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Microtearing modes (MTMs) are suggested as a candidate for anomalous thermal transport in tokamak H-mode discharges. This study investigates MTMs in tokamak plasmas, employing simulations in the BOUT++ framework. It simplifies and linearizes the governing equations in detailed linear simulations. The study meticulously evaluates various conductivity models under diverse plasma conditions and collision regimes. The research thoroughly assesses different conductivity models across a range of plasma conditions and collision regimes. A unified dispersion relation that includes both MTM and Drift-Alfvén Wave (DAW) instabilities is derived, showing that DAW and MTM instabilities occur at varying distances from the rational surface. Specifically, MTMs become unstable near the rational surface but stabilize farther away, while drift-Alfvén instability appears farther from the rational surface. The study also re-derives MTM dispersion relations using Ohm's law and the vorticity equation, providing a thorough analysis of electromagnetic and electrostatic interactions in tokamaks. Global simulations demonstrate an inverse correlation between MTM growth rates and collisionality, and a direct correlation with temperature gradients. The nonalignment of the rational surface with the peak ω * e stabilizes the MTMs. Nonlinear simulations highlight electron temperature relaxation as the primary saturation mechanism for MTMs, with magnetic flutter identified as the dominant mode of electron thermal transport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Astrophysical jets play crucial roles in star formation and transporting angular momentum away from accretion discs, however, their collimation mechanism is still a subject of much debate due to the limitations of astronomical observational techniques and facilities. Here, a quasi-static toroidal magnetic field is generated through the interaction between lasers and a four-post nickel target, and our all-optical laboratory experiments reveal that a wide-angle plasma plume can be collimated in the presence of toroidal magnetic fields. Besides the confinement effects, the experiments show the jet can also be accelerated by the enhanced thermal pressure due to the toroidal magnetic fields compressing the flow. These findings are verified by radiation magneto-hydrodynamic simulations. The experimental results suggest certain astrophysical narrow plasma flows may be produced by the confinement of wide-angle winds through toroidal fields. Astrophysical jets are pivotal in the process of star formation, yet the mechanism responsible for their collimation remains a topic of intense debate, largely due to the constraints imposed by astronomical observational techniques and facilities. In this study, the authors demonstrate that a wide-angle plasma plume can undergo collimation and acceleration when subjected to toroidal magnetic fields, as evidenced by all-optical laboratory experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neuregulin receptor degradation protein-1 (Nrdp1) is a newly discovered E3 ligase that plays a role in the apoptosis process of multiple diseases. Previous studies has shown that Nrdp1 exerted a proapoptotic effect in cardiac diseases. The purpose of this study is to investigate the potential involvement of Nrdp1 in the pathological processes of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). To create a mouse model of experimental colitis, trinitrobenzenesulfonic acid (TNBS) was administered and the severity of colitis was assessed based on changes in weight and histological scores. Using Western blot and immunohistochemistry, significant increase in Nrdp1 expression was observed in intestinal epithelial cells (IECs). This was accompanied with the up-regulation of cleaved PARP and active caspase-3 in IECs, indicating a potential function in IECs. To study this further, we built an in vitro model of tumor necrosis factor-apha (TNF-a)-induced apoptosis using human IEC line HT-29 cells. When Nrdp1 was knocked down, a decrease in apoptosis was observed, suggesting that Nrdp1 may play a proapoptotic role in IEC apoptosis. The mechanism behind this phenomenon is associated with the suppression of downstream targets of Nrdp1, such as protein kinase B (AKT). Furthermore, immunohistochemistry analysis in patients with Crohn's disease (CD) and normal controls supported the same results as observed in experimental colitis. We conclude that Nrdp1 may be a promising new therapeutic target for ameliorating IBD in humans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A compact online proton spectrometer based on a CMOS plate detector was proposed for the diagnosis of picosecond intense-laser accelerated protons. Inside the CMOS plate detector, a composite structure that composed of a scintillator screen, a fiber optic plate (FOP), and a CMOS sensor was designed to detect the protons safely and efficiently. The scintillator screen converted the incident protons to visible light, which, in turn, was collected by using the FOP and detected by using the CMOS sensor. An additional aluminum housing was designed to decrease the strong electromagnetic pulse (EMP) impact on the electronic readout system from picosecond laser–plasma interaction. This online spectrometer is compact and cost-effective than the system based on the micro-channel plate or scintillator screen in combination with an electron multiplying CCD camera and has better resistance to radiation damage than the system based on a single CMOS sensor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we report the generation of Ar plasmas by using an electron beam passing through a diamond window. It is observed that plasma brightness varies with the electron beam energy and the duty cycle. The transmission properties of the electrons in a 5-μm-thick diamond film are investigated by both experiments and Monte Carlo simulation. The measured transmittance of the electron beam increases from 20% to 80% by increasing the incident energy of the electron beam on the diamond window from 32.5 keV to 50 keV. The diamond window was checked using a CCD camera and SEM after plasma generation experiments. It is found that the focused electron beam passes through the central region of the diamond window, from the incident plane to the exit plane, and the cross section of the diamond window gradually changes from textured morphology to a featureless structure, indicating that the main energy loss of electrons in the diamond window occurs in the later stage of the transmitting journey. The interaction between the electron and the diamond causes the structure change of the diamond. The simulated transmittances of the electron beam with respect to its incident energy are in agreement with the experimental results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Endophytic fungi exert beneficial effects on enhancing plant seed germination, increasing the growth of shoots and roots, strengthening tolerance of host plants to abiotic and biotic stress, and inducing bioactive metabolite aggregation in the host plant. Hence, biological strategies using endophytic fungi are promising and effective to augment the quality of medicinal herbs. Here, we isolated 34 endophytes from the corms of Crocus sativus collected from Hecun Village, Zhejiang Province, China. Two strains, namely CS04 and CS29, symbiotically enhanced the biomass of C. sativus; induced biosynthesis and accumulation of its specialized metabolites, including crocin I and II, and antagonized the growth of pathogenic fungi for preventing rot disease. A multilocus phylogenetic analysis identified CS04 and CS29 as Talaromyces sp. and Penicillium sp., respectively. Treatment with CS04 and CS29 increased the activities of stress-related enzymes. Thus, both CS04 and CS29 are remarkable fungal resources for enhancing plant growth and specialization of metabolite accumulation in C. sativus for agricultural cultivation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Polymer dispersed liquid crystal (PDLC) films have potential applications in many aspects due to unique electrically switching properties, and thus the films with excellent comprehensive properties are highly demanded at present. In this study, aromatic polyurethane acrylate (PUA) was used as polymer-matrix, and effect of diluents [lauryl methacrylate (LMA) and isobornyl acrylate (IBOA)] content on the electrical-optical properties of PDLC films was investigated. The results indicate that increase of PUA/LMA or decrease of LMA/IBOA weight ratio increases threshold and saturation voltages (Vth and Vsat), decreases on- and off-state transmittances (Ton and Toff) and increases contrast ratio. Under optimised PUA/LMA weight ratio of 31/19 or PUA/LMA/IBOA weight ratio of 31/15/4, the Vth and Vsat of the films first increase and then decrease with increasing Ag nanowires (NWs) content, and better overall properties are achieved at 0.05 or 0.075 wt.% Ag NWs, respectively. In order to explore essential reasons for the influence of diluents and Ag NWs on the properties of PDLC films, the relationships between film properties (Vth or Vsat, Ton, Toff, and response time) and liquid crystal (LC) droplets size were analysed emphatically, and the changes of system viscosity and anchoring force between polymer-matrix and LC droplets were also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

High energy protons from solar energetic particle (SEP) events are a hazard to spacecraft systems and instruments. For interplanetary and geosynchronous‐Earth‐orbiting spacecraft, a mission's cumulative SEP fluence is an important consideration for hardware design. The total solar proton fluence for a mission can be dominated by a small number of very high‐fluence events. Because of the sporadic and unpredictable nature of these large events, data sets collected over multiple solar cycles are needed to construct a statistical model that can predict a mission's risk of seeing a given fluence exposure during its mission. Several statistical models have been developed, including the JPL model and the Emission of Solar Protons (ESP) model. The models produce somewhat different results, which could be due in part to the different data sets from which they were derived. To understand the sensitivity of predicted mission fluence to the choice of data set and to the statistical distribution to which that data set is fit, we present a comparison of the JPL and ESP cumulative fluence models as reformulated from the same SEP data set, a background‐subtracted version of the Reference Data Set Version 2.0 (RDSv2.0) based on data from IMP‐8 and GOES, covering 41 years of SEP events from 1974 to 2015 with proton energies between 5 and 289 MeV. The comparisons show that different modeling approaches can produce a factor of 2 or greater difference in the mission fluences even when the same data set is used for model development. Plain Language Summary: Long term exposure to high energy solar protons from solar energetic particle events, typically associated with solar flares, is damaging to spacecraft. Solar energetic particle events are infrequent enough that data must be collected over many decades in order to gather a large‐enough sample of events for a statistical treatment. Many models have been developed to predict the total number of solar protons a spacecraft will see over time. However, the models were developed from different sets of data so it is difficult to say whether or not the differences between the model predictions are due to data used or due to the models themselves. We compared two commonly used solar proton models using the same set of data and found that the two models had some differences, especially for lower energy protons. Missions using these model predictions should take the differences into account in their planning. Key Points: High energy solar protons from solar energetic particle events are a hazard to spacecraftEven with the same data set, different statistical formulations still produce a factor of 2 or greater difference in the mission fluence [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background The incidence of infections among cancer patients is as high as 23.2–33.2% in China. However, the lack of information and data on the number of antibiotics used by cancer patients is an obstacle to implementing antibiotic management plans. Aim This study aimed to investigate bacterial infections and antibiotic resistance in Chinese cancer patients to provide a reference for the rational use of antibiotics. Design This was a 5-year retrospective study on the antibiotic resistance of cancer patients. Methods In this 5-year surveillance study, we collected bacterial and antibiotic resistance data from 20 provincial cancer diagnosis and treatment centers and three specialized cancer hospitals in China. We analyzed the resistance of common bacteria to antibiotics, compared to common clinical drug-resistant bacteria, evaluated the evolution of critical drug-resistant bacteria and conducted data analysis. Findings Between 2016 and 2020, 216 219 bacterial strains were clinically isolated. The resistance trend of Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae to amikacin, ciprofloxacin, cefotaxime, piperacillin/tazobactam and imipenem was relatively stable and did not significantly increase over time. The resistance of Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains to all antibiotics tested, including imipenem and meropenem, decreased over time. In contrast, the resistance of Acinetobacter baumannii strains to carbapenems increased from 4.7% to 14.7%. Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) significantly decreased from 65.2% in 2016 to 48.9% in 2020. Conclusions The bacterial prevalence and antibiotic resistance rates of E. coli , K. pneumoniae , P. aeruginosa , A. baumannii , S. aureus and MRSA were significantly lower than the national average. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Registration for multi-sensor or multi-modal image pairs with a large degree of distortions is a fundamental task for many remote sensing applications. To achieve accurate and low-cost remote sensing image registration, we propose a multiscale unsupervised network (MU-Net). Without costly ground truth labels, MU-Net directly learns the end-to-end mapping from the image pairs to their transformation parameters. MU-Net performs a coarse-to-fine registration pipeline by stacking several deep neural network models on multiple scales, which prevents the backpropagation being falling into a local extremum and resists significant image distortions. In addition, a novel loss function paradigm is designed based on structural similarity, which makes MU-Net suitable for various types of multi-modal images. MU-Net is compared with traditional feature-based and area-based methods, as well as supervised and other unsupervised learning methods on the Optical-Optical, Optical-Infrared, Optical-SAR and Optical-Map datasets. Experimental results show that MU-Net achieves more robust and accurate registration performance between these image pairs with geometric and radiometric distortions.We share the datasets and the code implemented by Pytorch at https://github.com/yeyuanxin110/MU-Net. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accurate matching of multimodal remote sensing (RS) images (e.g., optical, infrared, LiDAR, SAR, and rasterized maps) is still an ongoing challenge because of nonlinear radiometric differences (NRD) between these images. Considering that structural properties are preserved between multimodal images, this paper proposes a robust matching method based on multi-directional and multi-scale structural features, which consist of two critical steps. Firstly, a novel structural descriptor named the Steerable Filters of first- and second-Order Channels (SFOC) is constructed to address severe NRD, which combines the first- and second-order gradient information by using the steerable filters to depict multi-directional and multi-scale structural features of images. Meanwhile, SFOC is further enhanced by performing the dilated Gaussian convolutions with different dilated rates on it, which can capture multi-level context structural features and improve the ability to resist noise. Then, a fast similarity measure, called Fast Normalized Cross-Correlation (Fast-NCCSFOC), is established to detect correspondences by a template matching scheme, which employs the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) technique and the integral image to improve the matching efficiency. The performance of the proposed SFOC has been evaluated with many different kinds of multimodal RS images, and experimental results show its superior matching performance compared with the state-of-the-art methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to investigate the effect of neuropilin-1 (NRP-1) silencing on epithelial-mesenchymal transformation (EMT) mediated by transforming growth factor-b1 (TGF-b1) and on the proliferation and migration of colon cancer SW480 cells. After transfection of small interfering ribonucleic acid (siRNA)-NRP-1 into colon cancer SW480 cells, the messenger RNA (mRNA) and protein expression levels of NRP-1 were detected using quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) and Western blot. Four EMT models were induced using 0, 2, 5, and 10 ng/mL TGF-b1, respectively. Cell proliferation was detected using Cell Counting Kit-8, and the protein levels of EMT markers E-cadherin and vimentin were detected using Western blot. EMT was induced in the transfected SW480 cells using TGF-b1, after which four groups were created: a negative control group (siRNA-Ncontrol), a transfection group (siRNA-NRP-1), an induction group (TGF-b1), and a transfection + induction group (siRNA-NRP-1+TGF-b1). Western blot was then used to detect the expression of E-cadherin and vimentin, and cell proliferation and migration were detected using cell counting kit-8 (CCK-8) and scratch assay.After transfection with siRNA-NRP-1, the mRNAand protein expression levels of SW480 cells were significantly decreased (P<0.05). After 48 hours of induction with 10 ng/mL TGF-b1, cell proliferation was obvious, E-cadherin expression decreased, and vimentin expression significantly increased (P<0.05), indicating that EMT had been successfully induced compared with the induction group, the transfection + induction group had significantly increased E-cadherin expression after corresponding treatments (including transfection and induction alone) (P<0.05), and the proliferation and migration of colon cancer cells decreased (P<0.05). In conclusion: silencing, NRP-1 in colon cancer SW480 cells can partially reverse TGF-b1-mediated EMT, reduce the proliferation activity of colon cancer cells, and slow their migration ability. Therefore, NRP-1 may become a new target for the treatment of colon cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background The relationship of osteoporosis and stroke is still not fully clarified. Apart from the well-known risk factors for stroke, bone mineral density (BMD) has gained more interest in recent years. Aim To further elucidate the relationship between BMD and stroke risk, a prospective cohort study in the Chinese rural population was conducted. Design Retrospective analysis of a family osteoporosis cohort. Methods Our subjects were selected from an osteoporosis cohort conducted in Anqing, China. All participants underwent a questionnaire assessment, clinical examinations and laboratory assessments. During the follow-up period, the number of people who had a stroke was recorded. Generalized estimating equation regression analysis was performed to determine the significance of the association between BMD and stroke. Results A total of 17868 people were included. A two-way interaction test of sex and BMD on stroke was significant (P  = 0.002). There was a significant difference in BMD and stroke morbidity in the male group (P  = 0.003). When BMD was assessed as quartiles and the lowest quartile was used as reference, a significantly lower risk for stroke was observed in Q2–4. Notably, no significant difference was observed in female participants with adjusted odds ratio (P  > 0.05). The P -value for interaction was calculated. The body mass index (P  = 0.014) and waist-to-hip ratio (P  = 0.027) were found to be significantly associated with BMD and stroke risk in female participants. Conclusions In Chinese rural areas, total BMD may negatively correlated with stroke, especially in men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The received signal strength (RSS) fingerprint based localization is a widely used technique for location estimation in the indoor environment with the fifth generation (5G) wireless communication. However, the RSS feature is easily affected by the noise and other variations of the propagation channel, thus limiting the localization accuracy. In this paper, we propose a multiple RSS fingerprint based localization scheme in the reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) assisted system, where the RSS values under different RIS configurations are leveraged as the fingerprints. However, it is challenging to set the favorable RIS configurations. To tackle this challenge, we design an optimization method based on Cramér-Rao Lower Bound (CRLB) to derive the optimal RIS configurations to achieve a robust and accurate location estimation, where the CRLB is minimized, and projected gradient descent (PGD) method is applied to solve this optimization problem. After the fingerprints are collected, deep neural network (DNN) is employed for location estimation. Simulation results reveal that the proposed scheme performs well in terms of localization accuracy and stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drug resistance is a serious problem in cancer therapy. Growing evidence has shown that docosahexaenoic acid has anti-inflammatory and chemopreventive abilities. Studies have shown that autophagy inhibition and ferroptosis are promising therapeutic strategies for overcoming multidrug resistance. This study was aimed to examine whether docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) could reverse docetaxel resistance in prostate cancer cells. Cell survival was examined by MTT and colony formation. Protein expression was determined by Western blot. Reactive oxygen species (ROS) production was measured by flow cytometry. DHA displayed anti-cancer effects on proliferation, colony formation, migration, apoptosis, autophagy and epithelial mesenchymal transition. Glutathione-S-transferase π is an enzyme that plays an important role in drug resistance. DHA inhibited GSTπ protein expression and induced cytoprotective autophagy by regulating the PI3K/AKT signalling pathway in PC3R cells. DHA combined with PI3K inhibitor (LY294002) enhanced apoptosis by alleviating the expression of LC3B, (pro-) caspase-3 and (uncleaved) PARP. DHA induced ferroptosis by attenuating the expression of glutathione peroxidase 4 (GPX4) and nuclear erythroid 2-related factor 2 (Nrf2). DHA-treated PC3R cells produced ROS. The ROS and cytotoxicity were reversed by treatment with ferrostatin-1. DHA combined with docetaxel inhibited EMT by regulating the expression of E-cadhein and N-cadherin. In summary, DHA reversed drug resistance and induced cytoprotective autophagy and ferroptosis by regulating the PI3K/AKT/Nrf2/GPX4 signalling pathway in PC3R cells. We propose that DHA could be developed as a chemosensitizer and that the PI3K/AKT /Nrf2/GPX4 signalling pathway might be a promising therapeutic target for overcoming cancer drug resistance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: This study aimed to summarise the evidence for efficacy of combination treatment of intranasal corticosteroid spray with oxymetazoline hydrochloride nasal spray for chronic rhinitis. Method: Nine databases were systematically searched from study inception in September 2016 to 1 June 2020. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses statement was followed. Results: A total of 130 studies were screened, and 4 randomised controlled trials comprising 838 patients met inclusion criteria. The study found superior improvement of nasal congestion from onset of treatment to completion in intranasal corticosteroid spray and oxymetazoline hydrochloride groups compared with control groups. Intranasal corticosteroid spray and oxymetazoline hydrochloride use resulted in higher nasal volume (standard error of mean 1, 15.8 + 1.1 ml; p <.03) compared with either placebo (12.1 + 0.9 ml) or oxymetazoline hydrochloride (12.4 + 0.8 ml) alone (p = 0.003). Conclusion: Intranasal corticosteroid spray and oxymetazoline hydrochloride combination treatment may be superior in reducing rhinitis symptoms compared with either intranasal corticosteroid spray or oxymetazoline hydrochloride alone, without inducing rhinitis medicamentosa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The magnetic properties of the binuclear Cu(II) complex {Cu2(μ2-O2CCH3)4}(N2C4H4)2 were studied using density functional theory combined with the broken state (DFT-BS). The magnetic coupling constant J of the acetic acid bridged binuclear copper complex model have been calculated by different density functional methods (B3LYP, B3PW91, B3P86, BLYP, BP86, BPW91, PBE0, M06, PBE) and basis sets (6-31G, LANL2DZ, SDD, 6-31G-SVP, 6-31++G-SVP, TZV-SVP, TZVP-SVP). The best calculated J value is –182.18 cm–1, which is in excellent agreement with the experimental value (J = –175.36 cm–1). The spin density distribution of the complex indicates the spin delocalization effect between Cu(II) cation and acetic acid ligand. Molecular orbital analysis explained that the large energy split between metal centers is the main reason for the antiferromagnetic effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using Zn/ZnO composite target, ZnO films were prepared by RF magnetron sputtering under Ar, Ar + O2 and Ar + H2 atmospheres and substrate temperatures of 150 and 300 °C. The effects of gas (O2 or H2) flow rate and substrate temperature on the thickness, preferred orientation, crystallinity, stress, transparent conductive properties, electrically conductive stability in air, Eg and Raman spectrum of the films were investigated. The results show that the film prepared in Ar atmosphere exhibits poor transparent conductive properties and conductive stability. Substrate temperature of 300 °C is advantageous to prepare ZnO films with (002) preferred orientation, high crystallinity, low compressive stress and good transparent conductive properties under Ar + O2 atmosphere. Under Ar + H2 atmosphere, ZnO films with low compressive stress and better transparent conductive properties can be obtained at substrate temperature of 150 °C. The related mechanisms for the effect of gas flow rate and substrate temperature on structure and properties of ZnO films are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Smart control is an attracting and important function for modern electromagnetic wave absorber. This paper presents the design, fabrication, and measurement of a frequency and bandwidth tunable metamaterial absorber (MA) in X-band. The unit cell of the MA consists of a microstrip resonator loaded with the varactors. Simulation and measurement results show that by tuning the bias voltage on the varactors, the peak absorption frequency can be tuned by 0.44 GHz with the peak absorption greater than 95%. Field and circuit model analysis is conducted to reveal the working mode and predict the absorbing frequency. After that, by specially designing the bias circuit so as to adjust the bias voltage on neighboring unit cells separately, dual resonance and absorption peaks occur, and the overall absorption bandwidth can thus be tuned conveniently by controlling the difference of the two resonance frequencies. The center absorbing frequency can also be tuned. Simulation and experiment results show that the 75% absorption (-6 dB reflection) bandwidth can be tuned from 0.40 GHz to 0.74 GHz, which is a two-fold tuning range. This work is believed to improve the state-of-the-art smart metamaterial absorber. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Warm mix asphalt is gaining increasing acceptance in pavement construction due to their advantages in energy saving, reduced emissions and improved worker comfort. This paper highlights another benefit of warm mix asphalt (WMA) in allowing shorter road closure time window for pavement repair or resurfacing works as compared with the conventional hot mix asphalt (HMA) construction. This is of good practical value to busy roads where closure time windows as short as 4–5 h are common. A finite-element simulation model for predicting temperature cooling of WMA and HMA was developed to study the potential benefits of WMA in allowing shorter time windows for pavement repairs and resurfacing operations. Full-scale field trials were conducted to compare the temperature cooling characteristics of multi-lift construction of WMA and HMA, and provide the necessary data to calibrate and validate the simulation model developed. The validated simulation model was employed to analyse the cooling characteristics of HMA and WMA resurfacings under different environmental conditions and resurfaced layer thicknesses. These analyses provide useful information on the length of cooling time needed before the resurfaced layer is sufficiently stable to receive traffic. It was found that, compared with HMA, the use of WMA shortened the night-time cooling time needed by 5–35 min when the resurfacing thickness increased from 75 to 150 mm. The corresponding cooling time reductions for day-time paving were 19–79 min. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Litterfall is a good indicator of overall forest functions in forest ecosystems. Globally, forest litterfall has been extensively investigated, however, there is a lack of long‐term data analysis to show the various litterfall components in relation to environmental factors on the monthly and yearly scales. Here, monthly (May–October) and annual (1981–2018) litterfall including leaves, twigs, bark, reproductive, and miscellaneous fractions were collected in a mixed mature Pinus koraiensis forest on Changbai Mountain in Northeast, China, across 30 years. Based on these long‐term litterfall data, we analyzed the seasonal and annual variations in different litterfall fractions and the internal/external drivers. We observed that both the leaf and total litterfall exhibited a strong, similar seasonal pattern, with the highest levels between September and October, and the annual litterfall had an "S‐shaped" increasing pattern from 1981 to 2018. The other litterfall fractions showed distinct monthly and yearly fluctuations across the 30 years. Mean monthly evapotranspiration and temperature (minimum and maximum) were the best predictors for monthly litterfall. By contrast, the models that best predicted the annual litterfall production included mean annual precipitation and mean monthly precipitation and temperature in May and October. Our study, using a unique dataset of detailed long‐term litterfall dynamics, has potentially major significance for enhancing our understanding of the role of climatic factors controlling forest litterfall amount and seasonality in temperate mixed mature forests. This insight is of paramount importance for modeling and estimating soil carbon sequestration and nutrient cycling of temperate forests under climate change. Plain Language Summary: Forest litterfall is very important for nutrient cycling in forest ecosystems. Many researchers have studied forest litterfall, but still, there is an obvious lack of long‐term data analysis to show the relationships between forest litterfall and environmental factors. In this study, we analyzed the monthly and annual litterfalls of various components (leaf, reproductive, twig, bark, and miscellaneous litterfall) collected over 30 years in a mixed broad‐leaved Pinus koraiensis old‐growth forest on Changbai Mountain in northeastern China, in relation to climatic factors. We found that the highest monthly values of both leaf and total litterfall occurred during September‐October, and the annual litterfall of all components had an increasing trend from 1981 to 2018. The monthly litterfall was strongly influenced by the mean monthly evapotranspiration and temperature (minimum and maximum). The annual litterfall was mainly influenced by the mean annual precipitation, mean monthly precipitation, and temperature in May and October. These long‐term data based findings have important implications for better understanding the role of climatic factors on forest litterfall dynamics under climate change. Key Points: Leaf and total litterfall exhibited a strong and similar seasonal patternThere was an "S‐shaped" increasing pattern in the annual litterfallContrasting climatic factors controlled seasonal and annual litterfall dynamics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Goose is an important type of domesticated poultry. The wild geese that are regarded as the ancestors of modern domestic geese present gray plumage. Domesticated, geese have both white and gray feathers. To elucidate the genetic mechanisms underlying the formation of white and gray plumage in geese, we resequenced the whole genome of 18 geese from six populations including white and gray goose breeds. The average sequencing depth per individual was 9.81× and the average genome coverage was 96.8%. A total of 346 genes were detected in the top 1% of FST scores of gray‐ and white‐feathered geese, and a significant FST site was located in the intron region within the KIT gene, the 18 bp deletion in KIT having the strongest potential association with white feathers. It has been reported that a number of genes are associated with plumage colors in birds. However, no studies have identified the relationship between KIT and plumage color in birds at present, although the white coat can be attributed to mutations in KIT in some mammals. Our study showed that that KIT is a plausible candidate gene for white/gray plumage color in Chinese domestic geese. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Background: Significantly more patients with moderate‐to‐severe plaque psoriasis treated with the interleukin (IL)‐17A inhibitor ixekizumab vs. the IL‐23p19 inhibitor guselkumab in the IXORA‐R head‐to‐head trial achieved 100% improvement in Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI 100) at week 12. Objectives: To compare skin and nail clearance and patient‐reported outcomes for ixekizumab vs. guselkumab, up to week 24. Methods: IXORA‐R enrolled adults with moderate‐to‐severe plaque psoriasis, defined as static Physician's Global Assessment ≥ 3, PASI ≥ 12 and involved body surface area ≥ 10%. Statistical comparisons were performed using the Cochran–Mantel–Haenszel test stratified by pooled site. Time‐to‐first‐event comparisons were performed using Kaplan–Meier analysis, and P‐values were generated using adjusted log‐rank tests stratified by treatment group. Cumulative days at clinical and patient‐reported responses were compared by ancova. The trial was registered with ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT03573323). Results: Of the 1027 patients randomly assigned, 90% completed the trial (465 of 520 ixekizumab and 459 of 507 guselkumab). As early as week 2 and through week 16, more patients on ixekizumab achieved PASI 100 (P < 0·01). At week 24, ixekizumab was noninferior to guselkumab (50% vs. 52%, difference −2·3%), with no statistically significant difference in PASI 100 (P = 0·41). More patients receiving ixekizumab showed completely clear nails at week 24 (52% vs. 31%, P = 0·007). The median time to first PASI 50/75/90 and PASI 100 were 2 and 7·5 weeks shorter, respectively, for patients on ixekizumab vs. guselkumab (P < 0·001). Patients on ixekizumab also had a greater cumulative benefit, with more days at PASI 90 and 100, with Dermatology Life Quality Index of 0 or 1, and itch free (P < 0·05). The frequency of serious adverse events was 3% for each group, with no new safety signals. Conclusions: Ixekizumab was noninferior to guselkumab in complete skin clearance and superior in clearing nails at week 24. Ixekizumab cleared skin more rapidly in patients with moderate‐to‐severe plaque psoriasis, with a greater cumulative benefit, than guselkumab. Overall, the safety findings were consistent with the known safety profile for ixekizumab. What is already known about this topic?Patients with plaque psoriasis desire both high levels of clearance and rapid onset of treatment effects.Ixekizumab is a high‐affinity monoclonal antibody that selectively targets interleukin (IL)‐17A.In the 12‐week report of the IXORA‐R study, ixekizumab demonstrated significantly higher efficacy at early timepoints than the IL‐23p19 inhibitor guselkumab, with more patients achieving 100% improvement in Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI 100) and improved quality of life as early as week 4. What does this study add?Patients on ixekizumab vs. guselkumab achieved similar levels of skin clearance and superior efficacy in the resolution of nail psoriasis at week 24.Patients on ixekizumab vs. guselkumab had a greater cumulative benefit, with more days at PASI 90 and 100, more days when psoriasis did not impact their quality of life, and more itch‐free days.The safety profiles of both drugs were consistent with those in previous studies. Linked Comment: Puig. Br J Dermatol 2021; 184:992–993. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Hypertension is a growing health concern in people living with HIV (PLWH). However, association between HIV infection and hypertension is equivocal. Methods: In all, 1472 PLWH and 2944 HIV‐negative individuals frequency‐matched by age and sex were derived from the baseline survey of Comparative HIV and Aging Research in Taizhou (CHART), China. Prehypertension was defined as systolic blood pressure (BP) of 120–139 mmHg and/or diastolic blood pressure of 80–89 mmHg. Results: Despite the fact that prevalence of hypertension was overall lower among PLWH than among HIV‐negative people (21.1% vs. 29.1%, P < 0.001), it was similar at ages 18–29 (7.6% vs. 8.5%) and 30–44 years (17.1% vs. 18.5%) but significantly lower in PLWH at ages 45–59 (26.1% vs. 40.7%) and 60–75 years (37.1% vs. 57.3%). Prehypertension prevalence was consistently higher in PLWH across all age groups. In the model adjusting for traditional risk factors, HIV infection was associated with hypertension (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 1.27, 95% confidence interval: 1.04–1.55) and prehypertension (aOR = 1.77, 95% CI: 1.51–2.08), and attenuated after additional adjustment for abdominal obesity. Age‐stratified analysis showed that these associations of HIV with hypertension were observed at ages 18–29 and 30–44 years and associations with prehypertension were observed at ages 18–29, 30–44 and 45–59 years only. Years since HIV diagnosis and stavudine use were the HIV‐specific factors independently associated with hypertension or/and prehypertension. Conclusions: HIV infection is independently associated with prehypertension and hypertension especially at younger ages, and this risk may increase as treatment becomes prolonged. Our findings reinforce the urgent necessity for active BP screening and control strategies be adopted for PLWH in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent years have seen a resurgence of interest in inexpensive low magnetic field (< 0.3 T) MRI systems mainly due to advances in magnet, coil and gradient set designs. Most of these advances have focused on improving hardware and signal acquisition strategies, and far less on the use of advanced image reconstruction methods to improve attainable image quality at low field. We describe here the use of our end-to-end deep neural network approach (AUTOMAP) to improve the image quality of highly noise-corrupted low-field MRI data. We compare the performance of this approach to two additional state-of-the-art denoising pipelines. We find that AUTOMAP improves image reconstruction of data acquired on two very different low-field MRI systems: human brain data acquired at 6.5 mT, and plant root data acquired at 47 mT, demonstrating SNR gains above Fourier reconstruction by factors of 1.5- to 4.5-fold, and 3-fold, respectively. In these applications, AUTOMAP outperformed two different contemporary image-based denoising algorithms, and suppressed noise-like spike artifacts in the reconstructed images. The impact of domain-specific training corpora on the reconstruction performance is discussed. The AUTOMAP approach to image reconstruction will enable significant image quality improvements at low-field, especially in highly noise-corrupted environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Turbulence simulations in diverted geometry across the edge and scrape-off layer (SOL) of ASDEX Upgrade are performed with the GRILLIX code (Stegmeir et al 2019 Phys. Plasmas 26 052517). The underlying global (full-f) drift-reduced Braginskii model allows to concurrently study the self-consistent dynamics of the turbulence and the background as well as the evolution of toroidal and zonal flows. Different contributions to the radial electric field are identified. The dominant contribution on closed flux surfaces comes from the ion pressure gradient, due to the diamagnetic drift in the curved magnetic field. Large deviations can be induced, in particular, by the polarization particle flux, leading to zonal flows. The latter are driven by small-scale eddies, but do not exhibit much impact on the overall transport which is driven by ballooning modes at larger scales. Ion viscosity is found to be important in damping poloidal rotation through adjusting of the parallel velocity profile, but not via direct vorticity damping. The zonal flow drive peaks at the separatrix, where a strong shear layer forms due to the sheath-induced counter-propagating SOL flow, allowing for the formation of a transport barrier. The temperature profile across the separatrix is determined by the competition between cross-field transport and outflow in the SOL, the latter being largely controlled by the parallel heat conductivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The aim was to explore the diagnostic value of computed tomographic colonography (CTC) compared with conventional colonoscopy in individuals at high risk for colorectal cancer. Method: PubMed, Embase, the Cochrane Library and the Web of Science were searched by two independent reviewers for potentially eligible studies published up to 31 October 2018 that were based on a per‐patient analysis. stata, meta‐disc and revman were used to perform this meta‐analysis. A random‐effect model was used, and a subgroup analysis was conducted to explore the sources of heterogeneity. Results: A total of 14 full‐text articles, involving 3578 patients, were included in this meta‐analysis. The pooled sensitivity, specificity, positive likelihood ratio, negative likelihood ratio and the area under the summary receiver operating characteristic curve of CTC for detecting polyps ≥ 6 mm were 0.87 (95% CI 0.83–0.90), 0.90 (95% CI 0.86–0.93), 9.08 (95% CI 6.28–13.13), 0.14 (95% CI 0.11–0.18) and 0.94 (95% CI 0.92–0.96), respectively. For polyps ≥ 10 mm, the pooled sensitivity, specificity, positive likelihood ratio and negative likelihood ratio of CTC were 0.91 (95% CI 0.86–0.94), 0.98 (95% CI 0.95–0.99), 40.36 (95% CI 19.16–85.03), 0.90 (95% CI 0.06–0.14) and 0.98 (95% CI 0.96–0.99), respectively. Conclusion: In this meta‐analysis, CTC had high diagnostic accuracy for detecting polyps ≥ 6 mm and ≥ 10 mm in patients at high risk of developing colorectal cancer and it had a higher sensitivity and specificity for detecting polyps ≥ 10 mm than polyps ≥ 6 mm. However, the results should be used cautiously due to the significant heterogeneity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pair plasmas, collections of both matter and antimatter particles of equal mass, represent a paradigm for the study of basic plasma science, and many open questions exist regarding these unique systems. They are found in many astrophysical settings, such as gamma-ray bursts, and have recently also been produced in carefully designed laboratory experiments. A central research topic in plasma physics is instability; however, unlike their more common ion–electron siblings, pair plasmas are generally thought to be stable to cross field pressure gradients in homogeneous magnetic fields. It is shown here by means of kinetic full-f simulations that, when a pressure gradient is first established, the Gradient-driven Drift Coupling mode is destabilized and becomes turbulent. Force balance is eventually achieved by a combination of flattened pressure profiles due to turbulent transport and establishment of a magnetic field gradient, saturating the growth. During the unstable phase, key physics can be captured by a δf gyrokinetic description, where it is shown analytically and numerically that parallel particle motion results in a coupling of all electromagnetic field components. A fluid model derived therefrom accurately predicts linear eigenmodes and is used to resolve global profile effects. For laser-based electron–positron plasma experiments, prompt instability is predicted with growth times much shorter than plasma lifetimes. Similarly, growth rates are calculated for the planned APEX experiment as well as gamma-ray burst scenarios, suggesting that the instability may contribute to the early evolution of these systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: To explore a prokaryotic species‐specific DNA marker, 16S‐23S rRNA gene internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequence for identification and classification of Vibrio. Methods and Results: Five hundred and seventy four ITS sequences from 60 Vibrio strains were collected, then the primary and secondary structures of ITS sequence were analysed. The ITS was divided into several subunits, and the species‐specificity of these subunits were evaluated by blast. The variable subunit of ITS showed high species‐specificity. A protocol to identify a Vibrio species based on ITS analysis was developed and verified. Both the specificity and sensitivity were 100%. The phylogeny analysis of Vibrio based on ITS showed that ITS devised a better classification than 16S rDNA. Finally, an identification method of Vibrio based on ITS sequencing in food samples was developed and evaluated. The results of ITS sequencing were (100%) consistent with the results identified by ISO standard. Conclusions: Vibrio could be accurately identified at the species level by using the ITS sequences. Significance and Impact of the Study: The present study suggests that the ITS can be considered as a significant DNA marker for identification and classification of Vibrio species, and it posed a new path to screen the Vibrio in food sample. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two-fluid Braginskii codes have simulated open-field line turbulence for over a decade, and only recently, it has become possible to study these systems with continuum gyrokinetic codes. This work presents a first-of-its-kind comparison between fluid and (long-wavelength) gyrokinetic models in open field-lines, using the GDB and Gkeyll codes to simulate interchange turbulence in the Helimak device at the University of Texas [T. N. Bernard et al., Phys. Plasmas 26, 042301 (2019)]. Partial agreement is attained in a number of diagnostic channels when the GDB sources and sheath boundary conditions (BCs) are selected carefully, especially the heat-flux BCs that can drastically alter the temperature. The radial profile of the fluctuation levels is qualitatively similar and quantitatively comparable on the low-field side, although statistics such as moments of the probability density function and the high-frequency spectrum show greater differences. This comparison indicates areas for future improvement in both simulations, such as sheath BCs, and improvements in GDB like particle conservation and spatially varying thermal conductivity, in order to achieve better fluid-gyrokinetic agreement and increase fidelity when simulating experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ovarian cancer is one of the most common malignancies in women in the world. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) were identified as a group of regulators that played important roles in the progression of cancer development. The main purpose of this study was to investigate the functional mechanism of microRNA-193a-5p (miR-193a-5p) in human ovarian cancer. Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) was used to detect the RNA levels of miR-193a-5p and homeobox genes A7 (HOXA7). Western blot assay was performed to determine the protein level of HOXA7. The interaction between miR-193a-5p and HOXA7 was predicted by online software starBase v3.0, and then verified by the dual luciferase reporter assay. The cell proliferation and apoptosis rate were examined by 3-(4,5-dimethyl-2-thiazolyl)-2,5-diphenyl-2-H-tetrazolium bromide (MTT) and colony formation assay as well as flow cytometry analysis. We found out that the expression level of miR-193a-5p was decreased in human ovarian cancer tissues and cells. The overexpression of miR-193a-5p inhibited cell proliferation and induced apoptosis in human ovarian cancer. Interestingly, miR-193a-5p reduced the expression of HOXA7 by binding to 3'-untranslated region (3'-UTR) of HOXA7 mRNA. As expected, the knockdown of HOXA7 also suppressed cell proliferation and promoted apoptosis in human ovarian cancer. Besides, the upregulation of HOXA7 reversed the effect of miR-193a-5p on human ovarian cell proliferation and apoptosis. Our findings confirmed that miR-193a-5p inhibited cell proliferation and induced apoptosis through the downregulation of HOXA7 in human ovarian cancer, providing a theoretical value for the therapy of human ovarian cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

GRILLIX employs the flux‐coordinate independent approach (FCI), which allows us to study boundary plasma turbulence in realistic diverted configurations. Recently, the physical model in GRILLIX has been extended to a global drift‐reduced Braginskii model, without any separation between background and fluctuations. It includes electromagnetic and thermal dynamics with hot ions, relaxation of the Boussinesq approximation and non‐linear parametric dependencies. This contribution presents solutions to associated issues, that is, the ion diamagnetic polarization and the stiff parallel heat conduction. Simulations based on parameters characteristic for the Alcator C‐Mod tokamak were carried out. In circular geometry, the self‐consistent electric field contains zonal flows and geodesic acoustic modes in the confined region. In the scrape‐off layer, the electron parallel heat conduction and its boundary condition determine the temperature and electric field, leading to sheared flows at the last closed flux surface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the generation of relativistic electron mirrors (REM) and the reflection of an ultra-short laser off the mirrors are discussed, applying two-dimension particle-in-cell simulations. REMs with ultra-high acceleration and expanding velocity can be produced from a solid nanofoil illuminated normally by an ultra-intense femtosecond laser pulse with a sharp rising edge. Chirped attosecond pulse can be produced through the reflection of a counter-propagating probe laser off the accelerating REM. In the electron moving frame, the plasma frequency of the REM keeps decreasing due to its rapid expansion. The laser frequency, on the contrary, keeps increasing due to the acceleration of REM and the relativistic Doppler shift from the lab frame to the electron moving frame. Within an ultra-short time interval, the two frequencies will be equal in the electron moving frame, which leads to the resonance between laser and REM. The reflected radiation near this interval and corresponding spectra will be amplified due to the resonance. Through adjusting the arriving time of the probe laser, a certain part of the reflected field could be selectively amplified or depressed, leading to the selective adjustment of the corresponding spectra. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Objective: The objective of this article is to study the correlation between neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL) and soluble CD14 subtype (presepsin) on the severity and prognosis evaluation of acute paraquat poisoning (APP) patients. Materials and methods: We studied 120 APP patients who were divided into three groups: light (28 cases), moderate (52 cases), and heavy poisoning (40 cases) groups. Twenty healthy volunteers were enrolled as controls. Results: Acute kidney injury (AKI) occurred in 86 APP patients (71.7%, 86 of 120). In AKI group, urine NGAL was elevated 3 h after treatment, serum NGAL was elevated 24 h after treatment, and serum creatine (SCr) was elevated 2 days after treatment, which were all significantly higher than non-AKI group. Compared with control group, there were significant differences in presepsin and acute physiology and chronic health status (APACHE) II score of different poisoning groups. There were significant differences in detection indices 24 h, 3 days, and 7 days after treatment among different poisoning groups. There was a positive correlation between urine NGAL and serum paraquat concentration, urine NGAL, and AKI morbidity (r 1 = 0.974, r 2 = 0.766, p < 0.001), suggesting higher urine NGAL level indicated higher AKI morbidity. Receiver operating characteristic curves analysis suggested serum presepsin level and urine NGAL level had higher sensitivity and specificity than APACHE II score when predicting 28-day mortality of APP patients. Conclusion: Serum and urine NGAL level is elevated earlier than SCr, which is important for the early diagnosis of APP. Serum presepsin and urine NGAL levels can be used as markers to diagnose the severity of AKI and predict the mortality of APP patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Acetylation is an important, reversible posttranslational modification to a protein. In a previous study, we found that there were a large number of acetylated sites in various nutrient storage proteins of the silkworm haemolymph. In this study, we confirmed that acetylation can affect the stability of nutrient storage protein Bombyx mori apolipophorin‐III (BmApoLp‐III). First, the expression of BmApoLp‐III could be upregulated when BmN cells were treated with the deacetylase inhibitor panobinostat (LBH589); similarly, the expression was downregulated when the cells were treated with the acetylase inhibitor C646. Furthermore, the increase in acetylation by LBH589 could inhibit the degradation and improve the accumulation of BmApoLp‐III in BmN cells treated with cycloheximide and MG132 respectively. Moreover, we found that an increase in acetylation could decrease the ubiquitination of BmApoLp‐III and vice versa; therefore, we predicted that acetylation could improve the stability of BmApoLp‐III by competing for ubiquitination and inhibiting the protein degradation pathway mediated by ubiquitin. Additionally, BmApoLp‐III had an antiapoptosis function that increased after LBH589 treatment, which might have been due to the improved protein stability after acetylation. These results have laid the foundation for further study on the mechanism of acetylation in regulating the storage and utilization of silkworm nutrition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We proposed a new method to yield brilliant keV-MeV x-ray emission, inspired by Cao et al (2010 Phys. Plasma 17 043103). When a short femtosecond pulse is coupling into a microwire array target, due to the weakly unbalanced quasi-static electric and magnetic fields, the energetic electrons accelerated by the laser will emit a large amount of photons per shot, comparable to that from the laser-wake betatron radiation. It was found that the critical energy of the photons and the total photon yields are strongly dependent on the laser intensity and structure parameters of the target. The peak spectral brightness of the radiation in our scheme was estimated to be 4 × 1019 photons s-1 mm² mrad² 0.1% bandwidth at the laser intensity 3 × 1020W cm-2. More important, the photon energies can be extended to hundreds of keV to MeV readily if electron beam accelerated by the laser is in the range of MeV to GeV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Co-Registration of aerial imagery and Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data is quilt challenging because the different imaging mechanism causes significant geometric and radiometric distortions between such data. To tackle the problem, this paper proposes an automatic registration method based on structural features and three-dimension (3D) phase correlation. In the proposed method, the LiDAR point cloud data is first transformed into the intensity map, which is used as the reference image. Then, we employ the Fast operator to extract uniformly distributed interest points in the aerial image by a partition strategy and perform a local geometric correction by using the collinearity equation to eliminate scale and rotation difference between images. Subsequently, a robust structural feature descriptor is build based on dense gradient features, and the 3D phase correlation is used to detect control points (CPs) between aerial images and LiDAR data in the frequency domain, where the image matching is accelerated by the 3D Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). Finally, the obtained CPs are employed to correct the exterior orientation elements, which is used to achieve co-registration of aerial images and LiDAR data. Experiments with two datasets of aerial images and LiDAR data show that the proposed method is much faster and more robust than state of the art methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]