Protein-based materials future

Due to the struggle to survive under circumstances of limited food supply, organisms evolve to use the most efficient mechanism available to their composition. The most efficient mechanism available to the proteins that sustain Life would seem to be the apolar-polar repulsive free energy of hydration as observed for the inverse temperature transitions for hydrophobic association. The efficiency of designed elastic-contractile protein-based machines and a number of additional properties make designed protein-based materials of substantial promise for the marketplace of the future. 

Axiom 1, given above and the first of five axioms listed below in section 5.6.3, becomes the basis for consideration of protein function and for the design of protein-based materials for the future (see Chapter 9). As simply interpreted below, when there are more water molecules surrounding oil-like groups, the phase separation of the oil-like groups from water occurs at a lower temperature. 

Advanced Materials for the Future Protein-based Materials with Potential to Sustain Individual Health and Societal Development... 

The materials applications addressed here are but a limited sampling of what we have done and but a preliminary sampling of that which will be forthcoming in the protein-based materials industry of the future. 

A few examples are discussed in Chapter 9 wherein the future will see the biosynthesis of biodegradable protein-based thermoplastics, materials to prevent postsurgical adhesions, temporary functional scaffoldings to direct tissue reconstruction, and drug delivery devices for new drug release regimens. 

If absorptions are limited to the UV range, interferences can become a considerable problem. The lack of selectivity of the Cy was also mentioned before. Future choices for chiral hosts will be based upon different association mechanisms and presumably will emphasize greater potential for selectivity. Virtually any material that has seen use as a stationary phase for chiral chromatography is a candidate, and others will eventually appear. Some of these have in fact been employed already, although not to the same degree that the Cy have, (e.g. cryptands, vesicles, micelles, metal complexes, and proteins). Their immediate most obvious advantage is a substantial increase in the magnitude of the induced ellipticity, which can be enhanced even further by fluorescence detection. 

Recently a field of science called Life Science has been developed and its further development as a synthetic science which is related to a wide range of scientific fields is expected in the future. The aim of life science is to investigate the structure and properties of biomolecules that govern life activity, to elucidate the mechanism of the reactions of biomolecules, and to utilize the aspects of biomolecules for reactions in vitro. There are a number of polymeric compounds in vivo, such as proteins, that are related directly to life phenomena and nucleic acids that control the transmission of genetic information. To understand the functionality of these biopdymers and to exploit useful functional materials, an investigation on Biologically Important Polymers should be based on polymer chenustry. 

Photoactivated redox proteins will play important roles in the future development of artificial photosynthetic systems. The unique participation of the protein matrices in photoinduced charge separation and the possibility of implanting catalytic sites in the protein indicate that tailored photoenzymes will be important components for the light-driven synthesis of fuels and valuable chemicals, e.g., CO2 and N2 fixation and amino acid synthesis. The areas of bioelectronics and opto-bioelectronics represent exciting interdisciplinary ventures for chemists, biologists, physicists and materials scientists. The advances in these fields oflFer compelling opportunities for the development of electronic biomaterial-based devices. 

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