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EEG signals exhibit commonality and variability across subjects, sessions, and tasks. But most existing EEG studies focus on mean group effects (commonality) by averaging signals over trials and subjects. The substantial intra- and inter-subject variability of EEG have often been overlooked. The recently significant technological advances in machine learning, especially deep learning, have brought technological innovations to EEG signal application in many aspects, but there are still great challenges in cross-session, cross-task, and cross-subject EEG decoding. In this work, an EEG-based biometric competition based on a large-scale M3CV (A Multi-subject, Multi-session, and Multi-task Database for investigation of EEG Commonality and Variability) database was launched to better characterize and harness the intra- and inter-subject variability and promote the development of machine learning algorithm in this field. In the M3CV database, EEG signals were recorded from 106 subjects, of which 95 subjects repeated two sessions of the experiments on different days. The whole experiment consisted of 6 paradigms, including resting-state, transient-state sensory, steady-state sensory, cognitive oddball, motor execution, and steady-state sensory with selective attention with 14 types of EEG signals, 120000 epochs. Two learning tasks (identification and verification), performance metrics, and baseline methods were introduced in the competition. In general, the proposed M3CV dataset and the EEG-based biometric competition aim to provide the opportunity to develop advanced machine learning algorithms for achieving an in-depth understanding of the commonality and variability of EEG signals across subjects, sessions, and tasks.

Abstract The purpose is to explore the brain’s structural difference in local morphology and between-region networks between two types of peripheral neuropathic pain (PNP): postherpetic neuralgia (PHN) and lower back pain (LBP). A total of 54 participants including 38 LBP and 16 PHN patients were enrolled. The average pain scores were 7.6 and 7.5 for LBP and PHN. High-resolution structural T1 weighted images were obtained. Both grey matter volume (GMV) and morphological connectivity (MC) were extracted. An independent two-sample t-test with false discovery rate (FDR) correction was used to identify the brain regions where LBP and PHN patients showed significant GMV difference. Next, we explored the differences of MC network between LBP and PHN patients and detected the group differences in network properties by using the two-sample t-test and FDR correction. Compared with PHN, LBP patients had significantly larger GMV in temporal gyrus, insula and fusiform gyrus (p

Drug‐induced hepatotoxicity limits development of new effective medications. Drugs and numerous endogenous/exogenous agents are metabolized/detoxified by hepatocytes, during which reactive oxygen species (ROS) are generated as a by‐product. ROS has broad adverse effects on liver function and integrity, including damaging hepatocyte proteins, lipids, and DNA and promoting liver inflammation and fibrosis. ROS in concert with iron overload drives ferroptosis. Hepatic nuclear factor kappa B (NF‐κB)‐inducing kinase (NIK) is aberrantly activated in a broad spectrum of liver disease. NIK phosphorylates and activates inhibitor of NF‐κB kinase subunit alpha (IKKα), and the hepatic NIK/IKKα cascade suppresses liver regeneration. However, the NIK/IKKα pathway has not been explored in drug‐induced liver injury. Here, we identify hepatic NIK as a previously unrecognized mediator for acetaminophen (APAP)‐induced acute liver failure. APAP treatment increased both NIK transcription and NIK protein stability in primary hepatocytes as well as in liver in mice. Hepatocyte‐specific overexpression of NIK augmented APAP‐induced liver oxidative stress in mice and increased hepatocyte death and mortality in a ROS‐dependent manner. Conversely, hepatocyte‐specific ablation of NIK or IKKα mitigated APAP‐elicited hepatotoxicity and mortality. NIK increased lipid peroxidation and cell death in APAP‐stimulated primary hepatocytes. Pretreatment with antioxidants or ferroptosis inhibitors blocked NIK/APAP‐induced hepatocyte death. Conclusion: We unravel a previously unrecognized NIK/IKKα/ROS/ferroptosis axis engaged in liver disease progression.

Abstract We report a facile synthesis of tetrahydroquinoline derivatives via heterogeneous cascade Povarov reaction catalyzed by sulfonic acid functionalized metal‐organic frameworks (MIL‒101(Cr)‒SO3H). The porous MIL‒101(Cr)‒SO3H demonstrates superior catalytic activities and stabilities for this reaction in comparison either to homogeneous sulfonic acids or heterogeneous sulfonic acid resins. Experimental investigations reveal that the high catalytic performance is attributed to the cooperative action of dual Lewis‐ and Brønsted acid sites within the pores of MIL‒101(Cr)‒SO3H. In addition, this reaction proceeds smoothly at room temperature with a broad substrate scope, which provides an alternative approach in the construction of tetrahydroquinoline skeletons.

Mcm2, a subunit of the minichromosome maintenance proteins 2–7 (Mcm2-7) helicase best known for its role in DNA replication, contains a histone binding motif that facilitates the transfer of parental histones following DNA replication. Here, we show that Mcm2 is important for the differentiation of mouse embryonic stem (ES) cells. The Mcm2-2A mutation defective in histone binding shows defects in silencing of pluripotent genes and the induction of lineage-specific genes. The defects in the induction of lineage-specific genes in the mutant cells are likely, at least in part, due to reduced binding to Asf1a, a histone chaperone that binds Mcm2 and is important for nucleosome disassembly at bivalent chromatin domains containing repressive H3K27me3 and active H3K4me3 modifications during differentiation. Mcm2 localizes at transcription starting sites and the binding of Mcm2 at gene promoters is disrupted in both Mcm2-2A ES cells and neural precursor cells (NPCs). Reduced Mcm2 binding at bivalent chromatin domains in Mcm2-2A ES cells correlates with decreased chromatin accessibility at corresponding sites in NPCs. Together, our studies reveal a novel function of Mcm2 in ES cell differentiation, likely through manipulating chromatin landscapes at bivalent chromatin domains.

BackgroundHigh mobility group box protein 1 (HMGB1) is considered as a kind of sterile inflammatory mediators, which is an overexpression in patients with unexplained recurrent spontaneous abortion (URSA). Specific targeting effect of aspirin on HMGB1 has been revealed. Our previous studies have explored the application of HMGB1 as a therapeutic target of aspirin in URSA disease of mice model and human, but the dynamic process of aspirin downregulating HMGB1 concentration has not been demonstrated.MethodsFrom December 2018 to November 2020, women with URSA (n = 91) and control women (n = 90) with no history of recurrent abortion or adverse pregnancy were included in the Reproductive Medicine Center of the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University. ELISA was applied to detect the concentrations of HMGB1 and IFN-γ in the peripheral blood. Thirty-one URSA patients were monitored for low-dose aspirin treatment (2 and 4 weeks), the changes of HMGB1 and IFN-γ concentrations in peripheral blood of URSA patients before and after using aspirin were compared, and pregnancy outcomes after aspirin treatment were followed up.ResultsThe levels of HMGB1 in peripheral blood were significantly higher in URSA patients compared with controls, decreasing trends of HMGB1 and IFN-γ concentrations in plasma of URSA patients were observed after treatment with low-dose aspirin continuously, and the expression of HMGB1 was positively correlated with IFN-γ. There were no birth abnormalities in the babies of the URSA patients treated with aspirin.ConclusionsHigh levels of HMGB1 may be one of the pathogenesis of URSA. Low-dose aspirin may provide protective effect on the HMGB1-triggered URSA.

Intervertebral disc (IVD) degeneration (IVDD) which is highly prevalent within the elderly population, is a leading cause of chronic low back pain and disability. Nucleus pulposus (NP) cell senescence plays an indispensable role in the pathogenesis of IVDD. Morroniside is a major iridoid glycoside and one of the quality control metrics of Cornus officinalis Siebold & Zucc (CO). An increasing body of evidence suggests that morroniside and CO-containing formulae share many similar biological effects, including anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidative, and anti-apoptotic properties. In a previous study, we reported that Liuwei Dihuang Decoction, a CO-containing formula, is effective for treating IVDD by targeting p53 expression; however, the therapeutic role of morroniside on IVDD remains obscure. In this study, we assessed the pharmacological effects of morroniside on NP cell senescence and IVDD pathogenesis using a lumbar spine instability surgery-induced mouse IVDD model and an in vitro H2O2-induced NP cell senescence model. Our results demonstrated that morroniside administration could significantly ameliorate mouse IVDD progression, concomitant with substantial improvement in extracellular matrix metabolism and histological grading score. Importantly, in vivo and in vitro experiments revealed that morroniside could significantly reduce the increase in SA-β-gal activities and the expression of p53 and p21, which are the most widely used indicators of senescence. Mechanistically, morroniside suppressed ROS-induced aberrant activation of Hippo signaling by inhibiting Mst1/2 and Lats1/2 phosphorylation and reversing Yap/Taz reduction, whereas blockade of Hippo signaling by Yap/Taz inhibitor-1 or Yap/Taz siRNAs could antagonize the anti-senescence effect of morroniside on H2O2-induced NP cell senescence model by increasing p53 expression and activity. Moreover, the inhibition of Hippo signaling in the IVD tissues by morroniside was further verified in mouse IVDD model. Taken together, our findings suggest that morroniside protects against NP cell senescence to alleviate IVDD progression by inhibiting the ROS-Hippo-p53 pathway, providing a potential novel therapeutic approach for IVDD.

The purpose of this study was to compare the effects of sweet potato peels dietary fiber obtained by different extraction methods on intestinal health. Specifically, four different dietary fibers were extracted by hot water, microwave, ultrasonic and subcritical water methods. And the prebiotics effects of sweet potato peels dietary fibers were explored in an in vitro fermentation model, by determining intestinal gas content, short-chain fatty acid content, pH, ammonia content and the gut microbiota composition. The results showed that dietary fiber obtained by four different extraction methods could be utilized by GM and improve human health by increasing the abundance of beneficial bacteria (e.g., Bifidobacterium, Faecalibacterium, and Prevotella) and reducing the abundance of harmful bacteria (e.g., Proteobacteria, Romboutsia and Dorea), enhancing the relative abundance of SCFA-producing bacteria, promoting the production of short-chain fatty acids, reducing intestinal pH from 6.89 to 4.63 and ammonia. Among them, dietary fiber extracted by ultrasound is better than the other three extraction methods. This study suggests that all the four different extraction methods are available for sweet potato peels dietary fiber, and the extracted dietary fiber could be served as potential functional foods with great development value. In addition, it is beneficial to reduce the environmental pollution of sweet potato peels and improve the high-value processing and utilization of sweet potato by-products.

In order to solve the problems that the monitoring data was easy to be tampered with in the process of railway engineering construction safety monitoring, and the authenticity of the data might be questioned during the accountability of accidents, a blockchain-based railway engineering construction safety monitoring data sharing model was proposed.The characteristics of automatic execution of smart contracts ensured the transparency of the process of monitoring data on the chain.In the PBFT algorithm, there was a problem that the Byzantine nodes and the normal nodes were selected as the master node with the same probability, a reputation-based practical Byzantine fault tolerance algorithm was proposed.Streaming data on the chain might cause network congestion, which simplified the consensus protocol and reduced the time complexity from O(n2) to O(n).A comparative experiment was conducted using Hyperledger Caliper to prove that the delay of the improved algorithm is lower than PBFT algorithm, and the throughput is higher than PBFT algorithm.A quantitative analysis of the possibility of attack and the probability of successful attack was carried out, and it was determined that the smart contract provides tamper-proof modification for the monitoring data on the chain.Comparative analysis proves that the proposed blockchain-based railway engineering construction safety monitoring data sharing model is good than other models in terms of consensus efficiency, TPS and block generation speed.

In order to improve the refrigeration performance of thermoelectric refrigeration box, the common thermoelectric (semiconductor) refrigeration box on the market was analyzed, and the structure between the refrigeration assembly of the refrigeration box and the wall of the box was explored. SolidWorks Flow Simulation was used to model and simulate the structure between the refrigeration assembly and the wall of the refrigeration box. The effects of gravity, fan direction, groove size and bracket on the refrigeration performance of semiconductor refrigeration box were analyzed. It is concluded that when the groove size is fixed, the cooling performance of thermoelectric refrigeration box is optimal when the gravity direction is at the longest side of the box size, the direction of fan intake is suction and symmetrical bracket is added in the groove. The four sides of the support are cut out as many circles as possible, and the larger the circle is, the better.

In order to promote and broaden the utilization of fly ash as a resource, the fly ash from a 2,660-MW coal-fired power plant in Huainan (China) was investigated. The physical and chemical properties of fly ash were characterized by scanning electron microscopy, energy spectrum analysis, and XRD. The content and different forms of the heavy metals Cd, Cr, Cu, Co, and Ni were determined by acid digestion, oscillation leaching, and Tessier five-step extraction. The effect of pH, temperature, and particle size on the leached amount of heavy metals was studied. Finally, the ecological risk index was calculated for each heavy metal via the risk assessment coding (RAC) method and Hakanson ecological risk assessment method, allowing the ecological risk of fly ash to be determined under different environmental conditions. Results showed that the average concentrations of Cd, Cr, Co, and Ni were all below the risk screening values reported for environmental pollutants (pH > 7.5). Under varying pH, temperature, and particle size conditions, the leached amounts (oscillation leaching) were below the soil risk screening values for agricultural land in China. An RAC-Cd value of >50% indicates a high ecological risk, while the RAC values of Co and Ni were between 10 and 30%, indicating a medium ecological risk, and the RAC values of Cr and Cu were

The effect of low-molecular-weight organic acids (citric acid and malic acid) on the migration characteristics of Pb in contaminated soils was explored in this study. Reclaimed soil was collected from the coal gangue hill area of the Panyi mine in Huainan City (China). The effect of citric acid and malic acid on the form of Pb present in the reclaimed soil was analyzed by spiking soil samples and simulating Pb-contaminated soil. The results indicate the following. 1) With increased concentration of exogenous Pb, the activity of Pb in the reclaimed soil was effectively improved. 2) The addition of citric acid and malic acid both resulted in an increased fraction of exchangeable Pb in the soil, which effectively promoted the active Pb fraction. As the concentrations of citric acid and malic acid increased, the active Pb fraction of the reclaimed soil increased accordingly. The Pb activation effect of citric acid was observed to be greater than that of malic acid. 3) With extended soil aging time, the activation effect of organic acids on Pb weakened, with the loosely bound Pb gradually transforming into strongly bound Pb. Chelating agents can activate heavy metals in soil, mainly through the combination of chelating agents and heavy metal ions in the soil solution to form soluble metal chelates, so as to increase the bioavailability of heavy metals in soil to plant roots. Therefore, adding citric acid can be considered as a strategy to enhance the efficiency of reclaimed soil remediation because of the ability of Pb activation.

Osteoclasts (OCs) are multinucleated cells that play a major role in osteolytic diseases such as osteoporosis. Monascin (Ms) is one of the active substances in the traditional Chinese medicine red yeast rice. Studies have found that red yeast rice can maintain bone health. In this study, the anti-osteoclastogenesis effects of Ms on RANKL-induced RAW264.7 cells were assessed, and the underlying mechanism was investigated. Ms exhibited inhibitory effects on OC differentiation and formation in a dose-dependent manner and suppressed the bone-resorbing activity of mature OCs. Ms blocked OCs-typical genes (c-Fos, NFATc1, CSTK, MMP-9, TRAP, ITG-β3, OSCAR and DC-STAMP). Furthermore, Ms treatment considerably inhibited the activation of MAPKs, JNK and p38. Taken together, Ms suppresses RANKL-induced osteoclastogenesis of RAW264.7 cells by restraining MAPKs signaling pathways and is a potential therapeutic option as a novel OC inhibitor to mitigate bone erosion.

Zona pellucida (ZP) abnormalities are the cause of low fertility or infertility, agar-like ZP is more common in abnormal ZP. The purpose of this exploration is to systematically analyze the fertilization competence of agar-like ZP oocytes, the development characteristics of subsequent embryos as well as the results of embryo transfer, aiming to explore effective clinical treatment strategies. A total of 58 patients with agar-like ZP were set as the case group and the control group involved 3866 patients, in which the patients’ oocytes presented normal ZP. BMI, basal hormone levels, and hormone levels were similar in both groups. The case patients suffered significantly longer infertility years than control (p

BackgroundSerious games (SGs) as one kind of intervention that can improve the level of knowledge and change behavior to affect health outcomes has been increasingly applied in health care.ObjectiveAnalyze hotspots and trends of the application of SGs in health care and provide reference and direction for further research in the future.MethodsThe Web of Science (WoS) Core Collection database was used for extracting the literature on SGs in health care for the period from the database established to 11 October, 2021. Scoping review and bibliometric analysis were used to deeply analyze and visualize countries, categories of studies, annual study output, cited authors, cited journals, cited articles, and keywords of healthcare field.ResultsA total of 1,322 articles were retrieved, then every articles' title and abstract were read one by one, and 795 articles were included after screening with an exponential increase in publication volume. The United States of America made the greatest contribution to global publications regarding SGs in health care. From the total, 20.8% of articles fall under the category of health care sciences services. The target groups were mainly concentrated in children (18.0%), youth (13.8%), the elderly (10.9%), adolescents (9.1%), and adults (3.4%). Baranowski T (n = 103 citations) is the most influential author, followed by Kato PM (n = 73 citations) and Desmet A (n = 58 citations). The top three cited journals were “Plos One” (n = 268 citations), “Games for Health Journal” (n = 209 citations), and “Journal of Medical Internet Research” (n = 197 citations), and the top three cited articles were “A meta-analysis of serious digital games for healthy lifestyle promotion,” “A Systematic Review of Serious Games in Training Health Care Professionals,” and “Video game training enhances cognitive control in older adults.” More and more studies focus on specific age groups, such as children, adolescents, and the elderly. The research hotspots and trends included “rehabilitation,” “medical education,” and “design.”ConclusionsThe application of SGs in health care remains important areas for future research. “Rehabilitation,” “medical education,” and “design” reflected the latest research hotpots and future trends.

In this paper, magnetic cotton textile wastes pyrolyzed by ferric cerium oxide (FexCey oxide/PC) were synthesized for degradation of p-nitrophenol by catalytic ozonation, and the optimal Fe-Ce ratio was 10:1. Compared to Fe10Ce1 oxide, the Fe10Ce1 oxide/PC not only greatly improved the degradation efficiency of PNP, but also reduced the dosage of catalyst. Through the BET test, the Fe10Ce1 oxide/PC has a high specific surface area to absorb part of the pollutants. VSM test shows that the material is magnetic and easy to recycle. Response surface methodology (RSM) was applied to optimize the experimental condition, and the optimal removal rate was 90% when the initial pH was 9, the catalyst dosage was 0.4 g/L, and the ozone addition was 1.77 L/min (5.9 mg/L). Finally, the mechanism of PNP degradation was explored utilizing inhibitor and ESR free radical detection. The adsorption capacity of the material and electron-absorbing property of PNP jointly determined the high catalytic efficiency with Fe10Ce1 oxide/PC in catalytic ozonation. HIGHLIGHTS The optimum proportion of cotton textile waste pyrolysis was determined by oxide screening.; The specific surface area of the oxide pyrolysis cotton textile wastes is larger than that of the oxide itself and it is magnetic to recycle.; Inhibitors and free radical detection proved that catalytic ozonation follows hydroxyl radical mechanism.; The response surface method was used to explore the optimal process parameters.;

Introduction The present work describes the green synthesis and characterization and cytotoxicity, antioxidant, and anti-human lung cancer activities of silver nanoparticles containing Curcumae kwangsiensis folium leaf aqueous extract. Material and methods Ag nanoparticles were produced by mixing the AgNO3 solution with aqueous C. kwangsiensis folium leaf extract. Characterization of Ag nanoparticles was done by FE-SEM, FT-IR, TEM, and UV-Vis. FE-SEM and TEM images revealed an average diameter of 15-21 nm for the nanoparticles. MTT assay was used on common human lung cancer cell lines, i.e., lung well-differentiated bronchogenic adenocarcinoma (HLC-1), lung moderately differentiated adenocarcinoma (LC-2/ad), and lung poorly differentiated adenocarcinoma (PC-14) cell lines, to survey the cytotoxicity and anti-human lung cancer effects of Ag nanoparticles. Results They had very low cell viability and high anti-human lung cancer activities dose-dependently against HLC-1, LC-2/ad, and PC-14 cell lines without any cytotoxicity towards the normal cell line (HUVEC). The IC50 values of Ag nanoparticles were 249, 187, and 152 µg/ml against HLC-1, LC-2/ad, and PC-14 cell lines, respectively. The best results of cytotoxicity and anti-human lung cancer properties were seen at the concentration of 1000 µg/ml. Ag nanoparticles inhibited half of the DPPH molecules in the concentration of 135 µg/ml. Maybe significant anti-human lung cancer potentials of Ag nanoparticles synthesized by C. kwangsiensis folium leaf aqueous extract against common human lung cancer cell lines are linked to their antioxidant activities. Conclusions After confirming the above results in the clinical trial research, this formulation can be administered to treat human lung cancers in humans.

Objective: This study aimed to investigate the outcomes of patients who had preimplantation genetic testing for chromosomal structural rearrangement (PGT-SR) or for aneuploidy screening (PGT-A) with different indications. Methods: This was a retrospective study at a single center. Pregnancy outcomes of all couples who had PGT from 2014 to 2018 were retrospectively analyzed, and the cumulative pregnancy rates (CPR) and the cumulative live birth/ongoing pregnancy rate (CLB/OPR) per patient with at least one transfer cycle were calculated. Results: A total of 313 PGT-SR cycles of 255 patients, 22 PGT-sexing cycles of 20 patients, and 190 PGT-A cycles of 168 patients were performed during the period. In PGT-SR, the overall CPR and the CLB/OPR were 68.04% and 59.79%, respectively. In PGT-A, the CPR and CLB/OPR were 67.52% and 58.12%, respectively. We also found that the CPR (93.75%) and CLB/OPR (87.50%) were highest in patients for PGT-sexing with a diagnosis of Y chromosomal microdeletion. In addition, we discovered a significant trend that aneuploidy rate significantly increased with maternal age (p = 0.000) in PGT-A population. No significant difference was found in the mosaicism rate or clinical outcomes among the age groups. Similarly, the significance was absent in the PGT-SR population. Conclusion: We reviewed the CPR and CLB/OPR for different indications since the 24-chromosome technique has been applied in the clinical setting for 4 years in our center. We hope that our results will provide some pointed guidance and a new perspective on outcomes for PGT in certain patients and clinicians.

3-Azabicyclo[3.1.0]hexanes are common structural components in natural products and bioactive compounds. Traditionally, the metal-mediated cyclopropanation domino reaction of chain enzymes is the most commonly used strategy for the construction of this type of aza[3.1.0]bicycle derivative. In this study, a base-promoted intramolecular addition of alkenes used to deliver conformationally restricted highly substituted aza[3.1.0]bicycles is reported. This reaction was tailor-made for saturated aza[3.1.0] bicycle-containing fused bicyclic compounds that may be applied in the development of concise and divergent total syntheses of bioactive compounds.

The influence of steaming treatment on the soluble dietary fiber (SDF) of sweet potato was investigated. The SDF content increased from 2.21 to 4.04 g/100 g (in dry basis) during 20 min of steaming. The microcosmic morphology of the fractured cell wall indicated the release of SDF components during steaming. The SDF from fresh (SDF-F) and 20 min steamed (SDF-S) sweet potato was characterized. The neutral carbohydrates and uronic acid levels in SDF-S were significantly higher than SDF-F (59.31% versus 46.83%, and 25.36% versus 9.60%, respectively) (p < 0.05). The molecular weight of SDF-S was smaller than SDF-F (5.32 kDa versus 28.79 kDa). The probiotic property was evaluated by four Lactobacillus spp. fermentation in vitro with these SDF as carbon source, using inulin as the references. SDF-F showed the best proliferation effects on the four Lactobacillus spp. in terms of the OD600 and pH in cultures, and the highest production of propanoic acid and butyric acid after 24 h fermentation. SDF-S presented higher Lactobacillus proliferation effects, but slight lower propanoic acid and butyric acid production than inulin. It was concluded that 20 min of steaming released SDF with inferior probiotic properties, which might derive from the degraded pectin, cell wall components, and resistant dextrin.

In this paper, a low-complexity joint compensation scheme of carrier recovery (JCSCR) for coherent free-space optical (CFSO) communication is proposed. We applied the carrier recovery joint compensation approach to a CFSO communication system in the quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) modulation format. A signal-preprocessing stage, which effectively avoided the repetitive operations found in traditional carrier recovery schemes, was proposed. Unlike in existing carrier recovery algorithms, the modulated phase of the received signal could be accurately removed using only the sum and subtraction of real absolute values in the signal-preprocessing stage, greatly reducing the complexity of the operation. Since this algorithm avoids the traditional fourth operation, the system’s complexity is reduced while additional noise generated by fourth cross-terms would be prevented and system noise immunity would be greatly enhanced. In addition, this algorithm uses joint compensation of phase errors in the final compensation stage, further reducing the complexity of the computation of the whole algorithmic scheme. A 10 Gbps QPSK CFSO communication transmission experiment was conducted in an atmospheric turbulence channel to verify the proposed technique and improvement in receiver sensitivity.

Video Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) has shown great potential in moving target detection and tracking. At present, most of the existing detection methods focus on the intensity information of the moving target shadow. According to the mechanism of shadow formation, some shadows of moving targets present low contrast, and their boundaries are blurred. Additionally, some objects with low reflectivity show similar features with them. These cause the performance of these methods to degrade. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a new moving target shadow detection method, which consists of background modeling and shadow detection based on intensity information and neighborhood similarity (BIIANS). Firstly, in order to improve the efficiency of image sequence generation, a fast method based on the Back-projection imaging algorithm (f-BP) is proposed. Secondly, due to the low-rank characteristics of stationary objects and the sparsity characteristics of moving target shadows presented in the image sequence, this paper introduces the low-rank sparse decomposition (LRSD) method to perform background modeling for obtaining better background (static objects) and foreground (moving targets) images. Because the shadows of moving targets appear in the same position in the original and the corresponding foreground images, the similarity between them is high and independent of their intensity. Therefore, using the BIIANS method can obtain better shadow detection results. Real W-band data are used to verify the proposed method. The experimental results reveal that the proposed method performs better than the classical methods in suppressing false alarms, missing alarms, and improving integrity.

Abstract Background Although postoperative delirium is a frequent complication of surgery, little is known about risk factors for delirium occurring in the post-anaesthesia care unit (PACU). The aim of this study was to determine pre- and intraoperative risk factors for the development of recovery room delirium (RRD) in patients undergoing elective non-cardiovascular surgery. Methods RRD was diagnosed according to the Confusion Assessment Method for the Intensive Care Unit (CAM-ICU). We collected perioperative data in 228 patients undergoing elective non-cardiovascular surgery under general anaesthesia and performed univariate and multivariate logistic regression to identify risk factors related to RRD. PACU and postoperative events were recorded to assess the outcome of RRD. Results Fifty-seven patients (25%) developed RRD. On multivariate analysis, maintenance of anaesthesia with inhalation anaesthetic agents (OR = 6.294, 95% CI 1.4–28.8, corrected p = 0.03), malignant primary disease (OR = 3.464, 95% CI = 1.396–8.592, corrected p = 0.018), American Society of Anaesthesiologists Physical Status (ASA-PS) III–V (OR = 3.389, 95% CI = 1.401–8.201, corrected p = 0.018), elevated serum total or direct bilirubin (OR = 2.535, 95% CI = 1.006–6.388, corrected p = 0.049), and invasive surgery (OR = 2.431, 95% CI = 1.103–5.357, corrected p = 0.035) were identified as independent risk factors for RRD. RRD was associated with higher healthcare costs (31,428 yuan [17,872–43,674] versus 16,555 yuan [12,618–27,788], corrected p = 0.002), a longer median hospital stay (17 days [12–23.5] versus 11 days [9–17], corrected p = 0.002), and a longer postoperative stay (11 days [7–15] versus 7 days [5–10], corrected p = 0.002]). Conclusions Identifying patients at high odds for RRD preoperatively would enable the formation of more timely postoperative delirium management programmes.

Abstract Nonfullerene organic solar cells (OSCs) have achieved breakthrough with pushing the efficiency exceeding 17%. While this shed light on OSC commercialization, high-performance flexible OSCs should be pursued through solution manufacturing. Herein, we report a solution-processed flexible OSC based on a transparent conducting PEDOT:PSS anode doped with trifluoromethanesulfonic acid (CF3SO3H). Through a low-concentration and low-temperature CF3SO3H doping, the conducting polymer anodes exhibited a main sheet resistance of 35 Ω sq−1 (minimum value: 32 Ω sq−1), a raised work function (≈ 5.0 eV), a superior wettability, and a high electrical stability. The high work function minimized the energy level mismatch among the anodes, hole-transporting layers and electron-donors of the active layers, thereby leading to an enhanced carrier extraction. The solution-processed flexible OSCs yielded a record-high efficiency of 16.41% (maximum value: 16.61%). Besides, the flexible OSCs afforded the 1000 cyclic bending tests at the radius of 1.5 mm and the long-time thermal treatments at 85 °C, demonstrating a high flexibility and a good thermal stability.

Abstract Background The brain’s dynamic spontaneous neural activity and dynamic functional connectivity (dFC) are both important in supporting cognition, but how these two types of brain dynamics evolve and co-evolve in subjective cognitive decline (SCD) and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) remain unclear. The aim of the present study was to investigate recurrent and concurrent patterns of two types of dynamic brain states correlated with cognitive decline. Methods The present study analyzed resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging data from 62 SCD patients, 75 MCI patients, and 70 healthy controls (HCs). We used the sliding-window and clustering method to identify two types of recurrent brain states from both dFC and dynamic regional spontaneous activity, as measured by dynamic fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (dfALFF). Then, the occurrence frequency of a dFC or dfALFF state and the co-occurrence frequency of a pair of dFC and dfALFF states among all time points are extracted for each participant to describe their dynamics brain patterns. Results We identified a few recurrent states of dfALFF and dFC and further ascertained the co-occurrent patterns of these two types of dynamic brain states (i.e., dfALFF and dFC states). Importantly, the occurrence frequency of a default-mode network (DMN)-dominated dFC state was significantly different between HCs and SCD patients, and the co-occurrence frequencies of a DMN-dominated dFC state and a DMN-dominated dfALFF state were also significantly different between SCD and MCI patients. These two dynamic features were both significantly positively correlated with Mini-Mental State Examination scores. Conclusion Our findings revealed novel fMRI-based neural signatures of cognitive decline from recurrent and concurrent patterns of dfALFF and dFC, providing strong evidence supporting SCD as the transition phase between normal aging and MCI. This finding holds potential to differentiate SCD patients from HCs via both dFC and dfALFF as objective neuroimaging biomarkers, which may aid in the early diagnosis and intervention of Alzheimer’s disease.

Background & Aims: Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is becoming a severe liver disorder worldwide. Autophagy plays a critical role in liver steatosis. However, the role of autophagy in NAFLD remains exclusive and under debate. In this study, we investigated the role of S100 calcium binding protein A11 (S100A11) in the pathogenesis of hepatic steatosis. Methods: We performed liver proteomics in a well-established tree shrew model of NAFLD. The expression of S100A11 in different models of NAFLD was detected by Western blot and/or quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Liver S100A11 overexpression mice were generated by injecting a recombinant adenovirus gene transfer vector through the tail vein and then induced by a high-fat and high-cholesterol diet. Cell lines with S100a11 stable overexpression were established with a recombinant lentiviral vector. The lipid content was measured with either Bodipy staining, Oil Red O staining, gas chromatography, or a triglyceride kit. The autophagy and lipogenesis were detected in vitro and in vivo by Western blot and quantitative polymerase chain reaction. The functions of Sirtuin 1, histone deacetylase 6 (HDAC6), and FOXO1 were inhibited by specific inhibitors. The interactions between related proteins were analyzed by a co-immunoprecipitation assay and immunofluorescence analysis. Results: The expression of S100A11 was up-regulated significantly in a time-dependent manner in the tree shrew model of NAFLD. S100A11 expression was induced consistently in oleic acid–treated liver cells as well as the livers of mice fed a high-fat diet and NAFLD patients. Both in vitro and in vivo overexpression of S100A11 could induce hepatic lipid accumulation. Mechanistically, overexpression of S100A11 activated an autophagy and lipogenesis process through up-regulation and acetylation of the transcriptional factor FOXO1, consequently promoting lipogenesis and lipid accumulation in vitro and in vivo. Inhibition of HDAC6, a deacetylase of FOXO1, showed similar phenotypes to S100A11 overexpression in Hepa 1–6 cells. S100A11 interacted with HDAC6 to inhibit its activity, leading to the release and activation of FOXO1. Under S100A11 overexpression, the inhibition of FOXO1 and autophagy could alleviate the activated autophagy as well as up-regulated lipogenic genes. Both FOXO1 and autophagy inhibition and Dgat2 deletion could reduce liver cell lipid accumulation significantly. Conclusions: A high-fat diet promotes liver S100A11 expression, which may interact with HDAC6 to block its binding to FOXO1, releasing or increasing the acetylation of FOXO1, thus activating autophagy and lipogenesis, and accelerating lipid accumulation and liver steatosis. These findings indicate a completely novel S100A11-HDAC6-FOXO1 axis in the regulation of autophagy and liver steatosis, providing potential possibilities for the treatment of NAFLD.

The sharply growing demand for increased transmission capacity and bandwidth in last meter and last mile access networks together with the commercialization of fifth generation (5G) wireless systems has been opening up new opportunities for non-radio frequency (RF)-based wireless technologies. Visible light communications (VLC) technology is a potential candidate for access networking in 5G, which offers a higher spectral efficiency than RF-based Femtocell networks by three orders of magnitude. This paper proposes an all wireless optical bidirectional VLC multiple access scheme for pure VLC network access points in terminals. Centralized coordination is adopted to reduce the system complexity. And reservation of resource is introduced to guarantee collision avoidance during data frame transmission. The proposed multiple access scheme introduces special system parameters to achieve the balance of system throughput and access latency. The feasibility of the proposed scheme is verified by both theoretical analysis and experimental investigation. We show that the proposed scheme is suitable for a bidirectional pure VLC access network and can be used as a supplement in the IEEE 802.11 bb for 5G+bidirectional VLC application scenarios.

Visible light communication (VLC) is considered an important complementary technology for extremely high sixth-generation (6G) data transmission and has become part of a hybrid 6G indoor network architecture with an ultradense deployment of VLC access points (APs) that presents severe challenges to user mobility. An adaptive handover mechanism, which includes a seamless handover protocol and a selection algorithm optimized with a deep reinforcement learning (DRL) method, is proposed to overcome these challenges. Experimental simulation results reveal that the average downlink data rate with the proposed algorithm is up to 48% better than those with traditional RL algorithms and that this algorithm also outperforms the deep Q-network (DQN), Sarsa and Q-learning algorithms by 8%, 13% and 13%, respectively.

Abstract Aberrant mechanical factor is one of the etiologies of the intervertebral disc (IVD) degeneration (IVDD). However, the exact molecular mechanism of spinal mechanical loading stress-induced IVDD has yet to be elucidated due to a lack of an ideal and stable IVDD animal model. The present study aimed to establish a stable IVDD mouse model and evaluated the effect of aberrant spinal mechanical loading on the pathogenesis of IVDD. Eight-week-old male mice were treated with lumbar spine instability (LSI) surgery to induce IVDD. The progression of IVDD was evaluated by μCT and Safranin O/Fast green staining analysis. The metabolism of extracellular matrix, ingrowth of sensory nerves, pyroptosis in IVDs tissues were determined by immunohistological or real-time PCR analysis. The apoptosis of IVD cells was tested by TUNEL assay. IVDD modeling was successfully produced by LSI surgery, with substantial reductions in IVD height, BS/TV, Tb.N. and lower IVD score. LSI administration led to the histologic change of disc degeneration, disruption of the matrix metabolism, promotion of apoptosis of IVD cells and invasion of sensory nerves into annulus fibrosus, as well as induction of pyroptosis. Moreover, LSI surgery activated Wnt signaling in IVD tissues. Mechanical instability caused by LSI surgery accelerates the disc matrix degradation, nerve invasion, pyroptosis, and eventually lead to IVDD, which provided an alternative mouse IVDD model.

Designing efficient adsorbents for trace gas removal remains a serious challenge. Here, the authors show promise in layered 2D metal−organic frameworks, often overlooked in favor of 3D frameworks, for separating trace acetylene from ethylene with enhanced performance and high stability.

Leaf morphology is an important component of rice ideal plant type. To date, many regulatory genes influencing leaf morphology in rice have been cloned, and their underlying molecular regulatory mechanism has been preliminarily clarified. However, the fine regulation relationship of leaf morphogenesis and plant type remains largely elusive. In this study, a rolling-leaf mutant, named rlm1-D, was obtained and controlled by a pair of dominant nuclear genes. Cytological observations revealed that the rlm1 was mainly caused by abnormal deposition of secondary cell walls. Molecular evidence showed ectopic expression of a MYB-type transcription factor LOC_Os05g46610 was responsible for the phenotype of rlm1-D. A series of experiments, including the transcription factor-centered technology, DNA-binding assay, and electrophoretic mobility shift assay, verified that RLM1 can bind to the promoter of OsCAD2, a key gene responsible for lignin biosynthesis in rice. An interacting partner of RLM1, OsMAPK10, was identified. Multiple biochemical assays confirmed that OsMAPK10 interacted with RLM1. OsMAPK10 positively regulated the lignin content in the leaves and stems of rice. Moreover, OsMAPK10 contributes to RLM1 activation of downstream target genes. In particular, RLM1 is exclusively expressed in the stems at the mature plant stage. The yield of RLM1 knockdown lines increased by over 11% without other adverse agricultural trait penalties, indicating great practical application value. A MAPK-MYB-OsCAD2 genetic regulatory network controlling SCW was proposed, providing a theoretical significance and practical value for shaping the ideal plant type and improving rice yield.

BackgroundThe government’s COVID-19 pandemic response lockdown strategy had a negative psychological and physical impact on individuals, which necessitated special care to pregnant women’s mental health. There has been no large-scale research on the underlying relationship between perceived stress and insomnia symptoms in pregnant Chinese women up to this point. During the COVID-19 pandemic, we wanted to see if there was an association between perceived stress and insomnia symptoms, as well as the moderating impact of resilience for Chinese pregnant women.MethodsThis cross-sectional study examined 2115 pregnant women from central and western China using multi-stage sampling methodologies. A systematic questionnaire was used to collect information on sleep quality, perceived stress, and resilience using the Insomnia Severity Index, Perceptual Stress Scale, and Connor and Davidson Resilience Scale. To assess the moderating influence of resilience, hierarchical regressions were used.ResultsDuring the COVID-19 pandemic, 18.53% of respondents (N = 2115) reported experiencing sleeplessness. In pregnant women, perceived stress was positively linked with insomnia symptoms (p < 0.001). Furthermore, resilience significantly attenuated the influence of perceived stress on insomnia symptoms in Chinese expectant mother (βinteraction = −0.0126, p < 0.001).ConclusionPregnant women with strong resilience were less influenced by perceived stress than those with poor resilience. The findings of this study might give empirical proof that health care professionals should identify the relevance of reducing perceived stress in pregnant women with poor resilience and provide better treatment and support when necessary.

The dominant approach in investigating the individual reliability for event-related potentials (ERPs) is to extract peak-related features at electrodes showing the strongest group effects. Such a peak-based approach implicitly assumes ERP components showing a stronger group effect are also more reliable, but this assumption has not been substantially validated and few studies have investigated the reliability of ERPs beyond peaks. In this study, we performed a rigorous evaluation of the test-retest reliability of ERPs collected in a multisensory and cognitive experiment from 82 healthy adolescents, each having two sessions. By comparing group effects and individual reliability, we found that a stronger group-level response in ERPs did not guarantee higher reliability. A perspective of neural oscillation should be adopted for the analysis of reliability. Further, by simulating ERPs with an oscillation-based computational model, we found that the consistency between group-level ERP responses and individual reliability was modulated by inter-subject latency jitter and inter-trial variability. The current findings suggest that the conventional peak-based approach may underestimate the individual reliability in ERPs and a neural oscillation perspective on ERP reliability should be considered. Hence, a comprehensive evaluation of the reliability of ERP measurements should be considered in individual-level neurophysiological trait evaluation and psychiatric disorder diagnosis.

BackgroundBlastocyst biopsy has become the most mainstream biopsy method. Currently, there are two blastocyst biopsy strategies. Many studies have compared the advantages and disadvantages between blastomere and blastocyst biopsy, but fewer articles have compared the two blastocyst biopsy strategies. For the moment, no published studies have explored the entire set of information on embryo development, next-generation sequencing results, and clinical outcomes, including the baby’s health status with the two blastocyst biopsy strategies.MethodsA total of 323 preimplantation genetic testing cycles from April 2018 to May 2020, including 178 cycles with Strategy A and 145 cycles with Strategy B. Strategy A was to create a laser-assisted zona pellucid opening for cleavage embryo on the third day after insemination, but Strategy B was not. Strategy A performed a biopsy for artificially assisted hatching blastocysts, while Strategy B performed a biopsy for expanded blastocysts on day 5 or 6. In this study, embryo development, next-generation sequencing results, pregnancy outcomes, and offspring health of the two strategies were compared and analyzed.ResultsThere were no statistical differences between the two groups in the rate of fertilization, blastocyst and abortion. The rate of cleavage from Strategy A was slightly higher than Strategy B, and the rate of high-quality cleavage embryo was lower than Strategy B, while the rate of high-quality blastocyst was higher than Strategy B. The rate of no-results blastocyst was significantly lower than Strategy B. In particular, the rate of biochemical pregnancy, clinical pregnancy, and live birth of Strategy A were significantly lower than those of Strategy B. The average Apgar scores of newborns were ≥8 in both groups, and there was no significant difference in average height and weight. In Strategy A, a baby was born with thumb syndactyly, and Strategy B had no congenital disabilities.ConclusionsBlastocyst biopsy strategy without laser-assisted zona pellucid drilling on day 3 achieves better clinical treatment effects. Therefore, Strategy B is an optimal treatment regime for PGT.

Characterization and prediction of individual difference of pain sensitivity are of great importance in clinical practice. MRI techniques, such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), have been popularly used to predict an individual’s pain sensitivity, but existing studies are limited by using one single imaging modality (fMRI or DTI) and/or using one type of metrics (regional or connectivity features). As a result, pain-relevant information in MRI has not been fully revealed and the associations among different imaging modalities and different features have not been fully explored for elucidating pain sensitivity. In this study, we investigated the predictive capability of multi-features (regional and connectivity metrics) of multimodal MRI (fMRI and DTI) in the prediction of pain sensitivity using data from 210 healthy subjects. We found that fusing fMRI-DTI and regional-connectivity features are capable of more accurately predicting an individual’s pain sensitivity than only using one type of feature or using one imaging modality. These results revealed rich information regarding individual pain sensitivity from the brain’s both structural and functional perspectives as well as from both regional and connectivity metrics. Hence, this study provided a more comprehensive characterization of the neural correlates of individual pain sensitivity, which holds a great potential for clinical pain management.

The random finite set-based extended target tracking methods generally partition measurements by spatial information. It is possible to place clutter measurements into target cells in a dense clutter environment resulting in degradation of tracking performance. To solve this issue, in this paper, the amplitude information of the target and clutter was introduced into the Gaussian Inverse Wishart Probability Hypothesis Density (GIW-PHD) filter, and thus, the optimal partition was found by calculating the amplitude likelihood of the measurement cells. Additionally, when calculating the centroid of a measurement cell, amplitude was used as a weighting factor to find the mass center instead of the widely used geometric center. This further reduced clutter interference. The tracking results of Swerling 1 fluctuating targets in a Rayleigh clutter when the signal-to-clutter ratios were 13 dB and 6 dB showed that the performance of the proposed algorithm in cardinality estimation and state estimation was better than that of the GIW-PHD filter.

Abstract Background The present study aimed to assess the perturbation in circular RNA (circRNA)/mRNA expression profiles and a circRNA-miRNA-mRNA coexpression network involved in the potential protective effect of diosgenin (DIO) on alveolar bone loss in rats subjected to ovariectomy (OVX). Methods The Wistar rats (female) manipulated with sham operation were classified as the SHAM group and the grouping of OVX rats administered with DIO, estradiol valerate or vehicle for 12 weeks was DIO group, EV group and OVX group respectively. Following treatments, the plasmatic levels of osteocalcin and tumor necrosis factor-alpha and the microstructure of alveolar bone were assayed. Based on microarray analyses, we identified differentially expressed (DE) circRNAs and mRNAs in alveolar bone of rats in both OVX and DIO group. The DE circRNAs and DE mRNAs involved in the bone metabolism pathway validated by RT-qPCR were considered key circRNAs/mRNAs. On the basis of these key circRNAs/mRNAs, we predicted the overlapping relative miRNAs of key circRNAs/mRNAs, and a circRNA-miRNA-mRNA network was built. Results DIO showed an anti-osteopenic effect on the rat alveolar bone loss induced by OVX. In total, we found 10 DE circRNAs (6 downregulated and 4 upregulated) and 614 DE mRNAs (314 downregulated and 300 upregulated) in samples of the DIO group compared with those of the OVX group. However, only one circRNA (rno_circRNA_016717) and seven mRNAs (Sfrp1, Csf1, Il1rl1, Nfatc4, Tnfrsf1a, Pik3c2g, and Wnt9b) were validated by qRT-PCR and therefore considered key circRNA/mRNAs. According to these key circRNA/mRNAs and overlapping predicted miRNAs, a coexpression network was constructed. After network analysis, one circRNA-miRNA-mRNA axis (circRNA_016717/miR-501-5p/Sfrp1) was identified. Conclusion The mechanism of DIO inhibiting alveolar bone loss after OVX is possibly relevant to the simultaneous inhibition of osteogenesis and osteoclastogenesis by mediating the expression of important molecules in the Wnt, PI3K, RANK/RANKL or osteoclastogenic cytokine pathways. The circRNA_016717/miR-501-5p/Sfrp1 axis may play important roles in these processes.

Abstract Background When utilizing the retrosigmoid approach (RA), accurately identifying the transverse and sigmoid sinus transition (TSST) is a key procedure for neurosurgeons, especially in developing countries restricted by the lack of expensive devices, such as the neural navigation system and the three-dimensional volumetric image-rendered system. Before operations, a computed tomography scan is a common and cost-effective method of checking patients who suffer lesions located at the cerebellopontine angle. Therefore, we present a technique using only high-resolution computed tomography to identify the transverse and sigmoid sinus transition. Methods This retrospective study included 35 patients who underwent retrosigmoid approach operations to resect an acoustic neurinoma with the assistance of our technique. In brief, our technique contains 4 steps: (1) All patients’ 1-mm, consecutive, high-resolution computed tomographic images that clearly displayed landmarks, such as the inion, lambdoid suture, occipitomastoid suture, and the mastoid emissary foramen, were investigated initially. (2) We selected two particular slices (A and B) among all of these high-resolution computed tomographic images in which scanning planes were parallel with the line drawn from the root of the zygoma to the inion (LZI). Slice A contained both the root of the zygoma and the inion simultaneously, and slice B displayed the mastoid emissary foramen. (3) Four points (α, β, γ, δ) were arranged on slices A and B, and point α was located at the inner surface of the skull, which represents the posterior part of the sulci of the sigmoid sinus. Point β was located at the outer surface of the skull, and the line connecting them was perpendicular to the bone. Similarly, on slice B, we labeled point γ as the point that represents the posterior part of the sulci of the sigmoid sinus at the inner surface and point δ as the point located at the outer surface of the skull, and the line connecting them was also perpendicular to the bone. The distances between point β and the lambdoid suture/occipitomastoid suture and between point δ and the mastoid emissary foramen were calculated for slices A and B, respectively. (4) During the operation, a line indicating the LZI was drawn on the bone with ink when the superficial soft tissue was pushed away, and this line would cross the lambdoid suture/occipitomastoid suture. With both the crosspoint and the distance obtained from the high-resolution CT images, we could locate point β. We also used the same method to locate point δ after revealing the mastoid emissary foramen. The line connecting point β and point δ indicated the posterior border of the sigmoid sinus, and the intersection between the line and LZI indicated the inferior knee of the transverse and sigmoid sinus transition (TSST). Results All 35 patients underwent the RA craniectomies that were safely assisted by our technique, and neither the sigmoid sinus nor the transverse sinus was lacerated during the operations. Conclusion Our cost-effective technique is reliable and convenient for identifying the transverse and sigmoid sinus transition (TSST) which could be widely performed to guarantee the safety of RA craniectomy.

Abstract Background The in vitro maturation (IVM) technique has physical and financial benefits, but a lower efficiency and outcome that is still unclear whether it is related to polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) itself or the IVM procedure. In this study, we analyzed the clinical and laboratory outcomes of an optimized IVM protocol in patients with and without PCOS. We also discussed the possible reasons for early embryo arrest in the IVM cycle. Methods This prospective study involved 58 PCOS patients and 56 non-PCOS patients who underwent mild stimulated IVF combined IVM (IVF/M) cycles. The clinical and laboratory outcomes were compared between the two groups. Also, metaphase II (MII) oocytes were obtained after IVM from the two groups, and in vivo MII oocytes randomly collected from IVF patients were examined for mitochondrial function using a laser scanning confocal microscope (LSCM). The aneuploidy rate for arrested cleavage embryos from IVM and IVF oocytes were screened using Next Generation Sequencing (NGS). Results Mildly stimulated IVF/M resulted in cumulative clinical pregnancy and implantation rates (40.2, 28.7% in the PCOS group vs. 41.9, 36% in the non-PCOS group), respectively. The blastocyst formation rates were comparable (28% vs. 28.2%) in PCOS and non-PCOS groups, respectively. Using LSCM, there was a significant decrease in the mitochondrial membrane potential of IVM oocytes compared with the control IVF oocytes (P

Ubiquitination, an essential post-transcriptional modification (PTM), plays a vital role in nearly every biological process, including development and growth. Despite its functions in plant reproductive development, its targets in rice panicles remain unclear. In this study, we used proteome-wide profiling of lysine ubiquitination in rice (O. sativa ssp. indica) young panicles. We created the largest ubiquitinome dataset in rice to date, identifying 1638 lysine ubiquitination sites on 916 unique proteins. We detected three conserved ubiquitination motifs, noting that acidic glutamic acid (E) and aspartic acid (D) were most frequently present around ubiquitinated lysine. Enrichment analysis of Gene Ontology (GO) annotations and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathways of these ubiquitinated proteins revealed that ubiquitination plays an important role in fundamental cellular processes in rice young panicles. Interestingly, enrichment analysis of protein domains indicated that ubiquitination was enriched on a variety of receptor-like kinases and cytoplasmic tyrosine and serine-threonine kinases. Furthermore, we analyzed the crosstalk between ubiquitination, acetylation, and succinylation, and constructed a potential protein interaction network within our rice ubiquitinome. Moreover, we identified ubiquitinated proteins related to pollen and grain development, indicating that ubiquitination may play a critical role in the physiological functions in young panicles. Taken together, we reported the most comprehensive lysine ubiquitinome in rice so far, and used it to reveal the functional role of lysine ubiquitination in rice young panicles.

Conventional multi-sensor multi-target multi-Bernoulli (MS-MeMBer) filters are based on the assumption that each target produces at most one measurement per time step. However, this assumption is not always reasonable in practice as an extended target can generate multiple measurements per step due to the recent improvement in the sensor resolution. In this case, a potential estimation bias may occur in the current MS-MeMBer filters. Therefore, a novel extended target MS-MeMBer filter and its Gaussian inverse Wishart mixture implementation are given in this paper. Specifically, we modify the update process of the MS-MeMBer filter by assuming that the generation of extended target measurements follows an approximate Poisson-Body model. Simulation results validate that the proposed filter can effectively estimate the shape and position of the extended target.

In this paper, we propose and demonstrate a low-complexity fiber nonlinearity impairments compensation (NLC) scheme based on simple recurrent neural network (SRNN), combining with the triplets derived from the first-order perturbation solution of the coupled nonlinear Schrodinger equation. Benefitting from the time memory of SRNN, the proposed NLC can reduce the computational complexity without sacrificing the compensation performance compared with the schemes based on memoryless feedforward neural networks. To verify the feasibility of the proposed NLC, the simulation systems of single channel and three channel 30 GBaud polarization division multiplexing (PDM) 16 quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) over 2400 km standard single mode fiber transmission are constructed respectively. Comprehensive numerical simulation results demonstrate that although the NLC performance of proposed scheme is inferior to that of digital back propagation (DBP) with much higher complexity and impracticality, it can still achieve the competitive NLC performance with lower computational complexity compared to the schemes based on deep neural network (DNN) and artificial neural network (ANN). Moreover, it is further proved that using triplets as the feature required for NLC can cause the pattern of pseudo random bit sequence to be destroyed, resulting in the neural network-based NLC scheme not suffering from the problem of overestimation for performance. Additionally, the time memory of SRNN enables the number of triplets in training set required by the SRNN-based NLC to be reduced by 169% compared to that of DNN and ANN. The experimental results of 16 GBaud PDM-16QAM wavelength division multiplexing coherent systems demonstrate that compared to with ANN and DNN, the comparable NLC performance can also be achieved by the proposed scheme with lower complexity.

Given the important challenges associated with the processing of brain signals obtained from neuroimaging modalities, cognitive systems have been proposed as useful and effective frameworks for the modeling and understanding of brain activity patterns. They also enable direct communication pathways between the brain and external devices (brain–computer/machine interfaces). However, most of the research so far has focused on lab-based applications in constrained scenarios, which cannot be extrapolated to realistic field contexts. Considering the decoding of brain activity, biomedical engineers provide excellent tools to overcome the challenges of learning from brain activity patterns that are very likely to be affected by nonstationary behaviors and high uncertainty. The application of health and neural engineering to learning and modeling has recently demonstrated its remarkable usefulness for coping with the effects of extremely noisy environments, as well as the variability and dynamicity of brain signals. In addition, neurobiological studies have suggested that the behavior of neural cells exhibits functional patterns that resemble the properties of computational neuroscience to encode logical perception.

Summary: During atherosclerosis plaque progression, pathological intraplaque angiogenesis leads to plaque rupture accompanied by thrombosis, which is probably the most important cause of arteries complications such as cerebral and myocardial infarction. Even though few treatments are available to mitigate plaque rupture, further investigation is required to develop a robust optimized therapeutic method. In this study using rabbit and mouse atherosclerotic models, sinoporphyrin sodium (DVDMS)-mediated sonodynamic therapy reduced abnormal angiogenesis and plaque rupture. Briefly, DVDMS is injected to animals, and then the plaque was locally exposed to pulse ultrasound for a few minutes. Furthermore, a small size clinical trial was conducted on patients with atherosclerosis. Notably, a significant reduction of arterial inflammation and angiogenesis was recorded following a short period of DVDMS-mediated sonodynamic therapy treatment. This beneficial outcome was almost equivalent to the therapeutic outcome after 3-month intensive statin treatment. Key Words: apoptosis-induced apoptosis, atherosclerotic plaque, endothelial cell, macrophage, neovascularization, sonodynamic therapy

Electroencephalography (EEG) microstate analysis is a powerful tool to study the spatial and temporal dynamics of human brain activity, through analyzing the quasi-stable states in EEG signals. However, current studies mainly focus on rest-state EEG recordings, microstate analysis for the recording of EEG signals during naturalistic tasks is limited. It remains an open question whether current topographical clustering strategies for rest-state microstate analysis could be directly applied to task-state EEG data under the natural and dynamic conditions and whether stable and reliable results could still be achieved. It is necessary to answer the question and explore whether the topographical clustering strategies would affect the performance of microstate detection in task-state EEG microstate analysis. If it exists differences in microstate detection performance when different topographical clustering strategies are adopted, then we want to know how the alternations of the topographical clustering strategies are associated with the naturalistic task. To answer these questions, we work on a public emotion database using naturalistic and dynamic music videos as the stimulation to evaluate the effects of different topographical clustering strategies for task-state EEG microstate analysis. The performance results are systematically examined and compared in terms of microstate quality, task efficacy, and computational efficiency, and the impact of topographical clustering strategies on microstate analysis for naturalistic task data is discussed. The results reveal that a single-trial-based bottom-up topographical clustering strategy (bottom-up) achieves comparable results with the task-driven-based top-down topographical clustering (top-down). It suggests that, when task information is unknown, the single-trial-based topographical clustering could be a good choice for microstate analysis and neural activity study on naturalistic EEG data.

Objetivo: Por lo tanto, este trabajo investiga el mecanismo molecular de la activación de factores inducibles por hipoxia bajo diferentes presiones parciales de oxígeno bajas. Métodos: Siga estrictamente el cultivo aséptico in vitro de la línea celular de cáncer de vejiga UMUC3 y cuando las células crezcan en la fase logarítmica, cultive las células bajo diferentes presiones parciales de oxígeno bajas. Entre estos grupos, se transfectaron dos grupos de células con plásmidos de liposomas si-HIF-1α para silenciar la expresión de HIF-1α. Resultados: El experimento de clonación celular mostró que HIF-1α aumentará la adhesión y proliferación celular bajo hipoxia. El experimento de angiogénesis de Matrigel mostró que la hipoxia tiene un impacto negativo en la angiogénesis de las células tumorales. La prueba de raspado celular indicó que la hipoxia tiene un mayor impacto en la capacidad de migración de las células cancerosas, y HIF-1α tiene un impacto significativo en el proceso de migración. La prueba de invasión celular demostró que la hipoxia tiene un mayor impacto en la capacidad de invasión de las células cancerosas y HIF-1α tiene un gran impacto en el proceso de invasión. Conclusión: HIF-1α puede dirigirse al gen regulador vascular endothelial growth factor para promover la proliferación, migración, invasión, neovascularización y metástasis en los ganglios linfáticos de las células tumorales.

Osteoclasts are the only multinucleated cells in vivo responsible for bone resorption and are vital for regulating bone remodeling and maintaining bone mass. The RAW264.7 cell line is widely used to study osteoclastic differentiation and biological molecular mechanism. However, protocols for inducing osteoclast formation in RAW264.7 cells vary considerably between laboratories, hindering the replication of results. Therefore, we tested the influence of culture conditions on osteoclast differentiation, including cell density and receptor activator of nuclear factor kappa-B ligand (RANKL) concentrations with or without macrophage colony-stimulating factors (M-CSF). Tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase (TRAP) staining was used to detect the morphology of osteoclasts. qPCR was used to detect gene expression of osteoclast-specific gene marker cathepsin K (CTSK), osteoclast transcription factors c-Fos and nuclear factor of activated T cells, cytoplasmic 1 (NFATc1). The bone resorption function was evaluated by a scanning electron microscope (SEM). RANKL treatment increased multinucleated osteoclasts formation and increased CTSK, c-Fos and NFATc1 gene expression. Compared with RANKL treatment, M-CSF significantly decreased multinucleated osteoclasts formation, reduced CTSK gene expression and had little effect on c-Fos and NFATc1 gene expression. Concerning bone resorption activity, RANKL treatment increased bone resorption pits on bovine bone slices. Significantly higher levels of osteoclastogenesis were observed with RAW264.7-cell density of 2×104 cells/well in 24-well plates. Our results suggest that the addition of 50 ng/ml M-CSF has no positive effect on osteoclastogenesis. RANKL treatment and cell density contribute to osteoclast formation, and the optimal conditions are beneficial when exploring osteoclast function and mechanism.

Lesion mimic mutants have become an effective material for understanding plant-microbe interactions and the immune mechanism in plants. Although many mechanisms responsible for the lesion mimic phenotype have been clarified in plants, the mechanism by which lesion mimic is regulated by posttranslational modification remained largely elusive, especially in rice. In this study, a mutant with the lesion mimic phenotype was obtained and named lmp1-1. Physiological measurements and quantitative real-time PCR analysis showed that the defense response was activated in the mutants. Transcriptome analysis showed that the phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL) pathway was activated in the mutant, causing the accumulation of salicylic acid (SA). The results of mapping based cloning showed that OsLMP1 encodes a deubiquitinase. OsLMP1 can cleave ubiquitination precursors. Furthermore, OsLMP1 epigenetically modifies SA synthetic pathway genes by deubiquitinating H2B and regulates the immune response in rice. In summary, this study deepens our understanding of the function of OsLMP1 in the plant immune response and provides further insight into the relationship between plants and pathogenic microorganisms.

BackgroundFunctional Assessment of Self-Mutilation (FASM) is one of the most widely used tools assessing adolescent's non-suicidal self-injury. However, the Chinese version of FASM (C-FASM) is lacking. The present study aimed to adapt the FASM to the Chinese patients and examine its reliability and validity.MethodsThe original English version of the FASM was translated into Chinese following Brislin's model of cross-culture translation, and then, pilot study and cognitive interview were carried out with 15 adolescent patients to assess the acceptability and comprehensibility of all items. The items were subsequently tested in a sample of 621 Chinese adolescent patients recruited by 20 psychiatric or general hospitals in nine provinces across China. We examined the distribution of responses for each item. Factor analysis, Cronbach's α and McDonald's Ω, intraclass coefficient, and Spearman's rank correlations were deployed to assess the dimensional structure, internal consistency reliability, test–retest reliability, and criterion validity.ResultsThe final adapted C-FASM included a 10-item method checklist and a 15-item function checklist of NSSI, and other characteristics of NSSI. C-FASM exhibited acceptable internal consistency (α = 0.81 and Ω = 0.80 for method checklist; α = 0.80 and Ω = 0.76 for function checklist) and test–retest reliability (method checklist: 0.79; function checklist: 0.87). Factor analysis for NSSI functions yielded a three-factor model with a good model fit. In addition, the instrument showed an expected correlation with the instrument of the Deliberate Self-Harm Behavior Inventory (r = 0.84, p < 0.001).ConclusionsThe C-FASM has good content, structural validity, and reliability. The instrument can be helpful to Chinese adolescents as a comprehensive measure of NSSI behaviors.