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The dual-scrambling scheme that combines position transformation and bit-plane transformation is a popular image encryption scheme. However, such schemes need more key information, and the encryption and decryption processes are complicated. In addition, the existing quantum image dual-scrambling schemes mainly deal with square images. In this paper, we propose a hybrid scrambling encryption scheme for multi-mode quantum image representation (MQIR) images based on random permutation, in which the H × W quantum image is represented in MQIR. A random number generator factor s uniquely associates one of the random permutations of integers from 1 to a positive integer, so as to hybrid scramble both the pixel position and the binarized position of each pixel value. Meanwhile, the quantum circuits and some examples of scrambling are given. Furthermore, various analyses of the performance of this scheme were conducted, including effectiveness, key space, and computational complexity. By modifying the random generation factor to construct multiple binary grayscale images, the simulated results on the IBM Quantum Cloud platform demonstrate that the proposed quantum image encryption scheme is effective. In comparison to existing quantum image dual scrambling schemes, it is both simple and effective, offering a large key space, lower computational complexity, and applicability to non-square quantum images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To explore the potential of radiomics features to predict the histologic grade of nonfunctioning pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor (NF-PNET) patients using non-contrast sequence based on MRI. Methods: Two hundred twenty-eight patients with NF-PNETs undergoing MRI at 5 centers were retrospectively analyzed. Data from center 1 (n = 115) constituted the training cohort, and data from centers 2–5 (n = 113) constituted the testing cohort. Radiomics features were extracted from T2-weighted images and the apparent diffusion coefficient. The least absolute shrinkage and selection operator was applied to select the most important features and to develop radiomics signatures. The area under receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) was performed to assess models. Results: Tumor boundary, enhancement homogeneity, and vascular invasion were used to construct the radiological model to stratify NF-PNET patients into grade 1 and 2/3 groups, which yielded AUC of 0.884 and 0.684 in the training and testing groups. A radiomics model including 4 features was constructed, with an AUC of 0.941 and 0.871 in the training and testing cohorts. The fusion model combining the radiomics signature and radiological characteristics showed good performance in the training set (AUC = 0.956) and in the testing set (AUC = 0.864), respectively. Conclusion: The developed model that integrates radiomics features with radiological characteristics could be used as a non-invasive, dependable, and accurate tool for the preoperative prediction of grade in NF-PNETs. Clinical relevance statement: Our study revealed that the fusion model based on a non-contrast MR sequence can be used to predict the histologic grade before operation. The radiomics model may be a new and effective biological marker in NF-PNETs. Key Points: The diagnostic performance of the radiomics model and fusion model was better than that of the model based on clinical information and radiological features in predicting grade 1 and 2/3 of nonfunctioning pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (NF-PNETs). Good performance of the model in the four external testing cohorts indicated that the radiomics model and fusion model for predicting the grades of NF-PNETs were robust and reliable, indicating the two models could be used in the clinical setting and facilitate the surgeons' decision on risk stratification. The radiomics features were selected from non-contrast T2-weighted images (T2WI) and diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) sequence, which means that the administration of contrast agent was not needed in grading the NF-PNETs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of automated tools using advanced technologies like deep learning holds great promise for improving the accuracy of lung nodule classification in computed tomography (CT) imaging, ultimately reducing lung cancer mortality rates. However, lung nodules can be difficult to detect and classify, from CT images since different imaging modalities may provide varying levels of detail and clarity. Besides, the existing convolutional neural network may struggle to detect nodules that are small or located in difficult-to-detect regions of the lung. Therefore, the attention pyramid pooling network (APPN) is proposed to identify and classify lung nodules. First, a strong feature extractor, named vgg16, is used to obtain features from CT images. Then, the attention primary pyramid module is proposed by combining the attention mechanism and pyramid pooling module, which allows for the fusion of features at different scales and focuses on the most important features for nodule classification. Finally, we use the gated spatial memory technique to decode the general features, which is able to extract more accurate features for classifying lung nodules. The experimental results on the LIDC-IDRI dataset show that the APPN can achieve highly accurate and effective for classifying lung nodules, with sensitivity of 87.59%, specificity of 90.46%, accuracy of 88.47%, positive predictive value of 95.41%, negative predictive value of 76.29% and area under receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.914. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Overuse of antibiotics causes environmental pollution, and activated carbon adsorption is an effective way to remove antibiotics from polluted water. Herein, a cost-effective biomass carbon adsorbent for the adsorption of chloramphenicol (CHL) was prepared from pomelo peel using KHCO3 activator. The activated carbon boasted a significant specific surface area (SBET) of 1608 m2 g−1 with a maximum adsorption capacity (Qmax) for CHL reaching 549.5 mg g−1. The effect of adsorption behavior on adsorption capacity was studied. The adsorption process followed the pseudo-second-order kinetic and Langmuir models. From combined FT-IR and XPS data, the adsorption action included both physical adsorption and chemical adsorption. The rate-limiting step was diffusion through the boundary layer. The adsorption mechanism mainly included the processes of pore filling, functional group binding, and hydrogen bond and π–π interactions. Thermodynamic parameters demonstrated spontaneous and exothermic properties. This work demonstrated the rational application of waste biomass carbon for efficient adsorption of antibiotics to provide new help for antibiotic removal from polluted water. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trading off the allocation of limited computational resources between front-end path generation and back-end trajectory optimization plays a key role in improving the efficiency of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) motion planning. In this paper, a sampling-based kinodynamic planning method that can reduce the computational cost as well as the risks of UAV flight is proposed. Firstly, an initial trajectory connecting the start and end points without considering obstacles is generated. Then, a spherical space is constructed around the topological vertices of the environment, based on the intersections of the trajectory with the obstacles. Next, some unnecessary sampling points, as well as node rewiring, are discarded by the designed position-checking strategy to minimize the computational cost and reduce the risks of UAV flight. Finally, in order to make the planning framework adaptable to complex scenarios, the strategies for selecting different attraction points according to the environment are designed, which further ensures the safe flight of the UAV while improving the success rate of the front-end trajectory. Simulations and real-world experiment comparisons are conducted on a vision-based platform to verify the performance of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this review is to systematically summarize the application of organoids in the field of otolaryngology and head and neck surgery. It aims to shed light on the current advancements and future potential of organoid technology in these areas, particularly in addressing challenges like hearing loss, cancer research, and organ regeneration. Methods: Review of current literature regrading organoids in the field of otolaryngology and head and neck surgery. Results: The review highlights several advancements in the field. In otology, the development of organoid replacement therapies offers new avenues for treating hearing loss. In nasal science, the creation of specific organoid models aids in studying nasopharyngeal carcinoma and respiratory viruses. In head and neck surgery, innovative approaches for squamous cell carcinoma prediction and thyroid regeneration using organoids have been developed. Conclusion: Organoid research in otolaryngology—head and neck surgery is still at an early stage. This review underscores the potential of this technology in advancing our understanding and treatment of various conditions, predicting a transformative impact on future medical practices in these fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective To investigate the relationship between disease fear, self-efficacy, and psychological resilience after coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) in Xinxiang of Henan province. Methods A total of 137 patients who underwent coronary artery bypass grafting in Xinxiang Central Hospital were selected by convenient sampling method. Fear disease progression simplified scale (FoPQ-SF) was used to investigate the status of postoperative fear of disease before discharge, 6 weeks, and 3 months after operation, and self-efficacy scale (GSES) and psychological resilience scale (CDRISC) were used to evaluate their self-efficacy and psychological resilience. Pearson method was used to analyze the correlation between GSES score, CD-RISC score, and FoP-Q-SF score, and Logistic regression model was used to analyze the influencing factors of self-efficacy and psychological resilience on disease fear progression. Results The scores of FoP -Q -SF items, total score, GSES score, and CD -RISC score increased gradually before discharge, 6 weeks, and 3 months after operation, and the difference was statistically significant. Pearson correlation showed that GSES score and CD-RISC score were positively correlated with FoP-Q-SF score. Stepwise multivariate Logistic regression analysis showed that GSES score and CD-RISC score were the influencing factors of postoperative disease fear progression. Conclusion The disease fear status of patients after coronary artery bypass grafting in Xinxiang area of Henan Province is at a high level, and self-efficacy and psychological resilience are closely related to it, which are also the influencing factors of postoperative disease fear progression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plants have evolved a multilayered and sophisticated immune system to establish effective resistance to a variety of pathogens. Phytophthora species are among the most notorious plant pathogens, causing destructive diseases on a variety of agricultural crops. Understanding the plant immune system is crucial for protecting crops from Phytophthora diseases. Here, we summarize the recent work on genes involved in plant resistance against Phytophthora pathogens, including cell surface pattern recognition receptors, cytoplasmic nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat receptors, regulator genes, and non-host resistance genes, small RNA, and long non-coding RNA are also discussed in this review. Although the molecular mechanisms of only a small proportion of them have been clarified, emergence of new mechanisms of plant defense will offer exciting opportunities for utilization of these genes in disease resistance breeding as well as generation of disease-resistant crop germplasms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The arthroconidial yeast-like species currently classified in the asexual genera Geotrichum and Saprochaete and the sexual genera Dipodascus, Galactomyces and Magnusiomyces are frequently associated with dairy and cosmetics production, fruit rot and human infection. However, the taxonomic system of these fungi has not been updated to accommodate the new nomenclature code adopting the “one fungus, one name” principle. Here, we performed phylogenetic analyses of these yeast-like species based on the sequences of the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region and the D1/D2 domain of the large subunit of the rRNA gene. Two monophyletic groups were recognised from these species. One group contained Dipodascus, Galactomyces, and Geotrichum species and the other Magnusiomyces and Saprochaete species. We thus assigned the species in each group into one genus and selected the genus name Geotrichum for the first group and Magnusiomyces for the second one based on the principle of priority of publication. Five new Geotrichum species were identified from arthroconidial yeast strains recently isolated from various sources in China. The new species are described as Ge. dehoogii sp. nov., Ge. fujianense sp. nov., Ge. maricola sp. nov., Ge. smithiae sp. nov., and Ge. sinensis sp. nov. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

C9H9Br3, monoclinic, P21 (no. 4), a = 8.7420(4) Å, b = 4.4696(2) Å, c = 13.3526(6) Å, β = 97.785(2)°, V = 516.92(4) Å3, Z = 2, Rgt(F) = 0.0235, wRref(F2) = 0.0528, T = 150 K. CCDC no.: 2332847 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider theoretical and practical issues for innovatively using a large number of covariates in clinical trials to achieve various design objectives without model misspecification. Specifically, we propose a new family of semiparametric covariate‐adjusted response‐adaptive randomization (CARA) designs and we use the target maximum likelihood estimation (TMLE) to analyze the correlated data from CARA designs. Our approach can flexibly achieve multiple objectives and correctly incorporate the effect of a large number of covariates on the responses without model misspecification. We also obtain the consistency and asymptotic normality of the target parameters, allocation probabilities, and allocation proportions. Numerical studies demonstrate that our approach has advantages over existing approaches, even when the data‐generating distribution is complicated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The spatiotemporal evolution of drought is often modulated by climate and watershed characteristics. While numerous drought studies using space geodesy have been conducted in Yunnan, the scarcity and limited sensitivity of observation instruments have hindered the development of watershed-scale drought analyses. This study aims to accurately characterize hydrological droughts within three watersheds in Yunnan from 2011 January to 2021 May by a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) inversion constrained by Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) data. Initially, we employed Variational Bayesian Independent Component Analysis to reconstruct the 3-D crustal deformations at 43 GNSS stations resulting from hydrological loadings. We then computed the time-series of vertical displacements caused by GRACE Mascon water products. Subsequently, utilizing the method of least squares, we derived the scaling factors between the vertical crustal displacements (VCD) obtained from GNSS observations and the synthetic displacements derived from GRACE data. By combing scaling-factor-adjusted VCDs derived from GRACE with the GNSS data, we have obtained accurate estimates of water storage for three Yunnan watersheds. Finally, we identified drought events characterized by abnormal decreases in water storage and used climatological methods to quantitatively describe the severity, extent and recovery of these drought extremes. Additionally, we evaluated the influence of various earth elastic structures on the scaling factors, and demonstrated their advantageous contribution to aligning GNSS and GRACE observations. In conclusion, our study introduces a novel approach to integrate GNSS and GRACE retrievals, allowing for accurate characterization of droughts in data-scarce regions, which cannot be achieved by GNSS or GRACE individually. Moreover, our results underscore the potential benefits of watershed-scale drought monitoring and analysis for effective water resource management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nonlinear surface waves propagating along a single interface between a linear metamaterial and a nonlinear antiferromagnet are theoretically studied. The frequency response of transverse-magnetic-polarized waves covering the frequency range from the microwave to the infrared regime is investigated in detail. We find that the waveguide supports soliton-like surface waves with low-pass response in the microwave range and bandpass response in the microwave and infrared ranges. The bandwidth is a function of the nonlinearity and can be tuned by controlling the incident wave power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Computed tomography (CT) scans have been shown to be an effective way of improving diagnostic efficacy and reducing lung cancer mortality. However, distinguishing benign from malignant nodules in CT imaging remains challenging. This study aims to develop a multiple-scale residual network (MResNet) to automatically and precisely extract the general feature of lung nodules, and classify lung nodules based on deep learning. The MResNet aggregates the advantages of residual units and pyramid pooling module (PPM) to learn key features and extract the general feature for lung nodule classification. Specially, the MResNet uses the ResNet as a backbone network to learn contextual information and discriminate feature representation. Meanwhile, the PPM is used to fuse features under four different scales, including the coarse scale and the fine-grained scale to obtain more general lung features of the CT image. MResNet had an accuracy of 99.12%, a sensitivity of 98.64%, a specificity of 97.87%, a positive predictive value (PPV) of 99.92%, and a negative predictive value (NPV) of 97.87% in the training set. Additionally, its area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) was 0.9998 (0.99976–0.99991). MResNet's accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, PPV, NPV, and AUC in the testing set were 85.23%, 92.79%, 72.89%, 84.56%, 86.34%, and 0.9275 (0.91662–0.93833), respectively. The developed MResNet performed exceptionally well in estimating the malignancy risk of pulmonary nodules found on CT. The model has the potential to provide reliable and reproducible malignancy risk scores for clinicians and radiologists, thereby optimizing lung cancer screening management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study was to investigate the potential and pathogenic mechanism of the pathogenic fungus Alternaria alternata strain GD-011-B against four major agricultural weeds on the Tibetan plateau, and to lay a foundation for the commercial production and application of this strain. The mycelial masses had herbicidal activity against the isolated leaves of the weeds Chenopodium album, Elsholtzia densa, Malva verticillata, and Amaranthus retroflexus L., with a descending herbicidal activity order of M. verticillata > E. densa > A. retroflexus > C. album. The fermentation broth also showed herbicidal activity by treating the whole plants of these four weeds in the descending order of C. album > E. densa > M. verticillata > A. retroflexus. Scanning electron microscopy revealed that GD-011-B mycelia invaded the inner part of the leaf of A. retroflexus through the stomata and epidermal tissue gap and extended to the back, damaging the leaf epidermis and tissues and sporulating on the leaf surface, ultimately resulting in leaf disease. The fermentation broth of pathogen GD-011-B was not pathogenic to Vicia faba L., Pisum sativum L., Hordeum vulgare L., or Triticum aestivum L., but it was slightly pathogenic to Brassica napus L. Therefore, Alternaria alternata can be used as a herbicidal microorganism with high potential for biological control of four major agricultural weeds on the Tibetan plateau. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to investigate the diagnostic performance of the histogram array and convolutional neural network (CNN) based on diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) with multiple b-values under magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to distinguish pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas (PDACs) from solid pseudopapillary neoplasms (SPNs) and pancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms (PNENs). This retrospective study consisted of patients diagnosed with PDACs (n = 132), PNENs (n = 45) and SPNs (n = 54). All patients underwent 3.0-T MRI including DWI with 10 b values. The regions of interest (ROIs) of pancreatic tumor were manually drawn using ITK-SNAP software, which included entire tumor at DWI (b = 1500 s/m2). The histogram array was obtained through the ROIs from multiple b-value data. PyTorch (version 1.11) was used to construct a CNN classifier to categorize the histogram array into PDACs, PNENs or SPNs. The area under the curves (AUCs) of the histogram array and the CNN model for differentiating PDACs from PNENs and SPNs were 0.896, 0.846, and 0.839 in the training, validation and testing cohorts, respectively. The accuracy, sensitivity and specificity were 90.22%, 96.23%, and 82.05% in the training cohort, 84.78%, 96.15%, and 70.0% in the validation cohort, and 81.72%, 90.57%, and 70.0% in the testing cohort. The performance of CNN with AUC of 0.865 for this differentiation was significantly higher than that of f with AUC = 0.755 (P = 0.0057) and α with AUC = 0.776 (P = 0.0278) in all patients. The histogram array and CNN based on DWI data with multiple b-values using MRI provided an accurate diagnostic performance to differentiate PDACs from PNENs and SPNs. • CNN is proposed to differentiate PDACs from non-PDACs by converting DWI into an image of histogram array. • AUCs of histogram array and CNN for diagnosing PDACs are 0.896, 0.846, and 0.839 in training, validating and testing cohorts. • The performance of histogram array and CNN for diagnosing PDACs is higher than that of DWI parameters in all patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid change of people's lifestyle, more childbearing couples live with irregular schedules (i.e., staying up late) and suffer from decreased fertility and abortion, which can be caused by luteal phase defect (LPD). We used continuous light‐exposed mice as a model to observe whether continuous light exposure may affect luteinization and luteal function. We showed that the level of progesterone in serum reduced (p <.001), the number of corpus luteum (CL) decreased (p <.01), and the expressions of luteinization‐related genes (Lhcgr, Star, Ptgfr, and Runx2), clock genes (Clock and Per1), and Mt1 were downregulated (p <.05) in the ovaries of mice exposed to continuous light, suggesting that continuous light exposure induces defects in luteinization and luteal functions. Strikingly, injection of melatonin (3 mg/kg) could improve luteal functions in continuous light‐exposed mice. Moreover, we found that, after 2 h of hCG injection, the level of pERK1/2 in the ovary decreased in the continuous light group, but increased in the melatonin administration group, suggesting that melatonin can improve LPD caused by continuous light exposure through activating the ERK1/2 pathway. In summary, our data demonstrate that continuous light exposure affects ovary luteinization and luteal function, which can be rescued by melatonin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The past decade has demonstrated the potential of human activity recognition (HAR) with WiFi signals owing to non-invasiveness and ubiquity. Previous research has largely concentrated on enhancing precision through sophisticated models. However, the complexity of recognition tasks has been largely neglected. Thus, the performance of the HAR system is markedly diminished when tasked with increasing complexities, such as a larger classification number, the confusion of similar actions, and signal distortion To address this issue, we eliminated conventional convolutional and recurrent backbones and proposed WiTransformer, a novel tactic based on pure Transformers. Nevertheless, Transformer-like models are typically suited to large-scale datasets as pretraining models, according to the experience of the Vision Transformer. Therefore, we adopted the Body-coordinate Velocity Profile, a cross-domain WiFi signal feature derived from the channel state information, to reduce the threshold of the Transformers. Based on this, we propose two modified transformer architectures, united spatiotemporal Transformer (UST) and separated spatiotemporal Transformer (SST) to realize WiFi-based human gesture recognition models with task robustness. SST intuitively extracts spatial and temporal data features using two encoders, respectively. By contrast, UST can extract the same three-dimensional features with only a one-dimensional encoder, owing to its well-designed structure. We evaluated SST and UST on four designed task datasets (TDSs) with varying task complexities. The experimental results demonstrate that UST has achieved recognition accuracy of 86.16% on the most complex task dataset TDSs-22, outperforming the other popular backbones. Simultaneously, the accuracy decreases by at most 3.18% when the task complexity increases from TDSs-6 to TDSs-22, which is 0.14–0.2 times that of others. However, as predicted and analyzed, SST fails because of excessive lack of inductive bias and the limited scale of the training data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Referred somatic pain triggered by hyperalgesia is common in patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). It was reported that sprouting of sympathetic nerve fibers into the dorsal root ganglion (DGR) and neurogenic inflammation were related to neuropathic pain, the excitability of neurons, and afferents. The purpose of the study was to explore the potential and mechanism of electroacupuncture (EA) at Zusanli (ST36) for the intervention of colon inflammation and hyperalgesia. Sprague-Dawley (SD) was randomly divided into four groups, including control, model, EA, and sham-EA. Our results showed EA treatment significantly attenuated dextran sulfate sodium- (DSS-) induced colorectal lesions and inflammatory cytokine secretion, such as TNF-α, IL-1β, PGE2, and IL-6. EA also inhibited mechanical and thermal pain hypersensitivities of colitis rats. Importantly, EA effectively abrogated the promotion effect of DSS on ipsilateral lumbar 6 (L6) DRG sympathetic-sensory coupling, manifested as the sprouting of tyrosine hydroxylase- (TH-) positive sympathetic fibers into sensory neurons and colocalization of and calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP). Furthermore, EA at Zusanli (ST36) activated neurogenic inflammation, characterized by decreased expression of substance P (SP), hyaluronic acid (HA), bradykinin (BK), and prostacyclin (PGI2) in colitis rat skin tissues corresponding to the L6 DRG. Mechanically, EA treatment reduced the activation of the TRPV1/CGRP, ERK, and TLR4 signaling pathways in L6 DRG of colitis rats. Taken together, we presumed that EA treatment improved colon inflammation and hyperalgesia, potentially by suppressing the sprouting of sympathetic nerve fibers into the L6 DGR and neurogenic inflammation via deactivating the TRPV1/CGRP, ERK, and TLR4 signaling pathways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective. The diagnosis of primary malignant melanoma of the esophagus (PMME) before treatment is essential for clinical decision-making. However, PMME may be misdiagnosed as esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) sometimes. This research is aimed at devising a radiomics nomogram model of CT for distinguishing PMME from ESCC. Methods. In this retrospective analysis, 122 individuals with proven pathologically PMME (n = 28) and ESCC (n = 94) were registered from our hospital. PyRadiomics was applied to derive radiomics features from plain and enhanced CT images after resampling image into an isotropic resolution of 0.625 × 0.625 × 0.625 m m 3 . The diagnostic efficiency of the model was evaluated by an independent validation group. Results. For the purpose of differentiation between PMME and ESCC, a radiomics model was constructed using 5 radiomics features obtained from nonenhanced CT and 4 radiomics features derived from enhanced CT. A radiomics model including multiple radiomics features showed excellent discrimination efficiency with AUCs of 0.975 and 0.906 in the primary and validation cohorts, respectively. Then, a radiomics nomogram model was developed. The decision curve analysis has shown remarkable performance of this nomogram model for distinguishing PMME from ESCC. Conclusions. The proposed radiomics nomogram model based on CT could be used for distinguishing PMME from ESCC. Moreover, this model also contributed to helping clinicians determine an appropriate treatment strategy for esophageal neoplasms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nitrophenols are important nitroaromatic compounds, both important environmental pollutants and dangerous explosives, posing a devastating danger and pollution threat to humans. It is vital to detect efficiently trace nitrophenols in the environment. In this contribution, a series of fully flexible cyclotriphosphazene-based COFs (FFCP COFs: HDADE, HBAPB, and HBPDA), prepared with both a flexible knot and flexible linkers of different lengths, were used for sensing 2,4,6-trinitrophenol (TNP) and p-nitrophenol (p-NP) in real time with excellent sensitivity and selectivity. The quenching constants of HDADE by TNP, HBAPB, and HBPDA by p-NP are 6.29 × 104, 2.17 × 105, and 2.48 × 105 L·mol–1, respectively. The LODs of TNP and p-NP are 1.19 × 10−11, 6.91 × 10−12, and 6.05 × 10−12 mol·L−1. Their sensitivities increase with the linker length, which is better than the corresponding COFs composed of rigid linkers. There is only a photoinduced electron transfer mechanism in the fluorescence quenching of HBPDA by p-NP. Meanwhile, the mechanisms of photoinduced charge transfer and resonance energy transfer exist in the fluorescence quenching of HDADE by TNP and the fluorescence quenching of HBAPB by p-NP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to compare and analyze the differences of fungi in different cultivated soils/substrates of pepper and reveal the characteristics of fungal community structure in the soilless culture substrates of pepper, the rhizosphere matrix (SIPlRh) for the soilless culture of pepper, non-rhizosphere matrix for the soilless culture (SIPlNRh), rhizosphere soil (PIRh), non-rhizosphere soil (PINRh) and uncultivated soil (NP1) were collected as the experimental materials. Then, the diversity and abundance of fungi in the five kinds of soils/substrates were detected by using the Illumina Seq high-throughput sequencing technology, and the structural characteristics of fungal community were analyzed. The results showed that PINRh had the highest fungal abundance and diversity, while SIPlNRh had the lowest. And there were significant differences in the abundance between the two samples, while there were no significant differences in the abundance and diversity among other samples. The fungal community composition of PIRh, SIPlRh and SIPlNRh was similar at the phylum classification level, and the average relative abundance ratio was different. At the genus classification level, the composition of NP1, PIRh and PINRh was similar, and the composition of SIPlRh and SIPlNRh was similar. The cluster analysis of fungal community showed that the three kinds of soil (NP1, PIRh and PINRh) and the two kinds of substrates (SIPlRh and SIPlNRh) were obviously divided into two class groups. The lEfSe analysis showed that PIRh and PINRh had the most species with significant difference, while SIPlRh had the fewest. By detecting the diversity and community composition of fungi in the planting soil and the soilless culture substrates of pepper, the differences of the rhizosphere fungal microbiome in different types of planting substrates were compared and analyzed. Then, the diversity and community structure characteristics of fungi in the soilless culture substrates of pepper were preliminarily revealed, which provided scientific basis for the selection of soilless culture substrates, the distribution ratio and improvement of matrix group in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Study Design: Prospective cohort study.Objective: To assess the differences in the clinical and radiological outcomes between oblique lateral interbody fusion (OLIF) and minimally invasive transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (MI-TLIF).Summary Of Background Data: Nowadays, there is still a controversy regarding whether OLIF is superior to MI-TLIF in the management of degenerative lumbar disease.Methods: Between August 3, 2019 and February 3, 2020, 137 patients were assigned to OLIF or MI-TLIF at their request and the surgeon's discretion: 71 in the OLIF group and 66 in the MI-TLIF group. The perioperative data, patient-reported outcomes, radiographic outcomes, and complications were compared between the two groups.Results: The OLIF group showed shorter operation time (110.5 vs.183.8 minutes, P < 0.001), lesser estimated blood loss (123.1 vs. 232.0 mL, P < 0.001), shorter length of hospital stay (5.5 vs. 6.7 days, P < 0.001), and lower serum creatine kinase (CK) (1 day postoperatively) (376.0 vs. 541.8 IU/L, P < 0.01) than that of MI-TLIF group. Both groups showed no significant differences in the visual analog scale (VAS) scores of lower back and leg pain and the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) scores preoperatively and at 1, 3, and 12 months postoperatively, respectively (P > 0.05). Compared with the MI-TLIF group, the OLIF group showed better restoration of disc height (DH) (4.7/4.6/4.7 vs. 3.7/3.7/3.7 mm, P < 0.01) and lumbar lordosis angle (LLA) (10.5°/10.8°/11.1° vs. 5.8°/5.7°/5.3°, P < 0.001), but not the value of segmental lordosis angle (SLA) (P > 0.05) at 1 day, 1 month, and 1 year postoperatively, respectively. The complication rate of OLIF was higher than that of MI-TLIF (29.4% vs. 9.7%, P < 0.01).Conclusion: Compared with MI-TLIF, OLIF showed similar results in terms of patient-reported outcomes, restoration of SLA and fusion rate, and superior results with respect to restoration of DH and LLA, operation time, estimated blood loss, length of hospital stay, and serum CK levels (1 day postoperatively). Even though the complication rate of OLIF is higher than that of MI-TLIF, it does not bring persistent and substantial damage to the patients.Level of Evidence: 3. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For the control of low-frequency noise in complex external-pressure environment, a new two-dimensional phononic crystal plate which is made of the lead stub with rubber coatings connected by narrow epoxy bars is proposed and the bandgap characteristics are simulated tentatively by the finite element method. The bandgap generation mechanism of the designed model is investigated by analyzing corresponding vibration modes. Furthermore, the bandgap adjustability under different pre-compression strains and geometric parameters is also investigated. Results show that obvious bandgaps tunability with small pre-compression strains or hydrostatic pressure is realized by changing geometric parameters and applying pre-compression strain to the matrix. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humans are susceptible to influenza. The influenza virus spreads quickly and behave seasonally. The seasonality and spread of influenza are often associated with meteorological factors and have spatio-temporal differences. Based on the influenza cases and daily average meteorological factors in Lanzhou from 2014 to 2017, this study firstly aimed to analyze the characteristics of influenza incidence in Lanzhou and the impact of meteorological factors on influenza activities. Then, SARIMA(X) models for the prediction were established. The influenza cases in Lanzhou from 2014 to 2017 was more male than female, and the younger the age, the higher the susceptibility; the epidemic characteristics showed that there is a peak in winter, a secondary peak in spring, and a trough in summer and autumn. The influenza cases in Lanzhou increased with increasing daily pressure, decreasing precipitation, average relative humidity, hours of sunshine, average daily temperature and average daily wind speed. Low temperature was a significant driving factor for the increase of transmission intensity of seasonal influenza. The SARIMAX (1,0,0)(1,0,1)[12] multivariable model with average temperature has better prediction performance than the university model. This model is helpful to establish an early warning system, and provide important evidence for the development of influenza control policies and public health interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To investigate the efficacy and safety of dicycloplatin as chemotherapeutic regimen in transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (TACE) for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Methods: In this randomized, open-label, phase II trial, patients with unresectable HCC who were TACE treatment–naïve or experienced recurrence after surgical resection or ablation were enrolled at 7 centers in China from March 2019 to November 2019. Participants were randomly assigned (1:1:1) to receive TACE with chemotherapeutic regimen of dicycloplatin alone (group A1), dicycloplatin plus epirubicin (group A2), or epirubicin alone (group B). The primary endpoint was objective response rate (ORR). The secondary endpoints included disease control rate (DCR), duration of response (DOR), progression-free survival (PFS), and safety. Results: The ORR at 6 months in group A1 (n = 22) was significantly better than that in group B (p = 0.093; 90% confidence interval [CI], 1.03–9.45). The DCR in group A1 was significantly higher than that in group B (p = 0.045; 90% CI, 1.29–12.88). There was no significant difference in DOR among the groups (p = 0.271). The median PFS were 6.00 and 3.05 months in groups A2 (n = 25) and B (n = 24), respectively (p = 0.061). Grade 3 or worse adverse events were similar among groups in the safety population (p = 0.173). Conclusion: TACE with dicycloplatin was comparably safe and well tolerable as epirubicin alone in patients with unresectable HCC. Compared with epirubicin alone, significant improvement in ORR and DCR when dicycloplatin was applied, as well as prolonged PFS when dicycloplatin plus epirubicin was applied, was generated. Key Points: • To our knowledge, this is the first multicenter randomized trial to assess the efficacy and safety of TACE with dicycloplatin in patients with unresectable HCC. • This phase II trial showed that TACE with dicycloplatin alone or plus epirubicin was comparably safe and well tolerable as epirubicin alone. • Significant improvements in ORR, DCR when dicycloplatin was applied, and prolonged PFS when dicycloplatin plus epirubicin was applied were recorded compared with epirubicin alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Co-occurrence networks inferred from the abundance data of microbial communities are widely applied to predict microbial interactions. However, the high workloads of bacterial isolation and the complexity of the networks themselves constrained experimental demonstrations of the predicted microbial associations and interactions. Here, we integrate droplet microfluidics and bar-coding logistics for high-throughput bacterial isolation and cultivation from environmental samples, and experimentally investigate the relationships between taxon pairs inferred from microbial co-occurrence networks. We collected Potamogeton perfoliatus plants (including roots) and associated sediments from Beijing Olympic Park wetland. Droplets of series diluted homogenates of wetland samples were inoculated into 126 96-well plates containing R2A and TSB media. After 10 days of cultivation, 65 plates with > 30% wells showed microbial growth were selected for the inference of microbial co-occurrence networks. We cultivated 129 bacterial isolates belonging to 15 species that could represent the zero-level OTUs (Zotus) in the inferred co-occurrence networks. The co-cultivations of bacterial isolates corresponding to the prevalent Zotus pairs in networks were performed on agar plates and in broth. Results suggested that positively associated Zotu pairs in the co-occurrence network implied complicated relations including neutralism, competition, and mutualism, depending on bacterial isolate combination and cultivation time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To assess the value of radiomics, apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC), intravoxel incoherent motion (IVIM) and stretched-exponential (SE) MR imaging in prediction of therapeutic response in patients with spinal metastases before chemotherapy. Thirty-six patients with 190 osteolytic metastatic lesions from breast cancer were prospectively enrolled and underwent MR imaging before and after 6 months' treatment on a 1.5 T MRI. According to MDA criteria, 68 lesions were categorized as progressive disease (PD) and 122 lesions were categorized as stable or improvement (non-PD). The regions of interest (ROIs) were manually drawn on DWI, T1WI, T2WI and FS-T2WI by two radiologists with ITK-SNAP. The ADC all (multiple b-values method), IVIM parameters (D, D* and f) and SE parameters (DDC and α) were generated. The radiomics features were extracted from the ROIs. The mean values of ADC, DDC, and D before treatment were significantly higher in non-PD group than those in PD group (P = 0.001). The radiomics based on ADC all had the highest AUC value (0.852), followed by that of the T2WI (0.829) and FS-T2WI (0.798). The radiomics model using ADC all and FS-T2WI showed excellent efficiency in predicting treatment response with AUCs of 0.905 and 0.873 in training and validation cohorts. The radiomics model had better performance than that of ADC all , D, and DDC for predicting treatment response of bone metastases. Radiomics model based on ADC all and FS-T2WI could predict the treatment response and contribute to assisting clinicians in accurately choosing appropriate management. • The mean values of ADC, DDC, and D values before treatment were significantly higher in non-PD group than those in PD group. • Radiomics ananlysis based on ADC all and FS-T2WI could predict treatment response of bone metastases. • The performance of radiomics model for predicting treatment response was higher than that of DWI parameters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Hengduan Mountains region (HMR) on the southeastern Tibetan Plateau, supports a high diversity of herbs, particularly in its subalpine to alpine ecosystems, due to high altitude and cool temperate climate. Current understanding on the formation of such herbaceous richness is based chiefly on molecular phylogenies; however, direct geological evidence is lacking because herbs are rarely preserved as macroscopic fossils. In this study, we present abundant fossil fruits and seeds of herbs from the late Pliocene Heqing Basin in the southern HMR. Our systematic analysis shows the presence of at least 18 species belonging to 11 genera, that is, Ranunculus, Corydalis, Rumex, Polygonum, Chenopodium, Stellaria, Fragaria, Astragalus, Aster, Carex, and Schoenoplectus, of which Polygonum is most abundant followed by Astragalus. This finding throws the first light from fossil evidence on the rise of herbaceous diversity in the region. We interpret the local assembly of these herbs as resulting from rapid pre‐Pliocene species diversifications of many herbaceous groups in the HMR. As nowadays most of these herbs grow primarily in meadows and a few occur as subaquatic plants, we suggest an open meadow hosting some scattered shrubs in the vicinity of a vegetated wetland in the Heqing Basin during the late Pliocene. This provides the first direct evidence of past treeless open vegetation within the HMR and thus improves our knowledge of vegetation evolution in the region. We suggest that the uplift‐induced climate cooling and monsoon‐associated precipitation seasonality are potentially the key driving forces for the opening of meadow vegetation in the HMR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Qaidam Basin is the highest and one of the largest and driest deserts on Earth. It is considered a mars analog area in China. In contrast to numerous studies concerning its geology, geophysical, and chemistry, relatively few studies have reported microbial diversity and distribution in this area. Here, we investigated culturable yeast diversity in the northeast Qaidam Basin. A total of 194 yeast strains were isolated, and 12 genera and 21 species were identified, among which 19 were basidiomycetous yeasts. Naganishia albida, N. adeliensis, and Filobasidium magnum were the three most dominant species and were distributed in thirteen samples from eight locations. Five new species (Filobasidium chaidanensis, Kondoa globosum, Symmetrospora salmoneus, Teunia nitrariae, and Vishniacozyma pseudodimennae) were found and described based on ITS and D1D2 gene loci together with phenotypic characteristics and physiochemical analysis. Representative strains from each species were chosen for the salt-tolerant test, in which species showed different responses to different levels of NaCl concentrations. Further, the strain from soil can adapt well to the higher salt stress compared to those from plants or lichens. Our study represents the first report of the yeast diversity in the Qaidam Basin, including five new species, and also provides further information on the halotolerance of yeasts from the saline environment in mars analog. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of activated carbon (CFAC-n, n = 1,2,3,4) adsorbents of higher adsorption capacity were synthesized through coconut fiber carbon (CFAC-0) and KOH activator (CFAC-0:KOH = 1:1, 1:2, 1:3, 1:4), respectively, by the heating method for chloramphenicol (CHL) adsorption. The pore diameter, pore volume, specific surface area and surface functional groups of CFAC-n were determined by several characterizations such as BET, XRD, Raman, TEM, FTIR and XPS. The adsorption kinetics of CFAC-n for CHL removal were investigated and the kinetic parameters were also calculated. According to the results, the adsorption capacity onto CFAC-n was positively correlated to the specific surface area. CFAC-3 possessed the largest specific surface area (1755 m2 g−1) and the best adsorption amount (523.0 mg g−1). The adsorption conditions (adsorbent dosage, antibiotic initial concentration, adsorption temperature and pH value) of CFAC-3 showed to be directly related to the adsorption effect. In addition, it was found that the CHL adsorption onto CFAC-n was well suitable for fitting with pseudo-second-order kinetic model and Elovich kinetics model. The adsorption isotherm was carried on and it was found that CHL adsorption onto CFAC best fitted to Freundlich and Temkin model. Those results revealed that the adsorption process was heterogeneous adsorption by main chemisorption. The adsorption capacity for CHL onto CHAC-3 was much higher than those of reported low-cost adsorbents. The adsorption included mainly hydrogen bond and π–π conjugation interactions, and electrostatic interaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Percutaneous endoscopic lumbar discectomy (PELD) has become a favorable surgical approach for lumbar radiculopathy caused by intervertebral disc herniation. Studies have revealed patients with type II Modic change may suffer from unrelieved low back pain and higher lumbar disc herniation (LDH) recurrence after herniated nucleus pulposus removal. Therefore, in this study, we aim to evaluate how PELD performed in management of LDH patients with type II Modic change. We collected 267 single-level LDH cases aged 20–50 yearswho underwent PELD from December 2016 to December 2019. The mean follow-up time was 26.3 months (range: 12–48 months). The visual analog scale (VAS), Oswestry Disability Index (ODI), and MacNab scores, as well as the recurrence rate, were analyzed pre- and post-surgery, as well as at the time points of 3 months, 12 months, and the final follow-up time after surgery. The clinical outcomes in LDH patients with or without type II Modic change who underwent PELD were thoroughly analyzed. Within the 267 LDH patients enrolled, 145 cases present Modic signals, among which 3 are type I and 142 are type II. The VAS and ODI scores of the patients in the 2 groups at different follow-up times were significantly lower than those before surgery. The excellent and good MacNab scores in the control group and Modic type II change group were 87.0% and 82.1%, respectively. However, with the extension of follow-up time, the VAS and ODI scores, as well as the recurrence rate, were found to be higher in the type II Modic change group when compared with those in the non-Modic change group. PELD performed well in management of LDH patients. However, we need to pay more attention to the continuous low back pain and the recurrence possibility in the cases with type II Modic change. In these cases, longer brace support or other interventions could be applied. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Aim: Osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures (OVCFs) are acknowledged to be common fractures, especially in the elderly population. Minimally invasive percutaneous methods of treatment for these fractures such as kyphoplasty (KP) and vertebroplasty (VP) have been valid and effective tools for decreasing clinical problems, which are associated with more beneficial effects compared with traditional methods such as open surgery or conservative treatment. Hence, we conducted the current meta-analysis in order to gather updated evidence for the systematic assessment of clinical and radiographic outcomes of KP compared with VP.Methods: We searched articles published based on the electronic databases, including PubMed, EMBASE, and Cochrane Library. Publications of studies comparing KP with VP in the treatment of OVCFs were collected. After rigorous and thorough review of study quality, we extracted the data on the basis of eligible trials, which analyzed the summary hazard ratios (HRs) of the end points of interest.Results: Our inclusion criteria involved a total of 6 studies. In total, data from 644 patients, 330 who received VP and 284 who received KP, were included in the review. There was no significant difference in either group in terms of visual analog scale (VAS) scores (MD = 0.17; 95% CI, -0.39 to 0.73; P = .56), risk of cement leakage (odds ratio [OR] = 1.31; 95% CI, 0.62 to 2.74; P = .47) or Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) scores (MD = 0.51; 95% CI, -1.87 to 2.88; P = .68). Nevertheless, the injected cement volume (MD = -0.52; 95% CI, -0.88 to -0.15; P = .005) in the VP group was linked to a markedly lower statistically significant trend compared with the KP group.Conclusion: This meta-analysis evaluated acceptable efficacy levels across the involved trials. VP injected cement volume had several advantages in this meta-analysis. Yet, no significant differences were observed in terms of VAS scores, ODI scores, or cement leakage when KP was compared to VP therapy. Given the combined results of our study, the optimal treatment for patients with OVCFs should be determined by further high-quality multicenter randomized controlled trials with longer follow-up and larger sample sizes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

High myopia is a risk factor for primary open angle glaucoma (POAG). The pathological mechanism of high myopia induced POAG occurrence is not fully understood. In this study, we successfully established the guinea pig model of ocular hypertension with high myopia, and demonstrated the susceptibility of high myopia for the occurrence of microbead-induced glaucoma compared with non-myopia group and the effect of YAP/TGF-β signaling pathway in TM pathogenesis induced by high myopia. Moreover, we performed stretching treatment on primary trabecular meshwork (TM) cells to simulate the mechanical environment of high myopia. It was found that stretching treatment disrupted the cytoskeleton, decreased phagocytic function, enhanced ECM remodeling, and promoted cell apoptosis. The experiments of mechanics-induced human TM cell lines appeared the similar trend. Mechanically, the differential expressed genes of TM cells caused by stretch treatment enriched YAP/TGF-β signaling pathway. To inhibit YAP/TGF-β signaling pathway effectively reversed mechanics-induced TM damage. Together, this study enriches mechanistic insights of high myopia induced POAG susceptibility and provides a potential target for the prevention of POAG with high myopia. • The guinea pig model of ocular hypertension with high myopia was successfully established. • The role of YAP/TGF-β signaling pathway in the POAG pathogenesis induced by high myopia. • Inhibition of YAP/TGF-β signaling pathway can effectively reverse the TM damage caused by axial elongation induced mechanical stress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ultimate goal of semantic web (SW) is to implement mutual collaborations among ontology-based intelligent systems. To this end, it is necessary to integrate those domain-independent and cross-domain ontologies by finding the correspondences between their entities, which is the so-called ontology matching. To improve the quality of ontology alignment, in this work, the ontology matching problem is first defined as a sparse multi-objective optimization problem (SMOOP), and then, a multi-objective evolutionary algorithm with a relevance matrix (MOEA-RM) is proposed to address it. In particular, a relevance matrix (RM) is presented to adaptively measure the relevance of each individual's genes to the objectives, which is applied in MOEA's initialization, crossover and mutation to ensure the population's sparsity and to speed up the the algorithm's convergence. The experiment verifies the performance of MOEA-RM by comparing it with the state-of-the-art ontology matching techniques, and the experimental results show that MOEA-RM is able to effectively address the ontology matching problem with different heterogeneity characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A high-efficiency W-band 12-way power combiner system based on the TM01 mode in a circular waveguide has been presented in this study. It is a radial structure composed of three elements: a circular waveguide TM01-mode transducer, an isolated 12-way radial power combiner, and amplifier modules. The measured passive combining efficiency is observed to be greater than 89.5% over the range of 85–100 GHz. The isolation between the inputs is better than 10 dB, with a maximum back-to-back return loss of 13 dB. By using 12 GaN monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) 2-W power amplifiers, the active combiner system produces a maximum power output of up to 22 W with an average combining efficiency of 81.7% within the band of 92–97 GHz. The power-added efficiency within the operating band has been measured to be up to 20.8%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a global public health concern, and few effective treatments for its delayed damages are available. Oridonin (Ori) recently has been reported to show a promising neuroprotective efficacy, but its potential therapeutic effect on TBI has not been thoroughly elucidated. The TBI mouse models were established and treated with Ori or vehicle 30 min post-operation and every 24 h since then. Impairments in cognitive and motor function and neuropathological changes were evaluated and compared. The therapeutic efficacy and mechanisms of action of Ori were further investigated using animal tissues and cell cultures. Ori restored motor function and cognition after TBI-induced impairment and exerted neuroprotective effects by reducing cerebral edema and cortical lesion volume. Ori increased neuronal survival, ameliorating gliosis and the accumulation of macrophages after injury. It suppressed the increased production of reactive oxygen species, lipid peroxide, and malondialdehyde and reversed the decrease of mitochondrial membrane potential and adenosine triphosphate content, which was also identified in oxidatively stressed neuronal cultures. Further, Ori inhibited the expression of nucleotide-binding domain leucine-rich repeats family protein 3 (NLRP3) inflammasome proteins and NLRP3-dependent cytokine interleukin-1β that can be induced by oxidative stress after TBI. Regarding underlying mechanisms, Ori significantly enhanced expression of key proteins of the nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2/heme oxygenase-1 (Nrf2/HO-1) pathway. Our results demonstrated that Ori effectively improved functional impairments and neuropathological changes in animals with TBI. By activating the Nrf2 pathway, it improved mitochondrial function and antioxidant capacity and suppressed the neuroinflammation induced by oxidative stress. The results therefore suggest Ori as a potent candidate for managing neurological damage after TBI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The prognosis of patients with liver metastases during or early after adjuvant chemotherapy for colorectal cancer (CRC) is significantly worse. This study aimed to explore the efficacy of perioperative second-line chemotherapy in prolonging survival in those patients. Methods: Patients who underwent liver resection, with resectable liver metastases that occurred within 12 months after the last cycle of adjuvant chemotherapy for CRC, from January 2006 to December 2019, were included. The long-term outcome of overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) between different groups was analyzed. Results: A total of 200 patients were included, of whom 112 underwent direct hepatectomy and 88 received upfront second-line chemotherapy. OS and PFS were significantly better in patients receiving upfront second-line chemotherapy than direct surgery (PFS, P = 0.016; OS, P = 0.013). Further analysis showed that perioperative second-line chemotherapy could provide a greater survival benefit, which was also confirmed by propensity score matching (OS: P = 0.03; PFS: P = 0.04). Multivariate analysis determined that perioperative second-line chemotherapy was an independent factor influencing OS (OR [95% CI]: 0.468 [0.294–0.744], P = 0.001) and PFS (OR [95% CI]: 0.517 [0.353–0.758], P = 0.001). Discussion: Perioperative second-line chemotherapy could improve the survival of patients who underwent hepatectomy, with resectable liver metastases that occurred during or early after adjuvant chemotherapy for CRC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reliable and accurate photovoltaic (PV) output power projection is critical for power grid security, stability, and economic operation. However, because of the indirectness, unpredictability, and solar energy volatility, predicting precise and reliable photovoltaic output power is a complicated subject. The photovoltaic output power variable is evaluated in this study using a powerful machine learning approach called the support vector machine model based on gray-wolf optimization. A vast dataset of previously published papers was compiled for this purpose. Several studies were carried out to assess the suggested model. The statistical evaluation revealed that this model predicts absolute values with reasonable accuracy, including R 2 and RMSE values of 0.908 and 74.6584, respectively. The practical input data were also subjected to sensitivity analysis. The results of this analysis showed that the air temperature parameter has a greater effect on the target parameter than the solar irradiance intensity parameter (relevancy factor equal to 0.75 compared to 0.49, respectively). The leverage approach was also used to test the accuracy of actual data, and the findings revealed that the vast majority of data is accurate. This basic but accurate model may be quite effective in predicting target values and could be a viable substitute for laboratory data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Premise of research. Our concept of the former diversity and geographic spread of Platanaceae continues to expand. Unlobed platanaceous leaves have been poorly known in the fossil record of western North America. New information on the extinct Paleogene genus Platimeliphyllum and its associated reproductive structures is helping to unravel the biogeographic and evolutionary history of Platanaceae. Methodology. We studied leaves of Platimeliphyllum and associated platanaceous inflorescences and infructescences from the Eocene of western North America and northeastern China. Epidermal anatomy was obtained from cuticle fragments macerated in Schultze solution and studied using transmitted light and epifluorescence microscopy. In situ pollen from inflorescences was studied using light microscopy and SEM. Pivotal results. We provide new evidence supporting the platanaceous affinity of Platimeliphyllum and document its occurrence in the Eocene of western North America as well as in eastern Asia. We present the new combinations Platimeliphyllum durhamensis (Wolfe) comb. nov. from Washington and Oregon and Platimeliphyllum fushunensis (Chen) comb. nov. from Fushun, Liaoning Province, northeastern China. This extends the geographic range of a genus previously known mainly from the Paleocene and Eocene of Russia and Kazakhstan. The ovate, unlobed, simple laminae correspond to Platanaceae in their marginal teeth with rounded sinuses, straight secondary veins, agrophic veins, and orthogonal tertiary and quaternary venation. The association of these leaves with platanaceous inflorescences further confirms their affinities with Platanaceae. Conclusions. Platimeliphyllum likely spread between North America and Asia via the Bering Land Bridge in the Paleocene or Eocene. Previous climate estimates of the Fushun flora based on the coexistence approach need reevaluation with the updated taxonomy of the flora. The co-occurrence of Platimeliphyllum with Macginitiea , Platanites , and Platanus indicates that an array of platanaceous lineages coexisted during the Eocene in western North America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, an ether-bridged aromatic carboxylic acid, 2-(2-carboxyphenoxy)terephthalic acid (H3cpta), was applied as the building block for the generation of two new Co(II)-based coordination polymers (CPs) with the chemical formulae of [Co3(μ5-cpta)2(2,2′-bipy)2]n (1, 2,2′-bipy = 2,2′-bipyridine) [Co3(μ3-cpta)2(phen)3(py)3(H2O)3]n (2, phen =1,10-phenanthroline, py = pyridine) by reaction of the Co(NO3)2·6H2O with the H3cpta ligand in the presence of different N-donor co-ligands under the hydrothermal reaction conditions. The single-crystal X-ray diffraction study shows that compound 1 features a 2D layered structure which has been reported previously and compound 2 shows a ladder-like 1D network. Furthermore, the treatment effect of compounds 1 and 2 on the rats undergoing gastrointestinal surgery was evaluated. The hemodynamics of the rats was measured after compound 1 or 2 treatment. Besides, the Richmond Agitation–Sedation Scale was also performed for the evaluation of rats' cognitive function after the treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The conventional method for the determination of heavy metals in food is acid digestion followed by atomic absorption spectrometry or induced coupled plasma mass spectrometry. However, for high salt foods, due to the strong matrix effect, the detection results are seriously inaccurate. In this work, sulfur-functionalized magnetic metal-organic frameworks (Fe 3 O 4 @UiO-66-SH) were synthesized by coating Fe 3 O 4 nanospheres with sulfydryl-functionalized UiO-66. The Fe 3 O 4 @UiO-66-SH possesses both the magnetic properties of Fe 3 O 4 and the diverse properties of metal-organic framework (MOF) in one material, which has the superiority of high surface area, easy-operation and strong adsorb ability with Pb (II) and Cd(II), is used to separate and determine Pb (II) and Cd(II) in high salt foods by magnetic solid phase extraction-induced plasma mass spectrometry. The detection limits (LODs) for Pb (II) and Cd(II) were 0.17 and 0.21 µg/kg, respectively, and the quantification limits (LOQs) were 0.56 and 0.66 µg/kg. Analyzing the certified reference material of soy sauce (CFAPA-QC1728–4, P41839) and estimating the spiked recoveries proved the accuracy and precision of the proposed method. The determined values agreed well with the reference values, and the recoveries for spiking sample varied from 85.8–100.5%. • A magnetic solid-phase extraction adsorbent was successfully prepared. • Extraction of heavy metal in high salinity foods. • The developed method can significantly reduce matrix effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A controllable non‐reciprocal transmission model is proposed. The model contains a Möbius ring, which is connected with two 1D semi‐infinite chains, with a two‐level atom located inside one of the cavities of the Möbius ring. The Green function method is used to study the transmittance of a single photon through the model. The results show that non‐reciprocal transmission can be achieved in this model and the two‐level atom can behave as a quantum switch for non‐reciprocal transport of the single photon. This controllable non‐reciprocal transmission model may inspire new quantum non‐reciprocal devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SUMMARY: Plants deploy various immune receptors to recognize pathogen‐derived extracellular signals and subsequently activate the downstream defense response. Recently, increasing evidence indicates that the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) plays a part in the plant defense response, known as ER stress‐mediated immunity (ERSI), that halts pathogen infection. However, the mechanism for the ER stress response to signals of pathogen infection remains unclear. Here, we characterized the ER stress response regulator NAC089, which was previously reported to positively regulate programed cell death (PCD), functioning as an ERSI regulator. NAC089 translocated from the ER to the nucleus via the Golgi in response to Phytophthora capsici culture filtrate (CF), which is a mixture of pathogen‐associated molecular patterns (PAMPs). Plasma membrane localized co‐receptor BRASSINOSTEROID INSENSITIVE 1‐associated receptor kinase 1 (BAK1) was required for the CF‐mediated translocation of NAC089. The nuclear localization of NAC089, determined by the NAC domain, was essential for immune activation and PCD. Furthermore, NAC089 positively contributed to host resistance against the oomycete pathogen P. capsici and the bacteria pathogen Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato (Pst) DC3000. We also proved that NAC089‐mediated immunity is conserved in Nicotiana benthamiana. Together, we found that PAMP signaling induces the activation of ER stress in plants, and that NAC089 is required for ERSI and plant resistance against pathogens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aquatic and wetland systems are widely used for landscapes and water regeneration. Microbiomes and submerged macrophytes (hydrophytes) play essential roles in conversions of organic and inorganic compounds in those ecosystems. The systems were extensively investigated for microbial diversities and compositions. However, little is known about how hydrophytes recruited diverse microbiota and affected functional zonation in aquatic systems. To address this issue, epiphytic leaf and root, sediment, and surrounding water samples were collected from the dragon-shape aquatic system in Beijing Olympic Park. Metagenomic DNAs were extracted and subjected to sequencing. Results showed that epiphytic leaf and root microbiomes and metabolic marker genes were remarkably different from that of surrounding environment. Twenty indicator bacterial genera for epiphytic microbiomes were identified and 50 metabolic marker genes were applied to evaluate the function of epiphytic leaf and root, water, and sediment microbiomes. Co-occurrence analysis revealed highly modularized pattern of metabolic marker genes and indicator bacterial genera related to metabolic functions. These results suggested that hydrophytes shaped microbiomes and drove functional zonation in aquatic systems. Key points: • Microbiomes of hydrophytes and their surrounding environments were investigated. • Twenty indicator bacterial genera highly specific to epiphytic biofilms were identified. • Epiphytes recruited unique microbiomes and drove functional zonation in aquatic systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research of quantum network will promote the application of quantum image to be more universal and widespread. Quantum image representation model is the basis of quantum image processing. Therefore, we propose a multimode quantum image representation (MQIR) and its preparation. In this representation, the image size can be arbitrary and the color can be in one of several color models, such as Gray, RGB, Lab, HSL. This improves the universality of quantum image applications, and our MQIR requires fewer qubits than other quantum image representations. Furthermore, an MQIR image encryption scheme is presented, which is based on three-dimensional non-equilateral Arnold transformation. We give the MQIR transformation (inverse transformation) algorithm and quantum circuits. Some of the transformation times and the parameters in the scrambling process can be used as the keys in the proposed encryption. Finally, we conduct some simulation experiments on the classical computer to analyze the performance such as histogram analysis, peak signal-to-noise ratio and the correlation coefficients of adjacent pixels between original images and encrypted images. Simulation results show that the proposed quantum image encryption scheme is efficient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Plant protoplasts constitute unique single-cell systems that can be subjected to genomic, proteomic, and metabolomic analysis. An effective and sustainable method for preparing protoplasts from tea plants has yet to be established. The protoplasts were osmotically isolated, and the isolation and purification procedures were optimized. Various potential factors affecting protoplast preparation, including enzymatic composition and type, enzymatic hydrolysis duration, mannitol concentration in the enzyme solution, and iodixanol concentration, were evaluated. Results: The optimal conditions were 1.5% (w/v) cellulase and 0.4–0.6% (w/v) macerozyme in a solution containing 0.4 M mannitol, enzymatic hydrolysis over 10 h, and an iodixanol concentration of 65%. The highest protoplast yield was 3.27 × 106 protoplasts g−1 fresh weight. As determined through fluorescein diacetate staining, maximal cell viability was 92.94%. The isolated protoplasts were round and regularly shaped without agglomeration, and they were less than 20 μm in diameter. Differences in preparation, with regard to yield and viability in the tissues (roots, branches, and leaves), cultivars, and cultivation method, were also observed. Conclusions: In summary, we reported on a simple, efficient method for preparing protoplasts of whole-organ tissue from tea plant. The findings are expected to contribute to the rapid development of tea plant biology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three newly synthesized copper(II) complexes with the general formula [CuL], where L is the dianionic form of N,N′-bis(3,5-difluorosalicylidene)ethane-1,2-diamine (H2L1) for 1, N,N′-bis(3,5-difluorosalicylidene)propane-1,3-diamine (H2L2) for 2, and N,N′-bis(3,5-difluorosalicylidene)-2-hydroxy-1,3-propanediamine (H2L3) for 3, have been obtained and structurally characterized by spectroscopic method and single-crystal X-ray determination. The Cu atoms in the complexes are in square planar coordination, with the two imino N and two phenolate O atoms of the Schiff base ligands. The in vitro antimicrobial activities of the compounds indicate that they are interesting antibacterial agents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Oblique lateral lumbar interbody fusion (OLIF) has been extensively used, with satisfactory outcomes for the treatment of degenerative lumbar disease. This article aims to demonstrate a modified lateral approach, also known as the anteroinferior psoas (AIP) technique for OLIF, which is expected to enhance security by operating under direct vision. The core procedures of our technique are as follows. First, a minimal skin incision is recommended 2 cm backward compared with the normal incision of OLIF, facilitating the oblique placement of the working channel and the orthogonal maneuver for the cage placement. Second, two special custom‐made retractors, as an alternative to the index finger, are used to pull the psoas muscle to the dorsal side and pull the abdominal organs together with extraperitoneal fate to the ventral side under direct visualization, making the exposure of the working channel convenient and safe and avoiding radiation exposure. Third, the anterior border of the psoas is bluntly dissected and retracted backwards, obviously enlarging the retroperitoneal anatomic corridor and then expanding clinical indications of OLIF. The benefits of this technique include that it has a short learning curve, satisfactory clinical outcomes, and low risk of perioperative complications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]