HiQA: A Hierarchical Contextual Augmentation RAG for Massive Documents QA

As language model agents leveraging external tools rapidly evolve, significant progress has been made in question-answering(QA) methodologies utilizing supplementary documents and the Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) approach. This advancement has improved the response quality of language models and alleviates the appearance of hallucination. However, these methods exhibit limited retrieval accuracy when faced with massive indistinguishable documents, presenting notable challenges in their practical application. In response to these emerging challenges, we present HiQA, an advanced framework for multi-document question-answering (MDQA) that integrates cascading metadata into content as well as a multi-route retrieval mechanism. We also release a benchmark called MasQA to evaluate and research in MDQA. Finally, HiQA demonstrates the state-of-the-art performance in multi-document environments

Una aproximación a estudio de las lacas chinas de la colección Federico Torralba (Museo de Zaragoza).

El origen de la laca en China se remonta al periodo Neolítico. Al principio, la laca solo constituía un barniz que se utilizaba para crear una cubierta sobre los objetos con el fin de protegerlos y garantizar su mayor duración. Sin embargo, en el discurrir del tiempo, la búsqueda de la belleza por parte de los artesanos dio lugar a que el arte de la laca fuera progresando en sus técnicas de producción y decoración lo que hizo que las piezas lacadas se conviertan gradualmente en autenticas obras de arte. La tecnología de producción y decoración de laca alcanzó su cumbre durante las dinastías Ming (1368--1644) y Qing (1644-1911), especialmente en esta última. Se puede decir que la laca es uno de los productos más representativos de la civilización china. Al igual que la seda y la porcelana, la laca fue conocida desde el pasado en Occidente, donde se han formado a lo largo de los siglos importantes colecciones. Desde el año 2001, el Museo de Zaragoza custodia una colección de obras de arte de Asia Oriental legadas por el Dr. Federico Torralba (1913-2012). Dicho profesor donó su colección de objetos de variada procedencia (Japón, China, India y diversos países del sudeste asiático) y categoría (cerámicas, pinturas, esculturas, caligrafías, muebles, textiles, grabados, marfiles, esmaltes, etc.), así como su biblioteca especializada, que consta de unos 2000 volúmenes. Entre los fondos procedentes de China hay que destacar las 23 piezas, la mayoría de la dinastía Qing que presentan distintos formatos (cajas, muebles, objetos rituales, etc.), diversas decoraciones (escenas de género, plantas, animales, motivos geométricos) y técnicas En este trabajo estudiaremos esta colección de laca, un símbolo muy característico del encuentro cultural entre Europa y China, con el fin de contribuir al conocimiento del legado del profesor Torralba, hoy en el Museo de Zaragoza.<br /

SiteFinding-PCR: a simple and efficient PCR method for chromosome walking

In this paper, we present a novel PCR method, termed SiteFinding-PCR, for gene or chromosome walking. The PCR was primed by a SiteFinder at a low temperature, and then the target molecules were amplified exponentially with gene-specific and SiteFinder primers, and screened out by another gene-specific primer and a vector primer. However, non-target molecules could not be amplified exponentially owing to the suppression effect of stem–loop structure and could not be screened out. This simple method proved to be efficient, reliable, inexpensive and time-saving, and may be suitable for the molecules for which gene-specific primers are available. More importantly, large DNA fragments can be obtained easily using this method. To demonstrate the feasibility and efficiency of SiteFinding-PCR, we employed this method to do chromosome walking and obtained 16 positive results from 17 samples

Coupling of RF Antennas to Large Volume Helicon Plasma

Large volume helicon plasma sources are of particular interest for large scale semiconductor processing, high power plasma propulsion and recently plasma-material interaction under fusion conditions. This work is devoted to studying the coupling of four typical RF antennas to helicon plasma with infinite length and diameter of $0.5$~m, and exploring its frequency dependence in the range of $13.56-70$~MHz for coupling optimization. It is found that loop antenna is more efficient than half helix, Boswell and Nagoya III antennas for power absorption; radially parabolic density profile overwhelms Gaussian density profile in terms of antenna coupling for low-density plasma, but the superiority reverses for high-density plasma. Increasing the driving frequency results in power absorption more near plasma edge, but the overall power absorption increases with frequency. Perpendicular stream plots of wave magnetic field, wave electric field and perturbed current are also presented. This work can serve as an important reference for the experimental design of large volume helicon plasma source with high RF power

The relationship between vitamin K and metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease among the United States population: National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 2017–2018

BackgroundThe effect of vitamin K is associated with several pathological processes in fatty liver. However, the association between vitamin K levels and metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD) remains unclear.ObjectiveHere, we investigated the relationship between vitamin K intake and MAFLD risk by employing the American National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) including 3,571 participants.MethodsMAFLD was defined as hepatic steatosis with one or more of the following: overweight or obesity, type 2 diabetes, or &gt;2 other metabolic risk abnormalities. The total vitamin K was the sum of dietary and supplement dietary intake. The relationship of between log10(vitamin K) and MAFLD was investigated using survey-weighted logistic regression and stratified analysis, with or without dietary supplementation.ResultsThe MAFLD population had a lower vitamin K intake than the non-MAFLD population (p = 0.024). Vitamin K levels were inversely associated with MAFLD in the fully adjusted model (OR = 0.488, 95% CI: 0.302–0.787, p = 0.006). Consistent results were seen in the group without dietary supplements (OR = 0.373, 95% CI: 0.186–0.751, p = 0.009) but not in the group consuming dietary supplements (OR = 0.489, 95% CI: 0.238–1.001, p = 0.050).ConclusionVitamin K intake may be a protective factor for MAFLD, especially for individual not using dietary supplements. Nevertheless, more high-quality prospective studies are needed to clarify the causal relationship between them