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Background. Coiled‐coil domain containing 25 (CCDC25) is a receptor for neutrophil extracellular trap (NET) DNA and is involved in various cancers, including CRC. This study aimed to investigate the regulatory role of CCDC25 in CRC using GWAS data, eQTL, transcriptomic profiles, and clinical information of CRC patients. Methods. From open‐source databases, GWAS summary data, eQTL expression profiles, and transcriptomic profiles, as well as clinical information were collected for CRC patients. Mendelian randomization (MR) was used to investigate the causal relationship between CCDC25 and CRC risk. The expression of CCDC25 and its associated differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified. We explored the relationship between CCDC25 expression and survival, biological functions, immune cell infiltration, immune checkpoint expression, and response to immunotherapy. Results. High CCDC25 expression reduces the risk of CRC. CCDC25 is downregulated in various cancers, particularly in CRC tumor tissues compared to normal tissues. Metabolic pathways are enriched in groups with high CCDC25 expression, while cancer‐related pathways are enriched in groups with low CCDC25 expression. High CCDC25 expression is also associated with increased infiltration of resting memory CD4+ T cells, elevated levels of most immune checkpoints, and an enhanced response to anti‐PD1 therapy. In addition, 95 DEGs were identified between high‐CCDC25 and low‐CCDC25 groups, and eight genes (FDFT1, ASAH1, ADAM9, CXCL14, SERPINA1, NAT1, EREG, and GSR) were identified as prognostic genes. Conclusion. CDC25 might serve as a candidate diagnostic and prognostic marker for CRC patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We aim to study the inhibitory effect of alkaline serine protease (ASPNJ) on lymphocytic leukemia Jurkat cells and its related mechanism through examining the expression of membrane proteins or membrane‐associated proteins. MTT assay and trypan blue staining were used to detect the inhibitory effect of ASPNJ on the proliferation and growth of Jurkat cells. Wright‐Giemsa staining was used to observe the effect of ASPNJ on the morphology of Jurkat cells. The effect of ASPNJ on Jurkat cell apoptosis was detected by flow cytometry. Two‐dimensional electrophoresis‐mass spectrometry (2‐DE‐MS) was used to detect and identify the differentially expressed proteins of Jurkat cells treated with ASPNJ (4 μg/mL, 3 h), of which three were selected and verified by Western blot. ASPNJ significantly inhibited the proliferation of leukemia cells (Raji, U937, and Jurkat), caused obvious morphological changes, and induced apoptosis of Jurkat cells. ASPNJ also increased the sensitivity of Jurkat cells to vincristine (VCR). Seven differentially expressed proteins were obtained through 2DE‐MS, of which Peroxiredoxin‐6 (PRDX6), Calcium‐binding protein (CHP1), and 40S ribosomal protein SA (RPSA) were validated. ASPNJ can cause significant toxic effects on Jurkat cells and enhance the effects of VCR. The mechanism of action of ASPNJ on Jurkat cells may be related to differentially expressed proteins such as PRDX6. This study provides a new experimental basis and direction for antileukemia research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The chemical constituents from Phellodendron amurense Rupr. were characterized systematically by ultra‐performance liquid chromatography—quadrupole–time‐of‐flight–mass spectrometry method for collecting mass spectrometry data, and the fingerprints method was established, providing reference for its quality control. The chromatographic column was ACQUITY UPLC BEH‐C18 (100 mm×2.1 mm, 1.7 μm). The mobile phase was acetonitrile‐0.1% formic acid aqueous solution and the compounds from P. amurense Rupr. were identified by Qualitative Analysis 10.0 software, reference substance, retention time, mass spectrometry fragmentation pattern and database retrieval. Meanwhile, liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry fingerprint methods of P. amurense Rupr. and Phellodendron chinense Schneid. were established by using the similarity evaluation system of chromatographic fingerprint of traditional Chinese medicine (2012 edition), and the differences were analyzed by multivariate statistical analysis methods. A total of 105 compounds were identified, including 102 alkaloids, two phenolic acids, and one lactone compound. Liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry fingerprint method was established with ideal precision, stability and repeatability, and 12 quality differential markers were recognized between the above two herbs. Liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry method can be used for qualitative analysis of the constituents of Phellodendron amurense Rupr., providing reference for clarifying the material basis and promoting the clinical precision medication and quality evaluation of P. amurense Rupr. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the thermodynamical and dynamical influences of the intense cyclone in the Arctic Ocean in August 2012 on the synoptic‐scale sea ice evolution, using the Arctic Ice Ocean Prediction System (ArcIOPS). As it is hard to fully isolate sea ice loss owing to extreme cyclone from that owing to background atmospheric state in most previous studies on this topic, this study introduces a newly developed algorithm to remove the cyclone component in atmospheric forcing, and conducts sea ice and heat budget analyses in two simulations driven by atmospheric forcing with and without the cyclone. Strong impact of the intense cyclone on sea ice locates on the east side of the cyclone's path, that is, Pacific Arctic for this case. The cyclone affects sea ice in two ways. First, cyclone‐induced enhancement in ice‐ocean interaction leads to increased sea ice basal melt in the Pacific Arctic and part of the Atlantic Arctic, which induces strong sea ice area and volume loss when the cyclone's intensity peaks. Second, as the cyclone strengthens, the increases in air temperature, humidity and wind speed accelerate turbulent heat exchange at the air‐ocean and air‐ice interfaces, leading to enhanced local sea ice surface melt in the Chukchi Sea and northern Beaufort Sea. The cyclone‐induced strong winds stir sea ice leading to enhanced gradients in sea ice velocity field and thus increased sea ice deformation, which further induces strong sea ice area loss. This study also demonstrates a precise atmospheric forcing field is essential for sea ice modeling. Plain Language Summary: We use a numerical model to study the effects of a strong Arctic cyclone on sea ice. First, we use a newly developed "cyclone removal algorithm" to remove the cyclone from the atmospheric data that is used to force the model. We can then compare how the sea ice changes between the model runs with and without the cyclone. We find that the cyclone has a strong local impact on sea ice, and sea ice losses are different on the two sides of the cyclone's path. The cyclone results in warm, moist air and strong wind, which leads to strong sea ice surface melting. At the same time, the cyclone increases the transfer of heat from the ocean to the sea ice, causing strong sea ice bottom melting. The strong wind also leads to more sea ice ridging and a reduction in sea ice area. Our study indicates that the effects of cyclones on sea ice are complex and that atmospheric data must accurately represent cyclones if we want to correctly model changes in the Arctic sea ice. Key Points: Removing a cyclone from the atmospheric forcing in an Arctic model reveals its contributions to sea ice loss along its trajectoryOceanic and turbulent heat fluxes are the key factors driving enhanced ice basal and surface melt during an intense cyclone in the ArcticStrong sea ice loss locates on the east side of the trajectory of an intense cyclone [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a key regulator for hormone activity, human aldo‐keto reductase family 1 member C3 (AKR1C3) plays crucial roles in the occurrence of various hormone‐dependent or independent malignancies. It is a promising target for treating castration‐resistant prostate cancer (CRPC). However, the development of AKR1C3 specific inhibitors remains challenging due to the high sequence similarity to its isoform AKR1C2. Here, we performed a combined in silico study to illuminate the inhibitory preference of 3‐(3,4‐dihydroisoquinolin‐2(1H)‐ylsulfonyl)benzoic acids for AKR1C3 over AKR1C2, of which compound 38 can achieve up to 5000‐fold anti‐AKR1C3 selectivity. Our umbrella sampling (US) simulations together with end‐point binding free energy calculation MM/GBSA uncover that the high inhibition selectivity originates from the different binding modes, namely "Inward" and "Outward," of this compound series in AKR1C3 and AKR1C2, respectively. In AKR1C3/38, the tetrahydroquinoline moiety of 38 is accommodated inside the SP1 pocket and interacts favorably with surrounding residues, while, in AKR1C2/38, the SP1 pocket is too small to hold the bulky tetrahydroquinoline group that instead moves out of the pocket with 38 transitioning from an "Inward" to an "Outward" state. Further 3D‐QSAR and energy decomposition analyses suggest that SP1 in AKR1C3 prefers to bind with a rigid bicyclic moiety and the modification of the R3 group has important implication for the compound's activity. This work is the first attempt to elucidate the selectivity mechanism of inhibitors toward AKR1C3 at the atomic level, which is anticipated to propel the development of next‐generation AKR1C3 inhibitors with enhanced efficacy and reduced "off‐target" effect for CRPC therapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The YTH domain of YTHDF3 belongs to a class of protein "readers" recognizing the N6‐methyladenosine (m6A) modification in mRNA. Although static crystal structure reveals m6A recognition by a conserved aromatic cage, the dynamic process in recognition and importance of aromatic cage residues are not completely clear. Here, molecular dynamics (MD) simulations are performed to explore the issues and negative selectivity of YTHDF3 toward unmethylated substrate. Our results reveal that there exist conformation selectivity and induced‐fit in YTHDF3 binding with m6A‐modified RNA, where recognition loop and loop6 play important roles in the specific recognition. m6A modification enhances the stability of YTHDF3 in complex with RNA. The methyl group of m6A, like a warhead, enters into the aromatic cage of YTHDF3, where Trp492 anchors the methyl group and constraints m6A, making m6A further stabilized by π–π stacking interactions from Trp438 and Trp497. In addition, the methylation enhances the hydrophobicity of adenosine, facilitating water molecules excluded out of the aromatic cage, which is another reason for the specific recognition and stronger intermolecular interaction. Finally, the comparative analyses of hydrogen bonds and binding free energy between the methylated and unmethylated complexes reveal the physical basis for the preferred recognition of m6A‐modified RNA by YTHDF3. This study sheds light on the mechanism by which YTHDF3 specifically recognizes m6A‐modified RNA and can provide important information for structure‐based drug design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because there is no multiplication of numbers in tropical algebra and the problem of solving the systems of polynomial equations in tropical algebra is NP-hard, in recent years some public key cryptography based on tropical semiring has been proposed. But most of them have some defects. This paper proposes new public key cryptosystems based on tropical matrices. The security of the cryptosystem relies on the difficulty of the problem of finding multiple exponentiations of tropical matrices given the product of the matrices powers when the subsemiring is hidden. This problem is a generalization of the discrete logarithm problem. But the problem generally cannot be reduced to discrete logarithm problem or hidden subgroup problem in polynomial time. Since the generating matrix of the used commutative subsemirings is hidden and the public key matrices are the product of more than two unknown matrices, the cryptosystems can resist KU attack and other known attacks. The cryptosystems based on multiple exponentiation problem can be considered as a potential postquantum cryptosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transactive response DNA binding protein 43 (TDP‐43), an alternative‐splicing regulator, can specifically bind long UG‐rich RNAs, associated with a range of neurodegenerative diseases. Upon binding RNA, TDP‐43 undergoes a large conformational change with two RNA recognition motifs (RRMs) connected by a long linker rearranged, strengthening the binding affinity of TDP‐43 with RNA. We extend the equally weighted multiscale elastic network model (ewmENM), including its Gaussian network model (ewmGNM) and Anisotropic network model (ewmANM), with the multiscale effect of interactions considered, to the characterization of the dynamics of binding interactions of TDP‐43 and RNA. The results reveal upon RNA binding a loss of flexibility occurs to TDP‐43's loop3 segments rich in positively charged residues and C‐terminal of high flexibility, suggesting their anchoring RNA, induced fit and conformational adjustment roles in recognizing RNA. Additionally, based on movement coupling analyses, it is found that RNA binding strengthens the interactions among intra‐RRM β‐sheets and between RRMs partially through the linker's mediating role, which stabilizes RNA binding interface, facilitating RNA binding efficiency. In addition, utilizing our proposed thermodynamic cycle method combined with ewmGNM, we identify the key residues for RNA binding whose perturbations induce a large change in binding free energy. We identify not only the residues important for specific binding, but also the ones critical for the conformational rearrangement between RRMs. Furthermore, molecular dynamics simulations are also performed to validate and further interpret the ENM‐based results. The study demonstrates a useful avenue to utilize ewmENM to investigate the protein‐RNA interaction dynamics characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND Protein and some minerals of rice seed are negatively affected by projected carbon dioxide (CO2) levels. However, an in‐depth assessment of rice quality that encompasses both CO2 and temperature for a wide range of nutritional parameters is not available. Using a free‐air CO2 enrichment facility with temperature control, we conducted a field experiment with two levels of CO2 (ambient; ambient + 200 ppm) and two levels of temperature (ambient; ambient + 1.5 °C). An in‐depth examination of qualitative factors indicated a variable nutritional response. RESULTS: For total protein, albumin, glutelin, and prolamin, elevated CO2 reduced seed concentrations irrespective of temperature. Similarly, several amino acids declined further as a function of higher temperature and elevated CO2 relative to elevated CO2 alone. Higher temperature increased the lipid percentage of seed; however, elevated CO2 reduced the overall lipid content. At the nutrient elements level, whereas elevated CO2 reduced certain elements, a combination of CO2 and temperature could compensate for CO2 reductions but was element dependent. CONCLUSION: Overall, these data are, at present, the most detailed analysis of rising CO2/temperature on the qualitative characteristics of rice. They indicate that climate change is likely to significantly impact the nutritional integrity of rice, with subsequent changes in human health on a global basis. © 2020 Society of Chemical Industry [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords: High-resolution; Peanut; Spatial transcriptome; Stereo-seq EN High-resolution Peanut Spatial transcriptome Stereo-seq 1648 1650 3 08/25/22 20220901 NES 220901 High-throughput single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) technology has developed rapidly in recent years (Xie I et al i ., 2022). Although the gene number captured in the four tissues is approximately half of that of single-cell sequencing technique; however, the more useful spatial information independent of marker genes makes sense in particular to the non-model species. [Extracted from the article]

The hybridization experiments have been made between Crassostrea ariakensis and C. gigas several times. However, it is difficult to obtain a large number of hybrid offspring, which becomes the bottleneck of subsequent cross‐breeding. To explore whether the production of hybrid larvae is affected by salinity, we investigated the effects of salinity (16, 20, 24, 28 and 32 psu) on the early activities of artificial hybridization between C. ariakensis and C. gigas at 23–24°C. In this study, the results showed that during artificial insemination, the appropriate salinity of high‐quality gametes in C. ariakensis and C. gigas was 20–32 psu and 24–32 psu respectively. Besides, the fertilization rate of AG (C. ariakensis♀ × C. gigas♂) and GA (C. gigas♀ × C. ariakensis♂) at 24–28 psu was significantly (p <.05) higher than that at 16–20 psu. For incubation, the optimal salinity of embryo incubation was 28 psu, under which all embryos of AG and GA can develop rapidly to the D‐larvae and yielded a high hatching rate. During larval rearing, the larval shell height and survival rate of AG were of no significant difference (p >.05) at all salinities, and the optimum salinity for larval growth and survival of GA was 24–28 psu. These findings can contribute to the increase in the hybrid progeny yield, which can serve as the new resource for genetic improvement of oyster germplasm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human multidrug resistance protein 1 (hMRP1) is an important member of the ATP‐binding cassette (ABC) transporter superfamily. It can extrude a variety of anticancer drugs and physiological organic anions across the plasma membrane, which is activated by substrate binding, and is accompanied by large‐scale cooperative movements between different domains. Currently, it remains unclear completely about how the specific interactions between hMRP1 and its substrate are and which critical residues are responsible for allosteric signal transduction. To the end, we first construct an inward‐facing state of hMRP1 using homology modeling method, and then dock substrate proinflammatory agent leukotriene C4 (LTC4) to hMRP1 pocket. The result manifests LTC4 interacts with two parts of hMRP1 pocket, namely the positively charged pocket (P pocket) and hydrophobic pocket (H pocket), similar to its binding mode with bMRP1 (bovine MRP1). Additionally, we use the Gaussian network model (GNM)‐based thermodynamic method proposed by us to identify the key residues whose perturbations markedly alter their binding free energy. Here the conventional GNM is improved with covalent/non‐covalent interactions and secondary structure information considered (denoted as sscGNM). In the result, sscGNM improves the flexibility prediction, especially for the nucleotide binding domains with rich kinds of secondary structures. The 46 key residue clusters located in different subdomains are identified which are highly consistent with experimental observations. Furtherly, we explore the long‐range cooperation within the transporter. This study is helpful for strengthening the understanding of the work mechanism in ABC exporters and can provide important information to scientists in drug design studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Protein–RNA interactions play essential roles in a wide variety of biological processes. Recognition of RNA‐binding residues on proteins has been a challenging problem. Most of methods utilize the position‐specific scoring matrix (PSSM). It has been found that considering the evolutionary information of sequence neighboring residues can improve the prediction. In this work, we introduce a novel method SNB‐PSSM (spatial neighbor–based PSSM) combined with the structure window scheme where the evolutionary information of spatially neighboring residues is considered. The results show our method consistently outperforms the standard and smoothed PSSM methods. Tested on multiple datasets, this approach shows an encouraging performance compared with RNABindRPlus, BindN+, PPRInt, xypan, Predict_RBP, SpaPF, PRNA, and KYG, although is inferior to RNAProSite, RBscore, and aaRNA. In addition, since our method is not sensitive to protein structure changes, it can be applied well on binding site predictions of modeled structures. Thus, the result also suggests the evolution of binding sites is spatially cooperative. The proposed method as an effective tool of considering evolutionary information can be widely used for the nucleic acid–/protein‐binding site prediction and functional motif finding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highly efficient photocathode with onset potential beyond 0.6 V is very desirable in order to construct photoelectrochemical (PEC) device for stand‐alone overall water splitting. In this work, it is reported a nonfullerene PBDB‐T:ITIC bulk heterojunction (BHJ) based photocathode delivering unprecedented positive onset potential of 0.8 V and optimal photocurrent density of −11.7 mA cm−2 at 0 V in pH 1 solution. The yielded high ideal ratiometric power‐saved efficiency (Φsaved,ideal) of 4.1% is a record among the previous organic photocathodes. When the electrolyte pH moves to neutral, the Φsaved,ideal is still to be 3.2%, yet being twice more than the currently reported highest value. Pairing with TiOx, the hole transport layer of CuOx with more efficient charge carrier transportation and hole extraction ability excels MoO3 and NiOx, contributing to the highly efficient solar hydrogen production in both acidic and neutral solutions. Premixing the BHJ blend precursor with an anti‐oxidative agent is proved to be a beneficial strategy to improve the PEC stability by suppressing the photo‐oxidation degradation of organic polymer materials. Subsequently a conceptual PEC cell comprising of tandem CuOx/BHJ/TiOx/Pt photocathode and BiVO4/NiFeOx photoanode with a high solar‐to‐hydrogen efficiency up to 1.1% is fabricated in neutral solution without assistance of extra bias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Noncoding RNAs (ncRNAs), especially microRNA (miRNA) and long noncoding RNA (lncRNA), have an impact on a variety of important biological processes during colon adenocarcinoma (COAD) progression. This includes chromatin organization, transcriptional and posttranscriptional regulation, and cell-cell signaling. The aim of this study is to identify the ncRNA-regulated modules that accompany the progression of COAD and to analyze their mechanisms, in order to screen the potential prognostic biomarkers for COAD. An integrative molecular analysis was carried out to identify the crosstalks of gene modules between different COAD stages, as well as the essential ncRNAs in the posttranscriptional regulation of these modules. 31 ncRNA regulatory modules were found to be significantly associated with overall survival in COAD patients. 17 out of the 31 modules (in which ncRNAs played essential roles) had improved the predictive ability for COAD patient survival compared to only the mRNAs of those modules, which were enriched in the core cancer hallmark pathways with closer interactions. These suggest that the ncRNAs' regulatory modules not only exhibit close relation to COAD progression but also reflect the dynamic significant crosstalk of genes in the modules to the different malignant extent of COAD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The distribution of glucagon‐like peptide 1 (GLP‐1)‐positive cells in digestive tracts and pancreases of aquatic vertebrates was investigated by immunohistochemical staining method. The results suggested that GLP‐1‐positive cells were distributed in the columnar mucous epithelium and tubular glands of lamina propria in the digestive system. However, GLP‐1‐positive cells were also found in subepithelial lamina propria of the mucosae and muscularis in each segment of the digestive tract of Rana nigromaculata. The distribution densities of these cells reached peaks in the stomachs, and the middle or end segments of small intestines of Chinese softshell turtle, Bufo gargarizans, R. nigromaculata and catfish, and there was the third distribution density peak in the rectum of catfish. The total amount or overall density of GLP‐1‐positive cells varied a lot in the digestive tracts of different animal species. The distribution density was relatively low in the digestive tract of chub and reached the maximum in the digestive tracts of snakehead and catfish, but no GLP‐1‐positive cells were found in the digestive tract of bighead carp. GLP‐1‐positive cells were densely distributed in the pancreases of Chinese softshell turtle, B. gargarizans and R. nigromaculata. These cells spread over the superficial layers of islets or scattered in exocrine pancreas in the pancreas of B. gargarizans, spread in the endocrine cells or scattered in the pancreas of Chinese softshell turtle, scattered in the pancreas of R. nigromaculata and distributed in the superficial layers of islets in the pancreas of catfish. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The tilt-rotor aircraft has often been proposed as a means to increase the maximum speed of the conventional helicopter. The tilt-rotor aircraft consists of three primary flight modes that are the helicopter flight mode in low forward speed flight, airplane flight mode in high forward speed flight, and conversion flight mode. The aim of this paper is to develop a nonlinear flight dynamics mathematical modeling method of tilt-rotor aircraft and investigate the dynamic stability characteristics of tilt-rotor aircraft. First, a nonlinear tilt-rotor aircraft flight dynamics model is developed. The trim and linearized results are present to verify the model. Then, using a numerical differentiation technique, the dynamic stability of the tilt-rotor aircraft is assessed. The results show that the flight speed and nacelle angle would affect the magnitude and the trend of the aerodynamic derivatives. The damping of the pitch short period mode and the Dutch roll mode is insensitive to flight speed while they could be affected by nacelle angle. In all flight modes, as flight speed increases, the natural modes become more stable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eucalyptus are a widely used short‐rotation species for timber production in South China. There are growing concerns regarding the influences of successive planting of Eucalyptus urophylla on microorganisms and soil. The aim of this work was to determine the effects of the successive planting of E. urophylla on soil characteristics. Five different stands, including 5‐, 10‐, 15‐, and 18‐year‐old E. urophylla plantations (abbreviated as 5yr, 10yr, 15yr, and 18yr, respectively) and one native evergreen broadleaf forest as a 0‐year‐old E. urophylla plantation (abbreviated as CK) were used. All of measured chemical indicators, microbial biomass, and enzyme activities were significantly lower in E. urophylla plantations compared with CK stand. The microbial biomass and enzyme activities significantly decreased in 5yr stand, significantly increased in 10yr stand, and subsequently declined in 15yr and 18yr stands. The relative abundance of Ascomycota in 15yr (77.10%) and 18yr (72.71%) plantations was significantly higher than in other stands. Basidiomycota relative abundance in the E. urophylla plantations was significantly lower than in the CK stand. In addition, the bacterial diversity was significantly decreased in 15yr and 18yr stands, whereas the fungal diversity was the lowest in 5yr stand and significantly increased in 10yr, 15yr, and 18yr stands. Furthermore, structural equation modelling showed that successive planting of E. urophylla decreased the soil bacterial community diversity, microbial biomass, and enzyme activity but increased the fungal community diversity. Thus, successive planting of E. urophylla negatively influenced the soil bacterial diversity, microbial biomass, and enzyme activity and positively influenced soil fungal diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the hybrid HVDC transmission system, which is composed by line-commutated converter (LCC) in parallel with voltage source converter (VSC), a coordinated reactive power control strategy of hybrid-HVDC in both steady and transient states is proposed. The operation characteristics in situations like low load operation, filter switching, and de-locking process are analysed. Influence of the method to AC bus voltage and system power factor is taken into account. Three kinds of reactive control methods of VSC and LCC are studied, and the logical relationship between the filter and VSC reactive power controller is also given. Considering both the system voltage drop and the risk of commutation failure caused by AC faults, the VSC in voltage control mode is utilised to maintain AC bus voltage stability by providing emergency power support. Simulation results show the feasibility and effectiveness of presented control strategy, then the proposed strategy is applied in practical DC project, whose results achieve the desired effect by engineering field test. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider the initial value problem for the nonlinear Schrödinger equation satisfying the strong dissipative condition Iλ<0 and Iλ>p-1/2pRλ in one space dimension. Our purpose in this paper is to study how the gain coefficient μ(t) and strong dissipative nonlinearity λvp-1v affect solutions to the nonlinear Schrödinger equation for large initial data. We prove global existence of solutions and present some time decay estimates of solutions for large initial data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Packaged fried foods have been appreciated worldwide, so monitoring quality deterioration during storage is very crucial. Twelve types of commercial packaged fried foods were selected to determine quality parameters such as moisture content (MC), hardness (HN), acid value (AV), peroxide value (PV), carbonyl value (CV), dielectric constant (DC), fatty acid compositions (FAC) and acrylamide (AA) every 3 days by Schaal oven tests. MC and HN showed a linear relationship with high correlation coefficient (R ≥ 0.821). PV increased from 2.65–8.51 meq/kg to 5.97–59.90 meq/kg. DC was highly correlated with MC, HN, PV, CV and AV (p ≤ 0.05). The content of unsaturated fatty acids slightly decreased, whereas that of saturated fatty acids marginally increased. AA content increased slightly during storage and varied from 43.07 to 226.82 μg/kg. These results revealed that DC can be used as an evaluation index of the quality deterioration of packaged fried foods during storage. Commercial packaged fried foods were selected to determine quality parameters such as moisture content (MC), hardness (HN), acid value (AV), peroxide value (PV), carbonyl value (CV), dielectric constant (DC), fatty acid compositions (FAC), and acrylamide (AA) every 3 days by Schaal oven tests. The relationships of physicochemical indices in packaged fried foods were confirmed; the content of unsaturated fatty acids slightly decreased, whereas that of saturated fatty acids marginally increased; DC can be used as a parameter for quality deterioration of packaging fried foods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Machine-constructed knowledge bases often contain noisy and inaccurate facts. There exists significant work in developing automated algorithms for knowledge base refinement. Automated approaches improve the quality of knowledge bases but are far from perfect. In this paper, we leverage crowdsourcing to improve the quality of automatically extracted knowledge bases. As human labelling is costly, an important research challenge is how we can use limited human resources to maximize the quality improvement for a knowledge base. To address this problem, we first introduce a concept of semantic constraints that can be used to detect potential errors and do inference among candidate facts. Then, based on semantic constraints, we propose rank-based and graph-based algorithms for crowdsourced knowledge refining, which judiciously select the most beneficial candidate facts to conduct crowdsourcing and prune unnecessary questions. Our experiments show that our method improves the quality of knowledge bases significantly and outperforms state-of-the-art automatic methods under a reasonable crowdsourcing cost. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A field experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of elevated atmospheric CO concentration and temperature, singly and in combination, on grain yield and the distribution of nitrogen (N) in different rice organs. The rice 'Wuyunjing 23' was planted under four treatments: ambient CO and temperature (ACT), elevated CO (200 μmol mol higher than ambient CO) (EC), elevated temperature (1 °C above the ambient temperature) (ET), and the combination of elevated CO and temperature (ECT) under T-FACE (temperature and CO free air controlled enrichment) system. CO-induced increment and temperature-induced reduction in grain yield was 6.0 and 25.2% in 2013, and that was 9.8 and 10.8% in 2014, respectively. Dry matter (DM) production in different organs increased under EC at vegetative stage but decreased under ET at reproductive stage. The negative effects of temperature on grain yield and DM was weakened when combined with CO enrichment. And the trends of decrease for yield and DM under ET and ECT in 2013 were more obvious than those in 2014 due to the annual temperature differences. Furthermore, ET led to greater distribution of N in root and stem but not for panicle than that under ACT. These mainly demonstrated that the rice production would be suffered varying degree of loss under global warming in future although the CO enrichment could alleviate the effects of high temperature on rice growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The heavy metal in tobacco has been widely concerned for the toxicity and bioaccumulation. Heavy metal in tobacco is of extremely related with the corresponding concentration in soil. One hundred soil samples were collected from five typical tobacco cultivated areas to evaluate the environmental quality and health implications. The inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry was employed to determine the concentrations of heavy metals (As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Hg, and Pb). The geo-accumulation index and potential health risk assessment were performed to investigate the environmental quality and health risk. The concentrations of As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Hg, and Pb are ranged from 0.40 to 112 mg/kg, 0.07 to 4.22 mg/kg, 5.52 to 338 mg/kg, 3.40 to 64.5 mg/kg, 0 to 1.62 mg/kg, respectively. The concentrations of heavy metals are various among the five different typical cultivation areas. The elevated concentrations of heavy metals in the selected soils suggesting that these heavy metals may be derived from anthropogenic sources i.e. industrial and agricultural activities. The results shown that the soils in the Jingxi, Longlin, and Debao County are posed to a moderately to heavily contamination for Hg and Cd. The noncarcinogenic and carcinogenic effects (except Lingyun County) caused by heavy metal exposure is regarded as acceptable. The Lingyun County soil should be paid more attention due to the unacceptable level of carcinogenic risk. As, Cd, Hg, and Cr are regarded as the priority control metals. © 2016 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 36: 483-488, 2017 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives/hypothesis: To evaluate the effectiveness of free fat grafting in preventing Frey's syndrome (FS) and facial depression after parotidectomy compared with acellular dermis.Methods: A prospective randomized trial was performed. Patients who underwent parotidectomy were randomly assigned to abdominal free fat or acellular dermis grafting groups. The occurrence of FS, the aesthetic outcome, economic results, and other complications were evaluated.Results: Both acellular dermis and free fat grafts were effective in preventing FS with an equal rate of postoperative complications. Patients undergoing free fat grafting had a significantly higher aesthetic score and lower cost than those undergoing acellular dermis grafting.Conclusion: Free fat grafting has equal risks but more advantages compared with acellular dermis. Free fat grafting is an effective, convenient, and inexpensive option for parotidectomy defect reconstruction.Level Of Evidence: 1b. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider the initial value problem for the nonlinear dissipative Schrödinger equations with a gauge invariant nonlinearity λup-1u of order pn2-6p-n=0 for n≥2 and p1=1+2 for n=1. Our purpose is to extend the previous results for higher space dimensions concerning L2-time decay and to improve the lower bound of p under the same dissipative condition on λ∈C: Im⁡ λ<0 and Im⁡ λ>p-1/2pRe λ as in the previous works. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) is a potent reactive oxygen species that causes cardiomyocytes injury. As an important cytokine, interleukin 6 (IL-6) has cardioprotective effects as it plays an essential role in the late phase of preconditioning. Our work is to investigate if IL-6 preconditioning has protective effects on neonatal rat ventricular cardiomyocytes in response to H2O2 and its underlying mechanism. Methods: Gel-based comparative proteomic approach along with small interfering RNA (siRNA) and Western blot analysis was used to analyse mechanisms of IL-6 preconditioning on H2O2-induced neonatal rat ventricular cardiomyocytes injury. Results: IL-6 preconditioning protected cardiomyocytes against H2O2-induced cell death. Proteomic analysis showed that IL-6 pretreatment further increased the expression of prohibitin and improved the viability of cardiomyocytes exposed to H2O2. Knocking down of prohibitin with siRNA abrogated this protection by increasing apoptosis rate. Tyrosine kinase inhibitor AG490 decreased signal transducers and activators of transcription 3 (STAT3) phosphorylation and down-regulated prohibitin expression in cardiomyocytes pretreated with IL-6 and exposed to H2O2, which further dampened the protective effects of IL-6 preconditioning. Conclusion: Our results provide direct evidence that prohibitin is a protective factor of IL-6 preconditioning in H2O2-induced neonatal rat ventricular cardiomyocytes death. The upregulation of prohibitin by IL-6 is, at least, partially regulated through STAT3 phosphorylation. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Protein-protein docking has made much progress in recent years, but challenges still exist. Here we present the application of our docking approach HoDock in CAPRI. In this approach, a binding site prediction is implemented to reduce docking sampling space and filter out unreasonable docked structures, and a network-based enhanced combinatorial scoring function HPNCscore is used to evaluate the decoys. The experimental information was combined with the predicted binding site to pick out the most likely key binding site residues. We applied the HoDock method in the recent rounds of the CAPRI experiments, and got good results as predictors on targets 39, 40, and 41. We also got good results as scorers on targets 35, 37, 40, and 41. This indicates that our docking approach can contribute to the progress of protein-protein docking methods and to the understanding of the mechanism of protein-protein interactions. Proteins 2010. © 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents research on the synthesis and properties of polyaniline (PANI) nanolayers as shown in the presence of retinol in aqueous ethanol. In the study, the two-probe method was used to examine the effects of retinol, the volume fraction of ethanol and the acidity of the polymerization medium on the direct circuit conductivity of PANI. It was observed that the PANI nanolayers showed an electromagnetic loss at the microwave frequency.

Studies have demonstrated that systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) remains one of the major causes of cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB)-associated organ injury during pediatric cardiac surgery. The purpose of this investigation was to compare the effectiveness of methylprednisolone (MP) and zero-balance ultrafiltration (ZBUF) on SIRS during pediatric CPB. Thirty infants undergoing open-heart surgeries were randomized to receive either MP in the priming solution (group M, n = 15) or ZBUF during CPB (group Z, n = 15). All the patients survived. Plasma levels of tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), interleukin-6 (IL-6), interleukin-8 (IL-8), and interleukin-10 (IL-10) were measured before CPB (T1), 5 min after the start of CPB (T2), at the termination of CPB (T3), the fourth hour (T4), and the eighth hour (T5) postoperatively. The results showed that the plasma concentrations of TNF-α in the Z group were significantly less than those in the M group at T4 and T5 ( P < 0.05), and the plasma concentrations of IL-6 were significantly less than those in the M group at T4 ( P < 0.05); the plasma concentrations of IL-8 in the Z group were significantly less than those in the M group at T5 ( P < 0.05). There was no difference between two groups on the plasma concentrations of IL-10. The duration of postoperative mechanical ventilation was (9.6 ± 0.8 h) in the M group and (7.8 ± 0.4 h) in the Z group ( P < 0.05). This study showed that application of ZBUF is more effective to decrease the level of inflammatory mediators including TNF-α, IL-6, and IL-8 than administration of MP after pediatric CPB. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nucleotide sequences from a total of 421 HEV isolates were retrieved from Genbank and analysed. Phylogenetically, HEV was classified into four major genotypes. Genotype 1 was more conserved and classified into five subtypes. The number of genotype 2 sequences was limited but can be classified into two subtypes. Genotypes 3 and 4 were extremely diverse and can be subdivided into ten and seven subtypes. Geographically, genotype 1 was isolated from tropical and several subtropical countries in Asia and Africa, and genotype 2 was from Mexico, Nigeria, and Chad; whereas genotype 3 was identified almost worldwide including Asia, Europe, Oceania, North and South America. In contrast, genotype 4 was found exclusively in Asia. It is speculated that genotype 3 originated in the western hemisphere and was imported to several Asian countries such as Japan, Korea and Taiwan, while genotype 4 has been indigenous and likely restricted to Asia. Genotypes 3 and 4 were not only identified in swine but also in wild animals such as boar and a deer. Furthermore, in most areas where genotypes 3 and 4 were characterised, sequences from both humans and animals were highly conserved, indicating they originated from the same infectious sources. Based upon nucleotide differences from five phylogenies, it is proposed that five, two, ten and seven subtypes for HEV genotypes 1, 2, 3 and 4 be designated alphabetised subtypes. Accordingly, a total of 24 subtypes (1a, 1b, 1c, 1d, 1e, 2a, 2b, 3a, 3b, 3c, 3d, 3e, 3f, 3g, 3h, 3i, 3j, 4a, 4b, 4c, 4d, 4e, 4f and 4g) were given. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zinc blende boron arsenide (BAs), boron phosphide (BP), and boron nitride (BN) have attracted significant interest in recent years due to their high thermal conductivity (Λ) predicted by first‐principles calculations. This research reports the study of the temperature dependence of Λ (120 K < T < 600 K) for natural isotope‐abundance BP and isotopically enriched 11BP crystals grown from modified flux reactions. Time‐domain thermoreflectance is used to measure Λ of sub‐millimeter‐sized crystals. At room temperature, Λ for BP and 11BP is 490 and 540 W m−1 K−1, respectively, surpassing the values of conventional high Λ materials such as Ag, Cu, BeO, and SiC. The Λ of BP is smaller than only cubic BN, diamond, graphite, and BAs among single‐phase materials. The measured Λ for BP and 11BP is in good agreement with the first‐principles calculations above 250 K. The quality of the crystals is verified by Raman spectroscopy, X‐ray diffraction, and scanning transmission electron microscopy. By combining the first‐principles calculations and Raman measurements, a previously misinterpreted Raman mode is reassigned. Thus, BP is a promising material not only for heat spreader applications in high‐power microelectronic devices but also as an electronic material for use in harsh environments. Thermal conductivities of high quality natural‐abundance BP and isotopically‐enriched 11BP single crystals measured between 120–600 K using time‐domain thermoreflectance show good agreement with theoretical calculation, surpassing many conventional high‐thermal‐conductivity materials at above 300 K. Such high intrinsic thermal conductivities, combined with their outstanding chemical inertness and high mechanical hardness, suggest their potential applications for heat dissipation in high‐power electronics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Big data from the Internet of Things may create big challenge for data classification. Most active learning approaches select either uncertain or representative unlabeled instances to query their labels. Although several active learning algorithms have been proposed to combine the two criteria for query selection, they are usually ad hoc in finding unlabeled instances that are both informative and representative and fail to take the diversity of instances into account. We address this challenge by presenting a new active learning framework which considers uncertainty, representativeness, and diversity creation. The proposed approach provides a systematic way for measuring and combining the uncertainty, representativeness, and diversity of an instance. Firstly, use instances' uncertainty and representativeness to constitute the most informative set. Then, use the kernel k-means clustering algorithm to filter the redundant samples and the resulting samples are queried for labels. Extensive experimental results show that the proposed approach outperforms several state-of-the-art active learning approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Internet of Things (IoT) is regarded as a remarkable development of the modern information technology. There is abundant digital products data on the IoT, linking with multiple types of objects/entities. Those associated entities carry rich information and usually in the form of query records. Therefore, constructing high quality topic hierarchies that can capture the term distribution of each product record enables us to better understand users' search intent and benefits tasks such as taxonomy construction, recommendation systems, and other communications solutions for the future IoT. In this paper, we propose a novel record entity topic model (RETM) for IoT environment that is associated with a set of entities and records and a Gibbs sampling-based algorithm is proposed to learn the model. We conduct extensive experiments on real-world datasets and compare our approach with existing methods to demonstrate the advantage of our approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Capturing the advantages of NAS and SAN, Object-based Storage System (OBSS) is becoming an active research area. OBSS is composed of clients, metadata server, and Object-based Storage Devices (OSDs). Similar to the prefetching of file and block, object prefetching is also an effective method to reduce the object access latency in OSD. However, the existing methods focus on intra-object prefetching [1] and they limit the prefetching capability among objects to a certain extent. In this paper, we present a novel inter-object prefetching approach which considers the characteristics of the object access in OSD. This approach adopts a kind of data mining technique called sequential pattern mining to find the object access sequential patterns [2], then produces the object sequential rules according to the patterns, and finally prefetches objects according to the rules and the object access context. The whole process includes the following three modules: Object Request Service Module. It maintains a current object access context, which is a l-length recently accessed object sequence. Furthermore, it appends new object information to the historic object access stream when an object is accessed. Sequential Rules Mining Module. It is composed of the object sequences preprocessing, the sequential pattern mining and the sequential rules producing modules. The preprocessing module divides the object access stream into many subsequences. Base on the discovered object sequential patterns gained by the sequential pattern mining module, object access sequential rules table is constructed. Prefetching Engine Module. When the current requested object is not in the object cache, the prefetching engine selects a matched rule with the highest confidence from the rules table according to the context, then chooses the corresponding objects and preloads them into the object cache. Simulated experimental results show that both prediction accuracy and object hit rate can be improved comparing with the Group-based prefetching method [3] which can also be used for object prefetching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]