Pirfenidone: A Promising Drug in Ocular Therapeutics.

Pirfenidone, initially indicated for lung fibrosis, has gone beyond its original purpose, and shown promise in eye care. This detailed review tracks its evolution from lung treatment to aiding eye healing as evidenced by published literature. Pirfenidone's multifaceted attributes extend to mitigating corneal fibrosis, inflammation, and trauma. Through rigorous investigations, its efficacy emerges in diabetic retinopathy, macular degeneration, and postoperative glaucoma interventions. As an unheralded protagonist, pirfenidone reshapes ocular care paradigms, inviting renewed research opportunities.

Picomolar Detection of Lead Ions (Pb2+) by Functionally Modified Fluorescent Carbon Quantum Dots from Watermelon Juice and Their Imaging in Cancer Cells.

Water contamination due to the presence of lead is one of the leading causes of environmental and health hazards because of poor soil and groundwater waste management. Herein we report the synthesis of functionally modified luminescent carbon quantum dots (CQDs) obtained from watermelon juice as potential nanomaterials for the detection of toxic Pb2+ ions in polluted water and cancer cells. By introducing surface passivating ligands such as ethanolamine (EA) and ethylenediamine (ED) in watermelon juice, watermelon-ethanolamine (WMEA)-CQDs and watermelon-ethylenediamine (WMED)-CQDs exhibited a remarkable ~10-fold and ~6-fold increase in fluorescence intensity with respect to non-doped WM-CQDs. The relative fluorescence quantum yields of WMEA-CQDs and WMED-CQDs were found to be 8% and 7%, respectively, in an aqueous medium. Among various functionally-modified CQDs, only WMED-CQDs showed high selectivity towards Pb2+ ions with a remarkably good limit of detection (LoD) of 190 pM, which is less than that of the permissible limit (72 nM) in drinking water. The functionally altered WMED-CQDs detected Pb2+ metal ions in polluted water and in a human cervical cancer cell line (HeLa), thus advocating new vistas for eco-friendly nanomaterials for their use as diagnostic tools in the environment and biomedical research areas.

Fabrication and Characterization of Cu Nanoparticles Dispersed on ZnAl-Layered Double Hydroxide Nanocatalysts for the Oxidation of Cyclohexane.

In the chemical industry, designing high-performance catalysts for the oxidation of cyclohexane into value-added products such as cyclohexanol and cyclohexanone (the combination is known as KA oil) is critical. The catalytic activity of copper nanoparticles supported on layered double hydroxide (LDH) for the liquid phase oxidation of cyclohexane was examined in this study. In this work, we have developed Cu nanoparticles supported on layered double hydroxide nanocatalysts, abbreviated as CuNPs@LDH, by the chemical reduction approach. Various physical methods were used to characterize the resulting material, including ICP-AES, XRD, FTIR, SEM, EDX, HRTEM, and BET surface area. The catalytic activity of copper nanoparticles supported on LDH was examined for the liquid phase oxidation of cyclohexane with tert-butyl hydroperoxide. CuNPs@LDH nanocatalysts with an excellent 52.3% conversion of cyclohexane with 97.2% selectivity of KA oil was obtained after 6 h at 353 K. The hot filtration test further indicated that CuNPs@LDH was a heterogeneous catalyst that could be recycled at least six times without suffering a substantial reduction in its catalytic activity.