Publications by authors named "Fei Fang"

Low-temperature direct ammonia fuel cell (DAFC) stands out as a more secure technology than the hydrogen fuel cell system, while there is still a lack of elegant bottom-up synthesis procedures for efficient ammonia oxidation reaction (AOR) electrocatalysts. The widely accepted d-band center, even with consideration of the d-band width, usually fails to describe variations in AOR reactivity in many practical conditions, and a more accurate activity descriptor is necessary for a less empirical synthesis path. Herein, the upper d-band edge, ε, derived from the d-band model, is identified as an effective descriptor for accurately establishing the descriptor-activity relationship.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The relationships between different dietary carbohydrates and risk of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have been rarely assessed. This study examined the relationships of different dietary carbohydrates with incident COPD and lung function, and the potential mediating role of chronic inflammation.

Methods: A total of 205,752 UK Biobank participants were included.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The development of active packaging offers a promising approach to reducing food waste. However, challenges remain, particularly in achieving efficient release dynamics of active compounds and balancing the barrier properties. Herein, a Janus structure zein/chitosan film is custom designed by layer-by-layer casting method to achieve sustainable and unidirectional release performance of antimicrobial agent, which comprises an inner loading layer of tannic acid (TA) and cinnamon essential oil (CEO) co-loaded Pickering emulsion incorporated with chitosan and an outer barrier layer of zein.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Bell palsy (BP) is a common cause of sudden facial paralysis, which negatively affects patients' daily lives and physical appearance.
  • This study aims to compare the effectiveness of two types of electroacupuncture (EA) waveforms—low frequency continuous and intermittent—on improving facial function in BP patients through a randomized clinical trial involving 120 participants.
  • It is the first study to assess the safety and treatment effects of these waveform types, potentially guiding future research on optimal EA parameters for BP.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The study aimed to examine how frailty affects outcomes after cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) by reviewing published research.
  • A systematic search identified 15 observational studies that assessed frailty using objective methods and analyzed the data using a random effects model.
  • Results showed frail patients had a significantly higher risk of in-hospital mortality and long-term complications, but frailty did not significantly impact the response to CRT; tailoring pre-CRT evaluations for frail patients could improve outcomes.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Atherosclerotic calcification often coincides with osteoporosis, suggesting a potential interplay between bone and vascular mineralization. Osteoblast-derived matrix vesicles (Ost-MVs), pivotal in bone mineralization, have emerged as potential contributors to ectopic vascular calcification. However, the precise role of Ost-MVs in vascular calcification and the underlying mechanisms remain elusive.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: Peer review frequently follows a process where reviewers first provide initial reviews, authors respond to these reviews, then reviewers update their reviews based on the authors' response. There is mixed evidence regarding whether this process is useful, including frequent anecdotal complaints that reviewers insufficiently update their scores. In this study, we aim to investigate whether reviewers anchor to their original scores when updating their reviews, which serves as a potential explanation for the lack of updates in reviewer scores.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Autoimmunity underlies many painful disorders, such as enthesopathies, which localize to the enthesis. From infiltration of the synovium and axial skeleton by B cells, to disturbances in the ratio of M1/M2 enthesis macrophages, to CD8 + T cell mediated inflammation, autoimmune dysregulation is becoming increasingly well characterized in enthesopathies. Tissue resident B cells, macrophages, neutrophils, and T cells have also been localized in healthy human entheses.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • * This study improves nanozyme performance by integrating Ru atoms into a VSnC MAX phase, resulting in V(SnRu)C, which exhibits a remarkable peroxidase-like activity, exceeding that of horseradish peroxidase.
  • * The findings also highlight the successful use of V(SnRu)C in a heart failure biomarker test and its broad antibacterial properties, paving the way for better-designed nanozymes in scientific applications.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Sarcopenia, an age-related disease, may be mitigated by melatonin (MEL), a hormone with antioxidant properties that helps combat oxidative stress in aging.* -
  • In a study, middle-aged mice treated with MEL showed improved muscle strength, endurance, and overall muscle weight, while also displaying less muscle damage and healthier mitochondrial function.* -
  • The results suggest that MEL influences key molecular pathways linked to muscle health, making it potentially more effective at higher doses (10 mg/kg) for treating sarcopenia-related issues.*
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Abnormal tau protein accumulation is a key feature of Alzheimer's disease, with various post-translational modifications (PTMs) such as phosphorylation contributing to the disease's progression.
  • A pilot study used complementary techniques, CZE-MS/MS and RPLC-MS/MS, to analyze recombinant human tau-0N3R, resulting in the identification of 50 phosphorylation sites, which is 25% more than RPLC-MS/MS could find alone.
  • The study also introduced capillary isoelectric focusing (cIEF)-MS, revealing multiple tau-0N3R proteoforms, some with up to nine phosphorylation sites, highlighting the effectiveness of these techniques for studying tau's complexity and potential dimerization.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • A study explores the early evolution of molecules in the universe, focusing on the abundant simple molecule, CH (carbon hyride).
  • It was found that high-energy γ-ray photons can drive the conversion of aqueous-phase CH into various products, especially glycine when ammonia is added, even at room temperature.
  • The presence of solid granules modifies the conversion process, with the addition of SiO leading to a high selectivity for CHCOOH (82%), suggesting a possible pathway for creating complex organic compounds in space and improving carbon usage for valuable products.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The study explores the relationship between cannabis use and metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD) among U.S. adults, especially focusing on clinically significant fibrosis (CSF).
  • Using data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (2017-2018), researchers performed a cross-sectional analysis on 2,756 participants regarding their cannabis use and liver health metrics.
  • While overall cannabis use was not linked to liver stiffness in MASLD patients, heavy cannabis use among women showed a potential association with MASLD and CSF, suggesting a nuanced impact of cannabis on liver health.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) secreted by endothelial cells in response to blood laminar flow play a crucial role in maintaining vascular homeostasis. However, the potential of these EVs to modulate the immune microenvironment within plaques for treating atherosclerosis remains unclear. Here, we present compelling evidence that EVs secreted by endothelial cells sheared by atheroprotective laminar shear stress (LSS-EVs) exhibit excellent immunoregulatory effects against atherosclerosis.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Capillary zone electrophoresis-tandem mass spectrometry (CZE-MS/MS) is a promising technique for top-down proteomics, but traditional neutral coatings have limitations in separation resolution due to protein adsorption.
  • This study introduces a cationic coating using poly (acrylamide-co-(3-acrylamidopropyl) trimethylammonium chloride) [PAMAPTAC], which significantly improves separation resolution and reproducibility for proteoform analysis compared to the standard linear polyacrylamide (LPA) coating.
  • The new PAMAPTAC coating enables effective detection of larger proteoforms from complex samples without prior size-based separation, potentially enhancing proteomic studies.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Critical limb ischemia (CLI) is caused by chronic inflammation in the vascular system and can be treated by inhibiting macrophage inflammation.
  • Modifying extracellular vesicles from endothelial cells with platelet membranes enhances their effectiveness in reducing macrophage activity, while a new alginate-based collagen composite hydrogel aids in localized delivery.
  • Treatment with the modified vesicles in the hydrogel significantly improves blood supply and reduces inflammation, showing promise as a strategy for CLI therapy.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Bixafen (BIX), a member of the succinate dehydrogenase inhibitor (SDHI) class of fungicides, has seen a surge in interest due to its expanding market presence and positive development outlook. However, there is a growing concern about its potential harm to aquatic life, largely due to its resistance to breaking down in the environment. In this study, we thoroughly examined the toxicological impact of BIX on zebrafish as a model organism.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • - The text discusses the significance of microRNA (miRNA) in diagnosing conditions like hypoxic cognitive impairment and cancers, highlighting current detection methods' issues with sensitivity and false positives due to interference.
  • - A new detection technique is introduced that combines padlock-based target identification, signal amplification with immobilized primers, and use of a personal glucose meter, making it portable and user-friendly.
  • - This innovative method offers precise site identification, high sensitivity, and no need for complex instruments, which could enhance diagnosis and research in diseases such as cancer and cognitive impairments.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Convolutional neural networks (CNNs) struggle to predict a variety of stitch types for embroidery feature synthesis, which hampers their ability to extract stitch features effectively.
  • The authors introduce a new model called multi-stitch embroidery generative adversarial network (MSEmbGAN) that incorporates a region-aware texture generation sub-network to improve the prediction of diverse embroidery features.
  • A new multi-stitch embroidery dataset has been created, containing over 30K images, and shows that MSEmbGAN outperforms existing embroidery synthesis methods in various evaluations.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Wang, Bowen, Mengjia Peng,, Liheng Jiang,, Fei Fang,, Juan Wang,, Yan Li,, Ruichen Zhao,, and Yuliang Wang,. A Rare Case of High-Altitude Polycythemia Complicated by Spontaneous Splenic Rupture. 25:247-250, 2024.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: We aimed to compare the clinical and endoscopic characteristics of sessile serrated lesions (SSLs) with dysplasia/carcinoma (SSLD/Cs) and SSLs without dysplasia in this systematic review and meta-analysis.

Methods: MEDLINE, EMBASE, and Cochrane Library databases and Clinicaltrials.gov were searched for relevant studies published up to August 28, 2023.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Abnormal accumulation of tau proteins is one pathological hallmark of Alzheimer□s disease (AD). Many tau protein post-translational modifications (PTMs) are associated with the development of AD, such as phosphorylation, acetylation, and methylation. Therefore, a complete picture of PTM landscape of tau is critical for understanding the molecular mechanisms of AD progression.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Mass spectrometry (MS)-based top-down proteomics (TDP) analysis of histone proteoforms provides critical information about combinatorial post-translational modifications (PTMs), which is vital for pursuing a better understanding of epigenetic regulation of gene expression. It requires high-resolution separations of histone proteoforms before MS and tandem MS (MS/MS) analysis. In this work, for the first time, we combined SDS-PAGE-based protein fractionation (passively eluting proteins from polyacrylamide gels as intact species for mass spectrometry, PEPPI-MS) with capillary zone electrophoresis (CZE)-MS/MS for high-resolution characterization of histone proteoforms.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Urine testing as a routine screening programme, abnormal test results can be suggestive to clinicians but can sometimes be overlooked, and the establishment of a diagnostic model can better assist clinicians in identifying potential problems. BLD (blood), LEU (leukocyte), PRO (protein) and GLU (glucose) are the four most important parameters in urine testing, and the accuracy of their results is a key concern for clinicians, so it is essential to verify the accuracy of their results. In this study, we evaluated the analytical and clinical performance of Mindray's automatic urine dry chemistry analyzer, the UA-5600 (Hereinafter referred to as the (UA-5600), and the test strips configured with the instrument, and developed a machine-learning (ML) model for kidney disease screening from the results of 11 parameters output from the UA-5600 with the aim of detecting abnormal urine test results.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Medial arterial calcification (MAC) accompanying chronic kidney disease (CKD) leads to increased vessel wall stiffness, myocardial ischemia, heart failure, and increased cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. Unfortunately, there are currently no drugs available to treat MAC. The natural polyphenol epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG) has been demonstrated to protect against cardiovascular disease; however, whether EGCG supplementation inhibits MAC in CKD remains unclear.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF