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Homeobox D gene cluster antisense growth-associated long noncoding RNA (HAGLR) functions as a crucial regulator in the progression and development of human cancers. We analyzed effects of HAGLR, microRNA (miR)-143-5p and lysosome-associated membrane glycoprotein (LAMP)3 on esophageal cancer (EC) and the related mechanisms. Microarray analysis was used to screen out EC-related genes and the regulation network among HAGLR, miR-143-5p, and LAMP3. The regulatory mechanisms of HAGLR and miR-143-5p in EC were analyzed following the treatment of miR-143-5p mimic, miR-143-5p inhibitor, HAGLR vector, or small interfering RNA against HAGLR in EC cells. The expression of N-cadherin, vimentin, Twist1, Snail1, and E-cadherin as well as the abilities of cell proliferation, invasion, and migration were measured. The effects of the HAGLR/miR-143-5p/LAMP3 axis were determined in vivo by assessing tumor formation in nude mice. The expression of HAGLR and LAMP3 was increased, whereas that of miR-143-5p was diminished in EC tissues and cells. HAGLR could competitively bind to miR-143-5p, and miR-143-5p targeted LAMP3. Down-regulated HAGLR or up-regulated miR-143-5p increased E-cadherin expression and significantly diminished expression of LAMP3, N-cadherin, vimentin, Twist1, and Snail1. Moreover, down-regulated HAGLR inhibited cell proliferation, invasion, migration, epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT), and tumor growth. Moreover, down-regulation of HAGLR inhibited LAMP3 expression by sponging miR-143-5p, thereby suppressing the progression of EC. Taken together, our results suggest HAGLR acts as a competing endogenous RNA of miR-143-5p to increase the expression of LAMP3, thus promoting EMT, proliferation, invasion, and migration in EC cells.-Yang, C., Shen, S., Zheng, X., Ye, K., Sun, Y., Lu, Y., Ge, H. Long noncoding RNA HAGLR acts as a microRNA-143-5p sponge to regulate epithelial-mesenchymal transition and metastatic potential in esophageal cancer by regulating LAMP3.

A novel anode material of Au nanoparticles grown on a self-supported reduced graphene oxide foam is successfully fabricated in this work. Characterization methods like X-ray diffraction pattern, sc...

Transition metal selenides are widely considered as good electron conductor materials, showing bright prospect in energy storage and conversion. However, binary metal selenides as supercapacitor electrode materials are rarely reported. Herein, a simple and binder-free hydrothermal method is employed to grow hierarchical urchin-like MnCo-selenide on nickel foam. The unique hierarchical microstructure, synergetic effect, and excellent conductivity enable the electrode exhibit outstanding supercapacitor performance compared with counterpart oxide and sulfide, including high specific capacitance (1656 F g–1 at 1 A g–1) and extraordinary cycle performance (8.2% capacity decline after 8000 cycles). Additionally, the asymmetric supercapacitor (ASC), employing MnCo-selenide and AC as anode and cathode, exhibits remarkable energy density of 55.1 Wh kg–1 at 880 W kg–1, confirming the as-prepared urchin-like MnCo-selenide is a satisfactory material for the energy storage system.

This study presents a novel and highly efficient superpixel algorithm, namely, depth-fused adaptive superpixel (DFASP), which can generate accurate superpixels in a degraded image. In many applications, particularly in actual scenes, vision degradation, such as motion blur, overexposure, and underexposure, often occurs. Well-known color-based superpixel algorithms are incapable of producing accurate superpixels in degraded images because of the ambiguity of color information caused by vision degradation. To eliminate this ambiguity, we use depth and color information to generate superpixels. We map the depth and color information to a high-dimensional feature space. Then, we develop a fast multilevel clustering algorithm to produce superpixels. Furthermore, we design an adaptive mechanism to adjust the color and depth information automatically during pixel clustering. Experimental results demonstrate that regardless of boundary recall, under segmentation error, run time, or achievable segmentation accuracy, DFASP is better than state-of-the-art superpixel methods.

In this paper, three-dimensional (3D) porous carbon framework (CF) is prepared using commercial sponge as template and furfuryl alcohol (C5H6O2) as carbon source, through polymerizing and solidifying by oxalic acid (H2C2O4) followed by a carbonizing process at high temperature. Then, one-demensional (1D) polyaniline (PANI) nanowires are deposited on the CF substrate by a simple one-step electrodeposition method to obtain CF-PANI energy storage electrode. The CF-PANI maintains initial 3D porous structure as CF substrate with PANI layer, benefiting for the diffusion of electrolyte and the contact between active material and electrolyte. Besides, the carbon skeleton is surrounded by the PANI nanowires, which provide more transfer channels for electrons during the charge/discharge process. The loading mass of PANI on CF is as high as 21.3 mg cm−3, and the gravimetric and volumetric capacitances reach 866 F g−1 and 18.5 F cm−3, respectively, at the scan rate of 2 mV s−1. Moreover, the asymmetric supercapacitor based on CF-PANI as anode electrode and CF as cathode electrode exhibits a high energy density of 44 W h kg−1 at the power density of 800 W kg−1, indicating its promising applications as the electrode material for supercapacitors.

Herein, we present the synthesis of oxygen vacancies-rich α-MoO3-x nanobelts through a novel defect-engineering strategy. The oxygen-vacancies could not only greatly increase the interlayer spacing and the electrical conductivity of MoO3, but also significantly enhance the electrochemical activity, which promotes faster charge storage kinetics. Meanwhile, to further facilitate the electron transfer and ion transport, a graphene nanomesh-carbon nanotube/MoO3-x (GC/MoO3-x) nanocomposite with three-dimensional sandwiched structure was fabricated, which displays high specific capacity up to 306 C g−1 as well as high volumetric capacity of 692 C cm−3. Our fabricated asymmetric supercapacitor (ASC) with the GC/MoO3-x and GC/MnO2 nanocomposites as anode and cathode, respectively, exhibits an ultrahigh energy of 150 Wh kg−1, corresponding to an impressive volumetric energy density of 319 Wh L−1. Notably, both the gravimetric and volumetric energy densities are much higher than most of the previously reported metal oxide based ASCs in aqueous electrolytes. Furthermore, the ASC displays an ultra-long lifespan with 101% retention ratio after 30,000 cycles. The outstanding performances of GC/MoO3-x composite render it a highly promising candidate for next-generation supercapacitors with both high energy and power densities in future applications, especially in greatly limited space.

Searching highly active, high stability, low-cost electrocatalysts toward the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) is imperative for electrochemical hydrogen production. We propose an effective synthetic method to obtain self-supported, hierarchical, and edge-rich nickel phosphide nanosheet arrays on nickel foam (Ni2P NSs-NF), which are successfully employed as a high-efficiency, three-dimensional (3D) binder-free electrode for the HER. Benefiting from the 3D open nanostructure with abundant edges in the Ni2P NSs, the Ni2P NSs-NF electrode exhibits superior activity for the HER both in alkaline and acidic conditions. It requires low overpotentials of 89 mV in the alkaline solution (1 M KOH) and 67 mV in the acidic solution (0.5 M H2SO4) to drive 10 mA cm–2 with low Tafel slopes of 82 and 57 mV dec–1, respectively. Besides, the hierarchical Ni2P NSs-NF electrode shows no apparent performance decay toward the HER even after 10,000 cycles. Theoretical calculation results prove that the free energy of hydrogen a...

A 3D NiCo2S4 nanowire arrays directly grown on Ni foam electrode (NiCo2S4/NF) is prepared by two-step simple hydrothermal process. The morphology and phase composition of NiCo2S4/NF are characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). As expected, in the following electrocatalytic measurement, the binder-free, self-made NiCo2S4/NF electrode exhibits much higher catalytic activity, lower onset potential, better stability and greater tolerance towards urea electrooxidation compared with the Ni3S2/NF electrode synthesized under the same reaction conditions. The NiCo2S4/NF electrode delivers a current density of 720 mA cm−2 at 0.18 V (vs. Ag/AgCl) in a solution containing 5 mol L−1 KOH and 0.33 mol L−1 urea. The impressive electrocatalytic activity of the NiCo2S4/NF catalyst is largely ascribed to its distinctive structure, which exposes more electrochemical active sites at the electrode–electrolyte interface. Besides, the high intrinsic electronic conductivity also largely boosts the charge transfer rates for urea electrooxidation. The results demonstrate that the NiCo2S4/NF electrode showing a beneficial application prospect in the wastewater treatment and direct urea fuel cells.

Facile hydrothermal method and galvanic replacement are employed to synthesize an electrode of ternary CuNiPd nanoneedles decorated Ni foam toward NaBH4 electrooxidation. In the whole preparation, traditional polymer binders are avoided which efficiently lowers the electrode cost. X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy are conducted to study the phase composition and morphology of CuNiPd nanoneedles. The unique needle-like structure of the as-prepared electrode allows electrolyte to fully contact with electrode surface which is beneficial to improve the catalytic activity. Besides, the electrochemical performance is tested through chronoamperometry and cyclic voltammetry in a traditional three-electrode system. In 2 mol L−1 NaOH and 0.3 mol L−1 NaBH4, a current density of 710 mA cm−2 at 0 V on the CuNiPd nanoneedles decorated Ni foam electrode is achieved which reveals a desired catalytic property for NaBH4 oxidation. In addition, the activation energy and number of exchange electrons of NaBH4 oxidation on CuNiPd nanoneedles decorated Ni foam electrode are 18.42 kJ mol−1 and 4.9. The excellent catalytic activity is a result of the synergy effect of Cu, Ni and Pd which makes the as-prepared electrode to be an alternative choice for direct sodium borohydride fuel cell.

A high working voltage and specific capacitance are vital for flexible solid-state symmetric supercapacitor (FSSC) devices to achieve decent energy densities with high power. In this paper, we report a 1.8 V FSSC based on NiFe2O4 nanocubes anchored on reduced graphene oxide (rGO) cryogel electrode. Through surface protection by a free-standing three-dimensional cross-linked network structure, NiFe2O4 converted from Ni3[Fe(CN)6]2 inhibits the original nanocube structure. Benefiting from the synergistic effects between NiFe2O4 nanocubes and graphene nanosheets, the newly synthesized NiFe2O4@rGO hybrid electrode delivers a high charge storage capacity (488 F g−1 at a constant current density of 1 A g−1), excellent rate ability and cycling performance (89.8% of the initial capacitance value after 10,000 cycles). In addition, NiFe2O4@rGO FSSC has been assembled and exhibits stable behavior at bend state, as well as high energy density of 62.5 Wh kg−1, and long cycle life (93.2% of the initial capacitance value after 6000 cycles). The proposed strategy for controlling the design and synthesis of NiFe2O4@rGO nanostructures provides promise for the development of high performance electrode in advanced energy storage devices.

NiCo2O4 nanowire arrays grown on Ni foam (NiCo2O4/NF) are synthesized by a simple template-free hydrothermal route followed by a thermal treatment in the air at 400 °C. The as-prepared Ni foam substrate exhibits homogeneous and porous nanowire arrays, which providing a number of active sites and electronic transmission channels for urea electrooxidation. The electroactivity of NiCo2O4/NF electrode toward the oxidation of urea in alkaline solution is evaluated using cyclic voltammetry (CV), chronoamperometry (CA) and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) measurements. Results show that the as-obtained electrode delivers an outstanding electrocatalytic activity and stability for urea electrooxidation. The NiCo2O4/NF electrode delivers a low open potential at 0.19 V versus Ag/AgCl with a corresponding current density of 570 mA cm−2 in 5 mol L−1 KOH and 0.33 mol L−1 urea electrolytes. Meanwhile, detailed investigation is made for the electrocatalytic oxidation of urea by varying several reaction parameters, such as scan rate, urea and KOH concentrations. Benefiting from the unique structure and synergistic effects of Ni and Co, the NiCo2O4/NF electrode exhibit superior electrocatalyst activity and is considered to be a promising candidate catalysis material for direct urea fuel cell.

Unique nanostructure, high electrical conductivity, satisfactory energy density, and extraordinary cycling stability are important evaluation criteria for high-efficient energy storage devices. Herein, Fe3O4 nanospheres are successfully in situ decorated on graphene nanosheets through an environmentally benign and facile solvothermal procedure. When utilized as an electrode for supercapacitor, the graphene/Fe3O4 nanocomposite exhibits a notably enhanced specific capacity (268 F·g−1 at 2 mV·s−1) and remarkable cycling performance with 98.9% capacity retention after 10,000 cycles. Furthermore, the fabricated graphene/MnO2//graphene/Fe3O4 asymmetric supercapacitor device displays a desirable energy density (87.6 Wh·kg−1) and superior cycling stability (93.1% capacity retention after 10,000 cycles).

At present, there is an urgent need for plentiful non-noble metal catalyst to substitute for valuableness platinum based metal catalyst in electrochemical water splitting. Here, we fabricated a three-demensional (3D) Ni Co NiCo2O4 nanosheets electrocatalyst that directly grew on Ni foam firstly and then were reduced in 0.1 mol dm−3 sodium borohydride solution. This electrode exhibited high activity in 1.0 mol dm−3 KOH solution with an onset potential of ∼40 mV and a tafel slope of 77 mV dec−1. Furthermore, the Ni Co NiCo2O4/NF electrode showed a splendid durability during long-playing electrochemical test. Our work may provide an inexpensive, easy-to-obtain and excellent catalyst candidate for future electrolytic water research and industry studies that may involve hydrogen applications in the future.

In this work, the porous SnS nanosheets with abundant ultra-small nanocrystals aligned on carbon microtubes are designed to achieve good structural stability, remarkable rate capability and high sodium storage capability.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the leading causes of cancer-related morbidity and mortality worldwide. Accumulating evidence suggests that mitochondrial dynamics are closely implicated in carcinogenesis including CRC. Paris Saponin II (PSII), a major steroidal saponin extracted from Rhizoma Paris polyphylla, has emerged as a potential anticancer agent. However, the effects of PSII on CRC and its underlying mechanisms remain unknown. In the present study, we found PSII induced apoptosis and inhibited colony formation in HT 29 and HCT 116 cells, and cell cycle arrest in G1 phase. PSII inhibited the phosphorylation of ERK1/2 and mitochondrial translocation of dynamin-related protein 1 (Drp1) by dephosphorylating Drp1 at Ser616, leading to the suppression of mitochondrial fission. PSII also suppressed NF-κB activation as a result of the inhibition of IKKβ and p65 translocation. Drp1 knockdown remarkably downregulated the nuclear expression of p65 and its target genes cyclin D1 and c-Myc in HCT 116 cell, confirming the link between mitochondrial fission and NF-κB pathway. Silencing of Drp 1 enhanced the inhibitory effects of PSII on p65 phosphorylation and the expressions of cyclin D1 and c-Myc, revealing that the inhibitory effects of PSII on cyclin D1 and c-Myc were relevant in the suppression of Drp1 and NF-κB activation. An in vivo study demonstrated PSII remarkably decreased the xenograft tumor size and suppressed the phosphorylation of ERK1/2 and Drp1 at Ser616. Taken together, our results suggested that PSII could inhibit colorectal carcinogenesis, at least in part, by regulating mitochondrial fission and NF-κB pathway.

Li-ion and K-ion batteries present their unique advantages of high energy density and low cost, respectively. It is a challenge to explore a universal anode with efficient electrochemical performance. Herein, a two-dimensional TiO2/reduced graphene oxide (RGO) composite was prepared by a facile hydrothermal method. TiO2 nanoparticles are transformed from Ti2C MXene and connect the RGO nanosheets to form a sheet-like structure. Serving as the anode material, the TiO2/RGO presents high capacity, remarkable rate ability and long cycling performance for both Li- and K-ion batteries. The superior electrochemical performance is attributed to the short ion diffusion path due to the small particle size (15–25 nm) and the highway for electron transport provided by RGO. In addition, RGO motivates the capacitive contribution, resulting in enhanced capacity and better rate performance. Meanwhile, the electrochemical kinetics of Li/K-ion storage was investigated by quantitative kinetics analysis. This work demonstrates a possibility to introduce the capacitive capacity to realize rapid ion storage and improve the cycling stability, providing a new strategy to design efficient electrodes for metal-ion batteries.

Urea electrolysis offers the prospect of cost-effective and energy-saving hydrogen production together with mitigating urea-rich wastewater pollution instead of overall water splitting. Hence, here, high-efficiency bifunctional electrocatalysts were developed for both the urea oxidation reaction (UOR) and hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) via the in situ vertical growth of thorny leaf-like (2D nanosheets supporting 1D nanowires) NiCoP on a carbon cloth (NiCoP/CC). After integrating the advantages of the synergistic effect between Ni and Co as well as the unique hierarchical structure combined with 1D nanowires, 2D nanosheets and a 3D conductive carbon cloth substrate, the electrode exhibited excellent electrocatalytic activity toward HER and UOR. The electrolytic cell assembled using NiCoP/CC as the anode and the cathode could provide current density of 10 mA cm−2 at a cell voltage of 1.42 V (160 mV less than that for its urea-free counterpart) as well as remarkable durability over 30 h. Thus, the cost-effectiveness and high activity of the NiCoP/CC electrode pave the way to explore transition metal-based electrocatalysts for urea electrolysis.

Designing and exploring earth-abundant but high-performance electrode materials are of crucial significance for the future large-scale development of supercapacitors. Herein, a facile anionic P-substitution strategy is used to in situ decorate ternary Ni–S–P nanoparticles on graphene nanosheets (G/Ni–S–P) for supercapacitors for the first time. Benefitting from the unique hierarchical structure and positive synergistic effects between each component, the resultant G/Ni–S–P composite delivers a spectacular specific capacity of 1406 C g−1 at 1 A g−1 with an outstanding rate capability of 60.2% at 120 A g−1, which is highly superior to those of the previously reported nickel based composites. The asymmetric supercapacitor assembled with the G/Ni–S–P and graphene/FeOOH composite as the cathode and anode exhibits high energy density up to 58.1 W h kg−1 and superb electrochemical stability with 4.9% decay after 30 000 continuous charge/discharge cycles. These intriguing electrochemical performances indicate that the G/Ni–S–P composite has enormous potential application in high-performance energy storage systems in the future.

The structural evolution of poly (ethylene terephthalate) (PET) with distinct water absorption during uniaxial deformation slightly above glass transition temperature (Tg) were investigated by in-situ synchrotron radiation wide angle X-ray scattering (WAXS). Results show that the locally ordered structures are not conducive to stretch-induced crystallization (SIC) although the corresponding entropy is more close to crystals compared to random chains, which is due to the limited chain mobility therein. The “frozen orders” should be destroyed to achieve the critical chain mobility required by SIC even with the presence of water as plasticizer. Unexpectedly, absorption of water does not enhance but suppresses SIC though it does promote the chain mobility, originating from lower stress level with higher water contents. Stress and chain mobility directly correlate with chain stretch and orientation in positive and negative manners, respectively, demonstrating that chain stretch and orientation also play important role in SIC around Tg.

We report carbon nanotube-encapsulated cobalt as an efficient oxygen reduction electrocatalyst (onset potential of 0.94 V and half-potential of 0.84 V). Calculation results firstly reveal that Co protected by graphitic-N-doped carbon holds more negative charge (-1.22 eV) and has an energy barrier (0.56 eV) lower than that of pyridinic-N-doped carbon (-1.11 eV; 0.78 eV), which is responsible for the ORR activity. The corresponding Zn-air batteries deliver an excellent gravimetric energy density of 837 W h kg-1.

Developing cost-efficient and effective catalysts for the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER) remains a great challenge for application in high-efficiency water electrolyzers. In this work, we design a highly efficient and durable water splitting system in an alkaline solution, in which platinum (Pt) sub-nanocluster (average size: 0.59 nm) functionalized nickel–iron layered double hydroxide nanosheets on carbon fiber cloth (Pt–NiFe LDH/CC) serve as the cathode and hierarchical (Ni0.77Fe0.23)Se2 nanosheets on CC ((Ni0.77Fe0.23)Se2/CC) act as the anode. For the HER, the three-dimensional (3D) Pt–NiFe LDH/CC electrode with an ultralow Pt content (1.56 wt%) drives a current density of 10 mA cm−2 at an ultralow overpotential of 28 mV. For the OER, the edge-rich (Ni0.77Fe0.23)Se2/CC electrode displays a current density of 10 mA cm−2 at a small overpotential of 228 mV, and the Tafel slope is as low as 69 mV dec−1. More importantly, the assembled Pt–NiFe LDH/CC||(Ni0.77Fe0.23)Se2/CC water splitting electrolyzer exhibits a high current density of 30 mA cm−2 at a low cell voltage of 1.57 V, which is superior to that of the electrolyzer assembled using commercial 20 wt% Pt/C and RuO2 electrodes (30 mA cm−2 at 1.62 V). Additionally, the Pt–NiFe LDH/CC||(Ni0.77Fe0.23)Se2/CC electrolyzer displays excellent stability over 40 h even at a high current density of 50 mA cm−2, which shows its great potential in the practical applications of full water splitting.

Transition metal selenide has stimulated much research interest in energy storage and conversion, due to its excellent electrical conductivity. β-Cu2Se with special crystal structure is considered as super-ionic conductor, of which the diffusion coefficient is as large as a liquid. The fast ions and electrons conductor β-Cu2Se with uniformly dense nanowire crossing with each other directly on nickel foam is prepared via simple one-step solvothermal grow method for 4 h, avoiding conductive agent and binder. The feature much benefitting for electrons and ions transfer enable the β-Cu2Se-4h electrode delivers specific capacity as high as 182.4 mA h g−1 at current density of 2 mA cm−2, which is still 105.6 mA h g−1 even at high current density of 50 mA cm−2, and excellent cycling stability of 85% after repetitively charge-discharge 10,000 times. The fabricated asymmetric supercapacitor (β-Cu2Se-4h//AC) achieves maximum energy and power density is 48 Wh kg−1 and 5500 W kg−1.

To balance the electrochemical performance gap between the Li+ insertion/deintercalation anode and the anion adsorption/desorption cathode, in this paper, for the first time, we investigated MnNb2O6 as a new rate capability type anode material for lithium-ion capacitors (LICs). Novel calendula-like MnNb2O6 particles anchored on reduced graphene oxide (rGO) were prepared via a simple two-step hydrothermal route. The special three-dimensional structure and cross-linked conductive network constructed by graphene could shorten the lithium-ion diffusion path, efficiently facilitate electron transmission and adapt to volume strain without shedding during the long-term charge/discharge process. This resulted in excellent charge storage capacity and reasonably superior cycling stability. MnNb2O6@rGO//AC LICs assembled with MnNb2O6@rGO as the cathode and activated carbon (AC) as the anode exhibited excellent performance with maximum energy density of 118 W h kg−1 and power density of 8000 W kg−1 based on the total mass loading of the active material weight. The initial capacity retention was up to 88% after 10 000 charge/discharge cycles, which was higher than that of bimetallic oxide materials reported so far. Therefore, this study might provide a novel rate capability anode material for LICs with high performance.

Hankel tensors are generalizations of Hankel matrices. This article studies the relations among various ranks of Hankel tensors. We give an algorithm that can compute the Vandermonde ranks and decompositions for all Hankel tensors. For a generic $n$-dimensional Hankel tensor of even order or order three, we prove that the the cp rank, symmetric rank, border rank, symmetric border rank, and Vandermonde rank all coincide with each other. In particular, this implies that the Comon's conjecture is true for generic Hankel tensors when the order is even or three. Some open questions are also posed.

Objectives We aimed to explore the shared and specific signalling pathways involved in diabetic retinopathy (DR), diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN) and diabetic nephropathy (DN). Methods Differentially expressed mRNAs and lncRNAs were identified by high-throughput sequencing. Subsequently, functional enrichment analysis, protein-protein interaction (PPI) analysis and lncRNAs-mRNAs networks were conducted to determine the pathogenic mechanisms underlying DR, DPN and DN. Results Twenty-six biological pathways were shared among DR, DPN and DN groups compared to the type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) group without complications, and most of the shared pathways and core proteins were involved in immune and inflammatory responses of microvascular damage. Cytokine‒cytokine receptor interactions and chemokine signalling pathway were the most significant and specific pathways for DR, and the lncRNA‒mRNA regulatory networks affected DR by targeting these pathways. Sphingolipid metabolism and neuroactive ligand-receptor pathways were found to be specific for the pathogenesis of DPN. Moreover, multiple amino acid metabolic pathways were involved in the occurrence and progression of DN. Conclusions Diabetic retinopathy, DPN and DN exhibited commonality and heterogeneity simultaneously. The shared pathologic mechanisms underlying these diabetic complications are involved in diabetic microvascular damage via immune and inflammatory pathways. Our findings predict several biomarkers and therapeutic targets for these diabetic complications.

The application of forensic genetic markers must comply with privacy rights and legal policies on a premise that the markers do not expose phenotypic information. The most widely-used short tandem repeats (STRs) are generally viewed as 'junk' DNA because most STRs are located in non-coding regions and therefore refrain from leaking phenotypic traits. But with a deepening understanding of phenotypes and underlying genetic structure, whether STRs could potentially reflect any phenotypic information may need re-examining. Therefore, we performed the following analyses. First, we analyzed the association between 15 STRs and three facial characteristics (single or double eyelid, with or without epicanthus, unattached or attached earlobe) on 721 unrelated Han Chinese individuals. Then, we collected 27199 individuals' STRs and geographic data from the literature to investigate the association between STRs and bio-geographic information, and predict geographic information by STRs on additional 1993 unrelated individuals. We found that there was scarcely any association between STRs with studied facial characteristics. Although allele19 in D2S1338 and allele 18 in FGA (P = 0.0032, P = 0.0030, respectively after Bonferroni correction) showed statistical significance, the prediction effectiveness was very low. For the STRs and bio-geographic information, the principal component analysis showed the first three components could explain 87.7% of the variance, but the prediction accuracy only reached 25.2%. We demonstrated that the forensic phenotypes are usually complex traits, it is hardly possible to uncover phenotypic information by testing only dozens of STR loci.

e15128 Background: The efficacy of BRAF inhibitors varies extremely among patients with different cancers, such as malignant melanoma (MM) and differentiated thyroid carcinoma (TC) (constituting > 95% of thyroid cancer). This study aims to investigate molecular biomarkers that may explain the efficacy difference of BRAF inhibitors in patients with MM and TC. Methods: Tumor tissue and paired peripheral blood samples from patients with MM and TC were sent for matched tumor-normal next-generation sequencing of 1021 cancer-related genes. MM and TC patients harboring known BRAF activating mutations were retrospectively recruited in this study. Concomitant mutations, tumor mutation burden (TMB) and other mutational features were compared between these two populations. Results: A total of 69 patients with MM and 315 patients with TC were included. The total and median number of mutations in these two groups were 503/6 and 605/1, respectively. Correspondingly, TMB was higher in MM compared with TC (median: 2.88 muts/Mb vs. 0.69 muts/Mb, p = 0.0002). Compared with TC, more copy number variants (CNV) (total number: 142 vs 5, p < 0.001) and less single nucleotide variants (total number: 353 vs 569, p < 0.001) were identified in MM. Most BRAF mutations in MM were located on V600, and other mutations including D594A/G/N, K483E/Q and K601E were identified. In TC, nearly all mutations were BRAF V600E. Excluding CNV and structural variants, the mutation frequency of 28 genes in MM was higher than TC. Pathway enrichment analysis suggested that 9 out of 28 genes (APC, ARID1B, ARID2, CDKN2A, CTNNB1, EGFR, PTEN, TERT, TP53) were significantly enriched on the hepatocellular carcinoma signaling. TERT, CDKN2A and PTEN were frequently mutated in MM, which may contribute to the efficacy difference of BRAF inhibitors in patients with MM and TC. Conclusions: This study found specific molecular features may explaining the efficacy difference of BRAF inhibitors in MM and TC, which requires further validation in patients treated with BRAF inhibitors.

In this work, activated carbon tube bundles (ACTBs) with porous hollow structure are prepared using dandelion fluffs as precursors. The open-framework porous structure of the ACTBs contributes to large specific surface area and enhanced electrochemical performances. Then the ACTBs are further modified with polyaniline (PANI) using the in-situ polymerization method, the unique hollow tube structure of the ACTBs effectively increases the growth area for the PANI. The PANI modified ACTBs (PANI/ACTBs) composite exhibits an excellent rate performance due to the highly retained porous hollow tube structure, which promotes the electrolyte ions diffusion and electron transport. Meanwhile, the ACTBs and PANI/ACTBs serve as the cathode and anode electrode materials for asymmetric supercapacitor, respectively. As a result, the asymmetric supercapacitor displays a high energy density of 42 Wh kg−1 and a capable cycling stability. These results demonstrate that the PANI/ACTBs composite is a promising electrode material for the energy storage devices.

We elucidate how the cooperation of two active centers can attenuate the linear scaling effect in NRR, through the first-principle study on 39 SACs comprised of two adjacent (~4 Å apart) four N-coordinated metal centers (MN4 duo) embedded in graphene.

MoS

We are very pleased that our research has received peer attention and comments1 , which also enphasized the importance of Microvascular invasion (MVI) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). In Professor Tsai's study2: 322 patients were included. 50 of them had macrovascular invasion (15.53%), 41 received TACE treatment before surgery, and 12 patients had positive postoperative margins.

It is of great significance to develop inexpensive and high-efficiency electrocatalysts for the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). In this work, we synthesized iron molybdenum selenide (FeSe2-MoSe2) loaded on reduced graphene oxide (FeSe2-MoSe2/rGO) by a one-step hydrothermal method. We further optimized the Fe/Mo ratio and determined the best ratio to be 1-1. In acidic (or alkaline) solution, the optimized FeSe2-MoSe2(1-1)/rGO has a small Tafel slope of 55 (or 80) mV dec−1 and needs an overpotential of 101 (or 178) mV to achieve 10 mA cm−2. These good properties are mainly due to the structure of bimetallic selenides combining rGO. Moreover, rGO enhances the electrical conductivity. Furthermore, the synergistic effect between FeSe2-MoSe2(1-1) and rGO results in better HER performance. Density functional theory (DFT) calculation proves that FeSe2-MoSe2(1-1)/rGO has a small work function. Based on our reasonable design and analysis, FeSe2-MoSe2(1-1)/rGO is expected to be an efficient and robust catalyst for large-scale applications.

Transplantation of retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) cells derived from human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) or induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) hold great promise as a new therapeutic modality for age-related macular degeneration and Stargardt disease. The development of hESC/hiPSC-derived RPE cells as cell-based therapeutic products requires a robust, scalable production for every hiPSC line congruent for patients. However, individual hESC/hiPSC lines show bias in differentiation. Here we report an efficient, robust method that induces RPE cells regardless of the differentiation propensity of the hiPSC lines. Application of the tankyrase inhibitor IWR-1-endo, which potentially inhibits Wnt signaling, promoted retinal differentiation in dissociated hiPSCs under feeder-free, two-dimensional culture conditions. The other tankyrase inhibitor, XAV939, also promoted retinal differentiation. However, Wnt signaling inhibitors, IWP-2 and iCRT3, that target porcupine and β-catenin/TCF, respectively, did not. Further treatment with the GSK3β inhibitor CHIR99021 and FGF receptor inhibitor SU5402 induced hexagonal pigmented cells with phagocytotic ability. Notably, the IWR-1-endo-based differentiation method induced RPE cells even in an hiPSC line that expresses a lower level of the differentiation propensity marker SALL3, which is indicative of resistance to ectoderm differentiation. The present study demonstrated that tankyrase inhibitors cause efficient and robust RPE differentiation, irrespective of the SALL3 expression levels in hiPSC lines. This differentiation method will resolve line-to-line variations of hiPSCs in RPE production and facilitate clinical application and industrialization of RPE cell products for regenerative medicine.

Electrocatalytic water splitting used for generating clean and sustainable hydrogen (H2) can be very promising to address current energy shortage and associated environmental issues. However, this methodology is severely impeded by the tardy oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Hence, designing a preferable kinetics and thermodynamics oxidation reaction that supersede OER is very significant for the energy-saving production of H2. Herein, hollow needle-like copper cobalt sulfide was constructed on carbon cloth (CuCo2S4/CC) as a bifunctional electrocatalyst to accelerate H2 generation and simultaneously convert ethanol into value-added acetic acid. Thanks to the synergistic effect and unique structure of Cu and Co, CuCo2S4/CC displays superior catalytic activity and durability in ethanol oxidation reaction (EOR) with a low potential of 1.38 V vs. RHE (@10 mA cm−2). Meanwhile, it exhibits excellent hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) performance. The homemade CuCo2S4/CC//CuCo2S4/CC ethanol–water electrolyser only demands a voltage of 1.59 V to deliver 10 mA cm−2, 150 mV less than that used for ordinary water splitting. This shows that the ethanol–water electrolyser elaborated here holds encouraging potential in the energy-saving production of H2 and oxidation of ethanol into value-added acetic acid. This present work may open the way for the rational design of other electrocatalysts for efficient biomass oxidation reaction and relevant H2 production applications.

The prosperity and development of mobile network makes mobile applications inseparable from people’s life. Although the encryption of mobile communication traffic protects the privacy of users to a certain extent, it also brings great challenges to network management and supervision. At present, many researches use machine learning or deep learning to classify encrypted traffic, but most of them only focus on single granularity classification task. Moreover, the method of multi granularity classification is more artificial, which cannot fully mine the effective information of multi granularity encrypted traffic classification. In this paper, we propose fusion feature based model, an end-to-end framework, which can automatically generate distinguishing fingerprints at three different granularities: app, in-app activity, and app-activity. Specifically, we use 1D-CNN to extract the spatial characteristics of the first packet payloads, and bidirectional LSTM to learn the timing characteristics of the packet length sequences and the packet direction sequences. Extensive experiments based on real-world encrypted mobile traffic show that, the proposed model achieves the best results in the multi-granularity classification task of mobile encrypted traffic, compared with the four state-of-the-art methods. Our work can provide an effective solution for the hierarchical and refined management of mobile networks.

Paederia scandens has been used as a traditional medicine in Asian countries to treat jaundice, dysentery, and the pain of rheumatism. The complete chloroplast (cp) genome sequence of P. scandens was reported and characterized in this study. The cp genome is 153,626 bp in length, composed of a pair of 26,513 bp inverted repeat (IR) regions separated by a large single-copy (LSC) region of 83,712 bp and a small single-copy (SSC) region of 16,888 bp. There were 131 predicted genes (86 protein-coding genes, 37 tRNA genes, and 8 rRNA genes) in the genome, and the overall GC content of the genome is 37.7%. Phylogenetic analysis based on the cp genome data showed that P. scandens was sister to the clade formed by Galium mollugo and G. aparine.

Aqueous lithium-ion batteries possess great potential due to their low cost and high safety. However, the narrow voltage window of the electrolyte significantly hinders their energy density and electrode materials selection. Herein, sheet-like todorokite-type magnesium manganese oxide molecular sieve (Mg-OMS-1) is synthesized and applied as cathode materials for aqueous lithium-ion batteries with water-in-salt electrolyte. The water-in-salt lithium difluorosulfonimide (LiTFSI) electrolyte enlarges the working window of the device and enhance the capacity of the Mg-OMS-1. Mg-OMS-1 displays a high capacity, remarkable rate ability, and stable cycling performance. Moreover, the water-in-salt electrolyte promises the device to work in the temperature range of 0–70 ℃. In addition, an active carbon (AC)|15 mol kg−1 LiTFSI|Mg-OMS-1 capacitor battery is designed and assembled. The device presents a capable electrochemical performance, demonstrating the potential application of the water-in-salt electrolyte and Mg-OMS-1 for the aqueous batteries with high energy density and wide operating temperature.

Tujia is a national minority, inhabiting in the mountainous Wuling area in China. Since 1978, Tujia medicine has been studied, summarized and developed, leading to numerous achievements by Chinese researchers, such as the publishing of approximately 30 monographs of Tujia medicine. These publications are focused on summarizing and improving the theory of Tujia medicine and developing clinical therapies from this system of medicine. The shortage of natural medicinal plants used in Tujia medicine has created the need to discover new resources to replace them and protect endangered natural plant species. Endophytic fungi are one of the conservation options, are considered a source of new bioactive natural products, and are a renewable and inexhaustible source of new drugs and agrochemicals. This review summarizes 260 compounds from endophytic fungi that have been previously isolated from the medicinal plants of Tujia. These compounds include steroids, terpenoids, meroterpenoids, polyketides, alkaloids, peptides, aliphatic compounds, aromatic compounds, and heterocyclic compounds. Graphic Abstract

Background Stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SABR) is the current standard‐of‐care in cases of inoperable early stage non‐small cell lung cancer (ES‐NSCLC). This study aimed to assess the survival outcomes and recurrence patterns after SABR for ES‐NSCLC in a hospital setting. Methods A single‐institution retrospective study was performed which included 109 patients who had undergone SABR. The main study endpoints were overall survival (OS), cancer specific survival (CSS), local recurrence‐free survival (LRFS), regional recurrence free survival (RRFS) and distant metastasis‐free survival (DMFS). Univariate and multivariate analysis were conducted to explore the potential factors which might be related to patient survival. Results A total of 109 patients were enrolled into the study. Median follow‐up was 44 months (range: 2–93 months). (i) Recurrence results: Among 45 patients with recurrence, 30 patients (28%) had distant metastasis (DM), 17 patients (16%) had local recurrence (LR), 10 patients (9%) had regional recurrence (RR) of lymph nodes and two patients (2%) had second primary lung cancer (SPLC). (ii) Survival results: Median OS, CSS, PFS was 78 months, 78 and 40 months. Two‐year OS, CSS, PFS, LRFS, RRFS and DMFS was 84.7%, 87.1%, 69.2%, 86.8%, 92.7% and 78.0%, respectively. Four‐year OS, CSS, PFS, LRFS, RRFS and DMFS was 55.6%, 60.7%, 37.3%, 76.3%, 88.4% and 59.4%, respectively. (iii) Univariate and multivariate analyses indicated that age was a prognostic factor of CSS in patients aged, We retrospectively analyzed the survival outcomes and failure patterns of 109 early stage non‐small cell lung cancer (ES‐NSCLC) patients treated with SABR. The results showed that high survival rates can be achieved in patients with inoperable ES‐NSCLC treated with SABR, which confirms previous results. However, among the 109 patients in the study, 45 (41%) failures were observed. Treatment with SABR may not be enough on its own. Prolonged surveillance and adjuvant therapy is needed.

In recent years, there has been an increase in automation of safety critical systems such as self-driving cars, caretaking robots, or rescue drones. With increase in automation, the risk of systems behaving in an undesired manner has also risen. Most safety analysis approaches predominantly concentrate on identifying or assessing how the failure of a component can affect the behavior of a system based on the system’s requirements. Yet, undesired behaviors can also occur when multiple components concurrently exert opposite effects on a shared resource. To identify safety-critical issues due to undesired concurrent component behaviors, we propose a property-driven approach called safety assessment for concurrent components (SACC). SACC uses a combinatorial technique that considers the requirements specification of a system, expressed as the states and properties of the system’s components for identifying undesired combinations of component behaviors. To evaluate SACC, we performed a study using a requirements document on a caretaking robot. Our results show that SACC identified 38%-80% more undesired system behaviors when compared to the control techniques.

Sodium (Na) metal batteries have attracted increasing attention and gained rapid development. However, the processing, storing, and application of Na metal anodes are restricted by its inherent stickiness and poor mechanical properties. Herein, an MXene (Ti

Sodium ion batteries and capacitors have demonstrated their potential applications for next-generation low-cost energy storage devices. These devices's rate ability is determined by the fast sodium ion storage behavior in electrode materials. Herein, a defective TiO2@reduced graphene oxide (M-TiO2@rGO) self-supporting foam electrode is constructed via a facile MXene decomposition and graphene oxide self-assembling process. The employment of the MXene parent phase exhibits distinctive advantages, enabling defect engineering, nanoengineering, and fluorine-doped metal oxides. As a result, the M-TiO2@rGO electrode shows a pseudocapacitance-dominated hybrid sodium storage mechanism. The pseudocapacitance-dominated process leads to high capacity, remarkable rate ability, and superior cycling performance. Significantly, an M-TiO2@rGO//Na3V2(PO4)3 sodium full cell and an M-TiO2@rGO//HPAC sodium ion capacitor are fabricated to demonstrate the promising application of M-TiO2@rGO. The sodium ion battery presents a capacity of 177.1 mAh g−1 at 500 mA g−1 and capacity retention of 74% after 200 cycles. The sodium ion capacitor delivers a maximum energy density of 101.2 Wh kg−1 and a maximum power density of 10,103.7 W kg−1. At 1.0 A g−1, it displays an energy retention of 84.7% after 10,000 cycles.

The practical utilization of plasmon-based technology relies on the ability to find high-performance plasmonic materials other than noble metals. A key scientific challenge is to significantly increase the intrinsically low concentration of free carriers in metal-oxide materials. Here, a novel electron-proton co-doping strategy is developed to achieve uniform hydrogen doping in metal-oxide MoO3 at mild conditions, which creates a metal-like ultrahigh free-carrier concentration approaching that of noble metals (1021 cm-3 in H1.68 MoO3 versus 1022 cm-3 in Au/Ag). This bestows giant and tunable plasmonic resonances in the visible region to this originally semiconductive material. Using ultrafast spectroscopy characterizations and first-principle simulations, the formation of a quasi-metallic energy band structure that leads to long-lived and strong plasmonic field is revealed. As verified by the surface-enhanced Raman spectra (SERS) of rhodamine 6G molecules on Hx MoO3 , the SERS enhancement factor reaches as high as 1.1 × 107 with a detection limit at concentration as low as 1 × 10-9 mol L-1 , representing the best among the hitherto reported non-metal systems. The findings not only provide a set of metal-like semiconductor materials with merits of low cost, tunable electronic structure, and plasmonic resonance, but also a general strategy to induce tunable ultrahigh free-carrier concentration in non-metal systems.

Gastric cancer is the third leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide, with relapse and metastasis being major contributors to the mortality. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) have been at the center of several researches and some circRNAs have been indicated to be involved in gastric cancer as sponges. Nevertheless, the mechanism underlying the function of circRNA remains largely unclear. Therefore, this study was conducted with the main objective of screening the associated circRNA in gastric cancer and exploring its mechanism. Expression of hsa_circRNA_0009172 was validated in gastric cancer tissues and cell lines after the correlation between hsa_circRNA_0009172 and prognosis was determined. Moreover, the binding site between miR-485-3p and hsa_circRNA_0009172 or NTRK3 was verified using dual luciferase assay and RNA pull down. Function-gain and -loss experiments were performed for the purpose of detecting the effect of hsa_circRNA_0009172 in vivo and in vitro as well as its mechanism with microRNA (miRNA)-485-3p and NTRK3 in gastric cancer. The hsa_circRNA_0009172 expression was downregulated in gastric cancer tissues and cell lines, indicating a positive association with patient prognosis. Functionally, hsa_circ_0009172 overexpression inhibited proliferative, invasive and migrative potential of gastric cancer cells as well as epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT)-related proteins by sponging miR-485-3p to inhibit NTRK3, while miR-485-3p overexpression could reverse the inhibitory effect of hsa_circ_0009172 on gastric cancer. Furthermore, either up-regulation of hsa_circ_0009172 or down-regulation of miR-485-3p led to the suppression of xenograft tumor growth in nude mice. In conclusion, hsa_circ_0009172 serves as a tumor suppressor in gastric cancer by targeting miR-485-3p/NTRK3 axis.

Aqueous batteries have attracted increasing and extensive attention, owing to their high safety, low cost, and low toxicity. These factors have become increasingly important, given the current focus on the rapid development of green energy technologies. In particular, multivalent-ion batteries are emerging as alternatives to lithium-ion batteries. Unfortunately, magnesium and aluminum ions have high polarization strengths that are unfavorable for electrode materials. In contrast, calcium-ion batteries successfully avoid the problem of high polarization. Herein, an aqueous calcium-ion battery (CIBs) based on mesoporous silica SBA-15 with a two-dimensional hexagonal through-hole structure is reported. The poly(3,4,9,10-perylentetracarboxylic diimide) (PPTCDI) organic material supported on SBA-15 is used as the anode and displays a capacity of 201 mAh g-1 , with a stable cycling performance of 95 % capacity retention after 1500 cycles. SBA-15@PPTCDI‖Ca2 MnO4 aqueous CIBs demonstrate a high energy density of 130.6 Wh kg-1 in the cell voltage range from 0.0 to 1.8 V, with a high capacity and excellent cycling stability. As the anode material, SBA-15@PPTCDI shows special bonding of redox electrons that leads to its highly stable performance, which paves the way for addressing the shortcomings of traditional organic electrode materials. The localization and delocalization of the redox electron offers additional voltage stability, which is another important advantage for practical applications. This study highlights the potential of organic electrode materials for applications in aqueous multivalent-metal-ion batteries.