Beijing, January 10 (China News Network) -- On January 10, the Life Science Society Consortium of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology announced the results of the 2021 "Top Ten Progress in Chinese Life Sciences", and 8 knowledge innovation projects, such as "Artificial Synthesis from Carbon Dioxide to Starch", "Research on the Mechanism of Natural Immunity and Antiviral Drugs of novel Coronavirus Escape Hosts", "Interference Single Molecule Positioning Microscopy", "New Model of Efficient and Low Toxicity Treatment to Improve the Efficacy of Advanced Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma", and 2 technological innovation projects were selected.
The latest announcement of the 2021 China Life Sciences Top Ten Progress Project Results are as follows:
Progress 1: Schematic diagram of synthetic starch. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
-- Synthesis from carbon dioxide to starch. Starch is the most important component of grain and an important industrial raw material. The Tianjin Institute of Industrial Biotechnology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, together with the Dalian Institute of Chemicals and other units, extracted the chemical nature of natural photosynthesis, designed and created an unnatural pathway from carbon dioxide to starch synthesis from scratch, solved the scientific problems of de novo calculation of pathway metabolic flow, design and assembly of key enzyme elements, precise regulation of biochemical pathways, etc., and subverted the complex biochemical process of natural photosynthesis fixed carbon dioxide synthesis of starch with 11-step reaction coupled with biocatalysis and chemical catalysis. For the first time in the world, the artificial total synthesis of carbon dioxide to starch has been realized, and the energy efficiency and rate have surpassed crops such as corn, breaking through the limitations of natural photosynthesis, opening a window for the workshop manufacture of starch, and providing new ideas for the synthesis of complex molecules of carbon dioxide raw materials. It has caused strong repercussions internationally and is considered a milestone breakthrough that will have a transformative impact on the next generation of biomanufacturing and agricultural production. The result paper was published in Science.
Progress 2: Major genetic innovations in the aquatic to terrestrial evolutionary process of vertebrates. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
Genetic innovation mechanisms for the evolution of vertebrates from aquatic to terrestrial. The evolution of vertebrates from aquatic to terrestrial more than 400 million years ago was a major event in the evolutionary history of terrestrial vertebrates, including humans, but little has been known about the mechanisms of genetic innovation for this major event for a long time. Wang Wen and Wang Kun of the School of Ecology and Environment of Northwestern Polytechnical University, together with He Shunping of the Institute of Hydrobiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Zhang Guojie of the Kunming Institute of Zoology, found that the ancestors of the teleost fish had evolved the preliminary genetic basis related to terrestrial adaptability, which was further strengthened in the flesh fin fish represented by the lungfish, and the tetrapods were finally perfected and successfully landed on land. Science reported that the results revealed "the genetic mystery of aquatic to terrestrial evolution hidden in living fish"; Professor Per Alhberg, an academician of the Swedish Academy of Sciences, wrote that the achievement overcomes the challenge of fossil research difficult to study soft tissue organs and physiological problems; Neil Shubin, an academician of the American Academy of Sciences and an internationally renowned vertebrate landing research expert, wrote that the results provide key cognitive and long-awaited data for understanding the study of aquatic to terrestrial animals in vertebrates. Two research papers were published in the journal Cell with a cover story.
Progress 3: mRNA capping status and replication correction status of the novel coronavirus transcriptional replication complex. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
The mechanism of natural immunity and antiviral drugs of the novel coronavirus escape host. The COVID-19 pandemic has been going on for two years, and the emergence of mutant strains is in dire need of the development of broad-spectrum drugs. The "transcriptional replication complex" is composed of viral replication enzymes, which is responsible for the whole process of viral transcriptional replication, which is highly conserved in each mutant strain and is the core target for the development of broad-spectrum drugs. The research group of Academician Rao Zihe and Professor Lou Zhiyong of Tsinghua University has discovered and reconstructed the complete composition of the transcriptional replication machine of the new coronavirus for the first time in the world. Based on this, for the first time, the key enzyme molecule of viral mRNA "capping" maturity was identified, answering the unanswered questions in coronavirus research for nearly 30 years, and the molecule was highly conserved in various mutant strains, and there were no homologs in the human body, providing a new target for the development of new and safe broad-spectrum antiviral drugs. At the same time, they also found for the first time that the virus "eliminated" the mismatched base and antiviral drugs in a "trans-retrospective" manner, elucidated the molecular mechanism of remdesivir and other drugs with poor efficacy, and provided a key scientific basis for optimizing antiviral drugs against polymerase. The research paper was published in the journal Cell.
Progress 4: Molecular mechanisms of transcription initiation complex recognition promoter (left) and transcriptional activation (right). Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
- Transcription initiation supercomplex assembly mechanism. Transcription initiation supercomplexes are the core of transcriptional steps in the central law, which is of great significance for understanding gene expression regulation and related physiological and pathological processes, and has always been the core and frontier issue of international life science research. Xu Yanhui's team at Fudan University analyzed the three-dimensional structure of the transcription initiation complex PIC and its transcription initiation super complex structure composed of mediater (mediator), systematically demonstrated the whole process of transcriptional machine recognition of different types of promoters and completed assembly, revealed why transcription occurs on the promoter of almost all genes, subverted the traditional understanding of promoter recognition and assembly of transcription initiation complexes, and elucidated the mechanism of Mediator to promote PIC assembly and transcriptional activation. The results were published in the journal Science in two lengthy research papers, one of which was selected as a cover article by Science, entitled "How Transcription Begins.".
Progress 5: A new model of highly effective and low-toxicity therapy with capecitabine beat chemotherapy. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
——A new model of high-efficiency and low-toxicity treatment to improve the efficacy of advanced nasopharyngeal carcinoma. Nasopharyngeal carcinoma is a tumor with "Chinese characteristics", accounting for half of the world's new cases every year. The small residual tumors of the whole body after radiotherapy are the root cause of their treatment failure, and due to the poor physical condition of patients after radiotherapy, it is difficult to tolerate the traditional chemotherapy of previous high intensity (the completion rate is only about 40%-50%), which has become a bottleneck restricting the improvement of efficacy. The ma jun research team of the Cancer Prevention and Control Center of Sun Yat-sen University proposed a beat chemotherapy model of the small-dose, long-term oral cytotoxic drug capecitabine, which can continuously inhibit tumors through mechanisms such as anti-angiogenesis and killing tumor stem cells, while improving the body's tolerance. Professor Ma Jun led a multi-center, prospective clinical study and found that the use of "capecitabine beat chemotherapy" after radiotherapy significantly reduced the risk of failure by 45%, and the incidence of serious toxic side effects was reduced by 3/5, and the completion rate reached 74%. At the same time, capecitabine oral medication is convenient and accessible, and it is easy to promote to the grass-roots level. As a result, the study broke the bottleneck of the efficacy of traditional chemotherapy and established a new standard for the international leading, efficient, low-toxicity and simple treatment of nasopharyngeal carcinoma, and its result paper was published in the journal The Lancet.
Progress 6: Heterologous tetraploid wild rice rapid de novo domestication path pattern map. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
- Heterologous tetraploid wild rice rapidly domesticated from scratch. Currently cultivated rice is domesticated from ancestral diploid wild rice over thousands of years, accompanied by a decline in genetic diversity and the loss of superior genes. Li Jiayang's team at the Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences proposed for the first time a new strategy for rapid de novo domestication of heterologous tetraploid wild rice, which provides a new feasible path for future food crises and opens up a new breeding direction. With this strategy as the blueprint, the project screened out a tetraploid high-stalk wild rice resource, established an efficient tissue culture regeneration, genetic transformation and gene editing system, assembled a high-quality reference genome, and successfully created a new tetraploid rice material for different types of improved granulation, mango, plant height, grain length, stem thickness, growth period, etc., breaking through all technical bottlenecks and demonstrating that the rapid de novo domestication strategy of heteroploid tetraploid wild rice is highly feasible. The successful cultivation of new tetraploid rice crops in the future is expected to bring a subversive revolution to world food production. The result paper was published in the journal Cell.
Progress 7: Cross-species identification atlases for RaTG13, GD/1/2019, and GX/P2V/2017. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
Cross-species identification and molecular mechanisms of coronaviruses. In the past 20 years, humanity has suffered three major outbreaks caused by the coronavirus. Most human-infecting coronaviruses originate from animals, and we found that the spread of viruses from person to person is often lagging behind, and the threshold of disease prevention and control needs to be moved forward in "time". Academician Gao Fu's team of the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has established methods for efficiently assessing the cross-species recognition ability of coronaviruses, using these methods to assess the potential risk of cross-species transmission of bat-derived coronavirus RaTG13 and pangolin-derived coronavirus GD/1/2019 and GX/P2V/2017, and elucidate the molecular mechanism of cross-species recognition, the study found that there is a potential risk of cross-species transmission of the above three coronaviruses, prompting us to continue to monitor the animal-derived coronavirus, Preventing new coronaviruses from triggering outbreaks while providing a molecular basis for understanding viral evolution. The research was published in the journal Cell and the European journal Molecular Biology.
Progress 8: Cover of the journal Nature and the migration route of the Arctic peregrine falcon. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
- Unravel the mystery of long-distance migration of birds. Bird migration is one of the most concerned natural wonders. The formation process of migration routes, maintenance mechanisms and future trends under climate change, as well as the genetic basis of migration strategies, have always been hot spots and difficulties in academic research. Zhan Xiangjiang's team at the Institute of Zoology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences spent 12 years integrating years of satellite tracking data and population genomic information to establish a continental-scale Falco peregrinus migration research system. The researchers elucidated the driving role of climate change in the formation, maintenance and future trends of bird migration routes, and found that ADCY8, a gene associated with memory ability, was positively selected in populations of peregrine falcons with longer migratory distances, revealing that long-term memory may be an important basis for long-distance migration of birds. The study comprehensively combines new research methods such as remote sensing satellite tracking, genomics, and neurobiology, and demonstrates the key role of interdisciplinary and innovative research in answering major scientific questions. The results were published in nature as a cover article and were named one of 12 annual retrospectives by the journal Nature-Ecological Evolution.
Progress 9: Interference single-molecule localization microscopy to resolve the hollow structure of cell microtubules. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
- Interference single molecule localization microscopy. The physiological processes of cells are performed by nanoscale biomolecules, so a deeper understanding of life activities requires nano-resolution imaging techniques. The technical research team composed of academician Xu Tao and Ji Wei research group of the Institute of Biophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has been focusing on the research of breakthrough optical microscopy resolution, the rose microscope developed in the early stage has increased the lateral (X-Y) resolution to the nano level, and based on the innovative principle of interference positioning, the ROSE-Z microscope has been developed, which further breaks through the axial (Z) resolution and can resolve the subcellular structure of the nanoscale, providing a powerful tool for life science research. The study shows that optical microscopy has entered the era of nano resolution, And Chinese scientists have multidisciplinary interdisciplinary technological innovation capabilities in this field, and the new super-resolution imaging equipment with independent intellectual property rights developed is in the leading position in the world. The results were published in the journal Nature Methods.
Progress 10: Whole-brain-scale morphological imaging, reconstruction, registration, analysis platforms, and processes. Courtesy of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology Life Science Society Consortium
——Whole brain single neuron diversity research and informatics big data platform. Single-neuronal precision whole-brain atlases are essential for understanding the brain. Peng Hanchuan, Gu Zhongze and Xie Wei of the Institute of Brain Science and Intelligent Technology of Southeast University have established the world's first complete whole-brain single-neuron resolution big data and informatics platform and applied it to whole mouse brain research, carrying out high-throughput neuron reconstruction, whole-brain mapping and intelligent data mining for the whole-brain three-dimensional imaging data of neurons, and based on this platform, the world's largest single-cell neuron morphological dataset has been produced, revealing for the first time the diversity of neuronal morphological subclasses based on long-range projection rules and molecular levels. It will continue to play an important role in the study of brain cell typing and function, brain connection circuits, large-scale simulation of the whole brain, brain-like computing, and new artificial intelligence algorithms and systems based on biological brains. This achievement realizes the first PB-level super-large-scale brain big data platform combining software and hardware and the first complete single-cell morphological data production line, which quantitatively proves that complete single-cell anatomy analysis is crucial to nerve cell type identification. The main scientific research results were published in the international academic journals "Nature" and "Nature-Methods".
According to the Consortium of Life Science Societies of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology, the selection of "Top Ten Advances in Life Sciences in China" has been carried out for 7 consecutive years since 2015, aiming to promote life science research and technological innovation, and fully display and publicize major scientific and technological achievements in the field of life sciences in China. After the selection results are announced every year, the experts of the selected projects are also invited to write and publish popular science books, and an exchange meeting and a science popularization report meeting for young people is held to reveal the new mysteries of the life science to the public, provide new ideas for the development of new technologies in life sciences, new breakthroughs in medicine and the development of bioeconomy, and greatly improve the social influence of life sciences and related technologies.
The 2021 annual selection continues the method of classifying and recommending and selecting the project results for knowledge innovation and technological innovation, organizing the recommendation of member societies, selected by senior experts in the fields of life sciences, biotechnology and clinical medicine, and finally determined by the presidium of the consortium of life sciences societies of the Chinese Association for Science and Technology. In the 2021 "Top Ten Progress in China's Life Sciences" selection, the number of recommended projects of the consortium member societies has increased significantly compared with previous years, and the selected projects have the characteristics of outstanding originality and great social significance. (End)