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This paper investigates an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) aided wireless powered communication network (WPCN) with a focus on multicast transmissions in a game-theoretic way, where a transmitter first harvests energy from a power station (PS) and then transmits the information to multiple Internet of Things (IoT) devices in a multicast form. An IRS is deployed to assist the wireless energy transfer (WET) and wireless information transfer (WIT) processes. Considering that the PS and the transmitter belong to different service providers, we propose two schemes based on Stackelberg game, namely IRS-aided transmitter dominant energy trading (IRS-TDET) with the transmitter as the leader and IRS-aided PS dominant energy trading (IRS-PDET) with the PS as the leader. To solve the non-convex optimization problem of the leader-level game in the IRS-TDET scheme, we first derive the closed-form optimal phase shifts in the WET stage, and then use the semidefinite relaxation approach to solve the max-min problem about the phase shifts of the WIT stage. Finally, a low-complexity alternating optimization algorithm is developed to solve the simplified non-convex optimization problem with regard to the energy price and WET time. Numerical results show that the performance of proposed IRS-TDET and IRS-PDET is superior to that of the corresponding non-IRS aided schemes, and the deployment of IRS can effectively improve the utilities of both the PS and the transmitter. In addition, it is preferred to deploy the IRS near the transmitter in WPCN, and the transmitter can be deployed near the PS or the IoT devices to obtain higher utility.

Decreasing energy consumption is critical to sustainable development. Because temperature regulation for human comfort consumes vast amounts of energy, substantial research efforts are currently directed towards developing passive personal thermal management techniques that cool the human body without any energy consumption1–9. Although various cooling textile designs have been proposed previously, textile-based daytime radiative cooling to a temperature below ambient has not been realized6–13. Silk, a natural protein fabric produced by moth caterpillars, is famous for its shimmering appearance and its cooling and comforting sensation on skin14–17. It has been recently recognized that silk, with its optical properties derived from its hierarchical microstructure, may represent a promising starting point for exploring daytime radiative cooling18–21. However, the intrinsic absorption of protein in the ultraviolet region prevents natural silk from achieving net cooling under sunlight. Here we explore the nanoprocessing of silk through a molecular bonding design and scalable coupling reagent-assisted dip-coating method, and demonstrate that nanoprocessed silk can achieve subambient daytime radiative cooling. Under direct sunlight (peak solar irradiance >900 W m–2) we observed a temperature of ~3.5 °C below ambient (for an ambient temperature of ~35 °C) for stand-alone nanoprocessed silks. We also observed a temperature reduction of 8 °C for a simulated skin when coated with nanoprocessed silk, compared with natural silk. This subambient daytime radiative cooling of nanoprocessed silk was achieved without compromising its wearability and comfort. This strategy of tailoring natural fabrics through scalable nanoprocessing techniques opens up new pathways to realizing thermoregulatory materials and provides an innovative way to sustainable energy. Processing silk through a molecular bonding design and scalable coupling reagent-assisted dip-coating method can lead to subambient daytime radiative cooling.

Introduction: The aim of this study was to assess the differences between childhood-onset and adult-onset systemic lupus erythematosus (cSLE and aSLE) for clinical manifestations and mortality using a meta-analytic approach. Methods: The PubMed, EMBASE, and the Cochrane library were searched for eligible studies published between January 1982 and March 2021. The odds ratio (OR) with 95% confidence interval was used to calculate the pooled effect estimates using the random-effects model. Results: Thirty-four studies involving 21,946 SLE patients were included. cSLE was associated with an increased risk of malar rash (OR: 1.64; p < 0.001), ulcers/mucocutaneous involvement (OR: 1.22; p = 0.039), general neurological involvement (OR: 1.52; p < 0.001), seizures (OR: 1.92; p < 0.001), general renal involvement (OR: 2.08; p < 0.001), proteinuria (OR: 1.35; p = 0.015), urinary cellular casts (OR: 1.67; p = 0.047), fever (OR: 2.31; p < 0.001), anemia (OR: 1.91; p < 0.001), thrombocytopenia (OR: 1.41; p < 0.001), leucopenia (OR: 1.57; p = 0.017), lymphadenopathy (OR: 2.40; p < 0.001), and cutaneous vasculitis (OR: 1.72; p = 0.001) as compared with aSLE. Moreover, cSLE versus aSLE was associated with a reduced risk of articular manifestations (OR: 0.63; p = 0.001), pulmonary involvement (OR: 0.54; p = 0.001), and pleuritis (OR: 0.61; p < 0.001). There were no significant differences between cSLE and aSLE for mortality risk (OR: 1.20; p = 0.203). Conclusion: We found that certain clinical manifestations of SLE are different in cSLE and aSLE. Moreover, the mortality risk of cSLE and aSLE was not significantly different.

We studied five cases of PID-related monogenic lupus to explore the characteristics. Among 42 cases of PID patients between 2017–2020, 5 patients were diagnosed as PID-related monogenic lupus, including 2 males and 3 females, with age range from 2 years 3 months to 13 years old. DMARDs, biological agents and stem cell transplantation were used to treat different patients. We collected the clinical observation indicators, auxiliary examination and treatment of the five patients. Patient 1 was diagnosed with monogenic lupus secondary to severe combined immunodeficiency and received prednisone and methotrexate treatment. Patient 2 was diagnosed with monogenic lupus secondary to activated phosphoinositide 3-kinase δ syndrome. Allogeneic stem cell transplantation was conducted. Patient 3 was diagnosed with monogenic lupus secondary to RAS‐associated lymphoproliferative disease. The child was treated with prednisone and rituximab. Patient 4 was diagnosed with monogenic lupus secondary to PSTPIP1-associated myeloid-related proteinaemia inflammatory syndrome. The child was given methylprednisolone, methotrexate, and infliximab. Patient 5 was diagnosed with monogenic lupus secondary to A20 haploinsufficiency. The child was treated with methylprednisolone and infliximab. Multiple PIDs can lead to monogenic lupus. Different PID-related monogenic lupus has different suitable targeted drugs.

Background Previous studies have shown that marital status was associated with stages and survival in patients with melanoma or Merkel cell carcinoma. To date, the impacts of marital status on stage and survival in patients with mycosis fungoides (MF) have not been determined yet. Methods A total of 3375 eligible cases diagnosed from 2004 to 2015 were included from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database. Association of marital status with stage and survival in patients with MF was analyzed. Results Married patients were more likely to be diagnosed at T1 stage (p = 0.041). And married patients were less likely to present with lymph node involvement (p = 0.007). More favorable overall survival (p, We found that married marital status was associated with earlier stage at diagnosis and longer survival compared with divorced or widowed marital status. A validated prognostic model that could be potentially used to stratify the patients with mycosis fungoides and guide clinical decision was constructed. Our study highlights the importance of inclusion of marital status as a prognostic factor in mycosis fungoides.

Background Methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) is widely used for heroin use disorder. Although its curative effect is remarkable, there are problems associated with its use. While previous studies have found that methadone use may have certain effects on cerebral white matter, its effect on gray matter (GM) and its related neural networks is unclear. This study aimed to observe the effects of long-term methadone use on cerebral GM and the changes in related neural networks. Methods Patients receiving MMT treatment for heroin use disorder (N=50) were recruited. Longitudinal self-control was adopted, and the voxel-based morphometry (VBM) was used to compare the difference in cerebral GM volume before and after 1 year of methadone use, then we select the brain region where the GM volume changed as the region of interest (ROI), and use the DPARSF software for the whole brain function connection, and the differences in brain function connections before and after 1year MMT treatment were compared. Results Our results demonstrated that, after 1 year of MMT, patients showed smaller GM volume in the bilateral insula, occipital lingual gyrus, right cingulate gyrus, middle temporal gyrus, left inferior parietal lobule, caudate nucleus, temporal, and occipital regions, and the resting neural network of the brain also changed. Conclusions We speculate that long-term methadone use can lead to damage to GM structure and adaptive changes in the neural network of patients with heroin use disorder, mainly involving emotional perception, spatial localization, working memory, and other related functions.

Internet of Things (IoT) is the connections of embedded sensing technologies that can be integrated with intelligent transportation systems (ITS), which can take advantage of the advanced sensing fusion to implement the intelligent interaction. Moreover, the environmental wireless signals was harvested and utilized to power the charging sensors, which can be used to assist and enhance the ITS and have attracted extensive attentions in industries. The simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) enabled ITS was designed and proposed with the advanced sensing fusion, where the sensor nodes of the source and destination were all equipped with multiple antennas and the maximum ratio transmission (MRT) precoding and maximum ratio combination (MRC) were adopted respectively in the proposed system, where the sensing nodes can be embedded into the data addressing equipment to fusion the sensing information. For the established massive sensing node transmission system, the transmission power, the number of source antennas and destination antennas were considered to fuse and optimize to obtain the maximum energy efficiency (EE) of the ITS. Since the original fusion problem was non-convex and difficult to solve, which can be transformed to convex problem via the large SNR approximation method and thereby the optimal solution of the sensing fusion problem was derived through the Lagrange algorithm and the Lambert function W. The simulation results showed that the proposed fusion algorithm can achieve remarkable EE compared with other algorithms and be utilized to the massive sensors to improve the intelligent predication and transportation for vehicle network.

Importance Burkitt lymphoma with bone marrow involvement and Burkitt leukemia behave aggressively. Thus far, there are limited data concerning survival and toxicity in Chinese children with Burkitt lymphoma or Burkitt leukemia who have undergone treatment with the non‐Hodgkin’s lymphoma Berlin‐Frankfurt‐Münster‐90/95 (NHL‐BFM‐90/95) protocol. Objective To analyze outcomes and toxicity in pediatric patients who exhibit Burkitt lymphoma with bone marrow involvement or Burkitt leukemia following treatment with the NHL‐BFM‐90/95 protocol. Methods Patients aged

What is known and objective Anti-tuberculosis (anti-TB) drug-induced hepatotoxicity (ATDH) is a serious adverse drug reaction. A recent study found that the rs2011404 variant of uridine 5'-diphospho-glucuronosyl-transferase 1A4 (UGT1A4) is a marker of susceptibility to ATDH. The present study aimed to validate this relationship in an Eastern Chinese Han anti-TB treatment population. Methods A 1:4 matched case-control study was conducted among anti-TB treatment patients in four regions of Jiangsu. ATDH was diagnosed based on the criteria from the Chinese Society of Hepatology and the updated Roussel Uclaf Causality Assessment Method. A conditional logistic regression model was used to estimate the association between rs2011404 genotypes and the risk of ATDH using odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (95% CIs) and smoking, drinking, hepatoprotectant use and liver diseases as covariates. Results and discussion A total of 202 ATDH cases and 808 controls were matched according to age, sex and treatment history. After correcting for potential confounding factors, conditional logistic regression analysis indicated no significant differences in genotypes between the two groups (CC vs. TC: OR = 0.933, 95% CI: 0.457-1.905, p = 0.849). Subgroup analysis suggested that patients carrying the CC genotype at rs2011404 in UGT1A4 were at a reduced risk of moderate or severe liver injury (OR = 0.293, 95% CI: 0.093-0.921, p = 0.036). What is new and conclusion Based on a 1:4 individual matched case-control study, possessing the CC genotype at rs2011404 of the UGT1A4 gene reduces the risk of moderate or severe liver injury in Eastern Chinese Han patients receiving anti-TB treatment. Further research is warranted to explain the role of the UGT1A4 gene and its contribution to individual differences in susceptibility to ATDH.

This study evaluated the influence of MTHFR C677T/A1298C polymorphisms on the survival of pediatric NHL. We enrolled 374 patients including 283 males and 91 females between 2014 and 2020. The media...

BackgroundThe aim of this study was to explore the risk factors associated with a poor left ventricular (LV) function among patients with peripartum cardiomyopathy (PPCM) and to determine the influence of acute kidney injury (AKI) on the LV function of the patients.MethodsSixty patients with PPCM were recruited between January 2007 and June 2018, among which 11 had AKI. The participants were divided into two groups, the recovery group (32 cases) and the nonrecovery group (28 cases), with their clinical features, echocardiography and electrocardiogram findings, laboratory results, and treatments compared between groups. We further determined the risk factors associated with nonrecovery and the influence posed by AKI on the LV function of the patients.ResultsCompared with the patients in the recovery group, those in the nonrecovery group had higher proportions of multiparity [78.6% (22/28) vs. 43.8% (14/32)], function class III– IV heart failure [92.9% (26/28) vs. 71.9% (23/32)], and a higher incidence of AKI [35.7% (10/28) vs. 3.1% (1/32)]. Logistic regression analysis showed that having AKI [odds ratio (OR): 10.556; 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.177–94.654;P = 0.035] and left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) P = 0.034] were independently associated with nonrecovery of PPCM.ConclusionsThe prognosis of patients with PPCM and AKI during hospitalization was poor compared to those without AKI; therefore, clinicians should pay more attention to this phenomenon.

The progress on human pose estimation by deep neural networks has been significantly advanced in recent years. However, the problem of precision loss caused by the prediction of the coordinates back to the original image has been neglected. In this paper, we propose a simple but effective method using Heatmap and Offset for Pose Estimation (HOPE). In order to solve the human pose estimation problem, firstly a general top-down method is used in HOPE to generate the human detection box based on a detector, and then the keypoints in each cropped box image are located. To alleviate the precision loss of mapping process, HOPE embeds the coordinate offset into the structure of the neural network, allowing the network to self-learn the slight offset in the mapping process in an end-to-end manner, which improves the accuracy in the current field of pose estimation. Experimental results on the multi-person pose estimation dataset MSCOCO, the single-person pose estimation dataset MPII and CrowdPose Pose Estimation dataset indicate that our method achieves state-of-the-art performance in terms of accuracy and computational complexity.

Action recognition based on 3D skeleton data has attracted much attention due to its wide application, and it is one of the most popular research topics in computer vision. The 3D skeleton data is an effective representation of motion dynamics and is not easily affected by light, scene variation, etc. Previous research on action recognition has mainly focused on video or RGB data methods. In recent years, the advantages of combining skeleton data and deep learning have been gradually demonstrated, many impressive methods have been proposed, especially GCN‐based methods. In this survey, we first introduce the development process of 3D skeleton‐data action recognition and the classification of graph convolutional network, then introduce the commonly used NTU RGB + D and NTU RGB + D 120 datasets. Finally, a detailed review of existing variants of three mainstream technologies is provided based on deep learning and their performance was compared from three dimensions. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first research to integrate the research of GCN‐based method and its various evolutionary methods. Comparative investigation of existing variants of research in action‐recognition task from different perspectives is made, a generic framework is described, state‐of‐the‐art practices are summarized, and the emerging trends of this topic are explored.

Xiaoqin Zhu,1,2,* Jia Zhu,1,2,* Feifei Sun,1,2,* Zijun Zhen,1,2 Dalei Zhou,1,3 Suying Lu,1,2 Junting Huang,1,2 Yi Que,1,2 Lian Zhang,1,2 Ruiqing Cai,1,2 Juan Wang,1,2 Yizhuo Zhang1,2 1State Key Laboratory of Oncology in South China, Collaborative Innovation Center for Cancer Medicine, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Pediatric Oncology, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, People’s Republic of China; 3Department of Molecular Diagnostics, Sun Yat-Sen University Cancer Center, Guangzhou, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Yizhuo Zhang; Juan Wang Email zhangyzh@sysucc.org.cn; wangjuan@sysucc.org.cnObjective: The association between UGT1A1*6/*28 polymorphisms and treatment outcomes of irinotecan in children remains unknown. This retrospective study investigated the influence of UGT1A1*6/*28 polymorphisms on irinotecan toxicity and survival of pediatric patients with relapsed/refractory solid tumors.Methods: The present study enrolled a total of 44 patients aged younger than 18 years at Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center between 2014 and 2017.Results: There were 26 boys and 18 girls; the median age at first VIT course was six years (range: 1– 18 years). The tumor types included neuroblastoma (n = 25), rhabdomyosarcoma (n = 11), Wilm’s tumor (n = 4), medulloblastoma (n = 2), and desmoplastic small round cell tumor (n = 2). Overall, 203 courses of VIT regimens were prescribed. Neither UGT1A1*6 nor *28 polymorphisms were associated with the incidence rates of severe (grade III–IV) irinotecan-related toxicities, but tended to reduce the patient overall survival (UGT1A1*6, P = 0.146; UGT1A1*28, P = 0.195). Moreover, patients with mutant UGT1A1*6 genotypes were more likely to develop grade I–IV irinotecan-related diarrhea (P = 0.043) and anemia (P = 0.002). Overall, the UGT1A1*28 polymorphism may play a protective role against irinotecan-related diarrhea and abdominal pain.Conclusion: In relapsed/refractory pediatric solid tumors, the UGT1A1*6 polymorphism was a risk factor of irinotecan-related diarrhea and anemia. The UGT1A1*28 polymorphism may serve a protective role in irinotecan-related abdominal pain and diarrhea. Both mutations had a tendency to be risk factors for survival. Nevertheless, prospective studies are required to verify such conclusions.Keywords: UGT1A1 *6/*28 polymorphism, irinotecan toxicity, pediatric, relapsed/refractory solid tumors

A protein complex is a group of associated polypeptide chains which plays essential roles in the biological process. Given a graph representing protein-protein interactions (PPI) network, it is critical but non-trivial to detect protein complexes, the subsets of proteins that are tightly coupled, from it. Network embedding is a technique to learn low-dimensional representations of vertices in networks. It has been proved quite useful for community detection in social networks in recent years. However, unlike social networks, PPI network does not contain rich metadata, so that existing network embedding methods cannot fully capture the network structure of PPI to improve the effect of protein complexes detection significantly. We propose a semi-supervised network embedding model by adopting graph convolutional networks to detect densely connected subgraphs effectively. We compare the performance of our model with state-of-the-art approaches on three popular PPI networks with various data sizes and densities. The experimental results show that our approach significantly outperforms other approaches on all three PPI networks.

Protracted abstinence (PA) and Methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) are two main types of heroin addiction treatment, however, the effects of both measures on the functional connectivity (FC) of the brain in heroin dependents in the drug cue event-related response are unclear. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) based drug cue-reactivity task has been widely used in addiction research, which may provide a new way to understand the change of brain function during a certain period of treatment. The default function network (DMN) with posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) as the core is generally involved in the process of addiction. The aim of the present study was to explore the brain response of FC in patients with heroin-dependent during PA, MMT treatment under task-fMRI. Twenty-two heroin-dependent patients during PA, 18 heroin-dependent patients during MMT and 16 healthy control (HC) individuals were included to conduct the heroin cue-reactivity task during fMRI. The MMT and PA patients' subjective craving for heroin was evaluated. The psychophysiological interaction (PPI) analysis of SPM12 was used to get FC during the task state. There was a significant difference on FC between PCC and the right medial Prefrontal Cortex (mPFC) in three groups. The post-hoc analysis showed that there was a significant difference of brain regions between the MMT and the PA group. The FC of PCC-mPFC in the MMT group was significantly stronger than that in the PA group. Compared with the PA group, the FC of the DMN in the MMT group was significantly increased under drug cue response. Therefore, PA is more beneficial for the heroin-dependent patients to lower the salience value of drug related cues, in turn to reduce relapse risks. It also reflected the important role of PCC-mPFC pathway in heroin dependents induced by heroin cues.

Introduction The contribution made by e-cigarettes to smoking cessation continues to be controversial. Reports suggest that teenagers are becoming increasingly addicted to e-cigarettes and that e-cigarette use in adolescents is associated with subsequent cigarette smoking. Methods Systematic searches of eleven databases were conducted (January 2015 to June 2020). Systematic reviews, randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and cohort studies comparing e-cigarettes with placebo e-cigarettes, nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) or no e-cigarette use were included. The two primary outcomes were smoking cessation among smokers and smoking initiation among non-smoking teenagers. The secondary outcome was adverse events. Data were synthesized using risk ratio (RR) or adjusted odds ratio (AOR) with 95% confidence interval (CI). Results Six systematic reviews, 5 RCTs and 24 cohort studies were identified. For smoking cessation, findings from 4 systematic reviews indicated that e-cigarettes contributed to cessation while one found the opposite. Meta-analysis of 5 RCTs suggested that e-cigarettes were superior to NRT or placebo for smoking cessation (RR=1.55; 95% CI: 1.00–2.40; I 2 =57.6%; low certainty; 5 trials, n=4025). Evidence from 9 cohort studies showed that e-cigarette use was not associated with cessation (AOR=1.16; 95% CI: 0.88–1.54; I 2 =69.0%; n=22220). Subgroup analysis suggested that intensive e-cigarette use may be associated with cessation. In terms of smoking initiation, adolescents who ever used e-cigarettes had a greater risk for smoking initiation than non-users (AOR=2.91; 95% CI: 2.61–3.23; I 2 =61.0%; 15 trials, n=68943), the findings were consistent with one included systematic review. No serious adverse events were reported in the included studies. Conclusions Low certainty evidence suggests that e-cigarettes appear to be potentially effective for smoking cessation. The use of e-cigarettes in adolescents may be associated with smoking initiation. No serious adverse events were reported.

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection is associated with an increased risk of aggressive lymphoma, especially diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL). There are few data regarding HIV-associated DLBCL in China. Therefore, we analyzed the characteristics and outcomes of patients with HIV-associated DLBCL from our center. We retrospectively studied HIV-infected patients with DLBCL from 2011 to 2019. Data on HIV infection and lymphoma characteristics, treatments and outcomes were retrieved and analyzed. In 78 patients with HIV-associated DLBCL, most had poor performance status (PS) (74%), elevated lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) levels (95%), B symptoms (74%), advanced Ann Arbor stages (81%), bulky diseases (64%) and extranodal involvement (70%) at diagnosis. The median CD4+ T cell count was 162/µl, and 26 patients were already on combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) treatment at diagnosis of DLBCL. Elevated whole blood EBV DNA copy number was detected in 38 patients (66%, 38/58). Of the 45 patients evaluated at the end of treatment, 26 (58%) achieved CR, 6 (13%) achieved PR and 6 (13%) experienced progressive disease. The 2-year progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) rates were 56.4% and 62.7%, respectively. Factors associated with decreased PFS and OS in univariate analysis were unfavorable PS and high international prognostic index. Elevated EBV DNA copy number was inclined to be associated with worse outcome. We did not observe a significant difference in survival between R-EPOCH and R-CHOP regimens. In our population, patients with HIV-associated DLBCL presented with aggressive characteristics and exhibited poor survival outcomes, even in the modern cART era.

Background 25-hydroxy vitamin D [25-(OH)D] is widely used to determine vitamin D status in clinic. The aim of our study was to evaluate the prognostic value of 25-(OH)D in extranodal NK/T cell lymphoma (ENKTL). Materials and Methods Ninety-three ENKTL patients with available serum 25-(OH)D values were enrolled in our study. Vitamin D deficiency is defined as a 25-(OH)D below 50 nmol/L. Univariate and multivariate regression analyses were performed to determine independent risk factors for progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS). Subgroup analyses were performed to determine the applicable subgroups. Receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curves were plotted to estimate the accuracy of PINK-E (prognostic index of natural killer lymphoma added with Epstein-Barr virus-DNA status) and 25-(OH)D deficiency in ENKTL risk-stratification. Results Our results suggested that vitamin D deficiency was an independent inferior prognostic factor for both PFS [hazard ratio (HR), 2.869; 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.540 to 5.346; P = 0.003] and OS (HR, 3.204; 95%CI, 1.559 to 6.583; P = 0.006) in ENKTL patients with age ≤ 60, ECOG PS ≤ 1, stage III‒IV and PINK-E score ≥ 3. Additionally, we demonstrated that adding 25-(OH)D deficiency to PINK-E score system indeed has a superior prognostic significance than PINK-E alone for PFS [AUC: 0.796 (95% CI: 0.699 to 0.872) vs. 0.759 (95% CI: 0.659 to 0.841), P = 0.020] and OS [AUC: 0.755 (95% CI: 0.655 to 0.838) vs. 0.721 (95% CI: 0.618 to 0.809), P = 0.040]. Conclusion In conclusion, our study proved that 25-(OH)D deficiency was associated with inferior survival outcomes of ENKTL patients.

Diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) is the most frequent type of lymphoma. Our retrospective study included 553 newly diagnosed DLBCL patients from May 2009 to October 2019. The relationships between hypogammaglobulinemia, hypocomplementemia and progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were assessed. In our center, 19.0% of patients had hypogammaglobulinemia, and 7.7% had hypocomplementemia at diagnosis. Immunoglobulin and complement deficiencies were associated with advanced disease and displayed inferior PFS and OS. Then, we designed a new immunization cumulative prognostic score (ICPS) model to comprehensively clarify the effect of these two variables on prognosis. Multivariate analysis showed that ICPS was an independent prognostic indicator for inferior clinical outcomes (PFS

Monolithic all-perovskite tandem solar cells offer an avenue to increase power conversion efficiency beyond the limits of single-junction cells. It is an important priority to unite efficiency, uniformity and stability, yet this has proven challenging because of high trap density and ready oxidation in narrow-bandgap mixed lead–tin perovskite subcells. Here we report simultaneous enhancements in the efficiency, uniformity and stability of narrow-bandgap subcells using strongly reductive surface-anchoring zwitterionic molecules. The zwitterionic antioxidant inhibits Sn2+ oxidation and passivates defects at the grain surfaces in mixed lead–tin perovskite films, enabling an efficiency of 21.7% (certified 20.7%) for single-junction solar cells. We further obtain a certified efficiency of 24.2% in 1-cm2-area all-perovskite tandem cells and in-lab power conversion efficiencies of 25.6% and 21.4% for 0.049 cm2 and 12 cm2 devices, respectively. The encapsulated tandem devices retain 88% of their initial performance following 500 hours of operation at a device temperature of 54–60 °C under one-sun illumination in ambient conditions. Ensuring both stability and efficiency in mixed lead–tin perovskite solar cells is crucial to the development of all-perovskite tandems. Xiao et al. use an antioxidant zwitterionic molecule to suppress tin oxidation thus enabling large-area tandem cells with 24.2% efficiency and operational stability over 500 hours.

China faces the greatest challenge from stroke in the world. The death rate for cerebrovascular diseases in China was 149.49 per 100 000, accounting for 1.57 million deaths in 2018. It ranked third among the leading causes of death behind malignant tumours and heart disease. The age-standardised prevalence and incidence of stroke in 2013 were 1114.8 per 100 000 population and 246.8 per 100 000 person-years, respectively. According to the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017, the years of life lost (YLLs) per 100 000 population for stroke increased by 14.6%; YLLs due to stroke rose from third highest among all causes in 1990 to the highest in 2017. The absolute numbers and rates per 100 000 population for all-age disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) for stroke increased substantially between 1990 and 2017, and stroke was the leading cause of all-age DALYs in 2017. The main contributors to cerebrovascular diseases include behavioural risk factors (smoking and alcohol use) and pre-existing conditions (hypertension, diabetes mellitus, dyslipidaemia and atrial fibrillation (AF)). The most prevalent risk factors among stroke survivors were hypertension (63.0%-84.2%) and smoking (31.7%-47.6%). The least prevalent was AF (2.7%-7.4%). The prevalences for major risk factors for stroke are high and most have increased over time. Based on the latest national epidemiological data, 26.6% of adults aged ≥15 years (307.6 million adults) smoked tobacco products. For those aged ≥18 years, age-adjusted prevalence of hypertension was 25.2%; adjusted prevalence of hypercholesterolaemia was 5.8%; and the standardised prevalence of diabetes was 10.9%. For those aged ≥40 years, the standardised prevalence of AF was 2.31%. Data from the Hospital Quality Monitoring System showed that 3 010 204 inpatients with stroke were admitted to 1853 tertiary care hospitals during 2018. Of those, 2 466 785 (81.9%) were ischaemic strokes (ISs); 447 609 (14.9%) were intracerebral haemorrhages (ICHs); and 95 810 (3.2%) were subarachnoid haemorrhages (SAHs). The average age of patients admitted was 66 years old, and nearly 60% were male. A total of 1555 (0.1%), 2774 (0.6%) and 1347 (1.4%) paediatric strokes (age

Very high power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) have been demonstrated by multijunction cells made of epitaxial III–V semiconductors; but they are too expensive to manufacture for terrestrial applic...

Context Children with brain tumors may have pubertal onset at an inappropriately young chronologic age. Hypothalamic-pituitary irradiation ≥18Gy has been found to be a risk factor; age at irradiation is associated with pubertal timing. However, the underlying mechanisms are unknown. Objective To determine the impact of body mass index (BMI) and catch-up growth on pubertal timing in females treated for medulloblastoma and other embryonal tumors. Design, Setting, and Patients Retrospective cohort analysis of 90 female patients treated for medulloblastoma and other embryonal tumors at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute/Boston Children’s Hospital from 1996 to 2016. Eighteen individuals met inclusion criteria, with a mean ± SD follow-up period of 11.9 ± 3.4 years. Main Outcome Measures Multiple linear regression models for age at pubertal onset and bone age discrepancy from chronologic age at pubertal onset assessed the joint influences of age at irradiation, hypothalamic irradiation dose, undernutrition duration, BMI standard deviation score (SDS) at pubertal onset, and catch-up BMI SDS. Results The mean ± SD age of pubertal onset was 9.2 ± 1.3 years and hypothalamic radiation dose was 31.9 ± 9.9 Gy. There was a direct relationship between age at irradiation and age at pubertal onset (β = 0.323 ± 0.144 [standard error] year per year; P = 0.04) that was significantly attenuated after adjusting for BMI SDS at pubertal onset (P = 0.5) and catch-up BMI SDS (P = 0.08), suggesting that BMI is a mediator. Conclusions Both absolute and catch-up BMI SDS at pubertal onset are significant mediators of pubertal timing and bone age discrepancy in pediatric medulloblastoma and other embryonal tumors, and thus, are targetable risk factors to optimize pubertal timing.

Background The prognosis of recurrent or refractory advanced childhood solid tumor patients is very poor and new therapeutic strategies are in urgent need. This study aimed to determine the efficacy and safety of apatinib in pediatric refractory/relapse advanced solid tumor patients. Patients and methods The study retrospectively reviewed recurrent or refractory advanced pediatric solid tumor patients who were treated with apatinib, an oral small-molecule tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) that targets vascular endothelial growth factor receptor-2 (VEGFR2), at the Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center (China) from January 2016 to March 2019. Results Fifty-six patients were included in the safety evaluation and 49 patients were included in the efficacy evaluation. The objective responses rate (ORR) was 26.5% (95% CI 15-41): 0 CR (complete response) and 13 PR (partial response). Disease control rate (DCR) (CR+PR+SD) was 79.6% (95% CI 65-90). The median progression-free survival (PFS) was 4.0 months (95% CI 2.6-5.4). There was no significant difference for ORR or PFS between the A (apatinib monotherapy), A+MT (apatinib combined with oral metronomic therapy) and A+SC (apatinib combined with salvage combination chemotherapy) group (p>0.05). The most common grade 3 or 4 adverse events were neutropenia (9[16.1%]), thrombocytopenia (8[14.3%]), hand-foot syndrome (3[5.4%]), hypertension (3[5.4%]), anaemia (3[5.4%]) and mucositis (2[3.6%]). Hypertension was the most serious adverse event and one death that occurred was considered as drug-related. Conclusion Apatinib showed promising clinical activity in heavily treated recurrent or refractory advanced childhood solid tumor patients. However, it is necessary to pay special attention to monitoring blood pressure when using apatinib in children. Prospective randomized controlled clinical trial is warranted.

BACKGROUND Oral appliance (OA) treatment for obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) has attracted more and more attention due to its low price, comfort, portable and non-invasion. This study aimed to investigate the clinical effectiveness of adjustable oral appliance on older adult patients with OSAS. METHODS Thirty older adult patients diagnosed with OSAS were chosen as the study participants and received an adjustable OA for 6 months. Then, the patients were subjected to a polysomnographic examination, Berlin Questionnaire (BQ) scale questionnaire, and cone beam computer tomography (CBCT) analytical measurement to evaluate their symptom improvement and the morphologic changes of the upper airway. RESULTS After treatment with adjustable oral appliance for six months, the results showed that there was an improvement of different degrees in the subjective symptoms. Apnea hypopnea index (AHI) had decreased from (27.65±1.31) per hour to (6.74±0.75) per hour (P

Plasmonics enables the manipulation of light beyond the optical diffraction limit1–4 and may therefore confer advantages in applications such as photonic devices5–7, optical cloaking8,9, biochemical sensing10,11 and super-resolution imaging12,13. However, the essential field-confinement capability of plasmonic devices is always accompanied by a parasitic Ohmic loss, which severely reduces their performance. Therefore, plasmonic materials (those with collective oscillations of electrons) with a lower loss than noble metals have long been sought14–16. Here we present stable sodium-based plasmonic devices with state-of-the-art performance at near-infrared wavelengths. We fabricated high-quality sodium films with electron relaxation times as long as 0.42 picoseconds using a thermo-assisted spin-coating process. A direct-waveguide experiment shows that the propagation length of surface plasmon polaritons supported at the sodium–quartz interface can reach 200 micrometres at near-infrared wavelengths. We further demonstrate a room-temperature sodium-based plasmonic nanolaser with a lasing threshold of 140 kilowatts per square centimetre, lower than values previously reported for plasmonic nanolasers at near-infrared wavelengths. These sodium-based plasmonic devices show stable performance under ambient conditions over a period of several months after packaging with epoxy. These results indicate that the performance of plasmonic devices can be greatly improved beyond that of devices using noble metals, with implications for applications in plasmonics, nanophotonics and metamaterials. A thermo-assisted spin-coating process followed by packaging is used to fabricate sodium films that are stable for several months, enabling the realization of plasmonic devices with state-of-the-art performance at near-infrared wavelengths.

This article investigates the physical layer security for a cooperative cognitive radio (CCR) system with energy-harvesting (EH) technique, which consists of a cognitive source (CS), multiple cognitive relays (CRs) and a cognitive destination (CD) as well as multiple eavesdroppers (Es) who are considered to tap the confidential transmission from CS via CRs to CD. Both CS and CRs are equipped with energy-harvesters to harvest energy from the surrounding radio frequency environment. Additionally, in order to guarantee the quality-of-service of primary communications, the transmit powers of CS and CRs are limited by the maximum tolerant power at primary destination. Depending on the availability of channel state information (CSI) of wireless energy links from primary transmitter (PT) to CRs, we respectively propose non-energy aware relay selection (NEARS) and energy aware relay selection (EARS) schemes for protecting the transmission from CS via CRs to CD from leaking to Es. We consider the use of the security-reliability tradeoff (SRT) to measure the performance of NEARS and EARS schemes. For the purpose of comparison, we also carry out the analysis of SRT performance for conventional direct communication (DC). Furthermore, the closed-form expressions of outage probability and intercept probability for NEARS and EARS schemes are derived and numerical results show that the SRT performance of EARS is better than that of DC and NEARS schemes.

PurposeThe purpose of this study was to investigate the prognostic impact of Epstein-Barr virus (EBV)–microRNA (miRNA, miR)-BHRF1-1 with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) as well as role of EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 in p53 gene.Materials and MethodsQuantitative reverse transcription–polymerase chain reaction and western blotting were used to quantify EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 and p53 expression in cultured CLL.Resultsp53 aberration was associated with the higher expression level of EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 (p < 0.001) which was also an independent prognostic marker for overall survival (p=0.028; hazard ratio, 5.335; 95% confidence interval, 1.193 to 23.846) in 97 newly-diagnosed CLL patients after adjusted with International Prognostic Index for patients with CLL. We identified EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 as a viral miRNA regulator of p53. EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 repressed luciferase reporter activity by specific interaction with the seed region within the p53 3′- untranslated region. Discordance of p53 messenger RNA and protein expression was associated with high EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 levels in CLL patients and cell lines. EBV-miR-BHRF1- 1 inhibition upregulated p53 protein expression, induced cell cycle arrest and apoptosis and decreased cell proliferation in cell lines. EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 mimics downregulated p53 protein expression, decreased cell cycle arrest and apoptosis, and induced cell proliferation in cell lines.ConclusionThis study supported the role of EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 in p53 regulation in vitro. Our results support the potential of EBV-miR-BHRF1-1 as a therapeutic target in EBV-associated CLL with p53 gene aberration.

© 2020 Beijing University of Chinese Medicine Objective: Qualitative research on therapeutic components is necessary to evaluate the efficacy of complex interventions in healthcare. As few qualitative syntheses have been conducted, this study aimed to derive a new conceptual framework for understanding the components of complex interventions and provide evidence for the implementation and evaluation of complex healthcare interventions. Methods: A systematic search of seven databases was conducted to identify qualitative studies that explored components of complex healthcare interventions. Meta-ethnography was used to analyze the data and thematic analysis was used to build the conceptual framework. Results: Of the 35 included studies, most complex interventions were non-pharmacological, with cancer accounting for 22%, mental health for 14%, and stroke for 8%. Half of the studies were conducted in the United Kingdom. Three main categories emerged: what should healthcare workers do? what qualifications should they have? and what should patients do? Five main themes were identified: psychological, biological, cognitive and behavioral, environmental, and social support. Conclusion: This analysis provides a reference for designing components of complex interventions in further studies.

Background Diabetes patients presenting with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) scheduled for primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) have an increased risk of contrast induced-acute kidney injury (CI-AKI). The effects of continuous use of metformin on kidney function are still controversial in patients submitted to primary PCI. This study aimed to assess continuous metformin therapy on kidney function in diabetic patients undergoing coronary intervention. Methods Two hundred eighty-four patients with metformin-treated diabetes, who underwent coronary intervention within 24 h for STEMI, were enrolled in the retrospective study. All the patients had estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) of > 30 mL/min/1.73 m2. According to the physicians’ decisions after admission, 119 patients continued metformin treatment after primary PCI, while 165 patients discontinued it > 48 h after the procedure. Serum creatinine was collected at admission and within 48 h post primary PCI to evaluate the incidence of CI-AKI. We performed a multiple logistic regression analysis to examine the determinants of CI-AKI. Results No statistical difference in CI-AKI incidence between the continuous and the discontinuous metformin group (12.6%vs10.3%, p = 0.545). Multivariable logistic regression analysis indicated eGFR ≤60 ml/min/1.73 m2[p = 0.025, OR: 3.131; 95% CI (1.156–8.482)] and contrast volume [p = 0.002, OR: 1.010; 95% CI (1.004–1.016)] were predictive factors of CI-AKI. Metformin therapy was irrelevant to CI-AKI [p = 0.365, OR: 0.698; 95% CI (0.320–1.521)]. No case of lactic acidosis was found in this study. Besides, the study supported discontinuation of metformin was not beneficial for patients’ blood glucose control after admission. Conclusions The study indicated that the metformin continuation after primary PCI for STEMI in diabetic patients with eGFR > 30 ml/min / 1.73 m2 did not increase the risk of CI-AKI.

Summary The recent advancements in evaporating water using renewable energy provide one of the promising pathways for treating water with minimized carbon footprint. Pursuing a high evaporation rate of water has been the central focus of this field, as it is directly related to the throughput of evaporative water treatment. However, in conventional designs of evaporators, diffusion of vapor into the atmospheric environment has been the limiting step for evaporation. In this work, we demonstrate that a carbon foam with a three-dimensional interconnected porous structure enables sufficient diffusion of vapor with a convective flow and therefore realizes an evaporation rate as high as 10.9 kg m−2 h−1 and outdoor evaporation of 42.0 kg m−2 for continuous 13 h. With such a high evaporation rate achieved, it shows great promise toward a high-throughput, around-the-clock, and eco-friendly technology of evaporative wastewater disposal.

Our purpose was to compare long-term survival outcomes and sequelae between child and adult nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) in the era of intensity modulated radiation therapy.Data on 285 patients with NPC aged ≤18 years at diagnosis and treated with intensity modulated radiation therapy between January 2004 and November 2016 were retrospectively reviewed. A propensity score matching method was adopted to screen matched adult patients with NPC at a ratio of 1:3. Survival outcomes and treatment-related toxicities between child and adult groups were compared.In total, 159 children and 477 adult patients with NPC were included in this study. The 5-year overall survival, distant metastasis-free survival, locoregional relapse-free survival, and disease-free survival between children and adults were 89.2% versus 83.6% (P = .144), 88.7% versus 83.5% (P = .124), 96.4% versus 89.1% (P = .013), and 86.5% versus 77.3% (P = .021), respectively. Subgroup analyses revealed that the young age was an independent prognostic factor of overall survival, distant metastasis-free survival, and locoregional relapse-free survival in the advanced N stage (N2-3) group and disease-free survival in the advanced T stage (T3-4) group and N2-3 and stage III-IVA groups. The most common sequela was ototoxicity (68.9%) in child patients and xerostomia (70.8%) in adult patients. Adult survivors had a significantly higher incidence of grade 3 to 4 late toxicities in xerostomia (17.6% vs 8.9%; P = .004), skin dystrophy (9.3% vs 3.7%; P = .022), neck fibrosis (8.3% vs 4.4%; P.001), and radiation encephalopathy (0.8% vs 0; P = .006). Child survivors were more likely to develop grade 3 to 4 growth retardation and endocrine insufficiency (3.0% vs 0.3%; P = .014).Child patients with NPC achieved significantly better survival outcomes but fewer late toxicities than adult patients. However, we should pay great attention to growth problems of child survivors.

Objective: Delayed puberty is a common condition, and typical management includes "watchful waiting" and/or sex-steroid therapy. We sought to characterize treatment practices and to assess provider comfort with the management of delayed puberty in girls and boys. Methods: A national survey of pediatric endocrine providers assessed definitions of delayed puberty, practices around sex-steroid therapy, reasons for treatment, and comfort in managing delayed puberty in girls and boys. Results: Of 184 respondents (12% participation rate), 64% and 71% used the traditional age cutoffs for defining delayed puberty of 13 years for girls and 14 years for boys, respectively. Nearly half (45%) of providers would treat boys relatively earlier than girls, compared to 18% who would treat girls relatively earlier (P

Low‐dimensional materials have pivotal significance in modern photonic, electronic, and optoelectronic areas due to their unique properties of the scale effect. Metal halide perovskites have revived in the optoelectronic fields recently, drawing intensive attention in photovoltaic devices, light‐emitting diodes, lasers, photodetectors, and so on. Compared to their three‐dimensional counterparts, the role of low‐dimensional perovskites is becoming crucial, requiring a comprehensive understanding and exploration unceasingly. In this review, we examine low‐dimensional perovskite of different forms and clarify various synthesis methods with morphological and dimensional control. Additionally, we also summarize potential optoelectronic applications based on their advantageous optical/electrical properties and enhanced mechanical integrity and stability. Finally, we propose a future perspective and possible developing directions in the exploration of novel perovskite‐derived materials, new physics, and promising applications.

Summary Energy and clean water are two intertwined fundamental elements for human civilization and sustainable development. Here, we devise a monolithic tandem solar electricity-water generator that synergistically produces electricity and clean water by utilizing the full spectrum of solar irradiance. The tandem generator has two components: a top infrared-transparent photovoltaic device using above-band-gap photons, and a bottom solar water purifier using the below-band-gap photons. More strikingly, a well-designed water-proof thermal interconnecting layer (WTIL) makes these two components work synergistically: the bottom purifier serves as an evaporative cooler of the top solar cell to increase its efficiency, whereas the thermalization energy of the top cell is reutilized by the bottom purifier for producing more clean water. We experimentally demonstrate that a prototype hybrid tandem solar device with WTIL can generate electricity with a power output of 204 W m−2 and purify water at a rate of 0.80 kg m−2 h−1 under 1-sun illumination.

Immunoglobulin heavy chain variable region (IGHV) mutational status has been an important prognostic factor for chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) for decades. Patients with unmutated IGHV (≥98% identity to the germline sequence) have inferior prognosis and tend to carry unfavorable genetic markers compared to those with mutated IGHV (, In this article, we focused on whether 98% is the best cutoff value for IGHV in Chinese patients on a 595 CLL cohort with 600 sequences in total. We found that for the whole cohort, 98% showed to be the best cutoff value for IGHV, holding prognostic value for both time to first treatment (TTFT) and overall survival (OS) in univariate analysis and being an independent prognostic factor for TTFT and OS in multivariate analysis. At the same time, all the prognostic factors were also significantly different in distribution between group

GPS-based surface drifters were used to investigate the surface currents in Daya Bay and along the eastern Guangdong coast in China. Surface current vectors were measured based on the GPS location and corresponding time information sent by drifters through the mobile phone network. The analysis of data from 120 drifters, deployed in late spring 2018 in the case-study region, shows that the drifters are generally capable of capturing the surface (tidal and residual) currents. The drifter trajectories suggest an anticlockwise surface current inside Daya Bay and a north-eastward current along the eastern Guangdong coast, where the coastal current along the eastern Guangdong coast is faster than that inside Daya Bay. The surface currents in the investigated region follow an irregular semidiurnal cycle due to the influence of the tidal current, while the currents inside Daya Bay are strongly affected by the topography. According to the harmonic analysis, an irregular semidiurnal type of tidal current is evident at a study grid inside Daya Bay, with an Eulerian residual current speed of 9.0 cm/s and a direction of 276°. The Lagrangian residual current outside Daya Bay moves north-eastward with a mean speed of 22 cm/s along the eastern Guangdong coast, while the current inside Daya Bay moves northward to the bay head with a mean speed of about 8.0 cm/s, which agrees well with the one reported in other literatures.

In recent years, China’s environmental pollution is serious, manufacturing industry has become one of the main targets of government environmental regulation. This paper uses the SBM model to calculate efficiency value of 29 manufacturing industries from 2008 to 2017. The results show that the overall performance of environmental regulation in manufacturing industry is high (the average efficiency value is 0.7806), but it shows a declining trend. The efficiency of environmental regulation also varies widely. The government should consider focusing on the 11 industries with low SBM value in the next step to improve the performance of environmental regulation.

This study introduces a type of self-developed, GPS-based, simple and cheap Surface Current Experiment (SUCE) drifters designated for observing surface coastal currents. By examining trajectories of six drifters deployed in the Daya Bay and the drifter-derived velocities, we conclude that such drifters are generally capable of capturing the characteristics of wintertime surface coastal currents along the Guangdong coast.

Measurements of the gas sensing performance of nanomaterials typically involve the use of interdigitated electrodes (IDEs). A separate heater is often integrated to provide elevated temperature for improved sensing performance. However, the use of IDEs and separate heaters increases fabrication complexity. Here, a novel gas sensing platform based on a highly porous laser-induced graphene (LIG) pattern is reported. The LIG gas sensing platform consists of a sensing region and a serpentine interconnect region. A thin film of metal (e.g., Ag) coated in the serpentine interconnect region significantly reduces its resistance, thereby providing a localized Joule healing in the sensing region (i.e., self-heating) during typical measurements of chemoresistive gas sensors. Dispersing nanomaterials with different selectivity in the sensing region results in an array to potentially deconvolute various gaseous components in the mixture. The self-heating of the LIG gas sensing platform is first studied as a function of the applied voltage during resistance measurement and LIG geometric parameters (e.g., linewidth from 120 to 240 μm) to achieve an operating temperature from 20 to 80 °C. Systematic investigations of various nanomaterials demonstrate the feasibility of the LIG gas sensing performance. Taken together with the stretchable design layout in the serpentine interconnect region to provide mechanical robustness over a tensile strain of 20%, the gas sensor with a significant response (6.6‰ ppm−1), fast response/recovery processes, excellent selectivity, and an ultralow limit of detection (1.5 parts per billion) at a modest temperature from self-heating opens new opportunities in epidermal electronic devices.

Two-photon fluorescent (TPF) probes, which allow imaging of biological events in a high spatiotemporal resolution, are in great demand. Recently, carbon quantum dots (CQDs) have emerged as a promising class of TPF probes. Unfortunately, the use of the existing CQDs has been limited by their weak TPF capacities. Herein, we report the first facile and large-scale synthesis of nitrogen-rich CQDs (NRCQDs) based on a donor-π-acceptor (D-π-A) strategy. The resulting NRCQDs demonstrated a tremendous TPF capacity with a two-photon absorption cross section (TPACS) and quantum yield (QY) up to 61 200 Göppert-Mayer (GM) units and 63%, respectively, which is greater than those that could be achieved by the existing TPF carbon probes. Structural and optical analyses of NRCQDs revealed that the great TPF capacity is contributed by the nitrogen-rich D-π-A structure as well as the high crystallinity, large plane, rigid, graphitic nitrogen-doped π-conjugated system. We further demonstrated that NRCQDs allow imaging of live cells as well as live liver tissues at depths of up to 440 μm. Our results suggest NRCQDs as a robust TPF probe that can be potentially used for a variety of biological applications.

Background Both periodontal disease and benign prostatic hyperplasia are age-related diseases that affect millions of people worldwide. Hence, this study aimed to investigate the association between periodontal disease and the risk of benign prostatic hyperplasia. Methods A total of 4930 participants were selected from an available health examination that was carried out in 2017, only males were considered for further analysis. All eligible males were divided into benign prostatic hyperplasia and normal groups, the benign prostatic hyperplasia group was then divided into prostate volume ≤ 60 g and > 60 g subgroups; all their periodontal status was extracted and then into normal (CPI score of 0), periodontal disease (CPI score between 1 and 4), and periodontitis (CPI score between 3 and 4) groups. The correlation between periodontal disease and benign prostatic hyperplasia was investigated using logistic regression analyses and greedy matching case-control analysis. Subgroup analysis based on prostate volume was also performed. All analyses were conducted with SAS 9.4 software. Results A total of 2171 males were selected for this analysis. The presence of periodontal disease significantly increased the risk of benign prostatic hyperplasia by 1.68 times (OR = 1.68, 95% CI: 1.26–2.24), and individuals with periodontitis showed a higher risk (OR = 4.18, 95% CI: 2.75–6.35). In addition, among matched cases and controls, this association remained robust (periodontal disease: OR = 1.85, 95% CI: 1.30–2.64; periodontitis: OR = 4.83, 95% CI: 2.57–9.07). Subgroup analysis revealed that periodontal disease significantly increased benign prostate hyperplasia risk as well (for prostate volume ≤ 60 g: OR = 1.64, 95% CI: 1.22–2.20; for volume > 60 g: OR = 2.17, 95% CI: 1.04–4.53), and there was a higher risk in the group with a prostate volume greater than 60 g. Conclusion Periodontal disease is significantly and positively associated with an increased risk of benign prostatic hyperplasia. Further validation studies should be performed to explore the relationship between periodontal treatment and benign prostate hyperplasia.

The abnormal interactions of three key large-scale brain networks (default mode [DMN], salience and executive control [ECN]) were showed underlie dysfunctions in heroin addiction. Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) targeting the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) is a potential treatment for heroin addiction. It is unclear whether impaired coupling among the large-scale brain networks would be improved by rTMS in treated heroin-dependent individuals. Thirty-five heroin-dependent individuals were included in this sham-controlled, randomized study. The patients received either active or sham rTMS for 1 week. The craving for heroin and resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data were collected before and after 1-week rTMS. Twenty-two healthy subjects were included as controls not receiving rTMS. After 1-week rTMS, only the active rTMS group showed a significant decrease in spontaneous and heroin cue-induced craving. The coupling between left DLPFC (a key node of left ECN) and left parahippocampal gyrus (PHG, included in DMN) significantly increased for the active group with a tendency towards that of controls. The coupling between the right precentral gyrus and three key regions included in DMN (posterior cingulate cortex/precuneus and bilateral inferior parietal cortex) significantly decreased for the active group with a tendency towards that of healthy controls. For the active rTMS individuals, the left DLPFC-PHG coupling negatively correlated with the spontaneous craving and the drug cue-induced craving. It suggested that the rTMS could reduce heroin craving, which might be related to the modulation of ECN-DMN coupling. This finding might shed light on the mechanism of rTMS for heroin addicti1on treatment.