An assessment of technology forecasting: Revisiting earlier analyses on dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs)

© 2018 Elsevier Inc. The increasingly uncertain dynamics of technological change pose special challenges to traditional technology forecasting tools, which facilitates future-oriented technology analysis (FTA) tools to support the policy processes in the fields of science, technology & innovation (ST&I) and the management of technology (MOT), rather than merely forecasting incremental advances via analyses of continuous trends. Dye-sensitized solar cells are a promising third-generation photovoltaic technology that can add functionality and lower costs to enhance the value proposition of solar power generation in the early years of the 21st century. Through a series of technological forecasting studies analyzing the R&D patterns and trends in Dye-sensitized solar cells technology over the past several years, we have come to realize that validating previous forecasts is useful for improving ST&I policy processes. Yet, rarely do we revisit forecasts or projections to ascertain how well they fared. Moreover, few studies pay much attention to assessing FTA techniques. In this paper, we compare recent technology activities with previous forecasts to reveal the influencing factors that led to differences between past predictions and actual performance. Beyond our main aim of checking accuracy, in this paper we also wish to gain some sense of how valid those studies were and whether they proved useful to others in some ways

Paracrine mechanisms of Mesenchymal Stem cell-based therapy: Current status and perspectives.

published_or_final_versio

Association of Exposure to Particular Matter and Carotid Intima-Media Thickness: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Background: Long time exposure to particular matter has been linked to myocardial infarction, stroke and blood pressure, but its association with atherosclerosis is not clear. This meta-analysis was aimed at assessing whether PM2.5 and PM10 have an effect on subclinical atherosclerosis measured by carotid intima-media thickness (CIMT). Methods: Pubmed, Ovid Medline, Embase and NICK between 1948 and 31 March 2015 were searched by combining the keywords about exposure to the outcome related words. The random-effects model was applied in computing the change of CIMT and their corresponding 95% confidence interval (95% CI). The effect of potential confounding factors was assessed by stratified analysis and the impact of traffic proximity was also estimated. Results: Among 56 identified studies, 11 articles satisfied the inclusion criteria. In overall analysis increments of 10 μg/m3 in PM2.5 and PM10 were associated with an increase of CIMT (16.79 μm; 95% CI, 4.95–28.63 μm and 4.13 μm; 95% CI, −5.79–14.04 μm, respectively). Results shown in subgroup analysis had reference value for comparing with those of the overall analysis. The impact of traffic proximity on CIMT was uncertain. Conclusions: Exposure to PM2.5 had a significant association with CIMT and for women the effect may be more obvious

An ECG-SoC with 535nW/channel lossless data compression for wearable sensors

10.1109/ASSCC.2013.6691003Proceedings of the 2013 IEEE Asian Solid-State Circuits Conference, A-SSCC 2013145-14

A smart cushion for real-time heart rate monitoring

10.1109/BioCAS.2012.64185122012 IEEE Biomedical Circuits and Systems Conference: Intelligent Biomedical Electronics and Systems for Better Life and Better Environment, BioCAS 2012 - Conference Publications53-5

Decreasing erucic acid level by RNAi-mediated silencing of fatty acid elongase 1 (BnFAE1.1) in rapeseeds (Brassica napus L.)

The β-ketoacyl CoA synthase encoded by fatty acid elongase 1 gene (BnFAE1.1) is a rate-limiting enzyme regulating biosynthesis of erucic acid in rapeseeds (Brassica napus). To develop low level of erucic acid in rapeseeds by intron-spliced hairpin RNA, an inverted repeat unit of a partial BnFAE1.1 gene interrupted by a spliceable intron was cloned into pCAMBIA3301, and a seed-specific (Napin) promoter was used to control the transcription of the transgene. Four transgenic plants harboring a single copy of transgene were generated. Expression of endogenous BnFAE1.1 gene in developing T3 seeds was significantly reduced. In mature T3 seeds, erucic acid was decreased by 60.8 to 99.1% compared with wild type seeds, and accounted for 0.36 to 15.56% of total fatty acids. The level of eicosenoic acid was also greatly decreased. Furthermore, it resulted in a significant increase in the level of oleic acid, but total fatty acid content in T3 seeds was the same with that in wild type seeds. In conclusion, the expression of endogenous BnFAE1.1 was efficiently silenced by the designed RNAi silencer, causing a significant down-regulation in the level of erucic acid. Therefore, the RNAi-mediated post-transcriptional silencing of FAE1 gene to reduce oleic acid in rapeseeds was an efficient method to breed some new B. napus lines.Key words: Brassica napus L., fatty acid elongase, intron-spliced hairpin RNA, down-regulation, erucic acid

Association of the genetic polymorphisms of the ACE gene and the eNOS gene with lupus nephropathy in northern Chinese population

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>It has been reported that some single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of the angiotensin converting enzyme (<it>ACE</it>) gene and the endothelial nitric oxide synthase (<it>eNOS</it>) gene are associated with the development of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and the progression of nephropathy. The aim of this study was to evaluate the possible association between six SNPs (<it>A-5466C</it>, <it>T-3892C</it>, <it>A-240T</it>, <it>C1237T</it>, <it>G2215A </it>and <it>A2350G</it>) of the <it>ACE </it>gene and two SNPs (<it>T-786C </it>and <it>G894T</it>) of the <it>eNOS </it>gene with lupus nephropathy in a northern Chinese population.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>In this study, 225 patients with lupus nephropathy were compared to 232 healthy controls, matched by gender, age and ethnicity. Following the extraction of genomic DNA from the leukocytes in the peripheral blood, the genotypes of the eight selected SNPs were determined by the method of PCR-RFLP; the haplotypes were inferred using PHASE 2.1. The associations between the SNPs and the risk of lupus nephropathy were analyzed using Chi-square test and Logistic regression with SPSS13.0 software.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Statistically significant differences of the allele frequency distribution of three SNPs (<it>A-5466C</it>, <it>A2350G </it>and <it>G894T</it>) were observed between cases and controls (<it>P </it>< 0.05). Among the 53 haplotypes identified, the frequencies of five haplotypes (CTTCGA, ACTTAA, ACATGG, ACACGG and ATTCGA) were significantly different between cases and controls (<it>P </it>< 0.05).</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our study indicated an association between the risk of lupus nephropathy and the sequence variations of both the <it>ACE </it>gene and the <it>eNOS </it>gene, which may play an important role in the pathogenesis of lupus nephropathy in the northern Chinese population. Further studies are warranted to validate our findings.</p