Longitudinal studies on the variations of phenotypic and genotypic characteristics of K. pneumoniae across two decades are rare. We aimed to determine the antimicrobial susceptibility and virulence factors for K. pneumoniae isolated from patients with bacteraemia or urinary tract infection (UTI) from 1999 to 2022. A total of 699 and 1,267 K. pneumoniae isolates were isolated from bacteraemia and UTI patients, respectively, and their susceptibility to twenty antibiotics was determined; PCR was used to identify capsular serotypes and virulence-associated genes. K64 and K1 serotypes were most frequently observed in UTI and bacteraemia, respectively, with an increasing frequency of K20, K47, and K64 observed in recent years. entB and wabG predominated across all isolates and serotypes; the least frequent virulence gene was htrA. Most isolates were susceptible to carbapenems, amikacin, tigecycline, and colistin, with the exception of K20, K47, and K64 where resistance was widespread. The highest average number of virulence genes was observed in K1, followed by K2, K20, and K5 isolates, which suggest their contribution to the high virulence of K1. In conclusion, we found that the distribution of antimicrobial susceptibility, virulence gene profiles, and capsular types of K. pneumoniae over two decades were associated with their clinical source.

A walking robot consisting of double Stewarts parallel legs was designed by our research team in the past time, which was mainly used for the transportation of the wounded after the disaster. In order to promote stability of control locomotion and ensure invariably horizontal state of the robot platform in the process of motion, the central pattern generator (CPG) based on particle swarm optimization (PSO) is presented to optimize the kinematic model. The purpose of optimization is to solve the hysteresis problem of displacement variation among the electric cylinders. Moreover, the dynamic model of the robot is established, which can provide mechanical basis for the feedback of control signal and make the robot move stably. The simulation results show that the displacement hysteresis problem of the electric cylinders is solved well. Meanwhile, compared with simulation results based on GA-CPG method, it is demonstrated that the robot motion planned using PSO-CPG method has better motion stability and can avoid the impact of legs landing during the transition phase of the motion cycle. The experimental results show that the platform on the robot can maintain an invariably horizontal state, and the locomotion is more stable. It verifies the feasibility of PSO-CPG model and the correctness of the dynamic model of the parallel mobile rescue robot.

The benefits of branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) administration after hepatic intervention in patients with liver diseases remain unclear. We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis to evaluate the effects of BCAA on patients undergoing hepatectomy, trans-arterial embolisation and radiofrequency ablation. Relevant randomised controlled trials (RCT) were obtained from PubMed, EMBASE and Cochrane Library databases. A meta-analysis was performed to calculate the pooled effect size by using random-effects models. The primary outcomes were survival and tumour recurrence. The secondary outcomes were hospital stay, nutrition status, biochemistry profile, complication rate of liver treatment and adverse effect of BCAA supplementation. In total, eleven RCT involving 750 patients were included. Our meta-analysis showed no significant difference in the rates of tumour recurrence and overall survival between the BCAA and control groups. However, the pooled estimate showed that BCAA supplementation in patients undergoing hepatic intervention significantly increased serum albumin (mean difference (MD): 0·11 g/dl, 95 % CI: 0·02, 0·20; 5 RCT) at 6 months and cholinesterase level (MD: 50·00 U/L, 95 % CI: 21·08, 78·92; 1 RCT) at 12 months and reduced ascites incidence (risk ratio: 0·39, 95 % CI: 0·21, 0·71; 4 RCT) at 12 months compared with the control group. Additionally, BCAA administration significantly increased body weight at 6 months and 12 months and increased arm circumference at 12 months. In conclusion, BCAA supplementation significantly improved the liver function, reduced the incidence of ascites and increased body weight and arm circumference. Thus, BCAA supplementation may beneficial for selected patients undergoing liver intervention.

SARS-CoV-2 rapidly spreads among humans via social networks, with social mixing and network characteristics potentially facilitating transmission. However, limited data on topological structural features has hindered in-depth studies. Existing research is based on snapshot analyses, preventing temporal investigations of network changes. Comparing network characteristics over time offers additional insights into transmission dynamics. We examined confirmed COVID-19 patients from an eastern Chinese province, analyzing social mixing and network characteristics using transmission network topology before and after widespread interventions. Between the two time periods, the percentage of singleton networks increased from 38.9$ \% $ to 62.8$ \% $$ (p<0.001) $; the average shortest path length decreased from 1.53 to 1.14 $ (p<0.001) $; the average betweenness reduced from 0.65 to 0.11$ (p<0.001) $; the average cluster size dropped from 4.05 to 2.72 $ (p=0.004) $; and the out-degree had a slight but nonsignificant decline from 0.75 to 0.63 $ (p=0.099). $ Results show that nonpharmaceutical interventions effectively disrupted transmission networks, preventing further disease spread. Additionally, we found that the networks’ dynamic structure provided more information than solely examining infection curves after applying descriptive and agent-based modeling approaches. In summary, we investigated social mixing and network characteristics of COVID-19 patients during different pandemic stages, revealing transmission network heterogeneities.

In this paper, we provide a new approach to prove some weighted-blowup formulae for genus zero orbifold Gromov–Witten invariants. As a consequence, we show the invariance of symplectically rational connectedness with respect to weighted-blowup along positive centers. Furthermore, we use this method to give a new proof to the genus zero relative-orbifold correspondence of Gromov–Witten invariants.

We present the third data release from the Parkes Pulsar Timing Array (PPTA) project. The release contains observations of 32 pulsars obtained using the 64-m Parkes “Murriyang” radio telescope. The data span is up to 18 years with a typical cadence of 3 weeks. This data release is formed by combining an updated version of our second data release with ∼ 3 years of more recent data primarily obtained using an ultra-wide-bandwidth receiver system that operates between 704 and 4032 MHz. We provide calibrated pulse profiles, flux-density dynamic spectra, pulse times of arrival, and initial pulsar timing models. We describe methods for processing such wide-bandwidth observations, and compare this data release with our previous release.

Smart manufacturing enterprises rely on adapting to rapid engineering changes while minimizing the generated risk. Making informed decisions related to engineering changes and managing risks against unexpected costs requires more information to be extracted from limited data. However, limited information in early-stage design can come in many forms, namely text and images. The development of innovative design tools and processes to link multisource data together is essential to assist designers in building model-based engineering (MBE) systems. However, the formal computational linking of multisource data is yet to be realized in MBE. We propose a framework to implement transfer learning and integrate domain specific knowledge to bridge this information gap. A synthetic dataset is created using web scraping techniques based on keywords extracted from the requirements. Requirement-image pairs are used to fine tune a contrastive language-image pretraining model to acquire domain knowledge. The results demonstrate how the content of images can be used to indicate all affected requirements for tracing engineering changes in a complex system.

Candidemia is a life-threatening infectious disease that has varying incidences. Previous studies revealed the differences in clinical characteristics and outcomes between non-hospital-onset (NHO) and hospital-onset (HO) candidemia. This 4-year retrospective research included adult patients with candidemia in a tertiary medical centre in Taiwan, and cases were categorised as NHO and HO candidemia. Survival analysis and risk factors associated with in-hospital mortality were performed using the Kaplan–Meier method and multivariate Cox proportional-hazards models. The analysis included 339 patients, and the overall incidence was 1.50 per 1,000 admission person-year. Of the cases, 82 (24.18%) were NHO candidemia, and 57.52% (195/339) of patients were diagnosed with at least one malignancy. C. albicans was the most commonly isolated species, accounting for 52.21%. Patients with NHO candidemia had a higher proportion of C. glabrata but a lower ratio of C. tropicalis in comparison to the HO group. The all-cause in-hospital mortality rate was 55.75%. Multivariate Cox proportional-hazards models showed that NHO candidemia was a better outcome predictor (adjusted hazard ratio, 0.44). The administration of antifungal therapy within 2 days was a protective factor. In conclusion, NHO candidemia showed distinct microbiological characteristics and a better outcome than HO candidemia.

In this study, a novel, cost-effective miniaturized tag antenna was developed for applications on the human body. To achieve impedance matching with the complex conjugate impedance of the Monza-4 tag chip (7.17–j74.22 Ω at 915 MHz), the proposed structure was configured by coarsely tuning the positions of vias and fine-tuning the small gaps of its coupled patches. For further reducing the profile and dimensions of the antenna, a design technique based on the three-dimensional dipole antenna current distribution was used. The proposed antenna configuration was not only miniaturized but also achieved a long stable reading distance (>5.0 m) and a wide impedance bandwidth of 71 MHz or 7.65% (covering the ultrahigh frequency radio frequency identification ranges in most regions), regardless of the location of the tag on the human body. Experiments were conducted to validate the simulated results, and adequate agreement was found between the simulated results and the measured results.

Se deficiency causes impaired growth of fish skeletal muscle due to the retarded hypertrophy of muscle fibres. However, the inner mechanisms remain unclear. According to our previous researches, we infer this phenomenon is associated with Se deficiency-induced high concentration of reactive oxygen species (ROS), which could suppress the target of rapamycin complex 1 (TORC1) pathway-mediated protein synthesis by inhibiting protein kinase B (Akt), an upstream protein of TORC1. To test this hypothesis, juvenile zebrafish (45 d post-fertilisation) were fed a basal Se-adequate diet or a basal Se-deficient diet or them supplemented with an antioxidant (DL-α-tocopherol acetate, designed as VE) or a TOR activator (MHY1485) for 30 d. Zebrafish fed Se-deficient diets exhibited a clear Se-deficient status in skeletal muscle, which was not influenced by dietary VE and MHY1485. Se deficiency significantly elevated ROS concentrations, inhibited Akt activity and TORC1 pathway, suppressed protein synthesis in skeletal muscle, and impaired hypertrophy of skeletal muscle fibres. However, these negative effects of Se deficiency were partly (except that on ROS concentration) alleviated by dietary MHY1485 and completely alleviated by dietary VE. These data strongly support our speculation that Se deficiency-induced high concentration of ROS exerts a clear inhibiting effect on TORC1 pathway-mediated protein synthesis by regulating Akt activity, thereby restricting the hypertrophy of skeletal muscle fibres in fish. Our findings provide a mechanistic explanation for Se deficiency-caused retardation of fish skeletal muscle growth, contributing to a better understanding of the nutritional necessity and regulatory mechanisms of Se in fish muscle physiology.

The physics of leading-edge vortex (LEV) stability on flapping wings and autorotating seeds is still underexplored due to its complex dependency on Reynolds number ($\textit {Re}$), aspect ratio (AR) and Rossby number (Ro). Our previous study observed an interesting dual-stage vortex tilting between radial and tangential components in a stable LEV. Here, the establishment of this novel mechanism, i.e. dual-stage radial–tangential vortex tilting (DS-VT$_{r-t}$), is investigated and explained in detail using numerical methods. The contributions of other tangential vorticity transport terms are also considered. It is shown that the stable LEV region coincides mostly with a constant ratio of tangential and radial vorticity components. The DS-VT$_{r-t}$ mechanism functions as a negative feedback loop for radial vorticity, thereby contributing to the LEV stability at $\textit {Re} > 500$. Specifically, this mechanism involves a dual-stage vortex tilting starting from negative radial component to positive tangential component, and then back to positive radial component, thereby leading to a $180^{\circ }$ reversal of radial vorticity. The radial Coriolis acceleration can also assist the DS-VT$_{r-t}$ by enhancing the tangential vorticity component and the reduction of radial vorticity inside the LEV via the second stage of DS-VT$_{r-t}$. The effects of $\textit {Re}$, AR and Ro on the constant radial–tangential vorticity ratio and DS-VT$_{r-t}$ are then analysed. The coupled effects of AR and Ro are separated into rotational effects and those of tip and root vortices. Our results establish an evident relationship among the LEV stability, the constant radial–tangential vorticity ratio, and the DS-VT$_{r-t}$, thereby deepening the understanding in the vorticity transport of LEV formation and stability.

My 5 moments (M5M) was used less frequently among cleaning staff members, suggesting that a poor compliance score in this group may not indicate deficient handwashing. This quasi-experimental study compared hand hygiene compliance (HHC), hand hygiene (HH) moments, and HH time distribution in the control group (no HH intervention; n = 21), case group 1 (normal M5M intervention; n = 26), case group 2 (extensive novel six moments (NSM) training; n = 24), and case group 3 (refined NSM training; n = 18). The intervention’s effect was evaluated after 3 months. The HHC gap among the four groups gradually increased in the second intervention month (control group, 31.43%; case group 1, 38.74%; case group 2, 40.19%; case group 3, 52.21%; p < 0.05). After the intervention period, the HHC of case groups 2 and 3 improved significantly from the baseline (23.85% vs. 59.22%, 27.41% vs. 83.62%, respectively; p < 0.05). ‘After transferring medical waste from the site’ had the highest HHC in case group 3, 90.72% (95% confidence interval, 0.1926–0.3967). HH peak hours were from 6 AM to 9 AM and 2 PM to 3 PM. The study showed that the implementation of an NSM practice can serve as an HHC monitoring indicator and direct relevant training interventions to improve HH among hospital cleaning staff.