Temperature Treatment of Highly Porous Zirconium-Containing Metal–Organic Frameworks Extends Drug Delivery Release

Abstract

Utilizing metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) as a biological carrier can lower the amount of the active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) required in cancer treatments to provide a more efficacious therapy. In this work, we have developed a temperature treatment process for delaying the release of a model drug compound from the pores of NU-1000 and NU-901, while taking care to utilize these MOFs' large pore volume and size to achieve exceptional model drug loading percentages over 35 wt %. Video-rate super-resolution microscopy reveals movement of MOF particles when located outside of the cell boundary, and their subsequent immobilization when taken up by the cell. Through the use of optical sectioning structured illumination microscopy (SIM), we have captured high-resolution 3D images showing MOF uptake by HeLa cells over a 24 h period. We found that addition of a model drug compound into the MOF and the subsequent temperature treatment process does not affect the rate of MOF uptake by the cell. Endocytosis analysis revealed that MOFs are internalized by active transport and that inhibiting the caveolae-mediated pathway significantly reduced cellular uptake of MOFs. Encapsulation of an anticancer therapeutic, alpha-cyano-4-hydroxycinnamic acid (α-CHC), and subsequent temperature treatment produced loadings of up to 81 wt % and demonstrated efficacy at killing cells beyond the burst release effect.

Stabilization of Formate Dehydrogenase in a Metal–Organic Framework for Bioelectrocatalytic Reduction of CO2

“…Enzyme stabilization through encapsulation in a porous material has been demonstrated to preserve the enzyme structure, while minimizing leaching, which is commonly observed when enzymes are immobilized through other methods . Metal–organic frameworks (MOFs), a class of tunable materials comprised of organic linkers and inorganic nodes, have been used as porous supports to enhance the stability and, in some cases, catalytic activity of the encapsulated enzymes . In particular, zirconium‐based MOFs (the NU‐10xx series) demonstrate excellent stability at a wide range of acidic and basic pH .…”

Pristine Transition‐Metal‐Based Metal‐Organic Frameworks for Electrocatalysis

“…[119,120] More and more interest has been attracted on Zrbased MOFs on account of their outstanding and distinctive properties, such as high chemical and thermal stability, large internal surface area, great wettability in water, etc. Zr-MOFs have been utilized in many fields, including photocatalysis, [122] detection, [123] molecule adsorption and separation, [124] drug delivery, [125] hydrogen storage, [126] and recently significant efforts have been devoted to exploit the application of Zr-MOFs in the electrocatalysis field. Zr-MOFs have been utilized in many fields, including photocatalysis, [122] detection, [123] molecule adsorption and separation, [124] drug delivery, [125] hydrogen storage, [126] and recently significant efforts have been devoted to exploit the application of Zr-MOFs in the electrocatalysis field.…”

Heteroepitaxial growth of vertically orientated zeolitic imidazolate framework‐L (Co/Zn‐ZIF‐L) molecular sieve membranes

“…Because of the flexible and precise control of pore architectures and network topologies, metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) have been proved to be promising for applications in areas such as gas storage and separation, 1, 2 catalysis, 3 drug delivery, 4 chemical sensing, 5 and liquid separation 6 . To date, the integration of MOFs with polymer materials, which is important for molecular sieve membranes, has been achieved by mixing them with a polymer matrix 7 or assembling a MOF layer on porous substrates 8 .…”