Congratulations to Wojciech Majstrzyk and other co-authors of the publication of the work „Hierarchical approach for the rational construction of helix-containing nanofibrils using ß-peptides” in the renowned Nanoscale (IF=6.9).

Hierarchical approach for the rational construction of helix-containing nanofibrils using ß-peptides

M. Szefczyk, N. Szulc, M. Gąsior-Głogowska, A. Modrak-Wójcik, A. Bzowska, W. Majstrzyk, M. Taube, M. Kozak, T. Gotszalk, E. Rudzińska-Szostak and Ł. Berlicki

The rational design of novel self-assembled nanomaterials based on peptides remains a great challenge in modern chemistry. A hierarchical approach for the construction of nanofibrils based on ?,ß-peptide foldamers is proposed. The incorporation of a helix-promoting trans-(1S,2S)-2-aminocyclopentanecarboxylic acid residue in the outer positions of the model coiled-coil peptide led to its increased conformational stability, which was established consistently by the results of CD, NMR and FT-IR spectroscopy. The
designed oligomerization state in the solution of the studied peptides was confirmed using analytical ultracentrifugation. Moreover, the cyclopentane side chain allowed additional interactions between coiled-coil-like structures to direct the self-assembly process towards the formation of well-defined nanofibrils, as observed using AFM and TEM techniques.

DOI: 10.1039/d0nr04313c