ALBERT

Beschreibung: Considering a nonregenerative untrusted relay network, we investigate three different secure transmission strategies, for example, noncooperative strategy, conventional amplify-and-forward (AF) strategy, and cooperative jamming (CJ) strategy. To thoroughly assess the secrecy performance achieved by the three strategies, we derive the closed-form expressions for the connection outage probability and secrecy outage probability regarding each strategy. Based on these expressions, the reliability and security tradeoff (RST) is examined to facilitate the design of the transmitting parameters. We then present the closed-form expression for the effective secrecy throughput (EST) and characterize the overall efficiency of these transmission strategies. Furthermore, we conduct the asymptotic analysis for the secrecy throughput, which enables us to determine the optimal transmission strategy under different scenarios. Our analytical and numerical results demonstrate that compared with the noncooperative and AF strategies, the CJ strategy possesses the best performance in terms of RST. Additionally, we also find that the EST performance of the AF strategy is nearly invariable when the quality of the second hop changes.

Beschreibung: Novel synthesized 2, 4-DAPG analogues: antifungal activity, mechanism and toxicology Scientific Reports, Published online: 26 August 2016; doi:10.1038/srep32266

Beschreibung: Background: The analyses of protein synthesis, accumulation and regulation during grain development in wheat are more complex because of its larger genome size compared to model plants such as Arabidopsis and rice. In this study, grains from two wheat cultivars Jimai 20 and Zhoumai 16 with different gluten quality properties were harvested at five development stages, and were used to displayed variable expression patterns of grain proteins. Results: Proteome characterization during grain development in Chinese bread wheat cultivars Jimai 20 and Zhoumai 16 with different quality properties was investigated by 2-DE and tandem MALDI-TOF/TOF-MS. Identification of 117 differentially accumulated protein spots representing 82 unique proteins and five main expression patterns enabled a chronological description of wheat grain formation. Significant proteome expression differences between the two cultivars were found; these included 14 protein spots that accumulated in both cultivars but with different patterns and 27 cultivar-different spots. Among the cultivar-different protein spots, 14 accumulated in higher abundance in Jimai 20 than in Zhoumai 16, and included NAD-dependent isocitrate dehydrogenase, triticin precursor, LMW-s glutenin subunit and replication factor C-like protein. These proteins are likely to be associated with superior gluten quality. In addition, some proteins such as class II chitinase and peroxidase 1 with isoforms in developing grains were shown to be phosphorylated by Pro-Q Diamond staining and phosphorprotein site prediction. Phosphorylation could have important roles in wheat grain development. qRT-PCR analysis demonstrated that transcriptional and translational expression patterns of many genes were significantly different. Conclusions: Wheat grain proteins displayed variable expression patterns at different developmental stages and a considerable number of protein spots showed differential accumulation between two cultivars. Differences in seed storage proteins were considered to be related to different quality performance of the flour from these wheat cultivars. Some proteins with isoforms were phosphorylated, and this may reflect their importance in grain development. Our results provide new insights into proteome characterization during grain development in different wheat genotypes.

Beschreibung: Background: The endoplasmic reticulum chaperone binding protein (BiP) is an important functional protein, which is involved in protein synthesis, folding assembly, and secretion. In order to study the role of BiP in the process of wheat seed development, we cloned three BiP homologous cDNA sequences in bread wheat (Triticum aestivum), completed by rapid amplification of cDNA ends (RACE), and examined the expression of wheat BiP in wheat tissues, particularly the relationship between BiP expression and the subunit types of HMW-GS using near-isogenic lines (NILs) of HMW-GS silencing, and under abiotic stress. Results: Sequence analysis demonstrated that all BiPs contained three highly conserved domains present in plants, animals, and microorganisms, indicating their evolutionary conservation among different biological species. Quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) revealed that TaBiP (Triticum aestivum BiP) expression was not organ-specific, but was predominantly localized to seed endosperm. Furthermore, immunolocalization confirmed that TaBiP was primarily located within the protein bodies (PBs) in wheat endosperm. Three TaBiP genes exhibited significantly down-regulated expression following high molecular weight-glutenin subunit (HMW-GS) silencing. Drought stress induced significantly up-regulated expression of TaBiPs in wheat roots, leaves, and developing grains. Conclusions: The high conservation of BiP sequences suggests that BiP plays the same role, or has common mechanisms, in the folding and assembly of nascent polypeptides and protein synthesis across species. The expression of TaBiPs in different wheat tissue and under abiotic stress indicated that TaBiP is most abundant in tissues with high secretory activity and with high proportions of cells undergoing division, and that the expression level of BiP is associated with the subunit types of HMW-GS and synthesis. The expression of TaBiPs is developmentally regulated during seed development and early seedling growth, and under various abiotic stresses.

Beschreibung: Influenza A (H1N1) continues to be a major public health threat due to possible emergence of a more virulent H1N1 strain resulting from dynamic changes in virus adaptability consequent to functional mutations and antigenic drift in the hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) surface proteins. In this study, we describe the genetic and evolutionary characteristics of H1N1 strains that circulated in India over a period of nine years from 2009 to 2017 in relation to global strains. The finding is important from a global perspective since previous phylogenetic studies have suggested that the tropics contributed substantially to the global circulation of influenza viruses. Bayesian phylogenic analysis of HA sequences along with global strains indicated that there is a temporal pattern of H1N1 evolution and clustering of Indian isolates with globally circulating strains. Interestingly, we observed four new amino acid substitutions (S179N, I233T, S181T and I312V) in the HA sequence of H1N1 strains isolated during 2017 and two (S181T and I312V) were found to be unique in Indian isolates. Structurally these two unique mutations could lead to altered glycan specificity of the HA gene. Similarly, sequence and structural analysis of NA domain revealed that the presence of K432E mutation in H1N1 strains isolated after 2015 from India and in global strains found to induce a major loop shift in the vicinity of the catalytic site. The findings presented here offer an insight as to how these acquired mutations could be associated to an improved adaptability of the virus for efficient human transmissibility.

Beschreibung: Atmospheric fine particulate matter (PM2.5) pollutions are of particular concern because of their direct and indirect harm to humans and organisms. China has suffered from severe air pollution for the past ten years, related to heavy pollution emissions and compounded by the effects of atmospheric circulation. This study applied statistical methods, observational data of ground pollutants, and meteorological data to analyze the impact of large-scale atmospheric circulations on PM2.5 pollution over China. Empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis was used to evaluate the main PM2.5 patterns and total contributions of the leading four EOFs. The results indicate that the total contributions of the leading four EOFs accounted for 50.5% of the total variance, reflecting four main types of PM2.5 pollution, namely, overall pollution phase, north–south phase, east–west phase and north–center–south phase, with contributions of 28.4%, 9.7%, 6.5% and 5.9%, respectively. We selected indices of the Asian Polar Vortex (APV) to analyze the impact of large-scale atmospheric circulations on PM2.5 pollution over China. The most pronounced APV control occurred in Beijing and its surroundings, specifically, along the Bohai Sea and the Northeast Plain.