It
is highly required to develop well-designed separation materials
for the specific isolation of certain proteins in proteomic research.
Herein, the new type of metal–organic framework (MOF)-derived
polymer-mediated magnetic hollow nanocages was fabricated via stress-induced
orientation contraction, which was further applied for specific enrichment
of proteins. The core–shell nanocomposites comprised of polymer-mediated
ZIF-67 cores and polydopamine (PDA) shells, after annealing, generated
magnetic hollow carbon nanocages with hierarchical pores and structures.
Particularly, the magnetic carbonized PDA@F127/ZIF-67 hollow nanocages
exhibited a remarkable adsorption capacity toward bovine hemoglobin
(BHB) up to 834.3 mg g–1, which was significantly
greater than that of the directed carbonized ZIF-67 nanoparticles.
The results also exhibited the notable specificity of the obtained
nanocages on complex biosamples, including intact mixed proteins and
fetal calf serum. The hierarchically hollow porous structure greatly
improves the specific surface area and reduces the mass transfer resistance,
leading to enhanced high adsorption for target protein BHB. This novel
method will be promising for the applications in purification and
enrichment of biomacromolecules for complex biosamples, which successfully
solve the problem of low adsorption efficiency and tedious separating
process of the previous MOF-derived materials.