Background: Postpartum depression (PPD) is a common serious mental health problem. Recent studies have demonstrated that hormone therapy serves as a promising therapeutic approach in managing PPD. The present study aims at exploring the role of thyroid hormone (TH), estrogen and progestogen in patients with PPD. Methods: Initially, PPD patients were enrolled and a PPD mouse model was established. The serum levels of estradiol (E2), progesterone (P), triiodothyronine (T3), thyroxine (T4), free triiodothyronine (FT3), free thyroxine (FT4), and thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) were subsequently measured. Next, in order to identify the effects of TH, estrogen and progestogen on PPD progression, mice were administrated with E2, P, contraceptives (CA), Euthyrox and methimazole (MMI). Besides, the body weight, activities, basolateral amygdala (BLA) neuron cell structure and the related gene expression of mice were analyzed. Results: The PPD patients and the mice showed elevated serum levels of T3, T4, FT3 and FT4 along with diminished E2, P and TSH levels. In the mice administered with a combination of E2, P, and MMI, decreased TH and increased estrogen and progestogen were detected, which resulted in increased body weight, normal activities, and BLA neuron cell structure. Moreover, brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and cAMP-responsive element-binding protein (CREB) were both up-regulated in PPD mice administrated with a combination of E2, P, and MMI, which was accompanied by decreased TH and elevated estrogen and progestogen. Conclusion: Taken together, reduced TH combined with enhanced estrogen and progestogen confers neuroprotection in PPD, highlighting a potential target in prevention and treatment of PPD.

No abstract

a b s t r a c tTo investigate the effect of biochar on coupling migration-biodegradation of total nitrogen (TN) during river-based groundwater recharge with reclaimed water, lab-scale columns were used to simulate the recharging process. The packing medium of the three columns was mainly composed of biochar amended soil (BCS), silty clay (SC) and sterilized soil (SS). The results showed that the attenuation effect of TN was ordered as BCS > SC > SS, which showed that biochar could improve the decay rate. -N into negatively charged aquifer soil. The key removal pathway was biodegradation in the recharge process, especially for the BCS system, because biochar amended improved the removal rate of nitrogen as well as denitrification enzyme activity. The 454 pyrosequencing 16s rRNA gene analysis showed that the ranking of the largest five relative abundances at the phylum level evidently changed and that the phylum related to denitrifying significantly increased with the biochar addition. Except for common and coexisting denitrifying bacteria, such as Pseudomonas and Bacillus, specific bacterial genera, such as Caenimonas, Helicobacter, Halomonas, Lactobacillus and Flavisolibacter, and the archaeal genus Woesearchaeota_DHVEG-6 had previously been detected in the BCS system, which might be involved in nitrogen removal and should be studied in future research. Biochar has an intensification effect on denitrification by changing microbial living environmental factors, such as oxidation-reduction potential, pH and C/N, and providing a better biological attachment condition. These findings might provide a useful method to improve nitrogen biotransformation in groundwater recharge areas and could facilitate the prediction of different types of nitrogen in underground aquifers.

When groundwater is recharged with reclaimed water, the presence of trace amounts of biorefractory pentabromodiphenyl ether (PBDE, specifically BDE-99) might cause potential groundwater pollution. A laboratory-scale column was designed to investigate the distribution of the community of archaea in this scenario and the associated anaerobic degradation of BDE-99. The concentration of BDE-99 decreased significantly as soil depth increased, and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) analysis suggested that archaea exerted significant effects on the biodegradation of PBDE. Through 454 pyrosequencing of 16s rRNA genes, we found that the distribution and structure of the archaeal community associated with anaerobic degradation of BDE-99 in the river-based aquifer media changed significantly between different soil depths. The primary debrominated metabolites varied with changes in the vertically distributed archaeal community. The archaea in the surface layer were dominated by Methanomethylovorans, and the middle layer was mainly composed of Nitrososphaera. Nitrosopumilus and Nitrososphaera were equally abundant in the bottom layer. In addition, Methanomethylovorans abundance depended on the depth of soil, and the relative abundance of Nitrosopumilus increased with increasing depth, which was associated with the oxidation-reduction potential and the content of intermediate metabolites. We propose that Nitrososphaera and Nitrosopumilus might be the key archaeal taxa mediating the biodegradation of BDE-99.