CHEMICAL AND BIOLOGICAL ADVANCEMENTS OF GRAPHENE FAMILY MATERIALS FUNCTIONALIZED WITH CYCLODEXTRINS

The grafting of cyclodextrins (CD) onto graphene-family materials (G) constitutes an inspiration for the scientific community and gave rise to various important findings in the field of electrochemical sensors, bioremediation, catalysis, and nanomedicine.1,2 In the last years, our research interest was focused on the synthesis, characterization and biological profile of CD-functionalized G (G-CD).3-6 Herein, we discuss the main design criteria used to develop our multifunctional nanoplatforms (Figure 1), their physicochemical properties, intracellular trafficking and biological response. Remarks will be devoted to our current results about the impact of G-CD exposure in HEp-2 cell gene expression. Promise and limits of nanostructured G-CD-based drug delivery systems will be elucidated, taking in account the main outcomes of our scientific runway (2014-2021).