Chiral Pearlescent Cellulose Nanocrystals Films with Broad-Range Tunable Optical Properties for Anti-Counterfeiting Applications.

Pearlescent materials are of technological importance in a diverse array of industries from cosmetics to premium paints; however, chiral pearlescent materials remain unexplored. Here, chiral pearlescent films with on-demand iridescence and metallic appearance are simply organized by leveraging vertical pressure to direct the self-assembly of cellulose nanocrystals. The films are formed with a bilayer planar anchored left-handed chiral nematic architecture, in which the bottom layer is featured with a vertical gradient pitch, and the top layer is featured with a uniform pitch. Simultaneous reflection of the rainbow colors and an on-demand color of left-handed polarized light with angle-dependent wavelength and polarization state accounts for the unique optical phenomenon based on experimental observation and theoretical analysis. Such chiroptical property can be readily tuned with architectural design, enabling reproducible optical appearance with high fidelity. Bringing the pearlescence, iridescence, and specular reflection together endows cellulose nanocrystal films with rich and tunable chiroptical properties that can be used for anti-counterfeiting applications. The current work marks the beginning of chiral pearlescent materials from renewable resources, while the pressure-directed self-assembly provides a step toward scalable production.

Complete and robust energy conversion by sum frequency generation based on invariant engineering.

An analytical method is proposed in this paper to achieve complete energy conversion in sum frequency generation based on the Lewis-Riesenfeld invariants theory. In the proposed scheme, a quasi-adiabatic single control parameter model is established, and the value of single control parameter is selected to make the initial eigenstate perfectly converted to the final eigenstate as needed. Corresponding to the nonlinear frequency conversion process, a nonlinear crystal structure is designed by inverse engineering using the optimal control theory. It is robust against perturbations of the coupling coefficient and phase mismatch, including variations in the pump intensity and crystal polarization period, and achieves almost 100% conversion efficiency at any crystal length. Theoretical simulations show that frequency conversion can be achieved in the wavelength range of 2.6 µm-3.6 µm, and the spectral bandwidth of conversion efficiency exceeds 50% and approaches 400 nm when the crystal length L = 1 mm.

Rosiglitazone-induced PPARγ activation promotes intramuscular adipocyte adipogenesis of pig.

Intramuscular fat (IMF) positively influences various aspects of meat quality, while the subcutaneous fat (SF) has negative effect on carcass characteristics and fattening efficiency. Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPARγ) is a key regulator of adipocyte differentiation, herein, through bioinformatic screen for the potential regulators of adipogenesis from two independent microarray datasets, we identified that PPARγ is a potentially regulator between porcine IMF and SF adipogenesis. Then we treated subcutaneous preadipocytes (SA) and intramuscular preadipocytes (IMA) of pig with RSG (1 µmol/L), and we found that RSG treatment promoted the differentiation of IMA via differentially activating PPARγ transcriptional activity. Besides, RSG treatment promoted apoptosis and lipolysis of SA. Meanwhile, by the treatment of conditioned medium, we excluded the possibility of indirect regulation of RSG from myocyte to adipocyte and proposed that AMPK may mediate the RSG-induced differential activation of PPARγ. Collectively, the RSG treatment promotes IMA adipogenesis, and advances SA lipolysis, this effect may be associated with AMPK-mediated PPARγ differential activation. Our data indicates that targeting PPARγ might be an effective strategy to promote intramuscular fat deposition while reduce subcutaneous fat mass of pig.

Reconstruction of weak near-infrared images in methyl red-doped nematic liquid crystals via stochastic resonance.

We propose a near-infrared (NIR) image reconstruction method based on molecular reorientation of nematic liquid crystals (NLCs) doped with the azo-dye methyl red (MR). The signal can be recovered at the expense of noise via stochastic resonance. The numerical results show that image reconstruction based on the molecular reorientation in a magnetic field can be achieved when the input light intensity is 0.9W/cm2, this is due to the strong enhancement of the nonlinear optical response in MR doped-NLCs. The cross-correlation coefficient is increased from 0.26 to 0.54, and the maximum cross-correlation gain is 2.25. The results suggest a potential method in NIR weak optical image processing under noisy environments.

Accuracy-enhanced coherent Ising machine using the quantum adiabatic theorem.

The coherent Ising machine (CIM) implemented by degenerate optical parametric oscillator (DOPO) networks is a novel optical platform to accelerate computation of hard combinatorial optimization problems. Nevertheless, with the increase of the problem size, the probability of the machine being trapped by local minima increases exponentially. According to the quantum adiabatic theorem, a physical system will remain in its instantaneous ground state if the time-dependent Hamiltonian varies slowly enough. Here, we propose a method to help the machine partially avoid getting stuck in local minima by introducing quantum adiabatic evolution to the ground-state-search process of the CIM, which we call A-CIM. Numerical simulation results demonstrate that A-CIM can obtain improved solution accuracy in solving MAXCUT problems of vertices ranging from 10 to 2000 than CIM. The proposed machine that is based on quantum adiabatic theorem is expected to solve optimization problems more correctly.

Magneto-optically reorientation-induced image reconstruction in bulk nematic liquid crystals.

We theoretically propose the magneto-optically reorientation-induced image reconstruction in bulk nematic liquid crystals (NLCs). The underlying signals are reinforced and recovered at the expense of scattering noise under reorientation-induced self-focusing nonlinearity. The intensity perturbation gain is derived and the numerical results are presented to show the response of NLC molecules to the diffusive images. The nonlinear image recovery is influenced by the input light intensity, the magnetic field direction, and the correlation length. The results suggest an alternative approach to detect noisy images and promote the application of NLCs in image processing.

Near-infrared image recovery based on modulation instability in CdZnTe:V.

We propose a near-infrared image recovery method based on modulation instability in the photorefractive semiconductor CdZnTe:V. The formation mechanism of modulation instability in CdZnTe:V is discussed, and the theoretical gain model is derived. Theoretical results of optical image recovery at 1 µm and 1.5 µm wavelengths demonstrate that the maximum cross-correlation gain is 2.6 with a signal to noise intensity ratio of 0.1. These results suggest that our method could be one of potential aids for near-infrared imaging.

A Highly Selective and Sensitive Peptide-Based Fluorescent Ratio Sensor for Ag.

A fluorescence ratio sensor based on dansyl-peptide, Dansyl-Glu-Cys-Glu-Glu-Trp-NH2 (D-P5), was efficiently synthesized by Fmoc solid phase peptide synthesis. The sensor exhibits high selectivity and sensitivity for Ag+ over 16 metal ions in 100 mM sodium perchlorate and 50 mM 2-[4-(2-hydroxyethyl)piperazin-1-yl]ethanesulfonic acid buffer solution by fluorescence resonance energy transfer. The 1:1 binding stoichiometry of the sensor and Ag+ is measured by fluorescence ratio response and the job's plot. The dissociation constant of the sensor with Ag+ was calculated to be 6.4 × 10-9 M, which indicates that the sensor has an effective binding affinity for Ag+. In addition, the limit of detection of the sensor for Ag+ was determined to be 80 nM, which also indicates that the sensor has a high sensitivity to Ag+. Result showed that the sensor is an excellent Ag+ sensor under neutral condition. Furthermore, this sensor displays good practicality for Ag+ detection in river water samples without performing tedious sample pretreatment, as well as for silver chloride detection.

Effect of fermented corn-soybean meal on carcass and meat quality of grower-finisher pigs.

The fermented feed has been identified as a potential alternative to antibiotics in feeds that markedly affects gut health and growth performance of pigs. Two recent studies performed in our laboratory investigated that the fermented corn-soybean meal (fermented feed, FF) improved the gut health of pigs. This study was conducted to determine the effect of a FF on the carcass, meat quality, muscle fatty acids profile, muscle amino acid and antioxidant ability of grower-finisher pigs. In this study, a total of 48 crossbred barrows (Duroc × Landrace × Large White) were randomly divided into 2 treatments with unfermented corn-soybean diet (Ctrl) and FF diet. Compared with control pigs fed a standard diet, the results showed that FF significantly increased the muscle colour of redness and significantly reduced muscle moisture loss rate. Furthermore, FF significantly increased the content of aromatic amino acids such as aspartic acid, glutamic acid and alanine. More importantly, FF increased monounsaturated fatty acid and polyunsaturated fatty acid content. Collectively, FF could be a promising feed strategy in improving meat quality and nutritional value in grower-finisher pig.

Giant optical activity in plasmonic chiral structure via double-layer graphene moiré stacking in mid-infrared region.

The plasmonic metamaterials and metasurfaces play a critical role in manipulating lights in the mid-infrared spectral region. Here, we first propose a novel plasmonic chiral structure with the giant optical activity in the mid-infrared spectral region. The chiral structure consists of the moiré patterns, which are formed by stacking double-layer graphene nanoribbons with a relative in-plane rotation angle. It is demonstrated that the graphene-based plasmonic structure with moiré patterns exhibits the strong circular dichroism. The giant chiroptical response can be precisely controlled by changing the rotation angle and Fermi level of graphene. Furthermore, a dielectric interlayer is inserted between two layers of graphene to obtain the stronger circular dichroism. Impressively, the strongest circular dichroism can reach 5.94 deg at 13.6 µm when the thickness of dielectric interlayer is 20 nm. The proposed structure with graphene-based moiré patterns can be superior to conventional graphene chiral metamaterials due to some advantage of rotation-dependent chirality, flexible tunability and cost-effective fabrication. It will advance many essential mid-infrared applications, such as chiral sensors, thermal imaging and chiroptical detectors.

Speed-up coherent Ising machine with a squeezed feedback system.

As a solver for non-deterministic polynomial time (NP)-hard combinatorial optimization problems, the coherent Ising machine (CIM) is in the early stages of research, and the potential of this innovative physical system will be developed. Here, we propose a speed-up coherent Ising machine with a squeezed feedback system, which we call S-CIM. We couple squeezed feedback pulses generated by the squeezed feedback system into the degenerate optical parametric oscillator (DOPO) network. Simulations indicate that quantum inseparability of the coupled DOPO network is further enhanced during the whole optimization process, and quantum fluctuations are significantly smaller around the oscillation threshold. Computation experiments are performed on MAX-CUT problems of order between 4 and 20000. Numerical results demonstrate that S-CIM increases the optimal normalized output by 2.27% and significantly reduces the optimal computation time by 75.12%.

Kilowatt-level tunable all-fiber narrowband superfluorescent fiber source with 40†nm tuning range.

In this study, we presented a high-power widely tunable all-fiber narrowband superfluorescent fiber source (SFS) by employing two tunable bandpass filters and three amplifier stages. More than 935 W output power is achieved, with a slope efficiency of >75% and a beam quality factor of M2=1.40. The tuning of the narrowband SFS ranges from ∼1045 nm to ∼1085 nm with a full width at half maximum linewidth of less than 0.71 nm. The tunable narrowband SFS stably operates without the influence of parasitic oscillation and self-pulsing effects under maximum power. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to demonstrate a widely tunable all-fiber narrowband SFS around 1 µm wavelength region with output power reaching kilowatt-level.

Phase-sensitive amplification of a QPSK signal using a dispersion engineered silicon-graphene oxide hybrid waveguide.

We numerically investigate phase-sensitive amplification of a quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) signal in a 35 µm dispersion engineered silicon-graphene oxide hybrid waveguide. The four-wave mixing efficiency is effectively enhanced by exploiting the ultrahigh Kerr nonlinearity and low loss of graphene oxide in the ultrawide wavelength range. A new structure of dispersion flat silicon-graphene oxide hybrid waveguide is proposed and used to achieve the phase regeneration of a QPSK signal using a dual-conjugated-pump degenerate scheme. The phase-dependent gain and phase-to-phase transfer functions are calculated to analyze the properties of a phase-sensitive amplifier (PSA). The constellation diagrams of the QPSK signal and the error vector magnitude are used to assess the regeneration capacity. The simulation results show that the proposed PSA with a good phase noise squeezing capability has potential applications in all-optical signal processing.

LncRNA RMST activates TAK1-mediated NF-κB signaling and promotes activation of microglial cells via competitively binding with hnRNPK.

This study aimed to explore the biological role and molecular mechanism of long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) rhabdomyosarcoma 2-associated transcript (RMST) in regulating microglial activation. Mouse microglial BV2 cells were cultured to establish the cell model of cerebral ischemic stroke by oxygen-glucose deprivation (OGD). We observed highly expressed RMST, increased expression of M1, and decreased expression of M2 markers in BV2 microglial cells stimulated with OGD. These alterations were reversed by RMST knockdown. Activation of transforming growth factor-beta-activated kinase 1 (TAK1)-mediated nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) pathway was observed upon OGD stimulation, which was promoted by RMST through competitively binding with heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein K (hnRNPK), confirmed by RNA pull down and RNA immunoprecipitation (RIP) assays. Furthermore, RMST overexpressing-BV2 cells effectively enhanced neuronal apoptosis. In conclusion, RMST promoted OGD-induced microglial M1 polarization by competitively interacting with hnRNPK via TAK1-mediated NF-κB pathway, which will provide a basis for understanding the pathogenesis of cerebrovascular diseases.

Pulse signal restoration via stochastic resonance in a Fabry-Perot cavity with an intracavity nematic liquid crystal film.

We theoretically propose a method to restore weak pulse signals submerged in noise via stochastic resonance, which is based on the optical bistability induced by the molecule reorientation in a Fabry-Perot cavity with an intracavity nematic liquid-crystal film. The bistable properties of this cavity are analyzed with different reflectance of the mirrors, initial phase shift and initial angle between the phase propagation vector and the director. The cross-correlation coefficient between pure input pulses and output is calculated to quantitatively evaluate the influence of noise intensity on output. The simulation results show a cross-correlation gain of 3.2 and that the buried signal can be recovered effectively by this device. It proves the potential of using this structure to recover noise-hidden pulse signals in an all-optical system.

Nonlinear reconstruction of weak optical diffused images under turbid water.

Forward scattering noise may degrade the imaging resolution and diffuse the image in turbid water. The reconstruction of diffused images hidden by forward scattering noise is crucial for underwater imaging. To overcome the limitation of forward scattering for optical imaging in turbid water, a nonlinear image reconstruction technology is proposed in the experiment. We experimentally demonstrated the reconstruction of the diffused images under turbid water via signal seeded incoherent modulation instability (MI) in a nonlinear photorefractive crystal. The reconstructed image with high quality and the minimum resolution of 28.51 lp/mm are observed in the experiment. This is the first time, to the best of our knowledge, that a spatial MI effect is used to process underwater weak optical diffused images in the experiment.

Plasmonic topological edge states in ring-structure gate graphene.

Topological photonic states exhibit unique robustness against defects, facilitating fault-tolerant photonic device applications. However, existing proposals either involve a sophisticated and bulky structure or can only operate in the microwave regime. We show a theoretical demonstration for highly confined topologically protected plasmonic states to be realized at infrared frequencies in monolayer graphene with a ring-structure gate. With a suitable bias voltage, the combined gate-graphene structure is shown to produce sufficiently strong Bragg scattering of graphene surface plasmons and to impart them with nontrivial topological properties. Our design is compact and could pave the way for dynamically reconfigurable, robust, nanoscale, integrated photonic devices.

Stochastic resonance based on modulation instability in spatiotemporal chaos.

A novel dynamic of stochastic resonance in spatiotemporal chaos is presented, which is based on modulation instability of perturbed partially coherent wave. The noise immunity of chaos can be reinforced through this effect and used to restore the coherent signal information buried in chaotic perturbation. A theoretical model with fluctuations term is derived from the complex Ginzburg-Landau equation via Wigner transform. It shows that through weakening the nonlinear threshold and triggering energy redistribution, the coherent component dominates the instability damped by incoherent component. The spatiotemporal output showing the properties of stochastic resonance may provide a potential application of signal encryption and restoration.

Risk Factors and Cognitive Relevance of Cortical Cerebral Microinfarcts in Patients With Ischemic Stroke or Transient Ischemic Attack.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: It was recently demonstrated that cerebral microinfarcts (CMIs) can be detected in vivo using 3.0 tesla (T) magnetic resonance imaging. We investigated the prevalence, risk factors, and the longitudinal cognitive consequence of cortical CMIs on 3.0T magnetic resonance imaging, in patients with ischemic stroke or transient ischemic attack. METHODS: A total of 231 patients undergoing 3.0T magnetic resonance imaging were included. Montreal Cognitive Assessment was used to evaluate global cognitive functions and cognitive domains (memory, language, and attention visuospatial and executive functions). Cognitive changes were represented by the difference in Montreal Cognitive Assessment score between baseline and 28-month after stroke/transient ischemic attack. The cross-sectional and longitudinal associations between cortical CMIs and cognitive functions were explored using ANCOVA and regression models. RESULTS: Cortical CMIs were observed in 34 patients (14.7%), including 13 patients with acute (hyperintense on diffusion-weighted imaging) and 21 with chronic CMIs (isointense on diffusion-weighted imaging). Atrial fibrillation was a risk factor for all cortical CMIs (odds ratio, 4.8; 95% confidence interval, 1.5-14.9; P=0.007). Confluent white matter hyperintensities was associated with chronic CMIs (odds ratio, 2.8; 95% confidence interval, 1.0-7.8; P=0.047). The presence of cortical CMIs at baseline was associated with worse visuospatial functions at baseline and decline over 28-month follow-up (ß=0.5; 95% confidence interval, 0.1-1.0; P=0.008, adjusting for brain atrophy, white matter hyperintensities, lacunes, and microbleeds). CONCLUSIONS: Cortical CMIs are a common finding in patients with stroke/transient ischemic attack. Associations between CMI with atrial fibrillation and white matter hyperintensities suggest that these lesions have a heterogeneous cause, involving microembolism and cerebral small vessel disease. CMI seemed to preferentially impact visuospatial functions as assessed by a cognitive screening test.

Reduction of phase noise to amplitude noise conversion in silicon waveguide-based phase-sensitive amplification.

We use a vector phase sensitive amplification (PSA) scheme, which can eliminate the inherent phase noise (PN) to amplitude noise (AN) conversion in a conventional PSA process. A dispersion-engineered silicon strip waveguide is used to investigate the vector PSA scheme at the telecom wavelengths. The phase-dependent gain and phase-to-phase transfer functions as well as constellation diagram at different signal polarization states (SPSs) are numerically analyzed. It is found that the PN to AN conversion is completely suppressed when the SPS is identical to one of the pump polarization states. Moreover, the binary phase shift keying signal is regenerated by the proposed vector PSA scheme, and the error vector magnitude is calculated to assess the regeneration capacity. Our results have potential application in all-optical signal processing.