A comparison of the performance of 68Ga-Pentixafor PET/CT versus adrenal vein sampling for subtype diagnosis in primary aldosteronism

ObjectiveTo investigate the diagnostic efficiency and prognostic value of 68Ga-Pentixafor PET/CT in comparison with adrenal vein sampling (AVS) for functional lateralization in primary aldosteronism (PA). Histology and long-term clinical follow-up normally serve as the gold standard for such diagnosis.MethodsWe prospectively recruited 26 patients diagnosed with PA. All patients underwent 68Ga-Pentixafor PET/CT and AVS. Postsurgical biochemical and clinical outcomes of patients with unilateral primary aldosteronism (UPA), as diagnosed by PET/CT or AVS, were assessed by applying standardized Primary Aldosteronism Surgical Outcome (PASO) criteria. Immunohistochemistry (IHC) was performed to detect the expression of aldosterone synthase (CYP11B2) and CXCR4.ResultsOn total, 19 patients were diagnosed with UPA; of these, 13 patients were lateralized by both PET/CT and AVS, four patients were lateralized by PET-only, and two by AVS-only. Seven subjects with no lateralization on AVS and PET received medical therapy. All patients achieved complete biochemical success except one with nodular hyperplasia lateralized by AVS alone. The consistency between PET/CT and AVS outcomes was 77% (20/26). Moreover, CYP11B2-positive nodules were all CXCR4-positive and showed positive findings on PET. Patients who achieved complete biochemical and clinical success had a higher uptake on PET as well as stronger expression levels of CXCR4 and CYP11B2.ConclusionOur analysis showed that 68Ga-Pentixafor PET/CT could enable non-invasive diagnosis in most patients with PA and identify additional cases of unilateral and surgically curable PA which could not be classified by AVS. 68Ga-Pentixafor PET/CT should be considered as a first-line test for the future classification of PA

Axial Compression Performance and Ultrasonic Testing of Multicavity Concrete-Filled Steel Tube Shear Wall under Axial Load

In this study, the mechanical performance of multicavity concrete-filled steel tube (CFST) shear wall under axial compressive loading is investigated through experimental, numerical, and theoretical methodologies. Further, ultrasonic testing is used to assess the accumulated damage in the core concrete. Two specimens are designed for axial compression test to study the effect of concrete strength and steel ratio on the mechanical behavior of multicavity CFST shear wall. Furthermore, a three-dimensional (3D) finite element model is established for parametric studies to probe into compound effect between multicavity steel tube and core concrete. Based on finite element simulation and limit equilibrium theory, a practical formula is proposed for calculating the axial compressive bearing capacity of the multicavity CFST shear wall, and the corresponding calculation results are found to be in good agreement with the experimental results. This indicates that the proposed formula can serve as a useful reference for engineering applications. In addition, the ultrasonic testing results revealed that the damage process of core concrete under axial load can be divided into three stages: extension of initial cracks (elastic stage), compaction due to hooping effect (elastic-plastic stage), and overall failure of the concrete (failure stage)

Efficient and Generalized Image-Based CNN Algorithm for Multi-Class Malware Detection

With the popularity of electronic devices, the number of malware has increased dramatically, posing a serious threat to the digital world. Accurately identifying malware has become a research focus. However, there are many difficulties in the research, such as insufficient algorithm generalization ability, unbalanced datasets, and long processing and identification times. To address these problems, this study proposes a malware detection framework (VBDN) based on a convolutional neural network (CNN). The framework incorporates data visualization, balanced adoption, data augmentation, and convolutional neural network techniques to achieve over 90% accuracy in classifying malware on all four open-source datasets. The experimental work has two other contributions: first, it not only focuses on the overall recognition effect of the algorithm during the research process, but also on the recognition effect of each category with the help of a confusion matrix, which provides useful information for cybersecurity personnel, researchers, and others to carry out subsequent targeted research. Secondly, the balanced approach adopted in this paper has the following advantages: no need to construct a new dataset, consumes fewer hardware resources, automatically evaluates the sampling weights, etc. Additionally, to enhance the generalization ability of the algorithm and alleviate the overfitting problem, this paper employs data augmentation techniques to improve the adopted method. By comparing with several state-of-the-art algorithms, it can be observed that the VBDN framework proposed in this paper achieves the desired results in time with acceptable accuracy

Clinical and epidemiological features of heart-hand syndrome, an updated analysis in China

Background: The purpose of this study was to prospectively recruit patients treated with limb malformation and to explore the prevalence and the clinical and epidemiological features of Heart-Hand Syndrome (HHS) in China. Methods: The consecutive patients treated for congenital upper limb malformation in Beijing Ji Shui Tan Hospital from October 1st, 2016 to October 1st, 2019 were prospectively recruited. We reviewed the patients’ medical records and identified patients with abnormal electrocardiogram (ECG) and/or abnormal ultrasonic cardiogram as well as their basic demographic and clinical characteristics. Results: A total 1653 (1053 male and 600 female) patients with congenital upper extremity malformations were prospectively recruited. Among them, 200 (12.1%) had abnormal ultrasonic cardiogram (181patients, 10.9%) and/or abnormal ECG (19 patients, 1.1%). The commonest type of abnormal heart structure was atrial septal defect (69/181 38.1%), and the commonest abnormal ECG was wave patterns (7/19, 36.8%). HHS patients had a higher comorbidity rate (11%) than non-HHS patients (6.9%). Patients with HHS were classified into four groups by the types of congenital upper extremity malformations, among which the most common group was thumb type (121/200, 60.5%). Conclusions: HHS occurred frequently among patients with congenital upper extremity malformation in China, particularly for those with multiple congenital malformations. The commonest type of hand malformations of HHS patients was thumb malformation

The Effect of Air Pollution on the Occurrence of Nonspecific Conjunctivitis

Purpose. To investigate the short-term effect of air pollution on occurrence of nonspecific conjunctivitis. Methods. Data were collected from outpatient visits from cases with conjunctivitis over a period of one year. Regression analysis was performed to evaluate the relationship between the number of outpatient visits and the air quality and the lag effect of air quality on conjunctivitis occurrence. Results. The air quality index on the day of presentation (P=0.023), one day before presentation (P=0.049), and two days before presentation day (P=0.050) had a positive relation with outpatient visits for conjunctivitis. The air quality index (P=0.001) and outpatient visits number per day (P=0.013) in autumn and winter (October to March) were significantly higher than those in spring (April) and summer (September). Conclusions. The air quality index within two days before presentation affected the probability of attending the outpatient clinic for nonspecific conjunctivitis. High number of cases can be expected in colder season

Study on Mechanical and Frost Resistance Properties of Slag and Macadam Stabilized with Cement and Fly Ash

China is a large country in terms of coal production and consumption. The fly ash and slag produced by thermal power plants pose a great threat to the environment. To reduce the adverse effects of fly ash and slag on the environment, a mixture of slag and macadam stabilized with cement and fly ash was prepared as pavement base material. Compaction tests, unconfined compressive strength tests, splitting strength tests, frost resistance tests, and ultrasonic tests were performed on the mixture. The results show that with an increase in slag replacement rate, the unconfined compressive strength and splitting strength decreased. However, the adverse influence of the slag replacement rate on unconfined compressive strength and splitting strength of specimens gradually weakened with increasing curing time. The frost resistance of the mixture first increased and then decreased with an increase in the slag replacement rate. When cement content was 5% and the slag replacement rate was 50%, the frost resistance of the mixture was the best. Regression analysis of the ultrasonic test showed that the ultrasonic test can effectively characterize the strength of the mixture and the internal damage degree under freeze–thaw cycles. In conclusion, the slag replacement rate of the mixture is recommended to be ~50%, which has preferable mechanical and frost resistance performance

Experimental Investigation on the Mechanical Properties of Self-Compacting Concrete under Uniaxial and Triaxial Stress

To explore the influence of fly ash (FA) and silica fume (SF) on the mechanical properties of self-compacting concrete (SCC) under uniaxial and triaxial, the compressive strength test, splitting strength test, ultrasonic testing test, and triaxial test were performed in this paper. The results show that the 3 days compressive strength and splitting strength of SCC decreased with the increase of FA substitution rate. The 28 days, 56 days, and 91 days compressive strength and splitting strength of SCC increased first and then decreased with the increase of FA substitution rate. The peak stress and peak strain of SCC gradually increased with the increase of confining pressure. The peak stress and strain of SCC increased first and then decreased with the increase of FA substitution rate. Moreover, the relationship models between compressive strength and splitting strength, between compressive strength and amplitude, between peak stress, peak strain and confining pressure under different FA substitution rates were proposed. As a conclusion, the addition of SF can increase the strength of SCC obviously. Under uniaxial stress, SCC failure mode is splitting failure, under triaxial stress, SCC failure mode is shear failure. Based on the Mohr-Coulomb strength theory, the failure criterion of SCC with FA and SF was discussed

Numerical simulation on ferrofluid flow in fractured porous media based on discrete-fracture model

Water flooding is an efficient approach to maintain reservoir pressure and has been widely used to enhance oil recovery. However, preferential water pathways such as fractures can significantly decrease the sweep efficiency. Therefore, the utilization ratio of injected water is seriously affected. How to develop new flooding technology to further improve the oil recovery in this situation is a pressing problem. For the past few years, controllable ferrofluid has caused the extensive concern in oil industry as a new functional material. In the presence of a gradient in the magnetic field strength, a magnetic body force is produced on the ferrofluid so that the attractive magnetic forces allow the ferrofluid to be manipulated to flow in any desired direction through the control of the external magnetic field. In view of these properties, the potential application of using the ferrofluid as a new kind of displacing fluid for flooding in fractured porous media is been studied in this paper for the first time. Considering the physical process of the mobilization of ferrofluid through porous media by arrangement of strong external magnetic fields, the magnetic body force was introduced into the Darcy equation and deals with fractures based on the discrete-fracture model. The fully implicit finite volume method is used to solve mathematical model and the validity and accuracy of numerical simulation, which is demonstrated through an experiment with ferrofluid flowing in a single fractured oil-saturated sand in a 2-D horizontal cell