Peptides as biocatalysts

There is an emerging interest in Fenton catalysts facilitating removal of a variety of hazardous contaminants from water. Fenton-like reactions have been widely used for the degradation of organic pollutants in water and soil, however, traditional Fenton reagents have several limitations including toxic byproducts, slowing down the production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) additionally, the Fenton reaction is dependent on the solubility of Iron limiting the rate of the overall reaction. With the large diversity of redox enzymes, enzyme-like catalysts recently emerged as biomolecular catalysts for broad applications. Peptides as biocatalysts can be designed with unique properties to present functional residues in catalyzing a diversity of reactions that make them ideal replacements for synthetic counterparts, usually having a shorter half-life, and breaking down into their organic components. Using peptide based self-assembled system, they can be further integrated with the natural iron catalysts and advance biomimetic biohybrid systems. Our group designed peptides and demonstrated degradation of common toxic organic dyes and increased ROS production.