Recent Development of Rhenium-Based Materials in the Application of Diagnosis and Tumor Therapy.

Rhenium (Re) is widely used in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer due to its unique physical and chemical properties. Re has more valence electrons in its outer shell, allowing it to exist in a variety of oxidation states and to form different geometric configurations with many different ligands. The luminescence properties, lipophilicity, and cytotoxicity of complexes can be adjusted by changing the ligand of Re. This article mainly reviews the development of radionuclide 188Re in radiotherapy and some innovative applications of Re as well as the different therapeutic approaches and imaging techniques used in cancer therapy. In addition, the current application and future challenges and opportunities of Re are also discussed.

Spatiotemporal analysis of ambient air pollution exposure and respiratory infections cases in Beijing.

BACKGROUND: Ambient air pollutants (PM2.5) are components of persistent haze in Beijing during the autumn and winter seasons. MATERIALS: We collected hourly PM2.5 monitoring data for 35 days from 35 sites in Beijing during 2012. We also identified patients developing respiratory infections during the same time period in the same locale. A BME model was used to simulate environmental exposure concentrations over the course of each day. A medical accessibility analysis was performed to exclude the impact of medical availability on the analysis. A spatial analysis was included in the evaluation of the relationship between exposure duration and concentration of PM2.5 with the development of acute respiratory disease. RESULTS: A low concentration of PM2.5 (greater than 35 µg/m3 and less than 115 µg/m3) for at least 3 days was associated with an increased risk of acute respiratory disease. A high concentration of PM2.5 (greater than 115 µg/m3) was associated with an increased risk of infection even after 1 day of exposure.

Adaptive and nonadaptive genome size evolution in Karst endemic flora of China.

Genome size variation is of fundamental biological importance and has been a longstanding puzzle in evolutionary biology. Several hypotheses for genome size evolution including neutral, maladaptive, and adaptive models have been proposed, but the relative importance of these models remains controversial. Primulina is a genus that is highly diversified in the Karst region of southern China, where genome size variation and the underlying evolutionary mechanisms are poorly understood. We reconstructed the phylogeny of Primulina using DNA sequences for 104 species and determined the genome sizes of 101 species. We examined the phylogenetic signal in genome size variation, and tested the fit to different evolutionary models and for correlations with variation in latitude and specific leaf area (SLA). The results showed that genome size, SLA and latitudinal variation all displayed strong phylogenetic signals, but were best explained by different evolutionary models. Furthermore, significant positive relationships were detected between genome size and SLA and between genome size and latitude. Our study is the first to investigate genome size evolution on such a comprehensive scale and in the Karst region flora. We conclude that genome size in Primulina is phylogenetically conserved but its variation among species is a combined outcome of both neutral and adaptive evolution.

Topology-regulated nanocatalysts for ferroptosis-mediated cancer phototherapy.

Ferroptosis-mediated tumor treatment is constrained by the absence of single-component, activatable multifunctional inducers. Given this, a topological synthesis strategy is employed to develop an efficient bismuth-based semiconductor nano-photocatalyst (Bi2O3:S) for tumor ferroptosis therapy. Photo-excited electrons can participate in the reduction reaction to produce harmful reactive oxygen species (ROS) when exposed to near-infrared light. Meanwhile, photo-excited holes can contribute to the oxidation reaction to utilize extra glutathione (GSH) in tumors. In the acidic tumor microenvironment, bismuth ions generated from Bi2O3:S may further cooperate with GSH to amplify oxidative stress damage and achieve biodegradation. Both promote ferroptosis by downregulating glutathione peroxidase 4 (GPX4) expression. Besides, sulfur doping optimizes its near-infrared light-induced photothermal conversion efficiency, benefiting its therapeutic effect. Thus, bismuth ions and holes synergistically drive photo-activable ferroptosis in this nanoplatform, opening up new avenues for tumor therapy.

Topochemical-like bandgap regulation engineering: A bismuth thiooxide nanocatalyst for breast cancer phototherapy.

The physical property tuning of nanomaterials is of great importance in energy, medicine, environment, catalysis, and other fields. Topochemical synthesis of nanomaterials can achieve precise control of material properties. Here, we synthesized a kind of element-doped bismuth-based nanomaterial (BOS) by topochemical-like synthesis and used it for the phototherapy of tumors. In this study, we employed bismuth fluoride nanoflowers as a template and fabricated element-doped bismuth oxide nanoflowers by reduction conditions. The product is consistent with the precursor in crystal structure and nanomorphology, realizing topochemical-like synthesis under mild conditions. BOS can generate reactive oxygen species, consume glutathione, and perform photothermal conversion under 730 nm light irradiation. In vitro and in vivo studies demonstrate that BOS could suppress tumor growth by inducing apoptosis and ferroptosis through phototherapy. Therefore, this study offers a general regulation method for tuning the physical properties of nanomaterials by using a topochemical-like synthesis strategy.

The Influence of Air Pollutants and Meteorological Conditions on the Hospitalization for Respiratory Diseases in Shenzhen City, China.

Air pollutants have significant direct and indirect adverse effects on public health. To explore the relationship between air pollutants and meteorological conditions on the hospitalization for respiratory diseases, we collected a whole year of daily major air pollutants' concentrations from Shenzhen city in 2013, including Particulate Matter (PM10, PM2.5), Nitrogen dioxide (NO2), Ozone (O3), Sulphur dioxide (SO2), and Carbon monoxide (CO). Meanwhile, we also gained meteorological data. This study collected 109,927 patients cases with diseases of the respiratory system from 98 hospitals. We investigated the influence of meteorological factors on air pollution by Spearman correlation analysis. Then, we tested the short-term correlation between significant air pollutants and respiratory diseases' hospitalization by Distributed Lag Non-linear Model (DLNM). There was a significant negative correlation between the north wind and NO2 and a significant negative correlation between the south wind and six pollutants. Except for CO, other air pollutants were significantly correlated with the number of hospitalized patients during the lag period. Most of the pollutants reached maximum Relative Risk (RR) with a lag of five days. When the time lag was five days, the annual average of PM10, PM2.5, SO2, NO2, and O3 increased by 10%, and the risk of hospitalization for the respiratory system increased by 0.29%, 0.23%, 0.22%, 0.25%, and 0.22%, respectively. All the pollutants except CO impact the respiratory system's hospitalization in a short period, and PM10 has the most significant impact. The results are helpful for pollution control from a public health perspective.

The Association between Air Pollution and Population Health Risk for Respiratory Infection: A Case Study of Shenzhen, China.

Nowadays, most of the research on air pollution and its adverse effects on public health in China has focused on megacities and heavily-polluted regions. Fewer studies have focused on cities that are slightly polluted. Shenzhen used to have a favorable air environment, but its air quality has deteriorated gradually as a result of development in recent years. So far, no systematic investigations have been conducted on the adverse effects of air pollution on public health in Shenzhen. This research has applied a time series analysis model to study the possible association between different types of air pollution and respiratory hospital admission in Shenzhen in 2013. Respiratory hospital admission was divided into two categories for comparison analysis among various population groups: acute upper respiratory infection and acute lower respiratory infection. The results showed that short-term exposure to ambient air pollution was significantly associated with acute respiratory infection hospital admission in Shenzhen in 2013. Children under 14 years old were the main susceptible population of acute respiratory infection due to air pollution. PM10, PM2.5 and NO2 were the primary air pollutants threatening respiratory health in Shenzhen. Though air pollution level is generally relatively low in Shenzhen, it will benefit public health to control the pollution of particulate matter as well as other gaseous pollutants.

Adaptive Molecular Evolution of PHYE in Primulina, a Karst Cave Plant.

Limestone Karst areas possess high levels of biodiversity and endemism. Primulina is a typical component of Karst endemic floras. The high species richness and wide distribution in various Karst microenvironments make the genus an idea model for studying speciation and local adaptation. In this study, we obtained 10 full-length sequences of the phytochrome PHYE from available transcriptome resources of Primulina and amplified partial sequences of PHYE from the genomic DNA of 74 Primulina species. Then, we used maximum-likelihood approaches to explore molecular evolution of PHYE in this Karst cave plant. The results showed that PHYE was dominated by purifying selection in both data sets, and two sites were identified as potentially under positive selection. Furthermore, the ω ratio varies greatly among different functional domains of PHYE and among different species lineages. These results suggest that potential positive selection in PHYE might have played an important role in the adaption of Primulina to heterogeneous light environments in Karst regions, and different species lineages might have been subjected to different selective pressures.

Population exposure to PM2.5 in the urban area of Beijing.

The air quality in Beijing, especially its PM2.5 level, has become of increasing public concern because of its importance and sensitivity related to health risks. A set of monitored PM2.5 data from 31 stations, released for the first time by the Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau, covering 37 days during autumn 2012, was processed using spatial interpolation and overlay analysis. Following analyses of these data, a distribution map of cumulative exceedance days of PM2.5 and a temporal variation map of PM2.5 for Beijing have been drawn. Computational and analytical results show periodic and directional trends of PM2.5 spreading and congregating in space, which reveals the regulation of PM2.5 overexposure on a discontinuous medium-term scale. With regard to the cumulative effect of PM2.5 on the human body, the harm from lower intensity overexposure in the medium term, and higher overexposure in the short term, are both obvious. Therefore, data of population distribution were integrated into the aforementioned PM2.5 spatial spectrum map. A spatial statistical analysis revealed the patterns of PM2.5 gross exposure and exposure probability of residents in the Beijing urban area. The methods and conclusions of this research reveal relationships between long-term overexposure to PM2.5 and people living in high-exposure areas of Beijing, during the autumn of 2012.