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The plant hormone ABA (abscisic acid) plays an extremely important role in plant growth and adaptive stress, including but are not limited to seed germination, stomatal closure, pathogen infection, drought and cold stresses. Reactive oxygen species (ROS) are response molecules widely produced by plant cells under biotic and abiotic stress conditions. The production of apoplast ROS is induced and regulated by ABA, and participates in the ABA signaling pathway and its regulated plant immune system. In this review, we summarize ABA and ROS in apoplast ROS production, plant response to biotic and abiotic stresses, plant growth regulation, ABA signal transduction, and the regulatory relationship between ABA and other plant hormones. In addition, we also discuss the effects of protein post-translational modifications on ABA and ROS related factors.

MicroRNA (miRNA) detection has attracted widespread interest as a tumor detection marker. In this work, a miRNA-responsive visual and temperature sensitive probe composed of a horseradish peroxidase (HRP)-encapsulated DNA hydrogel was designed and synthesized. The biosensor converted the miRNA hybridization signal to a photothermal effect which was measured using a digital thermometer. The substrate DNA linker strand of the hydrogel hybridizes with different sequences of miRNA resulting in the collapse of the hydrogel and the release of HRP. HRP oxidizes 3,3′,5,5′-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB) resulting in a color change and a strong photothermal effect was observed after shining near-infrared light on the oxidized product. The thermometer-based readout method has a wide linear range (0.5–4.0 µM) and a limit of detection limit of 7.8 nM which is comparable with traditional UV-vis absorption spectrometry detection and quantitative real time polymerase chain reaction methods. The low cost, ease of operation, and high sensitivity shows that this biosensor has potential for point-of-care biomolecular detection and biomedical applications.

Recently, the tumor microenvironment is increasingly recognized as playing an important role in cancer proliferation, invasion, and metastasis. To screen stroma-associated proteins involved in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) carcinogenesis, laser capture microdissection (LCM) and quantitative proteomic analysis were employed to assess different protein expression of the stroma between NPC and normal nasopharyngeal mucosa (NNM). In this study, periostin was identified to be significantly up-regulated in NPC stroma compared with NNM stroma and the result was further confirmed by Western blotting. Immunohistochemistry showed that over-expression of periostin was frequently observed in the stroma of NPC and matched lymph node metastases (LNM) compared with the stroma of NNM. Statistical analysis showed over-expression of periostin was significantly associated with advanced clinical stage ( P  < 0.001) and lymph node metastasis ( P  < 0.001) and decreased overall survival ( P  < 0.001) in NPC. Cox regression analysis indicated over-expression of periostin was an independent prognostic factor. Furthermore, ectopic expression of periostin was used to examine its effect on invasiveness of NPC cell in vitro and the result showed that periostin was able to promote invasiveness of NPC cell. In conclusion, periostin expression is correlated with tumor stage, lymph node metastasis, and patient survival. Periostin is a potential biomarker for the differentiation and prognosis of NPC, and it might play an important role in the progression of NPC.