[Determination of perchlorate and chlorate in drinks by ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry].

OBJECTIVE: To establish a method for determination of perchlorate and chlorate in drinks by ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry(UPLC-MS/MS) based on isotopic internal standard method. METHODS: The perchlorate and chlorate residue in liquid drinks were extracted with methanol, in solid drinks with acetic acid solution, then centrifuged. The supernatant was cleaned-up with PSA/C18 cleanup tube. The separation of perchlorate and chlorate was carried out on a Acquity CSH fluorophenyl column(100 mm×2.1mm, 1.7 µm) and the detection was performed with tandem mass spectrometry with internal standard method for quantification. RESULTS: The peak area ratio of perchlorate and chlorate had a good linear relationship with their mass concentration within their respective linear ranges, with correlation coefficients(r) greater than 0.999. The limits of detection of perchlorate and chlorate were 0.2and 1 µg/L respectively and the limits of quantification were 0.5 and 3 µg/L respectively. The mean recoveries of two compounds were from 84.0% to 105.5% with relative standard deviations from 4.2% to 17.0% and 82.7% to 112.1% with relative standard deviations from 5.5% to 18.4%(n=6), respectively. The perchlorates in 11 kinds of beverage samples were 0.53-4.12 µg/L, chlorates were 3.27-61.86 µg/L. CONCLUSION: This method is simple, sensitive, accurate and reliable, which is suitable for the determination of perchlorate and chlorate in drinks.

Dt1 inhibits SWEET-mediated sucrose transport to regulate photoperiod-dependent seed weight in soybean.

Soybean is a photoperiod-sensitive short-day crop whose reproductive period and yield are markedly affected by day-length changes. Seed weight is one of the key traits determining the soybean yield; however, the prominent genes that control the final seed weight of soybean and the mechanisms underlying the photoperiod's effect on this trait remain poorly understood. In this study, we identify SW19 as a major locus controlling soybean seed weight by QTL mapping and determine Dt1, an orthologous gene of Arabidopsis TFL1 that is known to govern the soybean growth habit, as the causal gene of the SW19 locus. We showed that Dt1 is highly expressed in developing seeds and regulates photoperiod-dependent seed weight in soybean. Further analyses revealed that the Dt1 protein physically interacts with the sucrose transporter GmSWEET10a to negatively regulate the import of sucrose from seed coat to the embryo, thus modulating seed weight under long days. However, Dt1 does not function in seed development under short days due to its very low expression. Importantly, we discovered a novel natural allelic variant of Dt1 (H4 haplotype) that decouples its pleiotropic effects on seed size and growth habit; i.e., this variant remains functional in seed development but fails to regulate the stem growth habit of soybean. Collectively, our findings provide new insights into how soybean seed development responds to photoperiod at different latitudes, offering an ideal genetic component for improving soybean's yield by manipulating its seed weight and growth habit.

Construction of Inorganic/Polymer Tandem Layer on Li Metal with Long-Term Stability by LiNO3 Concentration Gradient Electrolyte.

Metal electrode with long cycle life is decisive for the actual use of metal rechargeable batteries, while the dendrite growth and side reaction limit their cyclic stability. Herein, the construction of polymer and inorganic-rich SEI tandem layer structure on Li metal can be used for extraordinarily extending its cycle life is reported, which is generated by an in situ PVDF/LiF/LiNO3 (PLL) gel layer on the surface of Li metal with a chemically compatible ether solvent. The cycle life of Li//Li cells with the tandem layer structure is over 6000 h, six times longer than those with LiNO3 homogeneous electrolyte. It highlights the importance of LiNO3 concentration gradient electrolyte formed by the in situ PLL gel layer, in which highly concentrated LiNO3 is confined on the surface of Li metal to generate the uniform and inorganic-rich LiF/Li2 O/Li3 N layer on the bottom of PVDF/LiF with good mechanical strength, resulting in the dendrite free anode in cell cycling. The assembled Li//LiFePO4 and Li//NMC811 batteries show the capacity retention rate of 80.9% after 800 cycles and 82.3% after 500 cycles, respectively, much higher than those of references.

Heteroatoms-Doped Mesoporous Carbon Nanosheets with Dual Diffusion Pathways for Highly Efficient Potassium Ion Storage.

The high potassization/depotassization energy barriers and lack of efficient ion diffusion pathways are two serious obstacles for carbon-based materials to achieve satisfactory potassium ion storage performance. Herein, a facile and controllable one-step exfoliation-doping-etching strategy is proposed to construct heteroatoms (N, O, and S)-doped mesoporous few-layer carbon nanosheets (NOS-C). The mixed molten salts of KCl/K2 SO4 are innovatively used as the exfoliators, dopants, and etching agents, which enable NOS-C with expanded interlayer spacing and uniformly distributed mesopores with the adjusted electronic structure of surrounding carbon atoms, contributing efficient dual (vertical and horizontal) K-ion diffusion pathways, low potassization/depotassization energy barriers and abundant active sites. Thus, the NOS anodes achieve a high reversible capacity of 516.8 mAh g-1 at 0.05 A g-1 , superior rate capability of 202.8 mAh g-1 at 5 A g-1 and excellent long-term cyclic stability, and their practical application potential is demonstrated by the assembled potassium-ion full batteries. Moreover, a surface-interlayer synergetic K+ storage mechanism is revealed by a combined theoretical and experimental approach including in situ EIS, in situ Raman, ex situ XPS, and SEM analysis. The proposed K+ storage mechanism and unique structural engineering provide a new pathway for potassium-ion storage devices and even beyond.

Low-Background Signal-On Homogeneous Electrochemiluminescence Biosensor for Hepatitis B Virus Detection Based on the Regulation of the Length of DNA Modified on the Nanoparticles by CRISPR/Cas12a and Hybridization Chain Reaction.

In this work, combined with the high amplification efficiency of hybridization chain reaction (HCR), high specificity of the CRISPR/Cas12a system, and convenience of the homogeneous electrochemiluminescence (ECL) assay based on the regulation of negative charge on the reporting probes, a sensitive ECL biosensor for hepatitis B virus DNA (chosen as a model target) had been developed. The initiator chain trigger DNA that can induce HCR amplification is modified on the surface of ruthenium bipyridine-doped silica nanoparticles (Ru@SiO2 NPs) first, and large amounts of negative charges modified on the particles were achieved through the HCR amplification reaction. The efficiency of the nanoparticles reaching the negatively charged working electrode can be regulated and realize the change of the ECL signal. In addition, long DNA on the surface of the luminescent body may prevent the coreactant from entering the pore to react with ruthenium bipyridine. These factors combine to produce a low-background system. The presence of the target can activate the CRISPR/Cas12a system and make trigger DNA disappear from the nanoparticle surface, and strong ECL can be detected. The sensor does not require a complex electrode modification; therefore, it has better reproducibility. Additionally, due to dual signal amplification, the sensor has a high sensitivity. In the range of 10 fM to 10 nM, the ECL intensity exhibits a strong linear relationship with the logarithm of the target concentration, and the detection limit is 7.41 fM. This sensor has shown high accuracy in detecting clinical samples, which holds significant potential for application in clinical testing.

Nucleus Pulposus-Targeting Nanocarriers Facilitate Mirna-Based Therapeutics for Intervertebral Disc Degeneration.

Intervertebral disc degeneration (IDD) is a common cause of low back pain. Understanding its molecular mechanisms is the basis for developing specific treatment. To demonstrate that miR-22-3p is critical in the regulation of IDD, miRNA microarray analyses are conducted in conjunction with in vivo and in vitro experiments. The miR-22-3p knockout (KO) mice show a marked decrease in the histological scores. Bioinformatic analysis reveals that miR-22-3p plays a mechanistic role in the development of IDD by targeting SIRT1, which in turn activates the JAK1/STAT3 signaling pathway. This is confirmed by a luciferase reporter assay and western blot analysis. Therapeutically, the delivery of miR-22-3p inhibitors and mimics through the synthesized nanoparticles in the IDD model alleviates and aggravates IDD, respectively. The nanocarriers enhance transportation of miR-22-3p to nucleus pulposus cells, thus enabling the in vivo inhibition of miR-22-3p for therapeutic purposes and consequently promoting the development of miRNA-specific drugs for IDD.

A Real-Time Semantic Segmentation Method Based on STDC-CT for Recognizing UAV Emergency Landing Zones.

With the accelerated growth of the UAV industry, researchers are paying close attention to the flight safety of UAVs. When a UAV loses its GPS signal or encounters unusual conditions, it must perform an emergency landing. Therefore, real-time recognition of emergency landing zones on the ground is an important research topic. This paper employs a semantic segmentation approach for recognizing emergency landing zones. First, we created a dataset of UAV aerial images, denoted as UAV-City. A total of 600 UAV aerial images were densely annotated with 12 semantic categories. Given the complex backgrounds, diverse categories, and small UAV aerial image targets, we propose the STDC-CT real-time semantic segmentation network for UAV recognition of emergency landing zones. The STDC-CT network is composed of three branches: detail guidance, small object attention extractor, and multi-scale contextual information. The fusion of detailed and contextual information branches is guided by small object attention. We conducted extensive experiments on the UAV-City, Cityscapes, and UAVid datasets to demonstrate that the STDC-CT method is superior for attaining a balance between segmentation accuracy and inference speed. Our method improves the segmentation accuracy of small objects and achieves 76.5% mIoU on the Cityscapes test set at 122.6 FPS, 68.4% mIoU on the UAVid test set, and 67.3% mIoU on the UAV-City dataset at 196.8 FPS on an NVIDIA RTX 2080Ti GPU. Finally, we deployed the STDC-CT model on Jetson TX2 for testing in a real-world environment, attaining real-time semantic segmentation with an average inference speed of 58.32 ms per image.

High-risk Human Papillomavirus Infection in Putian, China: A Cross-sectional Analysis of 98085 Women.

OBJECTIVE: To assess high-risk human papillomavirus (hrHPV) infection among women undergoing cervical cancer screening in Putian for establishing an optimal cervical cancer screening mode and preventive vaccination strategy for HPV. STUDY DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. Place and Duration of the Study: The Affiliated Hospital of Putian University for cervical cancer screening period, from August 2020 to December 2022. METHODOLOGY: Cervical cell specimens were obtained using 'two cancer screening platforms'. qRT-PCR and flow-FISH were used for hrHPV typing. The pathological diagnostic test was performed for the hrHPV-positive samples. The results concerning the relationships between hrHPV infection at different age groups and pathological diagnosis were analysed retrospectively. RESULTS: A total of 98085 hrHPV preliminary screening results in the Putian region and 9036 hrHPV-positive samples were included. The infection rate of hrHPV for the three infection modes increased with age. The 41-50 age group is the highest incidence which the phase from cervical intraepithelial neoplasia to cervical cancer. The top three hrHPV subtypes were HPV52, HPV58, and HPV16. The positive rate of HPV16 was positively correlated with the progression of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia. CONCLUSION: Effective screening, vaccination, and education must be provided because HPV infections are district-specific and age-specific. HPV16 is correlated with cervical cancer progression. Pathological diagnosis and prevention of cervical cancer infected with HPV16 must be conducted. KEY WORDS: hrHPV, Cervical cancer, Pathological diagnosis.

Photoperiod controls plant seed size in a CONSTANS-dependent manner.

Photoperiodic plants perceive changes in day length as seasonal cues to orchestrate their vegetative and reproductive growth. Although it is known that the floral transition of photoperiod-sensitive plants is tightly controlled by day length, how photoperiod affects their post-flowering development remains to be clearly defined, as do the underlying mechanisms. Here we demonstrate that photoperiod plays a prominent role in seed development. We found that long-day (LD) and short-day (SD) plants produce larger seeds under LD and SD conditions, respectively; however, seed size remains unchanged when CONSTANS (CO), the central regulatory gene of the photoperiodic response pathway, is mutated in Arabidopsis and soybean. We further found that CO directly represses the transcription of AP2 (a known regulatory gene of seed development) under LD conditions in Arabidopsis and SD conditions in soybean, thereby controlling seed size in a photoperiod-dependent manner, and that these effects are exerted through regulation of the proliferation of seed coat epidermal cells. Collectively, our findings reveal that a crucial regulatory cascade involving CO-AP2 modulates photoperiod-mediated seed development in plants and provide new insights into how plants with different photoperiod response types perceive seasonal changes that enable them to optimize their reproductive growth.

Dual-target nucleic acid sequences responsive electrochemiluminescence biosensor using single type carbon dots as probe for SARS-CoV-2 detection based on series catalytic hairpin assembly amplification.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) is rampant all over the world, and rapid and effective virus detection is the best auxiliary to curb the spread of the epidemic. A diagnosis can only be made if two or more different nucleic acid sequences are confirmed at the same time, and in most of traditional detection technologies, these target sequences have been detected separately. In this work, an electrochemiluminescent (ECL) biosensor employing a single ECL probe as signal output and responding to dual-target simultaneously is proposed for the first time. Taking the two sequences located in ORF 1ab region and N region of SARS-CoV-2 gene sequence as the model target and nitrogen doped carbon quantum dots (CDs) as ECL beacon, supplemented with catalytic hairpin assembly (CHA) reaction for signal amplification, the presented strategy has been successfully applied to the rapid detection of SARS-CoV-2. The developed SARS-CoV-2 biosensor based on the series CHA systems can realize the quantitative determination of SARS-CoV-2 in the range of 50 fM to 200 pM within 40 min. Moreover, the clinical validity of this method has been verified by the high consistency between the detection results of using this method and those using RT-qPCR for seven clinical pharyngeal swab samples.

Epidemiological study of HPV infection in 40,693 women in Putian: a population study based on screening for high-risk HPV infection.

BACKGROUND: The infection rate of human papillomavirus (HPV) is high in the coastal regions of China. However, the infection rate among high-risk genotypes of women in Putian City is unknown. Therefore, this study aimed to analyse the epidemiology of high-risk HPV infection among women in Putian and provide a reference for the diagnosis, treatment and vaccination of cervical cancer in this region. METHODS: The data used were obtained from the Chinese government's public health program ("Cervical and Breast Cancer Screening Project"). A total of 40,693 female cervical cell exfoliation samples screened for high-risk HPV at the Affiliated Hospital of Putian University from July 2020 to December 2021 were enrolled. DNA was extracted using a fully automatic extractor. Then, 14 high-risk genotypes of HPV were detected by polymerase chain reaction. The characteristics of HPV infection, distribution of high-risk genotypes, infection types and thinprep cytologic test (TCT) classification at different age groups were analysed. RESULTS: Among the 40,693 samples, 3899 were infected with HPV, with an infection rate of 9.6%. Accordingly, HPV infection rates gradually increased with age, and statistically significant differences were observed among age groups (χ2 = 74.03, P < 0.01). The infection rates of high-risk HPV52, HPV58 and HPV16 were in the top three and increased with age. Single infection was dominant (84.7%), followed by double infections (12.7%). The cervical cytology of 3899 HPV-positive people can be classified into negative for intraepithelial lesion and malignancy (NILM, 88.0%), atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance (ASC-US, 6.6%), atypical squamous cells-cannot exclude high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (ASC-H, 1.4%), low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (LSIL, 3.2%) and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (HSIL, 0.8%). HPV16 infection rate increased with increasing severity of cervical cytology (χ2trend = 43.64, P < 0.01), whereas the infection rates of HPV52 (χ2trend = 13.89, P < 0.01) and HPV58 (χ2trend = 13.50, P < 0.01) showed opposite trends. CONCLUSION: The infection rate of female HPV high-risk screening in this region was 9.6% and mainly involved single infections. In addition, HPV16, HPV52 and HPV58 were closely related to the severity of cervical cytology. Effective screening, vaccination and education are needed. The 9-valent vaccine will be effective in reducing cervical pre-invasive disease. It would also be reasonable to state that the rising trend in HPV infection and high grade cytology with age emphasises the need to target older women with screening. Vaccination of younger women (aged ≤ 25) will lay the foundation for better cancer outcomes in the future.

Epigenetic modification of miR-217 promotes intervertebral disc degeneration by targeting the FBXO21-ERK signalling pathway.

BACKGROUND: Numerous potential therapeutic alternatives for intervertebral disc degeneration (IDD) have been investigated, the most promising of which are based on biological variables such as microRNAs (miRNAs). Therefore, we verified the hypothesis that miRNAs modulate IDD by affecting the FBXO21-ERK signalling pathway. METHODS: Microarray and quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) tests were used to examine the expression profiles of miRNAs in nucleus pulposus (NP) cells between patients with IDD and controls. Western blotting and luciferase reporter assays were used to identify the miRNA targets. RESULTS: Microarray and RT-qPCR assays confirmed that the expression level of miR-217 was significantly decreased in degenerative NP cells. CpG islands were predicted in the miR-217 promoter region. The IDD group had considerably higher methylation than the control group. Gain- and loss-of-function experiments revealed that miR-217 mimics inhibited apoptosis and extracellular matrix (ECM) breakdown in NP cells. Bioinformatic analyses and luciferase assays were used to determine the connection between miR-217 and FBXO21. In vitro tests revealed that miR-217 mimics inhibited the expression of FBXO21, pERK, MMP13, and ADAMTS5 proteins, successfully protecting the ECM from degradation. Additionally, in vivo investigation using the IDD mouse model demonstrated that the miR-217 agonist may sufficiently promote NP cell proliferation, decrease apoptosis, promote ECM synthesis, and suppress the expression of matrix-degrading enzymes in NP cells. CONCLUSIONS: Overexpression of miR-217 inhibits IDD via FBXO21/ERK regulation. TRIAL REGISTRATION: This study was performed in strict accordance with the NIH guidelines for the care and use of laboratory animals (NIH Publication No. 85-23 Rev. 1985) and was approved by the human research ethics committee of Wuhan University Renmin Hospital (Approval No. RMHREC-D-2020-391), and written informed consent was obtained from each participant.

α-Cyperone Improves Rat Spinal Cord Tissue Damage via Akt/Nrf2 and NF-κB Pathways.

INTRODUCTION: α-Cyperone has anti-inflammatory activities, but its effects on spinal cord injury (SCI) remain obscure. Thus, this study attempts to investigate the effects and modulatory mechanisms of α-Cyperone on SCI. MATERIALS AND METHODS: An SCI model was established in rats which were further treated with α-Cyperone. Basso-Beattie-Bresnahan (BBB) scoring was used to assess motor rehabilitation of rats modeled with SCI. The spinal cord tissues were collected, and the effect of α-Cyperone on the histopathology of rats modeled with SCI was detected by hematoxylin-eosin staining. Rat primary cortical neuron was stimulated with H2O2 and further treated with α-Cyperone and nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (Nrf2) inhibitor ML385. The levels of Nrf2, interleukin-6 (IL-6), nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB), Akt, toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4), and tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) were detected by immunofluorescence staining and western blotting. RESULTS: α-Cyperone elevated the BBB score and ameliorated the damage of spinal cord tissue in rats modeled with SCI. The levels of IL-6, Nrf2, NF-κB, TLR4, and TNF-α were upregulated, whereas that of Akt was downregulated in rats and cells modeled with SCI. Furthermore, α-Cyperone diminished the levels of IL-6, NF-κB, TLR4, and TNF-α, while augmenting those of Nrf2 and Akt in rats and cells modeled with SCI. ML385 inhibited the Nrf2 level that had been promoted by α-Cyperone in the nucleus and elevated the Nrf2 level that had been suppressed by α-Cyperone in the cytosol of cells modeled with SCI. ML385 increased the levels of IL-6, NF-κB, TLR4, and TNF-α that had been inhibited by α-Cyperone and decreased the Akt level that had been enhanced by α-Cyperone in cells modeled with SCI. CONCLUSIONS: α-Cyperone suppressed SCI-induced inflammation and spinal cord tissue damage via activating Akt/Nrf2 and suppressing NF-κB pathways.

Equipment-free, gold nanoparticle based semiquantitative assay of SARS-CoV-2-S1RBD IgG from fingertip blood: A practical strategy for on-site measurement of COVID-19 antibodies.

COVID-19 remains as a major threat to human society. A reliable, sensitive, rapid, and low requirement assay for serum neutralizing antibodies is needed as a pandemic management tool for estimation of revaccination time and implementation of "immune passport". Using gold nanoparticle (AuNR) as an immunosensor, we have established a semi-quantitative, instrument-free assay for measuring antibody level against SRAS-CoV-2 spike1 (S1) receptor binding domain (RBD) from fingertip blood samples. The testing results by the developed method correlated well with those obtained from conventional ELISA assay, indicating reliable quantitation could be achieved without use of plate reader. A declined of immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibody associated with vaccination time was observed, which agreed well with the data from other reports. The developed method provides a potentially complementary strategy for on-site measurement of COVID-19 antibodies.

Quick preparation of water-soluble perovskite nanocomposite via cetyltrimethylammonium bromide and its application.

A good water-soluble and stable nanocomposite has been facilely prepared by the encapsulation of CsPbBr3 QDs via cetyltrimethylammonium bromide and mineral oil through sonication, namely CsPbBr3@CMO nanocomposite. Such method is very quick and simple without complicated instruments and strict conditions. The results reveal that the synthesized CsPbBr3@CMO nanocomposite is spherical with uniform size and shows remarkably good solubility and stability in water. Specifically, the fluorescent intensity of CsPbBr3@CMO nanocomposite in water is decreased by 0.76% after 3 h; this result is comparable with those in earlier studies, and the good stability in water might be owned to the hydrophobic core of the CsPbBr3@CMO nanocomposite. The prepared CsPbBr3@CMO nanocomposite has been applied as a sensitive fluorescent probe for monitoring hydrogen sulfide (H2S), and the fluorescence intensity (~ 524 nm) has a linear relationship with the concentration of H2S in the range 0.15-105 µM with a detection limit of 53 nM, demonstrating application for monitoring H2S in rat brain coupled with microdialysis apparatus with satisfied results. The present study not only provides a simple but sensitive approach for the detection of H2S in living body, but also paves the way for expanding the application of CsPbBr3 QDs to aqueous medium.

One-pot facile synthesis of PDMS/PDMAEMA hybrid sponges for surfactant stabilized O/W emulsion separation.

Hydrophobic/oleophilic sponges are excellent absorbent materials for oil contaminant removal. However, the application is limited in dealing with surfactant stabilized O/W emulsions. The water in the emulsion isolates the contact between the sponge and oil droplets. Consequently, the oil absorption efficiency is not ideal. Herein, to improve the oil absorption efficiency from anionic surfactant stabilized O/W emulsions, water responsive hybrid sponges were reported. To prepare such sponges, water soluble poly(N,N-dimethylaminoethylmethacrylate) (PDMAEMA) was introduced into polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) sponges using table salt as a template and multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) as mechanical reinforcement in a one-pot method. Upon contact with an O/W emulsion, the water soluble PDMAEMA chain rose to the surface of the sponge, turning the hydrophobic surface into hydrophilic. Next, the tertiary amine groups in PDMAEMA ionized in water and carried positive charges which would cause the coagulation of oil droplets. Finally, the coagulated oil droplets were absorbed immediately by the oleophilic inner part of the sponge through the wicking effect. As a result, a Janus interface was generated in situ and sustained. Such material design synergistically contributed to a satisfactory hexadecane (HD) absorption efficiency of 178 ± 4% in 25 min. In contrast, the PDMS-MWCNT1.0% sponge could only absorb 9.8 ± 0.2% HD. Moreover, these sponges also presented robust mechanical performance and reusability, offering a new route for oil/water separation and oil pollution remediation in open water.

Chirality in peptide-based materials: From chirality effects to potential applications.

Chirality is ubiquitous in nature with primary cellular functions that include construction of right-/left-handed helix and selective communications among diverse biomolecules. Of particularly intriguing are the chiral peptide-based materials that can be deliberately designed to change physicochemistry properties via tuning peptide sequences. Critically, understanding their chiral effects are fundamental for the development of novel materials in chemistry and biomedicine fields. Here, we review recent researches on chirality in peptide-based materials, summarizing relevant typical chiral effects towards recognition, amplification, and induction. Driven forces for the chiral discrimination in affinity interaction as well as the handedness preferences in supramolecular structure formation at both the macroscale and microscale are illustrated. The implementation of such chirality effects of artificial copolymers, assembled aggregates and their composites in the fields of bioseparation and bioenrichment, cell incubation, protein aggregation inhibitors, chiral smart gels, and bionic electro devices are also presented. At last, the challenges in these areas and possible directions are pointed out. The diversity of chiral roles in the origin of life and chirality design in different organic or composite systems as well as their applications in drug development and chirality detection in environmental protection are discussed.

MiR-135-5p Alleviates Bone Cancer Pain by Regulating Astrocyte-Mediated Neuroinflammation in Spinal Cord through JAK2/STAT3 Signaling Pathway.

Bone cancer pain (BCP) was associated with microRNA dysregulation. In this study, we intended to clarify the potential role of miR-135-5p in a BCP mouse model, which was established by tumor cell implantation (TCI) in the medullary cavity of the mouse femur. The BCP-related behaviors were tested, including the paw withdrawal mechanical threshold (PWMT) and number of spontaneous flinches (NSF). The miRNA expression profiles in astrocytes of the sham and tumor groups were compared, and miRNA microarray and quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) assays confirmed that the amount of expression of miR-135-5p was significantly decreased in astrocytes of the tumor group. Gain- and loss-of-function studies showed that miR-135-5p could inhibit astrocyte activation and inflammation cytokine (TNF-α and IL-1ß) expression. The relation between miR-135-5p and JAK2 was detected by bioinformatic analysis and dual luciferase reporter gene assay. By conducting in vitro experiments, it was shown that the miR-135-5P mimics lowered the level of JAK2/STAT3 proteins and inflammatory factors in astrocytes. Moreover, in vivo analysis on BCP mice model indicated that the miR-135-5p agonist could sufficiently increase PWMT and decrease NSF. Meanwhile, reduced activation of astrocytes in the spinal cord, as well as decreased expression of JAK2/STAT3 and inflammatory mediators, were found after miR-135-5p agonist treatment. Collectively, the results showed that miR-135-5p could potentially reduce BCP in mice through inhibiting astrocyte-mediated neuroinflammation and blocking of the JAK2/STAT3 signaling pathway, indicating that the upregulation of miR-135-5P could be a therapeutic focus in BCP treatment.

Diverse immunoglobulin gene usage and convergent epitope targeting in neutralizing antibody responses to SARS-CoV-2.

It is unclear whether individuals with enormous diversity in B cell receptor repertoires are consistently able to mount effective antibody responses against SARS-CoV-2. We analyzed antibody responses in a cohort of 55 convalescent patients and isolated 54 potent neutralizing monoclonal antibodies (mAbs). While most of the mAbs target the angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) binding surface on the receptor binding domain (RBD) of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, mAb 47D1 binds only to one side of the receptor binding surface on the RBD. Neutralization by 47D1 is achieved independent of interfering RBD-ACE2 binding. A crystal structure of the mAb-RBD complex shows that the IF motif at the tip of 47D1 CDR H2 interacts with a hydrophobic pocket in the RBD. Diverse immunoglobulin gene usage and convergent epitope targeting characterize neutralizing antibody responses to SARS-CoV-2, suggesting that vaccines that effectively present the receptor binding site on the RBD will likely elicit neutralizing antibody responses in a large fraction of the population.

Engineering Z-scheme silver oxide/bismuth tungstate heterostructure incorporated reduced graphene oxide with superior visible-light photocatalytic activity.

Photocatalytic degradation of multiple organic contaminants has received extensive research attention and rational design of visible-light driven photocatalyst has been considered as an efficient approach. In this study, a visible-light Ag2O/Bi2WO6 heterostructure incorporated reduced graphene oxide (ABW-RGO) composite photocatalyst was prepared through a facile hydrothermal method for the first time and exhibited synergetic degradation behavior for contaminants in aqueous solutions. Under visible light, Tetracycline antibiotics has degraded 95.3% within only 40 min, and dye pollutants including Crystal Violet (cationic dye) and Congo Red (anionic dye) reached over 98.5% decomposition. The synthesized composite is also highly efficient in a wide pH range and multi-components system, maximizing the utilization of common sunlight, which make it suitable for industrial wastewater. The reactive oxidant species (ROS) experiment and electron spin resonance (ESR) measurement revealed the critical role of hydroxyl and superoxide radicals, clarifying the degradation pathway and mechanism analysis. The superior photocatalytic activity could be attributed to the formation of effective Z-scheme heterostructure and the excellent sorption capacity and conductivity of reduced graphene oxide. This research provides the design pathway to a novel catalyst using semiconductors composite and graphene support material, which can be extended to the energy-saving treatment of various organic pollutants.