Advances in the Stability of Catalysts for Electroreduction of CO2 to Formic Acid.

The electroreduction of CO2 to high-value products is a promising approach for achieving carbon neutrality. Among these products, formic acid stands out as having the most potential for industrialization due to its optimal economic value in terms of consumption and output. In recent years, the Faraday efficiency of formic acid from CO2 electroreduction has reached 90~100 %. However, this high selectivity cannot be maintained for extended periods under high currents to meet industrial requirements. This paper reviews excellent work from the perspective of catalyst stability, summarizing and discussing the performance of typical catalysts. Strategies for preparing stable and highly active catalysts are also briefly described. This review may offer a useful data reference and valuable guidance for the future design of long-stability catalysts.

Copper-Bridge-Enhanced p-Band Center Modulation of Carbon-Bismuth Heterojunction for CO2 Electroreduction.

Bismuth-based catalysts have advanced CO2 electroreduction to formic acid, but their intrinsic electronic structure remains a key obstacle to achieving a high catalytic performance. Herein, a copper bridge strategy is proposed to enhance electronic modulation effects in bismuth/carbon composites. Density functional theory calculations prove the novel p-d-p hybrid orbitals on the carbon-copper-bismuth heterojunction structure (Bi-Cu/HMCS) could stabilize the HCOO* intermediate and lower the thermodynamic barrier from CO2 to formic acid. With the rapid electron-supplying effect of "copper bridge", the faradaic efficiency of formate reaches 100% (±2%) at a low overpotential of 500 mV and remains above 90% within a wide potential range. Using a solid-state electrolyte device, pure 0.6 M HCOOH is produced at a stable current density of 100 mA cm-2 within 7.5 h, boasting an impressive energy efficiency of 53.8%. This work offers a new strategy for optimizing electronic structure of metal/carbon composite electrocatalysts.

Case Report: A case of PLA2G6 gene-related early-onset Parkinson's disease and review of literature.

Background: Early onset Parkinson's disease (EOPD) is a neurodegenerative disease associated with the action ofto genetic factors. A mutated phospholipase A2 type VI gene (PLA2G6) is considered to be one of pathogenic genes involved in EOPD development. Although EOPD caused by a mutated PLA2G6 has been recorded in major databases, not all mutant genotypes have been reported. Here, we report a case of PLA2G6-related EOPD caused by a novel compound heterozygous mutation. Case presentation: The case was an of 26-year-old young male with a 2-year course of disease. The onset of the disease was insidious and developed gradually. The patient presented with unsteady walking, bradykinesia, unresponsiveness, and decreased facial expression. Auxiliary examination showed a compound heterozygous mutation of the PLA2G6gene with c.991G > T and c.1427 + 1G > A. Mild atrophy of the cerebrum and cerebellum was detected on brain MRI. The patient was diagnosed with EOPD. We administered treatment with Madopar, which was effective. After a two-year disease course, we observed progression to stage 5 according to the Hoehn-Yahr Scale (without medicine in the off-stage). An MDS-UPDRS III score of 62 was obtained, with characteristics of severe disease and rapid progress. The diagnosis was an EOPD phenotype caused by a combination of mutations at the c.991G > T and c.1427 + 1G > A sites of the PLA2G6gene. Conclusion: After active treatment, the disease was set under control, with no significant progression during the three-month follow-up period. Dyskinesia did not recur after reducing the Madopar dose. The freezing sign was slightly decreased and the wearing-off was delayed to 2 h.

UV-Light-Induced Surface Reconstruction of Cubic Cu2 O Promotes CO2 Electroreduction to C2 Products.

Carbon dioxide electroreduction has been considered as one of the most appealing ways to reducing the CO2 emission but raising the selectivity of high-value added products like C2+ still faces great challenge. Herein, we report a convenient way to modify the cubic Cu2 O particles through UV-light irradiation induced reduction in a solution containing H2 O2 and i-propanol. The plane surface of Cu2 O was reconstructed to roughness shell composed of abandant grain boundaries, in which the ration of Cu+ /Cu0 can be easily regulated by controlling the irradiation time. At the same time, the increasing electrochemical active surface area facilitated the exposure of active sites. Combining of above factors, the Faradaic efficiency of C2 (ethylene and ethanol) from CO2 electroreduction was greatly increased to 62.56% with a high partial current density of 145 mA cm-2 . Our work put forward a facile method for the fine control of the surface structure of cuprous oxide and a novel platform to elucidate the synergistic effects of Cu+ /Cu0 on CO2 electroreduction.

Two-Scale Multimodal Medical Image Fusion Based on Structure Preservation.

Medical image fusion has an indispensable value in the medical field. Taking advantage of structure-preserving filter and deep learning, a structure preservation-based two-scale multimodal medical image fusion algorithm is proposed. First, we used a two-scale decomposition method to decompose source images into base layer components and detail layer components. Second, we adopted a fusion method based on the iterative joint bilateral filter to fuse the base layer components. Third, a convolutional neural network and local similarity of images are used to fuse the components of the detail layer. At the last, the final fused result is got by using two-scale image reconstruction. The contrast experiments display that our algorithm has better fusion results than the state-of-the-art medical image fusion algorithms.