Background
Postoperative complications have a great impact on the postoperative course and oncological outcomes following major cancer surgery. Among them, infective complications play an important ...role. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether postoperative infective complications influence long‐term survival after liver resection for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).
Methods
Patients who underwent resection with curative intent for HCC between July 2003 and June 2016 were identified from a multicentre database (8 institutions) and analysed retrospectively. Independent risk factors for postoperative infective complications were identified. After excluding patients who died 90 days or less after surgery, overall survival (OS) and recurrence‐free survival (RFS) were compared between patients with and without postoperative infective complications within 30 days after resection.
Results
Among 2442 patients identified, 332 (13·6 per cent) had postoperative infective complications. Age over 60 years, diabetes mellitus, obesity, cirrhosis, intraoperative blood transfusion, duration of surgery exceeding 180 min and major hepatectomy were identified as independent risk factors for postoperative infective complications. Univariable analysis revealed that median OS and RFS were poorer among patients with postoperative infective complications than among patients without (54·3 versus 86·8 months, and 22·6 versus 43·2 months, respectively; both P < 0·001). After adjustment for other prognostic factors, multivariable Cox regression analyses identified postoperative infective complications as independently associated with decreased OS (hazard ratio (HR) 1·20, 95 per cent c.i. 1·02 to 1·41; P = 0·027) and RFS (HR 1·19, 1·03 to 1·37; P = 0·021).
Conclusion
Postoperative infective complications decreased long‐term OS and RFS in patients treated with liver resection for HCC.
From a multi‐institutional database, 2442 patients who underwent resection with curative intent for hepatocellular carcinoma between 2003 and 2016 were analysed retrospectively. Among them, 332 patients (13·6 per cent) had postoperative infective complications within 30 days after surgery. Multivariable Cox regression revealed that postoperative infective complications decreased long‐term overall and recurrence‐free survival after liver resection for hepatocellular carcinoma.
Complications decrease long‐term overall survival
The increasing severity of droughts/floods and worsening air quality from increasing aerosols in Asia monsoon regions are the two gravest threats facing over 60% of the world population living in ...Asian monsoon regions. These dual threats have fueled a large body of research in the last decade on the roles of aerosols in impacting Asian monsoon weather and climate. This paper provides a comprehensive review of studies on Asian aerosols, monsoons, and their interactions. The Asian monsoon region is a primary source of emissions of diverse species of aerosols from both anthropogenic and natural origins. The distributions of aerosol loading are strongly influenced by distinct weather and climatic regimes, which are, in turn, modulated by aerosol effects. On a continental scale, aerosols reduce surface insolation and weaken the land‐ocean thermal contrast, thus inhibiting the development of monsoons. Locally, aerosol radiative effects alter the thermodynamic stability and convective potential of the lower atmosphere leading to reduced temperatures, increased atmospheric stability, and weakened wind and atmospheric circulations. The atmospheric thermodynamic state, which determines the formation of clouds, convection, and precipitation, may also be altered by aerosols serving as cloud condensation nuclei or ice nuclei. Absorbing aerosols such as black carbon and desert dust in Asian monsoon regions may also induce dynamical feedback processes, leading to a strengthening of the early monsoon and affecting the subsequent evolution of the monsoon. Many mechanisms have been put forth regarding how aerosols modulate the amplitude, frequency, intensity, and phase of different monsoon climate variables. A wide range of theoretical, observational, and modeling findings on the Asian monsoon, aerosols, and their interactions are synthesized. A new paradigm is proposed on investigating aerosol‐monsoon interactions, in which natural aerosols such as desert dust, black carbon from biomass burning, and biogenic aerosols from vegetation are considered integral components of an intrinsic aerosol‐monsoon climate system, subject to external forcing of global warming, anthropogenic aerosols, and land use and change. Future research on aerosol‐monsoon interactions calls for an integrated approach and international collaborations based on long‐term sustained observations, process measurements, and improved models, as well as using observations to constrain model simulations and projections.
Key Points
The fast‐developing Asia has suffered severe air pollution problem
Aerosol affects the Asian monsoon
Aerosol‐monsoon interactions dictate the climate change in the region
Deep Impact: Excavating Comet Tempel 1 A'Hearn, M. F; Belton, M. J. S; Delamere, W. A ...
Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science),
10/2005, Volume:
310, Issue:
5746
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Deep Impact collided with comet Tempel 1, excavating a crater controlled by gravity. The comet's outer layer is composed of 1- to 100-micrometer fine particles with negligible strength (<65 pascals). ...Local gravitational field and average nucleus density (600 kilograms per cubic meter) are estimated from ejecta fallback. Initial ejecta were hot (>1000 kelvins). A large increase in organic material occurred during and after the event, with smaller changes in carbon dioxide relative to water. On approach, the spacecraft observed frequent natural outbursts, a mean radius of 3.0 ± 0.1 kilometers, smooth and rough terrain, scarps, and impact craters. A thermal map indicates a surface in equilibrium with sunlight.
The limitations of the Haber–Bosch reaction, particularly high-temperature operation, have ignited new interests in low-temperature ammonia-synthesis scenarios. Ambient N2 electroreduction is a ...compelling alternative but is impeded by a low ammonia production rate (mostly <10 mmol gcat –1 h–1), a small partial current density (<1 mA cm–2), and a high-selectivity hydrogen-evolving side reaction. Herein, we report that room-temperature nitrate electroreduction catalyzed by strained ruthenium nanoclusters generates ammonia at a higher rate (5.56 mol gcat –1 h–1) than the Haber–Bosch process. The primary contributor to such performance is hydrogen radicals, which are generated by suppressing hydrogen–hydrogen dimerization during water splitting enabled by the tensile lattice strains. The radicals expedite nitrate-to-ammonia conversion by hydrogenating intermediates of the rate-limiting steps at lower kinetic barriers. The strained nanostructures can maintain nearly 100% ammonia-evolving selectivity at >120 mA cm–2 current densities for 100 h due to the robust subsurface Ru–O coordination. These findings highlight the potential of nitrate electroreduction in real-world, low-temperature ammonia synthesis.
Complex-oxide materials exhibit physical properties that involve the interplay of charge and spin degrees of freedom. However, an ambipolar oxide that is able to exhibit both electron-doped and ...hole-doped ferromagnetism in the same material has proved elusive. Here we report ambipolar ferromagnetism in LaMnO
, with electron-hole asymmetry of the ferromagnetic order. Starting from an undoped atomically thin LaMnO
film, we electrostatically dope the material with electrons or holes according to the polarity of a voltage applied across an ionic liquid gate. Magnetotransport characterization reveals that an increase of either electron-doping or hole-doping induced ferromagnetic order in this antiferromagnetic compound, and leads to an insulator-to-metal transition with colossal magnetoresistance showing electron-hole asymmetry. These findings are supported by density functional theory calculations, showing that strengthening of the inter-plane ferromagnetic exchange interaction is the origin of the ambipolar ferromagnetism. The result raises the prospect of exploiting ambipolar magnetic functionality in strongly correlated electron systems.
Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are millisecond-duration radio transients
of unknown origin. Two possible mechanisms that could generate extremely coherent emission from FRBs invoke neutron star ...magnetospheres
or relativistic shocks far from the central energy source
. Detailed polarization observations may help us to understand the emission mechanism. However, the available FRB polarization data have been perplexing, because they show a host of polarimetric properties, including either a constant polarization angle during each burst for some repeaters
or variable polarization angles in some other apparently one-off events
. Here we report observations of 15 bursts from FRB 180301 and find various polarization angle swings in seven of them. The diversity of the polarization angle features of these bursts is consistent with a magnetospheric origin of the radio emission, and disfavours the radiation models invoking relativistic shocks.
It is shown, by simulation and theory, that circularly or elliptically polarized terahertz radiation can be generated when a static magnetic (B) field is imposed on a gas target along the propagation ...direction of a two-color laser driver. The radiation frequency is determined by √ω(p)(2)+ω(c)(2)/4+ω(c)/2, where ω(p) is the plasma frequency and ω(c) is the electron cyclotron frequency. With the increase of the B field, the radiation changes from a single-cycle broadband waveform to a continuous narrow-band emission. In high-B-field cases, the radiation strength is proportional to ω(p)(2)/ω(c). The B field provides a tunability in the radiation frequency, spectrum width, and field strength.
During insect larval–pupal metamorphosis, the obsolete larval organs and tissues undergo histolysis and programmed cell death to recycle cellular materials. It has been demonstrated that some ...cathepsins are essential for histolysis in larval tissues, but the process of tissue destruction is not well documented. Fat body, the homologous organ to mammalian liver and adipose tissue, goes through a distinct destruction process during larval–pupal transition. Herein, we found that most of the Bombyx proteases – including Bombyx cathepsin B (BmCatB) (BmCatLL-2), Bombyx cathepsin D (BmCatD), Bombyx cathepsin L like‐1 (BmCatLL-1) and –2(BmCatLL-2), Bombyx fibroinase (BmBcp), Bombyx matrix metalloprotease (BmMmp), Bombyx A disintegrin and metalloproteinase with thrombospondin motifs 1 (BmAdamTS‐1), Bombyx A disintegrin and metalloproteinase with thrombospondin motifs like (BmAdamTS L) and Bombyx cysteine protease inhibitor (Bmbcpi)– were expressed highly in fat body during feeding and metamorphosis, with a peak occurring during the nonfeeding moulting or prepupal stage, as well as being responsive to 20‐hydroxyecdysone (20E). The aforementioned protease genes expression was upregulated by injection of 20E into the feeding larvae, while blocking 20E signalling transduction led to downregulation. Western blotting and immunofluorescent staining of BmCatB and BmBcp confirmed the coincident variation of their messenger RNA (mRNA) and protein level during the development and after the treatments. Moreover, BmCatB, BmBcp, BmMmp and BmAdamTS‐1 RNA interference all led to blockage of larval fat body destruction. Taken together, we conclude that 20E regulates larval fat body destruction by upregulating related protease gene expression and protein levels during larval–pupal transition.
This randomized, double‐blind, placebo‐controlled study evaluated whether lamivudine given during late pregnancy can reduce hepatitis B virus (HBV) perinatal transmission in highly viraemic mothers. ...Mothers were randomized to either lamivudine 100 mg or placebo from week 32 of gestation to week 4 postpartum. At birth, infants received recombinant HBV vaccine with or without HBIg and were followed until week 52. One hundred and fifty mothers, with a gestational age of 26–30 weeks and serum HBV DNA >1000 MEq/mL (bDNA assay), were treated. A total of 141 infants received immunoprophylaxis at birth. In lamivudine‐treated mothers, 56 infants received vaccine + HBIg (lamivudine + vaccine + HBIg) and 26 infants received vaccine (lamivudine + vaccine). In placebo‐treated mothers, 59 infants received vaccine + HBIg (placebo + vaccine + HBIg). At week 52, in the primary analyses where missing data was counted as failures, infants in the lamivudine + vaccine + HBIg group had a significant decrease in incidence of HBsAg seropositivity (10/56, 18%vs 23/59, 39%; P = 0.014) and in detectable HBV DNA (11/56, 20%vs 27/59, 46%; P = 0.003) compared to infants in the placebo + vaccine + HBIg group. Sensitivity analyses to evaluate the impact of missing data at week 52 resulting from a high dropout rate (13% in the lamivudine + vaccine + HBIg group and 31% in the placebo + vaccine + HBIg group) remained consistent with the primary analysis in that lower transmission rates were still observed in the infants of lamivudine‐treated mothers, but the differences were not statistically significant. No safety concerns were noted in the lamivudine‐treated mothers or their infants. Results of this study suggest that lamivudine reduced HBV transmission from highly viraemic mothers to their infants who received passive/active immunization.
The ONIOM Method and Its Applications Chung, Lung Wa; Sameera, W. M. C; Ramozzi, Romain ...
Chemical reviews,
06/2015, Volume:
115, Issue:
12
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
Chung et al present an in-depth investigation of the ONIOM method and related method developments. They focus on applications of the ONIOM method to organic systems, inorganic compoounds and ...homogeneous catalysis, heterogeneous catalysis, nanomaterials, excited states, solution chemistry, and biological macromolecules.
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