Theoretical and Experimental Analysis of Thin-Walled Curved Rectangular Box Beam under In-Plane Bending.

Thin-walled curved box beam structures especially rectangular members are widely used in mechanical and architectural structures and other engineering fields because of their high strength-to-weight ratios. In this paper, we present experimental and theoretical analysis methods for the static analysis of thin-walled curved rectangular-box beams under in-plane bending based on 11 feature deformation modes. As to the numerical investigations, we explored the convergence and accuracy analysis by normal finite element analysis, higher-order assumed strain plane element, deep collocation method element, and inverse finite element method, respectively. The out-of-plane and in-plane characteristic deformation vector modes derived by the theoretical formula are superimposed by transforming the axial, tangential, and the normal deformation values into scalar tensile and compression amounts. A one-dimensional deformation experimental test theory is first proposed, formulating the specific contributions of various deformation modes. In this way, the magnitude and trend of the influence of each low-order deformation mode on the distortion and warping in the actual deformation are determined, and the significance of distortion and warping in the actual curved beams subjected to the in-plane loads is verified. This study strengthens the deformation theory of rectangular box-type thin-walled curved beams under in-plane bending, thus providing a reference for analyzing the mechanical properties of curved-beam structures.

Screening lactic acid bacteria strains with ability to bind di-n-butyl phthalate via Turbiscan technique.

Di-n-butyl phthalate (DBP) is a ubiquitous environmental contaminant that poses a risk to humans. Previous work indicates that the ability of lactic acid bacteria (LAB) to bind phthalic acid esters is strain-specific. As cell suspensions of LAB strains in aqueous solution are likely to be colloidal dispersions, this study provided a technique to efficiently screen LAB strains that bind DBP via Turbiscan, which has been widely used to measure the stability of emulsions or colloidal dispersions. Eleven LAB strains belonging to Lactobacillus plantarum, Lb. pentosus, Lb. paralimentarius, Lb. helveticus, Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Lb. acidophilus, Bifidobacterium lactis, and Bifidobacterium bifidum species were used in this study, and seven of them were selected to test in an earlier stage of exploring the process for finding a screening method; others were used for a validation test. It was observed that the various values of the 10 h Turbiscan Stability Index (TSI) of the cell suspension from each strain, at the equilibrium time of dispersed particles according to the peak thickness of cell-suspensions as measured by Turbiscan, had significant negative correlations with the DBP-binding percentage of LAB strains. Higher TSI values are correlated with lower binding of bacteria strains to DBP with a correlation coefficient of 0.8292. Cell surface hydrocarbons of LAB strains and their adherence were observed to correlate with DBP-binding percentages and may lead to the different states of aggregation or equilibrium of bacterial cell-suspensions, and the aggregation of bacterial cells resulted in fewer binding sites in the cell wall for DBP. Finally, four LAB strains were randomly selected to verify the feasibility of the method. In all, the findings demonstrate that TSI might be used as a tool to quickly screen strains that bind DBP. The present work could be extended to the removal of other toxic compounds, when screening of high-efficiency strains is required.

Autophagy is involved in regulating VEGF during high-glucose-induced podocyte injury.

Podocytes are the major sites of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) production in kidneys. Over-expression of VEGF is involved in the pathogenesis of diabetic nephropathy (DN), and an emerging body of evidence suggests that autophagy plays an important role in DN. In this study, the effect of autophagy on over-expressed VEGF along with its underlying mechanism was investigated in streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic mice and high glucose (HG)-induced podocytes. We found that diabetes caused podocyte foot process effacement and VEGF upregulation significantly. In vitro, high glucose induced VEGF and reduced the podocyte viability. After treatment with rapamycin in podocytes, an autophagy inducer, VEGF activation was significantly abrogated and podocyte injury was ameliorated. In contrast, podocytes treated with 3-methyladenine (3-MA), a potent autophagy inhibitor, had increased VEGF expression. Furthermore, 3-MA significantly increased the production of HG-induced reactive oxygen species (ROS), whereas rapamycin decreased the cellular ROS level. Inhibition of ROS production by N-acetyl-l-cysteine (NAC) effectively reduced the over-expression of VEGF. These studies show the vital role of autophagy in the regulation of VEGF, which presents a protective effect on HG-induced podocyte injury. ROS production may be an important mechanism for mediating this process.

Cortical auditory evoked potentials (CAEPs) represent neural cues relevant to pitch perception.

Components of auditory event-related potentials (ERPs) may represent various aspects of the cortical processing of pitch. However, evidence hints an earlier representation of pitch perception in auditory ERPs of cortical origin. In this study, we examined whether earlier waves in cortical auditory evoked potentials (CAEPs) might reflect pitch-relevant features of both listeners and stimuli. CAEPs were elicited by pure tones and sweeping tones, and individual behavioral performance in pitch discrimination reflected by frequency difference limen (FDL) was also measured. Results show that CAEPs evoked by sweeping tones significantly correlate to FDL around ~50 ms, but CAEPs evoked by pure tones do not. Also, CAEPs are significantly affected by pitch-shift direction around ~130 ms. CAEPs evoked by ascending sweeping tones are larger in magnitude than those evoked by descending ones. Therefore, listeners' personal attributes relevant to pitch perception have already been reflected at a very early stage of cortical auditory processing, whilst certain pitch-related features of stimuli are recognized and represented at a later stage.