Lipidomic-based investigation into the therapeutic effects of polyene phosphatidylcholine and Babao Dan on rats with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease

In recent years, with the improvement of people’s living standards, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) has become the most common chronic liver disease in the world. In this paper, the metabolic disorders in Sprague Dawley (SD) rats were induced by a choline-deficient, l -amino acid–defined (CDAA) diet. The therapeutic effects of polyene phosphatidylcholine (PPC) and Babao Dan (BBD) on NAFLD were observed. Lipidomic analysis was performed using ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography-Orbitrap MS, and data analysis and lipid identification were performed using the software LipidSearch. Both PPC and BBD can reduce lipid accumulation in the liver and improve abnormal biochemical indicators in rats, including reduction of triglycerides, total cholesterol, alanine transaminase and aspartate transaminase in serum. In addition, lipids in rat serum were systematically analyzed by lipidomics. The lipidomic results showed that the most obvious lipids with abnormal metabolism in CDAA diet–induced rats were glycerides (triglycerides and diacylglycerols), phospholipids and cholesterol esters. Both BBD and PPC partly reversed the disturbance to lipids induced by the CDAA diet. PPC may be more effective than BBD in alleviating NAFLD because it has a better effect on inhibiting the abnormal accumulation of lipids and reducing the inflammatory reaction in the body.     

Injectable and self-healing hydrogels with tissue adhesiveness and antibacterial activity as wound dressings for infected wound healing

The design of wound dressings with excellent self-healing ability, adequate adhesion, good biocompatibility, and potential antibacterial ability is of great significance for the healing of infected wounds arising from human activities. Herein, a series of multi-functional hydrogel dressings, poly(ionized isocyanoethyl methacrylate-glutamine)/poly(hexamethylene guanidine) (iG_x/PHMG_y) hydrogels, were obtained through homopolymerization of fully ionized isocyanoethyl methacrylate-glutamine (iIEM-Gln) in the presence of poly(hexamethylene guanidine) (PHMG), in which strong hydrogen bonds were formed among urea groups in the P (iIEM-Gln) chain to form a stable hydrogel network. The prepared iG_x/PHMG_y hydrogels exhibited adequate self-healing ability and tissue adhesion, which could be firmly adhered to the wound surface and remained intact during application. In addition, the presence of PHMG imparted good antibacterial activity to the hydrogels for the effective promotion of the wound healing in S. aureus infected skin wound on mice. Overall, this multi-functional hydrogel provides a facile and effective strategy for the design of infected wound dressings, and may show great potential in clinical applications.     

Generalized Jacobi spectral Galerkin method for fractional pantograph differential equation

This work is concerned with the extension of the Jacobi spectral Galerkin method to a class of nonlinear fractional pantograph differential equations. First, the fractional differential equation is converted to a nonlinear Volterra integral equation with weakly singular kernel. Second, we analyze the existence and uniqueness of solutions for the obtained integral equation. Then, the Galerkin method is used for solving the equivalent integral equation. The error estimates for the proposed method are also investigated. Finally, illustrative examples are presented to confirm our theoretical analysis.     

Riemann–Hilbert approach and $$N$$ -soliton solutions of the generalized mixed nonlinear Schrödinger equation

Theoretical and Mathematical Physics - We apply the Riemann–Hilbert method to the generalized mixed nonlinear Schrödinger equation and obtain a new formula for an explicit $$N$$ -soliton...     

Photodegradation mechanisms of acyclovir in water and the toxicity of photoproducts

Journal of Radioanalytical and Nuclear Chemistry - In the present work the final products of coumarin radiation chemical transformation are investigated by chromatography. During radiolysis of...     

Synthesis of γ-(Arylamino)butyric Acid Derivatives via Ring-Opening Addition of Arylamines to Cyclopropane-1,1-Dicarboxylates

Russian Journal of Organic Chemistry - A rapid and efficient catalytic approach has been proposed for the synthesis of dimethyl 2-[2-(aryl-amino)but-3-en-1-yl]- and...     

Unveiling the Layer‐Dependent Catalytic Activity of PtSe2 Atomic Crystals for the Hydrogen Evolution Reaction

Two‐dimensional (2D) PtSe₂ shows the most prominent layer‐dependent electrical properties among various 2D materials and high catalytic activity for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), and therefore, it is an ideal material for exploring the structure–activity correlations in 2D systems. Here, starting with the synthesis of single‐crystalline 2D PtSe₂ with a controlled number of layers and probing the HER catalytic activity of individual flakes in micro electrochemical cells, we investigated the layer‐dependent HER catalytic activity of 2D PtSe₂ from both theoretical and experimental perspectives. We clearly demonstrated how the number of layers affects the number of active sites, the electronic structures, and electrical properties of 2D PtSe₂ flakes and thus alters their catalytic performance for HER. Our results also highlight the importance of efficient electron transfer in achieving optimum activity for ultrathin electrocatalysts. Our studies greatly enrich our understanding of the structure–activity correlations for 2D catalysts and provide new insight for the design and synthesis of ultrathin catalysts with high activity.     

A note on 3‐partite graphs without 4‐cycles

Let $C_4$ be a cycle of order 4. Write $ex\left(n,n,n,C_4\right)$ for the maximum number of edges in a balanced 3‐partite graph whose vertex set consists of three parts, each has $n$ vertices that have no subgraph isomorphic to $C_4$. In this paper, we show that $ex\left(n,n,n,C_4\right)\ge \frac{3}{2}n\left(p+1\right)$, where $n=\frac{p\left(p?1\right)}{2}$ and $p$ is a prime number. Note that $ex\left(n,n,n,C_4\right)\le \left(\frac{3\sqrt{2}}{2}+o\left(1\right)\right)n^{\frac{3}{2}}$ from Tait and Timmons's works. Since for every integer $m$, one can find a prime $p$ such that $m\le p\le \left(1+o\left(1\right)\right)m$, we obtain that $\underset{n\to \infty }{\lim }\frac{ex\left(n,n,n,C_4\right)}{\frac{3\sqrt{2}}{2}{n}^{\frac{3}{2}}}=1$.     

A novel asymmetric activated carbon electrode doped with metal-organic frameworks for high desalination performance

Journal of Solid State Electrochemistry - In this work, we synthesized metal-organic framework Cu3(BTC)2 which was applied as the doping materials of anode electrodes in capacitive deionization...     

An incremental bundle method for portfolio selection problem under second-order stochastic dominance

Numerical Algorithms - We propose a preconditioner to accelerate the convergence of the GMRES iterative method for solving the system of linear equations obtained from discretize-then-optimize...