DNA transfection is often the bottleneck of research and gene therapy practices. To explore the mechanism regulating transgene expression, we investigated the role of the cGAS-STING signaling pathway, which induces type-I interferons in response to DNA. We confirmed that deletion of cGAS enhances transgene expression at the protein level by~2-to 3-fold. This enhancement is inversely correlated with the expression of interferons and interferon stimulated genes (ISGs), which suppress expression of transfected genes at the mRNA level. Mechanistically, DNA transfection activates the cGAS-STING pathway and induces the expression of the OAS family proteins, leading to the activation of RNaseL and degradation of mRNA derived from transgenes. Administration of chemical inhibitors that block cGAS-mediated signaling cascades improves the expression of transgenes by~1.5-to 3-fold in multiple cell lines and primary cells, including T cells. These data suggest that targeting the cGAS-STING pathway can improve transgene expression, and this strategy may be applied to gene therapy.

Despite the fact that metal-catalyzed asymmetric alkylative cross-couplings have been well-established, enantioselective alkylative substitution of an unactivated C–O bond remains a challenge due to the lack of strategies to cleave the C–O bond and suppress β-H elimination as well as control stereochemistry simultaneously. Herein, the enantioselective alkylative activation of an unactivated C–O bond with β-H-containing alkylating reagents was described using a chiral nickel catalyst, and versatile axially chiral biaryls bearing alkyl moieties with different chain lengths were delivered in good yields and with high ee. Control experiments demonstrated the significant role of the solvent tetrahydrofuran to facilitate this transformation. DFT calculations revealed that the coordination of THF to Mg­(II) is pivotal for suppressing β-H elimination during reductive elimination, thus unlocking how the solvent molecule affects the competing β-H elimination and reductive elimination dynamics in transition-metal-catalyzed alkylative cross-coupling reactions.

The production of pipe assembly for a rocket engine has experienced challenges owing to the higher requirements of the joining and sealing performance. An adjustable laser bending pipe is a flexible and economical means of compensating for production errors after welding, located in the “closing” segment. To improve the productivity and accuracy of the adjustable laser bending pipe, inline measurement systems are integrated into production to develop an adaptive control system. The models of adjustable laser bending pipe to compensate for pipe assembly production errors are established using kinematics and the displacement screw system, and the proposed adaptive control system is validated by the experiment based on the springback-free laser pipe bending process. Using the proposed adaptive control system, the angle deviation decreases from 7.086° to 0.154°, and the distance deviation decreases from 5.076 mm to 0.104 mm. The validation results satisfactorily meet the requirement of the welding axis alignment of the pipe ends. These models demonstrate significant potential to be applied for calculating the feedback parameters required in the adjustments to compensate for pipe assembly production errors.

The size effect seriously affects the forming quality of micro-formed parts in the field of micro-forming. This paper focuses on the influence of the mold size effect in microscale laser dynamic flexible bulging (μLDFB). The experimental results indicate that, for the copper foil with a given thickness, there are suitable mold characteristic sizes to obtain better forming quality. The surface quality of bulging parts is poor when the mold characteristic size is small. However, the forming symmetry and forming uniformity of bulging samples are reduced when the mold characteristic size is large. As the laser pulse energy increases, the plastic strain increases, and the bulging samples experience five stages: uniform plastic deformation, local necking, cracks in the bulging zone, complete fracture in the bulging zone and complete rupture at the mold entrance zone. The increase of the surface roughening rate caused by the increase of grain size and mold characteristic size makes local necking easier, which further leads to fracture. On this basis, in this paper laser pre-shocking (LPS) is introduced to improve the forming quality. Comparative experiments show that LPS has a positive effect on improving the surface quality and the forming performance of bulging samples. The forming limit of bulging samples is increased and the occurrence of local necking is delayed.