Effects of repeated and continuous dry heat treatments on the physicochemical, structural, and in vitro digestion properties of chickpea starch.

The study investigated the impacts of repeated (RDH) and continuous dry heat (CDH) treatments on the physicochemical, structural, and in vitro digestion properties of chickpea starch. The results of SEM and CLSM showed that more fissures and holes appeared on the surface of granules as the treated time of CDH and the circles of RDH increased, both of which made the starch sample much easier to break down by digestive enzymes. Moreover, the fissures and holes of starch granules treated by CDH were more obvious than those of RDH. The XRD and FT-IR results suggested that the crystal type remained C-type, and the relative crystallinity and R1047/1022 of the chickpea starch decreased after dry heat treatments. In addition, a marked decline in the pasting viscosity and gelatinization temperature of chickpea starches was found with dry heat treatments. Moreover, the increased enzyme accessibility of starch was fitted as suggested by the increased RDS content and digestion rate. This study provided basic data for the rational design of chickpea starch-based foods with nutritional functions.

Hydrogel: a new material for intravesical drug delivery after bladder cancer surgery.

The standard treatment for non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) is transurethral resection of bladder tumor (TURBT). However, this procedure may miss small lesions or incompletely remove them, resulting in cancer recurrence or progression. As a result, intravesical instillation of chemotherapy or immunotherapy drugs is often used as an adjunctive treatment after TURBT to prevent cancer recurrence. In the traditional method, drugs are instilled into the patient's bladder through a urinary catheter under sterile conditions. However, this treatment exposes the bladder mucosa to the drug directly, leading to potential side effects like chemical cystitis. Furthermore, this treatment has several limitations, including a short drug retention period, susceptibility to urine dilution, low drug permeability, lack of targeted effect, and limited long-term clinical efficacy. Hydrogel, a polymer material with a high-water content, possesses solid elasticity and liquid fluidity, making it compatible with tissues and environmentally friendly. It exhibits great potential in various applications. One emerging use of hydrogels is in intravesical instillation. By employing hydrogels, drug dilution is minimized, and drug absorption, retention, and persistence in the bladder are enhanced due to the mucus-adhesive and flotation properties of hydrogel materials. Furthermore, hydrogels can improve drug permeability and offer targeting capabilities. This article critically examines the current applications and future prospects of hydrogels in the treatment of bladder cancer.

Study of the Effect of Retarder and Expander on the Strength and Cracking Performance of Rubber Concrete Based on Back Propagation Neural Network.

The advantages of rubber concrete (RC) are good ductility, fatigue resistance, and impact resistance, but few studies have been conducted on the effects of different rubber admixtures on the strength of RC and the cracking performance of rubber mortar. In this study, the compressive and flexural tests of rubber concrete and the crack resistance test of rubber mortar were carried out by changing the rubber content and adding expansion agent and retarder in this test. The test results show that the strength of RC decreases with the increase in rubber admixture. At 15% of rubber admixture, the expansion agent and retarder increase the compressive strength and flexural strength of RC the most; the compressive strength increased to 116% (22.6 MPa) and 109% (21.2 MPa), and the flexural strength increased to 111% (4.02 MPa) and 116%. (4.21 MPa). At the same rubber admixture, the expander improves the cracking time of the rubber mortar by about 3 times, and the retarder improves the cracking time of the rubber mortar by about 1.6 times. The BP neural network (BPNN) was established to simulate and predict the compressive and flexural strengths of RC with different admixtures and the cracking time of rubber mortar. The simulation results show that the predicted 7-day compressive strength of RC fits best with the actual value, with a value of 0.994, and the predicted 28-day flexural strength was closest to the measured value, with an average relative error of 1.7%. It was shown that the calculation results of the artificial intelligence prediction model are more accurate. The simulation results and test results show that the expander and retarder significantly improve the strength of RC as well as the cracking performance of rubber mortar.

Hard-Carbon Negative Electrodes from Biomasses for Sodium-Ion Batteries.

With the development of high-performance electrode materials, sodium-ion batteries have been extensively studied and could potentially be applied in various fields to replace the lithium-ion cells, owing to the low cost and natural abundance. As the key anode materials of sodium-ion batteries, hard carbons still face problems, such as poor cycling performance and low initial Coulombic efficiency. Owning to the low synthesis cost and the natural presence of heteroatoms of biomasses, biomasses have positive implications for synthesizing the hard carbons for sodium-ion batteries. This minireview mainly explains the research progress of biomasses used as the precursors to prepare the hard-carbon materials. The storage mechanism of hard carbons, comparisons of the structural properties of hard carbons prepared from different biomasses, and the influence of the preparation conditions on the electrochemical properties of hard carbons are introduced. In addition, the effect of doping atoms is also summarized to provide an in-depth understanding and guidance for the design of high-performance hard carbons for sodium-ion batteries.