Correction: Click activated protodrugs against cancer increase the therapeutic potential of chemotherapy through local capture and activation

Correction for ‘Click activated protodrugs against cancer increase the therapeutic potential of chemotherapy through local capture and activation’ by Kui Wu et al., Chem. Sci., 2021, 12, 1259–1271, DOI: 10.1039/D0SC06099B.

The authors regret that the reference to the bond-breaking bioorthogonal chemistry, termed ‘click-to-release’ was omitted from the original article. In addition, we would like to include a reference describing the synthesis of compound 1, which is an intermediate to the protodrugs described in the original article. These references are listed below as ref. 1 and 2.The Royal Society of Chemistry apologizes for these errors and any consequent inconvenience to authors and readers.     

Synthesis of 4-Dicyclohexylaminomethyl Antipyrine and Its Metal Complexes: Spectral Characterization and Evaluation of Thermodynamic Parameters

Complexes of Fe(III), Co(II), Ni(II), and Cu(II) with 4-dicyclohexylaminomethyl antipyrine (DCHAMA, L) were prepared and characterized by elemental and chemical analyses, IR, electronic absorption, ¹H NMR and EPR spectroscopies, thermal analysis, and magnetic susceptibility measurements. The stoichiometry of the complexes was found to be MLX₂, MLX₃, or MLX₂(H₂O)₂ where X = Cl or NO₃. The ligand exhibits a bidentate mode of coordination. Thermal analysis of the chloro complexes shows a three stage decomposition pattern for the Cu(II) complex and a two stage decomposition pattern for Fe(III) and Co(II) complexes to yield the respective metal oxides as the end product. Kinetic and thermodynamic parameters such as n, E _a, H ^#, S ^#, and G ^# were calculated using Coats–Redfern and Madhusudhanan–Krishnan–Ninan integral methods. The coordination number of the metal atom is found to influence the thermal stability of the complexes. The antimicrobial screening shows that the four-coordinated complexes are more active than the five- and six-coordinated ones and DCHAMA.     

BLEND MEMBRANES FOR DIRECT METHANOL AND PROTON EXCHANGE MEMBRANE FUEL CELLS

Sulphonated polystyrene ethylene butylene polystyrene(SPSEBS)prepared with 35%sulphonation was found to be highly elastic and enlarged up to 300%-400%of its initial length.It absorbed over 110%of water by weight.A major drawback of this membrane is its poor mechanical properties which are not adequate for use as polymer electrolytes in fuel cells.To overcome this,SPSEBS was blended with poly(vinylidene fluoride)(PVDF),a hydrophobic polymer.The blend membranes showed better mechanical properties than the base polymer.The effect of PVDF content on water uptake,ion exchange capacity and proton conductivity of the blend membranes was investigated.This paper presents the results of recent studies applied to develop an optimized in-house membrane electrode assembly(MEA)preparation technique combining catalyst ink spraying and assembly hot pressing.Easy steps were chosen in this preparation technique in order to simplify the method,aiming at cost reduction.The open circuit voltage for the cell with SPSEBS is 0.980 V which is higher compared to that of the cell with Nafion 117(0.790 V).From this study,it is concluded that a polymer electrolyte membrane suitable for proton exchange membrane fuel cell(PEMFC)and direct methanol fuel cell(DMFC)application can be obtained by blending SPSEBS and PVDF in appropriate proportions.The methanol permeability and selectivity showed a strong influence on DMFC performance.     

Growth and characterization of nonlinear optical material: l-alanine thiourea

The title compound of l-alanine thiourea, a semi organic material, has been grown from slow evaporation solution growth technique at room temperature. It is a potential material for nonlinear optical applications. The grown single crystals have been analyzed using powder X-ray diffraction. It belongs to monoclinic crystal system, and its lattice dimensions were determined. The presence of functional groups was identified from FTIR spectral analysis. The title compound has good optical transmission in the entire visible region. Thermal stability of the grown crystal was investigated by thermogravimetric and differential thermal analysis.     

Synthesis,antioxidant, and antimicrobial activity of 3-(1H-indole-3-carbonyl)-2H-chromen-2-ones

A simple and convenient method for the one-pot synthesis of 3-(1H-indole-3-carbonyl)-2H-chromen-2-one derivatives from the reaction of 3-cyanoacetyl indole and salicylaldehyde in the presence of Na₂CO₃ in water: methanol (1:1) is described. Wider substrate scope, high yields, operational simplicity, and simple purification process make the protocol highly applicable in the synthesis of 3-(1H-indole-3-carbonyl)-2H-chromen-2-ones. For the first time, in vitro antioxidant and antimicrobial activity was studied. Compounds 5e , 7a , and 7b exhibits good radical scavenging ability against DPPH free radical. Compounds 7b , 5f , and 5g possess lower EC₅₀ values than the Standards AA and BHA and thus proving their high reducing power. Compounds 5d and 5f show good antibacterial activity against gram-positive bacteria (MRSA) while compounds 5c , 7a , and 7b exhibits good antibacterial activity against Bacillus sp. Compounds 5b and 5e show good antibacterial activity against gram negative bacterial strains (Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae) and compounds 5g and 5h exhibits good antifungal activity against Candida albicans.     

FTIR SPECTRAL STUDIES OF THE BINARY SOLUTIONS OF ACETONE WITH XYLENE ISOMERS

Journal of Structural Chemistry - FTIR spectra of neat acetone (ACT), xylene isomers (o-xylene (OXY), m-xylene (MXY), and p-xylene (PXY)) and their binary solutions at various ACT molar...     

Self-assembled networks of ribbons in molecular hydrogels of cationic deoxycholic acid analogues

Aqueous gels derived from three cationic 24-nor 3,12-dihydroxy cholane (DC) derivatives with N-methyl-2-pyrrolidinone (NMP), N-methylmorpholine (NMM), and 1,4-diazabicyclo[2.2.2]octane (DABCO) at the side chain positions have been exhaustively characterized by small-angle neutron-scattering experiments. Although the molecular structures differ slightly by the heterocycle grafted to the steroid core, the derived gels exhibit a range of structural behaviors at the nanoscale that depart from those observed with simple deoxycholate systems. The NMM-DC aggregates are ribbons with a bimolecular thickness of t = 37 A and an anisotropy of the section b/a approximately 0.1. DABCO-DC exhibits a remarkable transition from ribbons (t = 29.5 A, b/a = 0.18) to thicker cylindrical fibers (R approximately 59 A), involving four original ribbons, upon a concentration increase. The NMP-DC system forms thick cylindrical fibers (R approximately 68 A) with steroid molecules organized in a specific morphology. Bilayered or interdigited structures are formed and favored by the presence of multiple polar interaction centers in the DC molecules. Secondary aggregation mechanisms are invoked in the formation of bundles having a lower cross-sectional anisotropic symmetry and exhibiting Bragg peaks corresponding to molecular length periodicities. The relations between the structural information and the rheological properties are discussed.     

Self-assembled nanoribbons and nanotubes in water: energetic vs entropic networks

We present a comparative investigation of two opposite classes of self-assembled fibrillar networks. Ribbons and tubes having cross-sectional dimensions in the nanoscale can be formed in aqueous solutions of steroids derived, respectively, from deoxycholic (DC) and lithocholic (LC) acids. Rheological features distinguish energetic networks of DC ribbons rigidly fixed in cylindrical bundles and entropic transient networks of LC tubes weakly interacting in shear-sensitive suspensions. The two classes are characterized by their frequency sweep profiles, viscoelastic linear domains, scaling laws of the elastic shear modulus vs concentration, kinetics of formation of the networks, and their optical birefringence aspects. A theoretical context for networks of rigid fibers is used to account for the scaling exponents α in the G’ (and σ*) ∝C ^α laws (α=2.0 and 1.0, respectively, for DC and LC). The evolution observed in DC gels from ribbons to cylindrical fibers with monodisperse sections made up with four ribbons is an indication of an equilibrated balance between face-to-face attractions and untwisting elastic processes of the constitutive ribbons.Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the European Society of Rheology, Grenoble, April 2005     

Dissecting Cooperative Communications in a Protein with a High‐Throughput Single‐Molecule Scalpel

Miscued communication often leads to misfolding and aggregation of the proteins involved in many diseases. Owing to the ensemble average property of conventional techniques, detailed communication diagrams are difficult to obtain. Mechanical unfolding affords an unprecedented perspective on cooperative transitions by observing a protein along a trajectory defined by two mutated cysteine residues. Nevertheless, this approach requires tedious sample preparation at the risk of altering native protein conformations. To address these issues, we applied click chemistry to tether a protein to the two dsDNA handles through primary amines in lysine residues as well as at the N terminus. As a proof of concept, we used laser tweezers to mechanically unfold and refold calmodulin along 36 trajectories, maximally allowed by this strategy in a single batch of protein preparation. Without a priori knowledge of the particular residues to which the double‐stranded DNA handles attach, we used hierarchical cluster analysis to identify 20 major trajectories, according to the size and the pattern of unfolding transitions. We dissected the cooperativity into all‐or‐none and partially cooperative events, which represent strong and weak high‐order interactions in proteins, respectively. Although the overall cooperativity is higher within the N or C lobe than that between the lobes, the all‐or‐none cooperativity is anisotropic among different the unfolding trajectories and becomes relatively more predominant when the size of the protein segments increases. The average cooperativity for all‐or‐none transitions falls within the expected range observed by ensemble techniques, which supports the hypothesis that unfolding of a free protein can be reconstituted from individual trajectories.