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Heteroatom-doped carbon materials have demonstrated great potential in the electrochemical reduction reaction of CO2 (CO2RR) due to their versatile structure and function. However, rational structure control remains one challenge. In this work, we reported a unique carbon precursor of soft template-containing porous poly(ionic liquid) (PIL) that was directly synthesized via free-radical self-polymerization of ionic liquid monomer in a soft template route. Variation of the carbonization temperature in a direct pyrolysis process without any additive yielded a series of carbon materials with facile adjustable textural properties and N species. Significantly, the integration of soft-template in the PIL precursor led to the formation of hierarchical porous carbon material with a higher surface area and larger pore size than that from the template-free precursor. In CO2RR to CO, the champion catalyst gave a Faraday efficiency of 83.0% and a current density of 1.79 mA cm−2 at −0.9 V vs. reversible hydrogen electrode (vs. RHE). The abundant graphite N species and hierarchical pore structure, especially the unique hierarchical small-/ultra-micropores were revealed to enable better CO2RR performance.

Na superionic conductor (NASICON)–type Na3V2(PO4)3(NVP) has attracted great attention due to its unique conductive framework and high capacity. However, the poor intrinsic conductivity seriously restricted the further development. This work proposes an effective strategy of introducing the beneficial carbon-based matrix materials including reduced graphene oxide (rGO), polypyrrole (ppy), and carbon nanotubes (CNTs) to the NVP system. The modified composites reveal particular morphological features and enhanced specific surface areas, benefiting to improve the kinetic characteristics and sodium storage performance. Accordingly, the optimized NVP/C@CNT composite shows superior electrochemical performance. It can release a high reversible discharge capacity of 98.7 mAh g−1 at the 0.1 C rate. Meanwhile, a high capacity retention of 81% is obtained after 500 cycles at 2 C. Moreover, the kinetic characteristics demonstrate that the optimized NVP/C@CNT sample shows a high Na+ diffusion coefficient. This work offers a unique avenue for the development of the modification and synthesis of polyanion cathodes for sodium ion batteries. The modified samples combined with carbon-based matrix materials for the NVP system are successfully synthesized through a facile sol–gel method.

Highlights Fully inkjet-printed transparent high-performance thin-film transistors (TFTs) with ultrathin indium tin oxide (ITO) as semiconducting channels were achieved. The energy band alignment at ITO/Al2O3 channel/dielectric interface was investigated by in-depth spectroscopy analysis. Fully printed n-type metal–oxide–semiconductor inverters based on ITO TFTs exhibited extremely high gain of 181 at a low-supply voltage of 3 V, promising for applications in advanced electronic devices and circuits. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40820-021-00694-4., Metal oxide thin-films transistors (TFTs) produced from solution-based printing techniques can lead to large-area electronics with low cost. However, the performance of current printed devices is inferior to those from vacuum-based methods due to poor film uniformity induced by the “coffee-ring” effect. Here, we report a novel approach to print high-performance indium tin oxide (ITO)-based TFTs and logic inverters by taking advantage of such notorious effect. ITO has high electrical conductivity and is generally used as an electrode material. However, by reducing the film thickness down to nanometers scale, the carrier concentration of ITO can be effectively reduced to enable new applications as active channels in transistors. The ultrathin (~10-nm-thick) ITO film in the center of the coffee-ring worked as semiconducting channels, while the thick ITO ridges (>18-nm-thick) served as the contact electrodes. The fully inkjet-printed ITO TFTs exhibited a high saturation mobility of 34.9 cm2 V−1 s−1 and a low subthreshold swing of 105 mV dec−1. In addition, the devices exhibited excellent electrical stability under positive bias illumination stress (PBIS, ΔVth = 0.31 V) and negative bias illuminaiton stress (NBIS, ΔVth = −0.29 V) after 10,000 s voltage bias tests. More remarkably, fully printed n-type metal–oxide–semiconductor (NMOS) inverter based on ITO TFTs exhibited an extremely high gain of 181 at a low-supply voltage of 3 V, promising for advanced electronics applications. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40820-021-00694-4.

Photocatalyst fabrication process plays the central role in photocatalytic hydrogen (H2) evolution reaction. Herein, we synthesize Na+ functionalized porous graphitic carbon nitride nanorods (Na-CNNR) via a facile one-pot calcination method. The morphology and size of Na-CNNR are controllable by changing the amount of sodium salt; both sodium salt and air are essential to the unique structure and oxygen doping. The obtained Na-CNNR contains abundant oxygen in the graphitic carbon nitride (CN) plane. The optimized Na20-CNNR (20 wt% Na2S2O3•5H2O to dicyanamide) photocatalyst exhibits a high surface area with enhanced visible light absorption. Besides, Na20-CNNR displays fast charge transfer and high carrier separation rate characterized by photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy and electrochemical test. Through time-resolved transient absorption spectra analysis, the trapped unreactive electron accumulation can be highly restrained, favoring efficient active electron de-trapping and transfer. The optimized Na20-CNNR sample exhibits the highest photocatalytic H2 evolution rate of 7.46 mmol/h/g under visible light irradiation (>400 nm, 100 mW/cm2), which is up to 85 times that of the bare CN and 27 times that of Na+ doped graphitic carbon nitride nanoparticles (Na20–CNNP). Meanwhile, the cyclability tests indicate that Na20-CNNR displays robust stability over 24 h.

In order to achieve safe and high-efficient photodynamic therapy (PDT), it was a powerful strategy of constructing O2-generated nanozyme with intelligent "off/on" modulation and enhancement. Herein, a kind of H2O2-responsive nanozyme was developed for off/on modulation and enhancement of magnetic resonance (MR) imaging and PDT, in which great amounts of gold nanoclusters (AuNCs) were loaded into mesoporous silica to form nanoassembly, and manganese dioxide (MnO2) nanosheets were wrapped as switching shield shell (AuNCs@mSiO2@MnO2). In a neutral physiological environment, stable MnO2 shells eliminated singlet oxygen (1O2) generation to switch off PDT and MR imaging. However, in an acidic tumor microenvironment, the MnO2 shell reacted with H2O2, in which MnO2 degradation switched on MR imaging and PDT, and the generated O2 further enhanced PDT. H2O2-responsive MnO2 degradation brought about excellent MR imaging with a longitudinal relaxation rate of 25.31 mM-1 s-1, and simultaneously sufficient O2 generation guaranteed a 74% high 1O2 yield. Under the irradiation of a 635 nm laser, the viability of MDA-MB-435 cells was reduced to 4%, and the tumors completely disappeared, demonstrating strong PDT performance. Therefore, H2O2-responsive AuNCs@mSiO2@MnO2 nanozyme showed excellent off/on modulation and enhancement of MR imaging and PDT and was a promising intelligent nanoprobe for safe and high-efficiency theranostics.

Acyl-CoA synthetase long-chain family member 4 (ACSL4) is an important isozyme for polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) metabolism that dictates ferroptosis sensitivity. The role of ACSL4 in the progression of ischemic stroke is unclear. Here, we found that ACSL4 expression was suppressed in the early phase of ischemic stroke and this suppression was induced by HIF-1α. Knockdown of ACSL4 protected mice against brain ischemia, whereas, forced overexpression of ACSL4 exacerbated ischemic brain injury. ACSL4 promoted neuronal death via enhancing lipid peroxidation, a marker of ferroptosis. Moreover, knockdown of ACSL4 inhibited proinflammatory cytokine production in microglia. These data identify ACSL4 as a novel regulator of neuronal death and neuroinflammation, and interventions of ACSL4 expression may provide a potential therapeutic target in ischemic stroke.

Metal-doped carbon dots (CDs) exhibited promising application in fluorescence and magnetic resonance (MR) imaging, but developing manganese-doped CDs (Mn-CDs) with long wavelength emission and enhanced MR performance is a challenge. Herein, using a one-step solvothermal method, Mn-CDs with redshifted orange emission and enhanced longitudinal relaxation were synthesized for fluorescence and MR imaging. The results indicated that the prepared Mn-CDs had a uniform size distribution, and the average size was 5 nm. Moreover, Mn-CDs possessed a stronger fluorescence performance than Mn-free CDs, and simultaneously, the emission wavelength can redshift from 542 nm (green emission) to 578 nm (orange emission), owing to the increasing N-doping. Because of the movement limit of Mn

The aqueous Al-ion battery has achieved great progress in recent years. It now shows comparable performance to that of even non-aqueous Al-ion batteries. However, it also shows relatively low energy output and there is limited general understanding of the mechanism behind this restriction to its practical application. Thus, the development of a high-performance cathode material is in great demand. Herein, a high-capacity single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) is developed as a cathode for the water-in-salt electrolyte-based aqueous Al-ion battery, which provides an ultra-high specific capacity of 790 mAh g–1 (based on the mass of SWCNT) at a high current density of 5 A g–1 even after 1000 cycles. Moreover, the SWCNT/Al battery shows a complicated multi-ion intercalation mechanism, where AlCl4–, Cl–, Al3+, and H+ can function at the same time, improving the battery output. Beyond recently revealed H+ and metal ion co-intercalation, the Cl-assisted intercalation of Al3+ ions mechanism is also studied by experimental characterization and modeling for the first time, which significantly boosts the Al3+ storage capacity. This multi-ion intercalation mechanism combines the high-voltage anion deintercalation and the high-capacity cation intercalation, and thus, benefits the development and application of high-energy Al-ion batteries in the future.

A memristor with a bilayer electrolyte structure (Pt/C/NbOx/TiN) is proposed as a self-rectification and quasi-linear electronic synapse. The device shows self-rectifying analogue memristive behavior with > 106 rectification ratio, which can solve the sneak current problem in crossbar array without additional hardware burden. Under identical pulses in potentiation process, the device conductance is quasi-linearly changed with 9.16% nonlinearity. In addition, the conductance change rate of device is effectively tuned by altering amplitudes and frequencies of spike pulses. Benefiting from the quasi-linear conductance change characteristics, excellent classification accuracy (95.7%) is achieved for the application of handwritten digit classification with a two-layer perceptron based on MINST stimulation.

Vertical Au/ZnO Schottky barrier diodes (SBDs) were fabricated on an n+ Si substrate and tested as X-ray detectors in this paper. The high-resistivity ZnO film-based SBDs had a large effective area about 0.78 cm2 and showed a notable sensitivity about 0.78 uC/Gy for X-ray illumination. The detector with linear outputs achieved an X-ray dose measurement across four orders of magnitude of the dose rate from 3.83 mGy/s to 19.00 Gy/s. The response current to switched X-ray illumination exhibited a repeatable and stable characteristic, and the response current mechanism was given and discussed. The results imply the potential of junction devices based on ZnO material for X-ray dose measurement.

Inspired by the mussel foot protein and chitosan-based macromolecular adhesives, a series of chitosan-graft-polypeptides were synthesized by ring-opening polymerization of three N-carboxyanhydrides (NCAs) - 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine-N-carboxyanhydride (DOPA-NCA), cysteine-NCA (Cys-NCA) and arginine-NCA (Arg-NCA) - using partial-NH2-protected chitosan as an initiator. These copolymers demonstrated good biodegradability and low cytotoxicity. The results of lap-shear adhesion test showed that the maximum lap-shear adhesion strength on the porcine skin and aluminum sheet were 195.97 ± 21.1 kPa and 3080 ± 320 kPa, respectively, and the maximum tensile adhesion strength on bone was 642.70 ± 61.1 kPa. The rat experiment in vivo showed that these copolymers exhibited good hemostatic performance and can promote the healing of skin wound and bone fracture. It is expected that thesecopolymeric adhesives will have broad applications in hemostasis and soft tissue adhesions.

s In this paper, the ethanol vapor deflagration with different fuel pool location and area were experimental studied in a reduced sized tunnel with a size of 3 m✕0.3 m✕0.25 m. There were two fuel pans were set in the tunnel, the first fuel pan with a diameter of 10 cm was fixed in the center of the tunnel, and this one was heated by a PID temperature control heater. The another one (with a diameter of 10 cm or 15 cm) was separately set at 25 cm, 50 cm, 75 cm, 100 cm, and 125 cm according to test conditions. The characteristics of deflagration flame propagation, flame structure and the pressure were analyzed. The study found that the complex liquid-gas two-phase coupling effect was showed during the deflagration progress in the tunnel that the combustible vapor required for the duration of deflagration was controlled by the vapor phase transition process of flammable liquid distributed in the tunnel. The flammable ethanol vapor is a necessary condition for explosion. On the contrary, the flame of explosion promotes the evaporation of ethanol liquid. When the area of the leak source is constant, the explosion pressure and the flame speed decrease as the distance from the leak source to the explosion source increases. When the position of the leak source in the tunnel is constant, the explosion pressure and the explosion flame speed increase as the area of the leak source increases. In particular, when the fuel pan is 25 cm from the center of the explosion source, the overpressure at a fuel pan with a diameter of 15 cm is nearly 2.6 times that at 10 cm, and the flame propagation speed is about 1.2 times.

This work reports a moderate round-the-clock route to treating organic pollutants by utilizing a La2NiO4 hollow-sphere microreactor. A glycerol-assisted solvothermal route followed by an annealing process was applied for fabricating the catalyst. Both the physicochemical properties and the catalytic performance of the as-obtained microreactor for treating pollutants were discussed. The microreactor exhibited a strong ability to degrade phenol and anionic dyes in the absence of light irradiation, owing to its high surface area and positively charged surface. With the aid of visible-light irradiation, the degradation rate of the organic pollutants could be further accelerated due to the light multireflection in a hollow structure, which enhances the utilization of light. The present work indicates that the hollow-sphere La2NiO4 microreactor is effectively energy saving for environmental remediation.

On the basis of BODIPY platform, a terpyridyl-substituent BODIPY-Copper complex (Cu(II)-BTPY) was rationally designed and synthesized as a redox reaction fluorescent sensor for detecting HNO over reactive oxygen species (ROS) and reactive nitrogen species (RNS) with impressive selectivity in living cells under mild and neutral conditions. The BTPY exhibits relatively high fluorescence quantum efficiency as much as 34.8% and presents large stokes shift, about 62 nm. When a series of transition metal ions were exploited to investigate the fluorescence quench towards BTPY, copper ion (Cu2+) gave the optimal result. After the fluorescence of the probe being effectively quenched in the presence of Cu2+, it can be in turn recovered through the reduction of Cu2+ into Cu+ by HNO accompanying with a visually observable fluorescence response. Still, the sensing mechanism was evidently confirmed by EPR and ESI-MS measurement. In addition, the employment of BTPY for imaging dyes was also presented in vivo.

Exploring active catalyst materials for solar-driven photocatalytic water splitting into oxygen has proven extremely challenging, mostly due to poor oxygen-evolving efficiency originating from intrinsically sluggish oxygen evolution reaction (OER) kinetics. Ag3PO4 has been actively pursued as a promising photocatalyst for oxygen evolution from water-splitting. However, its low OER efficiency is a long standing problem. Both the construction of Z-scheme Ag3PO4-based composite photocatalytic systems and the optimization of surface morphology and interfacial contact in heterojunctions photocatalysts would be beneficial for boosting OER efficiency. Here we report on the fabrication of Ag3PO4/fish scale-like graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) sheet composites with well-defined heterostructures and intimate interfacial contact driven by electrostatic assembly. The Ag3PO4/modified g-C3N4 composites photocatalyst reveals significantly enhanced oxygen-evolving activity under light-emitting diode (LED) illumination. Effective surface modification of g-C3N4, strong interfacial interactions between two semiconductors and tandem Z-scheme-type pathway for more efficient charge transfer synergistically accelerates the redox capability of Ag3PO4 for OER. This work may provide new insights into the design and construction of high-performance solar-driven Z-scheme photocatalytic water splitting systems.

Graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) fundamental photophysical processes exhibit a high frequency of charge trapping due to physicochemical defects. In this study, a copper phosphide (Cu3P) and g-C3N4 hybrid was synthesized via a facile phosphorization method. Cu3P, as an electron acceptor, efficiently captures the photogenerated electrons and drastically improved the charge separation rate to cause a significantly enhanced photocatalytic performance. Moreover, the robust and intimate chemical interactions between Cu3P and g-C3N4 offers a rectified charge-transfer channel that can lead to a higher H2 evolution rate (HRE, 277.2 μmol h-1 g-1) for this hybrid that is up to 370 times greater than that achieved from using bare g-C3N4 (HRE, 0.75 μmol h-1 g-1) with a quantum efficiency of 3.74% under visible light irradiation (λ = 420 nm). To better determine the photophysical characteristics of the Cu3P-induced charge antitrapping behavior, ultrafast time-resolved spectroscopy measurements were used to investigate the charge carriers' dynamics from femtosecond to nanosecond time domains. The experimental results clearly revealed that Cu3P can effectively enhance charge transfer and suppress photoelectron-hole recombination.

Photoelectrocatalytic (PEC) technique for hydrogen evolution from water splitting and pollutant degradation is one of the most sustainable and environmental approaches for wastewater treatment and energy regeneration. Herein, a porous graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4)/reduction graphene oxide (rGO) structure (CNG) is constructed via a solvothermal approach. By using a facile electrophoretic deposition method, CNG is deposited on nickel (Ni) foam with the formation of highly active CNG-Ni foam photoanode. rGO were utilized to load g-C3N4, and also acts as the bridge for accelerating the rate of electron transfer from g-C3N4 to Ni foam. The resulted photoanode exhibits an excellent photoelectrochemical performance for synergistic pollutant degradation and H2 evolution under visible light irradiation (λ > 420 nm). Such excellent PEC activity is attributed to the strong visible-light absorption and fast electron transmission of the as-obtained photoanode. The visible light-driven photocurrent value of the optimal photoanode can be well maintained up to 24 h, indicating its high stability during the PEC process. This work also shows significance for paving a facile route to fabricating highly active photoelectrodes for environmental and energy applications.

Panax ginseng is being used for medicinal treatment and health tonic for over 2000 years in orient countries. As transplanting is necessary during ginseng cultivation, selection of ginseng seedling is of economic importance for ginseng production. The objective of this study was to determine the effects of seedling size on post-planting performance, yield and ginsenoside content. Ginseng seedlings from two cultivars (‘Kangmei01’ and ‘Xinkaihe01’) were classified into three grades, and a field experiment was carried out to investigate seedling performance of different grades in 2013–2015 and 2014–2016. Larger size ginseng seedlings generally had higher stem height, stem diameter and leaf area for all growth seasons, but the differences were not significant between adjacent grades sometimes. Larger size ginseng seedlings also resulted in greater main root length, root diameter, single root weight, yield and seed number per plant at harvest. In contrast, smaller size seedlings had higher increase index of single root weight and yield as well as higher ginsenoside content in main root at harvest. Different grades of ginseng seedlings did not show difference in survival rate at each growth season and rootlet ginsenoside content at harvest. The results suggested that larger ginseng seedlings had greater aerial part and gained higher yield, while smaller ones showed higher relative growth rate and contained larger amounts of ginsenosides.

Hydrogel electrolyte is especially suitable for solid-state Al-air batteries targeted for various portable applications, which may, however, lead to continuous Al corrosion during battery standby. To tackle this issue, an ethanol gel electrolyte is developed for Al-air battery for the first time in this work, by using KOH as solute and polyethylene oxide as gelling agent. The ethanol gel is found to effectively inhibit Al corrosion compared with the water gel counterpart, leading to stable Al storage. When assembled into an Al-air battery, the ethanol gel electrolyte achieves a much improved discharge lifetime and specific capacity, which are 5.3 and 4.1 times of the water gel electrolyte at 0.1 mA cm−2, respectively. By studying the gel properties, it is found that a lower ethanol purity can improve the battery power output, but at the price of decreased discharge efficiency. On the contrary, a higher polymer concentration will decrease the power output, but can bring extra benefit to the discharge efficiency. As for the gel thickness, a moderate value of 1 mm is preferred to balance the power output and energy efficiency. Finally, to cater the increasing market of flexible electronics, a flexible Al-air battery is developed by impregnating the ethanol gel into a paper substrate, which can function normally even under serious deformation or damage.

Aqueous hybrid Na–Zn ion batteries (ASZIBs) are promising for large‐scale energy storage due to their low cost and potential for high output voltage. However, most ASZIBs show limited discharge voltage (

Multifunctional nanoprobes with tumor microenvironment response are playing important roles in highly efficient theranostics of cancers. Herein, a kind of theranostic nanoprobe was synthesized by coating manganese dioxide (MnO2) on the surface of black commercial P25 titanium dioxide (b-P25). The resultant nanoprobe (b-P25@MnO2) possessed glutathione (GSH)-responsive magnetic resonance (MR) imaging and enhanced photothermal therapy (PTT). In tumor microenvironments, the excessive GSH was consumed by reacting with MnO2 to generate Mn2+ for GSH-responsive MR imaging, in which the longitudinal relaxation rate of b-P25@MnO2 was up to 30.44 mM-1 s-1, showing excellent cellular and intratumoral MR imaging. Moreover, the prepared b-P25@MnO2 exhibited stable and strong photothermal conversion capability with a high photothermal conversion efficiency of 30.67%, by which the 4T1 tumors disappeared completely, indicating safe and highly efficient PTT performance. The current work developed GSH-responsive b-P25@MnO2 nanoprobes, demonstrated for MR imaging and enhanced PTT in cancers.

Measurement of electrical conductivity of conductive thin film deposited on a conductive substrate is important and challenging. An effective conductivity model was constructed for a bilayer structure to extract thin film conductivity from the measured Q-factor of a quasi-optical resonator. As a demonstration, aluminium films with thickness of 100 nm were evaporated on four silicon wafers whose conductivity ranges from ~101 to ~105 S/m (thus, the proposed method can be verified for a substrate with a wide range of conductivity). Measurement results at ~180 GHz show that average conductivities are 1.66 &times, 107 S/m (which agrees well with direct current measurements) with 6% standard deviation. The proposed method provides a contactless conductivity evaluation method for conductive thin film deposited on conductive substrate which cannot be achieved by the existing microwave resonant method.

Osteoarticular tuberculosis, a chronic inflammatory disease characterized by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M.tb) infection, has become a serious problem in China. The present study was conducted to determine the mechanism of action of tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α in the pathogenesis of osteoarticular tuberculosis. The number of osteoclasts in osteoarticular tuberculosis tissue samples was detected by tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase staining. Autophagy and apoptosis of osteoclasts were detected by western blotting, reverse transcription-quantitative PCR, transmission electron microscopy and TUNEL staining. The results showed that autophagy and the number of osteoclasts increased in the lesions of patients with osteoarticular tuberculosis compared with osteoarthritis samples. Moreover, activation of osteoclast autophagy inhibited the apoptosis of osteoclasts infected with M.tb, and increased the expression level of TNF-α. The results showed that TNF-α enhanced the autophagic activity of M.tb-infected osteoclasts and inhibited cell apoptosis. These findings indicated that M.tb infection induced osteoclast production and inhibited osteoclast apoptosis by regulating TNF-α-mediated osteoclast autophagy, revealing a new mechanism for TNF-α in the pathogenesis of osteoarticular tuberculosis.

An efficient sulfide-catalyzed [2 + 1] annulation of para-quinone methides (p-QMs) with diverse bromides has been achieved. This catalytic strategy provides an efficient and straightforward protocol for accessing a variety of spiro-cyclopropanyl-cyclohexadienone compounds in good to excellent yields (64% to 96% yields) with outstanding diastereoselectivities (>20 : 1 dr), displaying good functional group tolerance as well as gram-scale capacity.

Accumulating evidence suggests that p53 plays a suppressive role in cancer metastasis, yet the underlying mechanism remains largely unclear. Regulation of actin dynamics is essential for the control of cell migration, which is an important step in metastasis. The Arp2/3 complex is a major nucleation factor to initiate branched actin polymerization that drives cell migration. However, it is unknown whether p53 could suppress metastasis through modulating Arp2/3 function. Here, we report that WDR63 is transcriptionally upregulated by p53. We show with migration assays and mouse xenograft models that WDR63 negatively regulates cell migration, invasion, and metastasis downstream of p53. Mechanistically, WDR63 interacts with the Arp2/3 complex and inhibits Arp2/3‐mediated actin polymerization. Furthermore, WDR63 overexpression is sufficient to dampen the increase in cell migration, invasion, and metastasis induced by p53 depletion. Together, these findings suggest that WDR63 is an important player in the regulation of Arp2/3 function and also implicate WDR63 as a critical mediator of p53 in suppressing metastasis.

AlCl3 "water-in-salt" electrolyte has successfully expanded the electrochemical window of aqueous Al-ion battery to 4 volts, however, the limited Al intercalation capacity of graphite (165 mAh g-1 ) preclude higher energy density. A high-energy MnAl2O4 cathode was synthesized by a simple two-step hydrothermal method, which can utilize triple-ion intercalation chemistry to achieve a high specific capacity of 330 mAh g-1 with an average discharge voltage of 1.68V versus Al/Al3+ (a record energy density of 555 Wh kg-1 ). Besides, a higher discharge capacity of 830 Wh kg-1 was achieved with higher-concentration electrolyte, showing a potential capacity for cation intercalation. Unique triple-ion intercalation chemistry was firstly investigated thoroughly. Experimental characterization attributes this high voltage to the intercalation of anions, e.g., AlCl4- and Cl- , and Cl- was also revealed an interaction function with intercalated Al3+ cations, which can benefit the design of Aluminium-ion batteries (AIBs) in the future.

To reveal the effects of microwave irradiation on the structure, morphology, and supercapacitor performance of p-phenylenediamine (PPD)-functionalized graphene materials (FG), FG was synthesized by using PPD as a functional modifier with the combination of hydrothermal reflux and microwave irradiation. The results showed that microwave irradiation could realize rapid reduction of functionalized graphene oxide (FGO). With increase of the irradiation time, the structural defects decreased while the sp2 plane domains increased. Moreover, the lamellae began to decompose into small aggregates. Before microwave irradiation treatment, FGO exhibited good supercapacitor performance with superior specific capacitance of 614.2 F g−1 at 0.5 A g−1. However, after microwave irradiation, the supercapacitor performance of FG got worse, and the configuration types of nitrogen atoms in the FG structure changed significantly. These results indicate that microwave irradiation is not conducive to improvement of the supercapacitor performance of FG.

In this letter, effects of top electrodes (TEs) on ferroelectric properties of Hf0.5 Zr0.5 O2 (HZO) thin films are examined systematically. The remnant polarization (Pr) of HZO thin films increases by altering TEs with lower thermal expansions coefficient ( $\alpha $ ). The largest 2Pr value of 38.72 $\mu \text{C}$ /cm2 is observed for W TE with $\alpha = 4.5\times 10^{\mathsf {-6}}$ /K, while the 2Pr value is only $22.83~\mu \text{C}$ /cm2 for Au TE with $\alpha = 14.2\times 10^{\mathsf {-6}}$ /K. Meanwhile, coercive field (Ec) shifts along the electric field axis and the offset is found to be dependent on the difference of workfunctions (WFs) between TE and TiN bottom electrode (BE). Ec shifts toward negative/positive direction, when the WF of TE is larger/smaller (Pt, Pd, Au/W, Al, Ta) than TiN BE. This letter provides an effective way to modulate HfO2-based device performance for different requirements in actual application.

Carbon dioxide (CO2), as a kind of the greenhouse gas, was highly desirable to be converted into fuels by using solar energy. Herein, a novel microwave-induced synthesis route was explored for the in-situ growth and assemble of highly dispersed UIO-66-NH2 nanocrystals onto graphene (GR) with the formation of highly active photocatalyst for converting CO2. The as-obtained UIO-66-NH2/GR hybrid exhibited both high activity and selectivity in the photocatalytic reduction of CO2 to formic acid under visible-light irradiation (λ > 410 nm, 300 W Xe lamp). The photo-reduction efficiency of CO2 for UIO-66-NH2/GR was about 11 times of that for the pure UIO-66-NH2, and 2 times of as that for the UIO-66-NH2/GR sample obtained via traditional hydrothermal synthesis. The proposed microwave-assisted synthesis route may produce lots of "super hot spots" (SHS) on the surface of GR. These SHS not only resulted in small UIO-66-NH2 nanocrystals with a high dispersion onto the surface of GR, but also can greatly improve the interaction between UIO-66-NH2 and GR. Such highly dispersed UIO-66-NH2 ultrafine nanocrystals can allow more active surface for both trapping CO2 and enhancing the light absorption capability to generate photogenerated electrons from UIO-66-NH2 frameworks for reducing CO2 molecules. The strong UIO-66-NH2/GR interaction can effectively facilitate the photoelectron-hole separation and inhibit the leaching of UIO-66-NH2 from GR, contributing a high CO2 photo-reduction activity and excellent recyclability. Such work supplied a novel route for constructing strong interaction between MOFs and graphene with the aim at efficiently reducing CO2 under visible-light irradiation. It could also be explored for other applications, including N2 reduction, water-splitting, and solar cells.

Nitrogen-doped graphene has attracted increasing attention in recent years. Synthesis of nitrogen-doped 3D graphene with high capacitance and excellent capacitive behavior is highly desirable for high-performance supercapacitor applications. In this study, nitrogen-doped porous 3D graphene was prepared from graphite oxide using the mild one-pot hydrothermal procedure. The p-phenylenediamine and ammonia were selected as the reduction and doping agents, respectively. 3D graphene specimens with various nitrogen doping amounts of 6.52–7.81% were prepared. Scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction and supercapacitor performance were used to investigate the morphologies, structures and capacitance behaviors of the prepared 3D graphene composites. The results indicated that the as-prepared specimens contained different doping nitrogen amounts. NGP-10.6 showed well-connected 3D porous microstructure with largest doping nitrogen content. In turn, nature and content of nitrogen doping provided the graphene with excellent capacitive behavior. The specific capacitance of NGP-10.6 reached 788 F·g−1 at the current density of 0.5 A·g−1 and 296 F·g−1 at 10 A·g−1. Overall, these findings look promising for future applications as outstanding energy storage materials.

Copolymer thermoplastic polyurethane (C-TPU) was extruded with intumescing flame-retardant formulations based on ammonium polyphosphate and macromolecular nitrogen phosphorus. Carbon nanofiber and carbon nanotube were used as the additional carbon source. The synergism effect of each additive and their intumescing combinations on C-TPU composites degradation, smoke suppression, flammability, and melt rheology was systematically investigated by thermogravimetric (TG), smoke density test and cone calorimeter test (CCT), etc. The TG results showed that carbon particles combined with IFR showed a notable improvement in thermostability at high temperature, and this intumescing flame-retardant system effectively catalyzed the decomposition of macromolecule volatiles that is the major source of smoke particles. This intumescing flame-retardant system also promoted the generation of compact and continual char layer, reduced the peak heat release rate by more than 80% and the smoke generation by 50% obtained from CCT. What is more, the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) showed that this flame-retardant system could promote the formation of a char layer with network structure which helps produce composites with superior flame retardant. A synergistic effect on enhancing the limit oxygen index (LOI) and restricting the dropping of the composites is also obtained. This study has a potential contribution to the development of carbon-based flame-retardant composites.

Negative-SET behavior, induced by nano-filament overgrowth phenomenon, takes major responsibility to the reset failure phenomenon in conductive bridge random access memory (CBRAM). The unexpected negative-SET behavior in CBRAM devices can result in serious reliability issues and has been an obstacle on the way to mass production. In this letter, we have proposed a back-end-of-line (BEOL) compatible TiN barrier layer to improve the device reliability in CBRAM devices by eliminating the nano-filament overgrowth phenomenon and negative-SET behavior. Thus, a higher reset voltage can be applied to the TiN barrier layer devices to achieve more complete reset process and obtain better resistive switching performance. The results show that the Cu/HfO2/TiN/Ru device with one transistor structure has excellent comprehensive memory properties, including high reliability, fast switching speed, high resistance state uniformity, high endurance, long retention, and multi-level storage ability.

Silver oxide (Ag x O) has huge potential in the catalysts and semiconductor devices applications and thus it is of great significance to characterize its semiconductor properties. Here, by using the RF reactive magnetron sputtering method under different substrate temperatures, 40, 100, and 200 °C, respectively, three Ag x O films were prepared and their semiconductor properties were carefully investigated through X-ray diffraction, Hall measurement, transmittance and photoluminescence spectrum. The main phase of the Ag x O films sputtered at 40 and 100 °C is found to be AgO, while that sputtered at 200 °C is Ag 2 O. The resistivity of the Ag x O films increases with the substrate temperature and the mobility of the AgO films are about 21 and 15 cm 2 /V·s for the 40 and 100 °C deposited films, respectively. Photoluminescence measurement results suggest that the band gaps of Ag 2 O and AgO films are both 3.4 eV, and the emission bands in the visual light region indicate the existence of amount of defects in the Ag x O films. Moreover, the defect levels in the band gap deduced from the transmittance spectra are consistent with that from the photoluminescence spectra analysis. Besides, a metal-metal-semiconductor-metal structured X-ray detector was fabricated using the high-resistivity Ag 2 O film to explore its photoconductive response to the X-ray. The signal to noise ratio is 65 and the sensitivity is 4.2 nC/Gy at 5 V bias voltage using the 30 kV X-ray source with the dose rate of 1.53 Gy/s.

Background Secreted frizzled-related protein 5 (SFRP5) is an anti-inflammatory adipokine modulating metabolism dysfunction. This study aims to observe the effect of recombinant SFRP5 protein on nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). Methods We set up a prokaryotic expression system and purified the recombinant SFRP5 protein. Recombinant SFRP5 protein was further identified by SDS-PAGE, western blot, high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), protein mass spectrometry and in vitro Wnt5a-binding test. NASH mouse model was induced by methionine and choline deficient diet (MCDD) for 2 weeks. SFRP5 treatment group received intraperitoneal injection with a dosage of 10μg/kg SFRP5 twice a day for 2 weeks. Saline was used as control. Inflammation and fatty lesion score of liver tissue pathology and serum transaminase level were compared. Results The purity of recombinant SFRP5 protein is 90% identified by HPLC. Its molecule size is 36,096.08 tested by mass spectrometry. Recombinant SFRP5 can specifically bind with Wnt5a which verifies its activity in vitro. The endotoxin level of this recombinant protein is 0.01EU/μg-0.1EU/μg and is suitable for animal experiment. SFRP5 can significantly improve liver inflammation (SFRP5 vs. control, 1.40 ± 0.70 vs. 2.00 ± 0.47, P

The sneak path problem is one of the major hindrances to the application of high-density crossbar resistive random access memory; however, complementary resistive switching (CRS) is an effective solution to this problem. The co-existence of resistive switching (RS) and CRS is possible within the same device. Therefore, a precise control is highly required for the successful utilization of different modes. In this study, we have demonstrated an effective way to control both switching modes in a simple HfO2-based crossbar device. The interchange between RS and CRS modes is possible, based on the intrinsic anionic rearrangement by controlling the extrinsic stimulation, either in the form of voltage or in the form of current. In particular, a highly nonlinear CRS mode is reported, in which the nonlinearity is almost 100 times greater than in the RS mode, which is achieved at a high temperature of 150 °C. The procedure reported in this study may be useful for the other resistive memory systems.

Recently, biomaterials have been increasingly used for burn wound healing, but burn wound infections and biomaterial-associated infections still need to be addressed. As a novel inorganic antimicrobial, the antimicrobial effect of gallium nitrate was investigated, and the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of gallium nitrate against bacteria that are common in infected burn wounds was determined with a Microbial Viability Assay Kit-WST. The results showed that the MIC of Ga(NO3)3 against E. coli and E. faecalis was 256 μg mL−1, and it was 512 μg mL−1 against P. aeruginosa, K. pneumonia, E. cloacae, A. baumannii, S. maltophilia, S. aureus and S. epidermidis. Meanwhile, transmission electron microscopy (TEM) found similar visual evidence of the mechanism by which the gallium ion attacks both Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria, which was in agreement with the MIC results. By TEM observation, it was found that detachment of the cell membrane and wall and the appearance of an electron-light region containing condensed substances occurred in both Ga3+-treated E. coli and Ga3+-treated S. aureus cells, with smaller morphological changes in Ga3+-treated S. aureus compared with E. coli. This research shows the effective and wide-spectrum antimicrobial properties of gallium nitrate against most bacteria encountered in burn wound infections. Gallium(III) could be a good choice when fighting an infected burn wound, and it is a promising candidate for modifying biomaterials or medical devices to prevent infection in burn wounds.