Genetic engineering of biomolecnlar scaffolds for the fabrication of organic and metallic nanowires

(Figure Presented) Naturally born nanowires: The spontaneous self-assembly of the bacterial cytoskeletal protein FtsZ was used to position metal nanoparticles in an orderly fashion to fabricate a metal nanowire (see scheme). The genetic fusion of each monomer with an appropriate short protein motif enables the specific binding not only of nanoparticles, but also of other inorganic particles and biological molecules.