Self-limited self-assembly of chiral filaments

Abstract

The assembly of filamentous bundles with controlled diameters is common in biological systems and desirable for the development of nanomaterials. We discuss dynamical simulations and free energy calculations on patchy spheres with chiral pair interactions that spontaneously assemble into filamentous bundles. The chirality frustrates long-range crystal order by introducing twist between interacting subunits. For some ranges of system parameters this constraint leads to bundles with a finite diameter as the equilibrium state, and in other cases frustration is relieved by the formation of defects. While some self-limited structures can be modeled as twisted filaments arranged with local hexagonal symmetry, other structures are surprising in their complexity.

5 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (3)

• Self-Assembly of Patchy Particles into Polymer Chains: A Parameter-Free Comparison between Wertheim Theory and Monte Carlo Simulation
• Chirality and Equilibrium Biopolymer Bundles
• Phase transition to bundles of flexible supramolecular polymers

Cited by in corpus (17)

• Perspective: Geometrically-Frustrated Assemblies
• Equilibrium mechanisms of self-limiting assembly
• Mechanisms of kinetic trapping in self-assembly and phase transformation
• Using Markov State Models to Study Self-Assembly
• Geometry and Optimal Packing of Twisted Columns and Filaments
• Analyzing mechanisms and microscopic reversibility of self-assembly
• Defects in Crystalline Packings of Twisted Filament Bundles: I. Continuum Theory of Disclinations
• Chiral and achiral mechanisms of self-limiting, twisted bundle assembly
• Stall force of polymerizing microtubules and filament bundles
• Zipping mechanism for force-generation by growing filament bundles
• Theory of Crosslinked Bundles of Helical Filaments: Intrinsic Torques in Self-Limiting Biopolymer Assemblies
• Defects in Crystalline Packings of Twisted Filament Bundles: II. Dislocations and Grain Boundaries
• Controlling Chirality of Entropic Crystals
• Focussing frustration for self-limiting assembly of flexible, curved particles
• Structural Reorganization of Parallel Actin Bundles by Crosslinking Proteins: Incommensurate States of Twist
• Stress accumulation versus shape flattening in frustrated, warped-jigsaw particle assemblies
• Phase diagram of two-patch colloids with competing anisotropic and isotropic interactions