RCLane: Relay Chain Prediction for Lane Detection

Lane detection is an important component of many real-world autonomous systems. Despite a wide variety of lane detection approaches have been proposed, reporting steady benchmark improvements over time, lane detection remains a largely unsolved problem. This is because most of the existing lane detection methods either treat the lane detection as a dense prediction or a detection task, few of them consider the unique topologies (Y-shape, Fork-shape, nearly horizontal lane) of the lane markers, which leads to sub-optimal solution. In this paper, we present a new method for lane detection based on relay chain prediction. Specifically, our model predicts a segmentation map to classify the foreground and background region. For each pixel point in the foreground region, we go through the forward branch and backward branch to recover the whole lane. Each branch decodes a transfer map and a distance map to produce the direction moving to the next point, and how many steps to progressively predict a relay station (next point). As such, our model is able to capture the keypoints along the lanes. Despite its simplicity, our strategy allows us to establish new state-of-the-art on four major benchmarks including TuSimple, CULane, CurveLanes and LLAMAS.Comment: ECCV 202

No evidence of a causal relationship between ankylosing spondylitis and cardiovascular disease: a two-sample Mendelian randomization study

ObjectiveObservational studies have suggested an increased risk of cardiovascular disease in individuals with ankylosing spondylitis. However, these studies are prone to confounding factors and reverse causality. To address these limitations, we conducted a Mendelian randomization study to assess the causal relationship between AS and CVD.MethodsThe study population comprises 9,069 individuals with ankylosing spondylitis and 509,093 individuals with either of six common cardiovascular diseases and a related indicator. Causal analysis using summary effect estimates and inverse variance weighting were employed as the main methods.ResultsThe CAUSE analysis showed no evidence of a causal relationship between AS and CVD. The odds ratios for total CVD, heart failure, myocardial infarction, valvular heart disease, ischemic heart disease, and venous thromboembolism, Arterial stiffness index, were as follows: OR, 1.01; 95% confidence interval, 0.96–1.05; P = 0.91; OR, 1.03; 95% CI, 0.99–1.08; P = 0.50; OR, 0.94; 95% CI, 0.86–1.03; P = 0.53; OR, 0.99; 95% CI, 0.94–1.04; P = 0.99; OR, 0.98; 95% CI, 0.91–1.04; P = 0.94; OR, 0.98; 95% CI, 0.91–1.04; P = 0.99; β, −0.0019; 95% CI, 0.97–1.01; P = 0.99. The IVW and weighted median methods also yielded consistent results, and no heterogeneity or pleiotropy was found. Likewise, a reverse Mendelian randomization analysis did not uncover a heritable causal relationship between AS and CVD.ConclusionThis Mendelian randomization study does not support a causal relationship between AS and CVD. Further research is needed to confirm this association

Regional catastrophic health expenditure and health inequality in China.

BackgroundCatastrophic health expenditures (CHE) can trigger illness-caused poverty and compound poverty-caused illness. Our study is the first regional comparative study to analyze CHE trends and health inequality in eastern, central and western China, exploring the differences and disparities across regions to make targeted health policy recommendations.MethodsUsing data from China's Household Panel Study (CFPS), we selected Shanghai, Henan and Gansu as representative eastern-central-western regional provinces to construct a unique 5-year CHE unbalanced panel dataset. CHE incidence was measured by calculating headcount; CHE intensity was measured by overshoot and CHE inequality was estimated by concentration curves (CC) and the concentration index (CI). A random effect model was employed to analyze the impact of household head socio-economic characteristics, the household socio-economic characteristics and household health utilization on CHE incidence across the three regions.ResultsThe study found that the incidence and intensity of CHE decreased, but the degree of CHE inequality increased, across all three regions. For all regions, the trend of inequality first decreased and then increased. We also revealed significant differences across the eastern, central and western regions of China in CHE incidence, intensity, inequality and regional differences in the CHE influencing factors. Affected by factors such as the gap between the rich and the poor and the uneven distribution of medical resources, families in the eastern region who were unmarried, use supplementary medical insurance, and had members receiving outpatient treatment were more likely to experience CHE. Families with chronic diseases in the central and western regions were more likely to suffer CHE, and rural families in the western region were more likely to experience CHE.ConclusionsThe trends and causes of CHE varied across the different regions, which requires a further tilt of medical resources to the central and western regions; improved prevention and financial support for chronic diseases households; and reform of the insurance reimbursement policy of outpatient medical insurance. On a regional basis, health policy should not only address CHE incidence and intensity, but also its inequality

Reaction Chemistry and Kinetics of Corn Stalk Pyrolysis without and with Ga/HZSM-5

The bifunctional Ga/HZSM-5 catalyst has been proven having the capability to increase the selectivity of aromatics production during catalytic pyrolysis of furan and woody biomass. However, the reaction chemistry and kinetics of pyrolysis of herbaceous biomass promoted by Ga/HZSM-5 is rarely reported. Pyrolysis–gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (Py–GC/MS) analysis and non-isothermal thermogravimetric analysis at four heating rates were carried out to investigate the decomposition behavior and pyrolysis kinetics of corn stalk without and with Ga/HZSM-5. The effective activation energies for corn stalk pyrolysis were calculated by using the Friedman isoconversional method. The Py–GC/MS analysis results indicated that the Ga/HZSM-5 catalyst had a high selectivity toward producing the aromatic chemicals of xylene, toluene and benzene, whereas the major products from non-catalytic pyrolysis of corn stalk were oxygenated compounds. The presence of Ga/HZSM-5 could significantly reduce the effective activation energies of corn stalk pyrolysis from 159.9–352.4 kJ mol−1 to 41.6–99.8 kJ mol−1 in the conversion range of 0.10–0.85

Robust estimation of bacterial cell count from optical density

Optical density (OD) is widely used to estimate the density of cells in liquid culture, but cannot be compared between instruments without a standardized calibration protocol and is challenging to relate to actual cell count. We address this with an interlaboratory study comparing three simple, low-cost, and highly accessible OD calibration protocols across 244 laboratories, applied to eight strains of constitutive GFP-expressing E. coli. Based on our results, we recommend calibrating OD to estimated cell count using serial dilution of silica microspheres, which produces highly precise calibration (95.5% of residuals <1.2-fold), is easily assessed for quality control, also assesses instrument effective linear range, and can be combined with fluorescence calibration to obtain units of Molecules of Equivalent Fluorescein (MEFL) per cell, allowing direct comparison and data fusion with flow cytometry measurements: in our study, fluorescence per cell measurements showed only a 1.07-fold mean difference between plate reader and flow cytometry data

DNA Nunchucks: Nanoinstrumentation for Single-Molecule Measurement of Structure-Dependent DNA Bending and Dynamics

We present the design and application of a novel nanoscale instrument, the “DNA nunchuck”, which enables the dynamic measurement of bend angles in short double- stranded DNA (dsDNA) molecules. The DNA nunchuck, leveraging stiff, fluorescently- labeled DNA nanotubes, mechanically magnifies the orientations of an embedded dsDNA strand, allowing for precise angle determination through fluorescence imaging techniques combined with neural network image analysis. The validation of the DNA nunchuck tech- nique is demonstrated by reproducing expected relationships between nunchuck angular variance and dsDNA length, corroborating its effectiveness in accurately measuring DNA bending. Further application of the DNA nunchuck uncovers the dynamic mechanical behavior of short dsDNA sequences, particularly the existence of meta-stable bent states that have eluded detection with previous methodologies. Detailed analysis of nunchucks with a 37 bp embedded strand identifies a significant bent state, or “kink”, with a mean angle of 54 ± 2◦, providing insight into the anomalous high cyclization frequency ob- served in short dsDNA. This kinked state accounts for a substantial proportion of the observed bending dynamics at room temperature. The combined findings from the DNA nunchuck’s applications significantly advance our understanding of mechanical properties of dsDNA, contributing to a deeper understanding of its role in biological processes and its potential in nanoscale engineering. The work sets a precedent for future quantitativestudies of DNA mechanics and dynamics at the single-molecule level