Isoindigo-Based Dual-Acceptor Conjugated Polymers Incorporated Conjugation Length and Intramolecular Charge Transfer for High-Efficient Photothermal Conversion.

Photothermal tumor therapy (PTT) and photoacoustic imaging (PA) have emerged as promising noninvasive diagnostic and therapeutic approaches for cancer treatment. However, the development of efficient PTT agents with high photostability and strong near-infrared (NIR) absorption remains challenging. This study synthesizes three isoindigo-based dual-acceptor conjugated polymers (CPs) (P-IIG-TPD, P-IIG-DPP, and P-IIG-EDOT-BT) via a green and nontoxic direct arylation polymerization (DArP) method and characterizes their optical, electrochemical, and NIR photothermal conversion properties. By incorporating two acceptors into the backbone, the resulting polymers exhibit enhanced photothermal conversion efficiency (PCE) due to improved synergy among conjugation length, planarity, and intramolecular charge transfer (ICT). The nanoparticles (NPs) of P-IIG-EDOT-BT and P-IIG-DPP have a uniform size distribution around 140 nm and exhibit remarkable NIR absorption at 808 nm. In addition, P-IIG-EDOT-BT and P-IIG-DPP NPs exhibit high PCEs of 62% and 78%, respectively. This study promotes the molecular design of CPs as NIR photothermal conversion materials and provides guidance for the development of novel dual-acceptor CPs for tumor diagnosis and treatment.

A self-oscillating gel system with complex dynamic behavior based on a time delay between the oscillations.

The time delay existing between the chemical oscillation and mechanical oscillation (C-M delay) in a self-oscillating gel (SOG) system is observable in previous experimental studies. However, how the C-M delay affects the dynamic behavior of a large anisotropic SOG has not been quantified or reported systematically. In this study, we observed that the oscillation period increases with a decrease in the cross-linking density of the anisotropic SOG, and this determined whether regular mechanical oscillation occurs. Unlike before, the disrupted mechanical oscillations interestingly tend to be regular and periodic under visible light, which is an inhibitor for the B-Z reaction incorporating the Ru complex as a catalyst (Ru-BZ reaction). Moreover, the study of the C-M delay at different scales has far-reaching implications for intelligent soft actuators.

Development of a facial-expression database of Chinese Han, Hui and Tibetan people.

Recently, cross-cultural facial-expression recognition has become a research hotspot, and a standardised facial-expression material system can significantly help researchers compare and demonstrate the results of other studies. We developed a facial-expression database of Chinese Han, Hui and Tibetan ethnicities. In this study, six basic human facial expressions (and one neutral expression) were collected from 200 Han, 220 Hui and 210 Tibetan participants who lived in these regions. Four experts on each ethnicity evaluated the facial-expression images according to the expressions, and only those achieving inter-rater agreement were retained. Subsequently, 240 raters evaluated these images according to the seven emotions and rated the intensity of the expressions. Consequently, 2980 images were included in the database, including 930 images of Han individuals, 962 images of Hui individuals and 1088 images of Tibetan individuals. In conclusion, the facial-expression database of Chinese Han, Hui and Tibetan people was representative and reliable with a recognition rate of over 60%, making it well-suited for cross-cultural research on emotions.

Reprocessable and Multiple Shape Memory Thermosets with Reconfigurability.

Multiple shape memory thermosets for various engineering applications have been quickly developed in recent years, mainly due to their stable thermomechanical performance, environmental stability, excellent chemical, solvent resistance, etc. However, these thermosets are inherently non-recyclable due to their chemically crosslinked properties, and it is difficult to make the permanent shapes of these thermosets sophisticated and geometrically complex, which significantly restricts a great variety of engineering applications in the industry and technology fields, mainly due to the economic inefficiency and environmental impact. Here, a thermoset with recyclability, multiple shape memory effect (multi-SME), and permanent shape reconfiguration is reported. After recycling, it also exhibits excellent mechanical properties without sacrificing the excellent multi-SME, combined elasticity (shape memory), and solid state plasticity, which can be easily scaled up and generalized to a variety of dynamic covalent networks.

High-strain slide-ring shape-memory polycaprolactone-based polyurethane.

To enable shape-memory polymer networks to achieve recoverable high deformability with a simultaneous high shape-fixity ratio and shape-recovery ratio, novel semi-crystalline slide-ring shape-memory polycaprolactone-based polyurethane (SR-SMPCLU) with movable net-points constructed by a topologically interlocked slide-ring structure was designed and fabricated. The SR-SMPCLU not only exhibited good shape fixity, almost complete shape recovery, and a fast shape-recovery speed, it also showed an outstanding recoverable high-strain capacity with 95.83% Rr under a deformation strain of 1410% due to the pulley effect of the topological slide-ring structure. Furthermore, the SR-SMPCLU system maintained excellent shape-memory performance with increasing the training cycle numbers at 45% and even 280% deformation strain. The effects of the slide-ring cross-linker content, deformation strain, and successive shape-memory cycles on the shape-memory performance were investigated. A possible mechanism for the shape-memory effect of the SR-SMPCLU system is proposed.

A rapidly recoverable shape memory polymer with a topologically well-controlled poly(ethyl methacrylate) structure.

Many of the unique properties of a conventionally crosslinked shape memory network are not found at the same time, and this is a large challenge for the development of advanced shape memory functional materials. In this work, a topologically well-controlled network shape memory poly(ethyl methacrylate) (CN-SMPEMA) is designed and fabricated by introducing two tetra-armed functional structures simultaneously as well-defined structure units to promote switch segment and net-point uniform distribution via the combined technology of the unique controllable atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) and copper(i)-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAC). Compared with conventionally crosslinked networks, the as-prepared CN-SMPEMA not only exhibits a combination of excellent mechanical properties, shape fixity, shape recovery ratios and outstanding cycling stability, but also displays rapid recoverability. Additionally, a feasible molecular mechanism for the shape memory effect of the CN-SMPEMA system is analyzed and proposed. We anticipate that such a topologically well-defined network shape memory material with multiple excellent properties will broaden the practical application range of acrylate-based shape memory polymer materials.

Reconfigurable and Reprocessable Thermoset Shape Memory Polymer with Synergetic Triple Dynamic Covalent Bonds.

Degradable shape memory polymers (SMPs), especially for polyurethane-based SMPs, have shown great potential for biomedical applications. How to reasonably fabricate SMPs with the ideal combination of degradability, shape reconfigurability, and reprocessability is a critical issue and remains a challenge for medical disposable materials. Herein, a shape memory poly(urethane-urea) with synergetic triple dynamic covalent bonds is reported via embedding polycaprolactone unit into poly(urethane-urea) with the hindered urea dynamic bond. The single polymer network is biodegradable, thermadapt, and reprocessable, without sacrificing the outstanding shape memory performance. Such a shape memory network with plasticity and reprocessability is expected to have significant and positive impact on the medical device industry.

A Facile and General Approach to Recoverable High-Strain Multishape Shape Memory Polymers.

Fabricating a single polymer network with no need to design complex structures to achieve an ideal combination of tunable high-strain multiple-shape memory effects and highly recoverable shape memory property is a great challenge for the real applications of advanced shape memory devices. Here, a facile and general approach to recoverable high-strain multishape shape memory polymers is presented via a random copolymerization of acrylate monomers and a chain-extended multiblock copolymer crosslinker. As-prepared shape memory networks show a large width at the half-peak height of the glass transition, far wider than current classical multishape shape memory polymers. A combination of tunable high-strain multishape memory effect and as high as 1000% recoverable strain in a single chemical-crosslinking network can be obtained. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first thermosetting material with a combination of highly recoverable strain and tunable high-strain multiple-shape memory effects.

Theoretical study on structures and bond properties of NpO2(m+) ions and NpO2(H2O)n(m+) (m = 1-2, n = 1-6) complexes in the gas phase and aqueous solution.

The equilibrium structures, vibrational frequencies, and bond characteristics of NpO2(m+) ions and NpO2(H2O)n(m+) (m = 1-2, n = 1-6) complexes have been studied by carrying out ab initio calculations in the gas phase and aqueous solution. The geometries have been obtained at the B3LYP level with the use of the polarized continuum model (PCM). The computed structural parameters that are in reasonably good agreement with the available data show that the solvation effect leads to a red shift of the IR spectra and the weakness of interaction strengths in neptunyl ions. By comparing the structural properties and the density of states (DOS) of these aqua complexes in the gas phase and aqueous solution, it is found that the solvation effect can be simulated approximately with the calculations of these aqua complexes in the gas phase. In addition, the DOS of these aqua complexes together with the binding energies between the neptunyl ion and water molecule reveal that the penta-aqua complex is preferred for neptunyl ions in aqueous solution.

Facial feedback manipulation influences the automatic detection of unexpected emotional body expressions.

Unexpected or changing facial expressions are known to be able to engage more automatic processing than frequently occurring facial expressions, thereby inducing a neural differential wave response known as expression mismatch negativity (EMMN). Recent studies have shown that EMMN can be modulated by the observer's facial feedback (i.e., feedback from their own facial movements). A similar EMMN activity has been discovered for body expressions, but thus far only a few emotion types have been investigated. It is unknown whether the EMMNs evoked by body expressions can be influenced by facial feedback. To explore this question, we recorded EEG activity of 29 participants in the reverse oddball paradigm. Here two unexamined categories of body expressions were presented, happy and sad, placed in two paired stimulus sequences: in one the happy body was presented with a probability of 80% (standards) while the sad body was presented with a probability of 20% (deviants), and in the other the probabilities were reversed. The facial feedback was manipulated by different pen holding conditions (i.e., participants holding the pen with the teeth, lips, or nondominant hand). The nonparametric cluster permutation test revealed significant happy and sad body-related EMMN (bEMMN) activities. The happy-bEMMN were more negative than sad-bEMMN within the range of 100-150 ms. Additionally, the bEMMN amplitude of both emotions is modulated by the facial feedback conditions. These results expand the range of emotional types applicable to bEMMN and provide evidence for the validity of the facial feedback hypothesis across emotional carriers.

Attentional Bias of Individuals with Social Anxiety towards Facial and Somatic Emotional Cues in a Holistic Manner.

Attentional bias towards threatening information is a crucial factor contributing to the development and persistence of social anxiety. However, the attentional bias towards threat information and the preferential processing pattern of emotional cues in individuals with social anxiety disorder during integrated facial and physical stimuli processing remain unclear. In this study, we employed a dot-probe paradigm to investigate the attentional bias towards integrated emotions (facial-body) among students with high and low levels of social anxiety (Experiment 1). Experiments 2 and 3 examined the attentional bias of socially anxious individuals when faced with conflicting emotional cues from faces or bodies in relation to integrated emotions. The data revealed that participants both high and low levels of social anxiety participants exhibited accelerated orienting and biased attention towards facial-body emotional processing. When there was inconsistency between emotional cues from faces or bodies and integrated emotions, higher levels of social anxiety were associated with increased vigilance towards threatening faces or bodies. These findings underscore that individuals with social anxiety possess an ability to rapidly capture threatening cues during the processing of facial-body emotional stimuli while also demonstrating a tendency to avoid relying solely on facial cues by compensating through bodily cues for emotion perception.

Adolescent Internet Gaming Disorder and sensitivity to money and social rewards.

Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD) is a behavioural addiction characterised by excessive exposure to addictive stimuli, resulting in reduced sensitivity of the brain's reward system towards everyday rewards. Online game addiction is prevalent among adolescents; however, it remains unclear if there are variations in reward processing patterns among adolescents with online game addiction. We compared differences in sensitivity to two types of rewards between patients with IGD and patients with Recreational Game Use (RGU) using the Monetary Incentive Delay (MID) paradigm and the Social Incentive Delay (SID) paradigm (Experiment 1). Additionally, we used a mixed reward latency paradigm, including both monetary and social rewards, to further explore the processing characteristics of IGD towards a mixture of these two rewards (Experiment 2). There were significant differences in the sensitivity of IGD and RGU to monetary and social rewards. Adolescents with IGD had significantly shorter reaction times to the four mixed rewards compared to RGU, while no significant differences were found between groups regarding sensitivity to specific individual rewards. However, the simultaneous presence of two rewards affected the processing speed and preference of adolescents with IGD. The reward processing characteristics observed in adolescents with online gaming disorder show specificity concerning the type and presentation of rewards, providing a theoretical foundation for diagnosing and treating adolescent online gaming addiction.

The role of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex in conflict control during insomnia disorder.

BACKGROUND: Patients with insomnia are often accompanied by cognitive dysfunction, which seriously affects the quality of life of patients. Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) can induce brain neuroplasticity, regulate brain cognitive function and inhibitory control ability. OBJECTIVE: To explore the intervention effect of rTMS on conflict control and sleep quality in patients with insomnia. METHODS: In this single-blind, randomized controlled trial, 39 people with insomnia disorder were randomly divided into real stimulation group and sham stimulation group. The stimulation parameters were stimulation frequency 1 Hz, stimulation intensity 80 % resting motor threshold (RMT), total pulse number 1500 times, time 25 min, and the whole course of treatment lasted 7 days. The Insomnia Severity Index(ISI)、Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index(PSQI)、Multidimensional Fatigue Inventory(MFI) and Beck Anxiety Inventory(BAI) were assessed at pretest (baseline) and posttest (day 7 after intervention), and the color-word stroop task was used to measure the conflict control ability of the subjects. RESULTS: The sleep quality, correct rate and reaction time of the posttest in the real stimulus group were higher than those in the pretest. However, there was no significant difference between the pretest and posttest in the sham stimulation group. CONCLUSIONS: rTMS stimulation of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (LDLPFC) in patients with insomnia can significantly improve the conflict control ability and sleep quality of patients with insomnia.

Impaired Neurological Activity in the Mental Rotation Ability of Tibetan Indigenous Residents After Chronic Exposure to High Altitude.

Mental rotation is a core indicator of spatial ability, and a threshold for cognitive impairment may exist at approximately 4,000 m above sea level, but the specific thresholds for the severity of hypoxia in Tibetan indigenous populations in mental rotation ability remain largely unknown. To determine whether a threshold for mental rotation impairment exists in indigenous residents, we related a mental rotation task to inter-individual differences in a range of behavioral performance and neuropsychological characteristics across 51 indigenous Tibetan highlanders and 34 matched controls at three different altitudes (sea level, 2,900 m, and 4,200 m). Analyses of reaction time showed delayed behavioral responses in the 4,200 m altitude group. Further analyses of rotation-related negativity (RRN) revealed that the RRN was significantly more negative and the differences disappeared gradually for different angles among individuals exposed to an altitude of 4,200 m. Moreover, a time-frequency analysis showed significantly enhanced alpha- and beta-band power values for the 4,200 m altitude participants after stimulus presentation. The impairment in mental rotation ability is related to hypoxia and can be attributed to the absence of sufficient cognitive resources, which demonstrates the existence of a threshold for the effects of high altitude on the brain's mental rotation ability. Taken together, our findings have important implications for exploring the altitude threshold for the influence of high-altitude exposure on brain function, as well as for guiding the development of innovative strategies to optimize the response of the organism against chronic hypoxia-induced under extreme environments.

Altered electrophysiology mechanism related to inhibitory control in adults with insomnia.

Background: Insomnia disorder (ID), one of the most common psychophysiological disorders, can cause a serious burden on the individual's work and academic performance. Cognitive dysfunction often exists in patients with insomnia, which negatively affects their living quality. Inhibitory control (IC), as a vital cognitive function, allows individuals to suppress attention, behavior, or thoughts that are irrelevant to the task, so as to effectively adapt to the current goal. The earlier studies on the inhibitory control of insomnia patients predominantly used subjective scales for evaluation and that can have drawbacks because they don't provide an objective assessment. Methods: In order to investigate the inhibitory control function of insomniacs, this research subdivides inhibitory control into response inhibition and conflict inhibition. The response inhibition and conflict inhibition capacities of insomniacs were evaluated using the two-choice oddball task and the color-word stroop task, and accordingly the association between insomnia disorder and inhibitory control capacity as well as its cognitive neural mechanism was able to be examined. Results: Behavioral results finding, insomniacs conducted the two-choice oddball test and the color-word stroop task with lower accuracy and slower reaction times when compared to healthy sleepers. ERP results finding, when performing the two-choice oddball task, the P3 amplitude of the insomniacs was significantly lower than that of healthy sleepers while there was no significant difference between the two groups' N2 amplitudes. At the same time, when completing the color-word stroop task, the insomniacs' N450 amplitude was significantly lower than that of healthy sleepers. Discussion: The above findings suggest that in response inhibition tasks, insomniacs may have weaker motor inhibition abilities, and similarly perform weaker conflict monitoring abilities in conflict inhibition tasks, which indicates that insomniacs' inhibitory control is impaired compared to that of healthy sleepers. This study thus relates to the finding at the electrophysiological level that there is a certain correlation between insomnia and a decline in inhibitory control ability, which may suggest that improving inhibitory control function in patients with insomnia is a clinically significant and worthwhile area of adjuvant treatment.

The effect of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation on electroencephalography microstates of patients with heroin-addiction.

The effects of transcranial magnetic stimulation in treating substance use disorders are gaining attention; however, most existing studies used subjective measures to examine the treatment effects. Objective electroencephalography (EEG)-based microstate analysis is important for measuring the efficacy of transcranial magnetic stimulation in patients with heroin addiction. We investigated dynamic brain activity changes in individuals with heroin addiction after transcranial magnetic stimulation using microstate indicators. Thirty-two patients received intermittent theta-burst stimulation (iTBS) over the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Resting-state EEG data were collected pre-intervention and 10 days post-intervention. The feature values of the significantly different microstate classes were computed using a K-means clustering algorithm. Four EEG microstate classes (A-D) were noted. There were significant increases in the duration, occurrence, and contribution of microstate class A after the iTBS intervention. K-means classification accuracy reached 81.5%. The EEG microstate is an effective improvement indicator in patients with heroin addiction treated with iTBS. Microstates were examined using machine learning; this method effectively classified the pre- and post-intervention cohorts among patients with heroin addiction and healthy individuals. Using EEG microstate to measure heroin addiction and further exploring the effect of iTBS in patients with heroin addiction merit clinical investigation.

The automatic detection of unexpected emotion and neutral body postures: A visual mismatch negativity study.

The ability to automatically detect emotional changes in the environment is crucial for social interaction. In the visual system, expression-related mismatch negativity (EMMN) reflects the automatic processing of emotional changes in facial expression. However, body postures also carry visual emotional information that can be recognized effectively and processed automatically, although their processing mechanism remains unknown. In this study, the reverse oddball paradigm was used to investigate the mismatch responses of unexpected fear and neutral body postures. The nonparametric cluster permutation test revealed significant fear and neutral visual mismatch negativity (vMMN) activities, and the fear-related vMMN was enhanced prior (130-230 ms) to the neutral vMMN (180-230 ms). The body-sensitive N190 component may partially account for the vMMN obtained in this study. The fearful body posture evoked a greater N190 response over the neutral body, and amplitudes of N190 were more negative in the deviant condition than the standard condition. Additionally, the body-related visual mismatch oscillatory responses were associated with enhancement of the alpha band oscillation, especially for the fearful body posture. These results expanded the applicable scope of body posture cues corresponding to mismatch signals, objectively defined the electrophysiological activities evoked, and revealed the processing bias toward negative emotion.

Abnormal brain oscillations and activation of patients with heroin use disorder during emotion regulation: The role of delta- and theta-band power.

BACKGROUND: Emotion dysregulation is a crucial component of substance use disorders in predisposition, maintenance, and relapse. Emotional regulation strategies are an important factor in emotion dysregulation. However, studies on heroin use disorder (HUD) patients' ability to use emotion regulation strategies are scarce. METHODS: Time-frequency-based analyses were used to compare the power of 33 patients with HUD and 28 healthy controls to elucidate whether patients with HUD have abnormal neural oscillations during passive viewing and emotion regulation strategies. Using the standardized low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography algorithm (sLORETA), we estimated the possible sources of the anomalous band power. RESULTS: Compared to patients with HUD, healthy controls showed a stronger decrease in the power of the delta/theta band across all task conditions. The effect peaked at approximately 1300-1900 ms after stimulus onset and varied by task condition. The estimation of sLORETA suggested the frontal, parietal, and limbic lobes as possible generators. LIMITATIONS: We cannot exclude the potential influence of additional factors, such as sex, depression and anxiety levels, and polysubstance use, on the results. CONCLUSIONS: Patients with HUD have blunted arousal and impaired ability to use emotion regulation strategies. The abnormal patterns described above may be the underlying neurophysiological basis for this dysfunction. Future studies could combine different approaches to improve emotion dysregulation in patients with HUD to promote treatment outcomes.

Pollution and Cleaning of PDMS Pervaporation Membranes after Recovering Ethyl Acetate from Aqueous Saline Solutions.

The removal of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from wastewater containing nonvolatile salts has become an important and interesting case of the application of the pervaporation (PV) process. The aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of salts on the PV removal of ethyl acetate from wastewater using a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) membrane. The fouled membrane was then characterized via scanning electron microscopy-energy-dispersive X-ray analysis (SEM-EDX) to investigate salt permeation. The membrane backflushing process was carried out by periodically flushing the permeate side of the tubular membrane. The results demonstrated that salts (NaCl and CaCl2) could permeate through the PDMS membrane and were deposited on the permeate side. The presence of salts in the feed solution caused a slight increase in the membrane selectivity and a decrease in the permeate flux. The flux decreased with increasing salt concentration, and a notable effect occurred at higher feed-salt concentrations. A permeate flux of up to 98.3% of the original flux was recovered when the permeation time and backflushing duration were 30 and 5 min, respectively, indicating that the effect of salt deposition on flux reduction could be mitigated. Real, organic, saline wastewater was treated in a pilot plant, which further verified the feasibility of wastewater PV treatment.

Automatic change detection of multiple facial expressions: A visual mismatch negativity study.

The rapid detection of changes in facial expressions is an important social and survival skill. The detection of multiple facial emotions includes not only the information of emotional valence but also differences in emotional valence, that is, emotional valence consistency and inconsistency. Thus, we explored whether changes in multiple facial expressions could be automatically detected, as indexed by the visual mismatch negativity (vMMN) response. Participants were presented with a set of facial stimuli while performing a visual facial identity detection task; the stimulus was presented in the center of the visual field. The facial stimuli set consisted of five different facial identities and were presented in an oddball sequence, with four peripherally expressing the same positive or negative emotion and one in the center expressing congruent or incongruent emotions. We found vMMN responses to changes in positive congruent deviant emotions between 210 and 320 ms and in all deviant emotions between 480 and 560 ms over bilateral temporal-occipital sites. In addition, at 480-520 ms, the positive congruent stimulus versus the incongruent stimulus and the negative incongruent stimulus versus the congruent stimulus induced more negative vMMN amplitude in the left temporal-occipital electrodes. This shows that individuals can automatically identify the changes in multiple faces' emotional differences (emotional valence inconsistency), and that the emotional valence of the target face affects the automatic processing of multi-face emotional valence differences information. Furthermore, these results can be utilized in future research investigating automatic processing mechanisms.