Effects of Aromatherapy on Physical and Mental Health of Cancer Patients Undergoing Radiotherapy and/or Chemotherapy: A Meta-Analysis.

BACKGROUP: Currently, aromatherapy is being increasingly utilized in clinical practice, particularly in managing the side effects associated with radiotherapy and chemoradiotherapy. However, it remains to be established whether aromatherapy can effectively alleviate these symptoms. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effects of aromatherapy on the physical and mental health of patients with cancer undergoing radiotherapy and chemotherapy. METHODS: Seven databases were researched from inception until September 29, 2023, including PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science, Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure, Wanfang database, China Biology Medicine disc and VIP Chinese Medical Journal Database. Review Manager version 5.3 was utilized for data analysis. The Cochrane Risk of Bias tool RoB2 was employed to evaluate the quality of the literature included in the study. Evidence quality rating was assessed using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) approach through the GRADEpro GDT online tool. RESULTS: Nineteen studies involving 1,541 patients were included. Aromatherapy can alleviate nausea [relative risk (RR)=0.64, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.53 to 0.78, P<0.05, I2=46%; standardized mean difference (SMD)=-0.86, 95% CI: -1.21 to -0.51, P<0.05, I2=64%] and vomiting (RR=0.54, 95% CI: 0.42 to 0.69, P<0.05, I2=35%; SMD=-1.28, 95% CI: -1.52 to -1.03, P<0.05, I2=92%), improve sleep disorders [mean difference (MD)=-3.39, 95% CI: -3.95 to -2.84, P<0.05, I2=0%], relieve pain (SMD=-1.58, 95% CI: -1.96 to -1.21, P<0.05, I2=0%), mitigate fatigue (SMD=-1.28, 95% CI: -2.44 to -0.11, P<0.05, I2=93%) and enhance quality of life (SMD=0.50, 95% CI: 0.22 to 0.79, P<0.05, I2=0%) in cancer patients after radiotherapy and chemotherapy, but it may not have a significant effect on anxiety. The risk of bias was high in the included studies using the Cochrane Risk of Bias tool RoB2, and no studies were considered to be of high grade according to the GRADE system. CONCLUSIONS: Aromatherapy is an efficacious, safe and economic adjunctive therapy for cancer patients, which can mend the physical symptoms and mental health of cancer patients. However, more high-quality studies are needed to verify it. (PROSPERO registration No. CRD42023390171).

Exploiting data compression to improve reliability of phase-modulated holographic data storage.

Due to the interference of complex noise in holographic channels and the limitation of phase retrieve algorithms, the reliability of phase-modulated holographic data storage (PHDS) is seriously threatened, especially for multi-level phase modulation. A method for improving data reliability of PHDS is proposed by applying lossless data compression and low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes, which can eliminate data redundancy and correct errors effectively. We allocate the space saved by compression to store more LDPC parity bits and develop a method to determine the LDPC code rate and a method to manage the free space. Our method does not require the characteristics of the reconstructed phase distribution, which simplifies the statistical analysis and calculation. Simulation and experimental results demonstrate that our method greatly decreases the bit error rate (BER) and decoding iterations, and boosts the decoding success probability. For instance, when the phase error rate is 0.029 and the compression rate is 0.6, our method reduces the BER by 87.8%, the decoding iterations by 84.3%, and improves the decoding success probability by 93%. Our method enhances both data reliability and storage efficiency in PHDS.

Fast phase error correction with reference beam-assisted LDPC coding for collinear holographic data storage.

Low-density parity-check (LDPC) coding is a significant technique for ensuring data reliability in phase-modulated holographic data storage. To accelerate LDPC decoding, we design reference beam-assisted LDPC coding for 4-level phase-modulated holography. The reliability of a reference bit is higher than that of an information bit during decoding because reference data are known during recording and reading processes. By considering the reference data as prior information, the weight of the initial decoding information (i.e., log-likelihood ratio (LLR) information) of the reference bit is increased during LDPC decoding. The performance of the proposed method is evaluated through simulations and experiments. In the simulation, compared with the conventional LDPC code with a phase error rate (PER) of 0.019, the proposed method can reduce bit error rate (BER) by 38.8%, uncorrectable bit error rate (UBER) by 24.9%, decoding iteration time by 29.9%, the number of decoding iterations by 14.8%, and improve decoding success probability by 38.4% approximately. Experimental results demonstrate the superiority of the proposed reference beam-assisted LDPC coding. The developed method can significantly decrease the PER, BER, the number of decoding iterations, and decoding time by using the real captured images.

Three-Dimensional Nanolithography with Visible Continuous Wave Laser through Triplet Up-Conversion.

Direct laser writing (DLW) technology usually fabricates micronanostructures based on the principle of two-photon polymerization. However, two-photon polymerization requires high laser intensity which can be achieved by expensive femtosecond lasers. To address the issue, a direct laser writing method has been proposed in this work; it is based on triplet up-conversion which is characterized by its low cost, high precision, multidimensional property, and rapid processing. The feasibility of this method is jointly verified by applying both dynamic modeling and experiments. Based on the obtained results, the low laser intensity fabrication of multidimensional nanostructures is achieved. The minimum line width (∼50 nm) of micronanostructures is reached when the laser intensity is set at 2.5 × 105 W/cm2 along with a processing speed of 150 µm/s. As a result, the direct laser writing method, based on triplet up-conversion, offers a new route to achieve low-intensity and high-precision micronanostructure fabrication.

Decision-free downsampling method assisted via channel-transfer information to improve the reliability of holographic data storage systems.

A decision-free downsampling method (DFDS) assisted by channel-transfer information for phase-modulated holographic data storage is proposed. DFDS is used to address the issue of the accumulation of decision errors induced by traditional downsampling. The issue degrades the downsampling accuracy. DFDS comprises two functional segments: acquiring the channel-transfer information offline and performing decision-free downsampling online. With the assistance of the channel-transfer information, DFDS uses Bayesian posterior probabilities instead of traditional decision results to avoid the accumulation of decision errors and achieve more accurate downsampling. The simulation and experimental results show that DFDS reduces the phase error rate, thereby improving the reliability of the holographic data storage system.

Research Progress of Steels for Nuclear Reactor Pressure Vessels.

The nuclear reactor pressure vessel is an important component of a nuclear power plant. It has been used in harsh environments such as high temperature, high pressure, neutron irradiation, thermal aging, corrosion and fatigue for a long time, which puts forward higher standards for the performance requirements for nuclear pressure vessel steel. Based on the characteristics of large size and wall thickness of the nuclear pressure vessel, combined with its performance requirements, this work studies the problems of forging technology, mechanical properties, irradiation damage, corrosion failure, thermal aging behavior and fatigue properties, and summarizes the research progress of nuclear pressure vessel materials. The influencing factors of microstructures evolution and mechanism of mechanical properties change of nuclear pressure vessel steel are analyzed in this work. The mechanical properties before and after irradiation are compared, and the influence mechanisms of irradiation hardening and embrittlement are also summarized. Although the stainless steel will be surfacing on the inner wall of nuclear pressure vessel to prevent corrosion, long-term operation may cause aging or deterioration of stainless steel, resulting in corrosion caused by the contact between the primary circuit water environment and the nuclear pressure vessel steel. Therefore, the corrosion behavior of nuclear pressure vessels materials is also summarized in detail. Meanwhile, the evolution mechanism of the microstructure of nuclear pressure vessel materials under thermal aging conditions is analyzed, and the mechanisms affecting the mechanical properties are also described. In addition, the influence mechanisms of internal and external factors on the fatigue properties, fatigue crack initiation and fatigue crack propagation of nuclear pressure vessel steel are analyzed in detail from different perspectives. Finally, the development direction and further research contents of nuclear pressure vessel materials are prospected in order to improve the service life and ensure safe service in harsh environment.

Improving reliability using phase distribution aware LDPC code for holographic data storage.

The iterative Fourier transform (IFT) algorithm is an effective solution for phase retrieval in phase-type holographic data storage systems, but introduces a higher phase error rate. As a result, data reliability becomes a significant issue. In this paper, to improve reliability and decrease decoding latency, we propose a phase distribution aware low-density parity-check (LDPC) code [called point data abstraction library (PDAL)] with outstanding error correcting capability. After experiencing IFT, we first investigate the phase distribution characteristics and find that the adjacent phase distribution is more likely to cross, resulting in higher phase shift percentages. Then, using phase distribution, PDAL optimizes LDPC codes with higher precision decoding information by dynamically applying the phase threshold based on the phase error rate. When the phase error rate is 0.04, the bit error rate, decoding iteration times, and decoding failure rate are all reduced by 51.5%, 26.9%, and 51.8% on average, respectively, compared with traditional LDPC code without exploiting phase distribution. PDAL, which is an efficient and practical error correction approach for phase-modulated holographic data storage, can improve data reliability by boosting error correction performance.

Improving the data reliability of phase modulated holographic storage using a reliable bit aware low-density parity-check code.

Phase modulated holographic storage offers superior storage capacity and a longer life span compared with other storage technologies. However, its application is limited by its high raw bit error rate. We aimed to introduce low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes for data protection in phase modulated holographic storage systems. However, traditional LDPC codes can not fully exploit data error characteristics, causing inaccurate initial log-likelihood ratio (LLR) information, which degrades decoding performance, thus limiting the improvement degree of data reliability in phase modulated holographic storage. Therefore, we propose a reliable bit aware LDPC optimization method (RaLDPC) that analyzes and employs phase demodulation characteristics to obtain reliable bits. More accurate initial LLR weights are assigned to these reliable bits. Hence, the optimized initial LLR can reflect the reliability of the demodulated data more accurately. Experimental results show that RaLDPC can reduce the bit error rate by an average of 38.89% compared with the traditional LDPC code, improving the data reliability of phase modulated holographic storage.

Phase-distribution-aware adaptive decision scheme to improve the reliability of holographic data storage.

Owing to their high storage density and long storage life, holographic data storage (HDS) technologies are viable options for mass cold data storage in the era of big data. Phase-modulated holographic data storage (PHDS) is a promising implementation of HDS. However, because of complex noise in the storage channel, many errors remain after phase demodulation. This study investigates the phase decision in the data-reading stage of PHDS. We propose a phase-distribution-aware adaptive (PDAA) decision scheme to address the inaccurate thresholds in traditional phase decision schemes. The PDAA decision scheme can determine more accurate decision thresholds based on the phase distribution characteristics of each reconstructed phase data page and adaptively match different decision thresholds to each phase data page. The experimental results show that when compared to the traditional decision scheme, the PDAA decision scheme can significantly reduce the phase error of data pages, improving the data reliability of holographic storage.

Cluster-enabled patterning of copper nanostructures from aqueous solution using a femtosecond laser.

A one-step method for patterning low-resistivity nanoscale copper wire is proposed herein to solve the challenging issues of using common metals rather than noble metal nanostructures fabricated by direct laser writing in solution. A complexing and a reducing agent were introduced for the single-photon absorption of copper solution in the visible range and to enable two-photon absorption with a femtosecond laser. Copper clusters were generated prior to direct laser writing to decrease induced laser energy during two-photon absorption and accelerate copper nanowire patterning to avoid the boiling of copper solution. A surfactant was used to restrain the overgrowth of copper clusters to obtain written nanowires with high uniformity. By controlling the laser writing parameters, the obtained copper wire had a minimum width of 230 nm and a resistivity of 1.22 × 10-5Ω·m. Our method paves the way for the fabrication of common metal nanodevices by direct laser writing.

Active W Sites Promoted by Defect Engineering Enhanced C2H6S3 Sensing Performance of WO3 Nanosheets.

Defect engineering has received extensive attention as an effective method to tune the gas sensing properties of semiconductor materials. Here, defective WO3 (D-WO3) nanosheets were obtained by a simple hydrogenation process with a detection limit as low as 5 ppb for dimethyl trisulfide (DMTS) and a response of 2.3 times that of the initial WO3 nanosheets to 100 ppb DMTS. Importantly, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and Raman spectroscopy confirmed the partial loss of oxygen atoms in D-WO3 nanosheets, and density functional theory calculations found that the W sites near the oxygen defect showed higher adsorption energy for DMTS and transferred more electrons during the gas interaction, indicating that the active W site caused by oxygen atom loss can effectively enhance the reactivity of two-dimensional WO3 nanosheets. Different from the traditional oxygen defect model, this work reveals the positive effect of active metal sites on gas sensing for the first time, which is expected to provide an effective reference for the sensing application of defect engineering in metal oxides.

Exposed Mo atoms induced by micropores enhanced H2S sensing of MoO3 nanoflowers.

It is well known that the metal atoms of metal oxide semiconductor (MOS) exhibit significant activity in gas sensing. However, limited by the shielding effect of the outer oxygen atom layer, layered MoO3 is often difficult to show ideal gas adsorption activity. Hence, the MoO3 microporous nanoflowers (MPNFs) assembled by porous two-dimensional nanosheets were successfully synthesized and exhibited excellent gas sensing performance to H2S, and the response was 7.2 times higher than that of simple MoO3 nanosheets. The abundant pores of MoO3 MPNFs were due to the influence of the crystal cell shrinkage effect on the atomic arrangement, while the significantly enhanced gas sensing performance was attributed to the positive effect of the microporous structure on gas diffusion and the exposed edge Mo atoms. This was confirmed by DFT calculation results that, compared to the Mo atoms on the surface of MoO3 nanosheets, the Mo atoms around the pores were exposed because they broke through the shielding effect of the oxygen atom layer and exhibited higher adsorption activity for H2S and O2 molecules. Therefore, this work can shed a light on the design of high-performance gas sensors based on metal oxides.

Taxus wallichiana var. chinensis (Pilg.) Florin Aqueous Extract Suppresses the Proliferation and Metastasis in Lung Carcinoma via JAK/STAT3 Signaling Pathway.

As one of the most common neoplasms globally, lung cancer (LC) is the leading cause of cancer-related mortality. Recurrence and metastasis negatively influencing therapeutic efficacy and overall survival demand new strategies in LC treatment. The advantages of TCM are increasingly highlighted. In this study, we obtained the major chemical components and their ratios in the aqueous extract of Taxus wallichiana var. chinensis (Pilg.) Florin (AETW) by UPLC-Q/TOF-MS/MS detection. The CCK-8 assay revealed that AETW could selectively inhibit the growth of A549 and HCC827 cells in a dose-dependent manner with little effect on normal human lung cells. Moreover, both in vitro and in vivo experiments showed that AETW was able to suppress the capacities of cell migration and invasion and downregulate the EMT and the JAK/STAT3 signaling pathway. To further probe into the molecular mechanism, the overexpression of STAT3 was performed into LC cells with AETW treatment, which counteracted the inhibitory effect on malignant behaviors of A549 and HCC827 cells with the decline in the expressions of p-JAK and p-STAT3. Taken together, we propose that AETW may inhibit the proliferation and metastasis by inactivating the JAK/STAT3 axis.

Selectivity of a ZnO@ZIF-71@PDMS Nanorod Array Gas Sensor Enhanced by Coating a Polymer Selective Separation Membrane.

It is important for noninvasive diagnosis of diabetes to develop acetone gas sensors with high selectivity. ZnO@ZIF-71 has been reported as a highly sensitive and selective gas sensor on acetone detection. However, it is difficult to exclude the interference with similar molecular sizes gas in the gas-sensing process, like ethanol. To solve this problem, polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) was synthesized on the surface of ZnO@ZIF-71 to form a ZnO@ZIF-71@PDMS sensor by vapor deposition. The new sensor shows inert response to ethanol and effective response to acetone simultaneously. The PDMS membrane acts as a molecular sieve, which shows the acetone selectivity performance and can totally eliminate the response to low concentration ethanol at low temperature. Theory calculations and solubility test are also employed to prove the role PDMS plays in this process. It demonstrated that the acetone selectivity performance comes from the hydrogen bond interaction between the ethanol gas molecules and PDMS, which increases difficulty for ethanol gas molecules to penetrate the PDMS membrane. Further, this work provides a new method for enhancing gas-sensing selectivity and promoting for miniaturization of gas sensors.

Femtosecond laser induced in-situ crystallization of Tb-based luminescent metal organic framework.

Luminescent metal-organic frameworks (LMOFs) are a class of interesting and well-investigated MOF materials, which have shown remarkable prospects in the past and have been widely applied in different fields. However, due to their organic hybrid aspect, micro-/nano-patterning LMOFs in devices via a conventional semiconductor process is very challenging. In this work, we have introduced an elegant technique via nonlinear photon-chemical effect to induce the synthesis and growth of LMOFs. A facile technique for local synthesis and micro-pattering Tb-based luminescent metal organic frameworks (Tb(BTC)·G) from a solution of precursors is achieved. A single step approach micro-patterning for device integration with simultaneous chemical synthesis was proposed. Micro-devices with excellent fluorescence performance based on Tb(BTC)·G have been demonstrated. This work first suggested a high resolution bottom-up micro-patterning technique for MOF device fabrication using femtosecond laser direct writing, showing great potential on MOF based micro/nano-devices integration, especially promising for patterning high resolution luminescent MOF devices.

Arrayed dual-mode integrated liquid crystal microlens driven jointly by both independent signal voltages.

A new type of liquid crystal microlens array (LCMLA) constructed by a single-layered LC material is proposed. The basic dual-mode integrated LC microlens includes a concentric microhole electrode and a central plate electrode. Compared with traditional LC microlenses driven electrically, the dual-mode integrated LC microlens presents a better light control effect, such as being flexibly adjusted between the beam convergence and divergence modes, enlarging both the tunable range of the signal voltage and the focal length and also reducing the focal spot assisted by a convex electric-field generated by the central plate electrode, acquiring a sharper beam diverging microring formed by the concave LC microlens assisted by a concave electric-field generated by the microhole electrode. At the same time, we have also verified that the electric-field filling factor of the dual-mode integrated LCMLA can be obviously increased through jointly tuning the signal voltages applied independently over both the microhole electrode and the central plate electrode. This research has laid a solid foundation for continuously developing LCMLA technology.

Multiple-view D2NNs array: realizing robust 3D object recognition.

As an optical-based classifier of the physical neural network, the independent diffractive deep neural network (D2NN) can be utilized to learn the single-view spatial featured mapping between the input lightfields and the truth labels by preprocessing a large number of training samples. However, it is still not enough to approach or even reach a satisfactory classification accuracy on three-dimensional (3D) targets owing to already losing lots of effective lightfield information on other view fields. This Letter presents a multiple-view D2NNs array (MDA) scheme that provides a significant inference improvement compared with individual D2NN or Res-D2NN by constructing a different complementary mechanism and then merging all base learners of distinct views on an electronic computer. Furthermore, a robust multiple-view D2NNs array (r-MDA) framework is demonstrated to resist the redundant spatial features of invalid lightfields due to severe optical disturbances.

Anti-noise diffractive neural network for constructing an intelligent imaging detector array.

To develop an intelligent imaging detector array, a diffractive neural network with strong robustness based on the Weight-Noise-Injection training is proposed. According to layered diffractive transformation under existing several errors, an accurate and fast object classification can be achieved. The fact that the mapping between the input image and the label in Weight-Noise-Injection training mode can be learned, means that the prediction of the optical network being insensitive to disturbances so as to improve its noise resistance remarkably. By comparing the accuracy under different noise conditions, it is verified that the proposed model can exhibit a higher accuracy.

Electrically Controlled Liquid Crystal Microlens Array Based on Single-Crystal Graphene Coupling Alignment for Plenoptic Imaging.

As a unique electric-optics material, liquid crystals (LCs) have been used in various light-control applications. In LC-based light-control devices, the structural alignment of LC molecules is of great significance. Generally, additional alignment layers are required for LC lens and microlens, such as rubbed polyimide (PI) layers or photoalignment layers. In this paper, an electrically controlled liquid crystal microlens array (EC-LCMLA) based on single-crystal graphene (SCG) coupling alignment is proposed. A monolayer SCG with high conductivity and initial anchoring of LC molecules was used as a functional electrode, thus no additional alignment layer is needed, which effectively simplifies the basic structure and process flow of conventional LCMLA. Experiments indicated that a uniform LC alignment can be acquired in the EC-LCMLA cell by the SCG coupling alignment effect. The common optical properties including focal lengths and point spread function (PSF) were measured experimentally. Experiments demonstrated that the proposed EC-LCMLA has good focusing performance in the visible to near-infrared range. Moreover, the plenoptic imaging in Galilean mode was achieved by integrating the proposed EC-LCMLA with photodetectors. Digital refocusing was performed to obtain a rendering image of the target.