Acute lung injury (ALI) is one of the most common and highly prevailing respiratory system diseases. However, there is still a lack of effective specialized medicines for the treatment of ALI. Biocompatible gold nanoclusters (AuNCs) have shown great potential in alleviating ALI, but their lung-targeted delivery needs to be enhanced.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF: Tubulointerstitial fibrosis is a key pathological aspect of diabetic nephropathy (DN) linked to reduced kidney function. Recent research has identified varied functions of the sigma-1 receptor (S1R) in the pathological fibrosis processes of cardiac, pulmonary, and trabecular meshwork tissues. Nonetheless, the specific roles of S1R in renal fibrosis remain inadequately understood.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMetal nanoclusters (NCs), comprising tens to hundreds of metal atoms, are condensed matter with concrete molecular structures and discrete energy levels. Compared to metal atoms and nanoparticles, metal NCs exhibit unique physicochemical properties, especially fascinating electrocatalytic activities. This review focuses on recent progress in the precise synthesis of metal NCs and their applications in electrochemical analysis of various disease biomarkers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnviron Sci Technol
December 2024
The presence of low-dose radiation (LDR) in the environment has become more prevalent. However, the effect of LDR exposure on the immune system remains elusive. Here, we interestingly found that LDR specifically elevated the percentage of CD4IFNγ Th1 splenocytes, both in vitro and in vivo, without affecting the percentage of CD8IFNγ Tc1 cells and regulatory T cells.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDrug nanocrystals have received significant attention in drug development due to their enhanced dissolution rate and improved water solubility, making them effective in overcoming issues related to drug hydrophobicity, thereby improving drug bioavailability and treatment effectiveness. Recent advances in preparation techniques have facilitated research on drug surface properties, leading to valuable surface engineering strategies. Surface modification can stabilize drug nanocrystals, making them suitable for versatile drug delivery platforms.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMicrotubules are highly dynamic structures, and their dynamic instability is indispensable for not only cell growth and movement, but also stress responses, such as endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress. Docetaxel, a microtubule targeting agent (MTA), is the first-line drug for cancer treatment by simultaneously promoting microtubule dysregulation- and ER stress-induced cell death. However, it also causes adverse effects and drug resistance, especially in triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) with a poor prognosis and high mortality rate.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFluorescent probes are essential for optical imaging and have been extensively employed for precise cancer diagnosis studies. β-galactosidase (β-gal) serves as a primary biomarker for ovarian cancer and has been utilized to develop imaging probes for accurate tumor diagnosis. However, traditional small molecular probes have limitations in terms of rapid diffusion and metabolic clearance from the target lesion, resulting in a short imaging window and compromised tumor-to-background ratios (TBR).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFGlioblastoma multiforme (GBM) is the most aggressive brain tumor. There is a pressing need to develop novel treatment strategies due to the poor targeting effect of current therapeutics. Here, a gold cluster coated with optimized GBM-targeting peptide is engineered, namely NA.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFACS Appl Mater Interfaces
October 2024
The precise localization of metastatic tumors with subtle growth is crucial for timely intervention and improvement of tumor prognosis but remains a paramount challenging. To date, site-specific activation of fluorogenic probes for single-stimulus-based diagnosis typically targets an occult molecular event in a complex biosystem with limited specificity. Herein, we propose a highly specific site-specific cascade-activated strategy to enhance detection accuracy, aiming to achieve the accurate detection of breast cancer (BC) lung metastasis in a cascade manner.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTo date, earlier diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is still challenging. Recent studies revealed the elevated expression of connective tissue growth factor (CTGF) in AD brain is an upstream regulator of amyloid-beta (Aβ) plaque, thus CTGF could be an earlier diagnostic biomarker of AD than Aβ plaque. Herein, we develop a peptide-coated gold nanocluster that specifically targets CTGF with high affinity (KD ~ 21.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFActivatable near-infrared (NIR) fluorogenic probes offer a potent tool for real-time, in situ detection of hepatic biomarkers, significantly advancing the precision in diagnosing inflammatory liver disease (ILD). However, the limited distribution of small molecule fluorogenic probes in the liver and their rapid clearance impair the accuracy of fluorescence imaging and in ILD diagnosis. In this study, an effective utilization of ionizable lipid nanoparticles (iLNPs) is presented as liver-targeted carriers for efficient delivery of fluorogenic probes, aiming to overcome biodistribution barriers and achieve accurate detection of hepatic biomarkers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFActivatable near-infrared (NIR) fluorescent probes possess advantages of high selectivity, sensitivity, and deep imaging depth, holding great potential in the early diagnosis and prognosis assessment of tumors. However, small-molecule fluorescent probes are largely limited due to the rapid diffusion and metabolic clearance of activated fluorophores . Herein, we propose an efficient and reproducible novel strategy to construct activatable fluorescent nanoprobes through bioorthogonal reactions and the strong gold-sulfur (Au-S) interactions to achieve an enhanced permeability and retention (EPR) effect, thereby achieving prolonged and high-contrast tumor imaging .
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPeptide-protected gold nanoclusters (AuNCs), possessing exceptional biocompatibility and remarkable physicochemical properties, have demonstrated intrinsic pharmaceutical activity in immunomodulation, making them a highly attractive frontier in the field of nanomedicine exploration. Autoimmune hepatitis (AIH) is a serious autoimmune liver disease caused by the disruption of immune balance, for which effective treatment options are still lacking. In this study, we initially identified glutathione (GSH)-protected AuNCs as a promising nanodrug candidate for AIH alleviating in a Concanavalin A (Con A)-induced mice model.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFN-Methyladenosine (mA) stands out as the predominant internal modification in mammalian RNA, exerting crucial regulatory functions in the metabolism of mRNA. Currently available methods have been limited by an inability to quantify mA modification at precise sites. In this work, we screened a Bst 2.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFExploration (Beijing)
October 2023
Gliomas are histologically and genetically heterogeneous tumors. However, classical histopathological typing often ignores the high heterogeneity of tumors and thus cannot meet the requirements of precise pathological diagnosis. Here, proximity-anchored in situ spectral coding amplification (ProxISCA) is proposed for multiplexed imaging of RNA mutations, enabling visual typing of brain gliomas with different pathological grades at the single-cell and tissue levels.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is one of the main factors leading to colitis-associated colorectal cancer (CAC). Therefore, it is critical to develop an effective treatment for IBD to prevent secondary colorectal carcinogenesis. M2 macrophages play crucial roles in the resolution phase of intestinal inflammation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Prenatal maternal psychological distress (PMPD) is a known risk factor for adverse birth outcomes. N6-methyladenosine RNA (m6A) methylation is crucial in moderating RNA biology. This study aimed to evaluate the relationships between PMPD, birth outcomes, and placental m6A methylation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBio-electrochemical systems (BESs) have attracted wide attention in the field of wastewater treatment owing to their fast electron transfer rate and high performance. Unfortunately, the low electro-chemical activity of carbonaceous materials commonly used in BESs remains a bottleneck for their practical applications. Especially, for refractory pollutants remediation, the efficiency is largely limited by the cathode property in term of (bio)-electrochemical reduction of highly oxidized functional groups.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFis overexpressed in various tumor cells and plays a key role in tumor genesis, invasion, and metastasis. Therefore, it is of great significance to precisely detect the level in cells via a simple method. For this purpose, we have constructed a peptide-coated platinum (Pt) cluster.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFImmune-mediated skin diseases have a high prevalence and seriously affect patients' quality of life. Gold compounds have been considered promising therapeutic agents in dermatology, but the high incidence of adverse reactions have limited their clinical application. There is a great need to develop more effective and less toxic gold-based drugs.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEarly diagnosis of hepatic inflammation is the key to timely treatment and avoid the worsening of liver inflammation. Near-infrared fluorescence (NIRF) probes have high sensitivity but low spatial resolution in lesion imaging, while photoacoustic (PA) imaging has good spatial location information. Therefore, the development of a NIRF/PA dual-modal probe integrated with high sensitivity and spatial location feedback can achieve an accurate early diagnosis of hepatic inflammation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIdentifying effective reversal agents overcoming multidrug resistance with causal mechanisms from an efflux pump protein is of vital importance for enhanced tumor chemotherapy in clinic. To achieve this end, we construct a metal cluster-based probe, named clusterbody, to develop flow sorting-assisted single-cell mass spectrometry analysis. This clusterbody synthesized by biomimetic mineralization possesses an antibody-like property to selectively recognize an efflux pump protein.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFActivated B cell-like diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (ABC-DLBCL) is the most aggressive form of DLBCL, with a significantly inferior prognosis due to resistance to the standard R-CHOP immunochemotherapy. Survival of ABC-DLBCL cells addicted to the constitutive activations of both canonical and noncanonical NF-κB signaling makes them attractive therapeutic targets. However, a pharmaceutical approach simultaneously targeting the canonical and noncanonical NF-κB pathway in the ABC-DLBCL cell is still lacking.
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