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PurposeThis study examines whether Confucian culture can promote enterprise total factor productivity (TFP), and it also studies how transmission mechanism works on enterprise TFP.Design/methodology/approachBased on the data of A-share listed companies on Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets from 2008 to 2019, this study measures the influence of Confucian culture on enterprise TFP by the number of Confucian academies and Confucian temples within three radius ranges of a company's registered address.FindingsThe empirical results show that Confucian culture has a positive effect on the enterprise TFP. The transmission mechanism test shows that Confucian culture can promote the TFP of Chinese enterprises through reducing agency cost, improving agency efficiency and enhancing innovation.Practical implicationsThe findings in this study provide implications for policymakers, scholars and enterprises. The results show that Confucian culture can enhance the TFP of Chinese enterprises. Especially in emerging markets including China, the Confucian culture, as an informal institution, can effectively complement formal institutions, promoting enterprise TFP.Originality/valueThis study expands the literature on Confucian culture in two aspects: the influence of Confucian culture on TFP and its transmission mechanism. To the authors' knowledge, this is the first study to identify a link between Confucian culture and enterprise TFP.

Undifferentiated embryonal sarcoma of the liver (UESL) is a rare and aggressive mesenchymal tumor in children. Herein, we describe our experience in neoadjuvant therapy (NAT) and subsequent surgery for the treatment of UESL in children.To evaluate the efficacy of NAT and explore a new choice for successful operation of UESL in children.We retrospectively analyzed six patients newly diagnosed with unresectable UESL who received NAT and then surgery at our center between January 2004 and December 2019. The tumor was considered unresectable if it involved a large part of both lobes of the liver or had invaded the main hepatic vessels or inferior vena cava. The NAT included preoperative transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (TACE) and systemic chemotherapy. The patients were 4 boys and 2 girls with a mean age of 7 years. The longest tumor at presentation ranged from 8.6 to 14.8 cm (mean, 12 cm). Extrahepatic metastases were present in 2 cases. Preoperative systemic chemotherapy was administered 3 wk after TACE. Tumor resection was performed 3 wk after one or two cycles of NAT. The patients received systemic chemotherapy after surgery.All patients successfully underwent NAT and complete resection. The tumor volumes decreased by 18.2%-68.7%, with a mean decrease of 36% after 1 cycle of NAT (NAT effectively reduced tumor volume, cleared the tumor margin, and caused massive tumor necrosis. This may be a promising choice for successful surgery of UESL in children.

Amide synthesis is one of the most important transformations in organic chemistry due to the broad application in pharmaceutical drugs and organic materials. In this report, we describe a mild protocol for amide formation using the readily available nitroarenes as nitrogen sources and an inexpensive iron complex as a catalyst. Because of the use of the pH-neutral conditions and the avoidance of the strong oxidant or reductant, a wide range of aromatic and aliphatic aldehydes as well as nitroarenes with various functional groups could be tolerated well. A plausible mechanism is proposed based on the detailed studies, in which iron catalyst initiates the radical process and the solvent plays a key role as O-atom acceptor.

Additional file 6: Table S3. Univariate and multivariate analysis for overall survival duration.

Additional file 5: Table S2. The CR rate of AML with different burdens of IKZF1 mutation.

Additional file 4: Table S1. IKZF1-mutated AML patients in our cohort.

Additional file 9: Table S6. The influence of IKZF1 mutation on AML with different SF3B1-mutated status.

Additional file 8: Table S5. The influence of IKZF1 mutation on AML with different CEBPA-mutated status.

Additional file 7: Table S4. The influence of IKZF1 mutation on AML with different CSF3R-mutated status.

BackgroundThis study aimed to develop a vaccine that targets mutation-derived neoantigen in Chinese non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC).MethodsA cohort of 1862 Chinese NSCLC patients who underwent targeted sequencing with a 1021-gene panel was investigated. HLA typing was done using OptiType v1.0 and neoantigens were predicted by netMHCpan v4.0. HLA LOH was inferred using the lohhla algorithm and TMB were quantified by counting the total number of non-synonymous ones based on our panel data. CIBERSORT was utilized to estimate the TME in different EGFR mutant subtype by using TCGA data.ResultsHLA-A*11:01(42.59%) was the top one allele and HLA-A*33:03(12.94%) ranked 12th. EGFR L858R (22.61%) was the most prevalent gene variant. The binding affinity (IC50 MT = 22.9 nM) and shared frequency (2.93%) of EGFR L858R in combination with HLA-A*33:03 were optimal. In a subsequent further analysis on immunological features of EGFR mutant subtypes, 63.1% HLA loss of heterozygosity LOH (HLA LOH) and 0.37% (7 of 1862) B2M aberrations were found in our population, both had no significant association with EGFR mutant subtypes suggesting that the process of antigen presentation involved HLA LOH and B2M mechanisms in EGFR L858R is working. Tumor mutation burden (TMB) was investigated by utilizing our panel and showed that EGFR L858R had the lowest TMB compared with other EGFR mutant subtypes. In addition, analysis of 22 immune cell types from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) data showed EGFR L858R was correlated with low level of CD8 T cells, activated CD4 memory T cells and elevated level of macrophage M2 suggesting an inhibited tumor microenvironment (TME).ConclusionOur study identified that EGFR L858R neoantigen had the potential to generate cancer vaccines in NSCLC patients with HLA A*33:03. The neoantigen-based vaccines may become an effective salvage regimen for EGFR L858R subgroup after targeted therapy or immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) failure.

We report a general photocatalytic protocol for the remote C(sp3)-H bond amination of free aliphatic alcohols. The electron transfer between the abundant and inexpensive catalyst FeCl3 and simple alkanols under blue LED irradiation enables the alkoxy radical formation under mild redox-neutral conditions, with no need for additional oxidant and prefunctionalization. The subsequent selective 1,5-hydrogen atom transfer (HAT) and amination provide a simple and efficient way to access molecular complexity from readily available and bulk alcohols.

Erosion occurs in many industrial processes which results in economic losses and environmental issues. Having a more confident prediction method has always been the goal of the erosion community. Numerous studies have investigated erosion prediction utilizing Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) and many have obtained seemingly good agreement with experimental data. However, the uncertainties resulting from the grid size on erosion representation has not been investigated thoroughly. In this paper, one-way coupled discrete phase and Eulerian flow models are utilized to examine the effect of cell size on erosion calculated by CFD. It is found that both erosion pattern and magnitude can be easily affected by the grid size. Thus, an appropriate cell size range used to represent local erosion magnitude and the full erosion profile is proposed. The study provides guidelines for engineers to predict erosion in gas pipelines and quantify the uncertainties in a more deterministic fashion.

Qian Huang,1,2,* Lu Meng,1,2,* Huilin Li,2 Ni Xiong,1,2 Lin Zeng,1,2 Gaoxiang Wang,2,3 Pengxiang Zhang,1,2 Hengxia Zhao,2 Deliang Liu2 1The Fourth Clinical Medical College of Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine, Shenzhen, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Endocrinology, Shenzhen Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital, Shenzhen, People’s Republic of China; 3Shenzhen Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital Affiliated to Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Shenzhen, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Deliang Liu, Department of Endocrinology, Shenzhen Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital, 1# Fuhua Road, Futian District, Shenzhen, 518033, People’s Republic of China, Tel +86 13924610289, Fax +86 755-88358328-3319, Email vinson212@163.comPurpose: As a formula of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), Huoxue Jiangtang Decoction (HJD) has positive effects on diabetes mellitus (DM) through improving of the metabolism of glycolipid and the function of β-cell. Hence, this research aims to explore the potential therapeutic effects of HJD on diabetes and reveal its underlying mechanisms.Methods: Diabetic rat models induced by high-fat diet (HFD) and streptozotocin (STZ) were included in this study. Following successful modeling, diabetic rats were treated with HJD, and then its therapeutic effects in eight weeks were evaluated. In addition to biochemical indicators, two-bottle preference tests were carried out to examine the rats’ preferences for fat and sugar, and 16S rRNA gene sequencing was performed to disclose the differences of oral microbiota among groups. Finally, Pearson correlation coefficient was used to explore the correlation between oral microbiota and the preferences for fat and sugar.Results: It was found that HJD significantly improved the levels of fasting blood glucose (FBG), glucose tolerance, and dyslipidemia. Additionally, HJD contributed to decreasing preferences for fat and sugar in diabetic rats, which plays an important role in food intake. Furthermore, HJD regulated the abundance, distribution, and structure of oral microbiota in diabetic rats, serving as one of the underlying mechanisms of its antidiabetic effects.Conclusion: Taken with other formulas, HJD functions to improve the metabolism of glycolipid and the function of β-cell by inhibiting preferences for fat and sugar, as well as regulating the oral microbiota of diabetic rats. Furthermore, a potential correlation between the oral micro-environment and preferences for fat and sugar in STZ-induced diabetic rats is likely to exist.Keywords: Huoxue Jiangtang Decoction, diabetes, preferences for fat/sugar, oral microbiota