[This retracts the article DOI: 10.1021/acsomega.2c02732.].

ABSTRACT The development of effective treatment methods for rheumatoid arthritis (RA) with mitigated side effects and improved efficacy is the need of the time. Silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) have been used as anti‐inflammatory medications for the treatment of RA. This study investigates phyto‐nanoparticles based on Cichorium intybus , commonly known as chicory, a plant with a long history of use in traditional medicine due to its diverse pharmacological properties. The in vivo antiarthritic properties of this plant extract and AgNPs of C. intybus have not been studied yet. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report ever to evaluate the antiarthritic potential of C. intybus aqueous seed extract and its biosynthesized AgNPs. AgNPs were characterized via UV, FTIR, SEM, and XRD techniques after being optimized by screening several factors, including time, temperature, pH, and concentration. For investigating the antiarthritic potential of biosynthesized AgNPs, albino rats were used. The results suggested that C. intybus seed extract and its biosynthesized AgNPs have marked anti‐inflammatory effects in the rat arthritis models by lowering the edema in comparison to the untreated rats. X‐Ray analysis, hematological studies, and histological reports further supported that biosynthesized AgNPs have a promising anti‐inflammatory effect on arthritis.

In the current study, a low-cost and straightforward coprecipitation technique was adopted to synthesize CaO and La-doped CS/CaO NPs. Different weight ratios (2 and 4) of La were doped into fixed amounts of CS and CaO. Synthesized samples exhibited outstanding catalytic performance by degrading methylene blue (MB) in a highly efficient manner. The X-ray diffraction technique detected the presence of a cubic phase of CaO and a decrease in crystallite size of the samples with the addition of La. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy confirmed the presence of the dopant and the base material with functional groups at 712 cm–1. A decrease in the absorption intensity of doped CaO was observed with an increasing amount of dopants La and CS accompanied by a blueshift leading to an increase in the band gap energy from 4.17 to 4.42 eV, as recorded with an ultraviolet–visible spectrophotometer. The presence of dopants (La and CS) and the evaluation of the elemental constitution of Ca and O were supported with the energy-dispersive spectroscopy technique. In an acidic medium, the catalytic activity against the MB dye was reduced (93.8%) for 4% La-doped CS/CaO. For La-doped CS/CaO, vast inhibition domains ranged within 4.15–4.70 and 5.82–8.05 mm against Escherichia coli while 4.15–5.20 and 6.65–13.10 mm against Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) at the least and maximum concentrations, correspondingly. In silico molecular docking studies suggested these nanocomposites of chitosan as possible inhibitors against the enoyl-acyl carrier protein reductase (FabI) from S. aureus.

[This retracts the article DOI: 10.1021/acsomega.1c03723.].

[This retracts the article DOI: 10.1021/acsomega.2c05625.].

The presence of cationic dye in contaminated water effectively increases the complexity of processing. The catalytic efficacy of semiconductor nanoparticles for dye reduction has emerged as a viable strategy. The rising need for effective catalysts and antibacterial agents requires the advancement of advanced nanostructures. In this context, the co-precipitation method was employed to prepare varying concentrations (2 and 4 wt. %) of silver (Ag) with a fixed amount of polyacrylic acid-doped zirconium oxide nanostructures (PAA-ZrO2 NSs). This research focused on increasing the catalytic RhB reduction and antibacterial activities of ZrO2 with the help of dopants (Ag and PAA). Comprehensive characterizations XRD, SAED, PL, UV-Vis, FTIR, and TEM analysis confirmed the tetragonal structure, polycrystalline behavior, decreased recombination rate, enhanced bandgap energy, functional group presence, and agglomerated nanoparticles like morphology of Ag/PAA-ZrO2. Among all samples, 4% Ag/PAA-ZrO2 NSs revealed significant degradation potency (99.42%) in the basic medium as well as an effective antibacterial agent (inhibition zone 3.15 mm). In silico analysis were comparable to the bactericidal activity of synthesized NSs i.e., ZrO2, PAA-doped ZrO2, and Ag/PAA-doped ZrO2 against resistant E. coli, and validated their role as potential inhibitors for dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR), DNA gyrase, and enoyl-[acylcarrier-protein] reductase. This study proves to be efficient for RhB reduction in the basic medium as well as an antibacterial agent against E. coli bacteria.

Water contamination is a serious global issue, and exploring efficient water purification methods is of significant importance to research community to achieve sustainable development goals (SDGs). Widely explored low-cost and environmentally beneficial technique is biosorption, which uses inexpensive materials to adsorb contaminants from the wastewater. Ionic liquids (ILs), a significant class of liquid organic salts with melting temperatures below 100 °C, are composed of both organic and inorganic ion pairs bonded by weak electrostatic interactions. Recently, ILs have been employed to purify water both through extraction as well as adsorption techniques. This study explores, for the very first time, the effects of differently natured (acidic, basic, and neutral) ILs on the biosorption potentials of activated carbon of brewed tea that is a domestic food waste. Acidic IL-functionalized activated carbon (MAC-A) was found to be particularly effective in removing Orange G (OG) dye from the aqueous solutions. ILs are observed to enhance the structural properties of biosorbent by improving its morphology and reducing the crystallinity that in turn, helps in improved active sites. Biosorbent was performing best under mild conditions; room temperature, neutral pH, and fast sorption equilibrium (90 min). The practical adsorption capacity of MAC-A for OG was 30 mg/g, which is greater than many of the biomass-based biosorbents reported in the literature. The IL-functionalized MAC-A exhibited good recyclability up to the 3 runs. These facts mark the IL-functionalized MAC-A an appealing cost-effective choice for OG-contaminated wastewater treatment.

The world is currently endeavoring to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the 2030 Agenda adopted in 2015 by the United Nations. SDG-06 and SDG-14 are focused on clean water and sanitation as well as safety of the life present below water making it critical to recognize the current wastewater treatment gaps. To assure the clean drinking water and protect the aquatic life, there is an increasing demand for efficient, sustainable and green sorbent with enhanced surface functionality. As part of this approach, this study is focused on the sorption of a cationic dye methylene blue (MB) onto a novel, ecofriendly nanocomposite (IL-NC) of garlic (Allium sativum) peel functionalized by ionic liquids-the green solvents, to mitigate the environmental and human health risks. Activated carbon of garlic peel was impregnated with silver nanoparticles prior to ionic liquid functionalization. Comprehensive characterization of IL-NC was carried out by FTIR spectroscopy, SEM imaging, TGA and XRD analysis. Various factors such as initial dye concentration, sorbent amount, contact time, temperature and pH were investigated to optimize the batch sorption process. Sorption data were interpreted by isothermal, kinetic and thermodynamic models. The data fitted well with Langmuir isotherm model and pseudo-second-order. The thermodynamic parameters suggested that sorption process is spontaneous, exothermic and reversible. The sorption-desorption cycles revealed the cost-effectiveness of the sorption process making it a commendable contributor toward water ecosystem restoration and responsible consumption of biomass.

Utilizing domestic agricultural and food waste for wastewater purification is potentially a majestic route to achieve "clean water for all" under the agenda of sustainable development goals (SDGs). In this study, waste of potato peels as effective biosorbents are studied after carbonization, introduction of nanoparticles, and functionalization with the ionic liquids. These solvents are of significant attraction to the scientists, industrialists, and environmentalists for their fundamental applications in water purification techniques. Potato peel waste was first carbonized to enhance its surface area and availability of active sites, which was further improvised by the synergistic effects of silver nanoparticle decoration and functionalization with the IL. The prepared biosorbent (DMAC) was tested for the sorption of methylene blue dye. The sorption capacity of the DMAC was noted as 40.15 mg g-1 for highly concentrated (70 ppm) aqueous solutions of methylene blue, and the process was observed to have fast equilibrium kinetics. The biosorbent was effective over ambient conditions of temperature and pH, and the sorption followed a chemisorption, exothermic, and spontaneous mechanism. The biosorbent composite exhibited good regeneration and recycling ability up to five cycles, making the process green and sustainable.

Developing clean technologies to sustain the environment by fulfilling Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is one of the biggest challenges these days. This study was carried out to develop an economic, eco-safe, noncytotoxic biosorbent for wastewater treatment. The activated charcoal of local agri-waste was functionalized with biocompatible ionic liquids prepared from natural precursors; choline and saturated fatty acids. Resultant materials were characterized via FTIR, SEM and XRD analyses and used for sorption of orange G (OG) and methyl yellow (MY) dyes from aqueous solutions. Batch sorption studies were carried out to optimize different operational parameters as well as for isothermal, kinetic and thermodynamic studies. The results showed percentage removal as high as 97

Over the last few decades, there has been a growing interest in developing innovative drug delivery approaches that can assist drug release to attain the vital extent of therapeutic activity, monitoring of drug release, as well as delivery of drugs to targeted tissues. The marvelous extent of research has been converged on the pharmaceutical applications of ionic liquids (ILs) due to their high drug dissolution and expeditious drug delivery potential. Local anesthetic-based asset of lidocaine is of profound interest as biologically active cation of the ionic liquids due to its high pharmacological profile. Lidocaine-based ILs have been explored so far for their various synthetic methods as well as physicochemical profile. Being pharmacologically crucial, lidocaine-based ionic liquids as well as deep eutectic solvents (DESs) have been utilized in dermal anesthesia, skin permeation, transdermal drug delivery, wound dressing as well as topical drug delivery. Clinical trials also proved them efficient for oral mucositis. This review is first of its kind to cover all the lab and clinical progresses made so far for these significant ionic liquids.

Adsorption is the most efficient technique for the removal of toxic organic dyes and metal ions from wastewater and it demands efficient, low-cost, environment friendly and collectable adsorbents. In this study, a one-pot strategy has been developed for the crosslinking of chitosan and carboxymethyl cellulose with citric acid to form the cross-linked hydrogel. The synthesized biosorbent hydrogel was characterized by FTIR, XRD and SEM that have confirmed the successful crosslinking. The batch adsorption experiments were performed to examine the capacity of hydrogel for the adsorption of Cu(II). The optimization of the adsorption process was carried out on the basis of various factors including; metal ion concentration, time, temperature, pH, agitation speed and adsorbent dose. Different isothermal and kinetic models were applied to interpret the data. The thermodynamic studies revealed that Langmuir model was the best fit with > 90

Ionic liquid functionalised egg residues were tested for their biosorption ability towards water soluble anionic 'orange G' dye. Egg residues after ionic liquid treatment were characterised via FTIR, SEM and TGA. Adsorption process was optimised by evaluating different experimental parameters including effect of adsorbent dose, contact time, agitation speed, temperature and pH. Modified egg shell membrane (MESM) exhibited higher efficiency for orange G dye adsorption followed by unmodified egg shell membrane (ESM) and powdered egg shell (PES). Equilibrium states were achieved in 1 hour for the different studied initial dye concentrations at acidic pH, 120 rpm and 30 degrees C. Under optimum conditions >95% dye is removed with 27 mg/g adsorption capacity of MESM for 80 ppm dye solution. Study was further extended to find the best-fitted kinetic and isothermal model. It was found that the process follows pseudo-second-order kinetics and Langmuir isothermal model. Adsorbent was regenerated and reused without significant loss of efficiency. This research work presented that ionic liquid modified egg shell membrane is highly efficient with regard to its ecological perspective and cost effectiveness for the removal of toxic dye from wastewater.

Allosteric feedback inhibition of the committed step in amino acid biosynthetic pathways is a major concern for production of amino acids at industrial scale. Anthranilate synthase (AS) catalyzes the first reaction of tryptophan biosynthetic pathway found in microorganisms and is feedback inhibited by its own product i.e. tryptophan. Here, we identified new mutant sites in AS using computational mutagenesis approach. MD simulations (20 ns) followed by MMPBSA and per residue decomposition energy analysis identified seven amino acid residues with best binding affinity for tryptophan. All 19 mutant structures were generated for each identified amino acid residue followed by simulation to evaluate effect of mutation on protein stability. Later, molecular docking studies were employed to generate mutant-tryptophan complex and structures with binding energies (kcal/mol) much higher than wild-type AS were selected. Finally, two mutants i.e., S37W and S37H were identified on the basis of positive binding scores and loss of tryptophan binding inside pocket. Further, MD simulations run for 200 ns were performed over these mutant-tryptophan complexes followed by RMSD, RMSF, radius of gyration , solvent accessible surface area , intra-protein hydrogen bond numbers, principal component analysis, free energy landscape (FEL) and secondary structure analysis to rationale effect of mutations on stability of protein. Cross correlation analysis of mutant site amino acids (S37W) with key residues of catalytic site (G325, T326, H395 and G482) was done to evaluate the effect of mutations on catalytic site conformation. Current computational mutagenesis approach predicted two mutants S37W and S37H with proposed deregulated feedback inhibition by tryptophan and retained catalytic activity.Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma.