We give a simple proof of the Chen inequality for the Chen invariant $\underbrace{\delta (2,...,2)}_{k\mbox{ terms}}$ of submanifolds in Riemannian space forms.

The Chen circuit system, a three-dimensional autonomous system with intriguing dynamics, has gained considerable attention due to its potential applications in diverse scientific fields. In this article, a Chen circuit-like system is defined and a comprehensive dynamics has been studied. The system exhibits chaotic dynamics, limit cycles, and bifurcations, making it a captivating subject of study. By employing numerical simulations and analytical techniques, we explore the system's stability and identify critical parameter values leading to qualitative changes. Notably, we delve Hopf bifurcations, which give rise to stability changes and the emergence of limit cycles. Furthermore, we analyze the fractal dimension of the system's attractor, providing insights into its complexity and self-similarity. Through a systematic examination of the Chen circuit-like system, we deepen our understanding of its intricate dynamics and offer valuable insights into the underlying mechanisms. The findings contribute to the field of dynamical systems and hold potential implications in areas such as chaos-based secure communications, signal processing, and nonlinear control. This work serves as a valuable reference for researchers and practitioners interested in the dynamics and bifurcation analysis of nonlinear systems.

This paper presents a hybrid probability distribution known as the FCD, which is based on the hazard functions of the Fréchet and Chen distributions. A notable characteristic of the FCD is its ability to model monotonic (increasing and decreasing) and non-monotonic (bathtub-shaped) behaviors, commonly linked to electrical and electronic device failure times in reliability analysis. The paper explores the statistical properties relevant to the reliability analysis of these devices. It proposes a Maximum Likelihood Estimator (MLE) and Bayesian Analysis equations for estimating the parameters of the FCD. Three case studies of electronic device lifetimes with varying behaviors were analyzed to validate the proposed methodology. The FCD was compared to other distributions with similar characteristics, and the results from each case study demonstrated that the proposed distribution yields competitive outcomes, closely reflecting the behavior of the devices analyzed, making it a valuable option for reliability engineering practitioners in warranty and maintenance time evaluations

Image encryption is increasingly becoming an important area of research in information security and network communications, as digital images are widely used in various applications and are vulnerable to various types of attacks. In this research work, a color image cryptosystem that is based on a 3-layer permutation-substitution network (PSN) is proposed. For every layer, an encryption key and an S-box are generated and utilized. Those are based on a four-dimensional (4D) dynamical Chen system of a fractional-order, the Mersenne Twister, OpenSLL, Rule 30 Cellular Automata and Intel’s MKL. The sequential application of Shannon’s ideas of diffusion and confusion for 3 times guarantees a total distortion of any input plain image, resulting in a totally encrypted one. Apart from the excellent and comparable performance to counterpart algorithms from the literature, showcasing resistance to visual, statistical, entropy, differential, known plaintext and brute-force attacks, the proposed image cryptosystem provides an exceptionally superior performance in 2 aspects: a vast key space of 2^1658 and an average encryption rate of 3.34 Mbps. Furthermore, the proposed image cryptosystem is shown to successfully pass all the tests of the NIST SP 800 suite.

Abiogenic hydrocarbons are fundamentally important for understanding the deep microbial communities and the origin of life. The generation of abiogenic hydrocarbons was proposed to be limited to ultramafic-hosted hydrothermal systems, fueled by the serpentinization product H₂. Here, we present the discharge of short-chain alkanes from an andesitic rock-hosted Lutao geothermal field in the north Luzon arc, carrying abiotic chemical and isotopic signals. These abiogenic hydrocarbons were generated from CO₂-H₂O-rich fluid inclusions, where the long-term storage since Lutao volcanism (~ 1.3 Ma) allowed overcoming the sluggish kinetics of CO₂ to CH₄ reduction at temperatures of 174 - 206 ^oC. Natural abiogenic production of hydrocarbons, therefore, can be more ubiquitous than previously thought. The hypothesis regarding the origin of methane in Earth’s early atmosphere and its implication to the origin of life may require reconsideration.

Due to the high effectiveness of cancer screening and therapies, the diagnosis of second primary cancers (SPCs) has increased in women with endometrial cancer (EC). However, there’s no previous literature mentioned about adequate evidence to support screening for SPCs in endometrial cancer. This study was aimed to develop effective risk prediction models of second primary endometrial cancer in women with obesity (Body-mass index; BMI > 25) and this study includes datasets of the incidence of SPCs and the other risks of SPCs in 4480 primary cancer survivors by a hospital-based cancer registry database. In our study, we found the obesity played a key role in SPCs. There’re 10 independent variables used as predicting variables, which corelated to obesity should be monitored for the early detection of SPCs in endometrial cancer. In conclusion, it is a promising SPCs prediction. The proposed scheme can support the important influence of obesity and clinical data representations in all cases after primary treatments. Our results suggested that obesity is still a crucial risk factor to SPCs in endometrial cancer.

The recurrent coronavirus outbreaks in China (SARS-CoV and its relative, SARS-CoV-2) have raised speculations that perhaps Asians are somehow more susceptible to these coronaviruses. Here, we test this possibility based on an analysis of the lung-specific expression of ACE2, which encodes the known cell-entry receptor of both SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2. We show that ACE2 expression is not affected during tumorigenesis, supporting that the abundant transcriptomes in cancer genomic studies can be informatively used to study ACE2 expression among diverse individuals without cancer. We find that ACE2 expression in the lung increases with age, but is not associated with sex. Further, Asians do not differ from other populations for ACE2 expression and do not harbor unique genetic polymorphisms in the ACE2 locus. Thus, beyond illustrating an innovative method for assessing the potential impacts of demographic factors for non-cancer diseases from large-scale cancer sample datasets, our statistically robust findings emphasize that individuals of all races require the same level of personal protection against SARS-CoV-2.

Tulou dwellings in Southeast China have captivated global interest due to their distinctive appearance, sustainable construction materials and technologies, and their defensive and collective housing functions. Despite several recognized as World Cultural Heritage sites, the vast majority of tulou buildings are undergoing irreversible decline and destruction, necessitating a comprehensive and systematic study. Taking 83 Tulou buildings in Raoping County, Chaozhou City, Guangdong Province as the research object, this study reconstructs the historical scenes and systematically reveals the emergence, popularity, and consolidation process of tulou dwellings as integrated defensive and residential buildings for ordinary people by conducting a comprehensive analysis of historical documents and local chronicles. Based on an extensive field investigation, the study systematically analyzes the geospatial distribution and the spatial characteristics of Raoping tulou and its residential unit. The results demonstrate the adaptability and flexibility of tulou dwellings, showcasing their developmental process and revealing the inclusive nature of these traditional residences, as well as the initiative of those who reside within them. The research findings contribute to a more dynamic, comprehensive, and authentic understanding of tulou and Chinese traditional residences, providing valuable references for the preservation and sustainable development of tulou architectural heritage.

High dietary phosphate intake and poor adherence to phosphate-binding-therapy elevate the risk of hyperphosphatemia in maintenance hemodialysis (HD; MHD) patients. Therefore, chronic kidney disease-related mineral and bone disorder (CKD-MBD) indicators increase; consequently, risks of CKD-MBDs and inflammation are elevated. This double-blind, randomized control trial intervention study was designed to investigate the possibility of reducing blood CKD-MBD indicators and modulating inflammatory indicators by consuming low-phosphate (LP) meals accompanied by a minimum dose of a calcium-based phosphate binder (CaCO3). MHD patients were recruited and randomly assigned to an LP meal group (LP group) or a control group. After initial data collection, blood collection, and dietary counseling, subjects were asked to consume a washout diet for 1 week. During the washout diet period, subjects consumed their usual diet but took 1 tablet of calcium carbonate (1CaCO3) as a phosphate binder with each meal. After the washout diet period, subjects in the LP group and control group respectively consumed LP meals and regular meals twice a day for 1 week. Meat in the LP meals was boiled before the regular cooking process, but meat in control meals was not. All meals were supplied by a central kitchen so that the contents of phosphate and other nutrients could be identified. In total, 40 MHD patients completed the study program. After 1 week of the dietary intervention, the blood Ca x P product and dietary phosphate had significantly decreased in the LP group compared to the control group (p<0.05). The LP group had significantly lower variations in dietary phosphate intake, blood calcium, Ca x P product, and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α than the control group by comparing differences between after the dietary intervention and the baseline (△after intervention - baseline, p<0.05). The increase in dietary phosphate intake (△3rd - 2nd dietary phosphate intake) augmented the increase in the TNF-α level by 6.24-fold (odds ratio [95% confidence interval]: 6.24 [1.12~34.92], p<0.05). These results highlighted the conclusion that LP meals accompanied by a minimum dose of CaCO3 downregulated pro-inflammation by reducing CKD-MBD indicators which was triggered by decreasing dietary phosphate intake.

Mapping or quantitative inversion through remote sensing technology is an active way for mineral monitoring in large or uncultivated forest areas. Different spectral features of minerals, induced by ionic composition, can be identified which are related to mineral type or abundance. Based on the distinctive spectral absorption around 2.33µm induced by the carbonate ion, we use it as an analytic target to propose an improved continuum removal (ICR) algorithm to couple with normalized abundance to evaluate the relationship between continuum removal band depth (CRBD) and carbonate ion abundance. Through experimentally testing with synthetic and real image data, ICR with ratio abundance normalization can enhance the linear relation of CRBD and abundance. We find this technique performs best for abundance retrieval. The lowest root mean square error is 0.0400 for synthetic data and the mean relative error is as low as 6.80% for real image data. Compared with five other algorithms, coupling normalized carbonate mineral abundance with ICR can improve the quantitative retrieval accuracy of carbonate ion. By using a hyperspectral library, we also present a way to retrieve abundance without ground samples. These results make the quantitative inversion of mineral abundance more reasonable by distinct or enhanced features and provide great potential for use to extend mineral information extraction in the absence of sample data, even for surveys of the Moon and Mars for mineral quantitative analysis.

We propose a chemical language processing model to predict polymers’ glass transition temperature (Tg) through a polymer language (SMILES, Simplified Molecular Input Line Entry System) embedding and recurrent neural network. This model only receives the SMILES strings of polymer’s repeat units as inputs and considers the SMILES strings as sequential data at the character level. Using this method, there is no need to calculate any additional molecular descriptors or fingerprints of polymers, and thereby, being very computationally efficient and simple. More importantly, it avoids the difficulties to generate molecular descriptors for repeat units containing polymerization point `*’. Results show that the trained model demonstrates reasonable prediction accuracy on unseen polymer’s Tg. Besides, this model is further applied for high-throughput screening on an unlabeled polymer database to identify high-temperature polymers that are desired for applications in extreme environments. Our work demonstrates that the SMILES strings of polymer’s repeat units can be used as an effective feature representation to develop a chemical language processing model for predictions of Tg. The framework of this model is general and can be used to construct structure-property relationships for other polymer’s properties.

(1) Background: Previous systematic review suggested a beneficial effect of progressive muscle relaxation (PMR) for cancer patients receiving chemotherapy. However, poor quality of eligible studies impaired the reliability and validity of findings. Moreover, additional potential studies with good quality published in Chinese language have been published recently. The aim of the present systematic review was to investigate the value of PMR training in preventing and alleviating nausea and vomiting caused by chemotherapy among cancer patients. (2) Methods: We assigned two independent investigators to search all potential studies in PubMed, Cochrane Controlled Register of Trial (CENTRAL), Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), China Biomedical Literature database (CBM), China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), and Wanfang data. We used data extraction sheet extracted all essential information, and used the Cochrane risk of bias assessment tool to appraise the quality of eligible studies. Finally, we qualitatively summarized the results of all included studies. (3) Results: Six studies enrolling 288 patients were considered to meet our selection criteria finally. Of these 6 studies, three were labeled as moderate quality, and the remaining studies were low quality. All included studies consistently suggested that PMR has a positive impact on nausea and vomiting caused by chemotherapy among cancer patients especially alleviating the incidence, frequency and degree of delayed nausea and vomiting. (4) Conclusions: Independent studies indicated that PMR was a beneficial approach to prevent and alleviate nausea and vomiting caused by chemotherapy among cancer patients. However, further studies considering other types of primary tumors should be designed in order to increase the generality of PMR because studies included in the present systematic review mainly enrolled lung cancer and breast cancer.

Blind image quality assessment (BIQA) aims to evaluate image quality in a way that closely matches human perception. To achieve this goal, the strengths of deep learning and the characteristics of human visual system (HVS) can be combined. In this paper, inspired by the ventral pathway and dorsal pathway of HVS, a dual-pathway convolutional neural network is proposed for BIQA task. The proposed method consists of two pathways: “what” pathway, which mimics the ventral pathway of HVS to extract the content features of distorted images, and the “where” pathway, which mimics the dorsal pathway of HVS to extract the global shape features of distorted images. Then, the features from the two pathways are fused and mapped to an image quality score. Additionally, the gradient images weighted by the contrast sensitivity are used as the input to the “where” pathway, allowing it to extract global shape features that are more sensitive to human perception. Moreover, a dual-pathway multi-scale feature fusion module is designed to fuse the multi-scale features of the two pathways, enabling the model to capture both global features and local details, thus improving the overall performance of the model. The experiments conducted on six databases show that the proposed method achieves the state-of-the-art performance.

Based on the 2013–2017 Chinese Family Database and China Household Finance Survey, the study examines the impact of farmland transfer on the income structure of agricultural households. We observe a significant rise in the income of transferred-out households, while that of transferred-in households is unchanged. A further empirical decomposition of income shows a significant increase in both the wage and asset generated incomes of transferred-out households. Although the income generated by transferred-in households through agricultural production and management increases significantly, the decrease in wage income is larger. The study’s empirical designs are robustly tested with propensity score matching and instrumental variables. Moreover, we conduct a comparative analysis of the external constraints faced by the two groups to explore the reasons for the divergence of the income effect. The results show that transferred-in households face highly pronounced external constraints in terms of capital, technology, and farmland size, while transferred-out households face relatively fewer impediments to non-agricultural employment. Our empirical results imply that external constraints can limit the social welfare improvements of agricultural land reform, suggesting that other complementary measures would be required for future policy improvements to work better.

Incident rates of neurodegenerative diseases have steadily increased globally, but there is no therapeutic access available. We newly prescribed medicinal herbal remedy including five different herbal plants called, Chen-Ma-Dan-Sam-Ga-Mi-Bang (CMST), purposed to prove for pharmacological properties and corresponded actions on hippocampus neuronal cell injury by hypoxia-induced mice model. Mice were adapted to normoxia or hypoxia with or without CMST for 5 days. We gathered pharmacological effects of CMST on cell injury by enhancement of dihydroethidium and 4-hydroxynonenal signals which were correlated with abnormal redox status in the protein or gene expression levels (abnormal elevations of nitric oxide, reactive oxygen species, lipid peroxidation and deteriorations of total glutathione, total antioxidant capacity, and activities of superoxide dismutase and catalase) due to hypoxia. CMST also notably exerted to attenuates molecules for neuronal cell injury markers such as p-tau, cleaved caspase-3 due to DNA oxidations (53bp1and phosphor-histone H2AX), inflammatory cytokines, and hemeoxigenase-1. We further figured out the underlying actions of CMST by in vitro experiment through inactivation of microglial cell which can mediate neuronal cell injury. Collectively, CMST prevented from hippocampal neuronal cells via inactivation of microglial cell with normalization of redox status on hypoxia-induced hippocampus neuronal cell injury.

In this research article we solve the problem of synchronization and anti-synchronization of chaotic systems described by discrete and time-delayed variable fractional order differential equations. To guarantee the synchronization and anti-synchronization of these systems, we use the well-known PID control theory and the Lyapunov-Krasovskii stability theory for discrete systems of variable fractional order.We illustrate the results obtained through simulation with examples, in which it can be seen that our results are satisfactory, thus achieving synchronization and anti-synchronization of chaotic systems of variable fractional order with discrete time delay.

A series of penta-1,4-dien-3-one containing a H-phosphonate scaffold were designed and synthesized. The structures of all title compounds were determined by 1H-NMR, 13C-NMR, 31P-NMR, and HRMS. Bioassay results showed that several of the title compounds exhibited remarkable antibacterial and antiviral activities. Among these, compounds 3c and 3o exhibited substantial antibacterial activities against Xanthomonas oryzae pv. Oryzae (Xoo) and Xanthomonas axonopodis pv. citri (Xac). In addition, compounds 3c, 3f, and 3r showed remarkable curative activities against tobacco mosaic virus (TMV), with 50% effective concentration (EC50) values of 290.0, 234.0, and 373.6 μg/mL, respectively. These were superior to that of ningnanmycin (386.2 μg/mL). Compound 3r exhibited comparative protective activity against TMV, with an EC50 value of 291.1 μg/mL, which was better than that of ningnanmycin (297.1 μg/mL). Notably, the solubility of all title compounds improved relative to the lead compound curcumin. These results suggest that penta-1,4-dien-3-one containing a H-phosphonate scaffold may be considered as an activator for antibacterial and antiviral agents.

In order to assess the range of impact of thermal wastewater discharge from the third Nuclear Power Plant (NP_No.3) on the local ecosystem, a three-dimensional ocean model (MITgcm) driven by tidal and climatological forcings is employed to study the present work. Tides and daily wind forcings are incorporated into the MITgcm model to examine their effects on the thermal plume and the water circulation in Nan Wan Bay. The model results reveal that the thermal plume is most likely to disperse to the southwest in summer; it is unlikely to drift to the southeast or northeast because of the presence of gentle southwesterly monsoon. In winter, the thermal plume is most likely to be directed to the southwest but barely visible in the northeast or southeast directions because of prevailing northeasterly monsoon. Additionally, it is worth emphasizing that strong tidal currents generate a pair of counter-rotating eddies that significantly dominate the dispersal of the thermal plume. However, seasonal monsoons also play an essential role in modifying the plume’s direction and dispersion. The model results reveal that the flow field and thermal plume agree well with observational data.

The images captured by UAVs during inspection often contain numerous small targets related to transmission lines, which are critical and vulnerable elements for ensuring the safe operation of these lines. However, due to various factors such as the small size of the targets, low resolution, complex background, and potential line aggregation, achieving accurate and real-time detection becomes challenging. To address these issues, this paper proposes a detection algorithm called P2-ECA-EIOU-YOLOv5 (P2E-YOLOv5). Firstly, in order to address the challenges posed by the complex background and environmental interference that impact small targets, an ECA attention module is integrated into the network. This module effectively enhances the network's focus on small targets while concurrently mitigating the influence of environmental interference. Secondly, considering the characteristics of small target size and low resolution, a new high-resolution detection head is introduced, which is more sensitive to small targets. Lastly, the network utilizes the EIOU-Loss as the regression Loss function to improve the positioning accuracy of small targets, as they tend to aggregate. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed P2E-YOLOv5 detection algorithm achieves an accuracy P of 96.0% and an average accuracy (mAP) of 97.0% for small target detection in transmission lines.

When the image quality is evaluated, the human visual system (HVS) infers the details in the image through its internal generative mechanism. In this process, the HVS integrates both local and global information of the image, utilizes contextual information to restore the original image information, and compares it with the distorted image information for image quality evaluation. Inspired by this mechanism, a no-reference image quality assessment method is proposed based on a multitask image restoration network. The multitask image restoration network generates a pseudo-reference image as the main task and produces structural similarity index measure map as an auxiliary task. By mutually promoting the two tasks, a higher quality pseudo-reference image is generated. In addition, when predicting the image quality score, both the quality restoration features and the difference features between the distorted and reference images are used, thereby fully utilizing the information from the pseudo-reference image. To enable the model to focus on both global and local features, a multi-scale feature fusion module is proposed. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method achieves excellent performance on both synthetically and authentically distorted databases.

The papaya mealybug Paracoccus marginatus is an invasive, polyphagous pest and poses a quarantine threat to tropical and subtropical countries. Infested commodity internationally should be undergoing phytosanitary treatment, while irradiation is recommended to replace methyl bromide fumigation. Dose-response tests were conducted on the 2-, 4-, and 6-d-old eggs and gravid females of P. marginatus using the X-ray radiation doses of 15–105 Gy with an interval of 15 Gy, respectively. Radiotolerance was compared using fiducial overlapping and lethal dose ratio (LDR) test, resulting in insignificant difference except for LDR test at LD90 (leading 90% mortality at 95% confidence level (CL)); the estimated dose for 99.9968% mortality at 95% CL was 176.5–185.2 Gy, which was validated in the confirmatory tests using gamma irradiation because gammy and X-rays have equal biological effect on pests. Therefore, a total of estimating 60,386 gravid females of papaya mealybug irradiated with 146.8–185.0 Gy resulted in no F1 nymphs developing. Eggs can therefore be used as an alternative to gravid females for dose-response tests; the recommended minimum dose for phytosanitary treatment of P. marginatus on infested commodity is 185 Gy, with treatment efficacy ≥ 99.9950% at 95% CL.

Two austenitic stainless steel (ASS) plates, 304L and 316L, were cold-rolled (304R and 316R) with a 10 % reduction in thickness then subjected to laser welding. Cold-rolling caused a slight surface hardening and introduced residual tensile stress into the ASS plates. The susceptibility to stress corrosion cracking (SCC) of the welds (304RW and 316RW) was determined using the U-bend test pieces in a salt spray. To highlight the stress concentration at the weld’s fusion boundary (FB), the top weld reinforcement was not ground off before bending. Moreover, micro-shot peening (MSP) was performed to mitigate the SCC of the welds by imposing high residual compressive stress and forming a fine-grained structure. Cold-rolling increased the susceptibility of the 304R specimen to pitting corrosion (PTC) and intergranular (IG) microcracking. Moreover, PTC and SCC were found more often at the FBs of the 304RW. The corrosion pits of the peened 304RW (304RWSP) were finer but greater in amount than the un-peened one. The results also indicated that the 316L ASS welds with MSP was resistant to the incidence of PTC and SCC in a salt spray. The better reliability and longer service life of dry storage canister could be achieved by using 316L ASS for construction and application of MSP on it.

3CL^pro is the main protease of the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) responsible for their intracellular duplication. Based on virtual screening technology, we found 23 approved clinical drugs such as Carfilzomib, Saquinavir, Thymopentin and etc., which showed high affinity with the 3CL^pro active sites. These findings suggest that 3CL^pro inhibitors might be potential candidates for further activity detection and molecular modification.

The organic coating of bridge steel girders is subjected to physical scratches, corrosion, and aging in natural weathering. The breakdown of the coating may cause serviceability and safety problems if left unnoticed. A hyperspectral imaging method is proposed to detect the condition of steel coatings based on coating-responsive features in reflectance spectra. A field test was conducted on the real-world bridge which shows obvious signs of degradation. The hyperspectral signature enables an assessment of the coating health and defect severity. The results indicated that the coating scratch can be effectively located in the domain of a hyperspectral image and the scratch depth can be determined by mapping a scratch depth indicator (SDI=R532nm / R641nm). Rust sources and products in steel girders can be identified by the unique spectral signatures and the rust stains (and thus stain areas) scattered on the coating can be pinpointed at pixel level by the corrosion rust indicators. The chemical integrity of a topcoat is demonstrated by the short-wave infrared spectroscopy and the topcoat degradation can be evaluated by the absorption at 8000 cm-1 and 5850 cm-1.

Gastrodia elata Bl., one of the well-known edible plants in China, belongs to the family of Orchidaceae. In recent years, the consumption rate of this plant as food supplements or health products is gradually rising in China. However, the traditional industrialization processing procedures (TP) for this plant was found to be too complicated and not friendly to the environment with time and energy consuming. Hence, we investigated whether the processing procedures could be simplified without affecting its overall chemical profile and anti-oxidation activity. In this experiment, a new processing procedure (NP) was designed for processing this plant, and the chemical compositions of the extract for Gastrodia elata produced by two different processing procedures were identified by UPLC-Q-TOF/MS. It was found that phenols and parisins were the most abundant chemical components for this extract. Among all the identified components, the contents of gastrodin and its citric acid derivatives were obviously higher than that of other components. Therefore, the contents of six gastrodin derivatives and ethanol soluble extract rate for Gastrodia elata produced by two different processing procedures, traditional and newly designed processing procedures, were further comparatively investigated for the validation of the applicability. The DPPH radical scavenging activities of the extract from Gastrodia elata produced by two different processing procedures were also investigated. The results demonstrated that the contents of gastrodin and p-hydroxybenzyl alcohol in all samples were slightly decreased in NP samples compared with that of TP samples (except batches of S3 and S6 samples), but no significant difference was observed between these two groups (p = 0.8273 for gastrodin and p= 0.2320 for p-hydroxybenzyl alcohol). Additionally, the total contents of parisins were also in a decreased trend in NP samples but with no significant difference when comparing with that in TP samples (p = 0.1721). The results for ethanol soluble extract rate also had the same situation (p = 0.1094). Taken together, it was suggested that the chemical profiles and contents of gastrodin derivatives and ethanol soluble extract rate for NP samples was not significant different to that of TP samples. The DPPH radical scavenging activity of the extract of Gastrodia elata produced with NP method was not significant different from that of TP samples. As a result, the industrial processing procedures for the preservation of this material plant could be simplified to a more time and energy saving procedure without changing the quality of the products, which is also consistent with the concept of green and sustainable industrial production.

With the significant annual increase in the market demand for biopesticides, the industrial production demand for predatory mites, which hold the largest market share among biopesticides, has also been rising.To achieve efficient and low energy consumption control of predatory mite breeding environmental parameters, accurate estimation of breeding environmental parameters is necessary. This paper collects and pre-processing hourly time-series data of temperature and humidity from industrial breeding environments. Time series prediction models such as SVR, LSTM, GRU, and LSTNet are applied to model and predict historical data of the breeding environment. Experiments validate that the LSTNet model is more suitable for such environmental modeling. To further improve prediction accuracy, the training data for the LSTNet model is enhanced using hierarchical clustering of time-series features. After augmentation, the root mean square error (RMSE) of temperature prediction decreased by 27.3%, and the RMSE of humidity prediction decreased by 32.8%, significantly improving the accuracy of multi-step predictions and providing substantial industrial application value.

Viral infections have long been the biggest threat to human survival, and from a medical perspective, the development of noninvasive high-throughput screening methods that target the incubation period to either treat diseases or limit viral spread would be strikingly effective. Using this technology to target viral incubation periods would also be inexpensive to perform. The current study proposes to transform pulse signals into a rapid diagnostic test using “coincidence analysis” in the hope of preventing or reducing the symptoms of viral infections. The heart plays a critical role in calculating and supplying the needs of all tissues of the body. Pulse waves are pressurized signals in response to heart’s calculations and include all phases of the cardiac cycle, which maintains life and provides energy needed to perform tasks. Any small movement gives a corresponding signal to pulse waves. The current study investigated conclusive data on self-limiting infections, such as common cold. We used pulse wave, coincidence analysis technology to capture signals from individuals with common cold during the incubation period and investigated if particular characteristic signals could be applied to influenza during the incubation period. Preliminary work demonstrated that pulse waves could generate signals using this technology that would be worthwhile for future research. A small amount of analytical data from common cold existed previously. The data structure is based on the idea that a single pulse wave at differing physiological conditions would have slight modifications that would be amplified and presented by various geometrical shapes after extensive data are accumulated. These geometric shapes can then be sliced vertically or horizontally to extract data during different illness stages. The significance of these findings are impressive; from a personal or a public hygiene perspective, this analytical technology provides many benefits, such as rapid and precise decision-making that can be directly visualized or can be analyzed using software programs. Also, this technology also uses futuristic wearable technology that brings practical problem solving to physiology.

This study explores the public library service evaluation domain through user-generated content on Google Maps, highlighting digital feedback's significant yet underexplored potential in understanding public library patronage across Taiwan's six major cities. Utilizing a mixed-methods research design, this study integrates Google Maps review content analysis with Social Network Analysis to delineate public perceptions and identify areas for service enhancement in public libraries. It innovatively leverages personal experiences extracted from over 60,000 Google Maps reviews to evaluate public library services in cities such as Taipei, New Taipei, Taoyuan, Taichung, Tainan, and Kaohsiung. The research taps into the National Library of Taiwan's National Library Statistics System to provide a robust analysis of library performance and user satisfaction, offering a novel perspective by emphasizing user-centric feedback from Google Maps as a primary data source. This approach provides quantitative data on library usage and geographic distribution and enriches our understanding of the qualitative experiences of library users. In analyzing the keywords from Google Maps reviews of public libraries, we categorize and interpret these under the three core LibQUAL+ dimensions—Affect of Service, Information Control, and Library as Place. The findings expose variances in perceived service quality among the cities, with Kaohsiung and Taichung receiving the highest accolades for service satisfaction. Simultaneously, the study identifies potential areas for improvement, particularly in cities with lower satisfaction ratings like Taipei. This personalized feedback illustrates the intimate relationship between public libraries and their communities, offering invaluable insights for policymakers and library management to enhance service delivery and user experience.

In northern Canada where permafrost is prevalent, a shortage of accessible, affordable, and high-quality housing has been ongoing for decades. Design of foundations in permafrost presents unique engineering challenges due to permafrost soil mechanics and climate change. There is no specific design code for pile or shallow foundations in northern Canada. Consequently, the design process heavily relies on the expertise and experience of Arctic geotechnical engineers who have specialized knowledge in this field. Therefore, a comprehensive review of the practice or literature in foundation design in the Arctic would be necessary. The main objective of this review paper is to provide an overview of the common foundations in permafrost and the techniques adopted to counteract the effects of frozen soils. This study conducted a literature review of state-of-the-art practices on deep and shallow foundations used in northern Canada, including common steel pipe piles and thermosyphons. The review summarized the current principles, including adfreeze strength, creep settlement, and frost heave, used in the foundation design in permafrost. Then this paper summarized the findings from interviewing several engineers or professionals who have experiences in the design of foundations in permafrost. The interviews revealed the technical and non-technical aspects of foundation design practice in northern Canada. Lastly, in order to demonstrate the design methods, the paper presented two examples where screw piles and steel pipe piles were designed to support a residential building in northern Canada, according to the state-of-practice criteria for adfreeze strength, long term settlement and frost heave.

Federated learning trains a neural network model using the client's data to maintain the benefits of centralized model training, while maintaining the privacy. However, if the client data are not independently and identically distributed (non-IID) because of different environments, the accuracy of the model may suffer from client drift during training owing to discrepancies in each client's data. This study proposes a personalized federated learning algorithm based on the concept of multitask learning to divide each client model into two layers: a feature extraction layer and a category prediction layer. The feature extraction layer maps the input data to a low-dimensional feature vector space. Furthermore, the parameters of the neural network are aggregated with those of other clients using an adaptive method. The category prediction layer maps low-dimensional feature vectors to the label sample space, with its parameters remaining unaffected by other clients to maintain client uniqueness. The proposed personalized federated learning method produces faster learning model convergence rates and higher accuracy rates for the non-IID datasets in our experiments.

Azo dyes are the most widely used synthetic dyes in the printing and dyeing process. However, the discharge of untreated azo dyes poses potential threat for human health and aqueous ecosystem. Herein, we fabricated a novel heterogenous catalyst - activated carbon fiber-supported ferric alginate (FeAlg-ACF) . Together with peroxymonosulfate (PMS) and visible light, this photocatalytic oxidation system was used to remove an azo dye - azophloxine. The results indicated that the proposed catalytic oxidation system can remove 100% azophloxine within 24 min, while under the same system, the removal rate was only 92 % and 84 % when ferric alginate was replaced with ferric citrate and ferric oxalate respectively, which showed the superiority of activated carbon fiber-supported ferric alginate. The degradation of azophloxine is achieved by the active radicals (SO4•− and •OH) released from PMS and persistent free radicals from activated carbon fiber. After treating for 24 min, the total organic carbon of azophloxine solution (50 μmol/L) decreased from 1.82 mg/L to 79.3 μg/L and the nitrate concentration of ions increased from 0.3 mg/L to 8.6 mg/L. That is, up to 93.5% azophloxine molecules were completely degraded into inorganic compounds. Consequently, potential secondary contamination by intermediate organic products during catalytic degradation was prohibited. The azophloxine removal ratio was kept almost constant after seven cycles, indicating the recyclability and longevity of this system. Furthermore, the azophloxine removal was still promising at high concentrations of Cl-, HCO3-, CO32-. Therefore, our proposed system is potentially effective to remove dye pollutants from seawater. It provides a feasible method for the development of efficient and environmental friendly PMS activation technology combined with FeAlg-ACF, has significant academic and application value.

Excretory-secretory products (ESPs) are the main research targets for investigating the hosts and helminths interaction. Parasitic worms can migrate to parasitic sites and avoid the host immune response by secreting this product. Angiostrongylus cantonensisis an important food-borne zoonotic parasite that causes severe neuropathological damage and symptoms, including eosinophilic meningitis or meningoencephalitis in humans. Benzaldehydes are organic compounds composed of a benzene ring and formyl substituents. This compound has anti-inflammatory and antioxidation properties. Previous studies showed that 3-hydroxybenzaldehyde (3-HBA) and 4-hydroxybenzaldehyde (4-HBA) can reduce apoptosis in A. cantonensis ESPs treated astrocytes. These results on the protective effect underlying benzaldehyde have primarily focused on cell survival. The study was designed to investigate the molecular mechanisms of endoplasmic reticulum stress (ER stress) and oxidative stress in astrocytes in A. cantonensis ESPs treated astrocytes and to evaluate the therapeutic consequent of 3-HBA and 4-HBA. First, we initially established the RNA-seq dataset in each group, including Normal, ESPs, ESPs+3-HBA, and ESPs+4-HBA. We also found that benzaldehyde (3-HBA and 4-HBA) can stimulate astrocytes to express ER stress-related molecules after ESP treatment. The level of oxidative stress could also be decreased in astrocytes by elevating antioxidant activity and reducing ROS generation. These results suggested that benzaldehyde may be a potential therapeutic compound for human angiostrongyliasis to support brain cell survival by inducing the expression levels of ER stress- and oxidative stress-related pathway.

Background: While intimate feminine hygiene products are widely used by women as part of daily cleansing routines, little is known about how these products impact the vulvovaginal area and its microbiome stability. A novel gel wash containing lactic acid (pH 4.2) for external daily use was formulated to provide gentle cleansing, freshness, and antimicrobial protection to maintain a healthy balance of the vulvar skin area. This 4-week clinical study assessed tolerance of the gel wash when used on the external genital area and its effects on skin hydration, vulvar skin pH, and the vulvar microbiome. After a 7-day pre-study conditioning period, 36 healthy females in 3 balanced age groups (18-29, 30-44, and 45-55 years) used the gel wash to cleanse their external genital area (mons pubis and vulva) and entire body at least once per day for 28 days. The primary endpoint wasSkin tolerance of the gel wash was assessed by the gynecologist. Effects of the gel wash on vulvar skin microbiota were studied by performing bacterial 16S rRNA and fungal ITS microbial richness and diversity analysis. Results: Based on gynecologic assessment after 28 days of use, the gel wash showed acceptable tolerance, with no signs of increased dryness, redness, edema, itching, stinging, or burning. Use of the gel wash was associated with a significant increase in both short-term (single application) and longer-term (daily use for 28 days) skin moisturization. There was no significant change in vulvar skin pH over time with daily product use, and the gel wash did not significantly affect the natural vulvar microbiome species richness or diversity for bacteria or fungi. Conclusions: Results of the study showed that this new gel wash is a mild, moisturizing cleanser that does not harm and instead maintains the natural pH and microbial diversity of vulvar skin. To our knowledge, this was the first study to assess the effect of an antimicrobial feminine gel wash on the natural pH and vulvar microbiome habitat of the skin using bacterial 16S rRNA and fungal ITS genetic sequencing techniques, thereby providing a better understanding of the bacterial and fungal communities that inhabit the external vulvar area in healthy women.

Rapid analysis and characterization of compounds by mass spectrometry may overlook trace compounds, although targeted analysis methods can significantly improve detection sensitivity, it is difficult to discover novel scaffold compounds. This study developed a strategy for discovering trace compounds in the aging process of traditional Chinese medicine based on MS fragmentation and known metabolic pathway. Specifically, we found that the characteristic component of C. reticulata 'Chachi', methyl N-methylanthranilate (MMA), fragmented in ESI-CID to produce rearrangement ion 3-hydroxyindole, which has been proven to exist in trace amounts in C. reticulata 'Chachi' comparing with the reference substance by LC-MS/MS. By combining the known metabolic pathways of 3-hydroxyindole and the possible methylation reactions that may occur during aging, 10 possible indole derivatives were untargeted predicted. These compounds were confirmed to originate from MMA by purchasing or synthesizing reference substances and all of them were detected in C. reticulata 'Chachi' through LC-MS/MS analysis, achieving trace compound analysis from untargeted to targeted. It may contribute to explain the aging mechanism of C. reticulata 'Chachi' and the strategy of CID-induced special rearrangement ion binding metabolic pathway has potential application value in discovering trace compounds.

The traditional Chinese drug Bombyx Batryticatus mori.L (BBm) which is also named the white stiff silkworm has been widely used in Chinese clinics for thousands of years. It is famous for its antispasmodic and blood circulation promoting effects. Cardiomyocyte hypertrophy, interstitial cell hyperplasia and myocardial fibrosis are closely related to the N-glycosylation of key proteins. To examine the alterations of N-glycosylation that occur in diabetic myocardium during the early stage of the disease and clarify the therapeutic effect of 1-DNJ extracted from BBm, we used the db/db mouse model and an approach based on hydrophilic chromatography solid-phase extraction integrated with an LC-MS/MS identification strategy to perform a site-specific N-glycosylation analysis of left ventricular cardiomyocyte proteins. AGEs, hydroxyproline, CTGF and other serum biochemical indicators were measured with ELISA. In addition, the α1,6-fucosylation of N-glycans was profiled with LCA lectin blots and FITC-labelled lectin affinity histochemistry. The results indicated that 1-DNJ administration obviously downregulated myocardium protein N-glycosylation in db/db mice. The expression levels of serum indicators and fibrosis-related cytokines were reduced significantly by 1-DNJ in a dose-dependent manner. The glycan α1,6-fucosylation level of the db/db mouse myocardium was elevated, and the intervention effect of 1-DNJ administration on N-glycan α1,6-fucosylation was significant. To verify this result, the well-known TGF-β/smad2/3 pathway was selected, and core α1,6-fucosylated TGFR-βⅡ was analysed semi-quantitatively with western blotting. The result supported the conclusions obtained from LCA lectin affinity histochemistry and lectin blot analysis. The expression level of FUT8 mRNA was also detected, and the results showed that 1-DNJ administration did not cause obvious inhibitory effects on FUT8 expression. Therefore, the mechanism of 1-DNJ to relieve the DCM-associated fibrosis can be concluded as the inhibition of N-GlcNAc formation and the reduction of substrate concentration.

Aim: Aging is companied by deteriorations of insulin resistance (IR) and insulin secretion. However, little is known about the roles of aging on different phases of insulin secretion (ISEC); i.e., the first- and second-phase of insulin secretion (FPIS, SPIS) and glucose effectiveness (GE). Methods: Totally 169 individuals (43 men and 126 women) with the similar fasting plasma glucose (FPG: 90 mg/dL) and BMI (men: 23 kg/m2, women 22 kg/m2) were enrolled. IR, FPIS, SPIS, and GE were estimated using our previously developed equations shown below. Pearson correlation analysis was conducted to assess the correlations between age and four diabetes factors (DFs: IR, FPIS, SPIS and GE). The equations that are used to calculate the DF in the present study were built and published by our group. Results: The age of the participants ranged from 18- to 78-year-old. Men had higher FPIS but lower HDL-C levels than women (2.067±0.159, 1.950±0.186 μU/min and 1.130±0.306, 1.348±0.357 mmol/dl, accordingly). The results of Pearson correlation revealed that age was negatively related to IR and GE in both genders (IR: r = -0.39, p < 0.001 for men, r = -0.24, p < 0.003 for women; GE: r = 0.66, p < 0.001 for men, r = 0.78, p < 0.001 for women). In the meanwhile, FPIS was also only found to be negatively correlated with age in female (r = -0.238, p = 0.003). But there was no different with SPIS and age in both of genders. Conclusions: We have found that in Chinese with normal FPG level (90 mg/dl) and body mass index (men: 23 kg/m2, women: 22: kg/m2), age is negatively related to IR and GE in both genders. At the same time, only FPIS was found to be negatively related to age in women. The tightness of their relationships, from the highest to the lowest are, GE, FPIS and IR accordingly. The importance of GE should be re-evaluated. These results should be interpreted with caution because of the small sample size.

Drought stress is a major abiotic factor affecting tomato production and fruit quality. However, the genes and metabolites associated with tomato responses to water deficiency and rehydration are poorly characterized. To identify the functional genes and key metabolic pathways underlying tomato responses to drought stress and recovery, drought-susceptible and drought-tolerant inbred lines underwent transcriptomic and metabolomic analyses. A total of 332 drought-responsive and 491 rehydration-responsive core genes were robustly differentially expressed in both genotypes. The drought-responsive and rehydration-responsive genes were mainly related to photosynthesis–antenna proteins, nitrogen metabolism, plant–pathogen interactions, and the MAPK signaling pathway. Various transcription factors, including homeobox-leucine zipper protein ATHB-12, NAC transcription factor 29, and heat stress transcription factor A-6b-like, may be vital for tomato responses to the water status. Moreover, 24,30-dihydroxy-12(13)-enolupinol, caffeoyl hawthorn acid, adenosine 5′-monophosphate, and guanosine were the key metabolites identified in both genotypes under drought and recovery conditions. The combined transcriptomic and metabolomic analysis highlighted the importance of 38 genes involved in metabolic pathways, biosynthesis of secondary metabolites, biosynthesis of amino acids, and ABC transporters for tomato responses to water stress. Our results provide valuable clues regarding the molecular basis of drought tolerance and rehydration. The data presented herein may be relevant for genetically improving tomato to enhance drought tolerance.

Cancer immunotherapy targeting immune checkpoints has exhibited promising clinical outcomes in many cancers, but it offers only limited benefits for pancreatic cancer (PC). Cancer stem cells (CSCs), a minor subpopulation of cancer cells, play important roles in tumor initiation, progression, and drug resistance. Accumulating evidence suggests that CSCs employ immunosuppressive effect to evade the immune recognition. However, clinical implications of the associations among CD8+ T cells infiltration, programmed death receptor ligand-1 (PD-L1) expression, and CSCs existence are poorly understood in PC. Immunostaining and quantitative analysis were performed to assess CD8+ T cells infiltration, PD-L1 expression, and their relationship with CD44+/CD133+ CSCs and disease progression in PC. CD8+ T cells infiltration was associated with better survival while PD-L1 expression was correlated with PC recurrence. Both the low CD8+ T cells infiltration/high PD-L1 expression group and the high CD8+ T cells infiltration/high PD-L1 expression group show high levels of CD44+/CD133+ CSCs, but patients with low CD8+ T cells infiltration/high PD-L1 expression had worse survival and higher recurrence risk than those with high CD8+ T cells infiltration/high PD-L1 expression. Moreover, CD8+ T cells infiltration could reduce unfavorable prognostic effect of high co-expression of PD-L1 and CD44/CD133. Our study highlights an interaction among CD8+ T cells infiltration, PD-L1 expression, and CD44+/CD133+ CSCs existence, which contributes to PC progression and immune evasion.

This work aims to develop an integrated fault location and restoration approach for microgrids (MGs). This work contains two parts. Part I presents the fault location algorithm, and Part II shows the restoration algorithm. The proposed algorithms are implemented by particle swarm optimization (PSO). The fault location algorithm is based on network connection matrices, which are the modifications of bus-injection to branch-current and branch-current to bus-voltage (BCBV) matrices, to form the new system topology. The backward/forward sweep approach is used for the prefault power flow analysis. After the occurrence of fault, the voltage variation at each bus is calculated by using the Zbus modification algorithm to modify Zbus. Subsequently, the voltage error matrix is computed to search for the fault section by using PSO. After the allocation of the fault section, the multi-objective function is implemented by PSO for optimal restoration with its constraints. Finally, the IEEE 37-bus test system connected to distributed generations is utilized as the sample system for a series simulation and analysis. The outcomes demonstrated that the proposed optimal algorithm can effectively solve the fault location and restoration problem in MGs.

Inflammation is the response of the immune system to infection and injury, with complex interactions with the body, tissues and cells, and plays an important role in the initiation and progression of many diseases such as cancer and cardiovascular disease. Traditional excipients functioning as drug delivery systems can reduce the side effects of systemic distribution of inflammatory drugs. Oil phase, a common excipient in nanoemulsions (NEs), has the advantages of assisting the formation of emulsions, loading lipophilic drugs, thermodynamic stability, wide sources, low price and easy availability. In particular, some of them, like linolenic acid and medium chain triglyceride (MCT), also function as inhibitors of systemic inflammation marker and vascular inflammation marker. However, the influences of different oil phases on the construction of NEs and their distribution in vivo have not been fully investigated. Herein, Tween 80 and ethyl alcohol were screened out as emulsifiers and co-emulsifiers, and three different oil phases used in clinical practice widely, including MCT, oleic acid (OA), and ethyl oleate (EO), were selected as the oil phase to prepare NEs delivery platform. Three NEs had consistent size, potential, morphology, excellent stability and mitochondrial localization function. Importantly, they exhibited superior cellular uptake capacity in inflammatory-injuried human umbilical vein endothelial cells and significantly targeted the brain, lung, heart and thoracic aorta in the lipopolysaccharide-induced mouse and zebrafish larvae inflammation models. Meanwhile, the fluorescence intensities of three NEs were different in these organs, suggesting that their differential enrichment might provide alternative delivery platform for disease treatment in the corresponding organs.

Concrete cracks and local damage can affect the bond performance between concrete and steel bars, thereby reducing the durability of reinforced concrete structures. Compared with general concrete crack repair methods, biomineralization repair not only has effective bonding capabilities but is also particularly environmentally friendly. In view of this, this study aimed to apply biomineralization technology to repair damaged fiber-reinforced lightweight aggregate concrete (LWAC). Two groups of LWAC specimens were prepared. The control group used lightweight aggregates (LWAs) without bacterial spores and nutrient sources, and the experimental group used LWAs containing bacterial spores and nutrient sources. These specimens were first subjected to compression tests and pull-out tests, respectively, and thus were damaged. After the damaged specimen healed itself in different ways for 28 days, secondary compression and pull-out tests were conducted. The self-healing method of the control group involved placing the specimens in an incubator. The experimental group was further divided into experimental group I and experimental group II. The self-healing method of experimental group I was the same as that of the control group. The self-healing method of experimental group II involved soaking the specimen in a mixed solution of urea and calcium acetate for two days, and then taking it out and placing it in an incubator for two days, with a cycle of four days. The test results showed that, compared with the control group specimens, the relative bond strength ratio of the experimental group II specimens increased by 17.9%. Moreover, the EDS and XRD analysis results confirmed that the precipitate formed at the crack was calcium carbonate, which improved the compressive strength and bond strength after self-healing. This indicates that the biomineralization maintenance method used in experimental group II is more effective.

The Chinese drug Bombyx Batryticatus mori.L which also named as the white stiff silkworm is widely used in clinics, due to the significant antispasmodic and promotional blood circulation effects. In addition, its hypoglycemic effect is also recognized in recent years. From a pathological point of view, the enzymatic glycosylation and non-enzymatic glycation both have important roles in regulating properties of proteins and are associated with Diabetes. With the db/db mouse model, we examined the alterations of N-glycosylation of diabetic myocardium at primary stage and clarify the differences in glycosylation of myocardium before and after with 1-DNJ treatment. Hydrophilic chromatography solid phase extraction enrichment and LC-MS/MS identification was applied to profile the alternations in protein glycosylation. Meanwhile, N-glycan α1, 6-fucosylation alterations were profiled with LCA lectin blot and FITC-labelled lectin affinity histochemistry. Our results showed that AGES, hydroxyproline, CTGF and other serum indicators and fibrosis related cytokines expressional levels were reduced significantly by 1-DNJ in a dose-dependent manner. In order to verify this result, the well-known pathway of TGF-β/smad2/3 was picked out and α1, 6-core fucosylated TGFR-βⅡwas semi-quantified with western blot method. The result sustained the conclusion from LCA lectin affinity histochemistry and lectin blot analysis. The expressional level of α1, 6-fucosyltransferase mRNA was increased in the myocardium of db/db mice, however, the 1-DNJ administration did not show obvious inhibitory effect on FU8 expression. This unexpected result can be interpreted as 1-DNJ plays the roles by reducing the concentration of substrate rather than inhibiting α1，6-fucose glycosyltransferase expression. Meanwhile, 1-DNJ crude extract from BBm with some flavonoids accompany can also play the roles of anti-oxidant, and all the chemicals protect the diabetic myocardium from hyperglycemia damage commonly.

A rapid and efficient method using an alkyl functionalized magnetic nanoparticles-based extraction technique combined with Ultra-High Performance Liquid Chromatography was developed for the detection of trace amounts of polycystic aromatic hydrocarbons in tea leaves. As a popular coating for chromatographic column packing materials, C18-alkyl has been demonstrated to be effective in separating polycystic aromatic hydrocarbons. And the magnetism of the nanomaterials accelerates the extraction process while their high surface ratio enables desirable dispersity in the sample matrix. Meanwhile, the adsorbents can be washed and reused 30 times without compromise on recovery, which greatly reduced the budget. The effects of various parameters were investigated and optimized, and the recoveries for five analytes were in the range of 84.8–103.7%. The reproducibility rate of intra-day and inter-day were below 7.1% and 11.3% respectively. The limits of detection and limits of quantification ranged from 1.69–9.97 ng g-1 and 5.12–30.21 ng g-1, indicating satisfactory sensitivity. Thus, the proposed methodology is rapid, highly efficient, and economical, and it expands the application of magnetic cleanup approaches in complex food matrices.

Cellular oxidation is responsive to external and internal stimulation and is generated via signal molecules in defense mechanisms through networks of cell proliferation, differentiation, intracellular detoxification, bacterial infection, and immune reactions. Oxidative stress is not necessarily harmful per se; it depends on the balance between oxidation and antioxidation cascades, which are induced according to stimuli and can maintain oxygen homeostasis. The reactive oxygen species (ROS) that are generated during influenza virus (IV) infection have critical effects on both the virus and host cells. In this review, we outline the link between viral infection and ROS production, using IV as an example. We introduce the current state of knowledge on the molecular relationship between cellular oxidation mediated by ROS production and various effects of IV infection. We also summarize the potential anti-IV agents that act by targeting oxidative stress.

This study focuses on the decisions of picking, inventory, ripening, delivering, and selling mangoes in a harvesting season. Demand, supply, and prices are uncertain, and their probability density functions are fitted based on actual trading data collected from the largest spot market in Taiwan. A stochastic programming model is formulated to minimize the expected cost under the considerations of labor, storage space, shelf life, and transportation restrictions. We implement the sample-average approximation to obtain a high-quality solution of the stochastic program. The analysis compares deterministic and stochastic solutions to assess the uncertain effect on the harvest decisions. Finally, the optimal harvest schedule of each mango type is suggested based on the stochastic program solution.

This research takes Cuiwei Village in Qianshan District of Zhuhai City as an example. Through field research, the village is investigated and analyzed, and the street scale, spatial structure, functional characteristic streets, internal commercial distribution forms, and functions of Cuiwei Historic District are studied. analysis. On this basis, based on the convex space method and the line-of-sight analysis method in the space syntax theory, with the help of Depthmap software, the complex street node, that is, the space of the two nodes A and B, is established through the establishment of a visual field model. It includes the analysis of the integration degree of the horizon, the concentration of the horizon, the connection value of the horizon and the spatial characteristics of the historical area, as well as the traditional buildings that are the most representative of the village, namely the Three Kings Temple and the Webster's Mansion. When R=N and radius R=3, observe the changes in the two parameters of the visual integration and visual depth of the two historical buildings. And with the help of Baidu Time Machine photos in different periods to observe and record the changes in the store and the characteristics of people's behavior, and draw conclusions.

We provide representations for the generalized Drazin inverse of an anti-triangular matrix of the form $\left( \begin{array}{cc} a&b\\ 1&0 \end{array} \right)$ in a Banach algebra $\mathcal{A}$, under the condition that $ab=ba$. Specifically, we present the representation of Drazin inverse for these types of anti-triangular matrices in Banach algebras.

We investigate the existence and representation of the generalized core-EP inverse of some triangular matrices over a Banach algebra. Further, the general representations of the generalized core-EP inverse of a triangular matrix over a $C^*$-algebra are presented. As applications, the generalized core-EP inverses of some block operator matrices over Hilbert spaces are given.

In this paper, we introduce the notion of the generalized $w$-group inverse in a Banach algebra with proper involution. This is a natural generalization of generalized (weak) group inverse in Banach *-algebras. Many elementary properties of such new weighted generalized inverse are presented. We further establish the equivalent relations between generalized weighted group inverse and weighted generalized Drazin inverse. Related properties of generalized (weak) group inverse are extended to the wider cases.

The author introduces a novel theoretical framework that suggests matter and energy are both converted from curved space. In Space Theory, gravitation is generated by the flow of space, instead of being transmitted by the graviton as in String Theory. This theory also suggests that Newton's gravitational constant, denoted as G, may not be truly constant but could vary over time. The equivalent equation of space is S=Ec²=mc⁴, and the gravitation of hollow sphere space is S_μν=4πGm=(4/3)π((r+a)³-r³). The Space Theory also predicts that the surface gravitational acceleration of the neutron star Crab Pulsar (PSR B0531+21) is approximately 8.21924883×10⁶ m/s².

Recent studies revealing varied responses of infected cells to LRAs underscore the limited effectiveness of these agents and emphasize the wide array of determinants contributing to the heterogeneity of reservoirs, including virus genetic background, cell model, cell type, silencing mechanisms, tissue reservoirs, integration sites, patient, and gender specific factors. The enhancer region of the HIV-1 LTR contains two adjacent NF-κB binding sites that play a central role in mediating inducible HIV-1 gene expression. Beyond the involvement of various transcription factors, such as NF-κB, epigenetic constraints also play a pivotal role in suppressing the initiation of latent HIV transcription. Consequently, even latent viruses containing functional NF-κB sites remain unresponsive to drugs that activate NF-κB. Thus, it is evident that the activation of NF-κB alone does not suffice to trigger latent HIV, contradicting the central hypothesis of this study. The author used bioinformatics methods to analyze the viral proteins and their primer binding sites. The results show that the amino acid sequence ARG of Gag proteins of HTLV-1, HTLV-2, STLV-1 and STLV-2 match their primer binding site GGGGGCTCG in the 3'-to-5' direction and that the amino acid sequence SPR of Gag proteins of HIV-1, HIV-2, SIV and FIV match their primer binding site GGCGCCCGA in the 3'-to-5' direction. Related studies have shown that the genomic Gag/Gag-Pol complex recruits the LysRS/tRNA complex. The selective packaging of the tRNA primer requires HIV-1 Gag and Gag-Pol, and an interaction between LysRS and Gag is observed in vitro. In HIV-1, Gag/LysRS interaction depends on Gag sequences within the CTD of CA around amino acids 283-363 and motif 1 of LysRS around amino acids 208-259. It should be noted that the amino acid sequence SPR of the Gag protein is located at amino acids 148-150 within the NTD of CA, specifically at the NTD-NTD interface 1. Although this research is purely bioinformatics analysis, the relevant studies have demonstrated that Gag proteins match the HIV-1 primer binding site and possess the potential to directly activate dormant retroviruses.

Wireless sensor networks (WSN) are widely used in various fields such as military, industrial and transportation for real-time monitoring, sensing and data collection of different environments or objects. However, the development of WSN is hindered by several limitations, including energy, storage space, computing power and data transmission rate. Among these, the availability of power energy plays a crucial role as it directly determines the lifespan of WSN. To extend the life cycle of WSN, two key approaches are power supply improvement and energy conservation. Therefor, we proposed an energy harvesting system and a low energy consumption mechanism for WSN. Firstly, we delved into the energy harvesting technology of WSN, explored the utilization of solar energy and mechanical vibration energy to ensure a continuous and dependable power supply to the sensor nodes, and analyzed the voltage output characteristics of bistable piezoelectric cantilever. Secondly, we proposed a neighbor discovery mechanism that utilizes a separation beacon, is based on reply to ACK, and can facilitate the identification of neighboring nodes. This mechanism operates at a certain duty cycle ratio, significantly reduces idle listening time and results in substantial energy savings. In comparison to the Disco and U-connect protocols, our proposed mechanism achieves a remarkable reduction of 66.67% and 75% in the worst discovery delay, respectively. Furthermore, we introduced a data fusion mechanism based on integer wavelet transform. This mechanism effectively eliminates data redundancy caused by spatio-temporal correlation, results in a data compression rate of 5.42. Additionally, it significantly reduces energy consumption associated with data transmission by the nodes.

A series of novel sulfonylurea benzothiazoline were designed by splicing active groups and bioisosterism. A solvent-free synthetic route was developed for the sulfonylurea benzothiazoline derivatives via the cyclization and carbamylation. All the compounds were characterized by IR, 1H-NMR, 13C-NMR, HRMS. The biological activity tests indicated the compounds could protect maize against the injury caused by chlorsulfuron to some extent. The molecular docking result showed that the new compound competed with chlorosulfuron to bind with the herbicide target enzyme active site to attain detoxification.

： Anti-MDA5 antibody bearing (anti-MDA5+)-dermatomyositis (DM) or polymyositis (PM) is notorious for causing rapidly progressive interstitial lung disease (RPILD) &amp;/or cancers with high mortality rate. However, anti-MDA5 antibodies (Abs) are also found in other connective tissue diseases and their link with RPILD especially with regards to the mortality rate are unknown. We retrospectively recruited 71 patients bearing anti-MDA5-Abs in serum, stratified them in terms of a presence or absence of RPILD, and evaluated their clinical features, laboratory findings, associated myositis antibodies, concurrent connective tissue disease (CTD) as well as newly developed malignancies. Thirty-nine (55%) patients presented with DM/PM but 32 (45%) didn’t. Twenty-two of the former and 11 of the latter developed RPILD eventually, accounting for a total of 46% of all MDA5 bearing patients. On the other hand, 15 of all 71 (21.1%) patients had cancers. Among 32 patients who didn’t have DM/PM, 27 (38.0% of all 71) had other CTDs, indicating that only 5 (7.0% of 71) patients did not have CTDs. Senility (odds ratio [OR]=1.816, P=0.032), presence of anti-Ro-52 antibody (OR=1.676, P=0.018), elevated C-reactive protein (CRP, OR= 4.354, P&lt;0.001) and carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA, OR=2.625, P=0.005) posed risks for RPILD. High lactose dehydrogenase (LDH, p=0.009), CRP (p=0.001), CEA (p=0.001), ferritin (p ≤ 0.001) and low albumin (p ≤ 0.001) were significantly associated with mortality. Anti-SAE antibodies were negatively correlated with RPILD as analyzed by univariate (OR=0.245, P=0.017) and multivariate (OR= 0.058, P=0.036) regressions, indicating that they may be a protective factor from RPILD (OR= 0.543, P=0.008) or fatality (OR= 0.707, P=0.012), which was also demonstrated in subgroup analyses. In contrast to various risk factors for RPILD or mortality, anti-SAE antibodies might be conversely a protective factor in anti-MDA5+ patients.

Carnivore protoparvovirus 1 (CPPV-1) is a DNA virus causing gastrointestinal disease and immunosuppression in various terrestrial carnivores. Domestic dogs and cats are considered the primary CPPV-1 reservoirs. The habitat overlaps of wild carnivores and free-roaming dogs increases the threat of CPPV-1 transmission between them. This study explored the CPPV-1 distribution among wild carnivores through PCR screening and compared the DNA sequences of the partial capsid protein (VP2) between wild and domestic carnivores. In total, 181 samples were screened for the CPPV-1 VP2 gene, including 32 masked palm civets (Paguma larvata), 63 Chinese ferret badgers (Melogale moschata), and 86 crab-eating mongooses (Herpestes urva), from 2015 to 2019 in Taiwan. The average prevalence of CPPV-1 was 17.7% (32/181), with the highest prevalence in masked palm civets (37.5%). In addition, a masked palm civet was coinfected with two CPPV-1 strains. Among the 33 partial VP2 gene sequences, 23 were identical to sequences amplified from domestic dogs and cats in Asia and the remaining 10 were identified for the first time. This study demonstrated that CPPV-1 has circulated between domestic and wild carnivores in rural Taiwan. Therefore, further population control and health management of free-roaming domestic carnivores are recommended.

A facile iridium/graphene-catalyzed methodology providing an efficient synthetic route for C-N bond formation is reported. This catalyst can directly promote the formation of C-N bonds, without pre-activation steps, and without solvents, alkalis and other additives. This protocol provides a direct N -alkylation of amines using a variety of primary and secondary alcohols with good selectivity and excellent yields. Charmingly, the use of diols resulted in intermolecular cyclization of amines, and such products are privileged structures in biologically active compounds. Two examples illustrate the advantages of this catalyst in organic synthesis: the tandem catalysis to synthesize hydroxyine, and the intermolecular cyclyzation to synthesize cyclizine. Water is the only by-product, which makes this catalytic process sustainable and environmentally friendly.

This paper introduces the AltumView Sentinare smart activity sensor for senior care and patient monitoring. The sensor uses an AI chip and deep learning algorithms to monitor the activity of people, collect activity statistics, and notify caregivers when emergencies such as falls are detected. To protect privacy, only skeleton (stick figure) animations are transmitted instead of videos. The sensor is highly affordable, accessible, and versatile. It was a CES 2021 Innovation Award Honoree, and has been selected by Amazon as one of only three fall detection devices integrated into its Alexa Together urgent response service, and has received very positive reviews from Amazon customers. It has also been used in different senior care settings in about ten different countries. The paper presents the main features of the system, the evidences and lessons learned from its practical applications, and future directions.

In the TANGO study, the long-term noninferior efficacy of switching to dolutegravir/lamivudine (DTG/3TC) compared to continuing tenofovir alafenamide–based regimens was demonstrated in treatment-experienced adults with HIV. However, there is limited real-world data comparing the effectiveness and safety of bictegravir/emtricitabine/tenofovir alafenamide fumarate (BIC/FTC/TAF) and DTG/3TC in Asia. This retrospective observational study, conducted at a designated HIV-care hospital from March 2019 to January 2023, aimed to address this gap. Demographic, clinical, and laboratory data, including HIV viral loads and lipid profiles, were collected and analyzed. The primary outcome was the proportion of patients with HIV RNA <50 copies/mL at week 48 in both groups, utilizing a snapshot, per-protocol–exposed population. A total of 1086 patients were included, with 511 in the DTG/3TC group and 575 in the BIC/FTC/TAF group. At week 48, 98% of patients in the DTG/3TC group and 94% in the BIC/FTC/TAF group achieved HIV RNA <50 copies/mL (p <0.01). Logistic regression analysis identified risk factors for detectable viral loads at week 48, including HIV RNA >100,000 copies/mL (AOR 5.13, 95% CI 1.42–18.53), low-level viremia (AOR 3.91, 95% CI 1.07–14.25), and record of virologic failure ≥2 times (AOR 4.21, 95% CI 1.64–10.85) before the switch. Furthermore, no significant difference was found between the DTG/3TC and BIC/FTC/TAF regimens (AOR: 1.51, 95% CI 0.70–3.24). In conclusion, the study demonstrates that the effectiveness and safety profiles of DTG/3TC and BIC/FTC/TAF were comparable in treatment-experienced adults with HIV, particularly among those with undetectable viral loads at baseline.

Imbalanced classes can cause machine learning models to classify positive class instances poorly, and the models require hyperparameter sets to optimal values. This study aims to develop random forest (RF) and support vector machine (SVM) models that use the optimal hyperparameters obtained through 5-fold cross-validation data. Both models were trained using optimal hyperparameter pairs that fit two data scenarios, the original and oversampling training sets, to produce the benchmark and best models. The model's performance was evaluated using six metrics, including training and testing data. The acquired optimal RF hyperparameter pair was (500, 10) for the minimum number of instances and tree depth level. In contrast, the acquired optimal SVM hyperparameter pair was (0.001, 500) for the gamma and constant values. The benchmark model performed approximately 98% on Accuracy, Precision, Recall, and F1 score metrics but failed to deliver any performance on Mathew's Correlation Coefficient (MC) and Area under Curve (AUC) metrics. The best RF and SVM perform less than both benchmark models in four famous metrics. Both best models have performance improvements of approximately 6% and 11% for the MCC and AUC metrics, respectively. The best RF performance was slightly better than the best SVM performance.

Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic significantly disrupted global healthcare systems. The impacts of SARS-CoV-2 infection on urticaria and its management are unknown. To collect information about patients with urticaria infected with SARS-CoV-2 and to investigate the impact of SARS-CoV-2 infection on urticaria severity, course, and treatment to better support recovery. This was a questionnaire-based study of patients with urticaria infected with SARS-CoV-2. Changes in urticaria severity (measured with the urticaria activity score (UAS)), course, and treatment were assessed before, during, and after SARS-CoV-2 infection. Mean (± SD) UAS scores were 5.17 ± 1.67, 4.23 ± 1.98, and 4.37 ± 1.93 before, during, and after SARS-CoV-2 infection, respectively (F = 8.839, p < 0.01). The median (IQR) wheal score was 0.464 (0.464, 0.763), 0.464 (0.138, 0.763), and 0.464 (0.138, 0.763) before, during, and after infection, respectively (Kruskal-Wallis H-test, H=12.230, p = 0.02). The median (IQR) pruritus score was 0.695 (0.395, 0.695), 0.394 (0.123, 0.695), and 0.394 (0.123, 0.695) before, during, and after infection, respectively (Kruskal-Wallis H-test, H = 21.001, p < 0.01). Within the limitations of a questionnaire study, urticaria appears to improve during SARS-CoV-2 infection, worsens slightly after recovery, and the frequency of Western medicine use increases.

The theory of fractional calculus extends the order of classical integer calculus from integer to non-integer. As a new engineering application tool, it has made many important research achievements in many fields, including image processing. This paper mainly studies the application of fractional calculus theory in image enhancement and denoising, including the basic theory of fractional calculus and its amplitude frequency characteristics, the application of fractional differential operator in image enhancement, and the application of fractional integral operator in image denoising. The experimental results show that the fractional calculus theory has more special advantages in image enhancement and denoising. Compared with the existing integer order image enhancement operators, the fractional differential operator can more effectively enhance the "weak edge" and "strong texture" details of the image. The fractional order integral image denoising operator can not only improve the signal-to-noise ratio of the image compared to traditional denoising methods, but also better preserve detailed information such as edges and textures of the image.

Next-generation sequencing (NGS) has been a widely-used technology in biomedical research for understanding the role of molecular genetics of cells in health and disease. A variety of computational tools have been developed to analyse the vastly growing NGS data, which often require bioinformatics skills, tedious work and significant amount of time. To facilitate data processing steps minding the gap between biologists and bioinformaticians, we developed CSI NGS Portal, an online platform which gathers established bioinformatics pipelines to provide fully automated NGS data analysis and sharing in a user-friendly website. The portal currently provides 16 standard pipelines for analysing data from DNA, RNA, smallRNA, ChIP, RIP, 4C, SHAPE, circRNA, eCLIP, Bisulfite and scRNA sequencing, and is flexible to expand with new pipelines. The users can upload raw data in fastq format and submit jobs in a few clicks, and the results will be self-accessible via the portal to view/download/share in real-time. The output can be readily used as the final report or as input for other tools depending on the pipeline. Overall, CSI NGS Portal helps researchers rapidly analyse their NGS data and share results with colleagues without the aid of a bioinformatician. The portal is freely available at: https://csibioinfo.nus.edu.sg/csingsportal

Trehalose is a non-reducing disaccharide and participates in physiological activities such as or-gan formation, energy metabolism, and stress resistance of insects. In the present study, phylo-genetic analysis divided 21 Bmtret1 orthologs into three clades. These genes are equally distrib-uted on the nine chromosomes. Cis-elements in the promoter regions of Bmtret1s indicated the possible function of Bmtret1s in response to hormones and environmental stimulus. The qPCR analysis showed the significantly different expression levels of Bmtret1s in different tissues and organs, indicating possible functional divergence. In addition, most Bmtret1s showed disturbed expression levels in response to BmNPV stresses. Our results provide a foundation for further functional dissection of Tret1s in Bombyx mori and implicate them as potential regulators for an-tiviral responses.

In order to study the petrogenesis and tectonic setting of Permian A-type granites and their relationships with hydrothermal mineralization along the Hegenshan-Heihe suture zone (HHSZ) in northeastern China, we select the newly discovered Hongyan Cu-polymetallic deposit in the northeastern part of the HHSZ that develops three stages of mineralization associated with the Shanshenfu alkali-feldspar granite (SAFG). The zircon U-Pb dating and whole rock geochemistry suggest that the SAFG is a typical A-type granite formed in the Early Permian. The zircon Hf isotopes and trace elements suggest that the SAFG has high Ti-in-zircon temperature (721–990℃), high magmatic oxygen fugacity and largely positive εHf(t) (+6.0 to +9.9). Therefore, we propose that the SAFG was derived from the crustal assimilation and fractional crystallization of the charnockitized juvenile crust. The high oxygen fugacity favors the chalcophile elements (e.g., Cu, Au, Ag) of the source region enriched in the fluid phases after magmatic fractional crystallization, consequently facilitating subsequent hydrothermal mineralization, which is also consistent with the characteristics of ore-forming fluids that changed from the initial high temperature, high salinity, high fO2 and CO2-rich magmatic-hydrothermal fluids of stage I to CO2-poor, dilute, and cooling meteoric fluids of stage III. Combined with regional geological background, the Permian A2-type granites along the HHSZ can be formed in post-collisional slab break-off process. In subsequent exploration for hydrothermal deposits along the HHSZ, the Permian A-type granites with arc-related juvenile crustal source and high fO2 have great potential and need more attention.

Mouse embryonic stem cells (mESCs) possess remarkable characteristics of unlimited self-renewal and pluripotency, which render them highly valuable for both fundamental research and clinical applications. A comprehensive understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying mESC function is of utmost importance. The Human Silence Hub (HUSH) complex, comprising FAM208A, MPP8, and periphilin, constitutes an epigenetic silencing complex involved in suppressing retroviruses and transposons during early embryonic development. However, its precise role in regulating mESC pluripotency and differentiation remains elusive. In this study, we generated homogenous miniIAA7 tagged Mpp8 mouse ES cell lines. Upon induction of MPP8 protein degradation, we observed impaired proliferation and reduced colony formation ability of mESCs. Furthermore, this study unveils the involvement of MPP8 in regulating the activity of the LIF/STAT3 signaling pathway and Nanog expression in mESCs. Finally, we provide compelling evidence that degradation of the MPP8 protein impairs the differentiation of mESC.

：Non-Euclidean data, such as social networks, and citation relationships between documents, has node information and structural information. Graph Convolutional Network(GCN) can automatically learn node features and association information between nodes. The core ideology of the graph convolutional network is to aggregate node information by using edge information, thereby generating a new node feature. In the process of updating node features, there are two core influencing factors. One is the number of neighboring nodes of the central node, the other is the contribution of the neighboring nodes to the central node. Due to the previous GCN methods not simultaneously considering the numbers and different contributions of neighboring nodes to the central node, we design the Adaptive Attention Mechanism(AAM). To further enhance the representational capability of the model, we utilize Multi-Head Graph Convolution(MHGC). Finally, we adopt cross-entropy(CE) loss function to describe the difference between the predicted results of node categories and the ground truth (GT). Combined with backpropagation, this ultimately achieves accurate node classification. Based on AAM, MHGC and CE, we contrive the novel Graph Adaptive Attention Network (GAAN). Experiments show that the classification accuracy has achieved outstanding performances on Cora, Citeseer and Pubmed datasets.

The existing segmentation-based scene text detection methods mostly need complicated post-processing, and the post-processing operation is separated from the training process, which greatly reduces the detection performance. The previous method, DBNet successfully simplified post-processing and integrated the post-processing into a segmentation network. However, the training process of the model took a long time for 1200 epochs and the sensitivity to texts of various scales was lacking, leading to some text instances being missed. Considering the above two problems, we design the text detection Network with Binarization of Hyperbolic Tangent(HTBNet). First of all, we propose Binarization of Hyperbolic Tangent (HTB), optimized along with which, the segmentation network can expedite the initial convergent speed by reducing the amount of epochs from 1200 to 600. Because features of different channels in the same scale feature map focus on the information of different regions in the image, to better represent the important features of all objects in the image, we devise the Multi-Scale Channel Attention(MSCA). Meanwhile considering that multi-scale objects in the image cannot be simultaneously detected, we propose a novel module named Fused Module with Channel and Spatial(FMCS), which can fuse the multi-scale feature maps from channel and spatial dimension. Finally we adopt cross entropy as the loss function, which measures the difference between predicted values and ground truths. The experimental results show that HTBNet compared with lightweight models has achieved competitive performance and speed on Total-Text(F-measure:86.0%, FPS:30) and MSRA-TD500 (F-measure:87.5%, FPS:30).

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a multifaceted neurodegenerative disorder characterized by cognitive decline and neuronal loss, representing a most challenging health issue. We present a computational analysis of transcriptomic data of AD tissues vs. healthy controls, focused on elucidation of functional roles played by long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) throughout the AD progression. We first assembled our own lncRNA transcripts from the raw RNA-Seq data generated from 527 samples of dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, resulting in the identification of 31,574 novel lncRNA genes. Based on co-expression analyses between mRNAs and lncRNAs, a co-expression network is constructed. Maximal subnetworks with dense connections are identified as functional clusters. Pathway enrichment analyses are conducted over mRNAs and lncRNAs in each cluster, which serve as the basis for the inference of functional roles played by lncRNAs involved in each of the key steps in an AD development model that we have previously build based on transcriptomic data of protein-encoding genes. Detailed information is presented about the functional roles by lncRNAs in activities related to stress response, reprogrammed metabolism, cell-polarity, and development. Our analyses have also revealed that lncRNAs have discerning power in distinguishing between AD samples of each stage and healthy controls. This study represents the first of its kind.

There is increasing evidence that some adult mitral valve pathologies may have developmental origins involving errors in cell signaling and protein deposition during valvulogenesis. While early and late gestational stages are well-documented in zebrafish and small mammalian models, longitudinal studies in large mammals with a similar gestational period to humans are lacking. Further, the mechanism of chordae tendineae formation and multiplication remains unclear. This current study presents a comprehensive examination of mitral anterior leaflet and chordae tendineae development in a bovine model (with a gestational period of 9 months). Remarkably distinct from small mammals, bovine development displayed early branched chordae, with increasing attachments only until birth, while the anterior leaflet grew both during gestation and postnatally. Chordae also exhibited accelerated collagen deposition, maturation, and crimp development during gestation. These findings suggest that the bovine anterior leaflet and chordae tendineae possess unique compartmentalized processes of development despite being a continuous collagenous structure.

The collapsible loess will rapidly soften and lose its bearing capacity when soaked in water. Under a mild condition (20°C), the biomimetic inorganic agent, Diammonium phosphate (DAP), reacts with calcite in the collapsible loess, producing a stronger bonding material, hydroxyapatite (HAP), to modify and stabilize the soil. Uniaxial compression, permeability tests and morphological analysis using XRD and SEM/EDX microscopy were carried out to assess the effectiveness of DAP stabilization on the collapsible loess. The results indicated that HAP improved the inter-particle bonding within loess, filled the pores within particles, reduced the permeability, and consequently mitigated collapsibility of loess. The compressive strength of DAP-treated loess increased as DAP concentration increased. Following 28-days curing, the compressive strength of the loess treated with a 3.0 mol/L DAP solution was six times greater than that of the untreated group. DAP's reinforcement effect on loess was superior to that of cement. The compressive strength of DAP-treated loess was about double that of cement-treated loess and the permeability coefficient was reduced by more than 50% at equivalent solid content. Furthermore, DAP generated 68% fewer carbon emissions compared to Portland cement. Considering eco-friendly and sustainable development, DAP offers a more competitive alternative for modification and stabilization of loess.

Strategic researches on green mine construction are of great theoretical and practical significance to the sustainable development of China's mining industry as well as the great-leap-forward development strategies of China. Strategies of green mine construction in China are methods summarized to solve all potential problems from mine production to ecological restoration. At present, strategies of green mine construction in China are not fully evaluated and studied yet. Therefore, on the basis of green mine construction related literatures carried out by researchers in China and abroad, this study took the green mine of Yongcheng City in China as the research object to evaluate the current situation of green mine construction in Yongcheng City and put forward corresponding countermeasures. First of all, driving force-pressure-state-impact-response (DPSIR) model was introduced for the construction of evaluation index system; construction principles and selection methods of indexes and the index system based on driving force, pressure, state, impact and response were constructed. Secondly, principal component analysis (PCA) was adopted to calculate and evaluate data of green mine of Yongcheng City in recent years, and construction state of green mine in Yongcheng City was analyzed concretely according to the evaluation results. Empirical results showed that, the evaluation system constructed in this study was feasible, which could be applied to evaluate construction of green mine effectively.

Chemical instability of liquid-repellent surfaces is one of the nontrivial hurdles that hinders their real-world applications. Although much efforts have been made to prepare chemically durable liquid-repellent surfaces, few attentions have been paid to exploit the instability for versatile use. Herein, we propose to create hydrophilic patterns on superhydrophobic surface by taking advantage of its chemical instability induced by acid solution treatment. Superhydrophobic Cu(OH)2 nanoneedles covered Cu plate that shows poor stability towards HCl solution (1.0 M) is taken as an example. Results show that 2.5 min of HCl solution exposure leads to the etching of Cu(OH)2 nanoneedles and partial removal of self-assembled fluoroalkyl silane molecular layer, resulting in the wettability transition from superhydrophobocity to hydrophilicity, and the water contact angle decreases from ~160° to ~30°. Hydrophilic dimples with different diameters are then created on the superhydrophobic surfaces by depositing HCl droplets with different volumes. Afterwards, the hydrophilic dimple patterned superhydrophobic surfaces are used for water droplet manipulations, including controlled transfer, merging and nanoliter droplets deposition. The results thereby verify the feasibility of creating wettability patterns on superhydrophobic surfaces by using their chemical instability towards corrosive solutions, which broadens the fabrication methods and applications of functional liquid-repellent surfaces.

During their growth, bacteria respond to complex environmental changes through equally com-plex and orderly regulatory mechanisms. sRNA has an important role as a post-transcriptional regulator in the environmental adaptation of Bacillus. In this study, we identified an sRNA Bvs091 located in the intergenic region of the Bacillus velezensis, which is widely present in the genus Bacillus and whose expression is upregulated by salt treatment. The deletion of bvs091 in B. ve-lezensis PEBA20 led to a reduced growth rate and a change in the phenotypes, with simple colony structures and low and easily degradable biofilm. Salt tolerance tests indicated that the deletion of bvs091 results in a reduced salt tolerance. galT2 mRNA is supposed to be a direct target of Bvs091 according to results obtained by using the bioinformatic method and performing qRT-PCR analysis. The microscale thermophoresis (MST) analysis showed that Bvs091 could directly bind 28‒51 bases in front of the promoter of galT2. Subsequently, the deletion of galT2 in B. velezensis resulted in increased salt tolerance. Based on the techniques of double plasmids and a half-life period, sRNA Bvs091 is confirmed as a trans-encoded sRNA that negatively regulates the mRNA expression of galT2. In brief, the trans-encoded sRNA Bvs091 acts by pairing the incomplete complementary bases of galT2 mRNA, reducing galT2 mRNA’s stability and affecting the trans-lation efficiency.

In this study, an experiment was conducted on hoop pine (Araucaria cunninghamii), which is a common tree species in Taiwan. Holes with diameters of 4, 5, 7, 10, 12, and 14 cm were drilled in dry hoop pine timber with a diameter of 39 cm and a height of 57 cm, and an 800 MHz Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) antenna were used to determine the minimum image resolution and the size of the holes in the wood. GPR images of the timber were subjected to a filtering process to obtain characteristic reflection curves of the damage to the timber. Curves with clear waveforms were observed in the GPR profiles of eccentric holes with a diameter of 4 cm. Profiles of the damage were obtained and profile images with the trunk radius at the centre were transformed into polar coordinate images. From these polar coordinate images, the location, size and diameter of the eccentric holes in the wood were identified, and the reflection curves were characterised by waveforms and irregular fluctuations. The risk levels of tree trunks were determined on the basis of their t/R (minimum normal wall thickness of the cross-section of the trunk/radius of the trunk) values and hole area ratios. A comparison between the GPR-based results and the actual diameters of the holes revealed that the filtered GPR profiles could be used for the efficient and accurate assessment of damage to hoop pine timber (average error rate ≤ 4%).

The Cav3.2 T-type calcium channel is implicated in various pathological conditions, including cardiac hypertrophy, epilepsy, autism, and chronic pain. Phosphorylation of Cav3.2 by multiple kinases plays a pivotal role in regulating its calcium channel function. The calcium/calmodulin-dependent serine/threonine phosphatase, calcineurin, interacts physically with Cav3.2 and modulates its activity. However, it remains unclear whether calcineurin dephosphorylates Cav3.2, the specific spatial regions on Cav3.2 involved, and the extent of the quantitative impact. In this study, we elucidated the serine/threonine residues on Cav3.2 targeted by calcineurin using quantitative mass spectrometry. We identified six serine residues in the N-terminus, II-III loop, and C-terminus of Cav3.2 that were dephosphorylated by calcineurin. Notably, a higher level of dephosphorylation was observed in the Cav3.2 C-terminus, where calcineurin binds to this channel. Additionally, a previously known CaMKII-phosphorylated site, S1198, was found to be dephosphorylated by calcineurin. Furthermore, we also discovered that a novel CaMKII-phosphorylated site, S2137, underwent dephosphorylation by calcineurin. In CAD cells, a mouse central nervous system cell line, membrane depolarization led to an increase in the phosphorylation of endogenous Cav3.2 at S2137. Mutation of S2137 affected the calcium channel function of Cav3.2. Our findings advance the understanding of Cav3.2 regulation not only through kinase phosphorylation but also via calcineurin phosphatase dephosphorylation.

The increasing variability in power plant load, in response to a wildly uncertain electricity market and the need to to mitigate CO₂ emissions, lead power plant operators to explore advanced options for efficiency optimization. Model-based, system-scale dynamic simulation and optimization are useful tools in this effort, and the subject of the work presented here. In prior work, a dynamic model validated against steady-state data from a 605 MW subcritical power plant was presented. This power plant model is used as a test-bed for dynamic simulations, in which the coal load is regulated to satisfy a varying power demand. Plant-level control regulates plant load to match an anticipated trajectory of the power demand. The efficiency of the power plant operating at varying load is optimized through a supervisory control architecture that performs set point optimization on the regulatory controllers. Dynamic optimization problems are formulated to search for optimal time-varying input trajectories that satisfy operability and safety constraints during the transition between plant states. An improvement in time-averaged efficiency of up to 1.8% points is shown feasible with corresponding savings in coal consumption of 184.8 tons/day and carbon footprint decrease of 0.035 kg/kWh.

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune inflammatory disease characterized by chronic synovitis and progressive destruction of cartilage and bone. RA is commonly accompanied by extra-articular comorbidities. The pathogenesis of RA and its comorbidities is complex and not completely elucidated. Assembly of NLRP3 inflammasome activates caspase-1, which induces the maturation of interleukin (IL)-1β and IL-18 and leads to cleavage of gasdermin D with promot-ing pyroptosis. Although the available therapeutic agents are effective for RA treatment, their high cost and increased infection rate are causes for concern. Recent evidence revealed the components of NLRP3 inflammasome as potential therapeutic targets in RA and its comorbidities. This nar-rative review summarizes the current research evidence regarding the pathogenic role and the therapeutic potential of NLRP3 inflammasome in RA and its comorbidities. Areas covered. We searched the MEDLINE database using the PubMed interface and reviewed English-language literature on NLRP3 inflammasome from 2000 to 2023. Its pathogenic role and therapeutic potential in RA and its comorbidities are the focus of this review. Expert opinion. NLRP3 inflammasome may play a critical role in both innate and adaptive im-munity, and its dysfunction contributes to the pathogenesis of RA and its comorbidities. Conse-quently, the components of NLRP3 inflammasome signaling represent promising therapeutic tar-gets, and ongoing research might lead to the development of new, effective treatments for RA and its comorbidities.

Abstract: High step-up voltage gain nonisolated DC-DC converter have attracted much attention in photovoltaic, fuel cells and other renewable energy system applications. In this paper, by combining input current ripple-free boost cell with coupled-inductor voltage-doubler cell, an input current ripple-free high voltage gain nonisolated converter is proposed. In addition, passive lossless clamp circuit is adopted to recycle the leakage inductor energy and to reduce the voltage spike across the power switch. By utilizing voltage-doubler cell consisting of diode and capacitor, the voltage stress of switch is further reduced and the resonance between the leakage inductor and the stray capacitor of the output diode is eliminated. A low switch-on-resistance low-voltage-rated MOSFET can therefore be employed to reduce the conduction loss and cost. The reverse recovery loss of output diode is reduced, and the efficiency of converter can be improved. Furthermore, the proposed converter can achieve nearly zero input current-ripple and make the design of electromagnetic interference (EMI) filter easy. Steady state analysis and operation mode of the converter is performed. Finally, experimental results are presented to verify the analysis results of the proposed converter.

This study employed a TSMC 0.18-µm 50 V process to establish a high-voltage n-LDMOS structure. In the reference device, the number of floating-poly (poly-2) turns was 7, and the width and spacing of each turn was 1 µm. Although increasing the number of turns reduces the peak field, directly reducing or increasing the number of poly-2 turns is a common practice. The present experiment was realized in three steps, namely fixing the number of occupied area adjustment turns, adjusting the width of each turn, and adjusting the distance between turns. The first step was fixing the number of occupied area adjustment turns. The number of turns was increased from 7 to 9, and the number of turns was reduced to 5 and 3 in the reference group. A reduction in the number of turns led to a greater decrease in the peak field and increase in the breakdown voltage despite the area remaining unchanged. A comparison of the use of three turns with that of seven turns revealed that the maximum electric field decreased by 42%, from 4.17e+3 to 2.46e+3 V/cm, and that the breakdown voltage (VBK) increased from 30.2 to 35.84 V. The second step was adjusting the width of each turn from 1 to 1.4, 1.2, 0.8, and 0.6 µm in the reference group. This increase in width reduced the maximum electric field and led to a greater increase in VBK. When the width was increased to 1.4 µm, the maximum electric field decreased by 29% from 1.95e+3 to 1.4e+3 V/cm, and the VBK increased by 183% from 30.2 to 85.6 V. The third step was adjusting the spacing of each turn from 1 to 1.4, 1.2, 0.8, and 0.6 µm in the reference group. The results revealed that a reduction in the spacing led to a greater reduction in the maximum electric field and an in-crease in the VBK. When the pitch was reduced to 0.6 µm, the maximum electric field decreased by 33%, from 1.95e+3 to 1.32e+3 V/cm, and the VBK increased by 345%, from 30.2 to 134.4 V.

Background and Aims: Of all primary liver tumors, primary hepatic angiosarcoma (PHA) is a rare and aggressive malignant vascular tumor. The standard therapeutic care for hepatic angiosarcoma remains unclear. This study compared the survival outcomes of aggressive treatment (resection and liver transplant) and nonaggressive treatment (chemotherapy, transarterial chemoembolization [TACE], and conservative treatments) for patients with PHA and analyzed the prognostic factors influencing survival. Materials and Methods: Data of patients diagnosed as having PHA at our facility were retrospectively reviewed. The primary outcome was survival time. The secondary outcome was calculated baseline characteristics. Results: We included a total of 19 patients, who were divided into 2 treatment groups: aggressive (8 patients had undergone resection or transplants) and nonaggressive (11 patients had undergone TACE, chemotherapy, or conservative treatment). The mean survival time was 233.1 ± 189.7 days in the aggressive treatment group and 146.5 ± 115.8 days in the nonaggressive treatment group. A Kaplan-Meier plot revealed no significant difference in survival time between the 2 treatment groups (P = .3256). Conclusions: The survival time of patients receiving aggressive treatment was longer than that of those receiving nonaggressive treatment. The long term survival time in some selective cases of aggressive treatment will be achieved. Thought a difference was not significant between the groups. Because the number of patients was limited, more cases are required to confirm these findings.

We investigated new anodic coloring materials that are used as ion storage layers in complementary energy storage electrochromic devices (ESECDs) to enhance their electrochromic storage performance. In this study, we fabricated counter electrodes (ion storage layers) using IrO2 doping NiO (Ir: NiO) film through cathodic arc plasma (CAP) with varying surface charge capacities. We investigated the influence of MoO3-doped WO3 (Mo: WO3) film by various Ar/O2 gas flow ratios (1/4, 1/5, and 1/6). The ESECDs used in the demonstration were 10×10 cm2 in size. They achieved optical transmittance modulation of Ir: NiO- ESECDs (glass/ITO/ Mo: WO3/gel-polymer electrolytes/ Ir: NiO /ITO/glass), ΔT=53.3% (from Tbleaching (66.6%) to Tcoloration (13.1%)). The ESECDs had a quick coloration time of 3.58 seconds, a rapid bleaching time of 1.24 seconds, and high cycling durability. It remained at 45% transmittance modulation even after 3000 cycles. New anodic materials can provide an alternative to traditional active materials for bi-functional electrochromic batteries.

This study evaluates the incidence and characteristics of adverse events (AEs) following the second COVID-19 booster dose, leveraging Taiwan's distinctive approach of extending booster vaccinations to all citizens, unlike the targeted high-risk group strategies in other countries. Utilizing data from Taipei Veterans General Hospital's Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) from October 27, 2022, to January 19, 2023, the research examines AEs in 441 out of 1711 second booster recipients, considering factors like age, vaccine brands, and booster combinations. The findings reveal incidence rates (IR) of 25.6% (95% CI: 21.1-30.8) after the first booster and 24.9% (95% CI: 20.5-30.0) after the second, mostly non-serious, with those having AEs post-first booster 5 times more likely to report them again (Incidence rat rato, 5.02, P&lt;0.001). Significantly, switching from the mRNA1273 vaccine to another brand reduced AE risk by 18%. The study underscores that AEs are more repetitive than cumulative with additional booster doses, advocating for personalized vaccination strategies based on individual medical histories and previous vaccine reactions. These insights are valuable for healthcare providers in discussing potential AEs with patients, thereby improving vaccine compliance and public trust, and for policymakers in planning future booster vaccination strategies.

Water area segmentation in remote sensing is of great importance for flood monitoring. To overcome some challenges in this task, we construct the Water Index and Polarization Information (WIPI) multi-modality dataset and propose a multi-Modality Fusion and Gated multi-Filter U-Net (MFGF-UNet) convolutional neural network. The WIPI dataset enhances the water information and reduces the data dimension. In particular, the Cloud-Free label provided in the database effectively mitigates the issue of scarcity of labeled samples Since a single form or uniform kernel size cannot handle the variety in size and shape of water bodies, we proposed the gated multi-filter inception (GMF-Inception) module in our MFGF-UNet. Moreover, we utilize the attention mechanism by introducing the Gated Channel Transform (GCT) skip connection and integrating GCT into GMF- Inception to further improve model performance. Extensive experiments on three benchmarks, including WIPI, Chengdu and GF2020 datasets demonstrate that our method achieves favorable performance with lower complexity and better robustness against six competing approaches. For example, on WIPI, Chengdu and GF2020 datasets, the proposed MFGF-UNet model achieves F1 of 0.9191, 0.7410, and 0.8421, respectively, which average F1 on three datasets is 0.0045 higher than the U-Net model and reduces 62% average GFLOPs. New WIPI dataset, code and trained models have been released on GitHub

In this paper we investigate the differential topological properties of a subclass of singular space--subcarteisan spaces. First, we get further result on partition of unity for differential spaces. Second, we establish the tubular neighborhood theorem for subcartesian spaces with constant structural dimension. Third, we generalize the concept of Morse functions on smooth manifolds to differential spaces. For subcartesian space with constant structural dimension, we provide examples of Morse functions; With the assumption that the subcartesian space can be embedded as a bounded subset of an Euclidean space, we prove that smooth bounded functions on this space can be approximated by Morse functions; We study the infinitesimal stability of Morse functions on subcartesian spaces. Classical results on Morse functions on smooth manifolds can be treated directly as corollaries of our results here.

Polluted rivers are a primary problem in Changhua County, Taiwan, due to rapid and massive developments in agriculture and industry. In this study, samples consisted of water influent from the Yangzi-Cuo River, Ci-Tong Jiao, Changhua County. Ecology technology, a combination of gravel contact oxidation and surface flow constructed wetlands, was employed to enhance the water quality. Ecology technology is a useful and ordinary process that focuses on original treatment of pollution through chemical, physical, and biological procedures based on the mediums of soil, plant, water, and microorganisms from pure environments. Moreover, this study aimed to minimize the river pollution index (RPI) of the Yangzi-Cuo River by using combinations of gravel contact oxidation and surface flow constructed wetlands. The inflow volume of the water samples in situ was found to be 1534–2261 cubic meters per day (CMD). The pollution in the water sample mostly involved suspended solid (SS), ammoniacal nitrogen (NH₃–N), total phosphorus (TP), total nitrogen (TN), and biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), and the values of the above indexes were found to be 10.0–26.7 mg/L, 0.9–14.0 mg/L, 1.2–14.1 mg/L, 11.1–18.2 mg/L, and 0.5–3.6 mg/L, respectively. Efficiencies of pollution elimination in SS, NH₃–N, TP, TN, and BOD were found to be 24.2–93.1%, 58.3–86.2%, 5.2–85.0%, 59.4–77.2%, and 46.3–76.4%, correspondingly, after purification treatment via ecology technology. Thus, ecology technology is a valid means of purification treatment for polluted rivers.

Clubhouse is an auditory app that allows users to host various rooms surrounding a diverse range of topics from Artificial Intelligence to Philosophy. Along with its educational and serene approach, it is known for its popularity amongst celebrities, including Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerburg, CEO of Shopify, and its elusive invite and ios-only pass into gaining access into Clubhouse. Waiting lists are available in the case of not achieving an invite, but to further speed the process, various sellers on eBay, Reddit, Twitter, etc., charging invites from $10-$200. This research paper covers the phenomenon of Clubhouse and the emergence of audio-only rooms, along with a hypothesis of why Clubhouse and other apps of a similar kind are experiencing a harsh downfall despite its seemingly successful business model.

Dry eye disease (DED) most commonly caused by evaporative subtypes and mainly induced by meibomian gland dysfunction (MGD). Intense pulsed light (IPL) combined with meibomian gland expression (MGX) is noninvasive treatment for improvement of ocular discomfort symptoms and MGD. In this prospective study between November 2020 and May 2022, the patients met the criteria of both ocular surface disease index (OSDI) ≥13 scores and standardized patient evaluation of eye dryness (SPEED)≥ 8 scores were enrolled in Kaohsiung Veteran General Hospital. Three separate treatment sessions of IPL therapy combined with MGX administered to the lower lids with an interval of 28 days. Further tear film assessment included lipid layer thickness (LLT), tear meniscus height (TMH), non-invasive tear break-up time (NIBUT), meibomian gland loss (MGL) either beforeor after 1st and 3rd IPL therapy combined with MGX. Besides, lissamine green staining and pain scores were also recorded. We totally enrolled 37 patients of 74 eyes. Men accounted for 18.92% (7/37). The mean age was 54.51 ± 11.72 years. The mean OSDI scores were 58.12 ± 22, while the SPEED scores were 17.03 ± 5.98. The mean Schirmer’s test was 3.66 ± 2.43 mm. After three sessions IPL treatment with MGX, the OSDI, SPEED, LLT, TMH, MGL, MGXS and pain scores were significantly improved. For the MGX scores (MGXS) ≤20 group, MGL and lissamine green scores showed significant improvements. For the MGXS >20 group, TMH and dry spot rate revealed statistically improvement. Noninvasive IPL therapy with MGX statistically improved not only dry eye symptoms but also tear film assessments.

Satellite scene classification is challenging because of the high variability inherent in satellite data. Although rapid progress in remote sensing techniques has been witnessed in recent years, the resolution of the available satellite images remains limited compared with the general images acquired using a common camera. On the other hand, a satellite image usually has a greater number of spectral bands than a general image, thereby permitting the multi-spectral analysis of different land materials and promoting low-resolution satellite scene recognition. This study advocates multi-spectral analysis and explores the middle-level statistics of spectral information for satellite scene representation instead of using spatial analysis. This approach is widely utilized in general image and natural scene classification and achieved promising recognition performance for different applications. The proposed multi-spectral analysis firstly learns the multi-spectral prototypes (codebook) for representing any pixel-wise spectral data, and then based on the learned codebook, a sparse coded spectral vector can be obtained with machine learning techniques. Furthermore, in order to combine the set of coded spectral vectors in a satellite scene image, we propose a hybrid aggregation (pooling) approach, instead of conventional averaging and max pooling, which includes the benefits of the two existing methods but avoids extremely noisy coded values. Experiments on three satellite datasets validated that the performance of our proposed approach is much more accurate than even the deep learning framework for spatial analysis.

Betel quid (BQ) use disorder (BUD) is prevalent in many Asian countries, impacting approximately 600 million people. We conducted a randomized clinical trial to analyze the impact of MAOA genetic variations on the severity of BQ craving. This was measured using DSM-5 criteria and Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale modified for betel-quid (Y-BOCS-BQ). Participants were grouped according to the severity of BUD and MAOA gene single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) rs5953210 genotypes. Y-BOCS-BQ were assessed at baseline (week 0) and during follow-up at weeks 2, 4, 6, and 8. The AA genotype group showed significantly greater reductions in Y-BOCS-BQ at weeks 2 (p=0.0194), 4 (p=0.0078), 6 (p=0.0277), and 8 (p=0.0376) compared to the GG genotype group. Additionally, within the antidepressant group, the AA genotype showed significant reductions in Y-BOCS-BQ at weeks 2 (p=0.0313), 4 (p=0.0134), 6 (p=0.0061), and 8 (p=0.0241) compared to the GG genotype. Statistical analysis revealed a significant interaction between the treatment and placebo groups based on MAOA genotypes, with the AA genotype in the treatment group exhibiting a more pronounced decrease in Y-BOCS-BQ (p interaction <0.05) at week 6. These findings highlight the importance of considering genetic factors when developing personalized treatment plans for BUD.

With the introduction of policies to promote intangible cultural heritage into schools, intangible cultural heritage plays an increasingly important role in primary education. However, the implementation of the intangible cultural heritage policy in primary schools is mostly formalized, which leads to many problems in the introduction of intangible cultural heritage, such as mainly staying at the level of visual display and public opinion publicity, carrying out a small number of intangible cultural experience activities, and insufficient materialization and scenization of intangible cultural heritage, so that students cannot feel the inherent charm of intangible cultural heritage. In order to promote the development of intangible cultural heritage education, this paper uses the AGIL model of Parsons, literature analysis, case analysis and interview methods to study the promotion path of intangible cultural heritage in primary schools, and proposes solutions such as setting educational goals for school segments, setting up intangible cultural experience activities in schools, combining intangible cultural heritage with subject courses, and establishing a good maintenance mode. After the program is applied into practice, it is found that the use of storytelling by teachers to popularize the relevant knowledge of intangible cultural heritage is conducive to stimulating students' interest and prompting students to think. In addition, teaching and life practice should be combined, and students' five education should be emphasized at the same time to avoid teaching uniformity.

This article presents an automated vision-based algorithm for the die-scale inspection of wafer images captured using scanning acoustic tomography (SAT). This algorithm can find defective and abnormal die-scale patterns, and produce a wafer map to visualize the distribution of defects and anomalies on the wafer. The main procedures include standard template extraction, die detection through template matching, pattern candidate prediction through clustering, and pattern classification through deep learning. To conduct the template matching, we first introduce a two-step method to obtain a standard template from the original SAT image. Subsequently, a majority of the die patterns are detected through template matching. Thereafter, the columns and rows arranged from the detected dies are predicted using a clustering method; thus, an initial wafer map is produced. This map is composed of detected die patterns and predicted pattern candidates. In the final phase of the proposed algorithm, we implement a deep learning-based model to determine defective and abnormal patterns in the wafer map. The experimental results verified the effectiveness and efficiency of our proposed algorithm. In conclusion, the proposed method performs well in identifying defective and abnormal die patterns, and produces a wafer map that presents important information for solving wafer fabrication issues.

The greatly diversified flowering plants (angiosperms) are the dominating and defining group in the current earth ecosystem. However, from which group by what way the flowers, especially their gynoecia (key characteristics of angiosperms), are derived have been the questions in botany unanswered over centuries. Such an embarrassing situation can be attributed to the lack of plants with partially enclosed ovules, which are supposed to be a post between gymnosperms and angi-osperms. Here we report a fossil plant that has an apparent coniferous vegetative and reproduc-tive morphologies but has a single seed partially wrapped by the subtending bract. Such a mor-phology suggests that the carpels in angiosperms may be equivalent to bracts enclosing their axil-lary seed(s). Such a non-traditional interpretation of the homology of angiosperm carpels is com-patible with various new progresses made in botany and is in line with Tomlinson’s recent hy-pothesis. Together with other fossil evidence reported recently, it appears that gynoecia in angio-sperms are derived in multiple ways.

The degree of ore rock fragmentation of mine blasting is an important index for evaluating the effect of engineering blasting. In order to study the effect of millisecond delayed blasting on the internal fragmentation of the ore rock, LS-DYNA numerical simulation software was used to obtain the damage characteristics of the ore rock in the blasting area using the RHT model. The Mohr-Coulomb strength damage criterion was applied to analyze the internal stress state of the ore rock, and the effects of 25ms, 50ms and 75ms delay time conditions on ore rock fragmentation were studied. The results show that, within a certain range of delay time, the degree of rock fragmentation increases with the increase of delay time. The stress state in the ore rock due to blasting is strengthened with the increase of delay time in the direction of the blast hole, which shows that the stress concentration is strengthened from the excavation face to the interior of the ore rock. The damage and the degree of fragmentation show a characteristic relationship of 25ms＜50ms＜75ms, which is verified by carrying out blasting experiments on site.

Health information technology has been widely used in healthcare, which has contributed a huge amount of data. Health data has four characteristics: high volume; high velocity; high variety and high value. Thus, they can be leveraged to i) discover associations between genes, diseases and drugs to implement precision medicine; ii) predict diseases and identify their corresponding causal factors to prevent or control the diseases at an earlier time; iii) learn risk factors related to clinical outcomes (e.g., patients’ unplanned readmission), to improve care quality and reduce healthcare expenditure; and iv) discover care coordination patterns representing good practice in the implementation of collaborative patient-centered care. At the same time, there are major challenges existing in data-driven healthcare research, which include: i) inefficient health data exchanges across different sources; ii) learned knowledge is biased to specific institution; iii) inefficient strategies to evaluate plausibility of the learned patterns and v) incorrect interpretation and translation of the learned patterns. In this paper, we review various types of health data, discuss opportunities and challenges existing in the data-driven healthcare research, provide solutions to solve the challenges, and state the important role of the data-driven healthcare research in the establishment of smart healthcare system.

Edible coating gels developed from the Aloe vera plant have been used as a traditional medicine for about 3000 years. Aloe vera contains 110 potentially active constituents from six different classes: chromone and its glycoside derivatives; anthraquinone and its glycoside derivatives; flavonoids; phenylpropanoids and coumarins; phenylpyrone and phenol derivatives; and phytosterols and others. Apart from medicinal uses, Aloe gels have an important role in food preservation as edible coatings. They provide an edible barrier for atmospheric gases and moisture, and help to reduce the respiration and transpiration of fresh produce, which helps to preserve its postharvest quality. To date, numerous studies have been conducted on the postharvest use of Aloe vera gel. The present review article summarizes and discusses existing available information about the chemical constituents, antimicrobial activity, and food preservative characteristics of Aloe vera.

The monocular structured light measurement system has low cost, simple algorithms, and a wide measurement range, making it widely applicable in multiple fields. However, in practical applications, the system may be affected by various factors including noise, non-linear intensity, changes in the reflectivity of the object being measured, and the calibration method and accuracy of the system, thereby reducing the measurement accuracy. In order to solve these issues, this paper proposes a new monocular structured light measurement method, mainly comprises the following two points: (a) A denoising algorithm for phase images based on DAE is proposed, which calculates the wrapped phase of the phase-shifted fringes after initial denoising by DAE. Then, a new phase-shifted fringe pattern is generated and input into DAE for iterative denoising, achieving high-performance image denoising and high-precision wrapped phase solution. (b) A new absolute phase height calibration algorithm is proposed, which introduces camera internal and external parameters and uses a two-layer feedforward network to directly establish the relationship between phase and the 3D coordinate system. Without the need for high-precision motion platforms, high-precision phase height calibration is attainable. In general, compared to conventional methods, the experimental results indicate the effectiveness of the proposed method for low-quality phase-shifted fringe 3D reconstruction. In addition, the measurement method described in this article also demonstrates effectiveness in high-dynamic scenes.

Excessive body fat is a major contributor to obesity, which is related to high blood, total cholesterol and triglycerides. Lemons (Citrus limon) are renowned for their antioxidant and lipid-lowering properties. First, Sugar-free fermentation demonstrated better results lower sugar content and was identified as the preferred fermentation method. Next, the effect of two doses of sugar-free fermented lemon peel juice (SF-FLPJ) on obesity was investigated. Sprague Dawley (male rats) were randomly divided into 4 groups and fed a standard feed or high-fat diet (HFD) to induce fatness for eight weeks. The two groups of rats fed an HFD were administered SF-FLPJ at 0.45 or 0.9 g/kg body weight daily for eight weeks. The obese rats administered 0.9 g/kg (body weight/day) of SF-FLPJ exhibited significant reductions in body fat mass and percentage; they also had lower blood cholesterol and triglyceride levels than the other groups. Additionally, the rats displayed diminished liver fat accumulation. The results suggest that SF-FLPJ can be a supplement in managing body fat, contributing positively to addressing obesity within the context of health management, and reduce obesity-associated issues.

There is no doubt that seagrass beds constitute one of the most productive ecosystems in shallow coastal waters. Despite this, picoplankton in seagrass ecosystems has received relatively little attention. The purpose of this study was to compare picoplankton growth and mortality rates between seagrass and unvegetated habitats using chamber incubations. We tested two main hypotheses: (i) incubation with seagrass would result in higher bacterial growth rates due to increased DOM release from seagrass photosynthesis, and (ii) Synechococcus spp. would be lower in the presence of seagrass due to competition for inorganic nutrients. Our results showed bacterial growth rates of 2.31 and 2.44 d–1 without and with seagrass, respectively. In seagrass chambers, bacterial growth was higher than that in non-seagrass chambers, suggesting that organic carbon coming from the seagrass community may support bacterial production. Furthermore, we observed a negative Synechococcus spp. growth rate (-0.9 d–1) in the seagrass treatment, likely reflecting nutrient competition with the seagrass. Small-scale chambers proved to be a useful tool for studying the factors controlling spatial and temporal patterns of picoplankton across different habitats. Furthermore, future studies should examine picoplankton growth over a wider range of spatial scales in seagrass beds and adjacent unvegetated sediment.

The molecular clusters ((HO)3Si-O-Si(OH)3, and (HO)3Al-O-Si(OH)3 ) representative of aluminosilicate mineral surface were employed to study the dissolution of aluminosilicate in acidic condition via density functional theory with the M06-2X+G(d,p) methodology. The surface termination sites (Si and Al) were both tetra-coordinated and the terminal oxygen was protonated in acidic condition. In the dissolution reaction, the calculated barrier height of the six-membered ring transition state complex containing two water molecules was predicted to be lower than that of four-membered ring transition state complex containing one water molecule. In addition, the calculated barrier heights for Al-terminated sites were predicted to be lower than those for the Si-terminated sites, suggesting that breaking the Al-O bond is easier than Si-O bond in the aluminosilicate mineral surface; the barrier heights of the surface termination sites with protonated terminal oxygen were lower than those without protonated terminal oxygen. With the fracture of Si-O and Al-O bonds, the Si and Al release from the aluminosilicate. These results confirm the experimental conclusions that the acidic condition facilitates the release of Si and Al from the aluminosilicate, and the concentration of Al leaching from aluminosilicate is higher than Si.

The rapid development of three-dimensional (3D) acquisition technology based on 3D sensors provides a large volume of data, which is often represented in the form of point clouds. Point cloud representation can preserve the original geometric information along with associated attributes in a 3D space. Therefore, it has been widely adopted in many scene-understanding-related applications such as virtual reality (VR) and autonomous driving. However, the massive amount of point cloud data aggregated from distributed 3D sensors also poses challenges for secure data collection, management, storage, and sharing. Thanks to the characteristics of decentralization and security nature, Blockchain has a great potential to improve point cloud services and enhance security and privacy preservation. Inspired by the rationales behind Software Defined Network (SDN) technology, this paper envisions SAUSA, a blockchain-based authentication network that is capable of recording, tracking, and auditing the access, usage, and storage of 3D point cloud data sets in their life-cycle in a decentralized manner. SAUSA adopts an SDN-enabled point cloud service architecture which allows for efficient data processing and delivery to satisfy diverse Quality-of-Service (QoS) requirements. A blockchain-based authentication framework is proposed to ensure security and privacy preservation in point cloud data acquisition, storage, and analytics. Leveraging smart contracts for digitizing access control policies and point cloud data on the blockchain, data owners have full control of their 3D sensors and point clouds. In addition, anyone can verify the authenticity and integrity of point clouds in use without relying on a third party. Moreover, SAUSA integrates a decentralized storage platform to store encrypted point clouds while recording references of raw data on the distributed ledger. Such a hybrid on-chain and off-chain storage strategy not only improves robustness and availability but also ensures privacy preservation for sensitive information in point cloud applications. A proof-of-concept prototype is implemented and tested on a physical network. The experimental evaluation validates the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed SAUSA solution.