Clinical efficacy of EUS-guided celiac plexus neurolysis versus EUS-guided celiac ganglion irradiation with iodine-125 seeds for pain relief in advanced pancreatic cancer: A long-term retrospective study.

Background and Objective: To compare the efficacy of EUS-guided celiac plexus neurolysis (CPN) and celiac plexus irradiation with iodine-125 (125I) seeds with absolute ethanol for relieving pain in patients with advanced pancreatic cancer. Methods: We retrospectively analyzed data of 81 patients with advanced pancreatic cancer who underwent EUS-CPN or EUS-125I implantation between January 2017 and December 2020. Postoperative pain was assessed using visual analog scale (VAS) scores; self-assessments of quality of life and the median survival time were compared between the 2 groups. Results: EUS-CPN and 125I implantation were performed in 43 and 38 patients, respectively. Postoperative VAS scores were significantly lower than the preoperative levels in both groups. One week after the operation, 26 patients (60.5%) in the EUS-CPN group achieved partial pain relief, whereas no patients in the EUS-125I seed group experienced pain relief. However, after 4 weeks postoperatively, VAS scores had decreased, and the rate of partial pain relief was higher for EUS-125I seeds than for EUS-CPN. Self-assessments of quality of life were similar in both groups during the first 1 month after the procedure. Conclusions: Both EUS-CPN and EUS-125I seeds can safely and effectively relieve pain in patients with advanced pancreatic cancer. Although EUS-125I seeds take additional time to show effects, the extent and duration of pain relief are better compared with CPN, and interestingly, the median survival time was different.

Evaluation of oxaliplatin and tigio combination therapy in locally advanced gastric cancer.

BACKGROUND: Locally advanced gastric cancer (LAGC) is a common malignant tumor. In recent years, neoadjuvant chemotherapy has gradually become popular for the treatment of LAGC. AIM: To investigate the efficacy of oxaliplatin combined with a tigio neoadjuvant chemotherapy regimen vs a conventional chemotherapy regimen for LAGC. METHODS: Ninety patients with LAGC were selected and randomly divided into control and study groups with 45 patients in each group, according to the numerical table method. The control group was treated with conventional chemotherapy, and the study group was treated with oxaliplatin combined with tigio-neoadjuvant chemotherapy. The primary outcome measures were the clinical objective response rate (ORR) and surgical resection rate (SRR), whereas the secondary outcome measures were safety and Karnofsky Performance Status score. RESULTS: The ORR in the study group was 80.00%, which was significantly higher than that of the control group (57.78%). In the study group, SRR was 75.56%, which was significantly higher than that of the control group (57.78%). There were 15.56% adverse reactions in the study group and 35.56% in the control group. These differences were statistically significant between the two groups. CONCLUSION: The combination of oxaliplatin and tigio before surgery as neoadjuvant chemotherapy for patients with LAGC can effectively improve the ORR and SRR and is safe.

Seawater quality criteria derivation and ecological risk assessment for dichlorvos in China.

Dichlorvos (DDVP) is a widely used organophosphorus pesticide (OPP) that has been frequently detected in the marine environment of China. Water quality criteria (WQC) is however not available for this emergent pollutant in the marine environment, which hinders its ecological risk assessment. This study, therefore, screened toxicity values of DDVP and conducted toxicity tests on six marine species to supplement toxicity data. The WQC for DDVP was derived with the species sensitivity distribution (SSD) methodology, based on which the ecological risk of DDVP in the seawater of China was assessed. The results showed that the recommended short-term (SWQC) and long-term water quality criteria (LWQC) for DDVP were 1.47 and 0.0521 µg/L, respectively. Most marine waters of China showed low or negligible risk (HQ < 1, ORP < 2 %), whereas some estuarine waters warrant further concern due to higher risk. This study provides the scientific basis for seawater quality standard formulation and ecological risk management for DDVP.

Acesulfame potassium triggers inflammatory bowel disease via the inhibition of focal adhesion pathway.

Acesulfame potassium (ACK) was generally regarded as innocuous and extensively ingested. Nevertheless, ACK has recently gained attention as a burgeoning pollutant that has the potential to induce a range of health hazards, particularly to the digestive system. Herein, we uncover that ACK initiates inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in mice and zebrafish, as indicated by the aggregation of macrophages in the intestine and the inhibition of intestinal mucus secretion. Transcriptome analysis of mice and zebrafish guts revealed that exposure to ACK typically impacts the cell cycle, focal adhesion, and PI3K-Akt signaling pathways. Using pharmacological approaches, we demonstrate that the PI3K-Akt signaling pathway and the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) triggered by cell division are not significant factors in the initiation of IBD caused by ACK. Remarkably, inhibition of the focal adhesion pathway is responsible for the IBD onset induced by ACK. Our results indicate the detrimental impacts and possible underlying mechanisms of ACK on the gastrointestinal system and provide insights for making informed choices about everyday dietary habits.

Chemodynamic therapy combined with endogenous ferroptosis based on "sea urchin-like" copper sulfide hydrogel for enhancing anti-tumor efficacy.

Chemodynamic therapy (CDT) is a promising strategy for cancer treatment, however, its application is restricted by low hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) concentration, insufficient reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation, and high glutathione (GSH) levels. Here, we developed an injectable thermosensitive hydrogel (DSUC-Gel) based on "sea urchin-like" copper sulfide nanoparticles (UCuS) loaded with dihydroartemisinin (DHA) and sulfasalazine (SAS) to overcome these limitations of CDT. DSUC was cleaved to release DHA, SAS and Cu2+ under acidic tumor microenvironment to enhance CDT. DHA with peroxide bridge responded to intracellular Fe2+ to alleviate H2O2 deficiency. SAS prevented GSH synthesis by targeting SLC7A11 and inhibited glutathione peroxidase (GPX4) activity to induce endogenous ferroptosis. ROS produced by Fenton-like reaction of Cu2+ promoted lipid peroxidation (LPO) accumulation to promote ferroptosis. Enhanced CDT and ferroptosis induced immunogenic cell death (ICD), promoted dendritic cells (DCs) maturation and cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs) infiltration. As a result, DSUC-Gel significantly inhibited tumor growth both in vitro and in vivo. Our study provides a novel approach for enhancing anti-tumor efficacy by combining CDT, endogenous ferroptosis and ICD.

SSM-Net: Semi-supervised multi-task network for joint lesion segmentation and classification from pancreatic EUS images.

Pancreatic cancer does not show specific symptoms, which makes the diagnosis of early stages difficult with established image-based screening methods and therefore has the worst prognosis among all cancers. Although endoscopic ultrasonography (EUS) has a key role in diagnostic algorithms for pancreatic diseases, B-mode imaging of the pancreas can be affected by confounders such as chronic pancreatitis, which can make both pancreatic lesion segmentation and classification laborious and highly specialized. To address these challenges, this work proposes a semi-supervised multi-task network (SSM-Net) to leverage unlabeled and labeled EUS images for joint pancreatic lesion classification and segmentation. Specifically, we first devise a saliency-aware representation learning module (SRLM) on a large number of unlabeled images to train a feature extraction encoder network for labeled images by computing a contrastive loss with a semantic saliency map, which is obtained by our spectral residual module (SRM). Moreover, for labeled EUS images, we devise channel attention blocks (CABs) to refine the features extracted from the pre-trained encoder on unlabeled images for segmenting lesions, and then devise a merged global attention module (MGAM) and a feature similarity loss (FSL) for obtaining a lesion classification result. We collect a large-scale EUS-based pancreas image dataset (LS-EUSPI) consisting of 9,555 pathologically proven labeled EUS images (499 patients from four categories) and 15,500 unlabeled EUS images. Experimental results on the LS-EUSPI dataset and a public thyroid gland lesion dataset show that our SSM-Net clearly outperforms state-of-the-art methods.

Insight into the bacterial community composition of the plastisphere in diverse environments of a coastal salt marsh.

The microbial community colonized on microplastics (MPs), known as the 'plastisphere', has attracted extensive concern owing to its environmental implications. Coastal salt marshes, which are crucial ecological assets, are considered sinks for MPs. Despite their strong spatial heterogeneity, there is limited information on plastisphere across diverse environments in coastal salt marshes. Herein, a 1-year field experiment was conducted at three sites in the Yancheng salt marsh in China. This included two sites in the intertidal zone, bare flat (BF) and Spartina alterniflora vegetation area (SA), and one site in the supratidal zone, Phragmites australis vegetation area (PA). Petroleum-based MPs (polyethylene and expanded polystyrene) and bio-based MPs (polylactic acid and polybutylene succinate) were employed. The results revealed significant differences in bacterial community composition between the plastisphere and sediment at all three sites examined, and the species enriched in the plastisphere exhibited location-specific characteristics. Overall, the largest difference was observed at the SA site, whereas the smallest difference was observed at the BF site. Furthermore, the MP polymer types influenced the composition of the bacterial communities in the plastisphere, also exhibiting location-specific characteristics, with the most pronounced impact observed at the PA site and the least at the BF site. The polybutylene succinate plastisphere bacterial communities at the SA and PA sites were quite different from the plastispheres from the other three MP polymer types. Co-occurrence network analyses suggested that the bacterial community network in the BF plastisphere exhibited the highest complexity, whereas the network in the SA plastisphere showed relatively sparse interactions. Null model analyses underscored the predominant role of deterministic processes in shaping the assembly of plastisphere bacterial communities across all three sites, with a more pronounced influence observed in the intertidal zone than in the supratidal zone. This study enriches our understanding of the plastisphere in coastal salt marshes.

Efficient C(sp3)-H bond oxidation on perovskite quantum dots based on Ce-oxygen affinity.

Perovskite quantum dots (QDs) have shown attractive prospects in the field of visible photocatalysis, especially in the synthesis of high value-added chemicals. However, under aerobic conditions, the stable operation of QD catalysts has been limited by the reactive oxygen species (ROS) generated by photoexcitation, especially superoxide species. Here, we propose a strategy of Ce3+ doping in perovskite QDs to guide superoxide species for photocatalytic oxidation reactions. In C(sp3)-H bond oxidation of hydrocarbons, superoxide species were rapidly generated and efficiently utilized on the surface of perovskite QDs, which achieves the stable operation of the catalytic system and obtains a high product conversion rate (15.3 mmol/g/h for benzaldehydes). The mechanism studies show that the strong Ce-oxygen affinity accelerates the relaxation process of photoinduced exciton transfer to superoxide species and inhibits the radiative recombination pathway. This work provides a new idea of utilizing oxygen species on perovskite surface and broadens the design strategy of high-performance QD photocatalysts.

Vitamin D receptor gene polymorphisms and multiple myeloma: a meta-analysis.

Vitamin D acts through the vitamin D receptor (VDR), and vitamin D level decreases in multiple myeloma (MM) patients. Single nucleotide polymorphisms in VDR alter its functions to affect the vitamin D status. This raises the question of whether VDR gene polymorphisms are associated with MM risk, which has been investigated in case‒control studies, but the results have been inconsistent. This meta-analysis aimed to investigate the relationship between VDR gene polymorphisms and MM risk. The PubMed, Web of Science, Medline, Embase, Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), Chinese Scientific Journal (VIP), Wanfang Databases (WANFANG) were searched from inception to June 1, 2023, without language restriction or publication preference. Pooled odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) for each variable were calculated. Leave-one-out sensitivity analysis was performed to determine the source of heterogeneity. Publication bias was assessed using Begg' and Egger's tests, and the trim-and-fill method was used to compensate for publication bias. The correlation meta-analysis was conducted using Comprehensive Meta-Analysis 3.0 and STATA 12.0 software. All the included studies were based on Asian populations and involved four VDR gene polymorphisms, TaqI (rs731236), ApaI (rs7975232), BsmI (rs1544410) and FokI (rs2228570). The results showed that TaqI (C vs. T: OR = 1.487, 95% CI 1.052, 2.104, P = 0.025; CC + CT vs. TT: OR = 1.830, 95% CI 1.138, 2.944, P = 0.013), ApaI (T vs. G: OR = 1.292, 95% CI 1.101, 1.517, P = 0.002; TT vs. GG: OR = 1.600, 95% CI 1.106, 2.314, P = 0.013; TG vs. GG: OR 1.305, 95% CI 1.050, 1.622; P = 0.016; TT + TG vs. GG: OR = 1.353, 95% CI 1.103, 1.662, P = 0.004), BsmI (GG vs. AA: OR = 1.918, 95% CI 1.293, 2.844, P = 0.001; GA vs. AA: OR = 1.333, 95% CI 1.058, 1.679, P = 0.015; G vs. A: OR = 1.398, 95% CI 1.180, 1.657, P = 0.000; GG vs. AA + GA: OR = 1.686, 95% CI 1.174, 2.423, P = 0.005), and FokI (T vs. C: OR = 1.687, 95% CI 1.474, 1.931, P = 0.000; TT vs. CC: OR = 2.829, 95% CI 2.066, 3.872, P = 0.000; TC vs. CC: OR = 1.579, 95% CI 1.304, 1.913, P = 0.000, TT + TC vs. CC: OR = 1.771, 95% CI 1.477, 2.125, P = 0.000; TT vs. CC + TC: OR = 2.409, 95% CI 1.814, 3.200, P = 0.000) are associated with MM risk. VDR gene polymorphisms including ApaI, BsmI, TaqI, and FokI are associated with MM risk in Asian populations. Additional studies with large sample sizes and different ethnicities are needed.

Improved glucose detection limit based on phosphorescence from protected metalloporphyrin triplet state.

BACKGROUND: Non-invasive indirect blood glucose monitoring can be realized by detecting low concentrations of glucose (0.05-5 mM) in tears, but sensitive optical indicators are required. The intensity of the phosphorescence of a candidate optical indicator, palladium hematoporphyrin monomethyl ether (Pd-HMME), is increased by oxygen consumption under sealed conditions in the presence of glucose and glucose oxidase. However, the glucose detection limit based on this mechanism is high (800 µM) because the phosphorescence is completely quenched under ambient oxygen conditions and hence a large amount of glucose is required to reduce the oxygen levels such that the phosphorescence signal is detectable. RESULTS: To improve the glucose detection limit of Pd-HMME phosphorescence-based methods, the triplet protector imidazole was introduced, and strong phosphorescence was observed under ambient oxygen conditions. Detectable phosphorescence enhancement occurred at low glucose concentrations (<200 µM). Linear correlation between the phosphorescence intensity and glucose concentration was observed in the range of 30-727 µM (R2 = 99.9 %), and the detection limit was ∼10 µM. The glucose sensor has a fast response time (∼90 s) and excellent selectivity for glucose. SIGNIFICANCE AND NOVELTY: These results indicate the potential of the developed optical indicator for fast, selective, and reliable low-concentration glucose sensing.

The carbohydrate metabolism and expression of carbohydrate-active enzyme genes in Aspergillus luchuensis fermentation of tea leaves.

Introduction: Carbohydrates, which make up 20 to 25% of tea beverages, are responsible for their flavor and bioactivity. Carbohydrates of pu-erh tea change during microbial fermentation and require further research. In this study, we examined the carbohydrate metabolism and expression of carbohydrate-active enzyme genes during the fermentation of tea leaves with Aspergillus luchuensis. Methods: Widely targeted metabolomics analysis, high-performance anion-exchange chromatography measurements, and transcriptomics were used in this study. Results: After fermentation, the levels of soluble sugar, hemicellulose, lignin, eight monosaccharides, and seven sugar alcohols increased. Meanwhile, the relative contents of polysaccharides, D-sorbitol, D-glucose, and cellulose decreased. High expression of 40 genes encoding 16 carbohydrate enzymes was observed during fermentation (FPKM>10). These genes encode L-iditol 2-dehydrogenase, pectinesterase, polygalacturonase, α-amylase, glucoamylase, endoglucanase, ß-glucosidase, ß-galactosidase, α-galactosidase, α-glucosidase, and glucose-6-phosphate isomerase, among others. Discussion: These enzymes are known to break down polysaccharides and cell wall cellulose, increasing the content of monosaccharides and soluble sugars.

High Expression of CLDN 18.2 is Associated with Poor Disease-Free Survival of HER-2 Positive Gastric Cancer.

Background: Anti-claudin (CLDN) 18.2 therapy has been proven to be effective in treating advanced gastric cancer with negative human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER-2). This study purposed to investigate the relationship of CLDN 18.2 expression with prognosis of HER-2-positive gastric cancer patients. Objective: To investigate the expression of claudin (CLDN) 18.2 in Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER-2) positive gastric cancer patients after radical resection and its relationship with gastric cancer prognosis. Methods: A total of 55 postoperative HER-2-positive gastric cancer patients were included in this study. CLDN 18.2 protein was detected by immunohistochemistry, and detailed clinical and pathological information was collected. Factors considered potentially important in the univariate analysis were included in the multivariate analysis, which involved COX regression to find the independent prognostic factors affecting disease-free survival (DFS). Results: Immunohistochemistry showed that different levels of CLDN 18.2 protein were expressed in HER-2 positive gastric cancer tissues, and the Chi-square analysis showed that the expression level of CLDN 18.2 was significantly correlated with the lymph node stage. Higher expression levels of CLDN 18.2 were found in patients with lymph node positivity and were associated with poor prognosis in HER-2-positive gastric cancer patients. Gastric cancer patients with low and high expressions of CLDN 18.2 had postoperative median DFS of 38.5 months (95% confidence interval (CI) 28.8-48.2 months) and 12.1 months (95% CI, 11.7-41.0 months), respectively. Conclusion: High expression of CLDN 18.2 in HER-2 positive gastric cancer is associated with poor prognosis, and the optimal treatment mode for this population is worth exploring after the approval of anti-CLDN 18.2 drugs.

Discovering Intrinsic Subgoals for Vision-and-Language Navigation via Hierarchical Reinforcement Learning.

Vision-and-language navigation requires an agent to navigate in a photo-realistic environment by following natural language instructions. Mainstream methods employ imitation learning (IL) to let the agent imitate the behavior of the teacher. The trained model will overfit the teacher's biased behavior, resulting in poor model generalization. Recently, researchers have sought to combine IL and reinforcement learning (RL) to overcome overfitting and enhance model generalization. However, these methods still face the problem of expensive trajectory annotation. We propose a hierarchical RL-based method-discovering intrinsic subgoals via hierarchical (DISH) RL-which overcomes the generalization limitations of current methods and gets rid of expensive label annotations. First, the high-level agent (manager) decomposes the complex navigation problem into simple intrinsic subgoals. Then, the low-level agent (worker) uses an intrinsic subgoal-driven attention mechanism for action prediction in a smaller state space. We place no constraints on the semantics that subgoals may convey, allowing the agent to autonomously learn intrinsic, more generalizable subgoals from navigation tasks. Furthermore, we design a novel history-aware discriminator (HAD) for the worker. The discriminator incorporates historical information into subgoal discrimination and provides the worker with additional intrinsic rewards to alleviate the reward sparsity. Without labeled actions, our method provides supervision for the worker in the form of self-supervision by generating subgoals from the manager. The final results of multiple comparison experiments on the Room-to-Room (R2R) dataset show that our DISH can significantly outperform the baseline in accuracy and efficiency.

Targeting Super-Enhancer-Driven Transcriptional Dependencies Suppresses Aberrant Hedgehog Pathway Activation and Overcomes Smoothened Inhibitor Resistance.

Aberrant activation of the Hedgehog (Hh) signaling pathway plays important roles in oncogenesis and therapeutic resistance in several types of cancer. The clinical application of FDA-approved Hh-targeted Smoothened inhibitors (SMOi) is hindered by the emergence of primary or acquired drug resistance. Epigenetic and transcriptional targeted therapies represent a promising direction for developing improved anti-Hh therapies. In this study, we integrated epigenetic/transcriptional-targeted small-molecule library screening with CRISPR/Cas9 knockout library screening and identified CDK9 and CDK12, two transcription elongation regulators, as therapeutic targets for antagonizing aberrant Hh activation and overcoming SMOi resistance. Inhibition of CDK9 or CDK12 potently suppressed Hh signaling and tumor growth in various SMOi responsive or resistant Hh-driven tumor models. Systemic epigenomic profiling elucidated the Hh-driven super-enhancer (SE) landscape and identified IRS1, encoding a critical component and cytoplasmic adaptor protein of the IGF pathway, as an oncogenic Hh-driven SE target gene and effective therapeutic target in Hh-driven tumor models. Collectively, this study identifies SE-driven transcriptional dependencies that represent promising therapeutic vulnerabilities for suppressing the Hh pathway and overcoming SMOi resistance. As CDK9 and IRS inhibitors have already entered human clinical trials for cancer treatment, these findings provide comprehensive preclinical support for developing trials for Hh-driven cancers.

Tuning Molecular Packing and Boosting Self-Assembling Properties via Ring Fusion Strategy in Naphthalimide-Based A-D-A Conjugated Systems.

Two fully fused acceptor-donor-acceptor (A-D-A) architecture conjugated derivatives (NPF and NCF) comprising an electron-withdrawing naphthalimide (NMI) and two different electron-donating cores, phenanthrene and carbazole, respectively, were conveniently synthesized by bismuth(III)-catalyzed selective cyclization of vinyl ethers. Compared with their corresponding single bond-linked A-D-A molecules NPS and NCS, both having a moderately twisted aromatic configuration, the ring fusion strategy leads to fully coplanar conjugated skeletons and greatly changes the electronic structures, photophysical properties, self-assembling behaviors, and molecular packing motifs. In particular, the naphthalimide/carbazole derivative NCF exhibits intriguing 2D brickwork packing and significantly enhanced self-assembling properties.

Recent Progress of Low-Dimensional Metal-Organic Frameworks for Aqueous Zinc-Based Batteries.

Aqueous zinc-based batteries (AZBs) are promising energy storage solutions with remarkable safety, abundant Zn reserve, cost-effectiveness, and relatively high energy density. However, AZBs still face challenges such as anode dendrite formation that reduces cycling stability and limited cathode capacity. Recently, low-dimensional metal-organic frameworks (LD MOFs) and their derivatives have emerged as promising candidates for improving the electrochemical performance of AZBs owing to their unique morphologies, high structure tunability, high surface areas, and high porosity. However, clear guidelines for developing LD MOF-based materials for high-performance AZBs are scarce. In this review, the recent progress of LD MOF-based materials for AZBs is critically examined. The typical synthesis methods and structural design strategies for improving the electrochemical performance of LD MOF-based materials for AZBs are first introduced. The recent noteworthy research achievements are systematically discussed and categorized based on their applications in different AZB components, including cathodes, anodes, separators, and electrolytes. Finally, the limitations are addressed and the future perspectives are outlined for LD MOFs and their derivatives in AZB applications. This review provides clear guidance for designing high-performance LD MOF-based materials for advanced AZBs.

Protective role of fruits of Rosa odorata var. gigantea against WIRS-induced gastric mucosal injury in rats by modulating pathway related to inflammation, oxidative stress and apoptosis.

Objective: Rosa odorata var. gigantea is a popular medicinal plant. Some studies have demonstrated that ethanolic extract of the fruits of R. odorata var. gigantea (FOE) has gastroprotective properties. The aim of this study was to investigate the gastroprotective activity of FOE on water immersion restrained stress (WIRS)-induced gastric mucosal injury in a rat model and elucidate the possible molecular mechanisms involved. Methods: A rat stress ulcer model was established in this study using WIRS. After rats were treated with FOE orally for 7 d, the effect of FOE treatment was analyzed by hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) staining, and the changes of inflammatory factors, oxidative stress factors, and gastric-specific regulatory factors and pepsin in the blood and gastric tissues of rats were examined by ELISA assay. Molecular mechanism of FOE was investigated by immunohistochemical assay and Western blot. Results: Compared with the WIRS group, FOE could diminish both the macroscopic and microscopic pathological morphology of gastric mucosa. FOE significantly preserved the antioxidants glutathione peroxidase (GSH-PX), superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT) contents; anti-inflammatory cytokines interleukin-10 (IL-10) and prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) levels as well as regulatory factors tumor necrosis factor-α (TGF-α) and somatostatin (SS) contents, while decreasing malondialdehyde (MDA), nitric oxide synthase (iNOS), tumor necrosis factor (TNF-α), interleukin-1ß (IL-1ß), interleukin-6 (IL-6), gastrin (GAS) and endothelin (ET) levels. Moreover, FOE distinctly upregulated the expression of Nrf2, HO-1, Bcl2 and proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA). In addition, FOE activated the expression of p-EGFR and downregulated the expression of NF-κB, Bax, Cleaved-caspase-3, Cyto-C and Cleaved-PARP1, thus promoting gastric mucosal cell survival. Conclusion: The current work demonstrated that FOE exerted a gastroprotective activity against gastric mucosal injury induced by WIRS. The underlying mechanism might be associated with the improvement of anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidation and anti-apoptosis systems.

Effects of Multidimensional Carbon-Based Nanomaterials on the Low-Carbon and High-Performance Cementitious Composites: A Critical Review.

Cementitious composites are ubiquitous in construction, and more and more research is focused on improving mechanical properties and environmental effects. However, the jury is still out on which material can achieve low-carbon and high-performance cementitious composites. This article compares the mechanical and environmental performance of zero-dimensional fullerenes, one-dimensional carbon nanotubes (CNTs), two-dimensional graphene oxide (GO), and three-dimensional nano-graphite platelets (NGPs) on cementitious composites. The literature review shows that two-dimensional (2D) GO has the best mechanical and environmental performance, followed by 3D NGPs, 1D CNTs, and 0D fullerenes. Specifically, GO stands out for its lower energy consumption (120-140 MJ/kg) and CO2 emissions (0.17 kg/kg). When the optimal dosage (0.01-0.05 wt%) of GO is selected, due to its high specific surface area and strong adhesion to the matrix, the compressive strength of the cementitious composites is improved by nearly 50%. This study will help engineers and researchers better utilize carbon-based nanomaterials and provide guidance and direction for future research in related fields.

Study on the Long-Term Salt Release Characteristics of Self-Melting Ice Asphalt Mixtures and Their Impact on Pavement Performance.

Self-melting ice asphalt pavement materials inhibit pavement freezing and improve driving safety. This paper aims to study the long-term salt release characteristics of self-melting ice asphalt mixtures and the impact on pavement after complete salt release. Firstly, a method to accelerate the rapid release of salt based on the Los Angeles abrasion tester. Then, long-term salt release patterns were elucidated under the influence of deicing agent dosage, type of asphalt, and type of gradation. Finally, a quantitative analysis of the pavement performance after complete salt release is conducted. The results indicate that the release efficiency of the Los Angeles abrasion tester method has increased by 91 times compared to the magnetic stirrer immersion flushing method and by 114 times compared to the natural soaking method. The SBS-modified self-melting ice asphalt mixture possesses a longer duration of salt release, but the uniformity of salt release is inferior. Salt release duration is directly proportional to the dosage of deicing agents. SMA-13 self-melting ice asphalt mixture exhibits poorer uniformity in salt release. After complete salt release, high-temperature stability of self-melting ice asphalt mixtures decreased by 31.6%, low-temperature performance decreased by 15.4%, water stability decreased by 26.7%, and fatigue life decreased by 35.9%.