Low-Temperature, Universal Synthetic Route for Mesoporous Metal Oxides by Exploiting Synergistic Effect of Thermal Activation and Plasma.

Mesoporous metal oxides exhibit excellent physicochemical properties and are widely used in various fields, including energy storage/conversion, catalysis, and sensors. Although several soft-template approaches are reported, high-temperature calcination for both metal oxide formation and template removal is necessary, which limits direct synthesis on a plastic substrate for flexible devices. Here, a universal synthetic approach that combines thermal activation and oxygen plasma to synthesize diverse mesoporous metal oxides (V2O5, V6O13, TiO2, Nb2O5, WO3, and MoO3) at low temperatures (150-200 °C), which can be applicable to a flexible polymeric substrate is introduced. As a demonstration, a flexible micro-supercapacitor is fabricated by directly synthesizing mesoporous V2O5 on an indium-tin oxide-coated colorless polyimide film. The energy storage performance is well maintained under severe bending conditions.

Chromism-Integrated Sensors and Devices for Visual Indicators.

The bifunctionality of chromism-integrated sensors and devices has been highlighted because of their reversibility, fast response, and visual indication. For example, one of the representative chromism electrochromic materials exhibits optical modulation under ion insertion/extraction by applying a potential. This operation mechanism can be integrated with various sensors (pressure, strain, biomolecules, gas, etc.) and devices (energy conversion/storage systems) as visual indicators for user-friendly operation. In this review, recent advances in the field of chromism-integrated systems for visual indicators are categorized for various chromism-integrated sensors and devices. This review can provide insights for researchers working on chromism, sensors, or devices. The integrated chromic devices are evaluated in terms of coloration-bleach operation, cycling stability, and coloration efficiency. In addition, the existing challenges and prospects for chromism-integrated sensors and devices are summarized for further research.

Curcumin Stimulates Proliferation of Spinal Cord Neural Progenitor Cells via a Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase Signaling Pathway.

OBJECTIVE: The aims of our study are to evaluate the effect of curcumin on spinal cord neural progenitor cell (SC-NPC) proliferation and to clarify the mechanisms of mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinase signaling pathways in SC-NPCs. METHODS: We established cultures of SC-NPCs, extracted from the spinal cord of Sprague-Dawley rats weighing 250 g to 350 g. We measured proliferation rates of SC-NPCs after curcumin treatment at different dosage. The immuno-blotting method was used to evaluate the MAP kinase signaling protein that contains extracellular signal-regulated kinases (ERKs), p38, c-Jun NH2-terminal kinases (JNKs) and ß-actin as the control group. RESULTS: Curcumin has a biphasic effect on SC-NPC proliferation. Lower dosage (0.1, 0.5, 1 µM) of curcumin increased SC-NPC proliferation. However, higher dosage decreased SC-NPC proliferation. Also, curcumin stimulates proliferation of SC-NPCs via the MAP kinase signaling pathway, especially involving the p-ERK and p-38 protein. The p-ERK protein and p38 protein levels varied depending on curcumin dosage (0.5 and 1 µM, p<0.05). CONCLUSION: Curcumin can stimulate proliferation of SC-NPCs via ERKs and the p38 signaling pathway in low concentrations.

Abdominal aortic aneurysm presenting as a claudication.

Back pain and radiating pain to the legs are the most common symptoms encountered in routine neurosurgical practice and usually originates from neurogenic causes including spinal stenosis. The clinial symptoms are often confused with symptoms of peripheral neuropathy, musculo-skeletal disease and vascular disease in elderly patients. Because it is not easy to distinguish out the cause of symptoms by only physical examination, routine spinal MRI is checked first to rule out the spinal diseases in most outpatient clinics. Although it is obvious that spinal MRI is a very strong tool to investigate the spinal circumferences, most spine surgeons ignore the importance of looking at all aspects of their imaging and of remembering the extra-spinal causes of radiculopathy. A 68-year-old man who presented with a sudden aggravated both leg claudication. Although his symptom was mimicked for his long standing neurogenic claudication due to spinal stenosis diagnosed previously, abdominal aortic aneurysm(AAA) was found on routine lumbar MRI and it was repaired successfully. We emphasize to spinal surgeons the importance of remembering to look wider on routine MRI images when considering differential diagnoses in the outpatient clinic and to remember the extra-spinal causes of radiculopathy, especially when encountering in elderly patients.