Department of Chemistry, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208, United States.
Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208, United States.
J Am Chem Soc. 2022 Mar 16;144(10):4383-4392. doi: 10.1021/jacs.1c10936. Epub 2022 Mar 3.
Herein, a synthetic polymer proteomimetic is described that reconstitutes the key structural elements and function of mussel adhesive protein. The proteomimetic was prepared via graft-through ring-opening metathesis polymerization of a norbornenyl-peptide monomer. The peptide was derived from the natural underwater glue produced by marine mussels that is composed of a highly repetitive 10 amino acid tandem repeat sequence. The hypothesis was that recapitulation of the repeating unit in this manner would provide a facile route to a nature-inspired adhesive. To this end, the material, in which the arrangement of peptide units was as side chains on a brush polymer rather than in a linear fashion as in the natural protein, was examined and compared to the native protein. Mechanical measurements of adhesion forces between solid surfaces revealed improved adhesion properties over the natural protein, making this strategy attractive for diverse applications. One such application is demonstrated, using the polymers as a surface adhesive for the immobilization of live cells.
本文描述了一种合成聚合物模拟物，它再现了贻贝黏附蛋白的关键结构元素和功能。该模拟物是通过对降冰片烯-肽单体进行接枝贯穿开环复分解聚合制备的。该肽源自海洋贻贝产生的天然水下胶，由高度重复的 10 个氨基酸串联重复序列组成。假设以这种方式再现重复单元将为仿生黏附剂提供一条简便途径。为此，研究了这种材料，其中肽单元的排列方式是侧链在刷状聚合物上，而不是像天然蛋白那样呈线性排列，并将其与天然蛋白进行了比较。对固体表面之间粘附力的机械测量表明，该材料具有优于天然蛋白的粘附性能，这使得这种策略在各种应用中具有吸引力。其中一个应用是使用聚合物作为表面黏附剂，用于固定活细胞。
