活细胞合成无机纳米材料

Live cell synthesis of inorganic nanomaterials

纳米材料由于优异的光学、电学、磁学等性质,而被广泛应用于生物检测、示踪、光电转换及光热治疗等研究中.通过调节纳米材料的组成、结构、尺寸及形貌等,可以有效地调控纳米材料的性能,已发展的化学合成方法在实现纳米材料性能的调控方面取得了很大进展.随着化学、材料学及生物学等多学科的交叉,人们开始探索在纳米材料的合成中利用生物体系的调控网络来进行合成控制,以期更精确地控制纳米材料的结构及其性质,从而出现了纳米材料的活细胞合成方法.由于活细胞内的反应均受到精确调控,如果能被科学地利用,将可望实现纳米材料组成、结构、尺寸、形貌和性质的控制.

Nanomaterials,due to their versatile superior properties such as optical,electronic,and magnetic properties etc,have attracted tremendous research interests and led to a wide range of applications in tracking,biodetection,optoelectronics and photovoltaic devices. Conventional chemical synthesis methods have made great advances in controlling properties of nanomaterials by changing their compositions,structures,sizes and shapes. Recently,researchers started to utilize live cells,controlled by accurate bioregulatory networks,to synthesize nanomaterials. Live cells are highly organized with sophisticated molecular controls,in which bioactive molecules play a key role in nucleation and growth of nanomaterials. Such cells have provided a powerful tool as biosynthesizer,and even as a system producing precursors for synthesis of nanomaterials via intracellular regulatory networks. The composition,structure,size,shape of inorganic nanomaterials synthesized inside the cells can be tuned via the intracellular biochemical reactions and metabolic processes. Thus,utilizing biochemical reactions in living cells to synthesize nanomaterials offers a very attractive way to obtain the designer nanomaterials under feasible conditions.