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BackgroundZebrafish pigment cell differentiation provides an attractive model for studying cell fate progression as a neural crest progenitor engenders diverse cell types, including two morphologically distinct pigment cells: black melanophores and reflective iridophores. Nontrivial classical genetic and transcriptomic approaches have revealed essential molecular mechanisms and gene regulatory circuits that drive neural crest-derived cell fate decisions. However, how the epigenetic landscape contributes to pigment cell differentiation, especially in the context of iridophore cell fate, is poorly understood.ResultsWe chart the global changes in the epigenetic landscape, including DNA methylation and chromatin accessibility, during neural crest differentiation into melanophores and iridophores to identify epigenetic determinants shaping cell type-specific gene expression. Motif enrichment in the epigenetically dynamic regions reveals putative transcription factors that might be responsible for driving pigment cell identity. Through this effort, in the relatively uncharacterized iridophores, we validatealx4aas a necessary and sufficient transcription factor for iridophore differentiation and present evidence onalx4a’s potential regulatory role in guanine synthesis pathway.ConclusionsPigment cell fate is marked by substantial DNA demethylation events coupled with dynamic chromatin accessibility to potentiate gene regulation through cis-regulatory control. Here, we provide a multi-omic resource for neural crest differentiation into melanophores and iridophores. This work led to the discovery and validation of iridophore-specificalx4atranscription factor.

Chemoresistive gas sensors based on two-dimensional (2D) materials including graphene-based materials have attracted significant research interest owing to their potential use in next-generation technologies including the Internet of Things (IoT). The functionalization of 2D materials is considered as a key strategy to achieve superior gas sensing properties such as high selectivity, high sensitivity, and reversible response and recovery, because it can modulate the chemical and electrical properties of 2D materials for more efficient gas sensing. Herein, we present a facile solution process and the room temperature gas sensing properties of chemically fluorinated graphene oxide (CFGO). The CFGO sensors exhibit improved sensitivity, selectivity, and reversibility upon exposure to NH3 with a significantly low theoretical detection limit of ∼6 ppb at room temperature in comparison to NO2 sensing properties. The effect of fluorine doping on the sensing mechanism is examined by first-principles calculations based on density functional theory. The calculations reveal that the fluorine dopant changes the charge distribution on the oxygen containing functional groups in graphene oxide, resulting in the preferred selective adsorption and desorption of NH3 molecules. We believe that the remarkable NH3 sensing properties of CFGO and investigation by first-principles calculations would enlarge the possibility of functionalized 2D materials for practical gas sensing applications such as the IoT.

Two-dimensional (2D) molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) has been attracting rapidly increasing interest for application in chemoresistive gas sensors owing to its moderate band gap energy and high specific surface area. However, the mechanism of chemoresistive sensing via the adsorption and desorption of gas molecules and the influence of the shape of 2D materials are not well understood yet. Herein we investigate the oxygen sensing behavior of MoS2 microflakes and nanoparticles prepared by mechanical and liquid exfoliation, respectively. Liquid-exfoliated MoS2 nanoparticles with an increased number of edge sites present high and linear responses to a broad range of oxygen concentrations (1–100%). The energetically favorable oxygen adsorption sites, which are responsible for reversible oxygen sensing, are identified by first-principles calculations based on density functional theory. This study serves as a proof-of-concept for the gas sensing mechanism depending on the surface configuration of 2D materials and broadens the potential of 2D MoS2 in gas sensing applications.

Reduced graphene oxide (rGO) is one of the promising sensing elements for high-performance chemoresistive sensors because of its remarkable advantages such as high surface-to-volume ratio, outstanding transparency, and flexibility. In addition, the defects on the surface of rGO, including oxygen functional groups, can act as active sites for interaction with gaseous molecules. However, the major drawback of rGO-based sensors is the extremely sluggish and irreversible recovery to the initial state after a sensing event, which makes them incapable of producing repeatable and reliable sensing signals. Here, we show that pristine GO can be used as the active sensing material with reversible and high response to NO 2 at room temperature. First-principles calculations, in conjunction with experimental results, reveal the critical role of hydroxyl groups rather than epoxy groups in changing metallic graphene to the semiconducting GO. We show that the adaptive motions of the hydroxyl groups, that is, the rotation of these groups for the adsorption of NO 2 molecules and relaxation to the original states during the desorption of NO 2 molecules, are responsible for the fast and reversible NO 2 sensing behavior of GO. Our work paves the way for realizing high-response, reversible graphene-based room-temperature chemoresistive sensors for further functional convergence.

WO3 nanoigloos decorated with Ag-, Pd-, and Au nanoparticles are fabricated by soft-template method and self-agglomeration of metal films. The responses of WO3 nanoigloos decorated with metal nanoparticles to various gases such as NO2, CH3COCH3, C2H5OH, and H2 are much higher than those of bare WO3 nanoigloos. According to the surface decoration, WO3 nanoigloos show significantly different behaviors in the response enhancement, revealing that Pd-decorated WO3 nanoigloos exhibit the highest response to H2 together with fast response time to H2, C2H5OH, and CH3COCH3 (below 10 s), Au-decorated WO3 nanoigloos exhibit the highest response to NO2. The catalytic effect of Ag is relatively weaker than Pd and Au nanoparticles, however, it exhibit the fastest response time to NO2. These are attributed to not only the varied catalytic activities of the metal nanoparticles, but also the different work function energies of them. Our results show that highly sensitive and selective WO3 nanoigloos decorated with metal nanoparticles can be an effective platform to fabricate an electronic nose for the further application of semiconducting metal oxide gas sensors.

One of the top design priorities for semiconductor chemical sensors is developing simple, low cost, sensitive and reliable sensors to be built in handheld mobile devices. In this chapter, we discuss critical issues for the realization of miniaturized and integrated chemoresistive thin film sensors based on metal oxides and introduce notable recent achievements.

Graphene oxide (GO) is reduced spontaneously when palladium nanoparticles are decorated on the surface. The oxygen functional groups at the GO surface near the nanoparticles are absorbed to the palladium to produce a palladium oxide interlayer. Palladium therefore grows on the GO with preferred orientations, resulting in unique microstructural and electrical properties.

Self-assembled WO3 thin film nanostructures with 1-dimensional villi-like nanofingers (VLNF) have been synthesized on the SiO2/Si substrate with Pt interdigitated electrodes using glancing angle deposition (GAD). Room-temperature deposition of WO3 by GAD resulted in anisotropic nanostructures with large aspect ratio and porosity having a relative surface area, which is about 32 times larger than that of a plain WO3 film. A WO3 VLNF sensor shows extremely high response to nitric oxide (NO) at 200 °C in 80% of relative humidity atmosphere, while responses of the sensor to ethanol, acetone, ammonia, and carbon monoxide are negligible. Such high sensitivity and selectivity to NO are attributed to the highly efficient modualtion of potential barriers at narrow necks between individual WO3 VLNF and the intrinsically high sensitivity of WO3 to NO. The theoretical detection limit of the sensor for NO is expected to be as low as 88 parts per trillion (ppt). Since NO is an approved biomarker of chronic airway inflammation in asthma, unprecedentedly high response and selectivity, and ppt-level detection limit to NO under highly humid environment demonstrate the great potential of the WO3 VLNF for use in high performance breath analyzers.

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