Browse Articles

H3 lysine 18 lactylation-mediated RRAS2 facilitates migration and invasion of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma

Hydration assessment and physical performance of mountain bike cyclists in competition in a hot environment

Downregulation of UDP-glucose 6-dehydrogenase predicts adverse outcomes in patients with colorectal cancer and promotes tumorigenesis

Effects of LPBF printing parameters on the columnar-to-equiaxed grain transition in FeCoCrNiMn alloys

Exploring the regulatory mechanisms of reproductive dysfunction in obese patients with PCOS

NaLRR-RK4 mediates MAPK signaling to enhance plant defense against Alternaria alternata in Nicotiana attenuata

Neutrophil-targeting drug seeks first approval in an inflammatory lung disease

Research on urban resilience assessment and driving forces based on Production-Living-Ecological Spaces: A case study of the Three Gorges Reservoir Area in China

This study aims to develop a resilience evaluation approach based on production-living-ecological spaces and identify the key drivers of urban resilience in less-developed areas, taking the Three Gorges Reservoir Area in China as a case study. Understanding how to increase urban resilience and how to coordinate the three types of space in urban areas is critical for the healthy and stable development of cities. In this work, we develop an integrated assessment methodology for resilience in three dimensions: production space, living space, and ecological space. The geographical agglomeration impact is studied using the spatial approach, such as the Jenks natural breakpoint method and spatial autocorrelation analysis. Geographic Detectors are used to identify the drivers and to provide tailored optimization solutions. It was discovered that: (1) from 2010 to 2020, the comprehensive resilience of counties in the Three Gorges Reservoir Area of China continues to increase, as does the sub-spatial resilience; (2) both the resilience of counties and the sub-spatial resilience exhibit “unbalanced” characteristics, and the spatial distribution exhibits “randomization”. There appears to be no evident clustering influence; (3) each county’s production space has a high level of resilience, which is the component that has the greatest influence on the county’s total resilience and the living space is next, followed by the ecological space; (4) the vast majority of interactions between the driving factors are two-factor enhancement, with just a small percentage being non-linear enhancement. The study’s findings can provide theoretical guidance and technical help for the study of urban resilience in less-developed locations. Furthermore, the findings are extremely important for the development of resilient cities.

Ultrasound features of myofascial trigger points: a multimodal study integrating preliminary histological findings from the upper trapezius

Investigating health literacy and sociodemographic factors in college students

Energy optimization model of multi-energy system considering distributed photovoltaic coordinated carbon reduction

Comparative analysis of humoral immunity kinetics following three COVID-19 vaccines in a multi-ethnic cohort of medical students and healthcare professionals across Malaysia

Abstract The objective of our study was to evaluate the time-dependent humoral immunity kinetics among multi-ethnic population of medical students and healthcare professionals across Malaysia following two doses of Comirnaty, Vaxzevria, and CoronaVac vaccines. Prospective observational cohort research was carried out from September 2021-March 2023. 242 vaccine recipients have completed the follow-up. After second vaccination dosage, peripheral blood was drawn every four weeks from week 0–24. Anti-S IgG and percentage of neutralization were measured from each individual plasma sample. Recipients of Comirnaty and Vaxzevria vaccine, exhibited adequate anti-S IgG and neutralizing antibody till week 24. In compared to Comirnaty/Vaxzevria vaccine group, CoronaVac group showed significant decrease of antibody as early as week 12. The Comirnaty vaccine peaked anti-S IgG production at week 4, while the Vaxzevria and CoronaVac vaccines peaked at week 2. The Comirnaty vaccine (91.3%) showed strong Ig-RBD neutralizing antibody response even after week 24, which led to the slowest rate of antibody waning when compared to CoronaVac (13%), which never achieves high Ig-RBD neutralizing antibody. The percentage of inhibition of Ig-RBD binding on ACE2 receptor and anti-S IgG seroconversion were significantly higher in the Comirnaty vaccine. The antibody response of Comirnaty was lower in recipients with higher BMIs than in those with normal or low BMIs. Higher BMI, however, was associated with more robust humoral immune responses to Vaxzevria vaccine. Following immunisation, the Chinese and Indian populations might exhibit a stronger humoral immune response than the Malay population.

A novel method for hyoid suspension using a magnetic device in beagles: A preliminary study

Study on the chirality of gyroid photonic crystals in butterfly wing scales

Abstract Some brilliantly colored butterflies are known to possess gyroid photonic crystals in the wing scale. As the gyroid structure is inherently chiral, it is an intriguing question whether the structure has enantiomeric purity or not, considering that biomolecules exhibit homochirality. It has been previously reported for a few lycaenid species that both enantiomeric forms of the gyroid structure are found in multidomain photonic crystals. In this study, we evaluated the chirality of gyroid crystals in the wing scales of the papilionid butterfly Teinopalpus imperialis and found only one enantiomeric form (LH-type) in more than 200 gyroid crystals examined. In another papilionid butterfly, Parides sesostris, the populations of the two enantiomeric forms were found to be highly unbalanced. Because the gyroid crystals of these two butterflies are known to have a strong orientation preference along the surface normal of the scale, we suggest that crystal orientation-controlled development is related to chirality selection. Our findings provide insights into chirality-selected gyroid synthesis in self-organization processes.

PMSM sensorless control based on super-twisting algorithm sliding mode observer with the IAORLS parameter estimations

Antibiofilm efficacy of emodin alone or combined with ampicillin against methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus

Abstract Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is recognized as a significant global health concern. The development of resistance to a broad spectrum of antibiotics, particularly following biofilm formation, renders conventional therapeutic options for MRSA ineffective. Three MRSA clinical isolates were examined in vitro to assess their biofilm-forming capacity and the disruptive effects on pre-established biofilm (via crystal violet staining and scanning electron microscopy), and quantify extracellular DNA (eDNA) release after exposed to emodin alone or in combination with ampicillin. In addition, real-time PCR was employed to investigate the impact of emodin on the expression of biofilm-related genes in MRSA biofilms. The inhibitory effect of emodin on biofilm formation and disruption was observed in a dose dependent manner. The antagonistic activity of emodin in combination with ampicillin against MRSA biofilms was confirmed through adhesion assays. Real-time PCR analysis revealed that emodin, either alone or in combination with ampicillin, effectively downregulated the transcriptional levels of the biofilm-related genes fnbpB , clfA and atlA , but not icaA . In addition, drug treatment resulted in a significant reduction in eDNA release and protein contain in EPS (extracellular polymeric substances), which corresponded to the markedly decreased transcript level of atlA and fnbpB , respectively. These observations suggest that emodin, either alone or in combination with ampicillin, holds potential as a therapeutic approach for MRSA biofilm-related infections.

Upcoming FDA approval decisions in Q3 2025

BHGNN-RT: Capturing bidirectionality and network heterogeneity in graphs

Graph neural networks (GNNs) have shown great promise for representation learning on complex graph-structured data, but existing models often fall short when applied to directed heterogeneous graphs. In this study, we proposed a novel embedding method, a bidirectional heterogeneous graph neural network with random teleport (BHGNN-RT) that leverages the bidirectional message-passing process and network heterogeneity, for directed heterogeneous graphs. Our method captures both incoming and outgoing message flows, integrates heterogeneous edge types through relation-specific transformations, and introduces a teleportation mechanism to mitigate the oversmoothing effect in deep GNNs. Extensive experiments were conducted on various datasets to verify the efficacy and efficiency of BHGNN-RT. BHGNN-RT consistently outperforms state-of-the-art baselines, achieving up to 11.5% improvement in classification accuracy and 19.3% in entity clustering. Additional analyses confirm that optimizing message components, model layer and teleportation proportion further enhances the model performance. These results demonstrate the effectiveness and robustness of BHGNN-RT in capturing structural, directional information in directed heterogeneous graphs.

Different effects of verbal and visual working memory loads on Language prediction

Abstract Mounting studies suggest that working memory (WM) plays a crucial role in language prediction, but how varying types of WM loads influence language prediction remains unclear. This study investigated whether verbal and visual WM loads differentially impact language predictions during speech comprehension. Using a dual-task paradigm combined with eye-tracking in a visual world setting, we asked 48 participants to complete a sentence comprehension task under concurrent WM load conditions. Participants were divided into two groups, one of which performed a visual dots memory task and the other completed a visual words memory task, with memory load being applied in half of the trials. Results revealed anticipatory gaze towards target objects, suggesting the prediction of upcoming linguistic information. Notably, early fixations during the tonal cue window indicated tonal prediction in spoken sentence processing. Furthermore, WM load significantly disrupted participants’ language prediction effects, highlighting the involvement of working memory resources in this process. Importantly, the verbal memory task imposed a more severe disruption to language prediction than the visual memory task, suggesting differential roles of WM subtypes in linguistic prediction. This offers novel insights into how verbal WM and visual-spatial WM differentially influence predictive language processing.

Specific energy reduction in a semi-autogenous grinding mill circuit by an automatic control system

Abstract Grinding operations, especially those involving semi-autogenous mills, account for a significant portion of energy use in mineral processing. In this work, we describe the application of an advanced regulatory control strategy in a copper plant aimed at improving energy efficiency through automation. The system combines cascade and feedforward control structures to attenuate variations in the mill load, a key factor influencing energy consumption and process stability. The control scheme was integrated into the plant’s existing automation infrastructure and evaluated through a three-month industrial trial. By shifting from manual to automatic regulation of the feed rate, the plant reduced the influence of process disturbances and maintained more consistent operation. The automated system achieved a 5.84% reduction in specific energy consumption and a 1.90% increase in productivity. These results demonstrate the potential of enhanced regulatory control to deliver measurable performance gains with minimal changes to existing operations.