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Fiber-based photonic nanostructures with potential employment in nano/microscale optical devices are attracting a growing interest. In this work, we report on the emission features of polymer fibers made of 4(dicyanomethy-lene)-2-tert-butyl-6(1,1,7,7-tetramethyljulolidyl-9-enyl)4H-pyran (DCJTB) doped polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP) with diameters in the range of 1.5–2 μm, realized by electrospinning method. In the fibers, silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) are introduced as scatters, where multimode random lasing action is achieved. Experiments indicate that strengthened lasing shot has been triumphantly realized in the existence of metal Ag NPs. By optimizing the ratio of Ag NPs to DCJTB during the process of the preparation, random lasing emission has been realized with much cut down thresholds to 0.55 mW cm−2. The microscopic resonators may be shaped both by randomly oriented polymeric fibers and multiple scattering of Ag NPs which offer special opportunities to design multiple light scattering and random laser. Besides, the localized surface-plasmon resonance (LSPR) of Ag NPs is excited, which couples with output emission of DCJTB to improve the lasing efficiency. This system is a promising candidate for the coming growth of all-plastic, micro- to macroscale optical tables for signal transmission and processing.

Background A case of Acinetobacter baumannii (A. baumannii), known as gram-negative bacteria, causes a range of nosocomial infections. Due to the continuous detection of multi-drug resistant A. baumannii in the clinic, there is an urgent need to find alternative therapies, including broad-spectrum antibacterial peptides (AMP). Recently it has been found that the peptide Cec4 has good antibacterial activity against A. baumannii, but the antibacterial mechanism remains elusive. Materials and methods The basic structure of Cec4 was analyzed by circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy, and the potential antibacterial mechanism of Cec4 was detected by flow cytometry, transmission electron microscopy, fluorescence and confocal microscopy. The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of antimicrobial peptides against various A. baumannii was determinated with broth microdilution techniques. The biofilm formation and the sensitivity detection of biofilms to antimicrobial peptides were detected by crystal violet staining. Results In this study, the main secondary structure of the antibacterial peptide Cec4 is α-helix (99.7%) in the hydrophobic environment. Furthermore, after the treatment with Cec4, an amount of leakage of A. baumannii and the destruction of its cell membrane were detected. Moreover, it was observed that FITC-Cec4 can enter the cell, and more cells were held in the G1 phase with peptide Cec4. However, the DNA binding assay of the peptide Cec4 indicates that the peptide does not target DNA. In addition, peptide Cec4 was superior in reducing adherent biofilms of A. baumannii compared to conventional antibiotics and has no cytotoxicity. Conclusion It is apparent that the antibacterial peptide Cec4 may achieve rapid sterilization by multi-target interaction and presents an attractive therapeutic option for the prevention and control of A. baumannii infections.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Carotid atherosclerosis, especially rupture of plaques, is related to cerebrovascular diseases. Non-high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (non-HDL-C) is relevant to cerebrovascular diseases and may be a potential risk factor. We designed this study to investigate the association between non-HDL-C and the prevalence of asymptomatic vulnerable carotid atherosclerotic plaques. METHODS We enrolled 2888 participants who underwent carotid atherosclerotic plaque detection and non-HDL-C measurement, with no history of taking lipid-lowering agents, from the Asymptomatic Polyvascular Abnormalities in Community study. We used multivariable logistic regression to estimate the association between non-HDL-C levels and the presence of asymptomatic vulnerable carotid atherosclerotic plaques. RESULTS In our study, 1505 subjects had asymptomatic vulnerable carotid atherosclerotic plaques and 1383 subjects had stable plaques. After adjustment for confounding factors, the odds ratios for vulnerable plaques of non-HDL-C levels in the middle and highest tertile groups were 1.02 (95% confidence interval, 0.84-1.23) and 1.50 (95% confidence interval, 1.23-1.82), respectively (P trend

The paper analyzes problems in Marine Park management and put forward suggestions for improvement based on differences of social value about Marine Park ecosystem services between Pulau Payar Marine Park (PPMP) in Malaysia and Gili Matra Marine Park (GMMP) in Indonesia. The purpose is to construct the connectivity of ecology, social economy, culture and system, and to study the management of marine protected areas (MPAs) from a broader perspective. The survey method used in this study is similar to that of ‘SolVES’ method, which aims to assess relative importance of social value for Marine Park and discuss people's attitudes towards the future development of Marine Park and management of Marine Park. We selected purposive sampling survey according to the occupation category, and obtained 109 and 102 valid questionnaires in PPMP and GMMP respectively. In this study, four sets of questions, including familiarity with Marine Park, attitude toward use of Marine Park, understanding of social-value of Marine Park and personal profile, were designed to analyze differences between PPMP in Malaysia and GMMP in Indonesia. For both Marine Parks Biological Diversity Value (B) was scored the highest among all ten social-values. The participation rate of marine education in both Marine Parks are relatively low; both of them are no more than 35%. Compared with locals, tourists value biodiversity more, and while comparison among different occupations, civil servants value biodiversity more than other occupations. Through on-the-spot investigation and sorting out the management problems of marine parks reflected by respondents, we found that: (a) the weakness of basic education and lack of popular science publicity and education activities have caused the level of public's awareness of environmental protection to be not high enough; (b) the relative insufficiency of tourism infrastructure and increase in number of tourists in recent years, might have caused many problems such as destroying coral reef resources and littering. Some suggestions were put forward to solve the problem: (a) promote public awareness of environmental protection through popular science publicity and education; (b) for PPMP, the restriction on the number of tourists will benefit the protection of coral, while improving infrastructure, such as garbage collection, will help improve environmental pollution; (c) for GMMP, strengthening the synergy between local and central governments will help to deal with the relationship between land use and environmental protection and highlight environmental protection functions.

In this study, a pilot-scale biotrickling filter (BTF) was developed to remove poisonous gas contaminated by hydrogen sulfide (H2S) from a sewage lift station. The BTF provided a smooth start-up with an increase in the inlet H2S concentration and delivered a stable operation for more than 300 days. The biomass concentration and microbial community structures were analyzed to determine the biodegradation kinetics, and some key operating variables, the inlet H2S concentration and empty bed retention time (EBRT), were investigated to explore the deodorization performance of the pilot-scale BTF. When the EBRT was 10.9–28.9 s and the inlet H2S concentration was 5–20 ppmv, an H2S removal efficiency of no less than 99% was observed. The elimination capacity (EC) reached 6.58 g H2S/m3/h (removal efficiency of 99.8%) for an EBRT of 10.9 s. In addition, a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model was integrated with a biodegradation kinetic model and a porous medium model to simulate the deodorization performance of the pilot-scale BTF. Under different operating conditions, the simulated results agreed well with experimental data for H2S concentration profiles and the pressure drop (R2>0.985), which indicates that the established CFD model can be used as a reference for optimizing the design and scale-up of the BTF.

Embargo 12 kk The inability of traditional chemotherapeutics to reach cancer tissue reduces the treatment efficacy and leads to adverse effects. A multifunctional nanovector was developed consisting of porous silicon, superparamagnetic iron oxide, calcium carbonate, doxorubicin and polyethylene glycol. The particles integrate magnetic properties with the capacity to retain drug molecules inside the pore matrix at neutral pH to facilitate drug delivery to tumor tissues. The MRI applicability and pH controlled drug release were examined in vitro together with in-depth material characterization. The in vivo biodistribution and compound safety were verified using A549 lung cancer bearing mice before proceeding to therapeutic experiments using CT26 cancer implanted mice. Loading doxorubicin into the porous nanoparticle negated the adverse side effects encountered after intravenous administration highlighting the particles’ excellent biocompatibility. Furthermore, the multifunctional nanovector induced 77% tumor reduction after intratumoral injection. The anti-tumor effect was comparable with that of free doxorubicin but with significantly alleviated unwanted effects. These results demonstrate that the developed porous silicon-based nanoparticles represent promising multifunctional drug delivery vectors for cancer monitoring and therapy.

To meet the requirement for the exact computation of rotational stiffness, this paper puts forward a mesh adaptation based analysis method for a compact multi-throttle aerostatic guideway and its constituent micro-structure. Contrary to previous methods that substituted or even ignored them, the dimensionless thickness pertaining to the depth of the micro-structure is restored and incorporated into each computational grids. The mesh adaptation procedures accept the dimensionless thickness as an intermediate variable for the target mesh and apply local modifications to adapt the mesh to match the specified size. Then, the varying regularity of rotational stiffness by micro-structures can be studied by k- $\varepsilon $ turbulence model when tilt. The tilt angle, although small, leads to a wedge-shaped film and then an uneven pressure distribution which has been also taken into consideration. Guided by the mesh adaptation method, a vertical compact guideway with high rotational stiffness of $7.22\times 10^{3}$ Nm/rad is designed and manufactured for photolithography. The experiments verify its practical accuracy and effectiveness.

A method for the detection of the bubbly wake of targets in water is presented, which is based on the features of optical frequency domain of the scattering optical signal. A simulation on the optical frequency domain characteristics of the bubbly wake scattering signal is performed by statistical test method. The influence of the bubble population and the velocity distribution on the optical frequency domain characteristics is analyzed. On this basis, a test platform for the characteristics of optical frequency domain of the bubbly wake scattering signal is designed and established. The characteristics of the bubbly wake scattering signal are studied experimentally. Experimental results agree with the theoretical analysis. The results show that the amplitude and the cut-off frequency of the shift spectra will increase with the increasing bubble population and range of velocity distribution. It indicates the effectiveness of the detection method.

Surface morphology and internal microstructure of tungsten (W) pre-implanted by 40 keV mass-separated helium (He) ions with different fluences at room temperature were investigated in this work. The morphology changes of the samples were analyzed almost in situ, by repetitively examined the specified irradiation area which is marked by focused ion beam technology. As the samples were implanted by He ion with a fluence of 6 × 1020 He m−2, no He blisters or other microstructures could be found on the surface. When the fluence reaches 6 × 1021 He m−2, a large number of He blisters with the size of ∼1 μm were observed on the W specimens. For the results of the subsequent deuterium plasma exposure, instead of deuterium-induced blistering, no changes on the W surface which pre-irradiated by He ion irradiation at low fluence (6 × 1020 He m−2). Surprisingly, for He ions pre-implanted W with high fluence (6 × 1021 He m−2), almost all the He blisters were cracked and their lids even peeled off. It could be attributed to the lateral stress caused by subsequent D exposure. Moreover, the size of He bubbles was also increased under subsequent deuterium exposure, suggesting that He atoms can attract D atoms. No deuterium blisters were found on these samples which were pre-implanted with high and low fluences, suggesting that He ion pre implantation can effectively inhibit the surface blistering caused by deuterium exposure.

An analytical compliance matrix model of a flexure hinge is established and the conical-shaped notch flexure hinge is innovatively parameterized using the non-uniform rational B-spline (NURBS) curve, which can be used to describe several different conical notch shapes, including the ellipse, parabola, and hyperbola. Parameterization is useful for performing integral operations on compliance models. Three translational directions of compliance are simulated using the finite element (FE) method and results show a maximum error of 5.39% between the theoretical value and simulation result, thus verifying the accuracy of our analytical compliance model. The influence of certain parameters on flexure hinge performance, including compliance, relative compliance, and axial shift, is analyzed.

Haploid breeding is a significant technology of maize breeding. Rapid and accurate haploid kernel identification method has great significance to accelerating the efficiency of haploid breeding. At present, detecting genetic markers on the embryo of kernels by machine vision and determining oil content of maize kernels by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) are widely used to automatically identify haploid maize kernel. However, the machine vision method can only identify the haploid through embryo side of kernels, and the NMR method cannot distinguish them when haploid and diploid have the overlap oil content. The study was aimed exploring a rapid and accurate method to identify haploid maize kernel using near-infrared hyperspectral imaging technology to overcome the limitations of current automated haploid identification and to achieve more accurate screening of haploid. In terms of two representative varieties of maize (Zhengdan 958 and Nongda 616), the study adopted spectral features of hyperspectral imaging to discuss the influence of embryonic orientation (embryo faces to or against light source) on haploid identification model. Meanwhile, the separability of embryo and non-embryo and identification accuracy of joint modeling of embryo and non-embryo were analyzed. The study showed that the greater difference between embryo and non-embryo of haploid and diploid, but hyperspectral imaging method could effectively distinguish haploid and diploid through embryo or non-embryo. At the same time, with the qualitative analysis method, two maize varieties could accurately distinguished haploid and diploid with overlapping oil content based on joint modeling. In this case, the test set of haploid and diploid achieved yielded higher correct acceptance rate (CAR) of 99% and the false acceptance rate (FAR) were both below 1%, with a high accuracy rate. The study showed that it is feasible to recognize maize haploid using hyperspectral imaging technology, which can provide a reference for the later haploid sorting systems.

In recent years, the asset management of the fund industry has soared. By the end of 2016, it has exceeded 30 trillion yuan, and the industry structure has also undergone significant changes.

From 2013 to 2016, the trust industry entered a period of transitional development. Under the background of economic transition and the restructuring of the supervision of grand asset management industry, the growth rate of the scale of trust assets has significantly slowed until the second half of 2016, when the growth rate rebounded. Judging from the sources and flow of funds, there is a structural imbalance in the trust industry.

Since the China Banking Regulatory Commission issued the “Interim Measures for the Administration of Personal Banking Business of Commercial Banks” and the “Guidelines for the Risk Management of Commercial Banks’ Personal Wealth Management Services” in 2005, China’s asset management market has gradually entered the stages of exploration, development and standardization.

Background. Chronic primary musculoskeletal pain (CPMP) is a major health problem that has physical and psychological impacts as well as an associated economic burden. Currently, pharmacological treatment remains unsatisfactory because of side effects and potential misuse. Therefore, nonpharmacological approaches for pain are being actively explored, and Tai Chi has attracted increased attention as a therapy for pain. Although clinical trials have shown that Tai Chi may be effective in treating CPMP, no systematic review has clarified its effectiveness and safety. The objective of this systematic review is to assess the effect and safety of Tai Chi for patients suffering from CPMP. Methods and Analysis. We will search relevant electronic databases from inception to May 31, 2021: PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, the Wanfang database, the Chongqing VIP database, and China Biology Medicine Disc. Studies comparing the use of Tai Chi with other managements for CPMP patients will be included. Our review will include studies that measured change in pain intensity as the primary outcome using patient-reported ratings (visual analog scale or numerical rating scale). Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale scores, SF-36 Health Survey scores, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index scores, and adverse effects will be explored as secondary outcomes. The risk of bias and the reporting quality of included studies will be evaluated using the Cochrane Collaboration risk-of-bias assessment method. The data will be analyzed using RevMan v5.3 software. Study Registration. This study protocol was registered on PROSPERO. The registration number for this protocol is CRD42020165048.

From 2013 to March 2017, the scale of insurance funds increased from 7.67 trillion yuan to 14.07 trillion yuan. In terms of insurance funds utilization, “other items” have increased from 2.21 trillion yuan to 5.28 trillion yuan.

In the past five years, the grand asset management industry has become the fastest growing and most widely expanded area within the Chinese financial system.

In this chapter, we present an advanced machine learning strategy to detect objects and characterize traffic dynamics in complex urban areas by airborne LiDAR. Both static and dynamical properties of large-scale urban areas can be characterized in a highly automatic way. First, LiDAR point clouds are colorized by co-registration with images if available. After that, all data points are grid-fitted into the raster format in order to facilitate acquiring spatial context information per-pixel or per-point. Then, various spatial-statistical and spectral features can be extracted using a cuboid volumetric neighborhood. The most important features highlighted by the feature-relevance assessment, such as LiDAR intensity, NDVI, and planarity or covariance-based features, are selected to span the feature space for the AdaBoost classifier. Classification results as labeled points or pixels are acquired based on pre-selected training data for the objects of building, tree, vehicle, and natural ground. Based on the urban classification results, traffic-related vehicle motion can further be indicated and determined by analyzing and inverting the motion artifact model pertinent to airborne LiDAR. The performance of the developed strategy towards detecting various urban objects is extensively evaluated using both public ISPRS benchmarks and peculiar experimental datasets, which were acquired across European and Canadian downtown areas. Both semantic and geometric criteria are used to assess the experimental results at both per-pixel and per-object levels. In the datasets of typical city areas requiring co-registration of imagery and LiDAR point clouds a priori, the AdaBoost classifier achieves a detection accuracy of up to 90% for buildings, up to 72% for trees, and up to 80% for natural ground, while a low and robust false-positive rate is observed for all the test sites regardless of object class to be evaluated. Both theoretical and simulated studies for performance analysis show that the velocity estimation of fast-moving vehicles is promising and accurate, whereas slow-moving ones are hard to distinguish and yet estimated with acceptable velocity accuracy. Moreover, the point density of ALS data tends to be related to system performance. The velocity can be estimated with high accuracy for nearly all possible observation geometries except for those vehicles moving in or (quasi-)along the track. By comparative performance analysis of the test sites, the performance and consistent reliability of the developed strategy for the detection and characterization of urban objects and traffic dynamics from airborne LiDAR data based on selected features was validated and achieved.

Tai Chi has been proven to be a safe and effective assistant therapy for healthcare and disease treatment. However, whether the adjuvant therapeutic effect of Tai Chi is general or disease-oriented remains uncertain. This trial focuses on exploring the specific and nonspecific effects of Tai Chi and its potential central responses. The results will deepen our understanding of the characteristics of Tai Chi exercise for adjuvant therapeutic effects and promote its application in the clinic. In this neuroimaging trial, 40 functional constipation (FC) patients and 40 healthy subjects (HS) will be recruited and will receive 10 weeks of Tai Chi exercise. The motor function, respiratory function, stool-related symptoms, quality of life, and emotional state of the participants will be evaluated at the baseline, the 5-week Tai Chi practice, and the end of practice. The potential changes in the heart rate variability and the cerebral function will be recorded by the 24 h dynamic electrocardiogram at the baseline and the functional magnetic resonance imaging at the end of practice. The possible correlations among the clinical variables, the heart rate variability, and the cerebral activity alterations in FC patients and HS will be analyzed. The healthcare and therapeutic effects of Tai Chi exercise might consist of the specific and nonspecific effects. This study provides not only a new perspective for understanding Tai Chi but also a new approach for investigating the mind-body exercise. This trial was registered in the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry (http://www.chictr.org.cn/showproj.aspx?proj=33243) on 28 November 2018 (registration number: ChiCTR1800019781; protocol version number: V1.0). This trial is currently in the stage of recruiting patients. The first patient was included on 1 December 2018. To date, 18 FC patients and 20 HS have been included. Recruitment will be completed in December 2020.

Ripley’s K functions are powerful tools for studying the spatial arrangement or spatiotemporal distribution characteristics of geographic phenomena and events in spatial analysis and has been used in many fields. However, the K functions are compute-intensive for point-wise distance comparisons, edge correction and simulations for significance test. Although parallel computing technologies have been adopted to accelerate K functions, previous works haven’t extended the optimization from space to space-time dimension. This study presents an acceleration method for K functions upon state-of-the-art distributed computing framework Apache Spark, and four optimization strategies are leveraged to simplify calculation procedures and accelerate distributed computing respectively, including 1) spatiotemporal indexing based on R-tree with Sort-Tile-Recursive (STR) algorithm for reducing distance comparison when retrieving potential spatiotemporally neighbouring points; 2) Hash-Table-based caching for spatiotemporal edge correction weights reuse and reducing repetitive computation; 3) Spatiotemporal partitioning using KDB-tree as well as cylinder intersection redundancy strategy for decreasing ghost buffer redundancy in partitions and supporting near-balanced distributed processing; 4) Customized serialization of spatiotemporal objects and indexes for lowering the overhead of data transmission. Experiments verify the effectiveness and time efficiency of the proposed optimization strategies, and also evaluate the overall performance and scalability. Based on the proposed methods, a web-based visual analytics framework has been developed and publicly shared through GitHub, and four types of the distributed K functions are implemented, including space, space-time, local and cross K functions, which demonstrates its value on promoting geographical and socioeconomic studies.

Acidic pH of lysosomes is closely related to autophagy; thus, well known of the precise lysosomes, pH changes will give more information on the autophagy process and status. So far, however, only pH changes in a relatively broad range could be indicated, the exact lysosomes pH detection has never arrived. In our study, we established an endo/lysosome pH indicator based on the self-decomposable SiO2 nanoparticle system with specific synthesis parameters. The central concentrated methylene blue (MB) in the central-hollow structural nanoparticles presented sensitive release as a function of pH values from pH 4.0–4.8, which is exactly the pH range of lysosomes. The linear correlation of the optical density (OD) values and the pH values has been built up, which has been used for the detection of lysosomes pH in 6 different cell lines. Moreover, by this system, we succeeded in precisely detecting the pH average changes of lysosomes before and after black mesoporous silicon (BPSi) NP endocytosis, clarifying the mechanism of the autophagy termination after BPSi endocytosis. So, the self-decomposable nanoparticle-based luminal pH indicator may provide a new methodology and strategy to know better of the lysosome pH, then indicate more details on the autophagy process or other important signaling about metabolisms.

Peritrophic matrix/membrane (PM) critically prevents the midgut of insects from external invasion by microbes. The proteins in the peritrophic membrane are its major structural components. Additionally, they determine the formation and function of this membrane. However, the role of PM proteins in immune regulation is unclear. Herein, we isolated a novel PM protein (MdPM-17) from Musca domestica larvae. Further, the function of MdPM-17 in regulating host innate immunity was identified. Results showed that the cDNA of MdPM-17 full is 635 bp in length. Moreover, it consists of a 477-bp open reading frame encoding 158 amino acid residues. These amino acid residues are composed of two Chitin-binding type-2 domain (ChtBD2) and 19 amino acids as a signal peptide. Moreover, tissue distribution analysis indicates that MdPM-17 was enriched expressed in midgut, and moderate levels in the fat body, foregut, and malpighian tubule. Notably, MdPM-17 recombinant protein showed high chitin-binding capacity, thus belongs to the Class III PM protein group. MdPM-17 protein silencing via RNA interference resulted in the expression of antimicrobial peptide (defensin, cecropins, and diptericin) genes, and this occurred after oral inoculation with exogenous microbes Escherichia coli (Enterobacteriales:Enterobacteriaceae), Staphylococcus aureus (Bacillales:Staphylococcaceae), and Candida albicans (Endomycetales:Saccharomycetaceae)). Therefore, all the antimicrobial peptide (AMP) gene expression levels are high in MdPM-17-depleted larvae during microbial infection compared to controls. Consequently, these findings indicate that MdPM-17 protein is associated with the antibacterial response from the housefly.

Unit tests are an important artifact that supports the software development process in several ways. For example, when a test fails, its name can provide the first step towards understanding the purpose of the test. Unfortunately, unit tests often lack descriptive names. In this paper, we propose a new, pattern-based approach that can help developers improve the quality of test names of JUnit tests by making them more descriptive. It does this by detecting non-descriptive test names and in some cases, providing additional information about how the name can be improved. Our approach was assessed using an empirical evaluation on 34352 JUnit tests. The results of the evaluation show that the approach is feasible, accurate, and useful at discriminating descriptive and non-descriptive names with a 95% true-positive rate., Accepted by The Journal of Systems & Software

A major challenge in Automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems for Mandarin is to be able to handle speakers with different kinds of accents. ASR systems that are trained using single-task learning underperform due to poor generalization ability when confronted with a new accent. In this paper, we explore how to use accent sentences information that accent embeddings and multi-task learning on the basis of the bidirectional long short term memory (BLSTM) to improve accent speech recognition. Firstly we consider augmenting the speech input with accent information in the form of embeddings extracted by a standalone network. Then we propose multi-task learning architecture that we jointly learn an accent classifier and a multi-accent acoustic model. Experiments with these methods demonstrate that we obtain a 4% average relative improvement in word error rate over a multi-accent baseline system.

Background Acidic pH of lysosomes are closely related to the autophagy, thus well known of the precise lysosomes pH changes will give more information on the autophagy process and status. So far, however, only pH changes in a relative broad range could be indicated, the exactly lysosomes pH detection has never arrived. Methods In our study, we established an endo/lysosome pH indicator based on self-decomposable SiO 2 nanoparticle system with specific synthesis parameters. The central concentrated MB in the central-hollow structural nanoparticles presented sensitive release as a function of pH values from pH 4.0-4.8, which is the exactly the pH range of lysosomes. The linear correlation of the OD values and the pH values has been built up, which has been used for detection of lysosomes pH in 6 different cell lines. Results By this system, we succeeded in precise detecting the pH average changes of lysosomes before and after BPSi NPs endocytosis, clarifying the mechanism of the autophagy termination after BPSi endocytosis. Conclusions The self-decomposable nanoparticles based luminal pH indicator may provide a new methodology and strategy to know better of the lysosome pH, then indicate more details on autophagy process or other important signaling about metabolism.

Additional file 1. Fig. S1–26 and Table S1–4.

Micellar solubilization is an important concept in the delivery of poorly water-soluble drugs. The rational selection of the type and the amount of surfactant to be incorporated in a formulation require comprehensive solubility studies. These studies are time and material demanding, both of which are scarce, especially during late discovery and early development stages. We hypothesized that, if the solubilization mechanism or molecular interaction is similar, the solubilization capacity ratio (a newly defined parameter) is dictated by micellar structures, independent of drugs. We tested this hypothesis by performing solubility studies using 8 commonly used nonionic surfactants and 17 insoluble compounds with diverse characteristics. The results show a striking constant solubilization capacity ratio among the 8 nonionic surfactants, which allow us to develop predictive solubility models for both single and mixed surfactant systems. The vast majority of the predicted solubility values, using our developed models, fall within 2-fold of the experimentally determined values with high correlation coefficients. As expected, systems involving ionic surfactant sodium dodecyl sulfate, used as a negative control, do not follow this trend. Deviations from the model, observed in this study or envisioned, were discussed. In conclusion, we have established predictive models that are capable of predicting solubility in a wide range of nonionic micellar solutions with only 1 experimental measurement. The application of such a model will significantly reduce resource and greatly enhance drug product development efficiency.

The objective of this paper is to analyze the impact of the factors that stimulate inspiration in the design process. An empirical study is proposed in this paper. Three factors were summarized, including knowledge, knowledge relations and innovative strategies. Representations of these three factors that were extracted from the international patent classification (IPC) were analyzed. An experimental scheme was designed, where 40 undergraduate students were selected as subjects and divided into five groups. One group was used as the control group with no materials provided, and the other four groups were used as the experimental subjects. The three factors and their combinations were provided to each of the four experimental groups. Subjects in each group were asked to propose preliminary designs of a coin-sorting device. The submitted designs were evaluated based on the novelty and practicality of the innovation. By comparing the groups, the impact of each factor on inspiration could be analyzed. The results show that the verb knowledge in the IPC has a significant impact on stimulating inspiration. For untrained students lacking experience, innovative strategies have a negative impact on the novelty of the inspiration. The knowledge relations can overcome the negative impact on the novelty induced by the innovative strategies.

The aim of this study was to assess the association between fasting triglyceride (FTG) levels and the prevalence of asymptomatic intracranial arterial stenosis (ICAS). The Asymptomatic Polyvascular Abnormalities Community (APAC) study is a sub-population of the Kailuan study which targeting on the epidemiology of asymptomatic polyvascular abnormalities in Chinese adults. A total number of 5345 participants, aged ≥40, and without history of stroke, transient ischemic attack, and coronary heart disease were enrolled in this study. Transcranial Doppler Ultrasonography was performed for the detection of ICAS presence. Out of 5345 participants, 698 subjects diagnosed ICAS (13.1%). In univariate analysis, the association between fasting TG (FTG) levels and asymptomatic ICAS didn’t reach statistical significance (OR: 0.99, 95% CI: 0.89–1.09; P = 0.79), the same conclusion was reached in multivariate analysis, after adjustment for age, sex (OR: 1.05, 95% CI: 0.95–1.17) and age, sex, current smoking status, hypertension, diabetes, body mass index, estimated glomerular filtration rate, total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (OR: 0.95, 95% CI: 0.84–1.06), respectively. FTG failed to show any statistical significance on ICAS presence in the APAC study, but the TG actually plays an important role in the progression of atherosclerosis as a biomarker.

A novel series of non-peptide proteasome inhibitors (PIs) that act on chymotrypsin-like (ChT-L) of the proteasome were developed. These PIs bearing 4-aromatic sulfonyl naphthalene-based scaffold and Leu-boronic moiety as covalent bonding group displayed far better activity than PI-8182 for inhibiting ChT-L in preliminary biological activity test. The results showed that 2a (IC 50 = 6.942 μM, MCF-7) and 2c (IC 50 = 6.905 μM, MCF-7) displayed higher anti-proliferative activities than Bortezomib (IC 50 = 18.37 μM, MCF-7) under our experimental conditions. Furthermore, in the microsomal stability assay, 2a demonstrated excellent metabolic stability profiles with 56% remaining after 40 min, as compared to Bortezomib of which approximately 30% was remaining. The compounds 2a , 2c emerged as promising lead compounds for the development of novel non-peptide boronate PIs.

This study was based on 95391 participants (18–98 years old) from the Kailuan study, which assessed all-cause mortality in a community-based population in northern China according to estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) by the Chronic Kidney Disease Epidemiology Collaboration (CKD-EPI) formula and proteinuria estimated from urine dipstick results. Data were analysed based on Cox proportional hazards models with adjustment for relevant confounders, and the results were expressed as hazard ratios (HRs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs). During eight years of follow-up, a total of 6024 participants died. The two indicators, eGFR 2 and the presence of proteinuria, were independently associated with all-cause mortality. Compared with eGFR ≥45 ml/min/1.73 m2 with negative proteinuria, HRs of all-cause mortality were 1.26 (95% CI 1.10–1.44) for eGFR 2 without proteinuria, 1.95 (1.78–2.14) for eGFR ≥45 ml/min/1.73 m2 with proteinuria, and 2.63 (2.14–3.23) for eGFR 2 with proteinuria. The all-cause mortality risk of eGFR and/or proteinuria was much higher in females than in males (P for interaction

Luminescent organic dyes with tuning emission in widely visible gamut are still interesting challenging. Herein, we report two naphthalimide derivatives ( NAPP , NAPTPA ), which can output the variable emission colors covering the whole visible spectra from purple to far-red in aqueous solution. Both naphthalimide derivatives can exhibit bright emission in aqueous solution by introducing a phenyl ring into 4-site of naphthalimide, which acts as a π-bridge in delocalized system and not affects the intramolecular charge transfer process of naphthalimide dyes. Comparison with three analogues ( NAPDMP , NAPMOP and NAPDMA ), we evidenced the bright emissions in aqueous solution are from the amorphous emission different from the common crystal emission of naphthalimide dyes. We further fabricated the NAPP and NAPTPA into different nanoparticles matrixes to construct the multi-color toolbox, which could output four colors (purple, blue, green and red) in aqueous solution and yellow emission in crystal. Moreover, the white emission system was obtained through solution doping method.

Surface modification and deuterium (D) retention in rhenium (Re) doped tungsten (Namely, W-5 wt.% Re) exposed to 100 eV deuterium plasma with a constant flux of 1.8 × 1021 D/m2/s were investigated. All the samples were exposed to D plasma at three types of exposure conditions, namely, exposure with doses of 1.3 × 1025 D/m2 and 2.6 × 1025 D/m2 at 470 K as well as exposure with dose of 5.2 × 1025 D/m2 at 506 K. Before irradiation, it was found that Re doping caused the decreases of hardness and lattice constant. As the samples were exposed to D plasma with the fluence of 1.3 × 1025 D/m2 at 470 K, many deuterium blisters with a size of tens nanometer were observed on surface of pure tungsten (W). While for W-Re alloy, only strip-like nanostructures can be found. Meanwhile, Re doping inhibited the surface blistering but increased total deuterium in W under this exposure condition. As the exposure fluence up to 2.6 × 1025 D/m2, it was found that both the blisters and total deuterium retention in W was restrained by Re doping. As the exposure fluence and temperature increased simultaneously, surface blistering on W-Re alloy was further suppressed compared to pure W.

We report a facile way for continuously tuning the lasing wavelength of an organic solid-state laser by varying the effective refractive index. The effective refractive index of the organic gain medium can be fine controlled by the dopant concentration in the DCJTB:PS film. Continuous wavelength tuning of laser and amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) are achieved in the distributed feedback (DFB) gratings and planar waveguides, respectively. In the DFB laser, laser emission is demonstrated in the red spectral region with a tunable wavelength range of 30 nm, centered at 612 nm. The laser exhibits a well-defined pump threshold and good emission characteristics. Furthermore, ASE with a large wavelength range of 40 nm is also achieved by varying the dopant concentration, thus giving one the freedom to set or tune the lasing wavelength to meet a particular purpose with a common structure. Our results allow for a simple, broadband continuous tuning of the laser emission wavelength.

Background and study aims For bowel preparation, using a reduced volume of polyethylene glycol (PEG) solution without influencing its effectiveness would be preferable. While simethicone shows great potential as an adjunctive agent, data on its use are limited. We aimed to clarify whether simethicone added to low-volume PEG solution improved bowel cleansing. Patients and methods Consecutive adult patients registered for colonoscopy were recruited from seven medical centers in South China between 15 April and 15 July 2015 and prospectively randomized into two groups: 2 L PEG (conventional group) and 2 L PEG plus simethicone (simethicone group). The primary endpoint was the effectiveness of bowel cleansing according to the Boston Bowel Preparation Scale (BBPS). Secondary endpoints included cecal intubation time, adenoma detection rate (ADR), patient safety and compliance, and adverse events. Results We included 290 and 289 patients in the conventional and simethicone groups, respectively, for analysis. The proportion with acceptable bowel cleansing (BBPS ≥ 6) was significantly higher in the simethicone group than in the conventional group (88.2 % vs. 76.6 %; P Conclusions Simethicone added to low-volume PEG solution improves bowel-cleansing efficacy, with similar safety and compliance, shorter cecal intubation time, and higher ADR.

The steering arm has recently been frequently broken in a kind of mining truck with Macpherson suspension. To accelerate replacing the broken parts and minimize the economic cost, a fast calculation method for improving the steering arm is proposed in this paper. In this method, the forces on the steering arm are calculated by quasi-static analysis under a low vehicle velocity. Dynamic characteristics of the tire and road are partly included by considering the ranges of the rolling resistance coefficient and friction coefficient from the empirical values, which determines the torque on the steering arm under extreme conditions. The rigid–flexible coupling model for the left steering mechanism in ANSYS Workbench is established and solved to obtain the distribution stress on the steering arm under extreme conditions. Then, the reliability of the simulation results based on this fast calculation method is verified by the experiment. After determining an improvement scheme considering the economic and time cost, the satisfactory strength is obtained. The results illustrate that the strength of the improved steering arm has nearly doubled. Finally, the effectiveness of the improved steering arm is demonstrated by the users’ feedback after it is manufactured, installed, and used.

Based on stakeholder theory, this study sets up a research framework of value-satisfaction-demand, and chooses Gili Matra Marine Park, Indonesia as a case study to discuss the differences among stakeholders in ecological service value orientation, ecotourism satisfaction and resource development demand of marine park, to test the relationship among value-satisfaction-demand, and to identify relationships and potential conflicts among stakeholders. It shows that: (1) value orientation is a direct predictor of ecotourism satisfaction; (2) tourists' demands for the development of Gili Matra Marine Park are generally lower than that of local residents; (3) local residents' demands for future development are raised according to their professional needs or living needs; (4) the heterogeneity of resource development demands leads to the existence of conflicts. In order to promote the sustainable development of ecotourism in Gili Matra Marine Park, on the one hand, it is necessary to strictly follow the benefit distribution mechanism; on the other hand, it is also desirable to cultivate ecological value orientation.

In order to maintain the internal environment, underwater vehicles continue to emit carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide dissolves in water to form dissolved carbon dioxide wake characteristics. Based on a self-designed and built experimental bench, a model experiment of dissolved carbon dioxide produced by the underwater vehicle was carried out. The effects of carbon dioxide emission flow and speed of the vehicle on the characteristics of dissolved carbon dioxide wake are analysed. The results showed that, due to the carbon dioxide emissions of the underwater vehicle, the area passed by the underwater vehicle formed a wake containing dissolved carbon dioxide. The dissolved carbon dioxide wake of the underwater vehicle lasts for a long time, that is, in the area far behind the underwater vehicle, the characteristic of dissolved carbon dioxide is still obvious enough to be detected by the detector. In addition, the wake characteristics of dissolved carbon dioxide when the propeller is rotating and when it is not moving are compared. The results show that the mixing action of the propeller has a great influence on the characteristic distribution of dissolved carbon dioxide.

Agricultural pest catches on sticky traps can be used for the early detection and identification of hotspots, as well as for estimating relative abundances of adult pests, occurring in greenhouses. This study aimed to construct a detection model for whitefly and thrips from sticky trap images acquired in greenhouse conditions. An end-to-end model, based on the Faster regional-convolutional neural network (R-CNN), termed ‘TPest-RCNN’, was developed to improve the tiny pest detection accuracy. This architecture was trained using a transfer learning strategy on the Common Objects in Context dataset before training on the tiny pest training set to create the TPest-RCNN model. The new model achieved mean F1 score and average precision of 0.944 and 0.952, respectively, on a validation set. The TPest-RCNN model outperformed the Faster R-CNN architecture and other approaches using handcrafted features (color, shape and/or texture) in detecting multiple species from yellow sticky trap images. The test results also showed the model was robust to detect tiny pests on images of different pest densities and light reflections. Using a linear regression between the manual counts and an automatic detection results using the proposed method on images of 41 days, the determination coefficients reached 99.6% and 97.4% for whitefly and thrips, respectively. These results demonstrated that the proposed method could facilitate rapid gathering of information pertaining to numbers of the abundance of tiny pests in greenhouse agriculture and provide a technical reference for pest monitoring and population estimation.

Antimicrobial peptides/proteins are immune-related molecules that are widely distributed in bacteria, fungi, plants, invertebrates and higher animals. They have exhibited great potential to be developed into antimicrobial drugs. The housefly, Musca domestica, lives in a highly contaminated environment and has adapted a robust immune system against various pathogens. As an effort to search for new antimicrobial molecules in the housefly, we investigated the function of an uncharacterized gene firstly by confirming that its expression was induced by infection in M. domestica. The corresponding protein was then shown to have potent antimicrobial activity. Scanning Electron Microscopy data showed that treatment of C. albicans cells with the protein caused cell size decreasing and cell elongation. The results here suggest the protein a novel class of antimicrobial protein and provide new insights into the immunological mechanisms by which M. domestica combats invading C. albicans.