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Two-dimensional (2D) semiconductor heterostructures are key building blocks for many electronic and optoelectronic devices. Reconfiguring the band-edge states and modulating their interplay with charge carriers at the interface in a continuous manner have long been sought yet are challenging. Here, using organic semiconductor–incorporated 2D halide perovskites as the model system, we realize the manipulation of band-edge states and charge distribution via mechanical—rather than chemical or thermal—regulation. Compression induces band-alignment switching and charge redistribution due to the different pressure responses of organic and inorganic building blocks, giving controllable emission properties of 2D perovskites. We propose and demonstrate a “pressure gating” strategy that enables the control of multiple emission states within a single material. We also reveal that band-alignment transition at the organic-inorganic interface is intrinsically not well resolved at room temperature owing to the thermally activated transfer and shuffling of band-edge carriers. This work provides important fundamental insights into the energetics and carrier dynamics of hybrid semiconductor heterostructures.

Objective. To evaluate the efficacy of fluticasone and salmeterol dry powder in treating patients with bronchial asthma and its effects on inflammatory factors and pulmonary function. Methods. One hundred patients with bronchial asthma, admitted to our hospital between April 2019 and June 2020, were enrolled and assigned into two groups using the random number table method. The observation group (n = 50) received budesonide powder, and the experimental group received fluticasone and salmeterol dry powder. The two groups were compared with regard to clinical efficacy, inflammatory factors, pulmonary function, and adverse reactions. Results. In the experimental group, the total effective rate of treatment was significantly higher than that in the observation group ( P < 0.05 ); after treatment, the levels of inflammatory factors in the experimental group were lower than those in the observation group ( P < 0.05 ); after treatment, lung function in the experimental group was significantly higher than that in the observation group ( P < 0.05 ); the incidence of adverse reactions in the experimental group was significantly lower than that in the observation group ( P < 0.05 ). Conclusion. Salmeterol and fluticasone powder has shown impressive clinical benefits in the treatment of bronchial asthma patients. It might be a viable approach to reduce inflammatory factors and improve pulmonary function. Moreover, its good clinical safety profile makes it a promising treatment that ought to be promoted and used widely.

This study aimed to improve the stability and catalytic properties of Thermomyces lanuginosus lipase (TLL) adsorbed on a hydrophobic support. At the optimized conditions (pH 5 and 25 °C without any additions), the Sips isotherm model effectively fitted the equilibrium adsorption data, indicating a monolayer and the homogenous distribution of immobilized lipase molecules. To preserve the high specific activity of adsorbed lipase, the immobilized lipase (IL) with a moderate loading amount (approximately 40% surface coverage) was selected. Polyethylenimine (PEI) and chitosan (CS) were successfully applied as bridging units to in situ crosslink the immobilized lipase molecules in IL. At the low polymer concentration (0.5%, w/w) and with 1 h incubation, insignificant changes in average pore size were detected. Short-chain PEI and CS (MW ≤ 2 kDa) efficiently improved the lipase stability, i.e., the lipase loss decreased from 40% to

Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) was used to measure the solenoidal vector field of the Taylor-Couette flow with different tracers. It can be seen that both of them, the polyamide and flocs can be a suitable performance tracer particles for PIV in flow field measurement. The results indicated that the instantaneous velocity vector maps obtained with different tracer particles which could denote the characteristics of the flow structure, the size and the vortex centers of the vortex. At the meantime, the experimental results demonstrated that the velocity vector obtained by the flocs generated in real-time as tracer particles was similar with suitable performance to those obtained by polyamide.

Objective: This research was aimed to evaluate the impact of high-quality nursing (HQN) plus respiratory training on treatment compliance, pulmonary function (PF) and quality of life (QoL) of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Methods: We retrospectively analyzed 89 COPD patients who were treated at the affiliated Nanhua Hospital from February 2019 to February 2021. Among them, 40 cases received drug treatment and breathing training as the control group, and 49 cases were supplemented with HQN as the experimental group on the basis of the control group. The changes in PF, quality of life and compliance were compared between the two groups. Results: Vital capacity (VC) and alveolar ventilation (VA) increased in both cohorts after treatment (P < 0.05), and increased more significantly in experimental group compared with control group (P < 0.05). Experimental group also presented markedly higher total effective rate and noticeably lower scores of symptoms, activities and disease impact on daily life than control group (P < 0.05). Conclusions: HQN plus respiratory training can effectively improve the PF, efficacy and QoL of patients with COPD.

Background This study aimed to evaluate the correlation of A-kinase-interacting protein 1 (AKIP1) with C-X-C motif chemokine ligand (CXCL) 1 and CXCL2, and their associations with clinical characteristics and prognosis in cervical cancer patients. Methods One hundred and fifty early-stage cervical cancer patients treated with surgical resection were reviewed and tumor tissue samples were obtained. Expression of AKIP1, CXCL1 and CXCL2 was detected by immunohistochemistry (IHC). Data of tumor features were retrieved, and disease-free survival (DFS) as well as overall survival (OS) were calculated. Results AKIP1 expression was positively correlated with CXCL1 and CXCL2 expression in cervical cancer tissue (both P

Monolith based immobilized trypsin reactors (MITRs) were developed using different immobilization protocols. Compared with the use of reducing agent NaCNBH3, the application of 2-PB led to around 33% decrease in immobilization yield, while improved the specific activity of immobilized trypsin. The developed flow-through MITR was used to hydrolyze β-Lactoglobulin (β-Lg), and the feasibility of integrating ethanol in reaction media was evaluated. Raising ethanol concentrations from 0 to 50% increased the size of β-Lg molecules from 1.74 ± 0.32 nm to 5.67 ± 2.78 nm, and doubled the viscosity of β-Lg solutions. To avoid high backpressure and potential clog on MITR, β-Lg was hydrolyzed with the addition of ethanol up to 20%, where the activity of immobilized trypsin increased by 20% than that in aqueous media. Similar to free trypsin, the addition of ethanol contributed to an increase in DH and a faster depletion of intact protein for MITR. The presence of ethanol decreased the releases of peptides locating on C- termini, i.e., f(149–162) and f(142–148) for free and immobilized trypsin. However, the release of peptides locating inner β-Lg increased, e.g., a 5 times higher amount of f(125–138) was detected for MITR in 20% ethanol.

Immobilised trypsin is an alternative to free trypsin for producing protein hydrolysates with increased functionalities. However, the influence of hydrolytic conditions on this process remains unclear. The influence of salts on β-lactoglobulin (β-Lg) hydrolysis by free and immobilised trypsin was compared. For both forms of trypsin, 0.1 m Tris accelerated the release of most final peptides except f (71–75), and had no significant effects on the hydrolysis of intact β-Lg. Increasing NaCl concentrations from 0 to 0.02 m increased the degree of hydrolysis (DH) by 22.4% for free trypsin versus 62.1% for immobilised trypsin. The presence of 0.1 or 0.5 m NaCl hindered the release of peptides associated with the breakdown of intact protein. This led to 2–4 fold decreases in depleting intact β-Lg and DH, except immobilised trypsin at 0.1 m NaCl (DH increased by 44.3% versus without NaCl). Potential mechanisms underlying the effects of salts are discussed.

Tryptic hydrolysis of β-Lactoglobulin (β-Lg) is attracting more and more attention due to the reduced allergenicity and the functionality of resulting hydrolysates. To produce hydrolysates in an economically viable way, immobilized trypsin reactors (IMTRs), based on polymethacrylate monolith with pore size 2.1 μm (N1) and 6 μm (N2), were developed and used in a flow-through system. IMTRs were characterized in terms of permeability and enzymatic activity during extensive usage. N1 showed twice the activity compared with N2, correlating well with its almost two times higher amount of immobilized trypsin. N2 showed high stability over 18 cycles, as well as over more than 30 weeks during storage. The efficiency of IMTRs on hydrolyzing β-Lg was compared with free trypsin, and the resulting hydrolysates were analyzed by MALDI-TOF/MS. The final hydrolysis degree by N1 reached 9.68% (86.58% cleavage sites) within 4 h, while only around 6% (53.67% cleavage sites) by 1.5 mg of free trypsin. Peptides analysis showed the different preference between immobilized trypsin and free trypsin. Under the experimental conditions used in this study, the potential cleavage site Lys135-Phe136 was resistant against the immobilized trypsin in N1. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved

Velocity field data were acquired for Taylor-Couette flow in the annulus gap between a rotating inner cylinder and a fixed concentric outer cylinder by particle image velocimetry. The flocculation efficiencies were also obtained in the same Taylor-Couette flow under the conditions corresponding to the velocity field measurement. It was shown that the flocculation efficiencies reach the maximum values due to the closed vortices in WVF and their contraction and expansion with time, but out of WVF range, the comparatively low flocculation efficiencies were obtained due to the no-closed vortices connected with each other.

Although immobilized trypsin is a viable alternative to the free one in solution for producing protein hydrolysates, the change of selectivity introduced by immobilization is unclear. In this study, we compared the selectivity of free and immobilized trypsin towards different cleavage sites of β-lactoglobulin (β-Lg) with a focus on the impact of environmental pH. Both free and immobilized trypsin exhibited greater accessibility to native β-Lg at elevated pH (from pH 7.2 to 8.7). Additionally, free trypsin preferred to attack cleavage sites located at the C-terminus at pH 7.8, whereas an opposite preference for the N-terminus was observed at pH 8.7. Regarding the immobilized trypsin, the pH did not significantly influence its preference for the C- or N-terminus. Generally, immobilization of trypsin resulted in more focused cleavage within its specificity during the initial stage of hydrolysis, and some peptides were formed more rapidly by the immobilized trypsin.

Velocity field data were acquired for Taylor-Couette flow in the annulus gap between a rotating inner cylinder and a fixed concentric outer cylinder by using particle image velocimetry. The flocculation efficiencies were also obtained in the same Taylor-Couette flow under the conditions corresponding to the velocity field measurement. The flocculation efficiencies reached the maximum values due to the closed vortices, their contraction and expansion with time in wavy vortex flow. But out of the wavy vortex flow range, the comparatively low flocculation efficiencies were obtained due to the no-closed vortices which connected with each other.

Particle image velocimetry (PIV) was applied to characterize the morphological changes of flocs and to acquired velocity field data in the coagulation process in Taylor-Couette reactor. By use of PIV,the morphological of the flocs in the coagulation process can be characterized and described with good performance. It was shown that the flocculation efficiencies reached the maximum values and the size of the generated flocs in the coagulation process was the biggest when the roating speed was in the range between 20∼60 rpm. It was demonstrated that PIV can be exploited as a useful tool in the in-situ observation flocs during coagulation processes.