Proteasome activator 28A: A clinical biomarker and pharmaceutical target in acute cerebral infarction therapy

Purpose: To determine the dynamic changes in serum levels of PA28α in patients with acute cerebral infarction (ACI), and to investigate its correlation with infarct size and neurological deficit of the disease. Methods: A total of 100 ACI patients and 100 healthy volunteers were recruited from The First Affiliated Hospital of Xinxiang Medical University as case and control groups, respectively. Their serum levels of PA28α were determined by quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR). The potential of PA28α in predicting the incidence of ACI was assessed by plotting ROC curves. Multivariate logistic regression analysis was conducted to investigate the risk factors of ACI. In addition, an ACI model in rats was established, and ACI rats were classified into 1, 3, 5, 7 and 14 day subgroups based on the duration post-ACI. Rats in the sham group served as control. Results: Serum level of PA28α was significantly higher in ACI patients than in controls. Moreover, the serum level of PA28α at admission was positively correlated to the NIHSS score and infarct volume of ACI patients. The level of PA28α in ACI rats gradually increased post-ACI, reaching a peak on day 7. The number of apoptotic brain cells in ACI rats gradually decreased after ACI. In addition, PA28α level was negatively correlated to the number of apoptotic brain cells in ACI rats (R2 = 0.5148, p < 0.001). Conclusion: The serum level of PA28α is elevated in ACI patients, and is positively correlated to infarct volume and neurological deficit of the disease. The dynamic change in brain cell apoptosis post-ACI is negatively correlated to the serum level of PA28α. These findings may provide theoretical basis for the diagnosis and treatment of ACI

State Estimation Using Dependent Evidence Fusion: Application to Acoustic Resonance-Based Liquid Level Measurement

Estimating the state of a dynamic system via noisy sensor measurement is a common problem in sensor methods and applications. Most state estimation methods assume that measurement noise and state perturbations can be modeled as random variables with known statistical properties. However in some practical applications, engineers can only get the range of noises, instead of the precise statistical distributions. Hence, in the framework of Dempster-Shafer (DS) evidence theory, a novel state estimatation method by fusing dependent evidence generated from state equation, observation equation and the actual observations of the system states considering bounded noises is presented. It can be iteratively implemented to provide state estimation values calculated from fusion results at every time step. Finally, the proposed method is applied to a low-frequency acoustic resonance level gauge to obtain high-accuracy measurement results

Night-Light Image Restoration Method Based on Night Scattering Model for Luojia 1-01 Satellite

Aiming at solving the degradation problem of Luojia 1-01 night-light remote sensing images, the main reason for the “glow” phenomenon was analyzed. The APSF (Atmospheric Point Spread Function) template of night-light image was obtained from atmospheric source scattering. The template was used as the initial value in the regularization restoration model in this paper. Experiments were carried out using single point and regional images. The results demonstrate that the estimated APSF and restoration results of the method are better than those from other methods, and the image quality is improved after restoration

Nonlinear Dual Reconstruction of SPECT Activity and Attenuation Images

In single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), accurate attenuation maps are needed to perform essential attenuation compensation for high quality radioactivity estimation. Formulating the SPECT activity and attenuation reconstruction tasks as coupled signal estimation and system parameter identification problems, where the activity distribution and the attenuation parameter are treated as random variables with known prior statistics, we present a nonlinear dual reconstruction scheme based on the unscented Kalman filtering (UKF) principles. In this effort, the dynamic changes of the organ radioactivity distribution are described through state space evolution equations, while the photon-counting SPECT projection data are measured through the observation equations. Activity distribution is then estimated with sub-optimal fixed attenuation parameters, followed by attenuation map reconstruction given these activity estimates. Such coupled estimation processes are iteratively repeated as necessary until convergence. The results obtained from Monte Carlo simulated data, physical phantom, and real SPECT scans demonstrate the improved performance of the proposed method both from visual inspection of the images and a quantitative evaluation, compared to the widely used EM-ML algorithms. The dual estimation framework has the potential to be useful for estimating the attenuation map fro

Temporal and Spatial Distribution and Fluorescence Spectra of Dissolved Organic Matter in Plateau Lakes: A Case Study of Qinghai Lake

Dissolved organic matter (DOM) has a great impact on the main pollution indicators of lakes (such as chemical oxygen demand, COD). Therefore, DOM is the research basis for understanding the meaning of the water environment and the laws of the migration and transformation of pollutants. Qinghai Lake is one of the world’s typical inland plateau lake wetlands. It plays important roles in improving and regulating the climate and in promoting a virtuous regional ecological cycle. In recent years, with the acceleration of urbanization and the rapid development of tourism, under the background of climate change, and with grassland degradation and precipitation change, the whole basin of Qinghai Lake has been facing great ecological pressure. In order to comprehensively explore the water environment of Qinghai Lake and to protect the sustainable development of the basin, a systematic study was carried out on the whole basin of Qinghai Lake. The results show the following: (1) from 2010 to 2020, the annual average value of CODCr in Qinghai Lake fluctuated in the range from class III to class V according to the surface water environmental quality standard, showing first a downward trend and then an upward trend. (2) The concentration of CDOM in Qinghai Lake had obvious temporal and spatial changes. (3) The spatial distribution of the total fluorescence intensity of FDOM in water was also different in different seasons. However, in the three surveys, the area with the highest total fluorescence intensity of FDOM in the water body appeared near Erlangjian in the south of Qinghai Province, indicating that anthropogenic sources are the main controlling factors of dissolved organic matter in the lake

A Comprehensive Forecasting–Optimization Analysis Framework for Environmental-Oriented Power System Management—A Case Study of Harbin City, China

In this study, a comprehensive research framework coupled with electric power demand forecasting, a regional electric system planning model, and post-optimization analysis is proposed for electric power system management. For dealing with multiple forms of uncertainties and dynamics concerning energy utilization, capacity expansions, and environmental protection, the inexact two-stage stochastic robust programming optimization model was developed. The novel programming method, which integrates interval parameter programming (IPP), stochastic robust optimization (SRO), and two-stage stochastic programming (TSP), was applied to electric power system planning and management in Harbin, China. Furthermore, the Gray-Markov approach was employed for effective electricity consumption prediction, and the forecasted results can be described as interval values with corresponding occurrence probability, aiming to produce viable input parameters of the optimization model. Ten scenarios were analyzed with different emissions reduction levels and electricity power structure adjustment modes, and the technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) was selected to identify the most influential factors of planning decisions by selecting the optimal scheme. The results indicate that a diversified power structure that dominates by thermal power and is mainly supplemented by biomass power should be formed to ensure regional sustainable development and electricity power supply security in Harbin. In addition, power structure adjustment is more effective than the pollutants emission control for electricity power system management. The results are insightful for supporting supply-side energy reform, generating an electricity generation scheme, adjusting energy structures, and formulating energy consumption of local policies

High-Transparency and Colorless Polyimide Film Prepared by Inhibiting the Formation of Chromophores

Colorless polyimides (CPIs) with outstanding mechanical properties are essential materials in the production of flexible display panels, foldable windows, and even spacecraft cockpits. This paper specifically elaborates that the Morkit unit, and azo and nitro chromophores are important factors contributing to yellow PI, together with the well-known charge transfer complex (CTC) theory. Three diamine monomers, two anhydrides monomers, and three blockers were used to inhibit chromophores formation and, thus, obtain CPI films. The cut-off wavelength was blue-shifts to 334 nm and the transmittance is improved to 98.9% in the UV–vis range. Mechanical and thermal properties of the CPI films are not reduced through coupling effects of the blockers. Therefore, the inhibition method of the Morkit units and chromophore groups is a promising process for preparing CPIs to be used as flexible display materials

Int. J. Mol. Sci.

Superparamagnetic polymers (SPMP) microbead was an excellent form for nanosized magnetic particles less than 10nm to realize their potential applications in many fields. We developed a novel modified suspension polymerization method for the production of superparamagnetic poly ( methacrylate divinylbenzene) ( PMA-DVB) microbeads, with amino groups on their surface after simple modifications. We applied these SPMP microbeads to establish a sandwich enzyme chemiluminence immuno (ECLIA) procedure of detecting the free hCG beta in serum. It was proved to a better method compared to the ELISA, since it need half of the sample volume, simpler protocols, and the time it need was shortened from 2 hours to 1 hour. The detection limit was 0.22 mIU.m(-1), one order lower than the ELISA assay. Its linear range was between 0.45 - 185.2 mIU.m(-1). And in the detections of clinical serum samples, the related coefficient between the two methods' results was 0.955.Superparamagnetic polymers (SPMP) microbead was an excellent form for nanosized magnetic particles less than 10nm to realize their potential applications in many fields. We developed a novel modified suspension polymerization method for the production of superparamagnetic poly ( methacrylate divinylbenzene) ( PMA-DVB) microbeads, with amino groups on their surface after simple modifications. We applied these SPMP microbeads to establish a sandwich enzyme chemiluminence immuno (ECLIA) procedure of detecting the free hCG beta in serum. It was proved to a better method compared to the ELISA, since it need half of the sample volume, simpler protocols, and the time it need was shortened from 2 hours to 1 hour. The detection limit was 0.22 mIU.m(-1), one order lower than the ELISA assay. Its linear range was between 0.45 - 185.2 mIU.m(-1). And in the detections of clinical serum samples, the related coefficient between the two methods' results was 0.955