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We aimed to examine the effects of antibiotic and probiotic usage on the gut microbiota structure and the presence of antibiotic-resistance genes (ARGs) in infants during the first six months of life. Questionnaires and fecal samples were collected within three days of birth, two months, and six months to assess antibiotic and probiotic exposure. Gut microbiotas were sequenced via 16S rRNA, and ARGs were conducted by qPCR, including beta-lactam (mecA, blaTEM), tetracycline (tetM), fluoroquinolone (qnrS), aminoglycoside (aac(6′)-Ib), and macrolide (ermB). Infants were categorized by antibiotic and probiotic usage and stratified by delivery mode, microbial composition, and ARG abundances were compared, and potential correlations were explored. A total of 189 fecal samples were analyzed in this study. The gut microbiota diversity (Chao1 index) was significantly lower in the "only probiotics" (PRO) group compared to the "neither antibiotics nor probiotics" (CON) group at six months for the CS stratification (p = 0.029). Compositionally, the abundance of core genus Bifidobacterium_pseudocatenulatum was less abundant for the antibiotic during delivery (IAP) group than that in the CON group within the first three days (p = 0.009), while core genus Enterococcus_faecium was more abundant in the PRO than that in the CON group (p = 0.021) at two months. ARGs were highly detected, with Enterococcus hosting tetM and Escherichia associated with blaTEM within three days of birth, though no correlation was found between Bifidobacterium and ARGs. These findings emphasized the critical importance of carefully managing antibiotic and probiotic exposures in early life, with implications for promoting lifelong health through preserving a healthy infant gut ecosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a novel silicon carbide (SiC) self-aligned N-type ion implanted trench MOSFET (NITMOS) device. The maximum electric field in the gate oxide could be effectively reduced to below 3 MV/cm with the introduction of the P-epi layer below the trench. The P-epi layer is partially counter-doped by a self-aligned N-type ion implantation process, resulting in a relatively low specific on-resistance (Ron,sp). The lateral spacing between the trench sidewall and N-implanted region (Wsp) plays a crucial role in determining the performance of the SiC NITMOS device, which is comprehensively studied through the numerical simulation. With the Wsp increasing, the SiC NITMOS device demonstrates a better short-circuit capability owing to the reduced saturation current. The gate-to-drain capacitance (Cgd) and gate-to-drain charge (Qgd) are also investigated. It is observed that both Cgd and Qgd decrease as the Wsp increases, owing to the enhanced screen effect. Compared to the SiC double-trench MOSFET device, the optimal SiC NITMOS device exhibits a 79% reduction in Cgd, a 38% decrease in Qgd, and a 41% reduction in Qgd × Ron,sp. A higher switching speed and a lower switching loss can be achieved using the proposed structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates and compares the static performance and short-circuit (SC) robustness of 1200 V SiC MOSFETs with varying JFET widths (WJFET = 2.0–5.0 μm). Short-circuit measurements as well as electrical-thermal simulations are used to identify thermal distribution and maximum electrical field, providing valuable insights into the design limits. The devices under test (DUTs) with narrow and wide WJFET exhibit different failure mechanisms under SC stress. After the short-circuit failure, interlayer dielectric (ILD) cracks are observed in DUTs with narrow JFET width (WJFET < 3 μm). In contrast, it is discovered that the burn mark is located in the channel region of the device with a wide JFET width. Moreover, the short-circuit withstand time (SCWT) of DUTs with narrow and wide WJFET exhibits varying trends under high temperature conditions (100 °C). These results can help verify the different failure mechanisms and determine an optimal JFET design to improve the trade-off between the static performance and SC ruggedness of the SiC MOSFETs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid advancement of modern technology and radar detection systems, electromagnetic (EM) stealth technology has become increasingly significant, particularly in aircraft stealth and military radar applications. In this work, an all-metal metasurface is designed for broadband terahertz radar cross-section (RCS) reduction and infrared invisibility. The all-metal metasurface possesses extremely low infrared emissivity and high polarization conversion in the terahertz band. Through the joint simulation of MATLAB and CST, a genetic algorithm is used to optimize the random phase distribution of 2, 3, and 4-bit metasurfaces, so that the reflected wave is scattered to achieve broadband terahertz RCS reduction. Simulation results show that the metasurface can simultaneously achieve broadband terahertz RCS reduction in 3–5 THz and infrared invisibility in 24–38 THz (8–12.5 μm). The RCS reduction of the coding metasurface is greater than 10 dB compared to the metal plate, and the maximum RCS reduction of the 4-bit metasurface can reach 21.1 dB. Compared to the traditional design method, the proposed method can reduce time consumption and find the optimal result to achieve high performance. We believe the proposed method can provide significant guidance for surface coating in camouflage applications and opens up new possibilities for improving the information capacity of coding metasurfaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phospholipase C zeta1 (Plcz1) was known to be a physiological factor in sperm that activates oocytes to complete meiosis by triggering Ca2+ oscillations after fertilisation. However, the role of male Plcz1 in spermatogenesis and early embryo development in progeny has been controversial. Plcz1 knockout (Plcz1−/−) mouse model (Plcz1m3 and Plcz1m5) was generated by using the CRISPR-Cas9 system. The fertility of Plcz1−/− mice was evaluated by analysing the number of offsprings, sperm quality, pathological changes in the testis and epididymis. RNA-seq and RT-PCR were performed to screen differentially expressed genes and signalling pathways related to fertility in Plcz1−/− mice. Further mechanism was explored by using Plcz1−/− cells. Plcz1 knockout led to hypofertility in male mice. In particular, a significant time delay in development and polyspermy was found in eggs fertilized by both Plcz1m3 and Plcz1m5 sperm. Interestingly, a decline in sperm quality combined with pathological changes in epididymis was found in Plcz1m3 mice but not in Plcz1m5 mice. Notably, abnormal cytoskeleton appears in epididymis of Plcz1m3 mice and Plcz1−/− cells. Cytoskeleton damage of epididymis is involved in fertility decline of males upon Plcz1 deficiency in this model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The all-sky camera (ASC) images can reflect the local cloud cover information, and the cloud cover is one of the first factors considered for astronomical observatory site selection. Therefore, the realization of automatic classification of the ASC images plays an important role in astronomical observatory site selection. In this paper, three cloud cover features are proposed for the TMT (Thirty Meter Telescope) classification criteria, namely cloud weight, cloud area ratio and cloud dispersion. After the features are quantified, four classifiers are used to recognize the classes of the images. Four classes of ASC images are identified: "clear", "inner", "outer" and "covered". The proposed method is evaluated on a large dataset, which contains 5000 ASC images taken by an all-sky camera located in Xinjiang (38.19 ∘ N, 74.53 ∘ E). In the end, the method achieves an accuracy of 96.58 % and F1_score of 96.24 % by a random forest (RF) classifier, which greatly improves the efficiency of automatic processing of the ASC images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The acquisition of target data for underwater acoustic target recognition (UATR) is difficult and costly. Although deep neural networks (DNN) have been used in UATR, and some achievements have been made, the performance is not satisfactory when recognizing underwater targets with different Doppler shifts, signal-to-noise ratios (SNR), and interferences. On the basis of this, this paper proposed a Siamese network with two identical one-dimensional convolutional neural networks (1D-CNN) that recognize the detection of envelope modulation on noise (DEMON) spectra of underwater target-radiated noise. The parameters of underwater samples were diverse, but the states of the collected samples were very homogeneous. Traditional underwater target recognition uses multi-state samples to train the network, which is costly. This article trained the network using samples from a single state. The expectation was to be able to identify samples with different parameters. Datasets of targets with different Doppler shifts, SNRs, and interferences were designed to evaluate the generalization performance of the proposed Siamese network. The experimental results showed that when recognizing samples with Doppler shifts, the classification accuracy of the proposed network reached 95.3%. For SNRs, the classification accuracy reached 85.5%. The outstanding generalization ability of the proposed model shows that it is suitable for practical engineering applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past decades, metasurfaces have shown their extraordinary abilities on manipulating the wavefront of electromagnetic wave. Based on the ability, various kinds of metasurfaces are designed to realize new functional metadevices based on wavefront manipulations, such as anomalous beam steering, focus metalens, vortex beams generator, and holographic imaging. However, most of the previously proposed designs based on metasurfaces are fixed once design, which is limited for applications where light modulation needs to be tunable. In this paper, we proposed a design for THz tunable wavefront manipulation achieved by the combination of plasmonic metasurface and phase change materials (PCMs) in THz region. Here, we designed a metal-insulator-metal (MIM) metasurface with the typical C-shape split ring resonator (CSRR), whose polarization conversion efficiency is nearly 90% for circular polarized light (CPL) in the range of 0.95~1.15 THz when PCM is in the amorphous state, but the conversion efficiency turns to less than 10% in the same frequency range when PCM switches into the crystalline state. Then, benefiting from the high polarization conversion contrast of unit cell, we can achieve tunable wavefront manipulation by utilizing the Pancharatnam–Berry (PB) phase between the amorphous and crystalline states. As a proof-of-concept, the reflective tunable anomalous beam deflector and focusing metalens are designed and characterized, and the results further verify their capability for tunable wavefront manipulation in THz range. It is believed that the design in our work may pave the way toward the tunable wavefront manipulation of THz waves and is potential for dynamic tunable THz devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a 30–36 GHz limiter low‐noise amplifier (limiter‐LNA) MMIC for high power and high mobility millimeter‐wave radar systems. The PIN‐diode limiter network and the LNA are codesigned to realize high input‐power handling capability, good small‐signal performance, and small chip area. A two‐state matching capacitor is presented to improve both the input‐power handling capability at the high input‐power level and the input return loss at the small‐signal level. The proposed circuit is fabricated with a combined PIN/0.15‐µm‐GaAs‐pHEMT process. The limiter‐LNA is capable of handling 39 dBm continuous wave (CW) input‐power without failure with only two limiter stages. The measured noise figure is 1.8–2.5 dB, the small‐signal gain is 18.5 ± 0.5 dB, the output power at 1 dB compression point is larger than 11 dBm, and the dc power consumption is 72 mW. The chip area, including testing pads, is only 2.1 mm × 1.0 mm. This limiter‐LNA MMIC is believed to have the highest input‐power handling capability and smallest chip area among limiter‐LNA MMICs at this frequency range reported up to date. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Silicon carbide (SiC) super junction (SJ) JFETs fabricated by sidewall implantation with different mesa-widths (MWs) and termination designs are characterized in this article. The device with an MW of $1.8 \mu \text{m}$ and active area of 0.104 mm2 achieves a breakdown voltage of 1086 V and a specific ON-resistance of 0.98 $\text{m}\Omega \,\cdot $ cm2. The first-quadrant output and transfer characteristics are presented, from which the ON-resistance and pinch-off voltage are extracted and analyzed. The pinch-off voltage shows great stability against the variation of temperature. The forward blocking characteristics under different gate voltages and with different terminations are presented. The gate needs to be negatively biased below the hold-off voltage to prevent the premature breakdown caused by drain-induced barrier-lowering (DIBL) effect. The termination with narrow mesas in the ${x}$ -direction and trapezoidal mesas in the ${y}$ -direction is found to have the highest breakdown voltage, due to its optimized net charge distribution. The third-quadrant output characteristics are presented. Under forward-off gate voltage, the third-quadrant turn-on voltage is found to be determined by the difference of hold-off and pinch-off voltages, and there is a tradeoff between the absolute third-quadrant voltage drop ($\vert {V}_{\text{on}}\vert $) and the maximum current before gate junction turn-on (${J}_{\text{umax}}$). The third-quadrant performance can be improved by using forward-on gate voltage, a $\vert {V}_{\text{on}}\vert $ lower than 0.2 V (at 100 A/cm2) and a ${J}_{\text{umax}}$ larger than 500 A/cm2 are achieved. Finally, the whole output characteristics are modeled to facilitate the device design in different applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents the design and fabrication results of the silicon carbide (SiC) super-junction Schottky barrier diode (SBD). The impact of two key device structure parameters, i.e., mesa width (MW) and trench width (TW), on the device forward and reverse performance is studied by numeric simulations and measurements. Furthermore, a simple and efficient termination structure, i.e., wide-trench termination, is proposed to protect the device edge. With this termination, the simulated device breakdown voltage is significantly increased from 1423 to 2600 V with a wide-trench termination width (WTW) larger than $20~\mu \text{m}$. The outermost MW (OMW) of the transition region is also investigated. It is found that the narrower OMW can mitigate the electric field crowding at the top of the outermost mesa and reduce the electrical stress of the dielectric. Devices with different structural parameters are fabricated and measured. The device with WTW $= 50\,\,\mu \text{m}$ and the optimum OMW demonstrates the highest breakdown voltage of 1920 V. The specific ON-resistance (${R}_{{\rm \scriptscriptstyle {ON}},\text {sp}}$) of this device is 1.6 $\text{m}\Omega \cdot $ cm2. Subtracting the substrate resistance, the ${R}_{{\rm \scriptscriptstyle {ON}},\text {sp}}$ is only 1.2 $\text{m}\Omega \cdot $ cm2. Such device performance successfully breaks the theoretical 1-D limit of the SiC unipolar device. Furthermore, the leakage current path of the fabricated device is investigated by thermal emission microscope (EMMI). Future improvements to reduce the leakage current are also provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the impact of the trench angle on SiC super-junction device performance through the numerical simulation. Devices with different structure parameter sets (mesa width, epi doping) targeting different voltage ratings have been considered. It is found that with the optimum epi doping, the highest Baliga's figure of merit (BFOM) is always achieved at the trench angle of 90°. The advantage of 90° trench angle can be further increased by reducing the mesa width (MW). However, the 90° trench is hard to be achieved through the current fabrication technology. Once the trench angle is reduced slightly, the device BFOM will decrease evidently especially for high voltage devices. At this condition, the reduction of mesa width does not necessarily produce higher BFOM. For example, at the trench angle of 89° and trench depth of 25 μm, the BFOM of the device with MW = 3 μm is substantially higher than that of the device with MW = 1 μm. Such a phenomenon is contrary to conventional theory, which is crucial for device design. Finally, in order to improve the performance of devices with non-90° trenches, the multi-epi structure is proposed. With such a novel structure, significant improvements have been observed in the simulation. The BFOM increments for 2 kV, 3.5 kV and 5 kV voltage rating devices are 27.4%, 60.8% and 102.6% respectively, demonstrating the superiority of the proposed multi-epi structure for SiC super-junction devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the development of nonlinear science, improving the prediction performance of chaotic time series is of great significance in industrial production and daily life. Now, researchers have to develop effective models to achieve accurate prediction performance. The echo state network (ESN) has been proven to be an excellent prediction tool. However, the ESN has been criticized for not being principled enough. Thus, a novel ESN model namely self-join adjacent-feedback loop reservoir (SALR) is proposed. This model achieves the simplest topology structure on the premise of ensuring that all the connection modes of the classic ESN are available. In addition, in order to ensure the prediction performance of the network, the whale optimization algorithm was used to solve the parameter selection problems in the traditional cycle reservoir (SCR) model, the adjacent-feedback loop reservoir (ALR) model, and the SALR model. Finally, we use the proposed SALR model to solve classic benchmark chaotic time series as well as practical heating load prediction problems, and compare the SALR with the ESN, SCR, and ALR, respectively. Experimental results show that the proposed model can obtain higher accuracy with relatively low complexity than the ESN, SCR, and ALR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Termination design for 4H-SiC super-junction devices based on “trench-etching and implantation” technology, has been discussed through 3D numeric simulations and experiments. It is found that the existing design concept of super-junction termination extension (SJTE) structure is no longer capable of blocking high voltage due to the hole accumulation on the trench sidewall. In order to provide sufficient protection for the device edge, a novel device structure, i.e., hybrid termination of wide trench and SJTE (WT-SJTE), is proposed. With such WT-SJTE structure, the simulated device breakdown voltage can be improved from 700V to 800V. Furthermore, through the narrow termination mesa design, as predicted by numeric simulations, a noticeable improvement were measured, and a breakdown voltage of 960V was experimentally demonstrated. These results show the effectiveness of the WT-SJTE with such narrow termination mesa design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have studied the vortex dynamics of CaKFe4As4 single crystals using a dynamical magnetization relaxation method. A large region of vortex elastic motion is observed indicating strong vortex pinning ability. Temperature dependence of normalized flux pinning energy of g(t) is determined based on the data of transient current density Js and dynamical relaxation rate Q by the generalized inversion scheme (GIS), which suggests that both the δ(Tc)- and δ(l)-pinning may be responsible for the vortex dynamical behaviors in CaKFe4As4 under field parallel to c-axis (H // c). The value of Js for field parallel to ab-plane (H // ab) is obviously larger than that of H // c, this indicates that the flux pinning mechanisms are distinct in different crystal orientations. Under H // ab, a dip structure in the magnetic hysteresis loops (MHLs) is obtained around zero field, which is ascribed to planar defects in ab-plane. We further analyze the flux pinning mechanisms and find that the abnormal flux pinning behaviors should originate from its unique structure in CaKFe4As4. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The silicon carbide (SiC) super-junction JFET was designed, simulated and fabricated through trench-etching and sidewall-implantation technology, which avoids the expensive epi-regrowth process. The fabricated super-junction JFET achieves a breakdown voltage of 1000V with specific on-resistance of 1.3m $\Omega ~\cdot \text {cm}^{{2}}$. The threshold voltage (${V}_{\text {th}}$) is stable over a wide range of temperature with less than 0.2V shift from 25°C to 175°C. These results demonstrate that the trench-etching and sidewall-implantation technology is a promising option to fabricate SiC super-junction devices. These devices could have great potential for future power electronics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Maternal exposure to air pollution is related to fetal dysplasia. However, the association between maternal exposure to air pollution and the risk of congenital hypothyroidism (CH) in the offspring is largely unknown.Methods: We conducted a national database based study in China to explore the association between these two parameters. The incidence of CH was collected from October 1, 2014 to October 1, 2015 from the Chinese Maternal and Child Health Surveillance Network. Considering that total period of pregnancy and consequently the total period of particle exposure is approximately 10 months, average exposure levels of PM2.5, PM10 and Air Quality Index (AQI) were collected from January 1, 2014 to January 1, 2015. Generalized additive model was used to evaluate the association between air pollution and the incidence of CH, and constructing receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was used to calculate the cut-off value.Results: The overall incidence of CH was 4.31 per 10,000 screened newborns in China from October 1, 2014 to October 1, 2015. For every increase of 1 μg/m3 in the PM2.5 exposure during gestation could increase the risk of CH (adjusted OR = 1.016 per 1 μg/m3 change, 95% CI, 1.001-1.031). But no significant associations were found with regard to PM10 (adjusted OR = 1.009, 95% CI, 0.996-1.018) or AQI (adjusted OR = 1.012, 95% CI,0.998-1.026) and the risk of CH in the offspring. The cut-off value of prenatal PM2.5 exposure for predicting the risk of CH in the offspring was 61.165 μg/m3.Conclusions: The present study suggested that maternal exposure to PM2.5 may exhibit a positive association with increased risk of CH in the offspring. We also proposed a cut-off value of PM2.5 exposure that might determine reduction in the risk of CH in the offspring in highly polluted areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trench termination with SiO2-encapsulated dielectric for 4H-SiC devices is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. The trench is mainly refilled with spin-on dielectric which is encapsulated with SiO2to protect it from the high electric field in the trench. Such a trench termination is fabricated along with a high-voltage p-i-n diode. The fabricated device shows a repeatable breakdown voltage over 1750 V (96% of the ideal planar junction breakdown) with a termination length of $14~\mu \text{m}$ while the conventional trench termination has unrepeatable breakdown and requires over $30~\mu \text{m}$ termination length. Also, this termination length is less than ~ 1/4 of the dimension of a field limiting rings termination. Moreover, the fabrication process is robust with a large process window (Trench width ≥ 14 $\mu \text{m}$). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent findings suggest that cell and gene transplantation in the infarcted myocardium may improve heart function. The aim of the study was to investigate the mechanism involved in improving heart function following the co-injection of adipose-derived stem cells (ADSCs) and basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) in a rat model of myocardial infarction. In this study, ADSCs were isolated from subcutaneous adipose tissues. The ADSCs were induced to differentiate into adipocytes, osteoblasts and cardiac myocytes in vitro. bFGF was co-injected with the ADSCs into the left ventricular wall in a rat myocardial infarction model. The structural and functional outcomes resulting from this transplantation were determined through detailed histological analysis and echocardiography. The graft size was significantly larger in the bFGF + ADSC group than in the PBS + ADSC group and PBS + bFGF group 4 weeks after injection ( p < 0.05). The ADSCs were able to differentiate into cardiomyocytes, endothelial cells and vascular smooth muscle cells in vivo. There was a significant improvement in arteriole density within the infarcted area in the bFGF + ADSC group compared with the PBS + ADSC group and the PBS + bFGF group 4 weeks after transplantation ( p < 0.05). The results of Western blot analysis showed that all of the treatments significantly reduced MMP2 and MMP9 protein levels compared with the PBS control group ( p < 0.05) and that the levels of these proteins displayed the largest decrease in the bFGF + ADSC group ( p < 0.05). In addition, the results of a quantitative analysis revealed that the proportion of fibrotic areas was significantly lower in the PBS + ADSC and bFGF + ADSC groups compared with the PBS-only group and PBS + bFGF group ( p < 0.05). The combined application of bFGF and ADSC transplantation may significantly increase the number of arterioles, reduce the infarcted size, attenuate ventricular remodeling and improve cardiac function. This ADSC + bFGF treatment strategy (or a variation thereof) may prove to be broadly applicable to other candidate cell preparations used in regenerative medicine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A hypocycloid-shaped hollow-core photonic crystal fiber is proposed and investigated numerically, taking account of the inhibited coupling mechanism for light guidance. The results show that the curvature of the internal arcs surrounding the core has a very significant impact on the confinement loss, whereas the number of cladding rings has only a weak influence. For an arc curvature of 1 with three cladding rings, a confinement loss of just ∼10 dB/km can be achieved for a bandwidth of 1000 nm covering the range from 1 to 2 μm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To identify potential disease-causing mutation in the COL2A1 gene in a Chinese family with autosomal dominant spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia congenita (SEDC) and to analyze the phenotype-genotype correlation. Methods: Complete physical and radiographic examinations of four affected individuals from SEDC family were conducted. Genomic DNA were isolated from peripheral blood leukocytes. All 54 exons and exon-intron boundaries of the COL2A1 gene were amplified by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and bidirectionally sequenced. Results: All four affected individuals were found carried a novel missense mutation of c.2224G>A (p.Gly687Ser) in COL2A1, while normal members of the family and 50 healthy controls did not have this mutation. Protein prediction of missense mutation by polyphen-2 and SIFT software and mutation taster indicated severe damage to the function. Conclusions: c.2224G>A (p.Gly687Ser) is a novel mutation of COL2A1 associated with spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia congenital. There are heterozygous of phenotype for the mutation in members of the pedigree analyzed. Onset becomes more earlier and severe with each successive generation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cyclin-A2, which is downregulated following birth, has previously been established as a key regulator of the cell cycle. The present study aimed to detect the effects of cyclin-A2 on myocardial cells by using recombinant adeno-associated virus 9 (rAAV9). Sixty mice were selected and randomly divided into two groups (n=30). The control group were injected with saline and the experimental group were transfected with the rAAV9-cyclinA2-CMV vector by intravenous injection into the tail vein. Tissues were harvested at two and four weeks following injection. Cyclin-A2 expression levels and localization were evaluated using western blot and immunohistochemical analyses. DNA synthesis and mitosis in the myocardium were confirmed by analyzing proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) and phospho-histone H3 (H3P) expression levels. Expression of Cyclin-A2 in the myocardium commenced two weeks following tail vein injection in the cyclin-A2-treated group, while no expression was observed in the control group. Four weeks following injection, expression levels of cyclin-A2 were higher than those observed at two weeks following injection into the myocardium (two weeks: 0.146±0.013 vs. 27.1±3.33%, P<0.001; four weeks: 0.142±0.107 vs. 74.4±3.36%, P<0.001). PCNA displayed increased expression levels in the cyclin-A2-treated group (two weeks: 13.1±0.54 vs. 65.8±3.44%, P<0.001; four weeks: 13.2±0.55 vs. 71.2±1.58%, P<0.001); however, no change was observed in those of the control group. By contrast, no significant difference was observed in mitosis marker H3P expression levels between the two groups. Immunohistochemical analysis of cyclin-A2 indicated cytoplasmic, but not nuclear, localization. cyclin-A2 and PCNA expression levels in the liver, lung and kidney showed no significant difference between the two groups (P>0.05). It was therefore concluded that the delivery of cyclin-A2 via rAAV9 to the mouse myocardium restarted the myocardial cell cycle, thereby establishing steady and specific expression in the myocardium. Furthermore, the effect of Cyclin-A2 on the myocardium may provide a novel method for achieving cardiac regeneration following cardiac injury. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, the optical, structural, electrical and thermoelectric properties of undoped and Si-doped bulk GaN samples are investigated. The room temperature PL near band emission peaks of undoped and Si-doped bulk GaN samples are 3.414 eV and 3.402 eV. The undoped and Si-doped bulk GaN samples' PL spectra have different defect emission bands which are green band and red band with the maximum at 2.4 eV and 2.0 eV, respectively. At low temperature, the PL spectrum of undoped bulk GaN has well-defined excitonic emission lines, A0X, D0X, FXA (n = 1, 2), while the PL spectrum of Si-doped bulk GaN has just broad emission peaks at the similar energy level. The low temperature PL spectra of both undoped and Si-doped samples clearly show the first, second and third longitudinal-optical phonon (1 LO, 2 LO and 3 LO) replicas. There are no donor-acceptor pairs and electron-acceptors' emission in the PL spectra of the samples. The temperature dependence PL spectra of undoped GaN samples shows that the intensity ratio of the FXA to D0X decreases with the increase of the temperature. The full width at half maximum (FWHM) of D0X emission is about 4.7 meV. The carrier density of the undoped and Si-doped bulk GaN are 4.58 × 1015 and 2.41 × 1018 cm--3, and the mobility of the undoped and Si-doped bulk GaN are 1050 and 286 cm2V-1s-1. The FWHM of (0002) X-ray diffraction rocking curve are 54 arcsec and 95 arcsec for the undoped and Si-doped bulk GaN samples. The power factors of the undoped GaN sample and the Si-doped GaN sample are 0.315 × 10-4W/mK2 and 0.35495 × 10-4 W/mK2, respectively. (© 2014 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A facile and efficient synthetic methodology for the preparation of aza-pyrimidone and beno-pyrimidone derivatives is described, in which the triazinone ring and dihydroquinazolin-2(1H)-one was convenient constructed. The structures of all the newly synthesized compounds were characterized by mass, 1H NMR, and infrared spectroscopy. In additional, the crystal of pymetrozine was obtained to find useful information such as configuration and molecular action mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Al x Ga1 − x N/Al y Ga1 − y N multiple quantum well (MQW) structure for deep ultraviolet emission has been grown on sapphire by metal organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD). High resolution X-ray diffraction (HRXRD), atomic force microscopy (AFM), and cathodoluminescence (CL) are used to characterize the structural and optical properties of MQWs, respectively. Clear step flows can be observed in the AFM image indicating a two-dimensional growth model. There are many cracks on the surface of the MQW structure because of the high tensile stress. HRXRD shows multiple satellite peaks to the 2nd order. The HRXRD simulation shows that the MQW period is about 11.5 nm. The emission peak of Al x Ga1 − x N/Al y Ga1 − y N MQWs is about 295 nm in the deep ultraviolet region from the CL spectra. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Al x Ga1- x N ternary alloys are very attractive materials for application to ultraviolet (UV) photodetection. In this work, high Al content Al x Ga1- x N films are grown on sapphire substrate by low pressure metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD). The Al content in the Al x Ga1- x N epilayer is estimated to be 54% by high resolution X-ray diffraction (HRXRD) and Vegard’s law. The full width at half maximum (FWHM) of the rocking curve for the Al0.54Ga0.46N (0002) is about 597 arcsec. According to the transmittance measurement result, our sample is suitable for fabricating solar-blind photodetectors. The observed Fabry-Perot fringes in the transmission region indicate that high optical quality is obtained. Solarblind metal-semiconductor-metal (MSM) photodetectors based on the MOCVD-grown Al0.54Ga0.46N film are fabricated and tested. The detector has a low dark current of about 31 pA under a bias voltage of 5 V. An UV/visible contrast of about four orders of magnitude is observed and responsivity increases with increments of the bias voltage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reference 1 Li H, Ji A, Ma L, Wang B, Li Y, Cui Y. Identification of a novel mutation of COL2A1 gene in a Chinese family affected with spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia congenita. Authors Honghzhuo Li and Tao Xiao have not responded to any correspondence from the editor or publisher about this retraction. [Extracted from the article]

Background: Maternal health during pregnancy is a key input in fetal health and child development. This study aims to systematically describe the health behaviors of pregnant women in rural China and identify which subgroups of women are more likely to engage in unhealthy behaviors during pregnancy.Methods: We surveyed 1088 pregnant women in rural northwestern China on exposure to unhealthy substances, nutritional behaviors, the timing and frequency of antenatal care, and demographic characteristics.Results: Pregnant women were active in seeking antenatal care and had low rates of alcohol consumption (5.1%), exposure to toxins (4.8%), and exposure to radiation (2.9%). However, tobacco exposure was widespread (40.3%), as was low dietary diversity (61.8%), unhealthy weight gain (59.7%), unhealthy pre-pregnancy BMI (29.7%), and no folic acid intake (17.1%). Maternal education is closely linked to better health behaviors, whereas experience with a previous pregnancy is not.Conclusions: Tobacco exposure and unhealthy nutritional behaviors are common among pregnant women in rural northwestern China. The findings indicate that in the absence of professional health information, relying on experience of previous pregnancies alone may not help rural women avoid unhealthy maternal behaviors. Maternal health education campaigns targeting nutrition and tobacco exposure during pregnancy may improve maternal, fetal, and child health in rural China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the above letter , the epi doping listed in was wrong, and it should be $8\times 10^{15}$ cm−3 which is the same the value as mentioned in the main text. The corrected table is listed below. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]