Trajectories of the Hippocampal Subfields Atrophy in the Alzheimer’s Disease: A Structural Imaging Study

BackgroundThe hippocampus and hippocampal subfields have been found to be diversely affected in Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) and early stages of Alzheimer’s disease by neuroimaging studies. However, our knowledge is still lacking about the trajectories of the hippocampus and hippocampal subfields atrophy with the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.ObjectiveTo identify which subfields of the hippocampus differ in the trajectories of Alzheimer’s disease by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and to determine whether individual differences on memory could be explained by structural volumes of hippocampal subfields.MethodsFour groups of participants including 41 AD patients, 43 amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) patients, 35 subjective cognitive decline (SCD) patients and 42 normal controls (NC) received their structural MRI brain scans. Structural MR images were processed by the FreeSurfer 6.0 image analysis suite to extract the hippocampus and its subfields. Furthermore, we investigated relationships between hippocampal subfield volumes and memory test variables (AVLT-immediate recall, AVLT-delayed recall, AVLT-recognition) and the regression model analyses were controlled for age, gender, education and eTIV.ResultsCA1, subiculum, presubiculum, molecular layer and fimbria showed the trend toward significant volume reduction among four groups with the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Volume of left subiculum was most strongly and actively correlated with performance across AVLT measures.ConclusionThe trend changes in the hippocampus subfields and further illustrates that SCD is the preclinical stage of AD earlier than aMCI. Future studies should aim to associate the atrophy of the hippocampal subfields in SCD with possible conversion to aMCI or AD with longitudinal design

Martensitic Transformation and Magnetic-Field-Induced Strain in High-Entropy Magnetic Memory Alloy Ni20Mn20Ga20Gd20Co20 by Hot-Magnetic Drawing

The wires with chemical composition Ni20Mn20Ga20Gd20Co20 were prepared by hot-magnetic drawing and the microstructure evolution characteristics, martensitic transformation and MFIS process were investigated in detail, respectively. The results showed that a multiphase structure with γ phase and martensite was observed in samples when the magnetic field was 0 T to 0.2 T during the hot-magnetic drawing process. With the magnetic field increased to 0.5 T, due to the atomic diffusion by severe thermoplastic deformation and high external magnetic field, a single-phase structure with L10 type twin martensite was found in the sample. Moreover, an obvious increasing trend in martensitic transformation temperature in the sample was found by the enhancement of the magnetic field during the hot-magnetic drawing process. The highest phase transition temperature rose to about 600 °C when the magnetic field reached 0.5 T. Finally, the property of SME and MFIS in the sample can be enhanced by the magnetic field increasing during the hot-magnetic drawing process, excellent performance of SME was obtained at low total strain, and MFIS was achieved at 4.47% at a magnetic field of 8007 Oe in the sample in the 0.5 T magnetic field during the hot-magnetic drawing process

Promoting or inhibiting? Green fiscal policy and urban green innovation

Can green fiscal policy (GFP) incentivize the proliferation of urban green innovation (GI) and be a novel catalyst for energy conservation and emission reduction within the “dual-carbon” framework? This paper explores GFP ramifications for GI by implementing a difference-in-differences model in a natural experiment centered on the “Comprehensive Demonstration City of Energy Saving and Emission Reduction Fiscal Policies”. The empirical analysis reveals several key findings: (1) GFP exhibits significant augmentation at the GI level, with an observable evolutionary trend of increasing marginal impact. Importantly, these outcomes withstand rigorous robustness tests, including propensity score matching. (2) A mechanism analysis elucidates the dual impact of GFP on GI growth. GFP directly fosters GI advancement indirectly by promoting talent aggregation, expanding scientific and technological investment, and attracting external financial resources. (3) A heterogeneity analysis demonstrates that GFP enhancement of GI is closely associated with the patent category, manifesting a distinct pattern of “eastern region > other regions” and “non-resource cities > resource cities”. The study’s empirical findings offer crucial real-world insights to guide the Chinese government in formulating a more efficient GFP and facilitating the expansion of innovative endeavors while contributing to environmentally sustainable and high-value development

Ўсё бы пела ды гуляла

Ўсё бы пела ды гуляла, / Ўсё бы весялілася. / Ўсё б ляжала пад табой, / Ўсё бы шавялілася

Observing the Characteristics of Multi-Activity Trip Chain and Its Influencing Mechanism

Understanding mechanism of daily activity trip chain especially multi-activity trip chain is significant for travel demand management and urban redevelopment. This paper explores the multi-activity trip chain behavior from both individual attributes and spatial attributes. Multiactivity trip chain is identified from people’s full-day travel diaries, then categorized into multi-activity intermittent trip chain and continuous trip chain to distinguish the characteristics and influencing factors of different chains. Using resident travel survey data of Xiaoshan District of Hangzhou, China, multinomial logistic regression model, transition probability matrix and activity analysis methods are employed to make analyses. Findings include: 1) making multi-activity trip chain can achieve multiple purposes with less average travel time for each purpose, but public transit is less used. 2) The choices of single or multi-activity trip chain and multi-activity intermittent or continuous trip chain are mainly affected by different individual attributes such as occupation, education, household income, etc. Moreover, household registration, driver’s license, gender, and household car ownership are related to the choice of activity sequence. 3) For typical trip chain with purposes of work, shopping/dining, and home, activity sequence is also obviously influenced by spatial distance between origin and destination, especially for the chain of work-shopping/dining-home

Impact of Climate Change on the Water Requirements of Oat in Northeast and North China

Crop water requirements are directly affected by climatic variability, especially for crops grown in the areas which are sensitive to climatic change. Based on the SIMETAW model and a long-term meteorological dataset, we evaluated the spatiotemporal variations of climatic change impacts on water requirement of oat in North and Northeast China. The results indicated that effective rainfall showed an increasing trend, while the crop water requirement and irrigation demand presented decreasing trends over the past decades. The water requirement of oat showed significant longitudinal and latitudinal spatial variations, with a downtrend from north to south and uptrend from east to west. Climatic factors have obviously changed in the growth season of oat, with upward trends in the average temperature and precipitation, and downward trends in the average wind speed, sunshine hours, relative humidity, and solar radiation. Declines in solar radiation and wind speed, accompanied with the increase in effective rainfall, have contributed to the reduced crop water requirement over these decades. Given the complex dynamic of climate change, when studying the impact of climate change on crop water requirements, we should not only consider single factors such as temperature or rainfall, we need to analyze the comprehensive effects of various climatic factors

Increase the Content of Ester Compounds in Blueberry Wine Fermentation with the Ester-Producing Yeast: Candida glabrata, Pichia anomala, and Wickerhamomyces anomalus

The co-fermentation of Saccharomyces cerevisiae and ester-producing yeasts is considered to be an effective way to improve the flavor and quality of fruit wine. In this study, three kinds of ester-producing yeasts (Candida glabrata NCUF308.1, Pichia anomala NCUF306.1, and Wickerhamomyces anomalus NCUF307.1) and S. cerevisiae NCUF309.2 were used to simulate blueberry wine co-fermentation at different ratios. The results showed that, compared with S. cerevisiae NCUF309.2 fermentation (S), the population of S. cerevisiae NCUF309.2 in co-fermentation samples decreased to varying degrees, and the content of ethanol also decreased. The results also showed that the co-fermentation of C. glabrata NCUF308.1 and S. cerevisiae NCUF309.2 at the ratio of 1:1 (CS1), co-fermentation of P. anomala NCUF306.1 and S. cerevisiae NCUF309.2 at the ratio of 5:1 (PS5), and co-fermentation of W. anomalus NCUF307.1 and S. cerevisiae NCUF309.2 at the ratio of 5:1 (WS5) could significantly increase the content of ester compounds (p < 0.05), which was 3.29, 4.75, and 3.04 times that of the S sample, respectively. Among them, the sample of CS1 was characterized by phenethyl acetate and isoamyl acetate, while the samples of CS5 and PS5 were characterized by propyl octanoate and ethyl decanoate, and the sample of WS5 was characterized by 3-methylbutyl hexanoate. However, the contents of odor active compounds were higher in the CS1 sample. Therefore, the samples of CS1 had the potential to create the distinctive flavor of blueberry wine

The Difference in Diversity between Endophytic Microorganisms in White and Grey <i>Zizania latifolia</i>

The Zizania latifolia is usually infected by the obligate parasitic fungus Ustilago esculenta to form an edible fleshy stem which is an aquatic vegetable called Jiaobai in China. The infection by the teliospore (T) strain of U. esculenta induces Z. latifolia forming gray fleshy stems, while the mycelia-teliospore (MT) strain of U. esculenta induces white fleshy stems which are more suitable for edibility than gray fleshy stems. The mechanism of this phenomenon is still largely unknown. One of the possible causes is the diversity of endophytic microbial communities between these two fleshy stems. Therefore, we utilized fungal ITS1 and bacterial 16S rDNA amplicon sequencing to investigate the diversity of endophytic microbial communities in the two different fleshy stems of Z. latifolia. The results revealed that the α diversity and richness of endophytic fungi in white Z. latifolia were significantly greater than in gray Z. latifolia. The dominant fungal genus in both fleshy stems was U. esculenta, which accounted for over 90% of the endophytic fungi. The community composition of endophytic fungi in gray and white Z. latifolia was different except for U. esculenta, and a negative correlation was observed between U. esculenta and other endophytic fungi. In addition, the dominant bacterial genus in gray Z. latifolia was Alcaligenaceae which is also negatively correlated with other bacterium communities. Additionally, the co-occurrence network of white Z. latifolia was found to have a stronger scale, connectivity, and complexity compared to that of gray Z. latifolia. And the detected beneficial bacteria and pathogens in the stems of Z. latifolia potentially compete for resources. Furthermore, the function of endophytic bacteria is more abundant than endophytic fungi in Z. latifolia. This research investigated the correlation between the development of Z. latifolia fleshy stems and endophytic microbial communities. Our findings indicate that the composition of endophytic microbial communities is closely related to the type of Z. latifolia fleshy stems. This research also suggests the potential utilization of specific microbial communities to enhance the growth and development of Z. latifolia, thereby contributing to the breeding of Z. latifolia