Substantial heterogeneity exists within cervical cancer that is generally infected by human papillomavirus (HPV). However, the most common histological subtype of cervical cancer, cervical squamous cell carcinoma (CSCC), is poorly characterized regarding the association between its heterogeneity and HPV oncoprotein expression. We filtered out 138 CSCC samples with infection of HPV16 only as the first step; then we compressed HPV16 E6/E7 expression as HPV pca and correlated HPV pca with the immunological profiling of CSCC based on supervised clustering to discover subtypes and to characterize the differences between subgroups in terms of the HPV pca level, pathway activity, epigenetic dysregulation, somatic mutation frequencies, and likelihood of responding to chemo/immunotherapies. Supervised clustering of immune signatures revealed two HPV16 subtypes (namely, HPV16-IMM and HPV16-KRT) that correlated with HPV pca and clinical outcomes. HPV16-KRT is characterized by elevated expression of genes in keratinization, biological oxidation, and Wnt signaling, whereas HPV16-IMM has a strong immune response and mesenchymal features. HPV16-IMM exhibited much more epigenetic silencing and significant mutation at FBXW7, while MUC4 and PIK3CA were mutated frequently for HPV16-KRT. We also imputed that HPV16-IMM is much more sensitive to chemo/immunotherapy than is HPV16-KRT. Our characterization tightly links the expression of HPV16 E6/E7 with biological and clinical outcomes of CSCC, providing valuable molecular-level information that points to decoding heterogeneity. Together, these results shed light on stratifications of CSCC infected by HPV16 and shall help to guide personalized management and treatment of patients.

Silicon offers an extremely high theoretical specific capacity, but suffers from dramatic volume change during lithiation/delithiation processes, which typically leads to rapid anode degradation. Here we designed a facile and self-assembly strategy to construct a three-dimensional (3D) polymeric network as a promising binder for high-performance silicon submicro-particle (SiSMP) anodes through in situ interconnection of alginate chains by additive divalent cations. The highly cross-linked alginate network exhibits superb mechanical properties and strongly interacts with SiSMPs, which can tolerate the volume change of SiSMPs and restrict the volume expansion of the laminates to a large degree, thus effectively maintaining the mechanical and electrical integrity of the electrode and significantly improving the electrochemical performance. As a result, SiSMPs with a 3D binder network exhibit high reversible capacity, superior rate capability and much prolonged cycle life. Additionally, the 3D alginate binder was also successfully applied for the industrial submicro-silicon waste from solar cell production. With all of the advantages, the innovative way to tolerate the severe volume change by using a high-strength polymeric network may open a new approach to realize the industrial application of Si-based anodes in lithium-ion batteries.

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Recent advances in optimal design of lithium–sulfur batteries with the aid of in situ optical spectroscopic techniques, including Raman, infrared and ultraviolet-visible spectroscopies, are systematically summarized.

Despite the recent advancement in the in‐practical active materials (e.g., silicon, sulfur) in the rechargeable lithium‐ion energy storage systems, daunting challenges still remain for these high‐capacity electrode material candidates to overcome the severe volume changes associated with the repeated lithiation/delithiation process. Herein, developing a room‐temperature covalently cross‐linked polyacrylamide (c‐PAM) binder with high stretchability and abundant polar groups targeting the construction of high‐performance Si and sulfur electrodes is focused on. The robust 3D c‐PAM binder network enables not only significant enhancement of the strain resistance for working electrodes but also strong affinity to bonding with nano‐Si surface as well as effective capture of the soluble Li2Sn intermediates, thereby giving rise to remarkably improved cycling performances in both types of electrodes. This rational design of such an effective and multifunctional binder offers a pathway toward advanced energy storage implementations.