Refreshable Tactile Display Based on a Bistable Electroactive Polymer and a Stretchable Serpentine Joule Heating Electrode

The demand for tactile interactive devices has been growing exponentially as the sense of touch enriches the human–machine interaction experience. However, the tactile devices reported so far cannot offer high-quality performance, compact form factor, and relatively simple system architecture for low-cost production. We report the fabrication of a 4 × 4 pneumatic tactile display with Braille standard resolution using a bistable electroactive polymer (BSEP) thin film and a serpentine-patterned carbon nanotube electrode. The BSEP is a variable stiffness material that exhibits a stiffness change of 3000-fold within the narrow temperature range of 43 ± 3 °C. The carbon nanotube electrode was patterned on the polymer film via a P3R process, Prestretch-Pattern-Protect-Release, which leads to a serpentine-patterned composite electrode that is highly stretchable, retains its high electrical conductivity up to an ∼200% area strain, and provides a fast Joule heating rate of 31 °C/s. The tactile pixels are diaphragm actuators that can be individually controlled to produce 0.7 mm out of plain deformation and greater than 50 g of blocking force by application of local heating and pneumatic pressure. The device can operate under low voltage supply (30 V) and has a lifetime of over 100 000 cycles without much performance degradation. This work could open a path to building compact, user-friendly, and cost-effective tactile devices for a variety of important applications

Refreshable Tactile Display Based on a Bistable Electroactive Polymer and a Stretchable Serpentine Joule Heating Electrode

The demand for tactile interactive devices has been growing exponentially as the sense of touch enriches the human–machine interaction experience. However, the tactile devices reported so far cannot offer high-quality performance, compact form factor, and relatively simple system architecture for low-cost production. We report the fabrication of a 4 × 4 pneumatic tactile display with Braille standard resolution using a bistable electroactive polymer (BSEP) thin film and a serpentine-patterned carbon nanotube electrode. The BSEP is a variable stiffness material that exhibits a stiffness change of 3000-fold within the narrow temperature range of 43 ± 3 °C. The carbon nanotube electrode was patterned on the polymer film via a P3R process, Prestretch-Pattern-Protect-Release, which leads to a serpentine-patterned composite electrode that is highly stretchable, retains its high electrical conductivity up to an ∼200% area strain, and provides a fast Joule heating rate of 31 °C/s. The tactile pixels are diaphragm actuators that can be individually controlled to produce 0.7 mm out of plain deformation and greater than 50 g of blocking force by application of local heating and pneumatic pressure. The device can operate under low voltage supply (30 V) and has a lifetime of over 100 000 cycles without much performance degradation. This work could open a path to building compact, user-friendly, and cost-effective tactile devices for a variety of important applications

The complete chloroplast genome of <i>Keteleeria evelyniana</i> Mast var. <i>pendula</i> Hsüeh (Pinaceae), a species with extremely small populations in China

Keteleeria evelyniana Mast var. pendula Hsüeh, a typical plant species of extremely small population, is faced to be endangered. The complete chloroplast (cp) genome of K. evelyniana var. pendula has been assembled and annotated for the first time in this study. The complete genome in length was found to be 117,139 bp. The genome annotation revealed a total of 118 genes, including 34 transfer RNA (tRNA) genes, 4 ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes, and 80 protein-coding genes. The maximum-likelihood phylogenetic tree supported that K. evelyniana var. pendula, K. fortune, K. evelyniana, and K. davidiana are clustered in one branch. This complete chloroplast genome helped us to understand the evolution of K. evelyniana var. pendula. These results laid the foundation for future studies on the conservation of this species.</p

Additional file 1 of Metabolic subtypes and immune landscapes in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma: prognostic implications and potential for personalized therapies

Additional file 1: Supplementary Table 1. Clinicopathologic features of ESCA patients in this study. Supplementary Table 2. Primer sequence

Table_1_The role of rare earth elements and dietary intake in tongue cancer: a mediation analysis in southeast China.DOCX

ObjectiveThe current research aimed to examine how dietary intake and rare earth elements may affect the development of tongue cancer.MethodsThe serum levels of 10 rare earth elements (REEs) in 171 cases and 171 healthy matched controls were measured by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). The conditional logistic regression was used to examine the relationship between dietary intake, serum levels of 10 REEs, and tongue cancer. Mediation effect and multiplicative interaction analysis were then performed to estimate the potential contribution of REEs in dietary intake associated with tongue cancer.ResultsCompared with the control group, patients with tongue cancer consumed significantly less fish, seafood, fruit, green leafy vegetables, and non-green leafy vegetables, with higher serum praseodymium (Pr), dysprosium (Dy), and lanthanum (La) levels, and lower serum cerium (Ce) and scandium (Sc) levels. The interaction effect was observed between some REEs and food categories. Green vegetables' impact on the risk of tongue cancer is partially attributed to the La and Thorium (Th) elements (P ConclusionThe correlation between REEs and dietary intakes for tongue cancer is compact but intricate. Some REEs interact with food intake to influence tongue cancer, while others act as a mediator.</p

Additional file 1 of Association of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) with periodontitis: the mediating role of sex hormones

Supplementary Material

Different organization of upstream regulatory region between <i>E. coli</i> and <i>K. pneumoniae</i>.

<p>(A) Venn diagram showing orthologous genes and species-specific genes between <i>E. coli</i> and <i>K. pneumoniae</i>. (B) 4 different types of promoter regions, and their numbers identified in two species. (C) Schematic drawing of annotated TSSs and sequence comparison of regulatory region upstream of <i>lpd</i>. (D) Length difference between the pairs of comparable 5′ UTR. (E) Comparison of sequence conservation of promoter, 5′ UTR, and ORF regions. (F) Sequence conservation of genomic regions surrounding translation start sites.</p

Experimentally determined TSSs and their association with annotated genes.

<p>(A) Genome-wide TSS mapped onto <i>E. coli</i> and <i>K. pneumoniae</i> genome annotation. (B) Number of <i>E. coli</i> sRNAs detected with 5 TSS datasets generated by different methods. (C) Number of sRNAs detected from <i>E. coli</i> and <i>K. pneumoniae</i> during the exponential growth. (D) Schematic drawing of annotated TSSs assigned to orthologous <i>micF</i> sRNA and coding genes surrounding <i>micF</i> in <i>E. coli</i> and <i>K. pneumoniae</i>. (E) Schematic drawing of annotated TSSs assigned to <i>K. pneumoniae</i> sRNA, <i>rnai</i>, and coding genes near <i>rnai</i>.</p

Comparison analysis of orthologous sRNAs.

<p>(A) Expression of RNA-binding protein <i>hfq</i> (B) Sequence conservation of regulatory region upstream of <i>hfq</i> ORF, including promoter, TSS and 5′ UTR. (C) Conservation and expression of non-coding regulatory sRNAs, <i>rprA</i>, <i>arcZ</i> and <i>sgrS</i>. (D) Sequence comparison analysis of <i>rprA</i> and <i>arcZ</i> regulating translation of <i>rpoS</i>. (E) Sequence comparison analysis of <i>sgrS</i> regulating translation of <i>ptsG</i> and <i>manX</i>.</p

TSS annotation and structure of promoter region and 5′ UTR.

<p>(A) Number of TSSs assigned per annotated genes. (B) Distribution of 5′ UTR lengths for <i>E. coli</i> and <i>K. pneumoniae</i>, and the Shine-Dalgarno sequence motif. (C) Sequence motif of promoter region containing −10 and −35 boxes. (D) Conservation of RpoD amino acid sequences of 5 species in gammaproteobacteria and 3 other species belonging to proteobacteria. (E) Di-nucleotide preference near the TSS site.</p