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Electrochemical discharge machining (ECDM) is an emerging micromachining method to drill advanced non-conductive materials such as Hexagonal boron nitride (hBN). Physical contact of micro tools with work material could cause machining inaccuracies, excessive tool wear, and even tool breakage. In this study, a control system based on monitoring the force generated by the ECDM gas film has been developed to achieve non-contact machining of ECDM by dynamically adjusting the tool feed rate. The accuracy of the control system was verified by accelerometer and Fast Fourier Transformation (FFT) data. In the modules, it was found that a non-contact machining process requires the FFT amplitude to be lower than 42 V for a 1200 rpm tool rotation. The experimental results show consistent micro-holes with an average diameter of 650 µm and less than 20 µm error in the overcut achieved using this control system. 

Pancreatic cancer is usually asymptomatic in the early stages; the 5-y survival rate is around 9%; and there is a lack of effective treatment. Here we show that SSEA-4 is more expressed in all pancreatic cancer cell lines examined but not detectable in normal pancreatic cells; and high expression of SSEA-4 or the key enzymes B3GALT5 + ST3GAL2 associated with SSEA-4 biosynthesis significantly lowers the overall survival rate. To evaluate potential new treatments for pancreatic cancer, homogeneous antibodies with a well-defined Fc glycan for optimal effector functions and CAR-T cells with scFv construct designed to target SSEA-4 were shown highly effective against pancreatic cancer in vitro and in vivo. This was further supported by the finding that a subpopulation of natural killer (NK) cells isolated by the homogeneous antibody exhibited enhancement in cancer-cell killing activity compared to the unseparated NK cells. These results indicate that targeting SSEA-4 by homologous antibodies or CAR-T strategies can effectively inhibit cancer growth, suggesting SSEA-4 as a potential immunotherapy target for treating pancreatic disease. 

Consumer-generated online reviews of credence service providers, such as doctors, have become common on platforms such as Yelp and RateMDs. Yet doctors have challenged the legitimacy of these platforms on the grounds that consumers do not have the expertise required to evaluate the quality of the medical care they receive. This challenge is supported by the economics of information literature, which has characterized doctors as a credence service, meaning that consumers cannot evaluate quality even after consumption. Are interventions needed to ensure that consumers are not misled by these reviews? Data from real online reviews shows that many of the claims made in real reviews of credence service providers focus on experience attributes, such as promptness, which consumers can typically evaluate, rather than credence attributes, such as knowledge. Follow-up experiments show that consumers are more likely to believe experience claims (vs. credence claims) made by other consumers, claims that are supported by data, and longer reviews even if they are not more informative. The authors discuss implications for consumers and credence service providers and possible policy interventions.