Latest ArticlesAlthough titanate nanofibers (TiNFs) and titanate nanotubes (TiNTs) have been proposed as relatively biocompatible nanomaterials (NMs), there is currently lacking of systemic studies which investigated the toxicity of TiNFs and TiNTs to endothelium. In this study, we developed endothelial monolayer model by using cell culture inserts, and systemically investigated the toxicity of TiNFs and TiNTs by RNA-seq, with a focus on Kruppel-like factor (KLF)-mediated effects, since KLF are transcription factors (TF) involved in the regulation of vascular biology. It was shown that NMs did not significantly induce cytotoxicity despite substantial internalization. However, the expression of many KLF was altered, and Western blot further confirmed that NMs down-regulated KLF2 proteins. Ingenuity pathway analysis (IPA) revealed that NMs altered the expression of KLF2-targed genes, typically the genes involved in inflammatory responses. KLF2-related Gene Ontology (GO) terms and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Gene and Genomes (KEGG) pathways were also altered, and it should be noticed that NMs altered GO terms and KEGG pathways related with endothelial NO synthase (eNOS). This study further verified that NMs decreased intracellular NO and eNOS proteins. All the observed effects were more obvious for TiNFs compared with TiNTs. Combined, this study showed that TiNFs or TiNTs were non-cytotoxic to endothelial monolayer model, but TiNFs and more modestly TiNTs decreased KLF2 leading to decreased eNOS proteins and NO production. Our data may provide novel understanding about the toxicity of TiNFs as well as other Ti-based NMs to endothelium.
A new nonporous Zn-based metal-organic framework (NPMOF) synthesized from a high nitrogen-containing rigid ligand was converted into porous carbon materials by direct carbonization without adding additional carbon sources. A series of NPMOF-derived porous carbons with very high N/O contents (24.1% for NPMOF-700, 20.2% for NPMOF-800, 15.1% for NPMOF-900) were prepared by adjusting the pyrolysis temperatures. The NPMOF-800 fabricated electrode exhibits a high capacitance of 220 F/g and extremely large surface area normalized capacitance of 57.7 μF/cm2 compared to other reported MOF-derived porous carbon electrodes, which could be attributed to the abundant ultramicroporosity and high N/O co-doping. More importantly, symmetric supercapacitor assembled with the MOF-derived carbon manifests prominent stability, i.e., 99.1% capacitance retention after 10,000 cycles at 1.0 A/g. This simple preparation of MOF-derived porous carbon materials not only finds an application direction for a variety of porous or even nonporous MOFs, but also opens a way for the production of porous carbon materials for superior energy storage.
As a potent anticancer drug, gambogic acid (GA) suffers from its poor water solubility and low chemical stability and shows a limited clinical outcome. To address this problem, we report here a simple and effective strategy to immobilize and deliver GA using a reducible diblock poly(amino acid) as a model. The electrostatic interaction between GA and polymer enables a high drug loading content up to 53.6 %. Moreover, the drug complexation induces a micelle-to-vesicle transformation, combined with a conformation transition from random coil to α-helix. The hierarchically assembled drug nanocomplexes can serve as a smart carrier for efficient cell internalization and triggered release of multiple drugs under intracellular acidic and reductive conditions, resulting in a synergistic antitumor efficacy in vitro. This work provides a new insight into the drug-carrier interaction and a facile nanoplatform for drug delivery applications.
To search naturally occurring interleukin-1β (IL-1β) inhibitors, biscaesalmins A (1) and B (2), two highly oxidized dimeric cassane diterpenoids with a newly formed alicyclic skeleton, have been isolated from the traditional Chinese medicine Kushilian (Caesalpinia minax). Their full structures were determined by comprehensive spectroscopic analysis and quantum chemical TD-DFT (time-dependent density functional theory) calculation. Biosynthetically, 1 and 2 were formed via an intermolecular [4+2] Diels-Alder cycloaddition of two monomers, affording an additional six-membered carbon ring linkage. Compounds 1 and 2 inhibited nitric oxide production on lipopolysaccharide-stimulated THP-1 macrophages, with IC50 values being at 1.20±0.23 and 2.30±0.15 μmol/L, respectively. Furthermore, compound 1 inhibited NLRP3 (NOD-, LRR- and pyrin domain-containing protein 3) inflammasome-mediated IL-1β production and blocked the migration of macrophages towards adipocyte conditioned medium. Biscaesalmins A and B might be candidates for treating inflammation-related metabolic diseases.
Photocatalysis and Fenton process are two primary and promising advanced oxidation processes to degrade organic pollutants. However, the practical applications of single photocatalysis and Fenton process are still limited. Introducing one of them into another to form a combined photocatalytic Fenton-like system has shown great potential but still faces challenges in designing a well-tailored catalyst. Herein, a confined photocatalytic Fenton-like micro-reactor catalyst with a movable Fe3O4 core and a mesoporous TiO2 shell has been constructed via a successive Stöber coating strategy, followed by an ultrasound assisted etching method. The resulting micro-reactor possesses well-defined yolk-shell structures with uniform mesopores (~4 nm), a large Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area (~166.7 m2/g), a high pore volume (~0.56 cm3/g) and a strong magnetization (~51 emu/g), as well as tunable reactor sizes (20−90 nm). When evaluated for degrading bisphenol A under solar light in the presence of peroxymonosulfate, the micro-reactor exhibits a superior catalytic degradation performance with a high magnetic separation efficiency and an excellent recycle ability. The outstanding performance can be attributed to its unique textual structure, which leads to a great synergistic effect from the photocatalytic and Fenton-like process. This study gives an important insight into the design and synthesis of an advanced micro-reactor for a combined advanced oxidation processes (AOPs).
The urgent need for fresh water resource is a public issue facing the world. Solar distillation for seawater desalination is a promising freshwater production method. Interfacial solar evaporation systems based on 2D photo-thermal membranes have been widely studied, but salt pollution is one of the main challenges for solar distillation. In order to solve this problem, a hydrophilic three-dimensional (3D) porous photo-thermal fiber felt (PFF) was obtained by one-step method, through a simple polydopamine (PDA) coating method with hydrophobic graphite felt as a substrate. The PFF had a good evaporation rate of 1.48 kg/m−2h-1 and its corresponding light-vapor conversion efficiency reached 87.4%. In addition, the PFF exhibited an excellent salt-resistant ability when applied to photo-thermal evaporation of high-salinity seawater with 10 wt% NaCl, owing to its intrinsic 3D macroporous structure for the migration circulation of salt ions. The development of the PFF offers a new route for the exploration of salt-resistant photo-thermal materials and is promising for the practical application of solar distillation.
We describe an application of carrier protein-free strategy in constructing a fully synthetic methamphetamine (METH) vaccine that contains three components: Toll-like receptor 2 ligand, Th2 epitope, and METH hapten. The immunological evaluation in mice revealed high titers of METH-specific antibodies induced by the construct and the activation of humoral immunity that would be beneficial for neutralization and clearance of the METH molecule. Behavioral experiments indicated that the synthetic vaccine attenuated the acquisition of METH-induced conditioned place preference and inhibited the initiation and expression of METH-induced locomotor sensitization. These results demonstrate that the lipopeptide-based vaccine has invoked an immune response and showed the potential of preventing the rewarding and psychoactive effects of METH.
Fluorescent supramolecular nucleoside-based organogels or hydrogels have attracted increasing attention owing to their tunable stability, drug delivery, tissue engineering, and inherent biocompatibility for applications in designing sensors. As the temperature of a constant TPE-Octa-dU gelator at MGC as low as 0.2 wt% was increased with gel to sol transition, a progressive decrease in the fluorescence intensity was observed. 1H NMR study in ethanol-d6/H2O revealed the existence of intermolecular hydrogen-bond interaction between uridine nucleobase and triazole moieties. Based on these experiments, thus organogels induced by hydrogen bonding can promote an aggregation-induced emission (AIE) of TPE moiety. Thermoreversible gelation properties have been investigated systematically, including AIE-shapemorphing architecture owing to their unique solid-liquid interface and easy processability. At the same line, the related TPE-EdU derivative which was synthesized from 5-ethynyl-2'-deoxyuridine does not deliver organogels or hydrogels, and under similar circumstances TPE moiety of TPE-EdU does not efficiently exhibit AIE phenomenon either.
An efficient PET-based probe, in which the ferrocene quencher and the naphthalimide fluorophore are linked by a disulfide bond, has been developed. This probe can be activated by GSH with fluorescence a turn-on response for blocking the PET process. In addition, it was successfully applied for distinguishing cancer cells from normal cells
A series of triphenylamine (TPA) derivatives with various substituent groups were prepared and showed different absorption and fluorescence characteristics due to the substituent effect. On account of the existence of pyridine units, these TPA derivatives exhibited acid-induced tunable multicolor fluorescence emission including white light emission. In addition, acid-induced fluorescence regulation of these compounds has been also realized in the solid state, which enable them to be successfully constructed the stimuli-responsive fluorescent films and fluorescent inks for inkjet printing.
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