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The diabetic peripheral neuropathy pain model was constructed after 95 Sprague Dawley rats had been randomly divided among blank reference and model groups. Aescin low-dose group (0.5 mg/kg), aescin medium-dose group (1.0 mg/kg), aescin high-dose group (1.5 mg/kg), and positive control group (0.25 mg/ kg mecobalamin) were then randomly assigned to the simulation group following successful modeling. At the conclusion of the study, the mean sciatic nerve conduction velocity was determined, blood glucose in addition to the amount of inflammatory factors tumor necrosis factor-alpha, interleukin-6, and interleukin-1 were determined, and sciatic nerve cells from mice in all groups were collected for Western blot to identify the protein levels of high mobility group box 1 and receptor for advanced glycation end products. The mean sciatic nerve conduction velocity of the medium and high-dose groups of aescin was higher than those of the model control (p<0.05); rat blood glucose content, the contents of inflammatory factors interleukin-1 beta, interleukin-6 and tumor necrosis factor-alpha as well as the protein expression of high mobility group box 1 and receptor for advanced glycation end products in sciatic nerve tissue were lower and the body mass was higher than that of the model control group (p<0.05). Comparing the high-dose aescin group as well as the positive control group, there had been no discernible change in the aforementioned indices (p>0.05). Aescin is able to effectively improve the inflammatory response in the body by regulating high mobility group box 1-receptor for advanced glycation end products levels and slow down diabetic peripheral neuropathy caused by the inflammatory response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: This study aimed to explore the impact of the sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI) on the clinical outcomes in women undergoing artificial insemination by husband intrauterine insemination (AIH-IUI). Methods: In this retrospective study, the value of sperm DFI was detected by sperm chromatin structure assay (SCSA) in a semen analysis collected before fertility treatment (basal DFI) in 1,500 IUI cycles at the infertility clinic of Northern Jiangsu People's Hospital Reproductive Medicine Center from Jan 2016 to April 2021. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used to calculate the cut-off value for the clinical outcomes of IUI, including the biochemical pregnancy rate, clinical pregnancy rate, delivery rate, and live birth rate, and multivariate logistic regression was conducted to analyse the risk factors for clinical outcomes after IUI. Result: In 1,500 IUI cycles, the results showed that there were no statistically significant differences between the normal DFI group and the abnormal DFI group in biochemical pregnancy rate (14.41% vs. 11.3%, P = 0.386), clinical pregnancy rate (12.9% vs. 10.5%, P = 0.433), delivery rate (11.0% vs. 8.9%, P = 0.456), live birth rate (10.9% vs. 8.9%, P = 0.484) or pregnancy loss rate (14.6% vs. 15.4%, P = 1.000). Conclusion: Sperm DFI alone may have limited predictive power for IUI clinical outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To evaluate the effect of elevated sperm DNA fragmentation index (DFI) on fresh and frozen embryo transfer cycles. Methods: A retrospective study was performed with 549 fresh embryo transfer cycles and 1340 frozen embryo transfer cycles after in vitro fertilization/intracytoplasmic sperm injection (IVF/ICSI) from 2016 to 2021. Results: The statistical results of 549 fresh embryo transfer cycles showed that the delivery rate in the normal sperm DFI group (43.9% vs. 27.1%, P = 0.014) was significantly higher than that in the abnormal sperm DFI group, and there were no significant differences in the biochemical pregnancy rate (59.0% vs. 50.8%, P = 0.232), clinical pregnancy rate (53.1% vs. 40.7%, P = 0.072), or miscarriage rate (17.3% vs. 33.3%, P = 0.098) between the two groups. The results of 1340 frozen embryo transfer cycles showed that the biochemical pregnancy rate (57.9% vs. 45.6%, P = 0.006) and clinical pregnancy rate (50.3% vs. 40.7%, P = 0.027) in the normal sperm DFI group were significantly higher than those in the abnormal sperm DFI group. The delivery rate (40.9% vs. 33.3%, P = 0.074) and miscarriage rate (18.6% vs. 18.0%, P = 0.919) were not significantly different between the two groups. Conclusion: The increase of sperm DFI significantly reduced the delivery rate of fresh embryo transfer cycles and the biochemical pregnancy rate and clinical pregnancy rate of frozen embryo transfer cycles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Severe and critical Hand-Foot-and-Mouth Disease (HFMD) patients have an acute onset and poor prognosis. This study intended to establish an appropriate risk prediction model by analyzing the blood biochemical indicators of patients. Methods: A total of 3,204 patients with HFMD were enrolled in this study, including 2,131 mild patients, 962 severe patients, and 111 critical patients. We first analyzed the data of each group through multivariate statistics based on SIMCA-P and screened out the variables that had important contributions to the discrimination of each group. Furthermore, the risk factors and predictors were screened out by comparison with the results of univariate statistical analysis. Finally, binary logistic regression analysis was used to establish a suitable prediction model. Results: With the aggravation of HFMD patients' conditions, the blood content and risk warning ability of seven indicators of SP, DP, NEUT%, TP, GLB, RBP, and Glu were significantly increased. We found for the first time that the more severe the HFMD patients, the lower the levels of Chr, %MRETIC, and %HRETIC in their blood. The average prediction accuracy of the established models for Mild/Severe, Severe/Critical, and Severe/Critical was 82.89, 96.16, and 89.37%, respectively, and the AUROC was 0.8722 (95%CI, 0.8583 - 0.8861), 0.9499 (95%CI, 0.9339 - 0.9659), and 0.7913 (95% CI, 0.7471 - 0.8356), respectively. Conclusions: Multivariate statistical analysis based on SIMCA-P could be used to analyze the clinical data of HFMDpatients. Besides, SP, DP, NEUT%, TP, GLB, RBP, and Glu could be used as risk factors for severe and critical HFMD patients. The abnormal changes of Chr, %MRETIC, and %HRETIC reflected the possible damage to bone marrow hematopoietic function in HFMD patients. The predictive model established by us could be used for the differential diagnosis of Mild/Severe, Mild/Critical, and Severe/Critical. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The time-varying weights in the Chinese consumer price index (CPI) are estimated using a time-varying coefficient model, which is shown to be useful for testing the CPI's "weighting biases" and adjustment problem. The empirical results show that China's CPI has "weighting biases," in which the time-varying intercept reveals negative adjustment of the CPI. This means that people pay less for food and more for medical care, education, and housing. By comparing the weights between urban CPI and rural CPI, the extended examination suggests a widening income gap between urban and rural households. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new iterative inversion algorithm is proposed to reconstruct the electrical conductivity profile in a stratified underground medium for the grounded electrical source airborne transient electromagnetic (GREATEM) system. In forward modeling, we simplify the mathematical expressions of the magnetic fields generated by a finite line source in the layered ground to semianalytical forms in order to save the computation time. The Fréchet derivative is derived for the electromagnetic response at the receivers due to a small perturbation of the conductivity in a certain layer underground. The initial expression of the Fréchet derivative has an expensive triple integral and contains the Bessel function in the integrand. It is simplified by partially eliminating the integration along the source line and deriving the analytical expression for the integration in the vertical direction inside the perturbed layer. In the inverse solution, we use the distorted Born iterative method (DBIM). This is the first time that the DBIM is applied to data measured by the GREATEM system. Besides, the forward and inverse procedures are carried out in the frequency domain and based on the Fréchet derivative of a line source. We demonstrate the validity of our forward model, Fréchet derivative, inverse model, and the precision as well as robustness of the inversion algorithm through numerical computation and comparisons. Finally, we apply the inversion algorithm to the measured data and compare the retrieved conductivity to the actual drilling data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The hot-carrier relaxation dynamics of Cd3As2 thin films has been investigated by using femtosecond pump-probe spectroscopy in a transmission geometry. A comparative study of degenerate and non-degenerate experiments reveals that hot-carrier distribution in Cd3As2 is established with a time constant of ~400 fs. Significantly, the broadband measurements allow the extraction of the time evolution of electron temperature and the carrier-phonon coupling factor g=5.3 x 1015 W m-3K-1 is deduced by a semiclassical two-temperature model. These results provide fundamental insights into the hot-carrier dynamics of Cd3As2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Antenna arrays with shaped patterns have drawn significant attention for their wide applications in radar, sonar and communication systems. The combination of genetic algorithm (GA) and fast Fourier transform (FFT) has been used to synthesise shaped pattern of antenna array's factor without considering coupling effects. In this work, the GA-FFT method is generalised by integrating with a new virtual active element pattern (AEP) expansion method which approximates each AEP as the radiation pattern by exciting several equally spaced virtual elements surrounding the real element position. The generalised GA-FFT can be applied for the shaped pattern synthesis of unequally spaced linear arrays including mutual coupling and platform effect. Several synthesis examples with different pattern shapes and different antenna structures are given to demonstrate the effectiveness, accuracy and robustness of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is shown in this paper that the problem of reducing the number of elements for multiple-pattern arrays can be solved by a sequence of reweighted l1 optimizations under multiple linear constraints. To do so, conjugate symmetric excitations are assumed so that the upper and lower bounds for each pattern can be formulated as linear inequality constraints. In addition, we introduce an auxiliary variable for each element to define the common upper bound of both the real and imaginary parts of multiple excitations for different patterns, so that only linear inequality constraints are required. The objective function minimizes the reweighted l1-norm of these auxiliary variables for all elements. Thus, the proposed method can be efficiently implemented by the iterative linear programming. For multiple desired patterns, the proposed method can select the common elements with multiple set of optimized amplitudes and phases, consequently reducing the number of elements. The radiation characteristics for each pattern, such as the mainlobe shape, response ripple, sidelobe level and nulling region, can be accurately controlled. Several synthesis examples for linear array, rectangular/triangular-grid and randomly spaced planar arrays are presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed method in the reduction of the number of elements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Efficient and unsplit-field finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) implementation of the complex frequency-shifted perfectly matched layer (CFS-PML), based on the digital signal processing (DSP) techniques and the material independence relations via applying the electric flux density (D) and the magnetic flux density (B), is proposed for truncating three dimensional FDTD computational domain entirely composed of dispersive material realized with a Drude model. The CFS-PML implementation is introduced based on the stretched coordinate PML (SC-PML) and the uniaxial anisotropic PML (UPML), respectively. The implementation of the proposed CFS-PML formulations is based on the SC-PML due to the fact that has advantage of simple implementation in the corners and the edges of the PML regions. Moreover, these proposed formulations are completely independent of the material properties of the FDTD computational domain and hence can be applied to truncate arbitrary media without any modification because of the D-B constitutive relations used in Maxwell's equations. Besides, the DSP techniques include the Bilinear Z-transform (BZT) method and the Matched Z-transform (MZT) method, respectively. However, from the point of view of the Courant-Friedrichs-Levy (CFL) condition, to the best of our knowledge, time step based on the BZT only needs to meet CFL condition, whereas time step based on the MZT method has to make it smaller for retaining stability and desirable accuracy. Consequently, the former one is introduced into the proposed formulations. A numerical example has been carried out in a three dimensional FDTD computational domain to validate the proposed formulations. It is clearly shown that the proposed formulations with CFS scheme are efficient in attenuating evanescent waves and reducing late-time reflections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Efficient Z-transform implementation of the Complex Frequency-Shifted Perfectly Matched Layer (CFS-PML) using the D-B formulations are proposed to truncate open region multi-term dispersive Finite-Difference Time-Domain (FDTD) lattices. These formulations are independent of material properties of the FDTD domains and hence can be used for modeling general media because of the D-B constitutive relations. A Three-Dimensional (3-D) simulation of the two-term Lorentz dispersive FDTD domain has been carried out to demonstrate the validity of the proposed formulations. Furthermore, in order to show the validity of the proposed algorithm, the second 3D inhomogeneous problem has also been used for validating the proposed formulations. It is clearly shown that the new formulations with the CFS-PML scheme are efficient in attenuating evanescent waves and reducing late-time reflections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The equine infectious anemia virus (EIAV) is a lentivirus of the Retrovirus family, which causes persistent infection in horses often characterized by recurrent episodes of high fever. It has a similar morphology and life cycle to the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Its transmembrane glycoprotein, gp45 (analogous to gp41 in HIV), mediates membrane fusion during the infection. However, the post-fusion conformation of EIAV gp45 has not yet been determined. EIAV is the first member of the lentiviruses for which an effective vaccine has been successfully developed. The attenuated vaccine strain, FDDV, has been produced from a pathogenic strain by a series of passages in donkey dermal cells. We have previously reported that a V/I505T mutation in gp45, in combination with other mutations in gp90, may potentially contribute to the success of the vaccine strain. To this end, we now report on our structural and biochemical studies of the gp45 protein from both wide type and vaccine strain, providing a valuable structural model for the advancement of the EIAV vaccine. Results: We resolved crystal structures of the ecto-domain of gp45 from both the wild-type EIAV and the vaccine strain FDDV. We found that the V/I505T mutation in gp45 was located in a highly conserved d position within the heptad repeat, which protruded into a 3-fold symmetry axis within the six-helix bundle. Our crystal structure analyses revealed a shift of a hydrophobic to hydrophilic interaction due to this specific mutation, and further biochemical and virological studies confirmed that the mutation reduced the overall stability of the six-helix bundle in post-fusion conformation. Moreover, we found that altering the temperatures drastically affected the viral infectivity. Conclusions: Our high-resolution crystal structures of gp45 exhibited high conservation between the gp45/gp41 structures of lentiviruses. In addition, a hydrophobic to hydrophilic interaction change in the EIAV vaccine strain was found to modulate the stability and thermal-sensitivity of the overall gp45 structure. Our observations suggest that lowering the stability of the six-helix bundle (post-fusion), which may stabilizes the pre-fusion conformation, might be one of the reasons of acquired dominance for FDDV in viral attenuation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents an overview of the IEEE project 802.15.5 that targets providing mesh capabilities to both high-rate and low-rate wireless personal area networks. Low-rate mesh is built on IEEE 802.15.4 MAC, while high-rate mesh utilizes IEEE 802.15.3 MAC. We seek to share our insights and motivations of the approach adopted in the major components of the standard instead of presenting a Ia carte items drawn in the specification. We hope this article helps readers of the 802.15.5 standard to better understand the rationale and intent of the protocol design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past decade, wireless multihop ad hoc networks have received a tremendous amount of research focus, at the core of which lies the design problem for efficient routing algorithms to meet various scenarios and applications. The axiom, ‘One size doesn't fit all,’ continues to stand firmly to this day. In light of this, we introduce a new routing design concept — the component approach. We examine existing routing protocols and break them down into smaller building blocks, namely, routing components. The component analysis and classification results show that most routing protocols can be functionally decomposed into several basic routing components. This fact indicates that it is feasible to design a component-based routing (CBR) protocol. With a different realization for each basic routing component, it is expected that the routing behavior of CBR can be tailored to different application profiles and time-varying environment parameters at a reasonable cost. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes an AI planner assisted approach to generate test cases for system testing based on high level test objectives. We use four levels of test generation: the metaprocessor, the preprocessor, the AI planner, and the postprocessor levels. Test generation is based on an extended UML model of the system under test and a mapping of high-level test objectives into initial and goal conditions of the planner. Test objectives are derived from a series of interviews with professional testers. We suggest various options for test criteria related to test objectives. The AI planner was used to generate hundreds of test cases for a robot controlled tape silo. The planner generated tests within a reasonable time. It was successful for each test objective given. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The problem of synthesising a sparse linear array with multiple patterns is formulated as an extended reweighted l1-norm minimisation with multiple convex constraints. Synthesis results show that the proposed method can find the common sparse element positions with optimised excitations for multiple-pattern requirements, and the mainlobe, sidelobe as well as nulling region for each pattern can be accurately controlled. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces a new IEEE standard, IEEE 802.15.5,which provides mesh capability for wireless personal area network (WPAN) devices. The standard provides an architectural framework enabling WPAN devices to promote interoperable, stable, and scalable wireless mesh topologies. It is composed of two parts: low-rate WPAN mesh and high-rate WPAN mesh. In this paper, we present only low-rate WPAN mesh because it is designed to support wireless sensor networks. IEEE 802.15.5 low-rate part is a light-weight scalable mesh routing protocol that caters well to the requirements of resource-constrained wireless sensor networks. By binding logical addresses to the network topology, IEEE 802.15.5 obviates the need for route discovery. This eliminates the initial route discovery latency, saves storage space and reduces the communication overhead and energy consumption. A distributed link state scheme is further built atop the block addressing scheme to improve the quality of routes, robustness, and load balancing. The routing scheme scales well with regard to various performance metrics. The standard also provides enhanced functions such as multicast, reliable broadcast, power saving, time synchronization, route tracing and portability. We also present the performance evaluation of major functions performed with a 50-nodes tested deployed over a whole floor (100 x 140 ft2) at CUNY Engineering building. The results testify that the IEEE 802.15.5 will serve well for wireless personal area networks and wireless sensor networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]