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The bismuth oxide (Bi

For retailers, carrying inventories may force suppliers to lower wholesale prices in their futuretransactions. Previous literature on strategic inventories has assumed that the unit productioncost of the supplier is negligible. In practice, the production cost is the supplier's privateinformation. In this research, we study the impact of supplier's cost misreporting behavior onsupply chain decisions in a two-period strategic inventory basic model consisting of a retailerand a supplier. We find that the retailer's retention of strategic inventories can incentivize thesupplier to misreport costs. As the retailer carries inventories, the supplier can misreport ahigher cost, thus increasing the wholesale price and supplier's profit margins. Moreover, wefind that misreporting behavior hurts the retailer and exacerbates the double marginalizationeffect, leading to inefficiency in the supply chain. The supplier's profit is further improved whenthe supplier can misreport the different costs in each period. When we consider competitionfrom downstream retailers, only if both two retailers do not hold strategic inventories, can theyprevent the supplier from misreporting. The retailer's detection measures are needed to ensure the coordination role of strategic inventory

Shuang Ba,1 Pin Zhou,2 Ming Yu1 1Department of Ultrasound, The First Affiliated Hospital of Kangda College of Nanjing Medical University, Lianyungang, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Stomatology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Kangda College of Nanjing Medical University, Lianyungang, People’s Republic of ChinaCorrespondence: Ming YuDepartment of Ultrasound, The First Affiliated Hospital of Kangda College of Nanjing Medical University, 182 Northern Tongguan Road, Lianyungang, 222002, People’s Republic of ChinaTel/Fax + 86 51885605472Email ultrasoundhappy@163.comBackground: Temporomandibular joint disorder (TMD) affects millions of people. It is unclear if low intensity ultrasound (US) is effective to treat TMD.Methods: A total of 160 patients with TMD were enrolled in this study. The subjects were randomized into two groups to receive US therapy or no therapy. Patients in the US group were given US therapy once a day for 5 days per week for 2 consecutive weeks. Before and 4 weeks and 6 months after the treatments, the patients were assessed for pain using visual analog scale (VAS) and the maximum pain-free inter-incisal distance (IID). In addition, mandibular movement (MM), jaw noise (JN), disability index (DI) and craniomandibular index (CMI) were also assessed.Results: Compared with the patients before the therapy, VAS, IID, MM, JN, DI and CMI in the US group were significantly improved 4 weeks and 6 months after therapy. However, 6 months after the therapy, US group had a recurrence rate of 2.63%.Conclusion: US therapy can significantly reduce the pain, and improve the functionality of the temporomandibular joint and mouth opening limit for TMD patients, and is therefore recommended for TMD patients.Keywords: temporomandibular joint disorder, pain, ultrasound, exercise therapy, recurrence

The measurement of customer lifetime value (CLV) has long been of primary interest to marketing research. To date, almost all CLV modeling studies have been conducted in either the contractual or t...

Nano-prodrug, one of the most widely used nano-formulation at present, has excellent efficacies in tumor treatment with high potential and clinical value. Camptothecin and its derivatives have broad prospects in the preparation of prodrugs for the treatment of tumors. Given the special microenvironment of tumors, including partial acidity, high concentration of reactive oxygen species, high concentration of glutathione and enzyme concentration, a large number of tumor microenvironment-responsive camptothecin and its derivative prodrugs were prepared. This paper classified them from the microenvironment response types and drug release characteristics, reviewed the research progress of camptothecin and its derivative prodrugs based on safety and clinical trials, and analyzed the existing problems and deficiencies, hoping to provide references for the development of camptothecin and its derivatives.

Empirical and theoretical advances in human neuroscience have led to a reappraisal of the relationships between mind, brain and body, the implications of which are particularly relevant to understanding emotions, which is revealed to be embodied owing to the facts that they are on the one hand primarily arise from the internal bodily states controlled by interoceptive system, on the other they give rise to physiological reactions and physical action evoked by autonomic nervous system. More specifically, when considering the ‘embodied mind’ (i.e., how mental processes are inescapably contextualized by their location within the body), the brain, instead of the ‘master’ of the body, is increasingly revealed to function as the ‘servant’, with its primary goal to maintain the body’s homeostatic integrity. This is achieved through the control of interoceptive information concerning body’s physiological state, initially as ‘simple’ organ-level homeostatic reflexes and then through higher-order coordination across organ-systems allowing ‘allostatic policies’ to predict and maintain future health of the integrated whole ‘biological-self’. In this context, motivational and emotional feelings arise from interoceptive signals that accompany (motivational and emotional) internally-directed physiological responses, and externally-directed behaviors. Emotion concepts are thus the categorized embodied outcomes of bidirectional brain-body interactions and may arguably be differentiated into afferent interoceptive processes, i.e., from body to brain, and efferent/autonomic processes, i.e., from brain to body. When comparing emotion words used in Chinese and English languages, afferent/interoceptive processes seem to dominate conceptualization of embodied emotions in Chinese, while the efferent processes feature more commonly in English. The presence of distinct conceptual systems relating to emotions may, according to the linguistic relativity hypothesis as well as the theory of constructed emotion, significantly shape the distinct values and ‘national character’ of Chinese and English–speaking cultures. Correspondingly, it is argued that, in the expression of affective traits, Chinese-speaking people are biased towards being more receptive, reflective and adaptive, whereas native English speakers may tend to be more reactive, proactive and interactive. These patterns also encompass functions historically ascribed to bodily organs by traditional Chinese and ancient Greek medicine.

Objective. To investigate the effects of Danshen on the imaging and histological parameters, expression levels of ECM-associated proteins and inflammatory factors, and antioxidative activity in the degenerated intervertebral disc (IVD) of SD rats. Methods. Sixty male rats were randomly divided into three groups (control, IDD, and Danshen IDD). Percutaneous needle puncture in Co8-9 intervertebral disc was conducted in all rats of the IDD and Danshen IDD groups to induce intervertebral disc degeneration (IDD). After operation, animals of the Danshen IDD group were administrated with Danshen granules (3 g/kg body weight ) by gavage once a day. Four weeks later, the coccygeal vertebrae were harvested and used for imaging (disc height and MR signal), histological, immunohistochemical, and biochemical [water content, glycosaminoglycans (GAG), superoxide dismutase (SOD2), glutathione (GSH), and malondialdehyde (MDA)] analyses. Results. The puncture induced significant decreased IVD space and MR T2 signal at both 2 and 4 weeks, which were attenuated by Danshen treatment. The disc degeneration in the IDD group (HE and Safranin O-Fast Green histological staining was markedly more serious compared with that in the control group. Four weeks of Danshen treatment significantly alleviated this degeneration compared with the IDD group. Needle puncture resulted in the upregulation of IL-1β and TNF-α, MMP-3, and downregulation of COL2 and aggrecan in the IDD group. However, this change was significantly weakened by Danshen treatment. Significantly lower water and GAG content, as well as the SOD2 and GSH levels, in the IDD group were found compared with those in the control group. However, the above parameters of the Danshen IDD group were significantly higher than those of the IDD group. Danshen treatment significantly decreased the content of MDA which was increased by needle puncture in the IDD group. Conclusion. Danshen can attenuate intervertebral disc degeneration in SD rats by suppressing the oxidation reaction.

By-product synergy (BPS) is an innovative method to dispose of waste and create value from waste. We examine a supply chain composed of two competing manufacturers and one downstream processing plant with limited BPS capacity. The plant generates a by-product with waste from manufacturers and sells the by-product in a market with uncertain prices. We derive each manufacturer’s equilibrium decisions (production quantity and disposal amount) and the plant’s capacity investment plan (ex ante) and optimal transfer price (ex post). We show that BPS always benefits manufacturers, and although two opposite effects (competition effect and cost saving effect) appear, each manufacturer’s profit in limited BPS capacity is always lower than that in infinite BPS capacity. The reason is that the plant has the power to determine the transfer price and manufacturers prefer highest cost saving (enough BPS capacity) at the expense of highest competition effect. The effects of BPS technology parameters (i.e., processing cost of waste and investment cost of capacity) on supply chain performance are also discussed. Finally, we further explore the scenario that the plant determines the transfer price before the by-product’s price uncertainty is realized.

Purpose. We aimed to present our experience in anchoring technique and evaluate the efficacy and safety of unilateral percutaneous vertebroplasty in patients with neurologically intact Kümmell’s disease. Methods. From January 2014 to December 2017, 29 patients (17 males and 12 females) with neurologically intact Kümmell’s disease were operated on using anchoring technique in unilateral percutaneous vertebroplasty (PVP). Ages of the enrolled patients ranged from 67 to 81 years (mean 73.8 years). Clinical efficacy was evaluated by back pain visual analogue scale (BP-VAS) score, Oswestry disability index (ODI) score, as well as the height of anterior border and the kyphotic angle of the involved vertebral body on a standing lateral radiograph. The safety of PVP was assessed by surgical-related complications, including bone cement leakage and neurological deficit. Results. All 29 patients underwent the PVP procedure successfully. The mean operation time was 35 ± 12 min. And all patients were able to walk/ambulate with a thoracolumbar brace after 12 to 24 hours, staying in bed postoperatively. Significantly statistical differences were observed in both BP-VAS and ODI scores at each time point of follow-up when compared with the preoperative condition (P<0.05). Besides, statistically significant improvement in radiographic measurements such as kyphotic angle and the height of the anterior border of the involved vertebral body between the preoperative and postoperative assessments was also observed (P<0.05) and asymptomatic leakage of cement occurred in 7 of 29 cases (24.1%). Conclusions. We considered that the anchoring technique in unilateral PVP could provide an effective and safe alternative for neurologically intact Kümmell’s disease.

A Ni-catalyzed Suzuki-type cross-coupling of boronic acids with epoxides without an exogenous base and with broad substrate scope has been developed. The product selectivity of styrenyl epoxides is different from that of previous work. This methodology uses readily available starting materials to access a range of substituted alcohols, which are valuable feedstock chemicals.

A nickel-catalyzed defluorinative reductive cross-coupling of trifluoromethyl alkenes with epoxides has been developed. Various substituted trifluoromethyl alkenes and epoxides were found to be suitable reaction substrates. This reaction enabled C(sp3)-C(sp3) bond construction through allylic defluorinative cross-coupling of trifluoromethyl alkenes under mild reaction conditions. This methodology was highly compatible with various sensitive functional groups, providing access to a diverse array of functionalized gem-difluoroalkene-containing alcohol compounds.

To Pool or Not to Pool? Analyzing Customer-Intensive Services with Strategic Agents In customer-intensive services where service quality increases with service time, service providers commonly pool their agents and give performance bonuses that reward agents for achieving greater customer satisfaction and serving more customers. Conventional wisdom suggests that pooling agents reduce customer wait time whereas performance bonuses motivate agents to produce high-quality services, both of which should boost customer satisfaction. However, in “Pooling Agents for Customer-Intensive Services,” Wang, Yang, Cui, Ülkü, and Zhou find that when agents act strategically, they may choose to speed up under pooling in an attempt to serve more customers, thus undermining service quality. If this happens, pooling can backfire and result in both lower customer satisfaction and agent payoff. Consequently, the researchers propose a simple practical solution to restore the efficiency of pooling. They propose pooling a portion of the performance bonuses (incentive pooling) in conjunction with pooling agents (operational pooling).

Exploring highly-efficient noble-metal-free electrocatalysts for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) is crucial for preparation of rechargeable metal-air batteries. Herein, FeNi-mIm (guest) was loaded on the surface of ZIF-8 (host) via a novel host-guest strategy, and the resulting ZIF-8@FeNi(mIm)

In this work, solar drying technology was applied for the deep dewatering of coal slime to save thermal energy and reduce the dust produced during the hot drying process of coal slime. Solar drying technology is used to dry coal slime to realize its resource utilization. The influence of solar radiation intensity and slime thickness is investigated on the drying process. The greater the solar radiation intensity (SRI) is, the faster the drying indoor air and coal slime are heated, and the faster the drying efficiency is. As the slime becomes thinner, the internal water diffusion resistance becomes smaller and the drying efficiency correspondingly becomes faster. In addition, to facilitate the application of coal slime drying in the actual project, the Page model is fitted and found to have a good fit for solar drying coal slime. Meanwhile, the optimal drying conditions are determined by analyzing the energy utilization under different conditions. It is found that the target moisture content of 10% is optimal for coal slime drying with the highest energy utilization. The laying thickness (

This paper examines whether a firm will select an overoptimistic manager when a cost‐reduction investment has a spillover effect. We consider a Cournot competition model where R&D investment ex ante occurs before the process of product market competition. Our analysis reveals that there exists a unique and symmetric equilibrium for firms to delegate overoptimistic managers. We show that only when the spillover effect is sufficiently high do firms benefit from delegation. Furthermore, the equilibrium confidence level and investment decision first decrease and then increase as the spillover parameter changes. As the initial production cost increases, the equilibrium performance becomes worse.

Cost-effectively drying of sewage sludge is the prerequisite step for further disposal, such as landfilling, incineration and pyrolysis. A novel solar drying method was developed using a thin layer sandwich-like chamber. The drying rate was optimized by adjusting the operating variables such as the thickness of sludge bed, and solar radiation intensity. Lower height of sewage sludge bed facilitates the faster drying process in thin layer sandwich-like solar drying chamber. In this experiment, the most suitable thickness of sewage sludge layer was found to be 0.5 cm for quick drying (average drying rate 6.72 g/h) under the sunlight in sandwich-like dryer. The water content in sewage sludge was decreased from 79% to 5% in 11 h drying with thickness of 0.5 cm under the solar radiation intensity of 500 W/m2. It was observed that the solar radiation influenced the drying process significantly, the drying time was reduced from 18 h to 9 h, as the solar radiation was increased from 300 W/m2 to 700 W/m2, respectively. To identify the drying kinetics of raw sewage sludge inside the sandwich-like drying chamber, eight established drying kinetics models were tried and compared the suitability of the model based on the R2, sum of square error (SSE), chi-square value, and root mean square error. Among these models, Danish model was found applicable for sewage sludge drying in this newly designed thin layer sandwich-like dryer. Based on the results obtained for solar drying of sewage sludge in thin layer sandwich-like drying chamber, it could be proposed that thin layer solar dryer may be a good choice for fast drying of sewage sludge in a cost-effective way.

Ammonia leaching has recently been applied to leach metals from cathode scrap of the spent lithium-ion batteries (LIBs), and the performance of the manganese-based catalysts recovered from the reclamation of the residues produced in the leaching process was investigated in this study. The results showed that the origin residue from ammonia leaching was converted into mangano-manganic oxide (Mn3O4) and nickel manganese (NiMn2O4) after calcination. The catalytic activity of the recovered manganese-based catalysts could be efficiently enhanced after ball grinding for 15 min, with the degradation of methylene blue (MB) from 11% to 40%. Characterizations were carried out by X-ray diffraction (XRD), BET, particle size analysis, scanning electron microscope (SEM) as well as Fourier Transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR). It was found that the increase of the surface area and the reduction of particle size after grinding would be a benefit to improve the catalytic activity. It was indicated that the catalytic performance of the manganese-based catalysts recovered from ammonia leaching residues by calcination could be improved by mechanical methods.

A series of 3DOM zinc ferrites and silica composites were prepared and applied on the hydrogen sulfide (H2S) removal at 500 °C. With ∼230 nm-sized macropores and 15 nm-sized walls, the morphology analysis showed the as-prepared ZnFe2O4-SiO2 materials were conducted as a typical 3DOM structure. As a solifidation agent, silica significantly influenced not only the composites structure, which induced the homogeneity and stability of 3DOM structure, but also the desulfurization behavior, in which the active phase utilization decreased if the compounded silica amount was too high or too low. Anyway, the 3DOM sorbents exhibited remarkable desulfurization performance due to the unique structure features with high surface area, nano zinc ferrite particles, well arranged macropores with interconnected mesopores, which significantly enhances gaseous reactant diffusion during sulfidation compared with those of bulk sorbent. Sulfates could be formed during both sulfidation and regeneration process, while Fe2(SO4)3 in sulfided sample and ZnSO4 in regenerated sample. 3DOM structure and silica participation enhanced the breakthrough capacity of 50 wt% ZnFe2O4 compounded sorbent and maintained higher desulfurization capacities upon multiple sulfidation/regeneration cycles more ascribed to its special structural feature.

Objective To compare the clinical efficacy and safety between minimally invasive and traditional open transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion in the treatment of single-level spondylolisthesis grades 1 and 2. Methods This was a systematic review and meta-analysis. A comprehensive literature retrieval was performed in 3 electronic databases (PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane library). Randomized or nonrandomized controlled studies published from January 2000 to April 2018 that compared minimally invasive transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (MIS-TLIF) with traditional open transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (TO-TLIF) for treating single-level spondylolisthesis grades 1 and 2 were retrieved. Quality of included studies were evaluated by the modified Jadad scale. Data were extracted according to the predefined clinical outcome measures, including preoperative and postoperative back pain visual analogue scale and Oswestry Disability Index score; operation time and estimated intraoperative blood loss; length of hospitalization; and the complications, reoperation, and fusion rate. Results Six studies (n = 394 patients) were finally included. Two were randomized controlled trials and the remaining 4 were prospective or retrospective cohort studies. The pooled data revealed that both techniques had similar preoperative and last follow-up back pain visual analogue scale scores, complication rate, reoperation rate, and fusion rate. However, with the exception of more operation time, MIS-TLIF was associated with less intraoperative blood loss, shorter hospital stay, and better long-term functional outcome when compared with TO-TLIF. Conclusions Based on the available evidence, MIS-TLIF appears to be a more efficacious and safe technique with reduced tissue trauma, quicker postoperative recovery, and better long-term functional outcome for the treatment of single-level spondylolisthesis grades 1 and 2.

A simple and effective self-molten-polymerization strategy utilizing the molten metal salts from heated solid metal salt sources as the solvents to dissolve a self-polymerizable monomer, which acted as a mingling agent, was successfully applied to homogeneously synthesize a series of highly defected manganese/samarium (Mn/Sm-x, where x represents the molar ratio of Mn to Sm) hybrid bimetallic oxides with a mesoporous structure. The values of T50 and T90 over Mn/Sm-2 were 206 °C and 247 °C, respectively, for toluene conversion, as well as 213 °C and 273 °C for CO2 yield under saturated vapor with a weight hourly space velocity of 60 000 ml g−1 h−1, which were far superior to the performances of Mn/Cu-2 (233 °C and 274 °C; 237 °C and 300 °C) and MnOx (242 °C and 294 °C; 255 °C and 315 °C). Meanwhile, the most active catalyst Mn/Sm-4 exhibited complete mineralization of chlorobenzene under saturated vapor and a weight hourly space velocity of 60 000 ml g−1 h−1 at 350 °C. In addition, the Mn/Sm-4 catalyst also showed a high TOFMn value (8.35 × 10−6 s−1) at 140 °C for toluene oxidation and good stability for the catalytic oxidation of toluene and chlorobenzene under a long-term test running for 200 h of uninterrupted reaction. The XRD, Raman, N2 adsorption–desorption, FESEM, XPS, O2-TPD and H2-TPR results confirmed that more surface defects and surface oxygen vacancies were introduced into MnOx using proper doping with Sm. Combined with the in situ DRIFTS and on-line MS measurements, the mechanism for chlorobenzene oxidation over Mn/Sm-4 was also revealed. This work presents an important interpretation for developing improved catalysts to control air pollution.

γ-MnO2, SmMnO3, and γ-MnO2/SmMnO3 catalysts were prepared by facile methods, wherein the SmMnO3 (SMO) perovskite was synthesized through one-step calcination and the γ-MnO2/SmMnO3 was formed by an in situ growth of γ-MnO2 on the surface of SMO. These materials ware characterized by XRD, SEM-mapping, N2-adsorption, XPS and H2-TPR to investigate their textural properties. Compared with that of SMO and γ-MnO2, the γ-MnO2/SMO shows better performance for catalytic oxidation of aromatic VOCs in wet air (10 vol.%), which may be attributed to its higher surface molar ratio of lattice oxygen to adsorbed oxygen (Olatt/Oads) and better low-temperature reducibility. Besides, for γ-MnO2/SMO catalyst, a successive oxidation route and the inner principle of BETX (benzene, ethylbenzene, toluene, and o-xylene) oxidation were also revealed via various tests and a comprehension of dynamics investigation. Meanwhile, the experiments under simulated realistic exhaust conditions displayed that the γ-MnO2/SmMnO3 is also a good catalyst with high stability for aromatic VOCs oxidation, and fulfilled endurability to high humidity (20 vol.%).