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Abstract Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a major chronic disease worldwide and its risk factors have long been investigating in epidemiological studies. Our study aims to develop a body composition-based risk score and integrate it into the Framingham Risk Score (FRS) to improve CVD prediction among well-functioning older adults. We included 1882 older adults from the Health, Aging and Body Composition (Health ABC) study to screen body composition variables obtained from the Dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA). Three models were developed and compared: the 4-DXA model, the refit FRS, and the refit FRS plus 4-DXA model. C-statistics were 0.62 (95% CI: 0.59, 0.65) for the refit FRS, 0.58 (95% CI: 0.55, 0.61) for the 4-DXA model, and 0.63 (95% CI: 0.60, 0.66) for the refit FRS plus 4-DXA model. Compared to the refit FRS, the refit FRS plus 4-DXA model slightly improved CVD outcome prediction as the discrimination slope, net reclassification index, and the integrated discrimination index were 0.053 (95% CI: 0.041, 0.066), 0.098 (95% CI = – 0.0033, 0.20) and 0.013 (95% CI: 0.0069–0.019). This study provides a model for more accurate risk stratification and draws more attention on DXA-based indices in the clinical setting. It also encourages further research in validating the developed risk score in more diverse population and in investigating a broader range of CVD risk factors.

Abstract Several studies have observed renal cell ferroptosis during cisplatin‐induced acute kidney injury (AKI). However, the mechanism is not completely clear. In this study, oxidized arachidonic acid (AA) metabolites are increased in cisplatin‐treated HK‐2 cells. Targeted metabolomics showed that the end product of pyrimidine biosynthesis is decreased and the initiating substrate of pyrimidine biosynthesis is increased in cisplatin‐treated mouse kidneys. Mitochondrial DHODH, a key enzyme for pyrimidine synthesis, and its downstream product CoQH2, are downregulated. DHODH overexpression attenuated but DHODH silence exacerbated cisplatin‐induced CoQH2 depletion and lipid peroxidation. Mechanistically, renal DHODH acetylation is elevated in cisplatin‐exposed mice. Mitochondrial SIRT3 is reduced in cisplatin‐treated mouse kidneys and HK‐2 cells. Both in vitro SIRT3 overexpression and in vivo NMN supplementation attenuated cisplatin‐induced mitochondrial DHODH acetylation and renal cell ferroptosis. By contrast, Sirt3 knockout aggravated cisplatin‐induced mitochondrial DHODH acetylation and renal cell ferroptosis, which can not be attenuated by NMN. Additional experiments showed that cisplatin caused mitochondrial dysfunction and SIRT3 SUMOylation. Pretreatment with mitochondria‐target antioxidant MitoQ alleviated cisplatin‐caused mitochondrial dysfunction, SIRT3 SUMOylation, and DHODH acetylation. MitoQ pretreatment protected against cisplatin‐caused AKI and renal cell ferroptosis. Taken together, these results suggest that mitochondrial dysfunction‐evoked DHODH acetylation partially contributes to renal cell ferroptosis during cisplatin‐induced AKI.

As a functional composite material, nickel-coated aluminum powder has been widely used in conductive fillers, electromagnetic shielding materials and other fields due to its advantages of low density, high conductivity and low cost. In this paper, nickel-plated aluminum powder was prepared by a sodium hypophosphite system. The effects of different nickel coating amounts (the percentage of nickel-plating quality to nickel-plated aluminum powder quality) on the morphology, phase, compaction resistivity and electromagnetic parameters of nickel-plated aluminum powder coating were studied. The X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) results proved the successful preparation of nickel-coated aluminum powders with different nickel coating amounts. The Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images clearly show the coating effect under different nickel coating amounts. By plating nickel on the surface of aluminum powder, the surface characteristics of aluminum powder are changed, so as to adjust its conductivity, resistance, stability and other properties, thus affecting its electromagnetic performance and wave absorption performance. The results show that the comprehensive absorbing performance is excellent when the nickel coating amount is 40%. The reflection loss of the sample with a thickness of 2.0[Formula: see text]mm is less than [Formula: see text][Formula: see text]dB in the frequency range of 10.17–12.38[Formula: see text]GHz. When the frequency is 10.72[Formula: see text]GHz, the minimum reflection loss reaches [Formula: see text][Formula: see text]dB.

Increasing evidences demonstrate that environmental stressors are important inducers of acute kidney injury (AKI). This study aimed to investigate the impact of exposure to Cd, an environmental stressor, on renal cell ferroptosis. Transcriptomics analyses showed that arachidonic acid (ARA) metabolic pathway was disrupted in Cd-exposed mouse kidneys. Targeted metabolomics showed that renal oxidized ARA metabolites were increased in Cd-exposed mice. Renal 4-HNE, MDA, and ACSL4, were upregulated in Cd-exposed mouse kidneys. Consistent with animal experiments, the in vitro experiments showed that mitochondrial oxidized lipids were elevated in Cd-exposed HK-2 cells. Ultrastructure showed mitochondrial membrane rupture in Cd-exposed mouse kidneys. Mitochondrial cristae were accordingly reduced in Cd-exposed mouse kidneys. Mitochondrial SIRT3, an NAD+-dependent deacetylase that regulates mitochondrial protein stability, was reduced in Cd-exposed mouse kidneys. Subsequently, mitochondrial GPX4 acetylation was elevated and mitochondrial GPX4 protein was reduced in Cd-exposed mouse kidneys. Interestingly, Cd-induced mitochondrial GPX4 acetylation and renal cell ferroptosis were exacerbated in Sirt3−/− mice. Conversely, Cd-induced mitochondrial oxidized lipids were attenuated in nicotinamide mononucleotide (NMN)-pretreated HK-2 cells. Moreover, Cd-evoked mitochondrial GPX4 acetylation and renal cell ferroptosis were alleviated in NMN-pretreated mouse kidneys. These results suggest that mitochondrial GPX4 acetylation, probably caused by SIRT3 downregulation, is involved in Cd-evoked renal cell ferroptosis.

ObjectiveEarly identification of cognitive impairment in older adults could reduce the burden of age-related disabilities. Gait parameters are associated with and predictive of cognitive decline. Although a variety of sensors and machine learning analysis methods have been used in cognitive studies, a deep optimized machine vision-based method for analyzing gait to identify cognitive decline is needed.MethodsThis study used a walking footage dataset of 158 adults named West China Hospital Elderly Gait, which was labelled by performance on the Short Portable Mental Status Questionnaire. We proposed a novel recognition network, Deep Optimized GaitPart (DO-GaitPart), based on silhouette and skeleton gait images. Three improvements were applied: short-term temporal template generator (STTG) in the template generation stage to decrease computational cost and minimize loss of temporal information; depth-wise spatial feature extractor (DSFE) to extract both global and local fine-grained spatial features from gait images; and multi-scale temporal aggregation (MTA), a temporal modeling method based on attention mechanism, to improve the distinguishability of gait patterns.ResultsAn ablation test showed that each component of DO-GaitPart was essential. DO-GaitPart excels in backpack walking scene on CASIA-B dataset, outperforming comparison methods, which were GaitSet, GaitPart, MT3D, 3D Local, TransGait, CSTL, GLN, GaitGL and SMPLGait on Gait3D dataset. The proposed machine vision gait feature identification method achieved a receiver operating characteristic/area under the curve (ROCAUC) of 0.876 (0.852–0.900) on the cognitive state classification task.ConclusionThe proposed method performed well identifying cognitive decline from the gait video datasets, making it a prospective prototype tool in cognitive assessment.

The block-scale application of photovoltaic technology in cities is becoming a viable solution for renewable energy utilization. The rapid urbanization process has provided urban buildings with a colossal development potential for solar energy in China, especially in industrial areas that provide more space for the integration of PV equipment. In developing solar energy resources, the block layout and the PV materials are two critical factors affecting the distribution of solar radiation and generation. However, few studies have analyzed how to select the most suitable PV materials for different layouts of industrial blocks to obtain the best generation. This study considered the layout of industrial blocks and PV materials simultaneously, and the generation yield was calculated when combined. A total of 40 real industrial block cases were constructed, and radiation distribution data on building surfaces of different block cases were calculated. Data on both were combined to calculate the generation of different PV materials for each block type. The findings indicated that single-story industrial blocks possessed the highest potential for solar radiation, primarily due to the higher percentage of roof area. The influence of PV materials on the installation rate of different building facades varied, with the installation rate of the west facade being the most impacted by PV performance and the roof being the least impacted. Using different PV materials in industrial blocks could lead to a 59.2% difference in solar generation capacity. For single-layer industrial blocks, mono crystalline and poly crystalline silicon were preferable to achieve higher power generation. In contrast, multi-story and high-rise industrial blocks were best suited for a-Si and CIGS to attain higher cost performance. The methods and results of this study guided the selection and installation of PV equipment in various block typologies, thereby improving the refinement of solar resource development, maximizing solar resource utilization, and promoting the development of energy conservation and carbon reduction in cities.

Understanding the material composition and pore structure variation of shale gas reservoirs during supercritical CO2-shale interaction is of essence to achieve CO2 sequestration and enhanced natural gas production. The storage space evolution associated with mineral corrosion has been well reported, but the studies on the secondary precipitation and plugging characteristics are still insufficient, and there is particularly a lack of theoretical and experimental investigations. To analyze mineralogical corrosion/precipitation characteristics and its effects on adsorption capacity with different reaction time (6‒30 days) and thus demonstrate the fluid-solid interface kinetics and evolution laws of pore structure, the supercritical CO2 (scCO2)-water-shale reaction, scanning electron mi-croscope (SEM), low-pressure N2 adsorption and isothermal adsorption experiments were primarily conducted using the Lower Silurian Longmaxi shales in the southern Sichuan Basin. The results reveal that the content of calcium and potassium minerals in the sample after the reaction gradually decreases with time, leading to an increase of Ca2+ and K+ concentration in the solution. Calcite minerals are notably corroded across the reaction, accompanied by a number of carbonate precipitates that converge on the surface. Corrosion generally expands the initial pore space, resulting in a volumetric increase of pores ranging from 3.29 to 4.50 nm. But the precipitation process may lead to pore space plugging and correspondingly shrinks the increments of the pore volume. As a result of corrosion and precipitation, the surface fractal dimension D1 increases slightly, while the structure fractal dimension D2 shows a reducing trend, which intensifies pore heterogeneity. In general, mineralogical corrosion can enlarge the samples’ storage space, initiate more CO2 molecules to be polarized, and thus strengthen interactions between scCO2 fluids and shale. These are the main reasons for the enhancement of adsorption capacity and adsorption potential. There is no remarkable change in the adsorption and adsorption potential of the sample before and after precipitation, indicating that the precipitation effect has a minor impact on adsorption capacity. Insights into corrosion and precipitation mechanisms and their effects on storage space are a matter of enlightenment for high-efficiency and long-term CO2 geo-sequestration.

Bevacizumab is widely used in the treatment of colorectal cancer, liver cancer, and other advanced solid tumors because of its multiple targets, no genetic testing and better safety. Globally, the use of bevacizumab in the clinic has been climbing year by year based on several large-scale, multicenter prospective studies. While bevacizumab undeniably has a good clinical safety profile, it has also been associated with adverse effects such as drug-related hypertension and anaphylaxis. In our recent clinical work, we met a female patient with acute aortic coarctation previously treated with multiple cycles of bevacizumab, who was admitted with sudden onset of back pain. Because the patient had just had an enhanced CT of the chest and abdomen a month earlier, no abnormal lesions apparently associated with low back pain were found. So when the patient was seen on this occasion, our clinical diagnosis was first considered to be neuropathic pain, but a further multiphase enhancement CT was done again for further exclusion and the final diagnosis was acute aortic dissection. The patient later died within 1 hour after the chest pain had worsened again while waiting for a surgical blood supply within 72 hours of presentation. The risk of fatal acute aortic dissection is not sufficiently emphasized in the revised instructions for bevacizumab, although the adverse effects associated with aortic dissection and aneurysm are mentioned. Our report is of high practical value in raising clinicians’ vigilance and safe management of patients using bevacizumab worldwide.

Abstract Sodium ion‐batteries (SIBs) are considered as a class of promising alternatives to lithium‐ion batteries (LIBs) to overcome their drawbacks of limited sources and safety problems. However, the lack of high‐performance electrode materials hinders the wide‐range commercialization of SIBs. Comparing to inorganic counterparts, organic electrode materials, which are benefitted from flexibly designable structures, low cost, environmental friendliness, and high theoretical gravimetric capacities, should be a prior choice. Here, a covalent organic polymer (COP) based material (denoted as CityU‐9) is designed and synthesized by integrating multiple redox motifs (benzoquinone and thioether), improved conductivity (sulfur induction), and intrinsic insolubility (rigid skeleton). The half‐cell SIBs exhibit ultrahigh specific capacity of 1009 mAh g−1 and nearly no capacity drop after 650 cycles. The first all‐COP symmetric full‐cell shows high specific capacity of 90 mAh g−1 and excellent rate capability. This work can extend the selection of redox‐active moieties and provide a rational design strategy of high‐performance novel organic electrode materials.

Abstract Background Asthenozoospermia is a troublesome disease experienced by men in their reproductive years, but its exact etiology remains unclear. To address this problem, this study aims to identify the hub genes and crucial pathways in asthenozoospermia. Methods We screened two Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) datasets (GSE92578 and GSE22331) to extract the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between normozoospermic and asthenozoospermic men using the “Limma” package. Gene enrichment analyses of the DEGs were conducted using the “clusterProfiler” R package. The protein-protein interaction (PPI) network was then established using the STRING database. A miRNA-transcription factor-gene network was constructed based on the predicted results of hub genes using the RegNetwork database. The expression of four hub genes in asthenozoospermia and normal samples were verified using quantitative real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) and western blotting. Results We identified 271 DEGs, which included 218 upregulated and 53 downregulated in two asthenozoospermia datasets. These DEGs were observed to be markedly enriched in pathways with cell growth and embryonic organ development, phospholipase D signaling pathway, cGMP-PKG signaling pathway, and Wnt signaling pathway. The most significant genes were identified, including COPS7A, CUL3, KLHL7, NEDD4. We then constructed regulatory networks of these genes, miRNAs, and transcription factors. Finally, we found that the COPS7A was significantly upregulated in patients with asthenozoospermia, but CUL3, KLHL7 and NEDD4 were significantly downregulated compared with normal samples. Conclusion We applied bioinformatics methods to analyze the DEGs of asthenozoospermia based on the GEO database and identified the novel crucial genes and pathways in this disease. Our findings may provide novel insights into asthenozoospermia and identify new clues for the potential treatment of this disease.

Physical fatigue is one of the important problems that plague public health. Our objective is to investigate the anti-fatigue effect of a botanical beverage with ginseng extract and pueraria extract, including ginseng, wolfberry, Polygonatum, Pueraria, and niacin. Sixty ICR male mice were randomly divided into 6 groups, namely blank control group, experimental control group (swimming group), positive control group (caffeine group), low-dose group (3.33 g/kg BW), medium-dose group (6.67 g/kg BW), and high-dose group (13.33 g/kg BW) of botanical beverage. Then we performed behavioral examination, including grip and turn-club test, and investigated fatigue-related biochemical indexes and behavioral tests after consecutive gavage administration for 30 days.. Results showed that the fatigue rotarod time and forelimb pulling force of the mice are significantly increased in the middle and high dose groups of botanical beverage and the caffeine group, compared with the blank control group. The contents of blood sugar level, liver glycogen, and muscle glycogen of the mice in the middle dose group increased by 53.58%, 18.75%, and 45.00%, respectively, compared with the swimming group. While the contents of blood lactate and urea nitrogen and the activities of lactate dehydrogenase and creatine kinase in the middle-dose group decreased by 5.56%, 18.78% and 27.18%, 9.45%, respectively. It’s concluded that botanical beverage with ginseng extract and pueraria extract had the effect on relieving physical fatigue.

In this paper, the protective effect of a botanical beverage with pueraria extract and Hovenia dulcis Thunb. extract on acute alcoholic liver injury in mice was investigated. The acute alcoholic liver injury model was established by a one-time gavage of 50% alcohol, and then the relevant biochemical indicators and liver tissue morphology were detected to evaluate the hepatoprotective effect of the botanical beverage. Compared with the model control group, the middle-dose of plant beverage with pueraria extract and Hovenia dulcis Thunb. extract can significantly reduce the levels of ALT, AST, TC, TG and LDL in the serum of mice with acute alcoholic liver injury to (19.17±6.22) U/L, (14.81±4.61) U/L, (4.77±0.33) mmol/L, (1.92±0.24) mmol//L, (0.22±0.09) mmol/L, increase the activities of SOD, GSH-Px and GSH in liver, and decrease MDA content to (0.80±0.09) nmol/mg pro. This plant drink can also significantly improve the pathological changes of liver tissue to a certain extent, and reduce steatosis and inflammatory cell infiltration. The experimental results showed that the plant beverage with pueraria extract and Hovenia dulcis Thunb. extract had a certain protective effect on the liver tissue of mice after acute alcohol exposure.

In vitro strategies have widely been used to assess bioaccessibility of organic pollutants in soils. However, studies for comparing in vitro models with in vivo data are still limited. In this study, Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) and its metabolites (called as DDTr) bioaccessibility in nine contaminated soils were measured using physiologically based extraction test (PBET), in vitro digestion model (IVD), and Deutsches Institut für Normung (DIN) with/without Tenax as an absorptive sink, and DDTr bioavailability was assessed using an in vivo mouse model. Whether or not Tenax was added, DDTr bioaccessibility significantly varied among three methods, suggesting that DDTr bioaccessibility depended on the in vitro method employed. Multiple linear regression analysis indicated that sink, intestinal incubation time and bile content are identified to be the dominant factors in controlling DDTr bioaccessibility. Comparison of in vitro and in vivo results demonstrated that DIN assay with Tenax (TI-DIN) provided the best prediction for DDTr bioavailability (r2 = 0.66, slope=0.78). After extending intestinal incubation time to 6 h or increasing bile content to 4.5 g/L (same to DIN assay) of the TI-PBET and TI-IVD assays, the in vivo-in vitro correlation will improved significantly, with r2 = 0.76 and slope= 1.4 for TI-PBET and r2 = 0.84 and slope= 1.9 for TI-IVD under 6 h intestinal incubation, and r2 = 0.59 and slope= 0.96 for TI-PBET and r2 = 0.51 and slope= 1.0 for TI-IVD under 4.5 g/L of bile content. The results suggest that it is essential to understand these key factors influencing bioaccessibility for the development of standardized in vitro methods, which helps to refine the risk assessment of human exposure to contaminants via soil ingestion.

Exposure of human to parabens (commonly used preservatives) is inevitable due to their extensively applied in numerous consumer products. Thus, a reliable noninvasive matrix reflecting long-term exposure to parabens is essential for human biomonitoring study. Human nails are potentially a valuable alternative for measuring intergrated exposure to parabens. In this work, we collected 100 paired nail and urine samples from university students in Nanjing, China, and measured simultaneously for six parent parabens and four metabolites. Methylparaben (MeP), ethylparaben (EtP), and propylparaben (PrP) were three predominant paraben analogue in both matrices, with the median concentrations being 12.9, 0.753, and 3.42 ng/mL in urine, and 1540, 154, and 961 ng/g in nail, respectively, while 4-hydroxybenzoic acid (4-HB) and 3,4-dihydroxybenzoic acid (3,4-DHB) were the most abundant metabolites (median values of 143 and 35.9 ng/mL, respectively) in urine. Gender-related analysis suggested that females exposed to more higher parabens than males. Significantly positive correlations were found between levels of MeP, PrP, EtP, and OH-MeP (r = 0.54–0.62, p

In this paper, the approximate Bayesian computation combines the particle swarm optimization and sequential Monte Carlo methods, which identify the parameters of the Mathieu-van der Pol-Duffing chaotic energy harvester system. Then the proposed method is applied to estimate the coefficients of the chaotic model and the response output paths of the identified coefficients compared with the observed, which verifies the effectiveness of the proposed method. Finally, a partial response sample of the regular and chaotic responses, determined by the maximum Lyapunov exponent, is applied to detect whether chaotic motion occurs in them by a 0–1 test. This paper can provide a reference for data-based parameter identification and chaotic prediction of chaotic vibration energy harvester systems.

Evaluating scientific articles has always been a challenging task, made even more difficult by the constantly evolving citation networks. Despite numerous attempts at solving this problem, most existing approaches fail to consider the link relationships within the citation network, which can often result in biased evaluation results. To overcome this limitation, we present an optimization ranking algorithm that leverages the P-Rank algorithm and weighted citation networks to provide a more accurate article ranking. The proposed approach employs two hyperbolic tangent functions to calculate the corresponding age of articles and the number of citations, while also updating the link relationships of each paper node in the citation network. We validate the effectiveness of the proposed approach using three evaluation indicators and conduct experiments on three public datasets. The obtained experimental results demonstrate that the optimization article ranking method can achieve competitive performance when compared to other unweighted ranking algorithms. In addition, we note that the optimal Spearman’s rank correlation and robustness can all be achieved by using a combination of the following parameters: α=10, β=5, and γ=2.

Whilst certain environmental organochlorine pesticide exposure may still pose significant burden, the associations between dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) and chronic kidney disease (CKD) remain disputable notwithstanding the potentially inaccurate disease definition between age groups. National DDT exposure burden atlas was depicted from 92,061 participants by measuring their serum concentrations of DDT congeners and major metabolite in the US from 1999 to 2016. Temporal analyses of these toxicant exposure suggested that although serum DDT concentrations exhibited recent decline, the detection rates remain up to 99.8% every year, posing great concern for exposure risk. A total of 3,039 US adults were further included from these participants demonstrating the weighted CKD prevalence of 40.2% using the new age-adapted CKD-EPI40 model compared to 28.0% using the current CKD-EPI method. After adjustment for covariates, logistic regression model results showed individual metabolites and total DDT burden were positively, yet monotonically, associated with risk of CKD incidence (P-trend for all

Abstract Background Since the outbreak of COVID-19, it has been documented that old age and underlying illnesses are associated with poor prognosis among COVID-19 patients. However, it is unknown whether sarcopenia, a common geriatric syndrome, is associated with poor prognosis among older COVID-19 patients. The aim of our prospective cohort study is to investigate the association between sarcopenia risk and severe disease among COVID-19 patients aged ≥60 years. Method A prospective cohort study of 114 hospitalized older patients (≥60 years) with confirmed COVID-19 pneumonia between 7 February, 2020 and 6 April, 2020. Epidemiological, socio-demographic, clinical and laboratory data on admission and outcome data were extracted from electronic medical records. All patients were assessed for sarcopenia on admission using the SARC-F scale and the outcome was the development of the severe disease within 60 days. We used the Cox proportional hazards model to identify the association between sarcopenia and progression of disease defined as severe cases in a total of 2908 person-days. Result Of 114 patients (mean age 69.52 ± 7.25 years, 50% woman), 38 (33%) had a high risk of sarcopenia while 76 (67%) did not. We found that 43 (38%) patients progressed to severe cases. COVID-19 patients with higher risk sarcopenia were more likely to develop severe disease than those without (68% versus 22%, p

Block morphology refers to critical parameters influencing building energy performance on the block scale. However, analysis of the combined effect of block morphological parameters on building energy consumption with real blocks is lacking. In this paper, the aim is to evaluate the combined effect of office block morphology on building energy consumption in the context of the Hot-summer and Cold-winter zone in China. First, a workflow for the energy assessment of office buildings with the coupled block morphology on the block scale was proposed with evaluation tools. Seventy office blocks in Wuhan were taken as examples and then classified based on building layout typology and building height. Afterwards, the morphological parameters and building energy use intensity (EUI) for different blocks were calculated. Then, the combined effect of block morphology on the buildings’ energy consumption was evaluated and the model on predicting the building energy consumption of office blocks was proposed. Finally, based on the results, low-energy design strategies were projected for office blocks. The results illustrated that the effect of block morphology on building cooling, heating, and lighting is EUI 28.83%, 28.56%, and 23.23%, respectively. Building shape factor (BSF), floor area ratio (FAR), average building height of block (BH), and average building depth of block (BD) are effective block morphological parameters. The key morphological parameters which combined affect the building energy consumption of office blocks are BSF and FAR; BSF has 1.24 times the effect on building energy consumption than FAR. The workflow built in this paper can be applied to other cities around the world for promoting sustainable cities.

Though realizing organic materials with deep blue emission is attractive for next-generation display technologies, achieving this emission in afterglow molecules remains a challenge. Here, the authors report blue organic afterglow via a strategy involving guest sensitization and matrix rigidification.

Biomass pyrolysis is an important way to produce biofuel. It is a chemical reaction process significantly involving heat, in which the heating rate will affect the yield and composition (or quality) of the generated biofuel. Therefore, the heat transfer inside the biomass pellets is important for determining the rate of temperature rise in the pellets. The accurate knowledge of the thermophysical properties of biomass pellets is required to clarify the process and mechanism of heat transfer in the particles and in the reactor. In this work, based on the transient thermoelectric technology, a continuous in situ thermal characterization method for a dynamic heating process is proposed. Multiple thermophysical properties, including thermal conductivity and volumetric heat capacity for corn leaves, are measured simultaneously within a heating process. In temperatures lower than 100 °C, the volumetric heat capacity slightly increases while the thermal conductivity decreases gradually due to the evaporation of water molecules. When the temperature is higher than 100 °C, the organic components in the corn leaves are cracked and carbonized, leading to the increase in the thermal conductivity and the decrease in the volumetric heat capacity against temperature.

In recent years, the continuous development of electronic chips and the increasing integration of devices have led to extensive research on the thermal properties of ultrathin metallic materials. In particular, accurate characterization of their thermal transport properties has become a research hotspot. In this paper, we review the characterization methods of metallic nanomaterials, focusing on the principles of the transient electrothermal (TET) technique and the differential TET technique. By using the differential TET technique, the thermal conductivity, electrical conductivity, and Lorenz number of extremely confined metallic nanostructures can be characterized with high measurement accuracy. At present, we are limited by the availability of existing coating machines that determine the thickness of the metal films, but this is not due to the measurement technology itself. If a material with a smaller diameter and lower thermal conductivity is used as the substrate, much thinner nanostructures can be characterized.

Previous intermodulation (IM) studies have employed two (or more) temporal modulations of a stimulus, with different local elements of the stimulus being modulated by different frequencies. Brain activities of IM obtained mainly from electroencephalograms (EEG) have been analyzed in the frequency domain. As a powerful tool, IM, which can provide a direct and objective physiological measure of neural interaction, has emerged as a promising method to decipher neural interactions in visual perception, and reveal the underlying different perceptual processing levels. In this review, we summarize the recent applications of IM in visual perception, detail the protocols and types of IM, and extend its utility and potential applications to the multisensory domain. We propose that using IM could prevail in partially revealing the potential hierarchical processing of multisensory information and contribute to a deeper understanding of the underlying brain dynamics.

In China’s typical high-density cities, in order to meet the residential needs, a Chinese characteristic and typical high-rise residence with multiple flats sharing one staircase has been created. Due to the Chinese cooking methods, such as frying and stir-frying, the middle flats’ kitchens of these high-rise residences are easily exposed to cooking pollutants, which endanger people’s health. As the outdoor transition space directly adjacent to the kitchens of the middle flats, the inner-courtyards in high-rise residences make the cooking pollutants easier to be diffused. Therefore, the inner-courtyard form has a significant impact on the ventilation and diffusion of cooking pollutants. In this study, with the method of measurement and CFD simulation, the relationship between cooking pollutants diffusion in the kitchens of the middle flats and the flow field in inner-courtyards was analyzed, and the impact of different inner-courtyard forms on cooking pollutants diffusion distribution in high-rise residential under natural ventilation was discussed. The results show that different inner-courtyard forms have different effects on the diffusion of cooking pollutants: the enclosed courtyards will greatly increase the cross-contamination between the kitchen and the adjacent space; increasing the openness of the courtyard will not enhance the diffusion level of pollutants, but has a negative effect; compared with centralized courtyards, symmetrical courtyards have a better echo with the kitchen in the layout, which is more conducive to the diffusion of cooking pollutants.

BackgroundNowadays, researchers are leveraging the mRNA-based vaccine technology used to develop personalized immunotherapy for cancer. However, its application against glioma is still in its infancy. In this study, the applicable candidates were excavated for mRNA vaccine treatment in the perspective of immune regulation, and suitable glioma recipients with corresponding immune subtypes were further investigated.MethodsThe RNA-seq data and clinical information of 702 and 325 patients were recruited from TCGA and CGGA, separately. The genetic alteration profile was visualized and compared by cBioPortal. Then, we explored prognostic outcomes and immune correlations of the selected antigens to validate their clinical relevance. The prognostic index was measured via GEPIA2, and infiltration of antigen-presenting cells (APCs) was calculated and visualized by TIMER. Based on immune-related gene expression, immune subtypes of glioma were identified using consensus clustering analysis. Moreover, the immune landscape was visualized by graph learning-based dimensionality reduction analysis.ResultsFour glioma antigens, namely ANXA5, FKBP10, MSN, and PYGL, associated with superior prognoses and infiltration of APCs were selected. Three immune subtypes IS1–IS3 were identified, which fundamentally differed in molecular, cellular, and clinical signatures. Patients in subtypes IS2 and IS3 carried immunologically cold phenotypes, whereas those in IS1 carried immunologically hot phenotype. Particularly, patients in subtypes IS3 and IS2 demonstrated better outcomes than that in IS1. Expression profiles of immune checkpoints and immunogenic cell death (ICD) modulators showed a difference among IS1–IS3 tumors. Ultimately, the immune landscape of glioma elucidated considerable heterogeneity not only between individual patients but also within the same immune subtype.ConclusionsANXA5, FKBP10, MSN, and PYGL are identified as potential antigens for anti-glioma mRNA vaccine production, specifically for patients in immune subtypes 2 and 3. In summary, this study may shed new light on the promising approaches of immunotherapy, such as devising mRNA vaccination tailored to applicable glioma recipients.

Dexmedetomidine has a dose-dependent sedative and analgesic effect. To further evaluate the wake-up quality of dexmedetomidine in patients undergoing neurosurgery, a meta-analysis of dexmedetomidine in a randomized controlled trial of general anesthesia was performed. Firstly, an experimental algorithm was proposed, and then the data fusion algorithm was used to conduct randomized controlled trials. The clinical efficacy and safety of dexmedetomidine in the acupuncture of neurosurgical patients were evaluated one by one for quality evaluation and data extraction. The effect of different input variables on the depth of anesthesia was studied by using a multi-data fusion approach. The results show that the data fusion algorithm proposed can effectively connect redundant information and complementary information in multiple data, and estimate the real parameters of the measured object. In addition, data fusion brings great convenience to the design of control algorithms and controllers, and provides an effective basis for system simplification. Experiments have shown that dexmedetomidine is effective and safe in the operation of neurosurgical motor function, and the management of the recovery period is safe and effective. Based on the research, it can provide some reference for the awakening of patients undergoing neurosurgery, and promote the progress and development of medicine.

Past work has focused on the thermal properties of microscale/nanoscale suspended/supported graphene. However, for the thermal design of graphene-based devices, the thermal properties of giant-scale (~mm) graphene, which reflects the effect of grains, must also be investigated and are critical. In this work, the thermal conductivity variation with temperature of giant-scale chemical vapor decomposition (CVD) graphene supported by poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) is characterized using the differential transient electrothermal technique (diff-TET). Compared to the commonly used optothermal Raman technique, diff-TET employs joule heating as the heating source, a situation under which the temperature difference between optical phonons and acoustic phonons is eased. The thermal conductivity of single-layer graphene (SLG) supported by PMMA was measured as 743 ± 167 W/(m·K) and 287 ± 63 W/(m·K) at 296 K and 125 K, respectively. As temperature decreased from 296 K to 275 K, the thermal conductivity of graphene was decreased by 36.5%, which can be partly explained by compressive strain buildup in graphene due to the thermal expansion mismatch.

In the context of “Internet +” medical treatment, mobile health applications provide services for people in a new way, making it possible for people to carry out health management anytime and anywhere. According to the survey data, the most powerful consumers in the field of mobile health applications are those aged 24 to 35. Thus, it is particularly important to study the preferences of young people for mobile health applications. Therefore, this study established a domain-adaptive mobile health application evaluation model based on users' experience, and used an interactive algorithm combining machine learning and Delphi method to calculate the weight distribution of evaluation factors. Compared with previous studies, the evaluation index based on user experience of youth group is established. On the one hand, we have a targeted understanding of the use characteristics of the youth group and subdivide the market of mobile health applications; on the other hand, we establish evaluation indexes based on user experience, which is more in line with the customer-oriented product service concept. At the same time, the mobile health application evaluation system established in this study adopts human-computer interaction, which can not only ensure efficiency, but also add expertise in the field to make the results more accurate.

ObjectiveVitamin D plays an important role in bone and mineral metabolism. Ultraviolet B (UVB) is the primary determinant for vitamin D synthesis. However, population-based data of vitamin D status was sparse in areas with sunlight deprivation in China. This study aimed to assess serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] levels among adult women in Sichuan basin with the lowest sunlight radiation in China, and the associations with sunlight exposure and age.MethodsIn the context of the same ethnicity, similar latitude and lifestyle in sunlight-limited basin and sunlight-abundant plateau, 1,057 women in basin and 337 in plateau aged 29–95 years were included in this study, from November 2012 to February 2013. Daily sunlight exposure duration of previous month was obtained using questionnaires. Serum 25(OH)D was measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay.ResultsThe prevalence of vitamin D severe deficiency [25(OH)D

Several epidemiological studies reported that chronic arsenic exposure increased risk of prostate cancer. This study aimed to investigate whether chronic NaAsO2 exposure elevates stemness and chemoresistance in prostate cancer cells. DU145 (wild-type p53) and PC-3 (p53-null) cells were exposed to NaAsO2 (2 μmol/L) for 30 generations. IC50s to docetaxel and cisplatin were increased in NaAsO2-exposed DU145 and PC-3 cells. The number of tumor spheres was elevated in NaAsO2-exposed DU145 and PC-3 cells. Nanog, SOX-2 and ALDH1A1, three markers of cancer stemness, were upregulated in NaAsO2-exposed PC-3 spheres. Moreover, NaAsO2-exposed DU145 and PC-3 cells were arrested in G2/M phase. Histone H2AX phosphorylation on Ser139, an indicator for DNA double-strand break, was upregulated in NaAsO2-exposed DU145 and PC-3 cells. ATM phosphorylation on Ser1981, a key sensor of genotoxic stress, was rapidly elevated in NaAsO2-exposed DU145 cells. Phosphor-p53, a downstream molecule of ATM signaling, and p21, a direct target of p53, were upregulated in NaAsO2-exposed DU145 cells. Unexpectedly, p21 was also elevated in NaAsO2-exposed p53-null PC-3 cells. Antioxidant NAC alleviated NaAsO2-induced ATM phosphorylation, cell cycle arrest, and subsequent stemness enhancement and chemoresistance in both DU145 and PC-3 cells. These results suggest that ROS-mediated genotoxic stress is involved in NaAsO2-induced cell cycle arrest, stemness enhancement and chemoresistance of prostate cancer cells in a p53-independent manner.

The extremely small size of micro-/nanomaterials limits the application of conventional thermal measurement methods using a contact heating source or probing sensor. Therefore, non-contact thermal measurement methods are preferable in micro-/nanoscale thermal characterization. In this review, one of the non-contact thermal measurement methods, photothermal (PT) technique based on thermal radiation, is introduced. When subjected to laser heating with controllable modulation frequencies, surface thermal radiation carries fruitful information for thermal property determination. As thermal properties are closely related to the internal structure of materials, for micro-/nanomaterials, PT technique can measure not only thermal properties but also features in the micro-/nanostructure. Practical applications of PT technique in the thermal measurement of micro-/nanomaterials are then reviewed, including special wall-structure investigation in multiwall carbon nanotubes, porosity determination in nanomaterial assemblies, and the observation of amorphous/crystalline structure transformation in proteins in heat treatment. Furthermore, the limitations and future application extensions are discussed.

The rapid development of urbanization and population growth in China has posed a major threat to the green sustainable development of the ecological environment. However, the impact of urbanization on the eco-environmental quality (EEQ) in China remains to be developed. Understanding their interactive coupling mechanism is of great significance to achieve the urban sustainable development goals. By using multi-source remote sensing data and the coupling coordination degree model (CCDM), we intended to answer the question “What are the temporal and spatial characteristics of urbanization and EEQ in China on the pixel scale during 2000–2013, and what is the coupling mechanism between the urbanization and the EEQ?”. To answer these questions, we explored the coupling mechanism between urbanization and the EEQ in China with a combined mathematical and graphics model. The results show that the urbanization and the coupling coordination degree (CCD) of the whole region continually increased from 2000 to 2013, especially in the three major urban agglomerations, with a spatial distribution pattern that was “high in the east and low in the west”. Most importantly, from 2000 to 2013, the CCD type of cities in China gradually evolved from uncoordinated cities to coordinated cities. Additionally, the decisive factor affecting the CCD from 2000 to 2013 was the development of urbanization, and the degree at which urbanization had an impact on CCD was about 8.4 times larger than that of the EEQ. At the same time, the rapid urbanization that has occurred in some areas has led to a significant decline in the EEQ, thus indicating that China needs to increase its protection of the ecological environment while pursuing social and economic development in the future. This study makes up for the deficiencies in the existing literature and investigates the long-term coupling of the EEQ and urbanization in China, thereby providing a new research perspective for the sustainable development of China and even the world in the future.

This work documents the annealing effect on the thermal conductivity of nanotube film (CNTB) and carbon nanotube fiber (CNTF). The thermal properties of carbon nanotube samples are measured by using the transient electro-thermal (TET) technique, and the experimental phenomena are analyzed based on numerical simulation. During the current annealing treatment, CNTB1 always maintains the negative temperature coefficient of resistance (TCR), and its thermal diffusivity increases gradually. When the annealing current is 200 mA, it increases by 33.62%. However, with the increase of annealing current, the TCR of CNTB2 changes from positive to negative. The disparity between CNTB2 and CNTB1 suggests that they have different physical properties and even structures along their lengths. The high-level thermal diffusivity of CNTB2 and CNTF are 2.28–2.46 times and 1.65–3.85 times higher than the lower one. The results show that the decrease of the thermal diffusivity for CNTB2 and CNTF is mainly caused by enhanced Umklapp scattering, the high thermal resistance and torsional sliding during high temperature heating.

The G protein-coupled estrogen receptor (GPER) is a seven-transmembrane-domain receptor that mediates non-genomic estrogen related signaling. After ligand activation, GPER triggers multiple downstream pathways that exert diverse biological effects on the regulation of cell growth, migration and programmed cell death in a variety of tissues. A significant correlation between GPER and the progression of multiple cancers has likewise been reported. Therefore, a better understanding of the role GPER plays in cancer biology may lead to the identification of novel therapeutic targets, especially among estrogen-related cancers. Here, we review cell signaling and detail the functions of GPER in malignancies.

In this paper, the stabilization problem of nonholonomic chained-form systems is addressed with uncertain constants. In this paper, the active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) is designed to solve this problem. The proposed control strategy combines extended state observer (ESO) and adaptive sliding mode controller. The control of nonholonomic chained-form systems with dynamic nonlinear uncertain terms and uncertain constants is first discussed in this paper. In comparison with existing methods, the proposed method in this paper has better performance. It is proved that, with the application of the proposed control strategy, semiglobal finite-time stabilization of the systems is achieved. An example is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.