Aryl amides and amide derivatives are important functionality in drug and drug discovery, as many drugs have it as an integral part. However, the synthesis of amide requires the condensation or coupling of amines which is a tedious or costly approach. Herein we disclosed two easy and convenient methods for directly synthesizing aryl amide using aryl nitrile in a short time with good to excellent yield via base-driven partial hydrolysis.

Ferric Cl-doped CQDs were reported as a photocatalyst which synthesized via a feasible hydrothermal method and characterized using various techniques such as HRTEM imaging, EDS, EDS mapping, XRD, XPS, PL, FTIR, and UV–Vis spectroscopies. The photocatalytic activity of monometallic Fe@ClCQDs was scrutinized toward the photoconversion of RhB dye from water. The photoconversion of RhB dye in the presence of 6 mg of photocatalyst and 25 µL H2O2 was impressive (89%) in 90 s. The effect of catalyst dosage, light intensity, pH, H2O2 concentration, and temperature on dye conversion was studied. The results of using different scavengers indicated that ˚OH has an important role in photocatalytic conversion. More importantly, the photoactivity of monometallic Fe@ClCQDs remains > 89% after eleven times, which shows their good stability and utility. Hence, the monometallic Fe@ClCQDs are promising photocatalysts for extraordinarily efficient dye conversion in an extremely short time.

In this study, MnCoFe2O4@ovalbumin nanoparticles were synthesized using MnCoFe2O4 MNPs and egg white nano-ovalbumin. The surface of MnCoFe2O4 MNPs was activated with trisodium citrate anhydrou to improve the fabrication of nano-ovalbumin on MCF MNPs. The structure of these nanoparticles was properly characterized by Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), Scanning electron microscope, X-ray powder diffraction, Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, Transmission electron microscopy, Thermogravimetric, and Vibrating sample magnetometer. The catalytic activity of the MnCoFe2O4@ovalbumin nanoparticles was evaluated for the synthesis of pyrimido[4,5-d]pyrimidine derivatives via multi-component reaction of aldehyde, barbituric acid, urea, or thiourea under solvent-free condition. The desired products were prepared using an environmentally friendly method. Short reaction time, high efficiency, and easy work-up are some advantages of this procedure. This heterogeneous nanocatalyst can be easily recovered by a magnetic field and used at least six times without considerable loss of its activity. Also, MCF@OVL MNPs exhibited a CO2 adsorption capacity about 9.35 mmol/g at 25 °C.

A simple and straightforward synthetic strategy has been established toward furnishing of promising bis-heterocyclic pyrazole containing substituted tetrazole derivatives which might be proved as valuable molecules because of the presence of medicinally and biologically important pyrazole and tetrazole entities. Sulfonic acid decorated graphene oxide (GO-SO3H), a new class of heterogeneous carbo-catalyst was first time reported for synthesis of tert-butyl/ethyl acetate and pyrazole-substituted tetrazole through one-pot 4-C reaction. The synthesized GO-SO3H catalyst offered more than 95% yields of tetrazoles with a broad range of substrates including different substituted aldehyde, isocyanide, and amine within 15–20 min under mild reaction conditions. In addition, sulfonic acid decorated graphene oxide (GO-SO3H) was reused up to five reaction cycles without considerable drop in its catalytic efficiency. The formation of all synthesized pyrazole containing substituted tetrazole derivatives was confirmed by various spectroscopic techniques.

This study focuses on the synthesis and application of Co3O4 nanorods in post plasma catalysis (PPC) for toluene degradation. Results show that the addition of catalyst significantly improves the efficiency of the PPC system. Using non-thermal plasma (NTP) alone, O3 was produced and successfully used to completely oxidize toluene. Moreover, the system exhibits higher carbon dioxide selectivity and significantly reduces the production of VOCs and NOx. The nanorod structure of the catalyst plays a critical role in its remarkable performance due to the high surface area and more catalytic sites for reaction. Analysis of toluene degradation at various input powers showed complete oxidation at 40 W. These results indicate that the combination of cobalt oxide nanorods and NTP post plasma catalysis is a practical approach to lowering toluene and other unwanted secondary pollutants. Overall, this study demonstrates the potential of Co3O4 nanorods as an effective catalyst for PPC systems in the treatment of volatile organic compounds.

Thermocatalytic conversion of redundant CO2 to useful methanol is an attractive route to address both energy and environmental crises simultaneously. However, existing copper/oxide catalysts widely used in these thermocatalytic processes still suffer from low methanol yield under mild reaction conditions. In this work, we design inverse oxide/Cu catalysts to achieve superior thermal catalytic performance for CO2 hydrogenation. The optimized ZnO/Cu-1.0 catalyst exhibits maximum CH3OH selectivity of 83.4% and space–time yield (STY) of \(170.9\;{\text{g}}_{{{\text{CH}}_{3} {\text{OH}}}} \;{\text{kg}}_{{{\text{cat}}}}^{ - 1} \;{\text{h}}^{ - 1}\) in CO2 hydrogenation at 210 °C, nearly twofold higher STY than the previous optimal inverse ZnO/Cu catalysts (\(89.6\;{\text{g}}_{{{\text{CH}}_{3} {\text{OH}}}} \;{\text{kg}}_{{{\text{cat}}}}^{ - 1} \;{\text{h}}^{ - 1}\)at 250 °C). Importantly, ZnO/Cu-1.0 catalyst displayed not only a satisfactory catalytic stability but also a superior CH3OH STY with a time-on-stream of 24 h. Such inverse configuration of catalysts will pave the way for new strategies to design high-performance thermocatalytic catalysts and promote their commercialization.Graphical abstractTypical inverse ZnO/Cu-1.0 catalysts have been demonstrated and achieved to significantly facilitate the activation of inert CO2 molecules to produce methanol, due to its special physicochemical properties and strong ZnO–Cu interaction

Ononin and Corylin drug molecules exhibit antiviral effects against the H1N1 influenza A virus, with IC50 values of 30% at 200 µM and > 115 µM, respectively. The drug molecules Ononin and Corylin obey the Lipinski’s rule of five. Ononin and Corylin's ADMET properties indicate that the molecules can be exploited as an oral drug due to high solubility nature. The combined approach of computational methods such as molecular docking, molecular dynamics simulation and binding free calculations was used as a tool to achieve the drug-receptor intermolecular interactions, molecular electrostatic potential, conformational and energetic stability for Ononin and Corylin with H1N1 NA enzyme. In molecular docking analysis, the Ononin and Corylin molecules holds good inhibition constant (− 4.98 and − 7.53 kcalmol−1) and binding affinity (224.92 and 3.02 ki uM (micromol)) with H1N1 NA enzyme, respectively. The NBO, global and local reactivity descriptor were computed to find the stabilization energy, chemical reactivity, kinetic stability and toxicity nature for Ononin and Corylin molecules and also holds good results for both molecules. As a consequence, the Ononin and Corylin molecules has good biological activity and could be used as a probable treatment against the H1N1 influenza A virus.

A variety of new compounds containing two or three biologically active imidazolidine-2,4-dione and thiazolidine-2,4-dione (TZD) cores through two- and three-way optimization of 3 and 4CR by Knoevenagel condensation were synthesized (Method A). In another attempt, two and three Bucherer–Berg modified with 5 and 7CR directed to synthesize larger homologous molecules were used (Method B). The structure of these derivatives was confirmed by FT-IR, 1HNMR, 13CNMR, and Elemental analysis. To evaluate the anticonvulsant activity of these derivatives, all the compounds were considered to be studied through molecular docking for Anticonvulsant Drug Binding (ADB) to the Voltage-Gated Sodium Channel Inner Pore (VGCIP). The in-silico molecular docking study results showed that molecules 5c, 7, 9, and 10 among the synthesized compounds with − 8.31, − 9.23, − 8.91, and − 10.79 kJ mol−1 glide scores respectively, lead to more binding affinity toward the channel and fitting well in the active pocket, thus, they may be considered as good anticonvulsant agents. Also, to evaluate the antibacterial properties of these derivatives, the ligand–protein molecular docking calculation using the active sites of the following bacterial proteins has been performed. Gram-positive bacteria such as B. anthracis (PDB ID: 3TYE) and S. aureus (PDB ID: 3ACX) and gram-negative bacteria E. coli (PDB ID: 1AB4) and P. aeruginosa (PDB ID: 5U39). The most significant overall score has been obtained for S. aureus (PDB ID: 3ACX) bacteria. According to the calculation compound 10 leads to the most efficient antibacterial activity against two Gram-positive bacteria and compounds 4a and 7 with Gram-negative proteins bacterial. The highest binding affinity is related to compound 7 for the Gram-negative P. aeruginosa (PDB ID: 5U39) protein target. The antibacterial properties of these derivatives were also experimentally investigated confirming the results obtained by the ligand–protein molecular docking calculation.

In the realm of chemistry, increased energy consumption as a result of population development and industrialisation necessitates the usage of renewable energy sources. Nonrenewable energy sources emit not only greenhouse gases but also other toxic pollutants that harm all living creatures. This clearly necessitates the employment of an ecologically acceptable and cost-effective renewable energy source by the researchers. The Knoevenagel-Michael cyclocondensation of aldehyde derivatives, malononitrile, and barbituric acid/1,3-dimethylbarbituric acid via a three-condensation domino reaction can be used to create pyrano[2,3-d]pyrimidine scaffolds. This study establishes solar energy as a novel renewable energy source for the synthesis of pyrano[2,3-d]pyrimidine scaffolds under catalyst-solvent-free conditions, with excellent yields, reaction time savings, and atom economy. This reaction was carried out on a range of substrates with the use of a renewable energy source (sunlight) and a relatively simple experimental setup. The reaction was extremely fast, and there was no need for a solvent or chromatographic purification. According to a multigram scale reaction of model substrates, this reaction might be scaled up without affecting the outcome. Furthermore, the approach's broad applicability was proved by its usage to synthesis real-world pharmaceutical molecules.

A simple and convenient protocol has been developed for the synthesis of 1,8-dioxo-octahydroxanthenes via one-pot pseudo three-component reactions between two equivalents of dimedone and one-equivalent of aromatic aldehydes in the presence of a catalytic amount of camphor sulfonic acid as an efficient organocatalyst in ethanol under refluxed conditions. A variety of aryl as well as heteroaryl aldehydes were employed and all those afforded excellent yields of the desired products. The synthesized products were isolated pure in excellent yields by simple crystallization techniques. Use of organocatalyst, simple work up procedure, high atom economy, multicomponent strategy, easy isolation procedure and excellent yields are some of the major advantages of this newly developed protocol. X-ray crystallographic data of the five such synthesized 1,8-dioxo-octahydroxanthene derivatives were also recorded. 3D Hirshfeld surfaces and allied 2D fingerprint plots of these five 1,8-dioxo-octahydroxanthene derivatives were also analyzed further for molecular interactions.Graphical abstract

The electrode and MoS2@Ti electrochemical system were successfully optimized. However, there are problems such as easy flaking of catalytic layer and short electrode life. The use of electrode modifiers such as Nafion, Sodium dodecyl sulfate, or tin-antimony oxide interlayers attempts to optimize the bonding between the electrode substrate and the active layer. Moreover, we have successfully used foam titanium to replace the titanium plate substrate to improve the electrode stability. The adsorption reduction performance of MoS2@Ti electrodes and MoS2 powders was investigated to further clarify the mechanism of MoS2@Ti electrochemical system. The optimization of the MoS2@Ti electrode reaction system was attempted by designing the combined system as well as the diaphragm system, and the fact that the reduced mercury ions were re-oxidized in the original MoS2@Ti system was determined.Graphical abstract

In this (scenario) research work, the CQDs@g-C3N4 two-step-scheme nanocomposite was fabricated by a simple two-step hydrothermal/calcination process. The crystalline phase and morphological features of the materials were investigated by P-XRD, SEM, EDAX, and TEM. The designed CQDs@g-C3N4 nanocomposite was fruitfully formed, and the improved light absorption capability was tested with the photocatalytic activity of (Rhodamine B) RhB and (Ofloxacin) OFL. The CQDs@g-C3N4 nanocomposite shows enhanced activity in the degradation of RhB, and OFL and corresponds to a low recombination rate of charge carriers. Under optimized experimental conditions, the photocatalytic activities of pollutants (RhB & OFL) over CQDs@g-C3N4 can accomplish 94.3 and 99.5% within 30 and 60 min irradiation with visible light. The trapping experiments exhibited that \({\text{O}}_{2}^{ \cdot - }\), \(\cdot {\text{OH}}\), and intermediate mineralized compounds were involved in the catalysis process. Furthermore, the CQDs@g-C3N4 photocatalyst has remarkable storage stability after several consecutive runs. This research work presents a new platform for an effective route of heterostructures for environmental water contaminant treatments.Graphical abstract

Deep eutectics (DEs) are golden alternatives for conventional solvents, catalysts, and reagents. The present work focuses on a DE-acetylating agent from the screening of ZnCl2 and HOAc mole ratios in mZnCl2:nHOAc complexes. The formation of DE was founded by a profound decrease in melting point, increase in density, and viscosity changes. So, among the mZnCl2:nHOAc complexes, ZnCl2:2HOAc was the top DE due to melting point depression from ~ 290 °C to room temperature, 0.37 g/cm3 increase in density, 10 times higher viscosity than glacial HOAc, and shift in all FTIR vibrational modes. Such changes describe high intermolecular forces between the two HOAc hydrogen-bond donors and chlorides of ZnCl2 as hydrogen-bond acceptors in the transparent DES of ZnCl2:2HOAc. The characterized ZnCl2:2HOAc was successfully tested as either a homogeneous, atom economy, and low-cost DE-acetylating agent or reaction media for the chemo-selective large-scale synthesis of long-chain esters and Friedel–Crafts acetylation of phenols. Contrariwise chemo-selectivity for acetylation of –OH versus amino, reusability of DES when used in HOAc, high activity, non-corrosively, and less toxicity are the benefits of this polar liquid and promising alternative for the other acetylating agent.

In this work, the surface of Fe3O4 nanoparticles was functionalized with the glycine, furfural, and cobalt (II) nitrate hexahydrate to synthesize a novel support nanocatalyst (Fe3O4@gly@Furfural@Co(NO3)2). The characteristics of the nanocatalyst were confirmed by various techniques, such as energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), Fourier transform infrared spectrometer, EDX mapping, scanning electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, thermal gravimetric/derivative thermal gravimetric, vibrating sample magnetometer, and TEM. Finally, the performance of the nanocatalyst was investigated for the one-pot multicomponent synthesis of benzo[b]pyran and pyrano[2,3-d] pyrimidine derivatives. The good–excellent yield of the products was achieved in a green solvent under mild conditions at short reaction time. In addition, the green heterogeneous catalyst has features, such as environmental friendliness, easy separation from the reaction mixture by an external magnet, high catalytic activity, and reusability up to 6 stages without significant reduction of its catalytic activity.

It is still a challenging work of developing near-infrared (NIR) fluorescence dyes with excellent optical properties. Herein, we synthesized a series of NIR aza-BODIPY fluorescence dyes with electronic push–pull system and further investigated their photophysical properties, photostability, and application in cellular imaging. It was found that introducing electron-withdrawing groups (EWGs) on the para-position of aza-BODIPY 1,7-phenyls not only leads to the significant redshift of absorption and fluorescence emission bands of aza-BODIPY dyes but also increases their fluorescence quantum yield and photostablility. The DFT calculations and cyclic voltammetry measurements proved that introducing EWGs on para-position of 1,7-phenyls can decrease the energy level difference between HOMO and LUMO, resulting in the redshift of maximum absorption and emission wavelengths. On the basis of the feasible experiment results of cellular imaging and cytotoxicity assay, it is expected that the optimized aza-BODIPY dyes have a bright application prospect for in vivo cellular or tissue imaging.

In the present study, a novel biosynthetic process of NiO-NPs is described using an economical reducing/capping agent (Cordia myxa fruit mucilage) by the simple sol–gel method, and Ni(NO3)2.6H2O as a nickel precursor. The nanoparticles were calcinated at different temperatures of 500, 600, and 700 °C. The structure, size, and morphology of these nanoparticles were characterized by FT-IR, XRD, FESEM, and EDS spectroscopy. The thermal manner of the composition has been studied by the utilization of TGA. Analyses of XRD verified that the pure and single-crystalline phase of NiO-NPs was formed when the sample was calcinated at 700 °C. The average particle size of 15 to 27 nm was obtained which showed that increasing the calcination temperature could lead to an increase in the size of NiO-NPs. The result from FESEM revealed that nanoparticles were uniformly distributed while being homogenous and nearly spherical as well. Further, NiO-NPs showed excellent catalytic activity through a three-component condensation reaction for the synthesis of 3,4-dihyropyrano[c]chromenes and 2-amino-4H-chromene derivatives. This effective catalyst could be recovered and reused several times without any significant loss of activity.Graphical abstract

In this work, the efficient and green method has been presented to prepare arylbenzimidazoles via an aqueous, one-pot reaction. The products were obtained using the reaction between aldehydes, malononitrile, and 1,2-phenylenediamine in water as a solvent at room temperature. SnFe2O4 nanoparticles were used as the heterogeneous catalyst at room temperature under an inert atmosphere. The morphology and composition of the catalyst have been defined by SEM, XRD, UV–Vis, FTIR, and Raman spectroscopy. Ten different arylbenzimidazoles were prepared in 70–98% yield. The structural properties of the synthesized arylbenzimidazoles were investigated using FT-IR, NMR, and mass spectrometry. The plausible mechanism was studied using DFT calculations. Furthermore, molecular docking simulations identified the synthesized arylbenzimidazoles as an activator of transmembrane proteins of the human innate immune system. The usefulness of the product as a Human transmembrane Protein activator was proved using Docking studies.Graphical abstract

Considering the removal potential of anti-inflammatory drugs, it was observed that diclofenac and naproxen were more difficult to separate from sample matrix with respect to other anti-inflammatory drugs. As a result of the measurements of these drugs in the river, groundwater and treatment plant effluent streams, it was determined that 37% of the total chemical was retained on colloidal non-precipitating particles, and the remaining part was in dissolved form. In this study, the catalytic activity and adsorption performance of inexpensive, simple, environmentally friendly and innovative adsorbents such as Ag NPs, Cu NPs and Ag/Cu NPs synthesized at the first time by a green synthesis method using weed plant Helichrysum arenarium extract were investigated in the removal of naproxen and diclofenac drugs from aqueous solution. The structure of the obtained nanoparticles was characterized by UV–Vis, FT-IR, XRD, SEM–EDX, TEM and BET analyzes. It was determined that Cu NPs showed both the highest catalytic activity and the highest adsorption property among the synthesized other nanoparticles. The synergistic effect was investigated in detail by combining adsorption and catalytic wet peroxidation processes to perform with faster and higher efficiency of drug removal. Based on experimental results, Cu NPs degraded 84%, 91% and 75% of naproxen, diclofenac and naproxen + diclofenac drugs, respectively, and showed strong selectivity against diclofenac after 50 min.Graphical abstract

Micro-mesoporous zeolite shows great potential in the field of fuel denitrogenation. However, the current preparation method of zeolite with composite pores still has the problems of high cost and low denitrification rate. Herein, we prepared a low-cost phosphorus doped zeolite by directly impregnated Y zeolite in phosphoric acid and calcinated at 400 °C firstly. Experimental results showed that phosphorus doped 10 wt.% PA/MY provided optimum denitrogenation performance with denitrogenation rate as high as 97% compared to unmodified MY zeolite (21.11%) and ion exchanged 1.0 MHY zeolite (91.38%). What's more, it was found that the introduction of phosphorus led to the formation of P–O tetrahedra and Al–O–P bonds in zeolite, which increased the amount of mesopore and the Lewis acid in zeolite. Meanwhile, the comparative study found that ion exchanged MHY zeolite depended on the limited pore matching effect of micropores and nitrogen-containing molecules and the chemisorption reaction of non-regenerable Brøsted acid to achieve denitrogenation performance. However, phosphorus doped zeolite PA/MY not only had a better size matching effect between the mesopore and the size of nitrogen-containing molecules, but also had more Lewis acid to play a major role in denitrogenation. The Lewis acid on PA/MY zeolite also had the advantage of being easy to regenerate by desorption of the nitrogen-containing molecules absorbed. This study showed good prospects for the industrial application of the doped zeolite.

Titanium dioxide (TiO2) is a wide bandgap semiconductor which shows excellent photocatalytic activity under UV irradiation. To extend the light absorption efficiency to visible region, TiO2 can be coupled with other semiconductors to form nanocomposites. In the present study, photocatalytic efficiency of TiO2-WO3 nanocomposites against methylene blue dye was investigated. TiO2-WO3 nanocomposites with different W/Ti ratio were synthesized by sol–gel method. The samples were characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), High resolution transmission spectroscopy (HR-TEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Brunauer, Emmett and Teller surface area analyzer (BET), UV–Vis diffuse reflectance spectra (DRS) and zeta potential analyzer. XRD and HR-TEM analysis confirmed the crystallinity of nanocomposites. XPS analysis confirmed the phase purity of the nanocomposite. The specific surface area and pore radius were calculated from BET analysis. The energy bandgap of all the samples were calculated from UV–Vis DRS analysis. The optical band gap of the nanocomposites was less compared to that of pure TiO2. This decrease in band gap has resulted in extending the photocatalytic activity to visible range. Optimum W/Ti ratio for obtaining maximum photocatalytic efficiency was arrived at and its mechanism was studied in detail using zeta potential measurements and scavenging tests. Reusability of the catalyst was also confirmed.