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Finding a suitable oviposition site is a challenging task for a gravid female moth. At the same time, it is of paramount importance considering the limited capability of most caterpillars to relocate to alternative host plants. The hawkmoth, Manduca sexta (Sphingidae), oviposits on solanaceous plants. Larvae hatching on a plant that is already attacked by conspecific caterpillars can face food competition, as well as an increased exposure to predators and induced plant defenses. Here, we show that feces from conspecific caterpillars are sufficient to deter a female M. sexta from ovipositing on a plant and that this deterrence is based on the feces-emitted carboxylic acids 3-methylpentanoic acid and hexanoic acid. Using a combination of genome editing (CRISPR-Cas9), electrophysiological recordings, calcium imaging, and behavioral analyses, we demonstrate that ionotropic receptor 8a (IR8a) is essential for acid-mediated feces avoidance in ovipositing hawkmoths.

The genus Alternaria comprises many important fungal pathogens that infect a wide variety of organisms. In this report, we present the discovery of a new double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) mycovirus called Alternaria botybirnavirus 2 (ABRV2) from a phytopathogenic strain, XC21-21C, of Alternaria sp. isolated from diseased tobacco leaves in China. The ABRV2 genome consists of two dsRNA components, namely dsRNA1 and dsRNA2, with lengths of 6,162 and 5,865 base pairs (bp), respectively. Each of these genomic dsRNAs is monocistronic, encoding hypothetical proteins of 201.6 kDa (P1) and 2193.3 kDa (P2). ABRV2 P1 and P2 share 50.54% and 63.13% amino acid sequence identity with the corresponding proteins encoded by dsRNA1 of Alternaria botybirnavirus 1 (ABRV1). Analysis of its genome organization and phylogenetic analysis revealed that ABRV2 is a new member of the genus Botybirnavirus.

Deoxynivalenol (DON) is a mycotoxin widely detected in cereal products contaminated by Fusarium. Fusarium pseudograminearum megabirnavirus 1 (FpgMBV1) is a double-stranded RNA virus infecting Fusarium pseudograminearum. In this study, it was revealed that the amount of DON in F. pseudograminearum was significantly suppressed by FpgMBV1 through a high-performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS) assay. A total of 2564 differentially expressed genes were identified by comparative transcriptomic analysis between the FpgMBV1-containing F. pseudograminearum strain FC136-2A and the virus-free strain FC136-2A-V-. Among them, 1585 genes were up-regulated and 979 genes were down-regulated. Particularly, the expression of 12 genes (FpTRI1, FpTRI3, FpTRI4, FpTRI5, FpTRI6, FpTRI8, FpTRI10, FpTRI11, FpTRI12, FpTRI14, FpTRI15, and FpTRI101) in the trichothecene biosynthetic (TRI) gene cluster was significantly down-regulated. Specific metabolic and transport processes and pathways including amino acid and lipid metabolism, ergosterol metabolic and biosynthetic processes, carbohydrate metabolism, and biosynthesis were regulated. These results suggest an unrevealing mechanism underlying the repression of DON and TRI gene expression by the mycovirus FpgMBV1, which would provide new methods in the detoxification of DON and reducing the yield loss in wheat.

Wheat crown rot (WCR), caused by Fusarium pseudograminearum , poses a threat to wheat production worldwide. Two mycoviruses, designated as \"Fusarium pseudograminearum mitovirus 2\" (FupgMV2) and \"Fusarium pseudograminearum mitovirus 3\" (FupgMV3), were identified in F. pseudograminearum strain YY514-10-2. The two viral genomes are 2,429 and 2,450 nucleotides long, each containing a single open reading frame (ORF) encoding a 724-amino-acid-long RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp), with 31.98% amino acid sequence identity to each other. BLASTp analysis revealed that the RdRp of FupgMV2 exhibits at least 88.84% amino acid sequence identity to that of Fusarium mitovirus 1, while the RdRp of FupgMV3 shows 80.19% amino acid sequence identity to that of Fusarium mitovirus 2. Phylogenetic analysis indicated that FupgMV2 and FupgMV3 both belong to the genus Unuamitovirus of the family Mitoviridae . This is the first report of two mitoviruses hosted by the same strain of the plant-pathogenic fungus F. pseudograminearum .

The long‐tailed distribution of training samples is a fundamental challenge in human‐object interaction (HOI) detection, leading to extremely imbalanced performance on non‐rare and rare classes. Existing works adopt the idea of compositional learning, in which object and action features are learnt individually and re‐composed into new samples of rare HOI classes. However, most of these methods are proposed on traditional CNN‐based frameworks which are weak in capturing image‐wide context. Moreover, the simple feature integration mechanisms fail to aggregate effective semantics in re‐composed features. As a result, these methods achieve only limited improvements on knowledge generalisation. We propose a novel transformer‐based compositional learning framework for HOI detection. Human‐object pair features and interaction features containing rich global context are extracted, and comprehensively integrated via the cross‐attention mechanism, generating re‐composed features containing more generalisable semantics. To further improve re‐composed features and promote knowledge generalisation, we leverage the vision‐language model CLIP in a computation‐efficient manner to improve re‐composition sampling and guide the interaction feature learning. Experiments on two benchmark datasets prove the effectiveness of our method in improving performance on both rare and non‐rare HOI classes. In this work, we propose the first transformer‐based compositional learning method for HOI detection to enrich contextual semantics in re‐composed features and unleash the potential of compositional learning in promoting knowledge generalisation.

Apolygus lucorum (Meyer-Dür) (Hemiptera: Miridae) is a serious pest of cotton, jujube, grape and many other crops around the world. Understanding how olfactory information directs this insect to its host plants may provide environment-friendly approaches to the control of its population in agriculture. In our study, we cloned an odorant receptor gene, AlucOR46, that was specifically expressed in antennae and female-biased. Functional expression of AlucOR46 in Xenopus oocytes showed that it is tuned to six plant volatiles (S)-(−)-Limonene, (R)-(+)-Limonene, (E)-2-Hexenal, (E)-3-Hexenol, 1-Heptanol and (1R)-(−)-Myrtenol. Electroantennogram (EAG) recordings revealed that all six compounds could elicit electrophysiological responses from the antennae of A. lucorum, higher in females. Our results are in agreement with previous reports showing that (E)-2-Hexenal could attract female A. lucorum in behavior experiments. These results suggest that AlucOR46 might play an important role in locating the host plants of A. lucorum and therefore represents a suitable target for green pest control.

Finding a suitable oviposition site is a challenging task for a gravid female moth. At the same time, it is of paramount importance considering the limited capability of most caterpillars to relocate to alternative host plants. The hawkmoth, Manduca sexta (Sphingidae), oviposits on solanaceous plants. Larvae hatching on a plant that is already attacked by conspecific caterpillars can face food competition, as well as an increased exposure to predators and induced plant defenses. Here, we show that frass from conspecific caterpillars is sufficient to deter a female M. sexta from ovipositing on a plant and that this deterrence is based on the frass-emitted carboxylic acids 3-methylpentanoic acid and hexanoic acid. Using a combination of genome editing (CRISPR/Cas9), electrophysiological recordings, calcium imaging and behavioral analyses we demonstrate that the ionotropic co-receptor IR8a is essential for acid-mediated frass avoidance in ovipositing hawkmoths.

With the rapid development of nanotechnology, micro and nanometal materials have received much attention due to their unique physical and chemical properties. This paper aims to explore the size effect mechanism of the yield strength of micro and nano metal materials and establish the corresponding size effect model. We reveal the effect of grain size and interface effects on yield strength. The results show that by adjusting the composition and characteristic size of multilayers, metal multilayers can have a certain deformation ability while maintaining high strength.

This study aimed to explore the relationship between biochemical profiles and the risk of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) through a cross-sectional observational analysis. We examined data of U. S. population from the 2005–2008 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) database. Student’s t-test, multivariable logistic regression, Pearson’s correlation, restricted cubic spline (RCS) model, and linear regression were applied to analyze the underlying relationship between biochemical profiles and the AMD risk, through comparing data between the non-AMD and AMD subgroups. Multivariable logistic regression, adjusted for age and demographic factors, showed no significant associations between the AMD risk and the levets of specific biochemical parameters (P > 0.05). Pearson’s correlation revealed a positive linear relationship between age and total bilirubin, uric acid in the non-AMD subgroup (P < 0.05), but no such liner association was found in the AMD subgroup (P > 0.05). The RCS model confirmed no non-linear relationships presented between these variables in the AMD subgroup. In addition, without age adjustment, significant associations were found between total bilirubin, uric acid, and the AMD presence (P < 0.05). Biochemical profiles, after adjusting for age, did not significantly influence the AMD risk. However, total bilirubin and uric acid might potentially be related to the AMD presence. Our findings suggest a need for further research to clarify the role of these biomarkers in AMD development.

In order to investigate the relationship between perceived stress, anxiety, depression and hypertension in patients with essential hypertension, a case-control study was conducted among community residents. A total of 312 residents participated in the study by completing a self-reported questionnaire, 156 of whom were hypertensive patients and 156 were healthy. The questionnaire included demographic information, Perceived Stress Scale, Beck Anxiety Inventory and Beck Depression Inventory-II. The data were analyzed using t -test, correlation analysis, Logistic regression analysis, and structural equation modeling procedure to validate the mediation model. The results of Logistic regression analysis showed that anxiety (OR = 1.082, 95% CI 1.011–1.133, P  < 0.01), depression (OR = 1.041, 95% CI 1.006–1.078, P  < 0.05) and age (OR = 1.033, 95% CI 1.008–1.058, P  < 0.01) were risk factors for hypotension, however, perceived stress (OR = 0.955, 95% CI 0.921–0.990, P  < 0.05) was a protective factor against hypertension. Furthermore, structural equation model results reported that anxiety and depression play a mediating role between perceived stress and essential hypertension. These results suggest that anxiety and depression can raise the risk of developing essential hypertension. ​While the relationship between perceived stress and hypertension is still debated, it is well established that perceived stress can positively predict hypertension through the mediating role of anxiety and depression. Therefore, healthcare workers should take care of the mental health of patients and provide more psychological support to help them move away from negative emotions and better control their blood pressure.