Cellulase Recycling after High-Solids Simultaneous Saccharification and Fermentation of Combined Pretreated Corncob

Despite the advantageous prospect of second-generation bioethanol, its final commercialization must overcome the primary cost impediment due to enzyme assumption. To solve this problem, this work achieves high-concentration ethanol fermentation and multi-round cellulase recycling through process integration. The optimal time and temperature of the re-adsorption process were determined by monitoring the adsorption kinetics of cellulases. Both glucose and cellobiose inhibited cellulase adsorption. After 96 h of ethanol fermentation, 40% of the initial cellulase remained in the broth, from which 62.5% of the cellulase can be recycled and reused in fresh substrate re-adsorption for 90 min. Under optimum conditions, i.e., pH 5.0, dry matter loading of 15 wt%, cellulase loading of 45 FPU/g glucan, two cycles of fermentation and re-adsorption can yield two-fold increased ethanol outputs and reduce enzyme costs by over 50%. The ethanol concentration in each cycle can be achieved at levels greater than 40 g/L

Improving Strength and Microstructure of SiC Reticulated Porous Ceramic through In-Situ Generation of SiC Whiskers within Hollow Voids

SiC Reticulated Porous Ceramic with Excellent Strength and High-Density Ceramic Struts Was Successfully Prepared using the Polymer Replica Method, Followed by Pressureless Sintering under a Buried Charcoal Atmosphere. First, a Polyurethane (PU) Template Was Coated with a Si Slurry and Then a SiC-Containing Slurry, and Subsequently Heated under the Buried Charcoal Atmosphere. to Ensure Excellent Coating Ability of the Slurries, the Viscosity, Thixotropy, and Yield Stresses of the Si Slurry Were Optimized by Adjusting the Content of the Thickening Agent. during Heating, Si in the Coating Layer Reacted with the Residual C and CO Gas from the PU Template and Buried Charcoal, Forming SiC Whiskers that Filled Hollow Voids within the SiC Struts. Additionally, Catalyst Ferric Nitrate Was Added to the Si Slurry to Promote the Generation and Growth of SiC Whiskers. as a Result, When Compared to the Untreated SiC Reticulated Porous Ceramic, the SiC Reticulated Porous Ceramic Pre-Coated with Si Layers Exhibited Significant Improvements in Mechanical Strength and Thermal Shock Resistance, Despite Minor Differences in Porosity. Furthermore, an Industrial Test Conducted in the Copper Smelting Industry Showed that the Structure of SiC Reticulated Porous Ceramic, Prepared in This Study and Used as Filters, Remained Intact Even after 7 Days of Continuous Use. Meanwhile, a Significant Number of Inclusions Was Adhered to the Surfaces of the Filters. Therefore, the Processes Combined with In-Situ Generation of SiC Whiskers is an Ideal and Low-Cost Method for Fabricating SiC Filters with Excellent Properties

Loss of androgen signaling in mesenchymal sonic hedgehog responsive cells diminishes prostate development, growth, and regeneration.

Prostate embryonic development, pubertal and adult growth, maintenance, and regeneration are regulated through androgen signaling-mediated mesenchymal-epithelial interactions. Specifically, the essential role of mesenchymal androgen signaling in the development of prostate epithelium has been observed for over 30 years. However, the identity of the mesenchymal cells responsible for this paracrine regulation and related mechanisms are still unknown. Here, we provide the first demonstration of an indispensable role of the androgen receptor (AR) in sonic hedgehog (SHH) responsive Gli1-expressing cells, in regulating prostate development, growth, and regeneration. Selective deletion of AR expression in Gli1-expressing cells during embryogenesis disrupts prostatic budding and impairs prostate development and formation. Tissue recombination assays showed that urogenital mesenchyme (UGM) containing AR-deficient mesenchymal Gli1-expressing cells combined with wildtype urogenital epithelium (UGE) failed to develop normal prostate tissue in the presence of androgens, revealing the decisive role of AR in mesenchymal SHH responsive cells in prostate development. Prepubescent deletion of AR expression in Gli1-expressing cells resulted in severe impairment of androgen-induced prostate growth and regeneration. RNA-sequencing analysis showed significant alterations in signaling pathways related to prostate development, stem cells, and organ morphogenesis in AR-deficient Gli1-expressing cells. Among these altered pathways, the transforming growth factor β1 (TGFβ1) pathway was up-regulated in AR-deficient Gli1-expressing cells. We further demonstrated the activation of TGFβ1 signaling in AR-deleted prostatic Gli1-expressing cells, which inhibits prostate epithelium growth through paracrine regulation. These data demonstrate a novel role of the AR in the Gli1-expressing cellular niche for regulating prostatic cell fate, morphogenesis, and renewal, and elucidate the mechanism by which mesenchymal androgen-signaling through SHH-responsive cells elicits the growth and regeneration of prostate epithelium

Neural Speaker Diarization Using Memory-Aware Multi-Speaker Embedding with Sequence-to-Sequence Architecture

We propose a novel neural speaker diarization system using memory-aware multi-speaker embedding with sequence-to-sequence architecture (NSD-MS2S), which integrates the strengths of memory-aware multi-speaker embedding (MA-MSE) and sequence-to-sequence (Seq2Seq) architecture, leading to improvement in both efficiency and performance. Next, we further decrease the memory occupation of decoding by incorporating input features fusion and then employ a multi-head attention mechanism to capture features at different levels. NSD-MS2S achieved a macro diarization error rate (DER) of 15.9% on the CHiME-7 EVAL set, which signifies a relative improvement of 49% over the official baseline system, and is the key technique for us to achieve the best performance for the main track of CHiME-7 DASR Challenge. Additionally, we introduce a deep interactive module (DIM) in MA-MSE module to better retrieve a cleaner and more discriminative multi-speaker embedding, enabling the current model to outperform the system we used in the CHiME-7 DASR Challenge. Our code will be available at https://github.com/liyunlongaaa/NSD-MS2S.Comment: Submitted to ICASSP 202

TransGCN:Coupling Transformation Assumptions with Graph Convolutional Networks for Link Prediction

Link prediction is an important and frequently studied task that contributes to an understanding of the structure of knowledge graphs (KGs) in statistical relational learning. Inspired by the success of graph convolutional networks (GCN) in modeling graph data, we propose a unified GCN framework, named TransGCN, to address this task, in which relation and entity embeddings are learned simultaneously. To handle heterogeneous relations in KGs, we introduce a novel way of representing heterogeneous neighborhood by introducing transformation assumptions on the relationship between the subject, the relation, and the object of a triple. Specifically, a relation is treated as a transformation operator transforming a head entity to a tail entity. Both translation assumption in TransE and rotation assumption in RotatE are explored in our framework. Additionally, instead of only learning entity embeddings in the convolution-based encoder while learning relation embeddings in the decoder as done by the state-of-art models, e.g., R-GCN, the TransGCN framework trains relation embeddings and entity embeddings simultaneously during the graph convolution operation, thus having fewer parameters compared with R-GCN. Experiments show that our models outperform the-state-of-arts methods on both FB15K-237 and WN18RR

Advances in CAR-NK cell therapy for hematological malignancies

Chimeric antigen receptor T (CAR-T) cell therapy has revolutionized the treatment of hematological malignancies, demonstrably improving patient outcomes and prognosis. However, its application has introduced new challenges, such as safety concerns, off-target toxicities, and significant costs. Natural killer (NK) cells are crucial components of the innate immune system, capable of eliminating tumor cells without prior exposure to specific antigens or pre-activation. This inherent advantage complements the limitations of T cells, making CAR-NK cell therapy a promising avenue for hematological tumor immunotherapy. In recent years, preclinical and clinical studies have yielded preliminary evidence supporting the safety and efficacy of CAR-NK cell therapy in hematological malignancies, paving the way for future advancements in immunotherapy. This review aims to succinctly discuss the characteristics, significant therapeutic progress, and potential challenges associated with CAR-NK cell therapy

Improving the ORR Performance by Enhancing the Pt Oxidation Resistance

Proton exchange membrane fuel cells require oxygen reduction catalysts with high activity and stability. Pt based alloy materials are most widely applied ORR catalyst due to its high intrinsic activity, but usually suffer from rapid deactivation as a result of particle agglomeration, detachment, Ostwald ripening and/or Pt dissolution. Here we investigate the degradation of the PdPt alloys via in situ X-ray absorption fine structure, Δμ analysis, identical location-electron microscopy and DFT calculations. We conclude that the origin of high activity and stability of the PdPt catalyst stems from the oxidation resistance of metallic Pt, forming mainly surface adsorbed O species at high potentials. Two stage degradation process are observed, showing an evolution of dynamic surface dependent ORR performance along with the deactivation process. The careful design of Pt alloy structure leads to controlled surface oxygen behaviours. This opens a new way to increase the lifespan of fuel cells and improve the Pt utilization efficiency

Correlation between dietary patterns and cognitive function in older Chinese adults: A representative cross-sectional study

ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to investigate the relationship between dietary patterns and cognitive function in older adults (≥60 years old).MethodsFood intake was quantitatively assessed by the Food Frequency Questionnaire (FFQ), and cognitive function was assessed by the Chinese version of the Simple Mental State Examination Scale (MMSE). Four major dietary patterns were identified by the factor analysis (FA) method. The relationship between dietary patterns and cognitive function was evaluated by logistic regression.ResultsA total of 884 participants were included in the study. Four dietary patterns (vegetable and mushroom, oil and salt, seafood and alcohol, and oil tea dietary patterns) were extracted. In the total population, Model III results showed that the fourth quartile of dietary pattern factor scores for the vegetable and mushroom pattern was 0.399 and 7.056. The vegetable and mushroom dietary pattern may be a protective factor for cognitive function, with p-value = 0.033, OR (95% CI): 0.578 (0.348, 0.951) in Model III (adjusted for covariates: sex, ethnic, marital, agricultural activities, smoking, drinking, hypertension, diabetes, dyslipidemia, BMI, and dietary fiber). In the ethnic stratification analysis, the scores of dietary pattern factors of the vegetable and mushroom among the Yao participants were 0.333 and 5.064. The Vegetable and mushroom diet pattern may be a protective factor for cognitive function, p-value = 0.012, OR (95% CI): 0.415 (0.206, 0.815).ConclusionThe fourth quartile of the vegetable and mushroom dietary pattern scores showed dose-dependent and a strong correlation with cognitive function. Currently, increasing vegetable and mushroom intake may be one of the effective ways to prevent and mitigate cognitive decline. It is recommended to increase the dietary intake of vegetables and mushroom foods