Insect oogenesis is greatly affected by nutrient availability. When nutrients are abundant, oocytes are rapidly generated, but the process is slowed to conserve energy under nutrient-deficient conditions. To properly allocate limited resources toward oogenesis, systemic factors coordinate the behavioral response of ovarian germline stem cells (GSCs) to nutritional inputs by acting on the GSC itself, GSC supporting cells (the niche), or the adipose tissue surrounding the ovary. In this review, we describe current knowledge of the Drosophila ovarian GSC-niche-adipocyte system and major nutrient sensing pathways (insulin/IGF signaling, TOR signaling, and GCN2-dependent amino acid sensing) that intrinsically or extrinsically regulate GSC responses to nutrient signals. The aim of this study was to investigate the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of seven main active components of Mahuang decoction (MHD) and its time-concentration-effect relationship. The asthmatic rat model was established by the method of ovalbumin (OVA) sensttization. The plasma concentrations of ephedrine, pseudoephedrine, methylephedrine, amygdalin, liquiritin, cinnamic acid, glycyrrhizic acid in asthmatic model rat were investigated by a selective and rapid HPLC/MS-MS method. Simultaneously, the asthma-involved cytokines including leukotrienes B4 (LTB4), thromboxane B2 (TXB2), 6-Keto-Prostaglandin F1α (6-K-PGF1α) and histamine (HIS) levels in rat plasma were determined by using ELISA. A mathematics method was applied to assess the trend of percentage rate of change among different time intervals of the seven components. The sigmoid E max function was used to establish the PK-PD modeling of MHD. The results indicated that MHD could control or ameliorate asthma. There was a hysteresis between the peaked drug concentration and maximum therapeutic effect of MHD. The PK-PD curves of MHD showed clockwise or counter-clockwise hysteresis loop. In addition, amygdalin might exert a more significant influence on regulating cytokines levels in asthmatic rats among the seven components of MHD. With high morbidity and mortality, urinary bladder cancer (BC) ranks fifth among common cancers globally. The inherent limitations of urine cytology and cystoscopy, and marginal enhancements in the rate of survival promt us to develop surrogate serum based metabolic biomarkers of screening, identification, and follow-up protocols of management for BC patients. Earlier, we exhibited that abnormal expression levels of dimethylamine (DMA), malonate, lactate, glutamine, histidine, and valine in serum may be used as signature metabolites to differentiate BC from healthy controls (HC) (J. Proteome Res. 2013; 12(12)5839-50). Here we further gauge and validate these observations by comparing pre-operative to post-operative follow-up BC patients. This study was conducted on 160 sera samples involving HC (n = 52), pre-operative (n = 55) and post-operative (n = 53) BC cases. 1H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy was used to generate serum metabolic profiles and to gauge aberrantly expressed metabolites. The targeted metabolomic approach revealed that the expression levels of these signature metabolites were progressively and significantly decreased in post-operative follow-up at the interval of 30, 60, and 90 days compared to pre-operative BC sera samples and were maintained at HC levels. Serum metabolic biomarkers appear to be an inspiring and least-invasive tactic for detection and prognosticating BC patient follow-up. V.Herein, a novel Fe3+-stabilized magnetic polydopamine composite (Fe3O4/PDA-Fe3+) was facilely constructed, systematically characterized, and subsequently applied for the first time as a versatile adsorbent for treatment of Methylene blue (MB) in complex wastewater. Results showed that as-prepared material had prominent adsorption ability toward MB in its single dye solution over a wide pH range (3-10) with qmax value of 608.8 mg/g at 318 K. More interestingly, MB could be selectively captured by resulting adsorbent from mixed dye solutions (MB-cationic dye and MB-anionic dye) and complex aqueous solution with high ionic strength up to 0.5 mol/L NaCl. It was eventually revealed that the enhanced and selective adsorption of MB by as-resultant adsorbent was due to the synergistic effects between multiple uptake mechanisms. What’s more, its adsorption efficiency toward MB in simulated wastewater still maintained higher than 80 % of its original uptake performance after several runs of adsorption-desorption. Additionally, it exhibited more superior uptake performance toward MB than commercial powder activated carbon (PAC) in column adsorption system. Thus, the outstanding sorption ability, unique capture selectivity, as well as excellent stability and recyclability for model wastewater endow it a promising candidate adsorbent for selective adsorption and separation of MB from complex wastewater. As microplastics (MPs) have become ubiquitous in both aquatic and terrestrial environments, there has been a growing concern about these new anthropogenic stressors. However, comparatively little is known about the negative effects of MPs, co-contamination of MPs and heavy metals on terrestrial organisms. The objective of this study was performed to understand the adverse effects of exposure to MPs and co-exposure to MPs and cadmium (Cd) on the earthworm Eisenia foetida (E. foetida). Results showed that exposure to MPs only or to a combination of MPs + Cd decreased growth rate and increased the mortality (>300 mg kg-1) after exposure for 42 d, with MPs + Cd (>3000 mg kg-1) posing higher negative influence on the growth of E. foetida. BAF312 Exposure to MPs might induce oxidative damage in E. foetida, and the presence of Cd accelerates the adverse effects of MPs. Furthermore, the MPs particles can be retained within E. foetida, with values of 4.3-67.2 particles·g-1 earthworm, and can increase the accumulation of Cd in earthworm from 9.7%-161.3%. Collectively, the results of this study demonstrate that combined exposure to MPs and Cd poses higher negative effects on E. foetida, and that MPs have the potential to increase the bioaccessibility of heavy metal ions in the soil environment.