No abstract

No abstract

Neuroinflammation is one of the most significant factors involved in the initiation and progression of Parkinson’s disease. PD is a neurodegenerative disorder with a motor disability linked with various complex and diversified risk factors. These factors trigger myriads of cellular and molecular processes, such as misfolding defective proteins, oxidative stress, mitochondrial dysfunction, and neurotoxic substances that induce selective neurodegeneration of dopamine neurons. This neuronal damage activates the neuronal immune system, including glial cells and inflammatory cytokines, to trigger neuroinflammation. The transition of acute to chronic neuroinflammation enhances the susceptibility of inflammation-induced dopaminergic neuron damage, forming a vicious cycle and prompting an individual to PD development. Epigenetic mechanisms recently have been at the forefront of the regulation of neuroinflammatory factors in PD, proposing a new dawn for breaking this vicious cycle. This review examined the core epigenetic mechanisms involved in the activation and phenotypic transformation of glial cells mediated neuroinflammation in PD. We found that epigenetic mechanisms do not work independently, despite being coordinated with each other to activate neuroinflammatory pathways. In this regard, we attempted to find the synergic correlation and contribution of these epigenetic modifications with various neuroinflammatory pathways to broaden the canvas of underlying pathological mechanisms involved in PD development. Moreover, this study highlighted the dual characteristics (neuroprotective/neurotoxic) of these epigenetic marks, which may counteract PD pathogenesis and make them potential candidates for devising future PD diagnosis and treatment.

Abstract:This paper presents a hierarchical simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) system for a small unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) using the output of an inertial measurement unit (IMU) and the bearing-only observations from an onboard monocular camera. A homography based approach is used to calculate the motion of the vehicle in 6 degrees of freedom by image feature match. This visual measurement is fused with the inertial outputs by an indirect extended Kalman filter (EKF) for attitude and velocity estimation. Then, another EKF is employed to estimate the position of the vehicle and the locations of the features in the map. Both simulations and experiments are carried out to test the performance of the proposed system. The result of the comparison with the referential global positioning system/inertial navigation system (GPS/INS) navigation indicates that the proposed SLAM can provide reliable and stable state estimation for small UAVs in GPS-denied environments.

No abstract

No abstract

The highly soluble polyvinyl acetate (PVAc) was synthesized by simple solution polymerization, which was used to prepare the gel-state dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs) for the first time. The values for open-circuit photovoltage (Voc), short-circuit photocurrent density (Jsc), and fill factor (FF) of gel electrolyte-based DSCs were 0.712 V, 16.78 mA cm–2, and 68%, respectively, yielding an overall photovoltaic conversion efficiency (PCE) of 8.18%, which is comparable to a liquid electrolyte-based one with a value of 8.27%. The results of the electrochemical impedance spectra (EIS) revealed that the large charge transfer resistances at the TiO2/dye/electrolyte interface and the large diffusion resistances of the redox couple in the electrolyte are responsible for similar PCEs of gel and liquid electrolytes. The long-term stability test revealed that the PCE of the gel electrolyte-based DSC did not decay after 1000 h under AM1.5 simulated solar illumination at 60 °C and 40–50% humidity, which is superior to a liquid electrolyte-based DSC. This new method overcomes the degradation of DSCs arising from volatilization and leakage of the liquid electrolyte and promotes the industrialization process of DSC.

No abstract