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•The status quo of inorganic nanoparticles in clinical trials and translation is highlighted and summarized.•The progress and paradigms on inorganic nanomaterials for clinical ...relevance and translation are elucidated systematically.•The challenges and perspectives in clinical translation of inorganic nanoparticles are discussed in depth.
The development and application of nanotechnology-related knowledge and tools in modern medicine has been showing great potentials in elevating human’s living standards and improving mankind’s healthcare conditions via the prevention, early detection, diagnosis, treatment and follow-up of various diseases. The significant progress of nanomedicine has been achieved by the exploration of nanoparticulate formulations for theranostic purposes in a living organism. Among abundant nanoparticles, inorganic nanoparticles feature distinctive physiochemical properties and biological effects, with which conventional organic counterparts are typically not endowed. In the past thirty years, to be true, very few inorganic nanomaterials have been made from bench to bedside translation. It is thus more vital than ever for the scientific community to make ever-greater efforts to realize their clinical translations. Therefore, this review highlights and discusses such a compelling topic on the clinical trials and translation of inorganic nanoparticles. We will provide an update of the current progresses in clinic-relevant applications in terms of inorganic nanoparticles being used as detecting tools, contrast agents as well as therapeutic vehicles. Especially, the crucial challenges and future prospects in translating inorganic nanoparticles into clinical practices are highlighted and outlooked. This review aims to bring the issues of clinical relevance and translatability of inorganic nanoparticles to the forefront, which is the primary impetus, and also critically important, for the development of inorganic nanoparticles-based nanobiotechnology and nanomedicine.
Magnetic CuO-Fe3O4 composite was fabricated by a simple hydrothermal method and characterized as a heterogeneous catalyst for phenol degradation. The effects of pH and bicarbonate ions on catalytic ...activity were extensively evaluated in view of the practical applications. The results indicated that an increase of solution pH and the presence of bicarbonate ions were beneficial for the removal of phenol in the CuO-Fe3O4 coupled with persulfate (PS) process. Almost 100% mineralization of 0.1 mM phenol can be achieved in 120 min by using 0.3 g/L CuO-Fe3O4 and 5.0 mM PS at pH 11.0 or in the presence of 3.0 mM bicarbonate. The positive effect of bicarbonate ion is probably due to the suppression of copper leaching as well as the formation of Cu(III). The reuse of catalyst at pH0 11.0 and 5.6 showed that the catalyst remains a high level of stability at alkaline condition (e.g., pH0 11.0). On the basis of the characterization of catalyst, the results of metal leaching and EPR studies, it is suggested that phenol is mainly destroyed by the surface-adsorbed radicals and Cu(III) resulting from the reaction between PS and Cu(II) on the catalyst. Taking into account the widespread presence of bicarbonate ions in waste streams, the CuO-Fe3O4/PS system may provide some new insights for contaminant removal from wastewater.
•The reduction progress of graphene oxide (GO) by ascorbic acid was studied.•Depending on the reduction time, the properties of the reduced product can be tuned.•High purity grade natural graphite ...from Sri Lanka was used as the raw material.•GO and reduced GO (RGO) was synthesized in a much cheaper and scalable way.
Graphene oxide (GO) and reduced graphene oxide (RGO) are in greater demand in many research fields. As a result, the synthesis of these materials on a large scale in a costeffective manner is more concerned for numerous applications. In the present work, GO was synthesized by oxidizing natural graphite and reduced by ascorbic acid (AA), which is a green reductant. The reduced products obtained at different time periods were in detail characterized by UV–Visible spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FT-IR) spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), atomic force microscopy (AFM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Results showed that the oxidation of graphite has given highly oxidized GO with a 9.30 Å interlayer space and about 33% of oxygen atomic percentage. Until 50 min of the reduction, both GO and RGO coexist. The reduction rate is fast within the first 30 min. In addition, the suitability of natural graphite over synthetic graphite for the synthesis of GO is shown. The findings of this work pave the way to select GO and RGO for applications of interest in a cheap, green and efficient manner.
In the paper 1, the authors developed a new method to compute the exact overlap formulas between integrable boundary states and on-shell Bethe states in integrable spin chains. This method utilizes ...the coordinate Bethe ansatz representation of wave functions and singularity property of the off-shell overlaps. In this paper, we use this new method to derive the formula for overlaps between the Lieb-Liniger Bethe states and the Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) state. As a simple application this method, we obtained the overlaps between the Lieb-Liniger eigenstates and the free particle states with pair structure.
This study aimed to explore the effect of pelvic reconstruction surgery on the relation of pelvic organ prolapse (POP) and overactive bladder (OAB) and the impact of preoperative vaginal oestrogen ...supplement on vaginal tissue. A total of 100 postmenopausal women with symptomatic POP who underwent pelvic reconstruction surgery (laparoscopic sacrocolpopexy or transvaginal mesh) were enrolled in this study. Preoperative vaginal oestrogen was prescribed in 28 cases. The evaluation tools consisted of POP-Q, urodynamic study, Overactive Bladder Symptom Score (OABSS), and urinary NGF. Vaginal maturation index and vaginal specimens for hormone receptors study were investigated during operation to evaluate the effect of topical oestrogen. Follow-up assessments were performed at 1, 3, and 6 months after surgery. Preoperatively, 58 (58%) were POP with OAB. After reconstruction surgery, the OABSS decreased significantly (6.87 ± 0.85 vs 3.77 ± 0.61, p < 0.001) at postoperative 6 months in the group. Remarkable increasing trends of urinary NGF levels are noted till 3 months postoperatively, then decreasing to the baseline level at 6 months postoperative follow-up. Remarkable decrease of mRNA of the androgen receptor and significant higher expression of progesterone receptor (PR) were noted after use of the vaginal oestrogen cream. The severity of OAB in the POP women shows moderate degree according to OABSS. Pelvic reconstruction surgery can significantly improve the OAB symptoms. The surgery induced inflammation effect lasts for about 6 months. Short-term preoperative supplement of topical oestrogen brings alterations of the vaginal epithelium.
A triathlon, which consists of swimming, bicycling, and running, is a high-intensity and long-term form of exercise that can cause injuries such as muscular damage, inflammation, oxidative stress, ...and energy imbalance. Probiotics are thought to play an important role in disease incidence, health promotion, and nutrient metabolism, but only a few studies have focused on physiological adaptations to exercise in sports science. Previous studies indicated that Lactobacillus supplementation could improve oxidative stress and inflammatory responses. We investigate the effects of Lactobacillus plantarum PS128 supplementation on triathletes for possible physiological adaptation. The triathletes were assigned to one of two groups with different exercise intensity stimulations with different time-points to investigate the effects of body compositions, inflammation, oxidative stress, performance, fatigue, and injury-related biochemical indices. L. plantarum PS128 supplementation, combined with training, can significantly alleviate oxidative stress (such as creatine kinase, Thioredoxin, and Myeloperoxidase indices) after a triathlon (p < 0.05). This effect is possibly regulated by a 6⁻13% decrease of indicated pro-inflammation (TNF-α, IL-6, and IL-8) cytokines (p < 0.05) and 55% increase of anti-inflammation (IL-10) cytokines (p < 0.05) after intensive exercise stimulation. In addition, L. plantarum PS128 can also substantially increase 24⁻69% of plasma-branched amino acids (p < 0.05) and elevate exercise performance, as compared to the placebo group (p < 0.05). In conclusion, L. plantarum PS128 may be a potential ergogenic aid for better training management, physiological adaptations to exercise, and health promotion.
Cancer stem cells （CSCs） have been identified as rare cell populations in many cancers, including leukemia and solid tumors. Accumulating evidence has suggested that CSCs are capable of self-renewal ...and differentiation into various types of cancer cells. Aberrant regulation of gene expression and some signaling pathways has been observed in CSCs compared to other tumor cells. CSCs are thought to be responsible for cancer initiation, progression, metastasis, recurrence and drug resistance. The CSC hypothesis has recently attracted much attention due to the potential for discovery and development of CSC-related therapies and the identification of key molecules involved in controlling the unique properties of CSC populations. Over the past several years, a tremendous amount of effort has been invested in the development of new drugs, such as nanomedicines, that can take advantage of the ＂Achilles＇ heel＂ of CSCs by targeting cell-surface molecular markers or various signaling pathways. Novel compounds and therapeutic strategies that selectively target CSCs have been identified, some of which have been evaluated in preclinical and clinical studies. In this article, we review new findings related to the investigation of the CSC hypothesis, and discuss the crucial pathways involved in regulating the development of CSC populations and the advances in studies of drug resistance. In addition, we review new CSC-targeted therapeutic strategies aiming to eradicate malignancies.
This paper presents a method to estimate the inverter lifetime so that we can predict a failure prior to it actually happening. The key contribution of this study is to link the physics of the power ...devices to a large scale system simulation within a reasonable framework of time. By configuring this technique to a real system, it can be used as a converter design tool or online lifetime estimation tool. In this paper, the presented method is applied to the grid side inverter to show its validity. A power cycling test is designed to gather the lifetime data of a selected insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) module (SKM50GB123D). Die-attach solder fatigue is found out to be the dominant failure mode of this IGBT module under the designed accelerated tests. Furthermore, the crack initiation is found to be highly stress dependent while the crack propagation is almost independent with stress level. Two different damage accumulation methods are used and the estimation results are compared.
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