Search

Chemical-induced disease (CID) relation extraction from biomedical articles plays an important role in disease treatment and drug development. Existing methods are insufficient for capturing complete document level semantic information due to ignoring semantic information of entities in different sentences. In this work, we proposed an effective document-level relation extraction model to automatically extract intra-/inter-sentential CID relations from articles. Firstly, our model employed BERT to generate contextual semantic representations of the title, abstract and shortest dependency paths (SDPs). Secondly, to enhance the semantic representation of the whole document, cross attention with self-attention (named cross2self-attention) between abstract, title and SDPs was proposed to learn the mutual semantic information. Thirdly, to distinguish the importance of the target entity in different sentences, the Gaussian probability distribution was utilized to compute the weights of the co-occurrence sentence and its adjacent entity sentences. More complete semantic information of the target entity is collected from all entities occurring in the document via our presented document-level R-BERT (DocR-BERT). Finally, the related representations were concatenated and fed into the softmax function to extract CIDs. We evaluated the model on the CDR corpus provided by BioCreative V. The proposed model without external resources is superior in performance as compared with other state-of-the-art models (our model achieves 53.5%, 70%, and 63.7% of the F1-score on inter-/intra-sentential and overall CDR dataset). The experimental results indicate that cross2self-attention, the Gaussian probability distribution and DocR-BERT can effectively improve the CID extraction performance. Furthermore, the mutual semantic information learned by the cross self-attention from abstract towards title can significantly influence the extraction performance of document-level biomedical relation extraction tasks.

With the further exploration of the Moon, lunar landers need to land in complex and unexplored areas. However, current lunar landers are confined to basic landing conditions (low landing velocity and plain terrains). This research proposes a novel lunar lander with magnetorheological fluid (MRF) dampers that can adapt its damping forces to various complex landing conditions. The design process and coupled electromagnetic hydrodynamic model analysis of the lunar lander were systematically elucidated. According to the derived theory model of the damping force, a fuzzy control law is proposed. The controllable damping forces under different control currents are simulated according to the proposed fuzzy control law. Additionally, landing dynamic simulations of landers with different dampers are carried in MSC. Adams to compare with their landing performances. MRF dampers under fuzzy control can decrease the largest acceleration of the lander cabin by 63.6%. Finally, prototype drop simulations and experiments are performed, which results match each other well. By increasing the control current from 1 A to 2 A, the damping forces of the MRF damper increase approximately 20% in both the simulations and experiments. Simulations and experiments prove that MRF dampers can be used for energy impact absorption as variable dampers.

The microstructure of ceramic fibers is destroyed, as a result of phase transformation and fiber diameter growth. In this work, (La0.2Sm0.2Eu0.2Gd0.2Tm0.2)2Zr2O7 high-entropy ceramic nanofibers (HE-RE2Zr2O7 fibers) were prepared by the electrospinning method for the first time. XRD and TEM analyses indicated that the HE-RE2Zr2O7 fibers existed as a pure phase with a uniform distribution of rare-earth elements. SEM images showed that the HE-RE2Zr2O7 fibers retained a dense structure up to 1000 °C for 0 h–5 h. Upon annealing at 1000 °C for 0 h–2.5 h, the mean diameter of the HE-RE2Zr2O7 fibers increased from 169.34 nm to 176.95 nm, and the mean diameter of the La2Zr2O7 fibers increased from 174.52 nm to 215.14 nm. The thermal conductivity of the HE-RE2Zr2O7 fibers was approximately 0.23 W m−1 K−1. The sluggish diffusion effect of high-entropy materials and the slow fiber diameter growth and excellent thermal stability of the HE-RE2Zr2O7 fibers promote the broad application of these fibers as high-temperature heat insulation materials.

Background: Patients with multimorbidity often experience treatment burden as a result of fragmented, specialist-driven healthcare. The ‘family doctor team’ is an emerging service model in China to address the increasing need for high-quality routine primary care. Objective: To explore the extent to which treatment burden was associated with healthcare needs and patients’ experiences. Methods: Multi-site surveys were conducted in primary care facilities in Guangdong province, southern China. Interviewer-administered questionnaires were used to collect data from patients (N=2,160) who had ≥two clinically-diagnosed long-term conditions (multimorbidity) and had ≥one clinical encounter in the past 12 months since enrolment registration with the family doctor team. Patients’ experiences and treatment burden were measured using a previously-validated, Chinese version of the Primary Care Assessment Tool (PCAT) and the Treatment Burden Questionnaire, respectively. Results: The mean age of patients was 61.4 years and slightly over half were females. Patients who had a family doctor team as the primary source of care reported significantly higher PCAT scores (mean difference 7.2 points, p

The present study employed a quantitative and network approach to detect alignment effects in second language (L2) continuation tasks designed on the xu-argument (Wang, 2016). The materials used in this study were 6 sub-corpora consisting of two selected input stories and two groups of L2 written production based on two continuation tasks. During continuation, the participants were required to continue in English a story with its ending removed, with one group reading and continuing the Chinese version and the other group the English version, and then switching their roles in the two tasks. Results show that the alignment effect differs across the two versions of continuation. Specifically, compared with the Chinese-version continuation, L2 learners produced more use of unigrams and bigrams similar to the input story in terms of lexical items, frequency and ranking correlations in the English-version task; on the other hand, the English-version continuation can facilitate generating linguistic networks that are much closer to the native English networks. Moreover, this research corroborates that written production in L2 continuation tasks can be influenced by input content.

Data have always been the most valuable asset of enterprises and research institutions, and their confidentiality, especially the input and output data related to applications running on remote supercomputers, should be protected as much as possible. However, because of the large scale of the data, it takes a considerable amount of time to encrypt and decrypt them. The ChaCha20 cipher and the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) cipher are the only ciphers supported by TLS v1.3. The ChaCha20 cipher is a kind of high-speed stream cipher emerging in recent years, which has attracted more and more attention due to its security and high efficiency. In order to make large-scale data en-/decryption more efficient, we implement a parallel version of the ChaCha20 stream cipher, parallel ChaCha20, which is optimized for SW26010 heterogeneous multi-core processor on the Sunway TaihuLight supercomputer. We used multiple optimization methods such as Direct Memory Access (DMA) and Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD) supported by SW26010 and proposed an optimization scheme that dynamically changes with the size of input data. The experiment results show that the parallel ChaCha20 has a maximum throughput of 32.43 GB/s on a single SW26010 processor, which is 2.4 times that of the best AES implementation on Sunway as far as we know. Moreover, the parallel ChaCha20 has a good scalability and runs on 1024 core groups with a max throughput of 8296.43 GB/s.

Literatures have reported considerable heterogeneity with atypical functional connectivity (FC) pattern of psychiatric disorders. However, traditional statistical methods are hard to explore this heterogeneity pattern. We proposed a “brain dimension” method to describe the atypical FC patterns of major depressive disorder and bipolar disorder (BD). The approach was firstly applied to a simulation dataset. It was then utilized to a real resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging dataset of 47 individuals with major depressive disorder, 32 individuals with BD, and 52 well matched health controls. Our method showed a better ability to extract the FC dimensions than traditional methods. The results of the real dataset revealed atypical FC dimensions for major depressive disorder and BD. Especially, an atypical FC dimension which exhibited decreased FC strength of thalamus and basal ganglia was found with higher severity level of individuals with BD than the ones with major depressive disorder. This study provided a novel “brain dimension” method to view the atypical FC patterns of major depressive disorder and BD and revealed shared and specific atypical FC patterns between major depressive disorder and BD.

Aims. The prognostic value of plasma D-dimer in patients with coronary artery disease (CAD) remains controversial. The study is aimed at investigating the relationship between plasma D-dimer levels and in-hospital heart failure (HF) in ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) patients who underwent primary percutaneous coronary intervention (pPCI). Methods. STEMI patients who underwent pPCI were enrolled in this study. Venous blood samples were collected from patients on admission before pPCI procedure. The study endpoint was the occurrence of in-hospital HF. The participants were divided into two groups according to plasma D-dimer levels and further compared baseline D-dimer levels between male and female. Logistic regression and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were performed to evaluate the relationship of D-dimer and in-hospital HF. Results. A total of 778 patients were recruited in the study, of which 539 (69.3%) patients had normal D-dimer levels (≤0.5 mg/L) while 239 (30.7%) had increased D-dimer levels (>0.5 mg/L). The female patients have higher D-dimer levels and higher incident rate of in-hospital HF than that in male patients ( p < 0.001 ). The multivariate logistic regression model revealed that D-dimer was an independent predictor for in-hospital HF in overall population (adjusted odds ratio [OR]: 1.197, 95% CI: 1.003-1.429, and p = 0.046 ) and female patients (adjusted OR: 1.429, 95% CI: 1.083-1.885, and p = 0.012 ). Conclusion. Increased plasma D-dimer levels were an independent risk factor for incidence of in-hospital HF in STEMI patients who underwent pPCI, especially in female patients, which provides guidance for clinicians in identifying patients at high risk of developing HF and lowering their risk.

A fast and accurate method is presented for computing far‐field antenna patterns from planar near‐field measurements. The planar near‐field data can be sampled either using a single moving dipole probe or using an array of dipole probes. Near‐field to far‐field transformation for planar scanning may be efficiently performed under certain conditions by exploiting the block Toeplitz structure of the matrix and using conjugate gradient method and the fast Fourier transform, thereby drastically reducing computation time and storage requirements. The chapter argues that a single scanning moving probe may be replaced by a fixed array of probes to sample the planar near field for the solution of the equivalent magnetic currents on the surface enclosing the antenna under test. The source reconstruction method is a computational technique developed for antenna diagnostics and for carrying out near‐field to far‐field transformation.

BackgroundChronic kidney disease (CKD) is known to increase the risk of atrial fibrillation (AF) development, but the relationship between AF and subsequent renal function decline in patients with CKD is not well understood. In this study, we explored the role of AF on renal outcomes among patients with CKD.MethodsIn a retrospective hospital-based cohort study, we identified patients with CKD aged ≥20 years from 1 January 2008 to 31 December 2018. The patients were divided into AF and non-AF groups. We matched each patient with CKD and AF to two non-AF CKD controls according to propensity scores. The outcomes of interest included estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) decline of ≥20%, ≥30%, ≥40% and ≥50%, and end-stage renal disease (ESRD).ResultsAfter propensity score matching, 6731 patients with AF and 13 462 matched controls were included in the analyses. Compared with the non-AF group, the AF group exhibited greater risks of eGFR decline ≥20% (HR 1.43; 95% CI 1.33 to 1.53), ≥30% (HR 1.50; 95% CI 1.36 to 1.66), ≥40% (HR 1.62; 95% CI 1.41 to 1.85) and ≥50% (HR 1.82; 95% CI 1.50 to 2.20), and ESRD (HR 1.22; 95% CI 1.12 to 1.34). Higher CHA2DS2-VASc scores were associated with greater risks of eGFR decline and ESRD.ConclusionsIn patients with CKD, AF was associated with greater risks of subsequent renal function decline. CHA2DS2-VASc scores may be a useful risk stratification scheme for predicting the risk of renal function decline.

Voice reconstruction is possible, with an ileo-colon free flap, using the ileo-cecal valve as a new vocal cord. The voice carried by the ileal segment might have a ‘wet’ and coarse quality, even though still preferred by the patient over a pneumatic artificial larynx. Hence, secondary revisions may be needed, to shorten the ileum segment in the neck and to increase voice quality. Differently from classic fascio-cutaneous free flaps, the ileo-colon flap never integrates with the recipient site and continues to rely on the vascular pedicle for viability. During any subsequent revision, any injury to the pedicle causes irreversible ischaemia of the intestinal segment. This paper aims to present details about the surgical technique for voice tube shortening, without compromising its vascular supply. The mainstays of a safe surgical revision are the anti-mesenteric approach to the ileum segment and the division from the mesentery from inside to outside the intestinal wall. We developed our technique after our experience with 191 ileo-colic flaps for voice reconstruction. Adopting these refinements, no necroses ever occurred.

An advanced cogeneration system based on biomass direct combustion was developed and its feasibility was demonstrated. In place of the traditional single heat source (extraction steam), the extraction steam from the turbine, the cooling water from the plant condenser, and the low-pressure feedwater from the feedwater preheating system were collectively used for producing district heat in the new scheme. Hence, a remarkable energy-saving effect could be achieved, improving the overall efficiency of the cogeneration system. The thermodynamic and economic performance of the novel system was examined when taking a 35 MW biomass-fired cogeneration unit for case study. Once the biomass feed rate and net thermal production remain constant, an increment of 1.36 MW can be expected in the net electric production, because of the recommended upgrading. Consequently, the total system efficiency and effective electrical efficiency augmented by 1.23 and 1.50 percentage points. The inherent mechanism of performance enhancement was investigated from the energy and exergy aspects. The economic study indicates that the dynamic payback period of the retrofitting project is merely 1.20 years, with a net present value of 5796.0 k$. In conclusion, the proposed concept is validated to be advantageous and profitable.

Objective The most common coexisting organ-specific autoimmune disease in patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) is autoimmune thyroid disease (AITD). However, there have been few clinical reports based on a large population about the prevalence of zinc transporter 8 autoantibody (ZnT8A) and other islet autoantibodies in AITD patients. We aimed to explore the presence of islet autoantibodies, ZnT8A, glutamic acid decarboxylase autoantibodies (GADA) and insulinoma-associated antigen 2 autoantibodies (IA-2A) compared with thyroid autoantibodies, thyroid peroxidase autoantibodies (TPOAb) and thyroglobulin autoantibodies (TGAb) and thyrotropin receptor autoantibodies (TRAb) in patients with Graves’ disease (GD), Hashimoto’s thyroiditis (HT) and T1DM patients with AITD. Methods Totally, 389 patients with GD, 334 patients with HT, 108 T1DM patients with AITD and 115 healthy controls (HC) were recruited in the study. Islet autoantibodies (ZnT8A, GADA and IA-2A) were detected by radioligand binding assay. Thyroid autoantibodies, TPOAb and TGAb were detected by chemiluminescence assay, and TRAb was detected by RIA. Results The prevalence of ZnT8A, GADA and IA-2A was higher in GD and HT patients than that of HC (ZnT8A: GD 8.48%, HT 10.8% vs HC 1.74%; GADA: GD 7.46%, HT 7.74% vs HC 0.870%; IA-2A: GD 4.88%, HT 3.59% vs HC 0%; All P < 0.05) but lower than that of T1DM subjects with AITD (ZnT8A: 42.6%; IA-2A: 44.4%; GADA: 74.1%; all P < 0.0001). Conclusions An increased prevalence of ZnT8A as well as GADA and IA-2A was found in both GD and HT patients, indicating that there is a potential link between thyroid autoimmunity and islet autoimmunity.

Electromagnetic wave (EMW) absorbing materials play a vital role in modern communication and information processing technologies to inhibit information leakage and prevent possible damages to environment and human bodies. Currently, most of EMW absorbing materials are either composites of two or more phases or in the form of nanosheets, nanowires or nanofibers in order to enhance the EMW absorption performance through dielectric loss, magnetic loss and dielectric/magnetic loss coupling. However, the combination of complex shapes/multi phases and nanosizes may compound the difficulties of materials processing, composition and interfaces control as well as performance maintenance during service. Thus, searching for single phase materials with good stability and superior EMW absorbing properties is appealing. To achieve this goal, the EMW absorbing properties of transition metal carbides TMCs (TM=Ti, Zr, Hf, Nb and Ta) and high entropy (Ti0.2Zr0.2Hf0.2Nb0.2Ta0.2)C which belong to ultrahigh temperature ceramics, were investigated in this work. Due to the good electrical conductivity and splitting of d orbitals into lower energy t2g level and higher energy eg level in TMC6 octahedral arrangement, TMCs (TM=Ti, Zr, Hf, Nb and Ta) exhibit good EMW absorbing properties. Especially, HfC and TaC exhibit superior EMW absorbing properties. The minimum reflection loss (RLmin) value of HfC is −55.8 dB at 6.0 GHz with the thickness of 3.8 mm and the effective absorption bandwidth (EAB) is 6.0 GHz from 12.0 to 18.0 GHz at thickness of 1.9 mm; the RLmin value of TaC reaches −41.1 dB at 16.2 GHz with a thickness of 2.0 mm and the EAB is 6.1 GHz with a thickness of 2.2 mm. Intriguingly, the electromagnetic parameters, i.e., complex permittivity and permeability are tunable by forming single phase solid solution or high entropy (Ti0.2Zr0.2Hf0.2Nb0.2Ta0.2)C. The RLmin value of high entropy (Ti0.2Zr0.2Hf0.2Nb0.2Ta0.2)C is −38.5 dB at 9.5 GHz with the thickness of 1.9 mm, and the EAB is 2.3 GHz (from 11.3 to 13.6 GHz) at thickness of 1.5 mm. The significance of this work is that it opens a new window to design single phase high performance EMW absorbing materials by dielectric/magnetic loss coupling through tuning the conductivity and crystal field splitting energy of d orbitals of transition metals in carbides, nitrides and possibly borides.

In light of the recent advancement in economic narrative analysis, we develop a computational textual analysis method to study economic history. In this method, we collect narrative data from newspapers to measure economic trends. In particular, the popularity (frequency) of a narrative (keyword) on the newspapers is used as the proxy of the amount of economic activities associated with the narrative term; a high frequency indicates that there is a high volume of economic activities associated with the narrative term and vice versa. Regularized regression algorithms are then applied on the narrative frequency data to identify narrative terms whose associated microeconomic activities have macroeconomic impact. We apply the method to study a classic topic in Chinese economic history research: U.S. Silver Purchase Act and the Chinese price level in 1928–1936. Our results provide new insights into this controversial subject. For example, we find that the economic activity associated with the narrative term silver stock had no impact on the Chinese price level, which is contrary to previous research on the topic by Friedman and Schwartz [10]. Meanwhile, economic activities associated with the narrative terms U.S. silver purchase act and silver export are found to have a negative impact on the Chinese price level. This suggests the concerns at that time about the effects of U.S. Silver Purchase Act on the Chinese economy were not misplaced.

BACKGROUND The prognosis of high ulnar nerve injury is poor despite nerve repair or grafting. Anterior interosseous nerve (AIN) transfers provide a satisfactory recovery. However, the efficacy of end-to-side (ETS) AIN transfer and optimal timing in Sunderland grade IV/V of high ulnar nerve injury is lacking. OBJECTIVE The goals were to compare the outcomes of high ulnar nerve injury managed with ETS AIN transfers with those managed with conventional procedures (nerve repair or graft only) and identify differences between early and delayed transfers. METHODS Patients with isolated high ulnar nerve injury (Sunderland grade IV/V) from 2010 to 2017 were recruited. Patients with conventional treatments and AIN transfers were designated as the control and AIN groups, respectively. Early transfer was defined as the AIN transfer performed within 8 weeks postinjury. Outcomes were measured and analyzed by the British Medical Research Council (BMRC) score, grip strength, and pinch strength. RESULTS A total of 24 patients with high ulnar nerve injury (Sunderland grade IV/V) were included. There were 11 and 13 patients in the control and AIN groups, respectively. In univariate analysis, both early and delayed AIN transfers demonstrated significantly better motor recovery among BMRC score and strength of grip and pinch at 12 months (P < 0.05). No statistical significance was found between early and delayed transfer. In multivariate analysis, both early and delayed transfers were regarded as strong and independent factors for motor recovery of ulnar nerve. Compared with the control, early [odds ratio (OR), 1.83; P < 0.001] and delayed (OR, 1.59; P < 0.001) transfers showed significant improvement with regard to BMRC scores. The pinch strength in early (OR, 31.68; P < 0.001) and delayed (OR, 26.45; P < 0.001) transfers was also significantly better. CONCLUSION The ETS AIN transfer, in either early or delayed fashion, significantly improved intrinsic motor recovery in high ulnar nerve injuries classified as Sunderland grade IV/V. The early transfer group demonstrated a trend toward better functional recovery with less downtime.

As the world is changing and transforming at a fast pace, students today are expected to face more challenges in the future. For example, they need to prepare for jobs that do not yet exist, use technologies that have not been invented yet, or even solve problems that have not been discovered yet.The current study proposes that futures imagination is the key to better prepare students to face unknown challenges and an implementable education policy in Taiwan. This article introduces the development process and results of a futures imagination education program in compulsory education in Taiwan. In 2011, the Ministry of Education (MOE) in Taiwan started promoting the futures imagination program at all levels of education through different action plans for four consecutive years. The current study examines the ‘Grades 1–9 Action Plan’ and its teacher education workshops throughout this period. The Grades 1–9 Action Plan was implemented in compulsory education. The subjects of this study are teachers who participated in the action plan; they learned how to implement futures imaginative approaches in their classrooms. Through their cycle of planning, action, observation, and reflection from 2011 to 2015, they reported their findings through written reports, and then we collected their results through interviews and surveys. The results showed that students show higher learning interests and will have a more in-depth view of the future, which is expected to prepare students to adapt to their futures, and this contributes to their learning interests.

Background Sonoelastography (SEL) is widely used for assessing tissue stiffness and pathophysiology. It has also been used to diagnose carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS). However, the current criteria to diagnose CTS in SEL are diverse. The aim of this study was to systematically review the literature and assess the diagnostic value of SEL for CTS. Methods A literature review was performed using MEDLINE (PubMed), EMBASE, and the Cochrane Collaboration Library for primary research articles using the keywords sonoelastography and carpal tunnel syndrome. Data related to diagnostic and cutoff value were extracted. Bias assessment was performed. Results A total of 121 publications were reviewed. Nineteen primary case series met the inclusion criteria and were selected for full analysis. Different diagnostic approaches were identified, with units/expressions including kilopascals, conduct velocity, and strain ratio. The kilopascals and conduct velocity were measured using shear wave elastography, whereas strain ratio was calculated by relative compression quantification. A mean shear modulus cutoff value from 38.25 to 86 kPa and an acoustic radiation force impulse cutoff value of 3.0 to 3.23 m/s were used to diagnose CTS. Eight articles reported strain ratio between the median nerve and nearby tissues with diverse results due to different reference points. The other 3 additional diagnostic values were reported. Conclusions Sonoelastography is a useful noninvasive and promising modality to diagnose CTS. It may reflect both the condition of soft tissue scarring and quantitative values for CTS and median nerve stiffness. A diversity of examination values was found in different modalities. A high level of evidence was absent.

Objective In the conventional Charles' procedure for lower-limb lymphedema, full-thickness skin grafts (FTSGs) or flaps are the preferred treatment for areas around the knee and ankle because of the belief that FTSGs or flaps result in slighter contracture relative to split-thickness skin grafts (STSGs). However, the use of FTSGs or flaps prolongs operation and increases the risk of partial graft loss; should partial graft loss occur, additional grafting is required for remnant defects to avoid significant scarring after secondary healing. The senior author (HCC) thus modified the Charles' procedure and used STSGs around the knee and ankle. The aim of this study was to elucidate the long-term outcomes of STSGs in HCC-modified Charles’ procedure, including its attendant complications, such as joint contracture, range-of-motion limitations, and the presence of hypertrophic scars. Methods Participants were patients (n = 142) who underwent HCC-modified Charles’ procedure and STSGs between 1990 and 2016 for advanced lymphedema; the follow-up was at least 3 years. We detail our modification for improving the take of STSGs in the first operation and the rehabilitation protocol. Results The active flexion of knee was >90° in 89.4% and 70°–90° in 10.6% of patients. The active plantar flexion of ankle was 30° in 90.8% and 20°–30° in 9.2% of patients. In Stiefel Grading System, 85.9% were “Excellent,” 12.0% were “Good,” 2.1% were “Fair,” and 0 were “Poor.” Conclusion STSGs in HCC-modified Charles’ procedure yield satisfactory outcomes without joint contracture. Early physiotherapy and the primary take of STSGs are crucial to good functional outcomes.

Measuring the quality of digital videos viewed by human observers has become a common practice in numerous multimedia applications, such as adaptive video streaming, quality monitoring, and other digital TV applications. Here we explore a significant, yet relatively unexplored problem: measuring perceptual quality on videos arising from both luma and chroma distortions from compression. Toward investigating this problem, it is important to understand the kinds of chroma distortions that arise, how they relate to luma compression distortions, and how they can affect perceived quality. We designed and carried out a subjective experiment to measure subjective video quality on both luma and chroma distortions, introduced both in isolation as well as together. Specifically, the new subjective dataset comprises a total of $210$ videos afflicted by distortions caused by varying levels of luma quantization commingled with different amounts of chroma quantization. The subjective scores were evaluated by $34$ subjects in a controlled environmental setting. Using the newly collected subjective data, we were able to demonstrate important shortcomings of existing video quality models, especially in regards to chroma distortions. Further, we designed an objective video quality model which builds on existing video quality algorithms, by considering the fidelity of chroma channels in a principled way. We also found that this quality analysis implies that there is room for reducing bitrate consumption in modern video codecs by creatively increasing the compression factor on chroma channels. We believe that this work will both encourage further research in this direction, as well as advance progress on the ultimate goal of jointly optimizing luma and chroma compression in modern video encoders., Comment: 14 pages

Summary Background Colon interposition for total esophageal replacement cases represents one of the most challenging procedures in surgery. A retrospective study has been conducted and suggestions are proposed according to the analysis of 268 patients who underwent colon interposition for esophageal replacement. Complication rates and the duration of hospital stay were retrospectively analyzed. Methods A total of 268 patients were operated between 1984 and 2018. In group 1, 164 patients underwent colon interposition without supercharging with neck vessels and in group 2, 104 patients underwent colon interposition with supercharging. Data regarding flap loss, anastomotic leakage, the duration of hospital stay, and stricture formation in the long-term were statistically analyzed and compared between two groups. Results The success rate of reconstruction was 98,1% (161 of 164 patients) and 99% (103 of 104 patients) for group 1 and 2, respectively. Early complication (anastomotic leakage) rate was 4,9% in group 1 and 1% in group 2. The differences between two groups regarding flap loss and anastomotic leakage rates were not statistically significant (p = 0,495 and p = 0,077, respectively). The hospital stay was 26,3 days for patients without supercharging (group1) and 20,5 days for patients with supercharging (group 2). In group 1, 6,7% (11/164) of patients had narrowing at the junction of the pharynx and colon; however, in group 2, proximal anastomotic stricture formation was observed in only 1% (1/104) of the patients. The stricture rate was significantly lower in group 2 when compared to group 1 (p = 0,021). Conclusion The careful dissection of the marginal artery and supercharging with neck vessels provide lower complication rates in colon interposition for esophageal reconstruction.

It is a crucial component to estimate the similarity of biomedical sentence pair. Siamese neural network (SNN) can achieve better performance for non-biomedical corpora. However, SNN alone cannot obtain satisfactory biomedical text similarity evaluation results due to syntactic complexity and long sentences. In this paper, a cross self-attention (CSA) is proposed to design a new attention mechanism, namely self2self-attention(S2SA). Then the S2SA is introduced into SNN to construct a novel self2self-attentive siamese neural network, namely S2SA-SNN. In the S2SA-SNN, self-attention is used to learn the different weights of words and complex syntactic features in a single sentence. The means of the CSA are used to learn inherent interactive semantic information between sentences, and it employs self-attention instead of global attention to perform cross attention between sentences. Finally, three biomedical benchmark datasets of Pearson Correlation of 0.66 and 0.72/0.66 on DBMI and CDD-ful/-ref are used to test and prove the effectiveness of the S2SA-SNN. The experiment results show that the S2SA-SNN can achieve better performances with pre-trained word embedding and obtain better generalization ability than other compared methods.

Microgrids provide multiple benefits to end-use customers and electric utilities, including enhanced reliability and resilience, reduced operational costs, streamlined renewable generation integration, and improved energy efficiency. However, the microgrid technology’s large capital cost remains a major barrier to establishing its economic viability. This paper addresses this challenge by proposing a practical methodology for microgrid generation sizing. The proposed methodology uses the concept of robust optimization and a multi-criteria decision-making process, taking overall cost, emission reduction, and demand response into account as important factors in optimal generation sizing. The objective is to minimize the supply gap throughout the year, which is defined as the unmet load or required load curtailment under various load and solar generation scenarios. Numerical simulations on a real-world microgrid, ComEd’s Bronzeville Community Microgrid (BCM) on Chicago’s South Side, exhibit the practicality of the proposed method and its applications for electric utilities. The study proposes an optimal size of 4.8 MW considering the commercially available generator sizes for the BCM, which has a total peak load of 7 MW, 0.75 MW of PV and 0.5MW/2MWh of Battery energy storage installed.

ObjectiveInsulin resistance is a major risk factor for coronary artery disease (CAD). The C-peptide-to-insulin ratio (C/I) is associated with hepatic insulin clearance and insulin resistance. The current study was designed to establish a novel C/I index (CPIRI) model and provide early risk assessment of CAD. MethodsA total of 865 adults diagnosed with new-onset diabetes mellitus (DM) within one year and 54 healthy controls (HC) were recruited to develop a CPIRI model. The CPIRI model was established with fasting C/I as the independent variable and homeostasis model assessment of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) as the dependent variable. Associations between the CPIRI model and the severity of CAD events were also assessed in 45 hyperglycemic patients with CAD documented via coronary arteriography (CAG) and whom underwent stress echocardiography (SE) and exercise electrocardiography test (EET). ResultsFasting C-peptide/insulin and HOMA-IR were hyperbolically correlated in DM patients and HC, and log(C/I) and log(HOMA-IR) were linearly and negatively correlated. The respective correlational coefficients were −0.83 (p < 0.001) and −0.76 (p < 0.001). The equations CPIRI(DM) = 670/(C/I)2.24 + 0.25 and CPIRI(HC) = 670/(C/I)2.24 − 1 (F = 1904.39, p < 0.001) were obtained. Patients with insulin resistance exhibited severe coronary artery impairment and myocardial ischemia. In CAD patients there was no significant correlation between insulin resistance and the number of vessels involved. ConclusionsCPIRI can be used to effectively evaluate insulin resistance, and the combination of CPIRI and non-invasive cardiovascular examination is of great clinical value in the assessment of CAD.

Summary The aim of this study was to compare the incidence of infection and verrucous hyperkeratosis in patients who underwent surgery for advanced lymphedema according to the algorithm designed by the senior author, and were treated concurrently with/without toe treatment. A case series (Between 2004–2015) of 46 patients with unilateral advanced lower limb lymphedema was reviewed. Lymphoscintigraphy was used for evaluation of lymphedema severity. The ICG lymphography was used for staging. Fibrosis and skin induration were reflected by the tonicity. They were divided into two groups: (1) patients who underwent further treatment of toes according to the algorithm, and (2) patients who did not have toe-related treatment. Infection episodes and verrucous hyperkeratosis were recorded. There were 21 and 25 patients in Groups 1 and 2, respectively. All lymphoscintigrams showed severe dermal backflow with severe stagnation by 2.5 h after injection of Tc-99 colloid. All patients were stage IV or V. Tonicity values of skin were To achieve successful control of infection, they should be treated carefully according to the strategy described above.

The fracture field of coal and rock mass is the main channel for gas migration and accumulation. Exploring the evolution law of fracture field of coal and rock mass under the condition of drilling and slitting construction has important theoretical significance for guiding efficient gas drainage. The generation and evolution process of coal and rock fissures is also the development and accumulation process of its damage. Therefore, based on damage mechanics and finite element theory, the mathematical model is established. The damage variable of coal mass is defined by effective strain, the elastoplastic damage constitutive equation is established and the secondary development of finite element program is completed by FORTRAN language. Using this program, the numerical simulation of drilling and slitting construction of the 15-14120 mining face of Pingdingshan No. 8 Mine is carried out, and the effects of different single borehole diameters, different kerf widths and different kerf heights on the distribution area of surrounding coal fracture field and the degree of damage are studied quantitatively. These provide a theoretical basis for the reasonable determination of the slitting and drilling arrangement parameters at the engineering site.

Wafer identification (ID) is a serial number printed on the surface of wafer, which is used for indexing production process data in manufacture execution system. The automatic recognition of wafer ID is helpful to improve the level of automatic production. However, the existing equipment and methods mainly focus on single wafer-ID recognition, which require wafers to be taken out and placed on a specific platform, resulting in low efficiency. In this paper, we present a batch wafer-ID recognition method based on machine vision, including a specific designed image-acquisition system and recognition algorithms. Based on the priori information, we formulate a 3D model for the cassette and wafers to be registered with the features extracted from the image. Combined with image-processing techniques, the pose of wafers in the cassette is estimated to undistort the perspective deformation of wafer-ID characters, such that we can exploit a classic lightweight convolution neural network for character recognition. The proposed system can capture and recognize the whole image of a cassette of wafers at once, which does not need to take out the wafers from the cassette and avoids the risk of contamination. Extensive experiments were conducted to evaluate the performance of our proposed techniques by collecting the data set of wafer-ID images. The results show that our proposed 3D model-based rectification method can correct the character deformation effectively and enable the lightweight classifier to achieve high speed and high accuracy for batch wafer-ID recognition.

Objective To determine the incremental detection rate of clinically significant prostate cancer (csPCa) provided by sequential cores during in-bore magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-guided prostate biopsies. Methods Single-center, retrospective interpretation of prospectively acquired data in men without previous diagnosis of csPCa who underwent in-bore MRI-guided prostate biopsy between May 2017 and December 2019. Endpoints included detection of csPCa (grade group [GG] ≥ 2) and rate of GG upgrade provided by additional cores. Descriptive statistics presented as mean and standard deviation for the continuous variables, and frequency and percentage for the categorical variables. Results Four hundred and forty-three men with 747 lesions met eligibility criteria. Clinically significant prostate cancer was detected in 43.1% (322/747) of the biopsied lesions and GG 2 PCa or greater was identified by the first core in 78.3% (252/322) of them. On a per-core basis, cores 2, 3, 4, and 5 found new csPCa in 6% (42/744), 4% (26/719), 1% (2/137), and 0% (0/11) of the cases. Core biopsy 2, 3, 4, and 5 resulted in GG upgrade in 12% (91/744), 7% (49/719), 7% (9/137), and 0% (0/11) of the lesions, respectively. Each additional core was associated with a mean increase of 5 minutes in the duration of the biopsy. Conclusions In men undergoing in-bore MRI-guided prostate biopsies, 3 targeted cores per lesion provide an optimal trade-off between detection of clinically significant tumors and biopsy duration.

The human brain network is one of the most complex data processing centers so far and shows several topographic features such as small worldness, modularity, and high efficiency. Inspired by the human brain network, the artificial neural network (ANN) method was proposed and has become an important engineering tool for pattern recognition. A recent study suggested the similarity between the human brain network and ANN. Would the ANN show topographic features that are similar to those of the human brain network? In the present study, we first constructed a simple backpropagation ANN (BP-ANN) with one hidden layer, which is one of the simplest, representative ANN, based on CIFAR10 and CIFAR100 datasets. Then, we explored the topographic features of a network with artificial neurons. We found that artificial neurons of the BP-ANN showed a high local efficiency and modularity similar to the human brain network. However, the global efficiency of artificial neurons of the BP-ANN was comparable with those of a random network. Our results showed that the best model (high accuracy and no overfitting) of a large-scale BP-ANN during epochs of training showed the lowest local and global efficiency. These results might imply that after epochs of training, neurons of the BP-ANN form local highly intra-connected functional modules but lack cooperation at the global level. The topography structure of the BP-ANN also shows the potential to become an early-stop marker during training.

Autism spectrum disorder is an early-onset neurodevelopmental condition. This study aimed to investigate the progressive structural alterations in the autistic brain during early childhood. Structural magnetic resonance imaging scans were examined in a cross-sectional sample of 67 autistic children and 63 demographically matched typically developing (TD) children, aged 2–7 years. Voxel-based morphometry and a general linear model were used to ascertain the effects of diagnosis, age, and a diagnosis-by-age interaction on the gray matter volume. Causal structural covariance network analysis was performed to map the interregional influences of brain structural alterations with increasing age. The autism group showed spatially distributed increases in gray matter volume when controlling for age-related effects, compared with TD children. A significant diagnosis-by-age interaction effect was observed in the fusiform face area (FFA, Fpeak = 13.57) and cerebellum/vermis (Fpeak = 12.73). Compared with TD children, the gray matter development of the FFA in autism displayed altered influences on that of the social brain network regions (false discovery rate corrected, P

This paper digests the influences of financial transparency and media coverage in the Chinese stock market. In China, media performs under a regulatory system and media information is regarded as t...

BACKGROUND There is no consensus on the appropriate treatment of lymphedema. Proposed techniques include lymphaticovenous anastomosis (LVA), vascularized lymph nodes transfer (VLNT), and suction lipectomy (SL). The benefit of combined procedures has also been postulated. In this prospective study, a combined protocol is proposed as an alternative to single-procedure strategies. METHODS Between January 2016 and October 2018, we enrolled patients with secondary lymphedema of lower limbs, stage II-III according to the International Society of Lymphology, progressive swelling and skin tonicity >60. Thirty-seven consecutive patients were dichotomized into group I, undergoing VLNT, and group II undergoing VLNT and LVA. Gastroepiploic lymphnode flap was harvested through laparoscopy, and in the same operation, LVAs were performed in group II on the basis of indocyanine green lymphography and patent blue findings. Two weeks later, SL was performed in all the patients. Patients were prospectively evaluated through clinical examination, circumference measurement, and skin tonicity. RESULTS The average follow-up was 2 ± 0.8 years. The first consecutive 21 patients were treated with VLNT followed by SL. The next 16 patients underwent combined VLNT and LVA, followed by SL. A mean of 2.4 LVAs were performed. A significant difference in the postoperative circumference measurements was found overall (p

Multidrug resistance (MDR) is a major obstacle for successful cancer chemotherapy, and the main cause of MDR has been attributed to overexpression of P-glycoprotein (P-gp). In this present study, four P-gp modulators (E,E)-4,6-bis(styryl)-2-(substituted amino)-pyrimidines were evaluated for their activity in a breast cancer cell line overexpressing P-gp (LCC6MDR). The four modulators displayed significantly better P-gp modulating activity compared with the positive control verapamil (RF = 5.4), with a relative fold (RF) increase in activity ranging from 33.3 to 86.0. In contrast to compounds a and c that exhibited lower cytotoxicity, compounds b and d were nontoxic towards both cancer cells and normal cells, with IC50 values greater than 100 μmol/L. The qRT-PCR results demonstrated that after exposure to 2 μmol/L of compounds a, b, c, and d, the mRNA expression level of MDR1 in LCC6MDR cells decreased to 45%, 50%, 38%, and 51%, respectively. However, the Western-blot results indicated that compound c could reverse P-gp mediated MDR, but not via decreases in protein expression. DOX and Rh123 accumulation and efflux results further confirmed that the reversal of MDR activity happens via inhibition of P-gp efflux and increases in intracellular drug accumulation. These results demonstrated that compound c has low toxicity and is an efficient P-gp modulator, highlighting its potential as a promising candidate for P-gp-mediated reversal of MDR.

Analysis of miRNA-target mRNA interaction (MTI) is of crucial significance in discovering new target candidates for miRNAs. However, the biological experiments for identifying MTIs have a high false positive rate and are high-priced, time-consuming, and arduous. It is an urgent task to develop effective computational approaches to enhance the investigation of miRNA-target mRNA relationships. In this study, a novel method called MIPDH is developed for miRNA–mRNA interaction prediction by using DeepWalk on a heterogeneous network. More specifically, MIPDH extracts two kinds of features, in which a biological behavior feature is learned using a network embedding algorithm on a constructed heterogeneous network derived from 17 kinds of associations among drug, disease, and 6 kinds of biomolecules, and the attribute feature is learned using the k-mer method on sequences of miRNAs and target mRNAs. Then, a random forest classifier is trained on the features combined with the biological behavior feature and attribute feature. When implementing a 5-fold cross-validation experiment, MIPDH achieved an average accuracy, sensitivity, specificity and AUC of 75.85, 74.37, 77.33%, and 0.8044, respectively. To further evaluate the performance of MIPDH, other classifiers and feature descriptors are conducted for comparisons. MIPDH can achieve a better performance. Additionally, case studies on hsa-miR-106b-5p, hsa-let-7d-5p, and hsa-let-7e-5p are also implemented. As a result, 14, 9, and 9 out of the top 15 targets that interacted with these miRNAs were verified using the experimental literature or other databases. All these prediction results indicate that MIPDH is an effective method for predicting miRNA-target mRNA interactions.

Conduct disorder (CD) is a common psychiatric disorder defined by a repetitive and persistent pattern of aggressive and antisocial behaviors. Although numerous task-based and resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rsfMRI) studies have emphasized the disrupted functional connectivity in CD, the CD-related alterations in functional interactions between the bilateral cerebral hemispheres are rarely investigated directly. In this study, a voxel-mirrored homotopic connectivity (VMHC) method based on rsfMRI was employed for the first time to examine the abnormalities of interhemispheric functional connectivity in patients with CD. The VMHC was compared between eighteen pure CD patients and eighteen typically developing (TD) healthy controls. In CD patients, reduced homotopic connectivity was observed relative to TDs in the middle occipital gyrus (MOG), pre- and postcentral gyrus, rolandic operculum and paracentral lobe (PCL) which were the components of visual and motor networks. Furthermore, the VMHC of the MOG and PCL was found to be negatively correlated with clinical scores in the CD group. Moreover, the regions with altered VMHC exhibited a relative good and robust ability to discriminate CD patients from TDs. This study provided a novel angle to identify the important role of interhemispheric coordination in the pathophysiology underlying CD and further indicated that the aberrant homotopic connectivity could be a potential clinical neural marker for CD diagnosis.

Background With the difficulties in IOL power calculation and the potential side effects occurring postoperatively, multifocal IOL implantation after previous corneal refractive surgery are rarely reported especially for the trifocal IOL. Herein we report the clinical observation of trifocal IOL implantation in patients with previous myopia excimer laser correction. In this study, a multi-formula average method was performed for the IOLs power calculation to improve the accuracy. Visual and refractive outcomes were analyzed, and the subjective quality of patients’ life was evaluated by questionnaires survey. Methods This retrospective case series included patients with previous myopia excimer laser correction who underwent femtosecond laser assisted phacoemulsification and trifocal IOL (AT LISA tri 839 MP) implantation. Follow-up was done at 1-day, 1-month and 3-month to assess the visual outcomes. Outcome measures were uncorrected distance, intermediate and near visual acuity (UDVA, UIVA, UNVA), manifest refraction, defocus curve, and subjective quality of vision. Results Twenty-one Eyes from sixteen patients (14 eyes with previous laser in situ keratomileusis and 7 eyes with previous photorefractive keratectomy) were included. Mean postoperative spherical equivalent (SE) at 3-month was − 0.56 D ± 0.49 SD, wherein, 10 eyes (47.6%) were within ±0.50 D of the desired emmetropia and 19 eyes (90.5%) were within ±1.0 D. Mean monocular UDVA, UIVA and UNVA (logMAR) at last visit were 0.02 ± 0.07, 0.10 ± 0.10, and 0.15 ± 0.11 respectively. Three patients (19%) reported halos and glare in postoperative 3 months, two of them needed to use spectacles to improve the intermediate visual acuity. Fifteen patients (94%) reported a satisfaction score of ≥3.5 out of 4.0, without any difficulty in daily activity. Thirteen patients (81%) did not need spectacles at all distances, while the other 3 patients (19%) used spectacles for near-distance related visual activity. Mean composite score of the VF-14 questionnaire was 95.00 ± 7.29 out of 100. Conclusions Trifocal IOL implantation after myopia excimer laser correction could restore good distance, intermediate visual acuity and acceptable near visual acuity, and provide accurate refractive outcomes as well as high spectacles independence rate.

Background/purpose Interleukin-8 (IL-8) is an inflammatory cytokine and plays important role in development of cancers. We conducted a meta-analysis to explore the association between IL-8 rs4073 polymorphism and risk of prostate cancer. Methods PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science databases were searched for only case–control studies published before February 2019. The methodological quality assessment of included studies was performed based on Newcastle–Ottawa Quality Scale (NOS). Based on the heterogeneity, we conducted a meta-analysis using random-effect models. Pooled odds ratios (ORs) with a 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated using the allele (T vs. A), homozygous (TT vs. AA), heterozygous (TA vs. AA), dominant (TT + TA vs. AA), and recessive (TT vs. TA + AA) genetic models to assess the strength of the relationship between IL-8 rs4073 polymorphism and prostate cancer risk. In addition, the stability of our analysis was evaluated by heterogeneity, sensitivity, subgroup of ethnicity and study design, and publication bias analysis. Results We included 6 case–control studies with a total of 1752 cases and 1982 controls. Significantly higher prostate cancer risk of 1.12 (95% CI = 1.01–1.25), 1.26 (95% CI = 1.03–1.55), and 1.20 (95% CI = 1.02–1.41) were found for the allele, homogeneous, and recessive model, respectively. Though there was no statistical association with other genetic models in our meta-analyses, a tendency of higher prostate cancer risk was observed in all five genetic models. Conclusion The major findings of this meta-analysis suggested that IL-8 rs4073 polymorphism is significantly associated with risk of prostate cancer.

Developing electromagnetic (EM) wave absorbing materials with low reflection coefficient and optimal operating frequency band is urgently needed on account of the increasingly serious EM pollution. However, the applications of common EM absorbing materials are encumbered by poor high-temperature stability, poor oxidation resistance, narrow absorption bandwidth or high density. Herein, the strong EM absorption capability and wide efficient absorption bandwidth of high entropy ceramics are reported for the first time, which are designed by a combination of the novel high entropy (HE) rare earth silicide carbides/rare earth oxides (RE3Si2C2/RE2O3). Three HE powders, i.e., HERSC-1 (HE (Tm0.2Y0.2Dy0.2Gd0.2Tb0.2)3Si2C2), HERSC-2 HE (Tm0.2Y0.2Pr0.2Gd0.2Dy0.2)3Si2C2/HE (Tm0.2Y0.2Pr0.2Gd0.2Dy0.2)2O3) and HERSC-3 (HE (Tm0.2Y0.2Pr0.2Gd0.2Tb0.2)3Si2C2/HE (Tm0.2Y0.2Pr0.2Gd0.2Tb0.2)2O3), are synthesized. Although HERSC-1 exhibits a limited absorption effect (the minimum reflection loss (RLmin) is -11.6 dB at 3.4 mm) and a relatively narrow effective absorption bandwidth (EAB) of 1.7 GHz, the optimal absorption RLmin value and EAB of HERSC-2 and HERSC-3 are -40.7 dB (at 2.9 mm), 3.4 GHz and-50.9 dB (at 2.0 mm), 4.5 GHz, respectively, demonstrating strong microwave absorption capability and wide absorption bandwidth. Considering the better stability, low density and strong EM absorption effect, HE ceramics are promising as a new type of EM absorbing materials.

The inter-modal four-wave mixing (IM-FWM) and transversal mode instabilities (TMI) are experimentally studied in high-power distributed side-pumped fiber amplifiers. To the best of our knowledge, we have made the first demonstration of TMI and IM-FWM which can be suppressed simultaneously by increasing the bending diameter. Besides, the experimental results show that the counter-pumping scheme is beneficial to suppress both of IM-FWM and TMI, when comparing with co-pumping scheme. Furthermore, these two effects cannot be observed when the M2 factor is lower than 1.3, which can give a condition to estimate whether these two effects should be considered or not. The pertinent study can provide some guidance for understanding TMI and IM-FWM in the high-power fiber laser and amplifier.

Aim: This study aimed to explore leukocyte telomere length (LTL) in the prediction of the severity of coronary artery disease (CAD). Materials & methods: A total of 359 CAD patients who underwent coronary angiography were enrolled in this study. Severity of coronary artery was assessed by Gensini score (GS). Results: LTL is negatively correlated with GS (Spearman's rank correlation coefficient = -0.335; p

Background Pulmonary epithelioid hemangioendothelioma (P-EHE) is a rare disease. Thus far, consensus on a standard treatment for P-EHE has not been established given its low incidence worldwide. Apatinib combined with chemotherapy with doxorubicin/cyclophosphamide has been used as an effective combination treatment for human malignancies. However, the efficacy of this combination has not been reported in P-EHE cases. Case summary We present the case of a 64-year-old woman with chest tightness, cough, and chest pain. Computed tomography showed multiple unresectable pulmonary nodules. She had been misdiagnosed with lung carcinoma and underwent gefitinib treatment at a hospital. Subsequently, the patient underwent a cardiothoracic surgery for further disease investigation. CD31, CD34, and Vimentin expression were detected in the resected nodule specimens by immunohistochemical analyses, and pathological analyses confirmed the diagnosis of P-EHE. Following this, four cycles of apatinib combined with chemotherapy with doxorubicin/cyclophosphamide were initiated. The patient demonstrated stabilization of multiple bilateral nodules and showed a dramatic improvement in the clinical presentation after combination treatment. The patient could not tolerate the side effects of chemotherapy. Therefore, she then continued apatinib monotherapy, which is ongoing to date. The patient was stable at the last follow-up after 24 mo. Conclusion Apatinib combined with chemotherapy with doxorubicin/cyclophosphamide may be an effective therapeutic option for P-EHE treatment.

To explore the mechanism of An-pressing manipulation in improving post-stroke muscle spasticity, by observing the changes of γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) and glycine (Gly) in plasma and gray matter of L1-L3 spinal cord anterior horn in post-stroke rats with muscle spasticity after An-pressing manipulation intervention. Ten of 80 adult male Sprague-Dawley (SD) rats were randomly selected as the blank group, and the remaining 70 were used for modeling. The middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) rat model was established by insertion suture occlusion method in the left external carotid artery. Thirty rats with a Longa neurological score of 2-3 points and a modified Ashworth spasticity scale score of 1−, 1+, or 2 were included in the experiment. Using the random number table method, the 30 successfully modeled rats were randomly divided into a model group, an An-pressing tendon group and an An-pressing muscle belly group. Two days after modeling, rats in the An-pressing tendon group and An-pressing muscle belly group received An-pressing manipulation on the tendon and belly of quadriceps femoris muscle respectively, with the pressure of (350±50) g and the frequency of 5 s/time, 15 min per session, once a day for 5 continuous days. After the 5th treatment, the tension of the rat quadriceps femoris muscle was evaluated using the modified Ashworth spasticity scale. The Gly levels in rat plasma and L1-L3 segments of spinal cord were determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). The GABA levels in rat plasma and L1-L3 segments of spinal cord were measured by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The decrease in rat muscle tension scored by the modified Ashworth spasticity scale in the An-pressing tendon group was more significant than that in the An-pressing muscle belly group (P

In this article, high-efficiency n-Si interdigitated back contact solar cells (IBC) were fabricated with the perc-like process. The cell was demonstrated with the efficiency of 22.16% (cell area = 10 × 10 cm), open-circuit voltage of 685 mV, short-circuit current density of 41.21 mA/cm2, and fill factor of 78.48%. The low fill factor can be attributed to the high base recombination taking place under high-level injection. Fill factor over 81% and, therefore, cell efficiency over 23% is expected when wafers of high bulk lifetime ( τ bulk ≥ 10 ms) or low resistivity ( ρ ≤ 1 Ω·cm) are used. The light I–V curve was fully characterized with the optical and electronic properties obtained from independent measurements.

BackgroundThe key to modern drug discovery is to find, identify and prepare drug molecular targets. However, due to the influence of throughput, precision and cost, traditional experimental methods are difficult to be widely used to infer these potential Drug-Target Interactions (DTIs). Therefore, it is urgent to develop effective computational methods to validate the interaction between drugs and target.MethodsWe developed a deep learning-based model for DTIs prediction. The proteins evolutionary features are extracted via Position Specific Scoring Matrix (PSSM) and Legendre Moment (LM) and associated with drugs molecular substructure fingerprints to form feature vectors of drug-target pairs. Then we utilized the Sparse Principal Component Analysis (SPCA) to compress the features of drugs and proteins into a uniform vector space. Lastly, the deep long short-term memory (DeepLSTM) was constructed for carrying out prediction.ResultsA significant improvement in DTIs prediction performance can be observed on experimental results, with AUC of 0.9951, 0.9705, 0.9951, 0.9206, respectively, on four classes important drug-target datasets. Further experiments preliminary proves that the proposed characterization scheme has great advantage on feature expression and recognition. We also have shown that the proposed method can work well with small dataset.ConclusionThe results demonstration that the proposed approach has a great advantage over state-of-the-art drug-target predictor. To the best of our knowledge, this study first tests the potential of deep learning method with memory and Turing completeness in DTIs prediction.

The performance of multi-hop broadcast in vehicular ad hoc networks can be greatly affected by the highly varying link dynamics caused by mobility of vehicles and complex wireless channel environment. The conventional receiver-based and sender-based broadcast protocols usually decide the relay sequences only based on distance, neglecting the influence of links qualities. In this paper, we consider the impact of link qualities and vehicular mobility and investigate how to select broadcast relays to minimize the broadcast delay and maximize the broadcast efficiency. We first propose a novel broadcast scheme based on the prediction of dynamics (BPD), which utilizes the dynamic information to achieve the model-based prediction and combines the sender-based and receiver-based relay selection schemes for multi-hop broadcast. Then, we propose a novel metric called the expected remaining delay (D) and implement it in BDP (BPD-D) for minimizing the broadcast delay. We also propose a novel metric called the expected rebroadcast efficiency (E) and implement it in BDP (BPD-E) for maximizing the broadcast efficiency. The simulation results show that our proposed BPD-D and BPD-E broadcast protocols outperform the conventional protocols, while BPD-D can achieve the least delay and BPD-E has the highest dissemination efficiency.

Summary B10 cells restore immune balance by producing interleukin (IL)-10. Impaired B10 cell responses are related to numerous autoimmune diseases. However, the function of B10 cells in type 1 diabetes (T1D) patients is controversial. We hypothesized that there are numerical and functional defects of B10 cells in T1D. Sixty-two patients with T1D and 74 healthy volunteers were included in our study. We showed that B10 cells in human peripheral blood belong to a CD24hiCD38hi B cell subpopulation. CD24hiCD38hi B cells from healthy individuals possessed regulatory capacity, suppressed interferon (IFN)-γ, tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α and IL-17A production and promoted IL-4 production and forkhead box protein 3 (FoxP3) expression in CD4+ T cells through an IL-10-dependent mechanism. Compared to healthy controls, B10 cell percentages in T1D were significantly lower (5·6 ± 3·5 versus 6·9 ± 3·3%; P

In this research, we present and study an erbium fiber laser with triple-fiber-ring (TFR) scheme for continuous-wave (CW) wavelength-selection. The designed TFR not only can achieve single-longitudinal-mode (SLM) oscillation, but also can spread the tuning range from 1519.0 to 1583.0 nm covering C- and part of L-bands. Moreover, 0 dB power fluctuation can be obtained from 1523.0 nm to 1559.0 nm for flattened operation based on the compound-ring configuration. The Lorentzian laser linewidths of 22 to 29 kHz are also attained in the entire wavelength-tunable range.

The effect of tens-of-Watt seed light on the stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) in a distributed side-pumped Yb-doped fiber amplifier is studied. By using two sorts of seed sources with the power smaller than 70 W, it is observed in experiment that the SRS can be enhanced by lowering the seed power. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first observation of the weak-seed enhancement of SRS in the distributed side-pumped Yb-doped fiber amplifier. In order to reveal the physical mechanism of the phenomenon, the numerical study is carried out. It is found that the Yb-gain at Raman wavelength, although much smaller than that at signal wavelength (i.e., 1080 nm), plays an important role in the phenomenon. It is also revealed that the weak-seed enhancement of SRS can only be presented when the dopant concentration is large enough (e.g., larger than 3 × 1025 in our numerical calculation). Besides, with more effective suppression of Raman seed, the weak-seed induced enhancement of SRS could be observed in a larger seed power range. The pertinent results and conclusion can provide significant guidance for designing high-power fiber lasers and amplifiers.

Modeling image and video distortions is an important, but difficult problem of great consequence to numerous and diverse image processing and computer vision applications. While many statistical models have been proposed to synthesize different types of image noise, real-world distortions are far more difficult to emulate. Toward advancing progress on this interesting problem, we consider distortion generation as an image-to-image transformation problem, and solve it via a data-driven approach. Specifically, we use a conditional generative adversarial network (cGAN) which we train to learn four kinds of realistic distortions. We experimentally demonstrate that the learned model can produce the perceptual characteristics of several types of distortion.

Both structural and contextual information is essential and widely used in image analysis. However, current multi-view stereo (MVS) approaches usually use a single common pre-trained model as pixel descriptor to extract features, which mix structural and contextual information together and thus increase the difficulty of matching correspondence. In this paper, we propose FADE (feature aggregation for depth estimation), which treats spatial and context information separately and focuses on aggregating features for efficient learning of the MVS problem. Spatial information includes image details such as edges and corners, whereas context information comprises object features such as shapes and traits. To aggregate these multi-level features, we use an attention mechanism to select important features for matching. We then build a plane sweep volume by using a homography backward warping method to generate match candidates. Furthermore, we propose a novel cost volume regularization network aims to minimize the noise in the matching candidates. Finally, we take advantage of 3D stacked hourglass and regression to produces high-quality depth maps. With these well-aggregated features, FADE can efficiently perform dense depth reconstruction, achieving state-of-the-art performance in terms of accuracy and requiring the least amount of model parameters.