农学最新文献

Breast cancer stem cells (BCSCs) represent a distinctive subpopulation within breast cancer that exhibit stem cell-like characteristics, including self-renewal capability and multipotent differentiation. They are recognized as the central drivers of tumor initiation, progression, metastasis, and drug resistance. In-depth investigation of BCSCs represents a crucial avenue for overcoming the current therapeutic limitations in breast cancer. This review comprehensively summarizes recent advances in BCSCs-related research, focusing on key areas such as surface marker identification, mechanisms underlying tumor recurrence and metastasis, core regulatory signaling networks, and therapy resistance. Furthermore, it discusses potential clinical strategies targeting BCSCs, and explores future directions for precision medicine based on hetogeneity and dynamic regulation of BCSCs. These insights provide important theoretical foundations for the development of targeted therapies against breast cancer.

Fruit growth and development are generally initiated following successful pollination and fertilization. Seedless chestnut rose (Rosa sterilis), an elite promising fruit tree for both edible and medicinal purposes due to the extremely high vitamin C and superior quality, exhibits a naturally parthenocarpic character, however the underlying mechanism has been still unclear so far. Currently, gibberellins (GAs) were justified as the key hormone for parthenocarpy induction in seedless chestnut rose by endogenous hormone analysis and exogenous plant growth regulator (PGR) application. In total, 43 members of the GA oxidase gene family (RsGAoxs) were systematically identified and characterized based on genome-wide analysis of seedless chestnut rose. On the basis of transcriptomic analysis, overexpression experiments in tomato, as well as virus-induced gene silencing (VIGS) assay in seedless chestnut rose, RsGA3ox9 was substantially justified to be involved in the parthenocarpic fruitsetting of this species. Transcription factors RsMYB3, RsMYB8, and RsMYB73 were proven to positively regulate the expression of RsGA3ox9. Further, yeast two-hybrid (Y2H) and luciferase complementation assay illuminated that RsMYB8 and RsMYB73 may interact, leading to upregulating RsGA3ox9. Thereby, RsGA3ox9 substantially regulates parthenocarpy of seedless chestnut rose, and RsMYB8-RsMYB73 complex promotes parthenocarpic fruitsetting by upregulating RsGA3ox9, which may facilitate the seedless fruit breeding in chestnut rose (Rosa roxburghii Tratt.), as well as provide novel insights for better understanding the mechanism underlying the parthenocarpic fruitsetting in fruit species.

AP2/ERF transcription factors (TFs) constitute a large, plant-specific family that acts as a central hub integrating developmental and environmental signals to modulate the biosynthesis of secondary metabolites. These compounds, including terpenoids, phenolic compounds, and alkaloids, are vital for plant survival and are of immense value to human health and industry. This review provides a comprehensive synthesis of the molecular mechanisms by which AP2/ERF TFs regulate these crucial metabolic pathways. We systematically classify and dissect their regulatory modes, including direct binding to cis-elements (e.g. GCC-box, CE1, and DRE/CRT), indirect control via upstream signaling cascades, co-regulation through physical interactions with other TF families (e.g. MYB, bHLH, WRKY), and feedback regulation. We present numerous case studies across diverse plant species, highlighting both conserved principles and species-specific adaptations in the control of high-value natural products like artemisinin, tanshinones, anthocyanins, and nicotine. Furthermore, we discuss the emerging roles of AP2/ERF TFs in metabolic engineering and synthetic biology, and outline future research directions, emphasizing the application of multi-omics and CRISPR/Cas9 technologies to unravel and engineer these complex regulatory networks for targeted overproduction of valuable phytochemicals.

Postnatal cardiac function in mammals is closely associated with cardiomyocyte proliferation and hypertrophy. However, the molecular mechanisms regulating cardiomyocyte proliferation and hypertrophy have not yet been fully elucidated. Therefore, phenotypic measurements and transcriptomic sequencing were performed on myocardial tissues from 7-day-old (P7) and 3-month-old (3m) female C57BL/6 mice to investigate changes in cardiomyocytes during growth and development and to identify key genes regulating myocardial growth and development. In comparison to 7-day-old mice, 3-month-old mice exhibited a significant increase in heart weight (P<0.001) and the cross-sectional area of cardiomyocytes (P<0.001). Transcriptome sequencing identified 3,858 differentially expressed genes (DEGs), including 2,021 up-regulated and 1,837 down-regulated genes. Gene Ontology (GO) functional annotation analysis demonstrated that the differentially expressed genes were significantly enriched in biological processes including cell cycle, cell division, cardiac morphogenesis and cellular proliferation. Significantly enriched KEGG pathways were identified, including those for DNA replication, ECM-receptor interaction, the cell cycle, metabolic pathways, and other signaling pathways. Furthermore, key candidate genes associated with myocardial tissue growth and development in mice, including Hey2, Foxm1, Igf1, Xirp2, Sfrp2, Egf, Fgfr2, Tbx20, Fgf1 and Igf2 were identified through screening. qRT-PCR validation results demonstrated that the expression trends of the 10 candidate genes related to myocardial growth and development were consistent with the RNA-seq results, confirming the reliability of the sequencing data. The findings of this study provide new insights into the molecular mechanisms underlying the growth and development of mouse myocardial tissue.

Microbial profiles in dust are closely correlated with geographical locations and provide valuable clues for criminal investigation, demonstrating significant potential in forensic use. However, the feasibility of using microbial profiles from metagenomics datasets to infer the geographical locations remains underexplored. In this study, we collect 170 dust samples from resident communities in four cities across northern, eastern, southwestern, and northwestern China. All samples are subjected to shotgun metagenomic sequencing to reveal variations in microbial composition. In total, 41,029 species are annotated, including 93.39% bacteria, 6.37% eukaryotes, 0.21% viruses, and 0.03% archaea. Clear clustering patterns are observed among the four cities (R²=0.870, P<0.001). Further filtering of species with detection rates below 10% across all samples strengthens city-level clustering (R²=0.948, P<0.001). Additionally, 127 biomarkers are identified using linear discriminant analysis effect size (LEfSe) to distinguish between the cities. Each city harbors a distinct microbial community, with unique species and relatively abundant taxa that contribute to its differentiated microbial profile. All samples are randomly split into training and testing sets in a 7:3 ratio. Five machine learning models including SourceTracker, FEAST, LightGBM, Random Forest and Support Vector Machine are applied to 51 randomly sample data and achieve average accuracies of 88.89%, 92.16%, 98.04%, 99.35% and 69.28%, respectively. These results constitute a microbial genetic map of four cities in China that highlights distinct microbial taxonomic signatures and provides an approach for city-scale source tracking of dust samples.

The tea plant is an important nonalcoholic beverage crop known for its abundant secondary metabolites, particularly in buds and leaves. However, the coordinated regulation of bud-to-leaf development and metabolism remains poorly understood. Here, we applied single-nucleus RNA sequencing (snRNA-Seq), bulk RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq), and metabolomics to comprehensively profile the developmental trajectory and metabolic characteristics of tea plant buds and leaves. The snRNA-Seq analysis revealed 17 cell clusters and 8 cell types in buds and leaves, respectively. Notably, the proportion of palisade mesophyll (PM) cells increased progressively during development, while proliferating cells (PC) decreased. Interestingly, key enzymes in the flavonoid biosynthetic pathway were specifically localized to PM cells. Metabolomic analyses demonstrated dynamic accumulation patterns of various metabolites, including phytohormones, flavonoids, and amino acids, as the buds transitioned to mature leaves. Using multi-omics profiling, we identified CsmiRNA396b, CsUGT94P1, CsTCP3, and CsTCP14 as critical regulatory components. Enzyme activity assays confirmed that CsUGT94P1 catalyzes the conversion of flavonols into flavonol glycosides in vitro. Furthermore, CsmiRNA396b was found to regulate leaf development by inhibiting CsGRF3 expression, while CsTCP3 and CsTCP14 played antagonistic roles in leaf development and flavonoid biosynthesis. Our findings provide novel insights into the regulatory mechanisms underlying bud-to-leaf development and metabolite production in tea plants.