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The establishment of immunotherapy applying immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) has provided an important new option for the treatment of solid malignant diseases. However, different tumor entities show dramatically different responses to this therapy. BCC responds worse to anti-PD-1 ICIs as compared to cSCC. Differential immune checkpoint expression could explain this discrepancy and, therefore, the aim of this study was to analyze activating and inhibitory immune checkpoints in cSCC and BCC tissues. Tissue microarrays of the invasive front as well as the tumor core of BCC and cSCC samples were used to evaluate PD-1, PD-L1, CD28, and CD86 expression and their topographic distribution profiles by chromogenic immunohistochemistry. QuPath was used to determine the labeling index. The expression of PD-1, PD-L1, and CD28 was significantly higher in both the tumor core and the invasive front of cSCC samples as compared to BCC (p < 0.001). In addition, the ratios of PD-L1/CD86 (p < 0.001) and CD28/CD86 (p < 0.001) were significantly higher in cSCC. The invasive front of both tumor entities showed higher expression levels of all immune markers compared to the tumor core in both tumor entities. The significantly higher expression of PD-1, PD-L1, and CD28 in cSCC, along with the predominance of the inhibitory ligand PD-L1 as compared to the activating CD86 in cSCC, provide a potential explanation for the better objective response rates to anti-PD-1 immunotherapy as compared to BCC. Furthermore, the predominant site of interaction between the immune system and the tumor was within the invasive front in both tumor types. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tomographic reconstruction has been well established as a valuable tool in the analysis of polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEMFC) electrodes. While forays have been made into applying it to polymer electrolyte water electrolyzer (PEMWE) electrodes, CO2 electrolyzer electrodes are still new ground. Here a tomographic analysis of an electrochemical CO2 reduction gas diffusion electrode by means of focused ion beam scanning electron microscope tomography is presented. The reconstruction shows a porosity of 68%. While most of the porosity is on the nanoscale, a broad tail of micropores is observed in the distribution. The spatial distribution of the pores is nonuniform. The large pores are concentrated in the center of the layer in the through‐plane direction. From the reconstruction, an effective diffusivity factor of 0.5 for the catalyst layer is calculated. The Knudsen number of 0.19 obtained from the later shows that the diffusion is mostly in the bulk regime. Flooding of the catalyst layer is likely to decrease the effective diffusivity factor substantially. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present an in-depth investigation regarding the electron-accepting nature of pressuresynthesized carbon nanodots (pCNDs) in combination with porphyrins as excited-state electron donors. To this end, electrostatic attractions involving negative charges, which are present on the pCND surface, are essential to govern the hybrid assembly, on one hand, and charge separation, on the other hand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]