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Evaluating the actual direction efficiency of OAM supports directly into ring-core optical fibres.
Stearic acid (SA) is being used as phase change material (PCM) in energy storage applications. In the present study, the microencapsulation of SA with SiO2 shell was carried out by sol-gel method. Different amounts of SA (5, 10, 15, 20, 30 and 50 g) were taken against 10 ml of tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) for encapsulation. The synthesized microencapsulated PCM (MEPCM) were characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscope (FT-IR), X-Ray diffraction (XRD), X-Ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The characterization results showed that SA was successfully encapsulated by SiO2. Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) exhibited better thermal stability of the MEPCM than SA. The enthalpy values of MEPCM were found to be unchanged even after 30 heating-cooling cycles by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The latent heats of melting and solidification of 50 g SA containing MEPCM were found to be highest i.e. 182.53 J/g and 160.12 J/g, respectively among all microencapsulated samples. The encapsulation efficiency values were calculated using thermal data and the efficiency was found to be highest i.e. 86.68% in the same sample.To evaluate the diagnostic value of described thresholds of controlled attenuation parameter (CAP) and biomarker scores for liver steatosis and to evaluate new cut-offs to detect moderate-to-severe steatosis (S2-3) in patients with morbid obesity. In this prospective study, 32 patients with morbid obesity with indications for bariatric surgery (15 women and 17 men, mean age = 36 years, median BMI = 40.2 kg/m2) underwent CAP, magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), three biomarker scores (Steato-ELSA, Fatty Liver Index (FLI), and Hepatic Steatosis Index (HSI)), and liver biopsy. Subjects were divided into an exploratory cohort (reliable CAP and liver biopsy) and a confirmatory cohort (reliable CAP and MRS) to evaluate new thresholds for CAP and biomarker scores to detect S2-3. Receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curves analyses were performed and the optimal cut-off points were identified using the maximal Youden index. A total of 22 patients had CAP measure and liver biopsy (exploratory cohort) and 24 patients had CAP measure with MRS (confirmatory cohort). New cut-offs were identified for detection of S2-3 by the non-invasive tests using liver biopsy as the reference standard (exploratory cohort). Considering the new proposed cut-offs for detection of S2-3 for CAP (≥ 314 dB/m), Steato-ELSA (≥ 0.832), FLI (≥ 96), and HSI (≥ 53), for the exploratory and confirmatory cohorts sensitivities were 71-75%, 86-81%, 85-81%, and 71-69% and specificities were 94-89%, 75-63%, 63-63%, and 75-88%, respectively. Higher cut-offs for CAP and biomarker scores may be better to diagnose moderate-to-severe steatosis in patients with morbid obesity.The development of whole genome amplification (WGA) and related methods, coupled with the dramatic growth of sequencing capacities, has changed the paradigm of genomic and genetic analyses. This has led to a continual requirement of improved DNA amplification protocols and the elaboration of new tailored methods. As key elements in WGA, identification and engineering of novel, faithful and processive DNA polymerases is a driving force in the field. find more We have engineered the B-family DNA polymerase of virus Bam35 with a C-terminal fusion of DNA-binding motifs. The new protein, named B35-HhH, shows faithful DNA replication in the presence of magnesium or an optimised combination of magnesium and manganese divalent cofactors, which enhances the replication of damaged DNA substrates. Overall, the newly generated variant displays improved amplification performance, sensitivity, translesion synthesis and resistance to salt, which are of great interest for several applications of isothermal DNA amplification. Further, rolling-circle amplification of abasic site-containing minicircles provides a proof-of-concept for using B35-HhH for processive amplification of damaged DNA samples.Structurally-diversified bile acids (BAs) are involved in shaping of intestinal microbiota as well as absorption of dietary lipids. Taurocholic acid, a conjugated form of BA, has been reported to be a factor triggering germination of a wide range of spore-forming bacteria in intestine. To test a hypothesis that other BAs also promote germination of intestinal bacteria, we attempted culture of bacteria from ethanol-treated feces by using a series of BAs. It was found that conjugated-BAs, notably three glycine-conjugated BAs, glycodeoxycholic acid and glycochenodeoxycholic acid, significantly increased the number and the species variety of colonies formed on the agar plate. These colonized bacteria mostly belonged to class Clostridia, mainly consisting of families Lachnospiraceae, Clostridiaceae, and Peptostreptococcaceae. There were several types of bacteria associated with different sensitivity to each BA. Eventually, we isolated 72 bacterial species of which 61 are known and 11 novel. These results demonstrate that the culturable range of bacteria in intestine can be widened using the germination-inducing activity of BAs. This approach would advance the research on spore-forming Clostridia that contains important but difficult-to-cultured bacteria associate with host health and diseases.The applications of machine learning/deep learning (ML/DL) methods in meteorology have developed considerably in recent years. Massive amounts of meteorological data are conducive to improving the training effect and model performance of ML/DL, but the establishment of training datasets is often time consuming, especially in the context of supervised learning. In this paper, to identify the two-dimensional (2D) structures of extratropical cyclones in the Northern Hemisphere, a quasi-supervised reidentification method for extratropical cyclones is proposed. This method first uses a traditional automatic cyclone identification method to construct a trainable labeled dataset and then reidentifies extratropical cyclones in a quasi-supervised fashion by using a (pre-trained) Mask region-based convolutional neural network (Mask R-CNN) model. In comparison, the new method increases the number of identified cyclones by 8.29%, effectively supplementing the traditional method. The newly recognized cyclones are mainly shallow or moderately deep subsynoptic-scale cyclones.
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