Chemical Research in Chinese Universities ›› 2010, Vol. 26 ›› Issue (5): 842-846.

• Articles • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Facile and High Efficient Fabrication of Hybrid Microcapsules for Urease Encapsulation and Their Use as Biomimetic Reactors

GAO Quan-xing, WANG Chao-yang* and TONG Zhen   

  1. Research Institute of Materials Science, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou 510640, P. R. China
  • Received:2009-11-16 Revised:2009-12-29 Online:2010-09-25 Published:2010-11-26
  • Contact: WANG Chao-yang. E-mail: zhywang@scut.edu.cn
  • Supported by:

    Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China(Nos.20874030 and 50973034), the Chinese Universities Scientific Fund(No.2009ZZ0036) and the Planned Science and Technology Project of Guangdong Province, China (No.2010B010800017).

Abstract: Urease-loaded colloidosome microcapsules with SiO2 nanoparticle shells and gellan gel cores were prepared facilely and highly efficiently by self-assembly of colloidal particles at the liquid-liquid interfaces and subsequently in-situ gelation of gellan gum. The urease-loaded colloidosome microcapsules were used as an enzymatic reactor to produce calcium carbonate precipitates by urease-catalyzed urea hydrolysis in the presence of calcium cations. The CaCO3/SiO2 shells were formed finally around the gellan gel cores. The colloidosome microcapsules used as a biomimetic reactor has been demonstrated for the first time.

Key words: Microcapsule, Core-shell structure, Self-assembly