Assistive wearable soft robotic systems have recently made a surge in the field of biomedical robotics, as soft materials allow safe and transparent interactions between the users and devices. A ...recent interest in the field of soft pneumatic actuators (SPAs) has been the introduction of a new class of actuators called fabric soft pneumatic actuators (FSPAs). These actuators exploit the unique capabilities of different woven and knit textiles, including zero initial stiffness, full collapsibility, high power-to-weight ratio, puncture resistant, and high stretchability. By using 2D manufacturing methods we are able to create actuators that can extend, contract, twist, bend, and perform a combination of these motions in 3D space. This paper presents a comprehensive simulation and design tool for various types of FSPAs using finite element method (FEM) models. The FEM models are developed and experimentally validated, in order to capture the complex non-linear behavior of individual actuators optimized for free displacement and blocked force, applicable for wearable assistive tasks.
Conspectus Despite the development of medical technology, cancer still remains a great threat to the survival of people all over the world. Photothermal therapy (PTT) is a minimally invasive method ...for selective photothermal ablation of cancer cells without damages to normal cells. Recently, copper chalcogenide semiconductors have emerged as a promising photothermal agent attributed to strong absorbance in the near-infrared (NIR) region and high photothermal conversion efficiency. An earlier study witnessed a rapid increase in their development for cancer therapy, including CuS, Cu2–x Se and CuTe nanocrystals. However, a barrier is that the minimum laser power intensity for effective PTT is still significantly higher than the conservative limit for human skin exposure. Improving the photothermal conversion efficiency and reducing the laser power density has become a direction for the development of PTT. Furthermore, in an effort to improve the therapeutic efficacy, many multimode therapeutic nanostuctures have been formulated by integrating the photothermal agents with antitumor drugs, photosensitizers, or radiosensitizers, resulting in a synergistic effect. Various functional materials also have been absorbed, attached, encapsulated, or coated on the photothermal nanostructures, including fluorescence, computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, realizing cancer diagnosis, tumor location, site-specific therapy, and evaluation of therapeutic responses via incorporation of diagnosis and treatment. In this Account, we present an overview of the NIR-responsive photothermal semiconductor nanomaterials for cancer theranostics with a focus on their design and functionalization based on our own work. Our group has developed a series of chalcogenides with greatly improved NIR photoabsorption as photothermal agents, allowing laser exposure within regulatory limits. We also investigated the photothermal bioapplications of hypotoxic oxides including WO3–x , MoO3–x , and RuO2, expanding their applications into a new field of photothermal materials. Furthermore, considering a much more enhanced therapeutic effect of multifunctional nanoagents, our group elaborately designed many nanocomposites, such as core–shell nanoparticles of Fe3O4@Cu2–x S and Cu9S5@mSiO2, based on the integration of photothermal agents with contrast agents or other anticancer medicines, achieving cancer theranostic and synergistic treatment. Ternary compound nanocrystals were also prepared with synthetic simplicity for multimodal imaging-guided therapy for cancer. This Account summarizes our past work, including the design and concept, synthesis, and characterization for in vitro and in vivo applications. Then, we analyzed the tendencies of the NIR-responsive photothermal semiconductor nanomaterials for clinical applications, highlighting their prospects and challenges. We believe that the photothermal technology from the NIR-responsive photothermal semiconductor nanomaterials would promote cancer theranostics to result in giant strides forward in the future.
Ferroptosis is a multi-step regulated cell death that is characterized by excessive iron accumulation and lipid peroxidation. Cancer cells can acquire resistance to ferroptosis by the upregulation of ...anti-ferroptotic proteins or by the downregulation of pro-ferroptotic proteins. Apoptosis-inducing factor mitochondria-associated 2 (AIFM2, also known as FSP1 or PRG3) has been recently demonstrated as an endogenous ferroptosis suppressor, but its mechanism remains obscure. Here, we show that AIFM2 blocks erastin-, sorafenib-, and RSL3-induced ferroptotic cancer cell death through a mechanism independent of ubiquinol, the reduced and active antioxidant form of coenzyme Q10. In contrast, AIFM2-dependent endosomal sorting complexes required for transport (ESCRT)-III recruitment in the plasma membrane is responsible for ferroptosis resistance through the activation of a membrane repair mechanism that regulates membrane budding and fission. Importantly, the genetic inhibition of the AIFM2-dependent ESCRT-III pathway increases the anticancer activity of sorafenib in a xenograft tumor mouse model. These findings shed new light on the mechanism involved in ferroptosis resistance during tumor therapy.
•AIFM2 is a negative regulator of ferroptosis in vitro.•The ubiquinol-dependent antioxidant system is not essential for AIFM2-mediated ferroptosis resistance.•The ESCRT-III–dependent membrane repair is required for AIFM2-mediated ferroptosis resistance.•The AIFM2–ESCRT-III pathway promotes ferroptosis resistance in vivo.
Generative Adversarial Networks (GAN) have demonstrated the potential to recover realistic details for single image super-resolution (SISR). To further improve the visual quality of super-resolved ...results, PIRM2018-SR Challenge employed perceptual metrics to assess the perceptual quality, such as PI, NIQE, and Ma. However, existing methods cannot directly optimize these indifferentiable perceptual metrics, which are shown to be highly correlated with human ratings. To address the problem, we propose Super-Resolution Generative Adversarial Networks with Ranker (RankSRGAN) to optimize generator in the direction of different perceptual metrics. Specifically, we first train a Ranker which can learn the behaviour of perceptual metrics and then introduce a novel rank-content loss to optimize the perceptual quality. The most appealing part is that the proposed method can combine the strengths of different SR methods to generate better results. Furthermore, we extend our method to multiple Rankers to provide multi-dimension constraints for the generator. Extensive experiments show that RankSRGAN achieves visually pleasing results and reaches state-of-the-art performance in perceptual metrics and quality. Project page: https://wenlongzhang0517.github.io/Projects/RankSRGAN .
Expandable polystyrene (EPS), as an industrial material extensively used for energy saving in building exterior insulation system, helps to decrease the energy consumption from buildings. However, ...such material, because of its flammability, still has the potential risk of resulting in a large number of fire accidents. Pyrolysis is deemed as an essential stage before combustion, so studies on pyrolysis can lay a solid foundation for understanding the thermal behavior of EPS before combustion. Nevertheless, with a growing number of undegradable EPS waste that results in environmental issues, some measures must be taken to dispose of such waste. In this case, pyrolysis technology is gradually employed to convert polymer wastes into fuel or chemical feedstock. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the pyrolysis of EPS. To obtain the pyrolysis kinetics and mechanism of EPS, thermogravimetric analysis was performed at wider heating rates in the air, and the activation energy was estimated by adopting commonly-used model-free methods (including Flynn-Wall-Ozawa, Kissinger-Akahira-Sunose, Senum-Yang, Starink, and Advanced Vyazovkin method). Then, a reaction mechanism was established and the kinetic parameters were calculated by Coats-Redfern and masterplots methods. Finally, the Málek method was applied for a reconstruction of the experimental kinetic model of EPS pyrolysis. Results indicated that the pyrolysis of EPS might be well characterized by employing a reconstructed reaction function dα/dt = 2.18 × 108exp(-1.38 × 105/RT)α0.0309(1-α)0.7689. Furthermore, the results of pyrolysis analysis, especially the reaction function of such a reaction mechanism, could provide guidance for large-scale fire simulation of EPS and disposal of EPS waste, thus contributing to environmental sustainability and cleaner production of fuel.
•The pyrolysis kinetics of expandable polystyrene (EPS) is studied in the air.•Multiple model-free and model-fitting methods are coupled with the Málek method.•The reaction mechanism of EPS is established and kinetic parameters are estimated.•The kinetic model of EPS is reconstructedby employing the Málek method.
Life cycle assessment (LCA) has been proved to act as a desirable tool to evaluate the environmental impacts of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). However, the application of LCA methodology in the ...field of wastewater treatment is still in progress. This paper has made a review of the LCA studies dealing with biological (activated sludge) WWTPs, with the aim to provide qualitative interpretation of the associated environmental impact categories: eutrophication potential, global warming potential, toxicity-related impacts, energy balance, water use, land use and other impact categories. Possible sources for each impact category of WWTPs are summarized in order to provide information about the critical aspects in WWTP systems that might influence LCA results. Moreover, recent development and the application status of characterization models for each impact category have been reviewed. The analysis indicates that it is important to carry out site-specific LCA studies on WWTPs. The specificity is most typical for the eutrophication potential and toxicity-related impact categories, which need implementation of spatial differentiated characterization methods, considering the emission location, spatial dimensions (transfer between environmental compartments) and even properties of pollutants. Although remarkable progresses have been obtained, their applications in the field of wastewater treatment are still limited. For the global warming potential impact category, it is most crucial to calculate accurately the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, because nitrous oxide (N2O) and methane (CH4), as well as fossil origin carbon dioxide (CO2) in wastewater have the potential to make considerable contributions. In the end, prospective is made about which aspects in WWTPs are candidates for further LCA studies. Overall, there is still room for pursuing more accurate results when applying LCA to WWTPs.
•Current use of life cycle assessment (LCA) on biological wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) is overviewed•Possible sources for each analyzed impact category are summarized.•Recent development and application status of characterization models for each impact category is reviewed.•Candidate aspects of WWTPs for further LCA studies and methodological areas for improvement are indicated.
Waterborne pathogens, especially bacteria and viruses, pose significant health risks to the public, calling for the development of a sustainable, efficient, and robust disinfection strategy with ...reduced energy footprint and minimized byproduct formation. Here, we developed a sustainable photocatalytic composite for antimicrobial applications by integrating visible-light-responsive graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) with low-density porous expanded perlite (EP) mineral, and g-C3N4/EP-520 showed a high specific surface area of 45.3 m2/g and optimum performance for disinfection. g-C3N4/EP-520 achieved 8-log inactivation of E. coli and MS2 under 180 and 240 min visible-light irradiation without stirring, respectively. Water quality parameters were found to influence the disinfection performance of g-C3N4/EP-520: MS2 inactivation was promoted with the increase of dissolved oxygen (DO), proton concentration, salinity (NaCl), and hardness (Ca2+). Importantly, g-C3N4/EP-520 could fully inactivate MS2 in a real source water sample with prolonged light irradiation, and negligible activity loss was observed in recycle use, demonstrating its viability and robustness for waterborne pathogen removal. Antimicrobial mechanisms of g-C3N4/EP-520 were systemically evaluated by radical scavenger addition, and revealed that the inactivation behavior was dependent on the type of microorganisms. Microscopic analyses confirmed that the destruction of bacterial cells and viral particles, leading to the inactivation of microorganisms.
•Sustainable g-C3N4/EP floating composites were prepared by a facile thermal method.•g-C3N4/EP-520 inactivated both bacteria and viruses under visible light irradiation.•Viruses were more resistant to the inactivation of photogenerated ROS than bacteria.•Water quality parameters showed significant impacts on viral inactivation.
Tuning the intrinsic strain of Pt‐based nanomaterials has shown great promise for improving the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) performance. Herein, reported is a tunable surface strain in ...penta‐twinned ternary Pt–Cu–Mn nanoframes (NFs). Pt–Cu–Mn ultrafine NFs (UNFs) exhibit ≈1.5% compressive strain compared to Pt–Cu–Mn pentagonal NFs (PNFs) and show the superior activity toward ORR in an alkaline environment. Specifically, the specific and mass activity of Pt–Cu–Mn UNFs are 3.38 mA cm−2 and 1.45 A mg−1, respectively, which is 1.45 and 1.71 times higher than that of Pt–Cu–Mn PNFs, demonstrating that compressive strain in NFs structure can effectively enhance the catalytic activity of ORR. Impressively, Pt–Cu–Mn UNFs exhibit 8.67 and 9.67 times enhanced specific and mass activity compared with commercial Pt/C. Theoretical calculations reveal that compression on the surface of Pt–Cu–Mn UNFs can weaken the bonding strengths and adsorption of oxygen‐containing intermediates, resulting in an optimal condition for ORR.
The surface strain in penta‐twinned Pt–Cu–Mn nanoframes (NFs) is effectively tuned. Pt–Cu–Mn ultrafine NFs exhibit ≈1.5% compressive strain compared to Pt–Cu–Mn pentagonal NFs and show the superior activity toward oxygen reduction reaction in an alkaline environment.
Abstract
In order to meet the demand of high-precision flow control and modular design of aviation electric fuel pump control system, the flow controller is analyzed and designed from the demand of ...aviation engines for electric fuel pump. Tests show that the steady-state control deviation of the controller is no more than 1% for mass flow rate, and the dynamic control deviation of mass flow rate is no more than 3% in the range of 50kg/h~2000kg/h. A flow controller with high integration degree, high control accuracy and excellent dynamic characteristics for new pump-control system was designed for aero engine.
To assess the association of the programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD‐L1) with cisplatin‐based neo‐adjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) response, we investigated the level of PD‐L1 and found increased PD‐L1 ...expression in chemo‐resistant tumors compared with chemo‐sensitive tumors according to RNA‐Seq analysis. In a cohort of 92 patients with NAC, the positive staining of PD‐L1 was correlated with TNM stage, lower sensitive‐response rates and shorter overall survival rates. In another 30 paired tumor specimens pre‐ and post‐chemotherapy, the patients with high PD‐L1 expression post‐chemotherapy had a worse outcome and higher stable disease rate. CD8+ tumor‐infiltrating lymphocytes were found to be related to chemosensitive response and better prognosis and negative PD‐L1 expression. Furthermore, in two patient‐derived xenograft models and cell lines A549 and PC‐9, cisplatin upregulated PD‐L1 expression, and the enhancement of PD‐L1 in cancer cell lines was in a drug dose‐dependent manner. Moreover, the depletion of PD‐L1 significantly reduced cisplatin resistance. When phosphatidylinositol 3‐kinase/protein kinase B signaling was inhibited by corresponding inhibitors, PD‐L1 expression was downregulated and apoptosis was upregulated in the cisplatin‐treated cancer cells. These results suggest that the upregulation of PD‐L1 promotes a resistance response in lung cancer cells that might be through activation of the phosphatidylinositol 3‐kinase/protein kinase B pathway and suppression of tumor‐infiltrating lymphocytes. The high expression of PD‐L1 after NAC could be an indication of therapeutic resistance and poor prognosis in patients with non‐small‐cell lung cancer.
We explored PD‐L1 was induced in NSCLC patients with chemo‐resistance. PD‐L1 expression was associated with the poor prognosis for NSCLC patients. PD‐L1 expression changed before and after NAC for NSCLC tissues.
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