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Herein, burdock polysaccharide (BP) and modified burdock polysaccharide (MBP) were prepared, followed by the fabrication of chlorogenic acid (CA)-BP, CA-MBP, isochlorogenic acid A (ICA)-BP, and ICA-MBP nanoparticles. Afterward, the structural characteristics, physical stability, digestive characteristics, and antioxidant activity of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2)-damaged HepaRG cells were evaluated. The result indicated that the loading capacities of CA in BP-CA and MBP-CA were 0.14 and 0.53 μg/mg, respectively. Conversely, the loading capacities of ICA in BP-ICA and MBP-ICA were 0.36 and 0.60 μg/mg, respectively. Four complex nanoparticles exhibited excellent physical stability under different pH values, temperatures, and ionic concentrations, especially MBP-CA and MBP-ICA. Moreover, four complex nanoparticles could protect caffeoylquinic acid from being released in gastric fluid. All six samples exhibited high antioxidant activity in H2O2-induced HepaRG cells, especially BP and MBP-CA. These findings indicated that caffeoylquinic acid–polysaccharide complexes were successfully prepared and highlighted the potential of polysaccharides as natural carriers for hydrophobic bioactive molecules.

The present study aimed to modify the structure of ginger peel polysaccharides (GPPs) with Cr (III) and to evaluate the in vivo anti-inflammatory activities of the GPPs and GPP-Cr (III) complexes and their underlying mechanisms. The response surface methodology optimized the preparation process to a GPPs-Cr (III) mass ratio of 1:0.06, a temperature of 60 °C, and a pH of 6.8, with the greatest chelation rate of 91.1%. The modification of Cr (III) increased the molecular weight and altered the glucose proportion of the GPPs, through targeting the O–H of hydroxyl groups and affecting the C–O/O–C–O structures. The GPP-Cr (III) complexes had a similar crystallinity and conformation to the parent polysaccharides, but were more thermally stable than the GPPs (in the region of < 130 °C and > 332 °C). In CuSO4-induced inflammation in zebrafish, the GPP-Cr (III) complexes (dose: 50 and 100 μg/mL) showed significantly stronger anti-inflammatory activity than the GPPs did via down-regulating the expression of relevant transcription factors and cytokines in the MyD88/NF-κB/MAPK/iNOS signaling pathway. Therefore, GPP-Cr (III) complexes might be promising dietary formulations with anti-inflammatory effects, Cr (III) supplements, or functional food components, which substantially facilitated the high-value utilization of ginger peel by-products.

Hawthorn (Crataegus pinnatifida Bunge) has been highlighted as an excellent source of a variety of bioactive polymers, which has attracted increasing research interest. Pectin, as a kind of soluble dietary fiber in hawthorn, is mainly extracted by hot water extraction and ultrasonic or enzymatic hydrolysis and is then extensively used in food, pharmaceutical, and nutraceutical industries. Numerous studies have shown that hawthorn pectin and its derived oligosaccharides exhibit a wide range of biological activities, such as antioxidant activity, hypolipidemic and cholesterol-reducing effects, antimicrobial activity, and intestinal function modulatory activity. As discovered, the bioactivities of hawthorn pectin and its derived oligosaccharides were mainly contributed by structural features and chemical compositions and were highly associated with the extraction methods. Additionally, hawthorn pectin is a potential resource for the development of emulsifiers and gelling agents, food packaging films, novel foods, and traditional medicines. This review provides a comprehensive summary of current research for readers on the extraction techniques, functional characteristics, structure–activity relationship, and applications in order to provide ideas and references for the investigation and utilization of hawthorn pectin and its derived oligosaccharides. Further research and development efforts are imperative to fully explore and harness the potential of hawthorn pectin-derived oligosaccharides in the food and medicine fields.

Massa Medicata Fermentata (MMF) is widely applied in feed additives and human medicine. The stir-frying is a commonly used method for process of MMF, which will improve its efficacy in invigorating the spleen. However, the dynamic change of physical properties and ingredients during stir-frying remain un-elucidated. Here, the appearance color, pH values, UV–visible and fluorescence spectroscopy, content of volatile and non-volatile compounds of MMF at different process stage of stir-frying were measured. The results indicated that with increasing stir-frying time, the appearance color deepened, and pH value decreased, while the UV absorbance and fluorescence exhibited rising trends. Additionally, we identified four non-volatile compounds from MMF, and three of them showed gradual increase in content during stir-frying (from 0 to 30 min). Regarding the volatile compounds, the content of alcohols decreased, while aldehydes increased evidently after 30 min. These results demonstrated that the physicochemical properties, types of compounds and their content all significantly changed during stir-frying. The study provides insights regarding the change in substance and appearance, which will provide a guidance for the judgment of the degree of stir-frying MMF.

Panax quinquefolius (PQ) has been widely used in traditional Chinese medicine and functional food. Ginsenosides are the important functional components of PQ. The ginsenosides’ diversity is deeply affected by the processing conditions. The ginsenosides in the steamed PQ have been not well-characterized yet because of the complexity of their structure. In the study, the comprehensive investigation of ginsenosides was performed on the steamed PQ with different steaming times and temperatures by UPLC-Q-TOF-MS. Based on the molecular weight, retention time and characterized fragment ions, 175 ginsenosides were unambiguously identified or tentatively characterized, including 45 protopanaxatriol type, 49 protopanaxadiol type, 19 octillol type, 6 oleanolic acid type ginsenosides, and 56 other ginsenosides. Ten new ginsenosides and three new aglycones were discovered in the steamed PQ samples through searching the database of CAS SciFindern. Principal component analysis showed the significant influence on the chemical components of PQ through different processing conditions. The steaming temperature was found to promote the transformation of ginsenosides more than the steaming time. The protoginsenosides were found to transform into the rare ginsenosides by elimination reactions. The malonyl ginsenosides were degraded into acetyl ginsenosides, and then degraded into neutral ginsenosides. The sugar chain experienced degradation, with position changes and configuration inversions. Furthermore, 20 (S/R)-ginsenoside Rh1, Rh2, Rg2, and Rh12 were found to transform from the S-configuration to the R-configuration significantly. This study could present a comprehensive ginsenosides profile of PQ with different steaming conditions, and provide technical support for the development and utilization of PQ.

The elemental accumulation and recycling in the metamorphosed Keketale VMS-type Pb-Zn deposit of the Altai Mountains are presented in this study. Based on detailed fieldwork and microscopic observation, the formation of the deposit involved syngenetic massive sulfide mineralization and epigenetic superimposed mineralization. Different generations of iron sulfides (i.e., pyrite and pyrrhotite) with contrasting textural, elemental, and sulfur isotopic features were generated in primary mineralization (including hydrothermal iron sulfides, colloform pyrite) and secondary modification (including annealed iron sulfides, oriented iron sulfides, and vein-pyrite). It is revealed that the spatial variation in textures and elements of hydrothermal iron sulfides depends on the inhomogeneous fluid compositions and varied environment in VMS hydrothermal system. Both leached sulfur from the footwall volcanic rocks and reduced sulfur by the TSR process are regarded as important sulfur sources. Furthermore, large sulfur isotopic fractionation and negative δ34S values were mainly caused by varied oxygen fugacity, and to a lesser extent, temperature fluctuation. The epigenetic polymetallic veins that contain sulfides and sulfosalts (e.g., jordanite-geocronite, bournonite-seligmannite, boulangerite) were considered as the products of metamorphic fluid scavenged the metal-rich strata. All things considered, it is indicated that two episodes of fluid with distinct origins were essential for the formation of the deposit. The predominant evolved seawater along with subordinate magmatic fluid mobilized metals from volcanic rocks and precipitated massive sulfides near the seafloor are vital for primary mineralization. The metamorphic fluid remobilized metals (i.e., FMEs: fluid mobile elements, e.g., Pb, As, Sb) from neighboring volcanic and pyroclastic rocks and destabilized them within the fractured zone are responsible for secondary mineralization, which enhances the economic value of the deposit. Accordingly, metal-rich Devonian strata had been successively swept by different origins of fluid, leading to progressively elemental enrichment and the formation of a large deposit. Furthermore, the current study enlightens that FME-bearing veins with economic benefits can be discovered near the metamorphosed VMS deposits.

To efficiently eliminate highly polar organic pollutants from water has always been a difficult issue, especially in the case of ultralow concentrations. Herein, we present the facile synthesis of quinolinecarboxylic acid-linked COF (QCA–COF) via the Doebner multicomponent reaction, possessing multifunction, high specific surface area, robust physicochemical stability, and excellent crystallinity. The marked feature lies in the quinolinyl and carboxyl functions incorporated simultaneously to QCA–COF in one step. The major cis–orientation of carboxyl arms in QCA–COF was speculated by powder X–ray diffraction and total energy analysis. QCA–COF demonstrates excellent adsorption capacity for water–soluble organic pollutants such as rhodamine B (255.7 mg/g), methylene blue (306.1 mg/g), gentamycin (338.1 mg/g), and 2,4–dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (294.1 mg/g) in water. The kinetic adsorptions fit the pseudo–second order model and their adsorption isotherms are Langmuir model. Remarkably, QCA–COF can capture the above four water–soluble organic pollutants from real water samples at ppb level with higher than 95% removal efficiencies and excellent recycling performance.

In this paper, an imine-based porous 3D covalent organic polymer (COP) was synthesized via solvothermal condensation. The structure of the 3D COP was fully characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and powder X-ray diffractometry, thermogravimetric analysis, and Brunauer–Emmer–Teller (BET) nitrogen adsorption. This porous 3D COP was used as a new sorbent for the solid-phase extraction (SPE) of amphenicol drugs, including chloramphenicol (CAP), thiamphenicol (TAP), and florfenicol (FF) in aqueous solution. Factors were investigated for their effects on the SPE efficiency, including the types and volume of eluent, washing speed, pH, and salinity of water. Under the optimized conditions, this method gave a wide linear range (0.1–200 ng/mL) with a high correlation coefficient value (R2 > 0.99), low limits of detection (LODs, 0.01–0.03 ng/mL), and low limits of quantification (LOQs, 0.04–0.10 ng/mL). The recoveries ranged from 83.98% to 110.7% with RSDs ≤ 7.02%. The good enrichment performance for this porous 3D COP might contribute to the hydrophobic and π–π interactions, the size-matching effect, hydrogen bonding, and the good chemical stability of 3D COP. This 3D COP-SPE method provides a promising approach to selectively extract trace amounts of CAP, TAP, and FF in environmental water samples in ng quantities.

Lonicera japonica Thunb. (LJT) has been widely used as medicines or food additives in Asian countries for thousands of years. The flower buds are often medicinally used, and the other tissues are ignored. However, flowers, leaves and stems have also been reported to have antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects. In the current study, un-targeted metabolomics analysis was performed to investigate the metabolic difference among different tissues (flowers, flower buds, stems and leaves) of LJT based on liquid chromatography with mass spectrometry. A total of 171 metabolites were identified, including 28 flavonoids, 35 phenolic acids, 43 iridoids, 9 amino acids, 6 nucleotides, 16 fatty acids, 22 lipids and 12 others. Four new secondary metabolites were discovered. Some flavonoids and iridoids were not detected in leaves and stems. Principal component analysis showed significant differences among four different tissues. Some 27, 81, 113 differential metabolites were found between flowers/flower buds, leaves/flower buds, stems/flower buds, respectively. Primary metabolites showed a higher content in the flowers and flower buds. For the flavonoids, flavones were mainly accumulated in the leaves, flavonols were mainly accumulated in the flower buds, and acylated flavonol glucosides were mainly accumulated in the flowers. Most phenolic acids showed a higher content in the flowers or flower buds, while phenolic acid-glucosides showed significantly higher content in the flower buds. The most abundant iridoids in the LJT also showed a higher content in the flowers and flower buds. These results can provide new insights into the understanding of the metabolites changes in different tissues, and lay a theoretical foundation for the comprehensive utilization of LJT.

Abstract Background Sarcopenic obesity (SO) in nursing home residents is rarely studied. We aimed to evaluate and compare the prevalence and consistency of different SO diagnostic methods and to investigate which criterion demonstrated a stronger association with instrumental activities of daily living (IADL) disability. Methods We consecutively recruited older adults aged ≥ 60 years, residing in 15 nursing homes in Zigong City, China. Sarcopenia obesity was defined according to the European Society for Clinical Nutrition and Metabolism (ESPEN) and the European Association for the Study of Obesity criteria (SOESPEN), recommending skeletal muscle mass (SMM) adjusted by body weight (SMM/W) to identify low muscle mass. Further, we adapted ESPEN criteria (SOESPEN−M) by employing SMM adjusted by body mass index (SMM/BMI). Results We included 832 participants (median age 73.0 years, 296 women). The prevalence of SOESPEN and SOESPEN−M was 43.5% and 45.3%, respectively. SOESPEN showed good consistency with SOESPEN−M (Cohen’s kappa = 0.759). More than one-third of participants in the normal weight group were diagnosed with SOESPEN or SOESPEN−M. Even within the underweight group, the prevalence of SOESPEN and SOESPEN−M was 8.9% and 22.2%, respectively. Participants with IADL disability had significantly lower SMM/W and SMM/BMI, but higher fat mass percentage of body weight (FM%) than participants without IADL disability. After full adjustment for potential confounders, SOESPEN−M (OR 1.68, 95% CI 1.21 to 2.32), but not SOESPEN (OR 1.28, 95% CI 0.93 to 1.75), remained significantly associated with IADL disability. Conclusions Both SOESPEN and SOESPEN−M showed a high prevalence among nursing home residents, even among individuals with underweight or normal weight. While SOESPEN had a good consistency with SOESPEN−M, only SOESPEN−M was independently associated with IADL disability. Screening and diagnosis of SO should be conducted in nursing home residents irrespective of BMI.

Summary: Pyruvate dehydrogenase complex (PDC) is a crucial enzyme that connects glycolysis and the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle pathway. It plays an essential role in regulating glucose metabolism for energy production by catalyzing the oxidative decarboxylation of pyruvate to acetyl coenzyme A. Importantly, the activity of PDC is regulated through post-translational modifications (PTMs), phosphorylation, acetylation, and O-GlcNAcylation. These PTMs have significant effects on PDC activity under both physiological and pathophysiological conditions, making them potential targets for metabolism-related diseases. This review specifically focuses on the PTMs of PDC in cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) such as myocardial ischemia/reperfusion injury, diabetic cardiomyopathy, obesity-related cardiomyopathy, heart failure (HF), and vascular diseases. The findings from this review offer theoretical references for the diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis of CVD.

Objective(s): Cardiac arrest is a crucial procedure in various cardiac surgeries, during which the heart is subjected to an ischemic state. The occurrence of ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury is inevitable due to aortic blockage and opening. The Histidine-tryptophan-ketoglutarate (HTK) solution is commonly used as an organ protection liquid to mitigate cardiac injury during cardiac surgery. Despite its widespread use, there is significant potential for improving its protective efficacy.Materials and Methods: The cardioprotective effect of HTK solution with and without melatonin was evaluated using the isolated Langendorff-perfused mouse heart model. The isolated C57bL/6 mouse hearts were randomly divided into four groups: control, I/R, HTK solution treatment before reperfusion (HTK+I/R), and HTK solution combined with melatonin before reperfusion (HTK+M+I/R). Cardiac function and myocardial injury markers were then measured. AMP-activated protein kinase α2 (AMPKα2) KO mice were used to investigate the underlying mechanism.Results: In our study, we found that melatonin significantly improved the protective effects of HTK solution in an isolated Langendorff-perfused mouse model, mechanistically by reducing mitochondrial damage, improving energy metabolism, inhibiting cardiomyocyte apoptosis, and reducing myocardial infarction size. We also observed that the HTK solution alone was ineffective in inhibiting ER stress, but when melatonin was added, there was a significant reduction in ER stress. Furthermore, melatonin was found to alleviate carbonyl stress during cardiac I/R. Interestingly, our results showed that the cardioprotective properties of melatonin were dependent on AMPKα2.Conclusion: The findings presented in this study offer a valuable empirical foundation for the development of perioperative cardioprotective strategies.

Remote sensing (RS) visual question answering (VQA) provides accurate answers through the analysis of RS images (RSIs) and associated questions. Recent research has increasingly adopted transformers for feature extraction. However, this trend leads to escalating training costs as a consequence of increased model sizes. Furthermore, existing studies predominantly employ transformers to extract features from a single modality, insufficiently integrating multimodal information and thereby undermining the potential advantages of transformers in feature extraction and fusion in these scenarios. To address these challenges, we propose parameter-efficient multimodal transfer learning for RSVQA. We introduce a lightweight, parameter-efficient adapter into the visual feature extraction module, initialized with weights pretrained on large-scale RSIs to reduce both training costs and parameters. A cross-attention mechanism is employed for multimodal interaction, enhancing the integration of information across modalities. Comprehensive experiments were conducted on three datasets: RSVQA-LR, RSVQA-HR, and RSVQAxBEN, achieving state-of-the-art performance. Moreover, exhaustive ablation studies demonstrate that our parameter-efficient adapter strategy achieves performance comparable to full-parameter training under partial parameter conditions, validating the efficacy of our approach.

Abstract Background In the context of increasing population aging, ongoing drug-resistant pathogens and the COVID-19 epidemic, the changes in the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of patients with pneumonia remain unclear. This study aimed to assess the trends in hospitalization, case fatality, comorbidities, and isolated pathogens of pneumonia-related adult inpatients in Guangzhou during the last decade. Methods We retrospectively enrolled hospitalized adults who had doctor-diagnosed pneumonia in the First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University from January 1, 2013 to December 31, 2022. A natural language processing system was applied to automatically extract the clinical data from electronic health records. We evaluated the proportion of pneumonia-related hospitalizations in total hospitalizations, pneumonia-related in-hospital case fatality, comorbidities, and species of isolated pathogens during the last decade. Binary logistic regression analysis was used to assess predictors for patients with prolonged length of stay (LOS). Results A total of 38,870 cases were finally included in this study, with 70% males, median age of 64 (53, 73) years and median LOS of 7.9 (5.1, 12.8) days. Although the number of pneumonia-related hospitalizations showed an upward trend, the proportion of pneumonia-related hospitalizations decreased from 199.6 per 1000 inpatients in 2013 to 123.4 per 1000 in 2021, and the case fatality decreased from 50.2 per 1000 in 2013 to 23.9 per 1000 in 2022 (all P

Background: Given the rarity of tracheobronchopathia osteochondroplastica (TO), many young doctors in primary hospitals are unable to identify TO based on bronchoscopy findings. Objectives: To build an artificial intelligence (AI) model for differentiating TO from other multinodular airway diseases by using bronchoscopic images. Design: We designed the study by comparing the imaging data of patients undergoing bronchoscopy from January 2010 to October 2022 by using EfficientNet. Bronchoscopic images of 21 patients with TO at Anhui Chest Hospital from October 2019 to October 2022 were collected for external validation. Methods: Bronchoscopic images of patients with multinodular airway lesions (including TO, amyloidosis, tumors, and inflammation) and without airway lesions in the First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University were collected. The images were randomized (4:1) into training and validation groups based on different diseases and utilized for deep learning by convolutional neural networks (CNNs). Results: We enrolled 201 patients with multinodular airway disease (38, 15, 75, and 73 patients with TO, amyloidosis, tumors, and inflammation, respectively) and 213 without any airway lesions. To find multinodular lesion images for deep learning, we utilized 2183 bronchoscopic images of multinodular lesions (including TO, amyloidosis, tumor, and inflammation) and compared them with images without any airway lesions (1733). The accuracy of multinodular lesion identification was 98.9%. Further, the accuracy of TO detection based on the bronchoscopic images of multinodular lesions was 89.2%. Regarding external validation (using images from 21 patients with TO), all patients could be diagnosed with TO; the accuracy was 89.8%. Conclusion: We built an AI model that could differentiate TO from other multinodular airway diseases (mainly amyloidosis, tumors, and inflammation) by using bronchoscopic images. The model could help young physicians identify this rare airway disease.

Microplastics (MPs) are environmental pollutants and can be inhaled by humans to threaten health. The lung tissue, responsible for the gas exchange between the body and the environment, is vulnerable to MPs exposure. However, from the perspective of cellular senescence, the effect of MPs on lung cells and tissues has not yet been deeply dissected. In this study, we reported that all the four typical MPs exhibited the significant biological effects in term of inducing senescence of human lung derived cells A549 and BEAS-2B in vitro. We further found that polyvinyl chloride (PVC) increased the reactive oxygen species (ROS) level in A549 cells and that PVC-induced senescent characteristics could be largely reversed by antioxidant treatment. Importantly, intratracheal instillation of PVC MPs in mice could effectively impair their physical function, induce the increased systemic inflammation level, cause the accumulation of senescent cells. Our study demonstrates that MPs induce senescence in human lung epithelial cells and mouse lungs by activating ROS signaling, and provides new insight into the potential pathogenesis of MPs on lung diseases.

Identifying the parameters of solar photovoltaic (PV) cell models accurately and reliably is crucial for simulating, evaluating, and controlling PV systems. For this reason, we present an improved chimp optimization algorithm (IChOA) for the generation of precise and reliable solar PV cell models. As a new and improved version of the standard chimp optimization algorithm (ChOA), IChOA embeds two mutation rules in ChOA that include the elite opposition-based learning and visual search mechanism. The first rule is applied to strengthen global exploration capacity of ChOA, and the second one is utilized to enhance ChOA’s local exploitation ability (convergence accuracy). Based on the six benchmark test functions with different characteristics, the effectiveness of IChOA is evaluated by comparing to other five well-known optimization algorithms. The results suggest that IChOA offers superior performance over other competing algorithms. Finally, IChOA’s performance is confirmed through optimizing parameters for three widely employed mathematical models, specifically the single diode model, the double diode model, and the multi-cell PV modules. The findings prove the excellent performance of the suggested approach.