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Two-dimensional (2D) transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) have garnered considerable attention for their promising applications in sensors and optoelectronic devices, owing to their exceptional optical, electronic, and optoelectronic properties. However, the inherent high symmetry of TMD lattices imposes limitations on their functional versatility. Here, we present a strategy to disrupt the C3 rotational symmetry of monolayer WSe2 by fabricating a heterostructure incorporating WSe2 and SiP flakes. Through comprehensive experimental investigations and first-principle calculations, we elucidate that in the WSe2/SiP heterostructure, excitons—both neutral and charged—emanating from WSe2 exhibit pronounced anisotropy, which remains robust against temperature variations. Notably, we observe an anisotropic ratio reaching up to 1.5, indicating a substantial degree of anisotropy. Furthermore, we demonstrate the tunability of exciton anisotropy through the application of a magnetic field, resulting in a significant reduction in the anisotropic ratio with increasing field strength, from 1.57 to 1.18. Remarkably, the change in heterojunction anisotropy ratio reaches 24.8% as the magnetic field increases. Our findings elucidate that the perturbation of the C3 rotational symmetry of the WSe2 monolayer arises from a non-uniform charge density distribution within the layer, exhibiting mirror symmetry. These results underscore the potential of heterostructure engineering in tailoring the properties of isotropic materials and provide a promising avenue for advancing the application of anisotropic devices across various fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Design of non-noble metal electrocatalysts for biomass conversion to high-value chemicals and understanding the related catalytic mechanisms are of profound significance but have remained a major challenge. Here, we developed a novel biomass-derived electrocatalyst (denoted as Cu/NC), featuring with electron-deficient copper nanoparticles anchored on N-doped carbon nanosheets, for the electrochemical reduction of 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) to 2,5-bis(hydroxymethyl)furan (BHMF, a vital precursor of functional polymers). The optimized Cu/NC electrocatalyst exhibited an excellent performance with high Faradaic efficiency (89.5%) and selectivity (90.8%) of BHMF at a low concentration of HMF (18.1 mM). Even at a very high HMF concentration (108.6 mM), the Faraday efficiency and selectivity of BHMF could still reach 74.8% and 81.1%, respectively. This performance approached those of the reported noble metal-based electrocatalysts. Mechanism study revealed that the N doping in the Cu/NC catalyst could regulate the electronic structure of Cu, strengthening the adsorption of the HMF carbonyl group, and thus boosting the selectivity of BHMF. Additionally, strong electronic metal-support interactions of Cu and the N-doped carbon support optimized the charge transfer rate, thus promoting the dissociation of water to the active hydrogen (H*) species and boosting the reaction kinetic rate of H* and HMF. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is growing interest in using canopy temperature (Tc), including crop water Stress index (CWSI), for irrigation management. However, Tc varies greatly in one day, while soil water content (SWC) varies little, which may lead to different conclusions on whether irrigation is needed based on CWSI at different times. For this end, Tc of winter wheat was continuously monitored, and the data of such environmental factors as atmospheric temperature and soil water content (SWC) were simultaneously collected. CWSI was calculated based on empirical formulation and Tc and CWSI were generalized based on the normalization formulation. The correlation SWC between Tc and CWSI before and after generalization was compared and error analysis was based on SWC theoretical formula. The results showed: (1) the accuracy of SWC retrieval by Tc and CWSI increased firstly and then decreased with time during the day. The optimal time for Tc monitoring SWC was between 10:00 ~ 16:00 (R2 > 0.72) and the optimal time for CWSI monitoring SWC was between 9:00 ~ 18:00 (R2 > 0.69). (2) CWSI and Tc were mapped based on the relationship between crop water stress and soil water deficit and normalized canopy temperature expressions characterized the relationship between crop water stress and soil water deficit. (3) The accuracy of inversion of SWC by mapping Tc from 18:00 ~ 8:00 is increased from 0.5 ~ 0.6 to 0.7 ~ 0.8; the accuracy of soil water content inversion by mapping CWSI from 18:00 ~ 8:00 was improved from 0.2 ~ 0.4 to 0.4 ~ 0.6. (4) The theoretical expression of SWC deduced based on CWSI also proves that considering the relationship between crop water stress and soil water deficit change can effectively reduce the relative error from 30 to 5% in the morning and evening. This study contributes to the understanding of the reason why the correlation between Tc and SWC varies greatly during the day and solves the time-limited problem of thermal infrared remote sensing monitoring of crop water stress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The nitrogen-doped activated carbon (NAC) with high specific area (3140.76 m2·g− 1) derived from pomelo peel was prepared using hydrothermal carbonization, nitrogen doping and KOH activation method for the effective removal of Doxycycline (DOX) from aqueous solution. NAC showed exceptional adsorption efficacy for DOX than non-doped activated carbon (AC), which was attributed to the rich N-containing functional groups on the NAC surface and well-developed pore structure. The adsorption equilibrium data of DOX on NAC was fitted well to the Sips isotherm model and the adsorption process was spontaneous, endothermic and randomness-increasing. The Elovich kinetic model could better describe the adsorption process of DOX. The adsorption mechanisms of DOX onto NAC could be attributed to the hydrogen bonding, π-π electron donor-acceptor (EDA) interaction, hydrophobic effect and electrostatic interaction. Besides, the N-doping enhanced the adsorption performance of NAC. The maximum saturated adsorption capacity of NAC was 1559.35 mg·g− 1 at 298 K, indicating that the NAC could be a promising adsorbent for removing Doxycycline from wastewater. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two-dimensional (2D) anisotropic materials have garnered significant attention in the realm of anisotropic optoelectronic devices due to their remarkable electrical, optical, thermal, and mechanical properties. While extensive research has delved into the optical and electrical characteristics of these materials, there remains a need for further exploration to identify novel materials and structures capable of fulfilling device requirements under various conditions. Here, we employ heterojunction interface engineering with black phosphorus (BP) to disrupt the C3 rotational symmetry of monolayer WS2. The resulting WS2/BP heterostructure exhibits pronounced anisotropy in exciton emissions, with a measured anisotropic ratio of 1.84 for neutral excitons. Through a comprehensive analysis of magnetic-field-dependent and temperature-evolution photoluminescence spectra, we discern varying trends in the polarization ratio, notably observing a substantial anisotropy ratio of 1.94 at a temperature of 1.6 K and a magnetic field of 9 T. This dynamic behavior is attributed to the susceptibility of the WS2/BP heterostructure interface strain to fluctuations in magnetic fields and temperatures. These findings provide valuable insights into the design of anisotropic optoelectronic devices capable of adaptation to a range of magnetic fields and temperatures, thereby advancing the frontier of material-driven device engineering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: Quantitative characterization of the time-lag effect between canopy temperature and atmospheric temperature and its controlling factors in the agricultural ecosystem may contribute to a higher inversion accuracy of soil water content using canopy-air temperature information. Methods: Tc of winter wheat were continuously monitored, and the data of such environmental factors as solar radiation (Rs), atmospheric temperature (Ta), relative humidity (RH) and soil water content (SWC) were simultaneously collected. Results: Hysteresis existed between Tc and Ta over the diel cycles, and different weather and irrigation levels did not change the direction of the time lag loop. the key driver regulating the diel hysteresis pattern between Tc and Ta varied under different weather: on rainy days, key driver was Rs while on cloudy and sunny days, the key driver was RH. the multiple regression model indicated that together Rs, Ta, RH, and SWC explained 58 ± 10% of the variation of time-lag effect. Path analysis showed on rainy days the key driver (Rs and RH) could enhance the time-lag effect through other indirect factors (Ta and SWC); on cloud days the key driver (RH and SWC) could inhibit the time-lag effect through other indirect factors (Ta); On sunny days this mutual inhibition was further significant. Conclusions: These findings indicated a dynamic process of time-lag effect between Tc and Ta with different weather and different irrigation levels. This study contributes to the understanding of the time-lag effect and its driving factors and this analysis provides the basis for further improvement in monitoring crop water deficit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Measuring and extracting abrasive grains on the entire surface of monolayer brazing grinding wheels to analyze the distribution of abrasive grains are of great significance to grinding research and grinding wheel manufacture. It is not easy to carry out the work with traditional methods. In this paper, a linear CCD is used to acquire the entire grinding wheel surface image, and an improved encoder–decoder network based on Efficientnet, ASPP, and Skip Connections is designed to promote the accuracy and speed of abrasive grains prediction. Based on dataset creation, transfer learning, and hyper-parameter testing, 91.21% abrasive grain semantic segmentation accuracy was finally obtained. If we focus on whether the abrasive grains are recognized without considering semantic errors, an accuracy rate of 99.6% is obtained. The method can provide basic data for grinding mechanism research and abrasive tool manufacturing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: Combining multiple features of UAV-based multispectral images with the stacking ensemble model, to improve the feasibility and accuracy of evaluating water stress in winter wheat. Methods: UAV-based multispectral images of winter wheat with different moisture treatments were acquired, from which the features such as spectrum, texture, and color moments were extracted. The soil moisture content (SMC) as well as fuel moisture content (FMC), plant moisture content (PMC), and above-ground biomass (AGB) were collected for charging the degree of water stress. The basic models were used to build ensemble models such as stacking and weighted stacking (WE-stacking), and we estimated SMC, FMC, PMC and AGB combined with multiple features. The performance of these models was evaluated. Results: The more severe the water stress, the lower values of SMC, FMC, PMC and AGB were obtained with estimation models. The performance of estimation models based on multi-feature fusion outperformed single feature in the evaluation of winter-wheat water stress. In the estimation of SMC, both stacking and WE-stacking models performed better than the basic models. Compared to the stacking model, the WE-stacking model had higher accuracy, with R2 increased between 1.98% and 3.62% at different soil depths. The WE-stacking model with multi-feature fusion still had sufficient stability and high accuracy in FMC, PMC and AGB estimation, with R2 of 0.866, 0.881 and 0.884, respectively. Conclusions: The multi-feature fusion of UAV multispectral images combined with WE-stacking model has great application potential and provides technical support in evaluating crop water stress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research and development's role in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals is crucial. More specifically, to achieve a sustainable environment, the role of environment-related research and development expenditures, along with renewable energy research and development, is also important. This study focuses on the sustainable development perspective and the role of a sustainable environment via building a knowledge-based economy. A knowledge-based economy is more research and development oriented, and its role is undeniable in ensuring sustainable development. The current study focuses on the role of general research and development, environmental research and development, and cleaner energy research and development perspective for developed economies from 1989 to 2021. The study evaluated the role of research and development expenditures for the environment and cleaner energy on consumption-based carbon emissions along with political risk, income, green innovation, exports, and imports. The study used novel panel methods for econometric analysis. The study found that research and development expenditures for the environment and cleaner energy help limit carbon emissions. Moreover, reducing political risk, increasing green innovation, renewable energy consumption, and exports are also linked inversely with carbon emissions. In contrast, imports and income are deteriorating factors for consumption-based carbon emissions. The study recommends increasing research and development expenditures, encouraging green innovation, and limiting political risk for sustainable development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We synthesized B-He/B-GREDVY and immobilized them on avidin-coated surfaces. To examine the immobilization of molecules in the material, the following experiments were performed: fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) fluorescence staining, water contact angle and atomic force microscopy (AFM) measurements. Besides, the biological evaluation experiments were also performed, such as platelets adhesion and activation, the culturing of smooth muscle cells (SMC) and endothelial cells (EC). These experimental results show that the modified surfaces could prevent the hyperproliferation of SMC, and promote the proliferation and migration of EC and EPC. Furthermore, the adding of VEGF improved the EC adhesion in a dynamic environment. Generally, it is expected that the modified surfaces could be used to accelerate the formation of the newly endothelial layer for the construction of platforms for coronary artery stent therapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An environment-friendly hydrothermal method was developed to extract rutin and quercetin from a forestry waste of Cyclobalanopsis leaves using the mixture medium of alcohol-acetic acid–water. Various process variables were specifically studied, which included the concentration of acetic acid (0 ~ 40% v/v), ethanol content (30 ~ 80% v/v), reaction temperature (100 ~ 200 ℃), liquid–solid ratio (10 ~ 50 mL/g), and reaction time (1 ~ 7 h). The optimal combination of extraction parameters was established using single factor experiments and the 3 × 3 Box-Behnken design (BBD), which is a response surface methodology (RSM) with acetic acid concentration and time set to 15% (v/v) and 5 h, respectively. Optimal extraction conditions of rutin were the ethanol concentration of 57% v/v, the temperature of 183℃, and the liquid–solid ratio of 36 mL/g. Under these conditions, the average experimental yield of rutin was 155.36 mg/g. Optimal conditions of quercetin were the ethanol concentration of 60% v/v, the temperature of 180℃, and the liquid–solid ratio of 23 mL/g, which resulted in the highest yield of quercetin of 32.39 mg/g. Compared with the conventional reflux extraction (the yields of rutin and quercetin were 51.11 mg/g and 6.67 mg/g, respectively), the hydrothermal treatment was significantly beneficial to the extraction of rutin and quercetin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Objectives: Advanced esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is a prevalent and highly malignant tumor with a poor prognosis. Recently, the RATIONALE-306 trial demonstrated that tislelizumab combined with chemotherapy provided overall survival benefits for these patients. This study aimed to assess the cost-effectiveness of this treatment approach in Chinese patients with advanced ESCC from the perspective of healthcare system. Methods: A Markov model was constructed to assess the economic and health benefits associated with tislelizumab plus chemotherapy over a 10-year lifetime horizon, utilizing data from the RATIONALE-306 trial. The analysis encompassed the calculation of several key parameters, including the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER), total cost, incremental cost, total effectiveness, and incremental effectiveness. Tislelizumab was considered cost-effective if the ICER obtained was below the willingness-to-pay (WTP) threshold of US$38,223 per quality-adjusted life-year (QALY); otherwise, it would be deemed not cost-effective. To ensure the robustness of the findings, the results were subjected to one-way sensitivity analysis and probabilistic sensitivity analysis (PSA). Results: In the base-case analysis, the incremental effectiveness and cost associated with tislelizumab plus chemotherapy, compared to chemotherapy alone, were determined to be 0.40 QALY and US$7604, respectively. This resulted in an ICER of US$18,846 per QALY, which is below the WTP threshold of US$38,223 per QALY. Furthermore, the results from the one-way sensitivity analysis and PSA indicated robustness of the findings. Conclusion: Our lifetime simulation study demonstrated that, in the case of advanced ESCC, the combination of tislelizumab and chemotherapy offers increased effectiveness compared to chemotherapy alone, albeit at a higher cost. Moreover, considering the current WTP threshold in China, the addition of tislelizumab to chemotherapy is considered a cost-effective approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In situ N-doped porous carbon (NPC) derived from wheat bran via a convenient salt sealing and air-assisted strategy was prepared for the removal of doxycycline (DOX) from aqueous solution. The NPC was precisely characterized by SEM, FTIR, XPS and BET analysis. Additionally, the experimental variables including contact time, adsorbent dosage of NPC and pH were optimized by using Box–Behnken design (BBD) under response surface methodology (RSM). The predicted adsorption capacity of DOX was found to be 291.14 mg g−1 under optimalizing experimental conditions of 196 min contact time, 0.2 g L−1 adsorbent dosage and pH 5.78. The adsorption experimental data fitted Langmuir, Koble-Corrigan and Redlich-Peterson models well, and the pseudo-second-order model perfectly described the DOX adsorption process onto NPC. Thermodynamic parameters of DOX adsorbed onto NPC indicated that the adsorption process was spontaneous and endothermic. Moreover, the adsorption of DOX on NPC was mostly controlled by electrostatic interaction, π-π electron–donator–acceptor (EDA) interaction, hydrogen-bonding and Lewis acid–base effect. Besides, the N element of NPC also played a role in capturing DOX. The maximum monolayer adsorption capacity of DOX was turn out to be 333.23 mg g−1 at 298 K, which suggested that the NPC could be a prospectively adsorbent for the removal of DOX from wastewater. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The frequent occurrence of various sudden natural disasters in the world has caused heavy losses to human beings. It is very important to forecast the demand of emergency materials in order to protect people's safety and property. The purpose of this study is to use IACO-BP algorithm to forecast the demand of emergency supplies in the case of flood disaster. In this study, the flood disaster situation in recent years published by the Ministry of Water Resources of China is selected as the experimental data set. The data are sorted and analyzed by a variety of theoretical comprehensive operation, qualitative and quantitative research method, analytic hierarchy process and system dynamics method. The improved ant colony optimization algorithm is used to model the emergency material demand, and the population, flood level, flood level of the disaster area are analyzed. As the network input, the material situation outputs the material demand, so as to forecast. The results show that the iteration times of IACO-BP algorithm are 11 and the running time is 3S. The fluctuation of IACO-BP algorithm is the least and the most stable among the three algorithms. The material satisfaction degree predicted by IACO-BP algorithm is improved by 15% from the original 80.9%. It is concluded that this algorithm is very accurate and efficient in the prediction of emergency material demand, which can better assist the disaster situation. This study contributes to the prediction of emergency material demand for emergency disaster. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green synthesis of metal nanoparticles using plant extracts as an effective bio-reducing reagent has attracted considerable attention. Fe/Cu nanocomposites synthesized by extracts of sweet potato leaves served to remove basic magenta (BM) from aqueous solution. The adsorption operation conditions of BM on Fe/Cu nanocomposites were optimum by Box-Behnken design (BBD) model of response surface methodology (RSM). The adsorption equilibrium data were well described by the Sips and Redlich-Peterson models. The thermodynamic studies showed that the adsorption process was endothermic and spontaneous. The maximum adsorption capacity from the Sips model was 235.92 mg/g at 298 K, which indicated that Fe/Cu nanocomposites had potential application in wastewater treatment. As indicated by pseudo-second order kinetics model, the adsorption of BM onto Fe/Cu nanocomposites could be achieved through the complexation, H-bonding, π-π adsorbate-adsorbent interaction, and electrostatic interaction at different pH values. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A dengue virus serotype 1 (DENV-1) epidemic occurred from October to December 2018 in Xishuangbanna, Yunnan, Southwest China, neighboring Myanmar, Laos, and Vietnam. In this study, we investigated the molecular characteristics, evolution, and potential source of DENV from Xishuangbanna. The C (capsid), prM (premembrane), and E (envelope) genes of DENV isolated from 87 serum samples obtained from local patients were amplified and sequenced, and the sequences were evaluated by identification of mutations, phylogenetic and homologous recombination analysis, and secondary structure prediction. Phylogenetic analysis showed that all of the epidemic DENV strains from Xishuangbanna could be grouped in a branch with DENV-1 isolates, and were most similar to the Fujian 2005 (China, DQ193572) and Singapore 2016 (MF314188) strains. When compared with DENV-1SS (the standard strain), there were 31 non-synonymous mutations, but no obvious homologous recombination signal was found. Secondary structure prediction showed that some changes had occurred in a helical region in proteins of the MN123849 and MN123854 strains, but there were few changes in the disordered region. This study reveals the molecular characteristics of the structural genes of the Xishuangbanna epidemic strains in 2018 and provides a reference for molecular epidemiology, infection, and pathogenicity research and vaccine development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simile, a special type of metaphor, can help people to express their ideas more clearly. Simile component extraction is to extract tenors and vehicles from sentences. This task has a realistic significance since it is useful for building cognitive knowledge base. With the development of deep neural networks, researchers begin to apply neural models to component extraction. Simile components should be in cross-domain. According to our observations, words in cross-domain always have different concepts. Thus, concept is important when identifying whether two words are simile components or not. However, existing models do not integrate concept into their models. It is difficult for these models to identify the concept of a word. What's more, corpus about simile component extraction is limited. There are a number of rare words or unseen words, and the representations of these words are always not proper enough. Exiting models can hardly extract simile components accurately when there are low-frequency words in sentences. To solve these problems, we propose a hybrid representation-based component extraction (HRCE) model. Each word in HRCE is represented in three different levels: word level, concept level and character level. Concept representations (representations in concept level) can help HRCE to identify the words in cross-domain more accurately. Moreover, with the help of character representations (representations in character levels), HRCE can represent the meaning of a word more properly since words are consisted of characters and these characters can partly represent the meaning of words. We conduct experiments to compare the performance between HRCE and existing models. The experiment results show that HRCE significantly outperforms current models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The grain geometrical features of grinding wheels are critically important to evaluate their quality and grinding performance. Therefore, grain geometrical features should be comprehensively and systematically characterized. Such characterization parameters were defined from the geometric features of individual grains (for each grain) to the distribution features of grains (for a group of grains on a given wheel surface) on the basis of grain cross-sections. For each grain, characterization parameters included cross-section area, equivalent diameter, volume, and sharpness ratio of the grain. For a group of grains, the characterization parameters were distribution density, cross-section area, cross-section area-supporting rate, and volume proportion of the grains on a sectioning depth. The cross-sections of grains were extracted from the section-scanning images captured by an optical measurement system. A system based on optical vertical scanning using a narrow depth of field microscope was adopted to obtain the optical sectioning images, and the grain cross-section boundaries on each image were extracted through an image-processing program. The defined characterization parameters, vertical sectioning step, and sectioning numbers were calculated efficiently. A monolayer brazed grinding wheel with a grain size of 425–500 μm was selected for an experiment. The individual and group parameters, such as sharpness or strength, active volume, or area-supporting ratio, of grains were used for performance analysis. Experimental results indicated that the proposed parameters based on grain cross-sections are not only efficient to calculate but also effective to characterize the geometric features of grains for monolayer brazed grinding wheels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we used dry corn stover (DCS) silage as feedstock to produce ethanol using hot-washing treatment (HWT) followed by prehydrolysis and fed-batch simultaneous saccharification and fermentation (FD-SSF) using cellulase and Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The inoculants product for ensiling of DCS was composed of lactic acid-producing organisms, such as Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus fermentum and Enterococcus durans. Moreover, the appropriate condition was selected by the dynamic analysis of silage quality. Among test conditions, the pH value (4.22), pretreatment time (4 week) and the content of lactic acid in DCS silage (4.32%) could be considered as important indicators of the success of microbial ensiling. The 16S rRNA gene-based pyrosequencing was used to analyze the community of the resulting silage, and the results indicated that Lactobacillus was the advantageous species. The observed glass transition temperature (Tg) value for DCS silage occurred at a temperature of 124.2 °C (Tmid). DCS silage was hydrothermally treated at temperature of Tg for 20 min. It was proved that biomass can be pretreated for cellulosic ethanol production by the integrated process of microbial ensiling and HWT. Ethanol fermentation of HWT-treated (at 30% glucan loading) DCS silage hydrolyzate (resulting in 61.92 g/L ethanol at 59.15% metabolic yield of FD-SSF) was reported in this work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accurate forecasts of daily crop evapotranspiration (ETc) are essential for real-time irrigation management and water resource allocation. This paper presents a method for the short-term forecasting of ETc using a single-crop coefficient approach and public weather forecasts. Temperature forecasts with a 7-day lead time in 2013-2015 were retrieved and entered into a calibrated Hargreaves-Samani model to compute daily reference evapotranspiration (ET0) forecasts, while crop coefficient (Kc) empirical values were estimated from both observed ETc value and calculated ET0 values using the Penman-Monteith equation for the period of 2010-2012. Daily ETc forecasts of irrigated double-cropping rice were determined for three growing seasons during the period of 2013-2015 and were compared with ETc values measured by the weighing lysimeters at the Jiangxi experimental irrigation station in southeastern China. During the early rice season, the average mean absolute error (MAE) and root-mean-square-error (RMSE) values of ETc forecasts ranged from 0.95 to 1.06 mm day−1 and from 1.18 to 1.31 mm day−1, respectively, and the average correlation coefficient (R) ranged from 0.39 to 0.54; for late rice, the average MAE and RMSE values ranged from 1.01 to 1.09 mm day−1 and from 1.32 to 1.40 mm day−1, respectively, and the average R value ranged from 0.54 to 0.58. There could be three factors responsible for errors in ETc forecasts, including temperature forecast errors, Kc value errors and neglected meteorological variables in the HS model, including wind speed and relative humidity. In addition, ETc was more sensitive to changes in temperature than Kc. The overall results indicated that it is appropriate to forecast ETc with the proposed model for real-time irrigation management and water resource allocation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The steady-state diagnostic and prognostic simulation for the Xiao Dongkemadi glacier (XD) of the Tibetan Plateau was performed with the thermo-mechanically-coupled-with-Full-Stokes code Elmer (http://www.csc.fi/elmer/). In this paper, some changes of glacial thermodynamic parameters caused by ice thickness and atmospheric temperature variation were simulated in view of different thickness. The purpose of this study was to fill the gap in analyzing the ice dynamic characteristic of a polar continental glacier. The diagnostic simulation revealed the following conclusions: (1) when the thickness change was small, surface velocity, ice temperature, and deviation stress variation in the bedrock showed a tendency to change with thickness, and when the terrain was gentle, the thickness variation dominated the ice velocity. (2) The ice temperature of the bedrock was high in the whole profile and reached the pressure melting point in the terminus, and it was easy to slide at the bottom, which was consistent with the measured ground penetrating radar data near the terminus. (3) The static friction forces decrease with thickness, and they showed a complex nonlinear relationship, which revealed that the deviation stress in the bottom was influenced by thickness and ice temperature at the bedrock. The prognostic simulating from 2007 to 2047 presented: (1) The simulation forecasted a shrinkage of nearly 600 m in the terminus and the longitudinal section, and wound up diminished by nearly 25% by the end of 2047; (2) the change of thickness was small at the region between 5650 and 5700 m.a.s.l, which might be related to lower atmospheric temperature; (3) thickness dominated the deviation stress (σxx and σxz) in the bottom, and the impact of the terrain was little higher compared to deviation stress (σxx). In other words, the glacial thickness dominated the glacial force and movement to a great extent and the low temperature at high altitude reduced the XD’s sensitivity facing future climate warming. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Medical ultrasonic imaging has been utilized in a variety of clinical diagnoses for many years. Recently, because of the needs of portable and mobile medical ultrasonic diagnoses, the development of real-time medical ultrasonic imaging algorithms on embedded computing platforms is a rising research direction. Typically, delay-and-sum beamforming algorithm is implemented on embedded medical ultrasonic scanners. Such algorithm is the easiest to implement at real-time frame rate, but the image quality of this algorithm is not high enough for complicated diagnostic cases. As a result, minimum-variance adaptive beamforming algorithm for medical ultrasonic imaging is considered in this paper, which shows much higher image quality than that of delay-and-sum beamforming algorithm. However, minimum-variance adaptive beamforming algorithm is a complicated algorithm with O( n ) computational complexity. Consequently, it is not easy to implement such algorithm on embedded computing platform at real-time frame rate. On the other hand, GPU is a well-known parallel computing platform for image processing. Therefore, embedded GPU computing platform is considered as a potential real-time implementation platform of minimum-variance beamforming algorithm in this paper. By applying the described effective implementation strategies, the GPU implementation of minimum-variance beamforming algorithm performed more than 100 times faster than the ARM implementation on the same heterogeneous embedded platform. Furthermore, platform power consumptions, computation energy efficiency, and platform cost efficiency of the experimental heterogeneous embedded platforms were also evaluated, which demonstrated that the investigated heterogeneous embedded computing platforms were suitable for real-time portable or mobile high-quality medical ultrasonic imaging device constructions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Graphite-like carbon nitride − FeO magnetic nanocomposites were synthesized by a chemical co-precipitation method. The nanocomposites were characterized by transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, FTIR spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and magnetization hysteresis loops. The nanocomposites exhibit enhanced peroxidase-like activity (compared to that of graphite-like carbon nitride or FeO NPs). More specifically, they are capable of catalyzing the oxidation of different peroxidase substrates (such as TMB, ABTS or OPD) by HO to produce the typical color reactions (blue, green or orange). The nanocomposites retain their magnetic properties and can be separated by an external magnet. On the basis of these findings, a highly sensitive and selective method was applied to the determination of HO and glucose (by using glucose oxidase). It was successfully applied to the determination of glucose in (spiked) human serum. Compared to other nanomaterial-based peroxidase mimetics, the one described here provides distinctly higher sensitivity for both HO and glucose, with detection limits as low as 0.3 μM and 0.25 μM, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We analyzed Chinese Miao population samples (n = 268) from Guizhou province, Southwest China, with 19 X-chromosomal short tandem repeats (STRs) included in the AGCU X19 amplification kit. The combined PE is 0.999999922 and the combined PDs in males and females are 0.9999999999999999999994 and 0.9999999999998, respectively. The mean paternity exclusion change values are larger than 0.99999996. The HDs in seven linkage groups vary from 0.9324 to 0.9968. Subsequently, comparison among different Chinese populations shows that the substructures of Chinese were significantly influenced by ethno-linguistic rather than geographical boundaries, including most prominently Turkic-speaking and Tibeto-Burman-speaking populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human enteroviruses (EVs) are the major causative agents of aseptic meningitis. In this study, a total of 524 children were admitted to the children Kunming hospital (continental China) for aseptic meningitis manifestations in 2009 and 2010. An EV infection was diagnosed in 85/524 children (16.2 %) and the viruses detected were assigned to 16 serotypes. Most serotypes belonged to the enterovirus B species. Echovirus 9 was predominant (24.7 %), followed by coxsackievirus B5 (23.5 %) and then echovirus 30 (16.5 %). Echovirus 9 was firstly identified as the predominant serotype in sporadic aseptic meningitis which occurred in Yunnan, Southwest China. This work indicates the need to perform large-scale surveillance to gain a better insight into the epidemiology of enteroviruses associated with aseptic meningitis in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The survival rate of esophageal squamous cell cancer (ESCC) patients is still dismal. Therefore, novel prognostic biomarkers are critically needed for patients with ESCC. SLC9A9 has been reported to be downregulated in hormone-sensitive prostate cancer; however, the correlations between SLC9A9 and ESCC prognosis are unclear. The aim of this study is to evaluate the expression and prognostic significance of SLC9A9 in resectable ESCC. Fresh frozen or paraffin-embedded samples were collected from 167 or 59 patients with resectable ESCC, respectively. The expression of SLC9A9 was assessed by reverse transcription and quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction analysis (167 patients) and immunohistochemistry (61 patients). The expression of SLC9A9 was not associated with patient clinicopathological characteristics at both transcription and protein levels. The 5-year overall survival in the high SLC9A9 messenger RNA (mRNA) group ( n = 106) was poorer than that in the low expression group ( n = 61) (34.6 vs. 65.9 %, P < 0.001). Notably, higher SLC9A9 protein expression was also correlated with lower 5-year overall survival (33.1 vs. 66.5 %, P = 0.023). Moreover, multivariate analysis revealed that SLC9A9 mRNA (HR, 2.41; 95 % CI, 1.47-3.97; P = 0.001) and protein (HR, 2.31; 95 %CI, 1.06-5.02; P = 0.034) were independent prognostic factors. In conclusion, the expression of SLC9A9 can be a prognostic predictor for ESCC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The changes of the ionospheric electric field before and after four huge earthquakes, which include the Ms 8.7 earthquake of 2004 and the Ms 8.5 earthquake of 2005 in Sumatra of Indonesia, the Ms 8.0 Wenchuan earthquake of 2008 in China, the Ms 8.8 earthquake of 2010 in Chile, and their strong aftershocks are studied in this paper. The significant results revealed that the power spectral density of low-frequency electric field below 20 Hz in the ionosphere, a kind of electromagnetic radiation phenomena, increased abnormally before and after the earthquakes and partially corresponded to the increased power spectral density of the low-frequency geoelectric field in time. This research preliminarily indicates that the low-frequency electromagnetic radiation during the imminent stages before such earthquakes could be detected by the observation of the ionospheric electric field. However, the spatial, temporal, and intensive complexities of the electric field anomalies in the ionosphere before earthquakes have come in sight also. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coxsackievirus B4 is a member of the species Enterovirus B in the Enterovirus genus of the Picornaviridae family. So far, there are only seven complete genome sequences of CVB4 published in GenBank database. In the study, the complete genome analysis of a Coxsackievirus B4 strain A155/YN/CHN/2009 isolated from a child with aseptic meningitis in Yunnan Province was performed. It had 85.1 and 83.3 % nucleotide similarity with prototype strain J.V.B Benschoten in the VP1 region and the complete genome, respectively. Phylogenetic analysis of VP1 region showed that A155/YN/CHN/2009 belongs to Genotype V circulating only in mainland of China. The results of Simplot and Bootscanning analysis implicated that A155 has recombined with other HEV-B viruses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we extend several existing methods that apply distance function learning to regression problems. We discover that these methods may be viewed as approximating a matrix consisting of desired distances among all training samples. Based on this understanding, we propose an iterative framework where outlier samples are corrected by their neighbors via asymptotically increasing the correlation coefficients between the desired distances and the distances of sample labels. Moreover, using this framework, we find that most existing methods iterate only once. As another extension, we adopt a nonlinear distance function and approximate it with neural network. For a fair comparison, we conduct an experiment on age estimation from face images as a regression problem, and the results are comparable to the state of the art. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To investigate the effects of miR-1246 on proliferation, invasion, and migration in the human (CSCC) cell line SiHa. Methods: SiHa cells were assigned into three groups: miR-1246 analog; miR-1246 antagonist; and control. The MTT, transwell, and wound healing assays were performed to evaluate the proliferation, invasion, and migration abilities of SiHa cells, respectively. Western blot was carried out to detect protein expression of thrombospondin-2 (THBS2) before and after transfection with miR-1246 analog, antagonist, or control. In addition, a THBS2 3′-UTR-containing dual luciferase plasmid was generated and co-transfected with miR-1246, the inhibitor, or non-specific miRNA, into SiHa cells to observe its effects on THBS2-driven luciferase enzyme activity. Results: MTT, transwell, and wound healing assays revealed that proliferation, migration, and invasion were all significantly enhanced ( P < 0.01) in SiHa cells transfected with miR-1246 analog, but were suppressed in those transfected with the miR-1246 antagonist. Western blot data showed that miR-1246 analog-transfected SiHa cells had significantly decreased THBS2 expression when compared with control-transfected cells (gray value = 6.28 ± 10.22 vs. 9.58 ± 17.58; P = 0.013) while those transfected with the miR-1246 antagonist had significantly increased THBS2 expression (gray value = 12.90 ± 19.81; P = 0.037). Moreover, SiHa cells co-transfected with miR-1246 and the THBS2 3′-UTR-containing plasmid exhibited decreased luciferase enzyme activity compared with the control. Conclusion: MiR-1246 induced CSCC SiHa cell proliferation, invasion and migration. Preliminary evidence suggests that miR-1246 might promote CSCC tumorigenesis and progression by the suppression of its target gene THBS2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report the use of a high throughput (Solexa) sequencing platform to obtain the sequences of a large number of microRNAs (miRNAs) from the Chinese medicinal plant Rehmannia glutinosa L. The analysis of >14,000,000 sequence reads allowed the identification of seven novel miRNAs (comprising seven miRNA families) and conserved 89 miRNAs (comprising 25 miRNA families) in R. glutinosa. The relative abundance of some these miRNAs was checked using quantitive PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis. Some putative target genes of the novel miRNAs were predicted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our previous research results have shown that the Ti-O films with appropriate characteristics possess great potentials for biomaterials application. In this paper, using plasma immersion ion implantation and deposition (PIII-D), titanium oxide thin films are fabricated onto silicon wafer. The antithrombogenesis of films is evaluated in vitro through the platelet adhesion investigation. The biological behavior of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) on the film surface is investigated in vitro by endothelial cell (EC) culture. Our results reveal that the crystalline Ti-O films exhibit attractive blood compatibility. The in vitro HUVEC-cultured investigation of Ti-O film surface has justified that the biological behavior of HUVECs on different structure surfaces is significantly different. The adherence, growth and proliferation of HUVECs to the crystalline Ti-O film surface are in order, by forming a perfect single layer, preserving the natural original shape and displaying the cobblestone road metal rank, and obviously superior to that on the amorphous Ti-O film surface. According to our study, the crystalline Ti-O film, with proper microstructure, is helpful for seeding ECs and can be used as a functional surface for the adherence and growth of ECs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intrinsic resistance to anti-HER2 therapy in breast cancer remains an obstacle in the clinic, limiting its efficacy. However, the biological basis for intrinsic resistance is poorly understood. Here we performed a CRISPR/Cas9-mediated loss-of-function genetic profiling and identified TALDO1, which encodes the rate-limiting transaldolase (TA) enzyme in the non-oxidative pentose phosphate pathway, as essential for cellular survival following pharmacological HER2 blockade. Suppression of TA increases cell susceptibility to HER2 inhibition in two intrinsically resistant breast cancer cell lines with HER2 amplification. Mechanistically, TA depletion combined with HER2 inhibition significantly reduces cellular NADPH levels, resulting in excessive ROS production and deficient lipid and nucleotide synthesis. Importantly, higher TA expression correlates with poor response to HER2 inhibition in a breast cancer patient cohort. Together, these results pinpoint TA as a novel metabolic enzyme possessing synthetic lethality with HER2 inhibition that can potentially be exploited as a biomarker or target for combination therapy. Resistance to anti-HER2 therapy in breast cancer remains a major obstacle in the clinic. Here the authors performed a CRISPR-selective vulnerability screen to identify transaldoloase as a target that is synthetically lethal with HER2 inhibition in breast cancer cells. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performances of noble metal nanostructure-based surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) probes are highly determined by the local surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) effect of the nanostructures. In general, the enhancement factors are calculated from the experimental comparison of detected analyte molecule Raman spectra with and without SERS active nanostructures. In this research, the effect of centrosymmetric silver nanostructure geometries, dimeric (2-Ag) gap distances, and dimeric modes on extinction and absorption spectra, furtherly on the SERS enhancement factors (SERSEF, shows GSERS and lg(GSERS) for visualization), was investigated through electromagnetic field simulations by finite element method (FEM) and finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method. The GSERS was calculated by the outer normal mean electric field method. The reliability and validity of the calculation are confirmed from closed extinction spectra calculation results from both FEM and FDTD methods. The redshift and broadening extinction spectra originated from the electric dipole (ED)-induced scattering, for single (1-Ag) isolated nanosphere and nanocube, with growing radius or edge length. The relationship between optical properties of different nanosphere dimers distance and GSERS values discovers the well-matched extinction peak positions and wavelength positions of maximum GSERS. Higher GSERS data are obtained from both nanosphere and nanocube dimers under 532 nm beam excitation, than those under 633 nm and 785 nm beam excitation. The GSERS data exponentially decrease with growing dimer distances due to a weakening electric field. The edge to edge dimer shows higher GSERS than corner to corner dimer due to a larger hot spot area. The inhomogeneous electric field distributions from the YX-plane of face to face nanocube dimer result in the fluctuation of GSERS with edge lengths. In addition, the radius ratio of nanosphere dimer and the edge length ratios of nanocube dimer show maximum GSERS, from a sphere-like structure due to the large size difference. The GSERS also can be determined by the curvature of nanocube, from cubic to spherical structure evolution. This research provides a potential reference for rapid GSERS evaluation and nanostructure design for SERS detection performance improvement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]