Engineering novel materials and surfaces using proteins

Biological systems must function with exquisite specificity in a complex milieu. Although one can design proteins to adopt many structures, there are a number of examples where the structure and function of a natural protein is so unique that one cannot specify the requirements to recapitulate the desired activity.

We therefore take the approach of co-opting natural proteins with distinctive physical properties and using them in different applications.

I will present examples of how we have used this approach, including to engineer self-assembling functionalisable monolayers and hydrogels with tuneable physical and biological properties.