Peptide Self-assembled Nanostructures for Enzymes Encapsulation

Enzymes are extremely efficient biocatalysts, capable of enhancing reaction rates by up to 10¹⁹-fold (k_cat/k_noncat), and are involved in many biochemical and chemical reactions, hence widely used in several applications, such as food and textile industries, chemical and pharmaceuticals, biofuels and agriculture. Unfortunately, their widespread industrial and biological applications are often obstructing by their lack of long-term operational stability, shelf life and by their recovery and reusability.

In this work, we focus on enhancing the potential biotechnological use of enzymes by immobilization and encapsulation them in peptide-based-nanostructures that serve as very efficient support and protective materials. We are using self-assembling building blocks to form peptide-based sphere and hydrogels nanoparticles that act as enzyme nanocarriers. These are self-assembled ultra-short peptide building blocks that can self-assemble in aqueous solutions to form nano-scaled ordered sphere and hydrogel nanoparticles.

We have successfully encapsulated the selected enzyme on peptide-based self-assembly nanostructures and we have characterized both the spheres and nanoparticles in terms of size and zeta potential, enzymatic activity and stability. We have shown that the enzyme is able to maintain its activity with a slower and prolonged kinetic, after encapsulation on both the nanostructure. In this work, we present important preliminary results for the development of new systems for the encapsulation and delivery of enzymes. However, a deep analysis of enzyme encapsulation efficiency, as well as enzyme reaction rate, efficiency and stability in harsh condition has still to be performed.