Biomedical Technology最新文献

Complexities of the intestine have brought enormous controversy and discussions to the research on the digestive diseases. The neglected gas environment is crucial in shaping the dynamic intestinal microenvironment. Many gases are involved in the biological activities within the intestinal anaerobic environment, including oxygen, hydrogen, carbon monoxide, ammonia, methane, hydrogen sulfide, carbon dioxide, and nitrogen. These gases participate in the regulation of systemic inflammation and metabolism via different pathways, thereby alleviating or promoting the development of intestinal disease. Meanwhile, the constitution and changes of gases reflect the intestinal environment, which could be utilized to monitor the variation in local metabolism and imply the progress of digestive disorders. However, individual gas has intrinsic functions in maintaining a healthy intestinal microenvironment or causing digestive diseases, and the underlying mechanisms are still unclear. Therefore, exploring the profile of gases in the digestive tract and their extraordinary impact on the intestinal microenvironment will be of great value in understanding the interplay between intestinal health and diseases. By reviewing the research progress of gases in the digestive tract, we anticipate that a better understanding of the roles of gases would promote the research and application transformation in this field as well as the diagnostics and treatment of clinical diseases.

Background

Tocilizumab is a well-practiced strategy to manage cytokine release syndrome (CRS) after chimeric antigen receptor T cell (CAR-T) therapy. However, varied efficiency in CRS mitigation by tocilizumab has been reported to highlight affecting variables such as tumor types and timing of the administration.

Objective

The objective of this study is to identify different curative effect between diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) and acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) by early use of tocilizumab for prophylaxis and treatment of CRS.

Methods

By retrospectively summarizing our institution's experience with a CAR-T clinical trial targeting CD19, 11 cases were analyzed: 5 DLBCL, and 6 ALL. The two groups were compared with patient characteristics, CRS information and clinical outcomes. 3 patients were pretreated with tocilizumab for prophylaxis and the rest were treated with tocilizumab at CRS diagnosis.

Results

CRS occurred in 81.8% of patients (9/11), grade 3 or higher occurred in 55.6% of the CRS patients (5/9). The two group were similar in patient characteristics, CAR-T and CRS profile. However, tocilizumab produced much better efficacy against CRS in DLBCL group compared with ALL group (80% versus 16.7%, P ​= ​0.08).

Conclusions

Despite the statistical was non-significant, possibly due to small case pool and bias was unavoidable, our analysis suggested that early use of tocilizumab was more effective for DLBCL than ALL in the prophylaxis and treatment of CRS. A treatment algorithm for management of CRS with regard to DLBCL and ALL is proposed, which may extend to other local or systemic malignancies and warrant further investigation.

Improving the corrosion resistance, osteogenic activity, and antimicrobial capacity of the magnesium-based implant is considered the key to promoting their large-scale clinical application. In this study, we reported a novel calcium-phosphorus coating induced by gentamicin (G)-loaded polydopamine for the surface treatment of the magnesium alloy. According to material characterization, immersion tests, and electrochemical analysis, the composite coating has a dense structure and a high crystallinity for greater corrosion resistance. Meanwhile, drug release and antimicrobial experiments demonstrated that the magnesium matrix loaded with gentamicin showed strong inhibition of Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus, and the calcium-phosphorus coating further prolonged the release profile of G, which would contribute to the long-term bactericidal activity of the magnesium implants. In addition, the coating significantly promoted the adhesion, proliferation, and osteogenic differentiation ability of MC3T3-E1. The results of in vivo experiments confirmed that magnesium alloys with composite coatings significantly promoted bone regeneration under infected conditions. This study provides a promising strategy for the development of multifunctional magnesium-based implants with good corrosion resistance, and antibacterial and osteogenic capabilities.

According to the society of assisted reproductive technologies (SART), the top fertility clinics in North America have reported overall pregnancy rates of up to 50% in good prognosis patients. Although new techniques in advanced reproductive technologies have begun to emerge in the twenty-first century, including time-lapse monitoring of embryo development, analysis of metabolites in embryo culture media, and the use of artificial intelligence in morphometric embryo grading, currently chromosomal status obtained via pre-implantation genetic testing for aneuploidy (PGT-A) appears to be the most definitive in evaluating embryonic potential. Yet still, in most clinics, approximately 30% of euploid or chromosomally normal embryos fail to achieve a viable pregnancy resulting in stress and anxiety for patients, repeat cycles, and increased cost of treatment. Recent literature suggests that blastocysts with an increased mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) ratio have greatly reduced implantation potential, however, there exists controversial studies which do not report a relationship. This review summarizes the current literature on utilizing mitochondrial DNA as a possible biomarker for embryo implantation, highlights the reasons for inconsistencies in some studies and suggests possible improvements to the study design of future mtDNA ratio research.

As the most popular teeth problem, dental caries can result in pain, suffering, impaired function, and diminished quality of life among communities, which calls for new strategies to improve the therapeutic effects. With suitable biocompatibility properties, functional hydrogels had developed dramatically in dental caries treatments. In this review, the occurrence and development of dental caries were introduced. Then, the current hydrogels toward dental caries with antibacterial or (and) remineralization properties and hydrogel-related dental pulp tissue engineering were summarized. Finally, the limitation and outlook of the applications of hydrogels on dental caries treatment were prospected. Exploring innovative hydrogel delivery systems will build a solid basis for a brighter future of more friendly, effective and personalized treatment to deal with dental caries.

Owing to their superior capacity for building structures, polymeric fibers with diameters varying from a few nanometers to hundreds of microns have been explored in biomedical applications as drug carriers or tissue engineering scaffolds. Depending on the source materials, fabrication techniques, and post-treatments, both the fiber diameter and surface morphology, as well as mechanical features and the cell-fiber structure interactions can be thoroughly tuned. Although most techniques could produce fibers within a wide range of sizes, each type may have superior advantages in a certain range, which may highly relate to target biomedical fields. Therefore, to properly choose the optimal technique for specific fibers, a comprehensive review of the current fiber-producing techniques is indispensable. In the current review, several main fiber-producing techniques are summarized, compared, and discussed in detail regarding their dominant fiber size ranges, which were classified as nano (<1000 ​nm), micro (1 ​μm−100 μm) and macro (>100 ​μm). The principals, main parameters, and corresponding applications for each technique are reviewed, and the challenges and future perspectives are proposed. We believe this review is highly informative for novice researchers in this field.

Wettability, as a fundamental property of interface materials, is becoming increasingly prominent in frontier research areas, such as water harvesting, microfluidics, biomedicine, sensors, decontamination, wearables, and micro-electromechanical systems. Taking advantage of biological paradigm inspirations and manufacturing technology advancements, diverse wettability materials with precisely customized micro/nano-structures have been developed. As a result of these achievements, wettability materials have significant technical ramifications in sectors spanning from academics to industry, agriculture, and biomedical engineering. Practical applications of wettability-customized materials in medical device domains have drawn significant scientific interest in recent decades due to the increased emphasis on healthcare. In this review, recent advances of wettability-customized micro/nano-materials for biomedical devices are presented. After briefly introducing the natural wettable/non-wettable phenomena, the fabrication strategies and novel processing techniques are discussed. The study emphasizes the application progress of biomedical devices with customized wettability. The future challenges and opportunities of wettability-customized micro/nano-materials are also provided.

Micro-nano hydrogel is a novel functional material that has attracted extensive attention in various fields. Due to the size of micron and nano level, high water content and high specific surface area, the micro-nano hydrogels can achieve minimally invasive repair and are considered as promising agents in tissue repair engineering. In this review, we summarize the design and development of micro-nano hydrogels for biomedical applications, first introduce biopolymers for the synthesis of hydrogels, then introduce the preparation technologies of microgels and nanogels respectively, and systematically summarize the application characteristics and forms of different preparation technologies. Finally, the latest application progresses of microgels in local drug delivery, bone tissue repair, soft tissue repair and immunomodulation are introduced in detail, as well as the latest application progress of nanohydrogels in cartilage repair, antibacterial, antitumor/cancer nerve repair and prevention and diagnosis of diseases, and the key research directions of micro-nano hydrogel preparation technologies in the future are clarified.

Self-healing hydrogels are promising biomedical materials owing to their ability to restore the structure fracture and regain the initial functions. However, a comprehensive review of the dynamic hydrogels based on the Knoevenagel Condensation (KC) for wound healing is yet lacking. Here, we first summarize the recent advances in self-healing hydrogels constructed by the KC reaction, and then systematically illustrate the reaction process and self-healing mechanisms. The features of these hydrogels, for instance, self-healing characteristics, injectability, thermosensitivity, as well as thermoplastic properties are also highlighted. In addition, a series of hydrogels constructed by this reaction in the presence of various catalysts are presented and discussed. Furthermore, the potential application within the rapidly expanding field of wound healing is discussed in detail. Finally, recommendations to guide the designing strategies and a perspective on challenges faced by this kind of hydrogels are also described.

Platinum drugs have been coined as one of the great success representatives in cancer chemotherapy. With the accidental discovery of cisplatin, thousands of platinum-based complexes have been synthesized, including clinically approved classical platinum(II) (Pt(II)) drugs, non-classical Pt(II) drugs, and platinum(IV) (Pt(IV)) drugs. Currently, these drugs are widely utilized in the treatment of various solid tumors in the clinic. Unfortunately, systemic toxicity and innate or acquired drug resistance greatly restrict their applications. The nanocarrier-based drug delivery systems (NDDSs) offer the possibility of targeted delivery of platinum drugs to the tumor tissue with reduced toxicity and enhanced drug efficacy. Thus, in this review, inorganic and organic nanocarriers for platinum drug delivery are introduced. The significant improvements, future challenges, and prospects of the nanocarriers toward potential clinical application are briefly discussed.