Grafting improves tomato yield under low nitrogen conditions by enhancing nitrogen metabolism in plants.

To alleviate the effects of increasingly severe environmental conditions and meet the increasing demand for organic agricultural products, this paper studied tomato grafting under low nitrogen conditions in an effort to enhance yield and improve fruit quality by enhancing nitrogen metabolism. In this study, we screened for two tomato genotypes, a high nitrogen use efficiency genotype ('TMS-150') and a low nitrogen use efficiency genotype ('0301111'), using rootstocks from 25 tomato genotypes and studied the effects of tomato grafting on plant yield, fruit quality, nitrogen content, activities of key nitrogen metabolism enzymes, and nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) under different nitrogen fertilizer conditions. The results showed that the yield of the tomato plants, the activities of key enzymes during nitrogen metabolism, the contents of different forms of nitrogen, and the efficiency of nitrogen use were lower at low nitrogen fertilization levels and higher at higher nitrogen fertilization levels, while the measured indicators were the highest under the N40 nitrogen fertilizer treatment. Grafting tomatoes with high-NUE tomato seedlings as the rootstock resulted in significant increases in the nitrogen content and the activity of key enzymes, enhanced the NUE of tomato plants, increased tomato yield, and improved fruit quality compared to those of the seedlings grafted with low-NUE rootstock. Our results indicate that tomato plants grafted with high-NUE rootstock presented enhanced absorption and utilization of nitrogen and increased plant yield by promoting nitrogen metabolism at different nitrogen levels.

Serum proteomes of hypertension patients with abundant phlegm-dampness.

OBJECTIVE: To study the serum proteomes of essential hypertension (EH) patients with abundant phlegm-dampness, and try to find special proteins associated with abundant phlegm-dampness syndrome. METHODS: Fifty-nine hypertension patients were included, and the patients were divided into abundant phlegm-dampness syndrome group (39 cases) and non-phlegm-dampness syndrome group (20 cases). To find the special proteins associated with abundant phlegm-dampness, the EH patients with non-phlegm-dampness and another 30 healthy persons were regarded as control. Weak cation nano-magnetic beads were used to capture proteins in serum, and proteomic fingerprint was made by matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS). All the proteomic fingerprints were analyzed by Biomarker Wizard 3.1 Software. Then Biomarker Patterns Software (BPS) 5.0 was used to identify the differentiated proteins, which could induce phlegm-dampness. RESULTS: There were 102 differentiated protein peaks between abundant phlegm-dampness and the control group. The best markers of abundant phlegm-dampness were protein peaks with the mass to charge ratio (m/z) of 9,334.958 m/z (the expression increased), 9,280.191 m/z (the expression decreased), 8,030.794 m/z (the expression increased), and 2,941.551 m/z (the expression increased). These four protein peaks found by BPS could induce abundant phlegm-dampness. They could be used to separate the abundant phlegm-dampness syndrome from the healthy persons and the hypertension patients with non-phlegm-dampness. The sensitivity of the model was 93.103% (27/29), specificity was 92% (23/25), false positive rate was 8% (2/25), false negative rate was 6.897% (2/29) and Youden's index was 85.103%. Blind test data indicated a sensitivity of 90% (9/10) and a specificity of 88% (22/25), and the false positive rate was 12% (3/25), false negative rate was 10% (1/10), and Youden's index was 78%. CONCLUSION: The differentiated proteins between the abundant phlegm-dampness group and the control group are the material foundation of abundant phlegm-dampness. The selected differentiated proteins can be used to distinguish the EH patients with abundant phlegm-dampness from the healthy persons and the EH patients with non-phlegm-dampness. The molecular biology diagnosis model can offer an objective and accurate way for TCM syndrome differentiation.