This study investigates the dynamic and asymmetric propagation of return spillovers between sectoral commodities and industry stock markets in China. Using a daily dataset from February 2007 to July ...2022, we employ a time-varying vector autoregressive (TVP-VAR) model to examine the asymmetric return spillovers and dynamic connectedness across sectors. The results reveal significant time-varying spillovers among these sectors, with the industry stocks acting as the primary transmitter of information to the commodity market. Materials, energy, and industrials stock sectors contribute significantly to these spillovers due to their close ties to commodity production and processing. The study also identifies significant asymmetric spillovers with bad returns dominating, influenced by major economic and political events such as the 2008 global financial crisis, the 2015 Chinese stock market crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Russia-Ukraine war. Furthermore, our study highlights the unique dynamics within the Chinese market, where net information spillovers from the stock market to commodities drive the financialization process, which differs from the bidirectional commodity financialization observed in other markets. Finally, portfolio analysis reveals that the minimum connectedness portfolio outperforms other approaches and effectively reflects asymmetries. Understanding these dynamics and sectoral heterogeneities has important implications for risk management, policy development, and trading practices.
Somerset Maugham, a late Victorian British writer, examines in the early twentieth century how female identity is shaped by the daily routines of face painting. In his depiction of women's makeup, ...Maugham surveys the relationship between identity construction in literary characters and their body representations. Taking makeup as an analytic subject, this paper studies the three changes in the heroine Sophie's makeup styles and the three constructions of her ethical identity from the perspective of ethical literary criticism and the social constructionist views of the body. Through makeup narratives embodying body representations, Maugham probes deep into the tensions between the old and new moral codes, and explores the possible harmony between body and spirit, which provides inspiration for the construction of female identity in the twentieth century. Keywords: The RazorS Edge; makeup; body; ethical identity phrase omitted
Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women and several perioperative factors may account for tumor recurrence and metastasis. The anesthetic agents employed during cancer surgery might play a ...crucial role in cancer cell survival and patient outcomes. We conducted a retrospective cohort study to investigate the relationship between the type of anesthesia and overall survival in patients who underwent breast cancer surgery performed by one experienced surgeon.
All patients who underwent breast cancer surgery by an experienced surgeon between January 2006 and December 2010 were included in this study. Patients were separated into two groups according to the use of desflurane or propofol anesthesia during surgery. Locoregional recurrence and overall survival rates were assessed for the two groups (desflurane or propofol anesthesia). Univariable and multivariable Cox regression models and propensity score matching analyses were used to compare the hazard ratios for death and adjust for potential confounders (age, body mass index, American Society of Anesthesiologists physical status classification, TNM stage, neoadjuvant chemotherapy, Charlson Comorbidity Index, anesthesiologists, and functional status).
Of the 976 breast cancer patients, 632 patients underwent breast cancer surgery with desflurane anesthesia, while 344 received propofol anesthesia. After propensity scoring, 592 patients remained in the desflurane group and 296 patients in the propofol group. The mortality rate was similar in the desflurane (38 deaths, 4%) and propofol (22 deaths, 4%; p = 0.812) groups in 5-year follow-up. The crude hazard ratio (HR) for all patients was 1.13 (95% confidence interval CI 0.67-1.92, p = 0.646). No significant difference in the locoregional recurrence or overall 5-year survival rates were found after breast surgery using desflurane or propofol anesthesia (p = 0.454). Propensity score-matched analyses demonstrated similar outcomes in both groups. Patients who received propofol anesthesia had a higher mortality rate than those who received desflurane anesthesia in the matched groups (7% vs 6%, respectively) without significant difference (p = 0.561). In the propensity score-matched analyses, univariable analysis showed an insignificant finding (HR = 1.23, 95% CI 0.72-2.11, p = 0.449). After adjustment for the time since the earliest included patient, the HR remained insignificant (HR = 1.23, 95% CI 0.70-2.16, p = 0.475).
In our non-randomized retrospective analysis, neither propofol nor desflurane anesthesia for breast cancer surgery by an experienced surgeon can affect patient prognosis and survival. The influence of propofol anesthesia on breast cancer outcome requires further investigation.
The typical chalcopyrite AgGaQ2 (Q = S, Se) are commercial infrared (IR) second‐order nonlinear optical (NLO) materials; however, they suffer from unexpected laser‐induced damage thresholds (LIDTs) ...primairy due to their narrow band gaps. Herein, what sets this apart from previously reported chemical substitutions is the utilization of an unusual cationic substitution strategy, represented by SZn4S12 + S4Zn13S24 + 11ZnS4 ⇒ MS12+ M4ClS24 + 11GaS4, in which the covalent SxZny units in the diamond‐like sphalerite ZnS are synergistically replaced by cationic MxCly units, resulting in two novel salt‐inclusion sulfides, MM4ClGa11S20 (M = A/Ba, A = K, 1; Rb, 2). As expected, the introduction of mixed cations in the GaS4 anionic frameworks of 1 and 2 leads to wide band gaps (3.04 and 3.01 eV), which exceeds the value of AgGaS2, facilitating the improvement of high LIDTs (9.4 and 10.3 × AgGaS2@1.06 µm, respectively). Furthermore, compounds 1 and 2 exhibit moderate second‐harmonic generation intensities (0.84 and 0.78 × AgGaS2@2.9 µm, respectively), mainly originating from the orderly packing tetrahedral GaS4 units. Importantly, this study demonstrates the successful application of the cationic substitution strategy based on diamond‐like structures to provide a feasible chemical design insight for constructing high‐performance NLO materials.
What sets this apart from previously reported chemical substitutions is the utilization of an unusual cationic substitution strategy, offers two excellent infrared nonlinear optical materials, which provides a feasible chemical design insight for constructing high‐performance nonlinear optical materials.
Stock prices forecasting is a topic research in the fields of investment and national policy, which has been a challenging problem owing to the multi-noise, nonlinearity, high-frequency, and chaos of ...stocks. These characteristics of stocks impede most forecasting models from extracting valuable information from stocks data. Herein, a novel hybrid deep learning model integrating attention mechanism, multi-layer perceptron, and bidirectional long-short term memory neural network is proposed. First, the raw data including four types of datasets (historical prices of stocks, technical indicators of stocks closing prices, natural resources prices, and historical data of the Google index) are transformed into a knowledge base with reduced dimensions using principal component analysis. Subsequently, multi-layer perceptron is used for the fast transformation of feature space and rapid gradient descent, bidirectional long-short term memory neural network for extracting temporal features of stock time series data, and attention mechanism for making the neural network focus more on crucial temporal information by assigning higher weights. Finally, a comprehensive model evaluation method is used to compare the proposed model with seven related baseline models. After extensive experiments, the proposed model demonstrated its good forecasting performance.
The development and progression of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) are dependent on its local microenvironment. Hypoxia and inflammation are two critical factors that shape the HCC microenvironment; ...however, the interplay between the two factors and the involvement of cancer cells under such conditions remain poorly understood. We found that tumor‐associated macrophages, the primary proinflammatory cells within tumors, secreted more interleukin 1β (IL‐1β) under moderate hypoxic conditions due to increased stability of hypoxia inducible factor 1α (HIF‐1α). Under persistent and severe hypoxia, we found that the necrotic debris of HCC cells induced potent IL‐1β release by tumor‐associated macrophages with an M2 phenotype. We further confirmed that the necrotic debris–induced IL‐1β secretion was mediated through Toll‐like receptor 4/TIR domain–containing adapter‐inducing interferon‐β/nuclear factor kappa‐light‐chain‐enhancer of activated B cells signaling in a similar, but not identical, fashion to lipopolysaccharide‐induced inflammation. Using mass spectrometry, we identified a group of proteins with O‐linked glycosylation to be responsible for the necrotic debris–induced IL‐1β secretion. Following the increase of IL‐1β in the local microenvironment, the synthesis of HIF‐1α was up‐regulated by IL‐1β in HCC cells through cyclooxygenase‐2. The epithelial–mesenchymal transition of HCC cells was enhanced by overexpression of HIF‐1α. We further showed that IL‐1β promoted HCC metastasis in mouse models and was predictive of poor prognosis in HCC patients. Conclusion: Our findings revealed an HIF‐1α/IL‐1β signaling loop between cancer cells and tumor‐associated macrophages in a hypoxic microenvironment, resulting in cancer cell epithelial–mesenchymal transition and metastasis; more importantly, our results suggest a potential role of an anti‐inflammatory strategy in HCC treatment. (Hepatology 2018;67:1872‐1889)
ObjectiveHepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is heterogeneous, especially in multifocal tumours, which decreases the efficacy of clinical treatments. Understanding tumour heterogeneity is critical when ...developing novel treatment strategies. However, a comprehensive investigation of tumour heterogeneity in HCC is lacking, and the available evidence regarding tumour heterogeneity has not led to improvements in clinical practice.DesignWe harvested 42 samples from eight HCC patients and evaluated tumour heterogeneity using whole-exome sequencing, RNA sequencing, mass spectrometry-based proteomics and metabolomics, cytometry by time-of-flight, and single-cell analysis. Immunohistochemistry and quantitative polymerase chain reactions were performed to confirm the expression levels of genes. Three independent cohorts were further used to validate the findings.ResultsTumour heterogeneity is considerable with regard to the genomes, transcriptomes, proteomes, and metabolomes of lesions and tumours. The immune status of the HCC microenvironment was relatively less heterogenous. Targeting local immunity could be a suitable intervention with balanced precision and practicability. By clustering immune cells in the HCC microenvironment, we identified three distinctive HCC subtypes with immunocompetent, immunodeficient, and immunosuppressive features. We further revealed the specific metabolic features and cytokine/chemokine expression levels of the different subtypes. Determining the expression levels of CD45 and Foxp3 using immunohistochemistry facilitated the correct classification of HCC patients and the prediction of their prognosis.ConclusionThere is comprehensive intratumoral and intertumoral heterogeneity in all dimensions of HCC. Based on the results, we propose a novel immunophenotypic classification of HCCs that facilitates prognostic prediction and may support decision making with regard to the choice of therapy.
ABSTRACT
For filamentary clouds on various scales obeying general polytropic (GP) equation of state, their hydrodynamic collapses, expansions, and shocks are investigated. Our cylindrical model is ...axisymmetric, infinitely long with axial uniformity and involves Newtonian gravity. For such GP cylinders, we explore various analytical and numerical similarity solutions. Based on a singular hydrostatic solution, we derive a quasi-static asymptotic dynamic solution approaching the axis. There, we also derive the asymptotic cylindrical free-fall solution for polytropic index γ ≤ 1 and show the absence of such solutions for γ > 1. We find new asymptotic solutions for expanding cylindrical central voids with no matter inside, and examine the asymptotic expansion solutions to higher orders far from the axis. We classify the sonic critical curve (SCC) into three (or five) types and analyse their properties. The asymptotic behaviors of the SCC towards the axis and infinity are examined. Examples are shown for solutions crossing the SCC twice with the global features of cylindrical envelope expansion or contraction with core collapses. We numerically construct new types of global similarity solutions with or without outgoing shocks. For γ > 1, a shock is necessary to connect the inner and outer parts. The collapse and fragmentation of massive filaments or strings may give clues and implications to the formations of chains of stellar objects, chains of black holes, chains of galaxies or even chains of galaxy clusters in proper astrophysical and cosmological contexts.
ABSTRACT
We study the self-similar spherical hydrodynamics of γ = 4/3, with or without shocks, of general polytropic (GP) relativistically degenerate or hot matter in global mass reservoirs under the ...Paczynski–Wiita (PW) gravity that retains essential general relativistic (GR) effects for dynamic accretions on to growing Schwarzschild black holes (BHs). Various self-similar dynamic solutions are derived and constructed. Among others, one important solution type is the expansion-wave collapse solution (EWCS) with a central mass-growing BH event horizon in expansion. Such GP dynamic collapses are highly efficient for the rapid dynamic growth of supermassive and hypermassive BHs (SMBHs and HMBHs) in the Universe including the early Universe, in contrast to much slower disc mass accretion and BH merger processes. Particularly, the extra degree of freedom for the effective pressure of those relativistically degenerate or hot mass reservoirs makes it possible to construct EWCSs with even higher efficiency for BH growths. Pertinent astrophysical applications of our model also include dynamic core collapses of massive or very massive stars or supermassive stars and compact objects as well as supernova explosions. Under joint actions of effective pressure and the PW gravity, self-similar dynamic solutions with central expanding spherical voids or cavities with either sharp or smooth density transitions across their rims can emerge. Dynamic expansion shocks are also constructed and examined.
We explore self-similar hydrodynamics of general polytropic (GP) and isothermal cylinders of infinite length with axial uniformity and axisymmetry under self-gravity. Specific entropy conservation ...along streamlines serves as the dynamic equation of state. Together with possible axial flows, we construct classes of analytic and semi-analytic non-linear dynamic solutions for either cylindrical expansion or contraction radially by solving cylindrical Lane–Emden equations. By extensive numerical explorations and fitting trials in reference to asymptotes derived for large index n, we infer several convenient empirical formulae for characteristic solution properties of cylindrical Lane–Emden equations in terms of n values. A new type of asymptotic solutions for small x is also derived in the Appendix. These analyses offer hints for self-similar dynamic evolution of molecular filaments for forming protostars, brown dwarfs and gaseous planets and of large-scale gaseous arms or starburst rings in (barred) spiral galaxies for forming young massive stars. Such dynamic solutions are necessary starting background for further three-dimensional (in)stability analysis of various modes. They may be used to initialize numerical simulations and serve as important benchmarks for testing numerical codes. Such GP formalism can be further generalized to include magnetic field for a GP magnetohydrodynamic analysis.
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