Characteristics of the coal quality and elemental geochemistry in Permian coals from the Xinjier mine in the Huainan Coalfield, north China: Influence of terrigenous inputs

Fifty-six coals along with host rocks of Permian age (including samples from the Shanxi Formation, Lower Shihezi Formation and Upper Shihezi Formation) collected from the active Xinjier mine in the Huainan Coalfield, north China were studied in the present work. The overall object of this study was to characterize the coal quality and elucidate the possible genetic types for trace-element enrichment of Xinjier coals. Based on Chinese National Standards, all the coals can be classified as medium-high-volatile to high-volatile coal and ultra-low sulfur to low sulfur coal. The vitrinite-dominated Xinjier coals show phyiso-chemical properties difference along the coal-bearing strata. Compared to the coals of the Shanxi Formation, vitrinite contents are elevated in the coals of the Lower Shihezi and Upper Shihezi Formations, which indicates that they were probably exposed to a more reducing environment during peat accumulation. Most elements, such as Al2O3, K2O, Y, Se, and Sb, are enriched compared to those of Chinese and World coals. The major-element oxides Al2O3 and K2O as well as trace elements Th and Y increase from the lower to upper seams. Some elements are distinctly concentrated in host rocks (roof, floor, and parting) compared with adjacent coals. These geochemical anomalies and &quot;increasing stratigraphically upward&quot; ash yield trend are attributed to influence from terrigenous inputs. Elements in Xinjier coals were classified into three geochemical groups based on the statistical analysis. In particular, sequential extraction experiments of selected coals found that As, Se, and Sb predominantly occur as organic associations in coal.</p

Isolation and Characterization of New 24 Microsatellite DNA Markers for Golden Cuttlefish (Sepia esculenta)

Twenty-four microsatellite DNA markers were isolated and characterized for golden cuttlefish (Sepia esculenta) from a (GT)13—enriched genomic library. Loci were tested in 48 individuals from Jiaozhou bay of China. The numbers of alleles per locus ranged from two to 25 with an average of 10.3. The observed and expected heterozygosities ranged from 0.063 to 0.896 and from 0.137 to 0.953, with averages of 0.519 and 0.633, respectively. Six loci significantly deviated from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium after Bonferroni’s correction and no significant linkage disequilibrium between loci pairs was detected. These microsatellite markers would be useful for analyzing the population genetic structure to make conservation and management decisions for S. esculenta

CI431, an Aqueous Compound from Ciona intestinalis L., Induces Apoptosis through a Mitochondria-Mediated Pathway in Human Hepatocellular Carcinoma Cells

In the present studies, a novel compound with potent anti-tumor activity from Ciona intestinalis L. was purified by acetone fractionation, ultrafiltration, gel chromatography and High Performance Liquid Chromatography. The molecular weight of the highly purified compound, designated CI431, was 431Da as determined by HPLC-MS analysis. CI431 exhibited significant cytotoxicity to several cancer cell types. However, only a slight inhibitory effect was found when treating the benign human liver cell line BEL-7702 with the compound. To explore its mechanism against hepatocellular carcinoma, BEL-7402 cells were treated with CI431 in vitro. We found that CI431 induced apoptotic death in BEL-7402 cells in a dose- and time-dependent manner. Cell cycle analysis demonstrated that CI431 caused cell cycle arrest at the G2/M phase, and a sub-G1 peak appeared after 24 h. The mitochondrial-mediated pathway was implicated in this CI431-induced apoptosis as evidenced by the disruption of mitochondrial membrane potential. The results suggest that the CI431 induces apoptosis in BEL-7402 human hepatoma cells by intrinsic mitochondrial pathway

Identification and characterization of the expression profile of microRNAs in Anopheles anthropophagus

BACKGROUND: Anopheles anthropophagus, one of the most important mosquito-borne disease vectors in Asia, mainly takes blood meals from humans and transmits both malaria and filariae. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small non-coding RNAs, and play a critical role in many cellular processes, including development, differentiation, apoptosis and innate immunity. METHODS: We investigated the global miRNA expression profile of male and female adults of A. anthropophagus using illumina Hiseq2000 sequencing combined with Northern blot. RESULTS: By using the miRNAs of the closely-related species Anopheles gambiae and Aedes aegypti as reference, we obtained 102 miRNAs candidates out of 12.43 million raw sequencing reads for male and 16.51 million reads for female, with 81 of them found as known miRNAs in An. gambiae and/or Ae. aegypti, and the remaining 21 miRNAs were considered as novel. By analyzing the revised read count of miRNAs in male and female, 29 known miRNAs show sexual difference expression: >2-fold in the read count of the same miRNAs in male and female. Especially for miR-989, which is highly expressed in the female mosquitoes, but shows almost no detected expression in male mosquitoes, indicating that miR-989 may be involved in the physiological activity of female mosquito adults. The expression of four miRNAs in different growth stages of mosquito were further identified by Northern blot. Several miRNAs show the stage-specific expression, of which miR-2943 only expressed in the egg stage, suggesting that miR-2943 may be associated with the development of mosquito eggs. CONCLUSIONS: The present study represents the first global characterization of An. anthropophagus miRNAs in sexual differences and stage-specific functions. A better understanding of the functions of these miRNAs will offer new insights in mosquito biology and has implications for the effective control of mosquito-borne infectious diseases

Small RNA zippers lock miRNA molecules and block miRNA function in mammalian cells.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) loss-of-function phenotypes are mainly induced by chemically modified antisense oligonucleotides. Here we develop an alternative inhibitor for miRNAs, termed \u27small RNA zipper\u27. It is designed to connect miRNA molecules end to end, forming a DNA-RNA duplex through a complementary interaction with high affinity, high specificity and high stability. Two miRNAs, miR-221 and miR-17, are tested in human breast cancer cell lines, demonstrating the 70∼90% knockdown of miRNA levels by 30-50 nM small RNA zippers. The miR-221 zipper shows capability in rescuing the expression of target genes of miR-221 and reversing the oncogenic function of miR-221 in breast cancer cells. In addition, we demonstrate that the miR-221 zipper attenuates doxorubicin resistance with higher efficiency than anti-miR-221 in human breast cancer cells. Taken together, small RNA zippers are a miRNA inhibitor, which can be used to induce miRNA loss-of-function phenotypes and validate miRNA target genes

Canopy Spectral Characterization of Wheat Stripe Rust in Latent Period

Stripe rust, caused by Puccinia striiformis f. sp. tritici (Pst), is one of the important wheat diseases worldwide. In this study, the spectral data were collected from wheat canopy during the latent period inoculated with three different concentrations of urediniospores and classification models based on discriminant partial least squares (DPLS) were built to differentiate leaves with and without infection of the stripe rust pathogen. The effects of different spectra features, wavebands, and the number of the samples used in modeling on the performances of the models were assessed. The results showed that, in the spectral region of 325-1075 nm, the model with the spectral feature of 2nd derivative of Pseudoabsorption index had better accuracy than others. The average accuracy rate was 97.28% for the training set and 92.98% for the testing set. In the waveband of 925-1075 nm, the model with the spectral feature of 1st derivative Pseudoabsorption index had better accuracy than other models, and the average accuracy rates were 98.27% and 94.33% for the training and testing sets, respectively. The results demonstrated that wheat stripe rust in latent period can be qualitatively identified based on the canopy spectral detection. Thus, the method can be used for early monitoring of infections of wheat stripe rust