Silk fibroin molecularly imprinted nanoparticles as biocompatible molecular nanotraps: Molecular recognition ties the knot with biomaterials. The bioMIP's labeling and degradation

Molecularly imprinted nanoparticles (nanoMIPs) are biomimetic polymeric nanomaterials, typically prepared from acrylamide and derivatives, that are formed by a template-assisted synthesis. NanoMIPs display high affinity, selectivity, and specificity for the targeted molecule, on the par of natural receptors and antibodies. Recently, we introduced a paradigmatic change by forming nanoMIPs starting from biomaterials, under the name of bioMIPs, as a strategy to promptly translate them into the clinical settings. Silk fibroin, that is a biocompatible and non-immunogenic natural material, was used as a building block for the synthesis of bioMIPs tailored to recognize the protein human serum albumin. BioMIPs confirmed high selectivity and specificity for the targeted protein, together with cytocompatibility. The present work expands the actual knowledge on bioMIPs, studying a route to post-synthetically entail fluorescent tags, with the aim to localize these molecular nanotraps in cells and tissues. Moreover, the enzymatic degradation of bioMIPs was investigated, to support the role of bioMIPs as greener and biocompatible alternatives to non-natural biomimetics.