Structurally Ordered Nanowire Formation from Co-Assembly of DNA Origami and Collagen-Mimetic Peptides

• Published in: Journal of the American Chemical Society Vol. 139; no. 40; pp. 14025 - 14028
• Main Authors: Jiang, Tao, Meyer, Travis A, Modlin, Charles, Zuo, Xiaobing, Conticello, Vincent P, Ke, Yonggang
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Chemical Society 11.10.2017; American Chemical Society (ACS)
• Subjects: arrays; BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES; biomimetic materials; design; DNA; INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY; nanosheets; nanowires; peptides; periodicity; physical properties; virus
• ISSN: 0002-7863; 1520-5126; 1520-5126
• DOI: 10.1021/jacs.7b08087

We describe the co-assembly of two different building units: collagen-mimetic peptides and DNA origami. Two peptides CP ++ and sCP ++ are designed with a sequence comprising a central block (Pro-Hyp-Gly) and two positively charged domains (Pro-Arg-Gly) at both N- and C-termini. Co-assembly of peptides and DNA origami two-layer (TL) nanosheets affords the formation of one-dimensional nanowires with repeating periodicity of ∼10 nm. Structural analyses suggest a face-to-face stacking of DNA nanosheets with peptides aligned perpendicularly to the sheet surfaces. We demonstrate the potential of selective peptide-DNA association between face-to-face and edge-to-edge packing by tailoring the size of DNA nanostructures. This study presents an attractive strategy to create hybrid biomolecular assemblies from peptide- and DNA-based building blocks that takes advantage of the intrinsic chemical and physical properties of the respective components to encode structural and, potentially, functional complexity within readily accessible biomimetic materials.