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•This study was a post hoc analysis of a randomized controlled trial with 100 patients with β-thalassemia major.•Thalidomide can improve the lifespan and reduce hemolysis of red blood cells in patients with β-thalassemia major.•Provide a new treatment alternative for improving the quality of life of patients with β-thalassemia major. Recent studies have shown the thalidomide's therapeutic potential in treatment of patients with β-thalassemia major. However, the effect of thalidomide on metabolism and lifespan of red blood cells (RBCs) is rarely reported. This study was a post hoc analysis of a randomized controlled trial (Chinese Clinical Trial Registry, ChiCTR1800015702). One hundred patients with β-thalassemia major were randomly assigned 1:1 to treatment with a placebo or thalidomide. The primary outcomes were the differences in RBC lifespan, reticulocyte count, and peripheral nucleated RBC count of patients after treatment of 12 weeks. Other indicators of hemolytic reaction were also analyzed. Compared with the placebo group after treatment of 12 weeks, the thalidomide group showed a longer RBC lifespan (16.29 ± 6.42 vs 12.90 ± 4.98 days; P = 0.004), smaller mean corpuscular volume (68.34 ± 7.79 vs 78.01 ± 6.33 fl; P < 0.001), smaller mean corpuscular hemoglobin (21.62 ± 2.85 vs 24.68 ± 2.69 pg; P < 0.001), and lower lactate dehydrogenase (190.00 [148.00 - 305.00] vs 251.00 [199.20 - 327.80]; P = 0.014). Meanwhile, thalidomide significantly increased the RBC lifespan at 24 weeks (21.24 ± 8.30 days; P < 0.001) and 48 weeks (23.21 ± 8.42 days; P < 0.001) when compared with baseline (12.8 ± 6.0 days). Thalidomide increases the RBC lifespan and reduces hemolytic reactions in patients with β-thalassemia major. Chinese Clinical Trial Registry identifier: ChiCTR1800015702.

The main objective was to study the anticorrosion performance of poly（o-toluidine）/nano ZrO2/epoxy composite coating.Poly（o-toluidine）/nano ZrO2 composite was prepared by in situ polymerization of o-toluidine monomer in the presence of nano ZrO2 particles.Fourier transformation infrared spectroscopy（FT-IR）,UV-visible spectroscopy（UV-vis）,X-ray diffraction（XRD）,Scanning electron microscopy（SEM）,and Thermogravimetric analysis（TGA） were used to characterize the composition and structure of the composite.Poly（o-toluidine）/nano ZrO2 composite was mixed with epoxy resin through a solution blending method and the three components poly（o-toluidine）/nano ZrO2/epoxy composite coating was coated onto the surface of steel sample by the brush coating method.The anticorrosion performance of poly（o-toluidine）/nano ZrO2/epoxy composite coating on steel sample was studied by polarization curve and electrochemical impendence spectroscopy in 3.5% Na Cl solution as corrosion environment and also compared with that of poly（o-toluidine）/epoxy composite coating and pure epoxy coating.It was observed that the composite coating containing poly（otoluidine）/nano ZrO2 composite has got higher corrosion protection ability than that of poly（o-toluidine）.The electrochemical measurement results demonstrated that poly（o-toluidine） fillers improve the electrochemical anticorrosion performance of epoxy coating and the addition of nano ZrO2 particles increases the tortuosity of the diffusion pathway of corrosive substances.

Shrinkage during hardening and curing is one of the largest challenges for the widespread application of metakaolin-based geopolymers (MKGs). To solve this problem, a silane coupling agent (SCA) and waterborne epoxy resin (WER) were used to synthesize MKG composites. The individual and synergistic effects of the SCA and WER on chemical, autogenous, and drying shrinkage were assessed, the modification mechanisms were investigated by microstructural characterization, and shrinkage resistance was evaluated by the chloride ion permeability of MKG composite coatings. The results showed that the SCA and WER significantly decreased the chemical shrinkage, autogenous shrinkage, and drying shrinkage of the MKG, with the highest reductions of 46.4%, 131.2%, and 25.2% obtained by the combination of 20 wt% WER and 1 wt% SCA. The incorporation of the organic modifiers densified the microstructure. Compared with the MKG, the total volume of mesopores and macropores in MKG-WER, MKG-SCA, and MKG-WER-SCA decreased by 11.5%, 8.7%, and 3.8%, respectively. In particular, the silanol hydrolyzed from the SCA can react with the opened epoxy ring of the WER and the aluminosilicate oligomers simultaneously to form a compact network and resist shrinkage during the hardening and continuous reaction of the geopolymer. Furthermore, the apparently lowered chloride ion diffusion coefficient of concrete (i.e., reduction of 51.4% to 59.5%) by the WER- and SCA-modified MKG coatings verified their improved shrinkage resistance. The findings in this study provide promising methods to essentially solve the shrinkage problem of MKGs at the microscale and shed light on the modification mechanism by WERs and SCAs, and they also suggest the applicability of MKG composites in protective coatings for marine concrete.

A compact antenna test range (CATR) is an important testing facility for assessing electromagnetic characteristics of various wireless devices, in which the degradation of phase performance in a quiet zone due to feed defocusing severely affects the assessment results, especially for a higher frequency and longer defocusing distance. Based on the theory of geometric optics (GO), this paper precisely derives analytical formulas of phase characteristics in a quiet zone for a defocused feed in a commonly used CATR, such as that underpinned by single paraboloid and dual parabolic cylinders. The proposed evaluation method is of high accuracy and efficiency for higher frequencies and can be used in various scenarios with excellent results. The discrepancy between the formula calculation results and software simulation results of the machining accuracy tolerance for feeds and their turntable remains below 1°, demonstrating much better performance than the state of the art. Meanwhile, the deviation of the formula calculation results from the preset position of the feed stays within 1 mm, effectively supporting the confirmation of the feed position for equivalent pitch tests.

As a lightweight cementitious material for thermal insulation, the mechanical performance of foamed geopolymer is always compromised by its density reduction. In this study, recycled-glass-fiber-reinforced plastic (rGFRP) fiber was used to reinforce the fly ash-slag based foamed geopolymer, and vitrified micro bubbles (VMB) were applied to further decrease the thermal conductivity and modify the resistance of the lightweight mortar against drying shrinkage. The results revealed that the density, compressive strength, and thermal conductivity of the foamed geopolymer with/without VMB decreased with the increase in foaming agent content. By adding 2~6% of rGFRP fiber, the compressive strength was increased by 25~165%, and the drying shrinkage was reduced the most, by 55%. After the addition of 10% of VMB, the density, thermal conductivity, and drying shrinkage of foamed geopolymer mortar were further decreased, with the highest reductions of 8%, 26%, and 64%, respectively, due to the reduced pore volume and increase proportion of closed pores. With 6% of rGFRP fiber and 25% of foaming agent, the lightweight geopolymer mortar had the optimum performance, with compressive strength of 1.343 MPa, thermal conductivity of 0.134 W/(m·K), and drying shrinkage of 0.095%. This study developed a sustainable lightweight mortar with multiple types of industrial by-products, which benefit both the development of thermal insulation materials and reuse of solid wastes.

Firmness, soluble solid content (SSC) and titratable acidity (TA) are characteristic substances for evaluating the quality of cherry tomatoes. In this paper, a hyper spectral imaging (HSI) system using visible/near-infrared (Vis-NIR) and near-infrared (NIR) was proposed to detect the key qualities of cherry tomatoes. The effects of individual spectral information and fused spectral information in the detection of different qualities were compared for firmness, SSC and TA of cherry tomatoes. Data layer fusion combined with multiple machine learning methods including principal component regression (PCR), partial least squares regression (PLSR), support vector regression (SVR) and back propagation neural network (BP) is used for model training. The results show that for firmness, SSC and TA, the determination coefficient R2 of the multi-quality prediction model established by Vis-NIR spectra is higher than that of NIR spectra. The R2 of the best model obtained by SSC and TA fusion band is greater than 0.9, and that of the best model obtained by the firmness fusion band is greater than 0.85. It is better to use the spectral bands after information fusion for nondestructive quality detection of cherry tomatoes. This study shows that hyperspectral imaging technology can be used for the nondestructive detection of multiple qualities of cherry tomatoes, and the method based on the fusion of two spectra has a better prediction effect for the rapid detection of multiple qualities of cherry tomatoes compared with a single spectrum. This study can provide certain technical support for the rapid nondestructive detection of multiple qualities in other melons and fruits.

ObjectivesAccurate segmentation of focal cortical dysplasia (FCD) lesions from MR images plays an important role in surgical planning and decision but is still challenging for radiologists and clinicians. In this study, we introduce a novel transformer-based model, designed for the end-to-end segmentation of FCD lesions from multi-channel MR images.MethodsThe core innovation of our proposed model is the integration of a convolutional neural network-based encoder-decoder structure with a multiscale transformer to augment the feature representation of lesions in the global field of view. Transformer pathways, composed of memory- and computation-efficient dual-self-attention modules, leverage feature maps from varying depths of the encoder to discern long-range interdependencies among feature positions and channels, thereby emphasizing areas and channels relevant to lesions. The proposed model was trained and evaluated on a public-open dataset including MR images of 85 patients using both subject-level and voxel-level metrics.ResultsExperimental results indicate that our model offers superior performance both quantitatively and qualitatively. It successfully identified lesions in 82.4% of patients, with a low false-positive lesion cluster rate of 0.176 ± 0.381 per patient. Furthermore, the model achieved an average Dice coefficient of 0.410 ± 0.288, outperforming five established methods.ConclusionIntegration of the transformer could enhance the feature presentation and segmentation performance of FCD lesions. The proposed model has the potential to serve as a valuable assistive tool for physicians, enabling rapid and accurate identification of FCD lesions. The source code and pre-trained model weights are available at https://github.com/zhangxd0530/MS-DSA-NET.Critical relevance statementThis multiscale transformer-based model performs segmentation of focal cortical dysplasia lesions, aiming to help radiologists and clinicians make accurate and efficient preoperative evaluations of focal cortical dysplasia patients from MR images.Key PointsThe first transformer-based model was built to explore focal cortical dysplasia lesion segmentation.Integration of global and local features enhances the segmentation performance of lesions.A valuable benchmark for model development and comparative analyses was provided.

A fast and effective determination method of different species of vegetable seeds oil is vital in the plant oil industry. The near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIRS) method was developed in this study to analyze the oil and moisture contents of Camellia gauchowensis Chang and C. semiserrata Chi seeds kernels. Calibration and validation models were established using principal component analysis (PCA) and partial least squares (PLS) regression methods. In the prediction models of NIRS, the levels of accuracy obtained were sufficient for C. gauchowensis Chang and C. semiserrata Chi, the correlation coefficients of which for oil were 0.98 and 0.95, respectively, and those for moisture were 0.92 and 0.89, respectively. The near infrared spectrum of crush seeds kernels was more precise compared to intact kernels. Based on the calibration models of the two Camellia species, the NIRS predictive oil contents of C. gauchowensis Chang and C. semiserrata Chi seeds kernels were 48.71 ± 8.94% and 58.37 ± 7.39%, and the NIRS predictive moisture contents were 4.39 ± 1.08% and 3.49 ± 0.71%, respectively. The NIRS technique could determine successfully the oil and moisture contents of C. gauchowensis Chang and C. semiserrata Chi seeds kernels.

The physical origin of fast radio bursts (FRBs) remains uncertain. Although multiwavelength observations have been widely conducted, only Galactic FRB 20200428D is associated with an X-ray burst from the magnetar SGR J1935+2154. Here we present multiwavelength follow-up observations of the nearby bright FRB 20250316A, including the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST), Einstein Probe (EP) X-ray mission, Chandra X-ray Observatory, Wide Field Survey Telescope (WFST), and Space Variable Objects Monitor/Visible Telescope (SVOM/VT). The 13.08 hr FAST follow-up campaign without pulse detection requires an energy distribution flatter than those of well-known repeating FRBs, suggesting that this burst is likely a one-off event. A prompt EP follow-up and multiepoch observational campaign totaling >100 ks led to the detection of an X-ray source within the angular resolution of its Follow-up X-ray Telescope (FXT; 10″). A subsequent Chandra observation revealed this source to be offset by 7″ from the FRB position and established a 0.5–10 keV flux upper limit of 7.6 × 10−15 erg cm−2 s−1 at the FRB position, corresponding to ∼1039 erg s−1 at the 40 Mpc distance of the host galaxy NGC 4141. These results set one of the most stringent limits on X-ray emission from a nonrepeating FRB, disfavoring ultraluminous X-ray sources as counterparts of apparently one-off FRBs and offering critical insights into afterglow models. Our study suggests that an arcsecond localization of both the FRB and its potential X-ray counterpart is essential for exploring the X-ray counterpart of an FRB.

The main objective was to study the anticorrosion performance of poly(o-toluidine)/nano ZrO 2 /epoxy composite coating. Poly(o-toluidine)/nano ZrO 2 composite was prepared by in situ polymerization of o-toluidine monomer in the presence of nano ZrO 2 particles. Fourier transformation infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), UV-visible spectroscopy (UV-vis), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) were used to characterize the composition and structure of the composite. Poly(o-toluidine)/nano ZrO 2 composite was mixed with epoxy resin through a solution blending method and the three components poly(o-toluidine)/nano ZrO 2 /epoxy composite coating was coated onto the surface of steel sample by the brush coating method. The anticorrosion performance of poly(o-toluidine)/nano ZrO 2 /epoxy composite coating on steel sample was studied by polarization curve and electrochemical impendence spectroscopy in 3.5% NaCl solution as corrosion environment and also compared with that of poly(o-toluidine)/epoxy composite coating and pure epoxy coating. It was observed that the composite coating containing poly(o-toluidine)/nano ZrO 2 composite has got higher corrosion protection ability than that of poly(o-toluidine). The electrochemical measurement results demonstrated that poly(o-toluidine) fillers improve the electrochemical anticorrosion performance of epoxy coating and the addition of nano ZrO 2 particles increases the tortuosity of the diffusion pathway of corrosive substances.