The Role of the Gut Microbiome in Bipolar Disorder and its Common Medical Comorbidities

Bipolar disorder is a decidedly heterogeneous and multifactorial disease, with significant psychosocial and medical disease burden. Much difficulty has been encountered in developing novel therapeutics and objective biomarkers for clinical use in this population. In that regard, gut-microbial homeostasis appears to modulate several key pathways relevant to a variety of psychiatric, metabolic, and inflammatory disorders. Microbial impact on immune, endocrine, endocannabinoid, kynurenine, and other pathways are discussed throughout this review. Emphasis is placed on this system’s relevance to current pharmacology, diet, and comorbid illness in bipolar disorder. Despite the high level of optimism promoted in many reviews on this topic, substantial obstacles exist before any microbiome-related findings can provide meaningful clinical utility. Beyond a comprehensive overview of pathophysiology, this review hopes to highlight several key areas where progress is needed. As well, novel microbiome-associated suggestions are presented for future research.     

Real-time feedback on mobile application use for emergency management affects the door-to-needle time and functional outcomes in acute ischemic stroke

ObjectivesTime from onset to reperfusion affects mortality and favorable outcomes in patients with acute ischemic stroke (AIS). To evaluate effects of a real-time feedback mobile application on critical time intervals and functional outcomes in stroke emergency management.MethodsWe recruited patients with clinically suspected acute stroke from December 1st, 2020 until July 30st, 2022. All Patients had a non-contrast computed tomography (CT) and were included only if they had AIS. We divided the patients into two groups based on the date of availability on mobile application: pre-APP group and post-APP group. Onset to Door time (ODT), Door to Imaging Time (DIT), Door to Needle Time (DNT), Door to Puncture Time (DPT), Door to Recanalization Time (DRT), National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) and modified Rankin Scale (mRS) were compared between two groups.ResultsWe retrospectively enrolled 312 AIS patients who were assigned into the pre-APP group (n = 159) and post-APP group (n = 153). The median ODT time and median admission NIHSS score were not significantly different between the two groups at baseline assessment. The median (IQR) DIT [44 (30-60) min vs 28 (20-36) min, P < 0.01] and DNT [44 (36.25-52) min vs 39 (29-45) min, P = 0.02] both decreased significantly in two groups. However, median DPT and DRT time showed no significant differences. The proportion of mRS score of 0 to 2 at day 90 was significantly higher in the post-App group than in the pre-App group, at 82.4% and 71.7%, respectively (dominance ratio OR=1.84, 95% CI: 1.07 to 3.16, P = 0.03).ConclusionThe present findings indicate that the real-time feedback of stroke emergency management used by a mobile application have potential for shortening the DIT and DNT time and improve the prognosis of stroke patients.     

Harnessing Formamide Groups to Enhance the Heat-Resistance of Poly(β-amino esters) with Investigation into Reprocessability and Fluorescence

Poly(β-amino ester)s, which can be reprocessed via aza-Michael adducts catalyzing transesterification, are a type of highly promising thermosetting material. However, the low heat deformation temperatures of poly(β-amino ester)s limit their applications in high-performance materials. In this study, formamide groups are introduced into poly(β-amino ester) networks to prepare a series of poly(β-hydrazide ester)s (PHE)s. The presence of formamide groups in PHE networks is found to be effective in improving the heat deformation temperatures (glass transition temperature, T_g = 130 °C) of PHEs through hydrogen bonding without affecting network rearrangement rates. This enabled reprocessing temperatures and times of PHEs to remain close to those of poly(β- amino ester)s. In addition, the aggregation-induced emission (AIE) of ester and formamide groups allowed PHEs to demonstrate fluorescence, potentially expanding their application gallery. These discoveries offer a new way to produce high-value reprocessable materials that possess both high heat resistance and fluorescence capability.     

One-Step Polymerizations Enable Facile Construction and Structural Optimization of Graft Copolymer Electrolytes

The development of poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO)-based solid polymer electrolytes (SPEs) is limited by the semi-crystalline nature of PEO and the extremely strong EO-Li⁺ interactions. To promote the rapid migration of Li⁺, a one-step method combining radical polymerization and ring-opening polymerization catalyzed simultaneously by lithium carboxylate is proposed to construct multi-component graft copolymer electrolytes (GCPEs) in this study. Tailored macroinitiator with catalytic and initiated sites (PAALi(OH-Br)) realizes one-step polymerizations of vinyl monomers and cyclic monomers, and provides GCPEs with poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) and poly(ε-caprolactone) (PCL) side chains. The grafted structure of GCPE greatly facilitates the intra-chain hopping of Li⁺, resulting in excellent ionic conductivity. The introduction of PCL further improves the t_Li+ of GCPE. The three-component graft copolymer electrolyte constructed by polystyrene (PS), PEO, and PCL exhibits high tensile stress (1.62 MPa), a high ionic conductivity (2.4 × 10⁻⁵ S cm⁻¹, 30 °C), and a high t_Li+ of 0.47 and high electrochemical stability.