Solvent-derived Fluorinated Secondary Interphase for Reversible Zn-graphite Dual-ion Batteries.

The irreversibility of anion intercalation-deintercalation is a fundamental issue in determining the cycling stability of a dual-ion battery (DIB). In this work, we demonstrate that using a partially fluorinated carbonate solvent can drive a beneficial fluorinated secondary interphase layer formation. Such layer facilitates reversible anion (de-)intercalation processes by impeding solvent molecule co-intercalation and the associated graphite exfoliation. The enhanced reversibility of anion transport contributes to the overall cycling stability for a Zn-graphite DIB-a high Coulombic efficiency of 98.5 % after 800 cycles, with an attractive discharge capacity of 156 mAh g-1 and a mid-point discharge voltage of ≈1.7 V (at 0.1 A g-1 ). In addition, the formed fluorinated secondary interphase suppresses the self-discharge behavior, preserving 29 times of the capacity retention rate compared to the battery with a commonly used carbonate solvent, after standing for 24 hours. This work provides a simple and effective strategy for addressing the critical challenges in graphite-based DIBs and contributes to fundamental understanding to help accelerate their practical application.

Newborn Hearing Screening Results of Infants Born To Mothers Who Had COVID-19 Disease During Pregnancy: A Retrospective Cohort Study.

OBJECTIVE: Viral infections are known to be a risk factor for neonatal hearing loss. COVID-19 infection has been reported to affect hearing test results in one small sample sized study. We aimed to investigate the incidence the risk of neonatal hearing loss in infants of mothers who had COVID-19 infection during pregnancy, regarding their trimesters, by evaluating the neonatal hearing screening results. DESIGN: In this retrospective case-control study, neonatal hearing test results of 458 women with a history of COVID-19 infection in pregnancy were compared with 339 women who gave birth before the pandemic. Data of pregnant women who attended the COVID-19 outpatient clinic of the emergency service of a tertiary pandemic hospital and who had confirmed infection with a reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test were determined from the hospital's records and their neonatal hearing screening results were analyzed from the national database. Neonates born before <34 weeks, and with reported risk factors in the database such as congenital anomaly or known TORCH infection during pregnancy were excluded. The screening tests, Automated Auditory Brainstem Response or Transient Evoked Otoacoustic Emission (TEOAE), were used for screening, and patients who failed the first screening were reevaluated at least 2 weeks apart with a second screening. RESULTS: The incidence of failed second screening was 1.3% in the COVID-19 group and 2.9% in controls, and no significant difference was observed between the two groups according to the final screening results on the second test. Among the 458 mothers, 8 were infected in first trimester, 126 in second trimester, 127 in third trimester but did not deliver within 15 days after infection and 197 were positive at birth. Six neonates in the infected group failed the second screening (3 [2.4%] in the second trimester, 1 [0.8%] third trimester, and 2 [1.0%] positive at birth). CONCLUSIONS: COVID-19 infection during pregnancy was not found to be a risk factor for hearing loss, according to the newborn hearing screening results.

Evaluation of pulmonary arterial stiffness and comparison with right ventricular functions in patients with cirrhosis preparing for liver transplantation.

OBJECTIVE: Pulmonary complications are common in patients with liver cirrhosis. Devolopment of pulmonary hypertension (PH) is associated with a poor prognosis in these patients. Pulmonary arterial stiffness (PAS) is considered an early sign of pulmonary vascular remodeling. The aim of this study is to investigate PAS and compare it with right ventricular (RV) functions in patients with cirrhosis who are scheduled for liver transplantation. METHODS: The study included 52 cirrhosis patients (mean age 51.01 ± 12.18 years, male gender 76.9%) who were prepared for liver transplantation and 59 age and sex matched (mean age 51.28 ± 13.63 years, male gender 62.7%) healthy individuals. Patients with left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) less than 55%, ischemic heart disease, more than mild valvular heart disease, chronic pulmonary disease, congenital heart disease, rheumatic disease, moderate to high echocardiographic PH probability, rhythm or conduction disorders on electrocardiography were excluded from the study. In addition to conventional echocardiographic parameters, PAS value, pulmonary vascular resistance (PVR) and RV ejection efficiency was calculated by the related formulas with transthoracic echocardiography (TTE). RESULTS: Demographic characteristics and cardiovascular risk factors of the groups were similar. PAS, PVR, and sPAP values were found to be significantly higher in the patient group (20.52 ± 6.52 and 13.73 ± 2.05; 1.43 ± 0.15 and 1.27 ± 0.14; 27.69 ± 3.91 and 23.37 ± 3.81 p < 0.001, respectively). RV FAC and RV Ee were significantly lower and RV MPI was significantly higher in the patient group (45.31 ± 3.85 and 49.66 ± 3.62, p < 0.001; 1.69 ± 0.35 and 1.85 ± 0.23, p = 0.005; 0.39 ± 0.07 and 0.33 ± 0.09, p = 0.001, respectively). PAS was significantly correlated with RV FAC and MPI (r = -0.423, p < 0.001; r = 0.301, p = 0.001, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: Increased PAS in cirrhosis patients may be associated with early pulmonary vascular involvement. Evaluation of RV functions is important to determine the prognosis in these patients. FAC, MPI, and RV Ee measurements instead of TAPSE or RV S' may be more useful in demonstrating subclinical dysfunction. The correlation of PAS with RV FAC and MPI may indicate that RV subclinical dysfunction is associated with early pulmonary vascular remodeling in patients with liver cirrhosis.

Course of vitamin D levels before and after liver transplantation in pediatric patients.

BACKGROUND: 25-hydroxy VD insufficiency is known in children undergoing LT but the serial post-transplant VD course and supplementation modalities in the peri-transplant period are lacking. We aimed to determine the pre-VD status and the post-transplant VD status course following VD supplementation and to elucidate its relationship with post-transplant outcome parameters such as infection and survival. METHODS: Pre- and post-VD levels were monitored in parallel with interventions to adjust VD levels in LT patients. VD status was categorized as circulating levels <30-21 ng/ml (insufficiency), 20-10 ng/ml (deficiency), and <10 ng/ml (severe deficiency). Patients received stoss (300000IU) VD3 within the pretransplant period if serum levels were <20 ng/ml. RESULTS: 135 transplanted children were included. The age at LT was 22 months (IQR: 8-60). The pretransplant median VD level was 14 ng/ml. Despite stoss dose, post-transplant median VD level was 1.8 ng/ml (day one), 4 ng/ml (week one), 19 ng/ml (month one), 33 ng/ml (month three), 38 ng/ml (months 6-12), and 40 ng/ml (month 24). After 6 months, VD status reached >30 ng/ml in 98% of patients. Only at pre-LT, higher infection rate (18.7%) in the severe VD deficiency group was observed compared to the VD deficiency group (2.9%, p = .04). Survival was not affected by serum VD levels. CONCLUSION: VD levels fell substantially after LT but are rectifiable by stoss dose, which was well tolerated. Only the infection rate was associated with the VD status.

Low-Fouling Fluoropolymers for Bioconjugation and In†Vivo Tracking.

The conjugation of hydrophilic low-fouling polymers to therapeutic molecules and particles is an effective approach to improving their aqueous stability, solubility, and pharmacokinetics. Recent concerns over the immunogenicity of poly(ethylene glycol) has highlighted the importance of identifying alternative low fouling polymers. Now, a new class of synthetic water-soluble homo-fluoropolymers are reported with a sulfoxide side-chain structure. The incorporation of fluorine enables direct imaging of the homopolymer by 19 F MRI, negating the need for additional synthetic steps to attach an imaging moiety. These self-reporting fluoropolymers show outstanding imaging sensitivity and remarkable hydrophilicity, and as such are a new class of low-fouling polymer for bioconjugation and in vivo tracking.

A robust and reproducible procedure for cross-linking thermoset polymers using molecular simulation.

Molecular simulation can provide valuable guidance in establishing clear links between structure and function to enable the design of new polymer-based materials. However, molecular simulation of thermoset polymers in particular, such as epoxies, present specific challenges, chiefly in the credible preparation of polymerised samples. Despite this need, a comprehensive, reproducible and robust process for accomplishing this using molecular simulation is still lacking. Here, we introduce a clear and reproducible cross-linking protocol to reliably generate three dimensional epoxy cross-linked polymer structures for use in molecular simulations. This protocol is sufficiently detailed to allow complete reproduction of our results, and is applicable to any general thermoset polymer. Amongst our developments, key features include a reproducible procedure for calculation of partial atomic charges, a reliable process for generating and validating an equilibrated liquid precursor mixture, and establishment of a novel, robust and reproducible protocol for generating the three-dimensional cross-linked solid polymer. We use these structures as input to subsequent molecular dynamics simulations to calculate a range thermo-mechanical properties, which compare favourably with experimental data. Our general protocol provides a benchmark for the process of simulating epoxy polymers, and can be readily translated to prepare and model epoxy samples that are dynamically cross-linked in the presence of surfaces and nanostructures.

Correction: Determination of Kamlet-Taft parameters for selected solvate ionic liquids.

Correction for 'Determination of Kamlet-Taft parameters for selected solvate ionic liquids' by Daniel J. Eyckens et al., Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2016, 18, 13153-13157.

Determination of Kamlet-Taft parameters for selected solvate ionic liquids.

The normalised polarity E and Kamlet-Taft parameters of recently described solvate ionic liquids, composed of lithium bis(trifluoromethyl)sulfonimide (LiTFSI) in tri- () or tetraglyme () have been determined and compared to the parent glyme ( and ). We show that these solvate ionic liquids have a high polarity (, (E) = 1.03; , (E) = 1.03) and display very high electron pair accepting characteristics (, α = 1.32; , α = 1.35). Molecular dynamics simulations suggest that the chelated lithium cation is responsible for this observation. The relatively small hydrogen bond acceptor (ß) values for these systems (, ß = 0.41; , ß = 0.37) are thought to be due primarily to the TFSI anion, which is supplemented slightly by the glyme oxygen atom. In addition, these solvate ionic liquids are found to have a high polarisability (, π* = 0.94; , π* = 0.90).

Taking a Tailored Approach to Material Design: A Mechanistic Study of the Selective Localization of Phase-Separated Graphene Microdomains.

To achieve multifunctional properties using nanocomposites, selectively locating nanofillers in specific areas by tailoring a mixture of two immiscible polymers has been widely investigated. Forming a phase-separated structure from entirely miscible molecules is rarely reported, and the related mechanisms to govern the formation of assemblies from molecules have not been fully resolved. In this work, a novel method and the underlying mechanism to fabricate self-assembling, bicontinuous, biphasic structures with localized domains made up of amine-functionalized graphene nanoplatelets are presented, involving the tailoring of compositions in a liquid processable multicomponent epoxy blend. Kinetics studies were carried out to investigate the differences in reactivity of various epoxy-hardener pairs. Molecular dynamics simulations and in situ optical photothermal infrared spectroscopy measurements revealed the trajectories of different components during the early stages of polymerization, supporting the migration (phase behavior) of each component during the curing process. Confirmed by the phase structure and the correlated chemical maps down to the submicrometer level, it is believed that the bicontinuous phase separation is driven by the change of the miscibility between various building blocks forming during polymerization, leading to the formation of nanofiller domains. The proposed morphology evolution mechanism is based on combining solubility parameter calculations with kinetics studies, and preliminary experiments are performed to validate the applicability of the mechanism of selectively locating nanofillers in the phase-separated structure. This provides a simple yet sophisticated engineering model and a roadmap to a mechanism for fabricating phase-separated structures with nanofiller domains in nanocomposite films.

The violence profile of male mentally disordered offenders in a high secure unit in Turkiye.

Our knowledge of the severity and reoffending is limited for mentally disordered offenders, and studies generally evaluate without separation between different diagnostic groups. It was aimed to determine the general profile of mentally disordered offenders who are inpatients in a high secure psychiatry unit from Turkiye and to evaluate the factors associated with violence profiles among different diagnostic groups. According to the results the schizophrenia patients committed the most severe crimes, and intellectual disability patients had some different features from schizophrenia and bipolar disorder patients. History of substance misuse in the intellectual disability group (p = 0,045) and comorbid antisocial personality disorder in the bipolar disorder group (p = 0,015) were associated with increased crime severity. Substance misuse history, history of substance use during the crime, and the existence of comorbid antisocial personality disorder were associated with increased offenses in each of the three diagnosis groups. Living alone (p = 0,004) and having a suicide history (p= 0,052) were associated with the high number of offenses in the schizophrenia group. This study is the first study that compares three diagnostic groups to involve a large patient group. We believe that clinicians must evaluate these parameters for the violence risk assessment of patients.

Hepatic Artery Intimal Dissection During Living Donor Liver Transplantation: A New Modified Approach.

Ensuring optimal arterial flow in solid organ transplantation is very important. Insufficient flow causes important problems such as bile duct problems, intrahepatic abscess formation, and organ loss. Arterial intimal dissection is an important factor that negatively affects organ blood flow. In this study, hepatic artery dissections that we detected in patients who underwent living donor liver transplantation in our clinic were defined, and the microvascular intima-adventitial fixation technique, which can be considered a new approach, was described.

Literature Review and 2 Cases of Isolated Chylothorax After Pediatric Living-Donor Liver Transplant.

OBJECTIVES: Chylothorax without chylous ascites after liver transplant is rare. We present 2 cases of isolated chylothorax after liver transplant and a literature review. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We compiled a literature review of chylothorax cases after abdominal surgery and analyzed the cases related to liver transplant. The demographic information, follow-up results, and treatment details of our 2 cases of chylothorax after living-donor pediatric livertransplant were discussed. RESULTS: An 8-month-old child and a 15-month-old child with cholestatic liver disease and urea cycle defect, respectively, underwent living-donor left lateral segment liver transplant. Patients who presented with chylothorax after discharge were treated conservatively. CONCLUSIONS: Isolated chylothorax is rare complication after abdominal surgery, which is mostly possible to treat with conservative methods. Interventional procedures and a surgical approach should only be performed in resistant cases when conservative treatment has failed.

Living Donor-Initiated Domino Split-Liver Transplantation in Pediatric Setup: A Case Report With Literature Review.

BACKGROUND: In patients undergoing liver transplantation for metabolic diseases, removing the patient's liver for transplantation to another recipient is called "domino liver transplantation." The extracted liver can be divided and transplanted into 2 recipients, which is called domino split-liver transplantation in the literature. However, in our study, the domino liver was obtained from a pediatric patient. METHODS: A patient with maple syrup urine disease (MSUD) underwent a living donor liver transplant, and the explanted liver was divided in situ into right and left lobes and transplanted to 2 separate patients. Demographic data, surgical techniques, postoperative period, and patient follow-ups were evaluated. RESULTS: The father's left lobe liver graft was transplanted into a 12-year-old boy with MSUD. The removed liver was divided in situ into right and left lobes. The left lobe was transplanted to a 14-year-old male patient, whereas the right lobe was transplanted to a 67-year-old male patient. The donor and the first recipient were discharged on postoperative days 5 and 22. The second pediatric patient who underwent domino split-left lobe transplantation was discharged on postoperative day 23. The adult patient who underwent domino split-right lobe transplantation died on postoperative day 12 owing to massive esophageal variceal bleeding. CONCLUSION: Patients who underwent liver transplantation due to MSUD are among the best donor choices for domino liver transplantation. If the extracted liver has a sufficient volume and anatomic features for a split, it can be used in "selected cases."

A Computational Procedure for Atomistic Modelling of Polyphosphazenes towards Better Capturing Molecular-Level Structuring and Thermo-Mechanical Properties.

Poly(phosphazenes)(PZ) are versatile polymers due to their tunable properties that can be tailored for specific applications. Despite extensive experimental research, not all properties are tested, and the list of PZs studied via molecular simulations is limited. Further, a general procedure to generate and test PZ systems is lacking. We present an in situ polymerization procedure developed to make, test, and tune the thermo-mechanical properties of four PZs-poly(dichlorophosphazene)(PZ-DC), poly[bis(2,2,2-trifluoroethoxy)]phosphazene (PZ-TFE), poly(2,2,2-trifluoroethoxy-5,6-diazidohexanoxy) phosphazene (PZ-Azido), and poly(2,2,2-trifluoroethoxy-5,6-dinitratohexanoxy)phosphazene (PZ-Nitrato) via molecular dynamics simulations. The predicted thermo-mechanical properties (i.e., density and glass transition temperature) agreed with experimental values when a direct comparison of PZ systems was possible. This demonstrates the reproducibility and reliability of our procedure which will help understand the behaviour of PZs at the molecular scale.

Rational Design of Solid Polymer Electrolyte Based on Ionic Liquid Monomer for Supercapacitor Applications via Molecular Dynamics Study.

The safety concern arising from flammable liquid electrolytes used in batteries and supercapacitors drives technological advances in solid polymer electrolytes (SPEs) in which flammable organic solvents are absent. However, there is always a trade-off between the ionic conductivity and mechanical properties of SPEs due to the lack of interaction between the ionic liquid and polymer resin. The inadequate understanding of SPEs also limits their future exploitation and applications. Herein, we provide a complete approach to develop a new SPE, consisting of a cation (monomer), anion and hardener from ions-monomers using molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The results show that the strong solid-liquid interactions between the SPE and graphene electrode lead to a very small gap of ∼5.5 Šbetween the components of SPE and electrode, resulting in a structured solid-to-liquid interface, which can potentially improve energy storage performance. The results also indicated the critical role of the mobility of free-standing anions in the SPE network to achieve high ionic conductivity for applications requiring fast charge/discharge. In addition, the formations of hardener-depleted regions and cation-anion-poor/rich regions near the uncharged/charged electrode surfaces were observed at the molecular level, providing insights for rationally designing the SPEs to overcome the boundaries for further breakthroughs in energy storage technology.

New Framework for Computing a General Local Self-Diffusion Coefficient Using Statistical Mechanics.

Widely applicable, modified Green-Kubo expressions for the local diffusion coefficient (Dl) are obtained using linear response theory. In contrast to past definitions in use, these expressions are statistical mechanical results. Molecular simulations of systems with anisotropic diffusion and an inhomogeneous density profile confirm the validity of the results. Diffusion coefficients determined from different expressions in terms of currents and velocity correlations agree in the limit of large systems. Furthermore, they apply to arbitrarily small local regions, making them readily applicable to nanoscale and inhomogeneous systems where knowledge of Dl is important.

Selectively tuning ionic thermopower in all-solid-state flexible polymer composites for thermal sensing.

There has been increasing interest in the emerging ionic thermoelectric materials with huge ionic thermopower. However, it's challenging to selectively tune the thermopower of all-solid-state polymer materials because the transportation of ions in all-solid-state polymers is much more complex than those of liquid-dominated gels. Herein, this work provides all-solid-state polymer materials with a wide tunable thermopower range (+20~-6 mV K-1), which is different from previously reported gels. Moreover, the mechanism of p-n conversion in all-solid-state ionic thermoelectric polymer material at the atomic scale was presented based on the analysis of Eastman entropy changes by molecular dynamics simulation, which provides a general strategy for tuning ionic thermopower and is beneficial to understand the fundamental mechanism of the p-n conversion. Furthermore, a self-powered ionic thermoelectric thermal sensor fabricated by the developed p- and n-type polymers demonstrated high sensitivity and durability, extending the application of ionic thermoelectric materials.

Patient With Hemophilia A Undergoing Consecutive Coronary Bypass and Live Donor Liver Transplantation: A Case Report.

Liver transplantation surgery due to cirrhosis in patients with hemophilia is rare and there are limited cases in the literature. We present a case of a patient with hemophilia A who underwent 2 consecutive surgeries owing to coronary artery disease and cryptogenic cirrhosis with hepatocellular carcinoma. After these surgeries, no bleeding or other complications were seen, and the factor VIII levels have not changed since liver transplantation in the follow-up.

Molecular-Level Investigation of Cycloaliphatic Epoxidised Ionic Liquids as a New Generation of Monomers for Versatile Poly(Ionic Liquids).

Recently, a new generation of polymerised ionic liquids with high thermal stability and good mechanical performances has been designed through novel and versatile cycloaliphatic epoxy-functionalised ionic liquids (CEILs). From these first promising results and unexplored chemical structures in terms of final properties of the PILs, a computational approach based on molecular dynamics simulations has been developed to generate polymer models and predict the thermo-mechanical properties (e.g., glass transition temperature and Young's modulus) of experimentally investigated CEILs for producing multi-functional polymer materials. Here, a completely reproducible and reliable computational protocol is provided to design, test and tune poly(ionic liquids) based on epoxidised ionic liquid monomers for future multi-functional thermoset polymers.

Dendronized polydiacetylenes via photo-polymerization of supramolecular assemblies showing thermally tunable chirality.

Transformation of supramolecular chiral assemblies into covalent polymers integrates characteristics of supramolecular chemistry together with covalent entities, leading to fabrication of covalent chiral materials through versatile supramolecular chiral assemblies. Here, we report supramolecular assembly of an amphiphilic dendronized 10,12-pentacosadiynoic amide (PCDA) in aqueous solutions to form twisted ribbons, which were transferred into covalent dendronized polydiacetylenes (PDAs) via photopolymerization. These supramolecular dendronized PCDA and the corresponding covalent dendronized PDAs showed unprecedent thermoresponsive properties. The thermally-induced dehydration and aggregations tuned reversibly their chiralities, which can be visually inspected through colour changes.