Exploring the composition and structure of the faecal microbial community improves the understanding of the role of the gut microbiota in the gastrointestinal function and the egg-laying performance of hens. Therefore, detection of hen–microbial interactions can explore a new breeding marker for the selection of egg production due to the important role of the gut microbiome in the host’s metabolism and health. Recently, the gut microbiota has been recognised as a regulator of host performance, which has led to investigations of the productive effects of changes in the faecal microbiome in various animals. In the present study, a metagenomics analysis was applied to characterise the composition and structural diversity of faecal microbial communities under two selections of egg-laying performance, high (H, n = 30) and low (L, n = 30), using 16S rRNA-based metagenomic association analysis. The most abundant bacterial compositions were estimated based on the operational classification units among samples and between the groups from metagenomic data sets. The results indicated that Firmicutes phylum has higher significant (P < 0.01) in the H group than in the L group. In addition, higher relative abundance phyla of Bacteroides and Fusobacteria were estimated in the H group than the L group, contrasting the phyla of Actinobacteria, Cyanobacteria and Proteobacteria were more relative abundance in the L group. The families (Lactobacillus, Bifidobacterium, Acinetobacter, Flavobacteriaceae, Lachnoclostridum and Rhodococcus) were more abundant in the H group based on the comparison between the H and L groups. Meanwhile, three types of phyla (Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria and Cyanobacteria) and six families (Acinetobacter, Avibacterium, Clostridium, Corynebacterium, Helicobacter and Peptoclostridium) were more abundant in the L group (P < 0.01). Overall, the selection of genotypes has enriched a relationship between the gut microbiota and the egg-laying performance. These findings suggest that the faecal microbiomes of chickens with high egg-laying performance have more diverse activities than those of chickens with low egg-laying performance, which may be related to the metabolism and health of the host and egg production variation.

Rumen-protected betaine (RPB) can enhance betaine absorption in the small intestine of ruminants, while betaine can alter fat distribution and has the potential to affect the meat quality of livestock. Hence, we hypothesized that RPB might also affect the meat quality of lambs. Sixty male Hu sheep of similar weight (30.47 ± 2.04 kg) were selected and randomly subjected to five different treatments. The sheep were fed a control diet (control treatment, CTL); 1.1 g/day unprotected-betaine supplemented diet (UPB); or doses of 1.1 g/day (low RPB treatment; L-PB), 2.2 g/day (middle RPB treatment; M-PB) or 3.3 g/day (high RPB treatment; H-PB) RPB-supplemented diet for 70 days. Slaughter performance, meat quality, fatty acid and amino acid content in the longissimus dorsi (LD) muscle, shoulder muscle (SM) and gluteus muscle (GM) were measured. Compared with CTL, betaine (including UPB and RPB) supplementation increased the average daily weight gain (ADG) (P < 0.05) and average daily feed intake (P < 0.01) of lambs. Rumen-protected betaine increased ADG (P < 0.05) compared with UPB. With increasing RPB doses, the eye muscle area of the lambs linearly increased (P < 0.05). Compared with CTL, betaine supplementation decreased water loss (P < 0.05) in SM and increased pH24 in the SM (P < 0.05) and GM (P < 0.05). Compared with UPB, RPB decreased water loss in the GM (P < 0.01), decreased shear force (P < 0.05) in the LD and SM and increased the pH of the meat 24 h after slaughter (pH24). With increasing RPB doses, the shear force and b* value in the LD linearly decreased (P < 0.05), and the pH24 of the meat quadratically increased (P < 0.05). Compared with CTL, betaine supplementation increased the polyunsaturated fatty acid in the GM (P < 0.05). Compared with UPB, RPB supplementation decreased the saturated fatty acid (SFA) content in the LD (P < 0.05) and increased the unsaturated fatty acids (UFA), mono-unsaturated fatty acids and UFA/SFA ratio in the LD (P < 0.05). Compared with CTL, the content of histidine in the LD increased with betaine supplementation. Compared with UPB, RPB supplementation increased the content of total free amino acids and flavor amino acids in the LD of lambs (P < 0.05). With increasing RPB, the isoleucine and phenylalanine contents in the LD linearly increased (P < 0.05). Overall, the data collected indicated that the meat quality of lambs (especially in the LD) improved as a result of betaine supplementation, and RPB showed better effects than those of UPB.

Crystal structure and electronic structure of YMnO3 were investigated by X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy related techniques. According to the density of states (DOS), the individual interband transitions to energy loss peaks in the low energy loss spectrum were assigned. The hybridization of O 2p with Mn 3d and Y 4d analyzed by the partial DOS was critical to the ferroelectric nature of YMnO3. From the simulation of the energy loss near-edge structure, the fine structure of O K-edge was in good agreement with the experimental spectrum. The valence state of Mn (+3) in YMnO3 was determined by a comparison between experiment and calculations.

Heading date (HD) and flowering date (FD) are critical for yield potential and stability, so understanding their genetic foundation is of great significance in wheat breeding. Three related recombinant inbred line populations with a common female parent were developed to identify quantitative trait loci (QTL) for HD and FD in four environments. In total, 25 putative additive QTL and 20 pairwise epistatic effect QTL were detected in four environments. The additive QTL were distributed across 17 wheat chromosomes. Of these, QHd-1A, QHd-1D, QHd-2B, QHd-3B, QHd-4A, QHd-4B and QHd-6D were major and stable QTL for HD. QFd-1A, QFd-2B, QFd-4A and QFd-4B were major and stable QTL for FD. In addition, an epistatic interaction test showed that epistasis played important roles in controlling wheat HD and FD. Genetic relationships between HD/FD and five yield-related traits (YRTs) were characterized and ten QTL clusters (C1–C10) simultaneously controlling YRTs and HD/FD were identified. The present work laid a genetic foundation for improving yield potential in wheat molecular breeding programmes.

Section 1 of the FM14 focus on bridging the astronomy research and outreach communities - recent highlights, emerging collaborations, best practices and support structures. This paper also contains supplementary materials that point to contributed talks and poster presentations that can be found online.

In this paper, the occurrence of the stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) and its effects on stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) pulse compression in FC-40 are investigated. As the experimental medium, the characteristics of FC-40 are suitable for pulse compression. Firstly, the frequency shifts and the threshold of SRS in FC-40 are studied with a mode-locked laser system as pump source, without taking the SBS effect into account. On the basis of the experimental results, the competition between SRS and SBS as well as its effect on pulse compression is investigated. Results show that SRS gets higher gain and grows rapidly with the increase of the laser intensity by pump effect, which will result in decreasing of SBS energy reflection.

The present study investigated the effects of different levels of urea nitrogen (N) fertilizer on nutrient accumulation, in vitro rumen gas production and fermentation characteristics of forage oat straw (FOS) from oats (Avena sativa L. ‘Qinghai 444’) grown in the Tibet region of China. Fertilizer, applied at seeding (day 1), stem elongation (days 52–54) and heading (days 63–67), increased plant height and prolonged the maturity stage of the plant by 4–11 days compared with the non-fertilized control. Oat plants were harvested at maturity at the node 3–4 cm above ground, and then separated into grains and FOS. Both FOS and grain yields increased quadratically with increasing N fertilization, and their theoretical maximums occurred at the N fertilizing rates of 439 and 385 kg/ha, respectively. Increases in N fertilization did not affect the hemicellulose content of FOS, but substantially promoted the accumulation of crude protein, cellulose and lignin, resulting in a decrease in the energy content available for metabolism. A 72-h incubation of FOS with rumen fluids from lactating cows showed that increasing N resulted in FOS that showed a slower fermentation rate, decreased in vitro dry matter disappearance and lower cumulative gas production, but unchanged fermentation gas composition. Nitrogen fertilization increased the final pH in culture fluids and decreased the microbial volatile fatty acid (VFA) production. The molar proportions of acetate and propionate were not affected, but molar propionate proportion decreased linearly with increasing urea fertilization, and consequently, the ratio of lipogenic (e.g., acetate and butyrate)-to-glucogenic acids (propionate) tended to increase. In brief, increasing urea N fertilization promoted the growth of forage oats and increased the biomass yield as well as the crude protein and cellulose content of FOS. Considering the negative effect of increased lignin content on nutrient digestibility and total VFA production, the suggested range of urea N fertilization is 156–363 kg N/ha for forage oats planted in Tibet to retain the nutritive value of FOS in the rumen.

The cross-plane thermal conductivities of InGaZnO (IGZO) thin films in different morphologies were measured on three occasions within 19 months, using the 3ω method at room temperature 300 K. Amorphous (a-), semi-crystalline (semi-c-) and crystalline (c-) IGZO films were grown by pulsed laser deposition (PLD), followed by X-ray diffraction (XRD) for evaluation of film quality and crystallinity. Semi-c-IGZO shows the highest thermal conductivity, even higher than the most ordered crystal-like phase. After being stored in dry low-oxygen environment for months, a drastic decrease of semi-c-IGZO thermal conductivity was observed, while the thermal conductivity slightly reduced in c-IGZO and remained unchanged in a-IGZO. This change in thermal conductivity with storage time can be attributed to film structural relaxation and vacancy diffusion to grain boundaries.

A completely randomized experiment for planting highland barley in 36 field plots of the Lhasa Agricultural Experiment Station was applied to investigate the effect of urea nitrogen (N) fertilization levels of 0 (control), 156, 258, 363, 465 and 570 kg/ha on nutrient accumulation, in vitro rumen gas production and fermentation characteristics of highland barley straw (HBS). Each urea application was divided into three portions of 0.4, 0.3 and 0.3 and sequentially fertilized at seeding (growth stage (GS) 0), stem elongation (GS 32) and heading (GS 49), respectively. The maturity stage lasted 5–13 days longer in response to the urea N fertilization compared with the control. After removing grains, HBS biomass was harvested at maturity. The biomass yields of leaf, stem, straw and grain were increased quadratically with increasing urea N fertilization, and HBS and grain yields peaked at the estimated urea N fertilization levels of 385 and 428 kg/ha, respectively. The increase of urea N fertilization increased the accumulation of crude protein, cellulose and lignin, and decreased the content of ash and hemicellulose in HBS, resulting in a decrease of the energy content available to be metabolized. After incubating HBS for 72 h with rumen fluids from lactating cows, the urea N fertilization decreased in vitro dry matter disappearance and cumulative gas production, and slightly altered fermentation end-gas composition. Urea N fertilization decreased microbial volatile fatty acid production, but did not alter the ratio of lipogenic acetate and butyrate to glucogenic propionate. In a brief, the current urea N fertilization strategy promoted the growth of the highland barley and increased biomass yield, protein and cellulose accumulation of HBS. A urea N fertilization level ⩽385 kg/ha could be sufficient for growth of highland barley in Tibet without a consequent nutritive reduction in ruminal digestion.

We derive z phot for sources in the entire (~0.4 deg2) H-HDF-N field with the EAzY code, based on PSF-matched broad-band (U band to IRAC 4.5 μm) photometry. Our catalog consists of a total of 131,678 sources. We find σNMAD = 0.029 for non-X-ray sources. We also classify each object as a star or galaxy through SED fitting. Furthermore, we match our catalog with the 2 Ms CDF-N main X-ray catalog. For the 462 matched non-stellar X-ray sources, we improve their z phot quality (σNMAD = 0.035) by adding three additional AGN templates. We make our photometry and z phot catalog publicly available.

We hypothesized that presence of the short allele in the promoter region of the serotonin transporter would moderate the effect of early cumulative socioeconomic status (SES) risk on epigenetic change among African American youth. Contrasting hypotheses regarding the shape of the interaction effect were generated using vulnerability and susceptibility frameworks and applied to data from a sample of 388 African American youth. Early cumulative SES risk assessed at 11–13 years based on parent report interacted with presence of the short allele to predict differential methylation assessed at age 19. Across multiple tests, a differential susceptibility perspective rather than a diathesis–stress framework best fit the data for genes associated with depression, consistently demonstrating greater epigenetic response to early cumulative SES risk among short allele carriers. A pattern consistent with greater impact among short allele carriers also was observed using all cytosine nucleotide–phosphate–guanine nucleotide sites across the genome that were differentially affected by early cumulative SES risk. We conclude that the short allele is associated with increased responsiveness to early cumulative SES risk among African American youth, leading to epigenetic divergence for depression-related genes in response to exposure to heightened SES risk among short allele carriers in a “for better” or “for worse” pattern.

In this study, we have investigated various approaches to improve CIGS solar cells after thin film deposition. CIGS devices have been fabricated by a hydrazine solution based process. Post-deposition treatments by sulfurization were studied with focuses on the change of material structures and physical properties. Sulfurization has shown to increase grain size and band gap of the absorber layers at higher temperatures. This property change has shown a direct impact on open circuit voltage of the solar cell devices. Through these post-deposition processes, improved quality of CIGS materials can be obtained and the associated solar cell devices show better performance.

The front surface of dielectric passivated silicon wafers were spray coated with polyacrylic acid (PAA) using an ultrasonic coating system. A simple model was proposed to correlate the degree of coverage with the number of spray passes. The sprayed PAA films enabled good etching of the dielectric, using a process referred to as aerosol jet etching (AJE), despite the fact that the PAA thickness was non-uniform over the substrate. The AJE tip-to-substrate distance and diameter of the tip were tuned to balance process throughput and the etched line width. Controlling the level of condensation in the aerosol jet printer (AJP) fluid path was critical for etching 156-mm pseudo square silicon wafers.