Researchers at the Southern University of Science and Technology, Fudan University in China and the University of Leeds in the UK have recently joined forces to make gold particles more beneficial to bacteria and less harmful to our own bodies.
This heavy element, turned into fine nanoscale dust, is capable of causing serious damage – but not to us, but to our miniemies.
By weaving gold into two molecules with contrasting levels of electrostatic tack, the team has created a particle that can punch holes in the defenses of many common bacterial pathogens without damaging surrounding tissue.
At first glance, gold may not seem like an obvious way to kill germs. No matter how it is! This heavy element, turned into fine nanoscale dust, is capable of causing serious damage – but not to us, but to our miniemies.
One of the ways gold nanoparticles deal with them is by assisting chemical reactions that release oxygen species that can damage DNA. Another is to interfere with cell membranes, making them more permeable to various powerful substances such as antibiotics.
Unfortunately, these convenient ways to cleanse infections do not always distinguish harmful bacteria from host particles, putting our own cells at risk. It is necessary to make sure that they do not absorb as much gold as microbes.
In recent years, engineers have manipulated gold nanoparticles in two ways. One of them is to precisely control their size. The smaller they are, the faster they leave our body. Therefore, the researchers focused on limiting the size of their clusters to just 25 atoms.
The second way is the inclusion of “sticky” chemical structures called ligands, which endow the gold nanoparticles with different properties. For example, those that make it easy to track them or help control the shape of the particle.
In this case, the positively charged ligand to the clusters will induce more negatively charged bacterial cells to attract gold.
