Effect of leaf water extracts of four Asteraceae alien invasive plants on germination performance of Lactuca sativa L. under acid deposition

Plant Ecology - Allelopathy of alien invasive plants (AIP) on plant germination performance is essential for their successful invasion. However, the allelopathy of AIP may be reformed or even...     

Allelopathic effects of switchgrass on redroot pigweed and crabgrass growth

Non-native invasive plant species influence plant community composition and competitively eradicate native species. However, there is doubt regarding how global invasive species increase and explosively interfere with native plants. Invasive plants always have strong allelopathic potential. In this study, allelopathic effects of switchgrass on redroot pigweed and crabgrass growth were investigated by field and laboratory experiments. Within a 0.4-m distance of switchgrass, density and shoot biomass of native species were significantly suppressed in the field, with 95.1% and 93.0% inhibition on density of redroot pigweed and crabgrass and with 99.0% and 97.7% inhibition on shoot biomass, respectively, during the third growing season. Significant inhibitory effects on shoot and root biomass were observed at the 5:5 (switchgrass–native species) proportion in glass bottles, by 41.57% and 51.21% for shoot and root biomass of redroot pigweed and by 33.42% and 56.95% for shoot and root biomass of crabgrass, respectively. Results of a glass bottle experiment showed that shoot and root biomass of redroot pigweed and crabgrass could be significantly inhibited by contact with switchgrass root. Results of a Petri dish experiment showed that aqueous extracts of switchgrass significantly inhibited germination process of both species at high concentrations, with 90.74% and 18.62% inhibition on germination rate and plumule length of redroot pigweed and with 63.59%, 16.38%, and 19.92% inhibition on germination rate, plumule, and radicle lengths of crabgrass, respectively, at the concentration of 0.1 g·mL^?1. This report demonstrated that switchgrass had allelopathic effects on redroot pigweed and crabgrass growth.

     

Circular RNAs acting as ceRNAs mediated by miRNAs may be involved in the synthesis of soybean fatty acids

Functional & Integrative Genomics - Soybean oil is composed of fatty acids and glycerol. The content and composition of fatty acids partly determine the quality of soybean seeds. Circular RNAs...     

PRPF6 promotes androgen receptor/androgen receptor-variant 7 actions in castration-resistant prostate cancer cells

Androgen receptor (AR) and its variants play vital roles in development and progression of prostate cancer. To clarify the mechanisms involved in the enhancement of their actions would be crucial for understanding the process in prostate cancer and castration-resistant prostate cancer transformation. Here, we provided the evidence to show that pre-mRNA processing factor 6 (PRPF6) acts as a key regulator for action of both AR full length (AR-FL) and AR variant 7 (AR-V7), thereby participating in the enhancement of AR-FL and AR-V7-induced transactivation in prostate cancer. In addition, PRPF6 is recruited to cis-regulatory elements in AR target genes and associates with JMJD1A to enhance AR-induced transactivation. PRPF6 also promotes expression of AR-FL and AR-V7. Moreover, PRPF6 depletion reduces tumor growth in prostate cancer-derived cell lines and results in significant suppression of xenograft tumors even under castration condition in mouse model. Furthermore, PRPF6 is obviously highly expressed in human prostate cancer samples. Collectively, our results suggest PRPF6 is involved in enhancement of oncogenic AR signaling, which support a previously unknown role of PRPF6 during progression of prostate cancer and castration-resistant prostate cancers.     

The involvement of α-proteobacteria Phenylobacterium in maintaining the dominance of toxic Microcystis blooms in Lake Taihu,China

Lake Taihu in China has suffered serious harmful cyanobacterial blooms for decades. The algal blooms threaten the ecological sustainability, drinking water safety, and human health. Although the roles of abiotic factors (such as water temperature and nutrient loading) in promoting Microcystis blooms have been well studied, the importance of biotic factors (e.g. bacterial community) in promoting and meditating Microcystis blooms remains unclear. In this study, we investigated the ecological dynamics of bacterial community, the ratio of toxic Microcystis, as well as microcystin in Lake Taihu. High-throughput 16S rRNA sequencing and principal component analysis (PCA) revealed that the bacteria community compositions (BCCs) clustered into three groups, the partitioning of which corresponded to that of groups according to the toxic profiles (the ratio of toxic Microcystis to total Microcystis, and the microcystin concentrations) of the samples. Further Spearman's correlation network showed that the α-proteobacteria Phenylobacterium strongly positively correlated with the toxic profiles. Subsequent laboratory chemostats experiments demonstrated that three Phenylobacterium strains promoted the dominance of the toxic Microcystis aeruginosa PCC7806 when co-culturing with the non-toxic PCC7806 mcyB⁻ mutant. Taken together, our data suggested that the α-proteobacteria Phenylobacterium may play a vital role in the maintenance of toxic Microcystis dominance in Lake Taihu.     

Dynamically Tunable Plasmon-induced Transparency in a T-shaped Cavity Waveguide Based on Bulk Dirac Semimetals

We propose a dynamically tunable surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs) waveguide system based on bulk Dirac semimetals (BDS) containing only a side-coupled T-shaped cavity. Plasmon-induced transparency (PIT) is achieved in the terahertz band by introducing a position offset. We have analytically investigated the spectral characteristics of PIT in this system, indicating that the larger the position offset, the higher the peak of the PIT window. The spectrum responses of PIT system can be flexibly regulated via transforming the geometric parameters of the structure. At the same time, it is particularly sensitive to the refractive index of the surrounding medium, which is promising for sensing devices. In addition, the resonance frequency and peak transmission can be actively adjusted by controlling the Fermi energy of the BDS without reconstructing the geometric structure. Moreover, the optical delay time near the PIT peak reaches 11.001 ps, which has good slow-light characteristics and is a candidate in the field of slow-light equipment. The structure we designed may have potential application value in the design of SPPs light-guide devices.

     

MiR-467a-5p aggravates myocardial infarction by modulating ZEB1 expression in mice

Journal of Molecular Histology - Myocardial infarction (MI) is a great threat to patients all over the word. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a group of non-coding RNAs and can regulate initiation and...     

格氏栲天然林林窗植物物种多样性与系统发育多样性

林窗环境异质性导致群落物种多样性与系统发育多样性(phylogenetic diversity, PD)存在差异, 研究不同大小的林窗中群落的物种多样性与系统发育多样性有助于揭示林下生物多样性的形成及维持机制。本文以格氏栲(Castanopsis kawakamii)天然林为研究对象, 通过Pearson相关性分析与广义线性模型探讨了林窗内物种多样性与系统发育多样性间的相互关系及其环境影响因素。结果表明: (1)大林窗(面积 > 200 m²)植物种类及多度均高于中林窗(50 m² ≤ 面积 < 100 m²)、小林窗(30 m² ≤ 面积 < 50 m²)和非林窗(面积 = 100 m²)。大林窗群落系统发育结构趋于发散, 中、小林窗和非林窗群落系统发育结构受到生境过滤和竞争排斥综合作用。(2)群落系统发育多样性指数与物种丰富度(species richness, SR)、Margalef丰富度指数和Shannon-Wiener指数均呈显著正相关, 这与林窗内稀有种种类组成多于优势种有关。(3)林窗面积对物种多样性存在显著正效应; 土壤全氮含量对系统发育多样性和系统发育结构存在显著正效应。林窗形成提高了格氏栲天然林群落物种多样性和系统发育多样性, 林窗面积与土壤全氮共同驱动了格氏栲天然林林窗物种多样性和系统发育多样性的变化。     

肝硬化合并结核病患者的临床特征

目的分析肝硬化合并结核病患者的临床特征,为该类患者的治疗提供参考。方法回顾性分析2014年9月至2017年7月于浙江大学医学院附属第一医院住院的肝硬化合并结核病患者的相关资料,总结患者的临床特征。结果共收治68例肝硬化合并结核病患者,其中男性50例(73.5%),女性18例(26.5%),平均年龄(59.9±13.7)岁。在所有患者中,肝硬化最常见的原因是HBV感染(46例,67.7%)和酒精(9例,13.2%)。肺结核(43例)、结核性腹膜炎(13例)、结核性胸膜炎(12例)是最常见的结核类型,此外骨关节结核、结核性脑膜炎、结核性心包炎、泌尿系结核、肠结核、淋巴结结核均可见。该类患者常见临床表现为乏力、腹胀,出现发热的患者不足半数,有盗汗表现的更为罕见。结论肝硬化患者并发结核后可使病情复杂化,增加治疗难度。此外部分患者临床表现不典型,需提高警惕,避免漏诊。