Effects of immersive virtual reality training on the adaptive skills of children and adolescents with high functioning autism spectrum disorder: a mixed-methods pre-post study.

Background: Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is characterized by social deficits and restricted, repetitive behaviors, with fewer than 10% achieving independent adulthood. Immersive virtual reality (IVR) provides a novel training approach through interactive and realistic environments. This study developed an IVR system to enhance adaptive skills in children and adolescents with high-functioning ASD.

Advanced quantification pipeline reveals new spatial and temporal tumor characteristics in preclinical multiple myeloma.

Background: Radiological imaging plays an indispensable role in both preclinical and clinical studies of multiple myeloma (MM). However, manual quantification in longitudinal small animal PET/CT is limited by annotator bias, signal artifacts from urinary/fecal excretion, and voxel misalignment due to non-rigid registration. To address these challenges and improve characterization of tumor biology, we developed a semi-automated PET/CT quantification pipeline targeting defined regions of interest (ROIs) within the bone marrow-rich mouse skeleton, achieving sub-organ spatial resolution, including in anatomically complex sites such as the pelvis.

Accuracy and consistency of subtraction dual-layer spectral computed tomography in diagnosing coronary stenosis: invasive coronary angiography validation study.

Background: Noninvasive assessment of coronary artery stenosis is critical for the diagnosis and management of coronary artery disease (CAD), particularly in patients with intermediate pretest probability for CAD or contraindications to invasive procedures. However, conventional coronary computed tomography angiography (CCTA) is limited by the presence of artifacts from calcified plaques, leading to overestimation of stenosis severity. Subtraction CCTA (CCTA) has the potential to overcome these limitations by eliminating these artifacts and improving the visualization of the vessel wall, thereby enhancing diagnostic accuracy in terms of percent diameter stenosis (DS).

PTEN-L dephosphorylates Parkin and Ub Ser65 to aggravate mitophagy dysfunction in prion disease cell models.

PINK1-Parkin-dependent mitophagy dysfunction is a critical contributor to the accumulation of damaged mitochondria in prion disease, leading to impaired autophagy and neurons apoptosis. However, the specific molecular mechanisms underlying mitophagy dysfunction in prion disease remain unclear. Phosphorylation of Parkin at Ser65 (pSer65-Parkin) is a key determinant for the initiation of PINK1-Parkin-mediated mitophagy.

A Drosophila model of prion disease and its metabolic changes in the brain.

Background: Prion diseases (PrDs) are fatal transmissible neurodegenerative disorders caused by misfolded prion protein, which is highly expressed in the brain. Drosophila has been employed as a model system for studying mammalian neurodegenerative diseases.

Methods: Drosophila transgenic for hamster prion protein (HaPrP) was generated by Valium20 transformation.

A novel twin time series network for building energy consumption predicting.

Energy consumption prediction in buildings is crucial for optimizing energy management. The latest research faces three critical challenges: (1) Insufficient temporal correlation extraction and prediction accuracy, hindering widespread adoption and application; (2) The positive impact of timestamp embedding in time series prediction under multi-mode decomposition; and (3) The issue of adaptive coupling with multi-source data. To overcome these issues, the study proposes Twin Time-Series Networks (T2SNET), which incorporates a time-embedding layer and a Temporal Convolutional Network (TCN) to extract patterns from Complete Ensemble Empirical Mode Decomposition with Adaptive Noise (CEEMDAN), along with an adaptive fusion gate to combine energy consumption and meteorological data.

Advanced Quantification Pipeline Reveals New Spatial and Temporal Tumor Characteristics in Preclinical Multiple Myeloma.

Background: Radiological imaging plays an indispensable role in both preclinical and clinical studies of multiple myeloma (MM). However, manual quantification in longitudinal small animal PET/CT is limited by annotator bias, signal artifacts from urinary/fecal excretion, and voxel misalignment due to non-rigid registration. To address these challenges and improve characterization of tumor biology, we developed a semi-automated PET/CT quantification pipeline targeting defined regions of interest (ROIs) within the bone marrow-rich mouse skeleton, achieving sub-organ spatial resolution, including in anatomically complex sites such as the pelvis.

Regulated Second-sphere Coordination in Amorphous Metal-organic Framework for Efficient CO Fixation.

The endeavor toward photocatalytic CO fixation is largely hampered by the rigid spatial configurations and inadequate orbital overlap between the catalytic site and CO. Herein, we propose a second-sphere coordination regulation strategy by atomically tailoring the metal-metal coordination of the secondary building unit (SBU). Amorphous metal-organic framework (a-MOF) is constructed as proof-of-concept to achieve creative control over the second coordination sphere.

Episodic body size variations of early Paleozoic trilobites associated with marine redox changes.

Body size greatly affects how organisms interact with their environments. However, the macroevolutionary patterns of body size across many major metazoan clades and their constraining mechanisms remain elusive. A new high-resolution body size dataset covering 2435 species from 1091 genera of Cambrian and Ordovician trilobites reveals that body size evolution changes episodically, with three marked reductions in size.

Idebenone improves mitochondrial respiratory activity and attenuates oxidative damage via the SIRT3-SOD2 pathway in a prion disease cell model.

Prion diseases are neurodegenerative diseases that are transmitted between humans and animals, which cause spongiform brain degeneration and neuronal death. Prion diseases are difficult to treat. Mitochondrial damage and oxidative stress occurring early in disease progression.

Microglial plasticity governed by state-specific enhancer landscapes.

Single-cell transcriptomic studies have identified distinct microglial subpopulations with shared and divergent gene signatures across development, aging and disease. Whether these microglial subsets represent ontogenically separate lineages of cells, or they are manifestations of plastic changes of microglial states downstream of some converging signals is unknown. Furthermore, despite the well-established role of enhancer landscapes underlying the identity of microglia, to what extent histone modifications and DNA methylation regulate microglial state switches at enhancers have not been defined.

Irisin regulates oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction through the UCP2-AMPK pathway in prion diseases.

Prion diseases are a group of fatal neurodegenerative disorders characterized by the abnormal folding of cellular prion proteins into pathogenic forms. The development of these diseases is intricately linked to oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction. Irisin, an endogenous myokine, has demonstrated considerable neuroprotective potential due to its antioxidative properties.

Oxidative stress and mitochondrial impairment: Key drivers in neurodegenerative disorders.

Mitochondrial dysfunction and oxidative stress are critical factors in the pathogenesis of neurodegenerative diseases. The complex interplay between these factors exacerbates neuronal damage and accelerates disease progression. In neurodegenerative diseases, mitochondrial dysfunction impairs ATP production and promotes the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS).

Estimation of PEMFC optimal parameters based on an improved butterfly optimization algorithm.

This paper introduces a novel butterfly optimization algorithm, called the spiral search and dynamic crossover based butterfly optimization algorithm (SCBO), for parameter estimation in proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) models. To enhance the global performance of the butterfly algorithm, a spin-search strategy is incorporated to expand its exploration range, while an adaptive factor is introduced to strike a balance between exploration and exploitation. Additionally, a dynamic crossover operation is integrated to enhance solution diversity, addressing the algorithm's tendency to converge to local optima.

SIRT1 Regulates Mitochondrial Damage in N2a Cells Treated with the Prion Protein Fragment 106-126 via PGC-1α-TFAM-Mediated Mitochondrial Biogenesis.

Mitochondrial damage is an early and key marker of neuronal damage in prion diseases. As a process involved in mitochondrial quality control, mitochondrial biogenesis regulates mitochondrial homeostasis in neurons and promotes neuron health by increasing the number of effective mitochondria in the cytoplasm. Sirtuin 1 (SIRT1) is a NAD+-dependent deacetylase that regulates neuronal mitochondrial biogenesis and quality control in neurodegenerative diseases via deacetylation of a variety of substrates.

Metal-Free Electron Donor-Acceptor Pair Enabled Long-Term Stability of Li-CO Battery.

The challenges of Lithium-carbon dioxide (Li-CO) batteries for ensuring long-term cycling stability arise from the thermodynamically stable and electrically insulating discharge products (e.g., LiCO), which primarily rely on their interaction with the active materials.

Research on adults with subthreshold depression after aerobic exercise: a resting-state fMRI study based on regional homogeneity (ReHo).

Objective: Subthreshold depression (StD)/subsyndromal depression refers to a threatening precursor to depression. Aerobic exercise is a promising self-supportive adjunctive intervention and an effective measure for StD. Our study utilizes regional homogeneity (ReHo) to investigate the impact of aerobic exercise on resting-state brain function.

Moulting behaviour in the trilobite (Reed, 1910) from the Cambrian Miaolingian Series (Wuliuan Stage) of Jianhe, South China.

The accurate interpretation of trilobite moulting behaviour relies on a comprehensive understanding of their moult configurations, yet the focus has commonly been limited to a brief description of the exuviae, and how differences in moulting behaviour further impact the preservation of exuviae is often ignored. This study investigates the configuration, style, and process of moulting in through analysis of 88 exuviae collected from the Kaili Formation (Cambrian, Wuliuan) in Guizhou Province, South China. The moult configurations of are typically characterised by the lower cephalic unit (LCU), which comprises the librigenae and rostral-hypostomal plate connected as a whole, detached from the cephalon and positioned anterior to the thoracopygon, while the cranidium is mostly absent.

Charge disproportionation-induced multiferroics and electric field control of magnetism in a 2D MXene - MoNCl.

Two-dimensional (2D) magnetoelectric multiferroic materials with the coexistence of magnetization and ferroelectric polarization hold potential for application for the development of next-generation nano-memory devices. However, intrinsic 2D multiferroics with a high critical temperature and strong magnetoelectric coupling are still rare to date. Here, we propose a novel mechanism of 2D monolayer multiferroicity.

Cardiolipin externalization mediates prion protein (PrP) peptide 106-126-associated mitophagy and mitochondrial dysfunction.

Proper mitochondrial performance is imperative for the maintenance of normal neuronal function to prevent the development of neurodegenerative diseases. Persistent accumulation of damaged mitochondria plays a role in prion disease pathogenesis, which involves a chain of events that culminate in the generation of reactive oxygen species and neuronal death. Our previous studies have demonstrated that PINK1/Parkin-mediated mitophagy induced by PrP is defective and leads to an accumulation of damaged mitochondria after PrP treatment.

Ultrafast Superfilling Construction of a Metal Artificial Interface for Long-Term Stable Zinc Anodes.

Zinc (Zn)-metal anodes are promising candidates for large-scale, highly safe energy-storage systems. However, their cycling life is associated with instability issues such as dendritic growth, corrosion, and hydrogen evolution. Introducing an artificial metal interface is expected to help overcome this challenge owing to the optimization of the absorption, nucleation, and growth of Zn .

Asymmetric Janus functionalization induced magnetization and switchable out-of-plane polarization in 2D MXene MoCXX'.

Exploring two-dimensional (2D) van der Waals materials with out-of-plane polarization and electromagnetic coupling is essential for the development of next-generation nano-memory devices. A novel class of 2D monolayer materials with predicted spin-polarized semi-conductivity, partially compensated antiferromagnetic (AFM) order, fairly high Curie temperature, and out-of-plane polarization is analyzed in this work for the first time. Based on density functional theory calculations, we systematically studied these properties in asymmetrically functionalized MXenes (Janus MoC)-MoCXX' (X, X' = F, O, and OH).

A Review of Research Progress in Selective Laser Melting (SLM).

SLM (Selective Laser Melting) is a unique additive manufacturing technology which plays an irreplaceable role in the modern industrial revolution. 3D printers can directly process metal powder quickly to obtain the necessary parts faster. Shortly, it will be possible to manufacture products at unparalleled speeds.

PINK1/Parkin-mediated mitophagy in neurodegenerative diseases.

Mitochondria play key roles in bioenergetics, metabolism, and signaling; therefore, stable mitochondrial function is essential for cell survival, particularly in energy-intensive neuronal cells. In neurodegenerative diseases, damaged mitochondria accumulate in neurons causing associated bioenergetics deficiency, impaired cell signaling, defective cytoplasmic calcium buffering, and other pathological changes. Mitochondrial quality control is an important mechanism to ensure the maintenance of mitochondrial health, homeostasis, and mitophagy, the latter of which is a pathway that delivers defective mitochondria to the lysosome for degradation.