CsXDH1 gene promotes caffeine catabolism induced by continuous strong light in tea plant

Tea plant(Camellia sinensis)is an important cash crop with extensive adaptability in the world.However,complex environmental factors force a large variation of tea quality-related components.Caffeine is essential for the formation of bitter and fresh flavors in tea,and is the main compound of tea that improves human alertness.Continuous strong light stimulation was observed to cause caffeine reduction in tea leaves,but the mechanism is not clear.In this study,the response of tea plant to light intensity was analysed mainly by multi-omics association,antisense oligodeoxynucleotide(asODN)silencing technique,and in vitro enzyme activity assay.The results revealed multiple strategies for light intensity adaptation in tea plant,among which the regulation of chloroplasts,photosynthesis,porphyrin metabolism,and resistance to oxidative stress were prominent.Caffeine catabolism was enhanced in continuous strong light,which may be a light-adapted strategy due to strict regulation by xanthine dehydrogenase(XDH).asODN silencing and enzymatic activity assays confirmed that CsXDH1 is a protein induced by light intensity to catalyze the substrate xanthine.CsXDH1 asODN silencing resulted in significant up-regulation of both caffeine and theobromine in in vitro enzyme activity assay,but not in vivo.CsXDH1 may act as a coordinator in light intensity adaptation,thus disrupting this balance of caffeine catabolism.

Mechanical properties and simulated thermal conductivity of biomimetic structured PS-PVD(Gd_(0.9)Yb_(0.1))_(2)Zr_(2)O_(7) thermal barrier coatings

Plasma spray physical vapor deposition(PS-PVD)(Gd_(0.9)Yb_(0.1))_(2)Zr_(2)O_(7)(GYbZ)thermal barrier coatings(TBCs)exhibited better silicate-phobicity than coatings produced by electron beam physical vapor depo-sition.In combination with PS-PVD and ultrafast laser direct writing technology,biomimetic structured GYbZ TBCs,with a triple-scale micro/nano surface microstructure,were obtained.Laser ablating on the PS-PVD GYbZ coating enhanced the surface roughness,improving its wear resistance without increasing the surface hardness.Furthermore,during the laser ablation processing,numerous nanoparticles were deposited in-situ in the gaps between columns of the coating,reducing the coating Young’s modulus.The simulated temperature field and heat flux field demonstrated that the presence of numerous interfaces between small columns of the PS-PVD coatings is beneficial to thermal insulation.However,laser ablation decreased the coating thickness,reducing the thermal insulation by around 20%-30%as compared to its PS-PVD counterpart,suggesting that a moderate increase in the coating thickness should be considered when designing an efficient TBC system.

A novel defined risk signature of endoplasmic reticulum stress-related genes for predicting the prognosis and immune infiltration status of ovarian cancer

Endoplasmic reticulum(ER)stress,as an emerging hallmark feature of cancer,has a considerable impact on cell proliferation,metastasis,invasion,and chemotherapy resistance.Ovarian cancer(OvCa)is one of the leading causes of cancer-related mortality across the world due to the late stage of disease at diagnosis.Studies have explored the influence of ER stress on OvCa in recent years,while the predictive role of ER stress-related genes in OvCa prognosis remains unexplored.Here,we enrolled 552 cases of ER stress-related genes involved in OvCa from The Cancer Genome Atlas(TCGA)and Gene Expression Omnibus(GEO)cohorts for the screening of prognosis-related genes.The least absolute shrinkage and selection operator(LASSO)regression was applied to establish an ER stress-related risk signature based on the TCGA cohort.A seven-gene signature revealed a favorable predictive efficacy for the TCGA,International Cancer Genome Consortium(ICGC),and another GEO cohort(P<0.001,P<0.001,and P=0.04,respectively).Moreover,functional annotation indicated that this signature was enriched in cellular response and senescence,cytokines interaction,as well as multiple immune-associated terms.The immune infiltration profiles further delineated an immunologic unresponsive status in the high-risk group.In conclusion,ER stress-related genes are vital factors predicting the prognosis of OvCa,and possess great application potential in the clinic.

Modulation of Spike Count Correlations Between Macaque Primary Visual Cortex Neurons by Difficulty of Attentional Task

Studies have shown that spatial attention remarkably affects the trial-to-trial response variability shared between neurons.Difficulty in the attentional task adjusts how much concentration we maintain on what is currently important and what is filtered as irrelevant sensory information.However,how task difficulty mediates the interactions between neurons with separated receptive fields(RFs)that are attended to or attended away is still not clear.We examined spike count correlations between single-unit activities recorded simultaneously in the primary visual cortex(V1)while monkeys performed a spatial attention task with two levels of difficulty.Moreover,the RFs of the two neurons recorded were non-overlapping to allow us to study fluctuations in the correlated responses between competing visual inputs when the focus of attention was allocated to the RF of one neuron.While increasing difficulty in the spatial attention task,spike count correlations were either decreased to become negative between neuronal pairs,implying competition among them,with one neuron(or none)exhibiting attentional enhancement of firing rate,or increased to become positive,suggesting inter-neuronal cooperation,with one of the pair showing attentional suppression of spiking responses.Besides,the modulation of spike count correlations by task difficulty was independent of the attended locations.These findings provide evidence that task difficulty affects the functional interactions between different neuronal pools in V1 when selective attention resolves the spatial competition.