1Growth and Form: What is the Aim of Biomineralization?

12-Amino-acid peptides with binding-selected sequences and random functional groups synthesize the same inorganic material. Bacteria use structured polymers as filaments of cytoskeletal protein and of polysaccharides in templating biomin-erals. Nucleation appears to be involved not only in crystal formation, but also in the formation of porous or amorphous inorganic material. A seed of one iron ion for an iron-oxide cluster could be obtained in the low-iron-state of an archeal fer-ritin crystal. Porous inorganic materials were described to grow out in huge chan-neled complexes of organic compounds or crystallized seawater. The evolutionary progress of biomineralization runs apparently in the development of complex, inorganic–organic hybrid materials, composites, which are often structured hier-archically. The mechanical properties of a mineral undergo a change by presence and partition of the organic material, the most prominent example being the human skeleton. In order to describe such a complex system, a mathematical procedure – the finite element analysis – was introduced with great success. This analysis is governed amazingly by only one physical quantity, force, together with the modulus of elasticity. The overwhelming extent of research into the me-chanical properties of skeletons has resulted in the conclusion that the aim of bio-mineralization appears to be stability