Supramolecular protein assembly in cell-free protein synthesis system.

Protein-based biomaterials have the characteristics of stability and biocompatibility. Based on these advantages, various bionic materials have been manufactured and used in different fields. However, current protein-based biomaterials generally need to form monomers in cells and be purified before being assembled in vitro. The preparation process takes a long time, and the complex cellular environment is challenging to be optimized for producing the target protein product. Here this study proposed technology for in situ synthesis and assembly of the target protein, namely the cell-free protein synthesis (CFPS), which allowed to shorten the synthesis time and increase the flexibility of adding or removing natural or synthetic components. In this study, successful expression and self-assembly of the dihedral symmetric proteins proved the applicability of the CFPS system for biomaterials production. Furthermore, the fusion of different functional proteins to these six scaffold proteins could form active polymers in the CFPS system. Given the flexibility, CFPS is expected to become a powerful tool as the prototyping and manufacturing technology for protein-based biomaterials in the future.