Publications by authors named "Xi Ni"

High-entropy ceramics hold promise for application as thermal barrier coating materials. However, a key challenge in practical applications lies in the low fracture toughness compared to that of yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ). Herein, we designed (Hf,Zr,Ce,)O-AlO (M = Y, Ca, and Gd) ceramic composites by following a set of fundamental guidelines.

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Article Synopsis
  • Temperature-responsive metamaterials can change shape with heat but face challenges in achieving fast and effective thermal responses.
  • By using thermostat metal strips, researchers created metamaterials with impressive properties, achieving up to 30% thermal strain within just 5 seconds of heating, significantly outperforming similar materials.
  • These metamaterials have potential applications in soft robotics, vibration isolation for high-speed vehicles, and precision instruments due to their advanced mechanical and thermal capabilities.
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Cardiac fibrosis is a typical feature of cardiac pathological remodeling, which is associated with adverse clinical outcomes and has no effective therapy. Nicotine is an important risk factor for cardiac fibrosis, yet its underlying molecular mechanism remains poorly understood. This study aimed to identify its potential molecular mechanism in nicotine-induced cardiac fibrosis.

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In this study, Congo red (CR) was degraded by different particle sizes of zero-valent copper (ZVC) activated persulfate (PS) under mild temperature. The CR removal by 50 nm, 500 nm, 15 μm of ZVC activated PS was 97%, 72%, and 16%, respectively. The co-existence of SO and Cl promoted the degradation of CR, and HCO and HPO were detrimental to the degradation.

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Background & Aims: Macrophages display remarkable plasticity and can interact with surrounding cells to affect hepatic immunity and tissue remodelling during the progression of liver diseases. Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPARγ) plays a critical role in macrophage maturation, polarization and metabolism. In this study, we investigated the role of PPARγ in macrophage-hepatic stellate cell (HSC) interaction during non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) development.

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Herein, we have successfully synthesized binary AgSe, composite Ag:AgSe, and ternary Cu:AgSe through an ambient aqueous-solution-based approach in a one-pot reaction at room temperature and atmospheric pressure without involving high-temperature heating, multiple-processes treatment, and organic solvents/surfactants. Effective controllability over phases and compositions/components are demonstrated with feasibility for large-scale production through an exquisite alteration in reaction parameters especially pH for enhancing and understanding thermoelectric properties. Thermoelectric reaches 0.

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The global massive consumption of disposable face masks driven by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has emerged as a blooming disaster to both the land and marine environment that might last for generations. Growing public concerns have been raised over the management and control of this new form of plastic pollution, and one of the proposed sustainable solution is to use renewable and/or biodegradable resources to develop mask materials in order to minimize their environmental impacts. As a representative biodegradable polymer, polylactic acid (PLA) has been proposed as a promising candidate to produce non-woven face masks instead of those fossil-based polymers.

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Nicotine is proved to be an important factor for cardiac hypertrophy. Autophagy is important cell recycling system involved in the regulation of cardiac hypertrophy. Cilostazol, which is often used in the management of peripheral vascular disease.

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DNA sequencing has allowed for the discovery of the genetic cause for a considerable number of diseases, paving the way for new disease diagnostics. However, due to the lack of clinical samples and records, the molecular cause for rare diseases is always hard to identify, significantly limiting the number of rare Mendelian diseases diagnosed through sequencing technologies. Clinical phenotype information therefore becomes a major resource to diagnose rare diseases.

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Background: Memory and learning, as the core brain function, shows controversial results across studies focusing on aging and dementia. One of the reasons is because of the multi-faceted nature of memory and learning. However, there is still a dearth of comparable proxies with psychometric and morphometric portrait in clinical and non-clinical populations.

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The complete chloroplast genome of (Poaceae) has been reconstructed from the whole-genome Illumina sequencing data. The complete chloroplast genome sequence of . obtained in this study was 139,640 bp in length, with a large single copy (LSC) region of 83,220 bp, a small single copy (SSC) region of 12,826 bp, separated by two inverted repeat (IR) regions of 21,797 bp each.

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