A significant pathological signature of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the deposition of amyloid-β (Aβ) plaques in the brain and the synaptic dysfunction and neurodegeneration associated with it. Compounds or drugs that inhibit Aβ fibrillation are thus desirable to develop novel therapeutic strategies against AD. Conventional strategies usually require an elaborate design of their molecular structures. Here we report the size-effect of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) and nanoclusters (AuNCs) in the inhibition of protein amyloidosis. Using L-glutathione stabilized AuNPs with different sizes and AuNCs as examples, we show that large AuNPs accelerate Aβ fibrillation, whereas small AuNPs significantly suppress this process. More interestingly, AuNCs with smaller sizes can completely inhibit amyloidosis. Dynamic light scattering (DLS) experiments show that AuNCs can efficiently prevent Aβ peptides from aggregation to larger oligomers (e.g. micelles) and thus avoid nucleation to form fibrils. This is crucially important for developing novel AD therapies because oligomers are the main source of Aβ toxicity. This work presents a novel strategy to design anti-amyloidosis drugs, which also provides interesting insights to understand how biological nanostructures participate in vivo in Aβ fibrillation from a new perspective.

Various life forms in nature display a high level of adaptability to their environments through the use of sophisticated material interfaces. This is exemplified by numerous biological systems, such as the self-cleaning of lotus leaves, the water-walking abilities of water striders and spiders, the ultra-slipperiness of pitcher plants, the directional liquid adhesion of butterfly wings, and the water collection capabilities of beetles, spider webs, and cacti. The versatile interactions of these natural surfaces with fluids, or special wettability, are enabled by their unique micro/nanoscale surface structures and intrinsic material properties. Many of these biological designs and principles have inspired new classes of functional interfacial materials, which have remarkable potential to solve some of the engineering challenges for industrial and biomedical applications. In this article, we provide a snapshot of the state of the art of biologically inspired materials with special wettability, and discuss some promising future directions for the field.