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ObjectiveTo evaluate the impact of a health education intervention based on the protection motivation theory (PMT) on the prevention of falls in elderly hospitalized patients with orthostatic hypotension (OH). Methods A total of 400 elderly OH patients aged ≥ 65 years admitted to a tertiary grade A hospital in Nantong city from January 2019 to December 2022 were divided into an intervention group (n = 199) and a control group (n = 201). The control group received routine health education on fall prevention, while the intervention group received an additional health education intervention program based on PMT. The 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36), the Fall Risk Assessment Scale for the Elderly, and the Balance Test Scale for the Elderly were used to collect information on the two groups' fall risk, balance ability, and quality of life scores of before and 6 months after the intervention. Results The mean age of the 400 patients was 66.53 ± 7.51 years. There were no statistically significant differences in age, sex, education level, occupation, marital status, and monthly income between the intervention and control groups (all P > 0.05). Before the intervention, there were no statistically significant differences in balance test, fall risk assessment and SF-36 scores between the two groups (all P > 0.05). After 6 months of intervention, except for the health change dimension, the SF-36 scores of the intervention group were higher than those of the control group; the balance ability and fall risk scores of the intervention group were lower than those of the control group, and the differences were statistically significant (all P < 0.05). ConclusionThe PMT-based fall prevention health education intervention program can help reduce the risk of falls, improve balance, and improve the quality of life of elderly patients with OH.

Abstract Motivated by the importance of mixing arising from dissipating internal waves (IWs), vertical profiles of internal‐wave dissipation from a high‐resolution regional ocean model are compared with finestructure estimates made from observations. A horizontal viscosity scheme restricted to only act on horizontally rotational modes (such as eddies) is introduced and tested. At lower resolutions with horizontal grid spacings of 2 km, the modeled IW dissipation from numerical model agrees reasonably well with observations in some cases when the restricted form of horizontal viscosity is used. This suggests the possibility that if restricted forms of horizontal viscosity are adopted by global models with similar resolutions, they could be used to diagnose and map IW dissipation distributions. At higher resolutions with horizontal grid spacings of ∼250 m, the dissipation from vertical shear and horizontal viscosity act much more strongly resulting in dissipation overestimates; however, the vertical‐shear dissipation itself is found to agree well with observations.

Different endogenous components (tocopherols, phytosterols, polyphenols and squalene) of vegetable oils were added to compounded vegetable oils to investigate the antioxidant effects. Using a Schaal oven-accelerated experiment, the effects of endogenous antioxidants on the oxidative stability of compounded oils were examined by changes of fatty acid composition, acid value, peroxide value, anisidine value, and total oxidative value. The results demonstrated that the individual tocopherols and polyphenols showed a substantial antioxidant impact, and the antioxidant effect increased with concentration. As the concentrations of tocopherols and squalene increased, the combined of tocopherols and squalene showed antagonistic antioxidant effects and then synergistic effects, and the presence of squalene significantly increased the antioxidant capacity of tocopherols when the tocopherol content was greater than 480 mg/kg (P

BackgroundHigh sodium intake and fluid overhydration are common factors of and strongly associated with adverse outcomes in chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients. Yet, their effects on cardiac dysfunction remain unclear.AimsThe study aimed to explore the impact of salt and volume overload on cardiac alterations in non-dialysis CKD.MethodsIn all, 409 patients with CKD stages 1–4 (G1–G4) were enrolled. Daily salt intake (DSI) was estimated by 24-h urinary sodium excretion. Volume status was evaluated by the ratio of extracellular water (ECW) to total body water (TBW) measured by body composition monitor. Recruited patients were categorized into four groups according to DSI (6 g/day) and median ECW/TBW (0.439). Echocardiographic and body composition parameters and clinical indicators were compared. Associations between echocardiographic findings and basic characteristics were performed by Spearman’s correlations. Univariate and multivariate binary logistic regression analysis were used to determine the associations between DSI and ECW/TBW in the study groups and the incidence of left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) and elevated left ventricular filling pressure (ELVFP). In addition, the subgroup effects of DSI and ECW/TBW on cardiac abnormalities were estimated using Cox regression.ResultsOf the enrolled patients with CKD, the median urinary protein was 0.94 (0.28–3.14) g/d and estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) was 92.05 (IQR: 64.52–110.99) mL/min/1.73 m2. The distributions of CKD stages G1–G4 in the four groups was significantly different (p = 0.020). Furthermore, compared to group 1 (low DSI and low ECW/TBW), group 4 (high DSI and high ECW/TBW) showed a 2.396-fold (95%CI: 1.171–4.902; p = 0.017) excess risk of LVH and/or ELVFP incidence after adjusting for important CKD and cardiovascular disease risk factors. Moreover, combined with eGFR, DSI and ECW/TBW could identify patients with higher cardiac dysfunction risk estimates with an AUC of 0.704 (sensitivity: 75.2%, specificity: 61.0%). The specificity increased to 85.7% in those with nephrotic proteinuria (AUC = 0.713). The magnitude of these associations was consistent across subgroups analyses.ConclusionThe combination of high DSI (>6 g/d) and high ECW/TBW (>0.439) independently predicted a greater risk of LVH or ELVFP incidence in non-dialysis CKD patients. Moreover, the inclusion of eGFR and proteinuria improved the risk stratification ability of DSI and ECW/TBW in cardiac impairments in CKD.

Pyrus (pear) is among the most nutritious fruits and contains fibers that have great health benefits to humans. It is mostly cultivated in temperate regions globally and is highly subjected to biotic and abiotic stresses which affect its yield. Pheophorbide a oxygenase (PAO) is an essential component of the chlorophyll degradation system and contributes to the senescence of leaves. It is responsible for opening the pheophorbide a porphyrin macrocycle and forming the main fluorescent chlorophyll catabolite However, this gene family and its members have not been explored in Pyrus genomes. Here we report a pangenome-wide investigation has been conducted on eight Pyrus genomes: Cuiguan, Shanxi Duli, Zhongai 1, Nijisseiki, Yunhong No.1, d’Anjou, Bartlett v2.0, and Dangshansuli v.1.1. The phylogenetic history, their gene structure, conservation patterns of motifs, their distribution on chromosomes, and gene duplication are studied in detail which shows the intraspecific structural conservation as well as evolutionary patterns of Pyrus PAOs. Cis-elements, protein–protein interactions (PPI), and the Gene Ontology (GO) enrichment analyses show their potential biological functions. Furthermore, their expression in various tissues, fruit hardening conditions, and drought stress conditions is also studied. Based on phylogenetics, the identified PAOs were divided into four groups. The expansion of this gene family in Pyrus is caused by both tandem and segmental duplication. Moreover, positive and negative selection pressure equally directed the gene’s duplication process. The Pyrus PAO genes were enriched in hormones-related, light, development, and stress-related elements. RNA-seq data analysis showed that PAOs have varied levels of expression under diseased and abiotic stress conditions. The 3D structures of PAOs are also predicted to get more insights into functional conservation. Our research can be used further to get a deeper knowledge of the PAO gene family in Pyrus and to guide future research on improving the genetic composition of Pyrus to enhance stress tolerance.

The accurate handling of the relationships between economy, society, and environment in urban development is an important vision and goal of urban construction. Taking Xi’an as an example, this study established an urban development system dynamics model, including three subsystems (economy, society, and environment), to propose eight different development plans, and data from 2021 to 2025 were simulated in each plan. Finally, based on the simulation data, the entropy weight method and the Epsilon-based measure (EBM) model in data envelopment analysis (DEA) were used to measure the effect and efficiency of development in the city, respectively. The results showed that, in terms of effect, the comprehensive development plan (P8) had the highest score, which was 66.88% higher than the original plan. The plan scores of the double subsystem upgrading plans were higher than those of the single subsystem upgrading plans, indicating that comprehensive development can promote the coordination between subsystems and improve the development level. In terms of efficiency, the environmental (P4), economic–social (P5), economic–environmental (P6), social–environmental (P7), and comprehensive development (P8) plans were all effective according to DEA in each year, with P8 having the highest efficiency score, 1.1129. Therefore, considering the effect and efficiency comprehensively, P8 was considered the optimal plan. This study provides a method for exploring the relationship between variables in the process of urban development and is of great significance for defining an optimal plan.

Salicylic acid (SA) is known to be an efficient elicitor of secondary metabolism in plants. Arbutin, a characteristic phenolic glycoside found in ‘Yuluxiang’ pear (Pyrus bretschneideri Rehder × Pyrus sinkiangensis Yu), is widely used in lightening agents, in addition to cough, anti-inflammatory, and anti-microbial remedies, among other applications. However, research into the synthesis of arbutin in pear is limited. This study aimed to clarify the effect of exogenous SA on the arbutin content of pear using HPLC and investigate the mechanism for arbutin accumulation using RNA-Seq analysis. HPLC revealed that SA increased the arbutin contents of leaf, fruit, and callus in pear and demonstrated that the effect of SA is concentration and time dependent. RNA-Seq analysis of pear callus treated with or without SA revealed 380 differentially expressed genes (DEGs), 335 of which were up-regulated. According to a KEGG database analysis, the highest number of genes were annotated for phenylpropane biosynthesis. Overall, 21 DEGs were found to be involved in the synthesis of hydroquinone and UDP-glucose, which are substrates of arbutin synthesis. It is noteworthy that the expression levels of three up-regulated genes (Pbr006844.1, Pbr021064.1 and Pbr021069.1) related to hydroquinone glycosyltransferase were induced by SA and hydroquinone. Furthermore, transient overexpression of PbUGT72B1 (Pbr021069.1) increased the arbutin content in pear callus. These data explain the regulation of gene transcription associated with the promotive effect of SA on arbutin biosynthesis in pear, thus providing a theoretical foundation for enhancing the arbutin content of fruit through genetic engineering.

The membrane proteins of the magnesium transporter (MGT) family are essential to Mg homeostasis. However, there has not been a comprehensive study of MGT in pear. The 17 MGT that were renamed to PbMGT1–17 in this study were found in the pear genome database. Phylogenetically, PbMGT proteins were categorized into three groups, namely NIPA, MRS2, and CorA. The majority of PbMGT were hydrophobic proteins situated on the chloroplast, according to the characterization study. Members of the same group shared comparable conserved motifs and gene structure, as revealed by motif and exon/intron analysis. The application of gene ontology (GO) and cis-elements has demonstrated that PbMGT genes exhibit a high degree of sensitivity to stressors and take part in chloroplast development and Mg+ ion transport. It was discovered by tissue-specific expression analysis that PbMGT genes might have a role in the development of organs. The critical significance of PbMGT was shown through comprehensive expression in five pear cultivars at various fruit developmental stages. The PbMGT5 gene was significantly expressed throughout fruit development, suggesting a role in the setting and ripening processes of pear fruits. For the first time, our research brought attention to the function of PbMGT genes as they relate to fruit development. Our research is likely to serve as an incentive for the development of pear breeding initiatives in the future.

Based on the core corpus of Web of Science (WOS), CiteSpace software is utilized to analyze the annual number of publications, authors, institutional and national cooperation networks, keyword co-occurrence and emergence, and literature co-citation maps of 8310 related articles and reviews which is in the field of food and gut microbiota and published between 2004 and 2022. The results present that the annual number of publications in the field of food and gut microbiota is increasing from 2005, and the main research topic in this field is the influence of diet on gut microbiota and related diseases. Currently, research frontier is emulsifiers, symbiosis, gut microbiota, Akkermansia muciniphila, and Kefir. The number of publications from Chinese authors rank second in this field, but the international cooperation is lacking. In the future, more international cooperation should be performed to improve research skills.

A beam-changeable concentric annular Leaky-Wave Antenna (LWA) array is proposed, which contains two annular LWAs with constant-interval slots. By changing the excitations of the two LWAs, the radiation beam can be changed to different shapes and in different directions i.e. single beam to normal direction, conical beam to 40° and a synthetic beam. A theoretical model for analyzing the radiation properties of the LWA array is put forward, and a prototype of the array with the radius of 42.6 mm and the height of 4 mm is fabricated. By comparing simulation and the measurement results, it is found that the proposed LWA array exhibits a very well expected performance. The proposed antenna array is then applied to construct a self-sensing smart antenna which can provide flexible radio wave coverage according to the positions of users. Image-aware function is integrated into the smart antenna, and a series of tests including received power and Error Vector Magnitude (EVM) measurements are carried out in indoor scenarios. The results verify the effectiveness of the design.

Chlorella pyrenoidosa (C. pyrenoidosa) has been widely used in commercial food and feed production for numerous years. Its high protein content and cost-effectiveness make it an attractive source of novel protein. With a focus on sustainable development and the search for green natural products, current research is dedicated to maximizing the utilization of C. pyrenoidosa protein (CPP) and peptide. Various techniques, such as the use of ionic liquids, freeze–thawing, ultrasonication, enzyme digest, microwaving are employed in the extraction of CPP. The extracted CPP has demonstrated antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and bacteriostatic properties. It can also stimulate immune regulation, prevent cardiovascular disease, protect red blood cells, and even be used in wastewater treatment. Furthermore, CPP has shown some potential in combating obesity. Additionally, CPP is being explored in three-dimensional (3D) printing applications, particularly for the creation of biological scaffolds. It is also anticipated to play a role in 3D food printing. This review aimed to supply a comprehensive summary of CPP and C. pyrenoidosa peptide extraction methods, their functions, and practical applications in various industries. By doing so, it seeks to underpin subsequent research efforts, highlight current research limitations, and identify future research directions in this field.

Biomolecules, such as proteins and peptides, can be self-assembled. They are widely distributed, easy to obtain, and biocompatible. However, the self-assembly of proteins and peptides has disadvantages, such as difficulty in obtaining high quantities of materials, high cost, polydispersity, and purification limitations. The difficulties in using proteins and peptides as functional materials make it more complicate to arrange assembled nanostructures at both microscopic and macroscopic scales. Amino acids, as the smallest constituent of proteins and the smallest constituent in the bottom-up approach, are the smallest building blocks that can be self-assembled. The self-assembly of single amino acids has the advantages of low synthesis cost, simple modeling, excellent biocompatibility and biodegradability in vivo. In addition, amino acids can be assembled with other components to meet multiple scientific needs. However, using these simple building blocks to design attractive materials remains a challenge due to the simplicity of the amino acids. Most of the review articles about self-assembly focus on large molecules, such as peptides and proteins. The preparation of complicated materials by self-assembly of amino acids has not yet been evaluated. Therefore, it is of great significance to systematically summarize the literature of amino acid self-assembly. This article reviews the recent advances in amino acid self-assembly regarding amino acid self-assembly, functional amino acid self-assembly, amino acid coordination self-assembly, and amino acid regulatory functional molecule self-assembly.

Prebiotics and probiotics play a positive role in promoting human nutrition and health. Prebiotics are compounds that cannot be digested by the host, but can be used and fermented by probiotics, so as to promote the reproduction and metabolism of intestinal probiotics for the health of body. It has been confirmed that probiotics have clinical or health care functions in preventing or controlling intestinal, respiratory, and urogenital infections, allergic reaction, inflammatory bowel disease, irritable bowel syndrome and other aspects. However, there are few systematic summaries of these types, mechanisms of action and the promotion relationship between prebiotics and probiotic. Therefore, we summarized the various types of prebiotics and probiotics, their individual action mechanisms, and the mechanism of prebiotics promoting probiotics in the intestinal tract. It is hoped this review can provide new ideas for the application of prebiotics and probiotics in the future.

BackgroundSurgical resection could improve the survival of patients with early-stage small cell lung cancer (SCLC). However, there is a lack of dedicated studies concentrating on surgical treatment in older patients with T1-2N0M0 SCLC. Thus, we performed this population-based study to investigate whether older patients with T1-2N0M0 SCLC could benefit from surgery.MethodsWe collected the data of patients with SCLC between 2000 and 2015 from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results Program database. Older patients (≥ 65 years) with T1-2N0M0 SCLC were included, and we converted the staging information into those of the eighth edition. The propensity score matching (PSM) was used to balance the distribution of clinical characteristics between surgery and no-surgery groups.ResultsBefore PSM, the distribution proportions of clinical characteristics in 1,229 patients were unbalanced. The Kaplan–Meier curves of overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS) showed that the patients in the surgery group were better than those in the non-surgery group (all P < 0.001). After 1:2 PSM, the distribution proportions of clinical characteristics in 683 patients were balanced (all P > 0.05). The OS and CSS of patients in the surgery group were still better than that of patients in the no-surgery group (all P < 0.001), and subgroup analysis showed that the surgery was a protective factor for OS and CSS in all clinical characteristics subgroups (almost P < 0.001). The multivariate Cox analysis further confirmed this result (OS: HR, 0.33; 95% CI, 0.27–0.39; P < 0.001; CSS: HR, 0.29; 95% CI, 0.23–0.36; P < 0.001). The result of subgroup analysis based on age, T stage, and adjuvant therapy showed that surgery was related to better OS and CSS compared with non-surgery group (almost P < 0.001) and that lobectomy exhibited the longer survival than sublobectomy. Age, sex, and race were the independent prognostic factors for OS in patients undergoing surgery, whereas only the factor of age affects the CSS in patients with surgery.ConclusionsOlder patients with T1-2N0M0 SCLC can benefit significantly from surgical treatment, and lobectomy provides better prognosis than sublobectomy.

The effects of endogenous anti-oxidative components of ten common edible vegetable oils (palm olein, corn oil, rapeseed oil, soybean oil, perilla seed oil, high oleic sunflower oil, peanut oil, camellia oil, linseed oil, and sesame oil) on oxidation were explored in this research. The oxidation processes and patterns of the oils were investigated with the Schaal oven test using fatty acids and the oxidative stability index, acid value, peroxide value, p-anisidine value, total oxidation value, and content of major endogenous anti-oxidative components as indicators. The major endogenous anti-oxidative components in vegetable oils were tocopherols, sterols, polyphenols, and squalene, among which α-tocopherol, β-sitosterol, and polyphenols showed good anti-oxidative activity. However, squalene and polyphenols were relatively low and showed limited anti-oxidative effects. Moreover, the oxidative stability index of edible vegetable oils oxidized at high temperature (120 °C) was positively correlated with the content of saturated fatty acids (r = 0.659) and negatively correlated with the content of polyunsaturated fatty acids (r = −0.634) and calculated oxidizability (r = −0.696). When oxidized at a low temperature (62 °C), oxidative stability was influenced by a combination of fatty acid composition as well as endogenous anti-oxidative components. An improved TOPSIS based on Mahalanobis distance was used to evaluate the oxidative stability of different types of vegetable oils. Moreover, the oxidative stability of corn oil was better than the other vegetable oils, while perilla seed oil was very weak.

Abstract The optimised droop control method is proposed to achieve the state‐of‐charge (SoC) balance among parallel‐connected distributed energy storage units in islanded DC microgrid, which considers the difference of line impedance, initial state‐of‐charge values and capacities among distributed energy storage units. Since the droop control is the basic control strategy for load sharing in DC microgrid applications, however, the load sharing accuracy is degraded under conventional droop control method due to the unmatched line impedance in reality. Meanwhile, the initial state‐of‐charge values and capacities of each distributed energy storage unit are usually different. Hence, the state of charge for distributed energy storage units cannot be balanced. In order to prolong the lifetime of the distributed energy storage units and avoid the overuse of a certain distributed energy storage unit, the optimised droop control strategy based on sample and holder is designed, by modifying the droop coefficient adaptively, the accurate load sharing and balanced state of charge among distributed energy storage units are both obtained. Finally, the performance of the proposed control scheme is accessed through a series cases on technologies real‐time digital simulator (RTDS) and its effectiveness is verified.

In this paper, a theoretical model based on the electric field integration method is proposed to analyse radiation properties of the slotted annular Leaky-Wave Antenna (LWA), which can generate a Circularly Polarized (CP) conical beam or broadside beam. The annular LWA contains radiating elements arranged along a circular travelling-wave structure with equal intervals. By combining the proposed model and LWA theory, the design procedure for the annular SIW LWA is presented. To verify the model, three examples of LWAs with different beam angles have been designed and fabricated. Calculation results from the proposed model are consistent with the simulation and measurement results. The model can significantly reduce the design period and is an instructive tool for antenna design.

Abstract A new kind of smart antenna capable of automatically switching its main beam to track a moving target is presented. The antenna, which is suitable for mobile communication in long straight spaces, such as railways or highways, integrates a sensing element, signal processing element, and radiating element. The sensing element works based on a frequency-modulated continuous wave and delivers a beat frequency signal containing environmental information to the signal processing element, which is used to control the excitation of the radiating element. To verify the efficiency of the proposed antenna, a prototype is fabricated and implemented in a real corridor scenario. Furthermore, the error vector magnitude (EVM) along the test path is investigated to evaluate the system performance when using the proposed antenna. The results show that this kind of smart antenna is capable of improving mobile communication quality and decreasing energy consumption. Therefore, it is a promising candidate for mobile communication.

In this paper, a smart antenna array based on the image-aware technique that can automatically switch its beam to track users is proposed. Mobilenet, a deep neural network (DNN), is utilized to find the users' position information from images; it is trained using the collected dataset, and the parameters are optimized. The modified DNN is then implanted into a miniaturized embedded system RK3399. To obtain beam switchable radiation, a 2×2 microstrip patch antenna array with a 4×4 Butler feeding matrix is designed in the 2.4 GHz ISM band. Then, the RK3399 is compactly integrated with the patch antenna array, and a microcamera is used as the eye of the antenna to capture the environment information. A series of measurements of the received power and error vector magnitude (EVM) are performed in a real indoor scenario to verify the design. The results agree well with the expected results and show that the design is capable of guaranteeing communication quality and improving energy efficiency, making this technique a good candidate for indoor wireless applications.

Immune checkpoint inhibitor-induced sarcoid-like reactions and tertiary lymphoid structures (TLSs) are increasingly recognized but rarely reported in the same patient. We report a patient with lung adenocarcinoma who displayed sarcoid-like reactions in intrathoracic lymph nodes and tertiary lymphoid structures in surgical tumor after neoadjuvant therapy with nivolumab plus ipilimumab. Pathological examination revealed 50% residual tumor cells after treatment, and the CT evaluation of the primary tumor showed a stable disease. The patient experienced a recurrence eight months after surgery. To identify immune correlates of the limited response to immunotherapy, we conducted genomic and transcriptional assays, multiplex immunoassay, and multiplex immunohistochemistry on the pre- and post-immunotherapy tumor, lymph node, and plasma samples. TP53 R181C, KRAS G12C and SMAD4 R361H were identified as driver mutations of the tumor. In addition to abundant infiltrated lymphocytes, immunotherapy induced high levels of inhibitory components in post-treatment tissue samples, especially the FOXP3+ regulatory T cells in tumor and PD-L1 expression in the lymph node. Despite abundant TLSs in the post-treatment tumor, most TLSs were immature. Moreover, increasing levels of circulating checkpoint proteins BTLA, TIM-3, LAG-3, PD-1, PD-L1, and CTLA4 were observed during immunotherapy. Collectively, our observations revealed that high levels of immunosuppressive molecules in tumor, lymph nodes and/or in peripheral blood might indicate poor outcomes after immunotherapy, even in the setting of a patient with concurrent sarcoid-like reactions and tertiary lymphoid structures.

This paper focuses on the effect of hub clearance in the design space of the highly loaded cantilevered stator. The embedded 1.5 stages of a low-speed research compressor (LSRC) were conducted with Unsteady Reynolds Average Navier-Stokes (URANS) numerical investigation, and the cantilevered stator adopts positive bowed and fore-sweep three-dimensional design. The research details that with the hub clearance increasing from 1.1% to 4.5% span, the loss coefficient and the total leakage momentum of the cantilevered stator correspond to the change of the blade loading near the hub. When designing the inlet metal angle of the rotor downstream the cantilevered stator, emphasis should be given to considering the inter-stage matching below 15% span. The mixing of leakage flow in 1.1% span clearance and 2.5% span clearance is basically completed in the S3 passage, but the mixing of leakage flow in 3.5% span clearance and 4.5% span clearance is still relatively strong downstream of S3. When calculating the relative entropy variation based on Denton’s mixing model, attention should be paid to the relationship between the leakage flow velocity affected by the hub gap and the mainstream velocity, as well as whether the mixing has been completed in the blade passage.

Food packaging plays a vital role in the food supply chain by acting as an additional layer to protect against food contamination, but the main function of traditional conventional packaging is only to isolate food from the outside environment, and cannot provide related information about food spoilage. Intelligent packaging can feel, inspect, and record external or internal changes in food products to provide further information about food quality. Importantly, intelligent packaging indicators will account for a significant proportion of the food industry’s production, with promising application potential. In this review, we mainly summarize and review the upcoming progress in the classification, preparation, and application of food packaging indicators. Equally, the feasibility of 3D printing in the preparation of intelligent food packaging indicators is also discussed in detail, as well as the limitations and future directions of smart food packaging. Taken together, the information supported in this paper provides new insights into monitoring food spoilage and food quality.

The application of chitosan (CS) and whey protein (WP) alone or in combination in 3D/4D printing has been well considered in previous studies. Although several excellent reviews on additive manufacturing discussed the properties and biomedical applications of CS and WP, there is a lack of a systemic review about CS and WP bio-inks for 3D/4D printing applications. Easily modified bio-ink with optimal printability is a key for additive manufacturing. CS, WP, and WP–CS complex hydrogel possess great potential in making bio-ink that can be broadly used for future 3D/4D printing, because CS is a functional polysaccharide with good biodegradability, biocompatibility, non-immunogenicity, and non-carcinogenicity, while CS–WP complex hydrogel has better printability and drug-delivery effectivity than WP hydrogel. The review summarizes the current advances of bio-ink preparation employing CS and/or WP to satisfy the requirements of 3D/4D printing and post-treatment of materials. The applications of CS/WP bio-ink mainly focus on 3D food printing with a few applications in cosmetics. The review also highlights the trends of CS/WP bio-inks as potential candidates in 4D printing. Some promising strategies for developing novel bio-inks based on CS and/or WP are introduced, aiming to provide new insights into the value-added development and commercial CS and WP utilization.

Carotenoids harvest energy from light and transfer it to chlorophylls during photosynthesis. Here, Feng et al. perform ab initio calculations on excited-state dynamics and simulated 2D electronic spectrum of carotenoids, supporting the existence of a new excited state in carotenoids.

BACKGROUND: Rancidity causes unpleasant tastes and smells, and the degradation of fatty acids and natural antioxidants, so that an oil is unfit to be consumed. Natural antioxidants, including tocopherols, polyphenols (sesamol, canolol, ferulic acid, caffeic acid, etc.), β-carotene, squalene and phytosterols, contribute to delay the oxidation of vegetable oils. However, studies on the combination of natural antioxidants to lengthen the shelf life of unsaturated fatty acid-rich blended oil have not been reported. RESULTS: All of the composite antioxidants had the potential to significantly improve the oxidation stability of blended oil. Blended oil G with 0.05 g kg-1 β-carotene, 0.25 g kg-1 sesamol and 0.25 g kg-1 caffeic acid showed the best antiautooxidation. It is also effective in improving the oxidative stability of vegetable oils containing various fatty acids. The oxidation stability index of the blended oil containing the optimum composition of natural antioxidants was 2.17-fold longer than that of the control sample. After the end of accelerated oxidation, the oil's peroxide value, p-anisidine value and total oxidation value were 6.59 times, 12.26 times and 6.65 times lower than those of the control sample, respectively. CONCLUSION: (1) The combination of natural antioxidants β-carotene (0.05 g kg-1), sesamol (0.25 g kg-1) and caffeic acid (0.25 g kg-1) enhances the oxidative stability of unsaturated fatty acid-rich blended oils. (2) β-Carotene is the main antioxidant in the early stages of oxidation. (3) Sesamol and caffeic acid are the main antioxidants in the middle and late stages of oxidation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]