Self-assembled nanostructure naturally prepared

In this chapter we study the overview of the various naturally and artificially prepared self-assembled nanostructures which are currently very important and in demand in biomedical applications, for example, bone tissues, natural laminated composites present in sea shells, peptide chain arrays and their derivatives and cell membranes are naturally self-assembled materials. And Langmuir—Blodgett films, surfactant-directed nonporous materials, and molecularly directed films, composites, nanombes, nanofibrils, nanowires, spherical vesicles, and template-assisted growth are artificially prepared self-assembled nanostructures. Here we discuss in brief the synthesis of those nanostructures which exist in nature and are prepared artificially to fulfill certain requirements (Figure 2.1). 

Preparation and applications of self-assembled natural and synthetic nanostructures... 

Membranes can act as both active and passive templates for the formation of well-defined nanostructures in a number of ways. In the biological realm, they have a limited role in the formation of nanowires, where virus capsids are much more effective, as described elsewhere in this volume (see Viruses as Self-Assembled Templates, Self-Processes). An interesting exception that takes place close to the membranes of living cells is the formation of iron oxyhydroxide (akaganeite, /1-FeOOH) in a natural ecosystem, in which polysaccharides are shown to be important as they are contained in the filaments of the inorganic material. It is believed that the sugar is extruded from the cell and then acts as a template to promote the formation of the mineral. On the other hand, entirely synthetic lipids can be used for the preparation of pipes of organically functionalized layered materials—clays —in... 

A nanostructure of PT dendrimers has been synthesized and characterized with their unique supramolecular assembly into 2-D crystals, nanowires, and nanoparticle aggregates [346]. It was elucidated that self-organization of the dendrimers on the sohd substrate was dependent on the nature of the substrates, preparation methods, and the molecule-molecule and molecule-substrate interactions. It was remarkable that the PT dendrimer exhibited different nanostructures depending on the property of substrate surface. The results demonstrated the unique potential of thiophene dendrimers to form nanostructures on substrate surfaces. 

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