Amyloids may enable next generation electronics
1 min read
Amyloid proteins are associated with Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, but they also have characteristics that may lead to the development of new composite materials for the electronics industry. And researchers from Chalmers University of Technology say that, along with enabling nanoprocessors and storage devices, these materials may even help to make objects invisible.
Amyloids – variants of proteins that occur naturally in the body – react to multiphoton irradiation and the result could be used as a building block for future nanomaterials.
"It is possible to create these protein aggregates in a laboratory", says researcher Piotr Hanczyc, pictured. "By combining them with other molecules, one could create materials with unique characteristics."
The amyloids are shaped like discs piled upon each other. When a material gets merged with these discs, its molecules end up so densely and regularly placed that they can communicate and exchange information. By attaching a material's molecules to the amyloid, its characteristics change. According to Hanczyc: "This opens up new possibilities to change the nature of the material attached to the amyloids."
Hanczyc also believes that scientists may be able to use the material properties of amyloid fibrils in research on invisible meta materials. "An object's ability to reflect light could be altered so that what's behind it gets reflected instead of the object itself, in principle changing the index of light refraction. Kind of like when light hits the surface of water," he concluded.
