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Peptoid-based hierarchically-structured biomimetic nanomaterials: Synthesis, characterization and applications

基于类肽等级自组装结构仿生纳米材料: 合成, 表 征和应用

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Abstract

Peptoids (or poly-N-substituted glycines) are a promising class of bioinspired sequence-defined polymers due to their highly efficient synthesis, high chemical stability, enzyme hydrolysis resistance, and biocompatibility. By tuning the side chain chemistry of peptoids, it allows for precise control over sequences and achieving a large side-chain diversity. Due to these unique features, in the last several years, many amphiphilic peptoids were designed as highly tunable building blocks for the preparation of biomimetic nanomaterials with well-defined hierarchical structures and desired functionalities. Herein, we provide an overview of the recent achievements in this area by dividing them into the following three aspects. First, mica- and silica-templated peptoid self-assembly are summarized. The presence of inorganic substrates provides the guarantee of investigating their self-assembly mechanisms and interactions between peptoids and substrates using nanoscale characterization techniques, particularly in situ atomic force microscopy (AFM) and AFM-based dynamic force spectroscopy (AFM-DFS). Second, solution-phase self-assembly of peptoids into nanotubes and nanosheets is presented, as well as their self-repair properties. Third, the applications of peptoid-based nanomaterials are outlined, including the construction of catalytic nanomaterials as a template and cytosolic delivery as cargoes.

摘要

类肽(或N-取代甘氨酸)具有合成效率高、化学稳定性强、 抗酶水解及生物相容性好等优点, 是一类潜在的可自定义序列的 生物仿生聚合物. 通过调节类肽的侧链化学, 可以精确地控制类肽 序列并实现侧链的多样性. 基于以上类肽分子独特的优势, 在过去 的几年里, 研究者设计和合成了大量的双亲性类肽作为基本的结 构单元, 通过自下而上的分子自组装作用构建了结构可控和具有 特定功能的仿生纳米材料. 本文从以下三个方面综述了我们在类 肽自组装领域取得的一些成果. 首先, 概述了以云母和硅片为无机 基底辅助类肽自组装. 将原子力显微镜原位成像技术和单分子力 谱技术相结合, 可实时观察类肽分子在表面的组装过程并直接测 定类肽分子与基底间的相互作用, 揭示基底表面对类肽自组装的 影响. 其次, 介绍了类肽分子在溶液中自组装成纳米管和具有自修 复功能的纳米薄膜. 最后, 综述了基于类肽自组装纳米材料的应用, 包括以类肽自组装纳米材料为催化模板构建纳米仿生催化剂和作 为细胞内输送物质的载体等.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Startup Research Fund of Dongguan University of Technology (KCYKYQD2017015) and the US Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, as part of the Energy Frontier Research Centers program: CSSAS—The Center for the Science of Synthesis Across Scales (DESC0019288). Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is a multi-program national laboratory operated for the Department of Energy by Battelle under contract number DE-AC05-76RL01830.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Materials Science and Engineering, Dongguan University of Technology, Dongguan, 523808, China

    Jianli Liu  (刘建丽) & Lifeng Cui  (崔立峰)

  2. Physical Sciences Division, Physical and Computational Sciences Directorate, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, WA, 99352, USA

    Jianli Liu  (刘建丽), Bin Cai  (蔡彬) & Chun-Long Chen  (陈春龙)

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  1. Jianli Liu  (刘建丽)
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Contributions

Liu J and Chen CL proposed the topic and outline of this review article. Liu J and Cai B collected the related information needed in writing the paper; Liu J, Cui L and Chen CL cowrote and modified the manuscript. All authors discussed and commented on the manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Lifeng Cui  (崔立峰) or Chun-Long Chen  (陈春龙).

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Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Jianli Liu received her PhD degree in physical chemistry from the Institutes of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2016. She is a Postdoc under the supervision of Prof. Lifeng Cui in the School of Materials Science and Engineering, Dongguan University of Technology. Currently, she is working in Prof. Chun-Long Chen’s group as a visiting scholar in the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Her research interests are the design and assembly of peptoids and the study of their formation mechanisms by in situ AFM.

Lifeng Cui finished his undergraduate studies in electrical engineering at Xi’an University of Posts & Telecommunications in 2001. In 2007, he received his PhD degree in materials science under the supervision of Prof. Lai-Sheng Wang at Washington State University. After postdoctoral studies in materials science at Stanford University with Professor Yi Cui, he joined Amazon Inc. in 2010 and worked as a R&D engineer. He joined Shanghai University for Science & Technology as a professor in 2013 and moved to his present position as professor of materials science and engineering in 2016. His current research interests include advanced nano-structured materials, photocatalysis, and catalysis for biomass conversion.

Chun-Long Chen is currently a senior research scientist at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), and a joint Faculty Fellow in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Washington. His research group is tackling the challenges of developing sequence-defined peptoids that mimic proteins and peptides for assembly of biomimetic functional materials (e.g., artificial membranes) and for controlling inorganic crystal formation (e.g., plasmonic nanomaterials), aiming at design and synthesis of bio-inspired functional materials that rival those found in biology.

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Liu, J., Cai, B., Cui, L. et al. Peptoid-based hierarchically-structured biomimetic nanomaterials: Synthesis, characterization and applications. Sci. China Mater. 63, 1099–1112 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40843-020-1296-8

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