Communication with plants to understand their growth mechanisms and interaction with the surrounding environment may improve production yield in agriculture and facilitate prevention of plant diseases and negative influence of environmental stress. Typical sensing technologies in plant biology and precision agriculture largely rely on techniques with low spatial and temporal resolutions, and fail to continuously and precisely determine localized variation in leaf physiology and microenvironments. Here, techniques to develop a multifunctional stretchable leaf-mounted sensor have been developed to offer optimized adaptability to plant growth and monitor leaf physiological and environmental conditions in continuous and highly sensitive manners. The multifunctional leaf sensor contains multiple heterogeneous sensing elements made of metal, carbon nanotube matrix, and silicon, leading to temperature, hydration, light illuminance, and strain sensing capabilities on a leaf. Evaluation under a controlled environment indicates excellent precision and accuracy of the sensor compared to conventional devices. Furthermore, indoor and outdoor experiments have demonstrated the multifunctional monitoring ability of the sensor in real situations. The multifunctional stretchable sensor holds the promise to advance monitoring techniques in plant biology and precision agriculture, resulting in improved capability to record slow and subtle physiological changes in plants and plant/environment interaction.

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Hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD), which is a frequently reported and concerning disease worldwide, is a severe burden on societies globally, especially in the countries of East and Southeast Asia. Coxsackievirus A16 (CV-A16) is one of the most important causes of HFMD and a severe threat to human health, especially in children under 5 years of age. To investigate the epidemiological characteristics, spread dynamics, recombinant forms (RFs), and other features of CV-A16, we leveraged the continuous surveillance data of CV-A16-related HFMD cases collected over an 18-year period. With the advent of the EV-A71 vaccine since 2016, which targeted the EV-A71-related HFMD cases, EV-A71-related HFMD cases decreased dramatically, whereas the CV-A16-related HFMD cases showed an upward trend from 2017 to October 2019. The CV-A16 strains observed in this study were genetically related and widely distributed in the mainland of China. Our results show that three clusters (B1a-B1c) existed in the mainland of China, and that the cluster of B1b dominates the diffusion of CV-A16 in China. We found that eastern China played a decisive role in seeding the diffusion of CV-A16 in China, with a more complex and variant transmission trend. Although EV-A71 vaccine was launched in China in 2016, it did not affect the genetic diversity of CV-A16, and its genetic diversity did not decline, which confirmed the epidemiological surveillance trend of CV-A16. Two discontinuous clusters (2000-2013 and 2014-2018) were observed in the full-length genome and arranged along the time gradient, which revealed the reason why the relative genetic diversity of CV-A16 increased and experienced more complex fluctuation model after 2014. In addition, the switch from recombinant forms B (RF-B) and RF-C co-circulation to RF-D contributes to the prevalence of B1b cluster in China after 2008. The correlation between genotype and RFs partially explained the current prevalence of B1b. This study provides unprecedented full-length genomic sequences of CV-A16 in China, with a wider geographic distribution and a long-term time scale. The study presents valuable information about CV-A16, aimed at developing effective control strategies, as well as a call for a more robust surveillance system, especially in the Asia-Pacific region.

Since 2008, Mainland China has undergone widespread outbreaks of hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD). In order to determine the characteristics of epidemics and enteroviruses (EV) associated with HFMD in Tianjin, in northern China, epidemiological and virological data from routine surveillance were collected and analyzed. In Tianjin, a persistent epidemic of HFMD was demonstrated during 2008–2013, involving 102,705 mild, 179 severe, and 16 fatal cases. Overall, 8234 specimens were collected from 7829 HFMD patients for EV detection during 2008–2013. Enterovirus 71 (EV-A71) and coxsackievirus A16 (CV-A16) were the dominant serotypes during 2008–2012, and they were replaced by CV-A6 as the major causative agent in 2013. Phylogenetic analysis based on complete VP1 nucleotide sequences revealed that multiple CV-A6 lineages co-circulated in Tianjin, which grouped together with strains from China and other countries and split into two distinct clusters (clusters 1 and 2). Most Tianjin strains grouped in cluster 1 and were closely related to strains from several eastern and southern provinces of China during 2012 and 2013. Estimates from Bayesian MCMC analysis suggested that multiple lineages had been transmitted silently before the outbreaks at an estimated evolutionary rate of 4.10 × 10−3 substitutions per site per year without a specific distribution of rate variances among lineages. The sudden outbreak of CV-A6 in Tianjin during 2013 is attributed to indigenous CV-A6 lineages, which were linked to the wide spread of endemic strains around eastern and southern China.

Bioresorbable electronic devices are promising replacements for conventional build‐to‐last electronics in implantable biomedical systems and consumer electronics. However, bioresorbable devices are typically achieved by complex complementary metal oxide semiconductor fabrication processes that minimize exposure to humidity. Emerging printable techniques for bioresorbable electronics demand further improvement in electrical conductivity and mechanical robustness. This paper presents a room‐temperature spontaneous sintering method of bioresorbable inks that contain zinc nanoparticles and anhydride. The entire process can be conducted in atmosphere environment under 90% humidity within 300 min. It has minimum requirement for external heating and special ambient conditions, allowing humidity to trigger the surface chemistry of zinc nanoparticles and spontaneous welding between neighboring nanoparticles. The resulting bioresorbable patterns are highly conductive (σ = 72 400 S m−1) and mechanically robust (>1500 bending cycles) to enable practical applications. A radio circuit achieved through the above method can operate stably over 14 days in air and disappear in water for less than 30 min. The spontaneous room‐temperature sintering represents a rapid and energy‐efficient approach to achieve high‐performance bioresorbable electronics with improved mechanical robustness and electrical performance, leading to broader impacts in the areas of healthcare, information security, and consumer electronics.