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The effects of modification, electromagnetic stirring and compound treatment (modification and electromagnetic stirring) on the microstructure and thermal stability of Al-13% Si alloy are experimentally investigated. The results show that the three melt treatments can change the microstructure of the alloy. The modification has obvious refining effect on primary silicon and eutectic silicon grains, electromagnetic stirring has refining effect on primary silicon grains, and eutectic silicon grains appear coarsening phenomenon. The latent heat is obviously decreased by electromagnetic stirring, while the latent heat is increased by modification. Refining eutectic silicon grains will increase the latent heat of phase transformation of the alloy. When 560 °C remains unchanged, the melting temperature of the alloy generally decreases with the increase of holding time, but fluctuates, with a decrease of 7 °C. The latent heat decreases with the increase of constant temperature time, and the decrease amplitude reaches 8.4%.

In this paper, the effects of different Co contents on the microstructure and properties of Al-30% Si alloy were studied by means of metallographic microscope, microhardness tester, XRD, conductivity tester and DSC thermal analyzer. The results show that cobalt can effectively improve the microstructure of the alloy, the long needle eutectic silicon becomes short rod, and the coarse irregular block primary silicon particles become smaller. When 0.3% cobalt is added into the alloy, the refining effect of eutectic silicon is the most obvious. When the amount of Co is 0.6%, the refinement effect of primary silicon is the best. The addition of Co can improve the hardness of the alloy. When 0.6 ~ 0.9% cobalt is added, the hardness is the highest. With the increase of Co content, the conductivity and transformation latent heat of the alloy show the same change law. When 0.6% cobalt is added, its value is the maximum. It can be seen that when the Co content is 0.6%, the microstructure and comprehensive properties of the alloy are the best.

BACKGROUND Spinal cord injury (SCI) refers to the interruption of the tracts inside the spinal cord caused by various factors. The repair of damaged axons has always been a difficult point in clinical treatment and neuroscience research. The treatment of SCI with Buyang huanwu decoction (BYHWD), a well-known recipe for invigorating Qi (a vital force forming part of any living entity in traditional Chinese culture) and promoting blood circulation, shows a good effect. METHODS The rubrospinal tract (RST) transection model in rats was established in this study and rats were administrated with low (BL), medium (BM), or high (BH) doses of BYHWD. RESULTS Compared with the SCI group, BL, BM moderately, and BH significantly improved the motor function of forelimbs and increased the number of red nucleus neurons in SCI rats. As for the possible molecular mechanism, BL, BM moderately, and BH significantly increased mTOR whereas decreased Beclin-1 and LC3 in the red nucleus. CONCLUSION In conclusion, low, medium, and high doses of BYHWD could promote neural recovery in SCI rats through improving motor function and neuron survival in the red nucleus. The neuroprotective effects of BYHWD might be associated with affecting the mTOR signaling pathway and autophagy.

We sought to compare the clinical outcomes between culprit-only percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) versus multivessel PCI (MV-PCI) in patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) accompanied by chronic total occlusion (CTO) in the non-infarct-related artery(non-IRA).Studies that compared culprit-only PCI versus MV-PCI in patients with STEMI accompanied by CTO in the non-IRA were included. Random odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated.Eight studies with 2,259 patients were included. The results suggested that in patients with STEMI accompanied by CTO in the non-IRA, culprit-only PCI was associated with higher risks of all-cause mortality (OR: 2.89; 95% CI: 2.09-4.00;For patients with STEMI accompanied by CTO in the non-IRA, staged MV-PCI may be better compared with culprit-only PCI due to potential reduced risks of all-cause mortality, cardiac death, stroke, MACE, and heart failure. Meanwhile, further randomized trials are warranted to confirm or refute our findings.

The construction of a water intake along the wharf shoreline can realise the intensive and comprehensive utilisation of the shoreline. However, since the water intake will increase the lateral flow at the wharf and also the hydrodynamic forces on ships, it will bring risks to ships mooring and leaving. The effects of the water intake on ships are studied using a physical model, numerical model and standard formulas. The results show that it leads to an increase of the hydrodynamic forces acting on the ship when the standard formulas are used to calculate the forces without considering the water level difference between the two sides of the ship. The results of the physical model are closer to the real situation. Measures that can effectively reduce the influence of the water intake on ships are proposed by increasing the distance between the wharf front and the front of the water intake as well as the depth of the water inlet windows.

As a promising plasmonic photocatalyst under visible-light irradiation, Au/TiO2 nanocatalyst commonly suffers from risk of Au nanoparticles aggregation and relatively long activation period by using the conventional calcination activation method. We report here that a short-term O2 plasma treatment enables the Au/TiO2 catalyst to exhibit higher visible-light photocatalytic activity for formaldehyde (HCHO) oxidation compared with the calcination activated sample. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy characterization suggests that Au/TiO2 catalyst activated by O2 plasma achieves metallic Au content of 72.4% and surface oxygen species content of 29.8%, which not only lead to rapid reduction of cationic Au in HCHO oxidation but also facilitate the preliminary oxidation of HCHO to dioxymethylene and formate on catalyst surface. UV–vis diffuse reflectance spectra, photoluminescence spectra and diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform spectra measurements indicate that O2 plasma activated Au/TiO2 catalyst presents an enhanced visible-light absorption and surface charge transfer efficiency in HCHO oxidation, which accelerates the formation of superoxide (O2−) and OH radicals via hot electron transfer mechanism under visible-light irradiation, remarkably promoting formate oxidation to carbonate, carbonate decomposition and thus HCHO oxidation.

Steam methane reforming (SMR) via thermal catalytic approach is one of the dominant sources of industrial hydrogen, however it proceeds with slow response and low specific productivity. Here we demonstrate a plasma catalytic SMR for distributed hydrogen production, for which warm plasma by gliding arc discharge initiates the reaction, followed by Ni-based catalyst in a heat-insulated reactor without extra heating. In terms of the plasma alone process, specific energy input (SEI), steam/CH4 ratio (S/C) and total inlet flow rate (Ft) contribute to the methane conversion. In parallel, SEI and S/C account for the decrease in C2Hx selectivity hence the increase in selectivity of CO and CO2, while with Ft all the selectivity is approximately constant. The reaction pathway represented by the selectivity can be influenced by SEI and S/C rather Ft. To utilize the heat and active species with the reaction in plasma zone, Ni/CeO2/Al2O3 catalyst bed is coupled. For the coupled process, the conversion approaches the thermodynamic equilibrium values, with the favorable dismissed C2Hx selectivity thus the complete selectivity to CO and CO2. The coupled process was maintained steady for six hours, and the methane conversion of 90% at total hydrogen (t-H2) production rate of 2.7 SLM is achieved under optimum conditions of SEI, S/C, Ft and gas hourly space velocity (GHSV) of 110 kJ/mol, 3, 3 SLM and 18,000 ml·g−1 h−1. Compared to 59% and 2.3 kW h/Nm3 of the plasma alone process, such a coupled process achieves the energy efficiency (of methane to t-H2) of 75% and the low energy cost of 1.5 kW h/Nm3. Consequently, our approach of plasma catalytic SMR features the merits of rapid response, compact system and high specific productivity, which can be anticipated for the emerging needs of distributed hydrogen generation.

Efficient hydrogen production from methanol steam reforming is carried out in a heat-insulated warm plasma-catalytic (WPC) reactor. Methanol steam reforming in warm plasma and warm plasma-catalytic cases is investigated. For warm plasma alone, methanol mainly converts via pyrolysis reaction and its conversion linearly increases with specific energy input (SEI). The arc channel temperature and electron density of warm plasma are respectively measured to be around 2500 K and 3 × 1014 cm−3, based on optical emission spectra. To take advantage of energy from plasma, Fe-Cu/γ-Al2O3 catalyst for methanol steam reforming and water gas shift is placed after the warm plasma. Compare with plasma alone, methanol conversion in WPC case is nearly double therefore the energy cost decreases from 1.71 kW h/Nm3 to 0.85 kW h/Nm3. Energy efficiency of 84% and H2 selectivity of 98% with methanol conversion of 94% are achieved in this warm plasma-catalytic reactor.

Hydrogen and fuel cell technologies are being deployed to increase energy reliability and environmental performance. On-board hydrogen production via thermocatalytic reforming of liquid fuels is not a new concept, but has not been realized previously due to mismatches in rates and sizes of the necessary reactors. Here we demonstrate an advanced on-board hydrogen production by warm plasma chain catalysis for fuel-cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) with high specific productivity and transient response. Methanol, air and steam reactants as two specific feeds are fed into the reactor without soot formation and catalyst sintering. Oxidative pyrolysis reaction (OPR) by plasma, steam reforming (SR), and pyrolysis at high temperature, and SR and water gas shift (WGS) at medium temperature over catalysts occur subsequently for the coupled process. The heat with OPR is efficiently utilized by the subsequent endothermic reactions. Hydrogen selectivity of 99% (59 vol%, 4.1 SLM) with methanol conversion of 92% is achieved. The CO concentration of 7 vol% approaches the thermodynamic equilibrium value of 6.65 vol%. A fascinating match of energy efficiency of 91% (of methanol to hydrogen) and the hydrogen atom utilization of 88% is stressed. It is attributed to the chain catalysis of (oxidative) pyrolysis and WGS in sequence (as well as SR), which is initiated by warm plasma. Such a coupled process can be scaled up and used for wide applications from FCEVs and hydrogen refueling stations.

Functionalized amorphous TiO2 (AmT) with high surface area and abundant surface hydroxyl groups could be a promising support for plasmonic Au/TiO2 nanocatalysts. To overcome the limitations of conventional heat treatment on plasmonic Au/AmT nanocatalysts, cold hydrogen (H2) plasma activation is employed and makes it possible to achieve superior visible-light (VL) photocatalytic activity and durability. Catalyst characterization results suggest that H2 plasma can activate Au/AmT nanocatalysts to form high levels of metallic Au with strong surface plasmon resonance, low charge transfer resistance, and a unique interface between Au nanoparticles and AmT support. Comparative study of Au/AmT and Au/P25 (Degussa TiO2) activated by different plasmas (H2 or O2) reveals that the excellent performance of H2 plasma in Au/AmT activation originates from strong interaction between surface hydroxyl groups and Au precursors. This work offers the potential for preparing VL photocatalytic Au/AmT films on flexible substrates for extensive applications in photocatalysis and solar cells.

Toward developing an efficient plasma-based technique for CO2 reduction with CH4, warm-plasma catalytic (WPC) reduction of CO2 with CH4 in a reactor using gliding arc discharge and Ni/CeO2/Al2O3 catalyst is reported. In the warm plasma (WP) case, besides dry reforming reaction, reverse water gas shift (RWGS) reaction also comparably contributes for CO2 reduction. Although the contribution of dry reforming reaction is significantly enhanced by the increase of CH4/CO2 ratio, it accounts for only 60% due to the limitation of maximum CH4/CO2 ratio by the serious carbon deposition at CH4/CO2 >1/2. In addition, the low CH4/CO2 ratio also results in the low CO2 conversion, H2/CO ratio and H2 selectivity. In the WPC case, extra CH4 was fed after plasma to increase the CH4/CO2 ratio to 1, dry reforming reaction becomes the major contributor of CO2 reduction. Under the conditions of specific energy input of 86 kJ/mol, total flow rate of 2.67 SLM, catalyst-bed temperature of 850 °C and gas hourly space velocity of 3200 h−1, CO2 conversion of 91% and CH4 conversion of 94% with H2/CO = 1 and nearly 100% H2 selectivity are achieved with a CO2 energy cost of 598 kJ/mol and an energy efficiency of 72%.

Evaluation of the degree of liver fibrosis is an important basis for the clinical diagnosis and treatment of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). It is meaningful to make a preoperative evaluation with non-invasive methods. In the current study, 12 commonly used preoperative serological indicators from 161 HCC patients with different degree of liver fibrosis were collected retrospectively, and 8 of the indicators (ALB, PA, TBil, INR, AST, GGT, ALP, and PT) were ultimately used in matter-element analysis to create a formula. The relationship between those results and the histological sub-classification of the Laennec liver fibrosis scoring system was analyzed. The calculated value of R from this formula will indicate the differing degree of liver fibrosis in a patient: i) the value of 0.802 ≤ R < 1 indicates the early stage of liver cirrhosis, which corresponds to Laennec stages 0-3; ii) the value of 0.752 ≤ R < 0.802 indicates the mild stage of liver cirrhosis, which corresponds to Laennec stage 4A; iii) the value of 0.698 ≤ R < 0.752 indicates the moderate stage of liver cirrhosis, which corresponds to Laennec stage 4B; and iv) the value of 0.444 ≤ R < 0.698 indicates the severe stage of liver cirrhosis, which corresponds to Laennec stage 4C. The hope is that this formula for preoperative evaluation of the degree of liver fibrosis using non-invasive methods would be useful in the clinical diagnosis and treatment of patients with HCC in the future.

Full-field optical angiography is critical for vascular disease research and clinical diagnosis. Existing methods struggle to improve the temporal and spatial resolutions simultaneously.Spatiotemporal absorption fluctuation imaging (ST-AFI) is proposed to achieve dynamic blood flow imaging with high spatial and temporal resolutions.ST-AFI is a dynamic optical angiography based on a low-coherence imaging system and U-Net. The system was used to acquire a series of dynamic red blood cell (RBC) signals and static background tissue signals, and U-Net is used to predict optical absorption properties and spatiotemporal fluctuation information. U-Net was generally used in two-dimensional blood flow segmentation as an image processing algorithm for biomedical imaging. In the proposed approach, the network simultaneously analyzes the spatial absorption coefficient differences and the temporal dynamic absorption fluctuation.The spatial resolution of ST-AFI is up to 4.33 μm, and the temporal resolution is up to 0.032 s. In vivo experiments on 2.5-day-old chicken embryos were conducted. The results demonstrate that intermittent RBCs flow in capillaries can be resolved, and the blood vessels without blood flow can be suppressed.Using ST-AFI to achieve convolutional neural network (CNN)-based dynamic angiography is a novel approach that may be useful for several clinical applications. Owing to their strong feature extraction ability, CNNs exhibit the potential to be expanded to other blood flow imaging methods for the prediction of the spatiotemporal optical properties with improved temporal and spatial resolutions.

Glioma is highly lethal because of its high malignancy. Ubiquitination, a type of ubiquitin-dependent protein modification, has been reported to play an oncogenic or tumor-suppressive role in glioma development, depending on the targets. Ring finger protein 139 (RNF139) is a membrane-bound E3 ubiquitin ligase serving as a tumor suppressor by ubiquitylation-dependently suppressing cell growth. Herein, we firstly confirmed the abnormal downregulation of RNF139 in glioma tissues and cell lines. In glioma cells, ectopic RNF139 overexpression could inhibit, whereas RNF139 knockdown could aggravate the aggressive behaviors of glioma cells, including hyperproliferation, migration, and invasion. Moreover, in two glioma cell lines, RNF139 overexpression inhibited, whereas RNF139 knockdown enhanced the phosphorylation of phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K) and AKT serine/threonine kinase 1 (AKT). In a word, we demonstrate the aberration in RNF139 expression in glioma tissue samples and cell lines. RNF139 serves as a tumor-suppressor in glioma by inhibiting glioma cell proliferation, migration, and invasion and promoting glioma cell apoptosis through regulating PI3K/AKT signaling.

Genome-wide association study (GWAS) has seen great strides in revealing initial insights into the genetic architecture of Parkinson’s disease (PD). Since GWAS signals often reside in non-coding regions, relatively few of the associations have implicated specific biological mechanisms. Here, we aimed to integrate the GWAS results with large-scale expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) in 13 brain tissues to identify candidate causal genes for PD. We conducted a transcriptome-wide association study (TWAS) for PD using the summary statistics of over 480,000 individuals from the most recent PD GWAS. We identified 18 genes significantly associated with PD after Bonferroni corrections. The most significant gene, LRRC37A2, was associated with PD in all 13 brain tissues, such as in the hypothalamus (P = 6.12 × 10−22) and nucleus accumbens basal ganglia (P = 5.62 × 10−21). We also identified eight conditionally independent genes, including four new genes at known PD loci: CD38, LRRC37A2, RNF40, and ZSWIM7. Through conditional analyses, we demonstrated that several of the GWAS significant signals on PD could be driven by genetically regulated gene expression. The most significant TWAS gene LRRC37A2 accounts for 0.855 of the GWAS signal at its loci, and ZSWIM7 accounts for all the GWAS signals at its loci. We further identified several phenotypes previously associated with PD by querying the single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the final model of the identified genes in phenome databases. In conclusion, we prioritized genes that are likely to affect PD by using a TWAS approach and identified phenotypes associated with PD.

Background Parkinson's disease is a common neurodegenerative problem. Pramipexole (PPX) plays protective role in Parkinson's disease. Nevertheless, the mechanism of PPX in Parkinson's disease-like neuronal injury is largely uncertain. Methods 1-methyl-4-phenylpyridinium (MPP+)-stimulated neuronal cells and 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine (MPTP)-induced mice were used as the model of Parkinson's disease. MPP+-induced neuronal injury was assessed via cell viability, lactic dehydrogenase (LDH) release and apoptosis. microRNA-96 (miR-96) and BCL2/adenovirus E1B 19 kDa interacting protein 3 (BNIP3) abundances were examined by quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) or Western blotting. Mitophagy was tested by Western blotting and immunofluorescence staining. MPTP-induced neuronal injury in mice was investigated via behavioral tests and TUNEL. Results PPX alleviated MPP+-induced neuronal injury via increasing cell viability and decreasing LDH release and apoptosis. PPX reversed MPP+-induced miR-96 expression and inhibition of mitophagy. miR-96 overexpression or BNIP3 interference weakened the suppressive role of PPX in MPP+-induced neuronal injury. miR-96 targeted BNIP3 to inhibit PTEN-induced putative kinase 1 (PINK1)/Parkin signals-mediated mitophagy. miR-96 overexpression promoted MPP+-induced neuronal injury via decreasing BNIP3. PPX weakened MPTP-induced neuronal injury in mice via regulating miR-96/BNIP3-mediated mitophagy. Conclusion PPX mitigated neuronal injury in MPP+-induced cells and MPTP-induced mice by activating BNIP3-mediated mitophagy via directly decreasing miR-96.

The prognostic role of programmed death ligand-1 (PD-L1) expression in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has been widely studied but the results are controversial. In this comprehensive meta-analysis, we elucidated the clinical value of PD-L1 in HCC. Relevant studies were systematically searched in the Cochrane Library, EMBASE, and PubMed until June 27, 2019. Eligible studies were validated for the prognostic effect of PD-L1 on the overall survival (OS), disease-free survival (DFS), and relapse-free survival (RFS) in HCC using a hazard ratio (HR) and its 95% confidence interval (95% CI). Twenty-three studies with 3529 patients were involved in this meta-analysis. The pooled results revealed that high membrane-bound PD-L1 (mPD-L1) expression was associated with poor OS (HR: 1.42; 95% CI: 1.12–1.80; P = 0.004) and had no significant correlation with RFS (HR: 1.14; 95% CI: 0.85–1.54; P = 0.39), and DFS (HR: 1.36; 95% CI: 0.81–2.28; P = 0.25). The results also indicated that high soluble PD-L1 (sPD-L1) levels were associated with worse OS (HR: 2.93; 95% CI: 2.20–3.91; P < 0.00001). In addition, high mPD-L1 expression was associated with high alpha-fetoprotein levels (AFP; OR = 1.46; 95% CI: 1.16–1.84; P = 0.001), hepatitis (OR = 0.72; 95% CI: 0.54–0.98; P = 0.03), poor tumor differentiation (OR = 0.68; 95% CI: 0.55–0.84; P = 0.03), and tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (OR = 3.39; 95% CI: 1.06–10.91; P = 0.04). The mPD-L1 expression had no significant correlation with age, number of tumors, gender, tumor size, liver cirrhosis, vascular invasion, tumor encapsulation, or TNM stage. The study revealed that high mPD-L1 expression in the tumor tissue and high sPD-L1 levels were associated with shorter OS in HCC. Moreover, overexpression of mPD-L1 was significantly associated with poor tumor differentiation, hepatitis, AFP elevation, and tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes.

The efficient removal of carbon monoxide (CO) from H2-rich stream via the water gas shift (WGS) reaction requires the catalysts that possess high activity at low temperatures to avoid the thermodynamic equilibrium limitation. We report that oxygen (O2) plasma activation enables an Au/TiO2 nanocatalyst to achieve superior activity in the WGS reaction at low temperatures. At 120 °C, O2 plasma activated Au/TiO2 nanocatalyst exhibits CO reaction rate of 0.51 mmol·mg−1·h−1, which is 5 times higher than the conventional activated counterpart. CO conversion over O2 plasma activated Au/TiO2 nanocatalyst only slightly decreases from 73% to 68% during a 4.5 h continuous WGS reaction at 150 °C. The catalyst characterizations indicate that O2 plasma activation could control average size of Au nanoparticles below 3.5 nm, create plenty of coordinatively unsaturated sites (on Au nanoparticles) and sufficient Auδ+-Oδ--Ti sites (at interfaces between Au and TiO2), and modulate the electronic structure of interfaces, which accelerates greatly the WGS reaction. Further, the enhancement mechanism of the WGS reaction over O2 plasma activated Au/TiO2 nanocatalyst was disclosed.

We propose a novel Power to Synthesis Gas (P2SG) approach, composed of two high-efficiency and renewable electricity-driven units, i.e., plasma catalytic reforming (PCR) and water electrolysis (WE), to produce high-quality syngas from CH4, CO2 and H2O. As WE technology is already commercial, we mainly focus on the PCR unit, consisting of gliding arc plasma and Ni-based catalyst, for oxidative dry reforming of methane. An energy efficiency of 78.9% and energy cost of 1.0 kWh/Nm(3) at a CH4 conversion of 99% and a CO2 conversion of 79% are obtained. Considering an energy efficiency of 80% for WE, the P2SG system yields an overall energy efficiency of 79.3% and energy cost of 1.8 kWh/Nm(3). High-quality syngas is produced without the need for post-treatment units, featuring the ideal stoichiometric number of 2, with concentration of 94.6 vol%, and a desired CO2 fraction of 1.9 vol% for methanol synthesis. The PCR unit has the advantage of fast response to adapting to fluctuation of renewable electricity, avoiding local hot spots in the catalyst bed and coking, in contrast to conventional catalytic processes. Moreover, pure O-2 from the WE unit is directly utilized by the PCR unit for oxidative dry reforming of methane, and thus, no air separation unit, like in conventional processes, is required. This work demonstrates the viability of the P2SG approach for large-scale energy storage of renewable electricity via electricity-to-fuel conversion.

To reduce energy costs, minimize secondary pollution from undecomposed ozone, and improve the efficiency of ozone use, a novel process of cycled storage-ozone catalytic oxidation (OZCO) was employed to remove formaldehyde (HCHO) at low concentrations in air. We applied Al2O3-supported manganese oxide (MnOx) catalysts to this process, and examined the HCHO adsorption capacity and OZCO performance over the MnOx catalysts. Owing to the high dispersion of MnOx and low oxidation state of manganese, the MnOx/Al2O3 catalysts with a manganese acetate precursor and 10%-Mn loading showed good performance in both storage and OZCO stages. The presence of H2O led to a decrease of the HCHO adsorption capacity owing to competitive adsorption between moisture and HCHO at the storage stage; however, high relative humidity (RH) favored complete conversion of stored HCHO to CO2 at the OZCO stage and contributed to an excellent carbon balance. Four low concentration HCHO storage-OZCO cycles with a long HCHO storage period and relatively short OZCO period were successfully performed over the selected MnOx/Al2O3 catalyst at room temperature and a RH of 50%, demonstrating that the proposed storage-OZCO process is an economical, reliable, and promising technique for indoor air purification.

With an extension of the absorption band toward visible light, plasmonic photocatalysts directly harvest energy from solar light without compromising the activity, offering a desirable way to address energy and environmental issues. Here we demonstrate photocatalytic oxidation of formaldehyde in air over plasmonic Au/TiO2 catalyst under visible light in a single-pass continuous flow reactor. Compared to that under dark, a significant enhancement of up to 5 times the reaction rate at 13% RH under visible light is achieved. Au/TiO2 catalyst exhibits very high activity, a complete conversion of formaldehyde of 83.3% under visible light at 44% RH, but is completely inactive in dry air even under visible light. Also, the plasmonic Au/TiO2 is efficient for photocatalytic oxidation of formaldehyde under visible light, which is evidenced by a slight difference of conversion between UV light and visible light. To disclose the underlying mechanism, in situ diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform (DRIFT) spec...

To achieve on-board hydrogen production with high energy efficiency and low energy cost, the oxidative pyrolysis reforming (OPR) of methanol using air as an oxidant in a heat-insulated gliding arc plasma reactor is explored. Effects of dioxygen/methanol (O2/C) ratio, steam/methanol (S/C) ratio and specific energy input (SEI) on the OPR are investigated. The reaction rate ratio (α) of pyrolysis reforming to oxidative reforming in the OPR is deduced. The OPR of methanol strongly depends on the O2/C ratio, with which methanol conversion increases rapidly. In the OPR, methanol conversions occur mainly by the oxidative reforming (partial oxidation) at the O2/C ratios below 0.20, but by the oxidative reforming and the promoted pyrolysis reforming at the O2/C ratios above 0.20, which is confirmed by the enthalpy change for the overall reaction of OPR. Higher O2/C ratio results in higher energy efficiency and lower energy cost, however, higher S/C ratio or larger SEI leads to lower energy efficiency and higher energy cost. Under conditions of O2/C = 0.30, S/C = 0.5, SEI = 24 kJ/mol, energy efficiency of 74% and energy cost of 0.45 kWh/Nm3 with methanol conversion of 88% are achieved.

In terms of the reaction of CO2 reduction to CO with hydrogen, CO2 conversion is very low at low temperature due to the limitation of thermodynamic equilibrium (TE). To overcome this limitation, plasma catalytic reduction of CO2 to CO in a catalyst-filled dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) reactor is studied. An enhanced effect of plasma on the reaction over Au/CeO2 catalysts is observed. For both the conventionally catalytic (CC) and plasma catalytic (PC, Pin = 15 W) reactions under conditions of 400 °C, H2/CO2 = 1, 200 SCCM, GHSV = 12,000 mL•g−1cat•h−1, CO2 conversions over Au/CeO2 reach 15.4% and 25.5% due to the presence of Au, respectively, however, those over CeO2 are extremely low and negligible. Moreover, CO2 conversion over Au/CeO2 in the PC reaction exceeds 22.4% of the TE conversion. Surface intermediate species formed on the catalyst samples during the reactions are determined by in-situ temperature-programmed decomposition (TPD) technique. Interestingly, it disclosed that in the PC reaction, the formation of formate intermediate is enhanced by plasma, and the acceleration by plasma in the decomposition of formate species is much greater than that in the formation of formate species on Au/CeO2. Enhancement factor is introduced to quantify the enhanced effect of plasma. Lower reactor temperature, higher gas hourly space velocity (GHSV), and lower molar ratio of H2/CO2 would be associated with larger enhancement factor.

Atmospheric-pressure air plasma, powered by alternating current (AC) sine-wave high voltage, can in-situ regenerate deactivated Au nanocatalysts during CO oxidation, but it needs high-humidity air as the discharge gas. To overcome the limitation on humidity for in-situ regeneration of air plasma, a square-wave pulsed plasma is applied in this work. Differently from the AC plasma, the pulsed plasma exhibits excellent regeneration performance at any humidity. Further, surface carbonate decomposition, nitrogen oxides poisoning species and electric discharge of the pulsed plasma regeneration are investigated. For the pulsed plasma regeneration at any humidity, the evolution of CO2 concentration with the regeneration time almost keeps the same profile, featuring zero-order kinetics for the carbonate decomposition; on the other hand, whether in the gas phase or on the catalyst surface, there are no formation of poisoning nitrogen oxides. The pulsed plasma at any humidity has the powerful ability in carbonate decomposition and simultaneously prevents the formation of poisoning nitrogen oxides, which is ascribed to its highly centralized energy deposition with high instantaneous power and long interval of instantaneous power. For practical application, normal air is also confirmed to be qualified for the pulsed plasma regeneration.

Objective: To study the correlation of peripheral blood NK cell content with tumor marker content and proliferation molecule expression in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Methods: A total of 80 patients who were diagnosed with NSCLC in our hospital between June 2014 and October 2016 were selected as the NSCLC group of the research, and 96 healthy volunteers who received physical examination in our hospital during the same period were selected as the control group of the research. The peripheral blood NK cell content and serum tumor marker contents of two groups of subjects were determined, and the proliferation molecule expression levels in lung cancer focus tissue and focus tissue adjacent to carcinoma of NSCLC group were determined. Results: Peripheral blood NK cell content of NSCLC group was significantly lower than that of control group; serum CEA, CA125, Cyfra21-1 and HE4 contents were significantly higher than those of control group, and serum CEA, CA125, Cyfra21-1 and HE4 contents of NSCLC patients with high NK cell content were significantly lower than those of NSCLC patients with low NK cell content; c-myc, c-FLIP, Livin, Moesin and k-ras protein expression in lung cancer focus tissue were significantly higher than those in focus tissue adjacent to carcinoma, and c-myc, c-FLIP, Livin, Moesin and k-ras protein expression in lung cancer focus tissue with high NK cell content were significantly lower than those in lung cancer focus tissue with low NK cell content. Conclusion: Peripheral blood NK cell content significantly reduces in patients with NSCLC and is associated with the cancer cell proliferation activity.