Mapping and identification of soft corona proteins at nanoparticles and their impact on cellular association.

The current understanding of the biological identity that nanoparticles may acquire in a given biological milieu is mostly inferred from the hard component of the protein corona (HC). The composition of soft corona (SC) proteins and their biological relevance have remained elusive due to the lack of analytical separation methods. Here, we identify a set of specific corona proteins with weak interactions at silica and polystyrene nanoparticles by using an in situ click-chemistry reaction.