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Background: Dementia is characterized by progressive neurodegeneration and therefore early intervention could have the best chance of preserving brain health. There are significant differences in health awareness, living customs, and daily behaviors among Chinese older adults compared to Europeans and Americans. Because the synergistic benefits of multidomain non-pharmacological interventions are consistent with the multifactorial pathogenicity of MCI, such interventions are more appealing, easier to adhere to, and more relevant to daily life than single-mode interventions. One of the aims of this study is to verify the effect of multidomain intervention strategies for MCI patients based on Chinese population characteristics, and the other is to establish a biobank and image database to investigate the pathogenesis and pathways of cognitive impairment. Methods: Our study was designed as a national multicenter, community-based randomized controlled trial (RCT). Twelve medical institutions in ten Chinese cities will participate in our study from 2020 to 2024, and 1080 community residents aged 50 and above will be enrolled as participants. Each sub-center will be responsible for 90 participants (30 people per community) across three communities (non-contact control group, health education group, and multidomain intervention group). The community will be the basic unit of the present study, and all participants in each community will receive the same intervention/control measure. Three working groups are set up in each sub-center to manage the three communities independently to minimize interference at the implementation level between the groups. The multidomain intervention group will receive integrated interventions including exercise, nutrition, sleep, health education and mindfulness meditation. All data generated by the research will be analyzed and processed by statistical software (such as SPSS 21.0, Python 3.0, etc.), and part of the research data will be displayed in the form of graphs and tables. Discussion: In order to achieve a high-quality community intervention study, it is crucial to have a well-designed experimental protocol that follows rigorous scientific methodology. In addition, effective management of quality control measures and monitoring compliance throughout the study process are essential components. This study provides a detailed discussion of stakeholder compliance, research quality control, potential harm and mitigation, auditing, and future plans in order to better address research issues. Trial registration: : ChiCTR2000035012 (July 27, 2020). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates neighborly relations affecting mechanisms in participatory regeneration, based on cases of three typical types of urban neighborhoods in Shanghai: traditional Lilong residence, work-unit compounds, and commodity estates. We find that participatory regeneration affects neighborly relations through the collaboration and the physical improvements of the communal space. Although collaboration and physical improvements positively contribute to the enhancement of neighborly relations in traditional residence and work-unit compounds, neighborly relations are similar between neighborhoods with and without participatory regeneration because they have intense existing neighborly relations. Although the physical improvement of the communal space tends to decrease neighborly relations, the overall neighborly relations in commodity estates with participatory regeneration are stronger than the comparison group due to the contribution of collaboration. This study emphasizes the vital role of collaboration as affecting neighborly relations in commodity housing and generates practical implications for urban regeneration strategies in commodity estates and in urban planning in future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel method for predicting the thicknesses of plastics based on continuous-wave terahertz (THz) frequency-domain spectroscopy (THz-FDS) is presented in this study. Initially, the target material's THz refractive index is determined from the phase information provided by the coherent nature of THz-FDS. For thickness prediction, the optimal frequency band with a high signal-to-noise ratio and minor water vapor absorption is chosen first. The optical path along which the THz wave passes through a sample with unknown thickness is extracted from the phase delay information. The physical thickness of the sample is then determined using the calibrated refractive index obtained in the first step. Teflon, a classical plastic material, is utilized to illustrate the proposed process. A remarkable consistency with an overall relative difference of only 0.45% is revealed between the THz-FDS predicted and caliper measured thicknesses. The proposed method is expected to significantly expand the capabilities of THz spectroscopy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Establishing a wind-solar-hydro hybrid generation system is an effective way of ensuring the smooth passage of clean energy into the grid, and its related scheduling research is a complex and real-time optimization problem. Compared with the traditional scheduling method, this research investigates and improves the accuracy of the scheduling model and the flexibility of the scheduling strategy. The paper innovatively introduces a sand-table deduction model and designs a real-time adaptive scheduling algorithm to evaluate the source-load matching capability of the hybrid wind-solar-hydro system at ultra-short-term scales, and verifies it through arithmetic examples. The results show that the proposed adaptive sand-table scheduling model can reflect the actual output characteristics of the hybrid wind-solar-hydro system, track the load curve, and suppress the fluctuation of wind and solar energy, with good source-load matching capability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although housing tenure mix policy has been widely used in improving the quality of life for low-income populations, it is inconclusive whether it can deliver any mental health benefits for residents. This study explores the implications of housing tenure mix on residents’ mental health through investigating the intermediatory roles of the perception of neighborhood environment and sense of place. With 501 samples from six representative neighborhoods in Guangzhou, we constructed path analysis to test three potential mechanisms: the socioeconomic mechanism, the environment mechanism, and the person-place transactional mechanism. The results revealed that housing tenure mix level was significantly associated with neighborhood socioeconomic attributes and the perception of neighborhood environment, which shaped the sense of place. Dual mental health effects of housing tenure mix were identified: on the one hand, housing tenure mix resulted in income differentiation at the neighborhood level, which impeded individual mental functioning; on the other hand, the housing tenure mix protected residents’ internal well-being via improving the perceived social cohesion and providing a nurturing ground for a sense of place. Different mechanisms function simultaneously on the associations of housing tenure mix with mental health, which should be carefully referred to during the decision-making of public housing development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Terahertz waves exhibit excellent performance in molecular information detection of substances. Since natural materials exhibit weak absorption of terahertz waves, it's conventional to involve mixing analyte with polymer diluents and pressing them into pellets, or enhance the light-material interaction through coupling systems of natural materials with metamaterials. However, both pressure-induced metastable crystal structure transformations and spatial overlap between the analyte and metasurfaces can impact the absorption of terahertz waves by organic crystals. This paper proposes a novel analytical approach using paraffin as a dilution matrix for qualitatively and quantitatively characterizing organic crystals with THz spectroscopy. The featureless refractive index spectra and negligible absorption demonstrated the feasibility of paraffin as a diluting analyte. The analytical process was further demonstrated with well-studied lactose by being diluted in molten paraffin at different mass-ratios and solidified as pellets under room temperature and ambient pressure. A continuous wave terahertz frequency domain spectroscopy system (THz-FDS) is used for spectral acquisition over 0.4–1.3 THz. The experimental results reveal a significant linear correlation between the absorption coefficient peak areas and molar concentration of lactose, with a correlation coefficient R2 of 0.9678. Our method provides an additional optional dilution matrix for terahertz spectroscopy characterization of organic crystals, enabling non-destructive, rapid, and direct measurement of metastable crystals. Furthermore, this study on paraffin as a binder material holds potential for enhancing spatial overlap between natural materials and metamaterials in the field of metasurface-enhanced sensing. • A novel THz spectroscopy analytical approach using paraffin as a dilution matrix. • A pressure-free sample preparation method for THz spectral characterization. • Non-destructive, rapid, and direct measurement for metastable crystals. • Qualitative and quantitative analysis of metastable organic crystals. • Potential to enhance the spatial overlap between natural materials and metamaterials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid evolution of microelectronics and nanofabrication technologies, the feature sizes of large‐scale integrated circuits continue to move toward the nanoscale. There is a strong need to improve the quality and efficiency of integrated circuit inspection, but it remains a great challenge to provide both rapid imaging and circuit node‐level high‐resolution images simultaneously using a conventional microscope. This paper proposes a nondestructive, high‐throughput, multiscale correlation imaging method that combines atomic force microscopy (AFM) with microlens‐based scanning optical microscopy. In this method, a microlens is coupled to the end of the AFM cantilever and the sample‐facing side of the microlens contains a focused ion beam deposited tip which serves as the AFM scanning probe. The introduction of a microlens improves the imaging resolution of the AFM optical system, providing a 3–4× increase in optical imaging magnification while the scanning imaging throughput is improved ≈8×. The proposed method bridges the resolution gap between traditional optical imaging and AFM, achieves cross‐scale rapid imaging with micrometer to nanometer resolution, and improves the efficiency of AFM‐based large‐scale imaging and detection. Simultaneously, nanoscale‐level correlation between the acquired optical image and structure information is enabled by the method, providing a powerful tool for semiconductor device inspection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Terahertz (THz) time-domain spectroscopy provides a direct and nondestructive method for measuring the dielectric properties of materials directly from the phase delay of coherent electromagnetic radiation propagating through the sample. In cases when crystals are embedded within an inert polymeric pellet, the Landau, Lifshitz, and Looyenga (LLL) effective medium model can be used to extract the intrinsic dielectric constant of the crystalline sample. Subsequently, polarizability can be obtained from the Clausius–Mossotti (CM) relationship. Knowledge of the crystal structure density is required for an analytical solution to the LLL and CM relationships. A novel crystal structure-free graphical method is presented as a way to estimate both dielectric constants and polarizability values for the situation when the crystal structure density is unknown, and the crystals are embedded within a pellet composed of a non-porous polymer. The utility of this crystal structure-free method is demonstrated by analyzing THz time-domain spectra collected for a set of amino acids (L-alanine, L-threonine, and L-glutamine) embedded within pellets composed of polytetrafluoroethylene. Crystal structures are known for each amino acid, thereby enabling a direct comparison of results using the analytical solution and the proposed crystal structure-free graphical method. For each amino acid, the intrinsic dielectric constant is extracted through the LLL effective medium model without using information of their crystal structure densities. THz polarizabilities are then calculated with the CM relationship by using the determined intrinsic dielectric constant for each amino acid coupled with its crystal density as determined graphically. Comparison between the analytical and graphical solutions reveal relative differences between dielectric constants of 3.7, 5.1, and 13.6% for threonine, alanine, and glutamine, respectively, and relative differences between polarizability of 0.6, 0.9, and 5.4%, respectively. These values were determined over the 10–20 cm−1 THz frequency range. The proposed method requires no prior knowledge of crystal structure information. Graphical Abstract [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new method was adopted to improve the dispersion of nanoparticles in a polymer matrix. The nano bioactive glass (NBG) was successfully modified by silane coupling agent ethenyltrimethoxysilane (YDH171). A series of PLGA/PTMC/YDH-NBG composites with different amounts of surface modifier YDH-NBG were prepared by solution co-precipitation. The mechanical properties, fracture morphology, thermal properties, crystallization process, surface water wettability, biomineralization in vitro and bioactivity in vitro of PLGA/PTMC/YDH-NBG composites were investigated. The results showed that a higher amount of YDH-NBG would cause agglomeration in the PLGA/PTMC composite and reduce the mechanical properties of the PLGA/PTMC/YDH-NBG composite, although it could promote the PLGA crystallization. The PLGA/PTMC/YDH-NBG composite containing 5 wt% YDH-NBG had the best mechanical properties and crystallinity among all ternary composites. The POM results showed that PLGA/PTMC/YDH-NBG had the fastest crystallization rate, which indicated that YDH-NBG acted as a nucleating agent and might have a synergetic effect on the accelerated PLGA crystallization. When adding YDH-NBG, the contact angle of the ternary composite increased. Moreover, the PLGA/PTMC/YDH-NBG composite exhibited good biomineralization, better biocompatibility and no toxicity. Therefore, we concluded that PLGA/PTMC/YDH-NBG composites appear to be a promising biomaterial for bone tissue engineering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel application of terahertz time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) is described for the determination of permittivity and polarizability of organic crystals, as exemplified by measurements with the polymorph I form of crystalline aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid). The coherent nature of the THz pulse experiment, coupled with gated-detection, permits direct measure of differences in the phase angle of the electric field vector after passing through a pellet composed of the aspirin crystals embedded within an inert polymer matrix. An effective media model is used to extract dielectric information for the crystals from the measured time-domain signal that is representative of the entire pellet composition. Polarizability is then obtained for these organic crystals by using the Clausius–Mossotti relationship. Dielectric spectra and polarizability spectra are presented over the 0.3–3 THz frequency range (10–100 cm−1). The average polarizability values measured over the low frequency range (10–20 cm−1) are 22.4 ± 0.3 and 22.4 ± 0.5 Å3 for aspirin crystals embedded within matrixes of polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) and polyethylene (PE), respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The capacity to extract information and comprehend an unseen environment is critical for mobile robots to navigate. Few surveys has mentioned the combinatorial-non-optimality problem of the traditional visual navigation methods. As computer vision technology has improved in recent years, visual navigation approaches have escalated drastically, particularly after the appearance of the CVPR Embodied AI workshop. However, few studies take these important changes into account. This survey fills this research gap by collecting, analyzing, and summarizing more than 100 recent papers. The majority of them are published within 5 years and are cited over 80 times, which provide more credible results. Based on our thorough comparison, this survey categorizes all visual navigation methods into two styles: geometry style and embodied AI style. This survey examines these two styles from the perspective of input–output. In addition, this survey attempts to provide mathematical formulations for each style. This paper provides a case study to illustrate the methodological paradigm with greatest potential. This methodological paradigm using photo-realistic simulation in the Embodied AI style, which could solve the combinatorial-non-optimality problem. Thereafter, this survey discusses several issues including pros–cons analysis, problem formulation, common framework, task generalization, dynamic environment consideration, sim-to-real, and inspiring approaches, which are all based on the scholars who have cited the method. In the last part, challenges and future trends are summarized. This survey would assist researchers who work on AI-empowered visual navigation systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The insight into the composition of iron corrosion products is critical for corrosion studies. A novel and non-destructive method is proposed in this paper to quantitatively analyse the binary iron oxides mixtures based on the terahertz time-domain spectroscopy combined with the effective medium theory. The utility of this method is exemplified by analysing the THz refractive index for a set of samples, including hematite, magnetite, and their mixtures at several volume ratios. The effective medium theory is applied to the raw data of single-component samples to remove the dielectric influence of dilution polymer matrix and trapped air voids. The refractive index of hematite and magnetite is determined to be 4.01 ± 0.04 (1.00%) and 5.6 ± 0.2 (3.6%). The measured refractive index of two iron oxides is further adopted to construct an effective medium model for the binary mixture. The analytical model can predict the volume ratios of two iron oxides within the mixture. Comparison between the theoretical predictions and experimental measurements reveals a relative difference of less than 10.0%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• PAK4 contributes to remifentanil-induced postoperative pain hypersensitivity. • NLRP3 activation in microglia releases IL-1β/IL-18, driving pain hypersensitivity. • Microglia and their secretion of inflammatory factors are key in central sensitization. • PAK4/NF-κB/NLRP3 pathway mediates remifentanil-induced pain hypersensitivity. The perioperative use of remifentanil is associated with postoperative hyperalgesia, which can impair recovery and extend hospitalization. Recent studies have revealed that microglia-mediated activation of the NLRP3 inflammasome plays a critical role in opioid-induced hyperalgesia, with NF-κB acting as a pivotal activation point for NLRP3. Despite these findings, the specific molecular mechanisms underlying remifentanil-induced postoperative hyperalgesia remain unclear. This study aims to develop a model of remifentanil-induced hyperalgesia and investigate the molecular mechanisms, focusing on the NF-κB/NLRP3 pathway, using both in vitro and in vivo approaches. We established a remifentanil-induced hyperalgesia model and performed proteomic analysis to identify differential protein expression in the spinal cord tissue of rats. NLRP3 or PAK4 antagonists were administered intrathecally in vivo, and mechanical pain thresholds in the hind paws were measured using Von Frey testing. In vitro, we applied NLRP3 or PAK4 inhibitors or used lentivirus infection to silence PAK4, NF-κB, and NLRP3 genes. Protein expression was assessed through immunohistochemistry, immunofluorescence, and Western blotting. Additionally, ELISA was performed to measure IL-1β and IL-18 levels, and RT-qPCR was conducted to evaluate the transcription of target genes. Proteomic analysis revealed that remifentanil upregulates PAK4 protein in spinal cord tissue two hours after the surgery. In addition, remifentanil induces morphological changes in the spinal cord dorsal horn, characterized by increased expression of PAK4, p-p65, NLRP3 and Iba-1 proteins, which in turn leads to elevated IL-1β and IL-18 levels and an inflammatory response. Intrathecal injection of NLRP3 or PAK4 inhibitors mitigates remifentanil-induced hyperalgesia and associated changes. In vitro, downregulation of PAK4 inhibits the increase in PAK4, p-p65, NLRP3 and Caspase-1 induced by LPS. Conversely, the downregulation of NLRP3 does not impact the levels of PAK4 and p-p65 proteins, aligning with the in vivo results and suggesting that PAK4 acts as an upstream signaling molecule of NLRP3. Remifentanil can increase PAK4 expression in spinal cord dorsal horn cells by activating the NF-κB/NLRP3 pathway and mediating microglial activation, thereby contributing to postoperative hyperalgesia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zhang, T.; Shen, Y., and Zhang, D., 2020. Integrated management of an eco-clean small watershed in the Qinba Mountainous Area. In: Hu, C. and Cai, M. (eds.), Geo-informatics and Oceanography. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 105, pp. 51–55. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. An ecologically clean small watershed of Qinba Mountain is important to protect this water source of the South–North Water Diversion Project and to reinforce the ability to achieve sustainable development. A solution project on engineering technology and management measures is presented to develop an ecologically clean small watershed and living water environment in the Qinba Mountain Area. Some technologies and integrated measures were presented for protection of the water source, sewage treatment in rural drainages, and protection against agricultural surface pollution. The methodology and results of the ecologically clean small watershed of Qinba Mountain could be applied to other sites around the world that are affected by these extreme conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Literature about the importance of renewable energy resources, including wind and solar energy, is becoming increasingly important; however, these energy sources are unstable and volatile in nature, and are usually integrated with conventional energy sources, such as hydropower, forming hybrid power generation systems that maintain a stable grid. Short-term changes in wind speed or solar radiation intensity have a great impact on the stability of hybrid systems, and have been reported in the literature. However, reliable models to manage such systems are lacking, and previous studies have regarded the hour scale as the minimum baseline for systematic change. In this article, hybrid power systems are proposed that are controlled on very short time intervals. The results of a feasibility analysis of the proposed model indicate the viability of complementary hybrid systems in controlling and maintaining the stability, which are subjected to short durations of fluctuations in wind or solar radiation. The simulation results indicate that the influence of the shutdown of the wind turbine, with the regulation effect of the hydro power, is 3–5 times greater than that of the short-term wind turbulence fluctuation. When the hydro turbine is adopted to adjust the short-term fluctuation of solar radiation, the effect on the system was suppressed to 0.02–0.2 times of the former. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What makes unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) intelligent is their capability of sensing and understanding new unknown environments. Some studies utilize computer vision algorithms like Visual Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (VSLAM) and Visual Odometry (VO) to sense the environment for pose estimation, obstacles avoidance and visual servoing. However, understanding the new environment (i.e., make the UAV recognize generic objects) is still an essential scientific problem that lacks a solution. Therefore, this paper takes a step to understand the items in an unknown environment. The aim of this research is to enable the UAV with basic understanding capability for a high-level UAV flock application in the future. Specially, firstly, the proposed understanding method combines machine learning and traditional algorithm to understand the unknown environment through RGB images; secondly, the You Only Look Once (YOLO) object detection system is integrated (based on TensorFlow) in a smartphone to perceive the position and category of 80 classes of objects in the images; thirdly, the method makes the UAV more intelligent and liberates the operator from labor; fourthly, detection accuracy and latency in working condition are quantitatively evaluated, and properties of generality (can be used in various platforms), transportability (easily deployed from one platform to another) and scalability (easily updated and maintained) for UAV flocks are qualitatively discussed. The experiments suggest that the method has enough accuracy to recognize various objects with high computational speed, and excellent properties of generality, transportability and scalability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nitrogen (N) is essential for the physiological processes of plants. However, the specific mechanisms by which different nitrogen forms influence rice blast pathogenesis remain poorly understood. This study used hydroponic assays to explore how ammonium (NH 4 +) and nitrate (NO 3 −) affect rice after inoculation with Magnaporthe oryzae (M. oryzae). The results showed that NH 4 +, compared to NO 3 −, significantly reduced disease severity, fungal growth, fungal hyphae number, the expansion capacity of infectious hyphae, and disease-related loss of photosynthesis. Additionally, NH 4 + enhanced the expression of defense-related genes, including OsPBZ1 , OsCHT1 , OsPR1a , and OsPR10. NH 4 +-treated rice also exhibited higher hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2) accumulation and increased antioxidant enzyme activities. Moreover, susceptibility to rice blast disease increased when H 2 O 2 was scavenged, while a reduction in susceptibility was observed with the application of exogenous H 2 O 2. These results suggest that ammonium enhances rice resistance to M. oryzae , potentially through H 2 O 2 accumulation. The findings provide valuable insights into how different nitrogen forms affect plant immunity in rice, which is crucial for controlling rice blast and ensuring stable food production. • How nitrogen forms affect rice blast disease and its underlying mechanism. • Compared with NO 3 − treatment, NH 4 + treatment significantly suppresses the rice blast severity. • Ammonium enhances rice resistance against M. oryzae through associated H 2 O 2 accumulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a non-invasive innovative diagnosis platform, advanced flexible contact lenses can dynamically monitor vital ocular indicators, spot abnormalities and provide biofeedback guidance for real-time diagnosis and rehabilitation tracking of chronic eye diseases. However, most of the state-of-the-art reported contact lenses either can only monitor a single indicator at a time or realize multifunctional integration based on multiple materials. Herein, we developed a flexible multifunctional contact lens based on inorganic γ-Fe2O3@NiO magnetic oxide nanosheets, which can be attached conformally and seamlessly to the eyeball to simultaneously monitor glucose level in tears, eyeball movement, and intraocular pressure. The optimized contact lens has a reliable glucose detection limit (0.43 μmol), superior eye movement measurement accuracy (95.27%) and high intraocular pressure sensitivity (0.17 MHz mmHg− 1). This work presents a concept in the biochemical and biophysical integrated sensing of ocular signals using contact lens via an innovative material, and provides a personalized and efficient way for health management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vigorous development of electric vehicles is one way to achieve global carbon reduction goals. However, fires caused by thermal runaway of the power battery has seriously hindered large‐scale development. Adding thermal runaway retardants (TRRs) to electrolytes is an effective way to improve battery safety, but it often reduces electrochemical performance. Therefore, it is difficult to apply in practice. TRR encapsulation is inspired by the core–shell structures such as cells, seeds, eggs, and fruits in nature. In these natural products, the shell isolates the core from the outside, and has to break as needed to expose the core, such as in seed germination, chicken hatching, etc. Similarly, TRR encapsulation avoids direct contact between the TRR and the electrolyte, so it does not affect the electrochemical performance of the battery during normal operation. When lithium‐ion battery (LIB) thermal runaway occurs, the capsules release TRRs to slow down and even prevent further thermal runaway. This review aims to summarize the fundamentals of bioinspired TRR capsules and highlight recent key progress in LIBs with TRR capsules to improve LIB safety. It is anticipated that this review will inspire further improvement in battery safety, especially for emerging LIBs with high‐electrochemical performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vigorous development of electric vehicles is one way to achieve global carbon reduction goals. However, fires caused by thermal runaway of the power battery has seriously hindered large‐scale development. Adding thermal runaway retardants (TRRs) to electrolytes is an effective way to improve battery safety, but it often reduces electrochemical performance. Therefore, it is difficult to apply in practice. TRR encapsulation is inspired by the core–shell structures such as cells, seeds, eggs, and fruits in nature. In these natural products, the shell isolates the core from the outside, and has to break as needed to expose the core, such as in seed germination, chicken hatching, etc. Similarly, TRR encapsulation avoids direct contact between the TRR and the electrolyte, so it does not affect the electrochemical performance of the battery during normal operation. When lithium‐ion battery (LIB) thermal runaway occurs, the capsules release TRRs to slow down and even prevent further thermal runaway. This review aims to summarize the fundamentals of bioinspired TRR capsules and highlight recent key progress in LIBs with TRR capsules to improve LIB safety. It is anticipated that this review will inspire further improvement in battery safety, especially for emerging LIBs with high‐electrochemical performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Fabricate microlens arrays by embedding microspheres into PDMS films. • By scanning and stitching the images, achieve imaging over a large field. • FDTD simulations are used to characterize the cross talk between microspheres. The development of optical microscopy has greatly promoted the progress of biological fields, providing outstanding observation tools for genetics, molecular biology, and bioengineering technology, from the macro- to the micro-scale. Owing to the optical diffraction limit, the imaging resolution of traditional optical microscopy is limited. Recently, the use of microspheres has been demonstrated to aid the capability to realize super-resolution imaging under white light illumination; however, using this approach, the imaging field of view is only a few microns, due to the size of the microspheres. In this paper, we fabricated microlens arrays by embedding microspheres into polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) films. Using this method, we have successfully achieved parallel imaging under the sub-diffraction-limited resolution using multiple microspheres with a magnification up to ×2.59–×2.99, and the observed results are consistent with finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) simulation results. Furthermore, two imaging modes were developed: the microlens array-based dynamic scanning imaging mode and the stochastic microlens array region imaging overlay reconstruction mode, a surface image of 900 μm2 was presented stitched with 210 images. This study combines the advantages of parallel imaging and dynamic imaging to increase efficiency and observation range. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gait recognition is a biometric identification method that can be realized under long-distance and no-contact conditions. Its applications in criminal investigations and security inspections are thus broad. Most existing gait recognition methods adopted the gait energy image (GEI) for feature extraction. However, the GEI method ignores the dynamic information of gait, which causes the recognition performance to be greatly affected by viewing angle changes and the subject's belongings and clothes. To solve these problems, in this paper a cross-view gait recognition method that uses a dual-stream network based on the fusion of dynamic and static features (FDSN) is proposed. First, the static features are extracted from the GEI and the dynamic features are extracted from the image sequence of the human's lower limbs. Then, the two features are fused, and finally, a nearest neighbor classifier is used for classification. Comparative experiments on the CASIA-B dataset created by the Automation Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences showed that the FDSN achieves a higher recognition rate than a convolutional neural network (CNN) and Gaitset under changes in viewing angle or clothing. To meet our requirements, in this study a gait image dataset was collected and produced in a campus setting. The experimental results on this dataset show the effectiveness of the FDSN in terms of eliminating the effects of disruptive changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental noise and device 1/f noise will significantly degrade the accuracy of magnetic sensor detection. Most earth resource exploration magnetic and biomagnetic signals are predominantly in the low-frequency range, with weak output signals, and are highly susceptible to the influence of such noise. This paper proposed a method to suppress low-frequency noise for vectorial magnetic sensors with specific magnetic sensitivity directions. A relational equation was constructed for the rotation-modulated signals of vector magnetic sensors under noisy conditions. Taking the induction-type magnetic rod sensor as an example, the modulation system model under 1/f noise is constructed by finite element simulation, and the relational equations of the modulated signals under different rotational frequencies and various magnetic field amplitudes are verified. By employing both simulation and experimental approaches, the low-frequency signals received by the sensor were successfully modulated into high-frequency signals, and subsequently demodulated, which effectively suppressed the low-frequency noise in the magnetic sensor. The rotational modulation method for magnetic sensors proposed in this paper is crucial for vectorized magnetic sensors to improve the resolving power of low-frequency magnetic fields. [Display omitted] • Rotational modulation enhances low-frequency magnetic resolution by suppressing noise. • Modulating low frequencies to high helps distinguish from background noise. • Modulated and demodulated signal amplitude correlates linearly with applied signal. • Experimental and simulation results confirm equation accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The intestinal microbiota community is a fundamental component of the human body and plays a significant regulatory role in maintaining overall health and in the management disease states.The intestinal microbiota-gut-brain axis represents a vital connection in the cognitive regulation of the central nervous system by the intestinal microbiota.The impact of intestinal microbiota on cognitive function is hypothesized to manifest through both the nervous system and circulatory system. Imbalances in intestinal microbiota during the perioperative period could potentially contribute to perioperative neurocognitive dysfunction. This article concentrates on a review of existing literature to explore the potential influence of intestinal microbiota on brain and cognitive functions via the nervous and circulatory systems.Additionally, it summarizes recent findings on the impact of perioperative intestinal dysbacteriosis on perioperative neurocognitive dysfunction and suggests novel approaches for prevention and treatment of this condition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nano-hydroxyapatite (HA) was successfully treated by three different surface modification methods of oleic acid (OA), silane coupling agent γ-aminopropyl triethoxysilane (KH550), and ethenyltrimethoxysilane (YDH171), respectively. Then, the treated HA and unmodified HA with 8 wt% were introduced into PLGA/PTMC blends, respectively. And the fracture morphology, thermal property, crystallization behavior, mechanical properties, surface wettability, and in vitro bioactivity of PLGA/PTMC/HA ternary composites were investigated. The results showed that the PLGA/PTMC/HA composite with the HA surface modified by OA had the highest mechanical properties, while the PLGA/PTMC/HA composite with the HA treated by silane coupling agent YDH171 had the excellent toughness, compared to the other samples. Moreover, the cells' proliferation results confirmed that the ternary composites exhibited better biocompatibility. All the results suggested that the surface modification of HA was an ideal method in this study, and they would be potential to be used in the field of bone repair in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Terahertz (THz) transmission spectroscopy is widely used to obtain spectra of materials by measuring the electric field of a THz pulse in the time domain. However, time-domain waveforms are easily influenced by the surface roughness, which generates random noise and reduces the detection reliability. In this paper, we target the problem of roughness in the real-life application of THz time-domain spectroscopy. First, we investigate the influence of the sample surface roughness on the THz transmission spectra by establishing an analytical model that relates the sample transmission spectra to the sample surface roughness, refractive index and extinction coefficient. Then, we perform experiments with a THz transmission spectroscopy system using specific samples with different roughness values prepared in a well-controlled manner. By comparing the analytical model to the experimental results, this work accurately evaluates the effects of the surface roughness on THz transmission spectra. We do not address any new physics or any new device, but we provide a deeper understanding of the effects of the surface roughness on THz transmission spectra and a good theoretical reference to calibrate the spectra of rough samples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The field of human motion capture technology represents an emergent and multifaceted domain that encapsulates various disciplines, including but not limited to computer graphics, ergonomics, and communication technology. A distinct network platform within its domain has been established to ensure the reliability and stability of data transmission. Moreover, a sink node has been configured to facilitate sensor data reception through two distinct channels. Notably, the simplicity of the measurement system is directly proportional to the limited number of sensors used. This study focuses on accurately estimating uncertain human 3D movements via a sparse arrangement of wearable inertial sensors, utilizing only six sensors within the system. The methodology is based on a time series sequence throughout the motion process, wherein a series of discontinuous actions constitute the sequential motion. Deep learning methodologies, specifically recurrent neural networks, were employed to refine the regression parameters. Our approach integrated both historical and present sensor data to forecast future sensor data. These data were amalgamated into a superposed input vector, which was fed back into a shallow neural network to estimate human motion. Our experimental results demonstrate the viability of this approach: the six sensors could accurately replicate representative poses. This finding carries significant implications for advancing and applying wearable devices within the realm of motion capture, offering the potential for widespread adoption and implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metamaterials with Fano resonance have been developed to investigate the behavior of terahertz wave propagation, light-matter coupling mechanism, and improvement in detection efficiency. However, studies about gas molecules interacting with metamaterials in the terahertz regime were rarely reported due to the lack of structure enabling the strong coupling between two systems. In this paper, a novel design strategy based on mirror split rings and closed ring combined metamaterials is proposed. The established structure gives quadrupole mode Fano resonance, whose frequency locates around 0.56 THz. The frequency alignment with one of the well-known molecular rotation modes of water vapor leads to a strong coupling occurring on the surface of the metamaterial when illuminated by the terahertz wave. The strong coupling was experimentally observed by performing transmission THz-TDS measurements on metamaterial with several humidity environments. The humidity is controlled by nitrogen purging and oversaturated salt solutions. A transmittance window can be observed in the spectra instead of the expected water vapor absorption feature occurring around 0.56 THz. Furthermore, the conversion from attenuation to transmittance becomes more potent when the Fano resonance is excited. The physical mechanism of the transmission enhancement is interpreted and discussed in detail to show that the metamaterials' resonance could be effectively coupled with water vapor molecules' vibration mode in the atmosphere. Such novel covert effects in the transmission spectra can be exploited to reduce the loss of THz waves in the atmosphere, pointing out its remarkable potential in terahertz communication research and gas sensing. [Display omitted] • Two kinds of metamaterials (MMs) that can couple with vapor molecule vibration mode have been proposed. • MMs1 which cannot excite Fano resonance can cover the transmittance around 0.56 THz, and the conversion ability of MMs2 which can excite Fano resonance is stronger. • The physical mechanism of the transmission enhancement is interpreted and discussed in detail. • Oscillator system has been proposed to explain the coupling phenomenon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is one of the largest wheat production countries in the world. The wheat quality determines the price and many other aspects. The detection methods of wheat quality mainly depend on manual labor. It costs high amount of manpower and time, and the classification results are partly affected by different individuals. With the development of machine vision, an automatic classification system was presented in this study. A wheat unsound kernel identification method based on the improved YOLOv5 algorithm was designed by adding efficient channel attention (ECA). Compared with convolutional block attention module (CBAM) and squeeze-and-excitation network (SENet), the improved YOLOv5 algorithm was selected to fit the model better. The recognition results showed that YOLOv5 with the addition of the attention mechanism had a significant improvement in average accuracy over that without it. The most significant improvement was observed with the addition of ECA-YOLOv5, with an average accuracy of 96.24%, a 10% improvement over the other two models, and a 13% improvement over the original YOLOv5. This satisfied the application requirements for detection of wheat unsound kernel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, intelligent city construction has been promoted with the development of the Internet of things (IoT). The edge IoT gateway plays a critical role as the data aggregation core and processing center. Most existing gateways mainly solve heavy data storage and processing loads in cloud computing centers. There is less attention paid to multi-protocol data transmission and fusion. However, multiple products with different protocols in an IoT system require a flexible gateway compatible with multiple protocols. This paper proposes a multi-protocol edge gateway. The frame design was based on the actual demand for edge data acquisition. The gateway hardware platform used an RK3399 chip transplanted from the embedded operating system. It could support simultaneous multi-protocol access to ZigBee, LoRa, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi. We combined the plug-and-play (PnP) hardware device access detection scheme with the system onboard interface driver to realize dynamic access detection and unified device management. In addition, the gateway also integrated data storage and access functions and partial edge computing functions. Finally, the experiment results verified that the multi-protocol edge gateway could meet the demand for data access and device control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • •Terahertz time-domain spectroscopy was employed to characterize human glioma. • •The relationship between THz absorption coefficient of glioma samples and different tumor sites, pathological grades, histological types, molecular pathological status were systematically investigated. • •The THz absorption spectral characteristics of the tumor periphery tissue were more distinct than those of the tumor center. • •The THz spectral data were strongly correlated with histological type, pathological grade, and glioma-specific biomarkers. Gliomas are the most common type of primary tumor originating in the central nervous system of adults. Tumor histological type, pathological grade, and molecular pathology are significant prognosis and predictive factors. In this study, we were aiming to predict histological type and molecular pathological features based on terahertz time-domain spectroscopy technology. Nine gliomas with different grades, one meningioma, and one lymphoma were enrolled. There were significant differences in terahertz absorption coefficient between normal brain tissue, tumoral-periphery, and tumoral-center tissue in specific frequency bands (0.2–1.4 THz). Histological type, pathological grade, and glioma-specific biomarkers were closely related to the terahertz absorption coefficient in both tumoral-periphery and tumoral-center tissues. Interestingly, tumoral-periphery showed more obvious differences than tumoral-center tissues in almost all aspects. All the results show that the terahertz technology has potential application value in the intraoperative real-time glioma recognition and diagnosis of glioma histological and molecular pathological features. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The terahertz (THz) region has much appeal for differentiating between hydrate systems and for physically characterizing pharmaceutical drug materials. The present study employs THz absorption spectroscopy to investigate the effect of heating on dehydration and hydration in α-lactose monohydrate. Distinctive THz absorption spectra were observed following various heating durations. The THz absorption spectra for α-lactose monohydrate and anhydrous α-lactose exhibit clear differences. Pure α-lactose monohydrate displays clear absorption peaks at 0.53, 1.05, 1.11, 1.33, and 1.56 THz. The complete dehydration of α-lactose monohydrate takes only 15 mins at 145°C (418 K). Moreover, the THz refractive index of α-lactose monohydrate decreases during dehydration. The dehydration of α-lactose monohydrate was also studied using Beer–Lambert law to compare THz absorption spectra as functions of the heating time. The absorption coefficient spectra recorded at 0.53 and 1.35 THz for α-lactose monohydrate after different dehydration times vary linearly with the remaining water content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Internet of Things (IoT) is a highly integrated and comprehensive information technology that is currently a research hotspot. However, it presents many challenges; e.g., the use of multiple products in one IoT can lead to incompatible communication. It is imperative to solve the problem of communication protocol heterogeneity. In this study, a multi-protocol fusion IoT called MPFIoT was designed, implemented, and applied to environmental monitoring in a community. A hierarchical design was adopted in MPFIoT. It was divided into four layers: a data perception layer, a wireless transmission layer, a gateway layer, and an application layer. First, in the data perception layer, various sensors were used in the community to collect diverse environmental information. Second, in the wireless transmission layer, four wireless communication protocols were applied: Wi-Fi, LoRa, ZigBee, and Bluetooth. Third, the gateway layer had two sub-layers: the protocol fusion sub-layer was designed to reduce the degree of heterogeneity between protocols, and the control command sub-layer was used to control nodes via the control command frame. Finally, the application layer communicated with the gateway layer through the TCP/IP protocol. Thus, MPFIoT with four layers was developed, and its functions and performance were tested. The test results indicated that multiple types of environmental data can be collected and transmitted by MPFIoT. The packet loss ratio was less than 2% and the transmission delay was approximately 500 ms, which satisfied the application requirements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phytocyanins (PCs) are a plant-specific family of small copper-containing electron transfer proteins. PCs may bind with a single copper atom to function as electron transporters in various biological systems, such as copper trafficking and plant photosynthesis. Evidence indicates that PCs may also be involved in plant developmental processes and stress responses. Many PCs possess arabinogalactan protein-like regions and are therefore termed chimeric arabinogalactan proteins (CAGPs). Previously, 38 and 62 PC genes have been identified in Arabidopsis ( Arabidopsis thaliana) and rice ( Oryza sativa), respectively. The recent release of the Chinese cabbage genome ( B. rapa ssp. Pekinensis line Chiifu-401-42) enabled us to perform a genome-wide identification and analysis. In this study we identified 84 putative PC genes in the B. rapa genome. All of the Brassica rapa phytocyanins ( BrPCs) described here could be divided, based on motif constitution, into the following three main subclasses: 52 early nodulin-like proteins (ENODLs), 16 uclacyanin-like proteins (UCLs), and 11 stellacyanin-like proteins (SCLs). A structural analysis predicted that 71 BrPCs contained N-terminal secretion signals and 45 BrPCs may be glycosylphosphatidylinositol-anchored to the plasma membrane. Glycosylation prediction revealed that 48 BrPCs were CAGPs with putative arabinogalactan glycomodules, and 57 BrPCs had N-glycosylation sites. Additionally, gene duplication analysis demonstrated that almost all of the duplicated BrPC genes shared the same conserved collinear blocks and that segmental duplications play an important role in the diversification of this gene family. Surprisingly, all BrUCL genes were duplicated except for BrUCL16. Expression analyses indicated that BrENODL22/27 and BrSCL8/9 were highly expressed in reproductive organs; BrUCL6/16 was strongly expressed in roots and even more strongly expressed in stems. The genome-wide identification, classification and expression analysis of BrPCs will provide a fundamental basis for the evolution and modification of the gene family after a polyploidy event and enable the functional study of PC genes in a polyploid crop species. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Although in recent years some randomized controlled trails (RCTs) have explored the analgesic effect of erector spinae plane block (ESPB) in spine surgery, their results are controversial. Our study aimed to examine the analgesic effect of preoperative ESPB in spine surgery by a meta-analysis of RCTs. Methods: The articles of RCTs that compared preoperative ESPB with no block in terms of the analgesic effect in adult patients following spine surgery were eligible for inclusion. The primary outcome was the pain scores reported by Visual Analog Scale or Numerical Rating Scale of pain at different time intervals in 48 h after surgery. The secondary outcomes included postoperative opioid consumption, rescue analgesia requirement, opioid-related side effects and complications associated with ESPB. Results: Twelve studies involving 828 patients were eligible for our study. Compared with no block, ESPB had a significant effect on reducing postoperative pain scores at rest and at movement at different time intervals except at movement at 48 h. ESPB significantly decreased opioid consumption in 24 h after surgery (SMD − 1.834; 95%CI − 2.752, − 0.915; p < 0.001; I2 = 89.0%), and reduced the incidence of rescue analgesia (RR 0.333; 95%CI 0.261, 0.425; p < 0.001; I2 = 0%) and postoperative nausea and vomiting (RR 0.380; 95%CI 0.272, 0.530; p < 0.001; I2 = 9.0%). Complications associated with ESPB were not reported in the included studies. Conclusion: Our meta-analysis demonstrates that ESPB is effective in decreasing postoperative pain intensity and postoperative opioid consumption in spine surgery. Therefore, for the management of postoperative pain following spine surgery, preoperative ESPB is a good choice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • THz spectroscopy was applied to the analysis of EGFR amplification status in glioma. • This research proposes an ensemble model for predicting EGFR amplification status. • The ensemble model contains three terahertz features: absorption coefficient, refractive index, and dielectric loss angle. • The ensemble classifier consists of three types of base classifiers: SVM, RF, and XGBoost. • Ensemble classifier predicts EGFR amplification status in gliomas with an AUC of 0.858. Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) plays a pivotal role in the initiation and progression of gliomas. In particular, in glioblastoma, EGFR amplification emerges as a catalyst for invasion, proliferation, and resistance to radiotherapy and chemotherapy. Current approaches are not capable of providing rapid diagnostic results of molecular pathology. In this study, we propose a terahertz spectroscopic approach for predicting the EGFR amplification status of gliomas for the first time. A machine learning model was constructed using the terahertz response of the measured glioma tissues, including the absorption coefficient, refractive index, and dielectric loss tangent. The novelty of our model is the integration of three classical base classifiers, i.e., support vector machine, random forest, and extreme gradient boosting. The ensemble learning method combines the advantages of various base classifiers, this model has more generalization ability. The effectiveness of the proposed method was validated by applying an individual test set. The optimal performance of the integrated algorithm was verified with an area under the curve (AUC) maximum of 85.8 %. This signifies a significant stride toward more effective and rapid diagnostic tools for guiding postoperative therapy in gliomas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gas diffusion layers (GDLs) are the most rigid layers in a 5‐layer or 7‐layer membrane electrode assembly (MEA) of a proton exchange membrane fuel cell. Therefore, in the fuel cell analysis, the mechanical properties of GDLs have a great impact on the stress distribution of the membrane as well as the performance of the whole cell. However, the mechanical properties of GDLs are not sufficiently studied. Nonlinear behavior of GDLs under cyclic compression is discussed rarely in literature. The existing model takes both constraints into consideration, but due to a geometrical oversimplification of the carbon paper microstructure, it shows some deviation, which cannot be overcome by selecting appropriate parameters. In this paper, the geometry of carbon paper microstructure has been reanalyzed. Based on the improved geometry formula, a modified model of carbon paper GDL is presented and verified by experimental data. Furthermore, both the experimental mechanical characteristics are achieved as support data for the improved model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Adopting a macroscopic perspective, this study employs intercity cooperation network analysis to assess the institutional performance of the Pearl River Delta's (PRD) integration policy. To assess whether the existing PRD intercity cooperation network is advancing the three objectives of the PRD integration policy in terms of cooperation patterns, actors' involvement, and cooperation fields, this study analyzed news published on the Internet and official government websites. The study concludes that: (1) the Shenzhen-Dongguan-Huizhou sub-region (SDH) and the Zhuhai-Zhongshan-Jiangmen sub-region (ZZJ) are entirely integrated as institutional entities, while Zhaoqing and Yunfu have not been integrated into the Guangzhou-Foshan-Zhaoqing sub-region (GFZ); (2) the PRD integration process remains a government-led administrative process, with market and civil society actors having had little influence on the governance structure; and (3) the primary areas of cooperation involve institutional design and economic development, and secondary functions, such as entertainment, education, and environmental protection, have not been fully undertaken. We also consider that the PRD's institutional spatial structure is a monocentric structure centered on Shenzhen, which is inconsistent with previous studies indicating a functional spatial structure known as a “Polynuclear Urban Region.” Highlights • The institutional spatial structure of Pearl River Delta is monocentric. • Three sub-regions of Pearl River Delta are not fully achieved. • Pearl River Delta integration process is a government-led administrative process. • The primary cooperation fields of Pearl River Delta integration are institutional design and economic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • THz spectroscopy was applied to the analysis of IDH mutation status in glioma. • Six different THz spectral parameters were calculated in the study. • IDH mutant and wildtype glioma had different THz characteristics. • The LASSO algorithm was used to screen THz features, the PCA analysis to reduce dimensionality, and the Random Forest algorithm to establish a prediction model. • This research conducted a preliminary study on the possibility of glioma biomarker prediction by terahertz technology, and established a prediction model with an AUC of 0.844. Gliomas are the most common type of primary tumor in the central nervous system in adults. Isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH) mutation status is an important molecular biomarker for adult diffuse gliomas. In this study, we were aiming to predict IDH mutation status based on terahertz time-domain spectroscopy technology. Ninety-two frozen sections of glioma tissue from nine patients were included, and terahertz spectroscopy data were obtained. Through Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO), Principal component analysis (PCA), and Random forest (RF) algorithms, a predictive model for predicting IDH mutation status in gliomas was established based on the terahertz spectroscopy dataset with an AUC of 0.844. These results indicate that gliomas with different IDH mutation status have different terahertz spectral features, and the use of terahertz spectroscopy can establish a predictive model of IDH mutation status, providing a new way for glioma research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Crop plant architecture plays a highly important role in its agronomic performance. Plant height (PH) and primary branch number (PB) are two major factors that affect the plant architecture of rapeseed ( Brassica napus ). Previous studies have shown that these two traits are controlled by multiple quantitative trait loci (QTL); however, QTLs have not been delimited to regions less than 10 cM. Genome-wide association study (GWAS) is a highly efficient approach for identifying genetic loci controlling traits at relatively high resolution. In this study, variations in PH and PB of a panel of 472 rapeseed accessions that had previously been analyzed by a 60k SNP array were investigated for three consecutive years and studied by GWAS. Eight QTLs on chromosome A03, A05, A07 and C07 were identified for PH, and five QTLs on A01, A03, A07 and C07 were identified for PB. Although most QTLs have been detected in previous studies based on linkage analyses, the two QTLs of PH on A05 and the QTL of PB on C07 were novel. In the genomic regions close to the GWAS peaks, orthologs of the genes involved in flower development, phytohormone biosynthesis, metabolism and signaling in Arabidopsis were identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we used terahertz time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) over a range of 0.3-2.5 THz to investigate the formation of solid-state cocrystals of amino acids, formed by grinding mixtures of two different kinds of amino acids. For comparison, we prepared dual-layer samples, combined by pressing two single-component pellets together without grinding. In the ground-mixture samples, some extra absorption peaks appeared, different from the characteristic peaks of the pure components, but these peaks did not appear in the dual-layer samples. Thus, these extra absorption peaks in the THz range are unique features of cocrystals. From our results, we believe that THz-TDS is a promising technique to characterize cocrystals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A strategy can control the specific capacity of electrode and reduce the use of high cost active materials in applications. • The prepared Si/PC nanoparticles buffer the effect of silicon volume expansion while improve the diffusion of lithium ions. • The prepared hybrid electrode and full cell have an excellent electrochemical performance. [Display omitted] Silicon-based materials are expected to be the next generation of anode materials for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs). However, the electrode structure will be damaged due to large volume expansion during the lithiation process, resulting in a rapid decay of the battery performance. Nanostructures, porous structures, and carbon coatings have been shown to be effective in reducing the effect of volume expansion. In this work, porous carbon coated silicon (Si/PC) nanoparticles were prepared to suppress the effect of silicon volume expansion while improve the infiltration of electrolyte and the diffusion of lithium ions. The prepared Si/PC nanoparticles were mixed with commercial graphite in different mass ratios as anode materials for LIBs, which can effectively control the specific capacities of the anodes and help the practical applications by reducing the production cost. As the mass ratio of the prepared Si/PC nanoparticles to commercial graphite is 2:1, the first discharge specific capacity is 1586.3 mA h g−1 with an initial coulombic efficiency of 82.1% at a current density of 200 mA g−1. After 250 cycles at 1000 mA g−1, the capacity retention rate is 86.8%. The full cell with LiNi 0.8 Mn 0.1 Co 0.1 O 2 as cathode shows an excellent cycle stability with a high stack cell energy density of 882.3 Wh/L. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Plant non-specific lipid transfer proteins (nsLtps) are small, basic proteins encoded by multigene families and have reported functions in many physiological processes such as mediating phospholipid transfer, defense reactions against phytopathogens, the adaptation of plants to various environmental conditions, and sexual reproduction. To date, no genome-wide overview of the Brassica rapa nsLtp (BrnsLtp) gene family has been performed. Therefore, as the first step and as a helpful strategy to elucidate the functions of BrnsLtps, a genome-wide study for this gene family is necessary. Methodology/Principal Finding: In this study, a total of 63 putative BrnsLtp genes were identified through a comprehensive in silico analysis of the whole genome of B. rapa. Based on the sequence similarities, these BrnsLtps was grouped into nine types (I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VIII, IX, and XI). There is no type VII nsLtps in B. rapa, and a new type, XI nsLtps, was identified in B. rapa. Furthermore, nine type II AtLtps have no homologous genes in B. rapa. Gene duplication analysis demonstrated that the conserved collinear block of each BrnsLtp is highly identical to those in Arabidopsis and that both segmental duplications and tandem duplications seem to play equal roles in the diversification of this gene family. Expression analysis indicated that 29 out of the 63 BrnsLtps showed specific expression patterns. After careful comparison and analysis, we hypothesize that some of the type I BrnsLtps may function like Arabidopsis pathogenesis-related-14 (PR-14) proteins to protect the plant from phytopathogen attack. Eleven BrnsLtps with inflorescence-specific expression may play important roles in sexual reproduction. Additionally, BrnsLtpI.3 may have functions similar to Arabidopsis LTP1. Conclusions/Significance: The genome-wide identification, bioinformatic analysis and expression analysis of BrnsLtp genes should facilitate research of this gene family and polyploidy evolution and provide new insight towards elucidating their biological functions in plants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ureteral stents have a wide range of applications in urology. In this study, we aimed to prepare poly(1,3-trimethylene carbonate)/poly(L -lactide-co-ε-caprolactone) (PTMC/PLCL) networks with pentaerythritol triacrylate (PETA) as a crosslinking agent by gamma irradiation under vacuum to resist creep, improve shape stability and prevent the migration of stent tube. 1H and 13C NMR spectra showed that PTMC and PLCL were successfully synthesized. FTIR indicated that the PTMC/PLCL networks were successfully prepared. Both the PLCL content and the irradiation dose had an effect on the degree of crosslinking. The gel fraction of the networks increased first and then decreased. The optimized conditions for cross-linking were 20% PLCL and at a standard sterilization dose of 25 kGy. The PTMC/PLCL(80/20) network had a gel fraction of 92.5%, a tensile strength of 32.7 MPa, and a tensile set value as low as 5%. Meanwhile, the cross-linking behavior followed the Chen-Liu-Tang equation rather than the Charlesby-Pinner equation. Porcine pancreatic lipase effectively accelerated the degradation of the network in vitro. Cytotoxicity analysis showed that the PTMC/PLCL network containing PETA had no adverse effects on the growth and proliferation of cells. Therefore, the inherent biocompatibility and biodegradability, good flexibility and elasticity, and neither migration nor early fracture allowed the PTMC/PLCL network to be used as a ureteral stent. [Display omitted] • PTMC/PLCL network was prepared with PETA by gamma irradiation under vacuum. • The cross-linking behavior followed the Chen-Liu-Tang equation. • Porcine pancreatic lipase accelerated the degradation rate of the network. • PTMC/PLCL networks containing PETA were non-toxic and biocompatible. • PTMC/PLCL networks had broad application prospects in soft tissue engineering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Brain-like intelligent decision-making is a prevailing trend in today's world. However, inspired by bionics and computer science, the linear neural network has become one of the main means to realize human-like decision-making and control. This paper proposes a method for classifying drivers' driving behaviors based on the fuzzy algorithm and establish a brain-inspired decision-making linear neural network. Firstly, different driver experimental data samples were obtained through the driving simulator. Then, an objective fuzzy classification algorithm was designed to distinguish different driving behaviors in terms of experimental data. In addition, a brain-inspired linear neural network was established to realize human-like decision-making and control. Finally, the accuracy of the proposed method was verified by training and testing. This study extracts the driving characteristics of drivers through driving simulator tests, which provides a driving behavior reference for the human-like decision-making of an intelligent vehicle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heat stress can induce the cultured microspores into embryogenesis. In this study, whole genome bisulphite sequencing was employed to study global DNA methylation variations after short-term heat shock (STHS) treatments in cultured microspores of Brassica napus cv. Topas. Our results indicated that treatment on cultured Topas microspores at 32 °C for 6 h triggered DNA hypomethylation, particularly in the CG and CHG contexts. And the total number of T32 (Topas 32 °C for 6 h) vs. T0 (Topas 0 h) differentially methylated region-related genes (DRGs) was approximately two-fold higher than that of T18 (Topas 18 °C for 6 h) vs. T0 DRGs, which suggested that 32 °C might be a more intense external stimulus than 18 °C resulting in more changes in the DNA methylation status of cultured microspores. Additionally, 32 °C treatment for 6 h led to increased CHG differential methylations of transposons (DMTs), which were mainly constituted by overlaps between the hypomethylated differentially methylated regions (hypo-DMRs) and transposon elements (TEs). Further analysis demonstrated that the DRGs and their paralogs exhibited differential methylated/demethylated patterns. To summarize, the present study is the first methylome analysis of cultured microspores in response to STHS and may provide valuable information on the roles of DNA methylation in heat response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]