Polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)-based hydrogels have attracted significant attention due to their excellent biocompatibility, tunable mechanical properties, and ability to form stable three-dimensional networks. This comprehensive review explores the recent advancements in PVA-based hydrogels, focusing on their unique properties, fabrication strategies, and multifunctional applications. Firstly, it discusses various facile synthesis techniques, including freeze/thaw cycles, chemical cross-linking, and enhancement strategies, which have led to enhanced mechanical strength, elasticity, and responsiveness to external stimuli. These improvements have expanded the applicability of PVA-based hydrogels in critical areas such as biomedical, environmental treatment, flexible electronics, civil engineering, as well as other emerging applications. Additionally, the integration of smart functionalities, such as self-healing capabilities and multi-responsiveness, is also examined. Despite progress, challenges remain, including optimizing mechanical stability under varying conditions and addressing potential toxicity of chemical cross-linkers. The review concludes by outlining future perspectives, emphasizing the potential of PVA-based hydrogels in emerging fields like regenerative medicine, environmental sustainability, and advanced manufacturing. It underscores the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration in realizing the full potential of these versatile materials to address pressing societal challenges.

In recent years, membrane technologies have been developed to address water shortage and energy crisis. Forward osmosis (FO), as an emerging membrane-based water treatment technology, employs an extremely concentrated draw solution (DS) to draw water pass through the semi-permeable membrane from a feed solution. DS as a critical material in FO process plays a key role in determining separation performance and energy cost. Most of existing DSs after FO still require a regeneration step making its return to initial state. Therefore, selecting suitable DS with low reverse solute, high flux, and easy regeneration is critical for improving FO energy efficiency. Numerous novel DSs with improved performance and lower regeneration cost have been developed. However, none reviews reported the categories of DS based on the energy used for recovery up to now, leading to the lack of enough awareness of energy consumption in DS regeneration. This review will give a comprehensive overview on the existing DSs based on the types of energy utilized for DS regeneration. DS categories based on different types of energy used for DS recovery, mainly including direct use based, chemical energy based, waste heat based, electric energy based, magnetic field energy based, and solar energy based are proposed. The respective benefits and detriments of the majority of DS are addressed respectively according to the current reported literatures. Finally, future directions of energy applied to DS recovery are also discussed.

Three-dimensional (3D) printing represents a pivotal technological advancement in dental prosthetics, fundamentally transforming the fabrication of provisional crowns and bridges through innovative vat photopolymerization methodologies, specifically stereolithography (SLA) and digital light processing (DLP). This comprehensive scholarly review critically examines the technological landscape of 3D-printed resin-based dental provisional crowns and bridges, systematically analyzing their material performance, clinical applications, and prospective developmental trajectories. Empirical investigations demonstrate that these advanced restorations exhibit remarkable mechanical characteristics, including flexural strength ranging from 60 to 90 MPa and fracture resistance of 1000–1200 N, consistently matching or surpassing traditional manufacturing techniques. The digital workflow introduces substantial procedural innovations, dramatically reducing fabrication time while simultaneously achieving superior marginal adaptation and internal architectural precision. Despite these significant technological advancements, critical challenges persist, encompassing material durability limitations, interlayer bonding strength inconsistencies, and the current paucity of longitudinal clinical evidence. Contemporary research initiatives are strategically focused on optimizing resin formulations through strategic filler incorporation, enhancing post-processing protocols, and addressing fundamental limitations in color stability and water sorption characteristics. Ultimately, this scholarly review aims to provide comprehensive insights that will inform evidence-based clinical practices and delineate future research trajectories in the dynamically evolving domain of digital dentistry, with the paramount objective of advancing patient outcomes through technological innovation and precision-driven methodological approaches.

Aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) is one of the most frequently-found mycotoxins in contaminated food. As the content of mycotoxins is particularly low in food, the development of probes to detect AFB1 in foods with high sensitivity and selectivity is an urgent social need for the evaluation of food quality. Numerous techniques have been developed to monitor AFB1. Nevertheless, most of them require cumbersome, labor-consuming, and sophisticated instruments, which have limited their application. An aptamer is a single, short nucleic acid sequence that is capable of recognizing different targets. Owing to their unique properties, aptamers have been considered as alternatives to antibodies. Aptasensors are considered to be an emerging strategy for the quantification of aflatoxin B1 with high selectivity and sensitivity. In this review, we summarize recent developments in colormetric, electrochemical, SERS, and fluorescent aptasensors for the quantification of AFB1. Finally, the perspectives and current challenges of aptasensors for AFB1 are outlined.

Resin-based dental materials have been one of the ideal choices among various materials in the treatment of dental caries. However, resin-based dental materials still have some drawbacks, such as the lack of inherent antibacterial activity. Extensive research has been conducted on the use of novel quaternary ammonium monomers (QAMs) to impart antibacterial activity to dental materials. This review provides a comprehensive overview of the recent advances in quaternary ammonium monomers (QAMs) for dental applications. The current progress and limitations of QAMs are discussed based on the evolution of their structures. The functional diversification and enhancement of QAMs are presented. QAMs have the potential to provide long-term antibacterial activity in dental resin composites, thereby prolonging their service life. However, there is a need to balance antibacterial performance with other material properties and the potential impact on the oral microbiome and general health. Finally, the necessity for further scientific progress in the development of novel quaternary ammonium monomers and the optimization of dental resin formulations is emphasized.