Quantitative Theoretical Study of Molecular and Chain-Level Conformational Properties of Poly(ferrocenyldimethylsilanes)

Polyferrocenylsilanes (PFSs) represent an important class of transition metal-containing polymers. In this work, we report a systematical theoretical study of molecular and chain-level conformational properties of the most representative PFS polymer: poly­(ferrocenyldimethylsilane) (PFDMS). The density functional theory (DFT) is employed to search out the complete set of local minimum energy states of dimeric and trimeric PFDMS oligomers. The geometrical and energetic parameters determined for these low-energy conformations provide accurate input information to construct a novel rotational isomeric state (RIS) model for an unperturbed PFDMS chain with any degree of polymerization. To properly treat the special molecular structure of ferrocene units in the standard RIS theoretical framework, an “effective backbone” concept that is generic for the whole PFS class is originally proposed. The resulting RIS theory is used to investigate a wide range of conformational statistical mechanical properties (mean square end-to-end distance, mean square radius of gyration, temperature coefficient, etc.) of an unperturbed PFDMS. The previously unknown characteristic ratio and Kuhn length of PFDMS are quantitatively predicted for the first time (C∞ = 8.4 and lK = 1.9 nm when T = 25 °C). The DFT-RIS combinatory approach developed herein can be readily extended to study single-chain properties of other types of PFS polymers. This generality might urge some interesting new DFT and RIS calculations on a broader range of PFS polymers in the future

Additional file 1: of Unravelling the genomic architecture of bull fertility in Holstein cattle

Descriptive statistics for Sire Conception Rate (SCR): (A) Distribution of SCR values per evaluation, and (B) Distribution of the total number of SCR records per bull (number of repeated measurements). (JPG 135 kb

Additional file 2: of Unravelling the genomic architecture of bull fertility in Holstein cattle

Gene Ontology Molecular Function terms significantly enriched with genes associated with Sire Conception Rate. (DOCX 23 kb

Table_2_Cyclooxygenase-2 and β-Catenin as Potential Diagnostic and Prognostic Markers in Endometrial Cancer.docx

Objectives: Explore the diagnostic and prognostic value of cyclooxygenase-2 and wnt3a/β-catenin pathway in endometrial cancer.Methods: A prospective cohort study of 93 women underwent hysterectomy at the China-Japan Friendship Hospital (61 patients with primary endometrial carcinoma, and 32 control patients with uterine prolapse or leiomyoma of uterus). Cox2 and β-catenin expression were determined by immunohistochemistry. The serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a were detected via ELISA assays.Results: Patients with endometrial cancer showed overexpression of cox2 and β-catenin, as well as significantly higher serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a. The serum cox2 level, which is highly significant in predicting the risk of disease progression (RR, 9.617, 95% confidence interval, 1.162–79.622, P = 0.036), showed good diagnostic and prognostic potential, with cut-off of 55 U/L, but alongside β-catenin expression in tissues, were related to poor prognosis (RR, 12.426; 95% confidence interval, 1.618–95.450; P = 0.015).Conclusion: Serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a exhibited diagnostic value for endometrial cancer. Cox2 serum levels and β-catenin expression also showed potential value of prognostic prediction. Cox2 serum levels might be a potential marker for early diagnosis and prognosis prediction in endometrial cancer.</p

Table_3_Cyclooxygenase-2 and β-Catenin as Potential Diagnostic and Prognostic Markers in Endometrial Cancer.docx

Objectives: Explore the diagnostic and prognostic value of cyclooxygenase-2 and wnt3a/β-catenin pathway in endometrial cancer.Methods: A prospective cohort study of 93 women underwent hysterectomy at the China-Japan Friendship Hospital (61 patients with primary endometrial carcinoma, and 32 control patients with uterine prolapse or leiomyoma of uterus). Cox2 and β-catenin expression were determined by immunohistochemistry. The serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a were detected via ELISA assays.Results: Patients with endometrial cancer showed overexpression of cox2 and β-catenin, as well as significantly higher serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a. The serum cox2 level, which is highly significant in predicting the risk of disease progression (RR, 9.617, 95% confidence interval, 1.162–79.622, P = 0.036), showed good diagnostic and prognostic potential, with cut-off of 55 U/L, but alongside β-catenin expression in tissues, were related to poor prognosis (RR, 12.426; 95% confidence interval, 1.618–95.450; P = 0.015).Conclusion: Serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a exhibited diagnostic value for endometrial cancer. Cox2 serum levels and β-catenin expression also showed potential value of prognostic prediction. Cox2 serum levels might be a potential marker for early diagnosis and prognosis prediction in endometrial cancer.</p

Table_1_Cyclooxygenase-2 and β-Catenin as Potential Diagnostic and Prognostic Markers in Endometrial Cancer.docx

Objectives: Explore the diagnostic and prognostic value of cyclooxygenase-2 and wnt3a/β-catenin pathway in endometrial cancer.Methods: A prospective cohort study of 93 women underwent hysterectomy at the China-Japan Friendship Hospital (61 patients with primary endometrial carcinoma, and 32 control patients with uterine prolapse or leiomyoma of uterus). Cox2 and β-catenin expression were determined by immunohistochemistry. The serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a were detected via ELISA assays.Results: Patients with endometrial cancer showed overexpression of cox2 and β-catenin, as well as significantly higher serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a. The serum cox2 level, which is highly significant in predicting the risk of disease progression (RR, 9.617, 95% confidence interval, 1.162–79.622, P = 0.036), showed good diagnostic and prognostic potential, with cut-off of 55 U/L, but alongside β-catenin expression in tissues, were related to poor prognosis (RR, 12.426; 95% confidence interval, 1.618–95.450; P = 0.015).Conclusion: Serum levels of cox2 and wnt3a exhibited diagnostic value for endometrial cancer. Cox2 serum levels and β-catenin expression also showed potential value of prognostic prediction. Cox2 serum levels might be a potential marker for early diagnosis and prognosis prediction in endometrial cancer.</p

Air quality modeling for effective environmental management in the mining region

<p>Air quality in the mining sector is a serious environmental concern and associated with many health issues. Air quality management in mining regions has been facing many challenges due to lack of understanding of atmospheric factors and physical removal mechanisms. A modeling approach called the mining air dispersion model (MADM) is developed to predict air pollutants concentration in the mining region while considering the deposition effect. The model takes into account the planet’s boundary conditions and assumes that the eddy diffusivity depends on the downwind distance. The developed MADM is applied to a mining site in Canada. The model provides values for the predicted concentrations of PM₁₀, PM_2.5, TSP, NO₂, and six heavy metals (As, Pb, Hg, Cd, Zn, Cr) at various receptor locations. The model shows that neutral stability conditions are dominant for the study site. The maximum mixing height is achieved (1280 m) during the evening in summer, and the minimum mixing height (380 m) is attained during the evening in winter. The dust fall (PM coarse) deposition flux is maximum during February and March with a deposition velocity of 4.67 cm/sec. The results are evaluated with the monitoring field values, revealing a good agreement for the target air pollutants with <i>R</i>-squared ranging from 0.72 to 0.96 for PM_2.5, from 0.71 to 0.82 for PM₁₀, and from 0.71 to 0.89 for NO₂. The analyses illustrate that the presented algorithm in this model can be used to assess air quality for the mining site in a systematic way. Comparisons of MADM and CALPUFF modeling values are made for four different pollutants (PM_2.5, PM₁₀, TSP, and NO₂) under three different atmospheric stability classes (stable, neutral, and unstable). Further, MADM results are statistically tested against CALPUFF for the air pollutants and model performance is found satisfactory.</p> <p><i>Implications</i>: The mathematical model (MADM) is developed by extending the Gaussian equation particularly when examining the settling process of important pollutants for the industrial region. Physical removal effects of air pollutants with field data have been considerred for the MADM development and for an extensive field case study. The model is well validated in the field of an open pit mine to assess the regional air quality. The MADA model helps to facilitate the management of the mining industry in doing estimation of emission rate around mining activities and predicting the resulted concentration of air pollutants together in one integrated approach.</p

No reference objective quality metric for stereoscopic 3D video

The stereoscopic three-dimensional (3D) video technologies have achieved significant success in providing enhanced immersive experience to consumers. However network delivery of 3D video content at good quality levels is challenging mostly due to the variable network conditions. In this context, efficient objective 3D video quality assessment is a critical aspect, in particular for video service providers who need to adjust the video delivery process to the network conditions in real-time. Current objective 3D video quality assessment methods are reference-based, requiring the availability of the original 3D video sequences, which is difficult to achieve in practice. Additionally, most of the existing 3D video quality metrics are developed for depth-enhanced 3D. This paper proposes the No reference objective Video Quality Metric (NVQM) for real-time 3D video quality assessment. NVQM considers the correlation between network packet loss and perceptual video quality for different bit-rate video sequences. NVQM is modeled based on the video quality model specified in ITU-T G.1070 and tuned according to results of extensive subjective tests. NVQM was developed for the evaluation of side-by-side stereoscopic 3D sequences, the most widely commercialized 3D video format. The performance of NVQM is studied by comparing against three state-of-the-art video quality objective models: structural similarity index (SSIM), video quality metric (VQM), and ITU-T G.1070. Results show that NVQM outperforms the existing objective metrics with up to 23% in terms of accuracy

High-Flux Graphene Oxide Nanofiltration Membrane Intercalated by Carbon Nanotubes

A sort of novel high-flux nanofiltration membrane was fabricated by synergistic assembling of graphene and multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs), in which graphene played the role of molecular sieving and MWNTs expanded the interlayer space between neighbored graphene sheets. The MWNT-intercalated graphene nanofiltration membrane (G-CNTm) showed a water flux up to 11.3 L m^–2 h^–1 bar^–1, more than 2 times that of the neat graphene nanofiltration membrane (GNm), while keeping high dye rejection (>99% for Direct Yellow and >96% Methyl Orange). The G-CNTm also showed good rejection ratio for salt ions (i.e., 83.5% for Na₂SO₄, 51.4% for NaCl). We also explored the antifouling performance of G-CNTm and GNm with bovine serum albumin (BSA), sodium alginate (SA) and humic acid (HA). Both G-CNTm and GNm possessed excellent antifouling performance for SA and HA but inferior for BSA because of the strong interaction between protein and graphene sheets

Additional file 2 of Hydrogen sulfide attenuates intracellular oxidative stress via repressing glycolate oxidase activities in Arabidopsis thaliana

Additional file 2: Table S1. List of primers and restriction enzymes used in this study