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Fusarium head blight in wheat is mainly caused by Fusarium graminearum and results in significant economic losses. Coenzyme Q (CoQ) is ubiquitously produced across organisms and functions as a hydrogen carrier in energy metabolism. While UbiH in Escherichia coli serves as a hydroxylase in CoQ biosynthesis, its role in phytopathogenic fungi is not well understood. This study explored the role of the hydroxylase FgUbiH in F. graminearum. Using a FgUbiH deletion mutant, we observed reduced hyphal growth, conidial production, germination, toxin synthesis, and pathogenicity compared to the wild-type. A transcriptome analysis indicated FgUbiH’s involvement in regulating carbohydrate and amino acid metabolism. Deletion of FgUbiH impaired mitochondrial function, reducing adenosine triphosphate synthesis and increasing reactive oxygen species. Additionally, genes related to terpene skeleton synthesis and aldehyde dehydrogenase were downregulated. Our results underscore the importance of FgUbiH in F. graminearum’s growth, toxin production, and energy metabolism, aiding in the development of strategies for disease management.

Two kinds of nitrogen-bridged star-shaped fused-ring electron acceptors based on benzo[1,2-b:3,4-b’-5,6-b’’]tri(4-H-dithieno[3,2-b:2’,3’-d]pyrrole) (BTDTP) core with linear and branched alkyl side chains on bridging nitrogen atoms are developed. Both electron acceptors exhibit strong intramolecular charge transfer absorption bands at 500–800 nm (molar extinction coefficient of 3.0 × 105 M −1 cm−1) with narrow optical bandgaps around 1.58 eV, but reveal different molecular packing and morphology. Compared to acceptor with linear side chains, the acceptor bearing branched side chains exhibits ordered face-on orientation with tight π-π stacking, as well as more favorable phase separation morphology and balanced charge transport when blended with polymer donor PM6. Organic solar cell device based on acceptors bearing branched side chains achieves a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 9.95% with a fill factor of 74.98% and a short-circuit current density of 14.90 mA cm−2, which is much superior to the device using acceptors bearing linear side chains (a PCE of 6.74%).

Abstract Halogen bonding, as a kind of intermolecular interaction, has rarely been used to tune solid-state emission properties of luminescent materials, especially fluorescent materials. Herein, three trans-enaminone (TE) derivatives (nonbrominated TE, monobrominated BrTE, and tribrominated Br3TE) with aggregation-induced emission property have been designed and synthesized. Two types of BrTE crystals (BrTE-B and BrTE-G) with different fluorescence properties were obtained. It was observed that their solid-state fluorescence has been enhanced by the formation of halogen bonding. In particular, the crystal BrTE-G containing Br…π interactions exhibits a fluorescence quantum yield (9.6%) nearly sevenfold higher than BrTE-B, the crystal without halogen bonding (1.4%), and fivefold higher than the nonbrominated TE derivative (2.1%). By careful inspection of the single-crystal data and theoretical calculations, the high fluorescence quantum yield of BrTE-G appears to be due to halogen-bonding interactions as well as multiple stronger intermolecular interactions which may restrain molecular motions, leading to the reduced nonradiative decay rate and the enhanced radiative decay rate. Additionally, increasing the number of bromine substituents may further promote the radiative decay rate, explaining therefore the higher fluorescence quantum yield (12.5%) of Br3TE.

A readily available effective adsorbent is necessary to adsorb heavy-metal ions from aqueous solutions. In this study, a novel adsorbent with good adsorption properties [Al 3+ –oligomer–pillared diatomite (Al 3+ –oligomer–PD)] was prepared and was used to adsorb Cd 2+ ions in a solid/liquid system. The property and nature of the Cd 2+ ions adsorbed on the surface of the Al 3+ –oligomer–PD were studied by performing a series of adsorption tests and related surface property analyses. Our study results show that owing to a more favourable pore structure, the PD has a higher adsorption property compared with natural diatomite (ND) and most other common adsorbents. The adsorption capacity of PD is 27.36% greater than ND and also achieves an optimal value of 10.05 mg/l. Certain parameters have a significant effect on Cd 2+ ion adsorption. The most suitable isotherm and kinetics models for describing the adsorption of Cd 2+ ions are the Freundlich and pseudo-second-order models. The nature of Cd 2+ ion adsorption on PD is favourable, physical, spontaneous, exothermic and disorder increasing. The results of the study suggest that PD is an ideal adsorbent for the removal of cadmium ions from aqueous solutions.

A simple model is proposed for the prediction of equilibrium ion adsorption in liquid/solid systems. The establishment of the model was based on the assumption that the change in the standard chemical potential of the adsorption system should be zero if ion adsorption taking place spontaneously at a constant temperature is purely a thermodynamic process in which, driven by the electrochemical potentials, the ions move between liquid and solid phases without changing their chemical nature. Experiments have been conducted to test this assumption using the adsorption of Zn 2+ , Cd 2+ and K + ions from aqueous solutions onto swelling vermiculite, natural zeolite and synthetic zeolite. The results showed that the proposed model fitted the experimental data well. This study provides evidence that, under the conditions employed, ion adsorption reactions are essentially physical processes and the change in the standard chemical potential of the adsorption reaction is negligible.

Studies of Zn 2+ and Cd 2+ ion adsorption onto vermiculite from buffered and unbuffered aqueous solutions were conducted in order to compare their ion adsorption behaviours in different systems. The use of buffer reagents had a strong and negative effect on the adsorption of the metal ions under study. The experimental data obtained from both the buffered and unbuffered solutions could not be described by a single traditional adsorption isotherm due to the effect of the adsorbent concentration (W). The equilibrium ion concentration in bulk solution (Z) and the equilibrium ion adsorption density (X/W ratio) decreased with increasing W in both buffered and unbuffered systems, indicating that the use of a buffer solution is not an effective measure for eliminating the effect of the adsorbent concentration. The addition of competitive ions (H + , Cd 2+ and Zn 2+ ) greatly reduced the adsorption of the target metal ion. Within the pH range tested (initial pH < 7), the competitive effect of H + ions was equivalent to that of Zn 2+ and Cd 2+ ions. In unitary, binary and ternary systems, highly significant linear correlations were obtained between the change in the ionic strength (ΔI) and the quantity of ion adsorption. The results obtained suggest that it is not necessary to control the ionic strength in ion adsorption experiments because ΔI is a function of ion adsorption, and the use of buffer reagents has a negative effect on ion adsorption.