Exploring the Influences of BaO Amount on the Wettability and Mechanical Behavior of Vitrified Bond Diamond Composites.

In recent years, the vitrified bond diamond grinding wheel has been applied widely in automotive, aerospace and machine tools of manufacturing industries. However, the main problems of low intensity and poor wettability between the vitrified bond and diamond abrasive limit its further application. In this study, BaO was added into the basic SiO2-B2O3-Al2O3-R2O vitrified bond system, and the impact of BaO on the wettability, thermal and mechanical behavior of vitrified bond and vitrified bond diamond composites was systematically discussed, respectively. The test indicated that when the vitrified bond containing BaO of 6 wt.% was sintered with diamond abrasive at 750 °C, a continuous barium feldspar phase transition layer between diamond abrasive and the bond was generated, which ameliorated the wet property of the bond-diamond abrasive. The contact angle varied from 59° on the blank sample to 35°, and the expansion coefficient changed from 6.24 × 10-6/K to 5.30 × 10-6/K. The Rockwell hardness and flexural strength of the vitrified bond diamond composites achieved the peaks of 117.5 MPa and 113.6 MPa, respectively, which increased by 20.2% and 16.5% compared with that of sample without the addition of BaO.

Harel-Yoon syndrome caused by a novel variant in ATAD3A: A case report.

Objectives: To describe the clinical feature of a very recently identified phenotype associated with ATAD3A variation. Methods: A neonate with Harel-Yoon syndrome was identified. We describe the proband's clinical and radiological features. The affected newborn and her parents underwent whole-exome sequencing and PCR-Sanger sequencing. Results: Previously reported clinical manifestations were rare in the neonatal period, including unmanageable seizures necessitating the use of multiple drugs, congenital laryngeal stridor, hypotonia, challenges with feeding, corneal opacity, and subsequent demise due to respiratory failure. Molecular investigations have unveiled the presence of a newly identified heterozygous single-base substitution (c.1517A > C; p.Q506P) within the ATAD3A gene. Discussion: This study unveils a novel single-base substitution, thereby expanding the mutation spectrum associated with ATAD3A. Furthermore, the clinical characteristics exhibited during the neonatal phase are comprehensively described, potentially facilitating improved clinical recognition of ATAD3A-associated HAYOS.

Effects of carbonate on ferrihydrite transformation in alkaline media.

Alkaline media widely exist in natural and engineered systems such as semiarid/arid areas, radioactive waste sites, and mine tailings. In these settings, the commonly occurring iron (oxyhydr)oxides differed in their ability to influence the fate of nutrients and contaminants. Due to the substantially increased atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration, carbonate stands to increase in these media. However, how increasing carbonate affects the transformation of poorly crystalline iron (oxyhydr)oxides (e.g., two-line ferrihydrite) under alkaline conditions still remains unclear. Here, kinetics of ferrihydrite transformation were evaluated at pH ∼10 as a function of [carbonate] = 0-286 mM using synchrotron-based X-ray and vibrational spectroscopic techniques. The results showed that carbonate slowed down ferrihydrite transformation slightly and suppressed goethite formation, but promoted hematite formation regardless of its concentration. At low carbonate concentration (11.42 mM), the effect of carbonate on product formation was obvious due to the weak inner-sphere complex; however, at high carbonate concentration (80-286 mM), the effect was retarded because of the adsorption equilibrium of carbonate as well as the initial carbonate adsorption followed by desorption. Moreover, carbonate modified the morphology of hematite from rhombic to ellipsoidal to honeycomb and goethite from rod-like to needle-like to spindle-like due to the inner-sphere adsorption-desorption of carbonate and adsorption of hydroxyl ions on reactive sites of iron (oxyhydr)oxides in alkaline media. The results suggest that the concurrently increasing carbonate with enhanced atmospheric CO2 could control the transformation and occurrence of iron (oxyhydr)oxides in natural and engineered environments and have important implications for the biogeochemical cycles of iron and carbon.

Investigation of Al droplet wetting behavior on highly-oriented SiC.

In the integrated circuit industry, metal liquids are frequently in contact with chemical vapor deposited (CVD) SiC, and it is important to understand the interactions between CVD-SiC and metal droplets. In this study, the wetting behavior of Al on a highly oriented SiC surface was investigated, and the contact angle could be controlled from 6° to 153° at a wetting temperature (Twet) of 1573-1773 K; the obtained contact angle range was larger than that of polycrystalline silicon carbide (Twet = 873-1473 K, 9-113°) and single crystal silicon carbide (Twet = 873-1473 K, 31-92°). The presence of many dislocations at the Al/SiC interface increased the interfacial energy, resulting in a greater contact angle for Al on the 〈111〉-oriented SiC coating surface than on the 〈110〉 one.

Establishment of a nomogram model for predicting metabolic bone disease in preterm infants: A case‒control study.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate risk factors for metabolic bone disease (MBD) in preterm infants and establish a nomogram model for predicting MBD risk. METHODS: A total of 1104 preterm infants were enrolled, among whom 809 were included in the modelling set and 295 were included in the validation set. The modelling set was divided into MBD (n = 185) and non-MBD (n = 624) groups. A multivariate logistic regression analysis was used to investigate the independent risk factors for MBD. R software was used to plot the nomogram model, which was then validated by the data of the validation set. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) and calibration curves were used to evaluate the nomogram model's performance, and the clinical decision curve was used to assess the clinical practicability of the model. RESULTS: Gestational age, time of trophic feeding initiation, parenteral nutrition duration, necrotizing enterocolitis, bronchopulmonary dysplasia, cholestasis and sepsis were independent risk factors for MBD in preterm infants (P < 0.05). The ROC curve of the modelling set had an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.801; the risk prediction value of 0.196 corresponding to the maximum Youden index was the best value, and the prediction critical value was 125 points. The ROC curve of the validation set had an AUC of 0.854. The calibration curve analysis showed good accuracy and consistency between the model's predicted and actual values. CONCLUSIONS: The nomogram model provides an efficient tool for the early assessment of MBD risk. Preterm infants with scores ≥ 125 should receive close attention and interventions in the early stage. WHAT IS KNOWN: • The incidence and severity of MBD are inversely proportional to gestational age and birth weight. Bone loss can lead to prolonged hospital stay, ventilator dependence, pathological fractures and short stature. WHAT IS NEW: • Gestational age, time of trophic feeding initiation, parenteral nutrition duration, necrotizing enterocolitis, bronchopulmonary dysplasia, cholestasis and sepsis were independent risk factors for MBD in preterm infants. The nomogram model provides an efficient tool for the early assessment of MBD risk.

Optimizing Electromagnetic Interference Shielding of Ultrathin Nanoheterostructure Textiles through Interfacial Engineering.

Strong electromagnetic wave reflection loss concomitant with second emission pollution limits the wide applications of electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding textiles. Decoration of textiles by using various dielectric materials has been found efficient for the development of highly efficient EMI shielding textiles, but it is still a challenge to obtain EMI shielding composites with thin thickness. A route of interfacial engineering may offer a twist to overcome these obstacles. Here, we fabricated a Ni nanoparticle/SiC nanowhisker/carbon cloth nanoheterostructure, where SiC nanowhiskers were deposited by a simple manufacturing method, namely, laser chemical vapor deposition (LCVD), directly grown on carbon cloth. Through directly constructing a Ni/SiC interface, we find that the formation of Schottky contact can influence the interfacial polarization associated with the generation of dipole electric fields, leading to an enhancement of dielectric loss. A striking feature of this interfacial engineering strategy is able to enhance the absorption of the incident electromagnetic wave while suppressing the reflection. As a result, our Ni/SiC/carbon cloth exhibits an excellent EMI shielding effectiveness of 68.6 dB with a thickness of only 0.39 mm, as well as high flexibility and long-term duration stability benefited from the outstanding mechanical properties of SiC nanowiskers, showing potential for EMI shielding applications.

Characterization of a novel Toll-like receptor 13 homologue from a marine fish Nibea albiflora, revealing its immunologic function as PRRs.

Congenital immunity mediated by Toll-like receptor (TLR) family is the first line of defense for disease-resistant immunity of fish and plays a vital role as a bridge between innate immunity and acquired immunity. As a less known member of the TLR family TLR13 can participate in the immune and inflammatory reactions of the body for recognizing the conserved sequence of 23S rRNA in bacteria and induce immune response. In this study, the full-length cDNA of TLR13 from Nibea albiflora (named as NaTLR13) was cloned and was functionally characterized. It was 4210bp (GenBank accession no. MT701899) including an open reading frame (ORF) of 2886bp to encode 962 amino acids with molecular weight of 110.37 kDa and the theoretical isoelectric point of 9.08. There were several conservative structures in NaTLR13 such as 15 leucine-rich repeat sequences (LRRs), a Toll-IL-1 receptor domain (TIR), an LRR-CT terminal domain, two LRR-TYP structures and two transmembrane domains. The multiple sequence alignment and phylogenetic analysis manifested that NaTLR13 had high similarity with Larimichthys crocea and Collichthys lucidus (88.79% and 87.02%, respectively) and they fell into the same branch. The Real-time PCR showed that NaTLR13 was expressed in all selected tissues, with the highest in the spleen, followed by the liver, kidney, gill, heart and muscle. After being challenged by Vibrio alginolyticus, Vibrio parahaemolyticus or Poly (I:C), the expression of NaTLR13 increased firstly, then decreased and finally stabilized with time for its immune defense function. Subcellular localization analysis revealed that NaTLR13 was unevenly distributed in the cytoplasm with green fluorescence and MyD88 was evenly spread in the cytoplasm with red signals. When NaTLR13 and MyD88 were co-transfected, they obviously overlapped and displayed orange-yellow color, which showed that the homologous TLR13 might interact with MyD88 for NFκB signaling pathway transmission. The functional domains of NaTLR13 (named NaTLR13-TIR and NaTLR13-LRR) were expressed in E.coli BL21 (DE3) and purified by Ni-NAT Superflow Resin conforming to the expected molecular weights, and the recombinant proteins could bind to three Vibrios (V.alginolyticus, V.parahaemolyticus and Vibrio harveyi), indicating that NaTLR13 could be bounden to bacteria through its functional domain. These results suggested that NaTLR13 might play an important role in the defense of N.albiflora against bacteria or viral infection and the data would provide some information for further understanding the regulatory mechanism of the innate immune system in fish.

Phase-Selective Synthesis of Mo-Ta-C Ternary Nanosheets by Precisely Tailoring Mo/Ta Atom Ratio on Liquid Copper.

Phase-selective synthesis is an effective way to expand the ultra-thin transition metal carbide family and tune its properties. Herein, a chemical vapor deposition route with specially designed substrate (Ta wire-Cu foil-Mo foil) is carried out to synthesize Mo-Ta-C ternary nanosheets with tunable phase structure. The Ta atoms diffuse on the surface of liquid copper and Mo atoms diffuse through the liquid copper to the surface, which react with the carbon atoms decomposed from the methane and form the Mo-Ta-C ternary nanosheets. By precisely tailoring the Mo/Ta ratio and growth temperature, ultrathin layered orthorhombic (Mo2/3Ta1/3)2C nanosheets and non-layered cubic (Mo0.13Ta0.87) C nanosheets with thickness of 21 and 4 nm are selectively synthesized. The approach could pave the way for the formation of multi-component carbide nanosheets with controllable phases.

Identification, functional characterization and expression pattern of myeloid differentiation factor 88 (MyD88) in Nibea albiflora.

Myeloid differentiation factor 88 (MyD88), composed of an N-terminal death domain and a C-terminal Toll/interleukin (IL)-IR homology domain, is a key connector protein in the TLR signal transduction pathway. In this study a novel isoform of MyD88 in Nibea albiflora (named as NaMyD88) was identified and functionally characterized (GenBank accession no. MN384261.1). Its complete cDNA sequence was 1672 bp and contained an open reading frame of 879 bp encoding 292 amino acid residues, which was similar to its teleost fish counterparts in the length. The theoretical molecular mass was 33.63 kDa and the isoelectric point was 5.24. BLASTp analysis suggested that the deduced amino acids sequence of NaMyD88 shared high identity to the known MyD88, for instance, 94.77% identity with Collichthys lucidus. Sequence analysis showed that NaMyD88 protein was consistent with MyD88 protein of other species at three conserved domains, N-terminal DD, short middle domain and C-terminal TIR, and the TIR domain contained three highly conserved motifs: Box1, Box2, and Box3. NaMyD88 and red fluorescent protein (Dsred) were fused and expressed in the cytoplasm of the epithelioma papulosum cyprini (EPC cells). The NaTLR9-TIR-EGFP fusion protein, which was obtained in our previous studies, showed green fluorescence and mainly distributed in the cytoplasm. After co-transfection, NaMyD88-Dsred and NaTLR9-TIR-EGFP obviously overlapped and displayed orange-yellow color. The results showed that the homologous MyD88-Dsred could interact with NaTLR9-TIR-EGFP. Based on this result pcMV-NaMyD88-TIR-Myc plasmids and the pcDNA3.1-NaTLR9-TIR-flag were constructed and co-transfected into 293T cells for the immunoprecipitation test. According to Western blot, the protein eluted by Flag-beads could be detected by anti-Flag-tag antibody and anti-Myc tag antibody respectively, while the protein without NaTLR9-TIR could not be found, which further proved that TLR and MyD88 could interact each other. The prokaryotic plasmid of MyD88-TIR domain was constructed, expressed in BL21 (DE3) and purified by Ni-NAT super flow resin conforming to the expected molecular weight of 27 kDa with the corresponding active sites for its conferring protein-protein interaction functions. Real-time fluorescence quantitative PCR showed that NaMyD88 could be expressed in intestine, stomach, liver, kidney, gill, heart and spleen, with the highest in the kidney, and it was up-regulated after being infected with Polyinosinic:polycytidylic acid - Poly (I:C) and Pseudomonas plecoglossicida, which showed that NaMyD88 was involved in the immune response of N.albiflora. These data afforded a basis for understanding the role of NaMyD88 in the TLR signaling pathway of N.albiflora.

One-step chemical vapor deposition fabrication of Ni@NiO@graphite nanoparticles for the oxygen evolution reaction of water splitting.

NiO combined with conductive materials is a practicable way to improve its catalytic property for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) by enhancing its electrical conductivity. Herein, Ni@NiO@graphite nanoparticles less than 20 nm in average diameter were synthesized by a one-step chemical vapor deposition process. Due to the deliberately controlled lack of oxygen, Ni particles and carbon clusters decomposed from NiCp2 precursors were oxidized incompletely and formed Ni@NiO core-shell nanoparticles coated by a graphite layer. The thickness of the graphite layer and the content of Ni were controlled by varying deposition temperature. The electrochemical activity towards the oxygen evolution reaction was assessed within alkaline media. Compared with commercial NiO powder, the Ni@NiO@graphite nanoparticles with the unique core-shell microstructure exhibit excellent OER performance, i.e., an overpotential of 330 mV (vs. RHE) at 10 mA cm-2 and a Tafel slope of 49 mV dec-1, due to the improved electrical conductivity and more active sites. This work provides a facile and rapid strategy to produce nanoparticles with unique microstructures as highly active electrocatalysts for the OER.

Molecular insights of a novel fish Toll-like receptor 9 homologue in Nibea albiflora to reveal its function as PRRs.

Toll-like receptors (TLRs) are an important class of molecules involved in non-specific immunity, and they are also the bridge connecting between non-specific immunity and specific immunity. As a vital member of TLR family TLR9 can be activated by bacterial DNA and induce the production of inflammatory cytokines. In this study, a full length of TLR9 homologue of 3677 bp in Nibea albiflora (named as NaTLR9, GenBank accession no: MN125017.1) was characterized, and its ORF was 3180 bp encoding 1059 amino acid residues with a calculated molecular weight of 121.334 kDa (pI = 6.29). Several leucine-rich repeated sequences (LRR domain) and conservative TIR domain were found in NaTLR9, which was mainly expressed in dendritic cells and macrophages. The phylogenetic and synteny analysis further revealed high sequence identity of NaTLR9 with its counterparts of other teleost, confirming their correct nomenclature and conservative during evolution as an important pattern recognition receptor. The NaTLR9-TIR-pEGFP-N1 fusion protein showed green fluorescence and mainly distributed in the cytoplasm. After co-transfection of NaTLR9-TIR-pEGFP-N1 and NaMyD88-pDsRED-Monomer-N1, green fluorescence obviously overlapped with red and changed into yellowish-green, which suggested that there might be the interaction between homologous NaTLR9-TIR and MyD88. Based on this result the pCDNA3.1-NaTLR9-TIR-flag and pcMV-NaMyD88-TIR-Myc plasmids were co-transfected into 293T cells for the immunoprecipitation test. According to Western blot, TLR9 and MyD88 protein could interact with each other. Furthermore, NaTLR9 was ubiquitously expressed in all the investigated tissues, most abundantly in head kidney, followed by stomach, spleen, liver and gill, but lower in muscle. The vitro immune stimulation experiments revealed that Pseudomonas plecoglossicida and polyinosinic-polycytidylic acid [Poly (I:C)] induced higher levels of NaTLR9 mRNA expression with the peaks of 9.52 times at 2 h and 39.91 times at 24 h compared with the control group respectively. The functional domains (LRRs and TIR, named NaTLR9-TIR and NaTLR9-LRR respectively) of NaTLR9 were expressed and purified, the recombinant proteins both could bind three kinds of typical aquatic pathogenic bacteria (Vibrio. parahaemolyticus, Vibrio alginolyticus, and Vibrio harveyi), which showed that NaTLR9 could couple to bacteria by its function domains. The aforementioned results indicated that NaTLR9 played a significant role in the defense against pathogenic bacteria infection in innate immune response of sciaenidae fish, which may provide some further understandings of the regulatory mechanisms in the teleostean innate immune system.

Complete mitochondrial genome of the black-winged fly, Felderimyia fuscipennis (Diptera: Tephritidae) and its phylogenetic relationship within family Tephritidae.

The black-winged fly, Felderimyia fuscipennis (Diptera: Tephritidae), is an insect pest of bamboo shoot, mainly distributed in Thailand, Malaysia and Yunnan Province and Guangxi Autonomous Region, China. The complete sequence of the mitogenome of F. fuscipennis has been determined in this study. The whole mitogenome sequence is 16,536 bp in length, which totally contains 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), 2 rRNA genes, 22 tRNA genes, and a non-coding region (putative control region, CR). The phylogeny indicates that F. fuscipennis of subfamily Trypetinae was monophyletic and clearly separated from both Dacinae and Tephritinae with high bootstrap value supported.

Carbonate-Enhanced Transformation of Ferrihydrite to Hematite.

An elevated activity of (bi)carbonate in soils and sediments (pCO2, ∼2%) above current atmospheric CO2 (∼0.04%) could influence the iron cycling in mineral-water interfacial chemistry. However, the impact of (bi)carbonate on mineral transformation is unclear. Here, a model short range-ordered iron oxyhydroxide, two-line ferrihydrite, was used to evaluate the impact of (bi)carbonate on mineral transformation at near-neutral pH using experimental geochemistry, X-ray diffraction, X-ray absorption spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. Results showed that (bi)carbonate promoted the transformation of ferrihydrite to hematite and retarded the goethite formation. As pCO2 increased from 408 to 20,000 ppmv at 40 °C, the transformation efficiency of ferrihydrite increased from 53 to 95%, and the formation of hematite increased from 13 to 76%. During the formation of hematite, a terminal ligand on a Fe(III)O6 octahedral monomer such as a hydroxyl or water was displaced to form Fe(III)O6 octahedral dimers and/or polymers. Because the Fe-O bond of ≡(Fe-O)2-CO is much weaker than that of ≡Fe-O-H, the -O2CO group can be more easily replaced by two terminal -OH groups; the dehydration/rearrangement between Fe(III)O6 octahedral monomers was enhanced under high pCO2. Results suggest that high carbonate activity is an important geochemical parameter controlling the occurrence of hematite in oxic environments and, in turn, iron cycling in the critical zone.

Detecting vulnerable plaque with vulnerability index based on convolutional neural networks.

Plaque rupture and subsequent thrombosis are major processes of acute cardiovascular events. The Vulnerability Index is a very important indicator of whether a plaque is ruptured, and these easily ruptured or fragile plaques can be detected early. The higher the general vulnerability index, the higher the instability of the plaque. Therefore, determining a clear vulnerability index classification point can effectively reduce unnecessary interventional therapy. However, the current critical value of the vulnerability index has not been well defined. In this study, we proposed a neural network-based method to determine the critical point of vulnerability index that distinguishes vulnerable plaques from stable ones. Firstly, based on MatConvNet, the intravascular ultrasound images under different vulnerability index labels are classified. Different vulnerability indexes can obtain different accuracy rates for the demarcation points. The corresponding data points are fitted to find the existing relationship to judge the highest classification. In this way, the vulnerability index corresponding to the highest classification accuracy rate is judged. Then the article is based on the same experiment of different components of the aortic artery in the artificial neural network, and finally the vulnerability index corresponding to the highest classification accuracy can be obtained. The results show that the best vulnerability index point is 1.716 when the experiment is based on the intravascular ultrasound image, and the best vulnerability index point is 1.607 when the experiment is based on the aortic artery component data. Moreover, the vulnerability index and classification accuracy rate has a periodic relationship within a certain range, and finally the highest AUC is 0.7143 based on the obtained vulnerability index point on the verification set. In this paper, the convolution neural network is used to find the best vulnerability index classification points. The experimental results show that this method has the guiding significance for the classification and diagnosis of vulnerable plaques, further reduce interventional treatment of cardiovascular disease.

In Situ Doping of Nitrogen in <110>-Oriented Bulk 3C-SiC by Halide Laser Chemical Vapour Deposition.

Doping of nitrogen is a promising approach to improve the electrical conductivity of 3C-SiC and allow its application in various fields. N-doped, <110>-oriented 3C-SiC bulks with different doping concentrations were prepared via halide laser chemical vapour deposition (HLCVD) using tetrachlorosilane (SiCl4) and methane (CH4) as precursors, along with nitrogen (N2) as a dopant. We investigated the effect of the volume fraction of nitrogen (ϕN2) on the preferred orientation, microstructure, electrical conductivity (σ), deposition rate (Rdep), and optical transmittance. The preference of 3C-SiC for the <110> orientation increased with increasing ϕN2. The σ value of the N-doped 3C-SiC bulk substrates first increased and then decreased with increasing ϕN2, reaching a maximum value of 7.4 × 102 S/m at ϕN2 = 20%. Rdep showed its highest value (3000 µm/h) for the undoped sample and decreased with increasing ϕN2, reaching 1437 µm/h at ϕN2 = 30%. The transmittance of the N-doped 3C-SiC bulks decreased with ϕN2 and showed a declining trend at wavelengths longer than 1000 nm. Compared with the previously prepared <111>-oriented N-doped 3C-SiC, the high-speed preparation of <110>-oriented N-doped 3C-SiC bulks further broadens its application field.

A high-throughput synthesis of large-sized single-crystal hexagonal boron nitride on a Cu-Ni gradient enclosure.

Large monolayer two-dimensional h-BN can be employed in novel electronic devices because of its thin insulation, excellent thermal stability, and high mechanical strength. However, the efficient synthesis of an h-BN film with large lateral size still faces a great challenge. Here, we report a method for the high-throughput synthesis of large-sized single-crystal h-BN on a Cu-Ni gradient alloy enclosure as the substrate via a low-pressure chemical vapor deposition (LPCVD) method. By depositing Ni on the Cu foil in different concentrations to obtain a Cu-Ni in-plane gradient concentration alloy enclosure, the highest growth rate of h-BN was 1 µm min-1 with the lateral size of h-BN being higher than 60 µm. Furthermore, the effect of the Ni content on the single crystal h-BN grain size and nucleation density and the mechanisms for the growth of h-BN were also investigated.

Complete mitochondrial genome of melon fly, Zeugodacus cucurbitae (Diptera:Tephritidae) from Kunming, Southwest China and the phylogeny within subfamily Dacinae.

The melon fly, Zeugodacus cucurbitae (Diptera:Tephritidae) is an important invasive pest and distributed throughout tropical, subtropical countries and areas. In this study, we report the complete mitochondrial genome of the fly with 15, 685 base pair in length, which includes 37 genes (the large and small ribosomal RNA subunits, 22 transfer RNA genes, 13 genes encoding mitochondrial proteins) and a non-coding A + T-rich control region. Molecular phylogeny indicated that there was a high bootstrap value supported among Z. cucurbitae and Z. tau belonging to the Z. tau complex.

Automatic diagnosis of fungal keratitis using data augmentation and image fusion with deep convolutional neural network.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Fungal keratitis is caused by inflammation of the cornea that results from infection by fungal organisms. The lack of an early effective diagnosis often results in serious complications even blindness. Confocal microscopy is one of the most effective methods in the diagnosis of fungal keratitis, but the diagnosis depends on the subjective judgment of medical experts. METHODS: To address this problem, this paper proposes a novel convolutional neural network framework for the automatic diagnosis of fungal keratitis using data augmentation and image fusion. Firstly, a normal image is augmented by flipping to solve the problem of having a limited and imbalanced database. Secondly, a sub-area contrast stretching algorithm is proposed for image preprocessing to highlight the key structures in the images and to filter out irrelevant information. Thirdly, the histogram matching fusion algorithm is implemented, then the preprocessed image is fused with the original image to form a new algorithm framework and a new database. Finally, the traditional convolutional neural network is integrated into the novel algorithm framework to perform the experiments. RESULTS: Experiments show that the accuracy of traditional AlexNet and VGGNet is 99.35% and 99.14%, that of AlexNet and VGGNet based on MF fusion is 99.80% and 99.83%, and that of AlexNet and VGGNet based on histogram matching fusion (HMF) is 99.95% and 99.89%. The experimental results show that the AlexNet framework using data augmentation and image fusion achieves a perfect trade-off between the diagnostic performance and the computational complexity, with a diagnostic accuracy of 99.95%. CONCLUSIONS: These experimental results demonstrate the novel convolutional neural network framework perfectly balances the diagnostic performance and computational complexity, and can improve the effect and real-time performance in the diagnosis of fungal keratitis.

Structural Controlling of Highly-Oriented Polycrystal 3C-SiC Bulks via Halide CVD.

Highly-oriented polycrystal 3C-SiC bulks were ultra-fast fabricated via halide chemical vapor deposition (CVD) using tetrachlorosilane (SiCl4) and methane (CH4) as precursors. The effects of deposition temperature (Tdep) and total pressure (Ptot) on the orientation and surficial morphology were investigated. The results showed that the growth orientation of 3C-SiC columnar grains was strongly influenced by Tdep. With increasing Tdep, the columnar grains transformed from <111>- to <110>-oriented. The arrangement of <111>-oriented columnar grains was controlled by Ptot. Lotus-, turtle-, thorn-, and strawberry-like surface morphologies were naturally contributed by different arrangements of <111>-oriented grains, and the deposition mechanism was discussed. The wetting behaviors of CVD-SiC samples by molten aluminum were also examined at 1173 K in a high vacuum atmosphere.

Morphology controlling of 〈111〉-3C-SiC films by HMDS flow rate in LCVD.

Morphology of 〈111〉-oriented 3C-SiC films was transformed from mosaic to whisker to cauliflower-like with the increased flow rate (f) of hexametyldisilane (HMDS) in the process of laser chemical vapor deposition (LCVD). The SiC whiskers were naturally sharp hexagonal pyramids with average height of 250 nm and an aspect ratio in the range of 5 to 10, with a density of 1.3 × 108 mm-2. The influence mechanism of f on the surface morphology, as well as the growth mechanism of SiC whiskers, was discussed.