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Nurses' palliative care practice ability is the key to evaluating the quality of palliative care. This study aimed to identify the current situation of palliative care practices, competence and difficulties among nurses and determine whether difficulties play a mediating role between practices and competence.A cross-sectional study was conducted. The online survey comprised demographics, the Palliative Care Self-Reported Practices Scale, the Palliative Care Nursing Self-competence Scale and the Palliative Care Difficulties Scale. Data were analysed by using descriptive statistics, univariate analysis, linear regression and mediation analysis.A total of 284 questionnaires were included for statistical analysis. The mean scores for practices, competence and difficulties were 67.81 (SD = 13.60), 124.28 (41.21) and 44.32 (12.68), respectively. There was a correlation between practices, competence and difficulties (p 0.01). Competence and difficulties were independent predictors of practices (RContinuous efforts should be made to enhance nurses' practices, competence and problem-solving abilities in palliative care. This study suggested further targeted education programmes, especially in special symptom management, interagency and multidisciplinary communication.

Hypoxia induced by flooding or submergence is a serious abiotic stress affecting crop productivity worldwide. During evolution, plants have developed different metabolism mechanisms to cope with the energy crisis caused by hypoxia stress. Among those, the metabolism of γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA), a non-protein amino acid, is recognized as a crucial component for low-oxygen stress responses because of its link both in carbon and nitrogen metabolism. However, it is largely unknown how to control GABA homeostasis. In this study, we identified a novel glycosyltransferase encoding gene, UGT79B7, which was significantly downregulated by low-oxygen treatment in Arabidopsis. ugt79b7 knockout mutants showed increased resistance to hypoxia, while the overexpression lines showed increased sensitivity. We demonstrated that glycosyltransferase UGT79B7 could catalyze GABA to form GABA glucose conjugate (GABA-Glc) in vitro. The in vivo biochemical function of UGT79B7 in controlling GABA glycosylation was also verified. Moreover, we also demonstrated that UGT79B7 could negatively modulate the accumulation of GABA under hypoxia stress. Our data suggest that the glycosylation of GABA plays an important role in GABA homeostasis and reveal a new way for the regulation of plant hypoxia response through a dynamic balance of GABA and its glycosylation products, GABA-Glc.

Background Inula japonica Thunb. (IJT) is an extensively applied herbal medicine for treating non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) due to its anti-asthma, antitussive, and expectorant properties. However, the mechanism of IJT against NSCLC remains to be elucidated. Methods Network pharmacology analysis was applied to determine the function mechanism of IJT against NSCLC. Databases were used to collect compounds and their related and known therapeutic targets. The compound–target (C–T) and target–target networks were then constructed to screen the kernel compounds and NSCLC-related targets of IJT. Moreover, the NSCLC-related targets of IJT were input in the DAVID Bioinformatics Resources (version 6.8) for Gene Ontology Biological Processes (GOBP) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway enrichment analysis. Finally, the binding affinity of major compounds with the NSCLC-relevant targets of IJT was further verified by molecular docking. Results Two active compounds (quercetin and luteolin) and six putative targets (RAC-alpha serine/threonine-protein kinase, G1/S-specific cyclin-D1, cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor 2A, epidermal growth factor receptor, receptor tyrosine-protein kinase erbB-2, and cellular tumor antigen p53) were screened as the effective compounds and NSCLC-related targets of IJT. GOBP and KEGG enrichment analysis indicated that NSCLC was the major pathway of IJT in the treatment of NSCLC and the mediation of apoptosis, cell cycle, tumor progression, and proliferation of biological processes, including the Ras, ERBB, MAPK, PI3K–Akt, calcium, and p53 signaling pathways. The results of molecular docking validated that 10 of the 12 pairs of compound-target had effective binding. Conclusions The mechanisms of IJT against NSCLC through multi-compounds, multi-targets, and multi-pathways were elucidated.

Abscisic acid (ABA) is an important plant hormone that plays a crucial role in response to abiotic stresses. It is well-known that the level of ABA will be dynamically regulated under stress conditions, however, the regulatory mechanism of ABA homeostasis remains largely unknown. In this study, we isolated and characterized a putative UDP-glycosyltransferase (UGT3) in rice, which is proven to be stress-induced and involved in ABA dynamic change. Our data demonstrated that overexpression of the glycosyltransferase gene UGT3 enhanced drought and salt stress tolerance of the transgenic rice. However, ugt3 mutant exhibited sensitive phenotypes under stresses. The ectopic expression of UGT3 in Arabidopsis also enhanced the plant tolerance to drought and salt stresses. Overexpression of UGT3 in rice increased endogenous ABA level and showed hypersensitive phenotype to exogenous ABA treatment at both germination and post-germination stages. Further studies demonstrated that UGT3 elevated activities of the antioxidant enzymes and reduced the production of reactive oxygen species to control the oxidative burst under stress conditions. Taken together, this work reveals that glycosyltransferase UGT3 can cope with the environmental challenges through a possible interactive network of ABA, ROS and antioxidants under abiotic stresses.

Nano Eu 2 O 3 ethanol sols modified in situ were successively prepared by focused pulsed laser ablation at the interface of Eu 2 O 3 target submerged in flowing liquid containing modifiers. It is found that the decorated nano Eu 2 O 3 ethanol sols can radiate intense red light under ultraviolet radiation. The fluorescence spectrum of decorated nano Eu 2 O 3 ethanol sol exhibits the characteristic peak of Eu 3+ ion at 612 nm, which is different from that of non-decorated nano Eu 2 O 3 ethanol sol. It is proved that the luminescence mechanism of nano Eu 2 O 3 ethanol sols is the same as that of europium coordinate complex.

A sort of surface fine-decorated in situ Tb 2 O 3 nanoparticles in ethanol sols were successively prepared by focused pulsed laser ablation at the interface of Tb 2 O 3 target submerged in flowing liquid containing modifiers, and it is found that the nanoTb 2 O 3 sol decorated by acac and 2,2′-bipy can emit very intense characteristic fluorescence at 549 nm of Tb 3+ ions, which is different from nondecorated nanoTb 2 O 3 ethanol sols with only low fluorescence at 415 nm.