Fluorescent azobenzene-confined coiled-coil mesofibers

Punia, Kamia; Britton, Dustin; Hull, Katharina; Yin, Liming; Wang, Yifei; Renfrew, P. Douglas; Gilchrist, M. Lane; Bonneau, Richard; Trauner, Dirk und Montclare, Jin K. (2022): Fluorescent azobenzene-confined coiled-coil mesofibers. In: Soft Matter, Bd. 19, Nr. 3: S. 497-501

Abstract

Fluorescent protein biomaterials have important applications such as bioimaging in pharmacological studies. Self-assembly of proteins, especially into fibrils, is known to produce fluorescence in the blue band. Capable of self-assembly into nanofibers, we have shown we can modulate its aggregation into mesofibers by encapsulation of a small hydrophobic molecule. Conversely, azobenzenes are hydrophobic small molecules that are virtually non-fluorescent in solution due to their highly efficient photoisomerization. However, they demonstrate fluorogenic properties upon confinement in nanoscale assemblies by reducing the non-radiative photoisomerization. Here, we report the fluorescence of a hybrid protein-small molecule system in which azobenzene is confined in our protein assembly leading to fiber thickening and increased fluorescence. We show our engineered protein Q encapsulates AzoCholine, bearing a photoswitchable azobenzene moiety, in the hydrophobic pore to produce fluorescent mesofibers. This study further investigates the photocontrol of protein conformation as well as fluorescence of an azobenze-containing biomaterial.

• Dokumententyp: Zeitschriftenartikel
• Fakultät: Chemie und Pharmazie > Department Chemie
• Themengebiete: 500 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik > 540 Chemie
• ISSN: 1744-683X
• Sprache: Englisch