The effect of visceral adipose tissue (VAT) and subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT) area on metabolic syndrome (MS) has been debated. We aimed to evaluate the effects of VAT and SAT on the incidence of ...MS and its components in a large and apparently healthy Asian population. We performed a longitudinal cohort study of 1,964 subjects who received health screenings over a 5-year follow-up period; 317 incidents of MS (16.1%) were observed during a median follow-up of 4.5 years. The VAT area was significantly associated with a higher incidence of MS; the adjusted HR for incident MS per 1 SD of VAT was 1.50 (95% CI 1.29-1.74), and the adjusted HR of the 5
VAT quintile compared with the 1
quintile was 3.73 (95% CI 2.22-6.28). However, the SAT area was not associated with incident MS. Although the VAT area was longitudinally associated with the incidence of each component of MS, the SAT area was inversely associated with the risk of high blood pressure, fasting blood sugar, and triglycerides, with marginal significance. In conclusion, the VAT area is longitudinally associated with an increased risk of incident MS, while SAT may have a protective effect against the incidence of individual MS components.
Maritime autonomous surface ships (MASS) need to be sufficiently safe to gain commercial acceptance. Collision avoidance strategies in such MASS should comply with the International Regulations for ...Preventing Collision at the Sea (COLREGs). According to the COLREGs, collision risk assessment, which determines the optimal positioning and timing via all available means appropriate to the prevailing circumstances and conditions, is crucial to preventing collisions. However, existing collision risk assessment methods do not consider all vital factors in the COLREGs rules compliant collision avoidance. We propose a collision risk inference system for MASS that complies with COLREGs vital rules for collision avoidance as follows: (i) actions to avoid collision are defined according to the degree of danger, and a suitable response distance is determined; (ii) a collision risk index (CRI) according to the enlarged ship domain based on the designated response distance by each level is set; (iii) all vital factors of the COLREGs rules compliant collision avoidance are extracted as the data when the ship domain enlarged by each level is overlapped; (iv) the collision risk inference system is developed by learning extracted data via the adaptive neuro fuzzy inference system (ANFIS). In contrast to existing research, the proposed system considers all vital variables in the COLREGs rules compliant collision avoidance guidelines, thereby improving the timings and positionings of the potential collision warning. Consequently, it could secure more time for decision making to take necessary collision prevention action.
Highly efficient organic/inorganic hybrid perovskite light‐emitting diodes (PeLEDs) based on graphene anode are developed for the first time. Chemically inert graphene avoids quenching of excitons by ...diffused metal atom species from indium tin oxide. The flexible PeLEDs with graphene anode on plastic substrate show good bending stability; they provide an alternative and reliable flexible electrode for highly efficient flexible PeLEDs.
Despite the high energy density of lithium-rich layered-oxide electrodes, their real-world implementation in batteries is hindered by the substantial voltage decay on cycling. This voltage decay is ...widely accepted to mainly originate from progressive structural rearrangements involving irreversible transition-metal migration. As prevention of this spontaneous cation migration has proven difficult, a paradigm shift toward management of its reversibility is needed. Herein, we demonstrate that the reversibility of the cation migration of lithium-rich nickel manganese oxides can be remarkably improved by altering the oxygen stacking sequences in the layered structure and thereby dramatically reducing the voltage decay. The preeminent intra-cycle reversibility of the cation migration is experimentally visualized, and first-principles calculations reveal that an O2-type structure restricts the movements of transition metals within the Li layer, which effectively streamlines the returning migration path of the transition metals. Furthermore, we propose that the enhanced reversibility mitigates the asymmetry of the anionic redox in conventional lithium-rich electrodes, promoting the high-potential anionic reduction, thereby reducing the subsequent voltage hysteresis. Our findings demonstrate that regulating the reversibility of the cation migration is a practical strategy to reduce voltage decay and hysteresis in lithium-rich layered materials.
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Recent discovery of high-concentration electrolyte systems has opened a new avenue toward the high-voltage, safe, and low-cost aqueous rechargeable batteries. However, the need for ...generally high-cost organic solutes in the high-concentration electrolyte has become another major obstacle. Herein, we revisited all the commonly used low-cost solutes for high-concentration system and discovered that the use of NaClO4 solute effectively results in a wide electrochemical stability window by suppressing water decomposition and induces stable solid-electrolyte interphase (SEI) layer formation without involving the reduction of salt anions. The SEI layer, composed of Na2CO3 and NaO compounds including NaOH, guarantees the excellent electrochemical storage stability of the full-cell composed of Na4Fe3(PO4)2(P2O7) cathode and NaTi2(PO4)3 anode for the extended period of time. This new class of electrolyte systems provides remarkable cycle stability and a coulombic efficiency of ∼99% at 1C for over 200 cycles, which outperforms the state-of-the-art super-concentrated systems based on NaCF3SO3.
Although conventional p-type doping using small molecules on graphene decreases its sheet resistance (R
), it increases after exposure to ambient conditions, and this problem has been considered as ...the biggest impediment to practical application of graphene electrodes. Here, we report an extremely stable graphene electrode doped with macromolecular acid (perfluorinated polymeric sulfonic acid (PFSA)) as a p-type dopant. The PFSA doping on graphene provides not only ultra-high ambient stability for a very long time (> 64 days) but also high chemical/thermal stability, which have been unattainable by doping with conventional small-molecules. PFSA doping also greatly increases the surface potential (~0.8 eV) of graphene, and reduces its R
by ~56%, which is very important for practical applications. High-efficiency phosphorescent organic light-emitting diodes are fabricated with the PFSA-doped graphene anode (~98.5 cd A
without out-coupling structures). This work lays a solid platform for practical application of thermally-/chemically-/air-stable graphene electrodes in various optoelectronic devices.
Co-intercalation reactions make graphite as promising anodes for sodium ion batteries, however, the high redox potentials significantly lower the energy density. Herein, we investigate the factors ...that influence the co-intercalation potential of graphite and find that the tuning of the voltage as large as 0.38 V is achievable by adjusting the relative stability of ternary graphite intercalation compounds and the solvent activity in electrolytes. The feasibility of graphite anode in sodium ion batteries is confirmed in conjunction with Na
VPO
F
cathodes by using the optimal electrolyte. The sodium ion battery delivers an improved voltage of 3.1 V, a high power density of 3863 W kg
, negligible temperature dependency of energy/power densities and an extremely low capacity fading rate of 0.007% per cycle over 1000 cycles, which are among the best thus far reported for sodium ion full cells, making it a competitive choice in large-scale energy storage systems.
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Poor water solubility and poor bioavailability are problems with many pharmaceuticals. Increasing surface area by micronization is an effective strategy to overcome these problems, ...but conventional techniques often utilize solvents and harsh processing, which restricts their use. Newer, green technologies, such as supercritical fluid (SCF)-assisted particle formation, can produce solvent-free products under relatively mild conditions, offering many advantages over conventional methods. The antisolvent properties of the SCFs used for microparticle and nanoparticle formation have generated great interest in recent years, because the kinetics of the precipitation process and morphologies of the particles can be accurately controlled. The characteristics of the supercritical antisolvent (SAS) technique make it an ideal tool for enhancing the solubility and bioavailability of poorly water-soluble drugs. This review article focuses on SCFs and their properties, as well as the fundamentals of overcoming poorly water-soluble drug properties by micronization, crystal morphology control, and formation of composite solid dispersion nanoparticles with polymers and/or surfactants. This article also presents an overview of the main aspects of the SAS-assisted particle precipitation process, its mechanism, and parameters, as well as our own experiences, recent advances, and trends in development.
To take full advantage of rapidly deployable unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), it is essential to effectively compose many UAV images into one observation image over a region of interest. In this ...paper, we propose fast image mosaicking using a triangulated irregular network (TIN) constructed from tiepoints. We conduct pairwise tiepoint extraction and rigorous bundle adjustment to generate rigorous tiepoints. We apply a bucketing algorithm to the tiepoints and generate evenly distributed tiepoints. We then construct a TIN from the bucketed tiepoints and extract seamlines for image stitching based on the TIN. Image mosaicking is completed by mapping UAV images along the seamlines onto a reference plane. The experimental results showed that the image mosaicking based on a TIN of bucketed tiepoints could produce image mosaics with stable and fast performance. We expect that our method could be used for rapid image mosaicking.
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