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Currently, the focus of stochastic resonance (SR) research is primarily on bistable systems, and classical bistable SR systems have the problems of low dimension, inconvenient parameter adjustment, and high threshold for SR effects. In this paper, based on the classic bistable system, a class of multi-dimensional single potential well SR systems without transition threshold is proposed and applied to signal processing. Firstly, the mechanism of double potential well SR and single potential well SR is studied. On this basis, a kind of multi-dimensional single potential well SR system is defined and its theoretical conditions are analyzed. Then a specific four-dimensional single potential well SR system is constructed, and the dynamics of the system is analyzed. The gain range and the approximate relationship between the system input and the four-dimensional output are derived. Finally, the four-dimensional single potential well SR system is applied to the processing of various signals. The experimental results show that the constructed system has good noise reduction and feature amplification effects on noisy signals through the advantages of multi-dimensional output, and can be used to highlight the fault feature frequency in bearing fault signals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Objective Methods Results Conclusion The microneedle fractional radiofrequency system (MFRS) is able to rejuvenate facial appearance by heating and coagulating certain depth of skin tissue.To evaluate the safety and efficacy of a novel vacuum‐assisted MFRS for facial contour tightening.This prospective, randomized, split‐face study included 21 patients who underwent three treatments with a vacuum‐assisted MFRS at 1‐month intervals. Half of the face was treated with the MFRS; the other half was untreated (control). Facial volume changes and wrinkles were objectively measured using a three‐dimensional imaging system and VISIA‐CR.Volume changes of the treated midface were −0.24 ± 0.75, −0.59 ± 0.92, and −0.55 ± 0.65 mL at 1, 3, 6 months follow‐up; however, measurements of the control side were 0.08 ± 0.70, −0.08 ± 0.53, and − 0.10 ± 0.86 mL, indicating significant reductions (p < 0.05). The number of facial wrinkles on the treated side was significantly reduced to 12.44 ± 4.85 at 3 months and sustained at 6 months (11.11 ± 4.100) compared to the control side (14.89 ± 5.26 and 13.22 ± 4.44, respectively; p < 0.05). No long‐term side effects occurred.The vacuum‐assisted MFRS is safe and effective and is recommended for improving facial tightening and reducing wrinkles. This technology is sufficient to ensure the insertion depth, thus helping to improve the treatment accuracy and safety. The MFRS provides sustained effects for at least 6 months. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The complexity of deep neural network models (DNNs) severely limits their application on devices with limited computing and storage resources. Knowledge distillation (KD) is an attractive model compression technology that can effectively alleviate this problem. Multi-teacher knowledge distillation (MKD) aims to leverage the valuable and diverse knowledge distilled by multiple teacher networks to improve the performance of the student network. Existing approaches typically rely on simple methods such as averaging the prediction logits or using sub-optimal weighting strategies to fuse distilled knowledge from multiple teachers. However, employing these techniques cannot fully reflect the importance of teachers and may even mislead student's learning. To address this issue, we propose a novel Decoupled Multi-Teacher Knowledge Distillation based on Entropy (DE-MKD). DE-MKD decouples the vanilla knowledge distillation loss and assigns adaptive weights to each teacher to reflect its importance based on the entropy of their predictions. Furthermore, we extend the proposed approach to distill the intermediate features from multiple powerful but cumbersome teachers to improve the performance of the lightweight student network. Extensive experiments on the publicly available CIFAR-100 image classification benchmark dataset with various teacher-student network pairs demonstrated the effectiveness and flexibility of our approach. For instance, the VGG8|ShuffleNetV2 model trained by DE-MKD reached 75.25%|78.86% top-one accuracy when choosing VGG13|WRN40-2 as the teacher, setting new performance records. In addition, surprisingly, the distilled student model outperformed the teacher in both teacher-student network pairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Volatile organic compounds (VOC) have been proven to cause considerable harm to both the ecological environment and human health. Anthropogenic VOC emissions are primarily generated by the industrial sector. The utilization of porous carbon as an adsorbent has emerged as an effective method for the efficient removal of VOC from industrial sources. However, during the actual production processes, VOC exhaust gases are often mixed with water vapor, which poses challenges for adsorption purification. This review provides a comprehensive overview of the remarkable advancements in various carbon materials in terms of their ability to adsorb both VOC and water vapor. Additionally, it systematically summarizes the influence of surface groups on adsorbents and the molecular properties of VOC on their adsorption by carbon materials. Furthermore, this review introduces the mechanism underlying adsorption-adsorbent interactions and discusses the construction of models for adsorbing water vapor and VOC. The challenges associated with the application of carbon materials for VOC adsorption in humid environments are also addressed. This review aims to offer theoretical and technical guidance for the effective purification of moist VOC waste gases emitted from industrial sources, thereby achieving precise control of VOC emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing immunotherapy response rate and durability can lead to significant improvements in cancer care. To address this challenge, a novel multivalent immune checkpoint therapeutic platform is constructed through site‐specific ligation of anti‐PD‐L1 nanobody (Nb) on ferritin (Ftn) nanocage. Nb‐Ftn blocks PD‐1/PD‐L1 interaction and downregulates PD‐L1 levels via endocytosis‐induced degradation. In addition, the cage structure of Ftn allows encapsulation of indocyanine green (ICG), an FDA‐approved dye. Photothermal treatment with Nb‐Ftn@ICG induces immunogenic death of tumor cells, which improves systemic immune response via maturation of dendritic cells and enhanced infiltration of T cells. Moreover, Nb‐Ftn encapsulation significantly enhances cellular uptake, tumor accumulation and retention of ICG. In vivo assays showed that this nanoplatform ablates the primary tumor, suppresses abscopal tumors and inhibits tumor metastasis, leading to a prolonged survival rate. This work presents a novel strategy for improving cancer immunotherapy using multivalent nanobody‐ferritin conjugates as immunological targeting and enhancing carriers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Protein phase separation plays a very important role in many biological processes and is closely related to the occurrence and development of some serious diseases. So far, the fluorescence imaging method and fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) have been frequently used to study the phase separation behavior of proteins. Due to the wide size distribution of protein condensates in phase separation from nano-scale to micro-scale in solution and living cells, it is difficult for the fluorescence imaging method and conventional FCS to fully reflect the real state of protein phase separation in the solution due to the low spatio-temporal resolution of the conventional fluorescence imaging method and the limited detection area of FCS. Here, we proposed a novel method for studying the protein phase separation process by objective scanning-based fluorescence cross-correlation spectroscopy (Scan-FCCS). In this study, CRDBP proteins were used as a model and respectively fused with fluorescent proteins (EGFP and mCherry). We first compared conventional FCS and Scan-FCS methods for characterizing the CRDBP protein phase separation behaviors and found that the reproducibility of Scan-FCS is significantly improved by the scanning mode. We studied the self-fusion process of mCherry-CRDBP and EGFP-CRDBP and observed that the phase change concentration of CRDBP was 25 nM and the fusion of mCherry-CRDBP and EGFP-CRDBP at 500 nM was completed within 70 min. We studied the effects of salt concentration and molecular crowding agents on the phase separation of CRDBP and found that salt can prevent the self-fusion of CRDBP and molecular crowding agents can improve the self-fusion of CRDBP. Furthermore, we found the recruitment behavior of CRDBP to β-catenin proteins and studied their recruitment dynamics. Compared to conventional FCS, Scan-FCCS can significantly improve the reproducibility of measurements due to the dramatic increase of detection zone, and more importantly, this method can provide information about self-fusion and recruitment dynamics in protein phase separation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Enzymes are considered safe and effective therapeutic tools for various diseases. With the increasing integration of biomedicine and nanotechnology, artificial nanozymes offer advanced controllability and functionality in medical design. However, several notable gaps, such as catalytic diversity, specificity and biosafety, still exist between nanozymes and their native counterparts. Here we report a non‐metal single‐selenium (Se)‐atom nanozyme (SeSAE), which exhibits potent nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) oxidase‐mimetic activity. This novel single atom nanozyme provides a safe alternative to conventional metal‐based catalysts and effectively cuts off the cellular energy and reduction equivalents through its distinctive catalytic function in tumors. In this study, we have demonstrated the substantial efficacy of SeSAE as an antitumor nanomedicine across diverse mouse models without discernible systemic adverse effects. The mechanism of the NADPH oxidase‐like activity of the non‐metal SeSAE was rationalized by density functional theory calculations. Furthermore, comprehensive elucidation of the biological functions, cell death pathways, and metabolic remodeling effects of the nanozyme was conducted, aiming to provide valuable insights into the development of single atom nanozymes with clinical translation potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background. Low-fluence Q-switched Nd: YAG laser (LF-QSNY) and picosecond 755 nm alexandrite laser (PSAL) have shown superiority in the treatment of nevus of Ota (NO). Objective. To compare the efficacy and safety of PSAL and LF-QSNY in the treatment of NO. Methods. 15 patients randomly underwent split-lesion treatment of the two lasers within three months. The visual analogue scale (VAS) was used to evaluate the efficacy outcomes. The patient's preferences, recurrence rate, and adverse events were also documented. Results. Fifteen patients with 34 lesions finished the trial. Lesions, operated with LF-QSNY and PSAL, reached VAS scores of 3.47 ± 0.67 and 3.51 ± 0.87, respectively (P > 0.05). Most significant improvement in LF-QSNY was achieved after the first session (VAS = 1.84). One (6.67%) patient experienced a relapse on the PSAL side. Temporary hypopigmentation and hyperpigmentation mainly occurred on the PSAL side. Patients under five years demonstrated superior efficacy (3.81 ± 0.47 vs 3.08 ± 0.66, P = 0.046) than those over with the treatment of LF-QSNY. Limitations. Limited sample and lack of objective evaluation. Conclusion. The difference between the LF-QSNY and PSAL in the treatment of NO was statistically insignificant, while LF-QSNY may be a better choice for the treatment of early NO. This trial is registered with ChiCTR1900022690. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]