English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Global: Zendy Free Plan

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

Piezoelectricity is the ability of certain crystals to generate mechanical strain proportional to an external electric field. Though many biomolecular crystals contain polar molecules, they are frequently centrosymmetric, signifying that the dipole moments of constituent molecules cancel each other. However, piezoelectricity can be induced by stereospecific doping leading to symmetry reduction. Here, we applied piezoresponse force microscopy (PFM), highly sensitive to local piezoelectricity, to characterize (01¯0) faces of a popular biomolecular material, α-glycine, doped with other amino acids such as L-alanine and L-threonine as well as co-doped with both. We show that, while apparent vertical piezoresponse is prone to parasitic electrostatic effects, shear piezoelectric activity is strongly affected by doping. Undoped α-glycine shows no shear piezoelectric response at all. The shear response of the L-alanine doped crystals is much larger than those of the L-threonine doped crystals and co-doped crystals. These observations are rationalized in terms of host-guest molecule interactions.

Local Piezoelectric Properties of Doped Biomolecular Crystals