圆偏振发光（CPL）材料是一类重要的手性光学材料。荧光蛋白作为一类被广泛研究的蛋白质家族，是富具潜力的CPL材料。本项目拟通过对荧光蛋白分子手性结构与超分子手性结构的精准构筑与调控，发展具有高发光不对称因子的荧光蛋白CPL材料，阐明其CPL性质与多层次手性结构之间的关系。首先，测定一系列已知荧光蛋白的CPL性质，探索其分子手性结构，尤其是发光团结构、构象及其微环境的影响，并进一步通过突变改性，筛选具有高不对称因子的荧光蛋白；在此基础上，结合蛋白质拓扑工程与巨型分子组装，设计具有特定形状与拓扑结构的融合蛋白和巨型分子，通过可控组装，形成单一手性的多层次聚集态结构（如胆甾液晶相、螺旋柱状相等），并通过分子设计精细调控组装结构，研究超分子手性对CPL性质的影响；最后，初步探索这些材料在圆偏振发光“活”材料等方面的应用。本项目的完成将为理解圆偏振发光性质的构效关系奠定有益的理论和实践基础。

Circularly polarized luminescence (CPL) materials are important chiral optic material. Fluorescent proteins have been known for their precise structures, facile tunability, and high fluorescence quantum yield, but their application as CPL materials has been largely understudied. This proposal seeks to develop fluorescent protein-based CPL materials with high luminescence dissymmetry factor (g-lum) via the precise construction of hierarchical chiral structures both at the molecular and supramolecular level. We will first determine the CPL properties of various fluorescent proteins and investigate the influence of several factors on the CPL properties, including molecular chiral structure, the conformational chirality, and the microenvironment of the chromaphore. We will perform structure-guide mutagenesis on selected variants to improve its g-lum. Then, the fluorescent protein variant with high glum will be selected as the building block to make topological fusion proteins or giant molecules to facilitate the precise construction of hierarchical structures of single chirality such as cholesteric liquid crystal phase, helically packed cylinders, via controlled assembly to manipulate the supramolecular arrangement of fluorescent proteins. By refining the hierarchical structure via topology engineering and molecular design, we will modulate the CPL properties of these assemblies. The structure-property relationship between CPL properties and hierarchical chiral structure from monomer to folded chain, and further to condensed chiral structure will thus be elucidated. Finally, we will tentatively explore the applications of fluorescent protein-based "living" CPL materials in diverse fields such as biological imaging, 3D display, and information storage and encryption.