Auranofin loaded silk fibroin nanoparticles for colorectal cancer treatment.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the second most common cause of cancer related deaths worldwide and the prevalence in young people especially is increasing annually. In the search for innovative approaches to treat the disease, drug delivery systems (DDS) are promising owing to their unique properties, which allow improved therapeutic results with lower drug concentrations, overcoming drug resistance and at the same time potentially reducing side effects. Silk fibroin is a biopolymer that can be processed to obtain biocompatible and biodegradable nanoparticles that can be efficiently loaded by surface adsorption with small-molecule therapeutics and allow their transport and sustained release by modulating their pharmacokinetics.

Improved and Highly Reproducible Synthesis of Methacrylated Hyaluronic Acid with Tailored Degrees of Substitution.

Methacrylated hyaluronic acid (HAMA) is a versatile material that has gained significant attention in various pharmaceutical and biomedical applications. This biocompatible material can be photo-cross-linked in the presence of Irgacure 2959 (I2959) to produce hydrogels. Controlling the degree of methacrylation (DM) is crucial since it plays a pivotal role in determining the properties and thus the potential applications of the gels.

Promises of anionic calix[n]arenes in life science: State of the art in 2023.

Because they hold together molecules by means of non-covalent interactions - relatively weak and thus, potentially reversible - the anionic calixarenes have become an interesting tool for efficiently binding a large range of ligands - from gases to large organic molecules. Being highly water soluble and conveniently biocompatible, they showed growing interest for many interdisciplinary fields, particularly in biology and medicine. Thanks to their intrinsic conical shape, they provide suitable platforms, from vesicles to bilayers.

One-Step Photochemical Green Synthesis of Water-Dispersible Ag, Au, and Au@Ag Core-Shell Nanoparticles.

A simple and green synthetic protocol for the rapid and effective preparation of Ag, Au and Au@Ag core-shell nanoparticles (NPs) is reported based on the light irradiation of a biocompatible, water-soluble dextran functionalized with benzophenone (BP) in the presence of AgNO , HAuCl , or both. Photoactivation of the BP moiety produces the highly reducing ketyl radicals through fast (<50 ns) intramolecular H-abstraction from the dextran scaffold, which, in turn, ensures excellent dispersibility of the obtained metal NPs in water. The antibacterial activity of the AgNPs and the photothermal action of the Au@Ag core-shell are also shown.

A multifunctional β-cyclodextrin-conjugate photodelivering nitric oxide with fluorescence reporting.

This contribution reports the design, synthesis and photochemical properties of a novel cationic, water soluble, β-cyclodextrin (βCD) conjugate integrating an anthracene moiety and a nitroaniline derivative within the primary side of the βCD scaffold. Photoinduced energy transfer between the anthracene and the nitroaniline chromophores effectively suppresses the fluorescence of the anthracene unit. Excitation with visible light triggers the release of nitric oxide (NO) from the nitroaniline chromophore, accompanied to the concomitant revival of the anthracene fluorescence, which acts as an optical reporter for detecting the amount of the NO released.

Graphene oxide nanohybrid that photoreleases nitric oxide.

We report herein a photoresponsive nanoplatform that delivers nitric oxide (NO) on demand, achieved by the covalent functionalization of graphene oxide (GO) with an amino-terminated nitric oxide (NO) photodonor (NOP1). The resulting GO-NOP1 hybrid nanomaterial is dispersible in water, is very stable in the dark and has been thoroughly characterized by SEM, TEM, AFM, XRD, FTIR and UV-Vis absorption spectroscopy. Photolysis experiments demonstrate that the photodecomposition of the NO photoreleaser integrated into the GO scaffold occurs with an efficiency similar to that observed for a free model compound, ruling out any significant quenching effect (i.

Photo-antimicrobial polymeric films releasing nitric oxide with fluorescence reporting under visible light.

A novel photoresponsive molecular hybrid has been embedded in poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) to give an antibacterial polymeric film generating nitric oxide (NO) under visible light, with concomitant fluorescence reporting of NO release. The molecular hybrid integrates a nitroaniline NO photodonor and a coumarin latent fluorophore in the same molecular skeleton and results in quite homogeneous distribution in the polymer matrix where it preserves well the photobehavior exhibited in solution. The doped PLGA film shows an excellent optical transparency and can be excited by visible light leading to the production of NO and the parallel fluorescence revival of the coumarin fluorophore, which acts as an optical NO reporter.