| 1. |
- Eliaz, D., et al.
(författare)
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Micro and nano-scale compartments guide the structural transition of silk protein monomers into silk fibers
- 2022
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Ingår i: Nature Communications. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2041-1723. ; 13:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Silk is a unique, remarkably strong biomaterial made of simple protein building blocks. To date, no synthetic method has come close to reproducing the properties of natural silk, due to the complexity and insufficient understanding of the mechanism of the silk fiber formation. Here, we use a combination of bulk analytical techniques and nanoscale analytical methods, including nano-infrared spectroscopy coupled with atomic force microscopy, to probe the structural characteristics directly, transitions, and evolution of the associated mechanical properties of silk protein species corresponding to the supramolecular phase states inside the silkworm's silk gland. We found that the key step in silk-fiber production is the formation of nanoscale compartments that guide the structural transition of proteins from their native fold into crystalline beta-sheets. Remarkably, this process is reversible. Such reversibility enables the remodeling of the final mechanical characteristics of silk materials. These results open a new route for tailoring silk processing for a wide range of new material formats by controlling the structural transitions and self-assembly of the silk protein's supramolecular phases.
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| 2. |
- Kotov, Nikolay, et al.
(författare)
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Elucidating the fine-scale structural morphology of nanocellulose by nano infrared spectroscopy
- 2023
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Ingår i: Carbohydrate Polymers. - : Elsevier Ltd. - 0144-8617 .- 1879-1344. ; 302
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Nanoscale infrared (IR) spectroscopy and microscopy, enabling the acquisition of IR spectra and images with a lateral resolution of 20 nm, is employed to chemically characterize individual cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) and cellulose nanofibrils (CNFs) to elucidate if the CNCs and CNFs consist of alternating crystalline and amorphous domains along the CNF/CNC. The high lateral resolution enables studies of the nanoscale morphology at different domains of the CNFs/CNCs: flat segments, kinks, twisted areas, and end points. The types of nanocellulose investigated are CNFs from tunicate, CNCs from cotton, and anionic and cationic wood-derived CNFs. All nano-FTIR spectra acquired from the different samples and different domains of the individual nanocellulose particles resemble a spectrum of crystalline cellulose, suggesting that the non-crystalline cellulose signal observed in macroscopic measurements of nanocellulose most likely originate from cellulose chains present at the surface of the nanocellulose particles.
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| 3. |
- Lancaster, D. G., et al.
(författare)
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An ultra-stable 2.9 mu m guided-wave chip laser and application to nano-spectroscopy
- 2019
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Ingår i: APL Photonics. - : AIP Publishing. - 2378-0967. ; 4:11
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- We present a configurable guided-wave planar glass-chip laser that produces low-noise and high-quality continuous-wave laser emission tunable from 2.82 to 2.95 mu m. The laser has a low threshold and intrinsic power and mode stability attributable to the high overlap of gain volume and pump mode defined by an ultrafast laser inscribed waveguide. The laser emission is single transverse-mode with a Gaussian spatial profile and M-x,y(2) similar to 1.05, 1.10. The power drift is similar to 0.08% rms over similar to 2 h. When configured in a spectrally free-running cavity, the guided-wave laser emits up to 170 mW. The benefit of low-noise and stable wavelength emission of this hydroxide resonant laser is demonstrated by acquiring high signal-to-noise images and spectroscopy of a corroded copper surface film with corrosion products containing water and hydroxide ions with a scattering-scanning near-field optical microscope.
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