[Effect of low magnitude tension on the inflammatory response of periodontal ligament cells induced by isoproterenol].

PURPOSE: To investigate the effect of tension on the inflammatory response of human periodontal ligament cells (PDLCs) induced by isoproterenol (ISO) and its molecular mechanism. METHODS: Human PDLCs were cultured in vitro and stimulated with a certain concentration of ISO(0.01, 0.1, 1 µmol/L) for 24 h. Cyclic tensile strain with different degrees of elongation (5%, 10% and 15%) were applied. The expression of IL-1ß and IL-6 mRNA in PDLCs was detected by real-time quantitative PCR(RT-qPCR). The protein expression of p-PERK, PERK, p-eIF2α, eIF2α and ATF4 related to ER stress was detected by Western blot. The expression of PERK gene in PDLCs was knocked down by cell transfection technique, and the expression of IL-1ß and IL-6 mRNA in PDLCs with low expression of PERK was detected by RT-qPCR under the stimulation of ISO and low magnitude tension. Statistical analysis was conducted with SPSS 22.0 software package. RESULTS: ISO induction could significantly up-regulate the IL-1ß and IL-6 mRNA expression in PDLCs(P＜0.05). Compared with the control group, the expression of IL-1ß and IL-6 mRNA in PDLCs induced by ISO was inhibited by low magnitude tension, and the difference was statistically significant(P＜0.05). Western blot results showed that low magnitude tension could inhibit the ISO-stimulated phosphorylation of PERK and eIF2α and the expression of ATF4（P＜0.05）. Compared with the negative control group, IL-1ß and IL-6 mRNA expression was decreased in the ISO-stimulated PDLCs silenced by PERK gene. CONCLUSIONS: Tension with 5% degrees of elongation may inhibit ISO-stimulated periodontal inflammatory response through endoplasmic reticulum stress pathway.

[Screening and Control Measures for New Priority Pollutants in Surface Water of Tianjin].

Emerging pollutants are frequently detected in surface water, threatening the regional aquatic ecosystem and human health. Due to their complex types and large differences in risk and toxicity, research based on the comprehensive assessment of the pollution characteristics to determine the new priority pollutants remains incomplete. This study established a multi-criterion scoring method targeting 41 emerging pollutants with the goal of protecting aquatic organisms and human health, using five key indicators including environmental exposure level, persistence, bioaccumulation, ecological risk, and health risk of pollutants. The emerging pollutants were screened and identified in the surface water of Tianjin. The priority levels of different congeners were divided, and the ecological and health risks of pollutants in the priority control list were evaluated. The results showed that 41 emerging pollutants were generally detected in the study area. The average concentration of sulfonamide antibiotics (SAs) and other drugs (Others) were the largest, with 200.04 ng·L-1 and 176.30 ng·L-1, respectively, followed by perfluorinated compounds (PFASs, 57.98 ng·L-1). In terms of pollutant categories, high-priority emerging pollutants were dominated by PFASs, accounting for 50%. Medium-priority emerging pollutants were still dominated by PFASs (26.32%), but the proportion was lower. Low-priority emerging pollutants were dominated by SAs, accounting for 31.25%. Perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS), perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), carbamazepine (CBZ), caffeine (CAF), perfluorohexyl sulfonic acid (PFHxA), and clarithromycin (CLA) were defined as a priority control list. Compared with other pollutants, PFOS and PFOA had higher scores in persistence, bioaccumulation, and health risk, whereas CBZ and CAF had higher scores in ecological risk. The average risk quotient (RQ) of CAF was 4.8, which indicated a relatively high ecological risk. Health risk indicated that the potential risk caused by PFOA (average hazard quotient was 0.018) cannot be ignored. For the priority control list, because of the high removal rate of CAF in sewage treatment plants, the construction of a pipe network and riverside belt with high vegetation coverage should be strengthened to reduce the impact of untreated sewage discharge and rainfall runoff. Pollutants with low removal rates in sewage treatment plants should be treated with combined technologies to improve the removal efficiency. In addition, industry substitution work should be accelerated to reduce emissions of PFOS, PFOA, and PFHxA.

[Distribution, Sources, and Risk Assessment of Polyfluoroalkyl Substances in Main Rivers and Soils of Tianjin].

Rapid urbanization and industrialization may potentially impact the spatial distribution and transmission of polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs). Tianjin, a typical industrialized city with a high urbanization level around Bohai Bay, was selected to evaluate the spatial distribution and ecological risks of PFASs. Water and soil samples were systematically collected and analyzed by using solid-phase extraction and high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC/MS-MS) methods. The results showed that all 12 PFASs were detected in water and soils, and the detection rates of the other congeners were low. The concentrations of ΣPFASs in water ranged from 3.93 to 357.85 ng ·L-1, and the levels of ΣPFASs in soils ranged from 4.60 to 63.85 ng ·g-1. PFBA was the major component in water and soils, and the contribution of PFBA was 37% and 67% in water and soils, respectively. The spatial difference in ΣPFASs in the water bodies was significant. ΣPFAS concentrations in the surface water were higher in the north (mean value of 63.83 ng ·L-1) than in the south (mean value of 51.71 ng ·L-1) and higher in the eastern coastal area (mean value of 71.36 ng ·L-1) than in the western area (mean value of 36.08 ng ·L-1). ΣPFAS concentrations from upstream to downstream of the rivers showed an increasing trend. The highest PFAS concentration was found in the Chaobai River, and the lowest was detected in the South Canal. The spatial distribution of PFASs in soils was higher in the south (mean value of 13.33 ng ·g-1) than in the north (mean value of 6.38 ng ·g-1) and higher in the eastern coastal region (mean value of 11.45 ng ·g-1) than in the western region (mean value of 6.94 ng ·g-1). The soil concentrations of ΣPFASs in the Haihe River Basin were the highest. The source analysis results showed that the emulsification of rubber products, food packaging process, paper surface treatment, fire extinguishing agent use, and electrochemical fluorination process in industrial production were the main sources of PFASs in the soils in the study area. PFOS/PFOA, PFOA/PFNA, and PFHpA/PFOA analyses showed that the main source of PFASs in water bodies was the degradation of precursors. ΣPFASs in a few areas originated from the direct emissions from production, but the atmospheric deposition was small. The results of the ecological risk evaluation indicated that the exposure concentrations of PFASs in water and soils in the study area were at a low ecological risk level. However, the long-term ecological effects of PFASs cannot be ignored because of their long-distance transport capability and high food chain (web) accumulation capability.

Mechanism of surface treatments on carbon nanotube transparent conductive films by three different reagents.

Transparent conductive films (TCFs) were fabricated via a spray-coating method with a solution prepared by dispersing single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) in deionized water with sodium dodecylbenzene sulfonate (SDBS) as surfactant. We explored the mechanism of HNO3 treatment by treating TCFs with different reagents. After being treated with different concentrations of reagents by HNO3, HCl, and NaNO3 to lower the sheet resistance of TCFs, the properties of TCFs were further characterized by a UV-VIS spectrophotometer, a four-point probe method, atom force microscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and Raman spectroscopy. In this study, we conclude that the HNO3 treatment results in a decrease in the sheet resistance of the TCFs due to the combined effect of acidity and oxidizability. The strong interaction of the strong acidity and strong oxidizing property of HNO3 causes the SDBS to be removed. To further improve the film conductivity of the TCFs, the experimental conditions of the HNO3 treatment were optimized.

[Characterization of Phosphorus Forms in Organic Composts and Their Effects on Leaf Phosphorus Content of Castanea mollissima in Chinese Chestnut Producing Area].

Characterization of the forms of phosphorus (P) in four organic composts including compost of hulls and leaves of Castanea mollissima, edible fungi residues, corn stalks and chicken manure (BYZ), compost of edible fungi residues and chicken manure(ZF), composts of hulls and leaves of C. mollissima, edible fungi residues and chicken manure (BZ1 and BZ2) in Chinese chestnut producing area was conducted by sequential P fractionation developed by Dou et al. Field trial was conducted to study the effects of compost application on leaf phosphorus content of Castanea mollissima. The results showed that total phosphorus content(TP) of organic composts ranked as follows:BZ1(10.61 g·kg-1) > ZF(9.03 g·kg-1) > BYZ(8.56 g·kg-1) > BZ2(7.68 g·kg-1), and the inorganic phosphorus(Pi) accounted for 62.88%-73.62% of the total phosphorus in the organic composts. The content and proportion of HCl-P in the total fractionated phosphorus(Prt) was the highest among P forms in ZF, while that of H2O-P was the highest in BYZ, BZ1 and BZ2. The content of NaOH-P was very low in all the composts. Active H2O-Por NaHCO3-P had the highest inorganic phosphorus proportion(89.17%-96.00%) of all the P forms. The major Piforms in BZ2 were H2O- and HCl-extractable P fractions, while H2O-Pi, HCl-Pi and NaHCO3-Pi were major Pi forms in BYZ, BZ1 and ZF. Residual-P was the predominant organic phosphorus form, and BZ2 showed the highest Residual-P proportion of the total fractionated phosphorus(Prt) among all the composts. Leaf phosphorus contents per unit area of Castanea mollissima by field trial on the added phosphorus-equivalent basis were expressed as:BZ2>BZ1>BYZ>ZF>CK. Increment of leaf phosphorus content per unit area in Julyand per month on average showed positive relationship with the content and proportion of H2O-Pi in the total fractionated phosphorus of composts, which presumably played a key role in leaf phosphorus absorption of C. mollissima measured in the year of deep concentrated fertilization. The results suggested that composts of hulls and leaves of C. mollissima, edible fungi residues and chicken manure (BZ2) was a good choice in given area for aerobic composting raw material system in which organic wastes from Chinese chestnut industry accounted for 80% (hulls and leaves of Castanea mollissima and edible fungi residues accounted for 60% and 20% respectively), which had a high proportion of H2O-Pi and organic Residual-P pool and led to the highest leaf phosphorus content of C. mollissima.

Peptide nucleic acids (PNAs) patterning by an automated microarray synthesis system through photolithography.

Peptide nucleic acids (PNA) microarray assembled with hundreds of unique PNA oligomers has been regarded as a new and mighty competitor of DNA chip in gene analyzing. However, PNA microarray is still a luxury art due to the difficult and laborious chemical synthesis. Herein, we have developed a fully-automated synthesizer for PNA microarray through photolithography. A preactivation mixer was designed and integrated into the synthesizer in order to get rid of the annoying manual process and increase the coupling efficiency of PNA monomers. The PNA patterning model was carried out to check the performance of the automated synthesizer, revealing that an exposure time of 3 min was sufficient for the complete removal of o-nitroveratryloxycarbonyl (NVOC) groups from the synthetic sites with the help of photosensitizer isopropylthioxanthone and the stepwise yield was measured to be about 98.0%, which is comparable with that from conventional fluorenyl-methyloxycarbonyl (FMOC) chemistry. Those results have definitely demonstrated the possibility and capability of this fully-automated synthesizer to fabricate high-quality PNA microarrays.

[Research progress on chemical constituents of Laggera plants in China].

Laggera plants are traditionally used as folk medicine to treat bacterial infection, inflammation and fever in China. Three species, Laggera alata, L. intermedia and L. pterodonta, grow in China. Modem clinical studies show that L. pterodonta is a good medicine against inflammation. More than 100 compounds were obtained from these plants. In order to assist in medicinal application of this species of plants, progresses made in this field are systemically reviewed in this article.

Phenolic compounds from Anaphalis aureo-punctata.

From the ethanolic extract of the whole plant of Anaphalis aureo-punctata, a new acylated flavonoid glycoside 3-O-kaempferol-3-O-acetyl-6-O-(p-coumaroyl)-beta-D-glucopyranoside (1), and five known phenolic compounds were isolated. Their structures were established by spectral methods (UV, IR, MS, 1D, 2D-NMR). The flavonoid glycosides, 1, 2 and 3 showed markedly inhibited oxidative DNA strand breaks induced by Fenton reaction and NADH/PMS in a concentration-dependent manner.

Germacrane sesquiterpene esters from Salvia roborowskii.

From the whole plant of Salvia roborowskii, four new germacrane sesquiterpene esters, 3beta,6beta,8alpha-triacetoxy-4beta,5alpha-epoxy-1-oxogermacr-10(14)-ene, 3beta,6beta,8alpha-triacetoxy-4beta,5alpha-epoxygermacr-1 (10) E-ene, 3beta,6beta,8alpha-triacetoxy-4beta,5alpha:1alpha,10beta-diepoxygermacrane and 6beta-acetoxyglechomafuran were isolated, and their structures were elucidated by spectroscopic methods including 2D NMR techniques (1H-1H COSY and 1H-1H NOESY for 1).

Lupane triterpenoids from Salvia roborowskii Maxim.

A new lupane type triterpenoid, 3beta, 11alpha-dihydroxy-30-norlupan-20-one and 6 known lupane triterpenoids were isolated from the petroleum ether (60-90 degrees C) extract of the whole plant of Salvia roborowskii Maxim. Their structures were elucidated by means of spectral methods including NMR and MS techniques.