Earthquake Forecasting Based on Value and Background Seismicity Rate in Yunnan Province, China.

Characterized by frequent earthquakes and a dense population, Yunnan Province, China, faces significant seismic hazards and is a hot place for earthquake forecasting research. In a previous study, we evaluated the performance of the value for 5-year seismic forecasting during 2000-2019 and made a forward prediction of M ≥ 5.0 earthquakes in 2020-2024.

Laser hair depilation therapy for pilonidal sinus disease: A 5-year, retrospective experience in a University Teaching Hospital in the UK, 2017-2023.

Background: Pilonidal sinus disease (PSD) is a chronic debilitating condition predominantly affecting young men. Laser hair depilation is an established adjunct to surgical treatment for PSD and can lead to reduced rates of recurrence, and post-surgical interventions.This study aimed to assess the outcome of laser hair depilation therapy on disease progression in pilonidal sinus disease patients at the Birmingham Skin Regional Laser Centre.

Epigenetic regulation of lignin biosynthesis in wood formation.

Lignin, a major wood component, is the key limiting factor for wood conversion efficiency. Its biosynthesis is controlled by transcriptional regulatory networks involving transcription factor (TF)-DNA interactions. However, the epigenetic mechanisms underlying these interactions in lignin biosynthesis remain largely unknown.

Parkinson's disease with anxiety: clinical characteristics and their correlation with oxidative stress, inflammation, and pathological proteins.

Objective: This study was performed to explore the differences in the clinical characteristics and oxidative stress indicators, inflammatory factors, and pathological proteins in serum between Parkinson's disease (PD) with anxiety (PD-A) and with no anxiety (PD-NA) patients, and further correlations among clinical characteristics and above variables were analyzed in PD-A and PD-NA groups.

Methods: A total of 121 patients with PD were enrolled in this study and assessed by the Hamilton Anxiety Scale (14 items) (HAMA-14). These patients were divided into PD-A and PD-NA groups according to a cut-off point of 7 of HAMA-14.

Ectopic Expression of Retarded Primary and Secondary Growth in .

Primary and secondary growth of trees are needed for increments in plant height and stem diameter, respectively, affecting the production of woody biomass for applications in timber, pulp/paper, and related biomaterials. These two types of growth are believed to be both regulated by distinct transcription factor (TF)-mediated regulatory pathways. Notably, we identified PtrLBD39, a highly stem phloem-specific TF in and found that the ectopic expression of in markedly retarded both primary and secondary growth.

Robust Covariance Matrix Estimation for High-Dimensional Compositional Data with Application to Sales Data Analysis.

Compositional data arises in a wide variety of research areas when some form of standardization and composition is necessary. Estimating covariance matrices is of fundamental importance for high-dimensional compositional data analysis. However, existing methods require the restrictive Gaussian or sub-Gaussian assumption, which may not hold in practice.

Kinetics and toxicological potential of heavy metal leaching from asphalt pavements.

The leaching of heavy metals from asphalt pavement has attracted increasing attention due to its associated environmental risks. Comprehending the leaching process is crucial for ensuring the safe utilization of asphalt pavement. This study investigates heavy metal leaching kinetics from asphalt pavements using tank-leaching tests and dynamic simulations employing both first and second-order kinetic models.

Optimized Traffic Light System with AIC and Application to the 2021 M6.7 Yangbi Earthquake Sequence.

One important question in earthquake prediction is whether a moderate or large earthquake will be followed by an even bigger one. Through temporal -value evolution analysis, the traffic light system can be used to estimate if an earthquake is a foreshock. However, the traffic light system does not take into account the uncertainty of -values when they constitute a criterion.

Renewal of oligodendrocyte lineage reverses dysmyelination and CNS neurodegeneration through corrected N-acetylaspartate metabolism.

Myelinating oligodendrocytes are essential for neuronal communication and homeostasis of the central nervous system (CNS). One of the most abundant molecules in the mammalian CNS is N-acetylaspartate (NAA), which is catabolized into L-aspartate and acetate by the enzyme aspartoacylase (ASPA) in oligodendrocytes. The resulting acetate moiety is thought to contribute to myelin lipid synthesis.

Alzheimer's disease with sleep insufficiency: a cross-sectional study on correlations among clinical characteristics, orexin, its receptors, and the blood-brain barrier.

Previous studies have shown that reduced sleep duration, sleep fragmentation, and decreased sleep quality in patients with Alzheimer's disease are related to dysfunction in orexin signaling. At the same time, blood-brain barrier disruption is considered an early biomarker of Alzheimer's disease. However, currently no report has examined how changes in orexin signaling relate to changes in the blood-brain barrier of patients who have Alzheimer's disease with sleep insufficiency.

Real-world application of a fast stool DNA test for colorectal cancer screening in primary screening positive population.

Background: Stool DNA test has been emerged as an effective noninvasive method for colorectal cancer (CRC) screening, but the real-world performance of stool DNA test in Chinese population has rarely been reported.

Methods: A total of 36,527 subjects were recruited in Haining City from January 2021 to December 2021. Participants underwent primary screening by taking both two-samples fecal immunochemical tests (FITs) and high-risk factor questionnaire (HRFQ), and those who tested either positive by FITs or evaluated to be high risk by HRFQ were recommended to undertake subsequent stool DNA test and colonoscopy.

Proteomic Analysis of Alfalfa ( L.) Roots in Response to Nodulation and Salt Stress.

(1) Background: Alfalfa is an important legume forage throughout the world. Although alfalfa is considered moderately tolerant to salinity, its production and nitrogen-fixing activity are greatly limited by salt stress. (2) Methods: We examined the physiological changes and proteomic profiles of alfalfa with active nodules (NA) and without nodules (NN) under NaCl treatment.

Clinical Features and Potential Mechanisms Relating Neuropathological Biomarkers and Blood-Brain Barrier in Patients With Alzheimer's Disease and Hearing Loss.

Background: The aim of this study was to explore clinical features and potential mechanisms relating neuropathological biomarkers and blood-brain barrier (BBB) in Alzheimer's disease (AD) and hearing loss (HL).

Materials And Methods: A total of 65 patients with AD were recruited and auditory function was assessed by threshold of pure tone audiometry (PTA). Patients were divided into AD with HL (AD-HL) and AD with no HL (AD-nHL) groups based on the standard of World Health Organization.

Electromagnetic field controlled domain wall displacement for induced strain tailoring in BaTiO-epoxy nanocomposite.

Failure in an epoxy polymer composite material is prone to initiate by the coalescence of microcracks in its polymer matrix. As such, matrix toughening via addition of a second phase as rigid or/and rubber nano/micro-particles is one of the most popular approaches to improve the fracture toughness across multiple scales in a polymer composite, which dissipates fracture energy via deformation mechanisms and microcracks arrest. Few studies have focused on tailorable and variable toughening, so-called 'active toughening', mainly suggesting thermally induced strains which offer slow and irreversible toughening due to polymer's poor thermal conductivity.

Research advances on circulating long noncoding RNAs as biomarkers of cardiovascular diseases.

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) such as myocardial ischemia, myocardial infarction, heart failure, atherosclerosis, hypertension, arrhythmia, and their complications diseases are associated with increased morbidity and mortality, it is necessary to develop new diagnostic markers for CVD. LncRNAs have become a new class of biomarkers in CVD with good development prospects. Numerous studies have confirmed lncRNAs feasibility as diagnostic, prognostic and predictive tools for different types of CVD.

Improving paediatric flow in an UK Paediatric Assessment Unit.

The 2010 Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) guidelines for acute paediatric services set standards for time to senior review for paediatric medical admissions in the UK as tier two doctor (registrar) review within 4 hours and consultant review within 14 hours. Our aim was to implement these standards in our unit through increasing proportions of reviews within these timeframes and measuring the impact on patient flow. Four quality improvement cycles were completed between March 2018 and March 2020 capturing data from 288 patient data sets.

A PtrLBD39-mediated transcriptional network regulates tension wood formation in .

Tension wood (TW) is a specialized xylem tissue formed in angiosperm trees under gravitational stimulus or mechanical stresses (e.g., bending).

Assessing Earthquake Forecast Performance Based on Value in Yunnan Province, China.

Many studies have shown that values tend to decrease prior to large earthquakes. To evaluate the forecast information in value variations, we conduct a systematic assessment in Yunnan Province, China, where the seismicity is intense and moderate-large earthquakes occur frequently. The catalog in the past two decades is divided into four time periods (January 2000-December 2004, January 2005-December 2009, January 2010-December 2014, and January 2015-December 2019).

Unveiling the self-association and desolvation in crystal nucleation.

As the first step in the crystallization process, nucleation has been studied by many researchers. In this work, phenacetin (PHEN) was selected as a model compound to investigate the relationship between the solvent and nucleation kinetics. Induction times at different supersaturation in six solvents were measured.

Olfactory Dysfunction and Its Association With Neuropathologic Proteins in Cerebrospinal Fluid From Patients With Parkinson Disease.

Olfactory dysfunction (OD) is a common non-motor symptom of Parkinson disease (PD). However, the relationship between OD and neuropathologic proteins in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) from PD patients remains unclear. 166 PD patients were included in the study.

A pairwise pseudo-likelihood approach for left-truncated and interval-censored data under the Cox model.

Left truncation commonly occurs in many areas, and many methods have been proposed in the literature for the analysis of various types of left-truncated failure time data. For the situation, a common approach is to conduct the analysis conditional on truncation times, and the method is relatively simple but may not be efficient. In this paper, we discuss regression analysis of such data arising from the proportional hazards model that also suffer interval censoring.