Recent emerged antibacterial agents provide enormous new possibilities to replace antibiotics in fighting bacterial infectious diseases. Although abundant types of nanoagents are developed for preventing pathogen colonization, however, rationally design of nonchemotherapic, robust, and clinical‐adaptable nanoagents with tunable bacterial trap and killing activities remains a major challenge. Here, a demonstration of controlling the trap, ablation, and release activities of pathogenic bacteria via stimulus‐responsive regulatory mechanism is reported. First, temperature‐sensitive polymer brush is chemically grown onto carbon nanotube–Fe3O4, whereby the synthesized nanoagents can transfer from hydrophilic dispersion to hydrophobic aggregation upon near‐infrared light irradiation, which thus controls the bacterial trap, killing, and detaching. In turn, the formed aggregations will serve as localized heating sources to enhance photothermal ablation of bacteria. Systematically antibacterial experiments and mouse wound disinfection demonstrate the ultrarobust and recyclable disinfection capability of nanoagents with nearly 100% killing ratio to Staphylococcus aureus. Overall, for the first time, we represent a pioneering study on designing nonchemotherapic and robust dual‐responsive nanoagents that can sensitively and reversibly trap, inactivate, and detach bacteria. We envision that such nanoagents will not only have potential applications in pathogenic bacteria prevention but also provide a new pathway for wound disinfection, implant sterilization, and also live bacteria transportation.
Severe infectious diseases caused by pathogenic bacteria have become urgent threats to global public health. Antibacterial materials with combined chemophotothermal therapeutic capabilities possess distinct advantages when compared with many other antibacterial approaches. However, developing simplified and chemically tunable precursors to synthesize such antibacterial nanoagents for rapidly, safely, and synergistically combating pathogenic bacteria remains a huge challenge. Herein, metal-organic framework (MOF)-derived nanocarbons with near-infrared (NIR)-responsive and sizetransformable capabilities are designed to overcome this challenge. The MOF-derived nanocarbons with chemo-photothermal bactericidal capabilities are first synthesized, and then coated with a thermoresponsive gel layer to obtain ON-OFF switching capability for bacterial trapping. The fabricated nanocarbons exhibit high photo-to-thermal conversion efficiency and fast size transformation from nanodispersions to micrometer aggregations upon NIR irradiation, thus enabling nanocarbons to generate localized massive heat and abundant Zn 2+ ions for directly disrupting bacterial membrane and intracellular proteins. Furthermore, these nanocarbons not only exhibit a nearly 100% bactericidal ratio at very low dosage, but also possess highly efficient and safe wound disinfection activities, which are comparable to vancomycin. Overall, these proposed novel nanocarbons display robust and localized chemo-photothermal bactericidal capability and possess great potential to be used as alternative to antibiotics for broad-spectrum eradication of pathogenic bacteria.
In article number 1900143, Chong Cheng, Lang Ma, Changsheng Zhao, and co‐workers develop a metal–organic framework–derived nanocarbon with near‐infrared light controlled size‐transformable capability for chemophotothermal disinfection. The unique transformation from nanodispersions to micrometer aggregations enables this nanocarbon to generate localized massive heat and abundant Zn2+ ions for directly disrupting bacterial membrane and intracellular proteins.
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