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Background: The Chinese medicine punicalagin (Pun), the most important active ingredient in pomegranate peel, has significant bacteriostatic and anti-inflammatory properties. The potential mechanisms of Pun for bacterial enteritis, however, are unknown. Objective: The goal of our research is to investigate the mechanism of Pun in the treatment of bacterial enteritis using computer-aided drug technology, as well as to investigate the intervention effect of Pun on mice with bacterial enteritis using intestinal flora sequencing. Methods: The targets of Pun and Bacterial enteritis were obtained by using the specific database, and cross-targets were screened among these targets, followed by PPI and enrichment analysis of the targets. Furthermore, the degree of binding between Pun and key targets were predicted through molecular docking. After successfully establishing the bacterial enteritis model in vivo, mice were randomly assigned to groups. They were treated for 7 days, the symptoms were observed daily, and the daily DAI and body weight change rate were calculated. Following administration, the intestinal tissue was removed, and the contents were separated. The tight junction protein expression was detected in the small intestine by the immunohistochemical method; ELISA and Western Blot (WB) were performed to detect the expressions of tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) and interleukin-6 (IL-6) in the serum and intestinal wall of mice. The 16S rRNA sequence was used to determine the composition and diversity of the intestinal flora of mice. Results: In total, 130 intersection targets of Pun and disease were screened by network pharmacology. The enrichment analysis showed cross genes were closely related and enriched in the cancer regulation and the TNF signal pathway. The active components of Pun could specifically bind to the core targets TNF, IL-6, etc., determined from molecular docking results. In vivo experiment results showed that the symptoms in the PUN group mice were alleviated, and the expression levels of TNF-α and IL-6 were significantly reduced. Pun can cause substantial changes in the intestinal flora of mice in terms of structure and function. Conclusion: Pun plays a multi-target role in alleviating bacterial enteritis by regulating intestinal flora.

Accurate evaluation of the accessibility of medical facilities is a prerequisite for the reasonable allocation of medical resources in a city. The accessibility of medical facilities depends not only on the distance to the supply and demand points, but also on the time spent in the process, and the supply capacity of the supply points. Taking Xi’an City of Shaanxi Province as an example, this paper comprehensively considers the facility supply capacity and introduces the selection probability function based on the two-step floating catchment area (2SFCA) method. In addition, in order to approximate the residents’ acceptance of different types of hospitals for long-distance medical treatment in real situations, different levels of search radius were set for the different levels of hospitals, and ArcGIS was used to measure the accessibility and evaluate the spatial layout of medical facilities in the main urban area of Xi’an. The results show that there is a significant difference in the accessibility of medical facilities in the main urban area of Xi’an, and the accessibility tends to decrease gradually from the central city to the periphery. The inequity in the allocation of medical facilities in the main urban area of Xi’an is more obvious, with about 81.64% of people having access to 54.88% of medical resources. The accessibility evaluation model established by the improved 2SFCA method can obtain more accurate and objective evaluation results. This study can provide a reference basis for urban medical facilities’ planning and rational spatial layout.

Background: Amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) is regarded as a transitional state of Alzheimer’s disease, with working memory (WM) impairment. Objective: To investigate the brain activity in aMCI patients during WM tasks with the functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) technique, as well as explore the association between brain activity and cognitive function in multiple domains. Methods: This study is a case-control study of 54 aMCI patients and 33 cognitively healthy elderly (NC). All participants underwent neuropsychological assessments. fNIRS was applied to examine the brain activation during the WM task. Multivariable linear regression analysis was applied to evaluate associations between brain activation and cognitive function in multiple domains. Results: Compared to NC subjects, aMCI patients had lower activation in the bilateral prefrontal, parietal, and occipital cortex during the WM task. Additionally, activation in the left prefrontal, bilateral parietal, and occipital cortex during the encoding and maintenance phase was positively associated with memory function. During memory retrieval, higher activity in the left prefrontal, parietal, and occipital cortex were correlated with higher memory scores. Besides, a positive association also formed between attention function and the activation in the left prefrontal, parietal, and occipital cortex during the WM task. Conclusion: These findings demonstrated that reduced activation in the prefrontal, parietal and occipital cortex during WM might reflect the risk of cognitive impairment, especially memory and attention function in aMCI patients. Given the brain activation visualization, fNIRS may be a convenient and alternative tool for screening the risk of Alzheimer’s disease.

ObjectiveThis study aimed to explore the characteristics of Shenzhen residents’ preferences and influencing factors regarding their first choice of medical institution at various medical levels, and to understand their attitudes towards community health services.DesignCross-sectional survey.ParticipantsA total of 1612 participants at least 18 years of age were randomly sampled with stratification among 10 districts in Shenzhen. Data were gathered through a self-designed questionnaire. The effective questionnaire response rate was 93.05%. All patients participated in the study voluntarily, provided written informed consent and were able to complete the questionnaire.Main outcome measuresWe measured and compared the participants’ expected and actual preferences and influencing factors regarding their first choice of medical service at various medical levels.ResultsMore than 50% of the participants preferred municipal and district hospitals as their first choice, and 27.5% chose medical institutions according to specific circumstances. Univariate analysis indicated that age, education, income, medical insurance, housing conditions and registered permanent residence were significantly associated with the actual and expected preferred first medical institution. The main factors influencing participants' actual and expected preferred medical institution differed. With the actual preferred first medical institution as the dependent variable, education, monthly income, medical technology, convenience and providers’ service attitude and medical ethics were the main factors (χ2=212.63, p2=78.101, pConclusionThe main factors influencing participants’ preferred medical institution and their actual first visit differed. Patients with high education or income or registered permanent residence preferred high-level medical institutions for the first visit.

Medical diagnostic robot systems have been paid more and more attention due to its objectivity and accuracy. The diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is considered an effective means to prevent Alzheimer's disease (AD). Doctors diagnose MCI based on various clinical examinations, which are expensive and the diagnosis results rely on the knowledge of doctors. Therefore, it is necessary to develop a robot diagnostic system to eliminate the influence of human factors and obtain a higher accuracy rate. In this paper, we propose a novel Group Feature Domain Adversarial Neural Network (GF-DANN) for amnestic MCI (aMCI) diagnosis, which involves two important modules. A Group Feature Extraction (GFE) module is proposed to reduce individual differences by learning group-level features through adversarial learning. A Dual Branch Domain Adaptation (DBDA) module is carefully designed to reduce the distribution difference between the source and target domain in a domain adaption way. On three types of data set, GF-DANN achieves the best accuracy compared with classic machine learning and deep learning methods. On the DMS data set, GF-DANN has obtained an accuracy rate of 89.47%, and the sensitivity and specificity are 90% and 89%. In addition, by comparing three EEG data collection paradigms, our results demonstrate that the DMS paradigm has the potential to build an aMCI diagnose robot system., This paper has been accepted by 2021 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA 2021)

Developmental trajectories of gene expression may reverse in their direction during ageing, a phenomenon previously linked to cellular identity loss. Our analysis of cerebral cortex, lung, liver and muscle transcriptomes of 16 mice, covering development and ageing intervals, revealed widespread but tissue-specific ageing-associated expression reversals. Cumulatively, these reversals create a unique phenomenon: mammalian tissue transcriptomes diverge from each other during postnatal development, but during ageing, they tend to converge towards similar expression levels, a process we term Divergence followed by Convergence, or DiCo. We found that DiCo was most prevalent among tissue-specific genes and associated with loss of tissue identity, which is confirmed using data from independent mouse and human datasets. Further, using publicly available single-cell transcriptome data, we showed that DiCo could be driven both by alterations in tissue cell type composition and also by cell-autonomous expression changes within particular cell types.

Study objectivesTo investigate the extent to which sleep quality associated with plasma Aβ levels in amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) elderly.MethodsA total of 172 cognitively normal (NC) elderly and 133 aMCI elderly were included in this study. For the evaluation of sleep quality, the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) was used. Levels of plasma Aβ were determined by the sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay technique. Multivariable linear regression analysis was applied to evaluate associations between sleep quality and plasma Aβ levels after adjusting potential confounders.ResultsCompared to NC subjects, participants with aMCI had a higher global PSQI score (8.72 ± 3.87 vs. 7.10 ± 3.07, p < 0.001). The global PSQI score was positively associated with plasma Aβ42 level in the aMCI group (β = 0.063, 95% CI 0.001–0.125, and p = 0.049) but not in the NC group (p > 0.05). Additionally, a higher global PSQI score was associated with a higher plasma Aβ42/Aβ40 ratio in both NC (β = 0.010, 95% CI 0.003–0.016, and p = 0.003) and aMCI groups (β = 0.012, 95% CI 0.005–0.018, and p < 0.001). The association between global PSQI score and plasma Aβ42/Aβ40 ratio was stronger in individuals with aMCI relative to the NC subjects (β = 0.076 vs. 0.030, p for interaction = 0.023).ConclusionPoor sleep quality was associated with plasma Aβ42 and Aβ42/Aβ40 ratio, with a stronger effect among individuals with aMCI. A better understanding of the role of sleep in plasma Aβ levels in aMCI patients could lead to effective sleep-based intervention against the risk of Alzheimer’s disease.

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This study aims to investigate the extent to which sleep duration and efficiency are associated with plasma amyloid-β (Aβ) levels in non-demented older people. This study is a cross-sectional analysis of 305 non-demented older people. Sleep duration and efficiency were assessed used the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index. Levels of plasma Aβ were determined by sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay technique. Associations between sleep variables and plasma Aβ levels were evaluated with multivariable linear regression analysis. Compared to those with sleep duration > 7 h, participants with sleep duration < 6 h had a higher plasma Aβ42 level (β = 0.495, 95% CI 0.077~0.913, p = 0.021) and Aβ42/Aβ40 ratio (β = 0.101, 95% CI 0.058~0.144, p < 0.001). Compared to those with sleep efficiency ≥ 85%, participants with lower sleep efficiency (65~74%

The rumen is the hallmark organ of ruminants and hosts a diverse ecosystem of microorganisms that facilitates efficient digestion of plant fibers. We used 897 transcriptomes from three Cetartiodactyla lineages: ruminants, camels and cetaceans, as well as data from ruminant comparative genomics and functional assays to explore the genetic basis of rumen origin and evolution. Comparative analyses reveal that the rumen and the first-chamber stomachs of camels and cetaceans shared a common tissue origin from the esophagus. The rumen recruited genes from other tissues/organs and up-regulated many esophagus genes to aquire functional innovations involving epithelium absorption, improvement of the ketone body metabolism and regulation of microbial community. These innovations involve such genetic changes as ruminant-specific conserved elements, newly evolved genes and positively selected genes. Our in vitro experiements validate the functions of one enhancer, one positively selected gene and two newly evolved antibacterial genes. Our study provides novel insights into the origin and evolution of a complex organ.

Objectives: To characterize gait disorders in patients with amnestic mild cognitive impairments and determine the association between the performance of the gait function and cognition. Methodology: In this study, we enrolled 38 patients with amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) and 30 cognitively normal individuals (NC). Neuropsychological assessments included tests of memory, executive function, language, and attention. Using an inertial-sensor-based wearable instrument, we collected the gait data dynamically for at least 1 h/day for 2 weeks. The gait parameters included walking velocity, stride length, stride time, cadence, and stride time variability. Results: The aMCI patients had reduced walking velocity and stride length and increased stride time variability compared with the NCs. Walking velocity was positively correlated with long-term memory (r = 0.256, p = 0.043) and executive function (r = 0.490, p = 0.007). Stride length was positively correlated with long-term memory (r = 0.322, p = 0.036), executive function (r = 0.366, p = 0.024), and attention (r = 0.264, p = 0.048). Stride time variability was negatively correlated with long-term memory (r = −0.206, p = 0.038), executive function (r = −0.430, p = 0.022), and attention (r = −0.247, p = 0.015). Conclusion: This study suggested that cognitive impairment-related gait disorders occur (reduced gait speed, gait length, and gait stability) in daily life walking among the aMCI patients. A sensor-based wearable device for gait measurement may be an alternative and convenient tool for screening cognitive impairment.

Lipids are essential to brain functions, yet they remain largely unexplored. Here we investigated the lipidome composition of prefrontal cortex gray matter in 396 cognitively healthy individuals with ages spanning 100 years, as well as 67 adult individuals diagnosed with autism (ASD), schizophrenia (SZ), and Down syndrome (DS). Of the 5024 detected lipids, 95% showed significant age-dependent concentration differences clustering into four temporal stages, and resulting in a gradual increase in membrane fluidity in individuals ranging from newborn to nonagenarian. Aging affects 14% of the brain lipidome with late-life changes starting predominantly at 50–55 years of age—a period of general metabolic transition. All three diseases alter the brain lipidome composition, leading—among other things—to a concentration decrease in glycerophospholipid metabolism and endocannabinoid signaling pathways. Lipid concentration decreases in SZ were further linked to genetic variants associated with disease, indicating the relevance of the lipidome changes to disease progression.

The degradation and reuse of epoxy thermosets have significant impact on the environments. We report that an epoxy–amine thermoset embedded with Diels–Alder (DA) bonds was transformed into soluble polymers via sonochemistry under mild temperature (ca. 20 °C) for the first time. Sonication could effectively induce the position-oriented cleavage of DA bonds (i.e., retro-DA) of the fully swelled epoxy thermoset in dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), leading to the soluble polymers. Of importance, such sonochemical process could be regulated on demand via switching on-and-off of the sonication. The obtained soluble polymers could be recured to form epoxy–amine thermosets via DA reaction. This sonochemical method might provide an unprecedented and efficient way to the controlled degradation and recycling of the epoxy thermosets containing the dynamic covalent bonds likes DA groups.

Krüppel-like factors (KLFs) are zinc finger-containing transcription factors that play key roles in the regulation of differentiation and development as well as biological processes central to the development of malignancies. Increasing evidence indicates that Krüppel-like factor 9 (KLF9) plays a critical role in regulating tumorigenesis. However, the biological role and molecular mechanism of KLF9 in glioma progression remain unclear. Herein, we found that KLF9 expression was strongly reduced in gliomas. Reduced KLF9 expression promoted glioma cell proliferation. Importantly, re-constitution of KLF9 expression inhibited glioma cell proliferation and tumor growth in vivo. Furthermore, we determined that KLF9 interacted with the miR-21 promoter, leading to suppression of miR-21 expression and cell cycle arrest. Taken together, our findings indicate a novel mechanism for KLF function in tumorigenesis and may also suggest new targets for clinical intervention in human cancer.

The aim of this study was to investigate the mechanisms and effects of B-cell lymphoma 2 (Bcl-2) on the vasculogenic mimicry (VM) of human glioma cells. U87 cells were cultured under hypoxic conditions and then divided into four groups: Control, 3-(5-hydroxymethyl-2-furyl)-1-benzylindazole (YC-1), ABT-737 and YC-1 + ABT-737. These groups were treated with the corresponding simulators. The expression of hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α), matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-2, MMP-14 and Bcl-2 in each group was determined using a reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction and western blot analysis. Compared with that in the control group, the mRNA and protein expression of MMP-2, MMP-14 and Bcl-2 in the YC-1 and ABT-737 groups was significantly reduced. The expression of HIF-1α, however, was only significantly reduced in the YC-1 group (P

Although splicing is widespread and evolves rapidly among species, the mechanisms driving this evolution, as well as its functional implications, are not yet fully understood. We analyzed the evolution of splicing patterns based on transcriptome data from five tissues of humans, chimpanzees, rhesus macaques, and mice. In total, 1,526 exons and exon sets from 1,236 genes showed significant splicing differences among primates. More than 60% of these differences represent constitutive-to-alternative exon transitions while an additional 25% represent changes in exon inclusion frequency. These two dominant evolutionary patterns have contrasting conservation, regulation, and functional features. The sum of these features indicates that, despite their prevalence, constitutive-to-alternative exon transitions do not substantially contribute to long-term functional transcriptome changes. Conversely, changes in exon inclusion frequency appear to be functionally relevant, especially for changes taking place in the brain on the human evolutionary lineage.

Background: Dementia is increasingly prevalent due to rapid aging of the population, but under-recognized among people with low education levels. This is partly due to a lack of appropriate and precise normative data, which underestimates cognitive aging in the use of screening tools for dementia. Objective: We aimed to improve the precision of screening for cognitive impairment, by characterizing the patterns of cognitive aging and derived normative data of the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) for illiterate and low-educated populations. Methods: This community-based study included data from 2,280 individuals aged 40 years or older from two rural areas. Multiple linear modeling examined the effect of aging on cognition reflected by the MMSE, stratified by education level and gender. Threshold effect of age on cognition was performed using a smoothing function. Results: The majority of participants (60.4%) were illiterate or had attended only primary school (24.6%). The effect of aging on cognition varied by gender and education. Primary-school educated females and males remained cognitively stable up to 62 and 71 years of age, respectively, with MMSE score declining 0.4 and 0.8 points/year in females and males thereafter. Illiterates females scored 2.3 points lower than illiterate males, and scores for both declined 0.2 points/year. According to these results, normative data stratified by age, education and gender was generated. Conclusion: This study suggests gender and educational differences exist in cognitive aging among adults with limited or no formal education. To improve screening precision for cognitive impairment with the use of MMSE in low-educated population, age, gender, and education level should be considered.

The purpose of the present study was to characterize the expressions of phosphorylated Ca(2+)/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase II (p-CaMK-II), total CaMK-II, and L-type Ca(2+) channel in offspring hippocampus that was induced by prenatal restraint stress. Pregnant rats were divided into two groups: the control group and the prenatal stress (PNS) group. Pregnant rats in the PNS group were exposed to restraint stress on day 14-20 of pregnancy three times daily for 45 min. Adult offspring rats were used in this study. The results demonstrated that prenatal restraint stress induced a significant increase in the expression of p-CaMK-II, total CaMK-II, and L-Ca(2+) channel by western blot analysis in offspring hippocampus. The immunohistochemistry results revealed that PNS increased the expressions of CaMK-II and L-Ca(2+) channel in the hippocampal CA3 of offspring rats. These data suggest that PNS can have long-term neuronal effects within hippocampal structure involved in the feedback mechanisms of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal axis.

The present research designed six tasks with various distributions of involvement components: need, search and evaluation to verify the predictability of Involvement Load Hypothesis on Chinese adult English learners. The results showed that the vocabulary exercises did facilitate the incidental vocabulary acquisition, but the exercise with higher involvement load did not necessarily benefit the students more than the exercise with lower involvement. Three components of involvement did not reveal the same effect on incidental vocabulary acquisition. And the superiority of exercise with higher involvement load existing in the immediate vocabulary test did not survive in the delayed vocabulary test. In the delayed vocabulary test there were not any statistically significant differences among six groups. The further analysis reported besides the cognitive processing aroused by the tasks, other critical factors also worked on the incidental vocabulary acquisition: inference skill and repetition of occurrence.

Objective To record Calcium, Potassium and Sodium currents in acutely isolated hippocampal pyramidal neurons. Methods Hippocampal CA3 neurons were freshly isolated by 1 mg protease/3 ml SES and mechanical trituration with polished pipettes of progressively smaller tip diameters. Patch clamp technique in whole-cell mode was employed to record voltage-gated channel currents. Results The procedure dissociated hippocampal neurons, preserving apical dendrites and several basal dendrites, without impairing the electrical characteristics of the neurons. Whole-cell patch clamp configuration was successfully used to record voltage-gated Ca2+ currents, delayed rectifier K+ current and voltage-gated Na+ currents. Conclusion Protease combined with mechanical trituration may be used for the dissociation of neurons from rat hippocampus. Voltage-gated channels currents could be recorded using a patch clamp technique.

The hippocampus, which has the highest density of GC receptors in the brain, is involved in the regulation of the HPA and the behavioral responses to stress. Overexposure to corticosteroid hormones is harmful to hippocampal neuron integrity. Our purpose is to investigate the effects of prenatal stress (PNS) on expression of p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (p38 MAPK) in offspring hippocampal neurons using Western blotting and Immunohistochemistry. The prenatal restraint stress induces significant increase in the expression of p-p38 MAPK and total p38 MAPK in female offspring hippocampus. The level of p-p38 MAPK in PNS female offspring rats was significantly increased (126.41 ± 3.937, n = 6) compared with that in the control female offspring rats (101.35 ± 3.468, n = 6, P < 0.01). Immunoblot analysis revealed there was significant difference in the level of total p38 MAPK between the female control and prenatal restraint stress offspring rats (101.70 ± 3.162 vs. 128.111 ± 2.724, respectively, P < 0.01). Immunodensity of p38 MAPK was significantly increased above female control in PNS female offspring hippocampal CA3 and CA4 fields (P < 0.001 vs. control group, CON). The data suggest that exposure of animals to a period of stressful experience during a critical phase could impose lasting effects on the offspring hippocampal neurons cellular signalling of offspring hippocampus.

Prenatal stress is known to cause neuronal loss and oxidative damage in the hippocampus of offspring rats. The underlying molecular mechanism has not been fully understood. The extracellularsignal-regulated kinase (ERK1/2) is recruited when the brain undergoes synaptic plasticity and remodeling. In the present study, we used Western blotting and immunohistochemistry techniques to examine the effects of prenatal restraint stress (PNS) on the expression of phosphorylated ERK (p-ERK) and total ERK. Pregnant rats in the PNS group were exposed to restraint stress on day 14–20 of pregnancy three times daily for 45 min. One-month-old offspring rats were used in this experiment. PNS treatment increased the expression of p-ERK2 compared to that in the control female offspring rats and total ERK2 in female offspring hippocampus compared with that of control group. No significant changes in the amounts of total ERK1 of prenatally offspring hippocampus were observed in both genders compared with control animals. ERK immunodensity was significantly increased in PNS groups in CA3 field in male offspring hippocampus compared with control animals. ERK optical density was significantly increased in PNS female offspring hippocampus CA1, CA3 and CA4 region. However, ERK optical density was not significantly different between male control and PNS groups in CA1, CA4 fields and DG in offspring hippocampus. These findings suggest the sex and region-dependent effects of prenatal stress on the expression of ERK in offspring hippocampus. ERK expression changes induced by prenatal stress may contribute to hippocampus synaptic plasticity changes of the offspring.

Ultrathin organic semiconductor thin films have great value in the investigation of carrier transport behavior in organic field-effect transistors (OFETs). Here, the dual solution shearing (DSS) method is adopted to deposit ultrathin and closely packed 2,9-didecyldinaphtho[2,3-b:2′,3′-f]thieno[3,2-b]thiophene (C10-DNTT) films. This smooth, ultrathin and highly crystalline DSS-processed C10-DNTT layer can be utilized in p–n stacking bilayer ambipolar OFETs. It has two major functions in the bilayer OFET: (i) it acts as the p-channel active layer; and (ii) it serves as the growth template of the upper n-type semiconductor layer. The closely packed alkyl side chains of the C10-DNTT molecules behave like long alkyl chains in the self-assembled monolayer and can assist the packing and orientation of the following layer. The F16CuPc layer grown on DSS-processed C10-DNTT shows crystallized lamellae structure. The smooth C10-DNTT surface can suppress the trap states and enhance the charge transfer between the p–n layer interface. The drain-source current (IDS) in the p-channel and n-channel shows a threefold and fivefold increase compared with two-step thermal evaporation. These findings demonstrate the potential of using solution-processed ultrathin organic semiconductor in multilayer organic electronics, which cannot be easily achieved by the conventional thermal evaporation approach.

This work innovatively develops a dual solution-shearing method utilizing the semiconductor concentration region close to the solubility limit, which successfully generates large-area and high-performance semiconductor monolayer crystals on the millimeter scale. The monolayer crystals with poly(methyl methacrylate) encapsulation show the highest mobility of 10.4 cm2 V−1 s−1 among the mobility values in the reported solution-processed semiconductor monolayers. With similar mobility to multilayer crystals, light is shed on the charge accumulation mechanism in organic field-effect transistors (OFETs), where the first layer on interface bears the most carrier transport task, and the other above layers work as carrier suppliers and encapsulations to the first layer. The monolayer crystals show a very low dependency on channel directions with a small anisotropic ratio of 1.3. The positive mobility–temperature correlation reveals a thermally activated carrier transport mode in the monolayer crystals, which is different from the band-like transport mode in multilayer crystals. Furthermore, because of the direct exposure of highly conductive channels, the monolayer crystal based OFETs can sense ammonia concentrations as low as 10 ppb. The decent sensitivity indicates the monolayer crystals are potential candidates for sensor applications.

Alloying with various compositions is an efficient method to tailor the optoelectronic properties of two-dimensional (2D) transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs). However, the composition distribution in the monolayer of TMDs alloys lacks detailed investigation. Here, by exploring scanning Auger electron spectroscopy, we investigate the composition distribution in MoS2(1−x)Se2x monolayers with high spatial resolution. Our results demonstrate that inhomogeneous composition distribution exists not only among different nanosheets on a substrate but also within individual nanosheets. Our study would be helpful to develop new methods for controllable synthesis of TMDs alloys and other 2D materials.

The mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) is a crucial regulator in malignant gliomas. Vasculogenic mimicry (VM) describes functional channels established by highly malignant tumor cells that is different from endothelium-lined blood vessels. Our previous studies confirmed the existence and clinical significance of VM in medulloblastoma and glioblastoma. In the present study, by immunohistochemical and CD34/PAS histochemical double-staining, 34 cases (26.8%) with VM structures were identified among a total of 127 glioma cases, and these VM structures were associated with mTOR expression in the glioma specimens. In vitro, U87 malignant glioblastoma cells formed tube structures similar to HUVECs on Matrigel in 3D culture, and mTOR-specific inhibitor rapamycin inhibited VM formation in the U87 malignant glioblastoma cells under both normoxia and hypoxia. In addition, rapamycin and mTOR siRNA inhibited molecules in the signaling cascade of VM formation, particularly HIF-1α. Taken together, our results demonstrated that mTOR signaling is involved in VM formation, and may be a potential therapeutic target for gliomas.