Study on the Calcium-Driven Liquid-Liquid Phase Separation of Silk Fibroin/Dextran System
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The mechanism behind the silk-spinning process of animals, such as silkworms and spiders, has been a focus of many studies for decades. However, we still do not clearly understand how these animals quickly produce silk fibers with their well-known toughness. Previous research has shown that the metal ions inside the silk glands interact with silk proteins and play an essential role during the silk-spinning process. For silkworms, calcium is the most abundant metal ion inside the silk glands. Calcium ions are a well-known chaotropic agent delaying the liquid-to-solid transition of silk fibroins. While it also has been suggested to act as an ionic bridge between silk fibroin chains. Liquid-liquid phase separation(LLPS) is a spontaneous phase separation behavior leading to a protein-dense and a protein-deficient phase. It is observed in many proteins with liquid-to-solid transition tendencies. Here, our result shows that calcium ions induce LLPS of silk fibroin. We used dextran as a crowding agent to increase interaction between silk fibroin chains.