Collaborative Research: Experimental and Computational Examination of Biomimetic Peptides Acting as Anti-freeze Molecules

合作研究：仿生肽作为抗冻分子的实验和计算检验

• 批准号: 2203527
• 负责人: Amir Haji-Akbari
• 金额: $ 16.22万
• 依托单位: Yale University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2022-09-01 至 2025-08-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2203527&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Experimental; Computational; Examination

This award from the Environmental Chemical Sciences Program in the NSF Division of Chemistry supports this collaborative project of Profs. Daniel Knopf and Robert Grubbs at Stony Brook University and Prof. Amir Haji-Akbari at Yale University to examine and generate organic molecules that can control the freezing of water. The ability to inhibit ice formation is crucial in critical technological applications such as preservation of biological materials, food processing and storage, and preventing ice growth on exposed surfaces such as those on aircraft and offshore platforms. In nature some organisms can produce so-called antifreeze proteins (AFPs) to control ice formation allowing their survival at freezing temperatures. This collaborative project aims to understand and mimic those AFPs to allow for generation of designed synthetic antifreeze molecules that can be used in various research areas and industries. This project will train three graduate and two undergraduate students and provide a course module for a summer outreach program for high school students.The team will design AFP mimetics (AFPMs) with less complex structures than natural AFPs that can lead to practical and cost-efficient ice inhibitors and anti-icing coatings. A mechanistic understanding of the antifreezing capability will be sought by translating arrangements of hydrophilic and hydrophobic amino acid side chains found in ice-binding faces of β-helical AFPs to peptide-polymer conjugates covering various length scales from single molecules to arrays of substrate-anchored AFPMs. Ice nucleation and ice recrystallization inhibition experiments will determine the antifreezing efficacy of synthesized biomolecules. Theoretical studies using path-sampling will resolve the water-AFP mimetic interactions on length scales similar to those in the experiments. This comprehensive approach will determine the importance of the location and strength of the hydrophobic and hydrophilic groups and the flexibility of the AFPMs for antifreezing efficacy, thereby advancing the design of biomimetics that influence ice nucleation and growth.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

该奖项由美国国家科学基金会化学部环境化学科学项目资助，支持石溪大学 Daniel Knopf 教授和 Robert Grubbs 教授以及耶鲁大学 Amir Haji-Akbari 教授的合作项目，该项目旨在检查和生成能够控制抑制水结冰的能力对于生物材料的保存、食品加工和储存以及防止飞机和海上平台等暴露表面上的冰生长等关键技术应用至关重要。生产该合作项目旨在了解和模仿这些 AFP，以生成可用于各种研究领域和行业的设计合成防冻分子。项目将培训三名研究生和两名本科生，并为高中生暑期拓展项目提供课程模块。该团队将设计结构比天然 AFP 更简单的 AFP 模拟物 (AFPM)，从而产生实用且经济高效的冰抑制剂和通过将 β-螺旋 AFP 的冰结合面中发现的亲水性和疏水性氨基酸侧链的排列转化为涵盖从单分子到各种长度尺度的肽-聚合物缀合物，可以寻求对防冻能力的机械理解。冰成核和冰再结晶抑制实验将利用基质锚定 AFPM 的理论研究确定其抗冻功效。路径采样将在类似于实验的长度尺度上解析水-AFP 模拟相互作用，这种综合方法将确定疏水基团和亲水基团的位置和强度以及 AFPM 对防冻功效的灵活性的重要性，从而。推进影响冰成核和生长的仿生学设计。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。