MicroRNAs (miRNAs) have been discovered to play critical role in regulating prostate cancer (PC) progression. The function role of miR-629 in tumor progression of PC has not been studied. Here, we found that miR-629 was markedly upregulated in PC as determined using the cancer genome atlas (TCGA) dataset, clinical tissues, and cell lines. Functional analysis (MTT assays, colony formation assays, soft agar growth assay and BrdU incorporation assay) indicated that overexpression of miR-629 was drastically promoted, while miR-629-in significantly suppressed cell proliferation. LATS2 was predicted as a direct target of miR-629 and was confirmed by western blot and dual luciferase assay. Through downregulation of large tumor suppressor 2 (LATS2) by overexpression of miR-629, the p21 mRNA and protein were decreased while the Cyclin D3 mRNA and protein were enhanced, suggesting promoting of cell proliferation process. Additionally, knockdown of LATS2 reversed the inhibitory effect by miR-629-in in PC. Our study indicated that miR-629 might serve as a new promising target for PC treatment.

Piezoionic materials are potential smart soft materials because of their similarity to biological systems in signal generation and transmission but still have limited use due to their intrinsic low response strain, noisy signal output, and complex structure. We report herein that the piezoelectric effect can be observed on an electrolyte-coated high-surface-area carbon nanotube yarn, generating large lengthwise voltage gradients without the assistance of an external electrical bias when the yarn was stretched. A mechanism of dynamic structure-nonuniform-induced ion squeezing is proposed to explain the electricity generation along the conductive piezoionic yarn. Between the two ends of the yarn, sensitive and high-recognition voltage signals with ultralow noise are generated, when the yarn is subjected to mechanical stretching at a wide range of strains and frequencies. The voltage polarity is tuned by selecting a proper type of absorbed ions. Knitting of the piezoionic yarns as a self-powered sensor into a glove is demonstrated for precisely recognizing hand gestures and human-machine interactions. Because of features such as a simple structure, easy fabrication, high flexibility and stretchability, and a wide range of response, this piezoionic yarn is promising for smart textiles, wearable sensing devices, and implantable artificial muscle feedbacks.

A Pt partially coated core–shell PtFeNi nanoalloy catalyst is prepared for oxygen reduction and evolution that exhibits a remarkable bifunctional catalytic performance due to the presence of energy-optimized and synergistic catalytic sites on nanoalloys.

Transitional metal alloy and compounds have been developed as the low cost and efficient bifunctional electrocatalysts for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER). However, a high mass loading of these catalysts is commonly needed to achieve acceptable catalytic performance, which could cause such problems as battery weight gain, mass transport blocking, and catalyst loss. We report herein the preparation of fine CoNi nanoparticles (5-6 nm) anchored inside a nitrogen-doped defective carbon nanotube network (CoNi@N-DCNT) by a transient Joule heating method. When utilized as an electrocatalyst for oxygen reduction and evolution in alkaline media, the CoNi@N-DCNT film catalyst with a very low mass loading of 0.06 mg cm(-2) showed excellent bifunctional catalytic performance. For ORR, the onset potential (E-onset) and the half-wave potential (E-1/2) were 0.92 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode (vs. RHE) and 0.83 V (vs. RHE), respectively. For OER, the potential at the current density (I) of 10 mA cm(-2) (E-10) was 1.53 V, resulting in an overpotential of 300 mV much lower than that of the commercial RuO2 catalyst (320 mV). The potential gap between E-1/2 and E(10 )was as small as 0.7 V. Considering the low mass loading, the mass activity at E-10 reached at 123.2 A g(-1), much larger than that of the RuO2 catalyst and literature results of transitional metal-based bifunctional catalysts. Moreover, the CoNi@N-DCNT film catalyst showed very good long-term stability during the ORR and OER test. The excellent bifunctional catalytic performance could be attributed to the synergistic effect of the bimetal alloy. (C) 2020 Science Press and Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Published by ELSEVIER B.V. and Science Press. All rights reserved.

Confining Zn plating and stripping in a robust and conductive 3D carbon nanotube network results in an electrode, which shows excellent reversibility at high depth of discharge and enables zinc-ion batteries with high-rate and long-term performance.

Recently, the development of high-performance bifunctional oxygen catalysts integrated with flexible conductive scaffolds for rechargeable metal-air batteries has attracted considerable interest, driving by fast-growing wearable electronics. Herein, we report a flexible bifunctional oxygen catalyst thin film consisting of Co-N-C bifunctional catalysts embedding in carbon nanotube (CNT) networks. The catalyst is readily prepared by pyrolysis of cobalt-based zeolitic imidazolate frameworks (ZIF-67) that are in-situ synthesized in CNT networks. Such catalyst film demonstrates very high catalytic activities for oxygen reduction (onset potential: 0.91V, and half-wave potential: 0.87V vs. RHE) and oxygen evolution (10mA cm(-2) at 1.58V) reactions, high methanol tolerance property, and long-term stability (97% current retention). Moreover, our integrated catalyst film shows very good structure flexibility and robustness. Based on the obtained film air electrodes, flexible Zn-air batteries demonstrate low charging and discharging overpotentials (0.82V at 1 mA cm(-1)) and excellent structure stability in the bending tests. These results indicate that presently reported catalyst films are potential air electrodes for flexible metal-air batteries. (C) 2019 Science Press and Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Published by Elsevier B.V. and Science Press. All rights reserved.

A highly-conductive neutral gum electrolyte was used for all-solid-state supercapacitors with outstanding electrochemical performance at temperatures between −15 °C to 100 °C.

Air cathodes with a high catalytic activity of oxygen reduction reactions (ORR), long-term stability, and fast channels for mass and charge transportations are highly desirable for the development of fuel cells and metal-air batteries. Herein, we report a freestanding high-performance air electrode originated from an interconnected and highly conductive carbon nanotube (CNT) network film with iron impurity. The air electrode film where PtFe alloy nano-particles with average size of similar to 5 nm homogeneously are confined on CNTs is realized via a transient Joule heating induced alloying of the iron nanoparticles with platinum for 250 ms. Benefiting from the well-alloyed structure and the stabilized anchoring sites, the low-platinum-containing (1.7 wt %) hybrid film shows ORR mass activity over 6 times higher than that of commercial 20 wt % Pt/C catalyst. Besides, it demonstrates excellent long-term stability and high tolerance against methanol poisoning. High electrical conductivity, mechanical strength, and porous networks are well-retained for this freestanding air electrode film, integrating ORR catalysts, current collectors, and porous electrodes. Fiber Zn-air batteries assembled with these self-supported air cathodes show high discharging capacity (31.3 mA h cm(-3) at 10 mA cm(-3)) and excellent stability even after repeated applications, presenting a proof of concept and their potential applications for flexible and wearable energy supplies.

An adaptive and stable gum bio-electrolyte was developed, which enabled Zn-ion batteries that have very competitive performances in terms of capacity, energy density, power density, rate capability and cyclability.

As a promising energy-storage device, rechargeable Zn-air batteries have attracted considerable interests. Herein, a bifunctional oxygen electrode film prepared by adhering NiCo2 O4 nanosheets to a nitrogen and oxygen dual-doped carbon nanotubes film in a large scale is reported. The resulting self-supporting film electrode is multifunctional, which integrates a porous conducting structure for air diffusion and charge transfer, high-performance catalysts for oxygen reduction and evolution, and novel structural flexibility. The composite film demonstrates excellent oxygen reduction/evolution reaction catalytic activities with low Tafel slopes (50 mV dec-1 for oxygen reduction reaction; 92 mV dec-1 for oxygen evolution reaction). Without any additional current collector, gas diffusion layer, or binder, the obtained bifunctional film performs as an "all-in-one" air electrode in a Zn-air battery. A 50-cm-long cable-shaped Zn-air battery based on such a film air electrode exhibits high operating potentials (≈1.2 V at 0.25 mA cm-2 ), low charging-discharging overpotentials (≈0.7 V), and stable cycling performance. Moreover, the flexible cable Zn-air batteries show excellent stability under different deformation conditions. The proposed concept of constructing scalable, all-in-one, freestanding, and flexible air electrodes would pave the way to develop next-generation wearable and portable energy-storage devices.

Artificial muscles are reported in which reduced graphene oxide (rGO) is trapped in the helical corridors of a carbon nanotube (CNT) yarn. When electrochemically driven in aqueous electrolytes, these coiled CNT/rGO yarn muscles can contract by 8.1%, which is over six times that of the previous results for CNT yarn muscles driven in an inorganic electrolyte (1.3%). They can contract to provide a final stress of over 14 MPa, which is about 40 times that of natural muscles. The hybrid yarn muscle shows a unique catch state, in which 95% of the contraction is retained for 1000 s following charging and subsequent disconnection from the power supply. Hence, they are unlike thermal muscles and natural muscles, which need to consume energy to maintain contraction. Additionally, these muscles can be reversibly cycled while lifting heavy loads.

A hierarchical hybrid film of carbon nanotubes varying largely in diameter were prepared for high-performance supercapacitors.

A novel two-dimensional (2D) nanomaterial, namely sulfonated graphenal polymer (SGP), is used to tune the hydrothermal growth of Co3O4 nanoparticles. SGP provides abundant nucleation sites to grow Co3O4 nanoparticles and effectively reduces the particle size and dimension. As a result, with considering the improved size uniformity of Co3O4 and the tight wrapping of SGP around Co3O4 as well, the Co3O4/SGP hybrid electrode exhibits a high specific electrochemical capacitance of 234.28 F/g at a current density of 0.2 A/g, 237% higher than that of the pure Co3O4 electrode. By using the hybrid as the anode of an all-solid-state asymmetric supercapacitor, the capacitance can be well maintained up to 93% after 5000 cycles even at 2 A/g.

In symmetric supercapacitors based on MnO2, only MnO2 on the negative electrode serves as the electrochemically active material. MnO2 on the negative electrode dissolves and re-deposites on the positive electrode, thus induces a decrease in specific capacitance.

Developing efficient but nonprecious bifunctional electrocatalysts for overall water splitting in basic media has been the subject of intensive research focus with the increasing demand for clean and regenerated energy. Herein, we report on the synthesis of a novel hierarchical hybrid electrode, NiFe-layered double hydroxide molecularly ultrathin sheets grown on NiCo2O4 nanowire arrays assembled from thin platelets with nickel foam as the scaffold support, in which the catalytic metal sites are more accessible and active and most importantly strong chemical coupling exists at the interface, enabling superior catalytic power toward both oxygen evolution reaction (OER) and additionally hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) in the same alkaline KOH electrolyte. The behavior ranks top-class compared with documented non-noble HER and OER electrocatalysts and even comparable to state-of-the-art noble-metal electrocatalysts, Pt and RuO2. When fabricated as an integrated alkaline water electrolyzer, the designed electrode can deliver a current density of 10 mA cm-2 at a fairly low cell voltage of 1.60 V, promising the material as efficient bifunctional catalysts toward whole cell water splitting.

Dual‐band electrochromic composite materials are of utmost importance in advancing the electrochromic field toward achieving the ideal smart window with independent control over visible and near‐infrared (NIR) radiation. However, such composites usually need deliberate architecting of their mesoscale structure (e.g., via block copolymer‐templating method) to make the electrolyte contact with both NIR and visible‐light modulating components. Herein, instead of arduously making exterior pores, the intrinsic structural tunnels are utilized directly in electrochromic materials to facilitate the accommodation and transportation of insertion ions, which permit the infiltration of the electrolyte to be in contact with both visible (Prussian blue) and NIR‐light modulating components (nonstoichiometric tungsten oxide). Such simple‐fabricated composite materials exhibit excellent dual‐band electrochromic performance with an unprecedented dynamic optical range for modulation of visible and NIR light, up to 71.2% at 633 nm and 64.8% at 1600 nm, respectively.

Air electrodes with high catalytic activity are of great importance for rechargeable zinc-air batteries. Herein, a flexible, binder-free composite air electrode for zinc-air batteries is reported, which utilizes a lightweight, conductive, and crosslinked aerogel film of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) functioned as a 3D catalyst-supporting scaffold for bifunctional cobalt (II/III) oxides and as a current collector. The composite electrode shows high catalytic activities for both oxygen reduction reaction and oxygen evolution reaction, resulting from the synergistic effect of nitrogen-doped CNTs and spinel Co3 O4 nanoparticles. Solid-state Zn-air batteries assembled using such free-standing air electrodes (without the need of additional current collectors) are bendable and show low resistances, low charge/discharge overpotentials, and a high cyclic stability.

Three-dimensional (3D) electrodes, which are composed of thin inorganic pseudocapacitive nanowire networks, show high electrochemical capacities and excellent cyclic performance because of their high surface area, convenient ion/electron transport and mechanical stability. Herein, we reported the hydrothermal preparation of a 3D ultra-thin Ni/Co basic carbonate nanowire network with the aid of a small amount of graphene oxide (GO) (6 wt%) as both the binder and the conductive filler. Through using an electrochemical cyclic process, the Ni/Co basic carbonate nanowires were subsequently in situ converted to Ni/Co hydroxide nanowires with high electrochemical capacitance. The specific capacitance of the Ni/Co hydroxide nanowire/rGO hybrid networks achieved 1434 F g(-1) at 0.5 A g(-1). Furthermore, the specific capacitance of the sample has no loss during the 5000 charge/discharge cycles. This Ni/Co hydroxide nanowire/rGO composite can be used to prepare asymmetric supercapacitors with high performance. (C) 2016 Published by Elsevier Ltd.