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Sigma non-opioid intracellular receptor 1 (sigma-1 receptor), a non-opioid transmembrane protein, is located on cellular mitochondrial membranes and endoplasmic reticulum. Current research has demonstrated that sigma-1 receptor is related to human degenerative diseases. This study is focused on the effects of sigma-1 receptor on the pathophysiological process of diminished ovarian reserve (DOR) and granulosa cells (GCs) apoptosis. Sigma-1 receptor concentration in follicular fluid (FF) and serum were negatively correlated with basal follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) and positively correlated with anti-mullerian hormone (AMH), antral follicle count (AFC). Sigma-1 receptor reduction in GCs was accompanied by endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS)-mediated apoptosis in women with DOR. Plasmid transfection was used to establish SIGMAR1-overexpressed and SIGMAR1-knockdown human granulosa-like tumor (KGN) cell and thapsigargin (TG) was used to induce ERS KGN cells. We found that KGN cells treated with endogenous sigma-1 receptor ligand dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) and sigma-1 receptor agonist PRE-084 showed similar biological effects to SIGMAR1-overexpressed KGN cells and opposite effects to SIGMAR1-knockdown KGN cells. DHEA may improve DOR patients' pregnancy outcomes by upregulating sigma-1 receptor and downregulating ERS-mediated apoptotic genes in GCs. Thus, sigma-1 receptor may be a potential ovarian reserve biomarker, and ligand-mediated sigma-1 receptor activation could be a future approach for DOR therapy.

Discovering disease similarities are beneficial for the diagnosis and treatment of mental diseases. In this research, we proposed a data driven method, that is, integrating a variety of publicly available data resources including Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) Metathesaurus, Systematized Nomenclature of Medicine -- Clinical Terms (SNOMED CT) and cui2vec concept embedding to construct a mental disease similarity network. The resulting mental disease similarity network offered a new view for navigating and investigating disease relations; it also revealed popular mental disease in the literature in terms of the number of connections and similarities with other diseases. It shows that depressive disorder is directly connected with nine other popular diseases and connects 52 other diseases in the network. The top three popular mental diseases are depressive disorder, dysthymia (now known as persistent depressive disorder), and neurosis. Future research will focus on studying the clusters generated from the similarity network.

This research work is aimed at developing advanced eco-friendly methodologies in the area of iron, manganese and rhenium-catalyzed (de)hydrogenation and hydroelementation reactions. Initially, we reported the first examples of highly selective catalytic direct C-H borylation of styrene derivatives and terminal alkynes with pinacolborane using Fe(PMe3)4 and Fe(OTf)2/DABCO as catalyst systems, respectively. Afterwards, N-heterocyclic carbene (NHC) based iron complexes Fe(CO)4(IMes) and [CpFe(CO)2(IMes)][I] were efficiently employed in the catalytic reductive amination reactions with hydrosilanes to access a large variety of cyclic amines (pyrrolidines, piperidines and azepanes). Interestingly, with the commercially available Mn2(CO)10 or Re2(CO)10 as catalyst and Et3SiH as an inexpensive hydrosilane source, carboxylic esters, acids and amides can be chemospecifically reduced to the corresponding acetals, alcohols and amines. Besides hydrosilylation, we also explored the application of a series of well-defined manganese pre-catalysts featuring readily available bidendate pyridinyl-phosphine and 2-picolylamine ligands in hydrogenation reactions of aldehydes, ketones and aldimines. In line with our interest in developing group 7 metals based catalysts, we have also demonstrated that a series of amino-bisphosphino ligands coordinated rhenium catalysts can efficiently promote the hydrogenation of carbonyl derivatives, the mono N-methylation of anilines with methanol and the dehydrogenative synthesis of substituted quinolines. Lastly we also developed the Mn-catalysed ligand- and additive-free aerobic oxidation of amines to prepare aldimines, N-heteroaromatics and benzoimidazole derivatives., L’objectif de ce travail doctoral a été de développer de nouvelles méthodes éco-compatibles pour réaliser efficacement des réactions de (dé)hydrogénation et d’hydroélémentation catalysées par des catalyseurs bien définis de fer, de manganèse et également de rhénium. La première partie de ce travail porte sur le développement des premiers exemples de réaction de borylation de dérivés styrènes et acétyléniques terminaux avec le pinacolborane via une réaction d’activation de liaison C-H catalysée par des systèmes à base de Fe(PMe3)4 ou de Fe(OTf)2/ DABCO. Dans une seconde partie, des complexes de fer à base de ligands carbènes N-hétérocycliques (NHC) tels que Fe(CO)4(IMes) et [CpFe(CO)2(IMes)][I] ont été efficacement utilisés pour la synthèse d’une grande variété d’amines cycliques (pyrrolidines, pipéridines et azépanes) via une réaction d’amination réductrice catalytique en présence d’hydrosilanes. De façon très intéressante, les catalyseurs commerciaux Mn2(CO)10 et Re2(CO)10 en présence de triéthylsilane, ont permis de réduire sélectivement les esters, acides carboxyliques et amides en acétals, alcools et amines correspondants. En complément de l’hydrosilylation, l’hydrogénation d’aldéhydes, cétones et aldimines a pu être efficacement menée grâce à l’utilisation de nouveaux précatalyseurs bien définis de manganèse à base de ligands bidentes facilement accessibles tels que la pyridinyl-phosphine et la 2-picolylamine. Dans la continuité de notre intérêt pour le développement de nouveaux catalyseurs à base de métaux du groupe 7, une série de complexes de rhénium coordinés à des ligands amino-bisphosphino a montré une excellente aptitude à promouvoir l’hydrogénation de composés carbonylés (aldéhydes, cétones), la mono-méthylation sélective d’amines avec le méthanol comme agent de méthylant durable et la synthèse quinolines substituées. La dernière partie de se travail décrit le développement d’oxydations aérobies d’amines pour préparer des aldimines, des composés N-hétéroaromatiques et des dérivés de type benzoimidazole via une catalyse au manganèse en l’absence de ligands ou d’additifs.

Student to business(Abbr. S2B) e-commerce network platform is designed to display the college students’ creative works, and build joint channel for the creative talents of college and small and medium-sized enterprises requiring innovative resources. Firstly, this paper analyses the targets and features of S2B e-commerce platform. Secondly, the user requirements-oriented explicit functional demands are listed from two aspects of the individual users and enterprise users through investigation. In addition, implicit functional demand is obtained based on ontology. According to the method of ontology mapping, the function description by natural language is mapped to semantic elements and demand items, then the relationship of demand items coming into semantic structures. According to the method of ontology inference, the semantic structure is mapped to domain ontology of S2B e-commerce network platform, as well as the implicit functional requirements of platform are digging out. As a result, the whole functional structure tree of S2B e-commerce network platform is constructed. Finally, the detail functions of the platform are described by UML modeling tool. Through the platform the college students’ creative works are integrated and flow to meet the innovative demand of enterprises. S2B e-commerce model can make the creative resources be fully used and put forward the innovative and creative industry developing well.

Inflammation gene polymorphisms contributing to pro-atherosclerosis and pro-inflammation processes of infracted hearts were intensively investigated. In this study, we performed a case-control study involving 117 acute myocardial infarction (AMI) patients versus 165 unrelated normal subjects to distinguish associations of the onset of AMI with 252A/G, 804C/A polymorphisms of Lymphotoxin-alpha (LTA, also named TNF-β) gene, and 3279 C/T polymorphism of its binding partner, LGALS2 gene. An association concordant to the original study between LTA 252G and 804A homozygosity with the onset of AMI was found. In addition, 804C/A polymorphism more generally correlated to the prevalence of coronary artery disease (CAD) rather than the onset of AMI. The susceptible haplotype of LTA to AMI risk was found as the 252G allele couple with 804C or 804A allele among the Taiwanese population. More population-based studies are warranted to confirm these findings and evaluate its clinical impact on AMI diagnosis and prognosis.

Periodic orbits in an arbitrary 2nd degree and order uniformly rotating gravity field are studied. We investigate the four equilibrium points in this gravity field. We see that close relation exists between the stability of these equilibria and the existence and stability of their nearby periodic orbits. We check the periodic orbits with non-zero periods. In our searching procedure for these periodic orbits, we remove the two unity eigenvalues from the state transition matrix to find a robust, non-singular linear map to solve for the periodic orbits. The algorithm converges well, especially for stable periodic orbits. Using the searching procedure, which is relatively automatic, we find five basic families of periodic orbits in the rotating second degree and order gravity field for planar motion, and discuss their existence and stability at different central body rotation rates.

In the present study, we report the identification of a new gene from the Bacillus subtilis B3 strain (aatB3), which comprises 1308 bp encoding a 436 amino acid protein with a monomer molecular weight of 49.1 kDa. Phylogenetic analyses suggested that this enzyme is a member of the Ib subgroup of aspartate aminotransferases (AATs; EC 2.6.1.1), although it also has conserved active residues and thermostability characteristic of Ia-type AATs. The Asp232, Lys270 and Arg403 residues of AATB3 play a key role in transamination. The enzyme showed maximal activity at pH 8.0 and 45 °C, had relatively high activity over an alkaline pH range (pH 7.0-9.0) and was stable up to 50 °C. AATB3 catalyzed the transamination of five amino acids, with L-aspartate being the optimal substrate. The K(m) values were determined to be 6.7 mM for L-aspartate, 0.3 mM for α-ketoglutarate, 8.0 mM for L-glutamate and 0.6 mM for oxaloacetate. A 32-residue N-terminal amino acid sequence of this enzyme has 53% identity with that of Bacillus circulans AAT, although it is absent in all other AATs from different organisms. Further studies on AATB3 may confirm that it is potentially beneficial in basic research as well as various industrial applications.

VP1, the putative virion-associated RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) of infectious pancreatic necrosis virus (IPNV) can be guanylylated in vitro whereupon it becomes a primer for in vitro RNA synthesis [Virology 208 (1995) 19]. The role of a template or other virion polypeptides in the reaction is unknown. To shed light on this question, his-tagged recombinant VP 1 (rVP1) was expressed both in Escherichia coli and insect cells and used in the guanylylation reaction. Unlike other viral VPg polypeptides, the purified rVP1 alone could guanylylate itself in vitro in a template-independent manner. Chemical and enzymatic cleavage in combination with site-directed mutagenesis mapped the site of guanylylation to serine 163. The purified rVP1 functioned as a primer as well as an RdRp in vitro, producing labeled dsRNA in the presence of [α 32 P] NTP and synthetically produced viral ss + RNA as a template. Only a single cycle of replication was observed and labeled VPg could be recovered from the dsRNA by RNase V 1 digestion. Denaturation of the dsRNA yielded genome-length labeled ssRNA, indicating that RNA synthesis was not initiated by 3′-end snap-back self-priming. Mutating serine 163 to alanine of rVP1 abolished both its self-guanylylating and polymerizing activity.