Effect of Ammonia Concentration on Silica Spheres Morphology and Solution Hydroxyl Concentration in Stober Process.

Ammonia was used as catalyst to synthesize spherical silica particles by Stober process. More details about the effect of ammonia concentration on the silica powders were investigated. With increase of ammonia concentration from 0.

Comparative Study of Hydrogen and Argon Dilution Effects in Amorphous SiC Thin Films Deposited by Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition.

Amorphous SiC thin films were deposited from a mixture of silane and methane gas with the separate hydrogen and Argon dilution by using the plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition process. The effects of different dilution gas on the chemical composition, bonding states, microstructure and optical property of the films were studied and compared. For the films with H2 dilution, the higher hydrogen content passivated more Si dangling bonds so that the formation of nanocrystalline silicon was inhibited and the films were kept in amorphous state.

Deposition Time Dependent Size of Si Quantum Dots Embedded in Amorphous SiC Matrix.

A series of hydrogenated amorphous SiC (a-SiC:H) films that contain Si quantum dots (QDs) were grown using PECVD at a substrate temperature of 320 degrees C by changing the deposition time from 0.5 h to 3 h. The chemical composition, phase constitution, microstructure and optical gap of the films were systematically studied by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy, high-resolution transmission electron microscopy, and UV-vis spectrophotometer, respectively.

Transmission properties and molecular sensing application of CGPW.

In this paper, a cylindrical graphene plasmon waveguide (CGPW), which consists of two rolled graphene ribbons, a dielectric core and a dielectric interlayer is proposed, and its use for molecular sensing is investigated. First, an analytical model for the surface plasmon modes supported by this graphene geometry is presented and verified by finite element method simulations. Furthermore, we demonstrate a large tunability of the modes behavior by varying the Fermi level of the graphene, the coupling distance between the two sheets and the radius of the cylinder.

Metagenomic sequencing of bile from gallstone patients to identify different microbial community patterns and novel biliary bacteria.

Despite the high worldwide prevalence of gallstone disease, the role of the biliary microbiota in gallstone pathogenesis remains obscure. Next-generation sequencing offers advantages for systematically understanding the human microbiota; however, there have been few such investigations of the biliary microbiome. Here, we performed whole-metagenome shotgun (WMS) sequencing and 16S rRNA sequencing on bile samples from 15 Chinese patients with gallstone disease.

Differential expression of 2IgB7-H3 and 4IgB7-H3 in cancer cell lines and glioma tissues.

B7-H3 protein is an important tumor antigen, but the expression of its isoforms, 4IgB7-H3 and 2IgB7-H3, in tumor tissues remains unknown due to the lack of specific monoclonal antibodies (mAbs). In the present study, a mAb (9C3) specifically recognizing 2IgB7-H3, but not 4IgB7-H3, was prepared. Using 9C3 and a previously prepared mAb (4H7) that recognizes 4IgB7-H3 and 2IgB7-H3, the differential expression of 2IgB7-H3 and 4IgB7-H3 was analyzed in a variety of tumor cell lines by flow cytometry.

[Clinical application of preoperative imaging evaluation in the anterolateral thigh flap transplantation: comparison of computed tomography angiography, digital subtract angiography and magnetic resonance angiography].

Objective: To evaluate the value of three preoperative imaging methods in the anterolateral thigh flap (ALT) transplantation.

Methods: According to preoperative imaging, patients who underwent the ALT flap transplantation were divided into three groups: computed tomography angiography (CTA) group, digital subtract angiography ( DSA) group and magnetic resonance angiography (MRA) group. There were fifteen cases in each group.

The natural compound celastrol inhibits necroptosis and alleviates ulcerative colitis in mice.

Ulcerative colitis (UC) is a chronic intestinal inflammatory disease. Necroptosis plays an important role in the pathogenesis of UC. Celastrol, a triterpene from the root bark of the Chinese medicinal plant Tripterygium wilfordii, has been reported to have anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory activities in colitis.

SAMSVM: A tool for misalignment filtration of SAM-format sequences with support vector machine.

Sequence alignment/map (SAM) formatted sequences [Li H, Handsaker B, Wysoker A et al., Bioinformatics 25(16):2078-2079, 2009.] have taken on a main role in bioinformatics since the development of massive parallel sequencing.

MMN responses during implicit processing of changes in emotional prosody: an ERP study using Chinese pseudo-syllables.

In this study, we tested the underlying mechanisms of early emotional prosody perception, especially examined whether change detection in oddball paradigm was caused by emotional category and physical properties. Using implicit oddball paradigms, the current study manipulated the cues for detecting deviant stimuli from standards in three conditions: the simultaneous changes in emotional category and physical properties (EP condition), change in emotional category alone (E condition), and change in physical properties alone (P condition). ERP results revealed that physical property change increased brain responses to deviant stimuli in the EP than in the E condition at early stage 90-160 ms, suggesting that physical property change of emotional sounds can also be detected at the early stage.

[Preparation of a uncoordinated-5 homolog B monoclonal antibody and its effect on melanoma cell migration in vitro].

Objective: To prepare and characterize the monoclonal antibody (mAb) against uncoordinated-5 homolog B (UNC5B) and analyze its effect on the migration of melanoma cells.

Methods: UNC5B gene fragment was cloned into the prokaryotic expression vector pET-32a. The recombinant UNC5B protein was expressed in E.

[Correlation of Plasma Co-stimulatory Molecules B7-H2 and B7-H3 with Platelet Auto-antibodies in Patients with Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura].

Objective: To investigate whether the plasma level of platelet auto- antibodies in ITP patients is related to that of co-stimulatory molecules sB7-H2 and sB7-H3.

Methods: A total of 61 ITP patients and 25 healthy controls from the First Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University from June 2012 to August 2013 were enrolled in this study. The expression levels of platelet auto-antibodies against 5 glycoproteins (GPIX, GP Ib, GP IIIa, GPIIb and P-selectin) in plasma were detected by flow cytometric immuno-beads array, and the expression of soluable co-stimulatory molecules sB7-H2 and sB7-H3 was measured by ELISA.

Meta-analysis of macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF) gene -173G/C polymorphism and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) risk.

Macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF) is a multi-functional cytokine associated with inflammation and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). The association between MIF-173G/C polymorphism and IBD risk has been extensively investigated. However, the results were conflicted and inconclusive.

Massive interstitial copy-neutral loss-of-heterozygosity as evidence for cancer being a disease of the DNA-damage response.

Background: The presence of loss-of-heterozygosity (LOH) mutations in cancer cell genomes is commonly encountered. Moreover, the occurrences of LOHs in tumor suppressor genes play important roles in oncogenesis. However, because the causative mechanisms underlying LOH mutations in cancer cells yet remain to be elucidated, enquiry into the nature of these mechanisms based on a comprehensive examination of the characteristics of LOHs in multiple types of cancers has become a necessity.

Intrahepatic bile duct adenoma (peribiliary gland hamartoma): a case report and review of literature.

Bile duct adenoma (BDA) is a comparatively rare disease and there are relatively few reported cases in the English-language literature. Herein, we present a 63-year-old woman, who was incidentally found to have a liver-occupying lesion during a routine medical examination. Ultrasonography suggested "quick wash-in and wash-out" sign with an obvious nodular enhancement in the peripheral of the right intrahepatic nodular.

The electrocortical modulation effects of different emotion regulation strategies.

The current event-related potential study investigated the modulation effects of different emotion regulation strategies on electrocortical responses. When watching negative or neutral pictures, participants were instructed to perform three tasks: cognitive reappraisal, expressive suppression and passive viewing. We found that negative pictures elicited a larger late positive potential (LPP) than neutral pictures.

Four-sample lactose hydrogen breath test for diagnosis of lactose malabsorption in irritable bowel syndrome patients with diarrhea.

Aim: To validate 4-sample lactose hydrogen breath testing (4SLHBT) compared to standard 13-sample LHBT in the clinical setting.

Methods: Irritable bowel syndrome patients with diarrhea (IBS-D) and healthy volunteers (HVs) were enrolled and received a 10 g, 20 g, or 40 g dose lactose hydrogen breath test (LHBT) in a randomized, double-blinded, controlled trial. The lactase gene promoter region was sequenced.

Anisotropic relaxation of a CuO/TiO2 surface under an electric field and its impact on visible light absorption: ab initio calculations.

Ab initio calculations on the anisotropic relaxation of a CuO/TiO2 surface under electric fields and the visible light absorption of these relaxed surfaces are reported. We compare the relaxation of the CuO/TiO2 surface under the electric fields in the direction of [001] or [010]. Fewer Cu-O bonds with highly coordinated Cu-ions are found in the CuO/TiO2 relaxed surface under the electric field in the [010] direction.

Language differences in the brain network for reading in naturalistic story reading and lexical decision.

Differences in how writing systems represent language raise important questions about whether there could be a universal functional architecture for reading across languages. In order to study potential language differences in the neural networks that support reading skill, we collected fMRI data from readers of alphabetic (English) and morpho-syllabic (Chinese) writing systems during two reading tasks. In one, participants read short stories under conditions that approximate natural reading, and in the other, participants decided whether individual stimuli were real words or not.

Broadband molecular sensing with a tapered spoof plasmon waveguide.

Unambiguous identification of low concentration chemical mixtures can be performed by broadband enhanced infrared absorption (BEIRA). Here we propose and numerically study a corrugated parallel plate waveguide (CPPW) with gradient grooves which is capable of directly converting transmission modes to surface plasmon modes and could hence serve as a powerful chemical sensor. Such a waveguide can be designed to exhibit a wide pass band covering an extended portion of a molecule absorption spectrum.

Determinants of long-term complications of endoscopic sphincterotomy are infections and high risk factors of bile duct and not sphincter of Oddi dysfunction.

Background: With the popularity of endoscopic sphincterotomy (EST), long-term complications of EST are receiving increasingly more attention, but the mechanisms have not been sufficiently elucidated.

Aim: This study aimed to investigate the relationship between long-term complications of EST and sphincter of Oddi (SO) function and other associated risk factors.

Patients And Methods: A total of 139 patients with choledocholithiasis who had undergone EST were consecutively enrolled, and divided into two groups: patients with long-term complications (LC group) and patients without complications (control group).

Volcanic history of the Imbrium basin: A close-up view from the lunar rover Yutu.

We report the surface exploration by the lunar rover Yutu that landed on the young lava flow in the northeastern part of the Mare Imbrium, which is the largest basin on the nearside of the Moon and is filled with several basalt units estimated to date from 3.5 to 2.0 Ga.

Copy number variation analysis based on AluScan sequences.

Background: AluScan combines inter-Alu PCR using multiple Alu-based primers with opposite orientations and next-generation sequencing to capture a huge number of Alu-proximal genomic sequences for investigation. Its requirement of only sub-microgram quantities of DNA facilitates the examination of large numbers of samples. However, the special features of AluScan data rendered difficult the calling of copy number variation (CNV) directly using the calling algorithms designed for whole genome sequencing (WGS) or exome sequencing.

Memory and energy optimization strategies for multithreaded operating system on the resource-constrained wireless sensor node.

Memory and energy optimization strategies are essential for the resource-constrained wireless sensor network (WSN) nodes. In this article, a new memory-optimized and energy-optimized multithreaded WSN operating system (OS) LiveOS is designed and implemented. Memory cost of LiveOS is optimized by using the stack-shifting hybrid scheduling approach.