The Paradigm of Safe and Sustainable‐by‐Design Synthetic Catalysts for Catalytic Therapies

Abstract The rapid development of synthetic catalysts, including organometallic and coordination complexes, organometallic‐based artificial metalloenzymes, and nanozymes, for biomedical applications in academia and the private sector has outpaced the ability of health and environmental regulatory agencies to establish guidelines for human exposure. This challenge extends across the chemical and biomedical industries and has driven the emergence of the safe and sustainable‐by‐Design (SSbD) concept and related regulatory frameworks. Addressing SSbD is particularly complex for emerging fields such as catalytic therapies using synthetic catalysts. Nevertheless, advancing toward this goal should become a priority for researchers in the coming years. In this work, we review the state‐of‐the‐art synthetic catalysts for catalytic therapies and analyze the materials and elements used in their design in relation to their abundance, potential toxicity, and strategies to integrate the SSbD framework into this field.