Search

Abstract Background The role of proximal tubular autophagy in repairing kidney injury following ischemia remains unclear. Methods In this study, we utilized mice with conditional deletion of the Atg5 gene in proximal tubules and monitored the long-term dynamic regulation of autophagy following ischemic acute kidney injury (AKI). Results The results showed that Atg5-deficient proximal tubule epithelial cells exhibited damaged mitochondria, concentric membranes, and lysosomal accumulation 24 h after ischemia/reperfusion. However, 28 days after ischemia/reperfusion, concentric membrane bodies remained, but lysosomal accumulation was no longer observed. Notably, the absence of Atg5 in renal tubular epithelial cells impaired renal function and led to increased tubular cell proliferation and oxidative stress in the early stage of injury. However, during the repair period following AKI, Atg5 deficiency exhibited no significant difference in the expression of proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) and 4-hydoxynonenal (4HNE), suggesting that the improvement in renal fibrosis associated with Atg5 deficiency is unlikely to result from its effect on cell proliferation or reactive oxygen species levels. Additionally, Atg5 deficiency inhibits the secretion of profibrotic factor fibroblast growth factor 2 (FGF2) from the early stage of renal injury to the recovery stage of AKI, indicating that autophagy-specific regulation of FGF2 secretion is a dynamic process overlapping with other stages of injury. Furthermore, increased co-localization of ATG5 with 4HNE and FGF2 was observed in patient samples. Conclusion In summary, our results suggest that the dynamic regulation of autophagy on key molecules involved in kidney injury and repair varies with the stage of kidney injury. Graphical Abstract

Background: Minimal residual disease (MRD) testing is a promising approach to tailor the treatment of multiple myeloma (MM). However, several major concerns remain to be addressed before moving it into daily practice, most of which stem from the dynamic nature of the MRD status. Thus, it is crucial to understand the MRD dynamics and propose its clinical implications. Methods: We retrospectively analysed the data of patients with newly diagnosed MM (NDMM) who had flow cytometry-based MRD tests at multiple time points after initiation of therapy. The impact of undetectable MRD (including attainment, duration and loss) on clinical outcomes was analysed. Results: In a cohort of 220 patients with NDMM, attainment of MRD− offered favourable outcomes (P < 0.0001 for both progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS)), regardless of baseline risk factors. Notably, MRD− duration ≥12 months was associated with an 83 % (95 % confidence interval (CI), 0.09−0.34; P < 0.0001) or 69 % (95 % CI, 0.13−0.76; P = 0.0098) reduction in risk of progression/death or death, while the longer MRD− was sustained, the better the outcome was. Loss of MRD− led to poor PFS (hazard ratio (HR) 0.01, 95 % CI 0–0.06, P < 0.0001) and OS (HR 0.03, 95 % CI 0–0.24, P = 0.0008). Most patients (70 %) who lost MRD− status carried high-risk cytogenetic abnormalities (HRCAs). While MRD− was temporally inconsistent with conventional therapeutic responses (eg ≥ complete remission or very good partial response), it predicted disease progression or recurrence more robustly than the latter. Last, the predictive value of the MRD status was independent of baseline risk factors (eg high-risk cytogenetic abnormality, International Staging System (ISS) or Revised (R-)ISS staging). Conclusions: Longitudinal assessment of MRD during the treatment course and follow-up is required for monitoring disease progression or relapse, to guide treatment decisions. Accordingly, a prospective study is currently ongoing to investigate the feasibility and benefit of the MRD-tailored therapy according to the longitudinal changes of the MRD status.

Radiofrequency ablation (RFA) is an effective treatment for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but the recurrence rate remains high due to angiogenesis in residual cancer cells. We used thermal stimulation to simulate the post-RFA microenvironment. The expression profile of circRNAs between normal control HCC cell-derived exosomes and exosomes after heat stimulation were analyzed by RNA sequencing. Quantitative real-time PCR was applied to evaluate the expression of circPTPRK in exosomes and human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs). Then, the functions of heat-stimulated HCC cell-derived exosomes and exosomal circPTPRK on HUVECs were unveiled. Transcriptome sequencing was utilized to determine targeted genes of circPTPRK. Heat-stimulated HCC cell-derived exosomes augmented cell proliferation, migration, and angiogenesis of HUVECs. In total, 229 differentially expressed circRNAs were obtained, including 211 upregulated circRNAs and 18 downregulated circRNAs in heat-stimulated HCC cell-derived exosomes. The expression of circPTPRK was remarkably increased in heat-stimulated HCC cell-derived exosomes and the HUVECs incubated with them. Heat-stimulated HCC cell-derived exosomes with circPTPRK knockdown significantly inhibited cell proliferation, migration, and angiogenesis of HUVECs. Mechanistic studies indicated that PLA2G4E is a downstream target of circPTPRK, and PLA2G4E overexpression reversed the inhibitory effect of circPTPRK knockdown on HUVEC angiogenesis. Our results indicated that exosomal circPTPRK activated HUVEC angiogenesis by upregulating PLA2G4E expression.

Abstract It remains a substantial challenge to balance treatment efficacy and toxicity in geriatric patients with multiple myeloma (MM), primarily due to the dynamic nature of frailty. Here, we conducted a prospective study to evaluate the feasibility and benefits of dynamic frailty-tailored therapy (DynaFiT) in elderly patients. Patients with newly diagnosed MM (aged ≥ 65 years) received eight induction cycles of bortezomib, lenalidomide, and dexamethasone (daratumumab was recommended for frail patients), with treatment intensity adjusted according to longitudinal changes in the frailty category (IMWG-FI) at each cycle. Of 90 patients, 33 (37%), 16 (18%), and 41 (45%) were fit, intermediate fit, and frail at baseline, respectively. Of 75 patients who had geriatric assessment at least twice, 28 (37%) experienced frailty category changes at least once. At analysis, 15/26 (58%) frail patients improved (27% became fit and 31% became intermediate fit), 4/15 (27%) intermediate fit patients either improved or deteriorated (two for each), and 6/30 (20%) fit patients deteriorated. During induction, 34/90 (38%) patients discontinued treatment, including 10/33 (30%) fit, 4/16 (25%) intermediate fit, and 20/41 (49%) frail; 14/40 (35%) frail patients discontinued treatment within the first two cycles, mainly because of non-hematologic toxicity (mostly infections). For fit, intermediate-fit, and frail patients, the overall response rate was 100%, 93%, and 73%, respectively; one-year overall survival was 90%, 75%, and 54%, respectively. Therefore, the individualized DynaFiT is feasible and promising for heterogeneous elderly patients.

Abstract Background Autophagy is a lysosome-dependent degradation pathway that regulates macrophage activation, differentiation, and polarization. Autophagy related 5 (Atg5) is a key protein involved in phagocytic membrane elongation in autophagic vesicles that forms a complex with Atg12 and Atg16L1. Alterations in Atg5 are related to both acute and chronic kidney diseases in experimental models. However, the role of macrophage-expressed Atg5 in acute kidney injury remains unclear. Methods Using a myeloid cell-specific Atg5 knockout (MΦ atg5 −/−) mouse, we established renal ischemia/reperfusion and unilateral ureteral obstruction models to evaluate the role of macrophage Atg5 in renal macrophage migration and fibrosis. Results Based on changes in the serum urea nitrogen and creatinine levels, Atg5 deletion had a minimal effect on renal function in the early stages after mild injury; however, MΦ atg5 −/− mice had reduced renal fibrosis and reduced macrophage recruitment after 4 weeks of ischemia/reperfusion injury and 2 weeks of unilateral ureteral obstruction injury. Atg5 deficiency impaired the CCL20-CCR6 axis after severe ischemic kidneys. Chemotactic responses of bone marrow-derived monocytes (BMDMs) from MΦ atg5 −/− mice to CCL20 were significantly attenuated compared with those of wild-type BMDMs, and this might be caused by the inhibition of PI3K, AKT, and ERK1/2 activation. Conclusions Our data indicate that Atg5 deficiency decreased macrophage migration by impairing the CCL20-CCR6 axis and inhibited M2 polarization, thereby improving kidney fibrosis.

ABSTRACT To monitor the resistance rate and gain a deeper understanding of the resistance mechanisms, we conducted over a 2-year surveillance focusing on the Klebsiella pneumoniae associated with the clinical usage of ceftazidime-avibactam (CZA) in a teaching hospital. A total of 4,641 K. pneumoniae isolates were screened to identify the CZA resistance through antimicrobial susceptibility testing. Comprehensive analyses, including homology analysis, conjugation experiments, clone assays, and whole genome sequencing, were furtherly performed on the CZA-resistant strains. In total, four CZA-resistant K. pneumoniae (CZA-R-Kp) strains were separated from four patients, in which three of them received CZA treatment during the hospitalization, accounting for a 4% (3/75) resistance development rate of K. pneumoniae under CZA stress. All CZA-R-Kp isolates were found to possess variants of blaKPC-2. The identified mutations included blaKPC-33, blaKPC-86, and a novel variant designated as blaKPC-129, all of which were located in the Ω loop of the KPC enzyme. These mutations were found to impact the amino acid sequence and spatial structure of the enzyme’s active center, consequently affecting KPC carbapenemase activity. This study underscores the importance of active surveillance to monitor the emergence of resistance to CZA, highlighting the need for ongoing research to develop effective strategies for combating antimicrobial resistance. Understanding the mechanisms behind resistance is crucial in maintaining the efficacy of CZA, a vital tool in the battle against multidrug-resistant infections.IMPORTANCEAs an effective drug for the treatment of carbapenem-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae, ceftazidime-avibactam (CZA) began to develop resistance in recent years and showed an increasing trend. In order to effectively monitor the resistance rate of CZA and understand its resistance mechanism, we monitored K. pneumoniae for more than 2 years to find CZA-resistant strains. Through comprehensive analysis of the selected CZA-resistant strains, it was found that all the CZA-resistant strains had mutation, which could affect the activity of KPC carbapenemase. This study highlights the importance of proactive surveillance to monitor the emergence of CZA resistance, which highlights the need for ongoing research to develop effective strategies to combat antimicrobial resistance. Understanding the mechanisms behind resistance is critical to maintaining the effectiveness of CZA, an important tool in the fight against multidrug-resistant infections.

IntroductionThe dissemination of carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriales (CRE) in nosocomial settings is primarily associated with the horizontal transfer of plasmids. However, limited research has focused on the in-host transferability of carbapenem resistance. In this study, ten isolates were collected from gut specimens of five individuals, each hosting two different species, including Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Klebsiella aerogenes, Enterobacter cloacae, or Citrobacter koseri.MethodsSpecies identification and antimicrobial susceptibility were determined by MALDI-TOF MS and broth microdilution method. Carbapenemase genes were detected and localized using PCR, S1-PFGE and southern blot. The transferability of carbapenemase genes between species was investigated through filter mating experiments, and the genetic contexts of the plasmids were analyzed using whole genome sequencing.Results and discussionOur results revealed that each of the ten isolates harbored a carbapenemase gene, including blaNDM-5, blaNDM-1, or blaKPC-2, on a plasmid. Five different plasmids were successfully transferred to recipient cells of E. coli, K. pneumoniae or A. baumannii by transconjugation. The genetic contexts of the carbapenemase gene were remarkably similar between the two CRE isolates from each individual. This study highlights the potential for interspecies plasmid transmission in human gut, emphasizing the colonization of CRE as a significant risk factor for the dissemination of carbapenemase genes within the host. These findings underscore the need for appropriate intestinal CRE screening and colonization prevention.

Acinetobacter baumannii is one of the most common multidrug-resistant pathogens causing nosocomial infections. The prevalence of multidrug-resistant A. baumannii infections is increasing because of several factors, including unregulated antibiotic use. A. baumannii drug resistance rate is high; in particular, its resistance rates for tigecycline and polymyxin—the drugs of last resort for extensively drug-resistant A. baumannii—has been increasing annually. Patients with a severe infection of extensively antibiotic-resistant A. baumannii demonstrate a high mortality rate along with a poor prognosis, which makes treating them challenging. Through carbapenem enzyme production and other relevant mechanisms, A. baumannii has rapidly acquired a strong resistance to carbapenem antibiotics—once considered a class of strong antibacterials for A. baumannii infection treatment. Therefore, understanding the resistance mechanism of A. baumannii is particularly crucial. This review summarizes mechanisms underlying common antimicrobial resistance in A. baumannii, particularly those underlying tigecycline and polymyxin resistance. This review will serve as a reference for reasonable antibiotic use at clinics, as well as new antibiotic development.

Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a severe disease of the nervous system that causes irreparable damage and loss of function, for which no effective treatments are available to date. Engineered extracellular vesicles (EVs) carrying therapeutic molecules hold promise as an alternative SCI therapy depending on the specific functionalized EVs and the appropriate engineering strategy. In this study, we demonstrated the design of a drug delivery system of peptide CAQK-modified, siRNA-loaded EVs (C-EVs-siRNA) for SCI-targeted therapy. The peptide CAQK was anchored through a chemical modification to the membranes of EVs isolated from induced neural stem cells (iNSCs). CCL2-siRNA was then loaded into the EVs through electroporation. The modified EVs still maintained the basic properties of EVs and showed favorable targeting and therapeutic effects in vitro and in vivo. C-EVs-siRNA specifically delivered siRNA to the SCI region and was taken up by target cells. C-EVs-siRNA used the inherent anti-inflammatory and neuroreparative functions of iNSCs-derived EVs in synergy with the loaded siRNA, thus enhancing the therapeutic effect against SCI. The combination of targeted modified EVs and siRNA effectively regulated the microenvironmental disturbance after SCI, promoted the transformation of microglia/macrophages from M1 to M2 and limited the negative effects of the inflammatory response and neuronal injury on functional recovery in mice after SCI. Thus, engineered EVs are a potentially feasible and efficacious treatment for SCI, and may also be used to develop targeted treatments for other diseases.

Abstract Spinal cord injury (SCI) can result in irreversible sensory and motor disability with no effective treatment currently. After SCI, infiltrated macrophages accumulate in epicenter through destructed blood-spinal cord barrier (BSCB). Further, great majority of macrophages are preferentially polarized to M1 phenotype, with only a few transient M2 phenotype. The purpose of this study was to explore roles of vascular endothelial cells in microglia/macrophages polarization and the underlying mechanism. Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) was used to pretreat BV2 microglia and RAW264.7 macrophages followed by administration of conditioned medium from microvascular endothelial cell line bEnd.3 cells (ECM). Analyses were then performed to determine the effects of exosomes on microglia/macrophages polarization and mitochondrial function. The findings demonstrated that administration of ECM shifted microglia/macrophages towards M2 polarization, ameliorated mitochondrial impairment, and reduced reactive oxygen species (ROS) production in vitro. Notably, administration of GW4869, an exosomal secretion inhibitor, significantly reversed these observed benefits. Further results revealed that exosomes derived from bEnd.3 cells (Exos) promote motor rehabilitation and M2 polarization of microglia/macrophages in vivo. Ubiquitin-specific protease 13 (USP13) was shown to be significantly enriched in BV2 microglia treated with Exos. USP13 binds to, deubiquitinates and stabilizes the NF-κB inhibitor alpha (IκBα), thus regulating microglia/macrophages polarization. Administration of the selective IκBα inhibitor betulinic acid (BA) inhibited the beneficial effect of Exos in vivo. These findings uncovered the potential mechanism underlying the communications between vascular endothelial cells and microglia/macrophages after SCI. In addition, this study indicates exosomes might be a promising therapeutic strategy for SCI treatment.

Abstract Post-traumatic epilepsy (PTE) is an important cause of poor prognosis in patients with cerebral contusions. The primary purpose of this study is to evaluate the high-risk factors of PTE by summarizing and analyzing the baseline data, laboratory examination, and imaging features of patients with a cerebral contusion, and then developing a Nomogram prediction model and validating it. This study included 457 patients diagnosed with cerebral contusion who met the inclusion criteria from November 2016 to November 2019 at the Qinghai Provincial People's Hospital. All patients were assessed for seizure activity seven days after injury. Univariate analysis was used to determine the risk factors for PTE. Significant risk factors in univariate analysis were selected for binary logistic regression analysis. P

The AlGaN photocathode with a superlattice emission layer was grown by metal organic chemical vapor deposition. The existence of the superlattice structure was confirmed using a transmission electron microscope, and its optical and electrical properties were measured. The results showed that the introduction of a superlattice emission layer can reduce the transmittance and reflectance at 275 nm and improve the absorption of incident light. In particular, the Hall measurement results indicate that the introduction of a superlattice structure can significantly increase the concentration of holes in the AlGaN photocathode material. The activation experiment demonstrated that the photocurrent of the AlGaN photocathode subassembly with a superlattice structure increased significantly after Cs/O activation and that it showed better photoemission performance. The increase in the incident light absorption to produce more photoelectrons, the enhancement of photoelectron transport capacity by the polarized electric field generated by the superlattice structure, and the reduction in the surface barrier caused by the higher hole concentration were responsible for the significant improvement in photoemission performance.

The workforce has become more diverse than it used to be. Although organizations actively capitalize on workforce diversity to enhance team innovation and organizational performance, it is found that workforce diversity also has potential risks, among which interpersonal conflict is the most salient one. However, we still know relatively less about why workforce diversity may link to higher interpersonal conflict and, more importantly, how to mitigate the negative impact of workforce diversity. Based on the workplace diversity theories (e.g., the categorization-elaboration model), this study examined how workforce diversity was positively related to interpersonal conflict through impacting one’s affective states, and to what extent this indirect effect can be weakened by organization-initiated practices (i.e., the inclusive human resources management (HRM) practices) and employee-initiated behaviors (i.e., employee learning-oriented behaviors). Using two-wave surveys from 203 employees from various organizations in China, we confirmed our hypotheses. Our results showed that perceived workforce diversity was positively related to interpersonal conflict through increasing negative affect (after we controlled for the objective diversity level calculated by the Blau index), and this indirect effect was weakened when the levels of inclusive HRM practices and employee learning-oriented behaviors were high. Our study suggests that it is important for organizations to be aware of the detrimental impact of workforce diversity. In addition, it is essential to use both the top-down (e.g., inclusive HRM practices) and bottom-up (e.g., employee learning-oriented behaviors) approaches to managing the challenges presented by diversity so as to unlock more potential of diversity in the workplace.

Abstract Background And Objective Cerebral Contusion (CC) is one of the most serious injury types in patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI). In this study, the baseline data, imaging features and laboratory examinations of patients with CC were summarized and analyzed to develop and validate a prediction model of nomogram to evaluate the clinical outcomes of patients. Methods A total of 426 patients with cerebral contusion (CC) admitted to the People’s Hospital of Qinghai Province and Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University from January 2018 to January 2021 were included in this study, We randomly divided the cohort into a training cohort (n = 284) and a validation cohort (n = 142) with a ratio of 2:1.At Least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (Lasso) regression were used for screening high-risk factors affecting patient prognosis and development of the predictive model. The identification ability and clinical application value of the prediction model were analyzed through the analysis of receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC), calibration curve, and decision curve analysis (DCA). Results Twelve independent prognostic factors, including age, Glasgow Coma Score (GCS), Basal cistern status, Midline shift (MLS), Third ventricle status, intracranial pressure (ICP) and CT grade of cerebral edema,etc., were selected by Lasso regression analysis and included in the nomogram. The model showed good predictive performance, with a C index of (0.87, 95% CI, 0.026–0.952) in the training cohort and (0.93, 95% CI, 0.032–0.965) in the validation cohort. Clinical decision curve analysis (DCA) also showed that the model brought high clinical benefits to patients. Conclusion This study established a high accuracy of nomogram model to predict the prognosis of patients with CC, its low cost, easy to promote, is especially applicable in the acute environment, at the same time, CSF-glucose/lactate ratio(C-G/L), volume of contusion, and mean CT values of edema zone, which were included for the first time in this study, were independent predictors of poor prognosis in patients with CC. However, this model still has some limitations and deficiencies, which require large sample and multi-center prospective studies to verify and improve our results.

Osteosarcoma (OS) is a malignant bone tumor that mainly occurs in adolescents. It is accompanied by a high rate of lung metastasis, and high mortality. Recent studies have suggested the important roles of tripartite motif-containing (TRIM) family proteins in regulating various substrates and signaling pathways in different tumors. However, the detailed functional role of TRIM family proteins in the progression of OS is still unknown and requires further investigations. In this study, we found that tripartite motif-containing 22 (TRIM22) was downregulated in OS tissues and was hence associated with better prognosis. In vitro and in vivo functional analysis demonstrated that TRIM22 inhibits proliferation and metastasis of OS cells. Nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (NRF2), a redox regulator, was identified as a novel target for TRIM22. TRIM22 interacts with and accelerates the degradation of NRF2 by inducing its ubiquitination dependent on its E3 ligase activity but independent of Kelch-like ECH-associated protein 1 (KEAP1). Further, a series of gain- and loss-of-function experiments showed that knockdown or overexpression of NRF2 reversed the functions of knockdown or overexpression of TRIM22 in OS. Mechanistically, TRIM22 inhibited OS progression through NRF2-mediated intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) imbalance. ROS production was significantly promoted and mitochondrial potential was remarkably inhibited when overexpressing TRIM22, thus activating AMPK/mTOR signaling. Moreover, TRIM22 was also found to inhibit Warburg effect in OS cells. Autophagy activation was found in OS cells which were overexpressed TRIM22, thus leading to autophagic cell death. Treatment with N-Acetylcysteine (NAC), a ROS scavenger or the autophagy inhibitor 3-Methyladenine (3-MA) abolished the decreased malignant phenotypes in TRIM22 overexpressing OS cells. In conclusion, our study indicated that TRIM22 inhibits OS progression by promoting proteasomal degradation of NRF2 independent of KEAP1, thereby activating ROS/AMPK/mTOR/Autophagy signaling that leads to autophagic cell death in OS. Therefore, our findings indicated that targeting TRIM22/NRF2 could be a promising therapeutic target for treating OS.

Abstract Background In heart transplantation, donor hearts inevitably suffer from ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury, which leads to primary graft dysfunction and affects patients’ survival rate. Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) have been reported to attenuate myocardial I/R injury via their paracrine effects, which can be enhanced by hypoxic preconditioning. We hypothesized that the donor heart preservation with hypoxic conditioned medium (CdM) derived from BMSCs would improve post-transplant graft function. Methods Normoxic or hypoxic CdM were isolated from rat BMSCs cultured under normoxic (20% O2) or hypoxic (1% O2) condition. Donor hearts were explanted; stored in cardioplegic solution supplemented with either a medium (vehicle), normoxic CdM (N-CdM), or hypoxic CdM (H-CdM); and then heterotopically transplanted. Antibody arrays were performed to compare the differences between hypoxic and normoxic CdM. Results After heart transplantation, the donor heart preservation with normoxic CdM was associated with a shorter time to return of spontaneous contraction and left ventricular systolic diameter, lower histopathological scores, higher ejection fraction, and fractional shortening of the transplanted hearts. The cardioprotective effects may be associated with the inhibition of apoptosis and inflammation, as reflected by less TUNEL-positive cells and lower levels of plasma proinflammatory cytokines (interleukin-1β, interleukin-6, tumor necrosis factor-α) and cardiac troponin I in the N-CdM group compared with the vehicle group. These therapeutic effects can be further enhanced by hypoxic preconditioning. Antibody arrays revealed that nine proteins were significantly increased in hypoxic CdM compared with normoxic CdM. Furthermore, compared with vehicle and N-CdM groups, the protein levels of PI3K and p-Akt/Akt ratio in the transplanted hearts significantly increased in the H-CdM group. However, no significant difference was found in the phosphorylation of Smad2 and Smad3 for the donor hearts among the three groups. Conclusions Our results indicate that the cardioplegic solution-enriched with hypoxic CdM can be a novel and promising preservation solution for donor hearts.

In view of the problem of satellite mobility and terrestrial network resource constraints, a pre-placement strategy for terrestrial network content based on named data networking was proposed; Then, local content requests under the coverage of multiple base stations was fully considered.Based on the diff erence in distribution, a content distribution strategy based on fairness in satellite networks was proposed.The numerical results showed that the proposed content pre-placement strategy was eff ective in terms of satellite network content injection.In addition, in terms of satellite network content distribution, the proposed fair-based content distribution strategy could maximized content satisfaction.

In this paper, a dual-band dual-polarized antenna array is presented for 5G base station application. The developed antenna array consists of a 4 × 4 planar MIMO array operating at 3.3-5.0 GHz band (upper band UB) and a single antenna element working at 0.69-0.96 GHz band (lower band LB). The dual-band operation is based on our previously proposed antenna topology. The novelty of this paper is that the UB antenna array is a large-scale rectangular lattice array with 16 antenna elements for practical MIMO applications. Meanwhile, both the cross-band and in-band mutual coupling among the LB and UB antennas are furtherly suppressed by employing three decoupling techniques including rectangular ring resonator, ferrite chock ring, and novel baffle structure. With these decoupling technologies, the UB antenna array and the LB antenna are successfully integrated within a compact volume of 0.93λL× 0.93λL× 0.17λL (λL is the wavelength at 0.82 GHz). Experimental results show that the proposed dual-band antenna array offers high cross-band port isolation (>30 dB). Stable radiation patterns are also achieved for both the LB and UB antennas with averaged gain of 8.6 dBi and 7.3 dBi, respectively. The radiation efficiency is higher than 90% across the entire operation bands. It is the first time to realize a large scale sub-6 GHz MIMO antenna array shared-aperture working with a GSM band antenna element in a such compact volume.

AZO(ZnO/Al _2 O _3 ) conductive films were deposited in the microchannel of microchannel plate (MCP) by atomic layer deposition (ALD). The prepared films were characterized, including analysis of the thickness and composition uniformity of AZO films. The MCP bulk resistance was also measured, and the effect of annealing treatment on bulk resistance was investigated. The results suggest that the use of trimethylaluminum in the preparation of AZO composite film within the microchannel of MCP leads to corrosion of ZnO, resulting in non-uniformity in film thickness and incorrect composition of the film. The problem was resolved by increasing the pulse time of trimethylaluminum to 500 ms, resulting in the successful preparation of an AZO film with a uniform thickness and composition in the microchannel. After annealing, the bulk resistance of MCP increases while the variation of bulk resistance with voltage decreases. Specifically, the bulk resistance of the MCP having a ZnO/Al _2 O _3 ratio of 7/2 only experiences changes of the same order of magnitude (∼10 ^8 Ω) after undergoing a 60-minute annealing process in N _2 at 300 °C, thus satisfying the requirements of MCP.

Although solid organ transplantation remains the definitive management for patients with end-stage organ failure, this ultimate treatment has been limited by the number of acceptable donor organs. Therefore, efforts have been made to expand the donor pool by utilizing marginal organs from donation after circulatory death or extended criteria donors. However, marginal organs are susceptible to ischemia-reperfusion injury (IRI) and entail higher requirements for organ preservation. Recently, machine perfusion has emerged as a novel preservation strategy for marginal grafts. This technique continually perfuses the organs to mimic the physiologic condition, allows the evaluation of pretransplant graft function, and more excitingly facilitates organ reconditioning during perfusion with pharmacological, gene, and stem cell therapy. As mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have anti-oxidative, immunomodulatory, and regenerative properties, mounting studies have demonstrated the therapeutic effects of MSCs on organ IRI and solid organ transplantation. Therefore, MSCs are promising candidates for organ reconditioning during machine perfusion. This review provides an overview of the application of MSCs combined with machine perfusion for lung, kidney, liver, and heart preservation and reconditioning. Promising preclinical results highlight the potential clinical translation of this innovative strategy to improve the quality of marginal grafts.

Problems such as low light, similar background colors, and noisy image acquisition often occur when collecting images of lunar surface obstacles. Given these problems, this study focuses on the AD-Census algorithm. In the original Census algorithm, in the bit string calculated with the central pixel point, the bit string will be affected by the noise that the central point is subjected to. The effect of noise results in errors and mismatching. We introduce an improved algorithm to calculate the average window pixel for solving the problem of being susceptible to the central pixel value and improve the accuracy of the algorithm. Experiments have proven that the object contour in the grayscale map of disparity obtained by the improved algorithm is more apparent, and the edge part of the image is significantly improved, which is more in line with the real scene. In addition, because the traditional Census algorithm matches the window size in a fixed rectangle, it is difficult to obtain a suitable window in the image range of different textures, affecting the timeliness of the algorithm. An improvement idea of area growth adaptive window matching is proposed. The improved Census algorithm is applied to the AD-Census algorithm. The results show that the improved AD-Census algorithm has been shown to have an average run time of 5.3% and better matching compared to the traditional AD-Census algorithm for all tested image sets. Finally, the improved algorithm is applied to the simulation environment, and the experimental results show that the obstacles in the image can be effectively detected. The improved algorithm has important practical application value and is important to improve the feasibility and reliability of obstacle detection in lunar exploration projects.

Several studies have reported an intricate link between the G protein-coupled receptor 109A (GPR109A) and intestinal health. Upon activation, induced by butyric acid and β-hydroxybutyric acid, GPR109A regulates the expression of tight junction proteins, exerts anti-inflammatory effects, and maintains the integrity of the intestinal barrier. However, its function and the mechanism of action in combating the infection caused by exogenous pathogenic microorganisms remain unclear. This study established an animal model of infection by oral enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC) gavage to examine the underlying mechanism(s) and protective effects of GPR109A on the intestinal tract. Experimental GPR109A–/–and GPR109A+/+ mice were orally administered with 1 × 109 colony-forming units (CFUs) of ETEC, and changes in body weight were then observed. The colonization and translocation of ETEC in the intestine were detected by the plate counting method. The expression of tight junction proteins and the levels of inflammatory factors and secretory IgA (SIgA) in the intestine were detected by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (q-PCR), western blotting, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), and immunohistochemistry. The results demonstrated that GPR109A–/–mice were more susceptible to ETEC infection, showing more severe inflammatory reactions and intestinal damage. Moreover, the secretion of IgA in the intestinal tract of GPR109A+/+ mice was significantly increased after ETEC infection, whereas the IgA levels in GPR109A–/–mice did not change significantly. We added 5 g/L sodium butyrate to the drinking water of all mice. The GPR109A+/+ mice were protected against ETEC infection and no effect was observed in GPR109A–/–mice. Similarly, sodium butyrate increased the SIgA content in the gut of the GPR109A+/+ mice and no effect was observed in GPR109A–/–mice. In conclusion, activated GPR109A is effective against the colonization and translocation of ETEC in the gut and maintains the integrity of the intestinal barrier, possibly by promoting the secretion of intestinal IgA.

Most traditional methods have difficulty detecting landslide boundary accurately, and the existing methods based on deep learning often lead to insufficient training or overfitting due to insufficient samples. An end-to-end, semi-supervised adversarial network, which fully considers spectral and topographic features derived using unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) photogrammetry, is proposed to extract landslides by semantic segmentation to address the abovementioned problem. In the generative network, a generator similar to pix2pix is introduced into the proposed adversarial nets to learn semantic features from UAV-photogrammetry-derived data by semi-supervised operation and a confrontational strategy to reduce the requirement of the number of labeled samples. In the discriminative network, DeepLabv3+ is improved by inserting multilevel skip connection architecture with upsampling operation to obtain the contextual information and retain the boundary information of landslides at all levels, and a topographic convolutional neural network is proposed to be inserted into the encoder to concatenate topographic features together with spectral features. Then, transfer learning with the pre-trained parameters and weights, shared with pix2pix and DeepLabv3+, is used to perform landslide extraction training and validation. In our experiments, the UAV-photogrammetry-derived data of a typical landslide located at Meilong gully in China are collected to test the proposed method. The experimental results show that our method can accurately detect the area of a landslide and achieve satisfactiory results based on several indicators including the Precision, Recall, F1 score, and mIoU, which are 13.07%, 15.65%, 16.96%, and 18.23% higher than those of the DeepLabV3+. Compared with state-of-the-art methods such as U-Net, PSPNet, and pix2pix, the proposed adversarial nets considering multidimensional information such as topographic factors can perform better and significantly improve the accuracy of landslide extraction.

Most 3D CityGML building models in street-view maps (e.g., Google, Baidu) lack texture information, which is generally used to reconstruct real-scene 3D models by photogrammetric techniques, such as unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) mapping. However, due to its simplified building model and inaccurate location information, the commonly used photogrammetric method using a single data source cannot satisfy the requirement of texture mapping for the CityGML building model. Furthermore, a single data source usually suffers from several problems, such as object occlusion. We proposed a novel approach to achieve CityGML building model texture mapping by multiview coplanar extraction from UAV remotely sensed or terrestrial images to alleviate these problems. We utilized a deep convolutional neural network to filter out object occlusion (e.g., pedestrians, vehicles, and trees) and obtain building-texture distribution. Point-line-based features are extracted to characterize multiview coplanar textures in 2D space under the constraint of a homography matrix, and geometric topology is subsequently conducted to optimize the boundary of textures by using a strategy combining Hough-transform and iterative least-squares methods. Experimental results show that the proposed approach enables texture mapping for building façades to use 2D terrestrial images without the requirement of exterior orientation information; that is, different from the photogrammetric method, a collinear equation is not an essential part to capture texture information. In addition, the proposed approach can significantly eliminate blurred and distorted textures of building models, so it is suitable for automatic and rapid texture updates.

Considering that the traditional EMD method cannot be used to sufficiently extract true geophysical signals during GRACE time-varying gravity field postprocessing, a novel iterative empirical mode decomposition (EMD) processing strategy was proposed. The proposed iterative EMD method fully considers the inadequacy of the traditional EMD method in extracting geophysical signals and filtering noise. In this research, a 14-yr spherical harmonic (SH) time series of GRACE CSR RL06 data truncated to degree and order 60 was analysed by the iterative EMD method, and the results were compared with those of the traditional EMD method. To gain insight into the extracted signals, we analysed them from two perspectives: the spectral domain and the spatial domain. The results showed that the correlation coefficients between the filtered SH coefficients obtained by the iterative EMD method and the original SH coefficients are lower than those obtained by the traditional EMD method; for example, the correlation coefficients of C12,12 and C60,60 were 0.95 and 0.88 and 0.72 and 0.58, respectively. The spatial domain results indicated that compared with the traditional EMD method, the iterative EMD method could effectively retain the signal intensity while filtering north? south stripe noise. Moreover, to evaluate the noise filtering efficiency, the ratios of the latitude-weighted RMS over land and ocean were adopted, and the mean RMS ratios for all available months obtained via the iterative and traditional EMD methods were 3.54 and 3.34, respectively, representing a relative improvement of 6.17 %. Finally, to verify the accuracy of the iterative EMD method in extracting geophysical signals, two river basins were analysed via comprehensive comparison with GRACE mascon data, and the results showed that the estimated regional mean mass change series obtained via the iterative EMD method is closer to that obtained from the GRACE mascon data. Thus, it can be concluded that the iterative EMD method can be employed to effectively suppress noise and more accurately extract real geophysical signals relative to the traditional EMD method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]