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Predicting daily occupancy is extremely important for the revenue management of individual hotels. However, daily occupancy can fluctuate widely and is difficult to forecast accurately based on existing forecasting methods. In this article, ensemble empirical mode decomposition (EEMD)—a novel method—is introduced, and an individual hotel is chosen to test the effectiveness of EEMD in combination with an autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA). Result shows that this novel method, EEMD-ARIMA, can improve forecasting accuracy compared to the popular ARIMA method, especially for short-term forecasting.

Several lines of evidence suggest that genes involved in dopamine (DA) transmission may contribute to creativity. Among these genes, the catechol-O-methyltransferase gene (COMT) and the dopamine D2 receptor gene (DRD2) are the most promising candidates. Our previous study has revealed evidence for the involvement of DRD2 in creative potential. The present study extended our previous study by systematically exploring the association of COMT with creative potential as well as the interaction between COMT and DRD2. Twelve single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) covering COMT were genotyped in 543 healthy Chinese college students whose creative potentials were assessed by divergent thinking tests. Single SNP analysis showed that rs174697 was nominally associated with verbal originality, two SNPs (rs737865 and rs5993883) were nominally associated with figural fluency, and two SNPs (rs737865 and rs4680) were nominally associated with figural originality. Haplotype analysis showed that, the TCT and CCT haplotype (rs737865-rs174675-rs5993882) were nominally associated with figural originality, and the TATGCAG and CGCGGGA haplotype (rs4646312-rs6269-rs4633-rs6267-rs4818-rs4680-rs769224) were nominally associated with figural originality and verbal flexibility, respectively. However, none of these nominal findings survived correction for multiple testing. Gene–gene interaction analysis identified one significant four-way interaction of rs174675 (COMT), rs174697 (COMT), rs1076560 (DRD2), and rs4436578 (DRD2) on verbal fluency, one significant four-way interaction of rs174675 (COMT), rs4818 (COMT), rs1076560 (DRD2), and rs4648317 (DRD2) on verbal flexibility, and one significant three-way interaction of rs5993883 (COMT), rs4648319 (DRD2), and rs4648317 (DRD2) on figural flexibility. In conclusion, the present study provides nominal evidence for the involvement of COMT in creative potential and suggests that DA related genes may act in coordination to contribute to creativity.

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Observational studies suggest a link between depression and osteoporosis, but these may be subject to confounding and reverse causality. In this two-sample Mendelian randomization analysis, we included the large meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies for depression among 807,553 individuals (246,363 cases and 561,190 controls) of European descent, the large meta-analysis to identify genetic variants associated with femoral neck bone mineral density (FN-BMD), forearm BMD (FA-BMD) and lumbar spine BMD (LS-BMD) among 53,236 individuals of European ancestry, and the GWAS summary data of heel BMD (HE-BMD) and fracture among 426,824 individuals of European ancestry. The results revealed that genetic predisposition towards depression showed no causal effect on FA-BMD (beta-estimate: 0.091, 95% confidence interval [CI] − 0.088 to 0.269, SE:0.091, P value = 0.320), FN-BMD (beta-estimate: 0.066, 95% CI − 0.016 to 0.148, SE:0.042, P value = 0.113), LS-BMD (beta-estimate: 0.074, 95% CI − 0.029 to 0.177, SE:0.052, P value = 0.159), HE-BMD (beta-estimate: 0.009, 95% CI − 0.043 to 0.061, SE:0.027, P value = 0.727), or fracture (beta-estimate: 0.008, 95% CI − 0.071 to 0.087, SE:0.041, P value = 0.844). These results were also confirmed by multiple sensitivity analyses. Contrary to the findings of observational studies, our results do not reveal a causal role of depression in osteoporosis or fracture.

Tissue-specific stem/progenitor cells are essential to mediate organogenesis and tissue homeostasis. In addition, these cells have attracted significant interest for their therapeutic potential. However, it remains challenging to expand most types of these cells in vitro. In this study we devised a screening strategy aimed at identifying growth factors and small molecules that can sustain self-renewal of mouse hepatoblasts. This approach began with a defined basal condition, on top of which collections of growth factors and bioactive small molecules were screened for maintaining self-renewal of primary hepatoblasts. The initially identified proteins and small molecules were then combined in the basal media for subsequent screening to identify additional molecules that can synergistically promote hepatoblast self-renewal. This strategy was performed iteratively to eventually define a small molecule and growth factor cocktail, including epidermal growth factor, glycogen synthase kinase 3 inhibitor, transforming growth factor b receptor inhibitor, lysophosphatidic acid, and sphingosine 1-phosphate, which was sufficient to sustain long-term self-renewal of the murine hepatoblasts under chemically defined conditions. These expanded hepatoblasts retain the ability to respond to liver developmental cues and produce functional hepatocytes and form bile duct-like structures. Conclusion: Our work established a chemically defined condition that allows long-term expansion of hepatoblasts, improved our understanding of hepatoblast self-renewal, and highlights the power of phenotypic screening to enable self-renewal of somatic stem/progenitor cells. (HEPATOLOGY 2015;61:337-347)