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Persuading the public to get vaccinated against infectious diseases is critical and carries profound implications for preparing for future pandemics. This study examined whether and how persuasion strategies employed in pro-vaccine messages affect social endorsement and audience stance toward the COVID-19 vaccine expressed in comments on Chinese social media. Through manual coding and pre-trained BERT model, we analyzed 1,500 Weibo posts focused on COVID-19 vaccination persuasion and 238,201 associated comments. Results showed that medical experts succeeded in eliciting heightened social endorsement and receiving more pro-vaccine comments. Posts that employed negative emotional appeal were less likely to be liked or receive pro-vaccine comments. Besides, vaccine persuasion messages presented in a narrative format or emphasizing vaccine efficacy garnered significantly more likes but did not significantly receive more pro-vaccine comments. Discussing domestic issues or employing joy appeal received more pro-vaccine comments. These results offer valuable insights for health practitioners and communicators, highlighting more effective persuasion strategies for engaging citizens in vaccine-related discussions on social media. This study underscores the importance of leveraging persuasion tactics on social media to foster vaccination uptake and better prepare us for handling future pandemics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most recent studies on the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic and cutaneous melanoma (CM) focused more on delayed diagnosis or advanced presentation. We aimed to ascertain mortality trends of CM between 2012 and 2022, focusing on the effects of the COVID‐19 pandemic. In this serial population‐based study, the National Vital Statistics System dataset was queried for mortality data. Excess CM‐related mortality rates were estimated by calculating the difference between observed and projected mortality rates during the pandemic. Totally there were 108,853 CM‐associated deaths in 2012–2022. CM‐associated mortality saw a declining trend from 2012 to 2019 overall. However, it increased sharply in 2020 (ASMR 3.73 per 100,000 persons, 5.95% excess mortality), and remained high in 2021 and 2022, with the ASMRs of 3.82 and 3.81, corresponding to 11.17% and 13.20% excess mortality, respectively. The nonmetro areas had the most pronounced rise in mortality with 12.20% excess death in 2020, 15.33% in 2021 and 20.52% in 2022, corresponding to a 4–6 times excess mortality risk compared to large metro areas during the pandemic. The elderly had the most pronounced rise in mortality, but the mortality in the younger population was reduced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK)signaling-mediated smoking-associated pulmonary vascular remodeling (PVR) plays an important role in the pathogenesis of group 3 pulmonary hypertension (PH). And G protein pathway suppressor 2 (GPS2) could suppress G-protein signaling such as Ras and MAPK, but its role in cigarette smoking -induced PVR (CS-PVR) is unclear. Methods: An in vivo model of smoke-exposed rats was constructed to assess the role of GPS2 in smoking-induced PH and PVR. In vitro, the effects of GPS2 overexpression and silencing on the function of human pulmonary arterial smooth cells (HPASMCs) and the underlying mechanisms were explored. Results: GPS2 expression was downregulated in rat pulmonary arteries (PAs) and HPASMCs after CS exposure. More importantly, CS-exposed rats with GPS2 overexpression had lower right ventricular systolic pressure (RVSP), right ventricular hypertrophy index (RVHI), and wall thickness (WT%) than those without. And enhanced proliferation and migration of HPASMCs induced by cigarette smoking extract (CSE) can be evidently inhibited by overexpressed GPS2. Besides, GPS2siRNA significantly enhanced the proliferation, and migration of HPASMCs as well as activated Ras and Raf/ERK signaling, while these effects were inhibited by zoledronic acid (ZOL). In addition, GPS2 promoter methylation level in rat PAs and HPASMCs was increased after CS exposure, and 5-aza-2-deoxycytidine (5-aza) inhibited CSE-induced GPS2 hypermethylation and downregulation in vitro. Conclusions: GPS2 overexpression could improve the CS-PVR, suggesting that GPS2 might serve as a novel therapeutic target for PH-COPD in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Distributed learning has attracted considerable attention in recent years due to its power to deal with big data in various science and engineering problems. Based on a divide-and-conquer strategy, this paper studies the distributed robust regression algorithm associated with correntropy losses and coefficient regularization in the scheme of kernel networks, where the kernel functions are not required to be symmetric or positive semi-definite. We establish explicit convergence results of such distributed algorithm depending on the number of data partitions, robustness and regularization parameters. We show that with suitable parameter choices the distributed robust algorithm can obtain the optimal convergence rate in the minimax sense, and simultaneously reduce the computational complexity and memory requirement in the standard (non-distributed) algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: This study aimed to improve and implement the central sterile supply department (CSSD) training program through action research and to evaluate its effect. Materials and methods: The project was underpinned by action research. The problems that occurred in training were identified following scenario analysis, interviews, group discussions, and expert consultation to develop improvement measures. The training program characterized by CSSD was developed in the spiral circular process of "Plan-Act-Observe-Reflect". Results: After the two rounds of training, the CSSD nurses significantly improved their professional knowledge, skills, and satisfaction with training compared with those before improvement. The nurses' overall satisfaction with the training and their performance improved. Conclusions: The implementation of the training program designed based on action research can improve CSSD nurses' professional knowledge and skills and increase their enthusiasm for learning, laying the foundation for CSSD talent development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Human papillomavirus (HPV) integration is a crucial genetic step in cervical carcinogenesis. This study aimed to evaluate the performance of an HPV integration test for the triage of HPV‐positive women. Design: An observational cohort study. Setting: A cervical cancer screening programme in China. Population: 1393 HPV‐positive women aged 25–65 years undergoing routine cervical cancer screening and HPV integration testing with 1‐year follow‐up. Methods: The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value between HPV integration and cytology were compared. Main outcome measures: Cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 3 or more severe (CIN3+). Results: Among 1393 HPV‐positive patients, 138 (9.9% [8.3–11.5%]) were HPV integration test positive compared with 537 who had abnormal cervical cytology (38.5% [36.0–41.1%]). Compared with cytology, HPV integration exhibited higher specificity (94.5% [93.3–95.8%] versus 63.8% [61.2–66.4%]) and equivalent sensitivity (70.5% [61.4–79.7%] versus 70.5% [61.4–79.7%]) for detection of CIN3+. HPV integration‐negative women accounted for 90.1% (1255/1393) of the total population and had a low immediate CIN3+ risk (2.2%). At 1‐year follow‐up, the progression rate in the HPV integration‐positive women was higher than in the HPV integration‐negative women (12.0% versus 2.1%, odds ratio 5.6, 95% CI, 2.6–11.9). In 10 conservatively managed integration‐negative CIN2 patients, all showed spontaneous regression and seven showed HPV clearance after 1‐year follow‐up. Conclusion: The HPV integration test may be a precise risk stratification tool for HPV‐positive women and could avoid excessive use of invasive biopsies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated how goal‐directed and habitual behaviors recover after extinction within the context of the resurgence effect, a form of relapse induced by the removal or worsening of alternative reinforcement. Rats were trained to press a target lever with one reinforcer (O1) for either minimal (4) or extended (16) sessions. An extinction test after the completion of O1 devaluation confirmed that minimal and extended training formed goal‐directed and habitual behaviors, respectively. Then, pressing an alternative lever was reinforced with a second reinforcer (O2) while the target response was placed on extinction. When O2 was discontinued, the minimally trained target response resurged with goal‐directed status as in the extinction test. However, the extinguished habitual behavior in the extensively trained rats did not recover as a habit but instead with goal‐directed status, possibly due to the context specificity of habits or the introduction of a new response–reinforcer contingency. The critical finding that reinforcer devaluation consistently led to less resurgence regardless of the amount of acquisition training provides a clinical implication that coupling differential‐reinforcement‐of‐alternative‐behavior (DRA) treatments with the devaluation of the associated reinforcer of problematic behavior could effectively diminish its recurrence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Soybean mosaic virus (SMV), a member of Potyvirus, is the most destructive and widespread viral disease in soybean production. Our earlier studies identified a soybean 40S ribosomal protein S8 (GmRPS8) using the 6K1 protein of SMV as the bait to screen a soybean cDNA library. The present study aims to identify the interactions between GmRPS8 and SMV and characterize the role of GmRPS8 in SMV infection in soybean. Expression analysis showed higher SMV-induced GmRPS8 expression levels in a susceptible soybean cultivar when compared with a resistant cultivar, suggesting that GmRPS8 was involved in the response to SMV in soybean. Subcellular localization showed that GmRPS8 was localized in the nucleus. Moreover, the yeast two-hybrid (Y2H) experiments showed that GmRPS8 only interacted with 6K1 among the eleven proteins encoded by SMV. The interaction between GmRPS8 and 6K1 was further verified by a bimolecular fluorescence complementation (BiFC) assay, and the interaction was localized in the nucleus. Furthermore, knockdown of GmRPS8 by a virus-induced gene silencing (VIGS) system retarded the growth and development of soybeans and inhibited the accumulation of SMV in soybeans. Together, these results showed that GmRPS8 interacts with 6K1 and contributes to soybean susceptibility to SMV. Our findings provide new insights for understanding the role of GmRPS8 in the SMV infection cycle, which could help reveal potyviral replication mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background We investigate the pain relief and safety of microwave ablation (MWA) combined with percutaneous vertebroplasty (PVP) in the treatment of metastatic vertebral tumors. Methods This prospective pilot study enrolled patients with metastatic vertebral tumors treated between January 2018 and October 2019. The participants were randomized to the PVP and MWA + PVP groups. Clinical parameters, pain visual analog scale (VAS), analgesic use scores (AUS), and quality-of-life score (QLS) were compared between groups. Results Sixty-seven participants were enrolled (PVP: n = 35; MWA + PVP: n = 32). There were no differences in bone cement injection volume, extravasation, and X-ray exposure time between the two groups (p > 0.05), but treatment costs were higher for the MWA + PVP group (26,418 ± 194 vs. 15,606 ± 148 yuan; p < 0.05). There were no significant improvements in VAS from baseline to 24 hours, 72 hours, 7 days, 1 month, and 3 months in the two groups (p > 0.05); at 6 and 12 months after the operation, the improvement from baseline was significant in the two groups (p < 0.05). The VAS was lower at 6 months (2.7 ± 0.7 vs. 3.2 ± 0.7) and 12 months (3.5 ± 0.8 vs. 4.0 ± 0.7) in the MWA + PVP group (both p < 0.01 vs. PVP). The AUS and QLS were improved with PVP at 6 and 12 months (p < 0.05) and with MWA + PVP at 12 months (p < 0.05). The AUS was lower at 6 and 12 months in the MWA + PVP group (p < 0.05 vs. PVP). Conclusion MWA combined with PVP might be a safe and effective palliative treatment for pain from metastatic vertebral tumors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a demodulation method of electromagnetic wave carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) has been developed by using few electric fields sampled on an extremely small portion of the whole circumference in the radiation region. Considering that the field of the OAM wave is naturally of the form of exp (i l φ) in the far-field region, the matrix pencil method is used to extract the magnitude terms and the exponential terms according to the real and imaginary parts of the fields sampled on a small portion of the whole circumference, and further, the mode purities corresponding to the desirable OAM modes can be easily solved. The proposed demodulation method only uses four sampling electric fields with the sampling angle ranges of 3.3 ° and 9° to well demodulate the mode purities of the OAM waves with the single mode and the mixed dual-mode, respectively. The prototype of a dual uniform circular array with the equal divergent angle for the OAM waves of the modes l = 1 and l = 2 is fabricated and measured. Good agreement between the simulation and the measurement is observed to verify the proposed demodulation method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mine microseismic signal denoising is a basic and crucial link in microseismic data processing, which influences the accuracy and reliability of the monitoring system, and is of great significance with regard to safety during mining. Therefore, this study introduces a deep learning method to improve the mapping function and sparsity of signals in the time-frequency domain and constructs a denoising framework based on a deep convolutional autoencoder to address the denoising problem of mine microseismic signals. First, all noisy microseismic signals are normalized to ensure the nonlinear expression ability of the constructed denoising framework. Then, the normalized signals are transformed into the time-frequency domain using the short-time Fourier transform (STFT), and the real and imaginary parts of time-frequency coefficients serve as the input of the deep convolutional autoencoder to output the masks of the effective and noise signals. Next, these masks are applied to the time-frequency coefficients of the noisy microseismic signals, and the time-frequency coefficients of the potentially effective and noise signals are estimated. Finally, inverse STFT is used to transform these time-frequency coefficients to the time domain to obtain the final denoised effective and noise signals. The constructed framework automatically learns rich features from synthetic data to separate the effective and noise signals, thereby achieving the purpose of fast and automatic denoising. The experimental results show that compared with the wavelet threshold and ensemble empirical mode decomposition, the denoising framework considerably improves the signal-to-noise ratio of mine microseismic signals with less waveform distortion. Moreover, it can achieve a better denoising effect efficiently even in the case of a low SNR, which has obvious advantages. The constructed denoising framework is suitable for microseismic monitoring signals of various mine dynamic disasters and provides strong technical support for intelligent monitoring and early warning concerning production risks in mines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Soft strain sensors based on conductive polymer composites (CPCs) provide a simple and feasible detection tool in wearable electronics, soft machines, electronic skin, etc. However, the CPCs-based soft strain sensors exhibit resistive viscoelasticity (or time-dependent properties) that hinder the intuitive reflection of the accurate strain and a simple calibration process. In this paper, CPCs with different carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and carbon black (CB) contents were prepared, and electro-mechanical experiments were conducted to study the effect of filler dimensionality and content on the resistive viscoelasticity of CPCs, aimed at guiding the fabrication of CPCs with low resistive viscoelasticity. Furthermore, resistive viscoelasticity and mechanical viscoelasticity were compared to study the origin of the resistive viscoelasticity of CPCs. We found that, at the vicinity of their percolation threshold, the CPCs exhibit high resistive viscoelasticity despite their high sensitivity. In addition, the secondary peaks for CB/SR composite were negligible when the CB concentration was low. Generally, compared with one-dimensional CNT-filled CPCs, the zero-dimensional CB-filled CPCs show higher sensitivity, lower resistive hysteresis, lower resistance relaxation ratio, and better cyclic performance, so they are more suitable for sensor usage. By comparing the resistive viscoelasticity and mechanical viscoelasticity of CPCs, it is indicated that, when the concentration of nanoparticles (NPs) approaches the percolation thresholds, the resistive viscoelasticity is mainly derived from the change of conductive network, while when the concentration of NPs is higher, it is primarily due to the unrecoverable deformations inside the material. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The effectiveness of selective COX-2 inhibitors in preventing colorectal cancer recurrence has been demonstrated, however it is unknown how safe and successful they will be over the long term. As a result, we looked at the efficacy, safety, and consequences of adding COX-2 inhibitors to the treatment plan afterward. Methods: In patients with advanced colorectal cancer, we compared the efficacy of celecoxib at two different doses (200 mg twice day and 400 mg twice daily) with placebo. To evaluate the impacts of post-treatment, several datasets from inception to June 2022 were searched. Response rate, illness control rate, and 3-year survival were the main results. And evaluated several safety outcomes, particularly those that were susceptible to adverse events. Results: The study comprised a total of 9 randomized controlled trials (3206 participants). Celecoxib and rofecoxib doidn't significantly improved the 1–3 year remission rate (OR, 1.57 [95% CI: 0.95–2.57]) and disease control rate (OR, 1.08 [95% CI: 0.99–1.17]). Subgroup analysis of different doses showed that 400 mg of celecoxib significantly improved the response rate (OR, 2.82 [95%CI: 1.20–6.61]). 200 mg celecoxib was not significant (OR, 1.28 [95% CI: 0.66–2.49]). Rofecoxib also did not fully improve disease response rates. Celecoxib at any dose improved 3-year survival (OR, 1.21 [95% CI: 1.02–1.45]). It is important to note that COX-2 inhibitors did not significantly enhance the likelihood of adverse events including gastrointestinal or cardiovascular side effects at any dose. Conclusions: For patients with advanced colorectal cancer, a reasonable chemoprevention regimen can include celecoxib 400 mg twice daily. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The effectiveness of selective COX-2 inhibitors in preventing colorectal cancer recurrence has been demonstrated, however it is unknown how safe and successful they will be over the long term. As a result, we looked at the efficacy, safety, and consequences of adding COX-2 inhibitors to the treatment plan afterward. Methods: In patients with advanced colorectal cancer, we compared the efficacy of celecoxib at two different doses (200 mg twice day and 400 mg twice daily) with placebo. To evaluate the impacts of post-treatment, several datasets from inception to June 2022 were searched. Response rate, illness control rate, and 3-year survival were the main results. And evaluated several safety outcomes, particularly those that were susceptible to adverse events. Results: The study comprised a total of 9 randomized controlled trials (3206 participants). Celecoxib and rofecoxib doidn't significantly improved the 1–3 year remission rate (OR, 1.57 [95% CI: 0.95–2.57]) and disease control rate (OR, 1.08 [95% CI: 0.99–1.17]). Subgroup analysis of different doses showed that 400 mg of celecoxib significantly improved the response rate (OR, 2.82 [95%CI: 1.20–6.61]). 200 mg celecoxib was not significant (OR, 1.28 [95% CI: 0.66–2.49]). Rofecoxib also did not fully improve disease response rates. Celecoxib at any dose improved 3-year survival (OR, 1.21 [95% CI: 1.02–1.45]). It is important to note that COX-2 inhibitors did not significantly enhance the likelihood of adverse events including gastrointestinal or cardiovascular side effects at any dose. Conclusions: For patients with advanced colorectal cancer, a reasonable chemoprevention regimen can include celecoxib 400 mg twice daily. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SARS-CoV-2 has posed a threat to the health of people around the world because of its strong transmission and high virulence. Currently, there is no specific medicine for the treatment of COVID-19. However, for a wide variety of medicines used to treat COVID-19, traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) plays a major role. In this paper, the effective treatment of COVID-19 using TCM was consulted first, and several Chinese medicines that were frequently used apart from their huge role in treating it were found. Then, when exploring the active ingredients of these herbs, it was discovered that most of them contained flavonoids. Therefore, the structure and function of the potential active substances of flavonoids, including flavonols, flavonoids, and flavanes, respectively, are discussed in this paper. According to the screening data, these flavonoids can bind to the key proteins of SARS-CoV-2, 3CLpro, PLpro, and RdRp, respectively, or block the interface between the viral spike protein and ACE2 receptor, which could inhibit the proliferation of coronavirus and prevent the virus from entering human cells. Besides, the effects of flavonoids on the human body systems are expounded on in this paper, including the respiratory system, digestive system, and immune system, respectively. Normally, flavonoids boost the body's immune system. However, they can suppress the immune system when over immunized. Ultimately, this study hopes to provide a reference for the clinical drug treatment of COVID-19 patients, and more TCM can be put into the market accordingly, which is expected to promote the development of TCM on the international stage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the synergistic action of hydrogen bond and electrostatic interaction, provided by methacrylic acid and 2‐aminoethyl ester hydrochloride (FM2), respectively, novel molecularly imprinted polymers (SA‐MIPs) were designed to improve its selective recognition ability. Diclofenac sodium (DFC) was chosen as the template molecule of this study. The interaction and their recognition sites between two functional monomers and templates were confirmed by nuclear magnetic resonance hydrogen spectroscopy. Because of the synergistic action of hydrogen bond and electrostatic interaction, the imprinting factor (IF) of SA‐MIPs (IF = 2.26) is superior to the corresponding monofunctional monomer imprinting materials (IF = 1.52, 1.20) and the materials using two functional monomers with an only single type of interaction (IF = 1.54, 1.75). The results of selective adsorption experiments indicate that the selective recognition ability of SA‐MIPs is significantly better than that of the other four MIPs, and the difference in selectivity coefficient for methyl orange is the largest between SA‐MIPs and the MIPs only using FM2, which is about 70 times. In addition, x‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy was used to verify the interaction between SA‐MIPs and the template. This work and its explanation of the interaction mechanism at the molecular level will be helpful for the rational design of novel MIPs with higher selectivity. Besides, SA‐MIPs have good adsorption performance (37.75 mg/g) for DFC in aqueous solutions, which could be used as potential adsorption materials for the effective removal of DFC in the aquatic environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Acute radiation dermatitis (ARD) is one of the most common acute adverse reactions in breast cancer patients during and immediately after radiotherapy. As ARD affects patient quality of life, it is important to conduct individualized risk assessments of patients in order to identify those patients most at risk of developing severe ARD. Methods: The data of breast cancer patients who received radiotherapy were prospectively collected and analyzed. Serum ferritin, high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) levels, and percentages of lymphocyte subsets were measured before radiotherapy. ARD was graded (0–6 grade), according to the Oncology Nursing Society Skin Toxicity Scale. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression analyses were used and the odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) of each factor were calculated. Results: This study included 455 breast cancer patients. After radiotherapy, 59.6% and 17.8% of patients developed at least 3 (3+) grade and at least 4 (4+) grade ARD, respectively. Multivariate logistic regression analysis found that body mass index (OR: 1.11, 95% CI: 1.01–1.22), diabetes (OR: 2.70, 95% CI: 1.11–6.60), smoking (OR: 3.04, 95% CI: 1.15–8.02), higher ferritin (OR: 3.31, 95% CI: 1.78–6.17), higher hs-CRP (OR: 1.96, 95% CI: 1.02–3.77), and higher CD3 + T cells (OR: 2.99, 95% CI: 1.10–3.58) were independent risk factors for 4 + grade ARD. Based on these findings, a nomogram model of 4 + grade ARD was further established. The nomogram AUC was 0.80 (95% CI: 0.75–0.86), making it more discriminative than any single factor. Conclusion: BMI, diabetes, smoking history, higher ferritin, higher hs-CRP, and higher CD3 + T cells prior to radiotherapy for breast cancer are all independent risk factors for 4 + grade ARD. The results can provide evidence for clinicians to screen out high-risk patients, take precautions and carefully follow up on these patients before and during radiotherapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Enhancing the thermal conductivity of epoxy resin is an urgent demand for its application in electronic packaging field. In this work, thermally conductive epoxy/graphite composite featuring excellent self‐healing and reprocessability is prepared based on covalent adaptable networks. The effect of graphite on the rheology, reprocessing, and self‐healing properties of epoxy have been studied. The result shows that the prepared composites can be easily reprocessed and have excellent self‐healing property. On the fundamental of the highly multifunctional performance of the epoxy composites, highly thermally conductive bulk composites are constructed via multilayered stacking up and self‐healing based on the film composites, which is prepared using a rolling method. It is demonstrated that the films can assemble into new substance bulk by stacking up through self‐healing. The high thermal conductivity is achieved by the highly aligned graphite induced by the rolling process. Result reveals that, being filled with 50% mass fraction of GR, the bulk composites possesses high thermal conductivity of 8.411 Wm−1 K−1. This work provides a new strategy to prepare recyclable and highly thermally conductive epoxy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Numerous studies have found that inhibiting the expression of NLRP3 inflammasome can significantly improve depressive-like behaviors in mice, but the research on its effect on cognitive decline in depression and its mechanism is still lacking. This study aimed to elucidate the role of NLRP3 inflammasome in cognitive decline in depression and explore the common neuro-immunological mechanisms of depression and Alzheimer's disease (AD). Methods: Male C57BL/6 mice were subjected to chronic unpredictable mild stress (CUMS) for 5 weeks, treatment group was administered with the NLRP3 inhibitor MCC950 (10 mg/kg, i.p.), fluoxetine served as positive control. Then, the mice were assessed for cognitive behaviors and depression-like behaviors, and changes of microglia and neurons in hippocampus and levels of Aβ metabolic pathway and tau protein were measured. To explore the mechanism of NLRP3 activation on neurons, we performed in vitro studies using BV2 microglia and mouse primary neurons. Furthermore, we focused on the role of NLRP3 inflammasome in the function of neurons and the expression of AD pathological indicators. Results: CUMS induced depressive-like behaviors and cognitive decline in mice, which could be reversed by inhibiting NLRP3 inflammasome. MCC950, a specific NLRP3 inhibitor, alleviated CUMS-induced neuron injury and AD-like pathological changes, including the abnormal expression of Aβ metabolic pathway and the hyper-phosphorylation of tau protein. LPS (1 μg/mL) + ATP (1 mM) treatment activated the expression of NLRP3 inflammasome and IL-1β in vitro. In vitro experiment also proved that inhibiting the expression of NLRP3 inflammasome in microglia can restore the Aβ metabolic pathway to normal, decrease neuronal tau protein phosphorylation and protect neurons. Conclusions: Inhibition of NLRP3 inflammasome effectively alleviated CUMS-induced depressive-like behaviors and cognitive decline in mice, and inhibited the activation of AD physiological indicators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Direct absorption of sunlight and conversion into heat by uniformly dispersed photothermal nanofluids has emerged as a facile way to efficiently harness abundant renewable solar-thermal energy for a variety of heating-related applications. As the key component of the direct absorption solar collectors, solar-thermal nanofluids, however, generally suffer from poor dispersion and tend to aggregate, and the aggregation and precipitation tendency becomes even stronger at elevated temperatures. In this review, we overview recent research efforts and progresses in preparing solar-thermal nanofluids that can be stably and homogeneously dispersed under medium temperatures. We provide detailed description on the dispersion challenges and the governing dispersion mechanisms, and introduce representative dispersion strategies that are applicable to ethylene glycol, oil, ionic liquid, and molten salt-based medium-temperature solar-thermal nanofluids. The applicability and advantages of four categories of stabilization strategies including hydrogen bonding, electrostatic stabilization, steric stabilization, and self-dispersion stabilization in improving the dispersion stability of different type of thermal storage fluids are discussed. Among them, recently emerged self-dispersible nanofluids hold the potential for practical medium-temperature direct absorption solar-thermal energy harvesting. In the end, the exciting research opportunities, on-going research need and possible future research directions are also discussed. It is anticipated that the overview of recent progress in improving dispersion stability of medium-temperature solar-thermal nanofluids can not only stimulate exploration of direct absorption solar-thermal energy harvesting applications, but also provide a promising means to solve the fundamental limiting issue for general nanofluid technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Host proteins are essential during virus infection, and viral factors must target numerous host factors to complete their infectious cycle. The mature 6K1 protein of potyviruses is required for viral replication in plants. However, the interaction between 6K1 and host factors is poorly understood. The present study aims to identify the host interacting proteins of 6K1. Here, the 6K1 of Soybean mosaic virus (SMV) was used as the bait to screen a soybean cDNA library to gain insights about the interaction between 6K1 and host proteins. One hundred and twenty-seven 6K1 interactors were preliminarily identified, and they were classified into six groups, including defense-related, transport-related, metabolism-related, DNA binding, unknown, and membrane-related proteins. Then, thirty-nine proteins were cloned and merged into a prey vector to verify the interaction with 6K1, and thirty-three of these proteins were confirmed to interact with 6K1 by yeast two-hybrid (Y2H) assay. Of the thirty-three proteins, soybean pathogenesis-related protein 4 (GmPR4) and Bax inhibitor 1 (GmBI1) were chosen for further study. Their interactions with 6K1 were also confirmed by bimolecular fluorescence complementation (BiFC) assay. Subcellular localization showed that GmPR4 was localized to the cytoplasm and endoplasmic reticulum (ER), and GmBI1 was located in the ER. Moreover, both GmPR4 and GmBI1 were induced by SMV infection, ethylene and ER stress. The transient overexpression of GmPR4 and GmBI1 reduced SMV accumulation in tobacco, suggesting their involvement in the resistance to SMV. These results would contribute to exploring the mode of action of 6K1 in viral replication and improve our knowledge of the role of PR4 and BI1 in SMV response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To develop and validate a nomogram for differentiating benign and malignant thyroid nodules of American College of Radiology (ACR) Thyroid Imaging Reporting and Data System (TI‐RADS) level 5 (TR5) and improving the performance of the guideline. Methods: From May 2018 to December 2019, 640 patients with TR5 nodules were retrospectively included in the primary cohort. Univariate and multivariable analyses were performed to determine the risk factors for thyroid cancer. A nomogram was established on the basis of multivariable analyses; the performance of the nomogram was evaluated with respect to discrimination, calibration, and clinical usefulness. The nomogram model was also compared to the ACR score model. External validation was performed and the independent validation cohort contained 201 patients from April 2021 to January 2022. Results: Multivariable analyses showed that age, tumour location, multifocality, concomitant Hashimoto's disease, neck lymph node status reported by ultrasound (US) and ACR score were the independent risk factors for thyroid cancer (all p <.05). The nomogram showed good discrimination, with an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.786 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.742–0.830) and 0.712 (95% CI: 0.615–0.809) in the primary cohort and external validation cohort, respectively. Decision curve analysis demonstrated the clinical usefulness of the model. Compared to the ACR score model, the nomogram showed higher AUC (0.786 vs. 0.626, p <.001) and specificity (0.783 vs. 0.391). Conclusions: The presented nomogram model, based on age, tumour features and ACR score, can differentiate benign and malignant thyroid nodules in TR5 and had a high specificity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Greenhouse gas forcing has increased the likelihood of events like the 2021 wettest September in northern China by approximately twofold, while anthropogenic aerosols play a relatively minor suppressing role. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Poly(butylene succinate) (PBS), poly(hexamethylene succinate) (PHS) and three kinds of poly(butylene succinate-co-hexamethylene succinate)s (P(BS-co-HS)s) were enzymatically hydrolyzed by Fusarium solani cutinase. The results showed that the characteristics of the enzymatic hydrolysis of these polyesters were mainly affected by crystallinity, thermal properties and the BS/HS ratio. The enzymatic hydrolysis rates of the polyesters are as follows: P(BS-co-HS52) ≈ P(BS-co-HS71) > PHS > P(BS-co-HS32) > PBS. Furthermore, with increasing HS content, both the degree of crystallinity (Xc) and melting temperature (Tm) of the polyesters first decreased and then increased. P(BS-co-HS52) and P(BS-co-HS71) had the lowest Xc and the lowest Tm, thus had the highest hydrolysis rate; this shows that the hydrolysis rate is affected by Xc and Tm. The results also showed that BS/HS ratio could affect the physical properties and degradability of polyesters. Thus, it is possible to prepare polyesters with various physical properties and degradability for different applications by adjusting BS/HS ratio. The crystalline and amorphous regions of the polyesters were both hydrolyzed, during which parts of the crystalline regions were converted into the amorphous regions. Finally, we found that the crystal structure and thermal stability of the polyesters were not affected by the enzymatic hydrolysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To investigate the prenatal diagnostic value of chromosome microarray analysis (CMA) in fetuses with isolated or non-isolated umbilical cord cysts (UCCs) of various locations and numbers. Between November 2015 and November 2021, 45 pregnant women carrying fetuses with UCCs underwent amniocentesis and CMA. Fetal prognoses were followed from 6 months to 5 years. Five cases (11.1%, 5/45) of chromosomal aberrations were detected. No significant difference in total chromosome abnormalities was found between fetuses with isolated and non-isolated UCCs (13.3% [2/15] vs 10% [3/30]; p >.999). No common autosomal aneuploidies were found in fetuses with isolated UCCs. At follow-up, among 45 fetuses, there were 11 (24.4%) pregnancy terminations, 26 (57.8%) live healthy births, 4 (8.9%) postnatal UCC-related surgeries, and 4 (8.9%) live births of fetuses with other diseases. The frequency of postnatal surgeries of the infants with UCCs located adjacent to the anterior abdominal wall was higher than those located adjacent to the fetal surface of the placenta (30.8% [4/13] vs 0% [0/22]; p =.014). All 26 live healthy neonates and 4 neonates that underwent postnatal surgery had an overall good prognosis. For fetuses with isolated or non-isolated UCC, CMA could be a choice for parents after providing detailed information. Even when surgery was required, pregnancy outcomes and short- and long-term prognoses for fetuses with UCCs were favorable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pairwise learning usually refers to the learning problem that works with pairs of training samples, such as ranking, similarity and metric learning, and AUC maximization. To overcome the challenge of pairwise learning in the large scale computation, this paper introduces Nyström sampling approach to the coefficient-based regularized pairwise algorithm in the context of kernel networks. Our theorems establish that the obtained Nyström estimator achieves the minimax error over all estimators using the whole data provided that the subsampling level is not too small. We derive the function relation between the subsampling level and regularization parameter that guarantees computation cost reduction and asymptotic behaviors' optimality simultaneously. The Nyström coefficient-based pairwise learning method does not require the kernel to be symmetric or positive semi-definite, which provides more flexibility and adaptivity in the learning process. We apply the method to the bipartite ranking problem, which improves the state-of-the-art theoretical results in previous works. By developing probability inequalities for U-statistics on Hilbert–Schmidt operators, we provide new mathematical tools for handling pairs of examples involved in pairwise learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human islet amyloid polypeptide (hIAPP)-mediated cytotoxicity is identified as a potential target for developing new anti-diabetic molecules. Herein, we investigated the effect of the major bioactive compounds of Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi (S. baicalensis), including baicalein, baicalin, wogonin and oroxylin A, on hIAPP aggregation. We found that all of these compounds inhibited hIAPP fibril formation in a dose-dependent manner. But baicalein and baicalin, especially baicalein are more effective than wogonin and oroxylin A in stabilizing hIAPP monomers and eliminating toxic hIAPP assembly, suggesting that flavonoids with ortho-hydroxyl group on the A-ring exhibited higher anti-hIAPP nucleation potential than those without this structure. This stimulated our interest in further studying the possible structure-activity relationship between polyphenol and hIAPP aggregation inhibition. Our results demonstrated that flavonoids with ortho-hydroxyl group on the B-ring are also more effective against hIAPP nucleation than those without this structure. These results suggest that the ortho-hydroxybenzene structure is a key structural feature required for polyphenols to effectively inhibit hIAPP nucleation. This was further confirmed by the effects of polyphenol and phenols in inhibiting hIAPP nucleation. The conclusion that pyrogallol-type polyphenols are potential lead inhibitors may provide a valuable structural template for the further development of polyphenol-based inhibitor of amyloid peptides. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) is the most common metabolic disturbance during pregnancy, with adverse effects on both mother and fetus. The establishment of early diagnosis and risk assessment model is of great significance for preventing and reducing adverse outcomes of GDM. In this study, the broad-scale perturbations related to GDM were explored through the integration analysis of metabolic and clinical phenotypes. Maternal serum samples from the first trimester were collected for targeted metabolomics analysis by using ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS). Statistical analysis was conducted based on the levels of the 184 metabolites and 76 clinical indicators from GDM women (n =60) and matched healthy controls (n =90). Metabolomics analysis revealed the down-regulation of fatty acid oxidation in the first trimester of GDM women, which was supposed to be related to the low serum level of dehydroepiandrosterone.While the significantly altered clinical phenotypes were mainly related to the increased risk of cardiovascular disease, abnormal iron metabolism, and inflammation. A phenotype panel established from the significantly changed serum indicators can be used for the early prediction of GDM, with the area under the receiver-operating characteristic curve (ROC) 0.83. High serum uric acid and C-reaction protein levels were risk factors for GDM independent of body mass indexes, with ORs 4.76 (95% CI: 2.08-10.90) and 3.10 (95% CI: 1.38-6.96), respectively. Predictive phenotype panel of GDM, together with the risk factors of GDM, will provide novel perspectives for the early clinical warning and diagnosis of GDM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Online learning is an efficient approach in machine learning and statistics, which iteratively updates models upon the observation of a sequence of training examples. A representative online learning algorithm is the online gradient descent, which has found wide applications due to its low complexity and scalability to large datasets. Kernel-based learning methods have been proven to be quite successful in dealing with nonlinearity in the data and multivariate optimization. In this paper we present a class of kernel-based online gradient descent algorithm for addressing regression problems, which generates sparse estimators in an iterative way to reduce the algorithmic complexity for training streaming datasets and model selection in large-scale learning scenarios. In the setting of support vector regression (SVR), we design the sparse online learning algorithm by introducing a sequence of insensitive distance-based loss functions. We prove consistency and error bounds quantifying the generalization performance of such algorithms under mild conditions. The theoretical results demonstrate the interplay between statistical accuracy and sparsity property during learning processes. We show that the insensitive parameter plays a crucial role in providing sparsity as well as fast convergence rates. The numerical experiments also support our theoretical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Railway alignment optimization is a complex process in which human knowledge and experience are extensively used. However, the related knowledge is usually unstructured, which is difficult for computers to recognize. Moreover, related knowledge is applied in fragmented ways in existing alignment optimization methods, which are thus difficult to update with actual advancements of human experience and knowledge. To solve the above problems, the first-known knowledge graph modeling method for railway alignment optimization is proposed in this paper. First, a hierarchical and categorized semantic network modeling approach for railway alignment design knowledge is devised. Based on this, a railway alignment design knowledge graph (RAD-KG) is constructed. Then, a rapid knowledge retrieval method is proposed for improving the querying efficiency from the RAD-KG during alignment optimization. Finally, the RAD-KG integrating multiple alignment design principles is successfully applied to a real-world case. It is verified that the alignment generated by the proposed method reduces costs by 9.2% compared with conventional manual work by experienced engineers. Moreover, the RAD-KG-assisted method can rapidly update alignment design guidelines during optimization and, hence, produce several alignment alternatives satisfying various complicated requirements, which confirms the flexibility of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Overexpressing NbZFP1 tobacco exhibits activity against tobacco mosaic virus, cucumber mosaic virus, and potato virus Y. • The antiviral regulation of NbZFP1 is related to the salicylic acid pathway. • NbZFP1 may have potential of breeding virus-resistant tobacco varieties. Viral diseases are crucial determinants affecting tobacco cultivation, leading to a substantial annual decrease in production. Previous studies have demonstrated the regulatory function of the C3HC4 family of plant zinc finger proteins in combating bacterial diseases. However, it remains to be clarified whether this protein family also plays a role in regulating resistance against plant viruses. In this study, the successful cloning of the zinc finger protein coding gene NbZFP1 from Nicotiana benthamiana has been achieved. The full-length coding sequence of NbZFP1 is 576 bp. Further examination and analysis of this gene revealed its functional properties. The induction of NbZFP1 transcription in N. benthamiana has been observed in response to TMV, CMV, and PVY. Transgenic N. benthamiana plants over-expressing NbZFP1 demonstrated a notable augmentation in the production of chlorophyll a (P < 0.05). Moreover, NbZFP1 -overexpressing tobacco exhibited significant resistance to TMV, CMV, and PVY, as evidenced by a decrease in virus copies (P < 0.05). In addition, the defense enzymes activities of PAL, POD, and CAT experienced a significant increase (P < 0.05). The up-regulated expression of genes of NbPAL , NbNPR1 and NbPR-1a , which play a crucial role in SA mediated defense, indicated that the NbZFP1 holds promise in enhancing the virus resistance of tobacco plant. Importantly, the results demonstrate that NbZFP1 can be considered as a viable candidate gene for the cultivation of crops with enhanced virus resistance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a key component of the transmission system of high-speed trains, the reliability of gearbox is crucial to the overall reliability and driving safety of high-speed trains. In this work, a comprehensive reliability model for the key parts of the gearbox including the driving and driven gears, bearings, and gearbox housing is developed, which combines the strength degradation parameters obtained by P-S-N curves of the corresponding material, and a stress-strength interference model based on the Poisson distribution of random stress and the Wiener strength degradation process. Further, a nested Copula function reliability model of the gearbox series system is developed using the binary Frank Copula function considering the correlation of failures of different parts and different failure modes. This model realizes the dynamic reliability analysis of the gearbox under different failure modes. The reliability analysis of the key parts of the gearbox and the gearbox series system of high-speed train achieved with this model are in line with the engineering practice. This method enables dynamic tracking and monitoring of gearbox reliability during the service life of high-speed train. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ultrasound is increasingly applied to modify the structures and physicochemical properties of polysaccharides. Hence, this work investigated the ultrasound-induced changes in the rheological behavior and hydrophobic microdomains of Lignosus rhinocerotis polysaccharide (LRP). With an increase in ultrasonic time, the apparent viscosity, storage modulus, loss modulus, and the final percentage recovery of LRP/water system increased to reach the maximum after 10 min treatment and then decreased. These results indicated that short-term (10 min) ultrasound could increase the strength of the network structure of LRP/water system, while longer-term ultrasound (30 and 60 min) weakened the network structure. The self-healing properties of LRP/water system was not affected by ultrasound treatment according to repeated strain and time sweep data. The critical aggregation concentration of the LRP/water system decreased from 2.5 to 1.8 mg/mL after 10 min ultrasound and the number of hydrophobic microdomains increased, suggesting that ultrasound promoted the hydrophobic aggregation of LRP. • Ultrasound changed apparent viscosity of Lignosus rhinocerotis polysaccharide (LRP). • The viscoelasticity of LRP/water system were enhanced by ultrasound. • The highest recovery percentage of LRP was 83.74% at 10 min ultrasound. • LRP/water system still has excellent self-healing properties after ultrasound. • Ultrasound can promote the formation of LRP hydrophobic microdomains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Arsenic (As) is common in the human living environment and a certain amount of exposure to As can lead to liver damage; this toxic effect has been proved to be closely related to intracellular PINK1/Parkin pathway-mediated mitophagy. Dictyophora is an edible fungus that extracts polysaccharides with antioxidant and hepatoprotective effects. In the present study, we demonstrated that As induced the onset of mitophagy in hepatocytes by stimulating cellular production of ROS to activate PINK1/Parkin, and the extent of damage increased with increased As-induced toxicity. Dictyophora polysaccharide (DIP) has the ability to scavenge intracellular ROS, which can inhibit oxidative stress injury and inhibit the PINK/Parkin pathway through its receptors or efficacious proteins, thus preventing mitochondrial autophagy and alleviating the hepatotoxicity of As. In conclusion, our results indicate that DIP can reduce As-induced PINK1/Parkin pathway-mediated hepatic mitophagy through scavenging ROS and exert hepatoprotective effects, providing experimental data and theoretical basis for the development of medicinal value of Dictyophora as a dual-use food and medicinal fungus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present work investigates the direct mixing of aqueous zeolitic imidazolate framework-8 (ZIF-8) suspension into a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and crosslinked with glutaraldehyde (GA) to form swelling-resistant, mechanically robust and conductivity retentive composite membranes. This drying-free nanofiller incorporation method enhances the homogeneous ZIF-8 distributions in the PVA/ZIF-8/GA composites to overcome the nanofiller aggregation problem in the mixed matrix membranes. Various ZIF-8 concentrations (25.4, 40.5 and 45.4 wt.%) are used to study the suitability of the resulting GA-crosslinked composites for direct alkaline methanol fuel cell (DAMFC). Surface morphological analysis confirmed homogeneous ZIF-8 particle distribution in the GA-crosslinked composites with a defect- and crack-free structure. The increased ionic conductivity (21% higher than the ZIF-free base material) and suppressed alcohol permeability (94% lower from the base material) of PVA/40.5%ZIF-8/GA resulted in the highest selectivity among the prepared composites. In addition, the GA-crosslinked composites' selectivity increased to 1.5–2 times that of those without crosslink. Moreover, the ZIF-8 nanofillers improved the mechanical strength and alkaline stability of the composites. This was due to the negligible volume swelling ratio (<1.4%) of high (>40%) ZIF-8-loaded composites. After 168 h of alkaline treatment, the PVA/40.5%ZIF-8/GA composite had almost negligible ionic conductivity loss (0.19%) compared with the initial material. The maximum power density (Pmax) of PVA/40.5%ZIF-8/GA composite was 190.5 mW cm−2 at 60 °C, an increase of 181% from the PVA/GA membrane. Moreover, the Pmax of PVA/40.5%ZIF-8/GA was 10% higher than that without GA crosslinking. These swelling-resistant and stable solid electrolytes are promising in alkaline fuel cell applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With rapid warming since the mid‐20th century, China has experienced remarkable changes in the extreme temperatures. We use the updated observational data and the newest generation of climate models from Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) to investigate the relative contribution from different external forcing to the temperature extremes. We find that both intensity and frequency indices of extreme temperature experience continuous warming during 1951–2018. More intense and more frequent warm extremes and less intense and less frequent cold extremes are observed in most regions. An exception is a warming slowdown in the intensity of the coldest extremes since the late 1990s in northeast China. These observed changes are generally well reproduced by CMIP6 climate models, especially for the warm days and nights. Detection analyses based on an optimal fingerprinting method show that anthropogenic forcing (ANT) is the main driver for these changes, with cold extremes less detectability than warm extremes. Three‐signal detections show that both greenhouse gas (GHG) and anthropogenic aerosols (AA) influences can be detected and separated in most warm extreme indices but not in the cold extremes, while the natural forcing influence is negligible for most indices. GHG forcing plays a dominant role, accounting for about 1.6 (1.1–2) times of observed warming in changes of most indices, while the AA offset about 35% (10–60%) of GHG induced warming for warm extremes. Anthropogenic factors including land use and ozone may have a very small positive contribution to the extreme temperatures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The application of polysaccharides in the food industry mainly depends on their rheological properties and the polysaccharides in different concentration regions exhibit different rheological properties due to the interactions between polymer chains. Hence, this work investigated the concentration-dependent rheological behavior of Lignosus rhinocerotis polysaccharide (LRP) in water and determined the critical concentrations. The intrinsic viscosity of LRP was 378 ± 32 mL/g and the LRP exhibited more apparent shear-thinning behavior with increasing concentration. The LRP critical overlap and aggregation concentration in water was ~ 2.5 mg/mL, implicating the formation of hydrophobic regions may result from the aggregation and overlap between hyperbranched LRP molecules. The LRP/water system showed higher storage modulus than loss modulus with slight frequency dependence at the concentration of 15 mg/mL, exhibiting the structured liquid behavior. When the concentration increased from 10 mg/mL to 30 mg/mL, the compliance recovery percentage value increased from 58.51% to 92.30%, indicating the formation of a strong gel network in the LRP/water system. Furthermore, the micro-rheological test revealed that the LRP/water system exhibited a concentration-dependent increase in elasticity and viscosity and deterioration in fluidity. • LRP showed more apparent shear-thinning behavior at higher concentrations. • Critical overlap and aggregation concentration of LRP in water was ~2.5 mg/mL. • LRP molecules aggregated to form hydrophobic regions with increasing concentration. • The viscoelasticity of LRP/water system increased with increasing concentration. • LRP/water system was inclined to be elastic solids at concentrations ≥15 mg/mL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fine-tuning and inference on Large Language Models like BERT have become increasingly expensive regarding memory cost and computation resources. The recently proposed computation-flexible BERT models facilitate their deployment in varied computational environments. Training such flexible BERT models involves jointly optimizing multiple BERT subnets, which will unavoidably interfere with one another. Besides, the performance of large subnets is limited by the performance gap between the smallest subnet and the supernet, despite efforts to enhance the smaller subnets. In this regard, we propose layer-wise Neural grafting to boost BERT subnets, especially the larger ones. The proposed method improves the average performance of the subnets on six GLUE tasks and boosts the supernets on all GLUE tasks and the SQuAD data set. Based on the boosted subnets, we further build an inference framework enabling practical width- and depth-dynamic inference regarding different inputs by combining width-dynamic gating modules and early exit off-ramps in the depth dimension. Experimental results show that the proposed framework achieves a better dynamic inference range than other methods in terms of trading off performance and computational complexity on four GLUE tasks and SQuAD. In particular, our best-tradeoff inference result outperforms other fixed-size models with similar amount of computations. Compared to BERT-Base, the proposed inference framework yields a 1.3-point improvement in the average GLUE score and a 2.2-point increase in the F1 score on SQuAD, while reducing computations by around 45%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methane (CH 4) leaks have traditionally been thought to dramatically affect the marine carbon sinks, as CH 4 was a greenhouse gas that contributes about 30 times more than CO 2. However, research vessels in the Arctic have found that in areas with CH 4 leakage on the seafloor, the levels of CO 2 in the atmosphere are low. In order to prove this point and quantify the impact of methane leakage on the marine carbon sinks, a multiple physical fields model was built, which considered the roles of nutrients carried by CH 4 leakage, photosynthesis by algae, the changes of seawater flow field, and the solute transport processes of carbon component. Moreover, we predicted whether this phenomenon still exists in different regions. The results showed that methane leakage have a positive impact on marine carbon sinks, mainly manifested in two aspects: methane bubble plumes bring low-temperature and low salinity seawater from the bottom to the surface, contribute to the dissolution of CO 2 ; the CH 4 bubbles transport nutrient-rich substances from the seafloor to the sea surface promote the photosynthesis of algae. The analysis of the impact of methane leakage parameters indicates that the increase in leakage rate and leakage temperature both contribute to the increase in total accumulated negative carbon content. In the study of leakage rates, it was found that the continuous increase in nutrient concentration will no longer affect photosynthesis after reaching a certain threshold. The dominant effect was the positive feedback of CO 2 dissolution caused by the continuous decrease in seawater temperature and salinity. The increase in leakage temperature can offset the influence of low-temperature seawater in the upwelling flow, thereby enhancing photosynthesis but increasing Henry's constant (decrease in CO 2 dissolution rate). At higher leakage rates, changes in leakage temperature have a more significant impact on marine carbon sink potential. It is worth noting that the positive impact of methane leakage on the marine carbon sink still exists but the degree of enhancement may be diminished in tropical regions with higher temperatures. • Methane leakage can enhance the capacity of marine carbon sinks. • Photosynthesis elevation by the rising seafloor water has the maximum threshold. • Warmer regions may weaken the positive impact of CH 4 leakage on marine carbon sink. • The uplifting of deep seawater to achieve negative carbon is feasible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Low-permeability reservoirs have a lot of reserves, but there is the phenomenon that gas injection is prone to gas flushing during the development process. CO 2 foam drive combines the dual advantages of CO 2 drive and foam drive, which can significantly lessen CO 2 gas flushing and expand the wave efficiency of the replacement phase. The conventional CO 2 foam system contains a large number of foaming agents and foam stabilizers. Still, there are issues such as high viscosity of the extracted fluid, serious emulsification, and difficulty in foam defoaming, which leads to the difficulty and high cost of treating the extracted fluid. In this study, the best performing wormlike micelles system of 0.6 wt% DOAPA@NaSal-H+ to stabilise the CO 2 foam system was prepared by preferring N, N-dimethyl-3-oleamidopropylamine (DOAPA) and sodium salicylate (NaSal), using foam performance as an indicator. Analytical tests include conductivity test, rheological property test, surface tension test, Cryo-SEM, DLS are employed. According to the findings, the system under the influence of CO 2 exhibits an increase in the chemical shift of hydrogen atoms near the N atom, an increase in the conductivity of the system, a lamellar mesh microstructure, and an average particle size of micelles of 104.6 nm. The surface tension of DOAPA@NaSal-H+ decreases with the increase of concentration, and the apparent viscosity decreases with the increase of shear rate, which exhibits the typical viscoelastic fluid behaviour. It is important to study the stimulus-response rows of CO 2 stimulus responsive wormlike micelles, which provides theoretical support for the stabilization of CO 2 foams by wormlike micelles. [Display omitted] ● Preparation of a CO 2 stimulus-responsive wormlike micelles that enhance the stability of CO 2 foam. ● The WLMs exhibit shear thinning behaviour typical of non-Newtonian fluids. ● The WLMs has CO 2 responsive cyclicity and self-healing ability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Acylcarnitines were the most disturbed metabolites between T2DM patients and healthy controls. • Lower levels of bile acids and higher levels of fatty acids in serum were closely associated with CHD complications in T2DM patients. • The artificial neural network model using serum myristic acid, palmitic acid and heptanoylcarnitine demonstrated pretty good performance in the warning of CHD in patients with T2DM. Coronary heart disease (CHD) is the most important complication of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) and the leading cause of death. Identifying the risk of CHD in T2DM patients is important for early clinical intervention. A total of 213 participants, including 81 healthy controls (HCs), 69 T2DM patients and 63 T2DM patients complicated with CHD were recruited in this study. Serum metabolomics were conducted by using ultra-high performance liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS). Demographic information and clinical laboratory test results were also collected. Metabolic phenotypes were significantly altered among HC, T2DM and T2DM-CHD. Acylcarnitines were the most disturbed metabolites between T2DM patients and HCs. Lower levels of bile acids and higher levels of fatty acids in serum were closely associated with CHD risk in T2DM patients. Artificial neural network model was constructed for the discrimination of T2DM and T2DM complicated with CHD based on myristic acid, palmitic acid and heptanoylcarnitine, with accuracy larger than 0.95 in both training set and testing set. Altogether, these findings suggest that myristic acid, palmitic acid and heptanoylcarnitine have a good prospect for the warning of CHD complications in T2DM patients, and are superior to traditional lipid, blood glucose and blood pressure indicators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR stabilize ASCL1 mRNA in neuroblastoma, but whether their regulatory effects depend on m6A modification and whether their function involves ASCL1 remain unknown. This study investigated the m6A-dependent binding of HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR to ASCL1 and subsequent regulation, as well as the expression, clinical significance, and function of HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR in neuroblastoma. We revealed that METTL14 mediated ASCL1 m6A modification to stabilize ASCL1. HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR significantly enriched ASCL1 mRNA by binding to the 5′ and 3′ untranslated regions, respectively, and METTL14 knockdown reduced this enrichment. Mutations in m6A sites in the untranslated regions of ASCL1 mRNA considerably decreased probe capacity to engage HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR. HNRNPR interacts with IGF2BP1, and knocking down either impaired binding to ASCL1 mRNA. HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR knockdown suppressed neuroblastoma cell growth and invasion, while ASCL1 overexpression restored these effects. The high HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR expression in neuroblastoma correlated with ASCL1 expression. Thus, HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR bind and stabilize ASCL1 mRNA in an m6A-dependent manner to promote neuroblastoma progression. This study not only discovered a new mechanism underlying the high ASCL1 expression in neuroblastoma but also identified the HNRNPA2B1/HNRNPR/ASCL1 axis as a promising target for inhibiting neuroblastoma progression. [Display omitted] • HNRNPA2B1, served as a m6A reader, stabilizes ASCL1 in neuroblastoma (NB). • METTL14 stabilizes ASCL1 via writing its m6A modification in NB. • HNRNPR interacts with IGF2BP1 to stabilize ASCL1 in an m6A-dependent manner in NB. • HNRNPA2B1 and HNRNPR promote NB progression via stabilizing ASCL1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The SnO 2 /SnS/Sn@NG heterostructures are fabricated by hydrothermal and in-situ vulcanization. • Three-phase SnO 2 /SnS/Sn nanoparticles accelerate charge transfer kinetics and enhance ions diffusion/adsorption capacities. • 3D porous architecture supplies multiple transmission paths for electron/ion and adequate space for volume effect. • The SnO 2 /SnS/Sn@NG anode displays excellent electrochemical performances of LIBs/SIBs. Microstructure modulation by phase engineering induces electrode materials to exhibit excellent energy storage performance due to their adjustable surface/ interface and electronic characteristics. For tin dioxide (SnO 2), effective strategies for adjusting their microstructure properties are still lacking. Herein, 2D flexible N -doped graphene (NG) is rationally integrated with SnO 2 /SnS/Sn heterostructure via hydrothermal and subsequent partial in-situ vulcanization, in which the SnO 2 /SnS/Sn nanoparticles are tightly anchored on NG network (SnO 2 /SnS/Sn@NG). The unique SnO 2 /SnS/Sn heterostructures with modulated electronic properties can induce accelerated charge transfer kinetics and enhanced ions diffusion/adsorption capacities. The hierarchical structure with a large surface area along with nanocomponents can offer better permeability, more available charge storage sites of active material, and a stable electrochemical framework. As expected, the SnO 2 /SnS/Sn@NG heterostructure as an anode for lithium-ion battery exhibits an excellent charge capacity of 748 mAh g−1 at 0.2 A g−1, long-term cyclic stability of 507 mAh g−1 at 1 A g−1 for 800 cycles, and high-rate capability with of 476 mAh g−1 at 5 A g−1. Moreover, the anode for sodium-ion battery also shows excellent cyclic stability and rate capability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Patient-specific quality assurance (QA) for Volumetric Modulated Arc Therapy (VMAT) plans is routinely performed in the clinical. However, it is labor-intensive and time-consuming for medical physicists. QA prediction models can address these shortcomings and improve efficiency. Current approaches mainly focus on single cancer and single modality data. They are not applicable to clinical practice. To assess the accuracy of QA results for VMAT plans, this paper presents a new model that learns complementary features from the multi-modal data to predict the gamma passing rate (GPR). According to the characteristics of VMAT plans, a feature-data fusion approach is designed to fuse the features of imaging and non-imaging information in the model. In this study, 690 VMAT plans are collected encompassing more than ten diseases. The model can accurately predict the most VMAT plans at all three gamma criteria: 2%/2 mm, 3%/2 mm and 3%/3 mm. The mean absolute error between the predicted and measured GPR is 2.17%, 1.16% and 0.71%, respectively. The maximum deviation between the predicted and measured GPR is 3.46%, 4.6%, 8.56%, respectively. The proposed model is effective, and the features of the two modalities significantly influence QA results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective. To evaluate the effectiveness and safety of TAS-102 monotherapy and combination therapy with bevacizumab in the treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer. Methods. The PubMed, Web of Science, MEDLINE, and Cochrane Library databases were searched for the literature on TAS-102 treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer. Extracted data include median overall survival (mOS), median progression-free survival (mPFS), and the incidence of adverse events for meta-analysis. Results. Our study found that the mOS of patients treated with TAS-102 monotherapy was 6.95 (95% CI: 6.26-7.72) months and the mPFS was 2.53 (95% CI: 2.31-2.78) months. The mOS in patients treated by TAS-102 combined with bevacizumab was 10.41 (95% CI: 8.40-12.89) months, and the mPFS is 4.35 (95% CI: 3.05-6.20) months. In the control experiment, the patients' mOS and mPFS were improved. TAS-102+B vs. TAS-102 (OR = 0.41 , 95% CI: 0.18-0.93; OR = 0.72 , 95% CI: 0.63-0.83) and TAS-102 vs. placebo (OR = 0.44 , 95% CI: 0.29-0.67; OR = 0.51 , 95% CI: 0.42-0.62) were studied to actively prevent the occurrence of neutropenia, leukopenia, febrile neutropenia, anemia, and vomiting. Conclusion. TAS-102 monotherapy and combination therapy with bevacizumab can significantly improve the survival of patients and prevent specific adverse events from happening. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • A sequentially responsive Pt(IV) nanogels are fabricated by copolymerization. • Nanogels improve blood stability by Pt(IV)-crosslinking and PEGylation. • Nanogels increase cellular uptake by dePEGylation and active-targeting. • Nanogels trigger intracellular drugs release under reductive milieu. • Nanogels greatly suppress GSH-mediated detoxication by dual-regulation. Chemotherapy efficiency of platinum(II) (Pt(II)) is often attenuated owing to the low intracellular drugs concentration and glutathione (GSH)-mediated detoxification. To address these problems, we fabricated a step-by-step responsive nanogel (~160 nm) by copolymerization between four functional monomers. Hydrophilic methoxypolyethylene glycols (mPEG) distributed randomly on the surface of particles endowed the nanogel with "stealth" property in blood circulation, while the chemical crosslinking inside particles by platinum(IV) (Pt(IV)) linker remarkably increased the stability of nanogel in vivo. These advantages of nanogels leaded to higher accumulation at tumor region (6.4% ID/g), followed by triggering the dePEGylation effect by the cleavage of ortho ester at tumoral extracellular pH. Meanwhile, the exposed phenylboric acid (PBA) could significantly increase cellular uptake and intracellular drugs levels by targteing sialic acid residues on the cells membrane. More importantly, this nanogels could further deplete intracellular glutathione (GSH) by the dual-regulation of platinum(IV) and arylboronic ester, resulting in enhanced platinum(II) toxicity both in vitro and in vivo, eventually achieving superior inhibition rate (79.14%) in A549/DDP tumor. Thus, the sequentially responsive nanogel could be considered as an effective strategy for cancer treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plasmodium knowlesi, a simian malaria parasite responsible for all recent indigenous cases of malaria in Malaysia, infects humans throughout Southeast Asia. There are two genetically distinct subpopulations of Plasmodium knowlesi in Malaysian Borneo, one associated with long-tailed macaques (termed cluster 1) and the other with pig-tailed macaques (cluster 2). A prospective study was conducted to determine whether there were any between-subpopulation differences in clinical and laboratory features, as well as in epidemiological characteristics. Over 2 years, 420 adults admitted to Kapit Hospital, Malaysian Borneo with knowlesi malaria were studied. Infections with each subpopulation resulted in mostly uncomplicated malaria. Severe disease was observed in 35/298 (11.7%) of single cluster 1 and 8/115 (7.0%) of single cluster 2 infections (p = 0.208). There was no clinically significant difference in outcome between the two subpopulations. Cluster 1 infections were more likely to be associated with peri-domestic activities while cluster 2 were associated with interior forest activities consistent with the preferred habitats of the respective macaque hosts. Infections with both P. knowlesi subpopulations cause a wide spectrum of disease including potentially life-threatening complications, with no implications for differential patient management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The sperm quality of some males is in a critical state, making it hard for clinicians to choose the suitable fertilisation methods. This study aimed to develop an intelligent nomogram for predicting fertilisation rate of infertile males with borderline semen. 160 males underwent in vitro fertilisation (IVF), 58 of whom received rescue ICSI (R‐ICSI) due to fertilisation failure (fertilisation rate of IVF ≤30%). A least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) regression analysis identified sperm concentration, progressively motile spermatozoa (PMS), seminal plasma anti‐Müllerian hormone (spAMH), seminal plasma inhibin (spINHB), serum AMH (serAMH) and serum INHB (serINHB) as significant predictors. The nomogram was plotted by multivariable logistic regression. This nomogram‐illustrated model showed good discrimination, calibration and clinical value. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) of the nomogram was 0.762 (p <.001). Calibration curve and Hosmer–Lemeshow test (p =.5261) showed good consistency between the predictions of the nomogram and the actual observations, and decision curve analysis showed that the nomogram was clinically useful. This nomogram may be useful in predicting fertilisation rate, mainly focused on new biomarkers, INHB and AMH. It could assist clinicians and laboratory technicians select appropriate fertilisation methods (IVF or ICSI) for male patients with borderline semen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Low intracellular drugs concentration is one of the main representations of multidrug resistance (MDR), which often results in a weak or failed chemotherapy on cancer treatment. Herein, an acid-sensitive and pluronic L61-linked hyaluronic acid nanogels (HA-L61OE/NGs) were developed for solving this problem. The nanogels could well hold more drugs under neutral condition, while triggering efficiently drugs release (61.42% within 24 h) in acidic environment. In vitro cells experiments demonstrated that the nanogels greatly increased intracellular drugs concentration by CD44-mediated endocytosis and L61-mediated anti-MDR effect, resulting in the enhanced cell-killing in MDR cells. In vivo studies verified HA-L61OE/NGs could avoid drugs leakage in blood and reduce systemic toxicity. Subsequently, the specific accumulation and penetration of nanogels at tumor regions lead to the highest tumor growth inhibition (TGI, 77.42%). Overall, HA-L61OE/NGs were effective on MDR tumor therapy and expected to be further used in clinical trials. [Display omitted] • Acid-sensitive and L61-crosslinked hyaluronic acid nanogels were fabricated. • Acid-responsive behaviors of nanogels were evaluated by 1H NMR, TEM and DLS. • Nanogels increase cellular uptake by CD44-mediated endocytosis. • Nanogels can overcome tumor drug-resistance by L61-mediated anti-MDR effect. • Nanogels efficiently suppress MDR-tumor growth by multiple synergistic effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Solar cells based on organometal halide perovskites attract increasing research interest as an excellent source of renewable energy due to their inexpensive process, high power conversion efficiency, and availability of abundant raw material. The basic description, current research targets and status, and future perceptions of perovskite‐based photovoltaics along with the strategies toward the enhancement of both (intrinsic and extrinsic) stabilities of high‐efficiency devices are summarized and analyzed. This review provides the required knowledge for this design by studying various commercialized thin‐film technologies, analyzing large‐scale fabrication methods like physical vapor deposition, chemical vapor deposition, inkjet printing, doctor blading, spray coating, and roll‐to‐roll techniques. Addressing the present threat and opportunities for integrating the new material exploration, devices and large‐scale fabrication is conductive to the successful commercialization of the perovskite solar cells (PVSCs). This article presents the overview of the reports of the latest technological enhancement of cell stability, interfacial modification, replacement of electron and hole transport layers, techniques used for minimizing the lead‐based perovskites toxicity, and large‐scale fabrication. Finally, this provides an emphasis on organometal halide perovskite‐based solid‐state solar cell contacts that are believed to be the key factor for achieving highly stable PVSCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]