Comparison of Crop Evapotranspiration and Water Productivity of Typical Delta Irrigation Areas in Aral Sea Basin

The intensity of agricultural activities and the characteristics of water consumption affect the hydrological processes of inland river basins in Central Asia. The crop water requirements and water productivity are different between the Amu Darya and Syr Darya river basins due to the different water resource development and utilization policies of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, which have resulted in more severe agricultural water consumption of the Amu Darya delta than the Syr Darya delta, and the differences in the surface runoff are injected into the Aral Sea. To reveal the difference in water resource dissipation, water productivity, and its influencing factors between the two basins, this study selected the irrigation areas of Amu Darya delta (IAAD) and Syr Darya delta (IASD) as typical examples; the actual evapotranspiration (ETa) was retrieved by using the modified surface energy balance algorithm for land model (SEBAL) based on high spatial resolution Landsat images from 2000 to 2020. Land use and cover change (LUCC) and streamflow data were obtained to analyze the reasons for the spatio-temporal heterogeneity of regional ETa. The water productivity of typical crops in two irrigation areas was compared and combined with statistical data. The results indicate that: (1) the ETa simulated by the SEBAL model matched the crop evapotranspiration (ETc) calculated by the Penman–Monteith method and ground-measured data well, with all the correlation coefficients higher than 0.7. (2) In IAAD, the average ETa was 1150 mm, and the ETa had shown a decreasing trend; for the IASD, the average ETa was 800 mm. The ETa showed an increasing trend with low stability due to a large amount of developable cultivated land. The change of cultivated land dominated the spatio-temporal characteristics of ETa in the two irrigation areas (3). Combined with high spatial resolution ETa inversion results, the water productivity of cotton and rice in IAAD was significantly lower than in IASD, and wheat was not significantly different, but all were far lower than the international average. This study can provide useful information for agricultural water management in the Aral Sea region

Isolation of Endogenously Assembled RNA-Protein Complexes Using Affinity Purification Based on Streptavidin Aptamer S1

Efficient isolation of endogenously assembled viral RNA-protein complexes is essential for understanding virus replication mechanisms. We have developed an affinity purification strategy based on an RNA affinity tag that allows large-scale preparation of native viral RNA-binding proteins (RBPs). The streptavidin-binding aptamer S1 sequence was inserted into the 3′ end of dengue virus (DENV) 5′–3′ UTR RNA, and the DENV RNA UTR fused to the S1 RNA aptamer was expressed in living mammalian cells. This allowed endogenous viral ribonucleoprotein (RNP) assembly and isolation of RNPs from whole cell extract, through binding the S1 aptamer to streptavidin magnetic beads. Several novel host DENV RBPs were subsequently identified by liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS), including RPS8, which we further implicate in DENV replication. We proposed efficient S1 aptamer-based isolation of viral assembled RNPs from living mammalian cells will be generally applicable to the purification of high- and low-affinity RBPs and RNPs under endogenous conditions

RETRACTED ARTICLE: HOXA7 plays a critical role in metastasis of liver cancer associated with activation of Snail

Abstract Background Liver cancer is one of the main causes of cancer-related death in human. HOXA7 has been proved to be related with several cancers. Method The expression levels of HOXA7 were examined by Western blot, qRT-PCR or ICH. MTT was used to detect the proliferative rate of liver cancer cells. The invasive abilities were examined by matrigel and transwell assay. The metastatic abilities of liver cancer cells were revealed in BALB/c nude mice. Results In this report, we revealed that HOXA7 promoted metastasis of HCC patients. First, increased levels of HOXA7 were examined in liver cancer especially in metastatic liver cancer. Moreover, higher expression level of HOXA7 was associated with poorer prognosis of liver cancer patients. Overexpression of HOXA7 significantly enhanced proliferation, migration, invasion in vitro and tumor growth and metastasis in vivo meanwhile silencing HOXA7 significantly inhibited the aboves abilities of liver cancer cells. In this research, we identified that HOXA7 performed its oncogenic characteristics through activating Snail. Conclusion Collectively, we identify the critical role and possible mechanism of HOXA7 in metastasis of liver cancer which suggest that HOXA7 may be a potential therapeutic target of liver cancer patients

Additional file 4: Figure S4. of HOXA7 plays a critical role in metastasis of liver cancer associated with activation of Snail

HOXA7 promotes cell proliferation and tumor growth of liver cancer cell. (A) MTT assay of liver cancer cells with silent expression of HOXA7. (B) MTT assay of liver cancer cells with overexpression of HOXA7. (C) Tumor formation assay of liver cancer cells with silent expression of HOXA7. (D) Tumor formation assay of liver cancer cells with overexpression of HOXA7. **P < 0.01 based on the Student t test. Error bars, SD. The each number of replicates is 3. (JPG 3241 kb

Additional file 5: Figure S5. of HOXA7 plays a critical role in metastasis of liver cancer associated with activation of Snail

HOXA7 promotes expression levels of EMT markers. (A) Western blot analysis of EMT markers in liver cancer cells with silent expression of HOXA7. (B) Western blot analysis of EMT markers in liver cancer cells with overexpression of HOXA7. (C) qRT-PCR analysis of EMT markers in liver cancer cells with silent expression of HOXA7. (D) qRT-PCR analysis of EMT markers in liver cancer cells with overexpression of HOXA7. P < 0.01 in panel C-F based on the Student t test. Error bars, SD. The each number of replicates is 3. (JPG 4138 kb