bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Effects of guard and boom on needle Langmuir probes studied with particle-in-cell simulations
Authors: Brask S.M. , Marholm S. , Miloch W.J. , Marchand R.
Published: February 2024

We investigate the effects of different guard geometries on the currents to needle-type Langmuir probes. The results are based on particle-in-cell numerical simulations. We show that if the guard length is less than 6–8 Debye lengths there can be a significant effect on the currents to the probe. A guard radius should not be larger than the Debye length, otherwise it can also significantly affect the currents. However, since guard radii are often close to the probe radius, the second condition is usually satisfied.
Bringing Dance to Older Adults: Program Experts’ Perspectives on the Role of Community Dance Classes to Support Older Adults
Authors: Paglione Vanessa , Morrison Lindsay , McDonough Meghan H. , Downie Andrea , Kenny Sarah J.
Published: February 2024

Background:

Dancing offers several health and wellness benefits for older adults: it may promote physical literacy (PL) and positively influence the aging process. Yet, limited research considers the perspectives of those with experience working with older adults and in community dance programming.

Objective:

The purpose of this study was to understand program experts’ perspectives on how older adult community dance can promote PL and contribute to age-friendly cities and community initiatives.

Methods and Findings:

Four themes were identified from semi-structured interviews with five program experts: (1) expert instructors tailor classes to participants’ needs and interests; (2) the heart of what draws us to dancing: authentic experience and social connection; (3) elitist, ableist, and gendered assumptions of dance prevent social inclusion of older adults in dancing spaces; and (4) collaboration across sectors is needed to offer accessible, sustainable, and valued dance programming.

Discussion:

Recommendations for developing and implementing older adult community dance programming are described.
Partnership with the University of São Paulo Panel of Twins: A Four-City Tour and More / Twin Research Reviews: Twin Research on Binge Eating; Twins’ Physical Outcomes Linked to Different Diets; Working Conditions and Sickness Absence in Swedish Twins; Facial Morphology Differences in Monozygotic Twins / Human Interest and Importance: Michigan Family Forced to Adopt Their Own Twins; Ethics of Hiring a Surrogate to Bear Twins; Twin Survivors of the Israel-Hamas War; Twin Pregnancy with Double Uterus; Three Twin Pairs on Same Women’s Soccer Team
Authors: Segal Nancy L.
Published: February 2024

This article begins with an overview of twin research in Brazil, initiated by the University of São Paulo Panel of Twins. I met with many new research collaborators and students while on a fall 2023 four-city lecture tour in that country. A meeting with a world-famous surgeon who recently separated craniopagus conjoined twin pairs is also described. This overview is followed by summaries of twin research on binge eating, twins’ physical outcomes linked to different diets, working conditions and sickness absence in Swedish Twins and facial morphology differences in monozygotic twins. The final section of this article provides a sampling of human interest stories with important implications. They include a Michigan family forced to adopt their own twins, ethical issues surrounding the hiring of a surrogate to bear twins; twin survivors of the Israel-Hamas war, a twin pregnancy with a double uterus, and three twin pairs on the same women’s soccer team.
Spatiotemporal Variations and Postseismic Relaxation Process Around Mt. Fuji, Japan, During and After the 2011 Tohoku‐Oki Earthquake
Authors: Kakiuchi Y. , Nimiya H. , Tsuji T.
Published: February 2024

To monitor the volcanoes at a high spatiotemporal resolution, we introduce the singular value decomposition‐based Wiener filter and the three‐component waveforms in ambient noise velocity monitoring. The continuous ambient noise data from 63 stations around Mt. Fuji and Mt. Hakone, Japan, during the January‐September 2011 were analyzed to estimate the seismic velocity variations at a 1‐day temporal resolution, allowing us to distinguish the velocity drops caused by the 2011 Mw 9.0 Tohoku‐oki and the Mw 6.0 East Shizuoka earthquake. The velocity drop during the Tohoku‐oki earthquake was large in volcanic areas and was larger around Mt. Hakone than Mt. Fuji. This difference is possibly due to the existence of fluid‐ and gas‐rich zones at shallower depths and a higher crack density around Mt. Hakone. In addition, the velocity drop at Mt. Fuji during the Tohoku‐oki and the East Shizuoka earthquake was the same level, despite larger static stress changes beneath Mt. Fuji during the East Shizuoka earthquake. We interpret this inconsistency between the velocity drops and static stress changes to arise from incomplete recovery of the generated cracks during the Tohoku‐oki earthquake when the East Shizuoka earthquake occurred. This study also investigates the spatial variations in recovery speed and recovery amount, finding slow recovery speeds in the volcanic areas and fault areas, possibly due to larger crack densities in the crust. Furthermore, we observe the lowest velocity recovery amount in the volcanic areas, which is likely attributed to the maintained increase in pore pressure due to the volcanic gas bubbles.
Converging and evolving immuno-genomic routes toward immune escape in breast cancer
Authors: Blanco-Heredia Juan , Souza Carla Anjos , Trincado Juan L. , Gonzalez-Cao Maria , Gonçalves-Ribeiro Samuel , Gil Sara Ruiz , Pravdyvets Dmytro , Cedeño Samandhy , Callari Maurizio , Marra Antonio , Gazzo Andrea M. , Weigelt Britta , Pareja Fresia , Vougiouklakis Theodore , Jungbluth Achim A. , Rosell Rafael , Brander Christian , Tresserra Francesc , Reis-Filho Jorge S. , Tiezzi Daniel Guimarães , de la Iglesia Nuria , Heyn Holger , De Mattos-Arruda Leticia
Published: February 2024

The interactions between tumor and immune cells along the course of breast cancer progression remain largely unknown. Here, we extensively characterize multiple sequential and parallel multiregion tumor and blood specimens of an index patient and a cohort of metastatic triple-negative breast cancers. We demonstrate that a continuous increase in tumor genomic heterogeneity and distinct molecular clocks correlated with resistance to treatment, eventually allowing tumors to escape from immune control. TCR repertoire loses diversity over time, leading to convergent evolution as breast cancer progresses. Although mixed populations of effector memory and cytotoxic single T cells coexist in the peripheral blood, defects in the antigen presentation machinery coupled with subdued T cell recruitment into metastases are observed, indicating a potent immune avoidance microenvironment not compatible with an effective antitumor response in lethal metastatic disease. Our results demonstrate that the immune responses against cancer are not static, but rather follow dynamic processes that match cancer genomic progression, illustrating the complex nature of tumor and immune cell interactions.
Tunable afterglow for mechanical self-monitoring 3D printing structures
Authors: Huang Rongjuan , He Yunfei , Wang Juan , Zou Jindou , Wang Hailan , Sun Haodong , Xiao Yuxin , Zheng Dexin , Ma Jiani , Yu Tao , Huang Wei
Published: February 2024

Self-monitoring materials have promising applications in structural health monitoring. However, developing organic afterglow materials for self-monitoring is a highly intriguing yet challenging task. Herein, we design two organic molecules with a twisted donor-acceptor-acceptor’ configuration and achieve dual-emissive afterglow with tunable lifetimes (86.1–287.7 ms) by doping into various matrices. Based on a photosensitive resin, a series of complex structures are prepared using 3D printing technology. They exhibit tunable afterglow lifetime and Young’s Modulus by manipulating the photocuring time and humidity level. With sufficient photocuring or in dry conditions, a long-lived bright green afterglow without apparent deformation under external loading is realized. We demonstrate that the mechanical properties of complex 3D printing structures can be well monitored by controlling the photocuring time and humidity, and quantitively manifested by afterglow lifetimes. This work casts opportunities for constructing flexible 3D printing devices that can achieve sensing and real-time mechanical detection.
Intestinal IL-22RA1 signaling regulates intrinsic and systemic lipid and glucose metabolism to alleviate obesity-associated disorders
Authors: Gaudino Stephen J. , Singh Ankita , Huang Huakang , Padiadpu Jyothi , Jean-Pierre Makheni , Kempen Cody , Bahadur Tej , Shiomitsu Kiyoshi , Blumberg Richard , Shroyer Kenneth R. , Beyaz Semir , Shulzhenko Natalia , Morgun Andrey , Kumar Pawan
Published: February 2024

IL-22 is critical for ameliorating obesity-induced metabolic disorders. However, it is unknown where IL-22 acts to mediate these outcomes. Here we examine the importance of tissue-specific IL-22RA1 signaling in mediating long-term high fat diet (HFD) driven metabolic disorders. To do so, we generated intestinal epithelium-, liver-, and white adipose tissue (WAT)-specific Il22ra1 knockout and littermate control mice. Intestinal epithelium- and liver-specific IL-22RA1 signaling upregulated systemic glucose metabolism. Intestinal IL-22RA1 signaling also mediated liver and WAT metabolism in a microbiota-dependent manner. We identified an association between Oscillibacter and elevated WAT inflammation, likely induced by Mmp12 expressing macrophages. Mechanistically, transcription of intestinal lipid metabolism genes is regulated by IL-22 and potentially IL-22-induced IL-18. Lastly, we show that Paneth cell-specific IL-22RA1 signaling, in part, mediates systemic glucose metabolism after HFD. Overall, these results elucidate a key role of intestinal epithelium-specific IL-22RA1 signaling in regulating intestinal metabolism and alleviating systemic obesity-associated disorders.
Meiotic protein SYCP2 confers resistance to DNA-damaging agents through R-loop-mediated DNA repair
Authors: Wang Yumin , Gao Boya , Zhang Luyuan , Wang Xudong , Zhu Xiaolan , Yang Haibo , Zhang Fengqi , Zhu Xueping , Zhou Badi , Yao Sean , Nagayama Aiko , Lee Sanghoon , Ouyang Jian , Koh Siang-Boon , Eisenhauer Eric L. , Zarrella Dominique , Lu Kate , Rueda Bo R. , Zou Lee , Su Xiaofeng A. , Yeku Oladapo , Ellisen Leif W. , Wang Xiao-Song , Lan Li
Published: February 2024

Drugs targeting the DNA damage response (DDR) are widely used in cancer therapy, but resistance to these drugs remains a major clinical challenge. Here, we show that SYCP2, a meiotic protein in the synaptonemal complex, is aberrantly and commonly expressed in breast and ovarian cancers and associated with broad resistance to DDR drugs. Mechanistically, SYCP2 enhances the repair of DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) through transcription-coupled homologous recombination (TC-HR). SYCP2 promotes R-loop formation at DSBs and facilitates RAD51 recruitment independently of BRCA1. SYCP2 loss impairs RAD51 localization, reduces TC-HR, and renders tumors sensitive to PARP and topoisomerase I (TOP1) inhibitors. Furthermore, our studies of two clinical cohorts find that SYCP2 overexpression correlates with breast cancer resistance to antibody-conjugated TOP1 inhibitor and ovarian cancer resistance to platinum treatment. Collectively, our data suggest that SYCP2 confers cancer cell resistance to DNA-damaging agents by stimulating R-loop-mediated DSB repair, offering opportunities to improve DDR therapy.
Exosomes define a local and systemic communication network in healthy pancreas and pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma
Authors: Adem Bárbara , Bastos Nuno , Ruivo Carolina F. , Sousa-Alves Sara , Dias Carolina , Vieira Patrícia F. , Batista Inês A. , Cavadas Bruno , Saur Dieter , Machado José C. , Cai Dawen , Melo Sonia A.
Published: February 2024

Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC), a lethal disease, requires a grasp of its biology for effective therapies. Exosomes, implicated in cancer, are poorly understood in living systems. Here we use the genetically engineered mouse model (ExoBow) to map the spatiotemporal distribution of exosomes from healthy and PDAC pancreas in vivo to determine their biological significance. We show that, within the PDAC microenvironment, cancer cells establish preferential communication routes through exosomes with cancer associated fibroblasts and endothelial cells. The latter being a conserved event in the healthy pancreas. Inhibiting exosomes secretion in both scenarios enhances angiogenesis, underscoring their contribution to vascularization and to cancer. Inter-organ communication is significantly increased in PDAC with specific organs as most frequent targets of exosomes communication occurring in health with the thymus, bone-marrow, brain, and intestines, and in PDAC with the kidneys, lungs and thymus. In sum, we find that exosomes mediate an organized intra- and inter- pancreas communication network with modulatory effects in vivo.
A hybrid transistor with transcriptionally controlled computation and plasticity
Authors: Gao Yang , Zhou Yuchen , Ji Xudong , Graham Austin J. , Dundas Christopher M. , Miniel Mahfoud Ismar E. , Tibbett Bailey M. , Tan Benjamin , Partipilo Gina , Dodabalapur Ananth , Rivnay Jonathan , Keitz Benjamin K.
Published: February 2024

Organic electrochemical transistors (OECTs) are ideal devices for translating biological signals into electrical readouts and have applications in bioelectronics, biosensing, and neuromorphic computing. Despite their potential, developing programmable and modular methods for living systems to interface with OECTs has proven challenging. Here we describe hybrid OECTs containing the model electroactive bacterium Shewanella oneidensis that enable the transduction of biological computations to electrical responses. Specifically, we fabricated planar p-type OECTs and demonstrated that channel de-doping is driven by extracellular electron transfer (EET) from S. oneidensis. Leveraging this mechanistic understanding and our ability to control EET flux via transcriptional regulation, we used plasmid-based Boolean logic gates to translate biological computation into current changes within the OECT. Finally, we demonstrated EET-driven changes to OECT synaptic plasticity. This work enables fundamental EET studies and OECT-based biosensing and biocomputing systems with genetically controllable and modular design elements.
Integrating single-cell and spatially resolved transcriptomic strategies to survey the astrocyte response to stroke in male mice
Authors: Scott Erica Y. , Safarian Nickie , Casasbuenas Daniela Lozano , Dryden Michael , Tockovska Teodora , Ali Shawar , Peng Jiaxi , Daniele Emerson , Nie Xin Lim Isabel , Bang K. W. Annie , Tripathy Shreejoy , Yuzwa Scott A. , Wheeler Aaron R. , Faiz Maryam
Published: February 2024

Astrocytes, a type of glial cell in the central nervous system (CNS), adopt diverse states in response to injury that are influenced by their location relative to the insult. Here, we describe a platform for spatially resolved, single-cell transcriptomics and proteomics, called tDISCO (tissue-digital microfluidic isolation of single cells for -Omics). We use tDISCO alongside two high-throughput platforms for spatial (Visium) and single-cell transcriptomics (10X Chromium) to examine the heterogeneity of the astrocyte response to a cortical ischemic stroke in male mice. We show that integration of Visium and 10X Chromium datasets infers two astrocyte populations, proximal or distal to the injury site, while tDISCO determines the spatial boundaries and molecular profiles that define these populations. We find that proximal astrocytes show differences in lipid shuttling, with enriched expression of Apoe and Fabp5. Our datasets provide a resource for understanding the roles of astrocytes in stroke and showcase the utility of tDISCO for hypothesis-driven, spatially resolved single-cell experiments.
Chiral and flat-band magnetic quasiparticles in ferromagnetic and metallic kagome layers
Authors: Riberolles S. X. M. , Slade Tyler J. , Han Tianxiong , Li Bing , Abernathy D. L. , Canfield P. C. , Ueland B. G. , Orth P. P. , Ke Liqin , McQueeney R. J.
Published: February 2024

Magnetic kagome metals are a promising platform to develop unique quantum transport and optical phenomena caused by the interplay between topological electronic bands, strong correlations, and magnetic order. This interplay may result in exotic quasiparticles that describe the coupled electronic and spin excitations on the frustrated kagome lattice. Here, we observe novel elementary magnetic excitations within the ferromagnetic Mn kagome layers in TbMn6Sn6 using inelastic neutron scattering. We observe sharp, collective acoustic magnons and identify flat-band magnons that are localized to a hexagonal plaquette due to the special geometry of the kagome layer. Surprisingly, we observe another type of elementary magnetic excitation; a chiral magnetic quasiparticle that is also localized on a hexagonal plaquette. The short lifetime of localized flat-band and chiral quasiparticles suggest that they are hybrid excitations that decay into electronic states.
Accurate global and local 3D alignment of cryo-EM density maps using local spatial structural features
Authors: He Bintao , Zhang Fa , Feng Chenjie , Yang Jianyi , Gao Xin , Han Renmin
Published: February 2024

Advances in cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) imaging technologies have led to a rapidly increasing number of cryo-EM density maps. Alignment and comparison of density maps play a crucial role in interpreting structural information, such as conformational heterogeneity analysis using global alignment and atomic model assembly through local alignment. Here, we present a fast and accurate global and local cryo-EM density map alignment method called CryoAlign, that leverages local density feature descriptors to capture spatial structure similarities. CryoAlign is a feature-based cryo-EM map alignment tool, in which the employment of feature-based architecture enables the rapid establishment of point pair correspondences and robust estimation of alignment parameters. Extensive experimental evaluations demonstrate the superiority of CryoAlign over the existing methods in terms of both alignment accuracy and speed.
Iterative design of training data to control intricate enzymatic reaction networks
Authors: van Sluijs Bob , Zhou Tao , Helwig Britta , Baltussen Mathieu G. , Nelissen Frank H. T. , Heus Hans A. , Huck Wilhelm T. S.
Published: February 2024

Kinetic modeling of in vitro enzymatic reaction networks is vital to understand and control the complex behaviors emerging from the nonlinear interactions inside. However, modeling is severely hampered by the lack of training data. Here, we introduce a methodology that combines an active learning-like approach and flow chemistry to efficiently create optimized datasets for a highly interconnected enzymatic reactions network with multiple sub-pathways. The optimal experimental design (OED) algorithm designs a sequence of out-of-equilibrium perturbations to maximize the information about the reaction kinetics, yielding a descriptive model that allows control of the output of the network towards any cost function. We experimentally validate the model by forcing the network to produce different product ratios while maintaining a minimum level of overall conversion efficiency. Our workflow scales with the complexity of the system and enables the optimization of previously unobtainable network outputs.
Measuring entanglement entropy and its topological signature for phononic systems
Authors: Lin Zhi-Kang , Zhou Yao , Jiang Bin , Wu Bing-Quan , Chen Li-Mei , Liu Xiao-Yu , Wang Li-Wei , Ye Peng , Jiang Jian-Hua
Published: February 2024

Entanglement entropy is a fundamental concept with rising importance in various fields ranging from quantum information science, black holes to materials science. In complex materials and systems, entanglement entropy provides insight into the collective degrees of freedom that underlie the systems’ complex behaviours. As well-known predictions, the entanglement entropy exhibits area laws for systems with gapped excitations, whereas it follows the Gioev-Klich-Widom scaling law in gapless fermion systems. However, many of these fundamental predictions have not yet been confirmed in experiments due to the difficulties in measuring entanglement entropy in physical systems. Here, we report the experimental verification of the above predictions by probing the nonlocal correlations in phononic systems. We obtain the entanglement entropy and entanglement spectrum for phononic systems with the fermion filling analog. With these measurements, we verify the Gioev-Klich-Widom scaling law. We further observe the salient signatures of topological phases in entanglement entropy and entanglement spectrum.
Oncogenic c-Myc induces replication stress by increasing cohesins chromatin occupancy in a CTCF-dependent manner
Authors: Peripolli Silvia , Meneguello Leticia , Perrod Chiara , Singh Tanya , Patel Harshil , Rahman Sazia T. , Kiso Koshiro , Thorpe Peter , Calvanese Vincenzo , Bertoli Cosetta , de Bruin Robertus A. M.
Published: February 2024

Oncogene-induced replication stress is a crucial driver of genomic instability and one of the key events contributing to the onset and evolution of cancer. Despite its critical role in cancer, the mechanisms that generate oncogene-induced replication stress remain not fully understood. Here, we report that an oncogenic c-Myc-dependent increase in cohesins on DNA contributes to the induction of replication stress. Accumulation of cohesins on chromatin is not sufficient to cause replication stress, but also requires cohesins to accumulate at specific sites in a CTCF-dependent manner. We propose that the increased accumulation of cohesins at CTCF site interferes with the progression of replication forks, contributing to oncogene-induced replication stress. This is different from, and independent of, previously suggested mechanisms of oncogene-induced replication stress. This, together with the reported protective role of cohesins in preventing replication stress-induced DNA damage, supports a double-edge involvement of cohesins in causing and tolerating oncogene-induced replication stress.
Learning representations for image-based profiling of perturbations
Authors: Moshkov Nikita , Bornholdt Michael , Benoit Santiago , Smith Matthew , McQuin Claire , Goodman Allen , Senft Rebecca A. , Han Yu , Babadi Mehrtash , Horvath Peter , Cimini Beth A. , Carpenter Anne E. , Singh Shantanu , Caicedo Juan C.
Published: February 2024

Measuring the phenotypic effect of treatments on cells through imaging assays is an efficient and powerful way of studying cell biology, and requires computational methods for transforming images into quantitative data. Here, we present an improved strategy for learning representations of treatment effects from high-throughput imaging, following a causal interpretation. We use weakly supervised learning for modeling associations between images and treatments, and show that it encodes both confounding factors and phenotypic features in the learned representation. To facilitate their separation, we constructed a large training dataset with images from five different studies to maximize experimental diversity, following insights from our causal analysis. Training a model with this dataset successfully improves downstream performance, and produces a reusable convolutional network for image-based profiling, which we call Cell Painting CNN. We evaluated our strategy on three publicly available Cell Painting datasets, and observed that the Cell Painting CNN improves performance in downstream analysis up to 30% with respect to classical features, while also being more computationally efficient.
The development of aesthetic experience through virtual and augmented reality
Authors: Zhou Cong , Li JianQi
Published: February 2024

Emerging technological innovations offer the potential for experiential engagement through virtual scenarios, yet the viability of this approach for educational purposes remains significantly underexplored. This study aims to assess the feasibility of Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) technologies in providing users with aesthetic experiences when visiting digital exhibitions. A total of 190 students participated in this investigation. The control group visited traditional exhibits at the Palace Museum in Beijing. This group underwent a survey to evaluate their acquired aesthetic experience. In contrast, the experimental group, comprising 96 students, engaged with VR/AR scenarios at the Palace Museum in Beijing. Accordingly, students in the experimental group were also surveyed to evaluate both their aesthetic experiences and, additionally, their user experiences. The survey results unveiled significant distinctions in aesthetic experiences between students in the control and experimental groups. Moreover, there were notable correlations between individual variables related to user and aesthetic experiences within the experimental group. Furthermore, the study revealed disparities in both user and aesthetic experiences among male and female students. The findings have implications for aesthetic education teachers and officials in the context of developing sound strategies for providing aesthetic experiences to their students. This information is also of interest to employees of museums, exhibitions, and other cultural facilities, who are interested in holding or hold digital exhibitions.
Heatwaves in Peninsular Malaysia: a spatiotemporal analysis
Authors: Muhammad Mohd Khairul Idlan , Hamed Mohammed Magdy , Harun Sobri , Sa’adi Zulfaqar , Sammen Saad Sh. , Al-Ansari Nadhir , Shahid Shamsuddin , Scholz Miklas
Published: February 2024

One of the direct and unavoidable consequences of global warming-induced rising temperatures is the more recurrent and severe heatwaves. In recent years, even countries like Malaysia seldom had some mild to severe heatwaves. As the Earth's average temperature continues to rise, heatwaves in Malaysia will undoubtedly worsen in the future. It is crucial to characterize and monitor heat events across time to effectively prepare for and implement preventative actions to lessen heatwave's social and economic effects. This study proposes heatwave-related indices that take into account both daily maximum (Tmax) and daily lowest (Tmin) temperatures to evaluate shifts in heatwave features in Peninsular Malaysia (PM). Daily ERA5 temperature dataset with a geographical resolution of 0.25° for the period 1950–2022 was used to analyze the changes in the frequency and severity of heat waves across PM, while the LandScan gridded population data from 2000 to 2020 was used to calculate the affected population to the heatwaves. This study also utilized Sen's slope for trend analysis of heatwave characteristics, which separates multi-decadal oscillatory fluctuations from secular trends. The findings demonstrated that the geographical pattern of heatwaves in PM could be reconstructed if daily Tmax is more than the 95th percentile for 3 or more days. The data indicated that the southwest was more prone to severe heatwaves. The PM experienced more heatwaves after 2000 than before. Overall, the heatwave-affected area in PM has increased by 8.98 km2/decade and its duration by 1.54 days/decade. The highest population affected was located in the central south region of PM. These findings provide valuable insights into the heatwaves pattern and impact.
Vegetable disease detection using an improved YOLOv8 algorithm in the greenhouse plant environment
Authors: Wang Xuewei , Liu Jun
Published: February 2024

This study introduces YOLOv8n-vegetable, a model designed to address challenges related to imprecise detection of vegetable diseases in greenhouse plant environment using existing network models. The model incorporates several improvements and optimizations to enhance its effectiveness. Firstly, a novel C2fGhost module replaces partial C2f. with GhostConv based on Ghost lightweight convolution, reducing the model’s parameters and improving detection performance. Second, the Occlusion Perception Attention Module (OAM) is integrated into the Neck section to better preserve feature information after fusion, enhancing vegetable disease detection in greenhouse settings. To address challenges associated with detecting small-sized objects and the depletion of semantic knowledge due to varying scales, an additional layer for detecting small-sized objects is included. This layer improves the amalgamation of extensive and basic semantic knowledge, thereby enhancing overall detection accuracy. Finally, the HIoU boundary loss function is introduced, leading to improved convergence speed and regression accuracy. These improvement strategies were validated through experiments using a self-built vegetable disease detection dataset in a greenhouse environment. Multiple experimental comparisons have demonstrated the model's effectiveness, achieving the objectives of improving detection speed while maintaining accuracy and real-time detection capability. According to experimental findings, the enhanced model exhibited a 6.46% rise in mean average precision (mAP) over the original model on the self-built vegetable disease detection dataset under greenhouse conditions. Additionally, the parameter quantity and model size decreased by 0.16G and 0.21 MB, respectively. The proposed model demonstrates significant advancements over the original algorithm and exhibits strong competitiveness when compared with other advanced object detection models. The lightweight and fast detection of vegetable diseases offered by the proposed model presents promising applications in vegetable disease detection tasks.
Robot-assisted thoracic surgery for benign tumors at the cervicothoracic junction: a propensity-matched study
Authors: Maitiyasen Maierhaba , Peng Hao , Liu Yvxuan , Li Jingfeng , Gao Chuan , Chen Jing , Yi Jun
Published: February 2024

This study aimed to assess the feasibility and safety of robot-assisted thoracic surgery (RATS) for resecting benign tumors of the cervicothoracic junction. Between 2017 and 2021, a total of 54 patients with benign cervicothoracic junction tumors were included. Among them, 46 underwent RATS while 8 underwent open surgery. Using a propensity score based on four variables (age, sex, comorbidity, and tumor size). The outcomes compared included short-term outcomes such as blood loss, as well as long-term outcomes including respiratory function and patients' postoperative health-related quality of life. No operative deaths occurred in this study. RATS was associated with less intraoperative blood loss (102 < 380 ml, P = 0.001) and a shorter length of hospital stay (1.8 < 4.8, P < 0.001). After a median follow-up of 37 months, no recurrences were reported, and no statistically significant differences were found in the 3-year survival between the two groups. The postoperative respiratory function of patients with open surgery showed a significant decrease compared to preoperative levels and were lower than those of RATS patients. In terms of health-related quality of life, RATS was associated with a better mean EQ-5D-5L index than open surgery (0.808 > 0.650, P < 0.05). In RATS, tumor sizes > 5 cm (mean ± SD = 0.768 ± 0.111, P = 0.028) and neurogenic tumors (mean ± SD = 0.702 ± 0.082, P < 0.001) remained significantly and independently associated with a lower EQ-5D-5L index. This study demonstrated that robot-assisted thoracic surgery for benign tumors of the cervicothoracic junction is a safe and technically feasible procedure, particularly for tumors < 5 cm and non-neurogenic tumors.
Stability analysis of roadbed under flood scouring
Authors: Wang Rui , Tang Hongmei , Zhou Fuchuan
Published: February 2024

Soil roadbed along the river suffers from water erosion at the bottom and collapse at the top under flood scouring, which leads to the suspension of upper pavement slab. In order to ensure the safety of soil roadbed along the river, this study explored the development mechanism of soil roadbed damage by flood in actual cases, and proposed the evolution process of instability under roadbed scouring. The stability law of roadbed along the river under flood scouring was analyzed, and the stability safety factor was corrected to analyze the sensitivity of water depth, flow rate, river bending angle and stability safety factor K in working conditions. The sensitivity of width and height of soil roadbed after flood scouring to water depth, flow velocity, river bending angle was investigated. Moreover, numerical simulation was carried out to determine the displacement nephogram and maximum shear stress nephogram of soil roadbed along the river under the conditions of road surface and roadbed load, vehicle loading or constant change of water depth. By comparing the above theories and engineering cases, the water damage mechanism of soil roadbed along the river was further verified.
Simulation of optoelectronic oscillator injection locking, pulling & spiking phenomena
Authors: Banerjee Abhijit , Hall Trevor James
Published: February 2024

Complex envelope and reduced phase simulation models describing the dynamical behaviour of an optoelectronic oscillator (OEO) under injection by an external source are described. The models build on the foundations of a previously reported delay integral/differential equation (DDE) theory of injection locking of time delay oscillators (TDO) such as the OEO. The DDE formulation is particularly amenable to high precision simulation using the Simulink™ block diagram environment. The correspondence between the blocks and the oscillator components offers intuition and considerable freedom to explore different circuit architectures and design variations with minimal coding effort. The simulations facilitate the study of the profound effect the multimode nature of a TDO has on its dynamical behavior. The reduced phase models that make use of the Leeson approximation are generally successful in reproducing the results of complex envelope models for established oscillations except for spiking phenomena for which the Leeson approximation fails. Simulation results demonstrating phenomena not captured by classical injection theory are presented, including multimode oscillation, the appearance of sidemodes in the RF and phase noise spectrum, and persistent spike trains redolent of recent experimental observations of $$2\pi $$

2
π

phase pulse trains in a broadband OEO under injection.
Insights into kinetics, thermodynamics, and mechanisms of chemically activated sunflower stem biochar for removal of phenol and bisphenol-A from wastewater
Authors: Lingamdinne Lakshmi Prasanna , Angaru Ganesh Kumar Reddy , Pal Chandrika Ashwinikumar , Koduru Janardhan Reddy , Karri Rama Rao , Mubarak Nabisab Mujawar , Chang Yoon-Young
Published: February 2024

This study synthesized a highly efficient KOH-treated sunflower stem activated carbon (KOH-SSAC) using a two-step pyrolysis process and chemical activation using KOH. The resulting material exhibited exceptional properties, such as a high specific surface area (452 m2/g) and excellent adsorption capacities for phenol (333.03 mg/g) and bisphenol A (BPA) (365.81 mg/g). The adsorption process was spontaneous and exothermic, benefiting from the synergistic effects of hydrogen bonding, electrostatic attraction, and stacking interactions. Comparative analysis also showed that KOH-SSAC performed approximately twice as well as sunflower stem biochar (SSB), indicating its potential for water treatment and pollutant removal applications. The study suggests the exploration of optimization strategies to further enhance the efficiency of KOH-SSAC in large-scale scenarios. These findings contribute to the development of improved materials for efficient water treatment and pollution control.
Benefit of a laparoscopic jejunostomy feeding catheter insertion to prevent bowel obstruction associated with feeding jejunostomy after esophagectomy
Authors: Kitagawa Hiroyuki , Yokota Keiichiro , Utsunomiya Masato , Tanaka Tomoki , Namikawa Tsutomu , Kobayashi Michiya , Seo Satoru
Published: February 2024

The placement of a jejunostomy catheter during esophagectomy may cause postoperative bowel obstruction. The proximity of the jejunostomy site to the midline might be associated with bowel obstruction, and we have introduced laparoscopic jejunostomy (Lap-J) to reduce jejunostomy’s left lateral gap. We evaluated 92 patients who underwent esophagectomy for esophageal cancer between February 2013 and August 2022 to clarify the benefits of Lap-J compared to other methods. The patients were classified into two groups according to the method of feeding catheter insertion: jejunostomy via small laparotomy (J group, n = 75), and laparoscopic jejunostomy (Lap-J group, n = 17). Surgery for bowel obstruction associated with the feeding jejunostomy catheter (BOFJ) was performed on 11 in the J group. Comparing the J and Lap-J groups, the distance between the jejunostomy and midline was significantly longer in the Lap-J group (50 mm vs. 102 mm; P < 0.001). Regarding surgery for BOFJ, the distance between the jejunostomy and midline was significantly shorter in the surgery group than in the non-surgery group (43 mm vs. 52 mm; P = 0.049). During esophagectomy, Lap-J can prevent BOFJ by placing the jejunostomy site at the left lateral position to the midline and reducing the left lateral gap of the jejunostomy.
The Wnt/β-catenin pathway is important for replication of SARS-CoV-2 and other pathogenic RNA viruses
Authors: Xu Zaikun , Elaish Mohamed , Wong Cheung Pang , Hassan Bardes B. , Lopez-Orozco Joaquin , Felix-Lopez Alberto , Ogando Natacha S. , Nagata Les , Mahal Lara K. , Kumar Anil , Wilson Joyce A. , Noyce Ryan , Mayers Irv , Power Christopher , Evans David , Hobman Tom C.
Published: February 2024

Understanding how viruses affect cellular pathways during infection may facilitate development of host cell-targeted therapeutics with broad-spectrum antiviral activity. The interferon (IFN) response is critical for reducing replication and pathogenesis of many viruses including Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the causative agent of COVID-19. Mounting evidence indicates that peroxisomes which are best known as metabolic organelles, function in the IFN response. Recently, we reported that the Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway strongly suppresses peroxisome biogenesis. Here, we show that SARS-CoV-2 infection activates Wnt/β-catenin signaling and hypothesized that pharmacological inhibition of this pathway would result in increased peroxisome formation and enhanced IFN production. Indeed, Wnt/β-catenin signaling potently inhibits replication of SARS-CoV-2 and other pathogenic RNA viruses in vitro and reduces viral load, inflammation and clinical symptoms in a mouse model of COVID-19. As such, targeting this cellular pathway may have prophylactic and/or therapeutic value in reducing the disease burden caused by emerging viral pathogens.
IRE1 RNase controls CD95-mediated cell death
Authors: Pelizzari-Raymundo Diana , Maltret Victoria , Nivet Manon , Pineau Raphael , Papaioannou Alexandra , Zhou Xingchen , Caradec Flavie , Martin Sophie , Le Gallo Matthieu , Avril Tony , Chevet Eric , Lafont Elodie
Published: February 2024

Signalling by the Unfolded Protein Response (UPR) or by the Death Receptors (DR) are frequently activated towards pro-tumoral outputs in cancer. Herein, we demonstrate that the UPR sensor IRE1 controls the expression of the DR CD95/Fas, and its cell death-inducing ability. Both genetic and pharmacologic blunting of IRE1 activity increased CD95 expression and exacerbated CD95L-induced cell death in glioblastoma (GB) and Triple-Negative Breast Cancer (TNBC) cell lines. In accordance, CD95 mRNA was identified as a target of Regulated IRE1-Dependent Decay of RNA (RIDD). Whilst CD95 expression is elevated in TNBC and GB human tumours exhibiting low RIDD activity, it is surprisingly lower in XBP1s-low human tumour samples. We show that IRE1 RNase inhibition limited CD95 expression and reduced CD95-mediated hepatic toxicity in mice. In addition, overexpression of XBP1s increased CD95 expression and sensitized GB and TNBC cells to CD95L-induced cell death. Overall, these results demonstrate the tight IRE1-mediated control of CD95-dependent cell death in a dual manner through both RIDD and XBP1s, and they identify a novel link between IRE1 and CD95 signalling.
Green synthetic approaches in organophosphorus chemistry: recent developments
Authors: Brahmachari Goutam
Published: February 2024

Organophosphorus chemistry is a broad and exciting field, with potential opportunities for researchers involved in multi-disciplinary areas of scientific endeavour, including organic, medicinal, pharmaceutical, agricultural, and industrial chemistry. Organophosphorus compounds find extensive applications in all these fields owing to their inherent physical and biological properties. Since its first development in the 90s, green and sustainable chemistry has grown considerably over the past two decades. It has become much more prevalent among researchers working in all branches of chemical science. As part of these noteworthy developments, synthetic organic chemists have been motivated to develop eco-friendly methodologies for generating phosphorus-functionalised compounds of potential interest, focusing on various green chemistry principles. As a result, considerable progress towards green and sustainable chemistry has been accomplished during the last decade. In continuation of our earlier contributions, this chapter also aims to offer an overview of such developments in green synthetic approaches in organophosphorus chemistry reported in 2021.
Construction and application of NiCo2O4@MnS composite with hierarchical structure for hybrid supercapacitor
Authors: Liao Xuan , Hou Xiaolong , Yi Caini , Wang Guimiao , Wang Shuo , Yang Ying , Chen Changguo , Yu Danmei , Liu Yuping , Zhou Xiaoyuan
Published: February 2024

A composite with a hierarchical structure composed of NiCo2O4 microspheres and MnS particles exhibits excellent specific capacitance and cyclic stability.
Synthetic routes to carbon substituted cobalt bis(dicarbollide) alkyl halides and aromatic amines along with closely related irregular pathways
Authors: Nekvinda Jan , Bavol Dmytro , Litecká Miroslava , Tüzün Ece Zeynep , Dušek Michal , Grüner Bohumír
Published: February 2024

Carbon substituted cobalt bis(dicarbollide) alkyl halides [(1-X-(CH2)n-1,2-C2B9H10)(1,2-C2B9H11)-3,3′-Co]Me4N (X = Br, I; n = 1–3) are prepared in high yields (>90%) from their corresponding alcohols without side skeletal substitutions.
Synthesis of aminoalcohols from substituted alkenes via tungstenooxaziridine catalysis
Authors: Madiu Rufai , Dellosso Brandon , Doran Erin L. , Doran Jenna M. , Pinarci Ali A. , TenHoeve Tyler M. , Howard Amari M. , Stroud James L. , Rivera Dominic A. , Moskovitz Dylan A. , Finneran Steven J. , Singer Alyssa N. , Rossi Morgan E. , Moura-Letts Gustavo
Published: February 2024

Novel tungstenooxaziridine complex promotes the oxyamination of substituted alkenes with high stereoselectivity and stereospecificity. Mechanistic studies provide evidence for a highly selective syn-difunctionalization pathway.
Chemical synthesis of 6-deoxy-d-talose containing a tetrasaccharide repeating unit of the O-specific polysaccharide from Enterobacter cloacae G3422 in the form of its 2-aminoethyl glycoside
Authors: Das Subrata , Maiti Sanajit , Mukhopadhyay Balaram
Published: February 2024

Total chemical synthesis of the tetrasaccharide repeating unit of the O-specific polysaccharide from Enterobacter cloacae G3422.
Retraction: Novel ethynyl-pyrene substituted phenothiazine based metal free organic dyes in DSSC with 12% conversion efficiency
Authors: Nagarajan Bhanumathi , Kushwaha Suman , Elumalai Ramachandran , Mandal Sudip , Ramanujam Kothandaraman , Raghavachari Dhamodharan
Published: February 2024

Retraction of ‘Novel ethynyl-pyrene substituted phenothiazine based metal free organic dyes in DSSC with 12% conversion efficiency’ by Bhanumathi Nagarajan et al., J. Mater. Chem. A, 2017, 5, 10289–10300, https://doi.org/10.1039/C7TA01744H.
Therapeutic implication of human placental extract to prevent liver cirrhosis in rats with metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis
Authors: Yamagata Mitsuyoshi , Tsuchishima Mutsumi , Saito Takashi , Tsutsumi Mikihiro , George Joseph
Published: February 2024

Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) is always accompanied with hepatic fibrosis that could potentially progress to liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. Employing a rat model, we evaluated the role of human placental extract (HPE) to arrest the progression of hepatic fibrosis to cirrhosis in patients with MASH. SHRSP5/Dmcr rats were fed with a high-fat and high-cholesterol diet for 4 weeks and evaluated for the development of steatosis. The animals were divided into control and treated groups and received either saline or HPE (3.6 ml/kg body weight) subcutaneously thrice a week. A set of animals were killed at the end of 6th, 8th, and 12th weeks from the beginning of the experiment. Serum aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), hepatic malondialdehyde (MDA), and glutathione content were measured. Immunohistochemical staining was performed for α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA), 4-hydroxy-2-nonenal (4-HNE), collagen type I, and type III. Control rats depicted progression of liver fibrosis at 6 weeks, advanced fibrosis and bridging at 8 weeks, and cirrhosis at 12 weeks, which were significantly decreased in HPE-treated animals. Treatment with HPE maintained normal levels of MDA and glutathione in the liver. There was marked decrease in the staining intensity of α-SMA, 4-HNE, and collagen type I and type III in HPE treated rats compared with control animals. The results of the present study indicated that HPE treatment mediates immunotropic, anti-inflammatory, and antioxidant responses and attenuates hepatic fibrosis and early cirrhosis. HPE depicts therapeutic potential to arrest the progression of MASH towards cirrhosis.
Experimental and numerical study on atmospheric‐pressure air dielectric barrier discharge via 50 Hz/5000 Hz dual‐frequency excitation
Authors: He Junwen , Peng Bangfa , Yu Guanglin , Wang Ronggang , Jiang Nan , Li Jie , Wu Yan
Published: February 2024

A dual‐frequency (DF) dielectric barrier discharge, excited by the superposition of a 50 Hz low frequency (LF) and a 5000 Hz intermediate frequency (IF), is proposed to enhance discharge. The effect of the LF voltage component on the breakdown behaviour of the DF discharge during different periods has been studied both experimentally and numerically. The number of high‐current pulses rises as the LF voltage increases. The statistical analysis shows that the number of the current pulse amplitude above 80 mA in the DF discharge reaches nearly 6 times that in the IF discharge. Additionally, the total discharge energy in the DF discharge is significantly higher than that in the IF discharge. The simulation reproduces the temporal variation of the breakdown behaviours in the DF discharge. The simulated results reveal that the maximal electric field strength of the breakdown process is greater in the DF discharge compared to the IF discharge during a half‐period of DF. Finally, the comparison between the IF and DF discharges exhibits that the LF voltage regulates the accumulation of residual charged species on the dielectric surface after the breakdown by modulating the residual voltage between the air gap.