To evaluate the effect of 3D printing in treating trimalleolar fractures and its roles in physician-patient communication, thirty patients with trimalleolar fractures were randomly divided into the 3D printing assisted-design operation group (Group A) and the no-3D printing assisted-design group (Group B). In Group A, 3D printing was used by the surgeons to produce a prototype of the actual fracture to guide the surgical treatment. All patients underwent open reduction and internal fixation. A questionnaire was designed for doctors and patients to verify the verisimilitude and effectiveness of the 3D-printed prototype. Meanwhile, the operation time and the intraoperative blood loss were compared between the two groups. The fracture prototypes were accurately printed, and the average overall score of the verisimilitude and effectiveness of the 3D-printed prototypes was relatively high. Both the operation time and the intraoperative blood loss in Group A were less than those in Group B (P < 0.05). Patient satisfaction using the 3D-printed prototype and the communication score were 9.3 ± 0.6 points. A 3D-printed prototype can faithfully reflect the anatomy of the fracture site; it can effectively help the doctors plan the operation and represent an effective tool for physician-patient communication.

Here, we introduce core-shell nanofibers based on chitosan (CS)-loaded poly (εcaprolactone) (PCL) shell and 5-fluorouracil (5-FU)-loaded Poly(N-vinyl-2pyrrolidone) (PVP) core for synergistic therapy of melanoma skin cancer. The yielded nanofibers exhibited an average diameter of 503 nm with high drug-encapsulating efficiency and good mechanical properties. Moreover, the burst release of 5-FU significantly inhibited melanoma skin cancer cells (B16F10 cells), and the sustained release of CS exhibited "remedying effects" on normal skin cells (L929 cells) after suffering adverse effects from 5-FU treatment. For the B16F10 cells, the early apoptosis cells increased from 0. 8% to 62.2% after being treated with blended films loaded with 5-FU (2 wt%) for 24 h; for the L929 cells, the vital cells increased from 68.9% to 77.0%, and the early apoptosis of stage cells decreased from 12.3% to 10.9% after being treated with blended films with CS (8 wt%) for 24 h. In conclusion, the results introduced in this work can be a promising strategy for cancer treatment and possesses synergism potential to broaden an avenue for chemotherapeutic therapy with minimum adverse effects on normal cells.

Glucose transporter 4 (GLUT4; also known as SLC2A4) resides on intracellular vesicles in muscle and adipose cells, and translocates to the plasma membrane in response to insulin. The phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K)-Akt signaling pathway plays a major role in GLUT4 translocation; however, a challenge has been to unravel the potentially distinct contributions of PI3K and Akt (of which there are three isoforms, Akt1-Akt3) to overall insulin action. Here, we describe new optogenetic tools based on CRY2 and the N-terminus of CIB1 (CIBN). We used these 'Opto' modules to activate PI3K and Akt selectively in time and space in 3T3-L1 adipocytes. We validated these tools using biochemical assays and performed live-cell kinetic analyses of IRAP-pHluorin translocation (IRAP is also known as LNPEP and acts as a surrogate marker for GLUT4 here). Strikingly, Opto-PIP 3 largely mimicked the maximal effects of insulin stimulation, whereas Opto-Akt only partially triggered translocation. Conversely, drug-mediated inhibition of Akt only partially dampened the translocation response of Opto-PIP 3 . In spatial optogenetic studies, focal targeting of Akt to a region of the cell marked the sites where IRAP-pHluorin vesicles fused, supporting the idea that local Aktmediated signaling regulates exocytosis. Taken together, these results indicate that PI3K and Akt play distinct roles, and that PI3K stimulates Akt-independent pathways that are important for GLUT4 translocation.

Imaging and tracking of near-surface three-dimensional volumetric nanoscale dynamic processes of live cells remains a challenging problem. In this paper, we propose a multi-color live-cell near-surface-volume super-resolution microscopy method that combines total internal reflection fluorescence structured illumination microscopy with multi-angle evanescent light illumination. We demonstrate that our approach of multi-angle interference microscopy is perfectly adapted to studying subcellular dynamics of mitochondria and microtubule architectures during cell migration.