We investigated human understanding of different network visualizations in a large-scale online experiment. Three types of network visualizations were examined: node-link and two different sorting variants of matrix representations on a representative social network of either 20 or 50 nodes. Understanding of the network was quantified using task time and accuracy metrics on questions that were derived from an established task taxonomy. The sample size in our experiment was more than an order of magnitude larger (N = 600) than in previous research, leading to high statistical power and thus more precise estimation of detailed effects. Specifically, high statistical power allowed us to consider modern interaction capabilities as part of the evaluated visualizations, and to evaluate overall learning rates as well as ambient (implicit) learning. Findings indicate that participant understanding was best for the node-link visualization, with higher accuracy and faster task times than the two matrix visualizations. Analysis of participant learning indicated a large initial difference in task time between the node-link and matrix visualizations, with matrix performance steadily approaching that of the node-link visualization over the course of the experiment. This research is reproducible as the web-based module and results have been made available at: https://osf.io/qct84/.

We provide explicit and unified formulas for the cocycles of all degrees on the normalized bar resolutions of finite abelian groups. This is achieved by constructing a chain map from the normalized bar resolution to a Koszul-like resolution for any given finite abelian group. With a help of the obtained cocycle formulas, we determine all the braided linear Gr-categories and compute the Dijkgraaf–Witten Invariants of the n-torus for all n.

Multi-functions devices attract much attention due to their great potential and large demands in wearable electronics. Besides some studies of integrated different functional devices as one, there is a novel strategy to fabricate multi-functions devices, that using one device to achieve two or more functions. Herein, we report the temperature sensing and energy storage multi-functions device based on graphene supercapacitor. By measuring the change of leakage current of supercapacitor, the obtained device could detect the environmental temperature. Integrating the planar-structure supercapacitor on one flexible printed circuit board with electronic components together, the obtain device presents perfect mechanical stability that no noticeable difference of both capacitance and leakage current under any bending status. Importantly, the temperature sensing function exhibits a high accuracy of 1 °C with a high resolution of 0.0588 °C. This work demonstrates the feasibility of the strategy of one device achieve two functions: using one supercapacitor to achieve temperature sensing and energy storage dual function simultaneously.

The following paper investigates the prevalence and characteristics of asymptomatic norovirus infection in the population living around oyster farm sites. Two consecutive surveys were conducted from January 2014 to December 2014 and 4549 stool samples were screened during the same time period. The total asymptomatic infection rate was 4.04% (184/4549). Norovirus infection rate was 5.20% in oyster farming population which was significantly higher compared with non-farming population where the infection rate was 3.65% (χ2 = 5.49, P < 0.05). A total of 184 NoV positive samples were identified by real time-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) and semi-nested RT-PCR and 136 sequences were obtained. The sequences were clustered into 14 genotypes. GI strains were clustered into six genotypes, including GI.2, GI.3, GI.5, GI.6, GI.8 and GI.9; while GII strains were clustered into GII.2, GII.3, GII.4, GII.5, GII.6, GII.8 and GII.13. GI.9 and GII.17 were the predominant and most prevalent genotypes, respectively. The GII.17 genotype replaced GII.4 becoming the dominant genotype in the oyster farming area in 2014. To sum up, long-term monitoring of asymptomatic infection is crucial for the detection of new variant strains and for identifying outbreaks during the early stage.

Barium-rich silicates were recently found in the lower Cambrian black shale sequence of Anhui Province, South China. The Ba silicates can be divided into Ba-poor K-feldspar, Ba-rich K-feldspar and cymrite, on the basis of occurrence and composition. The Ba-poor K-feldspar have low BaO contents (<1.00 wt.%) and occur as sporadic grains in mudstone. In contrast, the Ba-rich K-feldspar have higher BaO contents (1.36–20.51 wt.%) and occur mainly as rims around grains of Ba-poor K-feldspar in mudstone, as void fillings in dolostone, and as grains dispersed in chert. The cymrite is observed only in chert and occurs as dispersed euhedral tabular crystals. Analyses of the Ba-poor K-feldspar and Ba-rich K-feldspar provide compositions that total <100 wt.% and show non-stoichiometry characterized by (Na + K + Ba + Ca)apfu less than 1.00 and (Al + Si)apfu slightly higher than 4.00. Raman and infrared (IR) spectroscopy has revealed the presence of ${\rm NH}_{\rm 4}^{\rm +} $ and H2O in the Ba-rich K-feldspar, which accounts for the unusual composition of these feldspars. We suggest that the formation processes of the Ba-poor K-feldspar, Ba-rich K-feldspar and cymrite were closely associated with multi-stage hydrothermal fluids enriched in Ba and NH4, consistent with an extensional tectonic setting during the early Cambrian. The Ba-poor K-feldspars might have formed through interactions between pre-existing K-feldspars and hydrothermal fluids. The Ba-rich K-feldspars in mudstone and dolostone formed mainly by precipitation from hydrothermal fluids that infiltrated the sediments, and we suggest the Ba-rich K-feldspars and cymrite in the chert are of exhalative hydrothermal origin.

Iron-deficiency anemia is a public health concern that frequently occurs in pregnant mammals and neonatal offspring. Ferrous N-carbamylglycinate chelate (Fe-CGly) is a newly designed iron fortifier with proven effects in iron-deficient rats and weanling piglets. However, the effects of this new compound on pregnant mammals are unknown. Therefore, this experiment was conducted to evaluate the effects of Fe-CGly on sow reproductive performance and iron status of both sows and neonatal piglets. A total of 40 large-white sows after second parity were randomly assigned to two groups (n=20). They were receiving a diet including 80 mg Fe/kg as FeSO4 or Fe-CGly, respectively, from day 85 of gestation to parturition. The serum (day 110 of pregnancy) and placentas of sows were sampled. Litter size, mean weight of live born piglets, birth (live) litter weight, number of live born piglets, and the number of still-born piglets, mummies, and weak-born piglets were recorded. Once delivered, eight litters were randomly selected from the 20 litters per treatment, and one new-born male piglet (1.503±0.142 kg) from each selected litter was slaughtered within 3 h after birth from the selected litters, without colostrum ingestion. The serum, longissimus muscle, liver and kidneys of the piglets were collected. The iron status of the serum samples and the messenger RNA level of iron-related genes in the placenta, liver and kidney were analyzed. The results showed that litter weight of live born piglets was higher (P=0.030) in the Fe-CGly group (19.86 kg) than in the FeSO4 group (17.34 kg). Fe-CGly significantly increased placental iron concentration (P<0.05) of sows. It also significantly increased iron saturation and reduced the total iron-binding capacity of piglets (P<0.05) at birth. However, the results revealed that supplementation of Fe-CGly in sows reduced liver and kidney iron concentration of neonatal piglets (P<0.05), indicating decreased iron storage. In addition, the concentration of iron in the colostrum was not significantly changed. Therefore, the present results suggested that replacement of maternal FeSO4 supplement with Fe-CGly in the late-gestating period for sows could improve litter birth weight, probably via enhanced iron transportation in the placenta.

Fluazifop-P-butyl, a selective graminicide, has been widely used to control annual grass weeds for more than three decades in Taiwan, and a resistant (R) biotype of goosegrass has consequently appeared. In this study, liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry (LC/MS/MS) was applied to analyze metabolites of fluazifop-P-butyl in a R biotype of goosegrass. Six signals, including mass-to-charge ratios (m/z) 512, 432, 423, 415, 314, and 160, in positive scanning mode, and four signals, including m/z 788, 623, 593, and 162, in negative scanning mode, were found in the metabolites of the R and S biotypes, respectively. All of the signals of these metabolites in the R biotype showed higher intensity than those of the S biotype, except for m/z 162. Based on the molecular weights of the fragments (MS2 signal) from the molecules (MS1 signal) and comparison with the Metabolite Link Metabolomics database, MassBank database, and related references, one reduced form of fluazifop acid, i.e., 2-[4-(5- trifluoromethyl-2-pyridyloxy) phenoxy] propanol (MW 313); two types of intermediates of MW 163, i.e., 5-trifluoromethyl-2-pyridone and 5-trifluoromethyl-2-hydroxypyridine (or 2-hydroxy-5-trifluoromethyl pyridine); and five possible conjugated compounds containing a common core fragment (MW 255) from fluazifop acid were identified. In addition, another compound, likely degraded from one of the five conjugated compounds, was also detected. Accordingly, the metabolic pathway of fluazifop-P-butyl in goosegrass is described in this study. An enzyme kinetic study on glutathione S-transferase showed that the R biotype has higher affinities to the substrates reduced glutathione (GSH) and 1-chloro-2, 4-dinitrobenzene, with S/R K m ratios of 3.0 and 2.4, respectively. No difference in V max was found, revealing that the S biotype has a strong ability to bind GSH and herbicide or target molecules and showed susceptibility to fluazifop.

Environmental filtering and competitive interactions are important ecological processes in community assembly. The contribution of the two processes to community assembly can be evaluated by shifts in functional diversity patterns. We examined the correlations between functional diversity of six traits (leaf chlorophyll concentration, dry matter content, size, specific leaf area, thickness and wood density) and environmental gradients (topography and soil) for 92 species in the 20-ha Dinghushan forest plot in China. A partial Mantel test showed that most of the community-weighted mean trait values changed with terrain convexity and soil fertility, which implied that environmental filtering was occurring. Functional diversity of many traits significantly increased with increasing terrain convexity and soil fertility, which was associated with increased light and below-ground resources respectively. These results suggest that co-occurring species are functionally convergent in regions of strong abiotic stress under the environmental filtering, but functionally divergent in more benign environments due to resource partitioning and competitive interactions. Single-trait diversity and multivariate functional diversity had different relationships with environmental factors, indicating that traits were related to different niche axes, and associated with different ecological processes, which demonstrated the importance of focusing niche axes in traits selection. Between 9% and 41% of variation in functional diversity of different traits was explained by environmental factors in stepwise multiple regression models. Terrain convexity and soil fertility were the best predictors of functional diversity, which contributed 30.5% and 29.0% of total R2 to the model. These provided essential evidence that different environmental factors had distinguishing impacts on regulating diversity of traits.

Autophagy process in Toxoplasma gondii plays a vital role in regulating parasite survival or death. Thus, once having an understanding of certain effects of autophagy on the transformation of tachyzoite to bradyzoite this will allow us to elucidate the function of autophagy during parasite development. Herein, we used three TgAtg proteins involved in Atg8 conjugation system, TgAtg3, TgAtg7 and TgAtg8 to evaluate the autophagy level in tachyzoite and bradyzoite of Toxoplasma in vitro based on Pru TgAtg7-HA transgenic strains. We showed that both TgAtg3 and TgAtg8 were expressed at a significantly lower level in bradyzoites than in tachyzoites. Importantly, the number of parasites containing fluorescence-labelled TgAtg8 puncta was significantly reduced in bradyzoites than in tachyzoites, suggesting that autophagy is downregulated in Toxoplasma bradyzoite in vitro. Moreover, after treatment with drugs, bradyzoite-specific gene BAG1 levels decreased significantly in rapamycin-treated bradyzoites and increased significantly in 3-MA-treated bradyzoites in comparison with control bradyzoites, indicating that Toxoplasma autophagy is involved in the transformation of tachyzoite to bradyzoite in vitro. Together, it is suggested that autophagy may serve as a potential strategy to regulate the transformation.

Intra-uterine growth restriction (IUGR) impairs postnatal growth and skeletal muscle development in neonatal infants. This study evaluated whether dietary β-hydroxy-β-methylbutyrate Ca (HMB-Ca) supplementation during the early postnatal period could improve muscle growth in IUGR neonates using piglets as a model. A total of twelve pairs of IUGR and normal-birth-weight (NBW) male piglets with average initial weights (1·85 (sem 0·36) and 2·51 (sem 0·39) kg, respectively) were randomly allotted to groups that received milk-based diets (CON) or milk-based diets supplemented with 800 mg/kg HMB-Ca (HMB) during days 7–28 after birth. Blood and longissimus dorsi (LD) samples were collected and analysed for plasma amino acid content, fibre morphology and the expression of genes related to muscle development. The results indicate that, regardless of diet, IUGR piglets had a significantly decreased average daily weight gain (ADG) compared with that of NBW piglets (P<0·05). However, IUGR piglets fed HMB-Ca had a net weight and ADG similar to that of NBW piglets fed the CON diet. Irrespective of body weight (BW), HMB-Ca supplementation markedly increased the type II fibre cross-sectional area and the mRNA expression of mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), insulin-like growth factor-1 and myosin heavy-chain isoform IIb in the LD of piglets (P<0·05). Moreover, there was a significant interaction between the effects of BW and HMB on mTOR expression in the LD (P<0·05). In conclusion, HMB-Ca supplementation during the early postnatal period could improve skeletal muscle growth and maturity by accelerating fast-twitch glycolytic fibre development in piglets.

Ageing accompanied by a decline in cognitive performance may be a result of the long-term effects of oxidative stress on neurologic processes. It has been shown that high-cholesterol contents in the blood and brain may lead to the deposition of the β-amyloid (Aβ) protein in the brain, which damages brain cells. The present study was designed to observe the effect of polyphenol-rich Oriental plums on cognitive function and cerebral neurodegeneration-related protein expression in mice that were fed a high-cholesterol diet for 5 months. The study consisted of four groups: the control (Ctrl) group, which was fed the American Institute of Nutrition (AIN)-93M diet; the high cholesterol (HC) group, which was fed the AIN-93M diet with 5 % cholesterol; the high cholesterol+low Oriental plum (LOP) group, which was fed the AIN-93M diet with 5 % cholesterol and 2 % Oriental plum powder; and the high cholesterol+high Oriental plum (HOP) group, which was fed the AIN-93M diet with 5 % cholesterol and 5 % Oriental plum powder. Measurements of cognitive function were assessed using the Morris water maze, and the mRNA expression of cholesterol hydroxylase (Cyp46), Aβ and β-secretase 1 (BACE1) were analysed. The results showed that cholesterol concentrations in both the blood and the brain were significantly higher in the HC group than in the Ctrl and HOP groups at the end of the trial. The high-cholesterol diet per se produced significant cognitive deficits, which were accompanied by a significantly increased mRNA expression of Cyp46, BACE1, Aβ and 24-hydroxycholesterol in the brain cortex and hippocampus. However, all of these variables were non-significantly increased in the HOP group as compared to the Ctrl group. In conclusion, incorporating polyphenol-enriched Oriental plum into a high-cholesterol diet can ameliorate some of the symptoms of neurodegenerative conditions.

The Shenguang-II Upgrade (SG-II Up) facility is an under-construction high-power laser driver with eight beams, 24 kJ energy, 3 ns pulse duration and ultraviolet laser output, in the Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, China. The prototype design and experimental research of the prototype final optics assembly (FOA), which is one of the most important parts of the SG-II Up facility, have been completed on the ninth beam of the SG-II facility. Thirty-three shots were fired using 1- ${\it\omega}$ energy from 1000 to 4500 J and 3- ${\it\omega}$ energy from 500 to 2403 J with a 3 ns square pulse. During the experiments, emphasis was given to the process of optical damage and to the effects of clean-gas control. A numerical model of the FOA generated by the Integrated Computer Engineering and Manufacturing code for Computational Fluid Dynamics (ICEMCFD) demonstrated that a flux within $1{-}5~\text{l s}^{-1}$ and a 180 s period is effectual to avoid contaminant sputtering to the optics. The presence of surface ‘mooning’ damage and surface spots located outside the clear aperture are induced by contaminants such as wire, silica gel and millimeter order fiber and metal.

The aim of the present study was to determine whether increased consumption of methionine as dl-methionine (DLM) or its hydroxy analogue dl-2-hydroxy-4-methylthiobutanoic acid (HMTBA) could benefit milk synthesis and neonatal growth. For this purpose, eighteen cross-bred (Landrace × Yorkshire) primiparous sows were fed a control (CON), DLM or HMTBA diet (n 6 per diet) from 0 to 14 d post-partum. At postnatal day 14, piglets in the HMTBA group had higher body weight (P= 0·02) than those in the CON group, tended (P= 0·07) to be higher than those in the DLM group, and had higher (P< 0·05) mRNA abundance of jejunal fatty acid-binding protein 2, intestinal than those in the CON and DLM groups. Compared with the CON diet-fed sows, milk protein, non-fat solid, and lysine, histidine and ornithine concentrations decreased in the DLM diet-fed sows (P< 0·05), and milk fat, lactose, and cysteine and taurine concentrations increased in the HMTBA diet-fed sows (P< 0·05). Plasma homocysteine and urea N concentrations that averaged across time were increased (P< 0·05) in sows fed the DLM diet compared with those fed the CON diet. Metabolomic results based on 1H NMR spectroscopy revealed that consumption of the HMTBA and DLM diets increased (P< 0·05) both sow plasma methionine and valine levels; however, consumption of the DLM diet led to lower (P< 0·05) plasma levels of lysine, tyrosine, glucose and acetate and higher (P< 0·05) plasma levels of citrate, lactate, formate, glycerol, myo-inositol and N-acetyl glycoprotein in sows. Collectively, neonatal growth and milk synthesis were regulated by dietary methionine levels and sources, which resulted in marked alterations in amino acid, lipid and glycogen metabolism.

The aim of the present study was to determine whether early weaning-induced growth retardation could be attenuated by increased consumption of methionine as dl-methionine (DLM) or dl-2-hydroxy-4-methylthiobutyrate (HMTBA) in both lactating sows and weaned piglets. Therefore, diets containing DLM and HMTBA at 25 % of the total sulphur-containing amino acids (AA) present in the control (CON) diet were fed to lactating sows and weaned piglets and their responses were evaluated. Compared with the CON diet-fed sows, the HMTBA diet-fed sows exhibited a tendency (P< 0·10) towards higher plasma taurine concentrations and the DLM diet-fed sows had higher (P< 0·05) plasma taurine concentrations, but lower (P< 0·05) isoleucine concentrations. Suckling piglets in the HMTBA treatment group had higher (P< 0·05) intestinal reduced glutathione (GSH) content, lower (P< 0·05) oxidised glutathione (GSSG):GSH ratio, and higher (P< 0·05) plasma cysteine and glutathione peroxidase (GPx) activity than those in the CON and DLM treatment groups. The feed intake (P< 0·05) and body weight of piglets averaged across post-weaning (PW) days were higher (P< 0·05) in the HMTBA treatment group than in the DLM treatment group and were higher (P< 0·05) and tended (P< 0·10) to be higher, respectively, in the HMTBA treatment group than in the CON treatment group. Increased (P< 0·05) GSSG content and GSSG:GSH ratio and down-regulated (P< 0·05) expression of nutrient transport genes were observed in the jejunum of piglets on PW day 7 than on PW day 0. On PW day 14, the HMTBA diet-fed piglets had higher (P< 0·05) intestinal GSH content than the CON diet-fed piglets and higher (P< 0·05) plasma GPx activity, villus height and goblet cell numbers than the CON diet- and DLM diet-fed piglets. In conclusion, early weaning-induced growth retardation appears to be attenuated through changes in plasma AA profiles and elevation of growth performance and intestinal antioxidant capacity in piglets following increased consumption of methionine as HMTBA.

The high repetition rate 10 J/10 ns Yb:YAG laser system and its key techniques are reported. The amplifiers in this system have a multi-pass V-shape structure and the heat in the amplifiers is removed by means of laminar water flow. In the main amplifier, the laser is four-pass, and an approximately 8.5 J/1 Hz/10 ns output is achieved in the primary test. The far-field of the output beam is approximately 10 times the diffraction limit. Because of the higher levels of amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) in the main amplifier, the output energy is lower than expected. At the end we discuss some measures that can improve the properties of the laser system.