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Cancer remains a significant challenge in extending human life expectancy in the 21stcentury, with staggering numbers projected by the International Agency for Research on Cancer for upcoming years. While conventional cancer therapies exist, their limitations, in terms of efficacy and side effects, demand the development of novel treatments that selectively target cancer cells. Tumor immunotherapy has emerged as a promising approach, but low response rates and immune-related side effects present significant clinical challenges. Researchers have begun combining immunotherapy with nanomaterials to optimize tumor-killing effects. Stimuli-responsive nanomaterials have become a focus of cancer immunotherapy research due to their unique properties. These nanomaterials target specific signals in the tumor microenvironment, such as pH or temperature changes, to precisely deliver therapeutic agents and minimize damage to healthy tissue. This article reviews the recent developments and clinical applications of endogenous and exogenous stimuli-responsive nanomaterials for tumor immunotherapy, analyzing the advantages and limitations of these materials and highlighting their potential for enhancing the immune response to cancer and improving patient outcomes.

Burns are a common mechanism of pediatric injury worldwide and a notable cause of disability-adjusted life-years. Burns in children represent a unique challenge due to the differences from adults regarding physical characteristics, physiology, and psychology. This retrospective cohort study examined trends of pediatric burns in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, from 2010 to 2022. It specifically focused on the changes in burn etiology and patient characteristics, body area affected, TBSA, first aid, location, and management. It also compared a “Pre-COVID-19” and “Peri-COVID-19” era to analyze the impact of COVID-19 on the pattern of pediatric burns, as children are at higher risk of injury during times of social disruption. The study found that burns in children continue to be concentrated in the toddler and preschooler age group, and the main mechanisms of injury remain as scald and contact burns. In recent years, there has been a rising trend of friction burns, alongside a fall in flame burns and severe burns. Management of pediatric burns has also evolved, with predominant use of ambulatory care and low rates of admission and operative intervention. Trends in burn injury continue to evolve with time, and over the last decade in NSW, key changes in the pattern of pediatric burns have been observed, with evolving mechanisms of injury, reduced severity of burns, and a shift toward ambulatory care.

An efficient calculation tool for rigorously optimizing the instrument parameters of matrix‐assisted laser desorption/ionization time‐of‐flight mass spectrometry (MALDI‐TOF MS) is demonstrated in this work. Optimization of MALDI‐TOF MS has been an experience‐based, time‐consuming process without a rigorous theoretical principle. Based on the comprehensive calculation model reported previously, we developed a software tool, MAXTOF, to rapidly determine instrument parameters providing ultimate mass resolving power (MRP). The software conducts big data analysis of most instrument parameters to predict the MRP, including instrument dimensions, voltages, mass‐to‐charge ratio of ions, and ion extraction delay. It can complete the calculation in seconds, providing parameters that serve as the starting point for subsequent optimization that greatly accelerates the optimization process. Experimental validation using a commercial instrument demonstrates MAXTOF's efficacy in predicting optimal parameters and enhancing MRP. The predicted ion extraction delays for bradykinin fragment, P14R polypeptide, and insulin chain B ions were within 5% of the values observed through long‐term optimization. The observed MRP of those ions ranged from 2800 to 4500. Results show that the method and software are highly advantageous for fast and precise measurements. This paper introduces MAXTOF, an innovative software tool designed to optimize matrix‐assisted laser desorption/ionization time‐of‐flight mass spectrometry instrument performance. Utilizing an advanced calculation model, MAXTOF determines the ideal parameters for maximizing mass resolving power within seconds, offering a reliable starting point for further fine‐tuning. Experimental validation demonstrates MAXTOF's effectiveness, ensuring precise and efficient high‐throughput measurements.

Corneal transplantation can restore visual function when visual impairment is caused by a corneal disease. However, this treatment is associated with the scarcity of cornea donors. The suitability of corneal donation from patients with glaucoma using ocular hypotensive agents (OHAs) is controversial. This study aimed to elucidate changes in corneal thickness, corneal endothelial cell density, and corneal endothelial cell hexagonality after OHA use in patients with primary open‐angle glaucoma. We retrospectively reviewed the data of 53 glaucoma suspect eyes without OHA use and 106 primary open‐angle glaucoma eyes under OHA use. All participants underwent corneal parameter assessment using SP‐3000P (Topcon Corp., Tokyo, Japan) at the time of diagnosis and the final visit. The OHA dose and timing of use were recorded. The ocular hypotensive agents score (OHAS) was determined based on the number, formula, frequency, and duration of OHA use. Baseline data showed no significant differences between the two groups with and without OHA use. At the final visit, the OHA‐treated group showed significantly lower corneal thickness and corneal endothelial cell density than those of the control group. A weak positive correlation between the OHAS and changes in corneal endothelial cell hexagonality was noted. However, no correlation was observed between the OHAS and changes in corneal thickness or endothelial cell density. In conclusion, patients with glaucoma and using OHAs should undergo the corneal structural properties examinations before donation to ensure the quality of donor cornea.

Supported platinum nanoparticle catalysts are known to convert polyolefins to high-quality liquid hydrocarbons using hydrogen under relatively mild conditions. To date, few studies using platinum grafted onto various metal oxide (MxOy) supports have been undertaken to understand the role of the acidity of the oxide support in the carbon–carbon bond cleavage of polyethylene under consistent catalytic conditions. Specifically, two Pt/MxOycatalysts (MxOy= SrTiO3and SiO2–Al2O3; Al = 3.0 wt %, target Pt loading 2 wt % Pt ∼1.5 nm), under identical catalytic polyethylene hydrogenolysis conditions (T= 300 °C, P(H2) = 170 psi, t= 24 h; Mw= ∼3,800 g/mol, Mn= ∼1,100 g/mol, Đ= 3.45, Nbranch/100C= 1.0), yielded a narrow distribution of hydrocarbons with molecular weights in the range of lubricants (Mw= < 600 g/mol; Mn< 400 g/mol; Đ= 1.5). While Pt/SrTiO3formed saturated hydrocarbons with negligible branching, Pt/SiO2–Al2O3formed partially unsaturated hydrocarbons (<1 mol % alkenes and ∼4 mol % alkyl aromatics) with increased branch density (Nbranch/100C= 5.5). Further investigations suggest evidence for a competitive hydrocracking mechanism occurring alongside hydrogenolysis, stemming from the increased acidity of Pt/SiO2–Al2O3compared to Pt/SrTiO3. Additionally, the products of these polymer deconstruction reactions were found to be independent of the polyethylene feedstock, allowing the potential to upcycle polyethylenes with various properties into a value-added product.

Many polymer upcycling efforts aim to convert plastic waste into high-value liquid hydrocarbons. However, the subsequent cleavage of middle distillates to light gases can be problematic. The reactor often contains a vapor phase (light gases and middle distillates) and a liquid phase (molten polymers and waxes with a suspended or dissolved catalyst). Because the catalyst resides in the liquid phase, middle distillates that partition into the vapor phase are protected against further cleavage into light gases. In this paper, we consider a simple reactive separation strategy, in which a gas outflow removes the volatile products as they form. We combine vapor–liquid equilibrium models and population balance equations (PBEs) to describe polymer upcycling in a two-phase semibatch reactor. The results suggest that the temperature, headspace volume, and flow rate of the reactor can be used to tune selectivity toward the middle distillates, in addition to the molecular mechanism of catalysis. We anticipate that two-phase reactor models will be important in many polymer upcycling processes and that reactive separation strategies will provide ways to boost the yield of the desired products in these cases.

The size-dependent and collective physical properties of nanocrystals (NCs) and their self-assembled superlattices (SLs) enable the study of mesoscale phenomena and the design of metamaterials for a broad range of applications. However, the limited mobility of NC building blocks in dried NCSLs often hampers the potential for employing postdeposition methods to produce high-quality NCSLs. In this study, we present tailored promesogenic ligands that exhibit a lubricating property akin to thermotropic liquid crystals. The lubricating ability of ligands is thermally triggerable, allowing the dry solid NC aggregates deposited on the substrates with poor ordering to be transformed into NCSLs with high crystallinity and preferred orientations. The interplay between the dynamic behavior of NCSLs and the molecular structure of the ligands is elucidated through a comprehensive analysis of their lubricating efficacy using both experimental and simulation approaches. Coarse-grained molecular dynamic modeling suggests that a shielding layer from mesogens prevents the interdigitation of ligand tails, facilitating the sliding between outer shells and consequently enhancing the mobility of NC building blocks. The dynamic organization of NCSLs can also be triggered with high spatial resolution by laser illumination. The principles, kinetics, and utility of lubricating ligands could be generalized to unlock stimuli-responsive metamaterials from NCSLs and contribute to the fabrication of NCSLs.

Atomically thin oxide semiconductors are emerging as potential materials for their potentiality in monolithic 3D integration and sensor applications. In this study, a charge transfer method employing viologen, an organic compound with exceptional reduction potential among n-type organics, is presented to modulate the carrier concentration in atomically thin In2O3without the need of annealing. This study highlights the critical role of channel thickness on doping efficiency, revealing that viologen charge transfer doping is increasingly pronounced in thinner channels owing to their increased surface-to-volume ratio. Upon viologen doping, an electron sheet density of 6.8 × 1012cm–2is achieved in 2 nm In2O3back gate device while preserving carrier mobility. Moreover, by the modification of the functional groups, viologens can be conveniently removed with acetone and an ultrasonic cleaner, making the viologen treatment a reversible process. Based on this doping scheme, we demonstrate an n-type metal oxide semiconductor inverter with viologen-doped In2O3, exhibiting a voltage gain of 26 at VD= 5 V. This complementary pairing of viologen and In2O3offers ease of control over the carrier concentration, making it suitable for the next-generation electronic applications.

Root mass density (RMD) is introduced as the core parameter in the flexible friction-stiffened model of the root–soil complex to build the improved model so that the parameter values have better operability. First, "RMD/k" was used to replace the original model parameter "A/n," and the improved flexible friction stiffened model with RMD as the core was derived in the flexible state. Then, the root distribution test, single-root tensile test, and shear test of the root–soil composite were carried out to investigate the root distribution pattern, root tensile resistance and tensile strength variation characteristics, and root–soil composite shear strength characteristics by using vetiver as the test sample. It is concluded that the increase in shear strength reaches the maximum when the shear deformation angle (β) is equal to the internal friction angle (φ) and the RMD variation characteristics of the improved model were obtained. The calculated value of the enhanced model is compared with the measured data and the original model, and the results were similar.

BackgroundPredicting how long a patient with far advanced cancer has to live is a significant part of hospice and palliative care. Various prognostic models have been developed, but have not been fully compared in South Korea.ObjectivesWe aimed to compare the accuracy of the Prognosis in Palliative Care Study (PiPS), Palliative Prognostic Index (PPI), Palliative Prognostic Score (PaP) and Objective Prognostic Score (OPS) for patients with far advanced cancer in a palliative care unit in South Korea.MethodsThis prospective study included patients with far advanced cancer who were admitted to a single palliative care unit at the National University Hospital. Variables for calculating the prognostic models were recorded by a palliative care physician. The survival rate was estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value of each model were calculated.ResultsA total of 160 patients participated. There was a significant difference in survival rates across all groups, each categorised through the five prognostic models. The overall accuracy (OA) of the prognostic models ranged between 54.5% and 77.6%. The OA of clinicians’ predictions of survival ranged between 61.9% and 81.3%.ConclusionThe PiPS, PPI, PaP and OPS were successfully validated in a palliative care unit of South Korea. There was no difference in accuracy between the prognostic models, and OA tended to be lower than in previous studies.

Effective urban land-use re-planning and the strategic arrangement of drainage pipe networks can significantly enhance urban flood defense capacity. Aimed at reducing the potential risks of urban flooding, this paper presents a straightforward and efficient approach to an urban distributed runoff model (UDRM). The model is developed to quantify the discharge and water depth within urban drainage pipe networks under varying rainfall intensities and land-use scenarios. The Nash efficiency coefficient of UDRM exceeds 0.9, which indicates its high computational efficiency and potential benefit in predicting urban flooding. The prediction of drainage conditions under both current and re-planned land-use types is achieved by adopting different flood recurrence intervals. The findings reveal that the re-planned land-use strategies could effectively diminish flood risk upstream of the drainage pipe network across 20-year and 50-year flood recurrence intervals. However, in the case of extreme rainfall events (a 100-year flood recurrence), the re-planned land-use approach fell short of fulfilling the requirements necessary for flood disaster mitigation. In these instances, the adoption of larger-diameter drainage pipes becomes an essential requisite to satisfy drainage needs. Accordingly, the proposed UDRM effectively combines land-use information with pipeline data to give practical suggestions for pipeline modification and land-use optimization to combat urban floods. Therefore, this methodology warrants further promotion in the field of urban re-planning.

A compound control method based on adaptive high-order fast non-singular terminal sliding mode control (AHONFTSMC) and sliding mode disturbance observer is investigated in this paper, so as to shorten the response time of speed tracking, and improve the perturbation resistance of torque pulsation in permanent magnet synchronous motors. Firstly, considering the contradictory requirement of achieving both rapid response and mitigating severe jitter in traditional non-singular terminal sliding mode control (NFTSMC), an adaptive parameter technique is proposed to enhance the system’s dynamic response. AHONFTSMC not only ensures the system’s good tracking performance, but also effectively reduces the jitter in the control output. Secondly, a nonlinear disturbance observer is established to further improve the system response accuracy, so as to observe the disturbance differentials in the system, and perform feedforward compensation on the controller. The stability and convergence of the designed compound controller are demonstrated through the application of Lyapunov theory. The experimental results demonstrate notable improvements in the motor controlled by AHONFTSMC, especially compared to sliding mode control (SMC) and NFTSMC methods. Specifically, compared to SMC and NFTSMC, the time required to reach the rated speed is reduced by 68.6%, 15.6% respectively. The speed overshoot is reduced by 22 and 3% respectively. Compared to the non-adaptive HONFTSMC method, the time required to reach the rated speed is reduced by 7.3%. Furthermore, AHONFTSMC ensures stable changes in electromagnetic torque, effectively reducing the occurrence of chattering. These findings confirm that the proposed control strategy significantly enhances the accuracy of system control and improves the overall dynamic performance of the system.

Hydrogen reduction of tungsten oxide is currently the most widely used technology to produce metal tungsten for its simplicity and pollution-free nature. The computer simulation is a powerful tool for exploring the mechanism of hydrogen reduction of tungsten oxide from a microscopic view. The density functional theory (DFT) is applied to investigate the adsorption characteristic of hydrogen molecule on the surface and inside the lattice of WO3. The adsorption energy of hydrogen on the WO3(001) surface is 66.56 kJ·mol−1which is larger than the adsorption energy of hydrogen molecule inside the lattice of WO3which indicates that once the hydrogen diffuses inside the lattice, it is easier to adsorb on the O atom to break W–O bond. And The diffusion process of a hydrogen molecule from the WO-terminated WO3(001) surface to the inside of the WO3lattice and hydrogen molecule adsorption inside the lattice was investigated. The activation energy of hydrogen molecule diffusion from the surface down to the first interstitial and diffusion from the first interstitial down to the second interstitial is 195.41 and 172.81 kJ·mol−1, respectively. The controlling step of hydrogen reduction of tungsten oxide may be the hydrogen molecule diffusion inside the oxides lattice through the interstitial.

Lamellar directed self-assembly (DSA) technology in combination with the self-aligned via (SAV) process has emerged as a novel and promising choice for via/contact layer fabrication, where a via between Metal- $x$ and Metal- $(x+1)$ is generated at the intersection of a wire segment on Metal- $(x+1)$ and a rectangular and perpendicular guiding template. Compared to the highly investigated cylindrical DSA, lamellar DSA does not suffer from the overlay error of generated holes and thus can have better yield, and it also benefits from the better flexibility of various via pitches a single template can produce. A state-of-the-art work has addressed the guiding template design problem for the new process, and an integer linear programming (ILP) formulation that can optimally solve the problem as well as a simple heuristic approach are proposed. However, solving the ILP formulation is time consuming, and the heuristic method suffers from unignorable degradation in solution quality due to several algorithm deficiencies. In this article, we propose an enhanced and efficient template design algorithm flow for the lamellar DSA and SAV process by using graph monomorphism for pattern conflict check in multiple patterning lithography. Experimental results show that the proposed flow can greatly reduce the numbers of conflicts and short templates and is almost as efficient as the existing heuristic approach.

Toward the age of ambient intelligence, in which contactless devices are widely applied to recognize human states. This study aims at designing critical motion features to build artificial intelligence (AI) models for identifying user activities in front of the computer. Eight participants were recruited in the study to perform four daily computer activities, including playing games, surfing the web, typing words, and watching videos. While performing the experimental tasks, the participants’ upper body were videotaped, and the recorded videos were processed to obtain four designed features, comprising (1) the eye-opening size, (2) the mouth-opening size, (3) the number of optical-fence pixels, and (4) the standard deviation of optical-fence pixels. After feature importance confirmation, these obtained motion features were used to establish three recurrent neural network (RNN) models using simple RNN, gated recurrent unit (GRU), and long short-term memory (LSTM). The comparison of the model predictions showed that the GRU model had the best performance (accuracy = 76%), compared to the Simple RNN model (accuracy = 59%) and the LSTM model (accuracy = 70%). This study showed that the four tested computer activities had significant effects on the four designed features, and hence the features could be applied to build AI models for recognizing activities in front of a computer. Limitations are discussed for directing future studies in extending the methodology to other applications.

Hormone receptor-positive (HR+)/human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-negative (HER2−) breast cancer is the most prevalent type of breast cancer, in which endocrine therapy resistance and distant relapse remain unmet challenges. Accurate molecular classification is urgently required for guiding precision treatment. We established a large-scale multi-omics cohort of 579 patients with HR+/HER2−breast cancer and identified the following four molecular subtypes: canonical luminal, immunogenic, proliferative and receptor tyrosine kinase (RTK)-driven. Tumors of these four subtypes showed distinct biological and clinical features, suggesting subtype-specific therapeutic strategies. The RTK-driven subtype was characterized by the activation of the RTK pathways and associated with poor outcomes. The immunogenic subtype had enriched immune cells and could benefit from immune checkpoint therapy. In addition, we developed convolutional neural network models to discriminate these subtypes based on digital pathology for potential clinical translation. The molecular classification provides insights into molecular heterogeneity and highlights the potential for precision treatment of HR+/HER2−breast cancer.

Infinite dilution activity coefficients (γi∞) of 31 organic solutes (alkanes, cycloalkanes, olefins, aromatics, chlorinated alkanes, alcohols, and other polar organic solutes) in the ionic liquid (IL) 1-butyl-2,3-dimethylimidazole thiocyanate ([BMMIM][SCN]) were determined by gas–liquid chromatographic (GLC) method in the temperature range of 313.15–353.15 K. The infinite dilution partial molar excess enthalpies (H̅iE, ∞), entropies (TrefS̅iE, ∞), and Gibbs free energies (G̅iE, ∞) of the organic solutes at the reference temperature T= 298.15 K and the solubility parameters (δ3) of [BMMIM][SCN] were derived from γi∞. The gas–liquid partition coefficients (KL) of solutes at different temperatures were calculated by referring to the densities of [BMMIM][SCN]. The linear free energy relationship solvation model was used to fit the KLvalues, and the KLprediction model was obtained. The selectivity (Sij∞) and capacity (kj∞) of n-hexane (i)/benzene (j) and cyclohexane (i)/benzene (j) at infinite dilution at 323.15 K were calculated. The results were compared with the values of ILs with the thiocyanate anion in the literature.

The Active-Matrix Organic Light-Emitting Diodes (AMOLED) technology has become the mainstream of displays in recent years. However, it will generate a lot of power consumption on AMOLED displays when displaying high-brightness content. To address this problem, an exposure correction mechanism is needed to remove high-brightness ambient light in the image. This work proposes a Power-Constrained Exposure Correction (PCEC) network based on adversarial learning. The PCEC network utilizes a U-Net-based generator with self-regularized high-exposure attention and adopts the global-local discriminator architecture for adversarial learning. To reduce the intensity of the high-exposed regions while constraining the AMOLED display’s power consumption, we include a power-constraint algorithm in the generator. The experimental results on three different datasets show that the proposed method can effectively correct high-exposed regions and achieve an average of 22.69% power-saving rate in the high-quality mode and 68.71% in the high-efficiency mode. The proposed method achieves 82.4 milliseconds of average inference time when run on a mobile device. Furthermore, the proposed method can enhance the saturation and contrast of the image and provide better visual quality than the existing power-constrained over-exposure correction methods.

Although substantial evidence reveals that healthy lifestyle behaviors are associated with a lower risk of rheumatoid arthritis (RA), the underlying metabolic mechanisms remain unclear.

Weekend catch-up sleep is associated with a lower prevalence of hyperuricemia in Korean postmenopausal women with insufficient sleep, especially at 1 to 2 hours of weekend catch-up sleep.

Gadolinium chelates for tumor magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) face challenges such as inadequate sensitivity, lack of selectivity, and risk of Gd leakage. This study presents a single-atom Gd nano-contrast agent (Gd-SA) that enhances tumor MRI. Isolated Gd atoms coordinated by six N atoms and two O atoms are atomically dispersed on a hollow carbon nanosphere, allowing the maximum utilization of Gd atoms with reduced risk of toxic Gd ion leakage. Owning to the large surface area and fast exchange of relaxed water molecules, Gd-SA shows excellent T1-weighted magnetic resonance enhancement with a r1value of 11.05 mM–1s–1at 7 T, which is 3.6 times that of the commercial gadolinium-diethylenetriamine pentaacetic acid (Gd-DTPA). In vivoMRI results show that the Gd-SA has a higher spatial resolution and a wider imaging time window for tumors than Gd-DTPA, with low hematological, hepatic, and nephric toxicities. These advantages demonstrate the great potential of single-atom Gd-based nanomaterials as safe, efficient, and long-term MRI contrast agents for cancer diagnosis.

Introduction Cabozantinib, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2012, is a tyrosine kinase inhibitor widely used in the treatment of metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC) and medullary thyroid carcinoma. To date, no ocular adverse events have been reported by the FDA or on the package label. Here, we described a patient with metastatic RCC who developed bilateral optic disc edema after a 4-month course of cabozantinib.Case description A 55-year-old ethnic Chinese male with RCC with multiple metastases presented to our department with progressive blurred vision in both eyes for 1 month. He started taking cabozantinib 60 mg once daily 5 months prior to this presentation. Poor visual acuity and bilateral disc edema were then noted. Cabozantinib was discontinued after that, and 3-day pulse steroid therapy with methylprednisolone 1 g/day was given. The optic disc edema subsided gradually with limited improvement in visual acuity.Conclusion Bilateral optic edema should be considered as a complication associated with cabozantinib. We propose discontinuation of the treatment in cases such as that, and pulse steroid therapy should be considered if there is no contraindication.

The process of dynamic self-organization of small building blocks is fundamental to the emergent function of living systems and is characteristic of their out-of-equilibrium homeostasis. The ability to control the interactions of synthetic particles in large groups could lead to the realization of analogous macroscopic robotic systems with microscopic complexity. Rotationally induced self-organization has been observed in biological systems and modeled theoretically, but studies of fast, autonomously moving synthetic rotors remain rare. Here, we report switchable, out-of-equilibrium hydrodynamic assembly and phase separation in suspensions of acoustically powered chiral microspinners. Semiquantitative modeling suggests that three-dimensionally (3D) complex spinners interact through viscous and weakly inertial (streaming) flows. The interactions between spinners were studied over a range of densities to construct a phase diagram, which included gaseous dimer pairing at low density, collective rotation and multiphase separation at intermediate densities, and ultimately jamming at high density. The 3D chirality of the spinners leads to self-organization in parallel planes, forming a three-dimensionally hierarchical system that goes beyond the 2D systems that have so far been modeled computationally. Dense mixtures of spinners and passive tracer particles also show active–passive phase separation. These observations are consistent with recent theoretical predictions of the hydrodynamic coupling between rotlets generated by autonomous spinners and provide an exciting experimental window to the study of colloidal active matter and microrobotic systems.