Search

Chronic low back pain (CLBP) is a common symptom of lumbar degenerative disease. Degeneration of the lumbar paravertebral muscles causes a loss of muscle mass and strength, which is a vital factor causing CLBP and often accompanied by lipid infiltration. Tandem mass spectrometry (TMT) was used to identify differentially expressed proteins in lipid-infiltrated and normal muscles. The results show that fatty acid binding protein 4 (FABP4) participated in the peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-γ (PPAR γ) signaling pathway as an up-regulated protein, which is related to lipogenesis in diverse cells. In addition, chronic inflammation is believed to be involved in lumbar muscle degeneration and lipogenesis, with interleukin-4 (IL-4) considered as the predominant contributor. In present study, we investigate the effect of FABP4 on lipogenesis in human skeletal muscle cells (HSMCs) stimulated by Interleukin-4 (IL-4) and explore the mechanistic basis. We found expression level of FABP4 in lipid-infiltrated muscles was significantly higher than that in normal muscles. Lipogenesis in HSMCs could be increased by IL-4 treatment, as well as by FABP4 overexpression. FABP4 inhibition suppressed IL-4-mediated lipogenesis in HSMCs, whereas the PPAR γ inhibitor alleviated lipogenesis in both IL-4-treated and FABP4-overexpressed HSMCs. Collectively, the results indicate that FABP4 induces lipogenesis in HSMCs stimulated with IL-4 via activating the PPAR γ signaling pathway. Our study offers a detailed perspective on the pathogenesis of muscle lipid infiltration and provides a potential target for the clinical treatment strategy of muscle lipid infiltration and CLBP.

To explore clinical effect of rotational Scarf osteotomy in treating hallux valgus (HV) with rotation of the first metatarsal bone.From January 2018 to October 2019, 35 patients (40 feet) with HV and rotation deformity of the first metatarsal were treated with rotational Scarf osteotomy, including 5 males and 30 females;aged from 25 to 76 years old with an average of (40.32±5.43) years old. Hallux valgus angle(HVA), intermetatarsal angle (IMA), distal metatarsal articular angle (DMAA), the first metatarsal length (FML) were observed and compared, American Orthopedic Foot and Ankle Society(AOFAS) of hallux metatarsophalangeal interphalangeal joint score and visual analogue scale (VAS) were used to evaluate functional evaluation.Thirty-five patients(40 feet) were followed up from 12 to 36 months with an average of (14.35±3.62) months. HVA, IMA and DMAA were corrected from (36.32±4.51) °, (14.21±3.22) ° and (28.35±4.32) ° before operation to (14.32±5.71) °, (5.83±3.97) ° and (7.32±2.14) ° after operation respectively (Rotational Scarf osteotomy with strong correction and high dimension could effectively correct HV combined with rotation deformity of the first metatarsal bone, improve function of the forefoot, and obtain good clinical results.

A 10kWe integrated reactor with Stirling generator is in design, to satisfy China’s power demand for both Earth orbit and deep space exploration in the next two decades. The integration of the core and the thermoelectric conversion system, reduces the number of tubes and pump structures, which leads to a higher energy conversion rate, fewer failure risks and coolant leaks. The waste heat of this reactor would be transferred through its heat pipes to its radiators, then to the space. Applying nanofluids would help reduce the heat pipe sizes, because nanofluids have great alterations in their thermo-physical properties with a small fraction of nanoparticles. Numerous models have been proposed to characterize the thermo-physical properties of nanofluids. However, it is found that researchers have different, sometimes even contradictory conclusions about some of the properties. At the same time, these properties could be affected by various aspects, the simple models are not sufficient for the reference. This work focuses on evaluating the models of density, specific heat capacity, thermal conductivity, viscosity, and Nusselt number of nanofluids with statistical methods, and provides reference thermo-physical properties for the design of the heat pipes in the space reactor. For this reason, a great amount of experimental data is collected. Profiting from the collected data, artificial neural network (ANN) models based on Pytorch are trained and compared with the other models.

Background Ankylosing spondylitis (AS) is a systematic and rheumatic disease, which causes multiple symptoms. However, dysphagia due to the formation of a giant anterior cervical osteophyte is rare in patients with AS. Case summary We present the case of a 65-year-old male patient who was diagnosed with AS and visited the hospital with a complaint of progressive dysphagia. The appropriate imaging examinations indicated that a giant anterior cervical osteo-phyte at C3-4 caused esophageal compression, which led to dysphagia. An operation for resection was performed without complications. Conclusion This case demonstrates that a large cervical osteophyte may be the cause of dysphagia in patients with AS, and early accurate diagnosis and surgical treat-ment are very important for the improvement of symptoms. Anterior cervical discectomy and fusion are extremely effective and should be taken into consideration.

A switchable and tunable dual-function absorber/polarization converter is presented in this work. The constitution of the structure, which incorporates patterned graphene and photosensitive silicon (Si), can minimize undesired optical losses. Simulated results show that when the Si is metallic, the structure behaves as a broadband absorption of more than 90% in the range of 1.45–3.36 THz. Its peak absorption can be tuned from 22% to 99.8% by changing the Fermi energy of graphene. Furthermore, the interference theory analyzes the physical mechanism for broadband absorption. When the Si is in the dielectric state, the structure has a transmission polarization conversion function, which realizes the conversion from linear to cross-polarized waves. The polarization conversion ratio (PCR) is greater than 90% in the 3.82–4.43 THz range. Meanwhile, the cross-polarization transmission can be dynamically tuned from 28% to 97%, and the PCR can also be tuned from 17% to 99.9% by adjusting the conductivity of the Si. The reason for realizing polarization conversion is explained by the polarization decomposition method. This study provides a design opinion of high-performance multifunctional tunable terahertz devices.

Based on the solvable dynamical model for quantum measurement process, we consider three uncoupled particles interacting with their local one-dimensional (1D) spin arrays. Here the 1D spin arrays can be regarded as the local phase decoherence environments for the particles. To demonstrate the dynamics of quantum entanglement among three particles in measuring process, the tripartite negativity is introduced. Our study indicates that the tripartite negativity is determined jointly by the initial states and the dephasing factors for four kinds of initial states, including GHZ-type states, W-type states, Weiner-GHZ states, and Weiner-W states. We find the particle-spin array interaction can destroy the tripartite negativity, and the tripartite negativity is the same for the family of entangled GHZ states or the family of entangled W states. Furthermore, there exists the sudden death of tripartite negativity when the initial states are Weiner-GHZ states or Weiner-W states.

The Roll-to-Roll (R2R) process refers to a high-efficiency, low-cost, continuous production method. The roll material used for processing is a flexible plastic or metal film. In many R2R processes, polarizing films are high-precision products with a high output value. In the production of conventional polarizers, product inspection will only be carried out after the production of the polarizing film is completed. The principal raw material of a polarizer sheet is a hydrophilic polymer, the properties of which may be influenced by water vapor, which degrades its quality. Whether or not the product is impacted can be ascertained by means of a quality inspection, but it must be performed after the process is finished. However, it is already too late when a defective product is detected: the production cost is increased, the schedule is influenced and the delivery date is delayed. The focus of this research was on environmental monitoring of the production drying process oven, but the commercial all-in-one sensors currently on the market cannot tolerate the temperature of the factory’s high-temperature oven. In particular, a commercial flow sensor is rarely suited to high-temperature applications. Some are expensive and cannot be widely distributed. Therefore, this study aimed to develop an integrated sensor to measure the internal environment of the drying process oven for the real-time monitoring of a polarizer sheet in the Roll-to-Roll (R2R) process. This study used micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) technology to make a flexible three-in-one (temperature, humidity and flow) micro-sensor. We monitored the temperature, humidity and flow uniformity in a laboratory oven to simulate the environment of the actual factory oven, with the aim to provide data to confirm whether or not a polarizer sheet has dried. Our system can be monitored instantly by Arduino, or even Raspberry Pi 3, to realize the flexible micro-sensor layout and field verification, in order to optimize the R2R process and to enhance the yield and performance of the polarizer sheet process.

Environment-induced decoherence would shorten the transmission distance or storage time of entangled states. Enhancing the intrinsic robustness and prolonging the disentangling time of entangled states are thus of importance. We here study the problem of optimal qubit-basis under which a two-qubit state has maximal residual entanglement or longest entanglement lifetime in general Pauli channels with the probabilities of three types of errors being not all the same. It is shown that the optimal qubit-bases are not the same in different cases. The advantages of the entangled states with optimal qubit-bases are obvious, e.g., sudden death of entanglement could be avoided. These results are expected to serve entanglement-based quantum protocols of which the real-world success or high-quality implementation relies on the longevity of entanglement in two-particle or multi-particle quantum states.

The Dongpu Sag, located in the Bohai Bay Basin, NE China, is a Cenozoic continental rift basin. The post-rift evolution of the Dongpu Sag is associated with the development of petroleum reservoirs and has implications for Neogene–Quaternary basin evolution along the eastern margin of Eurasia. To determine the nature and origin of post-rift subsidence in the Dongpu Sag, we apply backstripping, modified strain-rate inversion, and revised finite extension modelling techniques, using data from 14 real and synthetic wells that are intersected by three seismic lines. Our results reveal discrepancies by subsidence based on backstripping of well data (the observed subsidence) minus that predicted by modified strain-rate inversion and revised finite extension modelling (the predicted subsidence). During the Miocene, the observed subsidence was smaller than the predicted subsidence, leaving negative discrepancies referred to here as “insufficient subsidence” ranging from −343 to −96 m. In contrast, during the Pliocene–Quaternary the observed subsidence was greater than the predicted subsidence by +123 to +407 m, which left positive discrepancies referred to as “over-sufficient subsidence”. Therefore, we infer a transition from insufficient to over-sufficient subsidence during the post-rift stage. Normal faulting that started at ca. 5.3 Ma is estimated to have produced only ∼20% of the over-sufficient subsidence. Therefore, the remaining over-sufficient subsidence, as well as the preceding insufficient subsidence and the transition between the two, were likely controlled by lithosphere processes. We propose a new tectonic model in which variations in the conditions (e.g. rate, direction, and angle) associated with subduction of the Pacific plate resulted in a change of heat flow decreasing from a linear to a curvilinear pattern, leading to a transition from insufficient to over-sufficient subsidence.

We study temperature effects on non-Markovian dynamics in a model of an atomic impurity qubit immersed in a quasi-two-dimensional dipolar Bose–Einstein condensate , which can be described as a pure dephasing spin-boson model. We use the measure proposed by Breuer et al. (Phys Rev Lett 103:210401, 2009) to characterize non-Markovianity of the quantum process and find for larger relative dipole–dipole interaction, properly low temperature can induce the non-Markovianity enhancement. We give an explanation of the non-Markovianity enhancement that raising temperature can increase the sharpness of the temperature-dependent environmental spectral density.

It has been shown that a nearly pure Greenberger–Horne–Zeilinger (GHZ) state could be distilled from a large (even infinite) number of GHZ-diagonal states that can be obtained by depolarizing general multipartite mixed states (non-GHZ-diagonal states) through sequences of (probabilistic) local operations and classical communications. We here demonstrate that perfect GHZ states can be extracted, with certain probabilities, from two copies of non-GHZ-diagonal mixed states when some conditions are satisfied. This result implies that it is not necessary to depolarize these entangled mixed states to the GHZ-diagonal type, and that they are better than GHZ-diagonal states for distillation of pure GHZ states. We find a wide class of multipartite entangled mixed states that fulfill the requirements. Moreover, we display that the obtained result can be applied to practical noisy environments, e.g., amplitude-damping channels. Our findings provide an important complementarity to conventional GHZ-state distillation protocols (designed for GHZ-diagonal states) in theory, as well as having practical applications.

Osteosarcoma (OS) is the most common primary malignant bone tumor. Numerous studies have strongly implicated the ectopic expression of microRNAs (miRNAs/miRs), including miR-885-5p, which is aberrantly expressed in several cancer types, in multiple cancer-related processes. However, the role of miR-885-5p in OS remains unknown. In the present study, it was found that the expression of miR-885-5p was markedly upregulated in OS cell lines and clinical tissues. Moreover, high expression of miR-885-5p was significantly associated with the development of OS. The human OS MG-63 cell line was transfected with recombinant lentivirus to regulate miR-885-5p expression. Overexpressed miR-885-5p significantly promoted the proliferation and migration of MG-63 cells in vitro, while downregulating miR-885-5p expression reversed these effects. Furthermore, bioinformatic analysis was used to predict the potential target genes of miR-885-5p, and cell division cycle protein 73 homolog (CDC73) was identified as a novel and direct target of miR-885-5p. This interaction was further confirmed using reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction, western blotting and luciferase activity assays. These findings suggest that miR-885-5p serves a critical role in facilitating OS proliferation and migration, and can regulate CDC73 expression in OS cells and tissues. Thus, miR-885-5p could be a promising novel therapeutic biomarker for OS.

Two new dammarane-type triterpenoid saponins, namely ginsenoside Rk6 (1) and ginsenoside-Rh22 (2), were isolated from notoginseng medicinal fungal substance. The structures of 1 and 2 were established as 3β,6α,12β,26-tetrahydroxydammar-20(21),24(25)(E)-diene-6-O-β-D-glucopyranoside and 3β,6α, 20(S)-trihydroxy-12(R),23(R)-expoxy-13(S),17(S)-dammar-24-ene-6-O-β-D-glucopyranoside on the basis of spectroscopic analysis and chemical analysis, respectively.

A new compound, notoginsenoside ST-7 (1), and one known compound notoginsenoside ST-1 (2), were isolated from notoginseng medicinal fungal substance. The structure of the new compound was elucidated by combined analysis of the 1D and 2D NMR data, the HR-ESI-MS data, and a CD experiment with dimolybdenum tetraacetate [Mo2(OAc)4] complexation.

In the practical application of quantum entanglement, entangled particles usually need to be distributed to many distant parties or stored in different quantum memories. In these processes, entangled particles unavoidably interact with their surrounding environments, respectively. We here systematically investigate the entanglement-decay laws of cat-like states under independent Pauli noises with unbalanced probability distribution of three kinds of errors. We show that the robustness of cat-like entangled states is not only related to the overall noise strength and error distribution parameters, but also to the basis of qubits. Moreover, we find that whether a multi-qubit state is more robust in the computational basis or transversal basis depends on the initial entanglement and number of qubits of the state as well as the overall noise strength and error distribution parameters of the environment. However, which qubit basis is conductive to enhancing the robustness of two-qubit states is only dependent on the error distribution parameters. These results imply that one could improve the intrinsic robustness of entangled states by simply transforming the qubit basis at the right moment. This robustness-improving method does not introduce extra particles and works in a deterministic manner.

Entanglement distillation plays a very important role in quantum information science. Distillation of high-purity Greenberger–Horne–Zeilinger (GHZ) states has been widely studied. We here show that a pure GHZ-type entangled state or its local unitary (LU)-equivalent state could be extracted from two copies of a particular multipartite mixed state (e.g., an X state) in a single step. Such one-step distillation schemes for LU-equivalent states are expected to shed light on mixed-state manipulation and purification, as well as establish a link between entanglement classification and distillation.

The prognosis of patients with metastatic osteosarcoma is poor and has shown no significant improvement in nearly 20 years. The human epidermal growth factor (EGF) receptor (HER) family is frequently overexpressed in the majority of human carcinomas, and is involved in promoting the proliferation and survival of cancer cells. However, the role of EGFR and HER-2 expression in osteosarcoma survival remains controversial and no previous study has simultaneously investigated the association of the expression of all the four HER family members with the prognostic significance of osteosarcoma. Therefore, the present study investigated the expression levels of the complete members of the HER family in osteosarcoma specimens, as well as their associations with the clinicopathological parameters, progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) time of patients with osteosarcoma. The expression of HER family members was detected in osteosarcoma tumor specimens from 60 patients using immunohistochemistry. The association of the expression of HER receptors in osteosarcoma with clinicopathological parameters was analyzed using χ2 test and Fishers exact test. Survival analyses were evaluated by Kaplan-Meier method and Cox proportional hazards regression model. Overall, 18 (30%), 13 (22%), 23 (38%) and 19 (32%) patients presented with high expression of EGFR, HER-2, HER-3 and HER-4, respectively, and the co-expression of 2, 3 and all 4 members of the HER family was observed. High expression of EGFR and HER-4 was associated with distant metastasis. High HER-3 expression was significantly associated with an advanced Enneking stage and distant metastasis. Multivariate analysis demonstrated that the expression of EGFR, HER-3, HER-4, EGFR/HER-3, EGFR/HER-4 and HER-3/HER-4 was an independent predictor of poor PFS and OS time in osteosarcoma patients with stage I–IIB disease. In patients with stage IIB osteosarcoma, the expression of HER-4 and EGFR/HER-4 demonstrated a more significant effect on PFS and OS time. In conclusion, therapies targeting EGFR, HER-3 and HER-4 may provide promising strategies for primary osteosarcoma.

Two new triterpenoid saponins, named ginsenoside Rh10 (1) and notoginsenoside ST-6 (2), were isolated from notoginseng medicinal fungal substance. Their structures were elucidated by a combination of 1D and 2D NMR, MS and chemical analysis.

We investigate collective radiant properties of two separated atoms in X-type quantum states. We show that quantum correlations measured by quantum discord (QD) can trigger and enhance superradiance and subradiance in the two-atom system even though in the absence of interatomic quantum entanglement. We also explore quantum statistical properties of photons in the superradiance and subradiance by addressing the second-order correlation function. In particular, when the initial state of the two separated atoms is the Werner state with nonzero QD, we find that radiation photons in the superradiant region exhibit the nonclassical sub-Poissonian statistics and the degree of the sub-Poissonian statistics increases with increasing of the QD amount, while radiation photons in the subradiant region have either the sub-Poissonian or super-Poissonian statistics depending on the amount of QD and the directional angle. In the subradiant regime, we predict the QD-triggered photon statistics transition from the super-Poissonian to sub-Poissonian statistics. These results shed a new light on applications of QD as a quantum resource.

For carrying out many quantum information protocols entanglement must be established in advance between two distant parties. Practically, inevitable interaction of entangled subsystems with their environments during distribution and storage will result in degradation of entanglement. Here we investigate the decoherence of two-qubit entangled states in the local amplitude noise. We show that there exists a set of partially entangled states that are more robust than maximally entangled states in terms of the residual quantum correlation measured by concurrence, fully entangled fraction, and quantum discord. This result indicates that nonmaximally entangled states can outperform maximally entangled states for quantum correlation distribution and storage under the amplitude damping. It also educes a notable consequence that the ordering of states under quantum correlation monotones can be reversed even by local trace-preserving and completely positive maps., 4 pages, 2 figures

The robot is the product of the development of science and technology,they are moving towards intelligence, miniaturization of direction.The manipulator based on PLC is more widely used.Manipulator based on PLC makes use of PLC programming control, realizes the manipulator clamping, loosen, left, right, up and down. PLC manipulator, a development trend in the future, not only easy to learn, and more common, easy to operate.

We propose new methods to construct universal Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ)-state analyzers without destroying the qubits by using two-qubit parity gates. The idea can be applied to any physical systems where the two-qubit parity gate can be realized. We also investigate the feasibility of nondestructively distinguishing the GHZ-basis states for photonic qubits with such an idea. The nondestructive GHZ-state analyzers can act as generators of GHZ entangled states and are expected to find useful applications for resource-saving quantum information processing.

At present, there is more storm waterlogging in our urban, one of the main reasons is that there are many disadvantages in rainwater pipe network design, this paper in the pipe network design must be reasonable to determine the ground water runoff coefficient, The ground water time, reduction coefficient, catchment area and position and quantity of gully according to the measured data, and appropriately increasing the recurrence interval according to the actual in engineering, hydraulic calculation as much as possible to select data sets larger diameter, accurate calculation time of flow, to reduce the urban storm waterlogging fundamentally.

The Brown Parrotbill (Cholornis unicolor) is endemic to the central and eastern Himalayas and occurs in alpine bamboo thickets at an altitude of 1,980–3,600 m. Fieldwork was conducted in the Gaoligongshan National Nature Reserve and cameras were used to record reproductive behaviors. Duration of incubation, nestling provisioning, and other parental care behaviors were extracted from the videos, and measurements of the nest, eggs, and nestlings were taken in the field. One nest with a clutch of 3 eggs was found 2.1 m above the ground in a bamboo thicket in May, thus extending the documented breeding season. Two of the three eggs hatched and both nestlings fledged. Both the male and the female incubated the eggs and brooded and provisioned the nestlings. The incubation period lasted for at least 13 d and the nestling period was 15 d. As incubation progressed, incubation-bout duration decreased and recess frequency increased. During the nestling period, the frequency of parental provisioning increased as the nestlings matured. Our observations provide the first description of the nest, nestlings, and incubation behavior of Brown Parrotbill. Alpine bamboo thickets are assumed to be an important breeding habitat for Brown Parrotbills, as this is typical for at least 6 parrotbill species.

A simple scheme is presented for generating three-atomW state via nonresonant Jaynes-Cummings model. In the proposed protocol, it is injected two two-level atom initially prepared in the excited state and ground state through the cavity prepared in the vacuum state. The third two-level atom is prepared in the ground state and three two-level atom are injected into the second cavity prepared in the vacuum state. The experiment of the proposed scheme is feasibile. PACS: 03.67.-a, 03.67.Lx, 42.50.-p

It has been shown that two-photon parity check has widespread applications in optical quantum information processing. In recent years much effort has been made to implement nondestructive two-photon parity detection using cross-Kerr nonlinearity (XKNL) effect. We here put forward an XKNL-based scheme for nearly deterministic two-photon parity detection without destroying the photons, in which the required cross-Kerr phase shift could be much (even several orders of magnitude) smaller than that required for previous schemes. The scheme utilizes a ring cavity fed by a coherent state beam as a quantum information bus which interacts with one of the two path modes of two polarized photons through a cross-Kerr medium. The measurement outcome of the bus mode reveals the polarization-parity of the two photons.

Two new triterpenoid saponins, namely ginsenoside Re8 (1) and notoginsenoside ST-8 (2), were isolated from ginseng medicinal fungal substance. Their structures were elucidated by spectroscopic data and chemical analysis.

Two new dammarane-type triterpenoid saponins, namely ginsenosides Rb4 (1) and Rb5 (2), were isolated from ginseng medicinal fungal substance. The structures of 1 and 2 were established as 3β,12β,20(S)-trihydroxydammar-24(25)-ene-3-O-[α-d-glucopyranosyl-(1→4)-β-d-glucopyranosyl-(1→2)-β-d-glucopyranosyl]-20-O-β-d-glucopyranoside and 3β,12β,20(S)-trihydroxydammar-24(25)-ene-3-O-[α-d-glucopyranosyl-(1→4)-α-d-glucopyranosyl-(1→4)-β-d-glucopyranosyl-(1→2)-β-d-glucopyranosyl]-20-O-β-d-glucopyranoside on the basis of spectroscopic analysis and chemical analysis, respectively.

Isolation and structure-determination of ginsenoside Rh10 (I) and notoginsenoside ST-6 (II) are presented.

Taming decoherence is a critical issue in quantum information science. We here investigate amplitude-damping decoherence suppression of two-qubit entangled states by weak quantum measurements. It is shown that the weak measurements can effectively suppress the decoherence for different initial entangled states. More interestingly, we show that the weak measurements have different effects on the entanglement protection for two entangled states which are equivalent under a local unitary operation. This result implies that the entanglement protection effect could be modulated according to different demands.

A large number of experiments were done in order to find out the main factors which have an influence on the asphalt flue production in asphalt road construction and to master its dangers. The results show that the asphalt flue production varies with heating temperature, heating time, the asphalt thickness and stirring rate significantly. accordingly these are the main factors which influence the asphalt flue production. Further analysis by means of UV spectrophotometer and liquid chromatography shows that the asphalt flue contains serious harm to human body, such as aromatic compounds, alkanes, and sulfur heterocyclic compounds and other substances. therefore some steps should be taken to inhibit the production of asphalt flue for reducing the hazards to construction workers.