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The downscaling of commercial one-transistor–one capacitor ferroelectric memory cells is limited by the available signal window for the use of a charge integration readout technique. However, the erasable conducting charged walls that occur in insulating ferroelectrics can be used to read the bipolar domain states. Both out-of-plane and in-plane cell configurations are compared for the next sub-10-nm integration of ferroelectric domain wall memories with high reliability. It is highlighted that a nonvolatile read strategy of domain information within mesa-like cells under the application of a strong in-plane read field can enable a massive crossbar connection to reduce mobile charge accumulation at the walls and crosstalk currents from neighboring cells. The memory has extended application in analog data processing and neural networks. In-plane domain wall memory. Cross-bar architecture of three-terminal mesa-like cells with written bipolar domain information (thick arrows) using L and R electrodes, which can be read out at a sufficiently high voltage applied between M and R accompanied by erasure/creation of conductive domain walls (red dotted line).

Background The combination therapy of hydrocortisone, vitamin C, and thiamine has been proposed as a potential treatment in patients with sepsis and septic shock. However, subsequent trials have reported conflicting results in relation to survival outcomes. Hence, we performed this randomized controlled trial (RCT) to evaluate the efficacy and safety of early combination therapy among adult patients with septic shock. Methods This single-center, double-blind RCT enrolled adult patients with diagnosis of septic shock within 12 h from Northern Jiangsu People's Hospital between February 2019 and June 2021. Recruited patients were randomized 1:1 to receive intervention (hydrocortisone 200 mg daily, vitamin C 2 g every 6 h, and thiamine 200 mg every 12 h) or placebo (0.9% saline) for 5 days or until ICU discharge. The primary endpoint was 90-day mortality. The secondary endpoints included mortality at day 28, ICU discharge, and hospital discharge; shock reversal; 72-h Delta SOFA score; ICU-free days, vasopressor-free days, and ventilator support -free days up to day 28; ICU length of stay (LOS) and hospital LOS. Results Among 426 patients randomized, a total of 408 patients with septic shock were included in the per-protocol (PP) analysis, of which 203 were assigned to the intervention group and 205 to the placebo group. In the PP population, the primary outcome of 90-day mortality was 39.9% (81/203) and 39.0% (80/205) in the intervention and the placebo groups, respectively, and was not significantly different ( P  = 0.86). There was no significant difference between two groups in 28-day mortality (36.5% vs. 36.1%, P  = 0.94) or the ICU mortality (31.5% vs. 28.8%, P  = 0.55) and hospital mortality (34.5% vs. 33.2%, P  = 0.78). No other secondary outcomes showed significant differences between two groups, including shock reversal, vasopressor-free days, and ICU LOS. Intention-to-treat analysis included all the 426 patients and confirmed these results (all P  > 0.05). Conclusion Among adult patients with septic shock, early use of hydrocortisone, vitamin C, and thiamine combination therapy compared with placebo did not confer survival benefits. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT03872011 , registration date: March 12, 2019. Graphic Abstract

A bstract In this paper, we investigate, in the framework of the topological approach to black hole thermodynamics, using the generalized off-shell Helmholtz free energy, the topological numbers of the static multi-charge AdS black holes in four- and five-dimensional gauged supergravities. We find that the topological number of the static-charged AdS black holes in four-dimensional Kaluza-Klein (K-K) gauged supergravity theory is W = 0, while that of the static-charged AdS black holes in four-dimensional gauged – iX 0 X 1 -supergravity and STU gauged supergravity theories, and five-dimensional Einstein-Maxwell-dilaton-axion (EMDA) gauged supergravity and STU gauged supergravity, and five-dimensional static-charged AdS Horowitz-Sen black hole are both W = 1. Furthermore, we observe a novel temperature-dependent thermodynamic topological phase transition that can happen in the four-dimensional static-charged AdS black hole in EMDA gauged supergravity theory, the four-dimensional static-charged AdS Horowitz-Sen black hole, and the five-dimensional static-charged AdS black hole in K-K gauged supergravity theory. We believe that the novel temperature-dependent thermodynamic topological phase transition could help us better understand black hole thermodynamics and, further, shed new light on the fundamental nature of gauged supergravity theories.

Charge-transfer (CT) complexes, formed by electron transfer from a donor to an acceptor, play a crucial role in organic semiconductors. Excited-state CT complexes, termed exciplexes, harness both singlet and triplet excitons for light emission, and are thus useful for organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). However, present exciplex emitters often suffer from low photoluminescence quantum efficiencies (PLQEs), due to limited control over the relative orientation, electronic coupling and non-radiative recombination channels of the donor and acceptor subunits. Here, we use a rigid linker to control the spacing and relative orientation of the donor and acceptor subunits, as demonstrated with a series of intramolecular exciplex emitters based on 10-phenyl-9,10-dihydroacridine and 2,4,6-triphenyl-1,3,5-triazine. Sky-blue OLEDs employing one of these emitters achieve an external quantum efficiency (EQE) of 27.4% at 67 cd m −2 with only minor efficiency roll-off (EQE = 24.4%) at a higher luminous intensity of 1,000 cd m −2 . As a control experiment, devices using chemically and structurally related but less rigid emitters reach substantially lower EQEs. These design rules are transferrable to other donor/acceptor combinations, which will allow further tuning of emission colour and other key optoelectronic properties. The use of rigid linkers to control the relative position and interaction of donor and acceptor units in exciplex emitters leads to the realization of organic light-emitting devices with enhanced external quantum efficiency.

Based on the AdS/CFT correspondence, we study the holographic Einstein image of a Gauss–Bonnet AdS black hole in the framework of wave optics. Our results show that for the absolute amplitude of total response function, there always exists the interference pattern when the scalar wave passes through black hole. And, the value of the amplitude depends closely on the properties of Gaussian source and spacetime geometry. More importantly, we also find that the holographic images always appears as a ring surrounded by the concentric stripe when observer located at the north pole. At other positions, this ring will change into a luminosity-deformed ring, or two light points. In addition, the influence of Gauss–Bonnet parameter α , wave source and optical system on the holographic image have been carefully addressed and the results show that the radius of ring is dependent of the Gauss–Bonnet parameter α but not dependent of wave source and optical system. The holographic images that different types of black holes have different features may shed deep insights on the existence of a gravity dual for a given material.

Future data-intensive applications will have integrated circuit architectures combining energy-efficient transistors, high-density data storage and electro-optic sensing arrays in a single chip to perform in situ processing of captured data. The costly dense wire connections in 3D integrated circuits and in conventional packaging and chip-stacking solutions could affect data communication bandwidths, data storage densities, and optical transmission efficiency. Here we investigated all-ferroelectric nonvolatile LiNbO 3 transistors to function through redirection of conducting domain walls between the drain, gate and source electrodes. The transistor operates as a single-pole, double-throw digital switch with complementary on/off source and gate currents controlled using either the gate or source voltages. The conceived device exhibits high wall current density and abrupt off-and-on state switching without subthreshold swing, enabling nonvolatile memory-and-sensor-in-logic and logic-in-memory-and-sensor capabilities with superior energy efficiency, ultrafast operation/communication speeds, and high logic/storage densities. There is growing interest in non-traditional materials for logic applications. Here, the authors demonstrate a domain device architecture based on ferroelectric LiNbO 3 crystals with gate voltage controlled transistor without subthreshold swing and source voltage controlled nonvolatile transistor.

Background As one of the largest transcription factor families in plants, AP2/ERF gene superfamily plays important roles in plant growth, development, fruit ripening and biotic and abiotic stress responses. Despite the great progress has been made in kiwifruit genomic studies, little research has been conducted on the AP2/ERF genes of kiwifruit. The increasing kiwifruit genome resources allowed us to reveal the tissue expression profiles of AP2/ERF genes in kiwifruit on a genome-wide basis. Results In present study, a total of 158 AP2/ERF genes in A. eriantha were identified. All genes can be mapped on the 29 chromosomes. Phylogenetic analysis divided them into four main subfamilies based on the complete protein sequences. Additionally, our results revealed that the same subfamilies contained similar gene structures and conserved motifs. Ka/Ks calculation indicated that AP2/ERF gene family was undergoing a strong purifying selection and the evolutionary rates were slow. RNA-seq showed that the AP2/ERF genes were expressed differently in different flower development stages and 56 genes were considered as DEGs among three contrasts. Moreover, qRT-PCR suggested partial genes showed significant expressions as well, suggesting they could be key regulators in flower development in A. eriantha . In addition, two genes ( AeAP2/ERF061, AeAP2/ERF067 ) had abundant transcription level based on transcriptomes, implying that they may play a crucial role in plant flower development regulation and flower tissue forming. Conclusions We identified AP2/ERF genes and demonstrated their gene structures, conserved motifs, and phylogeny relationships of AP2/ERF genes in two related species of kiwifruit, A. eriantha and A. chinensis , and their potential roles in flower development in A. eriantha . Such information would lay the foundation for further functional identification of AP2/ERF genes involved in kiwifruit flower development.

By considering the celestial light source and the thin disk source, we employ the backward ray-tracing method to carefully study the shadow, inner shadow and observational images of the non-singular rotating black holes in loop quantum gravity. The results show that the increase of quantum parameter λ causes the shadow to shrink, while increases the deviation from circularity. And, the shadow’s angular diameter of M87* impose stronger constraints on the observed properties of the no-singulgar rotating black holes by comparing with SgrA*. For a celestial light source, the parameter λ indeed influences the distortion of light around black hole shadow, but this effect is relatively small and only becomes noticeable when extremely close to the shadow. When a thin accretion disk around black hole, it turns out that for an observer at any position, the parameter λ has little effect on the shape of the inner shadow. However, it decreases the size of the inner shadow, reduces the observed light intensity, and narrows the redshifted shadow images, regardless of whether the accretion disk is prograde or retrograde. Meanwhile, it is true that the thin disk images of black hole cannot effectively reflect the internal structure of black hole. Finally, we can conclude that a key observational feature of these non-singular rotating black holes is that the larger the black hole’s spin parameter, the smaller the upper limit of λ ’s effect. And, the parameter λ decreases the gravitational field’s strength, thereby weakens the observed images. This could provide a possible way to constraining black hole parameters, identifying quantum gravity effects, and distinguishing loop quantum gravity black holes, even if it cannot be used to distinguish the non-singular properties of black hole.

Interfacial ‘dead’ layers between metals and ferroelectric thin films generally induce detrimental effects in nanocapacitors, yet their peculiar properties can prove advantageous in other electronic devices. Here, we show that dead layers with low Li concentration located at the surface of LiNbO 3 ferroelectric materials can function as unipolar selectors. LiNbO 3 mesa cells were etched from a single-crystal LiNbO 3 substrate, and Pt metal contacts were deposited on their sides. Poling induced non-volatile switching of ferroelectric domains in the cell, and volatile switching in the domains in the interfacial (dead) layers, with the domain walls created within the substrate being electrically conductive. These features were also confirmed using single-crystal LiNbO 3 thin films bonded to SiO 2 /Si wafers. The fabricated nanoscale mesa-structured memory cell with an embedded interfacial-layer selector shows a high on-to-off ratio (>10 6 ) and high switching endurance (~10 10 cycles), showing potential for the fabrication of crossbar arrays of ferroelectric domain wall memories. An integrated one selector–one resistor device is realized using the volatile and non-volatile switching properties of ferroelectric domains created, respectively, at the interface and in the bulk of mesa-like LiNbO 3 domain wall memory cells.

Rockbursts are markedly characterized by the ejection of rock fragments from host rocks at certain speeds. The rockburst process is always accompanied by acoustic signals that include acoustic emissions (AE) and sounds. A deep insight into the evolutionary features of AE and sound signals is important to improve the accuracy of rockburst prediction. To investigate the evolutionary features of AE and sound signals, rockburst tests on granite rock specimens under true-triaxial loading conditions were performed using an improved rockburst testing system, and the AE and sounds during rockburst development were recorded and analyzed. The results show that the evolutionary features of the AE and sound signals were obvious and similar. On the eve of a rockburst, a ‘quiescent period’ could be observed in both the evolutionary process of the AE hits and the sound waveform. Furthermore, the time-dependent fractal dimensions of the AE hits and sound amplitude both showed a tendency to continuously decrease on the eve of the rockbursts. In addition, on the eve of the rockbursts, the main frequency of the AE and sound signals both showed decreasing trends, and the frequency spectrum distributions were both characterized by low amplitudes, wide frequency bands and multiple peak shapes. Thus, the evolutionary features of sound signals on the eve of rockbursts, as well as that of AE signals, can be used as beneficial information for rockburst prediction.