Search Results (8)

Sperm cryopreservation is helpful for maintaining the genetic diversity of fish species. This study was aimed at developing efficient methods to cryopreserve the sperm of three fish species, including koi carp (Cyprinus carpio L.), Ya fish (Schizothorax prenanti), and Glyptosternum maculatum. Firstly, based on the analysis of sperm viability, the cryomedium, dilution ratio, volume, and cooling procedure were assessed and optimized in koi carp. The results showed that the highest sperm viability was up to 63.23 ± 1.36% after a 14-day cryopreservation using the optimal method, briefly, sperm frozen with a volume of 50 μL (Vol.sperm:Vol.cryomedium = 1:9) of cryomedium containing 10% DMSO and 3% sucrose in D17 through ultrarapid cooling. Secondly, both the mitochondrial membrane potential and the DNA fragmentation index of sperm were examined and found to be significantly damaged after the cryopreservation. Intriguingly, the fertilization rate of sperm after 14-day cryopreservation is up to 63.03 ± 1.36% and the elongation of cryopreservation time (210 days) just slightly affected the fertilization rate (55.09 ± 4.70%) in koi carp. Thirdly, the optimal cryopreservation method was applied to cryopreserve Glyptosternum maculatum sperm; the cell viability was 45.39 ± 4.70%. And then this method, after a minor modification (3% sucrose of cryomedium replaced with 3% SMP) was adopted to cryopreserve Ya fish sperm, the cell viability was up to 70.45 ± 2.23%. Lastly, the ultrastructure and morphology of sperm was observed by SEM, and it was found that the cryopreservation prominently caused sperm head swelling and tail shortening in three fish species. In conclusion, this study established effective methods for cryopreserving sperm in three fish species and elaborated the injuries on sperm caused by cryopreservation. And the findings facilitate developing more protocols with practical value to cryopreserve sperm in different fish species. Full article

The emergence of drug resistance among pathogens has become a major challenge to human health on a global scale. Among them, antibiotic resistance is already a critical issue, and finding new therapeutic agents to address this problem is therefore urgent. One of the most promising alternatives to antibiotics are antibacterial peptides (ABPs), i.e., short peptides with antibacterial activity. In this study, we propose a novel ABP recognition method, called ABPCaps. It integrates a convolutional neural network (CNN), a long short-term memory (LSTM), and a new type of neural network named the capsule network. The capsule network can extract critical features automatically from both positive and negative samples, leading to superior performance of ABPCaps over all baseline models built on hand-crafted peptide descriptors. Evaluated on independent test sets, ABPCaps achieves an accuracy of 93.33% and an F1-score of 91.34%, and consistently outperforms the baseline models in other extensive experiments as well. Our study demonstrates that the proposed ABPCaps, built on the capsule network method, is a valuable addition to the current state-of-the-art in the field of ABP recognition and has significant potential for further development. Full article

Salinity is an important ecological factor affecting the osmolality of aquatic animals. Solenaia oleivora is an endemic and economically important freshwater shellfish in China. However, its osmotic response and osmoregulatory mechanisms under high salinity stress are still unclear. In this study, S. oleivora was exposed to saline water (salinity: 2.2‰) for 3 h, 6 h, 12 h, 24 h, and 48 h, and then the changes in osmolality, ion concentrations, free amino acid (FAA) content, Na⁺/K⁺-ATPase (NKA) activity, and gill histology were analyzed. The hemolymph osmolality increased from 3 h after salinity stress and stabilized between 24–48 h. Na⁺ in the hemolymph increased from 24 h after salinity stress, and Cl⁻ increased from 3 h. The content of total FAAs in the hemolymph increased after salinity stress. The content of alanine, glycine, glutamine, proline, and other FAAs increased after salinity stress. NKA activity in the gill, hepatopancreases, adductor muscle, and axe foot decreased during 3–48 h of salinity stress. The gill filament space increased and the number of gill cilia decreased after salinity stress. Principal component analysis (PCA) showed that the first two principal components (PC1 and PC2) cumulatively explained 77.6% of the total variation. The NKA activity was positively associated with PC1, while the ion concentration and most FAAs were negatively associated with PC1. Thus, these results indicated that S. oleivora is an osmoconformer, and inorganic ions, FAA, NKA, and gill structure changes play an important role in its osmoregulation. Full article

A pseudorabies virus (PRV) novel virulent variant outbreak occurred in China in 2011. However, little is known about PRV prevention and treatment. Huaier polysaccharide has been used to treat some solid cancers, although its antiviral activity has not been reported. Our study confirmed that the polysaccharide can effectively inhibit infection of PRV XJ5 in PK15 cells. It acted in a dose-dependent manner when blocking virus adsorption and entry into PK15 cells. Moreover, it suppressed PRV replication in PK15 cells. In addition, the results suggest that Huaier polysaccharide plays a role in treating PRV XJ5 infection by directly inactivating PRV XJ5. In conclusion, Huaier polysaccharide might be a novel therapeutic agent for preventing and controlling PRV infection. Full article

Porcine pseudorabies (PR) is an important infectious disease caused by pseudorabies virus (PRV), which poses a major threat to food safety and security. Vaccine immunization has become the main means to prevent and control the disease. However, since 2011, a new PRV variant has caused huge economic losses to the Chinese pig industry. Panax notoginseng polysaccharides have immunomodulatory activity and other functions, but the antiviral effect has not been reported. We studied the anti-PRV activity of Panax notoginseng polysaccharides in vitro. A less cytopathic effect was observed by increasing the concentration of Panax notoginseng polysaccharides. Western blot, TCID₅₀, plaque assay, and IFA revealed that Panax notoginseng polysaccharides could significantly inhibit the infectivity of PRV XJ5 on PK15 cells. In addition, we also found that Panax notoginseng polysaccharides blocked the adsorption and replication of PRV to PK15 cells in a dose-dependent manner. These results show that Panax notoginseng polysaccharides play an antiviral effect mainly by inhibiting virus adsorption and replication in vitro. Therefore, Panax notoginseng polysaccharides may be a potential anti-PRV agent. Full article

In order to explore the optimal cultivar × sowing date × plant density for summer maize (Zea mays L.) in the Northern Huang–Huai–Hai (HHH) Plain of China, field experiments were conducted over two consecutive years (2018–2019) on a loam soil in the Northern HHH Plain. A split–split plot design was employed in this study, and the main plots included three cultivars (HM1: early-maturing cultivar; ZD958: medium-maturing cultivar; DH605: late-maturing cultivar); subplots consisted of three sowing dates (SD1: June 10; SD2: June 17; SD3: June 24); sub-sub plots include two plant densities (PD1: 6.75 × 10⁴ plants ha⁻¹; PD2: 8.25 × 10⁴ plants ha⁻¹). The results showed that the effects of cultivar and plant density on grain yield of summer maize were not significant, and the sowing date was the major factor affecting the grain yield. Delayed sowing significantly decreased the grain yield of summer maize, this was due mainly to the reduced kernel weight, which is associated with the lower post-anthesis dry matter accumulation. Moreover, radiation use efficiency (RUE), temperature use efficiency (TUE), and water use efficiency (WUE) were significantly affected by cultivar, sowing date, and plant density. Selecting early- and medium-maturing cultivars was beneficial to the improvements in RUE and TUE, and plants grown at earlier sowing with higher plant density increased the RUE and TUE. The interactive analysis of cultivar × sowing date × plant density showed that the optimum grain yields of all tested cultivars were observed at SD1-PD2, and the optimum RUE and TUE for HM1, ZD958, and DH605 were observed at SD1-PD2, SD2-PD2, and SD2-PD2, respectively. The differences in the optimum grain yield, RUE, and TUE among the tested cultivars were not significant. These results suggested that plants grown at earlier sowing with reasonable dense planting had benefits of grain yield and resource use efficiency. In order to adapt to mechanized grain harvesting, early-maturing cultivar with lower grain moisture at harvest would be the better choice. Therefore, adopting early-maturing cultivars grown with earlier sowing with reasonably higher plant density would be the optimal planting pattern for summer maize production in the Northern HHH Plain of China in future. Full article

Interactions between particles and bubbles have been cornerstone for the successful applications of froth flotation to the beneficiations of minerals or coal. Particle-bubble interactions are highly physio-chemical processes on the basis of surface science and hydrodynamics. Though these two aspects are deeply interwoven, we focus on the discussions of the effects of turbulence on the interactions between particles and bubbles, i.e., collision, attachment and detachment. It has to be mentioned this effect is not working in one direction and can affect flotation performance in a complicated way. Only when turbulence effects are well understood, flotation processes can be optimised by suitably changing equipment structure or operating parameters. The aim of this paper is to review the most recent progresses in this aspect and to identify the future development in successfully considering turbulence effects on flotation processes. Full article

Impaired tissue perfusion underlies many chronic disease states and aging. Diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) is a noninvasive MRI technique that has been widely used to characterize tissue perfusion. Parametric models based on DWI measurements can characterize microvascular perfusion modulated by functional and microstructural alterations in the skeletal muscle. The intravoxel incoherent motion (IVIM) model uses a biexponential form to quantify the incoherent motion of water molecules in the microvasculature at low b-values of DWI measurements. The fractional Fickian diffusion (FFD) model is a parsimonious representation of anomalous superdiffusion that uses the stretched exponential form and can be used to quantify the microvascular volume of skeletal muscle. Both models are established measures of perfusion based on DWI, and the prognostic value of model parameters for identifying pathophysiological processes has been studied. Although the mathematical properties of individual models have been previously reported, quantitative connections between IVIM and FFD models have not been examined. This work provides a mathematical framework for obtaining a direct, one-way transformation of the parameters of the stretched exponential model to those of the biexponential model. Numerical simulations are implemented, and the results corroborate analytical results. Additionally, analysis of in vivo DWI measurements in skeletal muscle using both biexponential and stretched exponential models is shown and compared with analytical and numerical models. These results demonstrate the difficulty of model selection based on goodness of fit to experimental data. This analysis provides a framework for better interpreting and harmonizing perfusion parameters from experimental results using these two different models. Full article