9,9-Dimethylxanthene Derivatives with Room-Temperature Phosphorescence: Substituent Effects and Emissive Properties.

Room-temperature phosphorescence (RTP) emitters with ultralong lifetimes are emerging as attractive targets because of their potential applications in bioimaging, security, and other areas. But their development is limited by ambiguous mechanisms and poor understanding of the correlation of the molecular structure and RTP properties. Herein, different substituents on the 9,9-dimethylxanthene core (XCO) result in compounds with RTP lifetimes ranging from 52 to 601 ms, which are tunable by intermolecular interactions and molecular configurations. XCO-PiCl shows the most persistent RTP because of its reduced steric bulk and multiple sites of the 1-chloro-2-methylpropan-2-yl (PiCl) moiety for forming intermolecular interactions in the aggregated state. The substituent effects reported provide an efficient molecular design of organic RTP materials and establishes relationships among molecular structures, intermolecular interactions, and RTP properties.

Trastuzumab-mediated selective delivery for platinum drug to HER2-positive breast cancer cells.

Oxaliplatin is used widely as an anticancer drug for clinical treatment. However, its applications are limited because of its poor selectivity. In this work, we described the design, synthesis, and characterization of conjugates combining trastuzumab with a platinum (IV) analog of oxaliplatin, in which the trastuzumab acted as an active targeting agent for HER2-positive cancer cells. Indirect enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and immunofluorescence study indicated the platinum (IV)-trastuzumab conjugates retained specific binding activity to HER2 overexpressed SK-BR-3 cells. In the presence of ascorbic acid, platinum (IV)-trastuzumab conjugates were reduced to platinum (II) analogs, which could bind to and unwind PUC19 DNA in a manner similar to oxaliplatin. The cytotoxic study was tested on three breast cell lines: SK-BR-3, MCF-7, and MDA-MB-231. Platinum (IV)-trastuzumab conjugates showed promising antiproliferative activity against SK-BR-3 cells, but significantly decreased the inhibition to MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7 cells. The flow cytometric analysis showed that the conjugates arrested the cell cycle mainly at the G2/M phase and killed the cells through an apoptotic pathway.

[(2-Pyrid-yl)methanol-κN,O]bis-(thio-cyanato-κN)manganese(II).

In the title complex, [Mn(NCS)(2)(C(6)H(7)NO)(2)], the Mn(II) atom shows site symmetry 2. The distorted octa-hedral environment of Mn(II) is defined by two N atoms [Mn-N = 2.217 (4) and 2.132 (5) Å] and one O atom [Mn-O 2.305 (4) Å]. There are inter-molecular O-H⋯S hydrogen bonds and inter-molecular π-π stacking inter-actions between adjacent (2-pyrid-yl)methano-late ligands [centroid-centroid distance = 3.5569 (7) Å], leading to a chain structure running along [100].

A human anti-c-Met Fab fragment conjugated with doxorubicin as targeted chemotherapy for hepatocellular carcinoma.

c-Met is over-expressed in hepatocellular carcinoma(HCC) but is absent or expressed at low levels in normal tissues. Therefore we generated a novel conjugate of a human anti-c-Met Fab fragment (MetFab) with doxorubicin (DOX) and assessed whether it had targeted antitumor activity against HCC and reduced the side-effects of DOX. The MetFab was screened from human phage library, conjugated with DOX via chemical synthesis, and the conjugation MetFab-DOX was confirmed by HPLC. The drug release patterns, the binding efficacy, and cellular distribution of MetFab-DOX were assessed. MetFab-DOX was stable at pH7.2 PBS while release doxorubicin quickly at pH4.0, the binding efficacy of MetFab-DOX was similarly as MetFab, and the cellular distribution of the MetFab-DOX is distinct from free DOX. The cytotoxicity of MetFab-DOX was analyzed by the MTT method and the nude mouse HCC model. The MetFab-DOX demonstrated cytotoxic effects on c-Met expressing-tumor cells, but not on the cells without c-Met expression. MetFab-DOX exerted anti-tumor effect and significantly reduced the side effect of free DOX in mice model. Furthermore, the localization of conjugate was confirmed by immunofluorescence staining of tumor tissue sections and optical tumor imaging, respectively, and the tissue-distribution of drug was compared between free DOX and MetFab-DOX treatment by spectrofluorometer. MetFab-DOX can localize to the tumor tissue, and the concentration of doxorubicin in the tumor was higher after MetFab-DOX administration than after DOX administration. In summary, MetFab-DOX can target c-Met expressing HCC cells effectively and have obvious antitumor activity with decreased side-effects in preclinical models of HCC.

Synthesis and characterization of novel amphiphilic copolymer stearic acid-coupled F127 nanoparticles for nano-technology based drug delivery system.

Pluronic, F127, amphiphilic block copolymers, are used for several applications, including drug delivery systems. The critical micelle concentration (CMC) of F127 is about 0.26-0.8 wt% so that the utility of F127 in nano-technology based drug delivery system is limited since the nano-sized micelles could dissociate upon dilution. Herein, stearic acid (SA) was simply coupled to F127 between the carboxyl group of SA and the hydroxyl group of F127, which formed a novel copolymer named as SA-coupled F127, with significantly lower CMC. Above the CMC 6.9 × 10(-5)wt%, SA-coupled F127 self-assembled stable nanoparticles with Zeta potential -36 mV. Doxorubicin (DOX)-loaded nanoparticles were made, with drug loading (DL) 5.7 wt% and Zeta potential -36 to -39 mV, and the nanoparticles exhibited distinct shape with the size distribution from 20 to 50 nm. DOX-loaded nanoparticles were relatively stable and exhibited DOX dependant cytotoxicity toward MCF-7 cells in vitro. These results suggest that SA-coupled F127 potentially could be applied as a nano-technology based drug delivery method.