Chiral Psychoactive Substances: Identification, Toxicity, and Enantioselective Studies
A special issue of Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049). This special issue belongs to the section "Medicinal Chemistry".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (28 February 2023) | Viewed by 15324
Special Issue Editors
2. Centro Interdisciplinar de Investigação Marinha e Ambiental (CIIMAR/CIMAR), Universidade do Porto, Edifício do Terminal de Cruzeiros do Porto de Leixões, Av. General Norton de Matos s/n, 4050-208 Matosinhos, Portugal
Interests: medicinal chemistry; organic chemistry; chiral bioactive substances; enantioselective studies; chirality; chromatography
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: emerging contaminants; psychoactive drugs; ecotoxicity; chromatography
2. TOXRUN–Toxicology Research Unit, University Institute of Health Sciences, CESPU, CRL, 4585-116 Gandra, Portugal
Interests: organic and pharmaceutical chemistry; chromatography; chirality; organic environmental pollutants
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
The abuse of new psychoactive substances and the use of pharmaceuticals to reach psychoactive effects have dramatically increased in recent years. New psychoactive substances represent a public health threat since they are easily accessible online and are sold as a legal alternative to illicit drugs. To circumvent the law, new derivatives are clandestinely synthesized and, consequently, new psychoactive substances keep emerging on the drug market with unknown properties. Most of the psychoactive substances (legal or illicit) are chiral, meaning that they can exist as enantiomeric pairs with different biological and toxicological activities. Thus, enantioselective studies are required, including analysis, metabolism, (eco) toxicological and biodegradation.
The main aims of the present Special Issue include both fundamental studies and applications in a multidisciplinary research field that enrolls chiral psychoactive substances. Contributions to this issue, both in the form of original research or review articles, have the broad scope to illustrate recent and future trends in the identification of new chiral psychoactive substances, methodologies to obtain and analyze the enantiomers in diverse matrices such as biological or environmental, and enantioselective studies in metabolism, biodegradation and (eco)toxicity. Studies that consider enantiomeric profile as a tool for consumption estimation by wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) are also welcome.
Key aspects such as enantioselective synthesis, enantiomeric resolution, chiral analyses by chromatographic methods, chiral recognition studies—both in enantioseparation and in biological systems—and enantioselectivity in toxicodynamic, toxicokinetic, ecotoxicity studies and enantiomeric profile in WBE will be considered in this Special Issue.
Prof. Dr. Carla Sofia Garcia Fernandes
Prof. Dr. Cláudia Maria Rosa Ribeiro
Prof. Dr. Maria Elizabeth Tiritan
Guest Editors
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Keywords
- new psychoactive substances
- enantioselective studies
- enantioresolution
- chiral recognition
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