A fluorimetric study on the interaction between a Trp-containing beta-strand peptide and amphiphilic polymer-coated gold nanoparticles.

Owing to the inevitability of nanoparticles encountering proteins/peptides in current bio-nano-medicine development, it is important to know how they interact with each other in vitro before developing in vivo applications. To this end, a model de novo β-sheet-forming peptide and typical biocompatible nanoparticles were selected to study thermodynamic aspects of their interactions via a fluorescence quenching method. The results showed that Pep11 and AuNPs spontaneously formed conjugates, mainly driven by a coulombic interaction with a binding affinity of ~ 0.1 µM(-1); the physical adsorption process was cooperative. These results deepen our quantitative understanding of nanoparticle-peptide interactions. The results may also be helpful in further nanoparticle-peptide hybrid nanofabrication and also useful for the application of nanoparticles in the treatment of amyloid diseases.