Three‐Dimensional Gold Nanoparticle Clusters with Tunable Cores Templated by a Viral Protein Scaffold

Abstract

Assembling nanoparticles (NPs) into ordered architectures remains a challenge in the field of nanotechnology. Templated strategies have been widely utilized for NP assembly. As typical biological nanostructures, virus-based NPs (VNPs) have shown great promise in templating NP assembly. Here it is illustrated that the VNP of simian virus 40 (SV40) is a powerful scaffold in directing the assembly of 3D hybrid nanoarchitectures with one NP encapsulated inside as a core and a cluster of gold NPs (AuNPs) on the outer surface of the SV40 VNP as a shell, in which the core NPs can be CdSe/ZnS quantum dots (QDs), Ag(2)S QDs, or AuNPs. The assembling of AuNPs onto the SV40 VNP surface is determined by the interactions between the AuNPs and the amine groups on the outer surface of SV40 VNPs. It is expected that the VNP guided 3D hybrid nanoarchitectures provide ideal models for NP interaction studies and open new opportunities for integrating various functionalities in NP assemblies.

Formation mechanism of chalcogenide nanocrystals confined inside genetically engineered virus-like particles

“…They are amenable to displaying foreign protein inserts through genetic engineering or chemical modifications8910. Selective deposition of organic or inorganic materials, by design, at specific locations on the VLP affords precise control over the size, spacing, and assembly of nanomaterials, resulting in uniform and reproducible nano-architectures1112131415. Both the exterior and interior surfaces of the VLP can be functionalized by genetically or chemically modifying the protein subunits161718.…”

Fabrication of Nanoarchitectures Templated by Virus‐Based Nanoparticles: Strategies and Applications

“…Electrostatic interactions between VNP surface and AuNPs and gold‐amine bonding possibly drive the formation of AuNP clusters. More importantly, the core NP species are tunable from AuNPs to CdSe@ZnS QDs and Ag 2 S QDs, thanks to the versatility of SV40 VNPs in packaging NPs . Digging into the molecular mechanism of the self‐assembly of VNPs and NPs, disulfide bonds contributed by cysteine 9 and 104 of VP1 were confirmed to play essential roles in determining the robustness of SV40 VNPs as nanoscaffolds (Li and Chen et al, unpublished results).…”

“…The encapsulation efficiency increases as the AuNP size becomes larger . Recently, Ag 2 S QDs coated with dihydrolipoic acid (DHLA) have also been successfully encapsulated by SV40 VNPs . These works have demonstrated the versatility of SV40 VNPs in encapsulating NPs of different components, sizes and surface properties.…”

Encapsulation as a Strategy for the Design of Biological Compartmentalization

“…In principle, non-native cargo can be positioned either in the inner cavity or on the outer surface of virus capsids. When both of these approaches are combined multiple distinct or synergistic functionalities can be integrated into a single nanoarchitecture [69][70][71].…”