S100A8 and S100A9 (also known as MRP8 and MRP14, respectively) are Ca2+ binding proteins belonging to the S100 family. They often exist in the form of heterodimer, while homodimer exists very little because of the stability. S100A8/A9 is constitutively expressed in neutrophils and monocytes as a Ca2+ sensor, participating in cytoskeleton rearrangement and arachidonic acid metabolism. During inflammation, S100A8/A9 is released actively and exerts a critical role in modulating the inflammatory response by stimulating leukocyte recruitment and inducing cytokine secretion. S100A8/A9 serves as a candidate biomarker for diagnosis and follow-up as well as a predictive indicator of therapeutic responses to inflammation-associated diseases. As blockade of S100A8/A9 activity using small-molecule inhibitors or antibodies improves pathological conditions in murine models, the heterodimer has potential as a therapeutic target. In this review, we provide a comprehensive and detailed overview of the distribution and biological functions of S100A8/A9 and highlight its application as a diagnostic and therapeutic target in inflammation-associated diseases.

Substrate−molecule vibronic coupling enhancement, especially the efficient photoinduced charge transfer (PICT), is pivotal to the performance of nonmetal surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) technology. Here, through developing novel two-dimensional (2D) amorphous TiO 2 nanosheets (a-TiO 2 NSs), we successfully obtained an ultrahigh enhancement factor of 1.86 × 10 6 . Utilizing the Kelvin probe force microscopy (KPFM) technology, we found that these 2D a-TiO 2 NSs possessed more positive surface potential than their 2D crystalline counterpart (c-TiO 2 NSs). First-principles density functional theory (DFT) was used to further reveal that the low coordination number of surface Ti atoms and the large amount of surface oxygen defects endowed the 2D a-TiO 2 with high electrostatic potential, which allowed significant charge transfer from the adsorbed molecule to the 2D a-TiO 2 and facilitated the formation of a stable surface charge-transfer (CT) complex. Significantly, comparing with the 2D c-TiO 2 , the smaller band gap and higher electronic density of states (DOS) of the 2D a-TiO 2 effectively enhanced the vibronic coupling of resonances in the substrate−molecule system. The strong vibronic coupling within the CT complex obviously enhanced the PICT resonance and lead to the remarkable SERS activity of a-TiO 2 NSs. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on the remarkable SERS activity of 2D amorphous semiconductor nanomaterials, which may bring the cutting edge of development of stable and highly sensitive nonmetal SERS technology.

Impurity doping is an effective approach to tuning the optoelectronic performance of host materials by imparting extrinsic electronic channels. Herein, a family of lanthanide (Ln3+) ions was successfully incorporated into a Bi:Cs2AgInCl6 lead-free double-perovskite (DP) semiconductor, expanding the spectral range from visible (Vis) to near-infrared (NIR) and improving the photoluminescence quantum yield (PLQY). After multidoping with Nd, Yb, Er and Tm, Bi/Ln:Cs2AgInCl6 yielded an ultrabroadband continuous emission spectrum with a full width at half-maximum of ~365 nm originating from intrinsic self-trapped exciton recombination and abundant 4f–4f transitions of the Ln3+ dopants. Steady-state and transient-state spectra were used to ascertain the energy transfer and emissive processes. To avoid adverse energy interactions between the various Ln3+ ions in a single DP host, a heterogeneous architecture was designed to spatially confine different Ln3+ dopants via a “DP-in-glass composite” (DiG) structure. This bottom-up strategy endowed the prepared Ln3+-doped DIG with a high PLQY of 40% (nearly three times as high as that of the multidoped DP) and superior long-term stability. Finally, a compact Vis–NIR ultrabroadband (400~2000 nm) light source was easily fabricated by coupling the DiG with a commercial UV LED chip, and this light source has promising applications in nondestructive spectroscopic analyses and multifunctional lighting.

Two-dimensional (2D) nanomaterials show unique electrical, mechanical, and catalytic performance owing to their ultrahigh surface-to-volume ratio and quantum confinement effects. However, ways to simply synthesize 2D metal oxide nanosheets through a general and facile method is still a big challenge. Herein, we report a generalized and facile strategy to synthesize large-size ultrathin 2D metal oxide nanosheets by using graphene oxide (GO) as a template in a wet-chemical system. Notably, the novel strategy mainly relies on accurately controlling the balance between heterogeneous growth and nucleation of metal oxides on the surface of GO, which is independent on the individual character of the metal elements. Therefore, ultrathin nanosheets of various metal oxides, including those from both main-group and transition elements, can be synthesized with large size. The ultrathin 2D metal oxide nanosheets also show controllable thickness and unique surface chemical state.