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Quantum entanglement plays a key role in quantum computation and quantum information processing. It is of great significance to find efficient and experimentally friend separability criteria to detect entanglement. In this paper, we firstly propose two easily used entanglement criteria based on matrix moments. The first entanglement criterion only uses the first two realignment moments of a density matrix. The second entanglement criterion is based on the moments related to the partially transposed matrix. By detailed examples we illustrate the effectiveness of these criteria in detecting entanglement. Moreover, we provide an experimentally measurable lower bound of concurrence based on these moments. Finally, we present both bipartite and genuine tripartite entanglement measures based on the moments of the reduced states. By detailed examples, we show that our entanglement measures characterize the quantum entanglement in a more fine ways than the existing measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The synergistic effect between different fillers plays a crucial role in determining the performance of composites. In this work, spherical boron nitride (BN) and flaky BN are used as hybrid fillers to improve the thermal conductivity (TC) of high-density polyethylene (HDPE) composites. A series of HDPE composites were prepared by adjusting the mass ratio (1:0, 4:1, 2:1, 1:1, 1:2, 1:4, and 0:1) of spherical BN and flaky BN. The SEM results indicate that the spherical BN (with a particle size of 3 μm) effectively filled the gaps between the flaky BN (with a particle size of 30 μm), leading to the formation of more continuous heat conduction paths with the composite. Remarkably, when the mass ratio of spherical BN to flaky BN was set to 1:4 (with a total BN filling amount of 30 wt%), the TC of the composite could reach up to 1.648 Wm−1K−1, which is obviously higher than that of the composite containing a single filler, realizing the synergistic effect of the hybrid fillers. In addition, the synergistic effect of fillers also affects the thermal stability and crystallization behavior of composites. This work is of great significance for optimizing the application of hybrid BN fillers in the field of thermal management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives Ferroptosis is involved in many types of cancers, including triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC). Suppressor of cytokine signaling 1 (SOCS1) has recently been implicated as a regulator of ferroptosis. We aim to explore whether targeting SOCS1 is a potential therapeutic strategy for TNBC therapy. Methods Stable cell lines were constructed using lentivirus transfection. Cell viability was determined using CCK-8 and cell colony formation assays, respectively. Assays including lactate dehydrogenase release, lipid peroxidation and malondialdehyde assays were conducted to evaluate ferroptosis. Real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction and western blotting were performed to evaluate mRNA and protein expression, respectively. A xenograft animal model was established by subcutaneous injection of cells into the flank. Results Our results showed that SOCS1 overexpression inhibited cell proliferation and induced ferroptosis in TNBC cells, while SOCS1 knockdown promoted cell proliferation and reduced ferroptosis. We also found that SOCS1 regulated ferroptosis by modulating GPX4 expression. Furthermore, SOCS1 regulated cisplatin resistance in TNBC cells by promoting ferroptosis. Our in vivo data suggested that SOCS1 regulated tumor growth and cisplatin resistance in vivo. Conclusions SOCS1 inhibits the progression and chemotherapy resistance of TNBC by regulating GPX4 expression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The detection algorithm commonly misses obscured pedestrians in traffic scenes with a high pedestrian density because mutual occlusion among pedestrians reduces the prediction box score of the concealed pedestrians. The paper uses the YOLOv7 algorithm as the baseline and makes the following three improvements by investigating the variables influencing the detection method's performance: First, the backbone network of the YOLOv7 algorithm is replaced with the lightweight feature extraction network Mobilenetv3 since the pedestrian detection algorithm frequently needs to be deployed in driverless mobile, which requires a fast operating speed of the algorithm; second, a high-resolution feature pyramid structure is suggested for the issue of missed detection of hidden pedestrians, which upscales the feature maps generated from the feature pyramid to increase the resolution of the output feature maps and introduces shallow feature maps to strengthen the distinctions between adjacent sub-features to enhance the network's ability to extract features for the visible area of hidden pedestrians and small-sized pedestrians in order to produce deeper features with greater differentiation for pedestrians; and the third is to suggest a detection head based on an attention mechanism that is employed to lower the confidence level of target neighboring sub-features, lower the quantity of redundant detection boxes, and lower the following NMS computation. The mAP of the suggested approach in this work achieves 89.75%, which is 9.5 percentage points better than the YOLOv7 detection algorithm, according to experiments on the CrowdHuman pedestrian-intensive dataset. The algorithm proposed in this paper can considerably increase the detection performance of the detection algorithm, particularly for obscured pedestrians and small-sized pedestrians in the dataset, according to the experimental effect plots. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ring‐opening addition reaction of activated vinyl cyclopropanes with N‐tosylhydrazones in the presence of palladium(0) and triphenylphosphine affords N‐tosylhydrazone butenylmalonate compounds. Aromatic aldehyde‐derived N‐tosylhydrazones produced terminal and internal N‐allylated products, in which the terminal products are the main. While ketone‐derived tosylhydrazones produced only terminal addition products. The transformation relationship of the terminal and internal N‐allylated products in the reaction was also observed. A reasonable mechanism is proposed based on preliminary experimental results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the problem of poor biometric recognition performance that is caused by greatly increased variations among the hand vein patterns of the same individuals as a result of using different imaging devices under different acquisition conditions and presents a novel solution based on two-stage coarse-to-fine matching. In particular, a global pattern descriptor is proposed as a geometrical reference for optimum image segmentation of vein patterns without significant over-segmentation and under-segmentation. In order to accommodate large cross-device variations, a control parameter is introduced to allow adjustment of segmented vein patterns, thereby enabling not only intra-class pattern similarities but also inter-class pattern dissimilarities to be increased. Furthermore, overlapping of principal vein patterns is proposed as a criterion for global coarse matching to reduce the number of candidates for identification, and distinctive efficient robust features are employed to provide a biological vision-based descriptor of salient local pattern characteristics for fine matching. Using a large dataset of 2000 cross-device hand vein images captured from two different near-infrared imaging devices and 100 hands, the efficacy of the proposed approach for a cross-device biometric system is demonstrated, with a recognition performance shown to be compatible to that of a single-device biometric system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Precipitation type is a key parameter used for better retrieval of precipitation characteristics as well as to understand the cloud–convection–precipitation coupling processes. Ice crystals and water droplets inherently exhibit different characteristics in different precipitation regimes (e.g., convection, stratiform), which reflect on satellite remote sensing measurements that help us distinguish them. The Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory's microwave imager (GMI) and dual-frequency precipitation radar (DPR) together provide ample information on global precipitation characteristics. As an active sensor, the DPR provides an accurate precipitation type assignment, while passive sensors such as the GMI are traditionally only used for empirical understanding of precipitation regimes. Using collocated precipitation type flags from the DPR as the "truth", this paper employs machine learning (ML) models to train and test the predictability and accuracy of using passive GMI-only observations together with ancillary information from a reanalysis and GMI surface emissivity retrieval products. Out of six ML models, four simple ones (support vector machine, neural network, random forest, and gradient boosting) and the 1-D convolutional neural network (CNN) model are identified to produce 90–94% prediction accuracy globally for five types of precipitation (convective, stratiform, mixture, no precipitation, and other precipitation), which is much more robust than previous similar effort. One novelty of this work is to introduce data augmentation (subsampling and bootstrapping) to handle extremely unbalanced samples in each category. A careful evaluation of the impact matrices demonstrates that the polarization difference (PD), brightness temperature (Tc) and surface emissivity at high-frequency channels dominate the decision process, which is consistent with the physical understanding of polarized microwave radiative transfer over different surface types, as well as in snow and liquid clouds with different microphysical properties. Furthermore, the view-angle dependency artifact that the DPR's precipitation flag bears with does not propagate into the conical-viewing GMI retrievals. This work provides a new and promising way for future physics-based ML retrieval algorithm development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to study the fluid–solid coupling dynamic characteristics of parachute-payload system during drop process and analyze the unsteady aerodynamic characteristics under finite mass opening conditions, an adaptive moving fluid mesh method is developed on the basis of the existing arbitrary Lagrangian–Eulerian (ALE) fluid–solid coupling method. The calculation results of open force and drop velocity on the C-9 parachute demonstrate the effectiveness of this method. On this basis, the effect of canopies with three different permeability on parachute-payload system motion characteristic including opening property, steady descent property and stability is studied. Comparative analysis is conducted for structures and characteristics of vortex with different canopy materials, and interference mechanism of unsteady flow for parachute-payload system in unsteady oscillation is revealed. The results show that the adaptive moving fluid mesh method can effectively eliminate restrictions of existing simulation methods for parachute-payload system and significantly reduce calculation time. For the lightweight parachute, permeability has significant effect on kinetic characteristic of parachute-payload system. Canopy with large permeability has small opening load and structural stress in opening stage. After opening, there are mainly small vortexes distributed evenly behind the canopy with good stability. However, canopy with small permeability has obvious breath behavior and oscillation in opening stage. The main vortexes periodically shed off after opening. With the change of permeability from small to large, Parachute-payload system eventually presents three steady descent modes: conical descent, gliding descent and stable vertical descent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Electroreduction of CO 2 to formate was performed. • Electrooxidation of glucose to formate was performed. • A membrane electrode assembly system that combines CO 2 electroreduction with glucose electrooxidation was presented. • Coupling of CO 2 electroreduction of with glucose electrooxidation generated formate with high efficiency. Electrocatalytic reduction of CO 2 (CO 2 ER) coupled with the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is an energy-intensive process that generates low-value oxygen, limiting its industrial application. To overcome this limitation, here we report a membrane electrode assembly (MEA) system that combines CO 2 ER with glucose electrooxidation (GEOR) to simultaneously produce formate using bismuth subcarbonate and carbon nanotube hybrid (BOC-CNT) and nickel cobalt oxide decorated on carbon fiber paper (NCO-CFP) as the cathode and anode catalysts, respectively. The BOC-CNT catalyst showed excellent electrocatalytic performance for CO 2 ER to formate, affording a high FE HCOO - of 97.9 % with current density of 360 mA cm−2 at −0.77 V vs. RHE (-580 mV overpotential), and the NCO-CFP catalyst achieved GEOR at 0.99 V (vs. RHE) with FE HCOO - >98 %. The coupled CO 2 ER//GEOR MEA exhibits a low onset cell voltage of 1.20 V and reaches ultrahigh apparent Faraday efficiency of formate (>190 %) in a wide range from 1.8 to 2.4 V, achieving ∼ 33.3 % energy savings compared to CO 2 ER//OER with a high formate yield of 0.92 mol g-1h−1 at 100 mA cm−2. Besides, all generated formate can be collected from the electrolyte on the anode side due to the spontaneous migration of formate under electric field, thus reducing cross-contamination from CO 2 and alkaline electrolytes. In addition, the coupled CO 2 ER//GEOR system exhibited good electrocatalytic stability for at least 32 h. This strategy provides an innovative and promising approach for the co-electrolytic transformation of biomass derivatives and CO 2 to formate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Brushless doubly fed generator (BDFG) generally adopts double closed-loop vector control strategies. Owing to the influence of BDFG coupling parameters, the accuracy of feedforward decoupling parameters is very important; however, the complexity of the BDFG model makes its winding parameters difficult to identify. On the basis of the characteristics of the BDFG system control model and the decoupling control conditions, this study proposes a method for identifying the integrated coupling parameter. This method first uses particle swarm optimization to identify the coefficients of the current closed-loop transfer function. Then, the values of the integrated coupling parameters are calculated on the basis of the relationship between the coefficients of the current closed-loop transfer function and the integrated coupling parameters of the BDFG. This method bypasses the challenge of directly identifying BDFG winding parameters and can be used directly to design the controller. Experiments are performed using a 30 kW BDFG platform to prove the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In China, post-abortion care (PAC) services mainly focus on married couples, such that adolescents and unmarried young womenhave limited access to those services for contraception counseling. The provision of youth-friendly PAC services in public hospitals is a new concept in China. This study examined the magnitude of PAC services utilization as well as factors influencing it's uptake among adolescents and young women in Guangzhou, China.Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed from 1st March 2020 to 30th September 2020 using anonymous self-administered questionnaire among 688 women aged 15-24 years in Tianhe district, Guangzhou. The Multivariate logistic regression was used to determine factors that were significantly associated with the uptake of PAC services.Results: The magnitude of PAC services utilization was 35.9% among adolescents and young women in Guangzhou, China. Students were 69.0% significantly less likely to use PAC services compared to women who had no job. Immigrants were 59.0% significantly less likely to use PAC services than their native counterparts. Women who had a feeling of stigma were 70.0% significantly less likely to use PAC services compared to those who did not feel stigmatized.Conclusions: The study highlights the need to strengthen youth-friendly PAC services provision, and emphasizes the importance of education about both family planning and abortion services among disadvantaged sub-groups of women in the study setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In scenarios where visual and vestibular inputs are dissociated, humans' spatial cognitive and task performance can deteriorate. To investigate the neural basis, microelectrode arrays (MEA) with good chronic recording performance are needed. In this study, we proposed a novel approach to modify alkaline laminin onto neural electrodes and constructed an MEA using laminin (SIKVAV) modified for single-neuron tracking detecting. The modified interface has excellent hydrophilicity and biocompatibility and is conducive to enhancing the adhesion of neurons. Moreover, the MEAs exhibits excellent performance on signal-to-noise ratio, neuron detection amount, and neuron tracking effects in chronic recording experiment. Utilizing this tool, we record the electrophysiological activities in the rats' brains under sensory conflict. We observed an apparent response of pyramidal neurons to sensory conflict. Notably, this conflict disrupted the theta rhythmic firing of theta cells and local field potentials (LFP) theta oscillations in the retrosplenial cortex (RSC), which is associated with cognition, and both required a certain amount of time for recovery. This study provides a method for chronic detection of neurons in vivo and reveals part of the mechanism of cognitive impairment of patients with sensory conflict, which may provide theoretical support for future treatment strategies. • The modification of basic laminin (PEDOT-Citrate/SIKVAV) on MEA was proposed to improve the in vivo chronic detection. • PEDOT-Citrate/ SIKVAV-modified mea performed well in chronic detection of SNR, active channels and neuron tracking effect. • Sensory conflicts impaired theta activities involved in spatial cognition , laying foundations for motion sickness treatments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new protocol for the oxidative coupling of ketone oximes with dialkyl/diarylphosphine oxides to synthesize O -(dialkylphosphinyl)ketone oximes has been developed. Hydrogen peroxide is used as a green oxidizing agent, and molecular iodine is used as a nonmetal catalyst. The reaction has a high atom economy, with water as the only byproduct. O -(Dialkylphosphinyl)ketone oximes with 26 examples have been obtained with high yields. Furthermore, the product may be transformed into other molecules, i.e., by reduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prediction of oscillating pressure is a key technology for cavity research. Nonlinear Acoustic Solver (NLAS) is applied to analyze aeroacoustics recently. A nonlinear numerical solver is combined with the Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) method. RANS is applied to solving the flow field around a cavity, and average solution of initial turbulent statistics is obtained which contains the basic characteristics of the average flow field and statistic description of turbulence fluctuation. The source of acoustic generation is reconstructed, and the spreading of oscillating pressure is simulated precisely. According to the comparison of the cavity noise calculation and experimental results under Mach numbers 0.6, 0.85, and 1.35, it indicates that NLAS is capable to predict oscillating pressure of cavity flow from subsonic to supersonic with acceptable deviation. On this basis, the contribution to oscillating pressure suppression made by passive control such as rectangular fence (RF) and square tooth spoiler (STS) is investigated. It is found that these two passive control methods can lessen the total noise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In China, the world's largest developing country, low back pain (LBP) is a common public health issue affecting workability. This meta-analysis aimed to systematically assess the risk factors of LBP in the Chinese population. Methods: Four English language and four Chinese databases were searched, and cross-sectional studies on the risk factors for LBP in Chinese populations were identified and collected. The search timeframe covered the period from the establishment of the database to November 2023. Two researchers independently reviewed the literature, extracted the data, and evaluated the risk of bias. Begg's and Egger's tests were used to evaluate publication bias. Results: Fifteen cross-sectional studies involving 86,575 people were included. Seven risk factors for LBP were identified. Six risk factors were statistically significant: Cigarette smoking (odds ratio [OR] = 1.55; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.15, 2.08, P = 0.004, I2 = 72%), body mass index (BMI) ≥ 28 kg/m² (OR = 4.51; 95% CI: 3.36, 6.07, P < 0.00001, I2 = 8%), female sex (OR = 1.54; 95% CI: 1.25, 1.90, P < 0.0001, I2 = 63%), vibration exposure at work (OR = 1.65; 95% CI: 1.16, 2.34, P = 0.006, I2 = 84%), working overtime (OR = 2.57; 95% CI: 1.12, 5.91, P = 0.03, I2 = 85%), and lack of exercise (OR = 2.48; 95% CI: 1.62, 3.78, P < 0.0001, I2 = 0%). One risk factor that was not statistically significant was standing for long periods (OR = 1.02; 95% CI: 0.82, 1.26, P = 0.88, I2 = 73%). Conclusions: This study found that smoking, a BMI ≥ 28 kg/m², female sex, vibration exposure at work, working overtime, and lack of exercise may be risk factors for LBP in the Chinese population. Because the included studies were cross-sectional and the certainty of the evidence was very low, the results need to be interpreted cautiously. Multicentre, high-quality studies should be conducted in the future. To reduce the prevalence of LBP, the Chinese government and hospitals must develop early screening programs and implement effective preventive and interventional measures. Trial registration: This study is registered in the PROSPERO database (No. CRD42023447857). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simultaneous detection of spike firing and neurotransmitters in mice is conducive to further understanding the mechanism of innate fear induced by aversive stimuli. As the key brain region of the dopamine aversion system, the synchronous changes of neural discharge and neurotransmitter concentration in the striatum under innate fear are less studied. This paper proposed a fabrication method for dual-mode high-sensitive flexible microelectrode array (MEA) probe based on Parylene. The microelectrode sites were modified with platinum black nanoparticles and conductive polymer PEDOT, which can realize single neuron action potential recording and dopamine concentration detection. The electrode sensitivity for dopamine detection can reach 162.3 pA/μM. We used this flexible MEA probe to simultaneously real-time detect electrophysiology activities and dopamine in the striatum of awake mice under aversive stimulation. The results showed that after fear, with the decrease of the mean activity of mice behavior, the action potential firing rate, local field potential (LFP) power in low-frequency (0–30 Hz), and dopamine concentration in the striatum of mice decreased synchronously. The spike firing rate decreased by about 32 %, and the dopamine concentration decreased by about 23.5 %. Our electrodes provide a powerful tool for multimodal neural information detection and our research provides new evidence for striatum involvement in the dopamine aversion system. • Flexible MEA probe was fabricated for spike, LFP and dopamine detection. • The flexible MEA probe modified with PtNPs/PEDOT:PSS has high electrochemical sensitivity. • Electrophysiological activities and dopamine concentration of striatum decreased synchronously after fear. • New evidence of striatum involvement in dopamine aversion system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When adopting an image‐based biometric system, an important factor for consideration is its potential recognition capacity, since it not only defines the potential number of individuals likely to be identifiable, but also serves as a useful figure‐of‐merit for performance. Based on block transform coding commonly used for image compression, this study presents a method to enable coarse estimation of potential recognition capacity for texture‐based biometrics. Essentially, each image block is treated as a constituent biometric component, and image texture contained in each block is binary coded to represent the corresponding texture class. The statistical variability among the binary values assigned to corresponding blocks is then exploited for estimation of potential recognition capacity. In particular, methodologies are proposed to determine appropriate image partition based on separation between texture classes and informativeness of an image block based on statistical randomness. By applying the proposed method to a commercial fingerprint system and a bespoke hand vein system, the potential recognition capacity is estimated to around 1036 for a fingerprint area of 25mm2 which is in good agreement with the estimates reported, and around 1015 for a hand vein area of 2268mm2 which has not been reported before. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To fabricate the oxidation resistance accident tolerance fuel cladding, Cr layer and FeCrAl alloys were deposited on Zircaloy-4 using atmospheric plasma spraying technology. The specimens were exposed under a simulated loss-of-coolant accident condition. XRD, SEM and EDS techniques were carried out to explore their high temperature behavior. According to the analysis results, both Cr coating and FeCrAl coating were successfully prepared by atmospheric plasma spraying system. Cr coating had superior oxidation resistance. Compact Cr 2 O 3 scale forming on Cr coating acted as an oxygen diffusion barrier, whereas FeCrAl coating degraded due to inter-diffusion, leading to its poor protection for the cladding. Difference in standard Gibbs free energy of formation of Fe and Zr caused the prior oxidation of Zr. Accordingly, Zr-rich and Zr-depleted zones occurred in FeCrAl-coated specimens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recognition rate of SIFT algorithm in single hand vein database has been as high as 99.5%. But with the development of Internet-plus technology, the demand for distributed systems becomes more and more significant. However, the problem of picture quality caused by cross-device makes the intraclass variations larger. For example, when gathering the dorsal hand vein images, subtle changes in relative distance and orientation among the imaging camera, the illumination LED arrays and the different location of users' hand, as well as shielding by the external housing box from ambient light sources and so on, these will make large difference to one person's hand images. So, including the contrast, the lightness, the shifting, the angle of rotation, the size and so on, these differences make it possible to use some traditional methods to recognize dorsal hand vein with a low recognition rate of less than 50%. Therefore, based on the traditional SIFT, this paper optimized the scale factor , extreme searching neighborhood structure and matching threshold . It can be seen that the cross-device hand vein feature is more robust, and the recognition rate reached an average of 88.5%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phospholipase A2s (PLA2) is a major component of snake venom with diverse pathologic toxicities and, therefore, a potential target for antivenom therapy. Varespladib was initially designed as an inhibitor of mammal PLA2s, and was recently repurposed to a broad-spectrum inhibitor of PLA2 in snake venom. To evaluate the protective abilities of varespladib to hemorrhage, myonecrosis, and systemic toxicities that are inflicted by different crude snake venoms, subcutaneous ecchymosis, muscle damage, and biochemical variation in serum enzymes derived from the envenomed mice were determined, respectively. Varespladib treatment showed a significant inhibitory effect to snake venom PLA2, which was estimated by IC50 in vitro and ED50 in vivo. In animal models, the severely hemorrhagic toxicity of D. acutus and A. halys venom was almost fully inhibited after administration of varespladib. Moreover, signs of edema in gastrocnemius muscle were remarkably attenuated by administration of varespladib, with a reduced loss of myonecrosis and desmin. Serum levels of creatine kinase, lactate dehydrogenase isoenzyme 1, aspartate transaminase, and alanine transaminase were down-regulated after treatment with varespladib, which indicated the protection to viscera injury. In conclusion, varespladib may be a potential first-line drug candidate in snakebite envenomation first aid or clinical therapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Oil spills and the presence of oily wastewater have resulted in substantial ecological damage. Superhydrophobic polymer foam with selectivity and adsorption capacity is a promising candidate for efficient oil‐water separation. In this study, a method that combines phase separation and silica coating to produce superhydrophobic thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) foam is proposed. The TPU foam demonstrates superhydrophobicity with a water contact angle of 155.62°, and exhibits a maximum saturated adsorption capacity of 54.11 g g−1. Furthermore, the foam can be utilized as a filter for oil‐water separation, maintaining its filtration efficiency (41.2 m3 m2 h−1) even after ten filtration cycles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exploration of the Inhibitory Potential of Varespladib for Snakebite Envenomation. Reference 1 Wang Y., Zhang J., Zhang D., Xiao H., Xiong S., Huang C. Exploration of the Inhibitory Potential of Varespladib for Snakebite Envenomation. The authors would like to correct an error in the original publication [[1]]. [Extracted from the article]

As the identification technology is developed day by day, so is the counterfeit, and any accreditation system can be tricked. Therefore, a complete biometric identification system is supposed to distinguish between real and fake. Aiming at the liveness detection problems during the dorsal hand vein (DHV) recognition process, this paper proposes a method which combines principal component analysis and power spectrum estimation of the AR model together, three kinds of fake hand vein images which are paper printed, wearing thin rubber gloves and wearing thick rubber gloves have tested, and the result shows that the recognition rate of fake samples can reach 98.3 %, which proves that this method can realize in liveness detection of DHVs effectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In consideration of an increasing demand to adopt the biometric technology to minimize potential security risks, the paper presents a consumer-level biometric system for automatic physical access control. Through development of a near infrared imaging device for biometric acquisition of dorsal hand vein patterns and computation efficient image processing methods, the proposed system is shown to possess a range of desirable operation characteristics for real-world use, which include reliable in identification, convenient to use, high in security, fast in response, low in cost, and simple for installation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Insomnia is a common sleep disorder around the world, which is harmful to people's health, daily life, and work. The paraventricular thalamus (PVT) plays an essential role in the sleep–wake transition. However, high temporal-spatial resolution microdevice technology is lacking for accurate detection and regulation of deep brain nuclei. The means for analyzing sleep–wake mechanisms and treating sleep disorders are limited. To detect the relationship between the PVT and insomnia, we designed and fabricated a special microelectrode array (MEA) to record electrophysiological signals of the PVT for insomnia and control rats. Platinum nanoparticles (PtNPs) were modified onto an MEA, which caused the impedance to decrease and improved the signal-to-noise ratio. We established the model of insomnia in rats and analyzed and compared the neural signals in detail before and after insomnia. In insomnia, the spike firing rate was increased from 5.48 ± 0.28 spike/s to 7.39 ± 0.65 spike/s, and the power of local field potential (LFP) decreased in the delta frequency band and increased in the beta frequency band. Furthermore, the synchronicity between PVT neurons declined, and burst-like firing was observed. Our study found neurons of the PVT were more activated in the insomnia state than in the control state. It also provided an effective MEA to detect the deep brain signals at the cellular level, which conformed with macroscopical LFP and insomnia symptoms. These results laid the foundation for studying PVT and the sleep–wake mechanism and were also helpful for treating sleep disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For a purpose of verification and optimization of the thermal insulation design of a high speed aircraft, an accurate method is need to complete a simulation of inner heat transfer process caused by outer high speed aero-thermal flow. Therefor a simulation method that can solve outer fluid field and its aero-thermal, structural thermal conduction and inner fluid temperature distribution is studied, where heat transfer methods include conduction, convection, and radiation. The method adopt a structure of two models, two solvers and one transfer file, which constructs a fluid-thermal-structural multiple physical coupled method so as to realize transient temperature simulation and analysis in a inner fluid field which is isolated by solid structure with outer fluid field. In the end, an example is given to verify the whole method, and the results can be used to guide the thermal insulation design of a high speed aircraft. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a biometric identification system based on near‐infrared imaging of dorsal hand veins and matching of the keypoints that are extracted from the dorsal hand vein images by the scale‐invariant feature transform. The whole system is covered in detail, which includes the imaging device used, image processing methods proposed for geometric correction, region‐of‐interest extraction, image enhancement and vein pattern segmentation, as well as image classification by extraction and matching of keypoints. In addition to several constraints introduced to minimise incorrectly matched keypoints, a particular focus is placed on the use of multiple training images of each hand class to improve the recognition performance for a large database with more than 200 hand classes. By organising multiple keypoint sets extracted from multiple training images of each hand class into three sets, namely, the union, the intersection and the exclusion, based on their inter‐class and intra‐class relationships, this study shows the contribution made by each set to the recognition performance and demonstrates the feasibility of achieving 100% correct recognition by combining the three sets, based on the experiments conducted using more than 2000 dorsal hand vein images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT) has been established as being an effective treatment for advanced gastric cancer (GC), while the predictive biomarker of NACT efficacy remains under investigation. Aspartate β-hydroxylase (ASPH) represents an attractive target which is a highly conserved transmembrane enzyme overexpressed in human GC, and participates in the malignant transformation by promoting tumor cell motility. Here, we evaluated the expression of ASPH by immunohistochemistry in 350 GC tissues (including samples for NACT) and found that ASPH expression was higher in patients undergoing NACT compared with patients without NACT pre-operation. The OS and PFS time of ASPH-intensely positive patients was significantly shorter than that of the negative patients in the NACT group, while the difference was not significant in patients without NACT. We showed that ASPH knockout enhanced the inhibitory effects of chemotherapeutic drugs on the cell proliferation, migration, and invasion in vitro and suppressed tumor progression in vivo. Co-immunoprecipitation revealed that ASPH might interact with LAPTM4B to perform chemotherapeutic drug resistance. Our results suggested that ASPH might serve as a candidate biomarker to predict prognosis and a novel therapeutic target for gastric cancer patients treated with neoadjuvant chemotherapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On‐chip waveguide spectroscopic sensors have attracted considerable attention due to its potential for large‐scale integration. However, existing waveguide gas sensors based on direct absorption spectroscopy (DAS) suffer from limited sensitivity and measurement range. Here waveguide‐based on‐chip photothermal spectroscopy (PTS) is demonstrated for gas detection with high sensitivity and large dynamic range. On‐chip photothermal field due to non‐radiation relaxation of gas molecules and the resulted photothermal phase modulation are analyzed. By selecting chalcogenide glass (ChG) as the core‐layer material and fabricating thermally‐isolated ChG‐on‐SU8 waveguide for thermal field accumulation, a twofold increase in photothermal phase modulation is achieved as compared to ChG‐on‐SiO2 waveguides. Different from the major concern of multi‐path etalon noise in DAS, piezoelectric transducer noise in the interferometer is identified as the main source in this PTS. For a fair comparison, acetylene (C2H2) detection experiments are conducted using PTS and DAS with a 2 cm‐long ChG‐on‐SU8 waveguide. A remarkable sensitivity of 4 parts‐per‐million (ppm) is achieved, which is 16 times better than that of DAS. The dynamic range extends over five orders of magnitude for PTS, ≈3 orders of magnitude larger than that of DAS. Such high performance opens the possibility of fully‐integrated chip‐level sensors for low‐power, light‐weight applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is a public health emergency of international concern. To date, there are limited studies that have investigated the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on mental health among female population. Therefore, the study aims to investigate the prevalence of postpartum depression (PPD) and it's related factors among women in Guangzhou, China, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed from 30th March 2020 to 13th April 2020 using anonymous online questionnaire among 864 women at 6–12 weeks postpartum. The Chinese version of Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale and a questionnaire regarding associated factors were administered to all participants. Multivariate logistic regression was used to determine factors that were significantly associated with PPD. Results: The prevalence of PPD among women at 6–12 weeks postpartum was 30.0%. A multivariate logistic regression model identified significant factors as: immigrant women, persistent fever, poor social support, concerns about contracting COVID-19 and certain precautionary measures. Conclusions: The findings suggest the need for policies and interventions to not only mitigate the psychological impacts but also target disadvantaged sub-groups of women following childbirth during the COVID-19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zirconium-doped ZnO (ZZO) transparent conductive films are deposited on glass substrates by radiofrequency sputtering at 300°C. The influence of O2/Ar ratio on the structural, electrical and optical properties of ZZO films is investigated by X-ray diffraction, Hall measurement, and optical transmission spectroscopy. The results show that ZZO thin films are polycrystalline with a preferred (002) orientation. The lowest resistivity of 3.7×10−4 Ωcm is obtained at the O2/Ar ratio of 1/12. The average optical transmittance of the films is over 90%, and the transmittance has no evident change with increasing O2/Ar ratio. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The dorsal hand vein images captured by cross-device may have great differences in brightness, displacement, rotation angle and size. These deviations must influence greatly the results of dorsal hand vein recognition. To solve these problems, the method of dorsal hand vein recognition was put forward based on bit plane and block mutual information in this paper. Firstly, the input gray image of dorsal hand vein was converted to eight-bit planes to overcome the interference of brightness inside the higher bit planes and the interference of noise inside the lower bit planes. Secondly, the texture of each bit plane of dorsal hand vein was described by a block method and the mutual information between blocks was calculated as texture features by three kinds of modes to solve the problem of rotation and size. Finally, the experiments cross-device were carried out. One device was used to be registered, the other was used to recognize. Compared with the SIFT (Scale-invariant feature transform, SIFT) algorithm, the new algorithm can increase the recognition rate of dorsal hand vein from 86.60% to 93.33%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performance of a Ni–ZnS/three-dimensional (3D) graphene aerogel (GA) composite photocatalyst for hydrogen production was investigated in this study. Ni–ZnS precursor was loaded on 3D graphene aerogel through a simple solvothermal method, and the composite Ni–ZnS/GA was successfully synthesized. The average hydrogen production rate of Ni–ZnS/GA-4 can reached 12.06 mmol·g−1·h−1 and after three cycles for 9 h, the hydrogen production efficiency remained at 97.81%. Ni2+ doping provided suitable band gap for ZnS, which could fully absorb sunlight, and made the photo-generated carriers have sufficient redox ability. The large specific surface of 3D graphene gel enhanced the dispersion of nano Ni-ZnS, boosted photo-generated carrier separation, and accelerated sacrificial agent adsorption. The Ni–ZnS/GA composite had more active adsorption sites and photocatalytic reaction centers, improving photocatalytic activity and efficiency. [Display omitted] • Ni–ZnS/GA-4 has high hydrogen production rate (12.06 mmol g−1 h−1) and cycle stability. • The three-dimensional porous structure of graphene gel provides rich active sites for the reaction. • The low work function of graphene enables electrons to reach the surface of graphene quickly and inhibits electron-hole recombination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Preeclampsia (PE) is a maternal disease that causes maternal and child death. Treatment and preventive measures are not sound enough. The problem of PE screening has attracted much attention. The purpose of this study is to screen placental mRNA to obtain the best PE biomarkers for identifying patients with PE. We use Limma in the R language to screen out the 48 differentially expressed genes with the largest differences and used correlation-based feature selection algorithms to reduce the dimensionality and avoid attribute redundancy arising from too many mRNA samples participating in the classification. After reducing the mRNA attributes, the mRNA samples are sorted from large to small according to information gain. In this study, a classifier model is designed to identify whether samples had PE through mRNA in the placenta. To improve the accuracy of classification and avoid overfitting, three classifiers, including C4.5, AdaBoost, and multilayer perceptron, are used. We use the majority voting strategy integrated with the differentially expressed genes and the genes filtered by the best subset method as comparison methods to train the classifier. The results show that the classification accuracy rate has increased from 79% to 82.2%, and the number of mRNA features has decreased from 48 to 13. This study provides clues for the main PE biomarkers of mRNA in the placenta and provides ideas for the treatment and screening of PE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Informed by previous experimental observations, this study employed a combination of molecular dynamics simulations and dislocation continuum theory to investigate the interplay of super-screw dislocations and coherent twin boundary (CTB) in Ni 3 Al. The results reveal multiple interaction mechanisms depending on both the applied stress and the pathway for dislocation gliding. A continuum model framework has been developed to quantitatively evaluate the critical shear stress necessary for the CTB to accommodate dislocations along different pathway with the effects of anti-phase boundary (APB) and Complex Stacking fault (CSF) considered. The critical shear stress exhibits a significant inverse dependence on the quantity of dislocations, rendering it unsuitable as a measure of twin boundary strength. Instead, the resistant force of the CTB against all gliding dislocations is suggested as a more appropriate metric for quantifying its strength. This enables a direct comparison of the twin boundary strength between Ni and Ni 3 Al containing different amounts of Shockley dislocations, thereby extending its applicability to a wider range of materials. Our work offers new mechanistic insights critical for understanding and quantitative analysis of the interplay of super-dislocations and micro twining in nickel-based superalloys. [Display omitted] • Unlike the FCC lattice, Dislocation-CTB interactions in L 12 lattice depend strongly on glide pathways (shuffle and glide). • Distinct CTB interaction mechanisms with each dislocation glide pathway, dependent on applied stress, are identified. • Critical shear stress (τ) inversely relates to dislocation quantity, unsuitable for CTB strength measurement. • The resistant force of CTB against gliding dislocations is suggested as a suitable metric for the CTB strength. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We proposed a near‐infrared gas sensing system based on mode‐locked cavity‐enhanced absorption spectroscopy. A distributed feedback fiber laser (DFB‐FL) with a central wavelength of 1550 nm was employed as the light source, coupling with a Fabry–Perot (F‐P) cavity with an effective optical path length of 42.7 m served as the gas cell. By utilizing a homemade mode‐locked electric circuit and Pound–Drever–Hall (PDH) technique, the mode‐locking between the DFB‐FL and F‐P cavity was achieved with long‐term fluctuation of 3.2%. System performance was verified using ammonia as the analyte gas with a target line at 1550.17 nm. Allan variance analysis revealed that the minimum detection limit was 15.8 ppm with an averaging time of 216 s, corresponding to an absorption coefficient of 2.3 × 10−7 cm−1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To address the issues of low ratio of evanescent field (γ) and high reflectivity between waveguide cross‐section and gas for the mid‐infrared waveguide sensors, we propose a chalcogenide (ChG) suspended waveguide with Ge28Sb12Se60 as the core layer and silica (SiO2) as the buffer layer. The SiO2 beneath the waveguide core ridge structure is removed to create suspended structure. The waveguide sensing performance is obtained using a 10% methane (CH4) sample. The fabricated waveguide exhibits a γ of 112%, which is a 10% improvement compared to a free‐space optical sensor with the same optical path length. The good agreement between the theoretical and experimental results of γ confirms the reliability of our theoretical investigation approach. The influences of fabrication error, environmental temperature, and pressure on sensing performances are discussed. This work provides theoretical guidance for designing waveguide structures with large γ, contributing to the further enhancement of on‐chip sensor performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A mid‐infrared carbon dioxide (CO2) sensor system was developed for early fire detection based on photoacoustic spectroscopy. A miniaturized nonresonant photoacoustic gas cell was optimized by means of finite element method (FEM). A cylindrical cell was optimized with a radius of 12.7 mm and a length of 32 mm. An approximately proportional relationship between the optical path length and the amplitude of the photoacoustic signal was observed by theoretical analysis. The optimal modulation frequency was determined to be 44 Hz. A dual optical path was adopted to gain a low limit of detection (LoD) and a high sensitivity. The amplitude of the photoacoustic signal was increased by 1.8 times compared to single optical path. The LoD of the sensor system was measured to be 4.1 ppmv at an averaging time of 84 s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This letter presented a symmetric 8T2R NVSRAM with autosave function. By efficiently multiplexing the node voltages, the control of the nonvolatile memristor and the isolation of the data node from the memristor are achieved, which ensures an instantaneous transition to the memristor state. Store and restore can be achieved within 66.1ps and 2.97 ps in case of VDD is 1 V for the worst case. In addition, the 8T2R structure performs well at lower supply voltages as 243.3 mV for STORE and 411.8 mV for RESTORE. When a 10%‐dimensional error of the devices and 10% memristance mismatch are taken into account, the 8T2R still shows high stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] Allylic compounds are widely used in pharmaceutical, chemical and other industries, such as allyl indole derivatives widely present in alkaloids, allylylated derivatives of the antiviral drug acyclovir, and chiral allyl acinolides for the preparation of chiral amino acids. In recent years, vinylcyclopropanes has developed rapidly in organic synthetic chemistry. Activated vinylcyclopropanes are an important raw material for the synthesis of functionalized heterocyclic compounds or allyl derivatives. Transition metal-catalyzed allylation reaction of vinyl cyclopropanes can form new bonds with extensive nucleophiles containing C, N, O, Si, P and S centers. Progress on transition metal-catalyzed allylation of activated vinylcyclopropanes reviewed in this Digest Article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A near‐infrared methane (CH4) and ethane (C2H6) dual‐gas sensor system based on off‐axis integrated cavity output spectroscopy was demonstrated. Simultaneous detection of CH4 and C2H6 was performed using two distributed feedback laser diodes with central wavelengths of 1654 and 1680 nm by time division multiplexing (TDM). TDM of the two lasers was realized using a self‐developed master controller based on digital signal processor. Allan deviations of 27.3 parts‐per‐billion in volume (ppbv) for CH4 and 196.4 ppbv for C2H6 were achieved at an averaging time of 1 s. The reported sensor shows potential applications in vehicle‐deployed natural gas leakage monitoring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ethane (C2H6) is an important gas in environmental monitoring, especially in urban areas, and the development of vehicle‐mounted mobile C2H6 sensors is meaningful for high‐efficiency and wide‐range detection of C2H6 concentration levels. Based on tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy, a sensor system for the detection of trace C2H6 concentration in the atmosphere was developed using wavelength modulation spectroscopy. An interband cascade laser with a central wavelength of 3337 nm and a multipass gas cell (MPGC) with an optical path length of 26.4 m was used as core optical components. The pressure in the MPGC was optimized at 200 Torr, and such pressure was stabilized by a self‐developed pressure control system. The sensor system was compactly integrated into a standalone instrument with a dimension size of 52 × 33 × 28.8 cm3. The detection limit (1σ) was measured to be 3.45 parts per billion at an averaging time of 0.5 s. Forty‐eight‐hour field experiment and vehicle‐mounted mobile measurement of atmospheric C2H6 levels with concentration mapping were carried out on the Jilin University campus to validate the practical application ability of the system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel double‐slot subwavelength grating with high sensitivity and small size was presented for the detection of carbon dioxide (CO2). Compared with single‐slot structure, the proposed double‐slot structure reduces the influence of slot width on the transmission intensity and thus improves the sensor performance. For enabling selectivity and sensitivity, the gap of the grating is filled with polyhexamethylene biguanide (PHMB). The refractive index of PHMB decreases after the absorption of CO2 molecules, which changes the effective refractive index of the waveguide mode. For getting the highest sensitivity, the proposed sensor was numerically simulated and optimized. The limit of detection for CO2 can be as low as 6.3 parts per million (ppm), which is lower than other reported waveguide CO2 sensors based on PHMB. The proposed sensor is capable of atmospheric CO2 monitoring with an acceptable limit of detection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For optical waveguide sensor based on evanescent field, the limitation of the light intensity caused by the waveguide loss leads to a short interaction length. Increasing external confinement factor can increase absorbance to overcome this problem. A chalcogenide waveguide was proposed for water absorption measurement, whose core layer was fabricated by lift‐off method. Silver island film was fabricated on the surface of core layer by oblique angle deposition method, which was used to introduce surface‐enhanced infrared absorption (SEIRA) effect. The surface morphology of the metal island structure with different thicknesses were characterized. Liquid water was used as the analyte. The sensor with 1.8 nm thick silver island film had the largest absorbance enhancement factor (>2.1) with an increased waveguide loss of only 1 dB/cm. The SEIRA effect using metal island film can also be used in slot waveguide or suspended waveguide to further achieve better performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We reported on the dielectric and microwave absorbing properties of Ca-doped Y 2 Ti 2 O 7 prepared by hot-pressing sintering. The structure, thermogravimetric analysis, conductivity, dielectric and microwave absorbing properties were systematically investigated. The results indicated that the main charge compensation mechanism was oxygen vacancies at low Ca 2+ doping concentration, while at high Ca 2+ doping levels, oxygen vacancies and Ca interstitials coexisted in the Y 2-x Ca x Ti 2 O 7 . The major types of polarization process involved in this study are electronic, atomic and space charge polarization and orientational polarization. The minimum reflection loss of Y 1.8 Ca 0.2 Ti 2 O 7 can reach −40.9 dB with a thickness of 1.1 mm. These properties manifest that Ca-doped Y 2 Ti 2 O 7 ceramics have the potential applications as microwave absorbing materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Doxorubicin (DOX) is the most clinically important antibiotic in cancer treatment, but its severe cardiotoxicity and other side effects limit its clinical use. Therefore, monitoring DOX concentrations during therapy is essential to improve efficacy and reduce adverse effects. Here, we fabricated a sensitive electrochemical aptasensor for DOX detection. The sensor used gold wire as the working electrode and was modified with reduced graphene oxide (rGO)/gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) to improve the sensitivity. An aptamer was used as the recognition element for the DOX. The 5′ end of the aptamer was modified with a thiol group, and thus immobilized to the AuNPs, and the 3′ end was modified with methylene blue, which acts as the electron mediator. The combination between the aptamer and DOX would produce a binding-induced conformation, which changes the electron transfer rate, yielding a current change that correlates with the concentration of DOX. The aptasensor exhibited good linearity in the DOX concentration range of 0.3 μM to 6 μM, with a detection limit of 0.1 μM. In addition, the aptasensor was used for DOX detection in real samples and results, and showed good recovery. The proposed electrochemical aptasensor will provide a sensitive, fast, simple, and reliable new platform for detecting DOX. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]