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In this study, we develop a simple template-free strategy to fabricate uniform porous CuCoO hollow spheres. The shells of the as-synthesized CuCoO hierarchical hollow nanostructures are composed of primary nanoparticle units, leading to a superior specific surface area of 51 m g. When applied in lithium ion batteries, the porous CuCoO hollow spheres show excellent lithium storage performance, which could deliver a high specific capacity of 930 mAh g after 150 cycles for half-cell and 660 mAh g after 50 cycles for full cell. The good electrochemical properties of the as-synthesized porous CuCoO hollow spheres can be attributed to their unique porous structure, which is beneficial for shorting lithium ion-electron transmission path and alleviating the structural strain of volume change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this research, ultrafine fibrous scaffolds with deep cell infiltration and sufficient water stability have been developed from gelatin, aiming to mimic the extracellular matrices (ECMs) as three dimensional (3D) stromas for soft tissue repair. The ultrafine fibrous scaffolds produced from the current technologies of electrospinning and phase separation are either lack of 3D oriented fibrous structure or too compact to be penetrated by cells. Whilst electrospun scaffolds are able to emulate two dimensional (2D) ECMs, they cannot mimic the 3D ECM stroma. In this work, ultralow concentration phase separation (ULCPS) has been developed to fabricate gelatin scaffolds with 3D randomly oriented ultrafine fibers and loose structures. Besides, a non-toxic citric acid crosslinking system has been established for the ULCPS method. This system could endow the scaffolds with sufficient water stability, while maintain the fibrous structures of scaffolds. Comparing with electrospun scaffolds, the ULCPS scaffolds showed improved cytocompatibility and more importantly, cell infiltration. This research has proved the possibility of using gelatin ULCPS scaffolds as the substitutes of 3D ECMs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Non-motile primary cilia are dynamic cellular sensory structures and are expressed in adipose-derived stem cells (ASCs). We have previously shown that primary cilia are involved in chemically-induced osteogenic differentiation of human ASC (hASCs) in vitro. Further, we have reported that 10% cyclic tensile strain (1 Hz, 4 hours/day) enhances hASC osteogenesis. We hypothesize that primary cilia respond to cyclic tensile strain in a lineage dependent manner and that their mechanosensitivity may regulate the dynamics of signaling pathways localized to the cilium. We found that hASC morphology, cilia length and cilia conformation varied in response to culture in complete growth, osteogenic differentiation, or adipogenic differentiation medium, with the longest cilia expressed in adipogenically differentiating cells. Further, we show that cyclic tensile strain both enhances osteogenic differentiation of hASCs while it suppresses adipogenic differentiation as evidenced by upregulation of RUNX2 gene expression and downregulation of PPARG and IGF-1, respectively. This study demonstrates that hASC primary cilia exhibit mechanosensitivity to cyclic tensile strain and lineage-dependent expression, which may in part regulate signaling pathways localized to the primary cilium during the differentiation process. We highlight the importance of the primary cilium structure in mechanosensing and lineage specification and surmise that this structure may be a novel target in manipulating hASC for in tissue engineering applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]