The balance of poly(U) polymerase activity ensures germline identity, survival, and development in Caenorhabditis elegans

Uridylation of RNAs has been found to be highly prevalent and conserved among eukaryotes. The untemplated addition of uridines to the 3\u27 end of RNA molecules is catalyzed by poly (U) polymerase (PUP). Uridylation has a fundamental role in RNA decay. The emerging discoveries regarding uridylation emphasize a new layer of gene regulation, and therefore we were curious about the developmental consequences of such gene regulation. Here, we investigated the roles of three Caenorhabditis elegans proteins, with in vitro PUP activity, in germline development. PUP-1/CDE-1 and PUP-2 are known to target certain classes of small non-coding RNA, and the function of PUP-3 remains unknown. We examined the developmental phenotypes of pup mutants and evaluated the expression of PUP proteins in the germ line. We show that PUP-1 and PUP-2 function together to maintain germline identity and ensure germline survival and development under conditions of stress. PUP-1 and PUP-2 have distinct expression patterns within the germ line and localize to distinct subcellular compartments. In contrast, PUP-3 has a distinct role in germline development. PUP-3 abundance is elevated in the pup-1/-2 double mutant germline, and the loss of PUP-3 activity largely suppresses the pup-1/-2 germline phenotype. We propose that germline survival, identity, and development require the correct balance of PUP activity

The Impact of COVID-19 on Young Children\u27s Education - Exploring the Compatibility of Combining Progressive Education with Online Learning

The COVID-19 outbreak at the end of 2019 forced most schools around the world to move their classrooms online. This research takes the progressive education of young children as the basic educational concept and attempts to explore the compatibility of online education and progressive education of young children through interviews with educators in the United States and China. By understanding how online teaching occurred through interviews with early childhood teachers who implemented it during the COVID-19 outbreak, and the decisions and opinions of school administrators, this study compares the different teaching measures taken by early childhood teachers in the United States and China in the face of the COVID-19 outbreak. In addition, the study recommends a progressive education model for online education of young children based on a qualitative analysis of progressive educators’ and administrators’ reported practices and perspectives

Characterizations of distality via weak equicontinuity

For an infinite discrete group $G$ acting on a compact metric space $X$, we introduce several weak versions of equicontinuity along subsets of $G$ and show that if a minimal system $(X,G)$ admits an invariant measure then $(X,G)$ is distal if and only if it is pairwise IP$^*$-equicontinuous; if the product system $(X\times X,G)$ of a minimal system $(X,G)$ has a dense set of minimal points, then $(X,G)$ is distal if and only if it is pairwise IP$^*$-equicontinuous if and only if it is pairwise central$^*$-equicontinuous; if $(X,G)$ is a minimal system with $G$ being abelian, then $(X,G)$ is a system of order $\infty$ if and only if it is pairwise FIP$^*$-equicontinuous.Comment: 20 pages. To appear in Discrete and Continuous Dynamical Systems. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:2108.0127

Getting the real-time precise round-trip time for stepping stone detection

Stepping stone attacks are often used by network intruders to hide their identities. The Round Trip Times (RTT) between the send packets and corresponding echo packets for the connection chains of stepping stones are critical for detecting such attacks. In this paper, we propose a novel real-time RTT getting algorithm for stepping stones which is based on the estimation of the current RTT value. Our experiments show that it is far more precise than the previous real-time RTT getting algorithms. We also present the probability analysis which shows that our algorithm has a high matching rate and a high accurate rate

Sevoflurane ameliorates doxorubicin-induced myocardial injury by affecting the phosphorylation states of proteins in PI3K/Akt/mTOR signaling pathway

  Background: The effect of sevoflurane on the doxorubicin-induced myocardial injury was explored by investigating the phosphorylation states of proteins in phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K)/Akt/mam­malian target of rapamycin (mTOR) signaling pathway. Methods: Myocardial injury rat models were induced by doxorubicin and evenly assigned into five groups according to different treatment: Doxorubicin group (DG, 200-μL saline solution), sevoflurane group (SevG, inhaled with 2.4% sevoflurane for 2 h), LY294002 group (LYG, Akt inhibitor, 0.3 mg/kg in 200-μL Dimethyl Sulfoxide [DMSO]), solvent DMSO control group (SG) and autophagy inhibitor 3-methyladenine (3-MA) group (MG, 30 mg/kg in 200-μL DMSO). The healthy rats were assigned to a contro1 group (CG, 200-μL saline solution). Myocardial apoptosis was detected by terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick end labeling (TUNEL) assay. The concentration of cardiac troponin I (cTnI) was detected by ELISA. The levels of total Akt (t-Akt), phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt), mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), phosphorylated-mTOR (p-mTOR) and autophagy marker LC3-II was detected by Western Blot. The experiments were also repeated at the cell level. Results: Terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick end labeling analysis showed that the ap­optosis rates were high in DG and SG, reached the highest level in LYG, reduced in SevG and MG, and reached the lowest level in CG. The levels of p-Akt p-mTOR were low in groups DG and SG, reached the lowest level in LYG, increased in SevG and MG, and reached the highest level in CG. In contrast, LC3-II expression, apoptosis index and serum cTnI concentration were high in DG and SG, reached the highest level in LYG, reduced in SevG and MG, and reached the lowest level in CG (p < 0.05). Cell experiment showed similar results as with animal experiments. Conclusions: Sevoflurane ameliorates myocardial injury by affecting the phosphorylation states of the proteins in PI3K/Akt/mTOR signaling pathway and reducing the injury biomarker. (Cardiol J 2017; 24, 4: 409–418