A large-scale screening identifies receptor-like kinases with common features in kinase domains that are potentially related to disease resistance in planta.

Introduction: The plant genome encodes a plethora of proteins with structural similarity to animal receptor protein kinases, collectively known as receptor-like protein kinases (RLKs), which predominantly localize to the plasma membrane where they activate their kinase domains to convey extracellular signals to the interior of the cell, playing crucial roles in various signaling pathways. Despite the large number of members within the RLK family, to date, only a few have been identified as pattern-recognition receptors (PRRs), leaving many potential RLKs that could play roles in plant immunity undiscovered.

Methods: In this study, a recombinant strategy was initially employed to screen the kinase domains of 133 RLKs in the Arabidopsis genome to determine their involvement in the pathogen-triggered immunity (PTI) pathway.

Functional screening of the Arabidopsis 2C protein phosphatases family identifies PP2C15 as a negative regulator of plant immunity by targeting BRI1-associated receptor kinase 1.

Genetic engineering using negative regulators of plant immunity has the potential to provide a huge impetus in agricultural biotechnology to achieve a higher degree of disease resistance without reducing yield. Type 2C protein phosphatases (PP2Cs) represent the largest group of protein phosphatases in plants, with a high potential for negative regulatory functions by blocking the transmission of defence signals through dephosphorylation. Here, we established a PP2C functional protoplast screen using pFRK1::luciferase as a reporter and found that 14 of 56 PP2Cs significantly inhibited the immune response induced by flg22.

[Research Progress and Prospect Analysis of Vascular Interventional Surgical Robot].

Vascular interventional surgery is an important means to treat cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, but the particularity of its working environment will bring greater radiation threat to doctors. Vascular interventional surgery robots can effectively improve the working environment of doctors and can provide more stable operations, improve the success rate of surgery. This study mainly introduces the current research status, key technologies, and future application of vascular interventional surgical robots.

[Uncalibrated Positioning Method for Puncture Robots Based on Optical Navigation].

Robotic puncture system has been widely used in modern minimally invasive surgery, which usually uses hand-eye calibration to calculate the spatial relationship between the robot and the optical tracking system. However, the hand-eye calibration process is time-consuming and sensitive to environmental changes, which makes it difficult to guarantee the puncture accuracy of the robot. This study proposes an uncalibrated positioning method for puncture robot based on optical navigation.

A fast, accurate and uncalibrated robotic puncture method.

Background: Robotic puncture system (RPS) consists of an optical tracking system (OTS) and a robotic arm gripping the puncture needle. Typically, the RPS requires hand-eye calibration before the surgery in order to obtain the relative position between the OTS and the robotic arm. However, if there is any displacement or angular deviation in either the robotic arm or the OTS, the calibration results become invalid, necessitating recalibration.

Arabidopsis Protein Phosphatase PIA1 Impairs Plant Drought Tolerance by Serving as a Common Negative Regulator in ABA Signaling Pathway.

Reversible phosphorylation of proteins is a ubiquitous regulatory mechanism in vivo that can respond to external changes, and plays an extremely important role in cell signal transduction. Protein phosphatase 2C is the largest protein phosphatase family in higher plants. Recently, it has been found that some clade A members can negatively regulate ABA signaling pathways.

A Novel Approach of Surface Texture Mapping for Cone-Beam Computed Tomography in Image-Guided Surgical Navigation.

The demand for cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) imaging in clinics, particularly in dentistry, is rapidly increasing. Preoperative surgical planning is crucial to achieving desired treatment outcomes for imaging-guided surgical navigation. However, the lack of surface texture hinders effective communication between clinicians and patients, and the accuracy of superimposing a textured surface onto CBCT volume is limited by dissimilarity and registration based on facial features.

Conservation and divergence of flg22, pep1 and nlp20 in activation of immune response and inhibition of root development.

Many pattern-recognition receptors (PRRs) and their corresponding ligands have been identified. However, it is largely unknown how similar and different these ligands are in inducing plant innate immunity and affecting plant development. In this study, we examined three well characterized ligands in Arabidopsis thaliana, namely flagellin 22 (flg22), plant elicitor peptide 1 (pep1) and a conserved 20-amino-acid fragment found in most necrosis and ethylene-inducing peptide 1-like proteins (nlp20).

[Design and Validation of Accuracy Assessment Tools and Algorithms for Optical Positioning System in Surgical Navigation].

The precision of optical positioning system is one of the most important factors which affects the precision of navigation guided surgery. In this study, an efficient and low-cost tool and its algorithm were proposed to evaluate the accuracy of optical positioning system based on the ablation scenario of liver cancer, and two validation experiments were designed. Experimental results show that the tool and its algorithm can evaluate the accuracy of the current positioning system accurately and efficiently.

A New Concept for Primary Reconstruction of Skull Defects with 3D-Molded PEEK Patch Assisted by Navigation Based on Animal Study.

Aim: To perform an accurate primary repair of temporal bone defects.

Material And Methods: The temporal bone defect models were performed in beagles. Extended estimated patches of the defects were predesigned by 3D reconstruction software and molded from polyether ether ketone (PEEK) using a lathe.

A robotic puncture system with optical and mechanical feedback under respiratory motion.

Puncture robot can improve the accuracy and efficiency of puncture surgery, such as thoracoabdominal and liver puncture. However, as soft tissue is deformed and shifted under respiratory motion and during the puncture process, the needle is pulled, resulting in the needle's bending and deformation, which increases the risks and sufferings of the patient, a robotic puncture system with optical and mechanical feedback is necessary. Therefore, this paper proposes a multi-information sensing 'guide-clamp' end effector for puncture surgery to accurately detect the posture and force on the puncture needle in real time.

[Rapid Reconstruction of Craniotomy Defects Based on Surgical Navigation].

In neurosurgery, skull repair caused by surgical approach is one of the important research contents. In this paper, a rapid reconstruction method of the skull defect with optical navigation system is proposed. This method can automatically reconstruct the structure of skull defect with the intraoperative defect edge points and preoperative medical image data.

A multiple closed-loops robotic calibration for accurate surgical puncture.

Background: Robotic puncture system increasingly demands stringent standard in target location accuracy. The positional and orientational transformation relationships among all components of the system are supposed to be calibrated and identified preoperatively.

Aims: The target location performance is directly determined by the calibration result.

Experimental study on the seismic behavior of concentrically braced steel frames with extended end-plate bolted connections.

The prefabricated semi-rigid concentrically braced steel frame has always been the main form of residential steel structures, much work so far has focused on the earthquake-resistance performance of such structures. However, little attention has been devoted to systematic model testing, further effort is still required to explore the structural performance with experimental studies. Two semi-rigid concentrically braced steel frames were designed and tested to failure under reversed low-cyclic loading.

Optimization Model for the Distribution of Fiducial Markers in Liver Intervention.

The distribution of fiducial markers is one of the main factors affected the accuracy of optical navigation system. However, many studies have been focused on improving the fiducial registration accuracy or the target registration accuracy, but few solutions involve optimization model for the distribution of fiducial markers. In this paper, we propose an optimization model for the distribution of fiducial markers to improve the optical navigation accuracy.

An Accurate Recognition of Infrared Retro-Reflective Markers in Surgical Navigation.

Marker-based optical tracking systems (OTS) are widely used in clinical image-guided therapy. However, the emergence of ghost markers, which is caused by the mistaken recognition of markers and the incorrect correspondences between marker projections, may lead to tracking failures for these systems. Therefore, this paper proposes a strategy to prevent the emergence of ghost markers by identifying markers based on the features of their projections, finding the correspondences between marker projections based on the geometric information provided by markers, and fast-tracking markers in a 2D image between frames based on the sizes of their projections.

Therapeutic targets for the anemia of predialysis chronic kidney disease: a meta-analysis of randomized, controlled trials.

Anemia is one of the major complications in predialysis patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD). A clearer cognition of the prognostic impact of hemoglobin (Hb) or hematocrit (Hct) target on the outcomes of predialysis patients with CKD is significant. This article aims to establish the suitable hemoglobin target to provide clinical guidance.

Hemoglobin targets for the anemia in patients with dialysis-dependent chronic kidney disease: a meta-analysis of randomized, controlled trials.

Background: Anemia is extremely common among dialysis patients and underlies some of the symptoms associated with reduced kidney function, including fatigue, depression, reduced exercise tolerance, and dyspnea.

Objectives: A clearer cognition of the prognosistic impact of hemoglobin (Hb) or hematocrit (Hct) target for the outcomes of dialysis patients is urgent. This article aims to establish the suitable hemoglobin in order to provide clinical guidance.

Effect of gender-related depression on heart rate variability during an autonomic nervous test.

Patients with depression have lower heart rate variability (HRV) compared with controls. However, studies have indicated HRV difference between male and female controls. The gender effect might be interactive with the depression effect on the HRV, resulting in a low accuracy of recognising the patients with depression from the controls.

Geometric calibration of markerless optical surgical navigation system.

Background: Patient-to-image registration is required for image-guided surgical navigation, but marker-based registration is time consuming and is subject to manual error. Markerless registration is an alternative solution to avoid these issues.

Methods: This study designs a calibration board and proposes a geometric calibration method to calibrate the near-infrared tracking and structured light components of the proposed optical surgical navigation system simultaneously.

[Automatic Robotic Puncture System for Accurate Liver Cancer Ablation Based on Optical Surgical Navigation].

This paper designed an automatic robotic puncture system for accurate liver cancer ablation based on optical surgical navigation. The near-infrared optical surgical navigation system we constructed for liver ablation was applied to carry out surgical planning and simulation, the near-infrared cameras dynamically tracked the current position of puncture needle relative to the location of the patient's anatomy, then guided the surgery robot to position precisely in three-dimensional space and performed the surgery.

Depression recognition according to heart rate variability using Bayesian Networks.

Background: Doctors mainly use scale tests and subjective judgment in the clinical diagnosis of depression. Researches have demonstrated that depression is associated with the dysfunction of the autonomic nervous system (ANS), where its modulation can be evaluated by heart rate variability (HRV). Depression patients have lower HRV than healthy subjects.

Heart rate variability in patients with major depression disorder during a clinical autonomic test.

Major depression disorder (MDD) patients express dysfunction autonomic nervous system (ANS) and reduced heart rate variability (HRV). However, previous researches mainly focused on examining resting state without considering a series of stimulation tests of ANS between MDD patients and healthy people. For this purpose, 40 healthy people and 40 MDD patients participated and finished 10min clinical autonomic test-Ewing test.

Nonrigid registration with corresponding points constraint for automatic segmentation of cardiac DSCT images.

Background: Dual-source computed tomography (DSCT) is a very effective way for diagnosis and treatment of heart disease. The quantitative information of spatiotemporal DSCT images can be important for the evaluation of cardiac function. To avoid the shortcoming of manual delineation, it is imperative to develop an automatic segmentation technique for 4D cardiac images.

Tracking multiple surgical instruments in a near-infrared optical system.

Surgical navigation systems can assist doctors in performing more precise and more efficient surgical procedures to avoid various accidents. The near-infrared optical system (NOS) is an important component of surgical navigation systems. However, several surgical instruments are used during surgery, and effectively tracking all of them is challenging.