2003 Volume 43 Issue 6 Pages 281-286
The solid-state structures of Bombyx mori silk fibroin before and after spinning were determined with several solid-state NMR. A repeated β-turn type II structure was proposed for the former model and a heterogeneous structure which consists of two kinds of β-sheet structure with different inter-chain arrangement and distorted β-turn for the latter. New silk-like materials with several repeated sequences selected from B. mori and Samia cynthia ricini silk fibroins, and spider dragline silk were designed and produced using genetic engineering methods. The silk-like materials containing the cell-adhesive sequence, Arg-Gly-Asp, from fibronectin were produced similarly and their high cell-adhesive abilities were observed.
