Formulation is an important step in the development of pharmaceuticals ranging from etheogens to metallodrugs used in the treatment of cancer. The active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) offer multiple challenges which we need to overcome if we are to create stable, robust, reproducible, and biologically active products. These challenges include:

1. Lipophilicity and low water/serum solubility of API.

2. Limited bioaccessibility of API.

3. Extensive degradation of API during formulation, storage, or in vivo owing to metabolic pathways leading to unacceptable dosage variability.

4. Inability of API to cross the blood-brain barrier if psychoactivity is to be demonstrated.

We develop novel nanoformulations to circumvent these barriers, ensuring consistent and effective delivery of therapeutics to targets. We have developed different formulation types, ranging from operationally more accessible formulations (such as a nanoemulsion) to more complicated pharmaceutical formulations involving host-guest chemistry, more suited for novel therapeutics, and proved that our formulations prevent API degradation and facilitate drug uptake at the cellular level.

Multifunctional bionanoprobes combine multiple orthogonal imaging modalities within a single dose of a material administered for the purpose of augmented imaging. Of the techniques potentially to be combined within such a protocol, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a powerful, high-resolution diagnostic tool for in vivo imaging without resorting to invasive surgery or ionizing radiations. Most MRI scans require the use of contrast agents, which shorten relaxation times of water protons, thus improving contrast and signal-to-noise ratio. We strive to develop nanoparticulate contrast agents with cheap, biocompatible coatings which can potentially combine one or more imaging protocols (such as optical imaging or ultrasound). We have active collaborations with medical professionals and researchers who help us in determining the viability of commercial use of our contrast agents. Our expertise in tuning the magnetic properties of materials in the nano-domain, as well as potential functionalization of the NP-stabilizing ligands we examine, open our research to the exciting possibility of multi-modal imaging using a single 'custom-built' contrast agent.

Nanostructured materials are inherently complex, and characterization protocols developed with small molecules in mind often fail to produce worthwhile information when applied to such systems. Today’s understanding of the interactions between NPs and other molecules is gradually being enriched by techniques dependent on synchrotron-based X-ray absorption and scattering, especially when such measurements are carried out in a temporally resolved fashion concurrent with the occurrence of the process under investigation. X-ray absorption fine-structure (XAFS) spectroscopy is expected to become a core technique for deriving element-specific chemical state and local structure information under conditions of application of functional materials. As a subset of this broad field of study, the interaction of metals and ionic liquids is being studied intensively by scientists using XAS, primarily owing to novel solvation properties of the ILs that make them extremely useful for applications such as dissolution and chemical conversion of biopolymers such as chitin, lignin, cellulose, etc. in the interests of sustainable feedstock.

We intend to probe these systems (for example, ionic liquid and metal NP composites) with X-rays to determine mechanisms of reactions occurring in these systems during biopolymer dissolution, depolymerisation, and catalytic conversion. Events such as changes in oxidation states, effects of additives on any chemical reactions happening, etc., will be examined as a part of this project. The influence of secondary oxidants such as peroxides on the rate of biopolymer degradation could then be studied as a function of time; the use of controlled-atmosphere cells, as designed by Scott, Mclennan, Hu, and Banerjee would enable us to determine the influence of gases on the oxidation process. Such studies would go a long way in creating a library of unique catalytic composites targeted at generating value-added chemicals from renewable resources.

Tetraalkylphosphonium ILs are a relatively unexplored family of ILs, with definite advantages (such as easy synthesis and separation, tunable water solubility, stability towards heat and light, and relative inertness towards bases) over other IL families. Our previous work in this field gives us the expertise to design and synthesize novel catalytic composite materials within these IL matrices for unique catalytic applications. Metallic NPs – excellent catalytic materials owing to properties such as small size, high surface to bulk metal ratio, and potentially tailorable surfaces – together with room-temperature tetraalkylphosphonium ILs, which act both as NP stabilizers and as solvents – have been evaluated by us in multiple catalytic reactions involving both single-step and tandem catalytic protocols. Moreover, NPs immobilized in ILs allow vacuum-stripping of the volatile products and/or unreacted substrate from the reaction mixture, and the subsequent recycling of the system. ILs coating the catalytically active metal NP surfaces can potentially impose a high degree of directionality over the transition states. Therefore, rational design of catalytic functionalities within tetraalkylphosphonium IL matrices gives us access to unique catalytic pathways.  Furthermore, these ILs maybe polymerized to produce unique virucidal polymeric coatings for surfaces such as door-knobs, with the pendant alkyl chains of the ILs rupturing the viral membrane and annihilating the microbe.