Catalytic processing in ruthenium-based polyoxometalate coacervate protocells
Pierangelo Gobbo, Liangfei Tian, B. V. V. S. Pavan Kumar, Samuel Turvey, Mattia Cattelan, Avinash J. Patil, Mauro Carraro, Marcella Bonchio, Stephen Mann
Abstract
Abstract The development of programmable microscale materials with cell-like functions, dynamics and collective behaviour is an important milestone in systems chemistry, soft matter bioengineering and synthetic protobiology. Here, polymer/nucleotide coacervate micro-droplets are reconfigured into membrane-bounded polyoxometalate coacervate vesicles (PCVs) in the presence of a bio-inspired Ru-based polyoxometalate catalyst to produce synzyme protocells (Ru 4 PCVs) with catalase-like activity. We exploit the synthetic protocells for the implementation of multi-compartmentalized cell-like models capable of collective synzyme-mediated buoyancy, parallel catalytic processing in individual horseradish peroxidase-containing Ru 4 PCVs, and chemical signalling in distributed or encapsulated multi-catalytic protocell communities. Our results highlight a new type of catalytic micro-compartment with multi-functional activity and provide a step towards the development of protocell reaction networks.