To screen lactic acid bacteria for starter cultures in cheese production, 21 Lactococcus strains previously isolated from natural fermented milk and koumiss made by herdsman families in the Xinjiang, Gansu, and Qinghai provinces of China were evaluated for optimal growth temperature, acidification activity, proteolytic activity, aminopeptidase activity, and autolytic activity. All isolates presented low acidification rates, and the pH value did not reach 5.3 after 6 h of inoculation in sterile reconstituted skim milk at 30°C. Strains X9C2 and T7C showed the highest proteolytic activity of 24.67 and 23.58 mg of glycine/L of milk, respectively. For aminopeptidase activity, strains X9C2 and T1C2 displayed the highest activities of 30.56 and 27.70 U/mg of protein using L-leucine-p-nitroanilide as substrate, respectively. Autolytic activity in simulated cheese-like buffer ranged from 7.45 to 34.76%, and strains Q14C2 and Q16C showed the highest values of 34.76 and 34.20%, respectively. Collectively, one main finding is that some technological characteristics of Lactococcus isolates from Chinese traditional fermented products varied greatly. Some isolates with potentially important properties could be valuable for application as starter cultures of cheese or could constitute a mixed culture.

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In order to enhance the power-load of two-cell stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) system, methods of using different media and mixed medium are proposed. In theory, the amplification function of two-cell system of different medium with close vicinity in the Brillouin frequency shift (BFS) is analyzed. Also the variation of BFS of the mixed medium with the mixing ratio is analyzed. In the two-cell SBS system pumped by Q-switched Nd:YAG laser, the SBS system performance characteristics are investigated with different media and mixed medium. The experimental results indicate that the Stokes can be sufficiently amplified by choosing different medium with close vicinity in the BFS; the powerload performance is enhanced as well as the maximum amplification efficiency the Stokes by choosing mixed medium.

High-resolution continuous-wave terahertz (CW THz) real-time imaging operating at 2.52 THz is demonstrated based on THz digital holographic technique. To eliminate the influence of zero-order diffraction while reducing the recording distance, effective zero-order diffraction suppression methods are studied and compared. The spatial resolution of the imaging system is tested by imaging a selfmade Siemens star. When the recording distance is 2.1 cm, the measured resolution can reach 0.245 mm. The experimental results confirm the high imaging performance of the THz digital holography system.

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