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Electronic nematicity is observed in a heavy-fermion superconductor, CeRhIn 5 , suggesting a close link between unconventional superconductivity and the appearance of nematicity. Observing the origins of nematicity and superconductivity Several strongly correlated electron materials, such as iron pnictides, which were recently discovered to be high-temperature superconductors, have been found to harbour an unusual state: electronic nematicity. This state is characterized by a directional alignment of electronic structure against the rotational symmetry of the underlying lattice. An unresolved question is how this state connects to superconductivity. Philip Moll and colleagues present a unique set of measurements, directly observing anisotropy in the electrical resistivity of the heavy fermion superconductor CeRhIn 5 . The authors argue that electronic nematicity and superconductivity have a common origin, with nematicity emerging with increasing magnetic field and superconductivity with increasing pressure near the antiferromagnetic quantum phase transition. This scenario opens up a fresh direction for investigating exotic states in correlated electron systems and suggests that nematic states in such systems may be more common than previously thought. Electronic nematic materials are characterized by a lowered symmetry of the electronic system compared to the underlying lattice, in analogy to the directional alignment without translational order in nematic liquid crystals 1 . Such nematic phases appear in the copper- and iron-based high-temperature superconductors 2 , 3 , 4 , and their role in establishing superconductivity remains an open question. Nematicity may take an active part, cooperating or competing with superconductivity, or may appear accidentally in such systems. Here we present experimental evidence for a phase of fluctuating nematic character in a heavy-fermion superconductor, CeRhIn 5 (ref. 5 ). We observe a magnetic-field-induced state in the vicinity of a field-tuned antiferromagnetic quantum critical point at H c  ≈ 50 tesla. This phase appears above an out-of-plane critical field H * ≈ 28 tesla and is characterized by a substantial in-plane resistivity anisotropy in the presence of a small in-plane field component. The in-plane symmetry breaking has little apparent connection to the underlying lattice, as evidenced by the small magnitude of the magnetostriction anomaly at H* . Furthermore, no anomalies appear in the magnetic torque, suggesting the absence of metamagnetism in this field range. The appearance of nematic behaviour in a prototypical heavy-fermion superconductor highlights the interrelation of nematicity and unconventional superconductivity, suggesting nematicity to be common among correlated materials.

Apoptosis is a key mechanism for metazoans to eliminate unwanted cells. Resistance to apoptosis is a hallmark of many cancer cells and a major roadblock to traditional chemotherapy. Recent evidence indicates that inhibition of caspase-dependent apoptosis sensitizes many cancer cells to a form of non-apoptotic cell death termed necroptosis. This has led to widespread interest in exploring necroptosis as an alternative strategy for anti-cancer therapy. Here we show that in human colon cancer tissues, the expression of the essential necroptosis adaptors receptor interacting protein kinase (RIPK)1 and RIPK3 is significantly decreased compared with adjacent normal colon tissues. The expression of RIPK1 and RIPK3 was suppressed by hypoxia, but not by epigenetic DNA modification. To explore the role of necroptosis in chemotherapy-induced cell death, we used inhibitors of RIPK1 or RIPK3 kinase activity, and modulated their expression in colon cancer cell lines using short hairpin RNAs. We found that RIPK1 and RIPK3 were largely dispensable for classical chemotherapy-induced cell death. Caspase inhibitor and/or second mitochondria-derived activator of caspase mimetic, which sensitize cells to RIPK1- and RIPK3-dependent necroptosis downstream of tumor necrosis factor receptor-like death receptors, also did not alter the response of cancer cells to chemotherapeutic agents. In contrast to the RIPKs, we found that cathepsins are partially responsible for doxorubicin or etoposide-induced cell death. Taken together, these results indicate that traditional chemotherapeutic agents are not efficient inducers of necroptosis and that more potent pathway-specific drugs are required to fully harness the power of necroptosis in anti-cancer therapy.

Weyl fermions are a recently discovered ingredient for correlated states of electronic matter. A key difficulty has been that real materials also contain non-Weyl quasiparticles, and disentangling the experimental signatures has proven challenging. Here we use magnetic fields up to 95 T to drive the Weyl semimetal TaAs far into its quantum limit, where only the purely chiral 0th Landau levels of the Weyl fermions are occupied. We find the electrical resistivity to be nearly independent of magnetic field up to 50 T: unusual for conventional metals but consistent with the chiral anomaly for Weyl fermions. Above 50 T we observe a two-order-of-magnitude increase in resistivity, indicating that a gap opens in the chiral Landau levels. Above 80 T we observe strong ultrasonic attenuation below 2 K, suggesting a mesoscopically textured state of matter. These results point the way to inducing new correlated states of matter in the quantum limit of Weyl semimetals. Weyl semimetals should exhibit unusual electronic behaviour but conditions where these effects dominate are difficult to achieve. Ramshaw et al. use high magnetic fields to drive TaAs into the quantum limit, finding evidence for the predicted chiral anomaly and an unanticipated increase in resistivity at the highest fields.

The observation of a reconstructed Fermi surface via quantum oscillations in hole-doped cuprates opened a path towards identifying broken symmetry states in the pseudogap regime. However, such an identification has remained inconclusive due to the multi-frequency quantum oscillation spectra and complications accounting for bilayer effects in most studies. We overcome these impediments with high-resolution measurements on the structurally simpler cuprate HgBa 2 CuO 4+ δ (Hg1201), which features one CuO 2 plane per primitive unit cell. We find only a single oscillatory component with no signatures of magnetic breakdown tunnelling to additional orbits. Therefore, the Fermi surface comprises a single quasi-two-dimensional pocket. Quantitative modelling of these results indicates that a biaxial charge density wave within each CuO 2 plane is responsible for the reconstruction and rules out criss-crossed charge stripes between layers as a viable alternative in Hg1201. Lastly, we determine that the characteristic gap between reconstructed pockets is a significant fraction of the pseudogap energy. The identification of broken symmetry states in underdoped cuprate superconductors via quantum oscillation measurements remains inconclusive. Here, Chan et al . report the reconstructed Fermi surface of HgBa 2 CuO 4+ δ comprises only a single pocket indicating a biaxial charge-density-wave order within each CuO 2 plane.

Multiple crises, including climate change, ecosystem degradation, economic, political and social upheavals, severely impact people's well‐being. Ecosystem services (or nature's contributions to people) play a key role during crisis that needs to be further elucidated. Most research focusses on the material benefits that ecosystems provide in times of crisis, paying less attention to intertwined intangible, nonmaterial dimensions. Yet, these intangible ecosystem benefits are often crucial for people's resilience and well‐being in times of need. We examine the role that nature plays for resilience and well‐being in times of crisis through a case study of Greece's back‐to‐the‐land movement during the European economic crisis. We conducted semistructured interviews with 76 households that had gone back‐to‐the‐land to understand why people sought to reconnect to nature and what their experiences were. Our results show that reconnecting to nature provided material ecosystem benefits such as food and income often from previously undervalued ecosystems (e.g. abandoned orchards) as well as nonmaterial ecosystem benefits such as mental health, feelings of safety, calm and independence that helped people cope with the crisis and adapt and transform to new socio‐ecological contexts. Participants reported that reconnecting to nature also changed their relational values. People mentioned gaining new perspectives, meanings and relationships with others and the natural world. While the crisis significantly affected people's material well‐being, reconnecting with nature helped people cope with crisis but also prompted a profound reevaluation of what constitutes a good life, leading to changes in their subjective and relational well‐being. This enhanced their capacity to act and plan for the future (their agency). Overall, our research emphasizes how reconnecting to nature and its multidimensional ecosystem benefits during crises can have transformative effects on individuals' resilience, well‐being and their relationships with the environment. Our research shows that not only material benefits of ecosystem services need to be valued but also intangible, nonmaterial benefits that affect material, subjective and relational dimensions of well‐being and resilience. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog. Περίληψη Οι πολλαπλές κρίσεις, όπως η κλιματική αλλαγή, η υποβάθμιση των οικοσυστημάτων, και οι οικονομικές, πολιτικές και κοινωνικές αναταραχές, επηρεάζουν την ευημερία των ανθρώπων. Οι οικοσυστημικές υπηρεσίες (ή οι συνεισφορές της φύσης προς τους ανθρώπους) παίζουν βασικό ρόλο κατά τη διάρκεια αυτων των κρισεων, ενας ρόλος που πρέπει να διασαφηνιστεί περαιτέρω. Οι περισσότερες έρευνες επικεντρώνονται στα υλικά οφέλη που παρέχουν τα οικοσυστήματα σε περιόδους κρίσης, δίνοντας λιγότερη προσοχή στις αλληλένδετες μη υλικές διαστάσεις. Ωστόσο, αυτά τα άυλα οφέλη των οικοσυστημάτων είναι συχνά ζωτικής σημασίας για την ανθεκτικότητα και την ευημερία των ανθρώπων σε περιόδους ανάγκης. Εξετάζουμε τον ρόλο που διαδραματίζει η φύση για την ανθεκτικότητα και την ευημερία σε περιόδους κρίσης μέσω μιας περιπτωσιολογικής μελέτης του κινήματος επιστροφής στη γη στην Ελλαδα κατά τη διάρκεια της οικονομικής κρίσης. Πραγματοποιήσαμε ημιδομημένες συνεντεύξεις με 76 νοικοκυριά που επέστρεψαν στη γη για να κατανοήσουμε γιατί οι άνθρωποι επιδίωξαν να επανασυνδεθούν με τη φύση και ποιες ήταν οι εμπειρίες τους. Τα αποτελέσματά μας δείχνουν ότι η επανασύνδεση με τη φύση παρείχε υλικά οικοσυστημικά οφέλη, όπως τροφή και εισόδημα συχνά από προηγουμένως υποτιμημένα οικοσυστήματα (π.χ. εγκαταλελειμμένα περιβόλια), καθώς και μη υλικά οικοσυστημικά οφέλη, όπως ψυχική υγεία, αισθήμα ασφάλειας, ηρεμίας και ανεξαρτησίας, που βοήθησαν τους ανθρώπους να αντιμετωπίσουν την κρίση και να προσαρμοστούν και να μετασχηματιστούν σε νέα κοινωνικο‐οικολογικά πλαίσια. Οι συμμετέχοντες ανέφεραν ότι η επανασύνδεση με τη φύση άλλαξε επίσης τις αξίες των σχέσεών τους. Οι άνθρωποι ανέφεραν ότι απέκτησαν νέες προοπτικές και σχέσεις με τους άλλους και τον φυσικό κόσμο. Ενώ η κρίση επηρέασε σημαντικά την υλική ευημερία των ανθρώπων, η επανασύνδεση με τη φύση βοήθησε τους ανθρώπους να αντιμετωπίσουν την κρίση, αλλά προκάλεσε επίσης μια βαθιά επανεκτίμηση του τι συνιστά μια καλή ζωή, οδηγώντας σε αλλαγές στην υποκειμενική και σχεσιακή ευημερία τους. Αυτό ενίσχυσε την ικανότητά τους να ενεργούν και να σχεδιάζουν το μέλλον. Συνολικά, η έρευνά μας υπογραμμίζει πώς η επανασύνδεση με τη φύση και τα πολυδιάστατα οφέλη των οικοσυστημάτων κατά τη διάρκεια κρίσεων μπορεί να έχει μετασχηματιστικές επιδράσεις στην ανθεκτικότητα των ατόμων, την ευημερία και τις σχέσεις τους με το περιβάλλον. Η έρευνά μας δείχνει ότι δεν πρέπει να αναγνωρίζονται μόνο τα υλικά οφέλη των οικοσυστημικών υπηρεσιών, αλλά και τα άυλα, μη υλικά οφέλη που επηρεάζουν τις υλικές, υποκειμενικές και σχεσιακές διαστάσεις της ευημερίας και της ανθεκτικότητας. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.

PurposeQuantitative MRI (qMRI) was performed using a 1.5T protocol that includes a novel chemical exchange saturation transfer/magnetization transfer (CEST/MT) approach. The purpose of this prospective study was to determine if qMRI metrics at baseline, at the 10th and 20th fraction during a 30 fraction/6 week standard chemoradiation (CRT) schedule, and at 1 month following treatment could be an early indicator of response for glioblastoma (GBM).MethodsThe study included 51 newly diagnosed GBM patients. Four regions-of-interest (ROI) were analyzed: (i) the radiation defined clinical target volume (CTV), (ii) radiation defined gross tumor volume (GTV), (iii) enhancing-tumor regions, and (iv) FLAIR-hyperintense regions. Quantitative CEST, MT, T1 and T2 parameters were compared between those patients progressing within 6.9 months (early), and those progressing after CRT (late), using mixed modelling. Exploratory predictive modelling was performed to identify significant predictors of early progression using a multivariable LASSO model.ResultsResults were dependent on the specific tumor ROI analyzed and the imaging time point. The baseline CEST asymmetry within the CTV was significantly higher in the early progression cohort. Other significant predictors included the T2 of the MT pools (for semi-solid at fraction 20 and water at 1 month after CRT), the exchange rate (at fraction 20) and the MGMT methylation status.ConclusionsWe observe the potential for multiparametric qMRI, including a novel pulsed CEST/MT approach, to show potential in distinguishing early from late progression GBM cohorts. Ultimately, the goal is to personalize therapeutic decisions and treatment adaptation based on non-invasive imaging-based biomarkers.

The phase diagram of the cuprate superconductors continues to pose formidable scientific challenges. While these materials are typically viewed as doped Mott insulators, it is well known that they are Fermi liquids at high hole-dopant concentrations. It was recently demonstrated that at moderate doping, in the pseudogap (PG) region of the phase diagram, the charge carriers are also best described as a Fermi liquid. Nevertheless, the relationship between the two Fermi-liquid (FL) regions and the nature of the strange-metal (SM) state at intermediate doping have remained unsolved. Here we show for the case of the model cuprate superconductor HgBa2CuO4+δ that the normal-state transport scattering rate determined from the cotangent of the Hall angle remains quadratic in temperature across the PG temperature, upon entering the SM state, and that it is doping-independent below optimal doping. Analysis of prior transport results for other cuprates reveals that this behavior is universal throughout the entire phase diagram and points to a pervasive FL transport scattering rate. These observations can be reconciled with a variety of other experimental results for the cuprates upon considering the possibility that the PG phenomenon is associated with the gradual, non-uniform localization of one hole per planar CuO2 unit.

Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a common allergic skin disease, characterized by dryness, itchiness, thickening and inflammation of the skin. Infiltration of eosinophils into the dermal layer and presence of edema are typical characteristics in the skin biopsy of AD patients. Previous in vitro and clinical studies showed that the Pentaherbs formula (PHF) consisting of five traditional Chinese herbal medicines, Flos Lonicerae, Herba Menthae, Cortex Phellodendri, Cortex Moutan and Rhizoma Atractylodis at w/w ratio of 2:1:2:2:2 exhibited therapeutic potential in treating AD. In this study, an in vivo murine model with oxazolone (OXA)-mediated dermatitis was used to elucidate the efficacy of PHF. Active ingredients of PHF water extract were also identified and quantified, and their in vitro anti-inflammatory activities on pruritogenic cytokine IL-31- and alarmin IL-33-activated human eosinophils and dermal fibroblasts were evaluated. Ear swelling, epidermis thickening and eosinophils infiltration in epidermal and dermal layers, and the release of serum IL-12 of the murine OXA-mediated dermatitis were significantly reduced upon oral or topical treatment with PHF (all p < 0.05). Gallic acid, chlorogenic acid and berberine contents (w/w) in PHF were found to be 0.479%, 1.201% and 0.022%, respectively. Gallic acid and chlorogenic acid could suppress the release of pro-inflammatory cytokine IL-6 and chemokine CCL7 and CXCL8, respectively, in IL-31- and IL-33-treated eosinophils-dermal fibroblasts co-culture; while berberine could suppress the release of IL-6, CXCL8, CCL2 and CCL7 in the eosinophil culture and eosinophils-dermal fibroblasts co-culture (all p < 0.05). These findings suggest that PHF can ameliorate allergic inflammation and attenuate the activation of eosinophils.

Diet modification is a common compensation strategy to promote swallowing safety in patients with swallowing difficulties. The International Dysphagia Diet Standardisation Initiative (IDDSI) guideline provides qualitative descriptions on texture-modified food and thickened liquid. This study aimed to establish quantitative textural and rheological data on different IDDSI levels based on common Chinese ingredients and dishes. Textural and rheological properties of 226 samples of various food textures and 93 samples of various liquid consistencies were obtained using a texture profile analysis (TPA) and viscometer, respectively. The establishment of such quantitative data can be used for future texture-modified food product development and research purposes.

This study aimed to investigate the relationship between intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) dosimetry and swallowing kinematic and timing measures. Thirteen kinematic and timing measures of swallowing from videofluoroscopic analysis were used as outcome measures to reflect swallowing function. IMRT dosimetry was accessed for thirteen swallowing-related structures. A cohort of 44 nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) survivors at least 3 years post-IMRT were recruited. The cohort had a mean age of 53.2 ± 11.9 years, 77.3% of whom were male. There was an average of 68.24 ± 14.15 months since end of IMRT; 41 (93.2%) had undergone concurrent chemotherapy. For displacement measures, female sex and higher doses to the cricopharyngeus, glottic larynx, and base of tongue were associated with reduced hyolaryngeal excursion and pharyngeal constriction, and more residue. For timing measures, higher dose to the genioglossus was associated with reduced processing time at all stages of the swallow. The inferior pharyngeal constrictor emerged with a distinctly different pattern of association with mean radiation dosage compared to other structures. Greater changes to swallowing kinematics and timing were observed for pudding thick consistency than thin liquid. Increasing radiation dosage to swallowing-related structures is associated with reduced swallowing kinematics. However, not all structures are affected the same way, therefore organ sparing during treatment planning for IMRT needs to consider function rather than focusing on select muscles. Dose-response relationships should be investigated with a comprehensive set of swallowing structures to capture the holistic process of swallowing.