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Enhanced recovery after surgery (ERAS) is a perioperative management protocol used to accelerate patient recovery. This study evaluated its benefits in patients with resectable esophageal cancer.This retrospective study compared patients before (January 2013 to December 2016) and after (June 2018 to December 2020) ERAS protocol implementation in our hospital. A propensity score-matched analysis was used to compare short-term surgical outcomes between ERAS and non-ERAS groups. After propensity score matching each group included 243 patients.There were significant differences in hospital length of stay after surgery (7.40 vs 11.17 days, P.001) and hospitalization cost (¥69380 vs ¥78075, P.001) between the ERAS and non-ERAS groups. The time to chest tube removal (4.91 vs 7.16 days, P.001) and first bowel movement (2.87 vs 3.97 days, P.001) was significantly shorter in the ERAS group. However there was no significant difference in total postoperative complication morbidity (20.2% vs 25.1%, P = .193). The complication of postoperative atelectasis or pneumonia was significantly lower in the ERAS group (P = .003), but there was no significant difference in occurrence of at least grade III complications between the 2 groups (12.3% vs 11.5%, P = .889).We demonstrated that ERAS could reduce hospital stay, numerical pain scores, and hospitalization costs without increasing postoperative complication and readmission. Furthermore subgroup analyses revealed that ERAS was safe for older people (70 years old).

This paper proposes a shared-aperture self-diplexing antenna using the composite parallel-plate waveguide (PPW). The long-straight slots (LSS) etched on the top surface of the PPW are utilized as the common radiation aperture for two operating bands. At the high frequency band, the proposed antenna, excited by the alternative-phase TE10-mode wave, operates as a leaky-wave antenna (LWA). Meanwhile, it serves as a continuous transverse stub (CTS) array antenna when excited by the TEM wave at the low frequency band. Two kinds of feeding networks are adopted to generate the alternative-phase TE10-mode wave and TEM wave, respectively. To verify the proposed method, a millimeter-wave prototype is designed, fabricated and measured. The measured results show that -10 dB fractional bandwidths are 3.42% (76.25-78.9 GHz) and 14.5% (83.2-96.2 GHz), respectively, and the port isolation is higher than 40 dB. Additionally, the peak gains are 27.1 dBi at 78.5 GHz and 25.3 dBi at 90 GHz, respectively. The proposed antenna can be used to develop compact frequency-division system without using duplexers and multi-band wireless systems.

BACKGROUND: Thoracic endovascular repair (TEVAR) is considered the first-line therapy in the repair of acute complicated type B aortic dissection (AC-BAD). Given the difficulty of designing randomized trials in this surgical cohort, long-term outcome data is limited. This systematic review and meta-analysis provide a complete aggregation of reported long-term survival and freedom from reintervention of AC-BAD patients based on the existing literature. METHODS: Three databases were searched from date of database inception to January 2021. The relevant references were identified and baseline cohort characteristics, survival and freedom from reintervention were extracted. The primary endpoints were survival and freedom from reintervention, whilst secondary endpoints were post-operative outcomes such as cord ischemia and endoleak. Kaplan-Meier curves were digitized and aggregated as per established procedure. RESULTS: A total of 2,812 references were identified in the literature search for review, with 46 selected for inclusion. A total of 2,565 patients were identified, of which 1,920 (75%) were male. The mean age of the cohort was 59.8±5.8. Actuarial survival at 2, 4, 6 and 10 years was 87.5%, 83.2%, 78.5% and 69.7%, respectively. Freedom from all secondary reintervention at 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10 years was 74.7%, 69.1%, 65.7%, 63.9% and 60.9%, respectively. When accounting for study quality, actuarial survival at 2, 4, 6 and 8 years was 85.4%, 79.1%, 69.8% and 63.1%, respectively. Freedom from all secondary reintervention at 2, 4, 6 and 8 years was 73.2%, 67.6%, 63.7% (maintained), respectively. CONCLUSIONS: TEVAR is associated with promising long-term survival extended to 10 years, though rates of freedom from reintervention remain an ongoing point for improvement. Randomized controlled trials comparing endovascular with open repair in the setting of acute, complicated type B aortic dissection are needed.

A planar dual-band shared-aperture array antenna for the ${K}$ -/ Ka -band low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite communication is presented in this article. Substrate integrated coaxial line (SICL)-fed bow-tie transverse slots and substrate integrated waveguide (SIW)-fed slot pairs are employed to provide ${K}$ -band horizontal polarization and Ka -band vertical polarization, respectively. The ${K}$ -band and Ka -band radiating elements share a common metallic-via-array, which can effectively improve the port-to-port isolation. Furthermore, the port-to-port isolations in both bands can be also improved by introducing the high-pass characteristic of SIW and out-of-phase cancellation between two current paths. For the sake of achieving low-profile height and compact size, the ${K}$ -band feeding network is subtly buried between Ka -band shielding cavities. As a proof-of-concept example, a shared-aperture dual-polarized array antenna operating at ${K}$ -/ Ka -band is designed and fabricated for verification by using a multilayer printed circuit board (PCB) technology. The measured results show a good concordance with the simulated one, indicating that the proposed antenna has the advantages of wideband, high isolations, low profile, and easy planar integration, which can be adopted for the millimeter-wave (mm-Wave) LEO satellite communication system.

This article presents the 2-D numerical simulation results of the heavy-ion-induced leakage current degradation and single-event burnout (SEB) in the rated 1.2-kV silicon-carbide (SiC) super-junction (SJ) vertical diffusion metal-oxide-semiconductor (VDMOS). The employed simulation physics models were validated by the heavy-ion irradiation experiments of the commercially rated 1.2-kV SiC common VDMOS (C-VDMOS), which indicated a severe degeneration threshold of 500 V. The SiC common SJ VDMOS (C-SJ VDMOS) was proven to be sensitive to high-energy heavy-ion and represents comparative SEB performance compared with the SiC C-VDMOS. The robustness of the SiC SJ VDMOS with different single buffer layer (SBL) designs against a heavy-ion was simulated. It is found that the maximum temperature in the source metal/SiC interface and bottom of the structure could be compromised by the thickness of the buffer layer. As a result, the SiC SJ VDMOS with an optimal SBL exhibited a severe degeneration threshold of 800 V, which was a 60% increase compared to the SiC C-SJ VDMOS.

This study evaluated the safety, effectiveness, and feasibility of indocyanine green (ICG) tracing in guiding lymph-node (LN) dissection during laparoscopic D2 radical gastrectomy in patients with advanced gastric cancer (AGC) after neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC). We retrospectively analyzed data on 313 patients with clinical stage of cT1-4N0-3M0 who underwent laparoscopic radical gastrectomy after NAC between February 2010 and October 2020 from two hospitals in China. Grouped according to whether ICG was injected. For the ICG group (n = 102) and non-ICG group (n = 211), 1:1 propensity matching analysis was used. After matching, there was no significant difference in the general clinical pathological data between the two groups (ICG vs. non-ICG: 94 vs. 94). The average number of total LN dissections was significantly higher in the ICG group and lower LN non-compliance rate than in the non-ICG group. Subgroup analysis showed that among patients with LN and tumor did not shrink after NAC, the number of LN dissections was significantly more and LN non-compliance rate was lower in the ICG group than in the non-ICG group. Intraoperative blood loss was significantly lesser in the ICG group than in the non-ICG group, while the recovery and complications of the two groups were similar. For patients with poor NAC outcomes, ICG tracing can increase the number of LN dissections during laparoscopic radical gastrectomy, reduce the rate of LN non-compliance, and reduce intraoperative bleeding. Patients with AGC should routinely undergo ICG-guided laparoscopic radical gastrectomy.

Objective. To evaluate the stress status of fracture site caused by femoral neck shortening and to analyze the stress of fracture site and the implants from the finite element point of view. Methods. CT scan data of hip of a normal adult female were collected. Three-dimensional reconstruction MICs and related module function simulation was used to establish the postoperative shortening model of femoral neck fracture with Pauwels angle > 50 ° , which was treated with cannulated screws. The models were divided into four groups: normal femoral neck, shortening in 2.5 mm, shortening in 7.5 mm, and shortening in 12.5 mm. The finite element analysis software msc.nastran2012 was used, and the data of maximum stress and stress nephogram of fracture site and implants were carried out. Results. From normal femoral neck to shortening in 12.5 mm of the femoral neck, the maximum tensile stress increased gradually in the fracture site above the cannulated screws while compressive stress decreased gradually in the fracture site below the cannulated screws, and the maximum stress of the cannulated screws increased gradually with obvious stress concentration at the screw holes in the fracture site, and the peak value of stress concentration was about 179 MPa. Conclusion. The biomechanical environment of the fracture site changed by femoral neck shortening. With the increasing of femoral neck shortening, the stress of the fracture site and implants would be uneven; then, the stability of fracture site would become worse, and the possibility of implant sliding or even breakage would be increased.

Background and Aims Intrapapillary capillary loops (IPCLs) are microvascular structures that correlate with the invasion depth of early squamous cell neoplasia and allow accurate prediction of histology. Artificial intelligence may improve human recognition of IPCL patterns and prediction of histology to allow prompt access to endoscopic therapy for early squamous cell neoplasia where appropriate. Methods One hundred fifteen patients were recruited at 2 academic Taiwanese hospitals. Magnification endoscopy narrow-band imaging videos of squamous mucosa were labeled as dysplastic or normal according to their histology, and IPCL patterns were classified by consensus of 3 experienced clinicians. A convolutional neural network (CNN) was trained to classify IPCLs, using 67,742 high-quality magnification endoscopy narrow-band images by 5-fold cross validation. Performance measures were calculated to give an average F1 score, accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity. A panel of 5 Asian and 4 European experts predicted the histology of a random selection of 158 images using the Japanese Endoscopic Society IPCL classification; accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values were calculated. Results Expert European Union (EU) and Asian endoscopists attained F1 scores (a measure of binary classification accuracy) of 97.0% and 98%, respectively. Sensitivity and accuracy of the EU and Asian clinicians were 97%, 98% and 96.9%, 97.1%, respectively. The CNN average F1 score was 94%, sensitivity 93.7%, and accuracy 91.7%. Our CNN operates at video rate and generates class activation maps that can be used to visually validate CNN predictions. Conclusions We report a clinically interpretable CNN developed to predict histology based on IPCL patterns, in real time, using the largest reported dataset of images for this purpose. Our CNN achieved diagnostic performance comparable with an expert panel of endoscopists.

In this communication, the design and experimental verification of a reconfigurable $1 \times 4$ circularly polarized (CP) patch array antenna with frequency, radiation pattern, and polarization agility are reported. An orthohexagonal patch element antenna with three groups of parasitic patch and varactor diode is adopted to enable frequency and polarization reconfiguration. By properly adjusting the dc voltage applied on the three groups of varactor diode, the operating frequency can be tuned continuously, and the polarization can be switched simultaneously between left-handed CP (LHCP) and right-handed CP (RHCP). Four switchable feeding probes integrated with a designed single-pole four-throw (SPFT) switch are used to feed the element antenna for achieving different initial phase. Hence, by properly switching feeding probes for the four elements, the radiation beam of the array antenna can be dynamically reconfigured among five different beam states. To verify the proposed concept, a full functional prototype was fabricated and characterized for four different frequency bands with all polarization and beam states. A good agreement between the simulation and measurement is obtained, thus validating the multiple reconfigurable capability of the array antenna in frequency, pattern, and polarization.

Acupuncture has been used for treating drug addiction since the 1970s, but little is known about the mechanisms by which acupuncture affects drug cue-induced relapse. The transcription factor delta-FosB (ΔFosB) plays a critical role in behavior and pathology after chronic use of cocaine. ΔFosB regulates glutamate receptor signaling and dendritic spine morphology in animal models. This experimental study compared the effects of electroacupuncture (EA) at acupoints LI4 and LI11 with those of another potentially beneficial intervention, gabapentin (GBP), alone or in combination, on reinstatement of cocaine-induced conditioned place preference (CPP) and levels of ΔFosB and glutamate receptor subunit 2 (GluR2) expression in the nucleus accumbens (NAc). EA at LI4 and LI11 significantly prevented cue-induced cocaine CPP reinstatement, whereas needle insertion without electrical stimulation at these acupoints had no such effect. EA also significantly attenuated cocaine-induced increases in ΔFosB and GluR2 expression in the NAc. Unexpectedly, these effects were reversed when GBP was combined with EA. Treatment with EA at LI4 and LI11 prevented cocaine-induced increases in dendritic spine density in the NAc core and shell. Our results suggest that EA at LI4 and LI11 may prevent cocaine relapse by modulating ΔFosB and GluR2 expression, as well as dendritic spine density.

This brief presents 2-D numerical simulation results of a single-event burnout (SEB) in a 4H-silicon carbide (SiC) junction termination extension (JTE) termination structure of a power metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET). Using the rated 1.5-kV JTE termination structure, the most sensitive ion’s strike position to SEB is proved to be the edge of the P+/P− JTE region. Due to the severe punchthrough of the electric field, the source contact region is found to the most sensitive region to induce an SEB event. The SEB performance of the JTE termination structure with a single buffer layer or multilayer buffer is evaluated. The results show that the electric field distribution in four buffer layers (FBLs) is the most uniform to achieve the best SEB performance. Therefore, by adding an optimal FBL design to the termination region, the SEB threshold voltage can be increased to 1210 V instead of the common structure’s 250 V. The SEB safe operating area of the power MOSFET with an optimal FBL can increase more than three times compared with the common one.

Despite all the benefits that customer relationship management (CRM) offers to companies, various studies show high rates of failure when implementing CRM schemes. This study aims to explain how CRM can capitalize on the notion of learning behavior from failures in order to improve the relationship building and innovation performance in high technology ventures. Questionnaire survey data were collected from 234 CEOs and General Managers from ICT firms based in Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou, China. Subsequently, both hierarchical linear regression and SEM was conducted to test the hypothesized relationships. Findings show that CRM positively affects both NPD and commitment to long-term relationships and confirm that learning behaviour from failure mediates the main effects of CRM, which consists of strategic and market orientation foci, in combination with internal marketing and knowledge management. Specifically, although all four aspects of CRM are important to NPD, knowledge management is of particular importance.

Background The superior facet arthroplasty is important for intervertebral foramen microscopy. To our knowledge, there is no study about the postoperative biomechanics of adjacent L4/L5 segments after different methods of S1 superior facet arthroplasty. To evaluate the effect of S1 superior facet arthroplasty on lumbar range of motion and disc stress of adjacent segment (L4/L5) under the intervertebral foraminoplasty. Methods Eight finite element models (FEMs) of lumbosacral vertebrae (L4/S) had been established and validated. The S1 superior facet arthroplasty was simulated with different methods. Then, the models were imported into Nastran software after optimization; 500 N preload was imposed on the L4 superior endplate, and 10 N⋅m was given to simulate flexion, extension, lateral flexion and rotation. The range of motion (ROM) and intervertebral disc stress of the L4-L5 spine were recorded. Results The ROM and disc stress of L4/L5 increased with the increasing of the proportions of S1 superior facet arthroplasty. Compared with the normal model, the ROM of L4/L5 significantly increased in most directions of motion when S1 superior facet formed greater than 3/5 from the ventral to the dorsal or 2/5 from the apex to the base. The disc stress of L4/L5 significantly increased in most directions of motion when S1 superior facet formed greater than 3/5 from the ventral to the dorsal or 1/5 from the apex to the base. Conclusion In this study, the ROM and disc stress of L4/L5 were affected by the unilateral S1 superior facet arthroplasty. It is suggested that the forming range from the ventral to the dorsal should be less than 3/5 of the S1 upper facet joint. It is not recommended to form from apex to base. Level of evidence Level IV

This study analysed the clinical patterns and outcomes of elderly patients with organophosphate intoxication. A total of 71 elderly patients with organophosphate poisoning were seen between 2008 and 2017. Patients were stratified into two subgroups: survivors (n = 57) or nonsurvivors (n = 14). Chlorpyrifos accounted for 33.8% of the cases, followed by methamidophos (12.7%) and mevinphos (11.3%). Mood, adjustment and psychotic disorder were noted in 39.4%, 33.8% and 2.8% of patients, respectively. All patients were treated with atropine and pralidoxime therapies. Acute cholinergic crisis developed in all cases (100.0%). The complications included respiratory failure (52.1%), aspiration pneumonia (50.7%), acute kidney injury (43.7%), severe consciousness disturbance (25.4%), shock (14.1%) and seizures (4.2%). Some patients also developed intermediate syndrome (15.5%) and delayed neuropathy (4.2%). The nonsurvivors suffered higher rates of hypotension (P P P = 0.001) than survivors did. Kaplan–Meier analysis indicated that patients with shock suffered lower cumulative survival than did patients without shock (log-rank test, P P = 0.009). The mortality rate was 19.7%. Acute cholinergic crisis, intermediate syndrome, and delayed neuropathy developed in 100.0%, 15.5%, and 4.2% of patients, respectively.

In this letter, a planar array antenna with multiple-beams in orthogonal planes is proposed and investigated. A shared aperture is deployed for achieving a compact size, which is based on a cross transmitting network consisting of the substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) and the stripline. Two 1-D passive beamforming networks (BFNs) consisting of folded SIW Cassegrain reflectors are designed and integrated independently with the shared aperture. For demonstration, an 8 × 8 slot array at 26.0 GHz is designed and measured. In orthogonal planes, i.e., the xz plane and yz plane, six radiation beams have been achieved within ±40°, respectively. The proposed antenna is a good candidate for the millimeter-wave fifth-generation (5G) wireless applications.

Introduction: Very little artificial intelligence (AI) work has been performed to investigate acetaminophen-associated hepatotoxicity. The objective of this study was to develop an AI algorithm for analyzing weighted features for toxic hepatitis after acetaminophen poisoning. Methods: The medical records of 187 patients with acetaminophen poisoning treated at Chang Gung Memorial Hospital were reviewed. Patients were sorted into two groups according to their status of toxic hepatitis. A total of 40 clinical and laboratory features recorded on the first day of admission were selected for algorithm development. The random forest classifier (RFC) and logistic regression (LR) were used for artificial intelligence algorithm development. Results: The RFC-based AI model achieved the following results: accuracy = 92.5 ± 2.6%; sensitivity = 100%; specificity = 60%; precision = 92.3 ± 3.4%; and F1 = 96.0 ± 1.8%. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) was approximately 0.98. The LR-based AI model achieved the following results: accuracy = 92.00 ± 2.9%; sensitivity = 100%; specificity = 20%; precision = 92.8 ± 3.4%; recall = 98.8 ± 3.4%; and F1 = 95.6 ± 1.5%. The AUROC was approximately 0.68. The weighted features were calculated, and the 10 most important weighted features for toxic hepatitis were aspartate aminotransferase (ALT), prothrombin time, alanine aminotransferase (AST), time to hospital, platelet count, lymphocyte count, albumin, total bilirubin, body temperature and acetaminophen level. Conclusion: The top five weighted features for acetaminophen-associated toxic hepatitis were ALT, prothrombin time, AST, time to hospital and platelet count.

INTRODUCTION Entecavir (ETV) and tenofovir alafenamide (TAF) are both first-line hepatitis B virus (HBV) therapies, but ETV-to-TAF switch outcome data are limited. We aimed to assess outcomes up to 96 weeks after ETV-to-TAF switch. METHODS ETV-treated (≥12 months) chronic hepatitis B patients switched to TAF in routine practice at 15 centers (United States, Korea, Japan, and Taiwan) were included. Primary outcome was complete viral suppression (CVS) rate (HBV DNA

In this article, we propose SemanticHash, a simple and effective deep neural network model, to leverage semantic word embeddings (e.g., BERT) in hash codes learning. Both images and class labels are compressed into $K$ -bit binary vectors by using the visual (or the semantic) hash functions, which are jointly learned and aligned to optimize the semantic consistency. The $K$ -dimensional class label prototypes—projected from semantic word embeddings—guide the hash mapping on the image side and vice versa, creating the $K$ -bit image hash codes being aligned with their semantic prototypes and therefore more discriminative. Extensive experimental results on four benchmarks, CIFAR10, NUS-WIDE, ImageNet, and MS-COCO datasets, demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach. We also perform studies to analyze the effects of quantization and word semantic spaces and to explain the relations among the learned class prototypes. Finally, the generalization capability of the proposed approach is further demonstrated. It achieves competitive performance in comparison with state-of-the-art unsupervised and zero-shot hashing methods. Impact Statement —Hash code learning is an important technology that enables efficient image retrieval on large-scale data. While existing hashing algorithms can effectively generate compact binary codes in a supervised learning setting trained with a moderate-size dataset, they are demanding to be scalable to large datasets and do not generalize to unseen datasets. The proposed approach overcomes these limitations. Compared with state-of-the-art ones, our solution achieves 2.1% of average performance improvement on four moderate-size benchmarks and 4.7% of improvement on ImageNet, a large-scale dataset with over 1.2 M training images. With superior performance on popular benchmarks for binary hash code learning, the technology introduced performs well on cross-dataset and zero-shot (i.e., the testing concepts are unseen during training) scenarios too. Our approach attains over 17.7% of zero-shot retrieval performance improvement when compared to the state-of-the-art in the area. This article thus provides a powerful solution to utilize massive data for fast and accurate image retrieval in the big data era.

Increasing hepatitis-related mortality has reignited interest to fulfill the World Health Organization’s goal of viral hepatitis elimination by 2030. However, economic barriers have enabled only 28% of countries to implement countermeasures. Given the high disease burden among Asians, we aimed to present age, sex, disease activity and treatment-specific annual progression rates among Asian chronic hepatitis B (CHB) patients to inform health economic modeling efforts and cost-effective public health interventions. We analyzed 18,056 CHB patients from 36 centers across the U.S. and seven countries/regions of Asia Pacific (9530 treated; 8526 untreated). We used Kaplan–Meier methods to estimate annual incidence of cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Active disease was defined by meeting the APASL treatment guideline criteria. Over a median follow-up of 8.55 years, there were 1178 incidences of cirrhosis and 1212 incidences of HCC (297 without cirrhosis, 915 with cirrhosis). Among the 8526 untreated patients (7977 inactive, 549 active), the annual cirrhosis and HCC incidence ranged from 0.26% to 1.30% and 0.04% to 3.80% in inactive patients, and 0.55 to 4.05% and 0.19 to 6.03% in active patients, respectively. Of the 9530 treated patients, the annual HCC rates ranged 0.03–1.57% among noncirrhotic males and 2.57–6.93% among cirrhotic males, with lower rates for females. Generally, transition rates increased with age, male sex, the presence of fibrosis/cirrhosis, and active disease and/or antiviral treatment. Using data from a large and diverse real-world cohort of Asian CHB patients, the study provided detailed annual transition rates to inform practice, research and public health planning.

Ever since the deployment of the first-generation of mobile telecommunications, wireless communication technology has evolved at a dramatically fast pace over the past four decades. The upcoming fifth-generation (5G) holds a great promise in providing an ultra-fast data rate, a very low latency, and a significantly improved spectral efficiency by exploiting the millimeter-wave spectrum for the first time in mobile communication infrastructures. In the years beyond 2030, newly emerged data-hungry applications and the greatly expanded wireless network will call for the sixth-generation (6G) communication that represents a significant upgrade from the 5G network - covering almost the entire surface of the earth and the near outer space. In both the 5G and future 6G networks, millimeter-wave technologies will play an important role in accomplishing the envisioned network performance and communication tasks. In this paper, the relevant millimeter-wave enabling technologies are reviewed: they include the recent developments on the system architectures of active beamforming arrays, beamforming integrated circuits, antennas for base stations and user terminals, system measurement and calibration, and channel characterization. The requirements of each part for future 6G communications are also briefly discussed.

An ultrapure green phosphor with narrow emission range (525–535 nm) and full width at half maximum (FWHM < 25 nm) is critical for a backlit light-emitting diode to realize an ultrawide color gamut in liquid-crystal display (LCD), according to the Rec. 2020 standard. However, it is extremely formidable to achieve this goal for low-dimensional halide perovskites (LDHPs), which readily display broadband emissions arising from self-trapped excitons due to strong electron–phonon coupling. Herein, we report a new one-dimensional (1D) hybrid lead halide of [TMPDA]2Pb3Br10 (TMPDA = tetramethyl-1,3-diaminopropane) displaying unusual ultrapure green light emission. Benefiting from the synergistic work of weak electron–phonon interaction and strong quantum confinement, this 1D halide displays sharp green emission at 526 nm with narrow FWHM (25 nm), high photoluminescence quantum yield (71.95%) and color purity (91.1%), which achieves the Rec. 2020 standard and represents the purest green emitting LDHP to date. Remarkably, as a down-conversion green phosphor, [TMPDA]2Pb3Br10 provides an ultrawide color gamut covering 121.5% of NTSC and 90.7% of Rec. 2020 standards, showcasing the application in high-resolved LCD. The establishment of a fundamental structure–property relationship also paves a new way to rationally design novel narrow-band emitting LDHPs as a supplement of colloidal 3D perovskite nanostructures.

Despite HCV cure, patients remain at risk for HCC, but risk factor data for HCC following SVR are limited for Asian patients. To address this gap, we analyzed 5814 patients (5646 SVR, 168 non-SVR) from the Real-World Evidence from the Asia Liver Consortium for HCV (REAL-C) who did not have HCC or a history of HCC at baseline (pre-DAA treatment) and did not develop HCC within 6 months of baseline. To assess the effect of SVR on HCC incidence, we used 1:4 propensity score matching [(PSM), age, sex, baseline cirrhosis, and baseline AFP] to balance the SVR and non-SVR groups. In the PSM cohort (160 non-SVR and 612 SVR), the HCC incidence rate per 100 person years was higher in the non-SVR compared to the SVR group (5.26 vs. 1.94, p

A wide-angle frequency beam scanning antenna based on spoof surface plasmon polaritons (SSPPs) is proposed for planar-integrated communication circuits. The SSPP-based antenna is constructed by hole arrays etched on the standard $50~\Omega $ coplanar waveguide, which can achieve ultrawide bandwidth and wide-angle beam scanning from backward direction to forward direction as the frequency changes. The radiation mechanisms of the SSPP-based antenna are based on the higher-order modes of the structure, which have been analyzed by the dispersion curves and electric field distributions. The overall width of the proposed SSPP-based antenna is only $0.95\lambda _{0}$ (with $\lambda _{0}$ being the wavelength of the lowest working frequency). The simulated results show that the proposed frequency beam scanning antenna achieves a wide scanning angle of 129° over a frequency range from 11.7 to 50 GHz (for $\vert S_{11}\vert dB) with an average gain level of 12.38 dBi. The good agreements between the simulated and measured results validate the proposed design.

This letter reports a strategy of full-digital arrays with nonreciprocal transmitting (Tx) and receiving (Rx) beam patterns, for the first time, for 5G/6G wireless communications. The proposed full-digital array contains a smaller number of Rx channels than that of the Tx channels. The unequal number of Tx and Rx channels makes the transmitting and receiving patterns asymmetrical, which would not only release the burden of data processing but also reduce the hardware cost and power consumption of the entire system. Importantly, as compared with conventional large-scale beamforming arrays, the proposed strategy will not deteriorate the range of coverage at an instantaneous time. A 64-element full-digital beamforming array prototype was designed, fabricated, and characterized for a proof-of-concept demonstration.

Yueju, a famous classic Chinese prescription, has been extensively used in treating depression syndromes for hundreds of years. Recent studies have reported that Yueju showed good effects in treating metabolic diseases, such as obesity and hyperlipidemia. Nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), which leads to cirrhosis and severe cardiovascular diseases, is closely linked to obesity and abnormal lipid metabolism. In this study, Yueju could decrease the levels of alanine aminotransferase, aspartate transaminase, triglyceride, cholesterol, and low-density lipoprotein-C but increase the high-density lipoprotein-C in the serum of the NASH rat model induced by high-fat and high-cholesterol diet. Yueju could alleviate hepatosteatosis by increasing the phosphorylation of acetyl-CoA carboxylase and inhibiting the expression of fatty acid synthase and stearoyl-CoA desaturase 1. Yueju downregulated the expression of α-smooth muscle actin and collagen type 1A1, ameliorating the liver fibrilization. Yueju could also protect the hepatocytes from apoptosis by upregulating antiapoptosis protein Bcl-2 and X-linked inhibitor of apoptosis protein and downregulating apoptotic proteins Bax and cleaved poly ADP-ribose polymerase. Thus, Yueju could improve liver function, regulate lipid metabolism, alleviate hepatosteatosis and fibrosis, and protect hepatocytes from apoptosis against NASH. Yueju may be used as an alternative effective medicine for NASH treatment.

Purpose Emerging studies have revealed that platelets are involved in tumor metastasis in lung adenocarcinoma (ADC). The solid pathological subtype of lung ADC is associated with metastasis, recurrence, and poor prognosis. However, there is no study exploring the relationship between platelets and different lung pathological subtypes. Patients and Methods The association between platelet counts and lymph node metastasis was analyzed in 852 patients with lung ADC who underwent surgery and lymph node dissection. Multivariate logistic analysis was conducted to identify the risk factors of lymph node metastasis. Then, lymph node metastasis and other factors were analyzed to determine their correlation with platelet count and histological subtype. Results We found that the platelet count was associated with lymph node metastasis (P = 0.01) in multivariable analysis, independent of tumor size, predominant subtype, visceral pleural invasion, and microvessel invasion. In patients with a platelet count ≥300 × 109/L, the rate of lymph node metastasis was 38.5%, almost twice as high as that in patients with a platelet count

We conducted a multicenter retrospective cohort study of metabolic dysfunction‐associated hepatocellular carcinoma. In this cohort, cirrhosis was not associated with poorer survival, while history of liver imaging was., Metabolic‐associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD) is a major cause of liver‐related complications, including hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). While MAFLD‐related HCC is known to occur in the absence of cirrhosis, our understanding of MAFLD‐related HCC in this setting is limited. Here, we characterize MAFLD‐related HCC and the impact of cirrhosis and screening on survival. This was a multicenter, retrospective, cohort study of MAFLD‐related HCC. MAFLD was defined based on the presence of race‐adjusted overweight, diabetes, or both hypertension and dyslipidemia in the absence of excess alcohol use or other underlying cause of liver disease. The primary outcome of interest was overall survival, and the primary dependent variables were cirrhosis status and prior HCC screening. We used Kaplan‐Meier methods to estimate overall survival and Cox proportional hazards models and random forest machine learning to determine factors associated with prognosis. This study included 1,382 patients from 11 centers in the United States and East/Southeast Asia. Cirrhosis was present in 62% of patients, but under half of these patients had undergone imaging within 12 months of HCC diagnosis. Patients with cirrhosis were more likely to have early stage disease but less often received curative therapy. After adjustment, cirrhosis was not associated with prognosis, but the presence of cancer‐related symptoms at diagnosis was associated with poorer prognosis. Conclusion: Cirrhosis was not associated with overall survival in this cohort of MAFLD‐related HCC, while diagnosis in the presence of symptoms was associated with poorer prognosis. The HCC surveillance rate in patients with MAFLD‐related HCC was disappointingly low in a multicenter cohort.

Background: Data from the USA suggest that chronic hepatitis B (CHB) patients have aged in the past decade. However, the burden of nonliver comorbidities has not been well characterized in Taiwan, where CHB is very prevalent. Aim: Our study examined this issue as it presented between 2001 and 2011 in Taiwan. Methods: This study identified adult patients (≥18 years) who were diagnosed with CHB in 2001, 2006, and 2011, from the Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD). Changes in demographic characteristics, prevalence of nonliver comorbidities, and medication usage over the decade were examined. Non-CHB controls were adults without CHB diagnosis from the Longitudinal Health Insurance Database 2000 (LHID2000). Results: A total of 102,158, 252,809, and 338,200 eligible patients were identified in 2001, 2006, and 2011, respectively. The mean age significantly advanced from 45.4 to 52.3 years over the decade (p < 0.001). The prevalence of comorbidities, including diabetes mellitus, hypertension, stroke, chronic kidney disease, and bone fracture, significantly increased between 2001 and 2011 (all p < 0.001), as so were medication usage (all p < 0.001). Moreover, within each study period, compared to non-CHB controls, CHB patients were also older and more likely to have metabolic and cardiovascular comorbidities (all p < 0.001). In addition, the annual nonliver mortality in the CHB population significantly increased from 2001 to 2011. Conclusions: Over a decade, the CHB population in Taiwan has aged with a higher nonliver comorbidity burden and increasing nonliver mortality. These findings may provide information to care providers in the monitoring and management of CHB patients.

A ${W}$ -band large-scale substrate-integrated waveguide (SIW) cavity-backed slot array for high-gain applications is presented in this communication. The proposed antenna consists of a compact 16-way power divider and a $32\times33$ slot array. The 16-way power divider at the bottom-layer PCB provides equal-amplitude and alternative-phase excitation for 32 SIWs on the top layer PCB, and each of them supports 33 radiation slots. The loss along with the complexity of the feeding network is reduced by the implementation of alternative-phase excitation. To demonstrate the proposed slot array, a $4\times 33$ slot array excited by a two-way power divider is designed first. Then, the $4\times33$ slot array is extended to a $32\times33$ slot array by a 16-way power divider. To verify the proposed slot array, the designed array is fabricated and measured. The measured peak gain, radiation, and aperture efficiencies are 30.88 dBi, 42%, and 22.8% at 93.2 GHz, respectively. The proposed high-gain antenna is an excellent candidate for the high-frequency millimeter-wave (mm-wave) wireless system.

A compact planar directional coupled crossover with a wide fractional bandwidth is proposed in this letter, which is composed of overlapping planar 3-dB couplers based on the substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) and stripline techniques. In the proposed structure, the TE10 mode and TEM mode can be transmitted simultaneously without any interaction, which is helpful to design and integrate the SIW and stripline couplers for realizing a wideband directional coupled crossover with a compact footprint. A prototype with a center frequency of 26 GHz for 5G applications is designed and fabricated. The experimental results show that the measured crossover has high isolation among all ports and good directional coupling performance in orthogonal directions. The proposed crossover has a compact footprint and low loss, which can be a good candidate for developing the miniature feeding networks for multiple beam antennas.

This letter proposes a 400-GHz leaky-wave antenna with low sidelobe level (SLL) and low cross-polarization level (CPL). Tapered radiation slots are designed for achieving a low SLL, virtual electrical walls are deployed to remove the loss from metal sidewalls by using a high-order mode feeding network, and a symmetrical layout with alternative-phase excitations is adopted for the array to suppress the CPL. The conventional computer numerical controlled metal-milling and printed-circuit-board processes are used to fabricate the designed prototype. Experiments are carried out to verify the design. The measured peak gain and radiation efficiency of the fabricated prototype are 21.32 dBi and 34.65% at 395 GHz, respectively. In addition, its measured SLL and CPL are about −25 and −30 dB, respectively. The proposed antenna shows merits of the low cost, low SLL and CPL performance for potential terahertz applications.

Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a risk factor for pancreatic cancer but its prognostic impact remains controversial. We aimed to investigate the association between long-standing DM and the risk of mortality.This population-based cohort study analyzed data from the national healthcare database in Taiwan. We identified all patients diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and excluded those who were diagnosed with DM with-in 2 years of the cancer diagnosis. Eligible patients were grouped into long-standing DM (2 years) and nondiabetic controls, and were compared for overall survival using a Cox proportional hazard model. Sensitivity tests stratified by cancer stages (as indicated by specific treatment) were performed.Patients with long-standing DM were significantly older (mean age, 71.38 years versus 66.0 years; P.0001) and had a higher Charlson comorbidity index (9.53 versus 6.78; P.0001) and diabetes comorbidity severity index (2.38 versus 0.82; P.0001) compared with the non-DM controls. Although the unadjusted analysis showed a higher risk of mortality in the patients with long-term DM (crude hazard ratiolsqb;HR], 1.26; 95% confidence intervallsqb;CI], 1.20 to 1.33; P.0001), the association became insignificant after adjustment for age, sex, and comorbidity index (adjusted HR, 1.01; 95% CI, 0.95 to 1.06, P = .84). Subgroup analyses also showed no association between long-term DM and mortality in various subgroups stratified by cancer treatment.After adjusting for associated comorbidities and complications, long-standing DM per se was not an independent prognostic factor for overall survival in this nationwide population-based cohort with pancreatic cancer.CCI = Charlson Comorbidity Index; CI = confidence interval; DCSI = Diabetes Complication Severity Index; DM = diabetes mellitus; HR = hazard ratio; ICD = International Classification of Diseases; NHIRD = National Health Insurance Research Database; RCIPD = Registry for Catastrophic Illness Patient Database.

In this article, a novel snapback-free reverse-conducting insulated-gate bipolar transistor (RC-IGBT) with P+ pillars at the collector side (PPC) is proposed and investigated by TCAD simulations. This structure features the P+ pillar structure at the side of collector and exits a gap of N-buffers above N+ collector. The P+ pillars increase the distributed resistance below the buffer layer during turn-on transient, show bipolar mode, and eliminate the snapback phenomenon. Accordingly, the structure eliminates the snapback phenomenon with a smaller half-cell pitch of ${10}~\mu \text{m}$ , making that the device is more reliable and suitable for parallel connection. For the same forward voltage drop, the turn-off loss of the PPC structure is reduced by 34%.

With increasing numbers of patients surviving acute intoxication phase, long-term complication after paraquat intoxication is a topic worth exploring, such as osteonecrosis (ON) of femoral head. We reviewed 86 paraquat-intoxicated survivors between 2000 and 2012 in Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, a 3700-bed tertiary hospital in Taiwan. With all the patients underwent same detoxification protocol in the acute stage, 17.4% of paraquat poisoning survivors developed ON of femoral head requiring surgery during follow up. Most of ON episodes occurred within 2 to 4 years after paraquat intoxication and then plateau after 6 years. ON patients exhibited higher SOFA scores than non-ON patients (2.80 ± 2.14 vs. 1.76 ± 1.52, p = 0.028). Furthermore, AKIN scores are also higher in the ON patients than non-ON patients (0.87 ± 1.13 vs. 0.38 ± 0.74, p = 0.040). Multivariate logistic regression showed higher AKIN score and higher partial pressure of carbon dioxide in the blood 48 hours after admission significantly predicted ON of femoral head after paraquat intoxication (p = 0.002 and p = 0.006 respectively). Larger studies with longer follow-up durations are warranted to confirm our finding.

Background and aim Entecavir (ETV) and tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (TDF) have been shown to reduce incidence of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB). This systematic review aims to evaluate the magnitude, change over time, and prediction of residual HCC risks in CHB patients treated with ETV/TDF therapy. Methods Available literature was systematically reviewed through searches of PubMed and EMBASE databases from January 1, 2006 to September 1, 2019, to identify cohort studies that reported HCC incidence in CHB patients during ETV/TDF therapy. Studies were screened by title and abstract and then evaluated for eligibility in terms of full text. Results We identified 141 studies for full-text review, and 34 were eligible for analysis. From 19 studies with data separated by cirrhosis status, the 5-year cumulative incidence of HCC was 0.5-6.9% in patients without cirrhosis, 4.5-21.6% in compensated cirrhosis, and 36.3-46.5% in decompensated cirrhosis. All four studies that addressed temporal changes in HCC risks consistently found the incidence rate decreased over time in patients with cirrhosis, although the findings were inconsistent in patients without cirrhosis. Six predictive scores were developed and validated to predict incident HCC during ETV/TDF therapy in CHB patients. Common scoring variables included age, sex, cirrhosis (fibrosis grade), and hepatic function. Conflicting results were reported in seven individual studies and two meta-analyses that compared ETV versus TDF. Conclusions The residual risk of HCC remains during ETV/TDF treatment in CHB patients with cirrhosis but declines over time. Risk stratification is attainable by validated predictive scores.

Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most common and malignant primary adult brain tumor. Current care includes surgical resection, radiation, and chemotherapy. Recent clinical trials for GBM have demonstrated extended survival using interventions such as tumor vaccines or tumor-treating fields. However, prognosis generally remains poor, with expected survival of 20 months after randomization. Chemokine-based immunotherapy utilizing CCL21 locally recruits lymphocytes and dendritic cells to enhance host antitumor response. Here, we report a preliminary study utilizing CPZ-vault nanoparticles as a vehicle to package, protect, and steadily deliver therapy to optimize CCL21 therapy in a murine flank model of GBM. GL261 cells were subcutaneously injected into the left flank of eight-week-old female C57BL/6 mice. Mice were treated with intratumoral injections of either: (1) CCL21-packaged vault nanoparticles (CPZ-CCL21), (2) free recombinant CCL21 chemokine empty vault nanoparticles, (3) empty vault nanoparticles, or 4) PBS. The results of this study showed that CCL21-packaged vault nanoparticle injections can decrease the tumor volume in vivo. Additionally, this study showed mice injected with CCL21-packaged vault nanoparticle had the smallest average tumor volume and remained the only treatment group with a negative percent change in tumor volume. This preliminary study establishes vault nanoparticles as a feasible vehicle to increase drug delivery and immune response in a flank murine model of GBM. Future animal studies involving an intracranial orthotopic tumor model are required to fully evaluate the potential for CCL21-packaged vault nanoparticles as a strategy to bypass the blood brain barrier, enhance intracranial immune activity, and improve intracranial tumor control and survival.

Purpose A consensus about the pathogenesis of torus palatinus (TP) in patients receiving dialysis still eludes the scientific community. This prospective observational study investigated the epidemiology of TP in peritoneal dialysis and hemodialysis patients and analyzed the influences of multiple pathogenic factors such as mineral and bone disorders, genetic, environmental or nutritional triggers, progression of age, heredity, climatologic or biomechanical causes, and hyperparathyroidism on the formation of TP. Methods Between 2013 and 2016, a total of 575 chronic dialysis patients (441 on hemodialysis and 134 on peritoneal dialysis) were recruited from Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Taiwan. Patients were stratified into two groups based on the presence (n = 179) or absence (n = 396) of TP. Demographic, oral examination, laboratory, and dialysis data were collected for analysis. Student's t-test was used to analyze the quantitative variables and Chi-square or Fisher's exact test for categorical variables. Univariate binary logistic regression analysis was conducted to determine the predictors for TP and multivariate binary logistic regression analysis to identify significant associated factors. Results The prevalence of TP in dialysis patients in this study was 31.1% (28.3% for hemodialysis and 40.3% for peritoneal dialysis). Patients with TP were younger (54.6 ± 13.4 versus 58.9 ± 14.7 years, P = 0.001) and mostly female (60.3 versus 41.2%, P < 0.001). Most TP cases (55.3%) were small in size (

Background Radioresistance of some non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) types increases the risk of recurrence or metastasis in afflicted patients, following radiotherapy. As such, further improvements to NSCLC radiotherapy are needed. The expression of oncogene TP53-regulated inhibitor of apoptosis 1 (TRIAP1) in NSCLC is increased following irradiation. Furthermore, gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) has suggested that TRIAP1 might be involved in maintaining redox homeostasis. This in turn might enhance cell radioresistance. Methods In this study we irradiated human NSCLC cell lines (A549 and H460), while knocking down TRIAP1, to determine whether a disrupted redox homeostasis could attenuate radioresistance. Results Irradiation notably increased both mRNA and protein levels of TRIAP1. In addition, TRIAP1 knockdown decreased the expression of several antioxidant proteins, including thioredoxin-related transmembrane protein (TMX) 1, TMX2, thioredoxin (TXN), glutaredoxin (GLRX) 2, GLRX3, peroxiredoxin (PRDX) 3, PRDX4, and PRDX6 in A549 and H460 cells. In addition, silencing TRIAP1 impaired the radiation-induced increase of the aforementioned proteins. Continuing along this line, we observed a radiation-induced reduction of cell viability and invasion, as well as increased apoptosis and intracellular reactive oxygen species following TRIAP1 knockdown. Conclusions In summary, we identified TRIAP1 as a key contributor to the radioresistance of NSCLC by maintaining redox homeostasis.

The esophageal gland duct may serve as a pathway for the spread of early esophageal squamous cell neoplasia (ESCN) to a deeper layer. Deep intraductal tumor spreading cannot be completely eradicated by ablation therapy. However, the risk factors of ductal involvement (DI) in patients with ESCNs have yet to be investigated. We consecutively enrolled 160 early ESCNs, which were treated with endoscopic submucosal dissection. The resected specimens were reviewed for the number, morphology, resected margin, distribution and extension level of DI, which were then correlated to clinical factors. A total of 317 DIs (median:3, range 1–40 per-lesion) in 61 lesions (38.1%) were identified. Of these lesions, 14 have DIs maximally extended to the level of lamina propria mucosa, 17 to muscularis mucosae, and 30 to the submucosa. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that tumors located in the upper esophagus (OR = 2.93, 95% CI, 1.02–8.42), large tumor circumferential extension (OR = 5.39, 95% CI, 1.06–27.47), deep tumor invasion depth (OR = 4.12, 95% CI, 1.81–9.33) and numerous Lugol-voiding lesions in background esophageal mucosa (OR = 2.65, 95% CI, 1.10–6.37) were risk factors for DI. The maximally extended level of ducts involved were significantly correlated with the cancer invasion depth (P

The worldwide botanical and medicinal culture diversity are astonishing and constitute a Pierian spring for innovative drug R&D. Here, the latest awareness and the perspectives of pharmacophylogeny and pharmacophylogenomics, as well as their expanding utility in botanical drug R&D, are systematically summarized and highlighted. Chemotaxonomy is based on the fact that closely related plants contain the same or similar chemical profiles. Correspondingly, it is better to combine morphological characters, DNA markers and chemical markers in the inference of medicinal plant phylogeny. Medicinal plants within the same phylogenetic groups may have the same or similar therapeutic effects, thus forming the core of pharmacophylogeny. Here we systematically review and comment on the versatile applications of pharmacophylogeny in (1) looking for domestic resources of imported drugs, (2) expanding medicinal plant resources, (3) quality control, identification and expansion of herbal medicines, (4) predicting the chemical constituents or active ingredients of herbal medicine and assisting in the identification and determination of chemical constituents, (5) the search for new drugs sorting out, and (6) summarizing and improving herbal medicine experiences, etc. Such studies should be enhanced within the context of deeper investigations of molecular biology and genomics of traditional medicinal plants, phytometabolites and metabolomics, and ethnomedicine-based pharmacological activity, thus enabling the sustainable conservation and utilization of traditional medicinal resources.

A novel wideband high-gain planar antenna array for $E$ -band backhaul applications is presented in this article. The antenna element is composed of a substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) cavity-backed patch and a stepped waveguide horn. The SIW cavity-backed patch is worked as wideband waveform and impedance transformer to excite the stepped waveguide horn on the upper layer. The stepped waveguide horn is employed to enhance the gain of the antenna element by increasing the radiation aperture. Based on the proposed antenna element, a $2 \times 2$ subarray with element spacing larger than a wavelength is designed. A groove, which works as secondary radiation source, is etched between the elements to improve the gain and suppress the high sidelobes of the $2 \times 2$ subarray. By taking the advantage of the groove, the $2 \times 2$ subarray achieves a maximum boresight gain of 17 dBi and an −10 dB impedance bandwidth of 21.8% from 70 to 87 GHz. For further enhancing the gain, a prototype including $16 \times 16$ elements is manufactured and measured. The experimental results confirm that the proposed antenna achieves the −10 dB impedance bandwidth of 22.4% from 71 to 88.5 GHz and a peak gain of 28.8–30.9 dBi. With the merits of a wider operating bandwidth, high gain, low profile, and low cross-polarization, the proposed antenna array is suitable for application in the $E$ -band wireless backhaul systems.

This paper presents a low-profile 400 GHz Airy beam generator using a reflective anisotropic metasurface based on a phase-only modified Fourier-transform-type method. To efficiently launch 2-D terahertz (THz) Airy waves of compact size, the proposed Airy-beam system adopts a folded topology consisting of a single-layered reflective metasurface and a polarizing grid. Different from the conventional dielectric lens or single-layered transmitting metasurface, the proposed folded reflective structure achieves the required cubic phase using a quartz-based reflective metasurface with reduced volume and increased efficiency. A quasi-I-shaped unit cell is proposed for the metasurface to manipulate the incident THz wave by efficiently converting the initial illumination to its cross polarization and simultaneously adjusting its phase with a range of $2\pi $ . A reflective metasurface and a THz polarizing grid are designed and integrated to show both the unique transverse acceleration behavior and the self-reconstruction property at the 400 GHz band. The simulated and measured results demonstrate that the proposed folded topology can produce the expected THz Airy beam with compact size and polarization conversion efficiency over 90%.

Defect clusters on the wafer map can provide important clue to identify the process failures so that it is important to accurately classify the defect patterns into corresponding pattern types. In this research, we present an image-based wafer map defect pattern classification method. The presented method consists of two main steps: without any specific preprocessing, high-level features are extracted from convolutional neural network and then the extracted features are fed to combination of error-correcting output codes and support vector machines for wafer map defect pattern classification. To the best of our knowledge, no prior work has applied the presented method for wafer map defect pattern classification. Experimental results tested on 20,000 wafer maps show the superiority of presented method and the overall classification accuracy is up to 98.43%.

This paper investigates the fuzzy position/force hybrid control for a class of 5-degree-of-freedom (DOF) redundantly actuated parallel robots. The position control law is designed based on the proportional-integral-differential (PID) for the 5-DOF redundantly actuated parallel robot. The fuzzy proportional-integral (PI) redundant actuation force control law is designed based on the position/force hybrid control structure for the 5-DOF redundantly actuated parallel robot. The optimum driving force is obtained in the presence of interference, and the force tracking performance of the fuzzy PI controller is better than the conventional PI controller under the interference condition. Based on the fuzzy position/force hybrid controller, the tracking performance of the closed-loop system for the 5-DOF redundantly actuated parallel robot is improved by using the fuzzy position/force hybrid controller and the interference is eliminated effectively in the control system design. Finally, the co-simulation results of ADAMS and MATLAB/SIMULINK are given to show the effectiveness and advantages of the proposed methods compared with the conventional PI controller.

This letter proposes a 140 GHz high-efficiency slotted waveguide antenna with a low-loss feeding network. The feeding network provides the same-magnitude but alternating-phase excitations for the slotted parallel-plate waveguide (PPW) array. The alternating-phase excitations are used to implement virtual electric walls (VEWs) for replacing the physical metal walls. Hence, the antenna efficiency is improved significantly. To verify the proposed method, an 8 × 8 slot array with the proposed feeding network is designed and fabricated, which has a fractional bandwidth of 10.17%, i.e., from 132 to 146.15 GHz. Experimental results show that the radiation and aperture efficiency of the prototype can be as high as 93.4% and 73.2%, respectively. The measured antenna has a peak radiation gain of 24.59 dBi at 137.5 GHz and a flat in-band gain. The proposed antenna provides a promising solution to develop high-efficiency upper millimeter-wave and sub-terahertz (THz) applications.

Background Cure rates of hepatitis C virus (HCV) treatment with direct-acting antivirals (DAAs) for patients with active and inactive hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) may differ, but well-controlled studies are limited. We aimed to evaluate DAA outcomes in a large East Asian HCV/HCC population compared with HCV/non-HCC patients. Methods Using data from the Real-World Evidence from the Asia Liver Consortium (REAL-C) registry (Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan), we used propensity score matching (PSM) to match HCC and non-HCC (1:1) groups for age, sex, cirrhosis, prior treatment, HCV genotype, treatment regimen, baseline platelet count, HCV RNA, total bilirubin, alanine aminotransferase, and albumin levels to evaluate DAA treatment outcomes in a large population of HCV/HCC compared with HCV/non-HCC patients. Results We included 6081 patients (HCC, n = 465; non-HCC, n = 5 616) treated with interferon-free DAAs. PSM of the entire study population yielded 436 matched pairs with similar baseline characteristics. There was no statistically significant difference in the overall SVR rate of HCC (92.7%) and non-HCC (95.0%) groups. Rates of treatment discontinuation, adverse effects, and death were also similar between HCC and non-HCC groups. Among patients with HCC, those with active HCC had a lower SVR than inactive HCC cases (85.5% vs 93.7%; P = .03). On multivariable analysis, active HCC, but not inactive HCC, was significantly associated with lower SVR (OR, 0.28; P = .01) when compared with non-HCC. Conclusions Active HCC but not inactive HCC was independently associated with lower SVR compared with non-HCC patients undergoing DAA therapy, although cure rate was still relatively high (85%) in active HCC patients.

In this communication, a bidirectional same sense circularly polarized (Bi-SSCP) endfire antenna array with reconfigurable polarization is proposed and implemented. First, a circular polarization (CP) reconfigurable endfire antenna element is realized by adopting two pairs of switchable electric dipoles, which have a 180° phase difference inherently. Along with the fixed magnetic dipole, the endfire antenna element can work at two CP states, i.e., left-hand CP (LHCP) and right-hand CP (RHCP) by switching the states of the two electric dipoles. Then, a Bi-SSCP endfire antenna array with polarization diversity is developed by using two identical endfire antenna elements placed back-to-back with a single feeding probe. For verification, prototypes of the designed endfire antenna element and Bi-SSCP endfire antenna array are fabricated and measured. The measured results show reasonable agreement with the simulated ones. The measured overlapped bandwidth for 10 dB return loss and 3 dB axial ratio of the Bi-SSCP endfire antenna array is from 5.7 to 5.9 GHz for the two CP states.

This letter presents a continuous transverse stub (CTS) array antenna with high aperture efficiency, low sidelobes, and cross-polarization characteristics over an E -band. The antenna consists of a full-corporate-feed 32-slot CTS array and a 45° linear polarizer. A multiple-aperture excited parallel-plate waveguide structure works as a linear source generator to generate the quasi-TEM wave with a uniform amplitude distribution over the whole operating band from 71 to 86 GHz. The 45° linear polarizer contains two layers of slots, shifting the linear polarization from the principal E -plane ( φ = 90°) to the intended E -plane ( φ = 135°). The array antenna achieves the low cross polarization and sidelobe level (SLL) while maintaining high aperture efficiency. Measurement results show that the antenna has an aperture efficiency of over 74% with the peak gains of better than 37.9 dBi over the whole E -band, while the far-field SLLs in the intended E - and H -planes approach the ETSI class IV envelope standard.