A synthetic redox biofilm made from metalloprotein–prion domain chimera nanowires
- Resource Type
- Article
- Authors
- Altamura, Lucie; Horvath, Christophe; Rengaraj, Saravanan; Rongier, Anaëlle; Elouarzaki, Kamal; Gondran, Chantal; Maçon, Anthony L. B.; Vendrely, Charlotte; Bouchiat, Vincent; Fontecave, Marc; Mariolle, Denis; Rannou, Patrice; Le Goff, Alan; Duraffourg, Nicolas; Holzinger, Michael; Forge, Vincent
- Source
- Nature Chemistry; February 2017, Vol. 9 Issue: 2 p157-163, 7p
- Subject
- Language
- ISSN
- 17554330; 17554349
Engineering bioelectronic components and set-ups that mimic natural systems is extremely challenging. Here we report the design of a protein-only redox film inspired by the architecture of bacterial electroactive biofilms. The nanowire scaffold is formed using a chimeric protein that results from the attachment of a prion domain to a rubredoxin (Rd) that acts as an electron carrier. The prion domain self-assembles into stable fibres and provides a suitable arrangement of redox metal centres in Rd to permit electron transport. This results in highly organized films, able to transport electrons over several micrometres through a network of bionanowires. We demonstrate that our bionanowires can be used as electron-transfer mediators to build a bioelectrode for the electrocatalytic oxygen reduction by laccase. This approach opens opportunities for the engineering of protein-only electron mediators (with tunable redox potentials and optimized interactions with enzymes) and applications in the field of protein-only bioelectrodes.