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The utilization of lithium–sulfur battery is hindered by various challenges, including the “shuttle effect”, limited sulfur utilization, and the sluggish conversion kinetics of lithium polysulfides (LiPSs). In the present work, a theoretical design for the viability of graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) and phosphorus-doping graphitic carbon nitride substrates (P-g-C3N4) as promising host materials in a Li-S battery was conducted utilizing first-principles calculations. The PDOS shows that when the P atom is introduced, the 2p of the N atom is affected by the 2p orbital of the P atom, which increases the energy band of phosphorus-doping substrates. The energy bands of PC and Pi are 0.12 eV and 0.20 eV, respectively. When the lithium polysulfides are adsorbed on four substrates, the overall adsorption energy of PC is 48–77% higher than that of graphitic carbon nitride, in which the charge transfer of long-chain lithium polysulfides increase by more than 1.5-fold. It is found that there are powerful Li-N bonds between lithium polysulfides and P-g-C3N4 substrates. Compared with the graphitic carbon nitride monolayer, the anchoring effect of the LiPSs@P-g-C3N4 substrate is enhanced, which is beneficial for inhibiting the shuttle of high-order lithium polysulfides. Furthermore, the catalytic performance of the P-g-C3N4 substrate is assessed in terms of the S8 reduction pathway and the decomposition of Li2S; the decomposition energy barrier of the P-g-C3N4 substrate decrease by 10% to 18%. The calculated results show that P-g-C3N4 can promote the reduction of S8 molecules and Li-S bond cleavage within Li2S, thus improving the utilization of sulfur-active substances and the ability of rapid reaction kinetics. Therefore, the P-g-C3N4 substrates are a promising high-performance lithium-sulfur battery anchoring material.

Abstract Objectives Both cachexia and sarcopenia have been considered adverse predictors for prognosis in patients with pancreatic cancer; although sarcopenia and cachexia share some similarities, they are still defined as distinct nutritional conditions. We aimed to explore the differential impacts of sarcopenia and cachexia on prognosis for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) patients following radical excision. Methods From January 2015 to May 2022, 614 patients undergoing surgery for PDAC were retrospectively included. Sarcopenia was defined as the L3 total skeletal muscle index below 52.4 cm2/m2 (men) and 38.5 cm2/m2 (women). Cachexia was classified according to the following criteria: involuntary weight loss >5% over the past 6 months, or weight loss >2% and BMI 2% and sarcopenia. Results Of the 614 patients included in the analysis, 62% and 48% were diagnosed with sarcopenia and cachexia, respectively. Kaplan–Meier analysis showed that sarcopenia and/or cachexia were significantly associated with worse overall survival (OS) rather than worse recurrence‐free survival (RFS). Moreover, Cox regression analysis revealed that cachexia rather than sarcopenia was an adverse factor for OS in all PDAC patients. For poorly differentiated PDAC, both cachexia and sarcopenia were significantly associated with shorter OS. However, for moderately/well‐differentiated PADC, cachexia was an independent factor for adverse OS, but not sarcopenia. Conclusions Sarcopenia and cachexia have different effects on OS for PDAC patients undergoing radical excision. This difference may provide some important information for preoperative management.

Anti-IgLON5 disease is a recently defined autoimmune disorder of the nervous system associated with autoantibodies against IgLON5. Given its broad clinical spectrum and extremely complex pathogenesis, as well as difficulties in its early diagnosis and treatment, anti-IgLON5 disease has become the subject of considerable research attention in the field of neuroimmunology. Anti-IgLON5 disease has characteristics of both autoimmunity and neurodegeneration due to the unique activity of the anti-IgLON5 antibody. Neuropathologic examination revealed the presence of a tauopathy preferentially affecting the hypothalamus and brainstem tegmentum, potentially broadening our understanding of tauopathies. In contrast to that seen with other autoimmune encephalitis-related antibodies, basic studies have demonstrated that IgLON5 antibody-induced neuronal damage and degeneration are irreversible, indicative of a potential link between autoimmunity and neurodegeneration in anti-IgLON5 disease. Herein, we comprehensively review and discuss basic and clinical studies relating to anti-IgLON5 disease to better understand this complicated disorder.

In molecular dynamics (MD) simulations, selecting an appropriate potential function is a crucial element for accurately simulating the kinetic properties of lithium ion intercalation, storage, and diffusion in graphite systems. This work employed a combination of non-equilibrium molecular dynamics (NEMD) and density-functional theory (DFT) for simulation and analysis. The findings indicate that the AIREBO potential function precisely describes the motion of ordered lithium ions between graphite layers, consistent with the models proposed by Rüdorff and Hofmann (R--H) and Daumas and Hérold (D--H). Conversely, for the folded structure within the graphite layer, the Tersoff potential function provides a more suitable description, consistent with the localized-domains model. Further analysis reveals that with increasing Li-ion concentration, the voltage, Young's modulus, and ultimate tensile strength of the LixC6 system exhibit a decreasing trend. Notably, the diffusion coefficient of lithium ions within the graphite layer varies widely, ranging from 10-6 cm² s-1 to 10-16 cm² s-1. In summary, this work is anticipated to provide further insights into the mechanism of lithium ion intercalation and diffusion kinetics in graphite electrodes. It also serves as a valuable theoretical framework for guiding the design and optimization of high-performance lithium-ion batteries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rosemary (Salvia rosmarinus) is a world-famous plant frequently subjected to various environmental stresses. Heat Shock Transcription Factor (HSF) has been shown to be essential for plant growth and for resistance to environmental stresses. This study utilized bioinformatics techniques to identify the SrHSF gene family in the rosemary genome. A total of 49 SrHSFs were detected, unevenly distributed across 12 chromosomes. The SrHSF genes were classifiable into 3 subfamilies and contained in 14 subgroups. They were relatively conserved during the evolutionary process based on gene structure and conserved motif analysis. There were 22 kinds of cis-acting elements in the promoter regions of SrHSF genes, mostly related to hormones, stress, growth, and development. The interactions among 16 highly conserved SrHSF proteins were also identified. Gene collinearity analysis showed that 51 segmental duplication events were undergone among 41 SrHSF genes. Ka/Ks ratios were all less than 1, suggesting a purifying selection of SrHSF homologous genes. The expression pattern of SrHSF genes revealed that the majority of them are highly expressed in the secondary stems. After 0.1% MeJA treatment, SrHSF36 and SrHSF11 showed a significant upregulation in leaves. This research provides valuable insights into the functions and regulatory mechanisms of the SrHSF gene family. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Integrated bioremediation systems are widely emerging treatment of mariculture wastewaters. The system consists of several units including the biofilm which is microbial consortium that help in removal of waste nutrients. However, a great performance would have been achieved if there was an addition of exogenous compound bacteria (ECB) in the biofilm unit. In this study, the ECB were added to the biofilm unit of an artificially created integrated mariculture wastewater system to explore their influence on the microbial community composition and structural diversity. A high-throughput amplicon of 16 S rRNA, PERMANOVA and LDA Effect Size (LEfSe) analyses were used to investigate the effects of ECB on the microbial community and nutrients removal performance in the biofilm unit of the integrated bioremediation systems of aquaculture wastewater (ISBAW). The results showed that the contents of total phosphorus (TP), chemical oxygen demand (CODMn), ammonia nitrogen (NH4+-N), and nitrate (NO3--N) decreased significantly after the treatment of ECB with the removal rates of 68%, 58%, 75% and 84%, respectively. The bacterial community in the water column has experienced three successional stages: the pretreatment, the middle and the late stage. The biofilm has gone through two successional stages: the pretreatment - early stage and the late stage. Bacillus became potential biomarker in the late water column and the pretreatment biofilm, respectively. Random processes were closed correlated with the community in the water column while deterministic processes were closely correlated to the biofilm’s component. Generally, the addition of ECB significantly affects the structural composition of bacterial communities on different media in the biofilm unit. The study provides basic information for understanding and development of efficient and optimized the IBSAW.

The forest grains and oils are an important part of China's grain and oil resources. They are derived from woody plants, which have the advantages of not occupying arable land resources, high nutritional value, and being rich in many bioactive substances, and also have good economic and ecological benefits, and have enormous development potential. This article mainly introduced the resource status, distribution, componential and functional characteristics, processing and utilization status of protein, starch, and oilseed woody plants. In response to the problems existed in the development of the forest grain and oil industry, corresponding strategies and suggestions were proposed, which could provide reference for the development of the forest grain and oil industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Considering the defect detection issues in electroluminescence (EL) of photovoltaic (PV) cell systems, lots of factors result in performance degradation, including defect diversity, data imbalance, scale difference, etc. Focal-EIoU loss, an effective defect detection solution for EL, is proposed based on the improved YOLOv5. Firstly, by analyzing the detection background and scale characteristics of EL defects, a binary classification is carried out in the system. Subsequently, a cascade detection network based on YOLOv5 is designed to further extract features from the binary-classified defects. The defect localization and classification are achieved in this way. To address the problem of imbalanced defect samples, a loss function is designed based on EIoU and Focal-F1 Loss. Experimental results are illustrated to show the effectiveness. Compared with the existing CNN-based deep learning approaches, the proposed focal loss calculation-based method can effectively improve the performance of handling sample imbalance. Moreover, in the detection of 12 types of defects, the Yolov5 algorithms can always obtain higher MAP (mean average precision) even with different parameter levels (Yolov5m: 0.791 vs. 0.857, Yolov5l: 0.798 vs. 0.862, Yolov5x: 0.802 vs. 0.867, Yolov5s: 0.793 vs. 0.865). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The low cycle performance and low Coulomb efficiency of tin-based materials confine their large–scale commercial application for lithium–ion batteries. To overcome the shortage of volume expansion of pristine tin, Sn–Co alloy/rGO composites have been successfully synthesized by chemical reduction and sintering methods. The effects of sintering temperature on the composition, structure and electrochemical properties of Sn–Co alloy/rGO composites were investigated by experimental study and first-principles calculation. The results show that Sn–Co alloys are composed of a large number of CoSn and trace CoSn2 intermetallics, which are uniformly anchored on graphene nanosheets. The sintering treatment effectively improves the electrochemical performance, especially for the first Coulomb efficiency. The first charge capacity of Sn–Co alloy/rGO composites sintered at 450 °C is 675 mAh·g−1, and the corresponding Coulomb efficiency reaches 80.4%. This strategy provides a convenient approach to synthesizing tin-based materials for high-performance lithium–ion batteries.

In view of the problems of ordinary rubber seals, such as high- and low-temperature resistance, easy aging, and insufficient load-bearing performance, O-type metal rubber seals with large ring-to-diameter ratio were prepared by the cold stamping method using stainless steel wire as raw material. The effects of heat treatment and porosity on the compression and tensile properties of test samples were investigated. Under uniaxial compression testing, it was found that the test sample had typical hysteresis characteristics, and the loss factor and energy dissipation of the sample with the same size and different porosity increased with the decrease of porosity. The loss factor and energy dissipation of the heat-treated sample were lower than those of the untreated sample. Thus, the smaller the porosity, the greater the change of loss factor and energy dissipation. Under uniaxial tensile testing, obvious stage changes were found during the tensile process, which included a linear elasticity stage, the formation and development stage of wire breakage, the one-by-one fracture stage of wires, and the complete failure stage of the sample. The yield strength, ultimate tensile strength, and modulus of elasticity of four samples with different porosity were measured, and it was found that the three parameters increased with the decrease of porosity. Moreover, the thermal treatment conductivity increased with the decrease of porosity. The aforementioned three parameters were generally increased. This indicated that metal rubber materials have good mechanical properties under high-temperature environments, which effectively solves the problem of vulnerability to aging and failure of ordinary rubbers under normal working conditions and has strong practical engineering significance.

Lithium-sulfur batteries are very promising next-generation energy storage batteries due to their high theoretical specific capacity. However, the shuttle effect of lithium-sulfur batteries is one of the important bottlenecks that limits its rapid development. Herein, physical and chemical dual adsorption of lithium polysulfides are achieved by designing a novel framework structure consisting of MnO2, reduced graphene oxide (rGO), and carbon nanotubes (CNTs). The framework-structure composite of MnO2/rGO/CNTs is prepared by a simple hydrothermal method. The framework exhibits a uniform and abundant mesoporous structure (concentrating in ~12 nm). MnO2 is an α phase structure and the α-MnO2 also has a significant effect on the adsorption of lithium polysulfides. The rGO and CNTs provide a good physical adsorption interaction and good electronic conductivity for the dissolved polysulfides. As a result, the MnO2/rGO/CNTs/S cathode delivered a high initial capacity of 1201 mAh g−1 at 0.2 C. The average capacities were 916 mAh g−1, 736 mAh g−1, and 547 mAh g−1 at the current densities of 0.5 C, 1 C, and 2 C, respectively. In addition, when tested at 0.5 C, the MnO2/rGO/CNTs/S exhibited a high initial capacity of 1010 mAh g−1 and achieved 780 mAh g−1 after 200 cycles, with a low capacity decay rate of 0.11% per cycle. This framework-structure composite provides a simple way to improve the electrochemical performance of Li-S batteries.

Non-wood forest diseases affect and restrict the development of non--wood forest industry in China. Biological control has attracted more attentions for its friendliness to environment and human health. At present, biological control agents have been widely used, which can control diseases through the competition for nutrients, hyperparasitism and production of antibiotics against phytopathogens, and the stimulation of plant growth and induction of host defense mechanisms. Plant essential oils could inhibit pathogens by affecting the synthesis and function of cell wall and cell membrane of pathogens, interfering with respiration and energy metabolism of pathogens, synthesis of genetic material and related function regulation, function of biofilm and quorum sensing system. The antagonistic mechanism of biocontrol agents against pathogens and the inhibitory mechanism of plant essential oil were reviewed to provide reference for biological control of non-wood forest diseases. The potential of low cost and high efficiency plant essential oil in biological control of non-wood forest diseases was also prospected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dual tree complex wavelet transform (DT-CWT) exhibits superiority of shift invariance, directional selectivity, perfect reconstruction (PR), and limited redundancy and can effectively separate various surface components. However, in nano scale the morphology contains pits and convexities and is more complex to characterize. This paper presents an improved approach which can simultaneously separate reference and waviness and allows an image to remain robust against abnormal signals. We included a bilateral filtering (BF) stage in DT-CWT to solve imaging problems. In order to verify the feasibility of the new method and to test its performance we used a computer simulation based on three generations of Wavelet and Improved DT-CWT and we conducted two case studies. Our results show that the improved DT-CWT not only enhances the robustness filtering under the conditions of abnormal interference, but also possesses accuracy and reliability of the reference and waviness from the 3-D nano scalar surfaces.