Drought-Induced Carbon and Water Use Efficiency Responses in Dryland Vegetation of Northern China

Given the context of global warming and the increasing frequency of extreme climate events, concerns have been raised by scientists, government, and the public regarding drought occurrence and its impacts, particularly in arid and semi-arid regions. In this paper, the drought conditions for the forest and grassland areas in the northern region of China were identified based on 12 years of satellite-based Drought Severity Index (DSI) data. The impact of drought on dryland vegetation in terms of carbon use efficiency (CUE) and water use efficiency (WUE) were also investigated by exploring their correlations with DSI. Results indicated that 49.90% of forest and grassland experienced a dry trend over this period. The most severe drought occurred in 2001. In general, most forests in the study regions experienced near normal and wet conditions during the 12 year period. However, grasslands experienced a widespread drought after 2006. The forest CUE values showed a fluctuation increase from 2000 to 2011, whereas the grassland CUE remained steady over this period. In contrast, WUE increased in both forest and grassland areas due to the increasing net primary productivity (NPP) and descending evapotranspiration (ET). The CUE and WUE values of forest areas were more sensitive to droughts when compared to the values for grassland areas. The correlation analysis demonstrated that areas of DSI that showed significant correlations with CUE and WUE were 17.24 and 10.37% of the vegetated areas, respectively. Overall, the carbon and water use of dryland forests was more affected by drought than that of dryland grasslands

Heritability enrichment of immunoglobulin G N-glycosylation in specific tissues

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified over 60 genetic loci associated with immunoglobulin G (IgG) N-glycosylation; however, the causal genes and their abundance in relevant tissues are uncertain. Leveraging data from GWAS summary statistics for 8,090 Europeans, and large-scale expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) data from the genotype-tissue expression of 53 types of tissues (GTEx v7), we derived a linkage disequilibrium score for the specific expression of genes (LDSC-SEG) and conducted a transcriptome-wide association study (TWAS). We identified 55 gene associations whose predicted levels of expression were significantly associated with IgG N-glycosylation in 14 tissues. Three working scenarios, i.e., tissue-specific, pleiotropic, and coassociated, were observed for candidate genetic predisposition affecting IgG N-glycosylation traits. Furthermore, pathway enrichment showed several IgG N-glycosylation-related pathways, such as asparagine N-linked glycosylation, N-glycan biosynthesis and transport to the Golgi and subsequent modification. Through phenome-wide association studies (PheWAS), most genetic variants underlying TWAS hits were found to be correlated with health measures (height, waist-hip ratio, systolic blood pressure) and diseases, such as systemic lupus erythematosus, inflammatory bowel disease, and Parkinson’s disease, which are related to IgG N-glycosylation. Our study provides an atlas of genetic regulatory loci and their target genes within functionally relevant tissues, for further studies on the mechanisms of IgG N-glycosylation and its related diseases

All around suboptimal health — a joint position paper of the suboptimal health study consortium and European association for predictive, preventive and personalised medicine

First two decades of the twenty-first century are characterised by epidemics of non-communicable diseases such as many hundreds of millions of patients diagnosed with cardiovascular diseases and the type 2 diabetes mellitus, breast, lung, liver and prostate malignancies, neurological, sleep, mood and eye disorders, amongst others. Consequent socio-economic burden is tremendous. Unprecedented decrease in age of maladaptive individuals has been reported. The absolute majority of expanding non-communicable disorders carry a chronic character, over a couple of years progressing from reversible suboptimal health conditions to irreversible severe pathologies and cascading collateral complications. The time-frame between onset of SHS and clinical manifestation of associated disorders is the operational area for an application of reliable risk assessment tools and predictive diagnostics followed by the cost-effective targeted prevention and treatments tailored to the person. This article demonstrates advanced strategies in bio/medical sciences and healthcare focused on suboptimal health conditions in the frame-work of Predictive, Preventive and Personalised Medicine (3PM/PPPM). Potential benefits in healthcare systems and for society at large include but are not restricted to an improved life-quality of major populations and socio-economical groups, advanced professionalism of healthcare-givers and sustainable healthcare economy. Amongst others, following medical areas are proposed to strongly benefit from PPPM strategies applied to the identification and treatment of suboptimal health conditions:Stress overload associated pathologiesMale and female healthPlanned pregnanciesPeriodontal healthEye disordersInflammatory disorders, wound healing and pain management with associated complicationsMetabolic disorders and suboptimal body weightCardiovascular pathologiesCancersStroke, particularly of unknown aetiology and in young individualsSleep medicineSports medicineImproved individual outcomes under pandemic conditions such as COVID-19

Near-infrared digital hemispherical photography enables correction of plant area index for woody material during leaf-on conditions

Indirect optical measurement techniques enable efficient and non-destructive estimation of plant area index (PAI). However, because they cannot distinguish between foliage and other canopy elements, corrections are needed to determine leaf area index (LAI), which is typically the property of interest. In this study, we investigate near-infrared digital hemispherical photography (DHP) as a means of estimating and correcting for woody material. Using data collected at a deciduous broadleaf forest site, we show that near-infrared DHP could successfully estimate effective wood area index (WAIe) and wood area index (WAI) during leaf-on conditions, providing similar mean values (WAIe = 0.88, WAI = 1.53) to those determined from visible DHP during leaf-off conditions (WAIe = 0.87, WAI = 1.38). This information was used to correct estimates of effective PAI (PAIe) and PAI, enabling effective LAI (LAIe) and LAI to be derived with low RMSD (0.33 for LAIe and 0.76 for LAI), NRMSD (12% for LAIe and 19% for LAI), and bias (−0.01 for LAIe and −0.16 for LAI). Not correcting for woody material led to overestimation of LAIe by 31% on average and 46% in the worst observed case, and the degree of overestimation was further enlarged for LAI (42% on average and 61% in the worst observed case). In agreement with previous studies, the effects of clumping and woody area were found to be partly compensatory. On average, PAIe provided a reasonable approximation of LAI without correction, though overestimation of 52% and underestimation of 20% occurred at the lowest and highest LAI values, respectively. Compared to WAIe and WAI measurement using leaf-off visible DHP, near-infrared DHP offers two crucial advantages: i) data collection can be conducted at the same time as leaf-on PAIe and PAI measurements, and ii) it is likely that the approach could provide an indirect WAIe and WAI measurement option for evergreen species

Research on Index System for Disabled Elders Evaluation and Grey Clustering Model Based on End-point Mixed Possibility Functions

The file attached to this record is the Publisher's final version.An operational ability assessment system for older adults is of great help to address health and social challenges for ageing. In this paper, the main problems in currently available ADL and ability evaluation systems have been analyzed. The basic principles to build an index system for disability elders evaluation have been put forwarded. Then，an improved Barthel index system for ADL evaluation and a new older adults ability evaluation system consisted of 4 first-level indexes and 14 secondary indexes based on experts’ opinion and the ability assessment system for older adults by Ministry of Civil Affairs of China have been built. The grey clustering model based on end-point mixed triangular possibility function has been introduced. And three living examples of adults’ disability evaluation have been conducted. It is confirmed clearly that the three older adults belong to different categories of "severe disability", "mild disability", and "ability passable" respectively. The research results can be used as reference for government to formulate the elderly-care policies, to run and allocate the elderly-care resources, as well as reference for various nursing or elderly-care institutions

Translation and cross-cultural validation of a precision health tool, the Suboptimal Health Status Questionnaire-25, in Korean

Background Suboptimal health status (SHS) is a reversible stage between health and illness that is characterized by health complaints, low energy, general weakness, and chronic fatigue. The Suboptimal Health Status Questionnaire-25 (SHSQ-25) has been validated in three major populations (African, Asian, and Caucasian) and is internationally recognized as a reliable and robust tool for health estimation in general populations. This study focused on the development of K-SHSQ-25, a Korean version of the SHSQ-25, from its English version. Methods The SHSQ-25 was translated from English to Korean according to international guidelines set forth by the World Health Organization (WHO) for health instrument translation between different languages. A subsequent cross-sectional survey involved 460 healthy South Korean participants (aged 18-83 years; 65.4 % females) to answer the 25 questions focusing on the health perspectives of 5 domains, 1) fatigue, 2) cardiovascular health, 3) digestive tract, 4) immune system and 5) mental health. The K-SHSQ-25 was further validated using tests for reliability, internal consistency, exploratory factor analysis (EFA), and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Results The version of K-SHSQ-25 achieved linguistic, cultural, and conceptual equivalence to the English version. The intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of test-retest reliability for individual items ranged from 0.88 to 0.99. Reliability estimates based on internal consistency reached a Cronbach’s α of 0.953; the Cronbach’s α for each domain ranged from 0.76 to 0.94. Regarding construct validity, the EFA of the K-SHSQ-25 generally replicated the multidimensional structure (fatigue, cardiovascular, digestive, immune system, and mental health) and 25 questions. The CFA revealed that the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA), goodness-of-fit index (GFI) and adjusted goodness of fit index (AGFI) were excellent (RMSEA = 0.069 \u3c 0.08, GFI = 0.929 \u3e 0.90, AGFI = 0.907 \u3e 0.90). The five domains of the K-SHSQ-25 showed significant correlations with each other (r = 0.59-0.81, P \u3c 0.001). The cut-off point of K-SHSQ-25 for SHS was determined as an SHS score of 25. The prevalence of SHS in this study was 60.0 % (276/460), with 47.8 % (76/159) for males and 58.5 % for females (176/301). Conclusions Our results indicate that the Korean version of SHSQ-25, K-SHSQ-25, is a transcultural equivalent, robust, valid, and reliable assessment tool for evaluating SHS in the Korean-speaking population

The Double-stranded RNA–dependent Protein Kinase Differentially Regulates Insulin Receptor Substrates 1 and 2 in HepG2 Cells

The RNA-dependent protein kinase (PKR), initially known as a virus infection response protein, is found to differentially regulate two major players in the insulin signaling pathway, IRS1 and IRS2. PKR up-regulates the inhibitory phosphorylation of IRS1 and the expression of IRS2 at the transcriptional level

Group 16: Challenge: Task 3 - Detect defects in electron microscopy images

Our task is to design a model automatically detect defection in several graphene Sheets.From 256*256 whole graphene sheet, 48*48 subset patches are generated, see figure1. 32 patches of defected cases and 2279 patches of non-defected cases with ground truth information are provided. The defected patches are labelled as 1 and the non-detected ones are labelled as 0