Engineering Multishelled Nanostructures Enables Stepwise Self-Degradability for Drug-Release Optimization.

The balance between degradability and drug release kinetics is a major challenge for the development of drug delivery systems. Here we develop hierarchically structured nanoparticles comprising multiple noncontact silica shells using an amorphous calcium carbonate template. The system could be degraded in a sequential fashion on account of the molecularly engineered multishelled structures. The hydrolysis rate of drug-containing cores is inversely correlated with the nanoparticle concentration due to the shielding effect of the hierarchical nanostructure and could be exploited to regulate the release kinetics. Specifically, multishelled nanospheres show a low drug release rate with high doses that increases steadily as the concentration decreases due to continuous degradation, thus stabilizing the local drug concentration for effective tumor therapy. Moreover, the nanoparticles could be eventually degraded completely, which may reduce their health risks. This kind of hierarchically structured silica-based nanoparticle could serve as a sustainable drug depot and provides a new avenue for tumor treatment.

Amorphous Calcium Carbonate Cluster Nanospheres in Water-Deficient Organic Solvents.

As the key intermediate phase of crystalline calcium carbonate biominerals, amorphous calcium carbonate (ACC) remains mysterious in its structures because of its long-range disorder and instability. We herein report the synthesis of ACC nanospheres in a water-deficient organic solvent system. The obtained ACC nanospheres are very stable under dry conditions. Cryo-TEM reveals that each nanospheres consists of smaller nanosized clusters. We further demonstrate that these clusters can precipitate on other substrates to form an ultrathin ACC coating, which should be an ACC cluster monolayer. The results demonstrate that the presence of small ACC clusters as the subunits of larger aggregates is inherent to ACC synthesized in water-alcohol system but not induced by polymer additives.

Global status and trends of metabolomics in diabetes: A literature visualization knowledge graph study.

BACKGROUND: Diabetes is a metabolic disease characterized by hyperglycemia, which has increased the global medical burden and is also the main cause of death in most countries. AIM: To understand the knowledge structure of global development status, research focus, and future trend of the relationship between diabetes and metabolomics in the past 20 years. METHODS: The articles about the relationship between diabetes and metabolomics in the Web of Science Core Collection were retrieved from 2002 to October 23, 2023, and the relevant information was analyzed using CiteSpace6.2.2R (CiteSpace), VOSviewer6.1.18 (VOSviewer), and Bibliometrix software under R language. RESULTS: A total of 3123 publications were included from 2002 to 2022. In the past two decades, the number of publications and citations in this field has continued to increase. The United States, China, Germany, the United Kingdom, and other relevant funds, institutions, and authors have significantly contributed to this field. Scientific Reports and PLoS One are the journals with the most publications and the most citations. Through keyword co-occurrence and cluster analysis, the closely related keywords are "insulin resistance", "risk", "obesity", "oxidative stress", "metabolomics", "metabolites" and "biomarkers". Keyword clustering included cardiovascular disease, gut microbiota, metabonomics, diabetic nephropathy, molecular docking, gestational diabetes mellitus, oxidative stress, and insulin resistance. Burst detection analysis of keyword depicted that "Gene", "microbiota", "validation", "kidney disease", "antioxidant activity", "untargeted metabolomics", "management", and "accumulation" are knowledge frontiers in recent years. CONCLUSION: The relationship between metabolomics and diabetes is receiving extensive attention. Diabetic nephropathy, diabetic cardiovascular disease, and kidney disease are key diseases for future research in this field. Gut microbiota, molecular docking, and untargeted metabolomics are key research directions in the future. Antioxidant activity, gene, validation, mass spectrometry, management, and accumulation are at the forefront of knowledge frontiers in this field.