@article { ISI:000470794000021,
	title = {Engineering Protein-Clay Nanosheets Composite Hydrogels with Designed Arginine-Rich Proteins},
	journal = {LANGMUIR},
	volume = {35},
	number = {22},
	year = {2019},
	month = {JUN 4},
	pages = {7255-7260},
	abstract = {Clay nanosheets (CNSs) have been widely used in the design of nanocomposite biomaterials. CNSs display a disk-like morphology with strong negatively charged surfaces. It has been shown that guanidinium-containing molecules can bind CNSs through noncovalent salt-bridge interactions and thus serve as {\textquoteleft}{\textquoteleft}molecular glues{{\textquoteright}{\textquoteright}} for CNSs. Making use of the guanidinium side chain in arginine, here, we designed novel arginine-rich elastomeric proteins to engineer protein-CNS nanocomposite hydrogels. Our results showed that these arginine-rich proteins can interact with CNSs effectively and can cross-link CNSs into hydrogels. Rheological measurements showed that mechanical properties of the resultant hydrogels depended on the arginine content in the arginine-rich proteins as well as CNS/protein concentration. Compared with hydrogels constructed from CNSs or proteins alone, the novel protein-CNS nanocomposite hydrogels show much improved mechanical properties. Our work opens up a new avenue to engineer functional protein hydrogels for various applications.},
	issn = {0743-7463},
	doi = {10.1021/acs.langmuir.9b00701},
	author = {Lv, Shanshan and Duan, Tianyu and Li, Hongbin}
}
