To investigate the influences of cobalt (Co) and folic acid (FA) on growth performance and rumen fermentation, Holstein male calves (n 40) were randomly assigned to four groups according to their body weights. Cobalt sulphate at 0 or 0·11 mg Co/kg DM and FA at 0 or 7·2 mg/kg DM were used in a 2 × 2 factorial design. Average daily gain was elevated with FA or Co supplementation, but the elevation was greater for supplementing Co in diets without FA than with FA. Supplementing FA or Co increased DM intake and total-tract nutrient digestibility. Rumen pH was unaltered with FA but reduced with Co supplementation. Concentration of rumen total volatile fatty acids was elevated with FA or Co inclusion. Acetate percentage and acetate to propionate ratio were elevated with FA inclusion. Supplementing Co decreased acetate percentage and increased propionate percentage. Activities of xylanase and α-amylase and populations of total bacteria, fungi, protozoa, Ruminococcus albus, Fibrobacter succinogenes and Prevotella ruminicola increased with FA or Co inclusion. Activities of carboxymethyl-cellulase and pectinase increased with FA inclusion and population of methanogens decreased with Co addition. Blood folates increased and homocysteine decreased with FA inclusion. Blood glucose and vitamin B12 increased with Co addition. The data suggested that supplementing 0·11 mg Co/kg DM in diets containing 0·09 mg Co/kg DM increased growth performance and nutrient digestibility but had no improvement on the effects of FA addition in calves.

As the key part for energy amplification of high-power laser systems, disk amplifiers must work in an extremely clean environment. Different from the traditional cleanliness control scheme of active intake and passive exhaust (AIPE), a new method of active exhaust and passive intake (AEPI) is proposed in this paper. Combined with computational fluid dynamics (CFD) technology, through the optimization design of the sizes, shapes, and locations of different outlets and inlets, the turbulence that is unfavorable to cleanliness control is effectively avoided in the disk amplifier cavity during the process of AEPI. Finally, the cleanliness control of the cavity of the disk amplifier can be realized just by once exhaust. Meanwhile, the micro negative pressure environment in the amplifier cavity produced during the exhaust process reduces the requirement for sealing. This method is simple, time saving, gas saving, efficient, and safe. It is also suitable for the cleanliness control of similar amplifiers.

We propose a systematic methodology to derive the regularized 13-moment equations in the rarefied gas dynamics for a general class of linearized collision models. Detailed expressions of the moment equations are written down for all inverse power law models as well as the hard-sphere model. By linear analysis, we show that the equations are stable near the equilibrium. The models are tested for shock structure problems to show their capability to capture the correct flow structure in strong non-equilibrium.

The effect of polypropylene (PP) molecular weight on the properties of styrene-butadiene-styrene block copolymer (SBS)/PP blends was studied. All SBS/PP blends (50/50 and 90/10) exhibited a sandwich structure where the co-continuous SBS/PP layer was between the top and bottom PP layers. Solvent extraction tests suggested that the continuous phase structure of PP was independent of the blending ratio and PP molecular weight, while the SBS phase changed from a dispersed phase to a continuous phase as the SBS content increased. The decrease in PP molecular weight decreased the PP layer thickness but increased the phase domain size of SBS in SBS/PP(50/50) blends. As a result, less noticeable “stress-hardening” phenomenon was observed. The mechanism for the structural change was attributed to the different melt viscosities of each component. The crystallinity of the blends did not change with the variable PP molecular weight but decreased with the increasing SBS content.

In this paper, we review the status of the multifunctional experimental platform at the National Laboratory of High Power Laser and Physics (NLHPLP). The platform, including the SG-II laser facility, SG-II 9th beam, SG-II upgrade (SG-II UP) facility, and SG-II 5 PW facility, is operational and available for interested scientists studying inertial confinement fusion (ICF) and a broad range of high-energy-density physics. These facilities can provide important experimental capabilities by combining different pulse widths of nanosecond, picosecond, and femtosecond scales. In addition, the SG-II UP facility, consisting of a single petawatt system and an eight-beam nanosecond system, is introduced including several laser technologies that have been developed to ensure the performance of the facility. Recent developments of the SG-II 5 PW facility are also presented.

Several epidemiological studies have investigated that Na or K intakes might be associated with the metabolic syndrome (MetS). However, little evidence has evaluated the association between Na:K ratio and the MetS. In this study, we assessed the association between the dietary Na:K ratio and the MetS. The cross-sectional study was conducted among adults aged 18 years and older in Nanjing, using a multi-stage random sampling method, which resulted in a sample size of 1993 participants. Dietary Na and K intakes were assessed by 3 consecutive days of dietary recollection combined with condiments weighing method. Health-related data were obtained by standardised questionnaires, as well as physical examinations and laboratory assessments. The prevalence rate of the MetS was 36·5 % (728/1993). After adjusting for various lifestyle and dietary factors of the MetS, participants in the highest quartile of dietary Na:K ratio were at a higher risk of developing MetS (OR=1·602; 95 % CI 1·090, 2·353) compared with those in the lowest quartile. Each 1-sd increase in dietary Na:K ratio was associated with a higher risk of prevalent MetS (OR=1·166; 95 % CI: 1·018, 1·336). Among the components of the MetS, dietary Na:K ratio was positively associated with high blood pressure (quartile 3 v. quartile 1: OR=1·656; 95 % CI 1·228, 2·256) and hypertriacylglycerolaemia (quartile 4 v. quartile1: OR=1·305; 95 % CI 1·029, 1·655) in multivariate analysis. These results revealed that higher dietary Na:K ratio significantly increased the risk of the MetS in Chinese adults. Further studies are needed to verify this association.

DNA methylation is an important form of epigenetic regulation in mammalian development. Methyl-CpG-binding domain protein 1 (MBD1) and methyl-CpG-binding domain protein 2 (MeCP2) are two members of the MBD subfamily of proteins that bind methylated CpG to maintain the silencing effect of DNA methylation. Given their important roles in linking DNA methylation with gene silencing, this study characterized the coordinated mRNA expression and protein localization of MBD1 and MeCP2 in embryos and placentas and aimed to analysis the effects of MBD1 and MeCP2 on transgenic cloned goats. Our result showed that MBD1 expression of transgenic cloned embryo increased significantly at the 2–4-cell and 8–16-cell stages (P < 0.05), then decreased at the morula and blastocyst stages (P < 0.05); MeCP2 expression in transgenic cloned embryo was significant decreased at the 2–4-cell stage and increased at the 8–16-cell stage (P < 0.05). Placenta morphology analysis showed that the cotyledon number of deceased transgenic cloned group (DTCG) was significantly lower than that the normal goats (NG) and in the live transgenic cloned goats (LTCG) (P < 0.05). MBD1 and MeCP2 were clearly detectable in the placental trophoblastic binucleate cells by immunohistochemical staining. Moreover, MBD1 and MeCP2 expression in DTCG was significant higher than in the NG and the LTCG (P < 0.05). In summary, aberrant expression of methylation CpG binding proteins MBD1 and MeCP2 was detected in embryonic and placental development, which reflected abnormal transcription regulation and DNA methylation involved in MBD1 and MeCP2. These findings have implications in understanding the low efficiency of transgenic cloning.

We present a numerical method to solve the Vlasov-Poisson-Fokker-Planck (VPFP) system using the NRxx method proposed in [4, 7, 9]. A globally hyperbolic moment system similar to that in [23] is derived. In this system, the Fokker-Planck (FP) operator term is reduced into the linear combination of the moment coefficients, which can be solved analytically under proper truncation. The non-splitting method, which can keep mass conservation and the balance law of the total momentum, is used to solve the whole system. A numerical problem for the VPFP system with an analytic solution is presented to indicate the spectral convergence with the moment number and the linear convergence with the grid size. Two more numerical experiments are tested to demonstrate the stability and accuracy of the NRxx method when applied to the VPFP system.

A globally hyperbolic moment system upto arbitrary order for the Wigner equation was derived in [6]. For numerically solving the high order hyperbolic moment system therein, we in this paper develop a preliminary numerical method for this system following the NRxx method recently proposed in [8], to validate the moment system of the Wigner equation. The method developed can keep both mass and momentum conserved, and the variation of the total energy under control though it is not strictly conservative. We systematically study the numerical convergence of the solution to the moment system both in the size of spatial mesh and in the order of the moment expansion, and the convergence of the numerical solution of the moment system to the numerical solution of the Wigner equation using the discrete velocity method. The numerical results indicate that the high order moment system in [6] is a valid model for the Wigner equation, and the proposed numerical method for the moment system is quite promising to carry out the simulation of the Wigner equation.

Morphogenesis and identification of embryonic differentiation in porcine embryos are crucial issues for developmental biology and laboratory animal science. The current paper presents a study on the asynchronous development of hatched porcine embryos from days 7 to 13 post-insemination. Examination of semi-thin sections of the hypoblast showed that it had characteristics similar to those of the mouse anterior visceral endoderm during embryonic disc formation. Also, a cavity appeared in the epiblast, which was similar to a mouse proamniotic cavity. With the gradual disappearance of Rauber's layer, the cavity opened and contacted the external environment directly, all of which formed the embryonic disc. To confirm the differentiation characteristics, we performed immunohistochemical analyses and showed that GATA6 was detected clearly in parietal endoderm cells during embryonic disc establishment. OCT4 was expressed in the inner cell mass (ICM) and trophoblast of hatched blastocysts and in the epiblast during formation of the embryonic disc. However, OCT4 showed comparatively decreased expression in the posterior embryonic disc, primitive streak and migrating cells. SOX2 was present in the ICM and epiblast. Therefore, both SOX2 and OCT4 can be used as markers of pluripotent cells in the porcine embryonic disc. At the start of gastrulation, staining revealed VIMENTIN in the posterior of the embryonic disc, primitive streak and in migrating cells that underlay the embryonic disc and was also expressed in epiblast cells located in the anterior primitive streak. Together with serial sections of embryos stained by whole mount immunohistochemistry, the mesoderm differentiation pattern was shown as an ingression movement that took place at the posterior of the embryonic disc and with bilateral migration along the embryonic disc borders.

This paper is a continuation of our earlier work [SIAM J. Sci. Comput., 32(2010), pp. 2875-2907] in which a numerical moment method with arbitrary order of moments was presented. However, the computation may break down during the calculation of the structure of a shock wave with Mach number M0 ≥ 3. In this paper, we concentrate on the regularization of the moment systems. First, we apply the Maxwell iteration to the infinite moment system and determine the magnitude of each moment with respect to the Knudsen number. After that, we obtain the approximation of high order moments and close the moment systems by dropping some high-order terms. Linearization is then performed to obtain a very simple regularization term, thus it is very convenient for numerical implementation. To validate the new regularization, the shock structures of low order systems are computed with different shock Mach numbers.