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Inspired by origami shape, two origami tubes are obtained through the arrangement of single-origami-cell structures (SOSs). Under quasi-static compression load, the specific energy absorption (SEA) value of same direction origami tube (SOT) is 13.46% higher than that of reverse origami tube (ROT). ROT shows the deformation mode of compression rotation, and SOT is layer by layer crushing. Various two-, three-, and four-layer origami structures are proposed through the combination of origami tubes and connecting plates, and their energy absorption efficiency is significantly higher than that of origami tubes. These origami structures exhibit stable deformation modes, mainly axial compression, torsion, and mixed deformation modes. The deformation mode of origami structures with four ROTs (4R) is similar to Fried Dough Twists. Regarding two-layer structures, origami structures consisting of reverse SOTs (RSOTs) and SOTs have significantly higher SEA values than those composed of ROTs and SOTs as well as ROTs and RSOTs. In addition, the compression performance of two-layer origami structures is significantly better than that of three- and four-layer origami structures. The SEA value of two-layer origami structure with two RSOTs and two SOTs (2RS2S) is higher than that of three-layer origami structure with four A cells (4A) and four-layer origami structure with one C cell and three D cells (1C3D) 68.05% and 64.48%, respectively. In summary, the origami structures show excellent mechanical properties and have broad application potential as energy absorbing structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Supply chain risk management is crucial for the management of sports goods companies, which can help enterprises better complete the transparent and efficient management of the whole process from production to sales. However, there are inevitably some potential risks. Thereby, to study the supply chain risk management of badminton supplies companies in the general environment, the supply chain risk evaluation index system of badminton supplies companies is established in this study by studying the connotation of supply chain risk management and combining the steps of fuzzy comprehensive evaluation (FCE) method. Then, according to these evaluation indexes, the modelling process of the classification and regression tree (CART) algorithm in the corporate overall supply chain risk decision tree is proposed. Moreover, the corporate overall supply chain risk decision tree is established. Moreover, the financial data of 10 A‐share listed companies of badminton and other sports goods listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange in 2020 are selected as the sample dataset for model training and testing. The potential risks of badminton enterprises are predicted. The results show that the scale of badminton enterprises has been increasing gradually since 2018, but the return on total assets has steadily decreased with the increase of years. It shows that the badminton supplies enterprise's input and output assets are unbalanced, and the overall asset operation effect is relatively poor. However, the growth rate of total assets shows a significant upward trend from 2018 to 2020, rising from 4% to 12.69%. It indicates that the corporate investment and domestic and foreign investment expansion in recent years are high‐speed. The FCE method is employed to obtain the maximum eigenvalue λmax of the enterprise, which is 5.4698. Then, the C.I value is 0.1205, the R.I value is 1.12, and the consistency ratio value is 0.0958 < 0.1, indicating that the judgement matrix is acceptable. It suggests that under the influence of the macro environment and economic situation, the sales situation of the badminton supplies company is subtly affected by the macro environment, and there is a great business risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Patients with degenerative spinal deformity often experience symptoms that seriously affect their quality of life, such as low back pain and dysfunction. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between paravertebral muscle function and pelvic incidence (PI) and their effect on health-related quality of life (HRQL) in patients with degenerative spinal deformity. Methods: A total of 112 patients with degenerative spinal deformity in Southwest Hospital (Chongqing, China) were enrolled. They were divided into groups according to PI angle: high (PI > 60°, n = 37), normal (PI 50°–60°, n = 31), and low (PI < 50°, n = 44). Paravertebral muscle strength and endurance were assessed using the prone external fixation test frame. The sagittal vertical axis (SVA) was measured on X-rays of the spine in an anterolateral position, and all subjects were assessed with the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI), Roland–Morris questionnaire (RMQ), and 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36). Pearson or Spearman coefficients were used to assess the relationship of paravertebral muscle function with SVA, PI, and health-related quality of life. Results: Maximal voluntary exercise (MVE) in the high-PI group was significantly lower than the MVE of both the normal- and low-PI groups (p < 0.05). There was no significant difference in MVE between the normal- and low-PI groups (p > 0.05). There was no significant difference in endurance time, SVA, ODI, RMQ, and SF-36 among the three groups. Paravertebral muscle MVE was negatively correlated with PI, SVA, ODI, and RMQ (r = − 0.193, − 0.210, − 0.283, − 0.277, p < 0.05). Endurance time of paravertebral muscle was also negatively correlated with SVA, ODI, and RMQ (r = − 0.200, − 0.420, − 0.348, p < 0.05) and positively correlated with SF-36 (r = 0.245, p < 0.05). In addition, paravertebral muscle MVE was positively correlated with the physical functioning score of the SF-36 (r = 0.251, p < 0.05), and the endurance time of paravertebral muscle was positively correlated with the physical functioning, physical role, bodily pain, and social function scores of the SF-36 (r = 0.342, 0.230, 0.209, 0.256, p < 0.05). Conclusions: High PI may serve as a risk factor for decreased paraspinal muscle strength in patients with degenerative spinal deformities. Early and targeted exercises focusing on paraspinal muscle strength and endurance could potentially be of positive significance in slowing down the progression of sagittal imbalance, alleviating functional disorders, and increasing health-related quality of life in patients with degenerative spinal deformity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Community detection plays an important role in analyzing attributed networks. It attempts to find the optimal cluster structures to identify valuable information. Although deep nonnegative matrix factorization (DNMF) is widely used in community detection, it cannot be used to analyze attributed networks since only topology information is considered. Recent researches have taken attribute information into account, but we still need to face the following challenges. First, it is difficult to deal with topology noise and attribute noise in attributed networks at one stroke. Second, we need to balance the coupling between topology and node attributes with hyperparameters in most methods. However, with inappropriate hyperparameters, it is easy to cause interference and compromise between them. For the above challenges, in this paper, we propose a novel method, namely adaptive deep nonnegative matrix factorization. Specifically, we handle the inherent noise of attributed networks via dual-DNMF with autoencoder. And then, we use the attention mechanism to adaptively integrate topology information and attribute information without adjusting hyperparameters manually. Overall, our method not only handles the inherent noise in attributed networks, but also resolves the interference and compromise between topology and attributes in a generalized way. The results of comprehensive experiments support our conclusions and demonstrate that our method outperforms the state-of-the-art methods in most datasets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies have shown that perioperative dexmedetomidine could reduce the incidence of postoperative AKI in cardiovascular surgery, however, its effectiveness in the non-cardiovascular surgery patient population has not been reported. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of intraoperative dexmedetomidine on the incidence of postoperative AKI and postoperative ICU admissions in patients undergoing non-cardiovascular surgery. A single-center retrospective cohort study obtained from the database of the Center for Anesthesia and Surgery, the Third Xiangya Hospital. Inpatients between 18 and 75 years of age who were admitted to our hospital for non-cardiovascular surgery from 2012 to 2019. Overall 2391 patients who used dexmedetomidine intraoperatively were analyzed in comparison to 4552 patients who did not use dexmedetomidine after one-to-two matching. The two cohorts had similar baseline values and demographic characteristics. The incidence of AKI was lower in patients with intraoperative dexmedetomidine use than in the nonuse group (OR 0.60, p <.001). The rate of severe renal failure needing dialysis was also lower than in the nonuse group (β = –0.02, p <.05). After adjusting for confounding factors, the rate of AKI was still lower in the dexmedetomidine group. The rate of postoperative ICU admissions and in-hospital deaths were similar in the two groups (p >.05). For non-cardiovascular surgery patient population, intraoperative use of dexmedetomidine was associated with a lower incidence and less severity of postoperative AKI. However, there was no significant correlation with postoperative ICU occupancy or in-hospital mortality. Further prospective RCTs are needed in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A green and efficient method for the construction of functionalized 2,3-dihydrothiophene derivatives in water was reported. In this work, Novozym 435 acted as a remarkable biocatalyst in catalyzing the four-component reaction of aldehydes, malonitrile or ethyl cyanoacetate, 1,3-thiazolidinedione, and amines under mild conditions. Excellent yields (85–95%) of all the corresponding products could be obtained in reasonable reaction time. Moreover, Novozym 435 could be reused for six cycles with a yield of at least 80%. The rationality of this multicomponent reaction mechanism was also verified via control experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research systematically analyzes the behaviors of correlations among stock prices and the eigenvalues for correlation matrices by utilizing random matrix theory (RMT) for Chinese and US stock markets. Results suggest that most eigenvalues of both markets fall within the predicted distribution intervals by RMT, whereas some larger eigenvalues fall beyond the noises and carry market information. The largest eigenvalue represents the market and is a good indicator for averaged correlations. Further, the average largest eigenvalue shows similar movement with the index for both markets. The analysis demonstrates the fraction of eigenvalues falling beyond the predicted interval, pinpointing major market switching points. It has identified that the average of eigenvector components corresponds to the largest eigenvalue switch with the market itself. The investigation on the second largest eigenvalue and its eigenvector suggests that the Chinese market is dominated by four industries whereas the US market contains three leading industries. The study later investigates how it changes before and after a market crash, revealing that the two markets behave differently, and a major market structure change is observed in the Chinese market but not in the US market. The results shed new light on mining hidden information from stock market data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the facts that numerous regions with initially similar economic conditions end up with different levels of entrepreneurial agglomeration, this paper constructs a model assuming that the sequential entrants make their career choices based on existing entrepreneurial ratio and describing the dynamics of entrepreneurial agglomeration formation. After mathematical analysis and numerical simulation using NetLogo, it is found that under social selection, a nonlinear Polya process with self-reinforcing and path-dependency characters will emerge, and the repeated entrants' career choices will lead to the agglomeration of entrepreneurship; the agent's risk compensation value, the initial population of agents, the number of role models in the early stage and the initial entrepreneurial ratio are determinants to the formation of entrepreneurial agglomeration. The findings confirm that entrepreneurship has "memory" and the entrepreneurial history could have influence on the future. In order to forge the entrepreneurial agglomeration, our suggestions include exerting influence on the determinants from an early age, and improving the individual's risk-taking abilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Oats (Avena sativa L.) are a widely consumed functional cereal grain worldwide and have recently gained increasing attention due to their numerous health benefits. Oats are an excellent natural source of bioactive compounds, including β-glucan, and have broad application prospects for the development of functional foods or health products to prevent and treat of diabetes. In this review, oat bioactive compounds, including proteins, peptides, amino acids, β-glucans, resistant starch, dietary fibers, polyunsaturated fatty acids, vitamins, minerals, polyphenols, avenanthramides, oat saponins, and β-sitosterol are summarized, and their important biological functions are discussed, focusing on the relevant mechanisms of action. Due to their various bioactive ingredients, oats exhibit antioxidant, anti-diabetic, anti-microbial, anti-cancer, anti-hypertensive, immunomodulatory, anti-hyperlipidemic, anti-obesity, and cardioprotective properties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: Differentiating mesial temporal lobe epilepsy (MTLE) and neocortical temporal lobe epilepsy (NTLE) remains challenging. Our study characterized the metabolic profiles between MTLE and NTLE and their correlation with surgical prognosis using 18F‐FDG‐PET. Methods: A total of 137 patients with intractable temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) and 40 age‐matched healthy controls were recruited. Patients were divided into the MTLE group (N = 91) and the NTLE group (N = 46). 18F‐FDG‐PET was used to measure the metabolism of regional cerebra, which was analyzed using statistical parametric mapping. The volume of abnormal metabolism in cerebral regions and their relationship with surgical prognosis were calculated for each surgical patient. Results: The cerebral hypometabolism of MTLE was limited to the ipsilateral temporal and insular lobes (p < 0.001, uncorrected). The NTLE patients showed hypometabolism in the ipsilateral temporal, frontal, and parietal lobes (p < 0.001, uncorrected). The MTLE patients showed extensive hypermetabolism in cerebral regions (p < 0.001, uncorrected). Hypermetabolism in NTLE was limited to the contralateral temporal lobe and cerebellum, ipsilateral frontal lobe, occipital lobe, and bilateral thalamus (p < 0.001, uncorrected). Among patients who underwent resection of epileptic lesions, 51 (67.1%) patients in the MTLE group and 10 (43.5%) in the NTLE group achieved Engel class IA outcome (p = 0.041). The volumes of metabolic increase for the frontal lobe or thalamus in the MTLE group were larger in non‐Engel class IA patients than Engel class IA patients (p < 0.05). Conclusions: The spatial metabolic profile discriminated NTLE from MTLE. Hypermetabolism of the thalamus and frontal lobe in MTLE may facilitate preoperative counseling and surgical planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humanity has always benefited from an intercapillary study in the quantification of natural occurrences in mathematics and other pure scientific fields. Graph theory was extremely helpful to other studies, particularly in the applied sciences. Specifically, in chemistry, graph theory made a significant contribution. For this, a transformation is required to create a graph representing a chemical network or structure, where the vertices of the graph represent the atoms in the chemical compound and the edges represent the bonds between the atoms. The quantity of edges that are incident to a vertex determines its valency (or degree) in a graph. The degree of uncertainty in a system is measured by the entropy of a probability. This idea is heavily grounded in statistical reasoning. It is primarily utilized for graphs that correspond to chemical structures. The development of some novel edge-weighted based entropies that correspond to valency-based topological indices is made possible by this research. Then these compositions are applied to clay mineral tetrahedral sheets. Since they have been in use for so long, corresponding indices are thought to be the most effective methods for quantifying chemical graphs. This article develops multiple edge degree-based entropies that correlate to the indices and determines how to modify them in order to assess the significance of each type. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel network with Wavelet denoising-GARCHSK and Mixed CoVaR method is proposed to construct full-sample and dynamic networks for investigating the risk spillover effects across international crude oil and Chinese stock sectors before and after the COVID-19 outbreak. The empirical results denote that the total bidirectional oil-sector risk spillover effects increase rapidly after the COVID-19 outbreak. Interestingly, sectors shift from net risk receivers to net risk contributors in the oil-sector risk transfer effects during the pandemic period. Second, unlike the pre-COVID-19 period, Shanghai crude (SC) replaces Brent as the largest oil risk transmitter to stocks during the COVID-19 period. Third, there are notable sectoral features in the oil-sector risk spillovers, which differ across different periods. After the burst, Energy has an incredibly weak connection with crude oil, while the sectors, which oil products are input for, become close with crude oil. Far more surprising is that the petroleum-independent sectors have increasing closer risk transfer effects with crude, even becoming the largest risk contributors to oil, after that. Finally, the oil-sector relationships during the same period are time-varying but stable. This paper provides policymakers and investors with new method and insight into the oil-sector relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The work considers traveling wave optical solutions for the nonlinear generalized fractional KMN equation. This equation is considered for describing pulse propagation in optical fibers and communication systems using two quite similar approaches, based on the expansion of these solutions in the exponential or polynomial forms. Both approaches belong to the direct solving class of methods for PDEs and suppose the use of an auxiliary equation. The solutions acquired in this paper are obtained from first- and second-order differential equations that act as auxiliary equations. In addition, we generated 3D, contour, and 2D plots to illustrate the characteristics of the obtained soliton solutions. To create these plots, we carefully selected appropriate values for the relevant parameters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ultrathin vapor chambers (VCs) are the most typically used heat-sink components in the development of thin and light electronic products. In this study, microgrooved aluminum wicks with multi-scale structures fabricated by two-step laser processing are developed to enhancing the performance of ultrathin VCs. The multi-scale microgroove wick is composed of the main groove and the multi-scale microstructures that include cluster particles, the gradient structure, and holes formed between cluster particles. The effects of the second step laser processing scan interval and the scan number on the surface morphology, wettability, capillary rise rate, and capillary performance parameters of the multi-scale microgroove structured wicks are investigated. The second-step laser processing changes the morphology of the main groove surface, which affects the wettability of the multi-scale microgroove structure. When the scan interval of second step laser processing is 0.05 mm and the scan number is 1, the droplets on the surface of the multi-scale microgrooves are completely immersed within 23.5 ms, which is 80.6% less than all the time of A1. In addition, the capillary rise velocity of the two-step laser processing multi-scale microgroove structure in the initial 3 s is 150% higher than that of the one-step laser processed microgroove wick, and the capillary performance parameters K/Reff improves by 114.15%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, we find that Al cladding on Nb microstrip resonators is an efficient way to suppress nonlinear responses induced by local Joule heating, resulting in improved microwave power handling capability. This improvement is likely due to the proximity effect between the Al and the Nb layers. The proximity effect is found to be controllable by tuning the thickness of the Al layer. We show that improving the film quality is also helpful as it enhances the microwave critical current density, but it cannot eliminate the local heating. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As one of the most important components of urban space, an outdated inventory of road-side trees may misguide managers in the assessment and upgrade of urban environments, potentially affecting urban road quality. Therefore, automatic and accurate instance segmentation of road-side trees from urban point clouds is an important task in urban ecology research. However, previous works show under- or over-segmentation effects for road-side trees due to overlapping, irregular shapes and incompleteness. In this paper, a deep learning framework that combines semantic and instance segmentation is proposed to extract single road-side trees from vehicle-mounted mobile laser scanning (MLS) point clouds. In the semantic segmentation stage, the ground points are filtered to reduce the processing time. Subsequently, a graph-based semantic segmentation network is developed to segment road-side tree points from the raw MLS point clouds. For the individual tree segmentation stage, a novel joint instance and semantic segmentation network is adopted to detect instance-level roadside trees. Two complex Chinese urban point cloud scenes are used to evaluate the individual urban tree segmentation performance of the proposed method. The proposed method accurately extract approximately 90% of the road-side trees and achieve better segmentation results than existing published methods in both two urban MLS point clouds. Living Vegetation Volume (LVV) calculation can benefit from individual tree segmentation. The proposed method provides a promising solution for ecological construction based on the LVV calculation of urban roads. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Mitophagy is used by eukaryotic cells to eliminate damaged mitochondria. The deregulation of this process can lead to an accumulation of dysfunctional mitochondria and is implicated in carcinogenesis and tumorigenesis. Despite increasing evidence that mitophagy is involved in the development of colon cancer, the role of mitophagy-related genes (MRGs) in colon adenocarcinoma (COAD) prognosis and treatment remains largely unknown. Methods: Differential analysis was used to identify differentially expressed mitophagy-related genes associated with COAD and conduct key module screening. Cox regression and least absolute shrinkage selection operator, and other analyses were used to characterize prognosis-related genes and verify the feasibility of the model. The model was tested using GEO data and a nomogram was constructed for future clinical application. The level of immune cell infiltration and immunotherapy were compared between the two groups, and sensitivity to treatment with many commonly used chemotherapeutic agents was assessed in individuals with different risk factors. Finally, qualitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction and western blotting were performed to assess the expression of prognosis-related MRGs. Results: A total of 461 differentially expressed genes were mined in COAD. Four prognostic genes, PPARGC1A, SLC6A1, EPHB2, and PPP1R17, were identified to construct a mitophagy-related gene signature. The feasibility of prognostic models was assessed using Kaplan-Meier analysis, time-dependent receiver operating characteristics, risk scores, Cox regression analysis, and principal component analysis. At 1, 3, and 5 years, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curves were 0.628, 0.678, and 0.755, respectively, for TCGA cohort, and 0.609, 0.634, and 0.640, respectively, for the GEO cohort. Drug sensitivity analysis found that camptothecin, paclitaxel, bleomycin, and doxorubicin were significantly different between low- and high-risk patients. The qPCR and western blotting results of clinical samples further confirmed the public database results. Conclusions: This study successfully constructed a mitophagy-related gene signature with significant predictive value for COAD, informing new possibilities for the treatment of this disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Seropositive for both anti-AChR and anti-titin were more frequent in very late-onset MG. • Comorbid thymoma was rarely seen in very late-onset MG group. • The patients in very late-onset MG group showed poor therapeutic responses. • Close monitoring is very crucial for very late-onset patients to prevent relapse. • Non-immunotherapy may associate with a poor prognosis in the very late-onset group. Alteration in onset-age distribution in myasthenia gravis (MG) and its increasing prevalence among the elderly underscores the need for a better understanding of the clinical course of MG and the establishment of personalized treatment. In this study we reviewed the demographics, clinical profile, and treatment of MG. Based on onset age, eligible patients were classified as early-onset MG (onset age ≥18 and <50 years), late-onset MG (onset age ≥50 and <65 years), and very late-onset MG (onset age ≥65 years). Overall, 1160 eligible patients were enrolled. Patients with late- and very late-onset MG showed a male predominance (P =0.02), ocular MG subtype (P =0.001), and seropositivity for acetylcholine receptors and titin antibodies (P <0.001). In very late-onset MG, a lower proportion of patients retained minimal manifestations status or better, a higher proportion of patients had MG-related deaths (P <0.001), and a shorter maintenance time of minimal manifestation status or better was seen at the last follow-up (P =0.007) than that in patients with early- and late-onset MG. Non-immunotherapy may associated with a poor prognosis in patients in the very late-onset group. Further studies on very late-onset MG patients should be performed to evaluate the relationship between immunotherapy and prognosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the synchronization issue for uncertain multi-link complex networks incorporating stochastic characteristics and hybrid delays. Unlike previous works, internal delays, coupling delays, and stochastic delays considered in our model change over time; meanwhile, the impulse strength and position change with time evolution. To actualize network synchronization, a strategy called hybrid impulsive pinning control is applied, which combines the virtue of impulsive control and pinning control as well as two categories of impulses (i.e., synchronization and desynchronization). By decomposing the complicated topological structures into diagonal items and off-diagonal items, multiple nonlinear coupling terms are linearly decomposed in the process of theoretical analysis. Combining inequality technology and matrix decomposition theory, several novel synchronization criteria have been gained to ensure synchronization for the concerning multi-link model. The criteria get in touch with the uncertain strengths, coupling strengths, hybrid impulse strengths, delay sizes, impulsive intervals, and network topologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because the traditional methods do not select the best feature collection in feature analysis, the accuracy and effectiveness of user feature clustering are not high, and the accuracy of user feature classification is not high. Therefore, this paper proposes a customer feature analysis method based on power consumption feature selection and behavior portrait of different people. The optimal feature set is obtained according to the maximum correlation and minimum redundancy criterion, and the user portrait task is described. The spatial feature domain classification method is used to classify the user portrait information, and the user label database is constructed according to the classification results. The AP clustering algorithm is used to cluster the power user portrait information and complete the customer feature analysis. Experimental results show that this method effectively improves the accuracy and effectiveness of user feature clustering, and the accuracy of user feature classification is high, indicating that the application effect is good. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench) is a raw material that can be used as food, feed, bioenergy, and wine; it is also a gramineous crop with drought, salt, waterlogging, and high temperature resistance. However, liquor-making sorghum faces the disadvantages of having a narrow genetic basis, poor resources, and few high-quality varieties. Ethyl methane sulfonate (EMS) is a common alkylating agent that can react with one or more bases to alkylate and cause changes in the molecular structure of DNA, thereby causing mutations. It has a minimum effect on organisms and the highest efficiency. The obtained mutant populations are of great significance for cultivating new plant varieties and enriching plant germplasm resources. Therefore, in this study, 'Hongyingzi' a liquor-making sorghum variety, was studied using seeds treated with 0.5% EMS and 415 M3 generation plants were obtained. (1) Investigation and statistical analysis of agronomic traits in mutant libraries showed that in the M3 generation, nine important phenotypic mutant lines were obtained, including plant type, leaf blade, spike, glume, growth period, fertility, plant height, and drought resistance. The variation frequency from high to low was as follows: glume color (75.42%) > spike type (54.70%) > spike shape (47.23%) > chaff coating degree (28%) > plant growth period (23.86%) > plant height (23.61%) > absorption degree (16.14%) > branchiness (10.84%) > leaf color (4.58%) > tillering (2.16%). (2) The PCR sequencing of SbGA2ox3 from 415 sorghum M3 plants revealed that the mutation frequency of SbGA2ox3 was 1/99.02 kb. Eight plants underwent mutations, but only one line experienced missense mutations of different amino acid types, changing Ser/Ala/Val/Leu/Gln/Ser/Pro/Ala to Asn/Thr/Gly/Val/Gln/Ala/Ser. The mutant line also had shorter plant height, reduced glume coating degree, and enhanced drought resistance. The constructions of the sorghum mutant library widened the sorghum germplasm library and provided a method for sorghum breeding with a molecular basis for the functional verification of related genes and the analysis of related regulatory networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Haptic slippage is a frequently encountered and technically demanding complication in Yamane's surgery. The slipped haptic could be regained when bimanual operations are workable. Management of haptic slippage is difficult when the right hand is occupied by the puncture needle, which could be solved easily with the self-rescue technique, which uses the needle tip as an intraocular instrument for better exposure and easier engagement of the slipped haptic. With the aid of bimanual operations and self-rescue technique, Yamane's technique in situ is applicable when the haptic of dislocated intraocular lens suits for flange-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine contributions to the muon dipole moment g − 2 from a 3-form field Ω, which naturally arises from many fundamental theories, such as the string theory and the hyperunified field theory. In particular, by calculating the one-loop Feynman diagram, we have obtained the leading-order Ω-induced contribution to the muon g − 2, which is found to be finite. Then we investigate the theoretical constraints from perturbativity and unitarity. Especially, the unitarity bounds are yielded by computing the tree-level μ+μ− scattering amplitudes of various initial and final helicity configurations. As a result, despite the strong unitarity bounds imposed on this model of Ω, we have still found a substantial parameter space which can accommodates the muon g − 2 data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of non-natural enzymatic catalysis is important for multicomponent tandem organic transformations. However, the delicate acting environments of biological enzymes still present some challenges in the synthesis of spirooxindole skeleton via enzymatic catalysis. To address these issues, a lipase-catalyzed method was developed for the synthesis of spirooxindole frameworks. Using easily available isatins, cycloketones, and malononitriles as substrates, mild reaction conditions, and a reasonable reaction time, moderate to good yields (67–92%) and excellent functional group tolerance were accomplished via this protocol. The related mechanism explanation is also speculated in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Development and validation of a deep learning algorithm to automatically identify and locate epiretinal memberane (ERM) regions in OCT images. Methods: OCT images of 468 eyes were retrospectively collected from a total of 404 ERM patients. One expert manually annotated the ERM regions for all images. A total of 422 images (90%) and the remainig 46 images (10%) were used as the training dataset and validation dataset for deep learning algorithm training and validation, respectively. One senior and one junior clinician read the images. The diagnostic results were compared. Results: The algorithm accurately segmented and located the ERM regions in OCT images. The image-level accuracy was 95.65%, and the ERM region-level accuracy was 90.14%, respectively. In comparison experiments, the accuracies of the junior clinician improved from 85.00% to 61.29% without the assistance of the algorithm to 100.00% and 90.32% with the assistance of the algorithm. The corresponding results of the senior clinician were 96.15%, 95.00% without the assistance of the algorithm, and 96.15%, 97.50% with the assistance of the algorithm. Conclusions: The developed deep learning algorithm can accurately segment ERM regions in OCT images. This deep learning approach may help clinicians in clinical diagnosis with better accuracy and efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parkinson's disease (PD) is the second most common neurodegenerative disease. Chlorogenic acid (CGA) is a polyphenolic substance derived from various medicinal plants. Although CGA is reported to have potential anti-PD effect, the beneficial effect and the underlying mechanism remain unclear. In this study, we aimed to further investigate the protective effect and clarify the mechanism of action of CGA in Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) models of PD. Measurements of a-synuclein aggregation, movement disorders, and lipid, ROS and malondialdehyde (MDA) contents were observed in NL5901 nematodes. Determinations of dopamine (DA) neuron degeneration, food perception, and ROS content were performed in 6-OHDA-exposed BZ555 nematodes. The autophagy activation of CGA was monitored using DA2123 and BC12921 nematodes. Meanwhile, RNAi technology was employed to knockdown the autophagy-related genes and investigate whether the anti-PD effect of CGA was associated with autophagy induction in C. elegans. CGA significantly reduced α-synuclein aggregation, improved motor disorders, restored lipid content, and decreased ROS and MDA contents in NL5901 nematodes. Meanwhile, CGA inhibited DA neuron-degeneration and improved food-sensing behavior in 6-OHDA-exposed BZ555 nematodes. In addition, CGA increased the number of GFP::LGG-1 foci in DA2123 nematodes and degraded p62 protein in BC12921 nematodes. Meanwhile, CGA up-regulated the expression of autophagy-related genes in NL5901 nematodes. Moreover, the anti-PD effect of CGA was closely related to autophagy induction via increasing the expression of autophagy-related genes, including unc-51, bec-1, vps-34, and lgg-1. The present study indicates that CGA exerts neuroprotective effect in C. elegans via autophagy induction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This qualitative study was conducted among the family caregivers of cancer patients treated in a hospital in Shenzhen, southern China, to elucidate the truth-telling process. Thirteen participants were recruited, and the data were thematically analyzed. The five major themes are as follows: Who discloses the truth to cancer patients? How do patients react to being informed of their true condition? What happens to cancer patients after they learn the truth? What are the impacts of family relationships and Chinese culture on truth telling? How do cancer patients behave after learning the truth? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Breast cancer (BC) is among the most common cancers worldwide. Machine learning–based radiomics model could predict axillary lymph node metastasis (ALNM) of BC accurately. Purpose: The purpose is to develop a machine learning model to predict ALNM of BC by focusing on the radiomics features of axillary lymphatic node (ALN). Methods: A group of 398 BC patients with 800 ALNs were retrospectively collected. A set of patient characteristics were obtained to form clinical factors. Three hundred and twenty‐six radiomics features were extracted from each region of interest for ALN in contrast‐enhanced computed tomography (CECT) image. A framework composed of four feature selection methods and 14 machine learning classification algorithms was systematically applied. A clinical model, a radiomics model, and a combined model were developed using a cross‐validation approach and compared. Metrics of the area under the curve (AUC), accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity were calculated to evaluate the performance of these models in the prediction of ALNM in BC. Results: Among the 800 cases of ALNs, there were 388 cases of positive metastasis (48.50%) and 412 cases of negative metastasis (51.50%). The baseline clinical model achieved the performance with an AUC = 0.8998 (95% CI [0.8540, 0.9457]). The radiomics model achieved an AUC = 0.9081 (95% CI [0.8640, 0.9523]). The combined model using the clinical factors and radiomics features achieved the best results with an AUC = 0.9305 (95% CI [0.8928, 0.9682]). Conclusions: Combinations of feature selection methods and machine learning‐based classification algorithms can develop promising predictive models to predict ALNM in BC using CECT features. The combined model of clinical factors and radiomics features outperforms both the clinical model and the radiomic model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we study inverse nodal problems for a boundary value problem. A uniqueness result for the potential function and a reconstruction method are obtained. By using the nodal points as input data, we compute the approximation solution of the potential function for the boundary value problem by the first kind Chebyshev wavelet method. Two numerical examples show that the first kind Chebyshev wavelet method for solving the inverse nodal problems for the boundary value problem is valid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Permian Fengcheng Formation of the Mahu Sag in the Jungar Basin is one of the most important hydrocarbon source rocks in Xinjiang oil field. The preservation of the geological records of Milankovitch cycles can be studied to understand the history of the Earth's evolution and sedimentary processes, and high‐resolution astronomical time scales (ATS) can be obtained by analysing (quasi) periodic sedimentary signals in geological records. In this study, the natural gamma ray (GR) and density (DEN) logging data are used to carry out a detailed spectrum analysis, including 2π‐Multi‐taper Method (MTM), Evolutive Harmonic Analysis (EHA), Correlation coefficient method (COCO) and DYNOT simulation. GR and DEN data analysis results show sedimentary cycles of 39.3, 9.1 m, 3.6–2.7 m and 2.1–1.7 m, 37.5, 9.7, 3.7 m and 2.4–1.9 m in MY‐1 well; MH‐15 well recorded the significant peaks at 81, 20, 8.6 m and 3.6–3.4 m and 66, 17.6, 6.8 m and 3.3–2.7 m; FN‐14 well revealed high‐confidence level frequencies with wavelength of 97, 23, 8.8 and 3.9 m and 88, 22, 8.5 m and 4–3.4 m respectively. The average sediment accumulation rates (SAR) are estimated at 9–9.7 cm/kyr for MY‐1, 14.5–19 cm/kyr for MH‐15, 13.5–14.5 cm/kyr for FN‐14 by using the COCO. In addition, we construct a continuous time scale for Fengcheng Formation, yielding a deposition duration of about 3.5 ± 0.2 Myr for these three drilling cores. Finally, we used the DYNOT sea‐level change model to analyse the GR and DEN logging series of three wells, for reconstructing the lake‐level changes of the Fengcheng Formation in the Junggar Basin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nutrition intervention has emerged as a potential strategy to delay aging and promote healthy longevity. Citri Reticulatae Semen (CRS) has diverse beneficial effects and has been used for thousands of years to treat pain. However, the health benefits of CRS in prolonging health span and improving aging-related diseases and the exact mechanisms remain poorly characterized. In this study, Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) was used as a model organism to study the antiaging and health span promoting activities of 75% ethanol extract of CRS (CRSE). The results showed that treatment with CRSE at 1 000 μg/mL significantly extended the life span of worms by 18.93% without detriment to health span and fitness, as evidenced by the delayed aging-related phenotypes and increased body length and width, and reproductive output. In addition, CRSE treatment enhanced the ability of resistance to heat, oxidative, and pathogenic bacterial stress. Consistently, heat shock proteins and antioxidant enzyme-related and pathogenesis-related genes were up-regulated by CRSE treatment. Furthermore, CRSE supplementation also improved α-synuclein, 6-OHDA, and polyQ40-induced pathologies in transgenic C. elegans models of Parkinson's disease and Huntington's disease. The mechanistic study demonstrated that CRSE induced autophagy in worms, while the RNAi knockdown of 4 key autophagy-related genes, including lgg-1, bec-1, vps-34, and unc-51, remarkably abrogated the beneficial effects of CRSE on the extending of life span and health span and neuroprotection, demonstrating that CRSE exerts beneficial effects via autophagy induction in worms. Together, our current findings provide new insights into the practical application of CRS for the prevention of aging and aging-related diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, a solution processed Al-In-O/InOx bilayer resistive switching random access memory (RRAM) is demonstrated at temperature as low as 180 °C. The memory cell exhibits remarkable forming free resistive switching characteristics with stable data retention and low set/reset voltages. More importantly, this solution processed bilayer shows stable memory properties under different bending angles on a flexible substrate. The resistive switching mechanism was systematically investigated. Compared to single layer devices, an Al-In-O mixing layer is induced by the solution process in the bilayer RRAM. The first principle calculation confirms that in the Al-In-O mixing layer, the formation energy of oxygen vacancies is significantly reduced compared with the AlOx layer. As a result, the formation of the oxygen vacancy based conductive filament is realized without the electroforming process. The RRAM fabricated by the printable solution process at low temperature shows great application potential in next generation wearable electronics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In nature, seeds of some flowering plants such as Erodium and Pelargonium can bury themselves into the ground effectively for germination. Jung et al. (Phys Fluids 29:041702. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4979998, 2017) hypothesized that rotation induced by the hygroscopic coiling and uncoiling movement of the awn reduces the penetration resistance. Rotational penetration was also studied in geotechnical engineering, as it is relevant to the rotary installation of piles. However, there are limited fundamental explanations of the effect of rotation on the reduction of penetration resistance. In this study, shallow rotational penetration in dry sand is studied using the discrete element method (DEM); the directly available particle-scale data and the derived meso-scale data were analyzed to reveal the underlying mechanism of the rotational effect on penetration. A series of rotational penetration tests with different rotational speeds were conducted. It was confirmed that the penetration resistance at the cone decreases with rotational speed. Analysis of the particle–cone contact data shows that rotation does not only result in the inclination of the contact forces, but also significantly reduces their magnitude and the overall contact number. The force chain network, displacement fields and particle trajectories visualize the rotational effects at the particle-scale; and the evolution of the principal stresses of the soil provides a meso-scale explanation. The new multi-scale data tested the "force chain breakage" hypothesis and challenged the assumptions previously used in developing analytical models. Insights were also provided to power consumption and implications on the design of a self-burrowing robot, which could take advantage of the rotational effect on penetration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tight sandstone gas reservoirs are characterized by deep burial, high pressure, tight matrix, fracture development, and the prevalence of edge and bottom water. Because of the small pore throats, the phenomenon of capillary force is evident. In addition, the low permeability of the reservoir and the difference in fluid properties make the gas reservoir undergo severe water-blocking damage. In this paper, centrifugal and nuclear magnetic resonance methods are used. The relationship between pore throat characteristics, fluid distribution, and gas reservoir water-blocking mechanism is studied and analyzed. The experimental results show that fracture formation increases the porosity of the small pores and expands the pore size distribution. It is conducive to the displacement of the bound water in the small pore space and the reduction in the bound water saturation. When increasing the same displacement pressure, the core porosity increases. More residual water in the tiny pores is converted to moveable water, thereby reducing the capillary resistance. The high-angle penetration fractures and complex seam networks are created by fractures. They connect the pores to form a fracture network structure, which is conducive to the communication of seepage channels. The increase in porosity and the creation of a complex fracture network make the water inrush along the fractures more even in the process of mining. This slows the advance speed of the water invasion front and reduces the damage of water blocking. The results enhance the understanding of the water invasion mechanism of edge and bottom water so as to improve the recovery factors of tight sandstone gas reservoirs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main purpose of the current paper is to study the phase portraits and bounded and singular traveling wave solution of the stochastic nonlinear Biswas–Arshed equation by using the "three-step method" of Professor Li's method together with the phase orbit of planar dynamical system. Firstly, by employing the traveling wave transformation, the stochastic nonlinear Biswas–Arshed equation is simplified into deterministic nonlinear ordinary differential equation. Secondly, phase portraits of the stochastic nonlinear Biswas–Arshed equation are plotted by analyzing the planar dynamic system of the nonlinear ordinary differential equation. Finally, the bounded and singular traveling wave solutions of the stochastic nonlinear Biswas–Arshed equation are constructed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: HuR/ELAVL1 (embryonic lethal abnormal vision 1) was a downstream target of miR-29b in some cancer cells. HuR protein exerts important prognostic effects of involving in the pathogenesis and development of acute myeloid leukemia (AML). This study aims to investigate the role of miR-29b-3p in biological behaviors of AML cells by targeting HuR and the involvement of the NF-κB and JAK/STAT signaling pathways. Methods: The expressions of HuR and miR-29b-3p in AML cells were determined using RT-qPCR and Western blot, and the association between them was analyzed using the Spearman method. Next, the target relationship between HuR and miR-29b-3p was predicted by biological information databases and verified by the dual-luciferase reporter gene assay. MTS, methyl cellulose, flow cytometry and transwell assay were employed to detect the cell proliferation, clone formation, cell cycle and apoptosis, invasion and migration respectively, the effect of miR-29b-3p targeted HuR on the biological behaviors of AML cells was explored after over- /down-expression of miR-29b-3p and rescue experiment. Then, immunofluorescence assay and western blot were employed to detect location expression and phosphorylation levels of NF-κB and JAK/STAT signaling pathways related molecules respectively. Results: HuR was negatively correlated with miR-29b-3p, and was the downstream target of miR-29b-3p in AML cells. When miR-29b-3p was overexpressed in AML cells, HuR was down-regulated, accompanied by cell viability decreased, cell cycle arrest, apoptosis increased, invasion and migration weakened. Moreover, the opposite result appeared after miR-29b-3p was down-regulated. The rescue experiment showed that miR-29b-3p inhibitor could reverse the biological effect of HuR down-regulation in AML cells. Molecular pathway results showed that miR-29b-3p could inhibit p65 expression in nucleus and phosphorylation levels of p65, IκBα, STAT1, STAT3 and STAT5. Conclusion: miR-29b-3p can inhibit malignant biological behaviors of AML cells via the inactivation of the NF-κB and JAK/STAT signaling pathways by targeting HuR. miR-29b-3p and its target HuR can be used as a new potential molecular for AML treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: HuR/ELAVL1 (embryonic lethal abnormal vision 1) was a downstream target of miR-29b in some cancer cells. HuR protein exerts important prognostic effects of involving in the pathogenesis and development of acute myeloid leukemia (AML). This study aims to investigate the role of miR-29b-3p in biological behaviors of AML cells by targeting HuR and the involvement of the NF-κB and JAK/STAT signaling pathways.Methods: The expressions of HuR and miR-29b-3p in AML cells were determined using RT-qPCR and Western blot, and the association between them was analyzed using the Spearman method. Next, the target relationship between HuR and miR-29b-3p was predicted by biological information databases and verified by the dual-luciferase reporter gene assay. MTS, methyl cellulose, flow cytometry and transwell assay were employed to detect the cell proliferation, clone formation, cell cycle and apoptosis, invasion and migration respectively, the effect of miR-29b-3p targeted HuR on the biological behaviors of AML cells was explored after over- /down-expression of miR-29b-3p and rescue experiment. Then, immunofluorescence assay and western blot were employed to detect location expression and phosphorylation levels of NF-κB and JAK/STAT signaling pathways related molecules respectively.Results: HuR was negatively correlated with miR-29b-3p, and was the downstream target of miR-29b-3p in AML cells. When miR-29b-3p was overexpressed in AML cells, HuR was down-regulated, accompanied by cell viability decreased, cell cycle arrest, apoptosis increased, invasion and migration weakened. Moreover, the opposite result appeared after miR-29b-3p was down-regulated. The rescue experiment showed that miR-29b-3p inhibitor could reverse the biological effect of HuR down-regulation in AML cells. Molecular pathway results showed that miR-29b-3p could inhibit p65 expression in nucleus and phosphorylation levels of p65, IκBα, STAT1, STAT3 and STAT5.Conclusion: miR-29b-3p can inhibit malignant biological behaviors of AML cells via the inactivation of the NF-κB and JAK/STAT signaling pathways by targeting HuR. miR-29b-3p and its target HuR can be used as a new potential molecular for AML treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We aim to investigate the clinical efficacy and safety of a modified hematoma puncture drainage treatment through the burr hole lateral to Kocher's point from the frontal lobe in patients with hypertensive basal ganglia hemorrhage. Twenty-six patients were enrolled in the retrospective study. The volume of hematoma in those patients was between 25 and 35 mL, and the Glasgow Coma Scale scores were between 9 and 11; they were divided into a hematoma puncture drainage treatment group and a traditional conservative treatment group. The volume of remaining hematoma, neurological function defect scores, and life quality after treatment, duration of hospitalization, and cost of hospitalization were analyzed in these 2 groups. The volume of remaining hematoma was significantly less in the drainage group than that in the traditional group on the first day and the third day after treatment (P < 0.05). Posttreatment neurological function defect scores in the drainage group were statistically lower than those in the traditional group (P < 0.05). The duration of hospitalization was significantly shorter and the cost of hospitalization was also significantly less in the drainage group than that in the traditional group (P < 0.05). The Extended Glasgow Outcome Scale and Barthel Index scores were significantly higher in the drainage group than those in the traditional group (P < 0.05). There were no significant differences between the 2 groups in the complication rates (P > 0.05). The modified hematoma puncture drainage treatment represents an effective and safe way to treat hypertensive basal ganglia hemorrhage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through optical microscopic examination, scanning electron microscope analysis, whole rock X-ray diffraction analysis, X-ray fluorescence spectrum analysis, carbon and oxygen isotope analysis, and temperature measurement of fluid inclusions, the characteristics and formation mechanism of the alkaline lacustrine tight oil reservoirs of the Permian Fengcheng Formation in the Mahu Sag of the Junggar Basin have been systematically studied, and a genetic model has been proposed. Porosity of tight oil reservoirs of the Fengcheng Formation in the Mahu Sag is mostly less than 4%, with permeability mostly less than 0.1 mD. The lithology of the Fengcheng Formation in the Mahu Sag is mainly tuff, and the authigenic minerals mainly consist of feldspar, quartz, dolomite, and salt minerals (e.g., shortite, trona). The authigenic feldspar and quartz of the Fengcheng Formation in the Mahu Sag mainly originate from devitrification of volcanic glass in pyroclastic rocks. Reservoir space is dominated by dissolution pores of feldspar and salt minerals, followed by intercrystalline pores among feldspar, quartz, and other minerals formed by devitrification. Fractures are mainly comprised of shrinkage fractures, structural fractures, and bedding seans. The Permian Fengcheng Formation was mainly formed in an alkaline lake in the Mahu Sag, and the alkaline lacustrine sedimentary setting plays a decisive role in the formation of the tight oil reservoirs of the Fengcheng Formation. Volcanic glass in the tight oil reservoirs was generally devitrified within the alkaline lacustrine diagenetic fluid in the early diagenetic stage, and the devitrified micropores become an important reservoir space. Feldspars and salt minerals were mainly dissolved by acidic fluids generated by burial thermal evolution of the alkaline lacustrine source rocks of the Fengcheng Formation in the Mahu Sag, which produces the most developed dissolution pores in the tight oil reservoir. The abnormal high pressure formed by the early hydrocarbon generation and expulsion of the alkaline lacustrine source rocks in the Fengcheng Formation is one of the main reasons for porosity preservation. In the alkaline lake sedimentary environment of the Fengcheng Formation, widespread dolomitization and precipitation of a large number of salt minerals in the early diagenetic stage resisted partial compaction, which not only effectively protected early porosity, but also provided material conditions for dissolution porosity enhancement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reactive astrocytes undergo morphological, molecular, metabolic, and functional remodeling in response to central nervous system (CNS) damage. However, we still know very little about how the metabolic switching of astrocytes influences, or is influenced by, reactive astrocytes in response to neurological diseases. In this review, we initially cover a brief introduction into reactive astrocyte function under pathological conditions. Subsequently, we summarize the emerging roles of glucose and lipid metabolism in reactive astrocytes in the context of CNS injury to provide a new insight into metabolic mechanisms of reactive astrocyte-mediated neuroprotection or damage. Finally, we propose that deciphering the mechanistic link between astrocyte heterogeneity metabolism and improved methods is an emerging frontier for the therapeutic investigation of CNS injury and disease. The morphological and functional diversity of astrocytes, named astrocyte heterogeneity, depends largely on their location, microenvironment, developmental stage, and stimuli. Increasing evidence suggests that simple binary divisions of reactive astrocytes into good versus bad or neurotoxic versus neuroprotective cannot represent the heterogeneity of reactive astrocytes. Knowledge of metabolic alteration (e.g., glucose and lipid metabolism) in influencing the phenotype of reactive astrocytes in neurological diseases provides novel insights into the potential causal relationships between metabolic changes and astrocyte heterogeneity. A deep deciphering of the initiating metabolic mechanisms that determine the heterogeneity of reactive astrocytes may provide therapeutic targets for related neurological disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Esophageal carcinoma (ESCA) is a leading cause of cancer death worldwide, despite an overall decline in the incidence of new cases. However, knowledge of gene expression signatures for risk and prognosis stratification of ESCA is inadequate. Thus, identifying novel molecular biomarkers and therapeutic targets for ESCA might improve its prognosis and treatment. The current study investigated the role of ubiquitin-specific peptidase 53 (USP53), a member of the USP family that exhibits deubiquitinating activity, in ESCA and showed that USP53 is downregulated in ESCA tissues, indicating poor prognosis. USP53 suppresses the proliferation and growth of ESCA cells in vitro and in vivo , whereas its knockdown exerts opposite effects. AMP-activated protein kinase inhibitor reverses the effects of USP53 knockdown. USP53 also inhibits glycolysis, oxidative metabolism and mitochondrial dynamics. H3K27 acetylation increases USP53 expression by binding to its promoter region. Our study reveals that USP53 is activated by H3K27 acetylation and suppresses ESCA progression by regulating cell growth and metabolism. USP53 is therefore a promising target for ESCA treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of cooperative catalysis is of great significance for multi‐step sequential enantioselective organic transformations. However, the complicated subtle environments and inherent mutual deactivations of chiral dual catalysts pose a great challenge in a single operation. To address these issues, we here report the rational design of an integrated Cu/bisoxazoline and Ru/diamine co‐catalyst system, which enables a decarboxylative Mannich reaction/asymmetric transfer hydrogenation enantioselective cascade reaction for the direct preparation of 1,3‐distereocentered β‐sulfonamido alcohols. Through this cascade process, an initial Cu/bisoxazoline‐catalyzed decarboxylative Mannich reaction of a cyclic aldimine and a β‐keto acid to afford a chiral β‐sulfonamido ketone, followed by asymmetric transfer hydrogenation of this in situ generated ketone, produces a wide range of chiral β‐sulfonamido alcohols in 80–95% yields with 86–99% ee and 64:36–99:1 dr. Advantageous feature of this co‐catalyst system lies in the cooperative catalytic process, which greatly enhances the catalytic efficiency compared with the single‐step reactions, making it attractive for gaining direct access to the diastereoselective 1,3‐distereocenter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we prove the existence and uniqueness of solitary wave solutions of time-dependent nonlinear Schrödinger equations with behaviors tending to zero at infinity under certain conditions on trapping potentials and parameters. In addition, we provide the same issues for the Dirichlet boundary value problems on the ball centered at the origin. A classification of solutions for radial case is also established. Particularly, for constant trapping potentials, we conclude that there is at most one radial ground state under certain conditions on parameters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The interfacial polymerization based on the interlayer is an effective method for enhancing thin-film composite (TFC) nanofiltration (NF) membranes permeability. In this study, a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) interlayer was constructed on a polyethersulfone substrate through a physical deposition method. Then the TFC NF membranes regulated by PVA interlayer were prepared, and conducted a quantitative analysis of the impact of the PVA interlayer on the permeation resistance of TFC NF membranes. The results indicated that after regulated by the PVA interlayer, the permeation resistance of the polyamide layer decreased slightly, from 0.130 to 0.106 bar h m−1, while the permeation resistance of the substrate decreased significantly, from 0.277 to 0.087 bar h m−1. These results indicated that the dramatic decrease in permeation resistance of substrate caused by PVA interlayer was main reason for enhanced permeability, enriching our understanding of the mechanism of the interlayer. [Display omitted] • TFC NF membranes regulated by PVA interlayer were fabricated. • A striped structure was formed on polyamide layer. • PVA interlayer greatly reduced the permeation resistance of substrate. • Reveal the main battleground for the PVA intermediate layer's role. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Colon cancer is a prevalent invasive neoplasm in the gastrointestinal system with a high degree of malignancy. Despite extensive research, the underlying mechanisms of its recurrence and metastasis remain elusive.Rho GTPase activating protein 4 (ARHGAP4), a member of the small GTPases protein family, may be closely related to tumor metastasis, and its expression is increased in colon cancer. However, the role of ARHGAP4 in colon cancer metastasis is uncertain. This study investigates the impact of ARHGAP4 on the metastasis of colon cancer cells. Our objective is to determine the role of ARHGAP4 in regulating the invasive behavior of colon cancer cells. We downloaded colon adenocarcinoma (COAD) data from the Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), and performed differential analysis and survival analysis. By using the CIBERSORT algorithm, we evaluated the proportion of infiltrating immune cells in colon cancer. We further analyzed whether ARHGAP4 is associated with T cell exhaustion. Finally, we investigated the impact of ARHGAP4 knockdown on the migration and invasion of colon cancer cells through in vitro cell experiments. Additionally, we utilized western blotting to assess the expression of protein related to the TGF-β signaling pathway and epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT). We found that ARHGAP4 is upregulated in colon cancer. Subsequent survival analysis revealed that the high-expression group had significantly lower survival rates compared to the low-expression group. Immune infiltration analysis showed that ARHGAP4 was not only positively correlated with CD8+ T cells, but also positively correlated with T cell exhaustion markers programmed cell death 1 (PDCD-1), cytotoxic T-lymphocyte associated protein 4 (CTLA-4), and lymphocyte activating 3 (LAG-3). In vitro cell experiments, the knockdown of ARHGAP4 inhibited the migration and invasion of colon cancer cells. Among EMT-related proteins, when ARHGAP4 was knocked down, the expression of E-cadherin was increased, while the expression of N-cadherin and Vimentin was decreased. Meanwhile, the expression of TGF-β1, p -Smad2, and p -Smad3, which are associated with the TGF-β/Smad pathway, all decreased. ARHGAP4 promotes colon cancer metastasis through the TGF-β/Smad signaling pathway and may be associated with T cell exhaustion. It plays an important role in the progression of colon cancer and may serve as a potential target for diagnosis and treatment of colon cancer. • The knockdown of ARHGAP4 inhibited the migration and invasion of colon cancer cells. • Knockdown of ARHGAP4 increased the expression of E-cadherin and decreased the expression of N-cadherin and Vimentin. • Knockdown of ARHGAP4 decreased the expression of TGF-β1, p -Smad2 and p -Smad3. • ARHGAP4 may be associated with T cell exhaustion. • ARHGAP4 promotes colon cancer metastasis through the TGF/β signaling pathway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Underground gas storage (UGS) is efficient in large-scale natural gas storage and peak regulation. However, UGS operation based on gas-condensate reservoirs are challenging due to complicated phase behavior and multi-phase flow considering trapped condensate. This paper presents a method for full-cycle enhancing condensate oil recovery (EOR)-UGS by integrating cyclic gas flooding and storage from gas-condensate reservoirs. Full-cycle EOR-UGS is defined by four stages, including primary depletion, cyclic gas flooding, collaborative gas production and UGS operation. The EOR mechanisms of each stage are analyzed by experiments and simulation. Cyclic gas flooding can reduce drop out of condensate. The reasonable volume of cyclic gas flooding is 0.5 HCPV, enhancing condensate recovery factor by 42.8%. During the collaborative stage, gas injection can effectively evaporate and drive the condensate towards production wells. After five collaborative cycles, the condensate recovery factor is further enhanced by 21.8% and gas storage capacity can be increased more than 30%. Finally, optimal full-cycle EOR-UGS schemes can enhance condensate recovery factor by 69.92%. Compared with gas flooding to 1.5 HCPV followed by constructing UGS, the full-cycle EOR-UGS integration can improve condensate recovery factor by 7.37%. This work provides a new idea for UGS construction and operation based on gas-condensate reservoirs. • A method of Full-cycle EOR-UGS by integrating cyclic gas flooding and storage is established. • Experiments are conducted to estimate the conversion time at different stages of Full-cycle EOR-UGS integration. • The EOR mechanisms and phase behavior of Full-cycle EOR-UGS is analyzed. • Optimal schemes can enhance condensate recovery by 68.7% and improve gas storage capacity by more than 30%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The applicability of packed bed latent thermal energy storage devices is restricted by the limited thermal conductivity of phase change materials (PCMs). As a cheap and simple heat transfer-enhanced construction, the hollow channel allows the heat transfer fluid to go through the capsule center directly where the melting rate of PCM would be enhanced. In this study, an experiment was conducted to explore the promotion effect of hollow channels. The influence of the hollow channels on the charging duration and outlet temperature characteristics at different inlet flow rates, inlet temperatures, and placement angles was investigated. The results showed that the charging rate was improved with a reduction in charging duration of about 16.6%. The improvement was consistent in scenarios with variable inlet temperatures and flow rates, with a difference of less than 1%. Furthermore, adding hollow channels resulted in a lower average outlet temperature. Finally, there is no significant influence of horizontal and vertical placements of the hollow channels on the performance of PBLTES. Therefore, random angle placement is advised to reduce costs in engineering. However, the addition of hollow channels drops the PCM filling rate by 3.7%, reducing latent thermal energy storage but increasing sensible thermal energy storage. • The PBLTES employing capsules with simple and low-cost hollow channels is studied. • The hollow channel can decrease the charging completion time and outlet temperature. • The effect of inlet temperature, inlet flow rate and angle are investigated experimentally. • The flow field distribution in PBLTES may affect the effectiveness of the hollow channel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inspired by self-burial seeds and burrowing amphisbaenians, we experimentally explored the effect of rotation on vertical and horizontal penetration resistance in shallow sands; we then integrated the findings with previously identified burrowing principles to design a soft, horizontal burrowing robot. A rotational penetration system was developed by integrating a six-axis robotic arm with custom motorized penetrators and corresponding control and data acquisition units. A series of vertical rotational penetration tests were conducted in Ottawa F65 sand with different vertical and rotational velocity combinations. The effects of relative slip velocity (the ratio between the rotational and vertical penetration velocity, and inertial number (a function of the resultant velocity) were investigated. The results revealed that increase in relative slip velocity led to decrease in penetration force and increase in penetration torque. On the other hand, the inertial number had a negligible effect on the reduction of penetration force: The penetration force and torque levels were comparable under a same relative slip velocity, regardless of the initial number. The rotation-induced reduction in penetration force was further confirmed in the context of horizontal penetration. Furthermore, the results suggested that the reduction in penetration force was also influenced by the embedment depth and the geometry of the penetrators. Based on the findings, a self-burrowing robot was developed by incorporating a rotational tip into a soft linear actuator, and its burrowing behavior in the horizontal direction was preliminarily evaluated. We present these components together with the intention of demonstrating a real-life workflow that we employed in the emerging field of bio-inspired geotechnics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rate of usage of community elderly care services in China is low, and past studies about the effects of these services on caregiver burden domestically are few. This study used a large sample of Beijing census data (n = 55,634) to examine the impact of these services on caregiver burden. Logistic regression and propensity score matching were used to estimate the effects. The results showed that meal assistance, respite care, and spiritual comfort are all significantly associated with a lower likelihood of perceived emotional burden among caregivers, while only respite care is very significantly associated with a lower likelihood of feeling physically burdened. However, the effects of these services on caregiver burden also depend on the activities of daily living performance and location of residence of the care recipients. The practical implications for policy makers are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • A phosphorus/nitrogen-containing hyperbranched epoxy resin (HPITT) was simply synthesized. • Both flame retardancy and toughness of epoxy thermosets were enhanced by HPITT. • EP/HPITT thermosets maintained excellent T g and T 5%. • HPITT was a prospective and versatile modifier for epoxy thermosets. Concurrently enhancing the flame retardancy and toughness without sacrificing strength, thermal decomposition temperature, and glass transition temperature (T g) of epoxy thermosets is still challenging. Herein, a new phosphorus/nitrogen-containing hyperbranched epoxy resin (HPITT) was synthesized from itaconic anhydride, 9,10-dihydro-9-oxa-10-phosphaphenanthrene-10-oxide, piperazine, and triglycidyl isocyanurate by a facile method. The HPITT was then utilized for synergistic flame retarding and toughening modification of epoxy thermosets. Upon the introduction of 10 wt% HPITT, the epoxy thermosets reached a limiting oxygen index (LOI) of 31.5 % and UL-94 V-0 rating. Meanwhile, the peak heat release rate (PHRR) and total smoke production (TSP) decreased by 32.3 % and 27.7 % when compared to neat epoxy thermosets, respectively. Moreover, the synergistic flame retarding functions of phosphaphenanthrene, piperazine and isocyanurate segments in HPITT were demonstrated by combined gas and char phase residue analyses. Compared to neat epoxy, features such as the impact strength, tension strength, and flexural strength of the modified epoxy thermosets increased by respectively 53.9 %, 29.2 %, and 58 % owing to intramolecular cavities, rigid segments, and high crosslinking density supplied by HPITT. Moreover, the modified epoxy thermosets still maintained excellent T g and thermal decomposition temperature. In sum, an attractive strategy for concurrently enhancing flame retardancy and toughness of epoxy thermosets was proposed, useful for future advanced applications in adhesives, coatings, and composite materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]