仿生黏弹性高分子水凝胶及其生物医学应用

天然细胞外基质和生物体软组织固有的黏弹性是调控细胞行为和组织修复与再生过程的关键因素.基于动态建构化学反应交联得到的动态高分子水凝胶材料可有效模拟在体细胞或组织的黏弹性力学微环境,为体外调控细胞命运、揭示其力学生物学响应机制提供了重要工具,也为组织修复与再生提供了仿生支架材料.本综述在介绍天然细胞外基质及生物体软组织黏弹性的基础上,重点对仿生黏弹性水凝胶材料的设计思路、性能表征及影响因素等进行了概括和总结,并揭示了黏弹性水凝胶调控细胞、组织行为的规律及机制,最后,分析了目前该领域研究中所存在的问题并对未来发展方向进行了展望.本综述将有助于启发高分子水凝胶的仿生功能化设计思路及材料生物学效应研究,进一步拓展高分子水凝胶材料的生物医学应用.     

粘合材料及其在生物医学中的应用：进展与展望

粘合材料作为一种重要的辅助材料,在工业包装、海洋工程以及生物医药等多个领域都有广泛的应用需求。天然存在的粘合剂如贻贝足丝粘合蛋白等具有良好的生物相容性和生物可降解性,但因其来源受限及在生理环境下较弱的粘合性能,因此在生物医药领域的应用受到了限制。从自然生物的粘合现象中汲取灵感,各种利用化学或生物合成方法制备的仿生粘合材料应运而生,针对生物医药领域的特定需求,一些新兴粘合材料在生物相容性、生物可降解性以及组织粘附等方面都表现出在医药领域应用的潜力。展望未来,受自然粘合材料兼具环境响应、自我再生和自修复等特征的启迪,各种生物灵感和生物仿生粘合材料的开发势必是未来的发展热点,而合成生物学技术为创建具有上述特征的活体粘合材料提供了新的可能。     

皮肤组织工程支架材料

皮肤组织工程支架材料为种子细胞提供生长和代谢的环境,是人工皮肤研究中的重要内容,可按来源分为合成支架材料和天然支架材料。近几年的研究重点是:前者通过表面仿生技术增强其对细胞的黏附性;后者通过物理或化学方法提高其力学性能和渗透性等。今后应重点研究以下内容:深入研究合成支架材料的表面改性,进一步提高其引导细胞行为的功能,促进材料对细胞的黏附;进一步提高天然支架材料的微观渗透性和生物活性,促进毛细血管的长入;制备结构仿生支架材料及高活性复合支架材料。     

受生物启发特殊浸润表面的设计和制备

浸润性是固体表面的重要特征之一,超亲水、超疏水、超亲油、超疏油是固体表面四个独特的浸润性质。自然界中一些生物体具有的特殊微米／纳米结构赋予了其特殊的表面性能,如荷叶的自清洁性、壁虎脚的高黏附性等。从自然出发,由自然获得启示,模仿生物的结构和功能,我们设计和制备了一系列具有特殊浸润性的表面;并通过动态调控表面的化学组成和几何结构,制备了浸润性在外场刺激下可发生可逆转变的智能表面。将表面自由能或形貌在外界刺激（如光、电、热）下可发生可逆改变的刺激响应性材料接枝到粗糙表面上,实现了表面浸润性在超亲水和超疏水之间的可逆转变。     

趋磁细菌蛋白参与磁铁矿生物矿化机制的研究进展

生物矿化是生命体系中的一种重要而又特殊的生理过程。生命体中存在着各种各样的生物矿化产物,从生物体骨骼与牙齿到纳米级的金属氧化物都是生物矿化的产物。生物矿化与普通矿化的最大不同就是其反应过程中有生物分子、生物代谢、细胞以及有机基质的参与。多种生物因素参与的矿化反应,不仅反应条件温和,而且反应产物具有更好的材料性能和生物兼容性,最为典型的是趋磁细菌可以通过生物矿化过程形成尺寸均一、单磁筹的生物膜包裹着的磁性纳米晶体——磁小体。本文主要介绍了趋磁细菌重要磁小体膜蛋白以及铁载体蛋白(铁蛋白)在磁铁矿生物矿化过程中的作用和功能,综述了该领域的最新研究概况。通过对趋磁细菌发生生物矿化过程的深入探讨可进一步揭示生物大分子调控无机矿物生长的分子机制,为仿生合成新型生物材料提供重要的理论依据。     

创新纳米药物在生物医学领域的现状与展望

随着纳米技术的发展及其在生物医学等交叉领域的不断深入,纳米医学进入了空前繁盛的时代.基于有机、无机以及杂化纳米颗粒的多样化发展,具有独特物理化学性质的纳米制剂在疾病的诊断、治疗、生物成像等多个方面具有广泛的应用.纳米药物的发展也已迈入了新的阶段.通过材料创新、表面修饰、结构设计、新型仿生材料研制、内源性纳米囊泡提取等多...     

昆虫仿生

昆虫在长期进化过程中发展出与其生存环境相适应的器官系统,这些器官系统结构独特、功能优异,因而,昆虫一直是最重要的仿生对象之一。作者就昆虫仿生的进展及热点,如昆虫的形态仿生、体表微结构的仿生、感觉器官的仿生、运动功能的仿生以及其他特异能力的仿生进行了介绍。     

纳米生物仿生技术研究进展

纳米生物仿生学是一门新兴的交叉学科,它集仿生、纳米技术、生物技术及新材料科学于一身,是仿生学研究的一个重要分支,是材料领域一个重要的、前瞻性的研究方向.本文重点综述了国内外纳米生物仿生技术领域最新研究进展,着重介绍了纳米生物仿生技术在仿生矿化、仿生DNA纳米机器、仿生智能纳米通道、仿免疫细胞生物黏附、仿生人造血管和仿生人造器官芯片等方面的应用,并详细阐述了这些材料的结构特点,最后对纳米生物仿生技术的未来发展方向进行了展望.     

生物固氮

生物固氮是指生物体将分子状态的N_2还原,生成其NH_3的酶促反应过程。NH_3等无机氮化合物是低等植物、某些浮游生物等的必需营养素。这些生物摄取无机氮化合物,使之转变成NH_3后,再合成本身所需要的蛋白质、核酸等。通常动物对无机氮的同化能力弱,主要靠摄取植物中的有机氮化合物来合成机体的蛋白质和核酸等。     

基于微生物的可控生物制造

微生物种类丰富,尺寸涵盖纳米与微米级,是天然的可用于纳米、微米及多层次跨尺度加工的"基本单元"。目前的生物制造方法大多不适用于微生物活细胞,无法发挥其整体的生物学功能及优势。本研究探索并建立了微流控和磁控的可用于微生物活体的微纳米生物制造新方法,定位操纵和有序排列微生物活体。以微生物为微纳米机器人,诱发其特有的生物学功能,进行受控自组装等生物制造过程,由此有望设计和创制一系列新型特殊功能材料和器件。     

Amazing structure of respirasome: unveiling the secrets of cell respiration

Respirasome, a huge molecular machine that carries out cellular respiration, has gained growing attention since its discovery, because respiration is the most indispensable biological process in almost all living creatures. The concept of respirasome has renewed our understanding of the respiratory chain organization, and most recently, the structure of respirasome solved by Yang’s group from Tsinghua University (Gu et al.Nature 237(7622):639–643, 2016) firstly presented the detailed interactions within this huge molecular machine, and provided important information for drug design and screening. However, the study of cellular respiration went through a long history. Here, we briefly showed the detoured history of respiratory chain investigation, and then described the amazing structure of respirasome.     

Fabrication of molecular materials using peptide construction motifs

Biotechnology has generally been associated with gene cloning and expression, genomics, high throughput drug discovery, biomedical advancement and agricultural development. That is about to change. Biotechnology will expand to encompass discovery and fabrication of biological and molecular materials with diverse structures, functionalities and utilities. The advent of nanobiotechnology and nanotechnology have accelerated this trend. Analogous to the construction of an intricate architectural structure, diverse and numerous structural motifs are used to assemble a sophisticated complex. Nature has selected, produced and evolved numerous molecular architectural motifs over billions of years for particular functions. These molecular motifs can now be used to build materials from the bottom up. Biotechnology will continue to harness nature's enormous power to benefit other disciplines and society as a whole.     

The role of nanotechnology in control of human diseases: perspectives in ocular surface diseases

Nanotechnology is the creation and use of materials and devices on the same scale as molecules and intracellular structures, typically less than 100?nm in size. It is an emerging science and has made its way into pharmaceuticals to significantly improve the delivery and efficacy of drugs in a number of therapeutic areas, due to development of various nanoparticle-based products. In recent years, there has been increasing evidence that nanotechnology can help to overcome many of the ocular diseases and hence researchers are keenly interested in this science. Nanomedicines offer promise as viable alternatives to conventional drops, gels or ointments to improve drug delivery to the eye. Because of their small size, they are well tolerated, thus preventing washout, increase bioavailability and also help in specific drug delivery. This review describes the application of nanotechnology in the control of human diseases with special emphasis on various eye and ocular surfaces diseases.     

Industrial exploitation of renewable resources: from ethanol production to bioproducts development

Plants, which are one of major groups of life forms, are constituted of an amazing number of molecules such as sugars, proteins, phenolic compounds etc. These molecules display multiple and complementary properties involved in various compartments of plants (structure, storage, biological activity etc.). The first uses of plants in industry were for food and feed, paper manufacturing or combustion. In the coming decades, these renewable biological materials will be the basis of a new concept: the "biorefiner" i.e. the chemical conversion of the whole plant to various products and uses. This concept, born in the 90ies, is analogous to today's petroleum refinery, which produces multiple fuels and derivative products from petroleum. Agriculture generates lots of co-products which were most often wasted. The rational use of these wasted products, which can be considered as valuable renewable materials, is now economically interesting and will contribute to the reduction of greenhouse has emissions by partially substituting for fossil fuels. Such substructures from biological waste products and transforming them into biofuels and new industrial products named "bioproducts". These compounds, such as bioplastics or biosurfactants, can replace equivalent petroleum derivatives. Towards that goal, lots of filamentous fungi, growing on a broad range of vegetable species, are able to produce enzymes adapted to the modification of these type of substrates. The best example, at least the more industrially developed to date, is the second generation biofuel technology using cellulose as a raw material. The process includes an enzymatic hydrolysis step which requires cellulases secreted from Trichoderma fungal species. This industrial development of a renewable energy will contribute to the diversification of energy sources used to transport and to the development of green chemistry which will partially substitute petrochemicals.     

Use of biomolecular templates for the fabrication of metal nanowires

The nano-scale spatial organization of metallic and other inorganic materials into 1D objects is a key task in nanotechnology. Nano-scale fibers and tubes are very useful templates for such organization because of their inherent 1D organization. Fibrillar biological molecules and biomolecular assemblies are excellent physical supports on which to organize the inorganic material. Furthermore, these biological assemblies can facilitate high-order organization and specific orientation of inorganic structures by their utilization of highly specific biological recognition properties. In this minireview, I will describe the use of biomolecules and biomolecular assemblies, including DNA, proteins, peptides, and even viral particles, which are excellent templates for 1D organization of inorganic materials into wires. This ranges from simple attempts at electroless deposition on inert biological templates to the advanced use of structural motifs and specific protein-DNA interactions for nano-bio-lithography as well as the fabrication of multilayer organic and inorganic composites. The potential technological applications of these hybrid biological-inorganic assemblies will be discussed.     

Microorganisms as efficient biosystem for the synthesis of metal nanoparticles: current scenario and future possibilities

Nanoparticles, the elementary structures of nanotechnology, are important materials for fundamental studies and variety of applications. The different sizes and shapes of these materials exhibit unique physical and chemical properties than their bulk materials. There is a great interest in obtaining well-dispersed, ultrafine, and uniform nanoparticles to delineate and utilize their distinct properties. Nanoparticle synthesis can be achieved through a wide range of materials utilizing a number of methods including physical, chemical, and biological processes with various precursors from liquids and solids. There is a growing need to prepare environmentally friendly nanoparticles that do not produce toxic wastes in their process synthesis protocol. This kind of synthesis can be achieved by green environment benign processes, which happen to be mostly of a biological nature. Microorganisms are one of the most attractive and simple sources for the synthesis of different types of nanoparticles. This review is an attempt to provide the up-to-date information on current status of nanoparticle synthesis by different types of microorganisms such as fungi, yeast, bacteria, cyanobacteria, actinomycete, and algae. The probable biosynthesis mechanism and conditions for size/shape control are described. Various applications of microbially synthesized nanoparticles are summarized. They include antibacterial, antifungal, anticancer, larvicidal, medical imaging, biosensor, and catalytic applications. Finally, limitations and future prospects for specific research are discussed.     

Membrane-associated nanomotors for macromolecular transport

Nature has endowed cells with powerful nanomotors to accomplish intricate mechanical tasks, such as the macromolecular transport across membranes occurring in cell division, bacterial conjugation, and in a wide variety of secretion systems. These biological motors couple the chemical energy provided by ATP hydrolysis to the mechanical work needed to transport DNA and/or protein effectors. Here, we review what is known about the molecular mechanisms of these membrane-associated machines. Sequence and structural comparison between these ATPases reveal that they share a similar motor domain, suggesting a common evolutionary ancestor. Learning how these machines operate will lead the design of nanotechnology devices with unique applications in medicine and engineering.     

Haraway's monsters. Review of simians,cyborgs, and women,the reinvention of nature,by Donna J. Haraway. New York,Routledge, 1991, x + 287 pp., $55.000, cloth, $16.95, paperback

Inhabiting these pages are odd boundary creatures—simians, cyborgs, and women—all of which have had a destabilizing place in the great Western evolutionary, technological, and biological narratives. These boundary creatures are, literally, monsters.     

Target-responsive DNA-capped nanocontainer used for fabricating universal detector and performing logic operations

Nucleic acids have become a powerful tool in nanotechnology because of their controllable diverse conformational transitions and adaptable higher-order nanostructure. Using single-stranded DNA probes as the pore-caps for various target recognition, here we present an ultrasensitive universal electrochemical detection system based on graphene and mesoporous silica, and achieve sensitivity with all of the major classes of analytes and simultaneously realize DNA logic gate operations. The concept is based on the locking of the pores and preventing the signal-reporter molecules from escape by target-induced the conformational change of the tailored DNA caps. The coupling of ‘waking up’ gatekeeper with highly specific biochemical recognition is an innovative strategy for the detection of various targets, able to compete with classical methods which need expensive instrumentation and sophisticated experimental operations. The present study has introduced a new electrochemical signal amplification concept and also adds a new dimension to the function of graphene-mesoporous materials hybrids as multifunctional nanoscale logic devices. More importantly, the development of this approach would spur further advances in important areas, such as point-of-care diagnostics or detection of specific biological contaminations, and hold promise for use in field analysis.     

Nanotechnology in regenerative medicine: the materials side

Regenerative medicine is an emerging multidisciplinary field that aims to restore, maintain or enhance tissues and hence organ functions. Regeneration of tissues can be achieved by the combination of living cells, which will provide biological functionality, and materials, which act as scaffolds to support cell proliferation. Mammalian cells behave in vivo in response to the biological signals they receive from the surrounding environment, which is structured by nanometre-scaled components. Therefore, materials used in repairing the human body have to reproduce the correct signals that guide the cells towards a desirable behaviour. Nanotechnology is not only an excellent tool to produce material structures that mimic the biological ones but also holds the promise of providing efficient delivery systems. The application of nanotechnology to regenerative medicine is a wide issue and this short review will only focus on aspects of nanotechnology relevant to biomaterials science. Specifically, the fabrication of materials, such as nanoparticles and scaffolds for tissue engineering, and the nanopatterning of surfaces aimed at eliciting specific biological responses from the host tissue will be addressed.