Browsing by Author "Sun, Ziling"

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A supramolecular gel based on a glycosylated amino acid derivative with the properties of gel to crystal transition
(2016-01-01)
Liu, Jie
;
Xu, Fengyang
;
Sun, Ziling
;
Pan, Yue
;
Tian, Jian
Here we report the generation of a novel gelator from a glycosylated amino acid derivative, which contained three structural units, an aromatic residue, a carbohydrate moiety and a tert-butyl group in a single molecule. These structural units can promote the supramolecular self-assembly of this gelator in both aprotic and protic solvents via coordinated pi-pi stacking, multiple hydrogen binding and van der Waals interactions. More importantly, due to their non-equilibrium natures, the organogels formed in DCM, chloroform and ethanol can undergo gel to crystal transition in storage, driven by unbalanced gelator-gelator and solvent-gelator interactions. In this process, the gelators were firstly trapped in a kinetically favorable gel state, and then transferred into a more thermodynamically stable crystal state upon ageing, with the generation of microcrystals in different morphologies.
Peptide Glycosylation Generates Supramolecular Assemblies from Glycopeptides as Biomimetic Scaffolds for Cell Adhesion and Proliferation
(2016-03-23)
Liu, Jie
;
Sun, Ziling
;
Yuan, Yuqi
;
Tian, Xin
;
Liu, Xi
Glycopeptide-based hydrogelators with well-defined molecular structures and, varied contents of sugar moieties were prepared via in vitro peptide glycosylation reactions. With systematic glucose modification, these glycopeptide hydrogelators exhibited diverse self-assembling behaviors in water and formed supramolecular hydrogels with enhanced thermostability and biostability, in comparison with their peptide analogue. Moreover, because of high water content and similar structural morphology and composition to extracellular matrixes (ECM) in tissues, these self-assembled hydrogels also exhibited great potential to act as anew biomimetic scaffolds for mammalian cell growth. Therefore, peptide glycosylation proved to be an effective means for peptide modification and generation of novel supramolecular hydrogelators/hydrogels with improved biophysical properties (e.g., high biostability, increased thermostability, and cell adhesion) which could promise potential applications in regenerative medicine.