The joint observation of GW170817 and GRB 170817A indicated that short gamma-ray bursts (SGRBs) can originate from binary neutron star mergers. Moreover, some SGRBs could be detected off axis, while ...the SGRB jets are highly structured. Then, by assuming a universal angular distribution of the jet emission for all SGRBs, we reproduce the flux and redshift distributions of the cosmological SGRBs detected by Swift and Fermi. For self-consistency, this angular distribution is simultaneously constrained by the luminosity and event rate of GRB 170817A. As a result, it is found that the universal jet structure of SGRBs could approximately have a two-Gaussian profile. Meanwhile, the intrinsic luminosity function (LF) of the on-axis emission of the jets can be simply described by a single power law with a low-luminosity exponential cutoff. The usually discovered broken-power-law apparent LF for relatively high luminosities can naturally result from the coupling of the intrinsic LF with the angular distribution of the jet emission, as the viewing angles to the SGRBs are arbitrarily distributed.
The number of robotic assisted radical cystectomy (RARC) procedures is increasing despite the lack of Level I evidence showing any advantages over open radical cystectomy (ORC). However, several ...systematic reviews with meta-analyses including non-randomised studies, suggest an overall benefit for RARC compared to ORC. We performed a systematic review with meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) to evaluate the perioperative morbidity and efficacy of RARC compared to ORC in patients with bladder cancer.
Literature searches of Medline/Pubmed, Embase, Web of Science and clinicaltrials.gov databases up to 10th March 2016 were performed. The inclusion criteria for eligible studies were RCTs which compared perioperative outcomes of ORC and RARC for bladder cancer. Primary objective was perioperative and histopathological outcomes of RARC versus ORC while the secondary objective was quality of life assessment (QoL), oncological outcomes and cost analysis.
Four RCTs (from 5 articles) met the inclusion criteria, with a total of 239 patients all with extracorporeal urinary diversion. Patient demographics and clinical characteristics of RARC and ORC patients were evenly matched. There was no significant difference between groups in perioperative morbidity, length of stay, positive surgical margin, lymph node yield and positive lymph node status. RARC group had significantly lower estimated blood loss (p<0.001) and wound complications (p = 0.03) but required significantly longer operating time (p<0.001). QoL was not measured uniformly across trials and cost analysis was reported in one RCTs. A test for heterogeneity did highlight differences across operating time of trials suggesting that surgeon experience may influence outcomes.
This study does not provide evidence to support a benefit for RARC compared to ORC. These results may not have inference for RARC with intracorporeal urinary diversion. Well-designed trials with appropriate endpoints conducted by equally experienced ORC and RARC surgeons will be needed to address this.
•The study investigates on the factors influencing users' IU to adopt SCC.•MPC, MU and MPT have significant impact on IU.•MEU, MPSR and MPFR are non-significant with IU.•MPC and MPFR have significant ...influence on MU.•MPC has significant influence on MEU while MPFR is non-significant with MEU.
Smartphone credit card (SCC) is an emerging payment method using NFC-enabled smartphones. The proximity payment allows consumers to pay their products and services by waving their smartphones with a NFC reader. While there are advantageous adopting SCC, the adoption rate has not been encouraging. Interestingly, existing research work on past information technology and system models have so far focused primarily on organizational context and adopted specifically for work. Furthermore, past antecedents were mainly constructed using electronic commerce literatures which do not reflect the actual mobile environment. In contrast SCC is mainly adopted voluntarily by mobile users and for personal purposes. Thus this leads to the difficulty in drawing meaningful conclusion. The study addresses these limitations by proposing a new mobile technology acceptance model (MTAM) which consists of mobile usefulness (MU) and mobile ease of use (MEU) to determine SCC adoption. In anticipating on the complexity which exists in the mobile environment, additional mobile constructs namely mobile perceived security risk (MPSR), mobile perceived trust (MPT), mobile perceived compatibility (MPC) and mobile perceived financial resources (MPFR) were incorporated into the parsimonious MTAM. The integrated model was applied to 459 mobile users through a questionnaire approach and tested using partial least square-structural equation modelling-artificial neural network (PLS-SEM-ANN) has provided a new impact and a possible new research methodology paradigm as it is able to capture both linear and non-linear relationships. While the model confirms the role of MU in MTAM, MEU needs for more attention in practice. The results from the extended model showed that only three of the proposed hypotheses were non-significant in this study and thus warrant further investigation. The study contributes to academia by proposing new mobile constructs that brings together MTAM to assess the likelihood of mobile users to adopt SCC. The study also offers several important managerial implications which can be generalized to the mobile studies of other transportation, hotel, banking, and tourism industries.
Hybrid quantum dot–graphene photodetectors have recently attracted substantial interest because of their remarkable performance and low power consumption. However, the performance of the device ...greatly depends on the interfacial states and photogenerated screening field. As a consequence, the sensitivity is limited and the response time is relatively slow. In order to circumvent these challenges, herein, a composite graphene and graphene quantum dot (GQD) photodetector on lead zirconate titanate (Pb(Zr0.2Ti0.8)O3) (PZT) substrates has been designed to form an ultrasensitive photodetector over a wide range of illumination power. Under 325 nm UV light illumination, the device shows sensitivity as high as 4.06 × 109 A W−1, which is 120 times higher than reported sensitivity of the same class of devices. Plant derived GQD has a broad range of absorptivity and is an excellent candidate for harvesting photons generating electron–hole pairs. Intrinsic electric field from PZT substrate separates photogenerated electron–hole pairs as well as provides the built‐in electric field that causes the holes to transfer to the underlying graphene channel. The composite structure of graphene and GQD on PZT substrate therefore produces a simple, stable, and highly sensitive photodetector over a wide range of power with short response time, which shows a way to obtain high‐performance optoelectronic devices.
The permanent polarization of piezoelectric substrate (PZT) parallel to the built‐in electric field (DPZT) in the composite graphene and graphene quantum dot photodetector device assists efficient transfer of photogenerated holes to the graphene channel thus enhancing the photoresponsivity more than 100 times with ten times faster response compared to the device on SiO2 substrate. In contrast, opposite PZT polarization in UPZT devices abates the photoresponsivity with slower response time.
Abstract
High expression or aberrant activation of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is related to tumor progression and therapy resistance across cancer types, including non-small cell lung ...cancer (NSCLC). EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) are first-line therapy for NSCLC. However, patients eventually deteriorate after inevitable acquisition of EGFR TKI-resistant mutations, highlighting the need for therapeutics with alternative mechanisms of action. Here, we report that the elevated tribbles pseudokinase 3 (TRIB3) is positively associated with EGFR stability and NSCLC progression. TRIB3 interacts with EGFR and recruits PKCα to induce a Thr654 phosphorylation and WWP1-induced Lys689 ubiquitination in the EGFR juxtamembrane region, which enhances EGFR recycling, stability, downstream activity, and NSCLC stemness. Disturbing the TRIB3-EGFR interaction with a stapled peptide attenuates NSCLC progression by accelerating EGFR degradation and sensitizes NSCLC cells to chemotherapeutic agents. These findings indicate that targeting EGFR degradation is a previously unappreciated therapeutic option in EGFR-related NSCLC.
The outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in China has been declared a public health emergency of international ...concern. The cardiac injury is a common condition among the hospitalized patients with COVID-19. However, whether N terminal pro B type natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) predicted outcome of severe COVID-19 patients was unknown.
The study initially enrolled 102 patients with severe COVID-19 from a continuous sample. After screening out the ineligible cases, 54 patients were analyzed in this study. The primary outcome was in-hospital death defined as the case fatality rate. Research information and following-up data were obtained from their medical records.
The best cut-off value of NT-proBNP for predicting in-hospital death was 88.64 pg/mL with the sensitivity for 100% and the specificity for 66.67%. Patients with high NT-proBNP values (> 88.64 pg/mL) had a significantly increased risk of death during the days of following-up compared with those with low values (≤88.64 pg/mL). After adjustment for potential risk factors, NT-proBNP was independently correlated with in-hospital death.
NT-proBNP might be an independent risk factor for in-hospital death in patients with severe COVID-19.
ClinicalTrials, NCT04292964. Registered 03 March 2020.
•Effectiveness of cloud computing technology among the Malaysian manufacturing firms.•Applicability of cloud computing improves innovativeness and firm performance.•Using PLS-SEM-ANN analysis ...revealed that innovativeness leads to firm performance.
This study explores how performance expectancy (PE), effort expectancy (EE), firm size (FS), top management support (MS) and absorptive capacity (AC) of cloud computing technology can lead to innovativeness (IN) and firm performance (FP) among the manufacturing firms. Data gathered from 188 managerial positions were analysed using Partial Least Squares (PLS) Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) analysis, together with the Artificial Neural Network (ANN) analysis. Findings revealed that PE, FS, AC have a positive significant influence on IN; while IN positively influences FP. This study offers valuable perspective on the applicability of cloud computing technology to improve IN and FP, and subsequently be aligned with Industry 4.0, the next industrial revolution.
Dynamic microarrays hold great promise for advancing research in proteomics, diagnostics and drug discovery. However, this potential has yet to be fully realized due to the lack of reliable ...multifunctional platforms to transport and immobilize particles, infuse reagents, observe the reaction, and retrieve selected particles. We achieved all these functions in a single integrated device through the combination of hydrodynamic and optical approaches. Hydrodynamic forces allow simultaneous transportation and immobilization of large number of particles, whereas optical-based microbubble technique for bead retrieval gives dexterity in handling individual particles without complicated circuitry. Based on the criterion derived in this paper, the device was designed, and fabricated using standard photolithography and soft lithography methods. We examined the dynamics of bubble formation and dissipation in the device, and parametric studies revealed that higher power settings at short intervals were more efficient than low power settings at longer intervals for bead retrieval. We also demonstrated the capabilities of our device and its potential as a tool for screening methods such as the "one-bead-one-compound" (OBOC) combinatorial library method. Although both approaches, hydrodynamic confinement and optical-based microbubbles, are presented in one device, they can also be separately used for other applications in microchip devices.
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•An integrated compaction-combined carbonisation-activation method proposed for bio-carbons from agro-waste..•Hierarchically ultra-micro/mesoporous bio-carbons were successfully ...synthesized.•The bio-carbons exhibit high CO2 uptakes and record-high IS CO2/N2 selectivity.•The presence of mesoporosity greatly increased the CO2 adsorption kinetics.
Activated carbons represent one of the important categories of the adsorbent materials for CO2 capture currently under development. However, the low adsorption capacity and selectivity at low CO2 partial pressure and/or relatively high flue gas temperatures is the main barrier for carbons to be applied in post-combustion CO2 capture under practical conditions. Here, we report the successful preparation of hierarchical ultra-micro/mesoporous bio-carbons from using a facile one-step method with a low-grade biomass waste as the feedstock. The bio-carbons exhibit high adsorption capacities (1.90 mmol/g) and record-high Henry’s law CO2/N2 selectivities up to 212 at ambient temperature and low CO2 partial pressure. Unlike conventional chemical activation process for manufacturing carbon materials, the integrated compaction-carbonization-activation method proposed endows the biowaste-derived carbons with unique hierarchical bio-modal pore structures, which are highly characterised by their high mesoporosity and high ultra-microporosity with narrow pore size distributions. The results demonstrated that the unique surface textural properties along with the enhanced surface chemistry due to the simultaneously achieved potassium intercalation created favourable conditions for CO2 adsorption with high CO2/N2 selectivity at low CO2 partial pressures, whilst the presence of mesoporosity greatly increased the CO2 adsorption kinetics. Measurements of CO2 adsorption heat confirmed the strong surface affinity of the prepared bio-carbons to CO2 molecules.
Online iris recognition using distantly acquired images in a less imaging constrained environment requires the development of a efficient iris segmentation approach and recognition strategy that can ...exploit multiple features available for the potential identification. This paper presents an effective solution toward addressing such a problem. The developed iris segmentation approach exploits a random walker algorithm to efficiently estimate coarsely segmented iris images. These coarsely segmented iris images are postprocessed using a sequence of operations that can effectively improve the segmentation accuracy. The robustness of the proposed iris segmentation approach is ascertained by providing comparison with other state-of-the-art algorithms using publicly available UBIRIS.v2, FRGC, and CASIA.v4-distance databases. Our experimental results achieve improvement of 9.5%, 4.3%, and 25.7% in the average segmentation accuracy, respectively, for the UBIRIS.v2, FRGC, and CASIA.v4-distance databases, as compared with most competing approaches. We also exploit the simultaneously extracted periocular features to achieve significant performance improvement. The joint segmentation and combination strategy suggest promising results and achieve average improvement of 132.3%, 7.45%, and 17.5% in the recognition performance, respectively, from the UBIRIS.v2, FRGC, and CASIA.v4-distance databases, as compared with the related competing approaches.
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