Tailored Lattice Compressive Strain of Pt-Skins by the L1 -Pt M Intermetallic Core for Highly Efficient Oxygen Reduction.

The sluggish kinetics of oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and unsatisfactory durability of Pt-based catalysts are severely hindering the commercialization of proton-exchange-membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs). In this work, the lattice compressive strain of Pt-skins imposed by Pt-based intermetallic cores is tailored for highly effective ORR through the confinement effect of the activated nitrogen-doped porous carbon (a-NPC). The modulated pores of a-NPC not only promote Pt-based intermetallics with ultrasmall size (average size of <4 nm), but also efficiently stabilizes intermetallic nanoparticles and sufficient exposure of active sites during the ORR process.

Insights into the microstructure and interconnectivity of porosity in porous starch by hyperpolarized Xe NMR.

For the first time, hyperpolarized (HP) Xe NMR measurements are utilized to explore porous structures of porous starch (PS) successfully. Some micropores resided inside the mesopore walls of PS were detected by variable temperature (VT) HP Xe NMR, and the pore sizes of micropores were also estimated using the empirical relationship. Furthermore, the interconnectivity of pores was investigated in detail by two-dimensional (2D) exchange spectroscopy (EXSY).

Xe NMR: A powerful tool for studying the adsorption mechanism between mesoporous corn starch and palladium.

For the first time, Xe NMR measurements are utilized to explore adsorption mechanism between porous structures of mesoporous corn starch and Palladium. Dithiocarbamate modified mesoporous corn starch (donated as DTC MS) was synthesized and applied for adsorption of Pd (II) ion successfully. The structural characterization of DTC MS was carried out by FT-IR, C solid-state NMR and XRD, respectively.

Construction of octenyl succinic anhydride modified porous starch for improving bioaccessibility of β-carotene in emulsions.

Modified porous starch (PS), by introducing octenyl succinic anhydride (OSA) moieties, was synthesized successfully, which was applied as an emulsion of β-carotene for the first time. The pores and channels within porous starch provided more possibilities for OSA to modify starch. The ester linkage of OSA modified PS with different degrees of substitution (DS) were confirmed by both C solid-state NMR and Fourier transform-infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR).

Systematic discovery of the functional impact of somatic genome alterations in individual tumors through tumor-specific causal inference.

Cancer is mainly caused by somatic genome alterations (SGAs). Precision oncology involves identifying and targeting tumor-specific aberrations resulting from causative SGAs. We developed a novel tumor-specific computational framework that finds the likely causative SGAs in an individual tumor and estimates their impact on oncogenic processes, which suggests the disease mechanisms that are acting in that tumor.