School of Chemistry, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, 2052, Australia.
School of Optometry and Vision Science, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, 2052, Australia.
Sci Rep. 2022 Dec 23;12(1):22259. doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-26426-1.
In this study, we prepared antibacterial hydrogels through the self-assembly of naphthyl anthranilamide (NaA) capped amino acid based cationic peptide mimics. These ultra-short cationic peptide mimics were rationally designed with NaA as a capping group, L-phenylalanine, a short aliphatic linker, and a cationic group. The synthesized peptide mimics efficiently formed hydrogels with minimum gel concentrations between 0.1 and 0.3%w/v. The resulting hydrogels exhibited desirable viscoelastic properties which can be tuned by varying the cationic group, electronegative substituent, or counter anion. Importantly, nanofibers from the NaA-capped cationic hydrogels were found to be the source of hydrogels' potent bacteriacidal actvity against both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria while remaining non-cytotoxic. These intrinsically antibacterial hydrogels are ideal candidates for further development in applications where bacterial contamination is problematic.
在这项研究中，我们通过萘基邻氨基苯甲酸（NaA）封端的氨基酸基阳离子肽模拟物的自组装制备了抗菌水凝胶。这些超短阳离子肽模拟物经过合理设计，以 NaA 作为封端基团、L-苯丙氨酸作为短脂肪族连接体和阳离子基团。合成的肽模拟物能够以 0.1%至 0.3%w/v 之间的最小凝胶浓度有效地形成水凝胶。所得水凝胶具有理想的粘弹性，可以通过改变阳离子基团、电负性取代基或抗衡阴离子进行调节。重要的是，发现 NaA 封端阳离子水凝胶的纳米纤维是水凝胶对革兰氏阳性和革兰氏阴性细菌具有强大杀菌活性的来源，同时保持非细胞毒性。这些具有内在抗菌活性的水凝胶是在细菌污染成为问题的应用中进一步开发的理想候选材料。
