GATA transcription factors play important roles in plant development as well as light and hormone responses. Carrot is a kind of valuable root vegetable. The above-ground part of the carrot is affected by light during growth, which in turn affects the growth status of taproots. The functions of GATA factors have been characterized in several plant species. Little is known about the GATA factors in carrot biological process. In this study, 30 GATA family members were first identified in the carrot genome and classified into four subfamilies, named A-GATA, B-GATA, C-GATA, and D-GATA. C-GATA and D-GATA have specific functional motifs suggesting evolutionary conservation among plants. Predicted cis-elements of GATA factors revealed their potential hormone-responsive and light-responsive functions. Among them, B-GATA has been studied extensively and is represented by the GNC and GNL genes. There were three GNC/GNL homologs in carrot: DcGATA18, DcGATA20, and DcGATA22. Functional analysis revealed that the GNC homolog gene DcGATA20 was mainly expressed in carrot leaves, followed by petioles, and was barely detectable in taproots. Overexpression of DcGATA20 exhibited promotion of chlorophyll accumulation and increased the expression levels of DcGUN4 and DcCHLI1, along with a significant increase in expression of the transcription factor, DcGLK1, which is important for chlorophyll synthesis. In addition, the expression of the chlorophyll degradation gene DcSGR1 (STAY GREEN 1) was decreased. These results indicated that GNC genes exhibit functional conservation in carrot and may be helpful for understanding other GATA members' functions.
Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) is a major horticultural crop and an important model for studying fruit development and stress adaptation. Climate-induced stresses, including drought, salinity, heat, and oxidative damage, pose significant challenges to tomato productivity, emphasizing the need to understand molecular mechanisms that integrate stress responses with developmental processes. Bcl-2-associated athanogene (BAG) proteins, highly conserved co-chaperones, have emerged as key regulators at the intersection of proteostasis, signaling, and programmed cell death. However, despite their emerging importance, comprehensive studies reviewing BAG co-chaperones in tomato are still limited. In this review, we summarize the current knowledge on BAG proteins in tomato, focusing on their structural features, evolutionary divergence from animal BAGs, and functional roles in development and stress tolerance. We examined how SlBAGs interact with Hsp70 chaperones, MAPK signaling cascades, calcium/calmodulin pathways, and the ubiquitin-proteasome system to coordinate cellular responses under diverse abiotic stresses. Special attention is given to their involvement in reactive oxygen species regulation, programmed cell death, senescence, and fruit ripening. Furthermore, we highlighted the gaps in functional characterization, post-translational regulation, and field-level validation of SlBAGs. Finally, we discussed the emerging strategies, including multi-omics approaches, genome editing, and translational breeding, to harness the genetic potential of SlBAGs for developing climate-resilient, high-yielding, and quality-enhanced tomato cultivars.
The transition to sustainable agriculture requires technologies that simultaneously enhance crop yields and reduce environmental impacts. Solar-driven nitrate valorization, when coupled with CO2 capture from industrial flue gas, presents a promising dual strategy for producing high-value fertilizers while mitigating carbon emissions. However, its practical implementation is hindered by two interrelated challenges: (i) the intermittent nature of solar irradiation and (ii) the competitive hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), which severely compromises Faradaic efficiency (FE) of desired nitrogenous products. Here, we address these challenges by designing a heterogeneous CuPd electrocatalyst featuring an amorphous/crystalline heterojunction. This catalyst suppresses HER across a broad potential window (-0.4 to -1.4 V), maintaining >80% FE(ammonia) for >100 h. The catalytic robustness enables stable solar-powered electrolysis even under low irradiation (0.4 sun), achieving >70% FE(ammonia) and 6% solar-to-fuel conversion efficiency, while catholyte simultaneously captures CO2 at a rate of 6-20 mg h-1. Techno-economic analysis demonstrates cost competitiveness against biological counterparts. When applied to plant cultivation, this artificial photosynthesis system boosts solar-to-biomass conversion efficiency by 3.5-fold compared to natural photosynthesis. By unifying solar energy harvesting, waste nitrate reduction, and carbon sequestration, our work provides a scalable blueprint for a closed-loop agrochemical ecosystem and advanced catalyst design for intermittent renewable-powered electrosynthesis.
Carotenoids are essential pigments in the plant photosynthetic apparatus, functioning in light harvesting, photoprotection, and signal transduction, and serving as precursors of vital nutrients such as vitamin A. Phytoene synthase (PSY) is the first rate-limiting enzyme in the plant carotenoid biosynthetic pathway, and its transcriptional regulation primarily depends on cis-acting promoter elements, associated transcription factors, and epigenetic status. The PSY promoter region contains core cis-elements as well as multiple light-, hormone-, and stress-responsive elements, which collectively function as key regulatory sites governing spatiotemporal expression. This review systematically summarizes recent advances in PSY promoter regulation by plant hormones (e.g., abscisic acid, ethylene, jasmonic acid), environmental factors (light signaling, temperature, salinity, and drought), and epigenetic mechanisms (DNA methylation, histone modifications, and chromatin remodeling). In addition, the application of transgenic and biotechnological approaches to PSY promoter regulation is further summarized. Including promoter sequence engineering with precise editing of cis-elements and promoter-targeted CRISPR activation/interference (CRISPRa/i) for tunable transcriptional control. Emphasis is placed on how these signals are integrated at the promoter level. Deeper insights into these mechanisms will provide both theoretical foundations and practical strategies for enhancing carotenoid accumulation and stress tolerance in crops through molecular design.
Medicinal plants are widely used for applications in agriculture, food, medicine, and cosmetics due to their abundant bioactive secondary metabolites (SMs) such as terpenoids, phenylpropanoids, and alkaloids. The biosynthesis and accumulation of SMs are highly associated with multiple environmental factors. Among these abiotic stresses, drought plays a pivotal role in regulating the quality of medicinal plants. Understanding the regulatory mechanisms of medicinal plants in response to drought is beneficial for (i) cultivating high-quality traditional Chinese medicinal plants via targeted water management strategies; (ii) screening candidate marker genes to breed high-quality novel cultivars with enhanced bioactive compound accumulation under drought conditions, thereby addressing the adverse impacts of drought induced by global climate change; (iii) mining dual-functional genes that confer drought tolerance while maintaining high bioactive compound content, thus ensuring both the yield and quality of medicinal plants. To summarize the latest advances in the transcriptional regulation of SM biosynthesis with a focus on terpenoids, phenylpropanoids, and alkaloids in medicinal plants under drought conditions. A comprehensive literature search was conducted in three electronic databases including PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science using the search terms "regulatory mechanism", "secondary metabolites", "medicinal plants", "drought stress", "transcription factor", "bioactive compound", "synthetic biology", "smart irrigation", "terpenoid biosynthesis", "phenylpropanoid biosynthesis", "phenolic biosynthesis" and "alkaloid biosynthesis". All the retrieved data were then critically reviewed and summarized. Drought affects secondary metabolite biosynthesis via a complex molecular regulatory network, including shifts in microbial community composition, epigenetic remodeling, changes in global gene expression profiles, altered catalytic activity of core biosynthetic enzymes, as well as modifications of transcription factors. This review offers novel insights into unraveling the underlying transcriptional regulatory networks, and practical implications for researchers in the fields of medicinal plant biology, natural product chemistry, and crop stress physiology.
Streptococcus suis (S. suis, SS), a significant zoonotic pathogen, causes large-scale swine epidemics and substantial economic losses. Based on capsule antigen differences, at least 29 serotypes have been identified. Given that existing commercial vaccines target only serotypes 2 or a few others, and lack immunoprotection against serotype 9, this study designed and developed a bivalent inactivated candidate vaccine to cover serotypes 2 and 9, evaluation of the protective efficacy of weaning piglets. The vaccinated piglets were in normal condition without adverse reactions and deaths, indicating that the vaccine was very safe. Experimental vaccine induced significantly higher levels of specific antibodies than the commercial vaccine. Further pathogenicity tests confirmed that the vaccine exhibited 100% immunoprotection efficacy against both Streptococcus suis serotype 2 and serotype 9 strains, and significantly reduced mortality and clinical severity of disease following infection with these two bacterial strains. According to a search of the public literature, this study provides evidence that the bivalent vaccine demonstrates no less than the efficacy of existing commercial vaccines, while exhibiting high safety and superior immunoprotection efficacy, offering a reliable technical solution for the prevention and control of co-infection with Streptococcus suis type 2 and type 9.
Considering the devastating effect of salt stress on crops the present study investigates the regulatory role of exogenous silymarin in enhancing antioxidant defense system and morpho-physiology of Brassica napus under salt stress. Twenty-three-day-old rapeseed (Brassica napus cv. BARI Sarisha-18) plants were supplemented with a foliar spray of 250 ppm silymarin followed by two doses of NaCl, viz. 75 and 150 mM. This growing condition was maintained for the following 30 days. Salinity resulted in reduced biomass production, growth attributes, and relative water content of rapeseed plants with increased levels of Na+ ions, hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), lipid peroxidation, electrolyte leakage (EL), and proline (Pro) content. This led to oxidative damage by suppressing the activities of antioxidant enzymes. Silymarin reduced lipid peroxidation, H2O2, EL, and Pro content by 23, 15, 9, and 17%, respectively in 150 mM NaCl-stressed plants compared to their corresponding controls. The activities of glyoxalase, as well as antioxidant enzymes such as ascorbate peroxidase, monodehydroascorbate reductase, dehydroascorbate reductase, glutathione reductase, catalase, glutathione peroxidase, glutathione S-transferase, peroxidase, lipoxygenase, and superoxide dismutase were also upregulated due to silymarin application. Findings from the current study suggest that salt-induced rapeseed plants exhibited reduced growth attributes alongside elevated oxidative stress markers, including both enzymatic and non-enzymatic antioxidants. Furthermore, it highlights the potential of silymarin as a potential growth regulator and antioxidant that can enhance salt tolerance in rapeseed plants by reducing the harmful effects of reactive oxygen species.
Wild isolates of Toxoplasma gondii may exhibit different virulence characteristics and host adaptability compared with those of laboratory strains. In this study, we isolated a novel rodent-derived T. gondii strain, denoted TgRodGz1, and evaluated its pathogenic features. TgRodGz1 was isolated from T. gondii-positive wild rodents in Guangdong Province and compared with the RH and Me49 strains in C57BL/6 mice. Virulence and intestinal injury were evaluated by survival analysis, brain cyst quantification, histopathology, tight junction assessment and qPCR. Gut microbiota and metabolic alterations were analyzed by metagenomic sequencing and LC-MS/MS-based metabolomics. Compared with theT. gondii laboratory strains RH and Me49, TgRodGz1 was associated with more pronounced intestinal injury, including villus atrophy, barrier disruption and downregulation of tight junction proteins and increased gut permeability and inflammation. Metagenomic analysis revealed significant intestinal flora dysbiosis, with a marked reduction in beneficial bacteria and expansion of pathogenic bacteria. Metabolomic analysis revealed suppression of arachidonic acid (ARA) metabolism during TgRodGz1 infection. Supplementation with ARA did not directly inhibit parasite growth but significantly alleviated intestinal lesions, reduced brain cyst burden and attenuated inflammatory responses, including microglial activation. These findings suggest that TgRodGz1 represents a distinct T. gondii genotype associated with pronounced intestinal pathology and suggest that ARA supplementation may alleviate intestinal and neuroinflammatory changes associated with T. gondii infection.
Selective breeding over thousands of years has prioritized aboveground yield, with little regard for changes belowground. Roots underpin plant growth and resilience, but our knowledge of these critical structures lags behind that of aboveground structures. Accurately phenotyping root traits is labor-intensive, expensive, and often destructive. High-throughput, nondestructive methods are required to advance understanding of the fundamental biology of root systems and to integrate hard-to-measure root traits into breeding programs. We used American licorice (Glycyrrhiza lepidota Pursh.), a perennial legume with a rich ethnobotanical history, as a model to investigate root system phenotypes. We assessed root traits across multiple populations, analyzed relationships between above- and belowground phenotypes, and tested the use of multidimensional leaf traits, including spectral reflectance, in predicting root traits. Root traits of American licorice varied significantly across source populations. Root traits were strongly intercorrelated and each root trait correlated with an aboveground phenotype. Leaf spectral reflectance and elemental composition predicted belowground traits; however, interpretation of some trait-specific signals were complicated by isometric scaling between plant size and root traits. These findings demonstrate the use of high-dimensional leaf traits as a proxy for root traits, with potential applications for understanding foundational questions in plant biology and in breeding programs targeting belowground structures of perennial herbaceous species. Further optimization and larger studies are needed to improve predictive models.
Early diagnosis of plant leaf diseases plays an important role in protecting crop yields and supporting sustainable agriculture. This paper proposes an improved DeepFusionNet model optimized through a hybrid Flower Pollination Algorithm and Butterfly Optimization Algorithm, balancing global exploration with local refinement for faster and more stable convergence. The model combines DenseNet201 and MobileNetV2 by compressing their final convolutional feature maps with 1×1 convolutions and fusing them along the channel dimension to form a compact and discriminative representation. This fused representation is then classified using a Random Forest classifier. This framework consistently achieves high accuracy on all eight datasets, with performance ranging between 97.07% and 99.66%. Extensive experiments are performed that include statistical validation, convergence studies, and reliability tests to prove the robustness of the approach. Furthermore, to make it practically useful, the whole system is embedded into a mobile application capable of real-time disease detection and providing actionable recommendations to farmers for the effective treatment and prevention of diseases.
Early institutional rearing is associated with adverse biological and health outcomes in later life, including accelerated cellular aging as measured by telomere length. However, the extent to which foster care intervention can mitigate these risks, and whether telomere dynamics predict cardiometabolic health in young adulthood remains unclear. The present study aimed to estimate the association between early institutional care, randomization to foster care (intent-to-treat), and longitudinal changes in telomere length from ages 12-22 years among participants of the Bucharest Early Intervention Project (BEIP), and to determine whether the rate of telomere shortening predicts cardiometabolic health in early adulthood. The study included 156 BEIP participants who had been randomly assigned to either foster care or care-as-usual, with an additional comparison group of never-institutionalized peers. Buccal DNA was collected, and telomere length (T/S ratio) was measured at two to five timepoints between the ages 12 and 22. Cardiometabolic health at age 22 was assessed using metabolic z-scores and criteria for metabolic syndrome. Participants assigned to foster care exhibited a significantly slower decline in telomere length over the 10-year period compared to those in care-as-usual. Ever-institutionalized and never-institutionalized groups had similar overall patterns of telomere decline. Sex-specific analyses indicated that among the foster care group, males had shorter telomere length at age 12 than females, but rates of telomere shortening were similar between sexes over time. The rate of telomere attrition between ages 12 and 22 was not associated with cardiometabolic outcomes at age 22. Foster care intervention during early childhood may protect against telomere shortening among previously institutionalized children, highlighting its role in buffering the long-term impact of early adversity on cellular aging. However, variation in telomere shortening during adolescence and young adulthood did not predict cardiometabolic risk at age 22.
Intrinsic apoptosis is a form of programmed cell death that underpins development, tissue homeostasis and stress responses across Metazoa. In roundworms (nematodes), the pathway was first genetically defined in the free-living nematode Caenorhabditis elegans, yet how it has diversified and operates across the phylum Nematoda, encompassing parasites of humans and animals spanning clades IV, remains incompletely resolved. Here, we synthesise comparative genomic, structural and functional evidence to establish a framework for intrinsic apoptosis in nematodes. Although the core CED-9-CED-4-CED-3 module is broadly retained, regulatory wiring and developmental deployment remain largely uncharacterised beyond C. elegans. Unlike vertebrates, nematodes lack a canonical BAX/BAK-driven mitochondrial permeabilisation system, revealing what we term the "Nematode Apoptosis Paradox" - caspase activation in the absence of the mitochondrial amplification step central to vertebrate intrinsic apoptosis. This alternative regulatory configuration, coupled with structural divergence of nematode BCL-2-like proteins from their vertebrate homologues, suggests a distinctive evolutionary trajectory for apoptotic regulation in Nematoda. By integrating evolutionary cell biology with emerging structural and pharmacological insights, we define a conceptual framework for interrogating apoptosis across clades IV and evaluate its potential as a target for anthelmintic discovery.
Incidental cetacean bycatch provides irreplaceable opportunities to investigate population dynamics, mortality, and health. This multidisciplinary study examined morphology, age, gut microbiome, heavy metals, and gastrointestinal polymer-related materials in an immature male Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops aduncus, 248 cm, 114 kg, 5 years) accidentally captured in the East China Sea. Morphometrics indicated excellent body condition (BCI = 0.506) and superior dorsal fin shape compared to captive individuals, highlighting the role of natural environments in development. The gut microbiome was dominated by Proteobacteria and Firmicutes, showing segment-specific variation. Heavy metals accumulated mainly as Cd in kidneys and Cu and Zn in liver, with overall levels lower than those in other Chinese marine regions. LDIR analysis indicated the presence of polymer-related materials in the gastrointestinal tract, including reported matches to polyamide and chlorinated polyethylene, which may be associated with fisheries activities. These findings provide critical baseline ecotoxicological data for the East China Sea and underscore the importance of standardized passive biomonitoring networks that transform bycatch events into valuable scientific and conservation resources.
A series of α-methylene-γ-butyrolactone derivatives (A1-A23, B1-B23, and C1-C2) bearing a diaryl ether moiety were designed and synthesized. Bioassays revealed that several target compounds demonstrated potent fungicidal and bactericidal activities, particularly against Phytophthora capsici and Pseudomonas syringae pv actinidiae (Psa). Notably, compound C2 (EC50 = 0.74 mg/L) exhibited the highest antioomycete activity against P. capsici and admirable in vivo activities (protective activity of 100.0% and curative activity of 84.2%) against P. capsici. Meanwhile, compound A10 (EC50 = 11.38 mg/L) showed the strongest antibacterial activity against Psa and significant protective activity (74.4%) against kiwifruit bacterial canker. Preliminary mechanistic studies of P. capsici suggested that compound C2 exerts its bioactivity primarily by binding to respiratory chain complex III, thereby inhibiting mitochondrial ATP synthesis and impairing fungal energy metabolism. This work provides valuable insights for the development of MBL derivatives incorporating a diaryl ether moiety as promising novel agricultural fungicidal and bactericidal agents.
Chitin is the second most abundant polysaccharide in nature, and its degradation by marine microorganisms plays a critical role in the global carbon and nitrogen cycles. This study investigated the marine bacterium Microbulbifer harenosus CGMCC 1.13584T to elucidate its chitin metabolic pathway through genomic and transcriptomic analyses. When cultured with chitin as the carbon source, the strain exhibited an extended lag phase and enhanced extracellular chitinase activity. Genome sequencing revealed the presence of genes involved in both hydrolytic and oxidative chitin degradation pathways. Transcriptomic analysis showed that genes associated with the hydrolytic pathway were significantly upregulated upon chitin induction. In contrast, within the oxidative degradation pathway, only early-stage response genes (such as those encoding LPMOs) were markedly upregulated, while genes involved in subsequent metabolic steps (converting GlcNAc1A to KDG-6-P) did not show significant upregulation. Furthermore, a gene encoding a GH10 domain-containing protein was found to be substantially upregulated during growth on chitin. These findings indicate that Microbulbifer harenosus CGMCC 1.13584T utilizes a coordinated chitin degradation mechanism, where the hydrolytic pathway dominates carbon flux during active growth, while the oxidative pathway (via LPMOs) likely provides critical initial structural disruption.
This study investigated the effects of Bacillus-based biotics and enzyme cocktails on growth performance, physiological homeostasis, and the intestinal ecosystem in broilers fed a standardized dietary matrix. A total of 105 one-day-old male broilers were assigned to five dietary treatments: (1) CON (basal diet), (2) A (0.05% probiotics), (3) B (0.1% one-strain synbiotics), (4) C (0.1% two-strain synbiotics), and (5) D (0.1% enzyme cocktail). No significant differences were observed in body weight or average daily gain across treatments, although phase-specific differences in average daily feed intake were detected (p < 0.05). Serum biochemical parameters and total bile acid concentrations remained stable, indicating physiological homeostasis. In the fermentation microenvironment, ileal butyrate concentrations tended to increase in Treatment C compared with CON (p = 0.10). In addition, Treatment C significantly increased the duodenal villus height-to-crypt depth ratio (p < 0.05). Most notably, beta-diversity analysis using Jaccard distance and Bray-Curtis dissimilarity revealed a significant reconfiguration of the cecal microbial community (p < 0.05), with Treatments C and D exhibiting the most distinct clustering patterns. Although dietary biotics and enzyme cocktails altered intestinal morphology and microbial beta-diversity, and showed limited modulation of the fermentation microenvironment, these shifts did not translate into systemic growth enhancement.
The challenge in achieving simultaneous electrochemical detection of multiple phytohormones stems from the intricacies involved in delineating oxidation mechanisms of multiple phytohormones, along with the precise delineation of peaks in the electrochemical profiles. Electron-rich phytohormones, which readily participate in electron transfer reactions, possess strong electron-donor properties and can drive redox processes in signal transduction. This work reports electrochemical simultaneous detection of multiple electron-rich phytohormones (indole-3-acetic acid, salicylic acid, and naphthaleneacetic acid) on a portable flexible sensor and virtual visualization. The approach integrates electrochemical investigations with theoretical computations to decipher the intricate oxidation mechanisms of these electron-rich phytohormones at the sensor interface. The number of electrons and protons transferred during the redox processes of the three electron-rich phytohormones were individually quantified via electrochemical method. Furthermore, through calculations and analysis of electronic structure properties-frontier orbital distribution, Fukui function, electroactive sites and oxidation reaction energy barriers-the structure-activity relationship governing the molecular oxidation process is clearly elucidated. This work not only establishes an experimental and virtual visualization platform for the rapid multicomponent electron-rich phytohormones electro-analysis, but also provides an in-depth clarification of their interfacial reaction mechanisms and electron transfer pathways. It reveals distinct differences in the electrochemical behaviors of these phytohormones, thereby advancing the field from empirical monitoring toward rationally designed detection systems.
Discovering specific microbial markers and probiotics related to rapid growth offers a route for developing targeted feed solutions. This study was conducted in two phases: Phase I: Using 16 S rRNA sequencing to characterize the intestinal landscape and to discover a significant taxonomic shift in koi (Cyprinus carpio) that grow fast (FG) and grow slow (SG). Phase II: A dietary intervention trial was implemented across four experimental cohorts: a negative control (NC) fed a basal diet and three treatment groups (C1, C2, and C3) supplemented with Exiguobacterium sp. strain WY(Y)3 at escalating concentrations of 1 × 106, 1 × 107, and 1 × 108 CFU/g, respectively. The FG fish (11.44 ± 0.61 cm; 20.81 ± 1.33 g) harbored markedly higher proportions of Cyanobacteriota, Actinobacteriota, Chloroflexota, and notably Exiguobacterium sp., alongside enhanced metabolic pathways related to secondary metabolite biosynthesis compared with the SG fish. A piscine-derived strain, Exiguobacterium sp. WY(Y)3, isolated from the FG, significantly improved growth performance when supplemented in feed, with the 1 × 106 CFU/g producing the best overall outcomes (WGR = 186.26 ± 1.07 and FCR = 1.437 ± 0.08), including higher gut microbial diversity and stability. Integrated microbiome and metabolomic analyses revealed that supplementation with Exiguobacterium enhances growth performance by reshaping gut microbial composition and regulating host energy metabolism. This includes the downregulation of fatty acid β-oxidation and pyruvate metabolism pathways, alongside the upregulation of bile acid synthesis and vitamin-associated pathways (p < 0.05). Collectively, dietary inclusion of 1 × 106 CFU/g of Exiguobacterium sp. WY(Y)3 effectively promotes growth through microbiota restructuring and metabolic optimization, supporting its potential as a probiotic in aquaculture nutrition.
Climate-driven heat stress disrupts metabolic homeostasis in livestock, yet the molecular mechanisms underlying adaptive responses remain poorly understood. Here, we integrated newly generated plasma metabolomic data from 111 heat-stressed cows with previously published whole-genome sequencing datasets from the same animals, identifying 30 metabolic markers and 27 copy number variations (CNVs) associated with 25 candidate genes involved in the regulation of these metabolites. Notably, a CNV hotspot encompassing CIITA emerged as a key pleiotropic locus strongly associated with acylcarnitine levels, body weight, and rectal temperature. Heat exposure suppressed CIITA expression in skeletal muscle, correlating with impaired myogenic development. We demonstrate that CIITA overexpression in vitro induces coordinated remodeling of cell cycle-related gene expression and partially alleviates heat-induced inhibition of myoblast proliferation. Moreover, CIITA overexpression markedly suppresses long-chain fatty acid β-oxidation and mitochondrial electron transport activity, accompanied by reduced adenosine triphosphate production, suggesting that CIITA may limit metabolic heat generation by constraining mitochondrial metabolic flux. Overall, these findings position CIITA as a central integrative regulator linking immune function, energy metabolism, and cell proliferation during bovine adaptation to heat stress, and highlight a potential genetic target for improving thermotolerance in livestock.