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Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology

 

Indole-containing pharmaceuticals: targets, pharmacological activities, and SAR studies

Fri, 22/03/2024 - 10:00

RSC Med Chem. 2024 Jan 30;15(3):788-808. doi: 10.1039/d3md00677h. eCollection 2024 Mar 20.

ABSTRACT

Indole is a prestigious heterocyclic skeleton widely found in both naturally-occurring and biologically-active compounds. Pharmaceutical agents containing an indole skeleton in their framework possess a wide range of pharmacological properties, including antiviral, antitumor, analgesic, and other therapeutic activities, and many indole-containing drugs have been proven to have excellent pharmacokinetic and pharmacological effects. Over the past few decades, the FDA has approved over 40 indole-containing drugs for the treatment of various clinical conditions, and the development of indole-related drugs has attracted significant attention from medicinal chemists. This review aims to provide an overview of all the approved drugs that contain an indole nucleus, focusing on their targets, pharmacological activities, and SAR studies.

PMID:38516587 | PMC:PMC10953485 | DOI:10.1039/d3md00677h

High-performance bifacial perovskite solar cells enabled by single-walled carbon nanotubes

Wed, 13/03/2024 - 10:00

Nat Commun. 2024 Mar 12;15(1):2245. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-46620-1.

ABSTRACT

Bifacial perovskite solar cells have shown great promise for increasing power output by capturing light from both sides. However, the suboptimal optical transmittance of back metal electrodes together with the complex fabrication process associated with front transparent conducting oxides have hindered the development of efficient bifacial PSCs. Here, we present a novel approach for bifacial perovskite devices using single-walled carbon nanotubes as both front and back electrodes. single-walled carbon nanotubes offer high transparency, conductivity, and stability, enabling bifacial PSCs with a bifaciality factor of over 98% and a power generation density of over 36%. We also fabricate flexible, all-carbon-electrode-based devices with a high power-per-weight value of 73.75 W g-1 and excellent mechanical durability. Furthermore, we show that our bifacial devices have a much lower material cost than conventional monofacial PSCs. Our work demonstrates the potential of SWCNT electrodes for efficient, stable, and low-cost bifacial perovskite photovoltaics.

PMID:38472279 | PMC:PMC10933432 | DOI:10.1038/s41467-024-46620-1

Expanding the Reticular Chemistry Building Block Library toward Highly Connected Nets: Ultraporous MOFs Based on 18-Connected Ternary, Trigonal Prismatic Superpolyhedra

Fri, 01/03/2024 - 11:00

J Am Chem Soc. 2024 Mar 1. doi: 10.1021/jacs.3c12679. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

The chemistry of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) continues to expand rapidly, providing materials with diverse structures and properties. The reticular chemistry approach, where well-defined structural building blocks are combined together to form crystalline open framework solids, has greatly accelerated the discovery of new and important materials. However, its full potential toward the rational design of MOFs relies on the availability of highly connected building blocks because these greatly reduce the number of possible structures. Toward this, building blocks with connectivity greater than 12 are highly desirable but extremely rare. We report here the discovery of novel 18-connected, trigonal prismatic, ternary building blocks (tbb's) and their assembly into unique MOFs, denoted as Fe-tbb-MOF-x (x: 1, 2, 3), with hierarchical micro- and mesoporosity. The remarkable tbb is an 18-c supertrigonal prism, with three points of extension at each corner, consisting of triangular (3-c) and rectangular (4-c) carboxylate-based organic linkers and trigonal prismatic [Fe3(μ3-Ο)(-COO)6]+ clusters. The tbb's are linked together by an 18-c cluster made of 4-c ligands and a crystallographically distinct Fe3(μ3-Ο) trimer, forming overall a 3-D (3,4,4,6,6)-c five nodal net. The hierarchical, highly porous nature of Fe-tbb-MOF-x (x: 1, 2, 3) was confirmed by recording detailed sorption isotherms of Ar, CH4, and CO2 at 87, 112, and 195 K, respectively, revealing an ultrahigh BET area (4263-4847 m2 g-1) and pore volume (1.95-2.29 cm3 g-1). Because of the observed ultrahigh porosities, the H2 and CH4 storage properties of Fe-tbb-MOF-x were investigated, revealing well-balanced high gravimetric and volumetric deliverable capacities for cryoadsorptive H2 storage (11.6 wt %/41.4 g L-1, 77 K/100 bar-160 K/5 bar), as well as CH4 storage at near ambient temperatures (367 mg g-1/160 cm3 STP cm-3, 5-100 bar at 298 K), placing these materials among the top performing MOFs. The present work opens new directions to apply reticular chemistry for the construction of novel MOFs with tunable porosities based on contracted or expanded tbb analogues.

PMID:38428926 | DOI:10.1021/jacs.3c12679

A Fluorinated BODIPY-Based Zirconium Metal-Organic Framework for <em>In Vivo</em> Enhanced Photodynamic Therapy

Thu, 04/01/2024 - 11:00

J Am Chem Soc. 2024 Jan 17;146(2):1644-1656. doi: 10.1021/jacs.3c12416. Epub 2024 Jan 4.

ABSTRACT

Photodynamic therapy (PDT), an emergent noninvasive cancer treatment, is largely dependent on the presence of efficient photosensitizers (PSs) and a sufficient oxygen supply. However, the therapeutic efficacy of PSs is greatly compromised by poor solubility, aggregation tendency, and oxygen depletion within solid tumors during PDT in hypoxic microenvironments. Despite the potential of PS-based metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), addressing hypoxia remains challenging. Boron dipyrromethene (BODIPY) chromophores, with excellent photostability, have exhibited great potential in PDT and bioimaging. However, their practical application suffers from limited chemical stability under harsh MOF synthesis conditions. Herein, we report the synthesis of the first example of a Zr-based MOF, namely, 69-L2, exclusively constructed from the BODIPY-derived ligands via a single-crystal to single-crystal post-synthetic exchange, where a direct solvothermal method is not applicable. To increase the PDT performance in hypoxia, we modify 69-L2 with fluorinated phosphate-functionalized methoxy poly(ethylene glycol). The resulting 69-L2@F is an oxygen carrier, enabling tumor oxygenation and simultaneously acting as a PS for reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation under LED irradiation. We demonstrate that 69-L2@F has an enhanced PDT effect in triple-negative breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cells under both normoxia and hypoxia. Following positive results, we evaluated the in vivo activity of 69-L2@F with a hydrogel, enabling local therapy in a triple-negative breast cancer mice model and achieving exceptional antitumor efficacy in only 2 days. We envision BODIPY-based Zr-MOFs to provide a solution for hypoxia relief and maximize efficacy during in vivo PDT, offering new insights into the design of promising MOF-based PSs for hypoxic tumors.

PMID:38174960 | PMC:PMC10797627 | DOI:10.1021/jacs.3c12416

Establishing ZIF-8 as a reference material for hydrogen cryoadsorption: An interlaboratory study

Tue, 02/01/2024 - 11:00

Chemphyschem. 2024 Mar 1;25(5):e202300794. doi: 10.1002/cphc.202300794. Epub 2024 Jan 23.

ABSTRACT

Hydrogen storage by cryoadsorption on porous materials has the advantages of low material cost, safety, fast kinetics, and high cyclic stability. The further development of this technology requires reliable data on the H2 uptake of the adsorbents, however, even for activated carbons the values between different laboratories show sometimes large discrepancies. So far no reference material for hydrogen cryoadsorption is available. The metal-organic framework ZIF-8 is an ideal material possessing high thermal, chemical, and mechanical stability that reduces degradation during handling and activation. Here, we distributed ZIF-8 pellets synthesized by extrusion to 9 laboratories equipped with 15 different experimental setups including gravimetric and volumetric analyzers. The gravimetric H2 uptake of the pellets was measured at 77 K and up to 100 bar showing a high reproducibility between the different laboratories, with a small relative standard deviation of 3-4 % between pressures of 10-100 bar. The effect of operating variables like the amount of sample or analysis temperature was evaluated, remarking the calibration of devices and other correction procedures as the most significant deviation sources. Overall, the reproducible hydrogen cryoadsorption measurements indicate the robustness of the ZIF-8 pellets, which we want to propose as a reference material.

PMID:38165137 | DOI:10.1002/cphc.202300794