Hydrogel-Based Sensor for the Detection of Iron Ions and Excessive Alerting.

The excessive content of heavy metal ions in water has attracted increasing worldwide attention due to the potential harm to human health and ecological systems. Therefore, it is particularly significant to research and develop a sensitive and straightforward water quality monitoring method. Here, a dual-network designed hydrogel poly(acrylic acid-co--methylolacrylamide)/poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene): polystyrenesulfonate, P(AA-co-N-MA)/PEDOT: PSS, was constructed and used for Fe detection.

High-Sensitivity Electrical Admittance Sensor with Regression Analysis for Measuring Mixed Electrolyte Concentrations.

Electrolyte balance is essential for the proper functioning of the body, and imbalances can lead to various health issues, some of which may be life-threatening. Therefore, measuring electrolyte concentrations is becoming increasingly important, particularly for athletes engaged in high-intensity and prolonged physical activity. In this project, we developed a highly sensitive sensing device capable of accurately and rapidly measuring electrolyte concentrations in mixed solutions, providing precise analysis of trace electrolyte levels.

REDalign: accurate RNA structural alignment using residual encoder-decoder network.

Background: RNA secondary structural alignment serves as a foundational procedure in identifying conserved structural motifs among RNA sequences, crucially advancing our understanding of novel RNAs via comparative genomic analysis. While various computational strategies for RNA structural alignment exist, they often come with high computational complexity. Specifically, when addressing a set of RNAs with unknown structures, the task of simultaneously predicting their consensus secondary structure and determining the optimal sequence alignment requires an overwhelming computational effort of for each RNA pair.

Cardiac power output associated with hospitalization and mortality in coronary artery disease patients at stage B heart failure.

Background: Cardiac power output (CPO) predicts outcomes in advanced heart failure (HF) and cardiogenic shock, but its role in early HF stages is unclear. This study assessed the prognostic value of CPO in coronary artery disease patients with asymptomatic left ventricular systolic dysfunction (ALVSD) at stage B HF.

Methods: We conducted a retrospective analysis of coronary artery disease patients who underwent coronary and pulmonary artery catheterization between 2006 and 2016.

New generation estrogen receptor-targeted agents in breast cancer: present situation and future prospectives.

Endocrine therapy which blocking the signaling of estrogen receptor, has long been effective for decades as a primary treatment choice for breast cancer patients expressing ER. However, the issue of drug resistance poses a significant clinical challenge. It's critically important to create new therapeutic agents that can suppress ERα activity, particularly in cases of ESR1 mutations.

Substrate specificity of a branch of aromatic dioxygenases determined by three distinct motifs.

The inversion of substrate size specificity is an evolutionary roadblock for proteins. The Duf4243 dioxygenases GedK and BTG13 are known to catalyze the aromatic cleavage of bulky tricyclic hydroquinone. In this study, we discover a Duf4243 dioxygenase PaD that favors small monocyclic hydroquinones from the penicillic-acid biosynthetic pathway.

Functional characterization and structural basis of an efficient ochratoxin A-degrading amidohydrolase.

Ochratoxin A (OTA) contamination in various agro-products poses a serious threat to the global food safety and human health, leading to enormous economic losses. Enzyme-mediated OTA degradation is an appealing strategy, and the search for more efficient enzymes is a prerequisite for achieving this goal. Here, a novel amidohydrolase, termed PwADH, was demonstrated to exhibit 7.

Unleashing the Power of Evolution in Xylanase Engineering: Investigating the Role of Distal Mutation Regulation.

The drive to enhance enzyme performance in industrial applications frequently clashes with the practical limitations of exhaustive experimental screening, underscoring the urgency for more refined and strategic methodologies in enzyme engineering. In this study, xylanase Xyl-1 was used as the model, coupling evolutionary insights with energy functions to obtain theoretical potential mutants, which were subsequently validated experimentally. We observed that mutations in the nonloop region primarily aimed at enhancing stability and also encountered selective pressure for activity.

Functional tailoring of a PET hydrolytic enzyme expressed in Pichia pastoris.

Using enzymes to hydrolyze and recycle poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) is an attractive eco-friendly approach to manage the ever-increasing PET wastes, while one major challenge to realize the commercial application of enzyme-based PET degradation is to establish large-scale production methods to produce PET hydrolytic enzyme. To achieve this goal, we exploited the industrial strain Pichia pastoris to express a PET hydrolytic enzyme from Caldimonas taiwanensis termed CtPL-DM. In contrast to the protein expressed in Escherichia coli, CtPL-DM expressed in P.

Representativeness of the PIONEER-HF and PARAGLIDE-HF in patients hospitalized with acute heart failure.

Aims: The PIONEER-HF and PARAGLIDE-HF trials aimed to determine the efficacy and safety of the in-hospital initiation of sacubitril/valsartan in patients hospitalized for AHF. However, whether the inclusion and exclusion criteria of the trials apply to patients encountered in real-world routine care is unclear. This study aimed to investigate the applicability of the PIONEER-HF and PARAGLIDE-HF trials to real-world AHF patients.

Access Site Complication Rates Following Peripheral Artery Revascularization in patients With End-Stage Renal Disease: A Comparison of Vascular Closure Devices and Manual Compression.

Objectives: Manual compression (MC) or vascular closure devices (VCDs) are used to achieve hemostasis after percutaneous transluminal angioplasty (PTA). However, limited data on the comparative safety and effectiveness of VCDs vs MC in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) undergoing PTA are available. Accordingly, this study compared the safety and effectiveness of VCD and MC in patients with ESRD undergoing PTA.

2024 TSOC/TSPS Joint Consensus: Strategies for Advanced Vascular Wound Management in Arterial and Venous Diseases.

The Taiwan Society of Cardiology (TSOC) and Taiwan Society of Plastic Surgery (TSPS) have collaborated to develop a joint consensus for the management of patients with advanced vascular wounds. The taskforce comprises experts including preventive cardiologists, interventionists, and cardiovascular and plastic surgeons. The consensus focuses on addressing the challenges in diagnosing, treating, and managing complex wounds; incorporates the perfusion evaluation and the advanced vascular wound care team; and highlights the importance of cross-disciplinary teamwork.

Structural and functional insights into the self-sufficient flavin-dependent halogenase.

Flavin-dependent halogenases (FDHs) have tremendous applications in synthetic chemistry. A single-component FDH, AetF, exhibits both halogenase and reductase activities in a continuous polypeptide chain. AetF exhibits broad substrate promiscuity and catalyzes the two-step bromination of l-tryptophan (l-Trp) to produce 5-bromotryptophan (5-Br-Trp) and 5,7-dibromo-l-tryptophan (5,7-di-Br-Trp).

Discovery of novel covalent selective estrogen receptor degraders against endocrine-resistant breast cancer.

Endocrine-resistance remains a major challenge in estrogen receptor positive (ER) breast cancer (BC) treatment and constitutively active somatic mutations in ER are a common mechanism. There is an urgent need to develop novel drugs with new mode of mechanism to fight endocrine-resistance. Given aberrant ER activity, we herein report the identification of novel covalent selective estrogen receptor degraders (cSERDs) possessing the advantages of both covalent and degradation strategies.

Structural insights into a novel nonheme iron-dependent oxygenase in selenoneine biosynthesis.

Selenoneine (SEN) is a natural histidine derivative with radical-scavenging activity and shows higher antioxidant potential than its sulfur-containing isolog ergothioneine (EGT). Recently, the SEN biosynthetic pathway in Variovorax paradoxus was reported. Resembling EGT biosynthesis, the committed step of SEN synthesis is catalyzed by a nonheme Fe-dependent oxygenase termed SenA.

Remodeling the polymer-binding cavity to improve the efficacy of PBAT-degrading enzyme.

Poly(butylene adipate-co-terephthalate) (PBAT) is among the most widely applied synthetic polyesters that are utilized in the packaging and agricultural industries, but the accumulation of PBAT wastes has posed a great burden to ecosystems. Using renewable enzymes to decompose PBAT is an eco-friendly solution to tackle this problem. Recently, we demonstrated that cutinase is the most effective PBAT-degrading enzyme and that an engineered cutinase termed TfCut-DM could completely decompose PBAT film to terephthalate (TPA).

The structural and functional investigation into an unusual nitrile synthase.

The biosynthesis of neurotoxin aetokthonotoxin (AETX) that features a unique structure of pentabrominated biindole nitrile involves a first-of-its-kind nitrile synthase termed AetD, an enzyme that shares very low sequence identity to known structures and catalyzes an unprecedented mechanism. In this study, we resolve the crystal structure of AetD in complex with the substrate 5,7-di-Br-L-Trp. AetD adopts the heme oxygenase like fold and forms a hydrophobic cavity within a helical bundle to accommodate the indole moiety.

LSTM4piRNA: Efficient piRNA Detection in Large-Scale Genome Databases Using a Deep Learning-Based LSTM Network.

Piwi-interacting RNAs (piRNAs) are a new class of small, non-coding RNAs, crucial in the regulation of gene expression. Recent research has revealed links between piRNAs, viral defense mechanisms, and certain human cancers. Due to their clinical potential, there is a great interest in identifying piRNAs from large genome databases through efficient computational methods.

Phosphoantigens glue butyrophilin 3A1 and 2A1 to activate Vγ9Vδ2 T cells.

In both cancer and infections, diseased cells are presented to human Vγ9Vδ2 T cells through an 'inside out' signalling process whereby structurally diverse phosphoantigen (pAg) molecules are sensed by the intracellular domain of butyrophilin BTN3A1. Here we show how-in both humans and alpaca-multiple pAgs function as 'molecular glues' to promote heteromeric association between the intracellular domains of BTN3A1 and the structurally similar butyrophilin BTN2A1. X-ray crystallography studies visualized that engagement of BTN3A1 with pAgs forms a composite interface for direct binding to BTN2A1, with various pAg molecules each positioned at the centre of the interface and gluing the butyrophilins with distinct affinities.

Comparison of long-term outcomes of complete vs. incomplete revascularization in elderly patients (≥75 years) with acute coronary syndrome and multi-vessel disease undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention.

Background: The optimal revascularization strategy for elderly patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS) remains uncertain. We evaluated the impact of complete revascularization (CR) vs. incomplete revascularization (IR) in elderly ACS patients with multivessel disease (MVD) undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI).