Zinc Cerium Peroxide Antibacterial Agent with Acid-Activated Cascade Multienzymatic Activities

Recently, metal peroxides with the ability to self-supply H2O2 have been intensively used in antibacterial and cancer therapy. However, the performances are unsatisfactory due to the low efficiency of metal peroxide-mediated Fenton-like reaction. In this work, a novel zinc cerium bimetallic peroxide (CeZnOx) has been first reported, which possesses the acid-activated POD-like, OXD-like, and CAT-like multienzymatic activities for efficiently bacterial inhibition. Specifically, CeZnOx possesses H2O2 self-supplying ability under weakly acidic conditions and subsequently catalyzes the production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) through bimetallic synergistically enhanced POD-like and OXD-like activity. They can also exhibit CAT-like activity to catalyze the excessive H2O2 into O2 to play an anti-inflammatory role in normal pH conditions. The acid-activated cascade multienzymatic activities inhibit bacterial growth and can alleviate hypoxia, improving the bacterial microenvironment at the wound site. As expected, CeZnOx exhibits a superior antibacterial effect on the growth of Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli. Therefore, CeZnOx-mediated acid-activated multienzymatic activities offer a simple and promising strategy for the efficient treatment of bacterial infections.