Mean arterial blood pressure (MABP) measured under three physiological states.

<p>Mean arterial blood pressure (MABP) measured under three physiological states.</p

OMAG system and its typical <i>in vivo</i> images of detailed PBF within skeletal muscle in mice.

<p>(a) is schematic of OMAG system, where SLD is superluminescent diode, PC is polarization controller. (b) shows OMAG imaging area indicated by a yellow box covering an area of the gastrocnemius muscle in mouse hindlimb. (c) is one typical OMAG cross-sectional image (B-scan) of muscular microstructure and (d) is the corresponding blood flow image where some representative capillaries are shown by arrows. 3-D volumetric rendering of blood perfusion within scanned muscle tissue volume are demonstrated by projection view (e) and 3D view (f). In (e), the dash line indicates the corresponding position of chosen B-scan (c/d). White bar is 500 µm, which can apply to (c-e).</p

Different types of PBF in response to switching the physiological conditions between hypoxia, normoxia and hyperoxia.

<p>(a) shows diverse response of macro-circulation (>50 µm), micro-circulation(<50 µm) and all circulation in the cross-sectional area OMAG scanned. (b) shows the dynamics of collateral vessels located in the region denoted by a box in (c). Each value in (a) & (b) is calculated by normalizing the signals with the baseline at each time point and displayed by mean ± SD. (c) are B-scan images at five typical stages corresponding to the time points labeled by numbers in (a). (d) is one A-scan (Z-direction) over hyperoxic period showing the single vessel dynamics. The position of this A-scan was marked in (c) as the vertical line.</p

Time lapsed plots showing relative changes of PBF under controlled oxygen concentration, 10% (hypoxia), 20% (normoxia), 100% (hyperoxia), obtained from three individual animals.

<p>The relative values were obtained by normalizing the signals with the corresponding baseline values at each time point.</p

Cascade enhancement of magnetic dipole emission and efficient collection of photons by the hybrid topological structure

High photon emission rate, high collection efficiency and stability are all important for single photon source applications. Here we demonstrate that both cascade enhancement of magnetic dipole emission and efficient collection of emitted photons can be realized simultaneously in a hybrid structure of a two-dimensional honeycomb topological photonic crystal containing dielectric nanodisk. The magnetic dipole resonance of nanodisk can effectively excite topological edgestate due to their near field overlapping. If a magnetic emitter is used to excite the nanodisk, then its magnetic dipole resonance can be viewed as a large equivalent dipole interacting with the edgestates, which achieves the cascade enhancement of the magnetic emitter. In addition, almost all the scattered photons around the nanodisk can be collected through topological edge state with the collection efficiency up to 95%. The proposed mechanism may provide the practical applications of on-chip robust single photon sources and nanolasers

Hyperglycemic Stress Impairs the Stemness Capacity of Kidney Stem Cells in Rats

<div><p>The incidence of acute kidney injury in patients with diabetes is significantly higher than that of patients without diabetes, and may be associated with the poor stemness capacity of kidney stem cells (KSCs) and limited recovery of injured renal tubules. To investigate the effects of hyperglycemic stress on KSC stemness, KSCs were isolated from the rat renal papilla and analyzed for their self-renewal and differentiation abilities. Our results showed that isolated KSCs expressed the mesenchymal stem cell markers N-cadherin, Nestin, CD133, CD29, CD90, and CD73. Moreover, KSCs co-cultured with hypoxia-injured renal tubular epithelial cell (RTECs) induced the expression of the mature epithelial cell marker CK18, suggesting that the KSCs could differentiate into RTECs in vitro. However, KSC proliferation, differentiation ability and tolerance to hypoxia were decreased in high-glucose cultures. Taken together, these results suggest the high-glucose microenvironment can damage the reparative ability of KSCs. It may result in a decreased of recovery capability of renal tubules from injury.</p></div

Schematic of the KSC epithelial induction protocol.

<p>KSC epithelial differentiation was determined by Transwell co-culture differentiation assay. Hypoxia-injured RTECs and KSCs were prepared and plated in the Transwell inserts and wells, respectively. Cells were co-cultured in induction media for three days, moved to renal epithelial cell growth medium (REGM) for two days, and then changed back to induction medium. This series was repeated twice for a total 10 days. The inserts containing hypoxia-injured RTECs were renewed every three days.</p

Morphological characterization of renal papillary cells.

<p>(A) Primary cell culture on day 3. Cells exhibited colony-like growth and diverse morphology. (B) Primary cell culture on day 5. Epithelioid and fibroblast-like morphologies were observed. (C,D) P2 cells after passage on day 5. (E,F) P3 cells showed a short fusiform or dendritic shape, and epithelioid cells had almost completely disappeared. (G,H) P5 cells exhibited a spindle-shape. (Magnification: C, E, G, ×40; A, B, F, H, ×100; D, ×200).</p

KSC growth curves after culturing in normal-glucose or high-glucose medium.

<p>Growth curves for cells cultured in high-glucose or normal-glucose media were graphed based on the OD values at 450 nm. (*<i>P</i> < 0.05, **<i>P</i> < 0.01).</p

Phenotypic characterization of renal papillary cells.

<p>(A) Immunofluorescence analysis for markers of activated fibroblasts (α-SMA, green; Vimentin, red), mesenchymal stem cells (N-cadherin, green), and epithelial cells (CK18, red; E-cadherin, green; ZO-1, red). Nuclei were counterstained with DAPI (blue) (Magnification: ×100). (B) Immunofluorescence staining for the stem cell expression makers Nestin (green) and CD133 (red). Nuclei are stained with DAPI (blue). (Magnification: ×200). (C) Flow cytometry analysis for the MSC markers CD29 (i), CD90 (ii), and CD73 (iii), and the hematopoietic stem cell marker CD45 (iv).</p