Synthetic hydrogels with the ability to recognize and bind target proteins are useful for a number of applications, including biosensing and therapeutic agent delivery. One popular method for fabricating recognitive hydrogels is molecular imprinting. A long-standing hypothesis of the field is that these molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) retain the chemical and geometric profile of their protein template, resulting in subsequent ability to recognize the template in solution. Here, we systematically determined the influence of network composition, as well as the identity, amount, and extraction of imprinting templates, on the protein binding of MIPs. Network composition (i.e. the relative number of ionizable and hydrophobic groups) explained the extent of protein adsorption in all cases. The identity and amount of imprinting template, albeit a protein or synthetic polymer (PEG) of similar molecular weight, did not significantly influence the amount of protein bound. While the purification method influenced the extent of template adsorption, it did so by chemically modifying the network (acrylamide hydrolysis, increasing the acid content by up to 21%) and not by voiding occupied MIP pores. Therefore, our results indicate that material composition determines the extent to which MIPs bind template and non-template proteins.

中文翻译：

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聚合物组成主要决定分子印迹水凝胶的蛋白质识别特性

具有识别和结合靶蛋白能力的合成水凝胶可用于许多应用，包括生物传感和治疗剂递送。制造识别水凝胶的一种流行方法是分子印迹。该领域的一个长期假设是，这些分子印迹聚合物 (MIP) 保留了其蛋白质模板的化学和几何特征，从而导致随后能够识别溶液中的模板。在这里，我们系统地确定了网络组成以及印记模板的身份、数量和提取对 MIP 蛋白质结合的影响。网络组成（即可电离基团和疏水基团的相对数量）解释了所有情况下蛋白质吸附的程度。印迹模板的特性和数量，尽管是类似分子量的蛋白质或合成聚合物 (PEG)，但不会显着影响蛋白质结合的数量。虽然纯化方法会影响模板吸附的程度，但它是通过化学修饰网络（丙烯酰胺水解，将酸含量增加高达 21%）而不是通过使占据的 MIP 孔排空来实现的。因此，我们的结果表明材料组成决定了 MIP 结合模板和非模板蛋白的程度。