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The frequency of extreme weather events has increased worldwide, leading to more intense natural disasters, which pose significant threats to human life and property safety. The main form of disaster occurrence is multi-hazard coupling and multi-hazard chaining. This paper constructs a road natural disaster risk assessment model using a fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method and neural network to quantitatively analyze road disasters with multiple hazards, and provides valuable insights for the predication of road natural disaster risk. Here, ten factors, including temperature, relative humidity, precipitation, elevation, slope, slope orientation, vegetation cover, geologic lithology, historical impact factors, and road density, were selected as input variables, and risk grade was selected as the output value (the evaluation results). The remaining hidden layers use the fully connected neural network. This model was first trained using historical data (from 2011 to 2021) obtained from road networks and natural disasters in Guangxi, China. Then, taking Lingchuan County as an example, the model was used to predict the risk of natural disasters on its roads, and, finally, the prediction accuracy of the model was determined by comparing the results with actual disaster situations. This study can provide theoretical support and technical operations for the development of subsequent early warning systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although nondestructive ultrasonic technologies have been applied in laboratory and field tests in the field of heritage conservation, few studies have quantified the relationship among the real microstructures, micromechanical properties, and macroscopic acoustic responses of earthen-site soils. This paper develops a micromechanics-based multiscale model for quantitatively exploring the ultrasonic propagation characteristics of elastic waves in untreated and consolidated earthen-site soils. Scanning electron microscope images and image processing technology are integrated into the finite-element simulation. The effects of microstructure and wave features on the acoustic characteristics of soils are quantitatively investigated under pulsive loading. The simulation results of untreated and consolidated soils are efficiently compared to ultrasonic test data. It is demonstrated that the integration of microstructure image processing and multiscale modeling can predict the ultrasonic pulse velocity well, which improves the accuracy of laboratory testing and field monitoring and better serves the evaluation and implementation of engineering practice in the field of heritage conservation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Loess Plateau has been a focus of public discussion and environmental concerns over the past three decades. In this study, in order to investigate the effect of OCP pollution in water of the Beiluo River, concentrations of 25 OCPs at 17 locations in the water were examined. The results showed that the concentration of ∑OCPs in the water ranged from 1.76 to 32.57 ng L−1, with an average concentration of 7.23 ng L−1. Compared with other basins in China and abroad, the OCP content in the Beiluo River was at a medium level. Hexachlorocyclohexane (HCH) pollution in the Beiluo River was mainly from the mixed input of lindane and technical HCHs. Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) pollution was mainly from the mixed input of technical DDTs and dicofol. Most of the OCP pollution came from historical residues. The risk assessment results showed that hexachlorobenzene (HCB) and endosulfan had high ecological risks in the middle and lower reaches of the Beiluo River. Most residual OCPs were not sufficient to pose carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic health risks to humans. The results of this study can provide a reference for OCP prevention and control and watershed environmental management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Owing to the advantages of cost-effectiveness, compactness, and the avoidance of complicated camera synchronization, single-camera three-dimensional (3D) digital image correlation (DIC) techniques have gained increasing attention for deformation measurement of materials and structures. In the traditional single-camera 3D-DIC system, the left and right view images can be recorded by a single camera using diffraction grating, a bi-prism, or a set of planar mirrors. To further improve the measurement accuracy of single-camera 3D-DIC, this paper introduces a single-camera four-view imaging technique by installing a pyramidal prism in front of the camera. The 3D reconstruction of the measured points before and after deformation is realized with eight governing equations induced by four views, and the strong geometric constraints of four views can help to improve the measurement accuracy. A static experiment, a rigid body translation experiment, and a four-point bending experiment show that the proposed single-camera 3D-DIC method can achieve higher measurement accuracy than the dual-view single-camera 3D-DIC techniques and that the single-camera 3D-DIC method has advantages in reducing both random error and systematic error. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A remarkable risk in the field of rock engineering is the natural exposure of low-grade metamorphic rock to the freeze-thaw process. Examples of such materials are slate and phyllite, which are employed approximately mountainous permafrost zones. In order to study the weathering processes and mechanisms in low-grade metamorphic rock following freeze-thaw weathering processes, the freeze-thaw cycles were applied. Accordingly to this process, low-grade metamorphic rock partially or completely deteriorates, and mechanical properties, microstructure, and mineral content changes are commonly associated with freeze-thaw processes. This study shows that, following numerous freeze-thaw cycles processes, the quality, wave velocity, and compressive strength of rock reduce; calcite, mica, feldspar, and pyrite contents decrease; and clay minerals and gypsum content increase. Furthermore, the study also demonstrated that the changes in quality, wave velocity, and compressive strength caused by weathering of the rock followed the sequence slate > phyllite. However, the mineral contents of slate and phyllite alter in the same way. Because of this increase in volume and subsequent F-T cycles, new cracks form on the surfaces of pores due to outward pressure, and a lot of water is absorbed by clay minerals. The amount of water increases once again due to freezing as the temperature falls below zero degrees Celsius. This course duplicates with cyclic temperature changes and causes deterioration of low-grade metamorphic rock materials. By analysis of an examination of the damage variables based on wave velocity, it is possible to conclude that mineral changes during the freeze-thaw effect may make for the formation of voids and the deterioration of metamorphic rock. This research contributes to a better understanding of weathering processes and mechanisms of low-grade metamorphic rock following freeze-thaw weathering processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH) is one of the common clinical neurological emergencies. Its incidence accounts for about 5–9% of cerebral stroke patients. Even surviving patients often suffer from severe adverse prognoses such as hemiplegia, aphasia, cognitive dysfunction and even death. Inflammatory response plays an important role during early nerve injury in SAH. Toll-like receptors (TLRs), pattern recognition receptors, are important components of the body's innate immune system, and they are usually activated by damage-associated molecular pattern molecules. Studies have shown that with TLR 4 as an essential member of the TLRs family, the inflammatory transduction pathway mediated by it plays a vital role in brain injury after SAH. After SAH occurrence, large amounts of blood enter the subarachnoid space. This can produce massive damage-associated molecular pattern molecules that bind to TLR4, which activates inflammatory response and causes early brain injury, thus resulting in serious adverse prognoses. In this paper, the process in research on TLR4-mediated inflammatory response mechanism in brain injury after SAH was reviewed to provide a new thought for clinical treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since 2006, with the implementation of a series of national research projects in the field of earthen site conservation, the Chinese theoretical foundation and technological conservation system for the protection of earthen sites in arid environments has gradually formed. However, there are some global problems such as an unclear relationship between characteristics of diseases on sites and their existing environment, unclear deterioration mechanisms under multi-field coupling, immature stability control technology under dynamic loading, the poor suitability of protection process quality assessment equipment, and a lack of systematic research on comprehensive protection synergy mechanisms. On the basis of summarizing the research achievements in the field of earthen site conservation in China for more than 30 years, and a large number of practical experiences in earthen site reinforcement engineering, this paper expounds the multi-field coupling characteristics of earthen site construction technology, the climatic environment, and dynamic loading and protection measure activities, clarifies the main characteristics of the protection of earthen sites in China at present, puts forward the key scientific and technical problems existing in the conservation of earthen sites, constructs a picture of the research on the conservation of earthen sites under the action of multi-field coupling, and discusses the protection projects of earthen sites under different environments. We hope the technological system can provide support for the transformation of earthen site conservation from the rescuing conservation stage to the stage of both rescuing and preventive conservation, and move the foundation of earthen site conservation towards the stage of preventive protection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the macroscopic mechanical properties of earthen-site soils have undergone extensive experimental and modeling studies, few research efforts focus on the relationship between the overall mechanical behavior and micro-pore structure. We developed a microstructure-based finite element model to investigate the influence of micro-pore structure on the macroscopic mechanical behavior of earthen-site soils. Scanning electron microscopy images of the untreated and consolidated soils were processed to compare the changes in equivalent diameter, sphericity, and porosity of the soils after consolidation. According to the pore parameter range of the untreated and consolidated soils, the effects of micro-pores on the soil behavior are specifically conducted under both static and dynamic loads. The relationships between pore characteristics and stiffness, strength, and ultrasonic wave velocity are established. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: There have been many studies on the relationship between circRNAs and fat deposition. Although the liver is a central organ for fat metabolism, there are few reports on the relationship between circRNAs in the liver and fat deposition. Methods: In this study, we systematically analyzed circular RNAs in the liver of Ningxiang pigs, at four time points after birth (30 days, 90 days, 150 days and 210 days). Results: A total of 3705 circRNAs were coexpressed in four time periods were found, and KEGG analysis showed that the significantly upregulated pathways were mainly enriched in lipid metabolism and amino acid metabolism, while significantly downregulated pathways were mainly related to signal transduction, such as ECM–receptor interaction, MAPK signaling pathway, etc. Short time-series expression miner (STEM) analysis showed multiple model spectra that were significantly enriched over time in the liver. By constructing a competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) regulatory network, 9187 pairs of networks related to the change in development time were screened. Conclusions: The expression profiles of circRNAs in Ningxiang pig liver were revealed at different development periods, and it was determined that there is differential coexpression. Through enrichment analysis of these circRNAs, it was revealed that host genes were involved in metabolism-related signaling pathways and fatty acid anabolism. Through STEM analysis, many circRNAs involved in fat metabolism, transport, and deposition pathways were screened, and the first circRNA–miRNA–mRNA regulation network map in Ningxiang pig liver was constructed. The highly expressed circRNAs related to fat deposition were verified and were consistent with RNA-Seq results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sapping caused by prevailing wind erosion is one of the most significant factors in the deterioration of earthen sites located in Datong County, Qinghai Province, China. Long-term effects of wind may cause surface erosion, or even serious damage to the Great Wall of Ming Dynasty. Difference of sapping quantity should be attributed to variability of the prevailing wind directions. To better understand the effects of wind direction on erosion, meteorological data in the study area for fifty-two years (from 1961 to 2013) were collected and statistically analyzed. Sapping quantity of earthen structure was measured by field investigation on the Wall along the ridge whose azimuth ranges from 95°–244° and mainly concentrated in 140°–210°. Results showing obvious difference of sapping quantity could be observed at both sides of the Wall under the prevailing wind directions (ESE, SE and SSE). Further, the Wall was divided into small segments with a length of 20 m for comparison and maximum sapping quantity could be found at the Wall whose azimuth is at an angle of 30° to the prevailing wind. The aim of this study is to provide reference for the deterioration of the Wall under long-term wind pressure, and provide a targeted conservation method for earthen structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The filtered mass density function (FMDF) model has been employed for large-eddy simulations (LES) of compressible high-speed turbulent mixing and reacting flows. However, the mixing model remains a pressing challenge for FMDF methods, especially for compressible reactive flows. In this work, a temporal development mixing layer with two different convective Mach numbers, M c = 0.4 and M c = 0.8 , is used to investigate the mixing models. A simplified one-step reaction and a real hydrogen/air reaction are employed to study the mixing and turbulence-chemistry interaction. Two widely used mixing models, interaction by exchange with the mean (IEM) and Euclidean minimum spanning tree (EMST), are studied. Numerical results indicate that no difference is observed between the IEM and EMST models in simple reaction flows. However, for hydrogen/air reactions, the EMST model can predict the reaction more accurately in high-speed flow. For mixing models in compressible reactive flows, the requirement of localness preservation tends to be more essential as the convective Mach number increases. With the increase of compressibility, the sensitivity of the mixing model coefficient is reduced significantly. Therefore, the appropriate mixing model coefficient has a wider range. Results also indicate that a large error may result when using a fixed mixing model coefficient in compressible flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Ningxiang pig, a distinguished local breed in China, is recognized for its good meat quality traits. This study examines the proteomics of Ningxiang pigs at three developmental stages and delves into the upstream transcriptomics of these proteomics. Such an analysis facilitates a deeper understanding of the molecular interplay between proteins and transcriptomes in the Ningxiang pig muscle, influencing muscle growth and development. In this research, we analyzed the muscles of Ningxiang pigs at three developmental stages: 30 days in weaned piglets, 90 days in nursery pigs, and 210 days in late fattening pigs. There a total of 16 differentially co-expressed miRNAs (ssc-miRNA-1, ssc-miRNA-378, ssc-miRNA-143, ssc-miRNA-30e, etc.), 74 differentially co-expressed mRNA ( PLIN3 , CPT2 , IGF2 and HSP90AB1 , etc.) have been identified in the three stages. 572 differentially abundant proteins (DAPs) ( APOC3 , NDUFA2 , HSPD1 , ATP5E , PDHA1 , etc.) were readily identified by comparing different time periods. According to the KEGG enrich pathway results that DAPs most enriched in growth and development pathways, immune mechanism pathways and maintaining functions of physical. Through short time-series expression miner (STEM) association analysis, a total of 571 negative miRNA-mRNA interaction pairs and 2 negative miRNA-mRNA-protein (Chr05_11955-Pig.17268.1- ATP5F1B , ssc-miR-194a-3p-Pig.15802.1- ACY1 ) interaction pairs were found. Our study provides a theoretical basis on molecular mechanism for the study of IMF deposition, muscle growth and immunity in Ningxiang pig breed., Competing Interests: Author SZ employed by Yunnan Southwest Agriculture and Animal Husbandry Group Co., Ltd. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Chen, Xiao, Yang, Liufu, Gong, Li, Zhang, Tang, Li and Ma.)

Refraction-induced errors affect the accuracy of three-dimensional visual measurements in deepwater environments. In this study, a binocular camera refractive imaging model was established, and a calibration method for the refraction parameters was proposed for high-accuracy shape and deformation measurements in deep-water environments. First, an initial estimate of the refractive axis was obtained using a three-dimensional calibration target. Then, the errors in the distance between the spatial point pairs and the reprojection errors are taken as the dual optimization objectives, and the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II is applied to optimize the refraction parameters. To efficiently calculate the reprojection error, an improved numerical computation method is proposed to accelerate the calculation of the analytical forward projection. Underwater experiments were conducted to verify the method's effectiveness. The results showed that the average error of the absolute position of the reconstructed points was less than 1.1 mm and the average error of the displacement was less than 0.04 mm. This study provides a sound solution for accurate three-dimensional visual measurement in deep-water environments.

The Brangus cattle were developed to utilize the superior traits of Angus and Brahman cattle. Their genetic compositions are expected to be stabilized at 3/8 Brahman and 5/8 Angus. Previous studies have shown more than expected Angus lineage with Brangus cattle, and the reasons are yet to be investigated. In this study, we revisited the breed compositions for 3,605 Brangus cattle from three perspectives: genome-wise (GBC), per chromosomes (CBC), and per chromosome segments (SBC). The former (GBC) depicted an overall picture of the "mosaic" genome of the Brangus attributable to their ancestors, whereas the latter two criteria (CBC and SBC) corresponded to local ancestral contributions. The average GBC for the 3,605 Brangus cattle were 70.2% Angus and 29.8% Brahman. The K-means clustering supported the postulation of the mixture of 1/2 Ultrablack (UB) animals in Brangus. For the non-UB Brangus animals, the average GBC were estimated to be 67.4% Angus and 32.6% Brahman. The 95% confidence intervals of their overall GBC were 60.4%-73.5% Angus and 26.5%-39.6% Brahman. Possibly, genetic selection and drifting have resulted in an approximately 5% average deviation toward Angus lineage. The estimated ancestral contributions by chromosomes were heavily distributed toward Angus, with 27 chromosomes having an average Angus CBC greater than 62.5% but only two chromosomes (5 and 20) having Brahman CBC greater than 37.5%. The chromosomal regions with high Angus breed proportions were prevalent, tending to form larger blocks on most chromosomes. In contrast, chromosome segments with high Brahman breed proportion were relatively few and isolated, presenting only on seven chromosomes. Hence, genomic hitchhiking effects were strong where Angus favorable alleles resided but weak where Brahman favorable alleles were present. The functions of genes identified in the chromosomal regions with high ( ≥ 75 % ) Angus compositions were diverse yet may were related to growth and body development. In contrast, the genes identified in the regions with high ( ≥ 37.5 % ) Brahman compositions were primarily responsible for disease resistance. In conclusion, we have addressed the questions concerning the Brangus genetic make-ups. The results can help form a dynamic picture of the Brangus breed formation and the genomic reshaping., Competing Interests: CS, RT, and SB are employees of Neogen GeneSeek, an agri-genomics service provider. X-LW is an employee of the Council of Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB), a non-profit organization responsible for calculating and distributing genetic evaluations and genomic predictions and for managing genomic data storage. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest, (Copyright © 2023 Li, He, Yang, Yin, Gao, Chen, Sun, Tait, Bauck, Guo and Wu.)

In recent years, Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) based on deep learning techniques have achieved promising results in EEG-based depression detection tasks but still have some limitations. Firstly, most existing GNN-based methods use pre-computed graph adjacency matrices, which ignore the differences in brain networks between individuals. Additionally, methods based on graph-structured data do not consider the temporal dependency information of brain networks. To address these issues, we propose a deep learning algorithm that explores adaptive graph topologies and temporal graph networks for EEG-based depression detection. Specifically, we designed an Adaptive Graph Topology Generation (AGTG) module that can adaptively model the real-time connectivity of the brain networks, revealing differences between individuals. In addition, we designed a Graph Convolutional Gated Recurrent Unit (GCGRU) module to capture the temporal dynamical changes of brain networks. To further explore the differential features between depressed and healthy individuals, we adopt Graph Topology-based Max-Pooling (GTMP) module to extract graph representation vectors accurately. We conduct a comparative analysis with several advanced algorithms on both public and our own datasets. The results reveal that our final model achieves the highest Area Under the Receiver Operating Characteristic Curve (AUROC) on both datasets, with values of 83% and 99%, respectively. Furthermore, we perform extensive validation experiments demonstrating our proposed method's effectiveness and advantages. Finally, we present a comprehensive discussion on the differences in brain networks between healthy and depressed individuals based on the outputs of our final model's AGTG and GTMP modules.

Objective: To evaluate the correlation of serum biological markers and related scales to the occurrence of delayed cerebral ischemia and clinical prognosis in patients with aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage (aSAH) complicated with acute hydrocephalus before admission., Methods: The clinical data of 227 patients with pre-admission aSAH complicated with acute hydrocephalus admitted to Henan Provincial People's Hospital from April 2017 to December 2020 were retrospectively analyzed. Patients were grouped according to the presence or absence of delayed cerebral ischemia (DCI) after surgery and the prognosis at 6 months after discharge. Univariate and multivariable logistic regression analysis were performed to analyze the relationship between serum biological indicators combined with aneurysm related clinical score scale and the occurrence and prognosis of delayed cerebral ischemia. ROC curves and nomogram were drawn., Results: Multivariable Logistic regression analysis showed that high Hunt-Hess grade and surgical clipping were independent risk factors for postoperative DCI ( P < 0.05). Older age, higher Hunt-Hess grade, higher CRP and neutrophil levels were independent risk factors for poor prognosis at 6 months after surgery ( P < 0.05). ROC curve analysis showed that the area under the curve (AUC) of Hunt-Hess grade and surgical method for predicting DCI in patients with aSAH combined with hydrocephalus after surgery were 0.665 and 0.593. The combined AUC of Hunt-Hess grade and surgical method was 0.685, the sensitivity was 64.9%, and the specificity was 64.7%. The AUC of CRP, neutrophil, age and Hunt-Hess grade for predicting poor prognosis in patients with aSAH combined with hydrocephalus at 6 months after surgery were 0.804, 0.735, 0.596, 0.757, respectively. The combined AUC of CRP, neutrophil, age, Hunt-Hess grade was 0.879, the sensitivity was 79%, and the specificity was 84.5%. According to the correction curve, the predicted probability of the nomogram is basically consistent with the actual probability., Conclusion: Hunt-Hess grade and surgical method are independent predictors of postoperative DCI in patients with aSAH complicated with hydrocephalus. "CRP," "neutrophil," "age" and "Hunt-Hess grade" at admission are independent predictors of clinical prognosis in patients with aSAH complicated with hydrocephalus. The combination of the above indicators has high predictive value., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Wang, Zhang, Zhang, Zhang, Chen, Hou, Zheng, Guo, Chen, Wang, Hernesniemi, Andrade-Barazarte, Li, Li, Feng and Gu.)

The limited throughput of a digital image correlation (DIC) system hampers measuring deformations at both high spatial resolution and high temporal resolution. To address this dilemma, in this paper we propose to integrate snapshot compressive imaging (SCI)-a recently proposed computational imaging approach-into DIC for high-speed, high-resolution deformation measurement. Specifically, an SCI-DIC system is established to encode a sequence of fast changing speckle patterns into a snapshot and a high-accuracy speckle decompress SCI (Sp-DeSCI) algorithm is proposed for computational reconstruction of the speckle sequence. To adapt SCI reconstruction to the unique characteristics of speckle patterns, we propose three techniques under SCI reconstruction framework to secure high-precision reconstruction, including the normalized sum squared difference criterion, speckle-adaptive patch search strategy, and adaptive group aggregation. For efficacy validation of the proposed Sp-DeSCI, we conducted extensive simulated experiments and a four-point bending SCI-DIC experiment on real data. Both simulation and real experiments verify that the Sp-DeSCI successfully removes the deviations of reconstructed speckles in DeSCI and provides the highest displacement accuracy among existing algorithms. The SCI-DIC system together with the Sp-DeSCI algorithm can offer temporally super-resolved deformation measurement at full spatial resolution, and can potentially replace conventional high-speed DIC in real measurements.