Season, age, and sex affect the fecal mycobiota of free-ranging Tibetan macaques (Macaca thibetana)

Recent studies highlight that the gut mycobiota play essential roles in mammalian metabolic and immune systems, but to date we lack information on the forces that naturally shape the gut mycobiota of wild primates. To investigate the contributions of host and environmental factors in the taxonomic variation of the gut mycobiota, we examined the effects of age, sex, and season on the fecal mycobiota in wild-living Tibetan macaques (Macaca thibetana). Using next generation sequencing and a longitudinal set of fecal samples collected over 1 year, we identified a set of core fungal taxa present in the Tibetan macaque's fecal samples. The predominant genera Aspergillus and Penicillium, which promote the digestion of cellulose and hemicellulose in herbivorous mammals, were detected in this study. Similar to humans, we found age and sex effects on the macaques' fecal mycobiota. We also found that both fecal fungal composition and diversity (alpha and beta diversity) varied significantly by season. In particular, the Penicillium enriched mycobiota in summer samples may aid in the digestion of cellulose and hemicellulose present in mature leaves. The high alpha diversity detected in Tibetan macaques' winter fecal samples may facilitate a diet rich in fiber ingested during this season. We propose that the gut mycobiota play an important role in the macaques' ability to adapt to seasonal fluctuations in food availability and nutrient content.

Expression of endoplasmic reticulum stress protein in rabbit condyle cartilage following anterior disk displacement

OBJECTIVE

Anterior disk displacement (ADD) is a most common subtype of temporomandibular disorders (TMD), which is promoted by chondrocytes apoptosis. However, the signaling pathways that trigger apoptosis are still unknown. The aim of this study was to investigate the expression of endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress-related proteins in the condylar cartilage of rabbits following ADD.

METHODS

Sixty healthy adult rabbits were randomly assigned to the experimental and sham-operated control groups (n = 12). The experimental rabbits were subjected to surgical ADD in the right temporomandibular joints. The production of ER stress-related proteins C/EBP homologous protein (CHOP), glucose-regulated protein 78 (GRP78), cleaved caspase-3, and caspase-12 in cartilage was evaluated by immunohistochemistry, quantitative real-time PCR, and Western blot analysis.

RESULTS

Our results showed that the expression of CHOP, GRP78, cleaved caspase-3, and caspase-12 increased significantly along with degenerative changes in cartilage after ADD.

CONCLUSION

These results indicate that the ER stress pathway is activated in ADD cartilage and might promote the development of TMD.

Full-length genome sequence analysis of an avian leukosis virus subgroup J (ALV-J) as contaminant in live poultry vaccine: The commercial live vaccines might be a potential route for ALV-J transmission

One avian leukosis virus subgroup J (ALV-J) strain was isolated from 67 commercial live poultry vaccines produced by various manufacturers during 2013-2016 in China. The complete genomes of the isolate were sequenced and it was found that the genes gag and pol of the strain were relatively conservative, while the gp85 gene of the strain GX14YYA1 had the highest similarities with a field strain GX14ZS14, which was isolated from the chickens of a farm that had once used the same vaccine as the one found to be contaminated with the GX14YYA1. This is the first report of ALV-J contaminant in live poultry vaccine in China. Our finding demonstrates that vaccination of the commercial live vaccines might be a potential new route for ALV-J transmission in chickens and highlights the need for more extensive monitoring of the commercial live vaccines in China.

Nonrotationally symmetric aberrations of off-axis two-mirror astronomical telescopes induced by axial misalignments

In unobscured off-axis astronomical telescopes with an offset pupil, the effects of axial misalignments are very different from those in on-axis ones. Specifically, a series of nonrotationally symmetric aberrations with characteristic field dependence will be induced by axial misalignments. This paper takes off-axis two-mirror astronomical telescopes as an example to discuss the field characteristics of several important nonrotationally symmetric aberrations (including astigmatism, coma, and trefoil aberration) induced by axial misalignments in off-axis astronomical telescopes. The expressions of these aberrations are derived under some approximations. The accuracy of the proposed expressions is demonstrated. The specific field characteristics of these aberrations are presented and explicated. It is shown that the effects of axial misalignments bear strong similarities to the effects of the lateral misalignments in the symmetry plane of the off-axis system. On the other hand, the inherent relationships between astigmatism and coma induced by axial misalignments are further revealed, which are different from those induced by lateral misalignments. This fact presents the possibility of separating the effects of axial misalignments and lateral misalignments. Most of this work can be extended to other off-axis astronomical telescopes with more freedom.

Characterization of the triple-component linoleic acid isomerase in Lactobacillus plantarum ZS2058 by genetic manipulation

AIM

To assess the mechanism for conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) production in Lactobacillus plantarum ZS2058.

METHODS AND RESULTS

CLA has attracted great interests for decades due to its health-associated benefits including anticancer, anti-atherogenic, anti-obesity and modulation of the immune system. A number of microbial CLA producers were widely reported including lactic acid bacteria. Lactobacillus plantarum ZS2058, an isolate from Chinese traditional fermented food, could convert LA to CLA with various intermediates. To characterize the genetic determinants for generating CLA, a cre-lox-based system was utilized to delete the genes encoding myosin cross-reactive antigen (MCRA), short-chain dehydrogenase/oxidoreductase (DH) and acetoacetate decarboxylase (DC) in Lact. plantarum ZS2058, respectively. Neither intermediate was detected in the corresponding gene deletion mutant. Meanwhile all those mutants could recover the ability to convert linoleic acid to CLA when the corresponding gene was completed.

CONCLUSIONS

The results indicated that CLA production was a multiple-step reaction catalysed by triple-component linoleate isomerase system encoded by mcra, dh and dc.

SIGNIFICANCE AND IMPACT OF THE STUDY

Multicomponent linoleic acid isomerase provided important results for illustration unique mechanism for CLA production in Lact. plantarum ZS2058. Lactobacilli with CLA production ability offer novel opportunities for functional food development.

Miscellaneous Lasing Actions in Organo-Lead Halide Perovskite Films

Lasing actions in organo-lead halide perovskite films have been heavily studied in the past few years. However, due to the disordered nature of synthesized perovskite films, the lasing actions are usually understood as random lasers that are formed by multiple scattering. Herein, we demonstrate the miscellaneous lasing actions in organo-lead halide perovskite films. In addition to the random lasers, we show that a single or a few perovskite microparticles can generate laser emissions with their internal resonances instead of multiple scattering among them. We experimentally observed and numerically confirmed whispering gallery (WG)-like microlasers in polygon shaped and other deformed microparticles. Meanwhile, owing to the nature of total internal reflection and the novel shape of the nanoparticle, the size of the perovskite WG laser can be significantly decreased to a few hundred nanometers. Thus, wavelength-scale lead halide perovskite lasers were realized for the first time. All of these laser behaviors are complementary to typical random lasers in perovskite film and will help the understanding of lasing actions in complex lead halide perovskite systems.

Extract of Syzygium aromaticum suppress eEF1A protein expression and fungal growth

AIMS

Clove extract has therapeutic potential as an antifungal drug, yet the mechanism of action remains ambiguous. Current study aimed to address the molecular process of the antifungal activity exerted by clove extract.

METHODS AND RESULTS

The antifungal assay results showed that clove extract had some effects on all of the tested yeast. Propidium iodide staining assay showed cell membrane damage in Saccharomyces cerevisiae after treatment of clove extract for 30 h. Interestingly, SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis assays revealed that the protein expression of eukaryotic elongation factor 1 alpha (eEF1A) was suppressed significantly after treatment with clove extract (not pure eugenol). Transcriptional analyses revealed that the TEF1 and TEF2 genes (translation elongation factor EF-1 alpha) encoding eEF1A were not disturbed with the addition of clove extract; however, the expression of related genes EFB1 (translation elongation factor 1 subunit beta), ENO2 (phosphopyruvate hydratase ENO2), GSP1 (Ran GTPase GSP1), RPP0 (ribosomal protein P0), YEF3 (translation elongation factor EF-3), TEF4 (translation elongation factor EF1B gamma), and RPS2 (ribosomal 40S subunit protein S2) increased significantly.

CONCLUSIONS

These results suggest that clove extract plays a role in disrupting growth and affecting yeast metabolism. eEF1A was affected by clove extract at the protein level but not at the transcriptional level.

SIGNIFICANCE AND IMPACT OF THE STUDY

This study is based on a detailed study of antifungal action exerted by clove extract, and proposed that down-regulation of eEF1A protein expression may contribute to its antifungal activity. These results may have clinical significance for future application of clove extract as a natural antifungal agent.

Field diversity phase retrieval method for wavefront sensing in monolithic mirror space telescopes

To guarantee the uniqueness of the solution for the wavefront phase, a series of intensity images with known phase diversities is usually needed in the current phase retrieval wavefront sensing methods. However, to obtain these intensity images with deliberately added diversity phases, some additional instruments (e.g., beam splitters) or operations (e.g., adjustment of the focus) are usually needed, which can pose a challenge for wavefront sensing in space telescopes. This paper proposes a new concept for retrieving the wavefront phase of monolithic mirror space telescopes with perturbations, where the intensity measurements with phase diversities are directly obtained from different field positions of one image, without the need for any additional instruments or operations. To realize this new concept, we present a modified phase diversity method to account for the unknown phase diversities between these intensity measurements based on an in-depth understanding of the net aberration fields induced by misalignments and figure errors. Relevant simulations for different cases are performed to demonstrate the feasibility and accuracy of the proposed method. Since in this method the phase diversities between different intensity measurements are mainly induced by the diversities in the field position, we call it the field diversity phase retrieval method. This work can present great facility for wavefront sensing in monolithic mirror space telescopes.

Elimination of the field-dependent aberrations of the JWST-like space telescopes in the multi-field fine-phasing process

This paper investigates the alignment strategies for eliminating the field-dependent aberrations of the class of large three-mirror anastigmatic (TMA) space telescopes with a segmented primary mirror (PM) like the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) in the multi-field fine-phasing process based on the framework of nodal aberration theory. During the single-field (on-axis field) fine-phasing process, the individual segment tip, tilt, and piston errors, as well as the de-space of the secondary mirror, are well corrected, and the PM is also adjusted to compensate for those aberrations induced by the misalignments of other mirrors at the center of the science field of view. However, interrogating off-axis field points can reveal the presence of large wavefront errors due to mirror misalignments. Eliminating these field-dependent aberrations is the main goal of the multi-field fine-phasing process. This paper first presents an analytic study on an established alignment strategy used for eliminating the field-dependent aberrations. While it is demonstrated that this alignment strategy has the ability to reduce the field dependency of the wavefront errors, it will, however, also be revealed that this strategy still exhibits some problems, and its alignment efficiency is low. Then, a new alignment strategy with higher alignment efficiency is further proposed. Detailed simulations with a TMA telescope that has similar parameters with the JWST are performed to illustrate the efficiency and rationality of the proposed strategy. This work can not only contribute to an in-depth understanding of the multi-field fine-phasing process, but also present a possibility to improve the efficiency of this process.

Highly Reproducible Organometallic Halide Perovskite Microdevices based on Top-Down Lithography

Highly reproducible organometallic-halide-perovskite-based devices are fabricated by a manufacturing process, which is demonstrated. Various shapes that are hard to synthesize directly are fabricated, and many unique properties are achieved.The fabrication procedure is utilized to create a photodetector and the detection sensitivity is significantly improved. The results will bring revolutionary advancement to the future of lead-halide-perovskite-based optoelectronic devices.

The Role of Excitons on Light Amplification in Lead Halide Perovskites

The role of excitons on the amplifications of lead halide perovskites has been explored. Unlike the photoluminescence, the intensity of amplified spontaneous emission is partially suppressed at low temperature. The detailed analysis and experiments show that the inhibition is attributed to the existence of exciton and a quantitative model has been built to explain the experimental observations.

Orthopedics research output from China, USA, UK, Japan, Germany and France: A 10-year survey of the literature

BACKGROUND

In the past decade, researchers have made great progress in the field of Orthopedics. However, the research status of different countries is unclear. To summarize the number of published articles, we assessed the cumulative impact factors in top orthopedic journals. The aims of the study were to measure: 1) the quality and quantity of publications in orthopedics-related journals from China and other five counties, 2) the trend of the number of publications in orthopedics-related journals.

METHODS

The related journals were selected based on the 2014 scientific citation index (SCI) and articles were searched based on the PubMed database. To assess the quantity and quality of research output, the number of publications including clinical trials, randomized controlled trials, meta-analyses, case reports, reviews, citations, impact factors, number of articles in the top 10 journals and most popular journals were recorded.

RESULTS

A total of 143,138 orthopedics articles were published from 2005 to 2014. The USA accounts for 24.9% (35,763/143,138) of the publications, followed by UK (7878/143,138 (5.5%)), Japan (7133/143,138 (5.0%)), Germany (5942/143,138 (4.2%)), China (4143/143,138 (2.9%)) and France (2748/143,138 (1.9%)). The ranking for accumulated impact factors as follows: USA, UK, Japan, Germany, France and China. The mean impact factor's order is USA, China, Germany, Japan, France, UK, and interestingly the mean impact factors in Japan is similar to the Germany in 2005-2014. The USA had the highest percentage of articles in the top 10 journals, while China owns the least. The USA had the highest number of average citations, while Japan had lowest number of average citations.

CONCLUSIONS

According to this study, we can conclude that the USA has had been leading the orthopedics research in the past 10 years. Although China still falls behind, it has made considerable progress in the orthopedics research, not only in quantity but also quality.

LEVEL OF EVIDENCE

IV.

Aberration fields of off-axis two-mirror astronomical telescopes induced by lateral misalignments

This paper presents a systematic and in-depth discussion for the aberration fields of off-axis two-mirror astronomical telescopes with an offset pupil that is induced by lateral misalignment. Based on the framework of nodal aberration theory and a system level pupil coordinate transformation, the aberration function for misaligned off-axis telescopes is derived. Some general descriptions for the misalignment-induced aberrations are presented. The specific astigmatic and coma aberration field characteristics in off-axis two-mirror telescopes are then discussed. The precision of the presented aberration expressions is demonstrated. The discrepancies between the ray tracing data and aberration expressions are explicated. Then the inherent relationships between the astigmatism and coma aberration fields are revealed and explicated. Based on this knowledge, some quantitative discussions are further presented for determining the misalignments used to compensate for the effects of primary mirror astigmatic figure errors as well as separating these two effects when coupled. Other effects of lateral misalignments are also presented, especially the field-constant focal shift, which is only sensitive to the lateral misalignments in the symmetry plane of the nominal off-axis system. A quantitative discussion is also presented which explains the reason why trefoil aberration in off-axis telescopes is more sensitive to lateral misalignments. Most of the results presented in this paper can be extended to the other off-axis astronomical telescopes with more freedoms.

Postsynthetic and Selective Control of Lead Halide Perovskite Microlasers

The control of photoluminescence and absorption of lead halide perovskites plays a key role in their applications in micro- and nano-sized light emission devices and photodetectors. To date, the wavelength controls of lead halide perovskite microlasers are mostly realized by changing the halide mixture in solution. Herein, we report the postsynthetic and selective control of the optical properties of lead halide perovskites with conventional semiconductor technology. By selectively exposing a CH₃NH₃PbBr₃ microstructure with chlorine in inductively coupled plasma, we find that the wavelengths of absorption, photoluminescence, and laser emissions of exposed structures are blue-shifted around 50 nm. Most importantly, the device characteristics such as the photoluminescence intensities and laser thresholds are well maintained during the reaction process. We believe our finding will significantly boost the practical applications of lead halide perovskite based optoelectronics.

High-Density and Uniform Lead Halide Perovskite Nanolaser Array on Silicon

The realization of high density and highly uniform nanolaser arrays in lead halide perovskite is quite challenging, especially on silicon. Herein, we demonstrate a simple way to form lead halide nanolaser array on silicon chip with high density and uniform lasing wavelengths. By positioning a perovskite microwire onto a silicon grating, only the suspended parts can hold high quality (Q) resonances and generate laser emissions. As the perovskite microwire is periodically segmented by the silicon grating, the transverse lasers are divided into a periodic nanolaser array and the lasing wavelengths from different subunits are almost the same. The transverse laser has been observed in an air gap as narrow as 420 nm, increasing the density of nanolasers to about 1250 per millimeter (800 nm period in experiment). We believe this research shall shed light on the development of perovskite microlaser and nanolaser arrays on silicon and their applications.

Host Cell Dependence of Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type-1 Drug Resistance Profiles and Tissue Culture Selection Patterns

Clinical isolates of the human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) displayed differential sensitivity to antiviral nucleosides depending on the type of host cell employed for viral propagation. Viruses derived from the peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) of subjects on prolonged 3′-azido-3′-deoxythymidine (AZT) therapy behaved as AZT-resistant when tested in either cord blood mononuclear cells or MT-4 cells but as relatively drug-sensitive in the U-937 monocytic cell line. Viruses derived from monocytes/ macrophages of the same individuals behaved as drug-sensitive in all cells tested. It was also shown that cloned recombinant viruses, which contained defined resistance-conferring mutations at either position 65 or 184 in the HIV pol gene, were generally less susceptible to each of 2′-3′-dideoxyinosine (ddl), 2′,3′-dideoxycytidine (ddC) and the (-)enantiomer of 2′,3′-dideoxy-3′thiacytidine (3TC) in MT-4 cells than in any of PBMC, cord blood mononuclear cells (CBMC) or Jurkat cells. Finally, resistance against each of AZT, ddl and ddC could be selected for more easily using MT-4 cells than CBMC or Jurkat lymphocytes and not at all with the U-937 monocytic cell line.

Large-Scale and Defect-Free Silicon Metamaterials with Magnetic Response

All-dielectric metamaterials offer a potential low-loss alternative to plasmonic metamaterials at optical frequencies. Here, we experimentally demonstrate a silicon based large-scale magnetic metamaterial, which is fabricated with standard photolithography and conventional reactive ion etching process. The periodically arrayed silicon sub-wavelength structures possess electric and magnetic responses with low loss in mid-infrared wavelength range. We investigate the electric and magnetic resonances dependencies on the structural parameters and demonstrate the possibility of obtaining strong dielectric-based magnetic resonance through a broad band range. The optical responses are quite uniform over a large area about 2 × 2 cm². The scalability of this design and compatibility fabrication method with highly developed semiconductor devices process could lead to new avenues of manipulating light for low-loss, large-area and real integrated photonic applications.

Computation of astigmatic and trefoil figure errors and misalignments for two-mirror telescopes using nodal-aberration theory

In active optics systems, one concern is how to quantitatively separate the effects of astigmatic and trefoil figure errors and misalignments that couple together in determining the total aberration fields when wavefront measurements are available at only a few field points. In this paper, we first quantitatively describe the impact of mount-induced trefoil deformation on the net aberration fields by proposing a modified theoretical formulation for the field-dependent aberration behavior of freeform surfaces based on the framework of nodal aberration theory. This formulation explicitly expresses the quantitative relationships between the magnitude of freeform surfaces and the induced aberration components where the freeform surfaces can be located away from the aperture stop and decentered from the optical axis. On this basis, and in combination with the mathematical presentation of nodal aberration theory for the effects of misalignments, we present the analytic expressions for the aberration fields of two-mirror telescopes in the presence of astigmatic primary mirror figure errors, mount-induced trefoil deformations on both mirrors, and misalignments. We quantitatively separate these effects using the analytical expressions with wavefront measurements at a few field points and pointing errors. Valuable insights are provided on how to separate these coupled effects in the computation process. Monte Carlo simulations are conducted to demonstrate the correctness and accuracy of the analytic method presented in this paper.