Chemical markers for the quality control of herbal medicines: an overview

Selection of chemical markers is crucial for the quality control of herbal medicines, including authentication of genuine species, harvesting the best quality raw materials, evaluation of post-harvesting handling, assessment of intermediates and finished products, and detection of harmful or toxic ingredients. Ideal chemical markers should be the therapeutic components of herbal medicines. However, for most herbal medicines, the therapeutic components have not been fully elucidated or easily monitored. Bioactive, characteristic, main, synergistic, correlative, toxic and general components may be selected. This article reviews the effective use of chemical markers in the quality control of herbal medicines including the selection criteria considering the roles and physicochemical factors which may affect the effective use of chemical markers

Estimation method of earthwork excavation using shield tunneling data -- a case study of Chengdu Metro

The occurrence of over-excavation or under-excavation in tunnel construction poses significant safety risks. Moreover, there is currently no automatic estimation method available for real-time estimation of earthwork excavation, particularly in the case of shield tunnels. In this study, we tracked the excavation process of Chengdu Metro Line 19, acquired tunneling parameters and earthwork excavation data using various sensors, and subsequently proposed an automatic estimation method that combines Bayesian optimization (BO) and gradient boosting regression tree (GBRT) algorithm. The results of our case study indicate that the BO-GBRT model improves the performance of earthwork excavation estimation, reducing the residual after each calculation with a root mean square error (RMSE) of 1.712 and mean absolute error (MAE) of 1.331. Furthermore, compared to other machine learning methods, the proposed BO-GBRT model demonstrates superior estimation performance. Additionally, the importance distribution of input parameters reveals that propulsion pressure, foam pressure, and rotation speed are the most critical factors affecting earthwork excavation. Overall, the proposed automatic estimation method shows great promise as a tool for efficiently estimating earthwork excavation in shield tunnel construction

Genome-wide dose-dependent inhibition of histone deacetylases studies reveal their roles in enhancer remodeling and suppression of oncogenic super-enhancers.

Histone deacetylase inhibitors (HDACIs) are known to alter gene expression by both up- and down-regulation of protein-coding genes in normal and cancer cells. However, the exact regulatory mechanisms of action remain uncharacterized. Here we investigated genome wide dose-dependent epigenetic and transcriptome changes in response to HDACI largazole in a transformed and a non-transformed cell line. Exposure to low nanomolar largazole concentrations

The critical role of the central nervous system (pro)renin receptor in regulating systemic blood pressure

The systemic renin-angiotensin system (RAS) has long been recognized as a critically important system in blood pressure (BP) regulation. However, extensive evidence has shown that a majority of RAS components are also present in many tissues and play indispensable roles in BP regulation. Here, we review evidence that RAS components, notably including the newly identified (pro)renin receptor (PRR), are present in the brain and are essential for the central regulation of BP. Binding of the PRR to its ligand, prorenin or renin, increases BP and promotes progression of cardiovascular diseases in an angiotensin II-dependent and -independent manner, establishing the PRR a promising antihypertensive drug target. We also review the existing PRR blockers, including handle region peptide and PRO20, and propose a rationale for blocking prorenin/PRR activation as a therapeutic approach that does not affect the actions of the PRR in vacuolar H+-ATPase and development. Finally, we summarize categories of currently available antihypertensive drugs and consider future perspectives. Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license

Quantum Efficiency Enhancement of a GaN-Based Green Light-Emitting Diode by a Graded Indium Composition p-Type InGaN Layer

We propose a graded indium composition p-type InGaN (p-InGaN) conduction layer to replace the p-type AlGaN electron blocking layer and a p-GaN layer in order to enhance the light output power of a GaN-based green light-emitting diode (LED). The indium composition of the p-InGaN layer decreased from 10.4% to 0% along the growth direction. The light intensity of the LED with a graded indium composition p-InGaN layer is 13.7% higher than that of conventional LEDs according to the experimental result. The calculated data further confirmed that the graded indium composition p-InGaN layer can effectively improve the light power of green LEDs. According to the simulation, the increase in light output power of green LEDs with a graded indium composition p-InGaN layer was mainly attributed to the enhancement of hole injection and the improvement of the radiative recombination rate

Flat Panel CT Scanning Is Helpful in Predicting Hemorrhagic Transformation in Acute Ischemic Stroke Patients Undergoing Endovascular Thrombectomy

Purpose. Hyperdense lesions are frequently revealed on flat panel CT (FP-CT) immediately after endovascular thrombectomy in patients with acute ischemic stroke. This study is aimed at discriminating hyperdense lesions caused by extravasation plus hemorrhage from those caused by contrast extravasation alone. Methods. We retrospectively analyzed clinical and radiological data of patients who underwent an immediate postprocedure FP-CT scan and a follow-up noncontrast CT 24 hours after thrombectomy. We especially focused on the Maximum Hounsfield Units (HUmax) of each hyperdense lesion. A hyperdense lesion was judged to be hemorrhagic when it persisted on noncontrast CT and/or developed a mass effect. Results. Of 81 patients included in this study, 32 (39.5%) patients presented 41 hyperdense lesions on FP-CT. The chance of hemorrhagic transformation is higher in patients with hyperdense lesions on FP-CT than that in patients without hyperdense lesions (23/32 vs. 1/49, p600 predicted hemorrhagic transformation with a sensitivity of 50% and a specificity of 100%. Conclusions. The presence of hyperdensity on FP-CT can predict hemorrhagic transformation with a high sensitivity and negative predictive value. The measurement of HUmax of hyperdense lesion on FP-CT can be applied to the management of patients undergoing endovascular recanalization