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Abstract Background The Latarjet procedure (LP) is performed as a primary stabilization procedure (primary LP) and a salvage procedure when an earlier shoulder stabilization procedure has failed (salvage LP). However, whether primary LP or salvage LP provides better outcomes for anterior shoulder instability remains unknown. Methods Two independent reviewers performed the literature search based on the PRISMA guidelines. A comprehensive search of PubMed, Embase, web of science and Cochrane Library was performed from their inception date to December 4, 2023. Inclusion criteria mainly included the comparison of postoperative outcomes between primary and salvage LP, English language, and full text availability. Two reviewers independently examined the literature, collected data, and evaluated the methodological robustness of the included studies. The Methodological Index for Nonrandomized Studies was used to evaluate the quality of nonrandomized studies. Recurrent instability, complications, reoperations, return to sports, patient-reported outcomes, and range of motion were assessed. Statistical evaluations were conducted using Manager V.5.4.1 (The Cochrane Collaboration, Software Update, Oxford, UK). Results Twelve studies were included in the systematic review, with 940 shoulders undergoing primary LP and 631 shoulders undergoing salvage LP. Statistically significant differences in favor of primary LP were found in 2 of the 11 and 2 of 4 included studies in terms of recurrent instability and returning to the same sports (RTS) at preinjury level, respectively. In terms of the visual analog scale, subjective shoulder value and the Western Ontario Shoulder Instability Index, 2 of the 4, 1 of the 3 and 1 of the 3 included studies reported statistically significant differences in favor of primary LP. Differences were not noticed regarding complications, reoperations, the time to RTS, the Rowe score, the Athletic Shoulder Outcome Scoring System, and forward flexion. Conclusion Current evidence suggests that compared with primary LP, salvage LP may provide inferior postoperative outcomes in terms of recurrent instability and the rate of RTS at preinjury level. Primary and salvage LP may yield comparable efficacy in terms of complications, reoperations, the rate of RTS, the time to RTS, pain, shoulder function, and range of motion. Prospero id CRD42023492027.

Lung cystic fibrosis (CF) is a lethal inherited disease caused by mutations in the CF transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) gene, leading to a dysfunctional CFTR protein. Gene therapy offers promise for the treatment of lung CF. However, the development and clinical application of CF gene therapy have long been hampered by the absence of safe and highly efficient delivery vectors. In this work, a novel polymer-based gene replacement treatment approach was developed. A series of poly (β-amino esters) (PAEs) with various topological structures and chemical compositions were screened to create non-viral therapeutic systems for CFTR restoration in lung CF disease. A nanoparticle, formed by the selected highly branched PAE (HPAE) with a CpG-depleted CFTR plasmid, demonstrated CFTR gene expression and biocompatibility in lung epithelial cells, outperforming leading commercial gene transfection reagents such as Lipofectamine 3000 and Xfect. The newly developed gene therapy system successfully restored functional CFTR protein production in lung CF epithelial monolayers. This therapeutic approach holds great potential for use as an efficient and safe non-viral treatment for CF patients.

Summary: Natural silks are renewable proteins with impressive mechanical properties and biocompatibility that are useful in various fields. However, the cellular and spatial organization of silk-secreting organs remains unclear. Here, we combined single-nucleus and spatially resolved transcriptomics to systematically map the cellular and spatial composition of the silk glands (SGs) of mulberry silkworms late in larval development. This approach allowed us to profile SG cell types and cell state dynamics and identify regulatory networks and cell-cell communication related to efficient silk protein synthesis; key markers were validated via transgenic approaches. Notably, we demonstrated the indispensable role of the ecdysone receptor (ultraspiracle) in regulating endoreplication in SG cells. Our atlas presents the results of spatiotemporal analysis of silk-secreting organ architecture late in larval development; this atlas provides a valuable reference for elucidating the mechanism of efficient silk protein synthesis and developing sustainable products made from natural silk.

Pancreatic fat is associated with obesity and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM); however, the relationship between different types of pancreatic fat and diabetes status remains unclear. Therefore, we aimed to determine the potential of different types of pancreatic fat accumulation as a risk factor for T2DM in overweight or obese patients. In total, 104 overweight or obese patients were recruited from January 2020 to December 2022. The patients were divided into three groups: normal glucose tolerance (NGT), impaired fasting glucose or glucose tolerance (IFG/IGT), and T2DM. mDixon magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was used to detect pancreatic fat in all three groups of patients. The pancreatic head fat (PHF), body fat (PBF), and tail fat (PTF) in the IFG/IGT group were 21, 20, and 31% more than those in the NGT group, respectively. PHF, PBF, and PTF were positively associated with glucose metabolic dysfunction markers in the NGT group, and inter-lobular fat volume (IFV) was positively associated with these markers in the IFG/IGT group. The areas under the receiver operating characteristic curves for PHF, PBF, and PTF (used to evaluate their diagnostic potential for glucose metabolic dysfunction) were 0.73, 0.73, and 0.78, respectively, while those for total pancreatic volume (TPV), pancreatic parenchymal volume, IFV, and IFV/TPV were 0.67, 0.67, 0.66, and 0.66, respectively. These results indicate that intra-lobular pancreatic fat, including PHF, PTF, and PBF, may be a potential independent risk factor for the development of T2DM. Additionally, IFV exacerbates glucose metabolic dysfunction. Intra-lobular pancreatic fat indices were better than IFV for the diagnosis of glucose metabolic dysfunction.

Abstract Background The current literature shows that dyslipidemia can lead to a higher incidence of rotator cuff tears (RCTs) and an increased retear rate after repair. We aimed to evaluate the influence of preoperative dyslipidemia on postoperative pain, patient-reported outcomes (PROs), active range of motion (ROM), and structural integrity. Methods A cohort of 111 patients who underwent arthroscopic RCT repair between January 2021 and July 2022, and whose complete preoperative serum lipid data were available within one week prior to surgery was retrospectively reviewed. Dyslipidemia was defined as the presence of an increase or decrease in at least one blood lipid profile (triglycerides, total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein, high-density lipoprotein, or non-high-density lipoprotein). There were 43 patients in the dyslipidemia group and 68 in the ortholiposis group. Patient evaluations, including pain score, PROs, and ROMs, were conducted preoperatively; at 3 and 6 months postoperatively; and at the last follow-up. Structural integrity was assessed by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) 6 months after surgery if possible, and Sugaya type 4 or 5 was considered a retear. Propensity score matching (PSM) was used to reduce bias. Results The RCT size, surgical technique, preoperative pain status, PROs, and active ROM were comparable between patients with dyslipidemia and those with ortholiposis. Three months after surgery, patients in the dyslipidemia group had worse average PROs (Constant score: P = 0.001; ASES score: P = 0.012; UCLA score: P = 0.015), forward flexion (P = 0.012), and internal rotation (P = 0.001) than patients in the ortholiposis group did. The difference between the two groups persisted after PSM but disappeared at the sixth month after surgery. No significant differences in pain score, PROs, or active ROMs were detected between the dyslipidemia and ortholiposis groups after a mean follow-up of 24 months. Of the 72 patients who underwent MRI, 4 retears (5.6%) were found, and all were in the ortholiposis group. There was no difference in the rate of retears between the two groups (P = 0.291) or with (P = 0.495) PSM. Conclusions In conclusion, we found that perioperative dyslipidemia may impact initial recovery within the first 3 months following arthroscopic rotator cuff repair but may have no effect on pain, PROs, or active ROMs at a mean 2-year follow-up or rotator cuff integrity at 6 months postoperatively. Trail registration Retrospectively registered.

Large Language Models (LLMs) have demonstrated remarkable performance across various natural language tasks, marking significant strides towards general artificial intelligence. While general artificial intelligence is leveraged by developing increasingly large-scale models, there could be another branch to develop lightweight custom models that better serve certain domains, taking into account the high cost of training and deploying LLMs and the scarcity of resources. In this paper, we present MindLLM, a novel series of bilingual lightweight large language models, trained from scratch, alleviating such burdens by offering models with 1.3 billion and 3 billion parameters. A thorough account of experiences accrued during large model development is given, covering every step of the process, including data construction, model architecture, evaluation, and applications. Such insights are hopefully valuable for fellow academics and developers. MindLLM consistently matches or surpasses the performance of other open-source larger models on some public benchmarks. We also introduce an innovative instruction tuning framework tailored for smaller models to enhance their capabilities efficiently. Moreover, we explore the application of MindLLM in specific vertical domains such as law and finance, underscoring the agility and adaptability of our lightweight models.

Precipitation nowcasting refers to the prediction of small-scale precipitation events at minute and kilometer scales within the upcoming 0 to 2 h, which significantly impacts both human activities and daily life. However, prevailing deep learning models have primarily focused on a single radar echo data source, limiting their ability to effectively capture intricate and rapidly evolving precipitation patterns. Thus, meteorological satellite is considered to supplement radar echo data. To achieve a comprehensive integration of multisource data with enhanced details, a two-stage fusion satellite and radar GAN-based prediction network (named FsrGAN) is proposed. In the first stage, we design a satellite-radar fusion prediction network known as FsrNet. This network employs an encoder-fusion-decoder architecture, where a novel spatial-channel attention (SCA) is proposed to enhance the filtering and fusion of multisource and multiscale features. In the second stage, we introduce a GAN-based network (FusionGAN) that also mines the complementary information of satellite images to sharpen the first-stage predicted radar maps with more details. Experiments are conducted on meteorological dataset in the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) region. The test results exhibit the notably superior performance of our model in terms of image quality and precipitation forecasting metrics in comparison to traditional optical flow-based methods and some well-known deep learning methods (ConvLSTM, ConvGRU, TrajGRU and PredRNN++). More importantly, our fusion model using satellite and radar data demonstrates the ability to predict convective initiation.

Objectives Parameniscal cysts can be removed without meniscectomy, but for large or multiloculated meniscal cysts, traditional arthroscopic excision may leave the meniscus unstable. This study aimed to describe a modified fat pad approach for parameniscal cyst arthroscopic excision that retains a stable structure of the synovial margin of the meniscus and to compare the clinical outcomes between the traditional cyst excision and modified excision techniques. Methods Fifty‐six patients with parameniscal cysts between 2014 and 2018 were retrospectively included in this study with 28 patients in each group. All patients underwent arthroscopic parameniscal cyst excisions with traditional and modified excision techniques respectively in each group. The International Knee Documentation Committee subjective (IKDC) score, Lysholm score, visual analogue scale (VAS) score, Tegner score, active range of motion (ROM) and time to recover full ROM were used to evaluate the clinical outcomes by using the t‐test. Results The patient population included 21 males and 35 females, with a mean follow‐up of 29 months. Of these, 28 patients underwent traditional arthroscopic cyst excisions and meniscal sutures, and 28 patients underwent arthroscopic excisions by the modified fat pad approach. There were no significant differences in the IKDC score, Lysholm score, Tegner score or VAS score between the traditional and modified excision groups at the final follow‐up time point. However, the postoperative time to recover full ROM in the modified excision group was significantly lower than those in the traditional excision group (p

BackgroundLow back pain is one of the most prevalent pain conditions worldwide. Virtual reality–based training has been used for low back pain as a new treatment strategy. Present evidence indicated that the effectiveness of virtual reality–based training for people with chronic low back pain is inconclusive. ObjectiveThis study conducted a meta-analysis to evaluate the immediate- and short-term effects of virtual reality–based training on pain, pain-related fear, and disability in people with chronic low back pain. MethodsWe searched the PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, PEDro, CENTRAL, and CINAHL databases from inception until January 2024. Only randomized controlled trials assessing the effects of virtual reality–based training on individuals with chronic low back pain were selected. The outcomes were focused on pain, pain-related fear measured by the Tampa Scale of Kinesiophobia, and disability measured by the Oswestry Disability Index. The immediate term was defined as the immediate period after intervention, and the short term was defined as 3 to 6 months after intervention. The Cochrane Risk of Bias tool and the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation) approach were used to evaluate the quality of the methodology and evidence, respectively. ResultsIn total, 20 randomized controlled trials involving 1059 patients were eligible for analysis. Virtual reality–based training showed significant improvements in pain (mean difference [MD] –1.43; 95% CI –1.86 to –1.00; I2=95%; P

Background: The efficacy of Kinesio tape (KT) in lateral elbow tendinopathy (LET) has been widely discussed, but controversy remains. Objectives: To perform a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in the literature to ascertain the efficacy of KT in LET. Design: Systematic review and meta-analysis. Method: Two independent reviewers carried out a literature search in accordance with the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines. Any discrepancies were addressed by a third author. Included in the study were RCTs comparing KT to a control group in the context of LET. The quality of evidence was assessed with the 2.0 version of Cochrane Collaboration risk of bias tool. Evaluation centered on clinical outcomes, such as function scores and pain, with comparison made using the risk ratio for dichotomous variables and the mean difference for continuous variables. Statistical significance was considered for P values

In the present study, we demonstrated that the presence of cysteine could remarkably enhance the degradation of atrazine by Fe3O4/persulfate system. The results of electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectra confirmed the combination of cysteine and Fe3O4 exhibited much higher activity on activation of persulfate to generate more SO4•- and •OH than Fe3O4 alone. At pH of 3.0, SO4•- and •OH contributed to about 58.2 % and 41.8 % of atrazine removal respectively, while •OH gradually dominated the oxidation of atrazine from neutral condition to alkaline condition. The co-existing Cl− and HCO3− could quench SO4•-, resulting in the inhibition of atrazine degradation. The presence of low natural organic matters (NOM) concentration (0–2 mg L−1) could enhance the atrazine removal, and high concentration (>5 mg L−1) of NOM restrained the atrazine degradation. During the Cysteine/Fe3O4/Persulfate process, cysteine served as a complexing reagent and reductant. Through acidolysis and complexation, Fe3O4 could release dissolved and surface bound Fe2+, both of which contributed to the activation of persulfate together. Meanwhile, cysteine was not rapidly consumed due to a regeneration process, which was beneficial for maintaining Fe2+/Fe3+ cycle and constantly accelerating the activation of persulfate for atrazine degradation. The reused Fe3O4 and cysteine in the Cysteine/Fe3O4/Persulfate process exhibited high stability for the atrazine degradation after three cycles. The degradation pathway of atrazine included alkylic-oxidation, dealkylation, dechlorination-hydroxylation processes. The present study indicates the novel Cysteine/Fe3O4/Persulfate process might be a high potential for treatment of organic polluted water.

Abstract Background One-stage treatment involving rotator cuff repair and shoulder capsule release is mainly used to treat patients with rotator cuff tears (RCTs) and concomitant shoulder stiffness. Despite the increasing attention to the efficacy and safety of one-stage treatment, controversy still remains. Therefore, this systematic review aims to summarize the indications, operation procedure and rehabilitation protocol, and compare the range of motions (ROMs), functional outcomes and retear rates of one-stage treatment for RCTs in stiff shoulders and non-stiff shoulders. Methods Multiple databases (PubMed, the Cochrane Library, Embase and MEDLINE) were searched for studies that investigated outcomes after one-stage treatment for RCTs concomitant with shoulder stiffness compared with rotator cuff repair for RCTs alone, according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses criteria. Descriptive statistics, including range of motion, patient-reported outcome and retear rate, are presented without meta-analysis due to the heterogeneity and low levels of evidence. Results A total of 9 cohort studies were included, with 305 patients treated with one-stage treatment involving rotator cuff repair and simultaneous shoulder capsular release and 1059 patients treated with rotator cuff repair alone. Patients in both groups had significant symptom improvement and functional recovery after the one-stage treatment for the stiffness group and standard repair for the non-stiffness group, and most patients could return to normal life and work within 6 months after the operation. The retear rate in the one-stage treatment group was not higher than that in the rotator cuff repair group. No statistically significant differences between the two groups were observed in terms of range of motion and patient-reported outcomes in the vast majority of studies at the final follow-up, including the visual analog scale for pain, the Constant score, the American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons score, the University of California Los Angeles Shoulder Score, the Oxford shoulder score and the Simple Shoulder Test. Conclusion One-stage treatment for RCTs in stiff shoulders provides comparable ROM and patient-reported clinical outcomes as rotator cuff repair for non-stiff RCTs. In addition, the rate of postoperative retear in stiff shoulder treated with one-stage treatment was not higher than in non-stiff shoulders.

The mechanical pressure that arises from the external structure of the automotive lithium battery module and its fixed devices can give rise to the concentration and damage of the internal stress inside the battery and increase the risks of battery degradation and failure. Commercial batteries cannot be disassembled, and the diffusion stress distribution at different times during discharge is notoriously difficult to determine. This paper, therefore, establishes the electrochemical force-coupling model based on the electrochemical and diffusion mechanics principles of batteries and studies the internal stress distribution of the battery under the diffusion stress of the electrode-material level and external pressure. Mainly driven by the electrochemical potential of the electrode particle diffusion stress stemming from the lithium-concentration difference inside and outside the particles, rupture is more likely to occur at the surface of the negative-electrode active particle at the end of discharge or the beginning of charging, as shown in simulation analysis. The variation in the volume of electrode material also leads to different stress and strain inside different areas, with the order of strain and stress being negative active material > negative collector fluid > positive active material > positive fluid. Therefore, huge stress and deformation will first cause the negative active particles to deviate from the fluid gradually and squeeze the diaphragm, resulting in mechanical failure accordingly.

Frequent removal and reapplication of wound dressings can cause mechanical disruption to the healing process and significant physical discomfort for patients. In response to this challenge, a dynamic covalent hydrogel has been developed to advance wound care strategies. This system comprises aldehyde functionalized chondroitin sulfate (CS-CHO) and thiolated hyaluronic acid (HA-SH), with the distinct ability to form in situ via thiol–aldehyde addition and dissolve on-demand via the thiol–hemithioacetal exchange reaction. Although rarely reported, the dynamic covalent reaction of thiol–aldehyde addition holds great promise for the preparation of dynamic hydrogels due to its rapid reaction kinetics and easy reversible dissociation. The thiol–aldehyde addition chemistry provides the hydrogel system with highly desirable characteristics of rapid gelation (within seconds), self-healing, and on-demand dissolution (within 30 min). The mechanical and dissolution properties of the hydrogel can be easily tuned by utilizing CS-CHO materials of different aldehyde functional group contents. The chemical structure, rheology, self-healing, swelling profile, degradation rate, and cell biocompatibility of the hydrogels are characterized. The hydrogel possesses excellent biocompatibility and proves to be significant in promoting cell proliferation in vitro when compared to a commercial hydrogel (HyStem® Cell Culture Scaffold Kit). This study introduces the simple fabrication of a new dynamic hydrogel system that can serve as an ideal platform for biomedical applications, particularly in wound care treatments as an on-demand dissolvable wound dressing.

Recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa (RDEB) is an autosomal monogenic skin disease caused by mutations in COL7A1 gene and lack of functional type VII collagen (C7). Currently, there is no cure for RDEB, and most of the gene therapies under development have been designed as ex vivo strategies because of the shortage of efficient and safe carriers for gene delivery. Herein, we designed, synthesized, and screened a new group of highly branched poly(β amino ester)s (HPAEs) as non-viral carriers for the delivery of plasmids encoding dual single-guide RNA (sgRNA)-guided CRISPR-Cas9 machinery to delete COL7A1 exon 80 containing the c.6527dupC mutation. The selected HPAEs (named PTTA-DATOD) showed robust transfection efficiency, comparable with or surpassing that of leading commercial gene transfection reagents such as Lipofectamine 3000, Xfect, and jetPEI, while maintaining negligible cytotoxicity. Furthermore, CRISPR-Cas9 plasmids delivered by PTTA-DATOD achieved efficient targeted deletion and restored bulk C7 production in RDEB patient keratinocyte polyclones. The non-viral CRISPR-Cas9-based COL7A1 exon deletion approach developed here has great potential to be used as a topical treatment for RDEB patients with mutations in COL7A1 exon 80. Besides, this therapeutic strategy can easily be adapted for mutations in other COL7A1 exons, other epidermolysis bullosa subtypes, and other genetic diseases.

Abstract Background There is no gold standard for the operative treatment of patients with Müller-Weiss disease (MWD). This study reports the mid-term follow-up results for at least 5 years following talonavicular-cuneiform (TNC) arthrodesis for Müller-Weiss disease. Methods A total of 15 patients undergoing TNC arthrodesis for MWD were retrospectively reviewed between January 2015 and August 2017. Two senior doctors assessed the radiographic results twice at each visit (preoperative, three months after the operation, and final follow-up). The clinical results and complications from preoperative and final follow-up were recorded. Results The mean follow up period was 74.0 (range 64 to 90) months. The calcaneal pitch angle, lateral Meary's angle, anteroposterior (AP) Meary's angle, AP talocalcaneal angle, and talonavicular coverage were significantly different before and three months after the operation (p 0.05). The radiological measurements of the two senior doctors were calculated and found to be moderate to strong (ICC:0.899–0.995). The AOFAS, VAS, and SF-12 scores significantly improved at the last follow-up compared to those before the operation (p

Abstract Purpose To summarize the incidence, risk factors, diagnosis methods, prophylaxis methods, and treatment of venous thromboembolism (VTE) following arthroscopic shoulder surgery. Methods Literature on VTE after arthroscopic shoulder surgeries was summarized, and all primary full-text articles reporting at least 1 case of deep vein thrombosis (DVT) or pulmonary embolism (PE) after arthroscopic shoulder surgeries were included. Articles were critically appraised and systematically analyzed to determine the incidence, risk factors, diagnosis, prophylaxis, and management of VTE following arthroscopic shoulder surgeries. Results This study included 42 articles in which the incidence of VTE ranges from 0 to 5.71% and the overall incidence was 0.26%. Most VTE events took place between the operation day and the 14th day after the operation (35/51). Possible risk factors included advanced age (> 70 years), obesity (BMI ≥ 30 kg/m2), diabetes mellitus, thrombophilia, history of VTE, prolonged operation time, hormone use, and immobilization after surgery. The most common prophylaxis method was mechanical prophylaxis (13/15). No statistical difference was detected when chemoprophylaxis was applied. The management included heparinization followed by oral warfarin, warfarin alone and rivaroxaban, a direct oral anticoagulant. Conclusion Based on the included studies, the incidence rate of VTE after arthroscopic shoulder surgeries is relatively low. The risk factors for VTE are still unclear. CT/CTA and ultrasound were the mainstream diagnosis methods for PE and DVT, respectively. Current evidence shows that chemical prophylaxis did not deliver significant benefits, since none of the existing studies reported statistically different results. High-quality studies focusing on the prophylaxis and management of VTE population undergoing arthroscopic shoulder surgeries should be done in the future.

A large number of dead seedlings can occur in saline soils, which seriously affects the large-scale cultivation of rice. This study investigated the effects of plant growth regulators (PGRs) and nitrogen application on seedling growth and salt tolerance (Oryza sativa L.), which is of great significance for agricultural production practices. A conventional rice variety, “Huang Huazhan”, was selected for this study. Non-salt stress treatments included 0% NaCl (CK treatment), CK + 0.05 g N/pot (N treatment), CK + 40 mg·L−1 5-aminolevulinic acid (5-ALA) (A treatment), and CK + 30 mg·L−1 diethylaminoethyl acetate (DTA-6) (D treatment). Salt stress treatments included 0.3% NaCl (S treatment), N + 0.3% NaCl (NS treatment), A + 0.3% NaCl (AS treatment), and D + 0.3% NaCl (DS treatment). When 3 leaves and 1 heart emerged from the soil, plants were sprayed with DTA-6 and 5-ALA, followed by the application of 0.3% NaCl (w/w) to the soil after 24 h. Seedling morphology and photosynthetic indices, as well as carbohydrate metabolism and key enzyme activities, were determined for each treatment. Our results showed that N, A, and D treatments promoted seedling growth, photosynthesis, carbohydrate levels, and the activities of key enzymes involved in carbon metabolism when compared to the CK treatment. The A treatment had the most significant effect, with increases in aboveground dry weight and net photosynthetic rates (Pn) ranging from 17.74% to 41.02% and 3.61% to 32.60%, respectively. Stomatal limiting values (Ls) significantly decreased from 19.17% to 43.02%. Salt stress significantly inhibited seedling growth. NS, AS, and DS treatments alleviated the morphological and physiological damage of salt stress on seedlings when compared to the S treatment. The AS treatment was the most effective in improving seedling morphology, promoting photosynthesis, increasing carbohydrate levels, and key enzyme activities. After AS treatment, increases in aboveground dry weight, net photosynthetic rate, soluble sugar content, total sucrose synthase, and amylase activities were 17.50% to 50.79%, 11.39% to 98.10%, 20.20% to 80.85%, 21.21% to 33.53%, and 22.17% to 34.19%, respectively, when compared to the S treatment. In summary, foliar sprays of 5-ALA, DTA-6, and additional nitrogen fertilizer enhanced rice seedling growth, increased photosynthesis, lowered Ls values, and improved seedling salt tolerance. Spraying two regulators, 5-ALA and DTA-6, quantitatively increased the effect of nitrogen fertilizer, with comparable effects on NaCl stress regulation. This study provides the basis for efficient agricultural production.

The material undergoes high temperature and high strain rate deformation process during the cutting process, which may induce the dynamic recrystallization behavior and result in the evolution of dynamic mechanical properties of the material to be machined. In this paper, the modified Johnson-Cook (J-C) model for nickel-based powder metallurgy superalloy considering dynamic recrystallization behavior in high strain rate and temperature is proposed. The dynamic mechanical properties of the material under different strain rates and temperature conditions are obtained by quasi-static compression test and split Hopkinson pressure bar (SHPB) test. The coefficients of the modified J-C model are obtained by the linear regression method. The modified model is verified by comparison with experimental and model prediction results. The results show that the modified J-C model proposed in this paper can accurately describe the mechanical properties of nickel-based powder metallurgy superalloys at high temperatures and high strain rates. This provides help for studying the cutting mechanism and finite element simulation of nickel-based powder metallurgy superalloy.

Abstract Background Shoulder pigmented villonodular synovitis (PVNS) is a severe clinical condition, while few studies have focused on this situation due to its rarity. This study was to investigate the efficacy of arthroscopic treatment of patients diagnosed with shoulder PVNS. Methods From Jan 1st, 2010 to Dec. 31st, 2019, 6 patients (5 females and 1 male) diagnosed with shoulder PVNS underwent arthroscopic synovectomy in our hospital and combined rotator cuff repair was performed in 3 of them. The outcomes of this study include Constant score, Visual Analogue Scale (VAS), University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) score and American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons (ASES) score. The data were retrieved from the patients’ medical records. Results With a mean follow-up of 52.0 months (range, 28–92 months), the mean difference of Constant, VAS, UCLA and ASES scores were 27.83 ± 21.60, 2.83 ± 2.56, 11.67 ± 10.93 and 17.83 ± 25.35, respectively. Statistically significant improvements were detected in all the patient-reported outcomes except ASES score. One of the patients suffered from recurrence. Two patients suffered from mild complications after the surgeries while both of them achieved satisfactory recovery finally. Conclusion Arthroscopic synovectomy in the setting of shoulder PVNS can improve patients’ function. A concurrent rotator cuff repair is recommended if it is needed. The conclusion still needs testifying by further high-quality research with larger sample size.

Introduction: Type 2 diabetes (T2D) is a multifactorial complex chronic disease with a high prevalence worldwide, and Type 2 diabetes patients with different comorbidities often present multiple phenotypes in the clinic. Thus, there is a pressing need to improve understanding of the complexity of the clinical Type 2 diabetes population to help identify more accurate disease subtypes for personalized treatment.Methods: Here, utilizing the traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) clinical electronic medical records (EMRs) of 2137 Type 2 diabetes inpatients, we followed a heterogeneous medical record network (HEMnet) framework to construct heterogeneous medical record networks by integrating the clinical features from the electronic medical records, molecular interaction networks and domain knowledge.Results: Of the 2137 Type 2 diabetes patients, 1347 were male (63.03%), and 790 were female (36.97%). Using the HEMnet method, we obtained eight non-overlapping patient subgroups. For example, in H3, Poria, Astragali Radix, Glycyrrhizae Radix et Rhizoma, Cinnamomi Ramulus, and Liriopes Radix were identified as significant botanical drugs. Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) were found to be significant comorbidities. Furthermore, enrichment analysis showed that there were six overlapping pathways and eight overlapping Gene Ontology terms among the herbs, comorbidities, and Type 2 diabetes in H3.Discussion: Our results demonstrate that identification of the Type 2 diabetes subgroup based on the HEMnet method can provide important guidance for the clinical use of herbal prescriptions and that this method can be used for other complex diseases.

Background: The purpose of this research was to establish a safe, effective, and simple nervous system aneurysm model. This method could quickly and stably establish an exact canine tongue aneurysm model. This paper summarizes the technique and key points of the method.Methods: Under the condition of anesthesia by inhaling isoflurane with a mask, we punctured the femoral artery of the canine, and the tip of the catheter was placed in the common carotid artery for intracranial arteriography. The positions of the lingual artery, external carotid artery, and internal carotid artery were identified. Then, the skin near the mandible was cut according to the positioning and separated layer by layer until the bifurcation of the lingual artery and external carotid artery was exposed. The lingual artery were then sutured with 2–0 silk sutures approximately 3 mm from the external carotid/lingual artery bifurcation. The final angiographic review showed that the aneurysm model was successfully established.Results: The lingual artery aneurysm was successfully established in all 8 canines. All canines obtained a stable model of nervous system aneurysm and confirmed by DSA angiography.Conclusion: We have established a safe, effective, stable and simple method to establish a canine nervous system aneurysm model with controllable size. In addition, this method has the advantages of no arteriotomy, less trauma, constant anatomical location, and low risk of stroke.

Background: Carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) is the most common entrapment syndrome, primarily affecting women between the ages of 40 and 70, and conservative treatments are the first option for mild-to-moderate CTS. However, the comparisons between extracorporeal shock wave therapy (ESWT) and other non-surgical methods in the treatment of mild-to-moderate CTS remain controversial, and an updated systematic review is needed. Methods: An electronic search was performed, and all available articles until August 2023 were included in the analysis. The overall quality of evidence was assessed by the GRADE approach. Meta-analyses were conducted using Manager V.5.3.3. Pooled effect sizes were expressed as the weighted mean difference (WMD) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs). Results: A total of 19 RCTs were included. Low-level quality evidence showed that ESWT outperformed the control intervention in terms of functional improvements, pain relief, electrodiagnostic parameters, and cross-sectional area of the median nerve at any time point of follow-up. Compared to local corticosteroid injection (LCI), there were statistically better improvements in functional improvements, pain relief, and electrodiagnostic parameters at 3 and 6 months of follow-up. Conclusions: There is low-level quality evidence to show that both fESWT and rESWT are more clinically effective than controls in symptom relief, functional enhancement, and electrophysiologic parameters’ improvement for patients with mild-to-moderate CTS at any time point of follow-up. Compared with LCI, ESWT yielded similar short-term (6 months) improvements in pain relief and functional recovery with fewer potential complications.

Laser shock peening (LSP) is a novel metal surface modifying technology, which can enhance the mechanical properties of materials and extend fatigue performance of components evidently. The outstanding mechanical properties induced by LSP occurs through severe plastic deformation, which will cause the surface topography evolution. With the rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI), which provide an effective solution to solve complex problems when with limited experimental data. In this work, FGH4095 superalloy was selected as the experimental material. LSP experiments were conducted with a Q-switched Nd: YAG laser. Laser energy of 4 J, 6 J and 8 J were used with overlap rate of 30 % and 50 %. The residual stress, microhardness and surface topography of experimental samples treated by LSP was investigated. What is more, the AI method based on XGBoost was applied to predict the mechanical properties and surface roughness of FGH4095 treated by LSP. The laser energy, overlap rate, depth were set as input parameters, while the residual stress, microhardness and surface roughness were set as output parameters. The predicted results showed a great agreement with the experimental data. It can be indicated that XGBoost is a suitable method for accurately performing prediction of mechanical properties and surface roughness of materials treated by LSP.

T2-prepared (T2prep) blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) functional MRI (fMRI) is an alternative fMRI approach developed to mitigate the susceptibility artifacts that are typically observed in brain regions near air-filled cavities, bleeding and calcification, and metallic objects in echo-planar-imaging (EPI) based fMRI images. Here, T2prep BOLD fMRI was evaluated in an event-related paradigm for the first time. Functional experiments were performed using gradient-echo (GRE) EPI, spin-echo (SE) EPI, and T2prep BOLD fMRI during an event-related visual task in 10 healthy human subjects. Each fMRI method was performed with a low (3.4 × 3.4 × 4 mm3) and a high (1.5 mm isotropic) spatial resolution on 3T and a high resolution (1.5 mm isotropic) on 7T. Robust activation were detected in the visual cortex with all three fMRI methods. In each group of fMRI scans (3T low resolution, 3T high resolution, and 7T high resolution), GRE EPI showed the highest signal change (ΔS/S), largest full-width-at-half-maximum (FWHM) and longest time-to-peak (TTP) extracted from the hemodynamic response functions (HRF), indicating substantial signal contribution from large draining veins which have longer response times than microvessels. In contrast, T2prep BOLD showed the lowest ΔS/S, smallest FWHM, and shortest TTP, suggesting that T2prep BOLD may have a purer T2-weighted BOLD contrast that is more sensitive to microvessels compared to GRE/SE EPI BOLD. This trend was more obvious in fMRI scans performed with a lower spatial resolution on a lower field (3T with a 3.4 × 3.4 × 4 mm3 voxel). Scan-rescan reproducibility in the same subjects was comparable among the three fMRI methods. The results from the current study are expected to be useful to establish T2prep BOLD as a useful alternative fMRI approach for event-related fMRI in brain regions with large susceptibility artifacts.

While noble metals can be active electrocatalysts for producing renewable H2, there are relatively few works examining osmium materials. Here, the authors prepare boron-doped osmium aerogels for H2 evolution electrocatalysis plus examine the mechanism using computational and in situ characterization.

Underwater manipulators are pivotal in diverse applications, encompassing underwater pipeline repairs, salvage operations, and scientific sampling missions. However, attaining high-precision control mandates the establishment of precise mathematical models. Specifically, developing an accurate dynamic model for the underwater manipulator affixed to underwater robots proves exceptionally demanding, primarily attributed to the uncertainties arising from water currents and the perturbations induced by the vehicle’s motion. This paper presents a novel sliding mode controller with time delay estimation for the high-precision control of an underwater manipulator mounted on an underwater vehicle. The presented controller circumvents the requirement for an exact mathematical model of the underwater manipulator, enhancing its control precision even without detailed modeling information. Moreover, the proposed controller guarantees robustness against uncertain water flow disturbances, effectively preserving the performance of the underwater manipulator under challenging underwater conditions. The proposed controller comprises two key elements. Firstly, a time delay estimator is employed to estimate the system states using feedback from intentional time-delayed control inputs and a pre-designed matrix. Additionally, a specially designed reaching law is incorporated to reduce reaching time and prevent chattering in the sliding mode control. The controller offers several advantages, including easy implementation, insensitivity to model uncertainties, and robustness in the underwater environment. Simulations and experiments demonstrate the ability of the proposed controller to effectively mitigate disturbances, eliminate chattering, and ensure precise trajectory-tracking performance. The experiments are conducted on a fully self-developed 2-degree-of-freedom (2-DOF) underwater manipulator, showcasing the superiority of the proposed controller over other alternatives.

Cell therapy has been a promising strategy for cardiac repair after myocardial infarction (MI), but a poor ischemic environment and low cell delivery efficiency remain significant challenges. The spleen serves as a hematopoietic stem cell niche and secretes cardioprotective factors after MI, but it is unclear whether it could be used for human pluripotent stem cell (hiPSC) cultivation and provide a proper microenvironment for cell grafts against the ischemic environment. Herein, we developed a splenic extracellular matrix derived thermoresponsive hydrogel (SpGel). Proteomics analysis indicated that SpGel is enriched with proteins known to modulate the Wnt signaling pathway, cell-substrate adhesion, cardiac muscle contraction and oxidation-reduction processes. In vitro studies demonstrated that hiPSCs could be efficiently induced into endothelial cells (iECs) and cardiomyocytes (iCMs) with enhanced function on SpGel. The cytoprotective effect of SpGel on iECs/iCMs against oxidative stress damage was also proven. Furthermore, in vivo studies revealed that iEC/iCM-laden SpGel improved cardiac function and inhibited cardiac fibrosis of infarcted hearts by improving cell survival, revascularization and remuscularization. In conclusion, we successfully established a novel platform for the efficient generation and delivery of autologous cell grafts, which could be a promising clinical therapeutic strategy for cardiac repair and regeneration after MI.

Stem rust, caused by Puccinia graminis f. sp. avenae (Pga) is a key disease affecting oat production worldwide. Silicon (Si) plays an essential role in enhancing plant resistance against pathogens. However, the scientific evidence of Si-mediated stem rust resistance of oat from the photosynthetic perspective has not been reported. The specific objective of this research was to investigate the effects of Si application on disease inhibition, photosynthetic gas exchange parameters, light response parameters, photosynthetic pigments and chlorophyll fluorescence parameters under Pga infection. Our results illustrated that Si application significantly reduced rust severity while the other parameters like net photosynthetic rate (Pn), stomatal conductance (Gs), intercellular CO2 concentration (Ci) and transpiration rate (Tr) were significantly increased. Si application increased maximum photosynthetic rate (Pnmax) and light saturation point (LSP), while reduced the dark respiration rate (Rd) and light compensation point (LCP). The results also indicated that Si application significantly increased the activities of maximum fluorescence (Fm), variable fluorescence (Fv), maximum quantum yield of photosystem II (Fv/Fm), photochemical quenching (qP), photosynthetic performance index (PIABS), actual PSII quantum yield (ΦPSII), electron transfer rate (ETR), the absorbed light energy per unit reaction center (ABS/RC) and the dissipated energy per unit reaction center (DIo/RC), whereas it decreased the minimal fluorescence (Fo), non-photochemical quenching (NPQ), the absorbed light energy used for electron transfer per unit reaction center (ETo/RC) and the absorbed light energy used for reduction of QA per unit reaction center (TRo/RC). The contents of chlorophyll a, b and carotenoids were also increased due to the change in the activity of parameters due to Si application as mentioned above. In conclusion, the results of the current study suggests that Si imparts tolerance to the stem rust possibly by the underlying mechanisms of improving gas exchange performance, and efficiency of the photochemical compounds in oat leaves.

BackgroundAcute kidney injury is a common renal disease with high incidence and mortality. Early identification of high-risk acute renal injury patients following renal transplant could improve their prognosis, however, no biomarker exists for early detection.MethodsThe GSE139061 dataset was used to identify hub genes in 86 DEGs between acute kidney injury and control samples using three machine learning algorithms (LASSO, random forest, and support vector machine-recursive feature elimination). We used GSEA to identify the related signal pathways of six hub genes. Finally, we validated these potential biomarkers in an in vitro hypoxia/reoxygenation injury cell model using RT-qPCR.ResultsSix hub genes (MDFI, EHBP1L1, FBXW4, MDM4, RALYL, and ESM1) were identified as potentially predictive of an acute kidney injury. The expression of ESM1 and RALYL were markedly increased in control samples, while EHBP1L1, FBXW4, MDFI, and MDM4 were markedly increased in acute kidney injury samples.ConclusionWe screened six hub genes related to acute kidney injury using three machine learning algorithms and identified genes with potential diagnostic utility. The hub genes identified in this study might play a significant role in the pathophysiology and progression of AKI. As such, they might be useful for the early diagnosis of AKI and provide the possibility of improving the prognosis of AKI patients.

Summary: The widespread use of biological tissue adhesives for tissue repair is limited by their weak adhesion in a wet environment. Herein, we report the wet adhesion mechanism of a dry granular natural bioadhesive from Andrias davidianus skin secretion (ADS). Once contacting water, ADS granules self-assemble to form a hydrophobic hydrogel strongly bonding to wet substrates in seconds. ADS showed higher shear adhesion than current commercial tissue adhesives and an impressive 72-h underwater adhesion strength of ∼47kPa on porcine skin tissue. The assembled hydrogel in water maintained a dissipation energy of ∼8 kJ/m3, comparable to the work density of muscle, exhibiting its robustness. Unlike catechol adhesion mechanism, ADS wet adhesion mechanism is attributed to water absorption by granules, and the unique equilibrium of protein hydrophobicity, hydrogen bonding, and ionic complexation. The in vivo adhesion study demonstrated its excellent wet adhesion and hemostasis performance in a rat hepatic and cardiac hemorrhage model.

Objective: To investigate the acute effects of blood flow restriction (BFR) with single-leg low load resistance exercise and high load resistance exercise on serum insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1), growth hormone (GH), and testosterone in patients with unilateral knee osteoarthritis (OA). Methods: This study recruited 18 postmenopausal female patients with mild to moderate unilateral knee OA, which was then followed by randomly conducting three resistance exercise protocols by drawing lots: 1. A 30% 1-repetition maximum (1-RM) resistance exercise with BFR of 70% arterial occlusive pressure (AOP) (BFR group); 2. A 70% 1-RM resistance exercise without BFR (RES group); 3. A 30% 1-RM resistance exercise without BFR (CON group). Blood lactate (BLA) and muscle growth related hormone levels were tested at 4-time points: before exercise, immediately after exercise, 15 min after exercise, and 30 min after exercise. Results: There was no statistical difference between the indexes in each group before exercise, but the different exercise had different effects on each index and also an interactive effect (P < 0.05). The increase of rating of perceived exertion in the BFR and RES groups, which were of similar magnitude, was greater compared to the levels in the CON group (P < 0.05). Post-exercise BLA levels were lower in the CON group in comparison to the BFR and RES groups (P < 0.05). Rather than the RES group, GH levels of the BFR group were also significantly higher than the CON group (P < 0.05) at 15 min post-exercise. At post- and 15 min after exercise, the CON group recorded significantly lower IGF-1 levels compared to the BFR and RES groups (P < 0.05). At post- and 15 min after exercise, the CON group (P < 0.05) reflected the lowest testosterone levels, followed by the RES group (P < 0.05), and the highest in the BFR group (P < 0.05). Conclusions: Myogenesis-related hormones in women with unilateral knee OA could be increased by high load resistance exercise and low load resistance exercise with BFR on unaffected limb.

PurposeThe optimal treatment procedure for shoulder calcific tendinitis (CT) remains controversial. This study aimed to assess the efficacy of arthroscopic treatment for CT, and to compare the clinical outcomes following combined rotator cuff repair and isolated removal of calcific deposits.MethodsThis retrospective cohort study included 46 patients (47 shoulders) with confirmed shoulder CT, and the diameter of the calcific deposit was over 1 cm. All patients suffered from CT for a mean period of 17.82 months and had a poor response to conservative treatment. With 12 males and 34 females included, the mean age was 53.94 years. After failed conservative treatment, 23 shoulders underwent combined rotator cuff repair (repair group), and 24 shoulders underwent isolated removal of calcific deposits (debridement group). The clinical outcomes were evaluated at baseline, 3, 6, and 12 months after the surgery and annually thereafter. The efficacy measures included the visual analog scale (VAS) pain score, American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons (ASES) score, University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) score and radiographic outcomes.ResultsRemarkable improvement in clinical outcomes at the final follow-up (2- to 5-year) compared with those at baseline were observed (p

PurposeTo compare the clinical outcomes of arthroscopic anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) repair and autograft ACL reconstruction for ACL ruptures.MethodsPubMed, EMBASE, Scopus, Web of Science and The Cochrane Library were searched for relevant studies from 1 January 1990 to 21 March 2022. Two evaluators independently screened the literature, extracted data and assessed the methodological quality of the enrolled studies. Meta-analysis was conducted using RevMan 5.4 software.ResultsTen studies with mean follow-up periods from 12 to 36 months were included. For 638 patients with ACL ruptures, arthroscopic ACL repair showed statistically comparable outcomes of failure (p = 0.18), complications (p = 0.29), reoperation other than revision (p = 0.78), Lysholm score (p = 0.78), Tegner score (p = 0.70), and satisfaction (p = 0.45) when compared with autograft ACL reconstruction. A significantly higher rate of hardware removal (p = 0.0008) but greater International Knee Documentation Committee (IKDC) score (p = 0.009) were found in the ACL repair group. The heterogeneity of the side-to-side difference of anterior tibial translation (ΔATT) was high (I2 = 80%). After the sensitivity analysis, the I2 decreased dramatically (I2 = 32%), and the knees with ACL repair showed significantly greater ΔATT (P = 0.04).ConclusionFor proximal ACL ruptures, arthroscopic ACL repair showed similar clinical outcomes, and even better functional performance when compared to autograft ACL reconstruction. ACL repair has a higher rate of hardware removal, and might be related to greater asymptomatic knee laxity. More high-quality prospective trials are needed to confirm our findings.

Abstract Anaerobic ammonium oxidation (anammox) bacteria significantly improve the efficiency and reduce cost of nitrogen removal in wastewater treatment plants. However, their slow growth and vulnerable activity limit the application of anammox technology. In this paper, the enhancement of biotin on the nitrogen removal activity of anammox bacteria in short-term batch experiments was studied. We found that biotin played a significant role in promoting anammox activity within a biotin concentration range of 0.1–1.5 mg/L. At a biotin concentration of 1.0 mg/L, the total nitrogen removal rate (NRR) increased by 112%, extracellular polymeric substance (EPS) secretion and heme production significantly improved, and anammox bacterial biomass increased to maximum levels. Moreover, the predominant genus of anammox bacteria was Candidatus Brocadia.

Highly branched poly(β-amino ester) (HPAE) has become one of the most promising non-viral gene delivery vector candidates. When compared to other gene delivery vectors, HPAE has a broad molecular weight distribution (MWD). Despite significant efforts to optimize HPAE targeting enhanced gene delivery, the effect of different molecular weight (MW) components on transfection has rarely been studied. In this work, a new structural optimization strategy was proposed targeting enhanced HPAE gene transfection. A series of HPAE with different MW components was obtained through a stepwise precipitation approach and applied to plasmid DNA delivery. It was demonstrated that the removal of small MW components from the original HPAE structure could significantly enhance its transfection performance (e.g., GFP expression increased 7 folds at w/w of 10/1). The universality of this strategy was proven by extending it to varying HPAE systems with different MWs and different branching degrees, where the transfection performance exhibited an even magnitude enhancement after removing small MW portions. This work opened a new avenue for developing high-efficiency HPAE gene delivery vectors and provided new insights into the understanding of the HPAE structure–property relationship, which would facilitate the translation of HPAEs in gene therapy clinical applications.

Purpose: Surgical options for long head of the biceps tendon (LHBT) lesions include tenotomy and tenodesis. This study aims to determine the optimal surgical strategy for LHBT lesions with updated evidence from randomised controlled trials (RCTs). Methods: Literature was retrieved from PubMed, Cochrane Library, Embase and Web of Science on 12 January 2022. Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) comparing the clinical outcomes of tenotomy and tenodesis were pooled in the meta-analyses. Results: Ten RCTs with 787 cases met the inclusion criteria, and were included in the meta-analysis. Constant scores (MD, −1.24; p = 0.001), improvement of Constant scores (MD, −1.54; p = 0.04), Simple Shoulder Test (SST) scores (MD, −0.73; p = 0.03) and improvement of SST (p < 0.05) were significantly better in patients with tenodesis. Tenotomy was associated with higher rates of Popeye deformity (OR, 3.34; p < 0.001) and cramping pain (OR, 3.36; p = 0.008]. No significant differences were noticed between tenotomy and tenodesis regarding pain (p = 0.59), American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons (ASES) score (p = 0.42) and its improvement (p = 0.91), elbow flexion strength (p = 0.38), forearm supination strength (p = 0.68) and range of motion of shoulder external rotation (p = 0.62). Subgroup analyses showed higher Constant scores in all tenodesis types and significantly larger improvement of Constant scores regarding intracuff tenodesis (MD, −5.87; p = 0.001). Conclusions: According to the analyses of RCTs, tenodesis better improves shoulder function in terms of Constant scores and SST scores, and reduces the risk of Popeye deformity and cramping bicipital pain. Intracuff tenodesis might offer the best shoulder function as measured with Constant scores. However, tenotomy and tenodesis provide similar satisfactory results for pain relief, ASES score, biceps strength and shoulder range of motion.

A series of novel phenomena such as optical nonlinear enhancement effect, transmission enhancement, orientation effect, high sensitivity to refractive index, negative refraction and dynamic regulation of low threshold can be generated by the control of surface plasmon (SP) with metal micro-nano structure and metal/material composite structure. The application of SP in nano-photonics, super-resolution imaging, energy, sensor detection, life science, and other fields shows an important prospect. Silver nanoparticles are one of the commonly used metal materials for SP because of their high sensitivity to refractive index change, convenient synthesis, and high controllable degree of shape and size. In this review, the basic concept, fabrication, and applications of silver-based surface plasmon sensors are summarized.

Objectives. Curcumin is a potential complementary treatment for ulcerative colitis (UC). This overview systematically summarizes and evaluates the existing evidence of curcumin in the treatment of UC. Methods. Two researchers searched seven databases for systematic reviews (SRs)/meta-analyses (MAs) which are about randomized controlled trials (RCTs) on curcumin for UC. Two researchers use the Assessment of Multiple Systematic Reviews 2 (AMSTAR-2), the Risk of Bias in Systematic Reviews (ROBIS) scale, the list of Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA), and the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) system to assess the included SRs/MAs. Results. Seven published SRs/MAs were included in our study. According to the results of the AMSTAR-2 assessment, all SRs/MAs are considered to be of very low quality. According to the ROBIS evaluation results, no SR/MA has been assessed as a low risk of bias. According to the results of the PRISMA checklist assessment, no SR/MA has been fully reported on the PRISMA checklist. According to GRADE, a total of 19 outcome indicators extracted from the included SRs/MAs were evaluated. The quality of evidence was 10 moderate, 6 low, and 3 very low. Conclusions. Curcumin may be an effective and safe complementary treatment for UC. However, further standard and comprehensive SRs/MAs and RCTs are needed to provide an evidence-based medical rationale for this.

Short-term rainfall prediction by radar echo map extrapolation has been a very hot area of research in recent years, which is also an area worth studying owing to its importance for precipitation disaster prevention. Existing methods have some shortcomings. In terms of image indicators, the predicted images are not clear enough and lack small-scale details, while in terms of precipitation accuracy indicators, the prediction is not accurate enough. In this paper, we proposed a two-stage model (two-stage UA-GAN) to achieve more accurate prediction echo images with more details. For the first stage, we used the Trajectory Gated Recurrent Unit (TrajGRU) model to carry out a pre-prediction, which proved to have a good ability to capture spatiotemporal movement of rain field. In the second stage, we proposed a spatiotemporal attention enhanced Generative Adversarial Networks (GAN) model with a U-Net structure and a new deep residual attention module in order to carry out the refinement and improvement of the first-stage prediction. Experimental results showed that our model outperforms the optical-flow based method Real-Time Optical Flow by Variational Methods for Echoes of Radar (ROVER), and some well-known Recurrent Neural Network (RNN)-based models (TrajGRU, PredRNN++, ConvGRU, Convolutional Long Short-Term Memory (ConvLSTM)) in terms of both image detail indexes and precipitation accuracy indexes, and is visible to the naked eye to have better accuracy and more details.

Surface defect detection aims to classify and locate a certain defect that exists in the target surface area. It is an important part of industrial quality inspection. Most of the research on surface defect detection are currently based on convolutional neural networks (CNNs), which are more concerned with local information and lack global perception. Thus, CNNs are unable to effectively extract the defect features. In this paper, a defect detection method based on the Swin transformer is proposed. The structure of the Swin transformer has been fine-tuned so that it has five scales of output, making it more suitable for defect detection tasks with large variations in target size. A bi-directional feature pyramid network is used as the feature fusion part to efficiently fuse to the extracted features. The focal loss is used as a loss function to weight the hard- and easy-to-distinguish samples, potentially making the model fit the surface defect data better. To reduce the number of parameters in the model, a shared detection head was chosen for result prediction. Experiments were conducted on the flange surface defect dataset and the steel surface defect dataset, respectively. Compared with the classical CNNs target detection algorithm, our method improves the mean average precision (mAP) by about 15.4%, while the model volume and detection speed are essentially the same as those of the CNNs-based method. The experimental results show that our proposed method is more competitive compared with CNNs-based methods and has some generality for different types of defects.

Many polymeric gene delivery nano-vectors with hyperbranched structures have been demonstrated to be superior to their linear counterparts. The higher delivery efficacy is commonly attributed to the abundant terminal groups of branched polymers, which play critical roles in cargo entrapment, material-cell interaction, and endosome escape. Hyperbranched poly(β-amino ester)s (HPAEs) have developed as a class of safe and efficient gene delivery vectors. Although numerous research has been conducted to optimise the HPAE structure for gene delivery, the effect of the secondary amine residue on its backbone monomer, which is considered the non-ideal termination, has never been optimised. In this work, the effect of the non-ideal termination was carefully evaluated. Moreover, a series of HPAEs with only ideal terminations were synthesised by adjusting the backbone synthesis strategy to further explore the merits of hyperbranched structures. The HPAE obtained from modified synthesis methods exhibited more than twice the amounts of the ideal terminal groups compared to the conventional ones, determined by NMR. Their transfection performance enhanced significantly, where the optimal HPAE candidates developed in this study outperformed leading commercial benchmarks for DNA delivery, including Lipofectamine 3000, jetPEI, and jetOPTIMUS.

Stem rust, caused by Puccinia graminis f. sp. avenae (Pga) Eriks. and E. Henn., is a worldwide and harmful disease of oat (Avena sativa L.). Currently, no resistant varieties are used in production as the molecular resistance mechanism of oat to stem rust remains unclear. Here, oat plants were inoculated with Pga pathogens, and the metabolome and transcriptome of leaves were detected to investigate the molecular and physiological changes. Our results showed that Pga inoculation increased the activities of superoxide dismutase (SOD), peroxidase (POD), catalase (CAT), and phenylalnine ammonialyase (PAL), which triggered defense responses. The transcriptomic and metabolomic analyses were performed to detect the key genes and metabolites of oat interacting with Pga. We identified 1814 upregulated and 1955 downregulated genes in Pga infected leaves. These genes were mainly involved in the ‘phenylpropanoid biosynthesis’, ‘flavonoid biosynthesis’, and ‘photosynthesis-antenna proteins’. We also detected 162 differential metabolites between Pga-infected and non-infected leaves, including flavonoids and derivatives, amino acids, organic acids, and carbohydrates. The integrated analysis revealed four pathways, including the ‘citrate cycle’, ‘cysteine and methionine metabolism’, ‘tryptophan metabolism’, and ‘glyoxylate and dicarboxylate metabolism’. The networks for these pathways were subsequently constructed. Overall, the results suggested that oat plants fight against Pga by activating the metabolism of amino acids, organic acids, and flavonoids. This study provides valuable molecular information about the response of oat to Pga infection.

Platinum (Pt)-based multi-metallic nanostructures show great promise as electrocatalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) in fuel cell cathodes. Herein, we report a simple, one-step surfactant-directed synthetic strategy to directly synthesize tri-metallic PtPdNi mesoporous nanospheres (PtPdNi MNs) in a high yield. The synthesis could be accomplished in aqueous solution at mild reaction temperature (40 °C) without needing any organic solvent, yielding well-dispersed PtPdNi MNs with uniform shape and narrow size distribution. Benefitting from their unique mesoporous and highly open structure and tri-metallic composition, the as-synthesized PtPdNi MNs demonstrate superior catalytic activity and stability for ORR in acidic solution in comparison with PtPdNi nanodendrites (PtPdNi NDs), PtPd MNs and commercial Pt/C catalyst. The present approach may open a reliable path to the design of advanced electrocatalysts with desired performance. Keywords: Tri-metallic PtPdNi, Mesoporous structures, Nanospheres, Oxygen reduction reaction, Electrocatalysts

Shallow urban groundwater interacts with surface water and underground infrastructures. Low-impact development in urban water management by at-source infiltration should consider shallow urban groundwater in a holistic manner. Traditional hydrological models, however, rarely detail groundwater flows and their interaction with urban runoff and the water budget. In the present study, a new approach is proposed, using the integration of a flow module WTI for the saturated zone in a distributed urban hydrological model URBS-MO. This integration is carried out by paying attention to retaining the initial waterflow subsurface parameterization. The performance of the integrated model is evaluated by piezometric and runoff data in an experimental urban catchment, through a sensitivity analysis and a manual calibration of the main model parameters, as well as a validation step. The new module shows its capacity to improve groundwater flow simulation by assessing more realistic water table variations, along with a very small improvement of flowrate simulation. The bias on the average groundwater level was reduced from +14 to +7% for the one-year validation period. The modelling results show the importance of parameter calibration for distributed physically-based hydrological models. Difficulties in the calibration of parameter values due to spatial heterogeneities are also revealed, as the use of piezometric data for the calibration of a hydrological model is rather innovative.

Existing end-to-end cloud registration methods are often inefficient and susceptible to noise. We propose an end-to-end point cloud registration network model, Point Transformer for Registration Network (PTRNet), that considers local and global features to improve this behavior. Our model uses point clouds as inputs and applies a Transformer method to extract their global features. Using a K-Nearest Neighbor (K-NN) topology, our method then encodes the local features of a point cloud and integrates them with the global features to obtain the point cloud’s strong global features. Comparative experiments using the ModelNet40 data set show that our method offers better results than other methods, with a mean square error (MSE), root mean square error (RMSE), and mean absolute error (MAE) between the ground truth and predicted values lower than those of competing methods. In the case of multi-object class without noise, the rotation average absolute error of PTRNet is reduced to 1.601 degrees and the translation average absolute error is reduced to 0.005 units. Compared to other recent end-to-end registration methods and traditional point cloud registration methods, the PTRNet method has less error, higher registration accuracy, and better robustness.

Baicalein (BAI) is an acknowledged flavonoids compound, which is regarded as a useful therapeutic pharmaceutical for numerous cancers. However, its involvement in melanoma is largely unknown. This study aimed to examine the anti-melanoma function of BAI and unraveled the regulatory mechanism involved. A375 and SK-MEL-28 were treated with BAI for 24 h. Then, CCK-8 assay, flow cytometry, and transwell assay were carried out to investigate cell growth, migration, and invasion. RT-qPCR was applied to detect the expression of colon cancer associated transcript-1 (CCAT1) in melanoma tissues and cells. The functions of CCAT1 in melanoma cells were also evaluated. Western blot was utilized to appraise Wnt/β-catenin or MEK/ERK pathways. BAI restrained cell proliferation and stimulated cell apoptotic capability of melanoma by suppressing cleaved-caspase-3 and cleaved-PARP. Cell migratory and invasive abilities were restrained by BAI via inhibiting MMP-2 and vimentin. CCAT1 was over-expressed in melanoma tissues and down-regulated by BAI in melanoma cells. Overexpressed CCAT1 reversed the BAI-induced anti-growth, anti-migratory, and anti-invasive effects. Furthermore, BAI inhibited Wnt/β-catenin and MEK/ERK pathways-axis via regulating CCAT1. Our study indicated that BAI blocked Wnt/β-catenin and MEK/ERK pathways via regulating CCAT1, thereby inhibiting melanoma cell proliferation, migration, and invasion.

In this paper, we propose a new method for detecting abnormal human behavior based on skeleton features using self-attention augment graph convolution. The skeleton data have been proved to be robust to the complex background, illumination changes, and dynamic camera scenes and are naturally constructed as a graph in non-Euclidean space. Particularly, the establishment of spatial temporal graph convolutional networks (ST-GCN) can effectively learn the spatio-temporal relationships of Non-Euclidean Structure Data. However, it only operates on local neighborhood nodes and thereby lacks global information. We propose a novel spatial temporal self-attention augmented graph convolutional networks (SAA-Graph) by combining improved spatial graph convolution operator with a modified transformer self-attention operator to capture both local and global information of the joints. The spatial self-attention augmented module is used to understand the intra-frame relationships between human body parts. As far as we know, we are the first group to utilize self-attention for video anomaly detection tasks by enhancing spatial temporal graph convolution. Moreover, to validate the proposed model, we performed extensive experiments on two large-scale publicly standard datasets (i.e., ShanghaiTech Campus and CUHK Avenue datasets) which reveal the state-of-art performance for our proposed approach when compared to existing skeleton-based methods and graph convolution methods.

Recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa (RDEB) is a rare autosomal inherited skin disorder caused by mutations in the COL7A1 gene that encodes type VII collagen (C7). The development of an efficient gene replacement strategy for RDEB is mainly hindered by the lack of vectors able to encapsulate and transfect the large cDNA size of this gene. To address this problem, our group has opted to use polymeric-based non-viral delivery systems and minicircle DNA. With this approach, safety is improved by avoiding the usage of viruses, the absence of bacterial backbone, and the replacement of the control viral cytomegalovirus (CMV) promoter of the gene with human promoters. All the promoters showed impressive C7 expression in RDEB skin cells, with eukaryotic translation elongation factor 1 α (EF1α) promoter producing higher C7 expression levels than CMV following minicircle induction, and COL7A1 tissue-specific promoter (C7P) generating C7 levels similar to normal human epidermal keratinocytes. The improved system developed here has a high potential for use as a non-viral topical treatment to restore C7 in RDEB patients efficiently and safely, and to be adapted to other genetic conditions.