In Situ Raman Monitoring of Trace Antibiotics in Different Harsh Water Environments

In situ surface-enhanced Raman scattering(SERS)is a widely used operando analytical technique,while facing numerous complex factors in applications under aqueous environment,such as low detection sensitivity,poor anti-interference capability,etc.,resulting in unreliable detectability.To address these issues,herein a new hydrophobic SERS strategy has been attempted.By comprehensively designing and researching a SERS-active structure of superhydrophobic ZnO/Ag nanowires,we demonstrate that hydrophobicity can not only draw analytes from water onto substrate,but also adjust"hottest spot"from the bottom of the nanowires to the top.As a result,the structure can simultaneously concentrate the dispersed molecules in water and the enhanced electric field in structure into a same zone,while perfecting its own anti-interference ability.The underwater in situ analytical enhancement factor of this platform is as high as 1.67×10^(11),and the operando limited of detection for metronidazole(MNZ)reaches to 10^(-9)M.Most importantly,we also successfully generalized this structure to various real in situ detection scenarios,including on-site detection of MNZ in corrosive urine,real-time warning of wrong dose of MNZ during intravenous therapy,in situ monitoring of MNZ in flowing wastewater with particulate interference,etc.,demonstrating the great application potential of this hydrophobic platform.This work realizes a synergistic promotion for in situ SERS performance under aqueous environment,and also provides a novel view for improving other in situ analytical techniques.

Synthesis and Photocatalytic Activity of Fe-doped TiO_2 Supported on Hollow Glass Microbeads

In this paper, Fe-doped TiO_2 photocatalyst supported on hollow glass microbeads(Fe-TiO_2 /beads)is prepared by dip-coating method, which uses hollow glass microbeads as the carriers and tetrabutylorthotitanate [Ti(OC_4H_9)_4] as the raw material. The phase structure, ingredient, morphologies, particle size and shell thickness of the products are characterized by X-ray powder diffraction(XRD), energy-dispersive spectroscopy(EDS) and field emission scanning electron microscope(FESEM). The feasibility of photocatylic degradation of Rhodamine B(Rh B) under illumination of UV-vis light is studied. The results show that the core-shell structure catalyst is composed of Fe-doped anatase TiO_2 and hollow glass microbeads, and the catalytic activity of the TiO_2 is markedly enhanced by Fe ion doping. The optimum concentration of Fe ion is 0.1%(molecular fraction) in the precursor and the photocatalytic activity can be increased to 98% compared with that of the undoped one. The presence of ferrum elements neither influences the transformation of anatase to rutile, nor creates new crystal phases. The possible mechanism of photocatalytic oxidation is also discussed.

Modeling and Simulation of a Hybrid Jet-Impingement/Micro-Channel Heat Sink

With the progressive increase in the number of transistors that can be accommodated on a single integrated circuit,new strategies are needed to extract heat from these devices in an efficient way.In this regard methods based on the combination of the so-called“jet impingement”and“micro-channel”approaches seem extremely promising for possible improvement and future applications in electronics as well as the aerospace and biomedical fields.In this paper,a hybrid heat sink based on these two technologies is analysed in the frame of an integrated model.Dedicated CFD simulation of the coupled flow/temperature fields and orthogonal tests are performed in order to optimize the overall design.The influence of different sets of structural parameters on the cooling performance is examined.It is shown that an optimal scheme exists for which favourable performance can be obtained in terms of hot spot temperature decrease and thermal uniformity improvement.

Effects of Salt Quenching Temperatures on Microstructure and Creep Properties of a PM Ni-based Superalloy

By means of the microstructure observation and creep properties measurement, an investigation has been made into the influence of the salt quenching temperatures on the microstructure and creep property of FGH95 superalloy. The results shown that, after full heat treatment, a high volume of g￠ phase and some granular carbide dispersedly precipitate in the matrix. Thereinto, as the molten salt temperature decreases from 650℃to520℃, the size of fine g￠ phase in the alloy decrease gradually and the amount of carbides increase in the alloy. And the alloy quenched in molten salt at520℃possesses better creep resistance due to the fact that there are more granular carbides precipitating in the alloy to enhance the grain strength. During creep, the deformation features of the alloy are that the configurations of stacking fault and slipping dislocations are activated in the alloy.

How do kinases contribute to tonicity-dependent regulation of the transcription factor NFAT5?

NFAT5 plays a critical role in maintaining the renal functions. Its dis-regulation in the kidney leads to or is associated with certain renal diseases or disorders, most notably the urinary concentration defect. Hypertonicity, which the kidney medulla is normally exposed to,activates NFAT5 through phosphorylation of a signaling molecule or NFAT5 itself. Hypotonicity inhibits NFAT5 through a similar mechanism. More than a dozen of protein and lipid kinases have been identified to contribute to tonicity-dependent regulation of NFAT5. Hypertonicity activates NFAT5 by increasing its nuclear localization and transactivating activity in the early phase and protein abundance in the late phase. The known mechanism for inhibition of NFAT5 by hypotonicity is a decrease of nuclear NFAT5. The present article reviews the effect of each kinase on NFAT5 nuclear localization, transactivation and protein abundance, and the relationship among these kinases, if known. Cyclosporine A and tacrolimus suppress immune reactions by inhibiting the phosphatase calcineurin-dependent activation of NFAT1. It is hoped that this review would stimulate the interest to seek explanations from the NFAT5 regulatory pathways for certain clinical presentations and to explore novel therapeutic approaches based on the pathways. On the basic science front, this review raises two interesting questions. The first one is how these kinases can specifcally signal to NFAT5 in the context of hypertonicity or hypotonicity, because they also regulate other cellular activities and even opposite activities in some cases. The second one is why these many kinases, some of which might have redundant functions, are needed to regulate NFAT5 activity. This review reiterates the concept of signaling through cooperation. Cells need these kinases working in a coordinated way to provide the signaling specificity that is lacking in the individual one. Redundancy in regulation of NFAT5 is a critical strategy for cells to maintain robustness against hypertonic or hypotonic stress.

A non-viral gene therapy for melanoma by staphylococcal enterotoxin A

Staphylococcal enterotoxin A(SEA)derived from Staphylococcus aureus,as a superantigen,shows potential for cancer immunotherapy,but systemic immunotoxicity restricts its clinical application.Targeted delivery of SEA to tumor site provides a promising option for reducing the systemic toxicity.Here,we constructed an iRGD peptide(H-[Cys-Arg-Gly-Asp-Lys-Gly-Pro-Asp-Cys]-NH_(2))modified nanoparticle(iDPP)to deliver plasmids encoding SEA for melanoma treatment.The iDPP/SEA nanocomplexes efficiently mediated SEA expression in B16-F10 cells in vivo and in vitro and induced the activation of lymphocytes and maturation of murine bone marrow-derived dendritic cells(BMDCs)in vitro.In the subcutaneous B16-F10 melanoma model,the iDPP/SEA nanocomplexes could effectively enhance immune response and T lymphocytes infiltration in tumor site after intravenous administration,thereby considerably decreased melanoma growth.Meanwhile,no obvious adverse effect was observed after intravenous administration of the iDPP/SEA nanocomplexes in vivo.Our findings demonstrated that gene therapy of SEA is a potential candidate for melanoma treatment.

Sound Reduction Control in Acoustic Enclosure with Air Ventilation

An acoustic enclosure system with both interior sound reduction and air ventilation is designed and demonstrated.The system consists of a rectangular enclosed space coupled with ventilated metamaterials and microperforated panels(MPPs).By modeling the ventilated metamaterial as an impedance boundary condition,an analytic model is developed to characterize the frequency response of interior acoustic fields and evaluate the sound reduction performance of MPP structures.Numerical simulations are conducted to validate the accuracy of the theoretical model.It is found that the resonance response of the enclosure system can be suppressed by proper arrangement of the MPPs.Even with open area for airflow,the system still possesses good sound isolation originating from the low-transmission behavior of the ventilated metamaterial.The proposed model system may find potential applications in noise control engineering.

A structured packed-bed reactor designed for exothermic hydrogenation of acetone

Fixed-bed reactors randomly packed with catalysts have many disadvantages that may adversely affect the desired chemical reaction.The increasingly used monolithic reactor,in contrast,has many operational advantages;however,for a kinetically-controlled reaction,it does not contain sufficient catalyst to sustain the reaction.To address the problems associated with both randomly packed-bed reactor and the monolithic reactor,a structured packed-bed reactor was proposed and mathematical models were built for randomly packed-bed reactor and structured packed-bed reactor.Their respective performances were compared when applied to the exothermic reaction of the isopropanol-acetone-hydrogen chemical heat pump system.The results showed that the structured packed-bed reactor performed better in terms of pressure drop and heat transfer capacity,and had a lower radial temperature gradient,indicating that this reactor had a higher effective heat conductivity.Isopropanol on the catalyst particle surfaces was more concentrated near the tube wall because a wall effect existed in the boundary layer around the particle-wall contact points.

3D CFD modeling of acetone hydrogenation in fixed bed reactor with spherical particles

Acetone hydrogenation in a fixed bed reactor packed with spherical catalyst particles was simulated to study the effects of inlet gas velocity and particle diameter on hydrogenation reaction. Computational results show that the catalyst particles in the reactor are almost isothermal, and the high isopropanol concentration appears at the lee of the particles. With the increase of inlet velocity, the outlet isopropanol mole fraction decreases, and the total pressure drop increases drastically. Small diameter catalyst particles are favorable for acetone hydrogenation, but result in large pressure drop.

Unusual one-way edge state in acoustic gyroscopic continuum

Unusual one-way edge states have been observed in composite structures composed of periodic lattices loaded with gyroscopes.Here, we provide a continuum-mechanics understanding to the one-way edge state by formulating surface state equations of acoustic gyroscopic mediums with Hermite mass density tensor. We discover that the unidirectional edge effect arises from nontrivial off-diagonal components of Hermite densities, which causes the symmetric breaking of surface wave propagation towards forward and backward directions. Theoretical predictions on the velocity and decay length of surface waves coincide excellently with numerical simulations. The unidirectional edge state in a two-interface gyroscopic medium is also analyzed.Due to the rotational symmetry in geometry, the unidirectional edge state on one interface is able to prevent itself from the coupling to surface waves on the other interface regardless of the slab thickness. With these anomalous effects, surface waves residing on gyroscopic mediums can flow around the edge defects without back-scatterings, or can be split into two beams of equal energy magnitudes. Our findings may make a bridge that would help to reach the design of non-reciprocal composite materials via an effective medium approach.

Acoustic cloak constructed with thin-plate metamaterials

We propose a strategy for designing the cylindrical acoustic cloak with thin-plate metamaterials.The inhomogeneous cloaking shell as derived by transformation acoustics is first discretized into a three-layer anisotropic metafluid,and their material parameters are optimized by minimizing the external scatterings.Then these metafluids are practically realized by thin-plate structures according to the metamaterial concept.As an example,an acoustic cloak is designed with nine layers of thin plate and totally 900 plate units.Numerical simulations are performed to assess the cloaking performance of the designed structure.

Non-reciprocal Sound Transmission in Electro-acoustic Systems with Time-Modulated Circuits

Non-reciprocal sound transmission is demonstrated in an electro-acoustic system consisting of two shunt loudspeakers with time-modulated circuits.The shunt circuit is modulated by periodically varying the resistance in time sequence,and a phase difference of time modulation is set between two sets of loudspeakers to produce a spatial bias.The spatiotemporal modulation of acoustic properties is thus formed to break the reciprocity.The theoretical model based on the transfer-matrix method is developed to predict acoustic scatterings of electro-acoustic systems.Acoustic asymmetric transmission in opposite directions is disclosed by the model and is verified by time-domain simulation results based on the finite-difference time-domain method.Asymmetric transmission in multiple frequency bands can be created by tuning circuit parameters,showing their ability in regulating acoustic non-reciprocal behavior.This study may provide a platform for the design of compact and non-reciprocal acoustic devices with applications to efficient noise control.

Developmental Exposure to Bisphenol A Degrades Auditory Cortical Processing in Rats

Developmental exposure to bisphenol A(BPA),an endocrine-disrupting contaminant,impairs cognitive function in both animals and humans.However,whether BPA affects the development of primary sensory systems,which are the first to mature in the cortex,remains largely unclear.Using the rat as a model,we aimed to record the physiological and structural changes in the primary auditory cortex(A1)following lactational BPA exposure and their possible effects on behavioral outcomes.We found that BPA-exposed rats showed significant behavioral impairments when performing a sound temporal rate discrimination test.A significant alteration in spectral and temporal processing was also recorded in their A1,manifested as degraded frequency selectivity and diminished stimulus rate-following by neurons.These post-exposure effects were accompanied by changes in the density and maturity of dendritic spines in A1.Our findings demonstrated developmental impacts of BPA on auditory cortical processing and auditory-related discrimination,particularly in the temporal domain.Thus,the health implications for humans associated with early exposure to endocrine disruptors such as BPA merit more careful examination.

Using RAPD in Neisseria gonorrhoeae genotyping and transmission detection

The aim of this paper is to develop an applic-able Random Amplified Polymorphic DNAs(RAPD)method for genotyping Neisseria gonorrhoeae strain,and discuss the possibility of using the RAPD method to trace N.gonorrhoeae strain transmission route.Four different pretreatment methods were used on the N.gonorrhoeae genomic DNA component,and the best adaptive extract method was selected for RAPD.Different RAPD primers sequence was used for amplification and their differenti-ating capabilities for N.gonorrhoeae strains were com-pared.Applicable RAPD primer was selected for N.gonorrhoeae genotyping and then applied into transmis-sion detection.The results show that the so called cetyl-trimethylammonium bromide(CTAB)method for extracting genomic DNA could give integrated genomic DNA and give out relatively better RAPD fingerprint maps,subsequently,using selected RAPD primer could give out a group of amplification polymerase chain reac-tion bands.The fingerprint maps from different N.gonor-rhoeae strains were distinctive.Some main segments were common to all the N.gonorrhoeae strains tested.Some segments were different among the N.gonorrhoeae strains.According to the fingerprint maps and similarity index of different N.gonorrhoeae isolates,isolates from a pair of sex-partners were very similar.Based on these findings,the best extracting method and suitable RAPD primer were chosen.The RAPD fingerprint maps could type N.gonorrhoeae effectively and could be used as an additional approach in molecular epidemiology for tracing infection sources.