Prevention or suppression of protein aggregation is of great importance in the context of protein storage, transportation and delivery. Traditionally chaperones or other chemically active agents are used to stop or diffuse native protein aggregation. We have used gold nanoparticles to prevent thermal aggregation of alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH), a protein that maintains the alcohol level in the liver and stomach. A light-scattering assay has been used to investigate the effect of gold nanoparticles on thermal aggregation of ADH and the result of our study has been summarized in Fig. 1. The scattered light intensity from the solution containing ADH decreases when 45 nm gold nanoparticles are added prior to heating (thermal denaturation) the solution, which indicates prevention of aggregation. The aggregation of the protein is suppressed to the extent of 96% with picomolar concentration of 45 nm gold nanoparticles while micromolar amounts of other proteins and biological substances are necessary to achieve the same effect. The extent varies with the size and the concentration of the gold NPs for the same protein concentration. Fig.1Scattering intensity at 360 nm from ADH in the absence and presence of different concentrations of 45 nm gold nanoparticles in 10 mM pH = 7 phosphate buffer at 500C.A similar effect for the prevention of aggregation of insulin by gold nanoparticles is also seen. Some of these results will be presented in the talk.

Metal nanoparticles as better protein-aggregation prevention agents than chaperones

246th National Meeting (2013)

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