NJC Blog

This month’s outside cover illustrates an article by Prof. Richard Keene (James Cook University, Australia) and co-workers in which they report important observations in the development of multinuclear ruthenium complexes as a new class of anticancer agents.

There has been little success in developing drugs that are active in cancer cell lines resistant to cisplatin. Consequently, there was a need in developing “non-classical” platinum complexes – complexes that can bind DNA differently than cisplatin and its analogues. Thus, multinuclear platinum complexes, where two or more platinum coordination units are linked by a variety of organic ligand bridges, represent a genuinely new class of anticancer drug.

This study shows that it should be possible to optimize cellular uptake and the kinetics of DNA binding, and thereby produce dinuclear ruthenium(II) complexes with significant clinical potential.

Multinuclear ruthenium(II) complexes as anticancer agents
Anil K. Gorle, Alaina J. Ammit, Lynne Wallace, F. Richard Keene and J. Grant Collins.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 4049-4059. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00545G.
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Also discover the four Letters comprising this issue:

• Ruthenium supported on MIL-101 as an efficient catalyst for hydrogen generation from hydrolysis of amine boranes

Nan Cao, Teng Liu, Jun Su, Xiaojun Wu, Wei Luo and Gongzhen Cheng.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 4032-4035. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00739E.

• Graphene-wrapped single-crystalline Fe3O4 nanorods with superior lithium-storage capabilities

Jinwei Yin, Huimin Shi, Ping Wu, Qingyun Zhu, Hui Wang, Yawen Tang, Yiming Zhou and Tianhong Lu.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 4036-4040. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00767K.

• A surfactant-free co-assembly route to fabricate 2D TiO2–WO3 composite inverse opal films for photochromic applications

Hongyu Zhen and Kan Li.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 4041-4044. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00768A.

• Facilely constructing 3D porous NiCo2S4 nanonetworks for high-performance supercapacitors

Yang Liu, Jianan Zhang, Shoupei Wang, Kaixi Wang, Zhimin Chen and Qun Xu.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 4045-4048. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00816B.

Access the full issue here.

This month’s issue begins with a Focus article by Dr Fuwei Li (Lanzhou Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences) and co-workers in which the authors review reactions that introduce carbonyl groups into unactivated heterocycles. They highlight that various heterocycles could be utilized as simple starting materials to generate carbonyl group containing target molecules.

Carbonylative diversification of unactivated heteroaromatic compounds
Rui Lang, Chungu Xia and Fuwei Li.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 2732-2738. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00099D.

This month’s front cover illustrates the Letter by Dr Soumen Basak (Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, India) and co-workers who report an elegant, facile and green protocol for designing dendrimer-like assemblies of multicolor fluorophore-labeled peptides grafted on gold nanoparticles.

According to the authors, multicolour fluorescent labeling of both intra- and extracellular structures is a powerful technique for simultaneous monitoring of multiple complex biochemical processes. These multi-functional nanoparticles have shown great promise as new probes for biomedical imaging and carriers in drug delivery.

A multicolor fluorescent peptide–nanoparticle scaffold: real time uptake and distribution in neuronal cells
Kallol Bera, Shounak Baksi, Moupriya Nag, Subhas Chandra Bera, Debashis Mukhopadhyay and Soumen Basak.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 2739-2743. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00265B.

The inside cover was designed by Dr Leigh Loots (University of Stellenbosch, South Africa).

Dr Loots and her colleagues demonstrated that the synthesis of novel pyridinium zwitterionic compounds show a great potential as a new class of supramolecular building blocks for the formation of ionic as well as metal-organic frameworks.

Synthesis and solid-state supramolecular chemistry of a series of pyridinium-derived zwitterions
Leigh Loots, Delia A. Haynes and Tanya le Roex.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 2778-2786. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00281D.

Read the full issue here

This month’s front cover illustrates the article by Dr Andrew Hunt (University of York, UK) and co-workers. The authors’ work demonstrated that microwave assisted extraction is an efficient green technology for the recovery of D-limonene from orange waste.

The study details the microwave assisted extraction (MAE) of D-limonene from oranges and focuses on understanding the MAE mechanism based on kinetic analysis of the process.

It was shown that microwave radiation favourably interacts with the sample during extraction, causing simultaneous cell rupture and diffusion and resulting in a greater yield. These results provide an important insight into the development of extraction processes for orange peel.

Microwave assisted extraction as an important technology for valorising orange waste
Thomas M. Attard , Baillie Watterson , Vitaliy L. Budarin , James H. Clark and Andrew J. Hunt.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 2278–2283. DOI: 10.1039/C4NJ00043A.

The inside cover was designed by Prof. Zofia Urbanczyk-Lipkowska (Polish Academy of Sciences). In their perspective, Zofia and her colleague Marta Sowinska wanted to provide insight into currently available synthetic methods that yield dendrimers with various morphologies, placing emphasis on the evaluation of their advantages and limitations.

The review outlines the spectacular benefits of recent applications of several novel approaches to the synthesis of dendrimers. In particular, accelerated methods and click chemistry have opened new alternative ways to obtain the high generation, defect-free dendrimeric molecules with high efficacy that was previously unreachable.

Advances in the chemistry of dendrimers
Marta Sowinska and Zofia Urbanczyk-Lipkowska.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 2168–2203. DOI: 10.1039/C3NJ01239E.

Access the full issue here.

An article by Shiguo Sun (Northwest A&F University, China) and co-workers features on this month’s front cover. In their work, the authors of this paper employed the host–guest chemistry between CB[8] and acridine orange to investigate its interaction with DNA/RNA.

The results highlighted that the host–guest chemistry of CB[8] provides a convenient and efficient way to solve the autofluorescence problem of the tricyclic basic dyes, and that the method can be employed to fluorescence discriminate DNA from RNA and quantitatively detect trace levels of DNA.

Discrimination of DNA from RNA with the host–guest complexes of tricyclic basic dyes and cucurbit[8]uril
Fusheng Li, Yongqian Xu, Hongjuan Li, Chaoxia Wang, Aiping Lu and Shiguo Sun.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 1396–1400. DOI: 10.1039/C3NJ01178J.

The inside cover was designed by Magda Blosi (Institute of Science and Technology for Ceramics, Italy). In their paper, Dr Blosi and her colleagues focused on developing a green synthesis process for the production of PVP-coated noble metal nanoparticles in the form of stable nanosols.

The focus on the colloidal stability together with the eco-friendly method represents a key point in view of a large-scale production. In fact, dealing with nanoparticles in form of suspensions represents an essential goal both from a safety point of view and for the subsequent process steps.

According to them, the synthesis versatility and the strong variation of the catalytic activity detected for different metals, make this process very promising for the production of bimetallic nanostructures enabling synergistic effects.

Green and easily scalable microwave synthesis of noble metal nanosols (Au, Ag, Cu, Pd) usable as catalysts
M. Blosi, S. Albonetti, S. Ortelli, A. L. Costa, L. Ortolani and M. Dondi.
New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 1401-1409. DOI: 10.1039/C3NJ00894K.

Read all 59 articles in this month’s issue here.

by Cynthia Challencin, Publishing Assistant

The March issue outside front cover was designed by Jonathan Steed (Durham University), former NJC Associate Editor, and Jonathan Foster (University of Cambridge). The two authors and co-workers wrote a paper dealing with supramolecular gelators with different fibre morphologies used as templates to form mesoporous covalent polymers with different pore shapes. These materials have found use in applications such as filtration, storage, catalysis, cell growth, drug delivery and as rewritable materials.

Using gel morphology to control pore shape by Jonathan A. Foster, David W. Johnson, Mark-Oliver M. Pipenbrock and Jonathan W. Steed, New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 927-932. DOI: 10.1039/C3NJ01295F.

In their article, Seiya Kobatake, who designed the inside front cover, and his colleagues report on photochemical and thermal reaction behavior of thiophene-S,S-dioxidized diarylethenes having various alkyl groups at the reactive positions. Their results provide the new strategy for molecular design to make the molecules showing light-starting irreversible thermosensors.

Alkyl substituent effects in photochemical and thermal reactions of photochromic thiophene-S,S-dioxidized diarylethenes by Hiroaki Shoji, Daichi Kitagawa and Seiya Kobatake, New J. Chem., 2014, 38, 933-941. DOI: 10.1039/C3NJ01246H.

Do not hesitate to read the whole issue available online at: NJC 2014, issue 3