Theory and reality of antivirals against SARS-CoV-2

At present,over 180 million people have been infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2(SARS-CoV-2)worldwide and there have been more than 3.8 million deaths due to the virus.However,specific effective antiviral treatment for this infectious disease is absent.At the beginning of the epidemic,relevant cellular and animal experiments of antiviral treatment for SARS-CoV-2 were conducted based on the prior studies of SARS-CoV and Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus.Some antivirals were preliminarily validated to be potentially effective in the clinical settings.But as the epidemic continued and more studies were carried out,the efficacy of these antiviral drugs became controversial.This paper reviews the pharmacology and application of interferon,lopinavir/ritonavir,ribavirin,chloroquine,arbidol,favipiravir,remdesivir,and thymosinα1 in coronavirus disease 2019.The actual effect of these drugs remains controversial.Meanwhile,the efficacy and safety of these drugs for patients with coronavirus disease 2019 still need to be explored.

Death from Fat Embolism after Lipectomy in a Patient with Madelung’s Disease

A 56-year-old man with a long history of alcoholism and a palpable raised mass about 23 cm×12 cm in size on his neck was diagnosed with Madelung’s disease(MD);the patient also had hyperuricemia.On day 1,he underwent neck lipoma tissue resection and suddenly had dyspnea 9 h after the operation,which was followed by cardiac arrest.After heart rate resuscitation,he developed a heartbeat,but he remained in a coma and died 9 days after the operation.No obvious pathological tracheal compression from a hematoma was observed while evaluating the patient’s neck on autopsy.On microscopy,the patient had an extensive pulmonary fat embolism,partial alveolar septal rupture and hemorrhage,and fat particles,and there was extensive infiltration of macrophages,which had phagocytosed fat particles,in the alveolar cavity.There was also evidence of pulmonary infection and hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy.The cause of death was postoperative pulmonary fat embolism resulting in pneumonia and central nervous system injury.This is the first report of a patient with MD who died of a fatal pulmonary fat embolism after neck lipoma tissue resection.Medicolegal experts and clinicians should pay sufficient attention to this case.

Irradiation Behavior in High Entropy Alloys

As an increasing demand of advanced nuclear fission reactors and fusion facilities, the key requirements for the materials used in advanced nuclear systems should encompass superior high temperature property, good behavior in corrosive environment, and high irradiation resistance, etc. Recently, it was found that some selected high entropy alloys （HEAs） possess excellent mechanical properties at high temperature, high corrosion resistance, and no grain coarsening and self-healing abil- ity under irradiation, especially, the exceptional structural stability and lower irradiation-induced volume swelling, compared with other conventional materials. Thus, HEAs have been considered as the potential nuclear materials used for future fission or fusion reactors, which are designed to operate at higher temperatures and higher radiation doses up to several hundreds of displacement per atom （dpa）. An insight into the irradiation behavior of HEAs was given, including fundamental researches to investigate the irradiation-induced phase crystal structure change and volume swelling in HEAs. In summary, a brief overview of the irradiation behavior in HEAs was made and the irradiation-induced structural change in HEAs may be relatively insensi- tive because of their special structures.