Genetically controlled self-assembly of inorganic-bioorganic hybrid structures: From sponge genes to layered functional materials

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

The proposed project aims at the synthesis materials based on inorganic multicomponent oxides and recombinant silicatein and their evaluation for the fabrication of hierarchically structured tunable hybrid-biomaterials. We propose to utilize recombinant silicatein for the biocatalytic synthesis of binary and multinary (e.g. SnO2, In2O3, BaSnO3, PbTiO3, LaFeO3) oxides and the fabrication of multilayered structures from alternating proteins/oxide layers. Alternatively, Bragg stacks shall be used as synthetic analogues of these multilayer hybrids. Peptides with a specific affinity to various perovskites (e.g. BaSnO3, BaTiO3, BiFeO3, PbTiO3) will be selected by phage display screening. In addition, polymers containing silicatein, perovskite-affine peptides and self-assembling domains based on peptide sequences leading to the formation of interconnected, self-assembled β-sheet fibrils or poly-(-N-isopropyl-acrylamide) (PNIPAM) polymers that form stimulus-responsive polymers undergoing a volume phase transition across a lower critical solution temperature shall be prepared. These novel hybrid polymers will be investigated for their self-assembly properties, their solution behavior such as lower critical solution temperatures, their ability to form gel precipitates and others. In parallel, the potential of the silicatein protein polymers for the nucleation and growth of multimetallic perovskite and perovskite-like materials will be evaluated that possess a wide range of useful electronic, magnetic, and optical properties.