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This article provides new evidence on how access to finance affects technological innovation and establishes the role of labor practices in shaping this relation. We exploit a unique setting, pre-Civil War America, where staggered adoption of free banking laws across states encouraged bank entry, and variation in the use of exploited workers in agriculture generated differences in producers’ demands for labor-saving technologies. Results show that access to finance spurred innovation; the positive effect on agricultural innovation diminished with labor exploitation. We establish the causal role of labor exploitation using the 1850s cholera pandemic and the influx of Irish immigrants.

Graphs have provided an expressive mathematical tool to model quantum-mechanical devices and systems. In particular, it has been recently discovered that graph theory can be used to describe and design quantum components, devices, setups and systems, based on the two-dimensional lattice of parametric nonlinear optical crystals and linear optical circuits, different to the standard quantum photonic framework. Realizing such graph-theoretical quantum photonic hardware, however, remains extremely challenging experimentally using conventional technologies. Here we demonstrate a graph-theoretical programmable quantum photonic device in very-large-scale integrated nanophotonic circuits. The device monolithically integrates about 2,500 components, constructing a synthetic lattice of nonlinear photon-pair waveguide sources and linear optical waveguide circuits, and it is fabricated on an eight-inch silicon-on-insulator wafer by complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor processes. We reconfigure the quantum device to realize and process complex-weighted graphs with different topologies and to implement different tasks associated with the perfect matching property of graphs. As two non-trivial examples, we show the generation of genuine multipartite multidimensional quantum entanglement with different entanglement structures, and the measurement of probability distributions proportional to the modulus-squared hafnian (permanent) of the graph's adjacency matrices. This work realizes a prototype of graph-theoretical quantum photonic devices manufactured by very-large-scale integration technologies, featuring arbitrary programmability, high architectural modularity and massive manufacturing scalability.A graph-theoretical programmable quantum photonic device composed of about 2,500 components is fabricated on a silicon substrate within a 12 mm x 15 mm footprint. It shows the generation, manipulation and certification of genuine multiphoton multidimensional entanglement, as well as the implementations of scattershot and Gaussian boson sampling.

The online digital sphere has recently witnessed a rapid growing of amateur audiovisual translation, which not only reinvigorates the current body of translation scholarship but also calls for a paradigm shift from the entrenched monolingualism. Though a plethora of studies have been conducted on fansubbing, little is known about blogger subtitling. Drawing on the netnographic data from a subtitling video blogger, @暴躁鸭仔 (baozao yazai, Grumpy Duckling for English) on a microblogging site (Weibo) in the mainland of China, we explored trans-translating by examining the translanguaging involved in the blogger’s subtitling translation. It is revealed that the blogger makes a hybrid, integrated use of multiple semiotic, orthographic, discursive and modal resources, without being confined by the boundaries amongst nameable languages, or linguistic/non-linguistic codes. The orchestration of the unified heterolingual repertoire builds up a social-media translanguaging space, wherein the tensions between translation and translanguaging due to distinct conceptual schemas are manipulated to yield synergy insofar as they dovetail into ingenious language making. We concluded that such creative translation can be retheorized as a process of trans-translating to encapsulate the subtitling experience in light of its dynamic and fluid nature, and transformative power of translanguaging. The results of this research might add to the picture of amateur subtitling and translation and that of translanguaging as well as their relation to one another.

Tong III J, Mao Y, Yang Z, et al. Cancer Manag Res. 2021;13:4041–4053. The authors have advised due to an error at the time of figure assembly, Figure 2D on page 4048 is incorrect. The correct Figure 2 is shownin Download Article: The authors apologize for this error and advise it does not affect the results of the paper. Read the original article

The relationship between alcohol consumption and cancer has no consistent results both in epidemiological studies and animal models. The inaccuracy of alcohol consumption dosage in the experimental design maybe leads to inconsistent results and makes the researchers ignore the effect of very-light alcohol consumption on cancer. To determine the effects of very-light alcohol consumption on cancer, in this study, the manner of gavage was used to control the alcohol consumption accurately. The impacts of age and time of drinking on cancer progression were also evaluated in this study. Here, we find that a certain range of alcohol consumption (from 0.5% w/v to 2.0% w/v) can suppress tumor development in the breast metastasis mouse model by controlling the alcohol consumption dosage accurately. RNA sequencing analyses were performed in primary tumors and related metastases from the NC group and 1.0% w/v group. The results of primary tumors and related metastases indicated that chronic very-light alcohol consumption downregulates breast tumor-associated oncogenes in primary tumors and regulates the immune system and metabolic system in metastatic carcinoma. To provide the public with drinking recommendations, eight commercial alcohol types were investigated at a dosage of 1.0% w/v. Two types of commercial alcohol, red wine (made in France, brand 1) and baijiu (made in China, brand 1), exerted excellent primary tumor and metastasis inhibitory effects. The untargeted metabolomic analysis of commercial alcohol by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry indicated that baijiu (brand 1) and baijiu (brand 2) exhibited a difference in compositions that can lead to their different anti-cancer effects. These results indicated that a certain range of very light alcohol dosages might have a potential human-cancer inhibition effect.

We examine the effect of labor mobility on venture capital (VC) investment. Following the staggered adoption of the inevitable disclosure doctrine that restricts labor mobility, VCs are less likely to invest in affected states. This effect is more pronounced when human capital is more important to startups, when VC investment is more uncertain, and when VCs’ monitoring costs are higher. The reduced innovation productivity of employees is a plausible underlying mechanism. To mitigate this adverse effect, VCs stage finance startups more and syndicate more with other VCs. Our paper sheds new light on the real effects of labor market frictions.

We investigate the effect of pre-IPO investments by public market institutional investors (institutions) on the exit of venture capitalists (VCs). Results indicate that institutions’ pre-IPO investments reduce IPO underpricing by mitigating VCs’ reliance on all-star analysts to boost market liquidity. We conclude that institutions facilitate VC exits in the secondary market. Supporting this view, our analysis reveals that the presence of institutions allows VCs to exit with a reduced price impact in the secondary market. Consistent with the ease of exit, VCs offer fewer shares at the IPO and are more likely to invest in institutionally backed startups.

Plasmonics enables the manipulation of light beyond the optical diffraction limit1–4 and may therefore confer advantages in applications such as photonic devices5–7, optical cloaking8,9, biochemical sensing10,11 and super-resolution imaging12,13. However, the essential field-confinement capability of plasmonic devices is always accompanied by a parasitic Ohmic loss, which severely reduces their performance. Therefore, plasmonic materials (those with collective oscillations of electrons) with a lower loss than noble metals have long been sought14–16. Here we present stable sodium-based plasmonic devices with state-of-the-art performance at near-infrared wavelengths. We fabricated high-quality sodium films with electron relaxation times as long as 0.42 picoseconds using a thermo-assisted spin-coating process. A direct-waveguide experiment shows that the propagation length of surface plasmon polaritons supported at the sodium–quartz interface can reach 200 micrometres at near-infrared wavelengths. We further demonstrate a room-temperature sodium-based plasmonic nanolaser with a lasing threshold of 140 kilowatts per square centimetre, lower than values previously reported for plasmonic nanolasers at near-infrared wavelengths. These sodium-based plasmonic devices show stable performance under ambient conditions over a period of several months after packaging with epoxy. These results indicate that the performance of plasmonic devices can be greatly improved beyond that of devices using noble metals, with implications for applications in plasmonics, nanophotonics and metamaterials. A thermo-assisted spin-coating process followed by packaging is used to fabricate sodium films that are stable for several months, enabling the realization of plasmonic devices with state-of-the-art performance at near-infrared wavelengths.

Fuzzy c-means clustering (FCM) has proved highly successful in the manipulation and analysis of image information, such as image segmentation. However, the effectiveness of FCM-based technique is limited by its poor robustness to noise and edge-preserving during the segmentation process. To tackle these problems, a new objective function of FCM is developed in this work. The main innovation work and results of this paper are outlined as follows. First, a regularization operation performed by total generalized variation (TGV) is used to guarantee noise smoothing and detail preserving. Second, a weight factor incorporated into the spatial information term is designed to form nonuniform membership functions, which can contribute to the assignment of each pixel for the highest membership value. In addition, a regularization parameter is used to balance the respective importance of penalty between whole image and each neighborhood. The main advantage of this technique over conventional FCM-based methods is that it can reconstruct image patterns in heavy noise with only a small loss. We perform experiments on both synthetic and real images. Compared to state-of-the art FCM-based methods, the proposed algorithm exhibits a very good ability to noise and edge-preserving in image segmentation.

Objectives. This meta-analysis aimed to assess the efficacy and safety of transcutaneous acupoint electrical stimulation (TEAS) for postoperative pain in laparoscopy. The review has been registered on the “INPLASY” website and the registration number is INPLASY202150101. Methods. Relevant randomized controlled trials are selected from seven electronic databases (PubMed, the Cochrane Library, Embase, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, Chongqing VIP Information, WanFang Data, and Chinese Biomedical Database) from their inception up to November 30, 2020. Twenty-eight studies were included in this meta-analysis, and the statistical analyses and the exploration of heterogeneity sources were conducted by Stata 15.0 software. Besides, the bias assessment of the included studies was evaluated using the Cochrane risk of bias tool. Results. In total, 28 RCTs covering 2787 participants were included. The meta-analysis suggested that TEAS can effectively relieve pain in the short term after laparoscopy, reduce the postoperative consumption of rescue analgesics, improve the quality of life of patients, and shorten the length of hospitalization. And no serious adverse events are related to TEAS. Therefore, TEAS is relatively safe and efficacy for clinical application. The most used acupoints were Hegu (LI14), Neiguan (PC6), and Zusanli (ST36). Conclusions. TEAS can be recommended as a complementary and alternative therapy for the treatment of postoperative pain after laparoscopy. However, the included RCTs had some methodological limitations. Therefore, larger-size, more rigorous, and higher-quality RCTs are needed in the future to further explore the efficacy and safety of TEAS for postoperative pain after laparoscopy.

The identification of discriminative features from information-rich data with the goal of clinical diagnosis is crucial in the field of biomedical science. In this context, many machine-learning techniques have been widely applied and achieved remarkable results. However, disease, especially cancer, is often caused by a group of features with complex interactions. Unlike traditional feature selection methods, which only focused on finding single discriminative features, a multilayer feature subset selection method (MLFSSM), which employs randomized search and multilayer structure to select a discriminative subset, is proposed herein. In each level of this method, many feature subsets are generated to assure the diversity of the combinations, and the weights of features are evaluated on the performances of the subsets. The weight of a feature would increase if the feature is selected into more subsets with better performances compared with other features on the current layer. In this manner, the values of feature weights are revised layer-by-layer; the precision of feature weights is constantly improved; and better subsets are repeatedly constructed by the features with higher weights. Finally, the topmost feature subset of the last layer is returned. The experimental results based on five public gene datasets showed that the subsets selected by MLFSSM were more discriminative than the results by traditional feature methods including LVW (a feature subset method used the Las Vegas method for randomized search strategy), GAANN (a feature subset selection method based genetic algorithm (GA)), and support vector machine recursive feature elimination (SVM-RFE). Furthermore, MLFSSM showed higher classification performance than some state-of-the-art methods which selected feature pairs or groups, including top scoring pair (TSP), k-top scoring pairs (K-TSP), and relative simplicity-based direct classifier (RS-DC).

Jingtao Tong III,1,* Yifei Mao,2,* Ziru Yang,1 Quan Xu,1 Zhen Zheng,1 Hui Zhang,1 Jingjing Wang,1 Sandian Zhang,1 Weibo Rong,3 Lu Zheng III1 1Department of Radiation Oncology, Ningbo Medical Treatment Center Li Huili Hospital, Ningbo, 315040, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Emergency Medicine, Ninghai First Hospital, Ningbo, 315600, People’s Republic of China; 3Department of Pharmacy, Ningbo Medical Treatment Center Li Huili Hospital, Ningbo, 315040, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Lu ZhengDepartment of Radiation Oncology, Ningbo Medical Treatment Center Li Huili Hospital, No. 57, Xing Ning Road, Yinzhou District, Ningbo, 315040, People’s Republic of ChinaTel +86 13486688768Fax +86 574 83872180Email zhenglu2008@139.comPurpose: Although predictive markers of immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI)-based treatments have been extensively studied, with the exception of programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1), most are not widely used in the clinic due to poor effects or defective practicability. The aim of this study was to identify those patients with high baseline serum cholesterol who benefit from ICI-based treatments.Patients and Methods: Patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated at Ningbo Medical Center, Li Huili Hospital between August 2017 and December 2019 were enrolled in this retrospective study. The Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors (RECIST, version 1.1) were used to evaluate the efficacy of the ICI-based treatment. Progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were calculated using the Kaplan–Meier survival curves and compared using the log rank test. Univariate and multivariate analyses were conducted using the logistic regression analysis and Cox proportional hazards model. A receiver operating characteristic curve was created, and the area under the curve (AUC) was calculated to compare the predictive value of baseline serum cholesterol with PD-L1 expression for patient response to ICI-based treatment.Results: In our cohort of 169 NSCLC patients, the objective response rate (ORR) and disease control rate (DCR) of the treatment were significantly higher in patients with hypercholesterolemia (> 5.18 mmol/L) than in those with hypocholesterolemia (ORR: 33.67% vs 14.08%, P=0.004; DCR: 68.37% vs 42.25%, P=0.001). The median PFS was 7.9 months in the hypercholesterolemia group, significantly longer than in the hypocholesterolemia group (4.4 months, 95% CI: 4.620– 7.380, P< 0.001). The median OS in the two groups were 11 months and 8 months, with 95% CIs of 8.980– 10.420 (P< 0.001). The AUC for the baseline level of cholesterol was 0.706 (P< 0.001), while it was 0.643 (P=0.001) for PD-L1 expression.Conclusion: The baseline serum cholesterol level is predictive of a clinical benefit for advanced NSCLC patients who undergo ICI-based treatment, and hence it is a promising prognostic indicator for ICI-based treatment of NSCLC.Keywords: non-small cell lung cancer, NSCLC, serum cholesterol, immune checkpoint inhibitors, ICIs, prognostic marker

BACKGROUND: Chemical exchange saturation transfer (CEST) is an important contrast mechanism in the field of magnetic resonance imaging. Herein, we used CEST for glutamate (GluCEST) imaging to evaluate the Glu alterations in acute mild to moderate traumatic brain injury (TBI) and correlated such alterations with the cognitive outcome at 1-month postinjury. METHODS: Thirty-two patients with well-documented mild-to-moderate TBI and 15 healthy controls (HC group) underwent 3.0-Tesla magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with GluCEST, and magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) scans. The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) examination was administered to all study subjects at 1-month postinjury for cognitive outcome acquisition and divided TBI patients into patients with good cognitive outcome (GCO group) and with poor cognitive outcome (PCO group). RESULTS: The GluCEST% values for the occipital gray matter (OGM) and bilateral parietooccipital white matter (PWM) were higher in the PCO group compared with the HC and GCO groups (P0.05). In comparison with HCs, TBI patients had a significantly increased GluCEST% value for the OGM and bilateral PWM (P

Lead halide perovskites have recently emerged as groundbreaking photovoltaic materials due to their low-cost, solution-processed fabrication and extraordinary performance. Despite the rapid improvement in efficiency, perovskite devices often suffer from degradation and poor reproducibility, which are perhaps the greatest barriers for their commercialization. Fundamental understanding of perovskites' structure–property correlation is of great importance to reveal the origins of the instability and advance their practical utility. However, previous research studies mainly focused on perovskite polycrystalline thin films, a morphology with intrinsic grain boundaries that induce interference in such a direct correlation. Here, we develop a method that allows direct visualization of the structure–property correlation in one-dimensional (1D) crystalline perovskite microwires. In contrast to polycrystalline thin films, 1D microwires with well-defined crystal structures are very conducive to explore the fundamentally intrinsic properties of perovskites due to the absence of grain boundaries and a reduced trap state density. In such a clean system, we reveal the stable coexistence of two crystalline components, a MAPbI3 perovskite phase and a MAPbI3·DMF intermediate phase, appearing as axially alternating dark and bright domain patterns along individual microwires. We show that the MAPbI3·DMF phase has inferior optical properties and leads to the degradation and poor reproducibility of perovskites. We further elucidate that laser illumination is an effective method to obtain a homogeneous perovskite structure with high optical quality. Our work provides a new route for fundamental understanding and performance improvement of emerging perovskite materials and devices.

Background Glutamate (GLU) is one of the most important excitatory neurotransmitters in central nervous system (CNS). GLU is involved in many CNS diseases, which is well reported that it is closely related to the infectious diseases in CNS. Brain abscess is a common disease in CNS. GLU chemical exchange saturation transfer MRI (GLUCEST) is used to explore the changes of glutamate concentration in the brain abscess models. Methods Firstly, a SD rat brain abscess model was established by using Staphylococcus aureus in the right frontal lobe of SD rats. Secondly, imaging of normal SD rats and brain abscess rats were obtained in Agilent 7.0T animal magnetic resonance scanner respectively. Finally, all data are processed on Matlab. Results GLUCEST clearly delineated brain abscess at Z spectra. The CEST map of the brain abscess rats showed that the glutamate CEST effect in the lesions was significantly higher than that in the normal SD rats (p Conclusions GLUCEST may provide new insight into brain abscess and help to improve the differential diagnosis.

Due to their unique electromagnetic properties, meta-atom arrays have always been a hotspot to realize all kinds of particular functions, and the research on meta-atom structure has extended from two-dimensions (2D) to three-dimensions (3D) in recent years. With the continuous pursuit of complex 3D meta-atom arrays, the increasing demand for more efficient and more precise nanofabrication methods has encountered challenges. To explore better fabrication methods, we presented a programmable nanofabrication method for a complex 3D meta-atom array based on focused-ion-beam stress-induced deformation (FIB-SID) effect and designed a distinctive nanostructure array composed of periodic 3D meta-atoms to demonstrate the presented method. After successful fabrication of the designed 3D meta-atom arrays, measurements were conducted to investigate the electric/magnetic field properties and infrared spectral characteristics using scanning cathodoluminescence (CL) microscopic imaging and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, which revealed a certain excitation mode induced by polarized incident IR light near 8 &mu, m. Besides the programmability for complex 3D meta-atoms and wide applicability of materials, a more significant advantage of the method is that a large-scale array composed of complex 3D meta-atoms can be processed in a quasi-parallel way, which improves the processing efficiency and the consistency of unit cells dramatically.

Plasmonic nanolasers are a new class of laser devices which amplify surface plasmons instead of photons by stimulated emission. Here we demonstrate a room temperature sodium-based plasmonic nanolaser with a record low threshold of 140 kW/cm2 at near-infrared.

Knowing the distinction between benign and borderline/malignant phyllodes tumors (PTs) can help in the surgical treatment course. Herein, we investigated the value of magnetic resonance imaging-based texture analysis (MRI-TA) in differentiating between benign and borderline/malignant PTs.Forty-three women with 44 histologically proven PTs underwent breast MRI before surgery and were classified into benign (n = 26) and borderline/malignant groups (n = 18 [15 borderline, 3 malignant]). Clinical and routine MRI parameters (CRMP) and MRI-TA were used to distinguish benign from borderline/malignant PT. In total, 298 texture parameters were extracted from fat-suppression (FS) T2-weighted, FS unenhanced T1-weighted, and FS first-enhanced T1-weighted sequences. To evaluate the diagnostic performance, receiver operating characteristic curve analysis was performed for the K-nearest neighbor classifier trained with significantly different parameters of CRMP, MRI sequence-based TA, and the combination strategy.Compared with benign PTs, borderline/malignant ones presented a higher local recurrence (MRI-TA demonstrated good predictive performance for breast PT pathological grading and could provide surgical planning guidance. Clinical data and routine MRI features were also valuable for grading PTs.

Glutamate excitoxicity plays a crucial role in the pathophysiology of traumatic brain injury (TBI) through the initiation of secondary injuries. Glutamate chemical exchange saturation transfer (GluCEST) MRI is a newly developed technique to noninvasively image glutamate in vivo with high sensitivity and spatial resolution. The aim of the present study was to use a rat model of TBI to map changes in brain glutamate distribution and explore the capability of GluCEST imaging for detecting secondary injuries. Sequential GluCEST imaging scans were performed in adult male Sprague-Dawley rats before TBI and at 1, 3, 7, and 14 days after TBI. GluCEST% increased and peaked on day 1 after TBI in the core lesion of injured cortex and peaked on day 3 in the ipsilateral hippocampus, as compared to baseline and controls. GluCEST% gradually declined to baseline by day 14 after TBI. A negative correlation between the GluCEST% of the ipsilateral hippocampus on day 3 and the time in the correct quadrant was observed in injured rats. Immunolabeling for glial fibrillary acidic protein showed significant astrocyte activation in the ipsilateral hippocampus of TBI rats. IL-6 and TNF-α in the core lesion peaked on day 1 postinjury, while those in the ipsilateral hippocampus peaked on day 3. These subsequently gradually declined to sham levels by day 14. It was concluded that GluCEST imaging has potential to be a novel neuroimaging approach for predicting cognitive outcome and to better understand neuroinflammation following TBI.

Supersaturation drug delivery system (SDDS) based on amorphous solid dispersion (ASD) is a widely used strategy to improve oral absorption of poorly water-soluble drugs by achieving a supersaturated state where drug concentration is significantly higher than drug solubility. However, dissolved drugs tend to recrystallize in gastrointestinal (GI) tract if without effective stabilizing excipients. In this paper, well-recognized polymer (polyvinylpyrrolidone, PVP) and lipid (phosphatidylcholine, PC) excipients are combined as ASD carrier, aiming at investigating the effects on evolution of in vitro supersaturation and in vivo plasma concentration of a model poorly soluble drug indomethacin (IND). Fundamental aspects including polymer/lipid composition ratio, drug loading (DL) degree and administration dose were investigated. The in vitro dissolution profiles of ASDs were assessed by supersaturation degree, duration, maximum achievable drug concentration and dose-normalized efficiency, and correlated with in vivo pharmacokinetic data. Results showed that both in vitro and in vivo concentration-time profiles of IND were significantly varying with abovementioned factors. Solution viscosity, solid-state properties and morphology of ASDs were related to the results. This study revealed fundamental mechanisms of PVP/PC mixture effect on IND supersaturation and oral bioavailability, demonstrating that polymer/lipid mixture could be used as a promising carrier to alter supersaturation profile and oral bioavailability of SDDS products.

This study establishes a model for describing the interaction between Te inclusions, dislocations and point defects in CdMnTe crystals. The role of the complex environment surrounding the formation of Te inclusions was analyzed. Images of Te inclusions captured by scanning electron microscope and infrared microscope were used to observe the morphology of Te inclusions. The morphology of Te inclusions is discussed in light of crystallography, from the crystal growth temperature at 900°C to the melting temperature of Te inclusions using the traveling heater method. The dislocation nets around Te inclusions were calculated by counting lattice mismatches between the Te inclusions and the bulk CdMnTe at 470°C. The point defects of Te antisites were found to be gathered around Te inclusions, with dislocation climb during the cooling phase of crystal growth from 470°C to room temperature. The Te inclusions, dislocation nets and surrounding point defects are considered to be an entirety for evaluating the effect of Te inclusions on CdMnTe detector performance, and an effective mobility-lifetime product (μτ) was obtained.

This study investigated Te inclusions in CdMnTe crystals grown by the traveling heater method (THM). Three CdMnTe ingots were grown under different growth temperatures of 850°C, 900°C, and 950°C by the THM method. In the CdMnTe ingots, the concentration of Te inclusion was lower in the middle-to-deposit part, and the size of Te inclusions kept growing till the last-to-deposit part. The concentrations of Te inclusions along the CdMnTe ingots were in the range of 104–106 cm−3, with the size in the range of 3–16 μm. CdMnTe crystals grown under 900°C had the lowest density and size of Te inclusion, due to the smooth and near-planar growth interface as revealed by infrared (IR) transmission microscopy. The relationship between the origin of Te inclusions and growth interface was analyzed during the THM growth of CdMnTe. IR transmission spectrometry was used to characterize Te inclusions in CdMnTe crystals. Current–voltage (I–V) and energy response measurements were carried out to reveal the resistivity (ρ) and energy resolution of CdMnTe detectors. The effects of Te inclusions on the optical and electrical properties of CdMnTe crystals for nuclear detector applications are discussed.

Using exogenous variations in the market value of corporate real estate, this paper investigates whether appreciation of corporate collateral value facilitates innovation. My baseline finding shows that real estate appreciation leads to an increase in innovation quantity as measured by patent productions and in innovation quality as measured by citations per patent, especially when firms are credit constrained. To uncover the underlying channel, I show that real estate appreciation allows additional secured borrowing, which enables firms to increase their innovative investments including internal research and development (R&D), the acquisition of innovative target firms, and corporate venture capital (CVC). Moreover, following real estate appreciation, firms change the trajectory of innovation, as reflected in the patent-filing industries and in the characteristics of acquisitions and CVC investment deals. Finally, I provide evidence that firms that innovate more in response to real estate appreciation tend to have better future financial health and accounting profitability.

Background With the promotion of the concept of "minimally invasive" surgery, the advantages of laparoscopic surgery are increasingly manifested. However, the postoperative pain of laparoscopic surgery brings difficulties and challenges to patients' rehabilitation. Transcutaneous electrical acupoint stimulation (TEAS) is a non-invasive treatment, which can exert the dual efficacy of acupuncture and electrical stimulation. The efficacy and safety of TEAS for postoperative pain after laparoscopy based on randomized controlled trials (RCTs) need to further evaluate. Methods A comprehensive and systematic literature searching will mainly perform on 7 electronic databases (PubMed, the Cochrane Library, Embase, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, Chongqing VIP Information, WanFang Data, and Chinese Biomedical Database) from their inception up to November 30, 2020. We will also search for ongoing or unpublished studies from other websites (eg, PROSPERO, ClinicalTrials.gov, and Chinese Clinical Trial Registry) and do manual retrieval for potential gray literature. Only the relevant RCTs published in English or Chinese were included. Two independent investigators will independently complete literature selection, assessment of risk bias, and data extraction, the disagreements will be discussed with the third party for final decisions. The primary outcome measures: the pain intensity (eg, VAS) and the consumption of postoperative analgesics. The secondary outcome measures: the postoperative quality of life, the duration of hospitalization, and the incidence of adverse reactions and serious events. Assessment of bias risk will follow the Cochrane risk of bias tool. Data processing will be conducted by Stata 15.0 software. Results We will evaluate the efficacy and safety of TEAS for postoperative pain after laparoscopy based on RCTs. Conclusion This study can provide more comprehensive and strong evidence of whether TEAS is efficacy and safe for postoperative pain in laparoscopic surgery.

The In-doped Cd 0.9 Mn 0.1 Te (CdMnTe:In) crystal was grown by the Travelling Heater Method. The crystallity of the CdMnTe:In wafers extracted from different part of the CdMnTe:In ingot was studied including the impurity contents, the Te inclusions and the Mn composition. The point defects in the CdMnTe:In wafers were revealed by the Photo-Induced Current Transient Spectroscopy (PICTS). The ionization energy, the capture cross-section and the concentration of the defect traps in different parts of the ingot were identified. The PICTS result showed the concentration of the V Cd decreases from the top part to the tail part along the bulk while the concentration of A-center increase. The wafers from the middle part of the bulk were proved to have less deep level point defects compared to other parts of the crystal bulk, and had higher electronic performance with the resistivity up to 3.07 × 10 10 Ω cm and the μτ value up to 1.45 × 10 −3 cm 2 V −1 . The concentration of the deep level point defects plays an important role in the electrical properties, especially for the mobility-lifetime product.

Background: The preoperative diagnosis of phyllodes tumors (PTs) of the breast is critical to appropriate surgical treatment. However, reliable differentiation between PT and fibroadenoma (FA) remains difficult in daily clinical practice. The purpose of this study was to investigate the utility of breast MRI texture analysis for differentiating PTs from FAs.Materials and Methods: Forty-two PTs and 42 FAs were enrolled in this retrospective study. Clinical and conventional MRI features (CCMF) and MRI texture analysis were used to distinguish between PT and FA. Texture features were extracted from the axial short TI inversion recovery T2-weighted (T2W-STIR), T1-weighted pre-contrast, and two contrast-enhanced series (first contrast and third contrast). The Mann–Whitney U test was used to select statistically significant features of texture analysis and CCMF. Using a linear discriminant analysis, the most discriminative features were determined from statistically significant features. The K-nearest neighbor classifier and ROC curve were applied to evaluate the diagnostic performance.Results: With a higher classification accuracy (89.3%) and an AUC of 0.89, the texture features on T2W-STIR outperformed the texture features on other MRI sequences and CCMF. The AUC of the combination of CCMF with texture features on T2W-STIR was significantly higher than that of CCMF or texture features on T2W-STIR alone (p < 0.05). Based on the result of the classification accuracy (95.2%) and AUC (0.95), the diagnostic performance of the combination strategy performed better than texture features on T2W-STIR or CCMF separately.Conclusions: Texture features on T2W-STIR showed better diagnostic performance compared to CCMF for the distinction between PTs and FAs. After further validation of multi-institutional large datasets, MRI-based texture features may become a potential biomarker and be a useful medical decision tool in clinical trials having patients with breast fibroepithelial neoplasms.

Pathogenic bacteria such as Shiga toxigenic Escherichia coli and Salmonella can cause severe food-borne diseases. Rapid and sensitive detection of these foodborne pathogens is essential to ensure food safety. In this study, a novel method based on cell elongation induced by beta-lactam antibiotics for direct microscopic counting of Gram-negative bacteria was established. Combined with the sample preparation steps of membrane filtration and magnetic separation, the detection of E. coli O157:H7 and Salmonella enterica serotype Typhimurium was achieved by direct optical microscopic counting of the number of elongated bacteria. The limit of detection of E. coli O157:H7 and S. typhimurium could reach 20 CFU mL-1. The recovery tests for E. coli O157:H7 and S. typhimurium in water and milk samples showed acceptable recovery values between 93.6% and 106.2%. This method is sensitive, cost effective, and rapid (

A novel three-dimensional (3D) nanoantenna array, consisting of double-claw shape unit cell, is fabricated by focused ion beam stress-introduced deformation (FIB-SID) technique [1]-[3], and is employed as an ultrabroadband infrared (IR) optical modulator. The measured reflection spectra of the device show that an ultrabroadband infrared optical modulation can be achieved with tiny change of the double claw’s distance.The relative modulation value calculated from reflection spectra for the nanoantenna with lager unit size indicates that a broad IR modulation range of 3.39 μm (2.93 μm - 6.32 μm) and a maximum modulation value of 17.5% at 5.8 μm is realized as the double claw’s distance changes. Furthermore, the scaled down nanoantennas were also fabricated and measured, which covers a surprisingly ultrabroadband IR modulation range, from long-wave (9.93 μm) to short-wave (2.04 μm), and realizes a maximum modulation value of 71.7% at 3.29 μm as the double claw’s distance changes about 180nm.

Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are expected to serve as a blood-based biomarker in the diagnosis of cancers at an early stage, providing an opportunity to increase the survival of cancer patients. Current techniques for CTC detection were designed for some particular types of cancer with confirmed primary tumor origin. In this work, a platform for the detection of two cancer types and the identification of the primary tumor origin of CTCs was established to meet the requirement of cancer diagnosis and clinical application. A combined strategy based on in vivo capture method using antibody cocktail and multicolor fluorescence imaging using aptamer was designed to achieve the high-efficiency capture of CTCs and the accurate location of the primary tumor. An antibody cocktail of epithelial cell adhesion molecule (EpCAM) and epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) was applied to capture breast cancer CTCs and hepatocellular CTCs in vivo. The capture efficiency of hepatocellular CTCs was significantly increased from 3.17% to 26.67% and the capture efficiency of breast cancer CTCs slightly increased from 27.00% to 29.84% compared with EpCAM-based capture of CTCs. Meanwhile, the primary tumor origins of breast cancer CTCs and hepatocellular CTCs were simultaneously distinguished by specific aptamer-based fluorescence probes without any signal crosstalk. The results of in vivo experiments using the dual tumor-bearing mouse model confirmed the feasibility of this method to capture CTCs and identify primary tumor origins. This simple and efficient approach has potential for future applications in cancer diagnosis and prognosis.

This study investigated the prevalence of depression among children with epilepsy and evaluated factors associated with depression.Participants who met the selection criteria were included in this cross-sectional study, which was conducted at the Pediatric Neurology Department of the West China Women's and Children's Hospital from January to May 2018. Depression status among children with epilepsy was evaluated by the Depression Self-Rating Scale for Children (DSRSC). Information on sociodemographic characteristics, co-morbid diseases and family conditions were collected as independent variables. Variables found in univariate analysis to affect depression were used in a multiple linear regression model on factors related to depression among children with epilepsy.A total of 124 patients participated in the study, with a response rate of 93.9% (124/132). In this sample, 60.5% (75/124) of patients were male and the mean age of patients was 11.17 ± 2.29 years. The mean score on the DSRSC was 9.65 ± 6.45 and 16.9% (21/124) of children with epilepsy were considered to have depression. According to the multiple linear regression analysis, the DSRSC scores showed a significant correlation with comorbidities (B = 0.178; standard error (SE) = 1.123; P = .043), attitude towards seizures (B = -0.180; SE = 1.171; P = .039) and adverse reaction to medications (B = 0.233; SE = 1.797; P = .008).There is relatively high prevalence of depression in children with epilepsy in western China. More health education is needed to reduce the rate of depression in children with epilepsy, particularly for those patients with comorbidities, negative attitudes towards seizures and adverse reactions to medications.

Dietary phytochemicals have obtained significant attention in cancer prevention. In this study, the metastasis inhibition effects of eleven phytochemicals was evaluated by monitoring the number changes of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in the overall procession of cancer metastasis using in vivo CTC capture method. Meanwhile, the anticancer effect on primary tumor growth and lung metastasis were also investigated on breast tumor BALB/c mouse model. At selected dose, the primary tumor growth were suppressed for all of the eleven food phytochemicals except β-carotene. The numbers of lung metastases were reduced and increased tendency of the number of captured CTCs in the blood circulation were delayed in all groups of eleven food phytochemicals. These results indicate that phytochemicals could be the exquisitely suitable candidates for the development of novel therapeutic agents, and the in vivo CTC capture method provided a convenient approach to monitor the procession of tumor metastasis.

The current study aimed to evaluate the status of anxiety among caregivers of children with epilepsy and examine the associated factors. A cross-sectional study was conducted in western China, which consecutively recruited children with epilepsy in 2018. The self-rating anxiety scale (SAS) was used to assess the status of anxiety among caregivers of children with epilepsy. We collected information about aspects of sociodemographic data, disease status, attitude of caregivers towards the disease and family conditions as independent variables, using multiple linear regression to analyze factors related to the status of anxiety among caregivers. A total of 334 participants were included in the study with a response rate of 95.4% (334/350). The mean age of children with epilepsy was 6.05 ± 4.11 years. 7.2% (24/334) of patients were newly diagnosed and 55.4% (185/334) of patients presented with generalized epilepsy. A total of 25.7% (86/334) of caregivers among children with epilepsy presented the symptom of anxiety, with the scores of SAS 44.31 ± 10.558. SAS scores were negatively correlated with the children's age (B = −0.141; standard error = 0.135; P = .008), attitude towards seizures (B = −0.153; standard error = 1.192; P = .004) and medical expenses payment (B = −0.169; standard error = 1.703; P = .002). Symptoms of anxiety are common among caregivers of children with epilepsy in western China. Healthcare providers should pay more attention to caregivers with younger children, difficult financial situation, and greater fear of seizures. Exploring mental health interventions for caregivers is important.

How does access to finance affect technological innovation? We provide causal evidence on the finance-innovation nexus and on the role of labor practices in shaping this relation. We exploit a unique setting—antebellum America—where staggered adoption of free banking laws across states encouraged bank entry, and spatial variation in the use of exploited workers in agriculture generated differences in producers' demand for labor-saving technologies. Results show that access to finance spurred innovation, but the positive effect on agricultural innovation diminished with labor exploitation. Where exploitative labor practices were pervasive, finance aggravated exploitation and appears to have impeded agricultural innovation.

This paper examines the effect of the sharing economy on entrepreneurship. Using Airbnb’s penetration across counties as a proxy for the growth of the sharing economy and venture capital infusions interacted with local tourism as an instrument, we find that Airbnb spurs firm creation. A plausible underlying channel is that Airbnb facilitates short-term rental, which relaxes the financial constraint of potential entrepreneurs. Increases in entrepreneurs’ risk tolerance, local demand, and collateral value caused by Airbnb penetration do not appear to explain our main findings. Airbnb also create new jobs and promotes local employment rate.

This paper examines intraday price discovery in three closely-related U.S. markets: stocks, Over-The-Counter (OTC) corporate bonds, and New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) electronically-traded corporate bonds. We calculate the Hasbrouck (1995) information shares of these three markets over five years. We find that OTC corporate bond trades have a 5.7% information share, despite zero pre-trade transparency in the OTC market. Further, NYSE corporate bonds have a 45.8% information share, despite having a tiny market share, because of publicly-displayed, frequently-updated bid-ask quotes that can be traded at any time. OTC corporate bond information shares are inversely related to credit quality and are relatively constant over time. This is consistent with multi-security informed trading theory and the Merton (1974) corporate bond model. NYSE corporate bond information shares are positively related to their update frequency. Thus, the subset of NYSE bonds that are updated more frequently are more informative.

We exploit the deregulation of interstate bank branching laws to test whether banking competition affects innovation. We find robust evidence that banking competition reduces state-level innovation by public corporations headquartered within deregulating states. Innovation increases among private firms that are dependent on external finance and that have limited access to credit from local banks. We argue that banking competition enables small, innovative firms to secure financing instead of being acquired by public corporations. Therefore, banking competition reduces the supply of innovative targets, which reduces the portion of state-level innovation attributable to public corporations. Overall, these results shed light on the real effects of banking competition and the determinants of innovation.

We report a type of plasmonic palettes formed by an array of cross-shaped cavity nanostructures for multicolor image generation. And the nanocross-shaped antennas actually act as plasmonic cavity resonators and could realize surface plasmon excitation, resonating and coupling, which can impart intriguing optical properties. These features enable the nanotexted metasurfaces to implement full-gamut palettes through spatially color blending and continuously tunable coloration. We also employ the dark-field scattering and near-field scanning analysis to experimentally study the circularly nanoscale optical scattering in the new cavity-nanopin photonic metasurfaces resulting from aperiodic Fibonacci spiral arrangements.