SRCD: Semantic Reasoning with Compound Domains for Single-Domain Generalized Object Detection

This paper provides a novel framework for single-domain generalized object detection (i.e., Single-DGOD), where we are interested in learning and maintaining the semantic structures of self-augmented compound cross-domain samples to enhance the model's generalization ability. Different from DGOD trained on multiple source domains, Single-DGOD is far more challenging to generalize well to multiple target domains with only one single source domain. Existing methods mostly adopt a similar treatment from DGOD to learn domain-invariant features by decoupling or compressing the semantic space. However, there may have two potential limitations: 1) pseudo attribute-label correlation, due to extremely scarce single-domain data; and 2) the semantic structural information is usually ignored, i.e., we found the affinities of instance-level semantic relations in samples are crucial to model generalization. In this paper, we introduce Semantic Reasoning with Compound Domains (SRCD) for Single-DGOD. Specifically, our SRCD contains two main components, namely, the texture-based self-augmentation (TBSA) module, and the local-global semantic reasoning (LGSR) module. TBSA aims to eliminate the effects of irrelevant attributes associated with labels, such as light, shadow, color, etc., at the image level by a light-yet-efficient self-augmentation. Moreover, LGSR is used to further model the semantic relationships on instance features to uncover and maintain the intrinsic semantic structures. Extensive experiments on multiple benchmarks demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed SRCD.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure

Cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease, and diabetes mortality burden of cardiometabolic risk factors from 1980 to 2010: A comparative risk assessment

Background: High blood pressure, blood glucose, serum cholesterol, and BMI are risk factors for cardiovascular diseases and some of these factors also increase the risk of chronic kidney disease and diabetes. We estimated mortality from cardiovascular diseases, chronic kidney disease, and diabetes that was attributable to these four cardiometabolic risk factors for all countries and regions from 1980 to 2010. Methods: We used data for exposure to risk factors by country, age group, and sex from pooled analyses of population-based health surveys. We obtained relative risks for the effects of risk factors on cause-specific mortality from meta-analyses of large prospective studies. We calculated the population attributable fractions for each risk factor alone, and for the combination of all risk factors, accounting for multicausality and for mediation of the effects of BMI by the other three risks. We calculated attributable deaths by multiplying the cause-specific population attributable fractions by the number of disease-specific deaths. We obtained cause-specific mortality from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors 2010 Study. We propagated the uncertainties of all the inputs to the final estimates. Findings: In 2010, high blood pressure was the leading risk factor for deaths due to cardiovascular diseases, chronic kidney disease, and diabetes in every region, causing more than 40% of worldwide deaths from these diseases; high BMI and glucose were each responsible for about 15% of deaths, and high cholesterol for more than 10%. After accounting for multicausality, 63% (10·8 million deaths, 95% CI 10·1-11·5) of deaths from these diseases in 2010 were attributable to the combined effect of these four metabolic risk factors, compared with 67% (7·1 million deaths, 6·6-7·6) in 1980. The mortality burden of high BMI and glucose nearly doubled from 1980 to 2010. At the country level, age-standardised death rates from these diseases attributable to the combined effects of these four risk factors surpassed 925 deaths per 100 000 for men in Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Mongolia, but were less than 130 deaths per 100 000 for women and less than 200 for men in some high-income countries including Australia, Canada, France, Japan, the Netherlands, Singapore, South Korea, and Spain. Interpretation: The salient features of the cardiometabolic disease and risk factor epidemic at the beginning of the 21st century are high blood pressure and an increasing effect of obesity and diabetes. The mortality burden of cardiometabolic risk factors has shifted from high-income to low-income and middle-income countries. Lowering cardiometabolic risks through dietary, behavioural, and pharmacological interventions should be a part of the global response to non-communicable diseases. Funding: UK Medical Research Council, US National Institutes of Health. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd

Neural Basis of the Emotional Conflict Processing in Major Depression: ERPs and Source Localization Analysis on the N450 and P300 Components

Objects: Effective psychological function requires that cognition is not affected by task-irrelevant emotional stimuli in emotional conflict. Depression is mainly characterized as an emotional disorder. The object of this study is to reveal the behavioral and electrophysiological signature of emotional conflict processing in major depressive disorder (MDD) using event-related potentials (ERPs) and standardized low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography (sLORETA) analysis.Method: We used a face–word Stroop task involving emotional faces while recording EEG (electroencephalography) in 20 patients with MDD and 20 healthy controls (HCs). And then ERPs were extracted and the corresponding brain sources were reconstructed using sLORETA.Results: Behaviorally, subjects with MDDs manifested significantly increased Stroop effect when examining the RT difference between happy incongruent trials and happy congruent trials, compared with HC subjects. ERP results exhibited that MDDs were characterized by the attenuated difference between P300 amplitude to sad congruent stimuli and sad incongruent stimuli, as electrophysiological evidence of impaired conflict processing in subjects with MDD. The sLORETA results showed that MDD patients had a higher current density in rostral anterior cingulate cortex (rostral ACC) within N450 time window in response to happy incongruent trials than happy congruent stimuli. Moreover, HC subjects had stronger activity in right inferior frontal gyrus (rIFG) region in response to incongruent stimuli than congruent stimuli, revealing successful inhibition of emotional distraction in HCs, which was absent in MDDs.Conclusion: Our results indicated that rostral ACC was implicated in the processing of negative emotional distraction in MDDs, as well as impaired inhibition of task-irrelevant emotional stimuli, relative to HCs. This work furnishes novel behavioral and neurophysiological evidence that are closely related to emotional conflict among MDD patients

Preparation and Characterization of Nanoparticles Made from Co-Incubation of SOD and Glucose

The attractive potential of natural superoxide dismutase (SOD) in the fields of medicine and functional food is limited by its short half-life in circulation and poor permeability across the cell membrane. The nanoparticle form of SOD might overcome these limitations. However, most preparative methods have disadvantages, such as complicated operation, a variety of reagents—some of them even highly toxic—and low encapsulation efficiency or low release rate. The aim of this study is to present a simple and green approach for the preparation of SOD nanoparticles (NPs) by means of co-incubation of Cu/Zn SOD with glucose. This method was designed to prepare nanoscale aggregates based on the possible inhibitory effect of Maillard reaction on heating-induced aggregation during the co-incubation. Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) results indicated that the Maillard reaction occurred during the co-incubation process. It was found that enzymatically active NPs of Cu/Zn SOD were simultaneously generated during the reaction, with an average particle size of 175.86 ± 0.71 nm, and a Zeta potential of −17.27 ± 0.59 mV, as established by the measurement of enzymatic activity, observations using field emission scanning electron microscope, and analysis of dynamic light scattering, respectively. The preparative conditions for the SOD NPs were optimized by response surface design to increase SOD activity 20.43 fold. These SOD NPs showed storage stability for 25 days and better cell uptake efficacy than natural SOD. Therefore, these NPs of SOD are expected to be a potential drug candidate or functional food factor. To our knowledge, this is the first report on the preparation of nanoparticles possessing the bioactivity of the graft component protein, using the simple and green approach of co-incubation with glucose, which occurs frequently in the food industry during thermal processing

Epidemiological features and spatial clusters of hand, foot, and mouth disease in Qinghai Province, China, 2009–2015

Abstract Background Hand, Foot, and Mouth Disease (HFMD) is most frequently caused by Enterovirus71 (EV-A71) or Coxsackie virus A16 (CV-A16), infants and young children are at greatest risk. Describing the epidemiology of HFMD can help develop and better target interventions, including the use of pediatric EV-A71 vaccination. Methods We obtained data from the national surveillance system for HFMD cases with onset dates from 2009 to 2015. We defined probable cases as patient with skin papular or vesicular rashes on the hands, feet, mouth, or buttocks and confirmed cases as patients with the above symptoms along with laboratory-based enterovirus detection. We generated overall and age-specific annual incidence rates and described the temporal variability and seasonality of HFMD in Qinghai Province. We identified spatial clustering of HFMD incidence at the county level using the Local Indicator of Spatial Associationand an alpha level of 0.05. Results During the study period, 14,480 HFMD probable or confirmed cases were reported in Qinghai Province. Of the 2158 (14.9%) with laboratory confirmation, 924 (42.6%) were caused by CV-A16 and 830 (38.2%) were caused by EV-A71. The majority (89%) of all case-patients were ≤ 5 years of age and male (61.5%). The overall mean annual HFMD incidence rate was 36.4 cases per 100,000 populations, while the incidence rate for children ≤5 years of age was 379.5 cases per 100,000. Case reports peaked during the months of May through July. HFMD was predominantly caused by EV-A71, except in 2010 and 2014 when CV-A16 was the predominant causative agent. High incidence rates of HFMD were clustered (Moran’s I = 0.59, P < 0.05) in the eastern region of the province. Conclusion HFMD remains an important cause of childhood disease in Qinghai Province, occurring in an acyclical pattern of increased incidence, primarily due to CV-A16 circulation every three years. Incidence is also seasonal and tends to spatially cluster in the eastern region of the province. Since approximately 40% of confirmed HFMD cases were due to EV-A71, EV-A71 vaccination is likely to have a positive impact on the HFMD disease burden. Routine analysis of local surveillance data is crucial for describing disease occurrence and changes in etiology

Image_1_Neural Basis of the Emotional Conflict Processing in Major Depression: ERPs and Source Localization Analysis on the N450 and P300 Components.TIF

<p>Objects: Effective psychological function requires that cognition is not affected by task-irrelevant emotional stimuli in emotional conflict. Depression is mainly characterized as an emotional disorder. The object of this study is to reveal the behavioral and electrophysiological signature of emotional conflict processing in major depressive disorder (MDD) using event-related potentials (ERPs) and standardized low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography (sLORETA) analysis.</p><p>Method: We used a face–word Stroop task involving emotional faces while recording EEG (electroencephalography) in 20 patients with MDD and 20 healthy controls (HCs). And then ERPs were extracted and the corresponding brain sources were reconstructed using sLORETA.</p><p>Results: Behaviorally, subjects with MDDs manifested significantly increased Stroop effect when examining the RT difference between happy incongruent trials and happy congruent trials, compared with HC subjects. ERP results exhibited that MDDs were characterized by the attenuated difference between P300 amplitude to sad congruent stimuli and sad incongruent stimuli, as electrophysiological evidence of impaired conflict processing in subjects with MDD. The sLORETA results showed that MDD patients had a higher current density in rostral anterior cingulate cortex (rostral ACC) within N450 time window in response to happy incongruent trials than happy congruent stimuli. Moreover, HC subjects had stronger activity in right inferior frontal gyrus (rIFG) region in response to incongruent stimuli than congruent stimuli, revealing successful inhibition of emotional distraction in HCs, which was absent in MDDs.</p><p>Conclusion: Our results indicated that rostral ACC was implicated in the processing of negative emotional distraction in MDDs, as well as impaired inhibition of task-irrelevant emotional stimuli, relative to HCs. This work furnishes novel behavioral and neurophysiological evidence that are closely related to emotional conflict among MDD patients.</p

The complete mitochondrial genome of Tetragonia tetragonioides (Pall.) Kuntze and its phylogenetic implications

The complete mitochondrial genome sequence of Tetragonia tetragonioides (Pall.) Kuntze was assembled and characterized in the present study. The mitochondrial genome was 347,227 bp in length and had a GC content of 43.84%, including 24 transfer RNA (tRNA) genes and three ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes. Phylogenetic analysis showed that T. tetragonioides was close to and Sesuvium portulacastrum