Search

The cooperative operation of cascade reservoir systems is an efficient way to regulate water resources. However, noncooperation among various reservoir stakeholders is often observed in practice; this produces an interesting dilemma in the game of water resource management. Considering the upper Yellow River cascade reservoir system as a case study, in this paper we model and analyze the cooperation dilemma in a cascade reservoir system. In our game theoretical analysis, we find that, except for the most upstream reservoir, all reservoirs have free-ride strategies. The free-ride strategy indicates that a reservoir obtains free gain from the cooperation of other reservoirs due to spatial connections, and this fact changes the cooperative game in terms of equilibrium and benefit allocation. The results show that the regulation capacity of the free rider directly affects the equilibrium and benefit allocation of the game. A midstream reservoir with a small or medium regulation capacity tends to employ a free-ride strategy. A midstream reservoir with a large regulation capacity can entirely interrupt the cooperation between upstream and downstream reservoirs, interestingly, which can lead to the disappearance of the free-ride strategy for the midstream reservoir. However, the downstream reservoir may employ a free-ride strategy when the midstream reservoir chooses to cooperate. This implies that grand cooperation is not stable when considering free-ride, whereas partial coalitions are more likely to form. In this paper, we derive equilibrium in the cooperative game of cascade reservoirs, providing theoretical interpretation of the noncooperation phenomenon in the operation of cascade reservoirs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Characterizing the nature of hydrodynamical transport properties in quantum dynamics provides valuable insights into the fundamental understanding of exotic non-equilibrium phases of matter. Experimentally simulating infinite-temperature transport on large-scale complex quantum systems is of considerable interest. Here, using a controllable and coherent superconducting quantum simulator, we experimentally realize the analog quantum circuit, which can efficiently prepare the Haar-random states, and probe spin transport at infinite temperature. We observe diffusive spin transport during the unitary evolution of the ladder-type quantum simulator with ergodic dynamics. Moreover, we explore the transport properties of the systems subjected to strong disorder or a tilted potential, revealing signatures of anomalous subdiffusion in accompany with the breakdown of thermalization. Our work demonstrates a scalable method of probing infinite-temperature spin transport on analog quantum simulators, which paves the way to study other intriguing out-of-equilibrium phenomena from the perspective of transport. Quantum devices offer the potential to simulate quantum phenomena, which are otherwise computationally intractable. Here, Shi, Sun, Wang and coauthors use a superconducting quantum simulator to study spin-transport at infinite temperature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the impact of the Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) certification on export stability. Using a new and unique dataset on AEO certification, combined with the Chinese Customs Enterprise Database and Chinese Industrial Enterprise Database from 2002 to 2013, we find that AEO certification has a positive impact on export stability by employing a staggered difference‐in‐differences empirical strategy. It reduces the likelihood of export failure, enabling certified firms to achieve higher efficiency and maintain competitive advantages in trade risks. The negative effect of AEO certification on export failure is prominent in firms exporting products with higher prices, more physical inspection, and higher requirements of customs clearance time. Along with AEO adoption, certified firms perform better in export stability than non‐certified ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we use two methods, an algorithm of the density-based spatial clustering of applications with noise combined with the Gaussian mixture model, and the maximum likelihood method, to study two open clusters: IC 2488 and IC 2714 with Gaia Data Release 3 data. We compare the two methods in terms of cluster star number, isochrone fitting, cluster mass, and radius. The comparison shows that the selections of cluster stars by the two methods are consistent. The parameters obtained by the two methods are very close. But there are slight differences between the two methods for faint stars in IC 2714. The maximum likelihood method selects more faint stars outside of the main-sequence stripe. We conclude that the maximum likelihood method is more likely affected by field stars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Testicular torsion is a critical urologic condition for which testicular detorsion surgery is considered irreplaceable as well as the golden method of reversal. However, the surgical treatment is equivalent to a blood reperfusion process, and no specific drugs are available to treat blood reperfusion injuries. Salidroside (SAL) is one of the main effective substances in rhodiola, which has been shown to have antioxidant and antiapoptosis activities. This study was designed to determine whether SAL exerted a protective effect on testicular ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) injury. In this study, the I/R injury model of the testes and reoxygenation (OGD/R) model were used for verification, and SAL was administered at doses of 100 mg/kg and 0.05 mmol/L, respectively. After the experiments, the testicular tissue and TM4 Sertoli cells were collected for histopathologic and biochemical analyses. The results revealed that SAL improves the structure of testicular tissue and regulates the oxidation-antioxidation system. To further understand the molecular mechanisms of SAL in treating testicular I/R injuries, transcriptomics and metabonomics analyses were integrated. The results show that the Nfr2/HO-1/GPX4/ferroptosis signaling pathway is enriched significantly, indicating that it may be the main regulatory pathway for SAL in the treatment of testicular I/R injuries. Thereafter, transfection with Nrf2 plasmid-liposome was used to reverse verify that the Nfr2/HO-1/GPX4/ferroptosis signaling pathway was the main pathway for SAL anti-testicular I/R injury treatment. Thus, it is suggested that SAL can protect against testicular I/R injuries by regulating the Nfr2/HO-1/GPX4 signaling pathway to inhibit ferroptosis and that SAL may be a potential drug for the treatment of testicular I/R injuries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water demand management adopts economic and non-economic measures to reduce human water use. However, it is argued in this study that water use changes may cause idle water supply facilities and revenue losses, thereby challenging the sustainability of water supply systems in the context of climate change. A co-governance framework was established to inspire practical strategies of sustaining water supply systems by re-evaluating the long-term impacts of water demand changes. This framework adopts a broader view of water demand management by integrating the political, financial, and consumptive needs of the government, the market, and the users in the form of a collaborative strategy coupling both supply-side and demand-side solutions. The proposed framework was applied to the analysis of the sustainability of China's South-to-North Water Diversion Project. It is found that the South-to-North Water Diversion Project is not a simple water supply infrastructure but rather a synthesis of supply-side and demand-side water management solutions. Actively releasing water for ecological and cultural purposes is suggested in this study to maintain the socio-ecological benefits of the project in the context of human water use decline. The economic cost of the water supply could be recovered by ongoing revenues that include not only the water fees charged to users but also the benefits gained from cooperative investment in broader water-related businesses by both the state-owned water transfer company and local governments in water-receiving areas. The proposed framework and strategies are valuable for other water utilities around the world, especially those challenged by reduced water demand caused by climate change, high water prices, and economic depression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this systematic review is to comprehensively assess the weight loss (WL) practices in different combat sports (CS). The review protocol was preregistered with PROSPERO [CRD42023487196]. Three databases were searched (Web of Science, EBSCOhost, and PubMed) until 8 December 2023. Eligible studies had to meet five criteria: they must have been (a) written in English, (b) published in a peer-reviewed journal, (c) used a survey design to investigate the WL practices of CS athletes, and (d) reported the WL methods used by athletes using a five-point scale. Twenty-six studies (3994 participants from 14 CS) were included. This review found that (1) WL is highly prevalent in CS athletes; (2) many CS athletes started losing weight for competition as teenagers two to three times a year; (3) CS athletes usually lose <5% body weight in 7–14 days before competition; (4) increasing exercise and gradually dieting are the most commonly used WL methods; and (5) the influence of scientific practitioners on athletes is negligible. The habitual practices of CS athletes may be relatively harmless, but in some special cases, CS athletes also perform extreme WL practices. Scientific practitioners have little influence on their WL practices, which may form a vicious cycle of non-qualified influence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND: Visual vertigo (VV) is a disease characterized by various visual signal-induced discomforts, including dizziness, unsteady balance, activity avoiding, and so forth. Distinguishing it from other kinds of dizziness is important because it needs the combination of visual training and vestibular rehabilitation together. However, there is no appropriate tool to diagnose VV in China, thus we would like to introduce an effective tool to China. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to establish the reliability and validity of the Chinese version of visual vertigo analogue scale (VVAS-CH) and to achieve its cross-cultural adaptation in order to promote its further usage in China. METHODS: A total of 1681 patients complaining of vertigo or dizziness were enrolled and they were asked to complete the VVAS-CH. The cross-cultural adaptation, reliability and construct validity of the VVAS-CH were determined. RESULTS: Split-half reliability was 0.939, showing a good reliability. Factor analysis identified only one common factor for the nine items that explained 64.83% of the total variance. Most fit indices reached acceptable levels, proving the good fit of the VVAS-CH model. CONCLUSIONS: The VVAS-CH validated in this study can be used as an effective tool for diagnosing and evaluating VV in patients whose native language is Chinese. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Hepatoid adenocarcinoma (HAC) is rare in the urinary system, with only 7 reported cases in upper urinary tract. This report aimed to explore the genetic characteristics of ureteral HAC for first time, and to describe the treatment prognosis of ureteral HAC. Case presentation: We present a rare case of ureteral HAC in a 53-year-old female, showing elevated serum levels of AFP and CEA, prolonged chronic irritation may be an important cause of her ureteral HAC. Radical nephroureterectomy was performed, the serum levels of AFP and CEA decreased significantly, and metastasis in lymph nodes was found at 9 months after surgery, she had no related symptoms after 18 months postoperatively without adjuvant chemotherapy. Three driver somatic mutations in cancer were identified by NGS testing, including: TP53D281H, KMT2DL1211Ifs*2, KMT2DT1843Nfs*5, demonstrating that ureteral HAC has the similar mutational features to upper tract urothelial carcinoma. Homologous-recombination deficiency (HRD) was positive in this tumor with no mutations in HRD-related genes, which was possibly induced by the copy number deletion of SETD2 gene. Conclusions: We report a rare case of ureteral HAC with elevated serum levels of AFP and CEA. NGS testing demonstrated that ureteral HAC has the similar mutational features to upper tract urothelial carcinoma, which is an important guide for the diagnosis and treatment of ureteral HAC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban hydrological monitoring is essential for analyzing urban hydrology and controlling storm floods. However, runoff monitoring in urban areas, including flood inundation depth, is often inadequate. This inadequacy hampers the calibration of hydrological models and limits their capacity for early flood warning. To address this limitation, this study established a method for evaluating the depth of urban floods using image recognition and deep learning. This method utilizes the object recognition model YOLOv4 to identify submerged objects in images, such as the legs of pedestrians or the exhaust pipes of vehicles. In a dataset of 1,177 flood images, the mean average precision for water depth recognition reached 89.29%. The study also found that the accuracy of flood depth recognition by YOLOv4 is influenced by the type of reference object submerged by the flood; the use of a vehicle as the reference object yielded higher accuracy than using a person. Furthermore, image augmentation with Mosaic technology effectively enhanced the accuracy of recognition. The developed method extracts on-site, real-time, and continuous water depth data from images or video data provided by existing traffic cameras. This system eliminates the need for installing additional water gauges, offering a cost-effective and immediately deployable solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Array sensor failure poses a serious challenge to robust direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimation in complicated environments. Although existing matrix completion methods can successfully recover the damaged signals of an impaired sensor array, they cannot preserve the multi-way signal characteristics as the dimension of arrays expands. In this paper, we propose a structural-missing tensor completion algorithm for robust DOA estimation with uniform rectangular array (URA), which exhibits a high robustness to non-ideal sensor failure conditions. Specifically, the signals received at the impaired URA are represented as a three-dimensional incomplete tensor, which contains whole fibers or slices of missing elements. Due to this structural-missing pattern, the conventional low-rank tensor completion becomes ineffective. To resolve this issue, a spatio-temporal dimension augmentation method is developed to transform the structural-missing tensor signal into a six-dimensional Hankel tensor with dispersed missing elements. The augmented Hankel tensor can then be completed with a low-rank regularization by solving a Hankel tensor nuclear norm minimization problem. As such, the inverse Hankelization on the completed Hankel tensor recovers the tensor signal of an unimpaired URA. Accordingly, a completed covariance tensor can be derived and decomposed for robust DOA estimation. Simulation results verify the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water demand management adopts economic and non-economic measures to reduce human water use. However, it is argued in this study that water use changes may cause idle water supply facilities and revenue losses, thereby challenging the sustainability of water supply systems in the context of climate change. A co-governance framework was established to inspire practical strategies of sustaining water supply systems by re-evaluating the long-term impacts of water demand changes. This framework integrates the political, financial, and consumptive needs of the government, the market, and the users through a collaborative strategy coupling both supply-side and demand-side solutions. The proposed framework was applied to the analysis of the sustainability of China's South-to-North Water Diversion Project. It is found that the South-to-North Water Diversion Project is not a simple water supply infrastructure but rather a synthesis of supply-side and demand-side water management solutions. Actively releasing water for ecological and cultural purposes is suggested in this study to maintain the socioecological benefits of the project in the context of human water use decline. The economic cost of the water supply could be recovered by ongoing revenues that include not only the water fees charged to users but also the benefits gained from cooperative investment in broader water-related businesses by both the state-owned water-transfer company and local governments in water-receiving areas. The proposed framework and strategies are valuable for other water utilities around the world, especially those challenged by reduced water demand caused by climate change, high water prices, and economic depression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

High-quality graphene-based van der Waals superlattices are crucial for investigating physical properties and developing functional devices. However, achieving homogeneous wafer-scale graphene-based superlattices with controlled twist angles is challenging. Here, we present a flat-to-flat transfer method for fabricating wafer-scale graphene and graphene-based superlattices. The aqueous solution between graphene and substrate is removed by a two-step spinning-assisted dehydration procedure with the optimal wetting angle. Proton-assisted treatment is further used to clean graphene surfaces and interfaces, which also decouples graphene and neutralizes the doping levels. Twist angles between different layers are accurately controlled by adjusting the macroscopic stacking angle through their wafer flats. Transferred films exhibit minimal defects, homogeneous morphology, and uniform electrical properties over wafer scale. Even at room temperature, robust quantum Hall effects are observed in graphene films with centimetre-scale linewidth. Our stacking transfer method can facilitate the fabrication of graphene-based van der Waals superlattices and accelerate functional device applications. The large-scale fabrication of twisted van der Waals heterostructures remains challenging due to the formation of defects and contaminations during the transfer process. Here, the authors report a transfer method to fabricate graphene-based van der Waals superlattices at the wafer scale, showing controllable twist angles and robust quantum Hall effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Recent studies had shown that gut microbiota played a significant role in the development of the immune system and may affect the course of airway allergic disease. We conducted this study to determine unique gut microbial associated with allergic disease in children by shotgun gene sequencing.Methods: We collected fecal samples from children with allergic asthma (n = 23) and allergic rhinitis (n = 18), and healthy control (n = 19). The gut microbiota of specimens was analyzed by high-throughput metagenomic shotgun gene sequencing.Results: The intestinal microbiota of children with allergic asthma and allergic rhinitis was characterized by increased microbial richness and diversity. Simpson and Shannon were significantly elevated in children with allergic asthma. Principal coordinates analysis (PCoA) showed that the gut microbial communities cluster patterns of children with asthma or rhinitis were significantly different from those of healthy controls. However, no significant difference was found between asthma group and rhinitis group At the phylum level, higher relative abundance of Firmicutes was found in the allergic rhinitis group and allergic asthma group, while the level of Bacteroidetes was significantly lower. At the genus level, Corynebacterium, Streptococcus, Dorea, Actinomyces, Bifidobacterium, Blautia, and Rothia were significantly enriched in the allergic asthma group. Finally, a random forest classifier model selected 16 general signatures to discriminate the allergic asthma group from the healthy control group.Conclusion: In conclusion, children in the allergic rhinitis group and allergic asthma group had altered gut microbiomes in comparison with the healthy control group. Compared to healthy children, the gut microbiome in children with allergic diseases has higher pro-inflammatory potential and increased production of pro-inflammatory molecules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The deuteration of energetic materials contributes to high signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) in neutron diffraction, thus allowing the structures of energetic materials to be effectively investigated. This study developed the synthesis methods of deuterated energetic materials through chemical synthesis or newly developed one-pot H/D exchange. Using these methods, it synthesized nine deuterated energetic materials in a concise and low-cost manner: deuterated 1,3,5-triamino-2,4,6-trinitrobenzene (TATB-d6, 1), 1,3,5,7-tetranitro-1,3,5,7-tetraazacyclooctane (HMX-d8, 2), 1,3,5-trinitro-1,3,5-triazacyclohexane (RDX-d6, 3), dihydroxylammonium 5,50 -bis(tetrazole-1- oate) (TKX-50-d8, 4), nitroguanidine (NQ-d4, 5), 1,1-diamino-2,2-dinitroethylene (FOX-7-d4, 6), 2,6-diamino-3,5- dinitropyrazine-1-oxide (LLM-105-d4, 7), trinitrotoluene (TNT-d3, 8), and 3-nitro-1,2,4-triazol-5-one (NTO-d2, 9). Furthermore, the single crystals of HMX-d8 (2) and RDX-d6 (3) were obtained, and the α-, β-, γ-, and δ-polymorphs of HMX-d8 (2) were prepared accordingly. The deuterated energetic materials were characterized and analyzed using infrared spectroscopy (IR), nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermogravimetry (TG), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and neutron diffraction. Besides, this study determined the decomposition activation energy (Ea), pre-exponential factor (A), decomposition rate constant (k), and critical explosion temperature (Tb) of TATB-d6 (1), HMX-d8 (2), and RDX-d6 (3) via DSC experiments at different heating rates. The NMR and neutron diffraction data show that these deuterated energetic materials have high deuteration rates of more than 95%. The DSC and TG analyses indicate that the deuterated energetic materials exhibit slightly higher decomposition temperatures than their nondeuterated counterparts. Furthermore, neutron diffraction shows that the deuterated energetic materials feature high SNRs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reservoirs are susceptible to interference from inter-basin water transfer projects intended to relieve serious water shortages. The Central Route of the South-to-North Water Division Project in China has altered the hydrological conditions and water storage status of the terminal reservoir, the Miyun Reservoir, thereby affecting the flood control reliability in the Chaobai River Basin. In this study, a dual-objective five-reservoir operation model was developed, in which reservoir releases are obtained through piecewise linear operating rules. The model considers the flooding risks both downstream of the basin and in the Miyun reservoir area. A parameterization-simulation-optimization approach was employed to obtain the Pareto-optimal front, providing decision-makers with a list of optimal rule parameters to select and match their own risk preferences. All optimized rules could ensure safe operation during the designed floods to be expected once (or more than once) every thousand years. In contrast, the current flood operation schemes largely ignore the water transfer between basins but primarily concentrate on storing water from floods. Thus, the Miyun Reservoir, whose design return period is 1000 years, can easily become filled during a 100-year flood, impeding the system's flood control capacity. Compared to the operating rule optimized in this study, the current schemes result in a 10.5% higher upstream inundation loss and an unsatisfactory 17 million CNY of equivalent water transfer loss. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How future multiple tropical cyclone events (MTCEs) could change is crucial for effective risk management and ensuring human safety, however, it remains unclear. This study projects changes in MTCEs by 2050 in the major basins of the Northern Hemisphere using high‐resolution climate models. Results show a significant increase in the frequency and duration of MTCEs over the North Atlantic (NA), a notable decrease over the western North Pacific (WNP), and little change over the eastern North Pacific (ENP). The increase in MTCEs over the NA is concentrated in August–September, while the decrease over the WNP occurs in most months. In contrast, the ENP exhibits large yet insignificant seasonal variation, suggesting considerable uncertainty in this basin. Further analysis shows that mid‐level vertical motion dominates the MTCE changes over the WNP, while vertical wind shear contributes the most to the NA, which may be linked to future changes in tropical convection. Plain Language Summary: Multiple tropical cyclone (TC) events (MTCEs), that is two or more TCs simultaneously occurring in the same basin, pose great risks to human society. This study projects future changes in the MTCEs by 2050, showing a significant increase over the North Atlantic (NA) while a robust reduction over the western North Pacific (WNP). The future MTCEs over the eastern North Pacific (ENP) show little change relative to the present climate. The increase of MTCEs over the NA is concentrated in August–September, while the decrease over the WNP occurs nearly from April to November. In contrast, there is large yet insignificant seasonal variation over the ENP, which could lead to little change in annual MTCEs. Furthermore, these changes are primarily attributed to the changes in local large‐scale dynamic conditions associated with tropical convection in future decades. Key Points: The projection of future multiple tropical cyclone events (MTCEs) shows a decline in the western North Pacific (WNP) but a significant increase in the North Atlantic (NA)The mid‐level vertical motion dominates the MTCE changes over the WNP, while vertical wind shear is important for the NAFuture monthly MTCEs show large yet insignificant seasonal variation over the eastern North Pacific, causing little trend in annual MTCEs [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to the diversity of scales and shapes, the uncertainty of object position, and the complexity of edge details, the recent merging problem of salient object detection in optical remote sensing image (RSI-SOD) is a considerably challenging topic. To cope with the challenges, we propose a new cross-scale interaction network (CIFNet) equipped with the enlarged receptive field, which mainly contains three modules in an encoder–decoder architecture, including a furcate skip connection module (FSCM), a global leading attention module, and an expansion–integration module (EIM). First, the FSCM uses dilated convolutions to enlarge the receptive field and furcate skip connections to capture more multiscale contextual information, both of which facilitate the adaptability of the model to different sizes, shapes, and quantities of the target objects. Second, on the low-resolution branch, a global leading attention module (GLM) locates the potentially significant object positions in the feature map from a global semantic perspective. Finally, through an attention-guided cascade structure, the EIM seeks more delicate characteristics by refining the features in a coarse-to-fine fashion. Extensive experiments are conducted on two RSI-SOD datasets, from which superior results can be achieved by our CIFNet, outperforming the other state-of-the-art methods. Compared with the second-best method, the performance gain of our method reaches 3.45% on mean absolute error (MAE) and 1.38% on $F_{\beta} ^{\mathrm {adp}}$. Notably, the proposed CIF-Net runs with 40.40-M parameters, 14.8-GFLOPs computational complexity, and 58-frames/s inference speed, which guarantees high efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Binding free energy calculation of a ligand to a protein receptor is a fundamental objective in drug discovery. Molecular mechanics/Generalized-Born (Poisson–Boltzmann) surface area (MM/GB(PB)SA) is one of the most popular methods for binding free energy calculations. It is more accurate than most scoring functions and more computationally efficient than alchemical free energy methods. Several open-source tools for performing MM/GB(PB)SA calculations have been developed, but they have limitations and high entry barriers to users. Here, we introduce Uni-GBSA, a user-friendly automatic workflow to perform MM/GB(PB)SA calculations, which can perform topology preparation, structure optimization, binding free energy calculation and parameter scanning for MM/GB(PB)SA calculations. It also offers a batch mode that evaluates thousands of molecules against one protein target in parallel for efficient application in virtual screening. The default parameters are selected after systematic testing on the PDBBind-2011 refined dataset. In our case studies, Uni-GBSA produced a satisfactory correlation with the experimental binding affinities and outperformed AutoDock Vina in molecular enrichment. Uni-GBSA is available as an open-source package at https://github.com/dptech-corp/Uni-GBSA. It can also be accessed for virtual screening from the Hermite web platform at https://hermite.dp.tech. A free Uni-GBSA web server of a lab version is available at https://labs.dp.tech/projects/uni-gbsa/. This increases user-friendliness because the web server frees users from package installations and provides users with validated workflows for input data and parameter settings, cloud computing resources for efficient job completions, a user-friendly interface and professional support and maintenance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using Jensen's inequality and integration by parts, some tight upper bounds are derived on the Gaussian Q‐function. The tightness of the bounds obtained by Jensen's inequality can be improved by increasing the number of exponential terms, and one of them is invertible. A piece‐wise upper bound is obtained and its application in the analysis of the symbol error probability of various modulation schemes in different channel models is shown. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Globally, despite prostate cancer (PCa) representing second most prevalent malignancy in male, the precise molecular mechanisms implicated in its pathogenesis remain unclear. Consequently, elucidating the key molecular regulators that govern disease progression could substantially contribute to the establishment of novel therapeutic strategies, ultimately advancing the management of PCa. Methods: A total of 49 PCa tissues and 43 adjacent normal tissues were collected from January 2017 to December 2021 at Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University. The advanced transcriptomic methodologies were employed to identify differentially expressed mRNAs in PCa. The expression of aspartoacylase (ASPA) in PCa was thoroughly evaluated using quantitative real-time PCR and Western blotting techniques. To elucidate the inhibitory role of ASPA in PCa cell proliferation and metastasis, a comprehensive set of in vitro and in vivo assays were conducted, including orthotopic and tumor-bearing mouse models (n = 8 for each group). A combination of experimental approaches, such as Western blotting, luciferase assays, immunoprecipitation assays, mass spectrometry, glutathione S-transferase pull-down experiments, and rescue studies, were employed to investigate the underlying molecular mechanisms of ASPA's action in PCa. The Student's t-test was employed to assess the statistical significance between two distinct groups, while one-way analysis of variance was utilized for comparisons involving more than two groups. A two-sided P value of less than 0.05 was deemed to indicate statistical significance. Results: ASPA was identified as a novel inhibitor of PCa progression. The expression of ASPA was found to be significantly down-regulated in PCa tissue samples, and its decreased expression was independently associated with patients' prognosis (HR = 0.60, 95% CI 0.40–0.92, P = 0.018). Our experiments demonstrated that modulation of ASPA activity, either through gain- or loss-of-function, led to the suppression or enhancement of PCa cell proliferation, migration, and invasion, respectively. The inhibitory role of ASPA in PCa was further confirmed using orthotopic and tumor-bearing mouse models. Mechanistically, ASPA was shown to directly interact with the LYN and inhibit the phosphorylation of LYN as well as its downstream targets, JNK1/2 and C-Jun, in both PCa cells and mouse models, in an enzyme-independent manner. Importantly, the inhibition of LYN activation by bafetinib abrogated the promoting effect of ASPA knockdown on PCa progression in both in vitro and in vivo models. Moreover, we observed an inverse relationship between ASPA expression and LYN activity in clinical PCa samples, suggesting a potential regulatory role of ASPA in modulating LYN signaling. Conclusion: Our findings provide novel insights into the tumor-suppressive function of ASPA in PCa and highlight its potential as a prognostic biomarker and therapeutic target for the management of this malignancy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Persistence of the traveling wave solutions of a perturbed higher order nonlinear Schrödinger equation with distributed delay is studied by the geometric singular perturbation theory. The solitary wave, kink and anti-kink solutions are proved to coexist simultaneously at the same speed c by combing the Melnikov method and the bifurcation analysis. Interestingly, a new type of traveling wave solution possessing crest, trough and kink (anti-kink) is discovered. Further, numerical simulations are carried out to confirm the theoretical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Asthma is a common chronic inflammatory disease of the airway. Intestinal flora, a significant risk factor for asthma, has become a widespread concern in the pathogenesis of asthma. To review the literature related to intestinal flora in asthma, summarize research direction, and report trends, this study used CiteSpace to perform bibliometric statistics and analysis on the research papers of intestinal flora and asthma collected in the Web of science core collection from 2001 to 2021. Eventually, a total of 613 articles were included. The results demonstrated that research on gut flora and asthma continued to heat up, with article numbers increasing, especially in the last decade. Moreover, analysis of the keywords showed that the research topics of intestinal flora and asthma range from confirming the link between intestinal flora and asthma to investigating mechanisms and then to asthma treatment. According to the summary of research hotspots, we expand on three emerging issues that require attention in the intestinal flora and asthma research, including (regulatory T)Treg cells, probiotics, and chain fatty acid. Evidence illustrated that Treg cells play a crucial role in the pathogenesis of asthma caused by dysbiosis of the gut flora. Furthermore, in contrast to probiotic supplements, which do not reduce the risk of developing asthma, short-chain fatty acids supplements do. Overall, the research direction in the field of intestinal flora and asthma has recently evolved from macro to micro with depth broadened. As a robust scientific evaluation, our study provided a comprehensive overview of the area, particularly for research focus, which could more precisely direct scholars on future research and clinical diagnosis, therapy, and individualized prevention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Allergic asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease primarily mediated by Th2 immune mechanisms. Exposure to antibiotics during early life is associated with an increased risk of allergic asthma, although the exact mechanism is not fully understood. In this study, mice were randomly divided into a normal saline control group (NS group), an OVA-induced asthma group (OVA group), a vancomycin treatment control group (VAN.NS group), and a vancomycin treatment the OVA-induced asthma group (VAN.OVA group). The results showed that vancomycin altered dominant species in experimental mice. The phylum level histogram showed that Bacteroides abundance was increased, and Firmicutes abundance was decreased in the OVA group. Airway inflammation and airway hyperresponsiveness (AHR) were aggravated in the vancomycin-exposed group. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) showed that the serum levels of IL-5, IL-13, and IL-33 in the OVA group were higher than those in the NS group, especially in the VAN.OVA group. The expression of GATA binding protein-3(GATA3) and retinoid acid receptor-related orphan receptor alpha (RORa) increased in the OVA group, even more so in the VAN.OVA group. Group 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2s) in the lung detected by flow cytometry was increased in OVA mice more than those in control mice, with a more remarkable increase in the VAN.OVA. Our results demonstrated that vancomycin used in early life could alter the intestinal microecology of mice, which, in turn, aggravates airway inflammation and upregulate type 2 innate lymphocytes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The resonance and dynamics of a qubit exposed to a strong aperiodic bichromatic field are studied by using a periodic counter‐rotating hybridized rotating wave (CHRW) Hamiltonian, which is derived from the original Hamiltonian with the unitary transformations under a reasonable approximation and enables the application of the Floquet theory. It is found that the consistency between the CHRW results and numerically exact generalized‐Floquet‐theory (GFT) results in the valid regime of the former while the widely used rotating‐wave approximation breaks down. It is illustrated that the resonance exhibits band structure and the Bloch–Siegert shifts induced by the counter‐rotating couplings of the bichromatic field become notable at the multiphoton resonance band. In addition, the CHRW method is found to have a great advantage of efficiency over the GFT approach particularly in the low beat‐frequency case where the latter converges very slowly. The present CHRW method provides a highly efficient way to calculate the resonance frequency incorporating the Bloch–Siegert shift and provides insights into the effects of the counter‐rotating couplings of the bichromatic field in the strong‐driving regimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intercalation-type layered oxides have been widely explored as cathode materials for aqueous zinc-ion batteries (ZIBs). Although high-rate capability has been achieved based on the pillar effect of various intercalants for widening interlayer space, an in-depth understanding of atomic orbital variations induced by intercalants is still unknown. Herein, we design an NH4+-intercalated vanadium oxide (NH4+-V2O5) for high-rate ZIBs, together with deeply investigating the role of the intercalant in terms of atomic orbital. Besides extended layer spacing, our X-ray spectroscopies reveal that the insertion of NH4+ could promote electron transition to 3dxy state of V t2g orbital in V2O5, which significantly accelerates the electron transfer and Zn-ion migration, further verified by DFT calculations. As results, the NH4+-V2O5 electrode delivers a high capacity of 430.0 mA h g−1 at 0.1 A g−1, especially excellent rate capability (101.0 mA h g−1 at 200 C), enabling fast charging within 18 s. Moreover, the reversible V t2g orbital and lattice space variation during cycling are found via ex-situ soft X-ray absorption spectrum and in-situ synchrotron radiation X-ray diffraction, respectively. This work provides an insight at orbital level in advanced cathode materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of our study was to compare the short-term outcomes of early (within 3 months after stroke) and nonearly (more than 3 months after stroke) radical colorectal cancer surgery to find an appropriate time to surgery for these colorectal cancer patients complicated with new-onset cerebral infarction. A retrospective analysis of patients with stroke who underwent curative colorectal cancer surgery between January 2010 and December 2020 was conducted. Propensity score matching (PSM) analysis was performed to overcome patient selection bias between the two groups. A total of 395 patients were reviewed. After PSM, 40 patients in the early group and 40 patients in the nonearly group were compared. The median time to surgery was 4 weeks in the early group. The overall incidence of postoperative complications between the groups was not significantly different (p = 0.745). The early group was associated with less intraoperative blood loss (50 vs. 100, p = 0.029 ml), with no difference in 30-day morbidity and mortality. Additionally, multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that previous abdominal surgery (p = 0.049) was an independent risk factor for postoperative complications after matching. Before matching, multivariate logistic analysis showed that ESRS (p = 0.028) and MRS (p = 0.039) were independent risk factors. Radical surgery after 4 weeks of cerebral infarction may be feasible for colorectal cancer patients with new onset stroke, as it appear not to increase the perioperative complications of Clavien–Dindo grade II or higher, while strengthening the preoperative evaluation and perioperative monitoring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper takes the China's A-share listed companies in the heavy pollution industry from 2010 to 2021 as the research sample and constructs a corresponding model to explore the existence, heterogeneity, and economic consequences of peer effect of green innovation. The results show that the enterprises' green innovation not only has strategic behaviors of direct imitation, but also receives the environmental information disclosed by peer enterprises to correct their own decision-making; that is, there are two types of peer effects: imitation and reference. At the same time, the enterprises tend to imitate and learn from large-scale and high-quality enterprises with high governance level while making decisions on green innovation. External situational characteristics can moderate the peer effects of green innovation. The strengthening of intellectual property protection and the improvement of market competition will promote mutual learning and reference among enterprises, and the improvement of the institutional environment will inhibit the interaction of enterprises. Further analysis shows that the peer effect of imitation amplifies the promoting effect of green innovation on business performance, while the peer effect of reference does not show obvious spillover characteristics. The above analysis is helpful to reveal the more real decision-making motivation and potential driving mechanism for enterprises to take green innovation actions and provides new ideas and experience for green innovation to serve the development of entity enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: The therapeutic efficacy of microwave ablation (MWA) for subcapsular hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has not been well characterized. We aimed to compare the long-term outcomes of MWA and surgical resection (SR) in patients with subcapsular HCC. Methods: This retrospective study comprised 321 patients with subcapsular HCC meeting the Milan criteria who received MWA (n = 99) or SR (n = 222). Local tumor progression (LTP), overall survival (OS), and disease-free survival (DFS) were analyzed using propensity score matching (PSM) to compare the therapeutic efficacy. Results: In the total cohort, there were no significant differences in 5-year LTP rates (14.0% vs. 8.9%, p = 0.12), OS rates (70.7% vs. 73.2%, p = 0.63), and DFS rates (38.3% vs. 41.2%, p = 0.22) between the MWA and SR groups. After PSM, the cumulative LTP rates at 1, 3, and 5 years were 9.7%, 14.0%, and 16.4% in the MWA group (n = 84) and 7.2%, 8.6%, and 10.6% in the SR group (n = 84), respectively, with no significant difference (p = 0.31). Neither corresponding OS rates (96.4%, 84.8%, and 73.0% vs. 95.2%, 85.5%, and 72.1%, p = 0.89) nor DFS rates (76.0%, 52.6%, and 38.1% vs. 76.2%, 44.7%, and 32.3%, p = 0.43) were significantly different between the MWA and SR groups. Whereas MWA obtained fewer complications for both cohorts (both p < 0.05). Conclusion: MWA showed comparable long-term therapeutic outcomes to SR, and it might be an alternative curative option for subcapsular HCC within the Milan criteria. Key Points: • Microwave ablation showed comparable local tumor progression, overall survival, and disease-free survival to surgical resection for subcapsular hepatocellular carcinoma meeting the Milan criteria. • Microwave ablation obtained fewer complications and shorter postoperative hospital stay. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conventional direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimation methods for multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) joint sensing and communication system normally pursue high estimation accuracy and resolution by imposing orthogonal waveforms. However, such operation results in a deterioration of communication performance. In this paper, we propose a nonorthogonal waveform assisted DOA estimation algorithm, where an augmented virtual array is derived by exploiting the nonorthogonal MIMO communication waveforms, while a high communication rate can still be maintained. To estimate the round-trip sensing channels of each subcarrier, we utilize the transmitted symbols as pilot symbols, and obtain all the channel coefficients with a minimum mean square error solver. A virtual channel matrix can be formulated with these channel coefficients, which can be regarded as the samples of an augmented virtual array. Based on that, the subspace processing can be conducted for DOA estimation with fully nonorthogonal waveforms. Furthermore, the rank deficiency property of the equivalent signal matrix of the virtual array is analyzed when the distance of targets are identical. To address the problem, a Toeplitz reconstruction method is proposed to restore the rank of the rank-deficient equivalent signal matrix for DOA estimation. Simulations show that the proposed nonorthogonal waveform assisted DOA estimation algorithm outperforms the conventional methods in terms of resolution and accuracy, while maintaining a satisfactory computational efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Timely diagnosis of bearing faults can effectively predict initial faults and avoid severe accidents. Ordinary neural networks have achieved relatively high accuracy for bearing failure classification. However, for the convolution process in neural networks, convolution kernels of fixed size are used across the whole image acquired by the time-frequency transformation, which is prone to overlook the intrinsic local time-frequency features of data. So as to solve this problem that the kernel may not reflect the local time-frequency characteristics of the non-stationary signal, a new method for planning convolutional kernels is proposed in this paper. We leverage variable kernels to capture the time-frequency resolution altering nature within the non-stationary signals. Firstly, starting from the time-frequency characteristics of non-stationary signals, the theoretical basis of adopting variable convolution kernels is analyzed, and the impact of Heisenberg's measurement inaccuracy principle on the design of the learning framework is analyzed in-depth with wavelet analysis as an example. Secondly, since the performance of different wavelet basis functions on time-frequency resolution varies dramatically, after comprehensive study of the mutual relationship between these resolutions, a proper criteria is deduced to deliver the measurement of performances, and the Gabor wavelet basis is chosen according to this principle. This design can be obtained by using wavelet analysis parameters before learning and training. This method is orthogonal to the model training process and can be plug-and-play with other deep learning frameworks. Finally, it is shown through datasets and practical experiments that the proposed method outperforms other newly proposed classification methods in terms of achieving higher accuracy in less time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Transrectal (TR) ultrasound guided prostate biopsy and transperineal (TP) ultrasound guided prostate biopsy are the two most commonly used methods to detect prostate cancer, the detection rate of the two biopsy approaches may differ in patients with different clinical characteristics. Here we aimed to compare the prostate cancer detection rate and positive rate of biopsy cores between TR and TP prostate biopsy in patients with different clinical characteristics. Methods: We retrospectively analyzed and compared the clinical data of 452 patients underwent TR or TP prostate biopsy in our hospital from June 2017 to September 2021. And patients were stratified according to several clinical characteristic (serum PSA level, prostate volume, PSA density, T stage and ISUP grade), cancer detection rate and positive rate of biopsy cores were compared in different stratified groups. Results: There was no significant difference in age, PSA level, prostate volume, and PSA density between the TR and TP groups. TR group had a higher overall cancer detection rate and positive rate of biopsy cores than TP group. Further subgroup analysis showed that TR group had a higher cancer detection rate in patients with prostate volumes 30–80 mL, and that the TR group had a higher positive rate of biopsy cores among the patients with T3–T4 stages, while TP group had a higher positive rates of biopsy cores among the patients with T1–T2 stages. There were no significant differences between the TR and TP groups for each subgroup when stratified by PSA level, PSA density and ISUP grade. Conclusions: TR approach may have advantage in patients with prostate volumes 30–80 mL and T3–T4 stages, while TP approach may have advantage in patients with T1–T2 stages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metal laminated composites are widely used in industrial and commercial applications due to their excellent overall performance. In this study, the copper/graphene-aluminum-copper/graphene (Cu/Gr-Al-Cu/Gr) laminated composites were prepared by ingenious hot pressing design. Raman, optical microscope (OM), scanning electron microscope (SEM), van der Pauw (vdP), and X-Ray Diffractometer (XRD) were used to investigate the graphene status, interface bonding, diffusion layer thickness, electrical conductivity, Miller indices and secondary phases, respectively. The results demonstrate that the Cu-Al interfaces in the Cu/Gr-Al-Cu/Gr composites were free of pores, cracks and other defects and bonded well. The number of graphene layers was varied by regulating the thickness of the Cu/Gr layer, with the Cu/Gr foils fabricated by chemical vapor deposition (CVD). The electrical conductivity of the composite was significantly improved by the induced high-quality interfaces Cu/Gr structure. The increased number of graphene layers is beneficial for enhancing the electrical conductivity of the Cu/Gr-Al-Cu/Gr composite, and the highest conductivity improved by 20.5% compared to that of raw Al. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding the petrogenesis of rare‐metal pegmatites is important for understanding ore‐forming processes and their tectonic settings. In this study, we performed zircon U–Pb geochronological and Hf–O isotopic analyses of the Xiaokalasu, Dakalasu, and Yelaman pegmatites in the Chinese Altay orogen. These pegmatites have low εHf(t) values (−0.6 ~ +4.3), two‐stage model ages of 989 ~ 1,293 Ma, and high δ18O values (+6.52 ~ +11.31), indicating that they may have been derived from the anatexis of mature sedimentary rocks in the deep crust, with a small amount of mantle‐derived or juvenile material. Geochronological and Hf–O isotopic data for granitic intrusions in the Chinese Altay Mountains indicate that the εHf(t) values decreased from the Permian to the Triassic, which implies that two‐stage post‐collisional magmatism occurred in this region. During the Permian, the thin lower crust was cold; thus, magmatism likely originated in the deep crust close to the Moho surface and involved intense mantle–crust interactions. During the Triassic, asthenospheric upwelling provided heat to the lower crust, which increased the geothermal gradient and led to the anatexis of shallow crustal material. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chiral bis‐oxalamide (CBOA)/rare‐earth metal complexes‐catalyzed asymmetric inverse‐electron‐demand oxa‐hetero‐Diels‐Alder (HDA) reactions were investigated under mild reaction conditions, which was performed between β,γ‐unsaturated α‐ketoesters and various electron‐riched dienophiles, such as cyclopentadiene, 2,3‐dihydrofuran, 3,4‐dihydro‐2H‐pyran, tetrahydropyridine as well as phenyl(vinyl)sulfane. Several series of optically active functionalized 3,4‐dihydro‐2H‐pyran or ring fused dihydropyran derivatives were obtained in high yields with high diastereo‐ and enantioselectivity. The procedure was able to tolerate a relatively wide range of substrates. The coordination mode of chiral bis‐oxalamide with Sc(III) was demonstrated by the X‐ray crystallographic structure, and DFT calculations were carried out to uncover the regio‐ and stereocontrol. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: This study aimed to describe a novel double-sheath vacuum suction minimally invasive percutaneous nephrolithotomy (mini-PCNL) to overcome the deficiencies of the conventional procedure. Patients and Methods: Between March 2019 and December 2019, 65 patients (37 males and 28 females) with a mean age of 41 years (range 23–69) underwent mini-PCNL with double-sheath vacuum suction. It consisted of an F20 Y-shaped sheath as an outer sheath and an F16 Y-shaped sheath as an inner sheath, in which the inner sheath was longer than the outer sheath. The oblique arm of the outer sheath and the inner sheath was connected to the perfusion inflow and the vacuum suction, respectively. A 550-μm holmium-YAG laser was introduced for stone fragmentation through the working channel of the mini-nephroscope, which was no longer connected to the perfusion fluid. Results: All procedures were successful. Mean operation time was 50.2 min (range 39–83). Mean hemoglobin decrease was 5.2 g/L (range 1.0–15.5), and no patient needed a blood transfusion. One patient (1.5%) with low fever (<38°C) at day 1 had returned to normal at day 2 without administration of antibiotics. There were no Clavien grade 2–4 complications. Mean postoperative hospital stay was 2.4 days (range 2–6). The initial stone-free rate of PCNL was 81.53% (53 of 65 patients). One month after surgery, the final stone-free rate increased to 90.77% (59/65 patients). Conclusions: The double-sheath vacuum suction mini-PCNL is a safe and effective modality for large renal stones, which might increase the efficiency of stone extraction with low intrapelvic pressure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the chaotic motion of the driven and damped double Sine-Gordon equation is analyzed. We detect the homoclinic and heteroclinic chaos by Melnikov method. The corresponding Melnikov functions are derived. A numerical method to estimate the Melnikov integral is given and its effectiveness is illustrated through an example. Numerical simulations of homoclinic and heteroclinic chaos are precisely demonstrated through several examples. Further, we employ a state feedback control method to suppress both chaos simultaneously. Finally, numerical simulations are utilized to prove the validity of control methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we study the chaotic behavior of a class of hybrid piecewise-smooth system incorporated into an impulsive effect (HPSS-IE) under a periodic perturbation. More precisely, we assume that the unperturbed system with a homoclinic orbit, it transversally jumps across the first switching manifold by an impulsive stimulation and continuously crosses the second switching manifold. Then the corresponding Melnikov-type function is derived. Based on the new Melnikov-type function, the bifurcation and chaotic threshold of the perturbed HPSS-IE are analyzed. Furthermore, numerical simulations are precisely demonstrated through a concrete example. The results indicate that it is an extension work of previous references. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effective measures to improve road accessibility during storms are required as traffic congestion caused by storm floods increasingly constrains the efficiency of urban commuting. However, flood impacts on urban road connectivity are not yet well assessed due to inaccurate simulation of flood processes in urban areas where high-resolution data for drainage networks and gauged hydrological data are insufficient. Thus, this study assesses flood impacts on road network connectivity in an urban area of southern China through joint modeling of 1-D hydrodynamic processes in drainage networks and 2-D flood inundation processes on roads using MIKE Urban and MIKE 21. High-resolution DEM images of 5 m and a drainage network of 5635 pipelines were used for urban hydrological simulation. Flood depths were gauged for model calibration and validation by recruited volunteers in the context of citizen science. The results show that road network connectivity decreases as rainfall increases. More than 40% of road connectivity is lost in the study area when a 1-in-100-year return period rainfall occurs. The study results can help to inform more adaptive strategies for local flood control. The study methods are also applicable to improving urban hydrological modeling in broader regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Energy Harvesting Roadside Unit (EH‐RSU) with self‐powered module will not only effectively reduce the communication load of regional Vehicular Ad Hoc Networks, but also enjoys a low deployment cost. Given the imbalance in communication demands invoked by transportation systems, the EH‐RSU should allocate energy appropriately in accordance with its energy harvesting rate to ensure the communication safety of vehicles within its coverage. Firstly, we propose a novel attention‐based spatial‐temporal graph convolutional network (ASTGCN) to predict the communication load around the EH‐RSU in the road network through the surrounding vehicle information. Secondly, we use the predicted communication load as part of the input parameters to neural network and leverage a double deep Q network to ameliorate the operating states switching strategy of EH‐RSUs by reinforcement learning so that they achieve a more satisfying effective time with limited resources. Finally, we built a dataset by simulation to validate the effectiveness of our model. The results show that our prediction model has a better accuracy and the improved strategy has higher efficiency compared with other methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To compare a novel vacuum suction ureteroscopic laser lithotripsy (VS-URS) with traditional ureteroscopic laser lithotripsy (T-URS) for impacted upper ureteral stones and to better define the potential benefits of VS-URS. Methods: Between May 2019 and March 2021, 158 patients with impacted upper ureteral stones underwent ureteroscopic holmium-YAG laser lithotripsy. Of these, 76 underwent VS-URS and 82 underwent T-URS. In VS-URS procedures, the vacuum suction device is composed of a 5F ureteral catheter and a tee joint. The ureteral catheter is linked to the vacuum aspirator by the sidearm of the tee joint, and a 200 μm fiber is inserted through the tee joint and the ureteral catheter into the stone site for lithotripsy. Results: When compared to the T-URS group, the VS-URS group had a shorter mean operation time (38.18 ± 6.37 min vs. 46.65 ± 5.66 min; P = 0.000), lower fever rate (3.9% vs. 14.6%; P < 0.022), less stone retropulsion (5.3% vs. 18.3%; P = 0.012), lower extra management rate (6.58% vs. 21.95%; P = 0.006), and a higher stone-free rate of the first postoperative day (88.2% vs. 72.0%; P = 0.011). There were no significant differences in stone-free rates 1 month after surgery between groups (94.7% vs. 92.7%; P = 0.748). Conclusions: VS-URS is an effective modality for impacted upper ureteral stones, and has a shorter operating time, lower fever rate, less stone retropulsion, and a higher primary stone-free rate compared with T-URS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]