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This study assesses the global and cross-regional influence of China's currency, the renminbi (RMB). We first develop a theoretical framework to determine the channel through which progress in RMB internationalization can be mapped onto the market influence of the RMB exchange rate on that of other currencies. Using a volatility connectedness approach, we then construct a series of spillover indices reflecting the international influence of the RMB. We find that the RMB's influence is worldwide but is smaller than that of major international currencies, such as the US dollar. Overall, the RMB has basically become a peripheral currency in Greater China, Central Asia, Eastern Europe, and some South Asian economies. Because of the Belt and Road initiative, regionalization of the RMB has also progressed in developing economies; however, China still has far to go in fully achieving internationalization of its currency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper constructs a risk reduction model based on signalling theory to investigate how the platform- and user-oriented signals affect perceived risks, which in turn affect users' actual engagement and purchase behaviours in social commerce. The moderating effects of perceived effectiveness of social commerce institutional mechanisms (PESIM) on the relationships between signals and perceived risks are also considered. Longitudinal data from 226 users of Xiaohongshu were collected to test the proposed hypotheses. We identify signals oriented from platforms and users significantly influence users' perceptions of commerce and participation risks. We also demonstrate that commerce and participation risks influence users' actual engagement and purchase behaviours, respectively. Furthermore, we also verify that PESIM negatively moderates the relationship between signals and perceived risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The composition of microbiota which correlates with infiltrating immune cells and clinical signatures is not clarified in CRC. We applied 4 kinds of bioinformatic tools GSVA (version: 1.42.0), ESTIMATE (version: 1.0.13), CIBERSORT (version: 2.0), and immune-related genes. We found that a total of 8 types of microbiotas appeared in the three immune correlation analyses. Among these microbiotas, significant enrichments in relative abundances associated with immune cell infiltration can be found for the dominant phyla Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, and Actinobacteria. Moreover, there existed correlations between some of the 8 microbiotas and clinical-related indicators. We identified some novel microbiotas involved in immune regulation in CRC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study revealed the non-linear impact of the internet on the spatial structure of intracity employment and how transportation infrastructure moderates this non-linear impact. Using data from 22.47 million enterprises from the China Economic Census of 2004, 2008 and 2013, we found that (1) on average, the internet promotes urban employment agglomeration, but this agglomeration effect diminishes marginally as internet penetration increases; (2) the internet promotes the secondary sector to agglomerate first and then disperse, while it only has an agglomeration effect on the tertiary sector; and (3) improvements in the transportation infrastructure diminish the internet's agglomeration effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Jacobaea cannabifolia is a widely used medicinal plant. The total length of the chloroplast genome was 151,390 bp, and it comprised a large single-copy (LSC, 83,432 bp) region, a small single-copy (SSC, 18,304 bp) region, and a pair of inverted repeats (IRs, 49,654 bp). A total of 130 coding genes were annotated, including 88 protein-coding genes, 8 rRNA genes, and 34 tRNA genes. A phylogenetic tree was showed that J. cannabifolia and other species of the same genus clustered together. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The VIV responses of the circular cylinder at low and moderate Reynolds numbers are calculated according to two-dimensional numerical simulation and the fourth-order Runge–Kutta algorithm. The first part of the study is focused on the applicability of 2D numerical simulation between the response of 2D numerical simulation and the actual response, which can guide the preliminary engineering studies by vortex shedding. The reasonable vortex shedding mode of each branch, and the change process of the trajectory from the '8' type to the 'droplet' type, are discussed in the second part of the study. And independent calculations under different speed reduction conditions are employed to suit practical application scenarios. The comparison shows the applicability of the 2D numerical simulations at low Reynolds numbers. Although the amplitude calculation results at moderate Reynolds numbers are inconsistent with the experimental results, the two-dimensional numerical simulation has good reliability in the trailing vortex capture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The global optimization of interplanetary trajectory design is a challenge and tough problem in deep space. To cope with the extreme nonlinearity of the search space and a large number of locally optimal solutions, a novel hybrid algorithm based on success-history based adaptive differential evolution with linear population size reduction (LSHADE), called HLSHADE, is proposed. In HLSHADE, after the global search finds a better solution, a new two-step local search with an adaptive control parameters strategy is designed to enhance the exploitation ability of HLSHADE. The presented method is tested on well-known global trajectory optimization problems (GTOPs) developed by the Advanced Concepts Team of the European Space Agency (ESA). Experimental results have demonstrated the competitive performance of HLSHADE with respect to the three sets of compared algorithms, including LSHADE and ten of its variants, six famous algorithms in the IEEE Competitions on Evolutionary Computation (CEC) and eleven algorithms in the software platform PyGMO developed by the ESA's Advanced Concepts Team. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electrospraying technique has attracted much attention in food science because of its importance for biological macromolecule encapsulation of food bioactive substances. The purpose of this review is to overview the electrospraying technique and its recent application advances for biological macromolecule encapsulation of food bioactive substances. First, the history, principles, setup, and products of the electrospraying technique are briefly introduced. Second, the application of electrosprayed nano-, micro-, and millimeter-sized particles with solid, porous, core-shell, and multi-core structures for biological macromolecule encapsulation of nutrients is reviewed. Thirdly, the application of electrosprayed micro- and millimeter-sized particles for biological macromolecule encapsulation of probiotics is analyzed. Finally, the application of electrospraying technique for biological macromolecule encapsulation of food bioactive substances is summarized and an outlook is provided. This review will provide guide instruction to the research and development of electrosprayed particles for biological macromolecule encapsulation of food bioactive substances in novel food development. It will be useful for those who are interested to enter this field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the mean and volatility spillover effects of U.S. economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on the RMB exchange rate return and the effects' time-varying features corresponding to the 2015 "8.11" RMB exchange rate reform and the Sino–U.S. trade friction. We find that rising U.S. EPU amplifies the RMB exchange rate return's volatility at the volatility spillover level while driving the RMB's appreciation against the USD at the mean spillover level. After the reform's implementation, the U.S. EPU's mean spillover on the RMB exchange rate return disappears, while the volatility spillover increases and is further enhanced by trade friction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using city-level data from China for the period 2003–15, this paper studies how the Internet affects economic disparities between cities through its heterogeneous impact on the economic growth of cities with different penetration rates and population sizes. The results show that the Internet widens the economic disparities between cities with low Internet penetration rates and cities with high Internet penetration rates, and even if the penetration gap between cities is bridged in the future, the Internet will still widen the economic gap between large and small cities due to the reinforcing effect of city size. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The biodegradation of benzene series compounds is a difficult problem in environment pollution control, which is attributed to the deficiency of high efficiency bacteria and suitable embedding materials. In this study, the immobilized cells Rhodococcussp. strain PB-1 was used to synchronously biodegrade phenol and aniline by entrapped in sodium alginate (SA)-bamboo charcoal (BC)-chitosan acetate (CA) beads. The free cells of the strain PB-1 could completely degrade 1500 mg/L phenol or 800 mg/L aniline within 48 h, while the degradation rate of 2000 mg/L phenol and 1500 mg/L aniline was 35.76% and 68.06% at 72 h, respectively. The ortho-cleavage pathway was used to degrade phenol and aniline by strain PB-1. However, after entrapped with SA-BC-CA beads,the removal rate of 2000 mg/L phenol was 100% at 108 h, 1500 mg/L aniline was 100% at 62 h and 2000–3000 mg/L total toxic compounds was over 95% at 120 h. These beads could be used four times and were more effective than SA or SA-BC beads. The SA-BC-CA beads could remarkably improve the stability and degradation efficiency of strain PB-1, and thus provide a potential application in the removal of phenol and aniline in wastewater. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A highly regioselective and stereoselective palladium-catalyzed addition reaction of indoles to glycals has been accomplished. This palladium-catalyzed chemistry provides a facile route to a variety of N-glycosyl indoles in high to excellent yields with β-selectivity. Remarkably, the reaction showed complete site selectivity toward the nitrogen of indole in a mild reaction condition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two new alkaloids, including one benzophenanthridine type, dehydroambiguanine A (1) and one isoquinoline type, ambiguanine J (2) together with four (3–6) known alkaloids were isolated from the n-butanol fraction of Corydalis ambigua subsp. amurensis. Their structures were elucidated by comprehensive spectroscopic methods including HR-ESIMS and NMR, and the absolute configuration of compound 1 was further confirmed by the quantum ECD calculations. In addition, all isolated alkaloids (1–6) were determined their anti-proliferative effects of on A549 and HCT 116 cell by colorimetric MTT assay. Among them, Compounds 1 and 4 exhibited anti-proliferative activity on HCT 116 cell line with the IC50 value at 49.8 ± 4.79, and 89.2 ± 1.86 μM, respectively. Compounds 2 and 5 showed mild anti-proliferative activity against A549 cell with IC50 values at 60.2 ± 10.7, and 89.2 ± 12.9 μM, respectively. Their preliminary structure-activity relationship was also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many studies have shown that healthcare quality such as mortality rate exhibits U-shaped curves for congestion. These studies usually focus on how the congestion rate affects the overall hospitals' mortality rate. Our study investigates the impact of congestion on two subcategories: surgical and non-surgical inpatients, using the records of 27,575 patients from a public hospital in China. We confirm that the overall mortality rate exhibits a U-shaped curve. We further show that the mortality rate of surgical patients first decreases and then almost stays unchanged as congestion level increases, while the curve for the mortality rate of non-surgical patients remains U-shaped. The initial decrease partly results from the combination of decreasing mortality and increasing peak occupancy with time. The increase is in accordance with the overwork, but the condition requirement and high standard protocols of care may cause the mortality of surgical patients to be less affected by congestion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of "drug-like" compounds based on quinoxaline scaffold with arylsulfonyl hydrazinyl, arylformyl hydrazinyl or arylsulfonyl groups at C-2 and aryloxy groups at C-3, were synthesized in 4 or 5 steps involving cyclization, chlorination and coupling reactions. Cellular anti-proliferative activities of these quinoxaline derivatives in vitro were determined, which revealed that the inhibitory potency and selectivity of 6f was comparable to that of the positive control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

L755S, a HER2 kinase domain mutation, is the most common HER2 mutation in breast cancer associated with resistance to anti-HER2 trastuzumab treatment. Here, we showed that HER2-L755S confers hyperactivation of MAPK and PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathways and resistance to both reversible and irreversible HER2 tyrosine kinase inhibitors. We further demonstrated that the HER2 TKIs in combination with MEK inhibitor, AZD6244, or PI3K inhibitor, GDC0941, yield robust killing in HER2-L755S cancer cells, indicating a novel targeted strategy to overcome HER2-L755S resistance to anti-HER2 treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]