Liquid medium used to study nanoengineered polymeric capsules

A joint Russian-Italian paper saw light in MethodsX.

Nanoengineered polymeric capsules (NPCs) are smart micro- and nano containers which are widely used as a container in the field of targeted drug delivery and induced release. Layer-by-layer technique is one of the options that can be used for their synthesis. The inner size of such containers is from 50 nm till several microns. The shell is consisting of different polymers, and it can contain enzymes, magnetic nanoparticles, gold nanoparticles etc. By varying components, the shell can be functionalized. The permeability of the shell can be changed by temperature, pH, UV, magnetic fields, etc. This allows to open and close pores of the capsules and to load it with a chemical.

Coherent X-ray diffraction imaging (CXDI) is a powerful tool that allows to reconstruct a 3D structure of samples with 10 nm resolution, including the distribution of the matter not only at the surface but also in the core of objects. CXDI can be used to analyze different types of samples. CXDI is a method based on diffraction. X-ray beam highlights the sample and as a result a diffraction pattern is received. ID 10 station of European Synchrotron Radiation Facilities (ESRF, Grenoble, France) is one of the places suitable for such experiments.

CXDI was used for the first time for characterizing such samples in liquid medium. Liquid medium is a natural one for almost all biological samples. Previously, this type of study was only performed with dried or frozen samples. The reconstruction of capsules in liquid medium has demonstrated obvious differences in structure between liquid and dried ones. Moreover, CXDI had shown the shape of capsules and allowed to study not only the surface but also the inner part of capsules.

Further samples can also be studied in a liquid medium to obtain new data and find other properties of such objects.

 

3D structure reconstruction of nanoengineered polymeric capsules using Coherent X-Ray diffraction imaging

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2215016121000236

 

Source text: Adelia Faizullina

Editing: Yury Nurmeev