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Biological materials, such as bamboo, are naturally optimized composites with exceptional mechanical properties. Inspired by such natural composites, traditional methods involve extracting nanofibers from natural sources and applying them in composite materials, which, however, often results in less ideal mechanical properties. To address this, this study develops a bottom-up nanofiber assembly strategy to create strong fiber-reinforced composite hydrogels inspired by the hierarchical assembly of bamboo. Self-assembled chitosan-sodium alginate nanofibers (CSNFs) are combined with tannic acid (TA) and poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) as the interfacial crosslinker and hydrogel matrix, respectively, to emulate the fundamental cellulose-lignin-hemicellulose composition unit of bamboo. Strong interfacial electrostatic interactions and hydrogen bonding form between the functional groups of these components. These molecular interactions can be further reinforced by constructing higher-order structure through stretch-induced orientation. The resulting composite hydrogel achieves good mechanical performance, including a high tensile strength of up to 60.2 MPa and a simultaneous high strength of 48.0 MPa and ultimate strain of 470%. This approach demonstrates a hierarchical bottom-up strategy to construct strong and robust composite hydrogels by effectively leveraging fundamental molecular interactions. By mimicking bamboo’s highly integrated structural composition, it offers a promising solution for creating advanced bioinspired materials with excellent mechanical properties. There is interest in mimicking the properties of biological composites in artificial materials, but the hierarchical structures can be challenging to replicate. Here, the authors report the development of a bamboo-inspired hydrogel with favourable mechanical performance.

Fabrication of composite hydrogels can effectively enhance the mechanical and functional properties of conventional hydrogels. While ceramic reinforcement is common in many hard biological tissues, ceramic-reinforced hydrogels lack a similar natural prototype for bioinspiration. This raises a key question: How can we still attain bioinspired mechanical mechanisms in composite hydrogels without mimicking a specific composition and structure? Abstracting the hierarchical composite design principles of natural materials, this study proposes a hierarchical fabrication strategy for ceramic-reinforced organo-hydrogels, featuring (1) aligned ceramic platelets through direct-ink-write printing, (2) poly(vinyl alcohol) organo-hydrogel matrix reinforced by solution substitution, and (3) silane-treated platelet-matrix interfaces. Unit filaments are further printed into a selection of bioinspired macro-architectures, leading to high stiffness, strength, and toughness (fracture energy up to 31.1 kJ/m 2 ), achieved through synergistic multi-scale energy dissipation. The materials also exhibit wide operation tolerance and electrical conductivity for flexible electronics in mechanically demanding conditions. Hence, this study demonstrates a model strategy that extends the fundamental design principles of natural materials to fabricate composite hydrogels with synergistic mechanical and functional enhancement. The preparation of composite hydrogels can allow for mechanical properties to be enhanced, and hierarchical structures can be effective. Here, the authors report improved mechanical properties by the addition of ceramic platelets to an organohydrogel in direct ink writing.

Lattice metamaterials emerge as advanced architected materials with superior physical properties and significant potential for lightweight applications. Recent developments in additive manufacturing (AM) techniques facilitate the manufacturing of lattice metamaterials with intricate microarchitectures and promote their applications in multi‐physical scenarios. Previous reviews on lattice metamaterials have largely focused on a specific/single physical field, with limited discussion on their multi‐physical properties, interaction mechanisms, and multifunctional applications. Accordingly, this article critically reviews the design principles, structure‐mechanism‐property relationships, interaction mechanisms, and multifunctional applications of multi‐physical lattice metamaterials enabled by AM techniques. First, lattice metamaterials are categorized into homogeneous lattices, inhomogeneous lattices, and other forms, whose design principles and AM processes are critically discussed, including the benefits and drawbacks of different AM techniques for fabricating different types of lattices. Subsequently, the structure–mechanism–property relationships and interaction mechanisms of lattice metamaterials in a range of physical fields, including mechanical, acoustic, electromagnetic/optical, and thermal disciplines, are summarized to reveal critical design principles. Moreover, the multifunctional applications of lattice metamaterials, such as sound absorbers, insulators, and manipulators, sensors, actuators, and soft robots, thermal management, invisible cloaks, and biomedical implants, are enumerated. These design principles and structure‐mechanism‐property relationships provide effective design guidelines for lattice metamaterials in multifunctional applications. This article critically reviews the structure–mechanism–property relationships and interaction mechanisms of lattice metamaterials enabled by additive manufacturing in a range of physical (mechanical, acoustic, electromagnetic/optical, and thermal) fields. Accordingly, critical design principles are summarized to achieve simultaneous enhancement of their multi‐physical properties. These design principles and structure–mechanism–property relationships deliver effective design guidelines for the multifunctional applications of multi‐physical lattice metamaterials.

Bridging biological and artificial systems, intelligent interfaces drive the demand for flexible electronics that emulate the skin’s multifunctionality. However, achieving such multifunctionality in a compact, self-sustained form remains challenging, as multimodal sensors often rely on rigid materials, discrete components, and external power sources. Herein, this study presents a single-component poly(vinyl alcohol) hydrogel e-skin integrating thermogalvanic, piezoionic, and diffusion mechanisms for self-powered sensing of skin temperature, arterial pulsation, and sweat secretion, simultaneously. The hydrogel features high stretchability, low modulus, and a prismatic architecture synergizing ionic polarization. Moreover, a temporal machine learning model with local attention is developed to decouple multimodal signals. Of practical importance, an active multimodal signal generator wristband is developed as a multifunctional human-machine interface for physiological detection, robotic control, and haptic feedback reproduction. Hence, this hydrogel e-skin represents an efficient material platform for intelligent interactions, showing broad potential for real-time health monitoring, robotic control, and virtual reality. Achieving multiple functions in a self-sustained human-machine interface remains challenging. Bai et al. show a hydrogel-based e-skin that integrates thermogalvanic, piezoionic, and diffusion mechanisms for self-powered simultaneous sensing of skin temperature, arterial pulsation, and sweat secretion.

The comprehensive water cut of periodic waterflood reservoirs is random and volatile, and it is a non-stationary time series. In order to solve the problems of poor prediction results of conventional methods or heavy workload and long time-consuming in reservoir numerical simulation, an EMD-LSTM neural network model and a smoothing spline regression (Smoothing Spline) variable weight combined prediction model are proposed. This method introduces empirical mode decomposition (EMD) to process non-stationary and non-linear data, and combines the advantages of machine learning and curve regression to improve the prediction accuracy of the model. The variable weight combination model is used to predict the water content of the periodic water injection reservoir. The results show that the prediction accuracy of the variable weight combination model is significantly higher than that of the single model. The variable weight combination model can reduce the prediction error and can effectively and accurately predict the periodic water injection oil. The comprehensive water content of the reservoir can guide the adjustment of water injection parameters for periodic water injection reservoirs.

Pancreatic cancer (PC) is one of the most common cancers worldwide and a leading cause of cancer-related death. Discovering novel targets is a key for its therapy. Carboxypeptidase E (CPE), a subtype of the pro-protein convertases, has been shown to be upregulated in many types of cancer, yet its function in PC remains elusive. The expressions of CPE in PC cell lines and cancer patients were investigated by Western blot and qRT-PCR. In PC cell line BX-pc-3, CPE was downregulated and its effect on cancer cell proliferation, migration, cisplatin chemosensitivity, and in vivo tumor growth was analyzed by Western blot, proliferation assay, invasion assay, and in vivo transplantation, respectively. The expression of nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-κB), a possible downstream target of CPE was examined by Western blot upon CPE regulation in PC cells, and the effects of inhibiting NF-κB on PC cell invasion and proliferation were examined. CPE was significantly upregulated in PC cell lines and tumor tissues. Proliferation and invasion assays indicated that downregulation of CPE inhibited cancer cell growth and migration and increased chemosensitivity to cisplatin. Inoculation of small interfering RNA (siRNA) transfected BX-pc-3 cells into null mice demonstrated that downregulation of CPE prevented tumor growth in vivo. NF-κB was directly regulated by CPE in pancreatic cancer, and siRNA-mediated inhibition of NF-κB exerted similar anti-tumor effect as downregulating CPE. Taken together, our results demonstrate that CPE plays an important role in pancreatic cancer. Inhibition of CPE may serve as a potential target for PC therapeutics.

The tissues or organs derived decellularized extracellular matrix carry immunogenicity and the risk of pathogen transmission, resulting in limited therapeutic effects. The cell derived dECM cultured in vitro can address these potential risks, but its impact on wound remodeling is still unclear. This study aimed to explore the role of decellularized extracellular matrix (dECM) extracted from adipose derived stem cells (ADSCs) in skin regeneration. Methods: ADSCs were extracted from human adipose tissue. Then we cultivated adipose-derived stem cell cells and decellularized ADSC-dECM for freeze-drying. Western blot (WB), enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and mass spectrometry (MS) were conducted to analyzed the main protein components in ADSC-dECM. The cell counting assay (CCK-8) and scratch assay were used to explore the effects of different concentrations of ADSC-dECM on the proliferation and migration of human keratinocytes cells (HaCaT), human umbilical vein endothelia cells (HUVEC) and human fibroblasts (HFB), respectively. Moreover, we designed a novel ADSC-dECM-CMC patch which used carboxymethylcellulose (CMC) to load with ADSC-dECM; and we further investigated its effect on a mouse full thickness skin wound model. Results: ADSC-dECM was obtained after decellularization of in vitro cultured human ADSCs. Western blot, ELISA and mass spectrometry results showed that ADSC-dECM contained various bioactive molecules, including collagen, elastin, laminin, and various growth factors. CCK-8 and scratch assay showed that ADSC-dECM treatment could significantly promote the proliferation and migration of HaCaT, human umbilical vein endothelia cells, and human fibroblasts, respectively. To evaluate the therapeutic effect on wound healing in vivo , we developed a novel ADSC-dECM-CMC patch and transplanted it into a mouse full-thickness skin wound model. And we found that ADSC-dECM-CMC patch treatment significantly accelerated the wound closure with time. Further histology and immunohistochemistry indicated that ADSC-dECM-CMC patch could promote tissue regeneration, as confirmed via enhanced angiogenesis and high cell proliferative activity. Conclusion: In this study, we developed a novel ADSC-dECM-CMC patch containing multiple bioactive molecules and exhibiting good biocompatibility for skin reconstruction and regeneration. This patch provides a new approach for the use of adipose stem cells in skin tissue engineering.

A new benzofuran, Cochinfuran A (1), and four known benzofurans (2-5) were isolated from the heartwood of Dalbergia cochinchinensisPierre ex Laness. The chemical structure of the new benzofuran was determined based on broad NMR and mass spectrometry evaluation. Bioactivity assays showed that the compounds 1-3 and 5 were found as anti-inflammatory agents with IC50 values 49.01 ± 1.54, 1368.93 ± 0.98, 67.48 ± 0.92 and 77.91 ± 1.53 μM, respectively. They could reduce the production of NO (P<0.001) with 3.52~7.04, 1.96~7.84, 1.85~7.40 and 0.98~3.93 μM and restrained LDH (P<0.01) with 3.52~7.04, 3.93~7.84, 3.70~7.40 and 0.98~3.93 μM in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated RAW 264.7 macrophages, respectively, the compound 4(IC50 218.20 ± 3.39 μM) showed no anti-inflammatory activity.

Senescence is an inevitable natural life process that involves structural and functional degeneration of tissues and organs. Recently, the process of skin aging has attracted much attention. Determining a means to delay or even reverse skin aging has become a research hotspot in medical cosmetology and anti-aging. Dysfunction in the epidermis and fibroblasts and changes in the composition and content of the extracellular matrix are common pathophysiological manifestations of skin aging. Reactive oxygen species and matrix metalloproteinases play essential roles in this process. Stem cells are pluripotent cells that possess self-replication abilities and can differentiate into multiple functional cells under certain conditions. These cells also possess a strong ability to facilitate tissue repair and regeneration. Stem cell transplantation has the potential for application in anti-aging therapy. Increasing studies have demonstrated that stem cells perform functions through paracrine processes, particularly those involving exosomes. Exosomes are nano-vesicular substances secreted by stem cells that participate in cell-to-cell communication by transporting their contents into target cells. In this chapter, the biological characteristics of exosomes were reviewed, including their effects on extracellular matrix formation, epidermal cell function, fibroblast function and antioxidation. Exosomes derived from stem cells may provide a new means to reverse skin aging.

This study was to investigate the stability, physico-mechanical property and biocompatibility of porcine corneal acellularized matrix (PCAM) that was prepared using human sera treatment to decellularize corneas. The stability (the rate of biodegradation) and physico-mechanical property (water uptake, density, and porosity) of PCAM were not compromised, compared with porcine fresh cornea matrix (PFCM, p > 0.05). The contact and extract cytotoxicity tests with human corneal epithelial cells and human keratocytes showed that PCAM has a good biocompatibility ex vivo and no cytotoxic effect. These results present the ability to create safety scaffolds that function as cornea grafts and provide a novel experimental approach for the study of cornea tissue engineering using acellular porcine cornea.