Protein Fractions from Korean Mistletoe ( Viscum Album coloratum

Mistletoe (Viscum Album coloratum) has been known as a medicinal plant in European and Asian countries. Recent data show that biological activity of mistletoe alleviates hypertension, heart disease, renal failure, and cancer development. In this study, we report the antidiabetic effect of Korean mistletoe extract (KME). KME treatments enhanced the insulin secretion from the pancreatic β-cell without any effects of cytotoxicity. PDX-1 and beta2/neuroD known as transcription factors that regulate the expression of insulin gene were upregulated by treatment of the KME protein fractions isolated by ion-exchange chromatography after ammonium sulfate precipitation. Furthermore, these KME protein fractions significantly lowered the blood glucose level and the volume of drinking water in alloxan induced hyperglycemic mice. Taken together with the findings, it provides new insight that KME might be served as a useful source for the development of medicinal reagent to reduce blood glucose level of type I diabetic patients

Vertically aligned InGaN nanowires with engineered axial In composition for highly efficient visible light emission.

We report on the fabrication of novel InGaN nanowires (NWs) with improved crystalline quality and high radiative efficiency for applications as nanoscale visible light emitters. Pristine InGaN NWs grown under a uniform In/Ga molar flow ratio (UIF) exhibited multi-peak white-like emission and a high density of dislocation-like defects. A phase separation and broad emission with non-uniform luminescent clusters were also observed for a single UIF NW investigated by spatially resolved cathodoluminescence. Hence, we proposed a simple approach based on engineering the axial In content by increasing the In/Ga molar flow ratio at the end of NW growth. This new approach yielded samples with a high luminescence intensity, a narrow emission spectrum, and enhanced crystalline quality. Using time-resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy, the UIF NWs exhibited a long radiative recombination time (τr) and low internal quantum efficiency (IQE) due to strong exciton localization and carrier trapping in defect states. In contrast, NWs with engineered In content demonstrated three times higher IQE and a much shorter τr due to mitigated In fluctuation and improved crystal quality

Dealing with bottled water expenditures data with zero observations: a semiparametric specification

Abstract This paper analyzes bottled water expenditures data with zero observations by employing parametric and semiparametric models. The overall results of specification tests indicate that the semiparametric model outperforms the parametric model significantly

Intersite Coulomb Interactions in Charge Ordered Systems

Using {\it ab initio} approaches for extended Hubbard interactions coupled to phonons, we reveal that the intersite Coulomb interaction plays important roles in determining various distinctive phases of the paradigmatic charge ordered materials of Ba$_{1-x}$K$_x A$O$_3$ ($A=$ Bi and Sb). We demonstrated that all their salient doping dependent experiment features such as breathing instabilities, anomalous phonon dispersions, and transition between charge-density wave and superconducting states can be accounted very well if self-consistently obtained nearest neighbor Hubbard interaction are included, thus establishing a minimal criterion for reliable descriptions of spontaneous charge orders in solids.Comment: 4 pages, 2 additional pages for references and 4 pages supplementary materials, title and abstract are modifie

Prediction of Advanced Fibrosis in Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease: An Enhanced Model of BARD Score.

UNLABELLED: BACKGROUNDAIMS: The BARD score is a model to detect advanced liver fibrosis in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) patients. The aims of this study were to identify additional factors and then to build an enhanced version of the BARD score. METHODS: One hundred seven patients with biopsy-proven NAFLD were enrolled retrospectively. Logistic regressions were performed to identify independent risk factors for advanced liver fibrosis (stage 3 or 4). An enhanced model of the BARD score (BARDI score) was built and evaluated with a receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. RESULTS: In multivariate analysis, age (odds ratio [OR], 0.89; p=0.04), aspartate aminotransferase/alanine aminotransferase ratio (OR, 1.73; p CONCLUSIONS: The BARDI score had an improved PPV over the BARD score and maintained an excellent NPV. Further study is warranted for its external validation and comparison with other models

Observation of superabsorption by correlated atoms

Emission and absorption of light lie at the heart of light-matter interaction. Although the emission and absorption rates are regarded as intrinsic properties of atoms and molecules, various ways to modify these rates have been sought in critical applications such as quantum information processing, metrology and light-energy harvesting. One of the promising approaches is to utilize collective behavior of emitters as in superradiance. Although superradiance has been observed in diverse systems, its conceptual counterpart in absorption has never been realized. Here, we demonstrate superabsorption, enhanced cooperative absorption, by correlated atoms of phase-matched superposition state. By implementing an opposite-phase-interference idea on a superradiant state or equivalently a time-reversal process of superradiance, we realized the superabsorption with its absorption rate much faster than that of the ordinary ground-state absorption. The number of photons completely absorbed for a given time interval was measured to be proportional to the square of the number of atoms. Our approach, breaking the limitation of the conventional absorption, can help weak-signal sensing and advance efficient light-energy harvesting as well as light-matter quantum interfaces.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figure