- Main
Crystal structure of an amphiphilic foldamer reveals a 48-mer assembly comprising a hollow truncated octahedron.
Published Web Location
https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms4581Abstract
Foldamers provide an attractive medium to test the mechanisms by which biological macromolecules fold into complex three-dimensional structures, and ultimately to design novel protein-like architectures with properties unprecedented in nature. Here, we describe a large cage-like structure formed from an amphiphilic arylamide foldamer crystallized from aqueous solution. Forty-eight copies of the foldamer assemble into a 5-nm cage-like structure, an omnitruncated octahedron filled with well-ordered ice-like water molecules. The assembly is stabilized by a mix of arylamide stacking interaction, hydrogen bonding and hydrophobic forces. The omnitruncated octahedra tessellate to form a cubic crystal. These findings may provide an important step towards the design of nanostructured particles resembling spherical viruses.
Many UC-authored scholarly publications are freely available on this site because of the UC's open access policies. Let us know how this access is important for you.
Main Content
Enter the password to open this PDF file:
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-