Stannate-Based Materials as Anodes in Lithium-Ion and Sodium-Ion Batteries: A Review.

Binary metal oxide stannate (M2SnO4; M = Zn, Mn, Co, etc.) structures, with their high theoretical capacity, superior lithium storage mechanism and suitable operating voltage, as well as their dual suitability for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) and sodium-ion batteries (SIBs), are strong candidates for next-generation anode materials. However, the capacity deterioration caused by the severe volume expansion problem during the insertion/extraction of lithium or sodium ions during cycling of M2SnO4-based anode materials is difficult to avoid, which greatly affects their practical applications. Strategies often employed by researchers to address this problem include nanosizing the material size, designing suitable structures, doping with carbon materials and heteroatoms, metal-organic framework (MOF) derivation and constructing heterostructures. In this paper, the advantages and issues of M2SnO4-based materials are analyzed, and the strategies to solve the issues are discussed in order to promote the theoretical work and practical application of M2SnO4-based anode materials.

Gambogic acid suppresses nasopharyngeal carcinoma via rewiring molecular network of cancer malignancy and immunosurveillance.

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is a malignant tumor highly prevalent in Southeast Asia. The distant metastasis and disease recurrence are still unsolved clinical problems. In recent years, traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) monomers have become significantly attractive due to their advantages. Using high throughput drug sensitivity screening, we identified gambogic acid (GA) as a common TCM monomer displaying multiple anti-NPC effects. GA could effectively inhibit the proliferation of low differentiated cells and highly metastatic cells in NPC via inducing apoptosis and G2/M cell cycle arrest. In addition, GA obviously repressed the abilities of cell clone, migration, invasion, angiogenesis and represented satisfied synergistic effects combined with chemotherapy. Importantly, we found the elevated immune checkpoint CD47 stimulated after chemotherapy was dramatically impaired by GA treatment. Mechanically, the network pharmacology analyses unraveled that the oncogenic signaling pathways including STATs were rewired by GA treatment. Taken together, our study reveals a molecular basis and provides a rationale for GA application as the treatment regime in NPC therapy in future.

S100A8/A9 Molecular Complexes Promote Cancer Migration and Invasion via the p38 MAPK Pathway in Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma.

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is one type of malignancy associated with migration and invasion through a currently unclear mechanism. We previously discovered S100A8/A9 levels were roughly elevated in the plasma of NPC patients as the promising biomarkers. However, their expressions and underlying functions in NPC tissues are still unknown. In the present study, we analyzed 49 NPC tissues and 20 chronic pharyngitis (CP) tissues. Immunohistochemical staining was performed in different tissues and analyzed by the Mann-Whitney U test statistically. Transwell migration and invasion experiments were further performed to determine S100A8/A9 effects on NPC. Our results showed that S100A8/A9 in NPC tissues were significantly higher than those in CP tissues, closely associated with NPC clinical stages. Intriguingly, exogenous S100A8/A9 protein stimulation could dramatically enhance NPC migration and invasion abilities. In addition, p38 MAPK pathway blockade could diminish the migration and invasion of NPC cells stimulated by S100A8/A9 proteins. The downstream tumor invasion and migration associated proteins (e.g., MMP7) were also elevated in NPC tissues, consistent with S100A8/A9 overexpression. Taken together, our present findings suggest that the secreted soluble inflammatory factors S100A8/A9 might promote cancer migration and invasion via the p38 MAPK signaling pathway along with invasion/migration associated proteins overexpression in the tumor microenvironment of NPC. This may shed light on the mechanism understanding of NPC prognosis and provide more novel clues for NPC diagnosis and therapy.

Network Pharmacology Reveals Polyphyllin II as One Hit of Nano Chinese Medicine Monomers against Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma.

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is a malignant tumor in southern China, and nano Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) represents great potential to cancer therapy. To predict the potential targets and mechanism of polyphyllin II against NPC and explore its possibility for the future nano-pharmaceutics of Chinese medicine monomers, network pharmacology was included in the present study. Totally, ninety-four common potential targets for NPC and polyphyllin II were discovered. Gene Ontology (GO) function enrichment analysis showed that biological processes and functions mainly concentrated on apoptotic process, protein phosphorylation, cytosol, protein binding, and ATP binding. In addition, the anti-NPC effects of polyphyllin II mainly involved in the pathways related to cancer, especially in the PI3K-Akt signaling indicated by the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis. The "drug-target-disease" network diagram indicated that the key genes were SRC, MAPK1, MAPK14, and AKT1. Taken together, this study revealed the potential drug targets and underlying mechanisms of polyphyllin II against NPC through modern network pharmacology, which provided a certain theoretical basis for the future nano TCM research.

[Determination of organochlorine pesticide residues in the roots of Zanthoxylum nitidum by GC-MS].

OBJECTIVE: To determine the contents of organochlorine pesticide residues in the roots of Zanthoxylum nitidum and provide scientific foundation for the quality control and standard establishment. METHODS: GC-MS method with selected ion monitoring (SIM) mode was used to analyze the contents of organochlorine pesticide residues in the roots of Zanthoxylum nitidum. The samples were extracted with acetone and ultrasonic vibrations, and the analytical samples were purified by anhydrous sodium sulfate-anhydrous magnesium sulfate -PSA -C18-PestiCarb -phase extraction (SPE) cartridge. RESULTS: Eight kinds of organochlorine pesticide were detected simultanously. Small amounts of OP-DDT were detected in samples 1, 4, 5, 6, 11 and 12, no organochlorine pesticide residue was detected in other samples. The RSD of precision ranged from 0.89% to 2.21%, and the average recovery ranged from 85.33% to 103.70%, with the RSD less than 4%. CONCLUSION: The contents of organochlorine pesticide residues in the roots of Zanthoxylum nitidum are less than 0.2 ppm. This method is sensitive, good purifying, and suitable for analyzing organochlorine pesticide residues in the roots of Zanthoxylum nitidum.