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Herein, disorder–order TaON homojunction photocatalysts with different concentrations of surface oxygen vacancies were prepared by a simple and novel aluminothermic reduction method. The surface oxygen vacancy defects disrupt the periodicity of the crystal surface and weaken the crystallinity of TaON particles, resulting in a crystalline core and an amorphous shell structure. Introduction of oxygen vacancy plays a pivotal role in regulating the band structure and charge kinetic behaviors of TaON. It renders not only the appearance of defect band level in the forbidden band, which allows drastically broadened and enhanced light absorption of TaON particles, but also the formation of the disorder–order TaON homojunction, which increases the concentration of photogenerated carriers, inhibits the recombination of photogenerated charge and promotes effective surface photocatalytic reaction, thus resulting in significantly improved photocatalytic hydrogen production activity of TaON photocatalyst. The aluminothermic reduction temperature for optimum photocatalytic activity of TaON was 400 °C, giving a hydrogen production activity of 25 μmol g −1  h −1 , about twice as pure TaON under visible light. This work could shed light on exploring oxygen vacancy-activated photocatalytic materials with great potential for solar-energy conversion.

We have developed a non-invasive predictive nomogram model that combines image features from Sonazoid contrast-enhanced ultrasound (SCEUS) and Sound touch elastography (STE) with clinical features for accurate differentiation of malignant from benign focal liver lesions (FLLs). This study ultimately encompassed 262 patients with FLLs from the First Hospital of Shanxi Medical University, covering the period from March 2020 to April 2023, and divided them into training set ( n  = 183) and test set ( n  = 79). Logistic regression analysis was used to identify independent indicators and develop a predictive model based on image features from SCEUS, STE, and clinical features. The area under the receiver operating characteristic (AUC) curve was determined to estimate the diagnostic performance of the nomogram with CEUS LI-RADS, and STE values. The C-index, calibration curve, and decision curve analysis (DCA) were further used for validation. Multivariate and LASSO logistic regression analyses identified that age, ALT, arterial phase hyperenhancement (APHE), enhancement level in the Kupffer phase, and Emean by STE were valuable predictors to distinguish malignant from benign lesions. The nomogram achieved AUCs of 0.988 and 0.978 in the training and test sets, respectively, outperforming the CEUS LI-RADS (0.754 and 0.824) and STE (0.909 and 0.923) alone. The C-index and calibration curve demonstrated that the nomogram offers high diagnostic accuracy with predicted values consistent with actual values. DCA indicated that the nomogram could increase the net benefit for patients. The predictive nomogram innovatively combining SCEUS, STE, and clinical features can effectively improve the diagnostic performance for focal liver lesions, which may help with individualized diagnosis and treatment in clinical practice.

Effective charge separation and transfer is deemed to be the contributing factor to achieve high photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting performance on photoelectrodes. Building a phase junction structure with controllable phase transition of WO3 can further improve the photocatalytic performance. In this work, we realized the transition from orthorhombic to monoclinic by regulating the annealing temperatures, and constructed an orthorhombic-monoclinic WO 3 (o-WO 3 /m-WO 3 ) phase junction. The formation of oxygen vacancies causes an imbalance of the charge distribution in the crystal structure, which changes the W-O bond length and bond angle, accelerating the phase transition. As expected, an optimum PEC activity was achieved over the o-WO 3 /m-WO 3 phase junction in WO 3 -450 photoelectrode, yielding the maximum O 2 evolution rate roughly 32 times higher than that of pure WO 3 -250 without any sacrificial agents under visible light irradiation. The enhancement of catalytic activity is attributed to the atomically smooth interface with a highly matched lattice and robust built-in electric field around the phase junction, which leads to a less-defective and abrupt interface and provides a smooth interfacial charge separation and transfer path, leading to improved charge separation and transfer efficiency and a great enhancement in photocatalytic activity. This work strikes out on new paths in the formation of an oxygen vacancy-induced phase transition and provides new ideas for the design of catalysts.

Hemiacetal compounds are valuable building blocks in synthetic chemistry, but their enzymatic synthesis is limited and often hindered by the instability of hemiacetals in aqueous environments. Here, we show that this challenge can be addressed through reaction engineering by using immobilized peroxygenase from Agrocybe aegerita ( Aae UPO) under neat reaction conditions, which allows for the selective C-H bond oxyfunctionalization of environmentally significant cyclic ethers to cyclic hemiacetals. A wide range of chiral cyclic hemiacetal products are prepared in >99% enantiomeric excess and 95170 turnover numbers of Aae UPO. Furthermore, by changing the reaction medium from pure organic solvent to alkaline aqueous conditions, cyclic hemiacetals are in situ transformed into lactones. Lactams are obtained under the applied conditions, albeit with low enzyme activity. These findings showcase the synthetic potential of Aae UPO and offer a practical enzymatic approach to produce chiral cyclic hemiacetals through C-H oxyfunctionalization under mild conditions. Hemiacetal compounds are valuable building blocks in synthetic chemistry, but difficult to obtain by enzymatic synthesis. Here, the authors use reaction engineering of an immobilized unspecific peroxygenase from Agrocybe aegerita for selective C-H bond oxyfunctionalisation of environmentally significant cyclic ethers to chiral cyclic hemiacetals.

Nine new mycophenolic acid derivatives, penicacids O–W (1–9), two first-time reported natural products (10, 11), and five known compounds (12–16), were isolated from a marine-derived fungus Penicillium senticosum RCDB005 found in a South China Sea sediment sample. Their structures were determined using NMR, HRESIMS, and optical rotatory dispersion (ORD) spectra, electronic circular dichroism (ECD) calculations, X-ray crystallography, and modified Mosher’s methods. Eight of these compounds were evaluated for anti-proliferative effects against nine human cancer cell lines and the IC50 values ranged from nM to μM levels. Compounds 5, 7–9 showed potent inhibition activity against MOLM-13 acute myeloid leukemia cells with IC50 values between 0.13 and 1.13 μM.

Oxygen vacancies (OVs) are important for changing the geometric and electronic structure as well as the chemical properties of anatase TiO 2 . In this work, we performed a density functional theory (DFT) calculation on the electronic structure and catalytic performance of anatase TiO 2 (101) with different numbers of OVs. A comparison of the measured XRD results with the simulated ones of TiO 2 demonstrates that OVs can cause changes in the crystal structure. The changes in the electronic structure (Mulliken charges, band structure, and partial density of states) and water splitting on TiO 2 (101) surfaces were investigated as a function of oxygen vacancy concentration. The results show that the introduction of OVs forms impurity levels below the conduction band of Ti 3d orbitals, through which electrons can gradually transit from VB to CB. However, when oxygen vacancy concentration is too high, the maximum electron transition energy increases and the promotion effect of OVs on water splitting is weakened. This work would provide more enlightenment and information for the design of defective TiO 2 with higher photocatalytic activity.

Lithium-ion capacitors (LICs) are emerging as one of the most advanced hybrid energy storage devices, however, their development is limited by the imbalance of the dynamics and capacity between the anode and cathode electrodes. Herein, anthracite was proposed as the raw material to prepare coal-based, nitrogen-doped porous carbon materials (CNPCs), together with being employed as a cathode and anode used for dual-carbon lithium-ion capacitors (DC-LICs). The prepared CNPCs exhibited a folded carbon nanosheet structure and the pores could be well regulated by changing the additional amount of g-C3N4, showing a high conductivity, abundant heteroatoms, and a large specific surface area. As expected, the optimized CNPCs (CTK-1.0) delivered a superior lithium storage capacity, which exhibited a high specific capacity of 750 mAh g−1 and maintained an excellent capacity retention rate of 97% after 800 cycles. Furthermore, DC-LICs (CTK-1.0//CTK-1.0) were assembled using the CTK-1.0 as both cathode and anode electrodes to match well in terms of internal kinetics and capacity simultaneously, which displayed a maximum energy density of 137.6 Wh kg−1 and a protracted lifetime of 3000 cycles. This work demonstrates the great potential of coal-based carbon materials for electrochemical energy storage devices and also provides a new way for the high value-added utilization of coal materials.

Neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC) is a highly aggressive cancer that is resistant to hormone therapy and characterized by poor prognosis, as well as limited therapeutic options. Since the natural product lycobetaine was reported to exhibit good antitumor activities against various types of cancers, we initially simplified the scaffold of lycobetaine to obtain the active compound 1, an isoquinoline derivative with an aryl moiety substitution at the 4-position, which showed apparent antiproliferative activities against NPEC cell line LASCPC-01 in vitro. Subsequently, we carried out structural optimization and systematic structure–activity relationship (SAR) studies on compound 1, leading to the discovery of compound 46, which demonstrated potent inhibitory activities against the LASCPC-01 cell line with an IC50 value of 0.47 μM. Moreover, compound 46 displayed remarkable selectivity over prostate cancer cell line PC-3 with a selectivity index greater than 190-fold. Further cell-based mechanism studies revealed that compound 46 and lycobetaine can effectively induce G1 cell cycle arrest and apoptosis dose dependently. However, lycobetaine inhibited the expression of neuroendocrine markers, while compound 46 slightly upregulated these proteins. This suggested that compound 46 might exert its antitumor activities through a different mechanism than lycobetaine, warranting further study.

Background Vitamin D deficiency (VDD) may increase the risk of hypertension in women of childbearing age, who may be exposed to secondhand smoke (SHS) simultaneously. Till now, few studies have investigated the joint effects of VDD and SHS on hypertension in this population. We evaluated whether exposure to SHS modified the association between VDD and hypertension. Methods Data from National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) 2007-2014 were analyzed. Our research subjects were 2826 nonsmoking and nonpregnant women of childbearing age (20-44 years old). Hypertension was defined based either on systolic blood pressure (SBP) ≥ 130 mmHg and/or diastolic blood pressure (DBP) ≥ 80 mmHg or on now taking prescribed medicine for hypertension. The directed acyclic graphs (DAG) and the back-door criterion were used to select a minimal sufficient adjustment set of variables (MSAs) that would identify the unconfounded effect of 25(OH)D and hypertension. The interactive effect of VDD and SHS on hypertension was evaluated by using logistic regression models, followed by strata-specific analyses. Results The prevalence of VDD in the hypertension group was significantly higher than that in the non-hypertension group (48.2% vs 41.0%, P  = 0.008), as well as the exposure rate of SHS (39.1% vs 33.8%, P  = 0.017). VDD was independently associated with nearly 50% increased risk of hypertension [adjusted odds ratio (aOR) = 1.43, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.01, 2.04], while no significant association was observed between SHS and hypertension. However, SHS showed a significant synergistic effect on VDD with a higher aOR of 1.79 (95% CI: 1.14, 2.80) ( P interaction  = 0.011). This synergistic effect was more obvious when stratified by BMI (in overweight women, aOR, 95% CI =4.74, 1.65-13.60 for interaction vs 2.33, 1.01-5.38 for VDD only) and race (in Non-Hispanic Black women, aOR, 95% CI =5.11, 1.58-16.54 for interaction vs 2.69, 1.10-6.62 for VDD only). Conclusion There exist synergistic effects of SHS and VDD on the prevalence of hypertension in American women of childbearing age, with more significant effects in women who were overweight or Non-Hispanic Black. Further studies are warranted to verify this finding in other populations, and the molecular mechanisms underlying the joint effect of SHS and VDD need to be elucidated.

Background The surgical difficulty of cesarean delivery after a trial labor is often increased, leading to uterine lacerations, postpartum hemorrhage and other adverse outcomes. In the study, we aimed to identify and quantify risk factors that cause cesarean uterine lacerations during the first stage of labor. Methods This was a retrospective cohort review of all women with a singleton, cephalic fetus at term delivered by caesarean section at four large departments in China between January 2023 and December 2024. A least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) and multivariate analysis were performed to identify labor related risk factors for cesarean uterine lacerations among patients that underwent cesarean delivery in the first stage of labor. The risk factors were used to construct a new score model to identify patients at risk for cesarean uterine lacerations. Results During the study period, there were 11,689 women delivered by caesarean section, 206 women had cesarean uterine lacerations and 824 pregnant women without cesarean uterine lacerations were included in the study. The following 6 high-risk factors were identified for cesarean uterine lacerations by LASSO regression and multiple regression: occiput transverse position, occiput posterior position, cervical dilatation (> 5 cm), station of the fetal head at the ischial spines ( > + 1), caput succedaneum (> 3 cm), and duration of labor (> 12 h). In clinical variables model, the ROC curve analysis showed that the sensitivity and specificity to predict cesarean uterine lacerations were 91.372% and 92.205% respectively, with AUC 0.892. Using our new score model, when the score point ≥ 6, the sensitivity and specificity in identifying cases at high risk for cesarean uterine lacerations were 92.168% and 91.605%, respectively, with AUC 0.902. Conclusions Increased risk of cesarean uterine lacerations in the first stage of labor is attributable mainly to fetal head position, larger cervical dilatation, lower fetal head, caput succedaneum, and duration of labor.