High-Power and Ultralong-Life Aqueous Zinc-Ion Hybrid Capacitors Based on Pseudocapacitive Charge Storage

© 2019, © 2019, The Author(s). Rechargeable aqueous zinc-ion hybrid capacitors and zinc-ion batteries are promising safe energy storage systems. In this study, amorphous RuO2·H2O for the first time was employed to achieve fast and ultralong-life Zn2+ storage based on a pseudocapacitive storage mechanism. In the RuO2·H2O||Zn zinc-ion hybrid capacitors with Zn(CF3SO3)2 aqueous electrolyte, the RuO2·H2O cathode can reversibly store Zn2+ in a voltage window of 0.4–1.6 V (vs. Zn/Zn2+), delivering a high discharge capacity of 122 mAh g−1. In particular, the zinc-ion hybrid capacitors can be rapidly charged/discharged within 36 s with a very high power density of 16.74 kW kg−1 and a high energy density of 82 Wh kg−1. Besides, the zinc-ion hybrid capacitors demonstrate an ultralong cycle life (over 10,000 charge/discharge cycles). The kinetic analysis elucidates that the ultrafast Zn2+ storage in the RuO2·H2O cathode originates from redox pseudocapacitive reactions. This work could greatly facilitate the development of high-power and safe electrochemical energy storage.[Figure not available: see fulltext.]

Stabilizing CsPbBr 3 perovskite quantum dots on zirconium phosphate nanosheets through an ion exchange/surface adsorption strategy

Abstract(#br)All-inorganic perovskite quantum dots (PQDs) being characterized by high photoluminescence quantum yield, tunable emission colors and high color purity attract enormous attention in optoelectronic fields, especially as highly efficient narrow-band phosphors for lighting and next-generation display devices. However, poor stability seriously impedes their practical applications. Herein, we proposed an ion exchange/surface adsorption strategy to realize the room-temperature synthesis and stabilization of CsPbBr 3 PQDs on α-Zr(HPO 4 ) 2 ·H 2 O (zirconium phosphate, α-ZrP) nanosheets. The inherent characteristics of the α-ZrP nanosheets including high Pb 2+ adsorptivity and good Cs + ion exchange capability promoted the heterogeneous nucleation-growth and effective anchoring of CsPbBr 3 PQDs on α-ZrP surfaces. Consequently, the synthesized α-ZrP/CsPbBr 3 composite exhibited superior green-emitting performance and significantly enhanced humidity stability and thermal stability in comparison to pure PQDs and many other matrix-protected PQDs. All these favorable characteristics listed above endowed the α-ZrP/CsPbBr 3 composite with good optical properties for lighting and displays. This work opens up a new way to use inorganic nanomaterials to stabilize all-inorganic PQDs and can promote the scalable synthesis of PQDs with long-term stability for optoelectronic devices

Cardiometabolic index is associated with increased bone mineral density: a population-based cross-sectional study

BackgroundOsteoporosis is a multifactorial bone disease in which lipid metabolism plays an important role. Bone Mineral Density (BMD) measured by Dual-energy X-ray Absorptiometry (DXA) is a critical indicator for diagnosing osteoporosis. The cardiometabolic index (CMI) is a novel metric that combines two quantitative indicators of blood lipids—triglycerides (TG) and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C). This study explores the association between CMI and BMD and seeks to elucidate the role of lipid metabolism in the context of bone health.MethodsBased on the data of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2017–March 2020-pre-pandemic, weighted multiple linear regression and smooth curve fitting were used to study the relationship between CMI and femoral BMD. Stratified analyses were also conducted for age, gender, BMI, ethnicity, diabetes and hypertension status. And, the saturation threshold effect of CMI was further analyzed using a two-stage linear regression model.ResultThis study enrolled a total of 1,650 participants (48.7% males), with an average age of 63.0 ± 8.6 years. After adjusting for multiple confounding factors, CMI was positively correlated with total femur BMD, trochanter BMD, and intertrochanter BMD, while the correlation with femur neck BMD was not statistically significant. In the fully adjusted model, each unit increase in CMI was associated with a 0.026 (g/cm2) increase in total femur BMD, a 0.022 (g/cm2) increase in trochanter BMD, and a 0.034 (g/cm2) increase in intertrochanter BMD. Subjects in the highest quartile of CMI had a 0.034 (g/cm2) increase in total femur BMD, a 0.035 (g/cm2) increase in trochanter BMD, and a 0.039 (g/cm2) increase in intertrochanter BMD in the fully-adjusted model compared to those in the lowest quartile. In addition, saturation was observed between CMI and total femur BMD, trochanter BMD and intertrochanter BMD, with saturation thresholds of 1.073, 1.431 and 1.073, respectively.ConclusionCMI is strongly associated with BMD, indicating its potential relevance in bone metabolism. However, the role of CMI in the context of bone health, especially regarding osteoporosis risk, requires further investigation in large-scale prospective studies

Quantum transport in indium nitride nanowires

Transport measurements are performed under the variations of temperature and magnetic field on single crystalline InN nanowires. Conduction at low temperature reveals a three-dimensional Mott variable range hopping mechanism. With rising temperature, a semiconductor-to-metal transition is observed around 80 K. In addition, the nanowire exhibits negative magnetoresistance under both parallel and perpendicular fields due to the suppression of the electron wave function interference. A field direction asymmetry on the change of magnetoresistance is examined, attributing to the conduction channel anisotropy.Physical Review B 83(24), 245310. (2011)1098-012

Association between intraoperative dexmedetomidine and all-cause mortality and recurrence after laparoscopic resection of colorectal cancer: Follow-up analysis of a previous randomized controlled trial

BackgroundDexmedetomidine (DEX) has been widely applied in the anesthesia and sedation of patients with oncological diseases. However, the potential effect of DEX on tumor metastasis remains contradictory. This study follows up on patients who received intraoperative DEX during laparoscopic resection of colorectal cancer as part of a previous clinical trial, examining their outcomes 5 years later.MethodsBetween June 2015 and December 2015, 60 patients undergoing laparoscopic colorectal resection were randomly assigned to the DEX and control groups. The DEX group received an initial loading dose of 1μ/kg before surgery, followed by a continuous infusion of 0.3μg/kg/h during the operation and the Control group received an equivalent volume of saline. A 5-year follow-up analysis was conducted to evaluate the overall survival, disease-free survival, and tumor recurrence.ResultsThe follow-up analysis included 55 of the 60 patients. The DEX group included 28 patients, while the control group included 27 patients. Baseline characteristics were comparable between the two groups, except for vascular and/or neural invasion of the tumor in the DEX group (9/28 vs. 0/27, p = 0.002). We did not observe a statistically significant benefit but rather a trend toward an increase in overall survival and disease-free survival in the DEX group, 1-year overall survival (96.4% vs. 88.9%, p = 0.282), 2-year overall survival (89.3% vs. 74.1%, p = 0.144), 3-year overall survival (89.3% vs. 70.4%, p = 0.08), and 5-year overall survival (78.6% vs. 59.3%, p = 0.121). The total rates of mortality and recurrence between the two groups were comparable (8/28 vs. 11/27, p = 0.343).ConclusionAdministration of DEX during laparoscopic resection of colorectal cancer had a nonsignificant trend toward improved overall survival and disease-free survival.Clinical Trial Registrationhttp://www.chictr.org.cn/, identifier ChiCTRIOR-15006518

Deep learning-enabled classification of kidney allograft rejection on whole slide histopathologic images

BackgroundDiagnosis of kidney transplant rejection currently relies on manual histopathological assessment, which is subjective and susceptible to inter-observer variability, leading to limited reproducibility. We aim to develop a deep learning system for automated assessment of whole-slide images (WSIs) from kidney allograft biopsies to enable detection and subtyping of rejection and to predict the prognosis of rejection.MethodWe collected H&E-stained WSIs of kidney allograft biopsies at 400x magnification from January 2015 to September 2023 at two hospitals. These biopsy specimens were classified as T cell-mediated rejection, antibody-mediated rejection, and other lesions based on the consensus reached by two experienced transplant pathologists. To achieve feature extraction, feature aggregation, and global classification, we employed multi-instance learning and common convolution neural networks (CNNs). The performance of the developed models was evaluated using various metrics, including confusion matrix, receiver operating characteristic curves, the area under the curve (AUC), classification map, heat map, and pathologist-machine confrontations.ResultsIn total, 906 WSIs from 302 kidney allograft biopsies were included for analysis. The model based on multi-instance learning enables detection and subtyping of rejection, named renal rejection artificial intelligence model (RRAIM), with the overall 3-category AUC of 0.798 in the independent test set, which is superior to that of three transplant pathologists under nearly routine assessment conditions. Moreover, the prognosis models accurately predicted graft loss within 1 year following rejection and treatment response for rejection, achieving AUC of 0.936 and 0.756, respectively.ConclusionWe first developed deep-learning models utilizing multi-instance learning for the detection and subtyping of rejection and prediction of rejection prognosis in kidney allograft biopsies. These models performed well and may be useful in assisting the pathological diagnosis

Artificial intelligence-assisted early screening of acute promyelocytic leukaemia in blood smears: a prospective evaluation of MC-100i

ObjectivesIdentification of abnormal promyelocytes is crucial for early diagnosis of Acute promyelocytic leukaemia (APL) and for reducing the early mortality rate of APL patients, which can be achieved by microscopic blood smear observation. However, microscopic observation has shortcomings, including interobserver variability and training difficulty. This is the first study evaluating the performance of MC-100i, an artificial intelligence (AI)-based digital morphology analyser, in identifying abnormal promyelocytes in blood smears and thus assisting in the early screening of APL.MethodsOne hundred ninety-two patients suspected of having APL were enrolled prospectively. The precision, accuracy, consistency with manual classification and turnaround time of MC-100i were studied in detail.ResultsThe precision of MC-100i in identifying all cell types was acceptable. MC-100i had excellent performance in preclassifying normal cell types, but its sensitivities for identifying blasts, abnormal promyelocytes, promyelocytes and neutrophilic myelocytes were relatively low, respectively. The Passing-Bablok and Bland-Altman tests revealed that the preclassification abnormal promyelocyte percentage obtained with MC-100i was proportionally different from that obtained with manual classification, whereas the postclassification and manual classification results were consistent. The clinical sensitivity and specificity for the early screening of APL were 95.8% and 100.0%, respectively. The turnaround and classification times were significantly shorter with the use of MC-100i for both the technologist and the experienced expert.ConclusionsMC-100i is an effective tool for identifying abnormal promyelocytes in blood smears and assisting in the early screening of APL. It is useful when experienced morphological experts or advanced tests are not available

ShenQi FuZheng Injection combined with chemotherapy in the treatment of colorectal cancer: A meta-analysis.

This study aims to investigate cellular immunity and clinical efficacy of ShenQi FuZheng Injection (SFI) in the associated chemotherapy of colorectal cancer (CRC).PubMed, Cochrane Library, EMBASE, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), Chinese Scientific Journals Full-text Database (VIP), WanFang Database and Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (CBM) searches were undertaken to identify randomized controlled trials of SFI plus chemotherapy versus chemotherapy alone in CRC patients. The quality of each trial was assessed according to the Jadad's scale, and Review Manager 5 was used to statisitically analyze the outcomes.Eight studies involving 722 patients were included in this review. The meta-analyses suggested there was a significantly higher overall response rate (OR 1.89; CI: 1.10-3.24; p = 0.02), grades of KPS (OR 2.35; CI: 1.55-3.56; p<0.01), CD3+cells (MD 10.29; CI: 8.46-12.12; p<0.01), CD4+cells (MD 7.06; CI: 5.33-8.794; p<0.01), CD4/CD8+cells (MD 0.32; CI: 0.25-0.40; p<0.01), NK+ (MD 7.20; CI: 2.02-12.37, p = 0.006), WBC (MD 1.24; CI: 0.59-1.89; p<0.01), HB (MD 14.55; CI: 7.47-21.63; p<0.01), and PLT (MD 19.05; CI: 4.29-33.81; p = 0.01), but lower severe toxicity for leukocytopenia (OR 0.37; CI: 0.17-0.80; p = 0.01), thrombocytopenia (OR 0.32; CI: 0.14-0.74; p = 0.008), gastrointestinal toxicity (OR 0.48; CI: 0.24-0.96; p = 0.04), when chemotherapy combined with SFI was compared with chemotherapy alone. There were similarities between two groups in liver dysfunction (OR 0.44; CI: 0.18-1.08; p = 0.07) and CD8+ (MD 0.54; CI: -1.89-2.96; p = 0.66). Also, there was presence of heterogeneity in the CD8 results; after the sensitivity analysis, the result of CD8+ was reversed (MD 1.57; CI: 0.32-2.81; p = 0.01). There was no significant publication bias across studies according to the Egger's (P = 0.19) and Begg's test (P = 0.23).SFI enhances chemotherapy efficiency as they are combined and used in the treatment of colorectal cancer patients. At the same time, SFI also improves patients' immunity function

Meta-analysis of anti-Saccharomyces cerevisiae antibodies as diagnostic markers of Behçet’s disease with gastrointestinal involvement

Objective Due to common exposure to yeast in the alcoholic and baking industry, positive rate of anti-Saccharomyces cerevisiae antibodies (ASCA) is reportedly high in patients with Behçet’s disease (BD) who have gastrointestinal symptoms (gastrointestinal BD (GIBD)). We performed a meta-analysis to assess the diagnostic value of ASCA in differentiating patients with BD from those with other chronic inflammatory bowel diseases.Methods The meta-analysis is presented with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses and Meta-analysis of Observational Studies in Epidemiology checklist. Relevant studies that investigated ASCA levels in patients with BD were retrieved from PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science, SCOPUS and the Cochrane Library on 12 July 2019; the search was rerun on 12 February 2020. Stata/SE V.12.0 and Meta-DiSc V.1.4 were used to perform the meta-analysis and sensitivity analysis, disaggregated by isotypes of ASCA.Results Nine studies were included in the meta-analysis. The results revealed a strong association between ASCA and GIBD, especially ASCA-IgG (OR=5.50 (95% CI 2.58 to 11.55), p=0.000) and ASCA-IgG+IgA (OR=5.36 (95% CI 1.40 to 20.45), p=0.014). The positivity rate of ASCA in GIBD was significantly higher than that in ulcerative colitis (UC): IgA (OR=2.13 (95% CI 1.30 to 3.50), p=0.003); IgG+IgA (OR=2.19 (95% CI 1.03 to 4.66), p=0.042); IgG/IgA ((=2.03 (95% CI 1.30 to 3.17), p=0.002). However, the frequency of ASCA-IgG was significantly higher in patients with Crohn's disease than GIBD (OR=0.48 (95% CI 0.28 to 0.83), p=0.009). There was no significant difference in ASCA positivity between BD without gastrointestinal involvement and healthy controls and between GIBD and intestinal tuberculosis (iTB) (p&gt;0.05).Conclusion ASCA may play a role in the pathogenesis of gastrointestinal involvement. Negative result of IgG favours the diagnosis of GIBD/BD when differentiated from Crohn’s disease. ASCA-IgA showed moderate diagnostic performance in distinguishing GIBD and UC and the diagnostic performance was better in combination with IgG. However, ASCA may not be a useful serologic marker distinguishing GIBD and iTB.PROSPERO registration number CRD42020115245