Cell receptor screening for human papillomavirus invasion by using a polyoxometalate-peptide assembly as a probe

Bioorthogonal chemistry of polyoxometalates - challenges and prospects

Bioorthogonal chemistry has enabled scientists to carry out controlled chemical processes in high yields in vivo while minimizing hazardous effects. Its extension to the field of polyoxometalates (POMs) could open up new possibilities and new applications in molecular electronics, sensing and catalysis, including inside living cells. However, this comes with many challenges that need to be addressed to effectively implement and exploit bioorthogonal reactions in the chemistry of POMs. In particular, how to protect POMs from the biological environment but make their reactivity selective towards specific bioorthogonal tags (and thereby reduce their toxicity), as well as which bioorthogonal chemistry protocols are suitable for POMs and how reactions can be carried out are questions that we are exploring herein. This perspective conceptualizes and discusses advances in the supramolecular chemistry of POMs, their click chemistry, and POM-based surface engineering to develop innovative bioorthogonal approaches tailored to POMs and to improve POM biological tolerance.

Polyoxometalate-peptide hybrid materials: from structure-property relationships to applications

Organo-functionalisation of polyoxometalates (POMs) represents an effective approach to obtain diverse arrays of functional structures and materials, where the introduction of organic moieties into the POM molecules can dramatically change their surface chemistry, charge, polarity, and redox properties. The synergistic combination of POMs and peptides, which perform a myriad of essential roles within cellular biochemistry, including protection and transport in living organisms, leads to functional hybrid materials with unique properties. In this Perspective article, we present the principal synthetic routes to prepare and characterise POM-peptide hybrids, together with a comprehensive description of how their properties - such as redox chemistry, stereochemistry and supramolecular self-assembly - give rise to materials with relevant catalytic, adhesive, and biomedical applications. By presenting the state-of-the-art of the POM-peptide field, we show specifically how emerging chemical approaches can be harnessed to develop tailored POM-peptide materials with synergistic properties for applications in a variety of disciplines.

Recent Progress in Ionic Coassembly of Cationic Peptides and Anionic Species

Peptide assembly has been extensively exploited as a promising platform for the creation of hierarchical nanostructures and tailor-made bioactive materials. Ionic coassembly of cationic peptides and anionic species is paving the way to provide particularly important contribution to this topic. In this review, the recent progress of ionic coassembly soft materials derived from the electrostatic coupling between cationic peptides and anionic species in aqueous solution is systematically summarized. The presentation of this review starts from a brief background on the general importance and advantages of peptide-based ionic coassembly. After that, diverse combinations of cationic peptides with small anions, macro- and/or oligo-anions, anionic polymers, and inorganic polyoxometalates are described. Emphasis is placed on the hierarchical structures, value-added properties, and applications. The molecular design of cationic peptides and the general principles behind the ionic coassembled structures are discussed. It is summarized that the combination of interesting and unique characteristics that arise both from the chemical diversity of peptides and the wide range of anionic species may contribute in a variety of output, including drug delivery, tissue engineering, gene transfection, and antibacterial activity. The emergent new phenomena and findings are illustrated. Finally, the outlook for the peptide-based ionic coassembly systems is also presented.

Disulfide crosslinking and helical coiling of peptide micelles facilitate the formation of a printable hydrogel

Tripeptides self-assembled into aligned micelles which transformed into nanohelices via covalent and noncovalent interactions to give a printable hydrogel.