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Sarcopenia and cognitive impairment are the most prevalent causes of disability in older individuals. The aim of this study was to assess the prevalence of sarcopenia and the association between cognitive impairment and sarcopenia in older patients.A cross-sectional study was undertaken, comprised 250 male patients aged 65 and over. Sarcopenia was defined using the diagnostic recommended consensus by the Asian Working Group for sarcopenia, and the participants were classified into the sarcopenia and non-sarcopenia groups according to this definition. The cognitive functions of older patients were assessed using the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). After bivariate analyses, a multivariate logistic regression model was constructed to determine the association of study variables with sarcopenia.The prevalence of sarcopenia and cognitive impairment was 20.8% and 19.6% respectively. Additionally, we found 10.8% patients had nutritional risk, 19.6% patients had cognitive impairment in this study. Multivariate analysis identified age (OR: 1.11, 95% Cl 1.03, 1.19, p=0.008), cognitive impairment (OR: 4.06, 95% Cl 1.42, 11.6, p=0.009) and nutritional risk (OR: 13.7, 95% Cl 3.06, 61.2, p=0.001) were significantly associated with sarcopenia. The prevalence of sarcopenia significantly increased stepwise with lower MMSE score. Additionally, the score on the attention and calculation (OR=0.68, 95% Cl: 0.51, 0.91, p=0.009) subsection of the MMSE was associated with the presence of sarcopenia. MMSE score was correlated with the fat free mass, handgrip strength (p0.05).Cognitive impairment, especially in the calculation and attention, and nutritional risk, are associated with sarcopenia in hospitalized Chinese male elderly. Adequate nutritional support may be the key to solving these diseases.

A flexible brush mechanism is designed and mounted at the end of a seven-degree-of-freedom robotic arm to despin a tumbling target. The dynamics model of the flexible brush is established using the absolute nodal coordinate method (ANCF), and its contact collision with the solar wing of the tumbling target is analysed. The H ∞ optimal control is proposed for a seven-degree-of-freedom robotic arm during despinning of a tumbling target while ensuring the global robustness and stability. Simulations verify that the despinning strategy can successfully eliminate the rotation speed and is feasible and effective.

Highlights • On day 14 after the admission, no viral load was detected in arbidol group. • 44.1% of patients in lopinavir/ritonavir group had positive RNA test on day 14. • Patients in the arbidol group had a shorter duration of positive RNA test. • No apparent side effects were found in both groups. • Arbidol monotherapy may be superior to lopinavir/ritonavir in treating COVID-19., Lopinavir/ritonavir and arbidol have been previously used to treat acute respiratory syndrome- coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) replication in clinical practice; nevertheless, their effectiveness remains controversial. In this study, we evaluated the antiviral effects and safety of lopinavir/ritonavir and arbidol in patients with the 2019-nCoV disease (COVID-19). Fifty patients with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 were divided into two groups: including lopinavir/ritonavir group (34 cases) and arbidol group (16 cases). Lopinavir/ritonavir group received 400 mg/100mg of Lopinavir/ritonavir, twice a day for a week, while the arbidol group was given 0.2 g arbidol, three times a day. Data from these patients were retrospectively analyzed. The cycle threshold values of open reading frame 1ab and nucleocapsid genes by RT-PCR assay were monitored during antiviral therapy. None of the patients developed severe pneumonia or ARDS. There was no difference in fever duration between the two groups (P=0.61). On day 14 after the admission, no viral load was detected in arbidol group, but the viral load was found in 15(44.1%) patients treated with lopinavir/ritonavir. Patients in the arbidol group had a shorter duration of positive RNA test compared to those in the lopinavir/ritonavir group (P

Introduction: Severe infection is a major risk factor for mortality in patients with liver failure. Multidrug-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae may lead to fatal infection, especially in patients with severe hepatitis. Case Presentation: We describe a 70-year-old Chinese patient with acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF) and multidrug-resistant KPC-producing K. peumoniae V113 isolate infection. The serum total bilirubin (TBIL) level was 308.7 µmol/L at the time of admission, and the international normalized ratio (INR) was 2.56. The serum level of TBIL ascended to 526 µmol/L on the 14th day after admission, and then gradually declined. The INR was maintained above 1.5 for 2 months. Creatinine level significantly increased (from 92.5 to 241 µmol/L) in the first month after admission, while estimated glomerular filtration rate declined to 16.9 mL/min 1.73m2. Diammonium glycyrrhizinate, plasma, as well as albumin were given intravenously. At the time of admission, she had sepsis with symptoms, including fever and shivering, and K. pneumoniae was identified by blood culture test. Biapenem combined with moxifloxacin was shown to be effective, while that could not eliminate the bacteria. Fever and shivering re-occurred, and repeated drug susceptibility tests confirmed the same multidrug-resistant K. pneumoniae isolate without extended-spectrum β-lactamases. Combination treatment of meropenem and ertapenem resulted in a positive clinical outcome without deterioration of liver function. Furthermore, single-molecule real-time (SMRT) sequencing identified 3 genes (blaPKC, blaTXM, and catA2) on the plasmid and 3 genes (blaSHV2, catB3, and arnA) on the chromosome. Moreover, 10 multidrug resistance efflux pump genes and 2 fosmidomycin efflux pump genes were found on the chromosome. Conclusions: Meropenem combined with ertapenem might be used for treating patients with ACLF and multi-drug resistant K. pneumoniae V113 isolate infection.

Tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (TDF) is a potent nucleotide analogue with high barrier to resistance, which is recommended for multi-drug resistant hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. However, nephrotoxicity has been reported during TDF treatment, and tenofovir alafenamide (TAF), which has comparable efficacy to TDF and improves bone and renal safety, can be used as a replacement strategy. Herein, we describe a clinical case concerning a 60-year-old individual suffering liver cirrhosis and renal dysfunction, and being infected with multidrug-resistant HBV. When failing treatment with TDF, he received TAF as a rescue therapy. TAF effectively inhibited HBV replication without worsening renal function or serum phosphorus abnormality. Furthermore, hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) occurred during TAF treatment despite controlling the viral load. The risk of HCC could not be eliminated and should be monitored during TAF treatment.

The gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase-to-platelet ratio (GPR) is a new noninvasive marker for assessing liver fibrosis. We aimed to evaluate the performance of GPR for prediction of 90-day mortality in patients with acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF).A total of 355 patients with HBV-associated ACLF were enrolled from two clinical centers and divided into training group (n=210) and validation group (n=145). Potential risk factors for 90-day mortality were analyzed.Age, MELD score and GPR were independent risk factors associated with ACLF prognosis. A new scoring system (MELD-GPR) was developed. MELD-GPR=9.211-0.029×age-0.290×MELD-0.460×GPR. For ACLF patients with liver cirrhosis, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) of MELD-GPR was 0.788, which was significantly higher than that of MELD and MELD-Na (0.706 and 0.666, respectively). Patients were stratified into three groups according to MELD-GPR scores (high risk:-0.19, intermediate risk: -0.19-0.95, and low risk:0.95), and the high-risk group (MELD-GPR-0.19) had a poor prognosis (P0.01). For ACLF patients without liver cirrhosis, MELD-GPR0.95 predicted a poor prognosis.Incorporating GPR into MELD may provide more accurate survival prediction in patients with HBV-ACLF.

Acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF) is a syndrome with a high rate of short-term mortality, and clinically it is important to identify patients at high risk of mortality. The present study evaluated the value of osteopontin (OPN) in the prediction of 90-day mortality in patients with ACLF. A total of 54 patients with HBV-associated ACLF were enrolled, and serum OPN levels were determined in a prospective, observational study design. Survival analysis was performed using Kaplan-Meier curves, and multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression was used to analyze independent risk factors of mortality. Serum OPN was significantly higher in HBV-ACLF patients compared with patients with chronic hepatitis B and healthy controls (both P9,043 ng/ml), for which the 90-day mortality rates were 27.78 (5/18), 52.94 (9/17) and 73.68% (14/19), respectively, and those in the high risk had a poorer prognosis compared with the low risk group (P=0.009). In conclusion, serum OPN may be an independent risk factor associated with HBV-ACLF prognosis.

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) swarm technology has been a hot topic. The concept of swarm comes from nature, such as the cooperation of bee colony or ant colony, so the research of swarm intelligence (SI) optimization algorithm inspired by swarm activities in nature is beneficial to the development of swarm UAVs technology. The characteristics and principles of eleven SI algorithms are described and analyzed in the paper. The article also analyzed how to combine SI and multi-UAV task assignments. Furthermore, the prospects for development of the SI are discussed.

Probability hypothesis density (PHD) filter has received extensive attention because of its good performance in target tracking. Considering engineering practicability and traditional PHD filter implementation, several commonly adaptive PHD algorithms for newborn target intensity have been presented and analyzed in this paper. The comparative analysis including two categories filters and both of them are used for adapting newborn target intensity: measurement-driven extended PHD filter under sequential Monte Carlo (SMC) framework and measurement-gate partition based PHD filter under Gaussian mixture (GM) framework. The performance of different algorithms is verified from the aspects of state estimation precision, target number estimation and simulation time, which provides technical support for engineering applications.

Inspired by recent successful deep learning methods, this paper presents a new approach for polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (PolSAR) image classification. It combines both advantages of pixel-based and object-based methods. An improved simple linear iterative clustering (SLIC) superpixel segmentation algorithm is used to obtain spatial information in the PolSAR image. Then, a Deep Belief Network (DBN) is introduced to make full use of the limited training data sets, which is trained in an unsupervised manner to extract high-level features from the unlabeled pixels. The DBN's preliminary classification results are finally refined according to the spatial information contained in superpixels. Experimental results over real PolSAR data show that the proposed approach is more efficient with less training data and higher classification accuracy compared with the conventional manners.

Backgroud: Autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (ASCT) is widely recommended for relapsed or refractory lymphoma as an important second-line salvage therapy. Post-transplant relapse is a main issue due to its lacking of the graft versus tumor effects with routine ASCT. Hereby we present a novel hybrid transplantation with autologous stem cells and matched unrelated cord blood cells for relapsed or refractory lymphoma. Method A total of 37 patients with relapsed or refractory lymphoma were enrolled from July 2013 to May 30, 2019 in the West China Hospital of Sichuan University. The autologous peripheral blood stem cells were collected and freezed. HLA matched cord blood cells were searched and provided by the Sichuan Cord Blood Bank. Autologous peripheral blood stem cell transplantation (APBSCT) were infused at day 0 and the selected cord blood cells were infused at day+1 with standard BEAM conditioning regimen. Result The gender distribution was 51.4% female and 48.6% male.The Median age was 37 years old (16-65 years old). The disease characteristics: relapsed or refractory HL 14 cases, relapsed or refractory DLBCL 9 cases, relapsed Burkitt lymphoma 1 case, HGBL with DHL 1 case, DEL 4 cases, Nos 2 cases, DLBCL with high IPI 3 cases. Advanced nasal NK/T cell lymphoma 2 cases, relapdsed EBV-LPD 1 case. The median number of CD34*106/kg for ASCT was 2.35 (1.32-4.58). The median number of total nucleated cord blood cells was 10.2*108 (6.13-17.9) and the CD34+ cord blood cells was 2.72*106 (1.08-5.2). HLA-identical related donor (6/6) was 10.81%, one-antigen-mismatched (5/6) was 72.98%, two-antigen-mismatched (4/6) was 16.21%. All patients were transplanted succesfully with neutrophil recovery of 11days (8-29) and platelet recovery of 14 days (10-120). An early transplanted syndrom with rash or fever were observed in 7 pts (18.9%), while a delayed neutropenia were observed in 5 pts (13.5%). All symptoms were relieved with prednisone therapy. 2 out of 10 pts examined showed sign of microchimerism at 1 month post transplant. With a median 28 months of follow-up (2-73 months), our hybrid transplantation for R/R lymphoma showed that the relapse-free surviaval (RFS) is 90.4% ,and the overall survival (OS) is 86.4%, which is improved remarkablly. The overall OS and RFS were significant different between complete remission (CR) and Non-CR before transplantation (p= 0.002 for OS; p= 0.015 for RFS), but there was no significant difference in the subgroups of HL and NHL. Conclusion This preliminary pilot study suggested that the hybrid stem cell transplantation with autologous stem cells and matched cord blood stem cells is effective and safe for the treatment of high risk lymphoma with limited controlable immuno reactions. Disclosures Zhang: the National Natural Science Foundation of China: Research Funding.

Supplemental Digital Content is available in the text, To date, a small number of studies concerning the effects and safety of tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (TDF) in Chinese individuals were conducted. In this study, we aimed to assess the antiviral effects and nephrotoxicity of TDF in Chinese patients with chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. Patients with chronic HBV infection were prospectively recruited and TDF treatment was given for 96 weeks. HBV serologic markers, HBV DNA, creatinine and phosphorus were collected. Fifty-seven treatment-naïve and 48 treatment-experienced patients were recruited. Irrespective of the prior treatment history, more than 95% of patients achieved virological response during 96 weeks treatment with TDF. Estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) significantly declined in the first year of treatment in patients with chronic hepatitis B or younger age ( .05). For patients who were treatment-naïve or treated previously with adefovir dipivoxil, eGFR declined at the 48th week; however, eGFR was partially recovered at the 96th week. Furthermore, multivariable analysis showed that basal eGFR

New viral disease such as SARS and H1N1 highlighted the vulnerability of healthcare workers to aerosol-transmitted viral infections. This paper was to assess the protection performance of different level personal respiratory protection equipments against viral aerosol. Surgical masks, N95 masks and N99 masks were purchased from the market. The masks were sealed onto the manikin in the aerosol testing chamber. Viral aerosol was generated and then sampled simultaneously before and after the tested mask using biosamplers. This allows a percentage efficiency value to be calculated against test phage SM702 aerosols which surrogates of viral pathogens aerosol. At the same time, the masks face fit factor was determined by TSI8020. The viral aerosol particles aerodynamic diameter was 0.744 μm, and GSD was 1.29. The protection performance of the material of all the tested masks against viral aerosol was all >95 %. All the five surgical masks face fit factor were 160. G model N95 mask face fit factor was 8.2. The protection performances of N95 or N99 masks were many times higher than surgical mask when considering the face fit factor. Surgical masks cannot offer sufficient protection against the inhalation of viral aerosol because they cannot provide a close face seal.

This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of aerosol generation, methods of sampling, storage conditions, and relative humidity on the culturability of the mycobacteriophage D29. The lytic phage D29 can kill Mycobacterium tuberculosis , and the phage aerosol can be treated as a potential tool for tuberculosis treatment. The culturability of D29 was tested using a test chamber designed for the bioaerosols research against three spray liquids (deionized water, phosphate-buffered saline [PBS], and normal saline), four collection media (suspension medium [SM], nutrient broth, PBS, and deionized water), two sampling systems (the all-glass impinger AGI-30 and the Biosampler) and across a range of humidities (20 to 90%). The effect of storage conditions on the culturability of collected sample was also evaluated for the AGI-30 impinger. The results proved that viable phage D29 particles generated by deionized water were approximately 30- and 300-fold higher than PBS and normal saline, respectively. As collection media, SM buffer and nutrient broth were observed to yield a higher number of plaques compared to PBS and deionized water. No difference was observed in collection efficiency between AGI-30 and Biosampler with two detection methods (culture-based technique and real-time PCR). The culturability of collected D29 in SM buffer or nutrient broth can be maintained up to 12 h irrespective of storage temperature. Relative humidity was found to strongly influence airborne D29 culturability which is 2- to 20-fold higher in low humidity (25%) than medium (55%) or high (85%) humidity. This research will help identify the optimal means for the application of D29 aerosol in animal inhalation experiments.

Hospital-based outbreaks of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) have once again highlighted the vulnerability of healthcare workers (HCWs). Use of personal respiratory protective equipment was the main method used by HCWs to avoid nosocomial transmission. This paper describes the technology used to evaluate the filtration efficiency of the half-face medical protection mask (N99), manufactured by Firmshield Biotechnology, against viral aerosol. Viral aerosol was generated and then sampled simultaneously with and without the test mask. This enables a percentage efficiency value to be calculated against test phage f2 aerosols (surrogates of viral pathogen aerosols). At the same time the mask filtration efficiency against NaCl particle aerosol was determined by use of TSI8130 equipment and face-fit factor was tested by use of TSI8020 equipment. The half-face medical protection mask (N99) evaluated by use of the viral aerosol had a filtration efficiency >99%. The mask filtration efficiency against NaCl particle aerosol was 99.634 ± 0.024% and it had a good face-fit factor. This half-face medical protection mask (N99) can protect the wearer from viral aerosol disease transmission. The test method can be used to assess filtration efficacy against viral aerosol of masks used for respiratory protection.

The present study focuses on the effects of three different sampling solutions, namely distilled water, phosphatic buffer solution, and suspension medium (SM), adding antifoam or not, on the survival probability of several different bacteriophages (EcP1,PhiX174,SM702, and F2) as surrogates for the mammalian viruses in the bubbling process. AGI-10 impinger was used as the representative for all the impingers which would bubble during operation. It was found that the survival probability of the same bacteriophage bubbling with different sampling solutions was different except that there was no significant difference observed for the bacteriophage F2. The use of SM as the collection fluid was relative to a high survival probability for the four bacteriophages. And the endurance or resistance of different kinds of bacteriophages in the same sampling solution was different. We conclude that SM is a promising sampling solution for liquid impingers in the process of sampling phages.

PCR quantification is regarded as one of the most promising techniques for real-time identification of bio-aerosols. We have, therefore, validated a QPCR assay for quantification of a viral aerosol sample using the double-stranded DNA-binding dye SYBR green I, an economical alternative for quantification of target microorganisms. To achieve this objective we used mycobacteriophage D29 as model organism. Phage D29 aerosol was produced in an aerosol cabinet and then collected by use of an AGI liquid sampler. A standard curve was created by use of purified genomic DNA from the phage in liquid culture of known concentration measured by titration. To prevent false-positive results caused by formation of primer–dimers, an additional data-acquisition step was added to the three-step QPCR procedure; the new technique was called four-step QPCR. The standard curve was then used to quantify the total amount of phage D29 in liquid culture and aerosol samples. For liquid culture samples there was no significant difference (P > 0.05) between results from quantification of the virus using double-agar culture and QPCR. For aerosol samples, however, the result determined by the QPCR method was significantly (P

The present paper reviews our studies on transmission routes and prophylactic measures of Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome (HFRS), including aerosol inhalation, skin injury/mucosa, insect vectors, peroral infection and vertical transmission. The results show that HFRS is transmitted by Hantaan virus via multi-routes. One of them, the aerosol transmission, is perhaps the main route transmitting HFRS from mouse to human beings. The injury and mucosa is the main transmission route from mouse to mouse and also an important agent from mouse to human beings. The peroral infection may occur in very serious pollution of foods. The insect vectors may play an important role in the focus of HFRS and in the transmission of HFRS from mouse to human. The epidemiological significance of vertical transmission is yet uncertain. According to the results, four proposals should be emphasized including killing insects and mice, long lasting and combined prophylactics, intensive studies on prophylactic measures on viral aerosols and the blocking of transmission of HFRS from mouse to human via aerosols.

Sensitive high-resolution ion microprobe (SHRIMP) sulfur isotope data show that pyrrhotite, pyrite, galena and chalcopyrite in syntectonic auriferous quartz veins at the Hill End goldfield are characterized by two populations, with δ34Sfluid-values of ∼ +7 and ∼0%. These two populations are accounted for by fluid mixing involving two sources of sulfur during evolution of the vein systems. A local sulfur source and reduced fluids derived from trough-fill Siluro-Devonian sedimentary and volcano-sedimentary sequences are responsible for the first two gold-bearing events, whereas a more oxidized fluid and a sulfur source from turbidites and volcanics in deeper parts of the crustal sequences appear responsible for gold deposition late in the second gold-forming event and are the dominant influences in the final gold-forming stage. For fine-grained mixtures, where mineral separation is difficult, the SHRIMP analyses are particularly useful for tracing detailed δ34S variations of sulfides precipitated in different paragenetic stages.

To isolate the bacteriophage of Serratia marcescens (8039) from sewage, and to study on its biological characteristics.We used Serratia marcescens (8039) as the host to isolate phage from raw sewage from the Sewage Treatment Center of Hospital. Phage SM701 was examined in electron microscope. The genome of SM701 was extracted and the size of its nucleic acid was identified with restriction enzyme analysis. Phage isolated was subjected to plaque forming unit (PFU) assay using double layer agar medium plate method and morphological properties of plaque was observed, and finally optimal MOI multiplicity of infection and one-step growth experiments were carried out.Phage SM701 specific to Serratia marcescens (8039) was isolated successfully from the raw sewage. SM701 had an isometric polyhedral head (about 64 nm in diameter) and a long noncontractile tail (about 143 nm long). The nucleic acid could be cut off by dsDNA restriction enzyme BamH I or HindIII and its complete size was about 57kb. The plaque of SM701 was transparent about 1mm in diameter at the 12th hour. When MOI equaled 10, the number of phage offspring was higher. One-stepgrowth kinetics was determined according to the results of one-step growth experiment, which showed that the latent period was about 30 min, the rise period was about 100 min, and the average bust size was about 63 pfu/cell.Phage SM701 belonged to tailed family: siphoviridae and lytic bacteriophage. It was quite easy to observe and count the plaques due to existing color differences between lytic and nonlytic zone.

Introduction: Non-ablative regimens have been shown to be effective and less toxic than traditional ablative regimens, but they usually need close monitoring and skillful manipulates e.g. donor lymphocyte infusions. In the present study, we used a novel reduced intensity regimen with melphanlan, lomustine and cyclophosphamide to treat patients with chronic myelocytic leukemia and made a long term follow-up. Methods: 14 patients with median age of 35(23~52) were treated with MCC regimen(Melphanlan 170 mg/m2/d×1, Lomustine 400 mg/m2/d×1, Cyclophosphamide 60 mg/kg/d×2) and the median follow-up time is 6 years; another 16 patients with median age of 33(16~44) were treated with BuCy regimen(Busulfan 4 mg/kg/d×4, Cyclophosphamide 60 mg/kg/d×2) and the median follow-up time is 4 years. Results: All the patients were engrafted successfully and the platelet recovery to 20×109/L was earlier at median 3 days in patients with MCC regimen. 4 of 10 patients examined in MCC group showed mixed chimerism at day 100 post transplant, whereas only 1 of 12 patients examined in BuCy group showed mixed chimerism. All the patients became complete donor sources later without any DLI. The regimen related toxicity was relatively lower in MCC group, especially the incidence and severity of mucositis and liver dysfunction were decreased significantly. The median duration of hospitalization was 39 days (25~55)for patients with MCC regimen, and 55 days (39~90) for BuCy regimen. The 5 year disease-free survival was 71.4% for MCC group and 62.5% for BuCy group, respectively. The transplant related mortality and relapse rate were 21% and 7% for MCC regimen, whereas 25% and 12% for BuCy regimen. Conclusions: MCC regimen is an effective and less toxic conditioning regimen and the long term disease-free survival is as the same as that of BuCy regimen. Considering the cost-effect efficacy, MCC regimen may have some prominent advantages over BuCy regimen. Figure Figure