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Many invertebrates and vertebrates secrete mucus from their body surface, which plays a crucial role in protecting themselves from attacks by microorganism or predators. This study reports on the potential functions of mucus secreted from the body surface of larvae of the moth Phauda flammans (Walker) (Lepidoptera: Phaudidae). We tested whether the mucus could inhibit the growth of the fungus Beauveria bassiana PfBb (Bals.‐Criv.) Vuill. (Hypocreales) and attract and/or deter predators such as the crazy ant, Paratrechina longicornis (Latreille) (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), and the predatory bug Eocanthecona furcellata (Wolff) (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae). Our results showed that de‐ and rehydrated mucus concentrations of 0.5–1.0 mg mL−1 had an inhibitory effect on the conidial germination and colony growth of B. bassiana PfBb; however, P. flammans mucus did not significantly affect fungal sporulation. Raw mucus and mucus concentrations of 1.0–4.0 mg mL−1 attracted P. longicornis workers in a Y‐tube olfactometer, whereas the physical viscosity of raw mucus hindered their foraging for food in a laboratory test. The E. furcellata adults did not display a preference for the odour of P. flammans mucus. Therefore, P. flammans mucus may inhibit pathogenic microorganisms and attract or repel predators, but the mucus does not act as a complete deterrent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The geographical distribution of bacteria is an important, but poorly understood, topic in microbial ecology. A major question is how broadly distributed generalist taxa, and limitedly distributed specialist taxa, vary across a latitudinal gradient in freshwater ecosystems. We predict that: (a) generalists and specialists exhibit latitudinal diversity gradient with different patterns; (b) their community assemblies are mainly driven by stochastic processes; and (c) generalists coexist through niche differences, while specialists coexist through fitness differences. Location: Sixty lakes and reservoirs in China, ranging from 18° N to 50° N. Time Period: July–August in 2012 and 2018. Taxa Studied: Bacterioplankton. Methods: We clustered zero‐radius operational taxonomic unit (zOTU) (subspecies‐like level) into operational taxonomic unit (OTU) (species‐like level) and calculated the intra‐specific variation and spatial asynchrony of OTU. We examined the relative effects of environment versus space (latitude) on bacterial community and quantified the community assembly processes of generalists and specialists, respectively. The binary‐state speciation and extinction (BiSSE) model has been used to estimate the evolutionary characteristics. The abundances of the top zOTUs within each OTU were identified to reveal their niche preferences (distribution patterns at different sites). Results: We found that bacterial generalists had a higher intra‐specific variation, greater asynchrony and wider niche width than the specialists. With increasing latitude, bacterial diversity decreased with abundance variations in generalists and occurrence variations in specialists, respectively. Diversification in stochastic processes was the main driving factor in both groups, though deterministic processes showed greater effects on specialists than generalists in local communities. Bacterial generalists coexisted through niche differences, whereas specialists coexisted through average fitness differences. Main Conclusions: We demonstrated distinct latitudinal distribution patterns of bacterial generalists and specialists. These results highlight differences in biogeography of microbial generalist and specialist taxa mediated by intra‐specific variation and emphasize their distinctly vital roles mediated by differing mechanisms in freshwater ecosystems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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When supply disruptions occur, firms want to employ an effective pricing strategy to reduce losses. However, firms typically do not know precisely how customers will react to price changes in the short term, during a disruption. In this article, we investigate the customer's order variability and the firm's profit under several representative heuristic pricing strategies, including no change at all (fixed pricing strategy), changing the price only (naive pricing strategy), and adjusting the belief and price simultaneously (one‐period correction [1PC] and regression pricing strategies). We show that the fixed pricing strategy creates the most stable customer order process, but it brings lower profit than the naive pricing strategy in most cases. The 1PC pricing strategy produces a more volatile customer order process and smaller profit than the naive one does. Although the regression pricing strategy is a more advanced approach, it leads to lower profit and greater customer order variability than the naive pricing strategy (but the opposite when compared to the 1PC strategy). We conclude that (i) completely eliminating the customer order variability by employing a fixed pricing strategy is not advisable and adjusting the price to match supply with demand is necessary to improve the profit; (ii) frequently adjusting the belief about customer behaviors under imperfect information may increase the customer's order variability and reduce the firm's profit. The conclusions are robust to the inventory assumption (i.e., without or with inventory carryover) and the firm's objective (i.e., market clearance or profit maximization). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND: Although parasitoids can precisely locate hidden gall‐inducing insects, the host location mechanism is unknown. In this study, our aim was to clarify the olfactory responses of the parasitoid Quadrastichus mendeli to eucalyptus volatiles induced by the gall wasp Leptocybe invasa. RESULTS: Q. mendeli preferred volatiles from gall‐damaged plants compared with those produced by mechanically damaged and undamaged plants. Coupled gas chromatographic–electroantennographic detection results demonstrated that 3‐carene, decanal, d‐limonene, ethanone,1‐(4‐ethylphenyl)‐, p‐cymene and benzene,1‐methyl‐4‐(1‐methylpropyl)‐ from DH 201‐2 (Eucalyptus grandis × Eucalyptus tereticornis) elicited significant antennal responses in Q. mendeli in all treatments. Q. mendeli was repelled by decanal and d‐limonene and was attracted to 3‐carene, benzene,1‐methyl‐4‐(1‐methylpropyl)‐, ethanone,1‐(4‐ethylphenyl) and p‐cymene. Quaternary blends containing 3‐carene, p‐cymene, benzene,1‐methyl‐4‐(1‐methylpropyl)‐ and ethanone,1‐(4‐ethylphenyl)‐ at a ratio of 1:1:1:1 were attractive to Q. mendeli. However, quaternary blends with added decanal and d‐limonene alone or both together induced significant repellence in Q. mendeli. CONCLUSION: Our report is the first to demonstrate that volatiles produced by galls induced by L. invasa are attractive to Q. mendeli, which suggests that this parasitoid could utilize herbivore‐induced plant volatiles to locate its host. The results are beneficial for understanding the function of plant volatiles in host searching by parasitoids of gall‐forming insect pests. © 2022 Society of Chemical Industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To evaluate and determine age‐related changes in rat brains by studying the diffusion kurtosis imaging results among different age groups of rats. Methods: Sprague–Dawley (SD) rats underwent conventional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and diffusion Kurtosis Imaging (DKI). Two diffusion values of mean kurtosis (MK) and kurtosis (K⊥) were measured and analyzed based on laterality, brain regions and age groups. The MK and K⊥ data were plotted against different age groups. Results: No laterality was found for the MK or K⊥ values in the cerebral cortex (CT), external capsule (EC), or caudate putamen (CPu) regions. In contrast, significant changes in these values were observed among different age groups. Changes of the MK and K⊥ values were significant in both hemispheres in the EC, the CT, and the CPu brain regions. The changes in the MK and K⊥ values showed a parabolic relationship with ages in all the brain regions. Conclusion: No laterality in the MK and K⊥ values was observed for the EC, CT, or CPu regions of the rat brain. Significant changes in MK and K⊥ values were both observed among different age groups, thus suggesting diffusion kurtosis imaging as an efficient tool for studying brain aging in rats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider a class of last mile distribution problems with multicenters and multiareas in disaster management, where the travel time for every pair of center‐area is uncertain. We propose a chance‐constrained model to handle this problem, which simultaneously determines the selection of emergency logistics centers (ELCs), the amount of relief transported to these ELCs, the allocation and routing of vehicles, and the equitable distribution of emergency materials from the ELCs to the disaster areas. We develop a distributionally robust optimization (DRO) model to reformulate the chance‐constraint model as a second‐order cone programming, which the proposed algorithm can solve efficiently. We present a case study of the Yushu earthquake in the Qinghai Province of the People's Republic of China to demonstrate the performance of our proposed model and method. The results reveal that (1) the DRO method outperforms the scenario‐based model in reducing cost and improving reliability, (2) deploying a large number of vehicles in the emergency centers near disaster areas can reduce cost, and (3) our proposed model evenly distributes vehicles on paths to curtail the rescue time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Lake Taihu in China has suffered serious harmful cyanobacterial blooms for decades. The algal blooms threaten the ecological sustainability, drinking water safety, and human health. Although the roles of abiotic factors (such as water temperature and nutrient loading) in promoting Microcystis blooms have been well studied, the importance of biotic factors (e.g. bacterial community) in promoting and meditating Microcystis blooms remains unclear. In this study, we investigated the ecological dynamics of bacterial community, the ratio of toxic Microcystis, as well as microcystin in Lake Taihu. High‐throughput 16S rRNA sequencing and principal component analysis (PCA) revealed that the bacteria community compositions (BCCs) clustered into three groups, the partitioning of which corresponded to that of groups according to the toxic profiles (the ratio of toxic Microcystis to total Microcystis, and the microcystin concentrations) of the samples. Further Spearman's correlation network showed that the α‐proteobacteria Phenylobacterium strongly positively correlated with the toxic profiles. Subsequent laboratory chemostats experiments demonstrated that three Phenylobacterium strains promoted the dominance of the toxic Microcystis aeruginosa PCC7806 when co‐culturing with the non‐toxic PCC7806 mcyB− mutant. Taken together, our data suggested that the α‐proteobacteria Phenylobacterium may play a vital role in the maintenance of toxic Microcystis dominance in Lake Taihu. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three experiments investigated whether and why sharing experiences of social exclusion or social acceptance with others strengthens social bonds. Participants experienced either social exclusion or social acceptance alongside another co‐participant who either also experienced the same outcome, or experienced a different outcome, as them. Multilevel modeling results showed that participant dyads who shared the experience of social exclusion or social acceptance felt closer to each other than those who experienced different outcomes, and that perceived similarity mediated the effect of shared experiences on social bonds. Interestingly, participants felt closer to one another after having shared social acceptance, more so than when they have shared social exclusion. Implications of the present findings are interpreted in light of theories of social exclusion, shared experiences, and social bonding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes daily and monthly transactional and in‐store display data of a large supermarket from January to October in 2019 associated with 28 757 stock‐keeping units (SKUs) in 5 categories and 41 subcategories. The database contains five parts, including information about each SKU, in‐store display, daily sales, inventory, and replenishment. We also propose some research questions related to assortment planning, pricing, inventory management, and customer behavior. Researchers are welcome to develop data‐driven models or other innovative methods to address these questions or other practical problems using this database. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We review the operations research/management science literature on data‐driven methods in retail operations. This line of work has grown rapidly in recent years, thanks to the availability of high‐quality data, improvements in computing hardware, and parallel developments in machine learning methodologies. We survey state‐of‐the‐art studies in three core aspects of retail operations—assortment optimization, order fulfillment, and inventory management. We then conclude the paper by pointing out some interesting future research possibilities for our community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Motivated by challenges in the smartphone manufacturing industry, we develop a dynamic production ramp‐up model that can be applied to economically satisfy nonstationary demand for short‐life‐cycle products by high‐tech companies. Due to shorter life cycles and more rapid evolution of smartphones, production ramp‐up has been increasingly critical to the success of a new smartphone. In the production ramp‐up, the key challenge is to match the increasing capacity to nonstationary demand. The high‐tech smartphone manufacturers are urged to jointly consider the effect of increasing capacity and decreasing demand. We study the production planning problem using a high‐dimensional Markov decision process (MDP) model to characterize the production ramp‐up. To address the curse of dimensionality, we refine Monte Carlo tree search (MCTS) algorithm and theoretically analyze its convergence and computational complexity. In a real case study, we find that the MDP model achieves revenue improvement by stopping producing the existing product earlier than the benchmark policy. In synthetic instances, we validate that the proposed MCTS algorithm saves computation time without loss of solution quality compared with traditional value iteration algorithm. As part of the Lenovo production solution, our MDP model enables high‐tech smartphone manufacturers to better plan the production ramp‐up. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social rejection research has largely focused on the consequences of rejection when individuals experience rejection alone. Yet little is known about the reaction of those co‐experiencing rejection. We tested the hypothesis that the co‐experience of rejection increases cooperation between the co‐experiencers. Three experiments provided supporting evidence for the hypothesis. The participants cooperated more when they co‐experienced rejection than when they experienced rejection alone. The need to belong mediated the relationship between those co‐experiencing rejection and cooperation. These findings shed light on the factors that initiate the formation of small groups, especially deviant ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Threat appeals have been widely utilized in numerous types of public service announcements (PSAs), and previous research has focused on the impact of the inherent messages in these announcements. By examining the research on the effects of framing PSAs in terms of the threat of the message to oneself or others, we proposed a clear conceptualization of "threat‐target framing." The first two studies addressed the direct effects of threat‐target framing and found that other‐oriented threat appeals can evoke more guilt than can self‐oriented threat appeals. Moreover, self‐oriented threat appeals can evoke more fear and immediately direct recipients' attention to the smoker than can other‐oriented threat appeals. Study 3 reported that a contextual factor—relationship norms—was introduced as a potential moderating factor. Results showed that relationship norms had the potential to moderate the effect of threat‐target framing on recipients' fear response, but not the effect on recipients' guilt and coping response. In sum, the results highlighted the importance of message framing of advertising copies and the placement context. Our findings may be useful in understanding the antecedents of the persuasiveness of PSAs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the diffusion couple of Ti3SiC2 and Ti3AlC2, only interdiffusion of Si and Al occurred during diffusion treatment process. Based on the concentration profiles of Si and Al measured by electron probe microanalysis (EPMA), the interdiffusion coefficients of Si and Al at 1373‐1673 K in Ti3SiC2–Ti3AlC2 diffusion couple were determined by both the Boltzmann‐Matano (B‐M) method and the Saucer‐Freise (S‐F) method. At the position of Matano plane with the composition of Ti3Al0.5Si0.5C2, the interdiffusion coefficient could be expressed as Dint (m2/s) = 5.6 × 10−4⋅exp [−246 ± 14 (kJ/mol)/RT]. Based on the two methods, the calculated interdiffusion coefficients increased with increasing temperature, and the magnitudes of their absolute values were on the order of 10–13‐10–11 m2/s at 1373‐1673 K. At 1373‐1573 K, the calculated interdiffusion coefficients decreased monotonously with the increase of Si concentration, that is, xSi/(xAl + xSi). But at 1673 K, the variation trend of interdiffusion coefficients with xSi/(xAl + xSi) was no longer monotonous, probably due to the presence of Ti5Si3 phase and voids on Ti3AlC2 side. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The identification of V‐raf murine sarcoma viral oncogene homolog B1 (BRAF)V600E mutations has been recommended in patients with Langerhans cell histiocytosis (LCH) with difficult diagnosis and failure of first‐line treatment. The reported frequencies of BRAFV600E mutations vary in Chinese patients with LCH. Methods: We conducted a retrospective analysis of LCH patients with a definitive pathological diagnosis who were hospitalized between 2013 and 2017. The BRAFV600E mutations were detected with the human BRAFV600E amplification refractory mutation system‐PCR (ARMS‐PCR) kit from the collected tissue samples. Results: This study consisted of 46 male (68.7%) and 21 female (31.3%) patients, with a mean age of 29.1 years (range, 2–76 years). Most were adults (45/67.2%) with the multisysytem‐LCH (MS‐LCH) disease subtype (49/61.3%). The overall frequency of BRAFV600E mutations was 22.4% (15 of 67 patients), confirmed by PCR analysis. These mutations were not closely correlated with age (nonadults vs. adults = 5/22.7% vs. 10/22.2%, P = 0.54), gender (female vs. male = 9/19.6% vs. 6/28.6%, P = 0.61), LCH classification type (single system: MS‐risk organ+: MS‐risk organ− = 3/16.7%: 12:28.6%: 0, P = 0.19) or prognosis (cured: improved/stable: exacerbated: died = 4/44.4%: 19.2%: 20%: 0, P = 0.37). There were 33 patients (49.2%) with lung involvement, and 12 patients (36.3%) underwent lung biopsies; after screening, four patients were diagnosed with solitary pulmonary LCH, all of whom were negative for BRAFV600E mutations. Conclusion: The BRAFV600E mutation rate in patients with LCH was lower than those reported in other studies. In addition, BRAFV600E mutations might not be correlated with age, gender, LCH classification type or prognosis for Chinese cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we develop an iterative piecewise linear approximation approach with a novel initialization method to solve natural gas pipeline transmission problems with the nonuniform network elevation. Previous approaches, such as energy minimization methods, cannot be applied to solve problems with the nonuniform network elevation because they exclude pressure range constraints, and thus provide solutions far from optimum. We propose a new initialization model that considers pressure range constraints and improves the optimality of the solutions and the computational efficiency. Furthermore, we extend the energy minimization methods and provide the necessary conditions under which the extended methods operate in networks with the nonuniform elevation. We test the performances of the methods with previously reported pipeline networks from the literature, with the open data set GasLib, and with our industrial collaborator. The initialization approach is shown to be more efficient than the method with fixed initial breakpoints. The newly proposed initialization approach generates solutions with a higher accuracy than the extended energy minimization methods, especially in large‐size networks. The proposed method has been applied to natural gas transmission planning by the China National Petroleum Corporation and has brought a direct profit increase of 330 million U.S. dollars in 2015‐2017. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: New catalytic systems that contain incompatible catalytic sites were constructed by the in situ polymerization of acidic and basic polymers into metal–organic frameworks, which resulted in highly porous, recyclable, and durable catalytic composites with excellent compartmentalization, so that opposing agents were spatially isolated. These synthesized hybrid catalysts exhibited excellent catalytic activity for one‐pot “wolf and lamb” reactions (deacetalization/Knoevenagel or Henry), which was attributed to their unique characteristic of having a locally homogeneous, but globally heterogeneous, structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: We tested the hypothesis that a sense of responsibility drives group representatives' decisions to be more risk averse compared with decisions made by individuals. The hypothesis was supported when the monetary considerations (i.e., payoff inequality and the magnitude effect) were controlled for in the potential gain domain as well as in the potential loss domain. Evidence showed that this is because the group representatives were concerned about how they would view themselves (e.g., guilt and self‐blame) and also how they would be viewed by others (i.e., to avoid being blamed and looked down upon by others). This study provided new insights into understanding group representatives' decision making under risk. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Jianzha Basin is located in the northeastern Tibetan Plateau (NETP) and contains a thick sequence of Cenozoic sediments that are an archive of information about the growth of the Tibetan Plateau and the evolution of the arid environment of the interior of Asia. Here, we present magnetostratigraphic and palaeoenvironmental records from a 361‐m‐thick sequence of Late Cenozoic eolian Red Clay and intercalated fluviolacustrine deposits in the Jianzha Basin. The magnetostratigraphic results show that the sediments have recorded a continuous geomagnetic polarity sequence from C5r.3r to C3r, spanning the interval from 11.8 to 5.8 Ma in the Late Miocene. There are two intervals of rapidly fluctuating sedimentation rates between ~10 and ~6 Ma, which we interpret as a response to a series of uplifts and expansions to the north and to the east in the NETP. The fluctuations in Rb/Sr ratio and magnetic susceptibility before ~8.57 Ma reflect intensified East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) precipitation which resulted from the growth of the NETP. From ~8.57 to ~7.21 Ma, the EASM was impacted by global cooling and ice build‐up in the Northern Hemisphere in addition to the uplift of the Tibetan Plateau (TP) in the Late Miocene. From ~8.57 to ~7.21 Ma, there is a lack of coherency between the fluctuations in MS and Rb/Sr ratio; however, subsequently, there is significant coherency between the Rb/Sr ratio and the deep‐sea oxygen isotope record present. This suggests that from ~8.57 Ma, the eolian Red Clay sediments in the Jianzha Basin were significantly affected by the addition of dust derived from the deforming and uplifting areas of the TP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When an unreliable supplier serves multiple retailers, the retailers may compete with each other by inflating their order quantities in order to obtain their desired allocation from the supplier, a behavior known as the rationing game. We introduce capacity information sharing and a capacity reservation mechanism in the rationing game and show that a Nash equilibrium always exists. Moreover, we provide conditions guaranteeing the existence of the reverse bullwhip effect upstream, a consequence of the disruption caused by the supplier. In contrast, we also provide conditions under which the bullwhip effect does not exist. In addition, we show that a smaller unit reservation payment leads to more bullwhip and reverse bullwhip effects, while a large unit underage cost results in a more severe bullwhip effect. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 64: 203-216, 2017 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers a multistage channel with deterministic price-sensitive demand. Two systems for pricing decisions, that is, the bargaining system and the leader-follower system, are compared. We characterize the necessary and sufficient conditions on the power structure, under which the solution of the bargaining system Pareto dominates that of the leader-follower system. Also, under such conditions, we give a tight upper bound of channel efficiency of the bargaining system, which converges to 100% channel efficiency as the number of stages increases to infinity. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 63: 449-459, 2016 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the field of eye tracking, scanpath analysis can reflect the sequential and temporal properties of the cognitive process. However, the advantages of scanpath analysis have not yet been utilized in the study of risky decision making. We explored the methodological applicability of scanpath analysis to test models of risky decision making by analyzing published data from the eye-tracking studies of Su et al. (2013); Wang and Li (2012), and Sun, Rao, Zhou, and Li (2014). These studies used a proportion task, an outcome-matched presentation condition, and a multiple-play condition as the baseline for comparison with information search and processing in the risky decision-making condition. We found that (i) the similarity scores of the intra-conditions were significantly higher than those of the inter-condition; (ii) the scanpaths of the two conditions were separable; and (iii) based on an inspection of typical trials, the patterns of the scanpaths differed between the two conditions. These findings suggest that scanpath analysis is reliable and valid for examining the process of risky decision making. In line with the findings of the three original studies, our results indicate that risky decision making is unlikely to be based on a weighting and summing process, as hypothesized by the family of expectation models. The findings highlight a new methodological direction for research on decision making. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT The backup supply strategy is demonstrated as an effective approach to mitigating supply risk. We study a supply chain in which a leader manufacturer designs a contract to a potential backup supplier to mitigate the yield uncertainty of the primary supplier. In this context, the backup supplier may compare with the primary supplier and have horizontal fairness concerns. We model the contract design problem using a Stackelberg game and characterize the optimal decisions for the manufacturer and backup supplier, in both fairness and off-fairness settings. The theoretical results show that the leader manufacturer must sacrifice his own payoff to balance the payoffs of both suppliers. As a result, using a self-interested backup supplier is the dominating strategy, whereas using a fair-minded backup supplier is only suggested when the reliability of the primary supplier is low and the fairness concern of the backup supplier is not strong. Additionally, the backup supplier only benefits from fairness concerns when the level is not exceeding a threshold value. With regard to high fairness levels beyond this threshold, fairness concern has negative effects on the monetary payoff and even might lead to loss of the business. By conducting laboratory experiments, we provide evidence of the horizontal fairness concern from the backup supplier. Further, we show that if the primary supplier also has horizontal fairness concerns, the leader manufacturer can conditionally benefit from a promoted yield reliability due to an extra effort from the primary supplier. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Consider a repeated newsvendor problem for managing the inventory of perishable products. When the parameter of the demand distribution is unknown, it has been shown that the traditional separated estimation and optimization (SEO) approach could lead to suboptimality. To address this issue, an integrated approach called operational statistics (OS) was developed by Chu et al., Oper Res Lett 36 (2008) 110-116. In this note, we first study the properties of this approach and compare its performance with that of the traditional SEO approach. It is shown that OS is consistent and superior to SEO. The benefit of using OS is larger when the demand variability is higher. We then generalize OS to the risk-averse case under the conditional value-at-risk (CVaR) criterion. To model risk from both demand sampling and future demand uncertainty, we introduce a new criterion, called the total CVaR, and find the optimal OS under this new criterion. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 62: 206-214, 2015 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we seek to understand how a capacity-constrained seller optimally prices and schedules product shipping to customers who are heterogeneous on willingness to pay (WTP) and willingness to wait (WTW). The capacity-constrained seller does not observe each customer's WTP and WTW and knows only the aggregate distributions of WTP and WTW. The seller's problem is modeled as an M/ M/ N s queueing model with multiclass customers and multidimensional information screening. We contribute to the literature by providing an optimal and efficient algorithm. Furthermore, we numerically find that customers with a larger waiting cost enjoys a higher scheduling priority, but customers with higher valuation do not necessarily get a higher scheduling priority. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 62: 215-227, 2015 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The efficacy of entecavir and tenofovir in patients with chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) is inconsistent. To address this issue, we conducted a metaanalysis based on a current review of the literature addressing the efficacy and safety of entecavir and tenofovir. Electronic databases were searched through June 2014 for relevant clinical trials. We included 2 randomized controlled trials, 2 prospective cohort studies, and 7 case-control studies that included 1,656 patients. In the entecavir group, 842 of 992 were nucleos(t)ide-naïve chronic HBV patients, and in the tenofovir group 481 of 664 were nucleos(t)ide-naïve. The virological response to tenofovir was superior to entecavir (RR: 0.82; 95%CI: 0.72-0.93), especially in nucleos(t)ide-naïve chronic HBV patients at 48 weeks (RR: 0.78; 95%CI: 0.65-0.92). Additionally, there was no difference between entecavir and tenofovir for virological response at 24 weeks (RR: 0.87, 95%CI: 0.71-1.05). The alanine aminotransferase normalization rate, serological response, and adverse event rate were also not significantly different between entecavir and tenofovir at 24 or 48 weeks after treatment. These results suggest that tenofovir is a better choice to treat chronic HBV patients than entecavir as it is better able to suppress HBV viral load and has a similar safety profile. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existing product line design literature devotes little attention to the effect of demand uncertainty. Due to demand uncertainty, the supply-demand mismatch is inevitable which leads to different degrees of lost sales depending on the configuration of product lines. In this article, we adopt a stylized two-segment setup with uncertain market sizes and illustrate the interplay between two effects: risk pooling that mitigates the impact of demand uncertainty and market segmentation that facilitates consumer differentiation. Compared to downward substitution, inducing bidirectional substitution through product line decisions including quality levels and prices can yield greater risk pooling effects. However, we show that the additional benefit from the risk pooling effect cannot compensate for the reduced market segmentation effect. We demonstrate that the presence of demand uncertainty can reduce the benefit of market segmentation and therefore the length of product lines in terms of the difference between products. We also propose three heuristics that separate product line and production decisions; each of these heuristics corresponds to one particular form of demand substitution. Our numerical studies indicate that the best of the three heuristics yields performance that is close to optimality. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 62: 143-157, 2015 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a great demand for dental implants with the ability to accelerate periimplant bone regeneration. Modification of surface micro- and nanotopographies has been revealed to affect bone cell metabolism. In this study, we utilized dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) technology to modify commercially pure titanium (Ti-tr) surfaces and then investigated the cytocompability of DBD-modified Ti surface when compared with machined (Ti-m) and polished (Ti-p) Ti surfaces. These three kinds of Ti plates exhibited different surface energies and topographies at the micro- and nanoscale levels. The DBD-treated pure Ti surface significantly enhances cell adhesion, spread, and proliferation of MC3T3-E1 preosteoblast cells compared with the Ti-p and Ti-m surfaces, suggesting that Ti-tr has better cytocompatibility compared with the other two surfaces. Preosteoblast cells on Ti-m surface exhibited higher alkaline phosphatase activity than cells on Ti-tr and Ti-p surfaces 14 days after seeding. No significant difference in alkaline phosphatase activity was observed between cells grown on Ti-tr and Ti-p surfaces. Our study demonstrated that DBD modification significantly enhanced cell adhesion, spread, and proliferation of preosteoblasts with no negative effects on cell differentiation. Microtopography and nanotopography of the surfaces of different materials and chemical/energetic properties have a synergistic effect on cell attachment, proliferation, and differentiation. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part A: 101A: 3278-3284, 2013. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE) is a common gasoline additive; it has become a worldwide groundwater pollutant. Granular activated carbon (GAC) adsorption treatment is not cost effective for removing MTBE because it is not well adsorbed. Bioaugmentation of enriched MTBE degraders originated from the soil sample of a gasoline station enhanced the performance of the column filled with the MTBE degrader containing spent GAC of the La Mirada remediation site, and made it an effective biological activated carbon (BAC) system producing a high quality effluent that will meet the US EPA's recommended <20 μg/L for source of drinking water. The carbon samples of this system were successfully employed to start up several highly efficient BAC columns in 30 days producing stable effluents under variable treatment conditions with long term effluent MTBE concentration mostly <10 μg/L, more than 99% reduction of 1-1.3 mg /L in the influent. On the basis of the similarity of 16 s rDNA sequence of the PCR-DGGE procedures, five major bacterial species of stable biochemical properties were found in the BAC effluent samples; one of the five was Bacterium RS58G, whereas the other four were uncultured bacteria. © 2012 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 32: 512-523, 2013 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE) is a common gasoline additive; it has become a groundwater pollutant in many countries. Granular activated carbon (GAC) adsorption treatment is not cost-effective for removing MTBE because it is not well adsorbed. Acclimated MTBE degraders actively growing in the GAC adsorber will make it a biological activated carbon (BAC) system capable of long-term MTBE removal without periodic GAC replacement. The conventional inoculation method of circulating a seeding solution of the MTBE degraders present in the spent GAC sample from a BAC system of a southern California MTBE remediation site failed to initiate the BAC function in treating a high MTBE influent (30 mg/L, simulating a newly contaminated groundwater); the effluent samples of inoculated coal and coconut GAC columns were nearly the same as those of the non-inoculated columns. After a start-up period of less than two months, the small GAC columns filled with new coconut GAC on top of the MTBE degrader containing spent GAC became effective BAC systems accomplishing more than 40% of MTBE removal from the high concentration (30 mg/L) influent and more than 80% of removal from the low concentration (1 mg/L) influent. When MTBE concentration of the influent declined steadily, the BAC capability prevented the sudden rise of MTBE in the effluent. A small dose of hydrogen peroxide provided the essential dissolved oxygen to sustain aerobic degradation of MTBE in the BAC; adding peroxide to the influents of two serial adsorbers is more efficient in treating newly contaminated groundwater. © 2012 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 32: 239-248, 2013 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider a class of facility location problems with a time dimension, which requires assigning every customer to a supply facility in each of a finite number of periods. Each facility must meet all assigned customer demand in every period at a minimum cost via its production and inventory decisions. We provide exact branch-and-price algorithms for this class of problems and several important variants. The corresponding pricing problem takes the form of an interesting class of production planning and order selection problems. This problem class requires selecting a set of orders that maximizes profit, defined as the revenue from selected orders minus production-planning-related costs incurred in fulfilling the selected orders. We provide polynomial-time dynamic programming algorithms for this class of pricing problems, as well as for generalizations thereof. Computational testing indicates the advantage of our branch-and-price algorithm over various approaches that use commercial software packages. These tests also highlight the significant cost savings possible from integrating location with production and inventory decisions and demonstrate that the problem is rather insensitive to forecast errors associated with the demand streams. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the first half of 2008, China suffered three natural disasters: a heavy snow storm, an outbreak of hand-foot-mouth disease, and a severe earthquake. The aim of the present study is to explore how low-probability/high-consequence events influence overconfidence. In Study 1, opportunity samples were obtained by recruiting residents in three different types of disaster-hit areas to answer a peer-comparison probability judgment questionnaire about 1 month after the corresponding disaster occurred. The performance of 539 participants in disaster-hit areas was compared with that of 142 residents in a nondisaster area. The findings indicate that residents in disaster-hit areas were less overconfident than those in the nondisaster area on both positive and negative events. In Study 2, we surveyed a total of 336 quake-victims 4 and 11 months after the earthquake to examine whether the impact of disasters on overconfidence would decay with time. The resulting data indicate that the disaster victims became more overconfident as time elapsed. The overall findings suggest that low-probability/high-consequence events could make people less overconfident and more rational and seem to serve as a function of debiasing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A good postoperative outcome after partial hepatectomy is highly dependent on limiting operative blood loss. This study evaluated the feasibility and efficacy of the tourniquet method compared with the Pringle maneuver in laparoscopic liver resection for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in the left liver. A retrospective, nonrandomized, comparative study for laparoscopic liver resection for HCC in the left liver using the Pringle maneuver (group A) or the tourniquet method (group B) was initiated in our center between March 2004 and October 2008. Sixteen patients (group A) underwent laparoscopic liver resection using the Pringle maneuver, and 13 patients (group B) underwent laparoscopic liver resection using the tourniquet method. No differences in operation time, operative blood loss, perioperative blood transfusion, and perioperative morbidity were found between the two groups. Both groups had no postoperative mortality. The liver enzymes were significantly elevated in group A compared with group B. Group B patients also had significantly faster recovery of liver function. The postoperative hospital stay for group B was significantly shorter than group A (mean, 5.6 days vs. 8.3 days). Both techniques of vascular control were equally safe, efficacious, and feasible for patients undergoing laparoscopic left-sided liver resection. The tourniquet method gave a wider safety margin for patients with chronic liver disease with a compromised hepatic reserve by causing less ischemia-reperfusion injury to the remnant liver. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study on the optimization of the location of two-echelon spare parts inventory system along with service considerations. A mixed integer nonlinear programming model (MINLP) was formulated to be used in designing service parts network that will ensure short response times. It reveals that using a response time requirement is less costly in the achievement of a target response time than through penalty costs.

The article focuses on the estimation and linearization of logistic problem solving in business warehouses through several solutions. It mentions three conditions on the cost structure of logistics planning problems in the warehouse as a cross-docking facility. It explains the use of the polynomial factor of 1+∈, the concave cost network flow and the polymatroidal constraints. It concludes that these solutions bring about easy strategies in problem solving.

Leakage from pancreatic anastomoses remains the single most important morbidity after pancreaticoduodenectomy and contributes to prolonged hospitalization and mortality. This observational cohort study reported the surgical outcome of a modified invagination technique of pancreaticojejunostomy after pancreaticoduodenectomy. Between December 2001 and December 2007, a total of 52 consecutive patients underwent elective pancreaticoduodenectomy for benign or malignant pathologies of the pancreas or the periampullary region in a tertiary referral center. All patients underwent our modified invagination technique of pancreaticojejunostomy regardless of the characteristics of the pancreatic stump. Data were collected prospectively. The mean hospital stay was 12.6 ± 3.2 days. The incidence of overall surgical complications was 9.6%. No patient developed pancreatic fistula. One patient (1.9%) died of respiratory failure on postoperative day 7. We reported our pancreaticojejunostomy anastomosis technique with a pancreatic fistula rate of 0% and low intra-abdominal complication rate. The favorable results of this technique warrant further investigation in large prospective cohort studies and prospective randomized controlled studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines a supply chain design problem with multiple retailers and unreliable supply. An integrated model for a three-tiered supply chain network with one supplier, one or more facilities and retailers is proposed. It takes into consideration the unreliable nature of the supply side. The properties of the best solution of the model is analyzed. It also proposes a general solution algorithm for the model and computational experience is presented and discussed.

In this paper, we study a strategic facility location problem under uncertainty. The uncertainty associated with future events is modeled by defining alternative future scenarios with probabilities. We present a new model called the α‐reliable mean‐excess model that minimizes the expected regret with respect to an endogenously selected subset of worst‐case scenarios whose collective probability of occurrence is no more than 1 − α. Our mean‐excess risk measure is coherent and computationally efficient. Computational experiments also show that the α‐reliable mean‐excess criterion matches the α‐reliable minimax criterion closely. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 2006 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The structure of the title compound, C23H26O6S2, contains three rings in a bicyclo[2.2.1] system (two five-membered rings and one six-membered ring). There are four C—H…O hydrogen bonds (three intramolecular hydrogen bonds and one intermolecular hydrogen bond) in the structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The europium(III) ion in the title compound, [Eu(2)(C(8)H(6)NO(2))(6)(C(12)H(8)N(2))(2)]·5H(2)O, is coordinated by seven carboxyl-ate O atoms and two N atoms from one phenanthroline mol-ecule. The carboxyl-ate groups of 3-(3-pyrid-yl)acrylate link pairs of europium(III) ions, forming centrosymmetric dinuclear units, which further assemble into a sheet parallel to the (001) plane through hydrogen-bonding inter-actions involving the uncoordinated water mol-ecules. One water molecule is disordered.