Upregulation of AT1 Receptor Mediates a Pressor Effect Through ROS-SAPK/JNK Signaling in Glutamatergic Neurons of Rostral Ventrolateral Medulla in Rats With Stress-Induced Hypertension

The present study examined whether angiotensin II (Ang II) mediates the pressor effect through nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) oxidase-derived reactive oxygen species (ROS)-mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling in the glutamatergic neurons of the rostral ventrolateral medulla (RVLM) in stress-induced hypertensive rats (SIHR). The SIHR model was established using electric foot-shocks combined with noises for 15 days. We observed that Ang II type 1 receptor (AT1R) and the glutamatergic neurons co-localized in the RVLM of SIHR. Furthermore, glutamate levels in the intermediolateral column of the spinal cord were higher in SIHR than in controls. Microinjection of Ang II into the RVLM of SIHR activated stress-activated protein kinase/Jun N-terminal kinase (SAPK/JNK), extracellular signal-regulated protein kinase (ERK) 1/2, and p38MAPK. Compared with controls, the activation of SAPK/JNK, ERK1/2, p38MAPK, and ROS in the RVLM were higher in SIHR, an effect that was blocked by an NADPH oxidase inhibitor (apocynin) and an AT1R antagonist (candesartan). RVLM microinjection of apocynin or a SAPK/JNK inhibitor (SP600125), but not an ERK1/2 inhibitor (U0126) or a p38MAPK inhibitor (SB203580), decreased AT1R mRNA and mean arterial blood pressure (MABP) in SIHR. The increase of AT1R protein expression and MABP was inhibited by intracerebroventricular infusion (ICV), for 14 days, of SP600125, but not U0126 or SB203580 in SIHR. We conclude that Ang II modulates the pressor effect through AT1R-dependent ROS-SAPK/JNK signaling in glutamatergic neurons in the RVLM of SIHR

Possible consequences of relatively decreasing cigarette price in China from 1999 to 2015

Background Cigarette price is an important factor affecting smokers' behavior. While raising price is considered to be a most cost-effective approach to confront the tobacco epidemic, a pricing stratagem could also be used as a weapon to interfere tobacco control efforts by the tobacco industry. The study examined the change of cigarette price from 1999 to 2015 in China, where inhabits a smoking population of more than 300 million, to explore its possible effects on population smoking behavior. Methods National Consumption Price Index (CPI), Tobacco Product Consumption Price Index (TCPI), tobacco consumption data were collected from China Statistical Yearbooks and China Tobacco Yearbooks. Tobacco use and cost data were acquired from two national tobacco surveys in 2010 and 2015. Results The TCPI in China increased 5.6% from 1999 to 2015, while at the same time the national CPI increased 42.3%, which meant the price for cigarettes relatively decreased 25.8% comparing to other commodities. Meanwhile, the annual number of cigarettes sold in China increased from 1.45 trillion to 2.49 trillion, raising 71.7% since 1999. Though the price of cigarettes changed little, the average cost per pack of cigarettes bought by smokers increased 42.9% (from RMB ￥7.0 to ￥10.0) in urban area and 59.2% (from RMB ￥4.9 to ￥7.8) in rural area from 2010 to 2015, which was a result of shift to more expensive cigarette brands, regarding to the dramatic increase in the average resident income (climbing 93.0% in rural, and 63.2% in urban during 2010-2015 in China). Conclusions The cigarette price in China barely changed during a sixteen year period from 1999 to 2015, made cigarettes more and more affordable in China. Combining with the increase in income, it contributed to the huge increase in tobacco consumption and brand shift by smokers in China

E-cigarettes use among urban male tobacco smokers age 15 years or older in China

Background There is paucity of data regarding e-cigarette use in China. Monitoring e-cigarette use is important given the rapid increase of e-cigarette use in some countries. We investigated the prevalence and determinants of e-cigarette use among Chinese male urban tobacco smokers, as most Chinese urban residents who use e-cigarettes are male smokers (~90%). Methods We analyzed data from China City Adult Tobacco Surveys, which were conducted in 14 major Chinese cities individually in 2013-14 with 15,008 males aged &#8805;15 years. Current e-cigarette users were defined as persons who reported using e-cigarette daily or less than daily at the time of the survey. We calculated the prevalence of e-cigarette use among male current tobacco smokers. Multivariate logistic regression was used to assess determinants of e-cigarette use, including age, education, quit attempts in the past 12 months, cigarettes smoked per day, and monthly expenditure on cigarettes. Results Among urban male current smokers in China, 3.6% were current e-cigarette users. The likelihood of being current e-cigarette users was significantly higher among: smokers aged 15-29 (OR=2.5) or 30-49 (OR=2.1) years than 50+ years; those who attempted to quit than those who made no attempt (OR=4.5); those with ≥college education than those with ≤high school education (OR=2.6); and those who smoked ≥15 cigarettes per day (OR=2.7) than those who smoked 1-14 cigarettes per day (all p< 0.05). Conclusions Among urban male tobacco smokers in China, current e-cigarette use was higher among those who were younger, had more education, attempted to quit smoking in the past year, and smoked more cigarettes per day. Given that e-cigarettes are not currently regulated and often marketed as healthier alternatives to cigarettes in China, continued monitoring of e-cigarette use is important to inform public health policy, planning, and practice

Characteristics of spontaneous and evoked GABAergic synaptic currents in cardiac vagal neurons in rats

Despite the importance of GABAergic input to cardiac vagal neurons the electrophysiological properties and possible origins of this innervation have not yet been studied. Individual cardiac vagal neurons were identified by a retrograde fluorescent tracer and were studied in an in vitro slice preparation using patch-clamp electrophysiology. Cardiac vagal neurons received spontaneous GABAergic inhibitory post-synaptic currents (IPSCs) that were blocked by the GABAA receptor antagonist bicuculline. The spontaneous presynaptic GABAergic input to cardiac vagal neurons in the nucleus ambiguus occurred at a significantly lower frequency than that recorded in cardiac vagal neurons in the dorsal motor nucleus of the vagus. To identify a possible source of the GABAergic innervation to cardiac vagal neurons the nucleus tractus solitarius was electrically stimulated. GABAergic synaptic currents in cardiac vagal neurons, in both the dorsal motor nucleus of the vagus (DMNX) and the nucleus ambiguus (NA), were consistently evoked upon stimulation of the nucleus tractus solitarius and these responses were also blocked by bicuculline. © 2001 Elsevier Science B.V

Agatoxin-IVA-sensitive calcium channels mediate the presynaptic and postsynaptic nicotinic activation of cardiac vagal neurons

Whole cell currents and miniature glutamatergic synaptic events (minis) were recorded in vitro from cardiac vagal neurons in the nucleus ambiguus using the patch-clamp technique. We examined whether voltage-dependent calcium channels were involved in the nicotinic excitation of cardiac vagal neurons. Nicotine evoked an inward current, increase in mini amplitude, and increase in mini frequency in cardiac vagal neurons. These responses were inhibited by the nonselective voltage-dependent calcium channel blocker Cd (100 μM). The P-type voltage-dependent calcium channel blocker agatoxin IV A (100 nM) abolished the nicotine-evoked responses. Nimodipine (2 μM), an antagonist of L-type calcium channels, inhibited the increase in mini amplitude and frequency but did not block the ligand gated inward current. The N- and Q-type voltage-dependent calcium channel antagonists conotoxin GVIA (1 μM) and conotoxin MVIIC (5 μM) had no effect. We conclude that the presynaptic and postsynaptic facilitation of glutamatergic neurotransmission to cardiac vagal neurons by nicotine involves activation of agatoxin-IV A-sensitive and possibly L-type voltage-dependent calcium channels. The postsynaptic inward current elicited by nicotine is dependent on activation of agatoxin-IV A-sensitive voltage-dependent calcium channels

Adaptive Dual Aggregation Network with Normalizing Flows for Low-Light Image Enhancement

Low-light image enhancement (LLIE) aims to improve the visual quality of images taken under complex low-light conditions. Recent works focus on carefully designing Retinex-based methods or end-to-end networks based on deep learning for LLIE. However, these works usually utilize pixel-level error functions to optimize models and have difficulty effectively modeling the real visual errors between the enhanced images and the normally exposed images. In this paper, we propose an adaptive dual aggregation network with normalizing flows (ADANF) for LLIE. First, an adaptive dual aggregation encoder is built to fully explore the global properties and local details of the low-light images for extracting illumination-robust features. Next, a reversible normalizing flow decoder is utilized to model real visual errors between enhanced and normally exposed images by mapping images into underlying data distributions. Finally, to further improve the quality of the enhanced images, a gated multi-scale information transmitting module is leveraged to introduce the multi-scale information from the adaptive dual aggregation encoder into the normalizing flow decoder. Extensive experiments on paired and unpaired datasets have verified the effectiveness of the proposed ADANF

Stability and Hydrocarbon/Fluorocarbon Sorption of a Metal-Organic Framework with Fluorinated Channels

The stabilities and hydrocarbon/fluorocarbon sorption properties of a zeolite-like metal-organic framework (MOF) Zn(hfipbb) with fluorinated channels has been studied. By the combination of thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD) measurements, we confirm that Zn(hfipbb) has exceptionally high hydrothermal and thermal stabilities. The adsorption behaviors of water and methanol by Zn(hfipbb) indicate that it is highly hydrophobic but with high adsorption of alcohols. Hexane and perfluorohexane adsorption measurements show that the fluorinated channels in Zn(hfipbb) have high affinity with hydrocarbon and fluorocarbon. The high fluorophilic nature of the channels and the high stability of the compound suggest its potential utility in practical separation applications

DCTE-LLIE: A Dual Color-and-Texture-Enhancement-Based Method for Low-Light Image Enhancement

The enhancement of images captured under low-light conditions plays a vitally important role in the area of image processing and can significantly affect the performance of following operations. In recent years, deep learning techniques have been leveraged in the area of low-light image enhancement tasks, and deep-learning-based low-light image enhancement methods have been the mainstream for low-light image enhancement tasks. However, due to the inability of existing methods to effectively maintain the color distribution of the original input image and to effectively handle feature descriptions at different scales, the final enhanced image exhibits color distortion and local blurring phenomena. So, in this paper, a novel dual color-and-texture-enhancement-based low-light image enhancement method is proposed, which can effectively enhance low-light images. Firstly, a novel color enhancement block is leveraged to help maintain color distribution during the enhancement process, which can further eliminate the color distortion effect; after that, an attention-based multiscale texture enhancement block is proposed to help the network focus on multiscale local regions and extract more reliable texture representations automatically, and a fusion strategy is leveraged to fuse the multiscale feature representations automatically and finally generate the enhanced reflection component. The experimental results on public datasets and real-world low-light images established the effectiveness of the proposed method on low-light image enhancement tasks