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Background: The pathogenesis and diagnosis of Ankylosing Spondylitis (AS) has remained uncertain due to several reasons, including the lack of studies on the local and systemic immune response in AS. To construct a clinical diagnostic model, this study identified the micro RNA-messenger RNA (miRNA-mRNA) interaction network and immune cell infiltration-related hub genes associated with AS.Materials and Methods: Total RNA was extracted and purified from the interspinous ligament tissue samples of three patients with AS and three patients without AS; miRNA and mRNA microarrays were constructed using the extracted RNA. Bioinformatic tools were used to construct an miRNA-mRNA network, identify hub genes, and analyze immune infiltration associated with AS. Next, we collected the blood samples and clinical characteristics of 359 patients (197 with AS and 162 without AS). On the basis of the clinical characteristics and results of the routine blood tests, we selected immune-related cells whose numbers were significantly different in patients with AS and patients without AS. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis was performed to construct a nomogram. Immunohistochemistry staining analysis was utilized to verify the differentially expression of LYN in AS and controls.Results: A total of 225 differentially expressed miRNAs (DE miRNAs) and 406 differentially expressed mRNAs (DE mRNAs) were identified from the microarray. We selected 15 DE miRNAs and 38 DE mRNAs to construct a miRNA-mRNA network. The expression of LYN, an immune-related gene, correlated with the counts of monocytes, neutrophils, and dendritic cells. Based on the independent predictive factors of sex, age, and counts of monocytes, neutrophils, and white blood cells, a nomogram was established. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis was performed to evaluate the nomogram, with a C-index of 0.835 and AUC of 0.855.Conclusion:LYN, an immune-related hub gene, correlated with immune cell infiltration in patients with AS. In addition, the counts of monocytes and neutrophils were the independent diagnostic factors for AS. If verified in future studies, a diagnostic model based on these findings may be used to predict AS effectively.

Ferritinophagy is a type of autophagy mediated by nuclear receptor activator 4 (NCOA4), which plays a role in inducing ferroptosis by regulating iron homeostasis and producing reactive oxygen species in cells. Under physiological conditions, ferritinophagy maintains the stability of intracellular iron by regulating the release of free iron. Studies have demonstrated that ferritinophagy is necessary to induce ferroptosis; however, under pathological conditions, excessive ferritinophagy results in the release of free iron in large quantities, which leads to lipid peroxidation and iron-dependent cell death, known as ferroptosis. Ferritinophagy has become an area of interest in recent years. We here in review the mechanism of ferritinophagy and its association with ferroptosis and various diseases to provide a reference for future clinical and scientific studies.

Objective: Few studies have reported the direct effect of C–X–C motif chemokine ligand 10 (CXCL10) and Neuregulin 1 (Nrg1) on neurons after spinal cord injury (SCI). This study reports the role of CXCL10 in the regulation of neuronal damage after SCI and the potential therapeutic effect of Nrg1. Methods: The expression level of CXCL10 and Nrg1 in SCI mice was analyzed in the Gene Expression Omnibus DataSets, followed by immunohistochemical confirmation using a mouse SCI model. HT22 cells and NSC34 cells were treated with CXCL10 and Nrg1, individually or in combination, and then assayed for cell viability. The percentage of wound closure was determined through the cell scratch injury model using HT22 and NSC34 cells. Potential molecular mechanisms were also tested in response to either the individual administration of CXCL10 and Nrg1 or a mixture of both molecules. Results: CXCL10 expression was significantly increased in both young and old mice subjected to SCI, while Nrg1 expression was significantly decreased. CXCL10 induced a decrease in cell viability, which was partially reversed by Nrg1. CXCL10 failed to inhibit scratch healing in HT22 and NSC34 cells, while Nrg1 promoted scratch healing. At the molecular level, CXCL10-activated cleaved caspase 9 and cleaved caspase 3 were both inhibited by Nrg1 through pERK1/2 signaling in HT22 and NSC34 cells. Conclusions: CXCL10 is upregulated in SCI. Despite the negative effect on cell viability, CXCL10 failed to inhibit the scratch healing of HT22 and NSC34 cells. Nrg1 may protect neurons by partially antagonizing the effect of CXCL10.

Hazardous gas release can pose severe hazards to the ecological environment and public safety. The source-term estimation of hazardous gas leakage serves a crucial role in emergency response and safety management practices. Nevertheless, the precision of a forward diffusion model and atmospheric diffusion conditions have a significant impact on the performance of the method for estimating source terms. This work proposes the particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm coupled with the Gaussian dispersion model for estimating leakage source parameters. The method is validated using experimental cases of the prairie grass field dispersion experiment with various atmospheric stability classes. The results prove the effectiveness of this method. The effects of atmospheric diffusion conditions on estimation outcomes are also investigated. The estimated effect in extreme atmospheric diffusion conditions is not as good as in other diffusion conditions. Accordingly, the Gaussian dispersion model is improved by adding linear and polynomial correction coefficients to it for its inapplicability under extreme diffusion conditions. Finally, the PSO method coupled with improved models is adapted for the source-term parameter estimation. The findings demonstrate that the estimation performance of the PSO method coupled with improved models is significantly improved. It was also found that estimated performances of source parameters of two correction models were significantly distinct under various atmospheric stability classes. There is no single optimal model; however, the model can be selected according to practical diffusion conditions to enhance the estimated precision of source-term parameters.

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is the second most common neurodegenerative disease; it mainly occurs in the elderly population. Cuproptosis is a newly discovered form of regulated cell death involved in the progression of various diseases. Combining multiple GEO datasets, we analyzed the expression profile and immunity of cuproptosis-related genes (CRGs) in PD. Dysregulated CRGs and differential immune responses were identified between PD and non-PD substantia nigra. Two CRG clusters were defined in PD. Immune analysis suggested that CRG cluster 1 was characterized by a high immune response. The enrichment analysis showed that CRG cluster 1 was significantly enriched in immune activation pathways, such as the Notch pathway and the JAK-STAT pathway. KIAA0319, AGTR1, and SLC18A2 were selected as core genes based on the LASSO analysis. We built a nomogram that can predict the occurrence of PD based on the core genes. Further analysis found that the core genes were significantly correlated with tyrosine hydroxylase activity. This study systematically evaluated the relationship between cuproptosis and PD and established a predictive model for assessing the risk of cuproptosis subtypes and the outcome of PD patients. This study provides a new understanding of PD-related molecular mechanisms and provides new insights into the treatment of PD.

The origin of the photoemission replica bands in monolayer FeSe/SrTiO3 remains controversial. Here, the authors perform angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy with polarized photon on FeSe/SrTiO3 and observe high-order replica bands with high intensity from various Fe 3d bands, suggesting a mixed mechanism.

Abstract Global lipidomics is of considerable utility for exploring altered lipid profiles and unique diagnostic biomarkers in diseases. We aim to apply ultra‐performance liquid chromatography‐tandem mass spectrometry to characterize the lipidomics profile in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) patients and explore the underlying pathogenic pathways using the lipidomics approach. Plasma samples from 18 SLE patients, 20 rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients, and 20 healthy controls (HC) were collected. A total of 467 lipids molecular features were annotated from each sample. Orthogonal partial least square‐discriminant analysis, K‐mean clustering analysis and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway analysis indicated disrupted lipid metabolism in SLE patients, especially in phospholipid, glycerol, and sphingolipid metabolism. The area under curve (AUC) of lipid metabolism biomarkers was better than SLE inflammation markers that ordinarily used in the clinic. Proposed model of monoglyceride (MG) (16:0), MG (18:0), phosphatidylethanolamine (PE) (18:3–16:0), PE (16:0–20:4), and phosphatidylcholine (PC) (O‐16:2–18:3) yielded AUC 1.000 (95% CI, 1.000–1.000), specificity 100% and sensitivity 100% in the diagnosis of SLE from HC. A panel of three lipids molecular PC (18:3‐18:1), PE (20:3–18:0), PE (16:0–20:4) permitted to accurately diagnosis of SLE from RA, with AUC 0.921 (95% CI, 0.828–1.000), 70% specificity, and 100% sensitivity. The plasma lipidomics signatures could serve as an efficient and accurate tool for early diagnosis and provide unprecedented insight into the pathogenesis of SLE.

Abstract In the past decades, the inverted structure (p‐i‐n structure) perovskite solar cells (PVSCs) have been attracted more by the researchers owing to their ease of fabrication, cost‐effectiveness, lower processing temperature for the fabrication of large scale and flexible devices with negligible J−V hysteresis effects. The hole transporting layer (HTL) as a major served content of PVSCs has significant influence on light harvesting, carrier extraction and transportation, perovskite crystallization, stability and cost. Generally, the organic materials are used as HTLs which have less stability due to their morphology under thermal conditions; thus, leads to change in properties of them. A tantalizing possibility is replacement of p‐type inorganic materials instead of organic materials but the plenty of options are available for inorganic HTLs. However, the development of more variants for inorganic HTL is a major challenge. Till date, many materials have been reported, but their performances have not superseded that of their organic counterparts. Herein, the review on various inorganic HTLs based inverted PVSCs has been reported and analyzed their performances with appropriate properties such as proper energy level and high carrier mobility which are not only assisted with charge transport, but also improved the stability of PVSCs under ambient conditions.

In this work, a novel PV station participating FR technique based on PV array reconfiguration and battery energy storage system (BESS) is put forward. Through the PV array reconfiguration under Partial shading condition, photovoltaic (PV) system can adjust the output power according to the power dispatch instruction. And with the help of BESS, The PV station can achieve continuous power output. Specifically, a joint PV energy storage system model combining profit maximization and power deviation minimization is established. In order to two conflicting goals simultaneously, multi-objective golden eagle optimizer and improved ideal point decision making method are applied. And Lagrange function is given to determine the weight coefficients of each objective more fairly. Two cases are designed and tested. In the high frequency response simulation test, the profit is increased by 8.4% and the power deviation from FR signal is decreased by 19.98%; meanwhile the profit is increased by 10.07% and power deviation is decreased by 67.69% in the low frequency response test. Therefore, the simulation results verify that the proposed method contributes to the frequency response of PV station.

BackgroundAnterior cervical decompression and fusion can effectively treat cervical spondylotic myelopathy (CSM). Accurately classifying patients with CSM who have undergone anterior cervical decompression and fusion is the premise of precision medicine. In this study, we used machine learning algorithms to classify patients and compare the postoperative efficacy of each classification.MethodsA total of 616 patients with cervical spondylotic myelopathy who underwent anterior cervical decompression and fusion were enrolled. Unsupervised machine learning algorithms (UMLAs) were used to cluster subjects according to similar clinical characteristics. Then, the results of clustering were visualized. The surgical outcomes were used to verify the accuracy of machine learning clustering.ResultsWe identified two clusters in these patients who had significantly different baseline clinical characteristics, preoperative complications, the severity of neurological symptoms, and the range of decompression required for surgery. UMLA divided the CSM patients into two clusters according to the severity of their illness. The repose to surgical treatment between the clusters was significantly different.ConclusionsOur results showed that UMLA could be used to rationally classify a heterogeneous cohort of CSM patients effectively, and thus, it might be used as the basis for a data-driven platform for identifying the cluster of patients who can respond to a particular treatment method.

Osteoporosis is among the major contributors of pathologic fracture in postmenopausal women, which is caused by the bone metabolic disorder owing to the over-activation of osteoclasts. Inhibition of osteoclast differentiation and maturation has become a mainstream research interest in the prevention of osteoporosis. Isoliensinine (Iso) is a dibenzyl isoquinoline alkaloid with antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-cancer activities. However, whether it can be used as a potential treatment for osteoporosis remains undiscovered. Here, we investigated whether Iso might suppress the differentiation of osteoclasts in vitro and in vivo to play an anti-osteoporosis role. Our results showed that Iso inhibits the formation of mature multinuclear osteoclasts induced by RANKL, the bone resorption, and the osteoclast-specific genes expression by blocking the nuclear translocation of NF-κB p65, and the effect was in a dosage-dependent way. Furthermore, we investigated the therapeutic effect of Iso on osteoporosis in ovariectomized (OVX) mice. We found that Iso attenuated bone loss in the OVX mice and significantly promoted BS, Conn. DN, Tb.Th, TB.N, and BV/TV Index. All in all, Iso showed a prominent effect of osteoclast inhibition, with great promise for treating osteoporosis.

Neuroinflammation is a key mechanism underlying the cognitive impairment induced by PM2.5, and activated microglia plays an important role in this process. However, the mechanisms by which activated microglia induced by PM2.5 impair hippocampal neurons have not been fully elucidated. In this study, we focused on the role of HMGB1-NLRP3-P2X7R pathway which mediated the microglia activation in hippocampal neurons impairment induced by PM2.5 using a co-culture model of microglia and hippocampal neurons. We found that PM2.5 resulted in activated microglia and HMGB1-NLRP3 inflammatory pathway, and elevated proinflammatory cytokines of IL-18 and IL-1β in a dose-dependent manner. Notably, we next utilized previously reported pharmacological inhibitors or siRNA for HMGB1 and found that they significantly inhibited the activation of downstream NLRP3 and MAPK pathways derived from PM2.5 exposure, and down-regulated IL-18 and IL-1β in microglia. Furthermore, we employed co-cultured hippocampal neurons and microglia and found that reducing HMGB1 significantly decreased neuron impairment, apoptosis related protein of cl-caspase3, synaptic damage, and neurotransmitter receptor of 5-HT2A, along with notably elevated presynaptic and postsynaptic proteins of SYP and PSD-95, as well as learning and memory related proteins of p-CREB and BDNF. The neuronal impairment induced by PM2.5 could not be prevented in the case of simultaneous employment of HMGB1 siRNA and NLRP3 agonist. After silencing NLRP3 alone in microglia, hippocampal neurons demonstrated decreased excessive autophagy and up-regulated synaptic protein of GAP43 as well as learning and memory related protein of NCAM1. Therefore, we further studied how hippocampal neurons affected microglia under PM2.5 exposure, Further investigation indicated that silencing HMGB1 could affect the activation of P2X7R and reduce the release of ATP from hippocampal neurons, thus protecting the interaction between microglia and hippocampal neurons. The present work suggests that regulation of HMGB1-NLRP3-P2X7R pathway can inhibit the microglia activation induced by PM2.5 to alleviate hippocampal neuron impairment and stabilize the microenvironment between microglia and neurons. This contributes to maintaining the normal function of hippocampal neurons and alleviating the cognitive impairment derived from PM2.5 exposure.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to investigate the associations of genetic variants in double-strand break (DSB) repair pathway genes with prognosis in patients with lung cancer treated with platinum-based chemotherapy.Methods: Three hundred ninety-nine patients with lung cancer who received platinum-based chemotherapy for at least two cycles were included in this study. A total of 35 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in DSB repair, base excision repair (BER), and nucleotide excision repair (NER) repair pathway genes were genotyped, and were used to evaluate the overall survival (OS) and the progression-free survival (PFS) of patients who received platinum-based chemotherapy using Cox proportional hazard models.Results: The PFS of patients who carried the MAD2L2 rs746218 GG genotype was shorter than that in patients with the AG or AA genotypes (recessive model: p = 0.039, OR = 5.31, 95% CI = 1.09–25.93). Patients with the TT or GT genotypes of TNFRSF1A rs4149570 had shorter OS times than those with the GG genotype (dominant model: p = 0.030, OR = 0.57, 95% CI = 0.34–0.95). We also investigated the influence of age, gender, histology, smoking, stage, and metastasis in association between SNPs and OS or PFS in patients with lung cancer. DNA repair gene SNPs were significantly associated with PFS and OS in the subgroup analyses.Conclusion: Our study showed that variants in MAD2L2 rs746218 and TNFRSF1A rs4149570 were associated with shorter PFS or OS in patients with lung cancer who received platinum-based chemotherapy. These variants may be novel biomarkers for the prediction of prognosis of patients with lung cancer who receive platinum-based chemotherapy.

Farmed animals produce excrement containing excessive amounts of toxic heavy metals as a result of consuming compound feed as well as receiving medical treatments, and the presence of these heavy metals may aggravate the risk of spreading drug-resistance genes through co-selection during manure treatment and application processes. However, research on the association between heavy metals and antimicrobial resistance is still lacking. In this study, metagenomic sequencing was used to explore the effects of the co-selection of environmentally toxic heavy metals on the resistome in manure. A relevance network analysis showed that metal-resistance genes (MRGs), especially for copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn), were positively correlated with multiple types of antibiotic-resistance genes (ARGs) and formed a complex network. Most bacteria that co-occurred with both MRGs and ARGs simultaneously are members of Proteobacteria and accounted for 54.7% of the total microbial species in the relevance network. The remaining bacteria belonged to Firmicutes, Bacteroidetes and Actinobacteria. Among the four phyla, Cu- and Zn-resistance genes had more complex correlations with ARGs than other MRG types, reflecting the occurrence of ARG co-selection under the selective pressure of high Cu and Zn levels. In addition, approximately 64.8%, 59.1% and 68.4% of MRGs that correlated with the presence of plasmids, viruses and prophages, respectively, are Cu- or Zn-resistant, and they co-occurred with various ARGs, indicating that mobile genetic elements participate in mediating ARG co-selection in response to Cu and Zn pressure. The results indicated that the use of heavy-metal additives in feed induces the increases of drug resistance genes in manure through co-selection, aggravating the risk of antimicrobial resistance diffusion from animal farm to manure land applications.

Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a common and deadly malignancy worldwide. Current treatment methods for hepatocellular carcinoma have many disadvantages; thus, it is urgent to improve the efficacy of these therapies. Glycolysis is critical in the occurrence and development of tumors. However, survival and prognosis biomarkers related to glycolysis in HCC patients remain to be fully identified.Methods: Glycolysis-related genes (GRGs) were downloaded from “The Molecular Signatures Database” (MSigDB), and the mRNA expression profiles and clinical information of HCC patients were obtained from TCGA. Consensus clustering was performed to classify the HCC patients into two subgroups. We used the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) regression analysis to construct the risk signature model. Kaplan–Meier (K-M) survival analysis was performed to evaluate the prognostic significance of the risk model, and the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was used to evaluate the prediction accuracy. The independent prediction ability of the risk model was validated by univariate and multivariate Cox regression analyses. The differences of immune infiltrates and relevant oncogenic signaling between different risk groups were compared. Finally, biological experiments were performed to explore the functions of screened genes.Results: HCC patients were classified into two subgroups, according to the expression of prognostic-related GRGs. Almost all GRGs categorized in cluster 2 showed upregulated expressions, whereas GRGs in cluster 1 conferred survival advantages. GSEA identified a positive correlation between cluster 2 and the glycolysis process. Ten genes were selected for risk signature construction. Patients were assigned to high-risk and low-risk groups based on the median risk score, and K-M survival analysis indicated that the high-risk group had a shorter survival time. Additionally, the risk gene signature can partially affect immune infiltrates within the HCC microenvironment, and many oncogenic pathways were enriched in the high-risk group, including glycolysis, hypoxia, and DNA repair. Finally, in vitro knockdown of ME1 suppressed proliferation, migration, and invasion of hepatocellular carcinoma cells.Conclusion: In our study, we successfully constructed and verified a novel glycolysis-related risk signature for HCC prognosis prediction, which is meaningful for classifying HCC patients and offers potential targets for the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma.

PurposeThe purpose of this article was to investigate the mechanism of immune dysregulation of COVID-19-related proteins in spinal tuberculosis (STB).MethodsClinical data were collected to construct a nomogram model. C-index, calibration curve, ROC curve, and DCA curve were used to assess the predictive ability and accuracy of the model. Additionally, 10 intervertebral disc samples were collected for protein identification. Bioinformatics was used to analyze differentially expressed proteins (DEPs), including immune cells analysis, Gene Ontology (GO) and KEGG pathway enrichment analysis, and protein-protein interaction networks (PPI).ResultsThe nomogram predicted risk of STB ranging from 0.01 to 0.994. The C-index and AUC in the training set were 0.872 and 0.862, respectively. The results in the external validation set were consistent with the training set. Immune cells scores indicated that B cells naive in STB tissues were significantly lower than non-TB spinal tissues. Hub proteins were calculated by Degree, Closeness, and MCC methods. The main KEGG pathway included Coronavirus disease-COVID-19. There were 9 key proteins in the intersection of COVID-19-related proteins and hub proteins. There was a negative correlation between B cells naive and RPL19. COVID-19-related proteins were associated with immune genes.ConclusionLymphocytes were predictive factors for the diagnosis of STB. Immune cells showed low expression in STB. Nine COVID-19-related proteins were involved in STB mechanisms. These nine key proteins may suppress the immune mechanism of STB by regulating the expression of immune genes.

High concentrations of PM2.5 in enclosed broiler houses cause respiratory disorders in humans and animals. Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa) is an opportunistic pathogen that can induce severe respiratory disease in animals under stress or with abnormal immune functions. Alveolar macrophages are lung-resident immune cells that play important roles in lung host defence and immune balance. In this study, the mechanism by which PM2.5 synergizes with P. aeruginosa to damage alveolar macrophage function and induce inflammation was investigated. The results will provide a theoretical basis for improving the poultry breeding environment and preventing the recurrence of infection with P. aeruginosa. Alveolar macrophages were stimulated by PM2.5 collected in an enclosed broiler house and P. aeruginosa. Phagocytosis was determined by the neutral red test. The apoptosis rate and cytoskeleton changes were observed by flow cytometry assays and laser scanning confocal microscopy. Protein levels related to autophagy and the mTOR pathway were detected by Western blotting. The results indicated that PM2.5 in combination with P. aeruginosa could decrease phagocytosis, inhibit autophagy, increase apoptosis, and destroy the cytoskeleton in alveolar macrophages. In addition, alveolar macrophages had significantly increased expression of mTOR pathway-related proteins in response to the synergistic stimulation of PM2.5 and P. aeruginosa. The above results confirmed that PM2.5 in poultry houses synergized with P. aeruginosa to impede alveolar macrophage function and caused more severe respiratory system injuries through a process closely related to the activation of the mTOR signalling pathway.

Abstract Guided image filtering is one of the widely used techniques in computer vision. However, it commonly leads to over‐smoothed edges and a distorted appearance when tackling intricate texture patterns and complex noise. In this paper, a window‐aware image filtering framework based on the bilateral filter guided by the local entropy is presented. The key idea of the authors' proposed approach is to design a novel guidance input and a non‐box filtering window. Specifically, using the Gaussian spatial kernel and the local entropy, a GEF that can maintain image feature details and yield a robust guidance input for BF is constructed. Meanwhile, based on an intensity‐similar strategy, the local non‐box filtering window is designed for the further preservation of edge structures. The authors' approach not only inherits the advantages of bilateral filter i.e. simplicity, parallelisation and easiness of programming, but also is more powerful than bilateral filter and its variants. In addition, the guided entropy filter and the non‐box window can also be transplanted to other local filters and can effectively improve the filtering effects. The qualitative and quantitative experimental results demonstrate that the authors' approach has good performance in image denoising, texture (or background) smoothing, edge extraction and other applications in image processing.

Tanycytes contribute to the regulation of multiple hypothalamic functions. Here the authors investigate the regenerative and tumorigenic potential of adult Rax+ tanycytes in the median eminence in the context of the stem cell niche in mice.

Abstract Urolithiasis is a common urinary disease with high recurrence. The risk factor for the recurrence of calculi is not very clear. The object of the present study was to evaluate the association between calculi composition and urine component and analyse the risk factor for the recurrence of urolithiasis. In this study, a total of 223 patients with calculi and healthy control were enrolled, and the components of the calculi and urina sanguinis collected before surgery were analysed. Of the 223 patients, 157 were males and 66 were females. According to the stone composition, the case group was subdivided into three groups. 129 patients had single calcium oxalate stones, 72 had calcium oxalate stones mixed with other stones and 22 had other type of stones excluding calcium oxalate stones. Urine biochemicals were analysed and the associations were found between the chemicals in each group. Multivariate logistic analysis demonstrated that reduced urinary magnesium and uric oxalic acid were independent risk factors when comparing all cases with normal controls. Only decreased urinary magnesium was found to be a risk factor comparing the single calcium oxalate group with normal control group. Low level of urinary magnesium and uric oxalic acid were found to be risk factors comparing the mixed calcium oxalate group with normal control group. No risk factor was found comparing the other stone group with normal control group. In conclusion, there were clear relationships between stone components and urine chemicals. Urine chemicals might be risk factors to predicate the occurrence of urolithiasis.

Maintaining a supply–demand balance of ecosystem services (ES) is essential for enhancing the effectiveness of ecosystem restoration. However, inappropriate land use and reforestation practices can negatively impact this balance. In this study, the ES balance of the Saihanba region in China was quantified by integrating land use/cover change (LUCC) data, landscape metrics, and ES indicators. The relationship between ES balance and its driving factors was analyzed using spatial panel models. The spatiotemporal changes of landscape patterns from 2002 to 2020 were also explored. The results indicated that the overall ES supply capacity of the study region, especially in the southwestern area, increased during the research period. The ES balance and its determining factors exhibited significant spatial heterogeneity and spillover effects. Large–scale afforestation increased the local ES supply and provided economic benefits, but it also led to ecological issues, including declines in wetland area and landscape fragmentation. Our study emphasized the importance of considering the supply–demand balance in the planning and decision–making of ES, providing insight into multifunctional management and the sustainable development in the Saihanba area.

Lake chlorophyll-a (Chl-a) is one of the important components of the lake ecosystem. Numerous studies have analyzed Chl-a in ocean and inland water ecosystems under pressures from climate change and anthropogenic activities. However, little research has been conducted on lake Chl-a variations in the Tibet Plateau (TP) because of its harsh environment and limited opportunities for in situ data monitoring. Here, we combined 95 in situ measured lake Chl-a concentration data points and the Landsat reflection spectrum to establish an inversion model of Chl-a concentration. For this, we retrieved the mean annual Chl-a concentration in the past 35 years (1986–2021) of 318 lakes with an area of > 10 km2 in the TP using the backpropagation (BP) neural network prediction method. Meteorological and hydrological data, measured water quality parameters, and glacier change in the lake basin, along with geographic information system (GIS) technology and spatial statistical analysis, were used to elucidate the driving factors of the Chl-a concentration changes in the TP lakes. The results showed that the mean annual Chl-a in the 318 lakes displayed an overall decrease during 1986–2021 (−0.03 μg/L/y), but 63%, 32%, and 5% of the total number exhibited no significant change, significant decrease, and significant increase, respectively. After a slight increase during 1986–1995 (0.05 μg/L/y), the mean annual lake Chl-a significantly decreased during 1996–2004 (−0.18 μg/L/y). Further, it decreased slightly during 2005–2021 (−0.02 μg/L/y). The mean annual lake Chl-a concentration was significantly negatively correlated with precipitation (R2 = 0.48, p < 0.01), air temperature (R2 = 0.31, p < 0.01), lake surface water temperature (LSWT) (R2 = 0.51, p < 0.01), lake area (R2 = 0.42, p < 0.01), and lake water volume change (R2 = 0.77, p < 0.01). The Chl-a concentration of non-glacial-meltwater-fed lakes were higher than those of glacial-meltwater-fed lakes, except during higher precipitation periods. Our results shed light on the impacts of climate change on Chl-a variation in the TP lakes and lay the foundation for understanding the changes in the TP lake ecosystem.

Abstract Background The purpose of the study is to investigate the correlation between upper lumbar disc herniation (ULDH) and multifidus muscle degeneration via the comparison of width, the cross-sectional area and degree of fatty infiltration of the lumbar multifidus muscle. Methods Using the axial T2-weighted images of magnetic resonance imaging as an assessment tool, we retrospectively investigated 132 patients with ULDH and 132 healthy individuals. The total muscle cross-sectional area (TMCSA) and the pure muscle cross-sectional area (PMCSA) of the multifidus muscle at the L1/2, L2/3, and L3/4 intervertebral disc levels were measured respectively, and in the meantime, the average multifidus muscle width (AMMW) and degree of fatty infiltration of bilateral multifidus muscle were evaluated. The resulting data were analyzed to determine the presence/absence of statistical significance between the study and control groups. Multivariate logistical regression analyses were used to evaluate the correlation between ULDH and multifidus degeneration. Results The results of the analysis of the two groups showed that there were statistically significant differences (p

DNA is always one of the most important targets for cancer therapy due to its leading role in the proliferation of cancer cells. Phototherapy kills cancer cells by generating reactive oxygen species (ROS) and local hyperthermia under light. It has attracted extensive interest in the clinical treatment of tumors because of many advantages such as non-invasiveness, high patient compliance, and low toxicity and side effects. However, the short ROS diffusion distance and limited thermal diffusion rate make it difficult for phototherapy to damage DNA deep in the nucleus. Therefore, nucleus-targeting phototherapy that can destroy DNAs via in-situ generation of ROS and high temperature can be a very effective strategy to address this bottleneck. Recently, some emerging nucleus-targeting phototherapy nanodrugs have demonstrated extremely effective anticancer effects. However, reviews in the field are still rarely reported. Here, we comprehensively summarized recent advances in nucleus-targeting phototherapy in recent years. We classified nucleus-targeting phototherapy into three categories based on the characteristics of these nucleus-targeting strategies. The first category is the passive targeting strategy, which mainly targets the nucleus by adjusting the physicochemical characteristics of phototherapy nanomedicines. The second category is to mediate the phototherapy nanodrugs into the nucleus by modifying functional groups that actively target the nucleus. The third category is to assist nanodrugs enter into the nucleus in a light-controlled way. Finally, we provided our insights and prospects for nucleus-targeting phototherapy nanodrugs. This minireview provides unique insights and valuable clues in the design of phototherapy nanodrugs and other nucleus-targeting drugs.

Cancer cell lysosomes contain various hydrolases and non-degraded substrates that are corrosive enough to destroy cancer cells. However, many traditional small molecule drugs targeting lysosomes have strong side effects because they cannot effectively differentiate between normal and cancer cells. Most lysosome-based research has focused on inducing mild lysosomal membrane permeabilization (LMP) to release anticancer drugs from lysosomal traps into the cancer cell cytoplasm. In fact, lysosomes are particularly powerful “bombs”. Achieving cancer cell-selective LMP induction may yield high-efficiency anticancer effects and extremely low side effects. Nanodrugs have diverse and combinable properties and can be specifically designed to selectively induce LMP in cancer cells by taking advantage of the differences between cancer cells and normal cells. Although nanodrugs-induced LMP has made great progress recently, related reviews remain rare. Herein, we first comprehensively summarize the advances in nanodrugs-induced LMP. Next, we describe the different nanodrugs-induced LMP strategies, namely nanoparticles aggregation-induced LMP, chemodynamic therapy (CDT)-induced LMP, and magnetic field-induced LMP. Finally, we analyze the prospect of nanodrugs-induced LMP and the challenges to overcome. We believe this review provides a unique perspective and inspiration for designing lysosome-targeting drugs.

ObjectiveAdenosine deaminase (ADA) plays an important role in immune response, which includes two isoenzymes: ADA1 and ADA2. This study aims to explore the roles of ADA1 and ADA2 in cancers.MethodsHuman Protein Atlas (HPA) and Gene Expression Profiling Interactive Analysis (GEPIA2) databases were used to analyze the mRNA expression of ADA1 and ADA2 in human normal cells and tumor tissues. The enzyme assay was used to detect the ADA1 and ADA2 activities in serum from cancer patients. The Kaplan–Meier (KM) plotter was used to analyze the prognostic value of ADA1 and ADA2. TIMER2.0 was used to explore how ADA1 and ADA2 correlate with immune infiltration and immune checkpoints. cBioPortal database was used to investigate the mutations of ADA1 and ADA2. LinkedOmics was used to screen the ADA1 and ADA2 expression-related genes.ResultsADA1 was significantly increased in several tumor tissues, including cholangiocarcinoma (CHOL), lymphoid neoplasm diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBC), head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSC), kidney renal clear cell carcinoma (KIRC), ovarian serous cystadenocarcinoma (OV), pancreatic adenocarcinoma (PAAD), thymoma (THYM), and uterine carcinosarcoma (UCS). ADA2 expression was significantly increased in esophageal carcinoma (ESCA), glioblastoma multiforme (GBM), acute myeloid leukemia (LAML), OV, PAAD, skin cutaneous melanoma (SKCM), and stomach adenocarcinoma (STAD). There were no significant changes in serum ADA1 activities in most cancers, while serum ADA2 activities were increased in most cancers. For prognosis, high ADA1 expression was associated with the poor survival in several cancers, including esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC), HNSC, KIRC, kidney renal papillary cell carcinoma (KIRP), liver hepatocellular carcinoma (LIHC), lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD), and uterine corpus endometrial carcinoma (UCEC). However, high ADA2 expression showed a favorable prognosis in breast invasive carcinoma (BRCA), cervical squamous cell carcinoma and endocervical adenocarcinoma (CESC), HNSC, KIRC, KIRP, LUAD, OV, PAAD, sarcoma, and THYM. ADA1 showed a moderate positive correlation with multiple infiltrating immune cells in most cancers. ADA2 was positively correlated with B cells, CD8 T cells, monocytes/macrophages, and dendritic cells (DCs) and was strongly negatively correlated with myeloid-derived suppressor cells. Function analysis showed that ADA1 expression-related genes were mainly enriched in cell division biological progression. However, ADA2-related genes were mainly associated with immune response.ConclusionAs isoenzymes, ADA1 and ADA2 showed opposite prognostic values and different correlative patterns with immune infiltrating. These data demonstrated the distinct roles of ADA1 and ADA2 in cancer. ADA2 might act as a protective factor in cancer.

Abstract The valance of Mo is critical for FeMo cofactor in ambient ammonia synthesis. However, the valence effect of Mo has not been well studied in heterogeneous nanoparticle catalysts for electrochemical nitrogen reduction reaction (NRR) due to the dissolution of Mo as MoO42− in alkaline electrolytes. Here, a MoO2+x catalyst enriched with surface Mo6+ is reported. The Mo6+ is stabilized by a native oxide layer to prevent corrosion and its speciation is identified as (MoO3)n clusters. This native layer with Mo6+ suppresses the hydrogen evolution significantly and promotes the activation of nitrogen as supported by both experimental characterization and theoretical calculation. The as‐prepared MoO2+x catalyst shows a high ammonia yield of 3.95 µg mgcat−1h−1 with a high Faradaic efficiency of 22.1% at −0.2 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode, which is much better than the MoO2 catalyst with Mo6+ etched away. The accuracy of experimental results for NRR is confirmed by various control experiments and quantitative isotope labeling.

BackgroundA cervical arteriovenous fistula (AVF) in neurofibromatosis type I (NF-1) is uncommon, and it brings challenges and difficulty in treatment.Case PresentationA 39-year-old woman was diagnosed with an NF-1-associated spontaneous vertebral artery-internal jugular vein-spinal vein fistula. The fistula was placed by coil embolization. Postoperative examination showed that the fistula closure was satisfied, and the patient's abnormal clinical manifestation disappeared without any complications after 24 months of interventional embolization. As per the literature, interventional embolization is currently the main treatment method, and it has the distinguishing features of less trauma, quick recovery, and a good prognosis.ConclusionNF-1 associated with a spontaneous arteriovenous fistula is rare in clinical practice, which carries significant challenges in treatment, but can be effectively treated using endovascular embolism. Endovascular embolism could be the potential choice of treatment in NF-1 associated with AVF.

BackgroundThe purpose of this study was to analyze the clinical efficacy of a patient with multiple tuberculosis of the spine combined with severe kyphosis.Case SummaryA 56-year-old male patient presented with low back pain with numbness and fatigue in both lower extremities for 5 months. Chest and back showed intermittent acid pain. The patient had not a history of constitutional symptoms. Preoperative X-ray and CT examination revealed multiple vertebral segmental bone destruction, multiple abscess calcification, and severe kyphosis. Preoperative MRI examination showed that the tuberculous abscess broke through the spinal canal and compressed the spinal cord and nerve roots. The patient underwent posterior lumbar abscess debridement, expanded decompression of the spinal canal, and nerve lysis in our hospital. The operation time was 70 min, and the intraoperative blood loss was 200 ml. The postoperative drainage volume was 250 ml. The patient was hospitalized for a total of 13 days, and the patient’s vital signs were stable before and after surgery. The patient was satisfied with the treatment.ConclusionFor the patient with multiple spinal tuberculosis complicated with severe kyphosis and multiple calcified abscesses in this study, we considered performing abscess debridement to relieve the symptoms of back pain and achieved good clinical efficacy.

Summary: Controlling the ion transport through graphene oxide (GO) membrane is challenging, particularly in the aqueous environment due to its strong swelling tendency. Fine-tuning the interlayer spacing and chemistry is critical to create highly selective membranes. We investigate the effect of single-site divalent cations in tuning GO membrane properties. Competitive ionic permeation test indicates that Cu2+ cations dominate the transport through the 2D channels of GO membrane over other cations (Mg2+/Ca2+/Co2+). Without/With the single-site M2+ modifications, pristine GO, Mg-GO, Ca-GO, and Cu-GO membranes show interlayer spacings of ∼13.6, 15.6, 14.5, and 12.3 Å in wet state, respectively. The Cu-GO membrane shows a two-fold decrease of NaCl (1 M) permeation rate comparing to pristine GO, Mg-GO, and Ca-GO membranes. In reverse osmosis tests using 1000 ppm NaCl and Na2SO4 as feeds, Cu-GO membrane shows rejection of ∼78% and ∼94%, respectively, which are 5%–10% higher than its counterpart membranes.

IntroductionThe specific pathogenesis of ankylosing spondylitis (AS) remains unclear, and our study aimed to investigate the possible pathogenesis of AS.Materials and MethodsTwo datasets were downloaded from the GEO database to perform differentially expressed gene analysis, GO enrichment analysis, KEGG pathway analysis, DO enrichment analysis, GSEA analysis of differentially expressed genes, and construction of diagnostic genes using SVM and WGCNA along with Hypoxia-related genes. Also, drug sensitivity analysis was performed on diagnostic genes. To identify the differentially expressed immune genes in the AS and control groups, we analyzed the composition of immune cells between them. Then, we examined differentially expressed genes in three AS interspinous ligament specimens and three Degenerative lumbar spine specimens using high-throughput sequencing while the immune cells were examined using the neutrophil count data from routine blood tests of 1770 HLA-B27-positive samples and 7939 HLA-B27-negative samples. To assess the relationship between ANXA3 and SORL1 and disease activity, we took the neutrophil counts of the first 50 patients with above-average BASDAI scores and the last 50 patients with below-average BASDAI scores for statistical analysis. We used immunohistochemistry to verify the expression of ANXA3 and SORL1 in AS and in controls.ResultsANXA3 and SORL1 were identified as new diagnostic genes for AS. These two genes showed a significant differential expression between AS and controls, along with showing a significant positive correlation with the neutrophil count. The results of high-throughput sequencing verified that these two gene deletions were indeed differentially expressed in AS versus controls. Data from a total of 9707 routine blood tests showed that the neutrophil count was significantly higher in AS patients than in controls (p < 0.001). Patients with AS with a high BASDAI score had a much higher neutrophil count than those with a low score, and the difference was statistically significant (p < 0.001). The results of immunohistochemistry showed that the expression of ANXA3 and SORL1 in AS was significantly higher than that in the control group.ConclusionUpregulated of ANXA3, SORL1, and neutrophils may be a key factor in the progression of Ankylosing spondylitis.

In this work, a series of novel 1,2,4-triazine-chalcone hybrids were designed through the molecular hybridization strategy, synthesized by two step chlorinations and further aldol condensation and evaluated their antiproliferative activity against MGC-803, HCT-116, PC-3, EC-109 and A549 cells. Compound 9l displayed significant antiproliferative activity against MGC-803, HCT-116, PC-3, EC-109 and A549 cell lines with IC50 values of 0.41, 0.43, 0.61, 0.78 and 0.52 μM, respectively. Subsequent mechanistic investigations suggested that compound 9l induced the generation of ROS and inhibited the activation of the ERK pathway. Compound 9l induced extrinsic cell apoptosis by up-regulating DR5 dependent on the generation of ROS, while up-regulation of DR5 caused by compound 9l relied on the inhibition of ERK. Thus, compound 9l inhibited the gastric cancer cells via an axis of ROS-ERK-DR5 in vitro. Compound 9l also showed potent activity on cell proliferation inhibition, and was effective in suppressing the growth of MGC-803 xenograft tumor in nude mice without obvious toxicity. Therefore, compound 9l is to be reported as anti-gastric cancer agent in vitro and in vivo via an axis of ROS-ERK-DR5.

Human studies on association between bisphenol A (BPA) exposure and semen quality, mostly based on single urinary measurement, are inconsistent. There is limited human evidence on BPA analogues such as bisphenol F (BPF) and bisphenol S (BPS), and little is known on potential effects of bisphenol mixtures. We aimed to explore whether individual or mixtures of BPA, BPS and BPF assessed in repeated urinary measurements were associated with semen quality among 984 Chinese men from an infertility clinic. We found that higher BPA exposure was associated with increased odds ratios (ORs) of having below-reference sperm concentration, total sperm count, progressive motility and total motility (all P for trends

Tumor metastasis is the major cause of tumor relapse and cancer-associated mortality in colorectal cancer, leading to poor therapeutic responses and reduced survival. eIF3a was previously described as an oncogene. However, its role in colorectal cancer progression and metastasis has not yet been fully investigated. In this study, the expression specificity and predictive value of eIF3a were investigated in clinical samples. The effects of eIF3a on cell proliferation and migration were verified in vivo and in vitro, respectively. The underlying molecular mechanism was revealed by western blotting, immunofluorescence, RNA-binding protein immunoprecipitation, and dual-luciferase reporter gene assays. The results showed that eIF3a was significantly overexpressed in tumor tissues compared with adjacent normal tissues. High eIF3a expression was correlated with tumor metastasis and overall survival. Downregulation of eIF3a obviously inhibited the proliferation and motility of malignant cells in vitro and in vivo. Mechanistically, eIF3a regulates Cdc42 and RhoA expression at the translation level, which further affects pseudopodia formation and actin cytoskeleton remodeling. Taken together, eIF3a accelerates the acquisition of the migratory phenotype of cancer cells by activating Cdc42 and RhoA expression at the translational level. Our study identified eIF3a as a promising target for inhibiting colorectal cancer metastasis.

PurposeThis study used a propensity score matching (PSM) analysis to explore the risk factors of post-operative complications and compared the differences in clinical data between them following spinal tuberculosis surgery.MethodsThe clinical data of patients with spinal tuberculosis were collected in our hospital from June 2012 to June 2021, including general information, laboratory results, surgical information, and hospitalization costs. The data were divided into two groups: complication and without complication groups. The baseline data of the two groups were obtained using the PSM analysis. Univariate and multivariate logistic analyses were used to analyze the differences between the two groups.ResultsA total of 292 patients were included in the PSM analysis: 146 patients with complications and 146 patients without complications. The operation time, incision length, hospital stay, and albumin quantity in the complications group were 162 ± 74.1, 11.2 ± 4.76, 14.7 ± 9.34, and 1.71 ± 2.82, respectively, and those in the without complication group were 138 ± 60.5, 10.2 ± 3.56, 11.7 ± 7.44, and 0.740 ± 2.44, respectively. The laboratory costs, examination costs, guardianship costs, oxygen costs, and total costs in the complications group were higher than those in the without complication group. A significant difference was observed in the albumin quantity by logistic regression analysis (P < 0.05).ConclusionSeveral costs in the complication group were higher than in the without complication group. The albumin quantity may be an independent factor to predict post-operative complications of spinal tuberculosis by logistic regression analysis.

Extensive efforts have been made to remove “harmful” inclusions during the steelmaking process. However, the concept of “oxide metallurgy” was proposed, where fine inclusions are used to induce the formation of acicular ferrite and pin the grain boundary, thus enhancing the low temperature toughness of the heat-affected zone (HAZ). The technology of improving the toughness of HAZ by forming TiOx−MgO−CaO fine particles (ITFFP) in steel has been successfully applied to the trial production of 30 mm (H30) and 60 mm (H60) thick high heat input welding EH420 offshore steel. The mechanical testing results show that the yield strength, tensile strength, and elongation of H30 steel are 461 MPa, 579 MPa, and 26%, respectively. In addition, the yield strength, tensile strength, and elongation of H60 steel are 534 MPa, 628 MPa, and 24.5%, respectively. The tested H30 and H60 steels achieved the national standard of EH420 offshore steel. The effect of ITFFP technology on the microstructure and impact toughness in the HAZ of H30 and H60 steels subjected to a 200 kJ·cm−1 heat input were investigated using a Gleeble-3800 welding simulation machine and Charpy impact tests. The results indicate that the CaO(−MgO)−Al2O3−TiOx−MnS formed in the tested steels induces the formation of acicular ferrite, and thus significantly improves the impact toughness. Additionally, electrode-gas welding with heat inputs of 247 kJ·cm−1 and 224 kJ·cm−1 was applied to H30 and H60 steels. The experimental results show that the impact absorbed energy of the weld in H30 tested steel is larger than 74 J at −40 ℃, and the HAZ exhibits an absorbed energy larger than 115 J at −40 ℃. In addition, the impact absorbed energy of the weld in H60 tested steel is larger than 91 J at −40 ℃, and the HAZ exhibits an absorbed energy larger than 75 J at −40 ℃. The impact absorbed energy of welded joints is much higher than the requirement of the national standard (42 J).

There are many therapeutic options for primary hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but very limited options for unresectable HCC with a single lesion larger than 5 cm (Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer [BCLC] stage A) or with 2-3 nodules beyond 5 cm (BCLC stage B). Transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (TACE) is considered the first-line treatment for these patients, and combination therapy has also been tried. However, the effectiveness of microwave ablation (MWA) combined with TACE in the treatment of the above tumors remains to be further confirmed. Therefore, this meta-analysis aimed to compare the effectiveness of combination therapy and TACE monotherapy on these patients. PubMed, Cochrane Library, Embase, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, and the Wan Fang electronic databases were retrieved to search for studies comparing combination therapy and TACE monotherapy, published between the earliest available date and August 20, 2019. A total of 20 articles (reporting 1736 patients) were included. Meta-analysis showed that, compared to TACE alone, TACE + MWA resulted in significantly higher 1-, 2-, and 3-year overall survival (OS) (1-year OS rate: RR = 1.36, 95% CI 1.28–1.44, P < 0.001; 2-year OS rate: RR = 1.56, 95% CI 1.40–1.74, P < 0.001 and 3-year OS rate: RR = 2.07, 95% CI: 1.67–2.57, P < 0.001). Complete response, partial response, and objective response rates were significantly higher in TACE + MWA than those in TACE alone (P < 0.001). Meanwhile, publication bias and sensitivity analysis were performed and did not show statistical significance.

In order to accurately and efficiently perform alias resolution on interface IP and support IP geolocation,a large-scale network alias resolution algorithm (MLAR) was proposed.Based on the statistical differences in delays,paths,Whois,etc.between alias IP and non-alias IP,before resolution,filtering rules were designed to exclude a large number of IPs that can not be aliases and improve efficiency of resolution,alias resolution was transformed into classification,and four novel features such as delay similarity,path similarity,etc.were constructed for the classification of possible alias IP and non-alias IP after filtering.Experiments based on millions of samples from CAIDA show that compared with RadarGun,MIDAR,and TreeNET,the accuracy is improved by 15.8%,4.8%,5.7%,the time consumption can be reduced by up to 77.8%,65.3%,and 55.2%,when the proposed algorithm is applied to IP geolocation,the failure rates of the three typical geolocation methods such as SLG,LENCR,and PoPG are reduced by about 65.5%,64.1%,and 58.1%.

The undesirable geological release of methane at remote locations can be lessened through an efficient methane conversion process. Here, the authors report selective ambient functionalization of methane by a vanadium (V)-oxo electrocatalyst with a low activation energy and a high turnover frequency.

Root nodules are of key importance in nitrogen fixation. Here, the authors report on an electrically powered artificial root nodule for nitrogen fixation made from silicon-based microwires which can accommodate nitrogen fixing symbiotic bacteria for fixing nitrogen into biomass and free ammonia.

In wireless sensor networks, energy harvesting is developed as an effective way to solve energy drain problem of nodes which powered by battery, just like that cooperative communication is used to improve transmission reliability. In some energy harvesting networks, the nodes' energy harvested from ambient environment is disequilibrium. For example, nodes exposed to sunlight collect more solar energy than those shaded. Impoverished energy will reduce transmission reliability because some nodes have not enough energy to send data or are forced to decrease transmission power to save energy. In this paper, energy collaboration is taken into consideration for non-homogeneous energy harvesting in cooperative wireless sensor networks, where all sensor nodes harvest solar energy and then store it in rechargeable battery. And an energy cooperative protocol is proposed for energy inhomogeneity to enhance transmission reliability among relay nodes through radio frequency, where the nodes with abundant energy share excess power to other nodes which undertake the forwarding task but store insufficient energy. By exploiting ACK/NACK frame fed back from the destination node and No Enough Energy (NEE) frame advertised by the forwarding relays in the active set, each candidate node forms its energy supply set when all of them are lack of energy for transmitting. For the relay selection, three strategies are presented for choosing the pair of the best forwarding relay and the optimal energy supply relay, which are respectively named Best Channel Strategy, Nearest Distance Strategy and Minimum Energy Sharing Strategy. Furthermore, the outage probability of cooperative transmission under energy collaboration is derived. Simulation results show that energy collaboration for cooperative wireless sensor networks can significantly reduce the outage probability of the system and improve transmission reliability of the network.

Image texture smoothing (ITS) aims at completely removing textures while preserving as much as possible different-scale structures of an image. However, few quality assessment metrics have been formulated to objectively evaluate the ITS results, due to the lack of ground-truth texture-free images. Considering both the smoothness of textures and the preservation of structures, we make the debut of objective evaluation of ITS results, and design an intuitive Texture Smoothness and Structural Similarity Index (T3SI) based on human perception. Specifically, we first intuitively select some patches which contain relatively more texture/structure information. We then employ the Edge Preservation Index and the Structural Similarity Index Measure to evaluate the texture smoothness and the structure similarity on the selected patches, respectively. We finally formulate the novel exponential entropy function to balance the texture smoothness and the structure similarity for the quality assessment of ITS. T3SI is objective, easy to use, simple to implement, and stable. An independent User Study is performed to verify our proposed T3SI, and large experiments show that T3SI competes successfully to the state-of-the-art metrics. Our code is publicly available.

In this article, a novel online method for multi-player non-zero-sum (NZS) differential games of nonlinear partially unknown continuous time (CT) systems with control constraints is developed based on neural networks (NN). The issue of multi-player NZS games with saturated actuator is elaborately analyzed and the unknown dynamics model is learned by applying identifier NN. Different from using the standard identifier-actor-critic framework of adaptive dynamic programming (ADP), the proposed method uses only identifier networks and critic networks for all the players to solve the coupled Hamilton-Jacobi (HJ) equations for multi-player NZS games, which could effectively simplify the algorithm and save computing resources. Moreover, a tuning law which utilizes the gradient descent method is designed for each critic network. Meanwhile, to remove the requirement for the initial stabilizing control, a novel stability term is designed to ensure the system stability during the training phase of the critic NN. By the means of Lyapunov approach, it is proven that the system states, the critic network weight estimation errors and the obtained control are all uniformly ultimately bounded (UUB). Finally, two numerical examples are simulated to illustrate the validity of the developed method for multi-player NZS games with control constraints.

IntroductionThe mechanism of ankylosing spondylitis with femoral head necrosis is unknown, and our study aimed investigate the effects of genetic and immune cell dysregulation on ankylosing spondylitis.Materials and MethodsThe protein expression of all ligaments in ankylosing spondylitis with femoral head necrosis was obtained using label-free quantification protein park analysis of six pairs of specimens. The possible pathogenesis was explored using differential protein analysis, weighted gene co-expression network analysis, recording intersections with hypoxia-related genes, immune cell correlation analysis, and drug sensitivity analysis. Finally, routine blood test data from 502 AS and 162 healthy controls were collected to examine immune cell differential analysis.ResultsSAA1 and TUBA8 were significantly expressed differentially in these two groups and correlated quite strongly with macrophage M0 and resting mast cells (P < 0.05). Routine blood data showed that monocytes were significantly more expressed in AS than in healthy controls (P < 0.05). SAA1 and TUBA8 were closely related to the sensitivity of various drugs, which might lead to altered drug sensitivity.ConclusionDysregulation of SAA1, TUBA8 and monocytes are key factors in ankylosing spondylitis with femoral head necrosis.

The grey system model with time power, which is often called the GM(1,1, tα), appeals considerable interest of research due to its effectiveness in time series forecasting. Aimed to improve further the GM(1,1, tα) model, this paper introduces a new whitening equation with variable coefficient into the original whitening equation which extends applicable scope; as a result, an improved grey model with time power, namely, OGM(1,1, tα), is proposed. Firstly, the time response function of the novel model and the restored values of original series are deduced through grey modelling techniques. Secondly, the variable coefficient in the whitening equation and the time power are determined by particle swarm optimization algorithm. Two empirical examples are then used to verify the validity of the novel model. Finally, the novel model is applied to predict the oil consumption of China from 2004 to 2018. Results show the novel model outperforms other commonly-used competitive models, which can well serve a benchmark model for scholars and decision-makers.

This paper examines the relation between continuous cash dividends, ownership structure and firm value across a sample of 1503 firms listed on Chinese A-share market from 2009 to 2017. The empirical results reveal (1) the positive effect of continuous cash dividends on firm value and that (2) values of both state-owned enterprises controlled by central government (SOECGs) and state-owned enterprises controlled by local governments (SOELGs) that distribute continuous cash dividends increase more with ownership concentration than values of those that distribute discontinuous cash dividends; continuous cash dividends fail to mediate the effect of ownership concentration on firm value in private firms (PFs). The results are robust.

Across Southeastern China, the expansion of citrus plantation has underpinned substantial economic development at the expense of forest cover and associated ecosystem services. The high-order complexity of citrus planting dynamics requires more detailed observations. To achieve this goal, we developed a novel monitoring scheme by integrating multi-epoch land cover classification and continuous change detection on the Google Earth Engine (GEE) platform using all available Landsat archives (1986–2018). First, a stable/changed area masking approach was adopted. Then, the GEE-based Continuous Change Detection and Classification (GEE-CCDC) algorithm was applied to detect the timing and position of citrus planting-related land cover changes. Finally, the effectiveness of the scheme was validated both spatially and temporally. We applied the proposed scheme in Xunwu, a typical County in Southeastern China where continuous expansion was disrupted by an outbreak of Huanglongbing (HLB, a destructive citrus disease). The validation results indicate that the multi-epoch classification effectively identified the stable, abandoned, and newly cultivated areas related to citrus planting. Within these areas, our monitoring of citrus planting dynamics had an overall temporal accuracy of 90.59% and a mean detection date deviation of −13.21 days (leading). Based on the change detection results, we found a two-stage change pattern, namely a continuous expansion period (1986–2016) followed by a disturbance period (2017–2018). Moreover, almost half of the orchards were cultivated in regions with an elevation and slope of 301–400 m and 11–20°. During the continuous expansion period, a total of 497.85 km2 natural lands were converted for citrus planting. Affected by the HLB outbreak, both orchard abandonment (114.66 km2) and new orchard cultivation (36.87 km2) were detected during the disturbance period. The proposed scheme offers a useful tool for cash crops management, and highlights the value of dense satellite data in monitoring the extent of ongoing human appropriation of natural ecosystems at a large scale and long-term.

Background: Toxicological studies suggest that maternal exposure to disinfection by-products (DBPs) can impair fetal neurodevelopment. However, evidence from epidemiological studies is scarce and the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Objective: To explore the trimester-specific associations between maternal blood trihalomethane (THM) and urinary haloacetic acid (HAA) concentrations and neonatal neurobehavioral development, and the potential mediating role of oxidative stress (OS). Methods: We included 438 pregnant Chinese women from the Xiaogan Disinfection By-Products (XGDBP) birth cohort. Biospecimens were repeatedly collected across trimesters and measured for blood THMs, urinary HAAs, and urinary OS biomarker concentrations. On the third day after birth, the Neonatal Behavioral Neurological Assessment (NBNA) test was administered to newborns. Associations of trimester-specific DBP measurements and OS biomarkers with neonatal NBNA scores were assessed using linear regression models with generalized estimating equations. The potential mediating role of maternal OS biomarkers was also investigated using mediation analyses. Results: After adjusting for potential confounders, blood bromodichloromethane (BDCM) concentrations in the first trimester were inversely associated with NBNA scores [percent change comparing the extreme BDCM tertiles = –28.1% (95% CI: –55.2%, –0.88%); p for trend = 0.043]. Besides, third-trimester urinary trichloroacetic acid (TCAA) concentrations were inversely associated with NBNA scores [percent change comparing the extreme TCAA tertiles = –32.9% (95% CI: –64.7%, –1.0%); p for trend = 0.046]. These inverse associations differed across pregnancy trimesters (Type 3 p-value = 0.066 and 0.053, respectively) and were stronger in male infants and mothers aged ≥25 years. There was no evidence of mediating effect by 8-hydroxy-2-deoxyguanosine (8-OHdG), 4-hydroxy-2-nonenal-mercapturic acid (HNE-MA), or 8-iso-prostaglandin F2α (8-isoPGF2α). Conclusions: Higher prenatal BDCM and TCAA concentrations during specific pregnancy trimesters were associated with lower NBNA scores. However, additional research is required to investigate underlying mechanisms.