National Natural Science Fund Research Articles

Consistency of Pantheon+ supernovae with a large-scale isotropic universe* *Supported by the National Natural Science Fund of China (12147102, 12275034) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of China (2023CDJXY-048)

We investigate the possible anisotropy of the universe using data on the most up-to-date type Ia supernovae, i.e., the Pantheon+ compilation. We fit the full Pantheon+ data with the dipole-modulated ΛCDM model and find that the data are well consistent with a null dipole. We further divide the full sample into several subsamples with different high-redshift cutoffs . It is shown that the dipole appears at the confidence level only if , and in this redshift region, the dipole is very stable, almost independent of the specific value of . For , the dipole amplitude is , pointing toward , which is approximately away from the CMB dipole. This implies that the full Pantheon+ sample is consistent with a large-scale isotropic universe, but the low-redshift anisotropy could not be purely explained by the peculiar motion of the local universe.

Lactate: A critical regulator of cell proliferation via anaphase promoting complex remodeling

Lactate: A critical regulator of cell proliferation via anaphase promoting complex remodeling

Inferring redshift and energy distributions of fast radio bursts from the first CHIME/FRB catalog* *Supported by the National Natural Science Fund of China (11873001, 12147102, 12275034)

We reconstruct the extragalactic dispersion measure – redshift () relation from well-localized fast radio bursts (FRBs) using Bayesian inference. Then, the relation is used to infer the redshift and energy of the first CHIME/FRB catalog. We find that the distributions of the extragalactic dispersion measure and inferred redshift of the non-repeating CHIME/FRBs follow a cut-off power law but with a significant excess at the low-redshift range. We apply a set of criteria to exclude events that are susceptible to the selection effect, but the excess at low redshifts still exists in the remaining FRBs (which we call the gold sample). The cumulative distributions of fluence and energy for both the full sample and the gold sample do not follow the simple power law, but they can be well fitted by the bent power law. The underlying physical implications require further investigation.

Infection and co-infection patterns of community-acquired pneumonia in patients of different ages in China from 2009 to 2020: a national surveillance study

Severe community-acquired pneumonia (SCAP) is associated with a substantial number of hospitalisations and deaths worldwide. Infection or co-infection patterns, along with their age dependence and clinical effects are poorly understood. We aimed to explore the causal and epidemiological characteristics by age, to better describe patterns of community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) and their association with severe disease. National surveillance of CAP was conducted through a network of hospitals in 30 provinces in China from 2009-20 inclusive. Patients with CAP were included if they had evidence of acute respiratory tract, had evidence of pneumonia by chest radiography, diagnosis of pneumonia within 24 h of hospital admission, and resided in the study catchment area. For the enrolled patients with CAP, nasopharyngeal and oral swabs were taken and tested for eight viral pathogens; and blood, urine, or expectorated sputum was tested for six bacterial pathogens. Clinical outcomes, including SCAP, were investigated with respect to age and patterns of infections or co-infections by performing binary logistic regression and multivariate analysis. Between January, 2009, and December, 2020, 18 807 patients with CAP (3771 [20·05%] with SCAP) were enrolled. For both children (aged ≤5 years) and older adults (aged >60 years), a higher overall rate of viral and bacterial infections, as well as viral-bacterial co-infections were seen in patients with SCAP than in patients with non-SCAP. For adults (aged 18-60 years), however, only a higher rate of bacterial-bacterial co-infection was observed. The most frequent pathogens associated with SCAP were respiratory syncytial virus (RSV; 21·30%) and Streptococcus pneumoniae (12·61%) among children, and influenza virus (10·94%) and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (15·37%) among older adults. Positive rates of detection of most of the tested pathogens decreased during 2020 compared with the 2009-19 period, except for RSV, P aeruginosa, and Klebsiella pneumoniae. Multivariate analyses showed SCAP was significantly associated with infection with human adenovirus, human rhinovirus, K pneumoniae, or co-infection of RSV and Haemophilus influenzae or RSV and Staphylococcus aureus in children and adolescents (aged <18 years), and significantly associated with infection with P aeruginosa, K pneumoniae, or S pneumoniae, or co-infection with P aeruginosa and K pneumoniae in adults (aged ≥18 years). Both prevalence and infection pattern of respiratory pathogens differed between patients with SCAP and patients with non-SCAP in an age-dependent manner. These findings suggest potential advantages to age-related strategies for vaccine schedules, as well as clinical diagnosis, treatment, and therapy. China Mega-Project on Infectious Disease Prevention and The National Natural Science Funds of China. For the Chinese translation of the abstract see Supplementary Materials section.

WNK1, a molecular crowding sensor, links phase separation to cellular physiological stress.

WNK1, a molecular crowding sensor, links phase separation to cellular physiological stress.

Trend analysis and development outlook for condensed matter physics: Discussions based on national natural science fund (2011&amp;ndash;2021) and disciplinary development plan of physics

<p indent="0mm">Condensed matter physics (CMP) is the biggest branch in physics, and one of the fastest growing areas in physics during the past half century. CMP is fundamental science with plenty inter-disciplinary applications to other subjects. It is the building-block of information science, material science and energy science, and connects physics with life science and chemical science. This paper reviews Chinese national natural science fund in CMP during 2011–2021, and provides a comparison with NSF (U.S.). It also summarizes the recent development plan of physics, and suggests the priority development areas in main branches of CMP.

Research on the Growth Experience of Presidents and Scientific Research Performance of Top Universities in China

More than half of the presidents in top universities of China have been grown up in their original universities. According to the upper echelon theory, the “indigenization” characteristics of university presidents will have an impact on their cognitive level and thus affect the scientific research performance of universities. Based on data from the National Natural Science Fund Projects and the National Social Science Fund Projects of China from 2007 to 2016, as well as individual characteristics of presidents, this paper empirically investigates the influence of the growth experience of presidents in 115 “Project 211” universities on scientific research performance. The results show that the presidents who grow up from the original universities have a significant negative impact on national fund projects, especially on the national natural science foundation projects. This paper suggest that the reason maybe the insufficient motivation and less access to external resources for native presidents. Some corresponding policy recommendations are proposed for this purpose.

A balloon-supported embolism protection technique during vertebral/subclavian artery angioplasty stenting.

A balloon-supported embolism protection technique during vertebral/subclavian artery angioplasty stenting.

Potential mechanisms by which impaired ketogenesis links metabolism to T-cell dysfunction in patients with severe COVID-19.

Potential mechanisms by which impaired ketogenesis links metabolism to T-cell dysfunction in patients with severe COVID-19.

Deep learning method for testing the cosmic distance duality relation* *Supported by the National Natural Science Fund of China (11873001 and 12147102), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of China (2022CDJXY-002)

The cosmic distance duality relation (DDR) is constrained by a combination of type-Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) and strong gravitational lensing (SGL) systems using the deep learning method. To make use of the full SGL data, we reconstruct the luminosity distance from SNe Ia up to the highest redshift of SGL using deep learning, and then, this luminosity distance is compared with the angular diameter distance obtained from SGL. Considering the influence of the lens mass profile, we constrain the possible violation of the DDR in three lens mass models. The results show that, in the singular isothermal sphere and extended power-law models, the DDR is violated at a high confidence level, with the violation parameter and , respectively. In the power-law model, however, the DDR is verified within a 1σ confidence level, with the violation parameter . Our results demonstrate that the constraints on the DDR strongly depend on the lens mass models. Given a specific lens mass model, the DDR can be constrained at a precision of using deep learning.

The effectiveness and safety of mRNA (BNT162b2) and inactivated (CoronaVac) COVID-19 vaccines among individuals with chronic kidney diseases

The effectiveness and safety of mRNA (BNT162b2) and inactivated (CoronaVac) COVID-19 vaccines among individuals with chronic kidney diseases

Opsonizing antibodies mediated SARS-CoV-2 entry into monocytes leads to inflammation.

Opsonizing antibodies mediated SARS-CoV-2 entry into monocytes leads to inflammation.

803-P: Serum Adiponectin Level Is Reduced after Short-Term Intensive Insulin Therapy in Patients with Newly Diagnosed Type 2 Diabetes

Objective: Short-term intensive insulin therapy (SIIT) can induce remission of type 2 diabetes (T2D) , and the improvement of insulin sensitivity is considered essential. This study aimed to evaluate the role of adiponectin change during SIIT in patients with newly diagnosed T2D. Methods: SIIT was given to 42 patients with newly diagnosed T2D to normalize blood glucose (4.4-6.0 mmol/L for fasting blood glucose [FBG], 4.4-8.0 mmol/L for 2h-postprandial blood glucose [2hBG]) for two weeks. Serum lipids, adiponectin, and high-sensitive C reactive protein levels, insulin resistance and β-cell function were evaluated before and after SIIT. Results:After the therepy, FBG (11.8±2.9 mmol/L vs. 6.8±1.3mmol/L,P&amp;lt;0.001) and 2hPG (18.4mmol/L± 6.4mmol/L vs. 9.7±2.4mmol/L, P&amp;lt;0.001) were both significantly decreased, with β-cell function (measured by acute insulin response [AIR], HOM-B) and insulin sensitivity (measured by HOMA-IR) improved. Serum adiponectin raised from 2.9±1.2mg/L to 3.4±1.1mg/L (P&amp;lt;0.001) ,while serum triglyceride and LDL-C decreased significantly. Serum adiponectin after treatment was correlated with baseline triglyceride (r = -0.33, P = 0.04) , HDL-C (r = 0.34, P = 0.03) , LDL-C (r = -0.31, P = 0.05) and Hs-CRP (r = -0.33, P = 0.05) ; the change of adiponectin (Δadiponectin) after treatment were significantly correlated with the level of Δtriglyceride (r = 0.38, P = 0.03) . There was no notable correlation between adiponectin and β-cell function index or HOMA-IR. Adiponectin levels were similar between patients who obtained diabetes remission (defined as FBG&amp;lt; 7.0mmol/L, 2hBG&amp;lt;10.0mmol/L without hypoglycemic agents) and those who did not (baseline:3.0±1.5mg/L vs. 2.9±1.0 mg/L; after SIIT:3.4±1.0mg/L vs. 3.3±0.9 mg/L,both P&amp;gt;0.05) . Conclusion: Adiponectin level was significantly increased after SIIT in patients with newly diagnosed T2D. The change of adiponectin is related to the improvement of lipid metabolism and reduced inflammation. Disclosure L.Liu: None. W.Ke: n/a. J.Chen: None. Y.Li: None. Funding The National Key R&amp;D Program of China (2018YFC1314100) , the Key-Area Research and Development Program of Guangdong Province (2019B020230001) , the National Natural Science Fund of China (81800716) , the science and technology program of Guangzhou, 202002020053.

1373-P: Changes in Body Composition Are Associated with Improvement of ß-Cell Function and Insulin Sensitivity after Short-Term Intensive Insulin Therapy in Patients with Newly Diagnosed Type 2 Diabetes

Objective: To investigate the change of muscle strength and body composition during short-term intensive insulin therapy (SIIT) and their association with treatment effects in patients with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes (T2DM) . Research Design and Method: Patients with newly diagnosed T2DM were treated with SIIT to normalized blood glucose for at least 1 week. Physical examination including measurement of body diameters (neck circumference, upper arm circumference, waist circumference, hip circumference, thigh circumference, and calf circumference) , muscle strength (grip strength, the five-repetition sit-to-stand test, and the 30-second sit-to-stand test) , and body composition (body fat mass, muscle mass) , were performed. HbA1c and standardized mixed meal challenge tests were performed before and after the therapy. Results: A total of 53 patients were included. After SIIT, the muscle strength of the lower limbs was significantly enhanced. The average time of the five-repetition sit-to-stand test was shortened from 7.24s±1.58s to 6.15±1.21 (P&amp;lt;0.001) , and the average number of the 30-second sit-to-stand test increased from 24.23±5.56 to 27.69±5.96 (P&amp;lt;0.001) . The HOMA-IR and β-cell function also improved after SIIT. And the baseline thigh circumference was correlated with the change of both HOMA-IR (rs=-0.296 P=0.035) and the insulinogenic index (IGI) (rs=0.373 P=0.006) after SIIT. The fat mass at baseline was also correlated with improvements in both HOMA-IR (rs=-0.368 P=0.021) and the IGI (rs=0.424 P=0.007) after therapy. Conclusion: The muscle strength of the lower limbs was promoted after SIIT. Improvements in β-cell function and insulin sensitivity after SIIT in newly diagnosed T2DM patients are associated with changes in body composition but there are no relations with muscle strength. Disclosure C.Xu: None. Y.Li: None. L.Liu: None. Funding the National Natural Science Fund of China (81800716) , the science and technology program of Guangzhou, (202002020053)

Shadows and observation intensity of black holes in the Randall–Sundrum brane world model * *Supported by the National Natural Science Fund of China (11775038, 12047564)

The shadow and observation intensity of a black hole surrounded by a thin spherical accretion in the Randall–Sundrum brane world model are investigated. The bulk metric depends on the tidal charge parameter, q, and deformation parameter, C. It reduces to the metric that possesses similar form with the Reissner–Nordström metric if . It is shown that the radius of the photon sphere of this black hole depends only on the tidal charge parameter. The radius of the photon sphere decreases with higher q. The observation intensity is mainly influenced by the tidal charge parameter, q, and the deformation parameter, C, is of secondary importance. In the optical observation, the black holes appear brighter with higher q or lower C.

Search for correlations between host properties and DM host of fast radio bursts: constraints on the baryon mass fraction in IGM * *Supported by the National Natural Science Fund of China (11775038, 11873001, 12147102)

The application of fast radio bursts (FRBs) as probes for investigating astrophysics and cosmology requires proper modelling of the dispersion measures of the Milky Way ( ) and host galaxy ( ). can be estimated using the Milky Way electron models, such as the NE2001 model and YMW16 model. However, is hard to model due to limited information on the local environment of the FRBs. In this study, using 17 well-localized FRBs, we search for possible correlations between and the properties of the host galaxies, such as the redshift, stellar mass, star-formation rate, age of galaxy, offset of the FRB site from the galactic center, and half-light radius. We find no strong correlation between and any of the host properties. Assuming that is a constant for all host galaxies, we constrain the fraction of the baryon mass in the intergalactic medium today to be . If we model as a log-normal distribution, however, we obtain a larger value, . Based on the limited number of FRBs, no strong evidence for a redshift evolution of is found.

Supramolecular Template-Assisted Catalytic [2+2] Photocycloaddition in Homogeneous Solution

Supramolecular Template-Assisted Catalytic [2+2] Photocycloaddition in Homogeneous Solution

Optimization study of the main parameters of different types of wind turbine generators * * This work was supported in part by the National Natural Science Fund under Grant 52071090, in part by the Doctoral Start-up and Postgraduate Fund under Grant R17062, and in part by the Young Innovative Talents in Colleges and Universities of Guangdong Province under Grant 2019KQNCX046.

The research and development of large-scale wind turbine generators have become a future trend in green renewable energy field from the dual perspectives of the environment and economics. In this work, an electrical design method is first proposed and applied to different types of wind turbine generators, including the high-temperature superconducting (HTS), the permanent magnet, and the traditional copper generators. The optimal electrical designs of the three types of 10 MW wind turbine generators are then created based on the developed design program. Second, the influences of the rated revolution on the basic performance parameters of the HTS generator are investigated, and the results are compared with those of the other two types of generators. It is found that the generator weight decreases with the increases of the rated revolution and the stator outer diameter, and the optimal rated revolution for a generator with a large stator outer diameter is determined to be 40 min−1. Moreover, the weight of the field parts is found to have the same regulation rule as the generator weight. Finally, the design results of the three types of wind turbine generators are comparatively discussed, and it is found that the HTS wind turbine generator is superior to its two counterparts.

Contribution of ferroptosis and GPX4's dual functions to osteoarthritis progression.

SummaryBackgroundOsteoarthritis (OA) is the most common joint disease and is the leading cause of chronic disability among older people. Chondrocyte death and extracellular matrix (ECM) degradation was involved in OA pathogenesis. Ferroptosis was an iron-dependent cell death associated with peroxidation of lipids. Here, we proved that ferroptosis exists in OA and identified glutathione peroxidase 4 (GPX4) as an important regulator of OA.MethodsFerroptosis-related alterations were analyzed in human OA and undamaged cartilage. Expression of GPX4 was examined in 55 paired human OA samples. Ferrostatin-1 (Fer-1) and Deferoxamine (DFO) were used to treat OA, in vitro and in vivo. Alterations of GPX4-mediated signaling pathway were identified by RNA-seq analysis. AAV-Gpx4-shRNA were used to downregulate GPX4 expression in vivo.FindingsTranscriptomic, biochemical, and microscopical analyses indicated that ferroptosis was closely associated with OA. Expression of GPX4 in the OA cartilage from 55 OA patients were significantly lower than undamaged cartilage. Fer-1 and DFO could protect OA in a necroptosis-independent manner, suggesting that ferroptosis exists in OA prog. Importantly, GPX4 downregulation could increase the sensitivity of chondrocytes to oxidative stress and aggravate ECM degradation through the MAPK/NFκB pathway. Furthermore, downregulation of GPX4 expression by AAV-Gpx4 shRNA aggravated OA in vivo.InterpretationFerroptosis contributes to OA pathogenesis and GPX4 was the intersection of two mechanisms in regulating OA progression: ferroptosis and ECM degradation.

Etiological and epidemiological features of acute meningitis or encephalitis in China: a nationwide active surveillance study

SummaryBackgroundAcute meningitis or encephalitis (AME) results from a neurological infection causing high case fatality and severe sequelae. AME lacked comprehensive surveillance in China.MethodsNation-wide surveillance of all-age patients with AME syndromes was conducted in 144 sentinel hospitals of 29 provinces in China. Eleven AME-causative viral and bacterial pathogens were tested with multiple diagnostic methods.FindingsBetween 2009 and 2018, 20,454 AME patients were recruited for tests. Based on 9,079 patients with all-four-virus tested, 28.43% (95% CI: 27.50%‒29.36%) of them had at least one virus-positive detection. Enterovirus was the most frequently determined virus in children <18 years, herpes simplex virus and Japanese encephalitis virus were the most frequently determined in 18−59 and ≥60 years age groups, respectively. Based on 6,802 patients with all-seven-bacteria tested, 4.43% (95% CI: 3.94%‒4.91%) had at least one bacteria-positive detection, Streptococcus pneumoniae and Neisseria meningitidis were the leading bacterium in children aged <5 years and 5−17 years, respectively. Staphylococcus aureus was the most frequently detected in adults aged 18−59 and ≥60 years. The pathogen spectrum also differed statistically significantly between northern and southern China. Joinpoint analysis revealed age-specific positive rates, with enterovirus, herpes simplex virus and mumps virus peaking at 3−6 years old, while Japanese encephalitis virus peaked in the ≥60 years old. As age increased, the positive rate for Streptococcus pneumoniae and Escherichia coli statistically significantly decreased, while for Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus suis it increased.InterpretationThe current findings allow enhanced identification of the predominant AME-related pathogen candidates for diagnosis in clinical practice and more targeted application of prevention and control measures in China, and a possible reassessment of vaccination strategy.FundingChina Mega-Project on Infectious Disease Prevention and the National Natural Science Funds