The pro-inflammatory cytokine interleukin-1 (IL-1) plays a key role in many physiological processes and during the inflammatory and immune response to most common diseases. IL-1 exists as two agonists, IL-1α and IL-1β that bind to the only signaling IL-1 type 1 receptor (IL-1R1), while a second decoy IL-1 type 2 receptor (IL-1R2) binds both forms of IL-1 without inducing cell signaling. The field of immunology and inflammation research has, over the past 35 years, unraveled many mechanisms of IL-1 actions, through in vitro manipulation of the IL-1 system or by using genetically engineered mouse models that lack either member of the IL-1 family in ubiquitous constitutive manner. However, the limitation of global mouse knockout technology has significantly hampered our understanding of the precise mechanisms of IL-1 actions in animal models of disease.  https://www.selleckchem.com/products/bms-927711.html  Here we report and review the recent generation of new conditional mouse mutants in which exons of Il1a, Il1b, Il1r1, and Il1r2 genes flanked by loxP sites (fl/fl) can be deleted in cell-/tissue-specific constitutive or inducible manner by Cre recombinase expression. Hence, IL-1αfl/fl, IL-1βfl/fl, IL-1R1fl/fl, and IL-1R2fl/fl mice constitute a new toolbox that will provide a step change in our understanding of the cell-specific role of IL-1 and its receptor in health and disease and the potential development of targeted IL-1 therapies.Honeybee pollen foragers departing the hive carry concentrated nectar to use as fuel for flight and glue for forming pollen loads. Since nectar is concentrated by in-hive bees at the cost of time and energy, using concentrated nectar increases the cost of foraging at the colony level. This experimental study explored the potential benefit to honeybees of using concentrated nectar for pollen collection by diluting nectar carried by pollen foragers from the hive. Mass feeding with 30% sugar solution successfully reduced the crop-load-sugar concentration in putative pollen foragers departing the hive, but while those bees tended to increase the crop-load volume, such increase did not fully compensate for the decreased amount of dissolved sugars in the crop load. Feeding 30% sugar solution reduced the pollen load dry weight by approx. 10-20% compared to the unfed control and to another test group fed 60% sugar solution. In addition, the pollen load size and sugar concentration of crop load remaining in returning pollen foragers was positively correlated. These results clearly show the advantage to honeybees of using concentrated nectar for pollen foraging.Hybridization is widespread in fish and constitutes an important mechanism in fish speciation. There is, however, little knowledge about hybridization in mormyrids. F1-interspecies hybrids between Campylomormyrus tamandua ♂ × C. compressirostris ♀ were investigated concerning (1) fertility; (2) survival of F2-fish and (3) new gene combinations in the F2-generation concerning the structure of the electric organ and features of the electric organ discharge. These F1-hybrids achieved sexual maturity at about 12-13.5 cm total length. A breeding group comprising six males and 13 females spawned 28 times naturally proving these F1-fish to be fertile. On average 228 eggs were spawned, the average fertilization rate was 47.8%. Eggs started to hatch 70-72 h after fertilization, average hatching rate was 95.6%. Average mortality rate during embryonic development amounted to 2.3%. Average malformation rate during the free embryonic stage was 27.7%. Exogenous feeding started on day 11. In total, we raised 353 normally developed larvae all of which died consecutively, the oldest specimen reaching an age of 5 months. During survival, the activities of the larval and adult electric organs were recorded and the structure of the adult electric organ was investigated histologically.Adsorbents with the combination of magnetic separation and removal performance are expected for reducing the adverse impact of nuclear pollution. In this study, the core-shell Fe3O4@polydopamine (Fe3O4@PDA) was successfully synthesized and used for removal of uranium (U(VI)) ion from aqueous solution. The abundant N-containing groups derived from PDA exist as the chelate sites for U(VI) and contribute greatly for U(VI) removal. Experimental results show that Fe3O4@PDA (56.39 mg g-1) exhibits greater sorption capacity for U(VI) removal compared with the pure Fe3O4 (9.17 mg g-1). The sorption isotherm can be well fitted with Freundlich model and the sorption process is endothermic and spontaneous. The removal of U(VI) can be explained by the complexation of U(VI) with -NH-, -NH2 and C-O in the surface of Fe3O4@PDA by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analysis.Cerium oxide nanoparticles (CeO2 NPs) are widely used in industries and have caused environmental problems. However, the phytotoxicity induced by CeO2 NPs lacks detailed information on phytotoxicity. In this research, the effect of CeO2 NPs on soybean plants (Glycine max) was studied. Scanning electron microscopy with the energy dispersion spectroscopy was used to characterize the NPs form in soybean. The growth of the root was increased, whereas the growth of shoot was inhibited. Besides, Chlorophyll Fluorescence Imager (CF Imager) showed that chlorophyll synthesis was inhibited the maximum quantum yield of Photosystem II complex (PSII) (Fv/Fm) and photochemical quenching (qP) decreased. Moreover, transmission electron microscopy revealed that the chloroplast thylakoid structure was changed, and thus reduced the energy conversion in the Calvin cycle from C5 to C3. Our work suggests that CeO2 NPs will cause growth changes as well as irreversible damage to soybean plants. Our findings will provide evidence for estimation of plant toxicity induced by CeO2 NPs.Papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) is the most common type of thyroid cancer. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are a novel class of RNAs, with higher stability and tissue specificity, which may be of value as novel clinical markers. High‑throughput RNA sequencing was used to profile the expression of circRNAs in 5 pairs of cancer and normal tissues, and reverse transcription‑quantitative PCR (RT‑qPCR) analysis was employed to verify the results of the RNA sequencing in 45 cases of PTC. The dysregulated circRNA expression and clinicopathological characteristics were assessed and the potential roles of circRNAs in the cellular miRNA and mRNA network were predicted using bioinformatics analysis. The results demonstrated that, compared with normal tissues, a total of 53 circRNAs were dysregulated in tumour tissues, and 8 circRNAs were validated at the mRNA level (P less then 0.001 and P less then 0.01). Among those, the expression of chr5161330882‑161336769‑ (P=0.015), chr922046750‑22097364+ (P=0.041) and chr818765448‑18804898‑ (P=0.