Extreme-mass-ratio inspirals (EMRIs) are significant observational targets for spaceborne gravitational wave detectors, namely, LISA, Taiji, and Tianqin, which involve the inspiral of stellar-mass compact objects into massive black holes with a mass range of approximately 104∼107M⊙. EMRIs are estimated to produce long lived gravitational wave signals with more than 105 cycles before plunge, making them an ideal laboratory for exploring the strong-gravity properties of the spacetimes around the MBHs, stellar dynamics in galactic nuclei, and properties of the MBHs itself. However, the complexity of the waveform model, which involves the superposition of multiple harmonics, as well as the high-dimensional and large-volume parameter space, make the fully coherent search challenging. In our previous work, we proposed a 10-dimensional search using Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) with local maximization over the three initial angles. In this study, we extend the search to an 8-dimensional PSO with local maximization over both the three initial angles and the angles of spin direction of the MBH where the latter contribute a time independent amplitude to the waveforms. Additionally we propose a 7-dimensional PSO search by using a fiducial value for the initial orbital frequency and shifting the corresponding 8-dimensional Time Delay Interferometry responses until a certain lag returns the corresponding 8-dimensional log-likelihood ratio maximum. The reduced dimensionality likelihoods enable us to successfully search for EMRI signals with duration of 0.5 years and signal-to-noise ratio of 50 within a wider search range than our previous study. We discuss further developments, such as using a hierarchical search to narrow down the search ranges of certain parameters, and applying Graphics Processing Units to speed up the code. These advances aim to improve the efficiency and accuracy of the EMRI search algorithm.

The effects of exogenous inorganic [i.e., nitrate (NO3-)/ammonium (NH4+)] and organic [i.e., glutamate (Glu)/argine (Arg)] N alone and in combination on the accumulation of proline (Pro) in rice plant under trivalent chromium [Cr(III)] stress were studied through the mass balance matrix model (MBMM). ‘NH4+’ application showed the largest contribution to the Pro content in rice shoots under different concentrations of Cr(III), followed by ‘NO3-’, ‘Arg’, and ‘Glu’ application respectively. While, ‘Arg’ application displayed the largest contribution to the Pro content in roots under Cr(III) stress, followed by ‘NH4+’, ‘Glu’, and ‘NO3-’ application. Among the combination cases of N sources used, the application of ‘NH4++Arg’ showed the greatest contribution to the Pro content in both roots and shoots of Cr(III)-treated rice seedlings, while the application of ‘NO3-+Glu’ showed the least contribution to the Pro content in rice seedlings under Cr(III) stress. Results from this study indicated that the level of indigenous Pro in rice seedlings is quite sensitive to Cr(III) stress under different N sources, and mathematical modeling showed a reliable result to estimate the relationship between Pro content and N source application in rice plants in response to Cr(III) exposure .

Swarm intelligence (SI) methods are nature-inspired metaheuristics for global optimization that exploit a coordinated stochastic search strategy by a group of agents. Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) is an established SI method that has been applied successfully to the optimization of rugged high-dimensional likelihood functions, a problem that presents the main bottleneck across a variety of gravitational wave (GW) data analysis challenges. We present results from a first application of PSO to one of the most difficult of these challenges, namely, the search for Extreme Mass Ratio Inspiral (EMRI) in data from future spaceborne GW detectors such as LISA, Taiji, or Tianqin. We use the standard Generalized Likelihood Ratio Test formalism, with minimal use of restrictive approximations, to search 6 months of simulated LISA data and quantify the search depth, in signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), and breadth, in the ranges of the EMRI parameters, that PSO can handle. Our results demonstrate that a PSO-based EMRI search is successful over a search region that is in the ballpark of the one that current hierarchical schemes can identify. Directions for future improvements, including computational bottlenecks to be overcome, are identified.

A series of novel N-n-butyl-1,8-naphthalimide derivatives were synthesized via a three-step reaction involving nucleophilic substitution and acylation. All of the compounds were characterized by IR, ¹H NMR, ¹³C NMR, MS, and elemental analysis, and the crystal structure of N-n-butyl-4-[N’,N’-bis(2`,4`-dichlorobenzoyl)ethylamino]-1,8-naphthalimide was determined. The π-π stacking interactions and hydrogen bonds between the two molecular core planes (naphthalimide ring) and the van der Waals forces between the flexible n-butyl groups resulted in a 3D long-chain structure. The UV-vis and fluorescence properties of the title compounds were investigated. The results indicated that the monosubstituted 1,8-naphthalimide derivatives bearing an electron-donating group on the benzene ring or a structure with a larger conjugative effect exhibited enhanced fluorescence properties.

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.

Both sand and fly ash were found to be promising for phosphorus removal in bioretention systems. However, nutrient removal in bioretention systems with sand, soil and fly ash was still uncertain due to a lack of data about the influence of layer structure and submerged zone. In this study, a mixture with sand, soil and fly ash (1:1:1) was selected as the base in bioretention systems with different packed layer structures and heights of submerged zone. The comparison of multi-layered structure with mixed structure implied that the used bioretention system with multi-layered structure was superior to that with mixed structure for nitrogen and phosphorus removal. The investigation of the influence of submerged zones on nutrient removal indicated that the submerged zone could significantly improve nitrate removal efficiency with 67.52%-86.32%, while sharply reduce the removal of ammonia nitrogen (from 95.15% to 51.81%) and TP (from 88.66% to 44.50%). Overall evaluation of the effect of packed layer structures and submerged zones suggested that the bioretention system with multi-layered structure at the height of submerged zone at 20-40cm was the most satisfactory, due to its microbial environment.

A full connected world is expected to gain in the 6th generation mobile network (6G). As a typi-cal fully connected scenario, the internet of vehicle (IoV) enables intelligent vehicle operations via artificial intelligence (AI) and edge computing technologies. In the future of vehicular net-works, wide variety of services need powerful computing resources and higher quality of ser-vice (QoS). Existing resources are insufficient to match these requirements. Aim to this problem, An intelligent service offloading framework is provided. Based on the framework, an Algorithm of Improved Gradient Descent (AIGD) is created to accelerate the speed of iteration. So, the con-vergence of convolutional neural network (CNN) based on AIGD is able to be accelerated too. Then, an Algorithm of convolutional long short-term memory (CN_LSTM) Based Traffic Predic-tion (ACLBTP) is designed to gain the predicted number of vehicles belonged to the edge node. At last, an Algorithm of Service Offloading Based on CN_LSTM (ASOBCL) is conducted to of-fload these services to the vehicles belonged to the edge node. In ASOBCL, sorting technique is adopted to speed up the offloading work. Simulation results demonstrate the fact that the pre-diction strategy designed in this paper has high accuracy. The low offloading time and main-taining stable load balance is gained via running ASOBCL. Low offloading time means short response time. And, the QoS is guaranteed. So, these strategies designed in this paper are effec-tive and valuable.

HybridAC/DC microgrids(HMG) are emerging as an attracting method for integrating the AC/DC distributed energy resources(DERs) with the features of high-performance and low-cost. In the isolated hybrid AC/DC microgrid (IHMG), the key problem is how to balance the power variation and regulate the voltage and frequency. Various energy storage systems (ESS)and interlinking converter (IC) technologies are viable for this application. The present study proposes a novel unified power flow model to evaluate and compare the abilities of the ESS with different connection topologies and ICs with different control approaches to maintain the voltage and frequency stability of the IHMG. In order to investigate the performance of the proposed scheme, five operation modes of the IHMG are defined and explained. The classification is based on the connection topologies and control modes of the ESS/IC in the IHMG. Then, a set of generic PF equations are derived. Moreover, three binary matrices are applied in the construction of the unified power equations. These matrices are used for describing the running state of the IHMG. Finally, in order to verify the proposed scheme, it is applied to several case studies of the IHMG. The operation characteristics of multi-DC subgrids IHMG in different modes, particularly when an external disturbance occurs, are investigated.

Mulberry is an economically significant crop for the sericulture industry worldwide. Stresses such as drought exposure have a significant influence on plant survival. Metabolome directly reflects plant physiological status; thus, a way to assess this impact is to perform a global metabolomic analysis. This study investigated the effect of drought stress on mulberry Yu-711 metabolic balance using a liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) based on an untargeted metabolomic approach. For this objective, Yu-711 leaves were subjected to two weeks of drought stress treatment and control without drought stress. Multivariate and univariate statistical analyses highlighted numerous differentially-accumulated metabolic elements as a function of time and treatment. Drought stress led to a more differentiated metabolites response than the control. We found that the levels of total lipids and galactolipids, and phospholipids (PC, PA, PE) were significantly altered, producing 48% of the total differentially expressed metabolites. Fatty acyls were the most abundant lipids expressed and decreased considerably by 73.6%. Prenol lipids class of lipids increased in drought leaves. Other classes of metabolites, including polyphenols( flavonoids and cinnamic acid), organic acid (amino acids), carbohydrates, benzenoids, and organoheterocyclic, all had a dynamic trend in response to the drought stress. However, their levels under drought stress generally decreased significantly compared to the control. These results provide an overview of the metabolic profile of the mulberry plant through differentially-accumulated compounds and provide a better understanding of global plant metabolic changes in defense mechanisms.

In 2015, the new installed capacity of global renewable energy power generation exceeded the newly installed capacity of conventional energy power generation, marking a structural change in the construction of the global power system. With the continuous improvement of wind energy utilization technology, the global wind power industry has developed rapidly in recent years. The world's available wind energy is 20 billion kilowatts and has become one of the most economical green power. In China, wind power has become the third largest source of electricity, with the installed capacity increasing from 3.1% in 2010 to 9.2% in 2017. In 2017, China's new installed capacity was 19,660 MW, accounting for 37.45% of the world's new installed capacity. This paper evaluates and compares the efficiency of wind power industry in the four regions of eastern, central, western and northeastern China through EBM models based on radial and non-radial factors. This paper discusses the contribution of China's wind power industry to CO2 emission reduction from the relationship between installed capacity efficiency and CO2 emission reduction efficiency. The conclusions show that the overall efficiency score and ranking of wind power in 2013-2017 is the best in the eastern region, followed by the northeast region and the western and central regions.

In the study of rough sets, there are many covering approximation spaces, how to classify covering approximation spaces has become a hot issue. In this paper, we propose concepts covering approximation $T_{1}$-space, $F-$symmtry, covering rough continuous mapping, covering rough homeomorphism mapping to solve this question. We also propose a new method for constructing topology in Theorem 5.1, and get the following properties: (1) For each $x\in U$, $\{X_{i}:i\in I\}\subseteq \mathcal{P}(U)$ is all the subsets of $U$ which contains $x$ and $*$ is a reflexive relation on $U$. If $V\in \tau$ is a subset of $U$ and $x\in V$, then $\underline{*}(\bigcap \limits_{i\in I}X_{i})$ is the smallest subset of $U$ and $x \in \underline{*}(\bigcap \limits_{i\in I}X_{i})\subseteq V$. Denoted by $C(x)=\bigcap \{\underline{*}(X_{i}):x\in \underline{*}(X_{i}),i\in I\}$. (2)If $V\in \tau$ is a subset of $U$, then $V =$ $\bigcup \limits_{x\in V} C(x)$. (3) Let $\{\underline{*}(X_{i}):x\notin \underline{*}(X_{i}), i\in I\}$, then $\overline{\{x\}}$ $=$ $U \setminus \bigcup \limits_{x\notin \underline{*}(X_{i}), i\in I}\underline{*}(X_{i})$; (4) Let $*$ be a reflexive relation on $U$. For every $X\subseteq U$, we have $int(\underline{*}(X))=\underline{*}(X)$. Where $int(\underline{*}(X))$ represents the interior of $\underline{*}(X)$. (5) Let $\{\underline{*}(X_{i}):x\in \underline{*}(X_{i}),i\in I\}$ be a family subsets of $U$, then $\{\underline{*}(X_{i}):x\in \underline{*}(X_{i}),i\in I\}$ is a base for $(U,\tau)$ at the point $x$. \\

The extant Keteleeria is endemic to East and Southeast Asia, while it is widely distributed in the northern hemisphere in Earth’s history. In this paper, we reported a novel wood fossil of Keteleerioxylon changchunense Shi, Sun, Meng et Yu sp. nov. collected from the middle member of Yingcheng Formation, Yingcheng Coal Mine, Changchun City, Jilin Province, Northeast China. The quantitative growth-ring analyses of K. changchunense indicate that it was evergreen and its leaf longevity was 1-3 years, which is consistent with the foliar retention of extant Keteleeria. Its high ring markedness index (RMI) indicates that the climate seasonality was pronounced during the early Albian in Songliao Basin, Northeast China. The fossil records of Keteleeria and closely related taxa indicate that this group might originate in Northeast China, spread and migrated northward during the Cretaceous, gradually decreased in the Cenozoic, and so far only survives in East and Southeast Asia.

Objective: To evaluate the effect of propofol combined with psychological intervention on pain and emotional evaluation in painless colonoscopic colonic polypectomy patients undergoing endoscopic mucosal resection (EMR).Methods: A total of 80 patients who underwent painless colonoscopic colonic polypectomy with EMR treatment between June 2020 and June 2022 were selected in order of admission and divided into two groups. The control group received conventional analgesia, while the observation group received propofol combined with psychological intervention. Pain visual analog scale (VAS) and emotional scale were used to evaluate pain and emotions in both groups of patients. Adverse reactions and clinical efficacy were also compared between the two groups.Results: The two groups of patients were generally comparable with no significant differences (P > 0.05). The VAS score in the observation group was significantly lower than that in the control group (P < 0.05), and the emotional scale score was also improved compared to the control group (P < 0.05). The number of patients with adverse reactions in the observation group was less than that in the control group. The clinical effective rate in the observation group was significantly higher than that in the control group (P < 0.05).Conclusion: Propofol combined with psychological intervention can effectively alleviate pain and improve emotional status in painless colonoscopic colonic polypectomy patients undergoing EMR treatment, thereby increasing the comfort and success rate of the surgery. The number of patients with adverse reactions in the observation group was less than that in the control group, and the clinical effective rate in the observation group was significantly higher than that in the control group (P < 0.05).

Previous investigations have illuminated the significant association between the gut microbiome and a broad spectrum of health conditions, including obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and psychiatric disorders. Evidence from certain studies suggests that dysbiosis of the gut microbiota may play a role in the etiology of obesity and diabetes. Moreover, it is acknowledged that dietary habits, pharmacological interventions, psychological stress, and other exogenous factors can substantially influence the gut microbial composition. For instance, a diet rich in fiber has been demonstrated to increase the population of beneficial bacteria, whereas the consumption of antibiotics can reduce these advantageous microbial communities. In light of the established correlation between the gut microbiome and various pathologies, strategically altering the gut microbial profile represents an emerging therapeutic approach. This can be accomplished through the administration of probiotics or prebiotics, which aim to refine the gut microbiota and, consequently, mitigate the manifestations of associated diseases. The present manuscript evaluates recent literature on the relationship between gut microbiota and metabolic syndrome published over the past three years and anticipates future directions in this evolving field.

The fluid seepage in local-saturated zone of subgrade promotes the migration of fine particles in the filler, resulting in the change of pore structure and morphology of the filler and the deformation of solid skeleton, which affects the fluid seepage characteristics. Repeatedly, the muddy interlayer, mud pumping and other diseases are finally formed. Based on the theory of two-phase seepage, the theory of porous media seepage, and the principle of effective stress in porous media, a two-phase fluid-solid coupling mathematical model in local-saturated zone of subgrade considering the effect of fine particles migration is established. The mathematical model is numerically calculated with the software COMSOL Multiphysics○R, the two-phase seepage characteristics and the deformation characteristics of the solid skeleton in local-saturated zone of the subgrade are studied. The research results show that due to the continuous erosion and migration of fine particles in local-saturated zone of the subgrade, the volume fraction of fine particles first increases then decreases and finally becomes stable with the increase of time. And the volume fraction of fine particles for the upper part of the subgrade is larger than that for the lower part of the subgrade. The porosity, the velocity of fluid, the velocity of fine particles, and the permeability show a trend of increasing first and then stabilizing with time; the pore water pressure has no significant changes with time. The vertical displacement increase first and then decrease slightly with the increase of time, and finally tend to be stable. For a filler with a larger initial volume fraction of fine particles, the maximum value of the volume fraction of fine particles caused by fluid seepage is larger, and the time required to reach the maximum value is shorter. It can be concluded that in actual engineering, the volume fraction of fine particles in the subgrade filler should be minimized on the premise that the filler gradation meets the requirements of the specification.

The eutrophication caused by excessive total nitrogen(TN) and total phosphorus(TP) emissions has been widely concerned by the whole society. Studies have revealed the relationship between land use and TN and TP, but the relationship between land use compound topographic position and TP and TN was seldom studied. Therefore, Spearman correlation and redundancy analyses were used to reveal the relationship between land use compound topographic position and TN and TP based on the monthly data of 28 water quality sampling sites and the land use data of 2013 and 2016 in the lakes of Guizhou Plateau. The results show that the nutritional state of the HBA watershed is medium. The trophic level index (TLI) value and TN concentration were high during flood, while TP concentration was high in dry period. The TN concentration in the tributaries was higher than that in the reservoir area. Construction and valley were the sources of the pollution, whereas forest land and gentle slope were the sink. According to the”source-sink”effect, the optimal zoning of land use was completed, and the urban land pollution govern area should be strengthened firstly. This paper can provide decision support for water environment management and sustainable development decision-making.

Chinese texts often feature a substantial volume of normative content, and their analysis has increasingly become a focal point in recent semantic analysis endeavors. Enhancing the effectiveness of text classification and clustering is pivotal in unveiling the intricate semantics within extensive textual data. Empirical research within the realm of computational social science has underscored the need for improved explanatory power when it comes to general text clustering methods applied to normative texts. This study introduces an innovative hierarchical clustering method that incorporates part-of-speech (POS) features and pioneers a novel semantic network model. It achieves this by amalgamating a POS-based feature weight calculation method with hierarchical clustering techniques. To assess its efficacy, the method is rigorously evaluated across three diverse text datasets, encompassing normative reports, news articles, and social media content. The experimental results unequivocally demonstrate the superior performance of the POS-HC method, surpassing the traditional TF and TF-IDF feature extraction methods in terms of clustering accuracy, and surpassing some existing clustering methods. Furthermore, its classification effectiveness exhibits notable advantages, particularly in the semantic classification of normative texts.

Rational delineation of urban–rural boundaries is a foundational prerequisite for holistic urban and rural development planning and rational resource allocation. However, the results of division of urban–rural boundaries extracted using a single data source are non-comprehensive. To address this problem, the present study proposes a method for using multiple sources such as population data, nighttime light data, land use, and points of interest (POI) data to extract urban–rural boundaries. Considering Guizhou Province for a case study, we here present a two-step method for identifying urban–rural boundaries. First, the random forest model was combined with the dasymetric mapping method to obtain the population spatialization data with a 30-m resolution in the studied province. Second, using the breaking point method, we extracted the urban–rural boundary for Guizhou Province in 2020 based on the spatialized population. This method fully integrated the benefits of various data and judiciously extracted the boundaries of the main urban areas and small- and medium-sized towns of each city in the study province at the same spatial scale. The stratified random sampling method revealed that the average overall accuracy was 88.05%. The method proposed has certain universality and application value and allows identifying the urban–rural boundaries more accurately and practically.

The characteristics of biogenic aerosols in urban area were explored by determining the composition, temporal distribution of saccharides in PM_2.5 in Shanghai. The total saccharides showed a wide range of 15.2 ng/m³ to 1752.8 ng/m³, with the averaged concentrations were 169.8 ng/m³，300.5 ng/m³，288.4 ng/m³，688 ng/m³ in spring, summer, autumn, and winter, respectively. The concerned saccharides include anhydrosaccharides (levoglucosan and mannosan), which were higher in cold seasons due to the increased biomass burning, saccharide alcohols (mannitol, arabitol, sorbitol) and monosaccharides (fructose, glucose), which showed more abundant in warm seasons attributed to the biological emissions. By PMF analysis, four emission sources of saccharides were demonstrated, including biomass burning, fungal spores, soil suspension and plant pollens. Resolution of backward trajectory and fire points showed a process of high concentrations of levoglucosan. We found that concentrations of anhydrosaccharides showed relatively stable under different pollution levels while saccharide alcohols exhibited an obvious decrease, indicated that biomass burning was not the core reason of the heavy haze pollution, however, and high level PM_2.5 pollution might inhibit effects of biological activities.

The previous studies on the diversion pipe of pumped storage power stations (PSPS) primarily focused on numerical simulations of pulsating pressure propagation within the pipe and its inducing factors. However, there was a lack of field monitoring and analysis of measured data to support surface ambient vibration, resulting in insufficient credibility and practicality of the numerical results. Based on ambient monitoring and data analysis, this paper examines the factors contributing to the ambient vibration of the water diversion pipeline in Changlongshan (CLS) PSPS. It is concluded that: (1) The primary source of vibration originates from units operation-induced ambient vibrations; (2) Vibration during pumping conditions exceeds that during power generation conditions; (3) The ground measuring point's vibration acceleration primarily depends on the distance from the vibration source; (4) Different types of units have varying effects on water diversion pipeline vibrations.

Strigolactones (SLs) are a novel emerging plant hormones, which play important roles in regulating plant organ development and environmental stress tolerance. Even though the SL related genes have been identified and well characterized in some plants. The information of SL related genes in soybean is not fully established yet, especially in response to salt stress. In this study, we identified nine SL biosynthesis genes: two D27, two CCD7, two CCD8, and three MAX1, and seven SL signaling genes: two D14, two MAX2 and three D53 in soybean genome. We found that SL biosynthesis and signaling genes are conserved during evolution in different species. Syntenic analysis of these genes revealed their location on nine chromosomes as well as existence of ten pairs of duplication genes. Moreover, plant hormone and stress-responsive elements were identified in the promoter regions of SL biosynthesis and signaling genes. By using quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR), we confirmed that SL genes have different tissue expression in roots, stems and leaves. Further, we also explored the expression profiles of SL biosynthesis and signaling genes under salt stress. These results suggested that SL signaling genes may play important regulatory roles in response to salt stress. In conclusion, we identified and provided valuable information on the soybean SL biosynthesis and signaling genes, and established a foundation for further functional analysis of soybean SL related genes in response to salt stress.

In order to solve the problem of feature extraction of underwater acoustic signals in complex ocean environment, a new method for feature extraction from ship radiated noise is presented based on empirical mode decomposition theory and permutation entropy. It analyzes the separability for permutation entropies of the intrinsic mode functions of three types of ship radiated noise signals, and discusses the permutation entropy of the intrinsic mode function with the highest energy. In this study, ship radiated noise signals measured from three types of ships are decomposed into a set of intrinsic mode functions with empirical mode decomposition method. Then, the permutation entropies of all intrinsic mode functions are calculated with appropriate parameters. The permutation entropies are obviously different in the intrinsic mode functions with the highest energy, thus, the permutation entropy of the intrinsic mode function with the highest energy is regarded as a new characteristic parameter to extract the feature of ship radiated noise. After that, the characteristic parameters, namely, the energy difference between high and low frequency, permutation entropy, and multi-scale permutation entropy, are compared with the permutation entropy of the intrinsic mode function with the highest energy. It is discovered that the four characteristic parameters are at the same level for similar ships, however, there are differences in the parameters for different types of ships. The results demonstrate that the permutation entropy of the intrinsic mode function with the highest energy is better in separability as the characteristic parameter than the other three parameters by comparing their fluctuation ranges and the average values of the four characteristic parameters. Hence, the feature of ship radiated noise can be extracted efficiently with the method.

The geological and hydrological conditions of tunnels near reservoirs are complex, and the impact of water level changes on the stability and leakage assessment of the lining structure is not considered in the current leakage evaluation. In order to construct an evaluation model for leakage level of tunnels near reservoirs, the influence of water level changes on tunnel stability and changes in environmental conditions on the leakage of tunnels were researched. Based on the AHP and extensibility theory, a hierarchical system for leakage assessment, incorporating values from nine indexes representing three aspects: geological conditions, hydrological conditions, and tunnel engineering. Numerical simulation was used to analyze the influence of water level changes. It was found that the water level change index greatly influences the displacement and stress distribution inside the tunnel structure. The leakage evaluation model was applied to the Tiebeishan Tunnel, resulting in a rating of 3, indicating medium-level leakage. Attention should be paid to water leakage in tunnels with changes in reservoir water levels. The leakage evaluation model for tunnels near reservoirs can effectively assess leakage levels under various conditions, providing a reference for safety assessments of tunnel leakage near reservoirs.

In order to apply RAP fine aggregate to High Modulus Asphalt Concrete(HMAC), this study first extracts aged asphalt from RAP fine aggregate through extraction and distillation, and adds it to high modulus modified asphalt in proportions of 20%, 40%, 60%, and 80%. The performance changes of the recycled asphalt were investigated using conventional performance tests and dynamic shear rheological tests (DSR). Microscopic techniques such as four‐component analysis and infrared spectroscopy were employed to explain macroscopic performance changes in terms of component and functional group changes in the asphalt. Using HMAC‐20 gradation as an example, uniaxial compression dynamic modulus tests, rutting tests, freeze‐thaw splitting tests, and low‐temperature bending tests were conducted to evaluate the performance changes of recycled asphalt mixture with different RAP fine aggregate contents through four indices: dynamic modulus, dynamic stability, tensile strength ratio (TSR), and maximum bending strain. The results indicate that for every 20% increase in aged asphalt, the penetration at 25°C, ductility at 25°C, and dynamic viscosity at 60°C decrease by approximately 6.2%, 15.4%, and 3.9%, respectively, while the softening point increases by approximately 13.3%. It is concluded that the addition of aged asphalt significantly affects the ductility at 25°C and the softening point. As the aged content increases, the complex shear modulus (G*) and phase angle (δ) of the recycled asphalt decrease, while the rutting factor increases. The four‐component analysis and infrared spectroscopy of the asphalt demonstrate that the incorporation of aged asphalt is merely a physical blending phenomenon, involving changes in the content of the four components without the formation of new functional groups (new peaks). When RAP fine aggregate is applied to high modulus recycled asphalt mixture, compared to high modulus modified asphalt mixture, the recycled mixtures exhibit higher dynamic modulus and dynamic stability, but significantly reduced water stability and low‐temperature performance.

This experiment was conducted to study the effects of Cyfluthrin (Cy) exposure on neurobehaviour, hippocampal tissue and synaptic plasticity in Wistar rats. First, high-dose Cy exposure can cause nerve injury with symptoms such as deficits in learning and memory ability, spatial exploration and autonomic motor ability. Moreover, it was found that medium- and high-dose Cy exposure can cause disordered energy metabolism in hippocampal cells and an abnormal release of the neurotransmitter Glu. Second, pathological brain sections showed that the middle and high doses of Cy caused deformation, reduction and disorder of hippocampal pyramidal cells, a decrease in the number of Nissl bodies, pyknosis of the hippocampal cell nuclear membrane and serious damage to organelles, indicating that exposure to these doses of Cy may cause hippocampal tissue damage in rats. Third, with the increase in exposure dose, the morphological changes in hippocampal synapses were more obvious, including blurred synaptic spaces, decreased synaptic vesicles and a decreased number of synapses. Moreover, the expression levels of the key synaptic proteins PSD-95 and SYP also decreased in a dose-dependent manner, indicating obvious synaptic damage. Finally, the study found that medium and high doses of Cy could upregulate the expression of A2AR in the hippocampus, and the expression levels of inflammatory factors and apoptosis-related proteins increased in a dose-dependent manner. Moreover, the expression of A2AR mRNA was correlated with neurobehavioural indicators, inflammatory factors, synaptic plasticity factors and apoptosis factors, suggesting that Cy may cause nerve damage in rats and has a close relationship with A2AR.

TiO2-based building materials have air purification, auto-cleaning and sterilization functions, and these innovative green building materials have great potential for energy-saving and emission reduction applications in the future. However, there are still great challenges in improving photocatalytic efficiency and stability from laboratory to practical applications. In recent years, researchers have done a lot of work to improve the efficiency and stability of TiO2-based building materials. This paper briefly discussed the air purification principle by photocatalytic building, and the preparation techniques of TiO2-based building materials and the strategies to improve the efficiency of TiO2. Moreover, this paper has outlined the key factors that affect the photocatalytic building performance in practical applications, and analyzed the limitations and future development trends. Finally, we proposed some suggestions for further research on photocatalytic buildings and its application in practice, aiming to provide an efficient reference for developing highly efficient and stable photocatalytic building materials. The aim of this paper is to provide effective guidance for the application of TiO2-based photo-catalysts in the field of green buildings, helping to develop more efficient and stable low-carbon buildings for the development of sustainable cities.

Band-gap alignment engineering has now been extensively studied due to its high potential application. Here we demonstrate a simple route to synthesize two metal oxide layers and align them together according to their bandgaps on surface of crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cells. The metal oxide layers can not only extend absorption spectrum to generate extra carriers but also serve to separate electron-hole pairs more efficiently. As a consequence, the photovoltaic performance of SnO₂/CdO /Si double-layer solar cell (DLSC) is highly improved compared to CdO/Si and SnO₂/Si single-layer solar cells(SLSCs) and SnO₂/CdO/Si double-layer solar cell (DLSC). By the alignment engineering, the SnO₂/CdO/Si DLSC produces a short circuit photocurrent (J_sc) of 38.20 mA/cm², an open circuit photovoltage (V_oc) of 0.575 V and a fill factor (FF) of 68.7%, corresponding to a light to electric power conversion efficiency (η) of 15.09% under AM1.5 illumination. These results suggest that with the use of metal oxide layers by band-gap alignment engineering, new avenues have been opened for developing high-efficiency and cost-effective c-Si solar cells.

Abnormal connections in brain networks of healthy people always bring the problems of cognitive impairments and degeneration of specific brain circuits, which may finally result in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Exploring the development of the brain from normal controls (NC) to AD is an essential part of human research. Although connections changes have been found in the development, the connection mechanism that drives these changes remain incompletely understood. The purpose of this study is to explore the connection changes in brain networks in the process from NC to AD, and uncover the underlying connection mechanism that shapes the topologies of AD brain networks. In particular, we propose a model named MINM from the perspective of topology-based mutual information to achieve our aim. MINM concerns the question of estimating the connection probability between two cortical regions with the consideration of both the mutual information of their observed network topologies and their Euclidean distance in anatomical space. In addition, MINM considers establishing and deleting connections, simultaneously, during the networks modeling from the stage of NC to AD. Experiment results show that MINM is sufficient to capture an impressive range of topological properties of real brain networks such as characteristic path length, network efficiency, and transitivity, and it also provides an excellent fit to the real brain networks in degree distribution compared to experiential models. Thus, we anticipate that MINM may explain the connection mechanism for the formation of the brain network organization in AD patients.

Wastewater-based surveillance is emerging as an important tool for COVID-19 pandemic trending. Current methods of wastewater collection, such as grab and auto-composite sampling, have drawbacks that impede effective surveillance, especially from small catchments with limited accessibility. Passive samplers, which are more cost-effective and require fewer resources to process, are promising candidates for monitoring wastewater for SARS-CoV-2. Here, we compared traditional auto sampling with passive sampling for SARS-CoV-2 detection in wastewater. Torpedo-style 3D printed passive sampler device containing both cotton swabs and electronegative filter membranes was used. Between April and June 2021, fifteen passive samplers were placed at a local hospital wastewater outflow alongside an auto sampler. Reverse transcription and quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) was used to detect SARS-CoV-2 in the samples after processing and RNA extraction. The swab and membrane of the passive sampler showed similar detection rates and Ct values for SARS-CoV-2 RNA for the N1 and N2 gene targets. The passive method performed as well as the grab/auto sampling, with no significant differences between N1 and N2 Ct values. There were discrepant results on two days with negative grab/auto samples and positive passive samples, which might be related to the longer duration of passive sampling in the study. Overall, the passive sampler was rapid, reliable and cost-effective, and could be used as an alternative sampling method for the detection of SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater.

For underwater vehicles navigating in Arctic Sea ice-covered waters, fatigue damage is a crucial issue. Many scholars have conducted low-temperature fatigue analysis on low-temperature ma-terials and substrate platforms for ships, and the results show that low-temperature is beneficial for improving the mechanical properties of materials. However, they mainly focus on low-temperature performance experiments and simulation analysis of standard components of materials, and there are very few fatigue life experimental studies on underwater vehicle me-chanical structures. This paper conducts experimental investigations on a scaled model of an underwater vehicle rudder mechanism in a polar environment laboratory. Using a comparative analysis method involving simulations and experiments, the low-temperature fatigue test data of the scaled underwater vehicle rudder mechanism are analyzed, and the quantified analysis be-tween fatigue and different low-temperature loading cycles, as well as the influence of icing on the fatigue life, is explored. It is indicated that the arctic environment can decrease the fatigue life of the underwater vehicle rudder mechanism by deteriorating its material properties. The paper builds the foundation for the fatigue life of an underwater vehicle rudder mechanism in arctic low-temperature environments.

Copper mine tailings are the residual products after the purification of precious copper from copper ores, and their storage can create numerous environmental problems. Many researchers have used copper mine tailings for preparation of geopolymer. This paper studies the enhancement of the cementitious activity of copper mine tailings in geopolymer system. First, copper mine tailings are activated through a mechanical grinding activation. Afterward, the mechanically activated copper mine tailings are further processed through thermal activation and alkaline roasting activating. The cementitious activity index of copper mine tailings is characterized through the degree of concentration of alkali leaching silicon and aluminum. It was observed that the Si and Al alkali leaching concentration of mechanical activated tailings was increased by 26.03% and 93.33%, respectively. The concentration of Si and Al was increased by 54.19% and 119.92%, respectively. For alkaline roasting activating, roasting time, temperature and (C/N ratio) were evaluated through the orthogonal test, and the best condition was activation for 120 min at 600℃ with C/N ratio is 5:1. In this study, the SEM, XRD and IR analysis show that mechanically activation, thermal activation and alkaline roasting activating can improve the cementitious activity index of copper mine tailings.

The need for cross-modal retrieval (CMR) among users is growing because of the swift advancements in computer vision and natural language processing. Promoting home operating systems is greatly aided by the openKylin home operating system. It is focused on enhancing the functionality of the operating system with safe and dependable operating technologies. Practical implications abound for integrating computer vision research into home operating systems. A multimodal retrieval approach based on openKylin is presented to improve the usability of text search graphs, audio, and video. The overview of pertinent domestic and international research is the main topic of this article. This technological advancement. It then offers details on the design, implementation procedure, and final implementation outcomes for demonstration. The works of natural operations show that this strategy has excellent accuracy and performance.

Liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS) of proteins has been found ubiquitously in eukaryotic cells, critical in the controlling of many biological processes through forming a temporary condensed phase with different bimolecular components. TDP-43 is recruited to stress granules in cells and is the main component of TDP-43 granules and proteinaceous amyloid inclusions in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). TDP-43 low complexity domain (LCD) is able to demix in solution forming the protein condensed droplets. The molecular interactions regulating its LLPS were investigated at the protein fusion equilibrium stage, where the droplets stopped growing. We found the molecules in the droplet were still liquid-like but with enhanced intermolecular helix-helix interaction in the LCD. The protein would start to aggregate after about 200 minutes of lag time and aggregate slower than at the condition when the protein does not phase separate or the molecules have a reduced intermolecular helical interaction. A structural transition intermediate towards protein aggregation was also discovered involving a decrease of the intermolecular helix-helix interaction and a reduction in the helicity. Therefore, LLPS and the intermolecular helical interaction could help maintain the stability of TDP-43 LCD.

Influenced by the quasi-stationary Mei-yu front and the development of mesoscale low vortices on the Mei-yu front, a torrential rain event occurred in Suzhou on July 6, 2020. The 24-hour rainfall recorded by the automatic station exceeded 200 millimeters, with the highest hourly intensity surpassing 70 millimeters, accompanied by thunderstorms and strong winds. This heavy precipitation process was characterized by suddenness, extremity, long duration, high precipitation efficiency, and backward propagation. Using various data sources such as the European ERA5 reanalysis data, ground-based automatic stations, sounding, Doppler weather radar, and wind profile radar, this paper analyzed in detail the circulation characteristics and radar echo structures of this torrential rain event, and further studied the triggering, feature evolution, and maintenance mechanisms of the heavy precipitation.The results show: (1) The continuously strengthening low-level jet stream propagates downward forming an ultra-low-level jet stream. Heavy precipitation is located on the left front side of the jet exit area, where strong convergence and lifting in the boundary layer overlap with the ascending branch of the secondary circulation above the shear line, resulting in heavy precipitation. (2) A supercell storm with intense precipitation produced this heavy rainfall event, characterized by a low centroid of strong echo; echo-free vault, bounded weak echo region, and other supercell structural features. During this event, the high reflectivity factor areas corresponded to high KDP value areas, indicating a large amount of liquid water content. Vertically, the KDP column can track the rainwater mixing ratio well, and its location corresponds to the vicinity of the short-term heavy precipitation occurrence. The high KDP value area mainly consists of numerous precipitation particles, and the vertical vortex wind field structure causes rapid growth of precipitation particles through continuous rolling. Furthermore, it can be found through correlation coefficients (CC) that there are always high-value areas for CC since they correspond to areas of intense precipitation. (3) Continuous triggering of mesoscale convective cloud clusters on the east-west ground convergence line leads to new development and forms a "train effect." Strong frontogenesis in both horizontal and vertical directions triggers and sustains this heavy precipitation event. The significant increase in liquid water and water vapor density has indicative significance for the occurrence of heavy precipitation.

Ce-promoted NiMgAl mixed-oxide (NiCex-C, x = 0, 1,5,10) catalysts were prepared from the quaternary hydrotalcite precursors for CO2 hydrogenation to methane. By engineering the Ce contents, NiCe5-C showed its prior catalytic performance in low-temperature CO2 hydrogenation, being about 3 times higher than that of Ce-free NiCe0-C catalyst (TOF of NiCe5-C and NiCe0-C: 1.19 h-1 vs 0.39 h-1 @ 250 oC). With extensive characterization, it was found that Ce dopants promoted the reduction of NiO by adjusting the interaction between Ni and Mg(Ce)AlOx support. The higest ratio of surface Ni0/(Ni2+Ni0) was obtained over NiCe5-C. Meanwhile, the surface basicity was tailored with Ce dopants. The strongest medium-strength basicity and highest capacity of CO2 adsorption was achieved on NiCe5-C with 5wt% Ce content. The TOF tests indicated a good correlation with medium-strength basicity over the NiCex-C samples. The results showed that the high medium-strength and Ce-promoted surface Ni0 species endows the enhanced low-temperature catalytic performance in CO2 hydrogenation to methane.

Nitric oxide (NO) is a key molecule in cardiovascular homeostasis and its abnormal delivery is highly associated with the occurrence and development of cardiovascular disease (CVD). The assessment and manipulation of NO delivery is crucial to the diagnosis and therapy of CVD, such as endothelial dysfunction, atherosclerotic progression, pulmonary hypertension, and cardiovascular manifestations of Coronavirus (COVID-19). However, due to the low concentration and fast reaction characteristics of NO in cardiovascular system, the clinical applications centered on the NO delivery are challenging. In this tutorial review, we first summarized the methods to estimate the in vivo NO delivery process based on the clinical images and mathematical modeling to assess the endothelial function and vulnerability of atherosclerotic plaque. Then, the emerging bioimaging technologies that have the potential to directly measure the arterial NO concentration were discussed, including the Raman spectroscopy and electrochemical sensor. Aside from the diagnostic methods, therapies aimed at controlling NO delivery to regulate CVD were reviewed, including the inhaled NO therapy to treat the pulmonary hypertension and COVID-19, stem cell therapy and NO-releasing platform to treat endothelial dysfunction and atherosclerosis.

With the dramatic increase in the number of mobile users and wireless devices accessing the network, the performance of the fifth generation (5G) wireless communication systems has been severely challenged. Reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS), one of the potential technologies for the sixth generation (6G), has received a lot of attention. Since it is easier to deploy, consumes less power, and is inexpensive. RIS is an electromagnetic metamaterial that serves to reconfigure the wireless environment by adjusting the phase, amplitude and frequency of the wireless signal. To maximize channel transmission efficiency and improve the reliability of communication systems, the acquisition of channel state information (CSI) is essential. Therefore, an effective channel estimation method guarantees the achievement of excellent RIS performance. This paper conducts a comprehensive investigation of the existing channel estimation methods of RIS, analysis and comparison of channel model building and CSI acquisition schemes in different frequency bands, in addition to a comprehensive description of generic channel estimation methods, with a focus on the application of deep learning. Finally, we conclude the paper and provide an outlook in the future development of RIS channel estimation.

This study investigated the spatial variability of soil organic carbon (SOC), total nitrogen (TN), soil microbial biomass carbon (SMBC) and soil microbial biomass nitrogen (SMBN) in Hongqipao reservoir dominated by different vegetation types and the possible relationships with other soil properties. Top 0–50cm soil samples were collected in sites dominated by different vegetation types within the reservoir littoral zone. There was high spatial variability for SOC, TN, SMBC and SMBN in the Hongqipao reservoir. In addition, the SOC, TN, SMBC and SMBN contents decreased with increasing soil depth. This could be attributed by the fact that when plants detritus decompose, most of their organic matter is mineralized and a new soil layer which contains a greater amount of organic carbon is formed at the top. According to Pearson's correlation values and redundancy analysis (RDA) results, SOC was significantly and positively correlated with TN likely because the vegetation organic matter and liter could be the main nitrogen sources. Similarly, soil moisture content (MC) was significant positive correlated with SOC and TN. Conversely, BD was significant negative correlated with SOC and TN contents in the 0-50 cm soil profiles. However, no significant correlations were observed between SOC, TN, SMBC and SMBN contents and soil pH values. SMBN was significantly and positive correlated with C:N ratio and BD and negative related with MC. Multiple linear regression model revealed that all measures soil properties in this study could explain higher significant variability of the response variables (SOC, TN, SMBC and SMBN contents). This implies that all the measured soil variables within the different vegetation types in the reservoir played a crucial role in determining the contents of SOC, TN, SMBC and SMBN. This study further suggests that vegetation types play a major role in determining the spatial characteristics of SOC and TN. Any changes in the vegetation types in the reservoir may influence the distribution of SOC and TN. This may affect the global carbon budget and the atmospheric greenhouse gas concentration significantly.

Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most common malignant primary brain tumor, with a median survival rate of less than two years. Currently, there is no cure for GBM, underscoring the urgent need for innovative treatment approaches. Vaccine design emerges as a crucial strategy, offering a safe and effective means for both preventive and therapeutic interventions against GBM. In this study, we targeted four GBM-associated mutated surface proteins—urokinase plasminogen activator sur-face receptor (PLAUR), integrin beta-3 (ITGB3), and the B-41 alpha chain (HLA-B) and A-24 alpha chain (HLA-A) of the HLA class I histocompatibility antigens—to design a peptide-based vaccine. The vaccine construct includes cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) and T helper cell (Th cell) epitopes, and was meticulously evaluated for antigenicity, allergenicity, and toxicity. The results indicate that the vaccine is antigenic and non-allergenic, making it a promising candidate. Additionally, the physico-chemical properties of the vaccine suggest stability and suitability for further de-velopment. Immune simulation studies predict efficient immune responses upon vaccine ad-ministration. Our vaccine shows promise as a potential tool in the fight against GBM, offering new hope for patients facing this devastating disease.

Legume-rhizobial symbiosis leads to to the formation of root nodules, where rhizobia reside and develop into bacteroids to reduce nitrogen into ammonium for plant growth, which leaves an opening question as how plant immunity is attenuated in nodules in the presence of large number of foreign bacteria. In Medicago truncatula, mutation in NAD1 (Nodules with Activated Defense 1) only produces necrotic nodules with overactivated immunity, indicating NAD1 is an indispensable component required for suppressing immunity in nodules. In this study, a dual RNA-seq transcriptomic technology was performed to extensively analyze gene expressions in nad1-1 mutant nodules. We indenifited 89 DEGs in symbiotic nitrogen fixation and 89 DEGs in immunity in Medicago truncatula at 10 dpi. Simultaneously, we indenifited 27 DEGs in fix and nif genes in Sinorhizobium meliloti. Then we identified 56 DEGs related to stress, including ROS, NO, and NCR, most of which were upregulated in Sinorhizobium meliloti. Our analyses of nitrogen fixation-defective plant nad1-1 mutants with overactivated defense indicate that host use plant immunity to control massive bacterial colonization during early and late symbiotic stages. Our findings provide insight into the function of NAD1 in improvement or inhibition of plant immune response to maintain symbiosis during rhizobial endosymbiosis.

Following our previous success in identifying new steroid-based anticancer agents, we herein disclosed the structural requirements for retaining high potency against cancer cells and associated modes of action. The structurally novel steroidal dimer by001 inhibited growth of different esophageal cancer cells and colony formation at low micromolar levels, elevated cellular ROS levels and caused mitochondrial dysfunction. Mechanistic studies showed that by001 induced cell death through the mitochondria and death receptor-mediated apoptotic pathways and autophagy induction, as well as inhibited migration.

The majority of existing numerical simulations of the effect of bridge piers on water movement are based on a limited number of bridge piers at a laboratory scale. Furthermore, some 2D numerical simulations for actual bridge projects have deficiencies, including the use of overly large mesh sizes and an inadequate treatment of bridge piers. In this study, we compare three methods of structural mesh encryption, suspension mesh, and nonstructural mesh based on Delft3D, and apply the optimization scheme to a real bridge project. It is demonstrated that optimal results can be achieved by utilising a grid size comparable to the pier diameter (Dp) in the region away from the piers. In the vicinity of the piers, the grid cell size should be no larger than 1/9 Dp. The suspended grid technique (DD Boundary) can yield results consistent with those obtained using a full-area high-resolution grid, provided that the total number of grids can be reduced and the computational time is considerably reduced. In this study, the unstructured mesh (Deflt3D Flexible Mesh) scheme was unable to capture the oscillations of the wake flow behind the bridge piers. However, the application of the optimized scheme in bridge engineering has demonstrated its practical value. The findings of this study on mesh resolution and suspension mesh scheme can be applied to the Delft3D software and are also useful for other numerical simulation work.

Air pollution is an important factor affecting human health and daily life. Chinese government is making vigorous efforts to control air pollution. The upgrading of industrial structure is a problem-solving tool in environment and economic growth cases. This paper aims to explore the relationships among environmental regulation, the upgrading of industrial structure and air pollution. The PVAR (Panel Vector Auto Regression) model and moderation effect model has been used to conduct empirical analysis based on panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2004 to 2020. The results of analysis indicate (1) the environmental regulation can significantly reduce the air pollution, but the deterioration of air quality could not effectively influence environmental regulations. (2) The upgrading of industrial structure can weaken the air pollution and air pollution hinders the upgrading of industrial structure. (3) With the improvement of environmental regulation, the industrial structure is constantly upgraded, but the upgrading of the industrial structure has a negative effect on the improvement of environmental regulation. (4) The upgrading of industrial structure can positively moderate the influence of environmental regulation on air pollution.

In this paper, the effects on the rheological properties, particle size distribution, and fluorescence properties of red wine were investigated under microwave irradiation, and the mechanism of the effects of microwave irradiation on the sensory properties of red wine was discussed. The results showed that the effect of microwave on the rheological properties in red wine could be fitted by the Power-law model and Carson model, through the analysis of the rheological constants, yield stress, and viscosity coefficient of wine, it was found that microwave treatment could improve leg phenomenon and thickening effect by the change of rheological properties; the particle size distribution in wine indicated that microwave irradiation did change the particle size distribution through friction effect and oxidative polymerization, resulting in the wine’s visual effect and mouthfeel; the wine quality could be improved by enhancing the fluorescence intensity under different microwave conditions, which meant that microwave technology could speed up the formation of fluorescent substances, such as the polymerization of flavan-3-ols. In conclusion, microwave treatment could modify the sensory characteristics of wine, and further provide the theoretical basis for the application of microwave in winemaking.

A tunable near-infrared surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensor based on gate-controlled graphene plasmons is investigated theoretically. The novel characteristics of chemical potential sensing make the proposed sensor promising in the application of ultra-sensitive and highly specific biosensing technology. The sensitivity of chemical potential sensing in wavelength interrogation mode can be calculated to be 1.5, 1.89, 2.29, 3.21, 3.73 and 4.68 nm/meV respectively at the central wavelength of 1100, 1200, 1310, 1550, 1700 and 1900 nm. The much smaller full width half maximum (FWHMs) comparing with that of 2D nanomaterial-enhanced metal SPR sensors indicates higher figure of merit. The sensitivity of chemical potential sensing in gate voltage interrogation mode also can be calculated to be 156.9822, 143.6147, 131.0779, 111.0351, 101.3415 and 90.6038 mV/meV respectively at the incident wavelength of 1100, 1200, 1310, 1550, 1700 and 1900 nm. It can be estimated theoretically that the limit of detection (LOD) in DNA sensing of the proposed sensor can reach femtomolar level and even attomolar level, comparable to and even lower than that of 2D nanomaterial-enhanced metal SPR sensors with AuNPs as a sensitivity enhancement strategy. The feasibility of preparation and operation of this new concept SPR biosensor is also analyzed and discussed.

Traditionally, studies on freeze–thaw erosion have used the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to calculate the weight of evaluation factors, however, this method cannot accurately depict the fuzziness and randomness of the problem. To overcome this disadvantage, the present study has proposed an improved AHP method based on the cloud model to evaluate the impact factors in freeze–thaw erosion. To establish an improved evaluation method for freeze–thaw erosion in Tibet, the following six factors were selected: annual temperature range, average annual precipitation, slope, aspect, vegetation coverage, and topographic relief. The traditional AHP and the cloud model were combined to determine the weight of the impact factors, and a consistency check was performed. The comprehensive evaluation index model was used to evaluate the intensity of freeze–thaw erosion in Tibet. The results show that freeze–thaw erosion is extensive, stretching over approximately 66.1% of Tibet. The problem is the most serious in Ngari Prefecture and Nagqu. However, mild erosion and moderate erosion, accounting for 37.1% and 25.0%, respectively, of the total freeze–thaw erosion are the most widely distributed. The evaluation results for the freeze–thaw erosion was confirmed to be consistent with the actual situation. In brief, this study provided a new approach to evaluate the conditions of freeze–thaw erosion quantitively in Tibet.

We suppose that a Cooper pair (CP) will experience a damping force exerted by the condensed matter. A Langevin equation of a CP in two dimensional condensed matter is established. Following a method similar to Nelson's stochastic mechanics, generalized Schr\"{o}dinger equation of a CP in condensed matter is derived. If the CPs move with a constant velocity, then the corresponding direct current (DC) electrical conductivity can be calculated. Therefore, a Drude like formula of resistivity of CPs is derived. We suppose that the damping coefficient of CPs in two dimensional cuprate superconductors is a linear function of temperature. Then the resistivity and scattering rate of CPs turn out to be also linear-in-temperature. The origin of linear-in-temperature resistivity and Planckian dissipation in cuprate superconductors may be the linear temperature dependence of the damping coefficient of CPs.

The utilization for water resource has been of great concern to human life. To assess the natural water system in Kangding County, the integrated methods of hydrochemcial analysis, multivariate statistics and geochemical modelling were conducted on surface water, groundwater and thermal water samples. Surface water and groundwater were dominated by Ca-HCO₃ type, while thermal water belonged to Ca-HCO₃ and Na-Cl type. The analyzing results concluded the driving factors that affect hydrochemical components. Following the results of the combined assessments, hydrochemcial process was controlled by the dissolution of carbonate and silicate minerals with slight influence from anthropogenic activity. The mixing model of groundwater and thermal water was calculated using silica-enthalpy method, yielding cold-water fraction of 0.56-0.79 and estimated reservoir temperature of 130-199 ^oC, respectively. δD and δ¹⁸O isotopes suggested surface water, groundwater and thermal springs were of meteoric origin. Thermal water should have deep circulation through the Xianshuihe fault zone, while groundwater flows through secondary fractures where it recharges with thermal water. Those analytical results were used to construct a hydrological conceptual model, providing a better understanding of the natural water system in Kangding County.

The theory of electron spin has been proposed for a century, but the study of quantum effects in biological molecules is still in its infancy. Chirality-induced spin selectivity (CISS) is a very modern theory that can explain many biochemical phenomena. In this paper, we propose a new theoretical model based on CISS theory and quantum chemistry theory, which can well explain the theoretical explanation of the chiral selectivity of chiral proteins. Moreover, this theory can predict the spin state of corresponding chiral molecules. Taking L-DOPA and AADC enzyme as examples, this theoretical model solves the theoretical explanation of AADC enzyme's chiral catalysis selectivity problem and successfully predicts the spin state of L-DOPA and D-DOPA's valence electrons.

Aiming at the removal of radioactive cobalt ions from water by graphene oxide (GO), the adsorption mechanism of Co2+ on graphene oxide was analyzed using the quantum chemical calculation software Gaussian 16 based on the density functional theory. The influence of material structure factors such as carboxyl group, hydroxyl group, epoxy group and graphene sheet as well as external environmental factors such as pH, temperature and interfering ions on the adsorption effect was determined, and the influence of external environment was verified through experiments. Through calculation and experiment, it was found that the existence of oxygen-containing functional groups on graphene oxide can improve the adsorption efficiency of the materialappropriately,and increasing pH under acidic conditions was also helpful to improve the adsorption effect, and the material had certain selectivity for Co2+, the adsorption capacity and selectivity could be further improved when it was modified by increasing hydroxyl group.

To conduct a precise impact assessment of marine diesel engines, a 200t floating impact platform was utilized to simulate realistic testing conditions. The testing generated the acceleration time curve and the impact response spectrum for the diesel engine. According to the applicable standards, the spectral velocity was chosen as the evaluation index, and an evaluation of the longitudinal, transverse, and vertical impact environment of the diesel engine was conducted. The shock factor interpolation method was corrected using the confidence interval based on normal distribution, and the interpolated confidence interval of the shock factor was determined. The findings reveal that: The 200t-class floating shock platform is capable of providing a reliable shock environment for diesel engine tests. The shock wave serves as the primary external force during the experiment, and the impact of bubble pulsation can be disregarded when assessing using the floating shock platform. To more accurately describe the experimental shock intensity when presented with dispersed data, the confidence interval can be utilized, and the resulting prediction formula provides a higher level of impact safety. The obtained conclusions can serve as a reference for predicting the shock environment of large shipboard equipment using the shock platform.

In China, there is an increasing need for greater genetic diversity in maize (Zea mays L.) germplasm and hybrids appropriate for mechanical harvesting. In order to test and distinguish American maize inbred lines with exceptional combining ability, four Chinese maize inbred lines (Chang7-2, Zheng 58, four-144 and four-287) were used to judge the combining ability and heterosis of 16 USA inbred lines by a NCII genetic mating method. The results showed that among the American inbred lines, 6M502A, LH208, NL001, LH212Ht, PHW51, FBLA and LH181 expressed good GCA for yield characteristics; while RS710, PHP76, FBLA, and PHJ89 showed excellent GCA for machine harvesting characteristics. Five hybrids (NL001 × Chang7-2, LH212Ht × Chang7-2, FBLA × four-144, LH181 × four-287, PHK93 × four-287) had better SCA values for yield characteristics, at 1.69, 1.07, 1.48, 1.84 and 1.05, respectively; while NL001 × Chang 7-2, 6M502A × Chang7-2, LH212Ht × Chang7-2, LH181 × four-287, PHW51 × Chang7-2 had better TCA values for yield characteristics, at 3.03, 2.80, 2.41, 2.19 and 1.91, respectively; NL001 × Chang7-2, 6M502A × Chang7-2, LH212Ht × Chang7-2, LH181 × four-287, PHW51 × Chang7-2 showed excellent Control Heterosis values, with 21.48%, 19.64%, 15.93%, 14.05% and 11.60% increases, respectively, compared to the check and potential for future utilization in Inner Mongolian corn production.

People have always hoped to be able to fill an entire plane with ``single unit cells'' without periodicity. This wish was realized after the mathematician discovered a 13-sided ``single unit cell'' named `einstein'. These non-periodic tessellations generally exhibit anisotropic properties, making them superior in terms of mechanical performance compared to periodic structures. From the perspective of information entropy, the reason behind the improved mechanical properties of these structures is the higher entropy associated with non-periodic configurations. To quantify the disorder of non-periodic structures, we propose an entropy expression for the `einstein' metamaterial. To demonstrate the mechanical properties of these high-entropy structures, we fabricate specimens using 3D printing and conducte mechanical experiments. For comparative analysis, we also use ABAQUS to perform finite element analysis of the problem. The research results reveal that the mechanical properties of high-entropy structures created by the non-periodic stacking of cells are significantly improved compared to those of low-entropy structures created by periodic stacking. The conclusions drawn from the study of individual issues are generalizable and may be of assistance in future material and structural design.

Objective: To explore three novel fasting blood glucose (FBG)-based novel indicators, including FBG-to-albumin ratio (FAR), FBG-to-lymphocytes ratio (FLR), and FBG-to-hemoglobin ratio (FHR), in predicting prognosis and detecting metastasis for patients with pancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms after resection. Materials and methods: A total of 178 pNEN patients underwent surgical resection were included in this study. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used to evaluate the diagnosis values of FAR, FLR, and FHR, and the cut-off values were obtained for further analyses. Univariate and multivariate analyses were conducted to determine the independent predictors. The Kaplan-Meier method was used to evaluate the progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) of the pNEN patients. Results: The optimal cut-off values of FAR, FLR, and FHR were 0.17, 2.85, and 0.028, respectively. As for PFS, the area under the curve (AUC) was 0.693 for FAR, 0.690 for FLR, and 0.661 for FHR, respectively. The AUC was 0.770, 0.692, and 0.715 accordingly for OS. The groups with lower FAR, FLR, and FHR were significantly associated with prolonged PFS and OS (p < 0.05). In patients with metastasis, the lower FAR group was correlated with significantly longer PFS and OS (p = 0.022 and 0.002, respectively). The FLR was an independent predictor of PFS in pNEN patients, and the FAR was a predictor of OS. FAR was an independent indicator of PFS in patients with metastasis. Conclusion: Preoperative FAR, FLR, and FHR are effective in predicting the prognosis of pNEN patients and detecting the synchronous metastases.

The chromatographic conditions were optimized using headspace gas chromatography, and a simple and rapid method was established for the simultaneous determination of five residual solvents in ursodeoxycholic acid raw materials. The corresponding quality standards were revised. The results showed that the concentration of methanol ranged from 0.06mg/ml to 0.3mg/ml, and the concentrations of acetone, tert butanol, ethyl acetate, and triethylamine showed a good linear relationship with the peak area within the range of 0.1mg/ml to 0.5mg/ml (r=0.999); The quantitation limits for methanol, acetone, tert-butanol, ethyl acetate, and triethylamine were 4.2, 0.9, 1.5, 1, and 0.1 μg/ml, respectively, with detection limits of 1.2, 0.25, 0.025, 0.3, and 0.025 μg/ml, respectively. The recovery rates of each solvent ranged from 92.9% to 106.0%, with RSD% (n=9) less than 3.8%; The method exhibited good repeatability, with RSD% (n=6) less than 2.5%. Furthermore, the durability is good. The established method is simple, accurate, specific, and highly sensitive, and can be used for the simultaneous and rapid determination of five residual solvents in ursodeoxycholic acid raw materials.

Underwater target detection is widely used in various applications such as underwater search and rescue, underwater environment monitoring, and Marine resources survey. However, the visibility of the underwater environment and the accuracy of target detection can be affected by complex underwater light changes and unpredictable background noise. To address these issues, we propose an improved underwater target detection algorithm based on YOLOv8n. Our algorithm focuses on three aspects. Firstly, we replace the original C2f module with Deformable Convnets v2 to enhance the adaptive ability of the target region in the convolution check feature map and extract the target region's features more accurately. Secondly, we introduce SimAm, a non-parametric attention mechanism, which can deduce and assign three-dimensional attention weights without adding network parameters. Lastly, we optimize the loss function by replacing the CIOU loss function with the Wise-IOU loss function. To conduct our experiments, we create our own dataset of underwater target detection for experimentation. Meanwhile, we also utilized the Pascal VOC dataset to evaluate our approach. The [email protected] and [email protected]:0.95 of the original YOLOv8n algorithm on the underwater target detection were 88.6% and 51.8%, respectively, and the improved algorithm [email protected] and [email protected]:0.95 can reach 91.8% and 55.9%. The original YOLOV8n algorithm was 62.2% and 45.9% [email protected] and [email protected]:0.95 on the Pascal VOC dataset, respectively. The improved YOLOV8n algorithm [email protected] and [email protected]:0.95 were 65.7% and 48.3%, respectively. The floating-point computation volume of the model is reduced by about 6%. The above experimental results prove the effectiveness of our method.

Water pollution, intensified by the release of hard-to-degrade pollutants, poses severe threats to ecosystems, human health, and economic development. The existing advanced oxidation processes often involve high operational costs and may result in secondary pollution, highlighting the necessity for innovative and more sustainable solutions. To address these challenges, our study introduces a cost-effective and eco-friendly corona discharge barrier plasma discharger for wastewater treatment. Through the central composite design/response surface methodology, a high decolorization rate of 98% of methylene blue (MB) within 10 minutes was achieved by optimizing parameters such as pH and voltage. Furthermore, the mechanisms of the generation of reactive oxygen species via this device was discussed in detail and the degradation pathways of MB were described. Moreover, this device is also very energy-efficient, with a low energy density and electrical energy per order of 0.15 watt/mL and 5.79 kWh/m³/order, respectively. In conclusion, the plasma discharger developed in this study provides a cost-effective and environmentally sustainable solution for dye wastewater treatment. This research contributes significantly to the advancement of sustainable dye wastewater management practices, offering an innovative method that meets both environmental and economic objectives.

This article presents a comprehensive framework for valuing financial instruments subject to credit risk. In particular, we focus on the impact of default dependence on asset pricing, as correlated default risk is one of the most pervasive threats in financial markets. We analyze how swap rates are affected by bilateral counterparty credit risk, and how CDS spreads depend on the trilateral credit risk of the buyer, seller, and reference entity in a contract. Moreover, we study the effect of collateralization on valuation, since the majority of OTC derivatives are collateralized. The model shows that a fully collateralized swap is risk-free, whereas a fully collateralized CDS is not equivalent to a risk-free one.

Ginkgolic acids (GA) have been reported to exhibit anticancer properties, however, the mechanisms remain unclear. This study aims to investigate the mechanisms of GA C13:0 that was isolated from Ginkgo biloba exocarp (GBE) for anti-proliferation, pro-apoptosis and anti-migration effects in human MCF-7 and mouse 4T-1 breast cancer cells. The cytotoxic effect, apoptosis induction and migration inhibition were measured using MTT, TUNEL and Wound healing assays. The expression of mRNA and protein were determined using qPCR and Western blot. Our results showed that no cytotoxicity was found at concentrations of C13:0 below 100µM. The effects of GA C13:0 was further demonstrated by up-regulation of the Bax/Bcl-2 apoptosis pathway and the expression of Apaf-1 protein in the mitochondria. In addition, GA C13:0 also suppressed cell migration and epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) with the increase of E-cadherin expression accompanied by the decrease of Snail, MMP-2, MMP-9 and Vimentin expression. Moreover, GA C13:0 induced cytochrome P450 (CYP) 1B1 expression in aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) pathway. Notably, the up-regulation of CYP1B1 also might play a pivotal regulatory role in mitochondrial and EMT pathways in MCF-7 and 4T-1 cells. Our results may have implications for the development of anticancer agents containing GA as functional additives.

Small peptides (SPs), ranging from 5 to 100 amino acids, play integral roles in plants due to their diverse functions. Despite their low abundance and small molecular weight, SPs intricately regulate critical aspects of plant life, including cell division, growth, differentiation, flowering, fruiting, maturation, and stress responses. As vital mediators of intercellular signaling, SPs have garnered significant attention in plant biology research. This comprehensive review delves into SPs' structure, classification, and identification, providing a detailed understanding of their significance. Additionally, we summarize recent findings on the biological functions and signaling pathways of prominent SPs that regulate plant growth and development. The review also offers a forward-looking perspective on future research directions in peptide signaling pathways.

Train fault detection primarily relies on the comparative analysis of collected images with standard reference images, making the accurate identification of the collected image types crucial for effective fault detection. Most current systems achieve indirect classification of carriage images by using Automatic Equipment Identification (AEI) devices to recognize carriage identification number information while capturing the carriage images. However, damaged RF tags or blurred characters can hinder these devices, obstructing further train fault analyses. The unique features of carriage linear array images, such as high resolution, extreme aspect ratios, and local non-linear distortions, pose significant challenges to recognition algorithms. This paper proposes a method specifically designed to recognize these types of images. First, we implement an object detection algorithm to locate the positions of key components in carriage linear array images. By leveraging the spatial layout mapping between these key components and the carriage type classification, we simplify the complex image recognition problem into a sparse point set alignment task. To ensure effective registration despite local distortions in the linear array images, we propose a weighted radial basis function. To address the issues of unknown matching relationships and quantity mismatches during point set alignment, the proposed objective function is designed to maximize the similarity between Gaussian mixtures of point sets, thereby determining the RBF weights. Extensive experiments have demonstrated that our algorithm achieves 100% recognition accuracy under local nonlinear scale distortions of less than 15%. The algorithm remains effective even in the presence of some false positives or missed detections in key component object detection results. It can accurately identify the target category from 79 image categories within 24 milliseconds on an i7 CPU without GPU support. It is of great significance to reduce system cost and promote automatic exterior fault detection for train rolling stock.

The robust control of high precision electromechanical systems, such as micropositioners, is challenging in terms of the inherent high nonlinearity, the sensitivity to external interference, and the complexity of accurate identification of the model parameters. To cope with these problems, this work investigates a disturbance observer-based deep reinforcement learning control strategy to realize high robustness and precise tracking performance. Reinforcement learning has shown great potential as optimal control scheme, however, its application in micropositioning systems is still rare. Therefore, embedded with the integral differential compensator (ID), deep deterministic policy gradient (DDPG) is utilized in this work with the ability to not only decrease the state error but also improves the transient response speed. In addition, an adaptive sliding mode disturbance observer (ASMDO) is proposed to further eliminate the collective effect caused by the lumped disturbances. The sterling performance is revealed with intensive tracking simulation experiments and demonstrates the improvement in the accuracy and response time of the controller.

Predators are dependent on the capture of prey to meet their energetic and nutritive requirements, imposing a regime of predation risk. Consequently, prey experience both consumptive and non-consumptive effects. Non-consumptive effects may manifest through altered growth and ontogenetic trajectories of prey species, a dynamic modulated by olfactory or other sensory cues from predators. Bactrocera dorsalis Hendel represents a great invasive threat to global horticulture. While earlier research has primarily centered on the consumptive interactions between B. dorsalis and its natural enemies, the potential consequences of non-consumptive interactions on the development of B. dorsalis have been overlooked. In this study, we investigated the impact of predation risk effects, induced by both visual exposure to the predatory mantis Hierodula patellifera Serville and its associated odor, on the life history traits of B. dorsalis. Female B. dorsalis demonstrated reduced development time in the presence of isolated H. patellifera or H. patellifera odor, yet evidenced significantly increased fecundity. Conversely, males displayed no significant change in development time. Additionally, neither female nor male body weight at death was significantly influenced by predation risk from isolated predators or predator odor. These results indicated adaptive developmental strategies of B. dorsalis when faced with risks from predators and highlight the important role of predator odor, which has the potential to lay the groundwork for improving biological control efforts and innovative approaches within pest control.

We suppose that vacuum is filled with a kind of continuously distributed matter which may be called the $\Omega(1)$ substratum, or the electromagnetic aether. Suppose that the time scale of a macroscopic observer is very large compares to the the Maxwelllian relaxation time of the $\Omega(1)$ substratum. Thus, the macroscopic observer concludes that the $\Omega(1)$ substratum behaves like a Newtonian-fluid. Inspired by H. A. Lorentz, we speculate that electric charges may be extremely small hard spherical sources or spherical sinks with finite radii. Based on the spherical source and spherical sink model of electric charges, we derive Coulomb's law of interactions between static electric charges in vacuum. Further, we derive a reduced form of the Lorentz's force law for static electric charges in vacuum.

Numerous dynamic and complicated processes characterize development from the oocyte to the embryo. However, given the importance of functional transcriptome profiles, long non-coding RNAs, single-nucleotide polymorphisms, and alternative splicing during embryonic development, the effect that these features have on the blastomeres of 2-, 4-, 8-, 16-cell, and morula stages of development have not been studied. Here, we conducted a scRNA-seq survey of cells from sheep from the oocyte to the blastocyst developmental stages. We then carried out experiments to identify and functionally analyze the transcriptome profiles, long non-coding RNAs, single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), and alternative splicing (AS). We founded that between the oocyte and zygote groups significantly down-regulated genes and the second-largest change in gene expression occurred between the 8- and 16-cell stages. We used various methods to construct a profile to characterize cellular and molecular features and systematically analyze the related GO and KEGG profile of cells of all stages from the oocyte to the blastocyst. This large-scale, single-cell atlas provides key cellular information and will likely assist clinical studies in improving preimplantation genetic diagnosis.

In this work, a simple and environmentally friendly process combining low pressure (vacuum) and mechanical compression is proposed to convert recycled polypropylene (PP) foams (28 kg/m3) into low density foams (90-131 kg/m3) having negative tensile and compressive Poisson's ratios (NPR). The effect of processing conditions (vacuum time, temperature, and mechanical pressure) was studied. Based on the optimized conditions, the tensile Poisson’s ratio of the resulting auxetic foams reached −1.50, while the minimum compressive Poisson's ratios was −0.32 for the same sample. The foam structure was characterized via morphological analysis (SEM) to determine any changes related to the treatment applied. Finally, tensile and compressive properties (Young's modulus, strain energy, energy dissipation and damping capacity) are also presented and discussed. It was observed that the mechanical properties of the resulting auxetic foams were improved compared to the original PP foam (PP-O) for all tensile properties in terms of modulus (19.9 to 59.8 kPa), strength (0.298 to 1.43 kPa) elongation at break (28 to 77%), energy dissipation (14.4 to 56.3 mJ/cm3) and damping capacity (12 to 19%). Nevertheless, improvements were also observed under compression in terms of energy dissipation (1.6 to 3.6 mJ/cm3) and damping capacity (13 to 19%). These auxetic foams can find applications in sport and military protective equipment, as well as any energy mitigation system.

Interest grows in designing silicon-on-insulator slot waveguides to trap optical fields in subwavelength-scale slots and developing their optofluidic devices. However, it is worth noting that the inherent limitations of the waveguide structures may result in high optical losses and short optical paths, which challenge the device performance in optofluidics. Incorporating the planar silicon-based slot waveguide concept into a silica-based hollow-core fiber can provide a perfect solution to realize an efficient optofluidic waveguide. Here we propose a subwavelength-scale liquid-core hybrid fiber (LCHF), where the core is filled with carbon disulfide and surrounded by a silicon ring in a silica background. The waveguide properties and the Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS) effect in the LCHF are investigated. The fraction of power inside the core of 56.3% allows an improved sensitivity in optical sensing; while the modal Raman gain of 23.60 m-1·W-1 is 2 times larger than that generated around a nano fiber with the interaction between the evanescent optical field and the surrounding Raman media benzene-methanol, which enables a significant low-threshold SRS effect. Besides, this in-fiber structure features compactness, robustness, flexibility, ease of implementation in both trace sample consumption and reasonable liquid filling duration, as well as compatibility with optical fiber systems. The detailed analyses of the properties and utilizations of the LCHF suggest a promising in-fiber optofluidic platform, which provides a novel insight into optofluidic devices, optical sensing, nonlinear optics, etc.

A enantioselective tandem transformation concerning asymmetric allylic decarboxylative addition and cyclization of N-nosylimines with vinylethylene carbonates (VECs) in the presence of [Rh(C2H4)2Cl]2, chiral sulfoxide-N-olefin tridentate ligand has been developed. The reaction of VECs with various substituted N-nosylimines proceeded smoothly under mild conditions, giving highly functionalized oxazolidine frameworks in good to high yields with good to excellent enantioselectivity.

Brassica yellows virus (BrYV) is a tentative species of the genus Polerovirus, which occurs widely and mostly damage Brassicaceae plants in East Asia. Since BrYV could not be transmitted mechanically, an insect transmission method is required for further virus research. Here, a reliable and unrestricted method was described, in which non-viruliferous aphids (Myzus persicae) acquired BrYV from transgenic Arabidopsis thaliana plants with virus full length genome germinated from seeds and frozen infected leaves were used to transmit the virus to healthy plants, and there was no significant difference in acquisition rate though transmission rate from frozen infected leaves was somehow lower compared to fresh infected leaves. This novel simple method could be applied to preservation of virus inocula, evaluation of variety resistance to BrYV, biological research on interaction among BrYV, aphid and host, which also provide a new idea on establishing a basic method using virus genomic transgenic plants or frozen infected leaves for other poleroviruses research.

The layer-by-layer (LBL) fabrication method allows for controlled microstructure morphology and vertical component distribution, and also offers a reproducible and efficient technique for fabricating large-scale organic solar cells (OSCs). In this study, polymer D18 and PYIT-OD are employed to fabricate all-polymer solar cells (all-PSCs) using the LBL method. Morphological studies reveal that the use of additives optimizes the microstructure of the active layer, enhancing the crystallinity and charge transport capability. The optimized device with 2% CN additive significantly reduces bimolecular recombination and trap-assisted recombination. All-PSCs fabricated by the LBL method based on D18/PYIT-OD deliver a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 15.07%. Our study demonstrates the great potential of additive engineering via LBL fabrication method in regulating microstructure of active layers, suppressing charge recombination, and enhancing the photovoltaic performance of devices.

Yield calculation is an important link in modern precision agriculture, which is an effective means to improve breeding efficiency, and adjust planting and marketing plans. With the continuous progress of artificial intelligence and sensing technology, yield calculation schemes based on image processing technology have many advantages such as high accuracy, low cost, and non-destructive calculation, and have been favored by a large number of researchers. This article reviews the research progress of crop yield calculation based on remote sensing images and visible light images, describes the technical characteristics and applicable objects of different schemes, and focuses on detailed explanations of data acquisition, independent variable screening, algorithm selection and optimization. Common issues are also discussed and summarized. Finally, solutions are proposed for the main problems that have arisen so far, and future research directions are predicted, with the aim of achieving more progress and wider popularization of yield calculation solutions based on image technology.

In order to make full use of the complementarity of existing navigation systems to improve the navigation and positioning accuracy, this paper investigates the visual/INS integrated navigation system based on the factor graph optimization (FGO) algorithm. In the traditional visual/INS integrated navigation system, there is often the problem of image blurring due to the rapid change of light and shadow captured by the vision sensor and the attitude change of the carrier, which leads to the decrease of the positioning accuracy of the combined navigation system. Therefore, this paper firstly introduces Retinex algorithm and BID algorithm to carry out the design of image de-blurring method; then implements the visual/INS integrated navigation algorithm based on the factor graph optimization method; finally, the experimental scheme is designed, comparative experiments are carried out, and the researched method is verified by using the public dataset. The experimental results show that the combined navigation algorithm realized in this paper has high accuracy, and its positioning accuracy is improved by 40% compared with visual positioning.

Biological neural network (BNN) is the core brain for creature to accomplish its intelligent behaviors through unique network structure and mechanisms. It also inspires controlling human-designed autonomous agents including robots to generate more advanced intelligent behaviors by mimicking the neural control mechanism of creatures at a deeper and more interactive level. Here, we constructed a whole-brain neural network model of Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans), which characterizes the electrochemical processes at the level of cellular synapse. The neural network simulation integrates computational programming and visualization of neurons and synapse connections of C. elegans, containing the specific controllable circuits summarization with their dynamic characteristics within the whole network. To illustrate its particular intelligent control capability in terms of robotics, we introduce the first innovative methodology for applying the BNN model to a 12-legged robot’s movement control based on the established numerical simulation platforms. We accomplished and designed two methods and corresponding encoding processes, one involving orientation control and the other involving locomotion generation, to demonstrate the intelligent control performance of BNN. Both simulation and experiment results indicate that the robot exhibits stronger autonomy and more intelligent moving performance under the control of BNN. We then summarized the contributions for digitalizing the C. elegans’ whole-brain neural network in real-time and utilizing it to control robot in a closed loop to validate its advanced intelligence control ability in terms of a scientific robot.

J. C. Maxwell, B. Riemann and H. Poincar$\acute{e}$ have proposed the idea that all microscopic particles are sink flows in a fluidic aether. Following this research program, a previous theory of gravitation based on a mechanical model of vacuum and a sink flow model of particles is generalized by methods of special relativistic continuum mechanics. In inertial reference frames, we construct a tensorial potential which satisfies the wave equation. Inspired by the equation of motion of a test particle, a definition of a metric tensor of a Riemannian spacetime is introduced. Applying Fock's theorem, generalized Einstein's equations in inertial systems are derived based on some assumptions. These equations reduce to Einstein's equations in case of weak field in harmonic reference frames. There exist some differences between this theory and Einstein's theory of general relativity.

Construction using earth materials demonstrates ecological sustainability using locally sourced natural materials and environmentally friendly demolition methods. In this study, the environmental impact of adding cement to soil materials for rammed-earth farmhouse construction in rural China was investigated and comparatively simulated using the One Click LCA database, focusing on the conflict between sustainability objectives and the practical aspects of cement addition. By analyzing how the addition of cement aligns with local construction practices and by addressing the debate surrounding the inclusion of cement in rammed earth construction, our objective is to provide insights into achieving a balance between the environmental impact and the pragmatic considerations of using cement in earthen building practices. Three local structure scenarios are evaluated via simulations: a cement-stabilized rammed earth wall, a fired brick wall, and a localized reinforced concrete frame structure. The quantitative environmental impacts are assessed, and the qualitative differences in adaptation, economic sustainability, and other factors are examined in the context of present-day development in rural China. The results show that the use of cement-stabilized rammed earth wall-supported structures is associated with higher embodied carbon emissions compared to structures supported by reinforced concrete frames and enclosed by brick walls; however, these emissions are lower than those for brick wall-supported structures, while effectively meeting the structural requirements. In addition, the use of cement-stabilized earth for perimeter walls simplifies material management and disposal throughout the building's life cycle, and the cost-effectiveness of cement has been found to be substantially greater than that of reinforced concrete frames and brick structures, improving economic viability and social acceptability, especially among low-income communities in rural areas.

Inspired by Dirac's large number hypothesis (LNH), Zeldovich proposed a relation between the cosmological constant (CC), the mass of a proton, the Planck constant and Newton's gravitational constant. Zeldovich's formula suggests that the substance which is responsible for CC may interact with elementary particles. Since Newton's gravitational constant and the Planck constant appear in Zeldovich's formula, these interactions may be related to gravitational phenomena and quantum phenomena. Following this clue, we propose a liquid droplet model of electron. Applying the Laplace's equation, Zeldovich's formula of CC is derived. Weinberg proposes a relation between the mass of a pion, the Planck constant, the Hubble constant, Newton's gravitational constant and the velocity of light in vacuum when discussing cosmological models with a varying constant of gravitation. Weinberg pointed out that this relation may not merely be regarded as a meaningless random combinations of these fundamental constants in physics. The Weinberg's relation is derived based on the critical mass density formula in the Friedmann model of the universe and Zeldovich's formula.

In recent years, with the development of the Internet of Things and distributed computing, the "server-edge device" architecture has been widely deployed. This study focuses on leveraging autoencoder technology to address the binary classification problem in network intrusion detection, aiming to develop a lightweight model suitable for edge devices. Traditional intrusion detection models face two main challenges when directly ported to edge devices: inadequate computational resources to support large-scale models and the need to improve the accuracy of simpler models. To tackle these issues, this research utilizes Extreme Learning Machine for its efficient training speed and compact model size to implement autoencoders. Two improvements over the latest related work are proposed: First, to improve data purity and ultimately enhance detection performance, this study partitions the data into multiple regions based on the prediction results of these autoencoders. Second, leveraging autoencoder characteristics to investigate further the data within each region. We used the public dataset NSL-KDD to test the behavior of the proposed mechanism. The experimental results show that when dealing with multi-class attacks, the model's performance was significantly improved, the accuracy and the F1-score are improved by 3.5% and 2.9%, respectively maintaining its lightweight nature.

Mountain ecosystems are crucial for global biodiversity conservation. However, their landscape features are constantly changing owing to urban expansion. Understanding the relationships between biotic communities and landscape features is essential for biodiversity conservation. This study aimed to examine the effect of land-cover type on avian communities in Lishui, a mountainous urban area in eastern China. Avian surveys were conducted using a total of 168 line transects across different land-cover types once per season from December 2019 to January 2021. We assessed the diversity of bird communities by calculating various metrics at both taxonomic and functional levels. Among the land-cover types measured, woodland, built-up land, cultivated land, and water bodies significantly influenced bird community diversity and composition. Species richness, species abundance, and functional richness were negatively correlated with the proportion of woodland but positively correlated with the proportion of non-natural land cover, such as built-up and cultivated land. In contrast, functional evenness was positively correlated with the proportion of woodland and grassland but negatively correlated with the proportion of non-natural land cover. Land-cover type also exhibited significant correlations with avian functional characteristics such as diet, foraging strata, and body mass, thereby influencing the overall community structure. Our results indicated that mountainous landscape patterns substantially affect avian communities. Different land-cover types possess varying resource endowments that affect the distribution of avian species. Therefore, urban landscape planning in mountainous areas should carefully consider the various functions provided to organisms by different types of land cover to promote biodiversity.

Tack is one of the most important factors affecting the operability of prepregs, but it is still very difficult to obtain the change of prepreg tack with time at different temperatures. In this paper, a newly designed T-peel device is used to test the tack decay rate of prepregs at different temperatures. The obtained decay rate deviates less than 8.9% from the manufacturer's data. The maximum deviation of the ratio of tack decay speeds calculated by the Arrhenius equation from the experiments is not higher than -9.7%. It is proved that the present method can obtain the decay rate of tack of prepregs at different temperatures. This method is also applicable to the other two types of prepregs. The article proposes the handling life unit, an operational life measurement unit for prepregs, and establishes that the relationship between tack and remaining shelf life reduces prepreg management costs.

The AREB/ABF (ABA response element binding) proteins in plants are vital for plant stress responses, but the understanding of AREB/ABFs in orchid species, an important traditional medicinal and ornamental plants, is limited. Here, twelve AREB/ABF genes were identified within three orchids’ complete genome and classified into three groups (groups I, II, and III) via a phylogenetic analysis, which was further supported by the analysis of their conserved motifs and gene structures. The cis-elements analysis showed that hormone response elements followed by light and stress responses were widely rich in AREB/ABFs. A prediction analysis of orchid ABRE/ABF-mediated regulatory network was further constructed through cis-regulatory elements (CREs) analysis of their promoter regions and revealed that several transcriptional factor (TF) gene family were abundant as the potential regulators for orchid AREB/ABFs. Expression profile analysis based on public transcriptomic data showed that most AREB/ABF genes have distinct tissue-specific expression patterns in orchid plants. Additionally, DcaABI5 as the homolog of ABA INSENSITIVE 5 (ABI5) from Arabidopsis was selected for further analysis. The results showed that Arabidopsis transgenic overexpressing DcaABI5 could rescue the ABA insensitive phenotype in the mutant abi5. Collectively, these findings will provide valuable information on AREB/ABF genes in orchids.

Two-dimensional (2D) ice I is an atomic-level ice that is composed of two interlocked atom-ic layers saturated with hydrogen bonds. It has recently been experimentally observed but its properties have yet to be clarified. Accordingly, we theoretically studied the hydrophobic properties of 2D ice I. On the contrary, simulation of a hydrogen fluoride molecule on a 2D ice surface manifested that it destroyed the 2d ice structure and connected new hydrogen bonds with water molecules. Investigations of the interfacial effect between 2D and three-dimensional (3D) ice films indicated that the network structure of 2D ice was not de-stroyed by a 3D ice surface, as the former was saturated with hydrogen bonds. However, the surface of 3D ice reorganized to form as many hydrogen bonds as possible. Thus, the 2D ice film was hydrophobic and inhibited the growth of 3D ice. This shows that if 2D ice can be produced on an industrial scale, it could be used as an anti-3D-icing agent under low tem-perature.

Objective: To investigate the effects and mechanisms of different concentrations of CCCP on mitophagy in human peripheral blood regulatory T cells. Methods: Tregs were isolated, identified and then grouped, treating with CCCP at a concentration of 2.5 μM, 5 μM, 10 μM, 20 μM and 40 μM for 24h in an incubator. Flow cytometry detected the reactive oxygen species (ROS), mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP), mitochondrial quality, and fluorescence microscopy observed the co-localization of mitochondria and lysosomes in each group. Results: The purity of CD4⁺CD25⁺Tregs was (93.36 ± 1.87) %. With the increase of CCCP concentration, the level of ROS gradually increased, while the MMP decreased gradually. About the mitochondria and lysosome fusion, the fluorescence intensity of orange (yellow) was the highest when the concentration of CCCP was in the range of 5-10 μM while decreased with the CCCP concentration continually increasing. The mitochondrial quality decreased with the increase of CCCP concentration. However, there was no significant difference between groups C, D and E. The mitochondrial quality of groups F and G were significantly lower than that of group E. Conclusions: With the concentration of CCCP gradually increased, the level of ROS in Treg cells increased, and MMP decreased, which promoted the mitophagy, mitochondrial quality maintains homeostasis; When ROS accumulated, and MMP decreased significantly, the mitophagy was inhibited, and the mitochondrial quality was significantly decreased.

This study reports rapid hydrolysis, acylation, and lipolysis with lipase B from Candida antarctica (CalB) and nanofructosome encapsulated CalB (CalB@NF) enzymes immobilized on silica-coated magnetic nanoparticles (Si-MNPs). Enzymatic hydrolysis was confirmed for conversion to p-nitrophenol (p-NP, λex=400 nm) from p-nitrophenyl butyrate (p-NPB, λex=270 nm), and various catalytic parameters such as Km, Vmax, and Kcat were calculated from Michaelis-Menten and Lineweaver-Burk plot. Efficiency of enzymatic hydrolysis was in the order of CalB > Si-MNPs@CalB > CalB@NF > Si-MNPs@CalB@NF, and reusability was much better with the enzyme immobilized on Si-MNPs than with the native enzyme. Enzymatic acylation was confirmed by the formation of benzyl benzoate (λex=229 nm) from benzoic anhydride (λex=240 nm), and efficiency exceeded 99% in all samples. Finally, enzymatic lipolysis was confirmed by the decomposition of olive oil to fatty acid such as oleic acid (λex=230 nm) using thin-layer chromatography (TLC), column chromatography, and proton nuclear magnetic resonance (1H -NMR). The lipases immobilized on Si-MNPs have the advantage of good thermal stability and reusability and are thus applicable to a wide range of industries.

This paper presents a new semi-explicit algorithm for parameters estimation in a time-fractional generalization of dual-phase-lag heat conduction model with the Caputo fractional derivatives. It is shown that this model can be derived from a general linear constitutive relation for the heat transfer by conduction when the heat conduction relaxation kernel contains the Mittag-Leffler function. The model can be used to describe heat conduction phenomena in a material with power-law memory. The proposed algorithm of parameters estimation is based on the time integral characteristics method. The explicit representations of the thermal diffusivity and the fractional analogues of the thermal relaxation time and the thermal retardation are obtained via a Laplace transform of the temperature field and utilized in the algorithm. An implicit relation is derived for the order of fractional differentiation. In the algorithm, this relation is resolved numerically. An example illustrates the proposed technique.

Femtosecond laser two-photon polymerization (TPP) technology, known for its high precision and capability to fabricate arbitrary 3D structures, has been widely applied in the production of various micro-nano optical devices, achieving significant advancements particularly in the field of photonic wire bonding (PWB) for optical interconnects. Currently, research on optimizing both the optical loss and production reliability of polymeric photonic wires is still in its early stages. One of the key challenges is that inadequate metrology methods cannot meet the demand for multiphysical measurements in practical scenarios. This study utilizes in-situ scanning electron microscopy (SEM), for the first time, to monitor the working PWBs fabricated by TPP technology at the microscale. Optical and mechanical measurements are made simultaneously to evaluate the production qualities and to study the multiphysical coupling effects of PWBs. The results reveal that photonic wires with larger local curvature radii are more prone to plastic failure, while those with smaller local curvature radii recover elastically. Furthermore, larger cross-sectional dimensions contribute dominantly to the improved mechanical robustness. The optical loss deterioration of the elastically deformed photonic wire is only temporary, which can be fully recovered when the load is removed. After further optimization based on the results of multiphysical metrology, the PWBs fabricated in this work achieve a minimum insertion loss of 0.6 dB. In this study, the multiphysical analysis of PWBs carried out by in-situ SEM metrology offers a novel perspective for optimizing the design and performance of microscale polymeric waveguides, which could potentially promote the mass production reliability of TPP technology in the field of chip-level optical interconnection.

The extrinsic and intrinsic factors are essential in glioma initiation. Many extrinsic factors (UV, radiation, food, etc.) and intrinsic factors (proteins, hormones, ageing, DNA and RNA damages, etc.) was reported to being responsible for glioma initiation and progression. However, the cell responsible for glioma origin is still unknown. Many research papers have reported that glioma stem cells, senescent cells, injured cells, and death neurons are the cells of glioma origin. However, gene mutation and oncogene protein overexpression doesn’t occur only in cancer but during life evolution. The source of genetic mutations has become a fundamental issue in understanding its role in the initiation of glioma. The glioma is the precise coordination of several distant factors that work together in the initiation and development of glioma. However, the role and effects of the genes (GDNF and SOX1) on cancer cells are well known, but their gene mutation origin is controversial. Several models and theories have been proposed to explain the origins of GDNF and SOX1 genetic mutations and epigenetic modification related to cancer. Our aim in this review is to clear that incertitude about glioma origin (gene mutation and epigenetic modifications) and those factors involved in glioma initiation and recurrence.

Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), a non-protein-producing amino acid, is extensively found in microorganisms, plants and vertebrates, and is abundantly expressed in the spinal cord and brain. To date, GABA is considered to be the major inhibitory neurotransmitter in the central nervous system. Its physiological effects are related to the regulation of synaptic transmission, the promotion of neuronal development and relaxation, and the prevention of insomnia and depres-sion. Mediated through its specific receptors, it plays a pivotal role in the control of neuronal ex-citability, which can serve as anovel target for developing analgesics for pain management. This review provides an update on the accumulating evidence of specific GABA receptors and their subtypes in the involvement of pain analgesia.

Periodontitis is a progressive and inflammatory oral disease and results in the damage of the supporting tissues of teeth. Peroxiredoxin6 (PRDX6) is an antioxidant enzyme and has been identified as a regulator in redox balance. This study aimed to investigate whether PRDX6 could protect human gingival fibroblasts (HGFs) from lipopolysaccharide (LPS) induced inflammation and its mechanisms. Here, both inflamed and non-inflamed human gingival tissues were collected to assess the expression of PRDX6 and NRF2 by Immunohistochemistry and Western blotting. Furthermore, HGFs were stimulated with LPS, MJ33 (PRDX6 phospholipase A2 inhibitor), or ML385 (NRF2 inhibitor). The expression levels of inflammatory cytokines were measured by RT-qPCR and ELISA, and reactive oxygen species (ROS) was detected using DCFH-DA. PRDX6 was downregulated in inflamed gingival tissues. In HGFs, LPS induced inflammatory cytokines and ROS was upregulated in PRDX6 knockdown cells. Furthermore, co-treatment with MJ33 alleviated LPS-induced inflammatory cytokines and ROS, while inhibiting NRF2 upregulated those in HGFs. Therefore, this study provided a new mechanistic insight that PRDX6, regulated by the NRF2 signaling, alleviates LPS- induced periodontitis in human gingival fibroblasts.

In order to quickly develop a multi ship collaborative collision avoidance plan in multi ship encounter scenarios, a multi ship collision avoidance decision model is proposed in accordance with the requirements of the International Maritime Collision Avoidance Regulations, taking into account the collision avoidance operations in multi ship encounter scenarios. Firstly, the collision risk between ships is determined by the closest encounter distance (DCPA) and closest encounter time (TCPA). Secondly, a decision objective function is established based on rules, degree of ship deviation, and ship risk. Finally, the prediction mechanism is used to calculate the minimum value of the objective function and complete the collision avoidance decision. The simulation results show that in the scenario of multiple ship encounters, the collision avoidance model can achieve safe collision avoidance with a smaller steering frequency and a shorter col-lision avoidance time. The proposed multi ship collision avoidance model can provide reference for collision avoidance decision-making in multi ship encounter scenarios, which helps to im-prove the collision avoidance efficiency in multi ship collision avoidance

Both ricin and R. communis agglutinin (RCA120), belonging to the type II ribosome-inactivating proteins (RIPs-Ⅱ), are derived from the seeds of castor bean plant. They share very similar amino acid sequences, but ricin is much more toxic than RCA120. It is urgently necessary to distinguish ricin and RCA120 in response to public safety. Currently, mass spectrometric assays are well established for unambiguous identification of ricin by accurate analysis of differentiated amino acid residues after trypsin digestion. However, diagnostic peptides are relatively limited for unambiguous identification of trace ricin, especially in complex matrices. Here, we demonstrate a digestion strategy of multiple proteinases to produce novel peptide markers for unambiguous identification of ricin. LC-HRMS was used to verified the resulting peptides, among which only the peptides with uniqueness and good MS response were selected as peptide markers. Seven novel peptide markers were obtained from tandem digestion of trypsin and endoproteinase Glu-C in PBS buffer. From the chymotrypsin digestion under reduction and non-reduction conditions, eight and seven novel peptides were selected respectively. Using pepsin under pH 1~2 and proteinase K digestion, 6 and 5 peptides were selected as novel peptide markers. In conclusion, the obtained novel peptides from the established digestion methods can be recommended for the unambiguous identification of ricin during the investigation of illegal use of the toxin.

Snap fit is a common mechanical mechanism. It uses the physical asymmetry that is easy to assemble but difficult to disassemble to provide a simple and fast link between objects. The ingenious combination of geometric shape, bending elasticity and friction of the snap fit is the mechanism behind the easy to assemble but difficult to disassemble disassemble. Yoshida and Wada (2020) has done a groundbreaking work in the analysis of the elastic snap fit. During our study of their paper, while we really enjoyed their research, unfortunately we detected several questioning formulations. After careful checking, we found that those formulations are not typographical, therefore it is necessary to make corrections. This paper reformulates the linear elasticity of a cylindrical snap fit, obtains an exact solution and proposes an accurate relation between the opening angle and bending tangent angle. Under the first order approximation, our formulations can reduced to the results of Yoshida and Wada and hence confirms the scientific correctness of Yoshida and Wada's work. Furthermore, this paper also derives a correct vertical displacement expression, and propose a new way of disassembly by bending for the first time and formulate a scaling law by data fitting. All formulations are validated by finite element simulation and experiment. The research here is helpful to the design of elastic snap fit or adjustable mechanical mechanism and metamaterial cell.

Our results demonstrated that SWT stimulates osteoblastogenesis and increase the cell number of osteoblasts, suggesting positive regulatory effects on osteoblast differentiation. However, the effect of SWT on bone formation need further examination, since the expression of alp gene is downregulated. On the other hand, SWT appears to negatively regulate osteoclast differentiation and bone resorption, as number of osteoclasts and the expression of critical bone resorptive genes are all downregulated. Collectively, SWT might change the equilibrium of bone remodeling and increase the bone mass. Our data provided supportive evidences that this medicine formulation can be applied to treat osteoporosis or bone destructive diseases.

Model selection and model averaging have been the popular approaches in handling modelling uncertainties. Fan and Li(2006) laid out a unified frame work for variable selection via penalized likelihood. The tuning parameter selection is vital in the optimization problem for the penalized estimators in achieving consistent selection and optimal estimation. Since the OLSpost-LASSO estimator by Belloni and Chernozhukov (2013), few studies have focused on the finite sample performances of the class of OLS post-penalty estimators with the tuning parameter choice determined by different tuning parameter selection approaches. We aim to supplement the existing model selection literature by studying such a class of OLS post-selection estimators. Inspired by the Shrinkage Averaging Estimator (SAE) by Schomaker(2012) and the Mallows Model Averaging (MMA) criterion by Hansen (2007), we further propose a Shrinkage Mallows Model Averaging (SMMA) estimator for averaging high dimensional sparse models. Based on the Monte Carlo design by Wang et al. (2009) which features an expanding sparse parameter space as the sample size increases, our Monte Carlo design further considers the effect of the effective sample size and the degree of model sparsity on the finite sample performances of model selection and model averaging estimators. From our data examples, we find that the OLS post-SCAD(BIC) estimator in finite sample outperforms most of the current penalized least squares estimators as long as the number of parameters does not exceed the sample size. In addition, the SMMA performs better given sparser models. This supports the use of the SMMA estimator when averaging high dimensional sparse models.

With prosperous development and successful application of deep learning technologies in the field of remote sensing, numerous deep-learning based methods have emerged for synthetic aperture radar (SAR) automatic target recognition (ATR) tasks over the past few years. Generally, most deep-learning based methods can achieve outstanding recognition performance in condition that an abundant of labeled samples are available to train the model. However, in real application scenarios, it is difficult and costly to acquire and to annotate abundant SAR images due to the imaging mechanism of SAR, which poses a big challenge to existing SAR ATR methods. Thereby, SAR target recognition under the situation of few-shot, where only a scarcely few of labeled samples are available, is a fundamental problem that needs to be solved. In this paper, we put forward a new method named enhanced prototypical network with customized region-aware convolution (CRCEPN) to specially tackle the few-shot SAR ATR tasks. To be specific, We first develop a feature extraction network based on a customized and region-aware convolution, which can adaptively adjust convolutional kernels and their receptive fields according to each SAR image’s own characteristics as well as the semantical similarity among spatial regions, thus augmenting its capability to extract more informative and discriminative features. To achieve accurate and robust target identity prediction under the few-shot condition, we then propose an enhanced prototypical network which can improve the representation ability of the class prototype by properly making use of training and test samples together, thus effectively raising the classification accuracy. Meanwhile, a new hybrid loss is designed to learn a feature space with both inter-class separability and intra-class tightness as much as possible, which can further upgrade the recognition performance of the proposed method. Experiments performed on the moving and stationary target acquisition and recognition (MSTAR) dataset and the OpenSARShip dataset demonstrate that the proposed method is competitive with some state-of-the-art methods for few-shot SAR ATR tasks.

Sphalerite has been recognized as the most important carrier of critical metal of Indium (In) due to that In mainly exists in the sphalerite lattice by isomorphic substitution. There are two significant replacing schemes for In entry into sphalerite, these are, Ag++In3+→2Zn2+ and Cu++In3+→2Zn2+. In order to understand the reaction process and constraints of the two substitution schemes, this paper uses first-principles methods to calculate In and Ag, Cu replacing Zn in sphalerite. According to the substitution schemes of Ag++In3+→2Zn2+ and Cu++In3+→2Zn2+, two doped sphalerite systems of Zn30InAgS32 and Zn30InCuS32 were constructed using 2×2×2 supercell model of sphalerite. Firstly, the pressure is controlled to 30MPa, and the temperature is set from 20-40MPa to simulate the response of the two doped sphalerite systems to temperature; Then, the control temperature was unchanged to 600K, and the pressure was set from 20-40MPa to investigate the pressure control of the two doped sphalerite systems. The lattice parameters, substitution energy, electronic structure, and population analysis of the designed models before and after replacement have been critically compared. The main conclusions can be drawn that it is more stable for In to enter sphalerite via the coupled substitution scheme Cu++In3+→2Zn2+, and the conditions that the two substitution schemes most likely to occur are 650K and 40MPa. This study not only reveals the physical and chemical properties of In-rich sphalerite formed by the two reaction processes of Ag++In3+→2Zn2+ and Cu++In3+→2Zn2+, but also has a certain enlightenment effect on the search for indium in sphalerite, and promotes the application of first principles in mineralization analysis.

The common dandelion uses a bundle of drag-enhancing bristles (the pappus) that enables seed dispersal over formidable distances; however, the scaling laws of aerodynamic drag underpinning pappus-mediated flight remains unresolved. In this paper, we study the aerodynamic shape of dandelion, derive the scaling law of resistance, determine the Vogel exponent. In particular, we find that the total drag coefficient is proportional to the -2/3 power of the dandelion pappus Reynolds number, and obtain the terminal velocity of the dandelion seed under gravitation field.

This article is a study on the (k,s)-Riemann-Liouville fractional integral, a generalization of the Riemann-Liouville fractional integral. Firstly, we introduce several properties of the extended integral of continuous functions. Furthermore, we make the estimation of the Box dimension of the graph of continuous functions after the extended integral. It presents that the upper Box dimension of the (k,s)-Riemann-Liouville fractional integral for any continuous functions is no more than the upper Box dimension of the functions on the unit interval I=[0,1], which indicates that the upper Box dimension of the integrand f(x) will not be increased by the σ-order (k,s)-Riemann-Liouville fractional integral ksD−σf(x) where σ&gt;0 on I. Additionally, we prove that the fractal dimension of ksD−σf(x) of one-dimensional continuous functions f(x) is still one.

This paper presents a study to accurately evaluate defects in reinforced concrete decks using ultrasonic pulse-echo signals. Two validation specimens were designed and tested where reinforced concrete deck slab specimens included planned voids and defects. A commercial Ultrasonic Pulse-Echo (UPE) device obtains 2-D images of the void/defect locations of the reinforced concrete deck. The UPE is based on the ultrasonic shear-wave test method using dry-point-contact transmitting and receiving transducers and employing a synthetic aperture focusing technique. The authors analyzed the recorded UPE A-scan data to enhance the accuracy of estimating the defects' locations using the synthetic aperture focusing technique imaging method. The analysis benefitted from an advanced denoising approach and defect echo peak extraction based on empirical modal decomposition, Hurst exponent characterization, and Hilbert envelope estimation. While output from conventional UPC devices can only provide qualitative results, the new method provides quantitative information on the anomalies inside the reinforced concrete deck. The developed approach accurately assists with assessing the location and depth of the voids/defects in the reinforced concrete deck slabs.

In this paper, the preparation methods of porous silicon nitride materials with controllable dielectric constant and pore structure were systematically studied. By using microwave sintering technology, porous silicon nitride materials with high closed pore ratio were prepared by adjusting the content of sintering additives and sintering process parameters, and controlling the grain boundary phase and pore structure and size. The effects of sintering conditions on the total porosity, closed porosity, pore structure and dielectric properties of materials were systematically studied.

Abstract In order to solve the problem that it is difficult to obtain the accurate trigger signal moment when using the time difference of UAV flight acoustic signals collected by acoustic sensors arranged in advance to locate the position of UAVs when they cannot be tracked by radar and are difficult to be observed by the human eye, an acoustic source localisation method with improved empirical modal decomposition (REMD) under an adaptive frequency window is proposed. Firstly, the collected UAV flight signals are smoothed and filtered, then the robust empirical modal decomposition (REMD) is used for IMF modal decomposition and spectral analysis of the collected signals, and a panning frequency window with variable bandwidth is introduced for corresponding frequency locking and extracting the IMFs; the GWO optimisation is used and the sliding metrics are set to determine the position of the panning frequency window automatically; finally, the extracted Finally, the extracted IMF components are reconstructed according to the criterion, and the trigger signal moments in the reconstructed IMF components are resolved and recorded, and the algorithm is used to calculate the difference between the reception moments of different sensors; for the traditional sound source localisation algorithms with a small detection range, which are prone to fall into the no-solution or false-solution, i.e., unable to achieve the localisation, a weighted least-squares-based Chan-Taylor algorithm is proposed for the localisation computation, and a weighted least-squares algorithm is proposed for the localisation computation, through the Inputting the sensor delay parameter and solving the linear equation system to get the target position information; finally, this paper verifies the robustness and performance of the design method with simulated and actual signals. The results show that the maximum positioning error is no more than 5% in an area with a side length of 15m in the measurement area. With the improved accuracy of time delay estimation, the positioning simulation results meet the positioning requirements even though the positioning error is further expanded when the measurement area is further expanded.