Tyrosine Mutation in the Characteristic Motif of the Amorphous Region of Spidroin for Self-Assembly Capability Enhancement.

ABSTRACT: Spidroin, with robust mechanical performance and good biocompatibility, could fulfill broad applications in material science and biomedical fields. Development of miniature spidroin has made abundant fiber production economically feasible, but the mechanical properties of artificial silk still fall short of natural silk. The mechanism behind mechanical properties of spidroin usually focuses on β-microcrystalline regions; the effect of amorphous regions was barely studied. In this study, residue tyrosines (Y) were designed to replace asparagine (N)/glutamic acid (Q) in the characteristic motifs (GGX)n in amorphous regions for performance enhancement of spidroin; the mutants presented lower free energy and significantly exhibited stronger van der Waals and electrostatic interactions, which m

SUBMITTER: Chen Z 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11112579 | biostudies-literature | 2024 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature