The status of room‐temperature potassium‐ion batteries is reviewed in light of recent concerns regarding the rising cost of lithium and the fact that room‐temperature sodium‐ion batteries have yet to ...be commercialised thus far. Initial reports of potassium‐ion cells appear promising given the infancy of the research area. This review presents not only an overview of the current potassium‐ion battery literature, but also attempts to provide context by describing previous developments in lithium‐ion and sodium‐ion batteries and the electrochemical reaction mechanisms discovered thus far. Perspectives and directions on the techniques available to characterize newly developed battery materials are also provided based on our experience and knowledge from the literature. It is hoped that through this review, the potential of potassium‐ion batteries as a competitive energy‐storage technology will be realised, and the accessibility and available knowledge of the techniques required to develop the technology will be made apparent.
A critical review and perspectives of electrode materials for potassium‐ion batteries, and the techniques available to characterise the materials or devices and search for new materials are presented.
Recommender systems are becoming an integral part of routine life, as they are extensively used in daily decision-making processes such as online shopping for products or services, job references, ...matchmaking for marriage purposes, and many others. However, these recommender systems are lacking in producing quality recommendations owing to sparsity issues. Keeping this in mind, the present study introduces a hybrid recommendation model for recommending music artists to users which is hierarchical Bayesian in nature, known as Relational Collaborative Topic Regression with Social Matrix Factorization (RCTR-SMF). This model makes use of a lot of auxiliary domain knowledge and provides seamless integration of Social Matrix Factorization and Link Probability Functions into Collaborative Topic Regression-based recommender systems to attain better prediction accuracy. Here, the main emphasis is on examining the effectiveness of unified information related to social networking and an item-relational network structure in addition to item content and user-item interactions to make predictions for user ratings. RCTR-SMF addresses the sparsity problem by utilizing additional domain knowledge, and it can address the cold-start problem in the case that there is hardly any rating information available. Furthermore, this article exhibits the proposed model performance on a large real-world social media dataset. The proposed model provides a recall of 57% and demonstrates its superiority over other state-of-the-art recommendation algorithms.
The work was intended to develop a novel acrylic acid grafted hydrogel by chemical crosslinking of xanthan gum and starch under microwave irradiation. The swelling capacity of hydrogel was found to ...be dependent upon pH. The maximum swelling capacity of hydrogel was recorded as 32.21 g/g under the optimized conditions. The swelling capacity of hydrogel was quite higher than most of the hydrogels containing xanthan gum mentioned in the literature. Various characterization techniques including FTIR, SEM, TGA and XRD confirmed successful synthesis of hydrogel with porous morphology and better thermal stability. Synthesized hydrogel was employed as an oral drug delivery vehicle. Releasing behavior of the hydrogels for the drugs aspirin and paracetamol was studied under specific physiological conditions. The drug release was significantly higher at pH 7.4 in comparison to acidic and neutral media. Synthesized hydrogel was found to be suitable for colon-specific drug delivery. Both aspirin and paracetamol followed non-Fickian diffusion mechanism at higher pH and Fickian mechanism at lower pH. Release profiles of both the drugs were best fitted in the first order model. Hydrogel was found to be non-cytotoxic to human fibroblast cells and biocompatible, with a low hemolytic ratio. Consequently results supported potential of this non-toxic, biofriendly and appropriately tailored polysaccharide based hydrogel to be used as drug delivery carrier for controlled and site-specific drug release.
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High-performance Mn-rich P2-phase Na2/3Mn0.8Fe0.1Ti0.1O2 is synthesized by a ceramic method, and its stable electrochemical performance is demonstrated. 23Na solid-state NMR confirms the substitution ...of Ti4+ ions in the transition metal oxide layer and very fast Na+ mobility in the interlayer space. The pristine electrode delivers a second charge/discharge capacity of 146.57/144.16 mA·h·g–1 and retains 95.09% of discharge capacity at the 50th cycle within the voltage range 4.0–2.0 V at C/10. At 1C, the reversible specific capacity still reaches 99.40 mA·h·g–1, and capacity retention of 87.70% is achieved from second to 300th cycle. In addition, the moisture-exposed electrode reaches reversible capacities of more than 130 and 80 mA·h·g–1 for C/10 and 1C, respectively, with excellent capacity retention. The correlation between overall electrochemical performance of both electrodes and crystal structural characteristics are investigated by neutron powder diffraction. The stability of pristine electrode’s crystallographic structure during the charge/discharge process has been investigated by in situ X-ray diffraction, where only a solid solution reaction occurs within the given voltage range except for a small biphasic mechanism occurring at or below 2.2 V during the discharge process. The relatively small substitution (20%) at the transition metal site leads to stable electrochemical performance, which is in part derived from the structural stability during electrochemical cycling. Therefore, the small cosubstitution (e.g., with Ti and Fe) route suggests a possible new scope for the design of sodium-ion battery electrodes that are suitable for long-term cycling.
Anti-tumour immune activation by checkpoint inhibitors leads to durable responses in a variety of cancers, but combination approaches are required to extend this benefit beyond a subset of patients. ...In preclinical models tumour-derived VEGF limits immune cell activity while anti-VEGF augments intra-tumoral T-cell infiltration, potentially through vascular normalization and endothelial cell activation. This study investigates how VEGF blockade with bevacizumab could potentiate PD-L1 checkpoint inhibition with atezolizumab in mRCC. Tissue collections are before treatment, after bevacizumab and after the addition of atezolizumab. We discover that intra-tumoral CD8(+) T cells increase following combination treatment. A related increase is found in intra-tumoral MHC-I, Th1 and T-effector markers, and chemokines, most notably CX3CL1 (fractalkine). We also discover that the fractalkine receptor increases on peripheral CD8(+) T cells with treatment. Furthermore, trafficking lymphocyte increases are observed in tumors following bevacizumab and combination treatment. These data suggest that the anti-VEGF and anti-PD-L1 combination improves antigen-specific T-cell migration.
Microglia are specialized brain macrophages that play numerous roles in tissue homeostasis and response to injury. Colony stimulating factor 1 receptor (CSF1R) is a receptor tyrosine kinase required ...for the development, maintenance, and proliferation of microglia. Here we show that in adult mice peripheral dosing of function-blocking antibodies to the two known ligands of CSF1R, CSF1, and IL-34, can deplete microglia differentially in white and gray matter regions of the brain, respectively. The regional patterns of depletion correspond to the differential expression of CSF1 and IL-34. In addition, we show that while CSF1 is required to establish microglia in the developing embryo, both CSF1 and IL-34 are required beginning in early postnatal development. These results not only clarify the roles of CSF1 and IL-34 in microglia maintenance, but also suggest that signaling through these two ligands might support distinct sub-populations of microglia, an insight that may impact drug development for neurodegenerative and other diseases.
Protected areas are important for wildlife conservation but they are also used by many local communities for livelihood activities. This often leads to conflicts and erodes the tolerance of local ...people for wildlife, particularly towards carnivores that prey on livestock. To enhance conservation success and improve the social carrying capacity of carnivores, it is essential to understand the factors influencing such conflicts and the attitudes of people interacting with carnivores. We used structured questionnaire surveys to assess the extent of livestock mortality and community responses to common leopards Panthera pardus in Kishtwar National Park, a relatively understudied protected area in the Greater Himalayan region of India. The mountainous Park and its surroundings have historically served as a haven for the local agro-pastoralists and transhumant pastoralists, resulting in complex human–wildlife interactions across the larger landscape. Our results showed that leopards were responsible for high livestock depredation (71 incidents in 2 years), and households with larger livestock holdings experienced a higher predation rate compared to those with smaller livestock holdings. An ordinal logistic regression model revealed that respondents’ age and period of activity in the Park significantly influenced their opinions regarding leopards. Large losses suffered by otherwise low-income households resulted in more negative attitudes towards these predators. Our study indicates that financial compensation for livestock losses is a key factor in improving human–leopard coexistence. A comprehensive, cross-sector collaborative approach would help to improve conflict resolution and promote favourable attitudes towards these predators.
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