Articular cartilage injury is a frequent worldwide disease, while effective treatment is urgently needed. Due to lack of blood vessels and nerves, the ability of cartilage to self-repair is limited. ...Despite the availability of various clinical treatments, unfavorable prognoses and complications remain prevalent. However, the advent of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine has generated considerable interests in using biomaterials for articular cartilage repair. Nevertheless, there remains a notable scarcity of comprehensive reviews that provide an in-depth exploration of the various strategies and applications. Herein, we present an overview of the primary biomaterials and bioactive substances from the tissue engineering perspective to repair articular cartilage. The strategies include regeneration, substitution, and immunization. We comprehensively delineate the influence of mechanically supportive scaffolds on cellular behavior, shedding light on emerging scaffold technologies, including stimuli-responsive smart scaffolds, 3D-printed scaffolds, and cartilage bionic scaffolds. Biologically active substances, including bioactive factors, stem cells, extracellular vesicles (EVs), and cartilage organoids, are elucidated for their roles in regulating the activity of chondrocytes. Furthermore, the composite bioactive scaffolds produced industrially to put into clinical use, are also explicitly presented. This review offers innovative solutions for treating articular cartilage ailments and emphasizes the potential of biomaterials for articular cartilage repair in clinical translation.
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Little evidence exists to confirm whether the sensory-related neural activity that occurs when observing others in pain is highly responsive to empathy for pain. From a perspective of intervention, ...the present study employed placebo manipulation with a transferable paradigm to explore whether the sensory regional activation that occurs when viewing pictures of others in pain could be modulated by the placebo effect. We first performed a screening behavioral experiment for selecting placebo responders and then entered them into a functional magnetic resonance (fMRI) experiment in which they were exposed to the same conditions as before. Participants were informed that it was equally possible to be assigned to the treatment group (placebo manipulation) or the no-treatment group (control); they all, in fact, received treatment and placebo effect would be detected by comparing placebo conditions and no-placebo control condition. Each participant experienced a phase of reinforcing placebo belief with pain in self and a phase of testing transferable placebo effect on empathy for pain. As a result, we found significant activation in sensory areas, including the posterior insula (PI) and the postcentral gyrus, and in the middle cingulate cortex while participants observed pictures of others in pain. More importantly, for the first time, we observed relieved activation in the PI modulated by the placebo effect only associated with pain pictures but not with no-pain pictures. This suggests that sensory activity in the PI might be involved in the processing for empathic pain. This new approach sheds light on research and applications in clinical settings.
Recovery of rare earth elements (REEs), especially heavy and critical REEs, from alternative resources such as coal refuse has recently become increasingly important. A natural leachate containing ...6.14 ppm of REEs with a pH value of 2.70 was collected from a coal coarse refuse pile and utilized as a feedstock for REE recovery tests. The pH value of the natural leachate was gradually increased in a step-wise manner using a sodium hydroxide solution which produced several precipitates. A precipitate containing about 1.1% total REEs was obtained in the pH range of 4.85–6.11 while recovering >80% of the REEs contained in the original leachate. The leaching and staged precipitation process enriched both the critical and heavy REE fractions. The ratios of heavy-to-light (H/L) and critical-to-uncritical (C/UC) REEs in the precipitate were much higher than the coarse refuse material (H/L: 1.54 vs 0.21, C/UC: 1.51 vs 0.34). Additionally, the precipitate contained 18.4% Al, 1.7% Zn, 1.4% Cu, 1.1% Mn, 0.5% Ni and 0.2% Co. A solution chemistry study indicated that the hydroxide and hydroxysulphate precipitates of Al, Si and Cu produced in the pH range of 4.85–6.11 contributed to the fractionation of the REEs and other metal ions such as Zn, Mn and Co to the precipitate. The iron hydroxide precipitates formed at lower pH values did not contain a significant amount of REEs. An explanation may be the competitive adsorption between Al, which was present at higher solution concentrations, and REEs on the iron hydroxide and/or hydroxysulphate precipitate surfaces as proven by results of precipitation tests conducted on model solutions. A product containing 94% of a rare earth oxide mix was obtained by re-dissolution of the REE enriched precipitates followed by selective precipitation using oxalic acid. The overall results including an economic assessment indicate that leachate solutions generated naturally from coarse coal refuse may be a valuable source of critical and heavy REEs that can be effectively recovered and concentrated using staged precipitation.
•A product containing 1.1% of REEs was obtained from a natural leachate of coal refuse.•Acid leaching naturally occurred within the coal coarse refuse pile selectively extracted the highly-valued REEs.•Heavy-to-light and critical-to-uncritical ratios of the precipitate were 1.54 and 1.51, respectively.•Fractionation of REEs to the solid phase was due to the hydroxides and hydroxysulphates of Al, Si and Cu.•Competitive adsorption existed between Al and REEs on the iron precipitate surfaces.
Plant organelle genomes are a valuable resource for evolutionary biology research, yet their genome architectures, evolutionary patterns and environmental adaptations are poorly understood in many ...lineages. Rhodiola species is a type of flora mainly distributed in highland habitats, with high medicinal value. Here, we assembled the organelle genomes of three Rhodiola species (R. wallichiana, R. crenulata and R. sacra) collected from the Qinghai-Tibet plateau (QTP), and compared their genome structure, gene content, structural rearrangements, sequence transfer and sequence evolution rates.
The results demonstrated the contrasting evolutionary pattern between plastomes and mitogenomes in three Rhodiola species, with the former possessing more conserved genome structure but faster evolutionary rates of sequence, while the latter exhibiting structural diversity but slower rates of sequence evolution. Some lineage-specific features were observed in Rhodiola mitogenomes, including chromosome fission, gene loss and structural rearrangement. Repeat element analysis shows that the repeats occurring between the two chromosomes may mediate the formation of multichromosomal structure in the mitogenomes of Rhodiola, and this multichromosomal structure may have recently formed. The identification of homologous sequences between plastomes and mitogenomes reveals several unidirectional protein-coding gene transfer events from chloroplasts to mitochondria. Moreover, we found that their organelle genomes contained multiple fragments of nuclear transposable elements (TEs) and exhibited different preferences for TEs insertion type. Genome-wide scans of positive selection identified one gene matR from the mitogenome. Since the matR is crucial for plant growth and development, as well as for respiration and stress responses, our findings suggest that matR may participate in the adaptive response of Rhodiola species to environmental stress of QTP.
The study analyzed the organelle genomes of three Rhodiola species and demonstrated the contrasting evolutionary pattern between plastomes and mitogenomes. Signals of positive selection were detected in the matR gene of Rhodiola mitogenomes, suggesting the potential role of this gene in Rhodiola adaptation to QTP. Together, the study is expected to enrich the genomic resources and provide valuable insights into the structural dynamics and sequence divergences of Rhodiola species.
The emergence of additive manufacturing technology opens up avenues for developing manufacturing industries, and a clear future direction for additive manufacturing is 4D printing. As a young field, ...it is full of new elements to be researched. In a summary and overview of the current state of research and trends, existing studies are generally manually reviewed and organized. It is susceptible to subjective thinking and knowledge blindness, making it difficult to reflect the current state of research in 4D printing in a comprehensive manner. This paper constructs a visualizing technology identification framework for the global 4D printing research field for manufacturing regarding basic information, technology evolution paths, knowledge structures, and emerging trends through bibliometric techniques and Gephi and CiteSpace software. The purpose of this paper was to provide a systematic, comprehensive, dynamic, quantitative, and objective analysis of the 4D printing research field in order to deepen and refine research in the field, as well as to reveal the overall existing knowledge structure and potential emerging trends. Researchers can use it to understand current research gaps and best practice pathways.
Three segments of a core sample collected from the Guxu coalfield (Sichuan Province, China) were evaluated to determine the rare earth element (REE) leachability and mineralogy. Elemental analysis of ...the three samples showed that the roof and floor strata contained as high as 2087 ppm of total REEs, a value much higher than other coal-based materials reported in the literature. For the floor samples, 47% to 65% of the light REEs (LREEs) were leached within 5 min of contact time using 1 M mineral acid, and prolonged contact, up to 120 min, increased the LREE recovery to as high as 75%. For the roof sample, only 25% of the LREEs were leached at extended contact times. Unlike the LREEs, heavy REE (HREE) recovery from both the roof and floor materials was less than 25%. The relatively high REE content of the feed materials facilitated detailed SEM-EDX and TEM-EDX analyses of the samples. These studies confirmed the presence of several rare earth carbonate minerals, including bastnaesite and parasite, as well as rare earth phosphate minerals such as florencite and apatite. Given the prevalence and rare earth content of the particles analyzed via SEM-EDX, the data suggests that the LREEs present in the floor and roof samples were primarily associated with carbonates and phosphates, respectively. Further SEM-EDX analysis of the leaching residues showed that florencite was the only LREE-bearing species remaining after prolonged acid leaching, indicating that florencite is less soluble relative to the other rare earth minerals. The leaching results corroborate the SEM-EDX and TEM-EDX findings, while providing critical fundamental information on the relationship between REE content, REE mineralogy, and REE leachability in coal refuse materials.
Osteoporotic fractures, also known as fragility fractures, are prevalent in the elderly and bring tremendous social burdens. Poor bone quality, weak repair capacity, instability, and high failure ...rate of internal fixation are main characteristics of osteoporotic fractures. Osteoporotic bone defects are common and need to be repaired by appropriate materials. Proximal humerus, distal radius, tibia plateau, calcaneus, and spine are common osteoporotic fractures with bone defect. Here, the consensus from the Osteoporosis Group of Chinese Orthopaedic Association concentrates on the epidemiology, characters, and management strategies of common osteoporotic fractures with bone defect to standardize clinical practice in bone repair of osteoporotic fractures.
Because the failure potential of a landslide is difficult to assess, a motorway landslide that has obviously deformed was used as a case study in this research. Several multi-integrated ...geotechniques, including field investigation, drilling, electrical resistivity tomography (ERT), stability analysis, and numerical simulations, were used to achieve this goal. Field investigation with drilling was used to roughly determine the failure potential mass boundary and the material composition ERT technique was further used to distinguish the structure and composition of underground materials; the results agreed well with the field investigation, as well as the drilling data in the lithology judgement. The above investigations also showed the failure potential mass is in a slow sliding state and the slip surface roughly follows the contact zone between the upper soil and bedrock. Next, stability analysis based on the limit equilibrium method (LEM) was used to judge the current stability status of the slope, and its factor of safety (FOS) was 1.2 under the natural condition, 1.05 under the earthquake condition, and 1.15 under the rainfall condition. Based on the assessed potential slip surface and digital elevation data, a three-dimensional smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) model was used to simulate the failure potential process. The dynamic information of the run-out behavior, including velocity, movement distance, and frictional energy, can be obtained, which is useful for hazard prediction.
Despite enormous advances in the generation of organoids, robust and stable protocols of organoids are still a major challenge to researchers. Research for assessing structures of organoids and the ...evaluations of their functions on in vitro or in vivo is often limited by precision strategies. A growing interest in assessing organoids has arisen, aimed at standardizing the process of obtaining organoids to accurately resemble human‐derived tissue. The complex microenvironment of organoids, intricate cellular crosstalk, organ‐specific architectures and further complicate functions urgently quest for high‐through schemes. By utilizing multi‐omics analysis and single‐cell analysis, cell‐cell interaction mechanisms can be deciphered, and their structures can be investigated in a detailed view by histological analysis. In this review, we will conclude the novel approaches to study the molecular mechanism and cell heterogeneity of organoids and discuss the histological and morphological similarity of organoids in comparison to the human body. Future perspectives on functional analysis will be developed and the organoids will become mature models.
• Technologies to assess the stability and authenticity of organoids
• From the mechanism to the functional evaluation of organoids, compared to human organ/tissue in vivo
• Single‐cell technologies and functional property technologies are important to assess the organoids both at macro‐ and micro‐level
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