Rajeev Yadav

Novel chemosensor for the visual detection of copper(II) in aqueous solution at the ppm level

A new water-soluble, multisite-coordinating ligand LH(7) was prepared by the condensation of tris(hydroxymethyl)aminomethane with 2,6-diformyl-p-cresol. LH(7) is a selective chemosensor for Cu(2+), under physiological conditions, with visual detection limits of 20 ppm (ambient light conditions) and 4 ppm (UV light conditions). LH(7) can also be used in biological cell lines for the detection of Cu(2+).

Synthesis of β-Carboline-Based N-Heterocyclic Carbenes and Their Antiproliferative and Antimetastatic Activities against Human Breast Cancer Cells

A series of novel β-carboline-based N-heterocyclic carbenes was prepared via Mannich reaction between methyl 1-(dimethoxymethyl)-9H-pyrido[3,4-b]indole-3-carboxylate, formaldehyde, and primary amines. All compounds were evaluated for their antiproliferative activity using human breast cancer and lung cancer cell lines. Three compounds, 3c, 3j, and 3h, were discovered to display IC50 less than 10 μM against human breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cells at 24 h of treatment. Pharmacologically these compounds lead to G2/M phase cell cycle arrest and induction of cellular apoptosis by triggering intrinsic apoptotic pathway through depolarization of mitochondrial membrane potential and activation of caspases. At lower concentrations, these compounds also showed antimigratory and antiinvasive effects against highly metastatic human breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cells via aberration of MAP-kinase signaling and by the inhibition of matrix metalloproteinases. However, these analogues lack in vivo effect in mouse model which may be attributed to their strong affinity to HSA that was investigated spectroscopically with compound 3h.

Microviscosity inside a nanocavity: a femtosecond fluorescence up-conversion study of malachite green.

Femtosecond fluorescence up-conversion measurements of malachite green (MG) have been carried out to confirm the relaxation pathway and subsequently to probe the microviscosity of water trapped in a nanoconfined environment using an AOT (sodium dioctylsulfosuccinate, aerosol-OT) reverse micelle as a model system. The experimental results reveal a strong dependence of S(1) state relaxation dynamics of MG on solvent viscosity while a very weak dependence has been observed for the S(2) state relaxation. The time-dependent density functional theory (TD-DFT) calculations have been used to construct potential energy surfaces of MG by pursuing an intramolecular rotation along the torsional coordinate of the phenyl rings. On synchronization with the experimental observations, the computational results comprehend the existence of a conical intersection along the S(1) and S(0) potential energy surfaces, which leads to mixed vibrational levels of S(1) and S(0) characteristics. The results suggest that the conical intersection is along the torsional coordinate of N,N-dimethyl substituted phenyl ring. Correlating the observed dynamics of MG in a confined system with the relaxation time of MG in different glycerol-water mixtures, we assert the determination of the microviscosity of water inside the AOT reverse micelle. The data confer that the microviscosity of water in an AOT water pool of w(0) = 2 (9 cP) is almost 9 times higher than the bulk water. As we increase the w(0) from 2 to 40, the microviscosity decreases monotonically to 5.68 cP, and the decrease is observed to be exponential in nature.

Conformational fluctuation dynamics of domain I of human serum albumin in the course of chemically and thermally induced unfolding using fluorescence correlation spectroscopy.

The present study elucidates the involvement of conformational fluctuation dynamics during chemically and thermally induced unfolding of human serum albumin (HSA) by fluorescence correlation spectroscopic (FCS) study, time-resolved fluorescence measurements, and circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopic methods. Two fluorescent probes, tetramethylrhodamine-5-maleimide (TMR) and N-(7-dimethylamino-4-methylcoumarin-3-yl) iodoacetamide (DACIA) were used to selectively label the domain I of HSA through the reaction with cys-34 for these studies. The guanidine hydrochloride (GnHCl) induced global structural change of HSA is monitored through its hydrodynamic radius (r(H)) and CD response, which is found to be two step in nature. In FCS experiment, along with the diffusion time component we have observed an exponential relaxation time component (τ(R)) that has been ascribed to the concerted chain dynamics of HSA. Unlike in the global structural change, we found that the τ(R) value changes in a different manner in the course of the unfolding. The dependence of τ(R) on the concentration of GnHCl was best fitted with a four state model, indicating the involvement of two intermediate states during the unfolding process, which were not observed through the CD response and r(H) data. The fluorescence lifetime measurement also supports our observation of intermediate states during the unfolding of HSA. However, no such intermediate states were observed during thermally induced unfolding of HSA.

Femtosecond excited-state dynamics of 4-nitrophenyl pyrrolidinemethanol: evidence of twisted intramolecular charge transfer and intersystem crossing involving the nitro group.

Ultrafast excited-state relaxation dynamics of a nonlinear optical (NLO) dye, (S)-(-)-1-(4-nitrophenyl)-2-pyrrolidinemethanol (NPP), was carried out under the regime of femtosecond fluorescence up-conversion measurements in augmentation with quantum chemical calculations. The primary concern was to trace the relaxation pathways which guide the depletion of the first singlet excited state upon photoexcitation, in such a way that it is virtually nonfluorescent. Ground- and excited-state (singlet and triplet) potential energy surfaces were calculated as a function of the -NO(2) torsional coordinate, which revealed the perpendicular orientation of -NO(2) in the excited state relative to the planar ground-state conformation. The fluorescence transients in the femtosecond regime show biexponential decay behavior. The first time component of a few hundred femtoseconds was ascribed to the ultrafast twisted intramolecular charge transfer (TICT). The occurrence of charge transfer (CT) is substantiated by the large dipole moment change during excitation. The construction of intensity- and area-normalized time-resolved emission spectra (TRES and TRANES) of NPP in acetonitrile exhibited a two-state emission on behalf of decay of the locally excited (LE) state and rise of the CT state with a Stokes shift of 2000 cm(-1) over a time scale of 1 ps. The second time component of a few picoseconds is attributed to the intersystem crossing (isc). In highly polar solvents both the processes occur on a much faster time scale compared to that in nonpolar solvents, credited to the differential stability of energy states in different polarity solvents. The shape of frontier molecular orbitals in the excited state dictates the shift of electron density from the phenyl ring to the -NO(2) group and is attributed to the charge-transfer process taking place in the molecule. The viscosity dependence of relaxation dynamics augments the proposition of considering the -NO(2) group torsional motion as the main excited-state relaxation coordinate.

Multi-pyrene assemblies supported on stannoxane frameworks: synthesis, structure and photophysical studies.

Organostannoxanes have been used as scaffolds for the preparation of multi-chromophore assemblies. A single-step synthesis procedure allows the preparation of compounds in which the number of chromophore units can be varied from two to six. Thus, the reactions of pyrene sulfonic acid (PySO3H) or C16H9CHNC6H3(COOH)2(LH2) with various organotin precursors gave pyrene-containing organostannoxanes, that is, [Ph3 SnPySO3]6 (1), [{(Me2Sn)2(μ3-O)(μ-OH)PySO3}2{(Me2Sn)2(μ3-O)(μ-OH)H2O}2⋅2 PySO3] (2), [{tBu2Sn(OH)PySO3}2] (3), [{(nBuSn)12(O)14(OH)6{PySO3}2] (4), and [{(nBu2Sn)L}3]2⋅C6H5CH3 (5). Compounds 1-5 were characterized by using X-ray crystallography. Compounds 1 and 5 are 24-membered macrocycles. Macrocycle 1 possesses intramolecular π-π stacking interactions. An unusual co-crystal of two tetrameric ladders in 2 was observed in which one of the components of the co-crystal is neutral whereas the other is dicationic and two pyrenesulfonate counterions are present to balance the overall charge. In the solid state these compounds reveal rich supramolecular structures. Photophysical studies on 1-5 reveal that interactions in the solid state lead to considerable broadening of the emission bands.

Mechanistic investigation of domain specific unfolding of human serum albumin and the effect of sucrose

This study is devoted to understand the unfolding mechanism of a multidomain protein, human serum albumin (HSA), in absence and presence of the sucrose by steady‐state and time‐resolved fluorescence spectroscopy with domain specific marker molecules and is further being substantiated by molecular dynamics (MD) simulation. In water, the domain III of HSA found to unfold first followed by domains I and II as the concentration of GnHCl is increased in the medium. The sequential unfolding behavior of different domains of HSA remains same in presence of sucrose; however, a higher GnHCl concentration is required for unfolding, suggesting stabilizing effect of sucrose on HSA. Domain I is found to be most stabilized by sucrose. The stabilization of domain II is somewhat similar to domain I, but the effect of sucrose on domain III is found to be very small. MD simulation also predicted a similar behavior of sucrose on HSA. The stabilizing effect of sucrose is explained in terms of the entrapment of water molecules in between HSA surface and sucrose layer as well as direct interaction between HSA and sucrose.

Effect of sucrose on chemically and thermally induced unfolding of domain-I of human serum albumin: Solvation dynamics and fluorescence anisotropy study

The present study is devoted to understand the effect of sucrose on the hydration dynamics and rotational relaxation dynamics within the domain-I of HSA during chemically as well as thermally induced unfolding. It has been observed that the average solvation time become slower in the presence of sucrose for the lower concentrations of GnHCl, however at higher concentrations of GnHCl the effect of sucrose is almost negligible. From the time resolved fluorescence anisotropy it has been observed that in the lower concentration region of GnHCl the sucrose induced stabilization is small as compared to the higher concentrations of GnHCl. We have concluded that the hydration dynamics plays an important role in the sucrose induced stabilization process at the low concentration region; whereas environmental restriction is responsible at the higher concentration of GnHCl. However, we have observed a negligible stabilizing effect of sucrose towards the temperature induced unfolding.

Static and Dynamic Aspects of Supramolecular Interactions of Coumarin 153 and Fluorescein with Bovine Serum Albumin

The static and dynamic aspects of supramolecular interactions between coumarin 153 (C153) and fluorescein (FL) with bovine serum albumin (BSA) has been studied by spectroscopic techniques. Both dyes were found to form 1 : 1 complexes with BSA, with binding constants 2.9 ± 0.3 × 105 M–1 and 2.1 ± 0.2 × 105 M–1 for C153 and FL respectively. The binding site of C153 has been determined by steady-state fluorescence resonance energy transfer, site marker competitive experiments, and a molecular docking study. Our studies indicate that C153 binds to domain IIIA of BSA whereas FL binds non-specifically. Denaturation characteristics of the C153 and FL binding region of BSA were found to be very different to global denaturation. Furthermore, kinetics of binding has been studied by the stopped-flow method. The observed rate constants were found to be 8.8 s–1 and 5.9 s–1 for C153 and FL respectively.

Study of molecular interaction in binary liquid mixtures of ethyl acetoacetate with chloroform and dimethylsulphoxide using excess acoustic parameters and spectroscopic methods

Densities and ultrasonic velocities were measured for binary liquid mixtures of ethyl acetoacetate (EAA) with chloroform (CHCl3) and dimethylsulphoxide (DMSO) over the entire composition range. These experimental values were used to calculate the adiabatic compressibility (βs), intermolecular free length (Lf), excess molar volume (VE), excess adiabatic compressibility (βsE) and excess intermolecular free length (LfE) for the liquid mixtures under consideration. In all the excess parameters, a positive deviation was observed in CHCl3–EAA binary mixture, whereas a slight negative deviation was found for EAA–DMSO binary liquid mixture. These deviations were explained in terms of molecular interactions between like and unlike molecules and further affirmed by UV–Vis spectroscopic measurements in terms of polar and non-polar environment in the close proximity of solvatochromic dye. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) and proton-nuclear magnetic resonance (H1 NMR) measurements have also been done to explain the molecular interaction in the binary liquid mixtures.