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Ulcerative colitis (UC) pathogenesis is largely associated with intestinal epithelial barrier dysfunction. A therapeutic approach to UC involves the repair of damaged intestinal barrier. Our study aimed to investigate whether aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) mediated the intestinal barrier repair effects of quercetin to ameliorate UC. 3% dextran sulfate sodium was used to induce colitic mice, and quercetin (25, 50, and 100 mg/kg) was administered orally for 10 days to assess the therapeutic effects. In vitro, Caco-2 cells were used to explore the effect of quercetin on tight junction protein expression and AhR activation. The results showed that quercetin alleviated colitic mice by restoring tight junctions (TJs) integrity via an AhR-dependent manner (p < 0.05). In vitro, quercetin dose-dependently elevated the expressions of TJs protein ZO-1 and Claudin1, and activated AhR by enhancing the expression of CYP1A1 and facilitating AhR nuclear translocation in Caco-2 cells (p < 0.05). While AhR antagonist CH223191 reversed the therapeutic effects of quercetin (p < 0.05) and blocked quercetin-induced AhR activation and enhancement of TJs protein (p < 0.05). In conclusion, quercetin repaired intestinal barrier dysfunction by activating AhR-mediated enhancement of TJs to alleviate UC. Our research offered new perspectives on how quercetin enhanced intestinal barrier function., (© 2023 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Background: The single port surgical robot causes only one incision and brings many benefits to patients. It is very challenging to design a single port surgical robot that causes a smaller incision than current products., Methods: This paper presents a highly compact single port laparoscopy surgical robot, which makes full use of the space of the port and only needs a 15 mm-diameter port. The robot is composed of a camera manipulator and two operating manipulators. The non-fully cylindrical manipulators enter the port sequentially, and the equivalent diameter of each operating manipulator is 12 mm. An additional 9 mm-diameter channel is left for other surgical tools to pass through after all manipulators entering the port., Results: The kinematics model of the robot is established, including detailed forward kinematics model and inverse kinematics solution based on geometric iteration method. The teleoperation experiment shows that the manipulator can complete the object-grasping, object-transfer and weight-lifting tasks., Conclusions: The proposed single port surgical robot design concept can also be extended to the field of natural orifice transluminal endoscopic surgical robots., (© 2022 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)