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Multiferroic materials have shown significant potential for next generation nanoelectronic and multifunctional devices due to their coexistent order parameters and versatile tunabilities. Nevertheless, the selectivity of the room temperature multiferroics is extremely limited. In this manner, single-phase solid-solution-type multiferroics that are composed by distinct oxides exhibiting either ferroelectricity or ferromagnetism individually have offered an alternative route toward the advancement of room temperature multiferroic systems. In this work, single crystalline lead iron tantalate lead zirconate titanate (PZTFT) thin films have been investigated for broadening the advancement of room temperature solid-solution multiferroics. The PZTFT thin films have been grown by pulsed laser deposition, while the ferroelectric and ferromagnetic properties are revealed by a combination of scanning probe microscopy and synchrotron-based X-ray absorption spectroscopy. Our results have further revealed remarkable fatigue and retention behaviors of PZTFT thin film, suggesting its potent role for practical applications. (Less)

The bridge crossing water way is in the risk of impact by vessel, and thus it is very important to estimate the collision force for the safety of bridge. The impact force between bridge pier and vessel is investigated by numerical simulation and various empirical formulae. The collision response between a 5000t DWT bulk carrier with bulb bow and rigid bridge pier is simulated in the explicit finite element code of ANSYS LS-DYNA. The difference of the impact force between the empirical formulae and FE analysis are discussed. Based on the comparison of the results, the coefficient in the formulae is suggested for obtaining more accurate assessment of impact force.

Background/Introduction Recent clinical trials showed that short aspirin duration (1 or 3 months) in dual antiplatelet therapy (DAPT) followed by P2Y12 inhibitor monotherapy reduced the risk of bleeding and did not increase the ischemic risk compared to 12-month DAPT in acute coronary syndrome (ACS) patients undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). However, it is unclear about the optimal duration of aspirin in P2Y12 inhibitor monotherapy. Purpose The purpose of this study was to evaluate the influence of aspirin treatment duration on clinical outcomes in a cohort of ACS patients intolerant to aspirin with early aspirin interruption and received P2Y12 inhibitor monotherapy. Methods From January 1, 2014 to December 31, 2018, we included 498 ACS patients with aspirin stopped for various reasons before 6 months after PCI and received P2Y12 inhibitor monotherapy. The efficacy and safety between the groups of early (≤1 month) and late discontinuation (>1 month) of aspirin were compared in 12-month follow up after PCI. To adjust for potential confounding due to baseline imbalances in study covariates while preserving sample size, we used the inverse probability of treatment weights (IPTW) method based on the propensity score. Results The mean duration of aspirin treatment was 7.52±8.10 days in the early and 98.05±56.70 days in the late discontinuation group (p Conclusion The risk of major adverse cardiac events was similar between those with aspirin treatment >1 month versus ≤1 month in ACS patients undergoing PCI who cannot tolerate aspirin and received P2Y12 inhibitor monotherapy. Under P2Y12 inhibitor therapy, early discontinuation of aspirin ≤1 month after PCI maybe feasible and safe. Funding Acknowledgement Type of funding sources: Public hospital(s). Main funding source(s): National Cheng-Kung university hospital Figure 1

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is a malignant disease of the hematopoietic system. At present, the mechanism and pathogenesis of ALL have not been fully clarified. This study aimed to illustrate the roles of Cdc10 protein-dependent transcript 1 (CDT1) in ALL. Real-Time Quantitative Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-qPCR) was performed to examine serum levels of CDT1 in childhood ALL patients and healthy volunteers. The interaction between CDT1 expression and prognosis of childhood ALL was analyzed. Meanwhile, expressions of CDT1 in ALL cell lines were determined. Furthermore, CDT1 knockdown model was constructed in ALL cells, and Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8), and Transwell assays were conducted to analyze the effect of CDT1 on the biological functions of ALL cells. Potential mechanism was further explored through detecting the expressions of Epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT)-related genes. RT-qPCR results indicated that serum level of CDT1 in childhood ALL patients was remarkably higher than that of healthy volunteers. Childhood ALL patients with high expression of CDT1 had lower overall survival rate compared with those expressing low expression of CDT1. CDT1 knockdown remarkably decreased the proliferation and metastasis abilities of pediatric ALL cells. Results of western blot showed that CDT1 might contribute to the malignant progression of childhood ALL via activating EMT. The findings showed that elevated CDT1 facilitated ALL metastasis by promoting EMT, suggesting that CDT1 played a pivotal role in ALL metastasis and may serve as a novel prognostic biomarker and therapeutic target.

This study proposes FEM simulation on forward extrusion of bi-metal rod comprised of Aluminum (Core) and Copper (Sleeve). A Deform-2D commercial software with constant shear friction is used to explore the forming characteristics, such as the effective stress, the effective strain, the velocity field, the extrusion force, the die stress, the ratio of inner diameter to outer diameter at exit after the deformation (the aspect ratio). Besides the extrusion forces and the aspect ratio after the deformation obtained by FEM 2D can be compared with the upper bound method (UBM) and the experiment from Hwang [13]. It notes that the results are in a good agreement among three methods. Therefore the results from FEM 2D can be verified to be feasible from the experiment and UBM.

Introduction During caesarean section, the use of a vasopressor is often required to achieve haemodynamic stability of the parturient. Metaraminol is a vasopressor used in this context in some countries. However, the differences between metaraminol and other vasopressors remain unclear. Methods A search of the PubMed, Cochrane Library, and Embase databases was performed to identify randomised controlled trials comparing the use of metaraminol with other vasopressors during spinal anaesthesia at caesarean section. The selected studies were subjected to meta-analysis and risk-of-bias assessment. Results Four randomised, controlled trials met the selection criteria and 409 parturients who underwent an elective caesarean section were included in this meta-analysis. The quality of these trials was good. Metaraminol was associated with higher umbilical arterial pH (standardised mean difference [SMD] 0.82, 95% CI 0.01 to 1.62, P=0.05); a lower incidence of fetal acidosis (RR 0.08, 95% CI 0.01 to 0.63, P=0.02); and a lower incidence of nausea or vomiting (RR 0.16, 95% CI 0.04 to 0.57, P=0.0005) than was ephedrine. Metaraminol resulted in higher umbilical arterial pH (SMD 0.42, 95% CI 0.15 to 0.68, P=0.002) but a higher incidence of reactive hypertension (RR 1.80, 95% CI 1.32 to 2.46, P=0.0002) than did phenylephrine. Conclusion The results of this study showed that for spinal anaesthesia at elective caesarean section, metaraminol may be a more suitable vasopressor than ephedrine and its effects are at least not inferior to those of phenylephrine.

A momentum resolved resonant inelastic X-ray scattering (qRIXS) experimental station with continuously rotatable spectrometers and parallel detection is designed to operate at different beamlines at synchrotron and free electron laser (FEL) facilities. This endstation, currently located at the Advanced Light Source (ALS), has five emission ports on the experimental chamber for mounting the high-throughput modular soft X-ray spectrometers (MXS) [24]. Coupled to the rotation from the supporting hexapod, the scattered X-rays from 27.5° (forward scattering) to 152.5° (backward scattering) relative to the incident photon beam can be recorded, enabling the momentum-resolved RIXS spectroscopy. The components of this endstation are described in details, and the preliminary RIXS measurements on highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) reveal the low energy vibronic excitations from the strong electron-phonon coupling at C K edge around σ* band. The grating upgrade option to enhance the performance at low photon energies is presented and the potential of this spectroscopy is discussed in summary.

Two low-lying unbound states in 16C are investigated by deuteron inelastic scattering in inverse kinematics. Besides the 2 state at 5.45 MeV previously measured in a 1n knockout reaction, a new resonant state at 6.89 MeV is observed for the first time. The inelastic scattering angular distributions of these two states are well reproduced by the distorted-wave Born approximation (DWBA) calculation with an l = 1 excitation. In addition, the spin-parities of the unbound states are discussed and tentatively assigned based on shell model calculations using the modified YSOX interaction.

The tetraneutron has attracted the attention of nuclear physicists during the past decades, but there is still no unambiguous confirmation of its existence or non-existence. A new experiment based on $$^{8}$$ He(p, 2p) $$^{7}$$ H{t+ $$^{4}n$$ } reaction, with direct detection of the four neutrons, has been carried out at RIBF, which can hopefully help to draw a definite conclusion on the tetraneutron system.

The potential for neuroprotection by baicalein (5,6,7-trihydroxyflavone), a major constituent from the root of a widely used Chinese medicinal herb Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi, against methamphetamine-induced neurotoxicity was studied. All ICR mice were treated by 4-times repeated intraperitoneal administration, at 2 hr intervals, of either methamphetamine (5 mg/kg), saline, baicalein (1 mg/kg) or baicalein pretreatment followed by methamphetamine. In the striatum of mouse, the tissue level of dopamine was monitored on day 3 and nitric oxide was assayed after 1 hr, 24 hrs and 3 days of the above treatments. The results showed that striatal dopamine was significantly depleted by methamphetamine and elevated by baicalein. Pretreatment with baicalein prevented the methamphetamine-induced dopamine depletion. Nitric oxide was depressed by methamphetamine, elevated by baicalein, but remained suppressed with baicalein plus methamphetamine after 1 hr post-treatment. At 24 hrs nitric oxide concentration was unaffected by methamphetamine but was significantly elevated by baicalein or baicalein plus methamphetamine administration. On 3 days post-treatment nitric oxide was elevated by methamphetamine, baicalein and further markedly elevated by the administration of baicalein plus methamphetamine. These results suggest a potential neuroprotective role for baicalein with the possible involvement of nitric oxide.

In the mixed-valence manganites, a near-infrared laser typically melts the orbital and spin order simultaneously, corresponding to the photoinduced d1d0→d0d1 excitations in the Mott-Hubbard bands of manganese. Here, we use ultrafast methods-both femtosecond resonant X-ray diffraction and optical reflectivity-to demonstrate that the orbital response in the layered manganite Nd1-xSr1+xMnO4(x=2/3) does not follow this scheme. At the photoexcitation saturation fluence, the orbital order is only diminished by a few percent in the transient state. Instead of the typical d1d0→d0d1 transition, a near-infrared pump in this compound promotes a fundamentally distinct mechanism of charge transfer, the d0→d1L, where L denotes a hole in the oxygen band. This finding may pave a different avenue for selectively manipulating specific types of order in complex materials of this class.

An inelastic excitation and cluster-decay experiment $\rm {^2H}(^{16}C,~{^{4}He}+{^{12}Be}~or~{^{6}He}+{^{10}Be}){^2H}$ was carried out to investigate the linear-chain clustering structure in neutron-rich $\rm {^{16}C}$. For the first time, decay-paths from the $\rm {^{16}C}$ resonances to various states of the final nuclei were determined, thanks to the well-resolved $Q$-value spectra obtained from the three-fold coincident measurement. The close-threshold resonance at 16.5 MeV is assigned as the ${J^\pi}={0^+}$ band head of the predicted positive-parity linear-chain molecular band with ${(3/2_\pi^-)^2}{(1/2_\sigma^-)^2}$ configuration, according to the associated angular correlation and decay analysis. Other members of this band were found at 17.3, 19.4, and 21.6 MeV based on their selective decay properties, being consistent with the theoretical predictions. Another intriguing high-lying state was observed at 27.2 MeV which decays almost exclusively to $\rm {^{6}He}+{^{10}Be{(\sim6~ MeV)}}$ final channel, corresponding well to another predicted linear-chain structure with the pure $\sigma$-bond configuration., Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures

Lymphocytes can affect the proliferation and migration of muscle satellite cells, which may be associated with reduced muscle mass in patients with sarcopenia. The present study aimed to further enrich understandings of the changes of blood lymphocytes and explore the relationship between peripheral lymphocyte subsets and muscle mass in patients with sarcopenia. A cross-sectional study. Geriatrics department of Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China. Eighty-five subjects were enrolled in this study, and were divided into two groups: the sarcopenia group (n=60) and the non-sarcopenia group (n=25). The diagnosis of sarcopenia was based on the diagnostic criteria updated by the Asian Working Group for Sarcopenia (AWGS) in 2014. Complete blood count, peripheral lymphocyte subsets, and body composition of all patients were measured. Skeletal muscle mass index (SMI) was negatively correlated with CD4+CD28null T lymphocytes in peripheral blood in patients with sarcopenia. The result of our study may point out the role of CD4+CD28null T lymphocytes in the pathogenesis of sarcopenia.

7 pags., 3 figs. -- 27th International Nuclear Physics Conference (INPC2019), The tetraneutron has attracted the attention of nuclear physicists during the past decades, but there is still no unambiguous confirmation of its existence or nonexistence. A new experiment based on 8 He(p,2p)7H{t+4n} reaction, with direct detection of the four neutrons, has been carried out at RIBF, which can hopefully help to draw a definite conclusion on the tetraneutron system., We acknowledge the support of the RIBF accelerator staff and the BigRIPS team for providing the high-quality beam. Z. H. Yang acknowledges the financial support from the Foreign Postdoctoral Researcher program of RIKEN. T. Aumann acknowledges the support by DFG via SFB 1245. P. Koseoglou acknowledges the support from BMBF (NUSTAR.DA grant No.05P 15RDFN1).

We report on the ultrafast dynamics of charge order and structural response during the photoinduced suppression of charge and orbital order in a mixed-valence manganite. Employing femtosecond time-resolved resonant x-ray diffraction below and at the Mn $K$ absorption edge, we present a method to disentangle the transient charge order and structural dynamics in thin films of ${\mathrm{Pr}}_{0.5}{\mathrm{Ca}}_{0.5}{\mathrm{MnO}}_{3}$. Based on the static resonant scattering spectra, we extract the dispersion correction of charge-ordered ${\mathrm{Mn}}^{3+}$ and ${\mathrm{Mn}}^{4+}$ ions, allowing us to separate the transient contributions of purely charge order from structural contributions to the scattering amplitude after optical excitation. Our finding of a coherent structural mode at around $2.3\phantom{\rule{0.16em}{0ex}}\mathrm{THz}$, which primarily modulates the lattice but does not strongly affect the charge order, supports the picture of the charge order being the driving force of the combined charge, orbital, and structural transition.

X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) is performed to study changes in the electronic structures of colossal magnetoresistance (CMR) and charged ordered (CO) La

The response to anti-vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) treatment is variable. It is generally measured in terms of changes in correlated functional and/or anatomical outcomes, and patients are then classified as optimal response, poor response and non-response. The precise cause of non-response remains undetermined. A variety of factors could account for poor or non-response to anti-VEGF therapy, such as age, baseline vision, disease course, lesion characteristics and genomic polymorphism. At the present time, many studies on the genetic factors of non-response or poor response to anti-VEGF treatment mainly focus on VEGF genes (VEGF-A, VEGFR-2), complement factor H (CFH), age-related maculopathy susceptibility 2 (LOC387715/ARMS2), high temperature factor A-1 (HTRA1), interleukin-related gene (IL-8 rs4073) and so forth. It is still worthy of further investigations that how to assess genetic reasons for non-response or poor response, so that we can provide individualized treatment sequences and predict the response to anti-VEGF therapy.抗血管内皮生长因子（VEGF）的疗效存在个体差异。根据功能及形态变化，抗VEGF治疗的应答程度可分为理想应答、弱应答、无应答3种情况。导致机体无应答的原因尚未明确，可能的影响因素包括年龄、基线视力、疾病病程、病灶特点及基因的多态性等。目前对于导致抗VEGF无应答遗传因素的研究主要集中在VEGF相关基因、补体因子H、年龄相关性黄斑病变易感因子2、高温必需因子A-1及白介素相关基因等。本文通过综合抗VEGF药物治疗无应答相关遗传学因素研究，进一步分析导致抗VEGF无应答的遗传机制，以期为临床制定个性化治疗方案和预测抗VEGF疗效研究提供参考。

With flexibility in tuning their electric and magnetic properties, multiferroics can be used in information exchange and storage in ways that are very different from the present electronic materials. Here we use resonant soft X-ray scattering spectroscopy to study the F -type ( 0 , τ , 0 ) and C -type (0, 1–2 τ , 0) diffraction peaks from sinusoidal antiferromagnetic spin order in multiferroic DyMnO 3 . By comparing the temperature dependence of ordering wave vectors τ , peak intensities I , and correlation lengths λ measured at Mn L 2 -, O K -, and Dy M 5 -edges, we show that the nearly perfect locking between the ordering wave vectors from Dy 4 f states and Mn 3 d orbitals manifesting the second harmonic diffraction peak implies the notable orbital involvement in the coupling between Mn and Dy spins. Our DFT calculations further suggest that the lattice response to different antiferromagnetic ground states (A-type versus E-type) is much weaker in TbMnO 3 , in agreement with previous claim that the symmetric exchange interaction can be an important factor for understanding the ferroelectricity in DyMnO 3 than in TbMnO 3 .

This study investigated micromixers formed by a T-junction and a mixing channel consisting of serial modules formed by appropriately arranging the subsections with right shifted T-shaped, left shifted T-shaped and square cross-sections. The T-shaped cross-sections are constructed by protrusions and indentations on the channel wall. The variation of shape and size of the channel cross-section may induce a strong swirl structure of flow to enhance fluid mixing. Four parameters (the lengths of the three aforementioned subsections and the sequence of modules) were selected to optimize the micromixer, and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) together with Taguchi method was applied to select the values of the parameters. Then, the micromixer was fabricated by a lithography process and the mixing of pure DI water and a solution of Rhodamine B in DI water in the micromixer was observed by using a confocal spectral microscope imaging system. The numerical and experimental results, compared to those of a straight channel with the same hydrodynamic diameter, show that the novel micromixer with the deliberately designed geometry with a hydrodynamic diameter equal to 120 μm enhances fluid mixing efficiently at relatively low Reynolds numbers (0.01---10), corresponding to the mean velocities from 0.000081 to 0.081 m/s. The effects of the four parameters on fluid mixing in the proposed micromixer are examined by CFD simulation.

Microelectromechanical system (MEMS) piezoresistive pressure sensor and ZnO nanowires (NWs) ultraviolet (UV) photodetector were 3D integrated into a single chip with a vertically stacked structure. The MEMS pressure sensor with a UV transparent SiO2 diaphragm was stacked on the top of UV photodetector. The fabricated pressure sensor presents good linearity and stability with increasing applied pressure from 0–500 mbar. The measured interval of 0.2 mbar also shows its high sensitivity with a small change in pressure and altitude. For the ZnO NWs UV photodetector, the cutoff wavelength was around 360 nm, and the measured responsivity was 6.2 × 10−1 A W−1 with 5 V applied bias. To discuss the influence of the applied pressure and UV on this 3D stacked device, the pressure sensor was also measured with and without UV illumination, and the UV photodetector was measured at various applied pressures. The results show that UV variation can be ignored for pressure sensor measurement. However, the photoresponses of ZnO NWs decreased, whereas the applied pressure was increased.

Self-powered multi-functional sensors were fabricated by integrating a crystalline Si interdigitated back-contact (IBC) photovoltaic (PV) cell with a vertically stacked structure into a single chip. The IBC PV cell was vertically connected with a humidity sensor and a photodetector (PD) in parallel. The measured humidity current of the WO 3 thin-film humidity sensor increased monotonically when the relative humidity was increased from 30% to 95%. In addition, the humidity characteristics of the unannealed WO 3 thin-film humidity sensor were better than those of the annealed samples. The cutoff wavelengths of WO 3 and Ga 2 O 3 thin-film PDs were around 370 and 250 nm, respectively. The measured responsivity of WO 3 and Ga 2 O 3 thin-film PDs at the cutoff wavelength were 1.7 × 10 −7 and 9.8 × 10 −7 A/W, respectively, under 1-sun illumination.

Despite routine vaccine use, sporadic outbreaks of infectious coryza in poultry continue to occur in Taiwan. This study was designed to determine the serotypes and the complete nucleotide sequences of a hemagglutinin gene (HMTp210) of Avibacterium paragallinarum isolated in Taiwan between 1994 and 2017. Hemagglutination inhibition tests showed that these isolates belong to serogroups B and C. Sequence analyses of the HMTp210 gene showed that Taiwanese serogroup B isolates are most similar (94.7%–98.2% identity) to strain FARPER-174 isolated in Peru in 2015. In contrast, Taiwanese serogroup C isolates are most similar (96.3%–99.8% identity) to strain H-18 isolated in Japan in 1976. This is the first report showing the presence of A. paragallinarum of serogroup B in Taiwan. In addition, one Taiwanese isolate showed cross-reactivity with serogroup B and C antisera. This isolate contains a chimeric HMTp210 gene that might result from recombination between serogroups B and C. These findings could be valuable for the epidemiologic study and molecular serotyping of A. paragallinarum.

The tetraneutron has been drawing the attention of the nuclear physics community for decades, but a firm conclusion on its existence and properties is still far from being reached despite many experimental and theoretical efforts. New measurements have recently been performed at RIBF with the SAMURAI spectrometer by applying complementary reaction probes, which will help to pin down the properties of this four-neutron system., Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures, conference proceedings of XXII International Conference on Few-Body Problems in Physics (FB22), Caen, France, July 2018

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) can affect all heart structures including the conduction system, with either reversible or permanent derangement. However, only a few cases of adult SLE and complete atrioventricular (AV) block have been reported. We describe a young pregnant woman who initially presented with complete AV block on electrocardiography before the diagnosis of SLE. Syncope subsequently developed during the postpartum period due to frequent nonsustained polymorphic ventricular tachycardia, suggesting lupus myocarditis. The ventricular arrhythmia was successfully treated by intravenous corticosteroids, lidocaine and implantation of a permanent pacemaker. This may represent the first report of complete AV block with polymorphic ventricular tachycardia, which was identified before the other clinical features of SLE fully manifested. SLE should be considered if a patient presents with complete AV block without other clinical features. It may warn for early diagnosis and appropriate treatment of SLE including lupus-related heart disease.

Endohedral metallofullerenes, formed by encaging Gd inside fullerenes like C80, can exhibit enhanced proton relaxitivities compared with other Gd-chelates, making them the promising contrast agents for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). However, the underlying key energy scales of Gd x Sc3−x N@C80 (x = 1–3) remain unclear. Here, we carry out resonant inelastic x-ray scattering (RIXS) experiments on Gd x Sc3−x N@C80 at Gd N4,5-edges to directly study the electronic structure and spin flip excitations of Gd 4f electrons. Compared with reference Gd2O3 and contrast agent Gadodiamide, the features in the RIXS spectra of all metallofullerenes exhibit broader spectral lineshape and noticeable energy shift. Using atomic multiplet calculations, we have estimated the key energy scales such as the inter-site spin exchange field, intra-atomic 4f–4f Coulomb interactions, and spin-orbit coupling. The implications of these parameters to the 4f states of encapsulated Gd atoms are discussed.

Maskless H2SO4 wet-etching on sapphire substrates creates three-dimensional pyramidal pattern on sapphire surface. Alunogen self-forming mask grows in H2SO4 etching generating a dynamic self-masking action, which fabricates 3-dimensional pyramidal pattern on the etched sapphire wafers. The slope and size of the pyramids are controlled by rate ratio (k) between alunogen growth rate and c-plane etching rate. Constant k results in flat facet side-planes of sapphire pyramids and varying k in etching produce curved side-planes of the sapphire pyramid. © The Author(s) 2015. Published by ECS. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (CC BY, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse of the work in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. [DOI: 10.1149/2.0051506ssl] All rights reserved.

Ultrafast x-ray scattering studies of the topological Skyrmion phase in Cu_{2}OSeO_{3} show the dynamics to be strongly dependent on the excitation energy and fluence. At high photon energies, where the electron-spin scattering cross section is relatively high, the excitation of the topological Skyrmion phase shows a nonlinear dependence on the excitation fluence, in contrast to the excitation of the conical phase which is linearly dependent on the excitation fluence. The excitation of the Skyrmion order parameter is nonlinear in the magnetic excitation resulting from scattering during electron-hole recombination, indicating different dominant scattering processes in the conical and Skyrmion phases.

© 2017 Author(s). Over the past decade, the advances in grating-based soft X-ray spectrometers have revolutionized the soft X-ray spectroscopies in materials research. However, these novel spectrometers are mostly dedicated designs, which cannot be easily adopted for applications with diverging demands. Here we present a versatile spectrometer design concept based on the Hettrick-Underwood optical scheme that uses modular mechanical components. The spectrometer’s optics chamber can be used with gratings operated in either inside or outside orders, and the detector assembly can be reconfigured accordingly. The spectrometer can be designed to have high spectral resolution, exceeding 10 000 resolving power when using small source (∼1μm) and detector pixels (∼5μm) with high line density gratings (∼3000 lines/mm), or high throughput at moderate resolution. We report two such spectrometers with slightly different design goals and optical parameters in this paper. We show that the spectrometer with high throughput and large energy window is particularly useful for studying the sustainable energy materials. We demonstrate that the extensive resonant inelastic X-ray scattering (RIXS) map of battery cathode material LiNi1/3Co1/3Mn1/3O2 can be produced in few hours using such a spectrometer. Unlike analyzing only a handful of RIXS spectra taken at selected excitation photon energies across the elemental absorption edges to determine various spectral features like the localized dd excitations and non-resonant fluorescence emissions, these features can be easily identified in the RIXS maps. Studying such RIXS maps could reveal novel transition metal redox in battery compounds that are sometimes hard to be unambiguously identified in X-ray absorption and emission spectra. We propose that this modular spectrometer design can serve as the platform for further customization to meet specific scientific demands.

X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) is performed to study changes in the electronic structures of colossal magnetoresistance (CMR) and charged ordered (CO) La1-x Ca x MnO3 manganites with respect to temperature. The pre-edge features in O and Mn K-edge XAS spectra, which are highly sensitive to the local distortion of MnO6 octahedral, exhibit contrasting temperature dependence between CMR and CO samples. The seemingly counter-intuitive XAS temperature dependence can be reconciled in the context of polarons. These results help identify the most relevant orbital states associated with polarons and highlight the crucial role played by polarons in understanding the electronic structures of manganites.

The integration of quantum materials like topological insulators (TIs) with magnetic insulators (MIs) has important technological implications for spintronics and quantum computing. Here we report excellent crystallinity of c-axis oriented epitaxial TI films Bi2Se3 grown on MI films, a rare earth iron garnet (ReIG), such as thulium iron garnet (Tm3Fe5O12, TmIG) by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) with a Se-buffered low-temperature (SBLT) growth technique. We demonstrated a streaky reflection high-energy electron diffraction pattern starting from the very first quintuple layer of Bi2Se3, indicating the high-quality interface between TmIG and Bi2Se3, a prerequisite for studying interfacial exchange coupling effects. The strong interfacial exchange interaction was manifested by observations of anomalous Hall effect in the Bi2Se3/TmIG bilayer and a shift of ferromagnetic resonance field of TmIG induced by Bi2Se3. We have reproducibly grown high-quality Bi2Se3/ReIG and interfaces using this new TI growth method, which may be applied to grow other types of van der Waals (vdW) hetero-structures., Comment: 17 pages, 4 figures

Oxygen is known to play an important role in the multiferroicity of rare earth manganites; however, how this role changes with rare earth elements is still not fully understood. To address this question, we have used resonant soft x-ray scattering spectroscopy to study the F-type (0,τ,0) diffraction peak from the antiferromagnetic order in DyMnO3 and TbMnO3. We focus on the measurements at O K edge of these two manganites, supplemented by the results at Mn L2 and Dy M5 edge of DyMnO3. We show that the electronic states of different elements are coupled more strongly in DyMnO3 than in TbMnO3, presumably due to the stronger lattice distortion and the tendency to develop E-type antiferromagnetism in the ferroelectric state that promote the orbital hybridization. We also show that the anomaly in the correlation length of (0,τ,0) peak in DyMnO3 signifies the exchange interaction between Mn and rare earth spins. Our findings reveal the prominent role of oxygen orbitals in the multiferroicity of rare earth manganites and the distinct energetics between them.

Ultrafast x-ray scattering studies of the topological Skyrmion phase in Cu_{2}OSeO_{3} show the dynamics to be strongly dependent on the excitation energy and fluence. At high photon energies, where the electron-spin scattering cross section is relatively high, the excitation of the topological Skyrmion phase shows a nonlinear dependence on the excitation fluence, in contrast to the excitation of the conical phase which is linearly dependent on the excitation fluence. The excitation of the Skyrmion order parameter is nonlinear in the magnetic excitation resulting from scattering during electron-hole recombination, indicating different dominant scattering processes in the conical and Skyrmion phases.

Studies to date on ferromagnet/d-wave superconductor heterostructures focus mainly on the effects at or near the interfaces while the response of bulk properties to heterostructuring is overlooked. Here we use resonant soft x-ray scattering spectroscopy to reveal a novel c-axis ferromagnetic coupling between the in-plane Cu spins in YBa$_2$ Cu$_3$ O$_{7-x}$ (YBCO) superconductor when it is grown on top of ferromagnetic La$_{0.7}$ Ca$_{0.3}$ MnO$_3$ (LCMO) manganite layer. This coupling, present in both normal and superconducting states of YBCO, is sensitive to the interfacial termination such that it is only observed in bilayers with MnO_2but not with La$_{0.7}$ Ca$_{0.3}$ interfacial termination. Such contrasting behaviors, we propose, are due to distinct energetic of CuO chain and CuO$_2$ plane at the La$_{0.7}$ Ca$_{0.3}$ and MnO$_2$ terminated interfaces respectively, therefore influencing the transfer of spin-polarized electrons from manganite to cuprate differently. Our findings suggest that the superconducting/ferromagnetic bilayers with proper interfacial engineering can be good candidates for searching the theorized Fulde-Ferrel-Larkin-Ovchinnikov (FFLO) state in cuprates and studying the competing quantum orders in highly correlated electron systems., Please note the change of the title. Text might be slightly different from the published version

To preserve the high quality topological surface state after air exposure without degradation, it is crucial to identify an effective capping layer. In this study, we report an effective capping layer obtained by crystallizing Se. Upon extended exposure to ultrahigh vacuum or humid air, we show by using x-ray photoemission spectroscopy that the stability and resistance to oxidation of crystalline Se capping layers are superior to those of the amorphous Se capping layer, which has been commonly used by current communities. Furthermore, time-dependent Hall measurements showed that crystalline Se capping layers had a much stronger ability to sustain the intrinsic transport properties of Bi2Se3.To preserve the high quality topological surface state after air exposure without degradation, it is crucial to identify an effective capping layer. In this study, we report an effective capping layer obtained by crystallizing Se. Upon extended exposure to ultrahigh vacuum or humid air, we show by using x-ray photoemission spectroscopy that the stability and resistance to oxidation of crystalline Se capping layers are superior to those of the amorphous Se capping layer, which has been commonly used by current communities. Furthermore, time-dependent Hall measurements showed that crystalline Se capping layers had a much stronger ability to sustain the intrinsic transport properties of Bi2Se3.

Labile organic carbon (C) in soil can act as a sensitive indicator of its quality, and understanding its response to crop residue incorporation rates is critical to increase soil C storage by residue return in conjunction with chemical fertilisation. A 30-year field experiment was carried out to study the effects of various rates of maize residue return on soil organic C fractions in the presence of chemical fertilisers in a wheat–maize cropping system in north-central China. Studies included a no-fertiliser and no-residues control (CK) and maize residue return at rates of 0 (S0), 2250 (S1), 4500 (S2), and 9000kg ha−1 (S3) using chemical fertilisers. Soil total organic C (TOC) and labile organic C fractions were determined. The S0 treatment increased soil microbial biomass C (MBC), KMnO4-oxidisable C (KMnO4-C), and TOC, but did not change water-soluble organic C (WSOC), light fraction organic C (LFOC), and particulate organic C (POC), relative to CK. All organic C fractions did not differ between S0 and S1; however, S2–S3 increased MBC, WSOC, LFOC, POC, KMnO4-C, and TOC by 31.8–41.0%, 17.7–28.6%, 33.9–81.3%, 35.3–82.4%, 19.3–42.8%, and 9.7–20.4% compared with S0 respectively. The KMnO4-C had the highest correlation with TOC, with LFOC and POC showing higher sensitivity to different residue-return rates. Redundancy analysis showed that LFOC, POC, and KMnO4-C were mainly affected by residue-C and root-C, while MBC was closely correlated with rhizodeposition-C levels. Overall, low rates of residue return did not affect soil labile organic C and TOC, with they only started to increase significantly when annual residue return exceeded 4500kg ha−1 under chemical fertilisation; and the rate of increase for labile organic C was found to be higher than for non-labile C as residue inputs were increased.