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Stimuli-Responsive Molecules for Biological Applications
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Stimuli-Responsive Molecules for Biological Applications

A special issue of Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049). This special issue belongs to the section "Photochemistry".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 June 2022) | Viewed by 11150

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Wen Sun

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
State Key Laboratory of Fine Chemicals, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116023, China
Interests: photoresponsive polymers; drug delivery nanoparticles; biological gel
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Dan Shao

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Medicine, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, China
Interests: bioactive materials; nanomedicine; inflammation; biomimetic materials
Dr. Fabiao Yu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Institute of Functional Materials and Molecular Imaging, Key Laboratory of Emergency and Trauma, Ministry of Education, The First Affiliated Hospital of Hainan Medical University, College of Emergency and Trauma, Hainan Medical University, Haikou 571199, China
Interests: fluorescence and raman analysis; functional biomaterials; theranostics

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Thanks to the recent progress in chemistry and material science, stimuli-responsive molecules susceptible of space-, time-, and dosage-dependent control have become a reality. The use of a relatively simple repertoire of molecules as building blocks allows the development complex systems with sophisticated biological functions and behaviors, including self-healing, signal amplification and regulation, homeostasis, and camouflage. Under physiological stimuli such as pH, redox potential, enzymatic activities, and glucose concentration and external stimuli such as temperature, light, electric fields, magnetic fields, and mechanical force, these attractive molecules can achieve “on-demand” release or assembly for biological applications, like drug delivery, diagnostic imaging, and detection of dysfunctions.

This Special Issue entitled ‘Stimuli-Responsive Molecules for Biological Applications’ aims to present works on the design, synthesis, and applications of various stimuli-responsive molecules and related applications that have been tested for the detection, diagnosis, and therapy of a broad range of diseases, including cancer, infections, inflammatory diseases, and metabolic disorders.

We look forward to receiving your contributions in the form of communications, full research articles, or reviews.

Dr. Wen Sun
Dr. Dan Shao
Dr. Fabiao Yu
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Molecules is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • stimuli-responsive
  • cancer therapy
  • anti-bacteria
  • anti-inflammation
  • cell and in vivo imaging
  • drug
  • bioactive molecules

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

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15 pages, 30935 KiB  
Article
A TCF-Based Carbon Monoxide NIR-Probe without the Interference of BSA and Its Application in Living Cells
by Yingxu Wu, Xiaojing Deng, Lan Ye, Wei Zhang, Hu Xu and Boyu Zhang
Molecules 2022, 27(13), 4155; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules27134155 - 28 Jun 2022
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1946
Abstract
As toxic gaseous pollution, carbon monoxide (CO) plays an essential role in many pathological and physiological processes, well-known as the third gasotransmitter. Owning to the reducibility of CO, the Pd0-mediated Tsuji-Trost reaction has drawn much attention in CO detection in vitro [...] Read more.
As toxic gaseous pollution, carbon monoxide (CO) plays an essential role in many pathological and physiological processes, well-known as the third gasotransmitter. Owning to the reducibility of CO, the Pd0-mediated Tsuji-Trost reaction has drawn much attention in CO detection in vitro and in vivo, using allyl ester and allyl ether caged fluorophores as probes and PdCl2 as co-probes. Because of its higher decaging reactivity than allyl ether in the Pd0-mediated Tsuji-Trost reaction, the allyl ester group is more popular in CO probe design. However, during the application of allyl ester caged probes, it was found that bovine serum albumin (BSA) in the fetal bovine serum (FBS), an irreplaceable nutrient in cell culture media, could hydrolyze the allyl ester bond, and thus give erroneous imaging results. In this work, dicyanomethylenedihydrofuran (TCF) and dicyanoisophorone (DCI) were selected as electron acceptors for constructing near-infrared-emission fluorophores with electron donor phenolic OH. An allyl ester and allyl ether group were installed onto TCF-OH and DCI-OH, constructing four potential CO fluorescent probes, TCF-ester, TCF-ether, DCI-ester, and DCI-ether. Our data revealed that ester bonds of TCF-ester and DCI-ester could completely hydrolyze in 20 min, but ether bonds in TCF-ether and DCI-ether tolerate the hydrolysis of BSA and no released fluorescence was observed even up to 2 h. Moreover, passing through the screen, it was concluded that TCF-ether is superior to DCI-ether due to its higher reactivity in a Pd0-mediated Tsuji-Trost reaction. Also, the large stokes shift of TCF-OH, absorption and emission at 408 nm and 618 nm respectively, make TCF-ether desirable for fluorescent imaging because of differentiating signals from the excitation light source. Lastly, TCF-ether has been successfully applied to the detection of CO in H9C2 cells. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Stimuli-Responsive Molecules for Biological Applications)
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9 pages, 2317 KiB  
Article
Characterization of a Hg2+-Selective Fluorescent Probe Based on Rhodamine B and Its Imaging in Living Cells
by Wenting Zhang, Chunwei Yu, Mei Yang, Shaobai Wen and Jun Zhang
Molecules 2021, 26(11), 3385; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules26113385 - 3 Jun 2021
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 2420
Abstract
A small organic molecule P was synthesized and characterized as a fluorometric and colorimetric dual-modal probe for Hg2+. The sensing characteristics of the proposed probe for Hg2+ were studied in detail. A fluorescent enhancing property at 583 nm (>30 fold) [...] Read more.
A small organic molecule P was synthesized and characterized as a fluorometric and colorimetric dual-modal probe for Hg2+. The sensing characteristics of the proposed probe for Hg2+ were studied in detail. A fluorescent enhancing property at 583 nm (>30 fold) accompanied with a visible colorimetric change, from colorless to pink, was observed with the addition of Hg2+ to P in an ethanol-water solution (8:2, v/v, 20 mM HEPES, pH 7.0), which would be helpful to fabricate Hg2+-selective probes with “naked-eye” and fluorescent detection. Meanwhile, cellular experimental results demonstrated its low cytotoxicity and good biocompatibility, and the application of P for imaging of Hg2+ in living cells was satisfactory. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Stimuli-Responsive Molecules for Biological Applications)
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9 pages, 2729 KiB  
Article
Synthesis and Characterization of a Mg2+-Selective Probe Based on Benzoyl Hydrazine Derivative and Its Application in Cell Imaging
by Chunwei Yu, Yuxiang Ji, Shaobai Wen and Jun Zhang
Molecules 2021, 26(9), 2457; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules26092457 - 23 Apr 2021
Viewed by 1634
Abstract
A simple benzoyl hydrazine derivative P was successfully synthesized and characterized as Mg2+-selective fluorescent probe. The binding of P with Mg2+ caused an obvious fluorescence enhancement at 482 nm. The fluorescent, UV-vis spectra, 1H-NMR, and IR spectra confirmed the [...] Read more.
A simple benzoyl hydrazine derivative P was successfully synthesized and characterized as Mg2+-selective fluorescent probe. The binding of P with Mg2+ caused an obvious fluorescence enhancement at 482 nm. The fluorescent, UV-vis spectra, 1H-NMR, and IR spectra confirmed the formation of P-Mg2+ complex, and the formation of a 1:1 stoichiometry complex was proved by Job’s plot and mass spectrometry. The recognition mechanism of P to Mg2+ was owing to the photoinduced electron transfer effect (PET). The fluorescent response was linear in the range of 0.9–4.0 µM with the detection limit of 0.3 µM Mg2+ in water–ethanol solution (1:9, v:v, pH10.0, 20 mM HEPES). In addition, the results of cell imaging of Mg2+ in Hl-7701 cells was satisfying. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Stimuli-Responsive Molecules for Biological Applications)
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Review

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25 pages, 4367 KiB  
Review
Intracellular Enzyme-Instructed Self-Assembly of Peptides (IEISAP) for Biomedical Applications
by Fengming Lin, Chenyang Jia and Fu-Gen Wu
Molecules 2022, 27(19), 6557; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules27196557 - 4 Oct 2022
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2760
Abstract
Despite the remarkable significance and encouraging breakthroughs of intracellular enzyme-instructed self-assembly of peptides (IEISAP) in disease diagnosis and treatment, a comprehensive review that focuses on this topic is still desirable. In this article, we carefully review the advances in the applications of IEISAP, [...] Read more.
Despite the remarkable significance and encouraging breakthroughs of intracellular enzyme-instructed self-assembly of peptides (IEISAP) in disease diagnosis and treatment, a comprehensive review that focuses on this topic is still desirable. In this article, we carefully review the advances in the applications of IEISAP, including the development of various bioimaging techniques, such as fluorescence imaging, photoacoustic imaging, magnetic resonance imaging, positron-emission tomography imaging, radiation imaging, and multimodal imaging, which are successfully leveraged in visualizing cancer tissues and cells, bacteria, and enzyme activity. We also summarize the utilization of IEISAP in disease treatments, including anticancer, antibacterial, and antiinflammation applications, among others. We present the design, action modes, structures, properties, functions, and performance of IEISAP materials, such as nanofibers, nanoparticles, nanoaggregates, and hydrogels. Finally, we conclude with an outlook towards future developments of IEISAP materials for biomedical applications. It is believed that this review may foster the future development of IEISAP with better performance in the biomedical field. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Stimuli-Responsive Molecules for Biological Applications)
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Other

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11 pages, 4651 KiB  
Opinion
Stimuli-Responsible SNARF Derivatives as a Latent Ratiometric Fluorescent Probe
by Eiji Nakata, Khongorzul Gerelbaatar, Futa Komatsubara and Takashi Morii
Molecules 2022, 27(21), 7181; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules27217181 - 24 Oct 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 1543
Abstract
Fluorescence imaging is a powerful technique for continuous observation of dynamic intracellular processes of living cells. Fluorescent probes bearing a fluorescence switching property associated with a specific recognition or reaction of target biomolecule, that is, stimuli-responsibility, are important for fluorescence imaging. Thus, fluorescent [...] Read more.
Fluorescence imaging is a powerful technique for continuous observation of dynamic intracellular processes of living cells. Fluorescent probes bearing a fluorescence switching property associated with a specific recognition or reaction of target biomolecule, that is, stimuli-responsibility, are important for fluorescence imaging. Thus, fluorescent probes continue to be developed to support approaches with different design strategies. When compared with simple intensity-changing fluorescent probes, ratiometric fluorescent probes typically offer the advantage of less sensitivity to errors associated with probe concentration, photobleaching, and environmental effects. For intracellular usage, ratiometric fluorescent probes based on small molecules must be loaded into the cells. Thus, probes having intrinsic fluorescence may obscure a change in intracellular signal if the background fluorescence of the remaining extracellular probes is high. To overcome such disadvantages, it is necessary to minimize the extracellular background fluorescence of fluorescent probes. Here, the design strategy of the latent ratiometric fluorescent probe for wash-free ratiometric imaging using a xanthene dye seminapthorhodafluor (SNARF) as the scaffold of fluorophore is discussed. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Stimuli-Responsive Molecules for Biological Applications)
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