Search

Broadband NIR phosphors as light sources are receiving increasing attention.

Transparent glass-ceramic is a highly attractive class of materials for photonic application. Transition metal ions are promising candidates for luminescence centers thanks to the sensitivity to the ligand ions of d-d electron transition. Here, the broadband second near-infrared (NIR-II) photoluminescence was achieved via precipitation of ZnGa2O4:Ni2+ nanocrystals within a zinc gallium-silicate glass matrix by the crystallization process. Excited by 260 nm UV photon, ZnGa2O4:Ni2+ GC displays NIR-II emission peaking at 1240 nm and has a full width at half maximum wider than 288 nm, attributing to 3T2g(3F)→3A2g(3F) electronic transition of octahedral coordinated Ni2+ ions. Moreover, broad persistent luminescence of Ni2+ ions can be effectively obtained after irradiation in the UV light. Based on the electron paramagnetic resonance spectra and thermoluminescence method, a physical model was constructed to demonstrate the mechanism of persistent luminescence. This developed afterglow luminescent glass-ceramic exhibits a potential application in biological imaging.

A novel green afterglow Na3(Y,Sc)Si3O9:Eu2+ phosphor is synthesized for optical data storage and latent fingerprint recognition.

Due to the simplicity of vacancy creation, Eu2+-doped melilite is an outstanding persistent luminescence (PersL) material with a continuing glow lifetime of more than several hours. In this paper, we...

ObjectiveCytokine storm syndrome is a fatal condition related to infectious and autoimmune diseases. Here we aim to investigate the regulatory mechanisms of Blimp-1 on cytokine storm.Methods The Blimp1 shRNA was transfected into RAW264.7 macrophages, followed by Toll-like receptor (TLR) ligand stimulation. The mRNA and protein levels of cytokines were detected by real-time PCR and flow cytometric bead array. The genomic binding sites of Blimp-1 were analyzed with chromatin immunoprecipitation-sequencing (ChIP-seq). The nuclear translocation of AP-1 and NF-κB p65 were measured by immunofluorescence staining.Results Blimp-1 significantly inhibited the expression and secretion of IL-1β, IL-6, and IL-18 in macrophages during stimulation with a variety of TLR ligands. ChIP-seq data showed that Blimp-1 stably combined with the promoters of Il1b and Tnf and the enhancers of Il6 and Il18, indicating a direct transcriptional repression of Blimp-1 on the pro-inflammatory cytokines. In addition, Blimp-1 strictly controlled nuclear translocation of NF-κB p65 in LPS-challenged macrophages, suggesting the regulatory mechanism of Blimp-1 on NF-κB activation.ConclusionBlimp-1 represses the production of multiple pro-inflammatory cytokines by directly binding the genomic region and restricting NF-κB p65 nuclear translocation. This finding may provide potential therapeutic strategies for the cytokine storm-related diseases.

Objective Cytokine storm syndrome is a fatal condition related to infectious and autoimmune diseases. Here, we aim to investigate the regulatory mechanisms of Blimp-1 on multiple cytokine production. Methods The Blimp1 shRNA was transfected into RAW264.7 macrophages, followed by Toll-like receptor (TLR) ligand stimulation. The mRNA and protein levels of cytokines were detected by real-time PCR and flow cytometric bead array. The nuclear translocation of AP-1 and NF-κB p65 was measured by immunofluorescence staining. The transcriptional activity was detected by luciferase reporter assay with 5 × NF-κB reporter or with IL6 promoter reporter. Results Blimp-1 significantly inhibited the expression and secretion of IL-1β, IL-6, and IL-18 in macrophages during stimulation with a variety of TLR ligands. The immunofluorescence staining results showed that Blimp-1 strictly controlled the nuclear translocation of NF-κB p65 in LPS-challenged macrophages. Furthermore, Blimp-1 directly inhibited the transcriptional activity of NF-κB and the transcription of IL6 gene. Conclusion Blimp-1 represses the production of multiple pro-inflammatory cytokines by directly binding the genomic region and restricting the nuclear translocation and transcriptional activity of NF-κB. This finding may provide potential therapeutic strategies for the cytokine storm-related diseases.

With the development of wireless sensor networks, many distributed algorithms have been studied by researchers. This paper considers the situation of distributed estimation with false data injection (FDI) attack. Owing to the fact that Kullback-Leibler (KL) divergence is very effective to detect outliers caused by FDI attack, a distributed adaptive algorithm over KL divergence is proposed to detect FDI attack. When the malicious nodes are detected, three algorithms are explored separately to weaken the impact of FDI attack. The performance of the three algorithms is analyzed in mean and mean-square. The effectiveness of the three proposed algorithms is shown through some illustrative examples under continual FDI attack and time-sharing FDI attack.

With the development of distributed algorithms, many researchers are committed to the goal of maintaining the long-term stability of the network by reducing the communication cost. However, many algorithms that lessen communication costs often result in a significant decrease in estimation accuracy. In order to reduce the communication cost with less performance degradation, the distributed neighbor-partial diffusion least-mean-square algorithm (NPDLMS) is proposed in this paper. Besides, considering the data redundancy in the network, we offer the distributed data selection NPDLMS algorithm, which further improves the estimation accuracy and reduces the communication cost. In the performance analysis, the stability and the communication cost of the algorithms are given.

The pathogenesis of liver fibrosis in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) remains unclear and the effective treatments have not been explored yet. The activation of hepatic stellate cells (HSCs) is considered as the most critical factor in the progression of liver fibrosis and cirrhosis. Autophagy has recently been identified as a new mechanism to regulate HSC activation. Here, we found that liver macrophages were polarized toward type 2 (M2) during the progression of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and liver fibrosis in both patients and NAFLD mice. Using the methionine-choline-deficient (MCD) diet NAFLD murine model and the in vitro cell culture system, we identified that the M2 macrophages promoted HSC autophagy by secreting prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) and binding its receptor EP4 on the surface of HSCs, which consequently enhanced HSC activation, extracellular matrix deposition, and liver fibrosis. Mechanistically, PGE2/EP4 signals enhanced HSC autophagy through the Erk pathway. A specific PGE2/EP4 antagonist E7046 significantly inhibited M2 macrophage-mediated HSC autophagy and improved liver fibrosis and histopathology in NAFLD mice. Our study provides novel mechanistic insights into the regulation of HSC activation and liver fibrosis. Our findings suggest that the PGE2/EP4 pathway is a promising therapeutic target to prevent NASH progression into cirrhosis.

The fundamental basis for the pathogenesis of sepsis is an inflammatory imbalance, which is considered to be the main target for treatment. Taurine is an intracellular free amino acid that has anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects. To investigate the protective mechanism of taurine in sepsis, we used in vitro and in vivo experiments to explore the effects of taurine on neutrophil and monocyte immune function. Metabolomic analysis showed large amounts of taurine in neutrophils and monocytes and a dramatic decrease in taurine levels after LPS exposure. Taurine supplementation decreased the expressions of tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), interleukin-1β (IL-1β) in LPS-challenged neutrophils and monocytes and reduced the formation of neutrophil extracellular traps by restricting reactive oxygen species. Moreover, taurine protected septic mice from death, improved tissue injuries in the lung, liver, and kidney by reducing neutrophil infiltration and TNF-α production. Our data indicate that a supplement with taurine might be a promising therapeutic strategy for sepsis to reduce hyper inflammation and improve multi-organ dysfunctions.

Nine-switch dual-output inverter stage two-stage matrix converter (NS-TSMC) has been widely applied in dual AC motors drive system, while it has the shortcoming of low voltage transfer ratio. Based on the NS-TSMC, a modified topology, named as series Z-source and nine-switch dual-output inverter stage two-stage matrix converter (ZS-NS-TSMC), is proposed, in which the series Z-source network is connected between the rectifier stage and nine-switch dual-output inverter stage (NS-DOI). In the presented topology, a brief shoot-through vector is employed, which can improve the voltage transfer ratio. Other advantages of the series Z-source network, such as low voltage stress of Z-source capacitor, zero dead-time of NS-DOI and limiting inrush current at startup, are discussed in the study. Furthermore, the dual space vector modulation is presented, which can achieve the merits of unity input power factor, sinusoidal input and outputs. Besides, the sinusoidal outputs, the capability of boosting voltage and adjustable output voltage amplitude are also discussed by the mathematical proof. Finally, an experimental prototype is set up based on the controllers of TMS320F28069 (DSP) and EPM570 (CPLD), the results of which verify the feasibility and desired advantages of the proposed topology and modulation strategy.

In wireless sensor networks, the dynamic network topology and the limitation of communication resources may lead to degradation of the estimation performance of distributed algorithms. To solve this problem, we propose an event-triggered adaptive partial diffusion least mean-square algorithm (ET-APDLMS). On the one hand, the adaptive partial diffusion strategy adapts to the dynamic topology of the network while ensuring the estimation performance. On the other hand, the event-triggered mechanism can effectively reduce the data redundancy and save the communication resources of the network. The communication cost analysis of the ET-APDLMS algorithm is given in the performance analysis. The theoretical results prove that the algorithm is asymptotically unbiased, and it converges in the mean sense and the mean-square sense. In the simulation, we compare the mean-square deviation performance of the ET-APDLMS algorithm and other different diffusion algorithms. The simulation results are consistent with the performance analysis, which verifies the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.