Manipulator with Integrated Flexible Tactile Sensing Arrays for Kiwifruit Ripeness and Size Classification.

Fruit grading for ripeness and size is an essential process in the supply chain. Incorrect grading can easily lead to spoiled and degraded fruits entering the market, reducing consumers' confidence in purchasing. At the same time, it is easy to cause the fruit supply chain to reduce profits, unreasonable resource allocation, and related practitioners' income. The current mainstream machine vision grading and manual grading in the production line have dilemmas such as susceptibility to environmental interference, inconsistent grading standards, high cost, and labor shortage. To overcome these problems, this study proposes an integrated flexible tactile sensing array (3 × 4) manipulator for efficient, stable, low-cost, and accurate ripeness and size grading of kiwifruit. The flexible sensing manipulator grasps the kiwifruit, detects the hardness of the kiwifruit by relying on tactile sensing, and determines the ripeness level based on the hardness. The size of the kiwifruit is also differentiated according to whether there is a significant change in the resistance of the topmost sensing unit of the flexible pressure sensor array. The 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 anomalies that may occur in actual production were tested and combined with machine learning KNN, SVM, and RF algorithms for data modeling and grading. The results show that the lowest accuracy of 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 possible outliers is 86.67% (KNN), 95.83% (SVM), and 92.5% (RF), respectively. KNN has the lowest classification effect, and SVM has the best. This study overcomes the drawbacks of inefficient destructive detection and unstable manual detection and makes up for the vulnerability of single machine vision to interference from environmental factors. This study can alleviate the challenges caused by fruit wastage and promote the sustainable production and consumption of the fruit industry chain.

Flexible Sensing Enabled Nondestructive Detection on Viability/Quality of Live Edible Oyster.

Environmental and physiological fluctuations in the live oyster cold chain can result in reduced survival and quality. In this study, a flexible wireless sensor network (F-WSN) monitoring system combined with knowledge engineering was designed and developed to monitor environmental information and physiological fluctuations in the live oyster cold chain. Based on the Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) plan to identify the critical control points (CCPs) in the live oyster cold chain, the F-WSN was utilized to conduct tracking and collection experiments in real scenarios from Yantai, Shandong Province, to Beijing. The knowledge model for shelf-life and quality prediction based on environmental information and physiological fluctuations was established, and the prediction accuracies of TVB-N, TVC, and pH were 96%, 85%, and 97%, respectively, and the prediction accuracy of viability was 96%. Relevant managers, workers, and experts were invited to participate in the efficiency and applicability assessment of the established system. The results indicated that combining F-WSN monitoring with knowledge-based HACCP modeling is an effective approach to improving the transparency of cold chain management, reducing quality and safety risks in the oyster industry, and promoting the sharing and reuse of HACCP knowledge in the oyster cold chain.

Chronic Stress That Changed Intestinal Permeability and Induced Inflammation Was Restored by Estrogen.

Chronic psychological stress affects the health of humans and animals (especially females or pregnant bodies). In this study, a stress-induced model was established by placing eight-week-old female and pregnant mice in centrifuge tubes for 4 h to determine whether chronic stress affects the intestinal mucosal barrier and microbiota composition of pregnant mice. Compared with the control group, we found that norepinephrine (NE), corticosterone (CORT), and estradiol (E2) in plasma increased significantly in the stress group. We then observed a decreased down-regulation of anti-inflammatory cytokines and up-regulation of pro-inflammatory cytokines, which resulted in colonic mucosal injury, including a reduced number of goblet cells, proliferating cell nuclear antigen-positive cells, caspase-3, and expression of tight junction mRNA and protein. Moreover, the diversity and richness of the colonic microbiota decreased in pregnant mice. Bacteroidetes decreased, and pernicious bacteria were markedly increased. At last, we found E2 protects the intestinal epithelial cells after H2O2 treatment. Results suggested that 25 pg/mL E2 provides better protection for intestinal barrier after chronic stress, which greatly affected the intestinal mucosal barrier and altered the colonic microbiota composition.

Effect of splenic transfer factor on the development of intestinal mucosal barrier in laying hens.

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of different doses of chicken spleen transfer factor (TF) on the structure of intestinal epithelial cells in different age groups. One-day-old White Leghorns laying hens were randomly divided into four groups: three groups were administered TF at different dosages (0.10, 0.25 or 1.00 mL) and a fourth group was set as control (administered saline, 1.00 mL). Using hematoxylin and eosin staining, high-throughput sequencing, microbiota analysis, quantitative polymerase reaction and western blotting. RESULTS: We measured the effects of different doses of TF on the following: intestinal mucosal epithelial tissue morphology, intestinal mucosal epithelial barrier-related gene expression profiles, and intestinal epithelial tight junction gene protein levels. The collected data show that TF can improve the absorption of nutrients by increasing villus height and crypt depth, and regulate intestinal flora disorders. Furthermore, we verified that the expression of the claudin and occludin tight junctions between intestinal epithelial cells was increased with TF. this research is very important for focusing on the structure and gene expression of intestinal tissues. CONCLUSION: The results provide a scientific rationale for feeding and nutrition programs for green and healthy farming, as well as technical support to improve the production efficiency of the livestock and poultry breeding industry. © 2022 Society of Chemical Industry.

Intelligent Dynamic Quality Prediction of Chilled Chicken with Integrated IoT Flexible Sensing and Knowledge Rules Extraction.

With the enhancement of consumers' food safety awareness, consumers have become more stringent on meat quality. This study constructs an intelligent dynamic prediction model based on knowledge rules and integrates flexible humidity sensors into the non-destructive monitoring of the Internet of Things to provide real-time feedback and dynamic adjustments for the chilled chicken cold chain. The optimized sensing equipment can be attached to the inside of the packaging to deal with various abnormal situations during the cold chain, effectively improving the packaging effect. Through correlation analysis of collected data and knowledge rule extraction of critical factors in the cold chain, the established quality evaluation and prediction model achieved detailed chilled chicken quality level classification and intelligent quality prediction. The obtained results show that the accuracy of the prediction model is higher than 90.5%, and all the regression coefficients are close to 1.00. The relevant personnel (workers and cold chain managers) were invited to participate in the performance analysis and optimization suggestion to improve the applicability of the established prediction model. The optimized model can provide a more efficient theoretical reference for timely decision-making and further e-commerce management.

[Study on the role of interleukin-5 and eosinophil cationic protein and the correlation between them in nasal polyp].

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the degree of recruitment and activation of eosinophils; to confirm the concentration and expression of IL-5 in nasal polyps; to study the correlation between eosinophilic activation and cytokine such as IL-5. METHOD: Blood and nasal specimens were collected from 30 patients with nasal polyps and 8 controls with deviation of nasal septum or OSAS. The serum ECP levels in two groups and the IL-5 and ECP in nasal polyp specimens or inferior turbinate mucosa were examined. RESULT: Concentration of IL-5 and ECP in nasal polyps tissue homogenates were significantly higher than those in inferior turbinate mucosas (P < 0.05). The same result was showed in serum ECP. The elevated IL-5 levels in polyp homogenates had a significant correlation with serum ECP(r = 0.598, P < 0.05) and polyp tissues ECP(r = 0.451, P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: The concentration of IL-5 increased in the nasal polyp tissues and the degree of expression showed a significant correlation with activated eosinophils.