Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is still considered a global complementary or alternative medical system, but exogenous hazardous contaminants remain in TCM even after decocting. Besides, it is time-consuming to conduct a risk assessment of trace elements in TCMs with a non-automatic approach due to the wide variety of TCMs. Here, we present MRTCM, a cloud-computing infrastructure for automating the probabilistic risk assessment of metals and metalloids in TCM. MRTCM includes a consumption database and a pollutant database involving forty million rows of consumption data and fourteen types of TCM potentially toxic elements concentrations. The algorithm of probabilistic risk assessment was also packaged in MRTCM to assess the risks of eight elements with Monte Carlo simulation. The results demonstrated that 96.64% and 99.46% had no non-carcinogenic risk (hazard indices (HI) were < 1.0) for animal and herbal medicines consumers, respectively. After twenty years of exposure, less than 1% of the total carcinogenic risk (CR_t) was > 10^-4 for TCM consumers, indicating that they are at potential risk for carcinogenicity. Sensitivity analysis revealed that annual consumption and concentration were the main variables affecting the assessment results. Ultimately, a priority management list of TCMs was also generated, indicating that more attention should be paid to the non-carcinogenic risks of As, Mn, and Hg and the carcinogenic risks of As and Cr in Pheretima and Cr in Arcae Conch. In general, MRTCM could significantly enhance the efficiency of risk assessment in TCM and provide reasonable guidance for policymakers to optimize risk management.

Background This cross-sectional study aimed to construct a database of Chinese medicine consumption, including the annual intake, the number of days of intake, and the daily intake of Chinese medicine, which is helpful for risk assessment and understanding of consumer trends.Methods About 40 million rows of data used in this study were derived from the hospitals in Shanghai, which contains the prescription number, the name of consumers, the date of the dispensing, the name of Traditional Chinese Medicines (TCMs), dosage, and the number of days taken. All data were stored in a MySQL database. R language was used as the main tool for statistical analysis and graphical work.Results The result shows the annual consumption, annual consumption days, and average daily consumption of 20 types of common TCMs and all TCMs consumed. The result shows Astragali radix, Coicis semen, and Danshen are the top three of consumption among the selected Chinese medicines. An easy-to-use software called the Chinese medicine consumption database (CMCD) was designed to search and download consumption data. It is built using the Shiny package in the R, is free to access on any device with an internet browser, and requires no programming knowledge to be used.Conclusions A Chinese medicine consumption database was constructed, which included the consumption situation of 20 types of common TCMs and all TCMs consumed. This database plays a pivotal role in the risk assessment of the pollutants in TCMs and the prediction of the consumption trend of TCMs.

Sex-specific markers are important for genetic sex identification and sex-control breeding in aquaculture. Siniperca scherzeri (Steindachner, 1892) is an economically important freshwater fish with female-biased sexual size dimorphism, but its sex-associated genomic architecture remains poorly characterized. Here, whole-genome resequencing of 10 females and 10 males generated approximately 480 Gb of clean data and identified 55 candidate male-associated fragments using a read-presence/absence screening strategy. PCR testing identified seven candidate male-associated markers that showed male-specific amplification and complete concordance with phenotypic sex in the tested S. scherzeri cohort. Marker4, Marker5, and Marker18 showed the same amplification pattern in the tested Siniperca chuatsi (Basilewsky, 1855) and Siniperca knerii (Garman, 1912) samples. The seven amplicons mapped to a marker-enriched interval at 20.677–20.695 Mb on chromosome 14. Marker18 overlapped a partial candidate amh-family gene model; however, no male-specific sequence variant, sex-biased expression, or functional role was tested. Because all S. scherzeri samples originated from one farmed cohort of unknown pedigree and the PCR assays lacked dedicated no-template and internal amplification controls, the observed concordance should not be interpreted as established diagnostic performance. The data support a male-associated marker cluster on chromosome 14, rather than establishing a Y-specific sex-determining region or a differentiated sex chromosome. Independent population validation with appropriate assay controls, together with genome-wide structural, expression, and functional analyses, is required.

Intermuscular bones (IBs) are ossified structures within the myoseptal connective tissues of cyprinid fishes and negatively affect eating quality and processing suitability. Although runx2b has been shown to be essential for IB formation, the molecular changes associated with runx2b-mediated IB reduction or loss remain poorly understood. In this study, runx2b-edited Culter alburnus F1 individuals were generated and classified into wild-type, heterozygous mutant, and homozygous mutant groups. Skeletal staining revealed a clear genotype-associated phenotypic gradient, with normal IBs in wild-type individuals, markedly reduced IBs in heterozygous mutants, and complete IB absence in homozygous mutants. Integrated transcriptomic and proteomic analyses were then performed using matched muscle/myoseptal tissues to characterize molecular changes associated with this phenotypic gradient. Global mRNA–protein correlations were weak and DEG-DEP overlaps were limited, suggesting that transcriptomic changes alone cannot fully explain protein-level remodeling after runx2b mutation. Functional enrichment and integrated omics analysis highlighted coordinated changes in cytoskeletal organization, extracellular matrix remodeling, cell adhesion, calcium-related signaling, muscle-associated processes, and ossification-related pathways. Representative candidate molecules, including MYH1s, CDH26, PLIN5, PAH, HBA/HBB, GPX4, KRT1, GSN, LGALS9, and ANXA3, were mainly associated with structural, metabolic, and microenvironmental remodeling rather than being interpreted as direct downstream osteogenic targets of runx2b. Overall, these findings suggest that runx2b-associated IB reduction and loss may involve coordinated remodeling of the myoseptal osteogenic microenvironment rather than disruption of a single ossification pathway. This study provides a discovery-oriented multi-omics resource and a hypothesis-generating molecular model for future functional validation of IB development in cyprinid fishes.