Achievement

Our IGERT investigators in Chemical Engineering and Chemistry encapsulated iron oxide nanoparticles in a bisacrylamide cross-linked polyacrylamide hydrogel network along with a model dehalogenase enzyme, L-2-HADST. This thermophilic enzyme is activated at elevated temperatures. By exposing the Fe3O4 nanoparticles to a remote stimulus, an alternating magnetic field (AMF), enhanced system heating can be achieved, thus remotely activating the enzyme. The internal heating of the nanocomposite hydrogel network in the AMF results in a 2-fold increase in enzymatic as compared to the same hydrogel heated externally in a water bath, suggesting that the internal heating of the nanoparticles is more efficient than the diffusion-limited heating of the water bath. This system may prove useful for remote actuation of biomedical and environmentally relevant enzymes and find applications in a variety of fields. The work was published recently in ACS Nano, a very high impact journal.