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Shape-Morphing of an Artificial Protein Cage with Unusual Geometry Induced by a Single Amino Acid Change (2022)
Journal Article
Sharma, M., Biela, A. P., Kowalczyk, A., Borzęcka-Solarz, K., Piette, B. M., Gaweł, S., …Heddle, J. G. (2022). Shape-Morphing of an Artificial Protein Cage with Unusual Geometry Induced by a Single Amino Acid Change. ACS Nanoscience Au, 2(5), 404-413. https://doi.org/10.1021/acsnanoscienceau.2c00019

Artificial protein cages are constructed from multiple protein subunits. The interaction between the subunits, notably the angle formed between them, controls the geometry of the resulting cage. Here, using the artificial protein cage, “TRAP-cage”, w... Read More about Shape-Morphing of an Artificial Protein Cage with Unusual Geometry Induced by a Single Amino Acid Change.

Characterization of near-miss connectivity-invariant homogeneous convex polyhedral cages (2022)
Journal Article
Piette, B. M., Kowalczyk, A., & Heddle, J. G. (2022). Characterization of near-miss connectivity-invariant homogeneous convex polyhedral cages. Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 478(2260), Article 20210679. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspa.2021.0679

Following the discovery of a nearly symmetric protein cage, we introduce the new mathematical concept of a near-miss polyhedral cage (p-cage) as an assembly of nearly regular polygons with holes between them. We then introduce the concept of the conn... Read More about Characterization of near-miss connectivity-invariant homogeneous convex polyhedral cages.

Artificial Protein Cage with Unusual Geometry and Regularly Embedded Gold Nanoparticles (2022)
Journal Article
Majsterkiewicz, K., Biela, A. P., Maity, S., Sharma, M., Piette, B. M., Kowalczyk, A., …Heddle, J. G. (2022). Artificial Protein Cage with Unusual Geometry and Regularly Embedded Gold Nanoparticles. Nano Letters, 22(8), 3187-3195. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.nanolett.1c04222

Artificial protein cages have great potential in a number of areas including cargo capture and delivery and as artificial vaccines. Here, we investigate an artificial protein cage whose assembly is triggered by gold nanoparticles. Using biochemical a... Read More about Artificial Protein Cage with Unusual Geometry and Regularly Embedded Gold Nanoparticles.

A Peptide–Nucleic Acid Replicator Origin for Life (2020)
Journal Article
Piette, B. M., & Heddle, J. G. (2020). A Peptide–Nucleic Acid Replicator Origin for Life. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 35(5), 397-406. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2020.01.001

Evolution requires self-replication. But, what was the very first self-replicator directly ancestral to all life? The currently favoured RNA World theory assigns this role to RNA alone but suffers from a number of seemingly intractable problems. Inst... Read More about A Peptide–Nucleic Acid Replicator Origin for Life.

Long-range donor-acceptor electron transport mediated by α helices (2019)
Journal Article
Brizhik, L., Luo, J., Piette, B., & Zakrzewski, W. (2019). Long-range donor-acceptor electron transport mediated by α helices. Physical Review E, 100(6), Article 062205. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreve.100.062205

We study the long-range electron and energy transfer mediated by a polaron on an α-helix polypeptide chain coupled to donor and acceptor molecules at opposite ends of the chain. We show that for specific parameters of the system, an electron initiall... Read More about Long-range donor-acceptor electron transport mediated by α helices.

An ultra-stable gold-coordinated protein cage displaying reversible assembly (2019)
Journal Article
Malay, A. D., Miyazaki, N., Biela, A., Chakraborti, S., Majsterkiewicz, K., Stupka, I., …Heddle, J. G. (2019). An ultra-stable gold-coordinated protein cage displaying reversible assembly. Nature, 569, 438-442. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-019-1185-4

Symmetrical protein cages have evolved to fulfil diverse roles in nature, including compartmentalization and cargo delivery1, and have inspired synthetic biologists to create novel protein assemblies via the precise manipulation of protein–protein in... Read More about An ultra-stable gold-coordinated protein cage displaying reversible assembly.

Directed polaron propagation in linear polypeptides induced by intramolecular vibrations and external electric pulses (2018)
Journal Article
Luo, J., & Piette, B. (2018). Directed polaron propagation in linear polypeptides induced by intramolecular vibrations and external electric pulses. Physical Review E, 98(1), Article 012401. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreve.98.012401

We study the propagation of α-helix polarons in a model describing the nonadiabatic interaction between an electron and a lattice of quantum mechanical oscillators at physiological temperature. We show that when excited by a subpicosecond electric pu... Read More about Directed polaron propagation in linear polypeptides induced by intramolecular vibrations and external electric pulses.

Reciprocal Nucleopeptides as the Ancestral Darwinian Self-Replicator (2017)
Journal Article
Banwell, E. F., Piette, B. M., Taormina, A., & Heddle, J. G. (2018). Reciprocal Nucleopeptides as the Ancestral Darwinian Self-Replicator. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 35(2), 404-416. https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msx292

Even the simplest organisms are too complex to have spontaneously arisen fully-formed, yet precursors to first life must have emerged ab initio from their environment. A watershed event was the appearance of the first entity capable of evolution: the... Read More about Reciprocal Nucleopeptides as the Ancestral Darwinian Self-Replicator.

A generalised Davydov-Scott model for polarons in linear peptide chains (2017)
Journal Article
Luo, J., & Piette, B. (2017). A generalised Davydov-Scott model for polarons in linear peptide chains. The European Physical Journal B, 90(8), Article 155. https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2017-80209-2

We present a one-parameter family of mathematical models describing the dynamics of polarons in periodic structures, such as linear polypeptides, which, by tuning the model parameter, can be reduced to the Davydov or the Scott model. We describe the... Read More about A generalised Davydov-Scott model for polarons in linear peptide chains.

Donor-acceptor electron transport mediated by solitons (2014)
Journal Article
Brizhik, L., Piette, B., & Zakrzewski, W. (2014). Donor-acceptor electron transport mediated by solitons. Physical review E: Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics, 90(5), Article 052915. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreve.90.052915

We study the long-range electron and energy transfer mediated by solitons in a quasi-one-dimensional molecular chain (conjugated polymer, alpha-helical macromolecule, etc.) weakly bound to a donor and an acceptor. We show that for certain sets of par... Read More about Donor-acceptor electron transport mediated by solitons.

Thermal enhancement and stochastic resonance of polaron ratchet (2014)
Journal Article
Brizhik, L., Eremko, A., Piette, B., & Zakrzewski, W. (2014). Thermal enhancement and stochastic resonance of polaron ratchet. Physical review E: Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics, 89(6), Article 062905. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreve.89.062905

We study the ratchet drift of large polarons (solitons) in molecular diatomic chains induced by unbiased time periodic electric fields at nonzero temperature below its critical value. We show that, at a nonzero temperature, the critical value of the... Read More about Thermal enhancement and stochastic resonance of polaron ratchet.

Phase transition and anisotropic deformations of neutron star matter (2012)
Journal Article
Nelmes, S., & Piette, B. (2012). Phase transition and anisotropic deformations of neutron star matter. Physical Review D, 85(12), Article 123004. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevd.85.123004

The Skyrme model is a low energy, effective field theory for QCD that when coupled to a gravitational field provides an ideal semiclassical model to describe neutron stars. We use the Skyrme crystal solution composed of a lattice of α-like particles... Read More about Phase transition and anisotropic deformations of neutron star matter.

Biopolymer hairpin loops sustained by polarons (2012)
Journal Article
Chakrabarti, B., Piette, B., & Zakrzewski, W. (2012). Biopolymer hairpin loops sustained by polarons. Physical review E: Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics, 86(2), Article 021910. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreve.86.021910

We show that polarons can sustain looplike configurations in flexible biopolymers and that the size of the loops depend on both the flexural rigidity of the polymer and the electron-phonon coupling constant. In particular we show that for single stra... Read More about Biopolymer hairpin loops sustained by polarons.

Skyrmion stars and the multilayered rational map ansatz (2011)
Journal Article
Nelmes, S., & Piette, B. (2011). Skyrmion stars and the multilayered rational map ansatz. Physical Review D, 84(8), Article 085017. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevd.84.085017

We investigate the large baryon number sector of the Einstein-Skyrme model as a possible model for baryon stars and construct low energy configurations that resemble neutron stars. Previous studies have shown that gravitating Skyrmions produced by us... Read More about Skyrmion stars and the multilayered rational map ansatz.

A Compartmental Model Analysis of Integrative and Self-Regulatory Ion Dynamics in Pollen Tube Growth (2010)
Journal Article
Liu, J., Piette, B., Deeks, M., Franklin-Tong, V., & Hussey, P. (2010). A Compartmental Model Analysis of Integrative and Self-Regulatory Ion Dynamics in Pollen Tube Growth. PLoS ONE, 5(10), Article e13157. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0013157

Sexual reproduction in higher plants relies upon the polarised growth of pollen tubes. The growth-site at the pollen tube tip responds to signalling processes to successfully steer the tube to an ovule. Essential features of pollen tube growth are po... Read More about A Compartmental Model Analysis of Integrative and Self-Regulatory Ion Dynamics in Pollen Tube Growth.

Ratchet dynamics of large polarons in asymmetric diatomic molecular chains (2010)
Journal Article
Brizhik, L., Eremko, A., Piette, B., & Zakrzewski, W. (2010). Ratchet dynamics of large polarons in asymmetric diatomic molecular chains. Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter, 22(15), Article 155105. https://doi.org/10.1088/0953-8984/22/15/155105

We study the dynamics of large polarons in diatomic molecular chains, at zero temperature, under the influence of an external, periodic in time, electric field of zero mean value. We show that in asymmetric chains, i.e. chains with two different atom... Read More about Ratchet dynamics of large polarons in asymmetric diatomic molecular chains.

Ratchet effect of Davydov's solitons in nonlinear low-dimensional nanosystems. (2010)
Conference Proceeding
Brizhik, L., Eremko, A., Piette, B., & Zakrzewski, W. (2010). Ratchet effect of Davydov's solitons in nonlinear low-dimensional nanosystems. . https://doi.org/10.1002/qua.22083

We study the ratchet behavior of polarons in diatomic molecular chains under the influence of an external electromagnetic field which is periodic in time. We show that in asymmetric chains a harmonic unbiased field causes a drift of polarons. This ph... Read More about Ratchet effect of Davydov's solitons in nonlinear low-dimensional nanosystems..