Gravescash6307
The efficient detection of cancer markers has faced many challenges, such as severe interference, complicated and time-consuming operation, low sensitivity and so on. In this paper, a microfluidic chip integrated with electrodes for dielectrophoretic (DEP) separation, microchannels for electrochemical nanoprobes binding and differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) detection was proposed for the sensitive and rapid detection of prostate specific antigen (PSA) in whole blood. The functional units, which could realize cell separation, PSA derivatization (binding of electrochemical nanoprobes), capture and detection, were integrated on the microfluidic chip. The well-designed V-shaped interdigital electrode arrays provided DEP separation for blood cells with efficiency as high as 98%. Particularly, DEP effect significantly improved the sensitivity of PSA detection and reduced the detection limit by two orders of magnitude. In order to achieve sensitive detection of PSA, binding of electrochemical nanoprobes and then DPV detection was selected and integrated following the DEP separation. A sandwich structure based on electrochemical nanoprobes and dual-aptamers for on-chip DPV detection was proposed, which included self-synthesized electrochemical nanoprobes bovine serum albumin/detection aptamer 2/polythionine@gold nanoparticles (BSA/Apt2/PThi@Au NPs), target PSA, and sensing interface 6-mercaptohexanol/capture aptamer 1/gold nanoparticles on gold electrode (MCH/Apt1/Au NPs/Au). The method of quantitative detection of PSA in whole blood was then established. The excellent performance of the microfluidic chip allowed the determination of PSA in whole blood in the range of 1 pg/mL ∼10 ng/mL with an ultralow limit of detection of 0.25 pg/mL, which was better than the results obtained by conventional methods.SARS-CoV-2 is quickly evolving from wild-type to many variants and spreading around the globe. Since many people have been vaccinated with various types of vaccines, it is crucial to develop a high throughput platform for measuring the antibody responses and surrogate neutralizing activities against multiple SARS-CoV-2 variants. To meet this need, the present study developed a SARS-CoV-2 variant (CoVariant) array which consists of the extracellular domain of spike variants, e.g., wild-type, D614G, B.1.1.7, B.1.351, P.1, B.1.617, B.1.617.1, B.1.617.2, and B.1.617.3. A surrogate virus neutralization on the CoVariant array was established to quantify the bindings of antibody and host receptor ACE2 simultaneously to spike variants. By using a chimeric anti-spike antibody, we demonstrated a broad binding spectrum of antibodies while inhibiting the bindings of ACE2 to spike variants. To monitor the humoral immunities after vaccination, we collected serums from unvaccinated, partial, or fully vaccinated individuals with either mRNA-1273 or AZD1222 (ChAdOx1). The results showed partial vaccination increased the surrogate neutralization against all the mutants while full vaccination boosted the most. Although IgG, IgA, and IgM isotypes correlated with surrogate neutralizing activities, they behave differently throughout the vaccination processes. Overall, this study developed CoVariant arrays and assays for profiling the humoral responses which are useful for immune assessment, vaccine research, and drug development.
The dynamics of essential metals such as Copper (Cu) and Zinc (Zn) may be associated with the novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) that has spread across the globe.
The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between serum levels of Cu and Zn, as well as the CuZn ratio in the acute phase of COVID-19 along with the assessment of their connection to other laboratory parameters (hematological, biochemical, hemostatic).
Serum levels of Cu and Zn were measured by atomic absorption spectrometry in 75 patients in the acute COVID-19 phase and were compared with those of 22 COVID-19 patients evaluated three months after the acute phase of the disease ('non-acute' group) and with those of 68 healthy individuals.
In comparison with both the non-acute patients and the healthy controls, the acute patients had lower levels of hemoglobulin and albumin, and higher levels of glucose, creatinine, liver transaminases, C-reactive protein (CRP), and higher values of the neutrophils to lymphocytes ratio (NLR) at the hospital admission. They also exhibited increased levels of Cu and decreased of Zn, well represented by the CuZn ratio which was higher in the acute patients than in both non-acute patients (p=0.001) and healthy controls (p<0.001), with no statistical difference between the last two groups. The CuZn ratio (log scale) positively correlated with CRP (log scale; r=0.581, p<0.001) and NLR (r=0.436, p=0.003).
Current results demonstrate that abnormal dynamics of Cu and Zn levels in serum occur early during the course of COVID-19 disease, and are mainly associated with the inflammation response.
Current results demonstrate that abnormal dynamics of Cu and Zn levels in serum occur early during the course of COVID-19 disease, and are mainly associated with the inflammation response.
Coupling stimuli-responsive building blocks with an oscillating reaction is an effective strategy to realize and investigate dissipative self-assembly. More importantly, since there is usually more than one component of which concentration periodically changes in a chemical oscillator, it can be expected that this strategy has the advantage of achieving dissipative self-assembly of the building blocks with dual- or even multi-responsiveness.
We realized the dissipative self-assembly of a pH- and iodine-responsive block copolymer, poly(ethylene oxide)-b-poly(2-vinyl pyridine) (PEO-P2VP), by coupling it with the IO
-SO
-Fe(CN)
(ISF) oscillator, and investigated its rhythmic self-assembly behavior. Furthermore, we proposed a mechanistic model to simulate the kinetics of the ISF oscillator coupling with different amounts of PEO-P2VP.
Rhythmic core-shell reversal of the polymer micelles formed by PEO-P2VP was found in the ISF oscillator. The mechanistic model we proposed successfully reproduced theresponsive self-assembly.Using earth abundant elements to develop oxygen evolution reaction (OER) electrocatalysts presents one of the most promising strategies to generate clean and renewable energy systems to deal with the ever-growing energy crisis. The challenge comes as how to rationally design the chemical composition and nanostructure to increase the OER efficiency. In this work, we demonstrated an operational ion strategy to improve OER performances of iron cobalt bimetallic phosphide (Fe0.5Co-P), which was fabricated by simultaneous annealing and phosphating metal organic framework (MOF) precursors. The iron regulates the charge density of the Co sites, changing the electronic structure of the phase interface for endowing dramatically enhanced OER activity. The Fe0.5Co-P catalyst possesses excellent durable and reliable characteristics and exhibits dramatically enhanced OER efficiency with an overpotential of only 260 mV to drive a current density of 10 mA cm-2 and a Tafel slope of 65.53 mV dec-1 in 1.0 M KOH. The work provides useful insights into the design and synthesis of multicomponent metal phosphides-based OER catalysts for practical application in water splitting.Rational construction of heterogeneous interfaces that maximize carrier flux and allow carrier separation for achieving efficient photocatalytic CO2 reduction still remain a challenge. In this work, high-throughput and intimate interfaces that allow efficient carrier separation and flux are designed by depositing high-density CeO2 nanoparticles on large-area Ti3C2TX (T = terminal group) nanosheets. Oxygen-containing functional groups of Ti3C2TX nanosheets facilitate the anchoring of CeO2 nanoparticles on the nanosheets via the formation of interfacial Ce-O-Ti bonds, which serve as effective channels for reverse and synergistic migration of electrons and holes to achieve spatial separation. The light absorption of the CeO2@Ti3C2TX composites is extended to the infrared (IR) region due to narrow bandgaps of Ti3C2TX. High-density lateral and basal interfaces enhance carrier migration, which ultimately aids the CeO2@Ti3C2TX composites to exhibit excellent activity for reducing CO2 to alcohols (i.e., methanol and ethanol) under both visible (vis) and IR irradiations. The total amount of produced alcohol under visible irradiation is 109.9 μmol•gcatal-1 (methanol and ethanol 76.2 and 33.7 μmol•gcatal-1, respectively), which is 4.3 times higher than that obtained using CeO2 (methanol and ethanol 19.8 and 6 μmol•gcatal-1, respectively). The yields of methanol and ethanol using the optimized CeO2@Ti3C2TX were 102.24 and 59.21 μmol•gcatal-1, respectively, after 4 h under the vis-IR irradiation.Solar steam generation has great potential in alleviating freshwater crises, particularly in regions with accessible seawater and abundant insolation. Inexpensive, efficient, and eco-friendly photothermal materials are desired to fabricate sunlight-driven evaporation devices. Here, we have designed an economical strategy to fabricate a high-performance wood-based solar steam generation device. In current study, 3D-hierarchical Cu3SnS4 has been loaded on wood substrates of variable sizes via an in-situ solvothermal method. Considering the water transportation capacity and thermal insulation property of wood, an enhanced light absorption was achieved by a uniform coating of Cu3SnS4 on the inside and outside of the 3D porous structure of the wood. Thanks for the synergistic effect of Cu3SnS4 and wood substrate, the obtained composite endorsed high-performance solar steam generation with a steam generation efficiency of 90% and an evaporation rate as high as 1.35 kg m-2h-1 under one sun.High-capacity and rapid adsorption of organic micropollutants (OMPs) from water by adsorbents remain a great significance in water treatment. Recently, porous organic polymers with high surface areas, tunable nanopores and easy-to-modify skeletons are promising new generation of adsorbents. Here, a series of silsesquioxane-crosslinked conjugated microporous polymers (PcCMPs) with high surface areas and well-defined nanopores are developed via a molecular expansion strategy for removing OMPs from water. Among these PcCMPs, PcCMP-2E exhibited the highest Brunauer-Emmett-Teller surface area up to 2518 m2 g-1. The maximum adsorption capacities of bisphenol A (BPA) of PcCMPs are ranging from 485.44 to 628.93 mg g-1. Specially, >93.5% of BPA could be removed even through a thin layer filtration device composed of PcCMPs, which can be regenerated well using a mild washing procedure. PcCMPs also exhibit extraordinary adsorption to a variety of OMPs, such as tetracycline (226.99 mg g-1), 1-naphthylamine (290.07 mg g-1), 2-naphthol (213.87 mg g-1), 2,4-dichlorophenol (183.85 mg g-1) and p-nitrophenol (360.24 mg g-1). This work provides a new strategy to design porous adsorbents with high adsorption capacity and fast adsorption rate for water treatment.The design of a high-performance microwave absorbing material is highly dependent on the synergistic structural design of heterostructure and the appropriate material compositions. Herein, a series of composites of reduced graphene oxide (RGO) and core-shell structured γ-Fe2O3@C nanoparticles have been achieved by a hydrothermal and in-situ chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method. In particular, the structure of the carbon layer, including its graphitization and thickness, can be controlled by optimizing the CVD conditions, which is beneficial to tailor the impedance matching and dielectric loss. The rationally designed RGO/γ-Fe2O3@C composite has multiple electromagnetic dissipation mechanisms. The effective absorption ranges of an optimal sample at a filling rate of 20% can cover 100% X-band and 98% Ku-band at thicknesses of 3.0 mm and 2.2 mm, respectively. This finding suggested that the controllable fabrication of core-shell heterostructures could be viable approach to upgrade the microwave absorption performance of transition metal oxides.
