Rationale and study design for one-stop assessment of renal artery stenosis and renal microvascular perfusion with contrast-enhanced ultrasound for patients with suspected renovascular hypertension

Background:Renal artery stenosis (RAS) is always associated with abnormalities in renal microvascular perfusion (RMP).However,few imaging methods can simultaneously evaluate the degree of luminal stenosis and RMP.Thus,this study will aim to evaluate the feasibility of using contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) for assessing both RAS and RMP to achieve a one-stop assessment of patients with suspected renovascular hypertension. Methods:This will be a single-center diagnostic study with a sample size of 440.Patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) and suspected of having resistant hypertension will be eligible.Patients with Stages 1–3 CKD will undergo CEUS and computed tomography (CT) angiography (CTA).Values obtained by CEUS and CTA for diagnosing low-grade (lumen reduced by <60%) and high-grade (lumen reduced by ≥60%) RAS will be compared.Moreover,all patients will also undergo radionuclide imaging.The diagnostic value for RAS will be assessed by the receiver operating characteristic curve,including the accuracy,sensitivity,specificity,positive predictive values,negative predictive values,and area under the ROC.Pearson correlation analysis will be performed to assess the association between CEUS findings for RMP and glomerular filtration rate measured by a radionuclide imaging method. Conclusion:The data gathered from this study will be used to evaluate the feasibility of expanding clinical applications of CEUS for evaluation of patients with suspected renovascular hypertension.

Highly reversible Zn anode enabled by anticatalytic carbon layer with suppressed hydrogen evolution

Aqueous zinc-ion batteries(AZIBs)have emerged as a promising high-efficiency energy storage system due to the high energy density,low-cost and environmental friendliness.However,the practical application of AZIBs is severely restricted by the challenges faced by the Zn anode,which include uncontrollable dendrite growth,corrosion and hydrogen evolution reaction.Herein,a simple and convenient physical vapor deposition(PVD)method is reported for fabricating uniform graphite as a protection layer on the surface of Zn anode.The high conductivity graphite layer on Zn anode(denoted as Zn@C)not only benefits the uniform distribution of the electric field,but also provides numerous Zn nucleation sites to regulate and navigate Zn-ion stripping/plating behaviors.Additionally,the graphite layer with a poor catalytic activity endows the Zn@C anode with a highly suppressed hydrogen evolution.Consequently,a hydrogen and dendrite free anode is achieved with artificial anticatalytic carbon layer on Zn anode,exhibiting a high reversibility and excellent cycling stability over 2600 h at the current density of 5 mA·cm^(-2)with a capacity of 2.5 mAh·cm^(-2)and longtime cycling stability for assembled full cells.This work strategically designs the properties of the artificial interface layer to effectively address various challenges simultaneously,which presents insights for the future development of high-performance rechargeable AZIBs.