The direct oxidation of methane (CH) to methanol (CHOH) has been a focus of global concern and is quite challenging due to the thermodynamically stable CH and uncontrolled overoxidation of the products. Here, we provided a new viewpoint on the role of oxygen vacancies that induce a dual-function center in enhancing the adsorption and activation of both CH and O reactants for the subsequent selective formation of a CHOH liquid fuel on two-dimensional BiOCl photocatalysts at atmospheric pressure. The key for the favorable activity lies in the simultaneous ability of the electron-trapped Bi atom in activating CH and the formation of O radicals due to the activation of O at the adjacent oxygen vacancy site, which immediately attack the activated CH to directly produce CHOH, in initiating the oxidation reaction.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAtmospheric pressure nonthermal plasmas hold great promise for applications in environmental control, energy conversion, and material processing. Even at room temperature, nonthermal plasmas produce energetic and reactive species that can initiate surface modifications at a plasma-surface interface, including thin-film nanoparticle assemblies, in a nondestructive and effective way. Here, we present the plasma-activated sintering of aerosol jet printed silver thin films on substrates ranging from glass to delicate materials including blotting paper, fruits, and flexible plastic.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFUnlabelled: The aim was to evaluate the effect of dihydropyridine calcium channel blocker on the prognosis for moderate-severe pulmonary acute respiratory distress syndrome in hypertension patients.
Design: A retrospective, observational, multicenter cohort study.
Setting: A total of 307 patients without propensity score matching and 186 adult inpatients with propensity score matching diagnosed with hypertension and moderate-severe pulmonary acute respiratory distress syndrome in five teaching hospitals in Jiangsu province, China, from December 2015 to December 2020 were enrolled.
Due to serious global warming and environmental issues, the demand for clean and sustainable energy storage devices is significantly increased. Often accompanied by rapid growth of portable electronic vehicles and devices, massive electromagnetic wave pollution becomes unavoidable. To mitigate the above two issues, this mini-review summaries preparation methods and recent developments of MXene/polyaniline-based composites for their applications in electrochemical devices and electromagnetic interference shielding.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSelf-assembled monolayers are predicated on thermodynamic equilibrium; hence, their properties project accessible relaxation pathways. Herein, we demonstrate that charge tunneling correlates with conformational degrees of freedom(s). Results from open chain and cyclic head groups show that, as expected, distribution in tunneling data correlates with the orientation of the head group, akin to the odd-even effect and more importantly the degree of conformational freedom, but fluctuates with applied bias.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Systemic inflammation relates to the initiation and progression of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). Neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) and red blood cell distribution width (RDW)/albumin ratio have been reported to be predictive prognostic biomarkers in ARDS patients. However, the role of monocyte-to-lymphocyte ratio (MLR) as a prognostic inflammatory biomarker in a variety of diseases is rarely mentioned in ARDS.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe results regarding the independent association between homocysteine (Hcy) levels and post-stroke cognitive impairment (PSCI) were inconsistent. The effect of age on this association has yet to be explored. This study aims to determine the relationship between Hcy levels, age, and cognitive impairment in a post-stroke population.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTopological-associated domains (TADs) are thought to be relatively stable across cell types, although some TAD reorganization has been observed during cellular differentiation. However, little is known about the mechanisms through which TAD reorganization affects cell fate or how master transcription factors affect TAD structures during cell fate transitions. Here, we show extensive TAD reorganization during somatic cell reprogramming, which is correlated with gene transcription and changes in cellular identity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe molecular biological mechanism of tubal factor infertility (TFI) is still unclear. Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) are considered a major part of the competitive endogenous RNA (ceRNA) network and have attracted growing attention. Our study aimed to explore the regulatory mechanisms of lncRNAs associated with TFI and screen potential key genes related to TFI.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFComp Biochem Physiol C Toxicol Pharmacol
September 2021
Cathelicidins are an important antimicrobial peptide family and are expressed in many different vertebrates. They play an important role in the innate immune system of the host. However, amphibian cathelicidins are poorly understood.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCurrent robotic studies are focused on the performance of specific tasks. However, such tasks cannot be generalized, and some special tasks, such as compliant and precise manipulation, fast and flexible response, and deep collaboration between humans and robots, cannot be realized. Brain-inspired intelligent robots imitate humans and animals, from inner mechanisms to external structures, through an integration of visual cognition, decision making, motion control, and musculoskeletal systems.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCompared with short-lived emission probes featuring fluorescence imaging , the use of phosphorescent probes imparts the advantage of long-lived signal persistence that distinguishes against background fluorescence interference. However, the realization of ultralong organic phosphorescent (UOP) probes with an ultralong emission lifetime in an aqueous medium is still a challenge. Here, we present a rational strategy for obtaining UOP nanoparticles (NPs) in an air-saturated aqueous medium prepared using an organic phosphor (PDBCz) and a surfactant polymer (PVP), named PDBCz@PVP, showing an ultralong emission lifetime of 284.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAconitine (AC) is the primary bioactive and secondary metabolite alkaloidin of Aconitum species which is accounted for more than 60% of the total diester-diterpenoid alkaloids in Aconite. To evaluate the analgesic effects of AC, 4 different pain models including hot plate assay, acetic acid writhing assay, formalin and CFA induced pain models were adopted in this study. In hot plate experiment, AC treatment at concentration of 0.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMDMX is overexpressed in the vast majority of patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). We report that MDMX overexpression increases preleukemic stem cell (pre-LSC) number and competitive advantage. Utilizing five newly generated murine models, we found that MDMX overexpression triggers progression of multiple chronic/asymptomatic preleukemic conditions to overt AML.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe association between body mass index (BMI) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) remains controversial. Therefore, a meta-analysis was conducted to further evaluate the relationship. A comprehensive literature search was performed in PubMed, Web of Science, EMBASE, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), and Wanfang databases to identify eligible articles until July 15, 2020.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn the quest for post-CMOS (complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor) technologies, driven by the need for improved efficiency and performance, topologically protected ferromagnetic 'whirls' such as skyrmions and their anti-particles have shown great promise as solitonic information carriers in racetrack memory-in-logic or neuromorphic devices. However, the presence of dipolar fields in ferromagnets, which restricts the formation of ultrasmall topological textures, and the deleterious skyrmion Hall effect, when skyrmions are driven by spin torques, have thus far inhibited their practical implementation. Antiferromagnetic analogues, which are predicted to demonstrate relativistic dynamics, fast deflection-free motion and size scaling, have recently become the subject of intense focus, but they have yet to be experimentally demonstrated in natural antiferromagnetic systems.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of temperament classification (assessed using an arena test) on health and productivity of Hu ram lambs. In experiment one, eight ram lambs classified as calm and eight classified as nervous (selected from 100 ram lambs) were fed individually for 60-days to compare food intake, food digestibility, weight gain, and biochemical indices of health. In experiment two, nine ram lambs classified as calm and nine classified as nervous (selected from 150 ram lambs) were fed in a group and slaughter traits, meat quality, and muscle histology were compared.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: To investigate the influence of alanine transaminase (ALT) on the accuracy of alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) for detecting hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).
Methods: This retrospective study recruited 799 patients with HCC, cirrhosis, and chronic hepatitis due to hepatitis B infection and healthy adults between July 2017 and January 2019. Comparisons of the area under the receiver operating characteristic curves (AUCs) for detecting HCC in different ALT levels were calculated.
Optimal treatment of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) arising in elderly patients remains a challenge. FDA approval of Ivosidenib and Enasidenib, small molecule inhibitors of isocitrate dehydrogenase enzymes (IDH1 and 2) have opened new avenues of treatment. We present a 60-year-old woman with refractory AML, achieving complete response to the combination therapy of hypomethylating agent, Azacytidine with the IDH2 inhibitor, Enasidenib, and BCL2 inhibitor, Venetoclax.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOsteoclasts are bone resorption cells of myeloid origin. Osteoclast defects can lead to osteopetrosis, a genetic disorder characterized by bone sclerosis for which there is no effective drug treatment. It is known that Pu.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study investigated whether valproic acid (VPA, a histone deacetylase inhibitor) can interfere with the carcinogenicity of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). A typical representative compound of PAHs, 7,12-Dimethylbenz[a]anthracene (DMBA), was used to induce rat breast cancer. The results showed that therapeutic concentration of VPA (50 and 100 mg/kg) delayed the occurrence of tumors, reduced tumor formation rate and attenuated tumors growth, and have a protective effect on normal tissues.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has spread to the world. Whether there is an association between lifestyle behaviors and the acquisition of COVID-19 remains unclear.
Methods: In this case-control study, we recruited 105 patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection as a case group from the Wuhan Tongji Hospital (Wuhan, China).
Sensors (Basel)
October 2020
In this paper, we propose a new unsupervised attention-based cycle generative adversarial network to solve the problem of single-image dehazing. The proposed method adds an attention mechanism that can dehaze different areas on the basis of the previous generative adversarial network (GAN) dehazing method. This mechanism not only avoids the need to change the haze-free area due to the overall style migration of traditional GANs, but also pays attention to the different degrees of haze concentrations that need to be changed, while retaining the details of the original image.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn this article, the detailed photoexcitation dynamics which combines nonadiabatic molecular dynamics with electronic transitions shows the occurrence of amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) in conjugated polymers, accompanied by spontaneous electric polarization. The elaborate molecular dynamic process of ultrafast photoexcitation can be described as follows: Continuous external optical pumping (laser of 70 µJ/cm) not only triggers the appearance of an instantaneous four-level electronic structure but causes population inversion for ASE as well. At the same time, the phonon spectrum of the conjugated polymer changes, and five local infrared lattice vibrational modes form at the two ends, which break the original symmetry in the system and leads to charge accumulation at the ends of the polymer chain without an external electric field.
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