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Main conclusion: Lysine plays an essential role in the growth differences between male and female S. linearistipularis plants under salt stress. Furthermore, SlDHDPS is identified as a vital gene contributing to the differences in saline-alkali tolerance between male and female plants of S. linearistipularis. Soil salinization is a significant problem that severely restricts agricultural production worldwide. High salinity and low nutrient concentrations consequently prevent the growth of most plant species. Salix linearistipularis is the only woody plant (shrub) naturally distributed in the saline-alkali lands of the Songnen Plain in Northeast China, and it is one of the few plants capable of thriving in soils with extremely high salt and alkaline pH (>9.0) levels. However, insufficient attention has been given to the interplay between salt and nitrogen in the growth and development of S. linearistipularis. Here, the male and female plants of S. linearistipularis were subjected to salt stress with nitrogen-starvation or nitrogen-supplement treatments, and it was found that nitrogen significantly affects the difference in salt tolerance between male and female plants, with nitrogen-starvation significantly enhancing the salt stress tolerance of female plants compared to male plants. Transcriptional analyses showed 66 differentially expressed nitrogen-responsive genes in female and male roots, with most of them showing sexual differences in expression patterns under salinity stress. RNA-seq and RT-qPCR analysis demonstrated that six genes had an opposite salt-induced expression pattern in female and male roots. The expression of the 4-hydroxy-tetrahydrodipicolinate synthase encoding gene (SlDHDPS) in female roots was higher than that in male roots. Further treatment with exogenous lysine could significantly alleviate the inhibitory effect of salt stress on the growth of female and male plants. These results indicate that the SlDHDPS in the nitrogen metabolism pathway is involved in the resistance of S. linearistipularis to salt stress, which lays a foundation for further exploring the mechanism of nitrogen on salt tolerance of S. linearistipularis, and has a significant reference value for saline-alkali land management and sustainable agricultural development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The context-dependent text-to-SQL task has profound real-world implications, as it facilitates users in extracting knowledge from vast databases, which allows users to acquire the information interactively for better accuracy. Unfortunately, current models struggle to address this task effectively due to the scarcity of data led by the high annotation overhead. The most straightforward method for addressing this problem is data augmentation, which aims at scaling up the parsing corpus. However, the naive methods suffer from the low diversity of the augmented data. To address this limitation, we propose the state-based CONtext-dependent text-to-SQL Data Augmentation (ConDA), which generate and filter augmented data based on the dialogue state, which has higher diversity. Experimental results show that ConDA yields performance improvement on all experimental datasets with an average boosting of 1.6 % , proving the effectiveness of our method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Integration of functional fillers into liquid metals (LM) induces rheology modification, enabling the free-form shaping of LM at the micrometer scale. However, integrating non-chemically modified low-dimensional materials with LM to form stable and uniform dispersions remain a great challenge. Herein, we propose a solvent-assisted dispersion (SAD) method that utilizes the fragmentation and reintegration of LM in volatile solvents to engulf and disperse fillers. This method successfully integrates MXene uniformly into LM, achieving better internal connectivity than the conventional dry powder mixing (DPM) method. Consequently, the MXene/LM (MLM) coating exhibits high electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding performance (105 dB at 20 μm, which is 1.6 times that of coatings prepared by DPM). Moreover, the rheological characteristic of MLM render it malleable and facilitates direct printing and adaptation to diverse structures. This study offers a convenient method for assembling LM with low-dimensional materials, paving the way for the development of multifunctional soft devices. This work offers a convenient method (solvent-assisted dispersion) for assembling liquid metals with MXene and other low-dimensional materials, paving a path for the development of multifunctional soft devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the global ecosystem, wetlands are vital carbon sinks, playing a crucial role in absorbing greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and mitigating global warming. Accurate estimation of wetland carbon content is essential for research on wetland carbon sinks. However, the carbon cycle of wetlands is complex, and the carbon sinking of wetlands is affected by climate, topography, water level conditions, vegetation types, soil types, and other factors. This has caused significant challenges in the estimation of wetland carbon sinks. In current studies, most research has focused on the impact of individual factors on wetland carbon sinks, often ignoring the interaction between various factors, which further leads to uncertainty in wetland carbon measurements. This paper aims to elucidate the process of the wetland carbon cycle, summarize the factors affecting wetland carbon sinks, and explore the interplay between various factors and their influence on wetland carbon sinks, aiming to provide theoretical support for the study of wetland carbon sinks. Additionally, this paper reviews the advantages and disadvantages of current wetland carbon measurement methods, proposes research directions for combining machine learning methods, identifies existing difficulties in current wetland carbon measurement, and offers suggestions to serve as a reference for future wetland carbon sink estimation and wetland management.Highlights: The potential and significance of wetland carbon sinks are explained. The advantages and disadvantages of current wetland carbon measurement techniques are summarized. The prospective method for integrating machine learning into integrated wetland carbon measurement is proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) poses a significant public health risk due to its association with respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. Given the limited availability of PM 2.5 monitoring stations, there is a pressing need for reliable real-time forecasting models. This study introduces TSPPM25, a novel Transformer-based model designed for spatiotemporal prediction of PM 2.5 levels. TSPPM25 leverages multiple data embedding techniques and various attention layers to effectively capture the intricate spatiotemporal relationships in multivariate data. The model's performance is evaluated using a California Aerosol Optical Depth PM 2.5 dataset and compared with several baseline models, including LSTM, Bi-LSTM, Linear Regression, and basic heuristics models. The results demonstrate that TSPPM25 exhibits superior spatiotemporal learning capabilities, robustness, and stability, outperforming other models across MSE, MAE, and SMAPE metrics. Furthermore, the study explores the underlying patterns in PM 2.5 data through harmonic analysis, revealing that TSPPM25 performs exceptionally well even in complex scenarios characterized by mixed wave patterns. Conclusively, TSPPM25 emerges as a valuable tool for predicting PM 2.5 levels demonstrating its efficacy in the California region, and thereby contributing significantly to the field of air quality forecasting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Forecasting time series data is a big challenge due to the temporal and multivariate dependencies in the data. In this paper, we present a new approach named as TPPM25 (Transformer-based Prediction of PM 2.5 ) for forecasting PM 2.5 , a key air quality indicator. It is based on the state-of-the-art Transformer neural network and various data embedding techniques. By performing attention calculations among features over time steps, TPPM25 mimics cognitive attention and selectively enhances essential parts of the input data while diminishing other parts. TPPM25 is able to effectively capture temporal relations to multiple influencing meteorological features. Experiments demonstrate its effectiveness by comparing with a cutting-edge ensemble deep learning model from Zhang et al. (Inf Sci 544:427–445, 2021). Our TPPM25 model outperforms Zhang et al.'s model under the same experimental setting on a well-researched benchmark dataset. As Zhang et al.'s model is restricted to univariate PM 2.5 prediction, our TPPM25 model bypasses this restriction and further improves the prediction accuracy when considering more influencing meteorological features. Moreover, our TPPM25 model is able to maintain high prediction accuracy over longer periods of time as compared to the Long-Short Term Memory (LSTM) and Bidirectional LSTM models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, great efforts have been made to explore high-performance microwave absorbing (MA) materials, which aim to reduce the booming electromagnetic wave (EMW) pollution caused by electronic devices. MXenes (i.e., two-dimensional (2D) transition metal carbide/nitride), an emerging family of 2D nanomaterials, demonstrate superiority to conventional nanomaterials, such as tunable electrical conductivity, unique layer structure, abundant terminal groups, and great physico-chemical properties, becoming potential candidate materials for high-efficiency MA. By hybridizing MXenes with other lossy mediums and designing novel microstructures, MA properties can be further optimized and enhanced for practical applications. Furthermore, MXene-based materials, with smartly designed multi-functionality, become a research priority to develop new or advanced applications for the coming "intelligent era". This review focuses on using MXenes to effectively absorb EMW energy. In the first part, the fabricating methods of MXenes are systematically introduced followed by a second part on the progress of MXene-based materials regarding the MA performances, as well as a summarization on their next-generation smart multifunctional materials. In the final part, opinions on the future perspectives and opportunities of MXene-based MA materials are presented. It is believed that this review will pave the way for further flourishing the development of MXene-based materials in MA field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The aim of this study was to explore an effective 124I labeling strategy and improve the signal-to-noise ratio when evaluating the expression of PD-L1 using an 124I-iodinated durvalumab (durva) F(ab')2 fragment. Methods: The prepared durva F(ab')2 fragments were incubated with N-succinimidyl-3-(4-hydroxyphenyl) propionate (SHPP); after purification, the HPP-durva F(ab')2 was iodinated using Iodo-Gen method. After the radiochemical purity, stability, and specific activities were determined, the binding affinities of probes prepared using different labeling strategies were compared in vitro. The clinical application value of [124I]I-HPP-durva-F(ab')2 was confirmed by PET imaging. To more objectively evaluate the in vivo distribution and clearance of tracers, the pharmacokinetics and biodistribution assays were also performed. Results: After being modified with SHPP, the average conjugation number of SHPP per durva-F(ab')2 identified by LC–MS was about 8.92 ± 2.84. The prepared [124I]I-HPP-durva F(ab')2 was obtained with a satisfactory radiochemical purity of more than 98% and stability of more than 93% when incubated for 72 h. Compared with unmodified [124I]I-durva F(ab')2, the specific activity of [124I]I-HPP-durva-F(ab')2 was improved (52.91 ± 5.55 MBq/mg and 15.91 ± 0.74 MBq/mg), while the affinity did not significantly change. The biodistribution experiments and PET imaging showed that the prepared [124I]I-HPP-durva-F(ab')2 exhibited an accelerated clearance and improved tumor-to-background ratio compared with [124I]I-durva-F(ab')2. The specificity of [124I]I-HPP-durva-F(ab')2 to PD-L1 was well demonstrated both in vitro and in vivo. Conclusions: A PD-L1 PET imaging probe [124I]I-HPP-durva F(ab')2 was successfully synthesized through the SHPP modification strategy. The prepared probe was able to accurately evaluate the PD-L1 expression level through high-contrast noninvasive imaging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We explored a new artificial intelligence-assisted method to assist junior ultrasonographers in improving the diagnostic performance of uterine fibroids and further compared it with senior ultrasonographers to confirm the effectiveness and feasibility of the artificial intelligence method. In this retrospective study, we collected a total of 3870 ultrasound images from 667 patients with a mean age of 42.45 years ± 6.23 [SD] for those who received a pathologically confirmed diagnosis of uterine fibroids and 570 women with a mean age of 39.24 years ± 5.32 [SD] without uterine lesions from Shunde Hospital of Southern Medical University between 2015 and 2020. The DCNN model was trained and developed on the training dataset (2706 images) and internal validation dataset (676 images). To evaluate the performance of the model on the external validation dataset (488 images), we assessed the diagnostic performance of the DCNN with ultrasonographers possessing different levels of seniority. The DCNN model aided the junior ultrasonographers (Averaged) in diagnosing uterine fibroids with higher accuracy (94.72% vs. 86.63%, P < 0.001), sensitivity (92.82% vs. 83.21%, P = 0.001), specificity (97.05% vs. 90.80%, P = 0.009), positive predictive value (97.45% vs. 91.68%, P = 0.007), and negative predictive value (91.73% vs. 81.61%, P = 0.001) than they achieved alone. Their ability was comparable to that of senior ultrasonographers (Averaged) in terms of accuracy (94.72% vs. 95.24%, P = 0.66), sensitivity (92.82% vs. 93.66%, P = 0.73), specificity (97.05% vs. 97.16%, P = 0.79), positive predictive value (97.45% vs. 97.57%, P = 0.77), and negative predictive value (91.73% vs. 92.63%, P = 0.75). The DCNN-assisted strategy can considerably improve the uterine fibroid diagnosis performance of junior ultrasonographers to make them more comparable to senior ultrasonographers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

External magnetic field assisted laser welding (MALW) is proved to be effective in improving welding stability, inhibiting welding defects and enhancing mechanical properties. Large numbers of researches are focusing on this technology and aiming at revealing the mechanisms and effects of magnetic field on molten pool dynamics, weld appearances and microstructures. The MALW is an advanced welding method being potential for industrial extension due to its flexible and cost-effective features. However, a comprehensive summarization on recent researches and the latest achievements is lacking. This review is significant in developing advanced welding techniques and promoting application of magnetic field in materials processing. This paper reviews the recent progress of magnetic field assisted laser welding in three aspects: (i) Mechanisms, the fundamental interaction mechanisms between magnetic field and fluid flow basing on magnetohydrodynamics (MHD); (ii) Technologies, the technologies developed basing on magnetic field assisted laser welding; (iii) Effects, the effects of magnetic fields on defects, microstructures and properties. Finally, the main conclusions of current researches and potential prospects are discussed to supply useful directions for future exploration in related fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The residues of pharmaceutical compounds such as nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs in aquatic environments are a matter of global concern because they may pose deleterious risks to human health and ecosystems. In this study, a novel composite was prepared by grafting ionic liquid hypercrosslinked polymer onto the surface of the melamine sponge skeleton. The resultant hypercrosslinked polymer@sponge was characterized using SEM, BET, FT-IR, TG-DSC, XPS, and a zeta potential analyzer. The composite can provide strong ion exchange sites and multiple interactions, which had a strong interaction with the target NSAIDs. The adsorption conditions, including pH, extraction time, salt concentration, and initial concentration of the drugs, were systematically optimized to obtain the maximum removal efficiency. Studies revealed that the prepared IL-HCPs@MS had a strong affinity for NSAIDs, particularly for diclofenac and ketoprofen. The adsorption isotherms and kinetics data of both these IL-HCPs@MS were in alignment with the Langmuir model (R2 > 0.98) and the pseudo-second-order model (R2 > 0.99), respectively. The results showed the removal of NSAIDs by the HCPs@MS was mainly based on the chemisorption process, monolayer adsorption with an endothermic mechanism, and an enthalpy-driven process. The composite will be a promising sorbent with potential applications in water environment remediation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The microscopic explanation of the elongation variation in a Fe-0.5 wt.% Si alloy during electrically assisted forming (EAF) was investigated. Specimens were electrically stretched, measured with electron backscattered diffraction (EBSD). Results show that there is a positive linear relationship between material elongation and the ratio of maximum special grain boundary cluster size and grain size, while the maximum special grain boundary cluster size is closely related to the fraction of special grain boundaries and triple junction distribution. The effect of electric current on the fraction and characteristic distribution of special grain boundaries is significant and can be attributed to that electric current has an influence on dislocations and then recovery and grain growth. Cooling condition has a complex effect on special grain boundaries and grain size. The distribution of special grain boundaries in triple junctions during EAF does not conform to random distribution. The variation of material elongation during EAF is attributed to the change of microcrack propagation behavior caused by the change of special grain boundary cluster size and grain size. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to determine the deformation process window and inquire the cause of internal cracks and voids, three-roll planetary rolling process was modeled by three-dimensional finite element method, and internal cracks and voids were investigated by real rolling of a bismuth-containing austenitic stainless steel bar. It shows that improper process parameters will lead to cracks and voids in the rolled bar. The Brozzo ductile fracture criteria revised can be used to determine the damage factor. The deformation process window to avoid internal cracks and voids can be described by rolling elongation and temperature. The three positive principal stresses in the center of the rolled bar, the alternating stress caused by periodically discontinuous contact between the rolls and the rolled piece, and the uneven radial strain distribution can be counted to be the main reasons for internal cracks and voids in the rolled bar. This study shows that the elongation has an upper limitation for avoiding internal cracks and voids in the bismuth-containing austenitic stainless steel bar rolled by three-roll planetary mill. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effects of deformation conditions on typical textures and the relationship between microstructural features and typical textures in a non-oriented electrical steel during electrically assisted forming were investigated. Specimens processed by electrically assisted tensile forming were measured with electron back-scatter diffraction (EBSD). Results show that Joule heat reduces cube, Goss texture, and θ-fiber but enhances rotated cube texture and γ-fiber. A stronger cooling rate brings a remarkable decrease of cube texture and γ-fiber and an increase of rotated cube and θ-fiber. It is concluded that electric current itself enhances cube texture and Goss texture. The variations of grain size and number fraction of rotated cube and Goss grains contribute to the volume fraction variations of rotated cube and Goss texture. The increases of the sum of Σ3 and Σ9 grain boundaries, grain boundary curvature, and microstructural defects in Goss grains are responsible for the enhancement of Goss texture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The triple junction features of 0.5 wt.% Si electrical steel in electrically assisted forming were investigated. Specimens were electrically stretched, measured with electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) method. The results show triple junction curvature, and the difference between the maximum and minimum dihedral angles and specific triple junctions are promoted. It is concluded that increased deviation from the equilibrium of dihedral angles can be attributed to the increased triple junction curvature induced by electric current. The increased triple junction curvature enhances the driving force for triple junction motion and reduces the retarding effect of particles on the motion of triple junctions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The stress–strain curves of a bainite steel have been measured with hot compression experiments at temperatures of 1173, 1273, 1373, 1473 K and strain rates of 0.01, 0.1, 1, 10 s−1 on a thermo-mechanical simulator (Gleeble-1500). The processing maps, activation energy maps, and the overlap regions of dynamic recrystallization zones and flow stability domains have been obtained by utilizing the stress–strain data experimented. The feasible process windows have been determined according to a new criterion that these windows are in the overlap regions where the activation energy isoline is the sparsest with its variation no more than 1%. Moreover, the optimum temperature and strain rate for a given strain have been ascertained by the largest power dissipation efficiency within the feasible process windows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cervical cancer is primarily caused by persistent infection with high-risk human papillomavirus (HPV), and 70% of cases are associated with HPV16 and 18 infections. The objective of this study was to establish rapid, simple, and sensitive internally controlled recombinase-aided amplification (IC-RAA) assays for the detection of HPV16 and 18. The assays were performed at 39 ℃ and were completed within 30 min. A total of 277 clinical samples of exfoliated cervical cells were tested by IC-RAA assays and commercial HPV real-time fluorescent PCR kits using extracted DNA and samples treated with nucleic acid releasing agent. The analytical sensitivity of the IC-RAA assay was found to be 10 copies/μL for the detection of HPV16 and 18 when using recombinant plasmids as targets. The optimal concentration of the internal control (IC) plasmid and 18 was 1000 copies/μL for HPV16 and 100 copies/μL for HPV18. The clinical sensitivity of the IC-RAA assays for HPV16 using extracted DNA and samples treated with nucleic acid releasing agent was 98.73% and 97.47%, respectively, with kappa values of 0.977 (P < 0.01) and 0.955 (P < 0.01), respectively, and 100% The specificity in both cases. For HPV18, the sensitivity and specificity were 100%, and the kappa value was 1 for both samples (P < 0.01). The IC-RAA assay is a promising tool for the detection of HPV16 and HPV18, especially in resource-constrained settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An efficient and effective spatiotemporal prediction algorithm for PM2.5 (i.e. particulate matter with a diameter of less than 2.5 micrometers) is urgently needed to study the distribution of PM2.5 over a continuous spatiotemporal domain, which not only helps to make scientific decisions on the prevention and control of PM2.5 pollution but also promotes meaningful assessment of the quantitative relationship between adverse health effects and PM2.5 concentrations over time. Existing spatiotemporal interpolation algorithms are usually based on the assumption that interpolation models follow explicit and simple mathematical descriptions. Unfortunately, the real world does not really follow these perfect mathematical models. Combining data fusion techniques and a Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) recurrent neural network (RNN), we present a novel spatiotemporal interpolation model, which is able to achieve high estimation accuracies over a long time period and a large area. By fusing the daily PM2.5 data, meteorological data, elevation data, and land-use data collected from China in 2016, four experiments were conducted in this study to evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of the proposed approach. Results showed that applying LSTM RNN on the fused dataset can achieve consistent and high accuracy in different geographies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel theoretical scheme is proposed to implement quantum cyclic controlled teleportation (QCYCT) of three unknown states by utilizing a seven-qubit entangled state as the quantum channel, where Alice can transmit an unknown m-qubit state to Bob, Bob can transmit an unknown n-qubit state to Candy and Candy can transmit an unknown t-qubit state to Alice under the control of the supervisor David. Only controlled-not (CNOT) operations, Bell-state measurements, a single-qubit measurement and appropriate unitary operations are needed in this scheme, which can be realized in experiment easily. The desired state of each communicator can be recovered deterministically by using auxiliary particles. The direction of the cyclic controlled teleportation can also be altered throughout changing the selection of the particle pairs to be measured of each communicator. Compared with the previous QCYCT schemes, the proposed scheme possesses higher intrinsic efficiency in most cases and can transfer as many qubits as the communicators desire. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The thermal behaviors of a porous calcium silicate (PCS) material prepared from coal-bearing strata kaolinite were investigated by thermogravimetry and derivative thermogravimetry (TG–DTG), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), scanning electron microscopy, and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller method. The XRD results showed that the PCS was determined as calcium silicate hydrates (C–S–H) and a small amount of CaCO3, which transformed to an orderly crystal structure of wollastonite approximately at 700 °C. The TG–DTG results indicated that the dehydration was observed until 300 °C and the dehydroxylation presented at 728 °C. The PCS exhibited a large number of pores with a fibrous flake network structure, which disappeared at 800 °C. The BET data showed that the specific surface area of material decreased as the temperature increased. The high-temperature phase transformation of PCS underwent the following transformation: active calcium silicate → dehydrated calcium silicate → dehydroxylated calcium silicate → wollastonite. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a common viral pathogen that causes lower respiratory tract infections in infants and children globally. In this study, we developed a duplex reverse transcription recombinase-aided amplification (duplex-rtRAA) assay containing an internal control in a single closed tube for the detection of human RSV. The internal control in the amplification effectively eliminated false-negative results and ensured the accuracy of the duplex-rtRAA system. We first developed and evaluated a universal singleplex-rtRAA assay for RSV. The sensitivity of this assay for RSV was determined as 4.4 copies per reaction, and the specificity was 100%. Next, a duplex-rtRAA assay with an internal control was established. The sensitivity of the duplex-rtRAA assay approached 5.0 copies per reaction, and no cross-reaction with other common respiratory viruses was observed. The two detection methods (singleplex-rtRAA and duplex-rtRAA) developed in this study were used to test 278 clinical specimens, and the results showed absolute consistency with RSV RT-qPCR analysis, demonstrating 100% diagnostic sensitivity and specificity. These data indicate that the duplex-rtRAA has great potential for the rapid detection of RSV with a high sensitivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Glucagon like peptide-1 (GLP-1) is produced to induce postprandial insulin secretion. Liraglutide, a full agonist of the GLP-1 receptor, has a protective effect on weight gain in obese subjects. Brown adipose tissue plays a major role in the control of energy balance and is known to be involved in the weight loss regulated by liraglutide. The putative anti-obesity properties of liraglutide and the cell signaling pathways involved were examined. Methods: Four groups of C57/BL6 mice fed with chow or HFHS diet were injected with either liraglutide or vehicle for four weeks. Western blotting was used to analyze protein expression. Results: Liraglutide significantly attenuated the weight gain in mice fed with HFHS diet and was associated with significant reductions of epididymal fat and inguinal fat mass. Furthermore, liraglutide significantly upregulated the expression of brown adipose-specific markers in perigonadal fat in association with upregulation of AMPK-SIRT-1-PGC1-α cell signaling. However, elevation of brown fat markers in skeletal muscle was only observed in HFHS diet fed mice after liraglutide treatment, and AMPK-SIRT-1 cell signaling is not involved in this process. Conclusions: the anti-obesity effect of liraglutide occurs through adaptive thermogenesis and may act through different cell signaling pathways in fat and skeletal muscle tissue. Liraglutide induces beige fat development partially through the AMPK-SIRT-1-PGC1-α cell signaling pathway. Therefore, liraglutide is a potential medication for obesity prevention and in targeting pre-diabetics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drillstring vibration is an important cause of precocious failure of drilling, and torsional vibration is a particular important phenomenon. Stick/slip is a severe type of torsional drillstring oscillation that affects the efficiency of the drilling process and can cause bit damage as well as drillstring failure. In an automatic vertical drilling system (VDS), frictional force between the pads and borehole wall will reduce the drill bit instantaneous rotational speed. The pads of the implementing agencies in VDS constantly pushed against the borehole wall, making bottom hole by a cycle of nonlinear damping force, which lead to chaotic and disorder motion to the bottom drilling tool. Here, the stick–slip vibration is modeled to understand the large amplitude torsional oscillation of the drillstring. Based on the model, the causes for torsional vibrations in VDS and torsional vibrations with and without stick–slip will be evaluated. We show that pushing the borehole wall will cause the drill bit torsional vibration more serious. The results contribute to the better understanding of the dynamics of the push-the-bit VDS. The results obtained can also be applied to the same type of rotary steerable system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A better understanding of spatiotemporal distribution of PM2.5 (particulate matter with diameter less than 2.5 micrometer) concentrations in a continuous space-time domain is critical for risk assessment and epidemiologic studies. Existing spatiotemporal interpolation algorithms are usually based on strong assumptions by restricting the interpolation models to the ones with explicit and simple mathematical descriptions, thus neglecting plenty of hidden yet critical influencing factors. In this study, we developed a novel deep-learning-based spatiotemporal interpolation model, which includes the bidirectional Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) Recurrent Neural Network (RNN) as the main ingredient. Our model is able to take into account both spatial and temporal hidden influencing factors automatically. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first time of applying the bidirectional LSTM RNN in the spatiotemporal interpolation of air pollutants concentrations. We evaluated our novel method using a dataset that contains daily PM2.5 measurements in 2009 over the contiguous southeast region of the USA. Results demonstrate a good performance of our model. We also conducted simulations to explore the properties of spatiotemporal correlations. In particular, we found the temporal correlation is stronger than the spatial correlation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To better assess the relationships between environmental exposures and health outcomes, an appropriate spatiotemporal interpolation is critical. Traditional spatiotemporal interpolation methods either consider the spatial and temporal dimensions separately or incorporate both dimensions simultaneously by simply treating time as another dimension in space. Such interpolation results suffer from relatively low accuracy as the true space-time domain is skewed inappropriately and the distance calculation in such domain is not accurate. We employ the efficient k-d tree structure to store spatiotemporal data and adopt several machine learning methods to learn optimal parameters. To overcome the computational difficulty with large data sets, we implement our method on an efficient cluster computing framework - Apache Spark. Real world PM2.5 data sets are utilized to test our implementation and the experimental results demonstrate the computational power of our method, which significantly outperforms the previous work in terms of both speed and accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Degradation behavior is one of the most important characteristics of biomedical materials for their applications. Herein, we systematically investigate the in vitro degradation behaviors of γ-glycidoxypropyltrimethoxysilane (GT) and/or epoxy-terminated polydimethylsiloxane oligomer (ES)-modified gelatin hybrid materials in physiological conditions. Their microscopic appearance, chemical composition, thermal performance, and mechanical properties at different degradation periods were thoroughly characterized by a series of measurements. It was found that the degradation behavior of silica-gelatin hybrids could be modulated by controlling the proportion of GT to ES oligomers. In particular, ES/GT-G hybrid as a result of combination of ES and GT, exhibited a faster degradation rate than that of GT-G hybrid when using merely GT, and showed a more homogeneous degradation behavior during the degradation process. Additionally, these silica-gelatin hybrids showed low cytotoxicity to human renal epithelial cells, and the cell viability was all above 83%. This work is helpful for a further insight into the in vivo degradation of silica-gelatin hybrid scaffolds, which are promising in biomedical applications. In vitro degradation behaviors of silica-gelatin hybrids were tested in physiological conditions.Degradation behaviors of silica-gelatin hybrids could be modulated by the proportion of GT to ES oligomers.ES/GT-G hybrid showed a faster and more homogeneous degradation performance.The prepared silica-gelatin hybrids exhibited cytocompatibility in vitro. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of triazolo-lapatinib hybrids were synthesized via copper (II)-oxide nanoparticle (Cu2O-NP)-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition. The ability of these compounds to reduce the viability of breast cancer SKBR3 and SUM159 cells and stem cell-like KG-1a leukemia cells was subsequently evaluated. Compared with lapatinib, compounds 6c-f were more potent than lapatinib against the three cell lines. Next, the toxicity of compounds 6c-f was assessed in zebrafish. Compound 6d had comparable toxicity with lapatinib at 200 μM (mortality rate = 10 vs. 10%), and compound 6e had lower toxicity than lapatinib at 200 μM (mortality rate = 0 vs. 10%). Thus, compound 6e is a promising lead compound worthy of further investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The surface of rex rabbit fibers is hydrophobic in nature because of the presence of the hard cuticle on its surface, and this hydrophobicity may give rise to many problems in the dyeing and finishing processes. In order to improve its dyeability and decrease dye pollution in sewage discharge, nitrogen plasma was used to modify rabbit fibers and after that the modified fibers were dyed with the anionic dyestuffs (C.I. number 16185). The effects of nitrogen plasma on the dyeing properties and the dyeing behavior for the rex rabbit fibers were studied, the related parameters including the treatment time and discharge power were optimized. Surface morphology and roughness of rex rabbit fibers were characterized by scanning electron microscope and atomic force microscopy. XPS and FTIR-ATR were further performed to determine the surface chemical compositions of rex rabbit fibers. The physical properties of rex rabbit fibers were characterized by tensile strength tests. The results show that nitrogen plasma treatment can remove surface scales on the rex rabbit fibers and introduce more active groups such as hydroxyl (–OH), carbonyl (–C=O), and amino (–NH2) on the surface of the fibers, which makes rex rabbit fibers have better dyeability, and effectively improves dyeing rate and dye fixation rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The metadynamic recrystallization (MDRX) and static recrystallization (SRX) softening behavior of a bainite steel was investigated by two-pass isothermal compression experiments at temperatures of 1173, 1273, 1373, and 1473 K and strain rates of 0.01, 0.1, 1, and 10 s with inter-pass times of 1, 5, 10, and 30 s on a Gleeble-1500 thermo-mechanical simulator. Kinetic equations were developed to evaluate the softening fractions caused by MDRX and SRX. A comparison between the experimental and predicted softening fractions showed that the proposed kinetic equations can provide a precise estimation of the MDRX and SRX behavior of the studied steel. The results based on the kinetic equations indicated that the MDRX and SRX softening fraction increases with the increase in strain rate, deformation temperature, inter-pass time, and pre-strain; the activation energy of MDRX is much smaller than that of SRX; and the no-recrystallization temperature of the investigated steel is 1179.4 K. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accurate prediction of fracture distribution in fractured reservoirs is important in the development process. Considering that assisted history matching technology is an effective method for the inversion of reservoir parameters, the technology can also be applied for the inversion of fractures. Because applying assisted history matching technology for the inversion of fractures has an inherent defect of multiplicity of solution, it is therefore necessary to alleviate the multiplicity for the success of inversion. Although there are many factors affecting the multiplicity, the paper focuses on the study of the inversion results of different combinations of inversion parameters which are all representative parameters of fractures and determine the distribution of fractures. Firstly, we simulate the flow behavior in fractured media based on the discrete fracture matrix (DFM) module of Matlab Reservoir Simulation Toolbox (MRST) to explicitly describe the effect of fractures on flow behavior. Secondly, history matching objective function is established based on Bayesian theory and different kinds of representative parameters of fractures are chosen as inversion parameters. Thirdly, simultaneous perturbation stochastic approximation (SPSA) algorithm is adopted to minimize the objective function to achieve the inversion of fractures corresponding to different inversion parameters. Finally, theoretical cases verify that the inversion method is effective for the accurate prediction of fracture distribution and proper inversion parameters are crucial to the success of fracture inversion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Central nervous system infection (CNSI) results in significant health and economic burdens worldwide, but the diversity of causative pathogens makes differential diagnosis very difficult. Although PCR and real-time fluorescent quantitative PCR (q-PCR) assays are widely applied for pathogen detection, they are generally optimized for the detection of a single or limited number of targets and are not suitable for the diagnosis of numerous CNSI agents. In this study, we describe the development of a resequencing pathogen microarray (RPM-IVDC4) method for the simultaneous detection of viruses, bacteria, fungi and parasites that cause CNSI. The test panel of this assay included more than 100 microorganism species across 45 genera and 30 families. The analytical specificity and sensitivity were examined using a panel of positive reference strains, and the clinical performance was evaluated using 432 clinical samples by comparing the results with q-PCR assays. Our results demonstrated good performance of the RPM-IVDC4 assay in terms of sensitivity, specificity and detection range, suggesting that the platform can be further developed for high-throughput CNSI diagnosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A flame-retardant leather (FR-leather) was prepared from blue wet leather treated with tetrakis hydroxymethyl phosphonium-melamine-pentaerythritol diphosphorate (THPM). An optimized genetic algorithm search method driven by Kissinger method was employed to estimate pyrolysis kinetic mechanism and the thermal stability of FR-leather. It is shown that the thermal decomposition of leather in nitrogen is a three-step kinetic scheme composed of the pyrolysis of triglyceride, multi-complexation collagen and single-complexation collagen, and the activation energies of the corresponding components of FR-leather are, respectively, 84.1, 172.6 and 253.6 kJ mol. Accordingly, those of blank leather are 69.3, 161.3 and 105.4 kJ mol. Meanwhile, cone calorimeter test demonstrates that when leather was treated with THPM, total heat release and total smoke production are decreased, respectively, 16.2 and 54.5%, and time to ignition increased from 20 s of blank leather to 26 s of FR-leather. The results of limit oxygen index value increased from 26.1% of blank leather to 32.9% of FR-leather, and the results of UL-94 vertical burning tests of FR-leather are significantly decreased, such as flame combustion time and length of carbonization decreased 88% and 72%, respectively. It is shown that the novel THPM material obviously improved the thermal stability and flame-retardant properties of leather fibers; at the same time, it has good smoke suppression effect and is an excellent flame retardant suitable for leather. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Betulinic acid (BA), a pentacyclic triterpene of natural origin, has been demonstrated to have varied biologic activities including anti-viral, anti-inflammatory, and anti-malarial effects; it has also been found to induce apoptosis in many types of cancer. However, little is known about the effect of BA on normal cells. In this study, the effects of BA on normal neuronal cell apoptosis and the mechanisms involved were studied using differentiated PC12 cells as a model. Treatment with 50 μM BA for 24 h apparently induced PC12 cell apoptosis. In the early stage of apoptosis, the level of intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) increased. Afterwards, the loss of the mitochondrial membrane potential, the release of cytochrome c and the activation of caspase-3 occurred. Treatment with antioxidants could significantly reduce BA-induced PC12 cell apoptosis. In conclusion, we report for the first time that BA induced the mitochondrial apoptotic pathway in differentiated PC12 cells through ROS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The association between ALOX5AP SG13S114 polymorphism and ischemic stroke (IS) susceptibility has extensively been investigated, especially in white populations; however, the results were inconclusive. Here, we perform a meta-analysis to clarify the effect of SG13S114 variant on the IS risk in Europeans. The Web of Science, PubMed, EMBASE, and Medline were searched up to August 1st, 2016. Data were extracted and the odd ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated by a fixed-effects or random-effects model. In total, 8 case control studies involved 8062 subjects were finally included in this meta-analysis. We observed a significantly decreased IS risk in persons carrying an A allele at the SG13S114 polymorphism compared with those with a T allele (A vs T, OR = 0.856, 95% CI = 0.797-0.919, p < 0.001). In addition, the results of sensitivity and cumulative meta-analysis indicated the robustness of our results. In addition, the publication bias was not detected using the funnel plot and Egger's tests. In summary, the present meta-analysis suggested that the A allele at the ALOX5AP SG13S114 polymorphism is a protective factor for the IS in the Europeans. In addition, further studies with large sample size are needed to validate the association, as well as in other ethnic groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The thermal behavior of coal gangue selected from Zhungeer, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China, was investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy, thermogravimetry (TG), derivative thermogravimetry (DTG), and scanning electron microscope (SEM). The XRD data indicated that the mineral compositions of the coal gangue were kaolinite, boehmite, and quartz. The coal-gangue sample was considered as belonging to a typical mixture of kaolinite and boehmite. The XRD and FT-IR spectra clearly showed that the structural changes and dehydroxylation of coal gangue occurred with increased temperature from 100 to 900 °C. The reaction activity of coal gangue could be effectively improved by calcination. The calcined coal gangue contained considerable active amorphous AlO and SiO and had significant loss on ignition. The optimum activation temperature range of coal gangue was from 600 to 700 °C. The dissolution contents of SiO and AlO were 92.31 and 64.44 %, respectively, when the calcination temperature at 700 °C. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A constitutive model has been established based on dislocation theory, work hardening and dynamic recovery theory, and softening mechanisms of dynamic recrystallization. The stress-strain curves of a bainite steel have been measured with hot compression experiments at temperatures of 1173, 1273, 1373 and 1473 K with strain rates of 0.01, 0.1, 1 and 10 s on a thermo-mechanical simulator (Gleeble-1500). The material constants involved in the constitutive model have been optimized by an inverse analysis of the stress-strain curves using the method of coordinate rotation, determining the strain-stress relationship or the constitutive equation, the kinetic models of dynamic recovery and dynamic recrystallization, and a few material constants of the investigated steel. Comparison of the calculated flow stress with the experimental data suggests that the relationship between the flow stress and the strain rate, temperature, strain of the steel during hot deformation can be described by the constitutive model, and that the underlying materials science can be captured from the material constants determined by the stress-strain curves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A multiple access chaos shift keying cooperative communication (MA-CSK-CC) system over Rayleigh fading channels and in the presence of Gaussian white noise is investigated in depth in this paper. The simplified half-duplex with a single relay decode-and-forward (DF) cooperative strategy is proposed to illustrate and analysis as an example. Exact and approximation bit-error-ratio (BER) performance expressions are derived. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed system has a prominent advantage of high BER performance over the conventional multiple access CSK systems that have a single path to transmit signal at the same data rate over Rayleigh fading channels with additive Gaussian white noise. Moreover, based on the BER performance analysis, some useful results are also derived such as the relationships between BER versus spread spectrum factors, BER versus the number of users, etc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fire-retardant fiber was prepared from goatskin fiber by treating with a melamine-based flame retardant. Kissinger and Flynn-Wall-Ozawa methods were used for analyzing the thermo-gravimetric data obtained from the goatskin fiber and the fire-retardant fiber at different heating rates. Kinetic parameters were calculated from the thermo-gravimetric data at different heating rates. Activation energies obtained using the Kissinger and Flynn-Wall-Ozawa methods were 154.57 kJ/mol and 158.45 kJ/mol, respectively, for the goatskin fiber and 210.15 kJ/mol and 212.52 kJ/mol, respectively, for the fireretardant fiber. The oxygen index of the fire-retardant fiber treated with 4 wt% melamine-based flame retardant increased significantly to a value of 31.7 %. The thermal stability and the flame retardant property of the fire-retardant fiber were improved significantly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neurogenin2 (Ngn2) is a proneural gene that directs neuronal differentiation of progenitor cells during development. This study aimed to investigate whether the use of adipose-derived stem cells (ADSCs) over-expressing the Ngn2 transgene (Ngn2-ADSCs) could display the characteristics of neurogenic cells and improve functional recovery in an experimental rat model of SCI. ADSCs from rats were cultured and purified in vitro, followed by genetically modified with the Ngn2 gene. Forty-eight adult female Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly assigned to three groups: the control, ADSCs, and Ngn2-ADSCs groups. The hind-limb motor function of all rats was recorded using the Basso, Beattie, and Bresnahan locomotor rating scale for 8 weeks. Moreover, hematoxylineosin staining and immunohistochemistry were also performed. After neural induction, positive expression rate of NeuN in Ngn2-ADSCs group was upon 90 %. Following transplantation, a great number of ADSCs was found around the center of the injury spinal cord at 1 and 4 weeks, which improved retention of tissue at the lesion site. Ngn2-ADSCs differentiated into neurons, indicated by the expression of neuronal markers, NeuN and Tuj1. Additionally, transplantation of Ngn2-ADSCs upregulated the trophic factors (brain-derived neurotrophic factor and vascular endothelial growth factor), and inhibited the glial scar formation, which was indicated by immunohistochemistry with glial fibrillary acidic protein. Finally, Ngn2-ADSCs-treated animals showed the highest functional recovery among the three groups. These findings suggest that transplantation of Ngn2-overexpressed ADSCs promote the functional recovery from SCI, and improve the local microenvironment of injured cord in a more efficient way than that with ADSCs alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A constitutive model including the kinetics of twinning and martensitic transformation has been established based on the dislocation theory and the mixture law. The stress-strain curve of a 304 stainless steel has been measured by a tensile test. The material constants for the constitutive model are then found through an inverse analysis of the stress-strain curve measured experimentally, determining the stress-strain relationship equation and the kinetics of twinning and martensitic transformation of the investigated alloy. The volume fractions of martensitic transformation have been measured by the magnetic tester of Fischer Model MP3C. It has been shown that the calculated stress-strain curve and the volume fractions of martensitic transformation are in agreement with those obtained from experimental measurements, demonstrating that the material constants found by using the stress-strain curve can capture the underlying materials science of deformation. On this basis, the influence of twins, martensitic transformation, and mechanical behavior of austenite and martensite on the strength and plasticity of the 304 stainless steel has been discussed further. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fire-retardant leather was prepared from wet blue leather treated with melamine resin. Kissinger, Šatava-Šesták and Flynn-Wall-Ozawa methods are used to process the thermogravimetric data from wet blue leather and fire-retardant leather at different heating rates. The E values of wet blue leather are, respectively, 123.46, 124.61 and 121.04 kJ mol based on Kissinger, Šatava-Šesták and Flynn-Wall-Ozawa methods. Accordingly, the E values of fire-retardant leather are 161.29, 151.48 and 160.81 kJ mol. It is shown that fire-retardant leather has better thermal stability and fire-retardant performance. The results of applied research show that the mechanical properties of fire-retardant leather have also been improved remarkably. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, the association between methylenetetrahydrofolate dehydrogenase 1 (MTHFD1) G1958A polymorphism and neural tube defects (NTD) susceptibility has been widely investigated; however, the results remained inconclusive. Hence, we conducted a meta-analysis to evaluate the effect of MTHFD1 G1958A polymorphism on NTD. The relative literatures were identified by search of the electronic databases PubMed, MEDLINE, and EMBASE. The extracted data were statistically analyzed, and pooled odds ratios (ORs) with 95 % confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated to estimate the association strength using Stata version 11.0 software. Finally, ten studies met our inclusion criteria, including 2,132/4,082 in NTD infants and controls; 1,402/3,136 in mothers with NTD offspring and controls; and 993/2,879 in fathers with NTD offspring and controls. This meta-analysis showed that, compared with the mothers with GG genotype, the women with AA genotype had an increased risk of NTD in their offspring, with OR values and 95 % CI at 1.39 (1.16-1.68), p < 0.001. Interestingly, fathers with AG genotype had a significant decreased risk of NTD offspring (OR = 0.79, 95 % CI = 0.66-0.94, p = 0.009). However, there was no significant association between the MTHFD1 G1958A polymorphism in NTD patients and the risk of NTD. In conclusion, the present meta-analysis provided evidence of the association between maternal MTHFD1 G1958A polymorphism and NTD susceptibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) trace the high- z universe, there is an appreciable probability for a GRB to be gravitational lensed by galaxies in the universe. Herein we consider the gravitational lensing effect of GRBs contributed by the dark matter halos in galaxies. Assuming that all halos have the singular isothermal sphere (SIS) mass profile in the mass range 10 h M < M < 2×10 h M and all GRB samples follow the intrinsic redshift distribution and luminosity function derived from the Swift LGRBs sample, we calculated the gravitational lensing probability in BATSE, Swift/BAT and Fermi/GBM GRBs, respectively. With an derived probability result in BATSE GRBs, we searched for lensed GRB pairs in the BATSE5B GRB Spectral catalog. The search did not find any convincing gravitationally lensed events. We discuss our result and future observations for GRB lensing observation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]