Search

Background and aims Methods Results Conclusion Evaluation of the programmed cell death ligand‐1 (PD‐L1) combined positive score (CPS) is vital to predict the efficacy of the immunotherapy in triple‐negative breast cancer (TNBC), but pathologists show substantial variability in the consistency and accuracy of the interpretation. It is of great importance to establish an objective and effective method which is highly repeatable.We proposed a model in a deep learning‐based framework, which at the patch level incorporated cell analysis and tissue region analysis, followed by the whole‐slide level fusion of patch results. Three rounds of ring studies (RSs) were conducted. Twenty‐one pathologists of different levels from four institutions evaluated the PD‐L1 CPS in TNBC specimens as continuous scores by visual assessment and our artificial intelligence (AI)‐assisted method.In the visual assessment, the interpretation results of PD‐L1 (Dako 22C3) CPS by different levels of pathologists have significant differences and showed weak consistency. Using AI‐assisted interpretation, there were no significant differences between all pathologists (P = 0.43), and the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) value was increased from 0.618 [95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.524–0.719] to 0.931 (95% CI = 0.902–0.955). The accuracy of interpretation result is further improved to 0.919 (95% CI = 0.886–0.947). Acceptance of AI results by junior pathologists was the highest among all levels, and 80% of the AI results were accepted overall.With the help of the AI‐assisted diagnostic method, different levels of pathologists achieved excellent consistency and repeatability in the interpretation of PD‐L1 (Dako 22C3) CPS. Our AI‐assisted diagnostic approach was proved to strengthen the consistency and repeatability in clinical practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neoadjuvant therapy (NAT) treats early‐stage breast cancers, especially triple‐negative breast cancers (TNBCs). NAT improves pathological complete response (pCR) rates for different breast cancer patients. Recently, immune checkpoint inhibitors that target programmed death 1 (PD‐1) or programmed death ligand 1 (PD‐L1) in combination with NAT have shown antitumor activity in patients with early breast cancer. However, the tumor immune microenvironment (TME) in different subtypes of breast cancers, like TNBC, hormone receptor‐positive (HR+), and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 amplified (HER2+) and its changes by NAT remain to be fully characterized. We analyzed pre‐NAT tumor biopsies from TNBC (n = 27), HR+ (n = 24), and HER2+ (n = 30) breast cancer patients who received NAT, followed by surgery. The different immune makers (PD‐1, PD‐L1, CD3, and CD8) of tumor‐infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) were identified with immunofluorescence‐based microenvironment analysis. TILs within cancer parenchyma (iTILs) and in cancer stroma (sTILs) were counted separately. We found that PD‐L1+ cells in tumor and stroma were significantly higher in TNBC patients than in others. PD‐L1+ sTILs were significantly higher in pCR than in non‐pCR patients of all the subtypes. The infiltration scores of B‐cell memory, T‐cell CD4+ memory activated, T‐cell follicular helper, and Macrophage M0 and M1 were relatively higher in TNBC patients, indicating immunoreactive TME in TNBC. Analysis of TCGA‐BRCA RNA‐seq indicated that PD‐L1 was highly expressed in TNBC patients compared with HR+ and HER2+ patients. Higher PD‐L1 expression in TNBC patients was associated with significantly longer overall survival (OS). Our results demonstrated that PD‐L1 expression level of iTILs and sTILs is highest in TNBC among breast cancers. TNBC patients had significantly different immunoreactive TME compared with HR+ and HER2+ patients, suggesting potentially favorable outcomes for immunotherapy in these patients. Also, PD‐L1+ could be a powerful predictor of pCR in TNBC patients after NAT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Several studies have explored the relationship between intratumoral microvessel density (MVD) and the risk of postoperative biochemical recurrence (BCR) in prostate cancer (PCa), although the results are contradictory. Therefore, we conducted a meta‐analysis to investigate the effect of MVD on BCR in PCa. Method: We searched PubMed, MEDLINE, Science Direct/Elsevier, the Cochrane Library, CNKI, and EMBase databases from inception through January 2022, with no year or language restrictions, and used NOS guidelines to evaluate the quality of the 19 eligible studies. The derived hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (95%CI) were used to assess each endpoint. Data synthesis was performed with RevMan to assess the prognostic value of MVD in PCa and its heterogeneity, while the publication bias was examined using STATA 16.0. Results: Our meta‐analysis included 19 articles (4 for T1‐2, 6 for T1‐3, and 9 for T1‐4) on postoperative biochemical recurrence of PCa, among which, 3933 patients were pooled. The predictive ability of intratumoral MVD for different stages of PCa on BCR was T1‐2 (HR, 2.46; 95% CI, 1.08–5.58; p = 0.03; I2 = 83%), T1‐3 (HR, 2.38, 95% CI, 1.41–4.01; p = 0.001; I2 = 82%), T1‐4 (HR, 1.61; 95% CI, 1.19–2.19; p = 0.002; I2 = 61%).The subgroup analyses based on European and immunohistochemical antibody none‐factor VII were consistent with primary one. Sensitivity analysis excluding those studies judged to be at high risk of bias in T1‐2 showed a HR of 2.99[1.70,5.27] (I2 = 38%, p = 0.0001), demonstrating the robustness of risk estimates of MVD for the assessment of biochemical recurrence. Conclusion: Microvessel density is a predictor of BCR among patients with PCa, and earlier T stage PCa with a stronger MVD is associated with BCR. Further studies are needed to investigate neoangiogenesis in different T stages of PCa and whether MVD will be of benefit to the EAU‐recommended tool for biochemical recurrence risk assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Single‐atom catalysts (SACs) exhibit intriguing performance in electrocatalysis owing to their maximized atom utilizations and unique electronic structures, but effective anchoring metal atoms with defined coordination structure on hierarchical integrated electrode remain a challenge. Herein, a fast and facial flame‐assisted strategy is developed to construct oxygen‐coordinated SACs on integrated carbon nanotube (CNT) arrays with promising applications in electrocatalysis. Density functional theory calculations show that oxygen in carbon substrate imparts homogeneous sites for the efficient anchoring of metal atoms, thereby enabling SACs to disperse uniformly and firmly and thus bringing optimized activities. Moreover, the integrated CNT array with abundant oxygen‐containing groups is constructed and has been used as an efficient matrix for anchoring metal atoms (CNT‐O@M) via a flame‐assisted method. The as‐prepared CNT‐O@M (M = Co and Pt as typical examples) shows excellent activities in electrocatalytic oxygen reduction reaction and hydrogen evolution reaction with utilization of active site as high as 75.7%, which is superior to the reported SACs. Particularly, the performance of CNT‐O@M can maintain stably under various harsh conditions, showing a promising prospect in the long‐time applications. The methodology and concept proposed in this work could be extended to the synthesis of a variety of integrated SACs for efficient electrocatalysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, large‐scale satellite networks have been studied emphatically due to its advantages in high throughput and low latency. Many companies and institutions are keen to build large‐scale low earth orbit satellite constellations to provide space‐based Internet services, which poses a great demand for the design of efficient and reliable routing schemes. Three attribute indexes to evaluate the performance of the satellites are proposed. With the Dempster–Shafer theory, the attributes can be fused for the routing decision‐making process. Based on the Message Identification divergence (M‐I divergence) measure method, a Belief Message Importance divergence based Routing algorithm is proposed. By adjusting the characteristic parameter, it can amplify the divergence between distance‐based evidence and others properly. In this way, Belief Message Importance divergence‐based Routing attempts to find the optimal shortest path according to the status of intermediate nodes. Compared with existing satellite routing schemes, the algorithm that is proposed can approach the optimal routing performance, increasing the throughput by 47.2% on average, and decreasing the total delay and packet drop rate by 59.5% and 42.1% on average, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Size‐fractionated aerosol particles were collected with a MOUDI 10‐stage cascade impactor from an urban roadside place in a downtown area of Hong Kong. Fine aerosol particulate samples from stage 6 (aerodynamic particle diameter between 0.56 and 1 μm) and stage 9 (aerodynamic particle diameter between 0.10 and 0.18 μm) were pretreated at a chosen temperature, including −100°C, −50°C, 25°C, and 60°C, in a load lock chamber and then analyzed using time‐of‐flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF‐SIMS) at the same temperature (−100°C). Principal component analysis (PCA) was applied to further analyze ToF‐SIMS spectra of aerosol particles with different pretreatment temperatures from two selected stages. ToF‐SIMS results showed that the intensities of aliphatic hydrocarbon ions such as C4H7+ and C4H9+ and amine ions such as C2H8N+ and C4H12N+ decreased with an increase of the pretreatment temperature under ultrahigh vacuum conditions. We have shown that analyses of this type of aerosol particles using ToF‐SIMS should not be conducted at ambient temperature but at low temperature (eg, −50°C). In addition, we also developed a procedure that can be used to analyze aerosol particle samples under ultrahigh vacuum environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane end-capped poly(spiropyran-containing methacrylate) (POSS-PSPMA) polymers, a kind of photoresponsive hybrid polymer, are synthesized via atom transfer radical polymerization. It is proved that the molecular weight of POSS-PSPMA is sharply increased by raising the proportion of methanol or the concentration of the reactants. The self-assembly behavior of POSS-PSPMA is studied in toluene: under the control of UV and visible light, POSS-PSPMA can reversibly self-assemble into aggregates because the charged merocyanines (MC) form stacks. These MC stacks act as non-covalent crosslinking points and POSS shell guarantees the stability of the aggregates. This system has a broad potential use in nanocarriers, especially for encapsulating and releasing polar substances in the nonpolar solvents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Controlling the structure and properties of catalysts through atomic arrangement is the source of producing a new generation of advanced catalysts. A highly active and stable catalyst in catalytic reactions strongly depends on an ideal arrangement structure of metal atoms. We demonstrated that the introduction of the defect‐rich structures, low coordination number (CN), and tensile strain in three‐dimensional (3D) urchin‐like palladium nanoparticles through chlorine bonded with sp‐C in graphdiyne (Pd‐UNs/Cl‐GDY) can regulate the arrangement of metal atoms in the palladium nanoparticles to form a special structure. In situ Fourier infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and theoretical calculation results show that Pd‐UNs/Cl‐GDY catalyst is beneficial to the oxidation and removal of CO intermediates. The Pd‐UNs/Cl‐GDY for methanol oxidation reaction (MOR) that display high current density (363.6 mA cm−2) and mass activity (3.6 A mgPd−1), 12.0 and 10.9 times higher than Pd nanoparticles, respectively. The Pd‐UNs/Cl‐GDY catalyst also exhibited robust stability with still retained 95 % activity after 2000 cycles. A defects libraries of the face‐centered cubic and hexagonal close‐packed crystal catalysts (FH‐NPs) were synthesized by introducing chlorine in graphdiyne. Such defect‐rich structures, low CN, and tensile strain tailoring methods have opened up a new way for the catalytic reaction of MOR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Controlling the structure and properties of catalysts through atomic arrangement is the source of producing a new generation of advanced catalysts. A highly active and stable catalyst in catalytic reactions strongly depends on an ideal arrangement structure of metal atoms. We demonstrated that the introduction of the defect‐rich structures, low coordination number (CN), and tensile strain in three‐dimensional (3D) urchin‐like palladium nanoparticles through chlorine bonded with sp‐C in graphdiyne (Pd‐UNs/Cl‐GDY) can regulate the arrangement of metal atoms in the palladium nanoparticles to form a special structure. In situ Fourier infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and theoretical calculation results show that Pd‐UNs/Cl‐GDY catalyst is beneficial to the oxidation and removal of CO intermediates. The Pd‐UNs/Cl‐GDY for methanol oxidation reaction (MOR) that display high current density (363.6 mA cm−2) and mass activity (3.6 A mgPd−1), 12.0 and 10.9 times higher than Pd nanoparticles, respectively. The Pd‐UNs/Cl‐GDY catalyst also exhibited robust stability with still retained 95 % activity after 2000 cycles. A defects libraries of the face‐centered cubic and hexagonal close‐packed crystal catalysts (FH‐NPs) were synthesized by introducing chlorine in graphdiyne. Such defect‐rich structures, low CN, and tensile strain tailoring methods have opened up a new way for the catalytic reaction of MOR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]