Carvalho André, Gallo Juan, Pereira David M, Valentão Patrícia, Andrade Paula B, Hilliou Loic, Ferreira Paula M T, Bañobre-López Manuel, Martins José A
Centre of Chemistry, University of Minho, Campus de Gualtar, 4710-057 Braga, Portugal.
Diagnostic Tools & Methods/Advanced (Magnetic) Theranostic Nanostructures Lab, International Iberian Nanotechnology Laboratory (INL), Av. Mestre José Veiga s/n, 4715-330 Braga, Portugal.
Nanomaterials (Basel). 2019 Apr 3;9(4):541. doi: 10.3390/nano9040541.
Self-assembled peptide hydrogels have emerged in recent years as the new paradigm in biomaterials research. We have contributed to this field the development of hydrogels based on dehydrodipeptides -capped with naproxen. The dehydrodipeptide hydrogels can be loaded with drugs, thus being potential nanocarriers for drug delivery. In this work novel dehydrodipeptides containing tyrosine and aspartic acid amino acid residues -capped with naproxen and -terminal dehydrophenylalanine were prepared and characterized. Superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) were incorporated into the dehydrodipeptide-based hydrogels and their effect on the self-assembly, structure and rheological and magnetic properties of the hydrogels was studied. Magnetic hydrogels, with incorporated SPIONs, displayed concentration-dependent ₂-MRI contrast enhancement. Moreover, upon magnetic excitation (alternating magnetic field -AMF-) the SPIONs were able to generate a significant amount of heat. Hence, magnetic hyperthermia can be used as a remote trigger for release of drug cargos and SPIONs incorporated into the self-assembled dehydrodipeptide hydrogels.
近年来，自组装肽水凝胶已成为生物材料研究的新范例。我们在这一领域做出了贡献，开发了以萘普生封端的脱氢二肽为基础的水凝胶。脱氢二肽水凝胶可以负载药物，因此是潜在的药物递送纳米载体。在这项工作中，制备并表征了含有酪氨酸和天冬氨酸氨基酸残基、以萘普生封端且末端为脱氢苯丙氨酸的新型脱氢二肽。将超顺磁性氧化铁纳米颗粒（SPIONs）掺入基于脱氢二肽的水凝胶中，并研究了其对水凝胶自组装、结构以及流变学和磁性性质的影响。掺入SPIONs的磁性水凝胶表现出浓度依赖性的T₂-MRI造影增强。此外，在磁激发（交变磁场-AMF-）下，SPIONs能够产生大量热量。因此，磁热疗可作为一种远程触发机制，用于释放掺入自组装脱氢二肽水凝胶中的药物和SPIONs。
