Molecular Ion Fishers as Highly Active and Exceptionally Selective K⁺ Transporters

Abstract

We report here a unique ion-fishing mechanism as an alternative to conventional carrier or channel mechanisms for mediating highly efficient and exceptionally selective transmembrane K+ flux. The molecular framework, underlying the fishing mechanism and comprising a fishing rod, a fishing line and a fishing bait/hook, is simple yet modularly modifiable. This feature enables rapid construction of a series of molecular ion fishers with distinctively different ion transport patterns. While more efficient ion transports are generally achieved by using 18-crown-6 as the fishing bait/hook, ion transport selectivity (K+/Na+) critically depends on the length of the fishing line, with the most selective MF6-C14 exhibiting exceptionally high selectivity (K+/Na+ = 18) and high activity (EC 50 = 1.1 mol % relative to lipid).

Self‐Assembled Artificial Ion‐Channels toward Natural Selection of Functions

“…Zeng and co‐workers used an unprecedented molecular motion related to an ion‐fishing transport mechanism [18] . Unlike the common ion channels, ion fishers consist of hydroxyl‐rich cholesterol groups as a rigid fishing rod, flexible alkyl chain‐based fishing line and crown ether‐based fishing bait/hook, which are highly modular.…”

“…Zeng and co-workers used an unprecedented molecular motion related to an ion-fishing transport mechanism. [18] Unlike the common ion channels,i on fishers consist of hydroxyl-rich cholesterol groups as arigid fishing rod, flexible alkyl chain-based fishing line and crown ether-based fishing bait/hook, which are highly modular.A mong these high selective ion fishers, MF6-C14 shows the excellent K + /Na + selectivity of 18 and an EC 50 value of 2.5 mm for K + cation, while exceptionally do not transport Li + .…”

“…(b) Computationally optimized structure of MF5-C10 and (c) Ion-fishingmechanismfor ions catching-and-releasingt hrough the membrane. Adapted with permission from ref [18]. Copyright 2019, American Chemical Society.…”

Selbstorganisierte künstliche Ionenkanäle für die natürliche Selektion von Funktionen

“…Zeng und Mitarbeiter verwendeten eine neuartige Molekülbewegung, die mit einem Ionenangel‐Transportmechanismus verbunden ist [18] . Im Gegensatz zu gewöhnlichen Ionenkanälen bestehen Ionenangeln aus hydroxyreichen Cholesterolgruppen als starre Angelrute, einer Angelschnur auf Alkylkettenbasis und einem Angelköder/haken auf Kronenether‐Basis, die jeweils modular sind.…”

Crystal Packing‐Guided Construction of Hetero‐Oligomeric Peptidic Ensembles as Synthetic 3‐in‐1 Transporters

“…Nevertheless, over the past four decades of intensive research since the first report on the synthetic transporter in 1982, [11] study on the synthetic membrane transporters has overwhelmingly focused on transport of inorganic cations [12–37] or anions, [38–60] with much less on molecular species such as water [61–71] and glucose [72] . Specific to synthetic amino acid transporters, we are aware of only two artificial transporter systems based on a pillar[5]arene derivative by Hou in 2013 [73] or dynamic covalent bonds by Gale in 2015 [74] …”