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PURPOSE: Amyands hernia is a rare hernia defined as an inguinal hernia that contains the appendix within the hernia sac. Current treatment of Amyands hernia remains controversial. Our study retrospectively reviewed 6 cases of Amyands hernia, aiming to provide a reference for the surgical treatment of Amyands hernia. METHODS: Six patients diagnosed with Amyands hernia from September 2010 to May 2020 were retrospectively enrolled in our study. We summarized clinical data of six patients including the chief complaint, physical examinations, laboratory examinations, imaging examinations, surgical methods, and postoperative treatments and outcomes. RESULTS: The diagnosis of six cases with Amyands hernia was made during surgery. Two patients had normal appendixes whereas the remaining four patients had appendicitis. Two patients with normal appendix received tension-free mesh repair through the inguinal incision. Among those with inflamed or perforated appendixes, two received mesh repair and the other two did not. The discharge time after surgery of six patients was 9.8 ± 6.1 days. One patient suffered from a wound infection. No additional postoperative complications were detected. CONCLUSIONS: Computed tomography and ultrasonography are helpful but limited in the definite diagnosis of Amyands hernia. The presence of a normal appendix does not require to be resected, but appendicectomy is necessary if the appendix is inflamed. The treatment of Amyands hernia should be tailored based on the patients condition and the type of Amyands hernia.

Background: α-dystroglycanopathies are congenital muscular dystrophies in which genetic mutations cause the decrease or absence of a unique and complex O-linked glycan called matriglycan. This hypoglycosylation of O-linked matriglycan on the α-dystroglycan (α-DG) protein subunit abolishes or reduces the protein binding to extracellular ligands such as laminins in skeletal muscles, leading to compromised survival of muscle cells after contraction. Methods: Surrogate molecular linkers reconnecting laminin-211 and the dystroglycan β-subunit through bispecific antibodies can be engineered to improve muscle function in the α-dystroglycanopathies. This study reports the metabolic engineering of a novel glycofusion bispecific (GBi) antibody that fuses the mucin-like domain of the α-DG to the light chain of an anti-β-DG subunit antibody. Results: Transient HEK production with the co-transfection of LARGE1, the glycoenzyme responsible for the matriglycan modification, produced the GBi antibody only with a light matriglycan modification and a weak laminin-211 binding activity. However, when a sugar feed mixture of uridine, galactose, and manganese ion (Mn2+) was added to the culture medium, the GBi antibody produced exhibited a dramatically enhanced matriglycan modification and a much stronger laminin-binding activity. Conclusions: Further investigation has revealed that Mn2+ in the sugar feeds played a critical role in increasing the matriglycan modification of the GBi antibody, key for the function of the resulting bispecific antibody. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Developing efficient anode catalysts for direct ammonia solid oxide fuel cells (NH3-SOFCs) under intermediate-temperatures is of great importance, in support of hydrogen economy via ammonia utilization. In the present work, the pyrochlore-type La2Zr2−xNixO7+δ (LZNx, x = 0, 0.02, 0.05, 0.08, 0.10) oxides were synthesized as potential anode catalysts of NH3-SOFCs due to the abundant Frankel defect that contributes to the good conductivity and oxygen ion mobility capacity. The effects of different content of Ni2+ doping on the crystal structure, surface morphology, thermal matching with YSZ (Yttria-stabilized zirconia), conductivity, and electrochemical performance of pyrochlore oxides were examined using different characterization techniques. The findings indicate that the LZNx oxide behaves as an n-type semiconductor and exhibits an excellent high-temperature chemical compatibility and thermal matching with the YSZ electrolyte. Furthermore, LZN0.05 exhibits the smallest conductive band potential and bandgap, making it have a higher power density as anode material for NH3-SOFCs compared to other anodes. As a result, the maximum power density of the LZN0.05-40YSZ composite anode reaches 100.86 mW/cm2 at 800 °C, which is 1.8 times greater than that of NiO-based NH3-SOFCs (56.75 mW/cm2) under identical flow rate and temperature conditions. The extended durability indicates that the NH3-SOFCs utilizing the LZN0.05-40YSZ composite anode exhibits a negligible voltage degradation following uninterrupted operation at 800 °C for 100 h. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is the first country in the world to grow, make and taste tea, and has a colorful tea culture. After absorbing some of the connotations of Chinese tea culture, the United Kingdom, through innovation and integration, has condensed a unique British tea culture. The two countries that both have tea have very different tea situations. This paper focuses on comparing the differences between the two countries at the level of the material culture in tea culture and exploring the reasons behind the differences.

High penetrations of renewable energy are crucial for low‐carbon power systems. However, the higher volatility of renewable power generation pushes real‐time operations closer to equipment limits. It is thus important to utilize flexibilities in the system through corrective security‐constrained economic dispatch (SCED) that allows generators to take corrective adjustments after contingencies. The corrective SCED problem, containing a large number of contingencies, and corresponding post‐contingency decisions and constraints, is very large in scale and difficult to solve using purely model‐based methods within the strict time limits of real‐time markets. To accelerate the solution process, this paper develops a novel interpretable data‐driven contingency classification method. Historical data and their potentially useful patterns are utilized in interpretable data‐driven decision tree classifiers. To directly consider continuous features, such as net load values, and to consider imbalanced datasets without much additional complexity, Improved Strong Optimal Classification Trees (ISOCTs) are developed with new branching threshold constraints and category weights in the objective function. ISOCTs are then embedded into a hybrid model‐based and data‐driven framework to guarantee the accuracy of the real‐time active contingency set and the resulting security of dispatch decisions. Numerical testing results demonstrate the classification accuracy, computational efficiency, and interpretability of the proposed approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]