ABSTRACT
Pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines require the use of material containers for protection, storage, and transportation. Glass and plastic materials are widely used for packaging, and a longstanding challenge in the field is the nonspecific adsorption of pharmaceutical drugs to container walls – the so-called "sticky containers, vanishing drugs” problem – that effectively reduces the active drug concentration and can cause drug denaturation. This challenge has been frequently discussed in the case of the anticancer drug, paclitaxel, and the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has brought renewed attention to this material science challenge in light of the need to scale up COVID-19 vaccine production and to secure sufficient quantities of packaging containers. To reduce nonspecific adsorption on inner container walls, various strategies based on siliconization and thin polymer films have been explored, while it would be advantageous to develop mass-manufacturable, natural material solutions, especially ones involving pharmaceutical grade excipients. Inspired by how lipid nanoparticles have revolutionized the vaccine field, in this perspective, we discuss the prospects for developing lipid bilayer coatings to prevent nonspecific adsorption of pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines and how recent advances in lipid bilayer coating fabrication technologies are poised to accelerate progress in the field. We critically discuss recent examples of how lipid bilayer coatings can prevent nonspecific sticking of proteins and vaccines to relevant material surfaces and examine future translational prospects. © 2021 The Authors. VIEW published by Shanghai Fuji Technology Consulting Co., Ltd, authorized by Professional Community of Experimental Medicine, National Association of Health Industry and Enterprise Management (PCEM) and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.
ABSTRACT
Plasmonic chips comprising gold nanoisland structures that are fabricated by solution-phase seeding, have demonstrated excellent promise as high-sensitivity substrates for molecular detection and medical diagnostic applications. Even so, there still remains an outstanding need to examine the potential utility of these plasmonic chips for label-free refractometric biosensing and to understand how nanostructure design principles affect measurement sensitivity. Herein, we developed a thiol-based surface functionalization strategy to fabricate gold nanoislands on a functionalized glass surface with improved fractional surface coverages and inter-island gap distances of 80–85% and 5–10 nm, respectively, as compared to values of 50–65% and 15–20 nm for gold nanoislands on bare glass substrates. By tuning the gap distance, it was possible to adjust the bulk refractive index sensitivity of the measurement signal from ∼99 nm per refractive index unit (nm/RIU) for gold nanoislands on a non-functionalized glass surface to ∼180 nm/RIU for gold nanoislands on a functionalized glass surface. The nanoplasmonic biosensing capabilities of the latter plasmonic chip were further investigated and demonstrated larger measurement responses for detecting bovine serum albumin (BSA) protein adsorption compared to other types of plasmonic gold nanostructures. It was also possible to detect antigen-antibody interactions related to coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19), especially binding events that occurred near the sensor surface. These findings demonstrate the broad application possibilities of gold nanoisland platforms for refractometric biosensing and emphasize the importance of finetuning nanostructure dimensions to optimize sensing performance. © 2021