[Characteristics of Pollution and Microbial Community Structure in the Antimony Mining Area of Longnan, Gansu Province].

Antimony （Sb） is a major pollutant that poses a serious threat to the environment in the mining and processing of nonferrous metals, coexisting with sulfide and oxide of arsenic （As）. Microorganisms play an important role in the migration, transformation, and repair of metals in soil. The ecological effects of bioavailable Sb and As on the microbial community in antimony mining areas（mining and smelting areas）are still poorly understood. The Wenzel method and high-throughput 16S rDNA amplicon were used to characterize soil pollution characteristics in different functional areas, and the relationship between the bacterial community and bioavailable concentrations have been investigated comprehensively. The results showed that： Chemical speciation of Sb and As were amorphous, and poorly crystalline hydrous oxides of Fe and Al （F3） > well-crystallized hydrous oxides of Fe and Al （F4） > residual phases （F5） > specifically adsorbed （F2） > non-specifically adsorbed （F1）. According to the estimation of the potential ecological risk index （RI） and geo-accumulation index （Igeo）, the Sb pollution degree was： smelting area > mining area > contrast area, in which the smelting area showed serious pollution, and the mining area showed moderate to severe pollution. The As pollution degree was： mining area > smelting area > contrast area, in which the mining area and smelting area showed moderate to severe pollution. High-throughput 16S rDNA amplicon showed that Proteobacteria was the most abundant phylum in mining and smelting areas； Kaistobacter, Pseudomonas, Sphingomonas, and Lysobacter were the most abundant microbial genera； Geobacter and Luteolibacter had a high LDA score in mining areas； and Thiobacillus had a high LDA score in antimony-contaminated areas. Spearman correlation analysis, variation partitioning analysis （VPA）, and random forest （RF） analysis showed that Sb, As, bioavailable antimony [Sb （Bio）], and bioavailable arsenic [As （Bio）]were the main factors affecting the microbial community structure in different functional areas of antimony ore. Redundancy analysis （RDA） indicated that Sb and its bioavailable concentrations showed uniformly negative associations with the relative abundance of bacteria Nitrospirae and showed a significant positive correlation with Thiobacillus （P<0.05）. The in-depth research on the ecological effects of bioavailable Sb and As on the bacterial community provides references and new perspectives for environmental monitoring and management.

Crystallization-Inspired Design and Modeling of Self-Assembly Lattice-Formation Swarm Robotics.

Self-assembly formation is a key research topic for realizing practical applications in swarm robotics. Due to its inherent complexity, designing high-performance self-assembly formation strategies and proposing corresponding macroscopic models remain formidable challenges and present an open research frontier. Taking inspiration from crystallization, this paper introduces a distributed self-assembly formation strategy by defining free, moving, growing, and solid states for robots. Robots in these states can spontaneously organize into user-specified two-dimensional shape formations with lattice structures through local interactions and communications. To address the challenges posed by complex spatial structures in modeling a macroscopic model, this work introduces the structural features estimation method. Subsequently, a corresponding non-spatial macroscopic model is developed to predict and analyze the self-assembly behavior, employing the proposed estimation method and a stock and flow diagram. Real-robot experiments and simulations validate the flexibility, scalability, and high efficiency of the proposed self-assembly formation strategy. Moreover, extensive experimental and simulation results demonstrate the model's accuracy in predicting the self-assembly process under different conditions. Model-based analysis indicates that the proposed self-assembly formation strategy can fully utilize the performance of individual robots and exhibits strong self-stability.

[Simulation of land use and assessment of ecosystem service value in the eastern coastal cities of Zhejiang Province, China]. / 浙江东部沿海城市土地利用模拟及生态系统服务价值评估.

Simulating the change of ecosystem service values (ESV) caused by land use/cover change (LUCC) in the eastern coastal cities of Zhejiang Province is of great significance for regional sustainable development and ecological security. Based on remote sensing images of land use and Statistics Yearbook of 2000, 2010, and 2020, we analyzed the influence of LUCC on ESV in the study area during 2000-2020. We used the PLUS model to simulate land use change under three scenarios, including inertial development, ecological protection, and urban development in 2030, analyzed the spatial distribution and concentration degree of ESVs based on grid scale, and clarified the sensitivity characteristics of ESVs. The results showed that the construction land area showed an increasing trend during 2000-2020. The area of forest, cultivated land and water decreased significantly, resulting in a continuous downward trend of ESVs, which decreased by 160×108 yuan. Under the simulation of three scenarios of inertial development, ecological development, and urban development, the construction land area would increase by 93624, 54927, and 111966 hm2, respectively. The eastern plain would become the agglomeration area of construction land expansion. The ESVs of those three scenarios was 1693×108, 1729×108, and 1688×108 yuan, respectively, which were all lower than the ESVs of the study area in 2020. The decline rate of ESV in the ecological protection scenario slowed down. The spatial distribution of ESVs in the study area was high in the west and low in the east. Hot spots and cold spots of ESVs were distributed in a large range with strong agglomeration. Hot spots were mainly concentrated in the west, while cold spots were mainly distributed in the east and north.

Biodegradability enhancement of waste lubricating oil regeneration wastewater using electrocoagulation pretreatment.

As a sustainable management of fossil fuel resources and ecological environment protection, recycling used lubricating oil has received widespread attention. However, large amounts of waste lubricating-oil regeneration wastewater (WLORW) are inevitably produced in the recycling process, and challenges are faced by traditional biological treatment of WLORW. Thus, this study investigated the effectiveness of electrocoagulation (EC) as pretreatment and its removal mechanism. The electrolysis parameters (current density, initial pH, and inter-electrode distance) were considered, and maximal 60.06% of oil removal was achieved at a current density of 15 mA/cm2, initial pH of 7, and an inter-electrode distance of 2 cm. The dispersed oil of WLORW was relatively easily removed, and most of the oil removal was contributed by emulsified oil within 5-10 µm. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis revealed that effective removal of the biorefractory organic compounds could contribute to the improvement of biodegradability of WLORW. Thus, the 5-day biochemical oxygen demand/chemical oxygen demand ratio (BOD5/COD) was significantly enhanced by 4.31 times, which highly benefits future biological treatment. The routes of WLORW removal could be concluded as charge neutralization, adsorption bridging, sweep flocculation, and air flotation. The results demonstrate that EC has potential as an effective pretreatment technology for WLORW biological treatment.

Fluoxetine inactivates STAT3/NF-κB signaling and promotes sensitivity to cisplatin in bladder cancer.

Bladder cancer is known as one of the top ten most common cancer types worldwide and can be majorly divided into muscles invasive bladder cancer (MIBC) and non-muscles invasive type (NMIBC). However, the prognosis of BC remains poor under standard treatment including radical cystectomy or concurrent chemoradiotherapy. Numerous studies have reported that the prognosis of BC is associated with the activation of signal transducer and activator of transcription (STAT3) and nuclear factor kappa-B (NF-κB). Fluoxetine, a well-known anti-depressant, has been reported to against various type of cancers. However, it is unclear whether fluoxetine has the capacity to inhibit BC progression by targeting STAT3 and NF-κB-mediated signaling. Here, we used cell viability, apoptosis assay, wound healing assay, invasion/migration assay, Western blotting assay, immunofluorescence staining, as well as animal experiments, to elucidate the efficacy of fluoxetine on in vitro and in vivo BC models. We found that fluoxetine may induce cytotoxicity and intrinsic/extrinsic apoptosis in BC and enhance the potential of cisplatin. Fluoxetine promoted both caspase-dependent and caspase-independent apoptosis signaling by activating caspase-3, 8, 9, apoptosis-inducing factor (AIF), and EndG. Furthermore, fluoxetine suppressed invasion and migration ability and the expression of metastasis-associated genes. Fluoxetine was also found to inactivate the phosphorylation of STAT3 (Tyr705) and NF-κB (Ser536) and suppress the nuclear translocation of NF-κB. In MB49-bearing mice, fluoxetine effectively delayed the progression of BC without inducing general toxicity. In summary, the induction of apoptosis and the inhibition of invasion triggered by fluoxetine are associated with the inactivation of STAT3 and NF-κB.

Fast Helmet and License Plate Detection Based on Lightweight YOLOv5.

The integrated fast detection technology for electric bikes, riders, helmets, and license plates is of great significance for maintaining traffic safety. YOLOv5 is one of the most advanced single-stage object detection algorithms. However, it is difficult to deploy on embedded systems, such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), with limited memory and computing resources because of high computational load and high memory requirements. In this paper, a lightweight YOLOv5 model (SG-YOLOv5) is proposed for the fast detection of the helmet and license plate of electric bikes, by introducing two mechanisms to improve the original YOLOv5. Firstly, the YOLOv5s backbone network and the Neck part are lightened by combining the two lightweight networks, ShuffleNetv2 and GhostNet, included. Secondly, by adopting an Add-based feature fusion method, the number of parameters and the floating-point operations (FLOPs) are effectively reduced. On this basis, a scene-based non-truth suppression method is proposed to eliminate the interference of pedestrian heads and license plates on parked vehicles, and then the license plates of the riders without helmets can be located through the inclusion relation of the target boxes and can be extracted. To verify the performance of the SG-YOLOv5, the experiments are conducted on a homemade RHNP dataset, which contains four categories: rider, helmet, no-helmet, and license plate. The results show that, the SG-YOLOv5 has the same mean average precision (mAP0.5) as the original; the number of model parameters, the FLOPs, and the model file size are reduced by 90.8%, 80.5%, and 88.8%, respectively. Additionally, the number of frames per second (FPS) is 2.7 times higher than that of the original. Therefore, the proposed SG-YOLOv5 can effectively achieve the purpose of lightweight and improve the detection speed while maintaining great detection accuracy.

An immediate-return reinforcement learning for the atypical Markov decision processes.

The atypical Markov decision processes (MDPs) are decision-making for maximizing the immediate returns in only one state transition. Many complex dynamic problems can be regarded as the atypical MDPs, e.g., football trajectory control, approximations of the compound Poincaré maps, and parameter identification. However, existing deep reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms are designed to maximize long-term returns, causing a waste of computing resources when applied in the atypical MDPs. These existing algorithms are also limited by the estimation error of the value function, leading to a poor policy. To solve such limitations, this paper proposes an immediate-return algorithm for the atypical MDPs with continuous action space by designing an unbiased and low variance target Q-value and a simplified network framework. Then, two examples of atypical MDPs considering the uncertainty are presented to illustrate the performance of the proposed algorithm, i.e., passing the football to a moving player and chipping the football over the human wall. Compared with the existing deep RL algorithms, such as deep deterministic policy gradient and proximal policy optimization, the proposed algorithm shows significant advantages in learning efficiency, the effective rate of control, and computing resource usage.

Modified low-dose second window indocyanine green technique improves near-infrared fluorescence image-guided dermatofibrosarcoma protuberans resection: A randomized control trial.

Objective: Conventional second window indocyanine green (SWIG) technique has been widely attempted in near-infrared fluorescence (NIRF) imaging for intraoperative navigation of tumor radical resection. Nevertheless, the overuse of indocyanine green (ICG) led to an increased risk of drug lethal allergy and high medical cost. This prospective study was to explore clinical application of modified low-dose SWIG technique in guiding dermatofibrosarcoma protuberans (DFSPs) radical resection. Method: Patients with DFSPs were randomly assigned to control and experimental group. The ICG was injected intravenously 24 h before surgery, at a dose of 3.5 mg/kg in the control group and 25 mg/patient in the experiment group, respectively. Intraoperative NIRF imaging included serial views of gross tumor, tumor bed and cross-sectional specimen. Results: Although NIRF imaging of gross tumor and tumor bed in the experimental group demonstrated similar sensitivity and negative predictive value, the specificity and positive predictive value were obviously higher compared to control group. The tumor-to-background ratios of cross-sectional specimens in the experimental group was significantly higher than in the control group (P = 0.000). Data in both groups displayed that there was a positive correlation of tumor size in cross-sections between integrated histopathologic photomicrographs and NIRF imaging of specimen views (P = 0.000). NIRF imaging of cross-sectional specimens had a significant decrease in time cost, and an increase in the ability of examining more surgical margins (P = 0.000). Conclusion: This is the first study to demonstrate that a low-dose SWIG technique could improve the accuracy of near-infrared fluorescence image-guided dermatofibrosarcoma protuberans resection.Clinical Trial Registration: ChiCTR2100050174; date of registration: August 18, 2021 followed by "retrospectively registered".

Plant extracellular vesicles: A novel bioactive nanoparticle for tumor therapy.

Extracellular vesicles are tiny lipid bilayer-enclosed membrane particles, including apoptotic bodies, micro vesicles, and exosomes. Organisms of all life forms can secrete extracellular vesicles into their surrounding environment, which serve as important communication tools between cells and between cells and the environment, and participate in a variety of physiological processes. According to new evidence, plant extracellular vesicles play an important role in the regulation of transboundary molecules with interacting organisms. In addition to carrying signaling molecules (nucleic acids, proteins, metabolic wastes, etc.) to mediate cellular communication, plant cells External vesicles themselves can also function as functional molecules in the cellular microenvironment across cell boundaries. This review introduces the source and extraction of plant extracellular vesicles, and attempts to clarify its anti-tumor mechanism by summarizing the current research on plant extracellular vesicles for disease treatment. We speculate that the continued development of plant extracellular vesicle-based therapeutic and drug delivery platforms will benefit their clinical applications.

A circadian rhythm-related gene signature for predicting relapse risk and immunotherapeutic effect in prostate adenocarcinoma.

Prostate adenocarcinoma (PRAD) represents the most common male carcinoma in developed countries, its high relapse risk contributes to the second-leading cause of cancer-related deaths. Therefore, it is required to develop an effective signature for predicting the relapse risk of PRAD. To identify a circadian rhythm- (CR-) related predictive signature, we analyzed RNA-seq data of patients with prostate adenocarcinoma (PRAD) from the TCGA and GEO cohort. Seven circadian rhythm- (CR-) related genes (FBXL22, MTA1, TP53, RORC, DRD4, PPARGC1A, ZFHX3) were eventually identified to develop a CR-related signature. AUCs for 3-year overall survival were 0.852, 0.856 and 0.944 in the training set, validation set and an external independent test set (GSE70768), respectively. Kaplan-Meier curve analysis showed that the high-risk group has a reduced relapse-free survival (RFS) than the low-risk group in the training set, validation set, and test set, respectively (P < 0.05). We constructed a prognostic nomogram combining the CR-related signature with T staging to precisely estimate relapse risk of PRAD patients. Finally, we observed that the CR-related gene signature was associated with tumor mutation burden, multiple immune checkpoint molecules and microsatellite instability, and thus could predict response to immune checkpoint inhibitors in PRAD. Conclusively, we developed a circadian rhythm-related gene signature for predicting RFS and immunotherapy efficacy in prostate adenocarcinoma.

Stem cells from human exfoliated deciduous teeth attenuate trigeminal neuralgia in rats by inhibiting endoplasmic reticulum stress.

Background: The treatment of trigeminal neuralgia remains a challenging issue. Stem cells from human exfoliated deciduous teeth (SHED) provide optimized therapy for chronic pain. This study aimed to investigate the mechanisms underlying the attenuation of trigeminal neuralgia by SHED. Methods: Trigeminal neuralgia was induced by chronic constriction injury of the infraorbital nerve. The mechanical threshold was assessed after model establishment and local SHED transplantation. Endoplasmic reticulum (ER) morphology and Caspase12 expression in trigeminal ganglion (TG) was evaluated as well. BiP expression was observed in PC12 cells induced by tunicamycin. Results: The local transplantation of SHED could relieve trigeminal neuralgia in rats. Further, transmission electron microscopy revealed swelling of the ER in rats with trigeminal neuralgia. Moreover, SHED inhibited the tunicamycin-induced up-regulated expression of BiP mRNA and protein in vitro. Additionally, SHED decreased the up-regulated expression of Caspase12 mRNA and protein in the TG of rats caused by trigeminal neuralgia after chronic constriction injury of the infraorbital nerve mode. Conclusions: This findings demonstrated that SHED could alleviate pain by relieving ER stress which provide potential basic evidence for clinical pain treatment.

STAT3 Inactivation and Induction of Apoptosis Associate With Fluoxetine-inhibited Epithelial-mesenchymal Transition and Growth of Triple-negative Breast Cancer In Vivo.

BACKGROUND/AIM: Breast cancer (BC) is the most common cancer and second leading cause of death in women worldwide. Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is the most aggressive type of BC, while the treatment option is limited and has long been considered as a major unmet need. Meta-analysis indicated the anti-tumor potential of anti-depressants, especially selective serotonin-reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). The SSRI fluoxetine has been shown to suppress BC and ovarian cancer cell growth; however, whether it suppresses tumor progression in vivo is unclear. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We established an 4T1 bearing animal model, an orthotopic TNBC model, to identify the mechanism and therapeutic efficacy of fluoxetine. RESULTS: Tumor growth evaluated by caliper and computed tomography scan demonstrated the inhibition effect by fluoxetine treatment. Immunohistochemistry showed that the expression of STAT3-mediated epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) proteins and apoptosis-related proteins was decreased. CONCLUSION: Fluoxetine may induce an anti-TNBC effect via inactivating STAT3 signaling transduction and triggering the caspase-mediated apoptotic pathway.

Double-type-I charge-injection heterostructure for quantum-dot light-emitting diodes.

Enforcing balanced electron-hole injection into the emitter layer of quantum-dot light-emitting diodes (QLEDs) remains key to maximizing the quantum efficiency over a wide current density range. This was previously thought not possible for quantum dot (QD) emitters because of their very deep energy bands. Here, we show using Mesolight® blue-emitting CdZnSeS/ZnS QDs as a model that its valence levels are in fact considerably shallower than the corresponding band maximum of the bulk semiconductor, which makes the ideal double-type-I injection/confinement heterostructure accessible using a variety of polymer organic semiconductors as transport and injection layers. We demonstrate flat external quantum efficiency characteristics that indicate near perfect recombination within the QD layer over several decades of current density from the onset of device turn-on of about 10 µA cm-2, for both normal and inverted QLED architectures. We also demonstrate that these organic semiconductors do not chemically degrade the QDs, unlike the usual ZnMgO nanoparticles. However, these more efficient injection heterostructures expose a new vulnerability of the QDs to in device electrochemical degradation. The work here opens a clear path towards next-generation ultra-high-performance, all-solution-processed QLEDs.

Carnation-like Morphology of BiVO4-7 Enables Sensitive Photoelectrochemical Determination of Cr(VI) in the Food and Environment.

Hexavalent chromium, namely, Cr(VI), is a significant threat to ecological and food safety. Current detection methods are not sensitive to Cr(VI). A photoelectrochemical (PEC) sensor based on bismuth vanadate (BiVO4) was developed for sensitive detection of Cr(VI). First, BiVO4-X (X: the pH of the reaction precursor solution) was synthesized using a facile surfactant-free hydrothermal method. The BiVO4-X morphology was well controlled according to pH values, showing rock-like (X = 1), wrinkled bark-like (X = 4), carnation-like (X = 7), and the collapsed sheet-like morphologies (X = 9, 12). BiVO4-7 exhibited excellent photoelectric performance due to a proper band structure under visible light and a large specific surface area. Then, BiVO4-7 was used to construct a PEC sensor to detect Cr(VI), which was demonstrated to have a low detection limit (10 nM) and wide detection range (2-210 µM). The BiVO4-7 PEC sensor had a stable output signal, as well as excellent reproducibility, repeatability, and selectivity. We used the BiVO4-7 PEC sensor to detect Cr(VI) in real environmental and food samples, resulting in a satisfactory recovery of 90.3-103.0%, as determined by comparison with results obtained using a spectrophotometric method. The BiVO4-7 PEC sensor is promising for practical application to heavy metal detection in the food and environment.

Regorafenib enhances antitumor immune efficacy of anti-PD-L1 immunotherapy on oral squamous cell carcinoma.

Oral squamous cells carcinoma (OSCC) is the most common oral malignancy that majorly originated from oral cavity. Though the prognostic and predictive value of targeting checkpoint molecules has been reported on OSCC, the treatment efficacy of monotherapy is remaining limited. Several studies suggested that multikinase inhibitors may show potential to facilitate anti-PD-L1-induced anti-tumor immunity. Regorafenib, an oral multikinase inhibitor has been approved by FDA for various types of cancer treatment. Here, we aim to identify whether regorafenib may boost anti-tumor immunity of anti-PD-L1 in MOC1-bearing OSCC animal model. The alteration of immune cells such as M1/M2-like macrophages (MΦ), cytotoxicity T cells, regulatory T cells (Tregs), and myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) after combination of anti-PD-L1 and regorafenib was validated by flow cytometry and immunohistochemistry staining. The combination index analysis (CI=0.89) supported that regorafenib effectively induce anti-OSCC efficacy of anti-PD-L1. Combination of anti-PD-L1 and regorafenib may not only trigger the polarization of M1-like MΦ (CD11b+CD86+) in mice bone marrow (BM) and spleen (SP), but also induce the accumulation and function of CD8+ T cells in tumor-draining lymph node (TDLN) and tumor. In addition, immunosuppressive related cells (MDSCs and Treg) and factors were all decreased by combination therapy in BM, SP and tumor. In sum, regorafenib may improve anti-OSCC efficacy of anti-PD-L1 through systemically and locally upregulating the immunostimulation immunity and suppressing immunosuppression immunity.

Four consecutive yearly point-prevalence studies in Wales indicate lack of improvement in sepsis care on the wards.

The 'Sepsis Six' bundle was promoted as a deliverable tool outside of the critical care settings, but there is very little data available on the progress and change of sepsis care outside the critical care environment in the UK. Our aim was to compare the yearly prevalence, outcome and the Sepsis Six bundle compliance in patients at risk of mortality from sepsis in non-intensive care environments. Patients with a National Early Warning Score (NEWS) of 3 or above and suspected or proven infection were enrolled into four yearly 24-h point prevalence studies, carried out in fourteen hospitals across Wales from 2016 to 2019. We followed up patients to 30 days between 2016-2019 and to 90 days between 2017 and 2019. Out of the 26,947 patients screened 1651 fulfilled inclusion criteria and were recruited. The full 'Sepsis Six' care bundle was completed on 223 (14.0%) occasions, with no significant difference between the years. On 190 (11.5%) occasions none of the bundle elements were completed. There was no significant correlation between bundle element compliance, NEWS or year of study. One hundred and seventy (10.7%) patients were seen by critical care outreach; the 'Sepsis Six' bundle was completed significantly more often in this group (54/170, 32.0%) than for patients who were not reviewed by critical care outreach (168/1385, 11.6%; p < 0.0001). Overall survival to 30 days was 81.7% (1349/1651), with a mean survival time of 26.5 days (95% CI 26.1-26.9) with no difference between each year of study. 90-day survival for years 2017-2019 was 74.7% (949/1271), with no difference between the years. In multivariate regression we identified older age, heart failure, recent chemotherapy, higher frailty score and do not attempt cardiopulmonary resuscitation orders as significantly associated with increased 30-day mortality. Our data suggests that despite efforts to increase sepsis awareness within the NHS, there is poor compliance with the sepsis care bundles and no change in the high mortality over the study period. Further research is needed to determine which time-sensitive ward-based interventions can reduce mortality in patients with sepsis and how can these results be embedded to routine clinical practice.Trial registration Defining Sepsis on the Wards ISRCTN 86502304 https://doi.org/10.1186/ISRCTN86502304 prospectively registered 09/05/2016.

Prognostic Significance of Serum PD-L1 Level in Patients with Locally Advanced or Metastatic Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma Treated with Combination Cytotoxic Chemotherapy.

BACKGROUND: There are no useful biomarkers for the clinical outcome of advanced esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). In this study, we aimed to investigate the prognostic value of soluble PD-L1 (sPD-L1) in serum of patients with locally advanced or metastatic ESCC who received cytotoxic chemotherapy as first-line treatment. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This study evaluated the expression pattern of PD-L1 by immunohistochemistry and sPD-L1 concentration, and correlation with clinicopathological factors and overall survival (OS) in 190 patients with ESCC. RESULTS: sPD-L1 concentration was highly expressed in ESCC, especially in female patients. Patients with a high sPD-L1 level (≥0.63 ng/mL) had a shorter OS than those with a low sPD-L1 level (<0.63 ng/mL). In a multivariate analysis, high sPD-L1 concentration remained an independent prognostic factor of OS after adjustment for possible confounders. However, tissue PD-L1 expression level was non-prognostic in this study. CONCLUSION: There was no significant correlation between serum sPD-L1 concentration and tissue PD-L1 expression level. sPD-L1 concentration before treatment could be an effective and convenient biomarker of prognosis in patients with locally advanced or metastatic ESCC treated with combination cytotoxic chemotherapy.

Enhancing anaerobic digestion process with addition of conductive materials.

Anaerobic digestion is widely used for the treatment of wastewater for its low costs and bioenergy production, but the performances of anaerobic digestion often need improving in practical applications. The addition of conductive materials could lead to direct interspecies electron transfer (DIET) among the anaerobic microorganisms, and consequently enhance the efficiencies of anaerobic digestion. In this paper, the effects of DIET via conductive materials on chemical organic demand (COD) removal, volatile fatty acid (VFA) consumption and methane production were reviewed. The reports on the increase of conductive microorganisms due to the addition of conductive materials were discussed. Results regarding activities of microorganisms and morphology and properties of sludge were described and commented, and future research needs were also proposed which included better understanding of the roles of DIET in each step of anaerobic digestion, mechanisms of metabolism of pollutants in DIET-established systems and inhibition of excessive dosage of conductive materials.

Inhibition of tetracycline on anaerobic digestion of swine wastewater.

The inhibition of tetracycline on anaerobic digestion of synthetic swine wastewater was examined with a semi-continuous operation for 103 days at a dosage ranging 2-8 mg/L. COD concentrations, VFA compositions in effluents and methane production were measured. The negative effects of tetracycline on the four individual steps of anaerobic digestion and its toxicity on anaerobic microorganisms were also evaluated. Results showed that continuous addition of 8 mg/L tetracycline in the bioreactor resulted in 73.28% reduction of daily methane production and made anaerobic digestion upset. Besides, methanogenesis was particularly inhibited compared to other three steps and the corresponding enzyme activities decreased by 66%. Furthermore, the polysaccharide contents in EPS increased after exposure to tetracycline, which could inhibit direct connections among microorganism. At last, long-term exposure to tetracycline inhibit anaerobic microbial activities and caused liberation of lactate dehydrogenase. The results would provide novel insights for anaerobic digestion of swine wastewater.