"If we learn to do this more generally – the programmable self-assembly of precisely-organized molecular building blocks – this will lead to a range of new materials towards a host of applications, from medicine to energy."Gevorg Grigoryan, Dartmouth College
A scientist at Dartmouth College and his collaborators have created an artificial protein that can organize new materials at the nanoscale.
"This is a proof-of-principle study demonstrating that proteins can be used as effective vehicles for organizing nano-materials by design," says senior author Gevorg Grigoryan, an assistant professor of computer science at Dartmouth. "If we learn to do this more generally – the programmable self-assembly of precisely-organized molecular building blocks – this will lead to a range of new materials towards a host of applications, from medicine to energy." The study is described in a paper in Nature Communications.
According to the US National Nanotechnology Initiative, scientists and engineers are coming up with a wide variety of ways to make materials at the nanoscale – or the atomic and molecular level. This is allowing them to take advantage of the enhanced properties of these nanoscale materials, such as higher strength, lighter weight, increased control of the light spectrum and greater chemical reactivity, compared with their larger-scale counterparts.
Proteins are ‘smart’ biomolecules, encoded by our genes, that organize and orchestrate essentially all molecular processes in our cells. The goal of the new study was to create an artificial protein that would self-organize into a new material – an atomically-periodic lattice made from buckminster fullerene.
Buckminster fullerenes (also known as buckyballs) are sphere-like molecules composed of 60 carbon atoms shaped like a soccer ball. They have an array of unusual properties, which have excited scientists for several decades because of their potential applications. Buckyballs are currently used in nanotechology due to their high heat resistance and electrical superconductivity, but the molecule is difficult to organize in desired ways, hampering its use for the development of novel materials.
In their new research, Grigoryan and his colleagues show that their artificial protein can interact with buckyballs and organize them into a lattice. Furthermore, they determined the three-dimensional structure of this lattice, providing the first ever atomic-scale view of a protein/buckyball complex.
"Learning to engineer self-assembly would enable the precise organization of molecules by design to create matter with tailored properties," Grigoryan says. "In this research, we demonstrate that proteins can direct the self-assembly of buckminsterfullerene into ordered superstructures. Further, excitingly, we have observed this protein/buckyball lattice conducts electricity, something that the protein-alone lattice does not do. Thus, we are beginning to see emergent material behaviors that can arise from combing the fascinating properties of buckyball and the abilities of proteins to organize matter at the atomic scale. Taken together, our findings suggest a new means of organizing fullerene molecules into a rich variety of lattices to generate new properties by design."
This story is adapted from material from Dartmouth College, with editorial changes made by Materials Today. The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent those of Elsevier. Link to original source.