A Surrogate-Assisted Extended Generative Adversarial Network for Parameter Optimization in Free-Form Metasurface Design

Metasurfaces have widespread applications in fifth-generation (5G) microwave communication. Among the metasurface family, free-form metasurfaces excel in achieving intricate spectral responses compared to regular-shape counterparts. However, conventional numerical methods for free-form metasurfaces are time-consuming and demand specialized expertise. Alternatively, recent studies demonstrate that deep learning has great potential to accelerate and refine metasurface designs. Here, we present XGAN, an extended generative adversarial network (GAN) with a surrogate for high-quality free-form metasurface designs. The proposed surrogate provides a physical constraint to XGAN so that XGAN can accurately generate metasurfaces monolithically from input spectral responses. In comparative experiments involving 20000 free-form metasurface designs, XGAN achieves 0.9734 average accuracy and is 500 times faster than the conventional methodology. This method facilitates the metasurface library building for specific spectral responses and can be extended to various inverse design problems, including optical metamaterials, nanophotonic devices, and drug discovery

Association between gout and atrial fibrillation: A meta-analysis of observational studies

Background: Gout is a systemic inflammatory arthritis characterized by the deposition of monosodium urate crystals due to hyperuricemia. Previous studies have explored the link between gout and atrial fibrillation (AF). Given the increasing prevalence and incidence of gout, there is a need to quantify the relationship between gout and the risk of AF. Therefore, we conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis on this topic. Methods: PubMed and Embase were searched for studies that reported the association between gout and AF using the following search term: (‘Gout’ and ‘Arrhythmia’). The search period was from the start of the database to 3rd August 2018 with no language restrictions. Results: A total of 75 and 22 articles were retrieved from PubMed and Embase, respectively. Of these, four observational studies (three cohort studies, one case-control study) including 659,094 patients were included. Our meta-analysis demonstrated that gout was significantly associated with increased risk of AF (adjusted hazard ratio: 1.31; 95% confidence interval: 1.00-1.70; P = 0.05; I2 = 99%) after adjusting for significant comorbidities and confounders. Conclusions: Our meta-analysis confirms the significant relationship between gout and AF. More data are needed to determine whether this risk can be adequately reduced by urate-lowering therapy

The Immungenicity and Cross-Neutralizing Activity of Enterovirus 71 Vaccine Candidate Strains

This study aimed to evaluate enterovirus 71 (EV-A71) vaccine candidate strains, including their genotypes, immunogenicity and cross-neutralization capacity. From clinical samples, EV-A71 strains were separated by using Vero cells. Six strains were chosen for vaccine candidates, and the sequences were analyzed. To detect the immunogenicity of the strains, we used them to immunize NIH mice at 0 and 14 days. Cytopathic effects (CPE) were examined to determine the EV-A71 neutralizing antibody (NTAb) titer 14 d after the first and second inoculations. To evaluate the cross-neutralizing capacity of the EV-A71 vaccine candidate strains, we tested serum immunized mice with ten EV-A71 genotype strains. Six EV-A71 vaccine candidate strains were identified, all belonging to sub-genotype C4, the prevalent genotype in China. The sequence similarity of the VP1 regions of the six candidate vaccine strains and three approved inactivated vaccines was 97.58%–97.77%, and the VP1 amino acid similarity was 98.65%–99.33%. Experiments were performed to evaluate the immunogenicity and cross-neutralizing activity of the EV-A71 vaccine candidate strains. The strains had good immunogenicity 14 d after two immunizations, inducing an NTAb titer ranging from 1:94 to 1:346. The NTAb seroconversion rates 14 d after one immunization were above 80% (except HB0007), and significantly increased immunogenicity of EV-A71 strains was observed post-inoculation. Furthermore, our candidate vaccine strains had broad cross-neutralizing activity after challenge with ten sub-genotypes of EV-A71. The highest NTAb titer/lowest NTAb titer ratios of sera against EV-A71 sub-genotypes were 8.0 (JS0002), 8.0 (JS0005), 21.3 (HB0005), 21.3 (HB0007), 10.7 (HB0040) and 8.0 (GD0002), respectively. Our EV-A71 strains had good immunogenicity and cross-neutralization activity, and have the potential to serve as vaccine strains for multivalent hand, foot and mouth disease vaccines

31st Annual Meeting and Associated Programs of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC 2016) : part two

Background The immunological escape of tumors represents one of the main ob- stacles to the treatment of malignancies. The blockade of PD-1 or CTLA-4 receptors represented a milestone in the history of immunotherapy. However, immune checkpoint inhibitors seem to be effective in specific cohorts of patients. It has been proposed that their efficacy relies on the presence of an immunological response. Thus, we hypothesized that disruption of the PD-L1/PD-1 axis would synergize with our oncolytic vaccine platform PeptiCRAd. Methods We used murine B16OVA in vivo tumor models and flow cytometry analysis to investigate the immunological background. Results First, we found that high-burden B16OVA tumors were refractory to combination immunotherapy. However, with a more aggressive schedule, tumors with a lower burden were more susceptible to the combination of PeptiCRAd and PD-L1 blockade. The therapy signifi- cantly increased the median survival of mice (Fig. 7). Interestingly, the reduced growth of contralaterally injected B16F10 cells sug- gested the presence of a long lasting immunological memory also against non-targeted antigens. Concerning the functional state of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs), we found that all the immune therapies would enhance the percentage of activated (PD-1pos TIM- 3neg) T lymphocytes and reduce the amount of exhausted (PD-1pos TIM-3pos) cells compared to placebo. As expected, we found that PeptiCRAd monotherapy could increase the number of antigen spe- cific CD8+ T cells compared to other treatments. However, only the combination with PD-L1 blockade could significantly increase the ra- tio between activated and exhausted pentamer positive cells (p= 0.0058), suggesting that by disrupting the PD-1/PD-L1 axis we could decrease the amount of dysfunctional antigen specific T cells. We ob- served that the anatomical location deeply influenced the state of CD4+ and CD8+ T lymphocytes. In fact, TIM-3 expression was in- creased by 2 fold on TILs compared to splenic and lymphoid T cells. In the CD8+ compartment, the expression of PD-1 on the surface seemed to be restricted to the tumor micro-environment, while CD4 + T cells had a high expression of PD-1 also in lymphoid organs. Interestingly, we found that the levels of PD-1 were significantly higher on CD8+ T cells than on CD4+ T cells into the tumor micro- environment (p < 0.0001). Conclusions In conclusion, we demonstrated that the efficacy of immune check- point inhibitors might be strongly enhanced by their combination with cancer vaccines. PeptiCRAd was able to increase the number of antigen-specific T cells and PD-L1 blockade prevented their exhaus- tion, resulting in long-lasting immunological memory and increased median survival

Coping Strategies and Brain Activity in Table Tennis Players Faced with Discrepancies between Predicted and Actual Outcomes

Prior studies have shown that athletes possess an excellent ability for action an-ticipation. However, it is not clear how athletes manage to regulate their behaviors when predicted outcomes deviate from actual outcomes. Based on Bayes theory and the predicted response outcome (PRO) model, the current study explored this ques-tion using novice and expert table tennis players. Discrepancies between predicted outcomes and actual outcomes were varied into seven conditions. We first examined the differences between experts and novices in a congruence discrimination task and confirmed that experts were better than novices at identifying discrepancies. Subse-quently, EEG technology was used to further explore the specific behavior and neural activity in experts during discrepancy processing. Reaction time and theta oscilla-tions gradually increased as the size of discrepancy between the predicted and the actual outcomes increased. These results suggest that experience promotes the mon-itoring of discrepancies between predicted and actual outcomes in athletes leading to flexibility in coping with varying degrees discrepancy

Modal Parameter Identification Based on Hilbert Vibration Decomposition in Vibration Stability of Bridge Structures

Modal parameters are important parameters for the dynamic response analysis of structures. An output-only modal parameter identification technique based on Hilbert Vibration Decomposition (HVD) is developed herein for structural modal parameter identification to (1) obtain the Free Decay Response (FDR) of a structure through free vibration or ambient vibration tests, (2) decompose the FDR into modal responses using HVD, and (3) calculate the instantaneous frequencies and instantaneous damping ratios of the modal responses to obtain the modal frequencies and modal damping ratios. A series of numerical examples are examined to demonstrate the efficiency and highlight the superiorities of the proposed method relative to the empirical model decomposition-based (EMD-based) method. The robustness of the proposed method to noises is also investigated and proved to be positive effect. The proposed method is proved to be efficient in modal parameter identification for both linear and nonlinear systems, with better frequency resolution, and it can be applied to systems with closely spaced modes and low-energy mode

Bayesian Aerosol Retrieval-Based PM2.5 Estimation through Hierarchical Gaussian Process Models

Satellite-based aerosol optical depth (AOD) data are widely used to estimate land surface PM2.5 concentrations in areas not covered by ground PM2.5 monitoring stations. However, AOD data obtained from satellites are typically at coarse spatial resolutions, limiting their applications on small or medium scales. In this paper, we propose a new two-step approach to estimate 1-km-resolution PM2.5 concentrations in Shanghai using high spatial resolution AOD retrievals from MODIS. In the first step, AOD data are refined to a 1&times;1km2 resolution via a Bayesian AOD retrieval method. In the second step, a hierarchical Gaussian process model is used to estimate PM2.5 concentrations. We evaluate our approach by model fitting and out-of-sample cross-validation. Our results show that the proposed approach enjoys accurate predictive performance in estimating PM2.5 concentrations

The Utilization of a Damping Structure in the Development of Self-Adaptive Water-Lubricated Stern Bearings

A novel water-lubricated stern bearing damping structure with self-adaptive performance is proposed to meet the load-balancing and vibration-damping requirements of water-lubricated bearings. This innovative damping structure comprises an elastic element and a damping alloy layer. The elastic element facilitates the static and dynamic load sharing of the stern bearing, mitigates the edge effects, ensures even distribution of the contact pressure along the axial direction, and enhances the overall bearing performance. Consequently, it prolongs the service life of the bearing and minimizes friction-induced stimulation. The damping alloy layer effectively attenuates the transmission of shafting vibrations to the foundation through the bearing, optimizing the vibration transmission characteristics. Leveraging the finite element model, an in-depth analysis of the compensation capability of the turning angle and damping performance of the adaptive stern bearing was conducted. The findings reveal that when the thickness of the elastic element is increased from 10 mm to 40 mm, the maximum contact pressure can be reduced by 12.53%. When the length ratio of the elastic element is reduced from 0.7 to 0.4, the maximum contact pressure is reduced by 12.42%. Therefore, increasing the thickness and decreasing the length of the elastic element in the adaptive damping device enhance the load performance, improve the compensation capabilities, and reduce the bearing wear, thereby promoting greater bearing uniformity. Furthermore, the adaptive vibration-damping device optimizes the vibration transmission characteristics from the propeller stimulation to the bearing node. The computational results demonstrate a noteworthy reduction in the speed, acceleration, and displacement responses at the first-order natural frequency, decreasing by 58.82%, 58.90%, and 58.86%, respectively. This substantial reduction in the vibration response at the first-order natural frequency signifies the effective mitigation of vibrations in the system