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Narrowband afterglow materials display interesting functions in high-quality anti-counterfeiting and multiplexed bioimaging. However, there is still a limited exploration of these afterglow materials, especially for those with a full width at half maxima (FWHM) around 30 nm. Here, we report the fabrication of narrowband organic/inorganic hybrid afterglow materials via energy transfer technology. Coronene (Cor) with a long phosphorescence feature and broad phosphorescence band is selected as the donor for energy transfer, and inorganic quantum dots (QDs) of CdSe/ZnS with a narrowband emission are used as acceptors. Upon doping into the organic matrix, the resultant three-component materials exhibit a narrowband afterglow with an afterglow lifetime of approximately 3.4 s and an FWHM of 31 nm. The afterglow wavelength of the afterglow materials can be controlled by the QDs. This work based on organic/inorganic hybrids provides a facile approach for developing multicolor and narrowband afterglow materials, as well as opens a new way for expanding the features of organic afterglow for multifunctional applications. It is expected to rely on narrowband afterglow emitters to solve the "spectrum congestion" problem of high-density information storage in optical anti-counterfeiting and information encryption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Fe/Fe 3 C embedded in N-doped carbon nanofiber (Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF) was prepared successfully. • The zero-dimensional Fe/Fe 3 C nanoparticles were homogeneously distributed to one-dimensional NCNF. • Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF exhibited excellent TC degradation over a wide range of pH 3–11. • Fe/Fe 3 C and graphitic N were the main active sites of Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF. • Superoxide radical and singlet oxygen were primary ROS for the TC degradation. The toxic metal ions leaching and metal nanoparticles agglomeration were the critical issues for metal-based carbon materials during the peroxymonosulfate (PMS) activation processes. Herein, a facile strategy was first proposed that zero-dimensional Fe/Fe 3 C nanoparticles were embedded in one-dimensional N-doped carbon nanofiber (Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF) to solve the above challenges. The as-obtained Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF-800 possessed a low E a value (11.7 kJ/mol) and exhibited high activity for activating PMS to degrade tetracycline (TC) in a wide range of pH 3–11. As expected, the iron ions leaching concentration of Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF-800 was very low (0.082 mg/L). Meanwhile, the Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF-800 was easily recovered from the reaction solution due to its magnetic properties. Both superoxide radicals (O 2 ∙−) and non-radical of singlet oxygen (1O 2) were the primary reactive oxygen species (ROS) in the Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF-800/PMS system via quenching tests and electron spin resonance spectroscopy (ESR). The catalytic mechanism suggested that the Fe/Fe 3 C and graphitic N were the main active sites in the Fe/Fe 3 C@NCNF-800 for PMS activation. This work provided a facile method for the preparation of Fe-based carbon materials with high catalytic ability, low metal leaching and easy recycling, showing a broad prospect for environmental applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] Proto-oncogene tyrosine-protein kinase Src, also known as c -Src, belongs to the family of non-receptor tyrosine protein kinases (TKs) called Src kinases. It plays a crucial role in cell division, motility, adhesion, and survival in both normal cells and cancer cells by activating various signaling pathways mediated by multiple cytokines. Additionally, c -Src kinase has been implicated in osteoclasts and bone loss diseases mediated by inflammation and osteoporosis. In recent years, remarkable advancements have been achieved in the development of c -Src inhibitors, with several candidates progressing to the clinical stage. This review focuses on the research progress in several areas, including the mechanism of action, drug discovery, combination therapy, and clinical research. By presenting this information, we aim to provide researchers with convenient access to valuable insights and inspire new ideas to expedite future drug discovery programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Magmas associated with post-collisional deposits and barren systems in the Gangdese belt both reached sulfide saturation and have comparable PGE and Cu concentrations at the early stage of differentiation. • The ore-forming magmas show highly variable Cu, Au and PGE trends after they reached fluid exsolution. • Assimilation and cannibalization of sulfides in the underlying mush zones by fluid-saturated ore-forming magmas result in the porphyry Cu deposits formation, which may be stimulated by regional extension. Production of Cu-rich melts via melting of sulfide-bearing lower crustal cumulates is thought to contribute to porphyry Cu formation in the post-collisional Gangdese belt (Tibet). We present new whole rock, including platinum group elements (PGE) data, for ore-causative granites (OCG), ore-related granites (ORG) and barren granites (BG) from the Gangdese belt. The OCG, ORG and BG show indistinguishable Cu, PGE and Cu/Ag behavior during differentiation down to ∼2 wt% MgO. These systematics, together with the occurrence of sulfides, demonstrate that the propensity for some Gangdese magmas to be ore-associated is unrelated to melting of sulfide-bearing cumulates or the relative timing of sulfide fractionation. The behavior of chalcophile and siderophile elements during differentiation of the OCG, ORG and BG diverges when melts evolve past 2–3 wt% MgO and exsolve H 2 O, S and Cl: the BG show a decrease in Cu, whereas the OCG and ORG show highly variable Cu, Au, and PGE trends. Because S degassing causes melts to become sulfur undersaturated and because Cu is highly soluble in Cl-rich fluids, any sulfides in contact with the melt or magmatic fluids following volatile exsolution would dissolve. Continual injection, cooling and ascent of magmas through the Gangdese crust is expected to have resulted in the development of regions of crystal-rich partially molten crust beneath the intrusive granites. We suggest that prior to porphyry mineralization, extension and erosion caused exhumation of these long-lived sulfide-bearing mush zones. This exhumation may have caused a change in magmatism style from volatile exsolution after the melts transited sulfide-bearing mushes (i.e., the BG), to volatile exsolution during magma transit through sulfide-bearing mushes (i.e., the OCG). We suggest that only the magmas and that exsolved fluids during their ascent through sulfide-bearing mushes were able to assimilate sufficient Cu-rich sulfides to fuel the formation of porphyry Cu deposits in the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Content-Defined Chunking (CDC) has been playing a key role in data deduplication systems recently due to its high redundancy detection ability. However, existing CDC-based approaches introduce heavy CPU overhead because they declare the chunk cut-points by computing and judging the rolling hashes of the data stream byte by byte. In this article, we propose FastCDC, a Fast and efficient Content-Defined Chunking approach, for data deduplication-based storage systems. The key idea behind FastCDC is the combined use of five key techniques, namely, gear based fast rolling hash, simplifying and enhancing the Gear hash judgment, skipping sub-minimum chunk cut-points, normalizing the chunk-size distribution in a small specified region to address the problem of the decreased deduplication ratio stemming from the cut-point skipping, and last but not least, rolling two bytes each time to further speed up CDC. Our evaluation results show that, by using a combination of the five techniques, FastCDC is 3-12X faster than the state-of-the-art CDC approaches, while achieving nearly the same and even higher deduplication ratio as the classic Rabin-based CDC. In addition, our study on the deduplication throughput of FastCDC-based Destor (an open source deduplication project) indicates that FastCDC helps achieve 1.2-3.0X higher throughput than Destor based on state-of-the-art chunkers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Begomoviruses are exclusively transmitted by whiteflies in a persistent circulative manner and cause considerable economic losses to crop production worldwide. Previous studies have shown that begomoviruses accumulate in vesicle-like structures in whitefly midgut cells and that clathrin-mediated endocytosis is responsible for their internalization. However, the process by which begomoviruses are trafficked within whitefly midgut cells remains largely unknown. In this study, we investigated the roles of vesicle trafficking in the transport of Tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV), a begomovirus that has spread to over 50 countries and caused extensive damage to a range of important crops, within midgut cells of whitefly (Bemisia tabaci). By disrupting vesicle trafficking using RNA silencing and inhibitors, we demonstrated that the early steps of endosomal trafficking are important for the intracellular transport of TYLCV in the whitefly midgut. In addition, our data show that, unlike many animal viruses, TYCLV is trafficked within cells in a manner independent of recycling endosomes, late endosomes, lysosomes, the Golgi apparatus and the endoplasmic reticulum. Instead, our results suggest that TYLCV might be transported directly from early endosomes to the basal plasma membrane and released into the hemolymph. Silencing of the sorting nexin Snx12, which may be involved in membrane tubulation, resulted in fewer viral particles in hemolymph; this suggests that the tubular endosomal network may be involved in the transport of TYLCV. Our results also support a role for the endo-lysosomal system in viral degradation. We further showed that the functions of vector early endosomes and sorting nexin Snx12 are conserved in the transmission of several other begomoviruses. Overall, our data indicate the importance of early endosomes and the tubular endosomal network in begomovirus transmission. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data reduction has become increasingly important in storage systems due to the explosive growth of digital data in the world that has ushered in the big data era. One of the main challenges facing large-scale data reduction is how to maximally detect and eliminate redundancy at very low overheads. In this paper, we present DARE, a low-overhead deduplication-aware resemblance detection and elimination scheme that effectively exploits existing duplicate-adjacency information for highly efficient resemblance detection in data deduplication based backup/archiving storage systems. The main idea behind DARE is to employ a scheme, call Duplicate-Adjacency based Resemblance Detection (DupAdj), by considering any two data chunks to be similar (i.e., candidates for delta compression) if their respective adjacent data chunks are duplicate in a deduplication system, and then further enhance the resemblance detection efficiency by an improved super-feature approach. Our experimental results based on real-world and synthetic backup datasets show that DARE only consumes about 1/4 and 1/2 respectively of the computation and indexing overheads required by the traditional super-feature approaches while detecting 2-10 percent more redundancy and achieving a higher throughput, by exploiting existing duplicate-adjacency information for resemblance detection and finding the “sweet spot” for the super-feature approach. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Background: Food allergy is the most common cause of anaphylaxis in children. Intramuscular delivery of epinephrine auto-injectors (EAI) is the standard of care for the treatment of anaphylaxis. We examined if children and adolescents at risk of anaphylaxis weighing 15-30 kg and >30 kg would receive epinephrine into the intramuscular space with the currently available EAI in North America and Europe. Methods: The distance from skin to muscle (STMD) and skin to bone (STBD) on the mid third anterolateral area of the right thigh was measured by ultrasound applying either high pressure (max) or slight pressure (min) in 102 children weighing 15-30 kg (group 1) and 100 children and adolescents, weighing more than 30 kg (group 2). Results: Using a high pressure EAI (HPEAI), Epipen Jr® and Auvi-Q®/Allerject® 0.15 mg, 11/102 (11%) children in group 1 and 38/102 (38%) using another HPEAI, Jext®, had a STMDmax that showed a risk of intraosseous injection. There was a 1% risk of subcutaneous injection with these devices. There was no risk of intraosseous injection using a low pressure EAI (LPEAI), Emerade®. In group 2, the risk of intraosseous injection using a HPEAI was 3% and no risk using a LPEAI. However, the risk of subcutaneous injection using HPEAI was 9% and using LPEAI was 2%. Conclusion: There is a risk of intraosseous injection using HPEAI (Epipen®/Epipen Jr®, Auvi-Q®/Allerject® and especially Jext®) in children at risk of anaphylaxis. There was also a risk of subcutaneous injection using the currently available HPEAI in children and adolescents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Sawur region, north Xinjiang, hosts many Late Paleozoic volcanic hosted gold deposits. • Lamprophyres in gold deposits with xenoliths and xenocrysts provide important information of lithospheric mantle. • Sawur mantle fertilized by alkali carbonatite metasomatism is susceptible for gold mineralization. The Sawur gold belt, northern Xinjiang, China, is the eastward extension of the Zarma-Sawur Au-Cu belt in Kazakhstan. Many gold deposits and other mineral occurrences are distributed in volcanic rocks of the Sawur area. Systematic studies are in need to learn how gold is associated with volcanic rocks. This study applied whole rock and mineral geochemical analysis on lamprophyres in Qia'erdunbasixi gold deposit. Clinopyroxene (Cpx) xenocryst in lamprophyre and Cpx megacryst core is Mg- and Cr-rich diopside, which is commonly eroded by salite with resorption boundary. These Cpx grains with low rare earth element (REE) abundance, light rare earth element (LREE) depletion ([La/Yb] N < 1) and without Eu anomaly are likely formed in the spinel-facies lithospheric mantle. Xenocryst in lamprophyre has undergone metasomatism, which is proved by the occurrence of amphibole and phlogopite along the rim of Cpx. In situ trace element analysis of amphibole and metasomatized clinopyroxene unravels the property of metasomatic melt with large LREE/HREE fractionation and strong depletion in Zr-Hf and Ti relative REE, with the occurrence of pargasite, phlogopite and apatite, which are typical characteristics of alkali carbonatite melt from upper mantle. Fe-rich salite with low Mg# (61 ∼ 64) and right-leaning REE pattern is different from any other clinopyroxene in Sawur lamprophyre, should be the subducted mélange, which is captured by upwelling melt together with xenocryst caught from spinel-facies mantle. Cpx phenocryst with low Mg#, Cr and high abundance of REE in lamprophyre has different compositions with xenocryst, should be formed in a shallow magma chamber. The lamprophyre is thought to be derived from deep mantle and therefore carry these various xenocrysts into surface. We suggest the mantle origin with alkali carbonatite metasomatism likely results in the gold fertility of Sawur volcanic rocks, which explains the common association with gold mineralization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data deduplication has gained increasing attention and popularity as a space-efficient approach in backup storage systems. One of the main challenges for centralized data deduplication is the scalability of fingerprint-index search. In this paper, we propose SiLo, a near-exact and scalable deduplication system that effectively and complementarily exploits similarity and locality of data streams to achieve high duplicate elimination, throughput, and well balanced load at extremely low RAM overhead. The main idea behind SiLo is to expose and exploit more similarity by grouping strongly correlated small files into a segment and segmenting large files, and to leverage the locality in the data stream by grouping contiguous segments into blocks to capture similar and duplicate data missed by the probabilistic similarity detection. SiLo also employs a locality based stateless routing algorithm to parallelize and distribute data blocks to multiple backup nodes. By judiciously enhancing similarity through the exploitation of locality and vice versa, SiLo is able to significantly reduce RAM usage for index-lookup, achieve the near-exact efficiency of duplicate elimination, maintain a high deduplication throughput, and obtain load balance among backup nodes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Wolbachia is the most prevalent symbiont described in arthropods to date. Wolbachia can manipulate host reproduction, provide nutrition to insect hosts and protect insect hosts from pathogenic viruses. So far, 13 supergroups of Wolbachia have been identified. The whitefly Bemisia tabaci is a complex containing more than 28 morphologically indistinguishable cryptic species. Some cryptic species of this complex are invasive. In this study, we report a comprehensive survey of Wolbachia in B. tabaci and its relative B. afer from 1658 insects representing 54 populations across 13 provinces of China and one state of Australia. Based on the results of PCR or sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene, the overall rates of Wolbachia infection were 79.6% and 0.96% in the indigenous and invasive Bemisia whiteflies, respectively. We detected a new Wolbachia supergroup by sequencing five molecular marker genes including 16S rRNA, groEL, gltA, hcpA, and fbpA genes. Data showed that many protein-coding genes have limitations in detecting and classifying newly identified Wolbachia supergroups and thus raise a challenge to the known Wolbachia MLST standard analysis system. Besides, the other Wolbachia strains detected from whiteflies were clustered into supergroup B. Phylogenetic trees of whitefly mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I and Wolbachia multiple sequencing typing genes were not congruent. In addition, Wolbachia was also detected outside the special bacteriocytes in two cryptic species by fluorescence in situ hybridization, indicating the horizontal transmission of Wolbachia. Our results indicate that members of Wolbachia are far from well explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Nitrogen-doped microtubes porous graphitic carbon (N-MPGC) was facilely prepared. • The as-obtained N-MPGC-2 showed superior catalytic performance for PMS activation. • N-MPGC-2 exhibited outstanding stability and reusability for ten successive cycles. • Singlet oxygen and electron transfer made a major contribution to RhB degradation. • The C O group and graphitic N were the main active sites for PMS activation. The agricultural waste-derived biochar can be used as an effective green catalyst for peroxymonosulfate (PMS) activation to utilize the biomass resource. Herein, nitrogen-doped microtubes porous graphitic carbon (N-MPGC) derived from loofah sponge was facilely prepared via the impregnation-calcination method. The amount of N doping was positively correlated with the catalytic performance of N-MPGC. The obtained N-MPGC-2 as a metal-free carbon catalyst showed excellent ability for rhodamine B (RhB) degradation via PMS activation with the pseudo-first-order reaction rate constant (k) of 0.293 min-1, which was 22.5-fold as high as that over microtube porous carbon (MPC). Besides, N-MPGC-2 showed still outstanding stability and reusability for RhB degradation after ten successive cycles. Excitingly, the N-MPGC-2 membrane exhibited good catalytic activity after the N-MPGC-2 had been immobilized in the polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) membrane. Non-radical pathways including singlet oxygen and electron transfer played a major role in RhB degradation for the N-MPGC-2/PMS/RhB system. The carbonyl (C O) group and graphitic N of N-MPGC-2 were the main active sites for PMS activation. This work opened a new idea for synthesizing N-doped biochar as a low-cost and high-efficiency catalyst and provided theoretical support for the mechanism of biochar-based carbonaceous materials activation of PMS for practical applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

FTIR was used to indicate whether the grinding can improve the floatability of the two different oxidized coals. The results of FTIR show that the grinding processes can reduce the contents of hydrophilic groups(carboxyl and hydroxyl) and increase the content of hydrophobic groups (benzene rings and methyl). The coal oxidized mildly can be floated efficiently after 20-30 min grinding. The coal heavily oxidized can also be floated efficiently after 80 min grinding. But the flotation recovery of heavy oxidized coal drops down while the grinding time is more than 80 min. The best flotation recovery of heavy oxidized coal occurs while the yield of size fraction 62-11 µm is the highest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Biosurfactant produced by Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Bacillus subtilis and Rhodococcus erythropolis that isolated from the formation water of Chinese petroleum reservoir has been compared in surface abilities and oil recovery. Maximum biosurfactant production reached to about 2.66g/l and the surface tension of liquid decreased from 71.2 to 22.56mN/m using P. aeruginosa. Three strains exhibited a good ability to emulsify the crude oil, and biosurfactant of P. aeruginosa attained an emulsion index of 80% for crude oil which was greater than other strains. Stability studies were carried out under the extreme environmental conditions, such as high temperature, pH, salinity and metal ions. Results showed an excellent resistance of all biosurfactants to retain their surface-active properties at extreme conditions. It was found that the biosurfactants from three isolated bacteria showed a good stability above pH of 5, but at lower pH (from 1 to 5) they will harmfully be affected. They were able to support the condition up to 20g/l salinity. P. aeruginosa biosurfactant was even stable at the higher salinity. Regarding temperature, all produced biosurfactants demonstrated a good stability in the temperature up to 120°C. But stability of three biosurfactants was affected by monovalent and trivalent ions. Oil recovery experiments in physical simulation showed 7.2–14.3% recovery of residual oil after water flooding when the biosurfactant of three strains was added. These results suggest that biosurfactants of these indigenous isolated strains are appropriate candidates for enhanced oil recovery with a preference to biosurfactant of P. aeruginosa. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Background: Despite evidence supporting the high correlation of the novel platelet-to-albumin ratio (PAR) with survival in diverse malignancies, its prognostic relevance in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) remains underexplored. This study aimed to examine the link between PAR and overall survival (OS) in NPC and to establish a predictive model based on this biomarker. Methods: We retrospectively assembled a cohort consisting of 858 NPC patients who underwent concurrent chemoradiotherapy (CCRT). Utilizing the maximally selected log-rank method, we ascertained the optimal cut-off point for the PAR. Subsequently, univariate and multivariate Cox proportional hazards models were employed to discern factors significantly associated with OS and to construct a predictive nomogram. Further, we subjected the nomogram’s predictive accuracy to rigorous independent validation. Results: The discriminative optimal PAR threshold was determined to be 4.47, effectively stratifying NPC patients into two prognostically distinct subgroups (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.53; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.28–0.98, P = 0.042). A predictive nomogram was formulated using the results from multivariate analysis, which revealed age greater than 45 years, T stage, N stage, and PAR score as independent predictors of OS. The nomogram demonstrated a commendable predictive capability for OS, with a C-index of 0.69 (95% CI: 0.64–0.75), surpassing the performance of the conventional staging system, which had a C-index of 0.56 (95% CI: 0.65–0.74). Conclusions: In the context of NPC patients undergoing CCRT, the novel nutritional-inflammatory biomarker PAR emerges as a promising, cost-efficient, easily accessible, non-invasive, and potentially valuable predictor of prognosis. The predictive efficacy of the nomogram incorporating the PAR score exceeded that of the conventional staging approach, thereby indicating its potential as an enhanced prognostic tool in this clinical setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fish are vital in river ecosystems; however, traditional investigations of fish usually cause ecological damage. Extracting DNA from aquatic environments and identifying DNA sequences offer an alternative, noninvasive approach for detecting fish species. In this study, the effects of environmental DNA (eDNA), coupled with PCR and next‐generation sequencing, and electrofishing for identifying fish community composition and diversity were compared. In three subtropical rivers of southern China, fish specimens and eDNA in water were collected along the longitudinal (upstream–downstream) gradient of the rivers. Both fish population parameters, including species abundance and biomass, and eDNA OTU richness grouped 38 sampling sites into eight spatial zones with significant differences in local fish community composition. Compared with order‐/family‐level grouping, genus‐/species‐level grouping could more accurately reveal the differences between upstream zones I−III, midstream zones IV−V, and downstream zones VI–VIII. From the headwaters to the estuary, two environmental gradients significantly influenced the longitudinal distribution of the fish species, including the first gradient composed of habitat and physical water parameters and the second gradient composed of chemical water parameters. The high regression coefficient of alpha diversity between eDNA and electrofishing methods as well as the accurate identification of dominant, alien, and biomarker species in each spatial zone indicated that eDNA could characterize fish community attributes at a level similar to that of traditional approaches. Overall, our results demonstrated that eDNA metabarcoding can be used as an effective tool for revealing fish composition and diversity, which is important for using the eDNA technique in aquatic field monitoring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The partition coefficient (K pew) of an analyte between low-density polyethylene (LDPE) film and water is a critical parameter for measuring freely dissolved concentrations of the analyte with PE passive sampling devices. Measuring log K pew for super hydrophobic organic chemicals (HOCs) have been proven extremely difficult. The present study developed a large volume model for measuring log K pew of super HOCs, i.e., novel halogenated flame retardants (NHFRs). Results showed that the measured log K pew values of selected PAHs and PCBs obtained by the large volume model were in line with those from the co-solvent model and the literature data within less 0.3 log units of difference, while those of NHFRs (6.27–7.34) except for hexachlorocyclopentadienyldibromocyclooctane (HCDBCO) and Decabromodiphenyl ethane (DBDPE) were significantly lower than those (6.51–8.89) from the co-solvent model. A curvilinear relationship was observed between log K pew and log K ow of all target compounds, with the turning point at log K ow = ∼8.0 in the large volume model, but that was not found for the co-solvent model. These can be attributed to the large molecular volumes (> 450 Å3) for NHFRs, which require high Gibbs free energy to penetrate into the inside structures of LDPE in the large volume model. However, the solvent swelling effects in the co-solvent model needs to be investigated. Therefore, the large volume model is robust to determine the K pew values of super HOCs for facilitating the application of aquatic passive sampling techniques. • The large volume model is feasible to measure the K pew values of super HOCs. • The K pew values of HOCs from the co-solvent model were greater than other models. • The K pew values of NHFRs decreased with increasing molecular volumes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the potency and specificity of valproic acids as an inhibitor of the activity of different human cytochrome P450 (CYP) isoforms in liver microsomes. Effects of valporic acid on the pharmacokinetics of other drugs; Inhibition of the activity of tolbutamide hydroxylase (CYP2CP); Co-administration of high doses of valporic acid with drugs metabolized by CYP2CP.

• Tannic acid was used as precursor to modify lanthanum oxide based nanoadsorbent. • La/C nanorods doped membrane with dual functions was synthesized. • Simultaneous removal of suspended solids and phosphate was achieved by the membrane. • Phosphorus in practical diluted wastewaters can be readily reduced to <0.1 mg/L. Finding effective ways to control eutrophication issue and achieve phosphate recycling remains a long-term challenge. Here, a composite membrane with dual functions of adsorption and filtration was proposed to remove phosphorus from diluted wastewaters. Firstly, a new adsorption material, lanthanum oxide-doped carbon material (La/C), was synthesized to selectively remove phosphorus ions from aqueous solution. Batch-experiment results revealed that the maximum adsorption capacity of La/C reached 48.8 mg-P/g at pH 7.0 with simulated phosphorus solution, which was superior to that of La compounds without C doping (37.4 mg-P/g). Combining with a serial of characterizations, ligand exchange involved multilayer adsorption was the main mechanism for the phosphorus removal. With a moderate doping amount of La/C into casting solution, the composite porous membrane was fabricated and applied to remove the particles and phosphorus from the diluted wastewaters such as secondary effluent and surface waters. Carbon component in La/C material was found to be beneficial for the pores development and hydrophilicity improvement of membrane, which resulted in a higher water flux and better anti-fouling performance. This work may provide the valuable information for the feasible application of phosphorus adsorption material and enlighten the technical development for the low phosphorus polluted wastewater remediation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kesuting Syrup, a Chinese herbal formula, has been registered in China since 2002 and has been used to treat upper respiratory symptoms such as sore throat and cough. A study conducted in China found that Kesuting Syrup may be effective in treating COVID-19, including the Omicron variant. The study used multidimensional computations and network pharmacology to explore the potential therapeutic mechanism of Kesuting Syrup. While Kesuting Syrup did not significantly impact viral replication, it improved recovery time and rate in patients with mild Omicron variant infection and reduced the expression of viral nucleic acid. Rutin, a compound in Kesuting Syrup, may be responsible for its anti-SARS-CoV-2 effect by targeting IFN-γ and enhancing the body's immune response. The study suggests that Kesuting Syrup could be used as an adjunct to standard care in managing COVID-19 symptoms and improving patient comfort. The authors declare no conflict of interest, and the data supporting the findings are available upon request. [Extracted from the article]

The utilization of food resources by aquatic consumers reflects the structure and functioning of river food webs. In lotic water systems, where food availability and predator–prey relationships vary with gradient changes in physical conditions, understanding diet assimilation by local communities is important for ecosystem conservation. In the subtropical Liuxi River, southern China, the relative contribution of basal resources to the diet assimilation of functional feeding groups (FFGs) was determined by stable carbon (13C) and nitrogen (15N) isotope analyses. The output of Bayesian mixing models showed that diatom‐dominated periphyton (epilithic biofilm), aquatic C3 plants (submerged hydrophytes), and suspended particulate organic matter (SPOM) associated with terrestrial C3 plants contributed the most to the diet assimilation of FFGs in the upper, middle, and lower reaches, respectively. The relative contribution of consumer diet assimilation was weighted by the biomass (wet weight, g/m2) of each FFG to reflect resource utilization at the assemblage level. From the upper to the lower reaches, the spatial variation in the diet assimilation of fish and invertebrate assemblages could be summarized as a longitudinal decrease in periphyton (from 57%–76% to <3%) and an increase in SPOM (from <7% to 51%–68%) with a notable midstream increase in aquatic C3 plants (23%–48%). These results indicate that instream consumers in the Liuxi River rely more on autochthonous production (e.g., periphyton and submerged hydrophytes) than on terrestrially derived allochthonous matter (e.g., terrestrial plants). The pattern of resource utilization by consumers in the mid‐upper Liuxi River is consistent with findings from other open subtropical and neotropical rivers and provides evidence for the riverine productivity model. Our study indicates that protecting inherent producers in rivers (e.g., periphyton and submerged hydrophytes) and restoring their associated habitats (e.g., riffles with cobble substrate) are conducive to aquatic ecosystem management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cellulase has many potential applications in ethanol production, extraction of medicinal ingredients, food, brewing, oil exploration, environmental protection. However, the widespread use of cellulase is limited by its relatively high production costs and low biological activity. Therefore, we studied the enzymatic properties and reusability of cellulase immobilized on multiwalled carbon nanotubes and sodium alginate for the first time. The results showed that the optimum temperature and pH of immobilized cellulase was 40 °C and 3.0, respectively. After 1 month of storage at 4 °C, the enzyme activity of immobilized cellulase dropped to 71.2% of the baseline. Immobilized cellulase was proved to be reusable and maintained ~ 70% of its activity after 7 cycles of repeated use. Versus free cellulase, the immobilized cellulase showed good thermal stability, pH resistance, storage stability and reusability, which could be beneficial in large-scale industrial manufacturing processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• With alkaline oxides adding, the proportion of CN for Al were AC > MAC > LAC > BAC > NAC. • The depolymerization ability of alkaline cations was ranked as NAC > BAC > MAC > LAC. • The charge compensation ability of alkaline cations was ranked as Na+ > Li+ > Ba2+ > Mg2+. • A small number of electrons were localized between O atoms, which surrounded Al to form a closed structure. To guide the research and development of CaO-Al 2 O 3 -based mold fluxes, the influence mechanism of 8 mol% alkaline oxides (Na 2 O, Li 2 O, BaO, MgO) on the multi-scale structure characteristics of aluminate slag (CaO/Al 2 O 3 = 1.3) at 1873 K was analyzed by first-principles calculation. With the addition of alkaline oxides, the stability of Al-O and Ca-O bonds in slag system was Na 2 O-Al 2 O 3 -CaO (NAC) ≈ BaO-Al 2 O 3 -CaO (BAC) > Li 2 O-Al 2 O 3 -CaO (LAC) ≈ Al 2 O 3 -CaO (AC) > MgO-Al 2 O 3 -CaO (MAC), and the proportion of average coordination number for Al were AC > MAC > LAC > BAC > NAC. The alkaline cations played two roles of structure depolymerization and charge compensation, as the ability was ranked as NAC > BAC > MAC > LAC, and Na+ > Li+ > Ba2+ > Mg2+, respectively. At the electronic level, a small number of electrons were localized between O atoms, which surrounded Al to form a closed structure. Adding appropriate amount of Na 2 O/BaO was necessary to effectively regulate the low/non-reactive mold flux. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: We aimed to identify the relationship between the genomic characteristics and clinical outcomes of oligo-metastatic breast cancer. Methods: Oligo-metastatic breast cancer diagnosed by pathology from January 2001 and August 2019 were reviewed and we matched the poly-metastatic patients based on the clinicopathological features of patients included. Clinicopathological values and data of genomic alterations were collected. Oligo-recurrence (oligo-R) was defined as a situation where disease progression occurred in less than 5 anatomical sites and other anatomic areas still suppressed by the ongoing therapy. Results: A total of 26 breast cancer patients were enrolled in our study, including 14 patients with strict oligo-metastatic disease (oligo-R > 6 months) and 12 with simultaneous poly-metastatic disease. PIK3CA, TP53 and ERBB2 were the most common shared alterations identified in patients included. Based on the median time of oligo-R, we divided the patients with oligo-metastasis into longer oligo-R group (oligo-R > 31.04 months) and shorter oligo-R group (oligo-R ≤ 31.04 months). The analysis of PIK3CA mutation sites showed that H1047R mutation was closely associated with oligo-metastasis, rather than poly-metastasis. H1047R mutation also predicted a better prognosis (oligo-R > 31.04 months) in oligo-metastatic breast cancer. In addition, HER2 positive was more likely to be related to a good outcome in patients with oligo-metastasis. Conclusions: Through the genetic analysis of samples from oligo-metastasis, we found the prognostic values of PIK3CA H1047R and HER2 in oligo- and poly-metastasis. We improved the stratification of prognosis and provided new insights for biological behaviors of oligo-metastatic breast cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scientific simulations in high-performance computing (HPC) environments generate vast volume of data, which may cause a severe I/O bottleneck at runtime and a huge burden on storage space for postanalysis. Unlike traditional data reduction schemes such as deduplication or lossless compression, not only can error-controlled lossy compression significantly reduce the data size but it also holds the promise to satisfy user demand on error control. Pointwise relative error bounds (i.e., compression errors depends on the data values) are widely used by many scientific applications with lossy compression since error control can adapt to the error bound in the dataset automatically. Pointwise relative-error-bounded compression is complicated and time consuming. In this article, we develop efficient precomputation-based mechanisms based on the SZ lossy compression framework. Our mechanisms can avoid costly logarithmic transformation and identify quantization factor values via a fast table lookup, greatly accelerating the relative-error-bounded compression with excellent compression ratios. In addition, we reduce traversing operations for Huffman decoding, significantly accelerating the decompression process in SZ. Experiments with eight well-known real-world scientific simulation datasets show that our solution can improve the compression and decompression rates (i.e., the speed) by about 40 and 80 p, respectively, in most of cases, making our designed lossy compression strategy the best-in-class solution in most cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Genetic testing plays an important role in guiding screening, diagnosis, and precision treatment of breast cancer (BC). However, the appropriate genetic testing criteria remain controversial. The current study aims to facilitate the development of suitable strategies by analyzing the germline mutational profiles and clinicopathological features of large‐scale Chinese BC patients. Methods: BC patients who had undergone genetic testing at the Sun Yat‐sen University Cancer Center (SYSUCC) from September 2014 to March 2022 were retrospectively reviewed. Different screening criteria were applied and compared in the population cohort. Results: A total of 1035 BC patients were enrolled, 237 pathogenic or likely pathogenic variants (P/LPV) were identified in 235 patients, including 41 out of 203 (19.6%) patients tested only for BRCA1/2 genes, and 194 out of 832 (23.3%) received 21 genes panel testing. Among the 235 P/LPV carriers, 222 (94.5%) met the NCCN high‐risk criteria, and 13 (5.5%) did not. While using Desai's criteria of testing, all females diagnosed with BC by 60 years and NCCN criteria for older patients, 234 (99.6%) met the high‐risk standard, and only one did not. The 21 genes panel testing identified 4.9% of non‐BRCA P/LPVs and a significantly high rate of variants of uncertain significance (VUSs) (33.9%). The most common non‐BRCA P/LPVs were PALB2 (11, 1.3%), TP53 (10, 1.2%), PTEN (3, 0.4%), CHEK2 (3, 0.4%), ATM (3, 0.4%), BARD1 (3, 0.4%), and RAD51C (2, 0.2%). Compared with BRCA1/2 P/LPVs, non‐BRCA P/LPVs showed a significantly low incidence of NCCN criteria listed family history, second primary cancer, and different molecular subtypes. Conclusions: Desai's criteria might be a more appropriate genetic testing strategy for Chinese BC patients. Panel testing could identify more non‐BRCA P/LPVs than BRCA1/2 testing alone. Compared with BRCA1/2 P/LPVs, non‐BRCA P/LPVs exhibited different personal and family histories of cancer and molecular subtype distributions. The optimal genetic testing strategy for BC still needs to be investigated with larger continuous population studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The conversion of waste into a valuable product is regarded as a promising alternative to relieving the burden of solid waste management and could be beneficial to the environment and humans. This study is focused on utilizing eggshell and orange peel enriched with banana starch to fabricate biofilm via the casting technique. The developed film is further characterized by field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), atomic force microscopy (AFM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). The physical properties of films, including thickness, density, color, porosity, moisture content, water solubility, water absorption, and water vapor permeability, were also characterized. The removal efficiency of the metal ions onto film at different contact times, pH, biosorbent dosages, and initial concentration of Cd(II) were analyzed using atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS). The film's surface was found to have a porous and rough structure with no cracks, which can enhance the target analytes interactions. EDX and XRD analyses confirmed that eggshell particles were made of calcium carbonate (CaCO3), and the appearance of the main peak at 2θ = 29.65° and 2θ = 29.49° proves the presence of calcite in eggshells. The FTIR indicated that the films contain various functional groups, such as alkane (C-H), hydroxyl (-OH), carbonyl (C=O), carbonate (CO32−), and carboxylic acid (-COOH) that can act as biosorption materials. According to the findings, the developed film exhibits a notable enhancement in its water barrier properties, thereby leading to improved adsorption capacity. The batch experiments showed that the film obtained the maximum removal percentage at pH = 8 and 6 g of biosorbent dose. Notably, the developed film could reach sorption equilibrium within 120 min at the initial concentration of 80 mg/L and remove 99.95% of Cd(II) in the aqueous solutions. This outcome presents potential opportunities for the application of these films in the food industry as both biosorbents and packaging materials. Such utilization can significantly enhance the overall quality of food products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The anaerobic ammonium oxidation (anammox) process has the advantages of a high nitrogen removal rate, low operational cost, and small footprint and has been successfully implemented to treat high-content ammonium wastewater. However, very little is known about the toxicity of the heavy metal element Ni(II) to the anammox process. In this study, the short- and long-term effects of Ni(II) on the anammox process in an upflow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor were revealed. The results of the short-term batch test showed that the half maximal inhibitory concentration (IC 50) of Ni(II) on anammox biomass was 14.6 mg L−1. A continuous-flow experiment was performed for 150 days of operation, and the results illustrated that after domestication, the achieved nitrogen removal efficiency was up to 93±0.03% at 10 mg L−1 Ni(II). The settling velocity, specific anammox activity and EPS content decreased as the Ni(II) concentration increased. Nevertheless, the content of heme c increased as the Ni(II) increased. These results indicate that short-term exposure to Ni(II) has an adverse impact on anammox process, but the anammox system could tolerate 10 mg L−1 Ni(II) stress after acclimation during continuous-flow operation for 150 days. High-throughput sequencing results indicated that the presence of Ni(II) had an impact on the microbial community composition in the anammox reactor, especially Candidatus Kuenenia. At Ni(II) concentrations of 0-10 mg L−1, the relative abundance of Candidatus Kuenenia decreased from 36.23% to 28.46%. • The IC50 of Ni(II) on anammox biomass was 14.64 mg L−1 in short-term assay. • The effect of Ni(II) on substrate removal kinetic behavior of anammox was studied. • The long-term effects of Ni(II) in anammox UASB reactor were evaluated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Advanced Breast Cancer Alliance conducted a nationwide investigation to understand the current situation of the diagnosis and treatment of human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-positive metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients. Methods: In 2019, electronic questionnaires including basic information about respondents, characteristics of patients, and the present status of diagnosis and treatment were sent to 495 doctors from 203 medical centers covering 28 provinces. Results: The factors that influenced treatment plans included the disease process, the performance status, and the economic status of patients. Regimens and response to neoadjuvant/adjuvant chemotherapy were important factors in the decision of the first-line treatment. Overall, 54% of doctors retained trastuzumab and replaced chemotherapy drugs in second-line treatment regimens for patients with progression-free survival (PFS) ≥ 6 months in the first-line setting, while 52% of participants chose pyrotinib plus capecitabine for patients with PFS < 6 months. Economic factors played an important role in doctors' decision-making and the varying treatment options for respondents in first-tier, second-tier, and other cities. Conclusions: This large-scale survey regarding the diagnosis and treatment of HER2-positive MBC patients revealed that clinical decisions made by Chinese doctors followed the guidelines, but their choices were constrained by economic factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long-term intensive use of mineral fertilizers in double rice-cropping systems has led to soil acidification and soil degradation. Manure fertilization was suggested as an alternative strategy to mitigate soil degradation. However, the effects of long-term mineral and manure fertilization on rice grain yield, yield stability, soil organic carbon (SOC) content, soil total nitrogen (TN) content, and the underlying mechanisms are unclear. Based on a long-term experiment established in 1981 in southern China, we compared four treatments: no fertilizer application (Control); application of nitrogen–phosphorus–potassium (NPK); NPK plus green manure in early rice (M1); and M1 plus farmyard manure in late rice and rice straw return in winter (M2). Our results showed that 37 years of NPK, M1, and M2 significantly increased rice grain yield by 54%, 46%, and 72%, and yield stability by 22%, 17%, and 9%, respectively. M1 and M2 significantly increased SOC content by 39% and 23% compared to Control, respectively, whereas there was no difference between Control and NPK. Regarding soil TN content, it was significantly increased by 8%, 46%, and 20% by NPK, M1, and M2, respectively. In addition, M2 significantly increased bacterial OTU richness by 68%, Chao1 index by 79%, and altered the bacterial community composition. Changes in soil nutrient availability and bacterial Simpson index were positively correlated with the changes in grain yield, while shifts in bacterial community were closely related to yield stability. This study provides pioneer comprehensive assessments of the simultaneous responses of grain yield, yield stability, SOC and TN content, nutrient availability, and bacterial community composition to long-term mineral and manure fertilization in a double rice-cropping system. Altogether, this study spanning nearly four decades provides new perspectives for developing sustainable yet intensive rice cultivation to meet growing global demands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fake news detection attracts many researchers’ attention due to the negative impacts on the society. Most existing fake news detection approaches mainly focus on semantic analysis of news’ contents. However, the detection performance will dramatically decrease when the content of news is short. In this paper, we propose a novel fake news detection multi-task learning (FDML) model based on the following observations: 1) some certain topics have higher percentages of fake news; and 2) some certain news authors have higher intentions to publish fake news. FDML model investigates the impact of topic labels for the fake news and introduce contextual information of news at the same time to boost the detection performance on the short fake news. Specifically, the FDML model consists of representation learning and multi-task learning parts to train the fake news detection task and the news topic classification task, simultaneously. As far as we know, this is the first fake news detection work that integrates the above two tasks. The experiment results show that the FDML model outperforms state-of-the-art methods on real-world fake news dataset. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The optimal therapeutic options, adding locoregional therapy (LRT) to systemic therapy (ST) or not, for patients with oligometastatic breast cancer (OMBC) have not been fully elucidated. Hence, we designed a retrospective observational study which enrolled patients with measurable extracranial OMBC having less than 5 metastatic lesions not necessarily in the same organ. We retrospectively reviewed a total of 199 patients diagnosed with extracranial OMBC, including 28 receiving ST followed by LRT (ST to LRT group), 44 receiving LRT followed by ST (LRT to ST group), and 127 receiving ST alone (ST alone group). After a median follow-up of 28.7 months, patients receiving both ST and LRT had a significantly better prognosis than those receiving ST alone: the median progression-free survival (PFS) was 16.3, 14.0, and 9.3 months (P < 0.001) and the median overall survival (OS) was 39.8, 70.5, and 26.7 months (P < 0.001) in the ST to LRT, LRT to ST, and ST alone groups, respectively. Sequence of ST and LRT had no significant impact on survival among patients receiving both. Further exploratory analysis identified ST plus LRT as an independent predictor for longer PFS. In conclusion, we demonstrated that adding LRT to ST was associated with survival benefits for patients with OMBC, and further prospective studies were warranted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary Endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) play an important role in repairing endothelial injury. Aging is associated with EPC dysfunction. Physical exercise has a beneficial impact on EPC activity. However, whether physical exercise can enhance the endothelial repair capacity of EPCs in healthy men with aging is not clear. Here, we investigated the effects of physical exercise on reendothelialization capacity and CXC chemokine receptor four (CXCR4) signaling in human EPCs. Before and after 12-week exercise, EPCs were isolated from elderly and young men. In vitro function and in vivo reendothelialization capacity of EPCs in a mouse model of carotid artery injury were measured. The expression of CXCR4 and its downstream signaling target Janus kinase-2 (JAK-2) were determined. Before exercise, in vitro function and in vivo reendothelialization capacity of EPCs were significantly reduced in elderly men compared with young men. After exercise intervention, in vitro function and in vivo reendothelialization capacity of EPCs from elderly men were markedly enhanced. Physical exercise increased a higher CXCR4 protein expression and higher JAK-2 phosphorylation levels of EPCs. The augmentation in reendothelialization capacity of EPCs was closely correlated with the upregulation of CXCR4/JAK-2 signaling and improvement of endothelial function. This study demonstrates for the first time that physical exercise attenuates age-associated reduction in endothelium-reparative capacity of EPCs by increasing CXCR4/JAK-2 signaling. Our findings provide insight into the novel mechanisms of physical exercise as a lifestyle intervention strategy to promote vascular health in aging population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the value of two quantitative indicators, the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) and the exponent apparent diffusion coefficient (EADC), of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) in the differential diagnosis of ovarian epithelial tumors. Materials and Methods: Clinical and MRI data from ovarian epithelial tumors were analyzed after pathology confirmation of 85 lesions from 76 cases (47 lesions from 41 benign cases; 38 lesions from 35 malignant cases). Patients underwent routine MRI examination and DWI before surgery. The average ADC and EADC values of the solid sections of the tumors were measured when the b value was 1000 s/mm 2. Results: The mean ADC value of the solid sections in the benign group was 1.28 ± 0.23 × 10-3 mm 2/s; the average EADC value was 27.96 ± 5.78 × 10-2. In the malignant group, the mean ADC value of the solid sections was 0.86 ± 0.17 × 10-3 mm 2/s; the average EADC value was 42.37 ± 5.96 × 10-2. When the b value was 1000 s/mm 2, there was a statistically significant difference in ADC and EADC values between benign and malignant ovarian tumors (P < 0.05). Conclusion: ADC and EADC values of DWI can be used to differentiate benign and malignant ovarian epithelial tumors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Despite significant survival improvement in human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) blockade for HER2-positive breast cancer, resistance to anti-HER2 remains inevitable. Subsequent anti-HER2 with continuing trastuzumab beyond progression is acceptable with limited efficacy when other anti-HER2 treatment is unavailable. This single-arm, phase II study (SYSUCC-005) aimed to explore the efficacy of switching mode for HER2-positive refractory metastatic breast cancer.Methods: Patients with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer rapidly progressing during pre-trastuzumab from six hospitals in China were designed to switch to lapatinib 1,250 mg orally once per day continuously plus capecitabine (1,000 mg/m2 orally twice per day on days 1-14) or vinorelbine (25 mg/m2 intravenously once per day on days 1 and 8) of each 21-day cycle. The primary endpoint was progression-free survival (PFS).Results: Between January 5, 2015 and May 31, 2020, 159 patients were eligible in this study. The median follow-up was 33.1 months, a median PFS of 8.5 months was achieved. Brain metastases (hazard ratio [HR] = 1.582, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.019- 2.453, P = 0.041) and ≥ 2 metastatic sites (HR = 1.679, 95% CI 1.151-2.450, P = 0.007) were independent prognostic factors for PFS. The most common grade ≥ 3 adverse events were diarrhea (3.8%) and hand-foot syndrome (9.4%).Conclusion: The switching mode showed predominant efficacy, which might be a prior therapeutic option over continuing mode in subsequent anti-HER2 therapy for patients with HER2-positive refractory metastatic breast cancer.Trial Registration: This trial was registered on ClinicalTrials.gov ( NCT02362958 ) on 13/02/2015. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Aging, an inevitable process characterized by functional decline over time, is a significant risk factor for various tumors. However, little is known about aging-related genes (ARGs) in breast cancer (BC). We aimed to explore the potential prognostic role of ARGs and to develop an ARG-based prognosis signature for BC. Methods: RNA-sequencing expression profiles and corresponding clinicopathological data of female patients with BC were obtained from public databases in The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO). An ARG-based risk signature was constructed in the TCGA cohort based on results of least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) and multivariate Cox regression analysis, and its prognostic value was further validated in the GSE20685 cohort. Results: A six ARG-based signature, including CLU, DGAT1, MXI1, NFKBI, PIK3CA and PLAU, was developed in the TCGA cohort and significantly stratified patients into low- and high-risk groups. Patients in the former group showed significantly better prognosis than those in the latter. Multivariate Cox regression analysis demonstrated that the ARG risk score was an independent prognostic factor for BC. A predictive nomogram integrating the ARG risk score and three identified factors (age, N- and M-classification) was established in the TCGA cohort and validated in the GSE20685 cohort. Calibration plots showed good consistency between predicted survival probabilities and actual observations. Conclusion: A novel ARG-based risk signature was developed for patients with BC, which can be used for individual prognosis prediction and promoting personalized treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Fourteen low-molecular-weight organic acids (organic acids) and eight neutral monosaccharides (monosaccharides) were used to investigate the intrinsic link between ferrous iron [Fe(II)] accumulation and pentachlorophenol (PCP) degradation at the paddy soil–floodwater interface. Using logistic curve fitting, significant differences were observed between Fe(II) accumulation with organic acids and monosaccharides. These differences were attributed to large variations in the dissociation constants and the number of carbon atoms per molecule. A significant relationship was observed between the maximum capacity of Fe(II) accumulation and PCP degradation. Correlations were established between environmental variables including PCP, NaOAc-/HCl-extractable Fe(II), water soluble organic carbon (WSOC), anodic peak oxidation potential (Ep ) of Fe(II) species, oxidation–reduction potential (ORP), and pH. The increase in pH combined with WSOC consumption caused a decrease in Ep , which greatly enhanced the HCl-extractable Fe(II) accumulation and subsequently contributed to PCP degradation. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Background: The fifth wave of H7N9 avian influenza virus caused a large number of human infections and a large number of poultry deaths in China. Since September 2017, mainland China has begun to vaccinate poultry with H5 + H7 avian influenza vaccine. We investigated the avian influenza virus infections in different types of live poultry markets and samples before and after genotype H5 + H7 vaccination in Nanchang, and analyzed the changes of the HA subtypes of AIVs. Methods: From 2016 to 2019, we monitored different live poultry markets and collected specimens, using real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) technology to detect the nucleic acid of type A avian influenza virus in the samples. The H5, H7 and H9 subtypes of influenza viruses were further classified for the positive results. The χ2 test was used to compare the differences in the separation rates of different avian influenza subtypes. Results: We analyzed 5,196 samples collected before and after vaccination and found that the infection rate of AIV in wholesale market (21.73%) was lower than that in retail market (24.74%) (P < 0.05). Among all the samples, the positive rate of sewage samples (33.90%) was the highest (P < 0.001). After vaccination, the positive rate of H5 and H7 subtypes decreased, and the positive rate of H9 subtype and untypable HA type increased significantly (P < 0.001). The positive rates of H9 subtype in different types of LPMs and different types of samples increased significantly (P < 0.01), and the positive rates of untypable HA type increased significantly in all environmental samples (P < 0.05). Conclusions: Since vaccination, the positive rates of H5 and H7 subtypes have decreased, but the positive rates of H9 subtypes have increased to varying degrees in different testing locations and all samples. This results show that the government should establish more complete measures to achieve long-term control of the avian influenza virus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the present study was to identify the potential risk of circulating-HPV-DNA in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and to analyze abnormally expressed miRNAs in circulating HPV-DNA-positive NSCLC. HPV universal primers were used to detect the presence of HPV-DNA in the peripheral blood of 100 patients with NSCLC. The relationship between circulating-HPV-DNA and NSCLC patients characteristics was analyzed. Then, eight differentially expressed miRNAs in NSCLC were screened based on the TCGA database. The levels of miRNAs in circulating HPV-DNA-positive NSCLC patients were detected by real-time quantitative PCR. ROC curves were generated to evaluate the diagnostic performance. Circulating-HPV-DNA was found in 16 patients. The proportion of HPV-DNA-positive patients with poorly differentiated NSCLC, advanced lung cancer and lymph node metastasis was higher than that of HPV-DNA-negative patients. The levels of miR-183, miR-210 and miR-182 were significantly higher and miR-144 was significantly lower in HPV-DNA-positive NSCLC than those in HPV-DNA-negative NSCLC patients. When using a single miRNA to identify circulating HPV-DNA-positive NSCLC patients, miR-210 had a higher area under the ROC curve (AUC) than other miRNAs, and its sensitivity and specificity were also higher. In addition, the combination of two miRNAs was more effective than a single miRNA. Among them, miR-210+ miR-144 had the highest AUC value and showed the best prediction performance. Circulating-HPV-DNA may serve as a risk factor in NSCLC. Plasma miR-183, miR-210, miR-182 and miR-144 can be used as reliable biomarkers to identify circulating HPV-DNA-positive NSCLC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heteroatom doping is an effective way to raise the electrochemical properties of carbon materials. In this paper, a novel electrode material including nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfur co-doped pyrolyzed bacterial cellulose (N/P/S-PBC) nanofibers was produced. The morphologies, structure characteristics and electrochemical performances of the materials were investigated by Scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectra, X-ray diffraction patterns, X-ray photoelectronic spectroscopy, N2 sorption analysis and electrochemical measurements. When 3.9 atom% of nitrogen, 1.22 atom% of phosphorus and 0.6 atom% of sulfur co-doped into PBC, the specific capacitance of N/P/S-PBC at 1.0 A/g was 255 F/g and the N/P/S-PBC supercapacitors' energy density at 1 A/g was 8.48 Wh/kg with a power density of 489.45 W/kg, which were better than those of the N/P-PBC and N/S-PBC supercapacitors. This material may be a very good candidate as the promising electrode materials for high-performance supercapacitors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Six-transmembrane epithelial antigen of prostate-1 (STEAP1) is a relatively newly identified gene target from prostate cancer, breast cancer, and gastric cancer. However, functions of STEAP1 in lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) are still unknown. In the present study, we explored the molecular and cellular mechanisms of STEAP1 in LUAD. Western blot and Q-PCR were conducted to detect the protein and mRNA expressions respectively. The cell proliferation was tested by CCK8 assay. The effects of STEAP1 on the metastasis and epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) of LUAD were evaluated by EdU assay, wound healing assay, and transwell migratory assay. H1650, H358, HCC827, H1299, H23, A549, H1693 were selected as human LUAD cell lines in the study. Results have shown that STEAP1 expression was up-regulated in LUAD cells compared with normal lung epithelial cells. Knockdowning of STEAP1 suppressed the proliferation, migration, and invasion of LUAD epithelial cells. Importantly, after comparing the proliferation, migration, and invasion of LUAD to the corresponding control groups treated in STAT3 inhibitor ADZ1480, we found that STEAP1 regulates EMT via Janus kinase 2/signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (JAK2/STAT3) signaling pathway. In conclusion, STEAP1 can serve as a therapeutic target, and it may have important clinical implications for LUAD treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the popularization of the Internet, the related information technology is developing faster and faster, and the scale and complexity of the network are also increasing. Wireless networks cover all aspects of life, along with it, network security issues have gradually emerged. In recent years, network security vulnerabilities have been exposed continuously, from WiFi to Bluetooth, people gradually realize the security of wireless networks. The purpose of this article is to solve the existing security problems and study the operation process of RC4 and Advanced Encryption Standard algorithms, and the improvement scheme is put forward. This article is based on the inherent media access control address filtering technology of wireless network card; a dynamic security model for wireless networks is proposed and constructed. Devices accessing the network use 802.1x authentication method and distribute and set security status values for each device, the authentication server uses Remote Authentication Dial in User Service. This article uses the method of virtual private network encryption network to provide an encryption layer for communication between devices and wireless networks, thus, the data in network transmission can be encrypted and protected. In this article, the structure and strategy of Remote Authentication Dial in User Service are changed, in order to ensure the high security of wireless network equipment in the connection process. In the testing phase of this article, we have tested the model in detail several times. Tests are divided into middleman and session interception tests. A large number of test results show that this model can improve the security of wireless network and has good performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Taxane-induced peripheral neuropathy (TIPN) is a dose-limiting adverse effect. Ganglioside-monosialic acid (GM1) functions as a neuroprotective factor. We assessed the effects of GM1 on the prevention of TIPN in breast cancer patients.Methods: We conducted a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial including 206 patients with early-stage breast cancer planning to receive taxane-based adjuvant chemotherapy with a follow-up of more than 1 year. Subjects were randomly assigned to receive GM1 (80 mg, day -1 to day 2) or placebo. The primary endpoint was the Functional Assessment of Cancer Treatment Neurotoxicity subscale score after four cycles of chemotherapy. Secondary endpoints included neurotoxicity evaluated by National Cancer Institute Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events Version 4.0 and the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group neuropathy scale. All statistical tests were two-sided.Results: In 183 evaluable patients, the GM1 group reported better mean Functional Assessment of Cancer Treatment Neurotoxicity subscale scores than patients in the placebo group after four cycles of chemotherapy (43.27, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 43.05 to 43.49 vs 34.34, 95% CI = 33.78 to 34.89; mean difference = 8.96, 95% CI = 8.38 to 9.54, P < .001). Grade 1 or higher peripheral neurotoxicity in Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events v4.0 scale was statistically significantly lower in the GM1 group (14.3% vs 100.0%, P < .001). Additionally, the GM1 group had a statistically significantly lower incidence of grade 1 or higher neurotoxicity assessed by Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group neuropathy scale sensory neuropathy (26.4% vs 97.8%, P < .001) and motor neuropathy subscales (20.9% vs 81.5%, P < .001).Conclusions: The treatment with GM1 resulted in a reduction in the severity and incidence of TIPN after four cycles of taxane-containing chemotherapy in patients with breast cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Approximately 8.3–15.9% of patients with clinical stage I non‐small cell lung cancer are subsequently shown to have lymph node metastasis. However, the clinical characteristics of patients with lymph node metastasis in China are not fully understood. Methods: This is a multicenter retrospective analysis of pathological T1 non‐small cell lung cancer patients who underwent surgical resection from 2 January 2014 to 27 December 2017. Clinical and pathological information was collected with the assistance of the Large‐scale Data Analysis Center of Cancer Precision Medicine‐LinkDoc database. The clinical and pathological factors associated with lymph node metastasis were analyzed by univariate and multivariate logistic regression. Results: A total of 10 885 participants (51.6% women; 15.3% squamous cell carcinoma) were included in the analysis. The median age was 60.0 years (range 12.9–86.6 years). A total of 1159 patients (10.6%) had metastases in mediastinal nodes (N2), and 640 patients (5.9%) had metastasis in pulmonary lymph nodes (N1). Most patients had T1b lung cancer (4766, 43.8%). Of the patients, 3260 (29.9%) were current or former smokers. The univariate and multivariate analyses showed that younger age, squamous cell carcinoma, poor differentiation, larger tumor size, carcinoembryonic antigen level ≥5 ng/mL, and vascular invasion (+) were significantly associated with higher percentages of lymph node metastases (P < 0.001 for all). Conclusion: This real‐world study showed the significant association of lymph node metastasis with age, tumor size, histology and differentiation, carcinoembryonic antigen levels, and status of vascular invasion. Female patients with T1a adenocarcinoma in the right upper lobe barely had lymph node metastasis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to save human lives and reduce injury and property loss, Situation Awareness (SA) information is essential and important for rescue workers to perform the effective and timely disaster relief. The information is generally derived from the shared images via widely used smartphones. However, conventional smartphone-based image sharing schemes fail to efficiently meet the needs of SA applications due to two main reasons, i.e., real-time transmission requirement and application-level image redundancy, which is exacerbated by limited bandwidth and energy availability. In order to provide efficient image sharing in disasters, we propose a bandwidth- and energy- efficient image sharing system, called BEES. The salient feature behind BEES is to propose the concept of Approximate Image Sharing (AIS), which explores and exploits approximate feature extraction, redundancy detection, and image uploading to trade the slightly low quality of computation results in content-based redundancy elimination for higher bandwidth and energy efficiency. Nevertheless, the boundaries of the tradeoffs between the quality of computation results and efficiency are generally subjective and qualitative. We hence propose the energy-aware adaptive schemes in AIS to leverage the physical energy availability to objectively and quantitatively determine the tradeoffs between the quality of computation results and efficiency. Moreover, unlike existing work only for cross-batch similar images, BEES further eliminates in-batch ones via a similarity-aware submodular maximization model. The response time of querying similar images is reduced via leveraging a geographic coordinate based index partitioning scheme. We have implemented the BEES prototype which is evaluated via three real-world image datasets. Extensive experimental results demonstrate the efficacy and efficiency of BEES. We have released the source codes of BEES at GitHub. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Mycoplasmal pneumonia is a common type of adult community‐acquired pneumonia in China, but round/spherical pneumonia caused by mycoplasma pneumoniae has rarely been reported. Here, we report an outbreak of mycoplasmal round pneumonia in a military dormitory in China. Methods: We analysed epidemiological, clinical, imaging and laboratory data from a series of adults affected by an outbreak of mycoplasmal round pneumonia in the dormitory of a military hospital (Fuzhou General Hospital) in Fuzhou, China. The dormitory included 2 separate buildings. Mycoplasma antibody was detected using a passive agglutination assay. Results: The first case in our series, a 23‐year‐old male intern, presented on July 16, 2015 with a 3‐day history of low‐grade fever, dizziness, fatigue and chest tightness. Chest computed tomography revealed spherical masses. Over the following 4 days, 11 individuals who had been in close contact with the first patient were found to have similar masses. All 12 cases were mildly symptomatic or asymptomatic, and fever was the only sign visible upon physical examination. Chest radiology revealed single, round consolidations in 3 cases and multiple round consolidations in 9 cases; consolidations ranged in size from 0.2 to 2.9 cm. Most cases had normal blood cell count, erythrocyte sedimentation rate and C reactive protein level. Nasopharyngeal swabs from all cases tested negative for 25 pathogens, including Mycoplasma pneumoniae, in a PCR‐based assay performed on August 1, 2015. All 12 patients showed a 4‐fold increase in the titre of anti‐mycoplasmal pneumonia antibody in paired sera on August 13, 2015. Patients were given the antibiotic moxifloxacin or symptomatic treatment, and 11 of the 12 cases showed complete resolution of round pneumonia lesions within 4 weeks. Conclusion: This case series illustrates the diversity of clinical manifestations as well as imaging findings for mycoplasmal pneumonia, to which clinicians should pay more attention. Mycoplasmal round pneumonia should be included in differential diagnosis of multiple pulmonary nodules in adults in order to enable accurate clinical identification of disease and successful treatment and resolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • The invertebrate OTU abundance (%) in wetland showed that Cnidaria > Porifera > Rotifera > Mollusca > Annelida > others. • 'Simpson' diversity index was the most effective to distinguish the differences in invertebrate communities. • The class-level alpha diversity showed higher recognition than other taxonomic levels. • Insecta, Ascidiacea, and Monogononta were biomarkers for lake, river, and estuary habitats, respectively. • Explanation of environmental factors on OTU richness showed the taxon-level tendency phylum > class > order > family > genus. Invertebrates play vital roles in maintaining biodiversity and food web structure. However, it is difficult to identify invertebrate taxa across complex habitats due to the limitation of traditional morphology. In subtropical wetlands, environmental DNA (eDNA) metabarcoding was used to characterize the composition and diversity of aquatic invertebrates and analyze the environmental impacts on invertebrate community structure. According to the relative abundance (%) of invertebrate OTU richness, 30 sampling sites in wetlands were clustered into six zones, which exhibited significant spatial (i.e., wetland type-specific) differences in taxonomic composition. The relative OTU abundance (%) at the phylum level showed that Cnidaria (48.5%) > Porifera (19.4%) > Rotifera (11.0%) > Mollusca (9.2%) > Annelida (5.3 ± 2.8%) > others (less than 2.2%). Of the five alpha diversity indexes, 'Simpson' was the most effective index to distinguish the spatial differences in invertebrate diversity, and the class-level alpha diversity showed higher recognition than other taxonomic levels. The class-level biomarkers that could indicate the habitat-specific composition of local invertebrates were Insecta, Cnidaria, Hydrozoa, and Gastropoda in the inflow river; Ascidiacea and Demospongiae in the fluvial wetland; Clitellata, Gymnolaemata, and Monogononta in the lacustrine wetland; and Echinoidea in the estuarine wetland. The associations between environmental factors and invertebrate OTU richness based on redundancy analysis showed the taxon-level tendency of phylum (78.5%) > class (73.4%) > order (69.3%) > family (64.9%) > genus (61.2%). Our results demonstrated that aquatic invertebrate diversity profiling by environmental DNA metabarcoding can effectively reflect the composition, diversity and biomarkers of invertebrate communities. In the future, because of its great application potential, the eDNA technique may play an important role in biomonitoring complex water environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Current options to treat clinical relapse in inflammatory central nervous system (CNS) conditions such as cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury are limited, and agents that are more effective are required. Disruption of the blood-brain barrier is an early feature of lesion formation that correlates with clinical exacerbation and facilitates the entry of inflammatory medium and inflammatory cells. Interleukin-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1RA) is a naturally occurring anti-inflammatory antagonist of the interleukin-1 (IL-1) family. The broad-spectrum anti-inflammatory effects of IL-1RA have been investigated against various forms of neuroinflammation. However, the effect of IL-1RA on blood-brain barrier disruption following ischemia-reperfusion has not been reported.Methods: In this study, we investigated the effects of IL-1RA and a novel protein (IL-1RA-PEP) that was fused to IL-1RA with a cell penetrating peptide, on blood-brain barrier integrity, in male rats subjected to transient middle cerebral artery occlusion.Results: After intravenous administration, IL-1RA-PEP (50 mg/kg) penetrated cerebral tissues more effectively than IL-1RA. Moreover, it preserved blood-brain barrier integrity, attenuated changes in expression and localization of tight junction proteins and matrix metalloproteinases, and enhanced angiogenesis in ischemic brain tissue. Further study suggested that the effects of IL-1RA-PEP on preserving blood-brain barrier integrity might be closely correlated with the p65/NF-κB pathway, as evidenced by the effects of the inhibitor JSH-23.Conclusions: Collectively, our results demonstrated that IL-1RA-PEP could effectively penetrate the brain of rats with middle cerebral artery occlusion and ameliorate blood-brain barrier disruption. This finding might represent its novel therapeutic potential in the treatment of the cerebral ischemia-reperfusion injury. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nephrotoxicity is a dose limiting side effect associated with the use of cisplatin in the treatment of solid tumors. The degree of nephrotoxicity is dictated by the selective accumulation of cisplatin in renal tubule cells due to: (1) uptake by organic cation transporter 2 (OCT2) and copper transporter 1 (CTR1); (2) metabolism by glutathione S-transferases (GSTs) and γ -glutamyltransferase 1 (GGT1); and (3) efflux by multidrug resistance-associated protein 2 (MRP2) and multidrug and toxin extrusion protein 1 (MATE1). The purpose of this study was to determine the significance of single nucleotide polymorphisms that regulate the expression and function of transporters and metabolism genes implicated in development of acute kidney injury (AKI) in cisplatin treated patients. Changes in the kidney function were assessed using novel urinary protein biomarkers and traditional markers. Genotyping was conducted by the QuantStudio 12K Flex Real-Time PCR System using a custom open array chip with metabolism, transport, and transcription factor polymorphisms of interest to cisplatin disposition and toxicity. Traditional and novel biomarker assays for kidney toxicity were assessed for differences according to genotype by ANOVA. Allele and genotype frequencies were determined based on Caucasian population frequencies. The polymorphisms rs596881 (SLC22A2/OCT2), and rs12686377 and rs7851395 (SLC31A1/CTR1) were associated with renoprotection and maintenance of estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR). Polymorphisms in SLC22A2/OCT2, SLC31A1/CTRI, SLC47A1/MATE1, ABCC2/MRP2, and GSTP1 were significantly associated with increases in the urinary excretion of novel AKI biomarkers: KIM-1, TFF3, MCP1, NGAL, clusterin, cystatin C, and calbindin. Knowledge concerning which genotypes in drug transporters are associated with cisplatin-induced nephrotoxicity may help to identify at-risk patients and initiate strategies, such as using lower or fractionated cisplatin doses or avoiding cisplatin altogether, in order to prevent AKI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]