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Developing a practical strategy to fabricate an anti-abrasion and durable superhydrophobic wood surface with ultraviolet (UV) resistance has great practical significance for expanding the application of natural wood. In this study, a robust superhydrophobic layer with a hierarchical micro/nano-roughness structure was modified on the wood surface through in-situ mineralization and polymerization using a simple sol–gel method along with efficient electron beam (EB) curing technology. Hydrophobic agent (polydimethylsiloxane, PDMS), and crosslinking monomer (γ-methacryloxypropyl trimethoxysilane, MAPS) form new covalent bonds between TiO2 particle layer and wood substrate after EB radiation，which endows robust superhydrophobicity and remarkable UV resistance on the wood surface. The as-prepared wood exhibited a water contact angle (WCA) of approximately 165.7° and obvious repellency to many aqua-phase liquids (cola, strongly acidic, alkaline droplets etc.). Furthermore, the hierarchical micro/nano-protrusion structures remained unchanged and micro/nano particles aggregated tightly on the as-prepared wood surface under harsh external environments (sandpaper abrasion and, ultrasonic treatment), confirming the desirable anti-abrasion and mechanically durable performance of the superhydrophobic surface. After the 18-day UV accelerated weathering test, the TiO2 particle layer conspicuously retained the discoloration and maintained its exceptional repellency toward water. The biomimetic superhydrophobic wood with excellent mechanical durability and UV resistance reveals its potential application in the furniture and architecture fields.

Grid is an important factor in numerical simulation of hypersonic aerothermodynamics. This paper introduces three criteria for determining grid size in the transition flow regime when using the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) method or the direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) method. The numerical relationship between these three criteria sizes is deduced according to the one-dimensional fluid theory. Then, the relationship is verified using the CFD method to simulate the flow around a two-dimensional cylinder. At the same time, the dependence of simulation accuracy on grid size in the CFD and DSMC methods is studied and the mechanism is given. The result shows that the simulation accuracy of heat flux especially depends on the normal grid size next to surfaces, where the $Re_{\mathit{cell},w}$ criterion and the $\unicode[STIX]{x1D706}_{w}$ criterion based on local parameters are applicable and equivalent, while the $Re_{\mathit{cell},\infty }$ criterion based on the free-stream parameter is only applicable under the assumption of constant viscosity coefficient and constant temperature wall conditions. On the other hand, the trend of the heat flux changing with grid size obtained by CFD and DSMC is exactly the opposite. Therefore, the grid size must be strictly satisfied with the grid criteria when comparing CFD with DSMC and even the hybrid DSMC with Navier–Stokes method.

On the basis of the [Fe3(μ3-O)(COO)6] cluster and 3,3′,5,5′-diphenyltetracarboxylic acid (H4BPTC), three novel metal–organic frameworks (MOFs), NJU-Bai25, NJU-Bai26, and NJU-Bai27 (NJU-Bai for Bai’...

A pure-supramolecular-linker (PSL) approach for the formation of metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) was initially given, which was demonstrated by syntheses of two highly connected and isostructural M...

International audience; The chemistry of d-block metal-metal multiple bonds has been extensively investigated in the past 5 decades. However, the synthesis and characterization of species with f-block metal-metal multiple bonds are significantly more challenging and such species remain extremely rare. Here, we report the identification of a uranium-rhodium triple bond in a heterometallic cluster, which was synthesized under routine conditions. The uranium-rhodium triple-bond length of 2.31 angstrom in this cluster is only 3% longer than the sum of the covalent triple-bond radii of uranium and rhodium (2.24 angstrom). Computational studies reveal that the nature of this uranium-rhodium triple bond is 1 covalent bond with 2 rhodium-to-uranium dative bonds. This heterometallic cluster represents a species with f-block metal-metal triple bond structurally authenticated by X-ray diffraction. These studies not only demonstrate the authenticity of the uranium-metal triple bond, but also provide a possibility for the synthesis of other f-block metal-metal multiple bonds. We expect that this work may further our understanding of the bonding between uranium and transition metals, which may help to design new d-f heterometallic catalysts with uranium-metal bonds for small-molecule activation and to promote the utilization of abundant depleted uranium resources.

A bifunctional interfacial layer was introduced onto the surface of cotton fabric which not only enhanced the interfacial bonding between Ag@ZnO and organic substrates but also improved the photocatalytic performance simultaneously. In detail, a modified cotton fabric (denoted as Cot-g-Si/Ag@ZnO) was fabricated through radiation-induced graft polymerization of γ-methacryloxypropyl trimethoxysilane and followed the in-situ formation of ZnO and loading of Ag nanoparticles simultaneously. Owing to ZnOSi between the graft chains and Ag@ZnO photocatalyst, the charge carrier concentration increased and Ag was prevented from oxidizing through the partial separation from ZnO, leading to enhanced near-field amplitudes of the localized surface plasmon resonance. Cot-g-Si/Ag@ZnO also exhibited excellent photocorrosion resistance, photostability and laundering durability. Its photocatalytic activity was fully maintained after several photodegradation cycles; moreover, after laundering durability test, the photocatalytic activity was improved compared with the newly prepared one. Credible mechanism for the photocatalytic activity of Cot-g-Si/Ag@ZnO under sunlight irradiation is proposed.

The convective heat transfer of the plume of a 120-N thruster is investigated experimentally and numerically. Numerical results agree well with experimental results in that there is a nonlinear decrease in convective heat transfer with an increasing cone angle. It is also found that convective heat transfer decreases with increasing distance from the thruster outlet. Furthermore, the convective heat transfer of the plume mainly concentrates within a 35° cone angle and the heat flux decreases to the same order as solar radiation at the Earth’s surface when the cone angle exceeds 60°. The results of the study will help improve spacecraft design.

Basic Leucine Zipper (bZIP) transcription factors (TFs) play important roles in many processes, especially in abiotic stress response in plants. In this study, we characterized a new gene EHANCED DROUGHT TOLERANCE 1 (EDT1), member of group E of bZIP transcription factor family in rice. The EDT1 protein contains one bZIP domain, one putative nuclear localization signal (NLS) and six conserved phosphorylation sites. The expression of EDT1 is suppressed by several abiotic stresses, such as cold, droutht, and salt. Corresponding with expression patterns, several stress-associated cis-acting elements were found in the EDT1 promoter. The results of subcellular localization and transactivation ability analyses indicated that EDT1 was localized in the nucleus and functioned as a nuclear protein, with its transactivation activity primarily located in N-terminal. Transgenic rice overexpressing EDT1 showed drought tolerance that has been significantly improved. Real-time PCR analysis revealed that some stress-related genes, such as OsbZIP12, SNAC1, OsLEA3, OsbZIP16, OsbZIP10 and OsABI2 were up-regulated in EDT1 overexpression lines. These results indicate that EDT1 plays a positive role in drought tolerance and provides valuable targets for breeding drought-tolerant rice cultivars.

A new amide-functionalized metal-organic framework (AFMOF) with the combined feature of highly selective CO2 adsorption and high thermal and chemical stability, [Sc3(μ3-O)(L)1.5(H2O)3Cl] n [NJU-Bai49; NJU-Bai for Nanjing University Bai's group, H4L = 5-(3,5-dicarboxybenzamido)isophthalic acid], was synthesized that exhibits 4.5 wt % CO2 uptake at 298 K and 0.15 bar and the highest selectivity for CO2/N2 (166.7) among all AFMOFs. Grand canonical Monte Carlo simulations further indicate that both the decorated amide group and the open metal site act as CO2 binding sites, which may contribute to its highly selective CO2 uptake.

Objective: To investigate the spectrum of diseases in female children and adolescents hospitalized for obstetric and gynecological conditions. Methods: This retrospective study included patients (age ≤19 years) admitted to the Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital of Fudan University, Shanghai, between January 2003 and December 2017. Their medical records – age, principal diagnosis, and treatment – were reviewed and analyzed. Diagnoses were divided into eight disease classifications. Comparison between groups was analyzed with Student's t-test. Results: This study enrolled 4,628 inpatients. The number of inpatients increased each year, especially in the groups of gynecologic tumors, pregnancy-related conditions, and disorders of the breast. The mean age was 16.33 ± 2.42 years (range: 2–19 years). Of all the inpatients, 41.9% (n = 1,939) were hospitalized for gynecologic tumors, and 85.5% (n = 1,657) of the tumors were benign. Altogether, ovarian cysts (28.66%, n = 1,325) were the most common disease observed in this group. In addition, 32.9% (n = 1,524) of the inpatients were hospitalized for pregnancy, childbirth, and puerperium; within this group, 21.9% (n = 1,014) were hospitalized for artificial abortions. Conclusions: The efforts of all stakeholders toward the implementation of government policies to promote sexual and reproductive health among children and adolescents in China have been effective.

Maximum likelihood (ML) method for direction of arrival (DOA) estimation achieves an excellent performance in array signal processing, but the complexity and computational load of searching the multidimensional nonlinear function prevented it from practical application. Based on squirrel search algorithm (SSA), an improved SSA (ISSA) for ML DOA estimation is proposed in this paper, which can reduces the computational complexity. The idea of spatial variation and diffuse inspired by the invasive weed optimization(IWO) algorithm is applied to ISSA. The simulation experiments compared ISSA with SSA, IWO, seeker optimization algorithm(SOA), sine cosine algorithm (SCA), genetic algorithm (GA), particle swarm optimization (PSO) and differential evolution (DE) method for ML DOA estimator show that the proposed algorithm has faster convergence speed, fewer iterations and lower root mean square error(RMSE) under different number of signal sources, different signal to noise ratio(SNR) and different population size. Therefor the proposed algorithm does not only ensure the estimation accuracy, but also greatly reduce the computation complexity of multidimensional nonlinear optimization for the ML method. Finally, the test experiment using Micro Electronic Mechanical Systems(MEMS) vector hydrophone array in Fenhe lake show the engineering practicability of proposed ML DOA estimator with ISSA.The results obtained will be valuable in the application of engineering.

99Tc is one of the most problematic fission products in the nuclear fuel cycle owing to its large inventory in used nuclear fuel, long half-life, potential radiation hazard, high environmental mobility of its major species 99TcO4−, and its redox-active nature. Ideally, 99TcO4− should be removed at the first stage, when the used fuel rods are dissolved in highly concentrated nitric acid solution, which can substantially reduce its interference with the solvent extraction process through catalytic redox reactions with the key actinides and diminish the chance of discharge into the environment as the volatile species during the waste vitrification process. However, this task cannot be achieved by any of the reported anion-scavenging materials including traditional polymeric anion-exchange resins, inorganic cationic framework materials, and recently developed cationic metal–organic framework materials, because they either are not stable under the extreme conditions of the combined high acidity and strong radiation field or do not possess the required uptake selectivity towards 99TcO4− in the presence of a huge excess of competing anions such as NO3− and SO42−. Herein, we present the first study of 99TcO4− removal under extreme conditions by a two-dimensional conjugated cationic covalent organic framework material, SCU-COF-1. This material exhibits ultrahigh acid stability, great resistance towards both large-dose β and γ irradiation and unprecedented 99TcO4− uptake capabilities including extremely fast sorption kinetics (sorption equilibrium can be reached within 1 min), ultrahigh uptake capacity (702.4 mg g−1 for the surrogate ReO4− at a slightly elevated temperature), and good anion-exchange selectivity towards 99TcO4−. These excellent features endow SCU-COF-1 with the practical capabilities of separating 99TcO4− from both simulant highly acidic fuel reprocessing solutions (3 M nitric acid) and low-activity waste streams at the US legacy nuclear site. The anion-exchange mechanism and the 99TcO4− uptake selectivity are further demonstrated and clearly visualized by the molecular dynamics simulation investigations.

For real-life CO2 capture, through the construction and fine tuning of the traps in metal-organic frameworks, we synthesized NJU-Bai51 with the combined features of high capacity, high selectivity and high water-stability, confirmed via breakthrough experiments, and its specific binding interaction was revealed from crystallographic measurements.

Existing parallel out-of-core graph processing systems focus on improving disk I/O locality, which leads to restrictions on their programming models. Although improving the locality, these constraints also restrict the expressiveness and hence only sub-optimal algorithms are supported. These sub-optimal algorithms typically incur sequential , but much larger , amount of disk I/O. In this paper, we explore a fundamentally different tradeoff: less total amount of I/O rather than better locality. We show that out-of-core graph processing systems uniquely provide the opportunities to lift the restrictions of the programming model in a feasible manner. To demonstrate the ideas, we build Clip , which enables more efficient algorithms that require much less amount of total disk I/O. Our experiments show that the algorithms that can be only implemented in Clip are much faster than the original disk-locality-optimized algorithms. We also further extend our technique's scope of application by providing a semi-external mode. Our analysis and evaluation demonstrate that semi-external is not only feasible for many cases, but also be able to deliver a significant speedup for important graph applications. Moreover, we further improve the performance of originally supported applications by designing more optimizations and evaluate our system on NVMe SSD.

Objective.Cone-Beam CT (CBCT) often results in severe image artifacts and inaccurate HU values, meaning poor quality CBCT images cannot be directly applied to dose calculation in radiotherapy. To overcome this, we propose a cycle-residual connection with a dilated convolution-consistent generative adversarial network (Cycle-RCDC-GAN). Approach. The cycle-consistent generative adversarial network (Cycle-GAN) was modified using a dilated convolution with different expansion rates to extract richer semantic features from input images. Thirty pelvic patients were used to investigate the effect of synthetic CT (sCT) from CBCT, and 55 head and neck patients were used to explore the generalizability of the model. Three generalizability experiments were performed and compared: the pelvis trained model was applied to the head and neck; the head and neck trained model was applied to the pelvis, and the two datasets were trained together. Main results. The mean absolute error (MAE), the root mean square error (RMSE), peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR), the structural similarity index (SSIM), and spatial nonuniformity (SNU) assessed the quality of the sCT generated from CBCT. Compared with CBCT images, the MAE improved from 28.81 to 18.48, RMSE from 85.66 to 69.50, SNU from 0.34 to 0.30, and PSNR from 31.61 to 33.07, while SSIM improved from 0.981 to 0.989. The sCT objective indicators of Cycle-RCDC-GAN were better than Cycle-GAN’s. The objective metrics for generalizability were also better than Cycle-GAN’s. Significance. Cycle-RCDC-GAN enhances CBCT image quality and has better generalizability than Cycle-GAN, which further promotes the application of CBCT in radiotherapy.

Microbiologically influenced corrosion (MIC) constantly occurs in water/wastewater systems, especially in marine water. MIC contributes to billions of dollars in damage to marine industry each year, yet the physiological mechanisms behind this process remain poorly understood. Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a representative marine electro-active bacterium, which has been confirmed to cause severe MIC on carbon steel through extracellular electron transfer (EET). However, little is known about how P. aeruginosa causes corrosion on stainless steel. In this study, the corrosivity of wild-type strain, phzH knockout, phzH complemented, and phzH overexpression P. aeruginosa mutants were evaluated to explore the underlying MIC mechanism. We found the accelerated MIC on 2205 duplex stainless steel (DSS) was due to the secretion of phenazine-1-carboxamide (PCN), which was regulated by the phzH gene. Surface analysis, Mott-Schottky test and H

A new kind of highly durable, electrically conductive UHMWPE fibers coated with copper was fabricated through a novel, simple, and universal process in this paper. Poly(acrylic acid) was anchored o...

WRKY transcription factors (TFs) have been reported to respond to biotic and abiotic stresses and regulate plant growth and development. However, the molecular mechanisms of WRKY TFs involved in drought stress and regulating plant height in rice remain largely unknown. In this study, we found that transgenic rice lines overexpressing OsWRKY55 (OsWRKY55-OE) exhibited reduced drought resistance. The OsWRKY55-OE lines showed faster water loss and greater accumulation of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and superoxide radical (O2−·) compared to wild-type (WT) plants under drought conditions. OsWRKY55 was expressed in various tissues and was induced by drought and abscisic acid (ABA) treatments. Through yeast two-hybrid assays, we found that OsWRKY55 interacted with four mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs) that could be induced by drought, including OsMPK7, OsMPK9, OsMPK20-1, and OsMPK20-4. The activation effects of the four OsMPKs on OsWRKY55 transcriptional activity were demonstrated by a GAL4-dependent chimeric transactivation assay in rice protoplasts. Furthermore, OsWRKY55 was able to reduce plant height under normal conditions by decreasing the cell size. In addition, based on a dual luciferase reporter assay, OsWRKY55 was shown to bind to the promoter of OsAP2-39 through a yeast one-hybrid assay and positively regulate OsAP2-39 expression. These results suggest that OsWRKY55 plays a critical role in responses to drought stress and the regulation of plant height in rice, further providing valuable information for crop improvement.

Graphical abstract As one kind of noble metal nanostructures, the plasmonic gold nanostructures possess unique optical properties as well as good biocompatibility, satisfactory stability, and multiplex functionality. These distinctive advantages make the plasmonic gold nanostructures an ideal medium in developing methods for biosensing and bioimaging. In this review, the optical properties of the plasmonic gold nanostructures were firstly introduced, and then biosensing in vitro based on localized surface plasmon resonance, Rayleigh scattering, surface-enhanced fluorescence, and Raman scattering were summarized. Subsequently, application of the plasmonic gold nanostructures for in vivo bioimaging based on scattering, photothermal, and photoacoustic techniques has been also briefly covered. At last, conclusions of the selected examples are presented and an outlook of this research topic is given.

Objective. To evaluate the clinical efficacy of traditional Chinese medicine in the treatment of arrhythmia. Methods. The researchers searched CNKI, VIP, WF, PubMed, Web of Science, and Cochrane Library with the set-up themes as randomized controlled trials (RCTs) on the clinical efficacy of traditional Chinese medicine in the treatment of arrhythmia. This research evaluated all the retrieve literature and conducted selection based on the evaluation. Stata software was applied for meta-analysis. Results. 23 articles were retrieved with a total patient number of 2846. The results observed from the meta-analysis indicated the following: (1) compared with the result showed in placebo group, the traditional Chinese medicine group presented to have good efficacy, especially in the treatment of premature ventricular contractions. (2) In comparison with the western medicine group, the curative effect of Chinese medicine could approximately equal the therapeutic effect as western medicine. (3) Compared with the application of sole western medicine group, the combination of both traditional Chinese medicine and western medicine could have a better curative effect. Conclusion. In the treatment of arrhythmia disease, the application of traditional Chinese medicine can be considered as an effective method. In addition to that, the therapeutic effect obtained from the combination of both Chinese traditional medicine and western medicine is clinically better than that of the sole use of western medicine.

Palladium isotopes as fission products in used nuclear fuel (UNF) represent precious alternative resources of this noble metal besides its natural reserves and therefore has a high extraction value. However, although solvent extraction of Pd from UNF has been considered for several decades, its practical use is still challenging mostly originating from the harsh fuel reprocessing conditions that lead to the extractant decomposition and the vast co-existing metal ions that depress the extraction efficiency. Herein, we present an interlayer synergistic binding strategy, a metal-recognition manner markedly deviating from chelation within a single ligand molecule in solvent extraction, for selective palladium chelation by a radiation-resistant and acid-stable salicylaldimine-based covalent organic framework (COF-TzDa), where the binding sites are pre-organized and spatially separated for the preference of Pd coordination between adjacent COF layers. COF-TzDa, as expected, shows ultrahigh extraction selectivity towards Pd ions both in static and dynamic conditions, primarily due to that the preorganized Pd-specific binding sites are less prone to match other undesired metal ions. Fast adsorption kinetics, high adsorption capacity (265.4 mg g-1), and more importantly one-round enrichment and purification of Pd from the simulated high level nuclear waste solution are unprecedentedly achieved. The powder X-ray diffraction analysis, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy results, and in-depth density functional theory corroborate the interlayer synergistic binding to be the result of enol-to-keto tautomerization where oxygen donors from two adjacent layers work together in a cooperative fashion. This work demonstrates the feasibility of structure-engineering of framework materials in designing upgraded adsorbent for targeted guests.

We disclose the intrinsic semiconducting properties of one of the largest mixed-valent uranium clusters, [H3 O+ ][UV (UVI O2 )8 (μ3 -O)6 (PhCOO)2 (Py(CH2 O)2 )4 (DMF)4 ] (Ph=phenyl, Py=pyridyl, DMF=N,N-dimethylformamide) (1). Single-crystal X-ray crystallography demonstrates that UV center is stabilized within a tetraoxo core surrounded by eight uranyl(VI) pentagonal bipyramidal centers. The oxidation states of uranium are substantiated by spectroscopic data and magnetic susceptibility measurement. Electronic spectroscopy and theory corroborate that UV species serve as electron donors and thus facilitate 1 being a n-type semiconductor. With the largest effective atomic number among all reported radiation-detection semiconductor materials, charge transport properties and photoconductivity were investigated under X-ray excitation for 1: a large on-off ratio of 500 and considerable charge mobility lifetime product of 2.3×10-4 cm2 V-1 , as well as a high detection sensitivity of 23.4 μC Gyair-1 cm-2 .

Sequences play an important role in many engineering applications and systems. Searching sequences with desired properties has long been an interesting but also challenging research topic. This article proposes a novel method, called HpGAN, to search desired sequences algorithmically using generative adversarial networks (GAN). HpGAN is based on the idea of zero-sum game to train a generative model, which can generate sequences with characteristics similar to the training sequences. In HpGAN, we design the Hopfield network as an encoder to avoid the limitations of GAN in generating discrete data. Compared with traditional sequence construction by algebraic tools, HpGAN is particularly suitable for intractable problems with complex objectives which prevent mathematical analysis. We demonstrate the search capabilities of HpGAN in two applications: 1) HpGAN successfully found many different mutually orthogonal complementary code sets (MOCCS) and optimal odd-length Z-complementary pairs (OB-ZCPs) which are not part of the training set. In the literature, both MOCSSs and OB-ZCPs have found wide applications in wireless communications. 2) HpGAN found new sequences which achieve four-times increase of signal-to-interference ratio--benchmarked against the well-known Legendre sequence--of a mismatched filter (MMF) estimator in pulse compression radar systems. These sequences outperform those found by AlphaSeq., 12 pages, 16 figures

BackgroundNovel therapies are needed to treat recurrent and advanced cervical cancer (CC), as their prognosis remains very poor. Although therapies targeting the programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) pathway have been approved for CC, a large subset of patients exhibit innate resistance. Using checkpoint inhibitors in combination could enhance their efficacy.MethodsBlood samples, tumor specimens, and peritumorous (PT) tissues were obtained from patients with CC. The inhibitory receptor expression and phenotypical analysis of CD8+ T cells in CC specimens were analyzed by flow cytometry. The ligands of CD96 expressed by tumor cells were measured by immunohistochemistry and immunofluorescence. Sensitivity to pembrolizumab was evaluated by an ex vivo treatment assay based on the single-cell culture of CC specimens. The efficacies of PD-1 and/or CD96 blockades were explored using an ex vivo treatment assay and an human papillomavirus-positive TC-1 xenograft mouse model in vivo.ResultsWe found that CD96 expression was elevated on CD8+ tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) from patients with CC who were insensitive to the PD-1 blockade. These CD96-expressing CD8+ TILs often coexpressed PD-1. The ratio of the CD96+CD8+/CD96−CD8+ T-cell gene signature from the scRNA-seq data was significantly associated with the poor survival of patients with cervical squamous cell carcinoma and endocervical adenocarcinoma. The costimulatory receptor CD226, which competes with CD96, was downregulated in tumors compared with blood and PT tissue. CD96 and T-cell immunoreceptor with Ig and ITIM domains (TIGIT) were upregulated on intratumoral CD8+ T cells. The CD226/CD96/TIGIT signaling ligands were widely expressed in CC tumor tissues. Phenotypical profiling showed that PD-1+CD96+CD8+ TILs exhibited a terminally exhausted effector phenotype with high levels of T-cell immunoglobulin mucin receptor 3 (TIM-3) and granzyme B (GZMB) and extremely low levels of proinflammatory cytokines and cytotoxic molecules. PD-1+CD96 cells exhibited a precursor exhausted phenotype with TCF-1 positivity. CD96 was further upregulated by CD8+ TILs on PD-1 blockade. Treatment with the CD96 blockade significantly enhanced the PD-1 blockade to blunt tumor growth and improve the function of CD8+ TILs in both mouse and CC specimen models.ConclusionsOur findings showed that CD96 and PD-1 cooperatively and negatively regulate the function of CD8+ TILs, and CD96 blockade has promise for use in combination with PD-1 blockade for the treatment of CC.

Ti-6Al-4V (TC4) has been widely used in dentistry as an implant biomaterial but is faced with difficulties in forming parts by traditional processing methods. Directed energy deposition (DED), a promising additive manufacturing technology, is very suitable for developing TC4/ZrO2 composite with different proportions of nano-ceramic additions (0, 5 or 10 wt%). As the content of alloying element Zr increased, the grains were refined, and the lattice distortion was more severe due to solid solution, both of which caused Vickers hardness of the composite to increase from 308 to 485. The electrochemical tests and corrosion morphology analysis indicated that the corrosion was intensified with the decrease of pH and the increase of F− ion concentration. The corrosion product detection showed that ZrO2 oxide might reduce the compactness of the TC4 passive film containing TiO2 and Al2O3, which resulted in a slight decrease in corrosion resistance but still satisfied the clinical requirements. Cytotoxicity and cytoskeleton staining results demonstrated that the composite was beneficial to biological safety and biocompatibility.

A new technique is proposed for the

Considerable attention has been devoted to the in-situ deposition of zinc oxide (ZnO) nanowires (ZnO-NWs) on the surface of organic supports, due to their very wide applications in superhydrophobicity, UV shielding, and nanogenerators. However, the poor interfacial bond strength between ZnO-NWs and its support limits their applications. Herein, we developed a facile process to grow robust ZnO-NWs on a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) fabric surface through simultaneous radiation-induced graft polymerization, hydrothermal processing, and in-situ nano-packaging, the obtained materials were denoted as PDMS@ZnO-NWs@PET. The introduction of an adhesion and stress relief layer greatly improved the attachment of the ZnO-NWs to the support, especially when the material was subjected to extreme environment conditions of external friction forces, strong acidic or alkaline solutions, UV-irradiation and even washing with detergent for a long time. The PDMS@ZnO-NWs@PET material exhibited excellent UV resistance, superhydrophobicity, and durability. The ZnO-NWs retained on the fabric surface even after 30 cycles of accelerated washing. Therefore, this process can be widely applied as a universal approach to overcome the challenges associated with growing inorganic nanowires on polymeric support surfaces.

Background Most cancers favor glycolytic-based glucose metabolism. Hexokinase-2 (HK2), the first glycolytic rate-limiting enzyme, shows limited expression in normal adult tissues but is overexpressed in many tumor tissues, including ovarian cancer. HK2 has been shown to be correlated with the progression and chemoresistance of ovarian cancer and could be a therapeutic target. However, the systemic toxicity of HK2 inhibitors has limited their clinical use. Since follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) receptor (FSHR) is overexpressed in ovarian cancer but not in nonovarian healthy tissues, we designed FSHR-mediated nanocarriers for HK2 shRNA delivery to increase tumor specificity and decrease toxicity. Results HK2 shRNA was encapsulated in a polyethylene glycol-polyethylenimine copolymer modified with the FSH β 33–53 or retro-inverso FSH β 33–53 peptide. The nanoparticle complex with FSH peptides modification effectively depleted HK2 expression and facilitated a shift towards oxidative glucose metabolism, with evidence of increased oxygen consumption rates, decreased extracellular acidification rates, and decreased extracellular lactate and glucose consumption in A2780 ovarian cancer cells and cisplatin-resistant A2780CP counterpart cells. Consequently, cell proliferation, invasion and migration were significantly inhibited, and tumor growth was suppressed even in cisplatin-resistant ovarian cancer. No obvious systemic toxicity was observed in mice. Moreover, the nanoparticle complex modified with retro-inverso FSH peptides exhibited the strongest antitumor effects and effectively improved cisplatin sensitivity by regulating cisplatin transport proteins and increasing apoptosis through the mitochondrial pathway. Conclusions These results established HK2 as an effective therapeutic target even for cisplatin-resistant ovarian cancer and suggested a promising targeted therapeutic approach.

Fluorescence microscopy enables spatial and temporal measurements of live cells and cellular communities. However, this potential has not yet been fully realized for investigations of individual cell behaviors and phenotypic changes in dense, three-dimensional (3D) bacterial biofilms. Accurate cell detection and cellular shape measurement in densely packed biofilms are challenging because of the limited resolution and low signal to background ratios (SBRs) in fluorescence microscopy images. In this work, we present Bacterial Cell Morphometry 3D (BCM3D), an image analysis workflow that combines deep learning with mathematical image analysis to accurately segment and classify single bacterial cells in 3D fluorescence images. In BCM3D, deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) are trained using simulated biofilm images with experimentally realistic SBRs, cell densities, labeling methods, and cell shapes. We systematically evaluate the segmentation accuracy of BCM3D using both simulated and experimental images. Compared to state-of-the-art bacterial cell segmentation approaches, BCM3D consistently achieves higher segmentation accuracy and further enables automated morphometric cell classifications in multi-population biofilms., Accurate cell detection in dense bacterial biofilms is challenging. Here, the authors report an image analysis pipeline that is able to accurately segment and classify single bacterial cells in 3D fluorescence images: Bacterial Cell Morphometry 3D (BCM3D).

The byte-addressable non-volatile memory (NVM) is a promising technology since it simultaneously provides DRAM-like performance, disk-like capacity, and persistency. The current NVM deployment with byte-addressability is \em symmetric, where NVM devices are directly attached to servers. Due to the higher density, NVM provides much larger capacity and should be shared among servers. Unfortunately, in the symmetric setting, the availability of NVM devices is affected by the specific machine it is attached to. High availability can be achieved by replicating data to NVM on a remote machine. However, it requires full replication of data structure in local memory --- limiting the size of the working set. This paper rethinks NVM deployment and makes a case for the \em asymmetric byte-addressable non-volatile memory architecture, which decouples servers from persistent data storage. In the proposed \em \anvm architecture, NVM devices (i.e., back-end nodes) can be shared by multiple servers (i.e., front-end nodes) and provide recoverable persistent data structures. The asymmetric architecture, which follows the industry trend of \em resource disaggregation, is made possible due to the high-performance network (e.g., RDMA). At the same time, \anvm leads to a number of key problems such as, still relatively long network latency, persistency bottleneck, and simple interface of the back-end NVM nodes. We build \em \anvm framework based on \anvm architecture that implements: 1) high performance persistent data structure update; 2) NVM data management; 3) concurrency control; and 4) crash-consistency and replication. The key idea to remove persistency bottleneck is the use of \em operation log that reduces stall time due to RDMA writes and enables efficient batching and caching in front-end nodes. To evaluate performance, we construct eight widely used data structures and two transaction applications based on \anvm framework. In a 10-node cluster equipped with real NVM devices, results show that \anvm achieves similar or better performance compared to the best possible symmetric architecture while enjoying the benefits of disaggregation. We found the speedup brought by the proposed optimizations is drastic, --- 5$\sim$12× among all benchmarks.

Additional file 1: Figure S1. The HPLC chromatograms of DHM analysis in young and old leaves of vine tea. A, The standards chromatograms of dihydromyricetin (1), rutin (2), myricetin (3), quercetin (4) and kaempferol (5) at 285 nm; B and C, HPLC chromatograms of young (B) and old (C) leaves of vine tea.

Additional file 6: Figure S4. Gene Ontology (GO) classification of unigenes of A. grossedentata.

Additional file 1: Table S1. DLS size and zeta potential of nanoparticles with different N/P ratios. Figure S1. Relative FSHR mRNA expression in human normal tissues ( https://gtexportal.org/home/gene/FSHR ). Figure S2. FTIR of FSH (A), DFSH (B), PEG (C), PEI (D), FSH-PEG (E) and DFSH-PEG (F). Figure S3. In vitro effects of HK2 shRNA-loaded nanoparticles on different cancer cell lines. (A) Cell viability according to a CCK-8 assay. (B) Cell apoptosis according to flow cytometry. Figure S4. In vitro effects of scramble shRNA-loaded nanoparticles on A2780 and A2780CP cells. A2780 and A2780CP cells were treated with scramble shRNA-loaded nanoparticles at a plasmid-equivalent concentration of 1.0 μg/ml. (A) Cell viability according to a CCK-8 assay. (B) Cell apoptosis according to flow cytometry.

Additional file 4: Figure S2. Annotation of all the unigenes from vine tea transcriptome. Number of genes annotated by five representatively databases (nt, nr, kog, go, pfam) was showed in Venn diagram.

Additional file 7: Figure S5. KOG Function classification the transcriptome of A. grossedentata.

Additional file 5: Figure S3. Characteristics of unigenes annotated against Nr databases. A, E-value distribution of the top BLAST hits for each unigene (E-value of 1.0e− 5); B, Similarity distribution of the top BLAST hits for each unigene; C, homologous species distribution against Nr database.

Additional file 8: Figure S6. KEGG classification of unigenes of A. grossedentata.

In this study, an amidoxime-appended zirconium metal-organic framework [Zr6O4(OH)4(BDC-NHCH2CH2C(=N–OH)NH2)6](UiO-66-AO, BDC = 1,4-benzenedicarboxylate) for efficiently and rapidly removing uranium from aqueous solution was fabricated through post-modifications. The chemical structure and composition of original and modified UiO-66 MOFs were investigated in detail. The principal factors affecting the adsorption of U(VI) ions have been investigated, including pH of the aqueous solution, contact time, temperature, and coexisting cations through batch adsorption experiments. The adsorption kinetics conformed to the pseudo-second-order model. It was found that the maximum adsorption capacity reached 232.8 mg/g at pH 5.0 and 328 K based on the Langmuir isotherm. The thermodynamics parameters revealed that this adsorption process was spontaneous and endothermic. The sorption experiment in a simulated nuclear industry effluent demonstrated a high adsorption efficiency (about 95.3%) and selectivity toward uranium. The extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS) analysis revealed the coordination mechanism of amidoxime-appended UiO-66 and uranyl.

The in situ growth of one-dimensional magnetite (Fe3O4) nanowire (NW) arrays with deterministic and tunable control over their orientation and morphology on a wide range of flexible and low heat resistance substrates is still a challenge. Herein, a facile method of controlling the orientation of Fe3O4 NW arrays on a polypropylene (PP) nonwoven fabric surface (PP-g-PAO/Fe3O4) through simultaneous radiation induced graft polymerization and coprecipitation processes was realized. We demonstrated a control over the orientation and geometric properties of coprecipitated Fe3O4 NWs via complex iron ion using amidoxime groups, which not only endow the material with high durability but also lead to the oriented growth of Fe3O4 NWs. The results showed that Fe3O4 NWs were only grown on the surface of the PP nonwoven fabric (length:diameter ratio ≈ 10), whereas the Fe3O4 produced in the solution exhibited a spherical structure under identical conditions. The PP-g-PAO/Fe3O4 composite presented a good saturated magneti...

Ethnopharmacological relevance Pinellia pedatisecta Schott extract (PE), a traditional Chinese medicine, has been used to reduce swelling, dry dampness and suppress cervical tumors. Aims To evaluate the roles of PE in the regulation of anti-tumor effects and the cellular immune response in the tumor microenvironment. Methods The immune microenvironment of HPV+TC-1 tumors was examined by immunohistochemistry, real-time PCR and flow cytometry. Results Our study demonstrated that PE in vitro could significantly increase the percentage of apoptosis and necrosis in HPV+TC-1 cells and block the cell cycle phase. In vivo treatment with PE eradicated established subcutaneous HPV+TC-1 tumors in wild-type C57BL/6 mice by infiltrating CD8+ T cells and CD4+ T cells and by directly suppressing tumor growth and resistance to avascular necrosis. The key factors in the canonical Wnt signaling pathway in the experimental group (PE+mDC+naive CD4+T cells) were challenged, and the levels of beta-catenin, C-myc, cyclin D1 and PPAR1 were significantly enhanced at the 5th day. In particular, the subset proportion of Th1 cells (characterized by IFNγ production and the transcription factor Tbet) increased significantly, and both Th2 cells (characterized by IL-4 production and the transcription factor GATA3) and Th17 cells (characterized by IL-17 production and the transcription factor RoRγt) decreased profoundly. Conclusions These findings linked the anti-tumor properties of PE with the immune microenvironment to present a reliable basis for the future practical application of PE in cervical cancer as a novel and pharmacologically safe immunotherapy strategy.

A new approach of finely tuning multinuclear clusters of metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) through symmetry-upgradingly isoreticular transformation was first presented and a bcu-type MOF, {[Cu4(μ4-O)Cl2(IN)4][CuCl2]}∞ (NJU-Bai35; NJU-Bai for Nanjing University Bai group), with cluster [Cu4(μ4-O)Cl2(COO)4N4] of higher symmetry compared to the pristine MOF, was successfully synthesized. The symmetry upgrading implemented on the inorganic part triggers the adjustment of channels in NJU-Bai35 to fit CO2 molecules, leading to a high CO2 adsorption capacity (7.20 wt % at ∼0.15 bar and 298 K) and high selectivity of CO2 over N2 and CH4 (275.8 for CO2/N2 and 11.6 for CO2/CH4) in NJU-Bai35. Breakthrough experiments further confirmed that NJU-Bai35 might be an excellent candidate for CO2 capture and natural gas purification.