Fullerenol Nanoparticles with Structural Activity Induce Variable Intracellular Actin Filament Morphologies.

Fullerenol nanoparticles are promising for various biological applications; many studies have shown that they induce variable and diverse biological effects including side effects. Separation and purification of two fractions of fullerenols has demonstrated that they have varied chemical structures on the surfaces of their carbon cages. Actin is an important structural protein that is able to transform functional structures under varied physiological conditions.

Synthesis of mesoporous Beta and Sn-Beta zeolites and their catalytic performances.

Mesoporous Beta zeolite has been successfully prepared through hydrothermal synthesis in the presence of cationic ammonium-modified chitosan as the meso-template. Through a subsequent solid-gas reaction between highly dealuminated mesoporous Beta zeolite and SnCl4 steam at an elevated temperature, mesoporous Sn-Beta has been facilely obtained. It was revealed that the addition of cationic chitosan induced the nanocrystal aggregation to particle sizes of ∼300 nm, giving rise to the intercrystalline/interparticle mesoporosity.

Gd@C82(OH)22 nanoparticles constrain macrophages migration into tumor tissue to prevent metastasis.

Macrophages can be recruited to tumor tissues and play a supportive role in the invasion microenvironment. Since nanoparticles can be easily endocytosed by this kind of cell, the advances in nanotechnology offer a new sight to target macrophages in tumor tissues for diminishing harmful phenotypes. In the xenograft mouse model, we found that metallofullerol Gd@C82(OH)22 can not only reduced the macrophage density in the tumor tissue, but also decreased the expression of matrix metalloproteinase-9 produced by this kind of cell.

Toxicological properties of nanomaterials.

The development of engineered nanomaterials opens tremendous opportunities for their application as therapeutic and diagnostic tools, as well as in the fields of consumer products. As the newly developed material subtype, they exhibit great activities for the high ratio of surface to total atoms. In the bio-system, the activity can render nanomaterials some negative outcomes for their unexpected deposition in organs and cells, the cellular response to the exogenous substance and the interfacial reaction with biomolecules.

Engineered design of theranostic upconversion nanoparticles for tri-modal upconversion luminescence/magnetic resonance/X-ray computed tomography imaging and targeted delivery of combined anticancer drugs.

Upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs) are ideal building blocks for fabricating multifunctional theranostic agents for simultaneous diagnosis and therapy. We develop multifunctional nanoparticles based on NaGdF:Yb/Er@NaGdF core-shell UCNPs, which are not only endowed with upconversion luminescence (UCL), magnetic resonance (MR) and X-ray computed tomography (CT) imaging ability, but also could be applied as nanocarriers for targeted drug delivery. We systematically investigate their upconversion luminescent, magnetic and X-ray attenuation properties.

Regulation on mechanical properties of collagen: enhanced bioactivities of metallofullerol.

Unlabelled: Increased mechanical property of extracellular matrix (ECM) around tumor tissue is highly correlated to the progression of cancer, and now its efficient regulation is still a challenge. Here, we report that Gd@C82(OH)22-collagen composites greatly suppress the malignant progression of cancer cells in vitro, and the metallofullerol can efficiently reduce the mechanical property of collagen matrix. Further study indicates that Gd@C82(OH)22 can firmly bind to tropocollagen, facilitate the nuclei and microfibril formation.

The effects of C60(C(COOH)2)2-FITC on proliferation and differentiation of human mesenchymal stem cells in vitro.

As manufactured nanoparticles, fullerene nanoparticles were used as the model to research the manufactured nanoparticles entering into cells and hence have been rapidly developed for biomedical uses. Human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) have become the most widely used seeding cells in tissue engineering because they are readily obtained without ethical problems and are multipotent with regard to adipogenic, chondrogenic, and osteogenic lineages. Because of their favorable biological and cellular activities, C60 carboxyl derivatives are among the most widely studied C60 derivatives.

Adjusting the balance between effective loading and vector migration of macrophage vehicles to deliver nanoparticles.

The nature of macrophage allows the possibility that this cell type could be used as drug delivery system to track therapeutic drug nanoparticles (NPs) in cancer. However, there is no existing research on the regulation between effective loading of NPs and targeted delivery of macrophages. Here, we investigated the important parameters of intracellular NP quantity and the vector migration rate.

A simple route to synthesize mesoporous ZSM-5 templated by ammonium-modified chitosan.

Uniform mesoporous zeolite ZSM-5 crystals have been successfully fabricated through a simple hydrothermal synthetic method by utilizing ammonium-modified chitosan and tetrapropylammonium hydroxide (TPAOH) as the meso- and microscale template, respectively. It was revealed that mesopores with diameters of 5-20 nm coexisted with microporous network within mesoporous ZSM-5 crystals. Ammonium-modified chitosan was demonstrated to serve as a mesoporogen, self-assembling with the zeolite precursor through strong static interactions.