Latest ArticlesA new paradigm to remove toxic chromate anions from aqueous solution by crystallization of chromatewater clusters with imine-linked guanidinium cationic ligands is introduced. The guanidium-based cationic ligand was easily prepared through the imine condensation of an aldehyde and aminoguanidine hydrochloride. The cationic imine-linked guanidinium ligand (BBIG-Cl) showed a high removal capacity (292.5 mg/g) in the solutions. Rapid decontamination of chromate anions from the wastewater by this cationic ligand was resulted from an instantaneous crystallization. The produced guanidium chromate salts have an extremely low solubility (Ksp, BBIG = 8.19×10-9). Such superior removal performance of these materials was attributed to the charge-assisted hydrogen bonding between the cationic ligand and chromate-water hydrate anions, which was revealed by the single-crystal X-ray diffraction analysis and density functional theory (DFT) calculations. In addition, the successful recovery of the guanidium-based ligand makes it more attractive for real-world applications.
The biogeochemical transformation of gold (Au), i.e. its dissolution and re-precipitation, is critical in supergene transport of Au and formation of Au granules. Besides biogenic reduction, the formation Au granules can also be driven by chemical processes. Previous studies have showed the formation of Au nanoparticles (AuNPs) from ionic Au(Ⅲ) can be mediated by dissolved organic matter under sunlight. In this letter, we further demonstrated that these AuNPs can further slowly (in years) grow into visible Au granules. Different sized nano-flower and fractal dendrite-like branched gold structures (from tens of nanometres to over 100 μm) were observed in the Au granule sample. This growth of AuNPs into visible Au granules may play a critical role in the supergene mineralization and enrichment of secondary Au and drive the biogeochemical cycle of Au.
Insulin fibrillation poses a variety of problems in biomedical and biotechnological applications of insulin. Inhibiting insulin fibrillation is highly on demand to address those problems. We herein demonstrate the capability of amphiphilic sulfonatocalixarene to inhibit insulin fibrillation. The amphiphilic assembly of p-sulfonatocalix[4]arene tetra dodecyl ether exhibits much better efficiency on inhibiting insulin fibrillation, with respect to p-sulfonatocalix[4]arene and sodium dodecyl benzenesulphonate. The pronounced inhibition effect results from both the preorganized scaffold of calixarene and the amphiphilic assembly.
The controlled self-assembly of discrete metal-organic nanocapsules (MONCs), and metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) based on the MONCs are achieved. Specifically, the solvothermal reaction of nickel nitrate hexahydrate and C-methylpyrogallol[4]arene in mixed DMF/MeOH solution leads to the unexpected form of discrete nickel-seamed hexameric pyrogallol[4]arene MONCs, and MONC-based three-dimensional (3D) MOF. Notably, the latter MOF is constructed from the aforementioned nickelseamed MONC building blocks and formate linkers in-situ generated from the hydrolysis of DMF solvent. Interestingly, introducing pyridine and formic acid in the reaction conditions leads to the controlled assemblies of the discrete MONC and MONC-based 3D MOF structures. Moreover, the variabletemperature magnetic susceptibilities of both the abovementioned compounds have been investigated, indicating typical antiferromagnetic interactions between the metal centers.
A novel BODIPY (boradiazaindacene) dye denoted as BODIPY-DT containing terpyridine unit has been designed and characterized. The dye is found to be selective and visual solvatochromic sensor toward DMF among test organic solvents. The sensing process displays time-controllable, dynamic signal outputs in the emission colors including red, purple, yellow and even white emission colors. It is presented that selective free radical oxidation reaction happens during the recognition process.
Fenton reaction is one of most promising approaches for efficient removal of various robust organic pollutants in wastewater, however it faces several intrinsic challenges such as acidic condition, sludge waste and sensitive to sulfide-containing compound. Here we reported a novel FeS1.92 as an efficient and sulfide resistant heterogeneous Fenton catalyst under mild condition. This novel FeS1.92 was facilely prepared through a mechanochemical synthesis of mackinawite (FeS) with sulfur powder (S) by ball milling. The sulfured mackinawite (FeS1.92) exhibits high performance in activating H2O2 to generate hydroxyle radicals for organic waste remediation. Furthermore, this FeS1.92 based heterogeneous Fenton catalyst is highly sulfide resistant and shows improved performance for degrading sulfide-containing organic pollutants. This study provides an effective mechanochemical approach to fabricate heterogeneous Fenton catalysts for sulfide-containing wastewater treatment.
Although occupying pillar position in clinical cancer treatments, surgery itself and surgical trauma would elicit series of local/systemic inflammation-related responses that resulted in high rate of tumor recurrence. Herein, chitosan with conjugated gallic acid (CSG) molecules were coordinated with Fe3+ to form CSG/Fe3+ hydrogel for filling the tumor-resected cavity with considerable wet-adhesion ability and anti-inflammatory performance. With the assistance of doxorubicin hydrochloride (DOX·HCl), CSG/Fe3+/DOX hydrogel exhibited synergistic photothermal-chemo tumor-inhibited performance under near-infrared (NIR) light irradiation for eradicating residual and/or surgical trauma-recruited cancer cells. Thus, our study attempts to show a paradigm that realizes quick surgical trauma healing, inflammation inhibition and prevention of postsurgical tumor recurrence.
Hyperbranched polymers have attracted increasing interests due to their unique structure-related advantages and have been utilized as drug carriers for controlled delivery. However, it is still challenging to prepare multi stimuli-responsive hyperbranched polymers to sense and response the complex yet delicate changes in physiological environment. Herein, we propose a triple-stimuli backbone-breakable hyperbranched polymer (HBP(OEG-IB)), which is prepared via the convenient iminoboronate multicomponent reaction of α, w-di(1, 2-diol)s oligo(ethylene glycol), tris(3-aminopropyl)amine and 2-formylphenylboronic acid. Upon the stimulation of CO2, lactic acid and glutathione, micelles formed by HBP(OEG-IB) could be disrupted via the dissociation of iminoboronate ester bond to subsequent release incorporated camptothecin (CPT). Cell experiments show that the HBP(OEG-IB) is non-toxic but can enhance the therapeutic effect of CPT thanks to the effect of the protonated tertiary amino groups. The demonstration made in this work can enrich the design of responsive HBPs and can be readily applied to other systems with tunable responsive properties and functions.
Se/C as a novel carbon-based biomaterial was prepared by using cheap and abundant glucose as the carbon source. It was highly active and could well restrain Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris (EC50 = 4.7403 μg/mL), a very harmful germ causing the devastating cabbage black rot disease and resulting in huge economic losses. As a type of carbon material insoluble in water, Se/C is bio-compatible and can adhere onto the leaves of the plants to allow a slow and sustained release of its efficacy, affording an efficient method for the cabbage black rot disease prevention and cure. This work as the first report on the bioactivity studies of Se/C significantly expands the application scopes of the selenium-containing materials and may draw continuous attentions from a broad field.
The recent evolution of active components yielded brilliant progresses for organic solar cells (OSCs), yet the mechanism is needed to be clearly understood. In this work, two electron acceptors, a linear SN6-2Br and a V-shaped BTP-2Br, are developed with nitrogen atoms introduced to replace the traditional sp3-hybridized carbon in the fused ring. BTP-2Br possesses an electron-deficient central core, which exhibits slightly blue-shifted absorption as well as deepened HOMO-level compared with SN6-2Br. The corresponding photovoltaic performance from V-shaped BTP-2Br based devices exhibit superior performance especially in short-circuit current (Jsc), despite an enhanced absorption and charge carrier mobilities for SN6-2Br. The primary reason for the higher Jsc from BTP-2Br is faster exciton diffusion and dissociation in blends, than those of SN6-2Br. As a result, PBDB-TF:BTP-2Br based devices achieve a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 13.84% with an voltage-loss of only 0.46 V, which is one of the lowest values ever reported. Moreover, we fabricated semitransparent OSCs that exhibit an excellent PCE of 9.62% with average visible transparency of 20.1%.
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