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Objective To evaluate the morphology of the upper airway of children with obstructive sleep apnea-hypopnea syndrome (OSAHS) using cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) combined with polysomnography (PSG) and provide references for clinical practice. Methods CBCT data of 45 OSAHS children and 45 normal children and PSG data of the OSAHS group were retrospectively collected. Three-dimensional reconstructions were performed using NNT 9.0 software. The total upper airway volume, nasopharyngeal volume, palatopharyngeal volume, glossopharyngeal volume, laryngopharyngeal volume, minimum cross-sectional area, anterior-posterior diameter of the minimum cross-section, and lateral diameter of the minimum cross-section were measured and recorded. According to PSG monitoring results, patients with an obstructive apnea hypopnea index (OAHI) and lowest oxygen saturation (LSaO2) were assessed. Body mass index (BMI) was recorded. The correlation between airway volume parameters, BMI and PSG test results was analyzed. Results The total upper airway volume, nasopharyngeal volume, palatopharyngeal volume, glossopharyngeal volume, laryngopharyngeal volume, minimum cross-sectional area, anterior-posterior diameter of the minimum cross-section, and lateral diameter of the minimum cross-section of the OSAHS group were significantly reduced compared with those of the control group (P0.05). No significant correlation was noted between BMI and PSG in the OSAHS group (P>0.05). Conclusion The morphology of the upper airway of children with OSAHS was significantly smaller than that of normal children. CBCT three-dimensional technology for analyzing the upper airway has a certain value in evaluating the morphology and degree of obstruction of the upper airway in children with OSAHS.

In this work, fabrication of Cu2O@Cu1.75S core‐shell octahedrons was achieved through a facile water bath stirring process. Compared with pure Cu2O, the composite showed enhanced sensing performance for NO2. The response value of Cu2O@Cu1.75S to 5 ppm NO2 at 40 °C is seven times that of Cu2O to 5 ppm NO2 at 75 °C. Moreover, Cu2O@Cu1.75S has the ability to detect 100 ppb NO2 and has good NO2 sensing selectivity and long‐term stability. This study shows that Cu2O@Cu1.75S hybrid is a type of outstanding NO2 gas sensing material on account of its low working temperature and high sensing sensitivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Genetic modification of industrial yeast strains often faces more difficulties than that of laboratory strains. Thus, new approaches are still required. In this research, the Angel Yeast‐derived haploid strain Kα was genetically modified by multiple rounds of δ‐integration, which was achieved via URA3 recycling. Three δ‐integrative plasmids, pGδRU, pGδRU‐BGL, and pGδRU‐EG, were first constructed with two 167 bp δ sequences and a repeat‐URA3‐repeat fragment. Then, the δ‐integrative strains containing the bgl1 or egl2 gene were successfully obtained by one‐time transformation of the linearized pGδRU‐BGL or pGδRU‐EG fragment, respectively. Their counterparts in which the URA3 gene was looped out were also easily isolated by selection for growth on 5´‐fluoroorotic acid plates, although the ratio of colonies lacking URA3 to the total number of colonies decreased with increasing copy number of the corresponding integrated cellulase‐encoding gene. Similar results were observed during the second round of δ‐integration, in which the δ‐integration strain Kα(δ::bgl1‐repeat) obtained from the first round was transformed with a linearized pGδRU‐EG fragment. After 10 rounds of cell growth and transfer to fresh medium, the doubling times and enzyme activities of Kα(δ::bgl1‐repeat), Kα(δ::egl2‐repeat), and Kα(δ::bgl1‐repeat)(δ::egl2‐repeat) showed no significant change and were stable. Further, their maximum ethanol concentrations during simultaneous saccharification and fermentation of pretreated corncob over a 7‐day period were 46.35, 33.13, and 51.77 g/L, respectively, which were all substantially higher than the parent Kα strain. Thus, repetitive δ‐integration with URA3 recycling can be a feasible and valuable method for genetic engineering of Angel Yeast. These results also provide clues about some important issues related to δ‐integration, such as the structural stability of δ‐integrated genes and the effects of individual integration‐site locations on gene expression. Further be elucidation of these issues should help to fully realize the potential of δ‐integration‐based methods in industrial yeast breeding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sewage and sludge are usually treated separately. Considering improving sludge treatment while improving sewage treatment is beneficial to the synergetic effect of sewage treatment and sludge treatment. The efficiency of pulverized coal-activated sludge (PAS) on contaminant removal, sludge calorific value, and combustion characteristic was investigated in contrast to conventional activated sludge (CAS) using the laboratory-scale sequencing batch reactor (SBR). Results indicated that the average chemical oxygen demand, ammonium nitrogen, total nitrogen, and total phosphorus removal efficiency of PAS were highest under a dosage of 0.4 g/L, which were 98.56%, 94.22%, 68.60%, and 95.96%, respectively. The average effluent concentration satisfied the Level A discharge standard of pollutants for municipal wastewater treatment plants (GB18918-2002). The calorific value and maximum weight loss of PAS gradually increased adjusting the dosage of pulverized coal. At the pulverized coal dosage of 0.2 g/L, the calorific value of PAS with 70% water content is 3,824.07 kJ/kg, which can satisfy the requirement of self-maintained combustion. Overall, the pulverized coal can simultaneously improve the treatment of wastewater in SBR and promote the sludge combustion by increasing calorific value. Therefore, PAS system is an innovation based on improving the sewage treatment sludge combustion. PRACTITIONER POINTS: An innovative method to simultaneously improving wastewater treatment and sewage sludge combustion using pulverized coal-activated sludge was developed. The average COD, NH 4 + - N , TN, and TP removal efficiency of PAS-0.4 is best. The 70% moisture content sludge calorific values of 3,824.07 kJ/kg in PAS-0.2 can satisfy the requirement of self-maintained combustion., (© 2020 Water Environment Federation.)

An ordered g-C 3 N 4 - and polyaniline-modified titanium oxide nanotube array (g-C 3 N 4 - and PANI-co-modified TiO 2 NTAs) was successfully synthesized and used as a photocatalyst. Polyaniline (PANI) was coated onto TiO 2 NTAs by electrochemical polycondensation, and g-C 3 N 4 was deposited via the soaking adsorption method. The photocatalysts were examined by several technologies. The experiments demonstrated that the amount of g-C 3 N 4 and PANI, as well as the initial pH value, had significant effects on the photocatalytic efficiency. The resulting photocatalysts exhibited high visible light photocatalytic ability for tetrabromobisphenol A (TBBPA) for two reasons. First, PANI expanded the light absorption into the visible region. Second, rapid and efficient separation of photoinduced charges from the photogenerated potential difference were produced at the contact interface of g-C 3 N 4 and PANI-co-modified TiO 2 NTAs. The •OH, [Formula: see text] and h + were dominant components for the photocatalytic degradation of TBBPA. In addition, the g-C 3 N 4 and PANI-co-modified TiO 2 NTAs have excellent long-term stability., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)