Role of intermolecular forces in defining material properties of protein nanofibrils - PubMed (original) (raw)

. 2007 Dec 21;318(5858):1900-3.

doi: 10.1126/science.1150057.

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Role of intermolecular forces in defining material properties of protein nanofibrils

Tuomas P Knowles et al. Science. 2007.

Abstract

Protein molecules have the ability to form a rich variety of natural and artificial structures and materials. We show that amyloid fibrils, ordered supramolecular nanostructures that are self-assembled from a wide range of polypeptide molecules, have rigidities varying over four orders of magnitude, and constitute a class of high-performance biomaterials. We elucidate the molecular origin of fibril material properties and show that the major contribution to their rigidity stems from a generic interbackbone hydrogen-bonding network that is modulated by variable side-chain interactions.

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