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ABSTRACT This study investigated the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and its associated restrictive measures on Mycoplasma pneumoniae infections in children with acute respiratory tract infection. The study aimed to elucidate the epidemiological characteristics of M. pneumoniae infections before and during the pandemic and following the easing of restrictive measures. Pharyngeal secretions were collected from 1,0174 pediatric patients with acute respiratory infection (ARI) who were admitted to Shaoxing Maternity and Child Health Care Hospital (Shaoxing, China) between May 2018 and December 2023. The analysis concentrated on M. pneumoniae detection rates, epidemiological features, and clinical characteristics. Among 10,174 samples collected from 2018 to 2023, 1,060 strains of M. pneumoniae were detected, resulting in an overall positive rate of 10.42% (n = 1,060 out of 1,0176). Further breakdown revealed positive rates of 8.25% (n = 279 out of 3,381) in phase I (May 2018–December 2019), 2.40% (n = 87 out of 3,623) in phase II (January 2020–November 2022), and 21.89% (n = 694 out of 3,170) in phase III (December 2022–December 2023). In comparison to phase I, a noteworthy decline in the positive rate of M. pneumoniae was found during phase II, followed by a substantial increase during phase III (P < 0.05). Furthermore, the positive rate of M. pneumoniae exhibited a significantly greater surge during the summer-autumn period in contrast to the winter-spring (P < 0.05). Additionally, the risk of M. pneumoniae infection in children who aged 7 years surpassed that of the age group of 0–3 years. Throughout the phases preceding, during, and after the COVID-19 pandemic, discernible fluctuations in both age distribution and seasonality of M. pneumoniae infections were identified among hospitalized children with ARI in the East China.IMPORTANCEThe resemblance between the transmission pathways of M. pneumoniae and those of COVID-19 suggests that non-pharmaceutical interventions may have comparable effects on both. This study aimed to analyze the epidemiological characteristics of children with M. pneumoniae infections in Shaoxing, China, from 2018 to 2023. This study explored how the COVID-19 pandemic has influenced the prevalence of M. pneumoniae and provided guidance for disease treatment and infection prevention.

Particle‐jamming soft grippers demonstrate notable shape adaptability and adjustable stiffness, which improve their grasping efficiency. However, integrating tactile sensing into these grippers presents challenges due to the specific properties of the particle jamming mechanism. This study introduces a parallel particle jamming soft gripper equipped with tactile sensing capabilities. The gripper consists of two tactile sensing particle jamming pads (TSPJPs) that are integrated with flexible optoelectronic skins. These skins are made of silicone rubber membranes and are embedded with a 3 × 3 array of stretchable optical waveguide arrays (SOWAs). Testing indicates that incorporating these sensors enhances the gripper's tactile sensing capabilities, with minimal impact on its particle jamming‐based grasping function. A single TSPJP can accurately detect various contact points and estimate the contract forces. The proposed soft gripper can reliably grasp a wide range of objects, varying in shape, hardness, and weight, and it provides detailed tactile feedback on contact locations and the intensity of the grasping through the SOWA sensor. It can precisely distinguish between different grasping postures using a light gradient boosting machine (LightGBM) learning model. Furthermore, it can effectively detect the slippage of grasped objects, facilitating accurate closed‐loop control for secure manipulation.

Abstract Objective It is now understood that the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and its associated containment measures have influenced the epidemiology of other respiratory viruses. This study aimed to characterize respiratory virus infections in pediatric patients hospitalized for acute respiratory infections (ARIs) in East China both prior to and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods We collected nasal secretions from 9782 pediatric ARI patients admitted to Shaoxing Maternal and Child Health Care Hospital between January 2018 and December 2022. We analyzed and compared changes in viral detection rates, epidemiological features, and clinical characteristics. Results A total of 1633 strains from 7 common respiratory viruses were identified, with an overall positive rate of 16.35% (n = 821/5021) in 2018–2019 and 17.06% (n = 812/4761) in 2020–2022. Compared to 2018–2019, the positive rate for RSV significantly increased in 2020–2022, while detection rates for ADV, PIV-2, PIV-3, and flu-B showed reductions (P

Deep‐sea exploration remains a challenging task as the extreme hydrostatic pressure environment, darkness, and suspended sediment launch severely hinder the capability of deep‐sea vehicles. As a complement to underwater camera, tactile perception becomes especially important in situations where machine vision is limited. However, tactile sensors utilized in deep sea, which should be able to detect pressure changes of only hundreds of pascals under high hydrostatic pressure, are still lacking. To tackle the challenge imposed by hydrostatic pressure, a simulated deep‐sea environment flexible sensor (SDEFS) is proposed, consisting of a force sensor array and a bending sensor based on hydrogels for tactile sensing in 50 MPa hydrostatic pressure environments. The force sensor is unaffected by the hydrostatic pressure and achieves high sensitivity of 82.62 N−1 under 100 MPa hydrostatic pressure. The SDEFS is utilized to classify objects based on the difference in hardness. It can accurately classify seven objects on the ground, and three objects in an underwater environment with hydrostatic pressure of 50 MPa, with total recognition accuracies of 98.3% and 96%, respectively. With high force measurement sensitivity and accurate recognition ability under water, the SDEFS is expected to provide very valuable haptic sensing and feedback in deep‐sea exploration.

As a friendly tool, the soft gripper can be used directly for grasping vulnerable objects in underwater environments. These tasks are generally performed by teleoperation based on the visual feedback, rather than the soft actuators’ sensing information. However, vision sensors’ function may be restricted in some complex underwater environments with poor visibility and narrow spaces. This will greatly reduce the efficiency of the underwater operations. Therefore, soft actuators strongly require an organism‐like perception system to sense environmental stimuli and can be applied to complex underwater environments. To address the problem, a multidirectional external perception soft actuator based on two flexible optical waveguide sensors is developed and machine learning methods are utilized to build its perceptual model herein. The experimental results indicate that the soft actuator can recognize 12 contact positions based on the sensing model, and the identifying accuracy is up to 99.82%. Additionally, according to the contact location feedback, teleoperation can be more efficiently completed in unknown underwater environments.

IntroductionCrataegi fructus (CF) is an edible and medicinal functional food used worldwide that enhances digestion if consumed in the roasted form. The odour of CF, as a measure of processing degree during roasting, significantly changes. However, the changes remain unclear, but are worth exploring.MethodsHerein, the variations in volatile flavour compounds due to CF roasting were investigated using an electronic nose (E-nose) and headspace gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (HS-GC-MS).ResultsA total of 54 components were identified by GC-MS. Aldehydes, ketones, esters, and furans showed the most significant changes. The Maillard reaction, Strecker degradation, and fatty acid oxidation and degradation are the main reactions that occur during roasting. The results of grey relational analysis (GRA) showed that 25 volatile compounds were closely related to odour (r > 0.9). Finally, 9 volatile components [relative odour activity value, (ROAV) ≥ 1] were confirmed as key substances causing odour changes.DiscussionThis study not only achieves the objectification of odour evaluation during food processing, but also verifies the applicability and similarity of the E-nose and HS-GC-MS.