New Non-Intravenous Routes for Benzodiazepines in Epilepsy: A Clinician Perspective.

Benzodiazepines represent the first-line treatment for the acute management of epileptic seizures and status epilepticus. The emergency use of benzodiazepines must be timely, and because most seizures occur outside of the hospital environment, there is a significant need for delivery methods that are easy for nonclinical caregivers to use and administer quickly and safely. In addition, the ideal route of administration should be reliable in terms of absorption. Rectal diazepam is the only licensed formulation in the USA, whereas rectal diazepam and buccal midazolam are currently licensed in the EU. However, the sometimes unpredictable absorption with rectal and buccal administration means they are not ideal routes. Several alternative routes are currently being explored. This is a narrative review of data about delivery methods for benzodiazepines alternative to the intravenous and oral routes for the acute treatment of seizures. Unconventional delivery options such as direct delivery to the central nervous system or inhalers are reported. Data show that intranasal diazepam or midazolam and the intramuscular auto-injector for midazolam are as effective as rectal or intravenous diazepam. Head-to-head comparisons with buccal midazolam are urgently needed. In addition, the majority of trials focused on children and adolescents, and further trials in adults are warranted

The crystallization of polar, channel-type inclusion compounds: Property-directed supramolecular synthesis

Research News: How can the efficiency of formation of polar materials be improved? The work presented here makes use of the concept of supramolecular synthons, resulting in an inclusion formation approach that produces a nearly four times higher yield of polar crystal structures than the crystallization of dipolar molecules alone. The example of co-crystallization of racemic all-trans perhydrotriphenylene (PHTP) with linear acceptors or donors is analyzed, and it is suggested that this `property-directed' synthesis has a potentially high degree of predictability.status: publishe

Nanopillar diffraction gratings by two-photon lithography

Two-dimensional photonic structures such as nanostructured pillar gratings are useful for various applications including wave coupling, diffractive optics, and security features. Two-photon lithography facilitates the generation of such nanostructured surfaces with high precision and reproducibility. In this work, we report on nanopillar diffraction gratings fabricated by two-photon lithography with various laser powers close to the polymerization threshold of the photoresist. As a result, defect-free arrays of pillars with diameters down to 184 nm were fabricated. The structure sizes were analyzed by scanning electron microscopy and compared to theoretical predictions obtained from Monte Carlo simulations. The optical reflectivities of the nanopillar gratings were analyzed by optical microscopy and verified by rigorous coupled-wave simulations. © 2019 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland

Statistically controlled self-assembly of polar molecular crystals

Communication: The synthesis of polar molecular materials with designed properties is a fundamental target of materials research. Here a fully rational synthesis of polar materials from a given set of precursors (perhydrotriphenylene and three different guests) is presented. A simulation shows that varying the relative proportions of each guest permits the level of polarity to be tuned with a high degree of control. These results are fundamental to the understanding of how a complex supramolecular system self-assembles into a material with polar properties.status: publishe