公开(公告)号：US11066449B2

公开(公告)日：2021-07-20

申请号：US15744116

申请日：2016-07-19

Applicant: University of Massachusetts

Inventor： Derek R. Lovley ,  Nikhil Malvankar ,  Ramesh Adhikari ,  Yang Tan ,  Joy Ward ,  Kelly Nevin

IPC: C07K14/195 ,  H01B1/12

Abstract: Improved electrically conductive pili were generated from a natural pilus protein from the microorganism Geobacter sulfurreducens. Substituting a tryptophan for the phenylalanine at position F51 and a tryptophan for the tyrosine at position Y57 of the pilus monomer substantially increased the conductivity of the pili and reduced their diameter to 1.5 nm. Substantial improvements in conductivity were also achieved by substituting an additional tyrosine, histidine, and phenylalanine in the pilus monomer to mimic the monomer of Geobacter metallireducens, but the pili retained the typical Geobacter sulfurreducens wild-type diameter of 3 nm.