The root of Salvia miltiorrhiza is a traditional Chinese medicinal plant used as an important drug to cure cardiovascular diseases. Reseacch on the technology of induction, identification and chemical analysis of polypoid plants is reported. The obtained results indicated that basal MS media plus 10 ppm colchicine can induce polyploid mutants effectively. Tetraploid plants were transferred to the fields so that comparative experiment for fu~her identification, observation and screening of 15 agronomic characteristics could be made. The major chemical compounds, tanshinones, in two tetraploid plants were higher than that in the control. An excellent plant 61-2-22 may develop into a new variety for large scale production.

A rapid and effective method of integrating extraction and purification for alkaloids from Sophora flavescens Ait. was developed by microwave-assisted aqueous two-phase extraction (MAATPE) based on the high efficiency of microwave-assisted extraction (MAE) and the demixing effect of aqueous two-phase extraction (ATPE). The aqueous two-phase system (ATPS), ethanol/ammonia sulfate was chosen from seven combinations of ethanol/salt systems, and its extraction properties were investigated in detail. Key factors, namely, the compositions of ATPS, solvent-to-materials ratio, and the extraction temperature were selected for optimization of the experimental conditions using response surface methodology (RSM) on the basis of the results of the single-factor experiment. The final optimized conditions were, the compositions of ATPS: ethanol 28% (w/w) and (NH 4 ) 2 SO 4 18% (w/w), solvent-to-material ratio 60:1, temperature 90°C, extraction time 5 min, and microwave power 780 W. MAATPE was superior to MAE, the latter using a single solvent, not only in extraction yield but also in impurity content. Moreover, compared with the combination of MAE and ATPE in the two-step mode, MAATP demonstrated fewer impurities, a better yield (63.78 ± 0.45 mg/g) and a higher recovery (92.09 ± 0.14%) in the extraction and purification of alkaloids. A continuous multiphase-extraction model of MAATPE was proposed to explicate the extraction mechanism. MAATPE revealed that the interaction between microwave and ATPS cannot only cause plant cell rupture but also accelerate demixing, improving mass-transfer from solid-liquid extraction to liquidliquid purification. MAATPE simplified procedures also contributed to the lower loss occurrence, better extraction efficiency, and reduced impurity to target constituents.

We report here on the results of a procedure for the determination of amphetamine drugs in hair. The procedure is simple and sensitive. The results from the procedure using small-volume extraction matches perfectly with those either from using the derivatization method or selected ion monitoring (SIM) detection. We validated our method using four different amine drugs, including amphetamine, methamphetamine, methylenedioxy-amphetamine and methylenedioxy-methamphetamine. The detection limit for these drugs is about 50 +/- 7.5 pg/mg in hair and the intra-day and inter-day reproducibility are within 15% at most drug concentrations. Moreover, we also showed the utility of the procedure in analyses of authentic hair samples taken from amphetamine abusers, and demonstrated that the method meets the requirement for the analysis of a trace amounts of amphetamines in human hair.

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Separation of potential field data forms the basis of inversion and interpretation. The low-rank matrix theory is used for the separation of potential field data. A theoretical analysis led to the approximate equation that demonstrates the relation between the amplitudes of the wavenumber components of potential field data and the singular values of the trajectory matrix embedded from the potential field data matrix. Therefore, the low-rank feature of the trajectory matrix of regional field data and the sparse feature of the trajectory matrix of residual field data can be obtained based on the features of the power spectrum of the potential field data. Based on this, we have developed a low-rank matrix decomposition model for the separation of the trajectory matrix of the potential field data. Minimizing the rank of the trajectory matrix of the regional field data and the [Formula: see text]-norm of the trajectory matrix of the residual field data is a double-objective optimization task, and this optimization task can be solved by the inexact augmented Lagrange multiplier algorithm. The weighting parameter is robust and easy to set. Numerical experiment results indicate that our method is robust, and the separation errors of the method are smaller compared to the matched filtering and wavelet analysis methods. In addition, our method can be easily implemented and has clear geophysical significance. Finally, our method is applied on real data sets in the Daye area, Hubei Province, China. The separated gravity and magnetic fields coincide well with target geologic sources.

Five Lycopodium alkaloids featuring novel C 17 N 2 (1 and 2), C 29 N 3 (3 and 4), and C 15 N 2 (5) skeletons were isolated from Lycopodium japonicum. Compound 1 is the first natural product containing a 3-aza[3.3.3]propellane motif. The structures of these compounds were elucidated by spectroscopic analysis, Xray crystallography, and computational methods. Compounds 1 and 3−5 significantly inhibited TGF-β 1 -induced fibronectin deposition in HK-2 cells at a nontoxic concentration of 20 μM.

BackgroundPorcine circovirus type 2 (PCV2) is associated with post-weaning multi-systemic wasting syndrome (PMWS) in young weaned pigs. Immune stimulation was found to activate the replication of PCV2 and exacerbate the clinical outcome of the infection. Proper amount of interferon-α (IFN-α) is able to enhance PCV2 infection and production in Porcine kidney-15 (PK-15) cells when administered after inoculation.MethodsIn the present study, luciferase reporter assays, construction of mutant viruses, Analysis the replication efficiency and the response to IFN-α treatment in PK-15 cells and animal experiments were carried out to analyze the function of interferon-stimulated response element (ISRE) of PCV2 and its role during viral replication in vitro and in vivo.ResultsA functional viral ISRE sequence, 5′-CTGAAAACGAAAGA-3′, was identified in Rep gene promoter (Prep) of PCV2. PCV2 Prep is composed of two mini promoters, the proximal one span the sequence +1 to -106, containing an ISRE while the distal mini promoter is composed of three tandem GC box like sites locate at -85 to -194. It was demonstrated that viral ISRE is necessary for porcine IFN-α initiated luciferase expression enhancement and it plays an important role in affecting the replication efficiency of PCV2 in vivo and in vitro.ConclusionsThese findings provide a theoretical basis for the Phenomenon of immunostimulation is able to enhance PCV2 infection, and improve the understanding of the complicated mechanisms involved in the host and pathogen interactions of PCV2.

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