Fig. 1

Schematic representation of design strategy for MIPs specific to epitope (peptide) selected from Spike protein of SARS-CoV-2. Silica nanoparticles (SiNP) were employed for surface imprinting of the target peptide (red). Computationally screened monomer combinations are used to synthesize MIPs. Following template removal, the core-shell type nanoparticle-MIP system so-formed is specific for binding the peptide as well as the virions. The box represents the modeling for multipoint interactions between the monomers (green) and the peptide (red). The blue lines mark the intermolecular H-bonding interactions.