We previously reported that loss of Nrdp1 contributes to human glioma progression by reducing apoptosis. However, the role of Nrdp1 in glioma migration and invasion has not been investigated. Here, we report that ErbB3, a substrate of Nrdp1, is undetectable in normal brain tissues and grade II/III glioma tissues, but is abundant in a certain percentage of grade IV glioma tissues and is associated with the loss of Nrdp1. This suggests that Nrdp1 may be involved in glioma migration and invasion by regulating ErbB3. Thus, the role of Nrdp1/ErbB3 signaling in glioma cell migration and invasion was investigated using Nrdp1 loss- and gain-of-function. The results show that down-regulation of Nrdp1 by use of short hairpin RNA promoted glioma cell migration and invasion. In contrast, overexpression of Nrdp1 significantly inhibited glioma cell migration and invasion. Further investigation on molecular targets revealed that Nrdp1 decreased the level of ErbB3, which resulted in decreasing p-AKT thereby reducing cytoplasmic p27(Kip1). Taken together, these findings suggest that Nrdp1-mediated ErbB3 degradation suppresses glioma migration and invasion and that loss of Nrdp1 may amplify ErbB3 signaling to contribute to glioma migration and invasion. These findings suggest that Nrdp1 may be a target for glioma therapy.

Soil salinity is a stringent abiotic constraint limiting crop growth and productivity. The present study was carried out to appraise the role of xylo-oligosaccharides (XOSs) in improving the salinity tolerance of Chinese cabbage. Salinity stress (0.5% NaCl solution) and four levels (0, 40, 80, 120 mg L(-1)) of XOSs were imposed on 20-day-old plants cultured under controlled conditions. Salinity stress decreased the aboveground fresh biomass, photosynthesis, transpiration rate, stomatal conductance, internal CO2 concentration, water use efficiency, and chlorophyll contents but increased the stomatal limitation value of Chinese cabbage compared with control. Such physiological interferences, disturbances in plant water relations, and visually noticeable growth reductions in Chinese cabbage were significantly alleviated by the addition of XOSs under salinity stress. Under salinity stress, application of XOSs significantly enhanced the activities of enzymatic (superoxide dismutase, peroxidase, catalase) and non-enzymatic (ascorbate, carotene) antioxidants and reduced the malondialdehyde content in the leaves of Chinese cabbage. The XOS-applied plants under salinity stress also recorded higher soluble sugars, proline, and soluble protein content in their leaves. Exposure of salinity stress increased the ratio of Na(+)/K(+), Na(+)/Ca(2+), and Na(+)/Mg(2+) in shoot as well as root of Chinese cabbage, however, XOS application significantly reduced these ratios particularly in shoot. Lower levels of XOSs (40 or 80 mg L(-1)) were more effective for most of the studied attributes. The greater salinity tolerance and better growth in these treatments were related with enhanced antioxidative defense system, reduced lipid peroxidation, increased osmolyte accumulation, and maintenance of ionic balance.

Νeuronal precursor cell expressed and developmentally downregulated protein (Nedd4-1) is an E3 ubiquitin ligase with critical roles in the pathogenesis of cancer. Herein, we demonstrated that Nedd4-1 protein was upregulated in glioma tissues vs. that in non-cancerous tissues by western blotting and immunohistochemistry. Scratch migration and Transwell chamber assays indicated that downregulation of Nedd4-1 significantly reduced the migration and invasion of the glioma cell lines U251 and U87. Conversely, overexpression of Nedd4-1 obviously enhanced the migratory and invasive capacities in both cell lines. To investigate the role of Nedd4-1 and the intracellular pathways involved, we performed pull-down and co-immunoprecipitation assays, and recognized that Nedd4-1, TNIK and Rap2a formed a complex. Moreover, Nedd4-1 selectively ubiquitinated its specific substrates, the wild-type Rap2a (WT-Rap2a) and dominant-active Rap2a (DA-Rap2a) rather than the dominant-negative Rap2a (DN-Rap2a) in the U251 cells. Subsequently, we demonstrated that Rap2a was robustly ubiquitinated by Nedd4-1 along with the K63-linked, but not the K48-linked ubiquitin chain, which significantly inhibited GTP-Rap2a activity by GST-RalGDS pull-down assay. To further verify whether the ubiquitination of Rap2a by Nedd4-1 regulated the migration and invasion of glioma cells, Nedd4-1, HA-tagged ubiquitin and its mutants as well as WT-Rap2a were co-transfected in the U251 and U87 cell lines. The results confirmed that Nedd4-1 inhibited GTP-Rap2a activity, and promoted the migration and invasion of glioma cells. In brief, our findings demonstrated the important role of Nedd4-1 in regulating the migration and invasion of glioma cells via the Nedd4-1/Rap2a pathway, which may qualify Nedd4-1 as a viable therapeutic target for glioma.

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The morphology, microstructure as well as the orientation of cathodic materials are the key issues when preparing high-performance aqueous zinc-ion batteries (ZIBs). In this paper, binder-free electrode Mn(OH)2 nanowire arrays were facilely synthesized via electrodeposition. The nanowires were aligned vertically on a carbon cloth. The as-prepared Mn(OH)2 nanowire arrays were used as cathode to fabricate rechargeable ZIBs. The vertically aligned configuration is beneficial to electron transport and the free space between the nanowires can provide more ion-diffusion pathways. As a result, Mn(OH)2 nanowire arrays yield a high specific capacitance of 146.3 Ma h g−1 at a current density of 0.5 A g−1. They also demonstrates ultra-high diffusion coefficients of 4.5 × 10−8~1.0 × 10−9 cm2 s−1 during charging and 1.0 × 10−9~2.7 × 10−11 cm−2 s−1 during discharging processes, which are one or two orders of magnitude higher than what is reported in the studies. Furthermore, the rechargeable Zn//Mn(OH)2 battery presents a good capacity retention of 61.1% of the initial value after 400 cycles. This study opens a new avenue to boost the electrochemical kinetics for high-performance aqueous ZIBs.