87 research outputs found

    Airfoil Tip Leakage Aeroacoustics Predictions using a Lattice Boltzmann Based Method

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    International audienceThe noise produced by rotating systems such as fans and turbo machines is of growing importance in the academic and engineering communities. The prediction and understanding of the physical mechanisms associated with noise generation are required in order to develop innovative solutions able to efficiently reduce radiated acoustics levels. The flow-induced noise generation mechanisms related to rotating devices are various and complex, and one of them is related to the blade tip flow. The tip flow noise, or tip leakage noise, is particularly important for free-tip configurations, for which the tip flow induced by the pressure gradient between the suction and pressure sides can be particularly intense. The experimental investigation of this mechanism is practically challenging. Consequently, a simplified non-rotating representative configuration has been proposed, and has been previously investigated experimentally. In this paper, transient, compressible, and time-explicit Computational Fluid Dynamics/Computational Aero-Acoustics (CFD/CAA) simulations of an airfoil tip leakage flow for this simplified geometry are performed using a Lattice Boltzmann Method (LBM) based approach. The studied configuration is a NACA 5510 airfoil profile at high Reynolds number flow conditions, for which a variable size gap is introduced between the airfoil and one of the end plates, modeling the tip gap encountered in free-tip fans. First, the simulation results are compared with experimental results to validate the numerical approach. Further investigation of the numerical results underlines the connection between the tip vortex structures and noise radiation, including a parametric study on the Angle of Attack (AoA) and the tip gap width

    Ku80 cooperates with CBP to promote COX-2 expression and tumor growth.

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    Cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) plays an important role in lung cancer development and progression. Using streptavidin-agarose pulldown and proteomics assay, we identified and validated Ku80, a dimer of Ku participating in the repair of broken DNA double strands, as a new binding protein of the COX-2 gene promoter. Overexpression of Ku80 up-regulated COX-2 promoter activation and COX-2 expression in lung cancer cells. Silencing of Ku80 by siRNA down-regulated COX-2 expression and inhibited tumor cell growth in vitro and in a xenograft mouse model. Ku80 knockdown suppressed phosphorylation of ERK, resulting in an inactivation of the MAPK pathway. Moreover, CBP, a transcription co-activator, interacted with and acetylated Ku80 to co-regulate the activation of COX-2 promoter. Overexpression of CBP increased Ku80 acetylation, thereby promoting COX-2 expression and cell growth. Suppression of CBP by a CBP-specific inhibitor or siRNA inhibited COX-2 expression as well as tumor cell growth. Tissue microarray immunohistochemical analysis of lung adenocarcinomas revealed a strong positive correlation between levels of Ku80 and COX-2 and clinicopathologic variables. Overexpression of Ku80 was associated with poor prognosis in patients with lung cancers. We conclude that Ku80 promotes COX-2 expression and tumor growth and is a potential therapeutic target in lung cancer

    Airfoil Tip Leakage Aeroacoustics Predictions using a Lattice Boltzmann Based Method

    Get PDF
    The noise produced by rotating systems such as fans and turbo machines is of growing importance in the academic and engineering communities. The prediction and understanding of the physical mechanisms associated with noise generation are required in order to develop innovative solutions able to efficiently reduce radiated acoustics levels. The flow-induced noise generation mechanisms related to rotating devices are various and complex, and one of them is related to the blade tip flow. The tip flow noise, or tip leakage noise, is particularly important for free-tip configurations, for which the tip flow induced by the pressure gradient between the suction and pressure sides can be particularly intense. The experimental investigation of this mechanism is practically challenging. Consequently, a simplified non-rotating representative configuration has been proposed, and has been previously investigated experimentally. In this paper, transient, compressible, and time-explicit Computational Fluid Dynamics/Computational Aero-Acoustics (CFD/CAA) simulations of an airfoil tip leakage flow for this simplified geometry are performed using a Lattice Boltzmann Method (LBM) based approach. The studied configuration is a NACA 5510 airfoil profile at high Reynolds number flow conditions, for which a variable size gap is introduced between the airfoil and one of the end plates, modeling the tip gap encountered in free-tip fans. First, the simulation results are compared with experimental results to validate the numerical approach. Further investigation of the numerical results underlines the connection between the tip vortex structures and noise radiation, including a parametric study on the Angle of Attack (AoA) and the tip gap width

    Efficacy and safety of triazavirin therapy for coronavirus disease 2019 : A pilot randomized controlled trial

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    Acknowledgements: We are deeply grateful to the front-line clinicians who participated in the study while directly fighting the epidemic. This study was supported by the Chinese Academy of Engineering Projects for COVID-19 (2020-KYGG-01-04) and Heilongjiang Province Urgent Project-6 for COVID-19. Data and safety monitoring board members of this trial included Kang Li, Yong Zhang, Songjiang Liu, and Yaohui Shi.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

    Novel Genetic Risk and Metabolic Signatures of Insulin Signaling and Androgenesis in the Anovulation of Polycystic Ovary Syndrome

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    Funding Information: The authors are grateful to all staff in the PCOSAct group for their effort in the collection of blood samples and clinical dataset which used in current study. Special thanks to Prof. Attila Toth from Institute of Physiological Chemistry, Dresden, Germany for the REC114 antibody. This study was supported by the National key Research and Development Program of China (2019YFC1709500); the National Collaboration Project of Critical Illness by Integrating Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine; the Project of Heilongjiang Province Innovation Team “TouYan;” the Yi-Xun Liu and Xiao-Ke Wu Academician Workstation; the Innovation Team of Reproductive Technique with Integrative Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine in Xuzhou City, China; Heilongjiang University of Chinese Medicine from the National Clinical Trial Base; Heilongjiang Provincial Clinical Research Center for Ovary Diseases; the Research Grant Council (T13-602/21-N, C5045-20EF, and 14122021); and Food and Health Bureau in Hong Kong, China (06171026). Ben Willem J. Mol is supported by a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Investigator grant (GNT1176437). Ben Willem J. Mol reports consultancy for ObsEva and Merck and travel support from Merck. Xiaoke Wu, Yongyong Shi, and Chi Chiu Wang developed the research question and designed the study. Xiaoke Wu, Yongyong Shi, Yijuan Cao, and Chi Chiu Wang designed the analysis. Yongyong Shi and Zhiqiang Li contributed to the design of the experiment of whole-exome plus targeted SNP sequencing and the analysis, and interpreted the results. Jingshu Gao, Hui Chang, Duojia Zhang, Jing Cong, Yu Wang, Qi Wu, Xiaoxiao Han, Pui Wah Jacqueline Chung, Yiran Li, and Lin Zeng contributed to the experiment of metabolic profile and immunofluorescent staining and the analysis, and interpreted the results. Astrid Borchert and Hartmut Kuhn provided antibody support and advice. Xu Zheng and Lingxi Chen contributed to create the predictive model with deep machine learning. Jian Li, Qi Wu, Hongli Ma, Xu Zheng, and Lingxi Chen contributed to the analysis of the clinical characteristics and interpreted the results. Jian Li, Hongli Ma, Hui Chang, Jing Cong, and Chi Chiu Wang drafted the manuscript. All authors reviewed and revised the manuscript. Xiaoke Wu is the guarantor of this work and, as such, had full access to all the data in the study and takes responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis. Xiaoke Wu, Chi Chiu Wang, Yijuan Cao, Jian Li, Zhiqiang Li, Hongli Ma, Jingshu Gao, Hui Chang, Duojia Zhang, Jing Cong, Yu Wang, Qi Wu, Xiaoxiao Han, Pui Wah Jacqueline Chung, Yiran Li, Xu Zheng, Lingxi Chen, Lin Zeng, Astrid Borchert, Hartmut Kuhn, Zijiang Chen, Ernest Hung Yu Ng, Elisabet Stener-Victorin, Heping Zhang, Richard S. Legro, Ben Willem J. Mol, and Yongyong Shi declare that they have no conflict of interest or financial conflicts to disclose. Funding Information: This study was supported by the National key Research and Development Program of China ( 2019YFC1709500 ); the National Collaboration Project of Critical Illness by Integrating Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine ; the Project of Heilongjiang Province Innovation Team “TouYan;” the Yi-Xun Liu and Xiao-Ke Wu Academician Workstation; the Innovation Team of Reproductive Technique with Integrative Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine in Xuzhou City , China; Heilongjiang University of Chinese Medicine from the National Clinical Trial Base ; Heilongjiang Provincial Clinical Research Center for Ovary Diseases ; the Research Grant Council ( T13-602/21-N , C5045-20EF , and 14122021 ); and Food and Health Bureau in Hong Kong, China ( 06171026 ). Publisher Copyright: © 2023Peer reviewedPublisher PD

    First-line ovulation induction for polycystic ovary syndrome : an individual participant data meta-analysis

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    Acknowledgements We would like to thank Mr M. Draper from Barr Smith Library, University of Adelaide, for his assistance in developing the search strategies and Dr M. H. Zafarmand from University of Amsterdam for assisting with the translation. We would like to acknowledge all the investigators and participants of the primary trials. The investigators of individual trials are listed in Supplementary Table SIV. We would like to acknowledge the assistance of NICHD, the Reproductive Medicine Network (RMN) and the Protocol Subcommittee, in making the database for PPCOS I and II available. +The authors of the Reproductive Medicine Network are R.S.L., R.G. Brzyski, M.P. Diamond, C. Coutifaris, W.D. Schlaff, P. Casson, G.M. Christman, H. Huang, Q. Yan, R. Alvero, D.J. Haisenleder, K.T. Barnhart, G.W. Bates, R. Usadi, S. Lucidi, V. Baker, J.C. Trussell, S.A. Krawetz, P. Snyder, D. Ohl, N. Santoro, H.X. Barnhart, B.R. Carr, S.A. Carson, M.P. Steinkampf, P.G. McGovern, N.A. Cataldo, G.G. Gosman, J.E. Nestler, L.C. Giudice, P.C. Leppert, E.R. Myers, E. Eisenberg and H. Zhang. The details of their affiliations and NIH Grants are listed in Supplementary Table SV. Funding An Australian government research training programme scholarship (to R.W.); Australian National Health and Medical Research Council-funded Centre for Research Excellence in Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (APP1078444). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish or preparation of the manuscript.Peer reviewedPostprin

    Quercetin Suppresses Cyclooxygenase-2 Expression and Angiogenesis through Inactivation of P300 Signaling

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    Quercetin, a polyphenolic bioflavonoid, possesses multiple pharmacological actions including anti-inflammatory and antitumor properties. However, the precise action mechanisms of quercetin remain unclear. Here, we reported the regulatory actions of quercetin on cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2), an important mediator in inflammation and tumor promotion, and revealed the underlying mechanisms. Quercetin significantly suppressed COX-2 mRNA and protein expression and prostaglandin (PG) E(2) production, as well as COX-2 promoter activation in breast cancer cells. Quercetin also significantly inhibited COX-2-mediated angiogenesis in human endothelial cells in a dose-dependent manner. The in vitro streptavidin-agarose pulldown assay and in vivo chromatin immunoprecipitation assay showed that quercetin considerably inhibited the binding of the transactivators CREB2, C-Jun, C/EBPβ and NF-κB and blocked the recruitment of the coactivator p300 to COX-2 promoter. Moreover, quercetin effectively inhibited p300 histone acetyltransferase (HAT) activity, thereby attenuating the p300-mediated acetylation of NF-κB. Treatment of cells with p300 HAT inhibitor roscovitine was as effective as quercetin at inhibiting p300 HAT activity. Addition of quercetin to roscovitine-treated cells did not change the roscovitine-induced inhibition of p300 HAT activity. Conversely, gene delivery of constitutively active p300 significantly reversed the quercetin-mediated inhibition of endogenous HAT activity. These results indicate that quercetin suppresses COX-2 expression by inhibiting the p300 signaling and blocking the binding of multiple transactivators to COX-2 promoter. Our findings therefore reveal a novel mechanism of action of quercetin and suggest a potential use for quercetin in the treatment of COX-2-mediated diseases such as breast cancers

    Direct simulation of flexible particle suspensions using lattice-boltzmann equation with external boundary force

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    Determination of the relation between the bulk or rheological properties of a particle suspension and its microscopic structure is an old and important problem in physical science. In general, the rheology of particle suspension is quite complex, and the problem becomes even more complicated if the suspending particle is deformable. Despite these difficulties, a large number of theoretical and experimental investigations have been devoted to the analysis and prediction of the rheological behavior of particle suspensions. However, among these studies there are very few investigations that focus on the role of particle deformability. A novel method for full coupling of the fluid-solid phases with sub-grid accuracy for the solid phase is developed. In this method, the flow is computed on a fixed regular 'lattice' using the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM), where each solid particle, or fiber, is mapped onto a Lagrangian frame moving continuously through the domain. The motion and orientation of the particle are obtained from Newtonian dynamics equations. The deformable particle is modeled by the lattice-spring model (LSM).The fiber deformation is calculated by an efficient flexible fiber model. The no-slip boundary condition at the fluid-solid interface is based on the external boundary force (EBF) method. This method is validated by comparing with known experimental and theoretical results. The fiber simulation results show that the rheological properties of flexible fiber suspension are highly dependent on the microstructural characteristics of the suspension. It is shown that fiber stiffness (bending ratio BR) has strong impact on the suspension rheology in the range BR < 3. The relative viscosity of the fiber suspension under shear increases significantly as BR decreases. Direct numerical simulation of flexible fiber suspension allows computation of the primary normal stress difference as a function of BR. These results show that the primary normal stress difference has a minimum value at BR ∼ 1. The primary normal stress differences for slightly deformable fibers reaches a minimum and increases significantly as BR decreases below 1. The results are explained based on the Batchelor's relation for non-Brownian suspensions. The influence of fiber stiffness on the fiber orientation distribution and orbit constant is the major contributor to the variation in rheological properties. A least-squares curve-fitting relation for the relative viscosity is obtained for flexible fiber suspension. This relation can be used to predict the relative viscosity of flexible fiber suspension based on the result of rigid fiber suspension. The unique capability of the LBM-EBF method for sub-grid resolution and multiscale analysis of particle suspension is applied to the challenging problem of platelet motion in blood flow. By computing the stress distribution over the platelet, the "blood damage index" is computed and compared with experiments in channels with various geometries [43]. In platelet simulation, the effect of 3D channel geometry on the platelet activation and aggregation is modeled by using LBM-EBF method. Comparison of our simulations with Fallon's experiments [43] shows a similar pattern, and shows that Dumont's BDI model [40] is more appropriate for blood damage investigation. It has been shown that channels with sharp transition geometry will have larger recirculation areas with high BDI values. By investigating the effect of hinge area geometry on BDI value, we intend to use this multiscale computational method to optimize the design of Bileaflet mechanical heart valves. Both fiber simulations and platelet simulations have shown that the novel LBM-EBF method is more efficient and stable compare to the conventional numerical methods. The new EBF method is a two-Cway coupling method with sub-grid accuracy which makes the platelet simulations possible. The LBM-EBF is the only method to date, to the best of author's knowledge, that can simulate suspensions with large number of deformable particles under complex flow conditions. It is hoped that future researchers may benefit from this new method and the algorithms developed here.Ph.D.Committee Chair: Cyrus K. Aidun; Committee Co-Chair: Ajit P. Yoganathan; Committee Member: Marc K. Smith; Committee Member: S. Mostafa Ghiaasiaan; Committee Member: Thorsten Stoesser; Committee Member: Victor Breedvel

    A study on Ken Liu's translation with the application of rewriting theory

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    The year of 2015 and 2016 saw the achievements made by The Three-Body Problem and Folding Beijing, marking the historic occasion of Chinese science fiction in the world stage and their success has brought Chinese science fiction from marginalisation to the center. Ken Liu, a Chinese American translator, is arguably the largest contributor of the Chinese science fiction's publicity in the overseas market. Whereas a previous focus on Ken Liu's successful translation fixated on translation strategies concerning linguistics, the non-textual factors have been ignored since few in-depth studies were carried out in this field. This study makes an analysis of Ken Liu's translation works in different periods on the basis of André Lefevere's rewriting theory, aiming to finding out to what extent patronage and ideology influence Ken Liu’s choices in re-writing (or not re-writing) as a translation strategy.The Three-Body Problem was not only known for its literary merit but also its background of Cultural Revolution; while Folding Beijing implies pungent conflicts among different social class. Besides two Hugo awarded books, the author selected another one, The Waste Tides, that included amounts of sensitive content concerning China and the US. The analysis is divided into two main parts, the manipulation of ideology and that of patronage on the rewritten and not rewritten parts in this three books. An in-depth analysis reveals that patronage, particularly Tor Books and Science Fiction World, comes first in supporting Ken Liu's decision to make his translation work public, resulting in his dominance over the decision to rewrite or not rewrite the original. The influence of Ken Liu's ideology, which is divided into two components in terms of politics and the world at large, can be traced back to his interviews in which his Americanism and view of history were mentioned. Such Americanism and an objective view of history have allowed him to make clarification and even addition to the original, and uphold a just attitude towards big events occurred in the world. The findings of the study show that as cultural communication speed up, the manipulation of ideology and patronage play a essential role in promoting a literary work in the international market.Master of Arts (Translation and Interpretation

    Seismic Behavior of Steel Plate-Concrete Shear Walls with Holes

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    Steel plate-concrete shear walls (SPSW) are used as the containment in nuclear power stations. However, the influence of holes and axial loading on the behavior of steel plate-concrete shear walls is neglected in most studies. Thus, it is necessary to understand the seismic behavior of SPSW members with holes in order to avoid the potential risks for nuclear power stations. In this study, a series of specimens were tested by low-cycle reciprocal loading. The specimens were designed with different holes to simulate real members in nuclear power stations. A hysteretic curve of specimens was obtained from a low-cycle reciprocal test to discuss the seismic behavior of steel plate-concrete shear walls (SPSW). Moreover, effects of axial compression ratio, hole size, thickness of the steel plate, and hole position on the hysteretic performance of SPSW were analyzed. The horizontal ultimate bearing capacity of SPSW specimens was estimated using the norms of the Architecture Institute of Japan and the calculation method of Ono reduction rate. Results provide theoretical references for the design and application of SPSW with holes
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