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Objective: Laparoendoscopic single-site myomectomy (LESS-M) is widely applied for the treatment of uterine leiomyoma. The purposes of this study were to investigate differences in hidden blood loss between LESS-M and conventional laparoscopic myomectomy (CLM) during treatment of uterine leiomyoma and to identify the associated risk factors. Design: This is a retrospective study. Participants: The participants of this study were patients who underwent laparoscopic myomectomy (114 and 156 for LESS-M and CLM, respectively) between July 1, 2019, and October 10, 2020, at the Second Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University. Setting: The study was conducted at the Second Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University. Methods: We enrolled a total of 114 and 156 patients who were treated with LESS-M and CLM, respectively, between July 1, 2019, and October 10, 2020. We collected clinical data, then applied the Nadler and Gross formula and multiple linear regression analysis to calculate the HBL and identify the associated risk factors, respectively. Results: Patients in the LESS-M group had a VBL of 115.4 ± 180.6 mL and an HBL of 364.3 ± 252.6 mL, accounting for 74.4 ± 22.4% of true TBL. On the other hand, patients in the CLM group had VBL of 187.9 ± 198.5 mL, and HBL of 306.8 ± 304.7 mL, accounting for 58.9 ± 30.2% of true TBL. HBL was significantly higher in the LESS-M than the CLM group (p = 0.000). Limitations: This study was the small sample size used. Conclusions: HBL accounted for a significant percentage of TBL in laparoscopic myomectomy, especially in patients treated with LESS-M. Paying attention to perioperative blood changes coupled with fully understanding HBL might promote postoperative recovery of patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate warming profoundly affects the vegetative growth, flowering phenology and sexual reproduction of plants; therefore, it affects the ornamental value of wild flowers. Despite this, the extent and mechanism of the impact remain unclear. Here, we conducted a warming experiment for two growing seasons (increases of 1.89 °C in 2017 and 2.37 °C in 2018) with infrared heaters to examine the effects of warming on the ornamental value of the wild flower Impatiens oxyanthera, endemic to China, in Mount Emei. We evaluated the comprehensive ornamental value based on plant morphology and flowering characteristics using the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and disentangled the impact of the two traits on ornamental value using principal component analysis (PCA) and the partial least squares structural equation model (PLS-SEM) under ambient and warming treatments. We hypothesized that warming would reduce the ornamental value of I. oxyanthera in terms of plant morphology and flowering traits. Our results showed that warming significantly decreased plant height and crown width and increased branch number and single-leaf area. Warming also decreased vexillum length, corolla tube length, nectar spur length and pedicel length. In addition, warming shortened flowering duration per plant and reduced flower number, while there was no significant effect on flower longevity and flower color at full-bloom stage between the control and warming treatment. Therefore, the comprehensive ornamental value under warming was lower than that under the control. Pedicel length, flower color, flower longevity and flowering duration per plant were the main factors affecting the comprehensive ornamental value. The PLS-SEM showed that warming had an indirect negative effect on ornamental value via direct negative effects on flowering traits. Collectively, these results indicate that, although promoting vegetative growth, short-term warming significantly decreased the ornamental value of I. oxyanthera due to warming-caused smaller flowers and shorter flowering duration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has been demonstrated that contrast sensitivity is sensitive to stimulus exposure duration. Here, we investigated how the duration effect on contrast sensitivity was modulated by the spatial frequency and intensity of external noise. Through a contrast detection task, the contrast sensitivity function under 10 spatial frequencies, three external noise, and two exposure duration conditions was measured. The temporal integration effect was defined by the difference in contrast sensitivity or the area under the log contrast sensitivity function between short and long exposure durations. We found that (1) the temporal integration effect was less pronounced in the zero‐noise condition than in the low‐ or high‐noise condition; (2) in the zero‐noise condition, a stronger temporal integration effect was observed at high spatial frequencies; (3) in the high‐noise condition, a stronger temporal integration effect was observed at low spatial frequencies; (4) the spatial‐frequency‐dependent transient or sustained mechanism is also sensitive to external noise level; and (5) perceptual template model analysis revealed that both decreased additive internal noise and an improved perceptual template accounted for the temporal integration effect, and these two factors were tuned to spatial frequency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three new perylene diimide derivatives PDI-NH2, PDI-OH and PDI-COOH modified with functional hydrogen bonding groups at bay positions by ethynyl bridges were successfully synthesized via Pd-catalyzed Sonogashira couplings. The structures were characterized by 1H-NMR, MS, and FT-IR. The photophysical properties were studied by UV-Vis absorption and fluorescence spectroscopy, and the three PDIs showed typical pronounced aggregation in the film state. PDI-NH2 showed "off–on" fluorescence behavior upon the addtion of trifluoroacetic acid due to the inhibition of photoinduced electron transfer between the PDI core and the phenylamine moiety. In addition, we studied the self-assembly behaviors of PDI-NH2, PDI-OH and PDI-COOH on the HOPG surface by using STM. PDI-NH2 and PDI-COOH formed a dumbbell-shaped dimer with a zigzag ridge structure and a linear ridge structure, respectively. PDI-OH first formed a dumbbell-shaped dimer and furthermore six dimers are connected head to tail to form a flower-shaped hexagonal 2D porous self-assembled structures. Cyclic voltammograms (CVs) were investigated. The LUMO energy levels of PDI-NH2, PDI-OH and PDI-COOH are −3.89 eV and the HOMO energy levels are −5.76 eV, −5.97 eV and −6.05 eV, respectively. The highly ordered supermolecular self-assembly monolayers and outstanding photophysical–electrochemical properties endow the three novel PDIs with good potential for application in organic devices such as organic field-effect transistors, solar cells and so on. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previously published studies have reported that 150 min of short-term monocular deprivation temporarily changes perceptual eye dominance. However, the possible mechanisms underlying monocular deprivation-induced perceptual eye dominance plasticity remain unclear. Using a binocular phase and contrast co-measurement task and a multi-pathway contrast-gain control model (MCM), we studied the effect of 150 min of monocular pattern deprivation (MPD) in normal adult subjects. The perceived phase and contrast varied significantly with the interocular contrast ratio, and after MPD, the patched eye (PE) became dominant. Most importantly, we focused on the potential mechanisms of the deprivation effect. The data of an averaged subject was best fitted by a model, which assumed a monocular signal enhancement of the PE after the MPD. The present findings might have important implications for investigations of binocular vision in both normal and amblyopic populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is critical to address the relationship between density label of Bangerter filters and expected visual acuity, and how filters modulate contrast sensitivity (CS) at different spatial frequency and external noise levels. In the current study, the monocular visual acuity and CS at ten spatial frequencies and three noise levels were measured in normal subjects wearing no filters, 0.8, 0.4, or 0.2 Bangerter filters. Compared with the baseline condition (no filter worn), Bangerter filters degraded both visual acuity and contrast sensitivity function (CSF) in zero-noise conditions, but the reduction of both visual functions did not correlate with each other at any filter level. In addition, the stronger the filter was, the worse both visual functions became. In contrast, when external noise was present, filters improved the contrast sensitivity at low frequencies but deteriorated it at intermediate and high spatial frequencies. The perceptual template model was used to reveal the corresponding mechanism accounted for filter-induced visual function changes. Although the internal process in visual system should not be affected by the filters, the measurement of parameters was biased. To be specific, (1) the internal additive noise was elevated at all frequencies; (2) the perceptual template was improved at low spatial frequencies but impaired at intermediate spatial frequencies; and (3) the changes in both factors were highly dependent on filter intensity. We conclude that Bangerter filters influence visual acuity and contrast sensitivity differently and that their effect on contrast sensitivity depends on spatial frequency and noise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Binocular summation is generally defined as the superiority of binocular over monocular performance. Here, we investigated how external noise modulates the effect of binocular summation on the contrast sensitivity function (CSF) and clarified the corresponding mechanisms with a perceptual template model (PTM). The contrast sensitivity (CS) over 10 spatial frequencies and three external noise levels was assessed under one binocular and two monocular viewing conditions. The binocular summation ratio (BSR) was calculated by dividing the area under the log CSF (AULCSF), or the CS of using both eyes, by that of only using the "good eye" (BSRG) or the "bad eye" (BSRB), respectively. We found that: (1) based on the AULCSF, the BSRB was higher than the BSRG; (2) based on the AULCSF, the BSR was more pronounced under zero-noise than under low-noise conditions, but the BSR was not higher than 1 under high-noise conditions due to a large individual difference; (3) based on the CS, with increasing spatial frequencies, the BSRB steadily increased; (4) both decreased internal additive noise and an improved perceptual template accounted for the gain in binocular summation. These results help us better understand the features of binocular CS and shed light on the clinical studies on populations with monocular CS loss. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In low-level perceptual tasks and reading tasks, deaf individuals show a redistribution of spatial visual attention toward the parafoveal and peripheral visual fields. In the present study, the experiment adopted the modified flanker paradigm and utilized a lexical decision task to investigate how these unique visual skills may influence foveal lexical access in deaf individuals. It was predicted that irrelevant linguistic stimuli presented in parafoveal vision, during a lexical decision task, would produce a larger interference effect for deaf college student readers if the stimuli acted as distractors during the task. The results showed there was a larger interference effect in deaf college student readers compared to the interference effect observed in participants with typical levels of hearing. Furthermore, deaf college student readers with low-skilled reading levels showed a larger interference effect than those with high-skilled reading levels. The current study demonstrates that the redistribution of spatial visual attention toward the parafoveal visual regions in deaf students impacts foveal lexical processing, and this effect is modulated by reading skill. The findings are discussed in relation to the potential effect that enhanced parafoveal attention may have on everyday reading for deaf individuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herein, a cobalt(ii) tetraphenyltetraphenanthroporphyrin (Co(ii)TPTPP) with phenanthrene-fused pyrrole rings was synthesized and characterized. Moreover, a detailed analysis of its optical and redox properties was carried out by comparing the results obtained via optical spectroscopy and electrochemistry with the trends predicted via a series of DFT and TD-DFT calculations. The electrochemistry results demonstrated that the π-expanded Co(ii)TPTPP interacted strongly with multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs), which were finally immobilized on carbon nanotubes via noncovalent interactions and further deposited on glassy carbon. This strong immobilization viaπ–π stacking between Co(ii)TPTPP and MWCNTs leads to significantly stable electrochemically catalyzed hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), which provides a new insight into the understanding electron transfer channels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The wide presence of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in lakes necessitates a better understanding of cyanobacteria metabolites under the contamination of PAHs. The M. aeruginosa strain PCC7806 was selected to investigate the effects of naphthalene and pyrene on the physiological and biochemical reactions of cyanobacteria, including antioxidant defense system (superoxide dismutase, catalase), intracellular microcystin (MC) content, phycobiliprotein (phycocyanin, allophycocyanin) contents, and specific growth rate. Naphthalene and pyrene altered the growth of the M. aeruginosa strain, reduced the contents of phycocyanin and allophycocyanin, and stimulated the activities of antioxidant enzymes without lipid peroxidation. Remarkably, the intracellular MC content was significantly increased by 68.1% upon exposure of M. aeruginosa to 0.45 mg L −1 naphthalene, and increased by 51.5% and 77.9% upon exposure of M. aeruginosa to 0.45 mg L −1 pyrene and 1.35 mg L −1 pyrene, respectively ( P ＜0.05). Moreover, significant correlations were observed between these physiological reactions, referring that a series of physiological and biochemical reactions in M. aeruginosa worked together against the PAH contamination. Considering that MCs are the most studied cyanobacterial toxins, our results clarified that the promoting MC production by PAH contamination cannot be neglected when making related risk assessments of eutrophic waters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]