Nanophotonics
May 2025
Excitons, which are bound states of electrons and holes, in transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs) have been studied as an information carrier for realizing new types of optoelectronic devices. However, the charge neutrality of excitons inhibits the electric control of their motion, as seen in conventional electronic devices, except when utilizing a heterostructure. Here, we investigated the drift motion of trions, quasiparticles composed of an exciton bound to an excess charge, at room temperature in a suspended WS monolayer by applying a gate-tunable electric field.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn colitis-associated colorectal cancer (CAC), the NF-κB pathway, especially IKKβ, drives inflammation and cancer progression. However, no IKKβ inhibitors have been approved due to compensatory mechanisms. The challenge is to develop an anti-tumor agent that effectively targets IKKβ while overcoming these compensatory pathways.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMicroRNAs play a crucial role in directly reprogramming (converting) human fibroblasts into neurons. Specifically, miR-9/9* and miR-124 (miR-9/9*-124) display neurogenic and cell fate-switching activities when ectopically expressed in human fibroblasts by erasing fibroblast identity and inducing a pan-neuronal state. These converted neurons maintain the biological age of the starting fibroblasts and thus provide a human neuron-based platform to study cellular properties in aged neurons and model adult-onset neurodegenerative disorders using patient-derived cells.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWith the rapid emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) technology and the exponential growth in data generation, there is an increasing demand for high-performance and highly integratable optical modulators. In this work, we present an ultra-compact exciton-polariton Mach-Zehnder (MZ) modulator based on WS multilayers. The guided exciton-polariton modes arise in an ultrathin WS waveguide due to the strong excitonic resonance.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnimals (Basel)
October 2023
This study aimed to determine how the route of antimicrobial administration affected the growth performance of weaned piglets. Additionally, we aimed to investigate potential differences between antimicrobial resistance developed by antimicrobials administered orally through drinking water, and those administered through feed, in weaned piglets. The research was undertaken on a farm housing 500 sows and involved 150 weaned piglets at 21 days of age.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjectives: Pig-farming systems consist of integrated or conventional farms, and many antimicrobials are used to treat bacterial infections. The objective of this study was to compare characteristics of third-generation cephalosporin resistance and extended-spectrum β-lactamase (ESBL)/pAmpC β-lactamase-producing Escherichia coli between integrated and conventional farms.
Methods: Third-generation cephalosporin-resistant E.
Excitons, electron-hole pairs in semiconductors, can be utilized as information carriers with a spin or valley degree of freedom. However, manipulation of excitons' motion is challenging because of their charge-neutral characteristic and short recombination lifetimes. Here we demonstrate electric-field-driven drift and funneling of charged excitons (i.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHuntington disease (HD) is an inherited neurodegenerative disease with adult-onset clinical symptoms. However, the mechanism by which aging triggers the onset of neurodegeneration in HD patients remains unclear. Modeling the age-dependent progression of HD with striatal medium spiny neurons (MSNs) generated by direct reprogramming of fibroblasts from HD patients at different disease stages identifies age-dependent decline in critical cellular functions such as autophagy/macroautophagy and onset of neurodegeneration.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHuntington's disease (HD) is an inherited neurodegenerative disorder with adult-onset clinical symptoms, but the mechanism by which aging drives the onset of neurodegeneration in patients with HD remains unclear. In this study we examined striatal medium spiny neurons (MSNs) directly reprogrammed from fibroblasts of patients with HD to model the age-dependent onset of pathology. We found that pronounced neuronal death occurred selectively in reprogrammed MSNs from symptomatic patients with HD (HD-MSNs) compared to MSNs derived from younger, pre-symptomatic patients (pre-HD-MSNs) and control MSNs from age-matched healthy individuals.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCell therapies for age-related macular degeneration (AMD) treatment have been developed by integrating hydrogel-based biomaterials. Until now, cell activity has been observed only in terms of the modulus of the hydrogel. In addition, cell behavior has only been observed in the 2D environment of the hydrogel and the 3D matrix.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Biomater Sci Polym Ed
April 2022
Collagen, a natural biomaterial derived from animal tissues, has attracted the attention of biomedical material researchers because of its excellent cell affinity and low rejection . In this study, collagen was extracted using livestock by-product flippers, and an experiment was performed to assess its application as a scaffold for bone tissue implantation. For this purpose, we fabricated 2%, and 3% duck's feet derived collagen (DC) sponges.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPeople tend to display fake expressions to conceal their true feelings. False expressions are observable by facial micromovements that occur for less than a second. Systems designed to recognize facial expressions (e.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHerein, an injectable thermosensitive hydrogel was developed for a drug and cellular delivery system. The composite was prepared by facile physical mixing of pluronic F-127 (PF) and silk fibroin (SF) in an aqueous solution. The chemical structure, transparency, viscosity, injectability, degradation kinetic, cumulative release of dexamethasone (Dex), a type of corticosteroid drug, and size distribution of the fabricated hydrogels were characterized.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAn amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNanomaterials (Basel)
August 2020
Efficient integration of a single-photon emitter with an optical waveguide is essential for quantum integrated circuits. In this study, we integrated a single-photon emitter in a hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) flake with a Ag plasmonic waveguide and measured its optical properties at room temperature. First, we performed numerical simulations to calculate the efficiency of light coupling from the emitter to the Ag plasmonic waveguide, depending on the position and polarization of the emitter.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn optoelectronic devices based on two-dimensional (2D) semiconductor heterojunctions, the efficient charge transport of photogenerated carriers across the interface is a critical factor to determine the device performances. Here, we report an unexplored approach to boost the optoelectronic device performances of the WSe-MoS - heterojunctions via the monolithic-oxidation-induced doping and resultant modulation of the interface band alignment. In the proposed device, the atomically thin WO layer, which is directly formed by layer-by-layer oxidation of WSe, is used as a charge transport layer for promoting hole extraction.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNat Nanotechnol
January 2020
Two-dimensional transition-metal dichalcogenide (TMD) crystals are a versatile platform for optoelectronic, catalytic and quantum device studies. However, the ability to tailor their physical properties through explicit synthetic control of their morphology and dimensionality is a major challenge. Here we demonstrate a gas-phase synthesis method that substantially transforms the structure and dimensionality of TMD crystals without lithography.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMaxillofac Plast Reconstr Surg
December 2019
[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1186/s40902-019-0208-2.].
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMaxillofac Plast Reconstr Surg
December 2019
Background: Brain abscess is a life-threatening condition that occurs due to complications during a neurosurgical procedure, direct cranial trauma, or the presence of local or distal infection. Infection in the oral cavity can also be considered a source of brain abscess.
Case Presentation: A 45-year-old male patient was transported with brain abscess in the subcortical white matter.
The ability to convert human somatic cells efficiently to neurons facilitates the utility of patient-derived neurons for studying neurological disorders. As such, ectopic expression of neuronal microRNAs (miRNAs), miR-9/9 and miR-124 (miR-9/9-124) in adult human fibroblasts has been found to evoke extensive reconfigurations of the chromatin and direct the fate conversion to neurons. However, how miR-9/9-124 break the cell fate barrier to activate the neuronal program remains to be defined.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn Huntington's disease (HD), expansion of CAG codons in the huntingtin gene (HTT) leads to the aberrant formation of protein aggregates and the differential degeneration of striatal medium spiny neurons (MSNs). Modeling HD using patient-specific MSNs has been challenging, as neurons differentiated from induced pluripotent stem cells are free of aggregates and lack an overt cell death phenotype. Here we generated MSNs from HD patient fibroblasts through microRNA-based direct neuronal conversion, bypassing the induction of pluripotency and retaining age signatures of the original fibroblasts.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDirected reprogramming of human fibroblasts into fully differentiated neurons requires massive changes in epigenetic and transcriptional states. Induction of a chromatin environment permissive for acquiring neuronal subtype identity is therefore a major barrier to fate conversion. Here we show that the brain-enriched miRNAs miR-9/9 and miR-124 (miR-9/9-124) trigger reconfiguration of chromatin accessibility, DNA methylation, and mRNA expression to induce a default neuronal state.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMol Cell Biol
January 2017
Fas-associated protein with death domain (FADD) plays a key role in extrinsic apoptosis. Here, we show that FADD is SUMOylated as an essential step during intrinsic necrosis. FADD was modified at multiple lysine residues (K120/125/149) by small ubiquitin-related modifier 2 (SUMO2) during necrosis caused by calcium ionophore A23187 and by ischemic damage.
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