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Sinomenine (SIN) is a purified alkaloid from the Chinese herb Sinomenium acutum. Previous studies demonstrated that SIN possesses anti-inflammatory and anti-apoptotic properties. We thus in the present report conducted studies to examine its impact on ischemia reperfusion (IR) induced renal injury. Precondition of mice with 200 mg/kg of SIN provided significant protection for mice against IR-induced renal injury as manifested by the attenuated serum creatinine (Cre) and blood urea nitrogen (BUN) along with less severity for histological changes and tubular cell apoptosis. In line with these results, treatment of mice with SIN suppressed IR-induced inflammatory infiltration and the expression of chemokine CXCL-10, adhesion molecule ICAM-1, and cytokines TNF-а/IL-6. Mechanistic studies revealed that SIN inhibits NF-κB transcriptional activity to suppress IR-induced inflammatory response in the kidney, while it attenuates MAP kinase signaling to prevent tubular cells undergoing apoptosis after IR insult. Altogether, our data support that SIN could be a useful therapeutic agent for prevention and treatment of IR-induced renal injury in the clinical settings.

In this paper, we consider the problem of blind identification in the underdetermined instantaneous mixtures case, where there are more sources than sensors. Recently, a simultaneous matrix diagonalization (SMD)-based method has been proposed without any need of sparsity assumption on sources. Instead of using SMD technique, we propose a fixed point algorithm, which estimates the columns of the mixing matrix sequentially one by one. Computer simulations are presented in order to demonstrate that the proposed algorithm has the ability to identify the mixing matrix, and its performance is comparable to that of SMD-based algorithm.

An orthogonal subspace-based method is proposed for the blind separation of convolutive mixtures of nonstationary colored signals. The proposed method relies on eigenvalue decomposition (EVD) of a specially constructed matrix, which contains inform from two orthogonal subspaces. A multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) blind deconvolution problem can be converted to multiple single-input multiple-output (SIMO) blind deconvolution problems by using the EVD. Numerical simulation demonstrates that the method can successfully separate audio and speech signals from their convolutive mixtures.

A novel algorithm for blind separation of instantaneous linear mixtures of source signals is proposed. The proposed algorithm is based on the generalized singular value decomposition of a matrix pencil. We use a set of linear combinations of time-delayed correlation matrices to estimate the mixing matrix. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm has better performance in accuracy comparing with TLS-ESPRIT algorithm.

In this paper a novel method for the chromatic analysis of burn scar is proposed. The aim of the algorithm is to evaluate the curative effect and set up the treatment plan pertinently, because the scar color is an impersonal parameter reflects the degree of scar hypertrophy. The method is based on artificial neural network (ANN) by using photoelectrical technique, and composed of three main parts: firstly capture the digital color images of the burn scar using CCD camera, then change the RGB color data of the burn scar into that of HSB color space and emend it using ANN, lastly judge the degree of burn scar hypertrophy by chromatic analysis using ANN again. The experimental results were good conformed to the degrees of scar hypertrophy given by clinical evaluations. It suggests that the chromatic analysis technique of the burn scar is valuable for further study and apply to the clinical engineering.

To study the clinical results of focal debridement and primary internal fixation with CD rod in treatment of multi-segmental spinal tuberculosis.From July 1999 to November 2002, 16 patients with multi-segmental spinal tuberculosis were given focal debridement and primary internal fixation with CD rod trans sick vertebra. There were 9 males and 7 females, aging from 21 to 59 years. The course of disease was 2 to 11 months. The locations of lesion were T6-T11 in 11 patients and T10-L2 in 5 patients. The involved vertebral bodies were 3 segments in 13 patients, 4 or more than 4 segments in 3 patients. There were 5 cases of Pott's paralysis (according to Frankel classification system: 3 cases of degree C, 2 cases of degree D) and 4 cases of kyphosis and 2 cases of collapse. Focal debridement and internal fixation was performed in 1 or 2 incisions according to concrete conditions.All patients were followed up 11 months (6 months-3 years), spinal tuberculosis was completely cured and the grafted bones were fused in all 16 patients. All patients obtained primary healing of the incision. Postoperative complication met with cerebrospinal fluid leakage in 1 case. After 6 months, 5 cases of paraplegia recovered. The kyphosis was corrected partly. No loose and dislocation of the nails and rods was found.Focal debridement and primary internal fixation with CD rod can stabilize involved spinal segments, prevent and correct local deformity, and improve its curative ratio and fused ratio of grafted bone.

The superconductivity and phases of SrBaYCuFO system are studied. The superconducting critical temperature T c , of this system is about 85K. When more SrCO 3 is added into the SrBaYCu 3 F 2 O 6 , the 1–2–3-like phase is formed whose superconductivity is quite different from that of multiphase SrBaYCuFO system, and this phase may be responsible for the superhigh temperature superconductivity of 105K.

An equation of state (EOS) is a thermodynamic equation describing the state of matter under a given set of physical conditions, and the Mie-Gruneisen EOS is a widely used EOS for solid materials. Polyimide is a typical complex high-molecular polymer of imide monomers which is widely used in the manufacture of parts for aerospace technology and for fabricating the inertial fusion energy shells (IFE). When a spacecraft collides with a meteoroids (or orbital debris) or the IFE shells are radiated by high power laser, the polyimide used in the equipment is in high pressure state. In order to study the safety of the spacecraft and IFE shells, the EOS of polyimide should be determined. In our research, the three key parameters of the Mie-Gruneisen EOS based on the shock adiabat for polyimide have been determined with two-stage light-gas gun experiments, i.e. the bulk speed of sound of polyimide is determined as 2.62±0.22 km/s, the linear Hugoniot slope coefficient is determined as 1.25±0.063, and the Gruneisen parameter at initial state is determined as 1.53±0.135. The Mie-Gruneisen EOS for polyimide is finally obtained, and the parameter values are proved reliable via the comparison of Gruneisen parameter value calculated from two different theoretical models using the experimental data.