The cycloaddition of CO with epoxides to cyclic carbonates is one of the most promising and green pathways for CO utilization, and the development of highly efficient catalysts remains a challenge. In this work, a novel hydroxy-rich covalent organic framework (TFPB-DHBD-COF) was synthesized, and it served as an efficient heterogeneous catalyst for the reaction of CO with 1,2-epoxybutane under mild conditions, providing the desired products in 90% conversion. The abundant hydroxy groups in the pore channels of TFPB-DHBD-COF could not only activate epoxides and CO via hydrogen bonding but also obviously enhance its stability through intramolecular five-membered ring hydrogen bonding.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPeople living with HIV (PLWH) have poor outcomes from severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2); vaccination reduces the associated mortality. The humoral immune response dynamics after booster inactivated vaccinations in PLWH remain unclear. In this longitudinal observational study, 100 PLWH after primary inactivated SARS-CoV-2 vaccination were consecutively recruited and followed up.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCyborg Bionic Syst
March 2023
Robot-assisted technologies are being investigated to overcome the limitations of the current solutions for transoral surgeries, which suffer from constrained insertion ports, lengthy and indirect passageways, and narrow anatomical structures. This paper reviews distal dexterity mechanisms, variable stiffness mechanisms, and triangulation mechanisms, which are closely related to the specific technical challenges of transoral robotic surgery (TORS). According to the structure features in moving and orienting end effectors, the distal dexterity designs can be classified into 4 categories: serial mechanism, continuum mechanism, parallel mechanism, and hybrid mechanism.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The prognosis of B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (B-ALL) has improved significantly with current first-line therapy, although the recurrence of B-ALL is still a problem. Toll-like receptor 9 (TLR9) agonists have shown good safety and efficiency as immune adjuvants. Apart from their immune regulatory effect, the direct effect of TLR9 agonists on cancer cells with TLR9 expression cannot be ignored.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFront Cell Infect Microbiol
November 2022
Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), featured by Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection and regional epidemiology, is curable when detected early, but highly lethal at an advanced stage. The molecular mechanism of NPC progression toward a clinically uncontrollable stage remains elusive. In this study, we developed a novel computational framework to conduct multiscale transcriptomic analysis during NPC progression.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAllogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (allo-HCT) is a promising therapeutic option for hematological malignancies, but relapse resulting predominantly from residual disease in the bone marrow (BM) remains the major cause of treatment failure. Using immunodeficient mice grafted with laboratory-generated human B-ALL, our previous study suggested that leukemia cells within the BM are resistant to graft-versus-leukemia (GVL) effects and that mobilization with CXCR4 antagonists may dislodge leukemia cells from the BM, enabling them to be destroyed by GVL effects. In this study, we extended this approach to patient-derived xenograft (PDX) and murine T-ALL and AML models to determine its clinical relevance and effects on GVHD and donor hematopoietic engraftment.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThere are high risks of infection for surgeons during the face-to-face COVID-19 swab sampling due to the novel coronavirus's infectivity. To address this issue, we propose a flexible transoral robot with a teleoperated configuration for swab sampling. The robot comprises a flexible manipulator, an endoscope with a monitor, and a master device.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRobot-assisted technologies are overcoming the limitations of the current approaches for transoral surgeries, which are suffering from limited vision and workspace. As a result, we develop a novel teleoperated parallel continuum robot with variable stiffness for collision avoidance. This paper focuses on the feasibility study on a cadaveric model for the robotic system as a first trial.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTransoral robotic surgery (TORS) allows for access to oropharyngeal regions in an effective and minimally invasive manner. However, safe TORS access to deep pharyngeal (such as hypopharynx) sites remains a great challenge for current surgical robotic systems. In this work, we introduce a novel continuum robot with an optimized flexible parallel mechanism, to meet stringent requirements imposed by TORS on size, workspace, flexibility, and compliance.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFStretchable skin-like pressure sensing with minimized and distinguishable strain-induced interference is essential for the development of collision-aware surgical robotics to improve the safety and efficiency of minimally invasive surgery in a confined space. Inspired by the multidimensional wrinkles of Shar-Pei dog's skin for tactile sensing, we developed a stretchable pressure sensor consisting of reduced graphene oxide (rGO) electrodes with biomimetic topographies to improve the robot-tissue collision detections. A facile fabrication route for stretchable rGO electrodes was first demonstrated by harnessing the surface instability during the sequential deformation processes.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To evaluate the efficacy and safety of targeted therapy plus fulvestrant for postmenopausal patients with hormone receptor-positive advanced breast cancer.
Methods: Pubmed, Embase and Web of Science databases were systematically searched on February 26, 2018. Eligible studies were screened according to selection criteria, and two reviewers independently extracted outcome data which included progression-free survival, overall survival, objective response rate, clinical benefit rate and toxicities.
Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the third-leading cause of cancer-related deaths with 750,000 newly diagnosed cases each year. Surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy constitute the main treatment modalities for HCC, but liver cirrhosis and damage often occur. Molecular targeted drugs have been recently developed to treat HCC.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: A potential association between diabetes and Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) has been indicated by a few case studies. We retrospectively analyzed the clinical features of a large cohort of GBS patients to explore the relationship between the level of fasting plasma glucose (FPG) obtained in the acute phase at admission and the severity of GBS.
Methods: Three hundred and four GBS patients were divided into two groups, one with normal FPG and the other with high FPG levels according to the international standards of FPG.
NF-κB plays an important role in many aspects of tumorigenesis and tumor progression by its antiapoptosis effect. Hence, NF-κB has been regarded as a therapeutic target in cancer, because inhibition of NF-κB not only induces enhancing apoptosis but also causes increasing sensitivity to radiation or chemotherapy in several tumor cells. The activation of NF-κB is presumed to be associated with PI3K/Akt signal pathway in gastric carcinoma, but the underlying molecular mechanism remains unclear.
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