Effects of Harvest Maturity on Chilling Injury and Storage Quality of Apricots

Fresh apricots have high nutritional value and demand. Determination of the appropriate maturity is vital for fruit storage. The effects of harvest maturity on chilling injury and storage quality were investigated in this study. Xinjiang Saimaiti apricots were used as the material; the fruit was picked at three different maturity classes, maturity class I (colored area < 50%), maturity class II (colored area 50–80%), and maturity class III (colored area > 80%) according to yellow conversion rate, and stored at 0°C and 90–95% RH. Chilling injury incidence, chilling index, and the physiological indicators were evaluated. The results showed that the incidence, index of chilling injury, and firmness in apricots of maturity class I were highest than other two groups, but maturity class I apricots did not ripe. Although the incidence and index of chilling injury in maturity class III were relatively low, fruit firmness decreased rapidly. The incidence and index of chilling injury of apricots in maturity class II were lower than those of fruits at maturity class I, whereas fruit firmness, soluble solid content, ascorbic acid level, and extractable juice quantity relatively were well-maintained. Therefore, maturity class II was considered the appropriate maturity stage at harvest for storage

Comparison of endostatin(endostar)and avastin's inhibition effect on mice choroidal neovascularization

AIM:To observe the inhibition effect of endostatin(endostar)on mice choroidal neovascularization model(CNV)and compare with the Avastin.<p>METHODS: Using 532nm laser photocoagulation to establish a mouse model of CNV. We observed the formation of CNV by histopathological examination after 2wk later. Forty successful models of mice were randomly divided into control group(group 1, 10 rats), normal saline group(group 2, 10 rats), endostatin group(group 3, 10 rats)and avastin group(group 4, 10 rats). The drugs were injected into the mice' vitreous after photocoagulation 2wk later. Then 1wk later, we took the mice eyeballs to perform the HE and immunohistochemical staining to observe. The statistical analysis of ANOVA was done by SPSS 16.0 and the LSD-<i>t</i> test was used for multiple samples, taking <i>P</i><0.05 as the test standards.<p>RESULTS: Two weeks later, HE histopathological examination was done, light microscope showed large amount of new vessels' formation, the positive rate for CNV was 72.8%. The blank control group compared with the normal saline group <i>P</i>>0.05, had no inhibitory effect on CNV; endostatin treated group compared with control group, <i>P</i><0.05, had a certain inhibitory effect; avastin group compared with the control group, <i>P</i><0.05, had an inhibitory effect on CNV; the LSD-<i>t</i> was performed on Avastin group and endostatin group, <i>P</i><0.05, which were statistically significant. We thought that the two drugs have different inhibitory effect on mice' CNV, because <i>(-overx)</i>_Avastin=26.90,<i>(-overx)</i>_endostatin=29.13,<i>(-overx)</i>_Avastin<<i>(-overx)</i>_endostatin, we can infer that endostar had lower inhibitory effect on mice CNV than Avastin.<p>CONCLUSION: Laser-induced CNV animal models of colored mice C57BL/6J is of short time and high rate establishment and it is an ideal model for CNV study. Endostar has certain inhibitory effect on CNV, and it is likely to become one of the important drugs for CNV-related diseases in the future

Protein kinases mediate increment of the phosphorylation of cyclic AMP -responsive element binding protein in spinal cord of rats following capsaicin injection

BACKGROUND: Strong noxious stimuli cause plastic changes in spinal nociceptive neurons. Intracellular signal transduction pathways from cellular membrane to nucleus, which may further regulate gene expression by critical transcription factors, convey peripheral stimulation. Cyclic AMP-responsive element binding protein (CREB) is a well-characterized stimulus-induced transcription factor whose activation requires phosphorylation of the Serine-133 residue. Phospho-CREB can further induce gene transcription and strengthen synaptic transmission by the activation of the protein kinase cascades. However, little is known about the mechanisms by which CREB phosphorylation is regulated by protein kinases during nociception. This study was designed to use Western blot analysis to investigate the role of mitogen-activated protein (MAP)/extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) kinase (MEK 1/2), PKA and PKC in regulating the phosphorylation of CREB in the spinal cord of rats following intraplantar capsaicin injection. RESULTS: We found that capsaicin injection significantly increased the phosphorylation level of CREB in the ipsilateral side of the spinal cord. Pharmacological manipulation of MEK 1/2, PKA and PKC with their inhibitors (U0126, H89 and NPC 15473, respectively) significantly blocked this increment of CREB phosphorylation. However, the expression of CREB itself showed no change in any group. CONCLUSION: These findings suggest that the activation of intracellular MAP kinase, PKA and PKC cascades may contribute to the regulation of phospho-CREB in central nociceptive neurons following peripheral painful stimuli

Intratumoral microbiome impacts immune infiltrates in tumor microenvironment and predicts prognosis in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma patients

BackgroundDifferent intratumoral microbiotaexist in different tumors and play a crucial function in carcinogenesis. However, whether they impact clinical outcomes in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) and their mechanism remain unclear.Methods16S rDNA amplicon sequencing was performed on surgically resected samples from 98 ESCC patients to analyze intratumoral microbiome abundance and composition. Multiplex fluorescent immunohistochemistry staining was used to profile the phenotypes of immune infiltrates in the tumor microenvironment (TME).ResultsPatients with higher intratumoral Shannon index had significantly worse surgical outcomes. When patients were divided into short-term survivors and long-term survivors based on the median survival time, both intratumoral alpha-diversity and beta-diversity were found to be significantly inconsistent, and the relative abundance of Lactobacillus and Leptotrichia emerged as the two microorganisms that probably influenced the survival of ESCC patients. Only Lactobacillus in ESCC was validated to significantly worsen patients’ prognoses and to be positively correlated with the Shannon index. Multivariate analysis revealed that the intratumoral Shannon index, the relative abundance of Lactobacillus, and the pathologic tumor–node–metastasis (pTNM) stage were independently associated with patients’ overall survival. Furthermore, the relative abundance of both Lactobacillus and Shannon index was positively correlated with the proportions of PD-L1+ epithelial cells (ECs) and tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs). The Shannon index was negatively correlated with the proportions of natural killer (NK) cells in the TME.ConclusionsA high abundance of intratumoral Lactobacillus and bacterial alpha-diversity was associated with the formation of the immunosuppressive TME and predicted poor long-term survival in ESCC patients

The Application of Solar Indirect System in Passive House in Cold Region and Severe Cold Region of CHINA

AbstractThis paper, the future developing prospect of application of passive house in China was provided,solar indirect system combined with fresh air ventilation system with heat recovery was used in designing to provide heat to meet fresh air load in the passive house, taking the Xining city as an example. The aperture areas of solar collector in different conditions were calculated by changing the influence factors such as the tilt angle of the collector and the solar fraction. This paper analyzed the relationship of the solar collector aperture area with the tilt angle of the collector and the solar fraction. On the basis of the analysis, it is safe to draw a conclusion that the program of using solar indirect system combined with fresh air ventilation system with heat recovery in passive house in cold region and severe cold region of China is economically feasible

Expression Sensitivity Analysis of Human Disease Related Genes

Background. Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have shown its revolutionary power in seeking the influenced loci on complex diseases genetically. Thousands of replicated loci for common traits are helpful in diseases risk assessment. However it is still difficult to elucidate the variations in these loci that directly cause susceptibility to diseases by disrupting the expression or function of a protein currently. Results. We evaluate the expression features of disease related genes and find that different diseases related genes show different expression perturbation sensitivities in various conditions. It is worth noting that the expression of some robust disease-genes doesn&apos;t show significant change in their corresponding diseases, these genes might be easily ignored in the expression profile analysis. Conclusion. Gene ontology enrichment analysis indicates that robust disease-genes execute essential function in comparison with sensitive disease-genes. The diseases associated with robust genes seem to be relatively lethal like cancer and aging. On the other hand, the diseases associated with sensitive genes are apparently nonlethal like psych and chemical dependency diseases