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A green, simple, and effective method for the extraction of sugarcane lipids from sugarcane rind was investigated by response surface methodology. The optimum conditions of technological progress obtained through response surface methodology were as follows: liquid-to-solid ratio 7.94: 1 mL/g, extraction temperature 50°C and extraction time 5.98 h. The practical sugarcane lipids extraction yield was 6.55 ± 0.28%, which was in good consistence with the predicted extraction yield of 6.47%. The results showed that the sugarcane lipids extraction yield obtained in optimum conditions increased by 1.16∼7.28-fold compared to the yields obtained in single-factor experiments. After saponification and SPE steps, the nonsaponifiable fraction of sugarcane lipids was analyzed by gas chromatography with mass spectrometry and high-performance liquid chromatography. β-Sitosterol, stigmasterol, and campesterol were the prevailing phytosterols in the sample, while fucosterol, gramisterol, stigmast-7-en-3-ol, (3β,5α,24S)-, stigmasta-4,6,22-trien-3α-ol, and cholest-8(14)-en-3β-ol acetate were also identified as minor steroids. Furthermore, the content of β-sitosterol and a mixture of campesterol and stigmasterol (quantified by high-performance liquid chromatography) was 44.18 mg/100 g dry weight and 43.20 mg stigmasterol/100 g dry weight, respectively. Our results indicate that sugarcane rind is a good source of phytosterol.

African Swine Fever (ASF) is a highly contagious hemorrhagic viral disease of domestic and wild pigs. ASF has led to huge economic loss and social impact worldwide. The biological mechanism of ASF's infections is still not fully understood, and the lack of preventative options at the individual level further complicates this major global health challenge. In this paper, we propose a novel method to model the spread of ASF in China by integrating the data of pork import/export, transportation networks, and port distribution centers. We first empirically analyze the overall patterns of ASF spread and performs extensive experiments to evaluate the efficacy of a number of distance measures. These empirical analyses show that the arrival of ASF is not purely based on the geographic distance from existing infected regions. The pork supply-demand patterns have clearly influenced the spread of ASF, which cannot be well explained by conventional geographical distance and the recent effective distance methods. Predictions based on the new distance measure achieve better performance in predicting the disease spreading among Chinese provinces and thus have the potential to enable more proactive and accurate deployment of interventions.