There currently lacks of a way to directly write out electronics, just like printing pictures on paper by an office printer. Here we show a desktop printing of flexible circuits on paper via developing liquid metal ink and related working mechanisms. Through modifying adhesion of the ink, overcoming its high surface tension by dispensing machine and designing a brush like porous pinhead for printing alloy and identifying matched substrate materials among different papers, the slightly oxidized alloy ink was demonstrated to be flexibly printed on coated paper, which could compose various functional electronics and the concept of Printed-Circuits-on-Paper was thus presented. Further, RTV silicone rubber was adopted as isolating inks and packaging material to guarantee the functional stability of the circuit, which suggests an approach for printing 3D hybrid electro-mechanical device. The present work paved the way for a low cost and easygoing method in directly printing paper electronics.

SummaryNatural resistance to infection with unrelated intraceUular parasites such as Mycobacteria, Salmonella, and Leishmania is controlled in the mouse by a single gene on chromosome 1, designated Bcg, lty, or Lsh. A candidate gene for Bcg, designated natural resistance-associated macrophage protein (Nrarnp), has been isolated and shown to encode a novel macrophage-specific membrane protein, which is altered in susceptible animals. We have cloned and characterized cDNA clones corresponding to the human NRAMP gene. Nucleotide and predicted amino acid sequence analyses indicate that the human NKAMP polypeptide encodes a 550-amino acid residue membrane protein with 10-12 putative transmembrane domains, two N-linked glycosylation sites, and an evolutionary conserved consensus transport motif. Identification of genomic clones corresponding to human NRAMP indicates that the gene maps to chromosome 2q35 within a group of syntenic loci conserved with proximal mouse 1. The gene is composed of at least 15 exons, with several exons encoding discrete predicted structural domains of the protein. These studies have also identified an alternatively spliced exon encoded by an Alu clement present within intron 4. Although this novel exon was found expressed in vivo, it would introduce a termination codon in the downstream exon V, resulting in a severely truncated protein. Northern blot analyses indicate that NRAMP mRNA expression is tightly controlled in a tissue-specific fashion, with the highest sites of expression being peripheral blood leukocytes, lungs, and spleen. Additional RNA expression studies in cultured cells identified the macrophage as a site of expression of human NRAMP and indicated that increased expression was correlated with an advanced state of differentiation of this lineage.

Printed electronics is becoming increasingly important in a variety of newly emerging areas. However, restricted to the rather limited conductive inks and available printing strategies, the current electronics manufacture is usually confined to industry level. Here, we show a highly cost-effective and entirely automatic printing way towards personal electronics making, through introducing a tapping-mode composite fluid delivery system. Fundamental mechanisms regarding the reliable printing, transfer and adhesion of the liquid metal inks on the substrate were disclosed through systematic theoretical interpretation and experimental measurements. With this liquid metal printer, a series of representative electronic patterns spanning from single wires to desired complex configurations such as integrated circuit (IC), printed-circuits-on-board (PCB), electronic paintings, or more do-it-yourself (DIY) devices, were demonstrated to be printed out with high precision in a moment. And the total machine cost already reached personally affordable price. This is hard to achieve by a conventional PCB technology which generally takes long time and is material, water and energy consuming, while the existing printed electronics is still far away from the real direct printing goal. The present work opens the way for large scale personal electronics manufacture and is expected to generate important value for the coming society.

Flexible materials with the ability to be bent, strained, or twisted play a critical role in soft robots and stretchable electronics. Although tremendous efforts are focused on developing new stretchable materials with excellent stability, inevitable mechanical damage due to long term deformation is still an urgent problem to be tackled. Here, a magnetic healing method based on Fe‐doped liquid metal (Fe‐GaIn) conductive ink via a noncontact way is proposed. Further, multifunctional flexible electronics are designed with combined performances of superior remote self‐healing under magnetic field, water‐degradable, and thermal transfer printing, which attribute to three parts of the materials including Fe‐GaIn conductive ink, degradable PVA substrate, and adhesive fructose. The as‐made light emitting diodes (LED) circuit is demonstrated with both structural and functional repairing after single or multipoint damage. The self‐healing time from multipoint damage is pretty fast within 10 s. Due to the water‐soluble PVA film, the recycling process is simple via immersing into water. Through heating, the electric circuit on fructose can be transferred to other flexible substrate with high efficiency, which broadens the practical applications of the present system. The novel and multifunctional electronics hold great promise for self‐healing electronics, transient electronics, and soft robots.

A direct electronics printing technique through atomized spraying for patterning room temperature liquid metal droplets on desired substrate surfaces is proposed and experimentally demonstrated for the first time. This method has generalized purpose and is highly flexible and capable of fabricating electronic components on any desired target objects, with either flat or rough surfaces, made of different materials, or different orientations from 1-D to 3-D geometrical configurations. With a pre-designed mask, the liquid metal ink can be directly deposited on the substrate to form various specific patterns which lead to the rapid prototyping of electronic devices. Further, extended printing strategies were also suggested to illustrate the adaptability of the method such that the natural porous structure can be adopted to offer an alternative way of making transparent conductive film with an optical transmittance of 47% and a sheet resistance of 5.167Ω/. Different from the former direct writing technology where large surface tension and poor adhesion between the liquid metal and the substrate often impede the flexible printing process, the liquid metal here no longer needs to be pre-oxidized to guarantee its applicability on target substrates. One critical mechanism was found as that the atomized liquid metal microdroplets can be quickly oxidized in the air due to its large specific surface area, resulting in a significant increase of the adhesive capacity and thus firm deposition of the ink to the substrate. This study established a generalized way for pervasively and directly printing electronics on various substrates which are expected to be significant in a wide spectrum of electrical engineering areas.

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RNA splicing contributes to a broad spectrum of post-transcriptional gene regulation during normal development, as well as pathological manifestation of heart diseases. However, the functional role and regulation of splicing in heart failure remain poorly understood. RNA binding protein (RBP), a major component of the splicing machinery, is a critical factor in this process. RNA binding motif protein 24 (RBM24) is a tissue-specific RBP which is highly expressed in human and mouse heart. Previous studies demonstrated the functional role of RBM24 in the embryonic heart development. However, the role of RBM24 in postnatal heart development and heart disease has not been investigated. In this paper, using conditional RBM24 knockout mice, we demonstrated that ablation of RBM24 in postnatal heart led to rapidly progressive dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), heart failure, and postnatal lethality. Global splicing profiling revealed that RBM24 regulated a network of genes related to cardiac function and diseases. Knockout of RBM24 resulted in misregulation of these splicing transitions which contributed to the subsequent development of cardiomyopathy. Notably, our analysis identified RBM24 as a splice factor that determined the splicing switch of a subset of genes in the sacomeric Z-disc complex, including Titin, the major disease gene of DCM and heart failure. Together, this study identifies regulation of RNA splicing by RBM24 as a potent player in remodeling of heart during postnatal development, and provides novel mechanistic insights to the pathogenesis of DCM. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1007/s13238-018-0578-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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