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A rationalized molecular and genomic coupled strategy to get a snapshot of the tuberculosis transmission in Madrid
Comparative regulomics of wood formation across dicot and conifer trees
Abstract Understanding the regulatory program underlying wood formation is key to improving biomass production and carbon sequestration in trees. However, how wood formation evolved and how these programs have been rewired across lineages remains unclear. Here, we present the first high-spatial-resolution evo-devo resource for wood transcriptomes spanning multiple dicots and conifers, representing the two major tree-containing lineages separated by more than 300 million years of evolution. Using orthology-aware co-expression network analysis, we identified genes with conserved and lineage-specific expression patterns. By integrating chromatin accessibility data and transcription factor motif analysis, we further inferred candidate regulatory networks for xylem differentiation and secondary cell wall formation. We demonstrate how this dataset can be used to answer long standing questions in wood biology related to differences in acetylation of cell wall polymers and master regulators of xylem specification across dicot and conifer tree species. The data offer a resource for the tree biology and evo-devo communities, and are publicly available at PlantGenIE.org.
Lipoprotein and inflammatory glycoprotein profiles in women with polycystic ovary syndrome alone or in association with type 1 diabetes
Zinc-phosphorus nanodomains with dynamic coordination for electrochemical CO2 reduction
Thermal behavior of single energy pile in saline soil environments
Structural insights enable drug discovery for the neuronal NBCn2 carbonate transporter
Abstract NBCn2 (SLC4A10), a member of the SLC4 solute carrier (SLC) family, is a sodium-dependent (bi)carbonate transporter that regulates acid extrusion in various brain regions. Mutations in NBCn2 cause severe neurodevelopmental disorders in humans, and knock out studies suggest that its role in regulating neuronal excitability could hold therapeutic potential for seizure disorders such as epilepsy. Despite its physiological importance, NBCn2’s molecular mechanisms remain largely unknown, and there is limited availability of tool compounds to further probe its role in health and disease. Combining cryoEM with computational docking and simulation studies, we herein elucidate NBCn2’s molecular architecture and substrate binding mechanisms on the atomic scale. Via structure-based drug discovery we further identify a compound series that inhibits NBCn2-mediated transport, and characterize its inhibitory mechanisms via cryoEM. Lastly, we showcase the potential of this compound series to template useful probes by demonstrating pharmacological activity both in primary culture as well as brain slices.
Green synthesis of zirconium oxide nanoparticles using Azadirachta indica leaves extract for multifunctional biomedical applications
Distinct Filament Conformation for Receptor-Bound Amyloid-β from Alzheimer’s Disease Brain
Pre-incision versus pre-closure intravenous tegileridine for analgesia after laparoscopic cholecystectomy: a randomized, double-blind, three-arm trial
Minute-scale red phosphorescence in carbon nanodots
SpikeMicroNet: neuromorphic visual sensing for energy-efficient optical microrobot pose and depth estimation under microscopy
Abstract Optical microrobots actuated by optical tweezers (OT) are an emerging tool for cell-level manipulation, micro-assembly, and targeted biomedical interventions, but their closed-loop control depends on perception subsystems that must run in real time within tight power budgets. Existing perception pipelines on optical-microscopy data rely on dense artificial neural networks that consume several to tens of millijoules per inference, which is incompatible with embedded controllers driving the optical hardware. This paper proposes SpikeMicroNet , a directly trained, defocus-aware spiking neural network for single-frame optical microrobot perception. The proposed model integrates a Phase-Coded Defocus Encoder (PCDE) that converts a static microscopy frame into a temporally structured spike train, an Adaptive-Threshold Leaky Integrate-and-Fire (AT-LIF) neuron that maintains stable firing rates across heterogeneous microrobot geometries, and a Defocus-Aware Spiking Self-Attention (DASSA) block whose attention map is conditioned on the temporal phase of the encoder. The performance of the proposed method is benchmarked on the OpTical MicroRobot dataset against seven ANN and SNN baselines under a subject independent evaluation protocol. SpikeMicroNet attains $$95.1\%$$ top-1 accuracy on pose classification and a depth mean absolute error of $$1.78\,\mu$$ m while reducing the estimated model-side compute energy by up to $$28.4\times$$ relative to the strongest dense vision transformer baseline. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first spiking neural network designed and benchmarked for optical microrobot perception.
Multicellular architectures for high-rate solar evaporation with spatial salt crystallization under high-salinity
Abstract Solar-driven evaporation offers decentralized freshwater production and brine management, yet remains limited by inefficient water transport, thermal losses and salt fouling arising from insufficient understanding of geometry–transport–performance relationships. Here, 3D-printed multicellular solar evaporators with systematically varied lattice unit cells are developed to clarify these relationships, identifying liquid–solid contact perimeter, porosity and thermal interface area as key geometric parameters governing capillary water delivery and heat transfer. Guided by these, an optimized FBCC-+_5 evaporator achieves a high evaporation rate of 6.90 kg m −2 h −1 and sustains zero-liquid-discharge operation. A hybrid multicellular architecture combining high- and low-evaporation-rate unit cells further generates controlled evaporation gradients, thereby localizing salt crystallization, enabling stable operation for 5.5 days with 97.49% salt recovery under 20 wt% NaCl. Outdoor desalination yields up to 47.7 kg m −2 day −1 of freshwater. This work establishes unit-cell and macro-scale geometry as programmable design parameters for scalable and durable solar desalination.
Random Forest Detection of charcoal driven vegetation loss in Ghana’s Afram Plains
Docking of virtual libraries identifies small-molecule agonists of neurotensin receptors with analgesic activity
Abstract Peptide-activated G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) play crucial roles in numerous diseases, but remain difficult therapeutic targets due to the challenges in developing small-molecule drugs. Here, we explore structure-based strategies to identify small-molecule agonists of neurotensin (NTS) receptors, which hold promise for developing non-opioid analgesics. Chemical libraries of drug-like molecules are first designed based on a receptor-peptide complex, and then 14.5 million compounds are computationally docked to the orthosteric binding site of the NTS 1 receptor. A set of 39 top-ranked compounds is synthesized, and seven of these are experimentally confirmed to activate the NTS 1 receptor. Structure-guided optimization yields NTS 1 ligands with signaling signatures distinct from the endogenous peptide, and these compounds also exhibit high affinity for the NTS 2 receptor. High-resolution crystal structures of two agonists bound to the NTS 1 receptor confirm predicted binding modes and reveal key determinants of activation. In vivo, the compounds produce robust antinociception in rodents without inducing hypotension, consistent with a contribution of NTS 2 receptor activity. To facilitate broader application of our virtual screening approach to peptide-binding GPCRs, we provide access to tailored chemical libraries containing billions of readily synthesizable compounds.
Study on structural design and stress simulation of carbon fiber composite Type IV hydrogen storage cylinder
Spinal nociceptive denervation impedes subsequent chronic autonomic remodeling after myocardial infarction in male swine
Abstract After chronic myocardial infarction (MI), pathological autonomic remodeling, including vagal dysfunction and sympathoexcitation, predisposes to ventricular arrhythmias (VT/VF). However, what underlies this functional and structural remodeling remains unknown. We hypothesized that spinal nociceptive afferent signaling initiates and perpetuates these pathological autonomic changes. We employed cervicothoracic epidural resiniferatoxin (RTX) to ablate spinal nociceptive neurons in male pigs before MI, and assessed autonomic and electrophysiological function four-to-six weeks post-infarction. Compared to vehicle-treated infarcted animals, epidural RTX attenuated the loss of vagal tone and baroreflex sensitivity, reduced spinal cord inflammation, glial activation, and circulating stress and inflammatory markers, and stabilized electrophysiological parameters, lowering VT/VF inducibility. In a separate cohort, acute C7–T1 nociceptive afferent ablation after chronic MI acutely restored vagal function and decreased VT/VF inducibility. This study demonstrates that cervicothoracic spinal nociceptive afferents significantly contribute to MI-induced autonomic remodeling and VT/VF, providing novel insight into the mechanisms underlying sympathovagal imbalance after MI.
A modified asperity model for bolted joint interfaces based on cubic polynomial interpolation
A global molecular code for birth order and neuronal identity in Drosophila
Abstract The assembly of functional neural circuits relies on the generation of diverse neural types with precise molecular identity and connectivity. Unlocking general principles of neuronal specification and wiring across the nervous system requires a systematic and high-resolution characterization of its diversity, recently enabled by advances in single-cell transcriptomics and connectomics. However, linking the molecular identity of neurons to circuit architecture remains a key challenge. Here we present a high-resolution developmental transcriptional atlas for the Drosophila melanogaster nerve cord, the central hub for sensory–motor circuits. With a considerable 38× aggregate coverage relative to its reference connectome 1,2 , our atlas captures extensive molecular diversity and enables robust alignment to the adult connectome. We identified three developmental principles underlying neuronal diversity in the nerve cord. First, the timing of neurogenesis shapes diversification of molecular identity: embryonic-born neurons diverge faster than larval-born neurons, as also observed in the adult connectome. Second, 17 transcription factors common to neurons from all lineages provide a global molecular identity code for birth order. Lastly, by mapping sex-specific transcriptional profiles to the connectome, we identified female-specific apoptosis and transcriptional divergence as key global drivers of sex specification. By revealing key organizational axes of molecular identity, this atlas opens avenues to dissect the molecular mechanisms underpinning the development and evolution of neural circuits.