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Avian reoviruses (ARV) are a group of poultry pathogens that cause runting and stunting syndrome (RSS), a condition otherwise known as “frozen chicken”, which are characterized by dramatically delayed growth in broilers. It has been known that p17, a nonstructural protein encoded by ARV, prohibits cellular proliferation by halting the cell cycle at the G2/M phase, the result of which is directly associated with the typical clinical sign of RSS. Nevertheless, the mechanism by which p17 modulates cell-cycle progression remains largely unknown. Here, we screened the interactome of ectopically expressed p17 through a yeast two-hybrid assay and identified Bub3, a cellular mitotic checkpoint protein, as a binding partner of p17. The infection of the Vero cells by ARV downregulated the Bub3 expression, while the knockdown of Bub3 alleviated the p17-modulated cell-cycle arrest during ARV infection. Remarkably, the suppression of Bub3 by RNAi in the Vero cells significantly reduced the viral mRNA and protein abundance, which eventually led to diminished virus replication. Altogether, our findings reveal that ARV p17 impedes host cell proliferation through a Bub3-dependent cell-cycle arrest, which eventually contributes to efficient virus replication. These results also unveil a hitherto unknown therapeutic target for RSS.

Diverse pectinolytic enzymes are widely applied in the food, papermaking, and other industries, and they account for more than 25% of the global industrial enzyme demands. Efficient lignocellulose degradation microbiota are reservoirs of pectinolytic enzymes and other lignocellulose-degrading genes. Metagenomics has been widely used to discover new pectinolytic enzymes. Here, we used a metagenomic strategy to characterize pectinolytic genes from one efficient lignocellulose-degrading microbiota derived from pulp and paper wastewater treatment microbiota. A total of 23 predicted full-length GH28 and PL1 family pectinolytic genes were selectively cloned and expressed in Escherichia coli, and 5 of the expressed proteins had pectinolytic activities. Among them, the characterization of one pectinolytic enzyme, PW-pGH28-3, which has a 58.4% identity with an exo-polygalacturonase gene of Aquipluma nitroreducens, was further investigated. The optimal pH and optimal temperature of PW-pGH28-3 were 8.0 and 40 °C, respectively, and its pectinolytic activity at the optimal condition was 13.5 ± 1.1 U/mg protein. Bioinformatics analyses and structural modeling suggest that PW-pGH28-3 is a novel secretory exo-polygalacturonase, which is confirmed by its hydrolysates of polygalacturonic acid. The detection of PW-pGH28-3 and other pectinolytic genes showed that efficient lignocellulose degradation microbiota could provide potential efficient pectinolytic enzymes for industrial application. In the future, improving metagenomic screening efficiency would discover efficient lignocellulose-degrading enzymes and lead to the sustainable and green utilization of lignocellulose.

Cow’s milk protein allergy (CMPA) is an immune response to cow’s milk proteins, which is one of the most common food allergies in infants and young children. It is estimated that 2–3% of infants and young children have CMPA. The diet, gut microbiota, and their interactions are believed to be involved in the alterations of mucosal immune tolerance, which might lead to the development of CMPA and other food allergies. In this review, the potential molecular mechanisms of CMPA, including omics technologies used for analyzing microbiota, impacts of early microbial exposures on CMPA development, and microbiota–host interactions, are summarized. The probiotics, prebiotics, synbiotics, fecal microbiota transplantation, and other modulation strategies for gut microbiota and the potential application of microbiota-based design of diets for the CMPA treatment are also discussed. This review not only summarizes the current studies about the interactions of CMPA with gut microbiota but also gives insights into the possible CMPA treatment strategies by modulating gut microbiota, which might help in improving the life quality of CMPA patients in the future.

Bacterial communities have been described as early indicators of both regional and global climatic change and play a critical role in the global biogeochemical cycle. Exploring the mechanisms that determine the diversity patterns of bacterial communities and how they share different habitats along environmental gradients are, therefore, a central theme in microbial ecology research. We characterized the diversity patterns of bacterial communities in Pipahai Lake (PPH), Mayinghai Lake (MYH), and Gonghai Lake (GH), three subalpine natural lakes in Ningwu County, Shanxi, China, and analyzed the distribution of their shared and unique taxa (indicator species). Results showed that the species composition and structure of bacterial communities were significantly different among the three lakes. Both the structure of the entire bacterial community and the unique taxa were significantly influenced by the carbon content (TOC and IC) and space distance; however, the structure of the shared taxa was affected by conductivity (EC), pH, and salinity. The structure of the entire bacterial community and unique taxa were mainly affected by the same factors, suggesting that unique taxa may be important in maintaining the spatial distribution diversity of bacterial communities in subalpine natural freshwater lakes. Our results provide new insights into the diversity maintenance patterns of the bacterial communities in subalpine lakes, and suggest dispersal limitation on bacterial communities between adjacent lakes, even in a small local area. We revealed the importance of unique taxa in maintaining bacterial community structure, and our results are important in understanding how bacterial communities in subalpine lakes respond to environmental change in local habitats.

Satellite image semantic segmentation, including extracting road, detecting building, and identifying land cover types, is essential for sustainable development, agriculture, forestry, urban planning, and climate change research. Nevertheless, it is still unclear how to develop a refined semantic segmentation model in an efficient and elegant way. In this paper, we propose attention dilation-LinkNet (AD-LinkNet) neural network that adopts encoder–decoder structure, serial–parallel combination dilated convolution, channel-wise attention mechanism, and pretrained encoder for semantic segmentation. Serial–parallel combination dilated convolution enlarges receptive field as well as assemble multi-scale features for multi-scale objects, such as long-span road and small pool. The channel-wise attention mechanism is designed to advantage the context information in the satellite image. The experimental results on road extraction and surface classification data sets prove that the AD-LinkNet shows a significant effect on improving the segmentation accuracy. We defeated the D-Linknet algorithm that won the first place in the CVPR 2018 DeepGlobe road extraction competition.

Background: Recent studies suggest that gut microbiota was associated with the bidirectional gut-brain axis which could modulate neuropsychological functions of the central nervous system. Gut microbiota could produce gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA) that could modulate the gut–brain axis response. Jianpi Jieyu (JPJY) decoction, a traditional Chinese formula, is mainly composed of Astragalus membranaxeus and Radix Pseudostellariae. Although the JPJY decoction has been used to treat the depression in China, the potential action of its antidepressant has not been well understood. Thus this study was aim to investigate the role of JPJY improve gut microbiota homeostasis in the chronic stress induced depressive mice.Methods: The antidepressant effect of JPJY on chronic unpredictable mild stress (CUMS) mice was evaluated by using sucrose preference test, tail suspension test and forced swim test. Fatigue-like behaviors were evaluated using degree of redness, grip strength test, and exhaustive swimming test. The new object recognition test was used to evaluate cognition performance. Fecal samples were collected and taxonomical analysis of intestinal microbial distribution was conducted with 16S rDNA. Serum level of GABA was measured using high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The expression of GluR1 and p-Tau protein in the hippocampus was determined using Western blotting.Results: The dose of 9.2 g/kg JPJY produced antidepressant-like effects. JPJY and its major components also modulated gut microbiota diversity in the CUMS mice. Serum level of GABA and the expressions of hippocampal GluR1 and p-Tau were reversed after the administration of JPJY in CUMS mice.Conclusion: JPJY regulates gut microbiota to produce antidepressant-like effect and improve cognition deficit in depressive mice while its molecular mechanism possibly be enhanced NR1 and Tau expression in hippocampus and increased GABA in serum.

BackgroundEpithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) is the main subtype of ovarian cancer and shows an aggressive phenotype and poor prognosis. Neuronal pentraxin II (NPTX2) is a member of the neuronal pentraxin family and plays a contradictory role in different tumors. However, there has been no report about the possible role and effect of NPTX2 in EOC.MethodsBioinformatics analysis, qPCR, western blotting and immunohistochemistry were used to detect the expression of NPTX2 in EOC. Lentivirus-based transfection for NPTX2 overexpression or knockdown was performed on the EOC cell lines A2780, HEY, SKOV3 and OVCAR-3. The effect of NPTX2 on the malignant phenotype of EOC was examined through methods of MTS assay, Edu assay, transwell assay, western blotting analysis, qPCR analysis, luciferase reporter assay and xenograft experiment.ResultsEOC tissues showed higher NPTX2 expression than the normal tissues with poor prognosis. NPTX2 overexpression can promote the proliferation, invasion, migration and tumorigenesis of EOC via IL6-JAK2/STAT3 signaling pathway. Moreover, hypoxia-inducible factor-1(HIF-1) can promote the transcription and expression of NPTX2 under the hypoxic environment. NPTX2 knockdown abolished the hypoxia-induced malignant phenotypes in ECO.ConclusionsThe above results suggest that NPTX2 may play a novel role in ovarian cancer’s malignant phenotype and act as a promising treatment target for EOC molecular therapy.

Fowl adenovirus serotype 4 (FAdV-4) is the primary causative agent responsible for the hepatitis-hydropericardium syndrome (HHS) in chickens, leading to considerable economic losses to stakeholders. Although the pathogenesis of FAdV-4 infection has gained attention, the underlying molecular mechanism is still unknown. Here, we showed that the ectopic expression of gga-miR-30c-5p in leghorn male hepatocellular (LMH) cells enhanced apoptosis in FAdV-4-infected LMH cells by directly targeting the myeloid cell leukemia-1 (Mcl-1), facilitating viral replication. On the contrary, the inhibition of endogenous gga-miR-30c-5p markedly suppressed apoptosis and viral replication in LMH cells. Importantly, the overexpression of Mcl-1 inhibited gga-miR-30c-5p or FAdV-4-induced apoptosis in LMH cells, reducing FAdV-4 replication, while the knockdown of Mcl-1 by RNAi enhanced apoptosis in LMH cells. Furthermore, transfection of LMH cells with gga-miR-30c-5p mimics enhanced FAdV-4-induced apoptosis associated with increased cytochrome c release and caspase-3 activation. Thus, gga-miR-30c-5p enhances FAdV-4-induced apoptosis by directly targeting Mcl-1, a cellular anti-apoptotic protein, facilitating FAdV-4 replication in host cells. These findings could help to unravel the mechanism of how a host responds against FAdV-4 infection at an RNA level.

The residue of estrogenic-disrupting compounds (EDCs) that are secreted by cows, added as drugs, and present in the feed may exist in dairy products. A gold nanoparticles (AuNPs)-estrogen receptor (ER) cocktail colorimetric assay equipped with ER cocktail solid phase extraction (SPE) was established to screen EDCs. Nine EDCs with high, moderate, and low estrogenic activity were selected to be the representative targets. The recognition range of the colorimetric assay combined with the ER cocktail SPE was wider than that of a single ERα or ERβ. The lowest detection limit of the established assay was about 10−9 mg·mL−1. The detection limits of estrone, bisphenol A, and bisphenol B were about one order of magnitude lower than the method based on a single ER. The recoveries of the spiked nine EDCs were between 80.0% and 110.0%, and daidzein was identified in the dairy product. The developed method has potential application prospects in food safety and environmental monitoring.

A preferable approach of a combination of a multiwavelength fusion HPLC fingerprint and chemometrics for the quality control of Xiaoer Chiqiao Qingre granules (XCQG) was established in this study. A single-wavelength HPLC fingerprint was performed to identify 18 peaks as common peaks in the beginning, and 12 of them were recognized by HPLC-Q/TOF-MS. To overcome the limitation of the single-wavelength HPLC fingerprint, a three-wavelength (230 nm, 250 nm, and 330 nm) fusion fingerprint was established for a more thorough quality assessment. Six main active ingredients (geniposide, paeoniflorin, forsythin, forsythoside A, baicalin, and wogonoside) were selected as chemical markers for simultaneous quantitative analysis, while the results indicated that the content of other five ingredients except forsythoside A presented comparatively stable. Chemometrics including hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) and orthogonal partial least squares discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA) were performed to evaluate the homogeneity and heterogeneity of sixteen batches of XCQG. The results of the multiwavelength fingerprint were clearly classified into two clusters by HCA, whereas the single-wavelength fingerprint showed no distinct difference between them. OPLS-DA was further employed to prove that the above six main active ingredients made great contributions to clustering. In summary, this integrated analysis provided a better promoted and more comprehensive method to control the quality of XCQG.

The disposal of nonferrous metal tailings poses a global economic and environmental problem. After employing a clinker-free steel slag-based binder (SSB) for the solidification/stabilization (S/S) of arsenic-containing tailings (AT), the effectiveness, leaching risk, and leaching mechanism of the SSB S/S treated AT (SST) were investigated via the Chinese leaching tests HJ/T299-2007 and HJ557-2010 and the leaching tests series of the multi-process Leaching Environmental Assessment Framework (LEAF). The test results were compared with those of ordinary Portland cement S/S treated AT (PST) and showed that the arsenic (As) curing rates for SST and PST samples were in the range of 96.80–98.89% and 99.52–99.2%, respectively, whereby the leached-As concentration was strongly dependent on the pH of the leachate. The LEAF test results showed that the liquid–solid partitioning limit of As leaching from AT, SST, and PST was controlled by solubility, and the highest concentrations of leached As were 7.56, 0.34, and 0.33 mg/L, respectively. The As leaching mechanism of monolithic SST was controlled by diffusion, and the mean observed diffusion coefficient of 9.35 × 10−15 cm2/s was higher than that of PST (1.55 × 10−16 cm2/s). The findings of this study could facilitate the utilization of SSB in S/S processes, replacing cement to reduce CO2 emissions.

In this paper, the effects of rigid-flexible coupling knees on the performance of the exoskeleton developed by us for power assist are mainly concerned. The work was conducted through a series of numerical simulation comparisons between rigid-flexible coupling models and pure rigid structure models of the exoskeleton under different loads. Before the dynamic analysis, a flat walking gait plan in sagittal plane was designed for the exoskeleton, and the coupling numerical model of the novel knee was verified through comparing with the experimental result. Compared with the pure rigid knees, the simulation results show that the rigid-flexible coupling knees exert a mixed influence on dynamics of the exoskeleton under different loads. Via the current study, a simple and practical gait plan is acquired for biped exoskeleton to imitate human level walking, and flexible parts utilized in the exoskeleton joints could lead to a vibration of joint driving torque without load, and on the contrary, it contributes to the lower impact ground reaction force and undemanding driving torque requirement with heavy load.

MicroRNAs are important regulators in plant developmental processes and stress responses. In this study, we generated a series of maize STTM166 transgenic plants. Knock-down of miR166 resulted in various morphological changes, including rolled leaves, enhanced abiotic stress resistance, inferior yield-related traits, vascular pattern and epidermis structures, tassel architecture, as well as abscisic acid (ABA) level elevation and indole acetic acid (IAA) level reduction in maize. To profile miR166 regulated genes, we performed RNA-seq and qRT-PCR analysis. A total of 178 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified, including 118 up-regulated and 60 down-regulated genes. These DEGs were strongly enriched in cell and intercellular components, cell membrane system components, oxidoreductase activity, single organism metabolic process, carbohydrate metabolic process, and oxidation reduction process. These results indicated that miR166 plays important roles in auxin and ABA interaction in monocots, yet the specific mechanism may differ from dicots. The enhanced abiotic stress resistance is partly caused via rolling leaves, high ABA content, modulated vascular structure, and the potential changes of cell membrane structure. The inferior yield-related traits and late flowering are partly controlled by the decreased IAA content, the interplay of miR166 with other miRNAs and AGOs. Taken together, the present study uncovered novel functions of miR166 in maize, and provide insights on applying short tandem target mimics (STTM) technology in plant breeding.

Toxoplasma gondii pathogen is a threat to human health that results in economic burden. Unfortunately, there are very few high-efficiency and low-toxicity drugs for toxoplasmosis in the clinic. (+)-Usnic acid derived from lichen species has been reported to have anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, anti-parasitology, and even anti-cancer activities. In associated with the published article “Effects of (+)-Usnic Acid and (+)-Usnic Acid–Liposome on Toxoplasma gondii” [1], this dataset article provided the detailed information of experimental designing, methods, features as well as the raw data of (+)-usnic acid and (+)-usnic acid–liposome on toxoplasma in vivo and vitro. (+)-Usnic acid may be a potential agent for treating toxoplasmosis. Keywords: Toxoplasma gondii, Tachyzoite, (+)-Usnic acid, (+)-Usnic acidliposome, Liposome

Hydropericardium-Hepatitis Syndrome (HHS) caused by Fowl Adenovirus Serotype 4 (FAdV4) infection is a severe threat to the poultry industry worldwide, especially in China since 2015. Recent studies show that FAdV4 induces liver injury through apoptosis. However, the underlying molecular mechanism is still unclear. We report here that FAdV4 infection caused apoptosis in Leghorn male hepatocellular (LMH) cells and that PX, a structural protein of FAdV4, acted as a major viral factor inducing apoptosis. Furthermore, the nuclear localization of PX is determined by the R/K regions of PX and required for PX-induced apoptosis. Moreover, alanines 11 and 129 of PX are crucial to PX-induced apoptosis. Inhibition of FAdV4-induced apoptosis by caspase inhibitors retarded viral replication, suggesting that PX serves as a virulence factor for FAdV4 infection, which may further our understandings of the pathogenesis of FAdV4 infection.

Infectious bursal disease (IBD) is an acute, highly contagious, and immunosuppressive avian disease caused by IBD virus (IBDV). MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are involved in host-pathogen interactions and innate immune response to viral infection. However, the role of miRNAs in host response to IBDV infection is not clear. We report here that gga-miR-155 acts as an anti-virus host factor inhibiting IBDV replication. We found that transfection of DF-1 cells with gga-miR-155 suppressed IBDV replication, while blockage of the endogenous gga-miR-155 by inhibitors enhanced IBDV replication. Furthermore, our data showed that gga-miR-155 enhanced the expression of type I interferon in DF-1 cells post IBDV infection. Importantly, we found that gga-miR-155 enhanced type I interferon expression via targeting SOCS1 and TANK, two negative regulators of type I IFN signaling. These results indicate that gga-miR-155 plays a critical role in cell response to IBDV infection.

Infectious bursal disease (IBD) is an acute, highly contagious and immunosuppressive avian disease caused by IBD virus (IBDV). Cell apoptosis triggered by IBDV contributes to the dysfunction of immune system in host. VP2 of IBDV is known to induce cell death but the underlying mechanism remains unclear. Here we demonstrate that VP2 interacts with the oral cancer overexpressed 1 (ORAOV1), a potential oncoprotein. Infection by IBDV or ectopic expression of VP2 causes a reduction of cellular ORAOV1 and induction of apoptosis, so does knockdown of ORAOV1. In contrast, over-expression of ORAOV1 leads to the inhibition of VP2- or IBDV-induced apoptosis, accompanied with the decreased viral release (p < 0.05). Thus, VP2-induced apoptosis during IBDV infection is mediated by interacting with and reducing ORAOV1, a protein that appears to act as an antiapoptotic molecule and restricts viral release early during IBDV infection.

Host immune response is tightly controlled by negative regulators to avoid excessive immune reactions for homeostasis. Some pathogens may take advantage of host negative regulating system to evade host defense. Our previous report showed that foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) VP1 inhibited TNF-α- and SeV-induced type I interferon response via interaction with cellular protein soluble resistance-related calcium-binding protein (sorcin). Conversely, TNF-α- or SeV-induced type I interferon response increased when sorcin knocked down, leading to inhibition of vesicular stomatitis virus replication. However, the exact role of sorcin in regulation of the immune response is still not clear. Here, we show that mice deficient of sorcin (sorcin−/−) display enhanced ConA-induced hepatitis. Importantly, splenocytes from sorcin−/− mice produced more IL-2, IL-4, IL-17, and IFN-γ than that of littermate controls (sorcin+/+) in response to anti-CD3/28 stimulation. Furthermore, our data indicate that sorcin interacts with signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT3) and enhances its phosphorylation and that STAT3 acts as an immediate downstream molecule of sorcin in the negative regulation of NF-κB signaling. Thus, sorcin, in association with STAT3, negatively regulates hepatic inflammation.

Fowl adenovirus serotype 4 (FAdV-4) causes hepatitis-hydropericardium syndrome (HHS), leading to severe economic losses in the poultry industry. Although the pathogenesis of FAdV-4 infection has caused much attention, the underlying molecular mechanisms remain poorly understood. Here, we identified chaperonin containing TCP-1 subunit eta (CCT7) as an interacting partner of the FAdV-4 capsid protein hexon. We found that ectopic expression of CCT7 in leghorn male hepatocellular (LMH) cells enhanced hexon expression in pRK5-flag-hexon transfected cells. On the contrary, knockdown of cellular CCT7 by RNAi markedly reduced hexon expression in FAdV-4-infected cells and suppressed viral replication. These data suggest that CCT7 is required for FAdV-4 replication and may serve as a potential target for controlling FAdV-4 infection.

Recovery following sports related concussion (SRC) is slower and often more complicated in young adolescent athletes than in collegiate players. Further, the clinical decision to return to play is currently based on symptoms and cognitive performance without direct knowledge of brain function. We tested the hypothesis that brain functional connectivity would be aberrant in recently concussed, asymptomatic athletes who had been cleared to return to play. A seed-based functional connectivity (FC) analysis measured the FC of the default mode network (DMN) (seeds = anterior cingulate cortex, posterior cingulate cortex, right lateral parietal cortex, and left lateral parietal cortex) 30 days after SRC in asymptomatic high school athletes cleared to return to play (n=13) and was compared to the FC of high school athletes with orthopedic injury (OI) (n=13). The SRC group demonstrated greater FC than the OI group between the posterior cingulate cortex and the ventral lateral prefrontal cortex, as well as between the right lateral parietal cortex and lateral temporal cortex (with regions both outside of and within the DMN). Additionally, the OI group demonstrated greater FC than the SRC group between right lateral parietal cortex and supramarginal gyrus. When relating the FC results to verbal memory performance approximately one week and one month after injury, significantly different between-group relations were found for the posterior cingulate and right lateral parietal cortex seeds. However, the groups did not differ in verbal memory at one month. We suggest that changes in FC are apparent one month post-SRC despite resolution of post-concussion symptoms and recovery of cognitive performance in adolescent athletes cleared to return to play.

The paper surveys and analyzes the basic present condition of Suiling black pottery in Heilongjiang Province, and innovates and designs black pottery products. This paper combines traditional technologies with modern design methods to enrich the categories of black pottery products, expands the industry chain, and promotes the economic development of Suiling. The rapid development of modern industry led to the decline of handicraft, and the development of Suiling black pottery has stagnated. Handicrafts should be designed and transformed to ensure the inheritance of traditional culture and skills.

Caulophine is a new fluorenone alkaloid isolated from the radix of Caulophyllum robustum MAXIM and identified as 3-(2-(dimethylamino) ethyl)-4,5-dihydroxy-1,6-dimethoxy-9H-fluoren-9-one. Due to its new chemical structure, the pharmacological activities of caulophine are not well characterized. The present study evaluated the protective effect and the primary mechanisms of caulophine on cardiomyocyte injury. Viability of cardiomyocytes was assayed with the MTT method, and cell apoptosis was detected by flow cytometry. Myocardial infarction was produced by ligating the coronary artery, and myocardial ischemia was induced by isoproterenol in rats. Myocardial infarction size was estimated with p-nitro-blue tetrazolium staining. Lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), creatine kinase (CK), superoxide dismutase (SOD), malondialdehyde (MDA), and free fatty acid (FFA) were spectrophotometrically determined. Histopathological and ultrastructural changes of ischemic myocardium were observed. The results showed that pretreatment with caulophine increased the viability of H2O2-and adriamycin-injured cardiomyocytes; decreased CK, LDH, and MDA; increased SOD; and inhibited H2O2-induced cellular apoptosis. Caulophine reduced myocardial infarct size and serum CK, LDH, FFA, and MDA; raised serum SOD; and improved histopathological and ultrastructural changes of ischemic myocardium. The results demonstrate that caulophine has the ability to protect cardiomyocytes from oxidative and ischemic injury through an antioxidative mechanism that provides a basis for further study and development of caulophine as a promising agent for treating coronary heart disease. Keywords:: caulophine, cardiomyocyte, oxidative injury, myocardial ischemia, apoptosis

Three-dimensional biofilm electrode reactors (3D-BERs) were constructed to degrade the azo dye Reactive Brilliant Red (RBR) X-3B. The 3D-BERs with different influent concentrations and external voltages were individually studied to investigate their influence on the removal of X-3B. Experimental results showed that 3D-BERs have good X-3B removal efficiency; even when the influent concentration was 800 mg/L, removal efficiency of 73.4% was still achieved. In addition, the X-3B removal efficiency stabilized shortly after the influent concentration increased. In 3D-BERs, the average X-3B removal efficiency increased from 52.8% to 85.4% when the external voltage rose from 0 to 2 V. We further identified the intermediate products via UV-Vis and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analyses, and discussed the potential mechanism of degradation. After the conjugate structure of X-3B was destroyed, all of the substances generated mainly consisted of lower-molecular-weight organics.

Individuals with traumatic brain injury (TBI) exhibit deficits in executive control, which may impact their reasoning abilities. Analogical reasoning requires working memory and inhibitory abilities. In this study, we tested adolescents with moderate to severe TBI and typically-developing (TD) controls on a set of picture analogy problems. Three factors were varied: complexity (number of relations in the problems), distraction (distractor item present or absent), and animacy (living or non-living items in the problems). We found that TD adolescents performed significantly better overall than TBI adolescents. There was also an age effect present in the TBI group where older participants performed better than younger ones. This age effect was not observed in the TD group. Performance was affected by complexity and distraction. Further, TBI participants exhibited lower performance with distractors present than TD participants. The reasoning deficits exhibited by the TBI participants were correlated with measures of executive function that required working memory updating, attention, and attentional screening. Using MRI-derived measures of cortical thickness, correlations were carried out between task accuracy and cortical thickness. The TD adolescents showed negative correlations between thickness and task accuracy in frontal and temporal regions consistent with cortical maturation in these regions. This study demonstrates that adolescent TBI results in impairments in analogical reasoning ability. Further, TBI youth have difficulty effectively screening out distraction, which may lead to failures in comprehension of the relations among items in visual scenes. Lastly, TBI youth fail to show robust cortical-behavior correlations as observed in TD individuals.