Development and validation of the perceived restorative soundscape scale for children

IntroductionProlonged exposure to noise environments can induce stress and fatigue, even impacting individuals’ physical and mental health. Conversely, positive soundscapes can have a beneficial impact on health by alleviating stress and fatigue, promoting psychological recovery. To assess the restorative potential of soundscapes, various scales have been developed to create environments conducive to recovery. However, current research on perceptual restorativeness soundscape scales primarily focuses on adults, lacking a dedicated scale for children to evaluate the restorative potential of their surrounding acoustic environments from their perspective.MethodsTherefore, this study introduces the development and validation process of the Perceived Restorativeness of Soundscapes Scale for Children (PRSS-C) using survey questionnaires and data statistical analysis.ResultsThe study comprises two experiments. Experiment one aims to develop an effective PRSS-C, evaluating the restorative potential of soundscapes in different environments (urban center, urban suburb, and urban peripheral forest) among 185 children aged 10-12. Through a series of analyses, a dual-factor structure scale consisting of 15 items is developed, revealing that the restorative potential of soundscapes is lower in urban centers than in urban suburbs and lower in urban suburbs than in urban peripheral forests. Experiment two aims to further validate the effectiveness of PRSS-C. 244 children aged 10-12 assess the restorative potential of soundscapes in similar environments (two city parks) using the PRSS-C developed in experiment one. Factor analysis confirms the dual-factor structure, with assessment results indicating that the restorative potential of soundscapes in Temple of Heaven Park is lower than in the National Botanical Garden. This suggests that PRSS-C enables children to differentiate the restorative potential of soundscapes in similar environments within the same city, further confirming its effectiveness.DiscussionThis study successfully develops and validates the PRSS-C through two experiments. The use of this scale allows for the assessment of the restorative potential of acoustic environments surrounding children, providing an effective tool for evaluating and creating positive soundscapes for children

Glycyrrhizin inhibits the invasion and metastasis of breast cancer cells via upregulation of expressions of miR-200c and e-cadherin

Purpose: To determine the inhibitory effect of glycyrrhizin (GLA) on cell invasion and metastasis in mammary carcinoma cells, and the mechanisms of actions involved.Methods: The effect of GLA at different concentrations on proliferation of breast cancer MDA-MB-231 and BT549 cells was assayed by MTT method. Transwell assay was used to determine the effect of GLA at different concentrations on invasiveness and metastasis of breast cancer MDA-MB-231 and BT549 cells. The influence of LGA on expressions of microRNA-200c and miR-200c was assayed by reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR).Results: There was no statistically significant difference in cell proliferation amongst cells treated with 5 and 20 μM GLA and untreated breast cancer cells. However, the proliferation of cells treated with 40 μM GLA was significantly reduced (p < 0.05). In the cell invasion and migration experiments, cell population transferred to the base of Transwell chamber in the two cell lines treated with GLA was markedly decreased, relative to cells without GLA treatment, while the number of cells decreased with increase in GLA concentration (p < 0.05). Results from image-pro-plus analysis revealed that the population of cells quantitatively crossing the Transwell compartment membrane decreased with increase in GLA concentration (p < 0.05). The expression of e-cadherin was increased by GLA treatment in a concentration-dependent manner. Moreover, GLA treatment led to significant changes in amounts of miR-200s a, b and c, with changes in miR-200c being the most significant (p < 0.05).Conclusion: GLA suppresses the invasiveness and metastasis of breast cancer MDA-MB-231 and BT549 cells via upregulation of the expressions of miR-200c and e-cadherin. These findings provide a theoretical basis for the development of new breast cancer drugs. Keywords: Glycyrrhiza, GLA, miR-200c, E-cadherin, Inhibition, Breast cancer cells, Invasion, Metastasi

Ginsenoside induces cell death in breast cancer cells via ROS/PI3K/Akt signaling pathway

Purpose: To study the influence of ginsenoside on breast carcinoma, and the mechanism of action involved.Methods: Different concentrations of ginsenoside were used to treat MCF-7 breast cancer cell line. Cell viability was measured by MTT assay, while protein expressions of p-Akt and p-PI3K were determined using Western blotting. The concentrations of reactive oxidative reactants and reactive oxygen species (ROS) were assessed using fluorescence immunoassay and immunofluorescence assay. The mechanism of action involved in ginsenoside-mediated apoptosis was determined based on ROS/PI3K/Akt signaling pathway.Results: There was no change in the inhibition of MCF-7 cell proliferation in control cells with time (p > 0.05). However, inhibition of MCF-7 cell proliferation in ginsenoside group was significantly higher than that in the control group (p < 0.05); furthermore, it increased with time and ginsenoside concentration. Apoptosis was markedly and concentration-dependently higher in ginsenoside-treated MCF-7 cells than in controls (p > 0.05). There were lower protein levels of p-PI3K and p-Akt in ginsenoside-exposed MCF-7 cells than in control group; the protein expressions  decreased with increase in ginsenoside concentration (p < 0.05). The expressions of ROS in ginsenoside-treated MCF-7 cells declined, relative to the untreated group; in addition, the expressions decreased with increase in ginsenoside concentration (p < 0.05).Conclusion: Ginsenoside suppresses proliferation of MCF-7 cell line, and exerts apoptotic effect on the cells via inhibition of the ROS/PI3K/Akt signal pathway. This provides a new approach to treat breast cancer. Keywords: Breast cancer cells, Ginsenoside, Apoptosis, ROS/PI3K/Akt signaling pathwa

DRL-GAN: dual-stream representation learning GAN for low-resolution image classification in UAV applications.

Identifying tiny objects from extremely low resolution (LR) UAV-based remote sensing images is generally considered as a very challenging task, because of very limited information in the object areas. In recent years, there have been very limited attempts to approach this problem. These attempts intend to deal with LR image classification by enhancing either the poor image quality or image representations. In this paper, we argue that the performance improvement in LR image classification is affected by the inconsistency of the information loss and learning priority on Low-Frequency (LF) components and High-Frequency (HF) components. To address this LF-HF inconsistency problem, we propose a Dual-Stream Representation Learning Generative Adversarial Network (DRL-GAN).The core idea is to produce super image representations optimal for LR recognition by simultaneously recovering the missing information in LF and HF components, respectively, under the guidance of high-resolution (HR) images. We evaluate the performance of DRL-GAN on the challenging task of LR image classification. A comparison of the experimental results on the LR benchmark, namely HRSC and CIFAR-10, and our newly collected “WIDER-SHIP” dataset demonstrates the effectiveness of our DRL-GAN, which significantly improves the classification performance, with up to 10% gain on average

Mejora del Rendimiento Académico Mediante la Aplicación de Metodologías de Trabajo en Equipo y Sistemas de Respuesta Inmediata en la Universidad China

La apertura educativa de China a través de acuerdos académicos con diferentes instituciones de formación superior del resto del mundo, supone también la posibilidad de aplicar herramientas y metodologías bien conocidas en contextos en los que su aplicación no se llevaba a cabo hasta ahora. En este sentido el presente trabajo persigue aplicar diferentes metodologías y herramientas para la gestión del trabajo en equipo y sistemas de respuesta presencial. Para ello se lleva a cabo un estudio cuasi-experimental en la Escuela Mecánica de la Universidad de Xiangtang durante tres años. En dicho estudio se observa el rendimiento académico de los alumnos en dos asignaturas, una como grupo de control y otra como grupo experimental. El grupo de control sigue el proceso tradicional de enseñanza en la Universidad China y en el grupo experimental un profesor de intercambio español adapta herramientas al contexto chino para fomentar el trabajo en equipo e incrementar la participación de los alumnos en clase. Los resultados obtenidos muestran un incremento de la participación de los estudiantes y de su rendimiento académico en la asignatura donde se aplicaron las diferentes técnicas y herramientas

Energy and Economic Analysis of Life Cycle Zero Energy Building in the Temperate Region

Life cycle zero energy buildings (LCZEBs) can present energy use more accurately than net zero energy buildings (NZEBs). Economic benefits are crucial for residents to accept LCZEBs. However, few relevant case studies have been conducted. A comparative analysis between a NZEB and a LCZEB with a multi-story apartment in a temperate region that meets the requirements of local building energy codes as the reference building was conducted in this study to ascertain economic feasibility of LCZEB. First, a building model and an energy model were established on the basis of site test, survey, and monitoring data. Then, the energy balances of the NZEB and LCZEB were calculated on the basis of the results of energy simulation and the foregoing data. Finally, the LCZEB and NZEB were realized on the condition that high thermal performance materials and high energy efficiency building equipment were adopted in accordance with the principle of maximizing net present value (NPV) and solar energy was fully utilized. Results demonstrate that solar hot water and photovoltaic systems are critical to the NZEB and LCZEB. Annual net energy (ANE) and annual NPV per square meter of thermal collector are −571.11 kWh and $455.5, respectively, and ANE and annual NPV per square meter of photovoltaic panel are −115.62 kWh and$13.2. The NZEB and LCZEB are economically feasible in the temperate region although the NZEB is superior to the LCZEB in terms of economic benefits. Their NPVs for the calculation period (20 years) are $15369.64 and$4718.77, and their payback periods are 11 and 16 years. This study can provide references for energy and economic optimization of NZEBs and LCZEBs

Rethinking the Metric in Few-shot Learning: From an Adaptive Multi-Distance Perspective

Few-shot learning problem focuses on recognizing unseen classes given a few labeled images. In recent effort, more attention is paid to fine-grained feature embedding, ignoring the relationship among different distance metrics. In this paper, for the first time, we investigate the contributions of different distance metrics, and propose an adaptive fusion scheme, bringing significant improvements in few-shot classification. We start from a naive baseline of confidence summation and demonstrate the necessity of exploiting the complementary property of different distance metrics. By finding the competition problem among them, built upon the baseline, we propose an Adaptive Metrics Module (AMM) to decouple metrics fusion into metric-prediction fusion and metric-losses fusion. The former encourages mutual complementary, while the latter alleviates metric competition via multi-task collaborative learning. Based on AMM, we design a few-shot classification framework AMTNet, including the AMM and the Global Adaptive Loss (GAL), to jointly optimize the few-shot task and auxiliary self-supervised task, making the embedding features more robust. In the experiment, the proposed AMM achieves 2% higher performance than the naive metrics fusion module, and our AMTNet outperforms the state-of-the-arts on multiple benchmark datasets

胃食道逆流症における好酸球性食道炎の頻度とタイトジャンクション蛋白の変動に関する前向き研究

研究科: 千葉大学大学院医学薬学府学位:千大院医薬博甲第医1127号要約博士(医学)千葉大

Clinical and molecular profiling of EGFR-mutant lung adenocarcinomas transformation to small cell lung cancer during TKI treatment

IntroductionSmall cell lung cancer (SCLC) transformation serves as a significant mechanism of resistance to tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) in advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutations. To address this clinical challenge, we conducted a retrospective analysis at Zhejiang University School of Medicine, the First Affiliated Hospital, focusing on patients with EGFR sensitizing mutations.MethodsA total of 1012 cases were included in this retrospective analysis. The cohort primarily consisted of patients with EGFR sensitizing mutations. Biopsy-confirmed small cell transformation was observed in seven patients, accounting for 0.7% of the cases. All patients in this subset were initially diagnosed with stage IV adenocarcinoma (ADC), with four cases classified as poorly differentiated and three as moderately to poorly differentiated ADC. EGFR exon 19 deletions were identified in five of these cases. Next-generation sequencing (NGS) was performed on seven cases, revealing mutations in the tumor protein p53 (TP53) gene in four cases and loss of the retinoblastoma1 (RB1) gene in three cases.ResultsThe median duration from the initial diagnosis to small cell transformation was 35.9 months (interquartile range: 12.1–84 months). Following small cell transformation during EGFR inhibition, all patients received etoposide/platinum-based treatment, leading to a median progression-free survival (PFS) of 4.7 months (interquartile range: 2.7–10.1 months). Notably, most patients in this series had poorly differentiated adenocarcinomas at the outset. TP53 mutations and RB1 loss were common genetic alterations observed in patients with small cell transformation in this cohort.DiscussionThe findings underscore the clinical significance of SCLC transformation as a resistance mechanism to EGFR TKIs in NSCLC with EGFR mutations. The observed genetic alterations, including TP53 mutations and RB1 loss, suggest potential associations with the transformation process and warrant further investigation. Understanding the genetic landscape and clinical outcomes in patients experiencing small cell transformation can contribute to improved strategies for managing resistance in EGFR-mutant NSCLC

Genome-wide QTL mapping for stripe rust resistance in spring wheat line PI 660122 using the Wheat 15K SNP array

IntroductionStripe rust is a global disease of wheat. Identification of new resistance genes is key to developing and growing resistant varieties for control of the disease. Wheat line PI 660122 has exhibited a high level of stripe rust resistance for over a decade. However, the genetics of stripe rust resistance in this line has not been studied. A set of 239 recombinant inbred lines (RILs) was developed from a cross between PI 660122 and an elite Chinese cultivar Zhengmai 9023.MethodsThe RIL population was phenotyped for stripe rust response in three field environments and genotyped with the Wheat 15K single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) array.ResultsA total of nine quantitative trait loci (QTLs) for stripe rust resistance were mapped to chromosomes 1B (one QTL), 2B (one QTL), 4B (two QTLs), 4D (two QTLs), 6A (one QTL), 6D (one QTL), and 7D (one QTL), of which seven QTLs were stable and designated as QYrPI660122.swust-4BS, QYrPI660122.swust-4BL, QYrPI660122.swust-4DS, QYrPI660122.swust-4DL, QYrZM9023.swust-6AS, QYrZM9023.swust-6DS, and QYrPI660122.swust-7DS. QYrPI660122.swust-4DS was a major all-stage resistance QTL explaining the highest percentage (10.67%–20.97%) of the total phenotypic variation and was mapped to a 12.15-cM interval flanked by SNP markers AX-110046962 and AX-111093894 on chromosome 4DS.DiscussionThe QTL and their linked SNP markers in this study can be used in wheat breeding to improve resistance to stripe rust. In addition, 26 lines were selected based on stripe rust resistance and agronomic traits in the field for further selection and release of new cultivars