Regulatory Effect of Melatonin on Cytokine Disturbances in the Pristane-Induced Lupus Mice

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) develops in relation to many environmental factors. In our opinion, it is more important to investigate the effect of melatonin on the environmental- related SLE. In the present study, 0.5 ml pristane were used to induce SLE in female BALB/c mice. Melatonin (0.01, 0.1, 1.0 mg/kg) was orally administered immediately after pristane-injection for 24 weeks. IgM anti ssDNA and histone antibodies were detected after 0, 1, 2, 4, 8 weeks pristane injection. The levels of IL-2, IL-6 and IL-13 were detected after 24 weeks. Renal lesions were also observed. The results showed that melatonin antagonized the increasing levels of IgM anti ssDNA and histone autoantibodies. Melatonin could also decrease the IL-6 and IL-13 production and increase the IL-2 production. Besides, melatonin could lessen the renal lesions caused by pristane. These results suggested that melatonin has a beneficial effect on pristane-induced lupus through regulating the cytokines disturbances

Recovering the CMB Signal with Machine Learning

The cosmic microwave background (CMB), carrying the inhomogeneous information of the very early universe, is of great significance for understanding the origin and evolution of our universe. However, observational CMB maps contain serious foreground contaminations from several sources, such as galactic synchrotron and thermal dust emissions. Here, we build a deep convolutional neural network (CNN) to recover the tiny CMB signal from various huge foreground contaminations. Focusing on the CMB temperature fluctuations, we find that the CNN model can successfully recover the CMB temperature maps with high accuracy, and that the deviation of the recovered power spectrum $C_\ell$ is smaller than the cosmic variance at $\ell>10$. We then apply this method to the current Planck observation, and find that the recovered CMB is quite consistent with that disclosed by the Planck collaboration, which indicates that the CNN method can provide a promising approach to the component separation of CMB observations. Furthermore, we test the CNN method with simulated CMB polarization maps based on the CMB-S4 experiment. The result shows that both the EE and BB power spectra can be recovered with high accuracy. Therefore, this method will be helpful for the detection of primordial gravitational waves in current and future CMB experiments. The CNN is designed to analyze two-dimensional images, thus this method is not only able to process full-sky maps, but also partial-sky maps. Therefore, it can also be used for other similar experiments, such as radio surveys like the Square Kilometer Array.Comment: 19 pages, 25 figures, and 3 tables, ApJS, in press. The code repository is available at https://github.com/Guo-Jian-Wang/cmbNNC

A saúde mental é o fator mais importante que influencia a qualidade de vida de idosos deixados para trás quando as famílias emigram da China rural

OBJECTIVES: to investigate the quality of life and the associated factors on left behind elderly in rural China. METHOD: the research was conducted cluster sampling to select 456 elderly left behind when family members migrated out of rural China to participate in a cross-sectional study by completing a general data questionnaire and Quality of Life questionnaire. RESULTS: 91.5% of the elderly requested psychological counseling and education. For the elderly, scores for mental health (39.56±13.73) were significantly lower compared with Chinese standard data (61.6±13.7) (POBJETIVOS: investigar la calidad de vida y los factores asociados a los adultos mayores que se quedan en las zonas rurales de China. MÉTODO: la investigación se realizó por medio de muestreo por conglomerados para seleccionar 456 adultos mayores que se quedaron cuando los miembros de la familia emigraron de zonas rurales de China, para participar en un estudio de corte transversal, completando un cuestionario de datos generales y cuestionario de calidad de vida. RESULTADOS: el 91.5% de los adultos mayores solicitó asistencia psicológica y educación. Para los adultos mayores, las puntuaciones de salud mental (39.56±13.73) fueron significativamente más bajos en comparación con los datos estándar de China (61.6±13.7) (pOBJETIVOS: investigar a qualidade de vida e fatores associados de idosos deixados para trás na China rural. MÉTODO: foi realizada amostragem por conglomerado para selecionar 456 idosos deixados para trás quando os membros da família emigram da China rural. Este é um estudo transversal com preenchimento de um questionário de dados gerais e de qualidade de vida. RESULTADOS: 91,5% dos idosos convidados solicitaram aconselhamento e educação psicológicos. Para os idosos, os escores de saúde mental (39,56±13,73) foram significativamente menores em comparação aos dados padrões chineses (61,6±13,7) (

The association of a single nucleotide polymorphism in the promoter region of the LAMA1 gene with susceptibility to Chinese high myopia

Purpose: High myopia is a severe hereditary ocular disease leading to blindness. LAMA1 (alpha subunit of laminin) is a promising candidate gene for high myopia present in the MYP2 (myopia 2) region. The purpose of this study was to determine if high myopia is associated with single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) variants in LAMA1 in Chinese subjects. Methods: Ninety-seven Chinese subjects with high myopia and ethnically and sexually matched 103 normal controls were enrolled. Genomic DNA was prepared from peripheral blood. The 5 SNPs of LAMA1 were analyzed using PCR and SNaPshot. Allele frequencies were tested for Hardy-Weinberg disequilibrium. The genotype and allele frequencies were evaluated using the χ2 tests or the Fisher exact tests. Results: One of the 5 SNPs showed a significant difference between patients and control subjects (rs2089760: pgenotype=0.005, pallel=0.003). There were no statistically significant differences between patients and control subjects for the other four SNPs: rs566655, rs11664063, rs607230, and rs3810046. Conclusions: Our results indicate that the polymorphism of rs2089760, located in the promoter region of LAMA1, may be associated with high myopia in the Chinese population and should be investigated further. © 2011 Molecular Vision.link_to_subscribed_fulltex

The influence of net-quarks on the yields and rapidity spectra of identified hadrons

Within a quark combination model, we study systematically the yields and rapidity spectra of various hadrons in central Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}= 200$ GeV. We find that considering the difference in rapidity between net-quarks and newborn quarks, the data of multiplicities, rapidity distributions for $\pi^{\pm}$, $K^{\pm}$, $p(\bar{p})$ and, in particular the ratios of charged antihadron to hadron as a function of rapidity, can be well described. The effect of net-quarks on various hadrons is analysed, and the rapidity distributions for $K^{0}_{s}$, $\Lambda(\bar{\Lambda})$, $\Sigma^{+}(\bar{\Sigma}^{_-})$, $\mathrm{\Xi^{-}}$ ($\mathrm{\bar{\Xi}^{_+}}$) and $\mathrm{\Omega^{-}}(\mathrm{\bar{\Omega}}^{_+})$ are predicted. We discuss the rapidity distribution of net-baryon, and find that it reflects exactly the energy loss of colliding nuclei.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figure

Centrality dependence of pTp_{T} spectra for identified hadrons in Au+Au and Cu+Cu collisions at sNN=200\sqrt{s_{NN}}= 200 GeV

The centrality dependence of transverse momentum spectra for identified hadrons at midrapidity in Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}= 200$ GeV is systematically studied in a quark combination model. The $\mathrm{{p}_{T}}$ spectra of $\pi^{\pm}$, $K^{\pm}$, $p(\bar{p})$ and $\Lambda(\bar{\Lambda})$ in different centrality bins and the nuclear modification factors ($R_{CP}$) for these hadrons are calculated. The centrality dependence of the average collective transverse velocity $$ for the hot and dense quark matter is obtained in Au+Au collisions, and it is applied to a relative smaller Cu+Cu collision system. The centrality dependence of $\mathrm{{p}_{T}}$ spectra and the $R_{CP}$ for $\pi^{0}$, $K_{s}^{0}$ and $\Lambda$ in Cu+Cu collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}= 200$ GeV are well described. The results show that $<\beta (r)>$ is only a function of the number of participants $N_{part}$ and it is independent of the collision system.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figure

The Basic Differential Equations of Self-Anchored Cable-Stayed Suspension Bridge

The static behavior of self-anchored cable-stayed suspension bridge under vertical load is described with the continuum method. Based on the partition generalized variation principle, considering the compression-bending coupling effect of the main girder and the tower, the large displacement incomplete generalized potential energy functional of three-span self-anchored cable-stayed suspension bridge is established. Then, the basic differential equations of self-anchored cable-stayed suspension bridge are derived through constraint variation. Taking a self-anchored cable-stayed suspension bridge with main span 100 m, for example, the results by the proposed analytic method agree with that of numerical analysis. Therefore, the basic differential equations proposed in this paper could be applied to the preliminary analysis of self-anchored cable-stayed suspension bridge. The equations also provide a theoretical basis to describe the static behavior of this type of bridge

Selenium‐doping induced two antiferromagnetic transitions in thiospinel compounds CuCo₂S_(4‐x)Se_x (0 ≤ x ≤ 0.8)

A series of copper thiospinels compounds, CuCo₂S_(4‐x)Se_x (x = 0, 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8), have been successfully synthesized by solid state reaction and their structure and magnetic properties have been studied. The Rietveld refinements of X‐Ray diffractions indicate that both the lattice constants and the nearest neighbor Cu‐Cu distances increase with increasing selenium doping. A weakly antiferromagnetic transition occurring at about 4 K is observed in CuCo₂S₄. Two antiferromagnetic transitions at about 3.5 K and 6 K are observed in selenium‐doped samples, which suggest that the exchange couplings associated with Cu‐S(Se)‐Cu and Cu‐Se(S)‐Cu, respectively, are responsible for the two antiferromagnetic transitions. Detailed analysis of the experimental results further indicate that the nearest‐neighbor molecular field coefficient is comparable to the next‐neighbor molecular field coefficient. We propose a reasonable model to explain this phenomenon