A Golden2-like transcription factor, BnGLK1a, improves chloroplast development, photosynthesis, and seed weight in rapeseed

Enhancing photosynthetic efficiency is a major goal for improving crop yields under agricultural field conditions and is associated with chloroplast biosynthesis and development.In this study,we demonstrate that Golden2-like 1a(BnGLK1a)plays an important role in regulating chloroplast development and photosynthetic efficiency.Overexpressing BnGLK1a resulted in significant increases in chlorophyll content,the number of thylakoid membrane layers and photosynthetic efficiency in Brassica napus,while knocking down BnGLK1a transcript levels through RNA interference(RNAi)had the opposite effects.A yeast two-hybrid screen revealed that BnGLK1a interacts with the abscisic acid receptor PYRABACTIN RESISTANCE 1-LIKE 1-2(BnPYL1-2)and CONSTITUTIVE PHOTOMORPHOGENIC 9 SIGNALOSOME 5A subunit(BnCSN5A),which play essential roles in regulating chloroplast development and photosynthesis.Consistent with this,BnGLK1a-RNAi lines of B.napus display hypersensitivity to the abscisic acid(ABA)response.Importantly,overexpression of BnGLK1a resulted in a 10%increase in thousand-seed weight,whereas seeds from BnGLK1a-RNAi lines were 16%lighter than wild type.We propose that BnGLK1a could be a potential target in breeding for improving rapeseed productivity.Our results not only provide insights into the mechanisms of BnGLK1a function,but also offer a potential approach for improving the productivity of Brassica species.

Energy-saving design and optimization of pressure-swing-assisted ternary heterogenous azeotropic distillations

A huge amount of energy is always consumed to separate the ternary azeotropic mixtures by distillations.The heterogeneous azeotropic distillation and the pressure-swing distillation are two kinds of effective technologies to separate heterogeneous azeotropes without entrainer addition.To give better play to the synergistic energy-saving effect of these two processes,a novel pressure-swing-assisted ternary heterogeneous azeotropic distillation(THAD)process is proposed firstly.In this process,the ternary heterogeneous azeotrope is decanted into two liquid phases before being refluxed into the azeotropic distillation column to avoid the aqueous phase remixing,and three columns'pressures are modified to decrease the flowrates of the recycle streams.Then the dividing wall column and heat integration technologies are introduced to further reduce its energy consumption,and the pressureswing-assisted ternary heterogeneous azeotropic dividing-wall column and its heat integration structure are achieved.A genetic algorithm procedure is used to optimize the proposed processes.The design results show that the proposed processes have higher energy efficiencies and lower CO_(2)emissions than the published THAD process.

Two types of cinnamoyl-Co A reductase function divergently in accumulation of lignins,flavonoids and glucosinolates and enhance lodging resistance in Brassica napus

Brassica crops,which are of worldwide importance,provide various oil,vegetable and ornamental products,as well as feedstocks for animal husbandry and biofuel industry.Cinnamoyl-Co A reductase(CCR)is the entry point to the lignin pathway and a crucial locus in manipulation of associated traits,but CCRassociated metabolism and traits in Brassica crops have remained largely unstudied except in Arabidopsis thaliana.We report the identification of 16 CCR genes from Brassica napus and its parental species B.rapa and B.oleracea.The Bn CCR1 and Bn CCR2 subfamilies displayed divergent organ-specificity and participation in the yellow-seed trait.Their functions were dissected via overexpression of representative paralogs in B.napus.Bn CCR1 was expressed preferentially in G-and H-lignin biosynthesis and vascular development,while Bn CCR2 was expressed in S-lignin biosynthesis and interfascicular fiber development.Bn CCR1 showed stronger effects on lignification-related development,lodging resistance,phenylpropanoid flux control,and seed coat pigmentation,whereas Bn CCR2 showed a stronger effect on sinapate biosynthesis.Bn CCR1 upregulation delayed bolting and flowering time,while Bn CCR2 upregulation weakened the leaf vascular system in consequence of suppressed G-lignin accumulation.Bn CCR1 and Bn CCR2 were closely but almost oppositely linked with glucosinolate metabolism via inter-pathway crosstalk.We conclude that Bn CCR1 and Bn CCR2 subfamilies offer great but differing potential for manipulating traits associated with phenylpropanoids and glucosinolates.This study reveals the CCR1–CCR2 divergence in Brassicaceae and offers a resource for rapeseed breeding for lodging resistance,yellowseed traits,and glucosinolate traits.

Selective conversion of methanol to propylene over highly dealuminated mordenite:Al location and crystal morphology effects

The growing consumption of light olefins has stimulated intensive researches on methanol to olefin(MTO)process which possesses great advantages for coal conversion to value‐added chemicals in an environmentally benign way.The catalysts commonly used for MTO process faces several challenges such as poor selectivity control,low hydrothermal stability and short lifetime.In the present study,we prepared a series of mordenite zeolites with variable Al contents(Si/Al molar ratios of 51−436)by a sequential dealumination treatment of air‐calcination and acid leaching.The textural properties,acidity and Al location before and after the dealumination treatment have been systematically studied and their effect on MTO especially the methanol to propylene(MTP)performance was thoroughly investigated.The mordenite zeolites with the Si/Al ratios over 150 selectively catalyzed methanol conversion in the MTP pathway,providing a high propylene selectivity of 63%and propylene/ethylene ratio of>10.Compared to the low‐silica MOR catalysts,highly dealuminated MOR showed much higher stability and longer lifetime,which can be further enhanced via harsh hydrothermal pretreatment.Furthermore,the lifetime was highly related to the crystal size along c‐axis.The excellent performance of highly dealuminated MOR is likely ascribed to the mesopores formed upon dealumination and the scarce Al sites located in the T sites shared by the 8‐member ring(MR)side pockets and 12‐MR pore channels.

Development of a target capture sequencing SNP genotyping platform for genetic analysis and genomic breeding in rapeseed

Rapeseed(Brassica napus)is an oil crop grown worldwide,making it a key plant species in molecular breeding research.However,the complexity of its polyploid genome increases sequencing costs and reduces sequencing accuracy.Target capture coupled with high-throughput sequencing is an efficient approach for detecting genetic variation at genomic regions or loci of interest.In this study,588 resequenced accessions of rapeseed were used to develop a target capture sequencing SNP genotyping platform named BnaPan50T.The platform comprised 54,765,with 54,058 resequenced markers from the pan-genome,and 855 variant trait-associated markers for 12 agronomic traits.The capture quality of BnaPan50T was demonstrated well in 12 typical accessions.Compared with a conventional genotyping array,BnaPan50T has a high SNP density and a high proportion of SNPs in unique physical positions and in annotated functional genes,promising wide application.Target capture sequencing and wholegenome resequencing in 90 doubled-haploid lines yielded 60%specificity,78%uniformity within tenfold coverage range,and 93%genotyping accuracy for the platform.BnaPan50T was used to construct a genetic map for quantitative trait loci(QTL)mapping,identify 21 unique QTL,and predict several candidate genes for yield-related traits in multiple environments.A set of 132 core SNP loci was selected from BnaPan50T to construct DNA fingerprints and germplasm identification resources.This study provides genomics resources to support target capture sequencing,genetic analysis and genomic breeding of rapeseed.

Realization of T_(e0)>10 keV long pulse operation over 100 s on EAST

In 2021,EAST realized a steady-state long pulse with a duration over 100 s and a core electron temperature over 10 keV.This is an integrated operation that resolves several key issues,including active control of wall conditioning,long-lasting fully noninductive current and divertor heat/particle flux.The fully noninductive current is driven by pure radio frequency(RF)waves with a lower hybrid current drive power of 2.5 MW and electron cyclotron resonance heating of 1.4 MW.This is an excellent experimental platform on the timescale of hundreds of seconds for studying multiscale instabilities,electron-dominant transport and particle recycling(plasma-wall interactions)under weak collisionality.

BnbHLH92a negatively regulates anthocyanin and proanthocyanidin biosynthesis in Brassica napus

Yellow seed trait is a desirable characteristic with potential for increasing seed quality and commercial value in rapeseed,and anthocyanin and proanthocyanidins(PAs)are major seed-coat pigments.Few transcription factors involved in the regulation of anthocyanin and PAs biosynthesis have been characterized in rapeseed.In this study,we identified a transcription factor gene BnbHLH92a(BnaA06T0441000ZS)in rapeseed.Overexpressing BnbHLH92a both in Arabidopsis and in rapeseed reduced levels of anthocyanin and PAs.Correspondingly,the expression profiles of anthocyanin and PA biosynthesis genes(TT3,BAN,TT8,TT18,and TTG1)were shown by quantitative real-time PCR to be inhibited in BnbHLH92a-overexpressing Arabidopsis seeds,indicating that BnbHLH92a represses the anthocyanin and PA biosynthesis pathway in Arabidopsis.BnbHLH92a physically interacts with the BnTTG1 protein and represses the biosynthesis of anthocyanins and PAs in rapeseed.BnbHLH92a also binds directly to the BnTT18 promoter and represses its expression.These results suggest that BnbHLH92a is a novel upstream regulator of flavonoid biosynthesis in B.napus.

Combining chlorination and sulfuration strategies for high-performance all-small-molecule organic solar cells

Three small-molecule donors based on dithieno [2,3-d:2’,3 ’-d’]-benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b’] dithiophene(DTBDT)unit were designed and synthesized by side chain regulation with chlorinated or/and sulfurated substitutions(namely ZR1,ZR1-Cl,and ZR1-S-Cl respectively),along with a crystalline non-fullerene acceptor IDIC-4 Cl with a chlorinated 1,1-dicyanomethylene-3-indanone(IC) end group.Energy levels,molar extinction coefficients and crystallinities of three donor molecules can be effectively altered by combining chlorination and sulfuration strategies.Especially,the ZR1-S-Cl exhibited the best absorption ability,lowest higher occupied molecular orbital(HOMO) energy level and highest crystallinity among three donors,resulting in the corresponding all-small-molecule organic solar cells to produce a high power conversion efficiency(PCE) of 12.05% with IDIC-4 Cl as an acceptor.

The correlation and relationship of obesity and cancer: a possible research perspective

Recently, obesity is a well-recognized risk factor of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. There is more and more sufficient evidence that excess body weight is an avoidable cause of excess cancers including gastrointestinal, endometrial, esophageal adenocarcinoma, colorectal, postmenopausal breast, prostate, and renal cancers. The mechanism that obesity association with cancer is remains not well understood. There be some most studied hypothesized mechanisms such as, high levels of insulin and free levels of insulin-like growth factors （IGFs）, sex hormones, adipocytokines, intlammatory cytokines, c-Myc （or Myc） oncogenic transcription factor, obesity-induced hypoxia and Warburg effect, and so on. In the future, the potential mechanisms and conclusions in obesity associated with increased risk for developing cancer, and the underlying cellular and molecular mechanisms will be studied.

Investigation of system structure and information processing mechanism for cognitive skywave over-the-horizon radar

Based on the cognitive radar concept and the basic connotation of cognitive skywave over-the-horizon radar（SWOTHR）, the system structure and information processingmechanism about cognitive SWOTHR are researched. Amongthem, the hybrid network system architecture which is thedistributed configuration combining with the centralized cognition and its soft/hardware framework with the sense-detectionintegration are proposed, and the information processing framebased on the lens principle and its information processing flowwith receive-transmit joint adaption are designed, which buildand parse the work law for cognition and its self feedback adjustment with the lens focus model and five stages informationprocessing sequence. After that, the system simulation andthe performance analysis and comparison are provided, whichinitially proves the rationality and advantages of the proposedideas. Finally, four important development ideas of futureSWOTHR toward ＂high frequency intelligence information processing system＂ are discussed, which are scene information fusion, dynamic reconfigurable system, hierarchical and modulardesign, and sustainable development. Then the conclusion thatthe cognitive SWOTHR can cause the performance improvement is gotten.

Genome-wide association study identifies novel loci and candidate genes for drought stress tolerance in rapeseed

Rapeseed(Brassica napus)is one of the most important oil crops worldwide;however,drought seriously curtails its growth and productivity.Identifying drought-tolerant germplasm is an efficient strategy for addressing water shortages.Here,we phenotyped a panel of 264 B.napus accessions at full-bloom stage using water loss ratio(WLR)as drought-tolerant index.It identified 8 low-WLR and 6 high-WLR accessions,regarded as droughttolerant and drought-sensitive,respectively.Comparing with drought-sensitive accessions at the seedling stage,drought-tolerant accessions had shown better performance in maintaining fresh and dry weights,and performed the higher expression of drought-induced marker genes under drought stress.Subsequently,a total of 139 SNPs(single nucleotide polymorphisms)were identified associated with the WLR using a genome-wide association study(GWAS)among 264 B.napus accessions,with the largest number SNPs at chromosome A10,and 13 SNPs significantly were associated with the WLR(-log_(10)(p-value)>6).Furthermore,4 putative candidate genes(BnaC09.RPS6,BnaC09.MATE,BnaA10.PPD5 and BnaC09.Histone)were screened involving in drought tolerance in B.napus.Together,our results highlight the WLR's importance in drought tolerance and establish the foundation for improving WLR-associated drought tolerance in rapeseed.

Estimation of Building’s Life Cycle Carbon Emissions Based on Life Cycle Assessment and Building Information Modeling: A Case Study of a Hospital Building in China

Throughout the life cycle, the buildings emit a great deal of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, which directly leads to aggravation in the greenhouse effect and becomes a severe threat to the environment and humans. Researchers have made numerous efforts to accurately calculate emissions to reduce the life cycle carbon emissions of residential buildings. Nevertheless, there are still difficulties in quickly estimating carbon emissions in the design stage without specific data. To fill this gap, the study, based on Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Building Information Modeling (BIM), proposed a quick method for estimating Building’s Life Cycle Carbon Emissions (BLCCE). Taking a hospital building in Chuzhou City, Anhui Province, China as an example, it tested its possibility to estimate BLCCE. The results manifested that: 1) the BLCCE of the project is 40,083.56 tCO2-eq, and the carbon emissions per square meter per year are 119.91 kgCO2-eq/(m2·y);2) the stage of construction, operational and demolition account for 7.90%, 91.31%, and 0.79% of BLCCE, respectively;3) the annual carbon emissions per square meter of hospital are apparently higher than that of villa, residence, and office building, due to larger service population, longer daily operation time, and stricter patient comfort requirements. Considering the lack of BLCCE research in Chinese hospitals, this case study will provide a valuable reference for the estimated BLCCE of hospital building.

Oligomeric donor with appropriate crystallinity for organic solar cells

Improving the performance of all-small-molecule organic solar cells(ASM-OSCs)largely depends on the design and application of novel donors with appropriate crystallinity.Extending molecular conjugation is an effective method for regulating molecular stacking and crystallinity.In this work,we successfully designed and synthesized two novel acceptor-donor-donor-donor-acceptor(A-D-D-D-A)type oligomeric donors with three dithieno[2,3-d:2′,3′-d′]benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b']dithiophene(DTBDT)as the central unit,named as 3DTBDT-Cl and 3DTBDT,depending on with and without chlorine substitution on the thiophene side chains.We found that the introduction of chlorine atoms makes the blend films display stronger crystallinity but with large-scale phase separation morphology and more defects,which eventually leads to a power conversion efficiency(PCE)of only 10.83%,whereas the blend films based 3DTBDT with appropriate crystallinity achieved 13.74%PCE.Compared with 3DTBDT-Cl/L8-BO,the 3DTBDT/L8-BO films exhibited a nanoscale bi-continuous interpenetrating network morphology with a smaller domain size and more suitable crystallinity,which guarantees the corresponding devices obtained more efficient exciton dissociation,efficient charge transport,reduced bimolecular recombination,and performed more balanced carrier mobility.These results demonstrated that regulating the crystallinity of oligomeric donors to obtain the desired phase separation morphology in the blend films could facilitate further improving the performance of ASM-OSCs.

Rapid oxidation of black phosphorus induced by copper ions via promoting oxygen bonding and phosphate desorption

Black phosphorus(BP)has garnered significant interest in the field of biomedicine because of its exceptional degradability.The oxidation product of BP phosphate has been utilized in numerous studies for the purpose of repairing bone defects and inducing apoptosis and autophagy in cancer cells.Nevertheless,this process has drawbacks in terms of low yield and a slow rate of phosphate production.In this study,we found that the oxidation rate of BP was increased 120-fold and the yield proportion of phosphate BP product was increased from 30%to 85%with the presence of less than 0.1%copper ions(Cu^(2+))in the reaction system.The enhancement was attributed to the fact that the presence of Cu^(2+)promoted the bonding of oxygen on the BP surface and then the desorption of phosphate molecules from the BP surface.This study offers a novel perspective on the process of BP oxidation and introduces innovative concepts for the development of biological drug delivery systems capable of rapid decomposition.

Genome-wide identi?cation of loci affecting seed glucosinolate contents in Brassica napus L.

Glucosinolates are amino acid-derived secondary metabolites that act as chemical defense agents against pests.However,the presence of high levels of glucosinolates severely diminishes the nutritional value of seed meals made from rapeseed(Brassica napus L.).To identify the loci affecting seed glucosinolate cont ent(SGC),we con ducted genome-wide resequencing in a population of 307 diverse B.napus accessions from the three B.napus ecotype groups,namely,spring,winter,and semi-winter.These resequencing data were used for a genome-wide association study(GWAS)to identify the loci affecting SGC.In the three ecotype groups,four comm on and four ecotype-specific haplotype blocks(HBs)were significantly associated with SGC.To identify candidate genes controlling SGC,transcriptome analysis was carried out in 36 accessions showing extreme SGC values.Analyses of haplotypes,genomic variation,and candidate gene expression pointed to five and three candidate genes in the common and spring group-specific HBs,respectively.Our expression analyses dem on strated that additive effects of the three candidate genes in the spring group-specific HB play important roles in the SGC of B.napus.

Fluorination-substitution effect on all-small-molecule organic solar cells

Due to the strong crystallinity and anisotropy of small molecules, matched molecular photoelectric properties and morphologies between small molecules and non-fullerene acceptors are especially important in all-small-molecule organic solar cells(OSCs).Introducing fluorine atoms has been proved as an effective strategy to achieve a high device performance through tuning molecular energy levels, absorption and assembly properties. Herein, we designed a novel benzodithiophene-based small molecule donor BDTF-CA with deep highest occupied molecular orbital(HOMO) energy level. All-small-molecule OSCs were fabricated by combing non-fullerene acceptor IDIC with different fluorine-atom numbers. Two or four fluorine atoms were introduced to the end-capped acceptor of IDIC, which are named as IDIC-2 F and IDIC-4 F, respectively. With the increase of fluorination from IDIC to IDIC-4 F, the open circuit voltage(Voc) of the devices decreased, while hole and electron mobilities of the active layers increased by one order of magnitude. Contributed to the most balanced Voc, short-circuit current(Jsc) and fill factor(FF), the device based on BDTF-CA/IDIC-2 F achieved the highest power conversion efficiency of 9.11%.

Naphthodithiophene-based donor materials for solution processed organic solar cells

As an emerging donor building block,naphthodithiophene（NDT） is causing more concerns in the field of organic semiconductors.With the rigid and coplanar molecule structure,NDT will exhibit more application space relying on its own advantage for facilitating the charge carrier transport.In this review article,we have summarized the development progress on the NDT-based donor materials for solution processed organic solar cells.Discussions and comments on those representative NDT type materials about structure and property are also presented.

D-A structural protean small molecule donor materials for solution-processed organic solar cells

Under the synergistic effect of molecular design and devices engineering, small molecular organic solar cells have presented an unstoppable tendency for rapid development with putting forward donor- acceptor （D-A） structures. Up to now, the highest power conversion efficiency of small molecules has exceeded 11%, comparable to that of polymers. In this review, we summarize the high performance small molecule donors in various classes of typical donor-acceptor （D-A） structures and discuss their relationships briefly.

高开路电压与低能量损失有机太阳能电池研究进展

有机太阳能电池(organic solar cells,OSCs)是光伏发电和能源功能材料的重要组成部分,因其制作简单、材料来源广泛、轻量化、柔性好等突出优势成为电池材料领域研究的热点.然而,与无机/钙钛矿太阳能电池相比,有机太阳能电池存在较大的电压损失(即能量损失),限制了效率的进一步提升.目前实验室报道最高效率远低于肖克利-奎伊瑟(Shockley-Queisser)理论所定义的极限效率.因此,最大化降低有机太阳能电池的电压损失,是进一步提升电池器件效率的关键.针对上述问题,国家纳米科学中心的相关科研人员做出了很多努力,在高开路电压、低能量损失的有机太阳能电池分子设计、理论计算以及新型器件结构等方面做了非常出色的工作.本文综述了近年来的相关研究进展,希望为有机太阳能电池相关领域的研究者提供借鉴并对有机太阳能电池的发展起到促进作用.

Halogenated thiophene substitutions on quinoxaline unit to achieve morphology optimization in efficient organic solar cells

Halogenated thiophenes are generally used units for constructing organic semiconductor materials for photovoltaic applications.Here,we introduced thiophene,2-bromothiophene,and 2-chlorothiophene units to the central core of quinoxaline-based acceptors and obtained three acceptors,Qx-H,Qx-Br,and Qx-Cl,respectively.Compared with Qx-H,Qx-Br and Qx-Cl showed enhanced absorption,down-shifted energy levels,improved crystallinity,and reduced energy disorder.The improved crystallinity significantly optimized the blend morphology,leading to efficient charge generation and transport and,therefore,less bimolecular recombination.Eventually,PM6:Qx-Br-based devices exhibited an outstanding power conversion efficiency of 17.42%with a high open-circuit voltage(VOC)of 0.915 V.Furthermore,Y6 was introduced into the PM6:Qx-Br binary system to improve the light utilization,and the resulting ternary devices delivered a high PCE of 18.36%.This study demonstrated the great potential of halogenated thiophene substitution in quinoxaline-based acceptors for building high-performance organic solar cell acceptor materials.