve as an antigen-delivering vehicle for the development of edible vaccine. The aim of this study was to produce edible UreB (urease B) vaccine derived from L. lactis against H. pylori. The UreB subunit is the most effective and common immunogen of all strains of H. pylori. The UreB was produced as a chimeric protein fused with IL-2 (human interleukin 2) as the mucosal adjuvant. Mucosal immunization of mice with recombinant L. lactis NZ9000 containing the UreB-IL-2 protein elicited more anti-UreB antibody that specifically bounded to the purified bacterial UreB protein and more cytokines such as IFN-γ, IL-4, and IL-17, and had a lower H. pylori burden and urease activity than control mice. These results suggest that the recombinant L. lactis expressing UreB-IL-2 can be potentially used as an edible vaccine for controlling H. pylori infection.

Anti-proliferation effects of interferon-gamma on gastric cancer cells.

IFN-γ plays an indirect anti-cancer role through the immune system but may have direct negative effects on cancer cells. It regulates the viability of gastric cancer cells, so we examined whether it affects their proliferation and how that might be brought about. We exposed AGS, HGC-27 and GES-1 gastric cancer cell lines to IFN-γ and found significantly reduced colony formation ability. Flow cytometry revealed no effect of IFN-γ on apoptosis of cell lines and no effect on cell aging as assessed by ß-gal staining. Microarray assay revealed that IFN-γ changed the mRNA expression of genes related to the cell cycle and cell proliferation and migration, as well as chemokines and chemokine receptors, and immunity-related genes. Finally, flow cytometry revealed that IFN-γ arrested the cells in the G1/S phase. IFN-γ may slow proliferation of some gastric cancer cells by affecting the cell cycle to play a negative role in the development of gastric cancer.