Orthogonal Light-Dependent Membrane Adhesion Induces Social Self-Sorting and Member-Specific DNA Communication in Synthetic Cell Communities.

Developing orthogonal chemical communication pathways in diverse synthetic cell communities is a considerable challenge due to the increased crosstalk and interference associated with large numbers of different types of sender-receiver pairs. Herein, the authors control which sender-receiver pairs communicate in a three-membered community of synthetic cells through red and blue light illumination. Semipermeable protein-polymer-based synthetic cells (proteinosomes) with complementary membrane-attached protein adhesion communicate through single-stranded DNA oligomers and synergistically process biochemical information within a community consisting of one sender and two different receiver populations.

Red/Far-Red Light Switchable Cargo Attachment and Release in Bacteria-Driven Microswimmers.

In bacteria-driven microswimmers, i.e., bacteriabots, artificial cargos are attached to flagellated chemotactic bacteria for active delivery with potential applications in biomedical technology.

Independent Blue and Red Light Triggered Narcissistic Self-Sorting Self-Assembly of Colloidal Particles.

The ability of living systems to self-sort different cells into separate assemblies and the ability to independently regulate different structures are one ingredient that gives rise to their spatiotemporal complexity. Here, this self-sorting behavior is replicated in a synthetic system with two types of colloidal particles; where each particle type independently self-assembles either under blue or red light into distinct clusters, known as narcissistic self-sorting. For this purpose, each particle type is functionalized either with the light-switchable protein VVDHigh or Cph1, which homodimerize under blue and red light, respectively.

Promotion of neurite outgrowth by rationally designed NGF-β binding peptide nanofibers.

Promotion of neurite outgrowth is an important limiting step for regeneration in nerve injury and depends strongly on the local expression of nerve growth factor (NGF). The rational design of bioactive materials is a promising approach for the development of novel therapeutic methods for nerve regeneration, and biomaterials capable of presenting NGF to nerve cells are especially suitable for this purpose. In this study, we show bioactive peptide amphiphile (PA) nanofibers capable of promoting neurite outgrowth by displaying high density binding epitopes for NGF.

Photocleavable linker for the patterning of bioactive molecules.

Herein, we report the use of a versatile photocleavable nitrobenzyl linker to micropattern a wide variety of bioactive molecules and photorelease them on demand. On one end, the linker has an NHS group that can be coupled with any amine, such as peptides, proteins or amine-linkers, and on the other end an alkyne for convenient attachment to materials with an azide functional group. This linker was conjugated with NTA-amine or the cell adhesion peptide cRGD to enable straightforward patterning of His6-tagged proteins or cells, respectively, on PEGylated glass surfaces.