Search

The Chinese economy has undergone high-speed, high-quality growth, and the concept of low-carbon technology has gained popular support. Businesses and consumers must jointly endeavor to achieve low-carbon economic development. Moreover, it is important to investigate whether enterprises' low-carbon behavior is correlated with consumers' green consumption behavior. We built a theoretical model to depict the relationship between corporate public welfare low-carbon behavior, consumers' green purchase intention, and green purchase behavior. We then divided corporate public welfare low-carbon behavior into three dimensions. We proposed hypotheses, collected data through a questionnaire survey, and analyzed the data using statistical analysis software of SPSS 26.0 and AMOS 24.0. Public welfare low-carbon behavior was significantly correlated with consumers’ green purchase intention, and public welfare low-carbon participation and public welfare low-carbon motivation were significantly correlated with green purchase intention. Finally, we proposed suggestions from three perspectives: the public welfare low-carbon mechanism, public welfare low-carbon participation, and public welfare low-carbon motivation. The results provide theoretical support for research methods related to the low-carbon growth of enterprises and green consumption, as well as guidance and decision-making support for enterprises in carrying out cause marketing.

Background: Previous studies have shown that a 0.05 μg/kg/min of norepinephrine infusion in combination with an initial bolus reduces the incidence of spinal hypotension during cesarean delivery. The initial norepinephrine bolus influences the incidence of spinal hypotension during continuous norepinephrine infusion; however, the ideal initial bolus dose for 0.05 μg/kg/min of continuous infusion remains unknown., Methods: This randomized, controlled, dose-finding study randomly allocated 120 parturients scheduled for elective cesarean delivery to receive initial bolus doses of 0, 0.05, 0.10, and 0.15 μg/kg of norepinephrine, followed by continuous infusion at a rate of 0.05 μg/kg/min. The primary outcome was the dose-response relationship of the initial norepinephrine bolus in preventing the incidence of spinal hypotension. Spinal hypotension was defined as systolic blood pressure (SBP) decreased to <80% of the baseline value or to an absolute value of <90 mmHg from intrathecal injection to delivery, and severe spinal hypotension was defined as SBP decreased to <60% of the baseline value. The secondary outcomes included the incidence of nausea and/or vomiting, hypertension, and bradycardia, as well as the Apgar scores and results of the umbilical arterial blood gas analysis. The effective dose (ED) 90 and ED95 were estimated using probit regression., Results: The per-protocol analysis included 117 patients. The incidence of spinal hypotension varied significantly among the groups: Group 0 (51.7%), Group 0.05 (44.8%), Group 0.10 (23.3%), and Group 0.15 (6.9%). The ED90 and ED95 values were 0.150 μg/kg (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.114-0.241 μg/kg) and 0.187 μg/kg (95% CI, 0.141-0.313 μg/kg), respectively. However, the ED95 value fell outside the dose range examined in this study. The incidence of severe spinal hypotension differed significantly (P = 0.02) among Groups 0 (17.2%), 0.05 (10.3%), 0.10 (3.3%), and 0.15 (0.0%); however, the incidence of hypertension and bradycardia did not. The incidence of nausea and/or vomiting decreased with an increase in the initial bolus dose (P = 0.03). The fetal outcomes were comparable among the groups., Conclusions: An initial bolus of 0.150 μg/kg of norepinephrine may be the optimal dose for preventing spinal hypotension during cesarean delivery with a continuous infusion rate of 0.05 μg/kg/min, and does not significantly increase the incidence of hypertension but substantially reduces the risk of nausea and/or vomiting., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest All authors declare no competing interests., (Copyright © 2024. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Background: Accurate prediction of neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) response allows for NAC-guided personalized treatment de-intensification in HPV-positive oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC). In this study, we aimed to apply baseline MR radiomic features to predict NAC response to help select NAC-guided de-intensification candidates, and to explore biological underpinnings of response-oriented radiomics., Methods: Pre-treatment MR images and clinical data of 131 patients with HPV-positive OPSCC were retrieved from Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center. Patients were divided into training cohort (n = 47), validation cohort 1 (n = 49) from NAC response-adapted de-intensification trial (IChoice-01, NCT04012502) and real-world validation cohort 2 (n = 35). NAC prediction model using linear support vector machine (SVM) was built and validated. Subsequent nomograms combined radiomics and clinical characteristics were established to predict survival outcomes. RNA-seq and proteomic data were compared to interpret the molecular features underlying radiomic signatures with differential NAC response., Findings: For NAC response prediction, the fusion model with both oropharyngeal and nodal signatures achieved encouraging performance to predict good responders in the training cohort (AUC 0·89, 95% CI, 0·79-0·95) and validation cohort 1 (AUC 0·71, 95% CI, 0·59-0·83). For prognosis prediction, radiomics-based nomograms exhibited satisfactory discriminative ability between low-risk and high-risk patients (PFS, C-index 0·85, 0·76 and 0·83; OS, C-index 0·79, 0·76 and 0·87, respectively) in three cohorts. Expression analysis unveiled NAC poor responders had predominantly enhanced keratinization while good responders were featured by upregulated immune response and oxidative stress., Interpretation: The MR-based radiomic models and prognostic models efficiently discriminate among patients with different NAC response and survival risk, which help candidate selection in HPV-positive OPSCC with regard to personalized treatment de-intensification., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

The high level of tyrosinase leads to the generation of neuromelanin, further causing the abnormality of redox-related protein level and mediating the occurrence and development of Parkinson's disease (PD). However, the existing tyrosinase inhibitors are mostly natural product extracts or polyphenolic derivatives, which hindered them from penetrating the blood-brain barrier (BBB). Herein, we obtained a novel tyrosinase inhibitor, 2-06 (tyrosinase: monophenolase IC 50  = 70.44 ± 22.69 μM, diphenolase IC 50  = 1.89 ± 0.64 μM), through the structure-based screening method. The compound 2-06 presented good in vitro and in vivo safety, and can inhibit the tyrosinase and melanogenesis in B16F10. Moreover, this compound showed neuroprotective effects and Parkinsonism behavior improving function. 2-06 was proved to penetrate the BBB and enter the central nervous system (CNS). The exploration of the binding mode between 2-06 and tyrosinase provided the foundation for the subsequent structural optimization. This is the first research to develop a central-targeting tyrosinase inhibitor, which is crucial for in-depth study on the new strategy for utilizing tyrosinase inhibitors to treat PD., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Ovarian cancer (OC) is one of the three major gynecologic malignancies and has the highest mortality rate because of the late diagnosis. Liquid biopsy based on serum protein biomarkers has demonstrated great potential for early diagnosis but remains limited by the analysis performance of conventional immunoassay technologies, such as chemiluminescence, and biomarkers, such as CA125. To address this challenge and achieve accurate early-stage diagnosis of OC, we developed a digital immunoassay on a SlipChip (DiSC) for quantitative analysis of a potential serum protein biomarker, Spondin-1 (SPON1). The DiSC system achieved a limit of detection (LoD) of 23 fg/μL for digital quantification of SPON1. The DiSC system was utilized to quantify the serum level of SPON1 in 357 clinical serum samples, including 63 from patients with benign ovarian tumors and 294 from patients with malignant ovarian cancer, ranging from stages I to IV. SPON1 concentrations were significantly different in samples from patients with malignant ovarian cancer. Notably, significantly different SPON1 levels were observed in early stages (I and II), in lymph node-negative cases (N 0 ), and before metastasis (M 0 ), suggesting that SPON1 could serve as a sensitive diagnostic biomarker for early-stage OC. The differential diagnostic model based on SPON1 levels quantified using DiSC demonstrated an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.8187 for early-stage OC, a significant improvement over CA-125 (AUC = 0.6967). For OC of all stages, the AUC was 0.8225, which could be further increased to 0.8750 when combined with CA-125. This showcases the potential of SPON1 as a novel biomarker for sensitive early-stage diagnosis of ovarian cancer and the capability of the DiSC system in discovering low-abundance biomarkers for disease diagnosis., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024. Published by Elsevier B.V.)

Grape and grape derived products contain many bioactive phenolics which have a variety of impacts on health. Following oral ingestion, the phenolic compounds and their metabolites may be detectable in human urine. However, developing a reliable method for the analysis of phenolic compounds in urine is challenging. In this work, we developed and validated a new high-throughput, sensitive and reproducible analytical method for the simultaneous analysis of 31 grape phenolic compounds and metabolites using Oasis PRiME HLB cleanup for sample preparation combined with ultra-performance liquid chromatography with triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-QqQ-MS/MS). Using this new method, the accuracy achieved was 69.3 % ∼ 134.9 % (except for six compounds), and the recovery achieved was 52.4 % ∼ 134.7 % (except for two very polar compounds). For each of the 31 target analytes, the value of intra-day precision was less than 14.3 %. The value of inter-day precision was slightly higher than intra-day precision, with a range of 0.7 % ∼ 19.1 %. We report for the first time on the effect of gender and BMI on the accuracy and recovery of human urine samples, and results from analysis of variance (ANOVA), and principal component analysis (PCA) indicated there was no difference in the value of accuracy and recovery between different gender or BMI (>30) using our purposed cleanup and UHPLC-QqQ-MS/MS method. Overall, this newly developed method could serve as a powerful tool for analyzing grape phenolic compounds and metabolites in human urine samples., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Archaea play a crucial role in microbial systems, including driving biochemical reactions and affecting host health by producing methane through hydrogen. The study of swine gut archaea has a positive significance in reducing methane emissions and improving feed utilization efficiency. However, the development and functional changes of archaea in the pig intestines have been overlooked for a long time. In this study, 54 fecal samples were collected from 36 parental pigs (18 boars and 18 pregnant/lactating sows), and 108 fecal samples from 18 offspring pigs during lactation, nursery, growing, and finishing stages were tracked and collected for metagenomic sequencing. We obtained 14 archaeal non-redundant metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs). These archaea were classified as Methanobacteriota and Thermoplasmatota at the phylum level, and Methanobrevibacter, Methanosphaera, MX-02, and UBA71 at the genus level, involving hydrogenotrophic, methylotrophic, and acetoclastic pathways. The hydrogenotrophic pathway dominated the methanogenesis function, and the vast majority of archaea participated in it. Dietary changes profoundly affected the archaeal composition and methanogenesis function in pigs. The abundance of hydrogen-producing bacteria in parental pigs fed high-fiber diets was higher than that in offspring pigs fed low-fiber diets. The methanogenesis function was positively correlated with fiber decomposition functions and negatively correlated with the starch decomposition function. Increased abundance of sulfate reductase and fumarate reductase, as well as decreased acetate/propionate ratio, indicated that the upregulation of alternative hydrogen uptake pathways competing with methanogens may be the reason for the reduced methanogenesis function. These findings contribute to providing information and direction in the pig industry for the development of strategies to reduce methane emissions, improve feed efficiency, and maintain intestinal health., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declared that they have no competing interests., (Copyright © 2024. Published by Elsevier B.V.)

Background: Digital polymerase chain reaction (digital PCR) is an important quantitative nucleic acid analysis method in both life science research and clinical diagnostics. One important hypothesis is that by physically constraining a single nucleic acid molecule in a small volume, the relative concentration can be increased therefore further improving the analysis performance, and this is commonly defined as the confinement effect in digital PCR. However, experimental investigation of this confinement effect can be challenging since it requires a microfluidic device that can generate partitions of different volumes and an instrument that can monitor the kinetics of amplification. (96)., Results: Here, we developed a real-time digital PCR system with a multivolume droplet array SlipChip (Muda-SlipChip) that can generate droplet of 125 nL, 25 nL, 5 nL, and 1 nL by a simple "load-slip" operation. In the digital region, by reducing the volume, the relative concentration is increased, the amplification kinetic can be accelerated, and the time to reach the fluorescence threshold, or Cq value, can be reduced. When the copy number per well is much higher than one, the relative concentration is independent of the partition volume, thus the amplification kinetics are similar in different volume partitions. This system is not limited to studying the kinetics of digital nucleic acid amplification, it can also extend the dynamic range of the digital nucleic acid analysis by additional three orders of magnitude by combining a digital and an analog quantification algorithm. (140)., Significance: In this study, we experimentally investigated for the first time the confinement effect in the community of digital PCR via a new real-time digital PCR system with a multivolume droplet array SlipChip (Muda-SlipChip). And a wider dynamic range of quantification methods compared to conventional digital PCR was validated by this system. This system provides emerging opportunities for life science research and clinical diagnostics. (63)., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Lymphatic metastasis is the main metastatic route for colorectal cancer, which increases the risk of cancer recurrence and distant metastasis. The properties of the lymph node metastatic colorectal cancer (LNM-CRC) cells are poorly understood, and effective therapies are still lacking. Here, we found that hypoxia-induced fibroblast activation protein alpha (FAP α ) expression in LNM-CRC cells. Gain- or loss-function experiments demonstrated that FAP α enhanced tumor cell migration, invasion, epithelial-mesenchymal transition, stemness, and lymphangiogenesis via activation of the STAT3 pathway. In addition, FAP α in tumor cells induced extracellular matrix remodeling and established an immunosuppressive environment via  recruiting regulatory T cells, to promote colorectal cancer lymph node metastasis (CRCLNM). Z-GP-DAVLBH, a FAP α -activated prodrug, inhibited CRCLNM by targeting FAP α -positive LNM-CRC cells. Our study highlights the role of FAP α in tumor cells in CRCLNM and provides a potential therapeutic target and promising strategy for CRCLNM., Competing Interests: The authors declare no potential conflicts of interest., (© 2024 The Authors.)

Objective: To compare children's access to and utilization of health care services in the United States during the first 2 years of the pandemic to prepandemic levels., Methods: This cross-sectional study used data from the 2017 to 2021 National Survey of Children's Health. Access to care was measured by having a usual place for sick and preventive care, having a personal doctor or nurse, and unmet care needs. Utilization measures included preventive, mental health, specialist, and emergency department (ED) visits, and hospital admissions in the past 12months. Outcomes were reported by parents or other caregivers. Multivariate logistic regressions were employed adjusting for sociodemographic factors and state of residence. The study sample included 163,353 children aged 0 to 17years., Results: Compared to 2019, there were declines in the probability of having a usual place for sick care in 2020 (-1.5 percentage-points) and a usual place for preventive care in 2021 (-2.1 percentage-points), and greater probability of unmet care needs in 2020 (+1.2 percentage-points) and 2021 (+0.8 percentage-points). The probability of having any preventive, specialist, and ED visits and hospitalizations remained lower in 2021 than 2019 (-7.5, 2.2, 5.4 and 0.9 percentage-points, respectively). These differences were not explained by prepandemic trends and were observed across a range of sociodemographic subgroups., Conclusions: Children's health care access and utilization declined noticeably over the first 2years of the pandemic. Evaluating these outcomes in subsequent years and addressing barriers to care continue to be critical to reduce unmet needs., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors have no conflicts of interest with this work., (Copyright © 2023 Academic Pediatric Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has been associated with declines in children's oral health and oral health care use in 2020. The authors examined the pandemic effects on these outcomes into 2021., Methods: This cross-sectional study used data from the National Survey of Children's Health from 2017 through 2021. The authors compared parent's or caregiver's perceptions of the child's oral health and reported dental problems and dental visits across years, adjusting for child and household covariates and state of residence. The authors evaluated potential heterogeneity across demographic and socioeconomic subgroups., Results: In 2021, parents and caregivers were still more likely to perceive children's oral health as poor (odds ratio [OR], 1.90; 95% CI, 1.28 to 2.82) and less likely to report very good or excellent oral health (OR, 0.83; 95% CI, 0.76 to 0.92) than in 2019, similar to differences between 2020 and 2019. Dental visits were also less likely in 2021 than 2019 (OR, 0.74; 95% CI, 0.66 to 0.83). These differences between 2021 and 2019 were not explained by prepandemic trends and were observed across a range of demographic and socioeconomic subgroups., Conclusions: Children's oral health as perceived by parents and caregivers and oral health care use were still worse in 2021 than before the pandemic both overall and across demographic and socioeconomic subgroups., Practical Implications: The persistent adverse effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on children's oral health as perceived by parents and caregivers and shown through dental visits highlight the need to improve oral health care access and use and to evaluate the long-term effects of the pandemic on children's oral health., (Copyright © 2023 American Dental Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

The selective AChE inhibitor donepezil has been approved by the FDA as a first-line drug for the treatment of mild to moderate AD. However, many peripheral side effects were observed in patients taking donepezil. Our main objective here is to provide insight into the opportunities and challenges associated with development of AChE inhibitors with high brain exposure and low peripheral side effects. In this study, we have for the first time revealed a series of novel thiazole salt AChE inhibitors, which exhibit a nanomolar inhibitory effect on human AChE. We further developed thiamine disulfide prodrugs based on optimized thiazole salt AChE inhibitors, which are reduced in the brain to form thiazole salt AChE inhibitors. In vivo experiments have confirmed that the representative prodrug Tap4 (i.p., 10 mg/kg) can be converted into the thiazole salt AChE inhibitor Tat2 and shows high brain exposure, reaching 500 ng/g. Further, the inhibitory effect of the prodrug Tap4 on AChE is obviously stronger in the brain than that on intestinal AChE of ICR mice. Our study provides a possible basis for centrally targeted thiazole salt inhibitors in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Ginseng, an ancient medicinal herb, is used in oriental medicine for the treatment of various diseases. Saponins are the main bioactive components of ginseng, but the multiple glucosyl side chains on its molecules prevent ginsenosides from entering the blood through the intestinal membrane, thus reducing the efficacy. The preparation of rare ginsenosides, which are easy to be absorbed by human body and have higher drug activity, has been widely practiced by removing the sugar group of natural ginsenosides in vitro. Rare ginsenosides Rg3 and Rh2 have been approved as drugs or health supplements to improve immune function. This review summarizes the preparation methods of ginsenoside Rg3 and Rh2 in recent years. Ginsenoside Rg3 and Rh2 were prepared by biotransformation of protopanaxadiol type ginsenoside, with the highest conversion rate of 98.19% and 95.89% in the laboratory, respectively. At present, improving the conversion rate and reducing the production cost are still the bottleneck of industrial scale production of Rg3 and Rh2 through the deglycosylation directly from Rb1, Rb2, Rb3, Rc and Rd in the crude extract of ginseng. In addition, ginsenosides Rg3 and Rh2 play anti-inflammatory, anticancer, cardiovascular protective, immunomodulatory, neuroprotective, anti-diabetic, anti-fatigue, anti-allergic, anti-aging, antioxidant and other pharmacological effects by activating AMPK, JNK, NF-κB, MAPKs, P13K/AKT/mTOR and other signaling pathways. As potential drugs for prevention and treatment of various diseases, ginsenoside Rg3 and Rh2 need to further clarify other underlying mechanisms of action through in vitro and in vivo experiments., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Objective: To examine changes in flourishing, school engagement, physical activity, and recreational screen time among school-aged children in the United States during the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic in 2020., Methods: In this cross-sectional study, data come from the 2018-2020 National Survey of Children's Health for 68,203 children aged 6 to 17 years. Flourishing is always/usually curious to learn, resilient and having self-regulation. School engagement is always/usually completing homework and having interest in doing well in school. Other outcomes are daily 60+ minutes physical activity or number of such days, and daily recreational screen time or 2+ hours/day. Weighted regression models compare 2020 to 2019 and 2019 to 2018 adjusting for child/household covariates and state indicators., Results: Among children age 6 to 17 years in 2020, there was a decline in flourishing (OR = 0.69; 95% CI, 0.63, 0.75), school engagement (OR = 0.71; 95% CI, 0.64, 0.79), physically active days (0.26 days, 95% CI, 35, 0.17), and daily 60+ minutes activity (OR = 0.91; 95% CI, 0.83, 1.00), and increase in daily recreational screen time (0.29 hours; 95% CI, 0.25, 0.34) and 2+ hours/day (OR = 1.65; 95% CI, 1.49-1.83) compared to 2019. These differences were observed across all evaluated demographic and socioeconomics subgroups. There were no significant differences between 2019 and 2018, indicating that the 2020-2019 differences were related to the pandemic rather than a continuation of prepandemic trends., Conclusions: Children's flourishing, school engagement, and physical activity declined while recreational screen time increased during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Monitoring these outcomes in the long-run is important to assessing needs and promoting children's learning and development., (Copyright © 2023 Academic Pediatric Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: Federally qualified health centers (FQHCs) have become safety-net providers of dental services for low-income patients. The authors examined the effects of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act Medicaid expansions, according to level of dental benefits, on the number of visits for dental services at FQHCs., Methods: The authors used publicly available facility-level data on 1,400 FQHCs across the United States from the 2011 through 2019 Uniform Data System. The authors used an event-study difference-in-difference design to examine the effects of expanding Medicaid in 2014, according to the level of dental benefits, compared with nonexpansion states. Outcomes included the number of dental visits for any dental service and separately for preventive and other services. Regression models adjusted for the demographic characteristics of the FQHC's patient population, county-level factors, and center and year fixed effects., Results: Expanding Medicaid with extensive dental benefits has increased the number of dental visits provided at FQHCs in 2014 through 2019 from 2013 by 1,329 to 7,647 visits per FQHC on average compared with FQHCs in nonexpansion states. There was an increase in visits for both preventive and other dental services. In contrast, there was no evidence of such an increase from expanding Medicaid with limited or emergency-only dental benefits., Conclusions: Expanding Medicaid eligibility with extensive dental benefits has increased the number of dental visits at FQHCs, including for both preventive and other dental services., Practical Implications: As safety-net providers, FQHCs might be able to provide more oral health care for low-income patients after Medicaid expansions that offer extensive dental benefits., (Copyright © 2023 American Dental Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Fabrication of adsorbents with excellent adsorption capacity, outstanding stability, easy separation ability, excellent recyclability and widely generality for organic dyes removal from wastewater remains challenging. Herein, three-dimensional polyaniline/poly(vinyl alcohol)/montmorillonite (PANI/PVAL/MMT) hybrid aerogels with easy separation performance and highly effective reusable adsorption on both anionic and cationic dyes were fabricated by a simple in-situ polymerization method. As-prepared hybrid aerogels were characterized via infrared and Raman spectra, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive spectra mapping, small and wide-angle X-ray scattering, thermogravimetric analysis, mercury intrusion porosimetry and elemental analysis. The results showed that MMT particles were successfully incorporated into aerogel matrix. Well-defined hierarchical structure, where PANI nanofibers are coated on the skeleton wall, can be observed for PANI/PVAL/MMT when the incorporation amount of MMT was around 11.1 wt%. The adsorption performance of as-prepared hybrid aerogels on both anionic and cationic dyes was systemically carried out at different solution pH, adsorbent dosage and initial dye concentration. The data analysis showed that the adsorption process for PVAL/PANI/MMT aerogel for Reactive Black 5, methyl orange and safranin followed Freundlich isotherm and the maximum experimental adsorption capacities were found to be 199, 251 and 57.0 mg g -1 at 25 °C, respectively. Mechanism studies indicated that the electrostatic interaction is the main driving force for the adsorption of dyes. The results demonstrated that the fabricated hybrid aerogel is an efficient adsorbent for the removal of both anionic and cationic organic dyes., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic led to early restrictions on access to oral health care and social distancing requirements. The authors examined the early effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on children's oral health and access to oral health care in the United States., Methods: Using nationally representative data from the National Survey of Children's Health, the authors compared several measures of children's oral health and oral health care use early during the pandemic in 2020 with 1 year earlier. Logistic (multinomial or binary) regression models were estimated, adjusting for several child and household covariates and state fixed effects. Similar comparisons were estimated for 2019 relative to 2018 to evaluate prepandemic trends., Results: Children in 2020 were 16% (relative risk ratio, 0.84; 95% CI, 0.75 to 0.93) less likely to have excellent dental health as perceived by parents and 75% (relative risk ratio, 1.75; 95% CI, 1.14 to 2.67) more likely to have poor dental health than in 2019. In addition, children in 2020 had higher risk of bleeding gingivae (odds ratio, 1.46; 95% CI, 1.16 to 1.85). The likelihood of having a dental visit in the past 12 months was 27% (odds ratio, 0.73; 95% CI, 0.65 to 0.82) lower in 2020, including lower likelihood for preventive visits. The differences between 2020 and 2019 were observed across demographic and socioeconomic subgroups. There were no such differences between 2019 and 2018., Conclusions: There was a widespread decline in children's oral health status and access to oral health care early during the COVID-19 pandemic., Practical Implications: Prompt policies and oral health campaigns are needed to counter the pandemic effects and increase timely access to dental services., (Copyright © 2022 American Dental Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) is a subtype of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) with the highest incidence, accounting for approximately one-third of NHL cases. Given the accumulated scientific publications related to the DLBCL domain, this study aimed to provide a comprehensive review of DLBCL studies from this millennium using the bibliometric method. With a strict retrieval strategy applied in the Web of Science database, a total of 10,869 publications from 2001 to 2020 were obtained and exported. The temporal and geographical distribution of these publications and the performance of contributing countries, institutions, journals, and authors corresponding to these documents were investigated, as well as an in-depth content analysis through keyword co-occurrence. With regard to the most productive countries, the United States ranks first with 2344 (21.6%) publications and shows the most frequent collaborations with other countries. By contrast, China has demonstrated remarkable performance in the growth rate of publications over the years, and it ranks first in the number of publications in the last five years. The University of Texas System is the institution with the highest number of published articles (4.99%). Leukemia Lymphoma is the journal with the highest number of publications in this field which contributed 588 articles. Solid and close collaborations between scholars are becoming more frequent over the four five-year periods. Overall, the highest cooperation frequency in the last two decades happens to Gascoyne RD at the British Columbia Cancer Agency and British Columbia Cancer Research Center in Canada. By comparing the article citation and keyword co-occurrence in each five-year period, as well as the changes in keyword clusters over two decades, we conclude that the stage, evaluation, prognosis, and treatment of DLBCL have always been the research hotspots in this field. Meanwhile, the evolution of keyword co-occurrence over the years demonstrates that new clusters appear. For instance, the effect of ferroptosis mechanism in DLBCL, immunotherapy for DLBCL, and PDL-1, PDL-2, and CAR-T therapy have drawn increasing attention from academia. Our research highlights the key characteristics of DLBCL research and provides comprehensive insights into the research status and evolutions in this field., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Raspberry ketone (RK) is a major flavor compound in red raspberries, and it has been marketed as a popular weight-loss dietary supplement with high potential in accumulating in fatty tissues. However, challenges in extracting and characterizing RK and its associated phenolic compounds in fatty tissues persist due to the complex matrix effect. In this work, we reported a high-throughput sample preparation method for RK and 25 related phenolic compounds in white adipose tissues using an improved micro-scale QuEChERS (quick, efficient, cheap, easy, rugged and safe) approach with enhanced matrix removal (EMR)-lipid cleanup in 96-well plates, followed by UHPLC-QqQ-MS/MS analysis. The absolute recovery was 73-105% at the extraction step, and achieved 71-96% at the EMR cleanup step. The EMR cleanup removed around 66% of total lipids in the acetonitrile extract as profiled by UHPLC-QTOF-MS/MS. The innovative introduction of a reversed-phase C18 sorbent into the extract significantly improved the analytes' recovery during SpeedVac drying. The final accuracy achieved 80-120% for most analytes. Overall, this newly developed and validated method could serve as a powerful tool for analyzing RK and related phenolic compounds in fatty tissues., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Cellular autophagy is an intracellular degradation pathway, which transports damaged, deformed, senescent or non-functional proteins and organelles to lysosome for digestion and degradation. Cellular autophagy is deeply evolutionarily conservedfromyeasttomammaliancells, and many homologous proteins of the autophahgy regulators are found in several species. This physiological process maintains the steady state of cells. Furtheremore, autophagy dysfunction is closely related to various diseases, such as neurodegenerative diseases, inflammation-related diseases, cardiovascular diseases, metabolic diseases, etc. The LC3 and p62 protein protein interaction (PPI) promotes the formation of autophagosomes and delivers polyubiquitinated "cargoes" to autophagic degradation. Therefore, LC3-p62 PPI plays an integral role in the formation of autophagosomes and effectively inhibits autophagy. However, there are still few studies on the LC3-p62 PPI inhibitors for its unclear molecular mechanism. Furthermore, most of these inhibitors are macromolecules with poorly active, and small molecules are particularly scarce. In this article, the computation method was used to identify the hot spot and design peptides as the binder of LC3-p62 PPI. Findings from this work provide a reference for the follow-up research of discovering small molecule inhibitors targeting LC3-p62 PPI., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Occludin is an important component of tight junction proteins and has been extensively studied in animals such as mice, chickens, geese, and pigs. As one of the most important waterfowl species in China, Muscovy duck (Cairina moschata) is an important economic animal for meat. However, research on the occludin gene in Muscovy duck is lacking. In the present study, Muscovy duck occludin cDNA was cloned for the first time. The length of the cDNA was 1,699 bp, and it showed a high sequence similarity with the Anser cygnoides domesticus and Gallus gallus occludin genes. The occludin gene was differentially expressed in the tissues of healthy ducks. The highest and lowest expressions of occludin were observed in the crop and the spleen, respectively. After the oral administration of Clostridium butyricum (CB), the occludin expression in the ileum of 7-day-old Muscovy ducks was significantly upregulated and subsequently showed a decreasing trend in 14-day-old Muscovy ducks. Under the early intervention of CB, no significant difference was observed in the occludin expression of cecum between the control and CB group. Collectively, these results suggest that CB plays an important role in regulating the expression of the occludin gene in Muscovy ducks, and adding CB in feed may maintain the intestinal barrier of ducks by regulating the expression of occludin., (Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

A hydrophilic interaction (HILIC) ultra-high performance liquid chromatography (UHPLC) with triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) method was developed and validated for the quantification of 21 free amino acids (AAs). Compared to published reports, our method renders collectively improved sensitivity with lower limit of quantification (LLOQ) at 0.5~42.19 ng/mL with 0.3 μL injection volume (or equivalently 0.15~12.6 pg injected on column), robust linear range from LLOQ up to 3521~5720 ng/mL (or 1056 ~ 1716 pg on column) and a high throughput with total time of 6 min per sample, as well as easier experimental setup, less maintenance and higher adaptation flexibility. Ammonium formate in the mobile phase, though commonly used in HILIC, was found unnecessary in our experimental setup, and its removal from mobile phase was key for significant improvement in sensitivity (4~74 times higher than with 5 mM ammonium formate). Addition of 10 (or up to100 mM) hydrochloric acid (HCl) in the sample diluent was crucial to keep response linearity for basic amino acids of histidine, lysine and arginine. Different HCl concentration (10~100 mM) in sample diluent also excreted an effect on detection sensitivity, and it is of importance to keep the final prepared sample and calibrators in the same HCl level. Leucine and isoleucine were distinguished using different transitions. Validated at seven concentration levels, accuracy was bound within 75~125%, matrix effect generally within 90~110%, and precision error mostly below 2.5%. Using this newly developed method, the free amino acids were then quantified in a total of 544 African indigenous vegetables (AIVs) samples from African nightshades (AN), Ethiopian mustards (EM), amaranths (AM) and spider plants (SP), comprising a total of 8 identified species and 43 accessions, cultivated and harvested in USA, Kenya and Tanzania over several years, 2013~2018. The AN, EM, AM and SP were distinguished based on free AAs profile using machine learning methods (ML) including principle component analysis, discriminant analysis, naïve Bayes, elastic net-regularized logistic regression, random forest and support vector machine, with prediction accuracy achieved at ca. 83~97% on the test set (train/test ratio at 7/3). An interactive ML platform was constructed using R Shiny at https://boyuan.shinyapps.io/AIV&#95;Classifier/ for modeling train-test simulation and category prediction of unknown AIV sample(s). This new method presents a robust and rapid approach to quantifying free amino acids in plants for use in evaluating plants, biofortification, botanical authentication, safety, adulteration and with applications to nutrition, health and food product development., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020. Published by Elsevier B.V.)

Indole is a major metabolite of tryptophan, which plays an important role in the intestinal microecological balance and human physiological activities. The determination of indole becomes important for its researches. So, it is urgent to establish a sensitive and cost-effective method for indole detection. Herein, a sensitive electrochemical method was constructed to determine the concentration of indole using screen-printed carbon electrode (SPCE) with the signal amplification strategy by gold/iron-oxide composite nanoparticles (Au/Fe 3 O 4 ). Au/Fe 3 O 4 nanoparticles were successfully synthesized under the irradiation by high-energy electron beams. 4-aminothiophenol (4-ATP) was connected to Au/Fe 3 O 4 via Au-S bond. And then NaNO 2 reacted with 4-ATP to form the azo bond, which could form the final product of Au/Fe 3 O 4 @ATP-azo-indole by the coupling reaction. Thus, the concentration of indole was detected by the electrochemical signal produced by Au/Fe 3 O 4 @ATP-azo-indole indirectly. The detection sensitivity was greatly improved by the large specific surface area provided by Au/Fe 3 O 4 after the modification. The linear range of indole was from 0.50 to 120.00 μg L -1 and the limit of detection (LOD) was as low as 0.10 μg L -1  (S/N = 3). Furthermore, the developed method exhibited acceptable intra-day and inter-day precisions with the coefficient of variations (CV) less than 4.9% and 8.2%, respectively. And the recoveries were from 97.2% to 105.4%. An innovative, sensitive, cost-effective method was established for indole determination in human plasma matrix in this manuscript, which provides a promising way for indole detection in conventional laboratories., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Coherent modulation imaging (CMI) has been shown to be an effective lensless diffraction approach to imaging general extended samples with fast algorithmic convergence and high robustness to data imperfection. In the reported phasing algorithms of CMI, an exact knowledge of modulator is used as a priori. Extra characterization of the modulator is thus required before the CMI experiments are conducted and this can be cumbersome. Here we propose a modulator refinement algorithm that allows for modulator refinement in the same iterative process of image reconstruction. We demonstrate the method for both near-field and far-field geometries in simulations and for a far-field experiment. A relaxed requirement on exactly knowing the modulator would turn CMI into a standalone technique and make it much easier to implement, thus open up its wider applications in biology and materials science., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

It is generally accepted that domestic ducks are valuable protein sources for humans. The gastrointestinal ecosystem contains enormous and complicated microbes that have a profound effect on the nutrition, immunity, health, and production of domestic ducks. To deeply understand the gastrointestinal microbial composition of domestic ducks, we investigated the microbiomes of 7 different gastrointestinal locations (proventriculus, gizzard, duodenum, jejunum, ileum, cecum, and rectum) and the short-chain fatty acids in 15 healthy muscovy ducks based on 16S rRNA gene sequencing, qPCR, and gas chromatography. As a result, 1 029 735 sequences were identified into 35 phyla and 359 genera. Firmicutes, Proteobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Cyanobacteria, and Actinobacteria were the major phyla, with Bacteroidetes being most abundant in the cecum. The population of the total bacteria and the representatives of the Firmicutes, Bacteroidetes, and Bacteroides groups increased from the proximal to the distal part of the GIT. Bacteroides was the most dominant group in the cecum. Acetate, propionate, and butytrate, as well as gene copies of butyryl-CoA including acetate-CoA transferase and butyrate kinase, were significantly higher in cecum than in other sections. Isobutyrate, valerate, and isovalerate were only found in the cecum. The differences of microbial composition and the short-chain fatty acids of their metabolites among these 7 intestinal locations might be correlated with differences in gut function. All these results provide a reference for the duck gastrointestinal microbiome and a foundation for understanding the types of bacteria that promote health and enhance growth performance and decrease instances of disease in duck breeding., (Copyright © 2020. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Cathelicidins represent a major group of host defense peptides (HDPs) that share a highly conserved cathelin-like domain. In birds, this gene family has been identified in many species. However, no information was available in the goose until now. In this study, we present the molecular characterization of 2 goose cathelicidin genes, namely goose CATH2 and goose CATH3, for the first time. The complete cDNA of goose CATH2 and goose CATH3 were 571 bp and 573 bp in length, respectively, and the deduced amino acid sequences exhibited high similarity with other avian cathelicidins. Furthermore, evolutionary analyses indicated that all known cathelicidins form 3 distinct clusters from reptiles, while the oldest cathelicidin member, which is known as CATHB1, is very likely absent in the goose genome. Meanwhile, highly expressed goose CATH2 and goose CATH3 were also observed in primary and secondary lymphoid tissues, same as the observations in other avian species. In addition, chemically synthesized mature peptides of the 2 cathelicidins exerted optimal antimicrobial abilities to a range of gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria. The discovery and characterization of goose cathelicidins complete the knowledge for goose HDPs and might contribute to understanding the evolution of avian cathelicidins as well as for the development of antibacterial agents., (Copyright © 2020. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Oxygen evolution reaction (OER) anodes, (e.g., IrO 2 ) are well-known inefficient catalysts for electrochemical oxidation (EO) of refractory organics in wastewater due to the high energy consumption via OER. However, in this study this kind of anode participated in a very effective EO process via a specific modular anode architecture. Traces of magnetic Fe 3 O 4 /Sb-SnO 2 particles as auxiliary electrodes (AEs) were attracted on the surface of the two-dimensional (2D) Ti/IrO 2 -Ta 2 O 5 by a NdFeB magnet, and thereby constituted a new magnetically assembled electrode (MAE). MAE could be renewed by recycling its AEs. The electrochemical properties as well as the EO performances of the MAE could be regulated by adjusting the loading amount of AEs. Results showed that even a small amount of AEs could increase surface roughness and offer massive effective active sites. When removing color of azo dye Acid Red G, the optimal MAE exhibited ∼1100 % and ∼500 % higher efficiencies than 2D Ti/IrO 2 -Ta 2 O 5 and 2D Ti/Sb-SnO 2 , respectively. The superiority of the MAE was also applicable in degrading phenol. The synergy between Ti/IrO 2 -Ta 2 O 5 and magnetic Sb-SnO 2 particles was therefore discussed., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Novel biochar/pectin/alginate hydrogel beads (BPA) derived from grapefruit peel were synthesized and used for Cu(II) removal from aqueous solution. FTIR, SEM-EDS, XRD, TGA and XPS, etc. were applied for characterization analysis. The synergistic reinforcing effect of polymer matrix and biochar fillers improved the adsorptive, mechanical and thermostabilized performance of BPA. Factors like component contents of biochar and pectin, pH, contact time, Cu(II) concentration and coexisting inorganic salts or organic ligands were systematically investigated in batch mode. The adsorption isotherms were fitted well by the Freundlich model and the experimental maximum adsorption capacity of optimized BPA-9 beads (mass ratio of pectin to alginate = 10:1) with 0.25% biochar, was ∼80.6 mg/g at pH 6. Kinetic process was well described by the pseudo-second-order model and film diffusion primarily governed the overall adsorption rate, followed by intraparticle diffusion. Thermodynamics analysis suggested spontaneous feasibility and endothermic nature of adsorption behavior. Moreover, BPA also showed better environmental adaptability in the presence of NaCl, MgCl 2 , CaCl 2 , EDTA-2Na and CA as well as good adsorption potential for other heavy metal [e.g. Pb(III)]. Crucially, the BPA beads showed good regeneration ability after five cycles. All these results indicated the potential of BPA for removing heavy metal from water., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Two kinds of industrial wastes (distillers grains and phosphogypsum) were used as raw materials to produce a new biochar composite for Cr(VI) removal in water. The influencing factors including pyrolysis temperature, dosage, initial solution pH as well as contacting time were explored. The adsorption kinetics, isotherms, and thermodynamics of two biochars were conducted. The results show that the adsorption of Cr(VI) by biochar is related to pH. The ideal pH was 3.0 and the adsorbed Cr(VI) decreases as the pH increases. The Cr(VI) adsorption process conformed to the pseudo-second-order equation. Phosphogypsum modified (PM)-biochar is well described by the Freundlich model. The maximum adsorption capacities of distillers grains (DG)-biochar and PM-biochar on Cr(VI) were 63.1 and 157.9 mg g -1 , respectively. The thermodynamic analysis indicates that the Cr(VI) adsorption occurs spontaneously which is an endothermic process. This study provided an alternative way for Cr(VI) removal from water., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

The lab-scale system combined bioelectrochemical and sulfur autotrophic denitrification (CBSAD) was established to evaluate the effects of currents (50-300 mA) on both the performances and microbial communities. Results showed that the nitrate removal rate increased significantly when the current increased from 50 to 200 mA, while it slightly decreased with higher currents. Mass balance results revealed that hydrogen autotrophic denitrification contributed almost three times (70.25-78.62%) to denitrification compared with that of the sulfur part (21.38-29.75%). Illumina MiSeq sequencing showed that the currents changed the bacterial richness and diversity in this system. Phylum Firmicutes and class Clostridia predominated >50% under each condition. And multiple key bacteria capable of denitrification such as Proteiniclasticum, Thauera and Family&#95;XI&#95;uncultured were identified and found in higher proportions when the current was 200 mA. Therefore, this study helps revealing the mechanisms of accelerating nitrate-reduction through applied currents in the CBSAD systems., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Formic acid is a common organic acid used in many industrial processes. There is a paucity of research on the direct toxicity of formic acid and how it might affect the cardiovascular system. This study aimed to understand the effect of formic acid on vascular tension in an animal model and the underlying mechanism. Results found that the vasodilation induced by formic acid was related to the endothelium. When the dosage of formic acid was 1 mM or 5 mM, the vasodilation of endothelium-intact rings was partially suppressed by l-NAME, NS-2028 and nifedipine, and vasoconstriction caused by CaCl 2 was inhibited, and the mRNA levels of eNOS, the activity of NOS (tNOS, iNOS and cNOS) and the level of NO and cGMP were significantly increased. Results also found that eNOS protein expression was significantly enhanced by 5 mM of formic acid. These results suggest formic acid can relax the aortic vessels of rats in a dose-dependent pattern. Further, the mechanism of the formic acid-induced vasodilatation likely involved the NO/cGMP pathway. Finally, the current study has revealed that vasodilation induced by high concentrations of formaldehyde may be the effect of the metabolite formic acid. This study will help further inform the etiologies of formic acid-related angiocardiopathies., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

5α-Reductase is a key enzyme responsible for dihydrotestosterone biosynthesis and has been recognized as an important target for discovering new drugs against benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH). In this study, a series of novel steroidal androst-3,5-diene-3-carboxylic acids have been designed and synthesized. Biological evaluations were performed on their 5α-reductase inhibitory activities by both in vitro enzyme inhibition assay and in vivo by prostate weighing method. Results showed that most of them displayed excellent 5α-reductase inhibitory potency. Detailed evaluation indicated that most of the compounds displayed slightly higher inhibition potency towards type 2 isozyme. Among all the compounds, 16a was found to be the most potential inhibitor with the IC 50 of 0.25μM and 0.13μM against type 1 and 2 isozymes respectively. In vivo 5a-reductase inhibitory evaluation of 16a also showed a more significant reduction effect (p<0.001) in rat prostate weight than epristeride. Furthermore, the results of in silico ADME study indicated that compound 16a exhibited good pharmacokinetic properties. Thus, 16a could serve as promising lead candidates for further study., (Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Inc.)