An enhanced analytical technique for nonlinear oscillators having a harmonic restoring force is proposed. The approach is passed on the change of the auxiliary operator by another suitable one leads to obtain a periodic solution. The fundamental idea of the new approach is based on obtaining an alternative equation free of the harmonic restoring forces. This method is a modification of the homotopy perturbation method. The approach allows not only an actual periodic solution, but also the frequency of the problem as a function of the amplitude of oscillation. Three nonlinear oscillators including restoring force, the simple pendulum motion, the cubic Duffing oscillator, the Sine-Gordon equation are offered to clarify the effectiveness and usefulness of the proposed technique. This approach allows an effective mathematical approach to noise and uncertain properties of nonlinear vibrations arising in physics and engineering.

In this paper, we consider the following fractional Schr\”{o}dinger-Poisson system: \begin{equation*} \left\{ \begin{array}{ll} (-\Delta)^su+u+\lambda K(x)\phi u=a(x)|u|^{p-2}u+b(x)|u|^{2}u& \hbox{in $\mathbb{R}^3$,}\\ (-\Delta)^t\phi=K(x)u^2& \hbox{in $\mathbb{R}^3$,} \end{array} \right. \end{equation*} where $s,t\in(0,1)$, $\lambda>0$, $2

A document by Gongbao LI. Click on the document to view its contents.

We study the spectral properties of resonances of general Hamiltonians in the Born-Oppenheimer approximation. We prove that this study can be reduced to the one of a family of finite matrices of semiclassical h-pseudodifferential operators. More precisely, we show that any resonance which is close enough to the real axis can be obtained from the discrete spectrum of one of these matrixes.

A document by Wanassi WANASSI. Click on the document to view its contents.

In this paper, we consider a nonlinear plate (or beam) Petrovsky equation with strong damping and source terms with variable exponents. The exponents of nonlinearity _p_(⋅) and _q_(⋅) are given functions. By using the Banach contraction mapping principle the local existence of a weak solutions is established under suitable assumptions on the variable exponents _p_ and _p_. We also show a finite time blow up result for the solutions with negative initial energy.

In the ecological literature, many models for the predator-prey interactions consider the monotonic functional responses to describe the action of the predators. However, there exist antipredator behaviors which are best represented by non-monotonic functions. The mathematical results on the predator-prey models provide very useful information to understand the complex food webs; they also help to the insight of the mechanisms that govern the evolution of ecological systems. The aim of this paper is to show, the dynamics of a modified Leslie-Gower model, assuming a rational non-monotonic functional response or Holling type IV. A principal target is to compare the obtained properties with other cases, in which different non-monotonic functional responses are incorporated. The model is described by an autonomous bi-dimensional ordinary differential equation system (ODEs), assuming that the prey and predator growth functions are the logistic type. The proposed model is not defined in $(0,0)$; considering a topological equivalent system, it is possible that to prove the origin is a non-hyperbolic saddle point. We also have established, there are subsets of the parameter space in which: i) there exists a unique positive equilibrium point, ii) a heteroclinic curve exists. iii) two concentric limit cycles exist, the innermost unstable and the outermost stable. Numerical simulations are given to endorse the analytical results and to exhibit the richness of the dynamics in the system.

Over thirty species of littoral marine Gammaridea occur along the coasts of the North Atlantic. From one to several species can coexist in a single region. There is an evident, inverse relationship between egg incubation time and temperature (from 14 to > 120 days) and consequent trends in the size of the animals on reaching maturity (from 5 mm in warmer waters to 30 mm in the coldest ones) and in lifespan (from < 6 months to > 5 years). Littoral gammarids are a good example of the shrinking size effect of increasing temperatures and size-related species diversity. In large species the annual cohorts of the population (3 to 5 annual size groups) functionally replace the adults of smaller species. The ongoing warming of the European Arctic seas may extend the distribution limits of boreal species so that more Gammarus species may appear on northern coasts hitherto occupied by just one or at most two species.

Domestic ducks are considered to have been tamed from the mallard or a descendant of the mallard and the spot-billed duck. Domestic ducks show remarkable phenotypic variation in morphology, physiology and behaviour. However, the molecular genetics of the origin and phenotypic variation of ducks are still poorly studied. Here, we present mallard and spot-billed genomes and perform whole-genome sequencing on eight domestic duck breeds and eight wild duck species. Surprisingly, analyses of these data support a model in which domestic ducks diverged from their closest wild lineage (mallard ducks and spot-billed ducks) at the last glacial period (LGP, 100-300 kilo years ago (Kyr)). The wild lineage further speciated into mallard ducks and spot-billed ducks approximately 70 Kyr, whereas the domestic lineage population decreased through the LGP. A scan of wild duck genomes compared with domestic duck genomes identified numerous loci that may have been affected by positive selection in ancestral wild ducks after their divergence from domestic lineages. Function analyses suggested that genes usually affecting organ development and energy metabolism may involve long-distance flight ability. Further selective sweep analyses identified two genes associated with egg production and three genes related to feeding modulation under selection in domestic ducks. These analyses unravel a distinct evolutionary pattern of ducks and two wild duck de novo genomes, thus providing a novel resource for speciation studies.

BLK belongs to the family of SRC kinases (SFKs), and are diagnosed with the aid of the presence of an SH3 and SH2 regulatory domains of N-terminal to the catalytic kinase domain. BLK in signalling has a vast position in transmitting alerts via immunoglobulins and ends in pro-B to pre-B conversion, and in signalling for boom arrest and apoptosis downstream of the B-cellular receptor. We have performed a series of computational analysis on various aspects on BLK viz phylogenetic analysis, domain analysis, secondary structure prediction, charge distribution, prediction of the antigenic region and have executed structural analysis by first structure modelling and then its refinement, and active site prediction for better understanding of the human BLK as a drug target. Our study includes a detailed analysis and graphical representation of different domains, charge distribution, prediction of the antigenic region etc with corresponding sequence and its secondary structure for the pharmacological aspect of BLK which observed that Tulipa suaveolens is the most outed clade in the BLK and Human BLK is found to be very closed to Pongo Abelii through the phylogenetic tree assessment.

Objective: To contribute to the validation of the self-administered ALSFRS-R - European Portuguese version (ALSFRS-R: EP), and to analyse its reliability in order to enable its use by ALS patients in Portugal. Methods: The study was developed in 3 phases. Phase 1: Translation and cultural adaptation of the self-administered ALFRS-R; Phase 2: Content validation by study participants; Phase 3: Analysis of internal consistency and test - retest reliability. Results: According to a panel of experts (N=6), a CVI of 100% were obtained for all ALSFRS-R: EP items. A sample of 18 people with ALS (13 male) fulfilled the test and evaluated its items regarding its clarity, comprehension, difficulty and relevance, obtaining values with an average between 8.6 and 8.9, 8.7 and 8.9, 8.5 and 8.8, and 8.5 and 8.9, respectively. The instrument total score and its subscales presented good internal consistency (Cronbach’s α: from 0.72 to 0.92 in the test; from 0.70 to 0.95 in the retest) and reliability (Kendall tau: from 0.575 to 0.990). Considering the scale total score for the test, no statistical differences were observed between females and males nor between bulbar ALS and medullar ALS. The correlation between the total score and age showed to be significant and negative (-0.53). Conclusions: The Self-Administered ALSFRS-R: EP version was successfully translated, validated, and presented good to excellent reliability results. It will allow its use by Portuguese ALS patients and enabling their health professionals to monitor the disease progression at home.

The article From Electrica to Invariant Automatica, with subtitle System and Invariant Electric Model, compares well-known power equations and other energy equations, regardless of the physical nature of the energy (mechanical, thermal, thermonuclear etc.) and thus the author creates a universal measure for the concept of energy. On this basis, the universal concept of a system is defined as a pair of two elements of energy source and energy consumer. The user is a production facility, at the output of which a product of certain qualities (mechanical dimensions, temperature, pressure, concentration, pH, etc.) appears. The control of the energy flow to it depends functionally on these qualities and, in addition, on the efficiency of the system (speed, flow rate, number of objects per unit of time, etc.). In the second part of the article with subtitle Electromechanical Dualism. The Universality of Energetic Equations, with the help of modern altebra, is proved the versatility of the electrical model of the system

A semiclassical phase-space perspective of band- and topological-insulator regimes of 2D Dirac materials, and normal- and superradiant-phases of atom-field interacting models is given in terms of delocalization, entropies, and quantum correlation measures. From this point of view, the low-energy limit of tight-binding models describing the electronic band structure of topological 2D Dirac materials like phosphorene and silicene with tunable band gaps, share similarities with Rabi-Dicke and Jaynes-Cummings atom-field interaction models, respectively. In particular, the edge state of 2D Dirac materials in the topological insulator phase exhibits a Schrödinger cat structure similar to the ground state of two-level atoms in a cavity interacting with a one-mode radiation field in the superradiant phase. Delocalization seems to be a common feature of topological insulator and superradiant phases.

This is a follow-on paper from the Hutchison group, expanding on some previous work looking at correlations of molecular energy from a variety of levels of theory with results from high-level ab initio calculations. A new addition in this paper is a small set of ML methods, a welcome addition to the forcefield and electronic structure methods usually used in comparisons of this kind.The paper presents some interesting results, but is riddled with missing or misattributed data, typos, grammatical errors (particularly agreements for single and plural nouns) and errors in the references. The paper should be carefully corrected before resubmission.The key omission in the paper is any attempt to provide confidence in the deductions made about the differences in accuracy between the methods compared. Confidence intervals on each of the estimators, estimates of success rates and their errors, and pairwise hypothesis tests, at a minimum, must be added before publication. With this data in hand the new version can make quantitative estimates of the differences between the methods.

Despite ca. seven decades of theoretical elaboration since Peter Medawar’s foundational ‘An Unsolved Problem of Biology’, we argue that the fundamental problem of the evolution of senescence, i.e. the increasing risk of mortality and decline in reproduction with age after maturity, remains unsolved. Theories of senescence predict the inescapability of senescence, or its universality at least among species with a clear germ-soma barrier. Here, using demographic information for 475 multicellular species, we exemplify the discrepancy between these theoretical predictions and currently available data. We derive age-based trajectories of mortality and reproduction whose form cannot be satisfactorily explained by the theories of senescence, and show that species’ may often display senescence for one fitness component but not the other. We propose that theories of senescence must be extended beyond merely individual chronological age; size, the species’ ecological context, and kin selection may all play hidden, yet integral roles in shaping patterns of senescence.

Objective: The subsequent reproductive events induced by early age at menarche (AAM) are tightly linked to immune dysfunction. This study aimed to analyze whether immune functions mediate the association between AAM and subsequent reproductive performance. Design: a follow-up and Mendelian Randomization (MR) study. Setting: A women’s and Children’s hospital in Shenzhen, China. Population: Sixty-eight healthy reproductive Chinese women were admitted to pre-pregnancy physical examinations. Methods: Pre-pregnancy immune functions were analyzed by flow cytometry. Subsequent reproductive performance was studied by a 15-month follow up. The associations of immune functions with AAM or pregnancy status were analyzed. Lastly, the important association was further validated by a two-sample MR test using public data. Main Outcome Measures: Miscarriages, thyroid function at early pregnancy, and metabolic indexes at mid pregnancy. Results: We found that AAM was negatively associated with Tfh1/Tfh2 ratio (Spearman r=-0.283, P=0.019). Moreover, this pre-pregnancy index was positively associated with TSH at early pregnancy (Spearman r=0.363, P=0.032), a risk for spontaneous miscarriage (adjusted Relative risk (RR)=12.25, 95% confidence interval (CI)=1.72-87.46, P=0.013), and a shorter time to miscarriage (42 days vs. 115 days, log-rank P=0.038). Moreover, the MR test showed that 84 AAM-related SNPs can explain 19% of variance in PD1- naïve Tfh cells (Directionality P=4.28×10-10); LIN28B and chromosome 9p12 (LINC01505, TAL2 and TMEM38B) were their share genetic factors. Conclusion: The present study implied that Tfh cells might mediate the process of early AAM-induced reproductive events. Larger population studies and functional studies are warranted. Funding: None.

MYB transcription factors are important in abiotic stress responses; however, the detailed mechanisms are unclear. Tamarix hispida contains multiple MYB genes. The present study characterized T. hispida MYB (ThMYB8) during salt stress using transgenic T. hispida and Arabidopsis assays. ThMYB8 overexpression and ThMYB8 RNAi analysis demonstrated that ThMYB8 enhanced the salt stress tolerance. Transgenic Arabidopsis overexpressing ThMYB8 displayed significantly increased root growth, fresh weight, and seed germination rate compared with that of the wild-type. Physiological parameters analysis in T. hispida and Arabidopsis showed that ThMYB8 overexpressing plants had the lowest levels of O2-, H2O2, cell death, malondialdehyde, and electrolyte leakage. Overexpression of ThMYB8 regulated Na+ and K+ concentrations in plant tissues while maintaining K+/Na+ homeostasis. Analysis using qRT-PCR and ChIP-PCR identified possible downstream ThMYB8-regulated genes. ThMYB8 regulated the expression of ThCYP450-2 (cytochrome p450-2), Thltk (leucine-rich repeat transmembrane protein kinase), and ThTIP (aquaporin TIP) by binding to the MBSI motif (‘CAACTG’) in their promoters. The results indicated that ThMYB8 enhanced salt stress tolerance in T. hispida by regulating gene expression related to the activation of stress-associated physiological changes, such as enhanced reactive oxygen species scavenging capability, maintaining K+/Na+ homeostasis, and decreasing the malondialdehyde content and lipid peroxidation cell membranes.

Objective: Clinical trials provide fundamental evidence used to inform healthcare decisions at patient- and population levels. It is therefore important that trials evaluate outcomes considered relevant by patients and relevant stakeholders. Although validated tools assessing other aspects of trial integrity exist, there is no tool for assessing the breadth and completeness of outcomes being measured. We have developed the Comprehensiveness of Outcome Reporting (COR) Tool to assist systematic reviewers and trialists in evaluating and choosing trial outcomes within the dynamic context of obstetrics. Methods: We identified five core outcome areas – mortality, clinical/physiological, functioning/life-impact, resource-use, and adverse events – from a published taxonomy for outcomes in medical research, and programmed an excel-based tool capable of producing a heatmap to enable users to visualize whether trial outcomes appropriately represent all outcomes areas for both mother and fetus. We used a mock-heatmap to demonstrate the tool’s utility in assessing comprehensiveness of outcome reporting in obstetric trials. Results: This excel-based tool guides users through a series of simple questions regarding the clinical trial(s) being assessed, producing a heatmap output that depicts the spread of reported outcome areas. Trends are readily interpreted with a heatmap, with over/under-reported maternal and fetal-neonatal outcome areas clearly highlighted. Conclusions: Comprehensive reporting of outcomes is necessary to ensure that interventions truly result in improved outcomes in all core areas. The COR Tool will enable systematic reviewers and trialists to determine and select outcomes with more breadth and completeness, encouraging transparency and the drawing of valid clinical conclusions. Funding: None

Abstract Objective To evaluate the clinical diagnostic validity of carbon nanoparticle suspension (CNS) in sentinel lymph node biopsy (SLNB) for assessing lymphatic spread of early-stage cervical cancer. Design A prospective study. Setting and population 356 cases. Methods We enrolled 356 stage Ia2-IIa2 cervical cancer patients to undergo SLNB using CNS followed by systematic pelvic lymphadenectomy. All lymph node specimens were assessed using conventional histopathologic ± pathologic ultrastaging analyses. Main outcome measures SLN detection rate (DR), clinical diagnostic validity, and various related factors were analysed. Results CNS identified 1456 SLNs in 325 patients. The overall SLN DR was 91.29%. A significantly higher DR was found for patients with tumours <20 mm (97.75% vs. 71.91%; p = 0.000). Two patients had false-negative results, accounting for 0.615% of patients who had successful SLN detection. SLNB with CNS had sensitivity of 92.86%, false-negative rate (FNR) of 7.14%, and negative predictive value (NPV) of 99.29%. Importantly, sensitivity (100%), NPV (100%), and FNR (0%) were improved when testing the subgroup of patients with tumours <20 mm (267 cases). There were no observed differences in DR based on pathologic type or grade, stage, depth of stromal invasion, surgical approach, menopausal status, or prior treatment with chemotherapy (p > 0.05). Conclusions SLNB with CNS results in favourable DR, sensitivity, and NPV for women with early-stage cervical cancer with small tumour sizes. SLNB with CNS is safe, feasible, and relatively effective for guiding precise surgical treatment of early-stage cervical cancer. Keywords SLNB, CNS, early-stage cervical cancer

Accurate and testable species delimitation hypotheses are essential for measuring, surveying and managing biodiversity. Today, taxonomists often rely on mitochondrial DNA barcoding to complement morphological species delimitations. Although COI barcoding has largely proven successful in assisting identifications for most animal taxa, there are nevertheless numerous cases where mitochondrial barcodes do not necessarily reflect the species history. For instance, what is regarded as one single species can be associated with two distinct DNA barcodes, which can point either to cryptic diversity or to deep within-species mitochondrial divergences with no reproductive isolation. In contrast, two or more species can share barcodes, for instance due to mitochondrial introgression. These intrinsic limitations of mitochondrial DNA barcoding can only be addressed with nuclear genomic markers, which are expensive, labour intensive, poorly repeatable, and often require high-quality DNA. To overcome these limitations, we examined the use of ultraconserved nuclear genetic elements (UCEs) as a quick and robust genomic approach to address such problematic cases of species delimitation. This genomic method was assessed using six different bee species complexes suspected to harbour cryptic diversity, mitochondrial introgression, or mitochondrial paraphyly. The sequencing of UCEs recovered between 686 and 1860 homologous nuclear loci and provided explicit species delimitation hypotheses in all investigated species complexes. These results provide strong evidence for the suitability of UCEs as a fast method for species delimitation even in recently diverged lineages. Furthermore, this study provided the first conclusive evidence for both mitochondrial introgression among distinct species, and mitochondrial paraphyly within a single bee species.

Objective: High data quality is essential to ensure the validity of clinical and research inferences based on it. However, these data quality assessments are often missing even though these data are used in daily practice and research. Our objective was to evaluate the data quality of our high-resolution electronic database (HRDB) implemented in our pediatric intensive care unit (PICU). Design: A prospective validation study of a HRDB. Setting: A 32-bed pediatric medical, surgical and cardiac PICU in a tertiary care freestanding maternal-child health center in Canada. Population: All patients admitted to the PICU with at least one vital sign monitored using a cardiorespiratory monitor connected to the central monitoring station. Interventions: None Measurements and Main Results: Between June 2017 and August 2018, data from 295 patient days were recorded from medical devices and 4,645 data points were video recorded and compared to the corresponding data collected in the HRDB. Statistical analysis showed an excellent overall correlation (R2=1), accuracy (100%), agreement (bias=0, limits of agreement=0), completeness (2% missing data) and reliability (ICC=1) between recorded and collected data within clinically significant pre-defined limits of agreement. Divergent points could all be explained. Conclusions: This prospective validation of a representative sample showed an excellent overall data quality.

Maternal effects have been well documented for offspring morphology and life history traits in plants and terrestrial animals, yet little is known about maternal effects in corals. Further, few studies have explored maternal effects in gene expression. In a previous study, F1 interspecific hybrid and purebred larvae of the coral species Acropora tenuis and A. loripes were settled and exposed to ambient or elevated temperature and pCO2 conditions for seven months. At this stage, the hybrid coral recruits from both ocean conditions exhibited strong maternal effects in several fitness traits. We conducted RNA-sequencing on samples from the same experiment and showed that gene expression of the hybrid Acropora also showed clear maternal effects. Only 40 genes were differentially expressed between hybrids and their maternal progenitor. In contrast, ~2000 differentially expressed genes were observed between hybrids and their paternal progenitors, and between the reciprocal F1 hybrids. These results indicate that maternal effects in coral gene expression can be long-lasting. Unlike findings from most short-term stress experiments in corals, no genes were differentially expressed in the hybrid nor purebred offspring after seven months of exposure to elevated temperature and pCO2 conditions.

Phaeodactylum tricornutum is a lipid-rich marine diatom that contains a high level of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, especially eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA). In an effort to reduce costs for large-scale cultivation of this microalga, we first established a modified BBM medium (0.3 x strength BBM with 90% reduced phosphate content) to replace the traditional F/2 medium. P. tricornutum could grow in extremely low phosphate concentrations (25 µM), without compromising the EPA content. In the presence of sea salts, silicate addition was not necessary for high rate growth, high EPA content or lipid accumulation in this species. Using urea as the sole nitrogen source tended to increase EPA contents (by 24.7%) while not affecting growth performance. The use of sea salts, rather than just sodium chloride led to significantly improved biomass yields (20% increase) and EPA contents (46-52% increase), most likely because it supplied sufficient essential elements such as magnesium. A salinity level of 35 ppt led to significantly higher biomass yields compared to 20 ppt, but salinity had no significant influence on EPA content that reached high average levels of 51.8% of total fatty acids during exponential growth phase at 20 ppt in modified BBM medium with sea salts.

The prediction of future land cover changes is an important step in proper planning and management of watersheds. Various methods exist for this purpose. In this study, land cover changes were investigated in the Hable-Rud River basin in Iran, an arid and semi-arid region, using remote sensing and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). First, a supervised classification technique was applied to Landsat images acquired for 1986, 2000 and 2017 using the maximum likelihood method. Then, using pixel-by-pixel change detection, the land cover changes were predicted for 2017 and 2040 using a Cellular Automata (CA)-Markov model. The descriptive variables used included slope, aspect, elevation, and calculated distances from various land features such as rivers, roads, industrial areas, residential areas, saline land, and land in agricultural production. The predictions for 2017 were validated using the derived map from a Landsat image of 2017 with a resulting standard Kappa index of 0.74. According to the prediction results for 2040, the areas of rangeland and saline land will increase by approximately 6.5% and 2%, respectively, whereas the areas of bare land and agricultural land will decrease by approximately 6% and 2%, respectively. Moreover, the analysis of historical records since 1986 showed that the annual streamflow and precipitation have reduced by almost 44% and 29%, respectively. The reductions, particularly to streamflow, can be attributed largely to agriculture expansion, rapid population growth, and industrial developments. The analysis of the results indicates a need for more effective design, planning, and development of land cover policies for ecosystem protection.