Global prevalence of Plasmodium infection in wild birds: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Avian malaria is a vector-borne parasitic disease caused by Plasmodium infection transmitted to birds by mosquitoes. The aim of this systematic review was to analyze the global prevalence of malaria and risk factors associated with infection in wild birds. A systematic search of the databases CNKI, WanFang, VIP, PubMed, and ScienceDirect was performed from database inception to 24 February 2023. The search identified 3181 retrieved articles, of which 52 articles met predetermined inclusion criteria. Meta-analysis was performed using the random-effects model. The estimated pooled global prevalence of Plasmodium infection in wild birds was 16%. Sub-group analysis showed that the highest prevalence was associated with adult birds, migrant birds, North America, tropical rainforest climate, birds captured by mist nets, detection of infection by microscopy, medium quality studies, and studies published after 2016. Our study highlights the need for more understanding of Plasmodium prevalence in wild birds and identifying risk factors associated with infection to inform future infection control measures.

miR-361-5p suppresses lung cancer cell lines progression by targeting FOXM1

Lung cancer is the most common type of cancer and the leading cause of death in worldwide. MicroRNAs are known to be key players in a variety of biological processes, including tumorigenesis. In present study, we investigated the effect of miR-361-5p on lung cancer progression. We found that miR-361-5p was down-regulated in lung cancer. Overexpression of miR-361-5p suppressed lung cancer proliferation and invasion. Mechanistically, FOXM1 was identified as a direct target of miR-361-5p. Furthermore, miR-361-5p inhibits EMT-like phenotype through down-regulation of FOXM1 expression in lung cancer cells. In conclusion, our results indicated that miR-361-5p acts as a tumor suppressor in lung cancer.

Construction, implementation and testing of an image identification system using computer vision methods for fruit flies with economic importance (Diptera: Tephritidae)

BACKGROUND

Many species of Tephritidae are damaging to fruit, which might negatively impact international fruit trade. Automatic or semi-automatic identification of fruit flies are greatly needed for diagnosing causes of damage and quarantine protocols for economically relevant insects.

RESULTS

A fruit fly image identification system named AFIS1.0 has been developed using 74 species belonging to six genera, which include the majority of pests in the Tephritidae. The system combines automated image identification and manual verification, balancing operability and accuracy. AFIS1.0 integrates image analysis and expert system into a content-based image retrieval framework. In the the automatic identification module, AFIS1.0 gives candidate identification results. Afterwards users can do manual selection based on comparing unidentified images with a subset of images corresponding to the automatic identification result. The system uses Gabor surface features in automated identification and yielded an overall classification success rate of 87% to the species level by Independent Multi-part Image Automatic Identification Test.

CONCLUSION

The system is useful for users with or without specific expertise on Tephritidae in the task of rapid and effective identification of fruit flies. It makes the application of computer vision technology to fruit fly recognition much closer to production level. © 2016 Society of Chemical Industry.

[Determination of titanium dioxide in the air of workplace by inductivehy coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry]

Objective: To establish the method for determination of titanium dioxide in the air of workplace by inductivehy coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES) . Methods: The titanium dioxide was collected by filter membrane and then digested by microwave digestion apparatus in the mixed solvents (HNO(3)∶HF∶H(2)O=4∶1∶1) , dilutedto 25 ml and detected by ICP-OES. Results: The sampling efficiency was higher than 95%; the linearity of ICP-OES was good at the range of 10-500 μg/ml, the minimum quantitation concentration was 0.72 mg/m(3) (as collecting 150 L air sample) , the maximum quantitation concentration was 21.7 mg/m(3) (as collecting 960 L air sample) , the recovery was ranged from 99.0%-102.0%, the RSD of intra- and inter-batch precision were 0.5%-3.2% and 1.7%-3.5%, respectively. Conclusion: The sampling method and determination method meet the requirements of guide for establishing occupational health standards-part 4: determinatin methods of air chemicals in workplace (GBZ/T 210.4-2008) , and areapplys to the collection and determination of TiO(2) in the air of workplace.

G501C polymorphism of the oxidized LDL receptor gene is associated with albuminuria in Chinese essential hypertension patients

Albuminuria is an independent predictor of renal and cardiovascular complications in hypertensive subjects. We previously showed that lectin-like oxidized low density lipoprotein receptor 1 (OLR-1) polymorphisms at G501C are associated with susceptibility to essential hypertension and serum C-reactive protein levels. We have now investigated a possible association between OLR-1 polymorphisms at G501C, genotyped by PCR-RFLP, and severity of albuminuria in 307 hypertensive Chinese subjects and 225 age- and sex-matched controls. Urine albumin concentration /urine creatinine concentrations (ACR) were measured to evaluate the severity of albuminuria. Hypertensive subjects had a significantly higher frequency of the CC genotype and the C allele of the OLR-1 polymorphism than controls; this was also true for . hypertensive subjects with macroalbuinuria and microalbuminuria compared to those with normoalbuminuria. The mean ACR levels and mean serum C-reactive protein levels in CC carriers were significantly higher than in GG and GC carriers. There was a significant, positive correlation between serum hs-C-reactive protein levels and ACR levels. We conclude that OLR-1 polymorphisms at G501C affect the severity of albuminuria in essential hypertension patients.

Algebraic Description of Anharmonic Stretching Vibrations

A U(2) algebraic model is presented to describe stretching vibrations of XYn (n = 2, 3, and 4) systems, where anharmonic interactions between the bond modes are considered. This model in a limit corresponds to an anharmonically coupled local-mode model. As an example, the model for a molecule XY4 is applied to recently observed spectra of methane in both gas and liquid phases, and the results obtained are in good agreement with the experiments. Copyright 1999 Academic Press.