Superior Hole Injection Material PEGDT/TPF/PVDF with p-Doping Capability for Highly Efficient Solution-Processed Organic Light-Emitting Diode.

The ability to charge injection is a key factor in determining the performance of the organic light-emitting diode (OLED) devices. Improving the work function of the anode surface via interface modification, thus lowering the hole injection barrier, stands as a crucial strategy for enhancing the performance of the OLED device. Herein, we propose an innovative p-doping hole injection material, namely, PEGDT/TPF/PVDF that exhibits excellent performance in OLED devices with the value of maximum current efficiency at 56.4 Cd A-1, maximum luminescence at 25,564 Cd m-2, and a high EQE of 19.8%. The results for PEGDT/TPF/PVDF showed good conductivity, excellent film-forming property, and high transmittance over 98% in the spectrum range of 500-700 nm. Changes in the hole-injection energy barriers observed from the surface of the anode suggest a modified anode with PEGDT/TPF/PVDF deepened the work function at a value of 0.2 eV, which dramatically improves the hole-injection properties. This work not only provides novel structural materials with exceptional hole-injection properties but also proposes a promising alternative to PEDOT/PSS.

The primary systemic vasculitis associated optic neuritis: a retrospective analysis in a single center over 10 years.

OBJECTIVES: To investigate the clinical and image characteristics of primary systemic vasculitis-associated optic neuritis patients. METHODS: This is a retrospective study. The patients clinically diagnosed with primary system vasculitis-induced optic neuritis were recruited from March 2013 to December 2023. All cases received orbital magnetic resonance imaging scans were analyzed. The ocular findings, systemic manifestations, laboratory data and prognosis were reviewed retrospectively. In addition, the related literature was reviewed. RESULTS: Fourteen patients (21 eyes), including 10 men and 4 women, were enrolled in this study. The ages ranged from 30 to 86 years in this cohort. Orbits MRI detects the enlargement and/or enhancement of the optic nerve. Cases 1-5 reported a confirmed diagnosis of Takayasu's arteritis, and cases 6-8 had giant cell arteritis. Cases 9-13 were antineutrophil cytoplasmic antibody-associated vasculitis. Case 14 was Cogan's syndrome. Mult organs and tissues, such as the kidneys, heart, paranasal sinuses, meninges, and respiratory system, were involved. In all of the 14 involved patients, the disease onset was either during the fall or winter season. There were no or only slight improvements in visual activity after conventional therapies. CONCLUSIONS: The autoantibodies' attack on the optic nerve, ischemic damage, or destruction of the blood-brain barrier may be the potential pathogenesis of vasculitis-associated optic neuritis. Even with prompt and aggressive clinical interventions, the prognosis remains unsatisfactory.

Insights into the mechanism of Danggui Liuhuang Tang in treating night sweats: A network pharmacology and molecular docking approach.

BACKGROUND: Night sweats can occur independently or in association with a number of medical conditions and can significantly disrupt daily life. This study focuses on the treatment of primary night sweats. Despite the considerable interest in Danggui Liuhuang Tang (DGLHT), an effective traditional Chinese medicine formula, its mechanism of action remains unknown. There is also no existing literature on the subject. METHODS: Network pharmacology and molecular docking techniques. RESULTS: Network pharmacology techniques were employed to identify 109 active ingredients and 808 potential targets of DGLHT, as well as 2385 targets associated with night sweating diseases. The screening process yielded 375 common targets shared between DGLHT and night sweating. These included the active ingredients baicalein, quercetin, huarangiin, and tetrahydroafrican antipyrine, and the core targets interleukin 6, serine/threonine protein kinase 1, tumor necrosis factor, GAPDH enzyme, and Src protein kinase were identified. The Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes enrichment analysis revealed that DGLHT exerts its therapeutic effects primarily by modulating the PI3K-Akt signaling pathway, neuroactive ligand-receptor interactions, lipid metabolism, and atherosclerosis pathways. Molecular docking revealed strong binding activity between the main active ingredients and their potential targets. CONCLUSION: The research identifies promising active ingredients and targets related to the effectiveness of DGLHT in controlling night sweats, thus contributing to the further exploration of potential therapeutics for this condition. In addition, the results of this experiment provide a basis for future research into night sweats.

Enhancing Fire Safety and Softness: Efficacy of Ethanolamine Polyphosphate as a Fire Retardant for Textiles.

The rising awareness of fire safety among consumers has driven the demand for fire retardants (FRs) that are both cost-effective and efficient across various industries, particularly in textiles. Traditional FRs often compromise fabric softness, resulting in undesirable tactile texture and stiffness changes. While the external addition of softeners can mitigate the stiffness, it may introduce issues such as a greasy texture and increased flammability. This study introduces ethanolamine polyphosphate (EAPP), an innovative organic polyphosphate, as an effective fire retardant that preserves the softness of textiles. Comprehensive evaluations are conducted on EAPP-treated textiles, revealing significant improvements in fire retardancy without compromising fabric quality. EAPP treatment (15 wt.% aqueous solutions) increases the limiting oxygen index (LOI) of pure cotton textiles from 17% to 36% and significantly reduces the peak heat release rate (pHRR) and total smoke rate (TSR) as measured by cone calorimetry. Unlike conventional FR products that form FR-salt crystal particles on the fabric surface after drying, EAPP forms a smooth FR protective layer on the fabric, enhancing mechanical fastness and maintaining tactile qualities. These findings highlight EAPP's potential as a non-washing durable, spray-on fire retardant solution for textiles, combining safety with user comfort.

Beneficial Effects of Ginger Extract on Eye Fatigue and Shoulder Stiffness: A Randomized, Double-Blind, and Placebo-Controlled Parallel Study.

This study aimed to assess ginger extract's impact on ocular and peripheral blood flow and its potential to alleviate eye fatigue and shoulder stiffness. This study included 100 healthy individuals aged 20-73 years with eye fatigue and shoulder stiffness. Participants were randomly assigned to receive either placebo capsules or ginger extract capsules daily for eight weeks. Ocular blood flow, peripheral blood flow, eye fatigue (visual analog scale [VAS]), shoulder stiffness (VAS), body warmth (VAS), and shoulder muscle stiffness were assessed at weeks 0, 4, and 8, respectively. No improvement in ocular blood flow was observed under the study conditions. Conversely, peripheral blood flow in deep areas was enhanced in females (p = 0.033). Subgroup analysis by age (≥51 or <51 years) revealed that ginger's effect on enhancing peripheral blood flow in deep vessels was restricted in females under 51 (p = 0.017). Similarly, subjective complaints of eye fatigue and shoulder stiffness were improved by ginger consumption in females under 51. Body warmth was favorably changed significantly in males ≥51 years due to ginger consumption. The muscle stiffness showed no statistically significant changes. In conclusion, ginger consumption reduces eye fatigue and shoulder stiffness by enhancing peripheral blood flow in relatively young females.

Self-powered triboelectric-responsive microneedles with controllable release of optogenetically engineered extracellular vesicles for intervertebral disc degeneration repair.

Excessive exercise is an etiological factor of intervertebral disc degeneration (IVDD). Engineered extracellular vesicles (EVs) exhibit excellent therapeutic potential for disease-modifying treatments. Herein, we fabricate an exercise self-powered triboelectric-responsive microneedle (MN) assay with the sustainable release of optogenetically engineered EVs for IVDD repair. Mechanically, exercise promotes cytosolic DNA sensing-mediated inflammatory activation in senescent nucleus pulposus (NP) cells (the master cell population for IVD homeostasis maintenance), which accelerates IVDD. TREX1 serves as a crucial nuclease, and disassembly of TRAM1-TREX1 complex disrupts the subcellular localization of TREX1, triggering TREX1-dependent genomic DNA damage during NP cell senescence. Optogenetically engineered EVs deliver TRAM1 protein into senescent NP cells, which effectively reconstructs the elimination function of TREX1. Triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) harvests mechanical energy and triggers the controllable release of engineered EVs. Notably, an optogenetically engineered EV-based targeting treatment strategy is used for the treatment of IVDD, showing promising clinical potential for the treatment of degeneration-associated disorders.

Platelet indices and inflammatory bowel disease: a Mendelian randomization study.

Background: Platelets play a significant role in the innate and adaptive processes of immunity and inflammation. Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is an autoimmune disease that is widely understood to be caused by a combination of genetic predisposition, aberrant immune responses, etc. Methods: To examine the relationships between genetically determined platelet indices and IBD, we conducted a Mendelian randomization (MR) study. Data associated with platelet count (PLT), mean platelet volume (MPV), platelet distribution width (PDW), plateletcrit (PCT) were used from the UK Biobank. The outcome data, including IBD, Crohn's disease (CD), ulcerative colitis (UC), were from the FinnGen database. The inverse variance-weighted (IVW), MR-Egger, weighted median methods were used for MR analyses. Results: The MR estimations from the IVW approach show a significant connection between PLT and IBD. Similarly, PCT and IBD have a relationship following the IVW and MR-Egger approaches. While PLT and PCT have strong relationships with CD, according to the findings of all three approaches respectively. Nevertheless, PDW was the only relevant indicator of UC. The only significant result was IVW's. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that the fluctuation of platelet indicators is of great significance in the development of IBD. PLT and PCT have a close association with IBD and CD, respectively; PDW only has a connection with UC. Platelets play an important role in the progression of IBD (UC, CD).

End-to-end Autonomous Driving: Challenges and Frontiers.

The autonomous driving community has witnessed a rapid growth in approaches that embrace an end-to-end algorithm framework, utilizing raw sensor input to generate vehicle motion plans, instead of concentrating on individual tasks such as detection and motion prediction. End-to-end systems, in comparison to modular pipelines, benefit from joint feature optimization for perception and planning. This field has flourished due to the availability of large-scale datasets, closed-loop evaluation, and the increasing need for autonomous driving algorithms to perform effectively in challenging scenarios. In this survey, we provide a comprehensive analysis of more than 270 papers, covering the motivation, roadmap, methodology, challenges, and future trends in end-to-end autonomous driving. We delve into several critical challenges, including multi-modality, interpretability, causal confusion, robustness, and world models, amongst others. Additionally, we discuss current advancements in foundation models and visual pre-training, as well as how to incorporate these techniques within the end-to-end driving framework.We maintain an active repository that contains up-to-date literature and open-source projects at https://github.com/OpenDriveLab/End-to-end-Autonomous-Driving.

The Research on the Effect of Nutritional Stage-based Care Intervention in Elderly Patients with Severe Pneumonia.

Objective: To evaluate the efficacy of a nutritional stage-based care intervention in improving outcomes for elderly patients with severe pneumonia. Methods: A retrospective analysis of clinical data was conducted on 203 elderly patients with severe pneumonia admitted to our hospital from January 2022 to January 2023. All patients met the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Upon admission, all patients received relevant symptomatic treatment and basic care. Based on the nutritional care intervention received by the patients, they were divided into a control group (n=101) and an observation group (n=102). The control group received routine nutritional care intervention, while the observation group received nutritional stage-based care intervention. The study compared the levels of organ recovery indicators (mechanical ventilation time, ICU hospitalization time), nutritional status indicators [serum albumin (Alb), prealbumin (PAB), hemoglobin (Hb)], immune function indicators [immunoglobulin A (IgA), immunoglobulin G (IgG), immunoglobulin M (IgM)], blood gas status indicators [arterial oxygen pressure (PaO2), arterial carbon dioxide pressure (PaCO2)], and the occurrence of complications between the two groups. Results: Organ Recovery Indicators: The observation group showed significantly lower mechanical ventilation time and ICU hospitalization time compared to the control group (P < .05). Nutritional Status Indicators: Before the intervention, there was no significant difference in albumin (Alb), prealbumin (PAB), and hemoglobin (Hb) levels between the two groups (P > .05). After the intervention, the Alb, PAB, and Hb levels in the observation group were significantly higher than the control group (P < .05). Immune Function Indicators: Before intervention, there was no significant difference in IgA, IgG, and IgM levels between the two groups (P > .05). After intervention, the levels of IgA, IgG, and IgM in the observation group were significantly higher than the control group (P < .05). Blood Gas Status Indicators: Before intervention, there was no significant difference in PaO2 and PaCO2 levels between the two groups (P > .05). After intervention, the PaO2 level in the observation group was significantly higher, while the PaCO2 level was significantly lower compared to the control group (P < .05). Complication Incidence: The complication incidence in the control group was 25.74%, while in the observation group it was 9.80%, which was significantly lower (P < .05). Conclusion: The application of nutritional stage-based care intervention in the management of elderly patients with severe pneumonia is shown to be highly beneficial. Compared to routine nutritional care, the nutritional stage-based approach significantly improved patients' nutritional status, immune function, blood gas conditions, and accelerated their organ recovery. Importantly, this intervention also led to a markedly lower incidence of complications. These findings suggest that incorporating nutritional stage-based care into standard treatment protocols for elderly patients with severe pneumonia may significantly enhance recovery rates and long-term health outcomes for this vulnerable patient population. Given the positive impact demonstrated in this study, the nutritional stage-based care intervention is worthy of broader clinical adoption and promotion.

Circ_0000758 Facilitates Bladder Cancer Cell Growth, Migration and Angiogenesis Via Severing as miR-1236-3p Sponge.

Circular RNA (circRNA) has been reported to regulate the development of bladder cancer (BCa). However, the role of circ_0000758 in BCa progression is unknown. Circ_0000758 and miR-1236-3p expression, as well as ZEB2 mRNA expression were determined by qRT-PCR. BCa cell biological functions were determined by MTT assay, EdU assay, flow cytometry, wound healing assay and tube formation assay. Protein expression was detected by western blot analysis. RNA pull-down assay and dual-luciferase reporter assay were used to confirm RNA interaction. Xenograft mice models were constructed to assess the effect of circ_0000758 on BCa tumor growth. Circ_0000758 had increased expression in BCa tissues and cells. Circ_0000758 silencing could inhibit BCa cell growth, migration, angiogenesis in vitro, and tumor growth in vivo. Circ_0000758 served as a molecular sponge for miR-1236-3p, and miR-1236-3p inhibitor reversed circ_0000758 knockdown-mediated the inhibition effect on BCa cell progression. ZEB2 was targeted by miR-1236-3p, and its overexpression also revoked the suppressive effect of miR-1236-3p on BCa cell growth, migration, and angiogenesis. Besides, circ_0000758 knockdown also restrained BCa tumor growth. Circ_0000758 might promote BCa cell growth, migration, and angiogenesis by regulating the miR-1236-3p/ZEB2 axis.