Maxim Shevtsov, Stefan Stangl, Boris Nikolaev, Ludmila Yakovleva, Yaroslav Marchenko, Ruslana Tagaeva, Wolfgang Sievert, Emil Pitkin, Anton Mazur, Peter Tolstoy, Oleg Galibin, Vyacheslav Ryzhov, Katja Steiger, Oleg Smirnov, William Khachatryan, Kerry Chester, Gabriele Multhoff, Granzyme B Functionalized Nanoparticles Targeting Membrane Hsp70‐Positive Tumors for Multimodal Cancer Theranostics, Small, V. 15, P. 1900205, 2019. DOI: 10.1002/smll.201900205.

Functionalized superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) have emerged as potential clinical tools for cancer theranostics. Membrane‐bound 70 kDa heat shock protein (mHsp70) is ubiquitously expressed on the cell membrane of various tumor types but not normal cells and therefore provides a tumor‐specific target. The serine protease granzyme B (GrB) that is produced as an effector molecule by activated T and NK cells has been shown to specifically target mHsp70 on tumor cells. Following binding to Hsp70, GrB is rapidly internalized into tumor cells. Herein, it is demonstrated that GrB functionalized SPIONs act as a contrast enhancement agent for magnetic resonance imaging and induce specific tumor cell apoptosis. Combinatorial regimens employing stereotactic radiotherapy and/or magnetic targeting are found to further enhance the therapeutic efficacy of GrB‐SPIONs in different tumor mouse models.

Muhammad Abdullah Butt, Antonino Calà Lesina, Martin Neugebauer, Thomas Bauer, Lora Ramunno, Alessandro Vaccari, Pierre Berini, Yuriy Petrov, Denis Danilov, Alina Manshina, Peter Banzer, Gerd Leuchs, Investigating the Optical Properties of a Laser Induced 3D Self‐Assembled Carbon–Metal Hybrid Structure, Small, 2019, V.15, 1900512. DOI: 10.1002/smll.201900512.

Carbon‐based and carbon–metal hybrid materials hold great potential for applications in optics and electronics. Here, a novel material made of carbon and gold–silver nanoparticles is discussed, fabricated using a laser‐induced self‐assembly process. This self‐assembled metamaterial manifests itself in the form of cuboids with lateral dimensions on the order of several micrometers and a height of tens to hundreds of nanometers. The carbon atoms are arranged following an orthorhombic unit cell, with alloy nanoparticles intercalated in the crystalline carbon matrix. The optical properties of this metamaterial are analyzed experimentally using a microscopic Müller matrix measurement approach and reveal a high linear birefringence across the visible spectral range. Theoretical modeling based on local‐field theory applied to the carbon matrix links the birefringence to the orthorhombic unit cell, while finite‐difference time‐domain simulations of the metamaterial relates the observed optical response to the distribution of the alloy nanoparticles and the optical density of the carbon matrix.

T.V.Plisko, A.V.Penkova, K.S.Burts, A.V.Bildyukevich, M.E.Dmitrenko, G.B.Melnikova, R.R.Atta, A.S.Mazur, A.A.Zolotarev, A.B.Missyul, Effect of Pluronic F127 on porous and dense membrane structure formation via non-solvent induced and evaporation induced phase separation, Journal of Membrane Science, V. 580, Pages 336-349. DOI: 10.1016/j.memsci.2019.03.028.

Novel porous and dense membranes based on polysulfone (PSF) modified by poly(ethylene glycol)–b–poly(propylene glycol)–b– poly(ethylene glycol) (Pluronic F127) were developed. The influence of Pluronic F127 introduction to the casting solution on different types of polymer membrane formation via two different phase inversion techniques—non-solvent induced phase separation (NIPS) for porous membranes and evaporation induced phase separation (EIPS) for dense membranes—was investigated. According to the triangular phase diagram obtained, PSF-Pluronic F127-N,N-dimethylacetamide (DMAc) systems feature lower critical solution temperature and have a tendency to micelle formation due to Pluronic F127 self-assembly...