Preventive approach against drug-induced pulmonary fibrosis through the suppression of epithelial-mesenchymal transition

A number of drugs induce pulmonary injury and subsequently lead to serious lung diseases such as pulmonary fibrosis as the adverse drug reactions. However, an effective preventive approach against drug-induced pulmonary fibrosis has not been established due to poor understanding of common preventive targets in a variety of drugs showing pulmonary toxicity. Epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT), a cellular phenotypic change of the epithelial to mesenchymal state, contributes to the development of pulmonary fibrosis through the conversion of damaged alveolar epithelium into myofibroblasts. As several drugs with pulmonary toxicity have been reported to induce EMT, EMT serves as a bridge between the drugs and pulmonary fibrosis. Accumulated evidence supports the potential of EMT as a preventive target against drug-induced pulmonary fibrosis. Additionally, since there are mechanistic differences between the main pharmacological effect and EMT induced by the drug, prevention based on EMT suppression would be possible and would contribute to continuous clinical treatment with the drug to avoid EMT-mediated serious pulmonary fibrosis. Furthermore, targeting EMT seems to be adequate for exerting a preventive effect since EMT in damaged alveolar epithelial cells occurs prior to the development of the pathophysiological state of the whole lung in a bleomycin-induced lung injury rat model. This viewpoint deals with the benefits and perspectives of preventive approaches against druginduced pulmonary fibrosis through the suppression of EMT, which has rarely been addressed.     

Ti-6.5Al-3.5Mo-1.5Zr-0.3Si合金中α′相和α″相的组织演变与力学性能

对Ti-6.5Al-3.5Mo-1.5Zr-0.3Si合金进行固溶时效处理,随后使用光学显微镜、扫描电镜、XRD衍射仪、拉伸试验以及冲击性能试验,分析固溶时效对合金中α′相和α″相的组织演变与力学性能的影响。结果表明,固溶处理后的微观组织中发生初生α相尺寸变小并趋于等轴化,尺寸较小的初生α相发生溶解并消失,其β转变组织变得不明显,经时效后的微观组织中析出大量α_s相,β转变组织更加明显。经固溶处理后,组织均由α+α′+α″相构成,经时效处理后,组织由α相和β相构成。合金经固溶处理后,其抗拉强度为1336 MPa,屈服强度为1070 MPa,断后伸长率为6%,断面收缩率为22%,冲击吸收能量为16 J。经时效处理后,强度随时效温度升高而升高,塑性趋势与之相反,其冲击性能几乎没有变化。合金经固溶处理后的拉伸与冲击断口微观形貌均由韧窝构成,为典型的韧性断裂。经时效处理后,拉伸和冲击断口的微观形貌有明显的高低起伏,随着时效温度的升高,韧窝的尺寸和数量减少,并出现撕裂棱以及空洞,断裂类型有向脆性断裂转变的趋势,但仍以韧性断裂为主。     

Molten salt synthesis of α-Al2O3 platelets using NaAlO2 as raw material

α-Al₂O₃ platelets were prepared by a molten salt synthesis method when NaAlO₂ was used as raw material. The effects of the stirring rate during the gel preparation, heating temperature, type and addition amount of molten salts, addition of plate-like α-Al₂O₃ seeds, additives such as TiOSO₄ and Na₃PO₄·12H₂O on the morphology of α-Al₂O₃ were studied. High stirring rate during the gel preparation and high heating temperature not only help to restrain the overlapping of α-Al₂O₃ platelets, but also improve the size distribution. When the heating temperature increases to 1200 °C, most of α-Al₂O₃ platelets are hexagonal in its morphology, and the size of platelets becomes relatively uniform. When Na₂SO₄-K₂SO₄ flux is used instead of NaCl-KCl flux, it is easy to obtain α-Al₂O₃ platelets with a big size. When the molar ratio of salt to final Al₂O₃ powders increases to 4:1, most of α-Al₂O₃ platelets are hexagonal, and the overlapping of powders is inhibited. The addition of a small amount of plate-like seeds has a significant effect on the size of α-Al₂O₃ platelets. With the increase of seed amount, the diameter of α-Al₂O₃ platelets tends to decrease. The addition of 5.45 wt.% TiOSO₄ results in the formation of hexagonal α-Al₂O₃ platelets with an average diameter of 5.1 μm and an average thickness of 1.4 μm. Thin α-Al₂O₃ platelets with a discal shape are obtained owing to the co-addition of 0.51 wt.% Na₃PO₄·12H₂O and 3 wt.% TiOSO₄.     

Antioxidant mechanism of grape procyanidins in muscle tissues: Redox interactions with endogenous ascorbic acid and α-tocopherol

The present study investigates the antioxidant mechanism of grape procyanidins and, in particular, their aptitude to establish redox interactions with two important components of the endogenous antioxidant system of muscle tissues, α-tocopherol (α-TOH) and ascorbic acid (AA). To this end, the progress of lipid oxidation was monitored in fish muscle supplemented with grape procyanidins at the concentrations usually employed in antioxidant food applications, and then related to the redox stability of the endogenous α-TOH and AA. In addition to the lipid oxidation protective effect, the incorporation of procyanidins also provided an improvement of the redox stability of the endogenous components in a straight procyanidinic concentration-dependent manner. Results showed the capacity of procyanidins to repair oxidised α-TOH at medium-long term, and to delay the AA depletion. Therefore, such cooperative redox interaction of exogenous procyanidins adequately complements the natural α-TOH regenerative system supplied by AA that is efficient at the early post mortem stages.     

Preparation and characterisation of α-methylstyrene–butadiene latexes for paper coating applications

The purpose of this work is to demonstrate how α-methylstyrene (AMS) can replace styrene in preparing styrene–butadiene (SB) type latexes and to compare the properties of the paper coating of the prepared α-methylstyrene–butadiene emulsion with the commercial styrene–butadiene latex reference sample. A lot of work is nowadays being conducted on different biorefinery concepts replacing fossil oil with biomass based raw materials due to the expected rise of the fossil oil cost. Aromatics can in principle be produced from renewable raw materials, such as lignin, sugars and terpenes for example. The potential methods include thermochemical conversions, catalytic fast pyrolysis, metabolic engineering, catalytic aromatisation and dehydrogenation among others. Terpenes, such as α-limonene and pinene, are possible sources of aromatics, and they can indeed be catalytically converted to p-cymene. Industrial hydrodealkylation and disproportionation processes developed by major petrochemical companies can further convert p-cymene to BTX aromatics or simultaneously dehydrogenate the alkyl chain of p-cymene to styrenic monomers such as α-methylstyrene. Based on the measured paper properties for uncalendered and calendered coated samples, AMS proved to be adequate to replace the oil based styrene in commercial reference SB latexes. Even though the emulsion polymerisation for the α-methylstyrene–butadiene latex was not optimised, almost all tested properties were at least equally good as in the commercial reference sample. α-Methylstyrene containing coating colours had slightly higher viscosity than the other coating colours. Coating colours containing α-methylstyrene seems to have an improved water retention compared to the commercial reference styrene–butadiene latex coating colour and the laboratory prepared styrene–butadiene coating colour. The paper coated with the commercial reference latex containing coating colour was less porous than the other coated papers. Despite of that, both dry and wet surface strength were at least equally good as in the case of the commercial reference latex. The results are promising when thinking of the future development of the bio-based latexes.     

超声波对α-Ni（OH）2电极结构及电化学性能的影响（英文）

分别采用共沉淀法和超声波共沉淀法制备Al/Co复合掺杂α-Ni(OH)2样品A和B,用XRD和激光粒度仪表征样品的晶相结构和粒度分布。结果表明,样品B比样品A具有较多的晶格缺陷和较小的平均粒径。循环伏安特性及电化学阻抗谱测试显示,样品B比样品A具有更好的电化学性能:较好的反应可逆性、较低的电荷转移电阻和较高的循环寿命等。样品B的质子扩散系数为1.96×10-10cm2/s,约为样品A(9.78×10-11cm2/s)的2倍。充放电测试显示,样品B的放电比容量达到308mA·h/g,比样品A的放电比容量高25mA·h/g。