Classification algorithms for automatically detecting sea surface oil spills from spaceborne Synthetic Aperture Radars (SARs) can usually be regarded as part of a three-step processing framework, ...which briefly includes image segmentation, feature extraction, and target classification. A Deep Convolutional Neural Network (DCNN), named the Oil Spill Convolutional Network (OSCNet), is proposed in this paper for SAR oil spill detection, which can do the latter two steps of the three-step processing framework. Based on VGG-16, the OSCNet is obtained by designing the architecture and adjusting hyperparameters with the data set of SAR dark patches. With the help of the big data set containing more than 20,000 SAR dark patches and data augmentation, the OSCNet can have as many as 12 weight layers. It is a relatively deep Deep Learning (DL) network for SAR oil spill detection. It is shown by the experiments based on the same data set that the classification performance of OSCNet has been significantly improved compared to that of traditional machine learning (ML). The accuracy, recall, and precision are improved from 92.50%, 81.40%, and 80.95% to 94.01%, 83.51%, and 85.70%, respectively. An important reason for this improvement is that the distinguishability of the features learned by OSCNet itself from the data set is significantly higher than that of the hand-crafted features needed by traditional ML algorithms. In addition, experiments show that data augmentation plays an important role in avoiding over-fitting and hence improves the classification performance. OSCNet has also been compared with other DL classifiers for SAR oil spill detection. Due to the huge differences in the data sets, only their similarities and differences are discussed at the principle level.
The residues and abuse of antibiotics have seriously endangered ecological balance and human health; meanwhile, antibiotics determination is very difficult because of their low levels and multiple ...categories in complicated matrices. Appropriate sample pretreatment is usually imperative to enrich (ultra)trace antibiotics and eliminate matrix interference prior to chromatographic analysis. Dispersive liquid-liquid microextraction (DLLME) has become an ideal pretreatment technique owing to its simplicity, effectiveness, low-consumption, etc. In this work, an ultrasonic-assisted DLLME (UA-DLLME) was developed for the simultaneous extraction of seven sulfonamides (SAs) antibiotics in environmental water and seafood samples coupled with HPLC-DAD determination. Several parameters affecting UA-DLLME efficiency were systematically optimized, and consequently the SAs were separated and detected within 14.5 min. The obtained limits of detection (LODs) and limits of quantification (LOQs) ranged from 0.7-7.8 μg/L and 2.4-26.0 μg/L for three water samples (seawater, aquaculture wastewater and lake water) and two seafood samples (pomfrets and shrimps). High recoveries (80.0-116.0%) with low relative standard deviations (0.1-8.1%) were achieved for all the tested samples at three spiked levels. Notably, sulfadimethoxine was found at 24.49 μg/L in one seawater sample. The facile, robust and benign DLLME-HPLC method demonstrated promising perspectives for multiresidue analysis of antibiotics.
Recent studies show that biomaterials are capable of regulating immune responses to induce a favorable osteogenic microenvironment and promote osteogenesis and angiogenesis. In this study, we ...investigated the effects of zinc silicate/nanohydroxyapatite/collagen (ZS/HA/Col) scaffolds on bone regeneration and angiogenesis and explored the related mechanism. We demonstrate that 10ZS/HA/Col scaffolds significantly enhanced bone regeneration and angiogenesis in vivo compared with HA/Col scaffolds. ZS/HA/Col scaffolds increased tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase (TRAP)-positive cells, nestin-positive bone marrow stromal cells (BMSCs) and CD31-positive neovessels, and expression of osteogenesis (Bmp-2 and Osterix) and angiogenesis-related (Vegf-α and Cd31) genes increased in nascent bone. ZS/HA/Col scaffolds with 10 wt % ZS activated the p38 signaling pathway in monocytes. The monocytes subsequently differentiated into TRAP+ cells and expressed higher levels of the cytokines SDF-1, TGF-β1, VEGF-α, and PDGF-BB, which recruited BMSCs and endothelial cells (ECs) to the defect areas. Blocking the p38 pathway in monocytes reduced TRAP+ differentiation and cytokine secretion and resulted in a decrease in BMSC and EC homing and angiogenesis. Overall, these findings demonstrate that 10ZS/HA/Col scaffolds modulate monocytes and, thereby, create a favorable osteogenic microenvironment that promotes BMSC migration and differentiation and vessel formation by activating the p38 signaling pathway.
Extracellular vesicles (EV)-based delivery of therapeutic mRNAs is challenged by the low loading efficiency. In this study, we designed a DNA aptamer consisting of two parts: the single strand part ...recognized the AUG region of target mRNA, preventing mRNA from translation and ribosome assembly; and the double strand part containing the elements recognized by the CD9-ZF (zinc finger) motifs, sorting DNA aptamer-mRNA complex into CD9-ZF engineered EVs. In vitro and in vivo studies revealed that the system could efficiently load functional mRNAs to the EVs. Furthermore, adipose specific delivery of loaded Pgc1α mRNA via the strategy could efficiently induce white adipocyte browning. Similarly, delivery of interleukin-10 (Il-10) mRNA via the strategy had potent anti-inflammatory effect in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) mouse model. Together, our study has proposed an efficient strategy to load therapeutic mRNAs of interest into EVs, which could be used as a promising strategy for gene therapy.
The complex structure of the catalytic active phase, and surface‐gas reaction networks have hindered understanding of the oxidative coupling of methane (OCM) reaction mechanism by supported ...Na2WO4/SiO2 catalysts. The present study demonstrates, with the aid of in situ Raman spectroscopy and chemical probe (H2‐TPR, TAP and steady‐state kinetics) experiments, that the long speculated crystalline Na2WO4 active phase is unstable and melts under OCM reaction conditions, partially transforming to thermally stable surface Na‐WOx sites. Kinetic analysis via temporal analysis of products (TAP) and steady‐state OCM reaction studies demonstrate that (i) surface Na‐WOx sites are responsible for selectively activating CH4 to C2Hx and over‐oxidizing CHy to CO and (ii) molten Na2WO4 phase is mainly responsible for over‐oxidation of CH4 to CO2 and also assists in oxidative dehydrogenation of C2H6 to C2H4. These new insights reveal the nature of catalytic active sites and resolve the OCM reaction mechanism over supported Na2WO4/SiO2 catalysts.
In the current study, with the aid of state‐of‐the‐art spectroscopic techniques, transient kinetic analysis, and implementation of robust experimental methodologies, we resolve the nature of catalytic active sites and reaction mechanism for oxidative coupling of methane over supported Na2WO4/SiO2 catalysts.
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•Noble metals, especially Rh promoted the rate and degree of ceria reduction by hydrocarbons.•NO was extremely selectively reduced into N2; formations of N2O and NO2 were ...excluded.•Noble metal either accelerated NO dissociation or N2 formation compared to ceria.
In this study, the role of the noble metals Pt and Rh (0.5 wt.%) for the selective reduction of NO into N2 is evaluated by the transient TAP technique and in-situ spectroscopy using a commercial stable ceria support (denoted as CZ) and applying isotopically labelled 15NO and 18O2. The transient operation was mimicked by multi-pulse oxidation (using O2 or NO) and reduction cycles (using CO, H2, C3H6 and C3H8), while following quantitatively the catalyst and reactants response. Pt and Rh significantly lowered the temperature of CZ reduction. CO and H2 only reduce the surface of CZ, while a 2.5 times deeper reduction was achieved by the hydrocarbons C3H6 and C3H8, removing also lattice oxygen. Pt and Rh also promoted carbon deposition after surface reduction. Rh was a more active promoter than Pt, while propene was more reactive than propane over both metals. During the NO reduction the pre-reduced CZ support became gradually re-oxidised and after filling 70–80% of the oxygen vacancies the NO started to appear in the product mixture. In the presence of carbon deposits the lattice oxygen of the CZ reacted with the carbon keeping the CZ in a reduced state, extending the NO decomposition process as long as the carbon was present. The reduction of NO over pre-reduced noble metal/CZ showed a selective formation N2, while N2O and NO2 were never observed. During the NO reduction process some unidentified N-species remained on the catalyst, the amount depending on the type of catalyst, but finally all nitrogen was released as N2. The presence of the noble metal led less unidentified N-species on the CZ surface and to a faster N2 formation rate than that over the bare CZ.
In this work, the effect of inorganic–organic corrosion inhibitor composition on corrosion inhibition rate was studied through electrochemical accelerated corrosion experiments and ambient atmosphere ...corrosion experiments. The corrosion inhibitor performance was analyzed to establish the relationship between inhibitor composition, steel temperature, inhibitor temperature, treatment time and corrosion inhibition rate. The effect of nano-emulsion type on the corrosion inhibition rate of reinforcing steel shows that different types of nano-emulsions can increase the self-corrosion potential and reduce the corrosion current of reinforcing steel, improving the corrosion resistance of reinforcing steel. The highest corrosion inhibition rate of 72.1% could be achieved with the addition of fluorocarbon nano-emulsion DF-1 to the corrosion inhibitor. This indicates that among the studied polymer nano-emulsions, fluorocarbon nano-emulsion DF-1 is the best polymer nano-emulsion corrosion inhibitor with a better content of 5%.
Whether osteoarthritis (OA) is a systemic metabolic disorder remains controversial. The aim of this study was to investigate the metabolic characteristics between plasma and knee joint fluid (JF) of ...patients with advanced OA using a differential correlation metabolic (DCM) networks approach. Plasma and JF were collected during the joint replacement surgery of patients with knee OA. The biological samples were pretreated with standard procedures for metabolite analysis. The metabolic profiling was conducted by means of liquid mass spectrometry coupled with a AbsoluteIDQ kit. A DCM network approach was adopted for analyzing the metabolomics data between the plasma and JF. The variation in the correlation of the pairwise metabolites was quantified across the plasma and JF samples, and networks analysis was used to characterize the difference in the correlations of the metabolites from the two sample types. Core metabolites that played an important role in the DCM networks were identified via topological analysis. One hundred advanced OA patients (50 men and 50 women) were included in this study, with an average age of 65.0 ± 7.6 years (65.6 ± 7.1 years for females and 64.4 ± 8.1 years for males) and a mean BMI of 32.6 ± 5.8 kg/m2 (33.4 ± 6.3 kg/m2 for females and 31.7 ± 5.3 kg/m2 for males). Age and BMI matched between the male and female groups. One hundred and forty-five nodes, 567 edges, and 131 nodes, 407 edges were found in the DCM networks (p < 0.05) of the female and male groups, respectively. Six metabolites in the female group and 5 metabolites in the male group were identified as key nodes in the network. There was a significant difference in the differential correlation metabolism networks of plasma and JF that may be related to local joint metabolism. Focusing on these key metabolites may help uncover the pathogenesis of knee OA. In addition, the differential metabolic correlation between plasma and JF mostly overlapped, indicating that these common correlations of pairwise metabolites may be a reflection of systemic characteristics of JF and that most significant correlation variations were just a result of "housekeeping" biological reactions.
In this paper, the reinforcement embedded in concrete is taken as the research object. By measuring the corrosion rate of the reinforcement in concrete, the open circuit potential of the primary ...battery composed of reinforcement and calomel electrode in concrete is measured. The chloride ion concentration on the surface of reinforced concrete was measured in situ by the nano-Ag/AgCl electrode. The chloride diffusion theory and corrosion electrochemistry theory were used to study the corrosion mechanism of reinforced concrete specimens. The corrosion rate of reinforced concrete increases with the increase of time in the initial stage of corrosion and reached maximum after 15 h. The pitting of concrete reinforcement is positively related to the concentration of chloride ion in the environment.
The abuse and residues of antibiotics have a great impact on the environment and organisms, and their determination has become very important. Due to their low contents, varieties and complex ...matrices, effective recognition, separation and enrichment are usually required prior to determination. Molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs), a kind of highly selective polymer prepared via molecular imprinting technology (MIT), are used widely in the analytical detection of antibiotics, as adsorbents of solid-phase extraction (SPE) and as recognition elements of sensors. Herein, recent advances in MIPs for antibiotic residue analysis are reviewed. Firstly, several new preparation techniques of MIPs for detecting antibiotics are briefly introduced, including surface imprinting, nanoimprinting, living/controlled radical polymerization, and multi-template imprinting, multi-functional monomer imprinting and dummy template imprinting. Secondly, several SPE modes based on MIPs are summarized, namely packed SPE, magnetic SPE, dispersive SPE, matrix solid-phase dispersive extraction, solid-phase microextraction, stir-bar sorptive extraction and pipette-tip SPE. Thirdly, the basic principles of MIP-based sensors and three sensing modes, including electrochemical sensing, optical sensing and mass sensing, are also outlined. Fourthly, the research progress on molecularly imprinted SPEs (MISPEs) and MIP-based electrochemical/optical/mass sensors for the detection of various antibiotic residues in environmental and food samples since 2018 are comprehensively reviewed, including sulfonamides, quinolones, β-lactams and so on. Finally, the preparation and application prospects of MIPs for detecting antibiotics are outlined.
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