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BackgroundEmphysematous pyelonephritis (EPN) is a rare acute severe necrotising infection of the kidneys in clinical practice. It is characterized by the presence of gas in the renal parenchyma, collecting system, or perirenal tissue. The prognosis is poor, with a high nephrectomy rate and a mortality rate of up to 20–40%.MethodsRetrospective analysis of 3 cases of emphysematous pyelonephritis with two different outcomes.ResultsThree patients who we described were all female with diabetes mellitus, and their blood sugar was poorly controlled. One patient with the advanced age and poor general health died due to the patient’s family choosing to terminate therapy. Two patients underwent surgical procedures achieved an excellent clinical recovery. Both of them underwent percutaneous nephrostomy and perinephric abscess puncture drainage before nephrectomy. Escherichia coli were the microorganisms implicated.ConclusionEPN is a rare and severe urinary system infection. Computed tomography (CT) and microbiological culture confirmed the diagnosis. Control of diabetes, sensitive antibiotic therapy, fluid resuscitation and prompt surgical intervention are crucial.

Molecular catalysts represent an exceptional class of materials in the realm of electrochemical carbon dioxide reduction (CO2RR), offering distinct advantages owing to their adaptable structure, which enables precise control of electronic configurations and outstanding performance in CO2RR. This study introduces an innovative approach to heterogeneous electrochemical CO2RR in an aqueous environment, utilizing a newly synthesized N4‐macrocyclic cobalt complex generated through a dimerization coupling reaction. By incorporating the quaterpyridine moiety, this cobalt complex exhibits the capability to catalyze CO2RR at low overpotentials and reaches near‐unity CO production across a wide potential range, as verified by the online mass spectrometry and in situ attenuated total reflectance‐Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. Comprehensive computational models demonstrate the superiority of utilizing quarterpyridine moiety in mediating CO2 conversion compared to the counterpart. This work not only propels the field of electrochemical CO2RR but also underscores the promising potential of cobalt complexes featuring quaterpyridine moieties in advancing sustainable CO2 conversion technologies within aqueous environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electrocatalytic hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2 ) production has emerged as a promising alternative to the chemical method currently used in industry, due to its environmentally friendly conditions and potential for higher activity and selectivity. Heterogeneous molecular catalysts are promising in this regard, as their active site configurations can be judiciously designed, modified, and tailored with diverse functional groups, thereby tuning the activity and selectivity of the active sites. In this work, nickel phthalocyanine derivatives with various conjugation degrees are synthesized and identified as effective pH-universal electrocatalysts for H 2 O 2 production after heterogenized on nitrogen-decorated carbon, with increased conjugation degrees leading to boosted selectivity. This is explained by the regulated d-band center, which optimized the binding energy of the reaction intermediate, reducing the energy barrier for oxygen reduction and leading to optimized H 2 O 2 selectivity. The best catalyst, NiPyCN/CN, exhibits a high H 2 O 2  electrosynthesis activity with ≈95% of H 2 O 2 faradic efficiency in an alkaline medium, demonstrating its potential for H 2 O 2 production., (© 2023 Wiley‐VCH GmbH.)