Environmental conditions and disturbances are important factors that could influence ecological processes. For this reason, it is essential to know the relationship between them. The objective of this study was to analyze the effect of environmental conditions and disturbance on three growth stages (adults, germinated individuals, and seeds) of conifers, oaks, and other broadleaf species that compose the temperate forests of the highlands of the Sierra Norte of Oaxaca, Mexico. For this purpose, we established 0.1 ha plots along an altitudinal gradient ranging from 1950 m to 3250 m asl where we sampled vegetation, placed traps for seed rain, and quantified seed germination. We recorded climatic, edaphic, topographic, light, and disturbance conditions. We recorded a positive influence of anthropogenic disturbances on conifers in all their growth stages analyzed. For oaks and other broadleaf species, climatic variables such as temperature and precipitation showed a negative effect on adults and seeds, while disturbance showed no effect. Our results indicate that environmental conditions and anthropogenic disturbances have a differential effect on the biological groups that compose these forests and depending on the growth stage of the biological groups.

Abstract Introduction Severe COVID-19 management is still challenging. Having a laboratory factor to predict the severity of a patient’s condition can be very useful in how to approach each patient. There have been studies concentrating on the correlation between serum C-reactive protein (CRP) level and COVID-19 severity but we aim to reach a threshold for CRP in disease severity determination. Methods We conducted a thorough search on PubMed, Web of Science and Google Scholar databases, and 323 studies were assessed for eligibility in three phases. The T-test was applied for the CRP level cutoffs. Results Eventually, 11 articles and 1615 patients were included in this systematic review. Our analysis evaluated combined mean, median, and standard deviation of severe patients’ CRP to be respectively 73.37, 53.80 and 47.936. Based on the combined mean, 75mg/dl was suggested as an initial threshold for baseline CRP in hospitalized patients for developing severe conditions. Conclusion This study recommends that COVID-19 patients with on-admission serum CRP levels of 75 mg/dl and more are likely associated with severe conditions. Thus, anti-inflammatory agents and further following may be helpful in these patients.

As one genus of Oleaceae, Osmanthus is well-known for its high ornamental value. Due to the deficiency of clearly discriminatory traits, the species classification of genus Osmanthus is controversial. Here, we obtained two chloroplast genomes of O. fragrans and O. matsumuranus using Illumina sequencing, and compared them with 13 previously published chloroplast genomes of Osmanthus species. The chloroplast genomes of 15 Osmanthus species were 155,155 to 155,570 bp in length, which showed a typical quadripartite structure with high conservation of gene order and gene content. Each chloroplast genome had 132 genes including 87 protein-coding genes, 37 tRNA genes and eight rRNA genes. The number of simple sequence repeats identified in each Osmanthus species was in the range of 55-68. A total of 11 highly variable loci could be potentially used as specific molecular markers in the identification of Osmanthus species. The third position of codons tended to use A/U base, and natural selection contributed more in the formation of codon usage bias in comparison to mutation pressure. The chloroplast genome phylogenetic analysis showed that the species of Sect. Leiolea formed a well-supported monophyletic clade sister to Chionanthus virginicus. Besides, O. austrocaledonicus also separated as a distinct lineage nested within the members of Notelaea and Nestegis. The results of comparative and phylogenetic analysis provide valuable references for further study in identification, breeding improvement and phylogenetic relationships in Osmanthus species.

The combined wind speed estimator and tip-speed ratio (WSE-TSR) tracking wind turbine control scheme has seen recent and increased traction from the wind industry. The modern control scheme provides a flexible trade-off between power and load objectives. In academia, the Kω2 controller is often used based on its simplicity and steady-state optimality and is taken as a baseline here. This paper demonstrates the steady-state equivalence and dynamic differences between these controllers and presents a systematic procedure for their optimal calibration. For calibration of the control schemes, a multi-objective optimisation problem is formulated with the conflicting objectives of power maximisation and torque fluctuations minimisation. The optimisation problem is solved by approximating the Pareto front based on the set of optimal solutions found by an explorative search. The Pareto fronts obtained for calibration of the baseline and for increasing fidelities of the WSE-TSR tracking controller show that no optimal solution exists, translating into increased power capture with respect to the baseline Kω2 controller. The frequency-domain analysis, however, shows increased control bandwidth for tip-speed ratio reference tracking for the solution leading to power maximisation. If the objective is to reduce the torque variance, the controller bandwidth decreases with a mild penalty on the energy yield. High-fidelity simulations confirm this trend, proving that, if properly calibrated, the WSE-TSR tracking controller obtains approximately the same generated power of the baseline while reducing torque actuation effort.

Converting CO2 with various epoxides to cyclic carbonates is extremely important. However, most of catalysts for such conversion either require complicated fabrication or are obtained from unsustainable sources. Motivated by this problem, we prepare biomass-based “all-in-one” carbon dots as nano-organocatalysts for firstly converting CO2 to cyclic carbonates. In this work, carbon dots (CD@KI) with high catalytic performance and good recyclability are prepared from sodium phytate (SP), polyethylenimine (PEI) and KI using one-pot hydrothermal treatment featuring cheap precursors and simple operation. Assisted by highly catalytic activity of CD@KI, up to 99.5% yield is achieved for converting CO2 and various epoxides to cyclic carbonates under mild conditions (solvent-free and 1 atm of CO2). Moreover, the conversion yield is maintained for reactions up to ten grams in scale. Significantly, by taking advantage of the inherent luminescence of CD@KI, the as-formed cyclic carbonates catalyzed by CD@KI can be directly converted to afterglow polymer composites.

Objective: An active role for the immune system in controlling the progress of multiple myeloma (MM) has been postulated for many years. However, the T-cells and their phenotype in MM remain to be elucidated. In this study, we compared the phenotype of T-cells in MM patients and healthy donors. The expression of chemokine recepptor marker (CCR7), senescent marker (CD57) , co-stimulator marker(CD28), activation marker (HLA-DR and CD38), and differentiation marker (CD45RA and CD45RO) , were assessed on T cells from MM patients and Healthy Donors (HD) using multicolor flow cytometry (MFC). Methods: from June 2021 to october 2022, 17 newly diagnosed MM patients were selected from the Affiliated Hospital of Chengde Medical College, and 20 healthy people were selected as control group. MFC was used to detect the markers on T cells in the peripheral blood of the patients and HD.

Blockchain-based decentralized technology has gained a lot of attraction and interest in academia and industry. This peer-to-peer and transparent blockchain network makes it an acceptable technology. This decentralized network has many great specifications such as transparency, immutability, irreversibility, and auditability. Bitcoin, the first and most successful blockchain application, achieves much success in recent years. This survey article attempts to outline an extensive survey of blockchain technology, investigating its structures, various protocol layers, features, value, challenges, and applications.

Our previous research developed a novel tuberculosis (TB) DNA vaccine ag85a/b showed a significant therapeutic effect on the mouse tuberculosis model by intramuscular injection (IM) and electroporation (EP). However, the action mechanisms between these two vaccine immunization methods remain unclear. In a previous study, 96 M. tuberculosis (MTB) H37Rv-infected BALB/c mice were treated with PBS, 10μg, 50μg, 100μg, and 200μg ag85a/b DNA vaccine delivered by IM and EP three times at two-week intervals, respectively. In this study, peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from 3 mice in each group were isolated to extract total RNA. The gene expression profiles were analyzed using gene microarray technology to obtain differentially expressed (DE) genes. Finally, DE genes were validated by real-time reverse transcription-quantitive PCR (RT-qPCR) and the GEO database. After MTB infection, most of the up-regulated DE genes were related to the digestion and absorption of nutrients or neuroendocrine, for example, Iapp, Scg2, Chga, Amy2a5, etc, and most of the down-regulated DE genes were related to cellular structural and functional proteins, especially the structure and function proteins of alveolar epithelial cell, for example, Sftpc, Sftpd, Pdpn, etc. Most of the abnormally up-regulated or down-regulated DE genes in the TB model group were recovered in the 100μg and 200μg ag85a/b DNA IM groups and four DNA EP groups. The pancreatic secretion pathway down-regulated and Rap1 signal pathway up-regulated had particularly significant changes during the immunotherapy of the ag85a/b DNA vaccine on the mouse TB model. The action target and mechanism of IM and EP are highly consistent. Tuberculosis infection caused rapid catabolism and slow anabolism in mice. For the first time, we found that the effective dose of the ag85a/b DNA vaccine immunized whether by IM or EP could significantly up-regulate immune-related pathways and recover the metabolic disorder and the injury caused by MTB.

Objective: this study was based on a reticulated meta-analysis to investigate the differences in efficacy and advantages and disadvantages of different acupuncture methods for the treatment of TS and to find the optimal acupuncture method for clinical reference. Methods: Randomized controlled trials of acupuncture for childhood tic-obstruction syndrome included in PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, Web of Science, CNKI, Wanfang, Vipers (VIP), and Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (SinoMed) databases were searched until 09/2022. The retrieved literature was screened and information extracted, and the risk of bias of the literature was evaluated using ROB2, and a Network Meta-analysis was performed using STATA 16. Results: A total of 22 studies including 1433 patients were included. 4 acupuncture methods were included: acupuncture, scalp acupuncture , electroacupuncture, and Auricular-Plaster. Network meta-analysis results showed that: efficacy: compared with western medicine acupuncture combined with scalp acupuncture (RR=1.26, 95% CI (1.18,1.35), P<0.05) was better. Reduction of YGTSS scores: compared with western , electroacupuncture (MD=-3.89, 95% CI(-7.10,-0.69), P<0.05) and acupuncture (MD=-4.35, 95% CI(-5.76,-2.95), P<0.05) were more effective. Overall, acupuncture combined with scalp acupuncture was the most effective. In terms of safety, acupuncture was superior to western medicine. Conclusion: Acupuncture has better efficacy and safety in the treatment of TS. Overall, acupuncture combined with scalp acupuncture was the most effective. Due to the low methodological quality of the included studies, the results of this study need to be confirmed by a large sample, more rigorous, randomized double-blind controlled tri

At present, the effect of exogenous interleukin (IL) -17A in septic mice is still controversial. This study further explored the effect of exogenous IL-17A on multiple organ function and prognosis in septic mice. Mice model of sepsis was established by cecal ligation and puncture (CLP) method, and the mice were randomly divided into 8 groups according to different intervention measures: Sham+PBS, CLP+PBS, CLP+0.25μg IL-17A, CLP+0.5μg IL-17A, CLP+1μg IL-17A, CLP+2μg IL-17A, CLP+4μg IL-17A and CLP+Anti-IL-17A. Survival rates were monitored and recorded at 12-hour intervals, and the expression changes of blood routine, related inflammatory cytokines, liver and kidney function indexes of mice. Pathological injuries of lung, liver and kidney of mice in each group were detected by H&E staining, and the evaluation of bacterial translocation in vitro was performed by inoculation medium. The results showed that except for the sham-operated group, the 7-day survival rate of the mice in the CLP+1μg IL-17A group was the highest (75%). And exogenous administration of appropriate dose of IL-17A was beneficial to reduce alanine aminotransferase (ALT), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), blood urea nitrogen (BUN) and creatinine (Cre) in septic mice. The pathological damage of lung, liver and kidney tissue also can be alleviated, and the colony count of peripheral blood and spleen tissue of mice were also significantly decreased. From this, we concluded that exogenous administration of appropriate dose of IL-17A can improve the bacterial clearance ability of septic mice, and improve the multiple organ dysfunction and 7-day survival rate of the septic mice.

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The names Salvia campanulata Wall. ex Benth. and S. nubicola Wall. ex Sweet (Lamiaceae) have not been typified before, and lectotypes are here designated from specimens preserved at G and K, respectively.

Diazotrophs/plant symbiosis model system has been developed but the nitrogen fixation efficiency of engineering systems was suboptimal compared to the wild-type system. In this study, CDs with benzoquinone structure and phenazine structure that prepared from O-phenylenediamine (o-PD) and catechol (CAT) were selected as electron-donor and electron relay for constructing CDs/microalgae nitrogen fixation hybrid system. the X-ray photoelectron spectroscope (XPS) and Fourier transform infrared spectrometer (FTIR) results demonstrated the presence of C=O bond from benzoquinone on CDs. 1H-Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectra reveal the fluorescent molecules linking on the CDs’ surface. The photocurrent response demonstrates the photoelectron donor ability of CDs. Nostoc commune Vauch microalgae were selected as a diazotroph. The hybrid system exhibited 1.32 times ethylene-produced content compared to pure microalgae. Linking this hybrid system with the lettuce hydroponics platform, the lettuce successfully utilized the nitrogen in the atmosphere as ammonia fertilizer. The net photosynthetic rate, total fresh weight, total chlorophyll content, and total soluble protein content of lettuce growth in the established platform increased by 1.20, 1.12, 1.14, and 1.32 times, respectively.

Purpose: Brain tumors, whether primary or secondary, have limited information about proteomic changes despite advances in the understanding of the driver gene mutations and heterogeneity within tumor cells. The purpose of this study is to distinguish primary and secondary brain tumors based on proteomics. Experimental Design: We assembled the most common primary tumors as follows: gliomas from WHO grade II to IV with or without IDH1 mutations; and BrMs with a wide range, including lung cancer (L.C), breast cancer (B.C), ovarian cancer (O.C), and colorectal cancer (C.C). A total of 29 tissue samples were analyzed by label free quantitative mass spectrometry-based proteomics. Results: In total, 8,370 protein groups were identified, and approximately 4,000 quantified protein groups were adopted for further analysis. Proteomic analysis of metastatic tumors reveals conserved features across multiple cancers. While proteomic heterogeneities were found for discriminating low- and high-grade of gliomas, as well as IDH1 mutant and wild-type gliomas. And distinct pathway-level differences among these two types of brain malignancies were revealed. The characteristic pathways of BrMs focused on proliferation and immunomodulation after colonizing the brain, whereas invasion processes were notably activated in gliomas. Conclusions and Clinical Relevance: We elucidated an extensive proteomic landscape of BrMs and gliomas, providing information for the development of potential therapeutic and diagnostic strategies for type-specific brain tumors.

An effective approach for monodesulfonation of polyphenol sulfonate under ultrasonic irradiation was reported. Series of substituted ortho-, meta- or para-hydroxylphenol sulfonates or 5-hydroxy-1,3-phenylene bis(4-methylbenzenesulfonate) were obtained specifically in the presence of sodium hydroxide in acetonitrile. With treatment of potassium carbonate in alcohol, alkyloxylphenol sulfonates was provided via one-pot monodesulfanation followed by alkylation under ultrasonicated solvent-free conditions. The alcohol had been re-garded as green alkylation reagent. The results of the exploration of the scalability of monodesulfonation and one-pot monodesulfona-tion-alkylation of resorcinol bissulfonate indicated that such modes had the potential application value in scale production.

Pogocablanols A–G (1–7), seven new compounds with an unprecedented sesquiterpenoid skeleton, were isolated from the aerial parts of Pogostemon cablin. This novel type of sesquiterpenoids, named pogocablane-type sesquiterpenoids, possesses a bicyclic nonisoprenoid system, including a five-membered carbocycle with a methyl group, a six-membered carbocycle with two methyl groups, and a methylene connecting the two carbocycles. Particularly, three isomers have an interesting 1-oxaspiro[4,4]nonane moiety. Their structures and absolute configurations were determined using extensive spectroscopic evidence, single-crystal X-ray diffraction, and electronic circular dichroism calculations. Pogocablanols A–D (1–4) exhibited a concentration-dependent inhibitory effect on rat jejunum smooth muscle contraction induced by acetylcholine, with Emax values varying from 48.87 ± 4.01% to 69.02 ± 7.54%. Preliminary structure–activity relationship analysis suggested that the oxaspirocycle and the pyran ring in pogocablanols are important structural features for the relaxing effects on jejunum smooth muscle.

A transcendental number has the nice property of being random with its digit expansion, but its potential for cryptography and security protocol applications has not been fully explored to date. In this paper, we bring out a random insertion method using the transcendental numbers that can be applied toward new challenges in security and privacy fields like defending machine learning based privacy attacks. To make the random insertion method applicable toward continuous back-and-forth communications, we propose to explore the nice properties of a transcendental number generator that allows low cost for frequent key distributions. We further analyze the security of the encryption method, identify the limits, and bring out a security protocol to overcome the limits.

Primulina pingguoensis H.S. Ma & B. Pan, a new species of Gesneriaceae from Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China, is illustrated and described here. The new species morphologically resembles Primulina carinata Y.G. Wei, F. Wen & H.Z. Lü, but it differs from the latter by leaf blade elliptic to broadly ovate, 6.5–9.5 × 4.5–6.5 cm (vs. broadly elliptic to ovate, 4.0–5.0 × 3.0–4.0 cm), leaf blade base slightly oblique, cuneate (vs. rounded), leaf blade carnose (vs. subcoriaceous), corolla pinkish purple to pink (vs.purple or purplish red), corolla tube tubular, ventrally carinate, (vs. narrowly funnelform, strongly carinate, forming a clear keel), staminodes 2 (vs. 3). etc. The conservation status of P. pingguoensis is considered as ‘Critically Endangered’ (CR) according to the IUCN red list categories and criteria.

Herein, we report an efficient photocatalytic startegy for the decarboxylative transformations of redox-active esters to construct C=C, C(sp3)–N, and C(sp3)-X bonds in a single-step. This operationally simple method provides a straightforward access to a variety of protected alkyl amines, alkyl halides and olefins under mild conditions in the absence of metals and photocatalysts. The method can successfully be applied to primary, secondary, and tertiary aliphatic carboxylic acid derivatives. Mechanistic studies indicate that the charge transfer complex (CTC) was formed by nBu4NI with redox-active esters, in which the nBu4NI acted as both an iodine source and an effi-cient electron donor.

Jurinea stenocarpa is described as a new species based on morphological characters. The new species is morphologically close to J. monocephala and J. sintenisii mainly by having semiglobose involucre and scapose stems but differs in plant indumentum, shape of phyllaries and features of achene and size of pappus rays. This species is a mountainous Irano-Turanian element distributed in north-west of Iran, Azarbaijan region. The specimens of this species were collected from Aqdagh Mountain in Ardabil Province (type locality) and Pir-Saqqa Mountain in Eastern Azarbaijan Province. Description, photos, distribution map and a diagnostic key to the new species and its close species are presented.

Decarboxylative oxidation of carboxylic acids was developed through visible light-induced photocatalysis with molecular oxygen as green oxidant and copper as co-catalyst. This reaction worked smoothly on α-disubstituted acids and primary acids, and could be potentially used in modifications of natural products. The high efficiency of this transformation was demonstrated on over 40 substrates.

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a systemic autoimmune disease with the main clinical characteristics of multi-system and multi-organ involvement of the whole body. It is commonly seen in skin mucosa, skeletal muscle, and respiratory system while rarely involved the spleen. The etiology of SLE is complex and related to many factors such as genetics, sex hormones, and environment. In this case, we present a young female patient with SLE with the symptom of progressing splenic calcification.

Toll-like receptors (TLRs) are a family of pattern-recognition receptors (PRRs) triggered by pathogen-derived and tissue-damage-related ligands. TLRs were previously believed to only be expressed in immune cells. However, it is now confirmed that they are ubiquitously expressed in cells within the body including neurons, astrocytes, and microglia of the central nervous system (CNS). Activation of TLRs is capable of inducing immunologic and inflammatory responses to injury or infection of CNS. This response is self-limiting that usually resolves once the infection has been eradicated or the tissue damage has been repaired. However, the persistence of inflammation-inducing insults or a failure in normal resolution mechanisms may result in overwhelming inflammation which may induce neurodegeneration. This implies that TLRs may play a role in mediating the link between inflammation and neurodegenerative diseases namely Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Parkinson’s disease (PD), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). So, new therapeutic approaches that specifically target TLRs may be developed by better understanding TLR expression mechanisms in the CNS and their connections to particular neurodegenerative disorders. Therefore, this review paper discussed the role of TLRs in neurodegenerative diseases.

Class imbalance refers to a major issue in data mining where data with unequal class distribution can deteriorate classification performance. The problem can become serious if multiple classes are assigned to a single data point representing data overlap. This study aims to provide a visual analysis of the UNSW-NB15 dataset to offer a deep insight into the intricacies of the dataset and the issues that may lead the data-driven models to demonstrate poor performance. A variety of visualization methods such as bar chart, 3D and 2D scatter plots, intercluster distance map, and parallel coordinate diagram are used to evaluate the data for imbalanced and overlapping issues. Several scalers and data transformation methods are implemented to address the overlapping issue and the distance between class centroids was measured by the Mahalanobis distance metric. The largest distance between the class centroids represents the high efficiency of the corresponding scalers and data transformers in dealing with the data overlap. The results reveal that the robust scaler can address the data overlap in binary class classification and the min-max scaler and power transformer can perform effectively in multi-class classification with regard to dealing with the overlapping issue.