the precursors of the gelators can be involved during the formation of self‐assembled structures. Using thixotropichydrogels formed by a supergelator as our studied system, we demonstrated that the enzyme concentration/conversion rate of enzymatic reaction had a strong influence on the morphology of resulting self‐assembled nanostructures and the property of resulting hydrogels. The principle demonstrated
This report shows that a nanovector composed of peptide-based nanofibrous hydrogel can condense DNA to result in strong immune responses against HIV. This nanovector can strongly activate both humoral and cellular immune responses to a balanced level rarely reported in previous studies, which is crucial for HIV prevention and therapy. In addition, this nanovector shows good biosafety in vitro and in vivo. Detailed characterizations show that the nanofibrous structure of the hydrogel is critical for the dramatically improved immune responses compared to existing materials. This peptide-based nanofibrous hydrogel shows great potential for efficacious HIV DNA vaccines and can be potentially used for delivering other vaccines and drugs.