Single-atom catalysts: promotors of highly sensitive and selective sensors.

Sensors, the underlying technology that supports the Internet of Things, are undergoing multi-disciplinary integration development to constantly improve the efficiency of human production and life. Simultaneously, the application scenarios in emerging fields such as medical diagnosis, environmental monitoring and industrial safety put forward higher requirements for sensing capabilities. Over the last decade, single-atom catalysts (SACs) have attracted tremendous attention in fields such as environment and energy due to their high atom utilization efficiencies, controllable active sites, tailorable coordination environments and structural/chemical stability. These extraordinary characteristics extend the sensitivity and selectivity of sensors beyond their current limitations. Here, we start with the working principles of SAC-based sensors, and summarize the relationship between sensor performance and intrinsic properties of SACs, followed by an overview of the design strategy development. We then review the recent advances in SAC-based sensors in different fields and highlight the future opportunities and challenges in their exciting applications.

Growth-regulated oncogene-α from oral submucous fibrosis fibroblasts promotes malignant transformation of oral precancerous cells.

BACKGROUND: Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is a common human malignancy and is usually preceded by the oral precancerous lesions. Oral submucous fibrosis (OSF) is one of the oral precancerous lesions with high incidence of malignant transformation. In addition to cancer cells, cancer-associated fibroblasts in the tumor microenvironment are correlated with cancer progression, but the role of fibroblasts from OSF in tumorigenesis and progression is still unknown. Growth-regulated oncogene-α (GRO-α), a member of CXC chemokine family, is related to tumorigenesis in several cancers. In this study, we would like to explore the role of GRO-α from OSF-associated fibroblasts in oral cancer progression. METHODS: We isolated primary culture fibroblasts of normal, precancerous, and tumor tissues from patients with OSCC accompanied with OSF. A cytokine array was used to screen cytokine secretions in the conditioned media of the fibroblasts. A wound healing migration assay, WST-1 cell proliferation assay, rhodamine-phalloidin staining, and soft agar colony formation assay were used to investigate the effects of GRO-α on a dysplastic oral keratinocyte cell line (DOK) cell migration, growth, and anchorage-independent growth. RESULTS: GRO-α was identified to be increased in conditioned media of OSF-associated fibroblasts. GRO-α promotes DOK cells proliferation, migration, and anchorage-independent growth through enhancing the EGFR/ERK signaling pathway, F-actin rearrangement, and stemness properties, respectively. Moreover, GRO-α neutralizing antibodies downregulated the conditioned medium-induced cell proliferation and migration of DOK. CONCLUSION: GRO-α from OSF-associated fibroblasts paracrinally promotes oral malignant transformation and significantly contributes to OSCC development.