we demonstrated that Au nanorods coated with a shell composed of Pt nanodots (Au@Pt nanostructures) exhibited intrinsic oxidase-like, peroxidase-like and catalase-like activity, catalyzing oxygen and hydrogen peroxide reduction and the dismutation decomposition of hydrogen peroxide to produce oxygen. Based on these findings, we established an Au@Pt nanostructures based enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for the detection of mouse interleukin 2 (IL-2). In comparison with natural enzymes, Au@Pt nanostructures have advantages of low cost, easy preparation, better stability, and tunable catalytic activity (compared with HRP), which make them a promising enzyme mimetic candidate and may find potential applications in biocatalysis, bioassays, and nano-biomedicine such as reactive oxygen species (ROS)-related fields (anti-aging and therapeutics for neurodegenerative diseases and cancers).

(He, W. W.; Liu, Y.; Yuan, J. S.; Yin, J. J.; Wu, X. C.; Hu, X. N.; Zhang, K.; Liu, J. B.; Chen, C. Y.; Ji, Y. L.; Guo, Y. T., Au@Pt nanostructures as oxidase and peroxidase mimetics for use in immunoassays. Biomaterials 2011, 32, 1139-1147.)