Neurological and Epigenetic Implications of Nutritional Deficiencies on Psychopathology: Conceptualization and Review of Evidence

In recent years, a role for epigenetic modifications in the pathophysiology of disease has received significant attention. Many studies are now beginning to explore the gene–environment interactions, which may mediate early-life exposure to risk factors, such as nutritional deficiencies and later development of behavioral problems in children and adults. In this paper, we review the current literature on the role of epigenetics in the development of psychopathology, with a specific focus on the potential for epigenetic modifications to link nutrition and brain development. We propose a conceptual framework whereby epigenetic modifications (e.g., DNA methylation) mediate the link between micro- and macro-nutrient deficiency early in life and brain dysfunction (e.g., structural aberration, neurotransmitter perturbation), which has been linked to development of behavior problems later on in life.     

Unrelated toxin–antitoxin systems cooperate to induce persistence

Persisters are drug-tolerant bacteria that account for the majority of bacterial infections. They are not mutants, rather, they are slow-growing cells in an otherwise normally growing population. It is known that the frequency of persisters in a population is correlated with the number of toxin–antitoxin systems in the organism. Our previous work provided a mechanistic link between the two by showing how multiple toxin–antitoxin systems, which are present in nearly all bacteria, can cooperate to induce bistable toxin concentrations that result in a heterogeneous population of slow- and fast-growing cells. As such, the slow-growing persisters are a bet-hedging subpopulation maintained under normal conditions. For technical reasons, the model assumed that the kinetic parameters of the various toxin–antitoxin systems in the cell are identical, but experimental data indicate that they differ, sometimes dramatically. Thus, a critical question remains: whether toxin–antitoxin systems from the diverse families, often found together in a cell, with significantly different kinetics, can cooperate in a similar manner. Here, we characterize the interaction of toxin–antitoxin systems from many families that are unrelated and kinetically diverse, and identify the essential determinant for their cooperation. The generic architecture of toxin–antitoxin systems provides the potential for bistability, and our results show that even when they do not exhibit bistability alone, unrelated systems can be coupled by the growth rate to create a strongly bistable, hysteretic switch between normal (fast-growing) and persistent (slow-growing) states. Different combinations of kinetic parameters can produce similar toxic switching thresholds, and the proximity of the thresholds is the primary determinant of bistability. Stochastic fluctuations can spontaneously switch all of the toxin–antitoxin systems in a cell at once. The spontaneous switch creates a heterogeneous population of growing and non-growing cells, typical of persisters, that exist under normal conditions, rather than only as an induced response. The frequency of persisters in the population can be tuned for a particular environmental niche by mixing and matching unrelated systems via mutation, horizontal gene transfer and selection.     

载人航天器环热控一体化仿真分析

采用系统建模及仿真方法搭建了一种典型载人航天器环热控一体化系统模型，分析了系统的性能。针对3人7天载人飞行工况开展了仿真分析，结果表明，经过合理设计，该系统可将舱内温湿度、压力、氧分压等参数控制在航天医学指标要求范围内。环热控系统仿真结果较好地预测了系统工作过程，显示了主要参数的变化情况，结果合理，验证了仿真方法、系统仿真模型的正确性。通过控制流体回路外回路旁通阀门开度，可准确控制外回路控温点温度，保证舱内温湿度在合理范围之内。此外，外回路控温点的设定会对环热控系统状态带来影响，通过合理设计外回路控温点，可保证舱内温湿度满足航天医学指标要求。     

Does visibility matter? – A simple nudge reduces the purchase of sugar sweetened beverages in canteen drink coolers

Obesity is a growing public health problem and the increased prevalence calls for preventive measures. Choice architecture and dual brain process thinking has been suggested as a promising strategy. One of the behaviors that are of significant public health nutrition concern is the intake of sugar sweetened beverages (SSB’s) of young people. An intervention was developed for 4 canteens for students (age 16–23) of vocational schools. We slightly re-arranged the location of SSB’s in drink coolers by reducing visibility. The canteen managers collected data on sales volumes of beverages in combination over a period of 3 weeks and the data collection was supplemented with interviews and observations. The results showed that the intervention was able to reduce the purchasing of SSB in three of the four canteens. In one of the canteens where the cooler was behind the cafeteria desk there were little difference. It is assumed to be due to the fact that the students could not see the cooler while standing in line. The results suggests that rethinking of the canteen interior and physical food environment has the potential to affect purchasing of SSB.     

Cooperative path planning with priority target assignment and collision avoidance guidance for rescue unmanned surface vehicles in a complex ocean environment

In this paper, a novel cooperative path planning scheme of unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) for rescuing targets in a complex ocean environment is proposed. The primary objective of the rescue USVs is to bring all targets back safely on the premise of first rescuing priority targets, while optimizing the path length, the navigation time and the angular energy. The main contributions of this paper are as follows: (1) The proposed K-means-division (KMD) algorithm is able to identify a complex ocean environment with collision-free zone and static-obstacles zone; (2) The proposed path planning method with fast-marching-method-based ellipse guidance range (E-FMM) is able to optimize the angular energy while ensuring safety; (3) The proposed cooperative management system (including priority-target-assignment (PTA) with reward-mechanism genetic-optimization (RM-GO) and collision-avoidance (CA) guidance law with Tangent-based surge-varying wave-disturbances-observer (Tangent-SV-WDO)) can accomplish the mission of the rescue USVs. Comparative studies with the state-of-the-art methods demonstrate that the proposed cooperative path planning scheme is superior in terms of priority-target-assignment (PTA) and collision-avoidance (CA) of the actual rescue work.     

Motion trajectory prediction model of hydrogen leak and diffusion in a stable thermally-stratified environment

The motion trajectory of hydrogen leakage is an essential safe issue for the application of hydrogen energy. A dimensionless fast-running motion trajectory prediction model is proposed to predict the dispersion characteristics of the buoyant jet of hydrogen leakage for the accident. The impact of different leakage angles, leakage velocity and thermal stratification of ambient air on hydrogen leakage behavior was analyzed. The new developed model was verified by experimental results in literatures. Leakage hydrogen can flow upwards freely in a uniform environment. However, it shows an oscillating trajectory at a certain height in a thermally stratified environment, which is so called “locking phenomenon”. The trajectory of hydrogen leakage is upward and hydrogen gathers at the top of the space to form stratification in a uniform environment, while the hydrogen leakage shows an oscillating trajectory at a certain height in a thermal stratification environment. With the increase of Froude number Fr, it shows that the stable height and maximum height of the leakage airflow have a trend of rising first and then falling in a thermally stratified environment. The findings are expected to give guidance in real-world situations, for example, a larger Fr value and a larger temperature gradient can lead to a decrease in the stable height in the thermally stratified environment. It is found that the fitting of the stable height with different temperature gradients satisfies the power function relationship. This work is expected to be helpful for reducing hydrogen leakage accumulation and explosion risk.     

茅台镇酱香型白酒酿造环境中真菌菌群多样性分析

采用高通量测序技术结合数理统计软件分析方法，系统研究茅台镇酱香型白酒不同酿造轮次生产环境中的真菌菌群结构及特征。7 个轮次中共检测到4 个真菌门、212 个真菌属。根据各菌门、属的相对丰度，子囊菌门（Ascomycota）和担子菌门（Basidiomycota）是茅台镇酱香型白酒酿造环节中各酿造轮次的优势菌门，节担菌属（Wallemia）、复膜孢酵母属（Saccharomycopsis）为各轮次绝对优势真菌属。不同轮次环境样品中真菌组成结构的相似度较高，但其各轮次标志性真菌属存在差异。7 个酿造轮次共有相同真菌属56 个，在各轮次占主导地位，特征性真菌属在各轮次当中相对丰度和占比较小但种类丰富。Ascomycota最强节点为德巴利酵母属（Debaryomyces），Basidiomycota最强节点为红酵母属（Rhodotorula）。本研究揭示了茅台镇酱香型白酒不同酿造轮次环境中真菌菌群结构及其特征，为深入研究酱香型白酒酿造机理以及对酿造环境中微生物结构的解析提供了参考依据。     

Associations between indoor environment in residential buildings in wet and dry seasons and health of students in upper northern Thailand

We performed a repeated questionnaire study on home environment and health (six medical symptoms) in 1159 junior high school students (age 12.8 ± 0.7 years) in upper northern Thailand in wet and dry seasons. Data on outdoor temperature, relative humidity (RH), and air pollution were collected from nearest monitoring station. Odds ratios (OR) were calculated by multi-level logistic regression. Most common symptoms were rhinitis (62.5%), headache (49.8%), throat (42.8%), and ocular symptoms (42.5%). Ocular symptoms were more common at lower RH and rhinitis more common in dry season. Water leakage (28.2%), indoor mold (7.1%), mold odor (4.1%), and windowpane condensation (13.6%) were associated with all six symptoms (ORs: 1.3–3.5). Other risk factors included cat keeping, environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), other odor than mold odor, gas cooking, and cooking with biomass fire. Biomass burning inside and outside the home for other reasons than cooking was associated with all six symptoms (ORs: 1.5–2.6). Associations between home environment exposure and rhinitis were stronger in wet season. In conclusion, dampness-related exposure, windowpane condensation, cat keeping, ETS, gas cooking, and biomass burning can impair adolescent health in upper northern Thailand. In subtropical areas, environmental health effects should be investigated in wet and dry seasons.     

生物滴滤床法降解二氯甲烷废气的因素影响特征

二氯甲烷作为溶剂广泛应用于制药行业，其挥发性废气对人类健康和大气环境的危害极大。本文采用生物滴滤床对某制药厂浓度范围在0.02~2g/m³的二氯甲烷废气进行了为期132天的中试规模实验。在适宜的停留时间、温度、喷淋量和pH等实验条件下，控制适当的进气浓度可得到高效去除效率并且废气出口浓度达标。实验揭示了生物膜内生物降解是过程的限制因素，结果表明，在喷淋量为1200L/h、进气浓度范围为0.45~0.65g/m³时该生物系统去除效率最高可达98.9%，最大去除负荷可达EC_max=155.25g/(m³·h)。随着进气浓度的增加，去除负荷随之增大，而去除效率下降，废气出口浓度超标，表明生物滴滤系统已处于反应控制。此外，间歇实验表明，该生物系统具有良好的稳定性。指出生物滴滤床的设计、运行取决于当地的二氯甲烷废气排放标准。     

基于洪泽湖(泗洪片区)国考断面超标的入湖河流污染来源影响权重分析

为明确洪泽湖(泗洪片区)国考断面水质超标的污染来源,界定各行政区对洪泽湖的影响权重,建立洪泽湖水环境数学模型,模拟不同风向影响下洪泽湖的TN、TP浓度场,分析各主要入湖河流对洪泽湖的影响权重。根据各入湖河流内外源污染物量,利用污染影响权重计算方法,分析不同行政区对洪泽湖(泗洪片区)国考断面污染权重。计算结果表明,龙集镇北断面的污染来源受徐州市影响最大,占50%左右;成河乡断面污染来源受泗洪县、徐州市的影响较大,均占30%左右;对临淮乡断面影响最大的是泗洪县内部的污染,占40%左右。