Metallochelate Coupling of Phosphorescent Pt-Porphyrins to Peptides, Proteins, and Self-Assembling Protein Nanoparticles.

Specific and reversible metallochelate coupling via nitrilotriacetate (NTA) moiety is widely used for immobilization, purification, and labeling of oligo(histidine)-tagged proteins. Here, we evaluated this strategy to label various peptides and proteins with phosphorescent Pt-porphyrin derivatives bearing NTA group(s). Zn(2+) complexes were shown to have minimal effect on the photophysics of the porphyrin moiety, allowing quenched-phosphorescence sensing of O2. We complexed the PtTFPP-NTA conjugate with His-containing peptide that can facilitate intracellular loading, and observed efficient accumulation and phosphorescent staining of MEF cells. The more hydrophilic PtCP-NTA conjugate was also seen to form stable complexes with larger polypeptide constructs based on fluorescent proteins, and with subunits of protein nanoparticles, which retained their ability to self-assemble. Testing in phosphorescence lifetime based O2 sensing assays on a fluorescence reader and PLIM microscope revealed that phosphorescent metallochelate complexes perform similarly to the existing O2 probes. Thus, metallochelate coupling allows simple preparation of different types of biomaterials labeled with phosphorescent Pt-porphyrins.