Jinye Niu

Sol–solvothermal synthesis and microwave evolution of La(OH)3 nanorods to La2O3 nanorods

Solvothermal synthesis of La(OH)3 sol and microwave radiation drying of La(OH)3 nanorods were employed for the first time to synthesize La2O3 nanorods with diameters around 10 nm and lengths up to 200 nm. The resulting products were characterized with XRD, TEM and HRTEM. Microwave radiation drying was found to be more effective to maintain the morphologies of nanorods than conventional drying.

Small-Molecule Fluorescent Probes for Imaging and Detection of Reactive Oxygen, Nitrogen, and Sulfur Species in Biological Systems

Intracellular redox homeostasis provides broad implications in physiological and pathological fields. The disruption of redox homeostasis is closely associated with some human diseases, such as cancer, neurodegenerative diseases, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes mellitus, and gastrointestinal diseases.1-6 Therefore, cells possess an elaborate regulation system to maintain their redox balance and the large or significant redox state changes can be buffered by the redox-active molecules.7,8 These molecules experience interreaction and interconversion to facilitate the dynamic balance of intracellular redox state, among which three types of representative molecules should be mentioned, including reactive oxygen species (ROS), reactive nitrogen species (RNS), and reactive sulfur species (RSS).

A surfactant-free route to single-crystalline CeO2 nanowires

A surfactant-free route was successfully established to synthesize CeO2 single-crystalline nanowires using H2O2 as oxidizer and template agent.

Simple, Rapid, and Sensitive Spectrofluorimetric Determination of Zaleplon in Micellar Medium

Abstract The influence of micellar medium on the absorption, fluorescent excitation and emission spectra character of Zaleplon was studied. The nonionic surfactant of Triton X-100 showed a strong sensitizing effect for the fluorescence of Zaleplon in a pH 5.0 buffer. The possible enhancement mechanism was discussed. Based on the optimum conditions, a simple, rapid, sensitive and selective spectrofluorimetric method (λex/λem = 345/455 nm) has been developed for the determination of Zaleplon. The linear range was 1.32 × 10−8–1.00 × 10−5 mol/L. The detection limit was 4.0 × 10−9 mol/L with an RSD of 0.06%. The proposed method was successfully applied to the determination of Zaleplon in tablets, serum and urine.

Simultaneous Fluorescence and Chemiluminescence Turned on by Aggregation-Induced Emission for Real-Time Monitoring of Endogenous Superoxide Anion in Live Cells

Biological sensors with simultaneous turn-on signals of fluorescence (FL) and chemiluminescence (CL) triggered by one single species are supposed to integrate spatiotemporally resolved FL imaging with dynamic CL sensing into one luminescent assay. Efficiently increased accuracy can be expected based on complementary information simultaneously obtained from two independent modes, which is crucial in disease detection and diagnosis. However, very few examples can be found to date because of the key challenges in the rational design of sensing structures. Herein, aggregation-induced emission (AIE) was employed to develop a novel organic platform TPE-CLA with simultaneous turn-on FL/CL signals specifically modulated by O2•- in cells, which can be attributed to the activation of AIE resulted from the decreasing solubility after recognition. Using imidazopyrazinone (CLA) as the reactive motif and tetraphenylethene (TPE) as FL/CL enhancing skeleton, TPE-CLA is sensitive enough to image native O2•- in Raw264.7 cells and lipopolysaccharide stimulated O2•- in mice. Endogenous O2•- in HL-7702 cells induced by acetaminophen (APAP) was uninterruptedly monitored for 7200 s with CL and the results were further confirmed by FL imaging. Accordingly, TPE-CLA turns out to be a reliable candidate for real-time and continuous monitoring of endogenous O2•- in live cells. The strategy utilizing AIE to accomplish the FL/CL dual detection is expected to extend the application of AIE as reaction-activated biosensors.