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SO ENDS this glimpse at the assembly of bacteriophages, these quasi-living viral entities, seemingly from outer space, whose apparent simplicity has us completely and entirely fooled. Just a dumb virus, we say. Not only the most successful creatures on earth but have played a major role in the evolution of humans and other life on this planet. So much for simplicity: the biggest outsourcing job in the history of the planet. And a vastly complex geometric enterprise. It is the plodding biologists who are dumb. View in LinkedIn

MANIFEST APPLICATIONS. "Recently innovative 2-D and 3-D structures were successfully constructed using the M13 bacteriophage. Its unique properties have been exploited in several studies relating to energy storage and harvesting area such as rechargeable batteries, piezoelectric devices, and solar cells." https://lnkd.in/dB6DwQj View in LinkedIn

BIOMIMICRY OF MILD CONDITION CHEMISTRY. "The M13 bacteriophage has demonstrated its capacity to fabricate various noble structures with evident functionality. The characteristic self-assembly property, the aqueous mild synthesis condition, and easy functionality of the M13 bacteriophage structure allows for its significant contribution to a variety of scientific areas." https://lnkd.in/dB6DwQj View in LinkedIn

ANOTHER BACTERIOPHAGE. "The M13 bacteriophage (Phage) is composed of 2, 700 copies of the helically arranged pVIII major coat protein on its body. Five to seven copies each of pIII, pVI, pIX, and pVII are located at each end of the M13 phage. It is a virus nanofiber of approximately 880 nm in length and 6.6 nm in diameter and is safe in humans." https://lnkd.in/dB6DwQj View in LinkedIn

GO FORTH AND MULTIPLY. "Will That tailed bacteriophages are the most abundant biological entities on Earth indicates the evolutionary advantage of this strategy for infecting bacterial cells. Infection by these viruses plays a central role in microbial ecosystems dynamics and in the horizontal transmission of genetic information within the bacterial world." http://www.pnas.org/content/112/22/7009.full View in LinkedIn

HIGH PRESSURE COMPARTMENT. "This sophisticated part of mechanics combines features of a flexible joint that can act as a camera aperture with robust architecture that can withstand the strong forces produced by the internal pressure of packed DNA at the beginning of the DNA ejection process (47 ± 6 atm for wild-type SPP1)." http://www.pnas.org/content/112/22/7009.full View in LinkedIn

PNEUMATIC DRAWBRIDGE. "The gatekeeper system opens for viral genome exit at the beginning of infection but recloses afterward, suggesting a molecular diaphragm-like mechanism to control DNA efflux. The mechanisms described here, controlling the essential steps of phage genome movements during virus assembly and infection, are likely to be conserved among long-tailed phages, the largest group of viruses in the Biosphere." http://www.pnas.org/content/112/22/7009.full View in LinkedIn

ACTIVATION OF INFECTIOUS DNA. "Phage tails are responsible for host cell recognition and delivery of the viral genome to the host cytoplasm. At the beginning of viral infection the phage adsorption apparatus, located at the tail end distal from the capsid, binds to the host receptor, generating a signal that triggers opening of the neck. DNA then moves through the tail tube to enter the host cell." http://www.pnas.org/content/112/22/7009.full View in LinkedIn

EXIT CHUTE MECHANISM. "DNA is locked in a capsid by gp16 loops that close the channel by an allosteric mechanism. Gp16 appears to open by a diaphragm-like motion, allowing the genome to exit the capsid through the tail tube to the host cell." http://www.pnas.org/content/112/22/7009.full View in LinkedIn

DEATH STARTED WITH MULTICELLULARITY? "There have been two main reasons that have led to the proposal that programmed cell death emerged with multicellularity. The first pertains to the very nature of multicellular organisms. Cells from multicellular organisms (in contrast to cells from single-celled organisms) are condemned to live together in a given spatial and temporal framework, the body. " http://www.nature.com/cdd/journal/v9/n4/full/4400950a.html View in LinkedIn