Design, complexing and catalytic properties of phosphorus thiazoles and benzothiazoles: a concise overview

Playing with the versatile reactivity of thiazole and phosphorus derivatives leads to active ligands and complexes in catalysis.

New Dendritic Polydiacetylene Sensor with Good Reversible Thermochromic Ability in Aqueous Solution and Solid Film

Thermal responsive polydiacetylene derived from PAMAM dendrimer (PDA-G₀) was synthesized. Unlike the ethylenediamine substituted PDA (PDA-NH₂) solution, the prepared PDA-G₀ vesicle solution showed reversible thermochromism property when temperature varied from 20 to 90 °C, which is due to the formation of an internal hydrogen bond in amide groups. Furthermore, PDA-G₀/PMMA film with excellent stability was obtained by a mixed-drying method, which could be stored for a long time without denaturation. After polymerization by UV irradiation, it displayed much better reversible thermochromic ability and the responded temperature range became wider, from 20 to 110 °C.

An emerging class of amphiphilic dendrimers for pharmaceutical and biomedical applications: Janus amphiphilic dendrimers

In recent years, a new class of dendrimer, known as Janus dendrimers (JDs), has attracted much attention due to their different structures and properties to the conventional symmetric forms. The broken symmetry of JDs offers the opportunity to form complex self-assembled materials, and presents new sets of properties that are presently inconceivable for homogeneous or symmetrical dendrimers. Due to their unique features, JDs have a promising future in pharmaceutical and biomedical fields, as seen from the recent interest in their application in conjugating multiple drugs and targeting moieties, forming supramolecular hydrogels, enabling micellar delivery systems, and preparing nano-vesicles, known as dendrimersomes, for drug encapsulation. The present paper is the first review, with an emphasis on various emerging applications of JDs, in the drug delivery and biomedical field reported so far. In addition, the paper describes different synthetic methods for producing JDs that can guide the design of new biocompatible forms with pharmacological activities, and that have the potential to be nano drug delivery vehicles. Furthermore, future studies to optimize the applications of JDs in drug delivery sciences and biomedical field to realize their potential to treat various disease conditions are identified and highlighted. Overall, this review identifies the current status of JDs in terms of their synthesis and applications, as well as the future research for their translation into macromolecules for clinical applications to solve health problems. It highlights the future combined efforts needed to be taken by dendrimer chemists, formulation scientist and microbiologists to develop novel antibacterials and nanomedicines from JDs.