Temperature is an important factor in the process of life, as thermal energy transfer participates in all biological events in organisms. Due to technical limitations, there is still a lot more information to be explored regarding the correlation between life activities and temperature changes. In recent years, the emergence of a variety of new temperature measurement methods has facilitated further research in this field. Here, we introduce the latest advances in temperature sensors for biological detection and their related applications in metabolic research. Various technologies are discussed in terms of their advantages and shortcomings, and future prospects are presented.

Context: It is common sense that chewing a mint leaf can cause a cooling feeling, while chewing ginger root will produce a burning feeling. In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), this phenomenon is referred to as 'cold/hot' properties of herbs. Herein, it is reported that TCM with different "cold/hot" properties have different effects on the variation of cells. Objective: To explore the intrinsic 'cold/hot' properties of TCM from the perspective of cellular and molecular biology. Materials and methods: A375 cells were selected using Cancer Cell Line Encyclopaedia (CCLE) analysis and western blots. Hypaconitine and baicalin were selected by structural similarity analysis from 56 and 140 compounds, respectively. A wireless thermometry system was used to measure cellular temperature change induced by different compounds. Alteration of intracellular calcium influx was investigated by means of calcium imaging. Results: The IC 50 values of GSK1016790A, HC067047, hypaconitine, and baicalin for A375 cells are 8.363 nM, 816.4 lM, 286.4 lM and 29.84 lM, respectively. And, 8 lM hypaconitine induced obvious calcium influx while 8 lM baicalin inhibited calcium influx induced by TRPV4 activation. Cellular temperature elevated significantly when treated with GSK1016790A or hypaconitine, while the results were reversed when cells were treated with HC067047 or baicalin. Discussion and conclusions: The changes in cellular temperature are speculated to be caused by the alteration of intracellular calcium influx mediated by TRPV4. In addition, the 'cold/hot' properties of compounds in TCM can be classified by using cellular temperature detection.

To obtain the basic data for the recovery of 1-methylimidazole from wastewater by extraction, the ternary liquid−liquid phase equilibrium data of the water (1) + 1-methylimidazole (2) + 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium hexafluorophosphate ([Bmim][PF 6 ]) (3) system were determined using an equilibrium autoclave at the temperatures of 303.15 to 323.15 K and 101.32 kPa. The solute distribution coefficient (D) and the selectivity (S) of the ternary system were calculated in accordance with the experimental data. Their values were up to 1.39 and 41.17, respectively, which showed that the ionic liquid can extract 1-methylimidazole effectively. The experimental results showed that the temperature had a slight effect on the liquid−liquid equilibrium behavior. Meanwhile, the calculated results revealed that the selectivity coefficient decreased with the enhancing concentration of 1-methylimidazole in the ternary system and the increasing temperature. In addition, the nonrandom two liquid (NRTL) model was used for correlation of the ternary systems. The root-mean-square deviation value of 0.0218 indicated that the calculated results using the model were in good agreement with the experimental data and were reliable to apply to practice.

Precise quantification of intracellular iron contents is important to biomedical applications of magnetic nanoparticles. Current approaches for iron quantification rely on specialized instruments while most only yield iron quantities averaged over plenty of cells. Here, a simple and robust approach, combining digital optical microscopy with the Beer–Lambert's law, that allows for imaging stainable iron distribution in individual cells and the quantification of stainable iron contents with an unprecedented accuracy of femtogram per pixel, is presented. It is further shown that this approach enables studying of the internalization and reduction dynamics of super‐paramagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) by stem cells in single cell level.

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