Angewandte Chemie International Edition

Gao, Yuexin; Ke, Yunzhe; Wang, Tianzuo; Shi, Yibo; Wang, Cheng; Ding, Shuaishuai; Wang, Yupu; Deng, Yunfeng; Hu, Wenping; Geng, Yanhou

doi: 10.1002/anie.202402642pmid: 38453641

Conjugated polymers (CPs) with low crystallinity are promising candidates for application in organic thermoelectrics (OTEs), particularly in flexible devices, because the disordered structures of these CPs can effectively accommodate dopants and ensure robust resistance to bending. However, n‐doped CPs usually exhibit poor thermoelectric performance, which hinders the development of high‐performance thermoelectric generators. Herein, we report an n‐type CP (ThDPP‐CNBTz) comprising two acceptor units: a thiophene‐flanked diketopyrrolopyrrole and a cyano‐functionalized benzothiadiazole. ThDPP‐CNBTz shows a low LUMO energy level of below −4.20 eV and features low crystallinity, enabling high doping efficiency. Moreover, the dual‐acceptor design enhances polaron delocalization, resulting in good thermoelectric performance. After n‐doping, ThDPP‐CNBTz exhibits an average electrical conductivity (σ) of 50.6 S cm−1 and a maximum power factor (PF) of 126.8 μW m−1 K−2, which is among the highest values reported for solution‐processed n‐type CPs to date. Additionally, a solution‐processed flexible OTE device based on doped ThDPP‐CNBTz exhibits a maximum PF of 70 μW m−1 K−2; the flexible device also shows remarkable resistance to bending strain, with only a marginal change in σ after 600 bending cycles. The findings presented in this work will advance the development of n‐type CPs for OTE devices, and flexible devices in particular.

Bi, Shiyi; Chen, Wei; Fang, Yanyun; Shen, Jieyu; Zhang, Qing; Guo, Hongqian; Ju, Huangxian; Liu, Ying

doi: 10.1002/anie.202402522pmid: 38421189

Immune checkpoint protein blockade (ICB) has emerged as a powerful immunotherapy approach, but suppressing immune‐related adverse events (irAEs) for noncancerous cells and normal tissues remains challenging. Activatable ICB has been developed with tumor microenvironment highly‐expressed molecules as stimuli, but they still lack precision and efficiency considering the diffusion of stimuli molecules in whole tumor tissue. Here we assemble PD−L1 with a duplex DNA strand, termed as “safety catch”, to regulate its accessibility for ICB. The safety catch remains at “on” status for noncancerous cells to prevent ICB binding to PD−L1. Cancer cell membrane protein c‐Met acts as a trigger protein to react with safety catch, which selectively exposes its hybridization region for ICB reagent. The ICB reagent is a retractable DNA nanostring with repeating hairpin‐structural units, whose contraction drives PD−L1 clustering with endocytosis‐guided degradation. The safety catch, even remained at “safety on” status, is removed from the cell membrane via a DNA strand displacement reaction to minimize its influence on noncancerous cells. This strategy demonstrates selective and potent immunotherapeutic capabilities only against cancer cells both in vitro and in vivo, and shows effective suppression of irAEs in normal tissues, therefore would become a promising approach for precise immunotherapy in mice.

Lan, Wenlong; Gou, Xiaoshuang; Wu, Yuewei; Liu, Ning; Lu, Lele; Cheng, Peng; Shi, Wei

doi: 10.1002/anie.202401766pmid: 38477673

Solar‐thermal water evaporation is a promising strategy for clean water production, which needs the development of solar‐thermal conversion materials with both high efficiency and high stability. Herein, we reported an ultra‐stable cobalt(II)‐organic assembly NKU‐123 with light‐generated radicals, exhibiting superior photothermal conversion efficiency and high stability. Under the irradiation of 808 nm light, the temperature of NKU‐123 rapidly increases from 25.5 to 215.1 °C in 6 seconds. The solar water evaporator based on NKU‐123 achieves a high solar‐thermal water evaporation rate of 1.442 and 1.299 kg m−2 h−1 under 1‐sun irradiation with a water evaporation efficiency of 97.8 and 87.9 % for pure water and seawater, respectively. A detailed mechanism study revealed that the formation of light‐generated radicals leads to an increase of spin density of NKU‐123 for enhancing the photothermal effect, which provides insights into the design of highly efficient photothermal materials.

Yang, Yuhui; Li, Yiran; Wang, Caixia; Wang, Yuru; Ren, Yi; Wu, Jie; Ju, Huangxian; Chen, Yunlong

doi: 10.1002/anie.202319849pmid: 38439625

Glycans on tumor cell surface have significant impacts in the immune‐killing process. Here an ultra‐galactocation to sialic acid (Sia) strategy is designed to hugely introduce galactose (Gal) to Sia and on tumor cells in vivo by using a penta‐functional dendritic probe (Den@5F), which efficiently enhances the immune‐killing of tumor cells. The Den@5F contains five different kinds of functional groups, including Gal, Cy5, amino, phenylboronic acid (PBA) and 4‐(4‐(hydroxymethyl)‐2‐methoxy‐5‐nitrophenoxy) butanoate (mNB), which can be conveniently prepared through a two‐step reaction. After injecting into the tumor‐bearing mouse, Den@5F can efficiently block Sia through the specific recognition between PBA and Sia on tumor cells and hugely introduce Gal through the subsequent photo‐crosslinking between mNB and amino groups to multiply conjugate excessive Den@5Fs. The comprehensively blocked Sia can prevent the immune escape, and the hugely introduced Gal can promote the immune stimulation of the immune cells, which lead to an efficient enhancement of the immune‐killing. The proposed strategy provides a significant and promising tool to promote the clinical immunotherapy of tumor.

Zhang, Jiongyu; Li, Ziyue; Guo, Chong; Guan, Xin; Avery, Lori; Banach, David; Liu, Changchun

doi: 10.1002/anie.202403123pmid: 38516796

The CRISPR‐Cas12a system has emerged as a powerful tool for next‐generation nucleic acid‐based molecular diagnostics. However, it has long been believed to be effective only on DNA targets. Here, we investigate the intrinsic RNA‐enabled trans‐cleavage activity of AsCas12a and LbCas12a and discover that they can be directly activated by full‐size RNA targets, although LbCas12a exhibits weaker trans‐cleavage activity than AsCas12a on both single‐stranded DNA and RNA substrates. Remarkably, we find that the RNA‐activated Cas12a possesses higher specificity in recognizing mutated target sequences compared to DNA activation. Based on these findings, we develop the “Universal Nuclease for Identification of Virus Empowered by RNA‐Sensing” (UNIVERSE) assay for nucleic acid testing. We incorporate a T7 transcription step into this assay, thereby eliminating the requirement for a protospacer adjacent motif (PAM) sequence in the target. Additionally, we successfully detect multiple PAM‐less targets in HIV clinical samples that are undetectable by the conventional Cas12a assay based on double‐stranded DNA activation, demonstrating unrestricted target selection with the UNIVERSE assay. We further validate the clinical utility of the UNIVERSE assay by testing both HIV RNA and HPV 16 DNA in clinical samples. We envision that the intrinsic RNA targeting capability may bring a paradigm shift in Cas12a‐based nucleic acid detection and further enhance the understanding of CRISPR‐Cas biochemistry.

Zhao, Jia‐Hui; Zheng, Long; Zou, Jian‐Ye; Zhang, Sheng‐Ye; Shen, Hua‐Chen; Wu, Yichen; Wang, Peng

doi: 10.1002/anie.202402612pmid: 38410071

The construction of silicon‐stereogenic silanols via Pd‐catalyzed intermolecular C−H alkenylation with the assistance of a commercially available L‐pyroglutamic acid has been realized for the first time. Employing oxime ether as the directing group, silicon‐stereogenic silanol derivatives could be readily prepared with excellent enantioselectivities, featuring a broad substrate scope and good functional group tolerance. Moreover, parallel kinetic resolution with unsymmetric substrates further highlighted the generality of this protocol. Mechanistic studies indicate that L‐pyroglutamic acid could stabilize the Pd catalyst and provide excellent chiral induction. Preliminary computational studies unveil the origin of the enantioselectivity in the C−H bond activation step.

Tian, Qiushuang; Chang, Jingxi; Wang, Junbo; He, Qingyun; Chen, Shaoyu; Yang, Pinghui; Wang, Hongze; Lai, Jingya; Wu, Mengyang; Zhao, Xiangru; Zhong, Chongyu; Li, Renzhi; Huang, Wei; Wang, Fangfang; Yang, Yingguo; Qin, Tianshi

Tu, Liangjing; Chen, Yi; Song, Xiaojuan; Jiang, Wanqing; Xie, Yujun; Li, Zhen

doi: 10.1002/anie.202402865pmid: 38415964

Recently, stimulus‐responsive organic materials with room‐temperature phosphorescence (RTP) properties have attracted significant attention owing to their potential applications in chemical sensing, anticounterfeiting, and displays. However, molecular design currently lacks systematicity and effectiveness. Herein, we report a capture‐release strategy for the construction of reversible RTP via B/N Lewis pairs. Specifically, the RTP of the Lewis acid of 7‐bromo‐5,9‐dioxa‐13b‐boranaphtho[3,2,1‐de]anthracene (BrBA) can be deactivated through capturing by the Lewis base, N,N‐diphenyl‐4‐(pyridin‐4‐yl)aniline (TPAPy), and reactivated by dissociation of B−N bonds to release BrBA. Reversible RTP is attributed to the exceptional self‐assembly capability of BrBA, whereas the tunable RTP colors are derived from distinct Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) processes. The potential applications of RTP materials in information storage and anti‐counterfeiting were also experimentally validated. The capture‐release approach proposed in this study offers an effective strategy for designing stimulus‐responsive materials.

Huang, Xing; Li, Yang; Fu, Shuai; Ma, Chao; Lu, Yang; Wang, Mingchao; Zhang, Peng; Li, Ze; He, Feng; Huang, Chuanhui; Liao, Zhongquan; Zou, Ye; Zhou, Shengqiang; Helm, Manfred; Petkov, Petko St.; Wang, Hai I.; Bonn, Mischa; Li, Jian; Xu, Wei; Dong, Renhao; Feng, Xinliang

Oshida, Kento; Yuan, Kang; Yamazaki, Yukari; Tsukimura, Rio; Nishio, Hidenori; Nomoto, Katsutoshi; Miura, Hiroki; Shishido, Tetsuya; Jin, Xiongjie; Nozaki, Kyoko

doi: 10.1002/anie.202403092pmid: 38415808

The hydrogenolysis of oxygenates such as alcohols and ethers is central to the biomass valorization and also a valuable transformation in organic synthesis. However, a mild and efficient catalyst system for the hydrogenolysis of a large variety of alcohols and ethers with various functional groups is still underdeveloped. Here, we report an aluminum metaphosphate‐supported Pt nanoparticles (Pt/Al(PO3)3) for the hydrogenolysis of a wide variety of primary, secondary, and tertiary alkyl and benzylic alcohols, and dialkyl, aryl alkyl, and diaryl ethers, including biomass‐derived furanic compounds, under mild conditions (0.1–1 atm of H2, as low as 70 °C). Mechanistic studies suggested that H2 induces formation of the surface Brønsted acid sites via its cleavage by supported Pt nanoparticles. Accordingly, the high efficiency and the wide applicability of the catalyst system are attributed to the activation and cleavage of C−O bonds by the hydrogen‐induced Brønsted acid sites with the assistance of Lewis acidic Al sites on the catalyst surface. The high efficiency of the catalyst implies its potential application in energy‐efficient biomass valorization or fine chemical synthesis.