Biologically derived polymers, such as chitosan, have gained attention as sustainable alternatives to synthetic materials for food and biomedical applications. Fungal-derived chitosan offers notable advantages over crustacean-based chitosan, including a renewable origin and lower allergenic potential. In this study, chitosan was extracted from fungal biomass through a sequential process comprising demineralization, deproteinization, and deacetylation. The extracted material was characterized using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), zeta potential measurement, dynamic light scattering (DLS), and color analysis. Compared to commercial chitosan, the fungal chitosan exhibited lower crystallinity and thermal stability, as well as a more porous surface morphology. Its degree of deacetylation and surface charge suggest promising potential for use in biodegradable films and functional materials. These findings highlight the feasibility of using fungal biomass as a sustainable and valuable source of chitosan for technological applications.

This study reports additional information's of geometric, electronic, thermodynamic, and vibrational properties of a Cu(II) complex with 1,10-phenanthroline and L-glutamine ligands. The experimental spectroscopic analyses were corroborated by density functional theory (DFT). Furthermore, these properties were evaluated using an implicit solvation method with water and methanol solvents, including vacuum condition. The theoretical predictions provided a deeper understanding of the frontier molecular orbitals, chemical reactivity indices, dipole moment, and electrostatic potential maps. A computational analysis of the intermolecular interactions using Hirshfeld surfaces was also performed, which demonstrated that the H⋯O/O⋯H and H⋯H interactions are mainly responsible for the structural and thermal stability of the complex. The calculated intramolecular vibration bands showed a good correlation with the experimental Raman and infrared (IR) data, although solvation effects caused some wavenumber shifts. In vitro, antitumor assays were performed to evaluate the cytotoxic effects of the complex against prostate (PC-3) and glioblastoma (SNB-19) cancer cells. Absorption, distribution, metabolism, and excretion (ADME) parameters, along with drug-like properties, are also presented in this work.