Intriguing Advantages Research Articles

Nanomaterials that Aid in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Alzheimer's Disease, Resolving Blood-Brain Barrier Crossing Ability.

As a form of dementia, Alzheimer's disease (AD) suffers from no efficacious cure, yet AD treatment is still imperative, as it ameliorates the symptoms or prevents it from deteriorating or maintains the current status to the longest extent. The human brain is the most sensitive and complex organ in the body, which is protected by the blood-brain barrier (BBB). This yet induces the difficulty in curing AD as the drugs or nanomaterials that are much inhibited from reaching the lesion site. Thus, BBB crossing capability of drug delivery system remains a significant challenge in the development of neurological therapeutics. Fortunately, nano-enabled delivery systems possess promising potential to achieve multifunctional diagnostics/therapeutics against various targets of AD owing to their intriguing advantages of nanocarriers, including easy multifunctionalization on surfaces, high surface-to-volume ratio with large payloads, and potential ability to cross the BBB, making them capable of conquering the limitations of conventional drug candidates.This review, which focuses on the BBB crossing ability of the multifunctional nanomaterials in AD diagnosis and treatment, will provide an insightful vision that is conducive to the development of AD-related nanomaterials.

Precision Chemistry of Metallofullerenes and Graphene: Recent Advances.

Precision chemistry of synthetic carbon allotropes including fullerene and graphene, characterized by a well-controlled and spatially resolved addends bonding, has received widespread attention owing to its capability to tailor their physicochemical properties for high-end applications. In the context of fullerene, particularly endohedral metallofullerenes (EMFs), precision chemistry emphasizes the regioselective binding of a specific number of moieties to the fullerene cage. In the case of graphene, precision chemistry focuses on achieving precise patterning and tailored modifications. Inspired by their intriguing advantages, the precision chemistry of these two members has witnessed rapid advancements. While existing reviews have outlined advancements in the precision chemistry of EMFs and graphene, this review uniquely concentrates on the most recent progress. Finally, the prospects in this field, with a special focus on the potential for creating functional materials through strategically patterned binding of fullerene and graphene networks are envisioned.

The use of Egyptian volcanic glass powder as a potential source for improving the properties of alkali-activated fly ash cement

In this article, for the first time, the potential use of Egyptian volcanic glass powder (VGP) has emerged as an intriguing option. The intriguing potential advantages of incorporating VGP into alkali-activated fly ash (AAFA) cement were explored. The volcanic glass (VG) was brought from the Egyptian eastern desert quarry in the form of lumps and fragments. To utilize it effectively, the VG was crushed and ground before being mixed with fly ash (FA). Various proportions of VGP ranging from 10% to 70% were blended with FA as a partial substitution. Both plain FA and those blended with VGP were then activated using an alkaline activator, resulting in the creation of alkali-activated cement. An investigation was conducted to assess the effect of various ratios of VGP on the flowability, compressive strength up to 90 days, resistance of drying/wetting cycles, crystalline phases, hydration products, and microstructures of AAFA cement. The results confirmed a positive effect of AAFA properties with including VGP. The obtained blended cement can be used in several potential applications such as in roadways, bridges and tunnels, facades and cladding, indoor and outdoor floorings, as well as aerospace and defense industries due to its high durability to resist the degradation caused by wetting/drying cycles.

Selectively etched inhomogeneous metal-organic framework-derived CoS/N-codoped hierarchical hollow carbon for long-cycling lithium sulfur batteries

Owing to high theoretical energy density and potentially low cost, lithium sulfur (Li–S) batteries have become a viable alternative for use in future energy storage devices. However, practical applications of this battery type are limited by the significant volume change of S and the undesired shuttle effect of polysulfides during cycling, ultimately causing rapid capacity decay. Herein, we developed a novel method to fabricate a N-doped hollow carbon composite (CoS/HNC) embedded with well-dispersed CoS nanoparticles (NPs) through inheritable carbonization of functionalized hollow metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). Specifically, the hollow UiO-66-NH2 is created by a sequence involving (1) use of non-uniform nucleation-growth approach to generate inhomogeneous UiO-66-NH2 that has more defects in the core, and (2) selective etching of the less stable core to obtain hollow structure. The CoS/HNC composite has advantages associated with not only hollow nanostructure that buffers the volume expansion of S species during cycling, but also CoS that prevents the shuttle effect. More importantly, both experimental and calculated results reveal that CoS/HNC could catalyze the reduction of LiPSs more effectively and CoS/HNC heterostructure enables the short-chain polysulfide that obtained from the catalytic conversion of soluble long-chain polysulfide by CoS NPs to be deposited on HNC. This process avoids passivation of the catalytic site and ensures continuity of the catalytic conversion. Benefiting from integration of its intriguing composition and morphology advantages, an as-prepared CoS/HNC–S cathode exhibits significantly improved electrochemical performance and cycling stability associated with a low capacity decay of 0.05% per cycle over 800 cycles at 1 C.

Oriented BN/BNNT heterostructure constructed by interface engineering strategy for polyamide-imide composite film with advanced flexibility and thermally conductive properties

Thermal conductive polymeric materials have aroused increasing attention as thermal management materials in the field of intelligent electronic devices due to their intriguing advantages. However, the discontinuity of phonon transmission path construction represents the bottleneck for thermal conductivity enhancement of composite materials, which limits the practical application of composite materials. Herein, flexible polyamide-imide (PAI) thermally conductive composite films with hierarchical structure composed of synergistically assembled functionalized boron nitride nanosheets (FBN) and polydopamine (PDA)-modified boron nitride nanotubes (FBT) by layer-by-layer assembly strategy are constructed. Benefitting from the optimized interface engineering with the ordered oriented arrangement FBN/FBT filler structure, the obtained composite film with optimized hybrid filler contents exhibits the super high thermal conductivity of 71.1 W·m−1·K−1, prominent thermal conductivity enhancement as high as 3663 % and excellent mechanical flexibility. The introduction of FBT can further expand the thermal contact area attributed to its inherent high thermal conductivity and aspect ratio. Additionally, the consecutive dual-channel phono transmission paths can be constructed in PAI composites under the synergistic action of FBN and FBT, further improving the phonon transmission density and suppressing phonon scattering, which endows PAI composite films with excellent thermal conductivity under low load of filler. The resulting multifunctionalities make the PAI composite films promising for flexible intelligent wearable electronic devices as thermal management materials.

Synthesizing Nanoporous Stainless Steel Films via Vacuum Thermal Dealloying

Vacuum thermal dealloying is a recently developed technique and was newly introduced to produce nanoporous metals, due to its intriguing advantages, i.e., preventing oxidation and producing no chemical waste, etc. Here, we report on the fabrication of nanoporous stainless steel films by vacuum thermal dealloying of sputtered stainless steel–magnesium precursor films. It was found that crack-free nanoporous stainless steel films can be successfully attained under a broad temperature range of 450–600 °C, with a dealloying time of 0.5–2 h. The resulting structure and ligaments were temperature- and time-dependent, and moreover, the condition of “600 °C + 2 h” generated the most homogeneous structure. Moreover, small amounts of residual Mg were found at pore sites in the resultant structures, suggesting that the dealloying was not fully complete.

Ultrasound-triggered piezocatalytic composite hydrogels for promoting bacterial-infected wound healing.

Wound healing has become one of the basic issues faced by the medical community because of the susceptibility of skin wounds to bacterial infection. As such, it is highly desired to design a nanocomposite hydrogel with excellent antibacterial activity to achieve high wound closure effectiveness. Here, based on ultrasound-triggered piezocatalytic therapy, a multifunctional hydrogel is designed to promote bacteria-infected wound healing. Under ultrasonic vibration, the surface of barium titanate (BaTiO3, BT) nanoparticles embedded in the hydrogel rapidly generate reactive oxygen species (ROS) owing to the established strong built-in electric field, endowing the hydrogel with superior antibacterial efficacy. This modality shows intriguing advantages over conventional photodynamic therapy, such as prominent soft tissue penetration ability and the avoidance of serious skin phototoxicity after systemic administration of photosensitizers. Moreover, the hydrogel based on N-[tris(hydroxymethyl)methyl]acrylamide (THM), N-(3-aminopropyl)methacrylamide hydrochloride (APMH) and oxidized hyaluronic acid (OHA) exhibits outstanding self-healing and bioadhesive properties able to accelerate full-thickness skin wound healing. Notably, compared with the widely reported mussel-inspired adhesive hydrogels, OHA/THM-APMH hydrogel due to the multiple hydrogen bonds from unique tri-hydroxyl structure overcomes the shortage that catechol groups are easily oxidized, giving it long-term and repeatable adhesion performance. Importantly, this hybrid hydrogel confines BT nanoparticles to wound area and locally induced piezoelectric catalysis under ultrasound to eradicate bacteria, markedly improving the therapeutic biosafety and exhibits great potential for harmless treatment of bacteria-infected tissues.

Demoralization and Hope: A Psychological Reading of Kant’s Moral Argument

Abstract Kant’s “primacy of the practical” doctrine says that we can form morally justified commitments regarding what exists, even in the absence of sufficient epistemic grounds. In this paper I critically examine three different varieties of Kant’s “moral proof” that can be found in the critical works. My claim is that the third variety—the “moral-psychological argument” based in the need to sustain moral hope and avoid demoralization—has some intriguing advantages over the other two. It starts with a premise that more clearly coheres with Kant’s mature account of moral motivation, and it invokes plausible empirical-psychological theses to motivate a commitment to the full-blown classical deity—the result Kant clearly wanted. From the point of view of its structure, I think this third variety of moral argument also has the most by way of contemporary interest.

A Strategy to Enhance the Ferroelectric Behavior of MOF-802(Hf) via Doping Zr4+ Ions.

MOF ferroelectrics, as a crucial member of molecular ferroelectrics, have shown intriguing advantages owing to the designability of structures and tunability of physicochemical properties, which make them an appealing group of ferroelectric materials. However, the weak ferroelectric property still is a huge challenge for further development. Here, a series of Zr-doped MOF-802(Hf)s were successfully synthesized through doping Zr4+ ions into the parent MOF-802(Hf) to improve ferroelectric properties. The well-shaped P-E hysteresis loops of Zr-doped MOF-802(Hf)s illustrate their ferroelectricity, and ferroelectric properties are effectively enhanced compared with the parent MOF-802(Hf). What's more, remanent polarization reaches 0.511 μC/cm2 when the concentration of Zr4+ ions is 5%, which is 5 times higher than that of the parent MOF-802(Hf) and is on par with some perovskite ferroelectrics. The increased ferroelectric performance is attributed to the enhanced polarity of the whole structure triggered by lattice distortion when Hf4+ ions of the parent MOF-802(Hf) are substituted by Zr4+ ions. As far as we know, this is the first report on Hf-MOF exhibiting improved ferroelectric behaviors through doping metal ions into lattice nodes. This work demonstrates that introducing the second metal ions into lattice nodes of MOFs is an efficacious approach for exploiting MOF ferroelectrics with superior performance.

Water-Soluble Au25 Clusters with Single-Crystal Structure for Mitochondria-Targeting Radioimmunotherapy.

Atomically precise gold clusters play an important role in the development of high-Z-element-based radiosensitizers, due to their intriguing structural diversity and advantages in correlating structures and properties. However, the synthesis of gold clusters with both water-solubility and single-crystal structure remains a challenge. In this study, atomically precise Au25(S-TPP)18 clusters (TPP-SNa = sodium 3-(triphenylphosphonio)propane-1-thiolate bromide) showing both mitochondria-targeting ability and water-solubility were obtained via ligand design for enhanced radioimmunotherapy. Compared with Au25(SG)18 clusters (SG = glutathione), Au25(S-TPP)18 exhibited higher radiosensitization efficiency due to its mitochondria-targeting ability, higher ROS production capacity, and obvious inhibition upon thioredoxin reductase (TrxR). In addition, the enhanced radiotherapy-triggered abscopal effect in combination with checkpoint blockade displayed effective growth inhibition of distant tumors. This work reveals the ligand-regulated organelle targeting ability of metal clusters by which feasible strategies to promote their application in precise theranostics could be realized.

Click Chemistry for the Preparation of β-Cyclodextrin Grafting Uniform Spherical Covalent Organic Framework Materials for Chiral Separation

Covalent organic framework (COF) as a kind of crystalline porous material possesses intriguing advantages, including low density, large surface area, permanent porosity, and excellent chemical stability. This novel material has shown great potential in the development of chromatographic stationary-phase materials. In this work, a room-temperature solvothermal method was utilized to yield a uniformly spherical COF-modified silica named Sil-COF. Then, the thiol-ene click chemistry was further used to modify thiolated β-cyclodextrin on the spherical Sil-COF composite for chiral separation called Sil-COF-CD. A series of characterization methods were performed to identify the successful construction of COF-modified stationary-phase materials. Then, three types of nonpolar substances realized baseline separation on the Sil-COF column. In addition, 2-phenylpropionic acid and 1-phenyl-1-propanol were selected as model enantiomers to identify the chiral recognition capability of the Sil-COF-CD column. Sil-COF and commercial β-CD columns were compared to further confirm the superiority of the prepared chiral column. In addition, both COF-modified columns possessed good repeatability. The results open a new avenue to apply spherical chiral COF for the preparation of the HPLC stationary phase.

Recent Advancements in Halide and Oxide Double Perovskites as Heterogeneous Photocatalysts for Solar-Driven Photocatalytic Water Splitting and CO2 Reduction

With many intriguing advantages, including cost-effective and outstanding optoelectronic properties such as high carrier mobility, low exciton binding energy, suitable band structure, and long carrier lifetime, all-inorganic lead-based halide perovskites (LHPs) have elicited great interest in optoelectronic fields, particularly in the photocatalysis field. However, the high toxicity and notorious instability of LHPs upon exposure to moisture, light, oxygen, and heat are significant barriers to their practical applications, prompting the development of stable lead-free perovskites. Among the various strategies, the chemical transmutations of two divalent Pb[Formula: see text] ions into one monovalent and one trivalent to form metal halide double perovskites (MHDPs) and their analogous metal oxide double perovskites (MODPs) have emerged as promising alternatives to replace the LHPs owing to their intrinsic chemical stability, eco-friendliness, comparable optoelectronic properties to the LHPs, and high catalytic activity. In this review, we elaborately discuss the recent advancements in MHDP and MODP semiconductor photocatalysts by briefly introducing their underlying fundamentals, such as history, chemical configurations, crystalline structures, electronic structures, and optical properties. Subsequently, we emphasize their contemporary applications in photocatalytic water splitting and CO2 reduction. Finally, we outline some perspectives and challenges in developing MHDPs and MODPs. We anticipated that this review might shed light on designing stable and efficient MHDP and MODP semiconductor photocatalysts for a wide range of solar applications.

New modalities of surgery for renal tumors in children: A Mini-Review

Nephroblastoma is one of the most frequent solid tumors in childhood. It is also a classical example of success in oncology achieved by consequent and randomized studies run since mid-XX until now. As systemic treatment is constantly very effective and has not changed markedly since the last 30 years, the development of precise imaging and surgical technique allowed for the introduction of several new operative methods offering intriguing advantages. This paper is based on the literature review limited to the state-of-the-art or corner-stone positions and over 30 years of personal experience of the author. It does not pretend to be a form of a systematic meta-analysis.

Ultraviolet-Based UAV Swarm Communications: Potentials and Challenges

Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) swarm communication has received increasing attention thanks to its intriguing advantages, such as low costs, high mobility, and deployment convenience. However, this technology is also facing certain new challenges, for example, RF spectrum scarcity, interference, and network connectivity. To this end, ultraviolet (UV) communication is introduced in this article to tackle these problems due to its distinctive benefits, such as license-free operation, immunity to electromagnetic interference, and the ability of non-line-of-sight transmission. First, a comparison between UV communication and other alternatives is presented. Then the structural designs of the high-capability UAV and the low-capability UAV, the system communication protocol and mutual interference, and the network topology of the UV-based UAV swarm are investigated. Further, the bit error rate performance, data rate, and communication range are analyzed. In the end, an artificial-intelligence-aided UV-based UAV swarm system is put forward to tackle users' complicated requirements. Simultaneously, the challenges are discussed to direct future research work.

Encapsulating hollow Fe3O4 in intertwined N-doped carbon nanofibers for high-performance supercapacitors and sodium-ion batteries

As a promising electrode for energy storage, Fe3O4 has many intriguing advantages, such as a high specific capacity, low cost, low toxicity, wide potential window and environmental benignity. However, the multi-phase changes of iron oxide during the charge and discharge process can give rise to a sharp decrease in its capacity. In addition, the low conductivity of Fe3O4 may hinder the charge transfer and ion diffusion during redox process. In order to solve the above issues, this study mainly attempts to design a nanocomposite of Fe3O4 encapsulated in intertwined N-doped carbon nanofibers (CNFs) via using electrospinning and high-temperature calcination. The sealed structure can efficiently relieve the volume effect of Fe3O4 and raise the stability of electrodes. While a 3-dimensional interconnected conductive network composed of CNFs can increase the electroconductibility of electrodes. At the same time, the N-doping increases active sites on the surface of CNFs, providing more space for ions and charges storage. Herein, different amounts of Fe3O4 are encapsulated in N-doped CNFs (Fe3O4-CNFs). Fe3O4-CNFs with 40 % content of Fe3O4 (4Fe3O4-CNFs) deliver splendid electrochemical performances for all-solid-state supercapacitors and sodium-ion batteries. The specific capacitance of 4Fe3O4-CNFs supercapacitor is 184.5 F g−1 and maintains 86.2 % of initial capacity at 2 A g−1 after 5000 times. Furthermore, 4Fe3O4-CNFs as the anode for the half cell vs. Na+/Na demonstrate a splendid specific capacity of 628.1 mAh g−1 at 0.02 A g−1 and can maintain 358.1 mA h g−1 after cycling for 200 laps at 500 mA g−1. Therefore, 4Fe3O4-CNFs can be widely used in energy storage.

Nonvolatile ferroelectric domain wall memory integrated on silicon

Ferroelectric domain wall memories have been proposed as a promising candidate for nonvolatile memories, given their intriguing advantages including low energy consumption and high-density integration. Perovskite oxides possess superior ferroelectric prosperities but perovskite-based domain wall memory integrated on silicon has rarely been reported due to the technical challenges in the sample preparation. Here, we demonstrate a domain wall memory prototype utilizing freestanding BaTiO3 membranes transferred onto silicon. While as-grown BaTiO3 films on (001) SrTiO3 substrate are purely c-axis polarized, we find they exhibit distinct in-plane multidomain structures after released from the substrate and integrated onto silicon due to the collective effects from depolarizing field and strain relaxation. Based on the strong in-plane ferroelectricity, conductive domain walls with reading currents up to nanoampere are observed and can be both created and erased artificially, highlighting the great potential of the integration of perovskite oxides with silicon for ferroelectric domain wall memories.

Cobalt (II)‐catalyzed oxidation of 2‐aryl benzoic acids to access biaryl lactones

Cobalt/peroxymonosulfate (Co/PMS) system is an efficient advanced oxidation process (AOP) for degradation of organic pollutants in wastewater, however, has limitations in organic synthesis. Herein, we employ a Co/PMS system to the preparation of biaryl lactones by the valorization of 2‐aryl aromatic acids via intramolecular O‐H/C‐X oxidative coupling. This system exhibits intriguing advantages, such as non‐noble metal catalyst, common oxidant, mild condition, easy workup and product isolation. Mechanism studies, including the radical quenching experiments and multiple probe substrates, suggest that a high‐valent cobalt‐oxo intermediate should be one major active species. Meanwhile, both persulfate radical anion (SO4•−) and hydroxyl radical (•OH) are present in the process and contribute to the organic reaction. This work not only expands the synthetic application of Co/Oxone system beyond environmental fields, but also provides more active intermediates than generally‐accepted SO4•− in the known metal‐based AOPs.

Lithium-plasmon-based low-powered dynamic color display.

Display and power supply have been two essential and independent cornerstones of modern electronics. Here, we report a lithium-plasmon-based low-powered dynamic color display with intrinsic dual functionality (plasmonic display and energy recycling unit) which is a result of the electric-field-driven transformation of nanostructured lithium metals. Dynamic color displays are enabled by plasmonic transformation through electrodeposition (electrostripping) of lithium metals during the charging (discharging) process, while the consumed energy for coloring can be retrieved in the inverse process respectively. Energy recycling of lithium metals brings energy consumption down to 0.390mW cm-2 (0.105mW cm-2) for the active (static) coloration state of a proof-of-concept display/battery device, which approaches nearly-zero-energy-consumption in the near-100%-energy-efficiency limit of commercial lithium batteries. Combining the subwavelength feature of plasmonics with effective energy recycling, the lithium-plasmon-based dynamic display offers a promising route towards next-generation integrated photonic devices, with the intriguing advantages of low energy consumption, a small footprint and high resolution.

Recent Advances in Strategies for Addressing Hypoxia in Tumor Photodynamic Therapy

Photodynamic therapy (PDT) is a treatment modality that uses light to target tumors and minimize damage to normal tissues. It offers advantages including high spatiotemporal selectivity, low side effects, and maximal preservation of tissue functions. However, the PDT efficiency is severely impeded by the hypoxic feature of tumors. Moreover, hypoxia may promote tumor metastasis and tumor resistance to multiple therapies. Therefore, addressing tumor hypoxia to improve PDT efficacy has been the focus of antitumor treatment, and research on this theme is continuously emerging. In this review, we summarize state-of-the-art advances in strategies for overcoming hypoxia in tumor PDTs, categorizing them into oxygen-independent phototherapy, oxygen-economizing PDT, and oxygen-supplementing PDT. Moreover, we highlight strategies possessing intriguing advantages such as exceedingly high PDT efficiency and high novelty, analyze the strengths and shortcomings of different methods, and envision the opportunities and challenges for future research.

CRISPR/Cas9 and Transgene Verification of Gene Involvement in Unfolded Protein Response and Recombinant Protein Production in Barley Grain.

The use of plants as heterologous hosts to produce recombinant proteins has some intriguing advantages. There is, however, the potential of overloading the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) capacity when producing recombinant proteins in the seeds. This leads to an ER-stress condition and accumulating of unfolded proteins. The unfolded protein response (UPR) is activated to alleviate the ER-stress. With the aim to increase the yield of human epidermal growth factor (EGF) and mouse leukemia inhibitory factor (mLIF) in barley, we selected genes reported to have increased expression during ER-induced stress. The selected genes were calreticulin (CRT), protein disulfide isomerase (PDI), isopentenyl diphosphate isomerase (IPI), glutathione-s-transferase (GST), HSP70, HSP26, and HSP16.9. These were knocked out using CRISPR/Cas9 or overexpressed by conventional transgenesis. The generated homozygous barley lines were crossed with barley plants expressing EGF or mLIF and the offspring plants analyzed for EGF and mLIF protein accumulation in the mature grain. All manipulated genes had an impact on the expression of UPR genes when plantlets were subjected to tunicamycin (TN). The PDI knockout plant showed decreased protein body formation, with protein evenly distributed in the cells of the endosperm. The two genes, GST and IPI, were found to have a positive effect on recombinant protein production. mLIF expression was increased in a F2 homozygous GST knockout mutant background as compared to a F2 GST wild-type offspring. The overexpression of IPI in a F1 cross showed a significant increase in EGF expression. We demonstrate that manipulation of UPR related genes can have a positive effect on recombinant protein accumulation.