Abortion Categories and Characteristics of Acarpous Crape Myrtle Floral Organs

Lagerstroemia indica (crape myrtle) is a popular Chinese landscape plant with a long flowering period that contributes to its gorgeous flowers and high ornamental value, which motivate L. indica breeding. We found a wild acarpous individual of L. indica that did not bear seeds after flowering and had a significantly longer flowering period than fructiferous L. indica. This study identified differences in floral organ morphology, and stamen and pistil structure between fructiferous and acarpous L. indica through observation, paraffin sectioning, and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The flowering time of each acarpous L. indica inflorescence lasts as long as 18 to 25 days. When a single flower withers, it falls from the pedicel without any fruit. The abortion in the floral organ of acarpous L. indica is characterized by sterile and undehisced anthers, pollen abortion, and deformed and irregularly arranged filament cells. Acarpous L. indica features short and loosely arranged papilla cells in the stigma, a flat style and narrow stylar canal, loosely arranged epidermal cells, and no obvious nuclei. No embryo sac cavity is found in acarpous L. indica ovules. In some nucelli, the egg apparatus structure can be observed indistinctly but without cell contour. In others, the egg apparatus structure is completely absent, and only flocculent tissue is observed. This study may provide a theoretical foundation for future studies on the molecular mechanisms of the mutations in acarpous L. indica.

PO-020 Aerobic Exercise Attenuates Myocardial Injury Through Activation of SIRT1 Signaling in T2DM Rats

Objective Myocardial injury caused by elevated blood glucose is a major risk factor for type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) cardiomyopathy. Aerobic exercise can significantly improve the energy metabolism and is widely used in clinic to prevent and cure T2DM and other metabolic diseases. Myocardial injury can be attenuated after aerobic exercise. Some researches showed SIRT1 is a histone deacetylation enzyme activated by NAD+/NADH, and mainly distributes in the heart, liver, etc. SIRT1 plays an important role in controlling the insulin secretion, which can regulate glucose and lipid metabolism and some other important biological functions. It is not known whether the myocardial injury was reduced by regulating the level of SIRT1 after aerobic exercise. The purpose of the research was to illustrate the regulatory mechanism of decreased myocardial injury after aerobic exercise, and provided theoretical basis for early prevention and treatment of T2DM myocardial injury. Methods There were two stages in the experiment. At the first stage, 30 male SD rats,12-month old, were randomly divided into two groups, the control group (CC, fed with standard diet and kept sedentary, 8 rats), the high-sugar-lipid fodder for T2DM model Group (DC, kept sedentary, 22 rats). High sugar and high fat diet formula for 10% lard, 20% sucrose, egg yolk powder 8%, 0.1% sodium deoxycholate, 61.9% basic feed, AIN-93g, provided by animal experimental center of Hebei Province. After 5-week high-sugar-lipid fodder, the DC rats were injected streptozocin (STZ, 35mg/kg), the FBG of the tail vein were measured after 12h, and FBG≥7.0mmol/L was defined as T2DM model. Six rats were excluded because of low FBG (<7.0mmol/L). At the second stage, all of the rats were fed with standard diet. The T2DM rats were randomly assigned to the T2DM group (DC, kept sedentary, 8 rats) and T2DM combined with aerobic exercise, (DE, run on treadmill at 15m/min～19m/min, 45min/d, slope 5%, 6d/w, 5W, 8 rats). The myocardial tissue sections were stained with hematoxylin and eosin (HE) to observe the histological changes. The level of serum insulin was examined by ELISA kits. The content of serum glucose, the activity of SOD and the content of MDA in heart were examined by reagent kits after 5 weeks. The expression of SIRT1 protein in heart were measured using Western blot. ELISA kits were used for the determination of the NAD+/NADH ratio. Results (1) The myocardial sections of CC can be observed clear cell contour, bright color, arranged closely and neatly, and nuclear distribution in cells border and nuclei of uniform size. In DC myocardial sections, myocardial cell contour was fuzzy, nuclei were relatively large, reduced the number of nuclei and inward migration. The broken cells and part of the cells and nuclei overflow can also be seen. The shape of nucleus was irregular and shifted to the internal. In myocardial cell sections of DE rats, the cell profile was relatively clear, and arranged more orderly, a larger number of nuclei, generated less shift. (2) The plasma insulin of DE were obviously lower than that of DC (P<0.01). The content of serum glucose of DE was significantly decreased compared with that of DC (P<0.01). (3) The ratio of NAD+/NADH in DE heart was higher than that of DC (P<0.05). (4) The expression of SIRT1 in DE heart was higher than that of DC (P<0.05). (5)The activity of SOD in DE heart was increased while the content of MDA in DE was significantly decreased compared with those in DC (P<0.01). Conclusions Aerobic exercise can effectively reduced the blood glucose level of T2DM rats. The NAD+/NADH ratio in the myocardium of T2DM rats were increased after the aerobic exercise. As a result, the content of SIRT1 protein in myocardial cells of T2DM rats were increased after the aerobic exercise, which resulted in the increased SOD activity and antioxidant capacity in the cardiac muscle cells, which lead to the attenuated myocardial injury in T2DM rats .

Simultaneous Segmentation of Leukocyte and Erythrocyte in Microscopic Images Using a Marker-Controlled Watershed Algorithm

The density or quantity of leukocytes and erythrocytes in a unit volume of blood, which can be automatically measured through a computer-based microscopic image analysis system, is frequently considered an indicator of diseases. The segmentation of blood cells, as a basis of quantitative statistics, plays an important role in the system. However, many conventional methods must firstly distinguish blood cells into two types (i.e., leukocyte and erythrocyte) and segment them in independent procedures. In this paper, we present a marker-controlled watershed algorithm for simultaneously extracting the two types of blood cells to simplify operations and reduce computing time. The method consists of two steps, that is, cell nucleus segmentation and blood cell segmentation. An image enhancement technique is used to obtain the leukocyte marker. Two marker-controlled watershed algorithms are based on distance transformation and edge gradient information to acquire blood cell contour. The segmented leukocytes and erythrocytes are obtained simultaneously by classification. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method is fast, robust, and efficient.

ГЕОМЕТРИЧЕСКИЕ И ФИЗИКО-МЕХАНИЧЕСКИЕ ПАРАМЕТРЫ ФИБРОБЛАСТОВ И РАКОВЫХ КЛЕТОК ЧЕЛОВЕКА ЛИНИЙ А549 и HEp-2c, ОЦЕНЕННЫЕ С ПОМОЩЬЮ АТОМНО-СИЛОВОЙ МИКРОСКОПИИ

Using an atomic force microscopy we studied the physical and mechanical parameters of cell surface layer patches (the parameters of local sliding friction force between atomic force microscope tip and cell surface and the fractal dimension of lateral force maps) and geometrical parameters of whole cells (cell contour, topography, diameter, height and others) for treated with glutaraldehyde (0,5 %) human fibroblasts and cancer epithelial cells lines A549 (lung carcinoma) and HEp-2c (larynx carcinoma). The revealed differences in the studied parameters are indicative of the difference in the cortical cytoskeleton state of the cells.

Alterations of Intercellular Junctions in Peritoneal Mesothelial Cells from Patients Undergoing Dialysis: Effect of Retinoic Acid

BackgroundDialysis patients are classified according to their peritoneal permeability as low transporter (LT, low solute permeability) or high transporter (HT, high solute permeability). Tight junction (TJ) proteins are critical to maintain ions, molecules and water paracellular transport through peritoneum. Exposure to peritoneal dialysis solutions causes damage to TJ in human peritoneal mesothelial cells (HPMCs). We analyzed the quantity, distribution and function of TJ proteins: claudin-1, -2 and -8, ZO-1 and occludin, in HPMC cultures from LT and HT patients. Since all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA) might modify the expression of TJ proteins, we studied its effect on HPMCs.MethodsControl HPMCs were isolated from human omentum, while HT or LT cells were obtained from dialysis effluents. Cells were cultured in presence of ATRA 0, 50 or 100 nM. Transepithelial electrical resistance (TER) measurement, immunostaining and Western blot analyses were performed.ResultsHT exhibited lower TER than control and LT monolayers. Immunofluorescence for TJ was weak and discontinuous along the cell contour, in LT and HT. Furthermore, claudin- 1, occludin and ZO-1 expressions were decreased. In all groups, claudin-2 was localized at nuclei. We observed that ATRA improved TJ distribution and increased TJ expression in HT. This retinoid did not modify claudin-2 and -8 expressions. All-trans retinoic acid decreased TER in HT, but had no effect in LT.ConclusionsTight junctions were altered in HPMCs from dialyzed patients. The HT monolayer has lower TER than LT, which might be associated with the peritoneal permeability in these patients. ATRA might be a therapeutic alternative to maintain mesothelial integrity, since it improved TJ localization and expression.