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Objectives: To investigate the selection, clinical efficacy and prognosis of surgical treatment for proximal femoral metastases and compare the effectiveness of the intramedullary nail and joint replacement to treat proximal femoral metastases.Methods: This study retrospectively enrolled 60 patients with proximal femur metastases treated from 2006 to January 2016. Outcomes among patients of the two surgical methods by collecting medical records, intraoperative blood loss, operative time, VAS score, MSTS score, ECOG score, postoperative complications, and overall survival time.RESULTS: The amount of bleeding and the average operation time were significantly different in the nailing group and the hip replacement group. The postoperative VAS score, MSTS score, and ECOG score were also significantly different.CONCLUSION: Intramedullary nailing is preferred for patients with a short survival time, and a better quality of life is achieved early in patients with a limited survival time. Hip replacement is appropriate for patients who are expected to have a long survival time.

Based on anti-perovskite Mn3ZnN, the negative thermal expansion (NTE) temperature can be effectively broadened via co-substituting Sn, Mn. Using optimized components, the room-temperature NTE effect covering a wide temperature range can be realized. Both the competing ferromagnetic order from Mn and local lattice disorder from Sn should be the reason for the physical origination of the broadening of the NTE temperature. By compositing with epoxy, the low thermal expansion could be achieved around room temperature, which exhibits great potential in the field of electronic packaging.

The serviceability and safety level of bridges often deteriorates due to the environmental or operational conditions. A stochastic deterioration model is of essential importance for describing the time-variation of bridge performance (e.g., stiffness and strength), and for use in the estimate of bridge reliability under a probabilistic framework. In this context, the Gamma process has been widely used to model the resistance deterioration of aging bridges, yet suffers from the deficiency that the statistical characteristics of the process (namely mean value, variance and autocorrelation) are not mutually independent. This paper presents a new stochastic model for bridge resistance deterioration. As a modified version of the Gamma process-based one, the proposed model includes a new parameter that can release the dependence of the process autocorrelation and variance on the mean value. The impact of the new deterioration model on the time-dependent reliability of aging bridges is studied.

The trilayer nickelate ${\mathrm{Nd}}_{4}{\mathrm{Ni}}_{3}{\mathrm{O}}_{10\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\delta}}$ was investigated by the measurements of x-ray diffraction, electrical resistivity, magnetic susceptibility, and heat capacity. The crystal structure data suggest a higher Ni valence in the inner perovskitelike layer. At ambient pressure the resistivity shows a jump at 162 K, indicating a metal-to-metal transition (MMT). The MMT is also characterized by a magnetic susceptibility drop, a sharp specific-heat peak, and an isotropic lattice contraction. Below $\ensuremath{\sim}50\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}\mathrm{K}$, a resistivity upturn with $logT$ dependence shows up, accompanied with negative thermal expansion. External hydrostatic pressure suppresses the resistivity jump progressively, coincident with the weakening of the $logT$ behavior. The low-temperature electronic specific-heat coefficient is extracted to be $\ensuremath{\sim}150\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}\mathrm{mJ}\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}{\mathrm{K}}^{\ensuremath{-}2}\phantom{\rule{0.16em}{0ex}}\mathrm{mol}\text{\ensuremath{-}}{\mathrm{f}.\mathrm{u}.}^{\ensuremath{-}1}$, equivalent to $\ensuremath{\sim}50\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}\mathrm{mJ}\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}{\mathrm{K}}^{\ensuremath{-}2}\phantom{\rule{0.16em}{0ex}}\mathrm{mol}\text{\ensuremath{-}}{\mathrm{Ni}}^{\ensuremath{-}1}$, indicating an unusual heavy-electron correlated state. The novel heavy-electron state as well as the logarithmic temperature dependence of resistivity is explained in terms of the ${\mathrm{Ni}}^{3+}$-centered Kondo effect in the inner layer of the ${({\mathrm{NdNiO}}_{3})}_{3}$ trilayers.

Objective Metastatic epidural spinal cord compression (MESCC) seriously affects the life span and quality of life of patients. Separation surgery combined with vertebroplasty combined with interstitial implantation of 125 I seeds (SSVPI) is a novel treatment for MESCC patients. To investigate the safety, feasibility and clinical efficacy on metastatic epidural spinal cord compression treated by SSVPI. Method Prospective analysis of 56 patients diagnosed with metastatic epidural spinal cord compression (MESCC) and receiving Separation surgery (SS) or separation surgery combined with vertebroplasty combined with interstitial implantation of 125 I seeds. Fifty-six patients were randomly divided into the SS group (26 patients) and SSVPI group (30 patients), and the differences in intraoperative bleeding, postoperative pain visual analog scale scores (VAS), Karnofsky performance scores (KPS) and American Spinal Injury Association grades were compared. Results There was no significant difference in intraoperative bleeding between the SS group and the SSVPI group ( P > 0.05). There was no significant difference at 1 week after surgery ( P > 0.05); there were significant differences in VAS scores at 2, 6 and 12 months after surgery ( P < 0.05). There was no significant difference in the KPS score 1 week after surgery ( P > 0.05); there were statistically significant differences in the KPS scores at 2, 6 and 12 months after surgery ( P < 0.05). In the SS group, there were 20 patients (76.92%) with an improvement in ASIA grades from pre- to postoperation. In the SSVPI group, there were 24 patients (80%) with improved ASIA grades from pre- to postoperation. Conclusion SSVPI is a safe, feasible, less invasive and effective treatment for MESCC patients.

Electricity transmission systems are essential to a community's functionalities but are susceptible to the aggressive environmental or operational factors such as the natural hazards and the environment-induced component deterioration during their service life. The service reliability of a power grid system shall be assessed under a probability-based framework taking into account the spatial uncertainty and correlation arising from both the component performance (i.e., plants, substations, and transmission lines) and the load effects. This paper estimates the resilience of a power grid system in the presence of the impacts of component deterioration and correlation, with an emphasis on the earthquake excitation hazards. The spatial variability of the component capacity and that associated with the earthquake ground motion are modeled by the Gaussian copula function. A posthazard performance indicator (PPI) is used to represent the seismic vulnerability of a grid system subjected to earthquake actions. With this, the statistics (mean value and variance) of the PPI conditional on the occurrence of an earthquake is estimated by a simulation-based method, and the resilience of the grid system (measured by a resilience index based on the recovery process of PPI) is assessed in a closed-form. The applicability of the proposed method is demonstrated through the seismic resilience assessment of an illustrative grid system.

We have synthesized a new series of layered oxyselenides La

The incidence and mortality of cardiovascular disease in diabetic patients are 2-3 times higher than those in non-diabetic patients. Abnormal function of the L-type calcium channel in myocardial tissue might result in multiple cardiac disorders such as a prolonged QT interval. Therefore, QT prolongation is an independent risk factor of cardiovascular disease in patients with diabetes mellitus. Metformin, a hypoglycemic agent, is widely known to effectively reduce the occurrence of macrovascular diseases. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effect of metformin on prolonged QT interval and to explore potential ionic mechanisms induced by diabetes. Diabetic mouse models were established with streptozotocin and an electrocardiogram was used to monitor the QT interval after 4 weeks of metformin treatment in each group. Action potential duration (APD) and L-type calcium current (I Ca-L) were detected by patch-clamp in isolated mice ventricular cardiomyocytes and neonatal cardiomyocytes of mice. The expression levels of CACNA1C mRNA and Cav1.2 were measured by real-time PCR, western blot and immunofluorescence. A shortened QT interval was observed after 4 weeks of metformin treatment in diabetic mice. Patch-clamp results revealed that both APD and I Ca-L were shortened in mouse cardiomyocytes. Furthermore, the expression levels of CACNA1C mRNA and Cav1.2 were decreased in the metformin group. The same results were also obtained in cultured neonatal mice cardiomyocytes. Overall, these results verify that metformin could shorten a prolonged QT interval by inhibiting the calcium current, suggesting that metformin may play a role in the electrophysiology underlying diabetic cardiopathy.

Many existing bridges suffer from resistance deterioration due to environmental or operational attacks and thus may rate under the anticipated performance requirements. The proof load testing is a commonly used approach to evaluate whether the bridge would have the capacity of carrying a certain load. The magnitude of proof load will determine the safety level of the proven bridge. A proof load test, if not designed properly, may potentially cause structural damage and even collapse to the bridge. This implies that the load testing should be oriented by a probability-based framework in an attempt to control the failure probability of the bridge. However, the current engineering practice insufficiently considers the risk control of proof load testings. This paper presents a reliability-based framework to guide and optimize the proof load testing for existing bridges. A mathematical model is developed to compute the target proof load, where two types of constraints are considered simultaneously: the acceptable structural safety level and the economic costs. A numerical example is presented to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed method. The framework developed in this paper can be used in practical engineering as an auxiliary decision-making tool for bridge load testings.

Background: This study purposed to construct a widely accepted prognostic nomogram in Chinese high-grade osteosarcoma (HOS) patients aged ≤ 30 years to provide insight into predicting 5-year overall survival (OS). Methods: Data of 503 consecutive HOS patients at our centre between 12/2012 and 05/2019 were retrospectively collected. The 84 clinical features, routine laboratory haematological and biochemical testing indicators of each patient at the time of diagnosis were collected. A prognostic nomogram model for predicting OS was constructed based on Cox proportional hazards model. The performance was assessed by concordance index (C-index), receiver operating characteristic curve and calibration curve. The utility was evaluated by decision curve analysis. Findings: The 5-year OS was 52.1% and 2.6% for the nonmetastatic and metastatic patients, respectively. The nomogram included nine important variables based on a multivariate analysis: tumour stage, surgical type, metastasis, preoperative neoadjuvant chemotherapy cycle, postoperative metastasis time, mean corpuscular volume, tumour-specific growth factor, gamma-glutamyl transferase and creatinine. The calibration curve showed that the nomogram was able to predict 5-year OS accurately. The C-index of the nomogram for OS prediction was 0.795 (range, 0.703-0.887). Moreover, the decision curve analysis curve also demonstrated the clinical benefit of this model. Interpretation: The nomogram provides an individualized risk estimate of the 5-year OS in patients with HOS aged ≤ 30 years in a Chinese population-based cohort. Funding Statement: This work was financially funded by the National Science Foundation of China (No. U1702283, 81972764, 81960488, 81760520, 81560471), the Joint Special Funds for the Department of Science and Technology of Yunnan Province-Kunming Medical University (No. 2017FE467-073, 2018FE001-060, 2019FE001-152, 2019FE001-078), the Scientific Research Projects of Internal Research Institutions of Medicine (Nos. 2017NS196, 2017NS197, 2018NS069, 2018NS070), the Medical Leaders of Yunnan Province (No. D-201603), the Foundation of the Young and Middle-aged Academic and Technical Leaders of Yunnan Province (No. 2017HB051), China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (No. 2018M643798XB), Training program for 100 Young and middle-aged Academic and technical backbones of Kunming Medical University and the Major Scientific and Technological Achievement Cultivation Project of Kunming Medical University (No. CGPY201703). Declaration of Interests: The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Ethics Approval Statement: All human tissue experiments were approved by the Institutional Ethics Committee of the Third Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University (Yunnan Cancer Hospital). Written informed consent forms for the experimental studies were obtained from the patients or their guardians.

Type 2 diabetes is a common metabolic disorder related to insulin resistance, or deficiency of insulin secretion, caused by decreased insulin sensitivity and destruction of islet structure and function. As the second human genome, the microbiota has been observed to have a growing relationship with diabetes in recent years. Microbiota imbalance has been hypothesized to be involved in the regulation of energy metabolism and the inflammatory immune response in diabetes. The present study aimed to investigate whether fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) could alleviate the symptoms associated with type 2 diabetes. To this end, a type 2 diabetes mouse model was first established through the consumption of a high-fat diet combined with streptozotocin (100 mg/kg), and FMT was used to rebuild the gut microbiota of diabetic mice. Fasting blood glucose, oral glucose tolerance tests, and HbA1c levels were monitored, while the hypoglycemic effects of FMT were also observed. Insulin levels were tested by ELISA and related indexes such as HOMA-IR, HOMA-IS, and HOMA-β were calculated. We found that insulin resistance and pancreatic islet β-cells were improved after FMT treatment. Meanwhile, the markers of inflammation in the pancreatic tissue were detected by ELISA and immunohistochemistry, which indicated that inflammatory response decreased following FMT treatment. Furthermore, flow cytometry and western blot results revealed that FMT inhibited the β-cell apoptosis. Here, the effect of FMT on hypoglycemia in type 2 diabetes was addressed by improving insulin resistance and repairing impaired islets, thereby providing a potential treatment strategy for type 2 diabetes.

Study Design: Meta-analysis. Background: Although some new insights have been offered for clinical and scientific relevance, minor progress has been made in osteosarcoma treatment after a dramatic survival improvement in the late 1980s with the addition of chemotherapy to surgery. Intensified chemotherapy strategies have been suggested to increase the survival rate of patients with osteosarcoma. We performed this study to access whether intensified chemotherapy strategiesincreased survival outcomes of osteosarcoma patients compared with conventional chemotherapy strategies. Methods: MEDLINE/PubMed, EMBASE, BIOSIS Previews, and Cochrane Library were searched from database set up to October2016. Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and comparative clinical trials (CCTs) on intensified versus conventional chemotherapy strategies for osteosarcoma patients met the inclusion criteria, and the methodological quality standard were retrieved and reviewed. Data on participant characteristics, interventions, follow-up period, and outcomes were extracted from the included studies and analyzed by Review Manager 5.3. Results: 12 studies (8 RCTs and 4CCT) involving 4112 patients were selected. There were no significant differences between intensified and conventional chemotherapy strategies group in 3-year event-free survival (OR, 1.01; 95% CI, [0.74–1.37]; P = 0.97), 5-year event-free survival (OR, 1.00; 95% CI, [0.86–1.17]; P = 0.97), and 5-year overall survival (OR, 1.04; 95% CI, [0.87–1.26]; P = 0.64), and good histologic response to preoperative chemotherapy (OR, 1.12; 95% CI, [0.78–1.60]; P = 0.55). Pooled analysis of local recurrence rate showed that local recurrence rate was significantly decreased in the intensified group compared with that in the conventional group (OR, 0.60; 95% CI, [0.42–0.85]; P = 0.004). Conclusions: Intensified chemotherapy might not be a preferred treatment for all of the osteosarcoma patients. Keywords: Meta-analysis, High dosage, Chemotherapy, Osteosarcoma

The deflections of retaining structures during deep excavation should be controlled below a predefined threshold in an attempt to mitigate the deformation-posed damage to the surrounding buildings and infrastructure facilities. In this paper, a new approach is presented to conducting deformation reliability assessments of retaining structures. The method is based on an extension of the classical first-passage reliability problem and is applied on the spatial scale of the retaining structures. With the proposed method, the in situ monitoring data and the associated measurement error can be easily incorporated, which accordingly improves the assessment accuracy. Moreover, the proposed method has a closed-form solution, which is beneficial for the computation efficiency and its practical application. The method was applied to assess the retaining structure reliability in a foundation excavation of a subway station in Fuzhou, China. The accuracy of the analytical results was verified through a comparison with those of Monte Carlo simulation. It was shown that the proposed method can represent well, the deformation-based safety level of retaining structures.

An important element of time-dependent reliability analysis of civil structures is choosing a proper model for the applied loads. Stochastic process theory has been widely used in existing ...

Tropical cyclones (TCs) are among the most costly natural hazards affecting civil construction in coastal areas, which have caused extensive economic losses and social disruption world-widely. Moreover, the intensity and/or frequency of future TCs have been projected to change with time due to the potential impacts of climate change, indicating the potential of ever larger TC damages for coastal regions. The estimate of future TC damage should be conducted under a probability-based framework, taking into account the uncertainties associated with both the TC characteristics (e.g., intensity and frequency) and the vulnerability of the coastal communities of interest. In this paper, an explicit approach is developed to evaluate the TC damage for TC-prone areas considering the potential impacts of climate change. The mean value and variance, as well as the cumulative density function of cumulative TC damage are estimated quantitatively. The proposed method is applied to TC damage assessment of Hong Kong, China – a TC-prone area which has suffered severely from historical cyclones. Sensitivity analysis is also performed to investigate the impacts of the time-variant characteristics of both the TC process and the TC damage conditional on one TC event on the cumulative damage costs for coastal areas.

The Hedgehog (Hh) signalling pathway is involved in cell differentiation, growth and tissue polarity. This pathway is also involved in the progression and invasion of various human cancers. Osteosarcoma, a subtype of bone cancer, is commonly seen in children and adolescents. Typically, pulmonary osteosarcoma metastases are especially difficult to control. In the present paper, we summarise recent studies on the regulation of osteosarcoma progression and metastasis by downregulating Hh signalling. We also summarise the crosstalk between the Hh pathway and other cancer-related pathways in the tumourigenesis of various cancers. We further summarise and highlight the therapeutic value of potential inhibitors of Hh signalling in the clinical therapy of human cancers.

Aging of structural performance and significant external loads may impair structural safety and serviceability and cause potential economic losses. In the presence of uncertainties associated with both resistance deterioration and external loads, structural safety shall be estimated quantitatively under a probability-based framework. A stochastic load process is often auto-correlated on the temporal scale, with correlations arising from both the occurrence times and intensities. Moreover, a deterioration process is physically dependent on the load magnitudes. This paper investigates the impacts of load temporal correlation and deterioration-load dependency on time-variant structural reliability. The load occurrence process is modeled as a Poisson point process with correlated separation time between two load events. The correlation between the intensities of load events is described by the multi-variate Gaussian copula function. The resistance aging process is considered to be a combination of both gradual and shock deteriorations. Four candidate copula functions, namely Gaussian, Clayton, Gumbel and Frank, are considered to model the dependency of shock deterioration on load intensity. Two types of failure mechanisms are considered: the first is due to the load effect exceeding the resistance, and the second occurs when the cumulative damage within the considered service period reaches the permissible level. A simulation-based method is developed to estimate structural reliability considering the two failure modes. Illustrative examples are presented to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed method. Parametric studies are conducted to investigate the impacts of temporal correlation in loads and deterioration-load dependency on structural failure probability.

A member of antiperovskite manganese compound Mn3PdN was successfully synthesized. The structural, magnetic, electrical, and thermal transport properties were investigated systematically. The results indicated that Mn3PdN is a weak correlated system. A first-order paramagnetic (PM) to antiferromagnetic (AFM) transition occurred at 285 ​K (TN) combining with an abrupt change in structure. Mn3PdN exhibits multifunctional properties such as near-zero temperature coefficient of resistivity (TCR) and negative thermal expansion (NTE).

Herein, Dy3+ doped indium nitride nanosheets with ferromagnetism at room-temperature were synthesized via a vapor - solid phase nitriding reaction. The as-synthesized samples exhibit clear ferromagnetism at room-temperature. The ferromagnetic properties of the samples could be changed by doped Dy3+. The saturation magnetization value of various Dy3+ doped indium nitride nanosheet samples display a parabolic-like change with the Dy3+ doped content increase and reaches the top value of 0.1455 emu g−1 corresponding to the Dy3+ doped content of 1.06 at. % at room temperature. The magnetic properties were originated from the d-f interaction between localized carriers and adjacent rare earth Dy3+ ions in the carrier orbits based on the first-principles calculation. The as-synthesized Dy doped indium nitride nanosheets can be widely used in spintronic devices due to the room temperature ferromagnetism.

The effect of heat treatment on the in-line transmittance of BaZr 0.5 Ce 0.3 Y 0.2 O 3−δ (BZCY532) ceramics prepared by spark plasma sintering method was investigated. The loss of Ba in transparent BZCY532 ceramics is the key reason for the loss of transmittance during the annealing process. This problem can be effectively alleviated by using a powder bed of BZCY532. Heat treatment atmospheres, wet air and dry air, were also found to be critical for obtaining high quality transparent ceramics. A highly transparent BZCY532 ceramic with the in-line transmittance (T in ) of 71.4% at 2000 nm can be obtained by using SPS method followed by an annealing in powder bed at 1500 °C in wet air.

In-service civil structures are often subjected to repeated external loads (shock events), which may lead to an accumulation of structural damage and further an increase in the probability of structural failure. The shock actions are by nature stochastic with randomness arising from their intensities and occurrence times. A varying trend in future intensity and/or occurrence rate of many types of shock action has been projected in the literature, such as cyclone actions due to the potential impact of climate change. This article proposes a method to assess the structural reliability in the presence of uncertainty and non-stationarity in external shock events, with a limit state that the cumulative damage exceeds the permissible level. The mean value and variance of the cumulative damage are estimated with proposed closed-form solutions, and the gamma distribution is suggested to describe the probabilistic characteristics of the cumulative damage, whose accuracy is verified through a comparison with Monte Carlo simulation. Furthermore, the cumulative density function of structural service life is derived explicitly. Parametric studies are conducted to investigate the impact of non-stationarity in shock actions on structural reliability.

For a magnetic confinement fusion device, the superconducting magnets and busbars need to be insulated with one layer of solid insulation to isolate the high voltage potential from the ground. The insulation layer commonly consists of several interleaved layers of epoxy resin-impregnated glass fiber tapes and polyimide films. The traditional electrical inspection methods for such solidified insulation on the magnet and busbar are a DC voltage test or a Paschen test. These tests measure the quality of the insulation based on the value of leakage currents. However, even if there is a larger quantity of high dielectric strength material implemented, if there are some microcavities or delaminations in the insulation system, the leakage current may be limited to microampere levels under testing levels over dozens of kilovolts. Therefore, it is difficult to judge the insulation quality just by the magnitudes of leakage current. Under long-term operation, such imperceptible defects will worsen and finally completely break down the insulation because of partial discharge (PD) incidents. Therefore, a PD detection test is an important complement to the DC voltage and Paschen tests for magnet and busbar insulations in the field of fusion. It is known that the PD detection test is a mature technique in the electric power industry. In this paper, the PD characteristics of samples containing glass fiber-reinforced composite insulations for use with the superconducting busbar were presented and discussed. Various samples with different void contents were prepared and the PD behaviors were tested.

Civil structures and infrastructure facilities are susceptible to deterioration posed by the effects of natural hazards and aggressive environmental conditions. These factors may increase the risk of service interruption of infrastructures, and should be taken into account when assessing the structural reliability during an infrastructure's service life. Modeling the resistance deterioration process reasonably is the basis for structural reliability analysis. In this paper, a novel model is developed for describing the deterioration of aging structures. The deterioration is a combination of two stochastic processes: the gradual deterioration posed by environmental effects and the shock deterioration caused by severe load attacks. The dependency of the deterioration magnitude on the load intensity is considered. The Gaussian copula function is employed to help construct the joint distribution of correlated random variables. Semi-analytical methods are developed to assess the structural failure time and the number of significant load events (shocks) to failure. Illustrative examples are presented to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed model in structural reliability analysis. Parametric studies are performed to investigate the role of deterioration-load correlation in structural reliability.

Understanding the spatial structure of wind speed profile of a tropical cyclone (TC) is of critical importance to assess the TC-related damage and map the risk for afflicted areas. The wind field structure of a TC can be regarded as a horizontal primary circulation superimposed by a vertical–radial secondary convection driven by thermal balance. The gradient wind field model has been widely utilized in literature to describe the radial distribution of wind speed with respect to the TC center. In this paper, a new gradient wind field model is developed for translating TCs, based on the vector summation of the rotational wind speed and the translation speed. The accuracy and efficiency of the proposed model are demonstrated through comparing the wind fields generated from model solution and those recorded historically. The proposed model only involves simple algebra, which is beneficial for practical applications, especially in simulation-based studies of TC wind field modeling.

Civil infrastructure systems provide physical supports to a community’s functionalities and are expected to achieve acceptable safety levels subjected to extreme load effects. However, these systems may deteriorate with time as a result of aggressive environmental or operating conditions in service, implying that the system reliability may decline beyond the baseline as assumed for design. Moreover, the increasing trend of the external loads may also contribute to the reduction of the system reliability. In this paper, a semi-analytical method is proposed for assessing the reliability of aging systems subjected to non-stationary loads. The series system is considered, where the system failure is defined as the failure of any single component (structure) among the system. The application of the proposed method is illustrated using a representative series bridge network with several individual bridges. The role of parameters such as the variations in the load intensity, resistance correlation and number of ...

We report the results of X-ray diffraction and 57Fe Mossbauer spectroscopy study, complemented by ab-initio calculations of the electronic structure, hyperfine-interaction parameters, and elastic properties of the new 30 K superconductor ThFeAsN. The superconductor crystallizes in the tetragonal space group P4/nmm with the lattice parameters a = 4.0356(1) A and c = 8.5286(1) A. Contrary to the claims in the literature, we demonstrate unequivocally that there is no magnetic order of the Fe magnetic moments down to 2.0 K. It is suggested that the absence of Fe magnetism may be due to an internal uniaxial chemical pressure whose presence is manifested by the unusually small c/a ratio. Evidence is provided for the presence of a mixture of ionic and covalent chemical bonding and of metallic characteristics. A detailed analysis of the energy band structure of ThFeAsN is presented. The shape of the Mossbauer spectra is accounted for by a quadrupole doublet with a small quadrupole splitting that increases with decreasing temperature. Excellent agreement between the calculated and measured 0 K quadrupole splittings is observed. Fair agreement between the experimental Debye temperature of 332(2) K and the calculated one of 370 K is observed.

Natural hazards such as hurricanes may cause extensive economic losses and social disruption for civil structures and infrastructures in coastal areas, implying the importance of understanding the construction performance subjected to hurricanes and assessing the hurricane damages properly. The intensity and frequency of hurricanes have been reported to change with time due to the potential impact of climate change. In this paper, a probability-based model of hurricane damage assessment for coastal constructions is proposed taking into account the non-stationarity in hurricane intensity and frequency. The non-homogeneous Poisson process is employed to model the non-stationarity in hurricane occurrence while the non-stationarity in hurricane intensity is reflected by the time-variant statistical parameters (e.g., mean value and/or standard deviation), with which the mean value and variation of the cumulative hurricane damage are evaluated explicitly. The Miami-Dade County, Florida, USA, is chosen to illustrate the hurricane damage assessment method proposed in this paper. The role of non-stationarity in hurricane intensity and occurrence rate due to climate change in hurricane damage is investigated using some representative changing patterns of hurricane parameters.

Probability-based assessment of hurricane damage costs for coastal communities is vital for policy-makers and insurers. The uncertainties associated with hurricane damage costs include both the inherent uncertainty due to the random nature of hurricane process and the model uncertainty of the mathematical representation of hurricane damage (vulnerability model). The hurricane vulnerability model has traditionally been modeled as a deterministic function of hurricane wind speed in the literature, without considering the effect of vulnerability model uncertainty on hurricane damage assessment. This paper develops two methods to assess the hurricane damage costs in the presence of vulnerability model uncertainty. To account for the non-stationarity in hurricane actions due to the potential impact of climate change, the hurricane occurrence process is modeled as a non-stationary Poisson process and the hurricane intensity is assumed to vary in time with time-variant statistical parameters of hurricane wind speed. A case study of Miami-Dade County, Florida, is conducted to illustrate the proposed methods and to investigate the impact of vulnerability model uncertainty on hurricane damage costs.

Tumor-targeted drug delivery systems with stimuli-response drug release have been increasingly used to improve the therapeutic efficacy of antitumor drugs. Here, we report a specific molecular recognition activation drug nanoplatform based on specially designed DNA sensor-capped doxorubicin (DOX)-loaded mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNs), designated as specific molecular recognition-activated nanoparticle (SMRAN). DNA sensors on the targeted nanoparticles can trigger DOX release through a conformational switch induced by MUC-1. This causes a significant difference in cell viability between breast cancer MCF-7 and normal breast Hs578bst cells (24.8% and 86.0%). In vivo experiments showed that the tumor volume was reduced 1.5-times in the SMRAN treatment group. Compared with that in the DOX group, due to significantly improved tumor accumulation and retention of DOX. The strategy of the MUC-1 activated drug delivery system is expected to provide a new perspective for clinical application.

Background The aim of this study is to examine miRNA profiling and miR-369-3p participates in endometrioid adenocarcinoma (EEC) via the regulation of autophagy. Methods EEC and its adjacent normal tissues were obtained from 20 clinical patients after surgery. MiRNA profiling was performed using next generation sequencing (NGS) and was validated with quantitative real time PCR (qRT-PCR). qRT-PCR was also employed to measure miR-369-3p and autophagy-related protein 10 (ATG10) expression levels. Western blotting assay was performed to measure the expressions of ATG10 and LC3B. Luciferase reporter assay was conducted to confirm the direct targeting of ATG10 by miR-369-3p. Cell proliferation and migration assays were utilized to analyze the role of miR-369-3p in HEC-1-A cells. Results We found that miR-369-3p expression levels were down-regulated in EEC compared to the control tissues. The overexpression of miR-369-3p inhibited cell proliferation and migration in EEC; furthermore, ATG10 expression increased in EEC tissues. ATG10 was found to be a potential target of miR-369-3p via a dual-luciferase reporter assay, and ATG10 was shown to be down-regulated by miR-369-3p in protein levels. Conclusions This study revealed that miR-369-3p inhibited cell proliferation and migration by targeting ATG10 via autophagy in EEC. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s12935-019-0897-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Recently, An electron-doped 12442-type iron-based superconductor BaTh$_2$Fe$_4$As$_4$(N$_{0.7}$O$_{0.3}$)$_2$ has been successfully synthesized with high-temperature solid-state reactions on basis of a structural design. The inter-block-layer charge transfer between the constituent units of "BaFe$_2$As$_2$" and "ThFeAsN$_{0.7}$O$_{0.3}$" was found to be essential to stabilize the target compound. Dominant electron-type conduction and bulk superconducting transition at ~22 K were demonstrated., Comment: 16 pages in total. 5 figures, 1 table (main article); 6 figures, 3 tables (Supporting Information)

The prognostic value of nonsentinel lymph-node (NSLN) status in breast cancer remains unclear. This study was designed to investigate the prognostic value of NSLN status in SLN-positive breast cancer. Retrospective 873 consecutive primary breast cancer patients from a single institution who were SLN-positive and underwent axillary lymph-node dissection (ALND) were included. Patients with incomplete clinical information or loss of follow-up were excluded. Survival analysis in patients with the same number of positive LNs and patients belonging to the same American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) node (N) classification was performed to establish a proposal for incorporating the NSLN status into the breast cancer staging system. The median follow-up was 41 months. Positive NSLN status was a significantly unfavorable factor for recurrence-free survival (RFS) (HR: 4.31, P

In this paper, the millimeter wave radar amplification device is designed using the MWG303 power amplifier chip of Milliway Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. The whole device comprises an input waveguide microstrip transition structure based on Rogers 5880 and an output waveguide microstrip transition structure based on quartz. And waveguide structures such as waveguide turn and waveguide lift, in this design, the waveguide microstrip transition circuit is designed and simulated in the 3D electromagnetic field simulation software HFSS of Ansoft Company, and then the parts are combined, and the micro-assembly test is carried out after CAD processing. The results show that the gain can reaches more than 10dB. The design has the advantages of high gain, good flatness, practical structure and so on.

The ceramic honeycomb sandwich structures of 3 mol% yttria-stabilized tetragonal ZrO2 (3Y-TZP) material were fabricated by an additive manufacturing technique based on the digital light processing (DLP) system. The bending behaviour of hexagonal and square honeycomb sandwich structures was investigated with three-point bending test. The effects of geometric parameters, including the thickness of the face-sheet, the height of the cell, the thickness of the cell wall and the size of the cell, were studied through experiments carefully. The results illustrated that the bending strength of the ceramic honeycomb sandwich structure can reach 170 MPa at a relative density of 41.72%. The geometric parameters of the honeycomb core were more critical than the sandwich face-sheet. The cell size, cell wall thickness and cell height were found to be the preferred geometric parameter for justifying the bending resistance performance of the ceramic sandwich panel. Square honeycomb demonstrated better bending performance than the hexagonal honeycomb. This study provides a new basis for further studies on the ceramic lightweight structures.

Probabilistic damage assessment of a community under a scenario tropical cyclone needs to consider the collective damage of individual structures within the community. This involves modelling the spatial correlations of wind speeds and structural vulnerability between individual structures. Ignoring the spatial correlations can lead to unconservative assessment. However, the methods to model these two spatial correlations and their effects on damage assessment are limited. In this paper, a general probabilistic framework is proposed to analyze the correlated damage of spatially distributed building portfolios using joint fragility functions. Two cases are investigated: (1) the correlation of fragility functions of different buildings is given, and (2) the correlation of structural resistance is given from which the correlation of fragilities is computed. To demonstrate the framework, an example is provided to analyze the roof sheathing damage of a residential building portfolio under a cyclone event.