Peptide Binding to Sheet Silicate and Metal Nanoparticles - Insight from Atomistic Simulation

Hendrik Heinz, The University of Akron

Abstract

Short peptides (8 to 12 amino acids, excluding Cys) bind selectively to nanoparticles composed of Au, Pd, and montmorillonite depending on the sequence of amino acids, as evidenced by laboratory screening of several billion peptides. The molecular reasons for binding versus non-binding and the specificity toward a certain surface are analyzed by molecular dynamics simulation, using recent force field extensions for fcc metals and sheet silicates to reproduce surface and interface energies with