Description: A novel method is developed to realize a III-V/Si dual-junction photovoltaic cell by combining epitaxial lift-off (ELO) and print-transfer-assisted bonding methods. The adoption of ELO enables III-V wafers to be recycled and reused, which can further lower the cost of III-V/Si photovoltaic panels. For demonstration, high crystal quality, micrometer-thick, GaAs/AlGaAs/GaAs films are lifted off, transferred, and directly bonded onto Si wafer without the use of any adhesive or bonding agents. The bonding interface is optically transparent and conductive both thermally and electrically. Prototype AlGaAs/Si dual-junction tandem solar cells have been fabricated and exhibit decent performance. A novel method is developed to realize an III-V/Si multijunction photovoltaic device by combining the epitaxial lift-off (ELO) and print-transfer-assisted bonding methods. The adoption of ELO enables III-V wafers to be recycled and reused, which is promising to further lower the cost of III-V/Si photovoltaic panels.

Description: Purpose To assess the amide proton transfer-weighted (APTw) MRI features of isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH)-wildtype and IDH-mutant grade II gliomas and to test the hypothesis that the APTw signal is a surrogate imaging marker for identifying IDH mutation status preoperatively. Methods Twenty-seven patients with pathologically confirmed low-grade glioma, who were previously scanned at 3T, were retrospectively analyzed. The Mann-Whitney test was used to evaluate relationships between APTw intensities for IDH-mutant and IDH-wildtype groups, and receiver operator characteristic (ROC) analysis was used to assess the diagnostic performance of APTw. Results Based on histopathology and molecular analysis, seven cases were diagnosed as IDH-wildtype grade II gliomas and 20 cases as IDH-mutant grade II gliomas. The maximum and minimum APTw values, based on multiple regions of interest, as well as the whole-tumor histogram-based mean and 50th percentile APTw values, were significantly higher in the IDH-wildtype gliomas than in the IDH-mutant groups. This corresponded to the areas under the ROC curves of 0.89, 0.76, 0.75, and 0.75, respectively, for the prediction of the IDH mutation status. Conclusion IDH-wildtype lesions typically were associated with relatively high APTw signal intensities as compared with IDH-mutant lesions. The APTw signal could be a valuable imaging biomarker by which to identify IDH1 mutation status in grade II gliomas. Magn Reson Med, 2017. © 2017 International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine.

Description: For scientific and sustainable management of water resources, hydrologic and meteorologic data series need to be often extended. This paper proposes a hybrid approach, named WA-CM (Wavelet Analysis-Cloud Model), for data series extension. Wavelet analysis has time-frequency localization features, known as ‘mathematics microscope,’ that can decompose and reconstruct hydrologic and meteorologic series by wavelet transform. The cloud model is a mathematical representation of fuzziness and randomness, and has strong robustness for uncertain data. The WA-CM approach first employs the wavelet transform to decompose the measured non-stationary series and then uses the cloud model to develop an extension model for each decomposition layer series. The final extension is obtained by summing the results of extension of each layer. Two kinds of meteorologic and hydrologic data sets with different characteristics and different influence of human activity from 6 (3 pairs) representative stations are used to illustrate the WA-CM approach. The approach is also compared with four other methods, which are conventional Correlation Extension (CE) method, Kendall-Theil Robust Line method (KTRL), Artificial Neural Network (ANN) method (BP, MLP and RBF), and single Cloud Model (CM) method. To evaluate the model performance completely and thoroughly, five measures are used, which are RE, MRE, SD-RE, RMSE and TIC. Results show that the WA-CM approach is effective, feasible and accurate, and is found to be better than other four methods compared. The theory employed and the approach developed here can be applied to extension of data in other areas as well.

Description: The in vivo flow cytometry (IVFC) is now a powerful technique in biomedical research, especially for tracking specific cells in circulatory system. The current fluorescence-based IVFC is limited to visible spectrum, while near infrared (NIR) dyes have their advantages, such as deeper penetration, less absorption and less scattering for NIR fluorescence. Here, using an NIR in vivo flow cytometer with a 785 nm laser excitation, the measurement of fluorescent dye IR-780 labeled circulating cells is demonstrated. Representative peaks corresponding to NIR fluorescent circulating cells are detected and quantified. In addition, blood flow information, including the blood flow velocity and flow volume per unit time, is obtained. By simultaneous detection of IR-780 and enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) signals from dual labeled cells, the IR-780 is shown to be a suitable fluorescent dye for multicolor detection by IVFC, including NIR. Thus, the IVFC is extended to the NIR range and shows potential application in biomedical research. © 2015 International Society for Advancement of Cytometry

Description: Stem cell therapy has attracted increasing attention as a promising treatment strategy for cardiac repair in ischemic heart disease. Nanoparticles (NPs), with their superior physical and chemical properties, have been widely utilized to assist stem cell therapy. With the help of NPs, stem cells can be genetically engineered for enhanced paracrine profile. To further understand the fate and behaviors of stem cells in ischemic myocardium, imaging NPs can label stem cells and be tracked in vivo under multiple modalities. Besides that, NPs can also be used to enhance stem cell retention in myocardium. These facts have raised efforts on the development of more intelligent and multifunctional NPs for cellular application. Herein, an overview of the applications of NPs-assisted stem cell therapy is given. Key issues and future prospects are also critically addressed.

Description: The discovery of natural gas reservoirs with high and varying CO 2 content (5% to 98%) in China has attracted worldwide attention. In this paper, the phase diagram of natural gas with different CO 2 content was calculated and drawn by PVT Sim 100 which was fitted by experimental data based on the Ruska PVT 2730 apparatus. Both the real critical parameters and the pseudo-critical para­meters were calculated and compared. Also, the phase state of natural gas along the wellbore in a representative well under both shut-in and flowing conditions was analyzed. In addition, to clarifying the phase transition process, videos of a gas sample showed variation between supercritical state to gas-liquid state with isobaric cooling and heating up between 35°C and 25°C. Moreover, the compressibility factor (Z-factor) of the natural gas with different CO 2 content was chosen as one of the key physical parameters of natural gas to measure at pressures ranging from atmospheric pressure to 45 MPa and temperatures ranging from 40°C to 140°C experimentally. Results show that the Z factor decreases with the increase of CO 2 content in natural gas at isothermal conditions, and increases with the increase of temperature. Furthermore, a new model is proposed to predict pressure and Z factor. The varying CO 2 -CH 4 concentrations of this reservoir are relevant to gas compositions which may arise in depleted natural gas reservoirs used for geologic carbon sequestration. © 2015 Society of Chemical Industry and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

Description: Purpose To determine whether intravoxel incoherent motion (IVIM) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) could detect parotid gland abnormalities in Sjögren's syndrome (SS) patients who were not identified by conventional MRI. Materials and Methods Ten consecutive patients with clinically proven SS who were not identified by conventional MRI were assessed by IVIM MRI with a 3.0T MRI scanner. Quantitative parameters (tissue diffusivity, D; pseudodiffusion coefficient, D*; perfusion fraction, f) derived from IVIM MRI were compared between the SS group and healthy control group ( n  = 15). A receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was used to evaluate the diagnostic value of each significant parameter. Results Excellent inter- and intrareader agreements were obtained during the measurement of D, f, and D* values (interreader, 0.980, 0.942, and 0.883; intrareader, 0.991, 0.952, and 0.896, respectively). All three parameters of the SS group were significantly higher than those of the healthy group (D, 1.049 ± 0.056 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s vs. 0.976 ± 0.116 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s, P  = 0.012; D*, 20.410 ± 1.786 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s vs. 18.764 ± 2.433 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s, P  = 0.013; f, 0.207 ± 0.003 vs. 0.182 ± 0.002, P  = 0.004). ROC analysis showed that the f value had the best diagnostic performance (AUC, 0.712; Sensitivity, 0.80; Specificity, 0.57; Cutoff value, 0.185) in detecting the parotid gland abnormalities in early SS patients. Conclusion IVIM MRI detected parotid gland abnormalities in early-stage SS patients. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2015.

Description: We propose to measure the HZγ and Hγγ anomalous couplings in the process e + e − → Hγ with the sequential decay of H → bb̄. The discovery potential of observing the anomalous couplings are explored in detail. Our study shows that future electron-positron colliders have great potential to test the HZγ and Hγγ couplings. Conservative bounds on the two anomalous couplings are also derived when no new physics signal is detected on top of the SM backgrounds.

Description: Raman spectroscopy and nonisothermal thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) measurements have been reported for different rank coals (lignite, bituminous coal, and anthracite) and the relationship between the measurements was examined. It was found that the Raman spectra parameters can be used to characterize structure changes in the different rank coals, such as the band area ratios based on the curve-fitted results. Higher ranked coal was found to have higher values of and but lower values of , , , and . The oxidation properties of the coal samples were characterized by the reactivity indexes , , and from TGA data which were found to correlate well with the band area ratios of , , and . Based on these correlations, the Raman band area ratios were found to correlate with the oxidation activity of coal providing additional structural information which can be used to understand the changes in the TGA measurements.

Description: Erigeron multiradiatus (Lindl.) Benth. has been used in Tibet folk medicine to treat various inflammatory diseases. The aim of this study was to investigate antimyocardial ischemia and reperfusion (I/R) injury effect of caffeoylquinic acids derivatives of E. multiradiatus (AE) in vivo and to explain underling mechanism. AE was prepared using the whole plant of E. multiradiatus and contents of 6 caffeoylquinic acids determined through HPLC analysis. Myocardial I/R was induced by left anterior descending coronary artery occlusion for 30 minutes followed by 24 hours of reperfusion in rats. AE administration (10, 20, and 40 mg/kg) inhibited I/R-induced injury as indicated by decreasing myocardial infarct size, reducing of CK and LDH activities, and preventing ST-segment depression in dose-dependent manner. AE decreased cardiac tissue levels of proinflammatory factors TNF-α and IL-6 and attenuated leukocytes infiltration. AE was further demonstrated to significantly inhibit I-κB degradation, nuclear translocation of p-65 and phosphorylation of JNK. Our results suggested that cardioprotective effect of AE could be due to suppressing myocardial inflammatory response and blocking NF-κB and JNK activation pathway. Thus, caffeoylquinic acids might be the active compounds in E. multiradiatus on myocardial ischemia and be a potential natural drug for treating myocardial I/R injury.