Universal Shot-Noise Limit for Quantum Metrology with Local Hamiltonians.

Quantum many-body interactions can induce quantum entanglement among particles, rendering them valuable resources for quantum-enhanced sensing. In this work, we establish a link between the bound on the growth of the quantum Fisher information and the Lieb-Robinson bound, which characterizes the operator growth in locally interacting quantum many-body systems. We show that for initial separable states, despite the use of local many-body interactions, the precision cannot surpass the shot noise limit at all times. This conclusion also holds for an initial state that is the nondegenerate ground state of a local and gapped Hamiltonian. These findings strongly hint that when one can only prepare separable initial states, nonlocal and long-range interactions are essential resources for surpassing the shot noise limit. This observation is confirmed through numerical analysis on the long-range Ising model. Our results bridge the field of many-body quantum sensing and operator growth in many-body quantum systems and open the possibility to investigate the interplay between quantum sensing and control, many-body physics and information scrambling.

Entanglement, Coherence, and Extractable Work in Quantum Batteries.

We investigate the connection between quantum resources and extractable work in quantum batteries. We demonstrate that quantum coherence in the battery or the battery-charger entanglement is a necessary resource for generating nonzero extractable work during the charging process. At the end of the charging process, we also establish a tight link of coherence and entanglement with the final extractable work: coherence naturally promotes the coherent work while coherence and entanglement inhibit the incoherent work. We also show that obtaining maximally coherent work is faster than obtaining maximally incoherent work. Examples ranging from the central-spin battery and the Tavis-Cummings battery to the spin-chain battery are given to illustrate these results.

Multiparticle Quantum Walks and Fisher Information in One-Dimensional Lattices.

Recent experiments on quantum walks (QWs) demonstrated a full control over the statistics-dependent walks of single particles and two particles in one-dimensional lattices. However, little is known about the general characterization of QWs at the many-body level. Here, we rigorously study QWs, Bloch oscillations, and the quantum Fisher information for three indistinguishable bosons and fermions in one-dimensional lattices using a time-evolving block decimation algorithm and many-body perturbation theory. We show that such strongly correlated QWs not only give rise to statistics-and-interaction-dependent ballistic transports of scattering states and of two- and three-body bound states but also allow a quantum enhanced precision measurement of the gravitational force. In contrast to the QWs of the fermions, the QWs of three bosons exhibit strongly correlated Bloch oscillations, which present a surprising time scaling t^{3} of the Fisher information below a characteristic time t_{0} and saturate to the fundamental limit of t^{2} for t>t_{0}.

Systems Pharmacology-Based Identification of Mechanisms of Action of Bolbostemma paniculatum for the Treatment of Hepatocellular Carcinoma.

BACKGROUND Traditional Chinese medicine has widely used Bolbostemma paniculatum to treat diseases, including cancer, but its underlying mechanisms remain unclear. The present study aimed to elucidate the potential pharmacological mechanisms of "Tu Bei Mu" (TBM), the Chinese name for Bolbostemmatis Rhizoma, the dry tuber of B. paniculatum, for the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). MATERIAL AND METHODS The active components and putative therapeutic targets of TBM were explored using SwissTargetPrediction, Traditional Chinese Medicine Systems Pharmacology Database and Analysis Platform (TCMSP), and Search Tool for Interactions of Chemicals (STITCH). The HCC-related target database was built using DrugBank, DisGeNet, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM), and Therapeutic Target Database (TTD). A protein-protein interaction network of the common targets was constructed, based on the matches between TBM potential targets and HCC-related targets, using Cytoscape software. Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) enrichment analyses of the cluster networks were used to elucidate the biological functions of TBM. RESULTS Pharmacological network diagrams of the TBM compound-target network and HCC-related target network were successfully constructed. A total of 22 active components, 191 predicted biological targets of TBM, and 3775 HCC-related targets were identified. Through construction of an HCC-related target database and a protein-protein interaction network of the common targets, TBM was predicted to be effective in treating HCC mainly through the PI3K-Akt, HIF-1, p53, and PPAR signaling pathways. CONCLUSIONS The PI3K/Akt, HIF1, p53, and PPAR pathways may play vital roles in TBM treatment of HCC. Also, the potential anti-cancer effect of TBM on HCC appears to stem from the synergetic effect of multiple targets and mechanisms.

[Effect of Sini San prescription on apoptosis and proliferation of hepatocellular carcinoma HepG2 cells].

Objective: To investigate the effects of Sini San prescription(SNS) on the proliferation and apoptosis of HepG2 cells and its molecular mechanism. Methods: The morphological changes of hepatocellular carcinoma HepG2 cells treated by SNS were observed by inverted microscope. MTT assay was used to detect the inhibitory effect of SNS on cell proliferation. Fluorescence staining and flow cytometry were employed to analyze the effect of SNS on apoptosis of HepG2 cells. Rho123 (Rhodamine 123) staining method was performed to detect the changes of mitochondrial membrane potential, and Western blot was used to evaluate the expression of proteins related to apoptosis. Results: The number of hepatocellular carcinoma HepG2 cells were significantly decreased (P＜0.01) and cells showed typical apoptotic cell morphology after treated with serum contained SNS. The inhibition rate of HepG2 cells was increased with the increase of concentration of serum contained SNS. The number of cells in G1 phase was significantly increased, while G2 phase was decreased after treated with serum contained SNS(P＜0.05).The apoptosis rate and mitochondrial membrane potential of HepG2 cells were significantly increased and decreased after treated with serum contained SNS(P＜0.05). The expression levels of Bax, caspase-3,-9 and cyt-c were significantly increased, while the expression of bcl-2 was decreased in HepG2 cells treated with serum contained SNS(P＜0.05).Conclusion: Sini San prescription can inhibit the proliferation of HepG2 cells and induce apoptosis by mitochondrial pathway.

Protecting quantum correlations of the XXZ model by topological boundary conditions.

The differences between the XXZ model with topological and periodical boundary conditions were compared by studying their entanglement, quantum discord, and critical temperature above which the entanglement vanishes. It shows that the different boundary conditions mainly affect bipartite quantum correlations of the boundary spins rather than that of other spin pairs. The topological boundary spins can protect entanglement and discord against strong magnetic fields while the periodical boundary spins can protect them against nonuniform magnetic fields. Compared with the periodical XXZ model, the critical temperature is significantly improved for the topological XXZ model. The topological XXZ model also allows us to improve significantly its critical temperature by increasing the strength of magnetic field, which is not feasible for the periodical XXZ model. It is therefore more promising for preparing entangled states at high temperature in the topological XXZ model.

Coherence transformations in single qubit systems.

We investigate the single qubit transformations under several typical coherence-free operations, such as, incoherent operation (IO), strictly incoherent operation (SIO), physically incoherent operation (PIO), and coherence-preserving operation (CPO). Quantitative connection has been built between IO and SIO in single qubit systems. Moreover, these coherence-free operations have a clear hierarchical relationship in single qubit systems: CPO ⊂ PIO ⊂ SIO=IO. A new and explicit proof for the necessary and sufficient condition of single qubit transformation via IO or SIO has been provided, which indicates that SIO with only two Kraus operators are enough to realize this transformation. The transformation regions of single qubits via CPO and PIO are also given. Our method provides a geometric illustration to analyze single qubit coherence transformations by introducing the Bloch sphere depiction of the transformation regions, and tells us how to construct the corresponding coherence-free operations.

Intramedullary Nailing Combined with Bone Grafting for Benign Lesions of the Proximal Femur.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effectiveness of intramedullary nailing for benign lesions of the proximal femur. METHOD: A retrospective analysis was carried out on 68 cases of benign lesions in the proximal femur at our hospital from April 2002 to April 2013 (38 men and 30 women). Mean age at surgery was 35.5 years (range, 22-56 years). The cases were divided into two groups: curettage of the lesion with bone grafting only as the grafting group (32 cases) and internal fixation after removal of the lesion as the fixation group (36 cases). For the grafting group, lesions were scraped out, deactivated and washed thoroughly with normal saline, then the allogeneic bone was implanted. For the fixation group, after the lesions were scraped, the intramedullary nails were implanted, and allogeneic bone was implanted into the scraped cavity with compaction. RESULTS: Pathological examination showed that 24 out of 68 cases (35.3%) had simple bone cysts (suffered from pathological fracture in 2 cases); 21 (30.9%) fibrous dysplasia; 18 (26.5%) aneurysmal bone cysts; 3 (4.4%) chondroblastoma, 2 (2.9%) out of which were combined with aneurysmal bone cysts. All patients were followed up for 12-96 months (56 months for mean). In the grafting group, 4 patients had postoperative complications (1 pathological bone fractures and 3 deep vein thrombosis), but only 1 patient of the fixation group (deep vein thrombosis) (P < 0.05). The average bedridden time after surgery was 11.4 ± 7.6 days for the grafting group, and for the other group was 7.5 ± 5.4 days ( P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: Both treatments are effective for benign lesions in the proximal femur, but the fixation group facilitated the functional recovery of patients and reduced postoperative complications.

Sternal tumor resection and reconstruction with titanium mesh: a preliminary study.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the clinical efficacy and complications of treating sternal tumors by resection and titanium mesh thoracic reconstruction. METHODS: This retrospective analysis of eight patients with sternal tumors treated in the Department of Orthopedic Surgery at the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University from January 2008 to June 2012 included five men and three women aged 37-66 years (mean, 50.4 years). The histological diagnoses were chondrosarcoma (two cases), osteosarcoma (one), malignant fibrous histiocytoma (two), eosinophilic granuloma (one) and sternal metastasis from breast cancer (two). The tumors were invading the manubrium sterni (three cases), manubrium sterni and body (three) and sternal body (two). All patients underwent needle or incisional biopsy prior to sternal tumor resection and titanium mesh thoracic reconstruction. RESULTS: All patients were followed for 9 months to 4 years. There were no intraoperative complications or operative or postoperative deaths. One patient developed a deep wound hematoma 1 week postoperatively; incisional drainage and debridement resulting in healing within 2 weeks. There was no loosening or exsertion of the titanium mesh and no patients developed respiratory complications or thoracic deformity. One patient with malignant fibrous histiocytoma died of lung metastases 9 months postoperatively, another with malignant fibrous histiocytoma died of liver metastases 14 months postoperatively; the remaining patients survived without tumor recurrence. CONCLUSION: Titanium mesh chest reconstruction after sternal tumor resection has the advantages of simplifying the procedure, achieving a good shape and having few complications. Titanium mesh is an ideal material for reconstruction of the sternum.

Prospective cohort study of comprehensive prevention to gastric cancer.

AIM: To evaluate the preliminary effects of comprehensive prevention of gastric cancer in Zhuanghe County epidemiologically. METHODS: Stratified sampling and cluster sampling were applied to define the intervention group and the control group. The prospective cohort study was used for evaluating the effect of preventing gastric cancer. The relative risk (RR) and attributable risk percent (AR %) of intervention on gastric cancer death were calculated. Potential years of life lost (PLYY) of the disease was analyzed, and the RR and AR % of PYLL were calculated. Survival analysis was applied among the screened patients. RESULTS: In the first 4 years after intervening, the relative risk (RR) of intervention on death was 0.5059 (95 % CI: 0.3462-0.7392, P<0.05) with significance statistically. AR % of the intervention on death was 49.41 %. The RR of intervention on cumulative PYLL was 0.6778 (95 % CI: 0.5604-0.8198, P<0.05) with statistic significance. AR % of the intervention on cumulative PYLL was 30.32 %. The four-year survival rate of the screened patients was 0.6751 (95 % CI: 0.5298-0.9047). CONCLUSION: The initiative intervention results showed that the intervention approach used in the trial was effective, it reduced mortality and increased survival rate, and alleviated the adverse effect of gastric cancer on the health and life of screened population.