Applying Synthetic Biology to Synthesize Functional Materials

Development of advanced functional materials with highly organized nano- and microstructures are of increasing demand across the medical, optical, energy, and mechanical fields. The functionality of materials is dependent on the relationship between structure and composition, demonstrating the importance of controlling molecular assembly throughout a material. In this work, we are applying several of nature’s biological mechanisms for building structurally complex materials to engineer new biomaterials that display a wide range of functional properties. First, we are exploring whether post-translational modifications to the silica mineralizing R5 peptide from diatoms can be used to control silica morphology at the submicron scales. Second, we are growing melanin on R5 to create R5-melanin embedded silica materials. Finally, we are combining R5 with proteins from magnetotactic bacteria to synthesize silica-coated magnetic nanoparticles. By integrating these approaches for controlling material structure and composition, we aim to demonstrate the feasibility of using proteins to synthesize multifunctional materials.