Associate Professor Tian Ruijun’s research group from the Department of Chemistry at Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech) joined a global effort over a long period of time to find new ways to target pancreatic cancer cells. Working with the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences, the collective group found that an interaction between pancreatic stellate cells (PSC) and pancreatic cancer cells (PCCs) could be taken advantage of through a key protein. This research was published today in Nature, under the title, “Targeting LIF-mediated paracrine interaction for pancreatic cancer therapy and monitoring.”

Shear forces can convert a colloid of tiny solid particles (a sol) into a gel. This process is similar to the biological activities that biological systems are capable of self-healing and could lead to dramatic changes in the smart materials sector.

Discovered decades ago, the quantum Hall effect remains one of the most studied phenomena in condensed matter physics and is relevant for research areas such as topological phases, strong electron correlations and quantum computing.

Nature Reviews – Chemistry is a top review journal for chemistry, from the Nature group of journals. Associate Professor Xu Jing from the Department of Chemistry of Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech) was recently invited to publish an article called “Innovation in protecting-group-free natural product synthesis.”

Recently, Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech) undergraduate student Zhong Xiaowei from the Department of Chemistry had a paper published in an internationally renowned academic journal Macromolecules, with the paper titled “Synergistic Effect of Chlorination and Selenophene: Achieving Elevated Solar Conversion in Highly Aggregated Systems.”

Thermoelectric materials are among the important potential candidates for alternative and complementary sources for energy, wherein heat can be directly converted into electrical energy and vice versa. These materials are realistic operational materials for applications in thermoelectric generators and refrigerators. Recent studies have started examining their efficiency in smaller, flexible devices, in hope of revolutionizing the thermoelectric power generation field.