Inhibition of hen egg white lysozyme fibrillation by a self-assembled nanostructured lysozyme and graphene oxide conjugate

Abstract

Amyloid fibrillation is an unusual phenomenon in several proteins and peptides that causes a range of neurological disorders such as Alzheimer's disease, prion disease, Parkinson's disease, and diabetes. Despite several therapeutic approaches, no effective therapy has yet been developed. Nanomaterials have recently been considered as effective regulators in the inhibition of the amyloid fibrillation process of multiple proteins. In this study, self-assembled nanostructured lysozyme (snLYZ) was prepared and its impact on the fibrillation process of HEWL was investigated. The results demonstrated that the administration of snLYZ to the HEWL solution during the incubation period inhibited the fibril formation in a concentration-dependent manner. The effectiveness of the inhibition was further enhanced by using graphene oxide and snLYZ nanoconjugate (GO-snLYZ). However, another protein nanoparticle, i.e. bovine serum albumin nanoparticles (nBSA), was shown to have a very small inhibitory effect on the fibrillation of HEWL. The inhibition of lysozyme fibrillation was associated with a considerable amount of thinner and smaller fibril fragments, as revealed by electron microscopic imaging and thioflavin-T analysis. In our study, we concluded that snLYZ and GO-snLYZ could successfully prevent HEWL fibrillation via protein binding and the formation of an aggregated complex.