Eriocaulon buergerianum extract protects PC12 cells and neurons in zebrafish against 6-hydroxydopamine-induced damage

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p><it>Ericaulon buergerianum </it>(<it>Gujingcao</it>) is an ophthalmic, anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial Chinese medicinal herb. This study aims to investigate the neuroprotective effects of <it>Ericaulon buergerianum </it>ethanol extract (EBE) and to elucidate its underlying action mechanism.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The viability of dopaminergic (DA) neuron in zebrafish was examined by anti-tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) immunostaining. The locomotor activity of zebrafish was assessed with a digital video tracking system. The viability and cellular damage of the PC12 cells were determined by MTT and LDH assays respectively. The nuclear morphological changes in apoptotic cells were evaluated with DNA staining by Hoechst 33342 dye. Intracellular nitric oxide (NO) was quantified by DAF-FM diacetate staining. The expression of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) was determined by Western blot.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>EBE inhibited the 6-OHDA-induced decrease in total distance of movement in zebrafish. Pretreatments of EBE (25, 50, 100 and 200 μg/ml) increased the viability of 6-OHDA-damaged PC12 cells in a dose dependent manner. Protection against 6-OHDA-induced nuclear fragmentation and accumulation of apoptotic bodies was also observed in EBE pretreated cells. Anti-oxidative (inhibition of NO production and iNOS expression in PC12 cells <it>in vitro</it>) activities of EBE are related to its neuroprotective effects in 6-OHDA-induced DA neuron damage.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>EBE exhibited significant neuroprotective activities in zebrafish, including recovery of dopaminergic neuron loss caused by 6-OHDA in a dose-dependent manner <it>in vivo</it>, inhibition of 6-OHDA-induced decrease of total distance in movement in zebrafish. The iNOS-NO pathway may be involved.</p

Metagenomic insights into the relationship between gut microbiota and residual feed intake of small-sized meat ducks

IntroductionThe objective of this study was to determine the regulatory effects of gut microbiota on the feed efficiency (FE) of small-sized meat ducks by evaluating correlations between gut microbiota and residual feed intake (RFI).MethodsA total of 500 21-day-old healthy male ducks with similar initial body weights (645 ± 15.0 g) were raised contemporaneously in the same experimental facility until slaughter at 56 days of age. In total, nine low-RFI (LR) and nine high-RFI (HR) birds were selected for further gut microbiota composition and functional analyses based on the production performance, and the RFI was calculated from 22 to 56 days of age.ResultsGrowth performance results indicated a significantly lower RFI, feed conversion ratio, feed intake, and average daily feed intake in the LR ducks (P &lt; 0.05). Taxonomy results of gut microbiota showed the identification of 19 kinds of phyla and more than 250 kinds of genera in all samples. No significant discrepancies in cecal bacterial α-diversity were discovered between the LR and HR groups, which indicated that the microbial modulatory effects on RFI may be attributed to the bacterial composition, rather than the species diversity. Differential analysis of bacterial communities between the LR and HR groups showed a significant increment of Firmicutes and a significant decline of Bacteroidetes in the LR group (P &lt; 0.05). Specifically, genera of Erysipelatoclostridium, Parasutterella, Fournierella, and Lactococcus significantly proliferated, while Bacteroides significantly decreased in the LR group (P &lt; 0.05). Furthermore, correlation analysis showed that the RFI was significantly correlated with carbohydrate metabolism-related bacteria including Bacteroides, Alistipes, Bifidobacterium, Ruminiclostridium_9, Sellimonas, Oscillibacter, Escherichia-Shigella, Lactococcus, and Streptococcus.ConclusionIn conclusion, the communities related to carbohydrate metabolism had positive regulatory effects on the FE of small-sized meat ducks, promoting it by improving the relative abundance and utilization of these communities. The present study provides valuable insight into the dynamics of gut microbiota underlying the variations in the FE of small-sized meat ducks

Identification of SNPs in MITF associated with beak color of duck

Introduction: Beak color—a pigment-related trait—is an important feature of duck breeds. Recently, little research has addressed genetic mechanism of the beak colors in poultry, whereas the process and the regulation factors of melanin deposition have been well described.Methods: To investigate the genetic mechanism of beak colors, we conducted an integrated analysis of genomic selection signatures to identify a candidate site associated with beak color. For this, we used black-billed (Yiyang I meat duck synthetic line H1, H2, H3&amp;HF) and yellow-billed ducks (Cherry Valley ducks and white feather Putian black duck). Quantitative real-time PCR and genotyping approaches were used to verify the function of the candidate site.Results: We identified 3,895 windows containing 509 genes. After GO and KEGG enrichment analysis, nine genes were selected. Ultimately, MITF was selected by comparing the genomic differentiation (FST). After loci information selection, 41 extreme significantly different loci were selected, which are all located in intron regions of MITF and are in almost complete linkage disequilibrium. Subsequently, the site ASM874695v1:10:g.17814522T &gt; A in MITF was selected as the marker site. Furthermore, we found that MITF expression is significantly higher in black-beaked ducks than in yellow-beaked ducks of the F2 generation (p &lt; 0.01). After genotyping, most yellow-billed individuals are found with homozygous variant; at the same time, there are no birds with homozygous variant in black-billed populations, while the birds with homozygous and heterozygous variant share the same proportion.Conclusion:MITF plays a very critical role in the melanogenesis and melanin deposition of duck beaks, which can effectively affect the beak color. The MITF site, ASM874695v1:10:g.17814522T &gt; A could be selected as a marker site for the duck beak color phenotype

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

How contractor behavior affects engineering project value-added performance

Contractors are one of the most important project participants, and their behavior has gained increasing attention for improving performance, but few studies have been devoted to focusing on the forms of contractor behavior and project value-added performance. This study developed and tested a theoretical model to investigate how different types of contractor behavior (perfunctory, consummate, and opportunistic) affect engineering project value added (EPVA) and analyze the moderating role of contract complexity and task complexity. The multiple regression analysis approach is used to analyze data collected from a survey of 290 Chinese project professionals. The results show that three types of contractor behavior have a significant impact on EPVA, that is, contractor perfunctory and consummate behaviors have a significant positive impact, whereas opportunistic behavior has a significant negative impact. In addition, contractor consummate behavior had the strongest impact, followed by perfunctory and opportunistic behaviors. The moderation results showed that the positive impact between perfunctory behavior and EPVA is strengthened and weakened by contract and task complexity, respectively, whereas the negative impact of opportunistic behavior is weakened and strengthened, respectively. The contract and task complexity have no significant moderating impact on the relationship between contractor consummate behavior and EPVA. The findings of this study contribute to the project governance and project performance literature and provide new knowledge for academe and practice for a deeper understanding of how to realize EPVA from the perspective of contractor behavior.</p

A New Plugging Technology and Its Application for the Extensively Collapsed Ore Pass in the Non-Empty Condition

Aiming at some long ore passes with severe damages and extensive collapses, we describe an optimal measure to plug a local area of ore pass in order to maintain the capacity of continued use. This paper, taking a new plug for the extensively collapsed long ore pass in the non-empty condition as a breakthrough, builds a structure-plugging system for ore pass based on plug effect, suspension effect, arch effect, and span-reducing effect. Meanwhile, a key plugging technology has been integrated which includes a stability evaluation method of plugging structure, controlled technology of drilling with casing in the composite rock mass, and controllable grouting for inhomogeneous loose rock mass. According to this structure-plugging system and technology, a case has been successful for the main ore pass in the Xingshan Iron Mine in China, which has created a precedent in the world. The practice results show that using this technology to plug the extensively collapsed long ore pass has a series of advantages including of scientific design, strong safety, high efficiency, and low cost

Geographic variation and local adaptation in Oryza rufipogon across its climatic range in China

Variation in plant functional traits and demographic behaviour in populations of widely distributed species on geographic gradients may be key to understanding their geographic range limits. Oryza rufipogon, a wild progenitor of rice, occurs in discrete wetland populations over a wide latitudinal range in China. We examined correlations between plant functional traits, latitude, longitude and climatic variables in 34 populations of O. rufipogon across its northern range limit. We also investigated the responses of individuals from all populations after transplantation to two experimental gardens: one north of its range and the other in the extreme south. Seed mass in the field was positively correlated with latitude and longitude, whereas flag-leaf area was negatively correlated with latitude; both effects could be explained largely as a response to temperature. Transplantation revealed that both plasticity and population differentiation contributed to geographic variation. All populations reproduced and overwintered in the southern garden, but in the northern garden, only populations from the northern range were able to reproduce (65%) and survive the winter (58%). Synthesis: Environmentally determined variation in plant functional traits is complex, with both plastic trade-offs between traits and genetic differentiation between populations contributing to the location of the northern limit of Oryza rufipogon

Lowering the n-6/n-3 PUFAs ratio inhibits the formation of THP-1 macrophage-derived foam cell

Abstract Background The balance between n-6 and n-3 PUFAs is an important determinant in the risk for cardiovascular disease. The study was to investigate the influence of the n-6 and n-3 PUFAs ratio on the formation of THP-1 monocyte-derived foam cells and explore the probable mechanism of anti-atherosclerosis. Methods THP-1 monocyte cells were cultured with PMA and ox-LDL to establish a foam-cell model, while treated with different ratios of n-6 to n-3 PUFAs for 48 h. The cholesterol of foam cells was measured by a cholesterol assay kit. The levels of IL-6 and TNFα in supernatant were detected with ELISA methods. The expressions of CD36, ABCA1, ACAT1, PPARγ and LXRα mRNA were detected with real-time PCR. Results Compared with the foam cell model group, the low and middle ratio of n-6 to n-3 PUFAs groups decreased the intracellular concentration of cholesterol (P < 0.01), but the high n-6/n-3 PUFAs ratio did not. Fatty acids decreased the level of IL-6 and TNFα in supernatant in a ratio-dependent manner. Fatty acids treatment also decreased the expressions of CD36、ACTA1、PPARγ、LXRα mRNA in a ratio-dependent manner. Conclusions Lowering the ratios of n-6 to n-3 PUFAs can decrease the secretion of inflammatory cytokines then reduce the expressions of CD36 and ACAT1 mRNA. As well, it can decrease the expressions of CD36 mRNA through the PPARγ pathway. This leads to less cholesterol ingestion into the cells and decreased synthesis of cholesteryl ester, which inhibits the formation of the foam cells, further preventing the occurrence and development of atherosclerosis

Effects of Ginger (Zingiber officinale Roscoe) on Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus and Components of the Metabolic Syndrome: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials

Objective. This article aims to assess the effects of ginger (Zingiber officinale Roscoe) on type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) and/or components of the metabolic syndrome (MetS). Methods. Electronic literature was searched in PubMed, Embase, the Cochrane Library, Chinese Biomedical Database, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, and Wanfang Database from inception of the database to May 19, 2017, and supplemented by browsing reference lists of potentially eligible articles. Randomized controlled trials on research subjects were included. Data were extracted as a mean difference (MD) and 95% confidence interval (CI). Subgroup analysis of fasting blood glucose (FBG) was performed. Results. 10 studies met the inclusion criteria with a total of 490 individuals. Ginger showed a significant beneficial effect in glucose control and insulin sensitivity. The pooled weighted MD of glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c) was −1.00, (95% CI: −1.56, −0.44; P<0.001). Subgroup analysis revealed that ginger obviously reduced FBG in T2DM patients (−21.24; 95% CI: −33.21, −9.26; P<0.001). Meanwhile, the significant effects of improvement of lipid profile were observed. Most analyses were not statistically heterogeneous. Conclusion. Based on the negligible side effects and obvious ameliorative effects on glucose control, insulin sensitivity, and lipid profile, ginger may be a promising adjuvant therapy for T2DM and MetS