Preface

Natural enzymes are highly efficient biocatalysts that not only play vital roles in virtually all the biological processes in living organisms, but are extensively explored for various applications in biomedicine, environmental protection, and food industry. However, several intrinsic drawbacks, such as high cost, low environmental tolerance, and difficulty of recycling, significantly limited their widespread use. To tackle these drawbacks, highly stable and low-cost alternatives to natural enzymes (termed as “artificial enzymes”) were developed. Various molecular or polymeric materials (cyclodextrins, metal complexes, dendrimers, etc.) have been developed as enzyme mimics since the pioneering work of Ronald Breslow and coworkers. Among different artificial enzymes, nanomaterials with enzyme-like characteristics (i.e., nanozymes) are regarded as next-generation artificial enzymes due to their unique advantages over conventional molecular or polymeric enzyme mimics. For instance, emerging from their nanoscale sizes, nanozymes possess large area for bioconjugation, self-assembly abilities, and multi-functionalities beyond catalysis. Nanozymes have attracted a wide range research interest in the fields of nanoscience, biology, chemistry, physics, and medicine. Great progress has been made in the field of nanozymes. Various natural enzymes including oxidoreductase, hydrolase, and ligase have been successfully imitated by hundreds of nanomaterials. By combining experimental results with computational studies, nanozymes’ catalytic mechanisms were elucidated, and structure-activity relationships were also explored. Further, by combining the enzyme-like activities with their physiochemical properties, nanozymes exhibited broad applications for bioanalysis, biomedical imaging, disease therapeutics, etc.

Symposia on “Nanozymes for Bioanalysis & Beyond” were organized by Professor Hui Wei and including in the 2018, 2019, and 2020 Spring ACS National Meetings. The enthusiastic participation of the symposia from international speakers mainly presented the bioanalytical applications of nanozymes. While the topics of symposia were mainly covered with nanozymes’ bioanalytical applications, to highlight the exciting achievements of nanozymes, this book is intended to describe the recent progress of nanozymes ranging from design and synthesis, catalytic mechanisms, to promising applications. Given the cross-discipline and importance of nanozymes, this book will be of immediate and broad interest to researchers in different communities, such as biomimetic chemistry, functional nanomaterials, artificial enzymes, enzymatic catalysis, bionanotechnology, nanocatalysis, etc.

The information in Chapters 1-3 focuses on how to rationally design and prepare nanozymes. Chapter 1 describes the structure-activity relationship of iron oxide nanozymes. Chapter 2 discuss the recent advances in design and fabrication of highly active nanozymes. Chapter 3 describe the catalytical mechanism and design principle of carbon-based nanozymes by the first-principles calculation. The information in Chapter 4 focuses on the bioanalytical applications of multifunctional nanozymes. Chapter 5-7 discuss several specific nanozymes, including cupric oxide nanozymes (Chapter 5), oxidase-mimicking nanozymes (Chapter 6), and photoresponsive nanozymes (Chapter 7), respectively. They also exhibit the biomedical applications of these nanozymes, including biosensing, tumor therapy, and antibacterial therapy. Chapter 8 describes the development of nanozymes-based modulation-enhanced strategies for cell therapy. Chapter 9 summarizes the recent progress of nanozymes-based medical devices for biomedical applications, in particular with therapeutic purpose. We anticipate this book will help researchers know well about the cutting-edge development of nanozymes, to catalyze more breakthroughs in this and other related fields.

I’m very grateful for all the authors for their contributions to this eBook, and all the reviewers for their insightful comments and recommendations to improve the quality of the chapters. I also would like to thank the wonderful ACS Books editorial team, especially Tracey Glazener, Amanda Koenig, Beth Campbell, and Arlene Furman, for their expert handling and timely responses of the submitted chapters. I thank my advisor Professor Hui Wei for his guidance, support, and encouragement.