Bridge Bonded Oxygen Ligands between Approximated FeN4 Sites Confer Catalysts with High ORR Performance.

The applications of the most promising Fe-N-C catalysts are prohibited by their limited intrinsic activities. Manipulating the Fe energy level through anchoring electron-withdrawing ligands is found effective in boosting the catalytic performance. However, such regulation remains elusive as the ligands are only uncontrollably introduced oweing to their energetically unstable nature. Herein, we report a rational manipulation strategy for introducing axial bonded O to the Fe sites, attained through hexa-coordinating Fe with oxygen functional groups in the precursor. Moreover, the O modifier is stabilized by forming the Fe-O-Fe bridge bond, with the approximation of two FeN4 sites. The energy level modulation thus created confers the sites with an intrinsic activity that is over 10 times higher than that of the normal FeN4 site. Our finding opens a novel strategy to manage coordination environments at an atomic level for high activity ORR catalysts.

Engineering Energy Level of Metal Center: Ru Single-Atom Site for Efficient and Durable Oxygen Reduction Catalysis.

Emerging as a new frontier in heterogeneous catalysis, single-atom site catalysts (SSCs) have sparked enormous attention and bring about new opportunities to oxygen reduction electrocatalysis. Despite considerable progress achieved recently, most of the reported SSCs suffer from either insufficient activity or unsatisfactory stability, which severely retards their practical application. Here, we demonstrate a novel Ru-SSC with appropriate adsorption free energy of OH* (ΔGOH*) to confer excellent activity and low Fenton reactivity to maintain long-term stability. The as-developed Ru-SSC exhibits encouraging oxygen reduction reaction turnover frequency of 4.99 e- s-1 sites-1, far exceeding the state-of-the-art Fe-SSC counterpart (0.816 e- s-1 sites-1), as a result of Ru energy level regulation via spontaneous OH binding. Furthermore, Ru-SSC exhibits greatly suppressed Fenton reactivity, with restrained generation of reactive oxygen species directly observed, thus endowing the Ru-SSC with much more superior stability (only 17 mV negative shift after 20 000 cycles) than the Fe-SSC counterpart (31 mV). The practical application of Ru-SSC is further validated by its excellent activity and stability in a real fuel cell device.

Climbing the Apex of the ORR Volcano Plot via Binuclear Site Construction: Electronic and Geometric Engineering.

Great enthusiasm in single-atom catalysts (SACs) for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) has been aroused by the discovery of M-NX as a promising ORR catalysis center. However, the performance of SACs lags far behind that of state-of-the-art Pt due to the unsatisfactory adsorption-desorption behaviors of the reported catalytic centers. To address this issue, rational manipulation of the active site configuration toward a well-managed energy level and geometric structure is urgently desired, yet still remains a challenge. Herein, we report a novel strategy to accomplish this task through the construction of an Fe-Co dual-atom centered site. A spontaneously absorbed electron-withdrawing OH ligand was proposed to act proactively as an energy level modifier to empower easy intermediate desorption, while the triangular Fe-Co-OH coordination facilitates O-O bond scission. Benefiting from these attributes, the as-constructed FeCoN5-OH site enables an ORR onset potential and half-wave potential of up to 1.02 and 0.86 V (vs RHE), respectively, with an intrinsic activity over 20 times higher than the single-atom FeN4 site. Our finding not only opens up a novel strategy to tailor the electronic structure of an atomic site toward boosted activity but also provides new insights into the fundamental understanding of diatomic sites for ORR electrocatalysis.

Single-Atom Cr-N4 Sites Designed for Durable Oxygen Reduction Catalysis in Acid Media.

Single-atom catalysts (SACs) are attracting widespread interest for the catalytic oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), with Fe-Nx SACs exhibiting the most promising activity. However, Fe-based catalysts suffer serious stability issues as a result of oxidative corrosion through the Fenton reaction. Herein, using a metal-organic framework as an anchoring matrix, we for the first time obtained pyrolyzed Cr/N/C SACs for the ORR, where the atomically dispersed Cr is confirmed to have a Cr-N4 coordination structure. The Cr/N/C catalyst exhibits excellent ORR activity with an optimal half-wave potential of 0.773 V versus RHE. More excitingly, the Fenton reaction is substantially reduced and, thus, the final catalysts show superb stability. The innovative and robust active site for the ORR opens a new possibility to circumvent the stability issue of the non-noble metal ORR catalysts.

Unveiling molecular mechanisms of pigment synthesis in gardenia (Gardenia jasminoides) fruits through integrative transcriptomics and metabolomics analysis.

This study conducted a combined transcriptomics and metabolomics analysis in premature and mature developmental stages of Gardenia jasminoides Ellis fruits to identify the molecular mechanisms of pigment synthesis. The transcriptomics data produced high-quality clean data amounting to 46.98 gigabytes, exhibiting a mapping ratio of 86.36% to 91.43%. Transcriptomics analysis successfully identified about 3,914 differentially expressed genes which are associated with pivotal biological processes, including photosynthesis, chlorophyll, biosynthetic processes, and protein-chromophore linkage pathways. Functional diversity was clarified by the Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COG) classification, which focused mainly on pigment synthesis functions. Pathways analysis using the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) and Gene Ontology (GO) revealed critical pathways affecting pigment development. Metabolomics studies were carried out utilizing Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatography and mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS). About 480 metabolites were detected via metabolomics investigation, the majority of that were significantly involved in pigment synthesis. Cluster and pathway analyses revealed the importance of pathways such as plant secondary metabolite biosynthesis, biosynthesis of phenylpropanoids and plant hormone signal transduction in pigment synthesis. Current research advances our comprehension of the underlying mechanisms at the molecular level governing pigment synthesis in gardenia fruits, furnishing valuable insights for subsequent investigations.

A nomogram for predicting the necessity of tracheostomy after severe acute brain injury in patients within the neurosurgery intensive care unit: A retrospective cohort study.

Objective: This retrospective study was aimed to develop a predictive model for assessing the necessity of tracheostomy (TT) in patients admitted to the neurosurgery intensive care unit (NSICU). Method: We analyzed data from 1626 NSICU patients with severe acute brain injury (SABI) who were admitted to the Department of NSICU at the Affiliated People's Hospital of Jiangsu University between January 2021 and December 2022. Data of the patients were retrospectively obtained from the clinical research data platform. The patients were randomly divided into training (70%) and testing (30%) cohorts. The least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) regression identified the optimal predictive features. A multivariate logistic regression model was then constructed and represented by a nomogram. The efficacy of the model was evaluated based on discrimination, calibration, and clinical utility. Results: The model highlighted six predictive variables, including the duration of NSICU stay, neurosurgery, orotracheal intubation time, Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) score, systolic pressure, and respiration rate. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis of the nomogram yielded area under the curve (AUC) values of 0.854 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.822-0.886) for the training cohort and 0.865 (95% CI: 0.817-0.913) for the testing cohort, suggesting commendable differential performance. The predictions closely aligned with actual observations in both cohorts. Decision curve analysis demonstrated that the numerical model offered a favorable net clinical benefit. Conclusion: We developed a novel predictive model to identify risk factors for TT in SABI patients within the NSICU. This model holds the potential to assist clinicians in making timely surgical decisions concerning TT.

Efficacy and Safety of Computed Tomography-Guided Percutaneous Balloon Compression under Local Anesthesia for Recurrent Trigeminal Neuralgia: A Prospective Study.

Purpose: There are several ways to treat trigeminal neuralgia (TN); however, TN may recur after treatment. This study investigated the efficacy and safety of computed tomography (CT)-guided percutaneous balloon compression (PBC) under local anesthesia for treatment of recurrent trigeminal neuralgia. Patients and Methods. This is a prospective and nonrandomized controlled clinical study. Forty-eight patients with classical TN were scheduled to undergo PBC surgery at the pain department of our institution between January 2021 and June 2021. The patients were prospectively divided into an initial onset group, A (21 cases), and a recurrence group, B (27 cases). All surgeries were performed with CT guidance and under local anesthesia. Postoperative complications were also observed. Pain was assessed using the visual analog scale (VAS) and Barrow Neurological Institute (BNI) scale. Efficacy indices were evaluated at 3, 6, 12, and 18 months after surgery. Results: All participants reported complete pain relief at discharge. After 18 months of follow-up, the total effective rate of pain control was 89.5% (group A, 90.5%; group B, 88.8%). There was no significant difference in the BNI scores between the two groups before and after treatment. All patients had hypoesthesia on the affected side, and no severe complications such as diplopia, blindness, intracranial hemorrhage, or intracranial infection occurred. Conclusions: CT-guided PBC under local anesthesia is safe and effective for the treatment of recurrent TN and thus acts as an effective alternative for geriatric patients and those with high-risk factors.

Deep learning-based signal-independent assessment of macular avascular area on 6×6 mm optical coherence tomography angiogram in diabetic retinopathy: a comparison to instrument-embedded software.

SYNOPSIS: A deep-learning-based macular extrafoveal avascular area (EAA) on a 6×6 mm optical coherence tomography (OCT) angiogram is less dependent on the signal strength and shadow artefacts, providing better diagnostic accuracy for diabetic retinopathy (DR) severity than the commercial software measured extrafoveal vessel density (EVD). AIMS: To compare a deep-learning-based EAA to commercial output EVD in the diagnostic accuracy of determining DR severity levels from 6×6 mm OCT angiography (OCTA) scans. METHODS: The 6×6 mm macular OCTA scans were acquired on one eye of each participant with a spectral-domain OCTA system. After excluding the central 1 mm diameter circle, the EAA on superficial vascular complex was measured with a deep-learning-based algorithm, and the EVD was obtained with commercial software. RESULTS: The study included 34 healthy controls and 118 diabetic patients. EAA and EVD were highly correlated with DR severity (ρ=0.812 and -0.577, respectively, both p<0.001) and visual acuity (r=-0.357 and 0.420, respectively, both p<0.001). EAA had a significantly (p<0.001) higher correlation with DR severity than EVD. With the specificity at 95%, the sensitivities of EAA for differentiating diabetes mellitus (DM), DR and severe DR from control were 80.5%, 92.0% and 100.0%, respectively, significantly higher than those of EVD 11.9% (p=0.001), 13.6% (p<0.001) and 15.8% (p<0.001), respectively. EVD was significantly correlated with signal strength index (SSI) (r=0.607, p<0.001) and shadow area (r=-0.530, p<0.001), but EAA was not (r=-0.044, p=0.805 and r=-0.046, p=0.796, respectively). Adjustment of EVD with SSI and shadow area lowered sensitivities for detection of DM, DR and severe DR. CONCLUSION: Macular EAA on 6×6 mm OCTA measured with a deep learning-based algorithm is less dependent on the signal strength and shadow artefacts, and provides better diagnostic accuracy for DR severity than EVD measured with the instrument-embedded software.

Comparative safety and efficacy of percutaneous radiofrequency thermocoagulation and percutaneous balloon compression in CT-guided and local anesthesia for recurrent trigeminal neuralgia.

Background: There are several ways to treat trigeminal neuralgia (TN); however, TN may recur after treatment. Although microvascular decompression (MVD) is considered an effective treatment for trigeminal neuralgia, patients with recurrence may not be willing to undergo craniotomy. Objective: This study compared the safety and efficacy of percutaneous radiofrequency thermocoagulation and percutaneous balloon compression for treating recurrent trigeminal neuralgia. Methods: This was a prospective non-randomized controlled study. A total of 52 with recurrent TN were scheduled to undergo surgery in our Hospital from January-June 2021. The patients were classified into percutaneous radiofrequency thermocoagulation (PRT) and percutaneous balloon compression (PBC) groups based on the treatment. All surgeries were performed under computed tomography guidance and local anesthesia. Post-operative complications were also observed. Pain was assessed using the visual analog scale (VAS) and Barrow Neurological Institute (BNI) scale. Efficacy indices were evaluated at 3, 6, 12, and 18 months after surgery. Results: During follow-up, the efficacy rates of the two methods within 18 months were 76.0 and 88.9%, respectively. All patients had hypoesthesia on the affected side, and no severe complications. Notably, 5 patients (20%) in the PRT group with multiple-branch pain, including the first branch of the trigeminal nerve (V1) pain in the PRT group, received radiofrequency therapy for the supraorbital notch (foramen) after puncture of the foramen ovale. However, multiple pain episodes resolved with only one operation in the PBC group. Conclusion: CT-guided percutaneous radiofrequency thermocoagulation and percutaneous balloon compression under local anesthesia may be good options for treating recurrent trigeminal neuralgia. Percutaneous balloon compression may be recommended when multiple branches are involved, particularly in cases of V1 neuralgia.

Safety and efficacy of intravitreal injection of conbercept for the treatment of patients with choroidal neovascularization secondary to pathological myopia: Results from the SHINY study.

PURPOSE: To evaluate the safety and efficacy of intravitreal injections of 0.5 mg conbercept in patients with choroidal neovascularization secondary to pathological myopia (pmCNV). METHODS: The 177 pmCNV patients were randomly assigned in a 3:1 ratio to receive conbercept or sham injection, respectively. The conbercept group receive conbercept intravitreal injections administered on a pro re nata (PRN) basis after 3 monthly loading doses. The sham group received three consecutive monthly sham injections and then one conbercept injection followed by PRN conbercept intravitreal injections. RESULTS: At month 3, the mean BCVA for the two groups were improved by 12.0 letters (conbercept group, from 54.05 letters to 66.05 letters) and 0.6 letters (sham group, from 49.77 letters to 50.33 letters), respectively (p < 0.001). The mean central retinal thickness (CRT) at month 3 in the two groups decreased 62.0 µm (conbercept group, from 348.90 µm to 286.18 µm) and 4.4 µm (sham group, from 347.86 µm to 343.47 µm) (p < 0.001). At month 9, the mean BCVA improved by 13.3 letters in the conbercept group and 11.3 letters in the sham group. The mean CRT decreased 73.6 µm in the conbercept group and 55.9 µm in the sham group (p < 0.001). The most common ocular adverse events were associated with intravitreal injections, such as conjunctival haemorrhage and increased intraocular pressure. CONCLUSION: Intravitreal injections of 0.5 mg conbercept provided improvement in visual and anatomical outcomes in pmCNV patients with low rates of ocular and nonocular safety events.

Plexus-specific retinal capillary avascular area in exudative age-related macular degeneration with projection-resolved OCT angiography.

OBJECTIVE: To detect the plexus-specific retinal capillary avascular area in exudative age-related macular degeneration (EAMD) with projection-resolved optical coherence tomography angiography (PR-OCTA). METHODS AND ANALYSIS: In this prospective cross-sectional single centre study, eyes with treatment-naïve EAMD underwent macular 3×3 mm OCTA with AngioVue system. OCTA scans were analysed and processed including three-dimensional projection artefact removal, retinal layer semi-automated segmentation and en face angiogram generation. Automated quantification of extrafoveal (excluding the central 1 mm circle) avascular area (EAA) were calculated on projection-resolved superficial vascular complex (SVC), intermediate capillary plexus (ICP) and deep capillary plexus (DCP), respectively. RESULTS: Nineteen eyes with EAMD and 19 age-matched healthy control eyes were included. There was no significant difference between the EAMD and control eyes in terms of age, sex, axial length and mean ocular perfusion pressure (all p>0.05). Compared with control eyes, EAMD eyes had significantly larger EAA in SVC (median 0.125 vs 0.059 mm2, p=0.006), ICP (0.016 vs 0.000 mm2, p=0.004) and DCP (0.033 vs 0.000 mm2, p＜0.001). CONCLUSION: PR-OCTA showed that EAMD is associated with focal avascular area in all the three retinal vascular plexuses.

The complete chloroplast genome of Phyllostachys edulis f. curviculmis (Bambusoideae): a newly ornamental bamboo endemic to China.

Phyllostachys edulis (Bambusoideae) is a temperate woody bamboo with a long history of cultivation in China. Phyllostachys edulis f. curviculmis is the latest new forma that repored in 2018. Here, we performed the complete chloroplast genomes of P. edulis and P. edulis f. curviculmis using genome skimming. The length of two chloroplast genomes was 139,678 bp, and their GC contents were 38.9%. The sequences of each species contained 132 unique genes, including 39 tRNA, eight rRNA, and 85 protein-coding genes. Moreover, in subspecies-level, P. edulis 'Pachyloen' and P. edulis f. curviculmis are identical to P. edulis in the terms of chloroplast genome size, structure, and composition, further indicating their affinity.

DcardNet: Diabetic Retinopathy Classification at Multiple Levels Based on Structural and Angiographic Optical Coherence Tomography.

OBJECTIVE: Optical coherence tomography (OCT) and its angiography (OCTA) have several advantages for the early detection and diagnosis of diabetic retinopathy (DR). However, automated, complete DR classification frameworks based on both OCT and OCTA data have not been proposed. In this study, a convolutional neural network (CNN) based method is proposed to fulfill a DR classification framework using en face OCT and OCTA. METHODS: A densely and continuously connected neural network with adaptive rate dropout (DcardNet) is designed for the DR classification. In addition, adaptive label smoothing was proposed and used to suppress overfitting. Three separate classification levels are generated for each case based on the International Clinical Diabetic Retinopathy scale. At the highest level the network classifies scans as referable or non-referable for DR. The second level classifies the eye as non-DR, non-proliferative DR (NPDR), or proliferative DR (PDR). The last level classifies the case as no DR, mild and moderate NPDR, severe NPDR, and PDR. RESULTS: We used 10-fold cross-validation with 10% of the data to assess the network's performance. The overall classification accuracies of the three levels were 95.7%, 85.0%, and 71.0% respectively. CONCLUSION/SIGNIFICANCE: A reliable, sensitive and specific automated classification framework for referral to an ophthalmologist can be a key technology for reducing vision loss related to DR.

Quantification of Nonperfusion Area in Montaged Widefield OCT Angiography Using Deep Learning in Diabetic Retinopathy.

Purpose: To examine the efficacy of a deep learning-based algorithm to quantify the nonperfusion area (NPA) on montaged widefield OCT angiography (OCTA) for assessment of diabetic retinopathy (DR) severity. Design: Cross-sectional study. Participants: One hundred thirty-seven participants with a full range of DR severity and 26 healthy participants. Methods: A deep learning-based algorithm was developed for detecting and quantifying NPA in the superficial vascular complex on widefield OCTA comprising 3 horizontally montaged 6 × 6-mm OCTA scans from the nasal, macular, and temporal regions. We trained the algorithm on 978 volumetric OCTA scans from all participants using 5-fold cross-validation. The algorithm can distinguish NPA from shadow artifacts. The F1 score evaluated segmentation accuracy. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve and sensitivity with specificity fixed at 95% quantified network performance to distinguish patients with diabetes from healthy control participants, referable DR from nonreferable DR (nonproliferative DR [NPDR] less than moderate severity), and severe DR (severe NPDR, proliferative DR, or DR with edema) from nonsevere DR (mild to moderate NPDR). Main Outcome Measures: Widefield OCTA NPA, visual acuity (VA), and DR severities. Results: Automatically segmented NPA showed high agreement with the manually delineated ground truth, with a mean ± standard deviation F1 score of 0.78 ± 0.05 in nasal, 0.82 ± 0.07 in macular, and 0.78 ± 0.05 in temporal scans. The extrafoveal avascular area (EAA) in the macular scan showed the best sensitivity at 54% for differentiating those with diabetes from healthy control participants, whereas montaged widefield OCTA scan showed significantly higher sensitivity than macular scans (P < 0.0001, McNemar's test) for detecting eyes with DR at 66%, referable DR at 63%, and severe DR at 62%. Montaged widefield OCTA showed the highest correlation (Spearman ρ = 0.74; P < 0.0001) between EAA and DR severity. The macular scan showed the strongest negative correlation (Pearson ρ = -0.42; P < 0.0001) between EAA and best-corrected VA. Conclusions: A deep learning-based algorithm for montaged widefield OCTA can detect NPA accurately and can improve the detection of clinically important DR.

Automated diagnosis and segmentation of choroidal neovascularization in OCT angiography using deep learning.

Accurate identification and segmentation of choroidal neovascularization (CNV) is essential for the diagnosis and management of exudative age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Projection-resolved optical coherence tomographic angiography (PR-OCTA) enables both cross-sectional and en face visualization of CNV. However, CNV identification and segmentation remains difficult even with PR-OCTA due to the presence of residual artifacts. In this paper, a fully automated CNV diagnosis and segmentation algorithm using convolutional neural networks (CNNs) is described. This study used a clinical dataset, including both scans with and without CNV, and scans of eyes with different pathologies. Furthermore, no scans were excluded due to image quality. In testing, all CNV cases were diagnosed from non-CNV controls with 100% sensitivity and 95% specificity. The mean intersection over union of CNV membrane segmentation was as high as 0.88. By enabling fully automated categorization and segmentation, the proposed algorithm should offer benefits for CNV diagnosis, visualization monitoring.

[Comparison of fundus photography and fluorescein angiography in grading diabetic retinopathy].

OBJECTIVE: To study the consistency of the color fundus photography and fluorescein angiography for grading the diabetic retinopathy. METHODS: It was a retrospective case series. The agreement study was conducted in a series of diabetic patients, who were excluded from the mild non-proliferative diabetic retinopathy (NPDR) and the severe proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR). Ninety-nine cases (188 eyes) met the selected criteria Five 50 degrees non-stereoscopic photography for each eye were taken in all cases before FFA was performed. The diabetic retinopathy was graded from the fundus photography and FFA images according to international diabetic retinopathy disease severity scale. The kappa value was calculated according to the grading outcomes from the fundus photography and FFA images to estimate the agreement of the grading outcomes. RESULTS: The fundus photography showed 59 moderate NPDR (31.4%), 76 severe NPDR (40.4%) and 53 PDR eyes (28.2%) respectively, FFA showed 50 moderate NPDR (26.6%), 72 severe NPDR (38.3%) and 66 PDR (35.1%) respectively. The agreement for the grading of DR by the fundus photography and FFA was substantial (K = 0.601). In the evaluation whether it was necessary to implement PRP (more serious than NPDR and PDR), there was higher agreement between them (K = 0.652). CONCLUSIONS: Five 50 degrees photography can provides the support of the application of PRP for diabetic patients, FFA may be earlier and relatively accuracy in the diagnose of diabetic retinopathy.

DcR3, a new biomarker for sepsis, correlates with infection severity and procalcitonin.

Early diagnosis of sepsis is critical for successful treatment. The clinical value of DcR3 in early diagnosis of sepsis was determined in a dynamic follow-up study. Alterations in plasma levels of DcR3, PCT, CRP, and IL-6 were measured by ELISA and compared among patients with sepsis (n = 134), SIRS (n = 60) and normal adults (n = 50). Correlations and dynamic patterns among the biomarkers, APACHE II scores, clinical outcomes, and pathogens were also examined. Plasma DcR3 was significantly increased in sepsis compared to SIRS and normal adults (median 3.87 vs. 1.28 and 0.17 ng/ml). The elevated DcR3 could be detected in 97.60% sepsis patients 1-2 days prior to the result of blood culture reported. For diagnosis of sepsis, the sensitivity was 97.69% and specificity 98.04%; and for differential diagnosis of sepsis from SIRS, the sensitivity was 90.77% and specificity 98.40%. DcR3 level was positively correlated with severity of sepsis (rs = 0.82). In 41 patients who died of sepsis, DcR3 elevated as early as 1-2 days before blood culture and peaked on day 3 after blood culture performed. In 90% of sepsis patients, the dynamic alteration pattern of DcR3 was identical to that of PCT, while pattern of 10% patients differed in which clinical data was consistent with DcR3. In 13% sepsis patients, while PCT remained normal, DcR3 levels were at a high level. DcR3 levels had no difference among various pathogens infected. DcR3, a new biomarker, will aid in early diagnosis of sepsis and monitoring its outcome, especially when sepsis patients were PCT negative.

[Clinical study of photodynamic therapy for exudative age-related degeneration].

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effects of photodynamic therapy on subfoveal choroidal neovascularization (CNV) in patients with age-related macular degeneration (AMD). METHODS: 93 patients (98 eyes) with subfoveal CNV secondary to AMD treated with verteporfin PDT from August 2000 to February 2006 were retrospectively analyzed. All patients received verteporfin PDT and were followed clinically with visual acuity testing, fundus fluorescein angiography (FFA) and indocyanine green angiography (ICGA). RESULTS: The visual acuity was stabilized in 59 eyes (60.2%), improved in 21 eyes (21.4%), and decreased in 18 eyes (18.3%) 6 months after PDT. 54 patients (54 eyes, 55.1%) received multiple sessions of PDT because the recurrence of CNV leakage. The intervals of additional courses of treatment were variable from 1 month (1 eye), 3 months (24 eyes), 6 months (15 eyes), 9 months (6 eyes) to more than 12 months (8 eyes). 40 eyes received two sessions, 12 received three courses and 2 received 4 times repeated treatment. All patients received the 1.7 treatments in average. The Mean time of follow-up was 14 months (6 - 58 months). No serious side effect was recorded. CONCLUSIONS: PDT is a safe and effective treatment for patients with CNV from AMD, however, retreatments are required.

[Photodynamic therapy of pigmented choroidal melanomas in rabbits using hematoporphyrin monomethyl ether].

OBJECTIVE: The purpose is to determine the effectiveness of photodynamic therapy of experimental choroidal melanoma in rabbits using hematoporphyrin monomethyl ether (HMME). METHODS: Pigmented choroidal melanomas were established in 46 New Zealand albino rabbit eyes. The animals were treated with daily injection of cyclosporine A. The tumors were followed up with funduscopic examination and ultrasonography until they were 1.5 to 4.6 mm in height. Then the rabbits were divided randomly into two groups. In the treatment group, 41 rabbits were injected intravenously with hematoporphyrin monomethyl ether (HMME, 10 mg/kg). 3 hours later, the tumors were irradiated at 630 nm through an He-Ne laser at estimated total light doses of 60 approximately 150 J/cm(2). Control animals (5 rabbit eyes) were treated with light only (2 rabbit eyes), photosensitizer only (2 rabbit eyes), or observation only (1 rabbit eyes). Each animal then was followed up for 4 to 5 weeks with indirect ophthalmoscopy, ultrasonography, and fundus photography (16 rabbit eyes among the treatment group were extirpated for pathologic examination 24 hours or 1 week after the treatment). In the end, all the rabbits were sacrificed and the pathologic examinations were performed. RESULTS: With the fluences of >or= 70 J/cm(2), all the tumors regressed evidently. With the fluence of 60 J/cm(2), not all the animals showed complete tumor arrest. In the control group, all the tumors showed continuous growth and filled most of the vitreous cavity in 2 to 3 weeks. CONCLUSION: The photodynamic therapy with homemade photosensitizer HMME may have a role in the treatment of pigmented choroidal melanomas.

Micro Galvanic Cell To Generate PtO and Extend the Triple-Phase Boundary during Self-Assembly of Pt/C and Nafion for Catalyst Layers of PEMFC.

The self-assembly powder (SAP) with varying Nafion content was synthesized and characterized by XRD, XPS, HRTEM, and mapping. It is observed that the oxygen from oxygen functional groups transfers to the surface of Pt and generate PtO during the process of self-assembly with the mechanism of micro galvanic cell, where Pt, carbon black, and Nafion act as the anode, cathode and electrolyte, respectively. The appearance of PtO on the surface of Pt leads to a turnover of Nafion structure, and therefore more hydrophilic sulfonic groups directly contact with Pt, and thus the triple-phase boundary (TPB) has been expanded.