The complete mitochondrial genome of an old world fruit bat Sphaerias blanfordi (Pteropodidae)

Sphaerias blanfordi Thomas is the single species of the genus Sphaerias Thomas in the family Pteropodidae. To better determine its phylogenetic location with respect to the related Pteropodidae species, the complete mitochondrial genome of S. blanfordi was sequenced. The whole genome is 16,926 bp in length. The overall GC content of the whole genome is 40.7%. Further, maximum-likelihood phylogenetic analyse was conducted using 11 complete mitochondrial genomes of the Pteropodidae, which support close relationship between S. blanfordi and Cynopterus brachyotis or C. sphinx

Effect of graphene quantum dots on the radiation resistance of epoxy resin

Investigations on the damage and degradation mechanisms of epoxy resin under a high-energy irradiation and improvement in its stability in irradiation environments are crucial to expand the application of epoxy resin in numerous fields including the aerospace and nuclear industries. In this study, graphene quantum dots (GQDs) were used as free radical scavengers to slow down the degradation of epoxy resin under a γ-irradiation environment, and the anti-irradiation mechanism of the GQDs on epoxy resin was investigated. The results demonstrated that following irradiation, the mechanical properties of epoxy resin exhibited a reduction of 49%, accompanied by a decrease in glass transition temperature by 4.4 ℃. Similarly, the mechanical properties of graphene quantum dots/epoxy resin (GQDs/EP) composites experienced a decline of 35%, along with a decrease in glass transition temperature by 2.2 ℃. Notably, upon the incorporation of GQDs, the generation of free radicals within irradiated GQDs/EP composites was significantly suppressed compared to pure resin. Furthermore, GQDs nanoparticles enhanced both the mechanical properties and thermal stability of epoxy resin prior to and after irradiation. Therefore, GQDs nanoparticles can be used as free radical scavenger to effectively improve the irradiation stability of epoxy resin. The scavenging mechanisms for free radicals mediated by GQDs is closely associated with sp2 carbon domains and surface functional groups. This study provides a novel concept and method to improve the stability of epoxy resin under γ-ray radiation

The Study of a Novel Nanoparticle-Enhanced Wormlike Micellar System

Abstract In this work, a novel nanoparticle-enhanced wormlike micellar system (NEWMS) was proposed based on the typical wormlike micelles composed of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) and sodium salicylate (NaSal). In order to strengthen the structure of wormlike micelles, silica nanoparticles are used to design the novel nanoparticle-enhanced wormlike micelle. The stability and morphologies of silica nanoparticles were studied by dynamic light scattering (DLS) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) at first. After the formation of NEWMS, the rheological properties were discussed in detail. The zero-shear viscosity of NEWMS increases with the addition of silica nanoparticles. Dynamic oscillatory measurements show the viscoelastic properties of NEWMS. Through comparison with the original wormlike micelles, the entanglement length and mesh size of NEWMS are nearly unchanged, while the contour length increases with the increase of silica concentration. These phenomena confirm the enhanced influence of silica nanoparticles on wormlike micelles. The formation mechanism of NEWMS, especially the interactions between wormlike micelles and nanoparticles, is proposed. This work can deepen the understanding of the novel NEWMS and widen their applications

Situational and Age-Dependent Decision Making during Life Threatening Distress in Myotis macrodactylus.

Echolocation and audiovocal communication have been studied extensively in bats. The manner in which these abilities are incorporated within escape behaviors during life-threatening distress is largely unknown. Here we tested the hypothesis that behavioral response profiles expressed during distress are relatively stereotypic given their evolutionary adaptations to avoid predators. We subjected juvenile and adult big-footed myotis (Myotis macrodactylus) to a sequence of three types of life threatening distress: 1) trapping them in a mist-net (environmental threat), 2) approaching them when trapped (predator threat), and 3) partially restraining their freedom to move (arrest), and recorded their escape behavior in each of the three conditions. Response profiles differed across individuals and with the context in which they were expressed. During environmental and predator threat, bats displayed significantly more biting and wing-flapping behaviors and emitted more echolocation pulses than during arrest. Response profiles also varied with age. During arrest, juveniles were more likely than adults to emit distress calls and vice-versa for biting and wing flapping during environmental and predator threat. Overall, individualized response profiles were classified into ten clusters that were aligned along two divergent response trajectories when viewed within two-dimensional, multifactorial decision space. Juvenile behaviors tended to follow a predominantly "social-dependence" trajectory, whereas adult behaviors were mostly aligned along a "self-reliance" trajectory. We conclude that bats modify their vocal behavior and make age-appropriate and contextually adaptive decisions when distressed. This decision-making ability is consistent with observations in other social species, including humans

Deep learning based fully automatic segmentation of the left ventricular endocardium and epicardium from cardiac cine MRI

BackgroundThe segmentation of cardiac medical images is a crucial step for calculating clinical indices such as wall thickness, ventricular volume, and ejection fraction.MethodsIn this study, we introduce a method named LsUnet that combines multi-channel, fully convolutional neural network, and annular shape level-set methods for efficiently segmenting cardiac cine magnetic resonance (MR) images. In this method, the multi-channel deep learning algorithm is applied to train the segmentation task to extract the left ventricle (LV) endocardial and epicardial contours. Next, the segmentation contours from the multi-channel deep learning method are incorporated into a level-set formulation, which is dedicated explicitly to detecting annular shapes to assure the segmentation's accuracy and robustness.ResultsThe proposed automatic approach was evaluated on 95 volumes (total 1,076 slices, ~80% as for training datasets, ~20% 2D as for testing datasets). This combined multi-channel deep learning and annular shape level-set segmentation method achieved high accuracy with average Dice values reaching 92.15% and 95.42% for LV endocardium and epicardium delineation, respectively, in comparison to the reference standard (the manual segmentation).ConclusionsA novel method for fully automatic segmentation of the LV endocardium and epicardium from different MRI datasets is presented. The proposed workflow is accurate and robust compared to the reference and other state-of-the-art methods

2D GeP-based photonic device for near-infrared and mid-infrared ultrafast photonics

Germanium phosphide (GeP), a rising star of novel two-dimensional (2D) material composed of Group IV–V elements, has been extensively studied and applied in photonics thanks to its broadband optical absorption, strong light–matter interaction and flexible bandgap structure. Here, we show the strong nonlinear optical (NLO) properties of 2D GeP nanoflakes in the broadband range with open-aperture Z-scan technique to explore the performance of 2D GeP microfiber photonic devices (GMPDs) in near-infrared (near-IR) and mid-infrared (mid-IR) ultrafast photonics. Our results suggest that employing the GMPD as an optical device in an erbium-doped fiber laser (EDFL) system results in ultrashort pulses and rogue waves (RWs) at 1.55 μm. Likewise, by the incorporation of GMPD into a thulium-doped fiber laser (TDFL) system, stable ultrashort pulse operation is also achieved at 2.0 μm. We expect these findings to be an excellent GMPD that can be applied in mode-locked fiber lasers to open up new avenues for its development and application in ultrafast photonics

Scatterplot of behavioral response profiles of juveniles (blue dots) and adults (red dots) within two-dimensional canonical space.

<p>Groups that are significantly different tend to have non-intersecting ellipses, in this case suggesting significant differences between juveniles and adults. See <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0132817#pone.0132817.g005" target="_blank">Fig 5</a> for details on the meaning of plot symbols.</p