A high‐performance thermoelectric oxyselenide BiCuSeO ceramic with ZT > 1.1 at 823 K and higher average ZT value (ZTave ≈0.8) is obtained. The heavy doping element and nanostructures can effectively ...tune its electronic structure, hole concentration, and thermal conductivity, resulting in substantially enhanced mobility, power factor, and thus ZT value. This work provides a path to high‐performance thermoelectric ceramics.
Summary
Plant protoplasts are useful for assessing the efficiency of clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)/CRISPR‐associated protein 9 (Cas9) mutagenesis. We improved the ...process of protoplast isolation and transfection of several plant species. We also developed a method to isolate and regenerate single mutagenized Nicotianna tabacum protoplasts into mature plants. Following transfection of protoplasts with constructs encoding Cas9 and sgRNAs, target gene DNA could be amplified for further analysis to determine mutagenesis efficiency. We investigated N. tabacum protoplasts and derived regenerated plants for targeted mutagenesis of the phytoene desaturase (NtPDS) gene. Genotyping of albino regenerants indicated that all four NtPDS alleles were mutated in amphidiploid tobacco, and no Cas9 DNA could be detected in most regenerated plants.
We describe a novel surgical technique in 31 women with histopathologically confirmed placenta accreta spectrum (PAS) disorders managed by a multidisciplinary team using a prophylactic infrarenal ...abdominal aortic cross‐clamping technique during caesarean hysterectomy. We conclude that this new surgical procedure is a relatively safe technique to potentially control operative blood loss. Our work may stimulate others to develop protocols assessing this innovative technique to improve the surgical outcome of PAS disorders.
The resilient control refers to the control methodology which provides an interdisciplinary solution to secure the control system. In this paper, the resilient control problem is investigated for a ...class of wireless networked control systems (WNCS) under a denial-of-service (DoS) attack. In the presence of the DoS attacker, the control command sent by the transmitter may be interfered, which can cause the degradation of the signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio and further lead to packet dropout phenomenon. Such a packet dropout phenomenon is described by a two-state Markov-chain. A cross-layer view is adopted toward the security issue of the considered WNCS. The Nash power strategies and optimal control strategy in the delta-domain are obtained in the cyber- and physical-layer, respectively. Based on the obtained strategies, the coupled-design problem is solved which aims to drive the underlying control performance to the desired security region by dynamically manipulating the cyber-layer pricing parameters. Finally, a numerical simulation is conducted to verify the validity of the proposed methodology.
Most of the pile-supported protection structures were designed by empirical and static analyses to resist ship impact loading. Limited studies were carried out to reveal the failure modes and the ...dynamic interaction process of the pile-supported structures subjected to ship collisions. To clarify these issues, high-resolution finite element models of the ship–structure–soil interactions are developed in this paper. Several modeling issues (e.g., material model, artificial boundary and stress initialization) are discussed herein to ensure the rationality of the numerical models. Numerical simulations indicate that the platform and the connection of the protective system should be carefully designed to prevent their brittle failure besides providing the piles with enough ductility. Four interaction phases (i.e., initial contact, loading with approximate velocities, unloading and free vibration) are clearly identified for the overall flexural failure of the pile-supported structures. To efficiently predict the collision-induced responses, an analytical model with two-degree-of-freedom is proposed based on the high-resolution simulation observations. Methods of determining the equivalent mass and the force–deformation relationship involved in the analytical model are discussed in detail. The dynamic responses obtained from the analytical model are compared with the high-resolution FE results. It is found that the proposed simplified model is reasonable and efficient.
•We develop the detailed finite element models of the ship–structure–soil interactions.•Two failure modes of the protections are shown.•Four interaction phases of ship–protection collisions are identified.•The analytical model with 2-DOF is proposed to efficiently evaluate the performance of the protections.•The analytical results are in good agreement with those of the detailed finite element analyses.
Daratumumab is an anti-CD38 monoclonal antibody with lytic activity against multiple myeloma (MM) cells, including ADCC (antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity) and CDC (complement-dependent ...cytotoxicity). Owing to a marked heterogeneity of response to daratumumab therapy in MM, we investigated determinants of the sensitivity of MM cells toward daratumumab-mediated ADCC and CDC. In bone marrow samples from 144 MM patients, we observed no difference in daratumumab-mediated lysis between newly diagnosed or relapsed/refractory patients. However, we discovered, next to an expected effect of effector (natural killer cells/monocytes) to target (MM cells) ratio on ADCC, a significant association between CD38 expression and daratumumab-mediated ADCC (127 patients), as well as CDC (56 patients). Similarly, experiments with isogenic MM cell lines expressing different levels of CD38 revealed that the level of CD38 expression is an important determinant of daratumumab-mediated ADCC and CDC. Importantly, all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA) increased CD38 expression levels but also reduced expression of the complement-inhibitory proteins CD55 and CD59 in both cell lines and primary MM samples. This resulted in a significant enhancement of the activity of daratumumab in vitro and in a humanized MM mouse model as well. Our results provide the preclinical rationale for further evaluation of daratumumab combined with ATRA in MM patients.
Controlling the shape of noble metal nanoparticles is a challenging but important task in electrocatalysis. Apart from hollow and nanocage structures, concave noble metal nanoparticles are considered ...a new class of unconventional electrocatalysts that exhibit superior electrocatalytic properties as compared with those of conventional nanoparticles (including convex and flat ones). Herein, several facile and highly reproducible routes for synthesizing nanostructured concave noble metal materials reported in the literature are discussed, together with their advantages over noble metal nanoparticles with convex shapes. In addition, possible ways of optimizing the synthesis procedure and enhancing the electrocatalytic characteristics of concave metal nanoparticles are suggested. Nanostructured noble metals with concave features are found to show better catalytic activity and stability hence improve their practical applicability in electrocatalysis.
Concave noble metal nanocrystals represent the new class of electrocatalyst materials. In recent decades, extensive works have been employed in the search for excellent catalyst materials for electrocatalysis applications. The surface defects and structural stability are considered responsible for the superiority of concave noble metals compared to their conventional convex counterparts.
To deter financial misstatements, many companies have recently adopted compensation recovery policies—commonly known as "clawbacks"—that authorize the board to recoup compensation paid to executives ...based on misstated financial reports. Clawbacks have been shown to reduce financial misstatements and increase investors' confidence on earnings information. We show that the benefits come with an unintended consequence of certain firms substituting for accruals management with real transactions management (e.g., reduce research and development R&D expenditures), especially firms with strong incentives to achieve short-term earnings targets, such as firms with high growth or high transient institutional ownership. As such, the total amount of earnings management does not decrease subsequent to clawback adoption. We further show that although real transactions management temporarily boosts those clawback adopters' short-term profitability and stock performance, this trend reverses after three years. In summary, clawbacks may have unexpected effects for a subset of firms whose managers are under greater pressure to meet earnings goals.
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