Impacts of high-quality coal mine drainage recycling for replenishment of aquatic ecosystems in arid regions of China: Bacterial community responses.

Coal mine water is usually recycled as supplementary water for aquatic ecosystems in arid and semiarid mining regions of China. To ensure ecosystem health, the coal mine water is rigorously treated using several processes, including reverse osmosis, to meet surface water quality standards. However, the potential environmental impacts of this management pattern on the ecological function of receiving water bodies are unclear. In this study, we built several microcosm water ecosystems to simulate the receiving water bodies. High-quality treated coal mine drainage was mixed into the model water bodies at different concentrations, and the sediment bacterial community response and functional changes were systematically investigated. The results showed that the high-quality coal mine drainage could still shape bacterial taxonomic diversity, community composition and structure, with a concentration threshold of approximately 50%. Moreover, both the Mantel test and the structural equation model indicated that the salinity fluctuation caused by the receiving of coal mine drainage was the primary factor shaping the bacterial communities. 10 core taxa in the molecular ecological network influenced by coal mine drainage were identified, with the most critical taxa being patescibacteria and g_Geothermobacter. Furthermore, the pathway of carbohydrate metabolism as well as signaling molecules and interactions was up-regulated, whereas amino acid metabolism showed the opposite trend. All results suggested that the complex physical-chemical and biochemical processes in water ecosystems may be affected by the coal mine drainage. The bacterial community response and underlying functional changes may accelerate internal nutrient cycling, which may have a potential impact on algal bloom outbreaks.

The side effects of local government debt: Evidence from urban investment bonds and corporate pollution in China.

Local government debt plays a vital role in achieving financial financialization and regional economic growth. However, the environmental side effects of the debt-financed infrastructure development model have received little attention. Using a large panel data of Chinese enterprises from 2007 to 2016, we explored the relationship between local government debt in terms of urban investment bonds and corporate pollution emission. We observe that the increase in local government debt exaggerates the intensity of COD emission, equal to 26% of the average. This pollution-promoting effect remains after a series of robust checks. In heterogeneous analysis, local government debt is more likely to affect enterprises located in coastal areas, from pollution intensive industry, operating in regions with weak fiscal strength and operating in regions with low governance quality. The mechanistic exploration from government environmental governance and financial constraint reveals that the local government debt increases corporate pollution when the local fiscal finance emphasizes economy over environmental governance, which has been alleviated after the central government advocates the construction of an environmentally friendly and resource-saving society; An increase of corporate pollution is also possible when local government debt increases the financing constraints of enterprises. We also unveil the source of corporate pollution, and find that if enterprises do not actively adopt environmental strategies either in terms of "end-of-pipe" or "source prevention", they choose to emit more to face with the onslaught of local debt. This study uncovers the environmental impacts of government debt, and explores the potential mechanisms, which can help reduce pollution from local government debt and achieve global climate governance.

The inequality of city-level energy efficiency for China.

This paper proposes a new methodology for measuring energy efficiency inequality based on the Shephard energy distance function and the "double" stochastic meta-frontier. To incorporate the regional inequality, we use three different grouping criteria, geography, city features, and strategic development goals. We also explore whether the different city grouping criteria can influence the energy efficiency. A panel data of 284 cities in China from 2003 to 2013 is used for empirical analysis. The results indicate that the regional heterogeneity has significant impact on the energy efficiency. We find that different grouping criteria affect energy efficiency, especially, the urban feature criteria. These results highlight the importance of choosing a proper grouping criteria in meta-frontier energy efficiency analysis.

A new age-related cutoff of medial temporal atrophy scale on MRI improving the diagnostic accuracy of neurodegeneration due to Alzheimer's disease in a Chinese population.

BACKGROUND: Visual rating scales are still the most popular tools in assessing atrophy degrees of whole brain and lobes. However, the false negative rate of the previous cutoff score of visual rating scales was relatively high for detecting dementia of Alzheimer's type (DAT). This study aimed to evaluate the diagnostic value of new cutoffs of visual rating scales on magnetic resonance imaging for discriminating DAT in a Chinese population. METHODS: Out of 585 enrolled subjects, 296 participants were included and diagnosed as normal cognition (NC)(n = 87), 138 diagnosed as amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI), and 71 as dementia of Alzheimer's type (DAT). Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analyses were used to calculate the diagnostic value of visual rating sales (including medial temporal atrophy (MTA), posterior atrophy rating scale (PA),global cortical atrophy scale (GCA) and medial temporal-lobe atrophy index (MTAi))for detecting NC from DAT . RESULTS: Scores of MTA correlated to age and Mini-mental state examination score. When used to detect DAT from NC, the MTA showed highest diagnostic value than other scales, and when the cutoff score of 1.5 of MTA scale, it obtained an optimal sensitivity (84.5%) and specificity (79.1%) respectively, with a 15.5% of false negative rate. Cutoff scores and diagnostic values were calculated stratified by age. For the age ranges 50-64, 65-74, 75-84 years, the following cut-offs of MTA should be used, ≥1.0(sensitivity and specificity were 92.3 and 68.4%), ≥1.5(sensitivity and specificity were 90.4 and 85.2%), ≥ 2.0(sensitivity and specificity were 70.8 and 82.3%) respectively. All of the scales showed relatively lower diagnostic values for discriminating aMCI from NC. CONCLUSIONS: The new age-based MTA cutoff showed better diagnostic accuracy for detecting DAT than previous standard, the list of practical cut-offs proposed here might be useful in clinical practice.

Evaluation of Physicochemical Properties and Prebiotics Function of a Bioactive Pleurotus eryngii Aqueous Extract Powder Obtained by Spray Drying.

A bioactive Pleurotus eryngii aqueous extract powder (SPAE) was obtained by spray drying and its performance in terms of physicochemical properties, in vitro digestion, inflammatory factors, and modulation of the intestinal microbiota was explored. The results indicated that the SPAE exhibited a more uniform particle size distribution than P. eryngii polysaccharide (PEP). Meanwhile, a typical absorption peak observed at 843 cm-1 in the SPAE FTIR spectra indicated the existence of α-glycosidic bonds. SPAE exhibited higher antioxidant abilities and superior resistance to digestion in vitro. In addition, SPAE supplementation to mice significantly reduced the release of factors that promote inflammation, enhanced the secretion of anti-inflammatory factors, and sustained maximum production of short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs). Additionally, it significantly enhanced the relative abundance of SCFAs-producing Akkermansia and reduced the abundance of Ruminococcus and Clostridiides in intestines of mice. These results show the potential of SPAE as a novel material with prebiotic effects for the food and pharmaceutical industries.

High-proportions of tailwater discharge alter microbial community composition and assembly in receiving sediments.

The tailwater from wastewater treatment plants serves as an important water resource in arid regions, alleviating the conflict between supply and demand. However, the effects of different tailwater discharge proportions on microbial community dynamics remain unclear. In this study, we investigated the effects of different tailwater discharge proportions on the water quality and microbial community characteristics of sediments in receiving water bodies under controlled conditions (WF-1, WF-2, WF-3, WF-4, and WF-5, containing 0% tailwater + 100% natural water, 25% tailwater + 75% natural water, 50% tailwater + 50% natural water, 75% tailwater + 25% natural water, and 100% tailwater + 0% natural water, respectively). Microbial co-occurrence networks and structural equation model were used to unveil the relationship between microbial communities and their shaping factors. Results showed that distinct microbial community compositions were found in the sediments with low- (< 50%) and high- (> 50%) proportions of tailwater. Specifically, WCHB1-41 and g_4-29-1, which are involved in organic degradation-related functions, were the key genera in the high-proportion cluster. A total of 21 taxa were more abundant in the low-proportion (< 50%) cluster than that in high-proportion (> 50%). Moreover, higher modularity was observed in the low-proportion. Total phosphorus directly affected while ammonia nitrogen indirectly affected the microbial community structure. Our findings support the distinct heterogeneity of microbial communities driven by tailwater discharge in receiving water bodies, and further confirmed that high-proportion tailwater depletes sensitive microbial communities, which may be avoided through scientific management.

Kaempferol efficacy in metabolic diseases: Molecular mechanisms of action in diabetes mellitus, obesity, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, steatohepatitis, and atherosclerosis.

The incidence of metabolic diseases has progressively increased, which has a negative impact on human health and life safety globally. Due to the good efficacy and limited side effects, there is growing interest in developing effective drugs to treat metabolic diseases from natural compounds. Kaempferol (KMP), an important flavonoid, exists in many vegetables, fruits, and traditional medicinal plants. Recently, KMP has received widespread attention worldwide due to its good potential in the treatment of metabolic diseases. To promote the basic research and clinical application of KMP, this review provides a timely and comprehensive summary of the pharmacological advances of KMP in the treatment of four metabolic diseases and its potential molecular mechanisms of action, including diabetes mellitus, obesity, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD)/nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), and atherosclerosis. According to the research, KMP shows remarkable therapeutic effects on metabolic diseases by regulating multiple signaling transduction pathways such as NF-κB, Nrf2, AMPK, PI3K/AKT, TLR4, and ER stress. In addition, the most recent literature on KMP's natural source, pharmacokinetics studies, as well as toxicity and safety are also discussed in this review, thus providing a foundation and evidence for further studies to develop novel and effective drugs from natural compounds. Collectively, our manuscript strongly suggested that KMP could be a promising candidate for the treatment of metabolic diseases.

Measurement of local government green governance efficiency based on total waste emissions and PM2.5 concentration: Evidence from China.

The problem of environmental pollution is becoming more and more prominent. Making ecological governance take an effective and sustainable development path has become a complex problem for countries to think about. The proposal of green governance provides new ideas for governments to manage enterprises and local environmental governance. The DEA method is commonly used to measure the effectiveness of environmental governance, but the traditional DEA method ignores environmental factors and management factors, and the measurement error is significant. Therefore, this paper introduces the total waste discharge and PM2.5 average concentration and other unexpected outputs, using the three-stage DEA model and three-stage DEA Malmquist index model, creatively constructing the green governance measurement index system, which measures and evaluates the green governance efficiency of 30 provinces in China from 2004 to 2019 from static and dynamic perspectives. The research results show that the efficiency value obtained by the three-stage DEA model is higher than the first stage, which confirms that the external environmental factors have a specific impact on the GGE. At the same time, the comprehensive technical efficiency value presents a "U"-shaped trend with time. From the perspective of sub-regions, there is heterogeneity in the efficiency values between regions, showing a decreasing trend of "east, west, and middle." From the efficiency decomposition results, the main reason for the negative growth rate of GGE is the low efficiency of technological progress, which provides targeted suggestions for governance in various regions of China. This study will help provinces prepare to strengthen investment in technological innovation, maximize the benefits of input and output, and promote green and sustainable development.

Does institutional quality affect air pollution?

As environmental pollution brings a series of problems to society and residential lives, how to effectively reduce air pollution and control climate change have become urgent problems. Since institutional quality is an important factor affecting air quality, we evaluated the causal relationship between them based on cross-country panel data from 2000 to 2016. We find that the improvement of institutional quality significantly reduces [Formula: see text], and this pollution reduction effect is obvious in high-income countries and in countries with common laws. Furthermore, under the components of institutional quality, the quality of government regulation, the degree of rule of law, corruption control, and government effectiveness have significant emission reduction effects. To explore how institutional quality affects air pollution, we perform mechanism analysis from the perspective of economic development, foreign trade, and technology progress. We further verify three environmental propositions including the Environmental Kuznets Curve, the Pollution Paradise Hypothesis, and Porter Hypothesis. Results show that the pollution reduction effect of institutional quality can be mediated by economic development rate, foreign direct investment, and technological progress. The Environmental Kuznets Curve exists, the Pollution Paradise Hypothesis is validated in countries with lower institutional quality level, and the improvement of the institutional quality can achieve the Porter Effect through technological progress.

Physicochemical properties and in vitro digestion behavior of a new bioactive Tremella fuciformis gum.

A new easy-dissolved Tremella fuciformis gum (TFG) from fruiting body was investigated in detail from three aspects: physicochemical characteristics, rheological behavior and in vitro digestion behavior. The results showed that TFG consisted of 73.9% polysaccharides, exhibiting easy solubility in water and good colloidal characteristics and stability. The physical and chemical treatments could decrease the apparent viscosity of TFG solution. The antioxidation activity of TFG remained constant at each static in vitro digestion phase, revealing that this gum could be used as a potential food thickener and antioxidant. The digestion behavior of TFG was also determined using a dynamic in vitro digestive system, DIVRS-II. The results demonstrated that the digestion behavior of TFG should be attributed to the morphology of digestive tracts, continuous secreting and continuous emptying. The antitussive effect of TFG was related to the increase in serum IL-10 content.

Urbanization and energy intensity: evidence from the institutional threshold effect.

This research, which considers the rapid growth of urbanization and the concerns about energy security, analyzes the effect of urbanization on energy intensity by using the panel data of 72 countries between 2000 and 2014. The impact of institutional quality on the relationship between urbanization and energy intensity is also evaluated on the basis of a panel threshold model. Results suggest that the increase in urbanization leads to higher energy intensity. However, this positive effect of urbanization on energy intensity can be weakened by 0.033 when the institutional quality exceeds the threshold value. The positive mediating effect of institutional quality comprises approximately 31.37% of the total effect. Furthermore, the institutional threshold effect varies across country income and energy types, and it promotes more energy reduction and less energy consumption in OECD and non-OECD groups, respectively. The institutional threshold effect is only significant for fossil energy group but not for the renewable energy group.

Sustainability drivers in road transportation system: Evidence from China.

This research explores the sustainability drivers of the Chinese road transportation system in terms of its cargo and environmental productivity levels. A novel Fuzzy Double-Frontier Network Data Envelopment Analysis (FDFNDEA) model is proposed to investigate the relationship between desirable (freight and passenger turnovers) and undesirable (CO2 and NOx emission levels) outputs against the respective power consumed in each one of the 29 Chinese provinces (municipalities and autonomous regions) between 1985 and 2017. The power consumption emerges spatially and temporally as a consequence of the evolution of the road system's productive resources (employees, highway length, number of vehicles, and fuel consumed) at the province level over the course of time. Shannon's entropy is used as the cornerstone to quantify input and output vagueness of this evolution in terms of triangular fuzzy numbers (TFN), thus allowing the building of alternative optimistic and pessimistic double efficiency frontiers. Respective Malmquist Productivity Indexes (MPI) for overall and each stage productivity are regressed against contextual variables related to demography, economic activity, competitor infrastructure, and highway quality using bootstrapped Cauchy regressions. Results confirm the disruptive evolution of the Chinese road transport system over the course of the years and different expansion strategies at the regions. The energy and environmental efficiency of the Chinese road transportation system is affected by these contextual variables.

High-level production of short branched-chain fatty acids from waste materials by genetically modified Bacillus licheniformis.

Short branched-chain fatty acids (SBCFAs) are multi-functional platform chemicals used in many fields. Currently, SBCFAs are produced mainly by chemical synthesis, which is high cost and lead to environmental pollution. The aim of this study was to achieve high-level production of SBCFAs from waste materials, bean dreg and crude glycerol. The Bacillus licheniformis DWc9n∗ was genetically modified by overexpression of SBCFAs synthesis genes via replacement of native promoter of bkd operon, the mutant strain DWc9n∗-PbacA produced 4.68 g/L of SBCFAs, increasing by 1.98-fold compared to wild-type strain. SBCFAs concentration was further increased to 7.85 g/L through process optimization. In a 5-L batch fermenter, the mutant showed SBCFAs production with high concentration (8.37 g/L) and productivity (0.20 g/L/h), which is the highest level of SBCFAs production based on low-value substrates fermentation. This is the first study describing efficient SBCFAs production by the modified B. licheniformis strain from bean dreg and crude glycerol.