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Background Primary pulmonary meningioma (PPM) is an extremely rare disease, which is often misdiagnosed as lung metastasis. Previous studies indicated that PPM usually showed homogeneous enhancement on enhanced CT and high uptake of 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose (18F-FDG) on positron emission tomography/CT (PET/CT). In this study, we report a case of PPM with atypical enhanced CT and 18F-FDG PET/CT features in a patient with rectal carcinoma. Case presentation A 70-year-old male was demonstrated to have rectal carcinoma by biopsy while a solitary pulmonary nodule (SPN) with well-defined edges measuring 13 × 13 × 15 mm was almost simultaneously found in the right lower robe on chest CT scan. Contrast-enhanced CT and PET/CT revealed mild centripetal enhancement of the nodule without accumulation of 18F-FDG. A thoracoscopic wedge resection of the right lower lobe was finally performed and histopathologic examinations and PET/CT imaging showed that the nodule was a PPM. Conclusion PPM is a rare disease with heterogeneity not only in blood supply but also in glucose metabolism. 18F-FDG PET/CT may be an effective method for differentiating benign and malignant SPNs. The diagnosis of PPM depends on pathological and radiological examinations.

The outbreak of COVID-19 has caused immeasurable loss to the world. The highly contagious virus poses a challenging risk to public health, especially medical doctors, who are in close contact with patients. Thus, robots can help reduce the risk of medical professionals conducting massive testing with throat swabs. Soft robots, fabricated with compliant materials, allow for low-cost development and safe interaction with humans and show promising potentiality in testing.

Background Hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) has been selected as therapeutic gene in gene therapy. The aim of this study was to explore the treatment effect of combined transarterial embolization using microsphere treatment (MD) and intraarterial transfecting HIF-1α shRNA on hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Materials and Methods Rabbit skin fibroblast was transfected with HIF-1α shRNA to evaluate the knocking down efficiency. Sixteen rabbit VX2 liver tumor models were randomly divided into four groups: the control group without any treatment, the MD group, the shRNA group (HIF-1α shRNA transfection by transcatheter intraarterial infusion), and the shRNA+MD group. The necrotic score, mitotic count and expression of HIF-1α, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), CD34 and periodic acid-Schiff (PAS) stain were evaluated at the 14th and 28th day after treatment. The expression of HIF-1α and VEGF of VX2 tumors was also evaluated by real-time polymerase chain reaction on the 28th day. Results The expression of HIF-1α-mRNA was lower in HIF-1α shRNA group than the control (p < 0.01). The tumor size was smaller in the shRNA + MD group than the shRNA group and the MD group (p < 0.05) on the 28th day. The growth rate of tumors in the shRNA + MD group was also lower than in other groups. The gene and protein expressions of both HIF-1α and VEGF in the shRNA + MD group were lower than the MD group, shRNA group and control group on the 28th day (p < 0.05). The necrotic score was higher in the shRNA + MD group than the MD group and control group (p < 0.05). The mitotic count and PAS-positive cells in shRNA + MD group were lower and CD34 was higher than the other three groups (p < 0.05). Conclusion Compared to therapy with MD or HIF-1α shRNA with transcatheter intraarterial transfection alone, the combined treatment has a better effect on HCC.

In fine-grained image recognition (FGIR), the localization and amplification of region attention is an important factor, which has been explored extensively convolutional neural networks (CNNs) based approaches. The recently developed vision transformer (ViT) has achieved promising results in computer vision tasks. Compared with CNNs, Image sequentialization is a brand new manner. However, ViT is limited in its receptive field size and thus lacks local attention like CNNs due to the fixed size of its patches, and is unable to generate multi-scale features to learn discriminative region attention. To facilitate the learning of discriminative region attention without box/part annotations, we use the strength of the attention weights to measure the importance of the patch tokens corresponding to the raw images. We propose the recurrent attention multi-scale transformer (RAMS-Trans), which uses the transformer's self-attention to recursively learn discriminative region attention in a multi-scale manner. Specifically, at the core of our approach lies the dynamic patch proposal module (DPPM) responsible for guiding region amplification to complete the integration of multi-scale image patches. The DPPM starts with the full-size image patches and iteratively scales up the region attention to generate new patches from global to local by the intensity of the attention weights generated at each scale as an indicator. Our approach requires only the attention weights that come with ViT itself and can be easily trained end-to-end. Extensive experiments demonstrate that RAMS-Trans performs better than exising works, in addition to efficient CNN models, achieving state-of-the-art results on three benchmark datasets.

ObjectivesSubcutaneous panniculitis-like T-cell lymphoma (SPTCL) is a fairly rare subtype of primary cutaneous lymphoma. This study aims to investigate the clinicopathologic features, 18F-FDG PET/CT findings, and outcome of patients with SPTCL.MethodsA retrospective single-center study enrolled 11 patients with SPTCL between August 2010 and March 2020. A total of 26 18F-FDG PET/CT scans were performed, and the initial and follow-up PET/CT imaging features, clinicopathologic and immunohistochemical characteristics, and outcome were analyzed.ResultsThe male-to-female ratio was 1.2. The mean age at diagnosis was 24.2 years (age range: 13–48 years). Histopathological examinations revealed atypical T-lymphocyte rimming of individual subcutaneous adipocytes, mostly with CD2+, CD3+, CD4−, CD5+, CD8+, CD56−, T-cell intracellular antigen-1+, Granzyme B+, and high Ki-67 index. Multiple large skin ulcerations with a maximum diameter of 10 cm were observed in one of the 11 patients (9.1%, 1/11), and hemophagocytic syndrome was found in another one. At initial PET/CT scans, the lesions in all 11 patients showed increased uptake of 18F-FDG with a wide range of maximum standard uptake value (SUVmax) from 2.0 to 14.9. The morphology of the lesions presented as multiple nodules and/or disseminated plaques mainly involving the trunk and/or limbs. Five patients had extracutaneous non-lymph node lesions with SUVmax of 5.6 ± 2.8 on 18F-FDG PET/CT. No significant correlation between SUVmax and Ki-67 index was observed (r = 0.19, P > 0.05). Follow-up 18F-FDG PET/CT scans in six patients showed complete remission of the disease in two, partial remission in three, and progressive disease in one. During the follow-up period, there was no death except for the patient with multiple ulcerations who died 4 months after diagnosis of SPTCL.ConclusionsSPTCL may be a group of heterogeneous diseases with varying degrees of 18F-FDG uptake. 18F-FDG PET/CT demonstrates its usefulness in detecting disease extent, providing diagnostic work-up, staging, and evaluating treatment response of SPTCL. Multiple large skin ulcerations may be a factor of poor prognosis for patients with SPTCL.

BackgroundThis is a study aimed at exploring the relationship between pretreatment overweight/obesity, adipose tissue distribution, and long-term prognosis of gastric cancer.MethodsA total of 607 gastric cancer patients were involved in the retrospective cohort study. Overweight/obese patients were defined as body mass index (BMI) greater than 25 kg/m2, and adipose tissue distribution parameters, including visceral adipose tissue (VAT), subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT), and VAT/SAT ratio were measured at the level of the third lumbar vertebra using computerized tomography images within 15 days before the surgery. Multiple Cox regression models were applied to evaluate the association between overweight/obesity and disease-specific survival (DSS) of gastric cancer, and covariates including age, gender, T stage, N stage, and chemotherapy were adjusted. Furthermore, multiple Cox regression models were performed to evaluate the association between adipose tissue distribution parameters and DSS of gastric cancer; except for covariates mentioned above, overweight/obesity was adjusted additionally.ResultsOverweight/obesity was a predictive factor (HR = 0.61, 95% CI: 0.37–0.99) for the prognosis of gastric cancer. After additionally adjusting for overweight/obesity, high SAT percentage was an independent protective factor (HR = 0.59, 95% CI: 0.36–0.96), while high VAT percentage (HR = 1.68, 95% CI: 1.06–2.68) and high VAT/SAT ratio (HR = 1.99, 95% CI: 1.19–3.34) were independent risk factors for DSS of gastric cancer. Compared with other patients (overweight/obesity with low VAT/SAT ratio group, non-overweight/obesity or high VAT/SAT ratio group), patients in the non-overweight/obesity with high VAT/SAT ratio group had a worse prognosis (HR = 1.89, 95% CI: 1.28–2.77).ConclusionThese results suggest that overweight/obesity is a predictive factor for the prognosis of gastric cancer. The VAT/SAT ratio could be used as a promising prognostic factor for gastric cancer. Therefore, in preoperative evaluation of gastric cancer patients, attention should be paid not only to BMI but also to adipose tissue distribution.

Purpose The purpose of this study was to evaluate the features of sclerosing angiomatoid nodular transformation (SANT) in spleen on the imaging of computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance (MR). Materials and methods From July 2006 to April 2017, 12 patients with SANT confirmed by pathology were evaluated in a retrospective study. Eight patients were with CT imaging only, 2 patients were with MR imaging only, and 2 patients were with both CT and MR. Three professional senior radiologists analyzed the imaging features on CT and MR. The main characteristic analysis included size, margin, density, signal intensity, and enhancement pattern. The significant enhancement was defined as the degree of enhancement of lesion that is higher than the surrounding spleen parenchyma, and the mild enhancement was defined as the degree of enhancement of lesion that is lower than the surrounding spleen parenchyma. Results All the 12 patients (5 men, 7 women; mean age, 45.8 years; age range, 21-62 years) presented as single lesion without special clinical symptoms. The range of lesions on diameter was from 25 to 80 mm. On CT images, 9 (90%) of 10 presented as hypodense in comparison with the parenchyma of spleen, 1 (10%) of 10 presented as isodense, and calcification was observed in 4 (40%) of 10 cases. On MR images, 4 (100%) of 4 manifested heterogeneous hypointensity on in-phase sequence and 3 (75%) of 4 performed as isointensity on out-of-phase sequence of T1-weighted. On the sequences of T2-weighted and diffusion-weighted image, 4 (100%) of 4 showed hypointensity. On CT and MR enhancement images, the number of significant enhancement and mild enhancement was 2 and 10, respectively. Seven (58%) of 12 showed progressive enhancement with the pattern of "spoke-wheel." Conclusions Imaging features on CT and MR have a high diagnostic value for SANT, especially when CT combined with MR examination.

Systemic vasculitis involving the breast is a rare clinical condition and may mimic breast cancer or mastitis clinically or radiographically. Here, we report a case of polyarteritis nodosa (PAN) with breast involvement and perform a literature review of published cases of systemic vasculitis affecting the breast to better understand this disorder. We report a case of PAN affecting the right breast in a young woman. A retrospective review was performed by searching Medline, Embase, Web of Science, the Cochrane Library, and Scopus for cases of systemic vasculitis involving the breast written in English up to June 1st, 2018. A 27-year-old woman presented with a painful mass in the right breast was diagnosed as PAN by the biopsy. She was treated with prednisone and methotrexate for 6 months, at which time her condition had stabilized and inflammatory markers had normalized. A total of 66 cases were identified, with granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA), giant cell arteritis (GCA), and PAN as the main types. The typical manifestation was mass (79.2%, 53/67) in the breast, and all diagnoses were made by the pathology of the breast biopsy. Glucocorticoid and immunosuppressant were the main therapies, and 74.6% (50/67) patients achieved remission during follow-up. Our case and a literature review of 66 cases of systemic vasculitis involving the breast reveal the importance of tissue biopsy to obtain a definitive diagnosis, because the vasculitis subtype strongly influences prognosis.

Eu-doped Ce:YAG single crystal (SC) was fabricated by the Czochralski method. The crystal structure, optical and photoelectric property of the constructed w-LED was investigated. The XRD and HRTEM results show that YAG crystal structure has little change when Eu3+, Ce3+ are doped. Absorption spectra and photoluminescence spectra show that the Ce,Eu:YAG single crystal can effectively absorb the 460 nm blue light to form a broadband emission center at 530 nm, decay curves of the crystal show that the energy transfer between Ce3+ and Eu3+ is highly suppressed. Compared with commercial Ce:YAG phosphor, Ce,Eu:YAG exhibits better thermal stability.

Objectives This was the first study to systematically landscape and examine China’s nationwide standardized residency training in radiology. Methods In this retrospective cross-sectional study, we used data from the 2019 national survey of the first two cohorts of 3679 radiology residents who completed training in 2017 and 2018 across all 31 provinces in China. A total of 1163 (32%) residents participated in the survey. Multivariable logistic regression was used to examine the implementation frequency of 24 identified training tasks (categorized into six competencies) by region, demographics, and other residency information. Results Among the 1163 respondents, 592 (51%) were trained in the more developed eastern region. Of the 24 identified training tasks, 15 were implemented significantly differently across regions, while the frequency of the most frequently conducted tasks (e.g., CT, MR, and radiograph interpretation and reporting) was consistent. The top 10 tasks all fell into the patient care and medical knowledge competency domains, while other competencies tended to be neglected. We found region and marital status were the most influential factors of training task implementation frequencies. Respondents trained in the northeast and the west were more likely to report, for instance, radiological examination recommendation (OR = 1.91, 95%CI = 1.27–2.88), as “very frequent.” Married respondents were more likely to report first-line night shift as “very frequent” (OR = 1.71, 95%CI = 1.29–2.26). Conclusions Despite the fast-win achievements of developing a national radiology residency training program, there is a gap to train quality and homogeneous radiologists across regions. Future improvement should be more tailored to residents’ personal characteristics and emphasize some “soft” competencies (e.g., communication skills).

In modern ion implanters, a plasma flood gun (PFG) is used to neutralize wafer charge during the doping process, preventing the breakdown of floating wafers caused by the space charge accumulation. Typically, there are two kinds of PFGs, namely, dc arc discharge with filament and RF discharge. As a PFG, the filament one has limited lifetime and cannot avoid metallic contamination because of the thermal emitting filament. RF discharge PFG has been developed to solve these problems, including prolonging the source lifetime and avoiding metal pollution. Recently, a 2.45 GHz electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) ion source is also regarded as a potential choice for PFG. However, the dimension of the 2.45 GHz ECR source system including the size of the source itself and its meter’s length RF subsidiary limits its application within an ion implanter. At Peking University, a miniaturized 2.45 GHz permanent magnet electron cyclotron resonance plasma flood gun with a coaxial RF transmission line has been built and tested. The dimensions of the ECR source body are Φ60 mm × Φ88 mm with a Φ30 mm × Φ40 mm plasma chamber. Its RF transmission line consists of a 200 W microwave generator, a 30 cm coaxial line, a 7 cm coaxial-to-waveguide transducer, and a microwave window that also serves as a vacuum seal. In continuous wave experiments, the electron extraction currents can be as high as 8.8 mA at an input RF power of 22 W with argon gas. The gas flow is less than 1.0 SCCM for this test.

In order to investigate the damage and collision force of prestressed concrete box bridge subjected to over-height truck collision, refined finite element (FE) models of a simply supported bridge and over-height truck were established, and the accuracy of finite element models was validated. The explicit dynamic FE software, LS-DYNA, was employed to conduct the simulation of over-height truck collision with bridge under 17 cases, which various vehicle impact speeds, vehicle impact masses, over heights of vehicle, thicknesses of carriage, positions of collision and concrete strengths were included in the analysis. The damage of impacted girder under different vehicle velocities was analyzed and the vertical bearing capacity of damaged girder was calculated to investigate its severity of damage. The results indicated that the vertical bearing capacity declined slightly in all cases if the prestressed bars work properly after collision. However, the vertical bearing capacity decreased by 56% once the prestressed bars all failed on the impact side after collision. As the same time, the characteristics of simplified collision force were analyzed and the sensitivity of vital indicators to all load cases were investigated. The results showed that vehicle velocity and carriage thickness exert a non-negligible effect on peak force, and the average force and duration time are mainly influenced by vehicle velocity, vehicle mass, collision height and carriage thickness.

Parapneumonic effusion (PPE) is a common condition that causes death in patients hospitalized with pneumonia. Rapid distinction of complicated PPE (CPPE) from uncomplicated PPE (UPPE) in Computed Tomography (CT) scans is of great importance for the management and medical treatment of PPE. However, UPPE and CPPE display similar appearances in CT scans, and it is challenging to distinguish CPPE from UPPE via a single 2D CT image, whether attempted by a human expert, or by any of the existing disease classification approaches. 3D convolutional neural networks (CNNs) can utilize the entire 3D volume for classification: however, they typically suffer from the intrinsic defect of over-fitting. Therefore, it is important to develop a method that not only overcomes the heavy memory and computational requirements of 3D CNNs, but also leverages the 3D information. In this paper, we propose an uncertainty-guided graph attention network (UG-GAT) that can automatically extract and integrate information from all CT slices in a 3D volume for classification into UPPE, CPPE, and normal control cases. Specifically, we frame the distinction of different cases as a graph classification problem. Each individual is represented as a directed graph with a topological structure, where vertices represent the image features of slices, and edges encode the spatial relationship between them. To estimate the contribution of each slice, we first extract the slice representations with uncertainty, using a Bayesian CNN: we then make use of the uncertainty information to weight each slice during the graph prediction phase in order to enable more reliable decision-making. We construct a dataset consisting of 302 chest CT volumetric data from different subjects (99 UPPE, 99 CPPE and 104 normal control cases) in this study, and to the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt to classify UPPE, CPPE and normal cases using a deep learning method. Extensive experiments show that our approach is lightweight in demands, and outperforms accepted state-of-the-art methods by a large margin. Code is available at https://github.com/iMED-Lab/UG-GAT.

Recipients with a low immunity are under a high risk of infection due to the extensive use of immunosuppressive drugs after renal transplantation. Pulmonary infection after renal transplantation is a prevalent postoperative complication characterized by a wide range of pathogens and high mortality. If the disease cannot be diagnosed in time, then the therapeutic effect will not be effective. This article reviews susceptible factors, high onset time, common pathogens, clinical manifestations, and therapy of pulmonary infection after renal transplantation to provide reference for disease prevention and treatment.

Superficial solid masses are common conditions in clinical practice, however, some of which can be easily diagnosed and others would be difficult. Although imaging of superficial masses is not always characteristic, it would be helpful to give a definitive diagnosis or narrow a differential diagnosis. Crossing-section imaging can depicture the masses directly, find some pathognomonic signs and demonstrate their relationship with adjacent structures, which can provide decision support for clinician’s reference. Computed tomography (CT) can be used to detect calcifications and bone erosion which could not be seen on radiographs. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is the preferred way for evaluating soft tissue lesions and provides information on hemorrhage, necrosis, edema, cystic and myxoid degeneration, and fibrosis. Other advantages of MRI are its superior soft tissue resolution and any profile imaging, which can aid the assessment of extension and adjacent infiltration. Positron emission tomography (PET)/CT and PET/MRI have been increasingly used in bone and soft tissue sarcomas and provides advantages in the initial tumor staging, tumor grading, therapy assessment, and recurrence detection. Therefore, imaging examination can play an important role in treatment decision making for superficial solid tumors. Here we review the important conditions presenting as superficial mass and show the imaging of typical cases diagnosed in our hospital.

At Peking University (PKU), a miniaturized 2.45 GHz antenna permanent magnet electron cyclotron resonance (PMECR) ion source , capable of generating a several-mA H + beam, was produced and tested. The dimensions of the plasma chamber were ∅ 30 mm × 40 mm, and the entire size of the ion source (including the extraction system) supply was ∅ 150 mm × 160 mm. A 4.5 mA CW H + beam was extracted at 35 kV with 200 W of microwave power supplied by a compact microwave generator with a coaxial cable . For a better understanding and optimization of the miniaturized ion source, plasma simulations were conducted to research the electromagnetic coupling of the antennas and the generation of ECR plasmas. The experimental and simulation results of the H + , H 2 + , and H 3 + fractions of cylindrical-type and “T”-type antenna microwave ion sources were presented and compared. Based on a series of comparisons between the experimental and simulation results, the impedance of the miniaturized antenna ECR ion source plasma and the real pressure in the plasma chamber were accurately calculated. An optimized microwave coupling system was designed for the new miniaturized antenna ECR ion source. From the plasma simulation results, the transmission efficiency of microwaves increased from 32% to 89% (coupled to plasma), 15 mA H + @ 150 W can be expected in the future.

This article presents a new method for structure assessment based on weigh-in-motion data and simulation analysis. The focus is particularly on the simply supported hollow slab bridges and extra-he...

Keratin 18 (KRT18) has been suggested to be overexpressed in most types of human tumor, but the expression pattern of KRT18 in colorectal cancer (CRC) remained unknown. In our research, KRT18 protein expression was markedly increased in CRC cancer tissues and cell lines compared with adjacent normal colorectal tissues and normal colonic epithelial cell line, respectively. Meanwhile, we observed high KRT18 expression was associated with advanced clinical stage, deep tumor invasion, lymph node metastasis, distant metastasis, poor differentiation and unfavorable prognosis in CRC patients. Multivariate Cox regression analysis showed high expression of KRT18 was an unfavorable independent predictor for overall survival in CRC patients. The in vitro studies indicated down-regulation of KRT18 expression depressed CRC cell viability, migration and invasion. In conclusion, KRT18 serves as an oncogenic role in CRC progression and may be a therapeutic target for promoting CRC patients’ prognosis.

Experiencing a tremendous growth, Cloud Computing offers a number of advantages over other distributed platforms. Introducing the advantages of High Performance Computing (HPC) also brought forward the development of HPCaaS (HPC as a Service), which has mainly focused on flexible access to resources, cost-effectiveness, and the no-maintenance-needed for end-users. Besides providing and using HPCaaS, HPC centers could leverage more from Cloud Computing technology, for instance to facilitate operation and administration of deployed HPC systems, commonly faced by most supercomputer centers. This paper reports the product, EasyOP, developed to realize the idea that one or more Cloud or HPC facilities can be run over a centralized and unified control platform. The main purpose of EasyOP is that the information of HPC systems hardware and system software, failure alarms, jobs scheduling, etc. is sent to the Wuxi cloud computing center. After a series of analysis and processing, we are able to share many valuable data, including alarm and job scheduling status, to HPC users through SMS, email, and WeChat. More importantly, with the data accumulated on the cloud computing center, EasyOP can offer several easy-to-use functions, such as user(s) management, monthly/yearly reports, one-screen monitoring and so on. By the end of 2016, EasyOP successfully served more than 50 HPC systems with almost 10000 nodes and over of 300 regular users.

Introduction Quadrilateral space syndrome (QSS) is a peripheral nerve entrapment disease, which can be misdiagnosed in clinic. In the past, QSS was mainly diagnosed by clinical symptoms combined with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), electromyography (EMG), and arterial angiography. There are few reports on the diagnosis of QSS by musculoskeletal ultrasound (MSKUS) combined with clinical symptoms. Patient concerns A middle-aged female patient had posterolateral pain and numbness in her right shoulder for 2 months. Diagnoses At first, she was diagnosed as suprascapular nerve entrapment, while EMG of suprascapular nerve and axillary nerve indicated that nerve conduction was normal. Then, MRI was performed, showing the shoulder had no abnormalities, and EMG and arterial angiography of upper limb showed no abnormalities too. Finally, she was diagnosed as QSS according to MSKUS and lidocaine block test. Interventions Two sealing treatments of axillary nerve block in quadrilateral space under the guidance of MSKUS were performed. Outcomes After 2 treatments, the pain and numbness in her shoulder disappeared, and her shoulder could move normally. There was no recurrence after 3 months of follow-up. Conclusion MSKUS is an effective method to diagnose QSS. It is fast, convenient and inexpensive, and is worth popularizing in clinic.

A hybrid ion source with a combination of a 2.45 GHz microwave source and a thermal surface ionization source was designed to generate 7Li 3 + ion beam. A minimum-B type magnetic field configuration that consists of axial mirror field and hexapole field was designed. During the design process of the magnets system, the magnetic field configuration, the mechanical structure of the source body and the water cooling system have been carefully calculated and verified. An electrostatic Particle in Cell (PIC) code was developed to simulate the motion of electrons in the designed magnetic field to verify the reasonability of the design.

STUDY DESIGN This is a cross-sectional study. OBJECTIVE To determine the prevalence and distribution patterns of Modic changes (MCs) in the lumbar spine and their associations with disk degeneration in mainland Chinese using a sample of general population. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA Previous studies reported that the prevalence of MCs in Hong Kong Chinese was much lower than in other populations. Moreover, their associations with disk degeneration need further study. MATERIALS AND METHODS The study sample consisted of 442 subjects (53.6±14.9 y; range, 20-88 y) randomly selected from a typical Chinese community. Lumbar spines were imaged using a 3.0 T magnetic resonance scanner. Eleven endplates (L1-S1) in the lumbar spine were evaluated for the presence of MCs, type, location, and size to determine MCs prevalence and distribution patterns. Disk degeneration was graded using a Pfirrmann scale. RESULTS MCs were present in 209 (47.3%) subjects and 593 (12.2%) endplates. Among these endplates, 84.1% (499) were type II, 9.1% (54) were type I, and 6.4% (38) were mixed MCs. Approximately 2/3 MCs were present in the lower lumbar spine and 44.9% of MCs were at the L5/S1 disk level. Most MCs (73.9%) involved both endplates of a disk. Greater age [odds ratio (OR)=2.44 for each 10-year increase, P

U-shaped girder has been extensively used for its excellent adaptability in the urban railway transit system. As an open thin-walled structure, significant difference of working mechanism exists between U-shaped girder and conventional section girder (e.g., T section or box section). The thin-walled web plays significant role in the flexural performance of U type girder particularly. Moreover, severe collision may occur between the moving train and the girder, and subsequently results in the decrease of the structural bearing capacity. In this paper, a full-scale test was carried out to examine the ultimate bearing capacity and the failure mechanism of the U-shaped girder, and a refined numerical model was developed to simulate the damage evolution and the failure process. It was shown that the flexural failure occurred on the U-shaped girder under vertical loads. In addition, the ultimate bearing capacity of the structure under different web damage conditions (e.g., web damaged region or damaged range) was studied by applying the displacement based lateral load on the flange of the U-shaped girder to simulate the damage caused by accidental train collision. The numerical results have shown that the damaged web greatly affects the ultimate bearing capacity of U-shaped girder, more severe bearing capacity descending occurs around the middle span rather than the beam ends. The damaged range (length) of the web has less influence on the falling amplitude of bearing capacity. It can be concluded that the major reason accounting for the bearing capacity decrease is that the original section is weakened by the web damage, and consequently results in the buckling of the damaged web and lead to the total failure of the structure. It is recommended that the lateral resistant design for the web should be taken into consideration to ensure the operation safety of the urban railway transportation.

The article “Systemic vasculitis involving the breast: a case report and literature review” written by Jinxia Zhao, was originally published electronically on the publisher’s internet portal (currently SpringerLink) on March 14, 2019 with open access. With the author(s) decision to step back from Open Choice, the copyright of the article changed to ©Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2019 and the article is forthwith distributed under the terms of copyright. The original article has been corrected.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to conduct network meta-analysis to assess drug resistances of the Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs for advanced renal cell carcinoma. Materials and Methods: Database searches were conducted to identify randomized controlled trials reporting results for eligible treatments. After searching for PubMed, MEDLINE, EMBASE, and ISI Web of Science, 22 studies ( n = 7854 patients) were included for the comparison of drug resistance in the present meta-analysis. Results: For overall present, the mean 6-month progression-free survival rates were 65.4%, 49.3%, 60.6%, 70.3%, 62.6%, 41.6%, 38.2%, 66.1%, 43.1%, and 17.9% for sunitinib, sorafenib, pazopanib, axitinib, bevacizumab plus interferon (IFN)-a, everolimus, temsirolimus, temsirolimus plus bevacizumab, IFN-a, and placebo, respectively. For indirect comparison, two combined therapies (bevacizumab plus IFN-a and temsirolimus plus bevacizumab) and sunitinib were of less ability of drug resistance. The risk ratio of sunitinib therapy was 3.64 (95% confidence interval [CI] [3.12, 4.25]), the risk ratio of temsirolimus plus bevacizumab therapy was 3.68 (95% CI [3.14, 4.33]), and the risk ratio of bevacizumab plus IFN-a therapy was 3.49 (95% CI [2.99, 4.06]). Conclusions: Our results support that combination of targeted therapies might be a novel strategy against advanced renal cell carcinomas.

The purpose of this study is to describe a small case series of primary gastritis cystica polyposa (GCP) and explore its imaging features, endoscopic findings, and pathological manifestations. In this institutional review board-approved, HIPAA-compliant, retrospective study, an electronic pathology database in our hospital was searched for all cases of GCP from July 2008 to December 2015, yielding five cases with both radiological and endoscopic examination. The characteristics of imaging and gastroscopy were explored, and the pathological basis was analyzed. All five cases of GCP occurred in a previously unoperated stomach, which underwent unenhanced CT and enhanced CT, and one of which underwent unenhanced MRI and enhanced MRI as well. Gastroscopy or gastroscopic ultrasound was performed on all five patients. Four submucosal cystic lesions were displayed, including three with low-attenuation liquid, and one with high-attenuation liquid on CT. Another lesion showed soft tissue mass attenuation protruding into the gastric cavity. The surface mucosal layers of all five lesions were smooth and obviously enhanced, with unenhanced cystic component inside. Four submucosal lesions were confirmed by gastroscopy. Gastroscopic ultrasound indicated anechoic area in the center of the lesion. A large mass-like lesion had protruded into the gastric cavity, and gastroscopic ultrasound indicated dispersed anechoic areas in the lesion. All Histopathological analyses indicated mild or moderate epithelial dysplasia, and cystic dilation of the gastric glands in the submucosal layers and lamina propria, surrounded by the infiltration of inflammatory cells. Primary GCP has relatively particular endoscopy features, which can be accurately diagnosed by gastroscopy when the lesion is small. But endoscopy has its limitations in the diagnosis and differentiation for some large lesions. In contrast to gastroscopy and gastroscopic ultrasound, CT or MRI provides more information about both the gastric wall and the extragastric extent of the disease, which is more helpful for differential diagnosis and surgical planning of GCP before operation.

A practical 2.45-GHz microwave-driven Cs-free H− source was improved based on the experimental H− source at Peking University (PKU). Several structural improvements were implemented to meet the practical requirements of Xi'an Proton Application Facility (XiPaf). Firstly, the plasma chamber size was optimized to enhance the plasma intensity and stability. Secondly, the filter magnetic field and electron deflecting magnetic field were enhanced to reduce co-extracted electrons. Thirdly, a new two-electrode extraction system with farther electrode gap and enhanced water cooling ability to diminish spark and sputter during beam extraction was applied. At last, the direct H− current measuring method was adopted by the arrangement of a new pair of bending magnets before Faraday cup (FC) to remove residual electrons. With these improvements, electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) magnetic field optimization experiments and operation parameter variation experiments were carried out on the H− ion source and a maximum 8.5-mA pure H− beam was extracted at 50 kV with the time structure of 100 Hz/0.3 ms. The root-mean-square (RMS) emittance of the beam is 0.25π⋅mm⋅mrad. This improved H− source and extraction system were maintenance-free for more than 200 hours in operation.

Rationale: Primary pulmonary angiosarcoma is a rare disease. Here, we report the case of primary pulmonary angiosarcoma diagnosed computed tomographic pulmonary angiography (CTPA) and discuss its specific imaging characteristics. Patient concerns: A 46-year-old man was admitted for cough and shortness of breath. Thoracic CTPA images demonstrated a high-attenuation lesion surrounding by a halo sign in upper lobe of right lung, and the dilated vessel was also seen in lower lobe of right lung. The sign of “hillside sign” was observed on CTPA. Diagnoses: It was diagnosed with primary pulmonary angiosarcoma. Interventions: Right thoracotomy and right upper lobe lobectomy were performed. Outcomes: Five years later, the patient dead of complete occlusion of the pulmonary artery owing to tumor recurrence. Lessons: Although primary pulmonary angiosarcoma is a rare disease with atypical early clinical symptoms, and it is often misdiagnosed as pulmonary embolism and pulmonary infection. Therefore, it is important to recognize the CTPA imaging characteristics of primary pulmonary angiosarcoma and Surgical resection should be performed to prolong the patients’ lifetime.

Rationale Synovial cysts are well known in rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and most common in the popliteal fossa. They may produce lots of local symptoms and complaints, which may present initially as an unrelated clinical condition. Few studies have reported multiple extra-articular synovial cysts (MESCs) in the RA patients. Early diagnosis is crucial for patient treatment. Patient concerns A 50-year-old man without any special clinical histories found a soya bean size bump at the left elbow medially, then multiple lumps were found at bilateral elbows and gradually increasing. No pain, no activity, no redness, and swelling. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) showed multiple cystic lesions in the bursa and surrounding soft tissue of bilateral elbow joints. In addition, the elbow joint bursa was swollen and the synovial membrane was significantly thickened. Diagnoses The man was diagnosed as RA with multiple extra-articular synovial cysts formation. Interventions The patient was performed tylectomy of the right elbow. Other lumps were punctured and injected with compound betamethasone injection. Outcomes The bumps were reduced in size and the swelling relieved, and the patient was sent to the department of rheumatology and immunology for further treatment. Lessons In this case, it is difficult for the diagnosis of RA because of no relative histories and simultaneously multiple cystic lesions in multiple joints. Imaging examinations can show the characteristics of such kind of disease and be very helpful for the diagnosis and differentiate diagnosis.

Rationale: Solitary fibrous tumors (SFTs) are rare spindle cell tumors that are most commonly found in the mediastinal pleura. Although there are increasingly more reports of extra-pleural SFTs, reports of SFTs in bone are very rare. To our knowledge, a SFT of the ilium has not yet been reported. With low specificity on computer tomograpy and magnetic resonance imaging, SFTs are easily misdiagnosed. Patient concerns: A 33-year-old man visited our hospital due to repeated right ilium pain for 3 months. The pain was dull and bearable, with no hip joint dyskinesia. The relevant physical examinations are negative. The patient was healthy before and had a negative family history. Radiologically, a large mass with inhomogeneous attenuation and intensity and obvious heterogeneous enhancement was misdiagnosed as a giant cell tumor of ilium. Diagnoses: The man was diagnosed as the solitary fibrous tumor of right ilium. Interventions: The patient was performed an “incision biopsy of the right ilium” and “extended resection of tumor”. Outcomes: The pathology and immunohistochemistry was confirmed as the solitary fibrous tumors. The patient was followed-up by computed tomography of pelvis in local hospital every 6 mouths, and there is no recurrence and any symptoms. Lessons: We learned that the solitary fibrous tumor could locate in the ilium, and when we see imaging manifestations like this case, we should think it may be SFT.

An optimization method for the survivability of networked C4ISR system structure is proposed. The strategies of selecting the key nodes to backup, determining the number of the backups, and optimizing the backups processing are given in the proposed method. Based on the computation method for the importance of the information flow betweenness, the survivability optimization problem with the constraints on backup processing and transmission cost is given. The validity of the proposed method is verified by an example of survivability optimization for a networked regional joint air defense system structure.

In order to improve the source stability, a long term continuous wave (CW) proton beam experiment has been carried out with Peking University compact permanent magnet 2.45 GHz ECR ion source (PKU PMECRIS). Before such an experiment a lot of improvements and modifications were completed on the source body, the Faraday cup and the PKU ion source test bench. At the beginning of 2015, a continuous operation of PKU PMECRIS for 306 h with more than 50 mA CW beam was carried out after success of many short term tests. No plasma generator failure or high voltage breakdown was observed during that running period and the proton source reliability is near 100%. Total beam availability, which is defined as 35-keV beam-on time divided by elapsed time, was higher than 99% [S. X. Peng et al., Chin. Phys. B 24(7), 075203 (2015)]. A re-inspection was performed after another additional 100 h operation (counting time) and no obvious sign of component failure was observed. Counting the previous source testing time together, this PMECRs longevity is now demonstrated to be greater than 460 h. This paper is mainly concentrated on the improvements for this long term experiment.

Our purpose was to investigate the applicative value of multislice spiral computed tomography (CT) perfusion imaging on quantitative assessment of tumor angiogenesis before and after transcatheter arterial embolization and monitoring the early interventional therapeutic effect in malignant solid tumors.Sixteen New Zealand white rabbits successfully implanted VX2 tumor in the unilateral proximal thigh were divided into 2 groups (8 per group) at random and performed conventional CT plain scan and perfusion scan 14 days after implantation and 3 days after interventional therapy, respectively. The values of blood flow (BF), blood volume (BV), mean transit time (MTT), and permeability surface area product (PS) in VX2 tumors and normal muscles were computed after intravenous bolus administration of iodinated contrast medium, and the differences among them were analyzed. Meanwhile, correlative analysis between perfusion parameters and microvessel density (MVD) counts and average optical density (AOD) of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) was done.Before interventional therapy, the values of BF, BV, MTT, and PS of the VX2 tumors in interventional group were 303.28 +/- 69.91 mL 100 g min, 7.02 +/- 3.10 mL 100 g, 1.99 +/- 0.28 seconds, and 65.88 +/- 9.38 mL 100 g min, respectively. Compared with the parametric values of normal muscular tissues, there were significant differences among them (F values were 4285.82, 1867.46, 413.04, and 698.42, respectively; P0.01). There were no significant differences of the above parametric values between the interventional group and the control group. Three days after interventional therapy, the values of BF, BV, MTT, and PS of the VX2 tumors in the interventional group were 7.53 +/- 2.37 mL 100 g min, 1.20 +/- 0.23 mL 100 g, 3.29 +/- 0.57 seconds, 4.01 +/- 1.51 mL 100 g min, respectively. Compared with the parametric values of preinterventional therapy and the control group, there were significant differences among them (P0.01). In addition, there was a good positive correlation between BF, BV, PS, and MVD, and AOD of VEGF (r0.7, P0.05) in VX2 tumors; however, there was no significant correlation between MTT and MVD (P0.05), and there was significant negative correlation between MTT and AOD of VEGF (r = -0.78, P0.05).Multislice spiral CT perfusion imaging is a functional imaging technique that provides useful, quantitative assessment to tumor angiogenesis, blood perfusion, and vascular permeability, which can evaluate the early interventional therapeutic effect in malignant solid tumors invasively and accurately.

Real-time streaming media transmission is used widely in computer network, and audio-video synchronization is a key issue. Because of using RTP protocol in data transmission, the synchronization requirements can be solved if the time information in RTP data packets is used effectively. In this paper, combining actual application, RTP data packets are simplified appropriately in sending end, and implementation process is given completely according to various situations in receiving end.

In AVO (Amplitude Variation with Offset) analysis, the amplitudes of reflected waves with different incident angles are studied to deduce lithology information beyond the structure map obtained by seismic imaging algorithms. The quantitative analysis of the amplitude, relies on common-image gathers being flat (or equivalently, at the same depth). But the waves with different incident angles will have different apparent velocities, resulting in different depths for the same image point at different angles, or non-flat common image gathers. In many scenarios, non-flat common-image gather was flattened by trim means at the cost of compromising zero-crossing and polarity-reversal information. This work presents a solution based on the seismic imaging subseries of the inverse scattering series (ISS) that flattens the common image gather without knowing or determining the subsurface velocity, and without any harmful amplitude consequencies.

An experimental animal model of malignant soft-tissue tumor was established to investigate the applied value of multi-slice spiral CT perfusion imaging preliminarily. Ten New Zealand white rabbits which were implanted with VX2 tumor in either proximal thigh were subjected to CT plain scan and perfusion scan two weeks later respectively, then the original perfusion images were transmitted to AW4.0 Workstation. The functional maps and perfusion parameters including blood flow (BF), blood volume (BV), mean transit time (MTT) and permeability surface (PS) were computed and analyzed. All the values of BF, BV and PS in VX2 soft-tissue tumors were obviously higher while the MTT-values were lower than those in the normal muscular tissues significantly. It was suggested that multi-slice spiral CT perfusion imaging is an accurate, convenient and relatively safe functional imaging technique, and can give a quantitative assessment to angiogenesis and blood perfusion of soft-tissue tumors.

In seismic exploration, acquiring full surface coverage with point receiver data is generally consistent with wave theoretic processing requirements. It is important to characterize the receiver array effect on any wave theory based seismic processing method. Deghosting is a prerequisite for free surface multiple removal (FSMR), internal multiple attenuation/elimination, and the imaging and inversion of primaries. The effectiveness of deghosting directly affects the performance of these methods. We propose a new method for deghosting towed streamer data that modifies and extends the Weglein et al. (2002) algorithm and make use of the wavelet method presented by Guo et al. (2005). We test the method for a simple 1D acoustic model and conclude that very accurate deghosting results can be obtained when using point receiver data. Useful but less accurate results can also be obtained when using receiver array data.

Objective To evaluate the serial changes of plasma microRNA-320 (miR-320) level in patients with acute ST elevated myocardial infarction (STEMI) in the course of ischaemic reperfusion (I/R), explore the relation between the changes of miR-320 and I/R injury. Furthermore, to provide some evidence of miR-320 as a potential biomarker of I/R. Methods Thirty patients with STEMI (25 males) undergoing primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) were involved. Their blood flow was TIMI 0/1 flow grade before reperfusion and TIMI 2/3 flow grade after reperfusion. The ST-segment elevation did not reduce spontaneously before reperfusion, but a resolution of at least 50% of the most prominent ST-segment elevation was observed 2 h after reperfusion. Control group (n=20, 15 males) with normal coronary angiography was set up. Venous blood samples were obtained before reperfusion, immediately after reperfusion (0 h), and 2 h, 4 h, 6 h, 6–12 h, 12–24 h, 24–72 h after successful reperfusion. Plasma miR-320, Hsp-20 and MDA levels were tested and their changes during reperfusion were analysed. The relationship between the changes of miR-320 and I/R injury was also evaluated. Results There were almost no significant differences in baseline clinical and laboratory characteristics between STEMI group and control group. The smokers, WBC and BNP in STEMI group were significantly higher than control group (p Conclusion Plasma miR-320 levels of STEMI patients definitely changed during the process of reperfusion. It rose to the peak value 2 h post reperfusion, and then decreased gradually to the level of preoperation about 12 h after reperfusion. Plasma miR-320 levels were significantly positively correlated with its target protein-Hsp-20 levels, but significantly negatively correlated with CK values.