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Fungal phytopathogens cause significant reductions in agricultural yields annually, and overusing chemical fungicides for their control leads to environmental pollution and the emergence of resistant pathogens. Exploring natural isolates with strong antagonistic effects against pathogens can improve our understanding of their ecology and develop new treatments for the future. We isolated and characterized a novel bacterial strain associated with the species Burkholderia cenocepacia, termed APO9, which strongly inhibits Zymoseptoria tritici, a commercially important pathogenic fungus causing Septoria tritici blotch in wheat. Additionally, this strain exhibits inhibitory activity against four other phytopathogens. We found that physical contact plays a crucial role for APO9's antagonistic capacity. Genome sequencing of APO9 and biosynthetic gene cluster (BGC) analysis identified nine classes of BGCs and three types of secretion systems (types II, III, and IV), which may be involved in the inhibition of Z. tritici and other pathogens. To identify genes driving APO9's inhibitory activity, we screened a library containing 1,602 transposon mutants and identified five genes whose inactivation reduced inhibition efficiency. One such gene encodes for a diaminopimelate decarboxylase located in a terpenoid biosynthesis gene cluster. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that while some of these genes are also found across the Burkholderia genus, as well as in other Betaproteobacteria, the combination of these genes is unique to the Burkholderia cepacia complex. These findings suggest that the inhibitory capacity of APO9 is complex and not limited to a single mechanism, and may play a role in the interaction between various Burkholderia species and various phytopathogens within diverse plant ecosystems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A single-center retrospective study of G-band karyotyping and chromosomal microarray analysis (CMA) for the invasive prenatal diagnosis of 6159 fetuses with ultrasound abnormalities was conducted. This study aimed to investigate the incidence rates of chromosomal abnormalities and pregnancy outcomes and postpartum clinical manifestations by long-term follow-up and to explore the correlation between different types of prenatal ultrasound abnormalities and pathogenic chromosomal abnormalities. The overall incidence of pathogenic chromosomal aberrations in fetuses with ultrasound abnormalities was 7.58% (467/6159), which comprised 41.7% (195/467) with chromosome number abnormalities, 57.6% (269/467) with pathogenic copy-number variations (pCNVs), and 0.64% (3/467) with uniparental disomy (UPD). In addition, 1.72% (106/6159) with likely pathogenic copy-number variations (lpCNVs) and 3.04% (187/6159) with variants of unknown significance (VOUS) were detected by CMA. Ultrasound abnormalities were categorized into structural anomalies and soft marker anomalies. The incidence rate of pathogenic and likely pathogenic chromosomal abnormalities was significantly higher among fetuses with structural anomalies than soft markers (11.13% vs 7.59%, p < 0.01). We retrospectively analyzed the prenatal genetic outcomes for a large cohort of fetuses with different types of ultrasound abnormalities. The present study showed that the chromosomal abnormality rate and clinical outcomes of fetuses with different types of ultrasound abnormalities varied greatly. Our data have important implications for prenatal genetic counseling for fetuses with different types of ultrasound abnormalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ocular dominance (OD), a commonly used concept in clinical practice, plays an important role in optometry and refractive surgery. With the development of refractive cataract surgery, the refractive function of the intraocular lens determines the achievement of the postoperative full range of vision based on the retinal defocus blur suppression and binocular monovision principle. Therefore, OD plays an important role in cataract surgery. OD is related to the visual formation of the cerebral cortex, and its plasticity suggests that visual experience can influence the visual system. Cataract surgery changes the visual experience and transforms the dominant eye, which confirms the plasticity of the visual system. Based on the concept and mechanism of OD, this review summarizes the application of OD in cataract surgery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction of oxygen vacancies (OVs) into the heterogeneous catalysts is an efficient method to improve their catalytic activity for persulfate activation. The OVs-rich Zn x Cu 1-x Fe 2 O 4 nano-catalysts were synthesized by a facile co-precipitation method and analyzed using various characterization techniques (XRD, FE-SEM, EDS, BET surface area and XPS). OVs-rich Zn x Cu 1-x Fe 2 O 4 nano-catalysts exhibited a significantly higher catalytic activity for the removal of tetracycline (TC) by activating peroxydisulfate (PDS) than ZnFe 2 O 4 and CuFe 2 O 4 nano-catalyst. TC degradation efficiency in different Zn x Cu 1-x Fe 2 O 4 /PDS systems demonstrated that Zn 0.6 Cu 0.4 Fe 2 O 4 showed the best catalytic performance due to its highest OVs content, largest specific surface area and pore volume, and 90.09% of TC (20 mg/L) was degraded by Zn 0.6 Cu 0.4 Fe 2 O 4 with PDS after 60 min. Cu in-situ introduction can increase the amount of OVs in ZnFe 2 O 4 and affect the cross-occupancy of Zn and Fe, thus promoting the generation of the reactive oxygen species (ROS) in PDS-activated process; moreover, doped Cu can also act as an activation site for PDS and boost the formation of active Fe(Ⅱ). Mechanism study showed that all of ROS (1O 2 , O 2 •−, SO 4 •− and •OH) generated in Zn x Cu 1-x Fe 2 O 4 /PDS system simultaneously engaged in TC elimination, and 1O 2 played the main role. The probable TC degradation pathways in Zn 0.6 Cu 0.4 Fe 2 O 4 /PDS system were proposed. The practical application potential of magnetic Zn 0.6 Cu 0.4 Fe 2 O 4 nano-catalyst in the treatment of TC-contaminated wastewater was assessed by investigating the reusability of Zn 0.6 Cu 0.4 Fe 2 O 4 , the removal of TC in real water matrix and the toxicity of TC degradation intermediates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental information disclosure is critical avenue for stakeholders to gauge the fulfillment of corporate environmental responsibilities, as well as a key path for companies to gain social reputation and achieve sustainable development. To achieve both economic and social sustainability and improve the environmental information disclosure by private firms, this study delves into the impact mechanism and realization path of mixed ownership reform on environmental information disclosure among Chinese private enterprises listed between 2010 and 2020. Utilizing a panel fixed effect model, we scrutinize the interplay between state capital involvement and the disclosure of environmental information by private enterprises. Our findings reveal that state capital involvement may encourage private enterprises to disclose environmental information through resource allocation and governance improvements. The higher the shareholding ratio of state-owned participating shareholders, the more it helps private firms to disclose environmental information. State-owned shareholders play a pivotal role in the appointment of supervisors, directors, and executives, effectively improving corporate governance mechanisms and positively moderates how private companies with state-owned capital participate in disclosing environmental information. Moreover, the magnitude of media coverage and the public opinion pressure faced by private enterprises further amplify the influence of state-owned capital involvement on environmental information disclosure. Additionally, our research reveals that corporate profitability partially interplays with the effects of state-owned capital disclosure of environmental information by private companies. According to the research results, we recommend that the government proactively promote mixed ownership reform with private enterprises as the main participants, fully leveraging the resource advantages and influence of state-owned capital. At the same time, it is imperative to strengthen the governance effect of internal state-owned shareholders and external public opinion supervision in private enterprises. Enhancing profitability is also identified as a key driver for private enterprises to engage in more robust environmental information disclosure practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Line-of-sight (LOS) indoor optical wireless communications (OWC) enable a high data rate transmission while potentially suffering from optical channel obstructions. Additional LOS links using diversity techniques can tackle the received signal performance degradation, where channel gains often differ in multiple LOS channels. In this paper, a novel active transmitter detection scheme in spatial modulation (SM) is proposed to be incorporated with signal space diversity (SSD) technique to enable an increased OWC system throughput with an improved bit-error-rate (BER). This transmitter detection scheme is composed of a signal pre-distortion technique at the transmitter and a power-based statistical detection method at the receiver, which can address the problem of power-based transmitter detection in SM using carrierless amplitude and phase modulation waveforms with numerous signal levels. Experimental results show that, with the proposed transmitter detection scheme, SSD can be effectively provided with ~0.61 dB signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) improvement. Additionally, an improved data rate ~7.5 Gbit/s is expected due to effective transmitter detection in SM. The SSD performances at different constellation rotation angles and under different channel gain distributions are also investigated, respectively. The proposed scheme provides a practical solution to implement power-based SM and thus aids the SSD realization for improving system performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we aimed to assess the effect of diet ZEA on serum hormones, the location and expression of estrogen receptor ERα/β and progesterone receptor (PR) of the uterus in weaned piglets and to reveal the mechanism underneath. A total of 40 healthy weaned gilts were randomly allocated to basal diet supplemented with 0 (Control), 0.5 (ZEA0.5), 1.0 (ZEA1.0) and 1.5 (ZEA1.5) mg ZEA/kg and fed individually for 35 days. Meanwhile, the porcine endometrial epithelial cells (PECs) were incubated for 24 h with ZEA at 0 (Control), 5 (ZEA5), 20 (ZEA20) and 80 (ZEA80) μmol/L, respectively. The results showed that nutrient apparent digestibility (CP and GE), nutrient apparent availability (ME/GE, BV and NPU), the uterine immunoreactive integrated optic density (IOD), relative mRNA and protein expression of ER-α, ER-β and PR and the relative mRNA and protein expression of ER-α and ER-β in PECs all increased linearly (p < 0.05) with ZEA. Collectively, ZEA can interfere with the secretion of some reproductive hormones in the serum and promote the expression of estrogen/progesterone receptors in the uterus and PECs. All these indicate that ZEA may promote the development of the uterus in weaned gilts through estrogen receptor pathway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The volume of epicardial adipose tissue (EAT) is associated with an increased incidence of cardiovascular disease (CVD); however, only a few studies have examined its effect on the myocardial function of endurance in athletes. The association between the EAT and the variation of myocardial function is still unclear in amateur marathoners. Consequently, by using some sedentary individuals as the control, this study aims to evaluate the correlation between the EAT volume and the myocardial strain in the left and right ventricles of Chinese amateur marathoners by cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR). Methods: A total of 30 amateur marathoners were included as the exercise group and 20 sedentary people as a control group. All participants received the cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) to measure the left and right ventricular end-diastolic volume, end-systolic volume and volume index, stroke volume and index, cardiac output index, ejection fraction and myocardial mass, the EAT volume, global radial, circumferential, and longi-tudinal strains, and the strain rates of left and right ventricular myocardium. Results: There was a significant difference in the EAT volume (EATV) index between the exercise group and the control group (26.82±11.76ml/m2 vs 37.82±17.15ml/m2, P = 0.01). Results from the multivariate linear regression analysis showed that BMI (standardized β = 0.458; P < 0.001) had an independent positive correlation with the EATV index. The EATV index was negatively correlated with the left ventricular global radial strain (GRS) (r = -0.505; P = 0.004) in the exercise group, while it is negatively correlated with right ventricular GRS (r = -0.492; P = 0.027) and positively correlated with global longitudinal strain (GLS) (r = 0.601; P = 0.005) in the control group. In the exercise group, the multivariate linear regression analysis showed that the EATV index (standardized β = -0.429; P = 0.021) was an independent determinant of the left ventricular GRS, and being a male (standardized β = 0.396; P = 0.029) was an independent determinant of the right ventricular GLS. Conclusion: The EATV index is independently correlated with the left ventricular GRS in the amateur Chinese marathoners, also, the amateur marathon reduces the EATV index and increases the left ventricular myocardial mass, which consequently reduces the adverse effects on myocardial function. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) is a neuromuscular disease mainly caused by the absence of both copies of the survival motor neuron 1 (SMN1) gene. Multiple regions recommended population-wide SMA screening to quantify the copy number of SMN1. SMN1 diagnostic assays for the simplified procedure, high sensitivity, and throughput continue to be needed. Real-time PCR with high-resolution melting for the quantifying of the SMN1 gene exon 7 copies and exon 8 copies were established and confirmed by multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification (MLPA). The diagnosis of 2563 individuals, including SMA patients, suspected cases, and the general population, was tested by real-time PCR. The results were compared with the gold standard test MLPA. In this study, the homozygous and heterozygous deletions were detected by real-time PCR with a high-resolution melting method with an incidence of 10.18% and 2.26%, respectively. In addition, the R -value distribution (P > 0.05) among 8 replicates and the coefficient of variation (CV < 0.003) suggested that the real-time PCR screening test had high reproducibility. High concordance was obtained between real-time PCR with high-resolution melting and MLPA. The real-time PCR based on high-resolution melting provides a sensitive and high-throughput approach to large-scale SMA carrier screening with low cost and labor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Few-shot fine-grained visual classification aims to identify fine-grained concepts with very few samples, which is widely used in many fields, such as the classification of different species of birds in biological research, and the identification of car models in traffic monitoring. Compared with the common few-shot classification task, it encounters difficulties due to significant variations within each class and small gaps between different categories. To address such problems, previous studies primarily project support samples into the space of query samples and employ metric learning to classify query images into their respective categories. However, we observe that such methods are not effective in resolving inter-class variations. To overcome this limitation, we propose a new feature alignment method based on mutual mapping, which simultaneously considers the discriminative features of new samples and classes. Specifically, besides projecting support samples into the space of query samples for reducing intra-class variations, we also project query samples into the space of support samples to increase inter-class variations. Furthermore, a direct position self-reconstruction module is proposed to utilize the location information of objects and obtain more discriminative features. Extensive experiments on four fine-grained benchmarks demonstrate that our approach is competitive when compared with other state-of-the-art methods, in both 1-shot and 5-shot settings. In the case of 5-shot, our method achieved the best performance on all four datasets, with 92.11%, 85.31%, 96.09%, and 94.64% accuracies on CUB-200-2011, Stanford Dogs, Stanford Cars, and Aircaft, respectively. • A direct position self-reconstruction module is proposed to enhance features. • A mutual mapping method is used to handle inter-class and intra-class variations. • Spatial and channel mutual mappings are applied to get better feature alignment. • Extensive benchmark experiments demonstrate the superiority of our method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Owing to the rising incidence of disease in intensive farming, prophylactic antibiotics have often been used to avoid shrimp diseases and economic losses. However, the efficiency of prophylactic antibiotics is questionable, while the underlying mechanism is unclear. Here, we used the most aquacultured shrimp Litopenaeus vannamei as a model to interrogate the effect of prophylactic sarafloxacin hydrochloride (SAR) on susceptibility to Vibrio anguillarum (a pathogen that causes acute hepatopancreatic necrosis disease) infection. SAR exposure significantly retarded shrimp growth, and caused faster and higher mortality in response to subsequent V. anguillarum infection. In addition, SAR exposure disrupted the gut microbiota, including reduced diversity, altered structure, accelerated turnover rate, instabilized gut network, increased beta-dispersion, pathogenic potential and immune activity. In addition, SAR exposure increased the proportion of stochastic processes in controlling the gut microbiota, in parallel with attenuated homogenizing selection, which could compromise host selection on the invading pathogen. The functional pathways involved in carbohydrate metabolism, lipid metabolism and signal transduction remarkably increased in SAR exposure shrimp, which could be attributed to the allocation of energy to immunity in facing pathogen invasion. We screened 30 infection-discriminatory taxa after removal of the ontogenic changes in gut microbiota. Our diagnosis model correctly differentiated (84.8% overall accuracy) SAR exposure and/or infection in shrimp, with 83.3% accuracy at the onset of infection. Collectively, our findings provide soild evidence that prophylactic antibiotics induce shrimp disease susceptibility from an ecologcial viewpoint. • SAR exposure significantly retarded shrimp growth, and increased susceptibility to subsequent V. anguillarum infection. • SAR exposure disrupts the structure and predicted function of shrimp gut microbiota. • SAR exposure increased the stochasticity and destabilized network in shrimp gut microbiota. • The 30 infection-discriminatory taxa accurately diagnosed SAR exposure and/or infection, achieving an overall accuracy of 84.8%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Video-based dynamic facial emotion recognition (FER) is a challenging task, as one must capture and distinguish tiny facial movements representing emotional changes while ignoring the facial differences of different objects. Recent state-of-the-art studies have usually adopted more complex methods to solve this task, such as large-scale deep learning models or multimodal analysis with reference to multiple sub-models. According to the characteristics of the FER task and the shortcomings of existing methods, in this paper we propose a lightweight method and design three attention modules that can be flexibly inserted into the backbone network. The key information for the three dimensions of space, channel, and time is extracted by means of convolution layer, pooling layer, multi-layer perception (MLP), and other approaches, and attention weights are generated. By sharing parameters at the same level, the three modules do not add too many network parameters while enhancing the focus on specific areas of the face, effective feature information of static images, and key frames. The experimental results on CK+ and eNTERFACE'05 datasets show that this method can achieve higher accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The nuclear factor Y (NF-Y) gene family is an important transcription factor family consisting of three subfamilies, NF-YA, NF-YB and NF-YC, which are widely involved in plant growth and development, stress responses and other processes. In this study, we identified 64 members of the NF-Y gene family in the M. sativa L. (Xinjiang Daye) genome, including 11 MsNF-YAs, 33 MsNF-YBs and 20 MsNF-YCs. Analysis of conserved motifs indicated that each unit included unique compounds of motifs, although certain members lost some motifs. Conserved functional domain analysis showed that each subunit contained a specific set of functional domains. Analysis of cis-acting elements in the promoter region of the MsNF-Y genes identified a series of cis-acting elements associated with stress responses. In addition, the transcriptome data and qRT-PCR analysis showed that MsNF-Y genes were significantly induced or downregulated by alkali treatment. The results of this study may help to establish a basis for further cloning and functional studies of NF-Y genes in Medicago sativa and other related legume species. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traditional k-means algorithm measures the Euclidean distance between any two data points, but it is not applicable in many scenarios, such as the path information between two cities, or when there are some obstacles between two data points. To solve the problems, we propose a quantum k-means algorithm based on Manhattan distance (QKMM). The main two steps of the QKMM algorithm are calculating the distance between each training vector and k cluster centroids, and choosing the closest cluster centroid. The quantum circuit is designed, and the time complexity is O (log (N d) + 2 n + k) , where N is number of training vectors, d is number of features for each training vector, n is number of bits for each feature, and k is the number of clustering classes. Different from other quantum k-means algorithms, our algorithm has wide applications and reduces the complexity. Compared with classical k-means algorithm, our algorithm reaches quadratic speedup. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Architectured hierarchical porous materials exist widely in nature. Inspired by their unique mechanical and functional responses, extensive efforts have been made to develop architectured hierarchical porous metallic materials for specific industrial applications where fast mass transport and specific surface area are both critical, such as energy storage and catalysis. More specifically, the rapid development of additive manufacturing (AM) technologies has enabled the design and fabrication of a wide variety of architectured hierarchical porous metals in recent years. This review discusses the developments to date of AM-enabled hierarchical porous metals with or without the combination of other manufacturing processes. AM opens avenues for the creation of unprecedented hierarchical porous metals with novel properties or functionalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Three depolymerised polysaccharides were prepared through different methods. • The depolymerized SLPs exhibited higher antioxidant activity than the original SLP. • HV-SLP possessed the highest antioxidant activity of the three depolymerised fractions. • H2O2/Vc treatment is an effective method for preparing depolymerised SLP products. Polysaccharides (SLP) derived from Sparassis latifolia were depolymerised by ultrasonication, hydrochloric acid, and H 2 O 2 /Vc to obtain the depolymerised polysaccharides U-SLP, H-SLP, and HV-SLP, respectively. Results from X-ray powder diffraction, atomic force microscopy, Fourier-transfrom infrared spectroscopy, proton nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy indicated that the SLP were damaged to varying degrees by the three methods. The results showed that the three depolymerisation methods broke down the molecular chains, impeded aggregation, and reduced the molecular weight of the polysaccharides without changing their primary structure and monosaccharide composition of SLP. Relative to the original SLP, the depolymerised SLPs showed higher antioxidant activity during in vitro ABTS and reducing power assays. Also, the depolymerised SLPs could effectively improve the survival rate of zebrafish and reduce their heart rate, reactive oxygen species production, and cell death. The HV-SLP had the highest antioxidant activity of the three depolymerised fractions. The results revealed that the H 2 O 2 /Vc treatment is an effective method for preparing depolymerised SLP products with low molecular weights and dramatic antioxidant activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Pt@TiO2 was successfully prepared using Pt@MIL-125 as template. • Pt NPs were highly separated inside TiO2 rather than aggregated on the surface. • Photocatalytic H2 production activity for Pt@TiO2 was 6.4 times of it for Pt/TiO2. • The stability of Pt@TiO2 can main at ~ 98% after 5 cycles reactions. • Pt@TiO2 can provide more active sites and facilitate the charge utilization. Pt/TiO 2 , with traditional surface-loaded cocatalyst Pt, not only suffers from Pt aggregation, but also the problem of cocatalyst losing during photocatalytic reactions. Here, porous TiO 2 with embedded Pt (Pt@TiO 2) was successfully prepared via in situ hydrothermal reaction followed by calcination using Pt@MIL-125 as precursor. The characterizations showed that Pt nanoparticles (NPs) were highly isolated inside of TiO 2. The porous structure of TiO 2 can provide abundant pathways for the mass transfer. Photocatalytic hydrogen production reactions showed that Pt@TiO 2 reached to an activity of 4.389 mmol/h/g with the apparent quantum efficiency of 39% at 380 nm, which was 6.4 times that for Pt/TiO 2. Besides, Pt@TiO 2 could efficiently prevent Pt NPs from losing and exhibited a good stability compared with Pt/TiO 2. Dynamic characterizations indicated that the embedded Pt@TiO 2 not only provides more active sites of Pt, but also facilitate the charge utilization, which contribute to the excellent photocatalytic activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Silver nanowires (AgNWs), as one-dimensional nanometallic materials, have attracted wide attention due to the excellent electrical conductivity, transparency and flexibility, especially in flexible and stretchable electronics. However, the microscopic discontinuities require AgNWs be attached to some carrier for practical applications. Relative to the preparation method, how to integrate AgNWs into the flexible matrix is particularly important. In recent years, plenty of papers have been published on the preparation of conductors based on AgNWs, including printing techniques, coating techniques, vacuum filtration techniques, template-assisted assembly techniques, electrospinning techniques and gelating techniques. The aim of this review is to discuss different assembly method of AgNW-based conducting film and their advantages. Conducting films based on silver nanowires (AgNWs) have been reviewed with a focus on their assembly and their advantages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • We prepare Ti-(N) powders with core–shell structure for additive manufacturing. • Ti-(N) powders are synthesized by nitriding of Ti powders at 873–1373 K for 10 min. • Shell thickness increases exponentially with nitriding temperature. • Alloy samples are produced from Ti-(N) powders using laser melt deposition. • Fabricated alloy samples show high tensile strength and good tensile ductility. In this study, Ti-(N) powders with a core–shell structure were prepared via a nitriding process of titanium (Ti) powders for metal additive manufacturing (AM). Nitriding of spherical Ti powders (D 50 = 130 µm and D 50 = 63 µm) was carried out at different temperatures from 873 K to 1373 K for 10 min. The nitriding process enabled the manufacture of a core–shell-structured Ti-(N) powder, where an N-enriched shell surrounds a lower N core. The thickness of the N-rich Ti shell increases exponentially with increasing nitriding temperature. Depending on nitriding temperature, a shell layer consisting of Ti 2 N and TiN compounds can form. Based on X-ray diffraction (XRD) results, it was identified that the N-rich shell is composed of (i) only Ti(N) solid solution when nitrided below 1023 K; and (ii) Ti(N) solid solution, Ti 2 N and TiN compounds if nitrided at or above 1023 K. The core–shell-structured Ti-(N) powders were subsequently used to manufacture bulk samples by spark plasma sintering (SPS) and laser metal deposition (LMD) processes for comparison. The microstructure was characterized and discussed. LMD-fabricated Ti-N alloy samples exhibited high tensile strength (965 MPa) with good tensile ductility (7.6%) due to the homogeneous distribution of N and fine grain size. In contrast, SPS-fabricated Ti-N alloy samples using the same nitrided Ti-N powder showed much lower tensile strength (708 MPa) with essentially no tensile ductility (0.3%) due to the inhomogeneous distribution of N. LMD can allow the fabrication of strong and ductile Ti-N alloys while it is not possible by SPS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid growth of video and image technology, the binary classification of matrices has attracted much attention. In 2017, Duan et al. proposed a quantum algorithm for support matrix machines (QSMM) that efficiently addresses image classification problems. The QSMM consists of two core subroutines: an HHL algorithm and a quantum singularity threshold (QSVT) algorithm with complexities of O κ 3 ϵ - 3 log (N m n) and O log (m n) , respectively, where κ is the condition number of the corresponding matrix of the HHL algorithm, ϵ is the expected accuracy of the output state, N is the number of samples in the training set and mn is the size of the feature space. The QSMM achieves an exponential increase in speed over classical counterparts. However, we find that Duan's QSMM can be improved by applying an improved quantum matrix inversion (QMI) algorithm instead of the HHL algorithm. Compared with that of Duan's QSMM, the dependence on precision of our improved QSMM (IQSMM) is exponentially improved, and the complexity of our first subroutine is as low as O [ κ 2 log 1.5 (κ / ϵ) log (N m n) ] . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is closely associated with the triglyceride glucose (TyG) index and its related indicators, particularly its combination with obesity indices. However, there is limited research on the relationship between changes in TyG-related indices and CVD, as most studies have focused on baseline TyG-related indices. Methods: The data for this prospective cohort study were obtained from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study. The exposures were changes in TyG-related indices and cumulative TyG-related indices from 2012 to 2015. The K-means algorithm was used to classify changes in each TyG-related index into four classes (Class 1 to Class 4). Multivariate logistic regressions were used to evaluate the associations between the changes in TyG-related indices and the incidence of CVD. Results: In total, 3243 participants were included in this study, of whom 1761 (54.4%) were female, with a mean age of 57.62 years at baseline. Over a 5-year follow-up, 637 (19.6%) participants developed CVD. Fully adjusted logistic regression analyses revealed significant positive associations between changes in TyG-related indices, cumulative TyG-related indices and the incidence of CVD. Among these changes in TyG-related indices, changes in TyG-waist circumference (WC) showed the strongest association with incident CVD. Compared to the participants in Class 1 of changes in TyG-WC, the odds ratio (OR) for participants in Class 2 was 1.41 (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.08–1.84), the OR for participants in Class 3 was 1.54 (95% CI 1.15–2.07), and the OR for participants in Class 4 was 1.94 (95% CI 1.34–2.80). Moreover, cumulative TyG-WC exhibited the strongest association with incident CVD among cumulative TyG-related indices. Compared to the participants in Quartile 1 of cumulative TyG-WC, the OR for participants in Quartile 2 was 1.33 (95% CI 1.00–1.76), the OR for participants in Quartile 3 was 1.46 (95% CI 1.09–1.96), and the OR for participants in Quartile 4 was 1.79 (95% CI 1.30–2.47). Conclusions: Changes in TyG-related indices are independently associated with the risk of CVD. Changes in TyG-WC are expected to become more effective indicators for identifying individuals at a heightened risk of CVD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Alkaline salt is one of the most devastating environmental factors limiting alfalfa productivity, however, the mechanisms underlying adaptation of alfalfa to alkaline remain unclear. Our aim is to investigate proteomic and metabolomic differences in growth and root of alfalfa under alkaline salt in Rhizobium -alfalfa symbiotic relationships. Rhizobium -inoculated and non-inoculated alfalfa plants were treated with 200 mmol/L NaHCO 3 to investigate physiological, metabolic, and proteomic responses of root-nodule symbiosis under alkaline-induced stress, using an integrated approach combining metabolome and proteome analysis with measurements of physiological parameters. The improved tolerance to alkalinity was observed in RI-plants compared with NI-plants. RI-plants accumulated more proline and MDH, and had higher antioxidant activity and relatively high RWC but low MDA content and low Na+/K+ ratio. The stress-related genes (P5CS, GST13, H + -Ppase, NADP-Me, SDH , and CS) were actively upregulated in RI plants under alkaline stress. In RI-plants, damage caused by alkaline stress was mainly alleviated by decreasing oxidative damage, enhancing the organic acid and amino acid metabolic processes, and scavenging harmful ROS by activating the phenylpropanoid biosynthetic pathway. We revealed distinct proteins and metabolites related to alkali tolerance in RI-plants compared to NI-plants. Alkali tolerance of rhizobia-inoculated alfalfa was enhanced by altered proteins and metabolic processes as well as decreased oxidative damage. • RI alfalfa showed better alkali tolerance than that of NI. • Distinct proteins and metabolites related to alkali tolerance were in RI-plants. • Alkali-responsive mechanisms might be consequence of complex regulatory mechanisms. • An active reprogramming of gene expression, proteome, and metabolome is important. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

UAV sampling can not only adapt to various complex terrain environments but also provide a broader vision. However, images captured by UAVs usually contain complex backgrounds and a large number of small objects. This poses a significant challenge to some existing advanced object detectors. Moreover, some existing state-of-the-art lightweight detectors have too many parameters and computational overheads, which are not friendly to lightweight devices. Responding to the above issues, we propose a single-stage detector named features enhancement and shift lightweight network in this work. Firstly, a lightweight adjust convolution is proposed, which unfolds the features and encodes the 3 × 3 background information into information-rich 1 × 1 features by averaging the pooling and convolution layers, which efficiently enhances the representation of 1 × 1 convolutional extracted features. Next, to efficiently suppress complex background information, we propose a three-dimensions attention module, which interacts information on the C-W, C-H and H-W dimensions in a unique way to obtain three efficient attention maps that highlight important information to weaken irrelevant information. Moreover, we create a novel receptive-field feature enhancement convolution, which unfolds the features and then interacts the 3 × 3 features to obtain weighted weights. The 3 × 3 convolution combining weighted features becomes parametric unshared convolution in principle, which enhances the ability to capture detailed information. Finally, in order to retain richer object and semantic information, we carefully analyze the down-sampling convolution and propose a feature shift down-sampling convolution. Then we combine it and improve Neck to get a new lightweight Neck. Furthermore, experiments on the VisDrone-DET2021 dataset show that our method obtained 36.21% on mAP50, which is 9.78% higher than the baseline model YOLOv5n. Meanwhile, compared with the advanced lightweight networks YOLOX-tiny, YOLOv6n, YOLOv7-tiny, and YOLOv8n, our network achieves superior detection results using fewer number of parameters. We also compare our network with the latest networks trained on images captured by UAVs, and experimentally demonstrate that our network achieves excellent performance using only 1.7 M parameters and 8.3 GFLOPS. • A lightweight adjustment convolution is proposed, which can improve the extracted benefit of the current feature. • An effective three dimensions attention module is proposed that focus on more detail information. • A feature shift down-sampling convolution is proposed, which compensates for the information loss of network. • An efficient receptive-field feature enhancement convolution is designed. It can be seen as a novel convolutional operation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The content of CuO x NPs can regulate the environmental transition of the active site of the photocatalytic reaction (HER or CO 2 RR). • The well dispersed CuO x NPs in CuO x @TiO 2 with lower content can provide plentiful active sites for H + reduction. • Sufficient loading of CuO x in CuO x @TiO 2 can provide well electron transfer pathways to generate the multi-electron environment for CO 2 RR. Cocatalyst act as the active site usually plays an important role in both photocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and carbon dioxide reduction reaction (CO 2 RR). As the size, distribution, location, contact behavior with semiconductor etc. show significant effects for the activity. In this work, the active site environment (aggregation state of the active site of the cocatalyst) was modulated by locating the different amounts of CuO x nanoparticles (NPs) into the porous TiO 2 (CuO x @TiO 2), which was achieved by calcination of Cu@MIL-125 as the precursor. The composition, morphology, and chemical state of the catalyst were analyzed by a series of characterization methods. The results showed that the embedded CuO x NPs exhibited obviously better dispersion than the externally supported ones, especially at the high loading amount. Cu NPs totally transformed to CuO at the lower loading amount, while it transformed to CuO x with partial Cu (I) species existence at the higher loading amount. Photocatalytic reactions showed that the activity of CuO x @TiO 2 was ∼ twice that of the traditional outside loading catalyst CuO x /TiO 2 in both HER and CO 2 RR. The high HER activity was obtained at relatively lower loading capacity (0.200 wt%∼0.500 wt%), while CO 2 RR was the advantageous reaction at higher loading capacity (5.000∼15.000 wt%). Apparently, CuO x @TiO 2 offered a quite different active site environment for the two type of reactions. The embedded structure can provide highly dispersed single active sites for HER at lower loading capacity, while it facilitates the formation of multi-electron environment under irradiation for CO 2 RR at higher loading capacity. The construction of an appropriate active center environment determines the occurrence of high-efficiency photocatalytic reactions. [Display omitted] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The sulfite reductase gene in Medicago sativa L. (MsSiR) encodes sulfite reductase (SiR) and catalyses the conversion of sulfite to sulfate in the sulfite assimilation pathway. In this study, we investigated the role of MsSiR in alfalfa by generating transgenic alfalfa that ectopically expressed MsSiR under the control of the CaMV35S promoter. The differences in alkali tolerance between the MsSiR -overexpressing and wild-type (WT) plants were analyzed, and the MsSiR -overexpressing plants exhibited an improved phenotype under alkali stress. Compared to WT plants, these plants demonstrated improved antioxidant activity as well as decreased H 2 O 2 and O 2 − contents and increased glutathione reduced (GSH), Cysteine (Cys) and glutathione oxidized (GSSG) contents. MsSiR -overexpressing plants also exhibited high levels of adenosyl phosphosulfate reductases (APR), sulfite oxidase (SO) and MsSiR expression under alkali stress. It was speculated that MsSiR is involved in sulfur metabolism pathways, including the stabilization of sulfate and sulfite levels and the synthesis of GSH. These two processes achieve alkali tolerance by positively regulating the detoxification and antioxidant activities of alfalfa. • Under alkali stress MsSiR stabilizes sulfite and sulfate and promote cysteine synthesis as well as increasing glutathione content. • A functional model diagram of the MsSiR response to alkali stress was constructed. • Overexpression of MsSiR plays an important role in promoting the development of grass industry and animal husbandry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Postpartum depression (PPD) is a common mental disease happens in perinatal period. Ketamine as an anesthesia and analgesia drug has been used for a long time. In recent years, ketamine is proved to have an antidepression effect with a single administration. We hypothesized that intraoperative ketamine can reduce postpartum depressive symptoms after cesarean delivery. Methods: In a randomized, double‐blind, placebo‐controlled study trail, healthy women scheduled for cesarean delivery were randomly assigned to receive intravenous ketamine (0.25 mg/kg diluted to 5 ml with 0.9% saline) or placebo (5 ml of 0.9% saline) within 5 min following clamping of the neonatal umbilical cord. The primary outcome was the degree of postpartum depressive symptoms, which was evaluated by Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS, a threshold of 9/10 was used) at 1 week, 2 weeks, and 1 month after delivery. The secondary outcome was the numerical rating scale (NRS) score of pain at 2 days postpartum. This trail is registered in the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry, number ChiCTR1900022464. Results: Between 26 January 2019 and 15 July 2019, 502 subjects were screened and 330 were randomly allocated: 165 (50%) to the ketamine group and 165 (50%) to the placebo group. There were significant differences in the degree of postpartum depressive symptoms between subjects in the ketamine group and the placebo group at 1 week postpartum (13.1% vs. 22.6%, respectively; p =.029). However, no difference was found between subjects in the two groups at 2 weeks (11.8% vs. 16.8%, respectively; p =.209) and 1 month postpartum (10.5% vs. 14.2%, respectively; p =.319). The NRS score of wound pain (3.0 ± 0.9 vs. 4.0 ± 1.0, respectively; p <.001) and uterine contraction pain (3.0 ± 0.9 vs. 4.1 ± 0.9, respectively; p <.001) was lower in the ketamine group at 2 days postpartum compared with placebo group. The prevalence of headache, hallucination, and dizziness was higher in the ketamine group than the placebo group during the operation. Conclusions: Operative intravenous ketamine (0.25 mg/kg) can reduce the postpartum depressive symptoms for 1 week. The long‐time effect is remained to be seen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many studies show either the absence, or very low levels of, SARS-CoV-2 viral RNA and/or antigen in the brain of COVID-19 patients. Reports consistently indicate an abortive infection phenomenon in nervous cells despite the fact that they contain the SARS-CoV-2 receptor, ACE2. Dopamine levels in different brain regions are in the range of micromolar to millimolar concentrations. We have shown that sub-micromolar to low micromolar concentrations of dopamine or its precursor (levodopa) time- and dose-dependently inhibit the activity of SARS-CoV-2 main protease (Mpro), which is vital for the viral life cycle, by forming a quinoprotein. Thiol detection coupled with the assessment of Mpro activity suggests that among the 12 cysteinyl thiols, the active site, Cys145-SH, is preferentially conjugated to the quinone derived from the oxidation of dopamine or levodopa. LC-MS/MS analyses show that the Cys145-SH is covalently conjugated by dopamine- or levodopa- o -quinone. These findings help explain why SARS-CoV-2 causes inefficient replication in many nerve cell lines. It is well recognized that inhaled pulmonary drug delivery is the most robust therapy pathway for lung diseases. CVT-301 (orally inhaled levodopa) was approved by the FDA as a drug for Parkinson's patients prior to the outbreak of COVID-19 in 2018. Based on the fact that SARS-CoV-2 causes inefficient replication in the CNS with abundant endogenous Mpro inhibitor in addition to the current finding that levodopa has an Mpro-inhibitory effect somewhat stronger than dopamine, we should urgently investigate the use of CVT-301 as a lung-targeting, COVID-19, Mpro inhibitor. [Display omitted] • The reason SARS-CoV-2 fails to cause productive infection in many nerve cell lines is unclear. • Neurons are rich in dopamine which inhibits Mpro by forming a quinoprotein. • Dopamine- o -quinone preferentially reacts with the active site, Cys145-SH, of 12 Mpro cysteinyl thiols. • The dopamine precursor, levodopa, exhibits an inhibitory effect stronger than that of dopamine itself. • Orally inhaled levodopa (the FDA-approved CVT-301) could be repurposed as an Mpro-inhibitor of COVID-19 that targets the lung. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Abdominal surgery is common and is associated with severe postoperative pain. The transverse abdominal plane (TAP) block is considered an effective means for pain control in such cases. The quadratus lumborum (QL) block is another option for the management of postoperative pain. The aim of this study was to conduct a meta-analysis and thereby evaluate the efficacy and safety of QL blocks and TAP blocks for pain management after abdominal surgery. Methods: We comprehensively searched PubMed, EMBASE, EBSCO, the Cochrane Library, Web of Science and CNKI for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that compared QL blocks and TAP blocks for pain management in patients undergoing abdominal surgery. All of the data were screened and evaluated by two researchers. RevMan5.3 was adopted for the meta-analysis. Results: A total of 8 RCTs involving 564 patients were included. The meta-analysis showed statistically significant differences between the two groups with respect to postoperative pain scores at 2 h (standardized mean difference [Std.MD] = − 1.76; 95% confidence interval [CI] = − 2.63 to − 0.89; p <.001), 4 h (Std.MD = -0.77; 95% CI = -1.36 to − 0.18; p =.01),6 h (Std.MD = -1.24; 95% CI = -2.31 to − 0.17; p =.02),12 h (Std.MD = -0.70; 95% CI = -1.27 to − 0.13; p =.02) and 24 h (Std.MD = -0.65; 95% CI = -1.29 to − 0.02; p =.04); postoperative morphine consumption at 24 h (Std.MD = -1.39; 95% CI = -1.83 to − 0.95; p <.001); and duration of postoperative analgesia (Std.MD = 2.30; 95% CI = 1.85 to 2.75; p <.001). There was no statistically significant difference between the two groups with regard to the incidence of postoperative nausea and vomiting (PONV) (RR = 0.55;95% CI = 0.27 to 1.14;p = 0.11). Conclusion: The QL block provides better pain management with less opioid consumption than the TAP block after abdominal surgery. In addition, there are no differences between the TAP block and QL block with respect to PONV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new ortho-dimethylaminomethylphenyl-tetramethylcyclopentadienyl ligand C5Me4H-C6H4-o-CH2NMe2 (HL) and a series of rare-earth metal complexes bearing this ligand were synthesized. Of these complexes, two binuclear alkyl complexes [(C5Me4-C6H4-o-CH2N(Me)CH2-μ)Ln(CH2SiMe3)]2 (Ln = Sc (1a) and Y (1b)) were obtained from the alkane elimination reaction of the free ligand with Ln(CH2SiMe3)3(THF)2, followed by an intramolecular C–H activation process of a NMe group in the ligand with a CH2SiMe3 group, two binuclear dichloro complexes (C5Me4-C6H4-o-CH2NMe2)2Y2Cl4[LiCl(THF)2] (2a) and [(C5Me4-C6H4-o-CH2NMe2)LuCl(μ-Cl)]2 (2b) were synthesized by the reaction of anhydrous yttrium or lutetium trichloride with the lithium salt of the ligand LiL, and the binuclear bis(borohydrido) complexes [(C5Me4-C6H4-o-CH2NMe2)Ln(μ-BH4)BH4]2 (Ln = Sm (3a) and Nd (3b)) were synthesized by the reaction of Ln(BH4)3(THF)3 (Ln = Sm and Nd) with the lithium salt of the ligand. The molecular structures of all complexes 1a, 1b, 2a, 2b, 3a and 3b were determined by single-crystal X-ray crystallography. Upon activation with AlR3/Ph3CB(C6F5)4, MAO or MMAO, the binuclear alkyl complexes 1a and 1b show good catalytic activity for isoprene cis-1,4 enriched regioselective polymerization and moderate catalytic activity for 1-hexene polymerization. Complexes 3a and 3b were studied as catalysts for methyl methacrylate polymerization reaction under different conditions and were found to show moderate to high catalytic activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A number of new sulfur-bridged tridentate [OSO] bisphenolato-based ligand precursors S(2-CH2-4-tBu-6-R-C6H2OH)2 [R = CMe3 (H2L1), CMe2Ph (H2L2), CMePh2 (H2L3), CPh3 (H2L4), and C(p-Tol)3 (H2L5)] were synthesized by reactions of Na2S·9H2O with 2 eq. of the corresponding 2-(bromomethyl)-4-(tert-butyl)-6-R-phenol. Their neutral titanium complexes [S(2-CH2-4-tBu-6-R-C6H2O)2]TiCl2 [R = CMe3 (1), CMe2Ph (2), CMePh2 (3), CPh3 (4), and C(p-Tol)3 (5)] were synthesized in high yields by direct HCl-elimination reactions of TiCl4 with the corresponding ligand precursors in toluene. Ionic titanium complexes [NHEt3][S(2-CH2-4-tBu-6-R-C6H2O)2TiCl3] [R = CMe3 (6), CMePh2 (7)] and [NH2Et2][S(2-CH2-4-tBu-6-R-C6H2O)2TiCl3] [R = CMe3 (8) and CMePh2 (9)] were obtained in high yields from the reactions of TiCl4 with the corresponding ligand precursors in the presence of 2 eq. of triethylamine or diethylamine. Neutral zirconium complexes [S(2-CH2-4-tBu-6-R-C6H2O)2]ZrCl2(THF) [R = CMe2Ph (10·THF), and CMePh2 (11·THF)] were synthesized by reactions of ZrCl4 with 1 eq. of the dilithium salt of the corresponding ligand precursors Li2L in THF. The new titanium and zirconium complexes were characterized by 1H and 13C NMR, IR and elemental analyses. The molecular structures of complexes 4, 6 and 10·THF were determined by single-crystal X-ray diffraction analysis. The X-ray crystallography analysis reveals that titanium complex 4 has a five-coordinating environment surrounding the central metal atom, while the titanium complex 6 and the THF-solvated zirconium complex 10·THF possess a six-coordinating pseudo-octahedral environment around the central metal atom. Upon activation with MAO or AliBu3/Ph3CB(C6F5)4, all these titanium and zirconium complexes exhibit moderate to high catalytic activities for ethylene polymerization and ethylene/1-hexene copolymerization with moderate to high comonomer incorporation, and the ionic titanium complexes 6, 7, 8 and 9 show lower catalytic activity than their corresponding neutral complexes under similar conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pre-diffusion grain boundary strategy was proposed to fabricate die-upset Nd-Fe-B magnets with excellent magnetic properties. Microstructure modification of die-upset magnets played a key role in determining the magnetic properties. The effective coercivity enhancement of die-upset magnets through pre-diffusion process was enhanced from 0.076 T/wt%Pr to 0.114 T/wt%Pr with a slight remanence loss. Driven by heat, the Pr–Cu eutectic alloys were diffused into melt-spun ribbons with weakened exchange couple of matrix phase, which led to enhanced coercivity. The uniform distribution of intergranular phase was obtained in die-upset magnet with pre-diffusion process and the remanence reduction was limited with a high squareness factor. Microstructure analysis confirmed that the pre-diffusion process suppressed the longitudinal/lateral ratio of platelet-shaped grains and grain growth in die-upset process. Simultaneously, the pre-diffusion process facilitated the formation of continuous and uniform grain boundaries (GBs). The grain size was distributed over a narrow range of value with similar local critical nucleation field, which resulted in the improved squareness. The thick and continuous intergranular phase strengthened the magnetic isolation between neighboring Nd 2 Fe 14 B phases and offered more "pinning" sites for domain wall shift. The modified structure hindered the nucleation and spread of reverse domains in a low magnetic field in favor of the coercivity enhancement. The view-direct time-dependent behavior of reverse magnetic domains indicated that the coercivity mechanism for die-upset magnet was a combination of "pinning" effect and nucleation model. Image 1 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Adolescents' mental health literacy is a topic of growing interest and studies have begun to explore the factors that influence adolescents' mental health literacy. This study investigated the relationship between parents' mental health literacy and adolescents' mental health literacy, as well as the mediating roles of parent-child relationship, and the moderating roles of school mental health service. Methods: Questionnaires were distributed to adolescents and their parents at two time points with an interval of one month. In the first survey, 835 parents completed a mental health literacy scale and a parent-child relationship scale. In the second, 841 adolescents completed a school mental health service questionnaire and an adolescent mental health literacy assessment questionnaire. A total of 617 paired data points were matched (parents' age: M = 40.47, SD = 5.10; adolescents' age: M = 13.34, SD = 0.99). Results: Bootstrapping results showed that parents' mental health literacy was positively associated with adolescents' mental health literacy. In addition, parent-child intimacy mediated the relationship between parents' mental health literacy and adolescents' mental health literacy. School mental health service moderated the relationship between parents' mental health literacy and parent-child intimacy and adolescents' mental health literacy. Conclusion: Intergenerational transmission of mental health literacy from parents to adolescents and its conditions were revealed. These findings provide new insights for the intervention of adolescents' mental health literacy, and may lead future research to investigate the role of parents within the family context, as well as the influence of home-school cooperation on adolescents' mental health literacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of new half-sandwich secondary amine-coordinated dichlorochromium complexes chelated by 2-(tetramethylcyclopentadienyl)benzylamine ligands, 2-Me4CpC6H4CH2(R)NHCrCl2 [R = iPr (1), Cy (2), Ph (3), 4-MePh (4), 2,6-Me2Ph (5), 2,6-Et2Ph (6)], have been synthesized from the reactions of CrCl3(THF)3 with the dilithium salts of the corresponding ligands in THF, followed by the addition of 1/2 eq. of H2O to the reaction mixtures. The isolated yields of the chromium complexes were found to increase with the increase in the amount of H2O introduced and reach the highest values (66–76%) when 1/2 eq. of H2O is added. Attempts to isolate the 2-(tetramethylcyclopentadienyl)benzylamidochromium complexes, 2-Me4CpC6H4CH2(R)NCrCl, were not successful. The new dichlorochromium complexes were characterized by IR, 1H NMR, EPR, and UV/Vis spectroscopy and elemental analyses, and the molecular structures of complexes 1, 5 and 6 were determined by X-ray crystallography. The X-ray crystallographic analysis reveals that these chromium complexes possess a three-legged piano-stool geometry with the amine N atom in a mitered six-membered chelating ring and the two chloride atoms as the legs. Upon activation with AlR3 and Ph3CB(C6F5)4, complexes 1–6 exhibit reasonable catalytic activity for ethylene polymerization and copolymerization with 1-hexene, producing polyethylenes with moderate to high molecular weights and poly(ethylene-co-1-hexene)s with moderate comonomer incorporation which are typical linear low-density polyethylenes (LLDPE). Complex 4 was found to show higher catalytic activity for ethylene homo- and co-polymerization than other complexes under similar conditions, while complex 3 produced poly(ethylene-co-1-hexene)s with the highest comonomer incorporation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Nano- to submicron-sized process provides a way to optimize microstructure of HDDR powders. • The uniform Nd-rich phase distribution could effectively optimize the deformation ability. • The coercivity was increased from 1.18 T to 1.37 T for die-upset magnet with NSG HDDR powders. • The remanence was increased from 1.1 T to 1.25 T for die-upset magnet with NSG HDDR powders. Abstract Nano-crystalline and micron-crystalline Nd-Fe-B powders were employed to hydrogenation-disproportionation-desorption-recombination (HDDR) process to investigate the structural factors of deformation ability in HDDR powders. It was found that the deformation ability and magnetic properties of the final die-upset magnet were optimized significantly by nano-crystalline powders. Structure investigation shows that the variations in coercivity and deformation ability were attributed to the Nd-rich phase distribution in HDDR powders. Meanwhile, enhancement of remanence and squareness indicated the uniform distribution of Nd-rich phase and the narrow grain size distribution by using nano-sized crystalline powders were in favor of c-axis alignment of 2:14:1 phase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Graphical abstract Highlights • This strategy offers a new approach for the radical dithiolation of alkynes. • Extremely low catalyst loading of both catalysts was required. • Au catalyst helped to initiate the reaction and deliver better stereoselectivity. • Features of this reaction include excellent stereoselectivity and atom economy. Abstract We report a gold and photoredox combined radical approach for the rapid synthesis of thio-functionalized vinylsulfones from alkynes. Key features of this method include very mild conditions, broad substrate scope, excellent regio- and stereoselectivties, and 100% atom economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LC3 is a key autophagy‐related protein involved in both autophagosome formation and autophagy cargo recruitment. Despite these functions being exerted by deacetylated LC3, this protein is more abundantly distributed in its acetylated form. Here, we reveal that the stability and cargo recognition ability of LC3 are highly dependent on its acetylation. Through detecting the diffusion rate of soluble LC3 by fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP), we found that nutrient‐state‐related acetylation inhibited LC3 complex formation. Acetylation blocked LC3's interaction with p62, the autophagic cargo receptor, preventing the mis‐targeting of p62 to nonautophagic LC3 and thus permitting the efficient degradation of autophagic cargoes. Acetylation also inhibited LC3 proteasome‐dependent degradation, thus maintaining LC3 as a long‐lived protein that could serve as a reserve. Altogether, acetylated LC3, the nonactivated form, is suitable for storage and avoids inopportune interactions with other proteins, assuring autophagic degradation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • The improved magnetic properties of HDDR powders were obtained by optimizing the Nd-rich phase distribution of ingot powders. • The coercivity of HP magnets still could be improved with the addition of Pr-Cu eutectic alloys. • The effect of Pr-Cu addition on coercivity of Nd-Fe-B HDDR magnets was clarified. Abstract The effect on the Nd-rich phase distribution of the ingot for hydrogenation-disproportionation-desorption-recombination (HDDR) powders was studied. Coercivity of HDDR powders was elevated to 1.64 T by crushing the ingot into particles and annealing at 800 °C for 18 h. HDDR processed Nd-Fe-B powders blended with Pr-Cu powders and annealed at 580 °C for 3 h were hot-pressed to obtain fully dense magnets. The microstructure evolution in hot-pressed HDDR magnets proved the impact of Pr-Cu diffusion on coercivity that the coercivity of hot-pressed magnets was improved to 1.55 T significantly. Backscatter electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy observations revealed that the variation in coercivity owing to the diffusion of Pr-Cu along the grain boundary with heat treatment. L-TEM images illustrated the thicker grain boundary layer can pin the motion of the domain wall more effectively, resulting in a higher coercivity in HP magnets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Anthocyanin pigments play many roles in plants, including providing protection against biotic and abiotic stresses. To identify new regulatory genes in apple (Malus domestica) that may be involved in regulating low temperature induced anthocyanin biosynthesis, we performed RNA-seq analysis of leaves from the ‘Gala’ apple cultivar following exposure to a low temperature (16 °C). A visible red color appeared on the upper leaves and the anthocyanin content increased significantly after the low temperature treatment. Genes from the flavonoid biosynthesis pathway were significantly enriched among the differentially expressed genes, and the expression of several transcription factors was shown by WGCNA (weighted gene co-expression network analysis) to correlate with anthocyanin accumulation, including members of the MYB, MADS, WRKY, WD40, Zinc Finger and HB-ZIP families. Three MYB transcription factors (MdMYB12, MdMYB22 and MdMYB114), which had several CBF/DREB response elements in their promoters, were significantly induced by low temperature exposure and their expression also correlated highly with anthocyanin accumulation. We hypothesize that they may act as regulators of anthocyanin biosynthesis and be regulated by CBF/DREB transcription factors in apple leaves under low temperature conditions. The analyses presented here provide insights into the molecular mechanisms underlying anthocyanin accumulation during low temperature exposure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • The ADP algorithm of actor-critic networks is used to deal with the decentralized reliable guaranteed cost control problem of large-scale nonlinear systems with mismatched interconnection and time-varying actuator fault. • A novel relationship of the control policy between isolated system and original system with interconnection and actuator faults, is constructed. • The considered reliable guaranteed cost control problem is transformed into design an optimal control strategy of the isolated system. Abstract In this paper, the decentralized reliable guaranteed cost control problem of large-scale nonlinear systems with mismatched interconnection and time-varying actuator fault is investigated. The unknown actuator fault is assumed to be with known upper bounds. Under the case that the interconnection term is unknown and mismatched, the guaranteed cost control problem for a class of large-scale nonlinear systems can be transformed into design an optimal control strategy of the isolated system, which is necessary to solve the HJB (Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman) equations by using adaptive dynamic programming (ADP) of actor-critic networks. The convergence property of the neural network weights and the stability of the closed-loop system have been strictly proved even if time-varying actuator faults and unknown interconnection coexist. Finally, simulation examples are given to show the effectiveness of the proposed approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies explored the relationship between negative perfectionism and parental burnout, but the impact of positive perfectionism on parental burnout remains largely unknown. This study examined the effects of positive and negative perfectionism on mothers' parental burnout, the mediating roles of parenting stress, and the moderating roles of fathers' co-parenting behavior. We collected data at three different time points and administered questionnaires to 507 mothers of adolescents. At Time 1, mothers reported their perfectionism and paternal co-parenting behavior. At Time 2, mothers reported parenting stress. At Time 3, mothers reported parental burnout. We found that parental burnout was positively correlated with negative perfectionism and negatively correlated with positive perfectionism. The above relationships were mediated by parenting stress. Paternal co-parenting behavior moderated the relationship between negative perfectionism and parenting stress. Mothers should be made aware of the different effects of positive perfectionism and negative perfectionism on parental burnout. Communication with their spouses regarding parenting behavior should be enhanced, while mothers' access to practical external resources against parental burnout should be facilitated. • Perfectionistic concerns were positively correlated with parental burnout. • Perfectionist striving was negatively correlated with parental burnout. • Parenting stress mediated between perfectionist concerns and parental burnout. • Paternal co-parenting moderated perfectionistic concerns and parenting stress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The Gibson-Ashby model is only applicable to low-density lattices with strut length-to-diameter ratios greater than 5. • Metal lattices with strut length-to-diameter ratios less than 5 undergo simultaneous bending-stretching-shear deformation. • Lattice mechanical property models are derived for simultaneous bending-stretching-shear deformation. • Three topological strategies are proposed to markedly improve lattice mechanical properties. The Gibson-Ashby (G-A) model has been instrumental in the design of additively manufactured (AM-ed) metal lattice materials or mechanical metamaterials. The first part of this work reviews the proposition and formulation of the G-A model and emphasizes that the G-A model is only applicable to low-density lattice materials with strut length-to-diameter ratios greater than 5. The second part evaluates the applicability of the G-A model to AM-ed metal lattice materials and reveals the fundamental disconnections between them. The third part assesses the deformation mechanisms of AM-ed metal lattices in relation to their strut length-to-diameter ratios and identifies that AM-ed metal lattices deform by concurrent bending, stretching, and shear, rather than just stretching or bending considered by the G-A model. Consequently, mechanical property models coupling stretching, bending and shear deformation mechanisms are developed for various lattice materials, which show high congruence with experimental data. The last part discusses new insights obtained from these remedies into the design of strong and stiff metal lattices. In particular, we recommend that the use of inclined struts be avoided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Geographical origin discrimination of agricultural products is essential to guarantee food safety and fair trade. Lentinula edodes (Shiitake mushroom) samples cultivated in three major production regions in China were characterized using stable isotopes (δ 13C, δ 2H, δ 18O, δ 15N, and δ 34S) and elemental contents (%C, %N, %S, %protein and C/N ratios). Results showed that 9 of 10 analyzed Shiitake variables had significant differences among production regions. Due to the arid/dry climate and a large day-night alternating temperature difference, the protein content of L. edodes in northeast China is higher than in northern and southeast China. Sulfur isotopes (δ 34S) are useful indicators of origin for L. edodes in China and to evaluate its protein quality. Hydrogen and oxygen isotopes (δ 2H and δ 18O) are most effective for regional discrimination. Two PLS-DA(partial least-squares discriminate analysis) models were developed; one using only five stable isotopes (Model 1) and the other using five stable isotopes and three elemental contents (Model 2), respectively. Model 2 had a discrimination accuracy of 95.2%, which was higher 10% than Model 1. Chemometric classification models using chemical elements and multi-isotopes provide a useful method to authenticate Chinese Shiitake origins. • 9 analyzed Shiitake variables had significant differences among production regions. • The protein content of Shiitake mushroom in northeast China is higher than in northern and southeast China. • δ 34S are useful indicators of origin for L. edodes in China and to evaluate its protein quality. • The PLS-DA models using 8 elements provide a useful method to authenticate Chinese Shiitake origins. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Doping heteroatoms into the skeletons of parent acenes can provide more opportunities to construct novel thermally and photostable organic π‐conjugated semiconductors. Herein, a family of diazole‐decorated acenes (APyS and APySe) and azaacenes (PyP, PyTh, PyPy, PyPh, and PyAP) have been successfully synthesized through the classical reactions. Single‐crystal X‐ray analyses showed that these as‐formed diazole‐modified derivatives adopted a twisted topology configuration, whereas the azaacenes display reclining‐chair architectures, besides a twisted structure. All these compounds displayed yellow or red light in solution. Moreover, their electrochemical behaviors were also examined. We also found that the azaacenes exhibited a positive spectroscopic response to acid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel cotton thread immunochromatographic assay device was successfully developed based on gold nanoparticles decorated carbon nanotube nanocomposite probe (CNT/GNPs). Squamous cell carcinoma antigen (SCCA), a protein biomarker related to lung cancer, was used as an analyte to demonstrate the principle of immunochromatograpgic assay on cotton thread biosensor. Results indicated that CNT/GNPs exhibited good stability and superior sensitivity comparing with individual carbon nanotubes as reporter probe. Under optimal conditions, the biosensor was capable of measuring 3.03 ng/mL SCCA which is 10 and 5000 folds more sensitive than previous reported CNT based lateral flow assay. The combination of CNT/GNPs nanocomposite probe with cotton thread based biosensor provide an alternative path for clinical diagnosis of other protein or nucleic acid biomarkers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we report a novel, simple and large-scale (about 100 g) synthesis of MoP nanoparticles with a high surface area (439.3 m2g−1). The current approach uses a solid mixture of MoO3, (NH4)2HPO4and phenol-formaldehyde resin (PFR) as a precursor and employs an inert gas as a feed gas. The formation mechanism of MoP was proposed by various techniques, including thermogravimetry-mass spectrometry (TG-MS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and carbon content analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

As researchers focus on the field of quantum machine learning, there are more and more quantum algorithms for data fitting. However, the majority of quantum algorithms for data fitting are only applicable to sparse matrices, which bring a large number of limitations to their application. In this paper, to solve this problem, we propose a quantum algorithm for data fitting for general matrices, not only sparse and dense matrices. The quantum algorithm is mainly composed of three subroutines which are generating target state, quantum state tomography and estimating fit quality. The time complexity of the quantum algorithm is O κ 4 ‖ A ‖ F polylog (M N) (M ′ 2 log (M ′) 2 / ɛ 3 + 1 / (ɛ ϵ 2)) , where A ∈ R M × N , κ is the conditional number of matrix A † A ∈ R N × N , | | A | | F is the Frobenius norm of A , M ′ is the maxima number of fit functions in allowing fit, ɛ is the fitting error, and ϵ is the error of fit quality estimation. Moreover, our quantum algorithm is independent of the sparsity of the matrix, so our algorithm has wide application in dense matrices and poses a new state of the art for solving dense data fitting. • Data fitting is a mathematical method to construct the least squares fitting problem. • The proposed quantum algorithm is independent of the sparsity of the matrix. • The algorithm achieves polynomial-scale speedup compared to other algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Elemental carbon has been successfully used to tune the light emission properties of zinc oxide (ZnO) through artificially doping but the underlying mechanism remains controversial. At present, carbon-related defect complexes are the main explanation. Nevertheless, the possibility of forming semiconducting Zn-C compounds has not been discussed. In this study, we reveal the existence of various stable semiconducting Zn-C compounds. Based on particle swarm optimization and first-principles calculations, we perform a structural search of Zn-C binary compounds and report four stable semiconducting structures, in which the covalent Zn-C bonding characteristics are stronger compared with that in the metal rocksalt zinc carbide (ZnC). Crucially, three of the four Zn-C compounds have direct or quasi-direct band gaps in the range of 1.09–2.94 eV which are energies highly desirable for optoelectronic applications. Electronic transitions across the band gaps of these Zn-C structures could contribute to blue and near-infrared light emissions of C-doped ZnO. Our results have not only unraveled a new perspective to explain and tailor the light emission properties of ZnO but also provide a deeper understanding of possible Zn-C compounds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes a low-cost, sensitive, visual and rapid immunochromatographic assay method on cotton thread for carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) detection by using novel carbon nanotube/gold nanoparticles (CNT/GNPs) nanocomposite reporter probe. CEA, a lung cancer protein biomarker, was used as analyte to demonstrate the principle of the immunochromatographic assay on cotton thread biosensor. In the presence of target CEA, the decreasing aggregation amount of CNT/GNPs nanocomposite reporter probes on the test zone induced directly readout by naked eye. Meanwhile, quantitative detection could be performed conveniently with a commercial available scanner. The performance with respect to sensitivity of the method was greatly improved by 2–3 magnitudes comparing with traditional gold nanoparticles (GNPs) or carbon nanotubes (CNTs) as reporter probe. Under optimal conditions, the biosensor was capable of detecting 2.32 ng/mL CEA (S/N ≥ 3) which is sensitive enough for clinical diagnosis. These results indicated the novel CNT/GNPs nanocomposite reporter probe based immunochromatographic assay on cotton thread is particularly suitable for point-of-care (POC) diagnostics in resource-limited regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neonatal hypoxic–ischemic (HI) brain damage causes acute mortality and morbidity in newborns and long-term neurological disorders in the survivors. Pterostilbene (PTE) is a natural compound possessing various biological and pharmacological activities. In the present study, we aimed to investigate the effect of PTE on neonatal HI brain damagein P7 rat model and to explore the possible mechanisms. Neonatal HI brain damage was induced in rat pups (P7). Prior to the induction of HI injury, PTE was injected with or without zinc protoporphyrin IX (ZnPP), an inhibitor of heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1). ZnPP was used to test whether abnormal changes of HO-1 expression were involved in the effect of PTE. The results showed that PTE exhibited excellent neuroprotective effects against neonatal HI brain injury, as evidenced by the decrease of brain infarct volume, brain edema, neurological score, and improvement in motor coordination motor deficit and working memory deficit. PTE pretreatment decreased the expression of several proinflammatory cytokines, including TNFα, IL-1β, IL-6, and key transcription factor p65 NF-κB, and reduced the number of TUNEL-stained neurons, indicating the inhibition of inflammation and programmed cell death. Moreover, PTE pretreatment decreased thiobarbituric acid reactive substances content, increased superoxide dismutase activity and decreased reactive oxygen species level, indicating that PTE played an important antioxidant role. Furthermore, ZnPP was able to inhibit PTE-induced suppression of oxidative stress, programmed cell death, inflammation and brain damage. In conclusion, PTE pretreatment prevented HI-induced brain injury in newborns through HO-1-mediated reduction of oxidative stress, programmed cell death, and inflammation, and final improvement of histological and functional injury. Overall, the data that obtained in rat model provide novel insights into the pathogenesis of neonatal HI brain injury and may be translational to human clinical intervention for HI-associated brain injury in newborns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A directly coating method, controlled double-jet precipitation (CDJP), was developed for synthesizing magnetic Fe 3 O 4 @Cu(OH) 2 composites in combination of advantages of magnetic rapid separation and satisfactory adsorption performance. The morphology and structure of the composites were analyzed by SEM, TEM, XRD, FTIR, XPS and VSM techniques. Through controlling the reaction on Fe 3 O 4 particles, directly coating of Cu(OH) 2 was successfully realized without the extra complicated procedures. The obtained Fe 3 O 4 @Cu(OH) 2 consists of micro particles of size around 250 nm coated with special leaflike nanomorphologies, possessing high saturation magnetization (from 56.5 to 98.84 emu g −1 ). As the amount of loaded Cu increased, As(V) removal of the composites augmented from 11.11 to 35.71 mg g −1 far beyond that of reported traditional magnetic adsorbents. The adsorption isotherm was best fitted by Langmuir adsorption mode and the mechanism was mainly ascribed to the OH functionality of the Fe 3 O 4 @Cu(OH) 2 composites and electrostatic attraction between As(V) species and Fe 3 O 4 @Cu(OH) 2 composites. The Fe 3 O 4 @Cu(OH) 2 composites is a promising candidate for treating arsenic contaminated water. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]