The current pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus‐2 (SARS‐CoV‐2) has challenged healthcare structures across the globe. Although a few therapies are approved by FDA, the search for better treatment options is continuously on rise. Clinical management includes infection prevention and supportive care such as supplemental oxygen and mechanical ventilatory support. Given the urgent nature of the pandemic and the number of companies and researchers developing COVID‐19 related therapies, FDA has created an emergency program to move potential treatments with already approved drugs to patients as quickly as possible in parallel to the development of new drugs that must first pass the clinical trials. In this manuscript, we have reviewed the available literature on the use of sequence‐specific degradation of viral genome using short‐interfering RNA (siRNA) suggesting it as a possible treatment against SARS‐CoV‐2. Delivery of siRNA can be promoted by the use of FDA approved lipids, polymers or lipid‐polymer hybrids. These nanoparticulate systems can be engineered to exhibit increased targetability and formulated as inhalable aerosols.
Recently, metal oxides-based have been widely used for catalytic reduction of nitro-aromatic compounds, which are notorious for their carcinogenic nature. The current study reports Sn-doped MnO2 as an efficient catalyst for the reduction of 4-nitrophenol (4-NP) to 4-aminophenol (4-AP). The FE-SEM characterization of SnO2-doped MnO2 revealed the diffused flower-like morphology. Further, the XPS survey scans were performed to investigate the binding energies, oxidation states, and elemental compositions of both MnO2 and Sn-doped MnO2. Kinetics analysis revealed that the catalytic reduction (> 98.8%) of 4-NP into 4-AP by Sn-doped MnO2 in the presence of NaBH4 occurs within four min, following pseudo-first order kinetics. Importantly, no observable deactivation of catalytic efficiency was noticed even after five cycles. Our strategy of loading SnO2 on the surface of semiconductor offers a versatile approach to enhance the catalytic performance, stability, and which may further promote their practical industrial application.
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