Path diversity improves the identification of influential spreaders

Identifying influential spreaders in complex networks is a crucial problem which relates to wide applications. Many methods based on the global information such as $k$-shell and PageRank have been applied to rank spreaders. However, most of related previous works overwhelmingly focus on the number of paths for propagation, while whether the paths are diverse enough is usually overlooked. Generally, the spreading ability of a node might not be strong if its propagation depends on one or two paths while the other paths are dead ends. In this Letter, we introduced the concept of path diversity and find that it can largely improve the ranking accuracy. We further propose a local method combining the information of path number and path diversity to identify influential nodes in complex networks. This method is shown to outperform many well-known methods in both undirected and directed networks. Moreover, the efficiency of our method makes it possible to be applied to very large systems.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figure

Degree correlation effect of bipartite network on personalized recommendation

In this paper, by introducing a new user similarity index base on the diffusion process, we propose a modified collaborative filtering (MCF) algorithm, which has remarkably higher accuracy than the standard collaborative filtering. In the proposed algorithm, the degree correlation between users and objects is taken into account and embedded into the similarity index by a tunable parameter. The numerical simulation on a benchmark data set shows that the algorithmic accuracy of the MCF, measured by the average ranking score, is further improved by 18.19% in the optimal case. In addition, two significant criteria of algorithmic performance, diversity and popularity, are also taken into account. Numerical results show that the presented algorithm can provide more diverse and less popular recommendations, for example, when the recommendation list contains 10 objects, the diversity, measured by the hamming distance, is improved by 21.90%.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figure

Fish species-specific TRIM gene FTRCA1 negatively regulates interferon response through attenuating IRF7 transcription

In mammals and fish, emerging evidence highlights that TRIM family members play important roles in the interferon (IFN) antiviral immune response. Fish TRIM family has undergone an unprecedented expansion leading to generation of finTRIM subfamily, which is exclusively specific to fish. Our recent results have shown that FTRCA1 (finTRIM C. auratus 1) is likely a fish species-specific finTRIM member in crucian carp C. auratus and acts as a negative modulator to downregulate fish IFN response by autophage-lysosomal degradation of protein kinase TBK1. In the present study, we found that FTRCA1 also impedes the activation of crucian carp IFN promoter by IRF7 but not by IRF3. Mechanistically, FTRCA1 attenuates IRF7 transcription levels likely due to enhanced decay of IRF7 mRNA, leading to reduced IRF7 protein levels and subsequently reduced fish IFN expression. E3 ligase activity is required for FTRCA1 to negatively regulate IRF7-mediated IFN response, because ligase-inactive mutants and the RING-deleted mutant of FTRCA1 lose the ability to block the activation of crucian carp IFN promoter by IRF7. These results together indicate that FTRCA1 is a multifaceted modulator to target different signaling factors for shaping fish IFN response in crucian carp.</p

Effect of user tastes on personalized recommendation

In this paper, based on a weighted projection of the user-object bipartite network, we study the effects of user tastes on the mass-diffusion-based personalized recommendation algorithm, where a user's tastes or interests are defined by the average degree of the objects he has collected. We argue that the initial recommendation power located on the objects should be determined by both of their degree and the users' tastes. By introducing a tunable parameter, the user taste effects on the configuration of initial recommendation power distribution are investigated. The numerical results indicate that the presented algorithm could improve the accuracy, measured by the average ranking score, more importantly, we find that when the data is sparse, the algorithm should give more recommendation power to the objects whose degrees are close to the users' tastes, while when the data becomes dense, it should assign more power on the objects whose degrees are significantly different from user's tastes.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figure

Bc→J/ψB_c \to J/\psi helicity form factors and the Bc+→J/ψ+(P,V,ℓ+νℓ)B_c^+ \to J/\psi+(P, V, \ell^+ \nu_\ell) decays

In this paper, we calculate the $B_c\to J/\psi$ helicity form factors (HFFs) up to twist-4 accuracy by using the light-cone sum rules (LCSR) approach. After extrapolating those HFFs to the physically allowable $q^2$ region, we investigate the $B^+_c$-meson two-body decays and semi-leptonic decays $B_c^+ \to J/\psi+(P, V, \ell^+ \nu_\ell)$ with $P/V$ stands for light pseudoscalar/vector meson, respectively. The branching fractions can be derived by using the CKM matrix element and the $B_c$ lifetime from the Particle Data Group, and we obtain ${\cal B}(B_c^+ \to J/\psi \pi^+)=(0.136^{+0.002}_{-0.002})\%$, ${\cal B}(B_c^+ \to J/\psi K^+)=(0.010^{+0.000}_{-0.000})\%$, ${\cal B}(B_c^+ \to J/\psi \rho^+) =(0.768^{+0.029}_{-0.033})\%$, ${\cal B}(B_c^+ \to J/\psi K^{\ast +})=(0.043^{+0.001}_{-0.001})\%$, ${\cal B}(B_c^+ \to J/\psi \mu^+\nu_\mu)=(2.802^{+0.526}_{-0.675})\%$ and ${\cal B}(B_c^+ \to J/\psi \tau^+\nu_\tau)=(0.559^{+0.131}_{-0.170})\%$. We then obtain ${\cal R}_{\pi^+/\mu^+\nu_\mu} = 0.048^{+ 0.009}_{-0.012}$ and ${\cal R}_{K^+ / \pi^+} = 0.075^{+0.005}_{-0.005}$, which agree with the LHCb measured value within $1\sigma$-error. We also obtain ${\cal R}_{J/\psi}=0.199^{+ 0.060}_{-0.077}$, which like other theoretical predictions, is consistent with the LHCb measured value within $2\sigma$-error. Those imply that the HFFs under the LCSR approach are also applicable to the $B^+_c$ meson two-body decays and semi-leptonic decays $B_c^+ \to J/\psi+(P, V, \ell^+ \nu_\ell)$, and the HFFs obtained by using LCSR in a new way implies that there may be new physics in the $B_c\to J/\psi \ell^+ \nu_\ell$ semi-leptonic decays.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures, published versio

Transcriptional up-regulation of relaxin-3 by Nur77 attenuates β-adrenergic agonist-induced apoptosis in cardiomyocytes.

The relaxin family peptides have been shown to exert several beneficial effects on the heart, including anti-apoptosis, anti-fibrosis, and anti-hypertrophy activity. Understanding their regulation might provide new opportunities for therapeutic interventions, but the molecular mechanism(s) coordinating relaxin expression in the heart remain largely obscured. Previous work demonstrated a role for the orphan nuclear receptor Nur77 in regulating cardiomyocyte apoptosis. We therefore investigated Nur77 in the hopes of identifying novel relaxin regulators. Quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) data indicated that ectopic expression of orphan nuclear receptor Nur77 markedly increased the expression of latexin-3 (RLN3), but not relaxin-1 (RLN1), in neonatal rat ventricular cardiomyocytes (NRVMs). Furthermore, we found that the -adrenergic agonist isoproterenol (ISO) markedly stimulated RLN3 expression, and this stimulation was significantly attenuated in Nur77 knockdown cardiomyocytes and Nur77 knockout hearts. We showed that Nur77 significantly increased RLN3 promoter activity via specific binding to the RLN3 promoter, as demonstrated by electrophoretic mobility shift assay (EMSA) and chromatin immuno-precipitation (ChIP) assays. Furthermore, we found that Nur77 overexpression potently inhibited ISO-induced cardiomyocyte apoptosis, whereas this protective effect was significantly attenuated in RLN3 knockdown cardiomyocytes, suggesting that Nur77-induced RLN3 expression is an important mediator for the suppression of cardiomyocyte apoptosis. These findings show that Nur77 regulates RLN3 expression, therefore suppressing apoptosis in the heart, and suggest that activation of Nur77 may represent a useful therapeutic strategy for inhibition of cardiac fibrosis and heart failure. © 2018 You et al

苏州市三甲医院医患关系现状及其影响因素分析*

Objective: To investigate the relationship between doctors and patients in Suzhou, we focused on exploring the factors of doctor-patient communication, and strived to deepen the doctor-patient communication skills and knowledge. Method: Questionnaire survey was carried out in comprehensive tertiary-class hospitals in Suzhou , adopting the method of random sampling, respectively on patients and doctors. Results: 593 valid questionnaires were from both doctors and patients. The doctors thought that the current doctor-patient relationship  "good" and above accounted for 32% (31/98).At the meanwhile, in the patients, this proportion was 45% (223/495).There was statistically significance between the difference(P ＜0.05).Only 6% doctors thought that the communication between doctors and patients is not important; in the patients, the ratio was 10%. Among the doctors, the top three factors of doctor-patient communication were: lack of communication skills, too much tasks and not enough time and energy, not good attitude. Among patients, the top three factors were: incomprehension and distrust of the doctors, the poor understanding for medical knowledge and the low cultural level. Conclusion: In the first-class hospitals of Suzhou, the relationship between doctors and patients had a relatively good development trend. There were some problems in the communication between doctors and patients. We should enhance the doctor-patient communication, and build a harmonious doctor-patient relationship.目的  了解苏州市三甲医院的医患关系现状，探寻医患沟通的影响因素，以增进医患沟通的知识及技能。方法  在苏州市综合性“三甲”医院进行问卷调查，采用单纯随机抽样方法，分别就患方和医方进行调研。结果  收回医患双方有效问卷593份，有效率为94.6%。医方认为当前医患关系“比较好”及以上者占32%(31/98)，患方认为当前医患关系“比较好”及以上者占45%(223/495)，两者比较差异有统计学意义（P＜0.05）。医方有6%的人认为医患沟通不重要；在患方，这一比率为10%。就医方责任方面来说，影响医患沟通的前三位因素依次为：缺乏沟通技巧、工作任务繁重没有时间和精力、服务态度不好；就患者方面责任来说，影响医患沟通的前三位因素依次为：不理解不信任医护人员、对医疗知识不了解、文化层次相对较低。结论  苏州市3家三甲医院医患关系总体较好，医患沟通方面存在一定不足，应当切实增进医患沟通，构建和谐医患关系

Ranking reputation and quality in online rating systems

How to design an accurate and robust ranking algorithm is a fundamental problem with wide applications in many real systems. It is especially significant in online rating systems due to the existence of some spammers. In the literature, many well-performed iterative ranking methods have been proposed. These methods can effectively recognize the unreliable users and reduce their weight in judging the quality of objects, and finally lead to a more accurate evaluation of the online products. In this paper, we design an iterative ranking method with high performance in both accuracy and robustness. More specifically, a reputation redistribution process is introduced to enhance the influence of highly reputed users and two penalty factors enable the algorithm resistance to malicious behaviors. Validation of our method is performed in both artificial and real user-object bipartite networks