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Student-teacher relationship drawings were employed to investigate how students' mental representations of student-teacher relationships were affected by their gender, age, and shyness across the Netherlands and China. The sample included 752 third- to sixth-graders (48.5% boys; Mage = 9.96) from the Netherlands and 574 third- to- sixth-graders (53.7% boys; Mage = 11.48) from China. Students' drawings were double-coded on eight relationship dimensions. Multiple group models showed that Chinese students' drawings scored lower on anger/tension, role reversal, emotional distance/isolation, and global pathology but higher on vulnerability than those of Dutch students. Boys' drawings displayed higher global pathology than girls' drawings and this difference was larger in the Netherlands than in China. Other associations between student characteristics (gender, age, shyness) and drawing dimensions were equally strong across countries. As an implication, findings from Western countries may not necessarily generalize to students and teachers in Eastern countries. Drawing may be a promising method to further understand differences and similarities in the formation of student-teacher relationships across countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Digital inclusive finance has a positive promotion effect on the development of the national economy, but little research exists on how digital inclusive finance affects high-quality consumption in economically developed regions. Therefore, to fill the gap, this paper aims to study the impact of digital inclusive finance on high-quality consumption development using the economically developed regions of Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai as examples. Design/methodology/approach: Firstly, the entropy method is used to construct the index of high-quality consumption among residents. Then, the municipal-level data of Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai from 2011 to 2020 are used to test the impact. Subsequently, the mechanism of action test and heterogeneity analysis are conducted. Findings: The results show that digital inclusive finance has a positive role in promoting the high-quality consumption of residents in Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai. At the same time, digital inclusive finance can promote high-quality consumption through its own digital payment and internet insurance channels. There is regional heterogeneity in the impact. Originality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first to examine whether and how digital inclusive finance affects high-quality consumption. The authors consider multiple dimensions, such as consumption level, consumption structure, consumption ability, consumption environment and consumption mode, to measure high-quality consumption. The findings provide valuable insights for policymakers, investors and regulators in planning regulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to the rapid sociocultural changes in China, Chinese parents' childrearing beliefs and practices have undergone dramatic transformations. Against this context, this study examined whether Chinese parents' endorsement of progressive and traditional childrearing beliefs would predict children's academic achievement, as well as whether parenting practices would mediate this association. This study utilized a longitudinal design and followed 206 Chinese families for 2 years from the end of preschool to Grade 2. Parents showed greater endorsement of progressive than traditional childrearing beliefs, as well as higher use of authoritative than authoritarian parenting practices. Parents' childrearing beliefs in preschool predicted children's math achievement in Grade 2 via authoritative parenting. However, parenting beliefs were unrelated to authoritarian parenting, and authoritarian parenting did not predict any of the child academic outcomes in Grade 2. The findings suggest Chinese parents' orientations toward progressive parenting beliefs and authoritative parenting practices. They also highlight the utility of parenting beliefs in explaining disparities in early academic achievement. The nonsignificant findings pertinent to authoritarian parenting call for re‐examination of the cultural meaning and effects of authoritarian parenting in Chinese society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exosomes regulate lipid metabolism by carrying miRNAs, nucleic acids, and proteins, thereby influencing the function of receptor cells. Glucose-regulated protein 78 (GRP78) is also involved in the regulation of lipid metabolism. However, it remains unclear whether exosomes derived from fatty hepatocytes (OA-Exo) regulate lipid metabolism through the enrichment of GRP78. In this study, we observed the expression of GRP78 was significantly increased in fatty hepatocytes (incubating hepatocytes with oleic acid (OA) for 24 h) and OA-Exo (P < 0.05). In addition, OA-Exo (50 μg/mL) and GRP78 protein (1 μg/mL) significant increased the content of triacylglycerol (TG) and total cholesterol (TC), as well as up-regulated the expression of GRP78 and inositol-requiring enzyme-1alpha (IRE1α) protein (P < 0.05). We further used YUM70 (an inhibitor of GRP78) to inhibit endogenous GRP78, and compared with the YUM70 group, OA-Exo reversed the effect of YUM70 and increased the content of TG, TC, and the expression of GRP78 protein in hepatocytes (P < 0.05). Furthermore, the inhibition of the IRE1α pathway with 4μ8C resulted in a significant decrease in TG content compared to the control group (P < 0.05). However, when compared with the 4μ8C group, OA-Exo and GRP78 reversed the effect of 4μ8C and significantly increased TG content (P < 0.05). Taken together, these results indicated that OA-Exo activated IRE1α to promote lipid accumulation in hepatocytes through the enrichment of GRP78. This study provided a new perspective for further exploration of exosomal lipid metabolism in fish. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To address the problems that a single feature in radio frequency fingerprint recognition could not fully represent the integrity of the signal and that the differences between features of different classes were small, which limited the recognition accuracy, a DA-ResNeXt50 (ResNeXt50 with dense connection and ACBlock) method for radio frequency fingerprint identification based on time-frequency and bi-spectral feature fusion was proposed. Firstly, short-time Fourier transform (STFT) and bi-spectrum transform were performed separately on the signals collected from different devices, the resulting images were bi-narized and then concatenated. By taking advantage of the advantages of both transformations in the time-frequency domain and high-order statistical characteristics respectively, the radio frequency fingerprint features of different devices can be extracted and characterized more comprehensively. Then, the DA-ResNeXt50 network model was proposed. Borrowing from the idea of dense connection, each layer of the four-layer residual unit was directly connected to all previous layers, promoting feature reuse and transmission, which enabled it to better capture subtle differences between classes. Finally, the asymmetric convolution block (ACBlock) was used to replace the 3x3 convolution in the last residual unit of the model. This effectively increased the receptive field of the network and enhanced the skeleton part of the convolutional kernel, thereby improving the performance of radio frequency fingerprint recognition. The experimental results show that compared with that of using a single feature extraction method, the proposed feature fusion approach significantly improves performance. Compared with various classical models, the improved model has higher recognition accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analyzing the impacts of urban landscape patterns on the thermal environment has become one of the key research areas in addressing urban heat islands (UHIs) and improving the living environment. A case study was carried out in Fuzhou, Fujian Province of China, and bi-temporal Landsat imagery was selected to calculate land surface temperature (LST), percent impervious surface area (ISA), and fractional vegetation cover (FVC). The urban area was further divided into three concentric urban zones, ranging from the city center to the urban periphery, based on urban development densities. The spatial pattern of LST and its variance were analyzed and compared between different zones and different dates. The thermal environment contribution of different zones was also quantified to indicate the change in urban landscape patterns resulting from urban expansion in different zones. Furthermore, Geodetector was used to explore the single factors and interaction factors controlling the spatial patterns of LST in each zone. The results showed that (i) urban expansion primarily increased in Zone 2 and Zone 3, and the areal proportion of high and sub-high LST areas increased from 56.11% and 21.08% to 62.03% and 32.49% in Zone 2 and Zone 3, respectively, from 2004 to 2021; (ii) the heat effect contribution of Zones 2 and 3 reached from 75.16% in 2004 to 89.40% in 2021, indicating that the increase in ISA with >LSTmean was more pronounced in Zone 3 and Zone 2 during the period; (iii) the driving factors of LST spatial distribution were regionally different because of the different landscape patterns, and the explanatory power for the heterogeneity of LST in Zone 1 was weaker than in Zone 2 and Zone 3 in the study area; (iv) the interaction of different factors had a higher explanatory power in the spatial distribution of LST than a single factor in each zone because the distributions of land cover types are heterogeneous in urban areas. The results of this study can be used to improve urban planning for urban ecology and UHI mitigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dr. Helmut Cölfen, an exceptional interdisciplinary scientist, mentor, colleague, and dear friend, passed away in November 2023 at the age of 58. His untimely departure is a profound loss for the fields of analytical ultracentrifugation, colloid, crystallization, and polymer research. This obituary pays tribute to Helmut, honoring his remarkable academic career and contributions to the study of nanochemistry, biophysics, and life sciences. Helmut was renowned for his pioneering research contributions in several key research areas: (1) Development of advanced analytical techniques: Helmut made major contributions to techniques such as analytical ultracentrifugation and field flow fractionation, which are widely utilized to characterize the structure of biomolecules and the growth of nanostructured crystalline materials; (2) Study of nucleation and crystallization processes: Helmut explored the early stages of crystallization which led to the discovery of pre-nucleation clusters and mesocrystal intermediates, in the presence of additives and templates; and (3) Investigation of structure and morphogenesis of mesocrystals, examining their molecular properties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research Findings: The present study focused on the affective quality of dyadic relationships between teachers and young children in China and the Netherlands. We examined whether there were cross-cultural differences in teachers' and children's relationship perceptions, as well as the degree to which teachers and children agreed on their relationship perceptions. The Dutch sample included 234 kindergartners and first-graders (47.7% girls; Mage = 5.82 years) and 35 teachers. The Chinese sample consisted of 190 kindergartners (50.5% girls; Mage = 5.60 years) and 19 teachers. Both teachers and children reported about their mutual relationships. Multiple group analyses showed that, unexpectedly, Chinese children experienced lower warmth and higher conflict with teachers than Dutch children. In contrast, teachers from China and the Netherlands did not differ in the degree of closeness and conflict they experienced in their relationships with young children. In both countries, teachers and children had significant agreement on conflict but lacked agreement on closeness. Practice or Policy: Thus, it seems important to include child perceptions in cross-cultural comparisons of early teacher-child relationships as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The porous structure formed by the interweaving of yarns in textiles is favorable for sound absorption. However, the absorption of sound waves by porous materials conforms to the law of linear response, which leads to poor sound absorption of textiles in the low-frequency range. It is usually necessary to increase the thickness to improve the low-frequency acoustic absorption performance of textiles, which does not meet the performance requirements of lightness, thinness, width and strength. This work proposes a method to increase the acoustic absorption performance based on acoustic-electric conversion and yarn resonance effect. In the form of a woven spacer fabric structure, different parts of the structure were prepared using nylon and PVDF yarns with different triboelectric sequences to realize acoustic-electric conversion between dielectric materials. Control samples woven with the same material were also prepared. Further, the resonance frequency of the yarns was modulated by controlling their tension to change the resonant frequency corresponding to the maximum acoustic-electric conversion efficiency and sound absorption peak. It was found that fabrics composed of two different materials had better sound absorption than fabrics composed of only one material. This is because the larger triboelectric sequence difference between materials results in more charge transfer, which favors acoustic-electric conversion and acoustic energy consumption. A significant acoustic absorption peak at 390 Hz with a peak value of about 0.05 was observed for a fabric with a thickness of about 4 mm after tension adjustment. This study demonstrates that acoustic-electric conversion between dielectric yarns and proper tension control improves the acoustic absorption efficiency and provides a reference for the development of structures based on this novel acoustic absorption mechanism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Erlotinib, an EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor, is used for treating patients with cancer exhibiting EGFR overexpression or mutation. However, the response rate of erlotinib is low among patients with gastric cancer (GC). The findings of this study illustrated that the overexpression of bromodomain PHD finger transcription factor (BPTF) is partially responsible for erlotinib resistance in GC, and the combination of the BPTF inhibitor AU‐1 with erlotinib synergistically inhibited tumor growth both in vivo and in vitro. AU‐1 inhibited the epigenetic function of BPTF and decreased the transcriptional activity of c‐MYC on PLCG1 by attenuating chromosome accessibility of the PLCG1 promoter region, thus decreasing the expression of p‐PLCG1 and p‐Erk and eventually improving the sensitivity of GC cells to erlotinib. In patient‐derived xenograft (PDX) models, AU‐1 monotherapy exhibited remarkable tumor‐inhibiting activity and is synergistic anti‐tumor effects when combined with erlotinib. Altogether, the findings illustrate that BPTF affects the responsiveness of GC to erlotinib by epigenetically regulating the c‐MYC/PLCG1/pErk axis, and the combination of BPTF inhibitors and erlotinib is a viable therapeutic approach for GC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigated how young children's (5‐to‐8‐year‐olds) social inhibition and solitary behavior were associated with teacher–child relationship quality and whether these associations differed across the Netherlands and China. The Dutch sample included 35 teachers and 201 children (49% girls). The Chinese sample consisted of 19 teachers and 152 children (50% girls). Teachers rated children's social inhibition and solitary behavior, and their relationship (closeness, conflict) with each child. Multilevel linear modeling revealed that in both countries, social inhibition was associated negatively with closeness and solitary behavior was associated positively with conflict. These associations were equally strong in China and the Netherlands. One association differed across countries: Social inhibition was associated negatively with conflict in the Netherlands, whereas this association was not significant in China. As such, cultural values could affect how social inhibition links to teacher–child relationships. Caution is recommended when generalizing findings from one country to another country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Real-time quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) has a high sensitivity and strong specificity, and is widely used in the analysis of gene expression. Selecting appropriate internal reference genes is the key to accurately analyzing the expression changes of target genes by RT-qPCR. To find out the most suitable internal reference genes for studying the gene expression in Broussonetia papyrifera under abiotic stresses (including drought, salt, and ZnSO4 treatments), seven different tissues of B. papyrifera, as well as the roots, stems, and leaves of B. papyrifera under the abiotic stresses were used as test materials, and 15 candidate internal reference genes were screened based on the transcriptome data via RT-qPCR. Then, the expression stability of the candidate genes was comprehensively evaluated through the software geNorm (v3.5), NormFinder (v0.953), BestKeeper (v1.0), and RefFinder. The best internal reference genes and their combinations were screened out according to the analysis results. rRNA and Actin were the best reference genes under drought stress. Under salt stress, DOUB, HSP, NADH, and rRNA were the most stable reference genes. Under heavy metal stress, HSP and NADH were the most suitable reference genes. EIF3 and Actin were the most suitable internal reference genes in the different tissues of B. papyrifera. In addition, HSP, rRNA, NADH, and UBC were the most suitable internal reference genes for the abiotic stresses and the different tissues of B. papyrifera. The expression patterns of DREB and POD were analyzed by using the selected stable and unstable reference genes. This further verified the reliability of the screened internal reference genes. This study lays the foundation for the functional analysis and regulatory mechanism research of genes in B. papyrifera. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The argonaute (AGO) protein, as an important member of the small RNA (sRNA) regulatory pathway gene-silencing complex (RNA-induced silencing complex, RISC), is a key protein that mediates gene silencing and plays a key role in the recruitment of sRNAs. In this study, bioinformatics was used to identify the AGO gene family in poplar and study its expression in various tissues and in response to abiotic stress treatments. A total of 15 PtAGO genes were identified in poplar, which were unevenly distributed in 9 chromosomes. Most proteins were predicted to be located in the nucleus and chloroplast. The PtAGOs had similar motif structures and conserved motifs, except for PtAGO3. All the PtAGO genes could be clustered into 3 groups, and Group II, including PtAGO2/3/7, had the smallest number of exons, while the others had more than 20 exons. Cis-regulatory elements involved in light response, growth and development, abiotic stress and hormone-induced responses were found in the promoters of PtAGO members. Further expression analysis found that the PtAGO genes had tissue-specific expression patterns. For example, PtAGO7 and PtAGO10b were mainly expressed in the xylem and might be involved in secondary xylem development. Furthermore, abiotic stress tests, including heat, ABA and PEG treatments, showed that most PtAGO genes could respond quickly to ABA treatment, and multiple PtAGO genes were constantly regulated under heat-shock stress. These results provide a basis for the elucidation mechanism of PtAGO genes and further molecular breeding in poplar. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The melt fluidity of polycarbonate (PC) significantly influences the processing, while the melt viscosity depends on the molecular structure. Specifically, the melt viscosity increases sharply with the increase of polymerization degree. However, the influence mechanism of alkali metal catalysts on the fluidity by affecting the molecular structure remains unclear. Herein, high and low concentrations of NaOH catalysts were used to synthesize PC with different polycondensation degrees. The effect of NaOH catalyst content on the molecular structure and thus melt fluidity of PC were systematically characterized and discussed employing NMR spectroscopy, absolute and relative molecular weight, intrinsic viscosity, melt flow index, and thermal analysis. The results show that a random branched structure of the PC molecular chain caused by excess NaOH improves the melt flowability. However, the residual NaOH promotes the degradation of carbonate bonds during thermal processing, resulting in poor PC stability. Based on the above discussion, empirical fitting equations are proposed to describe the relationship between molecular structure and flow properties, which provides a new way to judge PC performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

"Hormesis" is considered a dose–response phenomenon mainly observed at hyperaccumulator plants under heavy metals stress. In this study, the effects of electric fields on hormesis responses in Lonicera japonica Thunb. under cadmium (Cd) treatments were investigated by assessing the plant growth and photosynthetic characteristics. Under Cd treatments without electric fields, the parameters of plant growth and photosynthetic characteristics increased significantly when exposed to 5 mg L−1 Cd, and decreased slightly when exposed to 25 mg L−1 Cd, showing an inverted U-shaped trend, which confirmed that low concentration Cd has a hormesis effect on L. japonica. Under electric fields, different voltages significantly promoted the inverted U-shaped trend of the hormesis effect on the plant, especially by 2 V cm−1 voltage. Under 2 V cm−1 voltage, the dry weight of the root and leaf biomass exposed to 5 mg L−1 Cd increased significantly by 38.38% and 42.14%, and the photosynthetic pigment contents and photosynthetic parameters were also increased significantly relative to the control, indicating that a suitable electric field provides better improvements for the hormesis responses of the plant under Cd treatments. The synergistic benefits of the 5 mg L−1 Cd and 2 V cm−1 electric field in terms of the enhanced hormesis responses of growth and photosynthetic characteristics could contribute to the promoted application of electro-phytotechnology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, multiple rheological and molecular structure characterization methods are utilized to investigate the melt post‐polycondensation (MPP) process of polycarbonate (PC) at high temperatures (260–300°C) under a nitrogen atmosphere. We find some unexpected phenomena that the complex viscosity of PC melt rise rapidly and it reaches an extraordinarily high value of about 106 Pa·s during the MPP process of 10 h at 300°C. Dissoluble PC and insoluble gel residue are separated and both fractions are analyzed by gel permeation chromatography, 1H‐NMR, and pyrolysis‐gas chromatography mass spectrometry. Results show that the molecular weight of dissoluble PC significantly increases at the early stage of the reaction (less than 1 h). After that, it continues to reduce due to the occurrence of branching reactions and degradation reactions caused by high temperature reactions for a long time. Chemical structure analysis indicates that the same two branched structures are discovered in both dissoluble PC and insoluble gel residue, the changes in structures indicate that no new structures are formed during the crosslinking reaction. According to this study's results, we clearly understand the correlation between the rheological properties and structural changes for PC in the MPP progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Euonymus microcarpus (Oliv.) Sprague, is a species of evergreen shrub of the genus Euonymus, family Celastraceae. Here, we extracted the genomic DNA from the leaves of E. microcarpus and constructed a paired-end library. The chloroplast genome of E. microcarpus was generated with the high-throughput sequencing by the illumina Hiseq X Ten platform and de novo assembly. The chloroplast genome had a quadripartite structure, containing a long single copy region with a size of 85,386 bp and a short single copy region with a size of 18,456 bp, separated by two inverted repeat regions of 26,850 bp. The chloroplast genome contained 133 genes identified in total, including 87 potential protein-coding genes, 38 transfer RNA genes, and eight ribosomal RNA genes. A total of 282 simple sequence repeats and 63 long repeats were found. Furthermore, the phylogenetic relationships inferred that E. microcarpus is sister to E. japonicus and E. schensianus. A comparison of the structure of the chloroplast genomes of eight Euonymus species suggests a nucleotide variability of the junction sites and a higher divergence of non-coding regions, compared to the coding regions. The original findings of the study serves as a good reference for chloroplast genome assembly and a valuable foundation for the genetic diversity and evolution of E. microcarpus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cycloaliphatic diepoxides, CAEs, are well known for their better thermal, chemical and optical properties, compared with the glycidyl ether type epoxides. However, the shortages including low moisture resistance, and high reflective index or high dielectric constant limit their use for the emerging advanced optical and electronic applications, In this work, we have synthesized two new cycloaliphatic diepoxides containing different fluorinated linkers (2,2′‐((2,2,3,3‐tetrafluorobutane‐1,4‐diyl)bis(oxy))bis(7‐oxabicyclo[4.1.0]heptane) (TCE) and 2,2′‐((2,2,3,3,4,4,5,5‐octafluorohexane‐1,6‐diyl)bis(oxy))bis(7‐oxabicyclo[4.1.0]heptane) (OCE) and characterized their chemical structures using 1H NMR, 19F NMR, and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. We have cured these two fluorine‐containing CAEs, using hexahydro‐4‐methylphthalic anhydride (HMPA) and compared them with a commercial CAE, 3,4‐epoxycyclohexylmethyl‐3,4‐epoxycyclohexanecarboxylate (ERL‐4221) under the same condition. Compared to the cured ERL‐4221 (C‐ERL‐4221), the cured fluorinated CAEs (C‐OCE, C‐TCE) have much better water resistances (saturated water absorption after 6 days in water: 0.70%, 1.72%, and 2.83%, for C‐OCE, C‐TCE, and C‐ERL‐4221, respectively) and lower dielectric constant (Dk) (Dk: 2.54–2.44 and 2.78–2.66 vs. 4.01–4.00 @ 1 Hz‐5 MHz), and similar thermal stability (the statistical heat‐resistant index [Ts]: 169°C, 175°C vs. 175.5°C), although their glass transition temperature (Tg) and storage moduli are lower (Tg: 136°C, 171°C vs. 250°C; moduli: 0.56GPa, 1.25GPa vs. 1.38GPa). These results reveal that fluorine atoms on the linkers effectively reduce dielectric constant and improve hydrophobicity and wettability, providing new insights into the design of fluorine‐containing cycloaliphatic diepoxides. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) low breast cancer was considered as a distinct subtype different from HER2-zero breast cancer. Our study aimed to investigate the prognostic values of clinicopathological features and recurrence score (RS) in HER2-low and HER2-zero hormone receptor (HR)-positive breast cancer patients. Methods: A total of 2099 HR + primary female breast cancer patients diagnosed between Jan 2009 and Jan 2019 were collected. Tumors with immunohistochemistry 1 + /2 + and negative in situ hybridization results were defined as HER2-low. We compared the clinical and genetical features of HER2-low (n = 1732) and HER2-zero (n = 367) breast cancer and their prognostic values. Results: Estrogen receptor (ER) high expression (> 90%) was more common in HER2-low breast cancer than HER2-zero breast cancer (78.2% vs 58.6%, p < 0.01). Five-year disease-free survival (DFS) was similar between HER2-zero and HER2-low subgroups (92.3% vs 93.3%, p = 0.83). The predictive value of RS was only significant in HER2-zero patients (p = 0.03). The proliferation-related genes performed well in predicting DFS in HER2-zero patients, but not in HER2-low patients (p for interaction < 0.01). The higher HER2 module score was correlated with worse DFS only in HER2-low patients (p = 0.04). Conclusion: We observed similar survival outcomes between HER2-low and HER2-zero HR + patients. HER2-low patients had a higher proportion of ER high expressed tumors than HER2-zero patients did. RS and its proliferation module might be less clinically meaningful to HER2-low patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study examined the psychometric properties of Student–Teacher Relationship Drawings (STRDs) to assess student–teacher relationship quality in a cross-cultural context. A sample of upper elementary school students from both the Netherlands (N = 752) and China (N = 574) was included. Results showed sufficient inter-rater reliabilities of all drawing dimensions for both the Dutch (.68 < ICC <.84) and Chinese samples (.72 < ICC <.85). Multiple group analyses supported partially strong invariance of STRD-dimensions across the Dutch and Chinese samples. Relationship drawing dimensions also showed moderate associations with student-reported relationship quality and engagement across both the Dutch and Chinese sample. Future cross-cultural research may therefore employ STRDs to assess students' relationship experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Demand for electronic materials with improved dielectric properties are increasing. One of the ways to reduce the dielectric constant is to incorporate fluorine atoms. In this article, a novel fluorinated epoxy resin (diglycidol ether of 2,4‐bis (1,1,1,3,3,3‐hexafluoroisopropyl) fluorobenzene (FB‐EP)) with 45.7 wt% fluorine content was synthesized from fluorobenzene, epichlorohydrin and hexafluoroacetone. The structures of desired monomers were characterized by NMR and FTIR. The epoxy resin FB‐EP was cured by copolymerization with hexahydrophthalic anhydride (HHPA) and by homopolymerization catalyzed with boron trifluoride ethylamine (BF3MEA), respectively. The curing reaction kinetics of the fluorinated epoxy and the properties of the cured materials were studied in comparison with those of common diglycidol ether epoxy resin (BADGE). The results of curing activation energy indicate that FB‐EP is reactive as the BADGE, and the four‐trifluoromethyl groups on FB‐EP do not negatively affect the cationic polymerization reactivity of the epoxy groups. The cured FB‐EP materials had lower moisture absorption, and especially lower dielectric constant (Dk, 2.23) and lower dielectric loss (Df, 0.011) in the frequency range of 8.2–12.4 GHz. This article provides a base for further study of fluorinated epoxy resin as advanced electronic materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The multi-system of electro-phytotechnology using a woody ornamental cadmium (Cd) hyperaccumulator (Lonicera japonica Thunb.) is a new departure for environmental remediation. The effects of four electric field conditions on Cd accumulation, growth, and photosynthesis of L. japonica under four Cd treatments were investigated. Under 25 and 50 mg L−1 Cd treatments, Cd accumulation in L. japonica was enhanced significantly compared to the control and reached 1110.79 mg kg−1 in root and 428.67 mg kg−1 in shoots influenced by the electric field, especially at 2 V cm−1, and with higher bioaccumulation coefficient (BC), translocation factor (TF), removal efficiency (RE), and the maximum Cd uptake, indicating that 2 V cm−1 voltage may be the most suitable electric field for consolidating Cd-hyperaccumulator ability. It is accompanied by increased root and shoots biomass and photosynthetic parameters through the electric field effect. These results show that a suitable electric field may improve the growth, hyperaccumulation, and photosynthetic ability of L.japonica. Meanwhile, low Cd supply (5 mg L−1) and medium voltage (2 V cm−1) improved plant growth and photosynthetic capacity, conducive to the practical application to a plant facing low concentration Cd contamination in the real environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Melt post‐polycondensation (MPP) process is one of manufactures industrially that can efficiently increase the molecular weight of polycarbonate (PC). Herein, the MPP experiments of several PC materials using quaternary ammonium hydroxides and alkali metal compounds as the catalyst in the film state are studied. The reaction products are characterized by Ubbelohde viscometer, DSC, 1H‐NMR, ultraviolet spectrophotometry, advanced polymer chromatography and rotational rheometer. It is found that MPP can effectively improve the intrinsic viscosity of PC. After a certain reaction time at a specific temperature, the number average molecular weight (Mn) of PC is raised from 19,000 to 54,600 g/mol. Furthermore, the 1H‐NMR results reveal that Fries rearrangement products are produced during the MPP process. Based on the functional group model, a reaction kinetic model, combining the effects of the main melt polycondensation reaction and the Fries rearrangement reaction, is established for the first time. The reaction rate constants at different temperatures and the reaction activation energies of the two PC materials are obtained. This work provides a new reaction kinetics model to guide the MPP process of PC, which contains Fries rearrangement reaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hexagonal α-Fe2O3 nanoplates exposing {001} crystal planes have been synthesized by using ethanol as the control agent of crystal facets. The as-synthesized nanoplates exhibit higher responses to ethanol, methanol and triethylamine than commercial powders, and the responses can be further increased by hydrogenation. The enhancement of sensitivity is attributed to an increase in density of 3-coordinated Fe (Fe3c) atoms at the exposed (001) crystal plane after hydrogenating. The unsaturated Fe3c atoms at the Fe-terminated polar (001) surface are evidenced to serve as an active site for gas sensing, and a gas sensing mechanism at atomic scale is presented. On the (001) surface, the 3-coordinated Fe atoms adsorb oxygen and catalyzes the reaction of the adsorb oxygen with test gases. The adsorption and desorption of oxygen leads to a change in resistance of the α-Fe2O3 nanoplate sensor. This mechanism is instructive for the comprehending of gas sensing reactions, and the design of highly sensitivity gas sensing materials and devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The 21-gene assay recurrence score (RS) provides additional information on recurrence risk of breast cancer patients and prediction of chemotherapy benefit. Previous studies that examined the contribution of the individual genes and gene modules of RS were conducted mostly in postmenopausal patients. We aimed to evaluate the gene modules of RS in patients of different ages. Methods: A total of 1,078 estrogen receptor (ER)-positive and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-negative breast cancer patients diagnosed between January 2009 and March 2017 from Shanghai Jiao Tong University Breast Cancer Data Base were included. All patients were divided into three subgroups: Group A, ≤40 years and premenopausal (n = 97); Group B, >40 years and premenopausal (n = 284); Group C, postmenopausal (n = 697). The estrogen, proliferation, invasion, and HER2 module scores from RS were used to characterize the respective molecular features. Spearman correlation and analysis of the variance tests were conducted for RS and its constituent modules. Results: In patients >40 years, RS had a strong negative correlation with its estrogen module (ρ = −0.76 and −0.79 in Groups B and C) and a weak positive correlation with its invasion module (ρ = 0.29 and 0.25 in Groups B and C). The proliferation module mostly contributed to the variance in young patients (37.3%) while the ER module contributed most in old patients (54.1% and 53.4% in Groups B and C). In the genetic high-risk (RS >25) group, the proliferation module was the leading driver in all patients (ρ = 0.38, 0.53, and 0.52 in Groups A, B, and C) while the estrogen module had a weaker correlation with RS. The impact of ER module on RS was stronger in clinical low-risk patients while the effect of the proliferation module was stronger in clinical high-risk patients. The association between the RS and estrogen module was weaker among younger patients, especially in genetic low-risk patients. Conclusions: RS was primarily driven by the estrogen module regardless of age, but the proliferation module had a stronger impact on RS in younger patients. The impact of modules varied in patients with different genetic and clinical risks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigated (1) the mediating role of attention in the associations between children's sleep problems and classroom learning behaviors in elementary school, and (2) the moderating role of gender in these associations. Results from structural equation modeling showed that children's sleep problems had a significant and negative association with their attention level (β = –.08), and their attention level had a significant and positive association with their classroom learning behaviors (β =.20). The indirect effect of sleep problems on classroom learning behaviors, however, was not significant (β =.02). Gender of a child had significant moderating effects on the associations between sleep problems and attention level and between attention level and classroom learning behaviors. Related intervention programs can be implemented to reduce children's sleep problems and to improve their academic performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study identified umami and umami-enhancing peptides, which explain the umami taste of Sanhuang chicken. Ten novel peptides were isolated from chicken hydrolysate by gel filtration chromatography and reverse-phase high-performance liquid chromatography. The amino acid sequence was analyzed by UPLC-Q-Exactive Orbitrap-MS: HGEDKEGE, IPIPATKT, SEASNNK, IGPGLGR, AGDDAPR, FAGDDAPR, ADGLWL, KDGGGGK, PGPAGPAGP, and GFLGPQ. All synthetic peptides were discovered with umami and umami-enhancing effects based on the sensory evaluation and electronic tongue. Of these, HGEDKEGE, and SEASNNK showed a prominent umami taste, and the umami threshold values of the umami peptide were 0.56 and 0.33 mmol/L, respectively. The AGDDAPR and IGPGLGR had better a umami-enhancing effect. The molecular docking results confirmed that all peptides entered the Venus flytrap (VFT) domain of T1R3, new binding sites were obtained, Arg303, Ser123, and His121 might play critical roles in the umami-enhancing effects. Residues of Ser146 and Ser123 were found to play decisive roles in umami taste. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a causal attribution, attributing academic success to giftedness might influence students' academic achievement. According to previous studies, students' self-regulated learning and negative learning emotions may mediate the association between achievement attribution and academic achievement. Therefore, the present study employed structural equation modeling to examine the association between attributing academic success to giftedness and academic achievement among elementary and secondary students, and included students' negative learning emotions and self-regulated learning as mediators. The 2018 data from China Family Panel Studies were included in the present study for analysis. Results showed that the full mediation models had satisfactory model fits. After controlling the effects of the covariates, attributing academic success to giftedness had a positive indirect association with their academic achievement, through the mediation of self-regulated learning and negative learning emotions. Based on these findings, possible explanations and suggestions for practices and future research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Veterinary drugs are widely used in animal husbandry to prevent and treat animal diseases, to promote animal growth, and to improve the conversion rate of feed. However, the use of veterinary drugs in food-producing animals may leave residues of the parent compounds, and/or their metabolites in food products resulting in harmful effects to humans. To ensure food safety, sensitive and effective analytical methods have been developing rapidly. So it is necessary to make a systematic summary of detection methods of veterinary drug residues. Sample preparation methods and analytical techniques are the two main parts of analyzing veterinary drug residues which were described in detail. Sample preparation methods, such as solid-phase extraction, liquid–liquid extraction, immunoaffinity chromatography, and QuEChERS, were summarized by the specific examples. The three types of methods, microbial, immunological, and physicochemical methods, for screening or determination were described, including microbial inhibition, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay, colloidal gold immunoassay, fluorescence polarization immunoassay, biosensor technology, application of quantum dots, capillary electrophoresis, liquid chromatography, and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry. In addition, the advantages and shortcomings of methods were also described. The challenges and prospects were discussed for the analysis of veterinary drug residues in animal-derived foods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are one species of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) with strong carcinogenicity and teratogenicity. They can be widely found in the environment, which cause great harm to the ecological environment. In addition, they endanger human health by polluting food from the natural environment and food processing. Therefore, it is necessary to accurately detect PAHs in various sample matrices, which requires the accurate, practical and rapid detection methods. This review aims to investigate the progress of research methods for PAHs, including pretreatment methods and detection methods. A summary analysis of different methods is performed by searching the literature on numerous methods for detecting PAHs published in various journals. There are many pretreatment methods for PAHs, such as solid phase extraction (SPE), cloud point extraction (CPE) and so on. The most commonly used methods for detecting PAHs are high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Spectrophotometry, chromatography and chromatography-mass spectrometry have been used more frequently owing to their accuracy and convenience. At the same time, some immunological methods, such as immunosensormethods, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA), immunofluorescence, etc. are also widely used. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Co3O4 octahedrons enclosed by {111} facets were synthesized using Cl− ions as a crystal facet control agent. The Co3O4 octahedrons show higher responses than Co3O4 commercial particles to ethanol, methanol, acetone and triethylamine, and the responses are further enhanced by increasing the numbers of 3-coordinated Co atoms (Co3c) with one dangling bond at Co–Co3O4 (111) plane by eliminating surface Cl− ions and OH groups. Accordingly, we deem that the Co3c atom at (111) plane acts as an active center for sensing reaction and present an atomic and molecular level sensing mechanism. The Co3c atoms can produce free electrons, absorb O2 molecules and catalyze the gas-sensing reactions. The surface engineering may be used to bolster gas-sensing properties of other metallic oxides. The concept of Co3c atom as an active center will contribute to understand the true nature of the gas sensing and provide guidance on designing highly performance sensing materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metal–organic frameworks for lithium storage have gained intensive attention, but their cycling stabilities are still limited. A multi-coordinated strategy to improve the cycling stabilities is explored, inspired by the study of the stability and structure of metal ions coordinated with the amide group. A cobalt-based 2,5-pyridinecarboxylic metal–organic chain, named Co-pydc, was synthesized and applied as an anode for lithium-ion batteries after evacuation. The evacuated Co-pydc shows a unique laminar and porous structure, which benefits the Li-ion diffusion, thus exhibiting a faster activation of the electrode and capacitive-controlled electrochemical behavior. When tested at 100, 500, and 1000 mA g−1 for 50, 200, and 400 cycles, respectively, the evacuated Co-pydc delivered high capacities of 1036.4, 798.6, and 589.2 mA h g−1 after the final cycle, respectively, demonstrating outstanding cycling stabilities. The excellent cycling ability mainly arises from the unique chain network induced by the synergistic multi-coordination of pyridinic nitrogen and carboxylic oxygen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The application of flowering plants is the basis of urban forest construction. A newly-found flowering hyperaccumulator is crucial for remediating urban contaminated soil sustainably by cadmium (Cd). This study evaluated growth responses, Cd uptake and bioaccumulation characteristics of seven urban flowering plants. Based on growth responses of these plants, Calendula officinalis L. showed high tolerance to at least 100 mg kg−1 Cd, in terms of significant increase in biomass and with no obvious changes in height. After 60 d exposure to 100 mg kg−1 Cd, the accumulated Cd in shoots of the plant reached 279.51 ± 13.67 μg g−1 DW, which is above the critical value defined for a hyperaccumulator (100 μg g−1 DW for Cd). Meanwhile, the plant could accumulate Cd to as much as 926.68 ± 29.11 μg g−1 DW in root and 1206.19 ± 23.06 μg g−1 DW in plant, and had higher Cd uptake and bioaccumulation values. According to these traits, it is shown that Calendula officinalis L. can become a potential Cd-hyperaccumulator for phytoremediation. By contrast, Dianthus caryophyllus L. is very sensitive to Cd stress in terms of significantly decreased biomass, height and Cd uptake, indicating the plant is considered as a Cd-bioindicator. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new active fault tolerant control scheme based on active fault diagnosis is proposed to address the component/actuator faults for systems with state and input constraints. Firstly, the active fault diagnosis is composed of diagnostic observers, constant auxiliary signals, and separation hyperplanes, all of which are designed offline. In online applications, only a single diagnostic observer is activated to achieve fault detection and isolation. Compared with the traditional multi-observer parallel diagnosis methods, such a design is beneficial to improve the diagnostic efficiency. Secondly, the active fault tolerant control is composed of outer fault tolerant control, inner fault tolerant control and a linear-programming-based interpolation control algorithm. The inner fault tolerant control is determined offline and satisfies the prescribed optimal control performance requirement. The outer fault tolerant control is used to enlarge the feasible region, and it needs to be determined online together with the interpolation optimization. In online applications, the updated state estimates trigger the adjustment of the interpolation algorithm, which in turn enables control reconfiguration by implicitly optimizing the dynamic convex combination of outer fault tolerant control and inner fault tolerant control. This control scheme contributes to further reducing the computational effort of traditional constrained predictive fault tolerant control methods. In addition, each pair of inner fault tolerant control and diagnostic observer is designed integratedly to suppress the robust interaction influences between estimation error and control error. The soft constraint method is further integrated to handle some cases that lead to constraint violations. The effectiveness of these designs is finally validated by a case study of a wastewater treatment plant model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In China, the non-exploitation of bioenergy poses major problems and challenges. To solve bioenergy problems, considerable efforts have been made to expedite the construction of large-scale crop residue utilization projects. In this study, three principal supported modes of large-scale crop residue utilization projects were taken as empirical cases in Hubei province bioenergy planning. In terms of the overall benefit and sustainable development, a third-grade evaluation index system was established. The analysis was carried out using the analytical hierarchy process, principal component projection, and grey relational analysis. The conclusion indicates that according to the evaluation values, the sequence from best to worst was crop residue biogas project, crop residue briquette fuel project, and crop residue gasification project. Nevertheless, there was no remarkable difference in the overall evaluation values. The biogas project had certain advantages in terms of the production cost, soil improvement, and expenditure saving, whereas the gasification project was comparatively insufficient in environmental efficiency, product benefit, by-product disposal, and technical rationality. According to actual evaluation results, the unilateral determination approach of the single weight index can be seen as being overcome through the unified adaptation of the evaluation methods. The research results can serve as a reference for making investment decisions to build large-scale crop residue utilization projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to the important role of porous carbon in the development of sustainable materials, the synthesis of porous carbon materials with various pore structures and pore sizes is intensively developed. But it is still not an easy task to obtain uniform porous structures at different nanoscales, let alone the hierarchical structures which combine different uniform porosity. The objective of this paper is to investigate if centrifugal field is applicable in the synthesis of ordered macro‐microporous carbon structures and the performance of the obtained porous carbon used as the cathode of a lithium–oxygen cell. It is found that a centrifugal force can trap the nucleation and growth of ZIF‐8 nanocrystals in between the interstices of close‐packed polymeric spheres, and therefore result in ordered macro‐microporous carbon nanoparticles with smaller pores distributed in the wall of larger pores. The dual porosity structures significantly help the macro‐microporous carbon to deliver a much higher capacity when used as the cathodes of a lithium–oxygen battery. A centrifugal field assists the classical templating strategy to create a dual‐porosity. A centrifugal force traps the nucleation and growth of Zeolitic imidazolate framework‐8 nanocrystals in between polymeric spheres assembled structures, resulting in ordered macro‐microporous carbon materials. The dual porosity structure is a promising candidate for the cathodes of a lithium–oxygen cell. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]