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Publication Abstract from PubMed

We recently introduced protein-metal-organic frameworks (protein-MOFs) as chemically designed protein crystals, composed of ferritin nodes that predictably assemble into 3D lattices upon coordination of various metal ions and ditopic, hydroxamate-based linkers. Owing to their unique tripartite construction, protein-MOFs possess extremely sparse lattice connectivity, suggesting that they might display unusual thermomechanical properties. Leveraging the synthetic modularity of ferritin-MOFs, we investigated the temperature-dependent structural dynamics of six distinct frameworks. Our results show that the thermostabilities of ferritin-MOFs can be tuned through the metal component or the presence of crowding agents. Our studies also reveal a framework that undergoes a reversible and isotropic first-order phase transition near-room temperature, corresponding to a 4% volumetric change within 1 degrees C and a hysteresis window of approximately 10 degrees C. This highly cooperative crystal-to-crystal transformation, which stems from the soft crystallinity of ferritin-MOFs, illustrates the advantage of modular construction strategies in discovering tunable-and unpredictable-material properties.

Tunable and Cooperative Thermomechanical Properties of Protein-Metal-Organic Frameworks.,Bailey JB, Tezcan FA J Am Chem Soc. 2020 Oct 5. doi: 10.1021/jacs.0c07835. PMID:32972136^[1]

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.