Yan Hui Liu

In contrast to the poor plasticity that is usually observed in bulk metallic glasses, super plasticity is achieved at room temperature in ZrCuNiAl synthesized through the appropriate choice of its composition by controlling elastic moduli. Microstructures analysis indicates that the super plastic bulk metallic glasses are composed of hard regions surrounded by soft regions, which enable the glasses to undergo true strain of more than 160%. This finding is suggestive of a solution to the problem of brittleness in, and has implications for understanding the deformation mechanism of, metallic glasses.

BACKGROUND: Recent profile studies of microRNA (miRNA) expression have documented a deregulation of miRNA (miR-124) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). OBJECTIVE: To determine the status of miR-124 expression and its underlying mechanisms in the pathogenesis of HCC. METHODS: The expression levels of miR-124 were first examined in HCC cell lines and tumour tissues by real-time PCR. The in vitro and in vivo functional effect of miR-124 was examined further. A luciferase reporter assay was conducted to confirm target associations. RESULTS: The expression levels of miR-124 were frequently reduced in HCC cells and tissues, and low-level expression of miR-124 was significantly associated with a more aggressive and/or poor prognostic phenotype of patients with HCC (p<0.05). In HCC cell lines, stable overexpression of miR-124 was sufficient to inhibit cell motility and invasion in vitro, and suppress intrahepatic and pulmonary metastasis in vivo. In addition, ectopic overexpression of miR-124 in HCC cells inhibited epithelial-mesenchymal cell transition, formation of stress fibres, filopodia and lamellipodia. Further studies showed that miR-124 could directly target the 3'-untranslated region (3'-UTR) of both ROCK2 and EZH2 mRNAs, and suppress their mRNA and protein expressions. These findings suggest that miR-124 plays a critical role in regulating cytoskeletal events and epithelial-mesenchymal cell transition and, ultimately, inhibits the invasive and/or metastatic potential of HCC, probably by its direct target on ROCK2 and EZH2 genes. These results provide functional and mechanistic links between the tumour suppressor miRNA-124 and the two oncogenes ROCK2 and EZH2 on the aggressive nature of HCC. CONCLUSION: These data highlight an important role for miR-124 in the regulation of invasion and metastasis in the molecular aetiology of HCC, and suggest a potential application of miR-124 in prognosis prediction and cancer treatment.

mutant NKTL cell lines. In NKTL tumors, STAT3 activation correlated significantly with PD-L1 expression. We demonstrated that STAT3 activation confers high PD-L1 expression, which may promote tumor immune evasion. The combination of PD-1/PD-L1 antibodies and STAT3 inhibitors might be a promising therapeutic approach for NKTL, and possibly PTCL.

Abstract The outstanding efficiency of Fe‐based metallic glass powders in degrading organic water contaminants is reported. While the glassy alloy contains 24% chemically inactive metalloid elements, the powders are capable to completely decompose the C 32 H 20 N 6 Na 4 O 14 S 4 azo dye in aqueous solution in short time, about 200 times faster than the conventional Fe powders. The metastable thermodynamic nature and the particle surface topography are the major factors controlling the chemical performance of the metallic glass. Our findings may open a new opportunity for functional applications of metallic glasses.

A long-sought goal in metallic glasses is to impart ductility without conceding their strength and elastic limit. The rational design of tough metallic glasses, however, remains challenging because of the inability of existing theories to capture the correlation between plasticity, composition and processing for a wide range of glass-forming alloys. Here we propose a phenomenological criterion based on a critical fictive temperature, Tfc, which can rationalize the effect of composition, cooling rate and annealing on room-temperature plasticity of metallic glasses. Such criterion helps in understanding the widespread mechanical behaviour of metallic glasses and reveals alloy-specific preparation conditions to circumvent brittleness. Toughness of metallic glasses varies widely, with values spanning from very brittle to exceptionally tough. Kumar et al.report a characteristic fictive temperature, which can explain this widespread behaviour and provide guidelines for synthesis of ductile metallic glasses.