The Progress and Outlook of Metal Single-Atom-Site Catalysis.

Single-atom-site catalysts (SASCs) featuring maximized atom utilization and isolated active sites have progressed tremendously in recent years as a highly prosperous branch of catalysis research. Varieties of SASCs have been developed that show excellent performance in many catalytic applications. The major goal of SASC research is to establish feasible synthetic strategies for the preparation of high-performance catalysts, to achieve an in-depth understanding of the active-site structures and catalytic mechanisms, and to develop practical catalysts with industrial value. This Perspective describes the up-to-date development of SASCs and related catalysts, such as dual-atom-site catalysts (DASCs) and nano-single-atom-site catalysts (NSASCs), analyzes the current challenges encountered by these catalysts for industrial applications, and proposes their possible future development path.

Photothermal combined gene therapy achieved by polyethyleneimine-grafted oxidized mesoporous carbon nanospheres.

Combining controllable photothermal therapy and efficacious gene therapy in a single platform holds great promise in cancer therapy due to the enhanced combined therapeutic effects. Herein, polyethyleneimine-grafted oxidized mesoporous carbon nanospheres (OP) were developed for combined photothermal combined gene therapy in vitro and in vivo. The synthesized OP was characterized to have three dimensional spherical structure with uniformed diameter, ordered mesopores with graphitic domains, high water dispersion with zeta potential of +22 mV, and good biocompatibility. Consequently, OP was exploited as the photothermal convertor with strong NIR absorption and the gene vector via electrostatic interaction, which therefore cannot only deliver the therapeutic gene (pING4) to tumors for gene therapy, but also can eliminate the tumors by photothermal ablation. Moreover, the improved gene therapy accompanied by the NIR photothermally enhanced gene release was also well achieved based on OP. The excellent combined therapeutic effects demonstrated in vitro and in vivo suggested the OP's potential for cancer therapy.