Gastric cancer (GC) is among the most fatal cancers in China. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are versatile regulators during GC development and progression. miR‐491‐5p has been demonstrated to act as a tumor ...suppressor in several types of cancer. However, the role of miR‐491‐5p in GC metastasis remains unknown. Here, we found that miR‐491‐5p was significantly decreased in GC tissues compared with adjacent non‐cancerous tissues, and low miR‐491‐5p level was associated with large tumor size. Overexpression of miR‐491‐5p significantly suppressed GC cell epithelial‐to‐mesenchymal transition (EMT) and tumor metastasis in vitro and in vivo. Mechanistically, SNAIL was identified as a direct target of miR‐491‐5p. The silencing of SNAIL phenocopied the tumor suppressive function of miR‐491‐5p, whereas re‐expression of SNAIL in GC cells rescued the EMT markers and cell migratory ability that were inhibited by miR‐491‐5p. In addition, miR‐491‐5p inhibited FGFR4 indirectly. Inhibition of FGFR4 also decreased the SNAIL level and impaired EMT and cell migration. Taken together, these findings indicate that downregulation of miR‐491‐5p promoted GC metastasis by inducing EMT via regulation of SNAIL and FGFR4.
miR‐491‐5p is remarkably downregulated in gastric cancer. Restoration of miR‐491‐5p could effectively inhibited tumor growth and metastasis. We discovered that miR‐491‐5p directly targeted SNAIL and indirectly inhibited FGFR4, resulted in suppressed EMT and tumor metastasis.
Physiological temperature varies temporally and spatially. Accurate and real-time detection of localized temperature changes in biological tissues regardless of large deformation is crucial to ...understand thermal principle of homeostasis, to assess sophisticated health conditions, and further to offer possibilities of building a smart healthcare and medical system. Additionally, continuous temperature mapping in flexible and stretchable formats opens up many other potential areas, such as artificially electronic skins and reflection of emotional changes. This review exploits a comprehensive investigation onto recent advances in flexible temperature sensors, stretchable sensor networks, and platforms constructed in soft and compliant formats for wearable physiological monitoring. The most recent examples of flexible temperature sensors are first discussed regarding to their materials, structures, electrical and mechanical properties; temperature sensing network technologies in new materials and structural designs are then presented based on platforms comprised of multiple physical sensors and stretchable electronics. Finally, wearable applications of the sensing network are described, such as detection of human activities, monitoring of health conditions, and emotion-related bodily sensations. Conclusions are made with emphasis on critical issues and new trends in the field of wearable temperature sensor network technologies.
Bioactive species, including reactive oxygen species (ROS, including O
2
&z.rad;
−
, H
2
O
2
, HOCl,
1
O
2
, &z.rad;OH, HOBr,
etc.
), reactive nitrogen species (RNS, including ONOO
−
, NO, NO
2
, ...HNO,
etc.
), reactive sulfur species (RSS, including GSH, Hcy, Cys, H
2
S, H
2
S
n
, SO
2
derivatives,
etc.
), ATP, HCHO, CO and so on, are a highly important category of molecules in living cells. The dynamic fluctuations of these molecules in subcellular microenvironments determine cellular homeostasis, signal conduction, immunity and metabolism. However, their abnormal expressions can cause disorders which are associated with diverse major diseases. Monitoring bioactive molecules in subcellular structures is therefore critical for bioanalysis and related drug discovery. With the emergence of organelle-targeted fluorescent probes, significant progress has been made in subcellular imaging. Among the developed subcellular localization fluorescent tools, ROS, RNS and RSS (RONSS) probes are highly attractive, owing to their potential for revealing the physiological and pathological functions of these highly reactive, interactive and interconvertible molecules during diverse biological events, which are rather significant for advancing our understanding of different life phenomena and exploring new technologies for life regulation. This review mainly illustrates the design principles, detection mechanisms, current challenges, and potential future directions of organelle-targeted fluorescent probes toward RONSS.
The dynamic fluctuations of bioactive species in living cells are associated with numerous physiological and pathological phenomena. The emergence of organelle-targeted fluorescent probes has significantly facilitated our understanding on the biological functions of these species. This review describes the design, applications, challenges and potential directions of organelle-targeted bioactive species probes.
Lithium-oxygen batteries with ultrahigh energy density have received considerable attention as of the future energy storage technologies. The development of effective electrocatalysts and a ...corresponding working mechanism during cycling are critically important for lithium-oxygen batteries. Here, a single cobalt atom electrocatalyst is synthesized for lithium-oxygen batteries by a polymer encapsulation strategy. The isolated moieties of single atom catalysts can effectively regulate the distribution of active sites to form micrometre-sized flower-like lithium peroxide and promote the decomposition of lithium peroxide by a one-electron pathway. The battery with single cobalt atoms can operate with high round-trip efficiency (86.2%) and long-term stability (218 days), which is superior to a commercial 5 wt% platinum/carbon catalyst. We reveal that the synergy between a single atom and the support endows the catalyst with excellent stability and durability. The promising results provide insights into the design of highly efficient catalysts for lithium-oxygen batteries and greatly expand the scope of future investigation.
In the cloud, uploading encrypted data is the most effective way to ensure that the data are not leaked. However, data access control is still an open problem in cloud storage systems. To provide an ...authorization mechanism to limit the comparison of a user's ciphertexts with those of another, public key encryption supporting the equality test with four flexible authorizations (PKEET-FA) is presented. Subsequently, more functional identity-based encryption supporting the equality test (IBEET-FA) further combines identity-based encryption with flexible authorization. The bilinear pairing has always been intended to be replaced due to the high computational cost. Hence, in this paper, we use general trapdoor discrete log groups to construct a new and secure IBEET-FA scheme, which is more efficient. The computational cost for the encryption algorithm in our scheme was reduced to 43% of that of the scheme of Li et al. In Type 2 and 3 authorization algorithms, the computational cost of both was reduced to 40% of that of the scheme of Li et al. Furthermore, we give proof that our scheme is secure against one-wayness under the chosen identity and chosen ciphertext attacks (OW-ID-CCA), and indistinguishable against chosen identity and chosen ciphertext attacks (IND-ID-CCA).
Atomically ordered intermetallic nanoparticles are promising for catalytic applications but are difficult to produce because the high-temperature annealing required for atom ordering inevitably ...accelerates metal sintering that leads to larger crystallites. We prepared platinum intermetallics with an average particle size of <5 nanometers on porous sulfur-doped carbon supports, on which the strong interaction between platinum and sulfur suppresses metal sintering up to 1000°C. We synthesized intermetallic libraries of small nanoparticles consisting of 46 combinations of platinum with 16 other metal elements and used them to study the dependence of electrocatalytic oxygen-reduction reaction activity on alloy composition and platinum skin strain. The intermetallic libraries are highly mass efficient in proton-exchange-membrane fuel cells and could achieve high activities of 1.3 to 1.8 amperes per milligram of platinum at 0.9 volts.
Microbe‐mediated mineralization is ubiquitous in nature, involving bacteria, fungi, viruses, and algae. These mineralization processes comprise calcification, silicification, and iron mineralization. ...The mechanisms for mineral formation include extracellular and intracellular biomineralization. The mineral precipitating capability of microbes is often harnessed for green synthesis of metal nanoparticles, which are relatively less toxic compared with those synthesized through physical or chemical methods. Microbe‐mediated mineralization has important applications ranging from pollutant removal and nonreactive carriers, to other industrial and biomedical applications. Herein, the different types of microbe‐mediated biomineralization that occur in nature, their mechanisms, as well as their applications are elucidated to create a backdrop for future research.
Different types of biomineralization, including calcification, silicification, iron, carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus mineralization, which are mediated by algae, bacteria, fungi, and viruses, are summarized. The mechanisms of extracellular and intracellular microbe‐mediated mineralization, as well as their environmental, industrial, and biotechnological applications are discussed in depth.
•ZIF-8 can simultaneously remove 95.4% of Cu and 80.3% of norfloxacin.•Cu removal involved ion exchange with Zn.•Norfloxacin removal involved both electrostatic and π-π interactions.•Adsorption ...followed pseudo-second-order kinetics and best fit the Freundlich adsorption model.
Many wastewaters commonly contain complex mixtures of both antibiotics and heavy metals, where the simultaneous removal of these mixed contaminants is still a challenge. In this paper, ZIF-8, a metal-organic framework material, was proposed as a potential absorbent to simultaneously remove norfloxacin and copper from wastewater. Batch adsorption experiments showed that ZIF-8 could simultaneously remove 95.4% of Cu and 80.3% of norfloxacin. ZIF-8 was characterized before and after the removal of the mixed contaminants. X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) showed that ZIF-8 was synthesized successfully and maintained a stable structure after contaminant adsorption. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) both suggested that contaminants were partially adsorbed on the surface of ZIF-8. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) also indicated the presence of both carboxyl and Cu on the ZIF-8 surface confirming that a mixture of contaminants was adsorbed. For both contaminants, adsorption followed pseudo-second-order kinetics and best fit the Freundlich adsorption model with correlation coefficients (R2) of 0.973 and 0.994, for copper and norfloxacin, respectively. Finally, removal mechanisms for copper and norfloxacin by ZIF-8 were proposed. For Cu, the adsorption process on ZIF-8 was mainly due to ion exchange, whereas electrostatic interactions and π-π stacking may be responsible for norfloxacin adsorption. Overall this study demonstrated that ZIF-8 was a promising material for the treatment of wastewater containing mixtures of organic and metallic contaminants.
Kushen （Radix Sophorae Flavescentis） has a long history of use for the treatment of tumors, inflammation and other diseases in traditional Chinese medicine. Compound Kushen Injection （CKI） is a ...mixture of natural compounds extracted from Kushen and Baituling （Rhizoma Smilacis Glabrae）. The main principles of CKI are matrine （MT） and oxymatrine （OMT） that exhibit a variety of pharmacological activities, including anti-inflammatory, anti-allergic, anti-viral, anti-fibrotic and cardiovascular protective effects. Recent evidence shows that these compounds also produce anti-cancer actions, such as inhibiting cancer cell proliferation, inducing cell cycle arrest, accelerating apoptosis, restraining angiogenesis, inducing cell differentiation, inhibiting cancer metastasis and invasion, reversing multidrug resistance, and preventing or reducing chemotherapy- and/or radiotherapy-induced toxicity when combined with chemotherapeutic drugs. In this review, we summarize recent progress in studying the anti-cancer activities of MT, OMT and CKI and their potential molecular targets, which provide clues and references for further study.
Enzymes are efficient biocatalysts providing an important tool in many industrial biocatalytic processes. Currently, the immobilized enzymes prepared by the cross-linked enzyme aggregates (CLEAs) ...have drawn much attention due to their simple preparation and high catalytic efficiency. Combined cross-linked enzyme aggregates (combi-CLEAs) including multiple enzymes have significant advantages for practical applications. In this review, the conditions or factors for the preparation of combi-CLEAs such as the proportion of enzymes, the type of cross-linker, and coupling temperature were discussed based on the reaction mechanism. The recent applications of combi-CLEAs were also reviewed.
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