Project description:Mentha is a strongly scented herb of the Lamiaceae (formerly Labiatae) and includes about 30 species and hybrid species that are distributed or introduced throughout the globe. These fragrant plants have been selected throughout millennia for use by humans as herbs, spices, and pharmaceutical needs. The distilling of essential oils from mint began in Japan and England but has become a significant industrial product for the US, China, India, and other countries. The US Department of Agriculture (USDA), Agricultural Research Service, National Clonal Germplasm Repository (NCGR) maintains a mint genebank in Corvallis, Oregon. This facility preserves and distributes about 450 clones representing 34 taxa, hybrid species, advanced breeder selections, and F1 hybrids. Mint crop wild relatives are included in this unique resource. The majority of mint accessions and hybrids in this collection were initially donated in the 1970s by the A.M. Todd Company, located in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Other representatives of diverse mint taxa and crop wild relatives have since been obtained from collaborators in Australia, New Zealand, Europe, and Vietnam. These mints have been evaluated for cytology, oil components, verticillium wilt resistance, and key morphological characters. Pressed voucher specimens have been prepared for morphological identity verification. An initial set of microsatellite markers has been developed to determine clonal identity and assess genetic diversity. Plant breeders at private and public institutions are using molecular analysis to determine identity and diversity of the USDA mint collection. Evaluation and characterization includes essential oil content, disease resistance, male sterility, and other traits for potential breeding use. These accessions can be a source for parental genes for enhancement efforts to produce hybrids, or for breeding new cultivars for agricultural production. Propagules of Mentha are available for distribution to international researchers as stem cuttings, rhizome cuttings, or seed, which can be requested through the GRIN-Global database of the US National Plant Germplasm System, subject to international treaty and quarantine regulations.
Project description:Intervention type:DRUG. Intervention1:Huaier, Dose form:GRANULES, Route of administration:ORAL, intended dose regimen:20 to 60/day by either bulk or split for 3 months to extended term if necessary. Control intervention1:None.
Primary outcome(s): For mRNA libraries, focus on mRNA studies. Data analysis includes sequencing data processing and basic sequencing data quality control, prediction of new transcripts, differential expression analysis of genes. Gene Ontology (GO) and the KEGG pathway database are used for annotation and enrichment analysis of up-regulated genes and down-regulated genes.
For small RNA libraries, data analysis includes sequencing data process and sequencing data process QC, small RNA distribution across the genome, rRNA, tRNA, alignment with snRNA and snoRNA, construction of known miRNA expression pattern, prediction New miRNA and Study of their secondary structure Based on the expression pattern of miRNA, we perform not only GO / KEGG annotation and enrichment, but also different expression analysis.. Timepoint:RNA sequencing of 240 blood samples of 80 cases and its analysis, scheduled from June 30, 2022..
Project description:microRNAs(miRNAs) play critical regulatory roles mainly through cleaving targeted mRNAs or repressing gene translation during plant developments. Grapevine is amongst the most economically important fruit crops with whole genome available, and the study on grapevine miRNAs (Vv-miRNAs) have also been emphasized. However, the regulation mode of Vv-miRNAs on their target mRNAs during grapevine development has not been studied well, especially on a transcriptome-wide level. Here, six small RNA (sRNA) and mRNA libraries from various grapevine tissues were constructed for Illumina and Degradome sequencing. Subsequently, the spatiotemporal variation in the Vv-miRNAs’ regulation on their target genes was systematically analyzed. Totally, 242 known and 132 novel Vv-miRNAs were identified, and 193 target mRNAs including 103 for known and 90 for novel miRNAs were validated in one or more of tissues examined. The interesting finding was that over 50% of novel miRNAs were expressed exclusively in flowers or berries where they had tissue-specific cleavage roles on their target genes, especially, the breadth of their cleavage sites in flower tissues. Moreover, six novel miRNAs in berries were found to response to exogenous gibberellin (GA) and/or ethylene by real time RT-PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis, confirming their regulatory functions during berry development. Other finding was that about 93.6% of the known miRNAs possessed the high conservation in various tissues where their expression levels exhibited some dynamic variations during grapevine development. Significantly, it was found the phenomena that some Vv-miRNA families exist one key member that act as the main regulator of their target genes during grapevine development.
Project description:Primary objectives: Characterization of the macrophage population subset that is modulated by enteric neurons
Primary endpoints: Characterization of the macrophage population subset that is modulated by enteric neurons via RNA sequencing
Project description:Mentha haplocalyx (Mentha canadensis) is widely used as a medicinal plant in traditional Chinese medicine, and the extracts of its aerial parts are found to significantly inhibit the activity of ?-glucosidase with an IC50 value of 21.0 ?g/mL. Bioactivity-guided isolation of the extracts afforded two new compounds (1 and 2), together with 23 known ones (3-25). Their structures were established by extensive spectroscopic analyses (1D and 2D NMR, MS, IR and UV). Compounds 1-17 and 21-25 were evaluated for their ?-glucosidase inhibitory activities. Compound 11 was the most active ones with an IC50 values of 83.4 ?M. These results verify the ?-glucosidase inhibitory activity of M. haplocalyx (M. canadensis) and specify its active compounds for the first time.