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Introduction: Endometrial cancer is the most common malignancy of the female reproductive system in the United States. Asparagus officinalis is a versatile, nutrient-dense, low-calorie vegetable that contains various bioactive metabolites that have shown a variety of biologic functions beneficial to health. The metabolites from asparagus officinalis extracts or asparagus officinalis extracts exhibit significant anti-tumorigenic activity in some pre-clinical models of cancer. Methods: Endometrial cancer cells were used to study the effects of asparagus officinalis on anti-proliferation, anti-invasion and increased sensitivity to cisplatin, and obese and lean Lkb1 fl/fl p53 fl/fl mouse model of endometrial cancer was used to study the role of asparagus officinalis in tumor growth. Results: Treatment with increasing concentrations of Asparagus officinalis extracts significantly inhibited cell proliferation, reduced glycolytic activity, induced cellular stress and apoptosis, caused cell cycle G1 arrest, increased the sensitivity of cells to cisplatin, reduced cell adhesion and invasion, and activation of AMPK and inhibition of the AKT/mTOR and MAPK signaling pathways in endometrial cancer cells. Moreover, asparagus officinalis extracts suppressed cell adhesion and invasion through the modulation of the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition process. Asparagus officinalis extract treatment for 4 weeks resulted in a significant reduction in tumor growth in Lkb1 fl/fl p53 fl/fl mice under both obese and lean conditions, with a decrease in Ki-67 and vascular endothelial growth factor expression and an increase in Bip expression in endometrial tumors. Discussion: These findings provide strong preclinical evidence for the potential therapeutic benefit of asparagus officinalis extract as a novel dietary strategy in the treatment of endometrial cancer. Further clinical trials of dietary intervention of asparagus officinalis or combination with cisplatin in patients with endometrial cancer are warranted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] more...

Observational data on ocean subsurface temperature and salinity are patently insufficient because in situ observations are complex and costly, while satellite remote-sensed measurements are abundant but mainly focus on sea surface data. To make up for the ocean interior data shortage and entirely use the abundant satellite data, we developed a data-driven deep learning model named Convformer to reconstruct ocean subsurface temperature and salinity fields from satellite-observed sea surface data. Convformer is designed by deeply optimizing Vision Transformer and ConvLSTM, consisting of alternating residual connections between multiple temporal and spatial attention blocks. The input variables consist of sea surface temperature (SST), sea surface salinity (SSS), sea surface height (SSH), and sea surface wind (SSW). Our results demonstrate that Convformer exhibits superior performance in estimating the temperature-salinity structure of the tropical Pacific Ocean. The all-depth average root mean square error (RMSE) of the reconstructed subsurface temperature (ST)/subsurface salinity (SS) is 0.353 °C/0.0695 PSU, with correlation coefficients (R²) of 0.98663/0.99971. In the critical thermocline, although the root mean square errors of ST and SS reach 0.85 °C and 0.121 PSU, respectively, they remain smaller compared to other models. Furthermore, we assessed Convformer's performance from various perspectives. Notably, we also delved into the potential of Convformer to extract physical and dynamic information from a model mechanism perspective. Our study offers a practical approach to reconstructing the subsurface temperature and salinity fields from satellite-observed sea surface data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] more...

Developing electrode materials with high voltage and high specific capacity has always been an important strategy for increasing the energy density of lithium-ion capacitors (LICs). However, organic-based electrolytes with lithium salts limit their potential for application in LICs to voltages below 3.8 V in terms of polarization reactions. In this work, we introduce Li[N(C2F5SO2)2] (lithium Bis (pentafluoroethanesulfonyl)imide or LiBETI), an electrolyte with high conductivity and superior electrochemical and mechanical stability, to construct a three-electrode LIC system. After graphite anode pre-lithiation, the anode potential was stabilized in the three-electrode LIC system, and a stable solid electrolyte interface (SEI) film formed on the anode surface as expected. Meanwhile, the LIC device using LiBETI as the electrolyte, and a self-synthesized graphene/single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) composite as the cathode, showed a high voltage window, allowing the LIC to achieve an operating voltage of 4.5 V. As a result, the LIC device has a high energy density of up to 182 Wh kg−1 and a 2678 W kg−1 power density at 4.5 V. At a current density of 2 A g−1, the capacity retention rate is 72.7% after 10,000 cycles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] more...

As a typical binary transition metal oxide, ZnFe2O4 has attracted considerable attention for supercapacitor electrodes due to its high theoretical specific capacitance. However, the reported synthesis processes of ZnFe2O4 are complicated and ZnFe2O4 nanoparticles are easily agglomerated, leading to poor cycle life and unfavorable capacity. Herein, a facile microwave hydrothermal process was used to prepare ZnFe2O4/reduced graphene oxide (rGO) nanocomposites in this work. The influence of rGO content on the morphology, structure, and electrochemical performance of ZnFe2O4/rGO nanocomposites was systematically investigated. Due to the uniform distribution of ZnFe2O4 nanoparticles on the rGO surface and the high specific surface area and rich pore structures, the as-prepared ZnFe2O4/rGO electrode with 44.3 wt.% rGO content exhibits a high specific capacitance of 628 F g−1 and long cycle life of 89% retention over 2500 cycles at 1 A g−1. This work provides a new process for synthesizing binary transition metal oxide and developing a new strategy for realizing high-performance composites for supercapacitor electrodes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] more...