LncRNA PFAL suppresses TNF-α-induced inflammation by upregulating miR-18a in WI-38 cells

Purpose: Pneumonia is a serious respiratory disease among children with high mortality and morbidity all over the world. Long non-coding RNAs have been proven to play a vital role in many inflammatory diseases including pneumonia. In the present study, the protective impact of lncRNA PFAL on cell viability, cell apoptosis and secretion of inflammatory cytokines, as well as the underlying molecular mechanism in TNF-α-induced inflammatory injury model of pneumonia were investigated.Methods: WI-38 cell line was treated with 20 ng/ml TNF-α to establish an inflammatory injury model of pneumonia. LncRNA PFAL or miR-18a was up- or down-regulated in the WI-38 cells by transfection procedure. Cell viability was assessed using CCK-8 assay, while the rate of cell apoptosis was measured by utilizing flow cytometry. The mRNA expression levels of lncRNA PFAL, miR-18a, apoptosis-related and JNK pathway genes were determined with RT-qPCR. Moreover, the production of inflammatory cytokines such as IL-6 and MCP-1 were detected by using Western blot analysis.Results: The results indicated that cell viability was significantly (P<0.05) reduced, while the rate of cell apoptosis was increased in the TNF-α-induced WI-38 cells. Also, TNF-α treatment enhanced the expression of inflammatory cytokines that included IL-6 and MCP-1 in WI-38 cells. Overexpression of PFAL suppressed the injury induced by TNF-α and miR-18a was positively regulated by PFAL. Moreover, the inhibition of miR-18a weakens the effect of PFAL overexpression in TNF-α-induced cell injury. Furthermore, PFAL and miR-18a were involved in the regulation of JNK pathway.Conclusion: Overexpression of PFAL suppresses TNF-α-induced WI-38 cell injury by up-regulating miR-18a via the inactivation of JNK signaling pathway. Keywords: Inflammation, JNK pathway, miR-18a, PFAL, Pneumonia, TNF-

Quantitative Analysis of Driving Factors of Grassland Degradation: A Case Study in Xilin River Basin, Inner Mongolia

Current literature suggests that grassland degradation occurs in areas with poor soil conditions or noticeable environmental changes and is often a result of overgrazing or human disturbances. However, these views are questioned in our analyses. Based on the analysis of satellite vegetation maps from 1984, 1998, and 2004 for the Xilin River Basin, Inner Mongolia, China, and binary logistic regression (BLR) analysis, we observe the following: (1) grassland degradation is positively correlated with the growth density of climax communities; (2) our findings do not support a common notion that a decrease of biological productivity is a direct indicator of grassland degradation; (3) a causal relationship between grazing intensity and grassland degradation was not found; (4) degradation severity increased steadily towards roads but showed different trends near human settlements. This study found complex relationships between vegetation degradation and various microhabitat conditions, for example, elevation, slope, aspect, and proximity to water

Predicted Effects of Proposed New Regulation Plans on Sedge/Grass Meadows of Lake Ontario

Previously described models for predicting the percent of Lake Ontario wetlands that would be occupied by sedge/grass-dominated meadow marsh were used to test four proposed new plans for regulation of lake levels and to make comparisons with the current plan and unregulated conditions. The models for drowned river mouth, barrier beach, open embayment, and protected embayment wetlands assessed responses to lake levels that would be generated by each plan under net total supplies modified from those that occurred from1900 to 2000. In years when reduced supplies would allow meadow marsh regeneration, simulated unregulated lake levels produced the most meadow marsh in all wetland geomorphic types; current Plan 1958DD produced the least. Overall predicted percent meadow marsh under the test plans decreased in the order B+, 2007, D+, and A+, and the latter three plans produced rather similar results in many cases. Lower percentages of meadow marsh under some plans were due to insufficient low lake levels that could allow soils to dry and restrict invasion by cattails, as well as lack of periodic high lake levels that could kill invading upland plants. An assessment of seasonal lakelevel characteristics demonstrated that Plan 2007 would reduce mean winter lake levels by 13 cm or more than Plan B+ and springtime lake levels by more than 10 cm. These seasonal differences could result in less winter habitat for muskrats and reduced access to spring spawning habitats for fish such as northern pike. Our model results provide important information for use in the process of selecting a new regulation plan for Lake Ontario

Online Preconcentration and Determination of Trace Amounts of Zinc in Nature Waters

A simple, sensitive, reliable and flexible flow injection spectrophotometric method is proposed for on-line preconcentration and determination of trace amounts of zinc in water. At the presence of Tween-80 in pH 9.3 buffer solutions, the shade of color of Zn (II)-PAN complex is in a linear relation to the zinc amount at the point of the maximum absorption peak of 560 nm. The optimal experimental conditions, including reaction conditions and preconcentration conditions, had been obtained. The linear range of the proposed method was between 2.0 and 360 μg L−1 and the detection limit was 0.42 μg L−1. The relative standard deviation was 3.55% and 2.14% for 5.0 μg L−1 and 50 μg L−1 of zinc standard solution (n = 8). The method had been successfully applied to zinc determination in water samples and the analytical results were satisfactory

Effect of Ultrasound on the Stability of Partial Nitrification: Under the Interference of Aeration Rate

The fluctuation of dissolved oxygen is one of the primary cause of disruptions to the consistent operation of partial nitrification, and the level of dissolved oxygen is mainly controlled by the aeration rate. This study investigated the influence of ultrasonic treatment on the stability of partial nitrification of activated sludge under different aeration conditions. After being treated with ultrasound (energy density = 0.20 W·mL−1, treatment time = 10 min), partial nitrification process operated stably for 67 days, with the nitrite accumulation rate above 83.89 %. The effluent contained 42.50 mg·L−1 of nitrite, much higher than the control reactor (0.30 mg·L−1). The gap between the specific ammonia and nitrite oxidation rates widened continuously as the aeration rate increased, and nitrite-oxidizing bacteria activity did not recover even under conditions with a very high oxygen content. Further analysis showed that ultrasonic treatment had obvious stripping effect on excess extracellular polymeric substances (EPS), especially loosely bound EPS and protein. Additionally, long-term ultrasonic treatment promoted the enrichment of Nitrosomonas and strongly inhibited Nitrotoga. Based on these findings, it appears that under conditions of high aeration rate, ultrasound effectively suppress the recovery of Nitrotoga activity and improve the stability of partial nitrification

Tempo-Spatial Patterns of Land Use Changes and Urban Development in Globalizing China: A Study of Beijing

This study examines the temporal and spatial changes in land use as a consequence of rapid urban development in the city of Beijing. Using a combination of techniques of remote sensing and GIS, the study identifies a substantial loss of plain dryland and a phenomenal expansion of urban construction land over the recent decade. Geographically, there is a clear shifting of urban construction land from the inner city to the outskirts as a consequence of suburbanization. The outward expansion of the ring-road system is found to be one of the most important driving forces explaining the temporal and spatial pattern of land use change. The uneven distribution of population stands as another factor with significant correlation with land use change. The application of the techniques of remote sensing and GIS can enhance the precision and comparability of research on land use change and urban transformation in China

Hemispherical Retina Emulated by Plasmonic Optoelectronic Memristors with All‐Optical Modulation for Neuromorphic Stereo Vision

Binocular stereo vision relies on imaging disparity between two hemispherical retinas, which is essential to acquire image information in three dimensional environment. Therefore, retinomorphic electronics with structural and functional similarities to biological eyes are always highly desired to develop stereo vision perception system. In this work, a hemispherical optoelectronic memristor array based on Ag-TiO2 nanoclusters/sodium alginate film is developed to realize binocular stereo vision. All-optical modulation induced by plasmonic thermal effect and optical excitation in Ag-TiO2 nanoclusters is exploited to realize in-pixel image sensing and storage. Wide field of view (FOV) and spatial angle detection are experimentally demonstrated owing to the device arrangement and incident-angle-dependent characteristics in hemispherical geometry. Furthermore, depth perception and motion detection based on binocular disparity have been realized by constructing two retinomorphic memristive arrays. The results demonstrated in this work provide a promising strategy to develop all-optically controlled memristor and promote the future development of binocular vision system with in-sensor architecture

DQ-LoRe: Dual Queries with Low Rank Approximation Re-ranking for In-Context Learning

Recent advances in natural language processing, primarily propelled by Large Language Models (LLMs), have showcased their remarkable capabilities grounded in in-context learning. A promising avenue for guiding LLMs in intricate reasoning tasks involves the utilization of intermediate reasoning steps within the Chain-of-Thought (CoT) paradigm. Nevertheless, the central challenge lies in the effective selection of exemplars for facilitating in-context learning. In this study, we introduce a framework that leverages Dual Queries and Low-rank approximation Re-ranking (DQ-LoRe) to automatically select exemplars for in-context learning. Dual Queries first query LLM to obtain LLM-generated knowledge such as CoT, then query the retriever to obtain the final exemplars via both question and the knowledge. Moreover, for the second query, LoRe employs dimensionality reduction techniques to refine exemplar selection, ensuring close alignment with the input question's knowledge. Through extensive experiments, we demonstrate that DQ-LoRe significantly outperforms prior state-of-the-art methods in the automatic selection of exemplars for GPT-4, enhancing performance from 92.5% to 94.2%. Our comprehensive analysis further reveals that DQ-LoRe consistently outperforms retrieval-based approaches in terms of both performance and adaptability, especially in scenarios characterized by distribution shifts. DQ-LoRe pushes the boundary of in-context learning and opens up new avenues for addressing complex reasoning challenges. Our code is released at https://github.com/AI4fun/DQ-LoRe}{https://github.com/AI4fun/DQ-LoRe.Comment: Accepted in ICLR 202

Genome of the rams horn snail Biomphalaria straminea : an obligate intermediate host of schistosomiasis

This work was supported by the Hong Kong Research Grant Council Collaborative Research Fund (C4015-20EF), General Research Fund (14100919), NSFC/RGC Joint Research Scheme (N_CUHK401/21), and The Chinese University of Hong Kong Direct Grant (4053433, 4053489). Y.Y., W.L.S., C.F.W., S.T.S.L., and Y.L. were supported by the Ph.D. studentships of The Chinese University of Hong Kong. A.H. is supported by a Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) David Phillips Fellowship (BB/N020146/1). T.B. is supported by a studentship from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council-funded South West Biosciences Doctoral Training Partnership (BB/M009122/1). M.E.A.R. is supported by a Ph.D. studentship from the School of Biology and St Andrews University.Background: Schistosomiasis, or bilharzia, is a parasitic disease caused by trematode flatworms of the genus Schistosoma. Infection by Schistosoma mansoni in humans results when cercariae emerge into water from freshwater snails in the genus Biomphalaria and seek out and penetrate human skin. The snail Biomphalaria straminea is native to South America and is now also present in Central America and China, and represents a potential vector host for spreading schistosomiasis. To date, genomic information for the genus is restricted to the neotropical species Biomphalaria glabrata. This limits understanding of the biology and management of other schistosomiasis vectors, such as B. straminea. Findings: Using a combination of Illumina short‐read, 10X Genomics linked‐read, and Hi‐C sequencing data, our 1.005 Gb B. straminea genome assembly is of high contiguity, with a scaffold N50 of 25.3 Mb. Transcriptomes from adults were also obtained. Developmental homeobox genes, hormonal genes, and stress-response genes were identified, and repeat content was annotated (40.68% of genomic content). Comparisons with other mollusc genomes (including Gastropoda, Bivalvia, and Cephalopoda) revealed syntenic conservation, patterns of homeobox gene linkage indicative of evolutionary changes to gene clusters, expansion of heat shock protein genes, and the presence of sesquiterpenoid and cholesterol metabolic pathway genes in Gastropoda. In addition, hormone treatment together with RT-qPCR assay reveal a sesquiterpenoid hormone responsive system in B. straminea, illustrating that this renowned insect hormonal system is also present in the lophotrochozoan lineage. Conclusion: This study provides the first genome assembly for the snail B. straminea and offers an unprecedented opportunity to address a variety of phenomena related to snail vectors of schistosomiasis, as well as evolutionary and genomics questions related to molluscs more widely.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe