Latest ArticlesDiscrimination of different types of sulfur-containing species not only helps us to deeply understand how sulfur affects cellular signaling, but also contribute to the early diagnosis of diseases. However, the current investigation about sulfur-containing species discrimination is mainly concentrated in biothiols, which is relatively limited for practical application. Toward circumventing this limitation, herein, a convenient sensor array consisting of three kinds of Au NCs-Cu2+ for simultaneous and rapid identification of different types of sulfur-containing species is reported. Based on the fingerprint-like fluorescence responses generated by competitive binding between Au NCs-Cu2+ and different sulfur-containing species, not only ten different types of sulfur-containing species separately but also their binary or ternary randomly selected mixtures can be well discriminated even in human urine and serum samples. It is worth noting that it only takes 2 min to obtain the best response signals for sulfur-containing species discrimination. Most importantly, serums from cancer patients (such as liver cancer and breast cancer) and healthy people as well as sulfur-oxidizing bacteria (SOB) and sulfur-free bacteria can be both effectively and rapidly identified within 2 min, respectively, making it a promising approach for point-of-care disease diagnostic.
The development of efficient and cost-effective electrocatalysts toward anodic oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is crucial for the commercial application of electrochemical water splitting. As the most promising electrocatalysts, the OER performances of nickel-iron-based materials can be further improved by introducing metalloid elements to modify their electron structures. Herein, we developed an efficient hybrid electrocatalyst with nickel-iron boride (NiFeB) as core and amorphous nickel-iron borate (NiFeBi) as shell (NiFeB@NiFeBi) via a simple aqueous reduction. The obtained NiFeB@NiFeBi exhibits a small overpotential of 237 mV at 10 mA/cm2 and Tafel slope of 57.65 mV/dec in 1.0 mol/L KOH, outperforming most of the documented precious-metal-free based electrocatalysts. Benefiting from the in situ formed amorphous NiFeBi layer, it shows excellent stability toward the oxygen evolution reaction (OER). These findings might provide a new way to design advanced precious-metal-free electrocatalysts for OER and the application of electrochemical water splitting.
A ternary complex combining dual-phase perovskites - Cs4PbBr6/CsPbBr3 (DP-CPB) with ZnSe micropsheres (ZnSe-DP-CPB) was successfully prepared using supersaturated recrystallization technique at room temperature. It was showed that the DP-CPB composites were partially embedded in ZnSe microsphere composed with ZnSe NCs. The light absorption range of ZnSe-DP-CPB composites was extended from visible to near infrared light. Highly enhanced luminescence from ZnSe-DP-CPB composite was observed and the excitation power-dependent photoluminescence showed that the recombination involves excitons. The recombination lifetimes of the ternary composites increased compared with DP-CPB composite, indicating that the non-radiative combination was suppressed which may be possibly due to the decrease of both bulk and surface defects, owing to the passivation of ZnSe, as well as the suitable band alignments of these three components. The ternary complex also showed improved stability of photoluminescence (PL), which opens a new avenue for enhancing the stability of PL and optoelectronic applications for semiconductor-perovskite composites.
A highly sensitive electrochemiluminescence (ECL) biosensing method was developed for monitoring casein kinase Ⅱ (CK2) at subcellular level via bio-bar-code assay. A bio-bar-code probe (h-DNA/AuNPs/pDNA) prepared by conjugating phosphorylated DNA (p-DNA) and hairpin DNA (h-DNA) onto gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) was used as a carrier for ECL signal reagent (Ru(phen)32+) while a specific peptide was used as a recognition substance. A gold ultramicroelectrode with a diameter of 400 nm was fabricated and then modified with the specific peptide via self-assembly technique to obtain peptide modified gold ultramicroelectrode. The peptide on gold ultramicroelectrode was phosphorylated in the presence of CK2 and adenosine 5'-triphosphate, and then the phosphorylated peptide was integrated with the h-DNA/AuNPs/p-DNA through a process mediated by zirconium cations (Zr4+), and finally Ru(phen)32+ was intercalated into h-DNA. A "signal on" ECL method was developed for the detection of CK2 in the range of 0.005-0.2 U/mL with a detection limit of 0.001 U/mL. Additionally, combined efficient subcellular phosphorylation in vivo with bio-bar-code-based ECL biosensing method, the ECL method was further applied to monitor CK2 at subcellular level without tedious subcellular fractionation. It was found that the concentration of CK2 by inserting the peptide modified gold ultramicroelectrode into the nucleus was higher than that into cytoplasm of HeLa cells. A distinct heterogeneity among CK2 concentrations in single cells was observed for cellular heterogeneity assessment.
The realization of good aqueous dispersibility of commercial graphene products composed of exfoliated graphene sheets is of significance for downstream applications. However, the tap density of commercial graphene powder is quite low (0.03-0.1 kg/m3), meaning that 1 kg graphene powder occupies about 10-30 m3 in volume during transportation. And, the available content of commercial graphene dispersion/slurry in aqueous medium cannot exceed 5 wt%, although the density is high (≈1050 kg/m3). In this work, a graphene monolith was prepared by oven-drying of graphene sheets prefunctionalized with poloxamer surfactants. Our graphene monoliths not only have a high density (1500 kg/m3) and high graphene content (≈10 wt%), but also a full capability to be completely redispersed (≈100%) in water by bath sonication to obtain solubilized graphene sheets, whose lateral size and thickness are unchanged compared to as-exfoliated ones. Moreover, a simple empirical method was proposed to predict the redispersion capability of graphene monoliths using different poloxamers by contact angle measurements. Our results provide a universal approach to make exfoliated graphene-based products with better downstream availability and lower transportation cost.
Electrocatalytic N2 reduction to ammonia is a fascinating alternative to Haber-Bosch process and also considered as an energy storage method. This work, Fe doped MoS2/carbon cloth (CC) has been studied on the electro-catalysis fix nitrogen indicating the doped Fe can indeed enhance the MoS2 material ability. Compared with MoS2/CC, Fe-Mo-S-3/CC not only increases 10 times in the rate of production ammonia, but also 5 times in Faraday efficiency.
Sodium ion hybrid capacitors are of great concern in large-scale and cost-effective electrical energy storage owing to their high energy and power densities, as well as natural abundance and wide distribution of sodium. However, it is difficult to find a well-pleasing anode material that matches the high-performance cathode materials to achieve good energy and power output for sodium ion hybrid capacitors. In this paper, nitrogen and sulfur co-doped nanotube-like carbon prepared by a simple carbonization process of high sulfur-loaded polyaniline nanotubes is introduced as the anode. The assembled sodium ion half cell based on the optimal nanotube-like carbon delivers a high reversible capacity of ~304.8 mAh/g at 0.2 A/g and an excellent rate performance of ~124.8 mAh/g at 10 A/g in a voltage window of 0.01-2.5 V (versus sodium/sodium ion). For the hybrid capacitors assembled using the optimal nanotube-like carbon as the anode and high-capacity activated carbon as the cathode, high energy densities of ~100.2 Wh/kg at 250 W/kg and ~50.69 Wh/kg at 12, 500 W/kg are achieved.
Direct infusion mass spectrometry (DIMS) is a powerful technique in clinical diagnosis for screening neonatal amino acid metabolic disorders from dried blood spots (DBS). However, DIMS sometimes generated false-positive results for analysis of amino acids. In this work, we utilized a stable isotope derivatization method, combining with liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (SID-LC-MS), to improve the specificity for screening amino acids in DBS specimens. A pair of isotope reagents, p-(dimethylamino)phenyl isothiocyanate (DMAP-NCS) and 4-isothiocyanato-N, N-bis(methyl-[2H2])aniline ([2H4]DMAP-NCS), was synthesized and used to label amino acids in DBS specimens. The [2H4]DMAP-NCS labelled amino acid standards were used as internal standards to compensate the matrix effect. This method was validated by measuring linearity, recovery and accuracy. The results showed that the developed SID-LC-MS method can be used for sensitive and selective determination of 12 diagnostically important amino acids in DBS specimens.
D-peptides are recognized as a new class of synthetic chemical drugs and they possess many interesting advantages such as high enzymatic stability, improved oral bioavailability, as well as high binding affinity and specificity. Recently, D-peptide drugs have been attracting increasing attention in both academic and industrial researches over recent years. One D-peptide etelcalcetide has even entered the market that targets the calcium (Ca2+)-sensing receptor (CaSR) to fight secondary hyperparathyroidism. Effective discovery and optimization of D-peptide ligands that can bind to various disease-related targets with high specificity and potency is of great importance for the development of D-peptide drugs. This review surveys the recent method development in this area especially the chemical protein synthesis-assisted high-throughput screening strategies for D-peptide ligands and their application in drug discovery.
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