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A polysaccharide isolated from the radix of Astragalus membranaceus, called PG2, used in traditional Chinese medicine, with potential hematopoiesis inducing and immunomodulation activities. PG2 extracted from A. membranaceus has been demonstrated as a novel alternative medicine for cancer patients. Recently, we demonstrated that PG2 enhanced chemotherapy through bystander effect and reduced the expression of indoleamine 2, 3-dioxygenase 1 in tumor cells. Many tumors have been proven to have a high expression of programmed cell death protein ligand-1 (PD-L1), which binds with programmed cell death protein-1(PD-1) in immune cells, thus causing immune tolerance within the tumor microenvironment. With decreased expression of PD-L1, increased immune response can be observed, which might be helpful when developing tumor immunotherapy. The antitumor therapeutic effect mediated by PG2 may associate with an inflammatory immune response at the tumor site. However, the molecular mechanism that by which PG2 inhibits PD-L1 is still incompletely known. The expression of PD-L1 was decreased after tumor cells were treated with PG2. In addition, the cell signaling pathway in tumor cells was evaluated by Western blotting analysis after PG2 treatment. PG2 can downregulate the expression of PD-L1 on the cell surface via the protein kinase B (Akt)/mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR)/ribosomal protein S6 kinase beta-1 (p70S6K) pathway. In conclusion, our results indicate that PG2 inhibits PD-L1 expression and plays a crucial role in immunotherapy, which might be a promising strategy combined with other treatments.

Atomic-force microscopic images, x-ray diffraction patterns, Urbach energies and photoluminescence quenching experiments show that the interfacial contact quality between the hydrophobic [6,6]-phenyl-C

The averaged power conversion efficiency of polyelectrolytes (P3CT-Na) based MAPbI

A polysaccharide isolated from the radix of Astragalus membranaceus, called PG2, used in traditional Chinese medicine, with potential hematopoiesis inducing and immunomodulation activities. PG2 extracted from A. membranaceus has been demonstrated as a novel alternative medicine for cancer patients. Recently, we demonstrated that PG2 enhanced chemotherapy through bystander effect and reduced the expression of indoleamine 2, 3-dioxygenase 1 in tumor cells. Many tumors have been proven to have a high expression of programmed cell death protein ligand-1 (PD-L1), which binds with programmed cell death protein-1(PD-1) in immune cells, thus causing immune tolerance within the tumor microenvironment. With decreased expression of PD-L1, increased immune response can be observed, which might be helpful when developing tumor immunotherapy. The antitumor therapeutic effect mediated by PG2 may associate with an inflammatory immune response at the tumor site. However, the molecular mechanism that by which PG2 inhibits PD-L1 is still incompletely known. The expression of PD-L1 was decreased after tumor cells were treated with PG2. In addition, the cell signaling pathway in tumor cells was evaluated by Western blotting analysis after PG2 treatment. PG2 can downregulate the expression of PD-L1 on the cell surface via the protein kinase B (Akt)/mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR)/ribosomal protein S6 kinase beta-1 (p70S6K) pathway. In conclusion, our results indicate that PG2 inhibits PD-L1 expression and plays a crucial role in immunotherapy, which might be a promising strategy combined with other treatments.

Transmittance spectra, atomic-force microscopic images, energy-dispersive X-ray spectra and droplet contact angle images show that a facile wet etching process can be used to manipulate the thickness, surface roughness, surface chemical composition and surface wettability of the indium-tin oxide (ITO) thin films, which influences the molecular packing structure of the P3CT-Na thin films and thereby dominating the crystal quality of the CH3NH3PbI3 (MAPbI3) thin films. The power conversion efficiency (PCE) of the P3CT-Na based MAPbI3 solar cells can be improved from 17.02% to 19.35% by increasing the Sn/In concentration ratio of the ITO thin films from 0.36 to 0.47 with a facile wet etching process at a constant temperature of 40 °C. It is noted that the PCE of the optimal solar cell decreases slowly toward a stable PCE of 16% for more than 60 days under moderate environment conditions (55 ± 10 RH%).

Atomic-force microscopic images, x-ray diffraction patterns, Urbach energies and photoluminescence quenching experiments show that the interfacial contact quality between the hydrophobic [6,6]-phenyl-C61-buttric acid methyl ester (PCBM) thin film and hydrophilic CH3NH3PbI3(MAPbI3) thin film can be effectively improved by using a binary antisolvent mixture (toluene:dichloromethane or chlorobenzene:dichloromethane) in the anti-solvent mixture-mediated nucleation process, which increases the averaged power conversion efficiency of the resultant PEDOT:PSS (P3CT-Na) thin film based MAPbI3solar cells from 13.18% (18.52%) to 13.80% (19.55%). Beside, the use of 10% dichloromethane (DCM) in the binary antisolvent mixture results in a nano-textured MAPbI3thin film with multicrystalline micrometer-sized grains and thereby increasing the short-circuit current density and fill factor (FF) of the resultant solar cells. It is noted that a remarkable FF of 80.33% is achieved, which can be used to explain the stable photovoltaic performance without additional encapsulations.

The averaged power conversion efficiency of polyelectrolytes (P3CT-Na) based MAPbI3 solar cells can be increased from 14.94% to 17.46% with a wetting method before the spin-coating process of MAPbI3 precursor solutions. The effects of the wetting process on the surface, structural, optical and excitonic properties of MAPbI3 thin films are investigated by using the atomic-force microscopic images, x-ray diffraction patterns, transmittance spectra, photoluminescence spectra and Raman scattering spectra. The experimental results show that the wetting process of MAPbI3 precursor solution on top of the P3CT-Na/ITO/glass substrate can be used to manipulate the molecular packing structure of the P3CT-Na thin film, which determines the formation of MAPbI3 thin films.

This research considers the purpose of promoting research and development efficiency, and then establishes a management mechanism of enhancing product design quality. Based on a four-level design data expression, several “forward correlation matrices” can be constructed to represent the corresponding relationships between each level. Through the establishment of the correlation matrices between the various levels, we may trace the component relationship (i.e. the design parameter DP) that occurs in the product from the product's failure in appearance (Failure Mode, FM). After that, we can further explore the correspondence between FMs and other levels of product data, which we name it as “inverse correlation matrix analysis”. Therefore, it is helpful to systematically and quickly obtain the cause-and-effect relations among the appearance defects, the design requirements and engineering parameters, and which may help realize the critical and underlying key factors in order to better control the quality characteristics of the product design.

Additional file 2: Supplementary Information.

This paper proposes a lossless to lossy compression scheme for hyperspectral images based on dual-tree Binary Embedded Zerotree Wavelet (BEZW) algorithm. The algorithm adapts Karhunen-Loeve Transform and Discrete Wavelet Transform to achieve 3-D integer reversible hybrid transform and decorrelate spectral and spatial data. Since statistics of the hyperspectral image are not symmetrical, the asymmetrical dual-tree structure is introduced. The 3-D BEZW algorithm compresses hyperspectral images by implementing progressive bitplane coding. The lossless and lossy compression performance is compared with other state-of-the-art predictive coding and transform-based coding algorithms on Airborne Visible/Infrared Imaging Spectrometer images. Results show that the 3-D-BEZW lossless compression performance is comparable with the best predictive algorithms, while its computational cost is comparable with those of transform-based algorithms.

The paper describes an efficient lossy and lossless three dimensional (3D) image compression of hyperspectral images. The method adopts the 3D spatial-spectral hybrid transform and the proposed transform-based coder. The hybrid transforms are that Karhunen-Loeve Transform (KLT) which decorrelates spectral data of a hyperspectral image, and the integer Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) which is applied to the spatial data and produces decorrelated wavelet coefficients. Our simpler transform-based coder is inspired by Shapiro’s EZW algorithm, but encodes residual values and only implements dominant pass incorporating six symbols. The proposed method will be examined on AVIRIS images and evaluated using compression ratio for both lossless and lossy compression, and signal to noise ratio (SNR) for lossy compression. Experimental results show that the proposed image compression not only is more efficient but also has better compression ratio.

These precision instruments and equipments install inside the high-tech factory buildings have highly tendency of sensitiveness to ambient vibration; therefore, the criteria of ambient vibration have extremely strict requirements in relatively. For comply ambient vibration to have in accordance with the vibration standards, access the principle of increasing the product defect-free rate, the most common solution is applied by enhance the strength of its earth ground base. Nowadays the foundation base design of high-tech factory buildings is not like Seismic Design can be calculated by formulas and acquired the advance ambient vibration results from the software simulations; hence after the finalization of the factory building construction, it is necessary to have in-filed detection with inspection to makeup these improvements. As a matter of fact the weak signal can be hardly detected, so it reply on specific sensor to transform the signal into low current or low voltage then use an amplifier to magnify its amplitude; in the meanwhile, it not only enlarge the required signal but also the unnecessary noise in the whole process. This study apply Ensemble Empirical Mode Decomposition (EEMD) method to analyze the original signal, and the mean period of the Intrinsic Mode Function (IMF) derived partial components to proceed Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) transformation in order to get partial signal frequency; hereafter apply the white noise to substitute the first signal then reorganized it as the source of ambient vibration signal, a comparison is being made between the background vibration value of its actual measurement and the earth ground base response of its real measurement value. It anticipates having control the influential value of ambient vibration of the construction under the phase when design the factory building in order to elevate the reliable degree of foundation construction design in the future.

Carbon films are deposited on silica glass fibers by thermal chemical vapor deposition using pure methane as the precursor gas, and the individual effect of coating thicknesses and deposition temperatures on Raman spectra of carbon films is investigated. The results show that if the temperature is fixed at 950°C, the D peak position, the full‐width‐at‐half maximum of D band, and the integrated intensity ratio of the D band to the G band increase with increasing the coating thickness. This is because the size and number of particles grown on the carbon film surface increase with increasing the coating thickness and the carbon film becomes more disordered. Alternatively, if the coating thickness is fixed at 1200 nm, the D peak position, the full‐width‐at‐half maximum of D band, and the integrated intensity ratio of the D band to the G band decrease with increasing the deposition temperature. This indicates that the carbon film becomes more ordered and its nano‐grain size increases as the deposition...

The effects of deposition temperature on the properties of hermetically carbon-coated optical fibers are investigated. Hermetically carbon-coated optical fibers are prepared by thermal chemical vapor deposition using methane as the precursor gas. The deposition temperatures are 900, 925, 950, 975 and 1000 °C. The deposition rate, microstructure, electrical resistivity and Young's modulus of the carbon films are measured. The water-repellency and low-temperature surface morphology of carbon-coated optical fibers are elucidated. The results indicate that the deposition rate and electrical resistivity of the carbon films increase with the deposition temperature, while the degree of ordering, the nano-crystallite size and the Young's modulus of the carbon film decrease. Additionally, the water-repellency and low-temperature surface morphology of the carbon films show that the carbon film that is deposited at a temperature of 950 °C is the best for use in hermetical optical fiber coating.

In this paper, a lossless to lossy transform based image compression of hyperspectral images based on Integer Karhunen-Loeve Transform (IKLT) and Integer Discrete Wavelet Transform (IDWT) is proposed. Integer transforms are used to accomplish reversibility. The IKLT is used as a spectral decorrelator and the 2D-IDWT is used as a spatial decorrelator. The three-dimensional Binary Embedded Zerotree Wavelet (3D-BEZW) algorithm efficiently encodes hyperspectral volumetric image by implementing progressive bitplane coding. The signs and magnitudes of transform coefficients are encoded separately. Lossy and lossless compressions of signs are implemented by conventional EZW algorithm and arithmetic coding respectively. The efficient 3D-BEZW algorithm is applied to code magnitudes. Further compression can be achieved using arithmetic coding. The lossless and lossy compression performance is compared with other state of the art predictive and transform based image compression methods on Airborne Visible/Infrared Imaging Spectrometer (AVIRIS) images. Results show that the 3D-BEZW performance is comparable to predictive algorithms. However, its computational cost is comparable to transform- based algorithms.

This paper presents a transform based lossless compression for hyperspectral images which is inspired by Shapiro (1993)’s EZW algorithm. The proposed compression method uses a hybrid transform which includes an integer Karhunrn-Loeve transform (KLT) and integer discrete wavelet transform (DWT). The integer KLT is employed to eliminate the presence of correlations among the bands of the hyperspectral image. The integer 2D discrete wavelet transform (DWT) is applied to eliminate the correlations in the spatial dimensions and produce wavelet coefficients. These coefficients are then coded by a proposed binary EZW algorithm. The binary EZW eliminates the subordinate pass of conventional EZW by coding residual values, and produces binary sequences. The binary EZW algorithm combines the merits of well-known EZW and SPIHT algorithms, and it is computationally simpler for lossless compression. The proposed method was applied to AVIRIS images and compared to other state-of-the-art image compression techniques. The results show that the proposed lossless image compression is more efficient and it also has higher compression ratio than other algorithms.

Objective : To assess the current patterns of HIV transmission in Los Angeles County and determine if AIDS surveillance data accurately reflect these patterns. Design : Records-based cohort study. Methods : The demographic and HIV risk characteristics of persons considered to be recently infected with HIV (CD4+ count >700x10 6 /l) were determined and compared with the characteristics of persons meeting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) 1993 AIDS case definition. Data were obtained for patients with HIV infection enrolled from four HIV outpatient clinics and analyzed between August 1991 and July 1993. Results : The patient cohort included 1857 persons with HIV infection ; 1096(59.1%) met the CDC 1993 AIDS case definition and 134 (7.2%) had a CD4+ lymphocyte count > 700 x 10 6 /1. The median CD4+ count for the group presumed to be recently infected was 809x10 6 /l. Persons considered recently infected with HIV were more likely than those meeting the AIDS case definition to be female (26.1 and 14.5%, respectively ; P

Thromboxane B2 may be a mediator of neonatal persistent pulmonary hypertension. Elevated levels of plasma thromboxane and prostacyclin have been described previously in hypoxic newborn infants with neonatal pulmonary hypertension. We measured serial plasma levels of thromboxane B2 and 6-keto-prostaglandin F1α (stable metabolite of prostacyclin) in 21 newborn infants with severe respiratory failure and pulmonary hypertension who required extracorporeal membrane oxygenation support. We sought to study (1) the evolution of plasma prostanoids in pulmonary hypertensive infants treated with extracorporeal membrane oxygenation and (2) whether different pulmonary hypertensive diagnostic subgroups have distinctive prostanoid profiles. Our data indicated that infants with meconium aspiration had significantly lower levels of plasma thromboxane B2 and 6-keto-prostaglandin F1α while receiving extracorporeal membrane oxygenation than did infants with persistent pulmonary hypertension but no meconium aspiration. Levels of all infants decreased progressively as extracorporeal membrane oxygenation support continued.

This paper describes a non-linear IR (infra-red) scene prediction method for range video surveillance and navigation. A Gabor-filter bank is selected as a primary detector for any changes in a given IR range image sequence. The detected ROI (region of interest) involving arbitrary motion is fed to a non-linear Kalman filter for predicting the next scene in time-varying 3D IR video. Potential applications of this research are mainly in indoor/outdoor heat-change based range measurement, synthetic IR scene generation, rescue missions, and autonomous navigation. Experimental results reported herein show that non-linear Kalman filtering-based scene prediction can perform more accurately than linear estimation of future frames in range and intensity driven sensing. The low least mean square error (LMSE), on the average of about 2% using a bank of 8 Gabor filters, also proves the reliability of the IR scene estimator (or predictor) developed in this work.

Objective: To assess the factors that increase or decrease the risk of pneumonia with particular attention to immunization with pneumococcal and influenza vaccines in a group of HIV-infected persons. Design: A retrospective, case-control study based on information entered into a standard database and the medical record. Setting: Patients attending a referral clinic specializing in AIDS/HIV care at a public hospital. Patients: Among over 2000 subjects entered into a database in 8 years, 127 incidents of pneumonia were identified from the record. These cases were matched with 127 CD4 cell count matched, concurrent controls. Interventions: None. Main outcome measure: The principal hypothesis was that chart review would find a decreased frequency of pneumococcal immunization in the pneumonia cases compared with matched controls. Results: Pneumococcal immunization was associated with a reduction of the risk of pneumonia by nearly 70%. The effect was seen even when immunization was given with a CD4 cell count of less than 100/mm3. Injection drug users and African-Americans had a twofold increased risk of pneumonia. Conclusion: The study provides data to support the current recommendation for pneumococcal immunization of all HIV-infected persons. Although this conclusion could lead to renewed enthusiasm for increasing pneumococcal immunization rates in HIV-infected persons, it must be recognized that the study is observational and ascertainment bias cannot be excluded.

Growth of conical particles in carbon films deposited on silica glass fibers prepared by thermal chemical vapor deposition is investigated. The results show that the size and number of conical particles on the silica glass fiber increase with the film thickness and deposition temperature, but this effect is reduced when the carbon films are deposited on silica glass plates. The growth of conical particles on the silica glass fiber is mainly due to the small cross-sectional area of the fibers. These conical particles are against the hermetic property of carbon-coated optical fibers. We propose a method to minimize conical particles in carbon films on silica glass fibers.