NEW DATA ON THE RARE CHENGJIANG (LOWER CAMBRIAN, SOUTH CHINA) LINGULOID BRACHIOPOD XIANSHANELLA HAIKOUENSIS

ABSTRACT—The remarkable brachiopod Xianshanella haikouensis, from the Early Cambrian Chengjiang Lagerstätte, was briefly re-ported based on only two extraordinarily preserved specimens. Details of valve interiors remain unknown due to a lack of available material. We herein reillustrate the holotype of X. haikouensis, and, on the basis of many additional specimens from the type locality, provide further information on this brachiopod taxon, including shell ornamentation, a U-shaped digestive tract, mantle canal systems, lophophores, muscle scars, and well-defined visceral areas in the valves. This exceptional brachiopod is characterized by a biconvex, rounded, knob-shaped shell lacking visible pseudointerarea in the valves, an elongate and muscular pedicle, and, especially, its possession of exceptional setal fringes. A restudy of a number of new specimens justifies assigning Xianshanella to the family Obolidae. The elongate and horny setae of X. haikouensis, coupled with the massive pedicle in many cases with its end attached to shells of other animals, indicate that this species was an epibenthic, sessile suspension feeder, attached by a pedicle

High-temperature graphitization characteristics of vitrinite and inertinite

In order to explore the graphitization characteristic differences between vitrinite and inertinite in coal, this study conducted high-temperature thermal simulation experiments (at five temperature points: 1800°C, 2100°C, 2400°C, 2700°C, and 3000°C) using inertinite-rich and vitrinite-rich samples as graphitization precursors. The quantitative comparison for the evolution characteristics of their graphite lattice was carried out using high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM), X-ray diffractometer (XRD), and Raman spectroscopy (Raman) techniques. HRTEM revealed that an evident increase in carbon layer numbers and degree of extension was observed with increasing treatment temperature, XRD showed the variation of lattice parameters (d002/La/Lc) with temperature, Raman data revealed the variation of lattice defects (R2/R3) with temperature. It was discussed about the differences of graphite lattice construction processes between inertinite and vitrinite, throughout the entire temperature range of the experiment, the d002 spacing of inertinite was always smaller than that of vitrinite, indicating a higher degree of graphitization. vitrinite exhibited a uniform and smooth evolution state throughout the entire heating process, while inertinite exhibited an “inert” state between 1800°C and 2100°C (d002 values stagnated near at 0.3440 nm). With increasing simulated temperature, the defect level (R2 and R3) of vitrinite rapidly decreased below that of inertinite, throughout the entire temperature range, vitrinite demonstrated superior defect healing ability in terms of both rate and capability compared to inertinite. Under high-temperature thermal simulation, the three-dimensional lattice construction and defect elimination of vitrinite exhibited synchronous evolution characteristics. On the other hand, the formation of the graphite lattice in inertinite showed an evolutionary trend of “first three-dimensional lattice construction, followed by gradual defect elimination”

Long-term in situ observations on typhoon-triggered turbidity currents in the deep sea

This work is supported by the National Science Foundation of China (grants 91528304, 41576005, and 41530964). We thank J. Li, X. Lyu, P. Li, K. Duan, J. Ronan, Y. Wang, P. Ma, and Y. Li for cruise assistance; G. de Lange and J. Hinojosa for editing an early version of manuscript; and E. Pope and two anonymous reviewers for their reviews.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Synthetic Route Proposal for Cleistanthol Based on Retrosynthesis Approach

Cleistanthol of the diterpenoid group is a newly isolated naturally-occuring molecule of biological and pharmaceutical significance. The molecule contians three ring structures, only one of them aromatic, and hydroxy- and hydrocarbon- substitution groups modifying these rings. However, for this compound, a synthetic method has not yet been proposed for it and similar structures sharing the common ring structure but different sites and contents of modifying groups. This paper focuses on the construction of this molecule based on a reverse analysis from a retrosynthetic approach, and analyzed the advantages, shortcomings, and probable future advancements and improvements possibly being made to the route. This study also investigates its synthesis from a biological oriented approach given the target molecule’s likely medical application, and discussed certain aspects during the synthetic pathway possibly hindering its use and possible circumvention to be introduced

Research of Working Capital Management Regarding to Companies in China

This paper divides working capital into working capital of operating activities and working capital of financing activities. Working capital of operating activities can be further divided into working capital of procurement channels, working capital of productive channels and working capital of marketing channels by channel. Then we analyze the data in the balance sheet and income statement from Shenzhen biological, pharmaceutical listed companies in 2012 by the statistical description. Finally, we study the status of its working capital management

MiR-486 protects against acute myocardial infarction via regulation of PTEN

Purpose: To investigate the effect of miR-486 on rats with acute myocardial infarction (AMI), and its mechanism of action.Methods: A rat model of AMI was established. They were randomly divided into 4 groups, namely, sham, model, agomiR-486 and antagomiR-486 groups, respectively. Rats in these different groups were treated with agomiR-21 (5 μL, 40 nmol/mL), antagomiR-21 (5 μL, 40 nmol/mL) or agomiR-NC (5 μL, 40 nmol/mL), respectively. Then, key miRNAs were sorted out using gene-chip assay and verified by quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) assay. Luciferase reporter gene assay was conducted to determine the interaction between miR-486 and gene of PTEN. After intraperitoneal injection of agomiR-486 and antagomiR-486, hemodynamics was measured to determine the effect of miR-486 on myocardial function of the rats. The effect of miR-486 expression level on the expression of myocardial enzymes in serum, the morphology of myocardial tissues, and the apoptosis of myocardial tissues in rats, were investigated. Additionally, the effect of miR-486 expression level on PTEN/AKT signaling pathway in the rats was determined by Western blotting.Results: The results of gene-chip and qRT-PCR assays revealed that there were 8 differentially expressed genes in rat myocardial tissues in the model group when compared with the sham group. MiR-486 improved the cardiac function of rats and the morphology of myocardial tissues, but reduced AMI-induced apoptosis of myocardial cells and the expression of myocardial enzymes (markers of myocardial injury) in a dose-dependent manner (p < 0.05). The results of luciferase reporter gene assay showed that PTEN was a direct target of miR-486. In rat models of AMI, a raised expression of miR-486 remarkably suppressed the protein expression level of PTEN and up-regulated that of p-AKT/AKT (p < 0.05).Conclusion: MiR-486 protects against AMI in rats probably by targeting PTEN and activating the AKT signaling pathway. The results of the current study may provide new insights for the treatment of AMI

PromptStyle: Controllable Style Transfer for Text-to-Speech with Natural Language Descriptions

Style transfer TTS has shown impressive performance in recent years. However, style control is often restricted to systems built on expressive speech recordings with discrete style categories. In practical situations, users may be interested in transferring style by typing text descriptions of desired styles, without the reference speech in the target style. The text-guided content generation techniques have drawn wide attention recently. In this work, we explore the possibility of controllable style transfer with natural language descriptions. To this end, we propose PromptStyle, a text prompt-guided cross-speaker style transfer system. Specifically, PromptStyle consists of an improved VITS and a cross-modal style encoder. The cross-modal style encoder constructs a shared space of stylistic and semantic representation through a two-stage training process. Experiments show that PromptStyle can achieve proper style transfer with text prompts while maintaining relatively high stability and speaker similarity. Audio samples are available in our demo page

Strengthening and microbial regulation mechanism of Bacillus on purification device for grass carp culture wastewater

Aquaculture wastewater (AW) poses a threat to natural aquatic environments. Microecological agents are widely used to regulate and purify AW, with Bacillus being the most common. To evaluate the AW purification effect of adding Bacillus subtilis and Bacillus licheniformis to an AW treatment device, we constructed an experimental device including a small grass carp culture pond and three groups of cuboid reactors. The effects of adding the two strains to the AW treatment reactor on the AW purification effect and the microbiota compositions in the AW and packing surface biofilm were analyzed via high-throughput sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene. Our results showed that adding Bacillus bacteria to reactors improved the total nitrogen (TN) removal efficiency and reduced the chemical oxygen demand (COD). Adding both the B. subtillis and B. licheniformis preparations significantly increased the abundance of Firmicutes in the water microbiota of the reactor at the middle and end stages of the experiment. The addition of Bacillus changed the microbiota composition in the water and packing surface biofilm and significantly increased the abundance of Bacillus at the middle and later stages of the experiment. Therefore, the addition of Bacillus improved the TN removal efficiency in the AW grass carp treatment reactors and significantly reduced the COD in the AW by increasing the abundance of Bacillus and changing the microbiota composition in the system. We provide an effective way for improving the purification capacity of biofilm reactor

Evidence for gill slits and a pharynx in Cambrian vetulicolians: implications for the early evolution of deuterostomes.

BACKGROUND: Vetulicolians are a group of Cambrian metazoans whose distinctive bodyplan continues to present a major phylogenetic challenge. Thus, we see vetulicolians assigned to groups as disparate as deuterostomes and ecdysozoans. This divergence of opinions revolves around a strikingly arthropod-like body, but one that also bears complex lateral structures on its anterior section interpreted as pharyngeal openings. Establishing the homology of these structures is central to resolving where vetulicolians sit in metazoan phylogeny. RESULTS: New material from the Chengjiang Lagerstätte helps to resolve this issue. Here, we demonstrate that these controversial structures comprise grooves with a series of openings. The latter are oval in shape and associated with a complex anatomy consistent with control of their opening and closure. Remains of what we interpret to be a musculature, combined with the capacity for the grooves to contract, indicate vetulicolians possessed a pumping mechanism that could process considerable volumes of seawater. Our observations suggest that food captured in the anterior cavity was transported to dorsal and ventral gutters, which then channeled material to the intestine. This arrangement appears to find no counterpart in any known fossil or extant arthropod (or any other ecdysozoan). Anterior lateral perforations, however, are diagnostic of deuterostomes. CONCLUSIONS: If the evidence is against vetulicolians belonging to one or other group of ecdysozoan, then two phylogenetic options seem to remain. The first is that such features as vetulicolians possess are indicative of either a position among the bilaterians or deuterostomes but apart from the observation that they themselves form a distinctive and recognizable clade current evidence can permit no greater precision as to their phylogenetic placement. We argue that this is too pessimistic a view, and conclude that evidence points towards vetulicolians being members of the stem-group deuterostomes; a group best known as the chordates (amphioxus, tunicates, vertebrates), but also including the ambulacrarians (echinoderms, hemichordates), and xenoturbellids. If the latter, first they demonstrate that these members of the stem group show few similarities to the descendant crown group representatives. Second, of the key innovations that underpinned deuterostome success, the earliest and arguably most seminal was the evolution of openings that define the pharyngeal gill slits of hemichordates (and some extinct echinoderms) and chordates.RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are