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Interlaminar delamination damage is a common and typical defect in the context of structural damage in carbon fiber-reinforced resin matrix composites. The technology to identify such damage is crucial for improving the safety and reliability of structures. In this paper, we fabricated carbon fiber-reinforced composite laminates with different degrees of delamination damage, conducted static load experiments on them and used femtosecond fiber Bragg grating sensors (fsFBG) to determine their structural state to investigate the effects of delamination damage on their performance. We constructed a model to identify damage based on the deep residual shrinkage network, and used experimental data to enable it to identify varying degrees of delamination damage to carbon fiber-reinforced composites with an accuracy of 97.98%.
Leveraging the National COVID-19 Cohort Collaborative (N3C), a nationally sampled electronic health records repository, we explored associations between individual-level social determinants of health (SDoH) and COVID-19-related hospitalizations among racialized minority people with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) (PWH), who have been historically adversely affected by SDoH.
Methods:
We retrospectively studied PWH and people without HIV (PWoH) using N3C data from January 2020 to November 2023. We evaluated SDoH variables across three domains in the Healthy People 2030 framework: (1) healthcare access, (2) economic stability, and (3) social cohesion with our primary outcome, COVID-19-related hospitalization. We conducted hierarchically nested additive and adjusted mixed-effects logistic regression models, stratifying by HIV status and race/ethnicity groups, accounting for age, sex, comorbidities, and data partners.
Results:
Our analytic sample included 280,441 individuals from 24 data partner sites, where 3,291 (1.17%) were PWH, with racialized minority PWH having higher proportions of adverse SDoH exposures than racialized minority PWoH. COVID-19-related hospitalizations occurred in 11.23% of all individuals (9.17% among PWH, 11.26% among PWoH). In our initial additive modeling, we observed that all three SDoH domains were significantly associated with hospitalizations, even with progressive adjustments (adjusted odds ratios [aOR] range 1.36–1.97). Subsequently, our HIV-stratified analyses indicated economic instability was associated with hospitalization in both PWH and PWoH (aOR range 1.35–1.48). Lastly, our fully adjusted, race/ethnicity-stratified analysis, indicated access to healthcare issues was associated with hospitalization across various racialized groups (aOR range 1.36–2.00).
Conclusion:
Our study underscores the importance of assessing individual-level SDoH variables to unravel the complex interplay of these factors for racialized minority groups.
Ultra-processed plant-based foods, such as plant-based burgers, have gained in popularity. Particularly in the out-of-home (OOH) environment, evidence regarding their nutritional profile and environmental sustainability is still evolving. Plant-based burgers available at selected OOH sites were randomly sampled in Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Lisbon and London. Plant-based burgers (patty, bread and condiment) (n 41) were lab analysed for their energy, macronutrients, amino acids and minerals content per 100 g and serving and were compared with reference values. For the plant-based burgers, the median values per 100 g were 234 kcal, 20·8 g carbohydrates, 3·5 g dietary fibre and 12·0 g fat, including 0·08 g TFS and 2·2 g SFA. Protein content was 8·9 g/100 g, with low protein quality according to amino acid composition. Median Na content was 389 mg/100 g, equivalent to 1 g salt. Compared with references, the median serving provided 31% of energy intake based on a 2000 kcal per day and contributed to carbohydrates (17–28%), dietary fibre (42%), protein (40%), total fat (48%), SFA (26%) and Na (54%). One serving provided 15–23% of the reference values for Ca, K and Mg, while higher contributions were found for Zn, Mn, P and Fe (30–67%). The ultra-processed plant-based burgers provide protein, dietary fibre and essential minerals and contain relatively high levels of energy, Na and total fats. The amino acid composition indicated low protein quality. The multifaceted nutritional profile of plant-based burgers highlights the need for manufacturers to implement improvements to better support healthy dietary habits, including reducing energy, Na and total fats.
The target backsheath field acceleration mechanism is one of the main mechanisms of laser-driven proton acceleration (LDPA) and strongly depends on the comprehensive performance of the ultrashort ultra-intense lasers used as the driving sources. The successful use of the SG-II Peta-watt (SG-II PW) laser facility for LDPA and its applications in radiographic diagnoses have been manifested by the good performance of the SG-II PW facility. Recently, the SG-II PW laser facility has undergone extensive maintenance and a comprehensive technical upgrade in terms of the seed source, laser contrast and terminal focus. LDPA experiments were performed using the maintained SG-II PW laser beam, and the highest cutoff energy of the proton beam was obviously increased. Accordingly, a double-film target structure was used, and the maximum cutoff energy of the proton beam was up to 70 MeV. These results demonstrate that the comprehensive performance of the SG-II PW laser facility was improved significantly.
This paper studied the use of eye movement data to form criteria for judging whether pilots perceive emergency information such as cockpit warnings. In the experiment, 12 subjects randomly encountered different warning information while flying a simulated helicopter, and their eye movement data were collected synchronously. Firstly, the importance of the eye movement features was calculated by ANOVA (analysis of variance). According to the sorting of the importance and the Euclidean distance of each eye movement feature, the warning information samples with different eye movement features were obtained. Secondly, the residual shrinkage network modules were added to CNN (convolutional neural network) to construct a DRSN (deep residual shrinkage networks) model. Finally, the processed warning information samples were used to train and test the DRSN model. In order to verify the superiority of this method, the DRSN model was compared with three machine learning models, namely SVM (support vector machine), RF (radom forest) and BPNN (backpropagation neural network). Among the four models, the DRSN model performed the best. When all eye movement features were selected, this model detected pilot perception of warning information with an average accuracy of 90.4%, of which the highest detection accuracy reached 96.4%. Experiments showed that the DRSN model had advantages in detecting pilot perception of warning information.
We report the experimental results of the commissioning phase in the 10 PW laser beamline of the Shanghai Superintense Ultrafast Laser Facility (SULF). The peak power reaches 2.4 PW on target without the last amplifying during the experiment. The laser energy of 72 ± 9 J is directed to a focal spot of approximately 6 μm diameter (full width at half maximum) in 30 fs pulse duration, yielding a focused peak intensity around 2.0 × 1021 W/cm2. The first laser-proton acceleration experiment is performed using plain copper and plastic targets. High-energy proton beams with maximum cut-off energy up to 62.5 MeV are achieved using copper foils at the optimum target thickness of 4 μm via target normal sheath acceleration. For plastic targets of tens of nanometers thick, the proton cut-off energy is approximately 20 MeV, showing ring-like or filamented density distributions. These experimental results reflect the capabilities of the SULF-10 PW beamline, for example, both ultrahigh intensity and relatively good beam contrast. Further optimization for these key parameters is underway, where peak laser intensities of 1022–1023 W/cm2 are anticipated to support various experiments on extreme field physics.
To summarise and describe the clinical presentations, diagnostic approaches and airway management techniques in children with laryngotracheal trauma.
Methods
The clinical data related to laryngotracheal trauma diagnosed and treated at the Beijing Children's Hospital, between January 2013 and July 2018, were retrospectively reviewed. Disease diagnosis, treatment, management and outcomes were analysed.
Results
A total of 13 cases were enrolled, including 7 cases of penetrating laryngotracheal trauma. The six cases of blunt laryngotracheal trauma were caused by collisions with hard objects. In all cases, voice, airway and swallowing outcomes were graded as ‘good’, except for one patient who had residual paralysis of the vocal folds.
Conclusion
Flexible fibre-optic laryngoscopy and computed tomography can play an important role in diagnosing laryngotracheal trauma. The airway should be secured and, if necessary, opened by tracheal intubation or tracheostomy.
Root-lesion nematodes (Pratylenchus spp.) are a group of economically important pathogens that have caused serious economic losses in many crops. In 2019, root-lesion nematodes were recovered from tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) root samples collected from Sichuan Province, People's Republic of China (PRC). Extracted nematodes were disinfected, and one individual female was cultured on a carrot disc for propagation at 25 °C by parthenogenesis and designated the SC isolate. Afterwards, the isolate was identified on the basis of morphometric and molecular markers. Both morphometric characters and molecular analysis of the internal transcribed spacer region gene (ITS) of ribosomal DNA, the D2-D3 expansion region of the 28S rDNA gene and the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase I (mtDNA-COI) gene revealed that the species of root-lesion nematode was Pratylenchus scribneri. The Bayesian tree inferred from the ITS rDNA, 28S rDNA and mtDNA-COI gene sequences also showed that this isolate formed a highly supported clade with other P. scribneri isolates. The pathogenicity of the root-lesion nematode SC isolate on tomato was assessed, showing that tomato was a suitable host for P. scribneri. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of P. scribneri on tomato in Sichuan Province, PRC. These are also the first molecular data obtained from P. scribneri on tomato in the PRC, and the pathogenicity of P. scribneri to tomato was studied for the first time. This study provides scientific data for the detection, identification and control of tomato root-lesion nematode disease.
The aim of the present study was to perform a retrospective review of the lesion sites in congenital middle-ear cholesteatoma and any accompanying ossicular defects, as well as to explore the possible aetiology of congenital middle-ear cholesteatoma associated with such ossicular chain defects.
Method
The clinical characteristics and pathogenic mechanisms of ossicular chain defects were investigated in 10 patients with early-stage congenital middle-ear cholesteatoma confirmed by surgery, from August 2011 to February 2019.
Results
Monofocal cholesteatoma was located in the anterosuperior quadrant in 3 cases and in the posterosuperior quadrant in 7 cases; all 10 cases showed an absence of the long crus of incus, and 8 cases showed a complete or partial absence of stapes superstructure. The lesions were confined to the vestibular window and the stapes region and had no contact with the long crus of the incus or stapes in nine cases. None of the 10 patients had any recurrence of cholesteatoma.
Conclusion
Although cholesteatoma can cause erosion of ossicles, the present cases suggest that residual epithelium of the cholesteatoma may coexist with ossicular malformations. Therefore, the aetiology of the clinical characteristics in these patients may derive from residual epithelial hinderance of ossicle development.
Manure is a primary source of methane (CH4) emissions into the atmosphere. A large proportion of CH4 from manure is emitted during storage, but this varies with storage methods. In this research, we tested whether covering a manure heap with plastic reduces CH4 emission during a short-term composting process. A static chamber method was used to detect the CH4 emission rate and the change of the physicochemical properties of cattle manure which was stored either uncovered (treatment UNCOVERED) or covered with plastic (treatment COVERED) for 30-day periods during the four seasons? The dry matter content of the COVERED treatment was significantly less than the UNCOVERED treatment (P < 0.01), and the C/N ratio of the COVERED treatment significantly greater than the UNCOVERED treatment (P > 0.05) under high temperature. In the UNCOVERED treatment, average daily methane (CH4) emissions were in the order summer > spring > autumn > winter. CH4 emissions were positively correlated with the temperature (R2 = 0.52, P < 0.01). Compared to the UNCOVERED treatment, the daily average CH4 emission rates from COVERED treatment manure were less in the first 19 days of spring, 13 days of summer, 10 days of autumn and 30 days of winter. In summary, covering the manure pile with plastic reduces the evaporation of water during storage; and in winter, long-term covering with plastic film reduces the CH4 emissions during the storage of manure.
The aim of this study was to explore the frequency and distribution of gene mutations that are related to isoniazid (INH) and rifampin (RIF)-resistance in the strains of the multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M.tb) in Beijing, China. In this retrospective study, the genotypes of 173 MDR-TB strains were analysed by spoligotyping. The katG, inhA genes and the promoter region of inhA, in which genetic mutations confer INH resistance; and the rpoB gene, in which genetic mutations confer RIF resistance, were sequenced. The percentage of resistance-associated nucleotide alterations among the strains of different genotypes was also analysed. In total, 90.8% (157/173) of the MDR strains belonged to the Beijing genotype. Population characteristics were not significantly different among the strains of different genotypes. In total, 50.3% (87/173) strains had mutations at codon S315T of katG; 16.8% (29/173) of strains had mutations in the inhA promoter region; of them, 5.5% (15/173) had point mutations at −15 base (C→T) of the inhA promoter region. In total, 86.7% (150/173) strains had mutations at rpoB gene; of them, 40% (69/173) strains had mutations at codon S531L of rpoB. The frequency of mutations was not significantly higher in Beijing genotypic MDR strains than in non-Beijing genotypes. Beijing genotypic MDR-TB strains were spreading in Beijing and present a major challenge to TB control in this region. A high prevalence of katG Ser315Thr, inhA promoter region (−15C→T) and rpoB (S531L) mutations was observed. Molecular diagnostics based on gene mutations was a useful method for rapid detection of MDR-TB in Beijing, China.
Introduction. Smoking prevalence is disproportionately high among Asian American immigrant men with limited English proficiency. Understanding the role of family support may provide insights into culturally acceptable strategies to promote smoking cessation. Aims. This study examined how family support was associated with readiness to consider smoking cessation among Chinese and Vietnamese American male daily smokers. Methods. We analyzed baseline data (N = 340) from a cluster randomized trial of a family-based healthy lifestyle intervention. We assessed the frequency of receiving family support in various forms (encouraging use of cessation resources, praising efforts, checking in, and reminding of familial role). Multiple regression analysis was used to determine associations between family support areas and readiness to consider smoking cessation, controlling for covariates. Results/Findings. Reporting a higher frequency of receiving praise and encouragement for one’s efforts to quit was positively associated with readiness to consider cessation. Other areas of family support were not significant. Conclusions. These findings provide evidence to explore specific areas of family support in enhancing Asian American smokers’ readiness to consider cessation. As there is high interest from Asian American family members to support their smokers for quitting, culturally specific and acceptable strategies are needed to promote smoking cessation among Asian Americans.
Longan is an economically important sub-tropical fruit tree native to southern China and southeast Asia. Its production has been affected significantly by climate change, but the underlying reasons remain unclear. Herein, the potential growing areas of longan were simulated by the Maxent model under current and future conditions. The results showed excellent prediction performance, with an area under curve of >0.9 for model training and validation. The key environmental variables identified were mean temperature of the coldest quarter, minimum temperature of the coldest month, annual mean temperature and mean temperature of the driest quarter. The optimum suitable areas of longan were found to be concentrated mainly in south-western, southern and eastern China, with a slight increase in optimum suitable areas under two different emission scenarios of three global climatic models. However, its future potential growing areas were predicted to differ among provinces or cities. Suitable growing areas in Sichuan, Jiangxi, Guangxi and Chongqing will first increase and then remain approximately unchanged between the 2050s and 2070s; those in Yunnan, Guangdong and Hainan will remain approximately unchanged from the present to the 2070s; those in Fujian and Guizhou will fluctuate slightly from the present to the 2050s and then increase to the 2070s; those in Taiwan will first decrease and then increase. In summary, the major future production areas of longan will be Guangdong, Hainan and Guangxi provinces, followed by Chongqing, Yunnan, Fujian and Taiwan. Thus, this study serves as a useful guide for the management of longan.
Gravitational waves from coalescing neutron stars encode information about nuclear matter at extreme densities, inaccessible by laboratory experiments. The late inspiral is influenced by the presence of tides, which depend on the neutron star equation of state. Neutron star mergers are expected to often produce rapidly rotating remnant neutron stars that emit gravitational waves. These will provide clues to the extremely hot post-merger environment. This signature of nuclear matter in gravitational waves contains most information in the 2–4 kHz frequency band, which is outside of the most sensitive band of current detectors. We present the design concept and science case for a Neutron Star Extreme Matter Observatory (NEMO): a gravitational-wave interferometer optimised to study nuclear physics with merging neutron stars. The concept uses high-circulating laser power, quantum squeezing, and a detector topology specifically designed to achieve the high-frequency sensitivity necessary to probe nuclear matter using gravitational waves. Above 1 kHz, the proposed strain sensitivity is comparable to full third-generation detectors at a fraction of the cost. Such sensitivity changes expected event rates for detection of post-merger remnants from approximately one per few decades with two A+ detectors to a few per year and potentially allow for the first gravitational-wave observations of supernovae, isolated neutron stars, and other exotica.
Bordetella bronchiseptica is a potential zoonotic pathogen, which mainly causes respiratory diseases in humans and a variety of animal species. B. bronchiseptica is one of the important pathogens isolated from rabbits in Fujian Province. However, the knowledge of the epidemiology and characteristics of the B. bronchiseptica in rabbits in Fujian Province is largely unknown. In this study, 219 B. bronchiseptica isolates recovered from lung samples of dead rabbits with respiratory diseases in Fujian Province were characterised by multi-locus sequencing typing, screening virulence genes and testing antimicrobial susceptibility. The results showed that the 219 isolates were typed into 11 sequence types (STs) including five known STs (ST6, ST10, ST12, ST14 and ST33) and six new STs (ST88, ST89, ST90, ST91, ST92 and ST93) and the ST33 (30.14%, 66/219), ST14 (26.94%, 59/219) and ST12 (16.44%, 36/219) were the three most prevalent STs. Surprisingly, all the 219 isolates carried the five virulence genes (fhaB, prn, cyaA, dnt and bteA) in the polymerase chain reaction screening. Moreover, the isolates were resistant to cefixime, ceftizoxime, cefatriaxone and ampicillin at rates of 33.33%, 31.05%, 11.87% and 3.20%, respectively. This study showed the genetic diversity of B. bronchiseptica in rabbits in Fujian Province, and the colonisation of the human-associated ST12 strain in rabbits in Fujian Province. The results might be useful for monitoring the epidemic strains, developing preventive methods and preventing the transmission of epidemic strains from rabbits to humans.
Electric-powered disposable unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have wide applications due to their advantages in terms of long time flight and load capacity. Thus, improving their endurance has become an important task to enhance the performance of these UAVs. To achieve this, we investigated a battery dumping strategy which splits the battery into several packs that are used and dumped in sequence to reduce the dead weight. The Peukert effect is also considered. In this paper, the sensitivity analysis method was employed to analyse the endurance benefits for different battery weight ratios, Peukert constants and capacities, quantitatively. The results show that the endurance benefits are significantly affected by all three parameters. For ideal batteries, the endurance can be improved by 20% and 28% respectively when employing a double-pack or triple-pack battery strategy (for a battery weight ratio of 0.4), but these benefits will fall rapidly if the Peukert constant exceeds 1.0 or the battery weight declines. Besides, the endurance will be 10% longer if the lift coefficient rather than the velocity remains constant after the battery packs are dumped at a Peukert constant of 1.2.
Phytase has long been used to decrease the inorganic phosphorus (Pi) input in poultry diet. The current study was conducted to investigate the effects of Pi supplementation on laying performance, egg quality and phosphate–calcium metabolism in Hy-Line Brown laying hens fed phytase. Layers (n = 504, 29 weeks old) were randomly assigned to seven treatments with six replicates of 12 birds. The corn–soybean meal-based diet contained 0.12% non-phytate phosphorus (nPP), 3.8% calcium, 2415 IU/kg vitamin D3 and 2000 FTU/kg phytase. Inorganic phosphorus (in the form of mono-dicalcium phosphate) was added into the basal diet to construct seven experimental diets; the final dietary nPP levels were 0.12%, 0.17%, 0.22%, 0.27%, 0.32%, 0.37% and 0.42%. The feeding trial lasted 12 weeks (hens from 29 to 40 weeks of age). Laying performance (housed laying rate, egg weight, egg mass, daily feed intake and feed conversion ratio) was weekly calculated. Egg quality (egg shape index, shell strength, shell thickness, albumen height, yolk colour and Haugh units), serum parameters (calcium, phosphorus, parathyroid hormone, calcitonin and 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D), tibia quality (breaking strength, and calcium, phosphorus and ash contents), intestinal gene expression (type IIb sodium-dependent phosphate cotransporter, NaPi-IIb) and phosphorus excretion were determined at the end of the trial. No differences were observed on laying performance, egg quality, serum parameters and tibia quality. Hens fed 0.17% nPP had increased (P < 0.01) duodenum NaPi-IIb expression compared to all other treatments. Phosphorus excretion linearly increased with an increase in dietary nPP (phosphorus excretion = 1.7916 × nPP + 0.2157; R2 = 0.9609, P = 0.001). In conclusion, corn–soybean meal-based diets containing 0.12% nPP, 3.8% calcium, 2415 IU/kg vitamin D3 and 2000 FTU/kg phytase would meet the requirements for egg production in Hy-Line Brown laying hens (29 to 40 weeks of age).
Beef cattle are often fed high-concentrate diet (HCD) to achieve high growth rate. However, HCD feeding is strongly associated with metabolic disorders. Mild acid treatment of grains in HCD with 1% hydrochloric acid (HA) followed by neutralization with sodium bicarbonate (SB) might modify rumen fermentation patterns and microbiota, thereby decreasing the negative effects of HCD. This study was thus aimed to investigate the effects of treatment of corn with 1% HA and subsequent neutralization with SB on rumen fermentation and microbiota, inflammatory response and growth performance in beef cattle fed HCD. Eighteen beef cattle were randomly allocated to three groups and each group was fed different diets: low-concentrate diet (LCD) (concentrate : forage = 40 : 60), HCD (concentrate : forage = 60 : 40) or HCD based on treated corn (HCDT) with the same concentrate to forage ratio as the HCD. The corn in the HCDT was steeped in 1% HA (wt/wt) for 48 h and neutralized with SB after HA treatment. The animal trial lasted for 42 days with an adaptation period of 7 days. At the end of the trial, rumen fluid samples were collected for measuring ruminal pH values, short-chain fatty acids, endotoxin (or lipopolysaccharide, LPS) and bacterial microbiota. Plasma samples were collected at the end of the trial to determine the concentrations of plasma LPS, proinflammatory cytokines and acute phase proteins (APPs). The results showed that compared with the LCD, feeding the HCD had better growth performance due to a shift in the ruminal fermentation pattern from acetate towards propionate, butyrate and valerate. However, the HCD decreased ruminal pH and increased ruminal LPS release and the concentrations of plasma proinflammatory cytokines and APPs. Furthermore, feeding the HCD reduced bacterial richness and diversity in the rumen. Treatment of corn increased resistant starch (RS) content. Compared with the HCD, feeding the HCDT reduced ruminal LPS and improved ruminal bacterial microbiota, resulting in decreased inflammation and improved growth performance. In conclusion, although the HCD had better growth performance than the LCD, feeding the HCD promoted the pH reduction and the LPS release in the rumen, disturbed the ruminal bacterial stability and increased inflammatory response. Treatment of corn with HA in combination with subsequent SB neutralization increased the RS content and helped counter the negative effects of feeding HCD to beef steers.