Multi-scale thermal stability of a hard thermoplastic protein-based material
Name
Latza_Multi-scale thermal.pdf
Size
2.43 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
b07cb83187b58ef47333e2db5417b294
Author(s)
Latza, Victoria
Guerette, Paul A.
Ding, Dawei
Amini, Shahrouz
Kumar, Akshita
Schmidt, Ingo
Oxman, Neri
Weaver, James C.
Fratzl, Peter
Miserez, Ali
Date Issued
September 2015
Journal
Nature Communications
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
Citation
Latza, Victoria, Paul A. Guerette, Dawei Ding, Shahrouz Amini, Akshita Kumar, Ingo Schmidt, Steven Keating, et al. “Multi-Scale Thermal Stability of a Hard Thermoplastic Protein-Based Material.” Nat Comms 6 (September 21, 2015): 8313. © 2015 Macmillan Publishers Limited
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Although thermoplastic materials are mostly derived from petro-chemicals, it would be highly desirable, from a sustainability perspective, to produce them instead from renewable biopolymers. Unfortunately, biopolymers exhibiting thermoplastic behaviour and which preserve their mechanical properties post processing are essentially non-existent. The robust sucker ring teeth (SRT) from squid and cuttlefish are one notable exception of thermoplastic biopolymers. Here we describe thermoplastic processing of squid SRT via hot extrusion of fibres, demonstrating the potential suitability of these materials for large-scale thermal forming. Using high-resolution in situ X-ray diffraction and vibrational spectroscopy, we elucidate the molecular and nanoscale features responsible for this behaviour and show that SRT consist of semi-crystalline polymers, whereby heat-resistant, nanocrystalline β-sheets embedded within an amorphous matrix are organized into a hexagonally packed nanofibrillar lattice. This study provides key insights for the molecular design of biomimetic protein- and peptide-based thermoplastic structural biopolymers with potential biomedical and 3D printing applications.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Media Laboratory
Program in Media Arts and Sciences (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms9313
