Improving the Acidic Stability of Zeolitic Imidazolate Frameworks by Biofunctional Molecules

Abstract

We demonstrate the presence of a symbiotic stability reinforcement effect between bioentities and crystalline ZIFs, where the ZIF protects biomolecules from denaturation and the biomolecules improve the acid resistance of the ZIF framework. The strategy provides a potential route for stabilizing MOFs for diverse technological and industrial applications.

Nanobiohybrids: Materials approaches for bioaugmentation

“…Our study revealed that there exists an exclusive synergistic stability effect of both the biomolecule guest and MOF host, enabled from the unique, new coordination bonds between the host and guest molecules ( Fig. 4C) (74).…”

“…One substantial drawback of this approach is that biomolecules significantly larger than the pore size of the host could not be encapsulated. To address this challenge, a number of recent works focus on exploiting biomolecules' intrinsic ability to initiate an in situ growth of MOFs and end up encapsulated in the framework analogs to natural biomineralization process (70)(71)(72)(73)(74). In this approach, biomolecules are situated inside the MOFs by generating macromolecular defects during MOF crystallization, which eliminates the pore size limitation of the presynthesized MOFs.…”

“…We exploited the concept of biomineralization to synthesize a library of bio-MOF nanocomposites and showed that these MOF materials can provide excellent protection for biomolecules against various conditions. A range of biomolecules including amino acids, proteins, enzymes, DNA, and polysaccharides can attract MOF building blocks in aqueous environments, leading to the rapid MOF mineralization around these biomolecules (70,74,92). This versatile method overcomes the pore size restriction of the MOFs for hosting biomolecules, and the protected biomolecules showed up to 10-fold enhanced stability compared to free biomolecules.…”

Modulating the Biofunctionality of Metal–Organic‐Framework‐Encapsulated Enzymes through Controllable Embedding Patterns

“…[9] Av ery recent and emerging application is the engineering of rigid MOF layers as exoskeleton to protect fragile biomacromolecules,i ncluding enzymes,t hrough ad e novo embedding strategy. [10][11][12][13][14][15] In this approach, biomacromolecules of different size and even viruses and cells were encased within MOFs that possessed significantly smaller pore dimensions than themselves. [15][16][17][18][19] It was demonstrated that the porous MOF exoskeletons could not only improve the stability of the encapsulated enzymes through structural confinement, but also allow selective transport of the guest via the accessible micropores network of the exoskeleton.…”

Modulating the Biofunctionality of Metal–Organic‐Framework‐Encapsulated Enzymes through Controllable Embedding Patterns

“…These appealing features allowed MOFs to evolve as an outstanding platform for gas separation, catalysis, drug delivery and sensing . A very recent and emerging application is the engineering of rigid MOF layers as exoskeleton to protect fragile biomacromolecules, including enzymes, through a de novo embedding strategy . In this approach, biomacromolecules of different size and even viruses and cells were encased within MOFs that possessed significantly smaller pore dimensions than themselves .…”