Stellate macroporous silica nanospheres in bio-macromolecules encapsulation and delivery
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This project focused on using mesoporous silica as a solid support to encapsulate enzymes for operating a highly economic, and recyclable biomass processing system. The main objective is to turn non-food biomass sources into food products.
Enzymes are macromolecules with the structural backbone of proteins or ribonucleic acid sequences (RNAs) which work as catalysts in living organisms. Enzymes have the advantage of being the least contaminating catalyst due to normal catalyst might generate toxic by-product, and preferable to organic and inorganic catalysts, especially when used for product related to human used, which require biocompatibility of final product.
However, there are several disadvantages in enzyme utilization. Their fabrication is time-consuming and requires elaborated molecular biology processes. Most of the enzymes need well-defined reaction conditions to be functional and operate at high yield. Unfortunately, although they are reusable as normal catalysts, it proves difficult to extract or reuse the enzymes from a reaction. Also, enzyme molecules are easily degradable and demand proper storage.
To overcome some of the disadvantages, especially regarding stability to degradation, recovery, and reusability, immobilization of enzyme on solid support has become a thriving methodology. In recent years, mesoporous silica nanomaterials(MSN) have been at the forefront of enzyme immobilization given their extensive surface area, which provides capability to increase enzyme loading and for their demonstrate ability to protect enzyme from degradation, thus enabling high recyclability. Mesoporous silica is biocompatible and has already been used for several applications included. Catalysis, drug delivery, and Bio-imaging. Previously published research utilized mesoporous silica to deliver drugs, DNAs, RNAs or encapsulate single enzyme.
The objective of this research is completed to develop a new porous silica platform that is unique in its porosity structure and develop it into a dual-enzyme platform with the scope of demonstrating a multi-reaction bio nanocatalyst. In regard to the further applications, the stellate MSN can be used as drug delivery or become a package of the biomacromolecule delivery system kit.