[Nat Mater] Autonomous motors of a metal-organic framework powered by reorganization of self-assembled peptides at interfaces
29 October 2012
A variety of microsystems have been developed that harness energy and convert it to mechanical motion. The 
Hiroshi Matsui lab at the City University of New York Hunter College and the Susumu Kitagawa lab at Kyoto University have developed new autonomous biochemical motors by integrating a metal-organic framework (MOF) and self-assembling peptides. The MOF is applied as an energy-storing cell that assembles peptides inside nanoscale pores of the coordination framework. The nature of peptides enables their assemblies to be reconfigured at the water/MOF interface, and thus converted to fuel energy. Reorganization of hydrophobic peptides can create a large surface-tension gradient around the MOF that can efficiently power its translational motion. As a comparison, the velocity normalized by volume for the diphenylalanine-MOF particle is faster and the kinetic energy per unit mass of fuel is more than twice as great as that for previous gel motor systems. This demonstration opens the route towards new applications of MOFs and reconfigurable molecular self-assembly, possibly evolving into a smart autonomous motor capable of mimicking swimming bacteria and, with integrated recognition units, harvesting target chemicals. [Read more]
These findings have received nationwide media coverage in Japan.
Publication information
New autonomous motors of metal-organic framework (MOF) powered by reorganization of self-assembled peptides at interface
Yasuhiro Ikezoe, Gosuke Washino, Takashi Uemura, Susumu Kitagawa, Hiroshi Matsui*
Nature Materials | Published online 28 October 2012 | DOI: 10.1038/NMAT3461