Numerous strategies have been developed to mitigate the intrinsic low detection sensitivity that is a limitation of capillary electrophoresis. Among them, in-line stacking is an effective strategy to address the sensitivity challenge, and among the different stacking techniques, stacking based on field amplification is the most effective and simplest method of achieving high sensitivity without special complicated mechanisms or operations. This review introduces several stacking techniques based on field amplification. Field-amplified sample stacking, large-volume sample stacking, matrix field-amplified stacking injection (FASI), head-column FASI, matrix FASI combined with head-column FASI, FASI coupled with extraction and clean-up methods, electrokinetic supercharging, cation-anion selective exhaustive injection-sweeping-micellar electrokinetic chromatography, and newly developed techniques based on field amplification combined with other methods are included, and examples of straightforward methods for solving the sensitivity problem are provided. We also present a brief overview of the advantages, limitations, and future developments of these techniques.

Zeolitic imidazolate framework-8 (ZIF-8) has been successfully employed as a protective coating to encapsulate enzyme via various immobilization strategies by recent works. However, in all of the research, ZIF-8 only acts as the enzyme-immobilization matrix. In this work, by exploiting the fluorescence quenching properties of the ZIF-8 surface, we for the first time properly amalgamated the basic functionalities of ZIF-8 for horseradish peroxidise (HRP) encapsulation and fluorescence quencher by constructing HRP@ZIF-8/DNA hybrids and gave the successive detection of Hg2+ and phenol. Specifically, we introduced a biomimetic mineralization approach for facile encapsulation of HRP by ZIF-8 with high HRP-encapsulation efficiency (98.4%). Indeed, the HRP@ZIF-8 biocomposite functioned as an active biocatalyst under biologically challenging conditions, such as alkaline condition, high temperature, organic solvent, long-term storage, and continuous operation. After addition of FAM-labeled single-stranded DNA (ssDNA), the HRP@ZIF-8/DNA hybrid system could achieve rapid, specific, and sensitive detection of Hg2+ with a detection limit as low as 0.22 nM. Subsequently, benefiting from excellent catalytic activity of as-obtained HRP@ZIF-8 biocomposite, which could be successively utilized as a colorimetric sensor for sensitive measurement of phenol in micromolar level. It is believed that our strategy provides a convenient and efficient method for functionality integration of ZIF-8 without any complex modification. To the field of biosensing, our discovery broadens up the potential of bio-ZIF-8 composite for successive detection of two pollutants.

Food safety and food production are closely related to the health of consumers. Food-related accidents often cause tremendous losses of personnel and property. Thus, rapid detection and analysis of ingredients in food, tracing food sources, studying the optimal conditions for food production, and more are vital for preventing incidents related to safety. Conventional analysis based on proteomics, microbial cultures, and morphology, as well as biochemical tests based on metabonomics, are considered gold standards and used frequently, but they are labor-intensive, time-consuming, tedious, error-prone, and incapable of meeting the demand for rapid and precise detection at a large scale. Alternative detection methods that utilize capillary electrophoresis have the advantages of high efficiency, high throughput, high speed, and automation; these methods are coupled with various nucleic acid detection strategies to overcome the drawbacks of traditional identification methods, and to prevent false results. Therefore, this review focuses on the application of capillary electrophoresis based on nucleic acid detection in food analysis and provides an introduction to the limitations, advantages, and future developments of this approach.

Molecular conformations induced by the rotation about single bonds play a crucial role in chemical transformations. Revealing the relationship between the conformations of chiral catalysts and the enantiodiscrimination is a formidable challenge due to the great difficulty in isolating the conformers. Herein, we report a chiral catalytic system composed of an achiral catalytically active unit and an axially chiral 1,1′-bi-2-naphthol (BINOL) unit which are connected via a C–O single bond. The two conformers of the catalyst induced by the rotation about the C–O bond, are determined via single-crystal X-ray diffraction and found to respectively lead to the formation of highly important axially chiral 1,1′-binaphthyl-2,2′-diamine (BINAM) and 2-amino-2′-hydroxy-1,1′-binaphthyl (NOBIN) derivatives in high yields (up to 98%), with excellent enantioselectivities (up to 98:2 e.r.) and opposite absolute configurations. The results highlight the importance of conformational dynamics of chiral catalysts in asymmetric catalysis.

Cancer is malignant disease that causes many deaths worldwide every year, with most deaths occurring in the middle and advanced stages of cancer. Numerous deaths can be avoided by detecting cancer at an early stage, making early diagnosis and timely therapy critical for cancer treatment. Analyses at the level of nucleic acids rather than phenotypes can eliminate various false-positive and -negative results, and diagnoses can occur at an earlier stage. Many techniques have been developed for this purpose, including capillary electrophoresis (CE), which has the advantages of high-efficiency, high-speed, high-throughput, automation, cleanliness, and versatility, and CE can be conducted on a microscale or coupled with other separation techniques. These advantages afford this technique the ability to meet the future medical requirements that will undoubtedly call for amassing large numbers of samples for analysis, suggesting that CE may become an important tool for providing data in clinical cancer diagnosis and therapy. This review focuses on CE-based nucleic acid detection as it is applied to cancer diagnosis and therapy, and provides an introduction to the drawbacks and future developments of analysis with CE.

Rapid transmission, high morbidity, and mortality are the features of human infectious diseases caused by microorganisms, such as bacteria, fungi, and viruses. These diseases may lead within a short period of time to great personal and property losses, especially in regions where sanitation is poor. Thus, rapid diagnoses are vital for the prevention and therapeutic intervention of human infectious diseases. Several conventional methods are often used to diagnose infectious diseases, e.g. methods based on cultures or morphology, or biochemical tests based on metabonomics. Although traditional methods are considered gold standards and are used most frequently, they are laborious, time consuming, and tedious and cannot meet the demand for rapid diagnoses. Disease diagnosis using capillary electrophoresis methods has the advantages of high efficiency, high throughput, and high speed, and coupled with the different nucleic acid detection strategies overcomes the drawbacks of traditional identification methods, precluding many types of false positive and negative results. Therefore, this review focuses on the application of capillary electrophoresis based on nucleic detection to the diagnosis of human infectious diseases, and offers an introduction to the limitations, advantages, and future developments of this approach.

Introduction: Juvenile dermatomyositis (JDM) is a rare yet serious childhood systemic autoimmune condition that primarily causes skin rashes and inflammatory myopathy of the proximal muscles. Although the associated immune response involves the innate and adaptive arms, a detailed analysis of the pertinent immune cells remains to be performed. This study aims to investigate the dynamic changes of cell type, cell composition and transcriptional profiles in peripheral blood and muscle tissues, and in order to clarify the involvement of immune cells in the pathogenesis of JDM and provide a theoretical reference for JDM.Methods: Single-cell RNA sequencing combined with bioinformatic analyses were used to investigate the dynamic changes in cell composition and transcriptional profiles.Results: Analysis of 45,859 cells revealed nine and seven distinct cell subsets in the peripheral blood and muscle tissues respectively. IFITM2+ and CYP4F3+ monocytes were largely produced, and CD74+ smooth muscle cells (SMCs) and CCL19+ fibroblasts were identified as inflammatory-related cell subtypes in JDM patients, exhibiting patient-specific cell population heterogeneity.The dynamic gene expression patterns presented an enhanced type I interferon response in peripheral blood monocytes and T-cells, and SMCs and fibroblasts in muscle of untreated JDM patients. EGR1 and IRF7 may play central roles in the inflammation in both CD74+ SMCs and CCL19+ fibroblasts. Moreover, inflammatory-related monocytes could regulate T-cells, and the interaction between immune cells and SMCs or fibroblasts in muscle was enhanced under the inflammatory state.Conclusions: Immune dysregulation is one of the key pathogenic factors of JDM, and type I interferon responses are significantly enhanced in peripheral blood Monos and T cells as well as SMCs and fibroblasts. EGR1 and IRF7 may play central roles in the inflammation and are considered as potential therapeutic targets for JDM.

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