INDUSTRY News
New COF helps develop effi cient drug delivery
Researchers from Zhejiang Normal University in China and Tokyo University of Science (TUS) in Japan have jointly created a novel 3D covalent organic framework (COF) with the largest pore size and lowest density to date, suitable for many applications including effi cient drug delivery. The team has achieved this by reticulating a 6-linked triptycene and a 4-linked porphyrin linkers to form a non-interpenetrated network, resulting in the COF’s large pore size and density. Covalent organic frameworks (COFs) refer to all-organic crystalline, porous polymers that show promise for a variety of applications, including controlled drug delivery. However, their research has mostly focused on 2D COFs since it is challenging to construct a reticular 3D COF. Now, researchers in Japan and China have synthesised a 3D COF with the largest pore size reported that demonstrates effi cient loading and controlled release of fi ve diff erent drugs. Owing to their structural diversity, high porosity and easily accessible active sites, COFs can be designed for a range of applications such as gas storage and separation, catalysis and drug delivery. Despite such vast potential, however, most reported COFs
suff er from small pore size due to the formation of interpenetrated frameworks during the construction process, which results in closely knit interwoven structures with restricted pore sizes. Moreover, most research so far has focused on 2D COFs given the diffi culty of constructing a 3D, non-interpenetrated COF with large pore sizes.
The material, which the team named TUS-64, displays a high capacity to hold the drugs, along with a sustained release rate, making it suitable for delivering drugs over extended periods. “TUS-64 shows all the desirable qualities of a drug delivery vehicle, such as controlled release kinetics, sustained delivery and site-specifi c targeting,” said Professor Yuichi Negishi from TUS. “By making use of these characteristics of COFs, we could create new materials that will be required in the next generation society, such as drug delivery vehicles, energy and environmental materials and separation materials.”
Comau’s new mobile cobot is used in three EU projects
Comau is designing a powerful mobile robotics platform as part of an open, highly-collaborative production environment, in the context of three diff erent European projects. The integrated solution is a modular, scaleable and completely
re-confi gurable to be easily adapted to diff erent applications without changing the system’s underlying software or hardware. Furthermore, because the robotic arm is mounted on an autonomous mobile platform, it is not tied to a single operation but can address several applications in diff erent areas of the plant as needed.
This mobile robotics approach uses Comau’s Agile 1500 autonomous mobile vehicle and the high-payload Racer-5 cobot, a 6-axis articulated robotic arm that can work at speeds to 6m/s when human operators are not present. The solution is currently being used within several European projects: DIMOFAC, an EU-initiative aimed at helping companies implement a smart factory architecture, where it is used for warehouse automation tasks; PeneloPe, where it dispenses glue and carries out non- destructive quality inspection in the public transport domain; and ODIN, where it manipulates mechanical parts for automotive applications, with the aim of demonstrating the technical and performance feasibility of cobots on the factory fl oor. The global market for collaborative mobile robots is growing at a high rate. Some 13% of the industrial robotics market belongs to cobots, with automated mobile robots expected to achieve CAGR of 15% to 2027.
6 June 2023 | Automation
automationmagazine.co.uk
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