Fifteen individual perfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) were analyzed in 22 sediment samples collected from Anqing urban lakes (Anhui province, China) by ultra-performance liquid chromatography–tandem ...mass spectrometry (UPLC–MS/MS). Total PFAS concentration was between 0.61 and 26 ng g
− 1
dry weight. Perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) was the dominant PFAS contaminant, with a concentration range of < 0.040–13 ng g
− 1
. Results indicated higher total PFAS concentrations in lakes located to the northwest of Anqing City than in other regions. Adjacent chemical and industrial factories were hypothesized to be responsible for these higher PFAS levels in those lakes. In comparison to other measurements obtained from other lakes, PFAS concentrations in the urban lakes of Anqing City were relatively high.
The inverse-distance weighting (IDW) method is considered as one of the most popular deterministic methods and is widely applied to a variety of areas because of its low computational cost and easy ...implementation. In this paper, we show that the classical IDW is essentially a zeroth-order local kernel regression method with an inverse distance weight function. Thus, it suffers from various shortcomings, such as the boundary bias. Considering the advantages of the local polynomial modeling technique in statistics, the classical IDW was generalized into a higher-order regression by the Taylor expansion and then computed by means of a weighted least-squares method. Surface modeling of rainfall fields in China indicated that the generalized IDWs with the first- and second-orders are more accurate than the classical IDW in terms of root mean square error (RMSE). The example of digital elevation model construction with a group of sample points showed that the two generalized IDWs have better RMSE and mean error than the classical IDW. Furthermore, the second-order IDW has a better performance than the ordinary kriging in terms of RMSE. A theoretical analysis demonstrated that the gradient-plus-inverse distance squared method presented by Nalder and Wein (Agric For Meteorol 92(4): 211–225,
1998
) is a first-order form of the generalized IDW expanded on spatial coordinates and elevation. In a word, the generalized IDW can incorporate multiple covariates, which can better explain the interpolation procedure and might improve its accuracy.
An enhanced newly high-efficiency dual-function beam splitter of the grating is described in this paper. The proposed grating can realize newly dual-function at infrared wavelength under second Bragg ...incidence, which can function as high-efficiency component for TE polarization. Moreover, under TM polarization, the grating is different from the other traditional dual-function grating, which can achieve a three-port output with high efficiency and good uniformity. By using the finite element method, an optimum grating structure can be presented with the efficiency of three diffraction orders (0th, −1st, −2nd) for TM polarization greater than 30%. As for TE polarization, the efficiency of −2nd order will be better than 95% with a wide bandwidth. Therefore, the proposed grating can be well applied in variety optical fields.
The characteristics and identification methods of high quality deep-water gravity flow sandstone reservoirs in Baiyun sag of the Pearl River Mouth Basin are examined based on three-dimensional ...seismic and drilling data, and deep water sedimentary theory. The oil and gas discovered in the deep water of the Baiyun sag are dominantly from high quality gravity flow sandstones, including channel complexes, sheets, and channel-levee complexes. The analyses of the sediment supply, feeding channel, internal architecture of sedimentary bodies, depositional process and flow regime show that the development of three types of high quality reservoirs are controlled by sediment composition of the provenance (continental margin): Under the background of rich sand provenance, sandy debris flow is likely to form, giving rise to high quality reservoirs like channel complexes and sheets down dip the shelf-slope break. These reservoirs can be identified by seismic reflections such as incised valley, mound shape, and amplitude anomaly, and described by combining single sand body tracking with waveform recognition of sands and seismic attribute analysis. Under the background of sand-mud mixed provenance, gravity flow deposits are to occur below the shelf-slope break, where sedimentation differentiation is the key to the formation of high quality reservoirs. In the case that channel-levee complex is formed, high quality sandstone reservoirs, usually in the channel or the fan lobe below, can be identified and described by seismic features like U-shaped erosion on seismic profile, amplitude anomaly, bird-wing shaped seismic reflection, and waveform recognition.
A novel battery hybrid composite anode consisting of tin nanoparticles encapsulated by double nets of carbon matrixes is presented. The improved electron transfer and volume change accommodation are ...confirmed
via
density functional theory modeling and
in situ
transmission electron microscopy observations, respectively.
A novel hybrid anode consisting of tin encapsulated by double nets is presented, which is demonstrated
via in situ
transmission electron microscopy.
Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) patients with deletion of chromosome 17p, where the p53 gene is located, often develop more aggressive disease with poor clinical outcomes. To investigate the ...underlying mechanisms for the highly malignant phenotype of 17p- CLL and to facilitate in vivo evaluation of potential drugs against CLL with p53 deletion, we have generated a mouse model with TCL1-Tg:p53(-/-) genotype. These mice develop B-cell leukemia at an early age with an early appearance of CD5+ / IgM+ B cells in the peritoneal cavity and spleen, and exhibit an aggressive path of disease development and drug resistance phenotype similar to human CLL with 17p deletion. The TCL1-Tg:p53(-/-) leukemia cells exhibit higher survival capacity and are more drug resistant than the leukemia cells from TCL1-Tg:p53wt mice. Analysis of microRNA expression reveals that p53 deletion resulted in a decrease of miR-15a and miR-16-1, leading to an elevated expression of Mcl-1. Primary leukemia cells from CLL patients with 17p deletion also show a decrease in miR-15a/miR-16-1 and an increase in Mcl-1. Our study suggests that the p53/miR15a/16-1/Mcl-1 axis may be an important pathway that regulates Mcl-1 expression and contributes to drug resistance and aggressive phenotype in CLL cells with loss of p53.
•Four ferritins (MpFTs) of black carp (MpFT-H1α, MpFT-H1β, MpFT-M and MpFT-L) have been cloned and characterized.•An typical iron-responsive element (IRE) was predicted in the 5’-UTR of MpFT-H1α and ...MpFT-M.•Optimal dietary CHO (19.43% or 28.84%) could induce the mRNA expression levels of MpAdipoRs in the liver, muscle, brain and blood.•Four FTs could also be differently upregulated after Aeromonas hydrophila infection in black carp.•MpFTs might play important roles in innate immune defense during A. hydrophila infection.
As ubiquitous and conserved proteins, ferritin (FT) plays important roles in immune system and iron storage system. Four cDNAs encoding ferritin (MpFT) were cloned from black carp Mylopharyngodon piceus using homology cloning and rapid amplification of cDNA ends techniques. There were 177, 177, 176 and 173 amino acids in the MpFT-H1α, MpFT-H1β, MpFT-M and MpFT-L, respectively. BLAST analysis reveals that MpFTs shares high identities with other known FTs from zebrafish, Rainbow trout and Human, etc. A typical iron-responsive element (IRE) was predicted in the 5’-untranslated region (UTR) of MpFT-H1α and MpFT-M, respectively. The relative expression levels of MpFT1a were higher in the blood, liver and heart of black carp according to RT-PCR assays (P < 0.05). Higher expression levels of MpFT1b were shown in the liver and heart of black carp (P < 0.05). Relative higher transcriptional levels of MpFTL could be observed in the liver, blood and brain (P < 0.05). And higher expression levels of MpFTM were shown in the liver and intestine compared with these of in the muscle of black carp according to RT-PCR assays (P < 0.05). And the expression variations of FT-M and FT-L were more sensitive than these of FT-H1a and FT-H1b in the blood of black carp post infection. Similarly, the mRNA expression profiles of four FTs could also be differently upregulated and reached to the peak expression levels at 12h, 12h, 6h and 48h after Aeromonas hydrophila infection in the liver of black carp. In the intestine, all the transcription variations of four FTs were reached to highest levels at 24 h post infection in this study. As a whole, these results indicated that four MpFTs might play important roles in innate immune defense during A. hydrophila infection in this study.
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•Lack of GDF-11 does not influence the heart development and physiological growth.•However, GDF-11 deficient in cardiomyocytes leads to cardiac remodeling and eventually heart failure ...under pressure overload.•GDF-11 acts as an autocrine/paracrine factor to regulate the local cardiac function through promoting angiogenesis via the Akt/mTOR pathway.•Maintaining GDF-11 homeostasis in the heart improves and rescues contractile dysfunction following pressure overload.
The role of growth differentiation factor (GDF)-11 in cardiac diseases has not been fully determined. Our study revealed that GDF-11 is not essential for myocardial development and physiological growth, whereas its absence exacerbates heart failure under pressure overload condition via impairing the responsive angiogenesis. GDF-11 induced VEGF expression in CMs by activating the Akt/mTOR pathway. The effect of endogenous GDF-11 on the heart belongs to local self-regulation of myocardial tissue, rather than a way of systemic regulation.
Superconducting gravimetry is one main technique to determine the gravity tides. In superconducting gravimeter (SG) measurement, the gravity tides is affected by the gross errors (including spikes ...and severe deviations and mainly caused by instrument problems and earthquakes) and noise (caused due to the internal structure of SG instrument and measurement environment) in SG data. The singular spectrum analysis (SSA) method was proposed to correct and denoise SG data. Then the harmonic analysis method is used to precisely extract the gravity tides from SSA-denoised SG data. The SG data at Wuhan station of China are used in the case study. The results show that the accuracies of tidal amplitude factors, phase differences and amplitudes of most wave groups determined from SSA-denoised SG data by the harmonic analysis were improved significantly. The standard deviation of residuals between the synthetic gravity tides obtained by harmonic analysis of SSA-denoised SG data and theoretical gravity tides is 0.0096 μGal (1 μGal = 10
−8
m s
−2
), and is 0.1772 μGal while replacing the SSA-denoised SG data from the un-denoised SG data. The Akaike’s Bayesian Information Criterion value of harmonic analysis on SSA-denoised SG data is better than that from un-denoised SG data, which indicates that SSA denoising on SG data can improve the accuracy of harmonic analysis results. The root mean square of gravity residuals obtained by harmonic analysis of SSA-denoised SG data is 0.0019 μGal, and is 0.2275 μGal when replacing the SSA-denoised SG data from the un-denoised SG data. The result shows that SSA can effectively eliminate most of gross errors and noise existing in the SG data, and improve accuracy of the gravity tides with the harmonic analysis.
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