Curcumin Reduces Cognitive Deficits by Inhibiting Neuroinflammation through the Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress Pathway in Apolipoprotein E4 Transgenic Mice.

Apolipoprotein E4 (ApoE4) is the main genetic risk factor for Alzheimer's disease (AD), but the exact way in which it causes AD remains unclear. Curcumin is considered to have good therapeutic potential for AD, but its mechanism has not been clarified. This study aims to observe the effect of curcumin on ApoE4 transgenic mice and explore its possible molecular mechanism. Eight-month-old ApoE4 transgenic mice were intraperitoneally injected with curcumin for 3 weeks, and the Morris water maze test was used to evaluate the cognitive ability of the mice. Immunofluorescence staining, immunohistochemistry, western blotting, and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) were used to examine the brain tissues of the mice. Curcumin reduced the high expression of ApoE4 and the excessive release of inflammatory factors in ApoE4 mice. In particular, the expression of marker proteins of endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress was significantly increased in ApoE4 mice, while curcumin significantly reduced the increase in the expression of these proteins. Collectively, curcumin alleviates neuroinflammation in the brains of ApoE4 mice by inhibiting ER stress, thus improving the learning and cognitive ability of transgenic mice

Early-start antiplatelet therapy after operation in patients with spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage and high risk of ischemic events (E-start):Protocol for a multi-centered, prospective, open-label, blinded endpoint randomized controlled trial

BACKGROUND: For severe spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage (sSICH) patients with high risk of ischemic events, the incidence of postoperative major cardiovascular/cerebrovascular and peripheral vascular events (MACCPE) is notable. Although antiplatelet therapy is a potential way to benefit these patients, the severe hemorrhagic complications, e.g., intracranial re-hemorrhage, is a barrier for early starting antiplatelet therapy. OBJECTIVES: This randomized controlled trial aims to identify the benefit and safety of early starting antiplatelet therapy after operation for sSICH patients with high risk of ischemic events. METHODS: This study is a multicenter, prospective, randomized, open-label, blinded-endpoint trial. We will enroll 250 sSICH patients with a high risk of ischemic events (including cerebral infarcts, transient ischemic attack, myocardial infarction, pulmonary embolism, and deep venous thrombosis). The participants will be randomized in a 1:1 manner to early-start group (start antiplatelet therapy at 3 days after operation) and normal-start group (start antiplatelet therapy at 30 days after operation). The early-start group will receive aspirin 100 mg daily. The control group will not receive antithrombotic therapy until 30 days after operation. The efficacy endpoint is the incidence of MACCPE, and the safety endpoint is the incidence of intracranial re-hemorrhage. DISCUSSION: The Early-Start antiplatelet therapy after operation in patients with spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage trial (E-start) is the first randomized trial about early start antiplatelet therapy for operated sSICH patients with a high risk of ischemic events. This study will provide a new strategy and evidence for postoperative management in the future. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov, identifier NCT04820972; Available at: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04820972?term=NCT04820972&draw=2&rank=1. Chinese Clinical Trial Registry, identifier ChiCTR2100044560; Available at: http://www.chictr.org.cn/showproj.aspx?proj=123277

Experimental Study on Dynamic Effects of a Long-span Railway Continuous Beam Bridge

Studies on impact effects of trains on the railway bridge are important for ensuring the reliability of bridge and the safety of train operation. This paper presents an experimental study on the dynamic effects of moving trains on a long-span railway continuous beam bridge. The dynamic responses of the bridge under the moving trains were measured through in-situ testing and finite element analysis. The influences of the moving trains and track irregularity are considered. The investigated influencing factors include the weight and speed of the train and the irregularity of the track on the bridge. The results indicate that the train’s speed does not have obvious influence on the impact factor, while train’s weight and track irregularity have notable effects on the impact factor. But from the overall development law, with the increase of train speed, the impact factor increases. The impact factors obtained in this study are larger than the values provided by the China bridge design codes, which indicates that the bridge code underestimates the impact effect of the train on the bridge. The design value of the impact factor should be properly improved in the bridge design

Measuring individual morphological relationship of cortical regions

Background: Although local features of brain morphology have been widely investigated in neuroscience, the inter-regional relations in brain morphology have rarely been investigated, especially not for individual participants. New method: In this paper, we proposed a novel framework for investigating this relation based on an individual's magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data. The key idea was to estimate the probability density function (PDF) of local morphological features within a brain region to provide a global description of this region. Then, the inter-regional relations were quantified by calculating the similarity of the PDFs for pairs of regions based on the Kullback-Leibler (KL) divergence. Results: For illustration, we applied this approach to a pre-post intervention study to investigate the longitudinal changes in morphological relations after long-term sleep deprivation. The results suggest the potential application of this new method for studies on individual differences in brain structure. Comparison with existing methods: The current method can be employed to estimate individual morphological relations between regions, which have been largely ignored by previous studies. Conclusions: Our morphological relation metric, as a novel quantitative biomarker, can be used to investigate normal individual variability and even within-individual alterations/abnormalities in brain structure.5 page(s

Influence of PEG Stoichiometry on Structure-Tuned Formation of Self-Assembled Submicron Nickel Particles

Self-assembled submicron nickel particles were successfully synthesized via the one-step surfactant-assisted solvothermal method. The impact of surfactant and reducing agent stoichiometry is investigated in this manuscript. Different morphologies and structures of Ni particles, including flower-like nanoflakes, hydrangea-like structures, chain structures, sphere-like structures, and hollow structures were prepared through different processing conditions with two parameters such as temperature and time. Based on scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) and vibrating sample magnetometry (VSM), the submicron nickel particles show good saturation magnetization and excellent thermal stabilities with a possible growth mechanism for the variety of the structure-tuned formation. Importantly, the microwave absorption properties of the submicron nickel particles were studied. The lowest reflection loss of Ni-P9/T200/H15 with a thin layer thickness of 1.7 mm can reach −42.6 dB at 17.3 GHz

Transcriptome Analysis of Interspecific Hybrid between Brassica napus and B. rapa Reveals Heterosis for Oil Rape Improvement

The hybrid between Brassica napus and B. rapa displays obvious heterosis in both growth performance and stress tolerances. A comparative transcriptome analysis for B. napus (AnAnCC genome), B. rapa (ArAr genome), and its hybrid F1 (AnArC genome) was carried out to reveal the possible molecular mechanisms of heterosis at the gene expression level. A total of 40,320 nonredundant unigenes were identified using B. rapa (AA genome) and B. oleracea (CC genome) as reference genomes. A total of 6,816 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were mapped in the A and C genomes with 4,946 DEGs displayed nonadditively by comparing the gene expression patterns among the three samples. The coexistence of nonadditive DEGs including high-parent dominance, low-parent dominance, overdominance, and underdominance was observed in the gene action modes of F1 hybrid, which were potentially related to the heterosis. The coexistence of multiple gene actions in the hybrid was observed and provided a list of candidate genes and pathways for heterosis. The expression bias of transposable element-associated genes was also observed in the hybrid compared to their parents. The present study could be helpful for the better understanding of the determination and regulation of mechanisms of heterosis to aid Brassica improvement

Prokaryotic Expression of <i>Eimeria magna</i> SAG10 and SAG11 Genes and the Preliminary Evaluation of the Effect of the Recombinant Protein on Immune Protection in Rabbits

Eimeria magna is a common coccidia in the intestines of rabbits, causing anorexia, weight loss, diarrhea, and bloody stools. This study cloned and determined the expression levels of four Eimeria surface antigens (EmSAGs) at different developmental stages and showed that EmSAG10 and EmSAG11 are highly expressed at the merozoite stage. Rabbits were immunized with rEmSAG10 and rEmSAG11, and then challenged with E. magna after 2 weeks. Serum-specific antibodies and cytokine levels were detected using ELISA. Immune protection was evaluated based on the rate of the oocysts decrease, the output of oocysts (p EmSAG10 and rEmSAG11 had a higher average weight gain (62.7%, 61.1%), feed; meat ratio (3.8:1, 4.5:1), and the oocysts decrease rate (70.8%, 81.2%) than those in the control group, and also significantly reduced intestinal lesions. The specific IgG level increased one week after the first rEmSAG10 and rEmSAG11 immunization and was maintained until two weeks after the challenge (p EmSAG10 and rEmSAG11, while the IL-2 levels increased significantly after the secondary immunization with rEmSAG11 (both p EmSAG10 can induce a humoral and cellular immunity, while rEmSAG11 can only induce a humoral immunity. Therefore, rEmSAG10 is a candidate antigen for E. magna recombinant subunit vaccines