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To deploy deep learning algorithms on resource-limited scenarios, an emerging device-resistive random access memory (ReRAM) has been regarded as promising via analog computing. However, the practicability of ReRAM is primarily limited due to the weight drifting of ReRAM neural networks due to multi-factor reasons, including manufacturing, thermal noises, and etc. In this paper, we propose a novel Bayesian optimization method for fault tolerant neural network architecture (BayesFT). For neural architecture search space design, instead of conducting neural architecture search on the whole feasible neural architecture search space, we first systematically explore the weight drifting tolerance of different neural network components, such as dropout, normalization, number of layers, and activation functions in which dropout is found to be able to improve the neural network robustness to weight drifting. Based on our analysis, we propose an efficient search space by only searching for dropout rates for each layer. Then, we use Bayesian optimization to search for the optimal neural architecture robust to weight drifting. Empirical experiments demonstrate that our algorithmic framework has outperformed the state-of-the-art methods by up to 10 times on various tasks, such as image classification and object detection.

PM2.5-related neurological and mental diseases, such as cognitive impairment and stroke, tend to cause disability. Six-week-old male C57BL/6 mice were divided into 6 groups and exposed to concentrated PM2.5 or filtered air for 2, 4, and 6 months, respectively. The neurobehavioral changes of mice were tested. The weight of the whole brain and olfactory bulbs were recorded at the end of exposure, and the brain structure was observed by hematoxylin and eosin (HE) staining. Serum indicators, mRNA, and protein expressions were detected. The spatial learning memory ability was impaired, and the mice were more anxious after PM2.5 exposure. Relative brain weight decreased with age, and PM2.5 exposure exceeded the decrease of relative brain weight. Interestingly, superoxide dismutase (SOD) and albumin decreased in the PM2.5-exposed groups although neuronal morphology and other serum indicators did not show significant difference between PM and FA groups. Moreover, PM2.5 induced the increase of plasminogen at 2 months but recovered at 4 months and then increased at 6 months again. The results from protein expression and transcriptomic test demonstrated that PI3K/AKT/FoxO1 pathway might be activated after 6-month PM2.5 exposure in mice. Indicators albumin, the percentage of albumin over IgG (A/G value), and plasminogen were the main serous changes in mice after early-stage (2 months) and long-term (6 months) PM2.5 exposure. In addition, early-stage injury induced by PM2.5 might recover at later time point and display significant injury again with the exposure time. PM2.5 exposure-induced brain injury might be associated with the activation of PI3K/AKT/FoxO1 pathway.

BACKGROUND: The chemokine-like factor (CKLF)-like MARVEL transmembrane domain-containing (CMTM) family refers to a family of transcriptional repressor genes. CMTMs are closely associated with the epigenetic regulatory mechanisms and development of multiple malignancies, including gastric cancer. However, their specific biological functions and prognostic values in gastric cancer have yet to be elucidated. METHODS: Tumor sample datasets were retrieved and analyzed using databases including Oncomine, STRING, GEPIA2, cBioportal, and Kaplan-Meier plotter. To investigate the prognostic role of CMTMs in gastric cancer, we applied unsupervised hierarchical clustering analysis of CMTM gene expression patterns. RESULTS: While the mRNA levels of CMTM1/3/6/7/8 were upregulated in gastric cancer, CMTM2/4/5 showed no statistically significant difference at the mRNA level in patients with gastric cancer. Moreover, the mRNA expressions of different CMTMs exhibited strong correlations with various clinical parameters of patients with gastric cancer, including tumor stage, metastatic lymph node status, H. pylori status, and tumor grade. Also, the results suggested that elevated levels of CMTM3/5 mRNA had a significant association (P

Blood pressure (BP) variability may have its effect on the development of vascular disease. The authors aimed to examine the association between the visit‐to‐visit variability (VVV) of BP and arterial stiffness in Chinese adults. The authors included 1407 participants from a prospective cohort study of community residents who were ≥40 years, without a history of myocardial infarction or stroke, and with data at the baseline, the second and the third visits in 2008, 2009, and 2013. The VVV of BP was defined as the standard deviation (SD), the coefficient of variation (CV), the average successive variability (ASV), and the variability independent of the mean (VIM) in BP levels at the 3 visits. Arterial stiffness was measured by brachial‐ankle pulse wave velocity (ba‐PWV) at the 2nd and the 3rd visits. Levels of ba‐PWV change and the occurrence of an elevated ba‐PWV increased significantly in the highest tertile of VVV measures of systolic BP (SBP) and pulse pressure (PP) compared with the lowest tertile, respectively. The multivariable regression analysis revealed that VVV measures of SBP and PP were significantly associated with levels of ba‐PWV change and the risks of developing an elevated ba‐PWV. The odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for the risk were 2.12 (1.57–3.12) and 1.92 (1.38–2.68) in participants with the highest versus the lowest tertile of SBP‐SD and PP‐SD, respectively. No significant association was found for diastolic BP variability measures. The increased long‐term variabilities of SBP and PP were associated with an increased risk of arterial stiffness.

The recall of defective automobile products is one of the important measures to promote the quality of product quality and protect consumers' pyhsical safety and property security. In order to assess the risk level of defect cases, automobile recall management experts need to analyze and discuss the defect information by personal. A risk level prediction method based on language pre-training Bert model is proposed in this paper, which can transform the defect information into rick level of the vehicle and then predict vehicle recall automatically, in which a seq2seq model is proposed to multi-label the vehicle complaint data. The outputs of the seq2seq model combined with other static and dynamic information are used as the input of the Bert communication model. Substantial comparative experiments of different feature combinations on different methods show that the proposed VDRF method achieves F1 value with 79% in vehicle recall risk prediction, which outperforms the traditional method.

Purpose: Severe early childhood caries (S-ECC) is a microbe-mediated disease with tooth hard tissue destruction. However, the role of the fungal community in various ecological niches of deciduous dental caries has not been fully elucidated. This study aimed to analyze the differences of mycobiome in diverse spatial niches with and without S-ECC.Method: A total of 48 samples were obtained from 8 S-ECC children (SE group) and 8 caries-free children (CF group) aged 4–5 years. Unstimulated saliva (S), healthy supragingival plaque (FMIX), mixed plaque from decayed teeth (SMIX) and carious lesion (DMIX) samples were collected. The ITS2 region of the fungi was amplified and sequenced using the Ion S5™XL platform.Results: A total of 281 species were identified. Candida albicans showed relatively higher abundance in S-ECC children, while Alternaria alternata and Bipolaris sorokiniana were more enriched in CF group. In this study, the relative abundance of C. albicans in CF.FMIX (0.4%), SE.FMIX (12.5%), SE.SMIX (24.0%), and SE.DMIX (37.2%) increased successively. Significant differences of fungal species richness and diversity were observed between SE.FMIX-SE.SMIX, SE.FMIX-SE.DMIX (P < 0.05).Conclusions: The diversity of fungal communities in S-ECC children showed significant differences in various spatial niches of primary teeth. The richness of C. albicans was closely related to the caries states and depth, suggesting that it may play a crucial role in caries pathogenicity.

ObjectiveThe aim of the study was to investigate the association between the visit-to-visit variability (VVV) of fasting plasma glucose (FPG) and arterial stiffness in Chinese adults.MethodsWe performed a cohort study involving 2002 Chinese adults with no history of myocardial infarction or stroke. All the participants attended three visits (the baseline visit in 2008, the 2nd visit in 2009 and the 3rd visit in 2013). We used four measures to define the VVV of FPG across the three visits: the standard deviation (SD), the coefficient of variation (CV), the average successive variability (ASV) and the variability independent of the mean (VIM). We used brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity (ba-PWV) to measure arterial stiffness at the 2nd and the 3rd visits.ResultsCompared with the lowest tertile of all the four measurements of VVV of FPG, significantly increased levels of ba-PWV change, ratio of ba-PWV change and the occurrence of the elevated ba-PWV were found in the highest tertile. The odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) comparing participants in the highest tertile vs. the lowest tertile of FPG-SD was 1.37 (1.01-1.86) for risks of having elevated ba-PWV, even after adjustment for covariates including the mean FPG. Similar results were found for FPG-CV and FPG-VIM.ConclusionGreater long-term variability of FPG was associated with an increased risk of arterial stiffness, suggesting that the VVV of FPG could be used for an early detection of subclinical atherosclerosis.

A new compact scheme based on the SIMPLER algorithm is developed for solving steady flow problems on three different coordinate systems. The compact corrective source term based on a compact and up...

This article aims to study suitability and merits of employing a biofuel in methane-air jet flames for energy security and environmental sustainability purposes. A special biofuel (methyl decanoate, methyl 9-decenoate, and n-heptane) oxidation with 118 species reduced/skeletal mechanism and 837 reactions is combusted instead of methane. The biofuel was fed in the main jet inlet of the well-known Sandia flame D (SFD) while the hot pilot jet is still responsible for ignition. The open-source software OpenFOAM was used for simulating turbulent biofuel-air combustion. To check the accuracy of computational results, the system was initially validated with SFD experimental results and good agreements were found. After ignition, mean temperature distribution and species mean mass fraction at different distances in axial and radial directions were investigated. Results showed that the biofuel can be effectively used as an alternative to SFD not only for generating a reasonable temperature as methane does, but also for significantly reduction in principal greenhouse gas emissions.

Objective: Hypopituitarism (Hypo-Pit) is partial or complete insufficiency of anterior pituitary hormones. Besides hormone metabolism, the global metabolomics in Hypo-Pit are largely unknown. We aimed to explore potential biomarkers to aid in diagnosis and personalized treatment.Methods: Using both univariate and multivariate statistical methods, we identified 72 differentially abundant features through liquid chromatography coupled to high-resolution mass spectrometry, obtained in 134 males with Hypo-Pit and 90 age matched healthy controls.Results: Hypopituitarism exhibits an increased abundance of metabolites involved in amino acid degradation and glycerophospholipid synthesis, but decreased content of metabolites in steroid hormone synthesis and fatty acid beta-oxidation. Significantly changed metabolites included creatine, creatinine, L-alanine, phosphocholines, androstenedione, hydroprenenolone, and acylcarnitines. In Hypo-Pit patients, the increased ratio of creatine/creatinine suggested reduced creatine uptake and impaired creatine utilization, whereas the decreased level of beta-hydroxybutyrate, acetylcarnitine (C2) and a significantly decreased ratio of decanoylcarnitine (C10) to free carnitine suggested an impaired beta-oxidation. Furthermore, the creatine/creatinine and decanoylcarnitine/carnitine ratio were identified as diagnostic biomarkers for Hypo-Pit with AUCs of 0.976 and 0.988, respectively. Finally, we found that the creatinine and decanoylcarnitine/carnitine ratio could distinguish cases that were sensitive vs. resistant to human chorionic gonadotropin therapy.Conclusion: We provided a global picture of altered metabolic pathways in Hypo-Pit, and the identified biomarkers in creatine metabolism and beta-oxidation might be useful for the preliminary screening and diagnosis of Hypo-Pit.

Nowadays, smartness and smart management of tourism destinations and suppliers are becoming a top priority and big challenge. This article focuses on tourist attractions and aims at exploring how smart technologies influence the customer journey. The main research question is how smart technologies are influencing the tourists’ visit experience. The study takes a consumer behavior perspective with a specific focus on the visit cycle (prospective, active, and reflective phases), based on the theoretical foundations of customer journey process model. First, a research framework was elaborated, encompassing three hypotheses. Then, this model was empirically tested and validated by means of a quantitative research using as a study site the Ningbo Museum, Ningbo, China. This investigation allows us to get insights into consumer behavior, which is useful for tourist attraction to become ‘smarter’. The study’s findings indicate that smart technologies have an influence on the customer journey at all three phases, the most significant being at the prospective and active phases, without neglecting the reflective one. This article extends our knowledge by providing new insights into the influence of smart technologies that have theoretical and marketing implications for tourist attraction.

Objective: To explore the most suitable calculation method for insulin dosage in an insulin tolerance test (ITT) and to evaluate the clinical application value of the optimization coefficient (γ). Methods: In this study, 140 adult patients with congenital growth hormone deficiency (GHD) or acquired hypopituitarism were randomized into the following two groups: the conventional group (n = 70) and the optimized group (n = 70). Oral glucose tolerance tests (OGTTs), insulin release tests (IRTs), and ITTs were conducted. For ITTs, insulin doses were the product of body weight (kg) and related coefficient (0.15 IU/kg for the control group and γ IU/kg for the optimized group, respectively). Notably, γ was defined as −0.034 + 0.000176 × AUCINS + 0.009846 × BMI, which was based on our previous study. Results: In the ITTs, the rate of achieving adequate hypoglycemia with a single insulin dose was significantly higher for the optimized group compared with the conventional group (92.9 vs. 60.0%, P < 0.001). The optimized group required higher initial doses of insulin (0.23 IU/kg). Meanwhile, the two groups did not differ significantly in their nadir blood glucose (1.9 vs. 1.9 mmol/L, P = 0.828). Conclusion: This study confirmed that the proposed optimized calculation method for insulin dosage in ITTs led to more efficient hypoglycemia achievement, without increasing the incidence of serious adverse events.

Background: Panhypopituitarism (Hypo-Pit) is characterized by a complete deficiency of anterior pituitary hormones. Besides hormone metabolism, the serum metabolomics in Hypo-Pit are largely unknown. We aimed to identify metabolic changes in Hypo-Pit to explain its clinical phenotype and to ultimately explore potential biomarkers to aid in diagnosis and personalized treatment. Methods: Metabolic profiles were collected in 134 males with Hypo-Pit and 90 same-aged healthy controls by non-targeted metabolomics in serum. Prognostic marker for human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) therapy was validated in another cohort including 95 males with congenital Hypo-Pit. Results: 59 metabolites altered significantly in Hypo-Pit. The most discriminating pathways included steroid metabolism, arginine and proline metabolism, β-fatty acid and glycerophospholipid metabolism. Hypo-Pit shows significantly higher creatine and its precursors, but a relative lower creatinine, indicates creatine metabolism disorder, conform to decreased muscle mass and muscle strength; Hypo-Pit also shows a significantly lower long-chain acyl-carnitines, but a higher free carnitine, indicates carnitine shuttle disorder, consistent with the symptom of decreased fatty acid oxidation. In addition, the creatine/creatinine and Decanoyl-L-carnitine/L-carnitine ratio could serve as promising diagnostic biomarkers for Hypo-Pit, which showed an area under the ROC curve (AUC) of 0.976 and 0.988, respectively. Moreover, the serum creatinine and acyl-carnitines/L-carnitine were shown as promising predictors of hCG therapy, with AUC of 0.746 and 0.713 in discriminating the hCG-sensitive and resistant patients. Conclusions: This is the first study to link a framework of metabolic perturbations with the pathophysiology, diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers of Hypo-Pit. Funding Statement: The present study was supported by scientific research project of Shanghai Health and Family Planning Commission (grant no. 201840160), Natural Science Foundation of Shanghai (20ZR1434100; Shanghai, China), the Science and Technology Commission of Jiading District (JDKW‐2017‐W09 and JDKW‐2017‐W11; Shanghai, China), and the Interdisciplinary funding of Shanghai Jiao Tong University (YG2017QN57; Shanghai, China), Ruijin Hospital North for Young Talents (grant no. 2017RCPY-A01, 2017RCPY-B10 and 2017RCPY-C01; Shanghai, China). Declaration of Interests: There is no conflict of interest that could be perceived as prejudicing the impartiality of the research reported. Ethics Approval Statement: The study was approved by the ethics committee of Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine. All participants or their legal guardians provided written informed consent.

With the development of electric helicopters’ motor technology and the widespread use of electric drive rotors, more aircraft use electric rotors to provide thrust and directional control. For a helicopter tail rotor, the wake of the main rotor influences the tail rotor’s inflow and wake. In the procedure of controlling, crosswind will also cause changes to the tail disk load. This paper describes requirements and design principles of an electric motor drive and variable pitch tail rotor system. A particular spoke-type architecture of the motor is designed, and the performance of blades is analyzed by the CFD method. The demand for simplicity of moving parts and strict constraints on the weight of a helicopter makes the design of electrical and mechanical components challenging. Different solutions have been investigated to propose an effective alternative to the mechanical actuation system. A test platform is constructed which can collect the dynamic response of the thrust control. The enhancement of the response speed due to an individual motor speed control and variable-pitch system is validated. Keywords: Electric tail rotor, Helicopter, More Electric Aircraft (MEA), Propulsion optimization, Tail rotor

Megahertz is the highest femtosecond laser repetition rate that the state-of-the art technology can achieve. In this article, a single femtosecond laser pulse is burst into multiple femtosecond las...

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune disease in which T cells play an important role. Paeoniflorin-6-oxy-benzenesulfonate (CP-25) shows a strong anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory effect in the joint of adjuvant arthritis (AA) rats, but the role of the spleen function is still unclear. The aim of this study was to research how CP-25 regulated spleen function of AA rats. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were administered with CP-25 (50 mg/kg) orally from day 17 to 29 after immunization. The spleen histopathological changes were analyzed by hematoxylin-eosin staining. G protein-coupled receptor kinases (GRKs) and prostaglandin receptor subtypes (EPs) were screened by Western blot and immunohistochemistry. The co-expression of GRK2 and EP2 as well as GRK2 and EP4 was measured by immunofluorescence and co-immunoprecipitation. The expression of GRK2 and EP4 in splenic T cells was further detected by immunofluorescence. CP-25 was found to relieve the secondary paw swelling, attenuate histopathologic changes, and downregulate GRK2, EP2 and EP4 expression in AA rats. Additionally, CP-25 not only downregulated the co-expression of GRK2 and EP4 but also downregulated GRK2, EP4 expression in splenic T cells of AA rats. From these results, we can infer that CP-25 play an anti-inflammatory and immune function by affecting the function of the splenic T cells.

Si/Gesuperlattices are promising thermoelectric materials to convert thermal energy into electric power. The nanoscale thermal transport in Si/Gesuperlattices is investigated via molecular dynamics (MD) simulation in this short communication. The impact of Si and Ge interface on the cross-plane thermal conductivity reduction in the Si/Gesuperlattices is studied by designing conestructured interface and aperiodicity between the Si and Ge layers. The temperature difference between the left and right sides of the Si/Gesuperlattices is set up for nonequilibrium MD simulation. The spatial distribution of temperature is recorded to examine whether the steadystate has been reached. As a crucial factor to quantify thermal transport, the temporal evolution of heat flux flowing through Si/Gesuperlattices is calculated. Compared with the even interface, the cone-structured interface contributes remarkable resistance to the thermal transport, whereas the aperiodic arrangement of Si and Ge layers with unequal thicknesses has a marginal influence on the reduction of effective thermal conductivity. The interface with divergent cone-structure shows the most excellent performance of all the simulated cases, which brings a 33% reduction of the average thermal conductivity to the other Si/Gesuperlattices with even, convergent cone-structured interfaces and aperiodic arrangements. The design of divergent cone-structured interface sheds promising light on enhancing the thermoelectric efficiency of Si/Ge based materials.

By imposing a picosecond laser pulse irradiation on an Al-shell/Ni-core nanoparticle, an exothermic self-sustained alloying is triggered. Molecular dynamics simulation is implemented to get atomistic insights into the alloying process. The nanoparticle is composed by an equiatomic number of Al atoms in the shell and Ni atoms in the core. Due to the absorption of laser energy from the surface of the nanoparticle, atomic motion becomes active. The inter-diffusion of Ni and Al atoms results in thermal energy generation. It is found that the incident laser energy is responsible for controlling the degree of self-heating of the nanoparticle by governing the potential energy change during the inter-diffusion of Al-shell and Ni-core atoms.

At low temperatures, charge–discharge performances of lithium-ion batteries decline rapidly. Preheat is essential for an effective battery thermal management system. Temperature uniformities of lithium-ion battery cells heated by the self-heating lithium-ion battery structure (SHLB) method and the wide-line metal film (WLMF) method are studied by the transient three-dimensional heating finite element models. Under the same condition, the temperature of a lithium-ion battery cell heated by SHLB heating method is three times more uniform than that heated by the WLMF heating method. However, temperature uniformity of a lithium-ion battery cell heated by SHLB method still is poor. Effects of environment temperature, heating time, heating power, thickness of a lithium-ion battery cell and stand time after heating on temperature distribution of a lithium-ion battery cell heated have been analyzed. For the two heating methods, heating power, thickness of a lithium-ion battery cell and stand time after heating have remarkably influences on temperature distribution of a heated lithium-ion battery cell. For SHLB heating method, temperature uniformity of a heated lithium-ion battery cell is acceptable by decreasing heating power and thickness of a lithium-ion battery cell if there is no safety issue on the structure. Meanwhile, for WLMF heating method, temperature uniformity of a heated lithium-ion battery cell is also acceptable by decreasing heating power, thickness of a lithium-ion battery cell or increasing stand time after heating.

G protein-coupled receptor kinase 2 (GRK2), as a vital Ser/Thr kinase, is an important regulatory protein in the inflammatory immune response (IIR) by maintaining the balance between the function of inflammatory immune cells and non-conventional inflammatory immune cells and regulating inflammatory immune cell infiltration, inflammatory cytokine secretion, and the signaling associated with endothelial function. However, the imbalance of GRK2 expression and activity plays an important role in the development of IIR-related diseases, such as hypertension, heart failure, Alzheimer’s disease, type 2 diabetes mellitus, insulin resistance, rheumatoid arthritis, thyroid cancer, multiple sclerosis, and liver cancer. Small molecule GRK2 inhibitors, including balanol, Takeda inhibitors, paroxetine and derivatives, M119 and gallein, peptides, RNA aptamers, Raf kinase inhibitory protein, and microRNAs, that can directly inhibit GRK2 kinase activity have been identified by different strategies. This review discusses recent progress in one of the hallmark molecular abnormalities of GRK2 in IIR-related diseases and explores the soft regulation of IIR by innovative drugs reducing the excessive activity of GRK2 to basal levels, without damaging normal physiological function, to ameliorate inflammatory disorders.

Using coal combustion ashes to synthetize alkali-activated cements (AACs) has significant advantages in the sustainable development of coal industry and exploiting cementitious materials for special occasions. Microwave heating and ultrafine precursors have been reported to improve the reaction extent that would greatly influence the strength development at the early ages of AACs, however, few researches focused on their influence on efflorescence, which is caused by the excessive unreacted alkaline in AACs diffusing to its surface, and reacting with CO2 in the air to form white carbonate deposits on the surface, and efflorescence may lead powder and peel on the AAC surface and gradually lose strength from the outside to the inside. In order to investigate the influence of microwave heating and ultrafine precursors on efflorescence, AAC samples adopting normal and ultrafine coal combustion ashes, and heated with steam and microwave respectively were synthetized. Additionally, the properties including geo-polymerization products, pore structure and moisture transport process which directly affect efflorescence were also compared. The results revealed that AACs heated with microwave exhibited faster and more serious efflorescence, especially for precursors with more amorphous phase and higher geo-polymerization reactivity, which can be attributed to the weak crystallization of reaction products improving the instability of sodium ions, and a less compact microstructure dominated absolutely by capillaries that promotes moisture movement, and also the transmission of sodium ions. Faster efflorescence tendency also revealed on AACs synthetized with ultrafine coal combustion ashes, however, their damage was significantly lower than that of microwave heating, and the increased moisture transport rate caused by the unitary capillaries distribution concentrated at 30 nm–100 nm may be the key reason. These results enrich the research on the application of coal combustion ashes and the influencing factors of AAC efflorescence.

The aeroelastic modeling of Tjaereborg wind turbine blades was performed based on the unsteady Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes equations (URANS) combined with Finite Element Method (FEM) in a loosely coupled manner. This method was verified by comparing numerical and experiment results at four axial inflow wind speeds. Furthermore, the aeroelastic performance of Tjaereborg wind turbine under yaw angle of 10°, 30° and 60°were computed and analyzed. The results showed that the average power and thrust of the wind turbine decreased with increasing yaw angle, along with the increasing oscillation amplitude under large yaw angle. The aerodynamic load showed periodic change within one revolution of rotor, resulting in the blade deflection and the strain present considerably asymmetric distributions. The maximum deflection and strain occurred at azimuth angle of about90° and their minimum values occurred at azimuth angle of about 270°. Besides, both the maximum deflection and strain under yaw conditions became larger than those in axial inflow condition do. For Tjaereborg wind turbine, the coupled solver gave a higher average power and thrust than the CFD solver alone. The aerodynamic performances showed more asymmetrical characters under the combined effect of yaw and fluid structure interaction (FSI).

Background: Rice seed proteins are lacking essential amino acids (EAAs). Genetic engineering offers a fast and sustainable method to solve this problem as it allows the specific expression of heterologous EAA-rich proteins. The use of selectable marker gene is essential for generation of transgenic crops, but might also lead to potential environmental and food safety problems. Therefore, the production of marker-free transgenic crops is becoming an extremely attractive alternative and could contribute to the public acceptance of transgenic crops. Objectives: The present study was conducted to examine whether AmA1 can be expressed specifically in rice seeds, and generate marker-free transgenic rice with improved nutritive value. Materials and Methods:AmA1 was transferred into rice using Agrobacterium-mediated co-transformation system with a twin T-DNA binary vector and its integration in rice genome was confirmed by southern blot. Transcription of AmA1 was analyzed by Real-Time PCR and its expression was verified by western analysis. Protein and amino acid content were measured by the Kjeldahl method and the high-speed amino acid analyzer, respectively. Results: Five selectable marker-free homozygous transgenic lines were obtained from the progeny. The expression of recombinant AmA1 was confirmed by the observation of a 35 kDa band in SDS-PAGE and western blot. Compared to the wild-type control, the total protein contents in the seeds of five homozygous lines were increased by 1.06~12.87%. In addition, the content of several EAAs, including lysine, threonine, and valine was increased significantly in the best expressing line. Conclusions: The results indicated that the amino acid composition of rice grain could be improved by seed-specific expression of AmA1.

Background The association of vitamin D status and inflammation prediabetes mellitus (PreDM) individuals has not been investigated. We investigated the association of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D 3 (25(OH) D 3 ) with adipokines and inflammatory markers in persons with PreDM. Methods In this cross-sectional study, we stratified 418 nondiabetic subjects as having PreDM or normal fasting glucose (NFG), and divided PreDM or NFG subjects into vitamin D sufficient, vitamin D insufficient and vitamin D deficient subgroups. 25(OH) D 3 concentrations were determined by HPLC. Serum tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), interleiukin-6 (IL-6) and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP), adiponectin, leptin and resistin were measured by ELISA. Results In the PreDM group, compared with those in the vitamin D sufficient subgroup, vitamin D insufficient subgroup and vitamin D deficient subgroup had higher concentrations of hs-CRP and leptin ( P P 3 concentrations were inversely associated with hs-CRP and leptin concentrations after adjusted the BMI only in the PreDM group ( P 3 concentration (β = − 0.174 and β = − 0.171, respectively). Conclusions 25(OH) D 3 status in PreDM individuals was inversely correlated with concentrations of hs-CRP and leptin, suggesting their involvement in the inflammation response between vitamin D status and PreDM.

The effects of uncertainties of laser exposure time, phase lag times, blood perfusion coefficient, scattering coefficient, and diffuse reflectance of light on the thermal damage of living biologica...

Uncertainty method incorporating the parametric uncertainty distribution is used to systematically investigate the influence of different slit sizes and excitation parameters on performance of double-clamped resonant beam with slit structure in a MEMS resonant pressure sensor, when inherent heat elevation of electro-thermal excitation is taken into account. The theoretical vibration model of double-clamped resonant beam with slit structure is established, and the inherent heat elevation of electro-thermal excitation is analyzed. The sample-based stochastic model is established to investigate the influence of different uncertain slit sizes and excitation parameters on performance of slit-resonant beam. Beside the theoretical vibration model, the neural network model is established and trained by sufficient data obtained by finite element method (FEM), and is used for the uncertainty method to obtain effects of different slit sizes on the performance of slit- resonant beam, which verified the results obtained by uncertainty method using the theoretical vibration model of slit-resonant beam. The results reveal the different influences of slit size and excitation parameters, which can be used as reference for design and optimization of the slit structure and sensor performances.

Colorectal cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide. Accurate diagnosis and evaluation of malignant extent are crucial for disease treatment. In order to improve the current limited effectiveness of agents for the current theranostics of this disease, we selected upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs) as an alternative agent, due to their unique luminescence properties. Considering tumorigenesis in the abdominal cavity, intraperitoneal (IP) administration is utilized, based on spatial proximity. Accordingly, citrate-modified UCNPs (cit-UCNPs) were synthesized and injected into mice via the IP route, compared with the IV route. The results demonstrated that cit-UCNPs following IP administration encountered significantly different biological processes from those following IV administration. Cit-UCNPs intraperitoneally injected primarily accumulated in the organs in the abdominal cavity, including the pancreas and the mesentery, while the intravenously injected UCNPs mainly gathered in the liver and the spleen. Through the IP route, the majority of cit-UCNPs accumulated in the cancerous cecum tissues, while the minority gathered in the normal cecum tissues. Consequently, cit-UCNPs administrated via the IP route to treat colorectal cancer are superior for clinical applications.

The supercavitation technique provides a means of significantly increasing the velocity of an underwater vehicle. This technique involves essentially the creation of stable supercavity shape. The method of artificial ventilation is most effective for generating and dominating the supercavity. This paper focuses on the numerical simulation of flow field around three-dimensional body. The method is based on the multiphase computational fluid dynamics model combined with the turbulence model and the full cavity model. The fundamental similarity parameters of ventilated supercavity flows that include cavitation number, Froude number Fr, entrainment rate CQ, and drag coefficient Cx are all investigated numerically in the case of steady flow and gravity field. We discuss the following simulations results in three parts: (1) the variations of the cavitation number and the supercavity’s relative diameter with entrainment rate; (2) the drag coefficient versus the cavitation number; and (3) deformation of supercavity axis caused by gravitational effect for three different fixed three Froude numbers. In the full paper, we give the comparison results of the drag reduction ratio among numerical simulation and experiment conducted in hydrodynamic tunnel and towing tank, respectively. We summarize our discussion of gravitational effect on the axis deformation of supercavity as follows: in the case of smaller Froude number, the inclination of the cavity axis increases monotonously with increasing horizontal length and reaches its maximal value at the end of supercavity; this deformation can be almost completely negligible when the Froude number Fr is larger than 7.0. The comparisons with the experimental data in the hydrodynamic tunnel and the towing tank indicate that the present method is effective for predicting the flows around ventilated supercavity; that the numerical results is in good agreement with the experimental ones and that the maximal value of the drag reduction ratio can be expected to reach the value of 90% compared with that of the condition of non-cavitation.

Automatic identification of pulmonary lobes from imaging is important in disease assessment and treatment planning. However, the lobar fissures can be difficult to detect automatically, as they are thin, usually of fuzzy appearance and incomplete on CT scans. The fissures can also be obscured by or confused with features of disease, for example the tissue abnormalities that characterise fibrosis. Traditional anatomical knowledge-based methods rely heavily on anatomic knowledge and largely ignore individual variability, which may result in failure to segment pathological lungs. In this study, we aim to overcome difficulties in identifying pulmonary fissures by using a statistical finite element shape model of lobes to guide lobar segmentation. By deforming a principle component analysis based statistical shape model onto an individual’s lung shape, we predict the likely region of fissure locations, to initialize the search region for fissures. Then, an eigenvalue of Hessian matrix analysis and a connected component eigenvector based analysis are used to determine a set of fissure-like candidate points. A smooth multi-level β-spline curve is fitted to the most fissure-like points (those with high fissure probability) and the fitted fissure plane is extrapolated to the lung boundaries. The method was tested on 20 inspiratory and expiratory CT scans, and the results show that the algorithm performs well both in healthy young subjects and older subjects with fibrosis. The method was able to estimate the fissure location in 100% of cases, whereas two comparison segmentation softwares that use anatomy-based methods were unable to segment 7/20 and 9/20 subjects, respectively.

Paeoniflorin-6'-O-benzene sulfonate (CP-25) has therapeutic potential for the treatment of AA and CIA models, anti-proliferation effect on FLS, inhibiting of release of inflammatory cytokines. Although our groups have revealed a role for CP-25 in improving FLS function by regulating GRK2 translocation, little is known as to how GRK2 translocation activity is suppressed. Here, we report that CP-25 inhibits FLS line of patients with rheumatoid arthritis (MH7A) proliferation by down-regulating GRK2 translocation to EP4 receptor. Binding affinity assay demonstrates that CP-25 and GRK2 have affinity. The docking of CP-25 and GRK2, site-directed mutagenesis and co-immunoprecipitation assay reveal that CP-25 regulated GRK2 translocation activity is related to G201, K220, K230, A321 and D335 in kinase domain of GRK2, especially A321, it may a key amino acid for CP-25 in inhibiting GRK2 translocation activity. Together, our study not only uncovers a molecular mechanism for the formation of a GRK2/EP4 complex that regulates MH7A abnormal proliferation but also suggests that CP-25 may be through forming hydrogen bonds with GRK2 to improve FLS abnormal proliferation. Funding: This research was supported by the Key Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 81330081), Surface Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 81673444) and Youth Science Fund Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 81502123). Declaration of Interest: The authors have no financial conflicts of interest. Ethical Approval: All patients gave their informed consent, and the study protocol was approved by Biomedical Ethic Committee of Anhui Medical University (No. 20131321).

Classification and treatment of vehicle defect complaint data is an important link in the process of vehicle recall. Traditionally, the complaint data is classified by keyword matching method based on defect label library during the process of dealing with vehicle complaint data, which heavily relies heavily on the quality of the vehicle defect label library. The speed of traditional classification methods is rapid, but the accuracy is low. We transform the classification task of vehicle complaint data into a multi-label classification problem. Multi-label classification of vehicle defect information collection based on seq2seq model named VDIF-M is proposed in this paper. Firstly, a synonymous vehicle defect description label library is constructed based on the vehicle defect description data and vehicle domain corpus collected from various channels. Then a seq2seq model is proposed to solve the problem of multi-label classification of vehicle complaint data, which fuses the distribution relationship between labels. Substantial experimental results show that the proposed method outperforms previous methods in multi-label classification of vehicle complaint data.

A multiscale modeling that integrates electronic scale ab initio quantum mechanical calculation, atomic scale molecular dynamics simulation, and continuum scale two-temperature model description of the femtosecond laser processing of nickel film at different thicknesses is carried out in this paper. The electron thermophysical parameters (heat capacity, thermal conductivity, and electron-phonon coupling factor) are calculated from first principles modeling, which are further substituted into molecular dynamics and two-temperature model coupled energy equations of electrons and phonons. The melting thresholds for nickel films of different thicknesses are determined from multiscale simulation. Excellent agreement between results from simulation and experiment is achieved, which demonstrates the validity of modeled multiscale framework and its promising potential to predict more complicate cases of femtosecond laser material processing. When it comes to process nickel film via femtosecond laser, the quantitatively calculated maximum thermal diffusion length provides helpful information on choosing the film thickness.

A roof solar chimney equipped with perforated absorber plate was proposed to improve the ventilation performance of buildings. The optimized roof solar chimney consists of a glazed panel, a gap, a perforated absorber plate, and an absorber wall. Three-dimensional numerical simulations were conducted to investigate the heat transfer and fluid flow in the roof solar chimney at different gap widths and inclination angles. Mass flow rate, velocity profile, and temperature distribution in the roof solar chimney were presented. In the meantime, the comparisons of ventilation performance between the optimized configuration and the traditional roof solar chimney were performed. The perforated absorber plate, which divided the roof solar chimney into two channels and heated the air in the gap, increases the pressure head and the temperature difference between the ambient and inside air to augment the natural ventilation. The mass flow rate of the proposed optimized roof solar chimney is higher than that of the traditional roof solar chimney. It is also found that the optimization techniques using perforated absorber plate fitted in the air gap are more effective for the roof solar chimney with larger inclination angle and gap width.

An integrated simulation approach, which couples Monte Carlo ray tracing (MCRT) and Gebhart methods, is proposed to simulate solar radiation transfer in a solar power tower system with a cavity receiver. The MCRT method is used to simulate the solar radiation transfer process from the heliostat field to interior surfaces of the cavity receiver, and the Gebhart method is used to simulate the multiple reflections process of solar radiation within the cavity. This integrated simulation method not only reveals the cavity effect on receiver performance but also provides real-time simulation results. Based on this method, the reflection loss of the cavity receiver and solar flux distributions are discussed in detail. The results indicate that the cavity effect can significantly reduce the reflection loss and homogenize the concentrated solar energy distributed on interior surfaces to some extent. Moreover, the surface absorptivity has less effect on the reflection loss when cavity effect is considered. The cavity effect on homogenizing solar flux distributions is greater with lower surface absorptivity. In addition, although the concentrated solar energy is distributed on the cavity aperture with similar shapes at different times, the shape of the solar flux distribution on interior surfaces varies greatly with time.

Background/Aims: Our aim was to evaluate whether visceral adiposity index (VAI) could predict the risk of type 2 diabetes (T2D) in different genders and to compare the predictive ability between VAI and other fatness indices. Methods: Four thousand seventy-eight participants including 1,817 men and 2,261 women, aged 18 and older and free of T2D at baseline were enrolled in 2010 and followed up for 4 years. New cases of T2D were identified via the annual medical examination. Cox regression analysis was used to assess the association between VAI and incidence of T2D. Receiver operating characteristic curve and area under the curves (AUC) were applied to compare the prediction ability of T2D between VAI and other fatness indices. Results: During the 4-year follow-up, 153 (8.42%) of 1,817 men and 88 (3.89%) of 2,261 women developed T2D. The multivariable-adjusted hazards ratios for developing T2D in the highest tertile of VAI scores were 2.854 (95% CI 1.815-4.487) in men and 3.551 (95% CI 1.586-7.955) in women. The AUC of VAI was not higher than that of other fatness indices. Conclusions: VAI could predict the risk of T2D among Chinese adults, especially in women. However, the prediction ability of T2D risk for VAI was not higher than that of the other fatness indices.

Little is known of the relationships between dietary patterns and cardiovascular risk factors in China. We therefore designed a 3-year longitudinal study to evaluate the impacts of dietary patterns on changes in these factors among Chinese women. A total of 1,028 subjects who received health examination in 2011 and 2014 were recruited. Three major dietary patterns ("vegetable pattern", "meat pattern", and "animal offal-dessert-and-alcohol pattern") were derived by principal component analysis based on validated food frequency questionnaires. Cardiovascular risk factors were standardized to create within-cohort z-scores and the changes in them were calculated as the differences between 2011 and 2014. Relationships between dietary patterns and changes in cardiovascular risk factors were assessed using general linear model. After adjustment for potential confounders, changes in total cholesterol and fasting blood glucose decreased across the tertiles of vegetable pattern (p for trend = 0.01 and 0.04, respectively). While, changes in diastolic blood pressure, total cholesterol and low density lipoprotein cholesterol increased across the tertiles of animal offal-dessert-and-alcohol pattern (p for trend = 0.02, 0.01, and 0.02, respectively). The findings suggest that vegetable pattern was beneficially related to cardiovascular risk factors, whereas animal offal-dessert-and-alcohol pattern was detrimental related to these factors among apparently healthy Chinese women.

The revival of Confucianism in the Song Dynasty is of great significance to the development of the Confucian school.Based on the development of Confucianism and systematic research, it can be found that the Song Dynasty is an important period of Confucianism revival, and also a period that cannot be ignored in the study of Confucianism. In general, the Confucian renaissance in the Song Dynasty was caused by many reasons, and under the background of the Confucian renaissance, Taoism and Buddhism have developed significantly, which has caused a large number of female rituals in the society.Analysing and studying the Confucian renaissance in Song Dynasty and the phenomenon of women's rites and buddhas are significant for understanding the cultural environment of Song Dynasty and understanding social life in Song Dynasty.The article makes a concrete analysis of the Confucian renaissance in Song Dynasty and the phenomenon of women's ritual Buddha, aiming to clarify the specific reasons of Confucian renaissance and the cause and influence of women's ritual Buddha.

Cultural values have a wide influence on international business management and its related activities. In people's daily living environment, due to the different culture and education people receive, the growing environment is different, so it can be divided into different groups, resulting in the relationship between each different cultural groups more and more estranged. If there is no correct sense of management, it is difficult to have close communication, and even there will be barriers in communication. This article mainly analyzes the cross-cultural issues, expounds the cultural factors in international business management, enumerates the cultural differences in international business management, and makes an in-depth analysis of the role of cultural values in international business management and related activities. The purpose is to strengthen the management awareness of relevant managers in cross-cultural management.

The original version of this article contained mistakes, and the authors would like to correct them.

In order to study the impact of the slot inner angle on the film cooling performance of the trailing edge cutback for turbine blade, physical model and the three-dimensional mathematical model were established. The temperature distribution on the pressure side close to the wall was obtained through numerical simulation method, and the adiabatic temperature difference ratio and actual temperature difference ratio on the trailing edge cutback with various slot inner angles were analyzed. The results showed that, as slot inner angle increases, the average adiabatic temperature difference ratio on the trailing edge cutback and the effect of thermal insulation of gas film are increased. The impact of actual temperature difference ratio on the trailing edge cutback suffers slot inner angle is small, and it is conducive to lower the wall temperature of trailing edge when reduces the slot inner angle. For the study of film cooling performance on the trailing edge cutback of turbine blade, in addition to evaluate the adiabatic temperature difference ratio, it should also assess the actual temperature difference ratio.

Nonlinear vibration model of double-clamped resonant beam driven by electro-thermal excitation in a MEMS resonant pressure sensor is established. Inherent heat elevation of electro-thermal excitation is taken into account besides the nonlinear geometric effect. An approximate solution for this model is obtained via Galerkin procedure and multiple scales method. The sample-based stochastic model is established to investigate the influence of inherent heat elevation on vibrating nonlinearity, including linear natural frequency frn, nonlinear frequency offset Foff, resonator amplitude Amp, and the non-linear factor Fnol, considering uncertainty distributions of structure size and excitation voltage due to fabricating or control errors. The results reveal that the dc bias of the excitation signal has significant effect on vibrating nonlinearity, which is verified by experiments. The results can be used as reference for sensor design and operation with respect to proposed nonlinear effects.

A number of studies have linked AMPK, a major metabolic sensor coordinating of multiple cellular functions, to tumor development and progression. However, the exact role of AMPK in tumor development is still controversial. Here we report that activation of AMPK promotes survival and anti-tumor function of T cells, in particular CD8+ T cells, resulting in superior tumor suppression in vivo. While AMPK expression is dispensable for T cell development, genetic deletion of AMPK promotes T cell death during in vitro activation and in vivo tumor development. Moreover, we demonstrate that protein phosphatases are the key mediators of AMPK-dependent effects on T cell death, and inhibition of phosphatase activity by okadaic acid successfully restores T cell survival and function. Altogether, our data suggest a novel mechanism by which AMPK regulates protein phosphatase activity in control of survival and function of CD8+ T cells, thereby enhancing their role in tumor immunosurveillance.

Three dimensional transient thermal analysis of an air-cooled module that contains prismatic Li-ion cells next to a special kind of aluminum pin fin heat sink whose heights of pin fins increase linearly through the width of the channel in air flow direction was studied for thermal management of Lithium-ion battery pack. The effects of pin fins arrangements, discharge rates, inlet air flow velocities, and inlet air temperatures on the battery were investigated. The results showed that despite of heat sinks with uniform pin fin heights that increase the standard deviation of the temperature field, using this kind of pin fin heat sink compare to the heat sink without pin fins not only decreases the bulk temperature inside the battery, but also decreases the standard deviation of the temperature field inside the battery as well. Increasing the inlet air temperature leads to decreasing the standard deviation of the temperature field while increases the maximum temperature of the battery. Furthermore, increasing the inlet air velocity first increases the standard deviation of the temperature field till reaches to the maximum point, and after that decreases. Also, increasing the inlet air velocity leads to decrease in the maximum temperature of the battery.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate and compare three kinds of two temperature models (TTMs) including the parabolic two-step (PTS) model, the hyperbolic two-step (HTS) model, and the dual-hyperbolic two-step (DHTS) model. First, the thin gold films subject to pico- to femtosecond laser pulses are simulated according to these three TTMs. Comparisons between the electron and lattice temperatures based on different models are presented. The results show that the differences can be neglected for the 20 ps laser, but for the 40 fs laser, the differences between PTS and the other two models are obvious. Then the numerical results are also compared with the experimental data of the damage thresholds for the 28 fs laser. It is found that the PTS model is invalid in simulating this case, and both the HTS model and the DHTS model coincide well with experimental data but the difference between them is still hard to discern. In addition, the interfacial tracking method is applied to the hyperbolic lattice temperature and a detailed comparison between the HTS model and the DHTS model on the beginning time of melting and the maximum ablation depth is presented. It is concluded that when the laser duration is less than 200 fs, the PTS model is invalid. And the beginning time of melting and the maximum ablation depth show remarkable differences between HTS and DHTS.

Effects of nanostructured defects of copper solid surface on the bubble growth in liquid argon have been investigated through a hybrid atomistic-continuum method. The same solid surfaces with five different nanostructures, namely, wedge defect, deep rectangular defect (R-I), shallow rectangular defect (R-II), small rectangular defect (R-III) and no defect, have been modeled at molecular level. The liquid argon is placed on top of the hot solid copper with superheat of 30 K after equilibration is achieved with CFD-MD coupled simulation. Phase change of argon on five nanostructures has been observed and analyzed accordingly. The results showed that the solid surface with wedge defect tends to induce a nano-bubble relatively more easily than the others, and the larger the size of the defect is the easier the bubble generate.

A multiscale studying integrating ab initio quantum mechanics, classical molecular dynamics and two-temperature model, is carried out to study film thickness dependent femtosecond laser spallation and ablation. As an interval of 130.73 nm, five silver films with increasing thickness from 392.19 nm to 915.11 nm are simulated. Absorbed laser fluences of 0.1 J/cm^2 and 0.3 J/cm^2 are chosen to observe the laser spallation and ablation. The simulation results show that film thickness has a close correlation with the Kelvin degree of heating of the laser-irradiated silver films, which further affects femtosecond laser spallation and ablation. Suggestions for precise micromachining are proposed in this paper.

The objective of this paper is to find a more appropriate source term for heat conduction in a nanoparticle subject to ultrashort laser irradiation. Monte Carlo simulation based on Mie's theory is used to investigate the heat source distribution in a single nanoparticle subject to ultrashort laser irradiation. The results show that when the particulate radius is much smaller than the wavelength, the source distribution is similar to that of blackbody sphere. However, if the radius is comparable to or greater than the wavelength, more photons will bypass the particle which makes the source distribution different.

Compressed air energy storage (CAES) is a commercial, utility-scale technology that provides long-duration energy storage with fast ramp rates and good part-load operation. It is a promising storage technology for balancing the large-scale penetration of renewable energies, such as wind and solar power, into electric grids. This study proposes a CAES-CC system, which is based on a conventional CAES combined with a steam turbine cycle by waste heat boiler. Simulation and thermodynamic analysis are carried out on the proposed CAES-CC system. The electricity and heating rates of the proposed CAES-CC system are lower than those of the conventional CAES by 0.127 kWh/kWh and 0.338 kWh/kWh, respectively, because the CAES-CC system recycles high-temperature turbine-exhausting air. The overall efficiency of the CAES-CC system is improved by approximately 10% compared with that of the conventional CAES. In the CAES-CC system, compressing intercooler heat can keep the steam turbine on hot standby, thus improving the flexibility of CAES-CC. This study brought about a new method for improving the efficiency of CAES and provided new thoughts for integrating CAES with other electricity-generating modes.