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Background: The growing prevalence of smartphone use among college students in China has led to health concerns, including De Quervain's Tenosynovitis (DQT). However, the specific smartphone usage behaviors contributing to DQT remain poorly understood. This study aimed to explore the relationship between smartphone usage behaviors and DQT in college students. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted with 937 students from various majors in Guangxi between September 2021 and April 2022. Participants completed an online questionnaire assessing smartphone usage behaviors and their association with DQT. The Finkelstein test was employed to diagnose DQT. Results: Over half of the college students (52%) tested positive for DQT via Finkelstein's test. Higher levels of smartphone usage time (6–8 h/day: OR = 4.454, 95%CI:1.662–12.229; ≥8 h/day: OR = 4.521, 95%CI:1.596–12.811), phone games (OR = 1.997, 95%CI:1.312–3.040), social media (OR = 2.263, 95%CI:1.795–3.833), and leisure activities (OR = 1.679, 95%CI:1.140–2.475) were significantly associated with an increased risk of DQT. Two specific gestures (Bilateral thumbs, BT: OR = 1.900, 95%CI:1.281–2.817; Bilateral thumbs-horizontal screen, BT-HS: OR = 1.872, 95%CI:1.244–2.818) and two screen sizes (5.0-5.5inch: OR = 2.064, 95%CI:1.108–3.846; 6.0-6.5inch: OR = 2.413, 95%CI:1.125–4.083) also exhibited a higher risk of DQT. Bilateral DQT was observed, with Gesture-BT identified as the primary risk factor. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that increased smartphone usage time, phone games, social media, and leisure activities elevate the risk of DQT among college students. Furthermore, two specific gestures and two screen sizes were also linked to a heightened DQT risk. To mitigate DQT development, college students should reduce smartphone usage time and adopt appropriate gestures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We previously identified glyceraldehyde 3‐phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) as one of the cyclic adenosine diphosphoribose (cADPR)'s binding proteins and found that GAPDH participates in cADPR‐mediated Ca2+ release from endoplasmic reticulum via ryanodine receptors (RyRs). Here, we aimed to chemically synthesise and pharmacologically characterise novel cADPR analogues. Based on the simulated cADPR–GAPDH complex structure, we performed the structure‐based drug screening, identified several small chemicals with high docking scores to cADPR's binding pocket in GAPDH and showed that two of these compounds, C244 and C346, are potential cADPR antagonists. We further synthesised several analogues of C346 and found that its analogue, G42, also mobilised Ca2+ release from lysosomes. G42 alkalised lysosomal pH and inhibited autophagosome–lysosome fusion. Moreover, G42 markedly inhibited Zika virus (ZIKV, a flavivirus) or murine hepatitis virus (MHV, a β‐coronavirus) infections of host cells. These results suggest that G42 inhibits virus infection, likely by triggering lysosomal Ca2+ mobilisation and inhibiting autophagy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last twenty years there has been increasing interest in studying the piecewise differential systems, mainly due to their many applications in natural science and technology. Up to now the most studied differential systems are in dimension two, here we study them in dimension three. One of the main difficulties for studying these differential systems consists in controlling the existence and nonexistence of limit cycles, and the numbers when they exist. In this paper, we study the nonsymmetric limit cycles for a family of three-dimensional piecewise linear differential systems with three zones separated by two parallel planes. For this class of differential systems we study the nonexistence, existence and uniqueness of their limit cycles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The experiences of patients with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) treated with chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy have received little attention. This study aimed to explore the treatment experiences of patients with relapsed or refractory (R/R) B-cell lymphoma during CAR T-cell therapy in China. Methods: This descriptive qualitative study was conducted using face-to-face semi-structured interviews with 21 DLBCL patients 0–2 years after CAR-T infusion. Two researchers independently coded the interviews in MAXQDA 2022, and the original data were analyzed by conventional content analysis. Results: Four themes emerged from the transcripts: (1) physiological distress, (2) functional impacts, (3) psychological experience, and (4) support requirement. Participants expressed 29 short-term or long-term symptoms related to their disease and treatment, influencing their daily life and function in a social setting. The participants expressed different negative emotions, polarized expectations about efficacy, and over-reliance on authoritative medical care. Their major concerns and hopes were achieving life goals, being treated with respect, obtaining more information about CAR T-cell therapy, and receiving government financial sponsorship. Conclusions: The patients experienced short-term and long-term symptoms of physical distress. Patients who have experienced failure in CAR T-cell therapy also experience strong negative emotions, such as dependency and guilt. They also require authentic spiritual and financial information that is authentic. Our study may guide the development of standardized and comprehensive nursing care for R/R DLBCL patients undergoing CAR T-cell therapy in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

African swine fever virus (ASFV) causes a viral disease in swine with a mortality rate of approximately 100%, threatening the global pig industry's economic development. However, vaccines are not yet commercially available, and other antiviral therapeutics, such as antiviral drugs, are urgently needed. In this study, berbamine hydrochloride, a natural bis-benzylisoquinoline alkaloid isolated from the traditional Chinese herb Berberis amurensis, showed significant antiviral activity against ASFV. The 50% cytotoxic concentration (CC50) of berbamine hydrochloride in porcine alveolar macrophages (PAMs) was 27.89 μM. The antiviral activity assay demonstrated that berbamine hydrochloride inhibits ASFV in a dose-dependent manner. In addition, a 4.14 log TCID50 decrease in the viral titre resulting from non-cytotoxic berbamine hydrochloride was found. Moreover, the antiviral activity of berbamine hydrochloride was maintained for 48h and took effect at multiplicities of infection (MOI) of 0.01, 0.1, and 1. The time-of-addition analysis revealed an inhibitory effect throughout the entire virus life-cycle. A subsequent viral entry assay verified that berbamine hydrochloride blocks the early stage of ASFV infection. Moreover, similar anti-ASFV activity of berbamine hydrochloride was also found in PK-15 and 3D4/21 cells. In summary, these results indicate that berbamine hydrochloride is an effective anti-ASFV natural product and may be considered a novel antiviral drug. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Domain shift problem is commonplace for ultrasound image analysis due to difference imaging setting and diverse medical centers, which lead to poor generalizability of deep learning-based methods. Multi-Source Domain Transformation (MSDT) provides a promising way to tackle the performance degeneration caused by the domain shift, which is more practical and challenging compared to conventional single-source transformation tasks. An effective unsupervised domain combination strategy is highly required to handle multiple domains without annotations. Fidelity and quality of generated images are also important to ensure the accuracy of computer-aided diagnosis. However, existing MSDT approaches underperform in above two areas. In this paper, an efficient domain transformation model named M2O-DiffGAN is introduced to achieve a unified mapping from multiple unlabeled source domains to the target domain. A cycle-consistent "many-to-one" adversarial learning architecture is introduced to model various unlabeled domains jointly. A condition adversarial diffusion process is employed to generate images with high-fidelity, combining an adversarial projector to capture reverse transition probabilities over large step sizes for accelerating sampling. Considering the limited perceptual information of ultrasound images, an ultrasound-specific content loss helps to capture more perceptual features for synthesizing high-quality ultrasound images. Massive comparisons on six clinical datasets covering thyroid, carotid and breast demonstrate the superiority of the M2O-DiffGAN in the performance of bridging the domain gaps and enlarging the generalization of downstream analysis methods compared to state-of-the-art algorithms. It improves the mean MI, Bhattacharyya Coefficient, dice and IoU assessments by 0.390, 0.120, 0.245 and 0.250, presenting promising clinical applications. • A multi-domain transformation model "M2O-DiffGAN" to standardize ultrasound images. • Bridging domain gaps to generalize downstream analysis methods to various source domains. • Many-to-one GANs scheme modeling multiple unlabeled ultrasound domains jointly. • Fast adversarial diffusive generation to produce high-fidelity images efficiently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aluminum gallium nitride (AlGaN) plays an essential role in deep ultra-violet light emitting diodes and high electron mobility transistors etc. For example, 2 nm â€" 5 nm AlGaN nanofilms consist of the quantum wells in ultra-violet light emitting diodes, which have been attracting extensive attention since the rise of COVID 2019. Since most photons and heat are generated in these AlGaN nanofilms, the thermal properties of AlGaN nanofilms are strongly influenced by the heat dissipation of devices. In this paper, utilizing elastic theory and the Boltzmann transport equation, the phonon dispersion relations, density of states, specific heat capacities and thermal conductivities of 2 nm Al δ Ga1âˆ' δ N nanofilms with various δ are theoretically calculated at different temperatures. The thermal conductivity of nanofilm is significantly smaller than that of its bulk counterpart. In contrast with bulk AlGaN, due to the dominance of boundary scattering and alloy disorder scattering, the thermal conductivity of Al δ Ga1âˆ' δ N exhibits a similar dependence on Al concentration to bulk Al δ Ga1âˆ' δ N. Meanwhile, since the screening of Umklapp scattering, the saturation temperature of thermal conductivity is delayed from 50 to 100 K in bulks to about 300 K in nanofilms. The shrinkage of nanofilms’ thermal conductivity is also slower than for bulks. We believe that our work will be helpful in controlling the self-heating effect of devices based on AlGaN nanofilms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A normal form is derived for codimension-two focus-fold bifurcation. • Observations of focus-fold bifurcation are extended from piecewise linear systems to general piecewise smooth systems. • Two types of sliding limit cycles are bifurcated from the focus-fold singularity for general piecewise smooth systems. • Two nested crossing limit cycles are bifurcated from the focus-fold singularity for general piecewise smooth systems. • Convergence in finite time is proved for sliding limit cycles. We consider codimension-two focus-fold bifurcation for general piecewise smooth (PWS) planar systems. Some changes of variables and parameters are employed to derive a normal form, which is topologically equivalent to the original system. Making use of the normal form, we verify that observations of focus-fold bifurcation in some special piecewise linear systems also hold for general PWS systems, including the existence of two types of sliding limit cycles and coexistence of crossing and sliding limit cycles. It is shown that two nested crossing limit cycles can be bifurcated from the focus-fold singularity. This result is the improvement of the work [Han and Zhang (2010) [29] ], in which only one bifurcated limit cycle is obtained. In addition, the sliding limit cycles are proved to be convergent in finite time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, a new perturbation approach is developed based on Bogdanov-Takens bifurcation theory, which enables the Poincaré-Lyapunov method for switching systems with linear type centers to be applied for studying the center conditions of planar switching polynomial systems associated with a nilpotent equilibrium point. The new method is then applied to consider a class of quadratic switching nilpotent systems, and a complete classification is given on the conditions of the nilpotent equilibrium point to be a center. Moreover, based on one of the center conditions, an example is constructed to show the existence of seven small-amplitude limit cycles around the nilpotent equilibrium point, which is a new lower bound on the number of limit cycles in such systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to study the sliding bifurcation in a planar piecewise smooth system with an elliptic switching curve. Some new phenomena are observed, such as a crossing limit cycle containing four intersections with the switching curve, sliding cycles having four sliding segments, and sliding cycles consisting of the entire switching curve. Firstly, we investigate the bifurcation of sliding cycle from a sliding heteroclinic connection to two cusps and show the appearance of one sliding cycle with two folds. To plot the bifurcation diagram, a planar piecewise linear system with two zones separated by an ellipse are considered. Moreover, we study in more detail the unfolding of a sliding cycle connecting four cusps by exhibiting its complete bifurcation diagram. More precisely, we explore the necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of limit cycles and derive the concrete bifurcation curves. Additionally, a simple piecewise smooth system with nonlinear subsystems is studied, which shows the possibility of the existence of two nested limit cycles. Finally, numerical simulations are given to confirm the theoretical analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the periodicity and multi-periodicity in delayed Cohen–Grossberg-type neural networks (CGNNs) possessing impulsive effects, whose activation functions possess discontinuities and are allowed to be unbounded or nonmonotonic. Based on differential inclusion and cone expansion–compression fixed-point theory of set-valued mapping, several improved criteria are given to derive the positive solution with ω -periodicity and ω -multi-periodicity for delayed CGNNs under impulsive control. These ω -periodicity/ ω -multi-periodicity orbits are produced by impulses control. The analytical method and theoretical results presented in this paper are of certain significance to the design of neural network models or circuits possessing discontinuous neuron activation and impulsive effects in periodic environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we formulate and study a vector-host epidemic model with spatial heterogeneity and general incidence rate. Our analyses show that if R0 < 1 the disease-free steady state is globally asymptotically stable and the disease dies out; if R0 > 1 then the disease persists. The obtained results are new and extend the previous results in the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public health is very important in big cities, and data analysis on public health studies is always a demanding issue that determines the study effectiveness. E-value was proposed as a standard sensitivity analysis tool to assess unmeasured confounders in observational studies, but its value is doubted. To evaluate the usefulness of E-value, in this paper, we collected 368 observational studies on drug effectiveness evaluation published from 1998 to September 2019 (out of 3426 searched studies) and evaluated the features of E-value. We selected the effects of primary outcomes or the largest effects in terms of hazard ratio, risk ratio, or odds ratio. Effects were transformed into estimated effect sizes following a standard E-value computation. In all 368 studies, the disease with the highest percentage was infections and infestations, at 21.7% (80/368). Our results showed that the median relative effect size was 1.89 (Q1-Q3: 1.41–2.95), and the corresponding median E-value was 3.19 with 95% confidence interval lower bound 1.77. Smaller studies yielded larger E-values for the effect size estimate and the relationship was considerably attenuated when considering the E-value for the lower bound of 95% confidence interval on the effect size. Notably, E-values have a monotonic, almost linear relationship with effect estimates. We found that E-value may cause misimpressions on the unmeasured confounder, and the same E-value does not reflect the varying nature of the unmeasured confounders in different studies, and there lacks a guidance on how E-value can be deemed as small or large, all of which limits the capability of E-value as a standard sensitivity analysis tool in real applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metagenomics data provide rich information for the detection of foodborne pathogens from food and environmental samples that are mixed with complex background bacteria strains. While pathogen detection from metagenomic sequencing data has become an activity of increasing interest, shotgun sequencing of uncultured food samples typically produces data that contain reads from many different organisms, making accurate strain typing a challenging task. Particularly, as many pathogens may contain a common set of genes that are highly similar to those from normal bacteria in food samples, traditional strain-level abundance profiling approaches do not perform well at detecting pathogens of very low abundance levels. To overcome this limitation, we propose an abundance correction method based on species-specific genomic regions to achieve high sensitivity and high specificity in target pathogen detection at low abundance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• It is important to evaluate the early prognosis of patients with periodic discharges. • The prediction model based on the risk factors for death has high accuracy. • EEG feature classification is convenient for clinical application and verification. To investigate death-related factors in patients with electroencephalographic (EEG) periodic discharges (PDs) and to construct a model for death prediction. This case-control study enrolled a total of 80 severe neurological disease patients with EEG PDs within 72 h of admission to the neuroscience intensive care unit (NICU). According to modified Rankin scale (mRS) scores half a year after discharge, patients were divided into a survival group (<6 points) and a death group (6 points). Their relevant clinical and biochemical indicators as well as EEG characteristics were retrospectively analyzed. Logistic regression analysis was used to identify the risk factors associated with the death of patients with EEG PDs. A death risk prediction model and an individualized nomogram prediction model were constructed, and the prediction performance and concordance of the models were evaluated. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that the involvement of both gray and white matter in imaging, disappearance of EEG reactivity, occurrence of stimulus-induced rhythmic, periodic, or ictal discharges (SIRPIDs), and an interval time of 0.5–4 s were independent risk factors for death. A regression model was established according to the multivariate logistic regression analysis, and the area under the curve of this model was 0.9135. The accuracy of the model was 87.01%, the sensitivity was 87.17%, and the specificity was 89.17%. A nomogram model was constructed, and a concordance index of 0.914 was obtained after internal validation. The regression model based on risk factors has high accuracy in predicting the risk of death of patients with EEG PDs. This model can help clinicians in the early assessment of the prognosis of severe neurological disease patients with EEG PDs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Background: This study examined the 10-year hospitalization characteristics, economic patterns and early clinical outcomes of type B aortic dissection (TBAD) patients that underwent thoracic endovascular aortic repair (TEVAR) in one high-volume hospital in China. Methods: We performed a population-based retrospective analysis based on electronic medical record system data provided by Zhongshan Hospital Fudan University from 2009 to 2018. Results: We identified 1,367 cases of TBAD patients with TEVAR over the past decade. The total incidence of in-hospital complications was 7.6% (104 of 1,367), among which acute kidney injury (AKI) had the highest incidence (3.1%, 42 of 1,367). Aortic-related reintervention was performed in 7 patients (0.5%). The overall aortic-related in-hospital mortality rate was 2.7% (37 of 1,367) and had no significant time-varying trend (P = 0.2). Among these, 27% of in-hospital deaths were caused by retrograde type A dissection (RTAD). Chronic TBAD had a higher risk of in-hospital death versus acute TBAD, with a risk ratio of 2.69 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.19-6.09). Patients with hypertension (risk ratio 4.63, 95% CI: 1.38, 15.54) also had a higher in-hospital death risk. These 2 factors were also the predictive factors for the composite endpoint of in-hospital adverse events (risk ratio 2.17, 95% CI: 1.43, 3.29 and risk ratio 4.83, 95% CI: 1.90, 12.28, respectively), in addition to Marfan syndrome (risk ratio 4.05, 95% CI: 1.61, 10.19). The average length of hospitalization significantly declined during the past decade (annual percentage change -6.3%, 95% CI -8.2 to -4.3), and the stent-grafts (SGs) cost was the main expenditure of the total hospitalization costs. Conclusion: Our study showed a favorable early outcome of TEVAR over the past decade. Greater attention should be paid to certain risk factors in order to reduce the in-hospital adverse events. SG expenditure is still the primary economic burden on Chinese TBAD patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The lab-confirmed interval is the date from lab confirmation in a core case (infector) to lab confirmation in a second case (infectee); however, its distribution and application are seldom reported. This study aimed to investigate the lab-confirmed interval and its application in the preliminary evaluation of the strength of disease prevention and control measures.Methods: Taking European countries and Chinese provinces outside Hubei as examples, we identified 63 infector-infectee pairs from European countries from Wikipedia, and 103 infector-infectee pairs from official public sources in Chinese provinces outside Hubei. The lab-confirmed intervals were obtained through analysis of the collected data and adopting the bootstrap method.Results: The mean lab-confirmed interval was 2.6 (95% CI: 2.1-3.1) days for Europe and 2.6 (95% CI: 1.9-3.3) days for China outside Hubei, which were shorter than the reported serial intervals. For index patients aged ≥60 years old, the lab-confirmed interval in Europe was slightly longer (mean: 2.9; 95% CI: 2.0-3.6) and obviously longer in China outside Hubei (mean: 3.8; 95% CI: 1.9-5.5) than that for patients aged < 60 years.Conclusion: Investigation of the lab-confirmed interval can provide additional information on the characteristics of emergent outbreaks and can be a feasible indication to evaluate the strength of prevention and control measures. When the lab-confirmed interval was shorter than the serial interval, it could objectively reflect improvements in laboratory capacity and the surveillance of close contacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A Filippov‐type plant disease model is developed by introducing a interaction ratio threshold, the number of susceptible plants infected by per diseased plant, which determines whether control measures including replanting or roguing are carried out. The main purpose of this paper is to give a completely qualitative analysis of the model. By employing Poincaré maps, our analysis reveals rich dynamics including a global attractor bounded by a touching closed orbit, which is convergent in finite time from its outside, a global attractor bounded by two touching closed orbits and a pseudo‐saddle, and a globally asymptotically stable pseudo‐node. Moreover, we give biological implications of our results in implementing control strategies for plant diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Autophagy, an evolutional conserved lysosomal degradation process, has been implicated to play an important role in cellular defense against a variety of microbial infection. Interestingly, numerous studies found that some pathogens, especially positive-single-strand RNA viruses, actually hijacked autophagy machinery to promote virus infection within host cells, facilitating different stages of viral life cycle, from replication, assembly to egress. Enterovirus, a genus of positive-strand RNA virus, can cause various human diseases and is one of main public health threat globally, yet no effective clinical intervention is available for enterovirus infection. Here we summarized recent literature on how enteroviruses regulate and utilize autophagy process to facilitate their propagation in the host cells. The studies on the interplay between enterovirus and autophagy not only shed light on the molecular mechanisms underlying how enterovirus hijacks cellular components and pathway for its own benefits, but also provide therapeutic option against enterovirus infection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: This paper gives the stability analysis of Filippov system with delay. Under the Filippov‐framework, we introduce a general type of Lyapunov‐Krasovskii functional (LKF) to derive the stability of delayed differential inclusions (DDIs), where the indefiniteness or positive definiteness of the derivative of LKF holds for almost everywhere along the trajectories of state solution. The proposed LKF of this paper generalizes the classic LKF whose derivative possesses negative definiteness or seminegative definiteness for everywhere. As a result, the stability, uniform stability, uniform asymptotic stability, and global exponential stability criteria of the trivial solution for DDI are established. Moreover, the developed LKF method is applied to solve the stabilization control issue of delayed neural networks, possessing discontinuous input‐output activation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the periodic solution of a delayed Beddington‐DeAngelis (BD) type predator‐prey model with discontinuous control strategy. Firstly, the regularity and visibility analysis of the delayed predator‐prey model is carried out by using the principle of differential inclusion. Secondly, the positiveness and boundeness of the solution is discussed by employing the comparison theorem. Based on the boundary conditions of the model and the Mawhin‐like coincidence theorem, it is shown that the solution of the delayed BD system is asymptotically stable in finite time. Furthermore, it is found that there exists at least one periodic solution of the nonautonomous delayed predator‐prey model by using the principle of topological degree and set value mapping. Specially, when the nonautonomous delayed BD system degenerates into an autonomous system, some criteria are obtained to guarantee the convergence behavior of the harvesting solutions for the corresponding autonomous delayed BD system. Finally, numerical examples are given to demonstrate the applicability and effectiveness of main results. It is worthy to point out that the discontinuous control strategy is superior to the continuous harvesting policies adopted in existing literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The aim of this study was to investigate the epidemiological characteristics of pediatric traumatic brain injury (TBI) requiring hospitalization in Chinese children ≤17 years of age according to sex and age group. Methods: This study retrospectively analyzed pediatric TBI inpatient data obtained via electronic health records from one children's hospital in China. Patients aged ≤17 years admitted to the hospital due to TBI between 1 January 2013 and 31 December 2015 were identified using International Classification of Diseases (ICD) ‐9 and ICD‐10 codes. The demographic, injury, and hospitalization characteristics were analyzed by sex and age groups. Results: The subject consisted of 1,087 pediatric TBI patients admitted to the hospital (61.5% boys). The highest proportion of hospitalization was observed in the 1–3 years age group. For both boys and girls, the most common diagnosis was "traumatic epidural hematoma" and the leading mechanism of TBI was "fall". The median length of hospital stay was 8.5 days and the median hospitalization cost was 7,977.4 Chinese yuan (approximately $US 1,140). Conclusions: Boys and children aged 1–3 years incurred more pediatric TBI requiring hospitalization than their counterparts. Prevention of falls, the most common injury mechanism in both boys and girls, is an important strategy to reduce pediatric TBI and related hospitalizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the fixed-time synchronization of Memristor-based neural networks with time-delayed and coupled. In view of the retarded differential inclusions theory, drive–response concept, the authors give some sufficient conditions to ensure the fixed-time synchronization issue of Memristor-based neural networks. Two novel state-feedback controllers and adaptive controller are designed such that the system can realize fixed-time complete synchronization by means of inequality technique and non-smooth analysis theory. It is worth to point out that, without desiring values of the initial conditions or under the linear growth condition of the controller, the settling time of fixed-time synchronization is estimated. Finally, an example is given to further illustrate the benefits of the proposed switched control approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since fatigue failure commonly occurs in mechanical equipment, the prediction of the fatigue life is important to ensure safety in the running cycle of production. In this paper, a method is proposed to predict the low-cycle fatigue life. The accuracy of the proposed method is compared to the strain energy criterion and Coffin-Manson/Basquin equation with three different materials. The results indicate that accuracy of the proposed method is similar to the strain energy criterion and Coffin-Manson/Basquin equation in predicting the low-cycle fatigue life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel biodegradable conducting polymer, PLA-b-AP-b-PLA (PAP) triblock copolymer of poly ( l -lactide) (PLA) and aniline pentamer (AP) with electroactivity and biodegradability, was synthesized and its potential application in cardiac tissue engineering was studied. The PAP copolymer presented better biocompatibility compared to PANi and PLA because of promoted cell adhesion and spreading of rat cardiac myoblasts (H9c2 cell line) on PAP/PLA thin film. After pulse electrical stimulation (5 V, 1 Hz, 500 ms) for 6 days, the proliferation ratio, and intracellular calcium concentration of H9c2 cells on PAP/PLA were improved significantly. Meanwhile, cell morphology changed by varying the pulse electrical signals. Especially, the oriented pseudopodia-like structure was observed from H9c2 cells on PAP/PLA after electrical stimulation. It is regarded that the novel conducting copolymer could enhance electronic signals transferring between cells because of its special electrochemical properties, which may result in the differentiation of cardiac myoblasts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, generalized pinning synchronization problem is investigated for a class of Cohen–Grossberg neural networks with discontinuous neuron activations and mixed delays. By designing generalized pinning state-feedback and adaptive controllers, several criteria for global exponential synchronization and global asymptotical synchronization of the drive–response based system are obtained in view of non-smooth analysis theory with generalized Lyapunov functional method, in which first pinning the neurons with very small self-inhibition and small amplification functions is pointed out. Some numerical examples are given to illustrate the feasibility of the obtained results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is devoted to discussing the sliding bifurcation phenomena of a planar piecewise linear system with two zones separated by a straight line. We consider those systems for which in each zone there is precisely one real focus. By introducing Poincaré map and defining proper displacement function, some results on the existence of crossing periodic orbits, sliding periodic orbits, sliding-crossing periodic orbits and sliding homoclinic connections are obtained. Moreover, we establish some conditions for the simultaneous occurrence of crossing and sliding periodic orbits and show a concrete example. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we study bifurcation of limit cycles from the equator of piecewise polynomial systems with no singular points at infinity. We develop a method for computing the Lyapunov constants at infinity of piecewise polynomial systems. In particular, we consider cubic piecewise polynomial systems and study limit cycle bifurcations in the neighborhood of the origin and infinity. Moreover, an example is presented to show 11 limit cycles bifurcating from infinity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: This study focuses on poly-victimization, with the aim of providing a realistic estimation of the prevalence of lifetime victimization in a Norwegian adolescent population (ages 18–19 years). Methods: Based upon the concept from previous research, we applied measures of child poly-victimization on Norwegian data obtained from a national youth survey in 2015 (N = 4,531) to arrive at an estimation of its prevalence. We used variables that measure individual characteristics such as gender and educational aspiration and socio-economic factors such as parents’ education level and home economic situation to derive a social and psychological profile of victimization and poly-victimization among young people. Finally, we estimated the effects of poly-victimization on mental health such as symptoms of depression, anxiety and trauma. Results: Our study identified a poly-victimization prevalence of 8.6% among young people, i.e. they were exposed to three of all four forms of violence investigated by our study: non-physical violence, witnessing violence against parents, physical violence and sexual abuse. Adolescents of poly-victimization are six times more likely to report depression and anxiety and trauma when compared with those without victimization. Conclusions: Poly-victimization is a phenomenon that heavily burdens many young people across many national contexts. Poly-victims clearly tend to develop depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress symptoms. The early detection of sexual abuse, physical violence, and bullying victimization is of critical importance and preventive measures could consider addressing family factors through parental educational programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we study a class of coupled time-delayed neural networks with discontinuous activations. Based on the new analysis techniques, framework of nonsmooth analysis, differential inclusion theory, both discontinuous controller and novel controller with continuous part are considered to realize the finite-time synchronization for discontinuous coupled neural networks. Some criteria are investigated in detail on constructing suitable Lyapunov functions cover 1-norm and quadratic-form, which were considered separately in the past. Finally, numerical examples are provided to show the correctness of our analysis. Our results are essentially new and they extend previously known researches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with the finite-time synchronization issue of time-varying delayed neural networks (DNNs) with discontinuous activations. Based on master-slave concept, several sufficient conditions are given to guarantee the finite-time synchronization of discontinuous DNNs. In order to control the synchronization error to converge zero in a finite time, we design three classes of novel switching state-feedback controllers which involve time-delays and discontinuous factors. The analysis in this paper employs the extended differential inclusion theory, the famous finite-time stability theorem, inequality techniques and generalized Lyapunov approach. Moreover, the upper bounds of the settling time of synchronization are estimated. Finally, the validity of proposed design method and theoretical results are illustrated by numerical examples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the finite-time stabilization problem for a class of delayed neural networks (DNNs) with discontinuous neuron activations. In order to stabilize the states of such DNNs in finite time, we design two classes of novel control strategies including switching adaptive control strategy and switching state-feedback control strategy. Based on the theory of differential inclusions, the famous finite-time stability theorem and the generalized Lyapunov functional method, several sufficient conditions are established to ensure the finite-time stabilization control of discontinuous DNNs. In addition, we also provide the settling time for stabilization which has an important significance in the application of neural networks for guaranteeing fast response. Finally, numerical examples are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control strategies and main results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

High intracellular levels of reactive oxygen species (ROS) cause oxidative stress that results in numerous pathologies, including cell death. Transient potential receptor melastatin-2 (TRPM2), a Ca 2 + -permeable cation channel, is mainly activated by intracellular adenosine diphosphate ribose (ADPR) in response to oxidative stress. Here we studied the role and mechanisms of TRPM2-mediated Ca 2 + influx on oxidative stress-induced cell death in cancer cells. We found that oxidative stress activated the TRPM2-Ca 2 + -CaMKII cascade to inhibit early autophagy induction, which ultimately led to cell death in TRPM2 expressing cancer cells. On the other hand, TRPM2 knockdown switched cells from cell death to autophagy for survival in response to oxidative stress. Moreover, we found that oxidative stress activated the TRPM2-CaMKII cascade to further induce intracellular ROS production, which led to mitochondria fragmentation and loss of mitochondrial membrane potential. In summary, our data demonstrated that oxidative stress activates the TRPM2-Ca 2 + -CaMKII-ROS signal loop to inhibit autophagy and induce cell death. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with a class of reaction–diffusion high-order Hopfield neural networks with time-varying delays subject to the Dirichlet boundary condition in a bounded domain. Easily verifiable delay-independent criteria are established to ensure the existence of periodic mild solutions, and the global exponential stability of the periodic mild solutions is also discussed by using the exponential dissipation property of semigroup of operators. The obtained results are easy to check and they effectually complement previously known results. A numerical example is given to show the effectiveness of theoretical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using data from a national survey (n = 6979) of young people in their last year in Norwegian secondary schools in 2007 (aged 18–19), this paper explores the relationship between sexual abuse and experiences of violence among young people in Norway and their reporting of suicidal ideation and self‐harm. This investigation includes three types of abuse experienced by young people: non‐physical, physical and sexual. We investigate suicidal ideation and two types of self‐harming behaviour: non‐suicidal self‐injury and suicidal self‐injury. The analyses that are reported involve descriptive analysis, chi‐square and t‐tests, and logistic regression. The hypothesis that was confirmed by the analysis was that being subject to sexual abuse or other violence was associated with increased risk of self‐harm. The hypothesis that was partially supported by the analysis was that violence experienced during childhood would have more effect on suicidal ideation and self‐harm than violence experienced at a later age. Contrary to our expectations, it was found that peer bullying has a stronger effect on young people's suicidal ideation and self‐harming behaviours than sexual abuse or physical violence. The implications of these findings for practitioners working with children and youth involve raising awareness about the long‐term effects of verbal, physical, sexual and witnessed abuse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a general framework named Filippov-framework and some new analytic techniques are presented for dealing with the exponential synchronization of memristor-based neural network system with time-varying delay. Several new sufficient conditions are established to guarantee two different types of exponential synchronization of the coupled networks based on master–slave (drive-response) concept and discontinuous state-feedback controller. In addition, we also provide an estimation of the exponential synchronization rate which depends on the time delay and system parameters. These conditions are good improvement and extension of the existing works on synchronization control of memristive or switching networks. Finally, the validity of our method and theoretical results is demonstrated by concrete examples with numerical simulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Half-Heusler (HH) thermoelectric (TE) materials have been attracting extensive research interest over the last two decades, owing to their thermal stability, mechanical strength, and moderate ZT . This material system are potential candidates for medium to high temperature applications, which is close to the temperature range of most industrial waste heat sources. In this mini-review article, we briefly summarize the recent progress and advances in HH thermoelectric materials. Some effectively available approaches, such as HH nanocomposites to reduce thermal conductivity, using larger atomic mass and size differences to enhance phonon scattering to further reduce the thermal conductivity, forming ternary systems following the cost effective approach. In addition, new thermoelectric HH members are also discussed in this article, which points out that many new HH compounds may be possible for TE applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the stability criteria for complex-valued bidirectional associative memory (BAM) with time delay. Firstly, based on the Lyapunov function method and mathematical analysis technique, sufficient conditions for the existence of unique equilibrium, and global asymptotic stability of the equilibrium are derived by separating complex-valued neural networks into real and imaginary parts. Secondly, we propose the delay-dependent stability criteria for the complex-valued BAM neural networks. Finally, numerical examples are given to show the effectiveness and merits of the present results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To investigate the effect of PPARγ agonist 15d-PGJ2 treatment on the microglia activation and neurological deficit of ischemia reperfusion in diabetic rat model, adult Sprague-Dawley rats were sacrificed for the research. The rats were randomly categorized into four groups: (1) sham-operated group; (2) standard ischemia group; (3) diabetic ischemia group; (4) diabetic ischemia group with diabetes and treated with 15d-PGJ2. Compared to the sham-operated group, all the ischemic groups have significantly severer neurological deficits, more TNF-α and IL-1 expression, increased labeling of apoptotic cells, increased CD68 positive staining of brain lesion, and increased volume of infarct and cerebral edema in both 24 hours and 7 days after reperfusion. Interestingly, reduced neurological deficits, decreased TNF-α and IL-1 expression, less apoptotic cells and CD68 positive staining, and alleviated infarct and cerebral edema volume were observed when 15d-PGJ2 was intraperitoneally injected after reperfusion in diabetic ischemia group, suggesting its neuroprotective role in regulating microglia activation, which may have a therapeutic application in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, without assuming the symmetry or irreducibility of the coupling configuration matrix, we investigate the synchronization of linearly coupled dynamical systems with discontinuous identical nodes and time delay. First, we design a feedback controller to realize the complete synchronization and exponential synchronization of discontinuous complex networks using a generalized Lyapunov approach. Second, we propose a set of adaptive controllers and adaptive laws to achieve complete synchronization. Third, we study the adaptive pinning synchronization of the discontinuous complex networks. The results of numerical simulations are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the controllers and the correctness of the theoretical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we introduce a class of predator-prey system with general functional response, whose harvesting policy is modeled by a discontinuous function. Based on the differential inclusions theory, topological degree theory in set-valued analysis and generalized Lyapunov approach, we analyze the existence, uniqueness and global asymptotic stability of positive periodic solution. In particular, a series of useful criteria on existence, uniqueness and global asymptotic stability of the positive equilibrium point are established for the autonomous system corresponding to the non-autonomous biological and mathematical model with a discontinuous right-hand side. Moreover, some new sufficient conditions are provided to guarantee the global convergence in measure of harvesting solution and convergence in finite time of any positive solution for the autonomous discontinuous biological system. The obtained results, which improve and generalize previous works on dynamical behavior in the literature, are of interest for understanding and designing biological system with not only continuous or even Lipschitz continuous but also discontinuous harvesting function. Finally, we give three examples with numerical simulations to show the applicability and effectiveness of our main results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]