Modeling of Menkes disease via human induced pluripotent stem cells.

Menkes disease (MD) is a copper-deficient neurodegenerative disorder that manifests severe neurologic symptoms such as seizures, lethargic states, and hypotonia. Menkes disease is due to a dysfunction of ATP7A, but the pathophysiology of neurologic manifestation is poorly understood during embryonic development. To understand the pathophysiology of neurologic symptoms, molecular and cellular phenotypes were investigated in Menkes disease-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (MD-iPSCs). MD-iPSCs were generated from fibroblasts of a Menkes disease patient. Abnormal reticular distribution of ATP7A was observed in MD-fibroblasts and MD-iPSCs, respectively. MD-iPSCs showed abnormal morphology in appearance during embryoid body (EB) formation as compared with wild type (WT)-iPSCs. Intriguingly, aberrant switch of E-cadherin (E-cad) to N-cadherin (N-cad) and impaired neural rosette formation were shown in MD-iPSCs during early differentiation. When extracellular copper was chelated in WT-iPSCs by treatment with bathocuprione sulfate, aberrant switch of E-cad to N-cad and impaired neuronal differentiation were observed, like in MD-iPSCs. Our results suggest that neurological defects in Menkes disease patients may be responsible for aberrant cadherin transition and impaired neuronal differentiation during early developmental stage.

Impedance-Readout Integrated Circuits for Electrical Impedance Spectroscopy: Methodological Review.

This review article provides a comprehensive overview of impedance-readout integrated circuits (ICs) for electrical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) applications. The readout IC, a crucial component of on-chip EIS systems, significantly affects key performance metrics of the entire system, such as frequency range, power consumption, accuracy, detection range, and throughput. With the growing demand for portable, wearable, and implantable EIS systems in the Internet-of-Things (IoT) era, achieving high energy efficiency while maintaining a wide frequency range, high accuracy, wide dynamic range, and high throughput has become a focus of research. Furthermore, to enhance the miniaturization and convenience of EIS systems, many emerging systems utilize two-electrode or dry electrode configurations instead of the conventional four-electrode configuration with wet electrodes for impedance measurement. In response to these trends, various technologies have been developed to ensure reliable operations even at two- or dry-electrode interfaces. This article reviews the principles, advantages, and disadvantages of techniques employed in state-of-the-art impedance-readout ICs, aiming to achieve high energy efficiency, wide frequency range, high accuracy, wide dynamic range, low noise, high throughput, and/or high input impedance. The thorough review of these advancements will provide valuable insights into the future development of impedance-readout ICs and systems for IoT and biomedical applications.

An Intra-Body Power Transfer System With 1-mW Power Delivered to the Load and 3.3-V DC Output at 160-cm of on-Body Distance.

This paper presents an intra-body power transfer (IBPT) system that can deliver power greater than 1 mW across an on-body distance of 160 cm. A system simulation model is built for the characterization of the channel and optimization of the power transfer. Our system analysis and experimental validation demonstrate that 1 MHz is an optimal carrier frequency for IBPT in terms of power delivered to the load (PDL) and power efficiency (PE). Prototype TX and RX boards were built, and an IC was fabricated in a 180-nm CMOS process for the RX. The proposed RX IC consists of a voltage doubler (VD) and a charge pump (CP) to obtain a sufficiently high voltage conversion ratio (VCR). Among various rectifier topologies, the VD is the optimal topology for the power receiver front-end because the parasitic ground coupling capacitances, which inevitably exist in the IBPT system, act as an inherent input-coupling capacitance for the VD. The implemented VD utilizes a dynamic VTH compensation (DVC) for its diode components. Compared to the conventional static VTH compensation (SVC), DVC in the VD reduces the reverse leakage current of the diode, thus maximizing the power conversion efficiency (PCE) and VCR. In addition, the PDL is enhanced by inserting an inductor on the TX board. It reduces the backward-path impedance without increasing the RX volume, boosting the PDL by up to 9.9 times compared to the PDL without the inductor insertion. The proposed IBPT system delivers up to 178.8 µW of power at 11.7% of maximum power efficiency with 3.3-V DC output voltage and even 1.385 mW of power with the inductor insertion, supporting various biomedical wearable sensors, such as ECG sensor modules.

Biomimetic Turbinate-like Artificial Nose for Hydrogen Detection Based on 3D Porous Laser-Induced Graphene.

Inspired by the turbinate structure in the olfaction system of a dog, a biomimetic artificial nose based on 3D porous laser-induced graphene (LIG) decorated with palladium (Pd) nanoparticles (NPs) has been developed for room-temperature hydrogen (H2) detection. A 3D porous biomimetic turbinate-like network of graphene was synthesized by simply irradiating an infrared laser beam onto a polyimide substrate, which could further be transferred onto another flexible substrate such as polyethylene terephthalate (PET) to broaden its application. The sensing mechanism is based on the catalytic effect of the Pd NPs on the crystal defect of the biomimetic LIG turbinate-like microstructure, which allows facile adsorption and desorption of the nonpolar H2 molecules. The sensor demonstrated an approximately linear sensing response to H2 concentration. Compared to chemical vapor-deposited (CVD) graphene-based gas sensors, the biomimetic turbinate-like microstructure LIG-gas sensor showed ∼1 time higher sensing performance with much simpler and lower-cost fabrication. Furthermore, to expand the potential applications of the biomimetic sensor, we modulated the resistance of the biomimetic LIG sensor by varying laser sweeping gaps and also demonstrated a well-transferred LIG layer onto transparent substrates. Moreover, the LIG sensor showed good mechanical flexibility and robustness for potential wearable and flexible device applications.