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In this study, the ratio of lateral stiffness of the stilted story to that of the second story was proposed as the story stiffness ratio (SSR) to quantify vertical stiffness irregularities of hillside stilted buildings. A quasi-static experiment was conducted on a plane stilted frame with an SSR of 40 in the slope direction. Experimental results were compared with those of a stilted frame with an SSR of 1.01. The results show that SSR is an important factor influencing seismic failure modes of stilted buildings. As SSR decreases, structural ductility and deformation capacity improve, and stiffness degradation decelerates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Paeoniflorin (PF), extracted from the root of Paeonia lactiflora Pall, exhibits anti‐inflammatory properties in several autoimmune diseases. Osteoclast, the only somatic cell with bone resorbing capacity, was the direct cause of bone destruction in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and its mouse model, collagen‐induced arthritis (CIA). The objective of this study was to estimate the effect of PF on CIA mice, and explore the mechanism of PF in bone destruction. We demonstrated that PF treatment significantly ameliorated CIA through inflammatory response inhibition and bone destruction suppression. Furthermore, PF treatment markedly decreased osteoclast number through the altered RANKL/RANK/OPG ratio and inflammatory cytokines profile. Consistently, we found that osteoclast differentiation was significantly inhibited by PF through down‐regulation of nuclear factor‐κB activation in vitro. Moreover, we found that PF suppressed nuclear factor‐κB activation by decreasing its translocation to the nucleus in osteoclast precursor cells. Taken together, our new findings provide insights into a novel function of PF in osteoclastogenesis and demonstrate that PF would be a new therapeutic modality as a natural agent for RA treatment and other autoimmune conditions with bone erosion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]