Background: The variability of postprandial plasma glucose is an independent risk factor for diabetes. The type and amount of carbohydrate may be important determinants of glycemic control. The aim of the study was to compare the effects of different proportions of carbohydrate in breakfast on postprandial blood glucose fluctuations in impaired glucose regulation (IGR) and normal glucose tolerance (NGT) subjects. Subjects and Methods: This is a cross-sectional study of two groups including 55 subjects with IGR and 78 individuals with NGT. Their recorded breakfast was sorted into low-carbohydrate (LC) (carbohydrate < 45%), medium-carbohydrate (MC) (carbohydrate 45-65%), and high-carbohydrate (HC) (carbohydrate > 65%) meals according to the proportion of carbohydrate. Glucose concentrations were continuously measured with a continuous glucose monitoring system, and parameters such as the incremental area under the curve (iAUC) of glucose and postprandial glucose excursion (PPGE) were calculated to evaluate postprandial glucose fluctuations. Results: The postprandial fluctuations of glucose increased gradually with increased proportions of carbohydrate in breakfast in both IGR and NGT subjects. For the MC and HC meals, iAUC, PPGE, postprandial glucose spike (PGS), and mean blood glucose were significantly greater than those in the NGT group (P < 0.05), respectively. The median time to PGS and the time period in which glucose concentrations decreased to baseline after the MC and HC meals in the IGR group were significantly longer than those in the NGT group (P < 0.01), respectively. Compared with the NGT subjects for the HC meal, the IGR subjects consuming the MC meal had greater PGS, range of glucose concentrations, SD, and PPGE (P < 0.05). Conclusions: The proportion of carbohydrate in breakfast contributes to glucose excursions in the NGT and IGR subjects. In the IGR subjects, a HC meal should be avoided and a LC meal should be recommended to prevent development of diabetes.

Despite the vast variety of colloidal superstructures available in soft matter photonics, it remains challenging to balance the trade‐off between their optical microstructures and material processability. By synergizing colloidal photonics and dynamic chemistry, a type of photonic “plasticine” with characteristics of uniform structural colors, high processability, and self‐healing is demonstrated. Specifically, a boronate ester bond‐based macromonomer is first prepared through complexation between the diols of polyvinyl alcohol and the boronic acid group of 3‐(acrylamido) phenylboronic acid in the presence of concentrated silica colloids. Upon photopolymerization, the dynamic photonic plasticine is formed in situ as the result of the crosslinking of the boronate ester bonded networks. The randomly packed colloids inside the plasticine compose the amorphous photonic crystals, giving rise to angle‐independent structural colors that would not compromise during subsequent processing steps; the reversible nature of the boronate ester bonds endows the plasticine with self‐adaptable and self‐healing properties. Further, the plasticine is also compatible with common shaping methods, that is, cutting, molding, and carving, and thus can be facilely processed into 3D structural colored objects, holding great potentials in fields such as bio‐encoding, optical filters, anti‐counterfeiting, etc.

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Moiré technique is a powerful, important and effective tool for scientific research, from the nano-scale to the macro-scale, which is essentially the interference between two or more periodic structures with a similar frequency. In this study, an inverse transmission electron microscopy (TEM) nano-Moiré method has been proposed, for the first time, to reconstruct an invisible lattice structure near the grain interface, where only one kind of lattice structure and Moiré fringe were visible in a high resolution TEM (HRTEM) image simultaneously. The inversion process was performed in detail. Three rules were put forward to ensure the uniqueness of the inversion result. The HRTEM image of a top-coat/thermally grown oxide interface in a thermal barrier coating (TBC) structure was observed with coexisting visible lattice and Moiré fringes. Using the inverse TEM nano-Moiré method, the invisible lower layer lattice was inversed and a 3-dimensional structure near the interface was also reconstructed to some degree. The real strain field of oriented invisible and visible lattices and the relative strain field of the Moiré fringe in the grain and near the grain boundary were obtained simultaneously through the subset geometric phase analysis method. The possible failure mechanism and position of the TBC spallation from the nano-scale to the micro-scale were discussed.

The R&D program on superconducting cavities fabricated from electron beam melted large grain/single crystal (LG/SC) niobium discs explores it's potential for production of approximately 1000 cavities for the European XFEL. Thermal, electrical, mechanical properties, crystal orientation and structure are investigated with the aim to make the fabrication procedure more efficient. In opposite to fine grain niobium the thermal conductivity of LG/SC has a pronounced maximum at 2K. Calculation found a correlation between thermal conductivity enhancement and phonon scattering at the grain boundaries. Detected enhancement is very susceptible to plastic deformation that can cause the complete elimination of the low temperature peak. The final annealing at 800°C of cavities made from large grain niobium is necessary for hydrogen outgassing, as well as for the thermal conductivity enhancement due to stress relaxation and recovery of crystal defects introduced at the cavity fabrication. The effects of annealing temperature up to 1200°C, heating rate, and holding time on the structure recovery after rolling are also established. Total elongation at the uniaxial tensile tests for LG is very high (50-110%) and depends significantly on the load direction, because only very few grains are in the gage length. The elongation after fracture by bi-axial testing (bulging test) for LG is lower (<15%) yet sufficient for deep drawing of half-cells. Metallographic investigation of and electron beam welding tests on, niobium single crystals show that an appropriate disc enlargement and annealing can be done without destruction of the single crystal. These tests showed that a cavity can be produced without grain boundaries even in the welding area. On base of the results a fabrication method of single crystal cavities is proposed.

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Behcet's disease (BD) and Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada (VKH) syndrome are two intraocular inflammatory diseases that are caused by an aberrant T lymphocyte response. Th17 cells, mainly producing the cytokine IL-17, and Th1 cells, characterized by the production of the index cytokine IFN-γ, are the CD4(+) T lymphocyte subsets implicated in the pathogenesis of both BD and VKH. Suppressing the excessive response of these Th17 and Th1 cells has been reported to be an effective therapeutic approach to treat these patients and continuous efforts are being undertaken to find new methods to modulate the function of these cells. Evidence is emerging that the Liver X receptor (LXR) is an important regulator of inflammatory and immune responses and the study reported here was designed to investigate the role of LXR activation in BD and VKH. Here we demonstrate that the frequency of Th17 and Th1 cells along with the relevant cytokines IL-17, IFN-γ and corresponding transcriptional factors RORC, T-bet were all decreased following LXR activation by the agonist GW3965. LXR controlled the expression of inflammatory cytokines through an effect on NF-kappa B (NFκb) phosphorylation. Data from our study provide evidence for an association between a decreased LXR expression and disease activity in both BD and VKH, due to the fact that a lower LXR activation may result in an enhanced Th1 and Th17 immune response. Our study suggests that enhancing LXR activation may offer a potential therapeutic approach targeting aberrant immune responses by inhibiting Th1 and Th17 cell responses.

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