Three dimensional reconstruction and measurement of underwater spent fuel assemblies

Zhao Jianping,He Shengbo,Yang Li,Feng Chang,Wu Guoqiang,Cai Gen 한국원자력학회 2023 Nuclear Engineering and Technology Vol.55 No.10

It is an important work to measure the dimensions of underwater spent fuel assemblies in the nuclear power industry during the overhaul, to judging whether the spent fuel assemblies can continue to be used. In this paper, a three dimensional reconstruction method for underwater spent fuel assemblies of nuclear reactor based on linear structured light is proposed, and the topography and size measurement was carried out based on the reconstructed 3D model. Multiple linear structured light sensors are used to obtain contour size data, and the shape data of the whole spent fuel assembly can be collected by onedimensional scanning motion. In this paper, we also presented a corrected model to correct the measurement error introduced by lead-glass and water is corrected. Then, we set up an underwater measurement system for spent fuel assembly based on this method. Finally, an underwater measurement experiment is carried out to verify the 3D reconstruction ability and measurement ability of the system, and the measurement error is less than ±0.05 mm.

Transcriptome sequencing and characterization of Astragalus membranaceus var. mongholicus root reveals key genes involved in flavonoids biosynthesis

Jianping Liang,Wenqian Li,Xiaoyun Jia,Ying Zhang,Jianping Zhao 한국유전학회 2020 Genes & Genomics Vol.42 No.8

Background Astragalus membranaceus (Fisch.) Bge. var. mongholicus (Bge.) Hsiao is a traditional medicinal herb of Leguminosae since it contains bioactive compounds such as flavonoids, which have significant pharmacological effects on immunity and antioxidant. However, the scanty genomic and transcriptome resources of Astragalus membranaceus have hindered further exploration of its biosynthesis and accumulation mechanism. Objective This project aim to further improve our understanding of the relationship between transcriptional behavior and flavonoids content of A. mongholicus. Methods The accumulation of flavonoids and related gene expression in five different developmental stages (A: vegetative, B: florescence, C: fruiting, D: fruit ripening and E: defoliating stages) of A. mongholicus root were studied by combining UV spectrophotometry and transcriptomic techniques. The de novo assembly, annotation and functional evaluation of the contigs were performed with bioinformatics tools. Results After screening and assembling the raw data, there were a total of 158,123 unigenes with an average length of 644.89 bp were finally obtained, which has 8362 unigenes could be jointly annotated by NR, SwissProt, eggNOG, GO, KEGG and Pfam databases. KEGG enrichment analysis was performed on differentially expressed genes(DEGs)in the four groups (A vs. B, B vs. C, C vs. D, D vs. E). The results showed that many DEGs in each group were significantly enriched to flavonoids biosynthesis related pathways. Among them, a number of 86 were involved in the biosynthesis of isoflavonoid (12), flavonoid (5) and phenylpropanoid (69). Further analysis of these DEGs revealed that the expression levels of key genes such as PAL, 4CL, CCR , COMT, DFR, etc. were all down-regulated at the fruiting stage, and then raised at the fruit ripening stage. This expression pattern was similar to the accumulation trend of total flavonoids content. Conclusions In summary, this comprehensive transcriptome dataset allowed the identification of genes associated with flavonoids metabolic pathways. The results laid a foundation for the biosynthesis and regulation of flavonoids. It also provided a scientific basis for the most suitable harvest time and resource utilization of A. mongholicus.

Influences of magnetic field on the removal of submicron particles in electrostatic cyclone at different temperatures

Jianping Zhang,Xiaolei Lu,Dawen Zhao,Pengju Zhang,Jun Hu,Zhiwei Zhang,Baodong Ren 대한환경공학회 2023 Environmental Engineering Research Vol.28 No.4

Aiming at improving the capture performance of inner vortex electrostatic cyclone (ESC), which is widely used in the field of flue gas purification, magnetic field is introduced to remove submicron particles. The theoretical and physical models of electromagnetic dust removal were established, and the dust-removal efficiency of submicron particles under different temperatures and magnetic fields was numerically simulated by FLUENT. The results show that a rise in temperature leads to a reduction in the grade efficiency of submicron particles of ESC, a decrease in the number of escaped particles at lower temperature, and the differences of the rising amplitude in overall efficiency corresponding to the traditional cyclone, which were 36.7%, 34.8%, 33.8%, and 31.9% at four temperatures. The contribution of temperature to the capture of submicron particles decreases continuously with the increasing temperature, but that of magnetic field progressively increases at this time. The magnetic field environment is conducive to the capture of submicron particles, the removal effect is more obvious with the increase of magnetic flux density, but the ascended ranges of magnetic field and temperature both decrease when it reaches 0.5 T. These results can provide a theoretical basis and a technical reference for the design of ESC.

Structural optimization of multistage centrifugal pump via computational fluid dynamics and machine learning method

Zhao Jiantao,Pei Ji,Yuan Jianping,WANGWENJIE 한국CDE학회 2023 Journal of computational design and engineering Vol.10 No.3

To implement energy savings in multistage centrifugal pumps, a return channel is utilized to replace the origin inter-stage flow channel structure, and then a single-objective optimization work containing high-precision numerical simulation, design variable dimensionality reduction, and machine learning is conducted to obtain the optimal geometric parameters. The variable dimensionality reduction process is based on the Spearman correlation analysis method. The influence of 15 design variables of the impeller and return channel is investigated, and seven of them with high-impact factors are selected as the final optimization variables. Thereafter, a genetic algorithm-backpropagation neural network (GA-BPNN) model is used to create a surrogate model with a high-fitting performance by employing a GA to optimize the initial thresholds and weights of a BPNN. Finally, a multi-island genetic algorithm (MIGA) is employed to maximize hydraulic efficiency under the nominal condition. The findings demonstrate that the optimized model’s efficiency is increased by 4.29% at 1.0Qd, and the deterioration of the pump performance under overload conditions is effectively eliminated (the maximum efficiency increase is 14.72% at 1.3Qd). Furthermore, the internal flow analysis indicates that the optimization scheme can improve the turbulence kinetic energy distribution and reduce unstable flow structures in the multistage centrifugal pump.

A missense variant in NCF1 is associated with susceptibility to multiple autoimmune diseases

Zhao, Jian,Ma, Jianyang,Deng, Yun,Kelly, Jennifer A,Kim, Kwangwoo,Bang, So-Young,Lee, Hye-Soon,Li, Quan-Zhen,Wakeland, Edward K,Qiu, Rong,Liu, Mengru,Guo, Jianping,Li, Zhanguo,Tan, Wenfeng,Rasmussen, Nature Pub. Co 2017 Nature genetics Vol.49 No.3

<P>Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a heterogeneous autoimmune disease with a strong genetic component characterized by autoantibody production and a type 1 interferon signatures. Here we report a missense variant (g.74779296G>A; p.Arg90His) in NCF1, encoding the p47phox subunit of the phagocyte NADPH oxidase (NOX2), as the putative underlying causal variant that drives a strong SLE-associated signal detected by the lmmunochip in the GTF2IRD1-GTF2I region at 7q11.23 with a complex genomic structure. We show that the p.Arg90His substitution, which is reported to cause reduced reactive oxygen species (ROS) production(2), predisposes to SLE (odds ratio (OR) = 3.47 in Asians (P-meta = 3.1 x 10(-104)), OR = 2.61 in European Americans, OR = 2.02 in African Americans) and other autoimmune diseases, including primary Sjogren's syndrome (OR = 2.45 in Chinese, OR = 2.35 in European Americans) and rheumatoid arthritis (OR = 1.65 in Koreans). Additionally, decreased and increased copy numbers of NCF1 predispose to and protect against SLE, respectively. Our data highlight the pathogenic role of reduced NOX2-derived ROS levels in autoimmune diseases.</P>

A transcriptional atlas of the silk gland in Antheraea pernyi revealed by IsoSeq

Duan Jianping,Li Shanshan,Zhang Zhengtian,Yao Lunguang,Yang Xinfeng,Ma Sanyuan,Duan Nini,Wang Jiazhen,Zhu Xuwei,Zhao Ping 한국응용곤충학회 2023 Journal of Asia-Pacific Entomology Vol.26 No.2

Silk fibers spun by the silk gland of Antheraea pernyi have many unique properties and are of great value in genetic improvement and non-traditional applications. However, the complete transcriptional landscape and accurate genic annotation of the silk gland are yet to be conducted, which limits related studies on this organ. In this study, isoform sequencing revealed the full-length transcriptome of the A. pernyi silk gland, producing 12,572 high-confidence isoforms from 7,658 genes, among which more than 40 % of genes have not yet been annotated in the reference genome. Moreover, approximately 9 % of isoforms are computationally identified as long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs). Up to 1,492 alternative splicing (AS) and 3,068 alternative polyadenylation (APA) events were revealed within this transcriptome. In addition, 2,569 putative transcription factors (TFs) belonging to 68 different families were first identified in A. pernyi genome, including 871 TFs in silk gland, and some TF families have undergone expansion or contraction. This study significantly improve our knowledge of the genes expressed in the silk gland of A. pernyi and provide a valuable resource for the in-depth study of silk protein synthesis and spinning, genetic improvement, and non-traditional applications in A. pernyi.

The preparation of alginate–AgNPs composite fiber with green approach and its antibacterial activity

Xihui Zhao,Qun Li,Xiaomei Ma,Wanying Liu,Jianping Wang,Yanzhi Xia 한국공업화학회 2015 Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Vol.24 No.-

Antibacterial alginate fibers containing silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) have been prepared in this work. Firstly, AgNPs colloid solution was obtained employing alginate as stabilizing agent and glucose as reducing agent. Then, sodium alginate powder was directly added to the above solution and the resultant sodium alginate–AgNPs spinning dope was spun to prepare alginate–AgNPs composite fibers. The fibers were characterized by scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction and thermal gravimetric analysis (TG). Mechanical properties of the fibers were also measured. The antimicrobial properties were investigated by Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli, and the results indicated that the composite fibers showed strong antibacterial activity.

Transcriptome-based identification of the optimal reference genes as internal controls for quantitative RT-PCR in razor clam (Sinonovacula constricta)

Xuelin Zhao,Jianping Fu,Liting Jiang,Weiwei Zhang,Yina Shao,Chunhua Jin,Jinbo Xiong,Chenghua Li 한국유전학회 2018 Genes & Genomics Vol.40 No.6

Quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) is a standard method to measure gene expression in function exploring. Accurate and reproducible data of qRT-PCR requires appropriate reference genes, which are stably expressed under different experimental conditions. However, no housekeeping genes were validated as internal controls for qRT-PCR in Sinonovacula constricta. In this study, we classified the transcriptome data of two tissues for Vibrio infection and Cd2+ stress into ten clusters based on the gene expression patterns. Among them, cluster 5 had the most stable gene expression patterns regardless of tissues and treatments as the database for candidate reference genes. A total of 55 orthologs of classical housekeeping genes in the clam transcriptome were annotated. Combined the expression profiles and housekeeping genes in S. constricta, we chose eight candidate reference genes and validated their expression in Vibrio-infected samples and different tissues by qRT-PCR. Their expression stability was analyzed by three different algorithms geNorm, NormFinder and BestKeeper. Although the rank of the eight candidate reference genes is different in different treatments using different software, RS9 could be the best reference genes for normalization of qRT-PCR expression data in S. constricta under various treatments considering the above analysis. Meanwhile, the ranking of genes based on the CV values of transcriptomic data was similar to the validation results. This study provides for the first time a list of suitable reference genes for S. constricta and a valuable resource for further studies of clam immune defense systems.

Silencing MR-1 attenuates atherosclerosis in ApoE–/– mice induced by angiotensin II through FAK-Akt –mTOR-NF-kappaB signaling pathway

Yixi Chen,Jianping Cao,Qihui Zhao,Haiyong Luo,Yiguang Wang,Wenjian Dai 대한생리학회-대한약리학회 2018 The Korean Journal of Physiology & Pharmacology Vol.22 No.2

Myofibrillogenesis regulator-1 (MR-1) is a novel protein involved in cellular proliferation, migration, inflammatory reaction and signal transduction. However,little information is available on the relationship between MR-1 expression and the progression of atherosclerosis. Here we report atheroprotective effects of silencing MR-1 in a model of Ang II-accelerated atherosclerosis, characterized by suppression focal adhesion kinase (FAK) and nuclear factor kappaB (NF-κB) signaling pathway,and atherosclerotic lesion macrophage content. In this model, administration of the siRNA-MR-1 substantially attenuated Ang II-accelerated atherosclerosis with stabilization of atherosclerotic plaques and inhibited FAK, Akt, mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) and NF-kB activation, which was associated with suppression of inflammatory factor and atherogenic gene expression in the artery. In vitro studies demonstrated similar changes in Ang II-treated vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) and macrophages: siRNA-MR-1 inhibited the expression levels of proinflammatory factor. These studies uncover crucial proinflammatory mechanisms of Ang II and highlight actions of silencing MR-1 to inhibit Ang II signaling, which is atheroprotective.

Silencing YY1 Alleviates Ox-LDL-Induced Inflammation and Lipid Accumulation in Macrophages through Regulation of PCSK9/ LDLR Signaling

Qian Zhengyao,Zhao Jianping 한국미생물·생명공학회 2022 Journal of microbiology and biotechnology Vol.32 No.11

The formation of macrophage foam cells stimulated by oxidized low-density lipoprotein (ox-LDL) is deemed an important cause of atherosclerosis. Transcription factor Yin Yang 1 (YY1), which is a universally expressed multifunctional protein, is closely related to cell metabolism disorders such as lipid metabolism, sugar metabolism, and bile acid metabolism. However, whether YY1 is involved in macrophage inflammation and lipid accumulation still remains unknown. After mouse macrophage cell line RAW264.7 cells were induced by ox-LDL, YY1 and proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9 (PCSK9) expressions were found to be increased while low-density lipoprotein receptor (LDLR) expression was lowly expressed. Subsequently, through reverse transcription‐quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR), Western blot analysis, Oil Red O staining and cholesterol quantification, it turned out that silencing of YY1 attenuated the inflammatory response and lipid accumulation in RAW264.7 cells caused by ox-LDL. Moreover, results from the JASPAR database, chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) assay, luciferase reporter assay and Western blot analysis suggested that YY1 activated PCSK9 by binding to PCSK9 promoter and modulated the expression of LDLR in the downstream of PCSK9. In addition, the results of functional experiments demonstrated that the inhibitory effects of YY1 interference on ox-LDL-mediated macrophage inflammation and lipid accumulation were reversed by PCSK9 overexpression. To sum up, YY1 depletion inhibited its activation of PCSK9, thereby reducing cellular inflammatory response, cholesterol homeostasis imbalance, and lipid accumulation caused by ox-LDL.