discussed in this review. A thorough assessment of patient history and physical examination should be made in patients with PD so chronic pain may be managed effectively.The aim of the study was to determine the effect of propylene glycol and maize grain content by-pass starch supplementation during the transition period and the first 56 days of lactation on blood metabolic indices, milk production and fertility parameters in dairy cows. Seventy-five Polish Holstein-Friesian dairy cows were assigned to treatment 21 days before calving. The treatments included TG-2.5 kg triticale grain/cow per day supplemented from 14 days prepartum to day 56 postpartum, PG-2.5 kg triticale grain/cow per day supplemented from day 14 before parturition to day 56 postpartum, and 400 g propylene glycol/cow per day from 14 days prepartum to 14 days of lactation and MG-2.5 kg maize grain/cow per day supplemented from day 14 before parturition to day 56 postpartum. PG and MG had an effect resulting in the highest glucose concentration at 28 d of lactation. Cows assigned to the PG and MG groups had significantly higher cholesterol levels confronted with TG group at day 14 of lactation, while at days 28 and 56 the same difference was observed only between the MG and TG groups. MAPK inhibitor PG had an effect on shortening the period to first ovulation. PG and MG improved the first service conception rate and decreased the number of services per conception in cows. In conclusion, both treatments of dairy cows with PG and MG improved their fertility parameters, while they had a slight effect on their metabolic profile and no effect on their milking performance.The global outbreak of COVID-19 has caused worrying concern amongst the public and health authorities. The first and foremost problem that many countries face during the outbreak is a shortage of medical resources. In order to investigate the impact of a shortage of hospital beds on the COVID-19 outbreak, we formulated a piecewise smooth model for describing the limitation of hospital beds. We parameterized the model while using data on the cumulative numbers of confirmed cases, recovered cases, and deaths in Wuhan city from 10 January to 12 April 2020. The results showed that, even with strong prevention and control measures in Wuhan, slowing down the supply rate, reducing the maximum capacity, and delaying the supply time of hospital beds all aggravated the outbreak severity by magnifying the cumulative numbers of confirmed cases and deaths, lengthening the end time of the pandemic, enlarging the value of the effective reproduction number during the outbreak, and postponing the time when the threshold value was reduced to 1. Our results demonstrated that establishment of the Huoshenshan, Leishenshan, and Fangcang shelter hospitals avoided 22,786 people from being infected and saved 6524 lives. Furthermore, the intervention of supplying hospital beds avoided infections in 362,360 people and saved the lives of 274,591 persons. This confirmed that the quick establishment of the Huoshenshan, Leishenshan Hospitals, and Fangcang shelter hospitals, and the designation of other hospitals for COVID-19 patients played important roles in containing the outbreak in Wuhan.Artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a powerful set of tools for engineering innovative materials. However, the AI-aided design of materials textures has not yet been researched in depth. In order to explore the potentials of AI for discovering innovative biointerfaces and engineering materials surfaces, especially for biomedical applications, this study focuses on the control of wettability through design-controlled hierarchical surfaces, whose design is supported and its performance predicted thanks to adequately structured and trained artificial neural networks (ANN). The authors explain the creation of a comprehensive library of microtextured surfaces with well-known wettability properties. Such a library is processed and employed for the generation and training of artificial neural networks, which can predict the actual wetting performance of new design biointerfaces. The present research demonstrates that AI can importantly support the engineering of innovative hierarchical or multiscale surfaces when complex-to-model properties and phenomena, such as wettability and wetting, are involved.In this paper, an alternative curing strategy, based on the application of an electric field, is proposed to harden nano-filled multifunctional resins. The resin is obtained through the dispersion of carbon nanotubes, which act as nanometric heater elements in the epoxy matrix. The electro-curing is activated by applying an external electric voltage, which allows tunable cross-linking within the epoxy matrix entrapped between the nanotubes. The electro-curing method allows reaching higher curing degrees with respect to the conventional ones and, consequently, higher glass transition temperatures. This is a direct consequence of the fact that the curing reactions start directly in the regions at the interphase between carbon nanotubes, acting as heater nano-filaments, and the polymeric matrix. The proposed method is able to give composites better properties, making the curing process fast and energy-saving.The aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to assess the blood concentrations of the total and reduced forms of the low-molecular-weight antioxidant thiol glutathione (GSH) in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients in comparison to healthy individuals. A literature search was conducted in the PubMed and Web of Science databases from inception until June 2020. In the 18 studies identified (involving a total of 974 COPD patients and 631 healthy controls), the pooled reduced GSH concentrations were significantly lower in patients with COPD than controls (SMD  =  -3.04, 95% CI = -4.42 to -1.67; p  less then  0.001). By contrast, the pooled total GSH concentrations were significantly higher in patients with COPD than controls (SMD = 0.42, 95% CI = 0.11 to 0.73; p = 0.009). Our meta-analysis showed that the blood concentrations of reduced GSH, even in the presence of higher total GSH concentrations, were significantly lower in patients with COPD when compared to healthy controls. This suggests that an impaired antioxidant defense system plays an important role in the pathogenesis of COPD.