Hexagonally Ordered Arrays of α-Helical Bundles Formed from Peptide-Dendron Hybrids

Combining monodisperse building blocks that have distinct folding properties serves as a modular strategy for controlling structural complexity in hierarchically organized materials. We combine an alpha-helical bundle-forming peptide with self-assembling dendrons to better control the arrangement of functional groups within cylindrical nanostructures. Site-specific grafting of dendrons to amino acid residues on the exterior of the alpha-helical bundle yields monodisperse macromolecules with programmable folding and self-assembly properties. The resulting hybrid biomaterials form thermotropic columnar hexagonal mesophases in which the peptides adopt an alpha-helical conformation. Bundling of the alpha-helical peptides accompanies self-assembly of the peptide-dendron hybrids into cylindrical nanostructures. The bundle stoichiometry in the mesophase agrees well with the size found in solution for alpha-helical bundles of peptides with a similar amino acid sequence.