Search

The infection with HPV 16 and 18 high-risk types account for more than 80 % of cervical cancer incidence, but there is still no targeted agent against HPV for cervical cancer therapy. Our previous study constructed a bispecific affibody Z

The siloxanes and their mixtures are suitable working fluids for organic Rankine cycle (ORC) systems with high-temperature heat sources. The thermal stability of siloxanes has a significant effect on the working fluid selection and cycle performance of ORCs. In this study, a thermal decomposition experimental system is designed to measure the thermal stability of octamethyltrisiloxane (MDM), and the effects of the hexamethyldisiloxane (MM) mass fraction and evaporation temperature on the net power and thermal efficiency are calculated. The results showed that the decomposition of MDM could be detected at 240��� and had higher decomposition ratios comparing with MM. With the temperature limit, the net power and thermal efficiency are both lower than those without the evaporation temperature limit. Siloxane mixtures are the better choice for ORC systems using siloxanes as working fluids in conditions of this paper. MM/MDM (0.6/0.4) improves the net power and heat efficiency of the system by 8.1% and 1.7% respectively, comparing with that of the pure working fluids.

The oral microbiota plays an important role in the development of various diseases, whereas its association with gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) remains largely unclear. The aim of this study is to identify biomarkers from the oral microbiota of GDM patients by analyzing the microbiome of the saliva and dental plaque samples of 111 pregnant women. We find that the microbiota of both types of oral samples in GDM patients exhibits differences and significantly varies from that of patients with periodontitis or dental caries. Using bacterial biomarkers from the oral microbiota, GDM classification models based on support vector machine and random forest algorithms are constructed. The area under curve (AUC) value of the classification model constructed by combination of Lautropia and Neisseria in dental plaque and Streptococcus in saliva reaches 0.83, and the value achieves a maximum value of 0.89 by adding clinical features. These findings suggest that certain bacteria in either saliva or dental plaque can effectively distinguish women with GDM from healthy pregnant women, which provides evidence of oral microbiome as an informative source for developing noninvasive biomarkers of GDM.

The task of electric power companies is to achieve their economic targets and social responsibilities. As one of the promising methods to make these targets come true, asset management is attracting more and more attention, and the life cycle cost management (LLCM) is an effective tool of asset evaluation. In order to optimize the electrical equipment life cycle, and aiming at some problems in the current equipment maintenance research, which includes ignoring the influence of maintenance on equipment failure rate, ignoring the trend of continued deterioration during the operation of equipment and so on, this paper introduces the deterioration theory in the field of mechanical engineering. This essence of this method can be regarded as searching the balance between the value of equipment themselves and the benefits brought by the power systems, between LCCM and equipment maintenance, and finally, between technologies and management of power system. Based on this method, this article deduces the relationship of the reliability of equipment in each maintenance circle, and constructs the maintenance strategy optimization model of equipment based on risk combined with the definition of risk and service age reduction factor. In the end, this paper employs the theory into a practical example and calculates the optimal maintenance interval, and finally compares it with traditional preventive maintenance.

Objectives/Scope PetroChina has gone through a journey of half century in the development of conventional reservoirs, most of which have been step into the late life with high water cut. However, the newly discovered resources tend to be inferior and on the margin of profitable development, especially tight-low permeability reservoirs (k Methods, Procedures, Process In this paper, three main technologies were firstly introduced in the development of tight low permeability reservoir in Ordos Basin, which is the second largest oil bearing basin in China. Secondly, real data of above-mentioned technologies from such mature fields was obtained and analyzed in order to characterize the production performance such as productivity capacity, decline curve and water cut analysis, etc. Numerical simulation was also conducted as a complementary method for production forecast. Thirdly, the production forecast and economic analysis integrated model considering CAPEX, OPEX and tax policy was build and run for each technological scenario. Finally, variable control method was adopted to investigate the economic feasibility for each development technology. We also conducted the sensitivity analysis for each scenario to explore the uncertainty and mitigate investment risk. Results, Observations, Conclusions Three main technologies includes: 1, waterflood with inverted nine-spot vertical well pattern (WFV); 2, waterflood with vertical injector and horizontal producer as 5-spot well pattern (WFHV); 3, natural depletion by horizontal well with massive hydraulic fracturing (NDHF). Production performance for each technology is different based on the analysis of real data, the third scenario (NDHF) has the most attractive productivity while declining in the highest rate, about 40% at the first year while the first scenario (WFV) produces in a more stable and slower speed but higher EUR. Economic model results shows that: for general tight low permeability reservoir, IRR for aforementioned technology is −2.52%, 4.52%, 10.43%, respectively. The minimum requirements for economic development with respect to cumulative oil production, oil price, OPEX, CAPEX are analyzed in detail. Economic sensitive analysis illustrates that oil price is the most sensitive factor for profitable development, followed by production rate, CAPEX and OPEX. Risk assessment indicates that for natural depletion by horizontal well with massive hydraulic fracturing, the investment uncertainty is extremely significant, about 4 times greater than that of WFV. Therefore, careful attention needs to be taken in choosing appropriate development strategy. Novel/Additive Information This paper provides an economic perspective on the development of tight-low permeability reservoir. It offers a glance at economic feasibility for different development technologies and their profitable operation requirement.

In order to improve the reliability of the secondary equipment operation of the intelligent substation, it is necessary to evaluate the operation status of the secondary equipment online in real time. In this paper, we analyze the characteristics of some 750kV substations in Xinjiang that are sampled by conventional sampling intelligent tripping methods and are in extreme operating environments. A Markov model is proposed by taking into account the typical line spacing of conventional sampling intelligent tripping substations in extreme operating environments. The dynamic model analyzes the reliability of the conventional sampling intelligent trip substation protection system theoretically. It is concluded that the method can provide theoretical support for the substation maintenance plan requirements.

Background: High risk type 16 of human papillomavirus (HPV16) is associated with 50% of cervical cancer, for which reliable targeted therapies are lacking. HPV early protein 7 (E7) is an oncoprotein responsible for cell malignant transformation. In our previous work, a highly specific affibody targeting HPV16E7 (ZHPV16E7) was developed. Objective: In order to improve the targeted therapeutic effect, the present study prepared an affitoxin consisting of ZHPV16E7 fused with granzyme B (GrB), namely, ZHPV16E7-GrB, and evaluated its targeting action in vitro and in vivo. Methods: The ZHPV16E7-GrB fusion protein was produced in a prokaryotic expression system. The targeted binding properties of the ZHPV16E7-GrB to the HPV16E7 were confirmed by immunofluorescence assay (IFA) in cervical cancer cell lines, by immunohistochemical assay (IHA) in cervical cancer tissue from clinical specimens and by near-infrared imaging in tumour-bearing mice. The anti- tumour effect on both cervical cancer cells in vitro and tumour-bearing mice in vivo were further evaluated. Results: A 34-kDa ZHPV16E7-GrB fusion protein was produced in E. coli and displayed the corresponding immunoreactivity. IFA revealed that ZHPV16E7-GrB bound specifically to HPV16-positive TC-1 and SiHa cells. IHA showed that ZHPV16E7-GrB also bound specifically to HPV16-positive clinical tissue specimens. In addition, the near-infrared imaging results showed that ZHPV16E7-GrB was enriched in tumour tissues. Moreover, both the ZHPV16E7-GrB affitoxin and ZHPV16E7 affibody (without GrB) significantly reduced the proliferation of cervical cancer cells in vitro and tumor-bearing mice in vivo, and the anti-proliferative effect of ZHPV16E7-GrB was higher than that of the ZHPV16E7 affibody. Conclusions: The affitoxin by coupling the affibody with GrB is a promising targeted therapeutic agent with the dual advantages of the targeted affibody and the GrB cytotoxin.

Due to the asymmetry of the traction transformer, there is a problem in the calculation of the measured impedance when the line distance protection on the grid side cooperates with the traction transformer, which causes problems for the setting calculation personnel whether the distance protection can avoid the faults on the other side of the traction transformer. Firstly, the influence of traction substation on distance protection is studied and analyzed. Secondly, the analysis models of single-phase Ii traction transformer, V/v wiring traction transformer and V/x wiring traction transformer are built. Finally, the measurement impedance correction scheme of the protection on the grid side distance after the other side faults of traction transformer is analyzed, and the setting calculation proposal of distance protection is given.

Background To analyze the associated factors that affect the coloration of methylene blue (MB) in axillary lymph node dissection (ALND) of patients with breast cancer and to explore the tracer effect of MB in high axillary lymph node metastasis, to guide surgical treatment. Methods We recruited 170 patients who underwent ALND, all of them were injected MB before operation. We analyzed the relationships between the clinical factors of age, body mass index (BMI), molecular typing, TNM staging, neoadjuvant chemotherapy, injection time and position and the MB coloration by univariate and multivariate analyses. A total of 84 cases were selected for observation of the application value of MB during intervention involving the lymph nodes upper axillary vein. Results Of 170 cases, 138 cases (81.17%) were colored. Univariate analysis showed that significant differences were observed between differing BMI’s (χ2=24.074, P

In this work, we developed a facile end-functionalization method using hydroxylated coumarin to initiate the ring-opening polymerization of cyclic esters to synthesize a series of fluorescent biodegradable aliphatic polyesters with tailorable properties. The resulting fluorescent functionalized poly(l-lactide) (PLLA-COU), poly(ε-caprolactone) (PCL-COU) poly(δ-valerolactone) (PVL-COU) and poly(trimethylene carbonate) (PTMC-COU) were investigated to evaluate the dependence of fluorescence on the chemical structure and molecular weight of the materials. The differences in the electron withdrawing ability and the density of ester groups are responsible for the changes in the fluorescence quantum yield. Then, two representative biodegradable materials, namely, PLLA-COU and PCL-COU, were used to prepare fluorescent paclitaxel-loaded microspheres. During in vitro drug release, the release rate of the PCL-COU microspheres is dramatically faster than that of the PLLA-COU microspheres due to the difference in the material nature and their surface morphologies, possibly achieving a tunable degradation and release rate for the drug carriers. Fluorescent functionalized polyester microspheres can retain their fluorescence properties and emit bright blue light for fluorescence tracing during the degradation process. Biological evaluations showed that both fluorescent polyesters are devoid of any significant toxicity and have good biocompatibility. The results demonstrated that the obtained fluorescent polyesters are promising for use in traceable and controlled drug delivery with tunable drug release.

This chapter identifies old and new paradigms for how people engage with mobile media and their implications for the self. The first involves talking to distant others, which can divide the self when done around co-present others in public settings. The next paradigm marks a shift from voice conversations to messaging, which can be more easily weaved into the flows of daily life moments and movements. The authors revisit how over time this leads to routinization, to the extent that the technology becomes a deeply embedded part of the self. Finally, the authors identify a paradigm presently gaining momentum with mobile conversational agents (e.g., Siri and Google Assistant), which heralds a return to talking. With this mode of engagement, the technology shifts away from the self to become the “other” as users interact with and not just through it.

Energy efficiency and air pollution mitigation are critical issues for future development of the Chinese economy. Energy savings and their contribution to reduced air pollution from energy sectors during the 12th Five Year Plan are assessed using input-output analysis. A new dynamic quantitative method was developed to explore key sectors and identify critical paths for efficient emission reductions from energy industries. All the energy intensive key sectors, including Metal, Power, Chemical Products, Nonmetal are used to determine critical paths for emission reductions. Results indicate that the Coal Sector failed to achieve significant energy savings and did not contribute to direct and overall emissions reductions. The Oil Sector only achieved co-effects for reduction of overall waste gas, SO2, and particulates, while the Power Sector achieved emission reductions of all air pollutants. The results suggest that Chinese government should enact four main measures to achieve effective targets for energy savings and emission reductions: (1) Strengthen energy conservation in Coal and Oil Sectors, particularly the Coal Sector. (2) Promote energy conservation and emission reductions in highly energy intensive sectors to help emission reductions from other sectors. (3) Promote synergy effects of energy savings and emission reductions to enterprises. (4) Set lowest emission reduction targets for each department combined with targets for energy savings.

Non-invasive micro-CT imaging functionalized biodegradable polymeric microspheres for interventional embolization are gaining increasing attention recent years. We herein report a facile method of end-group modification to prepare X-ray opaque poly(lactic acid) (PLA) using triiodobenzoic acid (TIBA) as end-capping agent, and develop the inherently radiopaque poly(lactic acid) materials towards embolic microspheres traceable with non-invasive micro-CT imaging. Two types, that is, linear 2-arm and star 4-arm, of TIBA terminated PLA were designed and successfully synthesized by 1H NMR characterization. Then these PLA materials were used to fabricate polymeric microspheres with well-controlled size (100–200 μm) by W/O emulsification method. As expected, the star 4-arm TIBA terminated poly(lactic acid) (I-S-PLA) microspheres possessed higher iodine content and exhibited greater radiopacity compared with linear 2-arm analogue (I-L-PLA). Both these microspheres showed low cytotoxicity and controllable micro-CT imaging. Furthermore, the effects of linear and star structure of I-PLA microspheres on in vitro degradation behavior was investigated by GPC, micro-CT, SEM and EDS. The degradable results revealed that iodine content of I-L-PLA decreased faster than that of I-S-PLA, which resulted in a further attenuation in micro-CT imaging. Consequently, CT-imaging of I-S-PLA microspheres did not drop sharply over degradation period, exhibiting higher HU values than aluminum wedge of 2 mm. These findings suggested that the biodegradable radiopaque poly(lactic acid) microspheres could be traceable by non-invasive micro-CT imaging, which are promising embolic agents.

To investigate the effect of CeO2 nanomaterial morphology on its performance for NO catalytic oxidation. Three kinds of CeO2 nanomaterials including CeO2 nanorods, nanospheres and nanoparticles were prepared by hydrothermal method and used for catalytic oxidation of NO at low temperature. The experimental results show that CeO2 nanorods are of the best catalytic performance. Characterization techniques including TEM, XRD, H2-TPR, NO-TPD and XPS were used to determine the relationship between the morphology of CeO2 nanomaterial and its catalytic performance. TEM images show that CeO2 nanorods predominantly exposed (110) and (1 0 0) planes, while CeO2 nanospheres and CeO2 nanoparticles predominantly exposed (1 1 1) plane. The excellent catalytic performance of CeO2 nanorods could be ascribed to the low crystallinity, high reducibility, strong NO adsorption ability and the presence of more surface chemisorbed oxygen.

The organic Rankine cycle (ORC) is an efficient power generation technology that has been widely used in renewable energy utilization and industrial waste heat recovery. The thermal stability of working fluids has a significant effect on the fluid selection and system design of ORC systems. In this study, an off-design model of an ORC system was established with hexamethyldisiloxane (MM) as the working fluid, and the effects of the MM thermal stability on the system were analyzed. The results showed that the effect of MM thermal decomposition on the cold source and working fluid pump was limited. The outlet temperature of the evaporator decreased with MM decomposition, which might lead to incomplete evaporation of working fluids and possible damage to the expander. The outlet temperature of the heat source also decreased with MM decomposition, which led to lower outlet temperatures than the acid dew point limit temperature. Both of these results can affect the safe operation of ORC systems. The net power and thermal efficiency of the system decreased with increasing thermal decomposition ratios of MM. The net power and thermal efficiency decreased by 7.48% and 10.72% respectively in the model of this study with a 10% decomposition ratio.

The Porter hypothesis states that environmental regulation can promote innovation. China faces serious environmental pressure and demand for innovation, and has a goal of becoming one of the most innovative countries by 2035. Due to China's vast territory and uneven development, realizing this goal will depend on both the economically developed coastal cities in the east, and the influence of underdeveloped coastal cities in the west. Given this context, this study investigates the causal relationship between environmental regulation and innovation in underdeveloped coastal cities, using the synthetic control method. The empirical analysis results show that environmental regulation has promoted innovation in underdeveloped coastal regions in western China, and the Porter hypothesis is verified to apply in the underdeveloped areas of developing countries. The research indicates there are certain differences among underdeveloped coastal cities; as such, local conditions should drive specific environmental regulation policies, whether they are in China or other developing countries. Specifically in China, the Guangxi government should adopt strict marine environmental regulation policies to force Fangchenggang industrial enterprises to make changes towards cleaner and more sustainable production, and should continue to promote innovative development of the city. Evidence from the world's largest developing country indicates that environmental regulation and innovation can provide a win-win in underdeveloped areas, in contrast to the view of environmental Kuznets curve.

Air pollution sources generally cannot be identified as the specific factories but certain industries. Focusing on this issue, a new method, based on an improved glowworm swarm optimization and remotely sensed imagery, was proposed to precisely orientate and quantify air pollution sources in this study. In addition, meteorological data and GIS information were also used to backtrack the pollution source. After that, in order to quantify the pollution of each factory in the study areas, three pollution indices, pollution gross (PG), pollution intensity, and area-normalized pollution (ANP), were proposed. As a result, the polluting contribution of each factory was listed, and the most polluting factories, which were bulletined as the key monitoring factories by the local authority, were accurately extracted. Among the pollution indices, ANP is the most robust, reliable, and recommended. Furthermore, the result also shows factory pollution background information achieved from the historical remote sensing data which can be used to improve the precision of identification. To our knowledge, this study provides the first attempt to address the problem of identifying a pollution source as originating from an individual factory based on remote sensing data. The proposed method provides a useful tool for air quality management, and the result would be meaningful to environmental and economic issue.

Oil production prediction model and water flooding characteristic curves are generally applied to production performance analysis. However, these two methods have some limitations especially in predicting water cut. Growth model can predict oil production and cumulative oil production, but it cannot predict water cut. Water flooding characteristic curves can predict water cut and cumulative oil production, but it cannot establish the relationship between production indexes and time. The Morgan–Mercer–Flodin (MMF) growth model is a kind of production prediction model. This study analyzed features of MMF growth model, then Hu–Chen (HC) model was deduced on the base of MMF growth model. Theoretical basis of HC model was improved and solution of parameters was simplified. Then combining it with water flooding characteristic curve, a new combined solution model was built. This new combined solution model can predict water cut versus time and it overcame deficiencies of production prediction model and water flooding characteristic curves. The applications of field case selected from the Block-A in Daqing Oilfield indicated that the prediction accuracy of this new combining model can meet the demand of production performance analysis and it can guide the determination and adjustment of the development programs in water flooding hydrocarbon reservoirs. It has features of higher prediction accuracy, easier to use and widely practicable compared with other combined models.

Under the background of worse air pollution and sluggish economic growth, green transportation is regarded as a powerful means to address these challenges and the governments in China's Capital Economic Circle (i.e. Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei) are making a great effort to promote new energy vehicles (NEVs). A series of new policies are issued to encourage the use of NEVs. A nature question is to know what the customers’ attitude on the NEVs and NEVs’ policies is, and what the effects of policies on customers’ purchase intention will be. Based on a consumer survey, this paper explores the consumers’ attitudes on NEVs by statistical analysis, and investigates the effects of NEVs’ policies on consumers’ behavioral intention with a structural equation model (SEM). The results indicate that: Consumers prefer hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) followed by plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs), but consumers’ cognition of NEVs and related policies is insufficient. Policy preferences are different among consumers’ in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei. Policies promote behavioral intention by easing perceived risks of consumers and the positive effects are transmitted through purchase willingness. There are correlations among perceived risks and differences among policies, so the effects of policies acting on each perceived risk vary widely.

Relatively high-latitude waters are supposed as a refuge for corals under ocean warming. A systematic assessment of the Weizhou Island reef in the northern South China Sea, a relatively high-latitude region, shows that the ecosystem restoration index decreased from 0.96 to 0.62 during the period between 1990 and 2015. Although the biotic community, supporting services, and regulating services remained at good or very good states, the provisioning services, cultural services, and especially habitat structure deteriorated to very poor or moderate states. Gray relational analysis showed that these ecological declines exhibited a strong relationship with human pressures from tourism activities and the petrochemical industry. The recoveries of the biotic community and supporting services that benefited from wintertime warming appeared to be partly offset by intensive human pressures. The long-term effects on ecosystem structure and functions suggest that anthropogenic disturbances have impaired the possibility of this area serving as a potential thermal refuge for reef-building corals in the South China Sea. This study thus provides an integrated approach for assessing the adaptive responses of coral reef ecosystems to climate change and local human activities.

strongBACKGROUND/strongIntrauterine adhesion (IUA) is a common reproductive system disease in women, characterized by endometrial stromal cell proliferation, increasing fibroblasts and increasing extracellular matrix secretion. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of mitomycin C on reducing endometrial fibrosis for IUA.strongMATERIAL AND METHODS/strongFirstly, a rat IUA model was constructed by intrauterine mechanical injury. The endometrial stromal cells and fibroblasts were isolated and treated with mitomycin C. After that, Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8) assay was used to investigate the endometrial stromal cell viability. Furthermore, cell cycle and apoptosis assays of endometrial stromal cells and fibroblasts were performed, respectively. Finally, the cell viability of human endometrial cells or human uterus adhesion fibroblasts treated with mitomycin C was determined using CCK-8 assay with or without estradiol.strongRESULTS/strongEndometrial stromal cells were isolated from a rat IUA model. Cell cycle assay results showed that mitomycin C inhibited cell viability and promoted G1 cell cycle arrest and apoptosis in rat IUA endometrial stromal cells. Fibroblasts were also isolated from the rat IUA model. We found that mitomycin C inhibited the synthesis and secretion of collagen type I by western blotting analysis. Furthermore, mitomycin C promoted G1 cell cycle arrest and apoptosis in IUA rat uterine fibroblasts. We found that estradiol decreased the inhibitory effects of cell viability of human endometrial cells and human uterus adhesion fibroblasts by mitomycin C.strongCONCLUSIONS/strongOur findings revealed that mitomycin C could reduce endometrial fibrosis for intrauterine adhesion.

Twitter produces various colloquial tweets as an open communication platform. Previous research shows the frequency of negative sentences in spoken sentences is twice that of written texts. Negative items in negative sentences can shift the polarity of words with feelings, and leads to wrong classification. Therefore, negation processing is essential for the sentiment classification of tweets generated by Twitter. On the basis of considering the importance of negation which is often ignored in previous work, this paper firstly combines the technique of Conjunction Analysis (CA) with the technique of Punctuation Mark Identification (PMI) to detect the negation clue and its scope more accurately. In addition, We propose the OL-DAWE model. The model uses Data Augmentation (DA) approach to generate the opposed tweet according to the original tweet. The model extends learnable data and learns its polarity from both of positive and negative aspects of a tweet. In predicting the polarity of a tweet, the OL-DAWE model takes the positive (negative) degree of the original tweet into account, and also considers the negative (positive) degree of the opposed tweet. We conduct two experiments on two real-world data sets and analyze the experimental results from the perspectives of accuracy and robustness. We prove the effectiveness of our combined technology in negation processing and show that our OL-DAWE model in the polarity sentiment analysis of tweets is better than the baseline for its simplicity and high efficiency.

Background: Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) leads to a series of adverse pregnancy outcomes, seriously endangering the health of mothers and infants. Oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) is the gold standard test for GDM diagnosis, but largely increases the discomfort of pregnant women, and is inconvenient to follow-up and detection. Considering that oral sampling is convenient, rapid, safe and non-invasive, the feasibility of distinguishing GDM via biomarkers from oral microbiota was evaluated in this study. Here, the 16S rRNA gene sequencing was used to compare the microbiome of saliva and dental plaque samples of 111 pregnant women, and to analyze the structure of oral microbiota in patients with GDM as well as to find effective biomarkers. Results: The results showed that the microbiota of both types of oral samples in patients with GDM changed, and it was quite different from that of neither periodontitis nor dental caries. By using bacterial biomarkers from oral microbiota, GDM classification models based on SVM and random forest algorithms were constructed. For the SVM algorithm, the AUC value of the classification model constructed by the combination of dental plaque Lautropia , Neisseria and saliva Veillonella achieved 0.83. For the random forest algorithm, the maximum AUC value of the model constructed by the dental plaque Streptococcus , Eikenella , Anoxybacillus and saliva Leptotrichia , Kingella was larger than 0.90. Conclusions: These findings revealed that certain bacteria of either saliva or dental plaque can accurately distinguish GDM from healthy pregnant women, which provides a potential non-invasive approach for GDM diagnosis with oral microbial markers.

Purpose: This study is aimed to investigate the effects of periocular steroids induction on intraocular pressure (IOP), retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) and trabecular meshwork (TM) ultrastructure in glucocorticoid-induced ocular hypertension mice model.Materials and Methods: Dexamethasone-21-acetate (Dex-Ace) was administered through periocular conjunctival fornix injection every 3 days in C57BL/6J mice. Intraocular pressure was measured weekly by rebound tonometry. RGCs were examined with immunofluorescent staining of BRN3a at week 1, 4, and 8. TM morphology was visualized with electron microscopy. Autophagy was evaluated with immunoblotting in TM tissues.Results: Dex-Ace rapidly and significantly induced IOP, which peaked at week 4. The absolute increase in IOP in the Dex-Ace-treated mice was 8.1 ± 1.4 mmHg, a 60% induction (p < .0001) compared with that in the vehicle-treated mice. The IOP sustained a higher level in the Dex-Ace group from week 4 to week 8. Dex-Ace treatment decreased the number of RGCs in a time-dependent manner, suggesting that high IOP resulted in optic neuropathy. In addition, Dex-Ace thickened trabecular beams and decreased intertrabecular spaces, with marked accumulation of fibrillar and amorphous granular extracellular material. Moreover, Dex-Ace induced swollen and elongated mitochondria in TM cells. The average mitochondria area was 0.090 ± 0.044 µm2 in the vehicle-treated mice, and increased to 0.161 ± 0.094 µm2 (p < .0001), 0.121 ± 0.029 µm2 (p = .0223) and 0.171 ± 0.076 µm2 (p < .0001) in the Dex-Ace-treated mice at weeks 1, 4 and 8, respectively. Autophagy was also increased by Dex-Ace treatment, indicating by the upregulation of LC3-I, LC3-II and beclin-1, and downregulation of p62.Conclusion: Dex-Ace administration decreased RGCs and changed TM ultrastructure, mimicking hallmarks of human glucocorticoid-induced glaucoma (GIG). In addition, mitochondria and autophagy dysfunction suggested abnormal energy metabolism in TM cells, which warranted further study to fully elucidate the pathogenesis of GIG.

Thanksgiving is known for celebration, indulgence, and, unfortunately, alcohol-related consequences. No research to date, however, has explored predictors of Thanksgiving drinking that may help to explain the risky behaviors commonly observed over this holiday. We examined whether Thanksgiving Day drinking is related to expectations about the holiday and negative affect, as well as gender differences in these associations. This study is the first to examine Thanksgiving as a high-risk drinking event and to focus exclusively on U.S. non-college adults. Two hundred eight participants recruited via Amazon Mechanical Turk completed online surveys one week before, one day before, and one day after Thanksgiving 2016. Measures included expectations about Thanksgiving, daily anxiety, depressed affect, stress, and alcohol use. Logistic and Poisson regressions were used to predict whether participants drank and how much they drank on Thanksgiving Day, respectively. Choosing to drink on Thanksgiving was associated with higher daily anxiety but not with daily depressed affect or stress. Among men who drank on Thanksgiving, higher daily depressed affect was associated with more consumption, especially for men with positive expectations about Thanksgiving. Among women who drank on Thanksgiving, higher daily depressed affect was associated with more consumption for women with negative expectations about Thanksgiving but less consumption for women with positive expectations. These findings suggest that negative affect experienced during Thanksgiving is relevant to event-specific alcohol use. This study also underscores the importance of research that focuses on specific, high-risk drinking events, and uses samples of non-college U.S. adults.

Catalytic oxidation of NO into NO 2 is a promising method for NO x emission control. The aim of this study was to develop an economic and environmental-friendly catalyst for NO catalytic oxidation. Herein a CeFeO x complex oxide catalyst for catalytic oxidation of NO was prepared by coprecipitation method. After that the catalytic performance of this catalyst was measured on a fixed-bed reactor. It was found that the intrinsic activity of CeFeO x was higher than that of CeO x and FeO x . The characterization techniques of Brumauer-Emmett-Teller (BET), X-ray diffraction (XRD), temperature programmed reduction with H 2 (H 2 -TPR), temperature programmed desorption with NO+O 2 (NO+O 2 -TPD) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) were performed to investigate the surface area, crystal structure, redox property and NO x adsorption behavior of the catalyst samples. From the characterization results, it was concluded that the low crystallinity of CeFeO x promoted the dispersion of active species, as a result, enhancing the redox ability and NO adsorption capacity of CeFeO x catalyst, which is favorable to NO catalytic oxidation. Furthermore, the presence of much chemisorbed oxygen on CeFeO x catalyst also made a great contribution to its good catalytic performance.

Currently coronary stent coating materials focus on biodegradable polymers requiring excellent performances, including biodegradability, cytocompatibility and hemocompatibility as well as ductility. To endow poly( l -lactide) (PLLA) with good ductility as stent coating, two kinds of high branched PLLA grafted copolymers with introduction of biobased poly(β-myrcene) rubber segments were developed towards sent coating. The impacts of topological architectures (including linear comb and star comb) on physical properties, hydrolytic and enzymatic degradation behaviors, cytocompatibility, hemocompatibility and coating morphology were investigated. It was found that the nonbiodegradable poly(β-myrcene) rubber segments delayed the degradation rate, and further decreased with more complex architectures. Proteinase K accelerated enzymatic degradation compared with hydrolytic degradation. Biocompatibility testing showed that the fully biobased thermoplastic elastomers possessed good cytocompatibility and hemocompatibility. Morphological characterization of stent coatings indicated that the linear comb and star comb PLLA grafted copolymers improved the surface smooth of pure PLLA coating. Thus, these highly branched fully biobased thermoplastic elastomers are promising to as potential coating materials in drug eluting stent.

Biodegradable polyesters with X-ray visibility for biomedical applications have attracted increasing attention. We herein reported a facile method of end-chain functionalization to prepare highly branched linear-comb poly (lactic acid) (Lc-PLA) using triiodobenzoic acid (TIBA) as end-capping and X-ray contrast agent. Three branch lengths of iodinated linear-comb poly (lactic acid) (I-Lc-PLA30k, I-Lc-PLA50k, and I-Lc-PLA70k) were successfully synthesized and then microspheres with well-controlled size (average size ~180 μm) were prepared. By micro-CT testing, the results showed that shorter branch length of PLA contributed more iodinated end-group functionalized sites, leading a relatively high iodine content and excellent radiopacity. After terminated with TIBA, glass transition temperature and thermal stability of I-Lc-PLA polymers were greatly improved. During the in vitro hydrolytic degradation of three months, the molecular weight, iodine content, surface microstructure and micro-CT radiopacity of these microspheres were investigated. The degradation results showed that I-Lc-PLA50k possessed sufficient iodine content and high household unit values, suggesting a well-maintained radiopacity of I-Lc-PLA. Therefore, this work proposed a highly branched I-Lc-PLA microspheres with promising CT-imaging capacity, which could be used as a long-term embolic material.

With the long-term operation of the power grid equipment, the reliable operation state of the equipment is declining, and the probability of failure of the power grid equipment will gradually increase. In order to ensure the safe and stable operation of the power system, it is necessary to timely diagnose and analyze the power grid equipment. This paper put forward the method of fault diagnosis for power grid equipment based on Spark, and realizes the parallelization of support vector machine and K-means algorithm, which are the traditional fault diagnosis algorithm. Then, this paper takes the transformer as the empirical object, uses the transformer oil dissolved gas data to carry on the transformer fault diagnosis. Experiments show that with the increasing of data, compared with the single environment, parallel fault diagnosis method and can remain a similar accuracy rate, and has a lower running time. It has been proved that in the face of big grid data, the power grid equipment fault diagnosis technology based on Spark has better ability of equipment fault diagnosis.

To prepare the dominant multiepitope fusion antigen ROP2-SAG1 (RSmultiepitope) from Toxoplasma gondii in a prokaryotic system, the major immunodominant region (MIR) of the human hepatitis B virus core antigen (HBcAg(MIR)) was used as a delivery vector. The gene encoding the RSmultiepitope was inserted into HBcAg(MIR), and rHBcAg(MIR)-RSmultiepitope was prepared, purified, and administered to BALB/c mice through intradermal injection. An indirect enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay analysis based on a multiepitope peptide facilitated the specific differentiation of sera obtained from mice immunized with the rHBcAg(MIR)-RSmultiepitope protein, and high titers (greater than 1:6,400) of specific anti-RSmultiepitope antibodies were obtained. Immunized splenocytes demonstrated enhanced IFN-γ production. Based on these results, the HBcAg(MIR) vector is easily applied in vitro for targeting the RSmultiepitope and efficiently presents this target epitope for the induction of significant humoral and cellular immune responses. This study offers a novel strategy for the design of a target epitope delivery system for a toxoplasmosis vaccine.

The accurate and reasonable prediction of natural gas consumption is significant for the government to formulate energy planning. To this end, we use the multiverse optimizer (MVO) algorithm to optimize the parameters of the Nash nonlinear grey Bernoulli model (NNGBM (1,1)) and propose a hybrid MVO-NNGBM model to predict the natural gas consumption in 30 regions of China. The results indicate that the prediction precision of the hybrid MVO-NNGBM model is better than that of other grey-based models. According to the forecast results, China’s natural gas consumption will grow rapidly over the next five years and reach 354.1 billion cubic meters (bcm) by 2020. Moreover, the spatial distribution of natural gas consumption will shift from being supply oriented towards being demand driven and will be mainly concentrated in coastal and developed provinces.

Recently, China’s energy industry has been continuously depressed due to a slowdown in its economic development. China’s energy companies have made considerable efforts to promote their corporate performance to mitigate this performance decline and to ensure the sustainable development of China’s energy industry, macro economy, society and environment. In this paper, the effects of two business strategies—industrial diversification and international diversification—on the performance of listed energy firms are empirically investigated. The empirical results show the following: (1) industrial diversification hinders corporate performance; (2) for industrially-diversified energy companies, related diversified strategies are more effective than unrelated diversified strategies; and (3) international diversification improves the performance of renewable energy firms, but hinders the performance of conventional energy firms. These results suggest that as economic conditions are not currently optimal, China’s energy companies should pay more attention to their main businesses and generate more products to satisfy market demand.

In this paper, a novel method was developed to orientate and quantify the air pollution sources based on remotely sensed aerosol data and Glowworm Swarm Optimization (GSO). In practice, based on source apportionment technique, the air pollution sources could just be identified to certain industries, such as transportation, power plants, biomass burning, and et.al. To our knowledge, the problem of orientating and quantifying the pollution to the individual factories is faced for the first time. In this study, the aerosol retrieved from remotely sensed image (MODIS) and GIS were used to locate and quantify the pollution to each enterprise in the study area based on an improved Glowworm Swarm Optimization and meteorological condition. As a result, the polluting contribution of each factory were be listed, and the most polluting factories were be found. Some experiments were carried out to validate the method, and the Key monitoring factories by authority was ferreted out accurately.

The wet Flue Gas Desulfurization in the coal-fired power plants has been the most widely used because of its high SO 2 removal efficiency, reliable and low utility consumption. The difficulty in the prediction of the SO 2 removal from flue gas is that the performance of the system is related to a wide range of variables. In this paper, the SO 2 was removed by absorbing and reacting SO 2 with limestone slurry, and limestone scrubbing was accomplished in a spraying reactor. Experimental investigations for effects of different operating variables on the SO 2 removal showed the reasonable process parameters such as the pH value of the liquid phase, droplet size of the spray and the flow rates of liquid and gas. The removal process was analyzed using the two-film theory of mass-transfer. Both the liquid and gas side resistances were important, and the absorption rate was controlled by a combination of both gas-film and liquid-film diffusion controls. A model of external mass-transfer with the effects of a chemical enhancement factor and sulfite concentration in the liquid phase was developed for the prediction of the SO 2 removal efficiency, and the calculated values were in reasonable agreement with the experimental values. The study is considered as the one-dimensional prediction of SO 2 removal and low-cost application of limestone slurry for commercial FGD technology.

In this paper, we developed a novel method to identify air pollution sources based on remotely sensed aerosol data and Glowworm Swarm Optimization (GSO). In practice, it is usually to identify the air pollution sources to certain industries, such as transportation, power plants, biomass burning, and et.al. To our knowledge, the problem of locating and quantifying the pollution to the specified factories is faced for the first time. In this study, the aerosol retrieved from remotely sensed image and GIS were used to locate and quantify the pollution to each enterprise in the study area based on an improved Glowworm Swarm Optimization and meteorological condition. As a result, the gross and intensity of every enterprise in the study area were achieved. Therefore, the polluting contribution of each factory could be listed, and the most polluting factories could be found. Some experiments were carried out to validate the method, and the Key monitoring factories by local authority was ferreted out accurately.

To delineate with computed tomography (CT) the anatomic regions containing the supraclavicular (SCV) and infraclavicular (IFV) nodal groups, to define the course of the brachial plexus, to estimate the actual radiation dose received by these regions in a series of patients treated in the traditional manner, and to compare these doses to those received with an optimized dosimetric technique.Twenty patients underwent contrast material-enhanced CT for the purpose of radiation therapy planning. CT scans were used to study the location of the SCV and IFV nodal regions by using outlining of readily identifiable anatomic structures that define the nodal groups. The brachial plexus was also outlined by using similar methods. Radiation therapy doses to the SCV and IFV were then estimated by using traditional dose calculations and optimized planning. A repeated measures analysis of covariance was used to compare the SCV and IFV depths and to compare the doses achieved with the traditional and optimized methods.Coverage by the 90% isodose surface was significantly decreased with traditional planning versus conformal planning as the depth to the SCV nodes increased (P.001). Significantly decreased coverage by using the 90% isodose surface was demonstrated for traditional planning versus conformal planning with increasing IFV depth (P = .015). A linear correlation was found between brachial plexus depth and SCV depth up to 7 cm.Conformal optimized planning provided improved dosimetric coverage compared with standard techniques.

In order to effectively control noise pollution in city and facilitate urban noise management, environmental noise zoning is imperative so much. In present study, GIS was adopted to noise zoning in Tangshan city based on Technical Specifications to Determinate the Suitable Areas for Environmental Noise of Urban Area (GB/T 15190-94) in China. According to the status of the built-up area in Tangshan, environmental noise area of Tangshan could be divided into Area 1, Area 2, Area 3 and Area 4. Their area were 21.02 km2, 36.686 km2, 35.202 km2 and 23.52 km2, respectively, and area percentage in Tangshan city were 18.05%, 31.51%, 30.23% and 20.21%, respectively. Comparison the geographic distribution of the noise zoning with urban master plan, it showed that the noise zoning is in agreement with the urban master plan, which was benefit to the implementation of master plan, but also it is a supplement. This result showed that GIS is a simply operation method, and can provide the result of accuracy and reliability. So it is acceptabled that GIS is adopted to environmental noise zoning of urban area.

Preventive diagnosis and maintenance of transformers have become more and more popular in recent times in order to improve the reliability of electric power systems. Dielectric testing techniques such as frequency domain spectroscopy (FDS) are being investigated as potential tools for condition assessment of transformer insulation. The FDS test has been affected by the factors, such as, the geometric, temperature, moisture content of insulation system. In this paper, those effect factors will be analyzed, according the field test data and laboratory model data.

The waste heat resource of iron and steel industry was the research object. The economical and technical of direct heating, sensible heat storage and latent heat thermal storage were compared. The result shows that using phase change materials (PCM) as storage materials, energy storage density is higher, cost and exergy loss is lower and the discharge of air pollutants can be reduced, which is compliance with the requirements of conservation and reduction of pollutant emissions and has a broad application prospect.

There were few reports on the lipid peroxidation of aquatic organisms exposed to 2,4-Dinitrochlorobenzene(CDNB). This research explored the hepatic lipid peroxidation of fish to long-term exposure of CDNB for the first time. Freshwater fish Brocarded Carp were chosen as experimental animals. The fish were exposed to four different concentrations of CDNB (0.168-0.5 mg/l) for 15 days and then liver tissues were separated for determination. As shown from the results, 15 days afterwards, the MDA level was induced significantly on the whole compared to control group; the MDA content responded to CDNB exposure in all treatment group; The MDA content were also determined to analyze the occurrence of oxidative stress. Besides, good dose-effect relations, which cover most of the exposure concentration range, were found between MDA level and CDNB exposure concentration. In conclusion, MDA level in the liver of fish may be potential early biomarkers of CDNB contamination in aquatic ecosystems, and further studies will be necessary.