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Summary: Germplasm resources serve as the foundations of advancements in breeding and are crucial for maintaining food security. Wild rice species of the genus Oryza include rich sources of genetic diversity and high adaptability, making them a substantial resource for rice breeding. The discovery of wild‐type cytoplasmic male sterility resources enabled the achievement of the 'three lines' goal in hybrid rice, significantly increasing rice yields. The application of resistance alleles from wild rice enables rice production to withstand losses caused by stress. Reduced genetic diversity due to rice breeding poses a significant limitation to further advances and can be alleviated through a systematic use of wild genetic resources that integrate geographic, climatic and environmental data of the original habitat, along with extensive germplasm collection and identification using advanced methods. Leveraging technological advancements in plant genomics, the understanding of genetic mechanisms and the application of artificial intelligence and gene editing can further enhance the efficiency and accuracy of this process. These advancements facilitate rapid isolation and functional studies of genes, and precise genome manipulation. This review systematically summarizes the utilization of superior genes and germplasm resources derived from wild rice sources, while also exploring the collection, conservation, identification and utilization of further wild rice germplasm resources. A focus on genome sequencing and biotechnology developments is leading to new breeding and biotechnology opportunities. These new opportunities will not only promote the development of rice varieties that exhibit high yields, superior stress resistance and high quality but also expand the genetic diversity among rice cultivars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, the highly efficient hydrogenation of guaiacol catalyzed by ruthenium supported on Al2O3-TiO2 (Ru/Al2Ti1) at very mild conditions was carried out. At temperatures as low as 25 °C and 2 MPa H2, about 60% of guaiacol could be converted to 2-methoxycyclohexanol (MCH) with a selectivity as high as 94% on the Ru/Al2Ti1 catalyst with an appropriate hydrogen pressure. At temperatures above 50 °C, almost all of the guaiacol could be converted with the catalyst of Ru/Al2Ti1, mainly into hydrogenated products such as MCH. The surprisingly efficient hydrogenation of guaiacol at low temperatures was most likely due to the ability of Ru particles loaded on the specific complex metal oxide carriers, particularly the reduction of the edge effect of Ru, to activate phenyl and hydrogen and reduce the competition of the dimethoxy process. These findings about the high activity of the Ru/Al2Ti1 catalyst at nearly room temperature may be helpful to upgrading the industrial process of the pyrolysis bio-oils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The averaged cortical thickness of meta-ROI is currently being used for the diagnosis and prognosis of Alzheimer's disease (AD) using structural MRI brain images. The purpose of this work is to present a hybrid meta-ROI for the detection of AD. Methods: The AD detectability of selected cortical and volumetric regions of the brain was examined using signal detection theory. The top performing cortical and volumetric ROIs were taken as input nodes to the artificial neural network (ANN) for AD classification. Results: An AD diagnostic accuracy of 91.9% was achieved by using a hybrid meta-ROI consisting of thicknesses of entorhinal and middle temporal cortices, and the volumes of the hippocampus and inferior lateral ventricles. Pairing inferior lateral ventricle dilation with hippocampal volume reduction improves AD detectability by 5.1%. Conclusions: Hybrid meta-ROI, including the dilation of inferior lateral ventricles, outperformed both cortical thickness- and volumetric-based meta-ROIs in the detection of Alzheimer's disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

‘Taro-like’ aroma is a pleasant flavor and value-added trait in pumpkin species imparted by unknown key volatile compounds. In this study, we used the electronic nose (E-nose), gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC–MS), and GC-Olfactometry (GC-O) to study the aroma profile, volatile compounds, and key contributors, respectively. By E-nose and GC–MS, we found significant differences in the aroma profiles and volatile compounds between fruits from five samples with/without ‘taro-like’ aroma. According to the analysis of differential volatile compounds obtained from GC–MS and the GC-O analysis of the sample with ‘taro-like’ aroma, we found that 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline representing the ‘taro’ odor was only identified in the sample with ‘taro-like’ aroma. Therefore, we conclude that 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline is the key contributor to the 'taro-like' aroma. Moreover, the relationship between 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline and ‘taro-like’ aroma was further verified via other pumpkin samples. Our results provide a theoretical basis for understanding the aroma characteristics of pumpkin fruit.

Simple Summary: 1. Three types of rice grown in Africa: The native African rice O. glaberrima, the Asian rice (O. sativa) and the new type of African rice (e.g., NERICA varieties). O. sativa has mostly supplanted O. glaberrima as the dominant crop in Africa. 2. There is no evidence of the existence of Asian weedy rice (O. sativa f. spontanea) in Africa, while African weedy rice (Oryza spp.) is a complex population which harbors both a native and Asian genetic background. The genomic approach is an ideal way to characterize the African weedy rice population structure. 3. There have been no genomics studies on African weedy rice yet, and the latest genomic study on African cultivated rice occurred five years ago. Rice is a staple crop in sub-Saharan Africa, and it is mostly produced by Asian cultivars of Oryza sativa that were introduced to the continent around the fifteenth or sixteenth century. O. glaberrima, the native African rice, has also been planted due to its valuable traits of insect and drought tolerance. Due to competition and resistance evolution, weedy rice has evolved from O. sativa and O. glaberrima, posing an increasing threat to rice production. This paper provides an overview of current knowledge on the introduction and domestication history of cultivated rice in Africa, as well as the genetic properties of African weedy rice that invades paddy fields. Recent developments in genome sequencing have made it possible to uncover findings about O. glaberrima's population structure, stress resilience genes, and domestication bottleneck. Future rice genomic research in Africa should prioritize producing more high-quality reference genomes, quantifying the impact of crop–wild hybridization, elucidating weed adaptation mechanisms through resequencing, and establishing a connection between genomic variation and stress tolerance phenotypes to accelerate breeding efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past few decades, a growing number of women have been becoming entrepreneurs and assuming a greater percentage of leader roles in the world. In this research, we develop a model, grounded in a family embeddedness perspective and expectancy violations theory, that explores why and when women entrepreneurs behave dominantly in the workplace, and what consequences this pattern produces. We propose that when a female entrepreneur is the primary income earner at home, she is more likely to behave dominantly in the workplace, and subsequently, her workplace dominance is positively related to subjective firm performance. Less industry experience strengthens the positive relationship between being the primary income earner and workplace dominance, and further accentuates the indirect effect of being the primary income earner on subjective firm performance through workplace dominance. Data collected from 58 women entrepreneurs and 271 members of their top management teams in China through a two-wave survey support our hypotheses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In adapting to the double-high development trend of high-voltage direct current (HVDC) receiving-end power systems and solving optimization problems in emergency frequency control (EFC) supporting virtual power plants (VPPs) in large-scale power systems, a parameter estimation method for a VPP frequency response model based on a successive linear programming (SLP) method is proposed. First, a "centralized/decentralized" hierarchical control architecture for VPP participation in EFC is designed. Second, the frequency response characteristics of multiple flexible resources are scientifically analyzed, and the system frequency response (SFR) model and equivalent model of VPP are constructed. Subsequently, parameter estimation of the VPP frequency response model is carried out based on the SLP method, aiming to balance the accuracy and computational efficiency of the model. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed methodology is verified by using PSD-BPA to simulate and test the three-zone HVDC recipient area grid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study draws from cognitive appraisal theory to examine when and how negative performance feedback could prevent employees from engaging in interpersonal counterproductive workplace behaviour towards the leader. We test the hypotheses using a three‐wave survey and a scenario‐based experiment with Chinese and Western samples, respectively. Our results indicate that negative performance feedback has a negative effect on perceived feedback quality when employees have a lower (vs. higher) level of trust in the leader. In addition, perceived feedback quality is negatively related to employee hostility towards leader and, in turn, interpersonal counterproductive workplace behaviour towards the leader. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the urban railway transportation vehicle wheel,three kinds of typical wheel plate（ straight plate,single S plate and double S plate） were set up. The study presents the calculation method of structure load and thermal load of the urban railway transportation vehicle wheel,and focuses on the thermal-mechanical coupling performance of the three types of wheel plate under different abrasion,the characteristic of the thermal-mechanical coupling stress is obtained under the thermal-mechanical coupling condition. The results show that three kinds of urban railway wheels are all satisfied with the requirements of fatigue strength; and the double S plate wheel has a better anti-fatigue performance than straight plate and single S plate wheel in the coupling field.