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The association between nonstenotic plaque at the petrous internal carotid artery (ICA) and embolic stroke of undetermined source (ESUS) remains unknown. We aimed to test the hypothesis that the presence of a larger build-up of petrous plaque is more prevalent in the ipsilateral versus the contralateral side among ESUS patients without plaque in the intracranial and proximal ICA.From a total of 243 patients with ESUS and 160 patients with small-vessel disease (SVD) without proximal ICA plaque, we enrolled 88 ESUS and 103 SVD patients without ipsilateral nonstenotic intracranial and proximal ICA plaque in the present study. Targeting the petrous segment of the ICA on two sides, plaque burden including plaque thickness, lumen area, vessel area, wall area, and percentage of luminal stenosis, and composition features (presence/absence of the ruptured fibrous cap, ulcer plaque, thrombus, discontinuity of plaque surface [DPS], intraplaque hemorrhage and complicated plaque) were assessed by high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging.We found a higher prevalence of petrous plaque thickness ≥3.5 mm ipsilateral versus contralateral to the stroke (25/88 [28.4%] vs. 12/88 [13.6%], odds ratio [OR] 3.60, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.34-9.70), but this imbalance was not seen in SVD. In patients with plaque thickness ≥3.5 mm, the presence of DPS (OR 4.05, 95% CI 1.11-14.78) and complicated plaque (OR 5.00, 95% CI 1.10-22.82) was more closely related to an index ESUS, a finding that was not evident in the subgroup with petrous plaque3.5 mm (p for interaction = 0.027).The present study provided the first evidence supporting a potential etiological role of vulnerable petrous plaque in ESUS.

Large language models (LLMs) have shown excellent performance on various tasks, but the astronomical model size raises the hardware barrier for serving (memory size) and slows down token generation (memory bandwidth). In this paper, we propose Activation-aware Weight Quantization (AWQ), a hardware-friendly approach for LLM low-bit weight-only quantization. Our method is based on the observation that weights are not equally important: protecting only 1% of salient weights can greatly reduce quantization error. We then propose to search for the optimal per-channel scaling that protects the salient weights by observing the activation, not weights. AWQ does not rely on any backpropagation or reconstruction, so it can well preserve LLMs' generalization ability on different domains and modalities, without overfitting to the calibration set; it also does not rely on any data layout reordering, maintaining the hardware efficiency. AWQ outperforms existing work on various language modeling, common sense QA, and domain-specific benchmarks. Thanks to better generalization, it achieves excellent quantization performance for instruction-tuned LMs and, for the first time, multi-modal LMs. We also implement efficient tensor core kernels with reorder-free online dequantization to accelerate AWQ, achieving a 1.45x speedup over GPTQ and is 1.85x faster than the cuBLAS FP16 implementation. Our method provides a turn-key solution to compress LLMs to 3/4 bits for efficient deployment., Code available at: https://github.com/mit-han-lab/llm-awq

In order to improve the cost control effect of the supply chain of intelligent manufacturing enterprises, this paper improves the IQC algorithm. In order to overcome the problem of multitype data processing in the supply chain, this paper describes the high-frequency NCS as a delta arithmetic system with input time-varying delay, high-frequency constraints, and actuator saturation. Moreover, through a double closed-loop feedback configuration, this paper combines the loop structure of the supply chain to analyze the stability of the actuator saturated high-frequency NCS and combines the experiments to verify the reliability of the improved algorithm. In addition, on the basis of the improved algorithm, this paper constructs an intelligent supply chain cost control system, evaluates its functional modules, sets up the system architecture, and analyzes the performance of the system in combination with experimental research. The experimental research results show that the supply chain cost control method of intelligent manufacturing enterprises based on the improved IQC algorithm proposed in this paper has good results and meets the operational needs of intelligent manufacturing enterprises.

Transformer, as an alternative to CNN, has been proven effective in many modalities (e.g., texts and images). For 3D point cloud transformers, existing efforts focus primarily on pushing their accuracy to the state-of-the-art level. However, their latency lags behind sparse convolution-based models (3x slower), hindering their usage in resource-constrained, latency-sensitive applications (such as autonomous driving). This inefficiency comes from point clouds' sparse and irregular nature, whereas transformers are designed for dense, regular workloads. This paper presents FlatFormer to close this latency gap by trading spatial proximity for better computational regularity. We first flatten the point cloud with window-based sorting and partition points into groups of equal sizes rather than windows of equal shapes. This effectively avoids expensive structuring and padding overheads. We then apply self-attention within groups to extract local features, alternate sorting axis to gather features from different directions, and shift windows to exchange features across groups. FlatFormer delivers state-of-the-art accuracy on Waymo Open Dataset with 4.6x speedup over (transformer-based) SST and 1.4x speedup over (sparse convolutional) CenterPoint. This is the first point cloud transformer that achieves real-time performance on edge GPUs and is faster than sparse convolutional methods while achieving on-par or even superior accuracy on large-scale benchmarks., CVPR 2023. The first two authors contributed equally to this work. Project page: https://flatformer.mit.edu

Supplementary Material 2

Clinical guidelines underscore the importance of regularly monitoring and surveilling arteriovenous fistula (AVF) access in hemodialysis patients to promptly detect any dysfunction. Although phono-angiography/sound analysis overcomes the limitations of standardized AVF stenosis diagnosis tool, prior studies have depended on conventional feature extraction methods, restricting their applicability in diverse contexts. In contrast, representation learning captures fundamental underlying factors that can be readily transferred across different contexts. We propose an approach based on deep denoising autoencoders (DAEs) that perform dimensionality reduction and reconstruction tasks using the waveform obtained through one-level discrete wavelet transform, utilizing representation learning. Our results demonstrate that the latent representation generated by the DAE surpasses expectations with an accuracy of 0.93. The incorporation of noise-mixing and the utilization of a noise-to-clean scheme effectively enhance the discriminative capabilities of the latent representation. Moreover, when employed to identify patient-specific characteristics, the latent representation exhibited performance by surpassing an accuracy of 0.92. Appropriate light-weighted methods can restore the detection performance of the excessively reduced dimensionality version and enable operation on less computational devices. Our findings suggest that representation learning is a more feasible approach for extracting auscultation features in AVF, leading to improved generalization and applicability across multiple tasks. The manipulation of latent representations holds immense potential for future advancements. Further investigations in this area are promising and warrant continued exploration.

Terahertz (THz) tomographic imaging has recently attracted significant attention thanks to its non-invasive, non-destructive, non-ionizing, material-classification, and ultra-fast nature for object exploration and inspection. However, its strong water absorption nature and low noise tolerance lead to undesired blurs and distortions of reconstructed THz images. The diffraction-limited THz signals highly constrain the performances of existing restoration methods. To address the problem, we propose a novel multi-view Subspace-Attention-guided Restoration Network (SARNet) that fuses multi-view and multi-spectral features of THz images for effective image restoration and 3D tomographic reconstruction. To this end, SARNet uses multi-scale branches to extract intra-view spatio-spectral amplitude and phase features and fuse them via shared subspace projection and self-attention guidance. We then perform inter-view fusion to further improve the restoration of individual views by leveraging the redundancies between neighboring views. Here, we experimentally construct a THz time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) system covering a broad frequency range from 0.1 THz to 4 THz for building up a temporal/spectral/spatial/ material THz database of hidden 3D objects. Complementary to a quantitative evaluation, we demonstrate the effectiveness of our SARNet model on 3D THz tomographic reconstruction applications., Comment: 34 pages, 13 figures

Supplementary Material 1. Figure S1. 1 Study procedures

Supplementary Material 3

Supplementary Material 2. Table S1 An example of an item of the 28-item T-MAPA in English

Supplementary Material 1

Fibroblast growth factor 9 (FGF9) modulates cell proliferation, differentiation and motility for development and tissue repair in normal cells. Growing evidence shows that abnormal activation of FGF9 signaling is associated with tumor malignancy. We have previously reported that FGF9 increases MA-10 mouse Leydig tumor cell proliferation, in vitro, and tumor growth, in vivo. Also, FGF9 promotes the tumor growth and liver metastasis of mouse Lewis lung cancer cells, in vivo. However, the effects of FGF9 in the early stage of tumorigenesis remains elusive. In this study, TM3 mouse Leydig progenitor cells, that are not tumorigenic in immunocompromised mice, were used as a model cell line to investigate the role of FGF9 in tumorigenesis. The results demonstrated that FGF9 significantly induced cell proliferation and activated the MAPK, PI3K and PLCγ signaling pathways in TM3 cells. The percentage of the cell number in G1 phase was reduced and that in S and G2/M phases was increased after FGF9 stimulation in TM3 cells. Cyclin D1, cyclin A1, CDK2, CDK1, and p21 expressions and the phosphorylation level of Rb were all induced in FGF9-treated TM3 cells. In addition, FGF9 increased the expression of FGF receptor 1-4 in TM3 cells, suggesting the positive feedback loop between FGF9 and FGFRs. Furthermore, in the allograft mouse model, FGF9 promoted the tumorigenesis of TM3 cells characterized by higher expression of tumor markers, such as tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFα) and α-fetoprotein (AFP), in the subcutaneously inoculated TM3 cell tissue. Conclusively, FGF9 induced cell cycle to increase cell proliferation of TM3 cells through FAK, MAPK, PI3K/Akt and PLCγ signaling pathways, in vitro, and promoted the tumorigenesis of TM3 cell allograft tissue, in vivo, which is a potential marker for tumor as well as a target for cancer therapeutic strategies.

The cycle stability and voltage retention of a Na

Poly-ε-caprolactone (PCL) incorporated with plasmid DNA was electrospun, and the resultant nanofibers were used to observe DNA release from the nanofibers. The plasmid DNA enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) with cytomegalovirus (CMV) promoter (PCMVb-GFP) was amplified with E. coli. PCL was chosen because it is biodegradable aliphatic polyester, which plays a critical role in tissue engineering, such as scaffolding, drug, DNA, gene and protein delivery vehicles. Some of the physical and biological properties of the nanofibers were determined using different methods. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) micrographs showed that nanofibers have an average diameter of about 100 nm. Cytotoxicity tests showed that cell viability for 1 day, 4 days, and 7 days of the tests were above 80 %. These data demonstrated that PCL-plasmid DNA nanofibers have no cytotoxicity and showed benign biocompatibility for biomedical applications. PCMVb-GFP plasmid-linked electrospun nanofibers continuously released double-stranded DNA for at least seven days. For the first 15 min, there was a burst release of about 1.8 ng/ml. For the following hours and days, the release was about to be the same (release of 0.575 ng/ml). Therefore, PCL nanofibers may be an ideal candidate for various biomedical applications such as cancer treatment, scaffolding, tissue engineering, and protein delivery vehicles.

ObjectiveTo assess (1) the association between atrial cardiopathy (AC) and non-stenotic intracranial complicated atherosclerotic plaque (NICAP) in patients with embolic stroke of undetermined source (ESUS) or small-vessel disease (SVD), and (2) the performance of previously proposed biomarkers to identify AC as the underlying aetiology in ESUS.MethodsBased on our high-resolution MRI (HR-MRI) cohort, 403 subjects (243 ESUS and 160 SVD) were enrolled in the final analysis. All patients underwent intracranial HR-MRI to assess the presence of ipsilateral NICAP. Biomarkers of AC (ie, P-wave terminal force in lead V1 (PTFV1) on ECG, N-terminal probrain natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP), high-sensitivity cardiac troponin T and left atrial diameter) were collected within 24 hours after admission.ResultsAmong patients without ipsilateral NICAP, we found an association between the presence of AC (adjusted OR (aOR): 4.76, 95% CI 2.48 to 9.14), increased PTFV1 (aOR: 5.70, 95% CI: 2.43 to 13.39) and NT-proBNP (aOR: 1.65, 95% CI: 1.16 to 2.35) with ESUS. This association was not evident among patients with ipsilateral NICAP. The discrimination between ESUS versus SVD by AC/AC-related biomarkers was significantly improved after excluding ipsilateral NICAP. Similarly, the discrimination between ESUS and SVD by ipsilateral NICAP was notably augmented after excluding AC, PTFV1 and NT-proBNP.InterpretationAC is more prevalent in patients who had ESUS without ipsilateral NICAP compared with patients with, implying that AC and ipsilateral NICAP are two distinct, competing aetiologies of ESUS. Among the AC biomarkers studied in this analysis, PTFV1 seems to be the most informative.

Single-atom catalysts (SACs) with metal–nitrogen (M–N) moiety are effective in boosting the redox kinetics of lithium–sulfur (Li–S) batteries. However, the precise preparation of SACs with controll...

Background The potential causes or sources of embolic stroke of undetermined source (ESUS) vary. This study aimed to investigate the main cause of deep ESUS by evaluating nonstenotic intracranial atherosclerotic plaque. Methods and Results We retrospectively screened consecutive patients with unilateral anterior circulation ESUS. After excluding the patients with possible embolism from an extracranial artery such as aortic arch plaque, carotid plaque, and so on, the enrolled patients with ESUS were categorized into 2 groups: deep ESUS and cortical with/without deep ESUS. All patients underwent intracranial high‐resolution magnetic resonance imaging to assess the characteristics of nonstenotic intracranial atherosclerotic plaque. Biomarkers of atrial cardiopathy (ie, P‐wave terminal force in lead V1 on ECG, NT‐proBNP [N‐terminal pro–brain natriuretic peptide] and left atrial diameter) were collected. A total of 155 patients with ipsilateral nonstenotic intracranial atherosclerotic plaque were found, with 76 (49.0%) in deep ESUS and 79 (51.0%) in cortical with/without deep ESUS. We found more prevalent plaque in the M1 segment of the middle cerebral artery and the ostia of the perforator, with a smaller remodeling index plaque burden, and less frequent occurrence of complicated plaque in deep ESUS versus cortical with/without deep ESUS. Higher BNP (brain natriuretic peptide) levels and a higher prevalence of atrial cardiopathy in cortical with/without deep ESUS versus deep ESUS. Moreover, the discrimination of vulnerable plaque for predicting ESUS was significantly enhanced after adjusting for or further excluding patients with deep ESUS. Conclusions The current study provides the first high‐resolution magnetic resonance imaging evidence that cortical with/without deep ESUS and deep ESUS should be 2 distinct entities and that atherosclerosis, not embolism, might be the main cause of deep ESUS.

Camera calibration is an essential step for the optical measurement method used in the experimental mechanics. Most plumb line methods focus on solving lens distortions without considering camera intrinsic and extrinsic parameters. In this paper, we propose a full camera calibration method to estimate the camera parameters, including camera intrinsic parameters, extrinsic parameters and lens distortion parameters, from a single image with six or more non-coplanar lines. We parameterize the 3D lines with the intersection of two planes that allow the direct linear transformation of the lines(DLT-Lines). Based on the DLT-Lines, the projection matrix is estimated linearly, and then the camera intrinsic and extrinsic parameters are extracted from the matrix. The relationship between the distorted 2D lines and the distortion coefficients is derived, based on which the distortion coefficients can be solved linearly. In the last step, a non-linear optimization algorithm is used to jointly refine all the camera parameters, including the distortion coefficients. Both synthetic and real data are used to evaluate the performance of our method, which demonstrates that the proposed method can calibrate the cameras with radial and tangential distortions accurately. We propose a DLT-lines based camera calibration method for experimental mechanics. The proposed method can calibrate all the camera parameters from a single image.

Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa), an opportunistic pathogen, is often associated with difficulties in treating hospital-acquired infections. Biofilms formed by P. aeruginosa significantly improve its resistance to antimicrobial agents, thereby, posing a great challenge to the combat of P. aeruginosa infection. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) have recently emerged as promising antibiofilm agents and increasingly attracting the attention of scientists worldwide. However, current knowledge of their antibiofilm behavior is limited and their underlying mechanism remains unclear. In this study, a novel AMP, named PEW300, with three-point mutations (E9H, D17K, and T33A) from Cecropin A was used to investigate its antibiofilm property and antibiofilm pathway against P. aeruginosa. PEW300 displayed strong antibacterial and antibiofilm activity against P. aeruginosa with no significant hemolysis or cytotoxicity to mouse erythrocyte and human embryonic kidney 293 cells. Besides, the antibiofilm pathway results showed that PEW300 preferentially dispersed the mature biofilm, leading to the biofilm-encapsulated bacteria exposure and death. Meanwhile, we also found that the extracellular DNA was a critical target of PEW300 against the mature biofilm of P. aeruginosa. In addition, multiple actions of PEW300 including destroying the cell membrane integrity, inducing high levels of intracellular reactive oxygen species, and interacting with genomic DNA were adopted to exert its antibacterial activity. Moreover, PEW300 could dramatically reduce the virulence of P. aeruginosa. Taken together, PEW300 might be served as a promising antibiofilm candidate to combat P. aeruginosa biofilms.

We propose a new architecture, double-pass multiple-plate continuum (DPMPC), for nonlinear pulse compression. In addition to having a smaller footprint, a double-pass configuration is designed to achieve substantial bandwidth broadening without incurring noticeable higher-order dispersion, thus improving the temporal contrast over those of the traditional single-pass geometry when only the quadratic spectral phase can be compensated. In our proof-of-concept experiment, 187 μJ, 190-fs Yb-based laser pulse is compressed to 20 fs with high throughput (75%), high Strehl ratio (0.76), and excellent beam homogeneity by using DPMPC. The subsequently generated octave-spanning spectrum exhibits a significantly raised blue tail compared with that driven by pulses from a single-pass counterpart.

ObjectiveTo determine the characteristics of intracranial plaque proximal to large vessel occlusion (LVO) in stroke patients without major-risk cardioembolic source using 3.0 T high-resolution MRI (HR-MRI).MethodsWe retrospectively enrolled eligible patients from January 2015 to July 2021. The multidimensional parameters of plaque such as remodelling index (RI), plaque burden (PB), percentage lipid-rich necrotic core (%LRNC), presence of discontinuity of plaque surface (DPS), fibrous cap rupture, intraplaque haemorrhage and complicated plaque were evaluated by HR-MRI.ResultsAmong 279 stroke patients, intracranial plaque proximal to LVO was more prevalent in the ipsilateral versus contralateral side to stroke (75.6% vs 58.8%, pConclusionThis is the first study to report the characteristics of intracranial plaque proximal to LVO in non-cardioembolic stroke. It provides potential evidence to support different aetiological roles of

Evolution of LiMn2O4 mechanical property during charge/discharge cycles is a critical issue because it is closely related to the performance of lithium-ion batteries. Extensive studies have been conducted by first-principles calculations/molecular dynamics simulation at the atomic level and by the nanoindentation technique at the micron scale. In this study, cycling-induced topographic and mechanical evolutions of the LiMn2O4 films are investigated at the nanoscale using the bimodal atomic force microscopy (AFM), which provides a complementary approach to bridge the gap between atomic-level calculation and micron-scale measurement. The topographic change and elastic modulus degradation of the LiMn2O4 films during the charge/discharge cycles are found to occur simultaneously and irreversibly. Moreover, a dramatic decrease in the elastic modulus of the films takes place at the first 10 cycles, which is consistent with the significant loss of the capacity and the change of the Coulombic efficiency measured by the galvanostatic method. By considering the nanoscale phenomena and the macroscopic measurement results, the reasons for the elastic modulus degradation are discussed. This study would be a valuable addition to a better understanding of the degradation mechanisms of this cathode material.

Zinc sulfide (ZnS) exhibits promise in sodium-ion batteries (SIBs) because of its low operation voltage and high theoretical specific capacity. However, pristine ZnS is not adequate in realizing rapid and robust sodium storage owing to its low reversibility, poor structure stability, and sluggish kinetics. To date, most efforts focus on utilizing carbonaceous incorporation to improve its electrochemical performances. Nevertheless, it remains an arduous challenge for realizing superior rate capability while obtaining stable cycling. Herein, inspired by the crystal structure of hexagonal ZnIn2S4, which possesses an intrinsic layered feature with larger unit-cell volume versus that of ZnS, indium incorporation is thus deployed as an immediate remedy. In/ex situ investigations combined with density functional theory calculations are conducted to reveal the superior kinetics, high reversibility, and good structure stability of ZnIn2S4. Notably, the formed indium-based derivatives during cycling manifest a Na+ (de)intercalation process, thereby exciting a synergetic mechanism to stabilize electrochemical cycling. As a result, the electrochemical performances of Zn-based sulfide are significantly improved via the indium incorporation. Furthermore, a full cell based on the ZnIn2S4 anode with the superior electrochemical performance is developed. This work provides an effective tactic of heteroatom incorporation for optimizing structure as well as exciting a complementary reaction process toward developing superior anodes for high-performance alkali-ion batteries.

Optical dynamic measurements are widely used for non-contact vibration, continuous deformation, or moving objects. Various measurement techniques were developed for different deformation amplitudes. This paper reviews three types of technique for different measurement ranges: interferometric techniques for deformation or vibration (nanometer to sub-millimeter amplitude) whose measurement accuracies rely on phase extraction of interferometric signal; imaging based techniques for deformation or vibration (micrometer to centimeter amplitude) with the aid of moire, structured light, and man-made speckles, whose sensitivities is from 1/100 to 1/10 pixel; and videometrics for large deformation or movement detection (greater than centimeter amplitude). Many research groups have improved measurement capabilities for these three techniques to meet particular industrial application requirements.

The aim was to investigate the characteristics of non-stenotic intracranial plaque (NSIP) in embolic stroke of undetermined source (ESUS) subtypes by high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging.Consecutive patients with ESUS who were mandatory for high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging were retrospectively enrolled. Based on the location and arterial supply of the infarct, the ESUS were categorized into three types: cortical ESUS, subcortical ESUS and mixed ESUS. The NSIP parameters including plaque location, morphology (plaque distribution, remodeling index and plaque burden) and composition (thick fibrous cap, discontinuity of plaque surface, intraplaque hemorrhage and complicated plaque) were evaluated amongst the subtypes.Of 243 patients, there were 87 (35.8%) cortical ESUS, 127 (52.3%) subcortical ESUS and 29 (11.9%) mixed ESUS. Significant differences were found in plaque location (p lt; 0.001), plaque quadrant (p lt; 0.001), remodeling index (p lt; 0.001), plaque burden (p lt; 0.001), discontinuity of plaque surface (p lt; 0.001), intraplaque hemorrhage (p = 0.001) and complicated plaque (p lt; 0.001) of ipsilateral NISP amongst the different ESUS subtypes, except for fibrous cap (p = 0.135). However, no differences were found amongst contralateral NISP. In addition, the clinical characteristics of the differences between ESUS subtypes were striking, including age (p = 0.004), initial National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (p lt; 0.001), coronary artery disease (p = 0.039), serum urea (p = 0.011) and creatinine (p = 0.002).This is the first report of significantly heterogeneous characteristics of ipsilateral NSIP and clinical findings amongst ESUS subtypes, which may suggest their different underlying mechanisms.

Visualizing information inside objects is an ever-lasting need to bridge the world from physics, chemistry, biology to computation. Among all tomographic techniques, terahertz (THz) computational imaging has demonstrated its unique sensing features to digitalize multi-dimensional object information in a non-destructive, non-ionizing, and non-invasive way. Applying modern signal processing and physics-guided modalities, THz computational imaging systems are now launched in various application fields in industrial inspection, security screening, chemical inspection and non-destructive evaluation. In this article, we overview recent advances in THz computational imaging modalities in the aspects of system configuration, wave propagation and interaction models, physics-guided algorithm for digitalizing interior information of imaged objects. Several image restoration and reconstruction issues based on multi-dimensional THz signals are further discussed, which provides a crosslink between material digitalization, functional property extraction, and multi-dimensional imager utilization from a signal processing perspective.

Funder: EC | Horizon 2020 Framework Programme (EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation H2020); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/100010661, Funder: RCUK | Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100000266, Funder: We acknowledge financial support from the EPSRC and the Winton Program for the Physics of Sustainability. This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Unions Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement no. 758826)., Optical pump-probe spectroscopy is a powerful tool for the study of non-equilibrium electronic dynamics and finds wide applications across a range of fields, from physics and chemistry to material science and biology. However, a shortcoming of conventional pump-probe spectroscopy is that photoinduced changes in transmission, reflection and scattering can simultaneously contribute to the measured differential spectra, leading to ambiguities in assigning the origin of spectral signatures and ruling out quantitative interpretation of the spectra. Ideally, these methods would measure the underlying dielectric function (or the complex refractive index) which would then directly provide quantitative information on the transient excited state dynamics free of these ambiguities. Here we present and test a model independent route to transform differential transmission or reflection spectra, measured via conventional optical pump-probe spectroscopy, to changes in the quantitative transient dielectric function. We benchmark this method against changes in the real refractive index measured using time-resolved Frequency Domain Interferometry in prototypical inorganic and organic semiconductor films. Our methodology can be applied to existing and future pump-probe data sets, allowing for an unambiguous and quantitative characterisation of the transient photoexcited spectra of materials. This in turn will accelerate the adoption of pump-probe spectroscopy as a facile and robust materials characterisation and screening tool.

Seawater desalination is the most promising solution to a sustainable water future. However, state-of-the-art desalination technologies suffer from energy intensiveness and high capital expenditure. To address these issues, we have developed a novel, membrane-less desalination battery comprising negatively charged redox-active electrodes. A two-dimensional (2D) Ni and Co bimetallic metal–organic framework anchored on a black phosphorus nanosheet (NiCo MOF@BP) composite with fast sodium ion transport kinetics and favourable redox potentials for sodiation/desodiation when coupled with reduced graphene oxide supported silver nanoparticles (Ag@rGO) is applied. The incorporation of black phosphorus stabilizes the NiCo MOF and improves the overall electrical conductivity. Ultrastable cycling (46.5 mA h g−1 after over 1000 cycles in 2 M NaCl solution and 33.4 mA h g−1 after over 500 cycles in synthetic seawater at 0.3 A g−1) and rate performance (25.7 mA h g−1 at 2.5 A g−1) are realised. Besides, a high coulombic efficiency of 96.9% and superb energy recovery of 70.7% are achieved. As such, a low energy consumption of 0.034 W h g−1 with a salt removal capacity of 103.1 mg g−1 is obtained using synthetic seawater as the electrolyte, which is among the lowest in energy consumption when compared with other similar desalination technologies. The exploration of this novel cathode material paves the way for future material selection for desalination batteries.

The Perspective of N Points (PNP) problem in optical measurement and machine vision is to estimate the pose parameters of an object by a monocular image. For traditional coplanar P4P methods, the four points must have known coordinates or be a rectangle’s four vertices. In this paper, a new method of the P4P problem for parallelogram objects without shape parameters is proposed to solve the objects’ pose and shape parameters based on the parallelogram vertices’ relative coordinate constraints. The correctness and effectiveness of the method have been verified through experiments. In addition to being used to estimate a parallelogram object’s pose and shape, the new method extends the conclusions of the coplanar P4P problem when the four points are a parallelogram’s four vertices.

The low charge storage in intercalation-type reaction and the large volume change induced by conversion/alloying reactions greatly limit the practical selection of anodes in sodium-ion batteries (S...

As a new biomedical bone tissue implant candidate, porous Ti–5Mo–5Cu alloy was developed by powder sintering from TiH2, Mo and Cu powders. Space holder material NH4HCO3 granules were added to regulate the pore characteristics like pore morphology and porosity and then mechanical properties including compressive strength and elastic modulus of the porous titanium alloy. The tailored elastic modulus (1.8–6.4 GPa) and compressive strength (93–152 MPa) of porous Ti–5Mo–5Cu alloys with porosity (49.6–61.8%) and average pore size (103–128 μm) fulfil the preliminary mechanical property and pore characteristics requirements of porous prosthesis. It is expected to be used for hard tissue prosthesis.

Optogenetics became successful in neuroscience with Channelrhodopsin-2 (ChR2), a light-gated cation channel from the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, as an easy applicable tool. The success of ChR2 inspired the development of various photosensory proteins as powerful actuators for optogenetic manipulation of biological activity. However, the current optogenetic toolbox is still not perfect and further improvements are desirable. In my thesis, I engineered and characterized several different optogenetic tools with new features. (i) Although ChR2 is the most often used optogenetic actuator, its single-channel conductance and its Ca2+ permeability are relatively low. ChR2 variants with increased Ca2+ conductance were described recently but a further increase seemed possible. In addition, the H+ conductance of ChR2 may lead to cellular acidification and unintended pH-related side effects upon prolonged illumination. Through rational design, I developed several improved ChR2 variants with larger photocurrent, higher cation selectivity, and lower H+ conductance. (ii) The light-activated inward chloride pump NpHR is a widely used optogenetic tool for neural silencing. However, pronounced inactivation upon long time illumination constrains its application for long-lasting neural inhibition. I found that the deprotonation of the Schiff base underlies the inactivation of NpHR. Through systematically exploring optimized illumination schemes, I found illumination with blue light alone could profoundly increase the temporal stability of the NpHR-mediated photocurrent. A combination of green and violet light eliminates the inactivation effect, similar to blue light, but leading to a higher photocurrent and therefore better light-induced inhibition. (iii) Photoactivated adenylyl cyclases (PACs) were shown to be useful for light-manipulation of cellular cAMP levels. I developed a convenient in-vitro assay for soluble PACs that allows their reliable characterization. Comparison of different PACs revealed that bPAC from Beggiatoa is the best optogenetic tool for cAMP manipulation, due to its high efficiency and small size. However, a residual activity of bPAC in the dark is unwanted and the cytosolic localization prevents subcellular precise cAMP manipulation. I therefore introduced point mutations into bPAC to reduce its dark activity. Interestingly, I found that membrane targeting of bPAC with different linkers can remarkably alter its activity, in addition to its localization. Taken together, a set of PACs with different activity and subcellular localization were engineered for selection based on the intended usage. The membrane-bound PM-bPAC 2.0 with reduced dark activity is well-tolerated by hippocampal neurons and reliably evokes a transient photocurrent, when co-expression with a CNG channel. (iv) Bidirectional manipulation of cell activity with light of different wavelengths is of great importance in dissecting neural networks in the brain. Selection of optimal tool pairs is the first and most important step for dual-color optogenetics. Through N- and C-terminal modifications, an improved ChR variant (i.e. vf-Chrimson 2.0) was engineered and selected as the red light-controlled actuator for excitation. Detailed comparison of three two-component potassium channels, composed of bPAC and the cAMP-activated potassium channel SthK, revealed the superior properties of SthK-bP. Combining vf-Chrimson 2.0 and improved SthK-bP “SthK(TV418)-bP” could reliably induce depolarization by red light and hyperpolarization by blue light. A residual tiny crosstalk between vf-Chrimson 2.0 and SthK(TV418)-bP, when applying blue light, can be minimized to a negligible level by applying light pulses or simply lowering the blue light intensity., Die Optogenetik wurde in den Neurowissenschaften mit Channelrhodopsin-2 (ChR2), einem lichtgesteuerten Kationenkanal aus der Grünalge Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, als leicht anwendbares Werkzeug erfolgreich. Der Erfolg von ChR2 inspirierte die Entwicklung verschiedener photosensorischer Proteine als leistungsstarke Aktuatoren für die optogenetische Manipulation der biologischen Aktivität. Die derzeitige optogenetische Toolbox ist jedoch immer noch nicht perfekt und weitere Verbesserungen sind wünschenswert. In meiner Arbeit habe ich verschiedene optogenetische Werkzeuge mit neuen Funktionen entwickelt und charakterisiert. (i) Obwohl ChR2 der am häufigsten verwendete optogenetische Aktuator ist, sind seine Einzelkanal-Leitfähigkeit und seine Ca2 + -Permeabilität relativ gering. Kürzlich wurden ChR2-Varianten mit erhöhter Ca2 + -Leitfähigkeit beschrieben, eine weitere Verbesserung schien jedoch möglich. Darüber hinaus kann die H+-Leitfähigkeit von ChR2 bei längerer Beleuchtung zu einer Ansäuerung der Zellen und zu unbeabsichtigten Nebenwirkungen im Zusammenhang mit dem pH-Wert führen. Durch rationales Design entwickelte ich mehrere verbesserte ChR2-Varianten mit größerem Photostrom, höherer Kationenselektivität und geringerer H+-Leitfähigkeit. (ii) Die lichtaktivierte Chloridpumpe NpHR ist ein weit verbreitetes optogenetisches Werkzeug für die neuronale Inhibierung. Eine ausgeprägte Inaktivierung bei längerer Beleuchtung schränkt jedoch die Anwendung für eine lang anhaltende neuronale Hemmung ein. Ich konnte zeigen, dass die Deprotonierung der Schiffschen Base der Inaktivierung von NpHR zugrunde liegt. Durch die systematische Untersuchung optimierter Beleuchtungsschemata fand ich heraus, dass die Beleuchtung mit blauem Licht allein die zeitliche Stabilität des NpHR-vermittelten Photostroms erheblich verbessern kann. Eine Kombination aus grünem und violettem Licht eliminiert den Inaktivierungseffekt, ähnlich wie blaues Licht, führt jedoch zu einem höheren Photostrom und deswegen effektiverer Licht-induzierter Inhibierung. (iii) Photoaktivierte Adenylylcyclasen (PACs) erwiesen sich als nützlich für die Lichtmanipulation der zellulären cAMP-Spiegel. Ich habe einen praktischen in-vitro-Test für lösliche PACs entwickelt, der deren zuverlässige Charakterisierung ermöglicht. Ein Vergleich verschiedener PACs ergab, dass bPAC von Beggiatoa aufgrund seiner hohen Effizienz und geringen Größe das beste optogenetische Werkzeug für die cAMP-Manipulation ist. Eine Restaktivität von bPAC im Dunkeln ist jedoch unerwünscht und die cytosolische Lokalisierung verhindert eine subzellulär präzise cAMP-Manipulation. Ich habe daher Punktmutationen in bPAC eingeführt, um dessen Dunkelaktivität zu reduzieren. Interessanterweise fanden Ich heraus, dass das Membrantargeting von bPAC mit verschiedenen „Linkern“ zusätzlich zu seiner Lokalisierung seine Aktivität erheblich verändern kann. Zusammengenommen wurde eine Reihe von PACs mit unterschiedlicher Aktivität und subzellulärer Lokalisation für unterschiedliche Anwendungen konstruiert. Das membrangebundene PM-bPAC 2.0 mit reduzierter Dunkelaktivität wird von Hippocampus-Neuronen gut vertragen und erlaubt, bei gleichzeitiger Expression mit einem CNG-Kanal, zuverlässig einen Licht-induzierten Strom auszulösen. (iv) Die bidirektionale Manipulation der Zellaktivität mit Licht unterschiedlicher Wellenlänge ist für die Dissektion neuronaler Netze im Gehirn von großer Bedeutung. Die Auswahl der optimalen Werkzeugpaare ist der erste und wichtigste Schritt für die zweifarbige Optogenetik. Durch N- und C-terminale Modifikationen wurde eine verbesserte ChR-Variante (d. h. Vf-Chrimson 2.0) entwickelt und als Rotlicht-gesteuerter Aktuator zur Anregung ausgewählt. Ein detaillierter Vergleich von drei Zweikomponenten-Kaliumkanälen, bestehend aus bPAC und dem cAMP-aktivierten Kaliumkanal SthK, ergab die überlegenen Eigenschaften von SthK-bP. Die Kombination von vf-Chrimson 2.0 und verbessertem SthK-bP „SthK(TV418)-bP“ konnte zuverlässig eine Depolarisation durch rotes Licht und eine Hyperpolarisation durch blaues Licht induzieren. Ein restliches, kleines Übersprechen zwischen vf-Chrimson 2.0 und SthK(TV418)-bP kann beim Anlegen von blauem Licht durch Anlegen von Lichtimpulsen oder durch einfaches Verringern der Intensität von blauem Licht auf ein vernachlässigbares Maß minimiert werden.

Terahertz Spatio-Temporal Deep Learning Computed Tomography: supplemental document

In recent years, with the continuous integration and development of manufacturing and intelligent technologies, the enhancement of the intelligence and informatization of production becomes an important issue in intelligent manufacturing. Industrial logistics systems are responsible for the transport of tools and raw materials for production and processing. Therefore, industrial logistics plays an essential role in improving the production efficiency of products. The value of the supply chain comes from the synergy of the various processes between various companies. The development of industrial logistics has effectively solved the issue of the inability of logistics to synchronize product and service flows in the supply chain and is an important part of the overall supply chain for the relevant enterprises. Now, the logistics industry is an important support industry for China’s economic development, and how to achieve rapid and stable development of the logistics industry is a key issue facing China that needs to be resolved. In addition, with the globalization of the economic environment today, enterprises are facing increasingly fierce competition. In this context, most companies are taking logistics informatization as an important factor for their success. Meanwhile, with the rapid development of the information industry, new information technologies are emerging. The application of new information technologies can improve the competitiveness of enterprises to a certain extent. After all, an important feature of modern industry is the organic integration of industry and services to promote the modernization of industry. The logistics industry, as a leading service industry, has already penetrated all aspects of the industry. However, the industry has not yet developed a comprehensive approach to the integration of industrial logistics information. The selection of a model based on unilateral consideration of transport costs and other indicators is no longer appropriate to the current situation. Therefore, it is of practical significance to study the integration of logistics information in the supply chain environment. Based on supply chain management, this research explores and designs a relevant approach to the integration of industrial logistics information, thus providing some suggestions for the direction of industrial logistics.

Summary Mn–Fe Prussian blue analogs (PBAs) cathode materials suffer from poor cycling reversibility and capacity retention during phase transition from cubic to tetragonal phase, which is related to the large structural deformation of Mn−N6 octahedra caused by Jahn-Teller distortion. Herein, we explore a controllable strategy for creating unconventional cation Mn vacancies (VMn) on the surface of Mn–Fe PBAs by utilizing a strong chelating agent—ethylenediaminet etraacetic acid disodium. The VMn in Mn–Fe PBAs can restrain the movement of Mn−N bonds and thereby mitigate the Jahn-Teller distortion of Mn−N6 octahedra, leading to highly reversible phase transitions of Mn–Fe PBAs as well as an outstanding long-term cycling stability and capacity retention for both the half-cell (72.3% after 2,700 cycles at 0.5 A g−1) and full cell (75.5% after 550 cycles at 0.1 A g−1). This work opens up a universal avenue to explore the relationship between vacancies and electrochemical performances, even in other materials beyond PBAs.

Exploring dynamic dimension change and lithium-ion diffusion kinetics of active nanoparticles is important to further improve the qualities of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs), such as the cycle life a...

This work contributes to the generalized finite element approach in free vibration, dynamic elastic, and elastoplastic analysis of plane frame subjected to random excitation generated by the wind action. The wind velocity is modeled mathematically by using power spectral density method in combination with Shinozuka’s model, along with the commonly employed wind spectra. From these spectra, the dynamic wind loading is determined from the sum of the mean and floating wind velocities. The governing equation is formulated by Euler–Bernoulli beam theory, and it is discretized by using the enriched beam element. The enrichment is done by employing enriched finite element shape function to construct the enriched mathematical space. This strategy is constituted by the enrichment space, which is constructed by trigonometric functions, and the conventional space, which is constructed by conventional two-node Lagrange–Hermite shape function. The time increment procedure is carried out by Hilber-Hughes-Taylor algorithm and the material nonlinearity is modeled by von Mises isotropic hardening model, solved by the Newton–Raphson algorithm. A flowchart is presented to summarize the proposed numerical modeling procedure. Finally, several applications are presented, and the results obtained by the generalized finite element method are compared with those obtained by conventional beam element. Natural frequencies are determined in a one-story plane frame and are compared with reference results. The relative error in displacement is determined in h-refine strategy for quadratic beam element (FEM3), while the generalized finite element method adopts the enrichment increment strategy. The results demonstrate the competitiveness and numerical stability of generalized finite element method in this type of application. Even in comparison to the quadratic beam element, the generalized finite element method presents good performance and accuracy in numerical modeling.

Introduction Recent studies have shown an increase in post-operative orthopaedic complications associated with pre-operative opioid use. It is, therefore, important to know if patients use opioids before scheduled surgery. The purpose of this study was to determine if urine drug screening (UDS) is an effective screening tool for detecting opioid and illicit drug use prior to joint arthroplasty (JA) procedures. Methods This retrospective chart review was performed with IRB approval on 166 out of 172 consecutive patients in a community-based practice. All the patients had a pre-operative UDS prior to primary or revision JA by a fellowship trained orthopaedic surgeon between March 2016 and April 2017. Patient demographics documented opioid and illicit drug use, co-morbid diagnosis, and UDS results were collected from clinical charts. Statistical analysis was conducted using Pearson Chi-square, Fisher’s exact, McNemar test, and t-tests with IBM SPSS Statistics, ver. 23. Significant differences were p < 0.05. Results Sixty-four of 166 patients (38.6%) tested positive for opioids. Among them, 55.0% (35/64) had no history of prescription opioid use. Significant differences were observed when comparing the test results of the UDS with the patient reported history of prescribed opioids (p = 0.001). Conclusion With a significant number of patients testing positive for opioids without evidence of a previous prescription, UDS may be beneficial for initial risk assessment for patients undergoing JA procedures.

This work presents an investigation in the numerical performance of finite element approach in the dynamic elastoplastic analysis of buried pipeline, which is subjected to random ground motion. The surrounding soil is modeled by Winkler and Pasternak type foundation, while the random ground motion is generated synthetically by generalized nonstationary Kanai–Tajimi model. The governing equation is formulated by Euler–Bernoulli beam theory and discretized by beam-pipe element. Moreover, the von Mises isotropic hardening model is employed for material behavior modeling. The Hilber–Hughes–Taylor (HHT) method and the Newton–Raphson method are adopted as the time incremental iterative algorithm to solve the global equilibrium equation. Several applications are carried out to investigate the numerical performance of the present numerical model in dealing with the dynamic elastoplastic analysis of buried pipe. The norm L 2 of stress and displacement error are determined for different time intervals and the factors that contribute to the error reduction are investigated in present work.

Porous TiNb-based alloys have attracted considerable attention in the medical field of orthopedic applications because of excellent biocompatibility, porous architecture, appropriate mechanical pro...

Summary The practical application of transition metal sulfides as anodes for sodium-ion batteries has long been hindered by the design and fabrication of stable electrodes. Here, inspired by architecture, we design a stable electrode based on Cu1.81S micro-truss structures (MTs) for the first time. The key to this “selective reduction” strategy is to engrave Cu1.75S precursors with a truss structure by using an anti-reduction agent (Fe3+ ions), and a subsequent recrystallization process reinforces the truss structure. The Cu1.81S MTs with high structural stability exhibits a pronounced stability enhancement for 1,000 cycles with 77.7% capacity retention and delivers excellent rate performance of 331 mAh g−1 at 3 A g−1. As a new method for designing robust electrode structures, this synthetic strategy is not limited to the synthesis of truss structures. It provides new insights into a new generation of electrode structures and could be applied to the structural design of other batteries.

Introduction Medial dislocation of the long head of the biceps tendon (LHBT) is classically known as a pathognomonic finding for a subscapularis or at least a rotator cuff (RC) injury. However, this case report outlines a young active individual with symptomatic medial dislocation of the long head of the biceps with associated posterior instability, without a corresponding RC injury. Case Report An 18-year-old male complained of the left shoulder pain and crepitus after a shoulder injury while playing hockey a year prior. Magnetic resonance imaging demonstrated medial dislocation of the LHBT without subscapularis or supraspinatus tendon injury. The patient complained of instability in the shoulder and exam findings supported posterior instability of the glenohumeral joint. Arthroscopic debridement of the glenohumeral joint with arthroscopic posterior capsulorrhaphy and open biceps tenodesis was performed. The patient regained full and painless range of motion at 2-year follow-up. Conclusion Medial dislocation of the LHBT can occur without injury to the subscapularis tendon. Furthermore, a capsulorrhaphy with open biceps tenodesis and closure of the rotator interval may provide a successful outcome for this rare injury pattern.