On September 10, the happy day we celebrate the 36th Teacher’s Day, the 24th and the 10th “Henan University, Biweekly BioMed Seminar” (referred to as “HU- BBS”) was held in the conference room on the fourth floor of Engineering Research Center for Nanomaterials, Henan University. Dr. Xueyan Zou from the Nanomaterials Engineering Research Center was invited to give a report on “Application of Nanotechnology in Protein Purification-Carrier Design, Surface Construction, and Functional Optimization”. As the first attempt to combine “materials science” with “biomedicine” at the seminar, over 50 experts and scholars in more than ten disciplines including chemistry, biology, medicine, pharmacy, mathematics, materials science, computer science and technology, psychology, etc., shared wonderful viewpoints and thoughts at the conference room; and many experts and scholars inside and outside the university and the majority of graduate students also participated in the seminar online via Tencent Conference.

Dr. Zou focused on "Carrier design, surface construction, and functional optimization of bio-nanomaterials", saying that protein separation and purification is commonly used in biomedicine research and nanomaterials are often used as carriers to achieve surface functionalization of proteins. The as-functionalized proteins could have promising potential to replace traditional materials for protein separation and purification. She said that, among various methods for protein separation and purification, the affinity precipitation method based on affinity adsorbent composed of carriers and ligands is of particular significance. Using nanomaterials as the carrier for affinity separation, Dr. Zou designed the carrier in relation to morphology, particle size, dispersion, and biocompatibility as well as ligand-target protein interaction. By utilizing surface construction and regulating the loading density of the ligand and the length of the linking arm between the carrier and the ligand, she finally optimized the purification efficiency, purification speed, detection limit, and regeneration capacity of the nano-adsorbent. So far, she has designed several affinity adsorbents for the separation and purification of histidine-tagged (His-tagged) protein and glutathione S-transferase-tagged (GST-tagged) protein, such as SiO2- IDA-Ni2+, hollow NiSiO3, magnetically responsive nano-adsorbent (Fe3O4/Cys-Ni2+), fluorescent "visible" nano-adsorbent (SnO2/SiO2-GSH). Compared with commonly used commercial purification materials, these nano-affinity adsorbents are advantageous with fast purification speed, high purification efficiency, strong specificity, high recycling rate and low price, Dr. Zou said. Upon completion of her presentation, the participants at the conference room and those on the internet made meaningful discussion and exchange of viewpoints.

As the faculty of the biomedical materials research group, Dr. Zou and her colleagues can provide several nano-affinity primary products for protein purification; and some of them have been successfully tried at laboratories of the University. With the aid of Industrial Pilot Base of Engineering Research Center for Nanomaterials of the University, they could scale up the nano-adsorbents at laboratory to engineering verification as well as enterprise incubation and mass production, achieving integrated and coordinated development of learning, researching, and producing.