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Updated: Aug 13, 2025
A Tripeptide-Stabilized Nanoemulsion of Oleic Acid
Published on: February 27, 2019
Minimalistic Artificial Catalysts with Esterase-Like Activity from Multivalent Nanofibers Formed by the Self-Assembly
Ning Liu1, Shuai-Bing Li1, Yan-Zhen Zheng2
1Xiamen Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials and Advanced Manufacturing, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Huaqiao University, Xiamen 361021, China.
Abstract:
Imitating and incorporating the multiple key structural features observed in natural enzymes into a minimalistic molecule to develop an artificial catalyst with outstanding catalytic efficiency is an attractive topic for chemists. Herein, we designed and synthesized one class of minimalistic dipeptide molecules containing a terminal -SH group and a terminal His-Phe dipeptide head linked by a hydrophobic alkyl chain with different lengths, marked as HS-C -His-Phe (n = 4, 7, 11, 15, and 17; n + 1 represents the carbon atom number of the alkyl chain). The His (-imidazole), Phe (-CO2 -) moieties, the terminal -SH group, and a long hydrophobic alkyl chain were found to have important contributions to achieve high binding ability leading to outstanding absolute catalytic efficiency (k cat/K M) toward the hydrolysis reactions of carboxylic ester substrates.
