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Distributed congestion control (DCC) improves system performance by lowering channel congestion in vehicular environments with high vehicle density. The 3rd Generation Partnership Project standard defines the related metrics of channel busy ratio (CBR) and introduces possible rate and power control mechanisms to mitigate channel congestion in cellular vehicle-to-everything (C-V2X) sidelink. However, the DCC of C-V2X is not sufficiently specified to implement these controls. In this letter, we propose a novel DCC algorithm based on deep reinforcement learning (DRL) to improve congestion control performance in C-V2X sidelink. The proposed algorithm allows the DRL agent to observe a CBR state and select the packet transmission rate that can maximize the reward of packet delivery rate (PDR) while maintaining higher channel utilization. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm provides performance gain in terms of PDR and sidelink throughput compared with the existing DCC method.

Ischemia-reperfusion injury is a major cause of acute kidney injury. Recent studies on the pathophysiology of ischemia-reperfusion-induced acute kidney injury showed that immunologic responses significantly affect kidney ischemia-reperfusion injury and repair. Nuclear factor (NF)-ĸB signaling, which controls cytokine production and cell survival, is significantly involved in ischemia-reperfusion-induced acute kidney injury, and its inhibition can ameliorate ischemic acute kidney injury. Using EXPLOR, a novel, optogenetically engineered exosome technology, we successfully delivered the exosomal super-repressor inhibitor of NF-ĸB (Exo-srIĸB) into B6 wild type mice before/after kidney ischemia-reperfusion surgery, and compared outcomes with those of a control exosome (Exo-Naïve)-injected group. Exo-srIĸB treatment resulted in lower levels of serum blood urea nitrogen, creatinine, and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin in post-ischemic mice than in the Exo-Naïve treatment group. Systemic delivery of Exo-srIĸB decreased NF-ĸB activity in post-ischemic kidneys and reduced apoptosis. Post-ischemic kidneys showed decreased gene expression of pro-inflammatory cytokines and adhesion molecules with Exo-srIĸB treatment as compared with the control. Intravital imaging confirmed the uptake of exosomes in neutrophils and macrophages. Exo-srIĸB treatment also significantly affected post-ischemic kidney immune cell populations, lowering neutrophil, monocyte/macrophage, and T cell frequencies than those in the control. Thus, modulation of NF-ĸB signaling through exosomal delivery can be used as a novel therapeutic method for ischemia-reperfusion-induced acute kidney injury.

Passive component-based soft resonators have been spotlighted in the field of wearable and implantable devices due to their remote operation capability and tunable properties. As the output signal ...

In this paper, a microwave fluidic glucose sensor based on dual complementary split ring resonators (CSRRs) with a switching circuit is proposed for non-invasive and continuous glucose concentration detection. A CSRR has been designed to detect subtle changes in the dielectric constant of glucose solutions, and the electric field distribution is utilized to determine the effective sensing region. In a well-controlled environment, the glucose concentration can be detected by tracking the transmission coefficient of the designed CSRR. However, because the variations in dielectric constant with the glucose concentration are very small, the environmental factors (i.e., ambient temperature and relative humidity) can be dominant compared to the glucose concentration. To qualify the effect of the environmental factors, the variation in the transmission coefficient of the CSRR has been measured when the ambient temperature condition is varied from 293 K to 313 K and the relative humidity is varied from 30% to 90% inside temperature- and humidity-controlled chamber. Moreover, the environmental effects are calibrated out using two identical CSRRs with the switching circuit: one detects changes in the glucose concentration, while the other operates as a reference for environmental factors. After the elimination of the environmental effects, glucose concentrations in the range of 0 mg/dL to 400 mg/dL have been measured, and the sensitivity is 0.008dB/(100mg/dL). In addition, the reproducibility of the proposed sensor is verified by repeated measurements. It is demonstrated that the proposed sensor can detect glucose concentrations under practical environmental conditions.

Purpose Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most aggressive type of brain tumor and has poor survival outcomes, even after a combination of surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy. Temozolomide is the only agent that has been shown to be effective against GBM, suggesting that combination of temozolomide with other agents may be more effective. Niclosamide, an FDA approved anthelmintic agent, has shown anti-cancer effects against human colon, breast, prostate cancers as well as GBM. However, the efficacy of the combination of niclosamide with temozolomide against GBM tumorspheres (TSs) has not been determined. We hypothesized that the combined treatment could effectively suppress GBM TSs. Methods GBM TSs (TS15-88, GSC11) were treated with niclosamide and/or temozolomide. Combined effects of two drugs were evaluated by measuring viability, neurosphere formation, and 3D-invasion in collagen matrix. Transcriptional profiles of GBM TS were analyzed using RNA sequencing. In vivo anticancer efficacy of combined drugs was tested in a mouse orthotopic xenograft model. Results Combination treatment of niclosamide and temozolomide significantly inhibited the cell viability, stemness, and invasive properties of GBM TSs. This combined treatment significantly down-regulated the expression of epithelial mesenchymal transition-related markers, Zeb1, N-cadherin, and β-catenin. The combined treatment also significantly decreased tumor growth in orthotopic xenograft models. Conclusion The combination of niclosamide and temozolomide effectively decreased the stemness and invasive properties of GBM TSs, suggesting that this regimen may be therapeutically effective in treating patients with GBM.

In this paper, a relative humidity monitoring sensor based on an active resonator with PEDOT:PSS is studied in the microwave regime. The proposed active resonator is patterned on a printed circuit board and excited by electromagnetic field coupling. The active resonator consists of two parts: a passive core resonator and an active circuit. The passive core resonator senses the humidity via the PEDOT:PSS conducting polymer film, which is located in the area of the passive core resonator with the strongest electric field. The active circuit compensates for the loss of the passive core resonator to enhance the quality factor and thus improve the sensitivity of the relative humidity sensor. By combining the passive core resonator with the active circuit, the active resonator exhibits a high quality factor (2887), which is 90 times that of the passive core resonator alone. Moreover, the sensitivity of the proposed humidity sensor is improved when using the active resonator. To verify the performance of the proposed humidity sensor, a commercial sensor is placed alongside the proposed sensor in a well-controlled environment chamber. According to the experimental results, as the relative humidity increases, the transmission coefficient (S21) increases, while the resonance frequency decreases. As a result, the sensor exhibits an increase in S21 of 3.58 dB and a decrease in the resonance frequency of 8.85 MHz when the relative humidity changes from 30% to 85%.

In this paper, a microwave fluidic glucose sensor based on a microwave resonator coupled with an interferometric system is proposed for sensitivity enhancement. The proposed glucose sensor consists of two parts: a sensing part and a sensitivity enhancement part. The former is composed of a rectangular complementary split ring resonator (CSRR), and the latter is composed of a variable attenuator, a variable phase shifter, two hybrid couplers, and an RF power detector. Because the variation in the electrical properties, which is utilized in the microwave detection scheme, with glucose concentration over the possible concentration range in the human body is very small, improvement of the sensitivity is critical for practical use. Thus, the effective sensing area of the rectangular CSRR is determined by considering the electric field distribution. In addition, magnitude and phase conditions for the effective sensitivity enhancement are derived from a mathematical analysis of the proposed interferometric system. In the present experiment, aimed at demonstrating the detection performance as a function of the glucose concentration in the range of 0 mg/dL to 400 mg/dL, the sensitivity is significantly improved by 48 times by applying the derived conditions for effective sensitivity enhancement. Furthermore, the accuracy of the proposed glucose sensor for glucose concentrations at a step of 100 mg/dL is verified by the Clarke error grid. Based on the measurement results, the proposed glucose sensor is demonstrated to be applicable to noninvasive and continuous monitoring in practical environments.

In this letter, a quasi-coaxial through-silicon-via (TSV) is presented for millimeter-wave integrated circuit (IC) packaging. The quasi-coaxial-via (Q-COV) structure in which one side ground metal is removed can minimize the interconnect length when it is mounted, in comparison to the coaxial-via (COV) structure. Simulation analysis shows that the Q-COV has similar electrical characteristics as the COV up to 100 GHz even though there is no GND on one side. To make the small signal core of the Q-COV, the silicon-core metallization process was used and a Si-interposer with Q-COVs of 50- $\mu \text{m}$ core diameter was fabricated and mounted on the glass board for signal transition analysis. The measured transition loss in the mounted Si-interposer was very small, only about 0.6 dB at 100 GHz, and the return loss was more than 20 dB for the entire measured frequency band (0–110 GHz).

The conceptual evolution of rigid-to-flexible in future electronic platforms requires unprecedented innovations in materials and manufacturing technologies to suit the new usage environment of flexible electronics. This research presents a novel method to implement a flexible wireless power transfer (WPT) module with a low coil resistive loss by overcoming the technical limitations associated with the rigidity of ceramic materials and the thickness resolution of inkjet printing. To ensure the low resistive loss of the WPT module, a high-aspect-ratio form of the coil consisting of alternating layers of polyimide (PI) and Ag is built into the 3D NiZn-ferrite (NZF) spiral trench structure. A resonance capacitor is also inkjet-printed and integrated with the WPT coil to minimize the final dimension of the WPT module. The hybrid (PI/Ag) coil in the 3D NZF spiral trench with the resonance capacitor is then inserted into polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) to render the entire 3D inkjet-printed structure flexible. The performance of the flexible WPT module is verified by charging a mobile phone under a flexible environment. The flexible WPT module is also successfully built into a wristband to demonstrate wireless charging of a smart watch.

In this paper, we characterize the thin conducting polymer film, PEDOT: PSS, using a microstrip line in a humid environment at microwave frequencies. To characterize the thin film alone over the microstrip line, a de-embedding technique of thru-reflect-line (TRL) calibration is utilized. After the de-embedding procedure, the thin film is modeled with a transmission line, and the film’s R, L, G, and C parameters are extracted from measured S-parameters. In addition, the characteristics of the thin film has been tested in terms of electrical conductivity with increasing relative humidity (RH). In the future, it is expected that this work can contribute to the improvement of stability as well as performance of conducting polymer-based electronic sensing devices.

In this paper, we propose a humidity sensor based on a negative resistance oscillator using conducting polymer (CP) PEDOT:PSS film at room temperature. The proposed humidity sensor basically consists of a microstrip line and a negative resistance circuit, which creates a negative resistance for high-frequency oscillation. The microstrip line has a circuit structure that is connected through a via hole between the ground plane and the signal line with a CP thin film. From our experimental results, we find that the oscillation frequency of the sensor gradually decreases as the relative humidity (RH) increases. Owing to the conductivity variation of the CP film with the RH value, the oscillation frequency of the sensor sensitively changes in real time. Therefore, we suggest that our microwave-oscillator-based sensor scheme is a good candidate for the design of a robust and stable humidity sensor.

A negative impedance converter (NIC) has been combined with a wireless power transfer (WPT) system to maximize the system efficiency based on non-foster theory. The NIC is composed of transistor, voltage divider, capacitor, and inductor for impedance matching, and resonant circuit operating at 6.78 MHz. The desired negative impedance can be controlled by tunable impedance in the NIC. In this paper, the loss of the transmitting coil is reduced to 0.1 Ω, yielding a quality factor of 7,050, which is 19.1 times higher than that of the conventional coil. The WPT system with the NIC provides high power transfer efficiency (PTE) at various transmission distances. The experimental results are improved from 64% to 96% and from 5% to 55% at the transmission distances of 50 and 200 mm, respectively. Furthermore, the PTE is enhanced from 38% to 87% and from 2% to 38% at the diagonal misalignment distance of 0 and 150 mm, respectively, at a transmission distance of 100 mm. The proposed technology for increasing the receiving power in the receiving coil with a higher PTE can be utilized for numerous applications in the industrial, scientific, and medical band, with a restricted radio frequency power on the transmitter side.

Although protein–protein interactions (PPIs) have emerged as the basis of potential new therapeutic approaches, targeting intracellular PPIs with small molecule inhibitors is conventionally considered highly challenging. Driven by increasing research efforts, success rates have increased significantly in recent years. In this study, we analyze the physicochemical properties of 9351 non-redundant inhibitors present in the iPPI-DB and TIMBAL databases to define a computational model for active compounds acting against PPI targets. Principle component analysis (PCA) and k-means clustering were used to identify plausible PPI targets in regions of interest in the active group in the chemical space between active and inactive iPPI compounds. Notably, the uniquely defined active group exhibited distinct differences in activity compared with other active compounds. These results demonstrate that active compounds with regions of interest in the chemical space may be expected to provide insights into potential PPI inhibitors for particular protein targets.

African swine fever virus (ASFV) causes a highly contagious and severe hemorrhagic viral disease with high mortality in domestic pigs of all ages. Although the virus is harmless to humans, the ongoing ASFV epidemic could have severe economic consequences for global food security. Recent studies have found a few antiviral agents that can inhibit ASFV infections. However, currently, there are no vaccines or antiviral drugs. Hence, there is an urgent need to identify new drugs to treat ASFV. Based on the structural information data on the targets of ASFV, we used molecular docking and machine learning models to identify novel antiviral agents. We confirmed that compounds with high affinity present in the region of interest belonged to subsets in the chemical space using principal component analysis and k-means clustering in molecular docking studies of FDA-approved drugs. These methods predicted pentagastrin as a potential antiviral drug against ASFVs. Finally, it was also observed that the compound had an inhibitory effect on AsfvPolX activity. Results from the present study suggest that molecular docking and machine learning models can play an important role in identifying potential antiviral drugs against ASFVs.

Tubulointerstitial renal fibrosis is a chronic disease process affecting chronic kidney disease (CKD). While the etiological role of transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β) is well known for epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT) in chronic kidney disease, effective therapeutics for renal fibrosis are largely limited. As a member of the TGF-β superfamily, bone morphogenetic protein-7 (BMP-7) plays an important role as an endogenous antagonist of TGF-β, inhibiting fibrotic progression in many organs. However, soluble rhBMP-7 is hardly available for therapeutics due to its limited pharmacodynamic profile and rapid clearance in clinical settings. In this study, we have developed a novel therapeutic approach with protein transduction domain (PTD) fused BMP-7 in micelle (mPTD-BMP-7) for long-range signalingin vivo. Contrary to rhBMP-7 targeting its cognate receptors, the nano-sized mPTD-BMP-7 is transduced into cells through an endosomal pathway and secreted to the exosome having active BMP-7. Further, transduced mPTD-BMP-7 successfully activates SMAD1/5/8 and inhibits the TGF-β–mediated epithelial–mesenchymal transition processin vitroand in anin vivounilateral ureter obstruction model. To determine the clinical relevance of our strategy, we also developed an intra-arterial administration of mPTD-BMP-7 through renal artery in pigs. Interestingly, mPTD-BMP-7 through renal artery intervention effectively delivered into Bowman’s space and inhibits unilateral ureter obstruction–induced renal fibrosis in pigs. Our results provide a novel therapeutic targeting TGF-β–mediated renal fibrosis and other organs as well as a clinically available approach for kidney.

PURPOSE Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most common and lethal brain tumor with the median survival between 10 and 14 months. Since current treatments including surgical resection, radiation and chemotherapy fail to cure GBM, a new strategy to maximize the efficacy is needed. Here, etomoxir, an inhibitor of fatty acid oxidation, has been combined with temozolomide, a standard treatment for GBM, to examine its anti-tumor effects. Etomoxir has shown anti-cancer effects against human bladder, prostate cancers as well as GBM. We hypothesize that etomoxir inhibits fatty acid metabolism in cancer cell to suppress tumor progression while temozolomide causes cancer cell death. METHOD Four kinds of human GBM tumorspheres (TSs) were treated with temozolomide or etomoxir alone, or in combination with each other. Therapeutic effects of two drugs were evaluated by measuring cell viability, apoptosis, neurosphere formation, 3D-invasion using collagen/matrigel matrix, and LC/MS analysis of energy metabolism. Protein and mRNA expression profiles after drug treatment were evaluated by western blotting and RNA-sequencing. RESULTS Combination treatment of temozolomide and etomoxir significantly inhibited the cell viability, stemness, and invasiveness in GBM TSs. Expression levels of stemness-, invasiveness-associated markers were also decreased by the combined treatment. The combined treatment also significantly inhibited ATP production in TCA cycle. CONCLUSIONS Our findings suggest that combined treatment of etomoxir and TMZ may be therapeutically effective in the treatment GBM

Fibrosis is presented in various physiologic and pathologic conditions of the salivary gland. Transforming growth factor beta (TGF-β) pathway has a pivotal role in the pathogenesis of fibrosis in several organs, including the salivary glands. Among the TGF-β superfamily members, TGF-β1 and 2 are pro-fibrotic ligands, whereas TGF-β3 and some bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) are anti-fibrotic ligands. TGF-β1 is thought to be associated with the pro-fibrotic pathogenesis of sialadenitis, post-radiation salivary gland dysfunction, and Sjögren’s syndrome. Potential therapeutic strategies that target multiple levels in the TGF-β pathway are under preclinical and clinical research for fibrosis. Despite the anti-fibrotic effect of BMPs, their in vivo delivery poses a challenge in terms of adequate clinical efficacy. In this article, we will review the relevance of TGF-β signaling in salivary gland fibrosis and advances of potential therapeutic options in the field.

While the bone morphogenetic protein‐7 (BMP‐7) is a well‐known therapeutic growth factor reverting many fibrotic diseases, including peritoneal fibrosis by peritoneal dialysis (PD), soluble growth factors are largely limited in clinical applications owing to their short half‐life in clinical settings. Recently, we developed a novel drug delivery model using protein transduction domains (PTD) overcoming limitation of soluble recombinant proteins, including bone morphogenetic protein‐7 (BMP‐7). This study aims at evaluating the therapeutic effects of PTD‐BMP‐7 consisted of PTD and full‐length BMP‐7 on epithelial‐mesenchymal transition (EMT)‐related fibrosis. Human peritoneal mesothelial cells (HPMCs) were then treated with TGF‐β1 or TGF‐β1 + PTD‐BMP‐7. Peritoneal dialysis (PD) catheters were inserted into Sprague‐Dawley rats, and these rats were infused intra‐peritoneally with saline, peritoneal dialysis fluid (PDF) or PDF + PTD‐BMP‐7. In vitro, TGF‐β1 treatment significantly increased fibronectin, type I collagen, α‐SMA and Snail expression, while reducing E‐cadherin expression in HPMCs (P

Wireless access in vehicular environments to support wireless communication between vehicles has been developed to provide road safety and infotainment services. In vehicular environments where the channel changes rapidly, channel estimation is very important in improving the reliability of wireless communication. Therefore, numerous channel estimation schemes have been proposed, however, none of the schemes proposed so far can perform well over the entire signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) region. In this paper, we propose a novel channel estimation scheme that selectively uses the better scheme between two channel estimation schemes on a symbol-by-symbol basis. The results show that the proposed scheme performs symbol-by-symbol selection of the better channel estimation scheme within a packet, and thus shows excellent performance over the entire SNR region in vehicular environments in terms of the bit error rate and packet error rate.

This study was performed to investigate the changes in gene expression in periodontal ligament (PDL) cells following mechanical stimulus through RNA sequencing. In this study, premolars extracted for orthodontic treatment were used. To stimulate the PDL cells, an orthodontic force of 100&times, g was applied to the premolar (experimental group, n = 11), whereas the tooth on the other side was left untreated (control group, n = 11). After the PDL cells were isolated from the extracted teeth, gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA), differentially expressed gene (DEG) analysis, and real-time PCR were performed to compare the two groups. GSEA demonstrated that gene sets related to the cell cycle pathway were upregulated in PDL. Thirteen upregulated and twenty downregulated genes were found through DEG analysis. Real-time PCR results confirmed that five upregulated genes (CC2D1B, CPNE3, OPHN1, TANGO2, and UAP-1) and six downregulated genes (MYOM2, PPM1F, PCDP1, ATP2A1, GPR171, and RP1-34H18.1-1) were consistent with RNA sequencing results. We suggest that, from among these eleven genes, two upregulated genes, CPNE3 and OPHN1, and one downregulated gene, PPM1F, play an important role in PDL regeneration in humans when orthodontic force is applied.

A novel wideband planar monopole antenna is proposed for wireless communication services and digital TV broadcasting signal reception in the ultra-high-frequency (UHF) band. The proposed antenna is a variation of the conventional planar triangular monopole. To obtain wideband characteristics and high gain, a notch is cut at the top side, and several steps are added to the oblique sides of a triangular patch. In addition, slopes are created at the front- and back-side ground planes, in order to further increase the bandwidth. Impedance matching has been optimised by adjusting the gap between the patch and the ground plane. The measured results show that the bandwidth is 2610 MHz in the range of 450-3060 MHz (148.72% bandwidth), which covers the entire UHF band. In the operating frequency range, the peak and the average peak gains in the E -plane were 2.73-6.09 and 4.62 dBi, respectively.

Under atmospheric pressure, dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) with a plasma layer is utilized to produce large-volume plasma without a vessel. When a 16-kV bias at 1 kHz is applied to 85 copper strips, the DBD actuator generates plasma with the dimensions 170 × 170 × 1 mm. When the incident wave with an electric wave vector perpendicular to the strip array is illuminated, the monostatic radar cross section (RCS) is reduced by a maximum of 3.5 dB. The measured results are validated using full-wave simulation based on homogeneous plasma, with estimated plasma parameters. By changing the number of copper strips connected to the feed line, the relative volume of plasma can be changed. If the relative volume decreases by 20%, the maximum RCS reduction is reduced by nearly 20%. This demonstrates the possibility of using plasma to control monostatic RCS in a wide bandwidth.

A real-time humidity sensor based on a microwave resonator coupled with a poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) polystyrene sulfonate (PEDOT:PSS) conducting polymer (CP) film is proposed in this paper. The resonator is patterned on a printed circuit board and is excited by electromagnetic field coupling. To enhance the sensitivity of the sensor, the CP film is located in the area with the strongest electric field in the resonator. To investigate the performance, the proposed sensor is placed alongside a reference sensor in a humidity chamber, and humidity is injected at room temperature. The experimental results indicate that the electrical properties of the resonator with the CP film, such as the transmission coefficient (S21) and resonance frequency, change with the relative humidity (RH). Specifically, as the RH changes from 5% to 80%, S21 and the resonance frequency change simultaneously. Moreover, the proposed sensor exhibits great repeatability in the middle of the sensing range, which is from 40% to 60% RH. Consequently, our resonator coupled with the CP film can be used as a real-time humidity-sensing device in the microwave range, where various radio-frequency devices are in use.

This work demonstrates attenuation effects of plasma on waves propagating in the 26.5–40 GHz range. The effect is investigated via experiments measuring the transmission between two Ka-band horn antennas set 30 cm apart. A dielectric-barrier-discharge (DBD) plasma generator with a size of 200 mm × 100 mm × 70 mm and consisting of 20 layers of electrodes is placed between the two antennas. The DBD generator is placed in a 400 mm × 300 mm × 400 mm acrylic chamber so that the experiments can be performed for plasma generated under various conditions of gas and pressure, for instance, in air, Ar, and He environments at 0.001, 0.05, and 1 atm of pressure. Attenuation is calculated by the difference in the transmission level, with and without plasma, which is generated with a bias voltage of 20 kV in the 0.1–1.4 kHz range. Results show that the attenuation varies from 0.05 dB/m to 9.0 dB/m depending on the environment. Noble gas environments show higher levels of attenuation than air, and He is lossier than Ar. In all gas environments, attenuation increases as pressure increases. Finally, electromagnetic models of plasmas generated in various conditions are provided.

In this letter, a compact bandpass filter (BPF) using integrated passive device (IPD) technology is presented, which is based on a pair of coupled-line inductors. To analyze the principle of this design, a simple but effective equivalent circuit model is provided. Using this model, it is easy to increase the number of resonators order. This structure is implemented by using a Si-based IPD process in which line inductors are located on a thick laminated organic ( $H = 40\,\,\mu \text{m}$ ) with a ground metal for shielding of lossy silicon. The minimum insertion loss of two-resonator BPF is 1.1 dB, and cascaded two-resonator structure is 2.3 dB. The size of two-resonator and cascaded two-resonator BPFs, excluding the pads, are only 0.246 $\text {mm} \times 0.44$ mm and 0.492 $\text {mm} \times 0.88$ mm, respectively.

Three-dimensional printing using digital light processing (DLP) technology has been studied in various fields because of its ability to create complex shapes through a simple process. In this study, DLP 3D printing was employed in the implementation of the metasurface-based dual-linear polarization converter (DLPC). The unit cell of the metasurface-based DLPC for linear polarization conversion was designed consisting of the upper and lower dipole-pair antennas connected through vias and a shielding layer that electrically shields the antennas from each other, and its fabrication was based on the characterization results of the dielectric properties of the photocurable substrate materials and electrical properties of the conductive materials used for synthesizing the metasurface. The printability evaluation of dipole pairs, vias, and a shielding layer was carried out to implement the detailed structures of the DLPC in 3D printing. The electromagnetic wave transmission characteristics of the 3D-printed 8 × 8 array DLPC demonstrated an orthogonal polarization conversion, as predicted by the simulation results. This study confirmed that the DLP-based 3D printing technology can go beyond the existing functions of manufacturing objects and can be applied to the implementation of various electronics based on different meta-structures.

This article presents a high-efficiency power amplifier using quasi-MMIC technology. The efficiency enhancement is achieved based upon the second or third harmonic control provided by input and output matching networks. The gate-source voltage waveform control with Class-F operation achieves significant efficiency improvements. The quasi-MMIC technology using silicon-integrated passive devices (Si-IPDs) can drive the solution to provide compact size at 2.4 GHz. The output matching network for Class-F operation is described, using lumped elements to reduce circuit size. The dimensions of the fabricated power amplifier are 3.6 mm × 7.6 mm, with a thickness of 0.15 mm. The measured results show that the power amplifier has a small signal gain of about 10 dB and a Psat of 41.8 dBm with a maximum drain efficiency of 70.8% at 2.4 GHz. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 58:2178–2182, 2016

Simple Summary Hyperactivation of the canonical Wnt and inactivation of the Hippo pathway are well-known genetic backgrounds for familial adenomatosis polyposis (FAP) and colorectal cancer (CRC), although the reciprocal regulation between those pathways is not yet clear. In this study, we found that Axin2, a bona fide downstream target of canonical Wnt, activates the Hippo pathway in APC-mutated CRC, limiting the therapeutic potential of niclosamide on advanced CRC through the inactivation of the Hippo pathway. To overcome the limitation, we combined niclosamide with AMPK activator metformin to activate Hippo and found that this combination synergistically suppressed canonical Wnt and activated Hippo in APC-mutated CRC. Using patient-derived cancer organoid and an APC-MIN mice model, we found the combinatory approach to be effective for APC-mutated CRC. Our results provide not only the reciprocal link between Wnt and Hippo in APC-mutated CRC, but they also provide an effective therapeutic approach with clinically available drugs for FAP and CRC patients. Abstract The Wnt and Hippo pathways are tightly coordinated and understanding their reciprocal regulation may provide a novel therapeutic strategy for cancer. Anti-helminthic niclosamide is an effective inhibitor of Wnt and is now in a phase II trial for advanced colorectal cancer (CRC) patients. We found that Axin2, an authentic target gene of canonical Wnt, acts as aYAP phosphorylation activator in APC-mutated CRC. While niclosamide effectively suppresses Wnt, it also inhibits Hippo, limiting its therapeutic potential for CRC. To overcome this limitation, we utilized metformin, a clinically available AMPK activator. This combinatory approach not only suppresses canonical Wnt activity, but also inhibits YAP activity in CRC cancer cells and in patient-derived cancer organoid through the suppression of cancer stemness. Further, combinatory oral administration suppressed in vivo tumorigenesis and the cancer progression of APC-MIN mice models. Our observations provide not only a reciprocal link between Wnt and Hippo, but also clinically available novel therapeutics that are able to target Wnt and YAP in APC-mutated CRC.

Background: Anoctamin (ANO)/transmembrane member 16 (TMEM16) proteins mediate diverse physiological and pathophysiological functions including cancer cell proliferation. The present study aimed to identify the role of ANOs in pancreatic cancer. Methods: In an initial screen of ANOs, ANO9/TMEM16J was overexpressed in pancreatic cancer cells, and its role in the pathogenesis of pancreatic cancer was evaluated using an integrated in vitro and in vivo approach. To determine clinical relevance of the experimental findings, the prognostic value of ANO9 was evaluated in patients with pancreatic cancer. Results: The ANO9 mRNA and protein levels were increased in pancreatic cancer-derived cells. Exogenous expression of ANO9 in PANC-1 cells significantly increased cell proliferation in cell cultures and in mice. In contrast, knockdown of ANO9 in AsPC-1, BxPC-3, and Capan-2 cells strongly inhibited cell proliferation. Mechanistic analysis suggested that physical association of ANO9 with epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) underlies ANO9-induced cell proliferation. Knockdown of ANO9 augmented the effects of the EGFR inhibitor and the cytotoxic agent on pancreatic cancer cell proliferation. In addition, high ANO9 expression is a poor prognostic factor in patients with pancreatic cancer. Conclusions: The ANO9/TMEM16J appears to be a clinically useful prognostic marker for pancreatic cancer and a potential therapeutic target.