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Chimeric antigen receptor-expressing T (CAR-T) cells induce robust antitumor responses in patients with hematologic malignancies. However, CAR-T cells exhibit only limited efficacy against solid tumors such as hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), partially due to their limited expansion and persistence. CD8+T cells, as key components of the adaptive immune response, play a central role in antitumor immunity. Aerobic glycolysis is the main metabolic feature of activated CD8+T cells. In the tumor microenvironment, however, the uptake of large amounts of glucose by tumor cells and other immunosuppressive cells can impair the activation of T cells. Only when tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) in the tumor microenvironment have a glycolytic advantage might the effector function of T cells be activated. Glucose transporter type 1 (GLUT1) and acylglycerol kinase (AGK) can boost glycolytic metabolism and activate the effector function of CD8+ T cells, respectively. In this study, we generated GPC3-targeted CAR-T cells overexpressing GLUT1 or AGK for the treatment of HCC. GPC3-targeted CAR-T cells overexpressing GLUT1 or AGK specifically and effectively lysed GPC3-positive tumor cells in vitro in an antigen-dependent manner. Furthermore, GLUT1 or AGK overexpression protected CAR-T cells from apoptosis during repeated exposures to tumor cells. Compared with second-generation CAR-T cells, GPC3-targeted CAR-T cells overexpressing GLUT1 or AGK exhibited greater CD8+T-cell persistence in vivo and better antitumor effects in HCC allograft mouse models. Finally, we revealed that GLUT1 or AGK maintained anti-apoptosis ability in CD8+T cells via activation of the PI3K/Akt pathway. This finding might identify a therapeutic strategy for advanced HCC.

Nonhealing skin wounds are a problematic complication associated with diabetes. Therapeutic gases delivered by biomaterials have demonstrated powerful wound healing capabilities. However, the cellular responses and heterogeneity in the skin regeneration process after gas therapy remain elusive. Here, we display the benefit of the carbon monoxide (CO)-releasing hyaluronan hydrogel (CO@HAG) in promoting diabetic wound healing and investigate the cellular responses through single-cell transcriptomic analysis. The presented CO@HAG demonstrates wound microenvironment responsive gas releasing properties and accelerates the diabetic wound healing process in vivo. It is found that a new cluster of Cxcl14+fibroblasts with progenitor property is accumulated in the CO@HAG-treated wound. This cluster of Cxcl14+fibroblasts is yet unreported in the skin regeneration process. CO@HAG-treated wound macrophages feature a decrease in pro-inflammatory property, while their anti-inflammatory property increases. Moreover, the TGF-β signal between the pro-inflammatory (M1) macrophage and the Cxcl14+fibroblast in the CO@HAG-treated wound is attenuated based on cell–cell interaction analysis. Our study provides a useful hydrogel-mediated gas therapy method for diabetic wounds and new insights into cellular events in the skin regeneration process after gas-releasing biomaterials therapy.

Porous structures are essential for some collagen-based biomaterials and can be regulated by crosslinkers. Herein, dialdehyde carboxymethyl cellulose (DCMC) crosslinkers with similar size but different aldehyde group contents were prepared through periodate oxidation of sodium carboxymethyl cellulose with varying degrees of substitution (DS). They can penetrate into the hierarchy of fibril and form inter-molecular and intra-fibril cross-linking within the collagen matrix due to their nanoscale sizes and reactive aldehyde groups. The collagen matrices possessed higher porosity, significantly greater proportion of large pores (Φ > 10 μm), and shorter D-periodicity after cross-linking, showing greater potential for biomedical applications. In addition, the crosslinked collagen matrices showed satisfactory biocompatibility and biodegradation. The decreased DS of carboxymethyl cellulose, which led to the increased aldehyde content of corresponding DCMC, brought about an enhanced cross-linking degree, porosity, and proportion of large pores of the crosslinked collagen matrix. DCMC dosage of 6% was sufficient for cross-linking and pore formation. Excess DCMC would physically deposit in the matrix and decrease the porosity instead. Therefore, the desired pore properties of the collagen matrix could be obtained by regulating the structure of DCMC and thereby achieving the required functions of the biomaterial.

UTX(also known as KDM6A) encodes a histone H3K27 demethylase and is an important tumour suppressor that is frequently mutated in human cancers1. However, as the demethylase activity of UTX is often dispensable for mediating tumour suppression and developmental regulation2–8, the underlying molecular activity of UTX remains unknown. Here we show that phase separation of UTX underlies its chromatin-regulatory activity in tumour suppression. A core intrinsically disordered region (cIDR) of UTX forms phase-separated liquid condensates, and cIDR loss caused by the most frequent cancer mutation of UTX is mainly responsible for abolishing tumour suppression. Deletion, mutagenesis and replacement assays of the intrinsically disordered region demonstrate a critical role of UTX condensation in tumour suppression and embryonic stem cell differentiation. As shown by reconstitution in vitro and engineered systems in cells, UTX recruits the histone methyltransferase MLL4 (also known as KMT2D) to the same condensates and enriches the H3K4 methylation activity of MLL4. Moreover, UTX regulates genome-wide histone modifications and high-order chromatin interactions in a condensation-dependent manner. We also found that UTY, the Y chromosome homologue of UTX with weaker tumour-suppressive activity, forms condensates with reduced molecular dynamics. These studies demonstrate a crucial biological function of liquid condensates with proper material states in enabling the tumour-suppressive activity of a chromatin regulator.

Industrial manufacture generates a huge quantity of emulsion wastewater, which causes serious threats to the aquatic ecosystems. Water-in-oil (W/O) and oil-in-water (O/W) emulsions are two major types of emulsions discharged by industries. However, dual separation of W/O and O/W emulsions remains a challenging issue due to the contradictory permselectivity for separating the two emulsions. In the present investigation, the amphiphilicity-derived regional wetting mechanism of water and oil on the amphiphilic collagen fibers was revealed based on the combination of numerous experiments and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. Electrostatic interactions and van der Waals force were manifested to be the driving forces of regional wetting in the hydrophilic and hydrophobic regions, respectively. The regional wetting endowed amphiphilic collagen fibers with underwater oleophobicity and underoil hydrophilicity, which enabled dual separation of emulsions by selectively retaining the dispersed water phase of W/O emulsions in the hydrophilic regions while the dispersed oil phase of O/W emulsions in the hydrophobic regions. The achieved separation efficiency was higher than 99.98%, and the flux reached 3337.6 L m–2h–1. Initial wetting status significantly affects the regional wetting-enabled dual separation. Based on the MD simulations, amphiphilic intramolecular conformations of tropocollagen were suggested to be the origins of regional wetting on collagen fibers. Our findings may pave the way for developing high-performance dual separation materials that are promising to be utilized for the practical treatment of emulsion wastewater.

Long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) Cancer Susceptibility 2 (CASC2) has been proved to contribute to the development of cancers. However, the mechanism behind the action of CASC2 in thyroid cancer is not quite clear. We demonstrated that CASC2 was downregulated in thyroid cancer. We noted that CASC2 overexpression restrained the growth, migration, and invasion of thyroid cancer cells, whereas CASC2 depletion caused opposite trends. Bioinformatics analysis predicted that hypoxia inducible factor 1 subunit alpha inhibitor (FIH‐1) was potentially targeted by miR‐18a‐5p, which was confirmed by luciferase reporter assay. Upregulation of FIH‐1 abrogated the promotive effect of miR‐18a‐5p on the growth and invasion of thyroid cancer cells. In addition, CASC2 serves as a competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) and a ''sponge'' for miR‐18a‐5p, thereby regulating the expression of FIH‐1. These data elucidated the CASC2/miR‐18a‐5p ceRNA network in thyroid cancer pathogenesis.

Efficient production of bioethanol is desirable for bioenergy large-scale applications, but it is severely challenged by ethanol and sugar stresses. Here, collagen peptide (CP), as a renewable nitrogen-containing biomass, remarkably enhanced the stress resistance of Saccharomyces cerevisiaeSLL-510 against ethanol challenge, based on its unique amino acid composition. Transcriptome analysis showed that the energy, lipid, cofactor, and vitamin metabolism may involve in stress tolerance provided by CP. When CP was added into the media containing 249.99 mg/mL glucose, the bioethanol yield increased from 8.03 to 12.25% (v/v) and 11.35 to 12.29% (v/v) at 43 and 120 h, respectively. Moreover, at 286.79 mg/mL glucose, the highest yield reached 14.48% (v/v), with 99.58% glucose utilization rate. The protection and promotion effects of CP were also shown by four other industrial S. cerevisiaestrains. These results coupled with the advantages of abundant reserves, cleanliness, and renewability revealed that CP is a promising economically viable and industrially scalable enhancer for bioethanol fermentation.

A high-shielding, low secondary radiation, lightweight, flexible, and wearable X-ray protection material was prepared by coimpregnating La2O3and Bi2O3nanoparticles in natural leather (NL) with an additional Bi2O3coating at the bottom surface of the leather. The prepared Bi28.2@Bi3.48La3.48–NL (28.2 and 3.48 mmol·cm–3are the loading contents of elements) showed excellent X-ray shielding ability (65–100%) in a wide energy range of 20–120 keV with reduced scattered secondary radiation (30%). The bottom surface coating played a critical role in enhancing the X-ray attenuation and reducing the scattered secondary radiation by reflecting and deflecting incident X-ray photons. Excellent mechanical property with superb bending resistance of the NL matrix was properly maintained, and its tensile strength and tearing load were 15.39 MPa and 25.81 N·mm–1, respectively. This lightweight and wearable high-performance protection material can facilitate safety and comfortability during intensive activities of practitioners in the health care industry.

To evaluate the performance of the quantitative markers of hepatitis B core-related antigen (HBcrAg) and anti-hepatitis B core antigen antibodies HbcAb versus hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) and hepatitis B virus DNA (HBV DNA) in predicting liver fibrosis levels in chronic hepatitis B patients.

The demand for innovative materials with favorable antiadhesion and antibiofilm abilities against bacteria has become imperative, given the increasing cognition of the harmfulness of biofilm colonization. Herein, typical plant polyphenols (PPs), including catechin, epigallocatechin gallate, and black wattle tannin (BWT), are utilized to catch and immobilize rare-earth ions onto the polyamide membrane to prepare advanced antibiofilm materials. The introduction of ytterbium (Yb) endows the polyamide membrane with excellent antiadhesion and antibiofilm abilities against Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The stability of Yb is improved by covalent immobilization by PPs. This effect significantly enhances the long-term antibacterial and antibiofilm activities under static and dynamic conditions. Furthermore, the Yb@BWT membrane exhibits the best antibacterial and antibiofilm performance among all prepared membranes with ∼100% inhibition for planktonic bacteria and biofilm formation after 2 days of soaking in artificial urine. The promising antibacterial and antibiofilm abilities of membranes prepared through the covalent immobilization of Yb by PPs indicate that the method reported here is a prospective facile, effective, and low-cost strategy for fabricating novel materials to prevent biofilm formation.

Size-sieving is an effective strategy for emulsion separation. However, the poly-dispersed porous nature of conventional size-sieving materials compromises their separation performances. Distinctive from poly-dispersed porous size-sieving materials, microporous metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) have homogeneous and uniform microporous channels that are promising to present high porosity utilization with exceptional demulsifying capability for both microemulsion and nanoemulsion. However, the internal diffusion kinetics of microporous MOFs dominate the transport behaviors of liquid inside their microporous channels, which poses a major kinetics obstacle for achieving high separation flux. Herein, we developed composite fibers by using hierarchically fibrous structured collagen fibers (CFs) as transport kinetics-promotable channels and microporous MOFs (ZIF-8 or HKUST-1) in situ-grown on CFs as a size-sieving layer. CFs feature a capillary effect that induces fast liquid transport along the fibers, which alleviates the kinetics shortcomings of microporous MOFs, thus boosting the separation flux. A synergistic effect was proven to exist between the size-sieving merits of MOFs and capillary effect of CFs. The as-prepared composite fibers realized the ultrafast separation of surfactant-stabilized micro- and nanoemulsions, showing two orders of magnitude flux enhancement on those of commercial double-sided polyvinylidene fluoride membrane and double-sided polytetrafluoroethylene membrane. These investigations demonstrated a new conceptual strategy for developing size-sieving materials with high flux.

It remains unknown if biophysical or material properties of biomolecular condensates regulate cancer. Here we show that AKAP95, a nuclear protein that regulates transcription and RNA splicing, plays an important role in tumorigenesis by supporting cancer cell growth and suppressing oncogene-induced senescence. AKAP95 forms phase-separated and liquid-like condensates in vitro and in nucleus. Mutations of key residues to different amino acids perturb AKAP95 condensation in opposite directions. Importantly, the activity of AKAP95 in splice regulation is abolished by disruption of condensation, significantly impaired by hardening of condensates, and regained by substituting its condensation-mediating region with other condensation-mediating regions from irrelevant proteins. Moreover, the abilities of AKAP95 in regulating gene expression and supporting tumorigenesis require AKAP95 to form condensates with proper liquidity and dynamicity. These results link phase separation to tumorigenesis and uncover an important role of appropriate biophysical properties of protein condensates in gene regulation and cancer.

The conventional liquid electrolytes (LEs) have a high level of ionic conductivity; however, they often suffer from the poor processability and safety risks of potential leakage. Although solid-state electrolytes (SSEs) can solve these inherent problems of LEs, the ionic conductivity of most SSEs is several magnitudes lower than these of LEs. Herein, we report a novel strategy by building liquid ion-transport channels in a solid framework and prepared an electrolyte-locked separator (ELS) using a collagen fiber membrane (CFm). The liquid electrolyte was primarily infiltrated in the smaller voids of CFm, and its ionic conductivity could attain to 9.0 × 10−3S cm−1when the electrolyte absorption (EA) reached up to 112.0%. After centrifuging treatment, the electrolyte retentions (ER) and ionic conductivities of ELS were 108.93% and 8.37 × 10−3S cm−1, respectively, which were much higher than those of commercial cellulose separator (CS), exerting excellent liquid-locking performances. In particular, the electrical double-layer capacitors (EDLC) assembled by ELS or CS were characterized and exhibited similar electrochemical performance, demonstrating the satisfactory ability and applicability of ELS for commercial use. In addition, the ELS-based EDLC exhibited favorable flexibility with relative lower loss of capacitance under different angles of bending.

Clinically related infection is a critical risk for human health and is usually caused by biofilm formation on medical devices. Herein, typical polyphenols, catechin (Cat), and rare-earth ions (Re3+) were used for self-assembled Cat–Re nanoparticles that can be facilely coated on the surface of a polyamide (PA) membrane to synergistically prevent bacterial adhesion and subsequent biofilm formation. The antibacterial adhesion feature of the assembled Cat–Re nanoparticles coated on the PA membrane surface was assessed using Pseudomonas aeruginosa, one of the most common pathogenic bacteria, as probe bacteria under static and dynamic simulation flow conditions. The Cat–Re nanocoating showed excellent antibacterial and anti-adhesion activities against P. aeruginosaand successfully prevented biofilm formation on the material’s surface. Regardless of the conditions, the Cat–Re nanocoating significantly suppressed the growth and attachment of P. aeruginosaand maintained >90% inhibition activity with favorable reusability and long-term stability. The results suggest that the self-assembled rare-earth–phenolic nanocoating has promising application potential in the prevention of medical device-related biofilm formation.

The aim of this study was to investigate the location characteristics of cystic lesions in a three-dimensional context and discuss the mechanism of formation.

Nowadays, X-rays are playing increasingly important roles in daily life and industrial manufacture, which calls for effective and mobile shielding materials. However, it seems to be a paradox to prepare shielding materials simultaneously achieving excellent X-ray attenuation properties and superior mechanical strength. Here, an advanced leather-based X-ray shielding material containing bismuth and iodine (BiINP-LM) is prepared, and the stable and well-dispersed loading of high-Z element components is enabled by favorable interactions between bismuth iodide and leather, i.e., coordination, hydrogen bonds, and electrostatic attractions. A piece of BiINP-LM with 1.00 mm thickness displays an excellent X-ray attenuation efficiency of more than 90% in the photon energy range below 50 keV and 65% at 83 keV, which averagely exceeds ∼3% than that of the 0.25 mm lead plate and ∼5% than that of the 0.65 mm commercial lead apron. Additionally, the coordination between bismuth and leather provides an enhanced tensile and tear strength of ∼10-fold and 3-fold compared with the lead apron. It is worth mentioning that BiINP-LM also displays extra high water-vapor permeability, which is ∼50-fold more than the lead apron. Overall, this work opens up a new prospect for preparing advanced X-ray shielding materials with both excellent X-ray attenuation and outstanding physiomechanical performances.

Despite the successes achieved in contaminant treatments with microscale Fe/Cu bimetals, some important limitations, such as high Cu loading and easily shedding of the Cu layer, cannot be ignored. The purpose of this research is to get a new mFe/Cu bimetal preparation method by changing the Cu(II) existence state during the preparation process. The Cu layer was regularly distributed on the surface of microscale Fe with uniform nanograde-sized globular shape particles (mFe/nCu) in the presence of complexants, which facilitated catalytic sites and galvanic couple formation. Furthermore, the reactivity of the prepared mFe/nCu bimetal increased linearly with the complexation constants (lgkMY) of the different complexants. Particularly, kobs(0.090 min–1) obtained by mFe/nCu bimetallic particles after five cycles was higher than that of the fresh mFe/Cu (0.074 min–1) bimetallic particles prepared without a complexant. This work improves the preparation of Fe/Cu bimetal and provides a deep insight into the improvement reason of reactivity and operational life.

The discharge of emulsion, cationic dyes, and heavy metals often coexists in wastewaters, greatly enhancing the difficulty of processing. In this work, we fabricated a nonswelling silica–poly(acrylic acid) (SiO2–PAA) composite through the surface modification of SiO2using PAA to remove emulsion, cationic dyes, and heavy metal co-contaminants simultaneously. In the SiO2–PAA composite, PAA exists in a linear and divergent form rather than a network structure. Thus, SiO2–PAA can gain the nonswelling property, provide abundant carboxyl groups as the binding sites for removal of pollutants, which is an important advanced feature of PAA-based materials, and improve the potential of practical application. The characterization results of SiO2–PAA demonstrated that PAA was successfully grafted on SiO2. In a monocomponent system, SiO2–PAA exhibited excellent separation efficiency for cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB)-stabilized emulsion separation and admirable adsorption capacity of 758.6 and 178.6 mg/g for methylene blue (MB) and Cr(III). This finding was ascribed to the exposure of carboxyl groups in SiO2–PAA, which could increase the mass transfer efficiency. Importantly, the SiO2–PAA composite exhibited high efficiency in the simultaneous uptake of CTAB-stabilized emulsion, MB, and Cr(III) co-contaminants. Thus, given the simple fabrication, efficient emulsion separation, admirable adsorption capacity, and excellent reusability of SiO2–PAA, it exhibits striking potential for the efficient treatment of coexisting pollutants.

Leather matrix (LM), a natural dielectric material, features a hierarchically suprafibrillar structure and abundant dipoles, which provides the possibility to dissipate electromagnetic waves (EW) energy via dipole relaxation combined with multiple diffuse reflections. Conventionally, metal-based materials are used as EW shielding materials due to that their high conductivity can reflect EW effectively. Herein, a lightweight and high-performance EW shielding composite with both absorption and reflection ability to EW was developed by coating metal nanoparticles (MNPs) onto LM. The as-prepared metal/LM membrane with only 4.58 wt % of coated MNPs showed excellent EW shielding effectiveness of ∼76.0 dB and specific shielding effectiveness of ∼200.0 dB cm3g–1in the frequency range of 0.01–3.0 GHz, implying that more than 99.98% of EW was shielded. Further investigations indicated that the high shielding performances of the metal/LM membrane were attributed to the cooperative shielding mechanism between LM and the coating of MNPs.

As an emerging micropollutant, p-arsanilic acid (p-ASA) would release highly toxic arsenate and arsenite during migration transformation. Herein, a three-dimensional polyethylenimine-aminated leather collagen fiber (CF-PEI) decorated with MgZnFe (MZF) metal oxides, i.e., CF-PEI@MZF monolith, was reported for the ultradeep p-ASA removal. The synergetic functions of hydrogen bonding and electrostatic interaction from the CF-PEI and coordinative interaction from the MZF on the monolith allow an ultrarapid kinetic that could achieve ca. 80% of the adsorption equilibrium within 20 min and a benchmarked exothermic Langmuir adsorption capacity as high as 588.24 mg g–1for the p-ASA. It also performed an unparalleled feasibility in the continuous treatment to reduce the concentration of p-ASA to below 0.05 mg L–1for real applications. We also highlight the monolith structure with great features of easy separation and recycling use for real industrial applications. All these demonstrate the merits of our CF-PEI@MZF monolith in addressing environmental engineering challenges.

Engineering graphene into a particular shape is vital for potential industrial applications. To this end, better understanding of the growth mechanism is needed to control the growth behavior of graphene on a substrate surface with a specific shape. In this work, a tetragon-shaped graphene single crystal (TS_GSC) with millimeter-scale grain size was achieved on copper foil, which was annealed at oxygen-free conditions (AOF) prior to graphene growth. The TS_GSC grains are featured by two dendritic Frontiers at the shorter-edge (SE) sides and two sharp Frontiers at the longer-edge (LE) sides of graphene grain. By combining scanning electron microscopy, optical microscopy, and Raman mapping with carbon isotope labeling, we revealed for the first time an asymmetric growth behavior of TS_GSC grains on an AOF-treated copper substrate. It was supposed that the growth of graphene was determined by the diffusion-limited aggregation mechanism at the SE side, whereas it was governed by the edge-determined atom-attachment mechanism at the LE side of graphene grain. In addition to single-layer graphene, tetragon-shaped bilayered graphene with grain size over 200 μm was also achieved on the AOF-treated copper substrate.

Taking plant polyphenols as multifunctional platforms, we developed an environmentally friendly surface decoration strategy for preparing new types of three-dimensional (3D) superhydrophobic foams. The superhydrophobic foams were fabricated by in situgrowth of β-FeOOH nanoparticles on melamine foams that were pretreated by noncovalent surface decoration of plant polyphenol–glutaraldehyde cross-linkage, followed by the Michael addition of 1-dodecanethiol to plant polyphenols. The as-prepared superhydrophobic foams had water contact angles of 154.93° and 153.12° on the exterior and interior surfaces, respectively. The superhydrophobic foams featured a large absorption capacity, high mechanical robustness, structural stability, and flame resistance. During the 100 cycles of absorption and squeezing, the loss of absorption capacity was as low as 0.14% per cycle. In a continuous separation process, organic pollutants were successfully removed from water with a separation efficiency of 98.0%. Notably, the 3D superhydrophobic foams successfully separated six types of oil/water microemulsions, with a peak separation efficiency of 99.82%.

Understanding of the growth properties of organic thin film (OTF) on graphene surface is beneficial to develop high-performance organic electronic devices based on OTF and graphene electrodes. In this work, we investigated the growth behaviors of pentacene on the poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA)-assisted wet-transfer graphene substrates. Especially, the influence of PMMA residues and graphene wrinkles on the initial nucleation behavior and subsequent aggregation of pentacene were studied in detail. Pentacene adopts standing-up geometry on the as-transferred graphene substrates. The molecules prefer to initially reside beside graphene wrinkles where the density of PMMA residues is found to be larger than the flat regions of graphene and then the subsequent deposited pentacene was packed face-to-face and developed into one-dimensional fiberlike domains with a fiber length of few micrometers. Controlled experiments and detailed surface analysis of graphene reveal that the hydroxyl groups of polymer residues are responsible for the standing-up geometry of pentacene on PMMA–graphene. This emphasizes the importance to prepare clean graphene surface for layer-by-layer growth of pentacene with a lying-down geometry. Unfortunately, the complete removal of PMMA using acetone is not possible. Higher temperature may partially remove PMMA residue, but the decomposed radicals especially the hydroxyl radical induce standing-up geometry of pentacene, resulting in the coexistence of standing-up and lying-down molecular geometry for pentacene film deposited onto annealed graphene substrates.

ABSTRACTIn the present investigation, an collagen fibre (CF), abundant natural biomass, was successfully grafted by polyethyleneimine (PEI). The resultant PEI grafted collagen fibre (CF-PEI) was employed as biocompatible and high cell loading support matrix for the immobilization of Saccharomyces cerevisiaecells. The as-prepared CF-PEI immobilized cells (CF-PEI-cell) exhibited high activity and stability for both batch and continuous fermentation. In batch fermentation, CF-PEI-cells showed enhanced stability as compared with other matrices supported cells, and produced an average ethanol concentration of 45.04 g/L with ethanol yield (YP/S) of 0.46 g/g and glucose conversion efficiency (η) of 90.4%. Continuous fermentation was operated stably in a down-flow trickling bed reactor charged with CF-PEI-cell for a total of 2 months. When the dilution rate was 0.16 1/h, the average ethanol productivity reached 7.18 g/(L h) with η of 88.94%. Further scanning electron microscopy observations confirmed that yeast cells can proliferate on the surface of CF-PEI during ethanol fermentation, which demonstrates that CF-PEI is indeed an ideal matrix for the immobilization of yeast cells.

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The study's aim is to calculate the parameters for retrograde insertion points for fixed superior pubic ramus fractures.

SO2removal is critical to flue gas purification. However, based on performance and cost, materials under development are hardly adequate substitutes for active carbon-based materials. Here, we engineered biomass-derived nanostructured carbon nanofibers integrated with highly dispersed bimetallic Ti/CoOxnanoparticles through the thermal transition of metal-phenolic functionalized industrial leather wastes for synergistic SO2adsorption and in situ catalytic conversion. The generation of surface-SO32–and peroxide species (O22–) by Ti/CoOxachieved catalytic conversion of adsorbed SO2into value-added liquid H2SO4, which can be discharged from porous nanofibers. This approach can also avoid the accumulation of the adsorbed SO2, thereby achieving high desulfurization activity and a long operating life over 6000 min, preceding current state-of-the-art active carbon-based desulfurization materials. Combined with the techno-economic and carbon footprint analysis from 36 areas in China, we demonstrated an economically viable and scalable solution for real-world SO2removal on the industrial scale.

The interactions between lignin oligomers and solvents determine the behaviors of lignin oligomers self-assembling into uniform lignin nanoparticles (LNPs). Herein, several alcohol solvents, which readily interact with the lignin oligomers, were adopted to study their effects during solvent shifting process for LNPs’ production. The lignin oligomers with widely distributed molecular weight and abundant guaiacyl units were extracted from wood waste (mainly consists of pine wood), exerting outstanding self-assembly capability. Uniform and spherical LNPs were generated in H2O-n-propanol cosolvent, whereas irregular LNPs were obtained in H2O-methanol cosolvent. The unsatisfactory self-assembly performance of the lignin oligomers in H2O-methanol cosolvent could be attributed to two aspects. On one hand, for the initial dissolution state, the distinguishing Hansen solubility parameter and polarity between methanol solvent and lignin oligomers resulted in the poor dispersion of the lignin oligomers. On the other hand, strong hydrogen bonds between methanol solvent and lignin oligomers during solvent shifting process, hindered the interactions among the lignin oligomers for self-assembly.

Collagen fibers (CFs) were previously used as packing materials for the separation of flavonoids based on hydrogen bond and hydrophobic interactions. However, as for flavonoid aglycones, CFs presented unsatisfactory adsorption capacity and separation efficiency due to the fact that they include limited hydroxyls and phenyls. In order to improve the adsorption capacity and separation efficiency, the hydrophobic modification strategy was employed in this research to enhance the hydrophobic interaction of CF with flavonoid aglycones by using silane coupling agents with different alkyl chains (isobutyl, octyl, and dodecyl). FT-IR analysis, DSC, TG, SEM, EDS mapping, water contact angle, and absorption time of solvent proved the successful grafting of alkyl chains on the CF without disturbing its special fiber structure, leading to the significantly enhanced hydrophobicity of the CF. The dynamic adsorption and elution behavior of kaempferol and quercetin (the typical flavonoid aglycones) on the hydrophobic CF showed that the adsorption rate and retention rate were largely increased in comparison with the CF without modification. Molecular dynamic simulations indicated that the CF grafted with isobutyls could interact with flavonoid aglycones through the highest synergetic effect of hydrophobic and hydrogen bond interactions, which exhibited the strongest retention to flavonoid aglycones. On further increasing the alkyl length (octyl and dodecyl), the hydrophobic interaction was further enhanced, but the hydrogen bonds were significantly weakened by steric hindrance, which showed that the retention to flavonoid aglycones was appropriately increased but without causing peak tailing. In the column separation of kaempferol and quercetin, the CF with hydrophobic modification presented a greater separation efficiency, with the purity of kaempferol increased from 71.99 to 86.57–97.50% and the purity of quercetin increased from 82.69 to 88.07–99.37%, which was much better than that of polyamide and close to that of sephadex LH 20. Therefore, the hydrophobicity of the CF could be controllably adjusted to enhance the adsorption rate and retention capacity, specifically improving the separation efficiency of flavonoid aglycones.

A number of limitations associated with the use of hollow nerve guidance conduits (NGCs) require further discussion. Most importantly, the functional recovery outcomes after the placement of hollow NGCs are poor even after the successful bridging of peripheral nerve injuries. However, nerve regeneration scaffolds built using electric spinning have several advantages that may improve functional recovery. Thus, the present study summarizes recent developments in this area, including the key cells that are combined with the scaffold and associated with nerve regeneration, the structure and configuration of the electrospinning design (which determines the performance of the electrospinning scaffold), the materials the electrospinning fibers are composed of, and the methods used to control the morphology of a single fiber. Additionally, this study also discusses the processes underlying peripheral nerve regeneration. The primary goals of the present review were to evaluate and consolidate the findings of studies that used scaffolding biomaterials built by electrospinning used for peripheral nerve regeneration support. It is amazing that the field of peripheral nerve regeneration continues to consistently produce such a wide variety of innovative techniques and novel types of equipment, because the introduction of every new process creates an opportunity for advances in materials for nerve repair.

To investigate the prevalence of diabetic at-risk foot and its associated factors.

Articular cartilage damage and osteoarthritis are the most common joint diseases. Joints are prone to damage caused by sports injuries or aging, and such damage regularly progresses to more serious joint disorders, including osteoarthritis, which is a degenerative disease characterized by the thinning and eventual wearing out of articular cartilage, ultimately leading to joint destruction. Osteoarthritis affects millions of people worldwide. Current approaches to repair of articular cartilage damage include mosaicplasty, microfracture, and injection of autologous chondrocytes. These treatments relieve pain and improve joint function, but the long-term results are unsatisfactory. The long-term success of cartilage repair depends on development of regenerative methodologies that restore articular cartilage to a near-native state. Two promising approaches are (i) implantation of engineered constructs of mesenchymal stem cell (MSC)-seeded scaffolds, and (ii) delivery of an appropriate population of MSCs by direct intra-articular injection. MSCs may be used as trophic producers of bioactive factors initiating regenerative activities in a defective joint. Current challenges in MSC therapy are the need to overcome current limitations in cartilage cell purity and to in vitro engineer tissue structures exhibiting the required biomechanical properties. This review outlines the current status of MSCs used in cartilage tissue engineering and in cell therapy seeking to repair articular cartilage defects and related problems. MSC-based technologies show promise when used to repair cartilage defects in joints.

The roll forming production line with fixed mould and moving roll of variable cross-section is a hydromechatronics line that implements the automatic processing of vehicle parts. Some technical problems of mass production of complicated cross section parts can be solved successfully by the production line, such as the low stability, the uncontrolled dimensional accuracy and the sheet deformation while a variable cross-section is cut off. The control system for the complete production line mainly consists of these parts: Siemens Simotion D455-2 motion control system, IPC, touch screen, ET200M input and output modules and so on. In order to develop the control system for the production line, the article completed system general design, full-closed loop control structure design and software design. It also completed building of hardware platform, development of software system and research of interpolation algorithm. Through several experimental verifications, the control system for the production line can meet the requirement of actual production.

Developing dual separation materials that exhibit high-flux separation capabilities towards oil-in-water (O/W) and water-in-oil (W/O) emulsions provides a promising and facile remediation strategy for the contamination caused by emulsified oily wastewater. Herein, environmentally benign amphiphilic composite fibers (ACFs) were facilely prepared by a green synthesis approach that relied on the non-covalent decoration of tannic acid (TA), the natural amphiphilic phenolic compound, onto collagen fibers (CFs) with inherent amphiphilicity and structural hierarchy. Hydrophobic interactions and multi-hydrogen bonding interactions between the amphiphilic TA and CFs brought the enhancement of amphiphilicity-enabled wetting behaviors as well as the structural stability of CFs. The green synthesized ACFs exhibited hydrophilicity, underwater superoleophobicity and underoil hydrophilicity. The as-prepared ACFs were directly utilized for the dual separation of O/W and W/O emulsions with high separation efficiency (> 99.99%) and high flux (e.g.2471 L m−2h−1) by selectively permeating the continuous water phase of O/W emulsions and the continuous oil phase of W/O emulsions, respectively. Compared with CFs, the structural stability of ACFs was improved significantly, which therefore provided appreciable reusability and long-term separation stability. Our findings demonstrated the essential role of amphiphilicity played in the dual separation of O/W and W/O emulsions, which also provided a new solution for the remediation of emulsified oily wastewater by developing biomaterials-based amphiphilic separation materials.

The magnetic biochar catalyst (Fe@BC) was synthesized by pyrolyzing Fe–tanned collagen fiber based on the tanning process and used as a high–efficiency and recyclable persulfate (PS) activator to degrade refractory dyes. In this study, methylene blue (MB) was chosen as a model pollutant to evaluate the performance of the Fe@BC/PS system. Results illustrated that MB was completely removed within 20 min with a rate constant (kobs) of 0.2246 min–1, which was much higher than that of pure biochar (0.0497 min–1), and high mineralization efficiency (92%) for MB degradation was obtained. Notably, the MB removal rate still reached 72% after 20 cycles. The high catalytic activity and excellent recycling performance could be attributed to the uniformly dispersed iron species, abundant oxygen functional groups, and defective carbon matrix. Radical quenching experiments and electron paramagnetic resonance studies illustrated that SO4•–was the predominant free radical for MB degradation. Moreover, other refractory dyes could also be rapidly and efficiently removed from the Fe@BC/PS system. This work is expected to propose a promising catalyst for the degradation of refractory dyes and open a new possibility for the durable removal of refractory organic dyes.

Coagulation-photocatalytic oxidation process was used for pretreatment of simulated seawater, which had moderate turbidity and more organics. The optimal conditions of PAC/PAM coagulation and TiO2 photocatalytic oxidation were investigated by simple variable method, coagulation and photocatalytic oxidation were combinated under optimal conditions finally. Results showed that when the dosage of polyacrylamide (PAM) and polyaluminium chloride (PAC) was 20mg/L and 0.5 mg/L respectively, the pH of simulated seawater was 8.0, the amount of TiO2 photocatalyst was 1.8g/L and UV radiation time was 1h, the removal ratio of the turbidity and CODMn in simulated seawater was 97.5% and 72% respectively. Synergistic effect between coagulation and photocatalytic oxidation eventually made turbidity and organics in the effluent water meet the requirements of reverse osmosis system.

Cerium-doped TiO2(Cex/TiO2) mesoporous nanofibers were prepared by one-pot facile synthesis method using collagen fiber as the biotemplate. The physicochemical properties of the as-prepared Cex/TiO2nanofibers were well characterized by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), N2adsorption–desorption isotherms, and UV–vis diffuse reflectance spectrum (UV–vis DRS). The visible light absorption ability and the band gap energy of the Cex/TiO2nanofibers could be adjusted by changing the doping amount of Ce. For example, when the mole ratio of Ce/Ti was fixed at 0.03, the absorbance wavelength of the Ce0.03/TiO2reached 739 nm, and the corresponding band gap energy was obviously reduced to 1.678 eV. Photodegradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) was used as the probe reaction to evaluate the visible light photocatalytic activity of the Cex/TiO2nanofibers. Compared with the undoped TiO2nanofiber and commercial TiO2catalyst (Degussa P25), the Cex/TiO2nanofibers showed the excellent photocatalytic activity. Especially, the degradation degree of RhB using Ce0.03/TiO2nanofiber reached 99.59% in 80 min, with corresponding TOC removal efficiency of 77.59%.

Once the tunnel fires happened, it will cause a major accident. And the smoke control of the runnel is important to fire prevention. A numerical simulation of the fire smoke flow in the tunnel model is presented by using FDS. The influence of different longitudinal ventilation on fire smoke flow of tunnel is obtained. And providing theory basis for tunnel ventilation system design, smoke spread control and safety evacuation. The results shown that in order to avoid reverse-flow and extend the time of smoke at the top of tunnel, the longitudinal speed should be controlled in 3.4 m/s; because of the role of longitudinal ventilation, smoke flow resistance and longitudinal ventilation generated by the effect of smoke flow resistance make the gas temperature first rise and then down.

In this paper, wind tunnel test of a large-span roof structure is firstly introduced. Secondly, data processing on synchronous multi-spots pressure measurement test is given. Wind pressure distribution is calculated by using the method mentioned in this paper. Some results and conclusion are useful for design of large-span roof structure.

The bioinspired approach to the construction of well-ordered microstructures is a crucial intersection of the branches of materials science and biotechnology. In this study, size-tunable silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) have been successfully prepared on a skin collagen fiber (SCF) biotemplate, which shows a hierarchical interwoven structure in nature having novel, special, and highly compact interlaced, biosupported Ag NPs chains. Conductivity measurements indicate that these novel Ag NPs/SCF@BT composites are semiconductive and have a typical percolation threshold of 0.85% (w/w) silver fraction. The enhancement of dielectric loss properties of Ag NPs/SCF@BT can be expressed by the Debye dipolar polarization model with three kinds of coexistent dielectric polarizations, in which the unique multiple reflection and scattering absorption characteristics are due to the special natural mesostructure of the SCF biosupport. Subsequently, it was found that the reflection loss (RL) values of the Ag NPs/SCF@BT0.35composite can be achieved in the whole X-band (exceeding −10 dB), the C-band, and some part of the S-band (exceeding −5 dB) with thicknesses from 2.0 to 5.0 mm. An important feature of the present work is that the specific gravity of our Ag NPs/SCF@BT composite is only 1/10 that of inorganic absorbing materials because of the special construction of this novel composite from biological tissue. Based on the promising properties of these biohybirds, the present work will hopefully lead to the development of new, lightweight, low-cost, flexible, and highly efficient microwave absorption materials based on biologic SCF-derived composites.

Plasma processes are widely used in the manufacturing of very large scale integration (VLSl) devices for dry etching and dielectric film deposition. Damage due to plasma becomes inevitable and can potentially break the gate dielectric bonds to increase gate dielectric leakage current, which would give rise to transistor threshold voltage shift and device failure. In our 40nm device data, there was a gate oxide leakage failure dominantly in wafer center. It was found that this failure is related to SiCN Cu interconnect cap film deposition. The purpose of this work was to investigate its failure mechanism. In the current study, SiCN films were deposited with two different types of commercial tools. The SiCN film surface charge results showed that the charge value in wafer center was obviously higher than that in wafer edge. The plasma density measurement result also showed that plasma density in the chamber center is higher than that of wafer edge. Plasma induced damage (PID) test data showed that the deposition initial step, or the NH3 pretreatment stage, was not the key factor for the device damage, but the main step of SiCN film deposition played the important role in the device damage. By adjusting the main deposition step, the film surface charge value and the charge uniformity were much improved, which led to a solution to the wafer central PID issue at 40nm device.

Size-controlled silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) were facilely synthesized on collagen fiber (CF), in which bayberry tannin (BT), a natural plant polyphenol, was grafted on CF to act as a reductant and stabilizer without any additional reagent (surfactant, template, and capping agent) or treatment (heat and photoirradiation) needed. The as-synthetic AgNPs-BT@CF was well characterized via combined techniques including SEM, HTEM, XRD, XPS, and FT-IR. The particle diameter and size distribution of AgNPs in BT@CF matrix are feasible to adjust by varying the grafting degree of BT on the CF surface. When the grafting degree of BT was 0.4, the particle size of AgNPs is as small as 5.2 ± 1.9 nm. Furthermore, the complex permittivity, and complex permeability of the AgNPs-BT@CF were also investigated in detail. It was found that with the increase of grafting degree of BT on CF the imaginary part (ε″) of complex permittivity was dramatically increased, whereas the real part (μ′) and imaginary part (μ″) of complex permittivity were not obviously changed. The reflection loss (RL) of AgNPs-BT@CF exceeding −10 dB was achieved in the whole Ku band (12.5–18 GHz).

With the aim of evaluating capabilities of a ventilation system with jet fans to control fire smoke in an underground garage, we carried out a set of FDS simulation. According to the results, temperature and soot density of fire has reduced within an acceptable range. We believe that the ventilation system based on the jet fans has indeed controlled fire smoke effectively, thereby we have enough time for safety rescue.

In this paper, pressure time history on curtain wall of high-rise building are sampled through synchronous multi-spots pressure measurement test in wind tunnel. Peak pressures are calculated by using the method mentioned in this paper for design of curtain wall. Some results and conclusion are useful for design of curtain wall on high-rise building.

A study of approach wind flow simulation of the low-rise building was performed in a boundary layer wind tunnel at Shantou University. Three kinds of experimental configuration are employed to simulate the suburban terrain. The characteristics of three types of simulated flow are presented. The wind tunnel testing of low-rise building, 1 : 30 geometrical scale model of the Texas Tech University test building was performed in the simulated flow. The model and full-scale pressure coefficients are presented for high-turbulence boundary layer flow. The comparison of the scale model and full-scale model building point pressure exhibits a good agreement for most of the pressure taps.

A study of approach aerodynamic shape optimization of a high-rise building, Shenzhen Kingkey financial tower, was performed in a boundary layer wind tunnel at Shantou University. Building shape has significant effects on the wind load forcing on the structure. The peak overturning moments about x-axis and the peak accelerations at the top of building are presented in this paper. Compared with the experimental results, one case is considered as the optimal case for structural design.

Type I collagen was isolated from calf skin and its assembly on PVA film induced by glutaraldehyde vapor was investigated. It was found that the collagen molecules were firstly orientationally assembled into collagen fibers under the inducement of glutaraldehyde vapor. Then the collagen fibers could be further aggregated into novel network structure in proper conditions of the induced reaction. The morphology of the assembled collagen fibers was depended on induced time and concentration of collagen. The network arrangement could be obtained after being induced for 72h when collagen concentration was 2.5mg/ml. At higher concentration of collagen (5 mg/ml), the collagen fibers with larger dimension were obtained, but the growth of fibers was almost in one direction.

Equivalent static wind loads (ESWL) are the bridge between engineer in the structure design field and researcher in wind engineering field. In this paper, a practical high-rise building with 204 meters high was tested in wind tunnel, and then ESWL was calculated by load-response correlation (LRC) method based on the results of wind tunnel. Some results are useful for design of building structures.

Flavonoids and alkaloids are two major classes of plant compounds with biological activities, and they usually coexist in many medicinal herbs. In this study, a novel collagen fiber adsorbent (CFA) was prepared, and its application for adsorption chromatography separation of flavonoids and alkaloids was systematically investigated. The typical flavonoids, rutin and baicalin, and the typical alkaloids, matrine and caffeine, were selected as probe molecules for the investigations. The batch adsorption behaviors of these compounds on CFA in different solvents indicated that hydrogen bond plays a predominant role for the adsorption of flavonoid and alkaloid in pure ethanol, while the hydrophobic interaction plays a predominant role for the adsorption in water. In column chromatography separation, flavonoids were completely separated from alkaloids by a stepwise elution process with pure ethanol followed by aqueous ethanol solution. The two flavonoids, rutin and baicalin, were also well separated although the two alkaloids, matrine and caffeine, were washed out together. The optimal loading volume of sample solution (10 mg/mL) for the separation was determined as 0.66 mL/g CFA. Under these conditions, flavonoid and alkaloid were effectively separated with a recovery higher than 90% in 8 times repeated applications.