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Bi2Sr2Ca2Cu3O10+δ (Bi-2223) precursors for the fabrication of high temperature superconducting tapes were prepared by spray pyrolysis technique followed by a calcination process. The influences of precursor powder phase composition on the phase evolution dynamics and final current capacity of Bi-2223 superconducting tapes were systematically studied. It was interesting to notice that slight increase of Cu content in chemical composition could cause obvious variations of both the phase composition and the morphology of CuO particles in precursors. Therefore, the Bi-2223 phase formation process during the sintering process of tapes could be affected, and the current capacity changed accordingly. On the other hand, during the calcination temperature optimization process, the Bi-2223 phase content in precursors changed accordingly, thus the Bi-2223 phase formation dynamics were also studied. More Bi-2223 nuclei were formed due to the pre-existed Bi-2223 grains, which worked as inhomogeneous nuclei centers. Thus, although the final Bi-2223 phase contents were similar in all the tapes, the particle size and texture structure of Bi-2223 varied greatly, which caused a dramatic decrease of critical current in Bi-2223 tapes with the formation of Bi-2223 in precursors. Therefore, it could be concluded that both the morphology of CuO particles and the Bi-2223 phase content in precursors were the factors controlling the phase evolution dynamics during Bi-2223 tape sintering process.

The reabsorption between the powders of phosphor-converted full-spectrum white-light-emitting diodes (WLEDs) was improved by using the powder sedimentation packaging method. The phosphors of red-em...

Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+δ (Bi-2212)/Ag round wires were fabricated by imposing ultrasonic-vibration drawing (UVD) technique during both the single-filament and multi-filament cold-drawing processes. The frequency of ultrasonic-vibration was set fixed at 20 kHz and different output power density levels had been altered by varied amplitudes. The influence of ultrasonic-vibration on the deformation process of Ag metal sheath, filament density, Ag/superconductor ratio, wire dimension, drawing force reduction, and the superconducting properties of final wires has been systematically studied. Softening effect of ultrasonic-vibration on the Ag metal can be deduced with the decreasing drawing flow stress and drawing force under certain amplitude. It was found that powder densification could be promoted and higher filament volume fraction as well as high wire diameter uniformity had been reached with the introduction of UVD process, leading to the enhancement of Jc and JE after proper heat treatment. Such technique could be considered in fabrication of Bi-2212 long wires as well as other superconducting materials.

BACKGROUND: A high prevalence of work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSDs) has been reported among flight attendants. Identifying the root causes of these disorders may improve the health conditions of flight attendants and further improve flight safety and service quality. OBJECTIVE: In this study, we aimed to identify WMSD risk factors for a specific population, namely Chinese female flight attendants. METHODS: A two-stage survey including an online questionnaire (46 flight attendants) and a semi-structured interview (16 flight attendants) was used to assess the WMSDs of Chinese female flight attendants. Text analysis tools in NVivo 11 were used to identify the main concerns and risk factors for WMSDs of Chinese flight attendants. RESULTS: In the online questionnaire, more than 86% of the participants reported discomfort in at least one body part. Biomechanical factors, work organizational factors, and psychosocial factors were reported by participants in this study. Chinese passengers were found to have an effect on WMSD development in Chinese flight attendants. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study suggested that WMSDs are severe problems among Chinese flight attendants. General factors as well as the passenger-relevant factor were identified as the most influential causes of WMSDs.

Precursor powders of Bi2Sr2Ca2Cu3O10+δ (Bi-2223) high temperature superconducting tapes were prepared with spray pyrolysis technique. By tuning the oxygen partial pressure in calcination atmosphere as 1.0%, 7.5%, and 10.0%, respectively, the influences of calcination atmosphere on the phase evolution dynamics during the precursor powders calcination process have been discussed. Then the optimal calcination temperatures have been obtained correspondingly. Moreover, Bi-2223 multi-filament tapes have been fabricated with the precursor powders calcinated under different atmosphere. The effects of precursor powder calcination parameters on the phase composition, microstructures as well as the current capacity of final tapes have been systematically studied. Due to the proper secondary phase content and enhanced Bi-2223 texture structures, the maximum critical current of 109 A at 77 K, self-field, corresponding to the critical current density of 23.3 kA cm−2 has been obtained with the oxygen partial pressure of 7.5% in calcination atmosphere and the calcination temperature of 790 °C.

Bi 1.76 Pb 0.34 Sr 1.93 Ca 2.02 Cu 3.06 O 10+δ (Bi-2223) high temperature superconducting tapes were fabricated with Powder in tube (PIT) process. The traditional drawing process was partially replaced by groove rolling. The influence of cold working method on the filament density, the phase evolution mechanism as well as superconducting properties has been systematically studied. The groove rolling process could obviously enhance the filament density of Bi-2223 green wires, which thus led to the change of Bi-2223 formation rate. Meanwhile, although the heat treatment process has not been thoroughly optimized, the residual secondary phase content was still high, the critical current has been improved for more than 20% with groove rolling process, which should be attributed to the improved intergrain connections. On the other hand, the groove rolling process was also effective on the fabrication of Bi-2223 tapes with larger filament number, such as 85 or 121 to maintain the uniformity of filament deformation.

It is well known that the existence of interstitial Fe is a great obstacle to enhancing the superconducting properties of the Fe(Se, Te) system. In this work, a silver and oxygen codoping effect toward enhancement of the superconductivity and flux pinning in Fe(Se, Te) bulks is reported. The oxygen ions from SeO

The microbubble pretreated resin was used for demulsification and deoiling of the simulated O/W emulsion. The demulsification and deoiling performance and the influencing factors were investigated systematically. Experimental results indicate that the microbubble pretreated resin reaches a 97% oil removal within 80 min; on the contrary, oil removals are 90% and 85% for NaOH solution soaked and un-pretreated resins respectively. After five repeated runs, the oil removal of microbubble pretreated resin can be maintained at over 70%. The demulsification mechanism was revealed by comparing zeta potential, surface tension, contact angle of the emulsion in treatment, and the characterization results of the resin before and after use. Three possible pathways of demulsification were concluded and the ranking contributions can be shown below. Pathway 1: Competitive trapping of surfactant. The cationic groups of the resin combine with the anionic groups of the surfactant and drag them away from the oil particle surface. Pathway 2: Distribution equilibrium of surfactant. Free surfactants in the emulsion are captured by resin and reduce the concentration of uncombined surfactant. This results in surfactants on the oil particle partly detaching from the oil surface to maintain the adsorption-desorption equilibrium of the surfactant. Pathway 3: Adsorption coalescence.

Passive Q-switching of a blue laser diode pumped Pr:LiYF4 laser is reported at 522 nm, 639 nm, and 720 nm using SnS2 as saturable absorber (SA). The maximum average output powers and the shortest pulse widths are (23 mW, 240 ns) for 522 nm, (60 mW, 165 ns) for 639 nm, (40 mW, 247 ns) for 720 nm, respectively. The experimental results demonstrate that the SnS2 have a good performance as SA in the visible domain.

We develop a hybrid cold/heat two-step splicing approach for low loss, low backreflection, and high polarization extinction ratio (PER) hollow-core to solid-core fiber interconnection. The employed hollow-core fiber (HCF) is our recently developed high-birefringence polarization-maintaining hollow-core fiber (PM-HCF) with a PER value of ∼30 dB, and the solid-core fiber (SCF) is a commercial Panda polarization-maintaining fiber (Panda fiber). Simultaneous low backreflection (

Compared with China’s domestic and outbound tourism, China’s inbound tourism has developed relatively slowly. An understanding of cultural similarities and differences can support destination managers in formulating strategies and increase the satisfaction of inbound tourists. As one of the best tourist cities in China, Chengdu is an important destination for inbound tourists. Meanwhile, American tourists are the major source of tourists for Chengdu’s inbound tourism. Based on the Cultural Dimensions Theory proposed by Hofstede, this research focuses on a cross-cultural comparison of two important markets for Chengdu tourism: Chinese and American tourists. In addition, electronic word-of-mouth (E-WOM) has become an important source of tourist information, the analysis of E-WOM may provide more insights into users’ feelings than questionnaires. This study uses content analysis to quantify online reviews and importance performance analysis to compare the importance and satisfaction of Chinese and American tourists with destination attributes. The results clearly show the comparison between the two groups in destination assessment.

Objectives This study investigated the prevalence of musculoskeletal discomfort among female cabin crew through cabin tasks and demographic factors, including age and seniority. Methods This study conducted an online questionnaire survey targeted at female cabin crew in Taiwan and ensured that the sample size was with a statistical power of 0.95. This study evaluated the work intensity by ranking six common cabin tasks and examined musculoskeletal discomfort with Cornell Musculoskeletal Discomfort Questionnaire. Descriptive statistics were used to learn the work intensity and discomfort conditions. In addition, the Chi‐square test of independence and multivariate adjustment were applied to clarify the impact of age and occupation on musculoskeletal discomfort in the neck, shoulders, and lower back. Results This study enrolled 88 female cabin crew members. Handling carry‐on baggage was voted as the highest intensity cabin task (40%), which was also ranked as the strongest intensity on shoulders. Meanwhile, the upper trunk was more prevalent in musculoskeletal discomfort. Moreover, after multivariate adjustment with controlling the effect of age, this study found a marginal significant association (p = .09) between seniority and right shoulder discomfort for younger staff. Conclusion This study found that handling carry‐on baggage was associated with musculoskeletal complaints in the shoulders. Therefore, this study suggested that shoulders, especially for the right side might be related to the occupational injury, which was prevalent along with seniority among the younger crew. Overall, this study provided the preliminary findings to improve occupational training for preventive health.

Polycrystalline bulks Bi2.1Sr1.96CaKxCu2.0O8+δ + yAg (Bi-2212) with different K incorporation content of x = 0, 0.02, 0.05 and 0.10 and addition of Ag nanoparticles with weight ratio of y = 0.10 wt% were fabricated by a hot-pressing (HP) process. The influences of K+ ions and Ag nanoparticles on the lattice parameters, phase composition, microstructures and related superconducting properties were systematically investigated. The introductions of K+ and Ag both obviously affected the thermodynamic parameters of Bi-2212 system. Accordingly the sintering temperature during HP process changed dramatically. After the HP process, increases of average grain size were obtained with Ag incorporation, based on both XRD and SEM analysis, which implied the formation of better texture alignment structure. Slight decrease of critical temperature was observed corresponding to the changing valence of Cu2+ ions on superconducting layer. Increase of superconducting phase volume was achieved on the K and Ag co-incorporated bulk. And the enhancement of current capacity was also achieved on the very same sample, under the magnetic field higher than 1 T. The different flux pinning mechanism between K and K/Ag incorporated sample from point pinning to surface pinning could be related to the microstructure change, which can be recognized as a solid evidence for the different effects of K and Ag.

SnO2/carbon hybrids with porous carbon as the carrier are considered as promising candidates for substituting graphite anode in Li-ion batteries (LIBs). However, in these composites, the active SnO2 particles are usually agglomerated and exposed on the surfaces of carbon matrix, which will lead to weak structure stability of the electrode, insufficient electric contact area between SnO2 and carbon, as well as more side reactions. To overcome these drawbacks, herein, a three-dimensional (3D) N-doped mesoporous carbon (NMC)/SnO2 composite with polypyrrole (PPy) coating layers (NMC/SnO2@PPy) is synthesized through a wet-impregnation and subsequent in situ vapor-phase pyrrole polymerization method, in which ultrafine SnO2 particles with monodisperse morphology are well encapsulated between porous carbon matrix and PPy coating layer. This novel structure can effectively reduce SnO2 aggregation, enhance electrical conductivity and depress excessive side reactions. The NMC/SnO2@PPy anode shows a reversible capacity of 775 mAh g−1 at a current density of 500 mA g−1 after 300 cycles. And a high reversible capacity of 591 mAh g−1 is obtained at a high rate of 1 A g−1 even after 1000 cycles. The successful preparation of NMC/SnO2@PPy anode can provide a rational approach to devise metal oxide-carbon hybrid anodes with 3D porous structures for LIBs development.

Moderate soil drying (MSD) stress at the grain filling stage can improve grain filling efficiently and thus increase grain yield. To elucidate the molecular response of grain filling to MSD stress, a labeling LC-based quantitative proteomics approach using tandem mass tags was applied to determine the changes in leaf and grain protein abundance level at 15 days after flowering. A total of 2109 leaf proteins and 3220 grain proteins were detected, and 251 leaf proteins and 220 grain proteins were differentially expressed under MSD stress. Based on MapMan ontology, differentially expressed proteins in leaf and grain were categorized within 22 and 18 functional categories, respectively. The patterns observed were interesting in that in some categories such as photosynthesis-related protein in leaf and cell division related proteins in grain showed higher expression abundant under MSD stress, which facilities increasing the source supply and sink size. In other categories, such as carbohydrate metabolism and mitochondrial electron transport, surprisingly showed a completely different expression pattern between leaf and grain under MSD stress, which led to faster and better remobilization of carbon from leaf to grain. Additionally, the complicated functional network including the small GTP-binding proteins, calmodulin, and 14-3-3 proteins play an important role in regulation carbon remobilization mediated by the stressful signals from soil after rice plants were treated with MSD at grain-filling stage. The findings provide theoretical evidence for better quality control and scientific improvement of rice in practice.

BACKGROUND Chinese square dancing, known as guangchang wu in Chinese, is a well-known public fitness activity that provides an entertaining way for older Chinese women to improve their flexibility, lower extremity strength, overall coordination, and balance. However, injuries, noise conflicts, and lack of space are challenging aspects of this activity. Somatosensory games (SG) are an increasingly popular physical fitness approach to enhance the selective attention of older persons with indoor engagement and exercises. OBJECTIVE The objectives of this study were to develop a newly designed somatosensory square dance system for older Chinese people and to evaluate its usability. METHODS This is a mixed methods study. The newly designed somatosensory square dance system is a somatic training tool that provides adequate Chinese square dance fitness training based on Laban Movement Analysis (LMA) and design guidelines established in a previous stage. The usability evaluation involved a questionnaire and interviews. Twelve participants were interviewed before and after experiencing the 15-minute dancing and learning process within the program. In addition, participants scored their experience satisfaction in psychological, physiological, and relaxation sections on a scale of 1 to 5 using a questionnaire. Qualitative content analysis and quantitative analysis of the satisfaction scores supported understanding of usability problems. RESULTS Based on the interview results, 6/12 (50%) of the participants thought the system could help them correct their dancing movements indoors without being affected by poor outdoor weather. Among the participants, 3/12 (25%) indicated that this indoor system could enable them to enjoy fitness activities in a private space. Moreover, 3/12 participants (25%) stated that this system could promote family relationships by providing easy dancing movements. All participants were highly satisfied with the relaxation aspect of the system (4.45/5). The participants were all psychologically satisfied and interested in the novel features of the system, with an average score of 4.16/5. Physiologically, participants affirmed that the system could help them maintain good health (4.91/5). CONCLUSIONS The results of this study suggest that the somatosensory square dance system can be used as an indoor fitness tool to improve older Chinese square dancers’ health conditions with reasonable dance training. Noise and space conflicts can be addressed. The Laban Elated Square Dance system, which was modified by therapists based on LMA and square dance design guidelines, was highly approved by dancers because it decreased the possibility of injuries, falls, and joint damage by considering the physical and psychological difficulties of older persons. Different features will be considered in the next stage, such as greater selection of exercises and difficulty level settings. Users’ social needs will also be explored in subsequent stages.

Background Chinese square dancing, known as guangchang wu in Chinese, is a well-known public fitness activity that provides an entertaining way for older Chinese women to improve their flexibility, lower extremity strength, overall coordination, and balance. However, injuries, noise conflicts, and lack of space are challenging aspects of this activity. Somatosensory games (SG) are an increasingly popular physical fitness approach to enhance the selective attention of older persons with indoor engagement and exercises. Objective The objectives of this study were to develop a newly designed somatosensory square dance system for older Chinese people and to evaluate its usability. Methods This is a mixed methods study. The newly designed somatosensory square dance system is a somatic training tool that provides adequate Chinese square dance fitness training based on Laban Movement Analysis (LMA) and design guidelines established in a previous stage. The usability evaluation involved a questionnaire and interviews. Twelve participants were interviewed before and after experiencing the 15-minute dancing and learning process within the program. In addition, participants scored their experience satisfaction in psychological, physiological, and relaxation sections on a scale of 1 to 5 using a questionnaire. Qualitative content analysis and quantitative analysis of the satisfaction scores supported understanding of usability problems. Results Based on the interview results, 6/12 (50%) of the participants thought the system could help them correct their dancing movements indoors without being affected by poor outdoor weather. Among the participants, 3/12 (25%) indicated that this indoor system could enable them to enjoy fitness activities in a private space. Moreover, 3/12 participants (25%) stated that this system could promote family relationships by providing easy dancing movements. All participants were highly satisfied with the relaxation aspect of the system (4.45/5). The participants were all psychologically satisfied and interested in the novel features of the system, with an average score of 4.16/5. Physiologically, participants affirmed that the system could help them maintain good health (4.91/5). Conclusions The results of this study suggest that the somatosensory square dance system can be used as an indoor fitness tool to improve older Chinese square dancers’ health conditions with reasonable dance training. Noise and space conflicts can be addressed. The Laban Elated Square Dance system, which was modified by therapists based on LMA and square dance design guidelines, was highly approved by dancers because it decreased the possibility of injuries, falls, and joint damage by considering the physical and psychological difficulties of older persons. Different features will be considered in the next stage, such as greater selection of exercises and difficulty level settings. Users’ social needs will also be explored in subsequent stages.

A low-cost and well-separated approach is introduced for adsorption pollutants in water. Chemical modified lignin is prepared with diethylenetriamine to enhance the reaction activities, then used to prepare lignin derivate magnetic hydrogel microspheres (LDMHMs) via blending with Fe3O4. The LDMHMs are successful prepared by the determination of FT-IR data, and the morphology shown from SEM imagine indicates the LDMHMs are in nanosized. The prepared LDMHMs are used as adsorbents for organic dyes, such as methylene blue (MB), methyl orange (MO) and malachite green (MG), the plateaus data are 43 mg/g, 39 mg/g and 155 mg/g, respectively. For inorganic pollutions, such as Pb2+, Hg2+ and Ni2+, the plateaus data are 33 mg/g, 55 mg/g and 23 mg/g, respectively. The adsorption data of unmodified lignin are 2.6 mg/g (Pb2+), 3.3 mg/g (Hg2+), 2.1 mg/g (Ni2+), 8 mg/g (MB), 10 mg/g (MG) and 2 mg/g (MO) in the same condition. The adsorbents are recycled by magnetic separation, regenerating from acid condition and reused for multiple cycles. The regeneration ratios are all above 90%, indicating a highly reusability and further reducing the cost of the treatment.

Sources of pulping red liquor, which is produced by acidic sulfite cooking in paper industry, consisted of lignosulphonate and polysaccharide, commonly considered as waste or byproducts and used in low value, such as surfactant and adhesive are wide and its price is low. Here a novel method for high value-added utilization of the pulp and paper industry waste for fabricating super-swelling biopolymer hydrogels is introduced. In contrast to other costly utilizations, which are needed to separate red liquor or purify hemicellulose and lignin before using, it is first time to directly utilize red liquor to prepare hydrogels without pretreatment. FT-IR, SEM, TGA and XRD are used to determine structure and morphology of hydrogels. It is excited the hydrogels fabricated from acrylic (AA) and industry waste exhibit super-swelling and slow release behaviors in water. Compared with synthetic materials, the hydrogels are at low price to be chosen as candidates for water retention agent for agriculture.

Black liquor produced by pulping industry is generally difficult to utilize considering its complex constitutions including lignin with undefined primary structure, various polysaccharides and mineral salts, thus generally being regarded as industrial waste. In this work, we report the preparation of black liquor-based hydrogel (BLH) by a redox free radical induced polymerization process and its applications as both water retention material and slow-release fertilizer. Comparing with the hydrogel prepared without black liquor, the maximum water swelling ratio of the BLH can be enhanced from 69 g/g to 359 g/g, and the water retention ratio was increased from 24.42% to 45.25 %. The hydrogel’s potential application as both water retention material and slow-release fertilizer was verified by performing a cultivating plant test in the hydrogel-mixed sand. Applying this polymer hydrogel as water retention material and slow-release fertilizer achieves the utilization of the whole components of black liquor that were treated as industrial waste before, which not only solve the pollution problem of paper-making process, but also expand its promising application prospect to the afforestation of desertification control projects.

Bi2SrxCa2Cu3O10+δ (Bi-2223) precursor powders were fabricated by co-precipitation process with different Sr content of x = 1.93, 1.90, and 1.85. Multi-filamentary Bi-2223 high temperature superconducting tapes were fabricated by the traditional powder in tube process (PIT) with different precursor powders. The influences of Sr content on the phase formation dynamics as well as the superconducting properties of Bi-2223 tapes have been systematically investigated. With decreasing Sr content, the critical temperature of Bi-2223 tapes decreased from 109.9 K to 107.7 K, which implied that the change of Sr content could change the carrier concentration on Cu-O plane, thus led to the variation of intrinsic superconducting transition behavior. Besides, with the decrease of Sr content, the phase formation temperature decreased. Bi-2223 tapes with higher superconducting phase content were obtained with the Sr content of 1.85, which was beneficial to the improvement of intergrain connections. Thus, the Jc-B behavior was enhanced under the magnetic field parallel to the ab plane of Bi-2223. With further optimization of sintering process, the maximum Ic of 128 A was achieved on Sr = 1.85 tape, corresponding to the critical current density, Jc of ~ 25.8 kAcm−2.

Taurine has been widely used as a growth- or health-promoting additive in aquatic animals because of its multiple functions, while little work has been done on its effects on sea cucumbers, in spite of the occurrence of serious diseases. In this study, juvenile sea cucumbers (4.68 ± 0.04 g) were fed diets supplemented with taurine at 0% (control), 0.1, 0.25, 0.5, 1, and 2% for 8 wk. At the end of an 8-wk feeding trial, growth performance of sea cucumbers was not significantly affected by dietary taurine (P > 0.05). However, dietary taurine significantly elevated intestinal lipase activities of sea cucumbers (P 0.05). Dietary taurine at all five dosages significantly increased total antioxidant capacity in sea cucumbers, while superoxide dismutase activity in groups with dietary taurine at 0.25 and 0.5% was significantly higher than that of the control group (P

In Pichia pastoris, the peroxisomal targeting signal 2 (PTS2)-dependent peroxisomal matrix protein import pathway requires the receptor, Pex7, and its co-receptor Pex20. A conserved lysine (Lys(19)) near the N terminus of Pex20 is required for its polyubiquitination and proteasomal degradation, whereas a conserved cysteine (Cys(8)) is essential for its recycling. In this study, we found that Cys(8) is required for the DTT-sensitive mono- and diubiquitination of Pex20. We also show that the PTS2 cargo receptor, Pex7, is required for Pex20 polyubiquitination. Pex4, the E2 ubiquitin-conjugation enzyme, is required for monoubiquitination of Pex20. However, it is also necessary for polyubiquitination of Pex20, making its behavior distinct from the ubiquitination described for other PTS receptors. Unlike the roles of specific RING peroxins in Pex5 ubiquitination, we found that all the RING peroxins (Pex2, Pex10, and Pex12) are required as E3 ubiquitin ligases for Pex20 mono- and polyubiquitination. A model for Pex20 ubiquitination is proposed based on these observations. This is the first description of the complete ubiquitination pathway of Pex20, which provides a better understanding of the recycling and degradation of this PTS2 cargo co-receptor.

Parameter estimation of chirp signal, such as instantaneous frequency (IF), instantaneous frequency rate (IFR), and initial phase (IP), arises in many applications of signal processing. During the phase-based parameter estimation, a phase unwrapping process is needed to recover the phase information correctly and impact the estimation performance remarkably. Therefore, we introduce support vector regression (SVR) to predict the variation trend of instantaneous phase and unwrap phases efficiently. Even though with that being the case, errors still exist in phase unwrapping process because of its ambiguous phase characteristic. Furthermore, we propose an SVR-based joint estimation algorithm and make it immune to these error phases by means of setting the SVR's parameters properly. Our results show that, compared with the other three algorithms of chirp signal, not only does the proposed one maintain quality capabilities at low frequencies, but also improves accuracy at high frequencies and decreases the impact with the initial phase.

Peroxisomes are essential organelles responsible for many metabolic reactions, such as the oxidation of very long chain and branched fatty acids, D-amino acids and polyamines, as well as the production and turnover of hydrogen peroxide. They comprise a class of organelles called microbodies, including glycosomes, glyoxysomes and Woronin bodies. Dysfunction of human peroxisomes causes severe and often fatal peroxisome biogenesis disorders (PBDs). Peroxisomal matrix protein import is mediated by receptors that shuttle between the cytosol and peroxisomal matrix using ubiquitination/deubiquitination reactions and ATP hydrolysis for receptor recycling. We focus on the machinery involved in the peroxisomal matrix protein import cycle, highlighting recent advances in peroxisomal matrix protein import, cargo release and receptor recycling/degradation.

A new Frequency-Hopping (FH) signal detection method is proposed. Different from previous methods which need to monitor the total band, it can monitor part of the band and decrease the range of the bandwidth. According to this method, a new detection model is set and the computation formulas of the detection probability and false-alarm probability are given. The parameters of a VHF radio are used to prove the validity of the method. Simulation results show that this method can decrease the range of the bandwidth and detect the FH signal with some penalty on the SNR and signal loss.

The complete genome sequence of Geobacillus thermodenitrificans NG80-2, a thermophilic bacillus isolated from a deep oil reservoir in Northern China, consists of a 3,550,319-bp chromosome and a 57,693-bp plasmid. The genome reveals that NG80-2 is well equipped for adaptation into a wide variety of environmental niches, including oil reservoirs, by possessing genes for utilization of a broad range of energy sources, genes encoding various transporters for efficient nutrient uptake and detoxification, and genes for a flexible respiration system including an aerobic branch comprising five terminal oxidases and an anaerobic branch comprising a complete denitrification pathway for quick response to dissolved oxygen fluctuation. The identification of a nitrous oxide reductase gene has not been previously described in Gram-positive bacteria. The proteome further reveals the presence of a long-chain alkane degradation pathway; and the function of the key enzyme in the pathway, the long-chain alkane monooxygenase LadA, is confirmed by in vivo and in vitro experiments. The thermophilic soluble monomeric LadA is an ideal candidate for treatment of environmental oil pollutions and biosynthesis of complex molecules.

Anthranilate is an important intermediate of tryptophan metabolism. In this study, a hydroxylase system consisting of an FADH2-utilizing monooxygenase (GTNG_3160) and an FAD reductase (GTNG_3158), as well as a bifunctional riboflavin kinase/FMN adenylyltransferase (GTNG_3159), encoded in the anthranilate degradation gene cluster inGeobacillus thermodenitrificansNG80-2 were functionally characterizedin vitro. GTNG_3159 produces FAD to be reduced by GTNG_3158 and the reduced FAD (FADH2) is utilized by GTNG_3160 to convert anthranilate to 3-hydroxyanthranilate (3-HAA), which is further degraded to acetyl-CoA through ameta-cleavage pathway also encoded in the gene cluster. Utilization of this pathway for the degradation of anthranilate and tryptophan by NG80-2 under physiological conditions was confirmed by real-time RT-PCR analysis of representative genes. This is believed to be the first time that the degradation pathway of anthranilate via 3-HAA has been characterized in a bacterium. This pathway is likely to play an important role in the survival ofG. thermodenitrificansin the oil reservoir conditions from which strain NG80-2 was isolated.