Preparation of gold nanorod-incorporated monolith for solid phase extraction of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.

An organic-inorganic hybrid monolithic column doped with gold nanorods (AuNRs) was prepared and evaluated for solid phase extraction (SPE) of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). Excellent dispersibility of AuNRs in binary green porogen system consisting of 1-hexyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate and deep eutectic solvents (DESs) was confirmed by energy dispersive spectrometry (EDS). The particle size of the resulting AuNRs (70-90 nm) was thoroughly examined by a transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The redox system including ammonium persulfate (APS) and tetramethylethylenediamine (TEMED) was used to initiate in situ polymerization at 4 °C to prepare the hybrid monolith. The mesoporous structure of the AuNR hybrid monoliths was confirmed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and nitrogen adsorption. With enrichment factors (EFs) of 150- to 292-fold, the developed method was successfully applied to the determination of 10 PAHs in wastewater samples. The recoveries at a spiked level were in the range 84.9 to 99.5% with limit of detections (LODs) and relative standard deviations (RSDs) ranging from 0.02 to 0.10 µg L-1 and 1.5 to 4.2%, respectively. The correlation coefficients (R2) for the calibration function obtained were better 0.9991 for the target compounds. Compared to the AuNR-free monolith, the extraction efficiency of the AuNR-incorporated monolith is more than two times higher. The results indicated that the doping of AuNRs is an effective approach to obtain the hybrid monolithic column with good separation ability for PAHs. Graphical abstract.

Preparation of graphene oxide incorporated monolithic chip based on deep eutectic solvents for solid phase extraction.

A monolithic chip incorporated with graphene oxide (GO) based on deep eutectic solvents (DESs) was developed for solid phase extraction (SPE). The carboxylated GO was modified with p-aminostyrene (pAS) by amidation, and the obtained GO (pAS-COOH-GO) was covalently incorporated into poly(butyl methacrylate-co-ethylene glycol dimethyl methacrylate) monolithic chip. Due to the high viscosity characteristics of DESs, a uniform pAS-COOH-GO incorporated monolithic chip with good permeability can be achieved. A systematic study of the preparation parameters on the performance of the resulting monolith was carried out, including the content of pAS-COOH-GO, DESs composition and porogen ratio. The resulting pAS-COOH-GO incorporated monolith was characterized by nitrogen adsorption, scanning electron microscopy, and transmission electron microscopy. The GO-doped monolithic chip can be used for SPE of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (phenanthrene, anthracene, fluoranthene, pyrene, benzo(a)anthracene, benzo(a) pyrene, dibenzo(a,h)anthracene and inden(1,2,3,-cd)pyrene). The recoveries were all higher than 90%, which was about twice as high as that of the monolithic chip prepared without GO. By comparing the SPE results with that of GO free monolithic chip, good enrichment effects were demonstrated on the pAS-COOH-GO incorporated monolithic chip.

Synergistic effect of organic-inorganic hybrid monomer and polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxanes in a boronate affinity monolithic capillary/chip for enrichment of glycoproteins.

A boronate affinity monolith with improved affinity and selectivity for glycoproteins was prepared starting from two monomers. The first is 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane-methacrylic acid (APTES-MAA), and the other is a polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane (POSS) monomer. In the next step, 3-(acrylamido)benzeneboronic acid was adopted as boronate affinity ligand, and ethylene glycol dimethacrylate as the crosslinker, and iso-propanol and octanol as binary porogens. The synergistic effect of APTES-MAA and POSS warrants good affinity and selectivity for glycoproteins, which results in a number of attractive features including (a) a wide operation pH range (from 5 to 8); (b) higher enrichment factors ranging from 19.3 to 20.6; (c) greater recoveries of glycoproteins between 95.8 and 107.1%; (d) lower relative standard deviations of ≤4.2%. Compared to the corresponding APTES-MAA/POSS-free monolith, the new boronate material had 1.7-fold increased glycoprotein recovery from complex samples. Glycoproteins in 500-fold diluted serum samples can be enriched by the boronate monolith. Graphical abstractSchematic representation of the preparation of 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane-methacrylic acid/polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxanes boronate affinity monolith. This sorbent exhibits high selectivity and wide pH operation range for capturing glycopeptides.

Overexpression miR-211-5p hinders the proliferation, migration, and invasion of thyroid tumor cells by downregulating SOX11.

PURPOSE: This study was aimed to investigate the relationship between miR-211-5p and SOX11, and the effects of their interaction on the proliferation, viability, and invasion of human thyroid cancer (TC) cells. METHODS: We used quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) to determine the expression of miR-211-5p and SOX11mRNA in the thyroid tumorous and the adjacent tissues. The target relationship between miR-211-5p and SOX11 was confirmed using dual luciferase reporter gene assay. Flow cytometry, colony formation assay, Transwell assay, and MTT assay were performed to determine the cell-cycle progression, cell apoptosis, proliferation and invasion, respectively. In addition, the tumor formation assay in nude mice was done to assess the effect of miR-211-5p on TC development in vivo. RESULTS: MiR-211-5p was underexpressed, whereas SOX11 was overexpressed in TC. The overexpression of miR-211-5p inhibited the expression of SOX11. The cell cycle was arrested and the proliferation as well as invasiveness was suppressed by exogenous miR-211-5p in TC cell line. The antitumor role of miR-211-5p was proved by the animal experiment. CONCLUSION: MiR-211-5p affected the viability, proliferation and invasion of TC by negatively regulating SOX11 expression.

Observation of the effect of targeted therapy of 64-slice spiral CT combined with cryoablation for liver cancer.

AIM: To observe the effect of targeted therapy with 64-slice spiral computed tomography (CT) combined with cryoablation for liver cancer. METHODS: A total of 124 patients (142 tumors) were enrolled into this study. According to the use of dual-slice spiral CT or 64-slice spiral CT as a guide technology, patients were divided into two groups: dual-slice group (n = 56, 65 tumors) and 64-slice group (n = 8, 77 tumors). All patients were accepted and received targeted therapy by an argon-helium superconducting surgery system. The guided scan times of the two groups was recorded and compared. In the two groups, the lesion ice coverage in diameter of ≥ 3 cm and < 3 cm were recorded, and freezing effective rate was compared. Hepatic perfusion values [hepatic artery perfusion (HAP), portal vein perfusion (PVP), and the hepatic arterial perfusion index (HAPI)] of tumor tissues, adjacent tissues and normal liver tissues at preoperative and postoperative four weeks in the two groups were compared. Local tumor changes were recorded and efficiency was compared at four weeks post-operation. Adverse events were recorded and compared between the two groups, including fever, pain, frostbite, nausea, vomiting, pleural effusion and abdominal bleeding. RESULTS: Guided scan times in the dual-slice group was longer than that in the 64-slice group (t = 11.445, P = 0.000). The freezing effective rate for tumors < 3 cm in diameter in the dual-slice group (81.58%) was lower than that in the 64-slice group (92.86%) (χ2 = 5.707, P = 0.017). The HAP and HAPI of tumor tissues were lower at four weeks post-treatment than at pre-treatment in both groups (all P < 0.05), and those in the 64-slice group were lower than that in the dual-slice group (all P < 0.05). HAP and PVP were lower and HAPI was higher in tumor adjacent tissues at post-treatment than at pre-treatment (all P < 0.05). Furthermore, the treatment effect and therapeutic efficacy in the dual-slice group were lower than the 64-slice group at four weeks post-treatment (all P < 0.05). Moreover, pleural effusion and intraperitoneal hemorrhage occurred in patients in the dual-slice group, while no complications occurred in the 64-slice group (all P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: 64-slice spiral CT applied with cryoablation in targeted therapy for liver cancer can achieve a safe and effective freezing treatment, so it is worth being used.

Recent advances in the template-directed synthesis of porphyrin nanorings.

The template-directed strategy is a powerful method to construct porphyrin nanorings with high complexities, wherein metalloporphyrin precursors pre-organize via supramolecular interactions of the porphyrin or its central metal with a carefully selected template, and then react with each other to deliver a final cyclic multiporphyrin structure. In this article, we review the recent breakthroughs in the template-directed synthesis methods and new structures of porphyrin or metalloporphyrin nanorings, as well as their applications in host-guest chemistry and artificial light-harvesting.

Power analysis of principal components regression in genetic association studies.

Association analysis provides an opportunity to find genetic variants underlying complex traits. A principal components regression (PCR)-based approach was shown to outperform some competing approaches. However, a limitation of this method is that the principal components (PCs) selected from single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) may be unrelated to the phenotype. In this article, we investigate the theoretical properties of such a method in more detail. We first derive the exact power function of the test based on PCR, and hence clarify the relationship between the test power and the degrees of freedom (DF). Next, we extend the PCR test to a general weighted PCs test, which provides a unified framework for understanding the properties of some related statistics. We then compare the performance of these tests. We also introduce several data-driven adaptive alternatives to overcome difficulties in the PCR approach. Finally, we illustrate our results using simulations based on real genotype data. Simulation study shows the risk of using the unsupervised rule to determine the number of PCs, and demonstrates that there is no single uniformly powerful method for detecting genetic variants.