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Allergic rhinitis and asthma are common airway allergic diseases, the incidence of which has increased annually in recent years. The human body is frequently exposed to allergens and environmental irritants that trigger immune and inflammatory responses, resulting in altered gene expression. Mounting evidence suggested that epigenetic alterations were strongly associated with the progression and severity of allergic diseases. Noncoding RNAs (ncRNAs) are a class of transcribed RNA molecules that cannot be translated into polypeptides and consist of three major categories, microRNAs (miRNAs), long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs), and circular RNAs (circRNAs). Previous studies showed that ncRNAs were involved in the physiopathological mechanisms of airway allergic diseases and contributed to their occurrence and development. This article reviews the current state of understanding of the role of noncoding RNAs in airway allergic diseases, highlights the limitations of recent studies, and outlines the prospects for further research to facilitate the clinical translation of noncoding RNAs as therapeutic targets and biomarkers.

In order to confirm the dietary calcium (Ca) requirement to keep a balance of the production performance and the albumen transparency, the study examined the effects of different dietary Ca levels on the production performance, egg quality, and albumen transparency of laying pigeons. 1080 pigeon pairs were randomly allocated into six treatment groups, each consisting of six replicates of 30 pigeon pairs per treatment. Ca levels of 0.60, 0.90, 1.20, 1.80, 2.40, and 3.00% were fed. The results showed that the laying rate, average egg weight, and feed to egg ratio were significantly influenced by Ca levels (p &lt, 0.05). Albumen percentage, albumen height, Haugh unit, and eggshell thickness at 8 w and 16 w were significantly influenced by Ca levels (p &lt, 0.05). The L*, a*, b*, and c* values of cooked albumen at 8 w and 16 w were all significantly influenced by Ca levels (p &lt, 0.05). After 16 w of feeding different Ca levels, the percentage of transparent eggs had an early increasing and later decreasing trend. In conclusion, taking the transparency of pigeon eggs as an assessment index and considering production performance secondly, the optimal level of dietary Ca for laying White King pigeons is 0.90%.

To explore the effects of breeds, number of nurturing squabs, and temperature on nest feed conversion ratio and analyze the effects of number of nurturing squabs on parent pigeon body mass, fertility rate, and laying intervals, 5 widely used breeds of pigeon were nurtured under the condition of natural laying and hatching in this research. In each breed, 24 pair pigeons nurturing 1, 2, 3, and 4 squabs were chosen to measure the production performance, respectively. The results indicate that different numbers of nurturing squabs had a significant effect on parent pigeon body mass changes and survival rate of 28-d old squabs (P＜0.05); the nest feed conversion ratio of breeds nurturing 1 squab (7.58) was extremely significantly higher than those of nurturing 2, 3, and 4 squabs (P＜0.01); the nest feed conversion ratio of breeds nurturing 2 squabs (4.75) was extremely significantly higher than those of nurturing 3 (3.95) and 4 squabs (3.75) (P＜0.01); there was no significant difference between breeds nurturing 3 and 4 squabs (P＞0.05). Laying intervals of breeds nurturing 4 squabs (43.8 d) were significantly higher than those of nurturing 3 (37.4 d), 2 (35.4 d), and 1 (33.8 d) squabs (P＜0.05). Nest feed conversion ratio significantly increased with the decrease of environment temperature (P＜0.05). The breed showed no effect on the nest feed conversion ratio. In production, nurturing 3 squabs of parent pigeons is appropriate. In some cold areas in winter, cold protection measures should be taken.

Using microsatellite markers, the genetic structure of 9 domestic duck (Anas platyrhynchos) populations in east china, including Weishan sheldrake, Chaohu sheldrake, Shaoxing, Gaoyou, Dayu, Jinding, Liancheng white, Putian black and San sheldrake, was analyzed. The results showed that the average heterozygosity was higher in 9 populations,which ranged from 0.5137~0.6055. The average heterozygosity of 9 duck populations was 0.5523, which reflected the rich diversity. Considerable breed differentiation was observed and 25.65% of the total genetic variation came from breed differences, this result affirmed that each breed was of own genetic diversity. The DA genetic distances suggested the longer differentiation existed between populations. The domestic duck populations in East China were clustered into four groups based on the NJ clustering, the clustering results had some relationship with the distributions and economic utilizations of these duck breeds.