A Spatial-Temporal Video Quality Assessment Method via Comprehensive HVS Simulation.

The quality of videos is the primary concern of video service providers. Built upon deep neural networks, video quality assessment (VQA) has rapidly progressed. Although existing works have introduced the knowledge of the human visual system (HVS) into VQA, there are still some limitations that hinder the full exploitation of HVS, including incomplete modeling with few HVS characteristics and insufficient connection among these characteristics. In this article, we present a novel spatial-temporal VQA method termed HVS-5M, wherein we design five modules to simulate five characteristics of HVS and create a bioinspired connection among these modules in a cooperative manner. Specifically, on the side of the spatial domain, the visual saliency module first extracts a saliency map. Then, the content-dependency and the edge masking modules extract the content and edge features, respectively, which are both weighted by the saliency map to highlight those regions that human beings may be interested in. On the other side of the temporal domain, the motion perception module extracts the dynamic temporal features. Besides, the temporal hysteresis module simulates the memory mechanism of human beings and comprehensively evaluates the video quality according to the fusion features from the spatial and temporal domains. Extensive experiments show that our HVS-5M outperforms the state-of-the-art VQA methods. Ablation studies are further conducted to verify the effectiveness of each module toward the proposed method. The source code is available at https://github.com/GZHU-DVL/HVS-5M.

Emerging catalysts for the ambient synthesis of ethylene glycol from CO2 and its derivatives.

Ethylene glycol (EG), a useful chemical raw material, has been widely applied in many aspects of modern society. The conventional preparation of ethylene glycol mainly uses the petroleum route at high temperatures and pressure. More and more approaches have been developed to synthesize EG from CO2 and its derivatives under mild conditions. In this review, the ambient synthesis of EG from thermocatalysis, photocatalysis, and electrocatalysis is highlighted. The coal-to-ethylene glycol technology, one of the typical thermal catalysis routes for EG preparation, is relatively mature. However, it still faces some problems to be solved in industrialization. The recent progress in the development of coal-to-ethylene glycol technology is introduced. The main focus is on how to realize the preparation of EG under mild conditions. The strategies include doping promoters, modification of supports, design of catalysts with special structures, etc. Furthermore, the emerging technological progress of photocatalytic and electrocatalytic ethylene glycol synthesis under ambient conditions is introduced. Compared with the thermal catalytic reaction, the reaction conditions are milder. However, there are still many problems in large-scale production. Finally, we propose future development issues and related prospects for the ambient synthesis of EG using different catalytic routes.

Boosting Activity and Selectivity of UiO-66 through Acidity/Alkalinity Functionalization in Dimethyl Carbonate Catalysis.

The acid-base properties of supports have an enormous impact on catalytic reactions to regulate the selectivity and activity of supported catalysts. Herein, a train of Pd-X-UiO-66 (X = NO2 , NH2 , and CH3 ) catalysts with different acidity/alkalinity functional groups and encapsulated Pd(II) species is first developed, whose activities in dimethyl carbonate (DMC) catalysis are then investigated in details. Thereinto, the Pd-NO2 -UiO-66 catalyst with acidity functionalization exhibits the best catalytic behavior: the DMC selectivity stemmed from methyl nitrite (MN) is up to 68%, the conversion of CO is 73.4%. The obtained experimental results demonstrate that the NO2 group not only affected the interaction between X-UiO-66 and Pd(II) active sites but also play an indispensable role in the adsorption and activation of MN and CO, which remarkably promote the formation of the COOCH3 * intermediate and DMC product.

Pig farm biogas slurry can effectively reduce the pH of saline-alkali soils.

Pig farm biogas slurry is being increasingly used as a potent organic fertilizer for sustainable agriculture under circular economy. However, the effect of biogas slurry on soil pH is currently controversial, and the underlying mechanisms especially in saline-alkali soils are not well understood. A saline-alkali soil (pH = 9.2, EC = 2.0 ms/cm) was selected for soil column (0-50 cm) experiments with (BS) and without (CK) addition of pig farm biogas slurry to investigate the soil pH change and its driving factors. Our results show that the soil pH under CK ranged between 9.1 and 9.5 across different soil depths. Compared to CK, the BS-treated soil had lower pH at 0-20 cm depth and higher pH at 20-30 cm depth (P < 0.01). The soil NH4+-N concentrations were negatively correlated with pH values under BS (P < 0.01), indicating that the oxidation of ammonium mainly contributed to the decrease of soil pH. Interestingly, the anions, such as Cl-, SO42- and NO3-, were accumulated in the topsoil (0-20 cm) under BS, resulting in the changed correlations of these anions with Na+ when compared to the control. FT-IR and 13C-NMR spectra uncovered that carboxyl, amide C, and total alkyl C groups may be responsible for reducing pH of the saline-alkali soil tested. The soil surface morphology confirmed a much tighter granular aggregate microstructure when mixing the biogas slurry with the soil. Overall, we concluded that from the perspective of soil pH, the utilization of biogas slurry for improving saline-alkali soil is feasible and sustainable.

Ambient-pressure synthesis of ethylene glycol catalyzed by C60-buffered Cu/SiO2.

Bulk chemicals such as ethylene glycol (EG) can be industrially synthesized from either ethylene or syngas, but the latter undergoes a bottleneck reaction and requires high hydrogen pressures. We show that fullerene (exemplified by C60) can act as an electron buffer for a copper-silica catalyst (Cu/SiO2). Hydrogenation of dimethyl oxalate over a C60-Cu/SiO2 catalyst at ambient pressure and temperatures of 180° to 190°C had an EG yield of up to 98 ± 1%. In a kilogram-scale reaction, no deactivation of the catalyst was seen after 1000 hours. This mild route for the final step toward EG can be combined with the already-industrialized ambient reaction from syngas to the intermediate of dimethyl oxalate.

[Research progress on genus Clinopodium].

The plants of genus Clinopodium are perennial herbs of Labiatae, which are widely distributed in the world and have a promising medicinal value. Modern researches have shown flavonoids, triterpenoid saponins, terpene glycosides, terpenoids, volatile oils and phenylpropanoids are the main compounds in the plants, presenting various pharmacological effects such as hemostasis, anti-bacteria, anti-inflammation, immunoregulation, reducing blood glucose, antioxidation, and anti-tumor effects. The preparations made of those plants are mainly used for treatment of various bleeding diseases in clinical application. In this review, we systematically summarized the research progress on taxonomy, resource distribution, chemical compositions, pharmacological activities, and clinical application of the medicinal plants of genus Clinopodium. This review provides references and scientific basis for further research and development of genus Clinopodium.

CO2 hydrogenation to high-value products via heterogeneous catalysis.

Recently, carbon dioxide capture and conversion, along with hydrogen from renewable resources, provide an alternative approach to synthesis of useful fuels and chemicals. People are increasingly interested in developing innovative carbon dioxide hydrogenation catalysts, and the pace of progress in this area is accelerating. Accordingly, this perspective presents current state of the art and outlook in synthesis of light olefins, dimethyl ether, liquid fuels, and alcohols through two leading hydrogenation mechanisms: methanol reaction and Fischer-Tropsch based carbon dioxide hydrogenation. The future research directions for developing new heterogeneous catalysts with transformational technologies, including 3D printing and artificial intelligence, are provided.

Impact of cross-correlated sine-Wiener noises in the gene transcriptional regulatory system.

We studied fluctuation-induced switching processes in the gene transcriptional regulatory system under cross-correlated sine-Wiener (CCSW) noises. It is numerically demonstrated that the increase of the multiplicative noise intensity A and cross-correlation time τ in CCSW noises can reduce the concentration of the TF-A monomer and switch to an "off" state. In addition, when the cross-correlation time τ is small, the increase of the additive noise intensity B leads to a switch of the process from "off"→"on". Simultaneously, the increase of the cross-correlation intensity λ of CCSW noises contributes to maintaining the current state. When the cross-correlation time is large, the high concentration state has two peaks and the stationary probability distribution presents a three-peak structure.

Transportation Spherical Watermarking.

During the past twenty years, there has been a great interest in the study of spread spectrum (SS) watermarking. However, it is still a challenging task to design a secure and robust SS watermarking method. In this paper, we first define a family of secure SS watermarking methods, named as spherical watermarking (SW). The watermarked correlation of SW is defined to be uniformly distributed on a spherical surface, and this makes SW be key-secure against the watermarked-only attack. Then, we propose an implementation of SW, called transportation SW (TSW), which is designed to decrease embedding distortion in a recursive manner using the transportation theory, meanwhile keeping the security of SW. Moreover, we present a theoretical analysis of the embedding distortion and robustness of the proposed method. Finally, extensive experiments are conducted on simulated signals and real images. The experimental results show that TSW is more robust than existing secure SS watermarking methods.

[Expression of Extracellular Matrix Protein Reelin in Patients with Multiple Myeloma and Its Relationship with Prognosis].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the expression of extracellular matrix protein Reelin (RELN) and its relationship with the prognosis of patients with multiple myeloma. METHODS: The mononuclear cells were collected from bone marrows of multiple myeloma patients by Ficoll gradient density centrifugation, the CD138+ cells were then purified by flow cytometry, the mRNA level of RELN was detected by real time PCR. The myeloma patients were divided into 2 groups according to the relative expression levels of RELN. Then the relationship of RELN expression level with clinical data was analyzed statistically. RESULTS: The high expression of RELN significantly correlated with the percentage of CD138+ cells, progress-free and total survival, but did not correlate significantly with DS (P>0.05) and ISS stages (P>0.05). The RELN high expression group showed higher levels of serum M protein, uric acid and serum calcium, lower hemoglobin, and more abnormal FISH results (including RB1 deletion, 1q21 amplification, IgH recombination, P53 deletion, D13S319 deletion) than those in RELN low expression group. CONCLUSION: Reelin correlates with the progression of multiple myeloma.