Electro-acupuncture promotes survival, differentiation of the bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells as well as functional recovery in the spinal cord-transected rats

Background  

Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are one of the potential tools for treatment of the spinal cord injury; however, the survival and differentiation of MSCs in an injured spinal cord still need to be improved. In the present study, we investigated whether Governor Vessel electro-acupuncture (EA) could efficiently promote bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) survival and differentiation, axonal regeneration and finally, functional recovery in the transected spinal cord.     

Thermodynamics and weak cosmic censorship conjecture of BTZ black holes in extended phase space

As a charged fermion drops into a BTZ black hole, the laws of thermodynamics and the weak cosmic censorship conjecture are investigated in both the normal and extended phase space, where the cosmological parameter and renormalization length are regarded as extensive quantities. In the normal phase space, the first and second law of thermodynamics, and the weak cosmic censorship are found to be valid. In the extended phase space, although the first law and weak cosmic censorship conjecture remain valid, the second law is dependent on the variation of the renormalization energy d K. Moreover, in the extended phase space, the configurations of extremal and near-extremal black holes are not changed, as they are stable, while in the normal phase space, the extremal and near-extremal black holes evolve into non-extremal black holes.     

Security of continuous-variable measurement-device-independent quantum key distribution with imperfect state preparation

The state preparation operation of continuous-variable measurement-device-independent quantum key distribution (CV-MDI-QKD) protocol may become imperfect in practical applications. We address the security of the CV-MDI-QKD protocol based on imperfect preparation of the coherent state under realistic conditions of lossy and noisy quantum channel. Specifically, we assume that the imperfection of Alice's and Bob's practical state preparations equal to the amplification of ideal modulators and lasers at both Alice's and Bob's sides by untrusted third-parties Fred and Gray employing phase-insensitive amplifiers (PIAs), respectively. The equivalent excess noise introduced by the imperfect state preparation is comprehensively and quantitatively calculated by adopting the gains of PIAs. Security analysis shows that CV-MDI-QKD is quite sensitive to the imperfection of practical state preparation, which inevitably deteriorates the performance and security of CV-MDI-QKD system. Moreover, a lower bound of the secret key rate is derived under arbitrary collective attacks, and the upper threshold of this imperfection tolerated by the system is obtained in the form of the specific gains of PIAs. In addition, the methods presented will improve and perfect the practical security of CV-MDI-QKD protocol.     

The Improvement of Performance for Continuous-Variable Quantum Key Distribution with Imperfect Gaussian Modulation

Gaussian modulation is one of the key steps for the implementation of continuous-variable quantum key distribution (CVQKD) schemes. However, imperfection in the Gaussian modulation may introduce modulation noise that can deteriorate the performance of CVQKD systems. In this paper, we mainly investigate how to improve the performance of a CVQKD system from different aspects. First, we explore the several different origins, impacts and monitoring schemes for the modulation noise in detail. Then, we discuss the practical performance of a CVQKD system with an untrusted noise model and neutral party model, respectively. These analyses indicate that the neutral party model should be reasonably regarded as a general noise model, which will passively and greatly raise the performance of the system. Further, we propose a dynamic auto-bias control scheme to actively resist the modulation noise which comes from the drift of bias point of the amplitude modulator. Together these methods contribute to the improvement of the practical performance of CVQKD systems with imperfect Gaussian modulation.

     

An improved cellular automaton model with the consideration of a multi-point tollbooth

Based on the classical Nagel–Schreckenberg model, we in this paper propose an improved cellular automaton (CA) model to study the influences of a multi-point tollbooth on traffic flow. The numerical results show that the multi-point tollbooth can be looked at as a bottleneck and that it can improve the road capacity compared with other tolling stations, which shows that the proposed model is more effective than other traffic flow models. In addition, the results can help readers to better understand the effects of a multi-point tollbooth on traffic flow and help traffic engineers to reasonably design the tolling station.     

Evaluation of ADC measurements among solid pancreatic masses by respiratory-triggered diffusion-weighted MR imaging with inversion-recovery fat-suppression technique at 3.0 T

Purpose

The objective of this paper was to investigate the value of apparent diffusion coefficients (ADCs) for differential diagnosis among solid pancreatic masses using respiratory triggered diffusion-weighted MR imaging with inversion-recovery fat-suppression technique (RT-IR-DWI) at 3.0 T.

Materials and Methods

20 normal volunteers and 72 patients (Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma [PDCA, n = 30], mass-forming pancreatitis [MFP, n = 15], solid pseudopapillary neoplasm [SPN, n = 12], and pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor[PNET, n = 15]) underwent RT-IR-DWI (b values: 0 and 600 s/mm²) at 3.0 T. Results were correlated with histopathologic data and follow-up imaging. ADC values among different types of pancreatic tissue were statistically analyzed and compared.

Results

Statistical difference was noticed in ADC values among normal pancreas, MFP, PDCA, SPN and PNET by ANOVA (p < .001). Normal pancreas had the highest ADC value, then followed by PNET, PDCA, MFP and SPN. There was noticeable statistical difference in ADC values among PDCA, MFP and normal pancreas by Least Significant Difference (LSD) (p < .001). ADC of SPN was statistically lower than that of PNET (p = 0.1800 × 10^− 4), PDCA (p = 0.0300 × 10^− 4) and normal pancreas (p = 0.0007 × 10^− 4). ADC of PNET was statistically lower than that of normal pancreas (p = 0.0360) and higher than that of MFP (p = 9.3000 × 10^− 4).

Conclusions

ADC measurements using RT-IR-DWI at 3.0 T may aid to disclose the histopathological pattern of normal pancreas and solid pancreatic masses, which may be helpful in characterizing solid pancreatic lesions.     

Synthesis and Characterization of Pressure and Temperature Dual‐Responsive Polystyrene Microbeads

A facile approach to the synthesis of pressure and temperature dual‐responsive polystyrene (PS) microbeads with controlled sizes via dispersion polymerization is described. Three different luminophors are selected and directly introduced into the reaction system and thus incorporated into the resultant PS microbeads during polymerization. By manipulating the reaction conditions, including concentrations of the initiator and monomer, polarity of the reaction medium, and injection rate for the monomer, uniform PS microbeads with sizes ranging from 1 to 5 μm are obtained. When a light source centered at 365 nm is used to excite all the luminophors in the PS beads, three distinct and resolvable emission peaks corresponding well with the luminophors are observed. By taking advantage of their sensitive responses to both pressure and temperature, the PS beads can be utilized for quantitative measurements of these two stimulations simultaneously. The PS beads loaded with multiple luminophors have the ability to serve as building blocks for the fabrication of novel sensing and imaging devices and therefore provide a promising strategy for the study of aerodynamics.     

Mechanical and electronic properties of stoichiometric silicene and germanene oxides from first‐principles

Using first‐principles calculations, we investigate the fully oxidized silicene and germanene with stoichiometric ratio Si:O/Ge:O = 1:1. For both compounds, the zigzag ether‐like conformation (z‐sSiO/z‐sGeO) is found to be the most energetically favorable structure. These z‐sSiO and z‐sGeO nanosheets have prominent elastic characteristics, which even exhibit an unconventional auxetic behavior with negative Poisson ratios. After oxidation, the semi‐metallic nanosheets are transformed into semiconductors with narrow direct band gaps. Due to the anisotropic mechanical and electronic properties, the z‐sSiO and z‐sGeO possess an axially high intrinsic charge mobility up to the order of 10⁴ cm²/Vs, which is comparable to that of graphene nanoribbons. Our studies demonstrate that the silicene and germanene oxides have peculiar mechanical and electronic properties, which endow these nanostructures for potential applications in nanoelectronics and devices. (© 2013 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

微谐振环结构体内太赫兹增强效应

基于严格电磁场理论,给出了微型谐振环形和Fishnet结构体内太赫兹波的严格表达式,并利用电磁场的边界条件分析了太赫兹波在微型谐振环形和Fishnet结构体内空间分布的增强效应。数值模拟结果表明:谐振环金属条附近的电场大于磁场,金属条附近的电场相对其他区域明显要强得多,开口处表现更为突出,太赫兹波在Fishnet结构体内电磁场的峰位处电场和磁场分布关于x对称;电场的极值出现在大十字架的上下四个角,而磁场的极值则出现在小十字架的上下两端点。同时用电磁场传输线理论对该现象作出一定的物理解释。收稿日期:; 修订日期:     

用双波长可见光谱法快速测定半纤维素提取液中糖的含量

传统的Douglas比色法(间苯三酚-冰醋酸显色法)只能测定水溶性聚戊糖或戊糖,该研究对上述方法进行了改进,通过采用双波长技术实现对总糖和戊糖、己糖含量的同时测定。研究发现,425 nm是戊糖和己糖的等摩尔吸收波长,553 nm是戊糖的特征吸收波长,以上述二波长为基础大大简化了双波长法的计算公式。半纤维素提取液中干扰物质的光谱结果显示,提取液中的木素和葡萄糖醛酸对戊糖和己糖的测定结果都没有显著干扰。结果表明,该方法测定总糖和戊糖、己糖的含量都具有较高的精度和准确性,回收率为97.4%~101.9%。该方法简单、快速,非常适用于阔叶木和禾本科植物半纤维素提取液中混合糖含量的同时测定。