Efficient remediation of different concentrations of Cr-contaminated soils by nano zero-valent iron modified with carboxymethyl cellulose and biochar.

Nano zero-valent iron (nZVI) is widely used in soil remediation due to its high reactivity. However, the easy agglomeration, poor antioxidant ability and passivation layer of Fe-Cr coprecipitates of nZVI have limited its application scale in Cr-contaminated soil remediation, especially in high concentration of Cr-contaminated soil. Herein, we found that the carboxymethyl cellulose on nZVI particles could increase the zeta potential value of soil and change the phase of nZVI. Along with the presence of biochar, 97.0% and 96.6% Cr immobilization efficiency through CMC-nZVI/BC were respectively achieved in high and low concentrations of Cr-contaminated soils after 90-days remediation. In addition, the immobilization efficiency of Cr(VI) only decreased by 5.1% through CMC-nZVI/BC treatment after 10 weeks aging in air, attributing to the strong antioxidation ability. As for the surrounding Cr-contaminated groundwater, the Cr(VI) removal capacity of CMC-nZVI/BC was evaluated under different reaction conditions through column experiments and COMSOL Multiphysics. CMC-nZVI/BC could efficiently remove 85% of Cr(VI) in about 400 hr when the initial Cr(VI) concentration was 40 mg/L and the flow rate was 0.5 mL/min. This study demonstrates that uniformly dispersed CMC-nZVI/BC has an excellent remediation effect on different concentrations of Cr-contaminated soils.

Temporal and spatial convergence: the major depressive disorder burden attributed to intimate partner violence against women.

Background: There is a strong causal relationship between intimate partner violence and major depressive disorder, which partly endangers women's safety across the life course and potentially affects the development of future generations. The international community has placed a high priority on addressing the intimate partner violence and the resulting burden of mental illness. Data collection needs to be captured across the temporal trend and spatial distribution for major depressive disorder attributed to intimate partner violence, to reflect the priorities and expectations of survivors.Method: This research obtained raw disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) information for major depressive disorder attributed to intimate partner violence from the Global Burden of Disease 2019. Using estimated annual percentage change and two-way fixed effects models, a secondary spatio-temporal analysis of the age-standardized DALYs rate from 1990 to 2019 was performed.Results: In 2019, DALYs lost among women experiencing major depressive disorder (3.16 million) accounted for 37.18% of the DALYs lost worldwide due to intimate partner violence. The age-standardized DALYs rate of major depressive disorder attributed to intimate partner violence was 108.57 per 100,000. The highest was concentrated in the menopausal transition (45-55), with 133.61 per 100,000, and particularly distributed in Uganda (429.31 per 100,000). The early reproductive period (15-19) showed the increasing age-standardized DALYs rate from 1990 to 2019, which was mainly driven by Malaysia (3.73% per year). Furthermore, countries with higher initial levels of the age-standardized DALYs rate were growing faster than those with lower levels.Conclusions: The burden of major depressive disorder attributed to intimate partner violence showed biological and spatial inequality, prioritized intervention should be targeted at vulnerable stage women in their early reproductive period and menopausal transition. Combined political, socio-cultural as well as medical measures to prevent violence and treat major depressive disorder should be implemented and developed.

Vulnerability to different biological stages of the burden of experiencing intimate partner violence leading to major depressive disorder in women. Women in their reproductive years and during the menopausal transition were more vulnerable.Intimate partner violence-induced depressive disorder is trending younger, with an increasing burden on girls aged 15­19 over the past 30 years.The burden of major depressive disorder attributed to intimate partner violence varies increasingly across countries.

Neuroinflammation inhibition and neuroprotective effects of purpurin, a potential anti-AD compound, screened via network proximity and gene enrichment analyses.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a complex neurodegenerative disease without any effective preventive or therapeutic drugs. Natural products with stable structures and pharmacological characteristics are valuable sources for the development of novel drugs for many complex diseases. This study aimed to discover potential natural compounds for the treatment of AD using new technologies and methods and explore the efficacy and mechanism of candidate compounds. AD-related large-scale genetic datasets were collated to construct disease-PPIs and natural products were collected from six databases to construct compound-protein interactions (CPIs). Potential relationships between natural compounds and AD were predicted via network proximity and gene enrichment analyses. Then, five AD-related cell models and d-galactose-induced aging rat model were established to evaluate the neuroprotective effects of candidate compounds in vitro and in vivo. We identified that 267 natural compounds were predicted to have close connections with AD and 19 compounds could exert protective effect in at least one cell model. Notably, purpurin exerted protective effect in three cell models and significantly improved the cognitive learning and memory functions, reduced the oxidative stress injuries and neuroinflammation, and enhanced the synaptic plasticity and neurotrophic effect in the brain of d-galactose-treated rats. In this study, AD-related natural compounds were identified via network proximity and gene enrichment analyses. In vivo and in vitro experiments revealed the therapeutic potential of purpurin for AD treatment, laying the foundation for further in-depth research and providing valuable information for the development of novel anti-AD drugs.

Exposure range matters: considering non-linear associations in the meta-analysis of environmental pollutant exposure using examples of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances and birth outcomes.

Meta-analysis is a powerful analytic method for summarizing effect estimates across studies. However, conventional meta-analysis often assumes a linear exposure-outcome relationship and does not account for variability over the exposure ranges. In this work, we first used simulation techniques to illustrate that the linear-based meta-analytical approach may result in oversimplistic effect estimation based on three plausible non-linear exposure-outcome curves (S-shape, inverted U-shape, and M-shape). We showed that subgroup meta-analysis that stratifies on exposure levels can investigate non-linearity and identify the consistency of effect magnitudes in these simulated examples. Next, we examined the heterogeneity of effect estimates across exposure ranges in two published linear-based meta-analyses of prenatal exposure to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) on changes in mean birth weight or risk of preterm birth. The re-analysis found some varying effect sizes and potential heterogeneity when restricting to different PFAS exposure ranges, but findings were sensitive to the cut-off choices used to rank the exposure levels. Finally, we discussed methodological challenges and recommendations for detecting and interpreting potential non-linear associations in meta-analysis. Using meta-analysis without accounting for exposure range could contribute to literature inconsistency for exposure-induced health effects and impede evidence-based policymaking. Therefore, investigating result heterogeneity by exposure range is recommended.

Superoxide radical derived metal-free spiro-OMeTAD for highly stable perovskite solar cells.

Lithium salt-doped spiro-OMeTAD is widely used as a hole-transport layer (HTL) for high-efficiency n-i-p perovskite solar cells (PSCs), but unfortunately facing awkward instability for commercialization arising from the intrinsic Li+ migration and hygroscopicity. We herein demonstrate a superoxide radicals (•O2-) derived HTL of metal-free spiro-OMeTAD with remarkable capability of avoiding the conventional tedious oxidation treatment in air for highly stable PSCs. Present work explores the employing of variant-valence Eu(TFSI)2 salts that could generate •O2- for facile and adequate pre-oxidation of spiro-OMeTAD, resulting in the HTL with dramatically increased conductivity and work function. Comparing to devices adopting HTL with LiTFSI doping, the •O2--derived spiro-OMeTAD increases the PSCs efficiency up to 25.45% and 20.76% for 0.05 cm2 active area and 6 × 6 cm2 module, respectively. State-of-art PSCs employing such metal-free HTLs are also demonstrated to show much-improved environmental stability even under harsh conditions, e.g., maintaining over 90% of their initial efficiency after 1000 h of operation at the maximum power point and after 80 light-thermal cycles under simulated low earth orbit conditions, respectively, indicating the potentials of developing metal-free spiro-OMeTAD for low-cost and shortened processing of perovskite photovoltaics.

Hydrogen generated by electrochemical water splitting as electron donor for nitrate removal from micro-polluted reservoir water.

Extremely limited organic carbon sources and aerobic environment in micro-polluted reservoir water make conventional denitrification exceptionally challenging. As a result, total nitrogen (TN) concentration in most reservoir waters exceeds standard value year-round. In this study, for the first time, we constructed a mini water-lifting and aeration system (mini-WLAS) to remove nitrate in actual reservoir water. In the mini-WLAS, H2 was produced through electrolysis of reservoir water without adding any electrolyte, and the ascending water flow carried the generated H2 from lower layer to upper bacteria layer. The maximum denitrification rate reached 0.29 mg (L·d)-1 under dissolved oxygen (DO) concentration of 6-8 mg L-1, 6.04 times higher than that of the control group. There is almost no accumulation of NH4+-N, NO2--N, and N2O, and the concentration of CODMn decreased by 55.2 %. More importantly, the pH stayed near-neutral steadily throughout the whole process. Microbial community analysis showed that the abundances of hydrogenotrophic denitrifying bacteria (HDB) were 2 orders higher than those in the control system. Some HDB could work under aerobic conditions, providing an explanation for the excellent denitrification performance under high DO. This study provides a novel perspective for TN removal from reservoir water.

Multiplexed spatial mapping of chromatin features, transcriptome, and proteins in tissues.

The phenotypic and functional states of a cell are modulated by a complex interactive molecular hierarchy of multiple omics layers, involving the genome, epigenome, transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome. Spatial omics approaches have enabled the capture of information from different molecular layers directly in the tissue context. However, current technologies are limited to map one to two modalities at the same time, providing an incomplete representation of cellular identity. Such data is inadequate to fully understand complex biological systems and their underlying regulatory mechanisms. Here we present spatial-Mux-seq, a multi-modal spatial technology that allows simultaneous profiling of five different modalities, including genome-wide profiles of two histone modifications and open chromatin, whole transcriptome, and a panel of proteins at tissue scale and cellular level in a spatially resolved manner. We applied this technology to generate multi-modal tissue maps in mouse embryos and mouse brains, which discriminated more cell types and states than unimodal data. We investigated the spatiotemporal relationship between histone modifications, chromatin accessibility, gene and protein expression in neuron differentiation revealing the relationship between tissue organization, function, and gene regulatory networks. We were able to identify a radial glia spatial niche and revealed spatially changing gradient of epigenetic signals in this region. Moreover, we revealed previously unappreciated involvement of repressive histone marks in the mouse hippocampus. Collectively, the spatial multi-omics approach heralds a new era for characterizing tissue and cellular heterogeneity that single modality studies alone could not reveal.

Plant diversity enhances ecosystem multifunctionality via multitrophic diversity.

Ecosystem functioning depends on biodiversity at multiple trophic levels, yet relationships between multitrophic diversity and ecosystem multifunctionality have been poorly explored, with studies often focusing on individual trophic levels and functions and on specific ecosystem types. Here, we show that plant diversity can affect ecosystem functioning both directly and by affecting other trophic levels. Using data on 13 trophic groups and 13 ecosystem functions from two large biodiversity experiments-one representing temperate grasslands and the other subtropical forests-we found that plant diversity increases multifunctionality through elevated multitrophic diversity. Across both experiments, the association between multitrophic diversity and multifunctionality was stronger than the relationship between the diversity of individual trophic groups and multifunctionality. Our results also suggest that the role of multitrophic diversity is greater in forests than in grasslands. These findings imply that, to promote sustained ecosystem multifunctionality, conservation planning must consider the diversity of both plants and higher trophic levels.

Radiomic feature reliability of amide proton transfer-weighted MR images acquired with compressed sensing at 3T.

Compressed sensing (CS) is a novel technique for MRI acceleration. The purpose of this paper was to assess the effects of CS on the radiomic features extracted from amide proton transfer-weighted (APTw) images. Brain tumor MRI data of 40 scans were studied. Standard images using sensitivity encoding (SENSE) with an acceleration factor (AF) of 2 were used as the gold standard, and APTw images using SENSE with CS (CS-SENSE) with an AF of 4 were assessed. Regions of interest (ROIs), including normal tissue, edema, liquefactive necrosis, and tumor, were manually drawn, and the effects of CS-SENSE on radiomics were assessed for each ROI category. An intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) was first calculated for each feature extracted from APTw images with SENSE and CS-SENSE for all ROIs. Different filters were applied to the original images, and the effects of these filters on the ICCs were further compared between APTw images with SENSE and CS-SENSE. Feature deviations were also provided for a more comprehensive evaluation of the effects of CS-SENSE on radiomic features. The ROI-based comparison showed that most radiomic features extracted from CS-SENSE-APTw images and SENSE-APTw images had moderate or greater reliabilities (ICC ≥ 0.5) for all four ROIs and all eight image sets with different filters. Tumor showed significantly higher ICCs than normal tissue, edema, and liquefactive necrosis. Compared to the original images, filters (such as Exponential or Square) may improve the reliability of radiomic features extracted from CS-SENSE-APTw and SENSE-APTw images.

PI4P-mediated solid-like Merlin condensates orchestrate Hippo pathway regulation.

Despite recent studies implicating liquid-like biomolecular condensates in diverse cellular processes, many biomolecular condensates exist in a solid-like state, and their function and regulation are less understood. We show that the tumor suppressor Merlin, an upstream regulator of the Hippo pathway, localizes to both cell junctions and medial apical cortex in Drosophila epithelia, with the latter forming solid-like condensates that activate Hippo signaling. Merlin condensation required phosphatidylinositol-4-phosphate (PI4P)-mediated plasma membrane targeting and was antagonistically controlled by Pez and cytoskeletal tension through plasma membrane PI4P regulation. The solid-like material properties of Merlin condensates are essential for physiological function and protect the condensates against external perturbations. Collectively, these findings uncover an essential role for solid-like condensates in normal physiology and reveal regulatory mechanisms for their formation and disassembly.

Preoperative prediction of microvascular invasion risk in hepatocellular carcinoma with MRI: peritumoral versus tumor region.

OBJECTIVES: To explore the predictive performance of tumor and multiple peritumoral regions on dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), to identify optimal regions of interest for developing a preoperative predictive model for the grade of microvascular invasion (MVI). METHODS: A total of 147 patients who were surgically diagnosed with hepatocellular carcinoma, and had a maximum tumor diameter ≤ 5 cm were recruited and subsequently divided into a training set (n = 117) and a testing set (n = 30) based on the date of surgery. We utilized a pre-trained AlexNet to extract deep learning features from seven different regions of the maximum transverse cross-section of tumors in various MRI sequence images. Subsequently, an extreme gradient boosting (XGBoost) classifier was employed to construct the MVI grade prediction model, with evaluation based on the area under the curve (AUC). RESULTS: The XGBoost classifier trained with data from the 20-mm peritumoral region showed superior AUC compared to the tumor region alone. AUC values consistently increased when utilizing data from 5-mm, 10-mm, and 20-mm peritumoral regions. Combining arterial and delayed-phase data yielded the highest predictive performance, with micro- and macro-average AUCs of 0.78 and 0.74, respectively. Integration of clinical data further improved AUCs values to 0.83 and 0.80. CONCLUSION: Compared with those of the tumor region, the deep learning features of the peritumoral region provide more important information for predicting the grade of MVI. Combining the tumor region and the 20-mm peritumoral region resulted in a relatively ideal and accurate region within which the grade of MVI can be predicted. CLINICAL RELEVANCE STATEMENT: The 20-mm peritumoral region holds more significance than the tumor region in predicting MVI grade. Deep learning features can indirectly predict MVI by extracting information from the tumor region and directly capturing MVI information from the peritumoral region. KEY POINTS: We investigated tumor and different peritumoral regions, as well as their fusion. MVI predominantly occurs in the peritumoral region, a superior predictor compared to the tumor region. The peritumoral 20 mm region is reasonable for accurately predicting the three-grade MVI.

Achieving Remarkable Specific Mechanical Strength and Energy Absorption Capacity in SiC Nanowire Networks through Graded Structural Design.

Lightweight porous ceramics with a unique combination of superior mechanical strength and damage tolerance are in significant demand in many fields such as energy absorption, aerospace vehicles, and chemical engineering; however, it is difficult to meet these mechanical requirements with conventional porous ceramics. Here, we report a graded structure design strategy to fabricate porous ceramic nanowire networks that simultaneously possess excellent mechanical strength and energy absorption capacity. Our optimized graded nanowire networks show a compressive strength of up to 35.6 MPa at a low density of 540 mg·cm-3, giving rise to a high specific compressive strength of 65.7 kN·m·kg-1 and a high energy absorption capacity of 17.1 kJ·kg-1, owing to a homogeneous distribution of stress upon loading. These values are top performance compared to other porous ceramics, giving our materials significant potential in various engineering fields.

Association between Personal Abiotic Airborne Exposures and Body Composition Changes among Healthy Adults (60-69 Years Old): A Combined Exposome-Wide and Lipidome Mediation Approach from the China BAPE Study.

BACKGROUND: Evidence suggested that abiotic airborne exposures may be associated with changes in body composition. However, more evidence is needed to identify key pollutants linked to adverse health effects and their underlying biomolecular mechanisms, particularly in sensitive older adults. OBJECTIVES: Our research aimed to systematically assess the relationship between abiotic airborne exposures and changes in body composition among healthy older adults, as well as the potential mediating mechanisms through the serum lipidome. METHODS: From September 2018 to January 2019, we conducted a monthly survey among 76 healthy adults (60-69 years old) in the China Biomarkers of Air Pollutant Exposure (BAPE) study, measuring their personal exposures to 632 abiotic airborne pollutions using MicroPEM and the Fresh Air wristband, 18 body composition indicators from the InBody 770 device, and lipidomics from venous blood samples. We used an exposome-wide association study (ExWAS) and deletion/substitution/addition (DSA) model to unravel complex associations between exposure to contaminant mixtures and body composition, a Bayesian kernel machine regression (BKMR) model to assess the overall effect of key exposures on body composition, and mediation analysis to identify lipid intermediators. RESULTS: The ExWAS and DSA model identified that 2,4,5-T methyl ester (2,4,5-TME), 9,10-Anthracenedione (ATQ), 4b,8-dimethyl-2-isopropylphenanthrene, and 4b,5,6,7,8,8a,9,10-octahydro-(DMIP) were associated with increased body fat mass (BFM), fat mass indicators (FMI), percent body fat (PBF), and visceral fat area (VFA) in healthy older adults [Bonferroni-Hochberg false discovery rate (FDRBH)<0.05]. The BKMR model demonstrated a positive correlation between contaminants (anthracene, ATQ, copaene, di-epi-α-cedrene, and DMIP) with VFA. Mediation analysis revealed that phosphatidylcholine [PC, PC(16:1e/18:1), PC(16:2e/18:0)] and sphingolipid [SM, SM(d18:2/24:1)] mediated a significant portion, ranging from 12.27% to 26.03% (p-value <0.05), of the observed increase in VFA. DISCUSSION: Based on the evidence from multiple model results, ATQ and DMIP were statistically significantly associated with the increased VFA levels of healthy older adults, potentially regulated through lipid intermediators. These findings may have important implications for identifying potentially harmful environmental chemicals and developing targeted strategies for the control and prevention of chronic diseases in the future, particularly as the global population is rapidly aging. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP13865.

Review of cathodic electroactive bacteria: Species, properties, applications and electron transfer mechanisms.

Cathodic electroactive bacteria (C-EAB) which are capable of accepting electrons from solid electrodes provide fresh avenues for pollutant removal, biosensor design, and electrosynthesis. This review systematically summarized the burgeoning applications of the C-EAB over the past decade, including 1) removal of nitrate, aromatic derivatives, and metal ions; 2) biosensing based on biocathode; 3) electrosynthesis of CH4, H2, organic carbon, NH3, and protein. In addition, the mechanisms of electron transfer by the C-EAB are also classified and summarized. Extracellular electron transfer and interspecies electron transfer have been introduced, and the electron transport mechanism of typical C-EAB, such as Shewanella oneidensis MR-1, has been combed in detail. By bringing to light this cutting-edge area of the C-EAB, this review aims to stimulate more interest and research on not only exploring great potential applications of these electron-accepting bacteria, but also developing steady and scalable processes harnessing biocathodes.

Biocompatible Perovskite Nanocrystals with Enhanced Stability for White Light-Emitting Diodes.

Recently emerged lead halide perovskite CsPbX3 (X = Cl, Br, and I) nanocrystals (PNCs) have attracted tremendous attention due to their excellent optical properties. However, the poor water stability, unsatisfactory luminescence efficiency, disappointing lead leakage, and toxicity have restricted their practical applications in photoelectronics and biomedical fields. Herein, a controllable encapsulated strategy is investigated to realize CsPbX3 PNCs/PVP @PMMA composites with superior luminescence properties and excellent biocompatibility. Additionally, the synthesized CsPbBr3 and CsPbBr0.6I2.4 PNCs/PVP@PMMA structures exhibit green and red emissions with a maximal photoluminescence quantum yield (PLQY) of about 70.24% and 98.26%, respectively. These CsPbX3 PNCs/PVP@PMMA structures show high emission efficiency, excellent stability after water storage for 18 months, and low cytotoxicity at the PNC concentration at 500 µg mL-1. Moreover, white light-emitting diode (WLED) devices based on mixtures of CsPbBr3 and CsPbBr0.6I2.4 PNCs/PVP@PMMA perovskite structures are investigated, which exhibit excellent warm-white light emissions at room temperature. A flexible manipulation method is used to fabricate the white light emitters based on these perovskite composites, providing a fantastic platform for fabricating solid-state white light sources and full-color displays.

On-Wire Design of Axial Periodic Halide Perovskite Superlattices for High-Performance Photodetection.

Precise synthesis of all-inorganic lead halide perovskite nanowire heterostructures and superlattices with designable modulation of chemical compositions is essential for tailoring their optoelectronic properties. Nevertheless, controllable synthesis of perovskite nanostructure heterostructures remains challenging and underexplored to date. Here, we report a rational strategy for wafer-scale synthesis of one-dimensional periodic CsPbCl3/CsPbI3 superlattices. We show that the highly parallel array of halide perovskite nanowires can be prepared roughly as horizontally guided growth on an M-plane sapphire. A periodic patterning of the sapphire substrate enables position-selective ion exchange to obtain highly periodic CsPbCl3/CsPbI3 nanowire superlattices. This patterning is further confirmed by micro-photoluminescence investigations, which show that two separate band-edge emission peaks appear at the interface of a CsPbCl3/CsPbI3 heterojunction. Additionally, compared with the pure CsPbCl3 nanowires, photodetectors fabricated using these periodic heterostructure nanowires exhibit superior photoelectric performance, namely, high ION/IOFF ratio (104), higher responsivity (49 A/W), and higher detectivity (1.51 × 1013 Jones). Moreover, a spatially resolved visible image sensor based on periodic nanowire superlattices is demonstrated with good imaging capability, suggesting promising application prospects in future photoelectronic imaging systems. All these results based on the periodic CsPbCl3/CsPbI3 nanowire superlattices provides an attractive material platform for integrated perovskite devices and circuits.

Personal exposure to airborne organic pollutants and lung function changes among healthy older adults.

Epidemiological evidence on the impact of airborne organic pollutants on lung function among the elderly is limited, and their underlying biological mechanisms remain largely unexplored. Herein, a longitudinal panel study was conducted in Jinan, Shandong Province, China, involving 76 healthy older adults monitored over a span of five months repetitively. We systematically evaluated personal exposure to a diverse range of airborne organic pollutants using a wearable passive sampler and their effects on lung function. Participants' pulmonary function indicators were assessed, complemented by comprehensive multi-omics analyses of blood and urine samples. Leveraging the power of interaction analysis, causal inference test (CIT), and integrative pathway analysis (IPA), we explored intricate relationships between specific organic pollutants, biomolecules, and lung function deterioration, elucidating the biological mechanisms underpinning the adverse impacts of these pollutants. We observed that bis (2-chloro-1-methylethyl) ether (BCIE) was significantly associated with negative changes in the forced vital capacity (FVC), with glycerolipids mitigating this adverse effect. Additionally, 31 canonical pathways [e.g., high mobility group box 1 (HMGB1) signaling, phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K)/AKT pathway, epithelial mesenchymal transition, and heme and nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD) biosynthesis] were identified as potential mechanisms. These findings may hold significant implications for developing effective strategies to prevent and mitigate respiratory health risks arising from exposure to such airborne pollutants. However, due to certain limitations of the study, our results should be interpreted with caution.

KLSANet: Key local semantic alignment Network for few-shot image classification.

Few-shot image classification involves recognizing new classes with a limited number of labeled samples. Current local descriptor-based methods, while leveraging consistent low-level features across visible and invisible classes, face challenges including redundant adjacent information, irrelevant partial representation, and limited interpretability. This paper proposes KLSANet, a few-shot image classification approach based on key local semantic alignment network, which aligns key local semantics for accurate classification. Furthermore, we introduce a key local screening module to mitigate the influence of semantically irrelevant image parts on classification. KLSANet demonstrates superior performance on three benchmark datasets (CUB, Stanford Dogs, Stanford Cars), outperforming state-of-the-art methods in 1-shot and 5-shot settings with average improvements of 3.95% and 2.56% respectively. Visualization experiments demonstrate the interpretability of KLSANet predictions. Code is available at: https://github.com/ZitZhengWang/KLSANet.

Tailoring Mechanical Properties of a Ceramic Nanowire Aerogel with Pyrolytic Carbon for In Situ Resilience at 1400 °C.

Resilient ceramic aerogels with a unique combination of lightweight, good high-temperature stability, high specific area, and thermal insulation properties are known for their promising applications in various fields. However, the mechanical properties of traditional ceramic aerogels are often constrained by insufficient interlocking of the building blocks. Here, we report a strategy to largely increase the interlocking degree of the building blocks by depositing a pyrolytic carbon (PyC) coating onto Si3N4 nanowires. The results show that the mechanical performances of the Si3N4 nanowire aerogels are intricately linked to the microstructure of the PyC nodes. The compression resilience of the Si3N4@PyC nanowire aerogels increases with an increase of the interlayer cross-linking in PyC. Additionally, benefiting from the excellent high-temperature stability of PyC, the Si3N4@PyC nanowire aerogels demonstrate significantly superior in situ resilience up to 1400 °C. The integrated mechanical and high-temperature properties of the Si3N4@PyC nanowire aerogels make them highly appealing for applications in harsh conditions. The facile method of manipulating the microstructure of the nodes may offer a perspective for tailoring the mechanical properties of ceramic aerogels.