Pretreatment with oral contraceptive pills in women with PCOS scheduled for IVF: a randomized clinical trial.

Study Question: What is the effect of pretreatment with oral contraceptive pills (OCPs) on oocyte and embryo quality and pregnancy rates in women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) scheduled for IVF/ICSI cycles?

Summary Answer: In women with PCOS who underwent a first or second IVF/ICSI cycle with a GnRH antagonist protocol and were randomized to start ovarian stimulation immediately, the quality of cleavage-stage embryos was non-inferior to pretreatment with OCP.

What Is Known Already: PCOS in Asian populations is characterized by high levels of circulating LH in the early follicular phase. Previous studies indicated that inappropriately high LH levels might affect oocyte maturation and fertilization rates, and impaired embryo quality, consequently resulting in higher rates of impaired pregnancy and miscarriage in women with PCOS.

Isoglycyrrhizin supplementation of frozen goat semen-extender improves post-thaw sperm quality and in vitro fertilization rates.

This study examined the effect of supplementation of freezing extender with isoglycyrrhizin (ISL), a natural antioxidant agent, on the quality and fertility potential of goat spermatozoa after cryopreservation. Forty ejaculates were collected from eight Chongming White rams and diluted with five concentrations of ISL: 0 (control group), 50, 100, 150, and 200 μg/mL. The quality, motility parameters, antioxidant properties, mRNA expression of antioxidant and ferroptosis genes, and ability to induce fertilization, were evaluated following freezing/thawing.

Dose optimization of extended collimators in boron neutron capture therapy.

In this paper, we propose the design of extending collimators aimed at reducing the radiation dose received by patients with normal tissues and protecting organs at risk in Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT). Three types of extended collimators are studied: Type 1, which is a traditional design; Type 2, which is built upon Type 1 by incorporating additional polyethylene material containing lithium fluoride (PE(LiF)); Type 3, which adds lead (Pb) to Type 1. We evaluated the dose distribution characteristics of the above-extended collimators using Monte Carlo methods simulations under different configurations: in air, in a homogeneous phantom, and a humanoid phantom model.

Highly Selective and Excitable Artificial Ion Channel for Spike Generation.

Cation channels of the neuron can be excited by neurotransmitters and have high ionic selectivity, which are crucial for the generation of spikes. Intuitively, if a channel has both a high ionic selectivity and excitability, it may be used to generate spikes. However, integrating the high selectivity and excitability in a single channel remains highly challenging.

Volatile organic compounds (VOC) metabolites in urine are associated with increased systemic inflammation levels, and smokers are identified as a vulnerable population.

Background: Previous studies indicated that exposure to VOCs was linked to increased systemic inflammation levels. However, the dose-response relationships between urine VOCs metabolites and systemic inflammation have not been established, and the key metabolite of the toxic compounds has not been identified.

Methods: We used data in 7007 US adults in the NHANES cycles (2011-2018) across 8 years.

Probiotics Enhance Growth Performance and Nutritional Value by Regulating Glucolipid Metabolism via the Gut-Liver Axis.

Large-scale intensive feeding triggered reduced growth performance and nutritional value. Exogenous probiotics can promote the growth performance and nutritional value of fish through improving the intestinal microbiota. However, detailed research on the correlation between the intestinal microbiota, growth performance, and nutritional value remains to be elucidated.

Mechanism of stabilized sludge-driven remediation in saline-alkali soil: New insights from salt-discharge capacity and microbially mediated carbon/nitrogen cycles.

Stabilized sludge products (SSP) are promising conditioners for saline-alkali soils, capable of enhancing soil physicochemical properties and stimulating microbial communities. However, there is limited knowledge regarding the effects of SSP on soil salt-discharge capacity and carbon/nitrogen cycles. Here, a six-month incubation experiment was conducted to evaluate SSP (0 % ~ 60 %) on saline-alkali soil properties, salt leaching, and microbial functions.

An intelligent emulsion explosive grasping and filling system based on YOLO-SimAM-GRCNN.

For the blasting scenario, our research develops an emulsion explosive grasping and filling system suitable for tunnel robots. Firstly, we designed a system, YOLO-SimAM-GRCNN, which consists of an inference module and a control module. The inference module primarily consists of a blast hole position detection network based on YOLOv8 and an explosive grasping network based on SimAM-GRCNN.

Single-cell data revealed the regulatory mechanism of TNK cell heterogeneity in liver metastasis from gastric cancer.

Aim: The present work set out to classify cell subpopulations related to liver metastasis from gastric cancer (GC) and the mechanisms of their interactions with other immune cell subpopulations.

Background: GC is characterized by a high degree of heterogeneity and liver metastasis. Exploring the mechanism of liver metastasis of GC from the perspective of heterogeneity of the tumor microenvironment (TME) might help improve the efficacy of GC treatment.

Study on Shear Strength of Soil-Root Systems of Different Vegetation Types.

The root systems of vegetation significantly contribute to enhancing slope stability. The shear strength of soil-root systems is a crucial parameter for assessing slope stability. This study focuses on six types of vegetation in the Yellow River Basin of China (woodland: and ; shrubland: and ; grassland: and ), employing in situ shear tests and the Wu-Waldron model (Wu model) to investigate the shear strength of soil-root systems.

Histone deacetylase 9 promotes osteogenic trans-differentiation of vascular smooth muscle cells via ferroptosis in chronic kidney disease vascular calcification.

Vascular calcification, a common complication of chronic kidney disease (CKD), remains an unmet therapeutic challenge. The trans-differentiation of vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) into osteoblast-like cells is crucial in the pathogenesis of vascular calcification in CKD. Despite ferroptosis promotes vascular calcification in CKD, the upstream or downstream regulatory mechanisms involved remains unclear.

Enhanced biofilm-dependent biogas upgrading from waste activated sludge fermentation liquor in microbial electrolysis cells.

This study demonstrated that metal-organic frameworks (MOFs)-derived Fe-NC cathode improved both methane yield and methane content in a microbial electrolysis cell-coupled anaerobic digestion (MEC-AD) system treating waste activated sludge (WAS) fermentation liquor. Results revealed that Fe-NC maintained a meso‑macroporous structure with a large specific surface area of 1381 m/g and superior electrochemical properties. Its calculated specific capacitance and electron transfer resistance were 5.

Hierarchical hypergraph learning in association-weighted heterogeneous network for miRNA-disease association identification.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) play a significant role in cell differentiation, biological development as well as the occurrence and growth of diseases. Although many computational methods contribute to predicting the association between miRNAs and diseases, they do not fully explore the attribute information contained in associated edges between miRNAs and diseases. In this study, we propose a new method, Hierarchical Hypergraph learning in Association-Weighted heterogeneous network for MiRNA-Disease association identification (HHAWMD).

Probing multi-mobility edges in quasiperiodic mosaic lattices.

The mobility edge (ME) is a crucial concept in understanding localization physics, marking the critical transition between extended and localized states in the energy spectrum. Anderson localization scaling theory predicts the absence of ME in lower dimensional systems. Hence, the search for exact MEs, particularly for single particles in lower dimensions, has recently garnered significant interest in both theoretical and experimental studies, resulting in notable progress.

Architectures of photosynthetic RC-LH1 supercomplexes from .

The reaction center-light-harvesting complex 1 (RC-LH1) plays an essential role in the primary reactions of bacterial photosynthesis. Here, we present high-resolution structures of native monomeric and dimeric RC-LH1 supercomplexes from () using cryo-electron microscopy. The RC-LH1 monomer is composed of an RC encircled by an open LH1 ring comprising 15 αβ heterodimers and a PufX transmembrane polypeptide.

Acoustic Modulation of Individual Nanowire Quantum Dots Integrated into a Hybrid Thin-Film Lithium Niobate Photonic Platform.

Surface acoustic waves are a powerful tool for controlling quantum systems, including quantum dots (QDs), where the oscillating strain field can modulate the emission wavelengths. We integrate InAsP/InP nanowire QDs onto a thin-film lithium niobate platform and embed them within SiN-loaded waveguides. We achieve a 0.