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Play behaviour is considered an indicator of animal welfare in young pigs. However, as play behaviour events are short-lasting and occur sporadically, continuous monitoring is necessary. This study presents a first attempt at automatic detection of locomotor play behaviour in young pigs from video by classifying locomotor play from other solitary behaviours including standing, walking, and running. Two methods were developed, compared, and sequentially combined: (1) a less computational heavy method utilising the Gaussian Mixture Model for quantification of movement combined with the calculation of contour features and standard machine learning classifiers (FEATURES); (2) a computational heavy method utilising a deep learning classifier taking both spatial and temporal features into account (DEEP). The DEEP classifier outperformed the FEATURES classifier and obtained values of internal validation recall, precision, and specificity of 94%, 88% and 96%, respectively. When combining the two classification methods, almost similar performance was retained, whilst 44% of the other behaviours were correctly classified without the need for deep learning methods. The combination thereby decreased the computational power needed to run the algorithm. Thus, locomotor play can be automatically detected in young pigs and the combination of a less computational heavy method with a deep learning method can reduce the computational requirements for the classification and detection of complex behaviours. Future work should focus on the segmentation of single pigs during high-speed activity in order to enable the play detection algorithm to work in real-life settings.

The pineal tumor was once considered as a restricted area for surgery. Such cases are rare, with many different opinions on surgical treatment.This study aimed to review our experience of tumor treatment in the pineal region and explore the optimal treatment strategy.The clinical data of 72 patients with pineal tumors from January 1997 to May 2015 (18 years) were retrospectively analyzed. Preoperative preparation, pathology types, tumor resection rate, surgical approach, and follow-up outcomes were used as the indicators to evaluate the treatment efficacy.The Krause approach was used in 46 cases, the Poppen approach in 10 cases, and the transcallosal-lateral ventricle-choroid fissure approach in 16 cases. The postoperative pathological results were as follows: 24 cases of germinoma, 11 of teratoma, 15 of glioma, 6 of meningioma, 11 of Pineocytoma, 2 of cholesteatoma, 2 of cavernous hemangioma, and 1 of choriocarcinoma. Further, the study included 64 cases of total surgical resections, 8 of subtotal resections, and 2 deaths. The follow-up period was from 7 months to 10 years. Further, 51 (70.8%) patients were followed up. The multivariate regression model showed that the surgical method and the pathological type contributed significantly to predicting outcomes.The type of pathology, extent of excision, and surgical approach had a significant impact on the prognosis of patients. The transcallosal-lateral ventricle-choroid fissure approach for large and medium-sized pineal tumors near the posterior part of the third ventricle had good efficacy.

The employment of electromagnetic (EM) absorbers integrating elaborate architecture, enhanced microwave absorption and multifunctional features remains a formidable challenge in practical applications including military stealth and incoming 5G electronic information era. Herein, a novel microwave absorber has been fabricated by in-situ growing carbon nanotubes (CNTs) on the prismatic nickel-cobalt (NiCo) clusters derived from Ni-Co layered double hydroxides (NiCo-LDH) via catalytic carbonization of ethyl acetate. The NiCo/CNTs composites with highly porous texture could provide sufficient open space to balance the impedance and introduce magnetic loss mechanism. Accordingly, the absorbers achieved remarkable EM absorption performance with a minimum reflection loss of -46.2 dB at 1.5 mm and broad bandwidth of 5.8 GHz owing to synergistic magnetic-dielectric effects and distinct structural merits. The NiCo/CNTs absorber manifests superior radar wave attenuation by the radar cross section simulation and density functional theory (DFT) was also performed to elucidate the potential mechanisms of the heterostructure formation and performance enhancement in the NiCo/CNTs composites. This work is expected to provide new insights or inspirations to modulate EM properties by rationally designing heterostructure for the elimination of severe EM pollution.

Damages of sensory hair cells (HCs) are mainly responsible for sensorineural hearing loss, while the pathological mechanism remains not fully understood due to the many potential deafness genes unidentified. Ftr82, a member of the largely TRIMs family in fish, has been found specifically expressed in the otic vesicle while its function is still unclear. Here, we investigated the roles of ftr82 in HC development and hearing function utilizing the zebrafish model. The results of in situ hybridization illustrated that ftr82 was always restricted to localize in otic vesicles at different stages. The defects of HCs were observed both in ftr82 morphants and mutants, including significantly decreased crista HCs, shortened cilia as well as remarkably reduced functional HCs in neuromasts, which could be successfully rescued by co-injection of exogenous ftr82 mRNA. The behavior assay of startle response indicated that larvae lacking of ftr82 exhibited lower sensitivity to external sound stimuli. Further research revealed that the loss of HCs was mainly caused by cell apoptosis mediated by caspase-3 activation. Our study demonstrates that ftr82 is a crucial hearing-related gene that regulates the HC morphogenesis and auditory function performing, which provides new insight into the rapid identification of the deafness gene.

Objective To evaluate the benefits and harmful effects of conservative versus liberal oxygen therapy in patients admitted to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU). Design A systematic review and meta-analysis was carried out. Setting ICU. Participants Adult patients (aged 18 years or older) were randomized to either a lower oxygenation target strategy (conservative oxygen therapy) or a higher oxygenation target strategy (liberal oxygen therapy) in the ICU. Interventions Patients received different oxygenation target strategies. Results Ten studies involving 5429 adult patients admitted to the ICU were included in the meta-analysis. The pooled results showed no decreased all-cause mortality at 28 days (RR 0.90; 95%CI 0.75–1.09; p = 0.28), 90 days (RR 1.02; 95%CI 0.92–1.13; p = 0.71) or longest follow-up (RR 0.97; 95%CI 0.88–1.08; p = 0.63) among patients administered conservative oxygen therapy. Secondary outcomes were comparable between the two groups. The results of sensitivity analyses and subgroup analyses were consistent with the main analyses. Conclusion No beneficial or harmful effects of conservative oxygen therapy were found compared to liberal oxygen therapy in relation to all-cause mortality among adult patients in the ICU. Conservative oxygen therapy did not reduce all-cause mortality at 28 days, 90 days or longest follow-up. Other important clinical outcomes were also comparable between the two groups.

Reducing the oil-water interfacial tension (IFT) to ultra-low is believed the primary mechanism for surfactant-based enhanced oil recovery (EOR) process. However, field trials have shown that low concentration surfactant flooding can also improve oil recovery without ultra-low IFT. To clarify the mechanism behind, the currently-used surfactant, naphthenic arylsulfonate (NAS), was used to unravel its function during surfactant flooding from the horizon of micron- and nano-scale. The solubilization capacity of NAS micelle to petroleum fractions was evaluated through light absorbance strategy, small-angle neutron scattering, dynamic light scattering and transmission electron microscopy. It was found that micellar solubilization plays a significant role during the surfactant flooding. In-situ emulsification was visualized in microfluidics with three types of microchips, respectively. A series of displacement tests were carried out with NAS solution pumping into oil-saturated chip. The results show that in-situ emulsification improve oil recovery mainly through blocking and entrainment effects. Results from this work aid in understanding the interaction between surfactant solution and petroleum fractions at low surfactant concentration, which is helpful for design surfactant-based displacing system for EOR process.

Carnitine biosynthesis has been related to fatty acid oxidation, a process probably exerting neuroprotective effects. However, the role of carnitine biosynthesis in the development of ischemic stroke (IS) remains unclear. We aimed to examine the associations between plasma markers of carnitine biosynthesis and the IS risk.We performed a case-control study nested in a community-based cohort (2013-2018, n = 16457). The study included 321 incident cases of IS and 321 controls matched by age and gender. Carnitine, lysine, trimethyllysine (TML), glycine, and their ratios were measured/calculated in the baseline plasma samples using ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass-spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS). Conditional logistic regression analyses were used to calculate odds ratios (ORs) and their 95% confidence intervals (CIs).Plasma carnitine, lysine, TML, and glycine were not significantly associated with the IS risk, although a gradually reduced risk was observed across the increasing tertiles of glycine. Notably, the ratios of glycine/carnitine, glycine/lysine, and glycine/TML were all inversely associated with the IS risk. Compared to the lowest tertiles, the corresponding odds ratios for the highest tertiles were 0.60 (95% CI: 0.40-0.91), 0.63 (95% CI: 0.42-0.94), and 0.63 (95% CI: 0.42-0.95), respectively, after adjustment for body mass index, smoking, hypertension, family history of stroke, estimated glomerular filtration rate and total cholesterol. Repeating the analyses by excluding the first two years of follow-up did not materially alter the risk associations for the ratios of glycine/lysine and glycine/carnitine.Increased ratios of plasma glycine to carnitine, lysine, and TML were associated with a lower risk of incident IS. Our observational findings suggest that the homeostasis of circulating carnitine, lysine, TML, and glycine may involve in the pathogenesis of IS.

Gene therapy would benefit from the effective editing of targeted cells with CRISPR-Cas9 tools. However, it is difficult to precisely assess the editing performance