Reduced expression of Metastasis Suppressor-1 (MTSS1) accelerates progression of human bladder uroepithelium cell carcinoma

Background: Metastasis suppressor 1 (MTSS1) is a multi-functional cytoskeletal protein. Recent research showed that MTSS1 is a potential tumor suppressor in many types of cancer cells, including kidney and bladder cancer cells. However, the clinical implication of MTSS1 in human bladder uroepithelium cell carcinoma (BUCC) and its potential in suppressing BUCC tumorigenesis remains undetermined. In the present study, the expression of MTSS1 in human BUCC tissue samples, and correlations between MTSS1 and pathological grade and stage of the tumors were examined in BUCC specimens. The function of MTSS1 in BUCC progression was explored. Materials and Methods: The mRNA and protein expression of MTSS1 were examined in 68 BUCC tissue samples with matching adjacent normal bladder tissues using quantitative real-time PCR and western blotting. Furthermore, the bladder cancer cell line 5637 was used to determine the anticancer effect of MTSS1. Results: Lower MTSS1 mRNA expression was recorded in BUCC tissues compared to normal bladder tissues. A lower MTSS1 mRNA level was observed in tumors with high clinical stage and with high pathological nuclear grade. Likewise, MTSS1 protein expression in normal bladder tissue was significantly higher than that in BUCC tissue. The protein level of MTSS1 significantly negatively correlated with clinical stage and pathological nuclear grade of BUCC. Cumulative survival curves indicated that MTSS1 expression was negatively correlated with survival time: patients with a high level of MTSS1 had significantly longer survival time than those with a low level of MTSS1 (p<0.001). Overexpression of MTSS1 reduced BUCC cell proliferation, cell-cycle progression and colony formation, but had no influence on BUCC cell apoptosis. Conclusion: Overexpression of MTSS1 suppresses BUCC development, providing a novel perspective for BUCC tumorigenesis and a potential therapeutic target for BUCC

Multi-task learning for aspect level semantic classification combining complex aspect target semantic enhancement and adaptive local focus

Aspect-based sentiment analysis (ABSA) is a fine-grained and diverse task in natural language processing. Existing deep learning models for ABSA face the challenge of balancing the demand for finer granularity in sentiment analysis with the scarcity of training corpora for such granularity. To address this issue, we propose an enhanced BERT-based model for multi-dimensional aspect target semantic learning. Our model leverages BERT's pre-training and fine-tuning mechanisms, enabling it to capture rich semantic feature parameters. In addition, we propose a complex semantic enhancement mechanism for aspect targets to enrich and optimize fine-grained training corpora. Third, we combine the aspect recognition enhancement mechanism with a CRF model to achieve more robust and accurate entity recognition for aspect targets. Furthermore, we propose an adaptive local attention mechanism learning model to focus on sentiment elements around rich aspect target semantics. Finally, to address the varying contributions of each task in the joint training mechanism, we carefully optimize this training approach, allowing for a mutually beneficial training of multiple tasks. Experimental results on four Chinese and five English datasets demonstrate that our proposed mechanisms and methods effectively improve ABSA models, surpassing some of the latest models in multi-task and single-task scenarios

Early Cenozoic diorite and diabase from Doumer Island, Antarctic Peninsula: zircon U-Pb geochronology, petrogenesis and tectonic implications

In order to understand the petrogenesis and tectonic setting of diorite and diabase units on Doumer Island, Antarctic Peninsula, this paper reports new laser ablation—inductively coupled plasma—mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) zircon U-Pb, geochemical, and Lu-Hf isotopic data for the magmatism. The diorite and diabase samples yielded zircon U-Pb ages of 55.4 ± 0.3 and 52.8 ± 0.4 Ma, respectively. These samples are enriched in the large ion lithophile elements and the light rare earth elements, and are depleted in the high field strength elements. The zircons in these samples yield Hf (t) values from 9.03 to 11.87 and model ages (TDM2) of 342–524 Ma. The major, trace, rare earth element (REE), and Hf isotopic data for the diorites indicate that these units were formed by the mixing of magmas generated by (a) the partial melting of mantle wedge material that experienced fluid-metasomatism in a subduction zone setting, and (b) the melting of juvenile crustal material induced by the upwelling of mantle-derived magmas in a subduction–collision setting. The diabase units contain higher total REE concentrations than the diorite, indicating they were derived from a different source region. These samples also have higher Mg# values and contain lower concentrations of Cr and Ni than the diorites, and have weakly negative Nb and Ta anomalies with Nb/Ta values of <3. The zircons in these samples yield Hf (t) values from 9.08 to 11.11 and model ages (TDM2) of 389– 503 Ma. The major, trace, REE, and Hf isotopic compositions of the diabase units indicate that that they were derived from the mixing of depleted mantle-derived magmas with magmas generated by the melting of juvenile crustal material which was induced by the upwelling of the mantle into the crust. Overall the Cenozoic diorite and diabase on Doumer Island is related to subduction environment

Electrolyte Salts and Additives Regulation Enables High Performance Aqueous Zinc Ion Batteries: A Mini Review

Aqueous zinc ion batteries (ZIBs) are regarded as one of the most ideally suited candidates for large-scale energy storage applications owning to their obvious advantages, that is, low cost, high safety, high ionic conductivity, abundant raw material resources, and eco-friendliness. Much effort has been devoted to the exploration of cathode materials design, cathode storage mechanisms, anode protection as well as failure mechanisms, while inadequate attentions are paid on the performance enhancement through modifying the electrolyte salts and additives. Herein, to fulfill a comprehensive aqueous ZIBs research database, a range of recently published electrolyte salts and additives research is reviewed and discussed. Furthermore, the remaining challenges and future directions of electrolytes in aqueous ZIBs are also suggested, which can provide insights to push ZIBs’ commercialization

The role of connectivity in significant bandgap narrowing for fused-pyrene based non-fullerene acceptors toward high-efficiency organic solar cells

Great attention has been paid to developing low bandgap non-fullerene acceptors (NFAs) for matching wide bandgap donor polymers to increase the photocurrent and therefore the power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) of NFA organic solar cells, while pyrene-core based acceptor-donor-acceptor (A-D-A) NFAs have been mainly reported via the 2,9-position connection due to their bisthieno[3′,2′-b']thienyl[a,h]pyrene fused via a five-membered ring bridge at the ortho-position of pyrene as the representative one named FPIC5, which has prohibited further narrowing their energy gap. Herein, an acceptor FPIC6 was exploited by creating the 1,8-position connection through fusing as bisthieno[3′,2′-b′]thienyl[f-g,m-n]pyrene linked at the bay-position via a six-membered bridge, with enhanced push-pull characteristics within such A-D-A structure. As a structural isomer of FPIC5, FPIC6 exhibited a much lower bandgap of 1.42 eV (1.63 eV for FPIC5). Therefore, the photocurrent and PCE of PTB7-Th:FPIC6 cells were improved to 21.50 mA cm-2 and 11.55%, respectively, due to the balanced mobilities, better photoluminescence quenching efficiency and optimized morphology, which are both ∼40% better than those of PTB7-Th:FPIC5 cells. Our results clearly proved that a pyrene fused core with 1,8-position connection with electron-withdrawing end groups instead of 2,9-position connection is an efficient molecular design strategy to narrow the optical bandgap and improve the photovoltaic performance of NFA based OSCs

What you don't know... can't hurt you? A natural field experiment on relative performance feedback in higher education

This paper studies the effect of providing feedback to college students on their position in the grade distribution by using a natural field experiment. This information was updated every six months during a three-year period. We find that greater grades transparency decreases educational performance, as measured by the number of examinations passed and grade point average (GPA). However, self-reported satisfaction, as measured by surveys conducted after feedback is provided but before students take their examinations, increases. We provide a theoretical framework to understand these results, focusing on the role of prior beliefs and using out-of-trial surveys to test the model. In the absence of treatment, a majority of students underestimate their position in the grade distribution, suggesting that the updated information is “good news” for many students. Moreover, the negative effect on performance is driven by those students who underestimate their position in the absence of feedback. Students who overestimate initially their position, if anything, respond positively. The performance effects are short lived—by the time students graduate, they have similar accumulated GPA and graduation rates

Seasonal variations in carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus concentrations and C:N:P stoichiometry in different organs of a Larix principis-rupprechtii Mayr. plantation in the Qinling Mountains, China

Understanding how concentrations of elements and their stoichiometry change with plant growth and age is critical for predicting plant community responses to environmental change. Weusedlong-term field experiments to explore how the leaf, stem and root carbon (C), nitrogen (N) and phosphorous (P) concentrations and their stoichiometry changed with growth and stand age in a L.principis-rupprechtii Mayr. plantation from 2012–2015 in the Qinling Mountains, China. Our results showed that the C, N and P concentrations and stoichiometric ratios in different tissues of larch stands were affected by stand age, organ type andsampling month and displayed multiple correlations with increased stand age in different growing seasons. Generally, leaf C and N concentrations were greatest in the fast-growing season, but leaf P concentrations were greatest in the early growing season. However, no clear seasonal tendencies in the stem and root C, N and P concentrations were observed with growth. In contrast to N and P, few differences were found in organ-specific C concentrations. Leaf N:P was greatest in the fast-growing season, while C:N and C:P were greatest in the late-growing season. No clear variations were observed in stem and root C:N, C:P andN:Pthroughout the entire growing season, but leaf N:P was less than 14, suggesting that the growth of larch stands was limited by N in our study region. Compared to global plant element concentrations and stoichiometry, the leaves of larch stands had higher C, P, C:NandC:PbutlowerNandN:P,andtherootshadgreater PandC:NbutlowerN,C:Pand N:P. Our study provides baseline information for describing the changes in nutritional elements with plant growth, which will facilitates plantation forest management and restoration, and makes avaluable contribution to the global data pool on leaf nutrition and stoichiometry

The Epitope and Neutralization Mechanism of AVFluIgG01, a Broad-Reactive Human Monoclonal Antibody against H5N1 Influenza Virus

The continued spread of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1 virus underscores the importance of effective antiviral approaches. AVFluIgG01 is a potent and broad-reactive H5N1-neutralizing human monoclonal antibody (mAb) showing great potential for use either for therapeutic purposes or as a basis of vaccine development, but its antigenic epitope and neutralization mechanism have not been finely characterized. In this study, we first demonstrated that AVFluIgG01 targets a novel conformation-dependent epitope in the globular head region of H5N1 hemagglutinin (HA). By selecting mimotopes from a random peptide library in combination with computational algorithms and site-directed mutagenesis, the epitope was mapped to three conserved discontinuous sites (I-III) that are located closely at the three-dimensional structure of HA. Further, we found that this HA1-specific human mAb can efficiently block both virus-receptor binding and post-attachment steps, while its Fab fragment exerts the post-attachment inhibition only. Consistently, AVFluIgG01 could inhibit HA-mediated cell-cell membrane fusion at a dose-dependent manner and block the acquisition of pH-induced protease sensitivity. These results suggest a neutralization mechanism of AVFluIgG01 by simultaneously blocking viral attachment to the receptors on host cells and interfering with HA conformational rearrangements associated with membrane fusion. The presented data provide critical information for developing novel antiviral therapeutics and vaccines against HPAI H5N1 virus