User-controlled Biocatalysis Induces Self-decontamination of Enzyme-based Composites Challenged with Simulant of B. anthracis

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1033266DinuIn today's society, there is a constant growing need to protect people from exposure to pathogen threats that affect health and wellbeing. Current decontamination methods are performed after exposure has occurred, and typically employ bleach, incineration, photocatalysis, or formaldehyde gas. All are time consuming, require significant resources and personnel, are environmentally unfriendly and highly corrosive, and require significant dosages to be effective. Thus, there is a critical need to develop measures that can successfully address contamination rapidly, completely, and in an economical manner. PIs Dinu and Wu of the Chemical Engineering Department at West Virginia University propose to develop self-sustainable and self-decontaminating coatings which are based on biocatalysts of chloroperoxidase (CPO) enzyme and the photocatalyst titanium dioxide, which are capable of decontaminating a large variety of pathogens, including spores of B. cereus (a model for B. anthracis). The biomimetic approach capitalizes upon the attachment of CPO to titanium dioxide nanomaterials, and in situ generation of reactive species of hydrogen peroxide by photocatalysis on the titanium oxide. The peroxide is used by the CPO enzyme as substrate for the local formation of hypochlorous acid, which is the decontaminant. This biomimetic approach would detoxify many times the biocatalyst weight thus reducing the logistical burdens of delivering large amounts of chemicals and eliminating environmental damage. Moreover, the proposed research is a potential platform as its successful completion would lay the foundation for future application of biocatalytic-based decontamination to a variety of chemical and biological agents by using a cocktail of enzyme with different specificities.The broader implications have already been recognized. Attention has been given to attempts to design environmentally friendly coatings that are capable of decontaminating a large variety of biological agents including spores, rapidly and completely, in an economical manner and without imposing an undue logistical burden for widespread deployment. Dinu and Wu propose to use nanomaterials of titanium dioxide for in situ generation of hydrogen peroxide. The enzyme-nanomaterials conjugates could then be incorporated into paint andgenerate coatings capable of decontaminating any species that adsorbs on the surface. The proposed research is significant because its successful completion will lead to fundamental knowledge about structure-affinity, structure-stability, and structure-function relationships for enzyme-nanomaterial conjugates. Understanding how the enzyme scaffolding can bestabilized by covalent or non-covalent association with nanomaterials such as titanium dioxide will in turn lead to understanding the platform for electron transfer and the decontamination pathways. Such a platform can be further engineered by modification of the nanomaterial or of the enzyme to tune the electron transfer properties and allow user-control of the biocatalytic-based decontamination. The project offers potential in education as well. The inherent interdisciplinary nature of the proposed research offers tremendous opportunities for enticing and integrating students with educational experience across diverse areas including biology, biochemistry, physics, chemistry and materials science. As the project involves aspects of life that are of interest and concern to people in many walks of life, and can be communicated in easily understood terms, the outreach and public education potential is very large.