Publications by authors named "Mengdi Sun"

Mitochondrial targeting in gliomas represents a novel therapeutic strategy with significant potential to enhance drug sensitivity by effectively killing glioma cells at the mitochondrial level. In this study, we developed artificial mitochondria derived from mitochondrial membrane-based nanovesicles, enabling precise mitochondrial targeting of doxorubicin (Dox) to selectively eradicate cancer cells by amplifying multiple cell death pathways. It was found that Dox-encapsulating mitochondria-based nanovesicles (DOX-MitoNVs) exhibited an extraordinary ability to penetrate the blood-brain barrier (BBB), specifically targeting gliomas.

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Chicoric acid (CA) as one of Chinese medicines had anti-inflammatory, less gastrointestinal irritation, less drug-resistance and low cost properties compared with chemical synthesized drug and biologics for rheumatoid arthritis (RA) treatment. To make CA preciously and effectly RA therapy, we firstly developed a supramolecular hydrogel (GHCAP) comprising β-cyclodextrin and graphene oxide (GO) modified hyaluronic acid (CD-HA-GO) as the "host" polymer and adamantane-modified four-arm polyethylene glycol (PEG-AD) as the "guest" polymer, and then the CA was loaded into the supramolecular hydrogel (DGHCAP). The results showed that DGHCAP exhibited injectable, high modulus, high CA loading rate (43.

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Article Synopsis
  • * The sensitivity is analyzed through a new metric called Fisher Information capacity, which considers fundamental quantum noise conditions.
  • * Using Bayesian optimization, we maximize this Fisher Information, enhancing sensitivity by integrating various physical phenomena within a single sensor-resonator, outperforming traditional shot-noise limited gyroscopes of similar size and power usage.
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Water oxidation presents a promising avenue for hydrogen peroxide (HO) production. However, the reliance on alkaline bicarbonate electrolytes as an intermediate has limitations, such as HO decomposition and a narrow pH effectiveness range (7-9), restricting its utility across wider pH ranges. This study unveils a crystal OH mediating pathway that stabilizes SOOH* as a crucial intermediate.

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In recent years, the rapid advancement of flexible conductive materials has significantly increased the demand for dough materials that offer high flexibility and conductivity for diverse applications. Here, we developed a flexible, stretchable, and self-healing dough utilizing hydrogen-bonding interactions between glutathione-stabilized copper nanoclusters (GSH-Cu NCs) and poly(acrylic acid) (PAA). The dough materials can be kneaded, readily reshaped, and further processed to create bulk materials of arbitrary form factors.

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Overexpression of ZmNAC19, a NAC transcription factor gene from maize, improves embryo development in transgenic Arabidopsis. NAC proteins are plant-specific transcription factors that are involved in multiple aspects of plant growth, development and stress response. Although functions of many NAC transcription factors have been elucidated, little is known about their roles in seed development.

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Article Synopsis
  • Understanding how chiral transfer works is essential for controlling chiral properties in materials, but finding new components for this process remains a challenge.
  • Liquid crystals (LCs), which are responsive materials, can be used to create chiral substances by confining chiral metal nanoclusters (NCs) within an achiral LC phase.
  • The study shows that adding chiral glutathione-stabilized copper NCs to a specific LC formulation can create supramolecular chirality and allows for control over the handedness of chirality, which enhances circularly polarized luminescence (CPL) signals when optimized.
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Preclinical evidence has firmly established a bidirectional interaction among the lung, gut, and gut microbiome. There are many complex communication pathways between the lung and intestine, which affect each other's balance. Some metabolites produced by intestinal microorganisms, intestinal immune cells, and immune factors enter lung tissue through blood circulation and participate in lung immune function.

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Objective: To explore the potential categories and influencing factors of fatigue trajectory in maintenance haemodialysis patients.

Methods: Between June 2023 and December 2023, a convenience sample of 306 maintenance haemodialysis patients in a tertiary hospital haemodialysis centre in Zhenjiang City was selected as the study population, and patient information was collected monthly after the baseline survey using the General Information Questionnaire, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Scale, Piper Fatigue Revision Scale, Collaborative Social Support Scale, Patient Health Questionnaire Depression Scale, Comprehensive Economic Toxicity Rating Scale, and Fear of Disease Progression Simplified Scale, for a total of six follow-up visits. In addition, the potential category growth model was used to identify the developmental trajectory of fatigue, and univariate analysis and binary logistic regression were used to analyse its determinants.

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Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are recognized as potential candidates for next-generation drug delivery systems. However, the inherent cancer-targeting efficiency is unsatisfactory, necessitating surface modification to attach cell-binding ligands. By utilizing phospholipase D from Streptomyces in combination with maleimide-containing primary alcohol, the authors successfully anchored ligands onto milk-derived EVs (mEVs), overcoming the issues of ligand leakage or functional alteration seen in traditional methods.

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Repairing damaged tissue caused by bacterial infection poses a significant challenge. Traditional antibacterial hydrogels typically incorporate various components such as metal antimicrobials, inorganic antimicrobials, organic antimicrobials, and more. However, drawbacks such as the emergence of multi-drug resistance to antibiotics, the low antibacterial efficacy of natural agents, and the potential cytotoxicity associated with metal antibacterial nanoparticles in hydrogels hindered their broader clinical application.

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Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis is a chronic interstitial lung disease characterized by excessive deposition of extracellular matrix. Cannabidiol, a natural component extracted from plant cannabis, has been shown to have therapeutic effects on lung diseases, but its exact mechanism of action is unknown, hindering its therapeutic effectiveness. To establish a pulmonary fibrosis model, combined with UPLC-Q-TOF/MS metabolomics and 16S rDNA sequencing, to explore cannabidiol's mechanism in treating pulmonary fibrosis.

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Schisandrae Sphenantherae Fructus (SSF), the dry ripe fruit of Rehd. et Wils., is a traditional Chinese medicine with wide application potential.

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Microbial biofilm build-up in water distribution systems can pose a risk to human health and pipe material integrity. The impact is more devastating in space stations and to astronauts due to the isolation from necessary replacement parts and medical resources. As a result, there is a need for coatings to be implemented onto the inner region of the pipe to minimize the adherence and growth of biofilms.

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A light-trapping transparent electrode design based on sub-surface binary dielectric gratings is introduced and demonstrated experimentally. The structure consists of metallic wires patterned with an array of silicon nanobeams. Optimization of the grating geometry achieves selective suppression of zero-order diffraction, while enabling redirection of incident light to an angle that exceeds critical angle of the local environment.

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Laboratory-scale analysis of natural rocks provides petrophysical properties such as density, porosity, pore diameter/pore-throat diameter distribution, and fluid accessibility, in addition to the size and shape of framework grains and their contact relationship with the rock matrix. Different types of laboratory approaches for petrophysical characterization involve the use of a range of sample sizes. While the sample sizes selected should aim to be representative of the rock body, there are inherent limitations imposed by the analytical principles and holding capacities of the different experimental apparatuses, with many instruments only able to accept samples at the μm-mm scale.

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. Accurate image registration is an important step in online image-guided adaptive radiotherapy. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of different factors on registration accuracy in a magnetic resonance (MR)-guided adaptive radiotherapy workflow.

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Objective: We aimed to study the cut-off values of estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) and the urinary albumin creatinine ratio (UACR) in the normal range for diabetic kidney disease (DKD).

Methods: In this study, we conducted a retrospective, observational cohort study included 374 type 2 diabetic patients who had baseline eGFR ≥60 mL/min/1.73 m and UACR <30 mg/g with up to 6 years of follow-up.

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Electroactive polymer (EAP) is a kind of intelligent material that, driven by external electric field, could produce changes in shape or volume. As an important class of EAP materials, poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) based relaxor ferroelectric polymers show remarkable potential for applications in sensors, actuator, and artificial muscles because of their excellent electrostrictive properties. However, the strain of PVDF-based relaxor ferroelectrics relies strongly on a high electric field, which seriously damages their reliability and limits their practical applications as wearable devices.

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A comprehensive characterisation of the pore structure in shale oil reservoirs is essential for forecasting oil production and exploration risks. This study forecasted these risks in the oil-rich Songliao Basin using combination of high-resolution field emission scanning electron microscopy and quantitative X-ray diffraction to analyze the pore genesis and evolution mode within the first member of the Cretaceous Qingshankou Formation (Kqn). The results showed the dominance of inorganic pores over organic pores, wherein diagenetic processes, such as compaction, pressure solution, and cementation, were responsible for the destruction of pore structure in the formation.

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As an effective form of narrative visualization, visual data stories are widely used in data-driven storytelling to communicate complex insights and support data understanding. Although important, they are difficult to create, as a variety of interdisciplinary skills, such as data analysis and design, are required. In this work, we introduce Erato, a human-machine cooperative data story editing system, which allows users to generate insightful and fluent data stories together with the computer.

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Pictorial visualizations portray data with figurative messages and approximate the audience to the visualization. Previous research on pictorial visualizations has developed authoring tools or generation systems, but their methods are restricted to specific visualization types and templates. Instead, we propose to augment pictorial visualization authoring with visual style transfer, enabling a more extensible approach to visualization design.

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Metal oxide semiconductors have been regarded as ideal candidates for photoelectrochemical (PEC) CO reduction if the contradiction between photon harvesting and photocarrier collection can be resolved. The novel three-dimensional structure provides an available approach to balancing the above-mentioned contradiction. In this work, CuBiO photonic crystal photocathodes with different feature sizes were developed to realize the regulation of optoelectrical properties.

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The reconstruction of a tubule-like structure in vitro has provided a promising system to analyze factors that drive morphogenesis and the underlying mechanisms. In this study, we took advantage of the inhibitor cyclopamine and a smoothened agonist to detect the role of the Dhh signaling pathway in the reconstructed tubule-like structure. Sertoli cells did not show polarity, rounded peritubular myoid cells and scattered Leydig cells were observed, combined with less laminin and lower proliferation of Leydig, peritubular myoid, germ, and Sertoli cells.

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Recently, soft actuators have attracted considerable interest owing to their biomimetic performance. Unfortunately, it remains a great challenge to fabricate multi-stimuli-responsive soft actuators by a facile but low-cost method. Herein, a thermoplastic film with bilayered architecture was designed and fabricated by a one-step method.

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