NSF/DMR-BSF: Peptide Based Multifunctional Materials for Selective Capture and Release of Nutrients and Contaminants

第 1 部分：非技术摘要磷对于食品生产至关重要。全球人口的增长增加了对优质食品和植物性生物燃料生产的需求，导致天然磷资源迅速枯竭。开采出来的磷酸盐最终会以农业径流、牲畜粪便和食品加工废物的形式从食品生产系统中流失，这一事实凸显了磷的不可持续来源。此外，含磷酸盐的废水污染了自然水体，导致生物多样性和饮用水减少。因此，推进磷的分离和回收利用对于保护自然水体和维持全球粮食生产是必要的。这项工作旨在开发一种可逆生物分子识别系统，该系统将去除有问题的磷酸盐，将其回收，并将其重新插入全球粮食生产系统，作为加强这一稀缺资源可持续利用的手段。第 2 部分：技术摘要 材料科学的一个挑战是开发用于选择性捕获和释放关键营养物质（例如磷、氮和钾）和污染物（例如重金属、有机氯农药、病原体）的材料。这项工作旨在开发一种新型、优化的多功能材料，用于基于具有超分子磷酸盐识别能力的生物启发肽两亲物选择性分离磷。这些肽两亲物的可调节自组装特性将用于设计一个系统，该系统（1）从模型废物流中隔离磷，（2）实现磷的特定释放和再利用，以及（3）抑制可能导致生物污垢的非特异性相互作用和细菌生长。这项工作的各个阶段将从设计和合成这些具有疏水性缀合的功能性肽，到这些分子在表面和胶束结构中的组装，再到磷酸盐结合能量和动力学的测量。与该实验开发周期并行，分子模拟将旨在阐明实验工作中候选肽的磷酸盐结合机制，并发现具有改进的超分子识别和组装特性的肽，然后将其反馈到实验程序中。

PART 1: NON-TECHNICAL SUMMARYPhosphorous is essential to food production. Rising global population is increasing demand for high quality foods and production of plant-based biofuels, causing the rapid depletion of natural phosphorus resources. This non-sustainable sourcing of phosphorus is underscored by the fact that, ultimately, mined phosphate is lost from the food production system as agricultural runoff, livestock manure and food-processing wastes. In addition, phosphate-containing waste streams contaminate natural bodies of water, which leads to a decrease in biodiversity and potable drinking water. Therefore, efforts that advance the separation and recycling of phosphorus are necessary for protecting natural bodies of water and sustaining global food production. This work aims to develop a reversible bio-molecular recognition system that will remove phosphate where it is problematic, recover it, and reinsert it into the global food-production system as a means for enhancing sustainable use of this scarce resource. PART 2: TECHNICAL SUMMARY A challenge in materials science is the development of materials for selective capture and release of key nutrients (e.g., phosphorous, nitrogen and potassium) and contaminants (e.g., heavy metals, organochlorine pesticides, pathogens). This work aims to develop a novel, optimized, multifunctional material for selective separation of phosphorus based on biologically inspired, peptide amphiphiles with supramolecular phosphate recognition capabilities. The tunable self-assembly properties of these peptide amphiphiles will be used to engineer a system that (1) sequesters phosphorus from model waste streams, (2) enables specific release and reuse of phosphorus, and (3) inhibits non-specific interactions and bacterial growth that can lead to bio-fouling. The stages of this proposed work will progress from design and synthesis of these functional peptides with hydrophobic conjugation, to assembly of these molecules on surfaces and in micellar constructs, to measurement of phosphate binding energetics and kinetics. In parallel with this experimental development cycle, molecular simulations will be aimed at elucidating the phosphate-binding mechanism of the peptide candidates in the experimental work and discovering peptides with improved supramolecular recognition and assembly properties, which can then feed back into the experimental program.