Summary
Crop production is facing unprecedented challenges. Despite the fact that the food supply has significantly increased over the past half‐century, ~8.9 and 14.3% people are still suffering ...from hunger and malnutrition, respectively. Agricultural environments are continuously threatened by a booming world population, a shortage of arable land, and rapid changes in climate. To ensure food and ecosystem security, there is a need to design future crops for sustainable agriculture development by maximizing net production and minimalizing undesirable effects on the environment. The future crops design projects, recently launched by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), aim to develop a roadmap for rapid design of customized future crops using cutting‐edge technologies in the Breeding 4.0 era. In this perspective, we first introduce the background and missions of these projects. We then outline strategies to design future crops, such as improvement of current well‐cultivated crops, de novo domestication of wild species and redomestication of current cultivated crops. We further discuss how these ambitious goals can be achieved by the recent development of new integrative omics tools, advanced genome‐editing tools and synthetic biology approaches. Finally, we summarize related opportunities and challenges in these projects.
Significance Statement
To ensure food and ecosystem security, there is a need to design future crops for sustainable agriculture development by maximizing net production and minimalizing undesirable effects on the environment. The future crops design projects, recently launched by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), aim to develop a roadmap for rapid design of customized future crops using cutting‐edge technologies in the Breeding 4.0 era.
Neuroinflammation in the central nervous system (CNS) is an important subject of neuroimmunological research. Emerging evidence suggests that neuroinflammation is a key player in various neurological ...disorders, including neurodegenerative diseases and CNS injury. Neuroinflammation is a complex and well‐orchestrated process by various groups of glial cells in CNS and peripheral immune cells. The cross‐talks between various groups of glial cells in CNS neuroinflammation is an extremely complex and dynamic process which resembles a well‐orchestrated symphony. However, the understanding of how glial cells interact with each other to shape the distinctive immune responses of the CNS remains limited. In this review, we will discuss the joint actions of glial cells in three phases of neuroinflammation, including initiation, progression, and prognosis, the three movements of the symphony, as the role of each type of glial cells in neuroinflammation depends on the nature of inflammatory cues and specific course of diseases. This perspective of glial cells in neuroinflammation might provide helpful clues to the development of the early diagnosis and therapeutic intervention of the various CNS diseases.
Main Points
Neuroinflammation in the CNS is well orchestrated by different groups of glial cells and immune cells.
Neuroinflammation reflects joint actions of glial cells in three phases of neuroinflammation, including initiation, progression and prognosis.
Dendrite growth of alkali metal anodes limited their lifetime for charge/discharge cycling. Here, we report near-perfect anodes of lithium, sodium, and potassium metals achieved by electrochemical ...polishing, which removes microscopic defects and creates ultra-smooth ultra-thin solid-electrolyte interphase layers at metal surfaces for providing a homogeneous environment. Precise characterizations by AFM force probing with corroborative in-depth XPS profile analysis reveal that the ultra-smooth ultra-thin solid-electrolyte interphase can be designed to have alternating inorganic-rich and organic-rich/mixed multi-layered structure, which offers mechanical property of coupled rigidity and elasticity. The polished metal anodes exhibit significantly enhanced cycling stability, specifically the lithium anodes can cycle for over 200 times at a real current density of 2 mA cm
with 100% depth of discharge. Our work illustrates that an ultra-smooth ultra-thin solid-electrolyte interphase may be robust enough to suppress dendrite growth and thus serve as an initial layer for further improved protection of alkali metal anodes.
Emerging evidence points to a strong association between the gut microbiota and the risk, development and progression of gastrointestinal cancers such as colorectal cancer (CRC) and hepatocellular ...carcinoma (HCC). Bile acids, produced in the liver, are metabolized by enzymes derived from intestinal bacteria and are critically important for maintaining a healthy gut microbiota, balanced lipid and carbohydrate metabolism, insulin sensitivity and innate immunity. Given the complexity of bile acid signalling and the direct biochemical interactions between the gut microbiota and the host, a systems biology perspective is required to understand the liver-bile acid-microbiota axis and its role in gastrointestinal carcinogenesis to reverse the microbiota-mediated alterations in bile acid metabolism that occur in disease states. An examination of recent research progress in this area is urgently needed. In this Review, we discuss the mechanistic links between bile acids and gastrointestinal carcinogenesis in CRC and HCC, which involve two major bile acid-sensing receptors, farnesoid X receptor (FXR) and G protein-coupled bile acid receptor 1 (TGR5). We also highlight the strategies and cutting-edge technologies to target gut-microbiota-dependent alterations in bile acid metabolism in the context of cancer therapy.
Cancer immunotherapies have made much headway during the past decades. Techniques including the immune checkpoint inhibition (ICI) and adoptive cell therapy (ACT) have harvested impressive efficacy ...and provided far-reaching tools for treating cancer patients. However, due to inadequate priming of the immune system, a certain subgroup of patients remains resistant to cancer immunotherapies during or after the treatment. β2-microglobulin (B2M) is an important subunit of major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class I which exerts substantive biological functions in tumorigenesis and immune control. Accumulating evidence has shown that alterations of B2M gene and B2M proteins contribute to poor reaction to cancer immunotherapies by dampening antigen presentation. Here, we discuss the basic biological functions of B2M, its distribution in a spectrum of cancers, and current understanding of its role in ICI, cancer vaccines and chimeric antigen receptor T cell (CAR-T) therapies. Furthermore, we summarize some promising therapeutic strategies to improve the efficacy inhibited by B2M defects.
•B2M loss causes primary and acquired resistance to immune checkpoint inhibition therapy.•B2M gene mutations occur in many cancer types, especially MSI-H cancers.•B2M plays multifaceted role in cancer immune control.•Several immunotherapies are promising approaches to handling B2M-realted resistance.
Metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) with carboxylate ligands as co‐catalysts are very efficient for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER). However, the role of local adsorbed carboxylate ligands around the ...in‐situ‐transformed metal (oxy)hydroxides during OER is often overlooked. We reveal the extraordinary role and mechanism of surface‐adsorbed carboxylate ligands on bi/trimetallic layered double hydroxides (LDHs)/MOFs for OER electrocatalytic activity enhancement. The results of X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), synchrotron X‐ray absorption spectroscopy, and density functional theory (DFT) calculations show that the carboxylic groups around metal (oxy)hydroxides can efficiently induce interfacial electron redistribution, facilitate an abundant high‐valence state of nickel species with a partially distorted octahedral structure, and optimize the d‐band center together with the beneficial Gibbs free energy of the intermediate. Furthermore, the results of in situ Raman and FTIR spectra reveal that the surface‐adsorbed carboxylate ligands as Lewis base can promote sluggish OER kinetics by accelerating proton transfer and facilitating adsorption, activation, and dissociation of hydroxyl ions (OH−).
In the oxygen evolution reaction (OER), surface‐adsorbed carboxylate ligands on bi/trimetallic layered double hydroxides (LDHs)/MOFs demonstrate a synergistic effect. As a Lewis base the carboxylate ligands promote the sluggish OER by accelerating proton transfer and facilitating adsorption, activation, and dissociation of OH− ions, while also facilitating intrinsic electron redistribution and a partially distorted octahedral structure.
The integration of Fe dopant and interfacial FeOOH into Ni‐MOFs Fe‐doped‐(Ni‐MOFs)/FeOOH to construct Fe−O−Ni−O−Fe bonding is demonstrated and the origin of remarkable electrocatalytic performance of ...Ni‐MOFs is elucidated. X‐ray absorption/photoelectron spectroscopy and theoretical calculation results indicate that Fe‐O−Ni−O−Fe bonding can facilitate the distorted coordinated structure of the Ni site with a short nickel–oxygen bond and low coordination number, and can promote the redistribution of Ni/Fe charge density to efficiently regulate the adsorption behavior of key intermediates with a near‐optimal d‐band center. Here the Fe‐doped‐(Ni‐MOFs)/FeOOH with interfacial Fe−O−Ni−O−Fe bonding shows superior catalytic performance for OER with a low overpotential of 210 mV at 15 mA cm−2 and excellent stability with ≈3 % attenuation after a 120 h cycle test. This study provides a novel strategy to design high‐performance Ni/Fe‐based electrocatalysts for OER in alkaline media.
Iron doping and FeOOH decorating leads to interfacial Fe−O−Ni−O−Fe bonding in Fe‐doped‐(Ni‐MOF)/FeOOH. This interfacial bonding can regulate the active Ni site to give the appropriate adsorption behavior of intermediates for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER). As a result, Fe‐doped‐(Ni‐MOF)/FeOOH shows outstanding catalytic performance with low overpotential, small Tafel slope, and high durability.
It is common that different crystal facets in metal and metal oxide nanocrystals display different catalytic performances, whereas such phenomena have been rarely documented in metal–organic ...frameworks (MOFs). Herein, we demonstrate for the first time that a nickel metal–organic layer (MOL) exposing rich (100) crystal facets (Ni‐MOL‐100) shows a much higher photocatalytic CO2‐to‐CO activity than the one exposing rich (010) crystal facets (Ni‐MOL‐010) and its bulky counterpart (bulky Ni‐MOF), with a catalytic activity up to 2.5 and 4.6 times more active than Ni‐MOL‐010 and bulky Ni‐MOF, respectively. Theoretical studies reveal that the two coordinatively unsaturated NiII ions with a close distance of 3.50 Å on the surface of Ni‐MOL‐100 enables synergistic catalysis, leading to more favorable energetics in CO2 reduction than that of Ni‐MOL‐010.
Crystal‐facet‐dependent catalytic performance for CO2 reduction has been observed in Ni‐based 2D MOLs. Ni‐MOL‐100 displays much higher catalytic activity than Ni‐MOL‐010, benefiting from the synergistic catalysis between two adjacent Ni sites in Ni‐MOL‐100.
A tunable photocatalytic method is reported for anti‐Markovnikov hydro‐ and aminooxygenation of unactivated alkenes using readily accessible ketoxime carbonates as the diverse functionalization ...reagents. Mechanistic studies reveal that this reaction is initiated through an energy‐transfer‐promoted N−O bond homolysis of ketoxime carbonates leading to alkoxylcarbonyloxyl and iminyl radicals under visible‐light photocatalysis, followed by the addition of alkoxylcarbonyloxyl radical to alkenes. By taking advantage of the different stability of the iminyl radicals, the generated carbon radical either s a hydrogen atom from the media to form the anti‐Markovnikov hydrooxygenation product, or it is trapped by the persistent iminyl radical to furnish the aminooxygenation product. Notably, this is the first example of direct hydrooxygenation of unactivated olefins with anti‐Markovnikov regioselectivity involving an oxygen‐centered radical.
A tunable protocol for anti‐Markovnikov hydro‐ and aminooxygenation of unactivated olefins under visible‐light photocatalysis has been developed. Mechanistic studies reveal that this reaction is initiated through an energy‐transfer‐mediated N−O bond homolysis of ketoxime carbonates, followed by an oxygen‐centered radical addition.
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