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Accurate welding defect location is of great significance to modern manufacturing which could be used for accurate quality evaluation and precise repairing decision-making basis of different products. Nevertheless, accurate welding defect location is still a challenging task due to some complex factors, such as complex backgrounds, low contrast, weak texture, class imbalance issue, etc. Recently, the deep learning has got great development due to strong feature expression ability which has been widely applied into the defect detection, but it still exists a certain shortcomings on segmentation tasks with class unbalanced issue or micro defects. To address these issues, with the encoder-decoder network architecture, a novel welding defect location method is proposed with an attention-guided segmentation network. To reduce the contextual information loss of the deep encoder module after multiple convolution and pooling operations, a multi-scale feature fusion block is proposed to embed into U-shape network (U-Net) to acquire more information. On the basis, combined with a bidirectional convolutional Long Short-Term Memory (BiConvLSTM) block, an improved attention block is integrated into the skip connections between encoder path and decoder path to capture the global, long-range contexts and emphasize target regions, contributing to locate welding defect areas and enhance the segmentation ability on micro defects. Meanwhile, to address the foreground-background class imbalance issue, a hybrid loss function combined with binary cross-entropy (BCE) and Dice loss functions is proposed to effectively utilize their unique excellent characteristics for accurate defect segmentation. Experiment results on the public GDXray data set show that the proposed segmentation method could obtain a competitive segmentation performance compared with other advanced segmentation models.

STUDY OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on insomnia and other sleep disturbances in health care professionals. METHODS: A survey was distributed using social media and organizational emails to Brazilian active health care professionals during the COVID-19 outbreak. We explored potential associated factors including age, sex, occupation, workplace, work hours, income, previous infection with COVID-19, recent/current contact with COVID-19 patients, regional number of incident deaths, anxiety, and burnout. We evaluated new-onset/previous insomnia worsening episodes (primary outcome), new pharmacological treatments, sleep quality, duration, nightmares, and snoring (secondary outcomes). RESULTS: A total of 4,384 health professionals from all regions of the country were included in the analysis (44 ± 12 years, 76% females, 53.8% physicians). Overall, 55.7% were assisting patients with COVID-19, and 9.2% had a previous COVID-19 infection. The primary outcome occurred in 32.9% of respondents in parallel to 13% new pharmacological treatments for insomnia. The sleep quality worsened for 61.4%, while 43.5% and 22.8% reported ≥ 1-hour sleep duration reduction and worsening or new-onset nightmares, respectively. Multivariate analyses showed that age (odds ratio [OR]: 1.008; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.001–1.015), females (OR: 1.590; 95% CI 1.335–1.900), weight change (decrease: OR: 1.772; 95% CI 1.453–2.161; increase: OR: 1.468; 95% CI 1.249–1.728), prevalent anxiety (OR: 3.414; 95% CI 2.954–3.948), new-onset burnout (OR: 1.761; 95% CI 1.489–2.083), family income reduction > 30% (OR: 1.288; 95% CI 1.069–1.553), and assisting patients with COVID-19 (OR: 1.275; 95% CI 1.081–1.506) were independently associated with new-onset or worsening of previous insomnia episodes. CONCLUSIONS: We observed a huge burden of insomnia episodes and other sleep disturbances in health care professionals during the COVID-19 pandemic. CITATION: Drager LF, Pachito DV, Moreno CRC, et al. Insomnia episodes, new-onset pharmacological treatments, and other sleep disturbances during the COVID-19 pandemic: a nationwide cross-sectional study in Brazilian health care professionals. J Clin Sleep Med. 2022;18(2):373–382.

Background Laryngeal masks airway (LMA) has been increasingly used in surgical patients. However, the use of LMA in laparoscopic surgeries remains controversial. The major concerns include the potential risk of esophageal regurgitation, aspiration, and difficulties to achieve effective ventilation. The aim of this study was to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of the LMA® Protector™ in patients undergoing laparoscopic surgery. Methods Patients aged 18 to 70 years, scheduled for laparoscopic surgeries were included. The insertion time, successful insertion rate, and oropharyngeal leak pressure were measured. Airway complications and airway manipulations during the procedure were documented. Effective ventilation rate was calculated. Visible bloodstains and reflux content in the drainage channel were documented after the removal of LMA® Protector™. Results Three hundred patients were enrolled. The insertion of LMA® Protector™ failed in seven patients resulting with a successful insertion rate of 97.7%. During the maintenance of anesthesia, airway manipulation was required in 19 patients (19/293, 6.48%), in three of whom the LMA was replaced with endotracheal intubation resulting with an effective ventilation rate of 96.7% (290/300). The oropharyngeal leak pressure was 30.18 ± 5.88 cmH2O. Seventy-five patients (25.86%) reported mild sore throat on the first day after surgery. Bloodstains on study devices were noticed in 58 patients (20%). Seventy-five patients (25.86%) reported mild sore throat on the first day after surgery. Gastric reflux was noticed in the drainage tube in 5 patients (1.72%) with no signs of aspiration in any of those patients. Conclusions The LMA® Protector™ was shown to be safe and effective in patients undergoing laparoscopic surgeries. Although minor complications that require no further treatment, no clinically diagnosed aspiration was noticed in our study. Gastric reflux was noticed in the drainage tube in five patients undergoing laparoscopic gynecology surgery. Further research is needed to verify whether LMA® Protector™ is suitable for procedures in Trendelenburg position or other situations that a high risk of gastroesophageal reflux exists. Trial registration The trial was registered at the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry (ChiCTR1800018300, date of registration: September 2018).

PURPOSE Impaired neurocognitive function (NCF) is extremely common in patients with higher grade primary brain tumor. We previously reported evidence of genetic variants associated with NCF in glioma patients prior to treatment. However, little is known about the effect of genetic variants on NCF decline after adjuvant therapy. METHODS Patients (N = 102) completed longitudinal NCF assessments that included measures of verbal memory, processing speed, and executive function. Testing was conducted in the postoperative period with an average follow up interval of 1.3 years. We examined polymorphisms in 580 genes related to five pathways (inflammation, DNA repair, metabolism, cognitive, and telomerase). RESULTS Five polymorphisms were associated with longitudinal changes in processing speed and 14 polymorphisms with executive function. Change in processing speed was strongly associated with MCPH1 rs17631450 (P = 2.2 × 10-7) and CCDC26 rs7005206 (P = 9.3 × 10-7) in the telomerase pathway; while change in executive function was more strongly associated with FANCF rs1514084 (P = 2.9 × 10-6) in the DNA repair pathway and DAOA rs12428572 (P = 2.4 × 10-5) in the cognitive pathway. Joint effect analysis found significant genetic-dosage effects for longitudinal changes in processing speed (Ptrend = 1.5 × 10-10) and executive function (Ptrend = 2.1 × 10-11). In multivariable analyses, predictors of NCF decline included progressive disease, lower baseline NCF performance, and more at-risk genetic variants, after adjusting for age, sex, education, tumor location, histology, and disease progression. CONCLUSION Our longitudinal analyses revealed that polymorphisms in telomerase, DNA repair, and cognitive pathways are independent predictors of decline in NCF in glioma patients.

Lung diseases are common clinical illnesses with high morbidity and mortality, which seriously threaten human health. In recent years, increasing evidence suggests that exosomes play a pivotal role in intercellular communication by delivering their cargo to pulmonary target cells, such as microRNAs. Physiologically, exosomes have been shown to be a critical mediator in maintaining homeostasis function in the complex thin-walled lung tissue and airway structure. Apart from being a diagnostic and prognostic biomarker, exosomes also participate in the progression of some lung diseases, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, pulmonary fibrosis, acute lung injury, lung cancer, interstitial lung disease, and tuberculosis. Here, we summarize the recent findings on the involvement of exosomes and exosomal microRNAs in the pathogenesis, diagnosis, and therapy of lung diseases, aiming to provide more information to discover novel diagnostic methods and treatment strategies for these disorders.

This systematic review aims to compare and evaluate the outcome of using either testicular sperm (Testi-ICSI) or ejaculated sperm (Ejac-ICSI) in intracytoplasmic sperm injections in patients with recurrent ICSI failure. The Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, EMBASE, and PubMed were used to search for relevant papers up till October 2020. Four cohort studies and two case series studies were included. Four studies investigated males with high sperm DNA fragmentation (SDF) and were classified as “high SDF”, which included 247 couples and 2712 injected oocytes. The other three studies provided paired data to an unselected population of infertile men with either untested SDF or when anomalous SDF was not used as the basis for deciding to use Testi-ICSI, and were classified as “noclassify” in this study. This subgroup consisted of a total of 290 couples and 1061 injected oocytes. There was a higher level of clinical pregnancy rates (CPRs) in the “high SDF” subgroup when Testi-ICSI was used as compared to Ejac-ICSI, at 43.4% and 20.8% respectively, with a pooled odds ratio (OR) of 2.87 (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.44–5.71; P = 0.003). Furthermore, in the “high SDF” subgroup, Testi-ICSI use was associated with better take home baby rates (38%) as compared to Ejac-ICSI (16%), with a pooled OR of 3.24 (95% CI 1.20–8.76; P = 0.02). In the “noclassify” group, there was no statistically significant difference in the CPRs and take home baby rates of Testi-ICSI and Ejac-ICSI, although there was a trend of better CPRs and take home baby rates with Testi-ICSI use. Utilization of Testi-ICSI in recurrent ICSI failure couples, where males were confirmed to have high SDF in their ejaculated sperm, were correlated with greater CPRs and take home baby rates. However, Testi-ICSI may not result in better ICSI outcomes among men with untested SDF or when anomalous SDF was not the main factor influencing the decision to utilize Testi-ICSI.

High-precision segmentation of fundus vessels is a fundamental step in the diagnosis and treatment of fundus diseases, in which both thick and thin vessels are important features for symptom detection. With the rapid development of artificial intelligence, the deep convolutional neural network (DCNN) has been widely applied into image analysis of fundus vessels. Nevertheless, due to the imbalanced ratio between thick and thin vessels, the existing segmentation methods are weak in the task of microvessel extraction from fundus images. To address this problem, this paper proposes a new hybrid deep image segmentation method for fundus vessels that consists of a multitask segmentation network and a fusion network. For the proposed method, a multitask segmentation network is developed to precisely segment both thick vessels and thin vessels from fundus images separately. In addition, an effective loss function is designed to adapt to the two different vessel segmentation tasks and ultimately solve the imbalanced ratio between these two vessels. Furthermore, an improved U-net network model is proposed to serve as the basic segmentation network to ensure the segmentation performance of the multitask segmentation network. Together with these networks, a fusion network is also proposed to fuse these two kinds of blood vessels to obtain the fusion images as the final segmentation results of fundus vessels. The proposed segmentation method is validated on many different public data sets of fundus images, such as DRIVE, STARE and CHASE_DB1. Experimental results show that the proposed method obtains a better segmentation performance on fundus images and acquires a higher recall, F_1 value, and accuracy than other advanced segmentation methods.

In the context of happiness industry, this paper constructs the input-output index system of tourism industry efficiency, uses DEA model and Malmquist model to measure the tourism industry efficiency and its temporal-spatial evolution of nine cities in Pearl River Delta from 2010 to 2016, and uses Grey relational model to analyze the influencing factors.The results show that, the overall tourism industry efficiency in Pearl River Delta reaches a relatively high level; the overall efficiency and technical efficiency showed a descending trend from inside out with the Pearl River Estuary economic circle as the core. The scale efficiency of tourism industry in Pearl River Delta showed a good trend, and the tourism elements input could satisfy the livelihood needs to a great extent. The total factor productivity of most cities in Pearl River Delta shows a growing trend, but the change trend differs in different areas. Impact of influencing factors of tourism industry efficiency differs in cities of different development degree and the impact of social benefit and environmental benefit indicators on tourism industry efficiency increases significantly. Based on the construction of happiness industry, cities in Pearl River Delta should take effective measures to improve the tourism industry efficiency.

Summary Seborrheic dermatitis (SD) is a recurrent common inflammatory skin disease that affects all ethnic groups in all regions worldwide. However, no specific treatment or preventive measure is yet available. Identifying effective treatments with acceptable safety and tolerability is desirable. In this study, scalp microbiota alterations were measured in SD, showing significantly greater abundance of Malassezia and Staphylococcus and diminished fungal and bacterial diversity compared with healthy controls. We investigated the benefit of a 4‐week treatment with 0.5 mg ml‐1 recombinant human thymosin β4 (rhTβ4) gel or 2% ketoconazole lotion on the scalp condition of 71 patients with SD compared with 21 healthy individuals. Clinical assessment (Adherent Scalp Flaking Score, and the Maximum Erythema Area) and physiological conditions (transepidermal water loss, hydration, and sebum secretion) were evaluated. The rhTβ4 treatment provided significantly greater efficacy than ketoconazole and a sustained effect in the treatment of scalp SD. More importantly, rhTβ4 dramatically improved the microbiome homeostasis and prompted a shift of scalp microflora towards healthy composition, helping symptoms and ameliorating physiological conditions more effectively and durably than ketoconazole. Our research demonstrated the scalp microbe dysbiosis of SD and highlighted rhTβ4 as a promising therapeutic strategy in the prevention and treatment of SD.

Several studies have showed that combining peg-interferon alpha (Peg-IFNα) with nucleotide analogues has complementary effects in chronic hepatitis B (CHB), but the optimal regimen and potential mechanisms remain unclear. This was a prospective, longitudinal and multicentre clinical trial (NCT03013556). HBeAg-positive CHB naïve patients were randomly assigned to three groups: tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (TDF) monotherapy for 96 weeks, TDF alone for 48 weeks and sequentially Peg-IFNα added for 48 weeks, TDF de novo combination with Peg-IFNα for 48 weeks then TDF alone for 48 weeks. The primary endpoint was HBeAg seroconversion at week 96 and HBsAg loss as the secondary endpoint. Furthermore, the levels of 12 cytokines in serum were assessed at different time points. A total of 133 patients were included in the analysis. The rates of HBeAg seroconversion at 96 weeks were not significant different among the three groups (p = 0.157). Interestingly, patients in the Peg-IFNα add-on group showed markedly lower HBsAg level compared with the other two groups at week 96. In addition, only three patients in the Peg-IFNα add-on group achieved HBsAg loss. For the following 24 weeks from week 96, no HBsAg reappearance in the three patients and no new patients with HBsAg loss were observed in the three groups. Serum cytokine analysis showed that the baseline level of interferon-inducible protein-10 (IP-10) was strongly higher in HBeAg conversion patients and HBsAg loss patients. Compared with de novo combination and TDF alone, the addition of Peg-IFNα in TDF-treated group might be an effective strategy for HBsAg loss in HBeAg-positive CHB naïve patients.

Remarkable advances in nano delivery systems have provided new hope for tumor prevention, diagnosis and treatment. However, only limited clinical therapeutic effects against solid tumors were achieved. One of the main reasons is the presence of abundant physiological and pathological barriers in vivo that impair tumoral penetration and distribution of the nanodrugs. These barriers are related to the components of tumor microenvironment (TME) including abnormal tumor vasculature, rich composition of the extracellular matrix (ECM), and abundant stroma cells. Herein, we review the advanced strategies of TME remodeling to overcome these biological obstacles against nanodrug delivery. This review aims to offer a perspective guideline for the implementation of promising approaches to facilitate intratumoral permeation of nanodrugs through alleviation of biological barriers. At the same time, we analyze the advantages and disadvantages of the corresponding methods and put forward possible directions for the future researches.

Position and Orientation system (POS), a loosely integrated inertial navigation system (INS) and global positioning system (GPS), can provide high-accuracy motion information for the airborne remote sensing loads, which plays a crucial role in airborne remote sensing imaging. However, the airborne POS often suffers from the harsh environment, such as aircraft maneuver mode and other external disturbance, which will lead to measurement noise unknown and further affects the accuracy of motion parameters. In this paper, an adaptive central difference Kalman filter method based on expectation maximization algorithm is proposed, which can estimate measurement noise adaptively and further improve the performance of POS. A flight experiment is conducted and the results show that the proposed method achieves higher-accuracy motion information by compared with the traditional CDKF method and covariance matching.

BACKGROUND The majority of surgical patients aged 65 years and over are accompanied with underlying conditions, making them susceptible to perioperative cerebral complications. Here, we investigated the clinical value of continuous cerebral autoregulation (CA) monitoring in protecting against cerebral dysfunction in elderly patients undergoing surgery. METHODS This study enrolled 40 elderly patients (aged ≥65 years) and 40 middle-aged patients (aged 45 to 64 years) selected to undergo robotic-assisted laparoscopic radical prostatectomy. Cerebral oxygenation was assessed by regional cerebral oxygen saturation (rScO2) using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). CA function was estimated using the cerebral oximetry index (COX), which is the rolling correlation between rScO2 and the mean arterial pressure (MAP). With the patient in the Trendelenburg position, the rScO2, MAP, calculated COX, HR, end-tidal CO2, and sevoflurane concentrations were continuously recorded. Standardized anesthesia was administered to all patients (sevoflurane, propofol, remifentanil, and rocuronium). Postoperative delirium (POD) was screened for daily using the Confusion Assessment Method (CAM). The primary outcome was the difference in periods of CA dysfunction between the elderly and middle-aged groups. Secondary outcomes included the incidence of POD and the optimal MAP range in the 2 groups. RESULTS Taking positive COX values (cutoff ≥0.3) to reflect periods of CA dysfunction, we found that the cumulative duration of CA dysfunction in the Trendelenburg position was longer in elderly patients than in middle-aged patients [ratio of cumulative time of CA dysfunction: middle-aged group, 32.8% (26.3%, 43.1%) vs. elderly group, 42.2% (33.1%, 51.2%)] (P

This paper focuses on the recent progress in the adoption of active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) in thermal processes as a viable alternative to proportional–integral–derivative (PID), especially in coal-fired power plants. The profound interpretation of this paradigm shift, with backward compatibility, is discussed in detail. A few fundamental issues associated with ADRC’s applications in thermal processes are discussed, such as implementation, tuning, and the structural changes. Examples and case studies are presented, encompassing coal-fired power plants, gas turbines and nuclear power plants, as well as highlighting results of field applications. Also discussed are future research opportunities brought by ADRC’s entry as the baseline control technology in thermal processes.

Chromosomal inversion is closely related to male infertility. Inversion carriers may produce abnormal gametes, which may lead to partial duplication/deletion of the embryonic chromosome and result in spontaneous abortion, a fetus with multiple anomalies, or birth of a malformed child. Genetic counselling remains challenging for these carriers in clinical practice. We report two male carriers with inversion of chromosome 10 and review 26 reported cases. In the first case, 46,XX,inv(10)(p13q22) of the fetal chromosome was found in prenatal diagnosis; this was inherited from the paternal side with 46XY,inv(10)(p13q22). Another case was a male carrier with inv(10)(q21.2q22.1). There have been 25 (89.3%) cases of pericentric inversion and three (10.7%) cases of paracentric inversion involving chromosome 10. Of 28 cases, nine were associated with pregestational infertility of the couples, while the other 19 cases were associated with gestational infertility of the couples or normozoospermia. The breakpoints at 10p15, 10p11, 10q11, and 10q21 were associated with pregestational infertility of the couples. The breakpoints at 10p15, 10p14, 10p13, 10p12, 10p11, 10q11, 10q21, 10q22, 10q23, 10q24, 10q25, and 10q26 were related to gestational infertility of the couples or normozoospermia. Although there is a high risk of infertility or recurrent miscarriages, carriers with inversion of chromosome 10 might produce healthy offspring. Natural pregnancy can be used as a choice for inversion carriers with recurrent spontaneous abortion.

Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are a subpopulation of cancer cells with functions similar to those of normal stem cells. Although few in number, they are capable of self-renewal, unlimited proliferation, and multi-directional differentiation potential. In addition, CSCs have the ability to escape immune surveillance. Thus, they play an important role in the occurrence and development of tumors, and they are closely related to tumor invasion, metastasis, drug resistance, and recurrence after treatment. Therefore, specific targeting of CSCs may improve the efficiency of cancer therapy. A series of corresponding promising therapeutic strategies based on CSC targeting, such as the targeting of CSC niche, CSC signaling pathways, and CSC mitochondria, are currently under development. Given the rapid progression in this field and nanotechnology, drug delivery systems (DDSs) for CSC targeting are increasingly being developed. In this review, we summarize the advances in CSC-targeted DDSs. Furthermore, we highlight the latest developmental trends through the main line of CSC occurrence and development process; some considerations about the rationale, advantages, and limitations of different DDSs for CSC-targeted therapies were discussed., Graphical abstract Emerging CSCs-targeted drug delivery systems for efficient cancer therapy following the main line of CSCs occurrence and development process from the whole to the part and from the outside to the inside.Image 1

Welding quality detection is a critical link in modern manufacturing, and the weld bead location is a prerequisite for the high-precision assessment of welding quality. It is generally necessary for weld bead detection to be accomplished in the context of complex industrial environments. However, conventional detection and location methods based on specific detection conditions or prior knowledge lack accuracy and adaptability. To precisely detect and locate the weld beads in real industrial environments, a novel weld bead detection and location algorithm is proposed based on deep convolutional neural networks. Because there is no open data set of weld beads and the samples in real industrial applications are insufficient for effective model training of the deep convolutional neural network, a novel data augmentation method based on a deep semantic segmentation network is proposed to increase the sample diversity and enlarge the data set. Then, a dynamic sample updating strategy is put forward to cover more welding situations. Finally, faced with the weak-feature and weak-texture characteristics of weld beads, a simplified YOLOV3 model is proposed to realize end-to-end weld bead location. Experiments demonstrate that the proposed method could effectively satisfy the robustness and precision requirements for weld bead detection and location combined with a deep semantic segmentation network and simplified YOLOV3 model.

Terahertz electromagnetic fields can be well confined and propagate at structured metal surfaces, known as spoof surface plasmon polaritons (SSPPs). Recent demonstrations of terahertz SSPP waveguid...

With the fast development of smart grid, the power line mileage and power equipments get rapid growth. The contradiction between the large number of maintenance equipments and the small number of maintenance workers becomes increasingly prominent. Meanwhile, the traditional maintenance mode has the disadvantages of over or under maintenance, which will lead to the increasing failure risk of power transmission system. Faced with these issues, to enhance the intelligence and automation level of power line inspection, many researchers have devoted much effort to the research of automatic power line inspection and some state-of-the-art techniques about power line inspection are proposed to improve the inspection efficiency and quality, such as unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), image processing, deep architecture, and so on. In this article, we analyzed and summarized the state-of-the-art techniques on power line inspection to provide a valuable reference for the researchers engaged in the smart grid. First, the common inspection tasks on power line inspection are reviewed. Second, the existing inspection platforms are examined in this article. Also, the advantages and disadvantages of different platforms are analyzed accordingly. Third, faced with different inspection tasks, different inspection sensors are integrated into the inspection platforms for data collection. Therefore, the common sensors on inspection platforms are discussed. Finally, to realize automatic power line inspection, different inspection methods are proposed or improved, and these advanced inspection methods are surveyed and discussed.

Acute myocardial infarction (AMI) can lead to myocardial injury, and long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) has been found to play an important regulatory role in the process of myocardial injury. However, the role and potential mechanisms of lncRNA testis-specific transcript Y-linked 15 (TTTY15) in AMI-induced myocardial injury has not been fully elucidated. Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2)-induced AMI cell model was built and AMI mice model were constructed. Relative expression levels of TTTY15, miR-98-5p and C-reactive protein (CRP) were determined by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR). Cell counting kit 8 (CCK8) assay, flow cytometry and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) were employed to assess cell viability, apoptosis, inflammatory response and oxidative stress. Western blot (WB) analysis was used to assess the protein expression levels. The mechanism of TTTY15 was confirmed by dual-luciferase reporter assay and RNA immunoprecipitation (RIP) assay. Our results revealed that TTTY15 was upregulated and miR-98-5p was downregulated in AMI patients and H2O2-stimulated myocardial cells. Knockdown of TTTY15 could alleviate H2O2-stimulated myocardial cell injury in vitro and AMI progression in vivo. Bioinformatics analysis and the rescue experiments confirmed that TTTY15 positively regulated H2O2-induced myocardial cell injury via regulating CRP by sponging miR-98-5p. Our research proposed that lncRNA TTTY15 promoted myocardial cell injury by regulating the miR-98-5p/CRP axis, suggesting that TTTY15 might be a potential target for alleviating AMI-caused myocardial cell injury.

Background Our trial aims to provide evidence for pain management and rehabilitation in patients with hemiplegic shoulder pain (HSP). HSP is one of the most common pains and disabilities occurring after a stroke. With accumulating evidence, the management of the suprascapular nerve (SSN) or axillary nerve (AN) might effectively relieve the pain and disability associated with HSP. However, no study has compared the effects of pulsed radiofrequency and nerve block of SSN and AN. Methods Twenty patients with chronic stroke (over one year from onset) and HSP [visual analog scale (VAS) for pain ≥30 mm] randomly underwent ultrasound-guided SSN and AN pulsed radiofrequency or nerve block treatment. All patients were evaluated before treatment (T0) and at 4 (T1) and 16 (T2) weeks of follow-up. The primary outcome was the VAS score. Secondary outcomes were the Modified Ashworth Scale (MAS) score, passive shoulder range of motion (PROM), Disability Assessment Scale (DAS) score, and EuroQol-5 dimension questionnaire (EQ-5D). Results Significant improvements in the VAS score were observed in both groups at T1 and T2. However, a significant difference was not observed between the two groups (T1: P=0.43; T2: P=0.23). No statistically significant differences were observed in the MAS score between the two groups at T1 (P=0.06) and T2 (P=0.07). In the PROM of shoulder abduction and external rotation, statistically, significant differences were observed between the two groups at T1 (P=0.02*, & P=0.04*) and T2 (P=0.02*, & P=0.00*). Statistically significant differences in shoulder flexion and extension were not observed between the two groups at T1 (P=0.23, & P=0.35) and T2 (P=0.14, & P=0.14). Statistically significant differences in the DAS score were not observed between the 2 groups at T1 (P=0.51, & P=0.33, & P=0.36, & P=0.75) and T2 (P=0.12, & P=0.54, & P=0.41, & P=0.86). No statistically significant differences in the EQ-5D responses were observed between the two groups at T1 (P=0.42) and T2 (P=0.11). Conclusions Pulsed radiofrequency of SSN and AN achieves similar therapeutic effects to the nerve block. Pulsed radiofrequency modulation is superior to nerve block in improving the PROM of shoulder abduction and external rotation.

Industrialization is one way to achieve a sustainable route out of poverty. During the implementation of industry-based poverty alleviation projects, rural households’ livelihood responses to change are crucial. A stronger livelihood response is conducive to multidimensional poverty relief due to industry-based poverty alleviation projects. Effective poverty alleviation can also stimulate stronger household responses. There is a positive cycle between livelihood response and multidimensional poverty relief effects that can help achieve sustainable poverty alleviation goals. Using a synergistic perspective on the relationship between “people–industry–land”, this paper explains the poverty alleviation logic connecting livelihood response, multidimensional poverty relief, and sustainable routes out of poverty by constructing a four-dimensional livelihood response measurement system with three elements of intensity. We analyzed survey data collected from 2363 households from 4 sample counties in 4 contiguous poverty-stricken areas, and measured and compared the characteristics of rural households’ livelihood responses and the factors influencing poverty alleviation projects. Rural households’ livelihood responses in four sample counties were moderate. The four dimensions of responses were ranked as livelihood strategy response, livelihood space response, livelihood output response, and livelihood capital response. The three intensities indicated that the perception and willingness elements of livelihood response were very similar, but there was a big gap between those elements and livelihood response actions. At the group level, poor households had higher and more consistent livelihood response than non-poor households. External environment factors (such as location, industry type, village organizational ability, and village atmosphere) and internal family factors (such as resource endowment, income sources, health, education, labor quantity, policy trust, credit availability, and social networks) had a significant impact on households’ livelihood response. However, this impact varied across different dimensions and had different intensities. This paper proposes a multidimensional poverty relief mechanism and suggests sustainable routes out of poverty.

Position and orientation system (POS) is a high-precision inertial navigation systems/Global navigation satellite system (INS/GNSS) integrated system that can continuously provide time-spatial reference for airborne remote sensing, mobile mapping and vehicle localization using Kalman Filter (KF) during the availability of GPS measurements. However, the POS suffers from the GPS outages in some especial environment, whose accuracy of motion parameters degrades with the time accumulation. In order to suppress the performance degradation caused by GPS outages, this work proposes a hybrid predictor based on data-driven Deep Gaussian Process Regression (DGPR), which uses multi-layer Gaussian Process Regression to deal with highly complex data relationships and predictive uncertainty. Once GPS outages happen, the proposed approach starts to predict the observation measurement, and then feeds it to KF as a virtual update to estimate all the INS errors. The proposed approach is validated by the real flight test, and the experimental results show that significant performance improvement has been achieved during various GPS outages.

Differences by sex in lung cancer incidence and mortality have been reported which cannot be fully explained by sex differences in smoking behavior, implying existence of genetic and molecular basis for sex disparity in lung cancer development. However, the information about sex dimorphism in lung cancer risk is quite limited despite the great success in lung cancer association studies. By adopting a stringent two-stage analysis strategy, we performed a genome-wide gene–sex interaction analysis using genotypes from a lung cancer cohort including ~ 47 000 individuals with European ancestry. Three low-frequency variants (minor allele frequency

Exploring the mechanism and constraints of Green Finance on high-quality economic development is of great significance to achieve the strategic goal of carbon peak and carbon neutral. Based on the panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2009 to 2019, this paper uses the epsilon-based measure model and entropy method to measure the total factor rate of green economy and the development level of green finance. It then brings green finance, technological innovation, industrial structure upgrading, environmental supervision and high-quality economic development into a unified research framework for the first time. By constructing a panel two-way fixed effect model, regulatory intermediary effect model and threshold effect model, this paper empirically tests the action mechanism and constraints between green finance and high-quality economic development. The results show that: (1) The spatial evolution of green finance in China presents a gradient decreasing pattern from east to middle to west, coastal to inland, and the spatial evolution presents an obvious southwest-northeast pattern. (2) Green finance does have a significant role in promoting high-quality economic development, in which technological innovation and industrial structure upgrading play a part of the intermediary role. This conclusion is still valid under the robustness test of lagged explanatory variables and after the possible endogenous problems are alleviated by the difference-in-difference model (DID). (3) Environmental regulation plays a non-linear regulatory role in the relationship between green finance and high-quality economic development, and there is a single threshold value. Too high intensity of environmental regulation will weaken green finance, resulting in the innovation compensation effect being more diminutive than the circular cost effect. At this time, the high-quality economic development presents a state of diminishing marginal benefits.

Background Healthy sexual behavior is critical for controlling the HIV/AIDS epidemic among university students, particularly in regions with increasing infection rates among university students in China. Methods This study investigated the prevalence of unhealthy sexual behavior in the past 6 months and the associated demographic and psychosocial factors among sexually active Chinese university students. Self-identified sexually active Chinese university students were recruited for the study. Results The study found that most students used condoms inconsistently during sexual intercourse (54.8%), and logistic regression showed that condomless sex was associated with being raised by a single parent (AOR = 1.934, 95% CI 1.234–3.031) or by grandparents or others (AOR = 1.583, 95% CI 1.003–2.50) and with sometimes using dating apps (AOR = 1.496, 95% CI 1.106–2.024). The independent protective factors for condomless sex were HIV knowledge scores between 15 and 18 compared to scores of 0 to 4 (AOR = 0.434, 95% CI 0.244–0.771). Among sexually active university students, 15.5% reported that they had multiple sexual partners; having multiple sexual partners was associated with sometimes (AOR = 2.543, 95% CI 1.553–4.167) or always (AOR =4.048, 95% CI 2.177–7.527) using dating apps. Being female (AOR = 0.402, 95% CI 0.231–0.699) and in a relationship (AOR = 0.236, 95% CI 0.154–0.363) were protective factors against having multiple sexual partners. Conclusions There is an urgent need to promote HIV prevention and to implement psychosocial interventions by providing comprehensive sex education and access to condoms and health care on campuses to decrease the potential factors related to unhealthy sexual behaviors among university students.

Robot welding is a basic but indispensable technology for many industries in modern manufacturing. However, many welding parameters affect welding quality. During the real welding process, welding defects are inevitably generated that affect the structural strengths and comprehensive performances of different welding products. Therefore, an accurate welding defect recognition algorithm is necessary for automatic robot welding to assess the effects of defects on structural properties and system maintenance. Much work has been devoted to welding defect recognition. It can be mainly divided into two categories: feature-based and deep learning-based methods. The detection performances of feature-based methods rely on effective image features and strong classifiers. However, faced with weak-textured and weak-contrast welding images, the realization of strong image feature expression still faces a certain challenge. Deep learning-based methods can provide end-to-end detection schemes for welding robots. Nevertheless, an effective deep network model relies on much training data that are not easily collected during real manufacturing. To address the above issues regarding defect detection, a novel welding defect recognition algorithm is proposed based on multi-feature fusion for accurate defect detection based on X-ray images. To improve network training, an effective data augmentation process is proposed to construct the dataset. Combined with transfer learning, the multi-scale features of welding images are acquired for effective feature expression with the pre-trained AlexNet network. On this basis, based on multi-feature fusion, a welding defect recognition algorithm fused to a support vector machine with Dempster–Shafer evidence theory is proposed for multi-scale defect detection. Experiments show that the proposed method achieves a better recognition performance in terms of detecting welding defects than those of other related recognition algorithms.

Background Phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors as the first-line treatment for erectile dysfunction, when patients with hypogonadism fail to respond to phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors, the beneficial of addition testosterone therapy is a major concern for clinicians. The objective of this study was to collect and summarize the evidence that evaluated the benefit of addition testosterone therapy in hypogonadism fail to respond to phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors. Methods Electronic literature searches of Cochrane Library, PubMed, MEDLINE and EMBASE databases were conducted up to October 2020 and included randomized controlled trials. Specifically, we were looking for papers where Erectile Function Domain Score differences between pre and post-treatment were used as the primary outcome after treatment of testosterone therapy alone, phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors therapy alone, or a dual treatment of both testosterone therapy and phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors. Secondary outcomes included the number of phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors non-responders who subsequently reported a satisfactory treatment of dual treatment with testosterone therapy and phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors. Results A total of 4 studies that met our criteria, consisting of 326 patients. The Erectile Function Domain Score was significantly higher after treatment of testosterone combine with phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors(4.88[4.18–5.57]), phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors with placebo(3.15[1.82–4.47]), and testosterone monotherapy (2.04[0.38–3.71]) compared with baseline. Dual treatment with testosterone and phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors significantly improved Erectile Function Domain Score when compared with testosterone monotherapy (3.16, 95% CI: 1.79–4.53), Of 41.7% patients in the dual treatment group reported an improvement, compared to only 33.0% in phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors treatment group. Conclusions Combination therapy of testosterone and phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors seems most effective in men with both erectile dysfunction and hypogonadism who initial unrespond to phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitors.

Recent years, the research of gesture recognition based on surface EMG signal has become an active topic. The conventional methods mainly focus on feature engineering, but the sEMG signal is non-stationary temporally, which makes proper feature design and selection very complicated. To tackle this problem, this paper proposes a novel dynamic gesture recognition method by employing Convolutional Neural Networks. Short-time Fourier transform (STFT) and continuous wavelet transform (CWT) are introduced to model the time-frequency features of a single channel and the relationship between different channels. Meanwhile, the performance of deep learning-based methods relies on a large amount of training data. In the context of sEMG based gesture recognition, one user cannot be expected to generate tens of thousands of examples at a time. Hence, transfer learning (TL) techniques is utilized to alleviate the data generation burden imposed on a single individual and enhance the performance of the Convolutional Neural Networks. Experiment results on the sEMG data set recorded with Myo Armband indicate that the transfer learning augmented ConvNet can achieve an accuracy of 99.41%.

In this paper, we provide analytical solutions describing the dynamic behavior of the Pearcey-Gaussian beams propagating in free space. Based on the analytical solutions, explicit expressions governing the focusing distances of the Pearcey-Gaussian beams are found and verified by numerical simulations. For the linearly chirped Pearcey-Gaussian beam, it exhibits a uni-focusing behavior during propagation. Particularly, the focusing distance is independent on the linear chirp parameter and remains z f = 2 unchanged. Of particular interest is that the quadratically chirped Pearcey-Gaussian beam focuses twice when the quadratic chirp parameter β zf1 = 2/(1 − 4β) and zf2 = −1/(2β), respectively. Furthermore, we numerically investigate the peak powers at the different focusing positions and find that as β increases, the peak powers at zf1 and zf2 linearly decrease. It is expected that the characteristics can be used for manipulating the focusing distances and the peak powers to generate an optical beam with high peak power by adjusting the chirp parameter β.

BackgroundPostoperative acute kidney injury (AKI) is associated with poor clinical outcomes. Early identification of high-risk patients of developing postoperative AKI can optimize perioperative renal management and facilitate patient survival. The present study aims to develop and validate a nomogram to predict postoperative AKI after liver resection in elderly patients.MethodsPostoperative AKI was assessed in 850 patients undergoing liver resection in a single-center retrospective cohort between 2012 and 2019. We reviewed electronic medical records and collected patient information on perioperative variables. The data were randomly split into training and validation datasets (split ratio 0.7:0.3). Stepwise regression was applied to identify predictive factors associated with postoperative AKI based on Akaike’s information criterion, and multivariate logistic regression was applied to establish the predictive nomogram. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve and calibration curve were used to evaluate the discrimination and accuracy of the prediction. The decision curve analysis (DCA) was used to assess clinical usefulness. A summary risk score was also constructed for identifying postoperative AKI patients (ClinicalTrials.gov NCT 04922866).ResultsPostoperative AKI occurred in 156 (18.3%) patients and was highly associated with in-hospital mortality (5.1% vs. 0.7%, P < 0.05). Predictors selected and assembled into the nomogram included age, preexisting chronic kidney disease (CKD), non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), preoperative direct bilirubin values, intraoperative hepatic inflow occlusion, blood loss, and transfusion. The predictive nomogram performed well in terms of discrimination with area under ROC curve (AUC) in training (0.74, 95% CI: 0.69 - 0.79) and validation (0.72, 95% CI: 0.64 - 0.80) datasets. The nomogram was well-calibrated in the validation dataset with the Hosmer-Lemeshow χ2 of 8.12 (P = 0.62). DCA demonstrated a significant clinical benefit. The summary risk score was calculated as the sum of points from the seven variables (one point for each variable) and performed as well as the nomogram in identifying the risk of AKI (AUC 0.73, 95% CI: 0.68 - 0.78).ConclusionsThis nomogram and summary risk score accurately predicted postoperative AKI using seven clinically accessible variables, with potential application in facilitating the optimized perioperative renal management in elderly patients undergoing liver resection.

The rapid development of smart grid causes a large increase of power equipments. Power insulator is one of the most important infrastructures in the power transmission lines which is vital to ensure the safe operation of power system. As a common defect, the missing-cap issues will affect the structural strength of power insulators and the safe operation of power lines. Consequently, the monitoring and assessment of abnormal power insulators are of extreme importance for the safe power transmission lines. Due to the good feature expression ability, machine learning algorithms have got much applications on power line inspection, and they could be divided into two categories: shallow learning and deep learning algorithms. Nevertheless, the defect recognition issues on power insulators are always against complex power inspection environment. It will bring a certain effect to the handcrafted feature design of shallow learning algorithms. Meanwhile, the small-scale defect data set will affect the model training of the deep network model. To address the above issues, aimed at the feature of the limited processing power of airborne processor, a novel lightweight defect detection algorithm is proposed for the defects of power insulators which fuses the advantages of shallow learning and deep learning models. Firstly, an insulator location algorithm based on lightweight deep convolutional neural network (DCNN) model is proposed to remove the disturbance of complex backgrounds and serve the high-precision defect detection. On the basis, the high-level image feature based on the improved transfer learning is acquired to effectively distinguish the normal and abnormal power insulators. Finally, a defect recognition method based on Support Vector Machine (SVM) is proposed to solve the small-scale defect detection issue. Experiments show that the proposed method could well meet the precision and speed demands of power system compared with other inspection methods.

Introduction Testosterone can improve glucose metabolism through multiple cellular mechanisms. However, it remains unclear as to whether hypogonadal men with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) can benefit from testosterone replacement therapy (TRT). Aims To assess the relative effect of TRT on glycolipid metabolism among hypogonadal men with T2DM. Methods : Electronic literature searches of the Cochrane Library, PubMed, MEDLINE, and EMBASE databases were conducted, up to the end of October 2020. Only studies that used randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were included in our systematic review. Main outcome measures From these studies, we extracted certain outcomes including changes in insulin resistance, glucose metabolism, and lipid parameters. Results There were a total of 8 studies that met our criteria. Four of these studies either did not have a consistent treatment strategy, or the control groups used untreated patients rather than patients that had been given a placebo. Thus, results from these four studies contributed to the variability in treatment outcomes. In four of the examined RCTs, there was no change in either the dose or the type of antidiabetic medication prescribed. Based on the homeostatic model assessment of insulin resistance, the pooled WMD was −0.34, 95% confidence interval (CI; −1.02, 0.34), P = .33; For fasting plasma glucose, the pooled WMD was −0.27, 95% CI (−1.02, 0.48), P = .48, the pooled WMD for HbA1c% was −0.00, 95% CI (−1.08, 1.08), P = 1.00. Conclusions Although certain RCTs showed that TRT improved insulin resistance and glycolipid metabolism when compared with the placebo or untreated control groups, these findings may partly be due to changes in antidiabetic therapy during the course of the study. In the current meta-analysis, analyses showed that TRT did not significantly improve insulin resistance or glycolipid metabolism. Future studies need to be rigorous in design and delivery, and comprehensive descriptions of all aspects of their methods should be included to further enable a more accurate appraisal and interpretation of the results.

Three-dimensional imaging for multi-node interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) or multi-task imaging sensors has become the prevailing trend in the field of aerial remote sensing, which requires multi-node motion information to carry out the motion compensation. A distributed position and orientation system (DPOS) can provide multi-node motion information for InSAR by transfer alignment technology. However, due to wing deformation, the relative spatial relationship between the nodes will change, which will lead to lower accuracy of the transfer alignment. As a result, the flexible baseline between the nodes affects the interferometric phase error compensation and further deteriorates the imaging quality. This paper proposes a flexible baseline measuring system based on optics, which achieves non-connect measurement and overcomes the problem that it is difficult to build an accurate wing deformation model. An accuracy test was conducted in the laboratory, and results showed that the measurement accuracy of the baseline under static and dynamic conditions was less than 0.3 mm and 0.67 mm, respectively.

Objective Higher mortality in COVID-19 in men compared to women is recognized, but sex differences in cardiovascular events are less well established. We aimed to determine the independent contribution of sex to stroke, myocardial infarction and death in the setting of COVID-19 infection. Methods We performed a retrospective cohort study of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in a racially/ethnically diverse population. Clinical features, laboratory markers and clinical events were initially abstracted from medical records, with subsequent clinician adjudication. Results Of 2060 patients, myocardial injury (32% vs 23%, p = 0.019), acute myocardial infarction (2.7% vs 1.6%, p = 0.114), and ischemic stroke (1.8% vs 0.7%, p = 0.007) were more common in men vs women. In-hospital death occurred in 160 men (15%) vs 117 women (12%, p = 0.091). Men had higher odds of myocardial injury (odds ratio (OR) 2.04 [95%CI 1.43–2.91], p

This paper takes Shenzhen Luzui Resort as an example, using SWOT analysis by participatory observation in four months and text analysis methods by ROST CM6 to investigate and analyze the local development status of coastal tourism. Tourists' online reviews with a total of 1060 comments on OTA Meituan, Ctrip, Qunaer and Tongcheng are selected as data sources for network text analysis. By using the “functional analysis” of ROST CM6 software to conduct emotional analysis on tourists' reviews, the satisfaction, emotional state, and the evaluation of coastal tourists are obtained. This paper puts forward the marketing strategies from six aspects: movie marketing, product marketing, price marketing, network marketing, internal marketing and customer relationship marketing. It is expected to provide reference for the marketing strategies of other coastal resorts in Shenzhen and other comprehensive coastal resorts.

Background: With the increasing number of aged population in China, the mortality and disability caused by atrial fibrillation (AF) and its complications lead to serious social burden and becoming more prominent. Due to the high false-negative rates of AF detected by routine ECG, the results on the recurrent rate and AF burden after cryoballoon ablation (CBA) in real world are inconsistent so far. Since the extension of monitoring time, the increased detection of AF in patients, insertable cardiac monitor (ICM) has its unique merits. Methods: Cryo-ICM AF study is a prospective, multicenter randomized controlled trial with 200 participants with paroxysmal atrial fibrillation from 4 centers. Monitoring AF load after CBA though two monitoring methods— ICM and 24 hours holter during the 1 years follow-up of the two groups. All data will be observed and recorded in baseline, 30th days and 3 th , 6 th , 9 th and 12 th months after CBA, which including incidence rates of postoperative complications and recurrence conditions, cardioelectrical indexes from 24-hours holter in all subjects and ICM in ICM group, UCG parameters about atrium/ventricular size and diastolic/systolic function, and biochemical indicators. Disucssion: This is the first study design to confirm the effectiveness of cryoballoon in real world, monitoring AF load with ICM in patients with paroxysmal AF after CBA.Trial registration: Chinese Clinical Trial Registry, No. ChiCTR1900026364. Registered 9 Oct 2019, http://www.chictr.org.cn/index.aspx

Background We analyzed the correlation of the clinical data with retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL) thickness and macular thickness in bipolar disorder patients and major depression patients. The aim of this study is to explore factors that affect RNFL thickness in bipolar disorder patients and major depression patients, with a view to providing a new diagnostic strategy. Methods Eighty-two bipolar disorder patients, 35 major depression patients and 274 people who were age and gender matched with the patients were enrolled. Demographic information and metabolic profile of all participants were collected. Best-corrected visual acuity of each eye, intraocular pressure (IOP), fundus examination was performed. RNFL and macular thickness were measured by optical coherence tomography (OCT). Correlations between RNFL and macular thickness and other data were analyzed. Results RNFL and macula lutea in bipolar dipolar patients and major depression patients are thinner than normal people. Triglyceride and UA levels are the highest in the bipolar disorder group, while alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and glutamic oxalacetic transaminase (AST) levels in the depression group are the highest. Age onset and ALT are positively while uric acid (UA) is negatively correlated with RNFL thickness in bipolar dipolar patients. Cholesterol level is positively correlated with RNFL thickness while the duration of illness is correlated with RNFL thickness of left eye in major depression patients. Conclusions RNFL and macula lutea in bipolar dipolar patients and major depression patients are thinner than normal people. In bipolar disorder patients, age-onset and ALT are potential protective factors in the progress of RNFL thinning, while UA is the pathological factor.

Intelligent construction technology has been widely used in the field of railway engineering. This work first analyzes the connotation, function, and characteristics of intelligent construction of railway engineering (ICRE) and establishes its system structure from three dimensions, namely, life cycle, layers of management, and intelligent function, to deeply understand the development situation of intelligent railway construction in China. Second, seven key technical support systems of ICRE, which include building information modeling (BIM) standard system for China’s railway sector, technology management platform and life cycle management based on BIM + GIS (geography information system), ubiquitous intelligent perception system, intelligent Internet-of-Things (IoT) communication system based on mobile interconnection, construction management platform based on cloud computing and big data, unmanned operation system based on artificial intelligence, intelligent machinery and robot, and intelligent operation and maintenance system based on BIM and PHM (prediction and health management), are established. Third, ICRE is divided into three development stages: primary (perception), intermediate (substitution), and advanced (intelligence). The evaluation index system of each stage is provided from the aspects of technology and function. Finally, this work summarizes and analyzes the application situation of ICRE in the entire railway sector of China, represented by Beijing-Zhangjiakou and Beijing-Xiong’an high-speed railways. Result shows that the technical support systems of the ICRE have emerged in China and are still in the process of deepening basic technology research and preliminary application. In the future, the ICRE of China’s railway sector will develop toward a higher stage.

The objective of the present systematic review and meta-analysis was to assess the effect of open, microsurgical, and laparoscopic varicocelectomy on the number of patients with improved sperm parameters (sperm concentration, motility) 6–12 months after surgery, spontaneous pregnancy rates ≥ 12 months after surgery, and postoperative sperm parameters in infertile males with a varicocele. We searched the Cochrane Library, PubMed, MEDLINE, and EMBASE databases from inception to December 2018 for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) comparing open, microsurgical, and laparoscopic varicocelectomy for male infertility. The meta-analysis demonstrated a significantly higher number of patients with improved sperm parameters 6–12 months after microsurgical varicocelectomy compared to laparoscopic varicocelectomy (OR = 1.63, 95% CI 1.03–2.56; p = 0.04) or open varicocelectomy (OR = 2.06, 95% CI 1.57–2.70; p < 0.0001), a significantly higher spontaneous pregnancy rate at ≥ 12 months after microsurgical varicocelectomy compared to open varicocelectomy (OR = 1.47, 95% CI 1.10–1.98; p = 0.01), a significant increase in postoperative sperm motility and concentration in patients that had undergone microsurgical varicocelectomy compared to laproscopic varicocelectomy or open varicocelectomy. These data suggest that, compared to laproscopic or open varicocelectomy, microsurgical varicocelectomy provides the greatest benefit to the most patients, results in a higher spontaneous pregnancy rate, and causes greater improvements in postoperative sperm parameters in males with a history of infertility. More high-quality large studies are needed to better illustrate the effects of the various surgical methods used to treat varicocele.

The golden tide, caused by the brown algae Sargassum horneri, exerts severe influences on the Pyropia aquaculture of Jiangsu coast, China. To study the outbreak of the golden tide in response to increasing greenhouse gas emissions, S. horneri was cultured under four conditions: ambient condition (10 °C, 400 μatm), elevated temperature condition (14 °C, 400 μatm), elevated CO2 level (10 °C, 1000 μatm), and potential greenhouse condition (14 °C, 1000 μatm). The growth, photosynthetic performances, and inorganic carbon affinity of S. horneri were studied. The results showed that elevated temperature exerted a more pronounced positive influence on S. horneri growth, photosynthesis, and carbon assimilation than CO2 enrichment. The growth of S. horneri was significantly improved by moderately elevated temperatures, especially under concurrently elevated CO2 levels. This suggests that the greenhouse effect will benefit growth and carbon sequestration of S. horneri, which may enhance the frequency and scale of golden tides.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to provide a feasible scheme for local governments to regulate corporate environmental data fraud and to discuss whether the influence of the construction of online information disclosure platform on the environmental behavior of enterprises is better than the offline spot check. Design/methodology/approach Under the background of changing environmental fees into taxes in China, this paper conducts evolutionary game analysis between local governments and enterprises in view of the existing problem of environmental data fraud. Furthermore, through the introduction of government information disclosure platform, this paper discusses the impact of the integration of direct government regulation and indirect public concern regulation on the evolution of environmental behavior of both sides. Finally, the evolutionary game is simulated by adopting system dynamics to analyses the implementation effect of different cases on the game process and game equilibrium. Findings The results showed that the introduction of information disclosure platform mechanism can effectively suppress the fluctuations existing in the game play and stabilize the game. Moreover, it is worth noting that the regulatory effect of local governments investing part of the monitoring cost in the construction of online information platform is proved to be better than that of putting all the monitoring cost into offline investigation. While optimizing the monitoring cost allocation, the local government still needs to attach great importance to organically combine the attention of the public and media with the governmental official platform. Practical implications The obtained results confirm that the proposed model can assist local government in refining the effects of their environmental regulatory decisions, especially in the case of corporate data fraud under environmental tax enforcement. Originality/value Previous literature only suggested that local governments should reduce the cost of supervision to change the corporate behavior to a better direction, but no further in-depth study. Thus, this study fills the gap by discussing the positive transformation effect of local government cost allocation scheme on corporate environmental behavior.

Although the world’s food production is approximately 3.99 billion metric tons, one in nine people remain malnourished. In combination with the projected world population of nine billion by 2050, further malnourishment of both humans and animals may occur; therefore, understanding of the current status of food waste and reuse is important. An extensive literature review was conducted to quantify food waste by weight and percentage at harvesting, processing/manufacturing, wholesale, retail, and consumer sectors of the food supply chain. The analysis of food waste was considered globally, within the United States, and within the state of California (USA). Large amounts of food waste (meat, vegetables, fruits, and breads) are produced daily. Results of the previous research suggest that food waste can be used successfully in diets of monogastric animals. The poultry industry is growing globally and uses large amounts of corn and soy for poultry diets; therefore, research should be conducted to investigate the partial use of alternative feed ingredients to meet the growing demand for poultry production. We proposed that food waste, occurring in all sectors of the food supply chain, could become a partial substitute for corn and soy in broiler diets.

BACKGROUND Contrast-induced acute kidney injury is an important clinical problem, yet its pathogenic mechanisms are incompletely understood. In this study we explored the potential beneficial effects of probucol as treatment of contrast-induced acute kidney injury in diabetic rats. MATERIAL AND METHODS Rats were divided into 3 groups: i) diabetic control, ii) diabetic with contrast, and iii) probucol treatment groups. Probucol was administered by gavage and the contrast diatrizoate (60%) was injected via femoral vein. After 24 h, the rats were sacrificed and samples were taken to measure biochemical indicators. Pathological damage of renal tubules was evaluated by HE staining. Expression of Bcl-2, Bax, p-ERKs, and p-JNK proteins in the kidneys was examined by Western blotting, whereas expression level of caspase-3 in kidneys was detected by immunohistochemistry. RESULTS Compared to the probucol treatment group, the diabetes with contrast group showed higher serum creatinine and lower creatinine clearance. The pathological changes of kidneys in the probucol treatment group were improved compared with the contrast group. Moreover, Western blot analyses revealed that use of contrast agent led to lower p-ERK1/2, higher p-JNK, lower Bcl-2, and higher Bax levels, which were reversed by probucol. Finally, immunohistochemical findings revealed higher caspase-3 after contrast use, which was partially reversed by probucol. CONCLUSIONS Probucol exerts protective effects on contrast-induced acute kidney injury in diabetic rats by inhibition of renal cell apoptosis. This is achieved by reducing mitochondrial caspase-3 expression through increasing and decreasing the expression of the upstream mediators p-ERK1/2 and p-JNK, respectively.

To meet the current flexible modern manufacturing mode, based on the idea from coarse to fine, a novel three-dimensional(3D) seam extraction algorithm is proposed in this paper which includes the global rough extraction and the local fine positioning. Firstly, a multi-functional vision system based on Digital Light Processing(DLP) projector is designed to adapt different 3D measurement tasks. Secondly, a global sensor based on DLP projector is constructed which is used to acquire the whole weld seam. Meanwhile, a new feature extraction algorithm based on 3D information of work pieces is proposed. Thirdly, a line structured light sensor based on DLP projector is to serve as local sensor. Based on the results of rough extraction, the close-range laser scanning is to improve the measurement precision. Finally, the 3D path model and pose estimation of weld seam are done which could be applied into the 3D path teaching of welding robots. The experiments show that the proposed algorithm could well finish the high-precision 3D seam path planning through the “Global-Local” method.