Absorption study on the effect of mixed cation on tin and germanium-based perovskite solar cells

The thin film industry has been introduced with an invention of lead-based perovskite solar cells which eventually has gained a huge attention throughout the years. As the concern arises, this lead-based perovskite solar cells contributed towards both the environmental and human health issues due to the high level of toxicity. This then carve the paths into the research in finding suitable alternative for lead-free perovskite where tin and germanium are proposed as possible substitute, but the long-term durability and stability of both perovskites are still a challenge to be improved and maintained. In this study, tin and germanium-based solutions are fabricated individually with mixed cations of FA-MA; FAxMA1–xSnI3 and FAxMA1–xGeI3 in variations (1⩽ x ⩽0). The UV-Vis spectroscopy was analyzed in 400-1100nm range to measure the light intensity absorption of full encapsulated fabricated perovskite solar cells after 30 days of exposure to surrounding conditions and recorded highest peak of absorption at the wavelength of 400 nm and 550 nm for tin based and germanium-based perovskite respectively.

Dissolving Polymer Microneedles for Transdermal Delivery of Insulin

It’s of great significance to develop insulin-loaded dissolving microneedles (MNs) which are fabricated with various methods and materials for transdermal delivery of insulin to effectively and efficiently treat diabetes. In this work, we present a kind of FITC-insulin tip-loaded dissolving MNs fabricated with the mixture of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and sucrose using homemade PDMS MNs mold under vacuum conditions. The uniform appearance of MN arrays contributes to controlling the drug dosage well as required. Sufficient mechanical strength for penetrating tough stratum corneum can be obtained by vacuum frozen-drying for at least 6 h after peeling MNs off the mold. About 90% of the FITC-insulin is localized in the conical MN tips and can be released into the skin within 2 min after insertion. The in vivo insulin absorption study and hypoglycemic effect in diabetic mice demonstrate that the proposed insulin-loaded MNs can efficiently deliver the insulin to the systemic circulation and exhibit a similar effect to hypodermic injection on hypoglycemic administration. Together these results suggested that the efficient MN fabrication process proposed in this work shows great potential for mass production and practical application of drug-loaded dissolving MNs in the future.

Evaluation of a natural compound extracted from Dolichandrone atrovirens as a novel antioxidant agent using Caenorhabditis elegans

The compound methyl cinnamoyl catalpol (DAM-1) was isolated from the methanol extract of Dolichandrone atrovirens. Studies have already reported the antioxidant activity of Dolichandrone atrovirens bark extract, but till date the antioxidant activity of the isolated compound DAM-1, remains unexplored. The endogenous process of reactive oxygen species generation which leads to various degenerative diseases, can be broken down using these exogenous moieties from plant origin, herein this study we sought to evaluate the antioxidant potential of the DAM-1 compound using Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans), which is the primary model to study the antioxidant activity of compounds. Cytotoxicity assay results showed that DAM-1 treatment in the concentration of 10, 25 and 50 μg/ml has shown 100%, 91%, and 50% survival respectively with overall p<0.0001 (treatment v/s control group). 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide–Formazan (MTT) assay results showed that treatment had better survival rates than the control group at different time intervals i.e. 48 h, and 72 h with p<0.01. Mechanosensation (behavioral study) as well as in vivo study results showed that at 0 h, 10 μg/ml of DAM-1 treatment showed a better anti-oxidative activity than the control group, 25 and 50 μg/ml of DAM-1 treated groups with p<0.001 but at 2.5 h incubation with 10, 25, 50 μg/ml of DAM-1 showed an increased anti-oxidative activity than the control group with p<0.001. Thermoresistance assay confirmed that the treatment group had more survival than control group with p<0.001. Absorption study of DAM-1 in C. elegans has shown that the absorption of the drug increases up to 180 mins with a slight decrease after 360 mins and then constant absorption up to 1440 mins. This study paves the way towards the initiative to explore the pharmacological role of DAM-1 in various oxidative stress mediated diseases at molecular levels and the absorption study points out its potential role which could be utilized in the metabolomics and proteomics analysis of this compound in other studies.