The introduction of oxygen vacancies (Ov) has been regarded as an effective method to enhance the catalytic performance of photoanodes in oxygen evolution reaction (OER). However, their stability ...under highly oxidizing environment is questionable but was rarely studied. Herein, NiFe‐metal–organic framework (NiFe‐MOFs) was conformally coated on oxygen‐vacancy‐rich BiVO4 (Ov‐BiVO4) as the protective layer and cocatalyst, forming a core–shell structure with caffeic acid as bridging agent. The as‐synthesized Ov‐BiVO4@NiFe‐MOFs exhibits enhanced stability and a remarkable photocurrent density of 5.3±0.15 mA cm−2 at 1.23 V (vs. RHE). The reduced coordination number of Ni(Fe)‐O and elevated valence state of Ni(Fe) in NiFe‐MOFs layer greatly bolster OER, and the shifting of oxygen evolution sites from Ov‐BiVO4 to NiFe‐MOFs promotes Ov stabilization. Ovs can be effectively preserved by the coating of a thin NiFe‐MOFs layer, leading to a photoanode of enhanced photocurrent and stability.
A core–shell Ov‐BiVO4@NiFe‐MOFs photoanode was constructed via a coordination‐assisted self‐assembly method. A NiFe‐MOFs thin layer acts as protective layer and cocatalyst to shift active sites from oxygen vacancies to NiFe‐MOFs, leading to improved stability and activity for OER. This molecular‐based approach tailors the coordination and electronic structure of active sites and provides mechanistic insights for rational design of photocatalysts.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Channel state information (CSI) reporting is important for multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) wireless transceivers to achieve high capacity and energy efficiency in frequency division duplex ...(FDD) mode. CSI reporting for massive MIMO systems could consume large bandwidth and degrade spectrum efficiency. Deep learning (DL)-based CSI reporting integrated with channel characteristics has demonstrated success in improving CSI compression and recovery. To further improve the encoding efficiency of CSI feedback, we develop an efficient DL-based compression framework CQNet to jointly tackle CSI compression, codeword quantization, and recovery under the bandwidth constraint. CQNet is directly compatible with other DL-based CSI feedback works for further enhancement. We propose a more efficient quantization scheme in the radial coordinate by introducing a novel magnitude-adaptive phase quantization framework. Compared with traditional CSI reporting, CQNet demonstrates superior CSI feedback efficiency and better CSI reconstruction accuracy.
In cellular communication systems with optional device-to-device (D2D) links, user equipments (UEs) can operate in either D2D mode or cellular mode for data transport. This work introduces mixed-mode ...D2D communication in which D2D links can operate in multiple modes through resource multiplexing. Within this framework, we study the problem of maximizing weighted D2D sum rate under cellular rate constraints by optimizing mixed-mode allocation and resource allocation in term of transmit power and subchannel assignment. Due to nonconvex cellular rate constraints and binary constraints of subchannel allocation, this problem is a nonconvex mixed-integer problem that is generally difficult to solve. We propose a two-step approach by introducing energy-splitting variables such that mixed-mode allocation and resource allocation can be decoupled and optimized independently. The resulting algorithm can be distributive, requires little signaling overhead, and has low computational complexity. We present extensive numerical results to demonstrate the practicality of our proposed algorithm with regard to various network parameters.
A novel ladder‐type donor (IDTT) is developed by substituting the two outward thiophenes of the IDT donor with two thieno3,2‐bthiophenes. The polymer derived from this donor possesses longer ...effective conjugation and better planarity, which improves electron delocalization along the polymer backbone and charge mobility. The polymer solar cell device using PIDTT‐DFBT shows a high power conversion efficiency of 7.03% with a large open‐circuit voltage of 0.95 V without using any additives or post‐solvent/thermal annealing processes.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Plant viruses have been used as rapid and cost-effective expression vectors for heterologous protein expression in genomic studies. However, delivering large or multiple foreign proteins in monocots ...and insect pests is challenging.
Here, we recovered a recombinant plant cytorhabdovirus, Barley yellow striate mosaic virus (BYSMV), for use as a versatile expression platform in cereals and the small brown plan-thopper (SBPH, Laodelphax striatellus) insect vector.
We engineered BYSMV vectors to provide versatile expression platforms for simultaneous expression of three foreign proteins in barley plants and SBPHs. Moreover, BYSMV vectors could express the c. 600-amino-acid β-glucuronidase (GUS) protein and a red fluorescent protein stably in systemically infected leaves and roots of cereals, including wheat, barley, foxtail millet, and maize plants. Moreover, we have demonstrated that BYSMV vectors can be used in barley to analyze biological functions of gibberellic acid (GA) biosynthesis genes. In a major technical advance, BYSMV vectors were developed for simultaneous delivery of CRISPR/Cas9 nuclease and single guide RNAs for genomic editing in Nicotiana benthamiana leaves.
Taken together, our results provide considerable potential for rapid screening of functional proteins in cereals and planthoppers, and an efficient approach for developing other insect-transmitted negative-strand RNA viruses.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NMLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Channel state information (CSI) feedback is important for multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) wireless systems to achieve their capacity gain in frequency division duplex mode. For massive MIMO ...systems, CSI feedback may consume too much bandwidth and degrade spectrum efficiency. This letter proposes a learning-based CSI feedback framework based on limited feedback and bi-directional reciprocal channel characteristics. The massive MIMO base station exploits the available uplink CSI to help recovering the unknown downlink CSI from low rate user feedback. We propose two deep learning architectures, DualNet-MAG and DualNet-ABS, to significantly reduce the CSI feedback payload based on the multipath reciprocity. DualNet-MAG and DualNet-ABS can exploit the bi-directional correlation of the magnitude and the absolute value of real/imaginary parts of the CSI coefficients, respectively. The experimental results demonstrate that our architectures bring an obvious improvement compared with the downlink-based architecture.
Rumen microbiota play a key role in the digestion and utilization of plant materials by the ruminant species, which have important implications for greenhouse gas emission. Yet, little is known about ...the key taxa and potential gene functions involved in the digestion process. Here, we performed a genome-centric analysis of rumen microbiota attached to six different lignocellulosic biomasses in rumen-fistulated cattle. Our metagenome sequencing provided novel genomic insights into functional potential of 523 uncultured bacteria and 15 mostly uncultured archaea in the rumen. The assembled genomes belonged mainly to Bacteroidota, Firmicutes, Verrucomicrobiota, and Fibrobacterota and were enriched for genes related to the degradation of lignocellulosic polymers and the fermentation of degraded products into short chain volatile fatty acids. We also found a shift from copiotrophic to oligotrophic taxa during the course of rumen fermentation, potentially important for the digestion of recalcitrant lignocellulosic substrates in the physiochemically complex and varying environment of the rumen. Differential colonization of forages (the incubated lignocellulosic materials) by rumen microbiota suggests that taxonomic and metabolic diversification is an evolutionary adaptation to diverse lignocellulosic substrates constituting a major component of the cattle's diet. Our data also provide novel insights into the key role of unique microbial diversity and associated gene functions in the degradation of recalcitrant lignocellulosic materials in the rumen.
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We investigate the localization of multiple signal sources based on sensors performing time-of-arrival (TOA) measurement in wireless sensor networks. Moving beyond the widely studied single source ...localization problem, concurrently active multiple sources substantially complicate the problem since anchored sensor nodes are unaware of associations between measured signals and source nodes. At the same time, as the total number of possible source-measurement associations grows exponentially with the number of sensor nodes, it is inefficient to attempt conventional single-source localization algorithm for each possible association in a brute-force manner. In this work, we address this difficult problem from a joint optimization perspective. Specifically, we consider simultaneous estimation of source-measurement associations and the source locations, in addition to finding the initial signal transmission time. This joint optimization problem includes both discrete and continuous variables. We propose an efficient three-step algorithm that progressively simplifies the original problem through convex relaxation and sensible approximations. Our proposed algorithm demonstrates results comparable to a genie-aided method that utilizes known source-measurement associations.
Long-term evolution in unlicensed spectrum (LTE-U) is an emerging technology for expanding cellular network capacity without additional spectrum cost. This paper investigates effective spectrum ...sharing for coexisting Wi-Fi and LTE-U services. Based on a novel hyper access point (HAP) we introduced for effectively embedding LTE-U in unlicensed Wi-Fi band, LTE-U can directly take advantage of the Wi-Fi point coordination function protocol. To facilitate the coexistence, our HAP dedicates a contention-free period to LTE-U users and allows a contention period (CP) for traditional Wi-Fi users. We investigate the optimization of joint user association and resource allocation to further improve system throughput and user fairness. We formulate a network utility maximization problem based on the Nash bargaining solution (NBS), for which we derive a closed-form expression for the optimal CP length under a given user association. We analyze this NBS-based utility maximization and the performance of the proposed algorithm under log-normal fading, Rayleigh fading, and Rician fading channel models, respectively. Our numerical results corroborate our analysis and demonstrate effective improvement of the system performance by the proposed HAP algorithm against traditional LTE-U deployment.
We study multicarrier multiuser multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) systems, in which the base station employs an asymptotically large number of antennas. We analyze a fully correlated channel ...matrix and provide a beam domain channel model, where the channel gains are independent of sub-carriers. For this model, we first derive a closed-form upper bound on the achievable ergodic sum-rate, based on which, we develop asymptotically necessary and sufficient conditions for optimal downlink transmission that require only statistical channel state information at the transmitter. Furthermore, we propose a beam division multiple access (BDMA) transmission scheme that simultaneously serves multiple users via different beams. By selecting users within non-overlapping beams, the MU-MIMO channels can be equivalently decomposed into multiple single-user MIMO channels; this scheme significantly reduces the overhead of channel estimation, as well as, the processing complexity at transceivers. For BDMA transmission, we work out an optimal pilot design criterion to minimize the mean square error (MSE) and provide optimal pilot sequences by utilizing the Zadoff-Chu sequences. Simulations demonstrate the near-optimal performance of BDMA transmission and the advantages of the proposed pilot sequences.
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