CELLULASE6 and MANNANASE7 affect cell differentiation and silique dehiscence in Arabidopsis

Cellulases, hemicellulases and pectinases play important roles in fruit development and maturation, but mutants with defects in the fruit have not been reported for cellulase or hemicellulase genes. Here we report the functional characterization of cellulase gene CEL6 and hemicellulase gene MAN7 in silique development and dehiscence in Arabidopsis. These genes were found to be expressed in vegetative and reproductive organs, and their expression in the silique partially depended on the IND and ALC transcriptional factors. Mutant alleles of cel6 and man7 exhibited delayed secondary cell wall thickening and altered cell morphology in the valve margin and impaired silique dehiscence. Cells in the separation layer in nearly mature siliques of the single mutants and the cel6-1 man7-3 double mutant remained intact whereas they degenerated in the wild-type control. Phenotypic studies of single, double, triple and quadruple mutants revealed that the higher-order mutant combinations of the cel6-1, man7-3, and pectinase adpg1-1 and adpg2- 1 mutations produced more severe silique indehiscent phenotypes than the corresponding lower-order mutant combinations, except for some combinations involving cel6-1, man7-3, and adpg2-1. Our results demonstrate that the ability of the silique to dehisce can be manipulated to different degrees by altering the activities of proteins of different types.Plant Biology, Ecology and Evolutio

Spatiotemporal features of microsporogenesis in the cycad species Macrozamia communis

Plant Biology, Ecology and Evolutio

Three-dimensional Isotropic Droplets in Rydberg-dressed Bose Gases

We predict a scheme for the creation of isotropic three-dimensional droplets in Rydbeg-dressed Bose gases, which contain both repulsive contact interactions and attractive van der Waals interactions causing the quantum fluctuation effect non-negligible. We present detailed beyond mean-field calculations with Lee-Huang-Yang correction and demonstrate the existence of isotropic droplets under realistic experimental conditions. Stable droplets possess flat-top density distribution, and their chemical potentials decrease with the particle number expansion towarding a critical value. We distinguish droplets from bright solitons through peak density, width of condensate and quantum depletion calculations. We summarize a phase diagram of realizing droplets, and subsequently highlight the stability of droplets by real time evolution as well as collisions. Our work provides a novel platform for investigating excitation spectrum and superfluid nature of droplets

Tetra­aqua­bis(2-oxo-1,2-dihydro­quinoline-4-carboxyl­ato-κO 4)nickel(II)

In the title compound, [Ni(C10H6NO3)2(H2O)4], the central NiII atom is located on an inversion center and coordinated in a slightly distorted octa­hedral geometry by two O atoms from two 2-oxo-1,2-dihydro­quinoline-4-carboxyl­ate ligands and four water mol­ecules, all of which act as monodentate ligands. The crystal structure features an extensive network of inter­molecular hydrogen-bonding inter­actions (O—H⋯O and N—H⋯O) and offset face-to-face π–π stacking inter­actions [centroid–centroid distances = 3.525 (3) and 3.281 (5) Å]

(Z)-Methyl 3-(2,4-dichloro­phen­yl)-3-hy­droxy­acrylate

The mol­ecular structure of the title compound, C10H8Cl2O3, exists in a cis-enol form, which is stabilized by a strong intra­molecular O—H⋯O hydrogen bond. In the crystal, C—H⋯O inter­actions generate zigzag chains along the c axis which are, in turn, linked by further C—H⋯O inter­actions into sheets parallel to (100)

Sintered silver finite element modelling and reliability based design optimisation in power electronic module

This paper discusses the design for reliability of a sintered silver structure in a power electronic module based on the computational approach that composed of high fidelity analysis, reduced order modelling, numerical risk analysis, and optimisation. The methodology was demonstrated on sintered silver interconnect sandwiched between silicon carbide chip and copper substrate in a power electronic module. In particular, sintered silver reliability due to thermal fatigue material degradation is one of the main concerns. Thermo-mechanical behaviour of the power module sintered silver joint structure is simulated by finite element analysis for cyclic temperature loading profile in order to capture the strain distribution. The discussion was on methods for approximate reduced order modelling based on interpolation techniques using Kriging and radial basis functions. The reduced order modelling approach uses prediction data for the thermo-mechanical behaviour. The fatigue lifetime of the sintered silver interconnect and the warpage of the interconnect layer was particular interest in this study. The reduced order models were used for the analysis of the effect of design uncertainties on the reliability of the sintered silver layer. To assess the effect of uncertain design data, a method for estimating the variation of reliability related metrics namely Latin Hypercube sampling was utilised. The product capability indices are evaluated from the distributions fitted to the histogram resulting from Latin Hypercube sampling technique. A reliability based design optimisation was demonstrated using Particle Swarm Optimisation algorithm for constraint optimisation task consists of optimising two different characteristic performance metrics such as the thermo-mechanical plastic strain accumulation per cycle on the sintered layer and the thermally induced warpage

Reduction of foodborne pathogens during cattle manure composting with addition of calcium cyanamide

Inactivation of four species of foodborne pathogens (E. coli, Salmonella, E. faecalis, and S. aureus) was investigated during laboratory-scale composting of fresh cow manure with addition of calcium cyanamide (CaCN2) at constant temperature conditions, and the effects of temperature and additive content of CaCN2 on the efficacy of inactivation were evaluated. At different composting temperatures (20, 30, 37 and 50 °C), a significant inhibition or quick inactivation of pathogens were observed during 10 d composting with addition of 2.0% CaCN2, and the effect was more obvious at mesophilic temperatures compared to thermophilic temperature. Therefore, the ideal additive content of CaCN2 was determined at 30 °C through mixing 2.0%, 2.5%, and 3.0% CaCN2 with manure. With increase in additive content of CaCN2, the efficacies of pathogen inactivation also increased. However, the result indicates that, no less than 2.5% CaCN2 should be mixed with the manure to entirely eliminate the pathogens during composting

Neuropeptide Y-mediated sex- and afferent-specific neurotransmissions contribute to sexual dimorphism of baroreflex afferent function

BACKGROUND: Molecular and cellular mechanisms of neuropeptide-Y (NPY)-mediated gender-difference in blood pressure (BP) regulation are largely unknown. METHODS: Baroreceptor sensitivity (BRS) was evaluated by measuring the response of BP to phenylephrine/nitroprusside. Serum NPY concentration was determined using ELISA. The mRNA and protein expression of NPY receptors were assessed in tissue and single-cell by RT-PCR, immunoblot, and immunohistochemistry. NPY was injected into the nodose while arterial pressure was monitored. Electrophysiological recordings were performed on nodose neurons from rats by patch-clamp technique. RESULTS: The BRS was higher in female than male and ovariectomized rats, while serum NPY concentration was similar among groups. The sex-difference was detected in Y1R, not Y2R protein expression, however, both were upregulated upon ovariectomy and canceled by estrogen replacement. Immunostaining confirmed Y1R and Y2R expression in myelinated and unmyelinated afferents. Single-cell PCR demonstrated that Y1R expression/distribution was identical between A- and C-types, whereas, expressed level of Y2R was ~15 and ~7 folds higher in Ah- and C-types than A-types despite similar distribution. Activation of Y1R in nodose elevated BP, while activation of Y2R did the opposite. Activation of Y1R did not alter action potential duration (APD) of A-types, but activation of Y2R- and Y1R/Y2R in Ah- and C-types frequency-dependently prolonged APD. N-type ICa was reduced in A-, Ah- and C-types when either Y1R, Y2R, or both were activated. The sex-difference in Y1R expression was also observed in NTS. CONCLUSIONS: Sex- and afferent-specific expression of Neuropeptide-Y receptors in baroreflex afferent pathway may contribute to sexual-dimorphic neurocontrol of BP regulation

Cationic Polystyrene Resolves Nonalcoholic Steatohepatitis, Obesity, and Metabolic Disorders by Promoting Eubiosis of Gut Microbiota and Decreasing Endotoxemia.

A pandemic of metabolic diseases, consisting of type 2 diabetes, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, and obesity, has imposed critical challenges for societies worldwide, prompting investigation of underlying mechanisms and exploration of low-cost and effective treatment. In this report, we demonstrate that metabolic disorders in mice generated by feeding with a high-fat diet without dietary vitamin D can be prevented by oral administration of polycationic amine resin. Oral administration of cholestyramine, but not the control uncharged polystyrene, was able to sequester negatively charged bacterial endotoxin in the gut, leading to 1) reduced plasma endotoxin levels, 2) resolved systemic inflammation and hepatic steatohepatitis, and 3) improved insulin sensitivity. Gut dysbiosis, characterized as an increase of the phylum Firmicutes and a decrease of Bacteroidetes and Akkermansia muciniphila, was fully corrected by cholestyramine, indicating that the negatively charged components in the gut are critical for the dysbiosis. Furthermore, fecal bacteria transplant, derived from cholestyramine-treated animals, was sufficient to antagonize the metabolic disorders of the recipient mice. These results indicate that the negatively charged components produced by dysbiosis are critical for biogenesis of metabolic disorders and also show a potential application of cationic polystyrene to treat metabolic disorders through promoting gut eubiosis

Multiscale Combined Model Based on Run-Length-Judgment Method and Its Application in Oil Price Forecasting

Forecasting of oil price is an important area of energy market research. Based on the idea of decomposition-reconstruction-integration, this paper built a new multiscale combined forecasting model with the methods of empirical mode decomposition (EMD), artificial neural network (ANN), support vector machine (SVM), and time series methods. While building the model, we proposed a new idea to use run length judgment method to reconstruct the component sequences. Then this model was applied to analyze the fluctuation and trend of international oil price. Oil price series was decomposed and reconstructed into high frequency, medium frequency, low frequency, and trend sequences. Different features of fluctuation can be explained by irregular factors, season factors, major events, and long-term trend. Empirical analysis showed that the multiscale combined model obtained the best forecasting result compared with single models including ARIMA, Elman, SVM, and GARCH and combined models including ARIMA-SVM model and EMD-SVM-SVM method