Gold Nanorod-Based Nanoplatform Catalyzes Constant NO Generation and Protects from Cardiovascular Injury
Haiyun Li, Jiao Yan, Dejing Meng, Rui Cai, Xinshuang Gao, Yinglu Ji, Liming Wang, Chunying Chen, Xiaochun Wu
Abstract
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.