Newly Emerging Strategies in Antiviral Drug Discovery: Dedicated to Prof. Dr. Erik De Clercq on Occasion of His 80th Anniversary

Viral infections pose a persistent threat to human health. The relentless epidemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has become a global health problem, with millions of infections and fatalities so far. Traditional approaches such as random screening and optimization of lead compounds by organic synthesis have become extremely resource- and time-consuming. Various modern innovative methods or integrated paradigms are now being applied to drug discovery for significant resistance in order to simplify the drug process. This review provides an overview of newly emerging antiviral strategies, including proteolysis targeting chimera (PROTAC), ribonuclease targeting chimera (RIBOTAC), targeted covalent inhibitors, topology-matching design and antiviral drug delivery system. This article is dedicated to Prof. Dr. Erik De Clercq, an internationally renowned expert in the antiviral drug research field, on the occasion of his 80th anniversary.     

Numerical approach for generic three-phase flow based on cut-cell and ghost fluid methods

In this paper, we introduce numerical methods that can simulate complex multiphase flows. The finite volume method, applying Cartesian cut-cell is used in the computational domain, containing fluid and solid, to conserve mass and momentum. With this method, flows in and around any geometry can be simulated without complex and time consuming meshing. For the fluid region, which involves liquid and gas, the ghost fluid method is employed to handle the stiffness of the interface discontinuity problem. The interaction between each phase is treated simply by wall function models or jump conditions of pressure, velocity and shear stress at the interface. The sharp interface method “coupled level set (LS) and volume of fluid (VOF)” is used to represent the interface between the two fluid phases. This approach will combine some advantages of both interface tracking/capturing methods, such as the excellent mass conservation from the VOF method and good accuracy of interface normal computation from the LS function. The first coupled LS and VOF will be generated to reconstruct the interface between solid and the other materials. The second will represent the interface between liquid and gas.     

Target Design of Novel Histone Deacetylase 6 Selective Inhibitors with 2-Mercaptoquinazolinone as the Cap Moiety

Epigenetic alterations found in all human cancers are promising targets for anticancer therapy. In this sense, histone deacetylase inhibitors (HDACIs) are interesting anticancer agents that play an important role in the epigenetic regulation of cancer cells. Here, we report 15 novel hydroxamic acid-based histone deacetylase inhibitors with quinazolinone core structures. Five compounds exhibited antiproliferative activity with IC₅₀ values of 3.4–37.8 µM. Compound 8 with a 2-mercaptoquinazolinone cap moiety displayed the highest antiproliferative efficacy against MCF-7 cells. For the HDAC6 target selectivity study, compound 8 displayed an IC₅₀ value of 2.3 µM, which is 29.3 times higher than those of HDAC3, HDAC4, HDAC8, and HDAC11. Western blot assay proved that compound 8 strongly inhibited tubulin acetylation, a substrate of HDAC6. Compound 8 also displayed stronger inhibition activity against HDAC11 than the control drug Belinostat. The inhibitory mechanism of action of compound 8 on HDAC enzymes was then explored using molecular docking study. The data revealed a high binding affinity (−7.92 kcal/mol) of compound 8 toward HDAC6. In addition, dock pose analysis also proved that compound 8 might serve as a potent inhibitor of HDAC11.     

Lanthanide (III) addition of [Mo2O3S(HNTA)2] (Ln=Eu, Dy)

The reactions of LnCl₃·6H₂O (Ln=Eu or Dy) and Na₂[Mo₂O₃S(HNTA)₂]·6H₂O afford Na[Mo₂O₃S(HNTA)₂]₂·Eu(H₂O)₉·3H₂O (1) (NTA=nitrilotriacetate) and Na{(H₂O)₆Dy[Mo₂O₃S(HNTA)₂]₂}·7.5H₂O (2), respectively. The [Mo₂O₃S(HNTA)₂]²⁻ cluster units of 1 are interconnected by Na⁺ into a 3-D open framework with rutile topology templated by . The coordination of [Mo₂O₃S(HNTA)₂]²⁻ to the slightly smaller Dy³⁺ ion of greater ionic potential as a consequence of lanthanide contraction has been observed to form the pentanuclear heterometallic {Dy(H₂O)₆[Mo₂O₃S(HNTA)₂]₂}⁻, which is linked by Na⁺ and hydrogen bonds between the protonated carboxylate groups into a 3-D supramolecular framework. The weak antiferromagnetic interactions between the Dy³⁺ ions of 2 have been observed.     

高分散Ru/FeOx催化剂在二氧化碳选择加氢反应中的应用及其催化活性的调控

由于化石能源的大量开采和利用造成CO2过度排放,从而导致严重的温室效应和气候环境问题,给人类生存带来极大威胁.CO2选择加氢反应可以将CO2催化加氢生成高附加值的CO产物.与其他的CO2转化反应策略相比,该过程中H2的消耗更少,成为可有效处理及转化CO2的手段之一.同时,应尽可能抑制CO2深度加氢以及甲烷的产生,研制及设计具有高CO选择性的新型高效催化剂及其构效关系的分析仍十分重要.据报道,负载型贵金属基催化剂的使用有利于H2分子的活化,具有优异的催化活性,因而广泛应用于多种催化反应中.然而,贵金属催化剂实现工业应用的最大挑战是资源的限制及其高额的成本.近年来,由贵金属制备的负载型亚纳米团簇受到广泛关注,主要包括如Au,Pt,Pd,Ru等贵金属,可有效应用于多相催化反应.人们还致力于提高负载型亚纳米团簇的分散度,促进催化剂活性位点的有效暴露,有利于大幅度提高催化剂的有效利用率.本文采用共沉淀法成功制备了超高分散的负载型Ru基催化剂,通过CO2选择加氢-程序升温表面反应(TPSR)和质谱联用技术测试了催化剂性能,发现CO2加氢反应生成CO选择性达100%.采用XRD,BET和TEM等方法对催化剂结构进行表征,并结合H2-TPR,H2-TPD和XPS等表征结果深入探讨了催化剂构效关系,并提出了针对该催化剂体系较为合理的反应模型.在CO2选择加氢反应的催化性能测试中,2.50%Ru/FeOx催化剂对目标产物CO选择性仅为41%; 随着Ru负载量降低至0.25%和0.1%时,CO选择性明显提高至80%; 当进一步降低Ru含量至0.01%时,CO选择性接近100%,且表现出优异的反应速率.在360 oC时,0.01%Ru/FeOx催化剂的相对反应速率为7.71 molCO2molRu-1 min-1,是2.50%Ru/FeOx催化剂相对反应速率的154倍.H2-TPR结果表明,贵金属Ru可以明显促进载体FeOx的还原,并产生丰富的氧空位,进而促进CO2的吸附、活化.而且CO2选择加氢TPSR结果显示,目标产物CO的起始生成温度总是滞后于原料H2的初始活化温度,与H2-TPR结果及文献报道的CO2选择加氢反应机理一致.通过H2-TPD深入理解H2在催化剂表面的活化和氢溢流现象,以及Hads与不同催化剂之间的相互作用力,0.01%Ru/FeOx催化剂相对较高的H2脱附峰温度表明,该样品中Ru与Hads具有极强的相互作用力,相对抑制了Hads与COads深入加氢生成CH4,从而提高了CO选择性,而2.50%Ru/FeOx催化剂的情况则与此相反.本文提出了从Hads吸附作用力强弱来考虑CO2选择加氢反应选择性的新思路,同时为设计CO2选择加氢制高附加值CO的高催化反应速率、高CO选择性的高分散Ru基催化剂提供了一种经济简易的催化剂设计思路.     

Stable Zinc-Based Metal-Organic Framework Photocatalyst for Effective Visible-Light-Driven Hydrogen Production

Herein, a new Zn-MOF material, [Zn(L1)(L2)], 1, was built successfully through a one-pot solvothermal method. The 3D MOF structure was determined by Single X-ray diffraction analysis, IR, and elemental analysis. A series of PXRD tests of 1 after being immersed in different solvents and pH solutions demonstrated the good stability of 1. Interestingly, this material displayed high catalytic activity for the visible-light-driven hydrogen generation under the illumination of white LED in pure water or a mixture of DMF and H₂O without additional photosensitizers and cocatalysts. Besides, the studies also showed that the catalytic activity changed constantly as well as the solvent ratio adjustment of DMF and H₂O from 4:6 to 2:8. Additionally, the catalytic activity reached the best value (743 μmol g⁻¹ h⁻¹) when the solvent ratio was 4:6. The heterogeneous nature and recyclability of the MOF catalyst, as well as several factors that affect the catalytic activity, were investigated and described in detail. Moreover, the photocatalytic mechanism for the hydrogen generation of 1 was also proposed based on the fluorescence spectra and UV-vis absorption.     

Globally solving a nonlinear UAV task assignment problem by stochastic and deterministic optimization approaches

In this paper, we consider a task allocation model that consists of assigning a set of m unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to a set of n tasks in an optimal way. The optimality is quantified by target scores. The mission is to maximize the target score while satisfying capacity constraints of both the UAVs and the tasks. This problem is known to be NP-hard. Existing algorithms are not suitable for the large scale setting. Scalability and robustness are recognized as two main issues. We deal with these issues by two optimization approaches. The first approach is the Cross-Entropy (CE) method, a generic and practical tool of stochastic optimization for solving NP-hard problem. The second one is Branch and Bound algorithm, an efficient classical tool of global deterministic optimization. The numerical results show the efficiency of our approaches, in particular the CE method for very large scale setting.