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The tracking of carbon and aerosol co-emissions is essential for environmental management. Satellite-based atmospheric synoptic observation networks provide large-scale and multifaceted data to help resolve emission behaviors. This study employs a comprehensive analysis of atmospheric dynamics, combustion byproducts, and aerosol characteristics around power plants. Strong correlations between Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD) at 500 nm and the column-averaged dry-air mole fraction of carbon dioxide (XCO2) were observed, revealing synchronous peaks in their emission patterns. The investigation into combustion completeness utilized metrics such as the ratio of carbon monoxide (CO)/XCO2 and Black Carbon Extinction (BCEXT)/Total Aerosol Extinction (TOTEXT). Discrepancies in these ratios across cases suggest variations in combustion efficiency and aerosol characteristics. Nitrogen dioxide (NO2) distributions closely mirrored XCO2, indicating consistent emission patterns, while variations in sulfur dioxide (SO2) distributions implied differences in sulfide content in the coal used. The influence of coal composition on AOD/XCO2 ratios was evident, with sulfide content contributing to variations besides combustion efficiency. This multifactorial analysis underscores the complex interplay of combustion completeness, aerosol composition, and coal components in shaping the air quality around power stations. The findings highlight the need for a nuanced understanding of these factors for effective air quality management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The hippocampus consists of histologically and functionally distinct subfields, which shows differential vulnerabilities to Alzheimer's disease (AD)-associated pathological changes. Objective: To investigate the atrophy patterns of the main hippocampal subfields in patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and AD and the relationships among the hippocampal subfield volumes, plasma biomarkers and cognitive performance. Methods: This cross-sectional study included 119 patients stratified into three categories: normal cognition (CN; N = 40), MCI (N = 39), and AD (N = 40). AD-related plasma biomarkers were measured, including amyloid-β (Aβ)42, Aβ40, Aβ42/Aβ40 ratio, p-tau181, and p-tau217, and the hippocampal subfield volumes were calculated using automated segmentation and volumetric procedures implemented in FreeSurfer. Results: The subiculum body, cornu ammonis (CA) 1-head, CA1-body, CA4-body, molecular_layer_HP-head, molecular_layer_HP-body, and GC-ML-DG-body volumes were smaller in the MCI group than in the CN group. The subiculum body and CA1-body volumes accurately distinguished MCI from CN (area under the curve [AUC] = 0.647–0.657). The subiculum-body, GC-ML-DG-body, CA4-body, and molecular_layer_HP-body volumes accurately distinguished AD from MCI (AUC = 0.822–0.833) and AD from CN (AUC = 0.903–0.905). The p-tau 217 level served as the best plasma indicator of AD and correlated with broader hippocampal subfield volumes. Moreover, mediation analysis demonstrated that the subiculum-body volume mediated the associations between the p-tau217 and p-tau181 levels, and the Montreal Cognitive Assessment and Auditory Verbal Learning Test recognition scores. Conclusions: Hippocampal subfields with distinctive atrophy patterns may mediate the effects of tau pathology on cognitive function. The subiculum-body may be the most clinically meaningful hippocampal subfield, which could be an effective target region for assessing disease progression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The power-electronics converters are increasingly applied in modern power system, which contains various sub-systems, such as renewable energy power plants and high voltage direct current transmission systems, etc. The electromagnetic transient simulation has been one of the important tools for the study of complex system containing large numbers of power converters. The coordination control of the power converters and corresponding power generation and load units is one of the challenges ensuring stability and obtaining optimal efficiency. However, the detailed modeling of the power converters considering the conduction and switching losses can cost a great number of computation resources, which makes it difficult to simulate a large system. This work proposed a current injection method for converter power loss representation, which can accurately consider the conduction and switching losses of the power-electronics switches with low computation complexity. A look-up table (LUT) of the power loss ratio is calculated before the simulation, and a current source representing the power loss is connected in parallel with the converter to track the reference loss generated by the look-up table. The proposed method can be combined with multiple converter modeling schemes, such as the two-resistance model, the switching-function model, and the average value model, etc. The topologies of the two-level converter and the modular multi-level converter (MMC) were used in the case studies to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method. Compared to the device-level model, the simulation power loss deviation is 0.64% and 4.13% applying the current injection method model in the case studies of the two-level converter and the MMC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study was to explore the relationship between parents' perceived social support and children's mental health and the mediating role of parental marital quality and parent‒child relationships. The Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support, the Parental Marital Quality Scale, the Child‒Parent Relationship Scale and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire were used to survey 822 parents of young children (50% fathers) in Changchun, Jilin Province, China. The results indicated that (1) parents' perceived social support was positively correlated with children's mental health; (2) parental marital quality and parent‒child relationships play a simple mediating role between parents' perceived social support and children's mental health; and (3) parental marital quality and parent‒child relationships also play a chain mediating role between parents' perceived social support and children's mental health. This suggests that providing good social support for parents enhances the quality of marriages and parent‒child relationships and will also contribute to good mental health in children. Highlights: Parents' perceived social support is positively associated with children's mental health. Parental marital quality and parent‒child relationships play a simple mediating role and a chain mediating role between parents' perceived social support and children's mental health. These findings have practical implications for parents, educators, and professionals in adopting appropriate methods to cultivate children's mental health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ensuring the security of transmitted content is an important task in network communication. Signcryption technology combines signature and encryption operations in a single step to achieve message authentication and confidentiality. In practical applications, users are usually in different cryptographic systems, the ordinary signcryption technology cannot realize communication between two different cryptographic systems. And the ciphertext structure of the existing signcryption schemes is relatively complex, signcryption is not efficient. Therefore, in order to solve the problem of efficient communication between different cryptosystems and ensure quantum security, this paper proposes a lattice-based efficient heterogeneous signcryption scheme for secure network communications. This signcryption scheme accomplishes signcryption through matrix operations and hash functions, which avoids complex signcryption structures, efficiently realizes bidirectional message communication between identity-based cryptosystems and certificateless cryptosystems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To delay the resistance of pests to Bt cotton producing Cry1Ac, pyramided cotton has been planted to replace Cry1Ac-cotton. However, the resistance mechanism of insects to Cry2Ab is rarely researched. In this study, a Cry2Ab-resistant Helicoverpa armigera strain (96-2Ab60) was selected in laboratory, which had a resistance ratio of 778.84-fold compared to the 96S susceptible strain. Genetic analysis showed that the resistance of 96-2Ab60 strain was controlled by more than one locus, and inheritance mode was incompletely dominant. The Cry2Ab-resistant H. armigera had high cross-resistance to Cry1Ac (284.28-fold), Cry1Fa (282.50-fold), Cry1Aa (> 71.40-fold), Cry2Aa (30.14-fold) toxins, and low cross-resistance to Cry1Ab (9.94-fold) and Cry1Ca (> 8.05-fold), while it had no cross-resistance to abamectin and spinetoram and negative cross-resistance to Vip3Aa toxin (0.14-fold). The fitness costs of 96-2Ab60 resistant strain were evaluated on toxin-free artificial diet, compared with 96S strain, the life table parameters such as pupa survival rate, pupa weight, oviposition period, hatching rate of egg, r, and λ in 96-2Ab60 were significantly decreased, and total pre-oviposition and T were significantly increased. There were obvious fitness costs in 96-2Ab60 strain whose fitness value Rf (0.7341) was lower than that of the 96S strain. The larval mortalities of 96-2Ab60 and 96S fed on either DP33B (single-toxin cotton) or Bollgard II (pyramided cotton) were significantly higher than those fed on non-Bt cotton; however, the mortalities of 96-2Ab60 were obviously reduced compared with 96S. These results indicated that although these two Bt cottons could kill part of 96-2Ab60 larvae, 96-2Ab60 already had resistance to them. These results provide useful information to further understand Cry2Ab resistance mechanism and apply pyramided cotton for managing resistance in H. armigera. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simple Summary: Machine learning methods have shown promise in accurately identifying small lung nodules. However, further exploration is needed to fully harness the potential of machine learning in distinguishing between benign and malignant nodules. This study aimed to develop and evaluate a ResNet50-Ensemble Voting model for detecting the nature (benign or malignant) of small pulmonary nodules (less than 20 mm) based on CT images. This study involved 834 CT imaging data from 396 patients with small pulmonary nodules. CT image features were extracted using ResNet50 and VGG16 algorithms, and classification was performed using XGBoost, SVM, and Ensemble Voting techniques, incorporating ten different combinations of machine learning classifiers. Among the models tested, the ResNet50-Ensemble Voting algorithm demonstrated the highest performance in the test set, achieving an accuracy of 0.943 (0.938, 0.948), with sensitivity and specificity values of 0.964 and 0.911, respectively. The implementation of machine learning models, particularly the ResNet50-Ensemble Voting approach, showed excellent performance in accurately identifying benign and malignant small pulmonary nodules (less than 20 mm) from diverse sources. These models have the potential to assist doctors in accurately diagnosing the nature of early-stage lung nodules in clinical practice. Background: The early detection of benign and malignant lung tumors enabled patients to diagnose lesions and implement appropriate health measures earlier, dramatically improving lung cancer patients' quality of living. Machine learning methods performed admirably when recognizing small benign and malignant lung nodules. However, exploration and investigation are required to fully leverage the potential of machine learning in distinguishing between benign and malignant small lung nodules. Objective: The aim of this study was to develop and evaluate the ResNet50-Ensemble Voting model for detecting the benign and malignant nature of small pulmonary nodules (<20 mm) based on CT images. Methods: In this study, 834 CT imaging data from 396 patients with small pulmonary nodules were gathered and randomly assigned to the training and validation sets in an 8:2 ratio. ResNet50 and VGG16 algorithms were utilized to extract CT image features, followed by XGBoost, SVM, and Ensemble Voting techniques for classification, for a total of ten different classes of machine learning combinatorial classifiers. Indicators such as accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity were used to assess the models. The collected features are also shown to investigate the contrasts between them. Results: The algorithm we presented, ResNet50-Ensemble Voting, performed best in the test set, with an accuracy of 0.943 (0.938, 0.948) and sensitivity and specificity of 0.964 and 0.911, respectively. VGG16-Ensemble Voting had an accuracy of 0.887 (0.880, 0.894), with a sensitivity and specificity of 0.952 and 0.784, respectively. Conclusion: Machine learning models that were implemented and integrated ResNet50-Ensemble Voting performed exceptionally well in identifying benign and malignant small pulmonary nodules (<20 mm) from various sites, which might help doctors in accurately diagnosing the nature of early-stage lung nodules in clinical practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Emotional labor is an important research area, but four key gaps remain regarding outcomes of nonwork strains, explanatory frameworks beyond the conservation of resources theory, adoption of person-centered approaches, and subjects of performers.Methods: By surveying 183 Chinese dance students, we employed cluster analysis to examine the adoption of emotional labor strategies (ie, surface acting, deep acting, and expression of naturally felt emotions) and to explore the outcomes on work strain (ie, emotional exhaustion and reduced flow experience) and nonwork strain (ie, depression and anxiety) with introducing the allostatic load theory as an analytical basis.Results: Four types of emotional workers were identified, namely, flexible regulators (33.33%), authentic regulators (15.85%), display rules compliers (39.34%), and non-regulators (11.48%). Authentic regulators had the lowest emotional exhaustion. Non-regulators had the lowest flow. No differences emerged in depression or anxiety across clusters.Discussion: Findings partially align with past research showing risks of surface acting in terms of emotional exhaustion. However, all three strategies enhanced flow states. Moreover, dancers' work strains did not extend to psychological problems, unlike other professions. Possible explanations include training in emotional regulation and flow states in performing. Practical implications exist for training emotional regulation and fostering flow at work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: The starch‐fatty acid (FA) complex belongs to a new type of resistant starch (RS5) and has become a prevalent research topic because of its slow‐digestion and enzymatic resistance properties. In this study, the starch‐FA complexes were prepared from potato starch (PS) and FAs with various carbon chain lengths and unsaturation by hydrothermal treatment (HT), alcohothermal treatment (AT) or ultrasound treatment (UT), and their physicochemical properties and digestibility were interpreted. The PS‐8% lauric acid (Lau) with the highest complex index value (approximately 95%) and RS content (approximately 31%) was obtained by HT; meanwhile, it had a slow glucose diffusion rate and a low free fatty acid release rate in simulated gastrointestinal digestion compared to native PS. Besides, the V‐type crystalline structure was formed obviously after HT, but it was too weak for AT and UT samples to be detected. The gelatinisation viscosity was reduced due to the physical combination of PS and Lau. Therefore, HT was a relatively efficient and safe approach to prepare starch‐FA complex with high RS content, and the obtained starch‐FA complex has the potential to become an alternative functional food ingredient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extensive researches have linked air pollutants with cardiovascular disease (CVD) and respiratory diseases (RD), however, there is limited evidence on causal effects of air pollutants on morbidity of CVD or RD with comorbidities, particularly diabetes mellitus in elder patients. We included hospital admissions for CVD or RD among elder (≥65 years) diabetic patients between 2014 and 2019 in Beijing. A time‐stratified case‐crossover design based on negative‐control exposure was used to assess causal associations of short‐term exposure to air pollutants with CVD and RD among diabetic patients with the maximum lag of 7 days. A random forest regression model was used to calculate the contribution magnitude of air pollutants. A total of 493,046 hospital admissions were recorded. Per 10 μg/m3 uptick in PM1, PM2.5, PM10, SO2, NO2, O3, and 1 mg/m3 in CO was associated with 0.29 (0.05, 0.53), 0.14 (0.02, 0.26), 0.06 (0.00, 0.12), 0.36 (0.01, 0.70), 0.21 (0.02, 0.40), −0.08 (−0.25, 0.09), and 4.59 (0.56, 8.61) causal effect estimator for admission of CVD among diabetic patients, corresponding to 0.12 (0.05, 0.18), 0.09 (0.05, 0.13), 0.05, 0.23 (0.06, 0.41), 0.10 (0.02, 0.19), −0.04 (−0.06, −0.01), and 3.91(1.81, 6.01) causal effect estimator for RD among diabetic patients. The effect of gaseous pollutants was higher than particulate pollutants in random forest model. Short‐term exposure to air pollution was causally associated with increased admission of CVD and RD among elder diabetic patients. Gaseous pollutants had a greater contribution to CVD and RD among elder diabetic patients. Plain Language Summary: Although researches for cardiovascular disease (CVD) and respiratory diseases (RD) with air pollutants are widely reported, there is little evidence for causal associations of air pollution with CVD combined with diabetes mellitus (CVD‐DM) and RD combined with diabetes mellitus (RD‐DM) in elder patients. We included elder hospital admissions (aged ≥65 years) on comorbid CVD‐DM and RD‐DM patients between 2014 and 2019 in Beijing, China, to assess associations and causal inferences between air pollutants with CVD‐DM and RD‐DM. Random forest regression model was used to calculate the contribution magnitude of air pollutants. We found that exposure to air pollution increased admissions of CVD‐DM and RD‐DM in the elderly. Gaseous pollutants had a greater contribution to CVD‐DM and RD‐DM. The finding may lead to policy changes to reduce air pollution concentration, particularly gaseous pollutants to decrease hospital admissions. Key Points: Investigated causal associations of air pollutants on comorbid elderly populationA stable and accurate effect of air pollution was gained base on large sample sizesThe effects of gaseous pollutants are stronger than those of PM for the elderly [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The intramolecular Heck reaction is a well-established strategy for natural product total synthesis. When constructing large rings, this reaction is also referred to as Heck macrocyclization, which has proved a viable avenue to access diverse naturally occurring macrocycles. Less noticed but likewise valuable, it has created novel macrocycles of non-natural origin that neither serve as nor derive from natural products. This review presents a systematic account of the title reaction in forging this non-natural subset of large rings, thereby addressing a topic rarely covered in the literature. Walking through two complementary sections, namely (1) drug discovery research and (2) synthetic methodology development, it demonstrates that beyond the well-known domain of natural product synthesis, Heck macrocyclization also plays a remarkable role in forming synthetic macrocycles, in particular macrocyclic drugs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eukaryotic elongation factor 1A (eEF1A) canonically delivers amino acyl tRNA to the ribosomal A site during the elongation stage of protein biosynthesis. Yet paradoxically, the oncogenic nature of this instrumental protein has long been recognized. Consistently, eEF1A has proven to be targeted by a wide assortment of small molecules with excellent anticancer activity, among which plitidepsin has been granted approval for the treatment of multiple myeloma. Meanwhile, metarrestin is currently under clinical development for metastatic cancers. Bearing these exciting advances in mind, it would be desirable to present a systematic up-to-date account of the title topic, which, to the best of our knowledge, has thus far been unavailable in the literature. The present review summarizes recent advances in eEF1A-targeting anticancer agents, both naturally occurring and synthetically crafted, with regard to their discovery or design, target identification, structure–activity relationship, and mode of action. Their structural diversity and differential eEF1A-targeting mechanisms warrant continuing research in pursuit of curing eEF1A-driven malignancy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Arterial stiffness, glycemic control and blood pressure are risk factors of macrovascular complications in type 2 diabetes. This study aimed to investigate the combined association of arterial stiffness, glycemic control and hypertension status with the occurrence of diabetic macrovascular complication. Methods: A total of 1870 patients of diabetes were enrolled from Beijing Health Management Cohort between 2008 and 2018 as baseline, and then followed for macrovascular complication onset. We proposed a composite risk score (0–4) by arterial stiffness severity, pool glycemic control and hypertension status. Cox model was used to estimate the hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (CI). Results: The mean age (SD) of this population was 59.90 (12.29) years. During a median follow-up of 4.0 years, 359 (19.2%) patients developed macrovascular complication. Compared to the normal arterial stiffness and good glycemic control group, patients with severe arterial stiffness and pool glycemic control had the highest risk of macrovascular complications (HR: 2.73; 95% CI: 1.42–5.25). Similarly, those of severe arterial stiffness and hypertension had the highest risk (HR: 2.69; 95% CI: 1.61–4.50). Patients of the composite score > 2 had a significantly increased risk of macrovascular complication. Conclusion: This study suggested the clinical importance of combined evaluation of arterial stiffness, glycemic control and hypertension status for the risk stratification and management of macrovascular complication of type 2 diabetes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The electrochemiluminescence (ECL) is generally emitted via radiative transition of singlet or triplet excited state (S1 or T1). Herein, an ECL mechanism with the transitions of both S1 and T1 of black phosphorus quantum dots (BPQDs) is found, and an arginine (Arg) modification strategy is proposed to passivate the surface oxidation defects of BPQDs, which could modulate the excited states for enhancing the ECL efficiency of BPQDs. The Arg modification leads to greater spatial overlap of highest and lowest occupied molecular orbitals, and spectral shift of radiative transitions, and improves the stability of anion radical of BPQDs. To verify the application of the proposed mechanism, it is used to construct a sensitive method for conveniently evaluating the inhibiting efficiency of cyclo-arginine-glycine-aspartic acid-d-tyrosine-lysine to cell surface integrin by using Arg containing peptide modified BPQDs as signal tag. The dual excited states mediated ECL emitters provide a paradigm for adjustable ECL generation and extend the application of ECL analysis. Electrochemiluminescence is emitted via the radiative transition of a singlet or triplet excited state. Here, the authors propose an arginine modification of black phosphorus quantum dots that exhibits enhanced emission based on dual excited states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Signcryption technology combines signature and encryption operations in a single step to achieve message authentication and confidentiality. The ordinary signcryption technology cannot realize communication between two different cryptographic systems. Therefore, to implement efficient communication between different cryptosystems and resist quantum attacks, this paper proposes a lattice‐based efficient heterogeneous signcryption scheme. The heterogeneous signcryption scheme is proved to be secure assuming the hardness of small integer solution and learning with errors problems. Then this paper applies the lattice‐based efficient heterogeneous signcryption scheme to the federated learning system to achieve the transmission of confidential information, and designs an intelligent federated learning system on lattice‐based efficient heterogeneous signcryption. This system realizes federated learning and the quantum security of data transmission while preserving private data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Age has been found to be the single most significant factor in COVID-19 severity and outcome. However, the age-related severity factors of COVID-19 have not been definitively established. In this study, we detected SARS-CoV-2-specific antibody responses and infectious disease-related blood indicators in 2360 sera from 783 COVID-19 patients, with an age range of 1–92 years. In addition, we recorded the individual information and clinical symptoms of the patients. We found that the IgG responses for S1, N, and ORF3a and the IgM for NSP7 were associated with severe COVID-19 at different ages. The IgM responses for the S-protein peptides S1-113 (aa 673–684) and S2-97 (aa 1262–1273) were associated with severe COVID-19 in patients aged <60. Furthermore, we found that the IgM for S1-113 and NSP7 may play a protective role in patients aged <60 and >80, respectively. Regarding clinical parameters, we analyzed the diagnostic ability of five clinical parameters for severe COVID-19 in six age groups and identified three-target panel, glucose, IL-6, myoglobin, IL-6, and NT proBNP as the appropriate diagnostic markers for severe COVID-19 in patients aged <41, 41–50, 51–60, 61–70, 71–80, and >80, respectively. The age-associated severity factors revealed here will facilitate our understanding of COVID-19 immunity and diagnosis, and eventually provide meaningful information for combating the pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, we fabricated a biaxially stretchable light-emitting diode (LED) display based on a wavy structured-metal electrode grid packaged together with LED chips. The micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) fabrication process was utilized to fabricate the wavy-structured metal connections and rigid islands. The resulting LED display can be readily bent, rolled, stretched and even washed with no degradation of its image quality. Here at least 1000 stretching cycles at a 10% strain can be tolerated. This work demonstrated the potential of inorganic materials as stretchable displays and MEMS compatible processes which can be used as stretchable electronics fabrication processes. [2022-0029] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blockchain gives a new method for distributed data ledgering. The smart grid obtains efficient two-way data transmission and information control. It effectively monitors and regulates the grid by collecting real-time electricity consumption data of users. However, online data collection brings privacy leakage. To solve the problem of privacy leakage in the electricity data collection in the smart grid, a privacy-aware electricity data collection model is proposed. Firstly, we propose a new group blind signature scheme by introducing the blind feature into the identity-based encryption method. Secondly, by applying the proposed group blind signature scheme to the electricity data collection process, we propose a privacy-aware electricity data collection model. The proposed model ensures the conditional anonymity and traceability of user identity and the privacy protection and unforgeability of electricity consumption data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently, traditional flight data sharing models cannot resist quantum attacks, which poses the risk of data leakage. The research on the flight data sharing model against quantum attack has become one of the research hotspots. Lattice-based cryptography is recognized as an effective way to resist quantum attacks. A flight data sharing model on consortium blockchain is proposed in this paper to resolve data leakage during data sharing. First, a new lattice-based multisignature scheme (Lamus) is proposed, capable of resisting quantum attacks. We prove the security of the proposed Lamus scheme in the random oracle model. Moreover, a flight data sharing model on consortium blockchain is proposed by applying the proposed Lamus scheme to resist quantum attacks. Security and performance analysis show that the model guarantees antiquantum security, and it achieves good performance in terms of storage efficiency and operating efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Private science and technology enterprises are the main force in building a high-level innovative province in Zhejiang, and are also the driving force for the province's high-quality integration into the Yangtze River Delta. At present, the integration of private science and technology enterprises in Zhejiang into the Yangtze River Delta has problems such as low integration ratio, high integration difficulty, low integration level, and insufficient integration confidence. The causes of the problem mainly include the concept bottlenecks and capacity limitations of private technology companies, the institutional dilemma of cooperation between regional governments and regional business environment synergy is not high, the role of non-governmental organizations is not fully developed. To create a powerful engine that drives private technology enterprises to deeply participate in the development of the Yangtze River Delta, it should be built and strengthened from the perspective of the main role of enterprises themselves, the role of government guidance, industry associations, and other non-governmental organizations to play the role of service coordination and supervision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Private science and technology enterprises are the main force in building a high-level innovative province in Zhejiang, and are also the driving force for the province's high-quality integration into the Yangtze River Delta. At present, the integration of private science and technology enterprises in Zhejiang into the Yangtze River Delta has problems such as low integration ratio, high integration difficulty, low integration level, and insufficient integration confidence. The causes of the problem mainly include the concept bottlenecks and capacity limitations of private technology companies, the institutional dilemma of cooperation between regional governments and regional business environment synergy is not high, the role of non-governmental organizations is not fully developed. To create a powerful engine that drives private technology enterprises to deeply participate in the development of the Yangtze River Delta, it should be built and strengthened from the perspective of the main role of enterprises themselves, the role of government guidance, industry associations, and other non-governmental organizations to play the role of service coordination and supervision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to the spectrum congestion of current navigation signals in the L-band, it is difficult to apply for another two proper frequencies in this band for future low earth orbit (LEO)-based navigation augmentation systems. A feasible frequency scheme of using the combined frequencies in the L, S and C bands is proposed. A high-efficiency modulation scheme, termed continuous phase modulation, is adopted to make full use of the very limited spectrums and satisfy the radio frequency compatibility with the existing navigation systems, radio astronomy, and microwave landing systems. The high propagation loss in the S and C bands is absent for LEO, as the power margin owing to the short-distance propagation has compensated the frequency-dependent attenuation. Besides, for high-precision positioning, we consider the specific integer ratios between frequencies and propose a strategy for LEO precise point positioning (PPP) ambiguity resolution (AR) by directly fixing the L + S or L + C dual-band ionospheric-free (IF) ambiguity. Based on the simulated data, the quality of fractional cycle biases (FCBs) and the performance of PPP AR are analyzed. After removing the FCBs, 100.0, 99.7 and 71.7% of the fractional parts are within ± 0.15 cycles for GPS narrow-lane, LEO L + S dual-band IF and LEO L + C dual-band IF float ambiguities. At user stations, the convergence time of GPS PPP in static mode can be significantly shortened from 17.9 to within 2.5 min with the augmentation of 5.44 LEO satellites. Furthermore, compared with ambiguity-float solutions, the positioning accuracy of GPS AR + LEO AR solutions in east, north and up components is improved from 0.008, 0.008 and 0.027 m to 0.002, 0.003 and 0.011 m for 10-min sessions, respectively, and the fixing rate after time to first fix is almost 100%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The association between visceral adiposity index (VAI) and diabetic complications has been reported in cross-sectional studies, while the effect of VAI on complication development remains unclear. This study aims to evaluate the longitudinal association of VAI and Chinese VAI (CVAI) with the incidence of diabetic nephropathy and retinopathy using a Chinese cohort. Methods: A total of 8 948 participants with type 2 diabetes from Beijing Health Management Cohort were enrolled during 2013–2014, and followed until December 31, 2019. Nephropathy was confirmed by urine albumin/creatinine ratio and estimated glomerular filtration rate; retinopathy was diagnosed using fundus photograph. Results: The mean (SD) age was 53.35 (14.66) years, and 6 154 (68.8%) were men. During a median follow-up of 4.82 years, 467 participants developed nephropathy and 90 participants developed retinopathy. One-SD increase in VAI and CVAI levels were significantly associated with an increased risk of nephropathy, and the adjusted hazard ratios (HR) were 1.127 (95% CI 1.050–1.210) and 1.165 (95% CI 1.003–1.353), respectively. On contrary, VAI and CVAI level were not associated with retinopathy after adjusting confounding factors. Conclusion: VAI and CVAI are independently associated with the development of nephropathy, but not retinopathy in Chinese adults with diabetes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, a stretchable thin film capacitive strain sensor based on wavy-structured interdigitated metal electrodes is successfully demonstrated. Wavy-shape metal electrodes were patterned using bulk silicon micromachining, endowing the electrodes with high stretchability and reliability. The electrodes were also protected with a layer of parylene C to prevent damage during stretching and embedded in polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) stretchable package layers. The interdigitated electrodes sitting on the wavy structures experienced a waving angle change under external strain resulting in capacitive change, which is the sensing mechanism of the wavy structured interdigitated capacitive strain sensor (WICSS). The sensitivity and stretchability of the WICSS is dependent on the design of interdigitated electrodes and the dimension of the wavy structures. The gauge factor (GF) of the WICSS was 0.27 at 25% strain. There was little hysteresis during the stretching and releasing process in the range of 25% strain. The sensing property remained stable within a 1000 cycling test. The applications of the high-performance WICSS are also demonstrated by detecting the motion of human fingers and wrists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Purpose: Aberrant lipid metabolism is recognized as a key feature of cancer cells. Our initial research on MS‐based analysis of lipids in a multiple myeloma (MM) cell line showed a significant accumulation of lipids in multiple myeloma cells after proteasome inhibition. This finding prompted us to hypothesize that multiple myeloma cell survival depends on the maximal utilization of abnormally accumulated lipids. Therefore, we explored whether lipid metabolism‐modulating agents would synergize with proteasome inhibitors. Experimental Approach Lipid accumulation in multiple myeloma cells was measured by MS. Synergism between lipid regulators and proteasome inhibitors was assessed by cell viability and apoptosis. A novel stable derivative of fenofibrate (FCE) was synthesized and used to treat multiple myeloma cells in vitro and in vivo along with the proteasome inhibitor ixazomib. ChIP‐seq, western blotting and RT‐qPCR were performed to explore the potential mechanism(s) underlying the increase in lipid levels in multiple myeloma cells after proteasome inhibition. Key Results: Accumulation of lipids in multiple myeloma cells was induced by proteasome inhibition. Lipid‐lowering drugs and MG‐132 exerted a synergistic effect to kill multiple myeloma cells. FCE showed significant synergistic activity in vitro and in vivo with ixazomib. The abnormal lipid accumulation in multiple myeloma cells that was enhanced by proteasome inhibitors might be due to the elevated SREBP1/2 expression induced by ATF4. Conclusions and Implications: Our results provide a proof of principle and support for the further clinical evaluation of the combination of lipid‐modulating drugs with proteasome inhibitors in the treatment of multiple myeloma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cathode layer of surface dielectric barrier discharge plasma is investigated experimentally by using the surface potential measurement under different bias voltages. Positive charge accumulation is found near the edge of the exposed electrode (x = 0 mm) under negative DC bias voltage. In addition, the plasma electromotive force (EMF) distribution curve near the edge of the exposed electrode diverges with the negative DC bias voltage. These phenomena are in good agreement with the conclusion that the cathode layer shows positive potential in time average. Five actuators with different exposed electrode widths are designed to study the relationship between the cathode layer and the mechanical properties of the actuator. With the widening of the exposed electrode, the positive charges in the cathode layer increase, and the plasma EMF divergence is more pronounced. However, the thrust force decreases. Moreover, the variation of thrust force with DC bias voltage is consistent with the change of the plasma EMF. The experimental results show that the narrow-exposed electrode actuator for the cathode layer with a small size and low number of positive ions has better mechanical properties. By analysis, this is mainly due to the lower number of positive ions of the cathode layer, producing less shielding from the applied voltage. More electrons are emitted from the cathode layer. This paper provides a method for the detection and study of the cathode layer. In addition, it can provide insight into how the cathode layer affects the development of thrust force. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the electromagnetic transient (EMT) and transient stability (TS) hybrid simulation, the entire power system is artificially split into two sub-grids, and sub-grids interact with each other via an interface. Thus interface distortions emerge, including latency and errors. The influence of interface latency is quantitated based on a demo circuit containing delayed interaction. Moreover, the principles of improving hybrid simulation interface accuracy are concluded. Inspired by the principles, a novel interface displacement (ID) and dynamic phasor mapping equivalence (DP-ME) interface scheme is proposed. The scheme makes sub-grids at opposite sides of an interface loosely coupled and avoids interface variable form conversion by applying two techniques. 1) Displacement of the partition interface from the converter buses to the control loops and interior of the EMT sub-grid to utilize the built-in inertias. 2) Construction of the DP-ME model to calculate the injected power from EMT to TS sub-grid. Tests based on designed cases and an actual HVAC/DC power grid give credibility to the proposed ID & DP-ME scheme in comparison with full electromagnetic simulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Surface quality is an important performance indicator of laser metal deposition. Based on annular laser beam internal powder feeding technology, the effect of higher energy of the outer side of the annular beam on the surface roughness and waviness of thin-wall parts is studied in this paper. The influences of laser power, scanning speed, and powder feeding rate on the surface finish of thin-wall parts are investigated. The results show that the laser power has a significant effect on surface finish. With the increase in laser power, the roughness decreases and the waviness increases first and then decreases. High laser power can improve surface finish. As the scanning speed increases, the roughness decreases first and then increases, and the waviness decreases. The scanning speed has a significant influence on surface waviness. Increasing the powder feeding rate is not beneficial to surface quality because the value of the roughness and the surface waviness will add with its rising. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the increasing penetration of renewable energies in modern power grids, large amounts of voltage source converters (VSCs) have been installed, resulting in many new transient issues. Electromagnetic transient (EMT) simulation plays an essential role in investigating and solving the issues. However, simulation efficiency plunges when object grids contain multiple VSCs, because each switching event incurs modification or re-decomposition of the network matrix in traditional EMT programs, which is very time-consuming. Thus, this paper proposes a VSC model represented by pulse voltage-current source pairs. Accordingly, a unidirectional loosely-coupled solving algorithm is designed. Synthetically, the authors propose a novel EMT simulation approach adaptive to systems with multiple VSCs. The proposed approach keeps the computational network invariable while sufficiently considers detailed switching events, thereby significantly improving the simulation efficiency of the EMTP program without precision loss. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Surface engineering of electrochemiluminescence (ECL) emitters with capping agents is highly important, yet it remains a challenge. Herein, using N-acetyl-L-cysteine and cysteamine as model capping agents, a dual-stabilizer-capped strategy was proposed to achieve red-shifted ECL in the near-infrared region (NIR) via surface engineering water soluble and biocompatible Au nanoclusters (NCs). The dual-stabilizer-capped Au NCs were environment-friendly and exhibited efficient ECL emission at around 860 nm when utilizing triethanolamine as a coreactant, thus providing an NIR ECL tag for bioanalysis in aqueous medium. Benefiting from the low background of NIR emission and the good biocompatibility of the dual-stabilizer-capped Au NCs, a "signal on"-genre NIR ECL immunosensing method was obtained. Then, the immunosensor was established by using the carcinoembryonic antigen as a model analyte and the aforementioned Au NCs as a tag to label the signal antibody, which exhibited a broad linear range from 1 fg/mL to 0.5 ng/mL with a limit of detection of 0.33 fg /mL (S/N = 3). The work offers a method toward deepened understanding of the surface engineering of Au NCs with capping agents for tuning the ECL waveband and developing ECL systems in even longer wavebands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Na 2 O - B 2 O 3 - SiO 2 - H 2 O system hydrated glass with T g ranges from - 10 to 150 ∘ C is synthesized by aqueous chemical methods and is applied to symmetrical cells as quasi-solid electrolyte. At the temperature around T g , the solid state transforms to quasi-solid state, whose mechanical property keeps like gel electrolyte, but the conductivity leaps from 5.31 × 10 - 6 S cm - 1 to 5.43 × 10 - 3 S cm - 1 , much higher than most of the glass–ceramic electrolytes. As most of the solvated water is evaporated, H 2 O left in the system distributes in the intervals as hydroxyl, which is much benefit to the ions transportation, and more important is to increase the voltage window to 2.24 V and even higher. The cycle performance is also researched. After 1000 circulations, there is still 65% capacity retention and no obvious damage is discovered in the electrolyte, which means much better cycle property of the electrolyte than gel electrolyte. Other compositions in the quasi-solid system including different contents of B 2 O 3 , Na 2 SO 4 and m in sodium silicate NaO 2 · mSiO 2 are also studied. In general, quasi-solid Na 2 O - B 2 O 3 - SiO 2 - H 2 O system owns better conductivity and cycle performance than most glass–ceramic solid electrolyte, and it is environment-friendly, inexpensive and practical to be used as sodium ions quasi-solid electrolyte. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herein, a facile and controllable strategy to synthesize self‐hydroxylated TiO2 nanocrystals with promoted photocatalytic activity in hydrogen evolution is demonstrated. Various colors (yellow, light yellow, blueish gray and gray) in appearance are induced by controlling the molar ratio of titanium source to oxidant during the hydrothermal treatment. Compared with commercial P25 TiO2 nanoparticles, the as‐obtained self‐hydroxylated TiO2 nanocrystals exhibit better photocatalytic performance in H2 evolution. Specifically, the maximum hydrogen evolution rate under solar light illumination (10.0 mmol/h/g) is 4.6 times superior to that of P25. The characterization results confirm the presence of abundant hydroxyls resulting from the hydrothermal treatment, which decreases the recombination rate of carriers and the energy barrier of hydrogen formation while facilitates light absorption for promoting photocatalytic performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the increasing applications of high‐voltage direct current inverters in heavy‐load grids, commutation failures (CFs) pose a severe threat to the safe and stable operation of power systems. This study first sorts methods of CF inhibition into different categories and then investigates their effectiveness, adaptability and limitations. Considering the economic benefits and applicability, CF inhibition calls for integrated methods involving supplementary power devices, control strategies and prediction techniques. Finally, this study makes clear potential future research directions, suggesting first control potential is exploited by machine learning‐based control, and then auxiliary devices to be added if necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Propamocarb (PM), a carbamate fungicide, can effectively control downy mildew on cucumber. However, due to the large-scale and high-dose use of this fungicide, PM residues have become a major problem in cucumber production. In this report, the cucumber cultivar "D0351" (with the lowest residual PM content) and the cucumber cultivar "D9320" (with the highest residual PM content) were used as experimental materials. The candidate gene CsMCF , which is related to a low residual PM content in cucumber, was screened by high-throughput tag-sequencing (Tag-Seq) and PM analysis, and its role in reducing PM residue in cucumber was explored. CsMCF was cloned and obtained. This gene contains an open reading frame of 1026 bp, encodes 341 amino acids and contains 3 Mito-carr domains. The encoded protein is a hydrophobic protein with 4 distinct transmembrane structures but no signal peptide cleavage sites. The subcellular localization of the protein is the cytoplasm. Evolutionary tree analysis showed that CsMCF had the highest homology to a gene from the melon Cucumis melo L. (XM_008464998.2). The core elements of the promoter include cis- acting elements, such as those related to salicylic acid (SA), jasmonic acid (JA), gibberellin (GA), and abscisic acid (ABA). Following PM treatment, CsMCF was significantly upregulated at most time points in different parts of the fruit, leaf, stem and root of "D0351," while expression was downregulated at most time points in the fruit, leaf and stem of "D9320." The order of the expression levels in different cucumber organs was as follows: fruit>leaf > stem > root. CsMCF was specifically expressed in the stems and leaves of "D0351." The PM residues in CsMCF (+)-overexpressing T0 and T1 cucumber fruits were significantly lower than those in the wild type, while the PM residues in CsMCF (-)-overexpressing T0 and T1 cucumber fruits were significantly higher. The qRT-PCR results showed that CsMCF can respond to biotic and abiotic stresses, actively respond to PM treatment and play a role in reducing PM residues in cucumber fruits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spatial heterogeneity in soil nutrient availability is considered to play an important role in promoting plant invasion success and can affect interspecific competition. Although some clonal plants have been demonstrated to be correlated with resource heterogeneity in terrestrial systems, little is known about how soil nutrient heterogeneity affects the growth of invasive aquatic plants or their population structure. A greenhouse experiment was therefore conducted to study the response of the invasive aquatic plant Myriophyllum aquaticum to the spatial heterogeneity of soil nutrients under three plant densities (one, four, or twelve plants 0.28 m2) with a constant amount of soil nutrients. The results showed that soil nutrient heterogeneity significantly increased the number of shoots in the single-plant density treatment. However, heterogeneous soil nutrient treatment significantly increased the number of shoots at the expense of total biomass and aboveground biomass in the twelve-plant density treatment. The heterogeneous soil nutrient treatment had low effects on other growth traits and intraspecific competition under different plant density treatments. These results indicate that spatial heterogeneity in soil nutrient availability may facilitate the spread of M. aquaticum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Efficient transient simulation of large power grid is of great importance for system operation and dispatching, fault repetition, operator training etc. Online stability estimation and testing on system control and protection require hard real‐time performance of transient simulation. The conventional real‐time simulation, which splits an entire grid into sub‐grids and solves them in parallel, lacks generality for various case systems. This study proposes a new efficiency enhancement method without grid partitioning. Three key techniques are involved. First, parallel solving format is proposed to distribute two‐layer computational burdens into central processing unit cores in balance. Second, to calculate the fault changing the grid structure, the inverse current compensation is employed instead of re‐forming impedance matrix and repeating lower‐upper (LU) decomposition. Third, dual‐loop forward and backward substitutions to solve grid equations are modified to a single‐loop iteration, which further improves the computational efficiency. At last, the validity and effectiveness of the proposed method are verified by tests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pollution and its governing problem have drawn the world’s extremely attention. To study the sensitivities of different governing methods, we formulate a dynamic system which is analyzed through two cases of noncooperation and with-cooperation among the enterprises and the government. The dynamic system describes the influences caused by the pollution control investment, the time delay of the abatement investment and the degree of the cooperation between the government and the enterprise. At last, we solve the optimal control problem based on turnpike theorem. It is shown that the economic output in a country could affect the steady state of the pollutant emissions. Moreover, the threshold value of time delay that the society can accept on the pollution control investment is non-integer. Furthermore, the environmental policies’ implementation could remedy the polluting weakness of the countries with higher economic outputs. Finally, we solve the optimal control problem in the G-P model through education promoting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change, especially warming temperatures, may increase invasion and modify the ecological impacts of invasive species by enhancing their ability to compete. To test the effects of warming on invasive plants, a mesocosm experiment was conducted to study competition between the invasive plant Egeria densa and the native hygrophyte Sparganium angustifolium under simulated warming conditions in a greenhouse. These two species were grown in monoculture (no competitor control) or mixed culture (competitor control) for two months under different temperature conditions (warming treatment or no-warming treatment). In S. angustifolium, the higher temperatures led to a shorter root length and significantly increased the aboveground traits of ramets, the total biomass, and the RGR (relative growth rate) but had no effect on the aboveground traits of genets. Growth in mixed culture significantly decreased the S. angustifolium ramet height under warmer conditions and significantly reduced the ramet root length, ramet number, genet biomass, root-to-shoot ratio and RGR of S. angustifolium under natural temperature conditions. All the morphological, biomass and growth traits of E. densa except for the root-to-shoot ratio were significantly increased by the warmer temperatures and decreased by growth in mixed culture. The RCI and RII of E. densa in both the no-warming and warmer environments were two and three times greater than those of S. angustifolium, whereas the ACI values for the two species were similar. Thus, S. angustifolium was a better competitor than E. densa under both temperature conditions. These results suggest that although the superior competitive ability of native species can inhibit E. densa growth, the performance of this species will be enhanced under future climate warming in cold regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modular multilevel converters (MMCs) play a critical role in the future energy Internet pattern. Therefore, proper models for the simulation of complex systems with multiple MMCs are required. This study proposes a simplified equivalent model (SEM) based on the implicit trapezoidal method and Thevenin equivalent. The model can accurately simulate arm voltages of the MMC and is thus capable of simulating system‐level transients after faults and disturbances, circulating currents and subsynchronous oscillation components. Subsequently, a hybrid model combining SEM and a detailed equivalent model (DEM) is built to improve the overall simulation speed in scenarios where submodule‐level transients are mixed with system‐level ones. Finally, this study notes that the major difference between DEM and SEM results only from the voltage‐balancing cycle. An experiential formula is given to regulate SEM when the voltage‐balancing cycle is large, where the difference may become obvious/insufferable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hollow TiO2 microspheres (HTS) were synthesized via a new one-pot template-free method, which exhibited amazing structure stability even at high temperature calcinations of 800 °C. The formation mechanism study indicates that the growth of HTS is like the inside-out Ostwald ripening process. The resultant HTS possess a fine porous structure and the surface area is high up to 86.5 m2 g−1. As a new functional material in the DSSC application, HTS simultaneously offer incompatible features such as a high specific surface area and a pronounced light-scattering effect, and hence an energy conversion efficiency of 6.3% can be archived directly utilizing HTS as photo-anodes. If fabricated into the bilayer structure by introducing HTS as the light scattering layer, the overall conversion efficiency can be further improved to 7.3%. The successful synthesis of these novel photo-anodes opens up a new way to improve the performance of DSSCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report herein a practical method for taming Langlois' reagent CF3SO2Na to generate CuSCF3 by a triphenylphospine-mediated deoxygenative reduction process. This chemistry highlights a novel utilization of the inherent CF3S skeleton of Langlois' reagent as a CF3S feedstock under mild conditions. The CuSCF3 intermediate generated by this protocol can react with a wide array of supporting ligands to furnish several air-stable [LCu(SCF3)] complexes as valuable trifluoromethylthiolating agents. In addition, the CuSCF3 intermediate can be directly employed for the trifluoromethylthiolation of (hetero)aryl iodides with operational simplicity and atomic efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]