Polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxanes (POSS) anchored to poly(2‐methoxy‐5‐(2‐ethylhexyloxy)‐1.4‐phenylenevinylene) (MEH‐PPV) (MEH‐PPV–POSS), and to poly(9,9‐dihexylfluorenyl‐2,7‐diyl) (PFO) (PFO–POSS) were synthesized. Compared with the corresponding parent polymers, MEH‐PPV and PFO, MEH‐PPV–POSS and PFO–POSS have better thermal stability. MEH‐PPV–POSS and MEH‐PPV have identical absorption and photoluminescent (PL) spectra, both in solution and as thin films. They also have identical electroluminescent (EL) spectra. Devices made from MEH‐PPV–POSS exhibit higher brightness (1320 cd m–2 at 3.5 V) and higher external quantum efficiency (ηext = 2.2 % photons per electron) compared to MEH‐PPV (230 cd m–2 at 3.5 V and ηext = 1.5 % ph el–1). Compared with PFO in the same device configuration, PFO–POSS has improved blue EL emission and higher ηext.

No abstract

Hereditary hypotrichosis simplex (HHS) is a form of nonsyndromic inherited hair loss disorders without characteristic hair shaft changes, which has marked genetic and clinical heterogeneity. After mapping the locus to 13q12.12-12.3 in a Chinese family with a generalized variant of autosomal dominant HHS (ADHHS), exome sequencing was performed in an affected individual. The cause of the disease in this family was identified as a c.95G>A (p.Arg32Gln) mutation in the RPL21 gene, which encoding the ribosomal protein L21. This mutation cosegregated completely with the disease phenotype and was not observed in unaffected family members, 200 normal controls, the dbSNP database, the YH database or pilot data from the 1000 Genomes Project. Additionally, this mutation was found in two patients from another unrelated Chinese family with HHS. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report describing the involvement of a ribosomal protein gene mutation in a non-syndromic hair loss disorder.

Although the performance of polymer solar cells has been improved significantly recently through careful optimization with different interlayers for the same materials, more improvement is needed in this respect for small-molecule-based solar cells, particularly for the electron-transport layers (ETLs). In this work, three different solution-processed ETLs, PFN, ZnO nanoparticles, and LiF, were investigated and compared in the performance of small-molecule-based devices, and power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) of 8.32, 7.30, and 7.38% were achieved, respectively. The mechanism for the ETL-induced enhancement has been studied, and different ETLs have a significantly different impact on the device performance. The clearly improved performance of PFN is attributed to the combination of reduced bimolecular recombination and increased effective photon absorption in the active layer.

No abstract