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Renovation philosophy and residential construction mode are key problems encountered in the renovation of urban villages in China. Existing research fruits on renovation philosophy, and policies consider fairness and efficiency and cover-sharing research consensus. However, research on residential construction mode in renovation still faces challenges, such as weak relevant policy pertinence, insufficient objective references, and poor universality. In this study, the changes of the architectural spaces of a typical urban village community in Xi'an City from the beginning to the end of the renovation were discussed. The space requirements of different user groups were analyzed and summarized, and then adapted to the different types of building spaces. In addition, the residential construction model applicable to the inclusive renovation philosophy was established. Research results corroborated that the renovation of urban village should refer to its functional orientations in the community. The community-centered renovation residential district should also meet the requirements of different user groups in the community, including residential, living, and entertainment functions. Community-subcentered residential district should meet the space demands of residential and living functions. Community-subordinated residential district meets space demands of internal residents for residential and living. Moreover, residential district space is relieved by combining practical and certain spatial factors. In this research, the building space compositions of different user groups were reviewed and refined in the “bottom-up” pattern. Research conclusions provide design references for the practical renovation of urban villages.

Background: According to the clinical manifestation, tuberculosis (TB) is divided into pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB) and extrapulmonary tuberculosis (EPTB). The incidence rate of EPTB has increased in many countries. The demographic and clinical characteristics of EPTB in China remain still unclear. Materials and methods: We retrospectively analyzed the medical records of 5,624 hospitalized patients with positive M. tuberculosis culture between January 2008 and June 2013 in Shandong province. We investigated the epidemiological, demographic, and clinical characteristics of patients with EPTB. Results: Among 5,624 hospitalized TB patients with positive M. tuberculosis culture, 4,277 (76.05 %) had PTB, 618 (10.99 %) had EPTB, and 729 (12.96 %) had both PTB and EPTB. The proportion of EPTB increased significantly from 6.97 % in 2008 to 19.98 % in 2012 (p

We investigated enhancement of articular cartilage regeneration using a combination of human adipose derived stem cells (hADSCs) and TGF-β3 microspheres (MS) in vivo. Poly-lactic-co-glycolic acid (PLGA)MS were prepared using a solid/oil/water emulsion solvent evaporation-extraction method. The morphology of the MS was evaluated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The release characteristic of the TGF-β3 MS was evaluated. A New Zealand rabbit model for experimental osteoarthritis (OA) was established using the anterior medial meniscus excision method. Thirty OA rabbits were divided randomly into three groups according to different treatments of the right knee joints on day 7 after surgery: hADSCs/MS group received injection of both hADSCs and TGF-β3 MS; hADSCs group was injected with hADSCs; control group was injected with normal saline. Gross observation, histological staining and RT-PCR for collagen II and aggrecan) were used to assess the severity of OA and for evaluating the effect of combined use of hADSCs and TGF-β3 MS on articular cartilage regeneration in vivo. The MS were spherical with a smooth surface and the average diameter was 28 ± 2.3 µm. The encapsulation efficiency test showed that 73.8 ± 2.9% of TGF-β3 were encapsulated in the MS. The release of TGF- β3 lasted for at least 30 days. At both 6 and 12 weeks after injection, three groups exhibited different degrees of OA. Histological analysis showed that the hADSCs/MS group exhibited less OA than the hADSCs group, and the control group exhibited the most severe OA. Real-time RT-PCR showed that the gene expression of both collagen II and aggrecan were significantly up-regulated in the hADSCs/MS group. At 12 weeks after injection, the hADSCs/MS group also exhibited less OA than the other two groups. Combined use of hADSCs and TGF-β3 MS promoted articular cartilage regeneration in rabbit OA models.

We examined the expression of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and characteristics of human neural stem cells after transfection with the lentiviral vector encoding the VEGF 165 gene. The latter gene was amplified from the human breast cancer cell line MCF-7 using RT-PCR; then the target gene was cloned into the pCDH–CMV–MCS-EF1-copGFP, a lentiviral expressing plasmid. After transformation, enzyme digestion led to a correct length of the VEGF165 gene, and DNA sequencing analysis confirmed that the VEGF165 gene sequence was exactly the same as that reported by the GeneBank. Then, the recombinant lentivirus produced by 293T cells and packaging plasmids were transfected into fourthpassage human neural stem cells (NSCs). One week after transfection with pCDH-VEGF165, NSCs expressed VEGF stably, and their proliferation ability significantly increased. Furthermore, human NSCs kept their characteristics and multiple differentiation activity after transfection. Our results indicate that human NSCs can express vascular endothelial growth factor highly and stably via transfection with the lentiviral vector encoding the VEGF165 gene, which may be useful for future research on function recovery after stroke.

To investigate the correlation between the endothelial cell apoptosis and sirtuin-3 (SIRT3) gene expression in atherosclerosis (AS) rats.The AS model in rats was established through the high-fat diet. A total of 12 rats fed normally were enrolled as the control group, while 12 rats fed with high-fat diet were enrolled as the experimental group. After the experiment, the aortic tissues of rats were collected, and the relative area of the arterial plaque (total area of plaque/total area of the vessel) was measured via oil red O staining. The serum was collected to detect the levels of blood lipid, including total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C). Moreover, the expression levels of SIRT3 and apoptotic genes were determined via Reverse Transcription-Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR), Western blotting and immunohistochemistry (IHC), respectively. The apoptosis was detected via terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase-mediated dUTP nick end labeling (TUNEL) staining.The area of aortic plaque in the experimental group [(36.15±9.52)%] was significantly larger than that in the control group [(11.62±3.25)%] (p0.01). Compared with those in the control group, the serum TC, TG and LDL-C levels were significantly increased in the experimental group, while the HDL-C level was significantly decreased (p0.05). Compared with those in the control group, the mRNA and protein expression levels of SIRT3 in the aorta of rats markedly declined in the experimental group (p0.05), while Caspase-3 and Caspase-9 expressions were significantly increased (p0.05), respectively. The results of TUNEL staining revealed that the apoptosis in the aorta of rats in the experimental group was remarkably higher than that in the control group (p0.05).The expression of SIRT3 is deleted in the aorta of AS rats and closely related to the apoptosis. SIRT3 may serve as a potential target for the treatment of AS.

A three-dimensional adaptive magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model is used to investigate the energy flow from the solar wind to the magnetosphere in response to sudden turnings of the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) on 5 June 1998. During this dynamic period, the size of magnetospheric cavity and the energy input fluctuated enormously. Due to the positive earth dipole tilt angle during the event, the distribution of energy transfer between northern and southern hemispheres of magnetopause is asymmetrical, with most energy transferred in the north hemisphere sunward of X-GSE > ORE. The electromagnetic and mechanical energy inputs increase rapidly after the arrival of an interplanetary shock, while the electromagnetic energy rises much more slowly after IMF turns from north to south. With a nearly invariable By component of IMF, under southward IMF the most electromagnetic energy is transferred near the plane anti-parallel to IMF clock angle, the most significant mechanical energy input occurs in the polar cusp of north hemisphere. In contrast, for northward IMF the electromagnetic energy is mostly transferred near the plane perpendicular to IMF clock angle, mechanical transferred energy occurs near equatorial plane of dayside magnetopause. Analyzing the distribution of the Poynting flux we show that the high-latitude reconnection causes different types of electromagnetic energy transfers into the magnetosphere during northward IMF especially with a large By component. It is also shown that the traditional energy transfer parameters from solar wind conditions do not include any of residual or hysteresis effects; therefore sometimes they do not reflect the right response to the solar wind variations. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

[1] Numerical results from a physics-based global magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model are used to investigate the controlling effects of the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) components, BY and BZ, on the location and shape of the magnetopause. The subsolar magnetopause is identified by using the plasma density and velocity, the cusp by using the current density, and the other area by streamlines and the current density. These data are fitted with a three-dimensional surface function constructed by Liu et al. (2012), which allows description of the cusp geometry as well as the north-south asymmetry and azimuthal asymmetry of the magnetopause. A new parameter which depends on the IMF BY and BZ is introduced to describe the orientation of the elliptical cross section of the magnetopause. Effects of IMF BY and BZ on the magnetopause configuration parameters are analyzed, and dependence of the magnetopause parameters in the IMF components are obtained. Magnetopause cross section is found to be largely controlled by the IMF clock angle. The stretch direction of the magnetopause cross section is always near the direction of the IMF but is a little closer to the meridional plane than the IMF. Increasing BY or BZ increases the eccentricity of the magnetopause cross section. This effect is larger for southward IMF than for the northward IMF, and the stretching effect of BY is smaller than that of BZ.

Physical biochemical techniques are used to establish the structure, subunit stoichiometry, and assembly pathway of the primosome complex of the bacteriophage T4 DNA replication system. Analytical ultracentrifugation and fluorescence anisotropy methods show that the functional T4 primosome consists of six gp41 helicase subunits that assemble into a hexagon, driven by the binding of six NTPs (or six nonhydrolyzable GTPγS analogues) that are located at and stabilize the intersubunit interfaces, together with a single tightly bound gp61 primase subunit. Assembling the components of the primosome onto a model DNA replication fork is a multistep process, but equilibrium cannot be reached along all mixing pathways. Producing a functional complex requires that the helicase hexamer be assembled in the presence of the DNA replication fork construct prior to the addition of the primase to avoid the formation of metastable DNA-protein aggregates. The gp41 helicase hexamer binds weakly to fork DNA in the absence of primase, but forms a much more stable primosome complex that expresses full and functional helicase (and primase) activities when bound to a gp61 primase subunit at a helicase:primase subunit ratio of 6∶1. The presence of additional primase subunits does not change the molecular mass or helicase activity of the primosome, but significantly inhibits its primase activity. We develop both an assembly pathway and a minimal mechanistic model for the structure and function of the T4 primosome that are likely to be relevant to the assembly and function of the replication primosome subassemblies of higher organisms as well.

To investigate the effects of medium- and long-chain triacylglycerol (MLCT) on blood triglyceride (TG) in Chinese hypertriglyceridemic subjects. A double-blind controlled clinical trial was carried out, in which 112 subjects with hypertriglyceridemia were randomly divided into two dietary oil groups: (1) long-chain triacylglycerol (LCT) and (2) MLCT. All subjects were requested to ingest fixed energy and to continue their normal activity levels, and to consume LCT or MLCT oil at 25–30 g daily during the study period. Anthropometric measurements of body weight, body mass index (BMI), body fat, body fat percentage, waist and hip circumference (WC and HC), areas of subcutaneous and visceral fat by computed tomography scanning and blood biochemical markers were measured at the beginning and end of the study. There were 50 and 51 subjects left in LCT and MLCT groups, respectively. There were no significant differences in daily intake of energy, protein, fat and carbohydrate, as well as the daily physical activity between the two groups during the study. After 8 weeks, MLCT group showed a significant decrease in body weight, BMI, WC, HC, ratio of WC and HC, body fat, body fat percentage and subcutaneous fat when compared with the initial values. The decrease in body weight, BMI, WC, body fat and subcutaneous and visceral fat was significantly greater in MLCT group than that in the LCT group. Furthermore, the serum concentrations of TG in MLCT group were significantly lower than those in the LCT group. Consumption of MLCT may reduce body weight, body fat and blood TG in hypertriglyceridemic subjects under an appropriate dietary regime.

A new method for measuring the attenuation coefficient of seawater in real time is suggested based on stimulated Brillouin scattering. The measurement can be achieved through detecting the intensity of back scattered stimulated Brillouin scattering and the intensity of the laser beam.

We propose a feasible scheme to create the single-mode or two-mode photon-added entangled coherent state (PAECS) and then compare its entanglement degree with that of the entangled coherent state or even the photon-added-and-subtracted entangled coherent state.

We study a Raman atom laser output coupler by considering a Feshbach-resonance-tuned atomic Bose-Einstein condensate which is often viewed as a dilute system since the collisions can be tuned. However, the dimer formation can be triggered by using a Feshbach technique in a magnetic trap. We examine the quantum dynamics and statistics of this system analytically, including the quadrature-squeezed effects and the mutual coherence of the output atoms and the formed dimers.

A study was conducted to investigate the muscle amino acid profiles of five species of marine fish, Pseudosciaena crocea (large yellow), Lateolabrax japonicus (common sea perch), Pagrosomus major (red seabream), Seriola dumerili (Dumeril's amberjack) and Hapalogenys nitens (black grunt). These carnivorous fishes, all of which belong to the Perciforms, were sampled from Xiamen Bay. Chemical analysis shows significant difference (P 0.05). The significant difference (P

Analytical closed-form solutions for the crack tip plastic zone shape have been derived for a semi-infinite crack in an isotropic elastic-perfectly plastic solid under both plane stress and plane strain conditions. Two yield criteria have been applied: the Von Mises and Tresca yield criteria. The solutions have been developed for crack modes I and III (mode II has been published previously). The results, which favorably compare to a limited number of existing experimental and analytical findings, indicate that the Tresca zone is larger in size than the Von Mises zone. Moreover, an interesting observation is that both zones are generally much larger than the ones predicted by classical Irwin and Dugdale-Barenblatt solutions.