Proton conduction in metal-organic frameworks and related modularly built porous solids.

Proton-conducting materials are an important component of fuel cells. Development of new types of proton-conducting materials is one of the most important issues in fuel-cell technology. Herein, we present newly developed proton-conducting materials, modularly built porous solids, including coordination polymers (CPs) or metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). The designable and tunable nature of the porous materials allows for fast development in this research field. Design and synthesis of the new types of proton-conducting materials and their unique proton-conduction properties are discussed.

Cucurbituril-based nanoparticles: a new efficient vehicle for targeted intracellular delivery of hydrophobic drugs.

Cucurbituril-based nanoparticles (CB[6]NPs) serve as new efficient vehicles for delivery of hydrophobic drugs, which have unique features including (1) a high drug loading capacity and efficiency, (2) noncovalently tunable surfaces, (3) efficient delivery of hydrophobic drugs into a cancer cell by receptor-mediated endocytosis, and (4) facile release of drugs into cytoplasm, which enhances the pharmaceutical effects of the drugs.

Solid lithium electrolytes based on an organic molecular porous solid.

A new type of solid lithium-ion conducting electrolytes prepared by incorporation of Li(+) ions into a cucurbit[6]uril (CB[6])-based organic molecular porous solid shows high Li(+) ion conductivity (∼10(-4) S cm(-1)) and mobility (transference numbers, tLi(+) = 0.7-0.8). In addition, the solid electrolytes show excellent, thermally stable performance even after several temperature cycles.

Enantioselective sorption of alcohols in a homochiral metal-organic framework.

Single-crystal X-ray diffraction study reveals the host-guest interactions between a homochiral metal-organic framework and two enantiomers of a chiral alcohol providing the key driving force for the enantioselective sorption of alcohols in the framework.

Porous carbon materials with a controllable surface area synthesized from metal-organic frameworks.

Carbonization of zinc containing metal-organic frameworks produces porous carbon materials with an interesting linear relationship between the Zn/C ratio of the precursors and the surface area of the resulting carbon materials.

Supramolecular fishing for plasma membrane proteins using an ultrastable synthetic host-guest binding pair.

Membrane proteomics, the large-scale global analysis of membrane proteins, is often constrained by the efficiency of separating and extracting membrane proteins. Recent approaches involve conjugating membrane proteins with the small molecule biotin and using the receptor streptavidin to extract the labelled proteins. Despite the many advantages of this method, several shortcomings remain, including potential contamination by endogenously biotinylated molecules and interference by streptavidin during analytical stages. Here, we report a supramolecular fishing method for membrane proteins using the synthetic receptor-ligand pair cucurbit[7]uril-1-trimethylammoniomethylferrocene (CB[7]-AFc). CB[7]-conjugated beads selectively capture AFc-labelled proteins from heterogeneous protein mixtures, and AFc-labelling of cells results in the efficient capture of membrane proteins by these beads. The captured proteins can be recovered easily at room temperature by treatment with a strong competitor such as 1,1'-bis(trimethylammoniomethyl)ferrocene. This synthetic but biocompatible host-guest system may be a useful alternative to streptavidin-biotin for membrane proteomics as well as other biological and biotechnological applications.