Department of Chemistry "Ugo Schiff", University of Florence, via della Lastruccia 3, 50019, Sesto Fiorentino, Italy.
Magnetic Resonance Center (CERM), University of Florence, via L. Sacconi 6, 50019, Sesto Fiorentino, Italy.
Chemistry. 2024 Jul 5;30(38):e202401249. doi: 10.1002/chem.202401249. Epub 2024 Jun 18.
Several organisms are able to polycondensate tetraoxosilicic(IV) acid to form silicon(IV) dioxide using polycationic molecules. According to an earlier mechanistic proposal, these molecules undergo a phase separation and recent experimental evidence appears to confirm this model. At the same time, polycationic proteins like lysozyme can also promote polycondensation of silicon(IV) dioxide, and they do so under conditions that are not compatible with liquid-liquid phase separation. In this manuscript we investigate this conundrum by molecular simulations.
几种生物体能利用多阳离子分子使四氧化硅（IV）酸发生缩聚反应，从而形成二氧化硅（IV）。根据早期的一个机制性假设，这些分子会发生相分离，而最近的实验证据似乎证实了这一模型。与此同时，溶菌酶等多阳离子蛋白也能促进二氧化硅（IV）的缩聚，而且它们是在与液-液相分离不兼容的条件下进行的。在本文中，我们通过分子模拟研究了这一难题。
