Correlation analysis of serum IGF-1 and IL-6 and urinary albumin/creatinine ratio in patients with type 2 diabetic kidney disease.

Objectives: Diabetic kidney disease (DKD) is one of the most common chronic complications in diabetic patients, and there are major limitations in its pathological diagnosis. This study's objectives were to examine the changes in serum insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) and interleukin-6 (IL-6) levels in DKD patients with various urinary albumin/creatinine ratio (ACR) and to evaluate the utility of these two biological markers in the clinical diagnosis of the condition. Methods: We chose 80 type 2 diabetic patients as the experimental group and 20 healthy normal participants as the control group. The experimental group was split into three groups based on the ACR range: diabetes without nephropathy group (ACR < 30 mg/g), microalbuminuric group (30 < ACR < 300 mg/g), and macroalbuminuric group (ACR > 300 mg/g). The levels of serum IL-6 and IGF-1 were assessed in each trial participant. Results: Serum IGF-1 was higher in the experimental group than in the control group (P < 0.01), and serum IL-6 levels were also higher than in the control group (P < 0.001). In DKD patients, serum levels of IL-6 and IGF-1 tended to rise when ACR levels rose. By Pearson correlation analysis, serum IGF-1 and IL-6 were positively correlated with ACR (r = 0.765 and r = 0.651, all P < 0.001) and negatively correlated with eGFR (r = -0.389 and r = -0.364, all P < 0.01). Additionally, the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) characteristic curve showed that the area under the curve (AUC) values for serum IGF-1 and IL-6 were 0.9056 and 0.7850, respectively, while the AUR value for both combined was 0.9367. Conclusion: Serum IGF-1 and IL-6 levels can be used to diagnose DKD, and the combined analysis of these two indicators can improve the sensitivity and specificity of the disease diagnosis.

A Materials Science Perspective of Midstream Challenges in the Utilization of Heavy Crude Oil.

An increasing global population and a sharply upward trajectory of per capita energy consumption continue to drive the demand for fossil fuels, which remain integral to energy grids and the global transportation infrastructure. The oil and gas industry is increasingly reliant on unconventional deposits such as heavy crude oil and bitumen for reasons of accessibility, scale, and geopolitics. Unconventional deposits such as the Canadian Oil Sands in Northern Alberta contain more than one-third of the world's viscous oil reserves and are vital linchpins to meet the energy needs of rapidly industrializing populations. Heavy oil is typically recovered from subsurface deposits using thermal recovery approaches such as steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD). In this perspective article, we discuss several aspects of materials science challenges in the utilization of heavy crude oil with an emphasis on the needs of the Canadian Oil Sands. In particular, we discuss surface modification and materials' design approaches essential to operations under extreme environments of high temperatures and pressures and the presence of corrosive species. The demanding conditions for materials and surfaces are directly traceable to the high viscosity, low surface tension, and substantial sulfur content of heavy crude oil, which necessitates extensive energy-intensive thermal processes, warrants dilution/emulsification to ease the flow of rheologically challenging fluids, and engenders the need to protect corrodible components. Geopolitical reasons have further led to a considerable geographic separation between extraction sites and advanced refineries capable of processing heavy oils to a diverse slate of products, thus necessitating a massive midstream infrastructure for transportation of these rheologically challenging fluids. Innovations in fluid handling, bitumen processing, and midstream transportation are critical to the economic viability of heavy oil. Here, we discuss foundational principles, recent technological advancements, and unmet needs emphasizing candidate solutions for thermal insulation, membrane-assisted separations, corrosion protection, and midstream bitumen transportation. This perspective seeks to highlight illustrative materials' technology developments spanning the range from nanocomposite coatings and cement sheaths for thermal insulation to the utilization of orthogonal wettability to engender separation of water-oil emulsions stabilized by endogenous surfactants extracted during SAGD, size-exclusion membranes for fractionation of bitumen, omniphobic coatings for drag reduction in pipelines and to ease oil handling in containers, solid prills obtained from partial bitumen solidification to enable solid-state transport with reduced risk of damage from spills, and nanocomposite coatings incorporating multiple modes of corrosion inhibition. Future outlooks for onsite partial upgradation are also described, which could potentially bypass the use of refineries for some fractions, enable access to a broader cross-section of refineries, and enable a new distributed chemical manufacturing paradigm.

Optimizing the Micro/Mesoporous Structure of Hierarchical Porous Carbon Synthesized from Petroleum Pitch Using the Solvent-Free Method for Ultra-Fast Capacitive Deionization.

In this work, a solvent-free ZnO-template method is used to synthesize hierarchical porous carbons (denoted as HPC-X; X = 1, 1.5, 2, and 4 g of ZnO) via the pyrolysis of petroleum industrial-residual pitch with ZnO. The proposed method allows precise control of the micro/meso/macroporous structure of the HPC by adjusting the amount of ZnO. The results show that the average pore size of HPCs prominently increases from 2.4 to 3.7 nm with the increase in the ZnO/pitch ratio. In addition, it is shown that HPCs have a high surface area between 1141 and 1469 m2 g-1, a wide-range pore size distribution (micro-, meso-, and macropores), and a tap density ranging from 0.2 to 0.57 g cm-3. The capacitive deionization performances of HPCs for sodium and chloride ions are investigated. The results show that HPC-2 exhibits the highest electrosorption capacity of 9.94 mg g-1 within 10.0 min and a maximum electrosorption capacity of 10.62 mg g-1 at 1.2 V in a 5.0 mM NaCl solution. Hence, HPC-2 is a highly promising candidate as an electrode material for rapid deionization.

Negative Thermal Expansion HfV2O7 Nanostructures for Alleviation of Thermal Stress in Nanocomposite Coatings.

A primary mode of failure of thin-film coatings is the mismatch in thermal expansion coefficients of the substrate and the coating, which results in accumulation of interfacial stresses and ultimately in film delamination. While much attention has been devoted to modulation of interfacial bonding to mitigate delamination, current strategies are constrained in their generalizability and have had limited success in imbuing resistance to prolonged thermal cycling. We demonstrate here the incorporation of rigid thermal expansion compensators within polymeric films as a generalizable strategy for minimizing thermal mismatch with the substrate. Nanostructures of the isotropic negative thermal expansion (NTE) material HfV2O7 have been prepared based on the reaction of nanoparticulate precursors. The NTE behavior, derived from transverse oxygen displacement within the cubic structure, has been examined using temperature-variant powder X-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy, electron microscopy, and selected-area electron diffraction measurements. HfV2O7 initially crystallizes in a 3 × 3 × 3 superlattice but undergoes phase transformations to stabilize a cubic structure that exhibits strong and isotropic NTE with a coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) = -6.7 × 10-6 °C-1 across an extended temperature range of 130-700 °C. Incorporation of HfV2O7 in a high-temperature thermoset polybenzimidazole enables the reduction of compressive stress by 67.3% for a relatively small loading of 26.6 vol % HfV2O7. Based on a composite model, we demonstrate that HfV2O7 can reduce the thermal expansion coefficient of polymer nanocomposite films, even at low volume fractions, as a result of its substantially higher elastic modulus compared to the continuous polymer matrix. By changing the volume fraction of HfV2O7, the overall coefficients of thermal expansion of the film can be tuned to match a range of substrates, thereby mitigating thermal stresses and resolving a fundamental challenge for high-temperature composites and nanocomposite coatings.

Crystal growth in dentinal tubules with bio-calcium carbonate-silica sourced from equisetum grass.

BACKGROUND/PURPOSE: One effective way to deal with dentin hypersensitivity is to develop materials to seal the tubules. The porous bio-calcium carbonate-silica (BCCS) contained well-dispersed CaCO3 would form calcium phosphates to seal the dentinal tubules when mixed with an acidic solution. The acidic hydrothermal treatment and calcination to isolate the BCCS from the agricultural waste like equisetum grass was used, which would be more environmentally friendly than chemically synthesized mesoporous biomaterials. The aim of this study was to develop mesoporous materials from natural resources to occlude the dentinal tubules which could be more environmentally-friendly. METHODS: Dentin disc samples were prepared and treated with different methods as follows: (1) BCCS mixed with H3PO4; (2) BCCS mixed with KH2PO4; (3) Seal & Protect® was used as a comparison group. Sealing efficacy was evaluated by measuring the depths and percentages of precipitate occlusion in dentinal tubules with SEM. RESULTS: The N2 adsorption-desorption isotherm of the BCCS demonstrated a pore size of around 15.0 nm and a surface area of 61 m2g-1. From the results of occlusion percentage and depth, the BCCS treated with H3PO4 or KH2PO4 demonstrated promising sealing efficacy than the commercial product. CONCLUSION: This synthetic process used the agricultural waste equisetum grass to produce bio-calcium carbonate-silica would be environmentally friendly, which has great potential in treating exposed dentin related diseases.

Epitaxial stabilization versus interdiffusion: synthetic routes to metastable cubic HfO2 and HfV2O7 from the core-shell arrangement of precursors.

Metastable materials that represent excursions from thermodynamic minima are characterized by distinctive structural motifs and electronic structure, which frequently underpins new function. The binary oxides of hafnium present a rich diversity of crystal structures and are of considerable technological importance given their high dielectric constants, refractory characteristics, radiation hardness, and anion conductivity; however, high-symmetry tetragonal and cubic polymorphs of HfO2 are accessible only at substantially elevated temperatures (1720 and 2600 °C, respectively). Here, we demonstrate that the core-shell arrangement of VO2 and amorphous HfO2 promotes outwards oxygen diffusion along an electropositivity gradient and yields an epitaxially matched V2O3/HfO2 interface that allows for the unprecedented stabilization of the metastable cubic polymorph of HfO2 under ambient conditions. Free-standing cubic HfO2, otherwise accessible only above 2600 °C, is stabilized by acid etching of the vanadium oxide core. In contrast, interdiffusion under oxidative conditions yields the negative thermal expansion material HfV2O7. Variable temperature powder X-ray diffraction demonstrate that the prepared HfV2O7 exhibits pronounced negative thermal expansion in the temperature range between 150 and 700 °C. The results demonstrate the potential of using epitaxial crystallographic relationships to facilitate preferential nucleation of otherwise inaccessible metastable compounds.

Hierarchical Micro/Mesoporous Carbons Synthesized with a ZnO Template and Petroleum Pitch via a Solvent-Free Process for a High-Performance Supercapacitor.

Hierarchical micro/mesoporous carbons were prepared using ZnO nanoparticles as hard templates and a petroleum industrial-residual pitch as the carbon source via a solvent-free process. The ZnO templates can be easily removed using HCl(aq), thereby avoiding limitations present in conventional porous silica templating approaches that require highly corrosive HF(aq) for template removal. Notably, the proposed solvent-free synthetic method from low-cost pitch to high-value porous carbons is a friendly process with respect to our overexploited environment. With the combination of ZnO nanoparticles and pitch, the surface area (76-548 m2 g-1) of the resultant mesoporous carbons increases with an increase in the weight ratios of ZnO to pitch. Furthermore, the hierarchical micro/mesoporous carbons with a large surface area (854-1979 m2 g-1) can be feasibly fabricated by only adding an appropriate amount of an activating agent. Meanwhile, N-doped hierarchical porous carbons can be achieved by carbonizing the blend of these materials with melamine. For supercapacitor application, the resultant carbons exhibit a high capacitance up to 200.5 F g-1 at 5 mV s-1 using LiClO4/PC as the electrolyte in a symmetrical two-electrode cell. More importantly, the coin-cell supercapacitor based on porous carbons achieved a capacitance of 94 F g-1 at 5 mV s-1 and 63% capacitance retention at 500 mV s-1, thereby holding the potential for commercialization.