Recent Advances in pH- or/and Photo-Responsive Nanovehicles.

The combination of nanotechnology and chemotherapy has resulted in more effective drug design via the development of nanomaterial-based drug delivery systems (DDSs) for tumor targeting. Stimulus-responsive DDSs in response to internal or external signals can offer precisely controlled delivery of preloaded therapeutics. Among the various DDSs, the photo-triggered system improves the efficacy and safety of treatment through spatiotemporal manipulation of light. Additionally, pH-induced delivery is one of the most widely studied strategies for targeting the acidic micro-environment of solid tumors. Accordingly, in this review, we discuss representative strategies for designing DDSs using light as an exogenous signal or pH as an endogenous trigger.

Adaptation of a mixed culture of acidophiles for a tank biooxidation of refractory gold concentrates containing a high concentration of arsenic.

We adapted a mixed culture of acidophiles to high arsenic concentrations to confirm the possibility of achieving more than 70% biooxidation of refractory gold concentrates containing high arsenic (As) concentration. The biooxidation process was applied to refractory gold concentrates containing approximately 139.67 g/kg of total As in a stirred tank reactor using an adapted mixed culture of Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans and Acidithiobacillus thiooxidans. The percentage of the biooxidation process was analyzed based on the total As removal efficiency. The As removal was monitored by inductively coupled plasma (ICP) analysis, conducted every 24 h. The results obtained with the adapted culture were compared with the percentage of biooxidation obtained with a non-adapted mixed culture of A. ferrooxidans and A. thiooxidans, and with their respective pure cultures. The percentages of biooxidation obtained during 358 h of reaction were 72.20%, 38.20%, 27.70%, and 11.45% for adapted culture, non-adapted culture, and pure cultures of A. thiooxidans and A. ferrooxidans, respectively. The adapted culture showed a peak maximum percentage of biooxidation of 77% at 120 h of reaction, confirming that it is possible to obtain biooxidation percentages over 70% in gold concentrates containing high As concentrations.

Bioleaching of arsenic from highly contaminated mine tailings using Acidithiobacillus thiooxidans.

The behavior of arsenic (As) bioleaching from mine tailings containing high amount of As (ca. 34,000 mg/kg) was investigated using Acidithiobacillus thiooxidans to get an insight on the optimal conditions that would be applied to practical heap and/or tank bioleaching tests. Initial pH (1.8-2.2), temperature (25-40 °C), and solid concentration (0.5-4.0%) were employed as experimental parameters. Complementary characterization experiments (e.g., XRD, SEM-EDS, electrophoretic mobility, cell density, and sulfate production) were also carried out to better understand the mechanism of As bioleaching. The results showed that final As leaching efficiency was similar regardless of initial pH. However, greater initial As leaching rate was observed at initial pH 1.8 than other conditions, which could be attributed to greater initial cell attachment to mine tailings. Unlike the trend observed when varying the initial pH, the final As leaching efficiency varied with the changes in temperature and solid concentration. Specifically, As leaching efficiency tended to decrease with increasing temperature due to the decrease in the bacterial growth rate at higher temperature. Meanwhile, As leaching efficiency tended to increase with decreasing solid concentration. The results for jarosite contents in mine tailings residue after bioleaching revealed that much greater amount of the jarosite was formed during the bioleaching reaction at higher solid concentration, suggesting that the coverage of the surface of the mine tailings by jarosite and/or the co-precipitation of the leached As with jarosite could be a dominant factor reducing As leaching efficiency.

Extraskeletal intraspinal mesenchymal chondrosarcoma; 18F-FDG PET/CT finding.

Mesenchymal chondrosarcoma is a rare and aggressive form of chondrosarcoma. The extraskeletal intraspinal type is even rare among the mesenchymal chondrosarcoma cases. We presented a case of a 17-year-old boy pathologically diagnosed with intraspinal mesenchymal chondrosarcoma. MRI showed multiple intradural extramedullary masses with contrast enhancement, without the evidence of brain lesion. On F-FDG PET/CT, hypermetabolism was observed in the lesions matched with enhancement on spine MRI. The lesions were well differentiated from spinal cord. In the case of hypermetabolic lesion in intradural and extramedullary lesion of the spinal cord, mesenchymal chondrosarcoma should be considered for the differential diagnosis.