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Osteoclasts overactivity plays a critical role in the progress of inflammatory bone loss. In addition, ROS can facilitate the formation and function of osteoclasts. Silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) with ROS scavenging activity are potential candidates for inflammatory bone loss. In this regard, the biosynthetic Ag NPs with low toxicity and high stability by using Flos Sophorae Immaturus extract as the reducing and capping agents are reported. The inflammatory bone loss model is established by injecting LPS. Quantitative reverse transcription‐polymerase chain reaction and Western Blot are utilized to determine the expression level of target biomarkers related to osteoclast formation. Ag NPs can significantly reduce the number of TRAP‐positive (TRAP+) cells. In addition, Ag NPs down‐regulate the expression of biomarkers relevant to osteoclast formation. Interestingly, Ag NPs can effectively suppress osteoclast formation via down‐regulating ROS‐mediated phosphorylation of NF‐κB pathways. The in vivo study shows that Ag NPs can ameliorate bone density and decrease osteoclast number. Due to these benefits, the constructed Ag NPs can delay the progression of inflammatory bone loss. These findings suggest that Ag NPs are a potential therapeutic agent in the treatment of inflammatory bone loss. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Co‐based metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) as electrocatalysts for two‐electron oxygen reduction reaction (2e− ORR) are highly promising for H2O2 production, but suffer from the intrinsic activity‐selectivity trade‐off. Herein, we report a ZnCo bimetal‐triazole framework (ZnCo‐MTF) as high‐efficiency 2e− ORR electrocatalysts. The experimental and theoretical results demonstrate that the coordination between 1,2,3‐triazole and Co increases the antibonding‐orbital occupancy on the Co−N bond, promoting the activation of Co center. Besides, the adjacent Zn−Co sites on 1,2,3‐triazole enable an asymmetric "side‐on" adsorption mode of O2, favoring the reduction of O2 molecules and desorption of OOH* intermediate. By virtue of the unique ligand effect, the ZnCo‐MTF exhibits a 2e− ORR selectivity of ≈100 %, onset potential of 0.614 V and H2O2 production rate of 5.55 mol gcat−1 h−1, superior to the state‐of‐the‐art zeolite imidazole frameworks. Our work paves the way for the design of 2e− ORR electrocatalysts with desirable coordination and electronic structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Insulin receptor substrate 1 and 2 (IRS1/2) have been found involved in many cancers development and their inhibitors exert significant tumor‐suppressive effects. Here, we tried to explore the function of NT157, an IGF1R‐IRS1/2 inhibitor, in ovarian cancer. We treated ovarian cancer cells with varying doses of NT157. The MTT assay was employed to evaluate cell proliferation and colony formation assay was used for detecting colony‐forming ability. TUNEL assay was adopted to test cell apoptosis. Cell invasion was checked by the Transwell assay. The expression of apoptosis‐related proteins, autophagy markers, IRS1/2, and PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway was compared by Western blot, immunofluorescence, or qRT‐PCR. As indicated by the data, NT157 abated the viability, proliferation, and induced autophagy of ovarian cancer cells. Overexpressing IRS1/2 attenuated the tumor‐suppressive effect of NT157 and heightened the PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway activation. Inhibition of the PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway enhanced the tumor‐suppressive effect of NT157 and facilitated NT157‐mediated autophagy. However, the autophagy inhibitor 3‐MA partly reversed NT‐157‐mediated antitumor effects. In conclusion, this study disclosed that NT157 suppressed the malignant phenotypes of ovarian cancer cells by inducing autophagy and hampering the expression of IRS1/2 and PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Semantic segmentation is a hot topic in computer vision and various deep learning networks are designed to achieve higher accuracy on that by fully exploring the capability of neural networks. This paper aims to address the issue and proposes the substructures with novelty for popular networks. Meanwhile, we present a cross‐channel structure, which simultaneously reduces parameter while the kernel size becomes larger. After that, to overcome the weakness of insufficient dataset which refers to satellite image data, we propose a feature attention mechanism with generative adversarial network to enhance the images' features. We show the recognition result on the satellite image dataset with a large picture. This paper evaluates substructures on the PASCAL VOC2012 dataset and improves the mIOU from 74.68% to 88.15%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Pneumonia is a serious pediatric lung injury disease caused by Mycoplasma pneumoniae (M. pneumoniae) with increasing global prevalence every year. The WHO has reported that nearly 19% of children die due to pneumonia worldwide. Objective: The present research was conducted to discover the ameliorative properties of geraniol against M. pneumoniae‐provoked pneumonia in mice through the modulation of inflammatory responses. Methodology: The pneumonia was provoked in the male Swiss albino mice via infecting animals with 100 µl of M. pneumoniae for 2 days and supplemented concurrently with 20 mg/kg of geraniol for 3 days. 100 mg/kg of azithromycin was used as a standard drug. The nitric oxide (NO) level and MPO activity were measured using kits. The SOD activity, GSH, and MDA levels were studied using standard methods. The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) study was performed to examine the M. pneumoniae DNA load. The inflammatory cytokines status was assessed by assay kits. The ERK1/2, JNK1/2, and NF‐κB expressions were studied by reverse‐transcription (RT‐PCR). The lung tissues were analyzed microscopically to investigate the histological alterations. Results: Geraniol treatment effectively reduced lung weight, NO level, and MPO activity in the pneumonia mice. The total cells and M. pneumoniae DNA load were also decreased by the geraniol. The SOD activity and GSH level were improved and MDA was decreased by the geraniol treatment. The IL‐1, IL‐6, IL‐8, TNF‐α, and TGF status were appreciably depleted by the geraniol in the pneumonia mice. Geraniol also suppressed the ERK1/2 and NF‐κB expressions in the lung tissues. Histological findings also suggest the therapeutic roles of geraniol against pneumonia in mice. Conclusion: In summary, our results proved the beneficial roles of geraniol against the M. pneumoniae‐provoked pneumonia. Geraniol could be a hopeful therapeutic agent to treat pneumonia in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Hyperuricemia is an independent risk factor for onset and progression of kidney disease. However, there remains a lack of a reliable and noninvasive biomarker to identify and monitor the changes of renal function in patients with hyperuricemia.Purpose: To assess the utility of intravoxel incoherent motion (IVIM) parameters in identifying the early changes of renal function in patients with hyperuricemia.Study Type: Retrospective case-control study.Population: Eighty-four male participants, including asymptomatic hyperuricemia (AH, 27 cases), gouty arthritis (GA, 31 cases), and 26 age-matched healthy controls.Field Strength/sequence: 3.0T; intravoxel incoherent motion (IVIM).Assessment: Differences in the IVIM parameters among the three groups were assessed. Pure molecular diffusion (D value); perfusion-related diffusion (D* value); pseudodiffusion fraction (f value); apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC value); estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR). Also, they were correlated with eGFR.Statistical Tests: Bonferroni test, Tamhane's T2 method, and Pearson correlation analysis.Results: The D values in renal cortex and medulla significantly decreased from the control, AH to GA groups (P < 0.05). The GA patients had a significantly lower cortical f value than the controls and AH patients (P < 0.05). The medullary f values in the AH and GA patients were significantly lower than that in the controls (P < 0.05). Also, the cortical and medullary ADC values had similar results across the three groups (P < 0.05), except for the comparison between the AH and GA groups (P = 0.668, P = 0.111, respectively). No significant correlation was found between any IVIM parameters with eGFR.Data Conclusion: IVIM imaging may be helpful for detecting the early changes of renal function induced by hyperuricemia. The D value could be the most sensitive IVIM-derived parameter in the assessment of renal function in patients with hyperuricemia in this study.Level Of Evidence: 3 Technical Efficacy Stage: 3 J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2020;51:833-840. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a stable porous biomass carbon (BC) and gold (Au) nanoparticles modified carbon ionic liquid electrode (CILE) was prepared for the investigation of direct electrochemistry and electrocatalysis of myoglobin (Mb). BC was synthesized via pyrolysis of Hainan's natural tropical plant Lagerstroemia indica leaves, which was modified on the surface of CILE with Au nanoparticles further electrodeposited on the electrode surface. Then, Mb was cast on the nanocomposite‐modified electrode to obtain an electrochemical sensing platform with Nafion film (Nafion/Mb/Au−BC/CILE). Direct electrochemistry of Mb on the modified electrode was investigated with appearance of a pair of enhanced redox peaks, indicating direct electron transfer rate of Mb was accelerated due to the presence of Au−BC nanocomposite. Au−BC nanocomposite exhibited high conductivity, good biocompatibility, and large surface area, which was beneficial for electron transfer of Mb. The Mb modified electrode showed excellent electrocatalytic activity toward the reduction of trichloroacetic acid (TCA) and sodium nitrite (NaNO2), which was further used to establish a new electroanalytical method with satisfied sensitivity in real samples analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: The amount of outsourced data grows rapidly. In recent years, cloud service providers integrate data deduplication systems with convergent encryption (CE) methods, in which a file encryption key is determined by its own content instead of the secret of a specific user, to save the storage cost and ensure the security of outsourced data. However, present secure deduplication systems failed to deal with data modifications efficiently. We observe that when a client makes small changes on an existing file, the current chunking algorithms cannot effectively detect the similarities and always create chunks with largely overlapped contents. It reduces data deduplication ratios and results in unnecessary overhead. In this paper, we propose Sed‐Dedup, an efficient secure delta encoding deduplication system to address this problem. In Sed‐Dedup, we introduce a novel delta encoding approach to store modified contents in delta files and leave the original files intact. Two schemes with different encoding policies are designed. Both of them can solve the issue and improve the secure deduplication performance. To evaluate the performance, we implement a prototype and conduct extensive experiments based on synthetic and real‐world datasets. Our experimental results show that Sed‐Dedup is superior to the state‐of‐the‐art secure deduplication systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Traffic bottlenecks dynamically change with the variance of traffic demand. Identifying traffic bottlenecks plays an important role in traffic planning and provides decision making. However, traffic bottlenecks are difficult to identify because of the complexity of traffic road networks and many other factors. In this article, we propose an influence spreading based method to find the dynamic changed traffic bottlenecks, where the influence caused by bottlenecks is maximal. We first build a traffic congestion diffusion (TCD) model to capture traffic flow influence (TFI) spreading over traffic road networks. The bottlenecks identification problem based on TCD is modeled as an influence maximization problem, that is, selecting the most influential nodes such that the deterioration of traffic condition is maximal. With the proof of the submodularity of TFI spreading over traffic networks, a provably near‐optimal algorithm is used to solve the NP‐hard problem. With the exploration of unique properties of TFI spread, an approximate influence maximization method for TCD (TCD‐AIM) is proposed. To the best of our knowledge, this should be the first model for a metro‐city scale from the influence perspective. Experimental results show that TCD‐AIM finds bottlenecks with up to 130% congestion density increase in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND The paper‐making industry has developed rapidly in recent years. The paper‐making process consumes much water and generates large amounts of wastewater. The reuse of the produced wastewater helps to save water consumption and reduce environmental pollution. Effective methods to treat and recycle paper‐making wastewater are urgently sought. RESULTS: In this study, the performance of a full‐scale internal circulation–anoxic/oxic (IC‐A/O)–ultrafiltration (UF)–reverse osmosis (RO) membrane system for reclamation and reuse of paper‐making wastewater was investigated. Results showed that the integrated system presented a stable and highly efficient performance. The effluent concentrations of chemical oxygen demand, total organic carbon, biochemical oxygen demand , NH4+ nitrogen and total nitrogen were 12, 4, 0.3, 0.5 and 2.9 mg L−1. gas chromatographic–mass spectrometric results showed that the organic composition in each process of the IC‐AO‐UF‐RO system varied significantly. Acute biological toxicity was obviously reduced, with an effluent toxic unit value of 3.11. The results of particle size distribution indicated that anaerobic granular sludge (around 3 mm) was formed in an IC reactor. Anaerolinea, Propioniciclava and Thauera were the main contributors to pollutant removal. Advanced treatment by the UF‐RO system achieved complete removal of suspended solids, silt density index and turbidity with little hardness and conductivity in the final effluent, which allowed for reclamation of paper‐making wastewater. CONCLUSION: Water reuse and energy recycling were successfully realized in the built‐up IC‐AO–membrane reactor system. © 2020 Society of Chemical Industry [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common sustained arrhythmia, and catheter ablation has been shown to be a highly effective treatment for patients with symptomatic AF. Very early recurrence (VER) of AF within 7 days after catheter ablation is common, but the clinical significance of VER remains unclear. We have examined the usefulness of the noninvasive electrocardiography monitor for the detection of VER and the relationship between VER and late recurrence (LR). Methods: Eighty‐eight patients with paroxysmal or persistent atrial fibrillation were retrospectively included. All patients underwent primary catheter ablation at a large general hospital between March 2016 and August 2018. All patients were followed up in atrial fibrillation clinic at an interval of every 3 months for late recurrence of AF. VER was evaluated by one‐lead continuous noninvasive electrocardiography monitoring device for 7 days after ablation. The association between VER and LR was analyzed by univariate and multivariate Cox regression model. Results: Mean age was 62.9 ± 9.7 years, and 39.8% were female. Thirty‐two patients (36.4%) experienced VER. After a mean follow‐up of 539.36 ± 211.66 days, 17 patients (19.3%) experienced LR. Multivariate Cox regression analysis revealed VER was an independent predictor of LR: HR 3.6 (95% CI, 1.2–10.8), p =.020. In addition, diabetes was also associated with LR of atrial fibrillation. Conclusions: Noninvasive electrocardiography monitoring was a useful tool for detecting VER and VER after catheter ablation was associated with LR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ability to develop bifunctional electrocatalysts for concurrent CO2 reduction reaction (CO2RR) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is the key to the practical application of CO2 splitting to produce CO. However, this remains a grand challenge. Herein, a robust strategy to rationally craft hierarchical structured bifunctional electrocatalysts composed of 3D CoS2 nanocages interconnected on 2D CoS2 nanosheet arrays (denoted hierarchical CoS2 nanocages) for high‐performance CO2 splitting is developed. The subsequent calcination removes the partial S edges of CoS2, thereby strongly suppressing the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) of CoS2. By combining theoretic and experimental results, for the first time, it is discovered that the plane S of CoS2, instead of S edges, are highly active for CO2RR but inactive for HER, rendering the plane S as ideal active sites for CO2RR. Intriguingly, the composition tuning via calcination and the presence of a hierarchical architecture confer hierarchical CoS2 nanocages respective outstanding CO2RR and OER performance. Notably, the hierarchical CoS2 nanocages can be exploited as bifunctional electrocatalysts for overall CO2 splitting to yield the current density of 1 mA cm−2 at a small cell voltage of 1.92 V, much lower than the widely reported values (>2.5 V). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

2D conjugated side-chain engineering is an effective strategy that is widely utilized to construct benzodithiophene-based polymers. Herein, an unconjugated side-chain strategy to design fused-benzodithiophene-based non-fullerene small molecule acceptors (SMAs) via vertical aromatic side-chain engineering on the ladder-type core is employed. Three SMAs named BTTIC-Th, BTTIC-TT, and BTTIC-Ph with thiophene, thieno[3,2-b]thiophene, and benzene, respectively, as side chains, are designed and synthesized. Three SMAs exhibit similar absorption ranges but different lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO) energy levels due to the different strength of the δ-inductive effect between vertical aromatic side chains and their electron-rich core. Organic solar cells based on PBDB-T:BTTIC-TT achieve a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 13.44%, which is higher than the PCE of devices based on PBDB-T:BTTIC-Th (12.91%) and PBDB-T:BTTIC-Ph (9.14%). The difference in device performance is investigated by electrical and morphological characterizations. A large domain size and different types of π- π stacking are found in the bulk heterojunction layer of PBDB-T:BTTIC-Ph blend film, which are detrimental to exciton dissociation and charge transport. Overall, it is demonstrated that when designing unconjugated side chains, thieno[3,2-b]thiophene is superior to thiophene and benzene through its dual roles of promoting the LUMO energy level and optimizing the morphology. These results shed light on the side-chain engineering of high-performance non-fullerene SMAs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nonadherence to antihypertensive medication is considered as a reason of inadequate control of blood pressure. This meta-analysis aimed to systemically evaluate the impact of fixed-dose combination (FDC) therapy on hypertensive medication adherence compared with free-equivalent combination therapies. Articles were retrieved from MEDLINE and Embase databases using a combination of terms "fixed-dose combinations" and "adherence or compliance or persistence" and "hypertension or antihypertensive" from January 2000 to June 2017 without any language restriction. A meta-analysis was performed to parallel compare the impact of FDC vs free-equivalent combination on medicine adherence or persistence. Studies were independently reviewed by two investigators. Data from eligible studies were extracted and a meta-analysis was performed using R version 3.1.0 software. A total of nine studies scored as six of nine to eight of nine for Newcastle-Ottawa rating with 62 481 patients with hypertension were finally included for analysis. Results showed that the mean difference of medication adherence for FDC vs free-equivalent combination therapies was 14.92% (95% confidence interval, 7.38%-22.46%). Patients in FDC group were more likely to persist with their antihypertensive treatment, with a risk ratio of 1.84 (95% confidence interval, 1.00-3.39). This meta-analysis confirmed that FDC therapy, compared with free-equivalent combinations, was associated with better medication adherence or persistence for patients with hypertension. It can be reasonable for physicians, pharmacists, and policy makers to facilitate the use of FDCs for patients who need to take two or more antihypertensive drugs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Southwest China is an important biodiversity hotspot. The interactions among the complex topography, climate change, and ecological factors in the dry‐hot valley areas in southwest China may have profoundly affected the genetic structure of plant species in this region. In this study, we determined the effects of the Tanaka Line on genetic variation in the wild Bombax ceiba tree in southwest China. We sampled 224 individuals from 17 populations throughout the dry‐hot valley regions. Six polymorphic expressed sequence tag–simple sequence repeat primers were employed to sequence the PCR products using the first‐generation Sanger technique. The analysis based on population genetics suggested that B. ceiba exhibited a high level of gene diversity (HE: 0.2377–0.4775; I: 0.3997–0.7848). The 17 populations were divided into two groups by cluster analysis, which corresponded to geographic characters on each side of the Tanaka Line. In addition, a Mantel test indicated that the phylogeographic structure among the populations could be fitted to the isolation‐by‐distance model (r2 = .2553, p < .001). A barrier test indicated that there were obstacles among populations and between the two groups due to complex terrain isolation and geographic heterogeneity. We inferred that the Tanaka Line might have promoted the intraspecific phylogeographic subdivision and divergence of B. ceiba. These results provide new insights into the effects of the Tanaka Line on genetic isolation and population differentiation of plant species in southwest China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Collagen α1 type XX, which contains fibronectin type III (FN3) repeats involving six FN3 domains (referred to as the FN#1-FN#6 domains), is an unusual member of the fibril-associated collagens with interrupted triple helices (FACIT) subfamily of collagens. The results of standard protein BLAST suggest that the FN3 repeats might contribute to collagen α1 type XX acting as a cytokine receptor. To date, solution NMR structures of the FN#3, FN#4 and FN#6 domains have been determined. To obtain further structural evidence to understand the relationship between the structure and function of the FN3 repeats from collagen α1 type XX, the crystal structure of the FN#2 domain from human collagen α1 type XX (residues Pro386-Pro466; referred to as FN2-HCXX) was solved at 2.5 Å resolution. The crystal structure of FN2-HCXX shows an immunoglobulin-like fold containing a β-sandwich structure, which is formed by a three-stranded β-sheet (β1, β2 and β5) packed onto a four-stranded β-sheet (β3, β4, β6 and β7). Two consensus domains, tencon and fibcon, are structural analogues of FN2-HCXX. Fn8, an FN3 domain from human oncofoetal fibronectin, is the closest structural analogue of FN2-HCXX derived from a naturally occurring sequence. Based solely on the structural similarity of FN2-HCXX to other FN3 domains, the detailed functions of FN2-HCXX and the FN3 repeats in collagen α1 type XX cannot be identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Premise of the study: The first set of expressed sequence tag–simple sequence repeat (EST-SSR) markers were developed and characterized for Speranskia tuberculata (Euphorbiaceae), a traditional medicinal plant endemic to northern China, to explore the effects of recent habitat fragmentation on the genetic diversity and structure of this species. Methods and Results: In this study, a total of 18 novel polymorphic microsatellite (EST-SSR) markers were developed for S. tuberculata using high-throughput transcriptome sequencing. Analysis of 24 individuals of S. tuberculata from four natural populations revealed their robust polymorphic reliability. The number of alleles per locus ranged from two to 11, while the expected and observed heterozygosity per marker varied from 0.187 to 0.827 and 0.042 to 0.917, respectively. Of these markers, 13 showed good amplification results in the closely related species S. cantonensis. Conclusions: These newly generated SSR markers are expected to provide novel tools for genetic studies of S. tuberculata, which will contribute to the conservation and sustainable use of the species’ wild genetic resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase-like protein 2 (HSDL2) is a member of the short-chain dehydrogenase/reductase (SDR) subfamily of oxidoreductases and contains an N-terminal catalytic domain and a C-termianl sterol carrier protein type 2 (SCP-2) domain. In this study, the C-terminal SCP-2 domain of human HSDL2, including residues Lys318-Arg416, was produced in Escherichia coli, purified and crystallized. X-ray diffraction data were collected to 2.10 Å resolution. The crystal belonged to the trigonal space group P3121 (or P3221), with unit-cell parameters a = b = 70.4, c = 60.6 Å, α = β = 90, γ = 120°. Two protein molecules are present in the asymmetric unit, resulting in a Matthews coefficient of 2.16 Å3 Da−1 and an approximate solvent content of 43%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the propylene polymerization process, the melt index (MI), as a critical quality variable in determining the product specification, cannot be measured in real time. What we already know is that MI is influenced by a large number of process variables, such as the process temperature, pressure, and level of liquid, and a large amount of their data are routinely recorded by the distributed control system. An alternative data-driven model was explored to online predict the MI, where the least squares support vector machine was responsible for establishing the complicated nonlinear relationship between the difficult-to-measure quality variable MI and those easy-to-measure process variables, whereas the independent component analysis and particle swarm optimization technique were structurally integrated into the model to tune the best values of the model parameters. Furthermore, an online correction strategy was specially devised to update the modeling data and adjust the model configuration parameters via adaptive behavior. The effectiveness of the designed data-driven approach was illustrated by the inference of the MI in a real polypropylene manufacturing plant, and we achieved a root mean square error of 0.0320 and a standard deviation of 0.0288 on the testing dataset. This proved the good prediction accuracy and validity of the proposed data-driven approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT Two pairs of new neolignan enantiomers, (±)-torreyayunan A ( 1a/ 1b) and (±)-torreyayunan B ( 2a/ 2b), featuring a rare C-8 − C-9′ linked skeleton, were isolated from leaves and twigs of Torreya yunnanensis. Their absolute configuration involving two chiral centers was determined by combined spectral and Density Functional Theory (DFT) calculation. This is the first report of the absolute configuration of this group of neolignans. Chirality 26:825-828, 2014. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article describes a process used to isolate cembranoids from soft coral Sarcophyton. Topics discussed include characteristics of Sarcophyton corals, biological activities of the metabolites found in Sarcophyton and chemical structure of the cembranoids isolated from the coral. Also discussed are the results of the cytotoxicity evaluation of the compounds as compared with human breast cancer cells.

ABSTRACT Aristoyunnolins G ( 1) and H ( 2), two new diastereoisomeric sesquiterpenes featuring a rare aristophyllene skeleton, were isolated from the traditional Chinese medicine Aristolochia yunnanensis. Their absolute stereochemistry involving three chiral centers was determined by combined chemical, spectral, and Density Functional Theory (DFT) calculation methods. Chirality 26:189-193, 2014. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Src homology 3 (SH3) domain is a small, noncatalytic domain with a conserved sequence of about 60 amino-acid residues that interacts with proline-rich peptides to form a protein complex. In this study, the C-terminal SH3 domain of human Tks4 (residues 853-911) was expressed, purified and crystallized. X-ray diffraction data were collected to 2.3 Å resolution. The crystal belonged to the trigonal space group P3121 (or P3221), with unit-cell parameters a = b = 83.87, c = 108.44 Å, α = β = 90, γ = 120°. Calculating the self-rotation and the native Patterson function did not lead to the detection of any noncrystallographic translational symmetry. Six, seven or eight protein molecules are likely to be present in the asymmetric unit, resulting in a Matthews coefficient and approximate solvent content of 2.71 Å3 Da−1 and 55%, 2.32 Å3 Da−1 and 47%, and 2.03 Å3 Da−1 and 39%, respectively. To solve the crystal structure of the C-terminal SH3 domain of human Tks4, the isomorphous replacement method is presently being utilized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the mushroom growth of state‐of‐the‐art digital image and video manipulations tools, establishing the authenticity of multimedia content has become a challenging issue. Digital image forensics is an increasingly growing research field that symbolises a never ending struggle against forgery and tampering. This survey attempts to cover the blind techniques that have been proposed for exposing forgeries. This work dwells on the detection techniques for three of the most common forgery types, namely copy/move, splicing and retouching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SUMMARY Data centers are experiencing a remarkable growth in the number of interconnected servers. Being one of the foremost data center design concerns, network infrastructure plays a pivotal role in the initial capital investment and ascertaining the performance parameters for the data center. Legacy data center network (DCN) infrastructure lacks the inherent capability to meet the data centers growth trend and aggregate bandwidth demands. Deployment of even the highest-end enterprise network equipment only delivers around 50% of the aggregate bandwidth at the edge of network. The vital challenges faced by the legacy DCN architecture trigger the need for new DCN architectures, to accommodate the growing demands of the 'cloud computing' paradigm. We have implemented and simulated the state of the art DCN models in this paper, namely: (a) legacy DCN architecture, (b) switch-based, and (c) hybrid models, and compared their effectiveness by monitoring the network: (a) throughput and (b) average packet delay. The presented analysis may be perceived as a background benchmarking study for the further research on the simulation and implementation of the DCN-customized topologies and customized addressing protocols in the large-scale data centers. We have performed extensive simulations under various network traffic patterns to ascertain the strengths and inadequacies of the different DCN architectures. Moreover, we provide a firm foundation for further research and enhancement in DCN architectures. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims Mesenchyme forkhead 1 ( Fox C2) is an epithelial-mesenchymal transition ( EMT)-inducing factor. Previous studies have demonstrated that Fox C2 binds directly to the promoter region of p120-catenin (p120ctn). The aim of this study was to investigate the clinical significance of Fox C2 expression and the inter-relationship between Fox C2 and p120ctn, in gastric cancer. Methods and results Immunohistochemistry was used to examine the expression of Fox C2 and p120ctn proteins in 325 gastric cancer samples. Staining for Fox C2 in cancer tissues was markedly stronger than in normal tissues. High Fox C2 expression was associated significantly with differentiation, invasion depth, lymph node metastasis and tumour stage. Patients with high Fox C2 expression or low p120ctn expression had a poor prognosis. In the high p120ctn expression group, the prognosis for patients with low Fox C2 expression was better than for the high Fox C2 group. Moreover, stepwise Cox regression showed that p120ctn was an independent prognostic factor, but Fox C2 in combination with p120ctn was not correlated significantly with survival. Conclusions We found that Fox C2 and p120ctn play important roles in the progression and prognosis of gastric cancer. Moreover, Fox C2 and p120ctn should be evaluated further as novel biomarkers and therapeutic targets for gastric cancer treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims/Introduction The goal of this study was to evaluate the effect of Roux-en- Y gastric bypass ( RYGB) on hyperglycemia and gastrointestinal hormones in Chinese obese type 2 diabetic patients with body mass index ( BMI) between 28 and 35 kg/m2. Materials and Methods A total of eight obese type 2 diabetes patients with BMI 28-35 kg/m2 who underwent RYGB and 10 obese normal glucose tolerance ( NGT) patients with no surgery were identified. BMI and blood glucose on baseline, and 2-4 months postoperative, changes of glucagon-like peptide-1 ( GLP-1), glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide ( GIP), peptide YY ( PYY), and oxyntomodulin ( OXM) were recorded. Efficacy of RYGB was defined by the percentage of excess weight loss (% EWL) and amelioration of type 2 diabetes. Results The %EWL was 53.00 ± 26.25% in 2 month and 63.65 ± 33.71% in 4 month. Glycated hemoglobin changed from 7.2 ± 1.0% preoperative to 6.2 ± 0.9% in 2 month and 6.3 ± 1.2% in 4 month postoperative. The improvement rate of type 2 diabetes 4 months after RYGB was 83.3%. After surgery, area under the curve ( AUC) GLP-1 120 increased with no significance. AUC PYY 120 changed from 10.37 ± 5.45 pmol/ L/min preoperative to 22.19 ± 10.61 pmol/ L/min in 2 month and 22.04 ± 7.73 pmol/ L/min in 4 month postoperative. Postoperative AUC OXM 120 was also higher than that of the preoperative level. AUC GIP 120 decreased from 13.06 ± 8.45 pg/ mL/min preoperative to 8.71 ± 3.28 pg/ml/min in 2 month and 6.88 ± 2.33 pg/ mL/min in 4 month postoperative. Conclusions Roux-en- Y gastric bypass has a beneficial effect on weight loss and glucose metabolism in obese type 2 diabetes patients with lower BMI. Postoperative concentrations of GLP-1, PYY and OXM increased, whereas GIP decreased. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dwarf bamboos impose intense resource competition in subalpine coniferous forests, and their exclusive densities have crucial impacts on tree regeneration and understory species diversity. We studied the factors influencing the distribution and growth of dwarf bamboo, Fargesia nitida, in a subalpine forest in southwest China. TWINSPAN, based on an attribute matrix, could divide the subalpine forest into 11 sub-associations, and more clearly reflected ecological functional features of the subalpine forest than analysis based on a species matrix. TWINSPAN was also generally consistent with DCA ordination based on the attribute matrix. DCA and DCCA ordination showed relationships between the distribution of F. nitida population and environment factor. The first DCCA axis showed topography and disturbance gradients (except fallen trees and broken branches); the second DCCA axis showed canopy density and composition gradients. Stepwise multiple regression analyses showed that distribution (culm density and coverage) of F. nitida decreased significantly with landslide and slope aspect, and increased significantly with soil status. The light condition had positive effects on growth and size of bamboo. A stable environment in the northern slope and more broadleaved species dominating in canopy would increase the dwarf bamboo biomass. Thus, the disturbance regimes, the slope aspect and the BA of evergreen conifer trees can provide useful guidelines for the control and management of F. nitida populations, and in helping to understand the succession and regeneration of subalpine forest in this region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current Grid architecture suffers from high complexity, inefficiency in leveraging common PC capabilities, and the single point of failure problem originated from Grid's client–server mode of interaction. In this paper, we propose an approach to solve the problems by incorporating peer-to-peer (P2P) networks with the Grid environment. A two-layer integration model is proposed, which consists of a Grid layer and an underlying P2P layer that can be accessed from but is not limited to the Grid layer. A prototype implementation of the model, called P2PGrid, has been developed and experimented with example applications built on the platform. The results show that the complexity for common PCs to participate in the Grid can be greatly reduced, the resource aggregation efficiency has been increased, and the single point of failure problem can be solved by using P2P mode of communication in the Grid environment. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 1990s have seen the explosive growth of the Internet and Web-based information sharing and dissemination systems. The Internet is also showing the potential to form a supercomputing resource out of networked computers. Parallel computing on the Internet often works in a machine-centric ‘pull’ execution model. That is, a coordinator machine maintains a pool of tasks and distributes the tasks to other participants on demand. This paper proposes a novel mobile agent based ‘push’ methodology from the perspective of applications. In this method, users declare their computation-bound jobs as autonomous agents. The computational agents roam on the Internet to find servers to run. Since the agents can be programmed to satisfy their goals, even if they move and lose contact with their creators, they can survive intermittent or unreliable network connections. During their lifetime, the agents can also move themselves autonomously from one machine to another for load balancing, enhancing data locality, and tolerating faults. We present an agent-oriented programming and resource brokerage infrastructure, Traveler, in support of global parallel computing. The Traveler provides a mechanism for clients to wrap their parallel applications as mobile agents. The agents are dispatched to a resource broker. The broker forms a parallel virtual machine atop available servers to execute the agents. Traveler relies on an integrated distributed shared array runtime system to support inter-agent communication and synchronization on clusters of servers. We demonstrate the feasibility of the Traveler in parallel sorting and LU factorization problems. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the author discusses various articles within the issue on the applications of game theory in the economics of contests, industrial organization and finance.

To develop a new technique for establishing a chronic myocardial infarction model by intracoronary arterial occlusion, we studied thirty Beagle dogs, weighing 10-12 kg. Under angiographic guidance, a guiding catheter was introduced via left common carotid artery into the left anterior descending coronary artery. In order to avoid lethal arrhythmias induced by sudden occlusion of the artery, ischemic preconditioning was proceeded. Two cycles of 50 sec inflation and 2 rain deflation were, performed via a Sprinter rapid exchange balloon dilatation catheter. Then an X-ray opacifying polyethylene foam (2.5 mm diameter) sticked onto a guiding wire was inserted through the catheter and advanced to occlude the arterial branch. In approximately 10 seconds, the foam was fixed. ECG showed focal ST-T elevation but no sustained ventricular tachyarrhythmias. Pathologic studies revealed well-demarcated focal ischemia/infarction that was correlated with. elevation of cardiac enzymes. The survival rate was 83.3% immediately after operation and 66.6% after 2 weeks of post-operation, respectively. We conclude that intracoronary arterial occlusion using an X-ray opacifying polyethylene foam can be selectively performed in a coronary arterial branch. This technique is potentially useful for chronic anti-infarct study and may be safer and more controllable than conventional ligation of coronary artery via thoracotomy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]