Physical obstacles in the substrate cause maize root growth trajectories to switch from vertical to oblique.

Hard pans, soil compaction, soil aggregation, and stones create physical barriers that can affect the development of a root system. Roots are known to exploit paths of least resistance to avoid such obstacles, but the mechanism through which this is achieved is not well understood. Here, we used a combination of 3D-printed substrates with a high-throughput live-imaging platform to study the responses of maize roots to a range of physical barriers.

A reusable AuNPS with increased stability applied for fast screening of trace heavy metals in edible and medicinal marine products.

Heavy metal pollution in marine environment poses a severe threat to the safety of marine products and is thus causing increasingly concerns in terms of their toxicity and potential health risks pose to human. Due to the complex matrix of marine products, a fast screening method for heavy metals at trace level with low price, reusability, high accuracy and long lifetime is of urgency and necessity for consumers and processing factories. This work described a simplified screening system through the preparation, characterization and particular application of Au nano particle sensor (AuNPS) in the complex marine matrix, the main aim is to significantly increase the stability, sensitivity and lifetime of detection system dedicated to Cu and Hg trace analysis in marine products.

Tin based organic-inorganic hybrid semiconductors with reversible phase transition and dielectric anomaly.

Organic-inorganic hybrid materials with perovskite structure have recently attracted tremendous interest due to their structural tunability and rich functional properties, such as phase transition and photoelectric properties. Within this context, two discrete tin-based organic-inorganic hybrid compounds [(FMBA)2SnCl6] (1) and [(FMBA)2SnBr6] (2) were prepared by the reaction of 3-fluoro-N-methylbenzylamine (FMBA) with SnX4 (X = Cl, Br) in the corresponding concentrated halogen acids HX. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and dielectric measurements showed that both compounds underwent reversible phase transition and dielectric anomaly at a phase transition point above 400 K.

[Safety evaluation of heavy metals contaminated Astragalus membranaceus using health risk assessment model].

To evaluate the safety of heavy metals contaminated Astragalus membranaceus,an appropriate protocol was established to study the heavy metals pollution level by health risk assessment. This study provided a detailed procedure to assess the medicinal herbs in quality control and safety evaluation,and expected to create awareness among the public on the safety of consuming of A. membranaceus or any other kinds of medicinal herbs.