Food nutrition estimation aims to predict calories, portion size, and nutrient composition from dietary observations, supporting health monitoring and personalized nutrition management. Accurate estimation remains difficult because food appearance often provides limited information about physical scale, hidden ingredients, cooking processes, and nutrient density. Multimodal sensing and learning provide new opportunities to reduce these ambiguities by integrating visual, geometric, semantic, and sensor-based information. This paper surveys multimodal information fusion for food nutrition estimation. Different from existing surveys that mainly organize food analysis studies by tasks, input modalities, or model architectures, this survey adopts a modality-aware and problem-oriented taxonomy. It explains how different modalities support key estimation problems, including portion and scale estimation, hidden-composition inference, nutrient aggregation, and physicochemical analysis. Existing methods are classified into four categories: visual-geometric multimodal learning, semantic and knowledge-augmented estimation, compositional multimodal reasoning, and other multimodal sensing. Representative methods, datasets, evaluation metrics, applications, and Nutrition5k results are reviewed and compared. Current limitations and future research directions are then discussed from the perspectives of accuracy, interpretability, robustness, and deployment. This survey provides a structured reference for developing reliable multimodal nutrition estimation systems.
Sea cucumber male gonads are valuable by-products of sea cucumber processing. However, it remains unknown whether sea cucumber male gonads are capable of resisting testicular damage and spermatogenesis disorder. Animal experiments showed that sea cucumber male gonad peptide (SCSP) supplementation can promote the quality of sperm and the integrity of the blood-testis barrier (BTB) and maintain the normal morphological structure of both the testicles and epididymides. In addition, SCSP reduced testicular oxidative stress and decreased serum TNF-alpha and IL-6 levels by 42.27% and 22.60%, respectively. Immunohistochemical staining showed that SCSP facilitated the expression of Bcl-2, ZO-1, and occludin in testes. Correspondingly, SCSP significantly promoted the expression of Bcl-xl, tubulin, beta-catenin, and connexin 43 and decreased the expression of Bax, Bad, Caspase-3, and p-p38 MAPK. The findings of this study suggested that SCSP alleviated testicular damage and spermatogenesis disorder not only by inhibiting inflammation and cell apoptosis but also by promoting the recovery of the BTB structure by restraining the p38 MAPK signaling pathway. The findings provide potential value for exploiting future food in SCSP applications. (c) 2027 The authors. Publishing services by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of KeAi Communications Co., Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
To improve the high-value utilization of bamboo shoot shells (BSS), a two-step strategy combining sodium chlorite pretreatment and hydrolysis with a thermostable xylanase from Thermomyces lanuginosus Q231 was developed to produce xylooligosaccharides (XOS). The xylanase exhibited an optimum pH of 6.0 and an optimum temperature of 70°C, while maintaining good catalytic performance at 50–65°C. The effects of sodium chlorite concentration (1%–8%, w/v) on the chemical composition, structural characteristics, and enzymatic hydrolysis performance of BSS were investigated. The results showed that sodium chlorite selectively removed lignin in a concentration-dependent manner, thereby increasing hemicellulose exposure and xylanase accessibility while largely preserving the cellulose crystalline structure. The optimal pretreatment concentration was 6% (w/v), at which the XOS yield reached 22.30%. HPLC analysis showed that xylotetraose (X4) and xylopentaose (X5) were the major components, and the xylose/XOS ratio remained at a low level of 0.06 after 2 h of enzymatic hydrolysis, indicating high product selectivity. Under the optimized conditions, 50.50 g of XOS was obtained from 1 kg of pretreated BSS. These results suggest that the proposed process has strong potential for the valorization of BSS and offer valuable insights for further research on enzymatic XOS production from lignocellulosic residues.
Biochar, a carbon-rich porous material derived from biomass, holds significant potential for saline-alkali soil remediation and carbon sequestration. To address gaps in existing reviews regarding feedstock-soil type matching effects and the synergistic mechanisms between soil improvement and carbon sequestration, this review systematically elucidates the multi-pathway remediation mechanisms of biochar. These include improving soil physicochemical properties, promoting plant growth, regulating microbe-driven nutrient cycles, and influencing salt transport and transformation processes. Furthermore, we emphasize the dual role of biochar in carbon management: direct carbon sequestration via its recalcitrant aromatic structure and indirect emission reduction through suppressing N₂O and CH₄ fluxes, thereby establishing an integrated“amendment-sequestration” pathway. Finally, we outline targeted future research directions, including precision modification of biochar, long-term stability assessment under saline-alkali conditions, and lifecycle risk evaluation, to advance the scientific application of biochar in sustainable agricultural systems.
The Western Sichuan region lies on the southeastern margin of the Tibetan Plateau and is a key area for understanding the eastward extrusion of plateau materials and the mechanisms of regional deformation. High-resolution imaging of crustal velocity structure and azimuthal anisotropy is essential for elucidating the seismogenic environment, earthquake-generation mechanisms, and deep geodynamic processes in this region. In this study, we use travel-time data of direct Pg and Sg phases, as well as the Pn and Sn phases, recorded by the China National Seismic Network and temporary seismic stations to conduct seismic tomography. Eikonal equation-based adjoint seismic tomography method is applied to obtain new three-dimensional, high-resolution models of P- and S-wave velocities and P-wave azimuthal anisotropy. The imaging results show that the new models are generally well correlated with the major crustal tectonic units and reveal more detailed velocity anomalies and anisotropic features. High-velocity anomalies distributed along the Longmenshan fault and the Lijiang-Xiaojinhe to Jinhe-Jinghe fault divide the study area into eastern and western parts. To the west, the crust is characterized by widespread low-velocity anomalies and high Vp/Vs ratios, supporting the crustal flow model of southeastward extrusion of Tibetan Plateau material. In contrast, the low-velocity anomalies east of the Anninghe-Zemuhe fault zone differ markedly from those in the west in terms of their origin, anisotropy, and Vp/Vs characteristics. The velocity anomaly structures and anisotropic patterns in this area are more complex, indicating differences in material transport processes. These low-velocity anomalies are likely shaped by the combined effects of deep mantle convection, eastward compression of the plateau, and material intrusion, manifested as the superposition of processes such as enrichment of weak materials, partial melting, and lateral material transport. These results provide new constraints and insights into the seismogenic mechanisms and regional tectonic deformation of the Western Sichuan region.
