Bioinspired, Sizeâ Tunable Selfâ Assembly of Polymerâ Lipid Bilayer Nanodiscs

Polymerâ based nanodiscs are valuable tools in biomedical research that can offer a detergentâ free solubilization of membrane proteins maintaining their native lipid environment. Herein, we introduce a novel ca. 1.6â kDa SMAâ based polymer with styrene:maleic acid moieties that can form nanodiscs containing a planar lipid bilayer which are useful to reconstitute membrane proteins for structural and functional studies. The physicochemical properties and the mechanism of formation of polymerâ based nanodiscs are characterized by light scattering, NMR, FTâ IR, and TEM. A remarkable feature is that nanodiscs of different sizes, from nanometer to subâ micrometer diameter, can be produced by varying the lipidâ toâ polymer ratio. The smallâ size nanodiscs (up to ca. 30â nm diameter) can be used for solution NMR spectroscopy studies whereas the magneticâ alignment of macroâ nanodiscs (diameter of > ca. 40â nm) can be exploited for solidâ state NMR studies on membrane proteins.Discrete bilayers: Lipid bilayer nanodiscs of different size are formed by using modified styrene maleic acid coâ polymer. The smallâ size nanodiscs (up to ca. 30â nm diameter) can be used for solution NMR spectroscopy studies, whereas the magnetic alignment of largeâ size nanodiscs (or macroâ nanodiscs with a diameter of >40â nm) can be exploited for solidâ state NMR studies on membrane proteins.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138344/1/anie201705569.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138344/2/anie201705569_am.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/138344/3/anie201705569-sup-0001-misc_information.pd