Gold Nanorod-Based Nanoplatform Catalyzes Constant NO Generation and Protects from Cardiovascular Injury

• Published in: ACS nano 2020-10, Vol.14 (10), p.12854-12865
• Main Authors: Li, Haiyun, Yan, Jiao, Meng, Dejing, Cai, Rui, Gao, Xinshuang, Ji, Yinglu, Wang, Liming, Chen, Chunying, Wu, Xiaochun
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Arginine; Cardiovascular Diseases - prevention & control; Gold; Humans; Hydrogen Peroxide; Nanotubes; Nitric Oxide
• ISSN: 1936-0851; 1936-086X
• DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.0c03629

Cardiovascular disease is a leading cause of death, and one of the effective therapeutic strategies for cardiovascular disease is to provide a controlled, constant supply of nitric oxide (NO) in a mild manner; however, this has proved challenging in the clinic. To address this problem, we built a nitric oxide synthase (NOS)-like nanoplatform (NanoNOS) that consists of a noble metal nanoparticle core and a mesoporous silica shell and demonstrated the ability of NanoNOS to catalyze production of NO in vitro. Mechanistic studies show that the catalysis consists of a three-step reaction: the oxidation of NADPH to produce O2 – via oxidase-like activity and the subsequent dismutation of O2 – to H2O2 via SOD-like activity, followed by H2O2-mediated oxidation of l-arginine to produce NO via a nonenzymatic pathway. The generation of NO is precisely regulated by both the content of the NanoNOS species and the plasmon excitation. We found that NanoNOS greatly suppressed injury-driven monocyte–endothelial cell adhesion, suggesting the NanoNOS treatment could help prevent cardiovascular disease. With such a design as well as plasmon excitation that allows for controlled and constant catalytic activity, NanoNOS technology could have a variety of biomedical applications.