Understanding structure and function of biomineralisation protein MmsFcc for green nanoparticle manufacture

磁性细菌使用磁小体膜特异性（Mms）生物矿化蛋白在磁小体中形成精确的磁性纳米颗粒（MNP）。Mms蛋白在体外控制纳米材料的形成，因此如果更好地理解该过程，可以开发成绿色纳米材料制造的添加剂。Mms膜蛋白表达/纯化困难;2.众所周知，Mms蛋白质的结构信息很难获得，因为Mms蛋白质本质上是无序的：-它们没有晶体结构。该项目的主管合作，为使用NMR理解Mms做出了重大贡献，但对更重要的Mms蛋白质如MmsF的结构知之甚少。重要的是，Staniland博士通过形成支架结构MmsFcc成功地克服了缺点1，并形成了一套对MNP形成有不同影响的点突变版本。我们的假设是结构特征是生物矿化的关键。本项目将专注于表征MmsFcc和突变体，因为它们与铁离子相互作用，并使用NMR和其他检测方法（例如ELISA）支持MNP的生长，建立评估从生物淘选中发现的肽序列对MNP，以形成一个假设的机制，可以用设计的肽和具有假设功能的分子进行测试。这些可以优化用于纳米材料制造的绿色添加剂。

Magnetic bacteria form precise magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) in magnetosomes using magnetosome membrane specific (Mms) biomineralisation proteins.Mms proteins control nanomaterial formation in vitro so could be developed into additives for green nanomaterial manufacturing, if the process is better understood.The key drawbacks to realisation are:1. Mms membrane proteins are difficult to express/purify;2. Structural information is notoriously difficult to obtain, as Mms proteins are intrinsically disordered:- they have no crystal structures.The supervisors of this project collaborated to contribute significantly to understanding Mms using NMR but little is known structurally about more important Mms proteins like MmsF. Critically Dr Staniland has succeeded in overcoming drawback 1 by forming the scaffold construct MmsFcc and has formed a suite of point-mutated versions that have varying effect on MNP formation. Our hypothesis is structural features are critical to biomineralisation.This project will focus on characterising MmsFcc and mutants as they interact with iron ions and growing MNP using NMR and supported by other assays (e.g. ELISA), building up to assessing peptide sequences found from biopanning against MNPs, to form a hypothetical mechanism that can be tested with designed peptides and molecules with the hypothesized function. These could be optimised for green additives for nanomaterial manufacture.