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Degree of Biomimicry of Artificial Spider Silk Spinning Assessed by NMR Spectroscopy
Author(s) -
Otikovs Martins,
Andersson Marlene,
Jia Qiupin,
Nordling Kerstin,
Meng Qing,
Andreas Loren B.,
Pintacuda Guido,
Johansson Jan,
Rising Anna,
Jaudzems Kristaps
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
angewandte chemie international edition
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.831
H-Index - 550
eISSN - 1521-3773
pISSN - 1433-7851
DOI - 10.1002/anie.201706649
Subject(s) - spider silk , silk , spinning , polymer science , biomimetics , materials science , nanotechnology , chemical engineering , polymer chemistry , composite material , engineering
Biomimetic spinning of artificial spider silk requires that the terminal domains of designed minispidroins undergo specific structural changes in concert with the β‐sheet conversion of the repetitive region. Herein, we combine solution and solid‐state NMR methods to probe domain‐specific structural changes in the NT2RepCT minispidroin, which allows us to assess the degree of biomimicry of artificial silk spinning. In addition, we show that the structural effects of post‐spinning procedures can be examined. By studying the impact of NT2RepCT fiber drying, we observed a reversible beta‐to‐alpha conversion. We think that this approach will be useful for guiding the optimization of artificial spider silk fibers.