Active Assembly of Conducting Peptide Gels

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In living organisms, some structural components are assembled only when they are demanded for specific functions and then dissembled when they are no longer needed. In this project, the research teams of Prof. Rein Ulijn at the City University of New York, and Prof. Allon Hochbaum at the University of California, Irvine, aim to understand how to control dynamic assembly processes and explore the feasibility of incorporating design concepts from the biological world into synthetic, non-living materials. An important goal of this project is to develop new approaches to preparing electrically conducting assemblies that can change shape and make new connections in response to the environment or external stimuli, mimicking the dynamic behavior of biological materials. The assemblies are potentially useful as materials for interfacing electronic devices with biological systems in biomedical applications. This project provides interdisciplinary research training to graduate and undergraduate students. The team inspires high school students, including underrepresented minority students, from the local area (Harlem, NY and Irvine, CA) with hands-on education and discovery programs.With the support from the Macromolecular, Supramolecular and Nanochemistry Program of the NSF Division of Chemistry, the research team designs transient assemblies of peptide nanostructures, based on biocatalytic reactions that utilize chemical fuels to dynamically sustain the self-assembled state. Activated amino acid methyl esters, with the energy stored in the ester bond, serve as fuels to provide the chemical energy required to drive assembly processes. The amino acid part encodes the self-assembly of nanofibers that entangle to form a gel-phase material. Modification of the peptide sequence enables modulation of the assembly dynamics and fiber stability. Electronic functionality is introduced by incorporating semi-conducting organic molecules into the peptide building blocks. Another aim of the project is to integrate the resulting materials with neuronal cells to investigate whether the behavior of neuronal cell can be influenced by electronic stimulation through these materials.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.