1,714 research outputs found
Geography and similarity of regional cuisines in China
Food occupies a central position in every culture and it is therefore of
great interest to understand the evolution of food culture. The advent of the
World Wide Web and online recipe repositories has begun to provide
unprecedented opportunities for data-driven, quantitative study of food
culture. Here we harness an online database documenting recipes from various
Chinese regional cuisines and investigate the similarity of regional cuisines
in terms of geography and climate. We found that the geographical proximity,
rather than climate proximity is a crucial factor that determines the
similarity of regional cuisines. We develop a model of regional cuisine
evolution that provides helpful clues to understand the evolution of cuisines
and cultures.Comment: 13 pages, 11 figures and 2 table
Influence of Reciprocal links in Social Networks
In this Letter, we empirically study the influence of reciprocal links, in
order to understand its role in affecting the structure and function of
directed social networks. Experimental results on two representative datesets,
Sina Weibo and Douban, demonstrate that the reciprocal links indeed play a more
important role than non-reciprocal ones in both spreading information and
maintaining the network robustness. In particular, the information spreading
process can be significantly enhanced by considering the reciprocal effect. In
addition, reciprocal links are largely responsible for the connectivity and
efficiency of directed networks. This work may shed some light on the in-depth
understanding and application of the reciprocal effect in directed online
social networks
An Assessment of Soil’s Nutrient Deficiencies and Their Influence on the Restoration of Degraded Karst Vegetation in Southwest China
The distribution of karst landscapes over the Earth's surface, to a large extent, follows the distribution of carbonate (limestone and dolomite) and gypsum rocks and together these make up about 12% of the Earth's land area, and the largest karst region in to world is in Southwestern China. Characterized by a unique set of landforms, these geographical areas also differ from other geomorphic regions by the presence of cave systems in the subsurface. Unfortunately, due to human disturbances, such as deforestation, agricultural expansion, livestock overgrazing and fire, these regions have been affected by varying degrees of degradation, which could also be worsened if water and soil erosion phenomena typical of these areas are considered. Therefore, there is a need to implement measures and strategies to protect these karst areas and develop plans to restore vegetation in this region. To support local and national authorities to achieve this goal, this study aims to characterize nutrient deficiencies in degraded areas and estimate what could be the thresholds required to facilitate the restoration of vegetation in karst areas in southwest China. The results obtained confirm that the total element concentrations for Soil Organic Carbon (SOC), N, K, Ca, P, S and Mg were relatively high in the study karst area in southwest China. However, the total amounts of soil nutrients stored were very low due to the limited amount of soil identified as a consequence of previous deforestation processes undertaken within this study area and this aspect needs to be taken into consideration if aiming at a positive success of future restoration processes
Topical application of TAT-Superoxide Dismutase in Acupoints LI 20 on allergic rhinitis
Reactive oxygen species are products of cellular metabolism and assigned important roles in biomedical science as deleterious factors in pathologies. In fact, some studies have shown that the therapeutic benefits of taking antioxidants were limited and the potential for therapeutic intervention remains unclear. New evidences showed that ROS have some ability of intercellular transportation. For treating allergic rhinitis, as a novel intracellular superoxide quencher, TAT-SOD applied to acupoints LI 20 instead of directly to nasal cavity can be used to test that. TTA group apply TAT-SOD cream prepared by adding purified TAT-SOD to the vehicle cream to acupoints LI 20, while placebo group used the vehicle cream instead. TTN group applied the same TAT-SOD cream directly to nasal cavity three times daily. Symptom scores were recorded at baseline and days 8 and 15. For the overall efficacy rate, TTA group was 81.0%, while placebo group was 5.9% and TTN was 0%. Malondialdehyde levels decreased observably in TTA group, and superoxide dismutase, catalase, and glutathione peroxidase levels remained basically unaffected. Enzymatic scavenging of the intracellular superoxide at acupoints LI 20 proved to be effective in treating allergic rhinitis, while no improvement was observed with the placebo group and TTN group
Effect of ozone gas processing on physical and chemical properties of wheat proteins
Purpose: To investigate the effects of ozone treatment on chemical and physical properties of wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) gluten, glutenin and gliadin.Methods: Wheat proteins isolated from wheat flour were treated with ozone gas. The physical and chemical properties of gluten proteins were investigated after treatment with ozone gas, with 5 g/h produced as a function of time (0, 30, and 60 min) in the study. To check whether the process of ozonation promoted changes in the quality of gluten proteins, sulfhydryl groups (SH), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), secondary structure, SDS-PAGE, and rheology analyses were performed.Results: Sulfhydryl group contents of wheat proteins ranged from 1.1 to 7.12 μmol/g. Sulfhydryl group content for all ozonated proteins was significantly lower than that of the control samples. Gluten proteins showed reduced SDS-PAGE band intensities of both high (HMW) gluten and glutenin subunits with increasing ozone gas treatment. The denaturation temperatures (Td) of ozonated gluten proteins were higher (99.80–106.79 °C) and the enthalpies of the ozonated gluten proteins were lower than those of the control samples. The storage moduli (G') and loss moduli (G”) of gluten and glutenin tended to increase from 7.84 to 10.20 KPa and 43.19 to 48.28 KPa, and from 3.33 to 4.06 KPa and 20.74 to 22.56 KPa, respectively, as ozone exposure increased from 0 to 30 min.Conclusion: Ozone gas can oxidize wheat proteins. Exposing wheat proteins to ozone gas for an extended time (60 min) deteriorated wheat protein quality.Keywords: Ozone treatment, Gluten proteins, Chemical changes, Rheological studies, CD spectroscopy, Thermal propertie
Improving mobility of silicon metal-oxide-semiconductor devices for quantum dots by high vacuum activation annealing
To improve mobility of fabricated silicon metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS)
quantum devices, forming gas annealing is a common method used to mitigate the
effects of disorder at the Si/SiO2 interface. However, the importance of
activation annealing is usually ignored. Here, we show that a high vacuum
environment for implantation activation is beneficial for improving mobility
compared to nitrogen atmosphere. Low-temperature transport measurements of Hall
bars show that peak mobility can be improved by a factor of two, reaching 1.5
m^2/(Vs) using high vacuum annealing during implantation activation. Moreover,
the charge stability diagram of a single quantum dot is mapped, with no visible
disturbance caused by disorder, suggesting possibility of fabricating
high-quality quantum dots on commercial wafers. Our results may provide
valuable insights into device optimization in silicon-based quantum computing.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figure
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