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This article presents a novel toroidal metasurface that is able to support a toroidal response at almost all incident angles for a transverse magnetic (TM) wave at the microwave range. A flat band is observed from the calculated band structure where the radiation power of the toroidal response is highest around 7.51 GHz. A high transmission at a resonant frequency is observed from the simulated and measured transmission coefficients with different incident angles, whereas the transmission is lower at the rest frequency range. The resonance frequency at a high sensitivity of 0.78 GHz/refraction index unit (RIU) is experimentally demonstrated, which is very sensitive to the thickness and the refraction index of the surrounding materials such that the proposed toroidal metasurface could be used for a tunable highly efficient filters.

Genetic effects on the liability scale are informative for describing the genetic architecture of binary traits, typically diseases. However, most genetic association analyses on binary traits are performed by logistic regression, and there is no straightforward method that transforms both effect size estimate and standard error from the logit scale to the liability scale. Here, we derive a simple linear transformation of the log odds ratio and its standard error for a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) to an effect size and standard error on the liability scale. We show by analytic calculations and simulations that this approximation is accurate when the disease is common and the SNP effect is small. We also apply this method to estimate the contribution of a SNP near the RET gene to the variance of Hirschsprung disease liability, and the age-specific contributions of APOE4 on the variance of Alzheimer’s disease liability. We discuss the approximate linear inter-relationships between genotype and effect sizes on the observed binary, logit, and liability scales, and the potential applications of the linear approximation to statistical power calculation for binary traits.

Owing to their high performance and earth abundance, copper sulfides (Cu2−xS) have attracted wide attention as a promising medium-temperature thermoelectric material. Nanostructure and grain-boundary engineering are explored to tune the electrical transport and phonon scattering of Cu2−xS based on the liquid-like copper ion. Here multiscale architecture-engineered Cu2−xS are fabricated by a room-temperature wet chemical synthesis combining mechanical mixing and spark plasma sintering. The observed electrical conductivity in the multiscale architecture-engineered Cu2−xS is four times as much as that of the Cu2−xS sample at 800 K, which is attributed to the potential energy filtering effect at the new grain boundaries. Moreover, the multiscale architecture in the sintered Cu2−xS increases phonon scattering and results in a reduced lattice thermal conductivity of 0.2 W·m−1·K−1 and figure of merit (zT) of 1.0 at 800 K. Such a zT value is one of the record values in copper sulfide produced by chemical synthesis. These results suggest that the introduction of nanostructure and formation of new interface are effective strategies for the enhancement of thermoelectric material properties. Supplementary Information The online version of this article (10.1007/s12598-020-01698-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Background Noni (Morinda citrifolia Linn.) is a tropical tree that bears climacteric fruit. Previous observations and research have shown that the second day (2 d) after harvest is the most important demarcation point when the fruit has the same appearance as the freshly picked fruit (0 d); however, they are beginning to become water spot appearance. We performed a conjoint analysis of metabolome and transcriptome data for noni fruit of 0 d and 2 d to reveal what happened to the fruit at the molecular level. Genes and metabolites were annotated to KEGG pathways and the co-annotated KEGG pathways were used as a statistical analysis. Results We found 25 pathways that were significantly altered at both metabolic and transcriptional levels, including a total of 285 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and 11 differential metabolites through an integrative analysis of transcriptomics and metabolomics. The energy metabolism and pathways originating from phenylalanine were disturbed the most. The upregulated resistance metabolites and genes implied the increase of resistance and energy consumption in the postharvest noni fruit. Most genes involved in glycolysis were downregulated, further limiting the available energy. This lack of energy led noni fruit to water spot appearance, a prelude to softening. The metabolites and genes related to the resistance and energy interacted and restricted each other to keep noni fruit seemingly hard within two days after harvest, but actually the softening was already unstoppable. Conclusions This study provides a new insight into the relationship between the metabolites and genes of noni fruit, as well as a foundation for further clarification of the post-ripening mechanism in noni fruit.

In this article, a novel miniaturized concept named strong-coupled frequency selective surface (SC-FSS) with excellent angular stability is presented. First, a conceptual design of SC-FSS is introduced, where the resonant frequencies are insensitive to almost all incident angles. A corresponding equivalent circuit model is developed to interpret the operating principle and formulate relevant design equations with an error of 0.2%. Furthermore, an ultraminiaturized and ultrathin band-stop structure with a unit cell size of λ 0/35 and thickness of 0.26 mm ( λ0 /578) is designed and fabricated to verify this concept. Analysis and experiment show that the proposed band-stop SC-FSS structure can work stably at 2 GHz for both TE and TM modes, even when the incident angle varies from 0° to 84°. The measurement results are consistent with those obtained by full-wave simulations and the equivalent circuit model, which fully demonstrates that the concept of SC-FSS can be widely used in designing antenna reflectors, electromagnetic interference shielding, and angle-insensitive absorbers.

To examine the longitudinal associations of sleep duration and sleep quality with coronary heart disease (CHD) risk among individuals aged ≥ 20 years. A systematic review and meta-analysis of observational cohort studies were performed to evaluate the association between sleep quality and duration, and the risk of CHD. We searched three databases including PUBMED, the Cochrane Library and EMBASE, selected relevant studies and used the classical and Net-work models to establish the hazard ratio (HRs) of the results. Data extracted from 11 studies including 769,452 participants and 14,769 patients with CHD events were reviewed. In the classical meta-analysis, night sleep duration of 8 h showed an increased risk of CHD (HR = 1.13, and 1.13, respectively) compared with reference sleep (7–8 h). However, the net-work model stratified sleep quality into good and poor subgroups, and there was no change in CHD risk in each subgroup despite different sleep hours. Furthermore, individuals with poor-quality sleep were at a greater risk of CHD than those with good-quality sleep (HR = 1.4, 1.3, and 1.4 for 8 h, respectively). Moreover, individuals with reference time sleep but that of poor quality were associated with an increased risk of CHD compared with good sleepers having short/long sleep duration (HR = 1.3 and 1.2, respectively). Poor-quality sleep was associated with great morbidity and mortality of CHD, independent of sleep duration. Sleep quality rather than sleep duration might be crucial for increased CHD risk, suggesting the potential importance of poor-quality sleep as a possible CHD risk factor.

The effect of thermo-mechanical treatment on the microstructural evolution of low carbon micro-alloyed high strength steel was studied by combining prestrain with tempering (PST) in this paper. It was found that the prestrain causes the dislocation to plug up around the grain boundary and carbide, resulting in carbide boundary fragmentation. Moreover, it breaks the thermo-dynamic equilibrium between the matrix and carbide, induces the dissolution of carbon in the high energy state, and then changes the distribution of carbon in the matrix. In the subsequent tempering process, the precipitation regularity of carbide was changed, which promoted the precipitation carbide at low temperature. The influence of carbide precipitation on dislocation can be divided into two stages: the first stage was precipitation induced creep, which promoted stress relaxation; the second stage was precipitation pinning dislocation, which improved material strength and inhibited stress relaxation.

Given the prevalence and severity of indoor HCHO pollution, the efficient elimination of HCHO is of great urgency. Hierarchical Pt/δ-MnO2/Mn3O4 constructed from ultrathin δ-MnO2 nanosheets and octahedron-shaped Mn3O4 nanoparticles was synthesized. About 1.19 mg of HCHO was oxidized over 0.1 g of Pt/δ-MnO2/Mn3O4 (0.5 wt% Pt) within 1 h at room temperature. Pt/δ-MnO2/Mn3O4 (0.1 wt% Pt) exhibited higher activity (0.91 mg) than Pt/commercial-MnO2 (0.5 wt% Pt, 0.87 mg). The enhanced performance of Pt/δ-MnO2/Mn3O4 mainly arose from three factors. Hierarchical texture consisting of ultrathin nanosheets and octahedral nanoparticles endowed the catalysts with high mass transfer efficiency and good Pt-dispersion through providing numerous accessible meso-/macropores and abundant available Pt-deposition sites. Ultrathin δ-MnO2 nanosheets with a high proportion of surface atoms offered a large number of active centres and highly mobile lattice oxygen for HCHO adsorption and oxidation. Active surface oxygen could be generated via a dual-pathway including emergence on the surface of Pt atoms and development through Mn4+/Mn3+ cycles, giving rise to a superb catalytic activity. This work provided a feasible approach for synthesizing low-cost catalysts with excellent performance toward HCHO removal at room temperature.

Contrast enhancement (CE) of magnetic resonance (MR) brain images is an important technique to bring out the tissue details for clinical diagnosis. Recently, a new form of image enhancement has been proposed to complete the task without any information loss. Specifically, information required to restore the original image is reversibly hidden into the enhanced image. Moreover, several image segmentation based algorithms have been proposed so that the region of interest can be exclusively enhanced. However, with the reversible algorithms, it is hard to properly enhance the tissues in MR brain images when they are relatively small or connected with each other. To address this issue, a hierarchical CE scheme is proposed for MR brain images with reversibility in this letter. Firstly, a deep convolutional neural network is used to segment multiple tissue classes automatically. Then, the segmented tissues are individually utilized to guide the CE procedure so that individual-tissue-enhanced images are generated. Compared with using the background information to guide the CE procedure, better tissue enhancement effects and visual quality are both obtained by our proposed hierarchical scheme. The evaluation results obtained over MR brain test images demonstrate the reversibility and adaptability of the proposed scheme for the enhancement of interested tissues.

Purpose Studies have indicated that the observed association between vitamin D and myopia was confounded by time spent outdoors. This study aimed to elucidate this association using a national cross-sectional dataset. Methods Participants with 12 to 25 years who participated in non-cycloplegic vision exam from National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2001 to 2008 were included in the present study. Myopia was defined as spherical equivalent of any eyes ≤ −0.5 diopters (D). Results 7,657 participants were included. The weighted proportion of emmetropes, mild myopia, moderate myopia, and high myopia were 45.5%, 39.1%, 11.6%, and 3.8%, respectively. After adjusting for age, gender, ethnicity, TV/computer usage, and stratified by education attainment, every 10 nmol/L increment of serum 25(OH)D concentration was associated with a reduced risk of myopia (odds ratio [OR] = 0.96, 95% confidence interval [95%CI] 0.93–0.99 for any myopia; OR = 0.96, 95%CI 0.93–1.00 for mild myopia; OR = 0.99, 95%CI 0.97–1.01 for moderate myopia; OR = 0.89, 95%CI 0.84–0.95 for high myopia). Serum 25(OH)D level was closely correlated with time spent outdoors. After categorizing time spent outdoors into quarters (low, low-medium, medium-high, and high), every 1 quarter increment of time spent outdoors was associated with 2.49 nmol/L higher serum 25(OH)D concentration. After adjusting for time spent outdoors, serum 25(OH)D level did not show significant association with myopia (OR = 1.01, 95%CI 0.94–1.06 for 10 nmol/L increment). Conclusions The association between high serum vitamin D and reduced risk of myopia is confounded by longer time spent outdoors. Evidence from the present study does not support that there is a direct association between serum vitamin D level with myopia.

The corrosion of rebars will change the mechanical properties of the reinforced concrete structure, leading to the decline in the structural strength, which seriously threatens the safety and stability of buildings and power equipment foundations. Hence, it is of great significance to detect the internal corrosion of reinforced concrete structures. In this paper, a nondestructive detection method for detecting the corrosion in reinforced concrete structures based on microwave was proposed, and the corrosion state of rebar can be evaluated by the change of microwave information. Compared with other detection methods, microwave nondestructive detection has the advantages of low energy consumption, strong penetration, no contact, and small equipment volume and weight. In order to verify the effectiveness of the method, a microwave nondestructive detection simulation test platform was built and reinforced concrete test models with different corrosion lengths and depths were made. The influences of concrete parameters, the microwave frequency, and the lifting distance of the waveguide were analyzed. The frequency sweeping and moving scanning detection methods of the waveguide were carried out for the test models with different corrosion defects, and the changes of microwave S-parameters under different corrosion defects were obtained. The results show that when the waveguide is placed horizontally by the frequency sweeping detection method, the corrosion length detection effect of rebar is better. When the waveguide is placed vertically by the frequency sweeping detection method, the corrosion depth can be identified and the amplitude of transmission coefficient increases with the increase in the corrosion depth. The corrosion length of rebars can be identified quantitatively by the moving scanning detection method of the waveguide.

BACKGROUND/AIM Injuries to the primary dentition affect children's esthetics, function, and mental health. They may also affect the development of the permanent teeth. The knowledge of dentists about deciduous tooth trauma is rarely evaluated. The aim of this study was to evaluate the knowledge and attitude of dentists in China regarding traumatic dental injuries to primary teeth. MATERIAL AND METHODS A self-administered online questionnaire containing questions on demographic data and knowledge based on a clinical scenario was given to a purposive sample of dentists, recruited by a non-probability convenience sampling method. The chi-square test was used for statistical analysis, with the significance level set at P

The degree of networking has a significant impact on the performance of venture capital firms. Conversely, social network analysis comprises the identification of furthermost prestigious and influe...

Online platforms for matching supply and demand, as part of the sharing economy, are becoming increasingly important in practice and have seen a steep increase in academic interest. Especially in the taxi/travel industry, platforms such as Uber, Lyft, and Didi Chuxing have become major players. Some of these platforms, including Didi Chuxing, operate two matching systems: Inform, where multiple drivers receive ride details and the first to respond is selected; and Assign, where the platform assigns the driver nearest to the customer. The Inform system allows drivers to select their destinations, but the Assign system minimizes driver-customer distances. This research is the first to explore: (i) how a platform should allocate customer requests to the two systems and set the maximum matching radius (i.e., customer-driver distance), with the objective to minimize the overall average waiting times for customers; and (ii) how taxi drivers select a system, depending on their varying degrees of preference for certain destinations. Using approximate queuing analysis, we derive the optimal decisions for the platform and drivers. These are applied to real-world data from Didi Chuxing, revealing the following managerial insights. The optimal radius is 1-3 kilometers, and is lower during rush hour. For most considered settings, it is optimal to allocate relatively few rides to the Inform system. Most interestingly, if destination selection becomes more important to the average driver, then the platform should not always allocate more requests to the Inform system. Although this may seem counter-intuitive, allocating too many orders to that system would result in many drivers opting for it, leading to very high waiting times in the Assign system.

In this paper, a novel image transformation scheme is proposed to protect the visual information. By mimicking an arbitrarily chosen reference image, a secret image is visually changed and can be exactly recovered from the transformed image when needed. Unlike the block-wise visual encryption methods, the proposed transformation scheme modifies the secret image by bit plane replacement and reordering so that no block effect is introduced. In particular, one or more bit planes are hidden into the other bit planes so that the most significant one(s) can be vacated. Besides replacing the vacated bit plane(s) and reordering the others according to the reference image, histogram modification may be performed to conceal the secret content if needed. To exactly recover the secret image, the required information is recorded and reversibly hidden into the transformed image by adopting a reversible data hiding algorithm. The experimental results on three image sets show that their content can be semantically changed to prevent leakage of visual information. Moreover, the applicability and efficiency of the proposed scheme have been validated by comparing the existing visual encryption schemes.

In this study, several machine learning-based experimental methods are used to analyse firms’ research and development (R&D)-related activities and predict their technological innovation performance. Using unbalanced panel data from the CSMAR database for all listed firms in China from 2008 to 2018, we analyse the firms’ basic information, R&D investment, patent application and authorization activity, financial status, and human capital. We use a logistic regression model, decision tree model, three weak classifiers random forest model, XGBoost model, and two weak classifiers gradient boosting decision tree (GBDT) model to integrate strong classifiers separately. A comparison of the results produced using the different models shows that the performance of the XGBoost model is better than that of the other models in terms of net profit, total sales revenue, and the number of invention patent applications as a proportion of the total number of patent applications. However, the performance of the GBDT model is significantly better than that of the other models in terms of the number of patent applications per 100,000 yuan of R&D expenditure. The results of this study can help scholars to accurately predict the innovation performance of firms and help business managers to make better decisions to improve the innovation performance of their firms in the current era of rapid technological change.

Selective Laser Sinering (SLS) and Reactive Melting Infiltration (RMI) were combined to fabricate complicated SiC ceramics with high performance in the research. The influence of carbon content on green parts’ mechanical properties was studied. Then, the effect of carbon density on the microstructure of SiC was studied. The results showed that the density of sintered body increased first and then decreased with the increase of carbon black content. Due to the increase of carbon density, the siliconizing property of carbonated preforms is also improved by impregnating asphalt. When the carbon density was 0.6612 g/cm3, sintered density reached 2.899 g/cm3. But the flexural strength reached peak value of 190.19 ± 1.89 MPa as the carbon density decreased to 0.5542 g/cm3. Therefore, this research lays a foundation for laser sintering to fabricate high performance and complex structure SiC ceramics by regulating carbon content.

For uveal melanoma (UM) patients, it is significant to establish diagnosis and prognosis evaluation systems through imaging techniques. However, imaging examinations are short of quantitative biomarkers and it is difficult to finish early diagnosis of UM. In order to discover new molecular biomarkers for the diagnosis and prognostic evaluation of UM, six circulating miRNAs (mir-132-3p, mir-21-5p, mir-34a-5p, mir-126-3p, mir-199a-3p, mir-214-3p) were chosen as candidates for independent validation. Validation of these miRNAs was performed in a cohort of 20 patients, including 10 spindle-shaped melanoma and 10 epithelioid cell melanoma, and 10 healthy donors. Then 5 patients with metastatic UM were included to validate the performance of miRNAs in advanced UM. Serum levels of miRNAs were determined using quantitative real-time PCR. We confirmed significantly higher levels of three miRNAs in serum of UM patients in comparison to healthy controls, and miR-199a-3p had the best performance (p < 0.0001; AUC = 0.985). MiR-214-3p and miR-21-5p were significantly upregulated in serum of epithelioid cell melanoma patients compared to spindle-shaped melanoma patients and miR-132-3p and, conversely, were significantly downregulated in serum of epithelioid cell melanoma patients. MiR-21-5p shows their best performance (p < 0.0001; AUC = 0.980). Both miR-199a-3p and miR-21-5p showed great performance in advanced UM. Significantly higher levels of miR-21-5p (p < 0.001) were found in serum of metastatic UM patients compared to patients with localized spindle-shaped melanoma, and significantly higher levels of miR-199a-3p (p < 0.001) were detected in serum of metastatic UM patients compared to healthy controls. Our preliminary data indicate promising diagnostic utility of circulating miR-199a-3p and promising prognostic utility of circulating miR-21-5p in both early and advanced UM patients.

The zona pellucida plays a crucial role in the process of fertilization to early embryonic development, including cellular arrangement and communication between blastomeres. However, little is known regarding the role of the zona pellucida in pre- and post-implantation embryonic development associated with gene expression. We investigated the effect of zona pellucida removal on pre- and post-implantation development of mouse embryos. After zona pellucida removal of two-cell stage embryos was performed by acid Tyrode’s solution, which is commonly used for zona pellucida treatment, compaction occurred earlier in zona pellucida-free than zona pellucida-intact embryos. In addition, the expression of differentiation-related genes in the inner cell mass and trophectoderm was significantly altered in zona pellucida-free blastocyst compared with zona pellucida-intact embryos. After embryo transfer, the rate of implantation and live fetuses was lower in zona pellucida-free embryos than in control embryos, whereas the fetal weight at E17.5 was not different. However, placental weight significantly increased in zona pellucida-free embryos. RNA-sequencing analysis of the placenta showed that a total of 473 differentially expressed genes significantly influenced the biological process. The present study suggests that zona pellucida removal by acid Tyrode’s solution at the two-cell stage not only disturbs the expression pattern of inner cell mass-/trophectoderm-related genes but affects the post-implantation development of mouse embryos. Overall, this study provides deeper insight into the role of the zona pellucida during early embryonic development and the viability of post-implantation development.

Chromosomal instability (CIN) is a hallmark of cancer that results from errors in chromosome segregation during mitosis. Targeting of CIN-associated vulnerabilities is an emerging therapeutic strategy in drug development. KIF18A, a mitotic kinesin, has been shown to play a role in maintaining bipolar spindle integrity and promotes viability of CIN cancer cells. To explore the potential of KIF18A, a series of inhibitors was identified. Optimization of an initial hit led to the discovery of analogues that could be used as chemical probes to interrogate the role of KIF18A inhibition. Compounds

Decabromodiphenyl ether (BDE-209) has drawn significant attention due to its suppression of immune functions in animals and even humans. In order to explore the mechanism through which BDE-209 affects the immune system, broiler chicks were fed a diet containing various concentrations of BDE-209 (0, 0.004, 0.04, 0.4, and 4 g/kg) for 42 days. Histopathological observations of immune organs found damaged and necrotic lymphocytes in the spleen and bursa, and losses of lymphoid cells in thymic gland. The activities of catalase, glutathione, glutathione peroxidase, and superoxide dismutase in both the spleen and serum were affected by BDE-209. Obvious bioaccumulation effect was found in spleen tissues (high to 1339 ± 181.9 μg/kg). Furthermore, transcriptome sequencing analyses of the spleen identified 424 upregulated and 301 downregulated DEGs, and the cytokine-cytokine receptor interaction signal pathway was most significantly enriched based on the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes database. Quantitative real-time PCR affirmed the decreased expressions of interleukin IL18, IL18R1, IL18RAP, IL21, as well as interferon gamma IFNG and tumor necrosis factor superfamily members TNFSF8, indicating significant interference to immunomodulation function and possible disease progression in inflammatory effects resulting from BDE-209 exposure. The immunotoxicity of BDE-209 may cause the suppression of immune and physiological functions of spleen cells, leading to inflammation and apoptosis and ultimately spleen atrophy.

TRPV4 (transient receptor potential vanilloid 4), a calcium permeable TRP ion channel, is known to play a key role in endocytosis. However, whether it contributes to exocytosis remains unclear. Here, we report that activation of TRPV4 induced massive exocytosis in both melanoma A375 cell and heterologous expression systems. We show here that, upon application of TRPV4-specific agonists, prominent vesicle priming from endoplasmic reticulum (ER) was observed, followed by morphological changes of mitochondrial crista may lead to cell ferroptosis. We further identified interactions between TRPV4 and folding/vesicle trafficking proteins, which were triggered by calcium entry through activated TRPV4. This interplay, in turn, enhanced TRPV4-mediated activation of folding and vesicle trafficking proteins to promote exocytosis. Our study revealed a signaling mechanism underlying stimulus-triggered exocytosis in melanoma and highlighted the role of cellular sensor TRPV4 ion channel in mediating ferroptosis.

Strong interchain interactions of conjugated polymers usually result in poor miscibility with molecular dopants, limiting the doping efficiency because of uncontrolled phase separation. We have developed a strategy to achieve efficient charge-transport and high doping miscibility in n-doped conjugated polymers. We solve the miscibility issue through disorder side-chains containing dopants better. Systemic structural characterization reveals a farther side-chain branching point will lead to higher disorders, which provides appropriate sites to accommodate extrinsic molecular dopants without harming original chain packings and charge-transport channels. Therefore, better sustainability of solid-state microstructure is obtained, yielding a stable conductivity even when overloading massive dopants. This work highlights the importance of realizing high host-dopant miscibility in molecular doping of conjugated polymers.

To assess the impact of the online car-hailing services on the environment in China, in this paper, we develop a model to evaluate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and emission reduction during the production and use of car-hailing, as a result of increased online bookings. Since energy use differs according to type of vehicle, this paper also contains different scenarios that depict degrees in the regulation stringency according to the Chinese Preliminary Rules on the Management of Online Car-Hailing, regional differences, and development of electric vehicles. The results show that, under the three different scenarios, the online car-hailing service would have the highest GHG emissions of 325, 413, or 160 MtCO2 and the highest reduction in emissions of 19.46, 25.1, or 9.48 MtCO2 by 2030. The government needs to encourage the development of online car-hailing to reduce the purchase of private cars, avoid compulsory actions to shut down online car-hailing platforms, and mandate that only electric vehicles (EVs) can be used for online car-hailing.

To explore clinical effect of arthroscopic debridement combined with platelet-rich plasma (PRP) injection for Kellgren-Lawrence(K-L) gradeⅠ-Ⅲ knee osteoarthritis (KOA) .Totally 117 patients with KOA who underwent arthroscopic debridement combined with injection from November 2015 to January 2019 were retrospectively analyzed. According to different injection drugs, the patients were divided into sodium hyaluronate group(group A) and PRP group(group B). In group A, there were 60 patients, including 27 males and 33 females, aged from 49 to 67 years old with an average age of (54.1±4.8) years old;12 patients with gradeⅠ, 23 patients with gradeⅡand 25 patients with grade Ⅲ according to K-L clssification, 2 ml(20 g) sodium hyaluronate was injected into knee joint after intraoperative, 1, 2, 3 weeks after operation for 4 times. In group B, there were 57 patients, including 25 males and 32 females, aged from 47 to 70 years old with an average of (55.8±5.0) years old, 10 patients with gradeⅠ, 20 patients with gradeⅡand 27 patients with grade Ⅲ according to K-L classification, injected 5 ml PRP at the same time. Postoperative complications was recorded between two groups. Postoperative visual analogue scale(VAS) and Lysholm score at 3, 6, 12 months were used to evaluate improvement of knee pain and joint function.All patients were followed up for 12 to 19 months with an average of (14.1±1.6) months. There was no significant difference in postopertaive complications between group A and group B (Arthroscopic debridement combined with sodium hyaluronate or PRP injection for K-L gradeⅠ-Ⅲ KOA could effectively relieve pain and improve joint function with higher safety in short term, but the medium-long-term effect of PRP injection is stable.

For collision-free navigation in unstructured and cluttered environments, deep reinforcement learning (DRL) has gained extensive successes for being capable of adapting to new environments without much human effort. However, due to its asymmetry, the problems related to its lack of data efficiency and robustness remain as challenges. In this paper, we present a new laser-based navigation system for mobile robots, which combines a global planner with reinforcement learning-based local trajectory re-planning. The proposed method uses Proximal Policy Optimization to learn an efficient and robust local planning policy with asynchronous data generation and training. Extensive experiments have been presented, showing that the proposed system achieves better performance than previous methods including end-to-end DRL, and it can improve the asymmetrical performance. Our analysis show that the proposed method can efficiently avoid deadlock points and achieves a higher success rate. Moreover, we show that our system can generalize to unseen environments and obstacles with only a few shots. The model enables the warehouse to realize automatic management through intelligent sorting and handling, and it is suitable for various customized application scenarios.

Excess dietary fructose intake is a major public health concern due to its deleterious effect to cause various metabolic and cardiovascular diseases. However, little is known about the effects of high-fructose consumption during pregnancy on offspring metabolic health in adulthood. Here, we show that maternal consumption of 20% (w/v) fructose water during pregnancy does not alter the metabolic balance of offspring with a chow diet, but predisposes them to obesity, fatty liver, and insulin resistance when challenged by a high-fat diet. Mechanistically, diet-induced brown fat reprogramming and global energy expenditure in offspring of fructose-fed dams are impaired. RNA-seq analysis of the fetal brown fat tissue reveals that the myogenic pathway is predominantly upregulated in the fructose-treated group. Meanwhile, circulating fructose level is found to be significantly elevated in both fructose-fed dams and their fetuses. Importantly fructose gavage also acutely activates the myogenic program in mice brown fat. Together, our data suggest that maternal high-fructose intake impairs fetal brown fat development, resultantly attenuates diet-induced thermogenesis and causes metabolic disorders in adult offspring probably through inducing myogenic signature in brown fat at the fetal stage.