Enhancing Conversion Kinetics through Electron Density Dual-Regulation of Catalysts and Sulfur toward Room-/Subzero-Temperature Na-S Batteries.

Room-temperature sodium-sulfur (RT Na/S) batteries have received increasing attention for the next generation of large-scale energy storage, yet they are hindered by the severe dissolution of polysulfides, sluggish redox kinetic, and incomplete conversion of sodium polysulfides (NaPSs). Herein, the study proposes a dual-modulating strategy of the electronic structure of electrocatalyst and sulfur to accelerate the conversion of NaPSs. The selenium-modulated ZnS nanocrystals with electron rearrangement in hierarchical structured spherical carbon (Se-ZnS/HSC) facilitate Na+ transport and catalyze the conversion between short-chain sulfur and Na2S. And the in situ introduced Se within S can enhance conductivity and form an S─Se bond, suppressing the "polysulfides shuttle". Accordingly, the S@Se-ZnS/HSC cathode exhibits a specific capacity of as high as 1302.5 mAh g-1 at 0.1 A g-1 and ultrahigh-rate capability (676.9 mAh g-1 at 5.0 A g-1). Even at -10 °C, this cathode still delivers a high reversible capacity of 401.2 mAh g-1 at 0.05 A g-1 and 94% of the original capacitance after 50 cycles. This work provides a novel design idea for high-performance Na/S batteries.

The effects of Solution-Focused Brief Therapy on self-care and mental health among older adults at risk of coronary heart disease: A randomized controlled trial.

This study tested the effectiveness of a nursing program developed based on Solution-Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT) in improving self-care skills and mental health among community-dwelling older adults at risk for coronary heart disease (CHD). A total of 120 older adults were randomly assigned to either an SFBT group or a control group. Participants' self-care ability, depressive symptoms, and anxiety at baseline and post-intervention were assessed using the Self-care Ability Scale for the Elderly (SASE), Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS), and Self-Rating Anxiety Scale (SAS), respectively. The t-test, Mann-Whitney U, and chi-square tests were conducted for group comparisons. After 6 months of intervention, the intervention group had significantly higher self-concept, self-skills, self-care awareness, and health knowledge scores than the baseline and the control group (all P-values < 0.05). The intervention group had significantly lower depression and anxiety scores than the baseline and the control group (all P-values < 0.05). SFBT is effective in improving older adults' self-care and mental health and may be widely applied among older adults to prevent CHD and promote well-being in the future.

Inhaled Volatiles for Status Asthmaticus, Epilepsy, and Difficult Sedation in Adult ICU and PICU: A Systematic Review.

OBJECTIVES: Inhaled volatile anesthetics support management of status asthmaticus (SA), status epilepticus (SE), and difficult sedation (DS). This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness, safety, and feasibility of using inhaled anesthetics for SA, SE, and DS in adult ICU and PICU patients. DATA SOURCES: MEDLINE, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, and Embase. STUDY SELECTION: Primary literature search that reported the use of inhaled anesthetics in ventilated patients with SA, SE, and DS from 1970 to 2021. DATA EXTRACTION: Study data points were extracted by two authors independently. Quality assessment was performed using the Joanna Briggs Institute appraisal tool for case studies/series, Newcastle criteria for cohort/case-control studies, and risk-of-bias framework for clinical trials. DATA SYNTHESIS: Primary outcome was volatile efficacy in improving predefined clinical or physiologic endpoints. Secondary outcomes were adverse events and delivery logistics. From 4281 screened studies, the number of included studies/patients across diagnoses and patient groups were: SA (adult: 38/121, pediatric: 28/142), SE (adult: 18/37, pediatric: 5/10), and DS (adult: 21/355, pediatric: 10/90). Quality of evidence was low, consisting mainly of case reports and series. Clinical and physiologic improvement was seen within 1-2 hours of initiating volatiles, with variable efficacy across diagnoses and patient groups: SA (adult: 89-95%, pediatric: 80-97%), SE (adults: 54-100%, pediatric: 60-100%), and DS (adults: 60-90%, pediatric: 62-90%). Most common adverse events were cardiovascular, that is, hypotension and arrhythmias. Inhaled sedatives were commonly delivered using anesthesia machines for SA/SE and miniature vaporizers for DS. Few (10%) of studies reported required non-ICU personnel, and only 16% had ICU volatile delivery protocol. CONCLUSIONS: Volatile anesthetics may provide effective treatment in patients with SA, SE, and DS scenarios but the quality of evidence is low. Higher-quality powered prospective studies of the efficacy and safety of using volatile anesthetics to manage SA, SE, and DS patients are required. Education regarding inhaled anesthetics and the protocolization of their use is needed.

The impact of SLCO1B1 rs4149056 on LDL-C target achievement after lipid lowering therapy optimization in men and women with familial hypercholesterolemia.

Background and aims: FH women are less likely to receive intensive statin treatment and to obtain a 50% reduction of LDL-C from baseline compared to men with FH. SLCO1B1 rs4149056 might influence statin therapy compliance and thus LDL-C target achievement. Our aim was to evaluate the impact of SLCO1B1 rs4149056 on LDL-C target achievement after lipid lowering therapy (LLT) optimization in men and women with FH. Methods: This was a retrospective observational study involving 412 FH subjects with a probable or defined clinical diagnosis of FH who had had genetic analysis from June 2016 to September 2022. Biochemical analysis was obtained from all subjects at baseline and at the last follow-up after LLT optimization. Results: After LLT optimization the percentage of FH subjects on high-intensity statins decreased from the M/SLCO1B1- group to the W/SLCO1B1+ group and the same was found in LDL-C target distribution (for both p for trend < 0.01). The prevalence of SASE fear increased from the M/SLCO1B1- group to the W/SLCO1B1+ group and the same was observed in reported myalgia distribution (for both p for trend < 0.01). Logistic regression analysis showed that the W/SCLO1B1-, M/SCLO1B1+ and W/SCLO1B1+ groups were inversely associated with LDL-C target achievement (p for trend < 0.001) and the W/SCLO1B1+ group exhibited the strongest association. Conclusion: A low prevalence of FH women with SLCO1B1 rs4149056 were on high intensity statins and they rarely achieved LDL-C target. The genotype effect of SLCO1B1 rs4149056 could be more pronounced in FH women than men.

Bleomycin-treated myoblasts undergo p21-associated cellular senescence and have severely impaired differentiation.

As we age, the ability to regenerate and repair skeletal muscle damage declines, partially due to increasing dysfunction of muscle resident stem cells-satellite cells (SC). Recent evidence implicates cellular senescence, which is the irreversible arrest of proliferation, as a potentiator of SC impairment during aging. However, little is known about the role of senescence in SC, and there is a large discrepancy in senescence classification within skeletal muscle. The purpose of this study was to develop a model of senescence in skeletal muscle myoblasts and identify how common senescence-associated biomarkers respond. Low-passage C2C12 myoblasts were treated with bleomycin or vehicle and then evaluated for cytological and molecular senescence markers, proliferation status, cell cycle kinetics, and differentiation potential. Bleomycin treatment caused double-stranded DNA breaks, which upregulated p21 mRNA and protein, potentially through NF-κB and senescence-associated super enhancer (SASE) signaling (p < 0.01). Consequently, cell proliferation was abruptly halted due to G2/M-phase arrest (p < 0.01). Bleomycin-treated myoblasts displayed greater senescence-associated ß-galactosidase staining (p < 0.01), which increased over several days. These myoblasts remained senescent following 6 days of differentiation and had significant impairments in myotube formation (p < 0.01). Furthermore, our results show that senescence can be maintained despite the lack of p16 gene expression in C2C12 myoblasts. In conclusion, bleomycin treatment provides a valid model of damage-induced senescence that was associated with elevated p21, reduced myoblast proliferation, and aberrant cell cycle kinetics, while confirming that a multi-marker approach is needed for the accurate classification of senescence within skeletal muscle.

Design and first-round commissioning result of the SASE beamline at the Shanghai Soft X-ray FEL facility.

The Shanghai Soft X-ray Free-Electron Laser (SXFEL) is the first X-ray free-electron laser facility in China. The SASE beamline, which consists of a pink-beam branch and a mono-beam branch, is one of the two beamlines in the Phase-I construction. The pink-beam branch opened for users in 2023 after successful first-round beamline commissioning. In this paper, the design of the beamline is presented and the performance of the pink-beam branch is reported. The measured energy-resolving power of the online spectrometer is over 6000 @ 400 eV. The focusing spot size of the pink beam is less than 3 µm in both the horizontal and vertical at the endstation.

SASE, Success and Adverse event Score in Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangiopancreatography: a Novel Grading System.

BACKGROUND: Validated, accepted grading tools for preprocedural complexity assessment in ERCP are lacking. We therefore created a grading system for ERCP based on the classification used by the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ASGE). METHODS: Data on ERCP adverse events (AE) and success were collected in a multicenter, prospective uncontrolled study. Multiple logistic regressions were applied to success and AEs in accordance with the ASGE classification. Each procedure suggested by ASGE was tested against different outcomes. Results were used to create a score and were evaluated in a control cohort. RESULTS: 16,327 ERCPs were documented in 27 centers. Analysis of ASGE categorization (10,904 cases) showed that this model fails to adequately predict parameters of complexity; only for cardiopulmonary AEs and perforation was no significant variance evident. Depending on the specific clinical circumstances, probability of success of the intervention sometimes varied significantly in risk, implying a twofold score, one part for probability of success and one for risk. A split score with three levels each was designed and tested in a validation cohort (5,423 procedures). Achieving therapeutic targets / post-ERCP pancreatitis could be correctly predicted in 87.0%/95.3%. CONCLUSIONS: Grading ERCP success and AEs have to be considered independently. Onefold grading systems appear incomplete and unable to provide an adequate classification of severity. SASE (Success and Adverse Event Score in Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangiopancreatography) was created to incorporate these findings. Showing high predictive value, this score could be a potent tool for planning ERCP and training in endoscopy.

Toward a fully coherent tender and hard X-ray free-electron laser via cascaded EEHG in fourth-generation synchrotron light sources.

Free-electron-laser-based beamlines utilize fully coherent laser pulses with extremely narrow bandwidth allowing direct use of X-rays without monochromators. This could be very beneficial for all users of current and future fourth-generation diffraction-limited synchrotron light sources (DL-SLSs) who need narrowband full-coherence high-brightness X-ray pulses. Based on our previous finding, i.e. that separating the two stages of echo-enabled harmonic generation (EEHG) with a few extra bending-magnet sections provides an effective way to increase the momentum compaction of chicane 1, one can simultaneously achieve adequate prebunching at extremely high harmonics as well as keep the energy modulation to the ideal minimum. This could open the door for cascaded EEHG, toward fully coherent tender and hard X-ray wavelengths. Built on our compact design of a twin-pulse seeding electron beam with an adjustable delay and timing jitter at the level of a few femtoseconds, a cascaded EEHG can be implemented, which includes two EEHG beamlines, where the radiation pulse generated by the first beamline with harmonic h1 could be used as the input seed laser pulse to the second beamline with harmonic h2. Hence, the second radiator could potentially reach very high harmonics [h = h1(20)h2(25-100)] from 500 to 2000, corresponding to tender and hard X-ray wavelengths. It is demonstrated that the cascaded EEHG scheme is compatible with almost any current or planned fourth-generation DL-SLS, with significant benefits for space-limited storage rings in particular. The main advantage is that this scheme requires almost no change of the storage-ring lattice and is fully compatible with other beamlines. Current proposals for rings with much longer straight sections would add self-amplified spontaneous emission as another viable option for storage-ring-based free-electron lasers.

Towards a wavefront-preservation X-ray crystal monochromator for high-repetition-rate FELs.

The wavefront preservation of coherent X-ray free-electron laser beams is pushing the requirement on the quality and performance of X-ray optics to an unprecedented level. The Strehl ratio can be used to quantify this requirement. In this paper, the criteria for thermal deformation of the X-ray optics are formulated, especially for crystal monochromators. To preserve the X-ray wavefront, the standard deviation of the height error should be sub-nm for mirrors and less than 25 pm for crystal monochromators. Cryocooled silicon crystals combined with two techniques can be used to achieve this level of performance for monochromator crystals: (1) using a focusing element to compensate the second-order component of the thermal deformation; (2) introducing a cooling pad between the cooling block and silicon crystal and optimizing the effective cooling temperature. Each of these techniques allows the thermal deformation in standard deviation of the height error to be reduced by an order of magnitude. As an example, for the LCLS-II-HE Dynamic X-ray Scattering instrument, the criteria on thermal deformation of a high-heat-load monochromator crystal can be achieved for a 100 W SASE FEL beam. Wavefront propagation simulations confirm that the reflected beam intensity profile is satisfactory on both the peak power density and focused beam size.

Clinical Relevance of Staphylococcus aureus Nasal Colonization and Staphylococcal Enterotoxin-Specific IgE Sensitization in Late-Onset Asthma.

This prospective observational study examined whether Staphylococcus aureus (SA) nasal colonization and staphylococcal enterotoxin (SE)-specific IgE sensitization synergistically affect clinical outcomes of adults with late-onset asthma (onset age ≥ 40 years). Nasal swabs were taken to evaluate SA colonization. Serum SE-IgE level was measured. Subjects were classified into 4 groups according to SA colonization and SE-IgE sensitization positivity. Among 181 patients with late-onset asthma recruited, the proportions of SA/SE (‒/‒), SA/SE (+ /‒), SA/SE (‒/ +), and SA/SE (+ / +) were 33.7%, 15.5%, 28.2%, and 22.6%, respectively. Severe asthma was more frequent in the SA/SE (+ / +) group than in the SA/SE (‒/‒) group (41.5% vs. 13.1%). The relationship of SA/SE (+ / +) with severe asthma was significant in multivariate logistic regression (vs. SA/SE (‒/‒); adjusted odds ratio: 4.36; 95% confidence intervals: 1.50‒12.73; p = 0.007), whereas SA/SE (+ /‒) or SA/SE (‒/ +) was not. In conclusion, SA nasal colonization and SE-IgE sensitization may synergistically affect disease severity in late-onset asthmatics.

YOLO-FR: A YOLOv5 Infrared Small Target Detection Algorithm Based on Feature Reassembly Sampling Method.

The loss of infrared dim-small target features in the network sampling process is a major factor affecting its detection accuracy. In order to reduce this loss, this paper proposes YOLO-FR, a YOLOv5 infrared dim-small target detection model, based on feature reassembly sampling, which refers to scaling the feature map size without increasing or decreasing the current amount of feature information. In this algorithm, an STD Block is designed to reduce the loss of features during down-sampling by saving spatial information to the channel dimension, and the CARAFE operator, which increases the feature map size without changing the feature mapping mean, is adopted to ensure that features are not distorted by relational scaling. In addition, in order to make full use of the detailed features extracted by the backbone network, the neck network is improved in this study so that the feature extracted after one down-sampling of the backbone network is fused with the top-level semantic information by the neck network to obtain the target detection head with a small receptive field. The experimental results show that the YOLO-FR model proposed in this paper achieved 97.4% on mAP50, which is a 7.4% improvement compared to the original network, and it also outperformed J-MSF and YOLO-SASE.

Superanomalous skin-effect and enhanced absorption of light scattered on conductive media.

Light scattering spectroscopy is a powerful tool for studying various media, but interpretation of its results requires a detailed knowledge of how media excitations are coupled to electromagnetic waves. In electrically conducting media, an accurate description of propagating electromagnetic waves is a non-trivial problem because of non-local light-matter interactions. Among other consequences, the non-locality gives rise to the anomalous (ASE) and superanomalous (SASE) skin effects. As is well known, ASE is related to an increase in the electromagnetic field absorption in the radio frequency domain. This work demonstrates that the Landau damping underlying SASE gives rise to another absorption peak at optical frequencies. In contrast to ASE, SASE suppresses only the longitudinal field component, and this difference results in the strong polarization dependence of the absorption. The mechanism behind the suppression is generic and is observed also in plasma. Neither SASE, nor the corresponding light absorption increase can be described using popular simplified models for the non-local dielectric response.

CC chemokine ligand 20 (CCL20) positively regulates collagen type I production in 3D skin equivalent tissues.

Chemokines are a group of small proteins that induce chemoattraction and inflammation and contribute to the differentiation and homeostasis of various cell types. Here we explored the role of chemokines, extracellular matrix production, and myofibroblast differentiation in self-assembled skin equivalents (SASE), a three-dimensional (3D) skin-equivalent tissue model. We found that the expression of three chemokines, C-C motif chemokine ligand (CCL) 20, C-X-C motif chemokine ligand (CXCL) 5, and CXCL8, increased with differentiation to myofibroblasts. Addition of recombinant CCL20 to human skin fibroblast induced collagen Type I alpha 2 gene expression, but did not affect the expression of alpha smooth muscle actin expression. Conversely, siRNA gene knockdown of CCL20 effectively inhibited the expression of collagen Type I gene and protein. Furthermore, when the CCL20 gene in fibroblasts was knocked down in SASE, collagen Type I synthesis and stromal thickness were decreased. Taken together, these results have indicated the utility of SASE in understanding how cytokines such as CCL20 positively regulate extracellular matrix proteins such as collagen Type I production during myofibroblast differentiation in 3D tissues that mimic human skin.

Stable Operation of a Free-Electron Laser Driven by a Plasma Accelerator.

The breakthrough provided by plasma-based accelerators enabled unprecedented accelerating fields by boosting electron beams to gigaelectronvolt energies within a few centimeters [1-4]. This, in turn, allows the realization of ultracompact light sources based on free-electron lasers (FELs) [5], as demonstrated by two pioneering experiments that reported the observation of self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) driven by plasma-accelerated beams [6,7]. However, the lack of stability and reproducibility due to the intrinsic nature of the SASE process (whose amplification starts from the shot noise of the electron beam) may hinder their effective implementation for user purposes. Here, we report a proof-of-principle experiment using plasma-accelerated beams to generate stable and reproducible FEL light seeded by an external laser. FEL radiation is emitted in the infrared range, showing the typical exponential growth of its energy over six consecutive undulators. Compared to SASE, the seeded FEL pulses have energies 2 orders of magnitude larger and stability that is 3 times higher.

Characterization of a hard X-ray self-seeding diamond crystal orientation.

We present a method to accurately control the photon energies for hard X-ray Self-seeding schemes with a single crystal monochromator in transmissive geometry. The energy calibration is performed by measuring which pairs of the machine pitch and yaw angles for different crystallographic planes reflect the X-ray at the same wavelength. The free parameters of an analytical formula for the self-seeding energies are determined by fitting the observed intersections and the normalized derivative with respect to the pitch and yaw angles in the observed intersections. The method requires a hard X-ray spectrometer, but it does not rely on its absolute energy calibration. Instead, identifying the self-seeded energies above the SASE background or the monochromatic notches within the SASE bandwidth is sufficient for the calibration.

Statistical analysis of hard X-ray radiation at the PAL-XFEL facility performed by Hanbury Brown and Twiss interferometry.

A Hanbury Brown and Twiss interferometry experiment based on second-order correlations was performed at the PAL-XFEL facility. The statistical properties of the X-ray radiation were studied within this experiment. Measurements were performed at the NCI beamline at 10 keV photon energy under various operation conditions: self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE), SASE with a monochromator, and self-seeding regimes at 120 pC, 180 pC and 200 pC electron bunch charge. Statistical analysis showed short average pulse duration from 6 fs to 9 fs depending on the operational conditions. A high spatial degree of coherence of about 70-80% was determined in the spatial domain for the SASE beams with the monochromator and self-seeding regime of operation. The obtained values describe the statistical properties of the beams generated at the PAL-XFEL facility.

Saccharomyces cerevisiae-incorporated and sucrose-rich sodium alginate film: An effective antioxidant packaging film for longan preservation.

A sodium alginate (SA) film incorporated with Saccharomyces cerevisiae (SE) and sucrose (SU) was fabricated to control the quality and pericarp browning of longan. The SE with satisfactory glutathione production was selected as the antioxidant agent. The scanning electron microscopy (SEM) results revealed that the SU-rich SA film could be used as an effective carrier to protect the cell integrity of SE. The FTIR and mechanical property results indicated that the SA-SE film with the incorporation of SU has good flexibility due to the existence of hydrogen bonds. Notably, the cell viability of the SE was significantly improved with the addition of SU, which positively affects the antioxidant property of the film during the storage period. Finally, the SA-SE-3.0%SU films obviously improved the quality and pericarp browning of longan. The SA-based film incorporated with SU and SE may be established as a novel antioxidant fruit packaging material.

YOLO-SASE: An Improved YOLO Algorithm for the Small Targets Detection in Complex Backgrounds.

To improve the detection ability of infrared small targets in complex backgrounds, an improved detection algorithm YOLO-SASE is proposed in this paper. The algorithm is based on the YOLO detection framework and SRGAN network, taking super-resolution reconstructed images as input, combined with the SASE module, SPP module, and multi-level receptive field structure while adjusting the number of detection output layers through exploring feature weight to improve feature utilization efficiency. Compared with the original model, the accuracy and recall rate of the algorithm proposed in this paper were improved by 2% and 3%, respectively, in the experiment, and the stability of the results was significantly improved in the training process.

Shot-to-shot flat-field correction at X-ray free-electron lasers.

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) provide high-brilliance pulses, which offer unique opportunities for coherent X-ray imaging techniques, such as in-line holography. One of the fundamental steps to process in-line holographic data is flat-field correction, which mitigates imaging artifacts and, in turn, enables phase reconstructions. However, conventional flat-field correction approaches cannot correct single XFEL pulses due to the stochastic nature of the self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE), the mechanism responsible for the high brilliance of XFELs. Here, we demonstrate on simulated and megahertz imaging data, measured at the European XFEL, the possibility of overcoming such a limitation by using two different methods based on principal component analysis and deep learning. These methods retrieve flat-field corrected images from individual frames by separating the sample and flat-field signal contributions; thus, enabling advanced phase-retrieval reconstructions. We anticipate that the proposed methods can be implemented in a real-time processing pipeline, which will enable online data analysis and phase reconstructions of coherent full-field imaging techniques such as in-line holography at XFELs.

Social anxiety in E-Learning: Scale validation and socio-demographic correlation study.

During the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic, over 1.5 billion students worldwide have been deprived of access to traditional learning. This situation has necessitated the use of social distancing-based educational methods; consequently, a tremendous shift towards e-learning has been observed. This study assesses medical students' social anxiety levels in e-learning environments. The study was conducted in two phases. In the first phase, the original Turkish Social Anxiety Scale for E-Learning Environments (SASE) was adapted in English and tested for validity and reliability. This instrument has two subscales: social anxiety in learner-learner interaction and in learner-instructor interaction. In the second stage, we explored the associations of gender, age, and perceived academic performance with medical students' social anxiety levels in e-learning environments. A total of 325 responses were analysed. Consistent with the original version, the adapted scale is a reliable and valid measure of social anxiety in e-learning. Social anxiety in e-learning was related to gender (p = 0.008) and age (p = 0.013). Social anxiety levels were higher in students with lower perceived performance during e-learning compared to students with enhanced performance, but the difference was not significant. The SASE is a useful instrument for evaluating social anxiety in e-learning environments across English educational frameworks. Considering the shift in social interaction environments, efforts are required to reduce medical students' social anxiety levels and enhance learning.