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FPNTs were synthesized to measure the temperature dynamically in in vitro 3D co-cultured tumor spheroids.

This work aims to demonstrate a facile method for the controlled orientation of nanostructures of block copolymer (BCP) thin films. A simple diblock copolymer system, polystyrene

Efficient implementations of two (or three) qubit logical gates are critical for the large-scale realization of quantum computation in decoherence-free subspace (DFS) immune to the influence of decoherence effect. In this paper, we propose some schemes for setting up a family of quantum control gates, including controlled-NOT (CNOT), Toffoli, and Fredkin gates for two or three logical qubits by means of cross-Kerr nonlinearities in DFS. These three logical gates require neither complicated quantum computational circuits nor auxiliary photons (or entangled states). The success probabilities of three logical gates are approximate unit by performing the corresponding classical feed-forward operations based on the different measuring results of the X homodyne detectors, and their fidelities are robust against the photon loss with the current technology.The proposed logical gates rely on only simple linear-optics elements, available single qubit operations, and mature measurement methods, making our proposed gates be feasible and efficient in practical applications., 11 pages, 9 figures

Data constraints are widely used in FinTech systems for monitoring data consistency and diagnosing anomalous data manipulations. However, many equivalent data constraints are created redundantly during the development cycle, slowing down the FinTech systems and causing unnecessary alerts. We present EqDAC, an efficient decision procedure to determine the data constraint equivalence. We first propose the symbolic representation for semantic encoding and then introduce two light-weighted analyses to refute and prove the equivalence, respectively, which are proved to achieve in polynomial time. We evaluate EqDAC upon 30,801 data constraints in a FinTech system. It is shown that EqDAC detects 11,538 equivalent data constraints in three hours. It also supports efficient equivalence searching with an average time cost of 1.22 seconds, enabling the system to check new data constraints upon submission., 14 pages, 11 figures, accepted by ICSE 2023

Detailed contact angle measurements are performed for protein drops on phenylcarbamide (PC), polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA), silicon nitride, and glass substrates by goniometer-sessile drop technique. Drop sizes are ranged from 0.1 to 6 w l with radius of curvature less than 1 mm. The bovine serum albumin (BSA) protein concentrations are 0.0, 0.1, 1.0, and 10 mg/ml. The results show weak dependence of the drop size for deionized water drops on all substrates and increased dependence of the drop size for protein drops with different protein concentrations. The significance of drop size effect varies from substrate to substrate; the effect is strongest for PC substrate, which is a nearly hydrophobic surface. The drop size dependence can be partly explained by the modified Young's equation.

Additional file 1. Supplementary materials and methods. Additional Figures S1 to S10.

The nanoscale photothermal effect and the optofluidic convection around plasmonic nanoparticles drive the application of such nanoparticles in micro-environment. In this work, heat transfer and fluid flow around Au nanospheres and nanorods in water medium under continuous and pulsed wave laser irradiance was investigated using an FEM based numerical framework. Au nanospheres of a wide range of diameter: 40 nm = Diameter (D) = 180 nm and relatively large nanorods (diameter: 50 nm) with varying aspect ratio (1 = Aspect ratio (A) = 5) and orientation (0 degrees = ? = 90 degrees, ? = 0 degrees, 90 degrees) with respect to the incident EM radiation were investigated for continuous wave (CW) and pulsed wave laser. It was found that although nanorods can attain much higher temperature than nanospheres, orientation of a nanorod is an important factor to be carefully considered in applications. In micro-scale spherical and hemispherical confinements (diameter < 14.4 p.m), the convective velocity fields around nanoparticles is in the order of 10-9 m/s, with only a weak effect of the slip or no-slip boundary condition on the confining walls. Importantly, the size of the confinement has a strong effect leading to an order of magnitude stronger convection for 14.4 p.m (diameter) spherical confinement as compared to 3.6 p.m confinement. Additionally close proximity of the nanoparticles to the confining walls strongly reduces (by an order of magnitude) the convective currents. The results reported herein provides important insights for the use of photothermal nanoparticles in microscale confined space (e.g. cellular environment) for applications such as optical tweezers, photoporation, etc.

This paper presents Squid, a new conjunctive query synthesis algorithm for searching code with target patterns. Given positive and negative examples along with a natural language description, Squid analyzes the relations derived from the examples by a Datalog-based program analyzer and synthesizes a conjunctive query expressing the search intent. The synthesized query can be further used to search for desired grammatical constructs in the editor. To achieve high efficiency, we prune the huge search space by removing unnecessary relations and enumerating query candidates via refinement. We also introduce two quantitative metrics for query prioritization to select the queries from multiple candidates, yielding desired queries for code search. We have evaluated Squid on over thirty code search tasks. It is shown that Squid successfully synthesizes the conjunctive queries for all the tasks, taking only 2.56 seconds on average., Comment: 32 pages, 7 figures, and 1 table. Accepted by ECOOP 2023

The advances in artificial intelligence that are transforming many fields have yet to make an impact in hearing. Hearing healthcare continues to rely on a labour-intensive service model that fails to provide access to the majority of those in need, while hearing research suffers from a lack of computational tools with the capacity to match the complexities of auditory processing. This Perspective is a call for the artificial intelligence and hearing communities to come together to bring about a technological revolution in hearing. We describe opportunities for rapid clinical impact through the application of existing technologies and propose directions for the development of new technologies to create true artificial auditory systems. There is an urgent need to push hearing towards a future in which artificial intelligence provides critical support for the testing of hypotheses, the development of therapies and the effective delivery of care worldwide. AI has impacted many fields, but hearing has lagged behind. This Perspective calls for a collaboration between the AI and hearing communities, with the goal of transforming hearing healthcare and research.

Three-dimensional (3D) spheroid culture provides opportunities to model tumor growth closer to its natural context. The collagen network in the extracellular matrix supports autonomic tumor cell proliferation, but its presence and role in tumor spheroids remain unclear. In this research, we developed an in vitro 3D co-culture model in a microwell 3D (μ-well 3D) cell-culture array platform to mimic the tumor microenvironment (TME). The modular setup is used to characterize the paracrine signaling molecules and the role of the intraspheroidal collagen network in cancer drug resistance. The μ-well 3D platform is made up of poly(dimethylsiloxane) that contains 630 round wells for individual spheroid growth. Inside each well, the growth surface measured 500 μm in diameter and was functionalized with the amphiphilic copolymer. HCT-8 colon cancer cells and/or NIH3T3 fibroblasts were seeded in each well and incubated for up to 9 days for TME studies. It was observed that NIH3T3 cells promoted the kinetics of tumor organoid formation. The two types of cells self-organized into core-shell chimeric tumor spheroids (CTSs) with fibroblasts confined to the shell and cancer cells localized to the core. Confocal microscopy analysis indicated that a type-I collagen network developed inside the CTS along with increased TGF-β1 and α-SMA proteins. The results were correlated with a significantly increased stiffness in 3D co-cultured CTS up to 52 kPa as compared to two-dimensional (2D) co-culture. CTS was more resistant to 5-FU (IC50 = 14.0 ± 3.9 μM) and Regorafenib (IC50 = 49.8 ± 9.9 μM) compared to cells grown under the 2D condition 5-FU (IC50 = 12.2 ± 3.7 μM) and Regorafenib (IC50 = 5.9 ± 1.9 μM). Targeted collagen homeostasis with Sclerotiorin led to damaged collagen structure and disrupted the type-I collagen network within CTS. Such a treatment significantly sensitized collagen-supported CTS to 5-FU (IC50 = 4.4 ± 1.3 μM) and to Regorafenib (IC50 = 0.5 ± 0.2 μM). In summary, the efficient formation of colon cancer CTSs in a μ-well 3D culture platform allows exploration of the desmoplastic TME. The novel role of intratumor collagen quality as a drug sensitization target warrants further investigation.

In 1665, Robert Hooke published his revolutionary book Micrographia [...]

IntroductionThis work aims to assess the accuracy of robotic assistance guided by a videometric tracker in deep brain stimulation (DBS).MethodsWe retrospectively reviewed a total of 30 DBS electrode implantations, assisted by the Remebot robotic system, with a novel frameless videometric registration workflow. Then we selected 30 PD patients who used stereotactic frame surgery to implant electrodes during the same period. For each electrode, accuracy was assessed using radial and axial error.ResultsThe average radial error of the robot-assisted electrode implantation was 1.28 ± 0.36 mm, and the average axial error was 1.20 ± 0.40 mm. No deaths or associated hemorrhages, infections or poor incision healing occurred.ConclusionRobot-assisted implantation guided by a videometric tracker is accurate and safe.

Laser mediated heat transfer and optofluidic nano-scale convection can be exploited in the photothermal applications of plamonic nanoparticles in different micro-environment. In this work, heat transfer and fluid flow around Au nanospheres and nanorods in water medium under continuous and pulsed wave laser irradiance was investigated using an FEM based numerical framework. Au nanospheres of a wide range of diameter: 40 nm ≤ Diameter (D) ≤ 180 nm and nanorods with varying aspect ratio (1 ≤ Aspect ratio (A) ≤ 5) and orientation (0o ≤ θ ≤ 90o, ϕ = 0o, 90o) with respect to the incident EM radiation were investigated for continuous wave (CW) and pulsed wave laser. Relatively large Au nanorods dimensions similar to the models were also synthesized. The numerical results were validated by comparison with the experimental optical cross-section of the synthesized nanorods. It was found that although nanorods can attain much higher temperature than nanospheres, orientation of a nanorod is an important factor to be carefully considered in applications. In micro-scale spherical and hemispherical confinements (diameter < 14.4 μm) convective velocity fields around nanoparticles were determined for slip and no-slip condition on the confining walls. It was found that slip boundary condition on the confining walls has a moderate effect on the strength of the flow field. While, the effect of the proximity of the nanoparticle from the walls is considerable.

Personalised drug delivery systems with the ability to offer real-time imaging and control release are an advancement in diagnostic and therapeutic applications. This allows for a tailored drug dosage specific to the patient with a release profile that offers the optimum therapeutic effect. Coupling this application with medical imaging capabilities, real-time contrast can be viewed to display the interaction with the host. Current approaches towards such novelty produce a drug burst release profile and contrasting agents associated with side effects as a result of poor encapsulation of these components. In this study, a 3D-printed drug delivery matrix with real-time imaging is engineered. Polycaprolactone (PCL) forms the bulk structure and encapsulates tetracycline hydrochloride (TH), an antibiotic drug and Iron Oxide Nanoparticles (IONP, Fe3O4), a superparamagnetic contrasting agent. Hot melt extrusion (HME) coupled with fused deposition modelling (FDM) is utilised to promote the encapsulation of TH and IONP. The effect of additives on the formation of micropores (10–20 µm) on the 3D-printed surface was investigated. The high-resolution process demonstrated successful encapsulation of both bioactive and nano components to present promising applications in drug delivery systems, medical imaging and targeted therapy.

High-efficiency quantum information processing is equivalent to the fewest quantum resources and the simplest operations by means of logic qubit gates. Based on the reflection geometry of a single photon interacting with a three-level $\Lambda$-typle atom-cavity system, we present some refined protocols for realizing controlled-not (CNOT), Fredkin, and Toffoli gates on hybrid systems. The first control qubit of our gates is encoded on a flying photon, and the rest qubits are encoded on the atoms in optical cavity. Moreover, these quantum gates can be extended to the optimal synthesis of multi-qubit CNOT, Fredkin and Toffoli gates with O(n) optical elements without auxiliary photons or atoms. Further, the simplest single-qubit operations are applied to the photon only, which make these logic gates experimentally feasible with current technology.

Background:. Deep brain stimulation (DBS) has seizure-suppressing effects but the molecular mechanisms underlying its therapeutic action remain unclear. This study aimed to systematically elucidate the mechanisms underlying DBS-induced seizure suppression at a molecular level. Methods:. We established a macaque model of mesial temporal lobe epilepsy (mTLE), and continuous high-frequency hippocampus DBS (hip-DBS) was applied for 3 months. The effects of hip-DBS on hippocampus gene expression were examined using high-throughput microarray analysis followed by bioinformatics analysis. Moreover, the microarray results were validated using quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) and Western blot analyses. Results:. The results showed that chronic hip-DBS modulated the hippocampal gene expression. We identified 4119 differentially expressed genes and assigned these genes to 16 model profiles. Series test of cluster analysis showed that profiles 5, 3, and 2 were the predominant expression profiles. Moreover, profile 5 was mainly involved in focal adhesion and extracellular matrix-receptor interaction pathway. Nine dysregulated genes (Arhgap5, Col1a2, Itgb1, Pik3r1, Lama4, Fn1, Col3a1, Itga9, and Shc4) and three genes (Col1a2, Itgb1, and Flna) in these two pathways were further validated by qRT-PCR and Western blot analyses, respectively, which showed a concordance. Conclusion:. Our findings suggest that hip-DBS could markedly reverse mTLE-induced abnormal gene expression. Findings from this study establish the basis for further investigation of the underlying regulatory mechanisms of DBS for mTLE.

Levodopa-induced dyskinesia (LID) is a common complication of chronic dopamine replacement therapy in the treatment of Parkinson’s disease (PD), and a noble cause of disability in advanced PD patients. Circular RNA (circRNA) is a novel type of non-coding RNA with a covalently closed-loop structure, which can regulate gene expression and participate in many biological processes. However, the biological roles of circRNAs in LID are not completely known. In the present study, we established typical LID rat models by unilateral lesions of the medial forebrain bundle and repeated levodopa therapy. High-throughput next-generation sequencing was used to screen circRNAs differentially expressed in the brain of LID and non-LID (NLID) rats, and key circRNAs were selected according to bioinformatics analyses. Regarding fold change ≥2 and p < 0.05 as the cutoff value, there were a total of 99 differential circRNAs, including 39 up-regulated and 60 down-regulated circRNAs between the NLID and LID groups. The expression of rno-Rsf1_0012 was significantly increased in the striatum of LID rats and competitively bound rno-mir-298-5p. The high expression of target genes PCP and TBP in LID rats also supports the conclusion that rno-Rsf1_0012 may be related to the occurrence of LID.

We previously developed chicken interleukin-1β (IL-1β) mutants as single-dose adjuvants that induce protective immunity when co-administered with an avian vaccine. However, livestock such as pigs may require a vaccine adjuvant delivery system that provides long-lasting protection to reduce the need for successive booster doses. Therefore, we developed chitosan-coated alginate microparticles as a carrier for bovine serum albumin (BSA) or porcine IL-1β (pIL-1β) and assessed their physical, chemical, and biological properties. Electrospraying of the BSA-loaded alginate microparticles (BSA/ALG MPs) resulted in an encapsulation efficiency of 50%, and those MPs were then coated with chitosan (BSA/ALG/CHI MPs). Optical and scanning electron microscopy, zeta potential analysis, and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy were used to characterize these MPs. The BSA encapsulation parameters were applied to ALG/CHI MPs loaded with pIL-1β, which were not cytotoxic to porcine fibroblasts but had enhanced bio-activity over unencapsulated pIL-1β. The chitosan layer of the BSA/ALG/CHI MPs prevented burst release and facilitated sustained release of pIL-1β for at least 28 days. In conclusion, BSA/ALG/CHI MPs prepared as a carrier for pIL-1β may be used as an adjuvant for the formulation of pig vaccines.

Purpose: With the rapid development of new technologies and resources, many avenues exist to adapt and grow as a profession. Embracing change can lead to growth, evolution, and new opportunities. Audiologists have the potential to harness many of these technological advancements to improve patient health care. Adoption and incorporation of these new technologies will likely benefit educational experiences, research methods, clinical practice, and clinical outcomes. Method: This commentary highlights some historical perspectives and accepted practices while illustrating opportunities to embrace new ideas and technologies. We also provide examples of how such adoption may yield positive outcomes. Specifically, we address embracing technology in audiology education, how artificial intelligence may influence patient performance in realistic listening scenarios, the convergence between hearing aids and consumer electronics, and the emergence of audiology telehealth services and their inclusion in clinical practice. Models of change are also discussed and related to audiology. Conclusion: This commentary aims to be a call to action for the entire profession of audiology to consider conscientiously the adoption of useful, evidence-based technological advancements in education, research, and clinical practice.

This diagnostic study assesses the performance of the Apple Watch Noise application in comparison with a class 1 sound level meter.

LED healthy light source by using a blue LED chip to excite phosphor was prepared successfully. Four kinds of LED commercial phosphors (cyan phosphor with a peak wavelength of 498 nm, green phosphor with 520 nm, yellow-green phosphor with 546 nm, and red phosphor with 628 nm) were selected that could be excited by blue light. A series of experimental studies were carried out on the different amounts of glue, different powder-glue ratio, different combinations of phosphors, and the influence of different driving currents. Trough the optimization of the experimental scheme, we obtained a LED healthy light source spectrum with luminous efficiency higher than 124 lm/w, color rendering index higher than 80, color temperature around 4000 k. These spectra are in good agreement with the full spectrum of sunlight, and the spectral continuity and uniformity are better, which accord with the requirements of bright (dark) vision, and the proportion of the blue spectrum is less than 2.4%, which meets the high quality and healthy lighting requirements of safety and comfort.

Objective To explore the pathophysiologic mechanism of SNCA gene in the early⁃stage of Parkinson's disease (PD). Methods Wild type (WT group, n=10) and SNCA Ala53Thr base substitution mice (TG group, n=10) were selected for further experiments. Endogenous metabolites in olfactory bulb (OB) of transgenic and wild type mice were detected and analyzed by high performance liquid chromatography⁃tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC⁃MS/MS). Then the endogenous metabolites were identified through mzCloud and determined by molecular formula and molecular weight. The differential endogenous metabolites were obtained by principal component analysis (PCA), partial least squares discrimination analysis (PLS⁃DA), orthogonal partial least squares discriminant analysis (OPLS⁃DA) and cluster analysis. Finally, the pathway and interaction network between the differential endogenous metabolites and corresponding pathways were constructed. Results Finally 29 variations were identified as differential metabolites. Among them, the relative expressions of phosphatidylcholine (PC), phosphatidylethanolamine (PE), vitamin C, sphingomyelin (SM), phosphatidylglycerol (PG) and glutamic acid were elevated in TG group (P＜0.05, for all) and the negative relationship was shown between elevated metabolite and decreased metabolite in relative expression, while the relative expressions of phosphalipids, taurine, ceramide valine and γ⁃aminobutyric acid (GABA) were decreased in TG group (P＜0.05, for all) and the relationship of relative expression among them was positive. The related metabolic pathways were mainly associated with the taurine and hypotaurine metabolism, glutamine and glutamate metabolism, ascorbate and aldarate metabolism, glycerophospholipid metabolism and alanine, aspartate and glutamate metabolism, included taurine, D⁃glutamate, vitamine C, phospholipid, LysoPC [18: 2 (9Z, 12Z)] and GABA all 6 significant metabolites. Conclusions The experiment verified pathological changes of OB in the early stage of PD. Meanwhile the differences in phosphatides could be a direct result of SNCA Ala53Thr mutation. Furthermore, malfunction of neurons in OB is also observed and may be contributed to the abnormal phosphatides' metabolism.

Use of artificial intelligence (AI) is a burgeoning field in otolaryngology and the communication sciences. A virtual symposium on the topic was convened from Duke University on October 26, 2020, and was attended by more than 170 participants worldwide. This review presents summaries of all but one of the talks presented during the symposium; recordings of all the talks, along with the discussions for the talks, are available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktfewrXvEFg and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gQ5qX2v3rg . Each of the summaries is about 2500 words in length and each summary includes two figures. This level of detail far exceeds the brief summaries presented in traditional reviews and thus provides a more-informed glimpse into the power and diversity of current AI applications in otolaryngology and the communication sciences and how to harness that power for future applications.

Objectives: our group explored the correlation between postoperative coordinates of the electrode contacts, VTA, and anxiety and depression symptoms in Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients after subthalamic nucleus deep brain stimulation (STN-DBS). Methods: STN-DBS was conducted on PD patients (n = 57) for six months with follow-up. Clinical outcomes were explored using the unified Parkinson’s disease rating scale Part III (UPDRS-III), the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HAM-A), and the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAM-D) before and after surgery. At the Montreal Neurological Institute (MNI), the location of active contacts and the volume of tissue activated (VTA) were calculated. Results: patient evaluations took place preoperatively and follow-ups took place at 1 month, 3 months, and 6 months. The average patient improvement rates for HAM-A and HAM-D scores at the 6-month follow-up were 41.7% [interquartile range (IQR) 34.9%] and 37.5% (IQR 33.4%), respectively (both p < 0.001). In medication-off, there were negative correlations between the HAM-A improvement rate and the Z-axis coordinate of the active contact (left side: r = −0.308, p = 0.020; right side: r = −0.390, p = 0.003), and negative correlations between the HAM-D improvement rate and the Z-axis coordinate of the active contact (left side: r = −0.345, p = 0.009; right side: r = −0.521, p = 0.001). There were positive correlations between the HAM-A and HAM-D scores improvement rate at 6 months after surgery and bilateral VTA in the right STN limbic subregion (HAM-A: r = 0.314, p = 0.018; HAM-D: r = 0.321, p = 0.015). Conclusion: bilateral STN-DBS can improve anxiety and depression symptoms in PD patients. The closer the stimulation to the ventral limbic region of the STN, the more significant the improvement in anxiety and depression symptoms of PD patients.

Insufficient prognosis of local recurrence contributes to the poor progression-free survival rate and death in colorectal cancer (CRC) patients. Various biomarkers have been explored in predicting CRC recurrence. This study investigated the expressions of plasma/exosomal microRNA-21 (miR-21) in 113 CRC patients by qPCR, their values of predicting CRC recurrence, and the possibility to improve the prognostic efficacy in early CRC recurrence in stratified patients by combined biomarkers including circulating miR-21s, circulating tumour cells/microemboli (CTCs/CTM), and serum carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA)/carbohydrate antigen 19-9 (CA19-9). Expressions of plasma and exosomal miR-21s were significantly correlated (p < 0.0001) in all and late-stage patients, presenting similar correlations with other biomarkers. However, stage IV patients stratified by a high level of exosomal miR-21 and stage I to III patients stratified by a high level of plasma miR-21 displayed significantly worse survival outcomes in predicting CRC recurrence, suggesting their different values to predict CRC recurrence in stratified patients. Comparable and even better performances in predicting CRC recurrence in late-stage patients were found by CTCs/CTM from our blood samples as sensitive biomarkers. Improved prognosing efficacy in CRC recurrence and better outcomes to significantly differentiate recurrence in stratified patients could be obtained by analysing combined biomarkers.

Background: Due to the noninvasive nature of boron neutron capture therapy (BNCT), it is considered a promising cancer treatment method. Aim: To investigate whether polyvinyl alcohol/boric acid crosslinked nanoparticles (PVA/BA NPs) are an efficient delivery system for BNCT. Materials & methods: PVA/BA NPs were synthesized and cocultured with brain and oral cancers cells for BNCT. Results: PVA/BA NPs had a boron-loading capacity of 7.83 ± 1.75 w/w%. They accumulated in brain and oral cancers cells at least threefold more than in fibroblasts and macrophages. The IC50 values of the brain and oral cancers cells were at least ninefold and sixfold lower than those of fibroblasts and macrophages, respectively. Conclusion: Theoretically, PVA/BA NPs target brain and oral cancers cells and could offer improved therapeutic outcomes of BNCT.

Debris avalanches have complex structures due to the internal discreteness of fragmentation events. From a meso perspective, a debris avalanche is essentially a collection of debris particles of various sizes. Friction and collision events are directly influenced by the gradation of debris particles, restricting the movement process of debris avalanches. Accordingly, a series of numerical simulations have been conducted to research the influence of motion behavior based on experimental tests. The results indicate that the inhomogeneous character of a debris avalanche creates a conducive particle structure for the movement of the debris avalanche, in which the fine particles can play a role in the conversion of sliding to rolling at the bottom, causing the reduction of friction dissipation and the differentiation of particle friction resistance along the vertical direction, which continues until deposition. Sudden decreases in friction resistance occurring on high-speed, fluid-like debris avalanches are primarily correlated to the particular particle structure due to the significant inhomogeneity of particle gradation.

International audience; Copper/bismuth sulfide heterojunctions boost the catalytic and photoresponsive properties engendered antibacterial activity against clinically isolated multidrug-resistant bacteria and their associated biofilms.We report a one-pot facile synthesis of highly photoresponsive bovine serum albumin (BSA) templated bismuth-copper sulfide nanocomposites (BSA-BiZ/CuxS NCs, where BiZ represents in situ formed Bi2S3 and bismuth oxysulfides (BOS)). As-formed surface vacancies and BiZ/CuxS heterojunctions impart superior catalytic, photodynamic and photothermal properties. Upon near-infrared (NIR) irradiation, the BSA-BiZ/CuxS NCs exhibit broad-spectrum antibacterial activity, not only against standard multidrug-resistant (MDR) bacterial strains but also against clinically isolated MDR bacteria and their associated biofilms. The minimum inhibitory concentration of BSA-BiZ/CuxS NCs is 14-fold lower than that of BSA-CuxS NCs because their multiple heterojunctions and vacancies facilitated an amplified phototherapeutic response. As-prepared BSA-BiZ/CuxS NCs exhibited substantial biofilm inhibition (90%) and eradication (>75%) efficiency under NIR irradiation. Furthermore, MRSA-infected diabetic mice were immensely treated with BSA-BiZ/CuxS NCs coupled with NIR irradiation by destroying the mature biofilm on the wound site, which accelerated the wound healing process via collagen synthesis and epithelialization. We demonstrate that BSA-BiZ/CuxS NCs with superior antimicrobial activity and high biocompatibility hold great potential as an effective photosensitive agent for the treatment of biofilm-associated infections.

Acoustic simulations of cochlear implants (CIs) allow for studies of perceptual performance with minimized effects of large CI individual variability. Different from conventional simulations using continuous sinusoidal or noise carriers, the present study employs pulsatile Gaussian-enveloped tones (GETs) to simulate several key features in modern CIs. Subject to the time-frequency uncertainty principle, the GET has a well-defined tradeoff between its duration and bandwidth. Two types of GET vocoders were implemented and evaluated in normal-hearing listeners. In the first implementation, constant 100-Hz GETs were used to minimize within-channel temporal overlap while different GET durations were used to simulate electric channel interaction. This GET vocoder could produce vowel and consonant recognition similar to actual CI performance. In the second implementation, 900-Hz/channel pulse trains were directly mapped to 900-Hz GET trains to simulate the maxima selection and amplitude compression of a widely-usedn-of-m processing strategy, or the Advanced Combination Encoder. The simulated and actual implant performance of speech-in-noise recognition was similar in terms of the overall trend, absolute mean scores, and standard deviations. The present results suggest that the pulsatile GET vocoders can be used as alternative vocoders to simultaneously simulate several key CI processing features and result in similar speech perception performance to that with modern CIs.

How is information processed in the brain during perception? Mechanistic insight is achieved only when experiments are employed to test formal or computational models. In analogy to lesion studies, phantom perception may serve as a vehicle to understand the fundamental processing principles underlying auditory perception. With a special focus on tinnitus -- as the prime example of auditory phantom perception -- we review recent work at the intersection of artificial intelligence, psychology, and neuroscience. In particular, we discuss why everyone with tinnitus suffers from hearing loss, but not everyone with hearing loss suffers from tinnitus. We argue that the increase of sensory precision due to Bayesian inference could be caused by intrinsic neural noise and lead to a prediction error in the cerebral cortex. Hence, two fundamental processing principles - being ubiquitous in the brain - provide the most explanatory power for the emergence of tinnitus: predictive coding as a top-down, and stochastic resonance as a complementary bottom-up mechanism. We conclude that both principles play a crucial role in healthy auditory perception., Comment: arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:2010.01914

Highly efficient intracellular delivery strategies are essential for developing therapeutic, diagnostic, biological, and various biomedical applications. The recent advancement of micro/nanotechnology has focused numerous researches towards developing microfluidic device-based strategies due to the associated high throughput delivery, cost-effectiveness, robustness, and biocompatible nature. The delivery strategies can be carrier-mediated or membrane disruption-based, where membrane disruption methods find popularity due to reduced toxicity, enhanced delivery efficiency, and cell viability. Among all of the membrane disruption techniques, the mechanoporation strategies are advantageous because of no external energy source required for membrane deformation, thereby achieving high delivery efficiencies and increased cell viability into different cell types with negligible toxicity. The past two decades have consequently seen a tremendous boost in mechanoporation-based research for intracellular delivery and cellular analysis. This article provides a brief review of the most recent developments on microfluidic-based mechanoporation strategies such as microinjection, nanoneedle arrays, cell-squeezing, and hydroporation techniques with their working principle, device fabrication, cellular delivery, and analysis. Moreover, a brief discussion of the different mechanoporation strategies integrated with other delivery methods has also been provided. Finally, the advantages, limitations, and future prospects of this technique are discussed compared to other intracellular delivery techniques., Graphical abstract Image 1

Animal studies have discovered that noise, even at levels that produce no permanent threshold shift, may cause cochlear damage and selective nerve degeneration. A hallmark of such damage, or synaptopathy, is recovered threshold but reduced suprathreshold amplitude for the auditory brainstem response (ABR) wave I. The objective of the present study is to evaluate whether the ABR wave I amplitude or slope can be used to diagnose tinnitus in humans. A total of 43 human subjects, consisting of 21 with tinnitus and 22 without tinnitus, participated in the study. The subjects were on average 44 ± 24 (standard deviation) years old and 16 were female; a subgroup of 19 were young adults with normal audiograms from 125 to 8000 Hz. The ABR was measured using ear canal recording tiptrodes for clicks, 1000, 4000 and 8000 Hz tone bursts at 30, 50, and 70 dB nHL. Compared with control subjects, tinnitus subjects did not show reduced ABR wave I amplitude or slope in either the entire group of 21 tinnitus subjects or a subset of tinnitus subjects with normal audiograms. Despite the small sample size and diverse tinnitus population, the present result suggests that low signal-to-noise ratios in non-invasive measurement of the ABR limit its clinical utility in diagnosing tinnitus in humans.

High-efficiency quantum information processing is equivalent to the fewest quantum resources and the simplest operations by means of logic qubit gates. Based on the reflection geometry of a single photon interacting with a three-level $Λ$-typle atom-cavity system, we present some refined protocols for realizing controlled-not (CNOT), Fredkin, and Toffoli gates on hybrid systems. The first control qubit of our gates is encoded on a flying photon, and the rest qubits are encoded on the atoms in optical cavity. Moreover, these quantum gates can be extended to the optimal synthesis of multi-qubit CNOT, Fredkin and Toffoli gates with O(n) optical elements without auxiliary photons or atoms. Further, the simplest single-qubit operations are applied to the photon only, which make these logic gates experimentally feasible with current technology.

The emergence of metaverse brings tremendous evolution to Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), which could certify the ownership the unique digital asset in the cyber world. The NFT market has garnered unprecedented attention from investors and created billions of dollars in transaction volume. Meanwhile, securing NFT is still a challenging issue. Recently, numerous incidents of NFT theft have been reported, leading to incalculable losses for holders. We propose a decentralized NFT anti-theft mechanism called TokenPatronus, which supports the general ERC-721 standard and provide the holders with strong property protection. TokenPatronus contains pre-event protection, in-event interruption, and post-event replevin enhancements for the complete NFTs transactions stages. Four modules are designed to make up the decentralized anti-theft mechanism, including the decentralized access control (DAC), the decentralized risk management (DRM), the decentralized arbitration system (DAS) and the ERC-721G standard smart contract. TokenPatronus is performing on the Turtlecase NFT project of Ethereum and will support more blockchains in the future., Comment: submitted to CESC 2022 as a work-in-progress paper

We report infrared (IR) pulse laser-activated highly efficient parallel intracellular delivery by using an array of titanium microdish (TMD) device. Upon IR laser pulse irradiation, a two-dimensional array of TMD device generated photothermal cavitation bubbles to disrupt the cell membrane surface and create transient membrane pores to deliver biomolecules into cells by a simple diffusion process. We successfully delivered the dyes and different sizes of dextran in different cell types with variations of laser pulses. Our platform has the ability to transfect more than a million cells in a parallel fashion within a minute. The best results were achieved for SiHa cells with a delivery efficiency of 96% and a cell viability of around 98% for propidium iodide dye using 600 pulses, whereas a delivery efficiency of 98% and a cell viability of 100% were obtained for dextran 3000 MW delivery using 700 pulses. For dextran 10,000 MW, the delivery efficiency was 92% and the cell viability was 98%, respectively. The device is compact, easy-to-use, and potentially applicable for cellular therapy and diagnostic purposes.

In this work, we aim to study zinc oxide (ZnO)-based functional materials over cotton fabrics and their effects after gamma ray exposure of 9 kGy. We found that the binding of the nanoparticles with cotton fabrics can be enhanced after irradiation. This could be due to the oxygen deficiency or defects created in the interface between ZnO and cotton fabrics after irradiation. Near-edge X-ray absorption fine structure and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) were used to detect the oxygen inadequacies generated in the interior and at the surface of the ZnO nanoparticles after gamma ray exposure. XPS results showed that the binding energy of Zn shifts by 2 eV at 1.5 kGy and by 4 eV at 9 kGy. This huge shift of about 4 eV is completely different from other works due to the reaction that takes place on the interface between ZnO nanostructures and cotton fabrics after gamma ray irradiation. Overall, this work suggests that after gamma ray irradiation, there is an enhanced level of binding between the coated functional nanoparticles and cotton fabrics, which can be advantageous for the textile industries.

In this paper, a phosphoric acid fuel cell integrated with reformer and evaporator is demonstrated. Oxidative steam reforming of methanol (OSRM) process is employed in this system in cooperated with a high efficient evaporator, and the reacted gas is sent into a phosphorus-acid fuel cell (PAFC) for direct power generation after surplus methanol/water filtration. The results show that the maximum power density of this hybrid system achieves 277 mW/cm2 without CO2 removal, while it achieves 485 mW/cm2 when employing pure hydrogen as the fuel.

Proteins are the essential components of all living creatures that link genes and bio-functionalities, and their crystallizations have attracted much interest as the study of the 3D structures thro...

Aim: To improve the killing efficacy of head and neck squamous cells (SAS) by boric acid-mediated boron neutron capture therapy (BNCT). Materials & methods: Boric acid-containing chitosan/alginate/polyvinyl alcohol nanoparticles (B-capNPs) were manufactured using the nano-electrospray process. Results: Less than 10% of the boric acid leaked from the B-capNPs over 2 days. The B-capNPs killed up to 2.8-fold more SAS cells and reduced cytotoxicity tenfold when compared with pure boric acid alone. B-capNPs show selective uptake in tumor cells with tumor/normal ratios of SAS to normal (NIH 3T3) and macrophage (RAW 264.7) cells of 4.0 and 3.5, respectively, which are greater than the minimum acceptable tumor/normal ratio for BNCT of 2.5. Conclusion: These findings illustrate that B-capNPs may be more superior as BNCT drugs than pure boric acid.