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The WRKY transcription factor (TF) belongs to one of the major plant protein superfamilies. The WRKY TF gene family plays an important role in the regulation of transcriptional reprogramming associated with plant stress responses. Change in the expression patterns of WRKY genes or the modifications in their action; participate in the elaboration of numerous signaling pathways and regulatory networks. WRKY proteins contribute to plant growth, for example, gamete formation, seed germination, post-germination growth, stem elongation, root hair growth, leaf senescence, flowering time, and plant height. Moreover, they play a key role in many types of environmental signals, including drought, temperature, salinity, cold, and biotic stresses. This review summarizes the current progress made in unraveling the functions of numerous WRKY TFs under drought, salinity, temperature, and cold stresses as well as their role in plant growth and development.

The integration of wind power is vital for enabling a low-carbon energy transition and fostering a sustainable society. However, its intermittent nature and the power system’s limited transmission capacity challenge system stability. This study develops a low-carbon optimal scheduling model incorporating post-combustion carbon capture technology, energy storage, and an improved genetic algorithm (GA) to solve the optimization problem efficiently. The model evaluates the impact of carbon capture prices on energy storage allocation and unit power supply costs under high wind power penetration. Results demonstrate that increasing wind power capacity reduces the unit cost of electricity supply from 0.202 CNY/kWh to 0.164 CNY/kWh while improving system stability through energy storage deployment. Additionally, increasing the carbon capture price raises generation costs, peaking at 3.584 million CNY, but significantly reduces carbon emissions. For instance, at a carbon capture price of 100 CNY per ton, energy storage capacity reaches 127.6 MWh with a power output of 74.9 MW, achieving a unit cost of 0.152 CNY/kWh. These findings highlight the effectiveness of the proposed model and the improved GA in balancing economic, environmental, and system stability goals, offering a robust strategy for sustainable power system operation.

This study proposes an optimized day-ahead economic dispatch framework for wind-integrated microgrids, combining energy storage systems with a hybrid demand response (DR) strategy to address real-time grid pricing dynamics. The model evaluates five operational scenarios: (1) conventional dispatch without renewable/storage/DR integration, (2) wind power participation, (3) coordinated wind-storage operation, (4) wind-DR synergy, and (5) full integration of wind, storage, and DR. A two-stage demand response mechanism is developed, integrating incentive-based load adjustments with price elasticity modeling through a tariff scaling factor approach. The analysis compares operational costs, renewable energy utilization efficiency, load profile characteristics, and user comfort levels across all scenarios. Results demonstrate that the combined deployment of wind generation, battery storage, and adaptive DR significantly reduces microgrid operating costs while enhancing peak load management. The integrated strategy proves most effective in balancing supply-demand dynamics, improving grid stability through synergistic storage-DR coordination, and maintaining user satisfaction. Case studies validate the framework’s practicality in achieving cost-efficient dispatch decisions without compromising renewable energy integration capabilities. The proposed model achieves a 23.4% reduction in operational cost and over 88% utilization of renewable energy, with load peaks significantly flattened and user comfort exceeding 90% throughout the scheduling horizon.

High impedance faults (HIF) in the resonant grounding system of distribution networks pose significant challenges for traditional protection devices, which often fail to detect and eliminate these faults promptly. The difficulty in setting an appropriate threshold and ensuring reliable detection at low signal-to-noise ratios further complicates the issue. To overcome these limitations, this paper presents a novel approach that analyzes the kurtosis and skewness characteristics of the single-phase high-impedance grounding zero-sequence current waveform, using the Emanuel model as a basis. The proposed method detects HIF based on a kurtosis threshold and pinpoints the faulted line using the skewness coefficient, introducing a more reliable and precise detection technique. Simulation and field tests validate the robustness of this approach, demonstrating strong resistance to noise interference and enhanced fault detection capabilities.

Due to the fluctuation of wind power output and the \"heat to power\" mode in the heating period, the wind abandonment phenomenon in coastal areas in winter is increasingly serious. From the perspective of integrated energy system in coastal areas, this paper first builds an optimal operation model of integrated energy system in coastal areas with the minimum daily total operating cost and the minimum amount of abandoned wind, and constrains the output condition of the corresponding equipment. Then, the mechanism of the adjustable characteristics of seawater desalination load is analyzed, the adjustment range of seawater desalination load is calculated, and the integrated energy system optimization operation method in coastal areas is designed considering the desalination load. Finally, the winter scene of a coastal area in northern China is taken as an example to conduct simulation verification. The results show that the total daily operation cost of the system is reduced by 4.6% and the wind power consumption rate is increased by 2.87% after considering the load regulation effect of seawater desalination, which effectively verifies that the integrated energy system operation strategy designed plays a significant role in improving the system operation economy and promoting the consumption of new energy.

Background Rice ( Oryza sativa L.) is a food crop for humans worldwide. However, temperature has an effect during the vegetative and reproductive stages. In high-latitude regions where rice is cultivated, cold stress is a major cause of yield loss and plant death. Research has identified a group of plant-specific transcription factors, DNA binding with one zinc fingers (DOFs), with a diverse range of functions, including stress signaling and stress response during plant growth. The aim of this study was to identify Dof genes in two rice subspecies, indica and japonica , and screen for Dof genes that may be involved in cold tolerance during plant growth. Results A total of 30 rice Dofs ( OsDofs ) were identified using bioinformatics and genome-wide analyses and phylogenetically analyzed. The 30 OsDOFs were classified into six subfamilies, and 24 motifs were identified based on protein sequence alignment. The chromosome locations of OsDofs were determined and nine gene duplication events were identified. A joint phylogenetic analysis was performed on DOF protein sequences obtained from four monocotyledon species to examine the evolutionary relationship of DOF proteins. Expression profiling of OsDofs from two japonica cultivars (Longdao5, which is cold-tolerant, and Longjing11, which is cold-sensitive) revealed that OsDof1 and OsDof19 are cold-inducible genes. We examined the seed setting rates in OsDof1 - and OsDof19 -overexpression and RNAi lines and found that OsDof1 showed a response to cold stress. Conclusions Our investigation identified OsDof1 as a potential target for genetic breeding of rice with enhanced cold tolerance.

Background This study aims to analyze trends in epidemiological characteristics of pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB) among children and youth in mainland China from 2019 to 2024 to support informed policy decisions for TB care and prevention. Methods Data on notified PTB cases were extracted from the National TB Surveillance System along with population information for each province from 2019 to 2024. Age-standardized incidence rate (ASIR) was estimated and stratified by year, age, gender and province. Descriptive analysis examined patient characteristics. The Kruskal-Wallis H and Chi-square tests compared data across years. Temporal trends were analyzed using Joinpoint regression models. The average annual percent change (AAPC) assessed the overall trend, and the annual percent change (APC) evaluated local trend or overall trend when there was no joinpoint (APC = AAPC). Spatial-temporal patterns were explored through spatial autocorrelation analysis and spatial-temporal scan statistics. Results From 2019 to 2024, mainland China reported 419,000 new PTB cases, with 90.6% in youth and 9.4% in children. The majority were students (48.3%) and farmers (23.8%). The proportion of ethnic minorities, students, individuals identified through active case finding, drug-resistant TB cases, and those with positive bacteriological tests increased over time. Males outnumbered females, but between ages 9 and 15, females surpassed males. The male-to-female ratio remained stable in children, while in youth, males were consistently more affected. The average ASIR over six years was 17.2 per 100,000. Joinpoint regression showed a significant decrease in ASIR from 24.7 per 100,000 in 2019 to 10.5 per 100,000 in 2024 (AAPC = − 15.98, P  < 0.0001), with no significant joinpoints. Seasonal peak occurred in late spring and autumn, with a trough in February each year. High PTB clusters persisted in the southwest and northwest, particularly in the southwest, where cases increased. Most provinces showed a decline in ASIR, with the most significant decrease in Xinjiang, while Tibet and Qinghai experienced slower reductions. Conclusion China has made progress in reducing PTB cases among children and youth. However, disparities remain, particularly in high-risk regions. Targeted interventions addressing social and structural factors, along with enhanced regional monitoring and public health measures, are essential to further reduce incidence.

Rubus L. is one of the most diverse genera belonging to Rosaceae; it consists of more than 700 species with a worldwide distribution. It thus provides an ideal natural “supergenus” for studying the importance of its edible, medicinal, and phylogenetic characteristics for application in our daily lives and fundamental scientific studies. The Rubus genus includes many economically important species, such as blackberry (R. fruticosus L.), red raspberry (R. ideaus L.), black raspberry (R. occidentalis L.), and raspberry (R. chingii Hu), which are widely utilized in the fresh fruit market and the medicinal industry. Although Rubus species have existed in human civilization for hundreds of years, their utilization as fruit and in medicine is still largely inadequate, and many questions on their complex phylogenetic relationships need to be answered. In this review, we briefly summarize the history and progress of studies on Rubus, including its domestication as a source of fresh fruit, its medicinal uses in pharmacology, and its systematic position in the phylogenetic tree. Recent available evidence indicates that (1) thousands of Rubus cultivars were bred via time- and labor-consuming methods from only a few wild species, and new breeding strategies and germplasms were thus limited; (2) many kinds of species in Rubus have been used as medicinal herbs, though only a few species (R. ideaus L., R. chingii Hu, and R. occidentalis L.) have been well studied; (3) the phylogeny of Rubus is very complex, with the main reason for this possibly being the existence of multiple reproductive strategies (apomixis, hybridization, and polyploidization). Our review addresses the utilization of Rubus, summarizing major relevant achievements and proposing core prospects for future application, and thus could serve as a useful roadmap for future elite cultivar breeding and scientific studies.

In the face of the dual crisis of energy shortages and global warming, the vigorous development of renewable energy represented by wind-solar energy is a significant approach towards achieving energy transition, carbon peaking, and carbon neutrality goals. Targeting the park-level integrated energy system (PIES) with high penetration of wind-solar energy, we propose a day-ahead dispatching strategy that takes into account the flexible supply and the reward-punishment ladder-type carbon trading mechanism (RPLTCTM). Firstly, RPLTCTM and carbon capture equipment (CCE) are considered in the dispatching model, and the mechanism of coordinated operation of CCE and RPLTCTM is explored to further improve the system’s ability to restrain carbon emissions. Secondly, power-based flexibility indicators (PFIs) are adopted to quantitatively evaluate the flexibility supply, and based on the load demand response characteristics, the dispatchable resources on the load side are guided to improve the system’s operation flexibility. On this basis, a multi-objective optimal dispatching model that takes into account the carbon emission cost, energy cost, and flexibility supply are constructed, and the original problem is transformed into a mixed-integer single-objective linear problem through mathematical equivalence and flexibility cost. Finally, simulation examples validate that the economy, flexibility, and low-carbon level of the dispatching plan can be synergistically improved by the proposed strategy.

Sclerotinia stem rot (SSR), caused by , is one of the most destructive fungal diseases affecting soybeans, and its effective management remains a challenge. This study aimed to investigate the epidemiology of SSR and to evaluate the efficacy of chemical fungicides, biocontrol agents (particularly low-risk, eco-friendly products), cultural practices, as well as to propose integrated strategies for SSR control in soybeans. Both small-scale and large-scale field trials were conducted in in Northeast China, the country's largest soybean-producing region. The soybean varieties included Heinong 48, Kenfeng 16, Hefeng 50, Nongqingdou, Kendou 25, and Kendou 39. The epidemiological study characterized the sclerotial germination dynamics and identified key factors influencing the disease severity index (DSI) and soybean yield. Assessment of low-risk, eco-friendly disease control products in small-scale field trials revealed that 6% oligosaccharins achieved the highest control efficacy of 70.0%. These findings informed the development of integrated control measures, which were then evaluated in scale-up field trials. Notably, these control measures significantly reduced disease incidence compared to control fields, demonstrating a disease control efficacy of 64.3-75.3%, alongside a yield increase of 5.7-14.7%. Subsequent implementation of the integrated measures achieved effective disease management, with a control efficacy of 56.41% and consistent yield improvements of 5.76-15.56%. Integrating disease-resistant variety selection, low-risk/eco-friendly chemical and biological agents, and cultural practices effectively manages SSR in soybean crops, significantly reducing DSI and increasing soybean yield in Northeast China. While these strategies may be applicable in other regions, optimal approaches may vary owing to regional differences and annual variations.