Diacenaphthylene-fused benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b‘]dithiophenes: polycyclic heteroacenes containing full-carbon five-membered aromatic rings

We herein report on an efficient synthesis of diacenaphthylenefused benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b’]dithiphenes and demonstrate that their packing structure in the solid state depends on the substituent groups. These compounds form dimers with their radical cations in high solution concentration and display good field-effect mobility

CXCR5+PD-1+ follicular helper CD8 T cells control B cell tolerance

Many autoimmune diseases are characterized by the production of autoantibodies. The current view is that CD4+ T follicular helper (Tfh) cells are the main subset regulating autoreactive B cells. Here we report a CXCR5+PD1+ Tfh subset of CD8+ T cells whose development and function are negatively modulated by Stat5. These CD8+ Tfh cells regulate the germinal center B cell response and control autoantibody production, as deficiency of Stat5 in CD8 T cells leads to an increase of CD8+ Tfh cells, resulting in the breakdown of B cell tolerance and concomitant autoantibody production. CD8+ Tfh cells share similar gene signatures with CD4+ Tfh, and require CD40L/CD40 and TCR/MHCI interactions to deliver help to B cells. Our study thus highlights the diversity of follicular T cell subsets that contribute to the breakdown of B-cell tolerance

Gab2 and Gab3 Redundantly Suppress Colitis by Modulating Macrophage and CD8+ T-Cell Activation

Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) is a multi-factorial chronic inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract prognostically linked to CD8+ T-cells, but little is known about their mechanism of activation during initiation of colitis. Here, Grb2-associated binding 2/3 adaptor protein double knockout mice (Gab2/3−/−) were generated. Gab2/3−/− mice, but not single knockout mice, developed spontaneous colitis. To analyze the cellular mechanism, reciprocal bone marrow (BM) transplantation demonstrated a Gab2/3−/− hematopoietic disease-initiating process. Adoptive transfer showed individual roles for macrophages and T-cells in promoting colitis development in vivo. In spontaneous disease, intestinal intraepithelial CD8+ but much fewer CD4+, T-cells from Gab2/3−/− mice with rectal prolapse were more proliferative. To analyze the molecular mechanism, reduced PI3-kinase/Akt/mTORC1 was observed in macrophages and T-cells, with interleukin (IL)-2 stimulated T-cells showing increased pSTAT5. These results illustrate the importance of Gab2/3 collectively in signaling responses required to control macrophage and CD8+ T-cell activation and suppress chronic colitis

Phospholipase Cγ1 is essential for T cell development, activation, and tolerance

Phospholipase Cγ1 (PLCγ1) is an important signaling effector of T cell receptor (TCR). To investigate the role of PLCγ1 in T cell biology, we generated and examined mice with T cell–specific deletion of PLCγ1. We demonstrate that PLCγ1 deficiency affects positive and negative selection, significantly reduces single-positive thymocytes and peripheral T cells, and impairs TCR-induced proliferation and cytokine production, and the activation of ERK, JNK, AP-1, NFAT, and NF-κB. Importantly, PLCγ1 deficiency impairs the development and function of FoxP3+ regulatory T cells, causing inflammatory/autoimmune symptoms. Therefore, PLCγ1 is essential for T cell development, activation, and tolerance

Critical role for Gimap5 in the survival of mouse hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells

HSCs lacking the guanosine nucleotide-binding protein Gimap5, which stabilizes expression of the Mcl-1 Bcl2 family protein, exhibit impaired survival and long-term repopulation capacity

LEAP-2017 Simulation Exercise: Calibration of Constitutive Models and Simulation of the Element Tests

This paper presents a summary of the element test simulations (calibration simulations) submitted by 11 numerical simulation (prediction) teams that participated in the LEAP-2017 prediction exercise. A significant number of monotonic and cyclic triaxial (Vasko, An investigation into the behavior of Ottawa sand through monotonic and cyclic shear tests. Masters Thesis, The George Washington University, 2015; Vasko et al., LEAP-GWU-2015 Laboratory Tests. DesignSafe-CI, Dataset, 2018; El Ghoraiby et al., LEAP 2017: Soil characterization and element tests for Ottawa F65 sand. The George Washington University, Washington, DC, 2017; El Ghoraiby et al., LEAP-2017 GWU Laboratory Tests. DesignSafe-CI, Dataset, 2018; El Ghoraiby et al., Physical and mechanical properties of Ottawa F65 Sand. In B. Kutter et al. (Eds.), Model tests and numerical simulations of liquefaction and lateral spreading: LEAP-UCD-2017. New York: Springer, 2019) and direct simple shear tests (Bastidas, Ottawa F-65 Sand Characterization. PhD Dissertation, University of California, Davis, 2016) are available for Ottawa F-65 sand. The focus of this element test simulation exercise is to assess the performance of the constitutive models used by participating team in simulating the results of undrained stress-controlled cyclic triaxial tests on Ottawa F-65 sand for three different void ratios (El Ghoraiby et al., LEAP 2017: Soil characterization and element tests for Ottawa F65 sand. The George Washington University, Washington, DC, 2017; El Ghoraiby et al., LEAP-2017 GWU Laboratory Tests. DesignSafe-CI, Dataset, 2018; El Ghoraiby et al., Physical and mechanical properties of Ottawa F65 Sand. In B. Kutter et al. (Eds.), Model tests and numerical simulations of liquefaction and lateral spreading: LEAP-UCD-2017. New York: Springer, 2019). The simulated stress paths, stress strain responses, and liquefaction strength curves show that majority of the models used in this exercise are able to provide a reasonably good match to liquefaction strength curves for the highest void ratio (0.585) but the differences between the simulations and experiments become larger for the lower void ratios (0.542 and 0.515)

LEAP-2017: Comparison of the Type-B Numerical Simulations with Centrifuge Test Results

This paper presents comparisons of 11 sets of Type-B numerical simulations with the results of a selected set of centrifuge tests conducted in the LEAP-2017 project. Time histories of accelerations, excess pore water pressures, and lateral displacement of the ground surface are compared to the results of nine centrifuge tests. A number of numerical simulations showed trends similar to those observed in the experiments. While achieving a close match to all measured responses (accelerations, pore pressures, and displacements) is quite challenging, the numerical simulations show promising capabilities that can be further improved with the availability of additional high-quality experimental results

Effect of Water Content on Properties of Homogeneous [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4–H2O Mixtures and Their Application in Oxidative Absorption of H2S

The potential of 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrachloroferrate ([bmim]Fe(III)Cl4) for replacing an iron(III) chelate catalytic solution in the catalytic oxidation of H2S is attributed to its no side reaction and no degradation of the chelating agent. The catalytic oxidation product of water in non-aqueous [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4 possibly has an influence on the oxidative absorption of H2S. Water and hydrophobic [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4 mixtures at water volume percents from 40% to 70% formed separate phases after srirring, without affecting the oxidative absorption of hydrogen sulfide. Then, studies on the properties of homogeneous [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4–H2O mixtures at water volume percents in the range of 5.88–30% and above 80% reveal that these mixtures are both Brønsted and Lewis acids at vol % (H2O) ≤ 30%, and only Lewis acids at vol % (H2O) ≥ 80%. Raman spectra showed that [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4 was the dominating species at vol % (H2O) ≤ 30%, in contrast, [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4 decomposed into FeCl3·2H2O and [bmim]Cl at vol % (H2O) ≥ 80%. Further research on oxidative absorption of H2S by homogeneous [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4–H2O mixtures demonstrated that [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4 was reduced by H2S to [bmim]Fe(II)Cl4H and FeCl3·2H2O was reduced to FeCl2, at the same time, H2S was oxidized to S8. In addition, the decrease in acidity caused by increasing the water content increased the weight percent of absorbed H2S, and decreased volatile HCl emissions. However, it is difficult to prevent the suspended S8 generated at vol % (H2O) ≥ 80% from the formation of sulfur blockage. Therefore, oxidative absorption of H2S by [bmim]Fe(III)Cl4–H2O mixtures is feasible at vol % (H2O) < 80% without sulfur blockage

Dynamic Behaviour Analysis of Turbocharger Rotor-Shaft System in Thermal Environment Based on Finite Element Method

The stable operation of a high-speed rotating rotor-bearing system is dependent on the internal damping of its materials. In this study, the dynamic behaviours of a rotor-shaft system with internal damping composite materials under the action of a temperature field are analysed. The temperature field will increase the tangential force generated by the internal damping of the composite material. The tangential force will also increase with the rotor speed, which can destabilise the rotor-shaft system. To better understand the dynamic behaviours of the system, we introduced a finite element calculation model of a rotor-shaft system based on a 3D high-order element (Solid186) to study the turbocharger rotor-bearing system in a temperature field. The analysis was done according to the modal damping coefficient, stability limit speed, and unbalance response. The results show that accurate prediction of internal damping energy dissipation in a temperature field is crucial for accurate prediction of rotor dynamic performance. This is an important step to understand dynamic rotor stress and rotor dynamic design

Forward Reaction Prediction as Reverse Verification: A Novel Approach to Retrosynthesis

Pupils\u27 intuitive knowledge can lead them to verify multiplication by means of division. Based on this analogy, this study introduces the basic reverse verification concept to verify retrosynthesis through forward reaction. In this work, we present a "combined" model approach for retrosynthetic reaction prediction, where the first model is applied to retrosynthesis, and the second model, which is a "verified" model, is applied to the forward reaction prediction to verify the top-n reactants predicted by the retrosynthetic model. Using a "combined" model borrowed from human language translation, sequence-to-sequence (seq2seq) + transformer models, we improve the top-1 accuracy of retrosynthetic prediction by 4.3% (37.4% vs 41.7%). The application of the similarity + seq2seq models increases the top-1 accuracy by 4.6% (52.9% vs 57.5%). In this way, we can not only improve the accuracy but also automate the evaluation of the synthetic route