ATP Inhibition for Starvation/Mild Photothermal/Photodynamic Synergy Therapy Using Polypeptide Nanoparticles Conjugating 2-Deoxy-D-Glucose and Dye under NIR Phototheranostic Strategy.

Rapid propagation of tumor cells requires plenty of energy, which is adenosine triphosphate (ATP) dependent. ATP inhibition in tumors not only results in the starvation of tumor cells but also down-regulation of the level of heat shock proteins (HSPs), which usually increase during traditional photothermal therapy (PTT), especially when the temperature is up 50 °C. 2-deoxy-D-glucose (2DG) is an anti-glycolytic reagent and can be used as an efficient agent for ATP inhibition in tumors. Compared with typical PTT, low-temperature mild photothermal therapy (MPTT) is receiving more and more attention due to it avoiding the high temperatures causing damage to the normal tissue, and the increase of HSPs which decrease PTT. Here, we have prepared multifunctional polypeptide nanoparticles pDG@Ahx conjugating both a NIR probe Ahx-BDP and 2DG into the side chain of the amphiphilic polypeptide. In vitro and in vivo studies reveal that the as-prepared nanoparticles achieve a synergistic effect of starvation/MPTT/PDT (photodynamic therapy), and it provides a new strategy to NIR-I/II fluorescence imaging-guided starvation/MPTT/PDT synergy therapy for tumors. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Coupling of the Structure and Magnetism to Spin Splitting in Hybrid Organic-Inorganic Perovskites.

Hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites are famous for the diversity of their chemical compositions, phases, phase transitions, and associated physical properties. We use a combination of experimental and computational techniques to reveal a strong coupling between structure, magnetism, and spin splitting in a representative of the largest family of hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites: the formates. With the help of first-principles simulations, we find spin splitting in both conduction and valence bands of [NH2NH3]Co(HCOO)3 induced by spin-orbit interactions, which can reach up to 14 meV. Our magnetic measurements reveal that this material exhibits canted antiferromagnetism below 15.5 K. The direction of the associated antiferromagnetic order parameter is strongly coupled with spin splitting in the centrosymmetric phase, allowing for the creation and annihilation of spin splitting through the application of a magnetic field. Furthermore, the structural phase transition to the experimentally observed polar Pna21 phase completely changes the aforementioned spin splitting and its coupling to magnetic degrees of freedom. This reveals that in [NH2NH3]Co(HCOO)3, the structure and magnetism are strongly coupled to spin splitting and can be manipulated through electric and magnetic fields. We believe that our findings offer an important step toward a fundamental understanding and practical applications of materials with coupled properties.

Self-enhanced regulation of stable organic radicals with polypeptide nanoparticles for mild second near-infrared phototheranostics.

Stable organic radicals have emerged as a promising option to enhance fluorescence quantum yield (QY), gaining traction in medical treatment due to their unique electronic transitions from the ground state (D0) to the doublet excited state (D1). We synthesized a stable dicyanomethyl radical with a NIR-II fluorescence QY of 0.86 %, surpassing many NIR-II organic dyes. Subsequently, amphiphilic polymer-encapsulated nanoparticles (NPs) containing the radical were created, achieving a NIR-II fluorescence QY of 0.32 %, facilitating high-contrast bio-imaging. These CNPPs exhibit self-enhanced photothermal properties, elevating photothermal conversion efficiency (PCE) from 43.5 % to 57.5 % under 915 nm laser irradiation. This advancement enables more efficient photothermal therapy (PTT) with lower dye concentrations and reduced laser power, enhancing both feasibility and safety. Through regular fractionated mild photothermal therapy, we observed the release of damage-associated molecular patterns (DAMPs) and an increase in cytokine expression, culminating in combined mild phototherapy (m-PTT)-mediated immunogenic cell death (ICD). Consequently, we developed an immunostimulatory tumor vaccine, showcasing a novel approach for refining photothermal agents (PTA) and optimizing the PTT process.

The effect of sense of security on job performance of medical staff: the mediating effect of psychological capital.

Objective: To investigate the current situation of sense of security, psychological capital and job performance of medical staff in Guangdong Province, and to explore the mediating role of psychological capital on the relationship between sense of security and job performance of medical staff. Methods: In this study, 969 health care workers were selected from February 2023 to April 2023 from 37 hospitals in Guangdong Province, China, using purposive sampling method. The Sense of Security Scale for Medical Staff (SSS-MS), psychological capital scale (PCS) in Chinese version and the Chinese version of job performance scale (JPS) were used in this study. We use SPSS 26.0 for statistical analysis and Amos 24.0 for structural equation modeling (SEM). The control variables entering SEM were selected by regression analysis. SEM analysis confirmed psychological capital scale's mediating function in the link between work performance scale and Sense of Security. Results: The overall SSS-MS, PCS, and JPS scores were 67.42 ± 16.136, 87.06 ± 15.04, and 77.87 ± 10.50, respectively. The results of Pearson's correlation analysis showed that there was a positive relationship between PCS and JPS (r = 0.722, P < 0.01), SSS-MS and JPS (r = 0.312, P < 0.01), and SSS-MS and PCS (r = 0.424, P < 0.01). PCS demonstrated a fully mediating influence on the link between medical workers' SSS-MS and JPS, according to structural equation modeling. Conclusion: The JPS of medical personnel in Guangdong Province is at a medium level, with much room for improvement. PCS is positively impacted by a sense of security. There is a supportive correlation between PCS, JPS, and SSS-MS. Furthermore, PCS fully mediates the relationship between medical staff members' JPS and their SSS-MS. The Job Diamond-Resource model and Conservation of Resource theory are further validated and supplemented by the findings of this study, which also gives managers a theoretical foundation for enhancing medical staff performance.

The Association between the Diversity of Coenzyme Q10 Intake from Dietary Sources and the Risk of New-Onset Hypertension: A Nationwide Cohort Study.

Coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10) is a food active component with blood-pressure-improving properties. However, the association between the variety and quantity of different sources of dietary CoQ10 and new-onset hypertension remains uncertain. We aimed to investigate the associations between the diversity and quantity of CoQ10 intake from eight major food sources and new-onset hypertension risk. A total of 11,489 participants were included. Dietary intake was evaluated via three consecutive 24 h recalls and household food inventory. The diversity score of CoQ10 sources was calculated by the sum of food groups consumed in the ideal range. Cox proportional hazard models were used for evaluating their associations with hypertension. Model performance was assessed by ROC analyses and 200-times ten-fold cross-validation. The relationships between CoQ10 and hypertension were U-shaped for meat, egg, vegetable, and fruit sources, inverse J-shaped for fish, and nut sources, and L-shaped for dairy products sources (all p-values < 0.001). A higher diversity score was associated with lower hypertension risk (HR (95% CI): 0.66 (0.64, 0.69)). The mean areas under the ROC curves for 6, 12 and 18 years were 0.81, 0.80 and 0.78, respectively. There is a negative correlation between the diversity of CoQ10 with moderate intake from different sources and new-onset hypertension. One diversity score based on CoQ10 was developed.

Correction: In situ formation of J-aggregate in the tumor microenvironment using acidity responsive polypeptide nanoparticle encapsulating galactose-conjugated BODIPY dye for NIR-II phototheranostics.

Correction for 'In situ formation of J-aggregate in the tumor microenvironment using acidity responsive polypeptide nanoparticle encapsulating galactose-conjugated BODIPY dye for NIR-II phototheranostics' by Huiping Dang et al., J. Mater. Chem. B, 2022, 10, 5279-5290, https://doi.org/10.1039/D2TB00705C.

Amino-Functionalized Graphdiyne Derivative as a Cathode Interface Layer with High Thickness Tolerance for Highly Efficient Organic Solar Cells.

Efficient cathode interfacial materials (CIMs) are essential components for effectively enhancing the performance of organic solar cells (OSCs). Although high-performance CIMs are desired to meet the requirements of various OSCs, potential candidates for CIMs are scarce. Herein, an amino-functionalized graphdiyne derivative (GDY-N) is developed, which represents the first example of GDY that exhibits favorable solubility in alcohol. Utilizing GDY-N as the CIM, an outstanding champion PCE of 19.30% for devices based on the D18-Cl:L8-BO (certified result: 19.05%) is achieved, which is among the highest efficiencies reported to date in OSCs. Remarkably, the devices based on GDY-N exhibit a thickness-insensitive characteristic, maintaining 95% of their initial efficiency even with a film thickness of 25 nm. Moreover, the GDY-N displays wide universality and facilitates exceptional stability in OSCs. This work not only enriches the diversity of GDY derivatives, but also demonstrates the feasibility of GDY derivatives as CIMs with high thickness tolerance in OSCs.

Dependence of copper(I) stability on long-range electromagnetic effects of Au under reducing atmospheres: the size effect of Au cores.

It has been widely recognized that adjusting the size of Au particles has emerged as a significant approach in catalyst design, catalyst screening, and comprehension of reaction mechanisms. However, the essential factors of Au nanoparticles used only as an additive to enhance the activity of traditional multicomponent thermocatalysts have not been fully revealed. In this study, a series of Au@Cu2O core-shell nanocatalysts were synthesized through a controllable method, featuring core sizes ranging from 11 to 33 nm and an average shell thickness of approximately 55 nm. It was revealed that the size effect of Au cores plays a very vital role in the stability of the active Cu+ species under reducing atmospheres (H2, acetylene and formaldehyde) as well as the catalytic performance of the catalysts in the ethynylation of formaldehyde. The experimental findings revealed that Au@Cu2O core-shell catalysts with Au core sizes ranging from 11 to 16 nm exhibited a higher abundance of electron-deficient Cu+ species in the shell, which is attributed to the strong long-range electromagnetic effects of the Au core in the absence of photoexcitation or an applied electric field. Additionally, the active Cu+ species demonstrated remarkable stability under reducing atmospheres. Although the stability of Cu+ decreased slightly when the Au core size exceeded 16 nm, the Cu+ content remained above 80%. Notably, the Au@Cu2O catalysts with Au core sizes ranging from 11 to 16 nm exhibited excellent catalytic activity in the ethynylation of formaldehyde.

L-shaped association between dietary coenzyme Q10 intake and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein in Chinese adults: a national cross-sectional study.

Background: Chronic inflammation contributes to the occurrence and progression of many diseases. Most previous clinical studies have explored the effect of high-dose CoQ10 supplements on inflammation. Food is another important source of CoQ10, but the relationship between the intake of CoQ10 from dietary sources and inflammation was unknown. We aimed to explore the dose-response association between the intake of dietary-derived CoQ10 and inflammation-related biomarkers. Methods: Seven thousand nine hundred and fifty-three Chinese adults from the China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS) were the subjects of this cross-sectional investigation. Dietary CoQ10 intake was assessed using dietary information from three days. High-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP) and white blood cell count (WBC) were assessed using fasting venous blood. Results: In an adjusted linear regression model, CoQ10 consumption from dietary sources was inversely associated with hsCRP, with effect sizes in each group: Q2 (ß = -0.85 mg L-1, 95% CI: -1.43 to -0.28 mg L-1, P = 0.004), Q3 (ß = -0.70 mg L-1, 95% CI: -1.28 to -0.12 mg L-1, P = 0.017), and Q4 (ß = -0.79 mg L-1, 95% CI: -1.39 to -0.19 mg L-1, P = 0.010). Moreover, restricted cubic splines (RCS) revealed a non-linear L-shaped association between dietary-derived CoQ10 consumption and hsCRP (Pnonlinear < 0.001). According to subgroup analyses, these relationships were more significant in males, or >45 years old (Ptrend < 0.05). Nevertheless, no significant relationship was found between dietary-derived CoQ10 intake and WBC. Conclusions: These findings suggested a significant negative association between dietary-derived CoQ10 and hsCRP levels.

A deep learning-based stripe self-correction method for stitched microscopic images.

Stitched fluorescence microscope images inevitably exist in various types of stripes or artifacts caused by uncertain factors such as optical devices or specimens, which severely affects the image quality and downstream quantitative analysis. Here, we present a deep learning-based Stripe Self-Correction method, so-called SSCOR. Specifically, we propose a proximity sampling scheme and adversarial reciprocal self-training paradigm that enable SSCOR to utilize stripe-free patches sampled from the stitched microscope image itself to correct their adjacent stripe patches. Comparing to off-the-shelf approaches, SSCOR can not only adaptively correct non-uniform, oblique, and grid stripes, but also remove scanning, bubble, and out-of-focus artifacts, achieving the state-of-the-art performance across different imaging conditions and modalities. Moreover, SSCOR does not require any physical parameter estimation, patch-wise manual annotation, or raw stitched information in the correction process. This provides an intelligent prior-free image restoration solution for microscopists or even microscope companies, thus ensuring more precise biomedical applications for researchers.

Image classification of Chinese medicinal flowers based on convolutional neural network.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Traditional Chinese medicine has used many herbs on the prevention and treatment of diseases for thousands of years. However, many flowers are poisonous and only few herbs have medicinal properties. Relying on experts for herbs identification is time consuming. An efficient and fast identification method is proposed in this study. METHODS: This study proposes ResNet101 models by combining SENet and ResNet101, adding convolutional block attention module or using Bayesian optimization on Chinese medicinal flower classification. The performances of the proposed ResNet101 models were compared. RESULTS: The best performance for accuracy, precision, recall, F1-score and PR-AUC are coming from ResNet101 model with Bayesian optimization which are 97.64%, 97.99%, 97.86%, 97.82% and 99.72%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: The proposed ResNet101 model provides a better solution on the image classification of Chinese medical flowers with favourable accuracy.

Engineering multicomponent tissue by spontaneous adhesion of myogenic and adipogenic microtissues cultured with customized scaffolds.

The integration of intramuscular fat-or marbling-into cultured meat will be critical for meat texture, mouthfeel, flavor, and thus consumer appeal. However, culturing muscle tissue with marbling is challenging since myocytes and adipocytes have different media and scaffold requirements for optimal growth and differentiation. Here, we present an approach to engineer multicomponent tissue using myogenic and adipogenic microtissues. The key innovation in our approach is the engineering of myogenic and adipogenic microtissues using scaffolds with customized physical properties; we use these microtissues as building blocks that spontaneously adhere to produce multicomponent tissue, or marbled cultured meat. Myocytes are grown and differentiated on gelatin nanofiber scaffolds with aligned topology that mimic the aligned structure of skeletal muscle and promotes the formation of myotubes in both primary rabbit skeletal muscle and murine C2C12 cells. Pre-adipocytes are cultured and differentiated on edible gelatin microbead scaffolds, which are customized to have a physiologically-relevant stiffness, and promote lipid accumulation in both primary rabbit and murine 3T3-L1 pre-adipocytes. After harvesting and stacking the individual myogenic and adipogenic microtissues, we find that the resultant multicomponent tissues adhere into intact structures within 6-12 h in culture. The resultant multicomponent 3D tissue constructs show behavior of a solid material with a Young's modulus of âˆ¼ 2 ± 0.4 kPa and an ultimate tensile strength of âˆ¼ 23 ± 7 kPa without the use of additional crosslinkers. Using this approach, we generate marbled cultured meat with âˆ¼ mm to âˆ¼ cm thickness, which has a protein content of âˆ¼ 4 ± 2 g/100 g that is comparable to a conventionally produced Wagyu steak with a protein content of âˆ¼ 9 ± 4 g/100 g. We show the translatability of this layer-by-layer assembly approach for microtissues across primary rabbit cells, murine cell lines, as well as for gelatin and plant-based scaffolds, which demonstrates a strategy to generate edible marbled meats derived from different species and scaffold materials.

First-principles property assessment of hybrid formate perovskites.

Hybrid organic-inorganic formate perovskites, AB(HCOO)3, are a large family of compounds that exhibit a variety of phase transitions and diverse properties, such as (anti)ferroelectricity, ferroelasticity, (anti)ferromagnetism, and multiferroism. While many properties of these materials have already been characterized, we are not aware of any study that focuses on the comprehensive property assessment of a large number of formate perovskites. A comparison of the properties of materials within the family is challenging due to systematic errors attributed to different techniques or the lack of data. For example, complete piezoelectric, dielectric, and elastic tensors are not available. In this work, we utilize first-principles density functional theory based simulations to overcome these challenges and to report structural, mechanical, dielectric, piezoelectric, and ferroelectric properties of 29 formate perovskites. We find that these materials exhibit elastic stiffness in the range 0.5-127.0 GPa; highly anisotropic linear compressibility, including zero and even negative values; dielectric constants in the range 0.1-102.1; highly anisotropic piezoelectric response with the longitudinal values in the range 1.18-21.12 pC/N; and spontaneous polarizations in the range 0.2-7.8 µC/cm2. Furthermore, we propose and computationally characterize a few formate perovskites that have not been reported yet.

XGBoost-based machine learning test improves the accuracy of hemorrhage prediction among geriatric patients with long-term administration of rivaroxaban.

BACKGROUND: Hemorrhage is a potential and serious adverse drug reaction, especially for geriatric patients with long-term administration of rivaroxaban. It is essential to establish an effective model for predicting bleeding events, which could improve the safety of rivaroxaban use in clinical practice. METHODS: The hemorrhage information of 798 geriatric patients (over the age of 70 years) who needed long-term administration of rivaroxaban for anticoagulation therapy was constantly tracked and recorded through a well-established clinical follow-up system. Relying on the 27 collected clinical indicators of these patients, conventional logistic regression analysis, random forest and XGBoost-based machine learning approaches were applied to analyze the hemorrhagic risk factors and establish the corresponding prediction models. Furthermore, the performance of the models was tested and compared by the area under curve (AUC) of the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. RESULTS: A total of 112 patients (14.0%) had bleeding adverse events after treatment with rivaroxaban for more than 3 months. Among them, 96 patients had gastrointestinal and intracranial hemorrhage during treatment, which accounted for 83.18% of the total hemorrhagic events. The logistic regression, random forest and XGBoost models were established with AUCs of 0.679, 0.672 and 0.776, respectively. The XGBoost model showed the best predictive performance in terms of discrimination, accuracy and calibration among all the models. CONCLUSION: An XGBoost-based model with good discrimination and accuracy was built to predict the hemorrhage risk of rivaroxaban, which will facilitate individualized treatment for geriatric patients.

Jamming and depletion in extremely bidisperse mixtures of microscale emulsions and nanoemulsions.

While much attention has been given to jamming of granular and colloidal particles having monomodal size distributions, jamming of systems having more complex size distributions remains an interesting direction. We create concentrated, disordered binary mixtures of size-fractionated nanoscale and microscale oil-in-water emulsions, which are stabilized by the same common ionic surfactant, and measure the optical transport properties, microscale droplet dynamics, and mechanical shear rheological properties of these mixtures over a wide range of relative and total droplet volume fractions. Simple effective medium theories do not explain all of our observations. Instead, we show that our measurements are consistent with more complex collective behavior in extremely bidisperse systems, involving an effective continuous phase that governs nanodroplet jamming, as well as depletion attractions between microscale droplets induced by nanoscale droplets.

The effect of TENS on sleep: A pilot study.

BACKGROUND: Insomnia is the second most common neuropsychiatric disorder, but the current treatments are not very effective. There is therefore an urgent need to develop better treatments. Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) may be a promising means of treating insomnia. OBJECTIVE: This work aims to explore whether and how TENS modulate sleep and the effect of stimulation waveforms on sleep. METHODS: Forty-five healthy subjects participated in this study. Electroencephalography (EEG) data were recorded before and after four mode low-frequency (1 Hz) TENS with different waveforms, which were formed by superimposing sine waves of different high frequencies (60-210 Hz) and low frequencies (1-6 Hz). The four waveform modes are formed by combining sine waves of varying frequencies. Mode 1 (M1) consists of a combination of high frequencies (60-110 Hz) and low frequencies (1-6 Hz). Mode 2 (M2) is made up of high frequencies (60-210 Hz) and low frequencies (1-6 Hz). Mode 3 (M3) consists of high frequencies (110-160 Hz) and low frequencies (1-6 Hz), while mode 4 (M4) is composed of high frequencies (160-210 Hz) and low frequencies (1-6 Hz). For M1, M3 and M4, the high frequency portions of the stimulus waveforms account for 50%, while for M2, the high frequency portion of the waveform accounts for 65%. For each mode, the current intensities ranged from 4 mA to 7 mA, with values for each participant adjusted according to individual tolerance. During stimulation, the subjects were stimulated at the greater occipital nerve by the four mode TENS. RESULTS: M1, M3, and M4 slowed down the frequency of neural activity, broadened the distribution of theta waves, and caused a decrease in activity in wakefulness-related regions and an increase in activity in sleep-related regions. However, M2 has the opposite modulation effect. CONCLUSION: These results indicated that low-frequency TENS (1 Hz) may facilitate sleep in a waveform-specific manner. Our findings provide new insights into the mechanisms of sleep modulation by TENS and the design of effective insomnia treatments.

Ultrasonic irradiation enhanced the efficacy of antimicrobial photodynamic therapy against methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus biofilm.

Antimicrobial photodynamic therapy (aPDT) is a non-pharmacological antimicrobial regimen based on light, photosensitizer and oxygen. It has become a potential method to inactivate multidrug-resistant bacteria. However, limited by the delivery of photosensitizer (PS) in biofilm, eradicating biofilm-associated infections by aPDT remains challenging. This study aimed to explore the feasibility of combining ultrasonic irradiation with aPDT to enhance the efficacy of aPDT against methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) biofilm. A cationic benzylidene cyclopentanone photosensitizer with much higher selectivity to bacterial cells than mammalian cells were applied at the concentration of 10 µM. 532 nm laser (40 mW/cm2, 10 min) and 1 MHz ultrasound (500 mW/cm2, 10 min, simultaneously with aPDT) were employed against MRSA biofilms in vitro. In addition to combined with ultrasonic irradiation and aPDT, MRSA biofilms were treated with laser irradiation only, photosensitizer only, ultrasonic irradiation only, ultrasonic irradiation and photosensitizer, and aPDT respectively. The antibacterial efficacy was determined by XTT assay, and the penetration depth of PS in biofilm was observed using a photoluminescence spectrometer and a confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM). In addition, the viability of human dermal fibroblasts (WS-1 cells) after the same treatments mentioned above and the uptake of P3 by WS-1 cells after ultrasonic irradiation were detected by CCK-8 and CLSM in vitro. Results showed that the percent decrease in metabolic activity resulting from the US + aPDT group (75.76%) was higher than the sum of the aPDT group (44.14%) and the US group (9.88%), suggesting synergistic effects. Meanwhile, the diffusion of PS in the biofilm of MRSA was significantly increased by 1 MHz ultrasonic irradiation. Ultrasonic irradiation neither induced the PS uptake by WS-1 cells nor reduced the viability of WS-1 cells. These results suggested that 1 MHz ultrasonic irradiation significantly enhanced the efficacy of aPDT against MRSA biofilm by increasing the penetration depth of PS. In addition, the antibacterial efficacy of aPDT can be enhanced by ultrasonic irradiation, the US + aPDT treatment demonstrated encouraging in vivo antibacterial efficacy (1.73 log10 CFU/mL reduction). In conclusion, the combination of aPDT and 1 MHz ultrasound is a potential and promising strategy to eradicate biofilm-associated infections of MRSA.

The inhibition of high ammonia to in vitro rumen fermentation is pH dependent.

Ammonia is an important rumen internal environment indicator. In livestock production, feeding a large amount of non-protein nitrogen to ruminants will create high ammonia stress to the animals, which increases the risk of ammonia toxicity. However, the effects of ammonia toxicity on rumen microbiota and fermentation are still unknown. In this study, an in vitro rumen fermentation technique was used to investigate the effects of different concentrations of ammonia on rumen microbiota and fermentation. To achieve the four final total ammonia nitrogen (TAN) concentrations of 0, 8, 32, and 128 mmol/L, ammonium chloride (NH4Cl) was added at 0, 42.8, 171.2, and 686.8 mg/100 mL, and urea was added at 0, 24, 96, and 384 mg/100 mL. Urea hydrolysis increased, while NH4Cl dissociation slightly reduced the pH. At similar concentrations of TAN, the increased pH of the rumen culture by urea addition resulted in a much higher free ammonia nitrogen (FAN) concentration compared to NH4Cl addition. Pearson correlation analysis revealed a strong negative correlation between FAN and microbial populations (total bacteria, protozoa, fungi, and methanogens) and in vitro rumen fermentation profiles (gas production, dry matter digestibility, total volatile fatty acid, acetate, propionate, etc.), and a much weaker correlation between TAN and the above indicators. Additionally, bacterial community structure changed differently in response to TAN concentrations. High TAN increased Gram-positive Firmicutes and Actinobacteria but reduced Gram-negative Fibrobacteres and Spirochaetes. The current study demonstrated that the inhibition of in vitro rumen fermentation by high ammonia was pH-dependent and was associated with variations of rumen microbial populations and communities.

Antiaggregation of NIR-II Probe Regulated by Amphiphilic Polypeptide with High Contrast Brightness for Phototheranostics and Vascular Microscopic Imaging under 1064 nm Irradiation.

Thanks to deep penetration and high resolution, the second near-infrared window (NIR-II, 1000-1700 nm) fluorescence (FL) imaging is expected to gain favor in clinical applications, including macroscopic imaging for cancer diagnosis and microangiography for vascular-related disease diagnosis. Nevertheless, most NIR-II fluorescent probes, especially cyanine, are highly susceptible to self-quenching in the aggregated state, which severely limits their application in bioimaging. Here, the Br-modified cyanine dye F4 -Br and the amphiphilic polypeptide poly(oligo[ethylene glycol]methacrylate)-b-poly(benzyl-L-aspartic acid) (POEGMA-PBLA) are synthesized. By modulating the self-assembly of F4 -Br and POEGMA-PBLA to effectively inhibit the H-aggregation of F4 -Br in aqueous solutions, nanoprobe F4 -Br@P17 with outstanding antiquenching capability is developed. This prominent feature allows it to perform vascular microscopic imaging with high spatiotemporal resolution and assess hemodynamic characteristics. F4 -Br@P17 nanoparticles (NPs) with good stability and satisfactory biocompatibility also enable high contrast brightness for NIR-II FL imaging of tumors. Given the efficient enrichment at tumor sites and the promising photothermal conversion efficiency (43.5%), F4 -Br@P17 NPs successfully conduct photothermal therapy and exhibit superior antitumor efficiency under 1064 nm laser irradiation. These remarkable performances reveal the tremendous possibility of F4 -Br@P17 NPs for in vivo microscopic imaging and FL imaging-guided photothermal therapy in the NIR-II region.