The FEM-Prediction on tensile performance of woven membrane materials under uni and Bi-axial loads

In this study, the mechanical model of the woven PVC-coated membrane materials has been built. By the FEM analysis, it was found out that when tensioned under uni-axial loads, the tensile modulus in the warp and fill direction of woven membrane materials could be predicted nicely, especially after the revision of the properties for the fiber materials. The effect of the tensile moduli of the fiber and the PVC coating materials on the modulus of the woven membrane fabrics has been discussed. It could be consulted that with the proper improvement of the modulus of the fiber materials in the fill direction, the discrepancy between the modulus of woven membrane materials in the warp and fill direction could be reduced to a certain extent. When it comes to the prediction of the modulus of the woven membrane materials under bi-axial loads, large difference could be noticed between the predicted results and the experimental results, especially in warp direction. This was due to the fact that the mechanical analysis model could only show the differences of the geometry configuration between the warp and fill directions. However, the reinforcement of membrane materials in warp direction during weaving and coating processes has been ignored

EFFECTS OF LONG-TERM TAI CHI EXERCISE ON BALANCE CONTROL IN OLDER ADULTS

This study assessed the static and dynamic balance control of older adults who have 10 years of Tai Chi exercise experience and compared their characteristics with their sedentary counterparts. The abilities were measured using methods: single-leg stance times with eyes open and closed; sway of center of pressure (COP) during static standing with eyes open/closed, and leaning the body in three specific directions. Compared with control group, 1) Tai Chi Group showed longer single-leg stance times with eyes open and closed, 2) slower sway velocity of COP in mediolateral and anterioposterior directions and shorter sway distance in both directions, and 3) shorter total, anterioposterior, and mediolateral routes and shorter time spent during the dynamic balance test. Long-term Tai Chi exercise improves the balance ability, especially the dynamic balance, of older adults

Interleukin-22 ameliorates liver fibrosis through miR-200a/beta-catenin

IL-22 ameliorates liver fibrosis by inhibiting hepatic stellate cells (HSC), and loss of miR-200a is associated with the development of liver fibrosis. The study aimed to investigate the interplay between IL-22 and miR-200a in regulating liver fibrosis in vivo and in vitro. We observed that IL-22 significantly reduced the proliferation of HSC and increased the expression of p-STAT3. β-catenin was identified as a target gene of miR-200a by luciferase reporter assay, and upregulation of miR-200a significantly attenuated the proliferation of HSC and reduced β-catenin expression. IL-22 treatment increased expression of miR-200a and decreased expression of β-catenin in HSC. The expression of p-STAT3 and miR-200a was elevated while β-catenin was decreased in fibrotic rat liver after IL-22 treatment. Expression levels of β-catenin and p-STAT3 were inversely correlated in fibrotic rat liver and HSC. Upregulation of β-catenin suppressed expression of p-STAT3 in HSC. We concluded that IL-22 inhibits HSC activation and ameliorates liver fibrosis through enhancing expression of miR-200a and reducing expression of β-catenin, suggesting there may be a crosstalk between IL-22/STAT3 and β-catenin pathway

Effect of Oral Administration of Enterococcus faecium Ef1 on Innate Immunity of Sucking Piglets

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of orally administered Enterococcus faecium EF1 on innate immune responses of jejunal mucosa in newborn piglets. Twenty-four commercial crossbred healthy newborn piglets were randomly divided into two groups, control (T0) and treatment (T1) group. Each group consists of 12 piglets. T1 was administered sterilized skim milk 2 ml piglet-1 day-1 with addition of E. faecium EF1 (5~6×108 cfu/ml) by oral gavage on alternative odd days (1st, 3rd and 5th) after birth. T0 fed with the same volume of sterilized skim milk without probiotics. The merciful killing of piglets at the 25th day after birth was performed to collect the samples of jejunal mucosa to measure the innate cytokine responses and the Toll-like receptors gene expression by quantitative real time PCR. The results showed that TGF-β1 and TNF-α concentrations increased and mRNA expression levels also improved significantly in T1 as compared to T0. While, the production of IFN-γ and IL-8 decreased significantly in T1 and gene expression modification was not observed. In addition, TLR (Toll-like receptor) 2 and TLR 9 transcription levels were up-regulated in treatment (T1) group. These findings revealed that oral administration of E. faecium EF1 was effective to activate innate immunity and could modulate the TLRs expression in jejunal mucosa of piglets

Meta-Analysis on the Efficacy and Safety of Hyperbaric Oxygen as Adjunctive Therapy for Vascular Dementia

Background: Vascular dementia (VD) is a common type of disease in the elderly. Numerous clinical trials have suggested that hyperbaric oxygen is an effective and safe complementary therapy for aging-related disorders. However, there is no reliable systematic evidence regarding hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) for the treatment of VD. Therefore, we performed a meta-analysis to evaluate the clinical efficacy and safety of HBOT in treating VD.Methods: We methodically retrieved the clinical studies from eight databases (PubMed, Cochrane Library, Embase, Web of Science, Sino-Med, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), China Science and Technology Journal Database (VIP), and WanFang) from their inception to November 2018. RevMan 5.3.5 was used for quality assessment and data analysis. Stata 15.1 was employed for publication bias detection and sensitivity analysis.Results: Twenty-five randomized clinical trials (RCTs) involving 1,954 patients met our inclusion criteria. These articles researched the HBOT + oxiracetam + conventional therapy (CT) vs. oxiracetam + CT (n = 13), HBOT + butylphthalide +CT vs. butylphthalide + CT (n = 5), HBOT + donepezil + CT vs. donepezil + CT (n = 4), HBOT + nicergoline + CT vs. nicergoline + CT (n = 2) and HBOT + CT vs. CT (n = 1). The results indicated that additional HBOT strikingly improved the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) (MD = 4.00; 95% CI = 3.28–4.73; P < 0.00001), activities of daily living (ADL) (MD = −5.91; 95% CI = −6.45, −5.36; P < 0.00001) and ADL by Barthel index (BADL) (MD = 13.86; 95% CI = 5.63–22.10; P = 0.001) and increased the total efficacy rate (TEF) (OR = 4.84, 95% CI = 3.19–7.33, P < 0.00001). The adverse events rates were not statistically significant between the HBOT and CT groups (OR = 0.85, 95% CI = 0.26–2.78, P = 0.79).Conclusion: In view of the effectiveness and safety of HBOT, the present meta-analysis suggested that HBOT can be recommended as an effective and safe complementary therapy for the treatment of VD.Protocol Registration: PROSPERO (ID: CRD42019117178). Available online at: http://www.crd.york.ac.uk/PROSPERO/display_record.asp?ID=CRD42019117178

Phylogeny and evolutionary history of Leymus (Triticeae; Poaceae) based on a single-copy nuclear gene encoding plastid acetyl-CoA carboxylase

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Single- and low- copy genes are less likely subject to concerted evolution, thus making themselves ideal tools for studying the origin and evolution of polyploid taxa. <it>Leymus </it>is a polyploid genus with a diverse array of morphology, ecology and distribution in Triticeae. The genomic constitution of <it>Leymus </it>was assigned as NsXm, where Ns was presumed to be originated from <it>Psathyrostachys</it>, while Xm represented a genome of unknown origin. In addition, little is known about the evolutionary history of <it>Leymus</it>. Here, we investigate the phylogenetic relationship, genome donor, and evolutionary history of <it>Leymus </it>based on a single-copy nuclear <it>Acc1 </it>gene.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Two homoeologues of the <it>Acc1 </it>gene were isolated from nearly all the sampled <it>Leymus </it>species using allele-specific primer and were analyzed with those from 35 diploid taxa representing 18 basic genomes in Triticeae. Sequence diversity patterns and genealogical analysis suggested that (1) <it>Leymus </it>is closely related to <it>Psathyrostachys</it>, <it>Agropyron</it>, and <it>Eremopyrum</it>; (2) <it>Psathyrostachys juncea </it>is an ancestral Ns-genome donor of <it>Leymus </it>species; (3) the Xm genome in <it>Leymus </it>may be originated from an ancestral lineage of <it>Agropyron </it>and <it>Eremopyrum triticeum</it>; (4) the <it>Acc1 </it>sequences of <it>Leymus </it>species from the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau are evolutionarily distinct; (5) North America <it>Leymus </it>species might originate from colonization via the Bering land bridge; (6) <it>Leymus </it>originated about 11-12MYA in Eurasia, and adaptive radiation might have occurred in <it>Leymus </it>during the period of 3.7-4.3 MYA and 1.7-2.1 MYA.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p><it>Leymus </it>species have allopolyploid origin. It is hypothesized that the adaptive radiation of <it>Leymus </it>species might have been triggered by the recent upliftings of the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau and subsequent climatic oscillations. Adaptive radiation may have promoted the rapid speciation, as well as the fixation of unique morphological characters in <it>Leymus</it>. Our results shed new light on our understanding of the origin of Xm genome, the polyploidization events and evolutionary history of <it>Leymus </it>that could account for the rich diversity and ecological adaptation of <it>Leymus </it>species.</p

Relationship of environmental factors in pond water and dynamic changes of gut microbes of sea bass Lateolabrax japonicus

The effect of structure of gut microbes on the health of host has attracted increasing attention. Sea bass Lateolabrax japonicus is an important farmed fish in China. The relationship of the dynamic changes of intestinal bacterial communities in L. japonicus and the cultural water environment is very important for healthy culture. Here, the diversity and abundance of the gut microbial communities of L. japonicus were evaluated during the culture using 16S rRNA Illumina sequencing. Both the opportunistic pathogens Aeromonas (1.68%), Vibrio (1.59%), and Acinetobacter (1.22%); and the potential probiotics Lactobacillus (2.27%), Bacillus (1.16%), and Lactococcus (0.37%) were distributed in the gut of L. japonicus. The increasing concentration of nitrogen of water environments with the increase of culture time significantly correlated with shifts in the microbial community structure: 40.04% of gut microbial changes due to nitrogen concentration. Higher concentrations of nitrogen showed a significantly negative correlation with intestinal probiotics in L. japonicus. The results indicate that the abundance of intestinal bacteria of L. japonicus is mainly driven by the changes of environmental factors (e.g., nitrogen), and it’s very important that the linking environmental parameters with bacterial data of guts could be used as an early warning indicator in L. japonicus heath culture