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Elasticity in Macrophage‐Synthesized Biocrystals
Author(s) -
Horstman Elizabeth M.,
Keswani Rahul K.,
Frey Benjamin A.,
Rzeczycki Phillip M.,
LaLone Ver,
Bertke Jeffery A.,
Kenis Paul J. A.,
Rosania Gus R.
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
angewandte chemie
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1521-3757
pISSN - 0044-8249
DOI - 10.1002/ange.201611195
Subject(s) - materials science , curvature , elasticity (physics) , intracellular , crystallography , crystal (programming language) , biophysics , chemistry , composite material , biochemistry , geometry , biology , mathematics , computer science , programming language
Supramolecular crystalline assembly constitutes a rational approach to bioengineer intracellular structures. Here, biocrystals of clofazimine (CFZ) that form in vivo within macrophages were measured to have marked curvature. Isolated crystals, however, showed reduced curvature suggesting that intracellular forces bend these drug crystals. Consistent with the ability of biocrystals to elastically deform, the inherent crystal structure of the principal molecular component of the biocrystals—the hydrochloride salt of CFZ (CFZ‐HCl)—has a corrugated packing along the (001) face and weak dispersive bonding in multiple directions. These characteristics were previously found to be linked to the elasticity of other organic crystals. Internal stress in bent CFZ‐HCl led to photoelastic effects on the azimuthal orientation of polarized light transmittance. We propose that elastic, intracellular crystals can serve as templates to construct functional microdevices with different applications.