Attaining substantial areal capacity (>3 mAh/cm2) and extended cycle longevity in all-solid-state lithium metal batteries necessitates the implementation of solid-state electrolytes (SSEs) capable of ...withstanding elevated critical current densities and capacities. In this study, we report a high-performing vacancy-rich Li9N2Cl3 SSE demonstrating excellent lithium compatibility and atmospheric stability and enabling high-areal capacity, long-lasting all-solid-state lithium metal batteries. The Li9N2Cl3 facilitates efficient lithium-ion transport due to its disordered lattice structure and presence of vacancies. Notably, it resists dendrite formation at 10 mA/cm2 and 10 mAh/cm2 due to its intrinsic lithium metal stability. Furthermore, it exhibits robust dry-air stability. Incorporating this SSE in Ni-rich LiNi0.83Co0.11Mn0.06O2 cathode-based all-solid-state batteries, we achieve substantial cycling stability (90.35% capacity retention over 1500 cycles at 0.5 C) and high areal capacity (4.8 mAh/cm2 in pouch cells). These findings pave the way for lithium metal batteries to meet electric vehicle performance demands.
Chronic pain is a global public health problem, but the underlying molecular mechanisms are not fully understood. Here we examine genome-wide DNA methylation, first in 50 identical twins discordant ...for heat pain sensitivity and then in 50 further unrelated individuals. Whole-blood DNA methylation was characterized at 5.2 million loci by MeDIP sequencing and assessed longitudinally to identify differentially methylated regions associated with high or low pain sensitivity (pain DMRs). Nine meta-analysis pain DMRs show robust evidence for association (false discovery rate 5%) with the strongest signal in the pain gene TRPA1 (P=1.2 × 10(-13)). Several pain DMRs show longitudinal stability consistent with susceptibility effects, have similar methylation levels in the brain and altered expression in the skin. Our approach identifies epigenetic changes in both novel and established candidate genes that provide molecular insights into pain and may generalize to other complex traits.
Cholestasis is frequently related to endotoxemia and inflammatory response. Our previous investigation revealed a significant increase in plasma endotoxin and CD14 levels during biliary atresia. We ...therefore propose that lipopolysacharides (LPS) may stimulate CD14 production in liver cells and promote the removal of endotoxins. The aims of this study are to test the hypothesis that CD14 is upregulated by LPS and investigate the pathophysiological role of CD14 production during cholestasis. Using Western blotting, qRT-PCR, and promoter activity assay, we demonstrated that LPS was associated with a significant increase in CD14 and MD2 protein and mRNA expression and CD14 promoter activity in C9 rat hepatocytes but not in the HSC-T6 hepatic stellate cell line in vitro. To correlate CD14 expression and endotoxin sensitivity, in vivo biliary LPS administration was performed on rats two weeks after they were subjected to bile duct ligation (BDL) or a sham operation. CD14 expression and endotoxin levels were found to significantly increase after LPS administration in BDL rats. These returned to basal levels after 24 h. In contrast, although endotoxin levels were increased in sham-operated rats given LPS, no increase in CD14 expression was observed. However, mortality within 24 h was more frequent in the BDL animals than in the sham-operated group. In conclusion, cholestasis and LPS stimulation were here found to upregulate hepatic CD14 expression, which may have led to increased endotoxin sensitivity and host proinflammatory reactions, causing organ failure and death in BDL rats.
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► RH shows good stability over a broad pH range. ► RH possesses excellent linearity between fluorescence intensity and NO concentration. ► RH shows ca. 1000-fold fluorescence ...enhancement after reacting with 5
equiv. NO. ► RH can be used to detect exogenous NO and to trace endogenous NO.
A colorless and non-fluorescent rhodamine derivative, rhodamine B hydrazide (RH), is applied to detect nitric oxide and form fluorescent rhodamine B (RB). The reaction mechanism of RH with NO is proposed in this study. The probe shows good stability over a broad pH range (pH
>
4). Furthermore, fluorescence intensity of RH displays an excellent linearity to the NO concentration and the detection limit is as low as 20
nM. A 1000-fold fluorescence turn-on from a dark background was observed. Moreover, the selectivity study indicated that the fluorescence intensity increasing in the presence of NO was significantly higher than those of other reactive oxygen/nitrogen species. In exogenously generated NO detection study, clear intracellular red fluorescence was observed in the presence of S-nitroso-
N-acetyl-D,L-penicillamine (SNAP, a kind of NO releasing agent). In endogenously generated NO detection study, increasing incubation time of RH with lipopolysaccharied (LPS) pre-treated cells could obtain a highly fluorescent cell image. These cell imaging results demonstrated that RH can efficiently penetrate into Raw 264.7 cells and be used for detection of exogenously and endogenously generated nitric oxide.
Aims: Colorectal carcinoma in patients under 40 years of age usually has a poor prognosis. Controversies still exist regarding the features and the prognosis of colorectal cancer in young patients.
...Methods: The records of 45 patients with histologically confirmed colorectal carcinoma treated between 1992 and 2002 at the Division of Oncology at Taipei Veterans General Hospital were reviewed. The relevance of sex, duration of symptoms, tumor site, histological type, lymph node involvement, Karnofsky performance status (KPS), carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) levels at the diagnosis and tumor stage to overall survival (OS) were determined by univariate analysis, and their independent significance were tested by multivariate analysis.
Results: Most patients presented with an advanced tumor stage (24% Dukes’ C and 66% Dukes’ D). Colon carcinoma constituted 76% of the colorectal tumors. Family history was present in two patients and did not affect the OS. Two patients were found to have colon carcinoma during pregnancy. The 5‐year survival rate in patients with Stage B, C, and D were 25, 16 and 0%, respectively. With aggressive treatment, patients with early stage carcinoma achieved longer survival. Eleven patients received resection of metastatic carcinoma of the liver, lung and ovary. Adjuvant chemotherapy with irinotecan/5‐fluoroucil‐based chemotherapy seemed to improve the OS in such patients, though the OS was still poorer than in patients with early stage tumors. In univariate analysis, KPS (P = 0.0001), lymph node involvement (P = 0.0024), CEA (P = 0.0423) and LDH levels (P = 0.0126) at the diagnosis and tumor stage (P = 0.0122) proved to be significant predictors of overall survival. Multivariate analyses revealed that KPS ≥70% (P = 0.007) and normal LDH levels at diagnosis (P = 0.004) were predictive of overall survival in this population.
Conclusions: The present study shows that performance status and preoperative LDH levels were the major determinants for survival in patients with colorectal carcinoma under 40 years of age and the present series also suggests that surgical resection of metastatic colorectal carcinoma followed by adjuvant chemotherapy might be beneficial in certain patients. The data also suggests that current treatment modalities for young patients with advanced colorectal cancer might not be effective and more effective therapeutic regimens might be needed. Thus, it is important for surgeons to recognize the potential for colorectal cancer in young patients and to take an aggressive approach to the diagnosis and early treatment of the disease.
The optical property and electrostatic discharge (ESD) endurance of GaN-based light-emitting diodes (LEDs) with varied undoped GaN thickness are studied and demonstrated. As the undoped GaN thickness ...increased, the generation of V-shaped defects in the active region was suppressed. Therefore, the output power for a 6-μ.m-thick undoped GaN layer would be enhanced remarkably due to the reduction of nonradiative recombination ratio within the active region. On the other hand, under a reverse ESD pulse voltage of 5.5 kV, the survival rate of the LEDs with an undoped GaN layer thickness of 1.5, 4, and 6 μm were 75%, 65%, and 55%, respectively. It was found that the ESD endurance for a 1.5-μ.m-thick undoped GaN layer with higher internal capacitance was obviously better than others. This could be related to the built-in electric field of LEDs induced by spontaneous polarization field.
An 8kb spin-orbit-torque magnetic random-access memory Chen, Guan-Long; Wang, I-Jung; Yeh, Po-Shao ...
2021 International Symposium on VLSI Technology, Systems and Applications (VLSI-TSA),
2021-April-19
Conference Proceeding
We'd built 8kb spin-orbit-torque (SOT) MRAM chips to evaluate our cell design and the process recipes to integrate them on CMOS wafer. For the SOT cell, the switching threshold is well correlated to ...the tungsten channel resistivity. We will show the cell design, integration process to CMOS wafers and the cell properties and array statistics. In this cell and array designs, we show the low switching current capability for the low power application and good thermal stability.
Alternative RNA splicing greatly increases proteome diversity and thereby contribute to species- or tissue-specific functions. The possibility to study alternative splicing (AS) events on a genomic ...scale using splicing-sensitive microarrays, including the Affymetrix GeneChip Exon 1.0 ST microarray (exon array), has appeared very recently. However, the application of this new technology is hindered by the lack of free and user-friendly software devoted to these novel platforms.
In this study we present a Java-based freeware, easyExon http://microarray.ym.edu.tw/easyexon, to process, filtrate and visualize exon array data with an analysis pipeline. This tool implements the most commonly used probeset summarization methods as well as AS-orientated filtration algorithms, e.g. MIDAS and PAC, for the detection of alternative splicing events. We include a biological filtration function according to GO terms, and provide a module to visualize and interpret the selected exons and transcripts. Furthermore, easyExon can integrate with other related programs, such as Integrate Genome Browser (IGB) and Affymetrix Power Tools (APT), to make the whole analysis more comprehensive. We applied easyExon on a public accessible colon cancer dataset as an example to illustrate the analysis pipeline of this tool.
EasyExon can efficiently process and analyze the Affymetrix exon array data. The simplicity, flexibility and brevity of easyExon make it a valuable tool for AS event identification in genomic research.
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