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Chinese materia medica decoction pieces (CMMDPs), one of the three pillars of the Chinese materia medica industry, are a key link in the Chinese materia medica industrial chain. Industrialization is the only way for the modernization of CMMDPs. This review mainly summarizes the characteristics, history, current situation and prospect of CMMDPs industry, providing a new reference for promoting the flourishing development of the industrialization of CMMDPs and for serving massive health industry. The literature was collected from databases including Web of Science, PubMed, Elsevier and CNKI (Chinese). CMMDPs industry has the characteristics of regionalism, resource dependency, customer diversity and low industrial concentration. Deeply processed products include traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) formula granules, small-packed decoction pieces, ultrafine decoction pieces, puffed decoction pieces, compressed decoction pieces and instant decoction pieces. Integration of treatment and processing at the place of origin is emerging. However, there is still room for improvement, for example, the manufacturing technologies of CMMDPs industry need to be continually improved. The management of CMMDPs' normalized production also needs to be strengthened. The quality of CMMDPs should be strengthened supervision and it should establish the objective and feasible quality evaluation system for CMMDPs. At present, China has attached unprecedented importance to the development of TCM, and issued a number of supporting policies, sparing no effort to support its development.

Characterization of fluorescence emissions from cells often leads to conclusive results in the early detection of cellular abnormalities. Cellular abnormalities can be characterized by their difference in the fluorescence lifetime, which may be less than nanoseconds. A sensitive frequency domain technique, also called a phase-resolved fluorescence imaging technique, is proposed in which fluorescence emissions at the same wavelengths can more effectively be separated with subnanosecond resolution in their lifetime difference. The system configuration is optimized by incorporating even-step phase shifting in the homodyne-assisted signal-processing concept along with the phase-resolved fluorescence technique to eliminate the dc offsets of emission. Experiments are carried out with simulated samples composed of two fluorescence emissions of the same wavelength but with different lifetime values. Suppression of either of the fluorescence emissions by selective imaging of the other validates the superiority of the proposed technique. Hence, this technique can potentially be applied in the early detection of cellular abnormalities.

Mesostructured V−Mg oxides were synthesized using the surfactant cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) as template, V2O5, V(acac)3 (vanadium acetylacetonate), or NH4VO3 as vanadium source, and Mg(NO3)2, MgCl2, MgSO4, (MgCO3)4·Mg(OH)2, Mg(CH3CO2)2, or Mg(C2H5O)2 as magnesium source. The factors that influence the formation of mesostructured V−Mg oxides, such as the pH, the natures of magnesium and vanadium sources, and the ionic strength, were identified. The formation of mesophases could be related to the presence of anionic vanadium species, to the electrostatic interactions between the oppositely charged vanadates and micellar headgroups, and to the nature of the counterion of Mg²⁺ in the magnesium source. The main role was played by the pH and only when the pH allowed the formation of vanadates was a mesostructure generated. The counterions of Mg²⁺ also played a role, which could be explained via specific ion effects and the formation of complexes between them and the vanadium-containing species, which are attracted by the headgroups of the micellar templates.

Mesostructured vanadium−magnesium oxides (V-Mg-O) were synthesized using vanadium pentoxide and magnesium nitrate as sources and cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) or the mixture of CTAB and hexadecylamine (HDA) as template. The effects of surfactant concentration, pH of the reaction medium, aging time, and temperature as well as aging mode (static or dynamic) were systematically investigated. The pH of the reaction medium and the surfactant concentration and nature were found to be the key parameters in the formation of V-Mg-O mesophases. When CTAB was employed alone as template and its concentration was higher than the critical micelle concentration, single lamellar mesophases were obtained in both acidic and neutral media. When the mixture of surfactants was used as template and its concentration was sufficiently low, only microporous phases were obtained in strongly acidic media (pH ≤ 4), even at elevated aging temperatures and/or for long aging times. A mixture of mesophases could be, however, obtained in weakly acidic and neutral media (pH = 4−7). At high surfactant concentrations, a single lamellar structure was generated in strongly acidic media and a mixture of mesophases in the weakly acidic and neutral ones. Only amorphous solids were generated in the basic range of pH, regardless of the surfactant concentration employed. With the change in aging time, numerous metastable phases have been identified, particularly in weakly acidic and neutral media. Some comments about the mechanisms of formation of the mesophases conclude the paper.

Mesostructured vanadium−magnesium oxides (V−Mg−O) with various morphologies were synthesized at room temperature using MgCl2 and V2O5 as source materials and a large number of surfactants as templates. It was found that, among the surfactants employed, the quaternary ammonium surfactants with long alkyl chains, such as cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB), or the nonionic surfactant Triton-X 100 could template V−Mg−O mesostructures. In the former case, the synthesized specimen had a lamellar structure and nanofibrous morphology. In the latter case, the specimen had a lamellar structure but a particulate morphology. Among the binary mixtures of cationic, anionic, or nonionic surfactants employed, only the combinations between a quaternary ammonium surfactant and hexadecylamine (HDA) were effective in templating a lamellar mesophase with nanofibrous morphology. The binary surfactants were more effective than the single surfactants in generating a higher regularity of the lamellar mesostructure. Mesostructured V−Mg−O could be synthesized even using binary mixtures consisting of HDA and a quaternary ammonium surfactant with a short alkyl chain, such as benzyltrimethyl (neither of the two was effective when used alone). The mesostructured V−Mg−O nanofibers synthesized with binary mixtures of surfactants were more stable during heating at high temperatures than those synthesized with a cationic surfactant alone.

Magnesium containing vanadium mesoporous materials were synthesized using vanadium(V) oxide and magnesium nitrate as sources and cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) and the mixture of CTAB and hexadecylamine (HDA) as templates. The effects of the Mg/V molar ratio and the surfactant concentration in the initial batches, the pH employed, and the length of aging time on the structural properties of the synthesized materials were investigated. Both CTAB alone and the mixture CTAB + HDA were effective in templating magnesium containing vanadium mesoporous materials, with a larger average pore size in the latter case. The degree of crystallinity of the mesoporous V−Mg−O was found to increase with increasing surfactant concentration in the initial batches. However, a too large amount of surfactant increased tremendously the viscosity of the system, generating difficulties in the preparation. At a given pH, the degree of crystallinity of the mesoporous materials increased with increasing Mg/V molar ratio in the initial batch, attaining a maximum followed by a decrease. At a given Mg/V molar ratio in the initial batch, the degree of crystallinity increased with increasing pH, passed though an optimum for a pH = 7, and then decreased. The analysis of the composition of the mesoporous materials revealed that the amount of magnesium included in the samples was small and increased only slightly with increasing amount in the initial batches; the increase of the pH increased, however, much more the amount of Mg included in the mesoporous materials. The stability toward heating at various temperatures increased with increasing amount of magnesium in the samples. Possible explanations for the effects found are suggested.