Presentation day

Thursday  1:00 PM

 

TITLE

Protein-polymer co-assembled nanoparticles for catalysis and vaccine applications

 

Abstract

A simple and robust protocol to maintain the structural feature of polymer-protein coreshell
nanoparticles (PPCS-NPs) is developed based on the synergistic interactions between proteins and
functional polymers. Using the self-assembly method, a broad range of proteins can be assembled to the
selective water-insoluble polymers. While proteins are displacing between water and polymer to minimize
the interfacial energy, the polymer offers a unique microenvironment to maintain protein structure and
conformation. The proposed mechanism is based on a fine balance between hydrophobicity and
hydrophilicity, as well as hydrogen bonding between proteins and polymer. This PPCS-NPs can further
serve as an effective scaffold to incorporate the bienzyme system onto a single particle with about a 20%
increase in activity in comparison to the mixed free enzymes. In addition, our method provides a unique
platform to display high-density proteins for vaccine development.