Bioinspired porous three-coordinated single-atom Fe nanozyme with oxidase-like activity for tumor visual identification via glutathione.

Chen, Da; Xia, Zhaoming; Guo, Zhixiong; Gou, Wangyan; Zhao, Junlong; Zhou, Xuemei; Tan, Xiaohe; Li, Wenbin et al. · Nat Commun · 2023

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Inspired by structures of natural metalloenzymes, a biomimetic synthetic strategy is developed for scalable synthesis of porous Fe-N<sub>3</sub> single atom nanozymes (pFeSAN) using hemoglobin as Fe-source and template. pFeSAN delivers 3.3- and 8791-fold higher oxidase-like activity than Fe-N<sub>4</sub> and Fe<sub>3</sub>O<sub>4</sub> nanozymes. The high catalytic performance is attributed to (1) the suppressed aggregation of atomically dispersed Fe; (2) facilitated mass transfer and maximized exposure of active sites for the created mesopores by thermal removal of hemoglobin (2 ~ 3 nm); and (3) unique electronic configuration of Fe-N<sub>3</sub> for the oxygen-to-water oxidation pathway (analogy with natural cytochrome c oxidase). The pFeSAN is successfully demonstrated for the rapid colorimetric detection of glutathione with a low limit of detection (2.4 nM) and wide range (50 nM-1 mM), and further developed as a real-time, facile, rapid (~6 min) and precise visualization analysis methodology of tumors via glutathione level, showing its potentials for diagnostic and clinic applications.

Medical subject headings