The catalyst in the oxygen electrode is the core component of the aqueous metal-air battery, which plays a vital role in the determination of the open circuit potential, energy density, and cycle ...life of the battery. For rechargeable aqueous metal-air batteries, the catalyst should have both good oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER) catalytic performance. Compared with precious metal catalysts, non-precious metal materials have more advantages in terms of abundant resource reserves and low prices. Over the past few years, great efforts have been made in the development of non-precious metal bifunctional catalysts. This review selectively evaluates the advantages, disadvantages and development status of recent advanced materials including pure carbon materials, carbon-based metal materials and carbon-free materials as bifunctional oxygen catalysts. Preliminary improvement strategies are formulated to make up for the deficiency of each material. The development prospects and challenges facing bifunctional catalysts in the future are also discussed.
Different types of advanced non-noble materials in bifunctional catalysts for ORR and OER.
A novel laboratory scale apparatus using infrared lamps replacing the electric heating plate for the freeze drying of Cordyceps militaris was developed in this study. The drying time, energy ...consumption, nutritional properties, antioxidant activities and main volatile compounds of Cordyceps militaris dried by infrared freeze drying (IRFD) and traditional freeze drying (TFD) at different drying temperatures (40, 50, 60 and 70 °C) were compared. Results indicated that drying at 40, 50 and 60 °C resulted in higher retention of cordycepin, total phenolics, hydroxyl radical scavenging activity, reducing power, 3-octanone, 3-octanol and 1,3-octadiene when compared with those dried at 70 °C. IRFD could reduce 7.21–17.78% of the drying time and 11.88–18.37% of the energy consumption at a constant drying temperature in comparison of TFD. In terms of quality, IRFD and TFD had similar retention effects on cordycepin, adenosine, hydroxyl radical scavenging activity and reducing power. Consequently, the results suggest that IRFD should be a promising approach for achieving high-quality dried products.
Industrial relevance.
IRFD could reduce 7.21–17.78% of the drying time and 11.88–18.37% of the energy consumption at a constant drying temperature in comparison of TFD without compromising the quality of the dried product. This study can help food processing industries to produce high quality freeze dried Cordyceps militaris and many other foods with an energy efficient freeze drying process.
•A novel infrared freeze drying device (IRFD) was developed for the drying of Cordyceps militaris.•Compared to TFD, IRFD could reduce 7.21–17.78% of the drying time at a constant drying temperature.•IRFD could reduce 11.88–18.37% of the energy consumption compared to TFD at the same temperature.•The quality of IRFD samples was close to that of TFD samples.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
Bioprinting as an enabling technology for tissue engineering possesses the promises to fabricate highly mimicked tissue or organs with digital control. As one of the biofabrication approaches, ...bioprinting has the advantages of high throughput and precise control of both scaffold and cells. Therefore, this technology is not only ideal for translational medicine but also for basic research applications. Bioprinting has already been widely applied to construct functional tissues such as vasculature, muscle, cartilage, and bone. In this review, the authors introduce the most popular techniques currently applied in bioprinting, as well as the various bioprinting processes. In addition, the composition of bioink including scaffolds and cells are described. Furthermore, the most current applications in organ and tissue bioprinting are introduced. The authors also discuss the challenges we are currently facing and the great potential of bioprinting. This technology has the capacity not only in complex tissue structure fabrication based on the converted medical images, but also as an efficient tool for drug discovery and preclinical testing. One of the most promising future advances of bioprinting is to develop a standard medical device with the capacity of treating patients directly on the repairing site, which requires the development of automation and robotic technology, as well as our further understanding of biomaterials and stem cell biology to integrate various printing mechanisms for multi‐phasic tissue engineering.
Bioprinting as an enabling technology for tissue engineering possesses the promises of fabricating highly mimicked tissue or organs with digital control. Here we present the bioprinting techniques in our aspect of review and the current successful applications in tissue engineering.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Electrocarboxylation reaction, which employs organic electrosynthesis to achieve the utilization of CO2 as a carboxylative reagent, provides a powerful and efficient tool for the preparation of ...organic carboxylic acid. In some electrocarboxylation reactions, CO2 also acts as a promoter to facilitate the desired reaction. This concept mainly highlights recent CO2‐promoted electrocarboxylation reactions via CO2⋅− intermediate or transiently protective carboxylation of active intermediate with CO2.
Electrocarboxylation reaction employs CO2 as a carboxylative reagent to prepare value‐added carboxylic acid via organic electrosynthesis. In some cases, CO2 also acts as a promoter to facilitate the desired reaction. This Concept mainly highlights recent CO2‐promoted electrocarboxylation reactions via CO2⋅− intermediate or transiently protective carboxylation of active intermediate with CO2.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
The molecular mechanism of leaf senescence in apple (Malus domestica) is still not fully understood. We used gene expression analysis and protein–protein interactions to decipher the relationships of ...abscisic acid (ABA) and two proteins, MdbHLH93 and MdBT2, in the senescence process.
We found that MdbHLH93 promoted leaf senescence and the expression of senescence-related genes, which exhibited similar effects to ABA on leaf senescence. MdbHLH93 activated directly the transcription of MdSAG18.
We also found that an ABA-responsive protein, MdBT2, interacted directly with MdbHLH93, and induced the ubiquitination and degradation of the MdbHLH93 protein, and thus delayed leaf senescence.
Our findings provide new insights into the regulatory network of leaf senescence through the functional interactions among ABA, MdbHLH93 and MdBT2.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NMLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
The superfluid properties of attractive Hubbard model in dice lattice are investigated. It is found that three superfluid order parameters increase as the interaction increases. When the filling ...factor falls into the flat band, due to the infinite large density of states, the resultant superfluid order parameters are proportional to interaction strength, which is in striking contrast with the exponentially small counterparts in usual superfluid (or superconductor). When the interaction is weak, and the filling factor is near the bottom of the lowest band (or the top of highest band), the superfluid density is determined by the effective mass of the lowest (or highest) single-particle band. When the interaction is strong and filling factor is small, the superfluid density is inversely proportional to interaction strength, which is related to effective mass of tightly bound pairs. In the strong interaction limit and finite filling, the asymptotic behaviors of superfluid density can be captured by a parabolic function of filling factor. Furthermore, when the filling is in flat band, the superfluid density shows a logarithmic singularity as the interaction approaches zero. In addition, there exist three undamped collective modes for strong interactions. The lowest excitation is gapless phonon, which is characterized by the total density oscillations. The two others are gapped Leggett modes, which correspond relative density fluctuations between sublattices. The collective modes are also reflected in the two-particle spectral functions by sharp peaks. Furthermore, it is found that the two-particle spectral functions satisfy an exact sum-rule, which is directly related to the filling factor (or density of particle). The sum-rule of the spectral functions may be useful to distinguish between the hole-doped and particle-doped superfluid (superconductor) in experiments.
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IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
Phosphate-solubilizing fungi (PSF) generally enhance available phosphorus (P) released from soil, which contributes to plants' P requirement, especially in P-limiting regions. In this study, two PSF, ...TalA-JX04 and AspN-JX16, were isolated from the rhizosphere soil of moso bamboo (Phyllostachys edulis) widely distributed in P-deficient areas in China and identified as Talaromyces aurantiacus and Aspergillus neoniger, respectively. The two PSF were cultured in potato dextrose liquid medium with six types of initial pH values ranging from 6.5 to 1.5 to assess acid resistance. Both PSF were incubated in Pikovskaya's liquid media with different pH values containing five recalcitrant P sources, including Ca3(PO4)2, FePO4, CaHPO4, AlPO4, and C6H6Ca6O24P6, to estimate their P-solubilizing capacity. No significant differences were found in the biomass of both fungi grown in media with different initial pH, indicating that these fungi could grow well under acid stress. The P-solubilizing capacity of TalA-JX04 was highest in medium containing CaHPO4, followed by Ca3(PO4)2, FePO4, C6H6Ca6O24P6, and AlPO4 in six types of initial pH treatments, while the recalcitrant P-solubilizing capacity of AspN-JX16 varied with initial pH. Meanwhile, the P-solubilizing capacity of AspN-JX16 was much higher than TalA-JX04. The pH of fermentation broth was negatively correlated with P-solubilizing capacity (p<0.01), suggesting that the fungi promote the dissolution of P sources by secreting organic acids. Our results showed that TalA-JX04 and AspN-JX16 could survive in acidic environments and both fungi had a considerable ability to release soluble P by decomposing recalcitrant P-bearing compounds. The two fungi had potential for application as environment-friendly biofertilizers in subtropical bamboo ecosystem.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Background and Aims
Hepatic ischemia‐reperfusion (IR) injury is a major complication of liver transplantation, resection, and hemorrhagic shock. Hypoxia is a key pathological event associated with IR ...injury. MicroRNA‐210 (miR‐210) has been characterized as a micromanager of hypoxia pathway. However, its function and mechanism in hepatic IR injury is unknown.
Approach and Results
In this study, we found miR‐210 was induced in liver tissues from patients subjected to IR‐related surgeries. In a murine model of hepatic IR, the level of miR‐210 was increased in hepatocytes but not in nonparenchymal cells. miR‐210 deficiency remarkably alleviated liver injury, cell inflammatory responses, and cell death in a mouse hepatic IR model. In vitro, inhibition of miR‐210 decreased hypoxia/reoxygenation (HR)–induced cell apoptosis of primary hepatocytes and LO2 cells, whereas overexpression of miR‐210 increased cells apoptosis during HR. Mechanistically, miR‐210 directly suppressed mothers against decapentaplegic homolog 4 (SMAD4) expression under normoxia and hypoxia condition by directly binding to the 3′ UTR of SMAD4. The pro‐apoptotic effect of miR‐210 was alleviated by SMAD4, whereas short hairpin SMAD4 abrogated the anti‐apoptotic role of miR‐210 inhibition in primary hepatocytes. Further studies demonstrated that hypoxia‐induced SMAD4 transported into nucleus, in which SMAD4 directly bound to the promoter of miR‐210 and transcriptionally induced miR‐210, thus forming a negative feedback loop with miR‐210.
Conclusions
Our study implicates a crucial role of miR‐210‐SMAD4 interaction in hepatic IR‐induced cell death and provides a promising therapeutic approach for liver IR injury.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Imaging-based spatial transcriptomics techniques provide valuable spatial and gene expression information at single-cell resolution. However, their current capability is restricted to profiling a ...limited number of genes per sample, resulting in most of the transcriptome remaining unmeasured. To overcome this challenge, we develop ENGEP, an ensemble learning-based tool that predicts unmeasured gene expression in spatial transcriptomics data by using multiple single-cell RNA sequencing datasets as references. ENGEP outperforms current state-of-the-art tools and brings biological insight by accurately predicting unmeasured genes. ENGEP has exceptional efficiency in terms of runtime and memory usage, making it scalable for analyzing large datasets.
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