COVID-19-inspired “artificial virus” to combat drug-resistant bacteria by membrane-intercalation- photothermal-photodynamic multistage effects

COVID-19 threatens human life because of the super destructiveness produced from its coronal morphology and strong transmembrane infection based on spike glycoprotein. Inspired by the coronal morphology of COVID-19 and its means of infecting, we designed an “artificial virus” with coronal morphology based on the concept of “defeating superbacteria with superviruses” by self-assembling a transacting activator of transduction peptide with triple-shell porous graphitic carbon nitride (g-C(3)N(4)) embedded with cobalt nanoparticles to forcefully infect methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). The results confirmed that this “artificial virus” had unique properties of crossing the bacterial cell membrane barrier, heating the internal bacterial microenvironment and triggering ROS outbreak, based on its coronal morphology, membrane penetration, temperature-rising and heat insulation, oxidase-like activity and excellent visible-light harvesting properties. It had a high sterilization efficiency of 99.99% at 20 min, which was 18.6 times that of g-C(3)N(4), and the efficiency remained at 99.99% after 3 rounds of recycling and reuse. Additionally, it can rapidly inactivate bacteria in river water and accelerate wound healing.