Utility of cone-beam CT imaging for the determination of feeding vessels during arterial embolization for massive hemoptysis

PURPOSE:We aimed to evaluate the role of cone-beam computed tomography (CT) performed as an adjunct to angiography for the determination of feeding vessels responsible for bleeding during arterial embolization for massive hemoptysis.METHODS:In this retrospective study, 23 patients with massive hemoptysis who underwent cone-beam CT evaluation prior to arterial embolization from December 2014 to December 2017 were included. During the angiographic session, two interventional radiologists selected the possible feeding vessels that were likely to supply the bleeding target lesions. Contrast-enhanced cone-beam CT was performed at the indefinite feeding arteries as an adjunct to angiography to determine whether the artery was a real feeding vessel, based on whether the target lesion was detected in the perfused territory of the study artery on images.RESULTS:Selective cone-beam CT was successfully performed in 21 patients, at 26 possible feeding vessels that were detected by selective angiography. Cone-beam CT determined the feeding vessel in 24 arteries (92.3%) in 19 patients (90.5%). As a result of cone-beam CT findings, 16 of 24 study arteries were judged as definitively not feeding vessels (66.7%) and the remaining 8 study arteries were judged as definitively feeding vessels (33.3%). In 2 of 26 study arteries, cone-beam CT could not determine the feeding vessel (7.7%).CONCLUSION:Cone-beam CT performed as an adjunctive technique to angiography is sufficient to provide adequate information for confident determination of the feeding vessel, which is essential for the operators to perform accurate embolization during arterial embolization for massive hemoptysis

V2C MXene-modified g-C3N4 for enhanced visible-light photocatalytic activity

Increasing the efficiency of charge transfer and separation efficiency of photogenerated carriers are still the main challenges in the field of semiconductor-based photocatalysts. Herein, we synthesized g-C3N4@V2C MXene photocatalyst by modifying g-C3N4 using V2C MXene. The prepared photocatalyst exhibited outstanding photocatalytic performance under visible light. The degradation efficiency of methyl orange by g-C3N4@V2C MXene photocatalyst was as high as 94.5%, which is 1.56 times higher than that by g-C3N4. This was attributed to the V2C MXene inhibiting the rapid recombination of photogenerated carriers and facilitating rapid transfer of photogenerated electrons (e) from g-C3N4 to MXene. Moreover, g-C3N4@V2C MXene photocatalyst showed good cycling stability. The photocatalytic performance was higher than 85% after three cycles. Experiments to capture free radicals revealed that superoxide radicals (02) are the main contributors to the photocatalytic activity. Thus, the proposed g-C3N4@V2C MXene photocatalyst is a promising visible-light catalyst.Comment: 20 pages, 9 figure

Monitoring monthly surface water dynamics of Dongting Lake using Sentinel-1 data at 10 m

High temporal resolution water distribution maps are essential for surface water monitoring because surface water exhibits significant inner-annual variation. Therefore, high-frequency remote sensing data are needed for surface water mapping. Dongting Lake, the second-largest freshwater lake in China, is famous for the seasonal fluctuations of its inundation extents in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River. It is also greatly affected by the Three Gorges Project. In this study, we used Sentinel-1 data to generate surface water maps of Dongting Lake at 10 m resolution. First, we generated the Sentinel-1 time series backscattering coefficient for VH and VV polarizations at 10 m resolution by using a monthly composition method. Second, we generated the thresholds for mapping surface water at 10 m resolution with monthly frequencies using Sentinel-1 data. Then, we derived the monthly surface water distribution product of Dongting Lake in 2016, and finally, we analyzed the inner-annual surface water dynamics. The results showed that: (1) The thresholds were −21.56 and −15.82 dB for the backscattering coefficients for VH and VV, respectively, and the overall accuracy and Kappa coefficients were above 95.50% and 0.90, respectively, for the VH backscattering coefficient, and above 94.50% and 0.88, respectively, for the VV backscattering coefficient. The VV backscattering coefficient achieved lower accuracy due to the effect of the wind causing roughness on the surface of the water. (2) The maximum and minimum areas of surface water were 2040.33 km2 in July, and 738.89 km2 in December. The surface water area of Dongting Lake varied most significantly in April and August. The permanent water acreage in 2016 was 556.35 km2, accounting for 19.65% of the total area of Dongting Lake, and the acreage of seasonal water was 1525.21 km2. This study proposed a method to automatically generate monthly surface water at 10 m resolution, which may contribute to monitoring surface water in a timely manner

Utility of intra-procedural cone-beam computed tomography imaging for the determination of the artery of Adamkiewicz suspected by angiography during transarterial embolization for hemoptysis

PURPOSETo evaluate the role of cone-beam computed tomography (CT) performed for the determination of the artery of Adamkiewicz (AKA) suspected by angiography during trans-catheter bronchial artery embolization for hemoptysis.METHODSIn this retrospective study, 17 patients with hemoptysis who underwent cone-beam CT for evaluation of the AKA prior to arterial embolization from December 2014 to March 2022 were included. During the angiographic session, two interventional radiologists selected the possible AKAs that were defined as obscured hairpin-curved vessels arising from the dorsal branch of the intercostal arteries and running towards the midline in the arterially enhanced phase. Contrast-enhanced cone-beam CT was performed as an adjunct to angiography to determine whether the indefinite AKA was a real AKA based on whether it was found to connect to the anterior spinal artery.RESULTSSelective cone-beam CT was performed at 17 possible AKAs detected by selective arteriogram of the intercostal artery (ICA). Cone-beam CT allowed for the determination of AKAs in 16 cases (94.1%). As a result of cone-beam CT findings, 9 of 16 study arteries (56.3%) were judged as definite AKAs, and the remaining 7 (43.7%) were judged as definitely not AKAs but as the musculocutaneous branching from the dorsal branch of the ICA. In 1 of 17 cases (5.9%), cone-beam CT could not determine the AKA because of poor image quality caused by inadequate breath holding. An additional anterior radiculomedullary artery arising from the dorsal branch of the lower ICA because of the inflow of the contrast medium through the anastomosis was detected in one case by conebeam CT but not by angiography.CONCLUSIONIntraprocedural enhanced cone-beam CT performed as an adjunctive technique to angiography is sufficient for confident determination of the AKA, which is essential for the operators to perform accurate and safe arterial embolization for hemoptysis

Exploiting Code Diversity to Enhance Code Virtualization Protection

Code virtualization built upon virtual machine (VM)technologies is emerging as a viable method for implementing code obfuscation to protect programs against unauthorized analysis. State-of-the-art VM-based protection approaches use a fixed set of virtual instructions and bytecode interpreters across programs. This, however, exposes a security vulnerability where an experienced attacker can use knowledge extracted from other programs to quickly uncover the mapping between virtual instructions and native code for applications protected under the same scheme. In this paper, we propose a novel VM-based code obfuscation system to address this problem. The core idea of our approach is to obfuscate the mapping between the opcodes of bytecode instructions and their semantics. We achieve this by partitioning each protected code region into multiple segments where the mapping of opcodes and their semantics is randomized in different ways in different segments. In this way, each bytecode instruction will be translated into different native code in different sections of the obfuscated code. This significantly increases the diversity of the program behavior. As a result, the knowledge of bytecode to native code mappings obtained from other programs will be less useful when targeting a new program. We evaluate our approach on a set of real-world applications and compare it against two state-of-the-art VM-based code obfuscation approaches. Experimental results show that our approach is effective, which provides stronger protection with comparable runtime overhead and code size

Transcription factors NF-YB involved in embryogenesis and hormones responses in Dimocarpus Longan Lour

IntroductionNF-YB transcription factor is an important regulatory factor in plant embryonic development.ResultsIn this study, 15 longan NF-YB (DlNF-YB) family genes were systematically identified in the whole genome of longan, and a comprehensive bioinformatics analysis of DlNF-YB family was performed. Comparative transcriptome analysis of DlNF-YBs expression in different tissues, early somatic embryogenesis (SE), and under different light and temperature treatments revealed its specific expression profiles and potential biological functions in longan SE. The qRT-PCR results implied that the expression patterns of DlNF-YBs were different during SE and the zygotic embryo development of longan. Supplementary 2,4-D, NPA, and PP333 in longan EC notably inhibited the expression of DlNF-YBs; ABA, IAA, and GA3 suppressed the expressions of DlNF-YB6 and DlNF-YB9, but IAA and GA3 induced the other DlNF-YBs. Subcellular localization indicated that DlNF-YB6 and DlNF-YB9 were located in the nucleus. Furthermore, verification by the modified 5'RNA Ligase Mediated Rapid Amplification of cDNA Ends (5' RLM-RACE) method demonstrated that DlNF-YB6 was targeted by dlo-miR2118e, and dlo-miR2118e regulated longan somatic embryogenesis (SE) by targeting DlNF-YB6. Compared with CaMV35S- actuated GUS expression, DlNF-YB6 and DlNF-YB9 promoters significantly drove GUS expression. Meanwhile, promoter activities were induced to the highest by GA3 but suppressed by IAA. ABA induced the activities of the promoter of DlNF-YB9, whereas it inhibited the promoter of DlNF-YB6.DiscussionHence, DlNF-YB might play a prominent role in longan somatic and zygotic embryo development, and it is involved in complex plant hormones signaling pathways