Fibrinogen stability under surfactant interaction

Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), circular dichroism (CD), difference spectroscopy (UV-vis), Raman spectroscopy, and small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) measurements have been performed in the present work to provide a quantitatively comprehensive physicochemical description of the complexation between bovine fibrinogen and the sodium perfluorooctanoate, sodium octanoate, and sodium dodecanoate in glycine buffer (pH 8.5). It has been found that sodium octanoate and dodecanoate act as fibrinogen destabilizer. Meanwhile, sodium perfluorooctanoate acts as a structure stabilizer at low molar concentration and as a destabilizer at high molar concentration. Fibrinogen`s secondary structure is affected by all three studied surfactants (decrease in alpha-helix and an increase in beta-sheet content) to a different extent. DSC and UV-vis revealed the existence of intermediate states in the thermal unfolding process of fibrinogen. In addition, SAXS data analysis showed that pure fibrinogen adopts a paired-dimer structure in solution. Such a structure is unaltered by sodium octanoate and perfluoroctanoate. However, interaction of sodium dodecanoate with the fibrinogen affects the protein conformation leading to a complex formation. Taken together, all results evidence that both surfactant hydrophobicity and tail length mediate the fibrinogen stability upon interaction. (C) 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Preparation and characterization of the novels terpolymers of poly-{trans-[RuCl(2)(vpy)(4)]-styrene-divinylbenzene} and styrene-divinylbenzene-vinylpiridine impregnated with silver nanoparticles

This paper reports the preparation and characterization of poly-{trans-[RuCl(2)(vpy)(4)]-styrene-divinylbenzene} and styrene-divinylbenzene-vinylpiridine filled with nanosilver. Theses materials were synthesized by non aqueous polymerization through a chemical reaction using benzoyl peroxide as the initiator. The nanosilver was obtained from chemical reduction using NaBH(4) as reducing agent and sodium citrate as stabilizer. The nanometric dimension of nanosilver was monitored by UV-visible and confirmed through TEM. The morphology was characterized by SEM and the thermal properties were done by TGA and DSC. The antimicrobial action of the polymers impregnated with nanosilver was evaluated using both microorganisms, Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli. The antimicrobial activity of the poly-{trans-[RuCl(2)(vpy)(4)]-styrene-divinylbenzene} filled with nanosilver was confirmed by the presence of an inhibition halo of the bacterial growth in seeded culture media, but was not confirmed to the styrene-divinylbenzene-vinylpiridine. The present work suggest that trans - [RuCl(2)(vpy)(4)] complex facilitate the release of silver ion from the media.