'Like A Fishing Net,' Nanonet Collapses to Trap Drug Molecules
Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
Northwestern University researchers are casting a net for nanoparticles.
The team has discovered a new, rapid method for fabricating nanoparticles from a simple, self-assembling polymer. The novel method presents new possibilities for diverse applications, including water purification, diagnostics and rapidly generating vaccine formulations, which typically require many different types of molecules to be either captured or delivered at the same time.
Using a polymer net that collapses into nanoscale hydrogels (or nanogels), the method efficiently captures over 95% of proteins, DNA or small molecule drugs-alone or in combinations. By comparison, loading efficiency is typically between 5% and 20% for other nanoparticle delivery systems.
"We use a polymer that forms a wide net throughout an aqueous solution," said Northwestern's Evan A. Scott, who led the study. "Then we induce the net to collapse. It collects anything within the solution, trapping therapeutics inside of nanogel delivery vehicles with very high efficiency."
"It works like a fishing net, which first spreads out due to electrostatic repulsion and then shrinks upon hydration to trap 'fish,'" added Fanfan Du, a postdoctoral fellow in Scott's laboratory.
The paper was published last week (Sept. 29) in the journal Nature Communications.
[...] In addition to drug delivery applications, the researchers also believe the novel method could be used for water purification. The network could collapse to collect contaminants in water, leaving pure water behind.
Journal Reference:
Fanfan Du, Baofu Qiao, Trung Dac Nguyen, et al. Homopolymer self-assembly of poly(propylene sulfone) hydrogels via dynamic noncovalent sulfone-sulfone bonding [open], Nature Communications (DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-18657-5)
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