Highly invasive tumor cells are characterized by a metabolic switch, known as the Warburg effect, from "normal" oxidative phosphorylation to increased glycolysis even under sufficiently oxygenated conditions. This dependence on glycolysis also confers a growth advantage to cells present in hypoxic regions of the tumor. One of the key enzymes involved in glycolysis, the muscle isoform of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH-A), is overexpressed by metastatic cancer cells and is linked to the vitality of tumors in hypoxia. This enzyme may be considered as a potential target for new anticancer agents, since its inhibition cuts cancer energetic and anabolic supply, thus reducing the metastatic and invasive potential of cancer cells. We have discovered new and efficient N-hydroxyindole-based inhibitors of LDH-A, which are isoform-selective (over LDH-B) and competitive with both the substrate (pyruvate) and the cofactor (NADH). The antiproliferative activity of these compounds was confirmed on a series of cancer cell lines, and they proved to be particularly effective under hypoxic conditions. Moreover, NMR experiments showed that these compounds are able to reduce the glucose-to-lactate conversion inside the cell.

Functionalized nanoparticles find increasing application as catalysts for enantioselective transformations. In this account the different strategies followed for the preparation of chirally modified nanoparticles and their application in asymmetric catalysis are reviewed.

Background Undernutrition is a serious health problem and highly prevalent in developing countries. There is no as such confirmatory test to measure undernutrition. The objective of the present study is to determine a new Composite Score using anthropometric measurements. Composite Score was then compared with other methods like body mass index (BMI) and mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC) classification, to test the significance of the method. Methods Anthropometric data were collected from 780 adult Oraon (Male = 387, Female = 393) labourers of Alipurduar district of West Bengal, India, following standard instruments, and protocols. Nutritional status of the study participants were assessed by conventional methods, BMI and MUAC. Confirmatory factor analysis was carried out to reduce 12 anthropometric variables into a single Composite Score (C) and classification of nutritional status was done on the basis of the score. Furthermore, all the methods (BMI, MUAC and C) were compared and discriminant function analysis was adopted to find out the percentage of correctly classified individuals by each of the three methods. Result The frequency of undernutrition was 45.9% according to BMI category, 56.7% according to MUAC category and 51.8% according to newly computed Composite Score. Further analysis showed that Composite Score has a higher strength of correct classification (98.7%), compared to BMI (95.9%) and MUAC (96.2%). Conclusion Therefore, anthropometric measurements can be used to identify nutritional status in the population more correctly by calculating Composite Score of the measurements and it is a non-invasive and relatively correct way of identification.

Oxidative Heck reactions of arylboronic acids and alkenes are carried out in the presence of polyaniline-supported palladium catalysts using air as a co-oxidant to afford the Heck products with excellent yields and selectivities under base-and ligand-free conditions. The catalyst was recovered by simple filtration and used for several cycles with consistent activity.

Polyaniline-supported Sc, In, Pd, Os and Re catalysts were prepared by using a simple protocol and the thus prepared catalysts were well characterized using FTIR, XPS, UV-Vis/DRS, TGA-DTA. All the catalysts were successfully employed in a wide range of organic transformations such as cyanation and allylation of carbonyl compound, Suzuki coupling of aryl halides and boronic acids, and, most importantly, in asymmetric dihydroxylation of olefins to afford optically active vicinal diols. All the catalysts were separated from the reaction mixture by simple filtration and reused with consistent activity for five cycles without noticeable leaching of metal from the support.