Macleangroth2188

Our feature analysis results showed that feature optimization can help to capture the most discriminative features. As compared to well-known existing feature descriptors, our proposed representations can more accurately separate true 5hmC from non-5hmC sites. To the best of our knowledge, iRNA5hmC is the first RNA 5hmC predictor that enables to make predictions based on RNA primary sequences only, without any need of prior experimental knowledge. Importantly, we have established an easy-to-use webserver which is currently available at http//server.malab.cn/iRNA5hmC. We expect it has potential to be a useful tool for the prediction of 5hmC sites. Copyright © 2020 Liu, Chen, Su, Chen and Wei.Melanoma is a highly aggressive cancer, attracting increasing attention worldwide. The 5-year survival rate of patients with metastatic melanoma is low. Therefore, it is critical to identify potential effective biomarkers for diagnosis of melanoma metastasis. In the present study, the melanoma cohort and immune genes were obtained from the Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database and the ImmPort database, respectively. Then, we constructed the immune risk score (IRS) using univariate and multivariate logistic analysis. The area under the curve (AUC) of IRS in sequencing samples and the initial diagnosis patients was 0.90 and 0.80, respectively. Besides, IRS could add benefits for metastasis diagnosis. For sequencing samples, IRS (OR = 16.35, 95% CI = 8.74-30.59) increased the odds for melanoma metastasis. Similar results were obtained in the initial diagnosis patients (OR = 8.93, 95% CI = 3.53-22.61). A composite nomogram was built based on IRS and clinical information with well-fitted calibration curves. We further used other independent melanoma cohorts from Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) databases to confirm the reliability and validity of the IRS (AUC > 0.75, OR > 1.04, and P value less then 0.01 in all cohorts). In conclusion, IRS is significantly associated with melanoma metastasis and can be a novel effective signature for predicting the metastasis risk. selleck compound Copyright © 2020 Sheng, Yanping, Tong, Ning, Yufeng and Geyu.Among many genes encoding for amino acid dehydrogenase, a novel leucine dehydrogenase gene from Exiguobacterium sibiricum (EsiLeuDH) was isolated by using genome mining strategy. EsiLeuDH was overexpressed in Escherichia coli BL21 (DE3), followed by purification and characterization. The high thermostability of the enzyme confers its half-life up to 14.7 h at 50°C. Furthermore, the substrate specificity shows a broad spectrum, including many L-amino acids and aliphatic α-keto acids, especially some aryl α-keto acids. This enzyme coupled with recombinant formate dehydrogenase (FDH) was used to catalyze trimethylpyruvic acid (TMP) through reductive amination to generate enantiopure L-tert-leucine (L-Tle). In order to overcome the substrate inhibition effect, a fed-batch feeding strategy was adopted to transform up to 0.8 M of TMP to L-Tle, with an average conversion rate of 81% and L-Tle concentration of 65.6 g⋅L-1. This study provides a highly efficient biocatalyst for the synthesis of L-Tle and lays the foundation for large-scale production and application of chiral non-natural amino acids. Copyright © 2020 Luo, Zhu, Zhao, Zhang, Yang, Liu, Rao and Yu.Polymer electrolytes for Li metal batteries (LMBs) should be modified to improve their ionic conductivity and stability against the lithium electrode. In this study, graphene oxide (GO) was modified by ion liquid (IL), and the IL modified GO (GO-IL) had been used as a filler for polyethylene oxide (PEO). The obtained solid polymer electrolyte (SPE) is of high ionic conductivity, low crystallinity and excellent stability against the lithium electrode. The PEO/GO-IL was characterized by various techniques, and its structure and performance were analyzed in detail. By addition of 1% GO-IL, the ionic conductivity of the PEO/GO-IL SPE reaches 1.8 × 10-5 S cm-1 at 25°C, which is 10 times higher than PEO (1.7 × 10-6 S cm-1), and the current density for stable Li plating/stripping in PEO/GO-IL can be increased to 100 μA cm-2 at 60°C. LiFePO4/Li cell (using PEO/GO-IL SPE) tests indicated that the initial discharge capacity can reach ~145 mA h g-1 and capacity retention can maintain 88% even after 100 cycles at a rate of 0.1C and at 60°C. Our creative work could provide a useful method to develop SPEs with excellent performance, thus accelerating the commercial application of LMBs. Copyright © 2020 Hu, Zhang, Liu and Zhu.In Chinese traditional medicine, quercetin (QT) plays a fundamental role in the treatment of asthma, as an anti-allergen and to lower blood pressure. Recent evidence suggests that QT can improve tumor radiosensitivity through multiple mechanisms. However, poor tumor tissue targeting ability and low water solubility of QT limit its usefulness in the treatment of cancers. Herein, we designed a novel drug delivery system (CQM) consisting of inner QT loaded mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNs) and outer cancer cell membranes (CM). The developed nanoplatform had strong anti-cancer effects under X-ray irradiation and good QT loading characteristics. In addition, CQM effectively targeted tumor tissues. Results of in vitro and in vivo experiments demonstrated that the developed CQM drug delivery system has excellent tumor targeting ability and effectively inhibited tumor growth. Therefore, the CQM platform realized targeted drug delivery and radiotherapy sensitization, which provided a newfangled idea of cancer treatment. Copyright © 2020 Huang, Chen, Zhu and Huang.Cell penetrating and targeting peptides (CPPs and CTPs) encompass an important class of biochemically active peptides owning the capabilities of targeting and translocating within selected cell types. As such, they have been widely used in the delivery of imaging and therapeutic agents for the diagnosis and treatment of various diseases, especially in cancer. Despite their potential utility, first generation CTPs and CPPs based on the native peptide sequences are limited by poor biological and pharmacological properties, thereby restricting their efficacy. Therefore, medicinal chemistry approaches have been designed and developed to construct related peptidomimetics. Of specific interest herein, are the design applications which modify the polyamide backbone of lead CTPs and CPPs. These modifications aim to improve the biochemical characteristics of the native peptide sequence in order to enhance its diagnostic and therapeutic capabilities. This review will focus on a selected set of cell penetrating and targeting peptides and their related peptidomimetics whose polyamide backbone has been modified in order to improve their applications in cancer detection and treatment. Copyright © 2020 Shah, Casanova, Antuono and Sabatino.β3-peptides consisting exclusively of β3-amino acids adopt a variety of non-natural helical structures and can self-assemble into well-defined hierarchical structures by axial head-to-tail self-assembly resulting in fibrous materials of varying sizes and shapes. To allow control of fiber morphology, a lipid moiety was introduced within a tri-β3-peptide sequence at each of the three amino acid positions and the N-terminus to gain finer control over the lateral assembly of fibers. Depending on the position of the lipid, the self-assembled structures formed either twisted ribbon-like fibers or distinctive multilaminar nanobelts. The nanobelt structures were comprised of multiple layers of peptide fibrils as revealed by puncturing the surface of the nanobelts with an AFM probe. This stacking phenomenon was completely inhibited through changes in pH, indicating that the layer stacking was mediated by electrostatic interactions. Thus, the present study is the first to show controlled self-assembly of these fibrous structures, which is governed by the location of the acyl chain in combination with the 3-point H-bonding motif. Overall, the results demonstrate that the nanostructures formed by the β3-tripeptide foldamers can be tuned via sequential lipidation of N-acetyl β3-tripeptides which control the lateral interactions between peptide fibrils and provide defined structures with a greater homogeneous population. Copyright © 2020 Habila, Kulkarni, Lee, Al-Garawi, Serpell, Aguilar and Del Borgo.New generation photovoltaic devices have attracted much attention in the last decades since they can be efficiently manufactured employing abundant raw materials and with less-energy intensive processes. In this context, the use of powerful environmental assessment is pivotal to support the fine-tuning of solar cells fabrication and hit the target of manufacturing effective sustainable technological devices. In this work, a mass-based green metrics and life cycle assessment combined approach is applied to analyze the environmental performances of an innovative synthetic protocol for the preparation of organic dye TTZ5, which has been successfully proposed as sensitizer for manufacturing dye sensitized solar cells. The new synthetic strategy, which is based on the C-H activation process, has been compared with the previously reported synthesis employing classic Suzuki-Miyaura cross-coupling chemistry. Results highlight the contribution of direct energy consumption and purification operations in organic syntheses at lab scale. Furthermore, they demonstrate the usefulness of the environmental multifaceted analytic tool and the power of life cycle assessment to overcome the intrinsic less comprehensive nature of green metrics for the evaluation of organic synthetic protocols. Copyright © 2020 Parisi, Dessì, Zani, Maranghi, Mohammadpourasl, Calamante, Mordini, Basosi, Reginato and Sinicropi.Nitrogen-doped porous carbon materials (NPCMs) are usually obtained by carbonization of complicated nitrogen-containing polymers in the presence of template or physical/chemical activation of the as-synthesized carbon materials. Herein we reported the facile synthesis of NPCMs by direct carbonization of a series of furfuryl amine (FA)-based protic salts ([FA][X], X = NTf2, HSO4, H2PO4, CF3SO3, BF4, NO3, Cl) without any templates, tedious synthetic steps and other advanced techniques. The thermal decomposition of precursors and structure, elemental composition, surface atomic configuration, and porosity of carbons have been carefully investigated by thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectra, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), combustion elemental analysis, energy-dispersive spectrometry, and nitrogen isotherm adsorption. Different from the parent amine FA that was evaporated below 130°C and no carbon was finally obtained, it was found that all the prepared protic precursors yield NPCMs. These carbon materials were found to exhibit anion structure- dependent carbon yield, chemical composition, and porous structure. The obtained NPCMs can be further exploited as adsorbents for dye removal and decoloration. Among all NPCMs, [FA][H2PO4]-derived carbon owing to its high surface area and special pore structure exhibits the highest adsorption capacities toward both Methylene blue and Rhodamine B. Copyright © 2020 Zhang, Wang, Shen, Duan and Zhang.