High temperature can improve the performance of invasive plants by facilitating root growth.

Premise: The ever-increasing temperatures of the Anthropocene may facilitate plant invasions. To date, studies of temperature effects on alien plants have mainly focused on aboveground plant traits but ignored belowground traits, which may confound predictions of plant invasion risks.

Methods: The temperature effects on the root growth dynamics of two alien shrubs, invasive Mimosa sepiaria and naturalized Corchorus capsulari, were studied using a 3D, transparent growth system under five temperature treatments (day/night: 18°C/13°C to 34°C/29°C) that cover the present and future warming temperature scenarios in China.

Flying squirrels use a mortise-tenon structure to fix nuts on understory twigs.

Squirrels of temperate zones commonly store nuts or seeds under leaf litter, in hollow logs, or even in holes in the ground; however, in the humid rainforests of Jianfengling in Hainan, South China, we show that some flying squirrels cache elliptical or oblate nuts by hanging them securely in vegetation. These small flying squirrels were identified as (G. M.

A mechanistic model for nitrogen-limited plant growth.

Background And Aims: Nitrogen is often regarded as a limiting factor to plant growth in various ecosystems. Understanding how nitrogen drives plant growth has numerous theoretical and practical applications in agriculture and ecology. In 2004, Göran I.

Sexual competition and kin recognition co-shape the traits of neighboring dioecious Diospyros morrisiana seedlings.

Plants respond differently to the identity of their neighbors, such as their sex and kinship, showing plasticity in their traits. However, how the functional traits of dioecious trees are shaped by the recognition of neighbors with different sex and kinship remains unknown. In this study, we set up an experiment with different kin/nonkin and inter/intrasexual combinations for a dioecious tree species, Diospyros morrisiana.

Species Identity and Initial Size Rather Than Neighborhood Interactions Influence Survival in a Response-Surface Examination of Competition.

To measure intraspecific and interspecific interaction coefficients among tree species is the key to explore the underlying mechanisms for species coexistence and biodiversity maintenance in forests. Through the response surface experimental design, we established a long-term field experiment by planting 27,300 seedlings of four tree species (, , , and ) in 504 plots in different species combinations (six pairwise combinations of four species), abundance proportions (five abundance proportions of two species, i.e.

Soil nitrogen concentration mediates the relationship between leguminous trees and neighbor diversity in tropical forests.

Legumes provide an essential service to ecosystems by capturing nitrogen from the atmosphere and delivering it to the soil, where it may then be available to other plants. However, this facilitation by legumes has not been widely studied in global tropical forests. Demographic data from 11 large forest plots (16-60 ha) ranging from 5.

High Temperature can Change Root System Architecture and Intensify Root Interactions of Plant Seedlings.

Climate change could alter plant aboveground and belowground resource allocation. Compared with shoots, we know much less about how roots, especially root system architecture (RSA) and their interactions, may respond to temperature changes. Such responses could have great influence on species'acquisition of resources and their competition with neighbors.

The association between particulate matter 2.5 exposure and children with autism spectrum disorder.

Objective: Particulate matter (PM) as an environmental pollutant is suspected to be associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The aim of this study was to assess whether exposures to PM during the first three years of life in relation to the risk and degree of the severity of ASD.

Methods: A total of two hundred and ninety-seven 3-6 years old Chinese children (99 confirmed autism cases and 198 their age-gender matched control subjects) were included.

Comparing shade tolerance measures of woody forest species.

Shade tolerance, the minimum light requirement for plant survival, is a key trait for understanding community assembly and forest dynamics. However, it is poorly defined for tree species to date. Current methods of measuring shade tolerance vary considerably in their performance.

The effect of soil-borne pathogens depends on the abundance of host tree species.

The overarching issue for understanding biodiversity maintenance is how fitness advantages accrue to a species as it becomes rare, as this is the defining feature of stable coexistence mechanisms. Without these fitness advantages, average fitness differences between species will lead to exclusion. However, empirical evidence is lacking, especially for forests, due to the difficulty of manipulating density on a large-enough scale.

Genotypic recognition and spatial responses by rice roots.

Root system growth and development is highly plastic and is influenced by the surrounding environment. Roots frequently grow in heterogeneous environments that include interactions from neighboring plants and physical impediments in the rhizosphere. To investigate how planting density and physical objects affect root system growth, we grew rice in a transparent gel system in close proximity with another plant or a physical object.

GiA Roots: software for the high throughput analysis of plant root system architecture.

Background: Characterizing root system architecture (RSA) is essential to understanding the development and function of vascular plants. Identifying RSA-associated genes also represents an underexplored opportunity for crop improvement. Software tools are needed to accelerate the pace at which quantitative traits of RSA are estimated from images of root networks.

[Clinical study on naoxintong capsule for stroke recovery of Qi-deficiency and blood-stasis syndrome].

Objective: To study the efficacy and safety of Naoxintong capsule treatment of stroke recovery with Qi-deficiency and blood-stasis syndrome (cerebral infarction), and to compared the non-inferiority analysis with the positive drug Tongxinluo capsule.

Method: Taking Tongxinluo capsules as control, randomized, double-blind, controlled, multi-center clinical experiments were studied. The evaluating indexes included the decrease of integral value of stroke patients, changes in traditional Chinese medicine, the improvement of the patient viability status (disability level), Chinese stroke scale (CSS), activities of daily living (DAL) scale and barthel index (BI ) points.

Crop root behavior coordinates phosphorus status and neighbors: from field studies to three-dimensional in situ reconstruction of root system architecture.

Root is a primary organ to respond to environmental stimuli and percept signals from neighboring plants. In this study, root responses in maize (Zea mays)/soybean (Glycine max) intercropping systems recognized soil phosphorus (P) status and neighboring plants in the field. Compared to self culture, the maize variety GZ1 intercropping with soybean HX3 grew much better on low P, but not in another maize variety, NE1.

3D reconstruction and dynamic modeling of root architecture in situ and its application to crop phosphorus research.

Root architecture plays important roles in plant water and nutrient acquisition. However, accurate modeling of the root system that provides a realistic representation of roots in the soil is limited by a lack of appropriate tools for the non-destructive and precise measurement of the root system architecture in situ. Here we describe a root growth system in which the roots grow in a solid gel matrix that was used to reconstruct 3D root architecture in situ and dynamically simulate its changes under various nutrient conditions with a high degree of precision.

[Exploration on essence of spleen-kidney deficiency in middle-aged patients].

Objective: To explore the essence of Spleen-Kidney Deficiency in middle-aged patients.

Methods: Investigation was carried out in 773 cases of 50-69 years old to assay 34 parameters in them, including blood lipid, oxidation and anti-oxidation related substance, sex hormone, liver and renal function, immune function, blood routine, blood pressure and lung vital capacity, etc.

Results: Spleen Deficiency Syndrome is closely related with lipid metabolism disorder; Kidney-Qi Deficiency Syndrome is closely related with hypoimmune function; Kidney-Yin Deficiency Syndrome is closely related with lipid metabolism disorder and hypertension, and Kidney Yang Deficiency is closely related with weakness of anti-oxidation capacity, hypoimmunity, the internal environment disorder of sex hormone and aging, manifested as multiple functions abating.