A highly flexible porous ionic membrane (PIM) is fabricated from a polyvinyl alcohol/KOH polymer gel electrolyte, showing well‐defined 3D porous structure. The conductance of the PIM changes more than 70 times as the relative humidity (RH) increases from 10.89% to 81.75% with fast and reversible response at room temperature. In addition, the PIM‐based sensor is insensitive to temperature (0–95 °C) and pressure (0–6.8 kPa) change, which indicates that it can be used as highly selective flexible humidity sensor. A noncontact switch system containing PIM‐based sensor is assembled, and results show that the switch responds favorably to RH change caused by an approaching finger. Moreover, an attachable smart label using PIM‐based sensor is explored to measure the water contents of human skin, which shows a great linear relationship between the sensitivity of the sensor and the facial water contents measured by a commercial reference device.

Freestanding carbon‐based hybrids, specifically carbon nanotube@3D graphene (CNTs@3DG) hybrid, are of great interest in electrochemical energy storage. However, the large holes (about 400 µm) in the commonly used 3D graphene foams (3DGF) constitute as high as 90% of the electrode volume, resulting in a very low loading of electroactive materials that is electrically connected to the carbon, which makes it difficult for flexible supercapacitors to achieve high gravimetric and volumetric energy density. Here, a hierarchically porous carbon hybrid is fabricated by growing 1D CNTs on 3D graphene aerogel (CNTs@3DGA) using a facile one‐step chemical vapor deposition process. In this architecture, the 3DGA with ample interconnected micrometer‐sized pores (about 5 µm) dramatically enhances mass loading of electroactive materials comparing with 3DGF. An optimized all‐solid‐state asymmetric supercapacitor (AASC) based on MnO2@CNTs@3DGA and Ppy@CNTs@3DGA electrodes exhibits high volumetric energy density of 3.85 mW h cm−3 and superior long‐term cycle stability with 84.6% retention after 20 000 cycles, which are among the best reported for AASCs with both electrodes made of pseudocapacitive electroactive materials.

Apoptosis as a novel target for cancer chemotherapy has generated an intense demand for new apoptosis-inducing agents. The newly revealed role of protein families involved in the apoptosis pathway, and resistance to cytotoxic therapies have opened new avenues for the development of novel anticancer strategies. We have established a novel strategy to rapidly obtain protein-targeted, instead of conventional DNA-targeted, apoptosis inducers as antitumor leads. First, a novel organic non-DNA intercalative compound S1 (8-oxo-3-thiomorpholin-4-yl-8H-acenaphtho[1,2-b]pyrrole-9-carbonitrile, M(W) = 331) was found with an IC50 of 10(-7)-10(-8) microM against diverse cancer cell lines. Further biological evaluation demonstrated that it was an apoptosis-inducer both in vivo and in vitro. The treatment of hydroperitoneum hepatoma cells (H22 cell line) with S1 at various concentrations (from 0.01 to 10 microM) for 24 h triggered these cells to enter the apoptosis process. The antitumor efficiency was also tested in the H22 xenotransplant models in mice. At a dosage of 0.3 mg kg(-1), S1 exhibited significant antitumor activity with a much longer survival time, a decrease in tumor size, and increased apoptosis cells in tumor tissue. More importantly, studies of the molecular mechanism of apoptosis induction by S1 revealed that S1 inactivated the Bcl-2 protein by binding to it, depolarizing the mitochondrial membrane, and then activating caspase 9, followed by caspase 3. Finally, structure-based virtual modification was performed by computer modeling. As a result, a derivative, S2 (8-oxo-3-[(thienylmethyl)amino]-8H-acenaphtho[1,2-b]pyrrole-9-carbonitrile, M(W) = 341) was identified that possessed a lower binding energy to Bcl-2, and demonstrated better antitumor potency, even on the Bcl-2-overexpressing human acute myeloid leukemia (HL-60) cells (IC50 = 1.3 microM) in vitro. S1 and S2 are the well-defined Bcl-2 inhibitors that give us a promising platform for the development of new therapeutic agents.

We demonstrate, for the first time, a new method of fabricating hybrid MoS/poly(ethyleneimine)-modified graphene oxide (PEI-GO) composites assembled through electrostatically charged interaction between the negatively charged MoS nanosheets and positively charged PEI-GO in an aqueous solution. The GO can not only improve the electronic conductivity of the MoS/PEI-GO composites, leading to an excellent charge-transfer network, but also hamper the restacking of MoS nanosheets. The composition ratios between MoS and PEI-GO were also optimized with the highest specific capacitance of 153.9 F g where 96.0% of the initial specific capacitance remains after 6800 cycles. The specific capacitance of only 117.5 F g was observed for the pure MoS nanosheets, and 68.2% of the initial specific capacitance was achieved after 5000 cycles. The excellent electrochemical performance of the hybrid MoS/PEI-GO composites was demonstrated by establishing an asymmetric supercapacitor with a MoS/PEI-GO-based negative electrode and an activated-carbon positive electrode. The asymmetric supercapacitor provided a maximum capacitance of 42.9 F g, and 93.1% of the initial capacitance was maintained after 8000 cycles. Furthermore, a MoS/PEI-GO//activated-carbon asymmetric supercapacitor delivered an energy density of 19.3 W h kg and a power density of 4500 W kg, indicating the potential of the hybrid MoS/PEI-GO composites in electrochemical energy storage applications.

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A series of novel borates, MM'4(BO3)3 (M = Li, M' = Sr; M = Na, M' = Sr, Ba), have been successfully synthesized by standard solid-state reaction. The crystal structures have been determined from powder X-ray diffraction data. They crystallize in the cubic space group Iad with large lattice parameters: a = 14.95066(5) A for LiSr4(BO3)3, a = 15.14629(6) A for NaSr4(BO3)3, and a = 15.80719(8) A for NaBa4(BO3)3. The structure was built up from 64 small cubic grids, in which the M' atoms took up the corner angle and the BO3 triangles or MO6 cubic octahedra filled in the interspaces. The isolated [BO3]3- anionic groups are perpendicular to each other, distributed along three 100 directions. The anisotropic polarizations were counteracting, forming an isotropic crystal. Sr and Ba atoms were found to be completely soluble in the solid solution NaSr(4-)xBax(BO3)3 (0 < or = x < or = 4). The photoluminescence of samples doped with the ions Eu2+ and Eu3+ was studied, and effective yellow and red emission was detected, respectively. The results are consistent with the crystallographic study. The DTA and TGA curves of them show that they are chemically stable and congruent melting compounds.

Metal ion capacitors (MICs), as the combination of supercapacitors and rechargeable batteries, are endowed with higher energy density and longer cycle life but not at the expense of high-power properties....

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