Compact highly sensitive photothermal RT-LAMP chip for simultaneous multidisease detection.

Developing instant detection systems with disease diagnostic capabilities holds immense importance for remote or resource-limited areas. However, the task of creating these systems-which are simultaneously easy to operate, rapid in detection, and cost-effective-remains a challenge. In this study, we present a compact highly sensitive photothermal reverse transcriptase-loop-mediated isothermal amplification (RT-LAMP) chip (SPRC) designed for the detection of multiple diseases.

BML-111 Modulates and Alleviates p38/MAPK Signaling Pathway and Th1/Th2/Th17 Cytokine Response in Murine Psoriasis-Like Dermatitis.

Background: Psoriasis is a prevalent cutaneous inflammatory disorder characterized by elevated keratinocyte inflammation. 5(S)-6(R)-7-trihydroxyheptanoic-acid-methyl-ester (BML-111), an established analogue of lipoxin A4, is known for its potent anti-inflammatory properties. However, the precise role of BML-111 within a murine psoriasis-like dermatitis model requires further clarification.

Automatic detection of fluorescent droplets for droplet digital PCR: a device capable of processing multiple microscope images.

Droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) is recognized as a high-precision method for nucleic acid quantification, extensively utilized in biomedical research and clinical diagnostics. This technique employs microfluidic technology to partition the nucleic acid-containing reaction mixture into discrete droplets for amplification, achieving absolute quantification by identifying and enumerating the number of fluorescent droplets. The accuracy of droplet quantification is pivotal to the success of the assay.

Ambient Moisture-Driven Self-Powered Iontophoresis Patch for Enhanced Transdermal Drug Delivery.

Iontophoretic transdermal drug delivery (TDD) devices are known to enhance the transdermal transport of drugs. However, conventional transdermal iontophoretic devices require external power sources, wired connections, or mechanical parts, which reduce the comfort level for patients during extended use. In this work, a self-powered, wearable transdermal iontophoretic patch (TIP) is proposed by harvesting ambient humidity for energy generation, enabling controlled TDD.

Multifunctional flexible magnetic drive gripper for target manipulation in complex constrained environments.

Soft actuators capable of remote-controlled guidance and manipulation within complex constrained spaces hold great promise in various fields, especially in medical fields such as minimally invasive surgery. However, most current magnetic drive soft actuators only have the functions of position control and guidance, and it is still challenging to achieve more flexible operations on different targets within constrained spaces. Herein, we propose a multifunctional flexible magnetic drive gripper that can be steered within complex constrained spaces and operate on targets of various shapes.

Comparative study on gene expression in psoriatic lesions versus chronic wound healing processes.

Psoriasis and chronic ulcers not only significantly impair quality of life but also pose a challenge in dermatological treatment. This study aimed to identify new therapeutic targets and biomarkers for psoriasis and chronic ulcers by comparing their gene expression profiles. The gene expression profiles of psoriatic, wound and chronic ulcer patients, as well as healthy controls, were determined via RNA extraction and next-generation sequencing of biopsies.

Prelimbic area to lateral hypothalamus circuit drives social aggression.

Controlling aggression is a vital skill in social species such as rodents and humans and has been associated with the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). In this study, we showed that during aggressive behavior, the activity of GABAergic neurons in the prelimbic area (PL) of the mPFC was significantly suppressed. Specific activation of GABAergic PL neurons significantly curbed male-to-male aggression and inhibited conditioned place preference (CPP) for aggression-paired contexts, whereas specific inhibition of GABAergic PL neurons brought about the opposite effect.

Wireless and Closed-Loop Smart Dressing for Exudate Management and On-Demand Treatment of Chronic Wounds.

Chronic wounds have become a significant threat to people's physical and mental health and have increased the burden of social medical care. Intelligent wound dressing (IWD) with wound condition monitoring and closed-loop on-demand drug therapy can shorten the healing process and alleviate patient suffering. However, single-function wound dressings cannot meet the current needs of chronic wound treatment.

Bioinspired claw-engaged and biolubricated swimming microrobots creating active retention in blood vessels.

Swimming microrobots guided in the circulation system offer considerable promise in precision medicine but currently suffer from problems such as limited adhesion to blood vessels, intensive blood flow, and immune system clearance-all reducing the targeted interaction. A swimming microrobot design with clawed geometry, a red blood cell (RBC) membrane-camouflaged surface, and magnetically actuated retention is discussed, allowing better navigation and inspired by the tardigrade's mechanical claw engagement, coupled to an RBC membrane coating, to minimize blood flow impact. Using clinical intravascular optical coherence tomography in vivo, the microrobots' activity and dynamics in a rabbit jugular vein was monitored, illustrating very effective magnetic propulsion, even against a flow of ~2.

Portable general microfluidic device with complex electric field regulation functions for electrokinetic experiments.

Electrokinetic sample manipulation is a key step for many kinds of microfluidic chips to achieve various functions, such as particle focusing and separation, fluid pumping and material synthesis. But these microfluidic experiments usually rely on large-scale signal generators for power supply, microscopes for imaging and other instruments for analysis, which hampers the portable process of microfluidic technology. Inspired by this situation, we herein designed a portable general microfluidic device (PGMD) with complex electric field regulation functions, which can accurately regulate static or continuous fluid samples.

Liquid metal droplet motion transferred from an alkaline solution by a robot arm.

The excellent motion performance of gallium-based liquid metals (LMs) upon the application of a modest electric field has provided a new opportunity for the development of autonomous soft robots. However, the locomotion of LMs often appears in an alkaline solution, which hampers the application under other different conditions. In this work, a novel robot arm is designed to transfer the motion of the LM from an alkaline solution in a synchronous drive mode.

A Self-Powered Dielectrophoretic Microparticle Manipulation Platform Based on a Triboelectric Nanogenerator.

Lab-on-a-chip systems aim to integrate laboratory operations on a miniaturized device with broad application prospects in the field of point-of-care testing. However, bulky peripheral power resources, such as high-voltage supplies, function generators, and amplifiers, hamper the commercialization of the system. In this work, a portable, self-powered microparticle manipulation platform based on triboelectrically driven dielectrophoresis (DEP) is reported.

RankAxis: Towards a Systematic Combination of Projection and Ranking in Multi-Attribute Data Exploration.

Projection and ranking are frequently used analysis techniques in multi-attribute data exploration. Both families of techniques help analysts with tasks such as identifying similarities between observations and determining ordered subgroups, and have shown good performances in multi-attribute data exploration. However, they often exhibit problems such as distorted projection layouts, obscure semantic interpretations, and non-intuitive effects produced by selecting a subset of (weighted) attributes.

Liquid Metal-Based Flexible and Wearable Sensor for Functional Human-Machine Interface.

Rigid sensors are a mature type of sensor, but their poor deformation and flexibility limit their application range. The appearance and development of flexible sensors provide an opportunity to solve this problem. In this paper, a resistive flexible sensor utilizes gallium-based liquid metal (eutectic gallium indium alloy, EGaIn) and poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) and is fabricated using an injecting thin-line patterning technique based on soft lithography.

Three Dimensional Printing of Bioinspired Crossed-Lamellar Metamaterials with Superior Toughness for Syntactic Foam Substitution.

Biological materials such as conch shells with crossed-lamellar textures hold impressive mechanical properties due to their capability to realize effective crack control and energy dissipation through the structural synergy of interfacial modulus mismatch and lamellar orientation disparity. Integrating this mechanism with mechanical metamaterial design can not only avoid the catastrophic post-yield stress drop found in traditional architectural materials with uniform lattice structures but also effectively maintain the stress level and improve the energy absorption ability. Herein, a novel bioinspired design strategy that combines regional particularity and overall cyclicity is proposed to innovate the connotation of long-range periodicity inside the metamaterial, in which the node constraint gradient and crossed-lamellar struts corresponding to the core features of conch shells are able to guide the deformation sequence with a self-strengthening response during compression.

Numerical investigation of field-effect control on hybrid electrokinetics for continuous and position-tunable nanoparticle concentration in microfluidics.

We introduce herein an effective way for continuous delivery and position-switchable trapping of nanoparticles via field-effect control on hybrid electrokinetics (HEK). Flow field-effect transistor exploiting HEK delicately combines horizontal linear electroosmosis and transversal nonlinear electroosmosis of a shiftable flow stagnation line (FSL) on gate terminals under DC-biased AC forcing. The microfluidic nanoparticle concentrator proposed herein makes use of a simple device geometry, in which an individual or a series of planar metal strips serving as gate electrode (GE) are subjected to a hybrid gate voltage signal and arranged in parallel between a pair of 3D driving electrodes.

Expandable carboxymethyl chitosan/cellulose nanofiber composite sponge for traumatic hemostasis.

Uncontrolled hemorrhage poses a severe life-threatening situation. However, traditional hemostats still have various limitations. It is urgent to develop a material with excellent biocompatibility and hemostatic ability.

Numerical characterization of inter-core coalescence by AC dielectrophoresis in double-emulsion droplets.

The utilization of an alternating current electric field provides a good means to achieve controlled coalescence between paired inner cores encapsulated in water-in-oil-in-water double-emulsion (DE) droplets. Although previous studies have experimentally determined the conditions under which inter-core electrokinetic fusion occurs, the transient interfacial dielectrophoretic (DEP) dynamics key to understand the underlying fluid mechanics is still unclear from a physical point of view. By coupling DEP motion of two-phase flow to phase-field formulation, bulk-coupled numerical simulations are conducted to characterize the spatial-temporal evolution of the surface charge wave and the resulting nonlinear electrical force induced at both the core/shell and medium/shell oil/water interfaces.

A tripodal wheeled mobile robot driven by a liquid metal motor.

As a novel driving concept, the liquid metal motor (LMM) has been regarded as a promising actuator due to its unique traits, such as infinitely variable speed, lack of transmission chain, convenient maintenance, and silence. However, at present, driving devices based on this material are still in the preliminary and rudimentary stage, and representative application examples are scarce. Therefore, an 8-shaped tripodal wheeled mobile robot (WMR) completely driven by a LMM is designed in this study to further prove the practicability of this material.

A visual portable microfluidic experimental device with multiple electric field regulation functions.

High portability and miniaturization are two of the most important objectives pursued by microfluidic methods. However, there remain many challenges for the design of portable and visual microfluidic devices (, electrokinetic experiments) due to the use of a microscope and power supply. To this end, we report a visual portable microfluidic experimental device (PMED) with multiple electric field regulation functions, which can realize the electric field regulation functions of various basic microfluidic experiments through modular design.

Fluid pumping by liquid metal droplet utilizing ac electric field.

We report a unique phenomenon in which liquid metal droplets (LMDs) under a pure ac electric field pump fluid. Unlike the directional pumping that occurs upon reversing the electric field polarity under a dc signal, this phenomenon allows the direction of fluid motion to be switched by simply shifting the position of the LMD within the cylindrical chamber. The physical mechanism behind this phenomenon has been termed Marangoni flow, caused by nonlinear electrocapillary stress.

Controllable Fabrication of Molecularly Imprinted Microspheres with Nanoporous and Multilayered Structure for Dialysate Regeneration.

Adsorption of urea from dialysate is essential for wearable artificial kidneys (WRK). Molecularly imprinted microspheres with nanoporous and multilayered structures are prepared based on liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS), which can selectively adsorb urea. In addition, we combine the microspheres with a designed polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) chip to propose an efficient urea adsorption platform.

Fabrication of syntactic foam fillers integrated on/off-chip microfluidic methods for optimized geopolymer composites.

To meet the evolving requirements of material designability, sustainability, and eco-friendliness, the development of syntactic foams puts great emphasis on filler optimization and matrix selection. Here, we present a novel microfluidic expansion coupled with the thermal contraction method to improve the fabrication of syntactic foam fillers (SFFs), highlighted by the independently regulated parameters in contrast to the hydrodynamic regulation approach. The eccentricity of droplets can be reduced osmotic swelling under a hypotonic circumstance and further preserved through real-time UV polymerization.

Desktop-level small automatic guided vehicle driven by a liquid metal droplet.

Gallium-based liquid metals (LMs) are a new type of intelligent material, and their ability to move under the action of an electric field provides new opportunities for the design of small flexible vehicles. However, due to the extremely high fluidity of LMs and the poor automatic control ability of LM vehicles, it's still a huge challenge to control the movement of LMs flexibly and accurately. Therefore, in this paper, a small traction vehicle is designed by putting the flexible LM in rigid armor to make the movement more controllable.