• Nano-Micro Letters
  • Vol. 17, Issue 1, 032 (2025)
Si Chen1,2, Fang Huang1, Lijie Mao1, Zhimin Zhang2..., Han Lin2, Qixin Yan1, Xiangyu Lu1,3,* and Jianlin Shi2,**|Show fewer author(s)
Author Affiliations
  • 1Department of Cardiology, Shanghai Tenth People’s Hospital, School of Medicine, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, People’s Republic of China
  • 2Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200050, People’s Republic of China
  • 3Shanghai Frontiers Science Center of Nanocatalytic Medicine, School of Medicine, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, People’s Republic of China
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    DOI: 10.1007/s40820-024-01522-1 Cite this Article
    Si Chen, Fang Huang, Lijie Mao, Zhimin Zhang, Han Lin, Qixin Yan, Xiangyu Lu, Jianlin Shi. High Fe-Loading Single-Atom Catalyst Boosts ROS Production by Density Effect for Efficient Antibacterial Therapy[J]. Nano-Micro Letters, 2025, 17(1): 032 Copy Citation Text show less

    Abstract

    The current single-atom catalysts (SACs) for medicine still suffer from the limited active site density. Here, we develop a synthetic method capable of increasing both the metal loading and mass-specific activity of SACs by exchanging zinc with iron. The constructed iron SACs (h3-FNC) with a high metal loading of 6.27 wt% and an optimized adjacent Fe distance of ~ 4 Å exhibit excellent oxidase-like catalytic performance without significant activity decay after being stored for six months and promising antibacterial effects. Attractively, a “density effect” has been found at a high-enough metal doping amount, at which individual active sites become close enough to interact with each other and alter the electronic structure, resulting in significantly boosted intrinsic activity of single-atomic iron sites in h3-FNCs by 2.3 times compared to low- and medium-loading SACs. Consequently, the overall catalytic activity of h3-FNC is highly improved, with mass activity and metal mass-specific activity that are, respectively, 66 and 315 times higher than those of commercial Pt/C. In addition, h3-FNCs demonstrate efficiently enhanced capability in catalyzing oxygen reduction into superoxide anion (O2·-) and glutathione (GSH) depletion. Both in vitro and in vivo assays demonstrate the superior antibacterial efficacy of h3-FNCs in promoting wound healing. This work presents an intriguing activity-enhancement effect in catalysts and exhibits impressive therapeutic efficacy in combating bacterial infections.
    Si Chen, Fang Huang, Lijie Mao, Zhimin Zhang, Han Lin, Qixin Yan, Xiangyu Lu, Jianlin Shi. High Fe-Loading Single-Atom Catalyst Boosts ROS Production by Density Effect for Efficient Antibacterial Therapy[J]. Nano-Micro Letters, 2025, 17(1): 032
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