The incidence of early-onset colorectal cancer (CRC), which occurs in individuals <50 years of age, has been increasing worldwide and particularly in high-income countries. The reasons for this ...increase remain unknown but plausible hypotheses include greater exposure to potential risk factors, such as a Western-style diet, obesity, physical inactivity and antibiotic use, especially during the early prenatal to adolescent periods of life. These exposures can not only cause genetic and epigenetic alterations in colorectal epithelial cells but also affect the gut microbiota and host immunity. Early-onset CRCs have differential clinical, pathological and molecular features compared with later-onset CRCs. Certain existing resources can be utilized to elucidate the aetiology of early-onset CRC and inform the development of effective prevention, early detection and therapeutic strategies; however, additional life-course cohort studies spanning childhood and young adulthood, integrated with prospective biospecimen collections, omics biomarker analyses and a molecular pathological epidemiology approach, are needed to better understand and manage this disease entity. In this Perspective, we summarize our current understanding of early-onset CRC and discuss how we should strategize future research to improve its prevention and clinical management.
Increasing evidence suggested obesity, measured by body mass index (BMI), was associated with prostate cancer-specific mortality, and its impact on biochemical recurrence was also inconclusive. We ...systematically searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, and bibliographies of retrieved studies up to January 5, 2010. We used random-effects meta-analysis to assess the relative risks (RR) of prostate cancer-specific mortality and biochemical recurrence associated with a 5 kg/m(2) increase in BMI. Among the six population-based cohort studies in 1,263,483 initially cancer-free men, 6,817 prostate cancer deaths occurred; a 5 kg/m(2) increase in BMI was associated with 15% (RR: 1.15, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.06-1.25, P < 0.01) higher risk of dying of prostate cancer. In the six postdiagnosis survival studies on 18,203 patients with 932 prostate cancer deaths, a 5 kg/m(2) increase in BMI was associated with 20% higher prostate cancer-specific mortality (RR: 1.20, 95% CI: 0.99-1.46, P = 0.06). In the sixteen studies which followed 26,479 prostate cancer patients after primary treatment, a 5 kg/m(2) increase in BMI was significantly associated with 21% increased risk of biochemical recurrence (RR: 1.21, 95% CI: 1.11-1.31 P < 0.01). Elevated BMI is associated with risk of prostate cancer-specific mortality in prospective cohort studies and biochemical recurrence in prostate cancer patients. Its association with prostate cancer-specific mortality in diagnosed patients needs to be further evaluated.
Audio pattern recognition is an important research topic in the machine learning area, and includes several tasks such as audio tagging, acoustic scene classification, music classification, speech ...emotion classification and sound event detection. Recently, neural networks have been applied to tackle audio pattern recognition problems. However, previous systems are built on specific datasets with limited durations. Recently, in computer vision and natural language processing, systems pretrained on large-scale datasets have generalized well to several tasks. However, there is limited research on pretraining systems on large-scale datasets for audio pattern recognition. In this paper, we propose pretrained audio neural networks (PANNs) trained on the large-scale AudioSet dataset. These PANNs are transferred to other audio related tasks. We investigate the performance and computational complexity of PANNs modeled by a variety of convolutional neural networks. We propose an architecture called Wavegram-Logmel-CNN using both log-mel spectrogram and waveform as input feature. Our best PANN system achieves a state-of-the-art mean average precision (mAP) of 0.439 on AudioSet tagging, outperforming the best previous system of 0.392. We transfer PANNs to six audio pattern recognition tasks, and demonstrate state-of-the-art performance in several of those tasks. We have released the source code and pretrained models of PANNs: https://github.com/qiuqiangkong/audioset_tagging_cnn .
Aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) has become one of the most commonly used drugs, given its role as an analgesic, antipyretic and agent for cardiovascular prophylaxis. Several decades of research have ...provided considerable evidence demonstrating its potential for the prevention of cancer, particularly colorectal cancer. Broader clinical recommendations for aspirin-based chemoprevention strategies have recently been established; however, given the known hazards of long-term aspirin use, larger-scale adoption of an aspirin chemoprevention strategy is likely to require improved identification of individuals for whom the protective benefits outweigh the harms. Such a precision medicine approach may emerge through further clarification of aspirin's mechanism of action.
Dense point defects can strengthen phonon scattering to reduce the lattice thermal conductivity and induce outstanding thermoelectric performance in GeTe‐based materials. However, extra point defects ...inevitably enlarge carrier scattering and deteriorate carrier mobility. Herein, it is found that the interstitial Cu in GeTe can result in synergistic effects, which include: 1) strengthened phonon scattering, leading to ultralow lattice thermal conductivity of 0.48 W m−1 K−1 at 623 K; 2) weakened carrier scattering, contributing to high carrier mobility of 80 cm2 V−1 s−1 at 300 K; 3) optimized carrier concentration of 1.22 × 1020 cm−3. Correspondingly, a high figure‐of‐merit of ≈2.3 at 623 K can be obtained in the Ge0.93Ti0.01Bi0.06Te‐0.01Cu, which corresponds to a maximum energy conversion efficiency of ≈10% at a temperature difference of 423 K. This study systematically investigates the doping behavior of the interstitial Cu in GeTe‐based thermoelectric materials for the first time and demonstrates that the localized interstitial Cu is a new strategy to enhance the thermoelectric performance of GeTe‐based thermoelectric materials.
Dense point defects can strengthen phonon scattering, however, inevitably strengthen carrier scattering and deteriorate carrier mobility. Herein, it is demonstrated that the localized interstitial Cu can induce a synergistic effect, leading to high µ (80 cm2 V−1 s−1) and ultralow κl (0.48 W m−1 K−1), thus approaching a high zT of ≈2.3 at 623 K in the Ge0.93Ti0.01Bi0.06Te‐0.01Cu.
Peatlands play a crucial role in the global carbon cycle. Sphagnum mosses (peat mosses) are considered to be the peatland ecosystem engineers and contribute to the carbon accumulation in the peatland ...ecosystems. As cold‐adapted species, the dominance of Sphagnum mosses in peatlands will be threatened by climate warming. The response of Sphagnum mosses to climate change is closely related to the future trajectory of carbon fluxes in peatlands. However, the impact of climate change on the habitat suitability of Sphagnum mosses on a global scale is poorly understood. To predict the potential impact of climate change on the global distribution of Sphagnum mosses, we used the MaxEnt model to predict the potential geographic distribution of six Sphagnum species that dominate peatlands in the future (2050 and 2070) under two greenhouse gas emission scenarios (SSP1‐2.6 and SSP5‐8.5). The results show that the mean temperature of the coldest quarter, precipitation of the driest month, and topsoil calcium carbonate are the main factors affecting the habitat availability of Sphagnum mosses. As the climate warms, Sphagnum mosses tend to migrate northward. The suitable habitat and abundance of Sphagnum mosses increase extensively in the high‐latitude boreal peatland (north of 50°N) and decrease on a large scale beyond the high‐latitude boreal peatland. The southern edge of boreal peatlands would experience the greatest decline in the suitable habitat and richness of Sphagnum mosses with the temperature rising and would be a risk area for the transition from carbon sink to carbon source. The spatial–temporal pattern changes of Sphagnum mosses simulated in this study provide a reference for the development of management and conservation strategies for Sphagnum bogs.
The response of Sphagnum mosses to climate change is closely related to the future trajectory of carbon fluxes in peatlands. We simulated the potential geographic distribution of Sphagnum mosses that dominate peatlands under future climate scenarios. The results show that climate change will result in the migration of Sphagnum species northward. The southern edge of boreal peatlands would experience the greatest decline in the suitable habitat and richness of Sphagnum mosses with the temperature rising and would be a risk area for the transition from carbon sink to carbon source.
According to the Mott's relation, the figure‐of‐merit of a thermoelectric material depends on the charge carrier concentration and carrier mobility. This explains the observation that low ...thermoelectric properties of GeTe‐based materials suffer from the degraded carrier mobility, on account of the fluctuation of electronegativity and ionicity of various elements. Here, high‐performance CuBiSe2 alloyed GeTe with high carrier mobility due to the small electronegativity difference between Cu and Ge atoms and the weak ionicity of CuTe and BiTe bonds, is developed. Density functional theory calculations indicate that CuBiSe2 alloying increases the formation energy of Ge vacancies and correspondingly reduces the amount of Ge vacancies, leading to an optimized carrier concentration and a high power factor of ≈37.4 µW cm−1 K−2 at 723 K. Moreover, CuBiSe2 alloying induces dense point defects and triggers ubiquitous lattice distortions, leading to a reduced lattice thermal conductivity of 0.39 W m−1 K−1 at 723 K. These synergistic effects result in an optimization of the carrier mobility, the carrier concentration, and the lattice thermal conductivity, which favors an enhanced peak figure‐of‐merit of ≈2.2 at 723 K in (GeTe)0.94(CuBiSe2)0.06. This study provides guidance for the screening of GeTe‐based thermoelectric materials with high carrier mobility.
The thermoelectric properties of GeTe‐based materials usually suffer from reduced carrier mobility. In this study, alloying CuBiSe2 into GeTe allows high intrinsic carrier mobility and a high zT of ≈2.2 at 723 K and an average zT of 1.4 from 300 to 723 K in (GeTe)0.94(CuBiSe2)0.06.
Compatible p‐ and n‐type materials are necessary for high‐performance GeTe thermoelectric modules, where the n‐type counterparts are in urgent need. Here, it is reported that the p‐type GeTe can be ...tuned into n‐type by decreasing the formation energy of Te vacancies via AgBiTe2 alloying. AgBiTe2 alloying induces Ag2Te precipitates and tunes the carrier concentration close to the optimal level, leading to a high‐power factor of 6.2 µW cm−1 K−2 at 423 K. Particularly, the observed hierarchical architectural structures, including phase boundaries, nano‐precipitates, and point defects, contribute an ultralow lattice thermal conductivity of 0.39 W m−1 K−1 at 423 K. Correspondingly, an increased ZT of 0.5 at 423 K is observed in n‐type (GeTe)0.45(AgBiTe2)0.55. Furthermore, a single‐leg module demonstrates a maximum η of 6.6% at the temperature range from 300 to 500 K. This study indicates that AgBiTe2 alloying can successfully turn GeTe into n‐type with simultaneously optimized thermoelectric performance.
By proper structure engineering, exotic n‐type GeTe‐based materials with hierarchical architectural structures are reported. This unique architecture can simultaneously increase electrical performance and decrease thermal performance, and demonstrating high thermoelectric conversion efficiency. The high‐performance n‐type GeTe‐based material matching well with p‐type GeTe‐based materials can promote the corresponding practical applications.
Ferroptosis is a form of necrosis caused by iron-induced accumulation of lipid hydroperoxide, involving several molecular events, and has been implicated in Parkinson’s disease. Gastrodin is a ...component of Gastrodia elata Blume with strong antioxidant activity. We examined whether gastrodin can prevent H2O2-induced cytotoxicity in rat glioma cell line C6. For this purpose, C6 cells were pretreated with gastrodin (1, 5, 25 µM) and then exposed to 100 µM H2O2. Results showed that pretreatment of C6 cells with gastrodin decreased H2O2-induced lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) release and cell death. Moreover, gastrodin decreased intracellular malondialdehyde (MDA) level, whereas increased glutathione peroxidase (GPX) activity and glutathione (GSH) level after H2O2 treatment. In addition, treatment of deferoxamine (DFO), ferrostatin-1, and liproxstatin-1 abolished ferroptosis induced by H2O2 or erastin pretreatment. Treatment with gastrodin attenuated H2O2-induced ferroptosis and decreased lipid reactive oxygen species (ROS) (C11-BODIPY) production in C6 cells. Moreover, gastrodin increased the protein expression of nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (Nrf2), GPX4, ferroportin-1 (FPN1), and heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) in C6 cells treated with H2O2. RSL3, a GPX4 inhibitor, inhibited GPX4 protein level in cells co-treated with gastrodin and 100 µM H2O2. These findings indicate that gastrodin can inhibit H2O2-induced ferroptosis through its antioxidative effect in C6 cells.
During the Second World War, Ramgarh, a small town in northeast India, was the site of the 53rd Session of the Indian National Congress and the training centre for the Chinese Expeditionary Force. By ...uncovering the links between the two events and knitting them into the broader context of the Indian nationalist movement and China’s War of Resistance, this article tries to break down the hegemony of the Eurocentric national narratives of the history of the Second World War in India and China. In doing so, it provides an alternative way of writing an entangled history of India and China during the Second World War.
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