P-BiSbTe bulk materials with high texture, superior thermoelectric properties and robust mechanical performance were fabricated by laser 3D printing.

from automobile exhausts, in powering the deep space probes, as well as managing spot-size distributed cooling of electronic devices and household appliances. [3] To date, TE conversion is mainly driven by the development of higher performing, practically stable, and environmentally friendly TE materials. The major scientific and technological challenge is to compete successfully with the established energy conversion technologies and broaden the range of industrial applications of thermoelectricity. The efficiency of a TE material is gauged by its dimensionless figure of merit ZT, defined as ZT = α 2 σT/(κ L +κ e), where α, σ, κ L , κ e , and T are the Seebeck coefficient, electrical conductivity, lattice thermal conductivity, electronic thermal conductivity, and the absolute temperature, respectively. [1] Among various classes of TE materials, mixed ionic-electronic conductors, such as Cu

Carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii (CRAB) which is noted as a major pathogen associated with healthcare-associated infections has steadily developed beyond antibiotic control. Lytic bacteriophages with the characteristics of infecting and lysing specific bacteria have been used as a potential alternative to traditional antibiotics to solve multidrug-resistant bacterial infections. Here, we isolated A. baumannii-specific lytic phages and evaluated their potential therapeutic effect against lung infection caused by CRAB clinical strains. The combined lysis spectrum of four lytic phages’ ranges was 87.5% (42 of 48) against CRAB clinical isolates. Genome sequence and analysis indicated that phage SH-Ab15519 is a novel phage which does not contain the virulence or antibiotic resistance genes. In vivo study indicated that phage SH-Ab15519 administered intranasally can effectively rescue mice from lethal A. baumannii lung infection without deleterious side effects. Our work explores the potential use of phages as an alternative therapeutic agent against the lung infection caused by CRAB strains.

In this study, we prepared a series of Ag-doped PbSe bulk materials by a melting–quenching process combined with a subsequent spark plasma sintering process, and systematically investigated the doping effects of Ag on the thermoelectric properties. Ag substitution in the Pb site does not introduce resonant levels near the valence band edge or detectable change in the density of state in the vicinity of the Fermi level, but moves the Fermi level down and increases the carrier concentration to a maximum value of ∼4.7 × 1019 cm−3 which is still insufficient for heavily doped PbSe compounds. Nonetheless, the non-monotonic variation in carrier concentration with increasing Ag content indicates that Ag doping reaches the solution limit at ∼1.0% and the excessive Ag presumably acts as donors in the materials. Moreover, the large energy gap of the PbSe-based material wipes off significant ‘roll-over’ in the Seebeck coefficient at elevated temperatures which gives rise to high power factors, being comparable to p-type Te analogues. Consequently, the maximum ZT reaches ∼1.0 for the 1.5% Ag-doped samples with optimized carrier density, which is ∼70% improvement in comparison with an undoped sample and also superior to the commercialized p-type PbTe materials.