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Objective Multiple myeloma (MM) is an incurable malignancy with a diversity of clinical characteristics and prognoses. The commonly used staging system has obvious shortcomings. Exploring accurate prognostic models is essential. Methods A total of 1,276 newly diagnosed MM patients were selected from Zhongshan Hospital Fudan University between January 2010 and April 2021. After excluding patients with amyloidosis or other tumors, a total of 802 patients receiving standard first-line therapy were included. 703 patients in the non-transplant group (527 patients in the training set and 176 patients in the validation set) and 109 patients in the transplant group. We enrolled 41 baseline parameters including clinical, laboratory, and pathological features. We used univariate and multivariate Cox analyses to screen for factors associated with overall survival and to develop prognostic models. Results The final risk-scoring system includes ECOG score, extramedullary lesion, thrombocyte, reticulocyte, anion gap, hypercalcemia, complement C3, β2-microglobulin, cytogenetics and interleukin-2 receptor. We identify the optimal cut-off for the risk score and divide the patients into high-risk and low-risk groups. Kaplan-Meier curves and Log-rank tests showed that the risk score was significant with overall survival in the training set (P

On February 6th 2023, a large Mw 7.8 earthquake struck Turkey and Syria near the border area. Only 9 hours later, another Mw 7.5 earthquake occurred about 90 km northeast of the epicenter of the first earthquake. Up to now, the two earthquakes have killed at least 43,000 people and injured 120,000. Preliminary inversion results from USGS show that the geometric structure of the seismogenic fault is rather complex, and the rupture propagates through multiple sub-faults.Massive casualties show the necessity and urgency of an earthquake rapid emergency response system, and ground motion simulation is a key component of this system. Empirical ground-motion prediction equations (GMPEs), which are widely used, can quickly provide the distribution of ground motion and seismic intensity. Unfortunately, the calculated seismic intensity is not accurate enough due to its incomplete consideration of the earthquake source and the complicated seismic wave propagation process(Paolucci et al., 2018; Infantino et al., 2020; Stupazzini et al., 2021). In contrast, the physics-based ground motion simulation method has more advantages. In this study, we employ the USGS's finite fault inversion results as kinematic source input to model the two earthquakes' strong ground motion using the CGFDM3D-EQR platform (Wang et al., 2022). The platform can quickly run an earthquake simulation while taking into account the three-dimensional complexity of topography, underground medium, and source, providing timely reliable distribution of ground motion and seismic intensity. Preliminary findings indicate that the first earthquake's maximum intensity is XI, the second earthquake's maximum intensity is X, which is consistent with the report issued by AFAD, and that the simulated intensity's spatial distribution range is also consistent. The simulation completely considers the effects of the source, geological environment, and topography, and the seismic intensity distribution exhibits complex non-uniform properties that are closer to the reality.The rapid ground shaking simulations of the Turkey–Syria earthquake allows for the quick, accurate, and scientific assessment of earthquake damage. To reduce lives and financial losses, these results can serve as a scientific foundation and point of reference for the relevant authorities as they decide how best to respond in an earthquake and conduct out rescue operations. ReferencesInfantino M, Mazzieri I, Özcebe A G, et al. 3d physics-based numerical simulations of ground motion in istanbul from earthquakes along the marmara segment of the north anatolian fault[J]. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 2020, 110(5): 2559-2576.Paolucci r, Gatti F, Infantino M, et al. Broadband ground motions from 3d physics-based numerical simulations using artificial neural networksbroadband ground motions from 3d pbss using anns[J]. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 2018, 108(3A): 1272-1286.Stupazzini M, Infantino M, Allmann A, et al. Physics-based probabilistic seismic hazard and loss assessment in large urban areas: A simplified application to istanbul[J]. Earthquake Engineering & Structural Dynamics, 2021, 50(1):99-115.Wang, W., Zhang, Z., Zhang, W., Yu, H., Liu, Q., Zhang, W., & Chen, X. (2022). CGFDM3D‐EQR: A Platform for Rapid Response to Earthquake Disasters in 3D Complex Media. Seismological Research Letters, 93 (4): 2320-2334.

Liquid metal nanoparticles (LMNPs) have recently attracted much attention as soft functional materials for various biorelated applications. Despite the fact that several reports demonstrate highly stable LMNPs in aqueous solutions or organic solvents, it is still challenging to stabilize LMNPs in biological media with complex ionic environments. LMNPs grafted with functional polymers (polymers/LMNPs) have been fabricated for maintaining their colloidal and chemical stability; however, to the best of our knowledge, no related work has been conducted to systematically investigate the effect of anchoring groups on the stability of LMNPs. Herein, various anchoring groups, including phosphonic acids, trithiolcarbonates, thiols, and carboxylic acids, are incorporated into brush polymers via reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization to graft LMNPs. Both the colloidal and chemical stability of such polymer/LMNP systems are then investigated in various biological media. Moreover, the influence of multidentate ligands is also investigated by incorporating different numbers of carboxylic or phosphonic acid into the brush polymers. We discover that increasing the number of anchoring groups enhances the colloidal stability of LMNPs, while polymers bearing phosphonic acids provide the optimum chemical stability for LMNPs due to surface passivation. Thus, polymers bearing multidentate phosphonic acids are desirable to decorate LMNPs to meet complex environments for biological studies.

Background Multiple myeloma (MM) is an incurable hematological malignancy. Although proteasome inhibitors and immunomodulators have significantly improved patient outcomes, some patients respond poorly to treatment and almost all patients will relapse. Mechanisms of proteasome inhibitor resistance in multiple myeloma have not been fully elucidated. ZHX2 is a transcription regulator degraded via proteasome and presents both oncogenic or tumor suppressive effect in different cancers, however, it is still unknown that the role of ZHX2 in myeloma. In this study, we aim to demonstrate the effect and mechanism of ZHX2 on proteasome inhibitor resistance in MM. Methods GSE24080 gene expression profile datasets from Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) were analyzed to evaluate the relationship between ZHX2 expression level and survival in MM. Expression of ZHX2 in human MM cell lines at baseline and after bortezomib (BTZ) treatment was determined by Western blotting (WB). The proliferation and apoptosis rate of MM cells treated with BTZ after the knockdown of ZHX2 were analyzed by flow cytometry. Nuclear translocation of NF‐κB after the knockdown of ZHX2 was evaluated by WB and immunofluorescence, and the expression of NF‐κB target genes was measured by real‐time quantitative PCR. Co‐immunoprecipitation (Co‐IP) and WB were used to detect the interaction of ZHX2 with NF‐κB. Results We found that higher ZHX2 expression was correlated with poorer clinical outcomes of patients. In addition, ZHX2 expression was relatively higher in RPMI‐8226 and MM.1S cell lines and the level of ZHX2 protein was upregulated after BTZ treatment. Knockdown of ZHX2 significantly enhanced the sensitivity of MM cells to BTZ, inhibited nuclear translocation of NF‐κB, and reduced mRNA expression of NF‐κB target genes. It was also revealed that ZHX2 directly binds to NF‐κB. Conclusion Our study showed that ZHX2 can promote proteasome inhibitor resistance in MM cells by regulating the nuclear translocation of NF‐κB., In this study, we aimed to demonstrate the effect and mechanism of ZHX2 on proteasome inhibitor resistance in MM. We found that ZHX2 can regulate the nuclear translocation of NF‐κB and is related to myeloma cell resistance to proteasome inhibitor.

The induction therapy containing ixazomib, an oral proteasome inhibitor, has shown favorable efficacy and safety in clinical trials, but its experience in real-life remains limited. In routine practice, few patients received ixazomib-based induction therapy due to reasons including (1) patients’ preference on oral regimens, (2) concerns on adverse events (AEs) of other intravenous/subcutaneous regimens, (3) requirements for less center visits, and (4) fears of COVID-19 and other infectious disease exposures. With the aim of assessing the real-life effectiveness and safety of ixazomib-based induction therapy, we performed this multi-center, observational study on 85 newly diagnosed multiple myeloma (NDMM) patients from 14 medical centers. Ixazomib-based regimens included ixazomib-lenalidomide-dexamethasone (IRd) in 44.7% of patients, ixazomib-dexamethasone (Id) in 29.4%, and Id plus another agent (doxorubicin, cyclophosphamide, thalidomide, or daratumumab) in 25.9%. Different ixazomib-based therapies were applied due to (1) financial burdens or limitations on local health insurance coverage, (2) concerns on treatment tolerance, and (3) drug accessibility issue. Ten patients received ixazomib maintenance. The median age was 67 years; 43.5% had ISS stage III disease; 48.2% had an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance score ≥ 2; and 17.6% with high-risk cytogenetic abnormalities. Overall response rate for all 85 patients was 95.3%, including 65.9% very good partial response or better and 29.5% complete responses. The median time to response was 30 days. The response rate was similar across different ixazomib-based regimens. Median progression-free survival was not reached. Severe AEs (≥ grade 3) were reported in 29.4% of patients. No grade 3/4 peripheral neuropathy (PN) occurred. Patients received a median of 6 (range 1–20) cycles of ixazomib treatment; 56.6% remained on treatment at data cutoff; 15.3% discontinued treatment due to intolerable AEs. These results support that the ixazomib-based frontline therapy was highly effective with acceptable toxicity in routine practice and the ixazomib oral regimens could be good alternative options for NDMM patients.

We performed a retrospective cohort study to analyze all 87 CAD patients with MGUS and 178 CAD patients without MGUS admitted in Zhongshan Hospital Fudan University from 2015 to 2017. Patients were followed up via regular patient visits or telephone, and the median follow-up period was 2.9 years. The end point of follow-up was the occurrence of major adverse cardiac events (MACE). CAD patients with MGUS had a higher risk of MACE than those without MGUS (log-rank P = 0.0015). After adjustment for other markers in the stepwise Cox regression model, MGUS was still related to the increasing risk of MACE incident (P = 0.002, HR = 2.308). Then, we constructed the nomogram based on the Cox regression model, and the concordance index (C-index) was 0.667. Hence, MGUS might be added into the risk model of CAD. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1007/s12265-019-09950-w) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

A novel CdS nanoparticles/hollow hydroxyapatite microsphere (CdS/HAP) photocatalysts, with excellent photocatalytic performance, was firstly prepared by using a facile hydrothermal method under low temperature. The CdS/HAP composite catalysts were explored by various techniques including X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), UV–vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Brunauer Emmett-Teller (BET) and photoelectrochemical measurements. The photocatalytic ability of the as-prepared composite catalysts was investigated by using tetracycline (TC) as a model contaminant. Compared to pure CdS and HAP, the CdS (10 wt.%)/HAP composite exhibited much higher photocatalytic removal efficiency with 90.2% degradation of TC in 30 min, where the best conditions were an initial pH at 5 and catalyst dosage of 0.50 g/L. Moreover, a probable reaction mechanism of CdS/HAP composite was evaluated based on the analysis of electron spin resonance (ESR) and trapping experiments. It was worth pointing out that the CdS nanoparticles can promote the photo-generated charges separation of HAP microspheres, and thus to improve the photocatalytic degradation performance of the catalysts. It can be inferred that the CdS/HAP composite's photocatalytic superiority could be used for applications in the removal of many hazard pollutants.

A series of CeO2-graphene oxide (CeO2-GO) composites were systematically prepared and compared for the visible-light photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue (MB). The experimental results show that the as-prepared CeO2-GO (5.0 wt%) composite exhibits superior photocatalytic activity as compared to pure CeO2. An optimum weight ratio of GO to CeO2 not only causes a decrease in particle size of CeO2, but also leads to an increase in BET specific surface areas and favors an effective separation of the photogenerated electron-hole pairs, which should be responsible for the enhanced photocatalytic performance. More importantly, there is a direct correlation between the electrocatalytic activity of CeO2-GO and its photocatalytic activity for the visible-light photocatalytic degradation of MB. This fundamental research will provide guideline for exploring of highly efficient photocatalysts with many potential applications in future.

Photocatalysis is a well-established and green technique for degradation of antibiotics in wastewater. Hydroxyapatite (HAp) has excellent biocompatibility, biological activity, non-toxicity and low cost, and has many applications in biomaterials. Recently, HAp has been reported as an inexpensive green photocatalyst for cleaning some drug contaminations. However, its photocatalytic performance and chemical stability are far from practical applications. In this research, a series of porous hollow hydroxyapatite (HAp) microspheres decorated with small amounts of ultrathin graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) were firstly and successfully fabricated by a facile hydrothermal procedure. The experimental results show that as-prepared g-C3N4/HAp photocatalysts exhibited evidently enhancement on the photocatalytic activities for the degradation of tetracycline (TC), compared with the corresponding ultrathin g-C3N4 and porous hollow HAp microspheres. Notably, g-C3N4 (1.5 wt.%)/HAp composite displayed a net high photocatalytic activity for TC degradation (almost 100% within 15 min). Moreover, the as-prepared g-C3N4 (1.5 wt.%)/HAp exhibited a good stability in the cyclic runs for the photocatalytic degradation of TC, demonstrating its promising potential as an efficient photocatalyst. An optimum decorating amount of ultrathin g-C3N4 onto porous hollow HAp microspheres favors an effective separation of photogenerated electron-hole pairs, which can be responsible for the enhanced photocatalytic performance. In addition, the photocatalytic degradation mechanism for TC was proposed. This fundamental research will provide a promising strategy for the development of highly efficient and compatible photocatalysts with many applications.

To evaluate the prognostic value of bone marrow (BM) imaging pattern and other imaging findings assessed by 18F-FDG PET-CT in multiple myeloma(MM) and to find out the image interpretation cut-off to define different BM tracer uptake pattern. We retrospectively studied PET-CT examinations and clinical data of 100 healthy individuals and 172 newly diagnosed MM patients. A BM uptake > liver SUVmean was selected as the positivity cut-off of pathological uptake in BM after comparing BM uptake in normal control and MM patients. With this interpretation cut-off, we defined the BM FDG uptake pattern as four types: normal, focal, diffuse, and mixed. The clinical correlation and prognostic value of BM uptake pattern were evaluated. The findings were validated in an independent prospective cohort with 72 MM patients. In MM cohort, 34.9% patients had focal BM uptake pattern, 3.5% had diffuse pattern, 38.4% had mixed pattern, and 23.3% had normal BM uptake. Diffuse/mixed pattern was correlated with clinical and imaging parameters indicating high tumor burden, and inferior progression free survival (PFS; 3-year-PFS 26.8%) and overall survival (OS; 3-year-OS 50.6%). BM uptake pattern was an independent prognostic factor and diffuse/mixed pattern was associated with inferior OS (P = 0.037, HR 7.16) and PFS (P = 0.015, HR 7.77). The prognostic value of BM uptake pattern was also confirmed in validation set. We propose an FDG uptake higher than liver as the positivity cut-off to discriminate between physiological and pathological uptake in BM and defined four BM FDG uptake pattern. BM FDG uptake pattern is a reliable prognostic predictor of MM.

WAGE is a hardware-oriented authenticated cipher, which has the smallest (unprotected) hardware cost (for 128-bit security level) among the round 2 candidates of the NIST lightweight cryptography (LWC) competition. In this work, we analyze the security of WAGE against the correlation power analysis (CPA) on ARM Cortex-M4F microcontroller. Our attack detects the secret key leakage from power consumption for up to 12 (out of 111) rounds of the WAGE permutation and requires 10,000 power traces to recover the 128-bit secret key. Motivated by the CPA attack and the low hardware cost of WAGE, we propose the first optimized masking scheme of WAGE in the t-strong non-interference (SNI) security model. We investigate different masking schemes for S-boxes by exploiting their internal structures and leveraging the state-of-the-art masking techniques. To practically demonstrate the effectiveness of masking, we perform the test vector leakage assessment on the 1-order masked WAGE. We evaluate the hardware performance of WAGE for 1, 2, and 3-order security and provide a comparison with other NIST LWC round 2 candidates.

Immunodeficiencies are widely becoming known as important features of multiple myeloma (MM) and may promote the proliferation of malignant cells as well as confer resistance to therapy. Few studies focus on the immunomodulatory effects of the complement system on MM. This study aims to explore the role of C1q in MM patients. Plasma C1q was found to be significantly reduced in MM patients, and the amount of C1q deposited around the CD138+ cells in bone marrow (BM) biopsy sections was observed to be much higher, especially in the subgroup with 1q21 amplification (Amp1q21). CD138+ cells expressed higher levels of C1q receptors (C1qRs) than CD138− cells. Patients with Amp1q21 expressed higher levels of globular C1qR (gC1qR), whereas patients without Amp21 expressed higher levels of collagen tail C1qR (cC1qR). Additionally, gC1qR was noted to suppress the MM-inhibiting role of C1q in H929, U266, and MM1S. gC1qR interacts with insulin-like growth factor 2 mRNA binding protein 3 (IGF2BP3), which also suppressed the function of C1q and regulated CDC28 protein kinase regulatory subunit 1B (CKS1B) mRNA. In summary, gC1qR suppressed the MM-inhibiting role of C1q and regulated CKS1B mRNA in promoting tumor proliferation via IGF2BP3 in 1q21-amplified MM. Our findings provide novel evidence on how MM cells evade the immune system and promote survival as well as suggest possible novel targets for future therapies of MM.

The prognostic value of 1q21 Gain/Amplification (1q21 Gain/Amp) in multiple myeloma (MM) has always been controversial. A total of 419 newly diagnosed MM patients were included in this retrospective study. The positive rate of 1q21 Gain/Amp was 48.6%. MM patients with 1q21 Gain/Amp were characterized as being in more advanced clinical stages and were more likely to be accompanied by del(13q14), t(4;14) or complex karyotypes (CKs) as well as with more severe anemia and worse renal function. In these patients, the percentage of complete remission (CR) or very good partial response (VGPR) was higher, however, in the early treatment period, the probability of progressive disease (PD) was also higher. No significant difference on progression free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) was showed between the group of 1q21Amp and 1q21Gain. The prognostic impact of 1q21 Gain/Amp on PFS of MM patients was heterogeneous and was in accordance with the accompanying parameters.

BackgroundThe outbreak of SARS CoV-2 has caused ever-increasing attention and public panic all over the world. Currently, there is no specific treatment against the SARS CoV-2. Therefore, identifying effective antiviral agents to combat the disease is urgently needed. Previous studies found that indomethacin has the ability to inhibit the replication of several unrelated DNA and RNA viruses, including SARS-CoV.MethodsSARS CoV-2 pseudovirus-infected African green monkey kidney VERO E6 cells treated with different concentrations of indomethacin or aspirin at 48 hours post infection (p.i). The level of cell infection was determined by luciferase activity. Anti-coronavirus efficacy in vivo was confirmed by evaluating the time of recovery in canine coronavirus (CCV) infected dogs treated orally with 1mg/kg body weight indomethacin.ResultsWe found that indomethacin has a directly and potently antiviral activity against the SARS CoV-2 pseudovirus (reduce relative light unit to zero). In CCV-infected dogs, recovery occurred significantly sooner with symptomatic treatment + oral indomethacin (1 mg/kg body weight) daily treatments than with symptomatic treatment + ribavirin (10-15 mg/kg body weight) daily treatments (P =0.0031), but was not significantly different from that with symptomatic treatment + anti-canine coronavirus serum + canine hemoglobin + canine blood immunoglobulin + interferon treatments (P =0.7784).ConclusionThe results identify indomethacin as a potent inhibitor of SARS CoV-2.

Novel A- or B-sites substituted LaFeO 3 /silica fiber (SF) composites were prepared via a facile and efficient carbon nanofibers (CNFs) template-assisted alcohol-thermal route. The resulting samples were characterized by X-Ray diffraction (XRD), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) apparatus, and ultraviolet-visible (UV–vis) diffuse reflectance spectroscopy. Furthermore, their photocatalytic activities were evaluated by visible-light photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue (MB). Compared with powder LaFeO 3 , the obtained A- or B-sites substituted LaFeO 3 /SF composites showed enhanced degradation efficiencies to MB dyes under the identical conditions. Good stability was also observed in the cyclic runs for the degradation of MB. The enhanced photocatalytic performance should be relent with the following two factors: 1) the unique morphology and structure of A- or B-sites substituted LaFeO 3 /SF composites, and 2) the contribution of the secondary element doping either in A- or B-sites of LaFeO 3 /SF. The synthetic procedure is simple and could be applicable to other efficient and inexpensive photocatalytic materials.

In this work, MoS2/MnO2 synthesized by hydrothermal methods was employed to remove Hg0 in flue gas. Benefited from the growth of MnO2 on the surface of MoS2, the specific surface area of the Mm adsorbent has increased. Compared with pure MoS2, specific surface area of Mm-30 has increased by 26.0287 m2/g. The MoS2 modified with 30 w.t. % MnO2 revealed higher mercury removal performance at 120 °C, which reached 93%. The oxidation of mercury over Mm-30 is proposed to follow Mars-van Krevelen mechanism, whereby the lattice oxygen in the adsorbent is consumed. In presence of NO, HCl, O2 and SO2, the effect of different concentrations on mercury oxidation is observed. Mm-30 adsorbent reveals stable mercury removal performance in the presence of NO and HCl, while it also exhibited good sulfur resistance under the condition of 400 ppm SO2 + N2. This phenomenon indicates that the adsorbent can be applied in power plants with medium concentrations of SO2, which facilitated the application of Mm-30 as a potential mercury removal adsorbent for power plants.

The atomic interaction between elemental mercury in the flue gas and defective carbonaceous surface is studied by the first-principles calculation. The defective carbonaceous surface is modeled by a nine-fused benzene cluster with two adjacent atomic vacancies. The results indicate that vacancies can increase the activity of their neighboring carbon atoms. However, the vacant sites present the decrease in mercury removal capacity, which is different from the behavior of the defective carbonaceous surface with only one atomic vacancy. In addition, flue gas molecules (FGMs) including CO, CO2, NO, NO2, SO2 and H2O, are examined to evaluate the influence on the mercury removal of the defective carbonaceous surface. The calculated results demonstrate that different adsorption behaviors for Hg0 occur on the defective carbonaceous surface due to the presence of FGMs. It can be found that CO may enhance the mercury removal capacity of the defective carbonaceous surface when its concentration is higher than that of Hg0. Meanwhile, SO2 presents the remarkable positive effect on the mercury removal efficiency at the vacancy. On the contrary, the presence of CO2, NO, NO2 and H2O leads to the increase in the adsorption energies of mercury on the defective carbonaceous surface.

At the front end of the Electrostatic precipitator (ESP), activated carbon injection is a common method to remove mercury from flue gas, but the high cost, low efficiency and non-recyclability limit the practical application of activated carbon. MoS2, a transition metal sulfide with a two-dimensional layered structure, was found to have favourable performances in removing contaminant. In this work, Fe3O4 was successfully grown on the surface of flower-like MoS2 by two-steps hydrothermal methods. The experimental results showed that the specific surface area of MoS2/Fe3O4 (MF) was the largest when the ratio is 10 wt% (MF-10). Compared with pure MoS2, the specific surface area of MF-10 increased by 6.7467 m2/g, which was attributed to the growth of Fe3O4. At the same time, the introduction of Fe3O4 made the MF possess superparamagnetism to facilitate its retrievability under an external magnetic field. In addition, MF-10 also showed a mercury removal efficiency of almost 100%. Although the efficiency of the MF-10 has decreased after 5 cycles and 24 h, it could still maintain about 90%, revealing a stable cycle life. Due to its mercury removal performance and recyclability, MF can be considered as a favorable adsorbent for removing elemental mercury.

// Ben Huang 1, * , Shaobo Mo 1, * , Liang Zhu 1 , Tianhong Xu 1 , Guoxiang Cai 1 1 Department of Colorectal Surgery, Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center, Shanghai 20032, People’s Republic of China * These authors have contributed equally to this work Correspondence to: Guoxiang Cai, email: gxcfuscc@163.com Keywords: rectal cancer, stage IIIA, stage II, survival Received: August 02, 2016 Accepted: October 17, 2016 Published: October 28, 2016 ABSTRACT Background: Stage IIIA rectal cancer has distinctive oncological features, including limited depth of intestinal wall invasion and early regional lymph node metastasis. We aim to compare survival outcomes and clinicopathological features for stage IIIA rectal cancer with those for stage II rectal cancer. Method: We analyzed patients with stage II or stage IIIA rectal cancer treated with surgery without receiving preoperative radiotherapy based on data from the US Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database between 1988 and 2003. Survival curves were plotted using the Kaplan-Meier method. Multivariate Cox proportional analyses were utilized to analyze independent prognostic factors for cancer-specific survival (CSS). Results: We included 12,036 rectal cancer patients (10,132 stage II and 1,904 stage IIIA) from the SEER database. Patients with stage IIIA rectal cancer had smaller tumor size than patients with stage II rectal cancer. A multivariate analysis suggested that compared with patients with stage IIIA rectal cancer, patients with stage II disease were more likely to have more unfavorable CSS (HR 1.195, 95% CI 1.079-1.324, p=0.001). When stage II rectal cancer was further analyzed as stage IIA, IIB and IIC rectal cancer, the multivariate analysis indicated that compared with patients with stage IIIA rectal cancer, patients with stage IIA rectal cancer (HR 1.113, 95% CI 1.003-1.235, p=0.044), stage IIB rectal cancer (HR 1.493, 95% CI 1.267-1.758, p

We report on tapered terahertz quantum cascade lasers with lateral gratings. The proposed devices exhibit not only low horizontal divergence due to tapered structure but also single-mode operation by using lateral grating structure. The tapered region and lateral gratings can be fabricated with the ridged waveguide in one etching step without inducing complexity into the fabrication. Side-mode suppression ratio ∼20 dB is obtained for proposed devices from threshold to rollover currents at all measure temperatures, with the peak output power of ∼30 mW at 10 K in pulsed mode and lateral divergence angle reduced by half. The proposed devices are good candidates for high-power, single-mode operation and low-divergence laser with easy fabrication.

Nanoparticle system with the composition xEu2O3-(1-x)α-Fe2O3 (x = 0.1 and 0.5) was successfully synthesized by mechanochemical activation of Eu2O3 and a-Fe2O3 mixtures for 0-12 hours of ball milling time. The study is of relevance to catalysis, biomedical, sensing and energy-related applications. 57Fe and 151Eu Mossbauer spectroscopy were used to investigate the phase evolution, solid solution formation and hyperfine parameters of xEu2O3-(1-x)α-Fe2O3 nanoparticle system under the mechanochemical activation process. The 57Fe Mossbauer studies showed that the spectrum of the ball milled samples evolved from a sextet for hematite to sextets and a doublet upon duration of the milling process with europium oxide. This indicated the formation of the EuFeO3 perovskite for large x values and long milling times. The 151Eu Mossbauer investigations showed that the isomer shift decreased with increasing milling time for all molar concentrations employed.

x RuO 2 –(1− x )α-Fe 2 O 3 ( x =0.1, 0.3, 0.5 and 0.7) nanoparticle systems were successfully synthesized by mechanochemical activation of RuO 2 and α-Fe 2 O 3 mixtures for 0–12 h of ball milling. Mossbauer spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD), magnetic measurements, simultaneous differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) were employed to investigate the phase evolution of x RuO 2 –(1− x )α-Fe 2 O 3 nanoparticle systems under the mechanochemical activation process. The Mossbauer studies showed that the spectrum of the mechanochemically activated composites evolved from a sextet for α-Fe 2 O 3 (hematite) to four sextets and a doublet upon duration of the milling process with ruthenium oxide. Rietveld refinement of the XRD patterns yielded the values of lattice parameters as function of composition and milling times. The presence of Ru-substituted hematite and Fe-doped ruthenium oxide was evidenced and correlated with differences between ionic radii of Fe 3+ and Ru 4+ . Magnetic measurements recorded at 5 and 300 K in applied magnetic fields of 50,000 and 100,000 Oe showed that the estimated saturation magnetization of the milled samples increased with ball milling time while preserving a multidomain magnetic structure. The Morin transformation was evidenced by zero-field cooling–field cooling (ZFC–FC) measurements in 200 Oe and 1 T, for samples milled for 0 and 8 h of mechanochemical activation. These results correlate well with the DSC–TGA measurements, which support the formation of mixed-oxide solid solutions in the system under investigation.

In this paper, we used coprecipitation method to prepare different ratios of Mn / γ - Fe 3 O 4 to remove Hg0. Different ratios of Mn and Fe could affect the mercury removal efficiency of M n / γ - F e 3 O 4 . The mechanism of Hg0 adsorption on the surface of M n / γ - F e 3 O 4 matches the Mars-van Krevelen reaction mechanism. The catalytic oxidation of mercury on the surface of the sample is related to Fe and Mn. We also performed a pseudo-first-order kinetic model and an improved pseudo-n-order kinetic model. In addition, the external magnetic field has a certain promoting effect on the mercury removal.

Photocatalysis is a well-established and green technique in environmental pollutant remediation. In the present study, a novel and green red phosphorus (5.0 wt%)/hollow hydroxyapatite microsphere photocatalyst was fabricated and applied forthe degradation of rifampicin, tetracycline, and levofloxacin. The as-prepared material exhibits outstanding photocatalytic activity and stability, and has universal application for degradation of each antibiotic. Notably, tetracycline, rifampicin, andlevofloxacin can be completely degraded within 10 min, 20 min, and 50 min, respectively, under a 300 W Xe lamp with full spectrum illumination, where the optimal conditions were an initial pH of 6.0 and a photocatalyst dosage of 1.0 g/L. In addition, a plausible photocatalytic reaction mechanism was proposed. The low-cost, highly efficient, and green red phosphorus (5.0 wt%)/hollow hydroxyapatite microsphere photocatalyst is a promising candidate for the removal of many hazardous pollutants.

The captions to Figures 1-4 in this article as originally published were mismatched with the figures themselves.