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Regulating the fluorescent properties of organic small molecules in a controlled and dynamic manner has been a fundamental research goal. Although several strategies have been exploited, realizing multi-color molecular emission from a single fluorophore remains challenging. Herein, we demonstrate an emissive system by combining pyrene fluorophore and acylhydrazone units, which can generate multi-color switchable fluorescent emissions at different assembled states. Two kinds of supramolecular tools, amphiphilic self-assembly and γ-cyclodextrin mediated host-guest recognition, are used to manipulate the intermolecular aromatic stacking distances, resulting in the tunable fluorescent emission ranging from blue to yellow, including a pure white-light emission. Moreover, an external chemical signal, amylase, is introduced to control the assembly states of the system on a time scale, generating a distinct dynamic emission system. The dynamic properties of this multi-color fluorescent system can be also enabled in a hydrogel network, exhibiting a promising potential for intelligent fluorescent materials. Regulating fluorescent properties of small molecules in a controlled manner has been a fundamental research goal but realizing multi-color emission from a single fluorophore remains challenging. Here the authros demonstrate that combined pyrene fluorophore and acylhydrazone units show multi-color switchable fluorescent at different assembled states.

The inherent heterogeneity of individual cells in cell populations plays significant roles in disease development and progression, which is critical for disease diagnosis and treatment. Substantial evidences show that the majority of traditional gene profiling methods mask the difference of individual cells. Single cell sequencing can provide data to characterize the inherent heterogeneity of individual cells, and reveal complex and rare cell populations. Different microfluidic technologies have emerged for single cell researches and become the frontiers and hot topics over the past decade. In this review article, we introduce the processes of single cell sequencing, and review the principles of microfluidics for single cell analysis. Also, we discuss the common high-throughput single cell sequencing technologies along with their advantages and disadvantages. Lastly, microfluidics applications in single cell sequencing technology for the diagnosis of cancers and immune system diseases are briefly illustrated.

C-reactive protein (CRP) is a plasma protein that is evolutionarily conserved, found in both vertebrates and many invertebrates. It is a member of the pentraxin superfamily, characterized by its pentameric structure and calcium-dependent binding to ligands like phosphocholine (PC). In humans and various other species, the plasma concentration of this protein is markedly elevated during inflammatory conditions, establishing it as a prototypical acute phase protein that plays a role in innate immune responses. This feature can also be used clinically to evaluate the severity of inflammation in the organism. Human CRP (huCRP) can exhibit contrasting biological functions due to conformational transitions, while CRP in various species retains conserved protective functions in vivo . The focus of this review will be on the structural traits of CRP, the regulation of its expression, activate complement, and its function in related diseases in vivo .

Over the last couple of decades, numerous piezoelectric footwear energy harvesters (PFEHs) have been reported in the literature. This paper reviews the principles, methods, and applications of PFEH technologies. First, the popular piezoelectric materials used and their properties for PEEHs are summarized. Then, the force interaction with the ground and dynamic energy distribution on the footprint as well as accelerations are analyzed and summarized to provide the baseline, constraints, potential, and limitations for PFEH design. Furthermore, the energy flow from human walking to the usable energy by the PFEHs and the methods to improve the energy conversion efficiency are presented. The energy flow is divided into four processing steps: (i) how to capture mechanical energy into a deformed footwear, (ii) how to transfer the elastic energy from a deformed shoes into piezoelectric material, (iii) how to convert elastic deformation energy of piezoelectric materials to electrical energy in the piezoelectric structure, and (iv) how to deliver the generated electric energy in piezoelectric structure to external resistive loads or electrical circuits. Moreover, the major PFEH structures and working mechanisms on how the PFEHs capture mechanical energy and convert to electrical energy from human walking are summarized. Those piezoelectric structures for capturing mechanical energy from human walking are also reviewed and classified into four categories: flat plate, curved, cantilever, and flextensional structures. The fundamentals of piezoelectric energy harvesters, the configurations and mechanisms of the PFEHs, as well as the generated power, etc., are discussed and compared. The advantages and disadvantages of typical PFEHs are addressed. The power outputs of PFEHs vary in ranging from nanowatts to tens of milliwatts. Finally, applications and future perspectives are summarized and discussed.

In this study, we developed an indirect method for the synthesis of 2-deoxyglycosides with an exclusive β-configuration using glucosyl and galactosyl bromide donors with 2-thioacetyl (SAc) groups. The 2-SAc glucosyl and galactosyl bromide donors were easily obtained through the treatment of 1-OAc, 2-SAc glucose and galactose with HBr-CH3COOH solution, respectively. The glycosylation of such donors with acceptors under an improved Koenigs–Knorr condition resulted in glycosylation products with an exclusive β-configuration in excellent yields. The synthetic approach of 2-SAc glycosyl donors using glycals as the starting materials was also investigated. Based on these studies, the synthetic method of using 2-deoxyglycosides with an exclusive β-configuration through desulfurization will have more practical applications.

Cold atoms with laser-induced spin-orbit (SO) interactions provide a platform to explore quantum physics beyond natural conditions of solids. Here we propose and experimentally realize two-dimensional (2D) SO coupling and topological bands for a rubidium-87 degenerate gas through an optical Raman lattice, without phase-locking or fine-tuning of optical potentials. A controllable crossover between 2D and 1D SO couplings is studied, and the SO effects and nontrivial band topology are observed by measuring the atomic cloud distribution and spin texture in momentum space. Our realization of 2D SO coupling with advantages of small heating and topological stability opens a broad avenue in cold atoms to study exotic quantum phases, including topological superfluids.

Piezoelectric ultrasonic motors (USMs) are actuators that use ultrasonic frequency piezoelectric vibration-generated waves to transform electrical energy into rotary or translating motion. USMs receive more attention because they offer distinct qualities over traditional magnet-coil-based motors, such as miniaturization, great accuracy, speed, non-magnetic nature, silent operation, straightforward construction, broad temperature operations, and adaptability. This review study focuses on the principle of USMs and their classifications, characterization, fabrication methods, applications, and future challenges. Firstly, the classifications of USMs, especially, standing-wave, traveling-wave, hybrid-mode, and multi-degree-of-freedom USMs, are summarized, and their respective functioning principles are explained. Secondly, finite element modeling analysis for design and performance predictions, conventional and nano/micro-fabrication methods, and various characterization methods are presented. Thirdly, their advantages, such as high accuracy, small size, and silent operation, and their benefits over conventional motors for the different specific applications are examined. Fourthly, the advantages and disadvantages of USMs are highlighted. In addition, their substantial contributions to a variety of technical fields like surgical robots and industrial, aerospace, and biomedical applications are introduced. Finally, their future prospects and challenges, as well as research directions in USM development, are outlined, with an emphasis on downsizing, increasing efficiency, and new materials.

( ) infections pose a critical clinical challenge. Although ceftazidime/avibactam (CAZ/AVI) and polymyxin B (PMB) are frontline therapies, their comparative effectiveness in terms of 30-day survival, renal safety profiles, and clinical success rates remains poorly characterized. To address this knowledge gap, a multicenter real-world study was conducted. -infected patients treated with PMB or CAZ/AVI-based regimens were enrolled from five hospitals between January 1, 2021, to July 31, 2023. Propensity score matching (PSM) and binary logistic regression analysis were performed to evaluate efficacy and acute renal injury (AKI) occurrence, and a multivariable COX proportional hazards regression of the 30-day all-cause mortality was performed. 170 -infected patients were enrolled, among whom 124 (72.9%) had d infections and 77 (45.3%) received CAZ/AVI-based regimens. After 1:1 PSM, the results demonstrated that the clearance rate was significantly higher in the CAZ/AVI group compared to the PMB group (61.0% vs. 24.4%, = 0.001); however, no significant differences were observed in clinical success rates (55.6% vs. 44.4%), incidence of AKI (26.8% vs. 39.0%), or 30-day all-cause mortality (7.3% vs. 12.2%) between the two groups (all > 0.05). Compared with the PMB-based regimens, CAZ/AVI-based regimens were significantly associated with clearance success (OR 0.185, 95%CI 0.061-0.564, < 0.001); additionally, multi-site infection (OR 0.295, 95%CI 0.097-0.899, = 0.032) and the number of combined anti- antibiotics (OR 0.435, 95%CI 0.213-0.888, = 0.022) were associated with enhanced clearance. The occurrence of AKI in patients with infection was associated with underlying diseases, including sepsis/septic shock (OR 3.405, 95%CI 1.007-11.520, = 0.049), and diabetes mellitus (OR 3.600, 95%CI 1.018-12.733, = 0.047). In addition, other infection (HR 40.849, 95%CI 3.323-502.170, = 0.004), APACHE II score (HR 1.072, 95%CI 1.032-1.114, < 0.001) were found to be independent predictors of 30-day all-cause mortality. In conclusion, CAZ/AVI-based regimens demonstrated superior efficacy in clearing compared to PMB-based regimens. Furthermore, several factors associated with AKI and mortality in -infected patients were identified, highlighting the need for further research to optimize treatment strategies.

Humans can naturally and effectively find salient regions in complex scenes. Motivated by this observation, attention mechanisms were introduced into computer vision with the aim of imitating this aspect of the human visual system. Such an attention mechanism can be regarded as a dynamic weight adjustment process based on features of the input image. Attention mechanisms have achieved great success in many visual tasks, including image classification, object detection, semantic segmentation, video understanding, image generation, 3D vision, multimodal tasks, and self-supervised learning. In this survey, we provide a comprehensive review of various attention mechanisms in computer vision and categorize them according to approach, such as channel attention, spatial attention, temporal attention, and branch attention; a related repository https://github.com/MenghaoGuo/Awesome-Vision-Attentions is dedicated to collecting related work. We also suggest future directions for attention mechanism research.

Infection with Carbapenem-resistant Gram-negative bacteria (CR-GNB) poses further challenges in treating stroke-associated pneumonia (SAP) patients. This multicenter retrospective study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of polymyxin B (PMB) in CR-GNB-infected SAP patients and to identify factors that may influence its effectiveness. From 1 September 2019, and 30 December 2022, a total of 196 CR-GNB-infected SAP patients from five hospitals in China were included in the study based on specific criteria. Demographics and clinical data were obtained from the electronic medical records. Propensity score matching (PSM) was used to minimize the effect of potential confounding variables. Univariate analysis and multivariate logistic analysis were performed to identify risk factors affecting microbial efficacy. Among the 196 SAP patients infected with CR-GNB, 24.5% received PMB combined inhalation and 75.5% received non-combined inhalation treatment. The clinical success rate was 68.9%, with 25.5% achieving microbial efficacy within 7 days and 37.8% achieving microbial cure. The 30-day all-cause mortality rate was 14.8%. The incidence of acute kidney injury was 34.7%. After adjustment by propensity score matching, the PMB combined inhalation group exhibited significantly higher microbial efficacy compared to the non-combined inhalation group (46.7% vs. 26.7%, p = 0.049). Multivariate logistic analysis identified multi-site infections and Carbapenem-resistant infection as independent risk factors for microbial efficacy. Combined inhalation of PMB demonstrated superior effectiveness in microbial clearance compared to non-combined inhalation in treating CR-GNB-infected SAP patients. We recommend aerosol combined inhalation of PMB and suggest developing personalized PMB-based regimens for individual patients to enhance treatment outcomes.