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This study focused on the extraction and analysis of β-glucan, free and bound phenols, total phenolic content (TPC), and total flavonoid content (TFC) from whole grain, rice, and bran of purple and glutinous hulless barley, and assessment of the antioxidant activity of extracts. Ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography (UPLC) quantified various phenolic compounds, including protocatechuic aicd, p-hydroxybenzoic acid, vanillic acid, caffeic acid, vanillin, p-coumaric acid, ferulic acid, sinspic acid, luteolin-7-O-glucuronide, chrysoeriol-7-O-glucuronide, luteolin, chrysoeriol, anthocyanin and 8 types of ferulic acid dimers. The antioxidant activities of free and bound phenolic extracts were evaluated by using DPPH and ABTS+ free radical scavenging assays. The results revealed that β-glucan content was comparable in whole grains and barley rice but significantly higher than that in bran (P

In this paper, we present a novel approach to radiometric normalization for aerial images, effectively addressing both intra- and inter-image color and illumination inconsistencies caused by varying sensor technologies, atmospheric conditions, and ground reflection. We introduce a comprehensive mathematical model for radiance transfer, which addresses brightness inhomogeneities resulting from the Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF) effect and vignetting effect, alongside color inconsistencies due to atmospheric and illumination variations. To enhance the model's efficiency and stability for solutions, we employ a strategy that leverages multiple polynomial models for approximation, significantly simplifying the complexity of rigorous solutions. Our efficient and robust solution leverages advanced radiometric triangulation theories, enabling effective radiometric normalization of aerial images. We validate the efficacy of our method with extensive testing on three large datasets, each containing over two hundred aerial images. The experimental results showcase our method's superiority over state-of-the-art methods, as evidenced by enhanced visual quality and improved quantitative performance in statistical assessments.

Study region: Dongting Lake (DTL), the second largest freshwater lake in China, plays a crucial role in regulating and storing water within the Yangtze River Basin.Study focus: The study utilized the water balance method to extensively investigate the exchange volume of groundwater and DTL from 2003 to 2020. Furthermore, we analyzed the impact of climate change and human activities on the interaction between groundwater and DTL.New hydrological insights for the region: Unlike previous studies, our study further included the ungauged runoff, providing a more comprehensive assessment of the water balance of DTL. From May to July, groundwater recharge from DTL, with an average monthly recharge of 0.71 km³. Conversely, groundwater discharges into DTL from August to April of the following year, with an average monthly discharge of 1.12 km³. The net groundwater discharge into the lake from 2003 to 2020 amounts to 7.98 km³/yr. Intriguingly, precipitation over the lake contributes a mere 0.6% to the total inflow, while lake evapotranspiration constitutes only 0.4% of the total outflow. Inflow runoff and outflow runoff play a leading role in the water balance of DTL, significantly influencing the exchange capacity between the lake and groundwater. Groundwater discharge into the lake serves as compensation for diminished runoff stemming from extreme climate occurrences, like droughts, and anthropogenic actions such as dam construction.

Anthocyanidins and flavonoids are important components in plant. In present study, the anthocyanidins and flavonoids in black hulless barley bran were identified by operating UPLC-QTOF-MS/MS. Among them, chrysoeriol 7-O-glucouronid, luteolin 7-O-glucouronid, chrysoeriol, and luteolin were quantified by using UPLC. Additionally, the total phenolic content (TPC), total flavonoids content (TFC) and total anthocyanin content (TAC) were determined. Furthermore, the antioxidant activity (via ferric reducing, DPPH and ABTS method) and α-glucosidase inhibition effect were estimated. From the results, fifty-one constituents comprised 19 anthocyanidins and 32 flavonoids were detected in hulless barley bran fractions. Wherein compounds 1 and 9–19 (belong to anthocyanidins), and 21, 25–32, 35–42, 44–50 (belong to flavonoids) were first identified in hulless barley. The contents of chrysoeriol 7-O-glucouronid luteolin 7-O-glucouronid, chrysoeriol and luteolin were higher in E80% than that of in E40%, but were not detected in E20%. Another, the TAC exhibited the trend of E40% > E80% > E20%, and the TPC and TFC showed same trend of E40% > E20% > E80%. The higher TPC and TFC showed stronger antioxidant activity. However, no significant correlation between TAC, TPC, TFC and α-glucosidase inhibitory activity was observed. These results provided the anthocyanidins and flavonoids information, antioxidant value and α-glucosidase inhibition potential, which could provide reference in the development of black hulless barley bran.

Identifying the sources of propagation in social networks, such as the misinformation propagation, is one of the key issues recently. Most existing studies assume the underlying propagation model is known, which is difficult to obtain in practice. Recent efforts have been devoted to detect multiple sources in real-world situations, and the social influence of neighbors in the propagation is assumed to be identical. However, this assumption will result in inaccurate results as the infection state of a node is determined by its critical neighbors. In this paper, we fill this gap by capturing social influence of neighbors with structural properties in social networks. For instance, opinions are more likely to spread via closely connected friends within small groups. Here we propose a Motif-based Graph Convolutional Networks for Source Identification (MGCNSI) framework based on the GCN-based source identification approach. Specifically, different network motifs are used to capture different types of structural properties. Then each motif extracts the critical neighbors of a particular type, and a motif-based graph convolutional layer is constructed to aggregate critical neighbors for that motif. To adapt to underlying propagation mechanisms, an attention mechanism for aggregation is designed to automatically assign higher weights to more informative motifs. The empirical results demonstrate that MGCNSI outperforms several benchmark methods on both synthetic and real-world networks. The advantage is most obvious for networks with denser node neighborhoods, where MGCNSI can select critical neighbors from the larger neighbor sets. How the motifs can capture the social influence and the underlying critical paths of propagation is also illustrated.

Abstract High-entropy rare-earth aluminate (Y0.2Yb0.2Lu0.2Eu0.2Er0.2)3Al5O12 (HE-RE3Al5O12) has been considered as a promising thermal protection coating (TPC) material based on its low thermal conductivity and close thermal expansion coefficient to that of Al2O3. However, such a coating has not been experimentally prepared, and its thermal protection performance has not been evaluated. To prove the feasibility of utilizing HE-RE3Al5O12 as a TPC, HE-RE3Al5O12 coating was deposited on a nickelbased superalloy for the first time using the atmospheric plasma spraying technique. The stability, surface, and cross-sectional morphologies, as well as the fracture surface of the HE-RE3Al5O12 coating were investigated, and the thermal shock resistance was evaluated using the oxyacetylene flame test. The results show that the HE-RE3Al5O12 coating can remain intact after 50 cycles at 1200 °C for 200 s, while the edge peeling phenomenon occurs after 10 cycles at 1400 °C for 200 s. This study clearly demonstrates that HE-RE3Al5O12 coating is effective for protecting the nickel-based superalloy, and the atmospheric plasma spraying is a suitable method for preparing this kind of coatings.

The water holding capacity of forest soil plays a crucial role in ensuring forest productivity, particularly in Eucalyptus urophylla plantations. In this study, we investigated the soil water holding capacity and hydrological properties of Eucalyptus in a subtropical area of Guangxi, China. Different stand ages (five years old, seven years old, and 15 years old) and successive rotations (first, second, and third) of Eucalyptus plantations were compared, with Cunninghamia lanceolata (Chinese Fir) and Pinus massoniana (Pine) plantations serving as references. Soil physical properties, soil hydrological parameters, and litter characteristics were analyzed to assess soil water retention and conservation variations. Our findings revealed that Eucalyptus and Chinese Fir plantation forests exhibit superior soil physical characteristics compared to Pine plantations, resulting in better soil water retention. However, an increase in the age of Eucalyptus plantations significantly diminished the capillary water holding capacity of the soil, despite an increase in surface litter accumulation and litter moisture content. Furthermore, successive rotations led to a notable reduction in soil capillary porosity, soil moisture content, soil saturated permeability, and overall soil water holding capacity. In addition, soil bulk density emerged as a critical factor relating to the hydrological characteristics of Eucalyptus plantation forests. Decreasing soil bulk density in Eucalyptus forests may offer potential for optimizing their water retention function. These results reveal that Eucalyptus management practices significantly alter the hydrological properties of soil through their effects on soil and litter properties, and consequently, stand age, rotation, and species mixing should be given intensive attention in maintaining the maximization of soil water holding capacity.

Although the thermal dissipation probe (TDP) method is prominent in forest transpiration studies, the accurate estimation of sap flow density in particular trees with different wood structures remains highly variable. To verify the applicability of the TDP method in the measurement of the transpirational water consumption of shrub communities in degraded karst areas in southern China, Granier’s original formula was validated and corrected using the isolated stem segment method with Celtis sinensis, Xylosma congesta, Triadica sebifera, Paliurus ramosissimus, Pyracantha fortuneana, Sageretia thea, and Phanera championii. Finally, the correction coefficients were analyzed in relation to wood structural parameters. Our study reveals that the sap flow density estimated using Granier’s original formula exhibited varying degrees of overestimation or underestimation compared to the measured sap flow density. The differences ranged from −78.9% to 114.2%, highlighting the need for formula correction. Consequently, we adjusted the coefficients α and β of the original formula (n = 3–5), resulting in a revised range of 0.0047–0.0509 g cm−2 s−1 and 0.5882–1.9821 (R2 = 0.81–0.97), respectively. The conduit diameter was significantly correlated with the correction coefficient α. It is currently unknown whether the results obtained for a particular species can be applied to different growth environments and more prominent individuals of the same species. In conclusion, it is necessary to verify the applicability of Granier’s original formula when estimating water consumption through transpiration in trees.

Refractory Mo–10%Nb sputtering targets play a key role in the electronic integrated circuit and flat panel display industries. However, the fabrication of high-performance Mo–10%Nb sputtering targets is a challenging task. In order to improve the sintering densification and homogeneity of Mo–10%Nb targets, activated Mo–10%Nb solid-solution powders were prepared and characterised in our previous study. In this research, the structural stability, deoxidation characteristics, and sintering behaviours of activated Mo–10%Nb solid-solution powders were investigated. The results revealed that the crystal structure and composition of the activated powders had good stability when stored in vacuum at room temperature for 30 days. Further, the oxygen content of the activated powders was mainly concentrated at the surface, as confirmed by electron probe microanalysis and X-ray photoelectron spectrometry. The oxygen content could be significantly decreased from ∼6000 to ∼3000 ppm by a deoxidation process using Mg as the reductant. Finally, the density of the sintered billet increased from 86.19 to 91.36% upon using the Mo–10%Nb solid-solution powder, and the homogeneity of the composition and microstructure was greatly improved. Moreover, the average grain size decreased from 20.89 to 6.69 μm. This research suggests that activated Mo–10%Nb solid-solution powders can effectively improve the quality of sintered Mo–10%Nb targets.

Background and purposeAs one of the most aggressive malignant tumor in the central nervous system, the main cause of poor outcome of glioblastoma (GBM) is recurrence, a non-invasive method which can predict the area of recurrence pre-operation is necessary.To investigate whether there is radiological heterogeneity within peritumoral edema and identify the reproducible radiomic features predictive of the sites of recurrence of glioblastoma(GBM), which may be of value to optimize patients’ management.Materials and methodsThe clinical information and MR images (contrast-enhanced T1 weighted and FLAIR sequences) of 22 patients who have been histologically proven glioblastoma, were retrospectively evaluated. Kaplan-Meier methods was used for survival analysis. Oedematous regions were manually segmented by an expert into recurrence region, non-recurrence region. A set of 94 radiomic features were obtained from each region using the function of analyzing MR image of 3D slicer. Paired t test was performed to identify the features existing significant difference. Subsequently, the data of two patients from TCGA database was used to evaluate whether these features have clinical value.ResultsTen features with significant differences between the recurrence and non-recurrence subregions were identified and verified on two individual patients from the TCGA database with pathologically confirmed diagnosis of GBM.ConclusionsOur results suggested that heterogeneity does exist in peritumoral edema, indicating that the radiomic features of peritumoral edema from routine MR images can be utilized to predict the sites of GBM recurrence. Our findings may further guide the surgical treatment strategy for GBM.

Abstract Background Soil fungi play crucial roles in ecosystem functions. However, how snow cover change associated with winter warming affects soil fungal communities remains unclear in the Tibetan forest. Methods We conducted a snow manipulation experiment to explore immediate and legacy effects of snow exclusion on soil fungal community diversity and composition in a spruce forest on the eastern Tibetan Plateau. Soil fungal communities were performed by the high throughput sequencing of gene-fragments. Results Ascomycota and Basidiomycota were the two dominant fungal phyla and Archaeorhizomyces, Aspergillus and Amanita were the three most common genera across seasons and snow manipulations. Snow exclusion did not affect the diversity and structure of soil fungal community in both snow-covered and snow-free seasons. However, the relative abundance of some fungal communities was different among seasons. Soil fungal groups were correlated with environmental factors (i.e., temperature and moisture) and soil biochemical variables (i.e., ammonium and enzyme). Conclusions These results suggest that the season-driven variations had stronger impacts on soil fungal community than short-term snow cover change. Such findings may have important implications for soil microbial processes in Tibetan forests experiencing significant decreases in snowfall.

Substoichiometric molybdenum oxide ceramics have aroused widespread interest owing to their promising optical and electrical performance. In this work, the thermal stability and decomposition mechanism of Mo9O26 and Mo4O11 at 700–1000 °C and 700–1100 °C were investigated, respectively. Based on this information, MoOx (2 < x < 3) bulk ceramics were prepared by spark plasma sintering (SPS). The results show that Mo9O26 is stable up to 790 °C in an argon atmosphere. As the temperature rises, it decomposes into Mo4O11. Mo4O11 can exist stably at 830 °C, beyond which it will convert to MoO2. The MoOx ceramic bulks with four different components (MoO2.9, MoO2.8, MoO2.7 and MoO2.6) were successfully sintered by SPS, and their relative density was greater than 96.4% as measured by the Archimedes principle. The reflectivity of MoOx ceramic bulk is low and only 6.3% when the composition is MoO2.8. The resistivity increases from 10−3 to 10−1 Ωcm with the increase in the O/Mo atomic ratio x. In general, the thermal stability information provides a theoretical basis for the processing of MoOx materials, such as the sintering of the MoOx target. The optical and electrical properties show that MoOx is a low-reflective conductive oxide material with great photoelectric application value.

Terrestrial vegetation is the largest contributor of isoprenoids (a group of biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs)) to the atmosphere. BVOC emission data comes mostly from temperate regions, and less is known about BVOC emissions from tropical vegetation, even though it is estimated to be responsible for >70% of BVOC emissions. This review summarizes the available data and our current understanding of isoprenoid emissions from tropical plant species and the spatial and temporal variation in emissions, which are strongly species-specific and regionally variable. Emission models lacking foliar level data for tropical species need to revise their parameters to account for seasonal and diurnal variation due to differences in dependencies on temperature and light of emissions from plants in other ecosystems. More experimental information and determining how emission capacity varies during foliar development are warranted to account for seasonal variations more explicitly.

Determining appropriate master images, reducing radiometric error accumulation, and eliminating outliers from the cloud, water, and land changes, are three main issues in radiometric normalization of multitemporal high-resolution satellite images (HRSI) during mosaicking. However, these three issues have not been simultaneously considered by the existing methods. This article presents a comprehensive radiometric normalization method for multitemporal HRSI using a radiometric block adjustment without master images. Pseudoinvariant features (PIFs) extracted from image pairs using the iteratively reweighted multivariate alteration detection are used as the corresponding pixel observations and organized to form radiometric tie points according to the corresponding horizontal space coordinates. Radiometric error equations are subsequently constructed, and the linear radiometric transformation parameters are solved by a global adjustment. The time-invariant PIFs generally represent the true corresponding features and naturally avoid the cloud, water, and land changes, which can eliminate the effects of outliers. Furthermore, the pixel values of tie points calculated from the weighted average of the corresponding pixel observations are used as virtual radiometric control points to eliminate the dependency on master images. Moreover, a global optimum can be achieved by the global adjustment, effectively overcoming the error accumulation, which is severe in large datasets. Four groups of HRSI datasets from various satellites are used to validate the performance of the proposed method. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method outperforms two state-of-the-art methods and has good applicability and stability, considering both visual effects and quantitative performance.

Aiming at the problem of wind turbine blades' icing, a carbon nanotube composite photothermal coating with both active deicing and passive anti-icing properties was prepared by the spin-coating method. The results indicate that the lubricating coating doped with carbon nanotubes can effectively delay freezing time and reduce ice adhesion strength. The spin-coated 6-layer coating can achieve the best photothermal conversion performance and consume relatively few nanomaterials to maximize the capture of energy in near-infrared light. Under the irradiation of near-infrared light (808 nm), the surface temperature of the coating can reach 97.1°C, which has good photothermal conversion performance. The antifrosting ability of carbon nanotube nanocomposite photothermal coating is related to the content of lubricating oil, and the defrosting performance is related to the content of carbon nanotubes in the coating. Adopting the lubrication-photothermal synergistic deicing method can greatly shorten the deicing time, which is compared with only using photothermal deicing from 392 s to 51 s.

Hulless barley contains phenolic compounds and possesses various antioxidant activities. To clarify the effects of thermal processing and in vitro digestion on the release of phenolic compounds in hulless barley, we studied the phenolic components and antioxidant activities of hulless barley after steaming, roasting processes, and in vitro digestions. Both total phenolic content (TPC) and total flavonoid content (TFC) in raw hulless barley (HB, 4.14 mg/g DW and 1.53 mg/g DW, respectively) were higher than that of steamed hulless barley (SHB) and roasted hulless barley (RHB). In vitro digestion significantly released more ferulic acid from its bound form, but hydrolyzed some amount of flavonoid (luteolin). Chrysoeriol-7-O-glucouronide was significantly detected (412.13 µg/g DW in HB, 382.19 µg/g DW in SHB, and 396.91 µg/g DW in RHB) in all three hulless barley. The total released content of phenolic compounds obtained from each phase after digestion reached to 46% and 45% for SHB and RHB, which was higher than that in the HB (41%). The antioxidant assay (via DPPH and ABTS free radical scavenging assays) indicated that the capacity of HB was obviously higher than that of SHB and RHB in undigested group. For digested group, the ABTS+ assay order was following, undigested > oral > small intestine > gastric > large intestine. The DPPH assay results indicated the antioxidant capacity as the order of undigested > oral > gastric > large intestine. Correlation analysis showed that ferulic acid, chrysoeriol-7-O-glucouronide, luteolin, chrysoeriol, and luteolin-7-O-glucouronide contributed to the antioxidant activities. Hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) grouped samples accordingly. Roasting process could be considered as a better daily thermal treatment for hulless barley than steaming in terms of phenolic compounds and their antioxidant activities.

With the development of the times, the challenge of the construction industry entering Construction 4.0 and surviving in it is still formidable. Although many studies state the importance of effective leadership in the context of Construction 4.0, there is a need to investigate what leadership qualities can effectively provide guidance on leading construction organisations in this era. Through a focused review, this study aims to propose a series of key leadership competencies in the context of Construction 4.0 for guiding the digital transformation and the development of leaders in construction organisations, as well as complementing the existing Construction 4.0 research gap in organisational management. Through in-depth analysis of the retrieved literature, this research extracted and analysed 22 leadership competencies, classified them into four top-level themes (cognition, interpersonal communication, business, and strategy), and discussed the potential relationships among them. Theoretically, the article provides the basis and guidance for future leadership research by redefining and explaining the meaning of each competency. In practice, the paper provides construction industry practitioners with guidance on the development of effective leadership in the era of Construction 4.0.

Litter humification is an essential process of soil carbon sequestration in forest ecosystems, but the relationship between soil fauna and humic substances has not been well understood. Therefore, a field litterbag experiment with manipulation of soil fauna was carried out in different soil frozen seasons over one year in cold forests. The foliar litter of four dominated tree species was selected as Birch (Betula albosinensis), Fir (Abies fargesii var. faxoniana), Willow (Salix paraplesia), and Cypress (Juniperus saltuaria). We studied the contribution of soil fauna to the accumulation of humic substances (including humic acid and fulvic acid) and humification degree as litter humification proceeding. The results showed that soil fauna with litter property and environmental factor jointly determined the accumulation of humic substances (humic acid and fulvic acid) and humification degree of four litters. After one year of incubation, the contribution rates of soil fauna to the accumulation of humic substances were 109.06%, 71.48%, 11.22%, and −44.43% for the litter of fir, cypress, birch, and willow, respectively. Compared with other stages, both growing season and leaf falling stage could be favorable to the contributions of soil fauna to the accumulation of humic substances in the litter of birch, fir, and cypress rather than in willow litter. In contrast, the contribution rates of soil fauna to humification degree were −49.20%, −7.63%, −13.27%, and 12.66% for the litter of fir, cypress, birch, and willow, respectively. Statistical analysis indicated that temperature changes at different sampling stages and litter quality exhibited dominant roles in the contributions of soil fauna on the accumulation of humus and litter humifiaction degree in the cold forests. Overall, the present results highlight that soil fauna could play vital roles in the process of litter humification and those strengths varied among species and seasons.

The heat exchange tubes of solar thermal power generation work in molten salt environment with periodic temperature change. In order to reveal the tensile creep behavior of 12Cr1MoV pipeline steel under high-temperature alkali metal salt environment, the tensile creep behavior of 12Cr1MoV alloy under different applied load and reaction temperature in high-temperature alkali metal chloride salt environment was studied. The results show that the deformation of 12Cr1MoV alloy in 600°C, NaCl-35%KCl mixed salt environment is mainly controlled by diffusion creep; with the increase of stress, the creep life of 12Cr1MoV alloy decreases. The creep fracture mechanism of 12Cr1MoV alloy in 600°C, NaCl-35%KCl mixed salt environment is intergranular ductile fracture; the increase of temperature will enhance the activation and oxidation of the chlorine atoms, thereby accelerating the corrosion of the base metal and increasing the spheroidization speed of the pearlite matrix, and the creep deformation rate of the alloy increases with increasing temperature.

Abstract Background The harsh environment on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau gives Tibetan hulless barley (Hordeum vulgare var. nudum) great ability to resist adversities such as drought, salinity, and low temperature, and makes it a good subject for the analysis of drought tolerance mechanism. To elucidate the specific gene networks and pathways that contribute to its drought tolerance, and for identifying new candidate genes for breeding purposes, we performed a transcriptomic analysis using two accessions of Tibetan hulless barley, namely Z772 (drought-tolerant) and Z013 (drought-sensitive). Results There were more up-regulated genes of Z772 than Z013 under both mild (5439-VS-2604) and severe (7203-VS-3359) dehydration treatments. Under mild dehydration stress, the pathways exclusively enriched in drought-tolerance genotype Z772 included Protein processing in endoplasmic reticulum, tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle, Wax biosynthesis, and Spliceosome. Under severe dehydration stress, the pathways that were mainly enriched in Z772 included Carbon fixation in photosynthetic organisms, Pyruvate metabolism, Porphyrin and chlorophyll metabolism. The main differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in response to dehydration stress and genes whose expression was different between tolerant and sensitive genotypes were presented in this study, respectively. The candidate genes for drought tolerance were selected based on their expression patterns. Conclusions The RNA-Seq data obtained in this study provided an initial overview on global gene expression patterns and networks that related to dehydration shock in Tibetan hulless barley. Furthermore, these data provided pathways and a targeted set of candidate genes that might be essential for deep analyzing the molecular mechanisms of plant tolerance to drought stress.

Abstract How forest management practice impacts the temperature response of soil carbon decomposition remains unclear in Tibetan boreal forests. Here, an experiment was conducted to compare soil carbon decomposition of two layers (organic and mineral) in three Tibetan forests (natural forest, NF; secondary forest, SF; spruce plantation, PF). Soils were incubated at two temperatures (10 °C and 20 °C) for 219 days. Increased temperature often stimulated carbon decomposition rates of organic layer but did not affect them in the mineral soils. Soil carbon decomposition rates in the organic layer followed a pattern of NF > SF > PF over the incubation period. Regardless of forest type, soil carbon decomposition rates and temperature coefficient (Q 10) were higher in the organic layers compared to mineral soils. Moreover, forest type conversion increased Q 10 values in each soil layer. Taken together, our results suggest that forest management practice has much stronger impacts on biochemical properties in the organic layers relative to mineral soils. Moreover, the temperature responses of soil carbon decomposition depend largely on forest management practice and soil layer in this specific area.

This paper addresses the load balancing problem, which is one of the key issues in high-performance computing (HPC) platforms. A novel method, called decentralized active queue management (DAQM), is proposed to provide a fair task distribution in a heterogeneous computing environment for HPC platforms. An implementation of the DAQM is presented, which consists of an ON-OFF queue control and a utility maximization-based coordination scheme. The stability of the queue control scheme and the convergence of the algorithm for utility maximization have been assessed by rigorous analysis. To demonstrate the performance of the developed queueing control system, numerical simulations are carried out and the obtained results confirm the efficiency and viability of the developed scheme.

The ice coating on the blade surface of wind turbine in winter seriously affects the operation safety and power generation efficiency of wind turbine, and anti icing and deicing is an urgent technical problem. In this paper, a super-hydrophobic anti-icing coating was prepared by fluorination modification, and the effect of the addition of perfluoropolyether (PFPE) and ZnO on the performance of the coating was studied. The research results show that the addition of PFPE reduces the surface energy of the coating from 18.12 mJ m ^−2 at 0% to 13.22 mJ m ^−2 at 15%. The surface free energy has a linear relationship with the binding force of icing. With the increase of the amount of PFPE, the contact angle of the coating increases, the sliding angle decreases, and the delayed icing performance improves. When the amount of PFPE reaches 15%, the contact angle reaches the highest value of 158°, and the sliding angle is 2°; adding PFPE coating, the freezing delay time can reach 107.1 s. The addition of PFPE can effectively reduce the icing strength, and the icing bonding force of the coating is reduced to 0.59 N at 15%. The addition of a amount of ZnO can greatly change the microstructure of the coating surface, thereby changing its superhydrophobicity. The fluorinated superhydrophobicity coating modified by the addition and removal of ZnO has obvious anti-icing performance. The 6 wt% sample has the best delayed icing energy.

Litter decomposition plays a critical role in regulating biogeochemical cycles in terrestrial ecosystems and is profoundly impacted by increasing atmospheric nitrogen (N) deposition. Here, a N manipulation experiment was conducted to explore the effects of N additions (0 kg N ha−1 yr−1, 20 kg N ha−1 yr−1 and 40 kg N ha−1 yr−1) on decay rates and nutrients release of two contrasting species, the evergreen and nutrient-poor Michelia wilsonii and the deciduous and nutrient-rich Camptotheca acuminata, using a litterbag approach at the western edge of the Sichuan Basin of China. The decay rate and the mineralization of N and phosphorus (P) was faster in nutrient-rich C. acuminata litter than in nutrient-poor M. wilsonii litter, regardless of N regimes. N additions tended to decrease the decay constant (k value) in M. wilsonii litter, but had no effect on C. acuminata litter. N additions had no significant effects on carbon (C) release of both litter types. N additions showed negative effects on N and P release of M. wilsonii litter, particularly in the late decomposition stage. Moreover, for C. acuminata litter, N additions did not affect N release, but retarded P release in the late stage. N additions did not affect the C:N ratio in both litter types. However, N additions—especially high-N addition treatments—tended to reduce C:P and N:P ratios in both species. The effect of N addition on N and P remaining was stronger in M. wilsonii litter than in C. acuminata litter. The results of this study indicate that N additions retarded the nutrients release of two foliar litters. Thus, rising N deposition might favor the retention of N and P via litter decomposition in this specific area experiencing significant N deposition.

Partitioning the components of soil respiration is crucial to understand and model carbon cycling in forest ecosystems. In this study, total soil respiration (RS), autotrophic respiration (RA), heterotrophic respiration (RH), litter respiration (RL), litterfall input and environmental factors were synchronously monitored for 2 years in a subtropical Michelia wilsonii forest of southwestern China. RH rates were often higher than RA rates during the two years except for the middle growing season (from July to September). The mean rate of Rs, RA, RH and RL was 1.94 μmol m-1 s-1, 0.85 μmol m-1 s-1, 1.09 μmol m-1 s-1 and 0.65 μmol m-1 s-1, respectively, during the 2-year experiment. Annual CO2 emission derived from RA, RH and RL was 3.26 Mg C ha-1 a-1, 4.67 Mg C ha-1 a-1 and 2.61 Mg C ha-1 a-1, respectively, which accounted for 41.4%, 58.6% and 32.9% of RS. Over the experimental period, the ratio of RA/RS increased with soil temperature but the opposite was true for RH/RS and RL/RS. The Q10 value was 2.01, 4.01, 1.34 and 1.30, respectively, for RS, RA, RH and RL. Path analysis indicated that environmental variables and litterfall production together explained 82.0%, 86.8%, 42.9% and 34.7% variations of monthly fluxes of RS, RA, RH and RL, respectively. Taken together, our results highlight the differential responses of the components of RS to environmental variables.

Forest land-use changes have long been suggested to profoundly affect soil microbial communities. However, how forest type conversion influences soil microbial properties remains unclear in Tibetan boreal forests. The aim of this study was to explore variations of soil microbial profiles in the surface organic layer and subsurface mineral soil among three contrasting forests (natural coniferous forest, NF; secondary birch forest, SF and spruce plantation, PT). Soil microbial biomass, activity and community structure of the two layers were investigated by chloroform fumigation, substrate respiration and phospholipid fatty acid analysis (PLFA), respectively. In the organic layer, both NF and SF exhibited higher soil nutrient levels (carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus), microbial biomass carbon and nitrogen, microbial respiration, PLFA contents as compared to PT. However, the measured parameters in the mineral soils often did not differ following forest type conversion. Irrespective of forest types, the microbial indexes generally were greater in the organic layer than in the mineral soil. PLFAs biomarkers were significantly correlated with soil substrate pools. Taken together, forest land-use change remarkably altered microbial community in the organic layer but often did not affect them in the mineral soil. The microbial responses to forest land-use change depend on soil layer, with organic horizons being more sensitive to forest conversion.

A novel hot embossing/low temperature ethanol solvent bonding method for the fabrication of polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) field flow fractionation devices has been developed. The separation channel on a PMMA substrate was generated by a hot embossing process without vacuum. Special temperature-pressure profiles were used to analyze the influence of the hot embossing parameters. After the hot embossing process, ethanol solvent bonding was used to seal the separation channel on the PMMA substrate. The experimental results show that the bonding strength with ethanol solvent bonding at 35 °C (aspect ratio (depth/width): 0.043) is 3.05 MPa, and the deformation percentage is very low (0.54%). A burst pressure test indicated that the as-prepared PMMA gravitational field flow fractionation device has a very high burst pressure. Furthermore, the higher resolution of the as-prepared PMMA gravitational field flow fractionation device in the separation of wheat and starch particles shows that the hot embossing/low temperature ethanol solvent bonding technique will have potential commercial value.

Displacement of distal ventriculo-atrial (VA) shunt is not uncommon. However, misplacement of the distal catheter of VA shunt in the internal jugular vein is a possibility, especially when conducted without intraoperative monitoring. We describe a patient in whom a VA shunt was performed due to failure of ventriculo-peritoneal shunt and the distal catheter of the shunt was found to be misplaced in the left internal jugular vein. Endovascular intervention via femoral vein was used to retrieve the distal catheter.

AIM: To evaluate the safety and efficacy of robotic gastrectomy versus open gastrectomy for gastric cancer. METHODS: A comprehensive search of PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, and Web of Knowledge was performed. Systematic review was carried out to identify studies comparing robotic gastrectomy and open gastrectomy in gastric cancer. Intraoperative and postoperative outcomes were also analyzed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of the surgery. A fixed effects model or a random effects model was utilized according to the heterogeneity. RESULTS: Four studies involving 5780 patients with 520 (9.00%) cases of robotic gastrectomy and 5260 (91.00%) cases of open gastrectomy were included in this meta-analysis. Compared to open gastrectomy, robotic gastrectomy has a significantly longer operation time (weighted mean differences (WMD) =92.37, 95% confidence interval (CI): 55.63 to 129.12, P